Visiting

We go out into the garden to prepare for dinner.

The dog is sitting on the table licking its bottom.

He pushes it onto the floor and starts laying the cutlery, casually
sweeping dog hairs out of the way with his hand.

I watch him for a minute before running round the table picking up
everything he puts down.
'No, no, no I can't. It's disgusting. The dog was licking its bum on
the bloody table.'
He rolls his eyes.
'Oh God here we go. Stop panicking. It's fine.'

He takes the cutlery from my hands and starts re laying it.

I go into the house and come back with a bottle of bleach, a bucket, a
dettox kitchen spray, two J-cloths and some kitchen roll.

Picking up the dettox I squirt so much of it onto the table that a
visible cloud of toxic fumes rises above the tablecloth. As intended it
drives him away from the table. Throwing down the cutlery he shuffles
through the bead curtain and back into the house, muttering.

I shake out the table cloth, sponge it with bleach, rinse it, hang it
on the line, wipe the table, put back the table cloth and spray it with
dettox before wiping it one last time with hot water.

The dog tries to climb back onto the table. I push it away roughly,
look it in the eye and swear at it. He comes back into the garden just
in time to hear me swearing at the dog.
'Oh don't be mean - poor tiddly winkey. Is she being horrid? Is
she?'
The dog licks his face.
'Is she? She's a mean girly pushing you off your table isn't she?
Horrid, horrid girl.'
He pushes out his lips and pushes them in the direction of the dog's
face. Holding it by the jaw he plants a kiss on its wet nose.

I swear at them both under my breath and give the table another
covering of dettox. He goes back into the house dragging the dog behind
him.

I am placing the cutlery on the now clean table when I hear him on the
phone to my mother.
'You've sent her here to punish me haven't you? She's worse than you -
she just won't relax.'

I move away from the door and start to pick the fag butts out from the
gravel.

*

A voice calls out from a room set back in the murky darkness of the
house.

He rolls his eyes.
'She wants lunch.'
Throwing his cigarette onto the gravel he goes inside to make lunch. I
watch him slide between the heavy blue curtains careful not to part
them too much. Soon I hear the muffled sounds of pots and pans being
banged about.

The kitchen is forbidden territory. 'You'll only fuss' being his
explanation for keeping it hidden behind a double layer of floor length
curtain.

I imagine a scene of such festering filth that only he dare set eyes on
it.

The curtaining off of the kitchen means that a whole section of the
house is out of bounds as you would have to pass through the kitchen in
order to access it.

A green frog was seen not long ago emerging from the double curtain,
hopping across the flagstones with my uncle chasing after it with a
broom like some demented male witch.

I walk past the forbidden area and follow the voice to the back of the
house.

Walking into a darkened room with only the television to light it I
catch sight of my grandmothers face against the pillow.
'Oh it's you - I called for John.'
'He heard you. He's in the kitchen.'
'He won't let me in there he says he's cleaning it.'
'I know he won't let me in either.'
'He's very kind to me you know, he does look after me.'

I can only agree, the implied abandonment by the rest of us left
hanging in the dusty air.