*

Father used to drive like a lunatic around the docks. He’d chase off mercilessly at high speed, in tight situations, around the water’s edge, now with their new sprays of graffiti colours, bright bold colours, silver signage, fancy dentists, purples and royal blues with yellow egg-yolk splashes. Old contemptuous oil tankers used to dock there when I was younger with wispy blonde hair that I would suck in my mouth, attempting to nibble away the split ends. The tankers terrified me with their honks and bellows, big metal sea monsters, old robot giants in a sea war. Our gold car would semicircle the docks, and I’d panic, squeezed in the back seat, taking in fast breaths. I was afraid they could blow up, these oil tanks, if anyone decided to light up a ciggie; or that Father would just crash into the sea, finally having enough of the lot of us. I calmed myself thinking that if Father did veer off course, we’d be swallowed whole like the toy submarine that I played with in the large enamel bath, watching the air escape from its soft plastic belly as it dropped to the bath floor with an easy thud, eventually settling itself beside the melting Imperial Leather soap. The submarines came free in the bottom of a bag of cereal. I knew the air could suck our bodies to the water surface if someone managed to wind down a window.

This never happened, our car never veered off course. Although the first time we went electric windows, I fainted.

That afternoon, Margaret Rose couldn’t concentrate the good or bad eye on her HELLO! She answered the phone twice and both times her caller hung up on her.

‘What are ya in far?’ she asked of me, gently.

Aggressive. Months. Treatment. Time. Tell. Talk.

‘Chest,’ I said.

‘Thought so,’ she said, ‘terrible thing a bad chest. And yar so young … very unfair. Have ya always had the chest bad?’

‘You’re right, unfair, it’s more than unfair, isn’t it all so unfair,’ said Jane, scanning the room and then focusing her attention on something outside the window. ‘Just watching for the postman,’ she said.

‘Yeah. Always,’ I lied.

I thumbed a pamphlet Molly had gingerly left by me. A smiling woman in many lavender hues, jumper slacks shirt, grandchildren at awkward angles to her chair, one on her lap, like on stage, not real life and she was holding a yellow flower, but nice graphics. ‘Dying is one of the few certainties of life.’ I shoved it to the middle of my Mindfulness book, one that I’d bought out of duty from those travelling salespeople who drop books and knick-knacks into the office staffroom.

Observe your thoughts. Slow down. Watch what is happening inside your head. Fuck sake.

‘The chair … OK if I …? You know …’ Molly said at me, as she began moving furniture.

‘Oh yeah, yeah, sure, take it away … have it,’ I managed, motioning the departure of the chair with my right hand. I was defensive of the chair, considered it Alex’s and yesterday’s curve of his arse was still in the leatherette. He’d have to share my bed and strain at Frank Underwood on the clammy screen of my iPhone, compliments of Shane’s Wi-Fi. Watching Shane’s catheter bag was so public. I focused on it for hours. Sack full in. Sack full out. Clear to yellow.