PART 5

Part 5

27 September 2016

For several years, the Cleverleys would joke that Achilles had damaged his tendon when he stumbled into the door drunk but, in reality, it was three toes that he broke on his left foot as he stumbled down the corridor and slipped on one of the hallway mats. The fact that he was inebriated at only twelve years old shocked both George and Beverley and, after putting him to bed and leaving a basin on his bedroom floor in case he needed to throw up, they gathered in the kitchen with the seventeen-year-old Nelson and the sixteen-year-old Elizabeth, demanding explanations.

‘What is going on in this family anyway?’ asked George, looking at his wife and elder children in turn. ‘Did anyone know that Achilles was drinking?’

‘Not a clue,’ replied Nelson and Elizabeth in unison.

‘I certainly didn’t,’ added Beverley.

‘He’s just a child!’ continued George. ‘Not even a teenager yet. Who are his friends? Who does he play with?’

‘Play with?’ asked Elizabeth, smirking. ‘He doesn’t “play with” anyone. Other than himself.’

‘Don’t be vulgar,’ said Beverley.

‘Who gave him the alcohol, then?’ asked George. ‘One of you must know.’

‘Why should we know?’ asked Nelson, who was annoyed to be drawn into this interrogation when he’d been busy watching a television documentary about Mykonos and was thinking it might be a nice place to visit one day.

‘Because you’re his brother and sister!’

‘And you’re his father,’ said Elizabeth. ‘And you’re his mother,’ she added, turning to Beverley.

‘We can’t be expected to know everything that goes on in our children’s lives,’ replied Beverley. ‘We’re busy people. With busy lives.’

‘Some might say that your children should come first.’

‘Are any of those people in this room?’ asked George, before calming down a little and dismissing them both. He poured two glasses of wine from the fridge and sat down at the island. ‘She has a point, you know,’ he said quietly.

‘I know she does,’ admitted Beverley.

‘Are we a bit … distant, do you think?’

‘We are a bit preoccupied at times,’ she admitted. ‘Me with my books. You with your television show.’

‘It’s not just that, though, is it?’ asked George.

‘What is it, then?’ asked Beverley, looking up from her phone.

George raised an eyebrow and nodded at what she was holding in her hand.

‘Oh, please,’ she said, laughing. ‘You think our phones are to blame for this?’

‘I don’t think they help,’ he replied. ‘We’re on them all the time, aren’t we? And not just us, Nelson and Elizabeth too. And we gave Achilles one for his birthday. It’s possible that he’s met some … undesirables … through the various …’ He waved a hand in the air, uncertain of the correct terminology. ‘Applications.’

Beverley shook her head. ‘Phones have existed since the dawn of time.’

‘Well, they haven’t, actually.’

‘For a century anyway.’

‘Landlines. But no one ever came in and stood in their hallway and stared at their landline, did they?’