Millie sometimes thought that perhaps shehadbeen born purely to annoy her mother, because that was all she seemed to do. During her cognitive behavioural therapy the subject of her parents had come up as a source of stress. Various different methods of processing their comments were discussed, but after Millie had recounted a few examples Anwar’s mouth had got tight and he’d told Millie to just stay away her mother as much as possible. When Millie asked if that was avoidance, knowing that she was supposed to be facing her problems head on, Anwar broke from his usual casual, serene persona.
‘You stay away from those fucking people at all costs,’ he’d said, his voice firm and dictatorial instead of soft and non-confrontational. ‘You hear me Millie? Stay away.’
So over the last five years she had managed to stay away. She saw her parents once a year at Christmas (last year she hadn’t even had to see them then as her father had a conference in America), and for some reason her mother rang her every year on her birthday. This was ostensibly to wish her many happy returns, but normally the phone call had more to do with her mother wanting something.
Her parents never asked why Millie rarely took their calls; Millie suspected that their pride wouldn’t let them, but she also doubted that she was sorely missed. Her father barely knew her anyway, and her mother had repeatedly told her throughout her life how annoying she was. Her limits were not really tolerated by her parents, despite the fact that in recent years Millie had started to suspect that her mother had quite a bit to do with them being there in the first place. She had been a painfully shy child, which her parents had found intensely frustrating and embarrassing.
‘The bloody girl’s not right in the head,’ her father had moaned on the way back from a family political function he’d taken Millie and her mother to. Millie had been seven and had not spoken a word the entire afternoon. Her vocal cords had simply frozen up on her. ‘They thought she was retarded or something. What an embarrassment.’
Yet another thing Millie had done ‘purely to annoy’ her parents. Not that it ever crossed their minds that a shy child would find hordes of adults intimidating, or even that it was bizarre to expect your child to hold a conversation when all the attention they received at home was a series of barked orders. Or to expect your child to play seamlessly with the other children there, when at school Millie had very little social interaction with her peers, due to her already working with children four years older (something her mother had pushed for so that Millie wasn’t ‘held back’ by being with children her own age).
Millie heard the key in the front door and frowned. Jamie and Libby had only left an hour ago and she had told them to stay out as long as they wanted. To be honest she’d been hoping Rosie would stay up later with her, but halfway through the game of Junior Monopoly Millie had bought for her, Rosie’s yawns had become almost continuous. And she’d only lasted a minute into the story Millie read to her whilst they cuddled in bed before she’d been sound asleep.
Heavy footsteps echoed through the hallway and Millie turned to look over the back of the sofa.
‘I’ve got to go. I –’
‘Now you listen to me, young lady.’ Millie barely registered the sharp note in her mother’s voice; she was too busy staring at a scowling Pav, who was filling the doorway from the hall into the lounge. ‘I don’t care what excuse you think you can come up with. Youwillcome to this function. We need to support your father in his campaign.’
‘Wh-what?’ Millie muttered. ‘I can’t …’
‘Camilla, you’ve been testing my patience for five bloody years and it’s about to run out. You know what, I’ve been thinking that it would be nice to see more of my mother-in-law. We’ve been discussing getting her moved to another, more convenient home out here in Hertfordshire. I don’t think it’s healthy for her to be stuck in the city; pollution and all that.’ Millie slowly turned away from Pav as all the colour drained from her face.
‘What?’ she whispered. ‘You can’t –’
‘Seeing as your father has power of attorney for her medical and financial needs, I think you’ll find that I can do exactly that. Moving out of all that smog is an eminently reasonable idea. And it’s not as though she has the capacity to make her own decisions anymore, is it?’
Millie squeezed her eyes shut and clenched her jaw, an uncharacteristic rage sweeping through her body, so strong it made her voice shake.
‘You can’t do that. She’s happy there. Disrupting her routine, the people she’s with, her carers. It would be … it would be cruel. Even you –’
‘Don’t be so melodramatic, darling, for goodness’ sake. She’s totally away with the fairies. She wouldn’t know if we stuck her on a rocket to the moon.’
‘She had a stroke, Mum,’ Millie said through gritted teeth. ‘She can’t walk very well. Her mind is –’
‘Spare me the sentimentality, Millie,’ her mother spat out. ‘What a load of tosh. Your grandmother is demented and getting worse all the time. She didn’t speak a word to us last time we went to that godforsaken place.’
Millie took an unsteady breath and let it out slowly. Her parents hadn’t visited the home for over two years. It wasn’t godforsaken, in fact it was one of the best residential homes in the country. Gammy was happy there. She didn’t cope well with change. And the reason she wouldn’t have spoken to them is because she hated them both. It had nothing to do with dementia.
‘You don’t even pay for the home,’ Millie said; to her annoyance her voice broke at the end. She took another steadying breath to try and strengthen it: if there was one thing Valerie Morrison detested it was weakness. ‘Please.’ Another wave of bitterness attacked her at being reduced to begging this poisonous woman. ‘Please, don’t do this.’
‘Well,maybeif you come and talk to me and your fatherin personat the party conference I’ll reconsider. Maybe.’
Millie lowered the phone slowly into her lap and sat back on the sofa, staring forward into the middle distance and not even registering the sofa dip as a big body took up the space next to her.
‘Millie?’ her mother’s shout floated up from her lap. ‘I need an answer. Why can’t you just be normal for a change? Why are you always such a basket case?’ Pav stiffened by her side and with a jolt she realised how close he was and what he must have overheard. At lightning speed she snatched the phone to her ear again.
‘Okay, you win,’ she said, her voice devoid of emotion now. ‘I’ll come to the dinner.’
‘Good,’ her mother said, her tone back to cool and collected now that she had got her way. ‘And darling?’
‘Yes?’
‘At least try to be normal could you? For once.’
‘Right … normal.’ Millie ended the call before her mother could respond. She doubted Valerie wanted to stay on the line any longer anyway, and it was highly unlikely that she’d planned to wish her a happy birthday.
‘Who wasthat?’
