have decided that the best way to get my parents to open up is to give them the impression that I am emotionally stable. I will tell them I am going to see a therapist and that he or she says that I am mostly fine except that I feel cut off from my parents, and that they ought to be more generous with their anecdotes.
There’s a clinic not far from my house that contains numerous types of therapist: physio-, psycho-, occupational. I weigh up which of the therapists will provide the least trouble. My body is pretty much perfect, so I plump for Dr Andrew Goddard B.Sc. M.Sc., a physiotherapist.
When I phone, a male secretary answers. I tell him that I need an early appointment with Andrew because I have to go to school. He says I can get an appointment for Thursday morning. He asks me if I’ve been to the clinic before. I say no. He asks me if I know where it is and I say yes, it is close to the swings.
I am amazed to discover that there are detective agencies in the Yellow Pages. Real detective agencies. One of them has this slogan: ‘You can run but you can’t hide’. I fold the corner of the page for easy reference.
Thursday morning. I usually let my Mum wake me up but today I have set my alarm for seven. Even from under my duvet, I can hear it bleating on the other side of my room. I hid it inside my plastic crate for faulty joysticks so that I would have to get out of bed, walk across the room, yank it out of the box by its lead and, only then, jab the snooze button. This was a tactical manoeuvre by my previous self. He can be very cruel.
As I listen to it, the alarm reminds me of the car alarm that goes off whenever heavy-goods vehicles drive past. It wails like a robotic baby.
The car is owned by the man at number sixteen on the street below us, Grovelands Terrace. He is a pansexual. Pansexuals are sexually attracted to everything. Animate or inanimate, it makes no odds: gloves, garlic, the Bible. He has two cars: a Volkswagon Polo for everyday and a yellow Lotus Elise for best. He parks the VW in front of his house and the Lotus out the back, on my road. The Lotus is the only yellow car on my street. It is very sensitive.
I have watched him many times as he jogs up through his back garden, swings open the gate and points his keys at the road. The wailing stops. If it happens late at night, he looks up to see how many lights have come on in the windows of the houses on my street. He checks the car for scratches, tenderly sliding a large hand over the bonnet and roof.
One night, it cried intermittently between the hours of midnight and four in the morning. I had one of Mrs Griffiths’s maths tests the next day and I wanted to let him know that, in our community, this behaviour is not acceptable. So I came home at lunchtime – having performed poorly in the test – went into the street and made myself sick on the bonnet of his Lotus. It was mostly blueberry Pop-Tart. The rain that afternoon was fierce and by teatime the lesson had been washed away.
When I make it down to breakfast, my dad asks me why I am up so early. ‘I’m going to see a therapist at eight thirty – Dr Goddard B.Sc. Hons.’ I say this as if it is no big deal, this new-found responsibility-taking.
He stops dead in the middle of slicing a banana on to his muesli. The open banana skin sits in his palm to protect him from the downward slash of his spoon. This is a man who knows about maturity.
‘Oh right. Good for you, Oliver,’ he says, nodding.
Dad admires preparation; he leaves his muesli in the fridge overnight so that it can fully absorb the semi-skimmed milk.
‘Yeah, it’s no biggie. I just thought I’d like to have a chat about a few things,’ I say, all casual.
‘That’s good, Oliver. Do you want some money?’
‘Yes.’
He pulls out his wallet and hands me a twenty and a ten. I know when I am spending Dad’s money because he folds the top of his twenties back on themselves, like a bed sheet, so that they fit inconspicuously