Chapter 4

Driving the car did wonders for my self-esteem too – in that it reduced it by half at least. Not even Erica laughed; they were all very quiet as the gears grated and crashed; and that was just backing it out of the garage. The girls sorted, with varying degrees of disgust, through their granny’s underclothes. “What is this for?” I heard Erica say loudly. There was some whispered explanation and an “oooh. Really? Does she do that?” I didn’t know what ‘it’ was, nor did I want to. I remembered staying with my granny (my other granny) and seeing her voluminous underclothes hanging up to dry; acres of cotton, reinforced gussets and some kind of bust protector – I wouldn’t call it a bra since it was big enough to catch the whole North Sea cod stocks in it. I had no desire to understand what the well-dressed octogenarian was wearing under her knitted twinset these days. Still, they packed a bag, found the housekeeping purse to stop at Pringles Supermarket on the way back (this was before Tesco built their mega-super-hyper mart and hoovered up all the trade in West Wales).

On the narrow, single track, I prayed that I wouldn’t meet anyone. Then we were on the open road! I concentrated on not crashing the gears, I finally got the double de-clutching! I also discovered that a 1930s Wolseley needed most of the width of Wales to come to a stop. The brakes were small and ineffectual, and the car was very, very heavy. If we hit one of the modern cars on the road we would demolish it. It had rolled steel bumpers, front and back, with the give and flexibility of a Panzer tank. Luckily we could only do about fifty, top; and I gathered that the car was rather surprised to be driven at such breakneck speeds as it was used to thirty as a maximum. There were no seat belts, and a plain glass windscreen, On one bend, where a car with a suicidal driver was overtaking blind, I screamed (we missed him), since I couldn’t remember where the horn was. I envisaged Terri and I flying through the glass windscreen and her lovely face turned into a horror film.

Well, we made it. I parked very carefully and walked with the girls to the entrance of the Aberystwyth General Hospital “I’ll wait here, they will only let relatives in, I’m sure.” I waited some time; when they finally returned it turned out that they only allowed two visitors at a time, so each girl went in for twenty minutes and sat with granny. I bet she got sick of being asked the same questions four times. They came out sombre. He was still unconscious, still touch and go. “We can come in tomorrow again.” I said “Maybe he’ll be improving.”

Then we went to Pringles and I parked at the far end of the car park. I really didn’t want to risk some bod swinging a car door into this classic car. Call me a male chauvinist if you like, I’m not averse to shopping; but shopping by committee takes time. I let the four of them spend an hour discussing whether it was better to buy one large tin of beans or a multipack – or some such rubbish. I went back to the street and called in to the second hand book shop. It almost jumped into my hand! A History of Wolseley. Scruffy, well-thumbed, but still. I was as nonchalant as I could be. “This isn’t in good condition, could you knock some off?”

“Oh, for Jack Maxwell is it? I heard he’d been taken in. He’ll like that. What’s the price?” I thought I was going to get a bargain now “Hmm, well I could knock 50p off.” I was trapped; still, this guy had to make a living I suppose; it wasn’t like his shop was crowded with customers. As I was leaving my eye caught another book ‘Pinups of the 30s’. I bought it for their grandad, of course I did. But when I looked at the pictures I wasn’t so sure. These were more than pinups, these were much, much more explicit that that. I was pleased he’d put the books in a brown paper bag.

“We bought a couple of bottles of wine; do you know the cashier asked me how old I was!” said Toni.

“Well, you are underage I think aren’t you?”

“I’m eighteen in two months, that must count for something”

“And you’re affronted because the cashier tried to do her job and stop underage drinking and getting the shop into trouble and fined? Yes, that’s fair.”

“No, I’m affronted, you posh git because she thought I didn’t look eighteen!”

The remainder of the journey home was spent arguing over whether affronted was a posh word or not. Oh, and they’d stopped being polite about my driving. Every time I crashed the gears there was a chorus of “oooohhhh aooow!” followed by a load of laughs. Then one of them found the books. “Oh, Gramps will like this, look Fiona.” I was swelling with pride at my good purchase “He’ll like the one about cars too. Dave, you can’t give him this one about pinups; goodness, did they have pubic hair in Victorian times?” Now I knew she was trying (and succeeding) to embarrass me.

“It was a special offer – buy one, get one half price” I lied. “I suppose I could keep it myself”

“Erica! Stop looking at that book! It isn’t suitable!” Fiona tried, vainly. It seemed Erica didn’t just look like sex on a stick, she thought like it.

“I could pose like that.” I really wanted to know which picture she was looking at.

As we got out, I told Toni she looked like her grannies sister, and she chased me round the house three times before catching me in the orchard. What now? I leant in and kissed her “Ooops, sorry. I shouldn’t have done that”

“No, especially if I look like I’m ninety” We walked back arm in arm. The others looked, were they smirking, smiling or what? Women are another country.

“We’ll need to wash these I suppose ... Dave, do you think you can fix the washing machine?” said Fiona. Clearly none of them relished washing grannies unmentionables (that’s what she called them) by hand.

“I’ll take a look first thing tomorrow. I honestly don’t know; but I will try. I could do with washing some stuff too. Do you need a hand? No? Then I’ll grab a shower if that’s okay”

“Don’t forget to lock it, you don’t want a gang of girls to rush in and have their wicked way with you do you?” Now, they knew, and I knew that they knew, that that would be precisely what I WOULD want them to do. I locked it anyway.

I had one clean pair of underpants left; I took a chance and put them on. I mean I took a chance that I would get the washing machine fixed. Not that I would need clean pants. Otherwise I’d have to wash them all by hand – I didn’t feel I knew the girls well enough to let them do that job even if they offered. I like to think that, even that long ago, I was a new man. I would wash my clothes, cook my own tea (I had the Cub Scouts Housekeeping badge after all), and I was only slightly embarrassed by boxes of tampons in the bathroom (two boxes of light, one of heavy flow – I tried to stop myself asking the obvious questions).

Dinner was great. A kind of Welsh beef bourginione (misspelling deliberate since it was nothing like the real thing), maybe that means it was a beef stew. But it was good! And the glass of wine helped. We played Scrabble after and I was comprehensively trounced by all four females with their superior word power. I didn’t know ANY words with a Q and no u!

And so to bed, my sofa bed was less comfy than it could be, so I lifted all the cushions onto the floor; which is where I was when I heard the footfalls. The padded, slowly and carefully in the dark, across the room to the sofa. “Dave” a voice hissed “Dave! Can I slip in, I’m cold and lonely and ... Dave?”

“I’m behind you” I whispered and she let out a shriek. Two minutes later the light was on and Erica was looking down at me, and Fiona was looking from the door at Erica. It could have been a difficult situation, except that there was enough evidence that I hadn’t been the instigator.

“You wearing pants?” said Fiona “Good, keep them on!” There was, I thought, a hint of a threat in her voice. Erica giggled and got under the blankets with me. I could have been using my sleeping bag of course; but I was glad I wasn’t, lets just say that sleeping alone at various places on my walk had resulted in some organic smells in the bag.