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| 'Thursday Dinner at Grandfather Jack's' | |
| By nj_hodges | ||
| 26 July 2006 | ||
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The introductory page to my first ever short story. At least, the first I'm happy enough with to put it about. The story is told by a young boy who, along with his nerve-wracked mother and complacent sister, visits his Grandfather for their weekly surreal visit at his throughly unconventional home. The narrator has long since worn himself into the grooves of his Grandfather's crazy behavior and the endless mysteries of the space under the stairs. Despite this, he is shocked to begin to discover how deeply related to each other the twisted influences of his life really are. Check me out at: http://njh2005onwards.blogspot.com ‘Thursday Dinner at Grandfather Jack’s.’ A short story by Nick Hodges. Our family cars’ headlights sweep and scout my Grandfather’s front lawn as Mum turns a sharp right into the driveway. She drives as she usually does on this trip, as if she was considering driving on, passing, just letting her foot drop heavily onto the accelerator like it was all of a sudden made of lead. I hold my breath every Thursday at this same time; I dread the day she decides, no, not this week, this week we’ll have a break, no, I’ll have a break, God knows I deserve it, we all do, but especially me... But she doesn’t this time, and never has before. She forces herself to turn the car onto my Grandpa’s property She has a duty, after all. Grandfather Jack’s front garden is an amusement park graveyard of the fads he’s adopted, ideas he’s had and rejected. A half dug pond mocks the gnomes fishing pointlessly around its rim, a shovel half buried at the center of its crater. A half built miniture railway partially circles the garden, it’s steel tracks rusted, the wooden supports rotted and mouldy. I step excitedly out of the car, noting, as I have done since the railway appeared, the overturned train and its three devoted carridges beached uselessly a few feet away from the tracks. An accident of interest. How fickle and short lived most interests and hobbies are. A dessertion disaster. The front of the house is a collage of mixed colours, changed and half completed so many times it looks like the project of a crazed artists convention, desperate to create a movement that could help enrich their lives. The three of us trudge up the short walk from the driveway to the front door in single file, in order of importance, I guess. My mother, head of the household, first. She looks defeated already. Next is me. Aden Woodsford, to be precise. If there’s someone to root for around at the moment, that’ll be me. I’m the only one who benefits from our weekly sojourns to Grandfather Jack’s, after all. I’m sixteen years old, six foot precisely, broad shouldered and pretty well built with mousey hair and a green eye. Last in the line is my little sister, Dolores. She drags her feet along the gravel of the drive, her eyes seemingly magnetically drawn to the featurelessness of the ground. As usual, she’d rather be at home, encased in her room. Chatting on MSN about the repeat of ‘Friends’ running on Channel 4 tonight, playing the same shit over and over. Talking to her friends in a little box on a screen about how much she likes Dan Wilkins, how she loves her new little kitten ‘Pliff’ and, of course, how much she hates her Christian name. As we approach the front door I begin to carefully scout my surroundings. Familiar as they are, its impossible to predict exactly what the first incident will be, now that we’ve arrived. In front of me, Mum’s observing similar tactics. I can see her head swiveling and almost hear her eyes rolling all over the place; from the front door, the garage, to the car. She even sneaks a worried glance all the way behind her, checking the entrance of the drive. As if! I can hardly blame Mum’s paranoia though. Our visits seldom pass without a bizarre event or freak occurance. Like the time when she awoke in my Grandpa’s bath, lacking the memory of ever feeling drousy or even tired. Awoke to find him putting the finishing touches to shaving off her long, dark sleek hair. Awoke despite the chlorophorm. I knock on the door before Mum can worry about it, and Grandfather Jack answers promptly. He’s dressed in his usual atire, and Mums shoulders relax at even that small relief, as if she’d expected he’d come to the door wearing nothing but a brown wellington boot on his head. Perhaps she had.
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