a fine Sunday lunch

Ms Rational Self-Determinism's younger son looks down from the top bunk, where he is busy affixing an entire deck of playing cards, face out, in a row along the ceiling moulding.

"Your mum," I repeat, "would very much like it if you would get in the bath, and then go to bed, sweetie."

"Did she really say it like that?"

"No," I admit. "She did use rather worse language than I probably would."

"Did she say to get in the fucking bath?"

"Well - not exactly."

His face falls, a perfect model of moral disappointment. "Oh. Did she use the C word?"

"I'm afraid so."

"Well I told her, I already had a bath today! At Dad's house! I'm cleeean!!"

I look at him. Shiny as a new penny. "Okay, here's what you do. Just go brush your teeth, then that's done, and you don't have to have a bath. I'll tell her you're fine, and you can go to bed when your brother does, nobody's going anywhere till Meercat Manor's over anyway." I'm a little worried about getting all this past Ms R S-D, who is sitting in the kitchen with a bottle of M&S chocolate wine (ugh), feeding the remains of the roast (aka tomorrow's sandwich meat) to the dog and slowly knitting a scarf for the boy, insisting that she's fine. If challenged, which she has been several times by her perspicaceous offspring, she snaps, "I am not fucking drunk!"

Atticus, who I should point out looks enchantingly like Ziggy Stardust without the make up, continues his cross-examination. "Did she really say I have to get in bed? Like, now or something??"

"Well - ye-es..."

He sits up. He looks at his watch. His voice is shrill. "It's SEVEN FORTY!!!" he says.

I go downstairs. I explain to my best friend about her older boy (who is in fact 14), watching Meercat Manor with clean teeth, and her younger one clean all over, and then the younger one comes down. He inspects the scarf. "What's this?" he says.

"What?"

"This thing."

"It's a knot," I say, "it's just where one ball of wool ended and another started."

He fingers the knot. It's very fat wool. It's a big knot.

"You can weave that in," I tell her, "but you have to do it at the beginning of the row. You get a big embroidery need-"

"Now you tell me!" she expostulates.

I sip my wine.

Atti looks at her. "Do you really expect me to wear this?"