huh.’
‘And did you put it away?’
‘No, that’s not my job. That’s your job.’
‘I can’t do everything, Jane. I just … can’t. Please help me out here. Meet me halfway?’
‘If you didn’t want to do everything yourself, you should have stayed with Dad then, shouldn’t you?’ snapped Jane. ‘Then you’d have had someone to help!’
I gave up and went through to the kitchen. The shopping was all over the floor. Jane followed me through.
‘And you had it delivered in bags!’ she said accusingly. ‘I mean, don’t worry about us, Mother! It’s not like we want a planet to live on in the future or anything.’
‘Oh shit,’ I said. ‘I must’ve ticked the wrong box. I’ll reuse them or take them to be recycled, it’ll be fine.’
Jane snorted again.
Peter meanwhile was standing there disconsolately, surrounded by the shopping.
‘When’s dinner?’ he said. ‘I’m SO hungry, Mum, and there’s no food.’
‘Dinner will be about half an hour,’ I said. ‘Peter, there’s literally food all around you, because neither of you have bothered your arse to put the shopping away.’
‘I did put it away,’ protested Peter. ‘I put the fridge stuff away, and then I didn’t know where anything else went.’
I opened the fridge. He had indeed ‘put the fridge stuff away’, if you could call cramming everything in randomly ‘putting it away’. There was a block of Cheddar at the front with teeth marks in it.
‘Who did this?’ I demanded.
Peter shrugged. ‘I told you I was hungry,’ he said.
‘Right,’ I said furiously. ‘There will be no dinner until all this shopping is put away. ALL of it. Work out where it goes, it’s not rocket science. I, meanwhile, am going to have a glass of wine and FIVE MINUTES’ PEACE, while you BOTH put it away – do not even think about bleating about gender stereotypes or the FUCKING PATRIARCHY at me, Jane, and Peter, PUT IT AWAY AND DO NOT EAT IT. You can go fifteen minutes without eating something.’
I poured myself a large glass of wine and stomped out to talk to my chatty chickens, followed by Judgy Dog, who wasn’t going to let a little thing like being in a sulk with me mean I could be let out of his sight, especially not to betray him with the chickens. I also suspected him of harbouring hopes of getting into the chicken house and being a winner, winner with a chicken dinner. I’ve already had stern words with him about how I’d struggle to love him so much if he ate the Speckled Sussexes, even though so far they’ve not laid a single egg. I expect they’re still settling in.
The chickens looked at me balefully in response to my cheery greeting. So far they’ve proved distinctly unchatty. I can’t help but wonder if they’ve taken against me because of their names? They also refuse to look Instagrammable every time I try to take a picture of them. Instead, as soon as I get my phone out, they hunch into themselves and huddle pathetically and do an excellent impression of an RSPCA advert, despite their extremely pampered life. Luckily Jane does seem to like them, and even deigns to feed them, so there’s that. I’m starting to wonder if buying expensive chickens was a mistake, and I should have got some rescue battery hens, who might at least have been grateful for their new home and not looked at me quite so nastily. Maybe I should get some rescue hens too? I fear the Speckled Sussexes might bully them, though.
‘What do you think? Would you like some friends?’ I asked the chickens. They glared at me. Oxo gave a disgusted squawk. I assumed that was a no.
I gave up trying to converse with them and drank my wine, while reflecting that at least Peter tries to help, even if his attempts are more of a hindrance, while I fretted that perhaps his efforts are due to some misplaced idea that he has to be the man of the house, which will go down badly with Jane and her views on the patriarchy if he tries to tell her what to do. Jane has recently become very vocal on the subject of the Oppression of the Patriarchy, although as far as I can see, rather than trying to overthrow it and bring about an equal and fair society, she mostly uses it as an excuse not to lift a finger, and to tell me why I’m wrong about everything, because obviously I’ve no idea whatsoever what it’s like to live in a patriarchal society like she does.
My wine finished, I gave up trying to work out the tangled thought processes of my teenage children, shut the chickens in their house for the night (Judgy would never forgive me if I allowed a dastardly fox to enjoy his
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