He sighs, exasperated, and not convinced she isn't being deliberately obtuse.
'My wife used to nag me when I came home late without phoning, which was most nights. She used to give me an earful when I'd drank too much, also most nights. She cooked a fantastic steak and kidney pie, and had an arse that'd put any bird to shame. If she didn't talk to me for more than two days, it usually meant she suspected I'd got off with some slag, and I knew I wouldn't be gettin' my leg over for at least another week. She was blonde, and it wasn't out of a bottle, ever.'
He looks across again, his face still set hard.
'Barbara at eighteen used to burn toast. God knows what she'd do to suet pastry. She'd go to church every Sunday, and secretly drink when she was out with me - never gave me gyp for gettin' pissed. Once I'd persuaded her that sex before marriage wouldn' kill either one of us, she never denied me that either. And she definitely wouldn' have stayed blonde without help.
Point bein' - do they sound like the same to you? I don't know what she would've been like twenty five years later. So yeah, it seemed real an' it always would, if I didn' know better now. But I do. You think the mother you met is the same as the real one I knew? You're dreamin', Alex.'
His 'life' was real - but it's all been undermined now. He doesn't know what's real, or what he made up. He doesn't know if he based the people he loved on what he wanted them to be, or whether he took bits of reality and expanded them to the logical conclusion. Nothing he knows is based on solid ground, and it's one of the things that's so hard about this.
no subject
'My wife used to nag me when I came home late without phoning, which was most nights. She used to give me an earful when I'd drank too much, also most nights. She cooked a fantastic steak and kidney pie, and had an arse that'd put any bird to shame. If she didn't talk to me for more than two days, it usually meant she suspected I'd got off with some slag, and I knew I wouldn't be gettin' my leg over for at least another week. She was blonde, and it wasn't out of a bottle, ever.'
He looks across again, his face still set hard.
'Barbara at eighteen used to burn toast. God knows what she'd do to suet pastry. She'd go to church every Sunday, and secretly drink when she was out with me - never gave me gyp for gettin' pissed. Once I'd persuaded her that sex before marriage wouldn' kill either one of us, she never denied me that either. And she definitely wouldn' have stayed blonde without help.
Point bein' - do they sound like the same to you? I don't know what she would've been like twenty five years later. So yeah, it seemed real an' it always would, if I didn' know better now. But I do. You think the mother you met is the same as the real one I knew? You're dreamin', Alex.'
His 'life' was real - but it's all been undermined now. He doesn't know what's real, or what he made up. He doesn't know if he based the people he loved on what he wanted them to be, or whether he took bits of reality and expanded them to the logical conclusion. Nothing he knows is based on solid ground, and it's one of the things that's so hard about this.