abel?’ I said in preparation, as we drove along.
Silence.
‘Billy?’
Silence.
‘Earth to Mabel and Billy?’
They both seemed to be in some sort of trance. Why couldn’t they have had the trance in the house so I could have sat down for a minute and read the Style section from last week’s Sunday Times whilst believing myself to be reading the News Review?
Decided to let the trance just happen: to go with the flow and make the most of any moment of calm to clear my head. It was really quite jolly driving along, the sun was shining, people out and about, lovers in each other’s arms and . . .
‘Mummy?’
Hah! I seized the moment, adopting a statesmanlike, Obama-esque tone. ‘Yes. Now. I have something to say: Billy – and particularly Mabel – hitting is not allowed in our family. And I say to you now: every day when a person doesn’t hit – or jab – they will get a gold star. I say to you: any time a person does hit they get a black mark. And I say to you, as a non-violent person and as your mother: any person who gets five gold stars by the end of the week will get a small prize of their choice.’
‘A Hellvanian bunny?’ said Mabel excitedly. ‘A Fuckoon Family?’
‘Yes, a Raccoon Family,’ I said.
‘She didn’t say Raccoon. She said the F-word. Can I have crowns on Wizard101?’
‘Yes.’
‘Wait. How much is a Raccoon Family? Can I get crowns that are worth the same as a Raccoon Family?’ Mark Darcy the top negotiator in child form. ‘How much money does Mabel lose for saying the F-word?’
‘I didn’t say de F-word.’
‘You did.’
‘I didn’t. I THAID Fuckoon.’
‘How many Wizard101 crowns does Mabel lose for saying the F-word again?’
‘Here we are at the super-dooper Heath!’ I said rousingly, pulling into the car park.
Is amazing how everything calms down once one is in the outdoors with blue skies and crisp winter sunshine. Headed for the climbing trees, standing close by as Billy and Mabel hung upside down, motionless, from the conveniently broad, low boughs. Like lemurs.
Wished, for a fleeting second, they were lemurs.
1 p.m. Suddenly had urge to check my Twitter followers and pulled iPhone out to take a look.
1.01 p.m. ‘Mummeee! Mabel’s stuck in the tree!’
Looked up in alarm. How had they got up there in thirty seconds when they’d just been hanging upside down? Mabel was now way up, clinging to the tree trunk like not so much a lemur as a koala, but slithering alarmingly.
‘Hang on, I’m coming.’
I took off my parka and hoisted myself awkwardly into the tree, positioning myself under Mabel and putting a firm hand under her bottom, wishing I hadn’t come in quite such low-rise jeans, and high-rise thong.
‘Mummy, I can’t get down either,’ said Billy who was crouched, wobbling, on a branch to my right like an unsteady bird.
‘Um,’ I said. ‘Hang on.’
I leaned my full weight against the tree, placing one foot on a slightly higher branch to lift me towards Billy and putting my hand on Billy’s bottom, whilst keeping the other hand under Mabel’s bottom, simultaneously feeling the low-rise jeans descending lower over my own bottom. ‘Calm and poised! Just hold on tight and . . .’
None of us could move. What was I going to do? Were we going to be frozen against the tree for ever, like a trio of lizards?