Tales of Disturbance

Fish

The only good thing about this holiday is the pool. I go there before Dad and Karen wake up, slip through the patio doors straight out into the morning heat. The water is spread out like liquid silk under a blue sky. I dive in, kick off from the side. It feels good and cool.

I swim until my insides burn and I'm no longer thinking. The only thing my mind attaches to in these moments is what it would be like to be a fish. To live in this clear, still underworld with the crowded cotton wool feeling in my ears, far away from Dad and Karen.

I let the last pocket of air in my lungs bubble out and watch it rise to the blue of the surface. I am deep and full of water. Coach says I have tremendous lung capacity. But the only thing I want is oblivion.

From down here the only hint of the real world is the moving specks of light. Those dimples of red that interrupt it is the Heliconia plant growing in the far corner of the pool. It dapples through the cobalt blue like scarlet paint. I have exceptional goggles.

I surface into the sunlight, and all my breath pours out at once. The soft lips of the water stay open around my shoulders as I bob, kicking my legs underneath me like a frog.

I run a hand through my short wet hair. With dismay I notice Dad and Karen have appeared on the white sun loungers. Karen lies on her stomach, her spine protruding like an alien. It's the only real part of her. The rest is filler and botox. Dad sits desperately by her side, squeezing sun lotion on to her back - it chugs out in great spots like he's putting poly filler on a wall. He sees me watching and jolts to his feet like he's been electrocuted. One fuzzy knee collides with the table between them. Karen's freshly squeezed organic orange juice teeters dangerously.

'Daaave! Caaaeeful!' she says in her cotney moan.

'Kat!' he waves violently, the sun lotion bottle still in his hand, 'HEY Kat!'

His guilt about the affair has led to a lifetime of embarrassing enthusiasm.

Karen twists her snake neck around and peers at me out through bug eyed sunglasses. She had her highlights done on Le Marais last weekend and I think without concern that the Tunisian sun will ruin them. As if reading my thoughts, she reaches for her oversized Chanel sun-hat with navy trim, balances it on top of her highlights and raises a palm at me. The tips of her manicure flash like shark's teeth. Then she goes back to reading Vogue. Or looking at the pictures.

I swim to the edge, press my hands on the curved lip of the pool and pull myself up; the water spits me out gently. The sun is a hot iron pressed across my shoulders, the cold water suddenly icy against my tender skin. I squeeze the liquid out of my hair and watch the dark splotches joining up on the pink patio flags. The beach is a flash of gold in the far distance. I take a moment to look at it; stall the inevitable.

I finally walk over to acknowledge the pantomime duo. Dad and Karen. I'm at that awkward age where you must obey the unspoken rule that when a parent who has betrayed your other parent forks out for an expensive holiday to Tunisia, you have to be polite. It would be preferable to launch into a screaming tantrum and upturn Karen's pine nut gorgonzola salad all over her white dress at lunchtime. It would also be preferable to scream for a long, long time. But I don't. All the screams stay inside.

By the time I get to them, Karen pretends to be asleep. She's wearing a mustard bikini that is far too small for her. It turns out not even working in the fashion industry can buy you taste.

'How's the pool love?' Dad's smile is too wide.

'Fine' I say. 

I finish ringing out my hair so I don't have to look at him, and blink a few drops from my eye lashes. When I finally glance at him, Dad's face is as red as a tomato. Karen's £350 sun protection factor clearly isn't working.