Every Time a Bell Rings. Carmel Harrington

But come on. Enough already.

      And it’s not like we don’t go through this every time she comes. Now that I think about it, she’s been visiting more often recently. I think this could even be her third visit this month. It used to be only once a month at the most.

      Don’t get me wrong, she’s alright – for someone who is as mad as a bag of cats, I suppose. And she loves Jim, so that makes her alright in my books. It’s just you don’t know what version of her she’s going to arrive with, when she does call round. It could be the ‘happy normal mammy’ or the ‘crazier than Michael Jackson and his pet monkey’ version.

      She’s been okay for a while now, but last month when she brought the crazy with her, well, Jim was in bits for ages afterwards.

      We were upstairs on the landing. There’s this big window ledge, which we’ve put cushions on, so it’s like a seat. We often hang out there and watch the world go by. Tess says we’ll take root there one of these days.

      Anyhow, there we were, waiting and watching for his mam to arrive. As it happens, we heard her high heels clipping the crazy pavement before we even noticed her arrival, because we were busy monitoring the slow trail of a spider up the wall.

      So we look down and Jim is all excited, he’s practically bouncing on the seat, but then his smile disappears. I knew without even looking that it must crazy mam time. I looked down and sure enough there she was doing this ridiculous zig-zag dance all the way up to the front door.

      She was clutching a brown paper bag to her chest for dear life and her eyes darted to and fro around the driveway, as if she was expecting something awful to happen.

      ‘What is she doing?’ I asked, incredulous by the display below. I’d never seen anything quite so bizarre in my life before.

      ‘She doesn’t like cracked pavement slabs,’ Jim replied. ‘I haven’t seen her do that for a while. I thought she’d gotten over it.’

      His whole demeanour changed, gone was all his excitement and instead now his face looked worried and anxious.

      My laughter at his mother’s expense disappeared when I saw his face. He went downstairs, shoulders slumped and I followed on behind. She was as white as a ghost by the time she got to the front door and a line of sweat was over her forehead, matting her hair to it.

      ‘Are you okay?’ Tess asked kindly.

      ‘I think I managed to avoid them all.’ She answered. ‘But they are everywhere. You need to get them fixed. It’s dangerous. Anything could happen if you were to stumble on a crack.’ She looked back at the driveway, as if she’d just managed to circumnavigate her way through a minefield.

      ‘What happens if you stand on one of the cracked ones?’ I asked. Tess kicked my ankle hard. ‘Ow,’ I yelped in pain. I thought it was a fair question. I was interested. I mean, it must be something bad if she went to so much trouble to avoid them.

      ‘Stepping on a cracked pavement slab is unlucky. You could unleash some really bad luck forevermore into your life, with one false step,’ she answered, starting at something on the wall behind my head.

      The maddest thing of that whole episode was, that after all the effort of the bunny hop hop to the front door, when she got inside, she stayed all of five minutes, then hopped her way back down the drive again.

      Told you, mad as a bag of cats. So as you can imagine, I’ve not got high hopes for this visit, I think crazy mam is due, we’ve not seen her for a few weeks.

      And it’s me who has to clean up the mess after she goes. When she left that time, Jim hid in his room for hours, wouldn’t let me in. I wasn’t going to say one smart word about her either. I knew that he was upset and didn’t want to talk about it. I was upset too, upset for him. I wanted to go to him, comfort him, tell him how sorry I was.

      ‘Leave the lad be. His mam isn’t right yet,’ Tess said, catching me as I was about to break into his room. She tapped her head three times. ‘She suffers terrible with her nerves you know that. It’s an awful affliction.’ She shook her head sorrowfully and heaved her groaning body down the stairs again, with a purple snack in her hand, half-eaten.

      I felt like crying for him that day. But I knew that would make him even sadder. So I bit down hard on my lip instead and sat outside Jim’s door on the patterned hall carpet. I was there for so long waiting my bum went numb and I had pins and needles all the way up my two legs. But there was no way I was moving. I had to be there, so that when Jim did come out, he would see me and know that I loved him.

      I couldn’t make his mother’s nerves any better, but I could make sure he knew he had a best friend. When he did come out, he looked down at me and said nothing. I didn’t mind, though. I understood, more than anyone, that sometimes there are no words.

      He was silent, sullen and I knew the reason why that was his heart was smashed into a hundred million pieces, again.

      I didn’t try to make him talk, I just fell into silent step with him, then we walked downstairs. I followed him outside and played football for ages with him and the garden was silent, bar the sound of our ragged breaths, as we ran and ran.

      Then Tess shouted for us to come in for our tea. She had gone to a lot of trouble, makings all of Jim’s favourites, to try and make him feel better. And by the time we were in the living room watching TV that night, he started to smile a little bit.

      So here we go again, waiting to see which version of his mother turns up today. And to make matters worse, the big eejit has gotten it into his head that this time is the time that she’s come to take him home. Something else we go through every single time. He always thinks the same thing, and each time he ends up disappointed.

      Tess told me once that her grandmother suffered from her nerves too. She used to take to her bed for weeks when they were kids. I asked her if she ever got better and she just shook her head sadly. Maybe his mam can change. Maybe she can get better, unlike Tess’s gran.

      I just want him to be happy. And I know that if I’m thinking about the last disastrous visit, so is he, no matter how much he prattles on about how this is going to be different.

      ‘How’d I look?’ he asks, walking into the room. He’s plastered down his hair to one side with half a bottle of gel, by the looks of it, and he looks pure ridiculous. He’s also got on a grand-daddy shirt, in a blue stripe. It looks like a pyjama top. What is he thinking? His Irish jersey looks much better on him.

      ‘You look stupid,’ I tell him and as my words bounce off him, his face crumples.

      Why did I say that? I feel awful. I want to take the words back, stuff them into my mouth again, but it’s too late.

      ‘Will I wash it out?’ He asks, frantically rubbing his hair with the sleeve of his shirt and I feel like crying, the guilt is so strong.

      Tess always says that jealousy is a shocking thing and she’s right. Because I know that I’m being horrid all because I’m jealous. I’ve never ever got to feel the excitement of seeing my mam come to visit. Not that I’d necessarily want her to, I suppose. But even so.

      Because despite the fact that Mrs Looney is off her head loopy-loo style, at least she comes to see Jim. At least she makes an effort to stay in touch and there’s no denying she loves him. It’s written all over her face.

      I’m not being a very good friend and I know it.

      ‘No, leave it alone, let me fix it. You don’t really look stupid, I was just joking. You just used too much gel, that’s all.’ I run my hands through his glooped-up hair and restyle his wavy locks into a halfway decent style, using my fingers as combs. He looks like Jim again and I tell him, ‘There, that’s perfect. Your mam will love it, don’t be worrying.’

      ‘I just want it to go well,’ Jim says for the one hundredth time, pulling at his shirt. He glances at the bouquet of flowers sitting on the hall table. He bought them out of his savings for her. I hope she knows how lucky she is,