Green Grass by Raffaella Barker Page A

earlier, when he tried to suggest changing channels to the programme on the fruit flies and their habits. ‘And anyway,’ she added, having watched five stony minutes of the nature programme, ‘your fruit flies are having sex and God knows what else. I don’t think you’ve got a leg to stand on as far as suitable goes.’
    Hopping from foot to foot in the hall, attendedby Diver, the Labrador, Hedley empathises with the dog’s single-note whining, and can almost believe that his own ears, like Diver’s, are cocked towards the door. He wouldn’t be surprised to find himself drooling. It is lonely here in Norfolk with only a taciturn teenager and a devoted dog for company. Hedley never envisaged himself as a single man, but since his failed affair with a neighbour, he has been on his own, and quite honestly, he can’t imagine anything changing now. Reflecting that it is time he got out more and spent some time with adults instead of pandering to Tamsin and complaining to Diver, Hedley opens the door to his sister and her family.
    â€˜Inigo, Laura. Lovely to see you. Come in, come in.’
    Laura hugs her brother, breathing deep as she steps away, loving the woodsmoke in the air, the hint of wet dog and the determined wafts of sweetness from a winter flowering jasmine scrambling up and over a plant stand in front of the fireplace in the hall.
    â€˜Hello, Hedley. It’s lovely to be back. I’d forgotten how much I love the smell here, and it never changes.’ Laura smiles, taking off her coat and walking through towards the kitchen.
    Inigo, behind her with a bag of groceries, mutters, ‘I hope you bought some wine, Laura. Hedley neverhas anything decent to drink here, and I could do with something now.’
    Hedley stays to greet Fred and Dolly, jumping back as if scalded when he puts his hands out to hug Dolly and encounters a slice of midriff complete with a diamanté tattoo below her belly button which reads STIFF .
    God, she’s becoming one too, he thinks despairingly. And last time I saw her she had plaits and still liked damming streams in the wood.
    Dolly, chewing gum, her headphones dangling around her neck, dribbling a tune, gives him a long, expressionless look which makes Hedley want to shrivel to the size of a screwed-up pocket handkerchief.
    â€˜Hello, Uncle Hedley,’ she says in the same lobotomised monotone with which Tamsin addresses him.
    â€˜Tamsin’s in there.’ Hedley points to the sitting room. Dolly spits her gum into the palm of her hand and throws it into the jasmine plant pot before vanishing into the sitting room. Hedley turns to Fred, braced for more of the same treatment, and is unnerved to find his nephew giving him a friendly smile as he crouches to stroke Diver.
    â€˜Hi, Uncle Hedley,’ he says cheerily. ‘Diver’s looking well.’
    â€˜Yeeess,’ says Hedley slowly, staring at him, fascinated by his civility, slowly warming beneath the uncritical expression on Fred’s face. ‘In fact, he’s just become a father. I’ve been up at a friend’s house looking at the puppies this evening,’
    â€˜NO!’ bellows Inigo, who has removed his jacket to reveal a snug green polo-neck in very soft, lightweight fleece material which reveals every bulge of his biceps and chest and makes him look as if he has just been beamed into the dimly lit medieval hall at Crumbly from Planet Zog. ‘On no account are you to take Fred to look at those puppies, Hedley. I will not have it.’ Inigo paces about the room brushing invisible hairs off his sleeves and glancing venomously at Diver. ‘They’ll all shed hair like that one there. How can you stand it, Hedley?’
    Hedley ignores this, recognising it as Inigo’s usual combative arrival. He will settle down when he has had a drink, but until then will prowl and scowl and find fault. Rather like a dog arriving at another