Love, Nina by Nina Stibbe

switch ignition on unless we’re off the public highway, which you can’t be in NW1. They don’t have driveways. Except AB, and his is occupied.
    Love, Nina
    *  *  *
    Dear Vic,
    We’re considering canceling the milkman and getting cartons with the main shop. AB is trying to put us off, saying we should support the milkman (at all costs), otherwise there might not be any milkmen. The milkman here wakes me up every morning earlier than necessary, clanking his bottles and revving his float. I wouldn’t be that sad to see him go actually. But I know what AB means, they are a good thing, checking on old people. Noticing milk that’s gone off on the step because someone’s had a fall and not got it in, type thing.
    MK hasn’t had a milk bill since 1981 and if she ever bumps into the milkman on the step, she tells him and he says he’ll look in the book. Still no bill comes. Maybe someone else is paying. Like someone else was feeding the cat.
    We have those stubby little milk bottles too. I think they’re everywhere now. The days of the long slim bottles are gone. Remember the ones with embossed writing on (Kirby & West)? Maybe it’s the stubby little bottles that are driving people to get cartons with the main shop? Are cartons any nicer than the not so nice bottles? No.
    Sam accidentally tipped Tom out of his wheelchair going up a curb. He came home all dramatic.
    Me: What’s up?
    Sam: It’s really bad, Tomalin’s wheelchair bumped into a moped and fell over and Tom fell out in the street and the moped went on its side.
    Me: Oh dear, was Tom OK?
    Sam: Yeah, I think so, he wasn’t hurt.
    Me: Poor Tom. Poor you.
    Will: Poor moped.
    Fifteen minutes later:
    Sam: Shall we go and check on him?
    Me: Tom?
    Sam: Yeah, see if anyone’s helped him up.
    Me: What? He’s still there?
    Sam: Probably, maybe, I don’t know.
    Me: What, you left him there?
    Sam: Yeah, I came to get you.
    Me: But, Sam, you’ve had a peanut butter sandwich.
    Tom was at home. He’d shouted, been helped up and wheeled himself home. He thought nothing of it (he was worried about Sam).
    Love, Nina
    *  *  *
    Dear Vic,
    Pippa brought new boyfriend round to show him off. S&W liked him because of what was written on his T-shirt. Will ran upstairs and put on his funny T-shirt ( Registered piss artist ) and the new boyfriend said he’d seen one like that before. Thoughtless.
    Pippa seems keen. Can’t see why. He seems pleased with himself and pushes his glasses up on his nose all the time with his hand. Unnecessarily. It’s one of those habits that you don’t realize you’re doing but drives other people mad and can cause blackheads (all the nose touching). Then yesterday she told me that he has this thing. He has to masturbate every night or else can’t get to sleep.
    Me: God!
    Pippa: Yeah, but to be fair, he does it himself.
    Me: What, and do you, you know, at all?
    Pippa: No, we don’t.
    Me: But you’re boyfriend and girlfriend?
    Pippa: The relationship is culture based, I don’t even have to shave my legs.
    Told Mary-Kay about him/it.
    Me: He can’t get to sleep unless he’s ejaculated.
    MK: Oh, that!
    Love, Nina
    PS Me and S&W have a new code. If we think someone’s annoying we tap our fingertips on the table. It’s so funny, esp. when MK’s mates are round. They go on about this, that and the other and we tap our fingers and laugh. MK even said one time, “What’s this finger tapping thing?” and we said, “Nothing,” but laughed.
    I told Helen about it which was a real shame and I regretted it because later she was talking to MK about Django Reinhardt (the Belgian guitarist with only seven fingers in total) and, though it started out interesting, it dragged on and on and I wanted to do the finger tap to S&W but Helen knew the code so I couldn’t. Will managed a half-tap thing, which meant