What a Pickle

His mother meant well. He knew that she cared about him, probably loved him, but unfortunately her dependency on alcohol hid that warmth and care quite effectively. Not that he could rationalise it, he was only seven. To him her behaviour was quite simply understood as ‘good mummy’ and ‘bad mummy’.

He knew that ‘good mummy’ tended to be around in the morning when she would hug him, kiss him and say sorry a lot. She would often cry when she was ‘good mummy’. ‘Bad mummy’ was there when he came home from school and some weekends. She would smell funny and speak in a weird way and sometimes she would hurt him.

This morning ‘good mummy’ was particularly sad about what ‘bad mummy’ had done the night before. She kept asking him to forgive her but he didn’t really know what that meant.

Finally she asked him if there was anything she could do that would make it better. After a long and deliberate pause he asked her. “Could I have a dog?”

“Oh Honey,” she said, “We couldn’t keep a dog.”
“A cat?” he asked quietly

“I’ll get you a pet that we can look after,” she said quietly and then tousled his hair and sent him off to school.

That afternoon when he got home he ran around the flat looking. “What are you doing?” his Mother slurred. “Looking for my pet,” he said with such obvious joy that it partly sobered her.

“It’s not here yet,” she said staggering to her feet. “I have to go and get it now. You stay here and remember not to let anyone in.” She took her bag and fell towards the door and out into the street.

He sat and waited. What he didn’t know was that she had bumped into an old friend who had taken her to the wine bar. It was four hours later when she lurched through the door with wrapped fish and chips under her arm. He ran towards her. She smelt bad.

“Where is it, where is it?” he shouted, his positivity and optimism not dampened by young years of disappointment.

She stared at him trying to remember what she had promised. Suddenly it came to her. She drew herself together and took the deliberate steps of a drunk trying to appear sober into the kitchen.

A moment later she stepped out into the hall. “Here it is,” she said placing a small warm object into his hand.

Kieran loved that pickled onion as much as he would have any dog or cat.