Parcel for you..Part 26

 

By the time Vanessa got back to the house she was beginning to have a niggling feeling that she might live to regret inviting Spencer into her bed. It was a feeling that she pushed back, refusing to engage with it but she wondered if this move towards increased intimacy was in fact a knee-jerk reaction. Was it based upon a possessive emotional need to have a stronger bond with Spencer than anyone else? 

 

Annie was in the kitchen playing loud music and using every pan, bowl and utensil available, even ones which hadn’t been used for years and were coated in a layer of sticky dust which Vanessa was quite sure hadn’t been washed off prior to use. 

 

‘I’m making dinner,’ she said, licking the spoon, ‘it’s peppers stuffed with black beans and annatto seeds, with a twist.’

 

‘What’s the twist?’

 

Annie paused for a few seconds, her eyes scanning the ingredients. ‘You’ll see,’ she said.

 

‘I didn’t know we had such things as annatto seeds,’ said Vanessa, wincing at the mess.

 

‘You’ll like it Mum. It’s hotter than hell. You know we should have invited Grandma to stay for dinner..’

 

‘Not if it’s going to be hotter than hell, Annie, I don’t think so.’

 

Vanessa went upstairs and shut her bedroom door. She felt as if there was mess everywhere, in her house, in her mind and beyond. During her previous life, pre-Spencer, when Annie was away, she’d experienced long periods alone and although she’d felt lonely, there was an order in her life, a sense of cleanliness and opportunities for spiritual re-charging. Now everything was disordered and out of control. Vanessa knew she must let go and just let things take their course otherwise her stress levels were going to reach dangerous highs. 

 

She lay back on the bed, a bed she had just committed herself to sharing. The bedroom had always been her sanctuary; she closed her eyes and imagined being carried down a fast river. The water contaminated with all the debris of her life, broken relationships, careers that never got going, old friends and pets long gone, all bashing her as the currant took her away.

 

This brief meditative state was broken by the smell of hot spices drifting upstairs, tickling her throat and making her cough. ‘Mum, it’s ready!’ yelled Annie from downstairs.

 

Spencer had busied himself on his lap-top, perusing HotUKDeals and all associated banter, he was fully engrossed, banging the keyboard, typing at super-human speed but that was the thing, he wasn’t human. She paused to observe his hand, ‘Oh, your henna tattoo looks like it’s faded a bit.’

 

‘We rubbed some cooking oil on it.’ said Annie as she slammed two plates down, mountains of rice with stuffed peppers perched on top covered in an orange greasy slick, dribbling down onto the table cloth.

 

‘It looks…hot.’ said Vanessa, girding her intestinal loins as she scooped some onto her fork. The food was much better than she’d anticipated, spicy but layered with different flavours. ‘Wow, this is actually very tasty. I like it!’

 

‘I don’t know why you sound so surprised, Mum. I sometimes think your expectations of me must be so low.’

 

‘Of course not. Why would you think that?’

 

‘Well you always seem very shocked when I do something well.’

 

Vanessa shook her head. ‘No. I just want to make sure you know when I think you’ve done something well, that’s all. By the way, what’s the twist?’

 

Annie shrugged. ‘You’ll find out later.’

 

Spencer closed the lid of his laptop suddenly and joined them at the table. ‘I’ve got some good news,’ he said.

 

‘Oh really,’ Annie laughed through a mouthful of food, ‘what’s that then?’

 

Vanessa could only think of worrying reasons for Spencer to have good news. She took a sip of red wine and stared at him. He looked sort of smug. ‘Tell us,’ she said, looking worried. 

 

‘I’ve unlocked another level..of married life.’

 

Annie laughed again, this time more hysterically. ‘What, like a computer game?’

 

‘I don’t see it like that.’ said Spencer, ‘The upgrade will happen tomorrow because your mother,’ he coughed and put his hand on top of Vanessa’s, ’my wife, Vanessa has asked me to sleep in her room, in her bed.’

 

Vanessa found herself blushing and feeling very exposed, she shook off his hand. ‘We’ll just take it one step at a time, see how it goes,’ she said and then instantly regretted her arrangement of words.

 

Annie screwed up her face. ‘I’m not sure if I know what’s happening here,’ she said, ‘and I’m not sure I want to.’

 

‘It’s not like that,’ Vanessa said quickly, ‘it’s just a change of location for shutdown time, for both of us. I have to shut down too, in the human sense of the word but if Spencer is next to me then we’ll both feel safer.’

 

‘Safe from what? Does Charlie know about this? I thought he liked to sleep on your bed, Mum. I wonder what he’ll think. He won’t like it, he might pee on Spencer.’

 

Vanessa was relieved that the conversation had drifted into the safer territory of the cat. ‘Spencer can handle some moisture. He’s waterproof, up to a point.’

 

‘But cat’s pee isn’t water, it’s super concentrated, probably very corrosive.’

 

They finished up their meal and Vanessa volunteered to do the washing up, knowing that the task would take her a very long time and this would allow her to prepare mentally for company at bedtime. She needn’t have worried though. Spencer followed her upstairs, she instructed him which side of the bed to sleep on and by the time she’d finished brushing her teeth, he was already in shut down mode. 

 

Spencer didn’t feel the cold so left the duvet down around his legs. She climbed in next to him and pulled it up to his chest and then shifted right to the other side of the bed and picked up her book. The sight of his face was distracting though. He always looked slightly freaky in shutdown mode and now there was no escape from it, she couldn’t get away.

 

Charlie was perched on the landing just outside the door which was slightly ajar. She was just starting to get into her reading when there was a faint knock at the door and it opened almost instantly after. Vanessa jumped, despite knowing it could only have been Annie at the door. 

 

‘What is it?’ she said pulling the duvet up even higher.

 

‘Sorry to disturb, I just remembered that I have some good news too.’

 

‘What?’

 

‘Pat emailed me with some free tickets to see The Hominids of Quasar at the Rolling Gimps Folk festival on Friday. She’s going out with one of the band members you know.’

 

‘I know, I’ve met him, Spencer and I had them over for dinner.’

 

Annie stared at Spencer. ‘He looks weird doesn’t he? I mean, are you not weirded out by this?’ She leant in until she was very close to his face and then touched his eyelid with her fingertip. ‘He didn’t even flinch.’

 

‘Annie!’ Vanessa whispered, ‘Don’t touch him like that! I’m getting a bit annoyed to be honest by the way you keep objectifying him all the time.’

 

Annie laughed. ‘Objectifying him, me! You bought him! You paid for him, Mum, like you pay for a thing, an object and you accuse me of objectifying him.’

 

‘I paid for him because he’s a machine although in my mind he’s becoming more and more like a human.’

 

‘Whichever way you paint this, it’s morally wrong. You can’t go accusing me of objectifying him when you paid for him and if you consider him as a human then it’s worse because do you know what that makes him?’

 

‘What?’

 

‘A slave.’