In My Sister's Shoes

Prologue

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, TESTOSTERONE

I waited. Nothing. Bollox. I still wanted to kill them. I thought the counting was supposed to calm me down, make me Zen, stop me wanting to murder them.

The letter T flew by me hit the wall and slid down, leaving a trail of tomato sauce behind it. An F hit me right in the face, splashing tomato sauce into my eye. They screeched with laughter.

I wiped my eye with my sleeve and sighed. How, in God’s name, had I ended up here? Where was my old life, the glamorous one, the independent one, the nice, clean, non-food-smudged, non-snot-covered one?

Maybe if they were my own kids it wouldn’t be so difficult. Maybe if they were my own kids I wouldn’t want to kill them right now. Maybe if they were my own kids I’d know what the hell I was doing.

But they weren’t and I was drowning in a sea of alphabet spaghetti.

Chapter 1

As I strutted up the pathway to my sister’s house, I realized I felt really happy for the first time in ages. I was on top of the world. I, Kate O’Brien, was a television presenter. After eight years of living in a studio apartment in London, making tea for other presenters, I finally had my own show and it felt fantastic.

I rang the doorbell and heard squealing from the other side. The twins were obviously very excited about being five.

The door opened and a very harassed-looking Dad, pulled me into the hall.

"Thank God you’ve arrived. Mark’s been boring me rigid about some new mathematical theory or other. I’d rather nail my balls to the mast of a sinking ship than listen to another word of it," he hissed

"Charmingly put, nice to see you too Dad," I laughed, looking over at my brother-in-law, Mark, who had his back to me and was now busy showing the twins how to multiply three apples by three pears. They looked adoringly at their father as he prattled on.

"That dude needs to get out more," drawled my younger brother Derek, from the couch. "It’s bad enough that he’s a maths professor but he doesn’t need to inflict it on his kids. They’re going to be total nerds. No one wants to hang out with kids who are good at maths!"

"You could have done with a bit more focus on your studies, instead of these pie- in-the-sky dreams about being a musician," grumbled Dad. He had been funding Derek’s dream of becoming a famous rapper for years and was clearly fed up.

"When I’m playing sell out gigs in Wembley, you’ll eat those words," said the confident artist.
"Seeing as you haven’t made it outside the garage yet, I won’t hold my breath," Dad replied.

"Where’s Fiona?" I asked, wondering where my older sister was.

"She’s in the kitchen putting the candles on the cake," said Dad. "If you can call it a cake, it’s a rotten looking organic carrot yoke. Sure you wouldn’t feed it to a rabbit."

As if on cue, Fiona came through the door carrying the birthday cake.

"Kate, I’m so glad you made it," she said coming over to kiss me.
"I wouldn’t miss the boys’ birthday," I said, winking at the twins who came over to say hello.

"Except last year when you forgot," said Mark, as I glared at him. I could never figure out what my sister saw in Mark. I suppose because Fiona was a maths genius too, they had numbers in common.

"Never mind, you’re here now," said Fiona, smoothing things over, as she always did.

"Where’s our present aunty Kate?" Bobby demanded

"It’s in here," I said handing him the bag.

"I hope it’s more suitable than their Christmas present," said Mark.

I blushed at the memory. Riddled with guilt at having forgotten their fourth birthday I had spent a month’s wages on a Playstation which came with two games – Big Mutha Truckers 2 and Airforce Delta Strike, which I thought was a really cool present. How was I to know that they were violent games and that the boys were too young for Playstation. I didn’t have a clue about kids. Fiona was speechless and Mark kept shaking his head saying how totally unsuitable it was and how could I be so clueless, didn’t I know that these games corrupted children’s minds…. I had felt about two feet tall.

Jack held up his present looking confused. "What is it?" he asked.

"They’re Burberry ear muffs, to keep your ears warm in the winter when you go to the park," I announced.

The twins looked blankly at me.

"Look, you put them on like this," I said, placing them on Jack’s head."
"Yucky," he said pulling them off.

"What’s this?" asked Bobby, trying to put a little jacket over his head.

"That’s a little matching Burberry coat for Teddy, so he can keep warm when you take him for walks," I said grinning at Teddy, the cocker spaniel, who was curled in a ball in the corner.

Everyone was staring at the ear muffs in silence.

"Lovely," said Fiona looking bemused.

"What’s Bunberrry?" asked Dad.

"It’s like totally bling designer gear," said Derek.

"I though tartan went out of fashion in the sixties," said Dad laughing

"Well, it’s better than last year’s fiasco," said Mark.

Bobby looked into the bag to see if anything else was in there, finding nothing he looked at me with raw disappointment.

"Sorry guys, I thought you’d like them," I said feeling like a total moron.

We heard a yowl and turned to see Jack wrestling poor Teddy into the little dog coat - clumps of his fur were stuck in the zip.

Mark ran over to save the poor dog.

"Guess what?" I said, still bursting to tell them my news.

"You’re up the duff," said Derek

"You’ve met a nice lad," said Dad hopefully.

"I’ve got my own show!" I said, ignoring them both.

"Kate that’s fantastic," said Fiona.

"Ah sure what good is that to you," said Dad. "You need to focus less on that auld job and more on meeting a nice boy."

"So are you going to be earning mucho dinero?" asked Derek, looking for a positive angle for himself.

"Well it’ll be a lot better that what I’m on now, although that wouldn’t be hard. But don’t be expecting hand outs, get your own job."

"Is it an entertainment show?" asked Fiona

"Yes, pretty light stuff, interviewing rising stars, reviewing music, movies and TV shows. It’s not exactly the BBC, it’s on the Lifestyle channel, but it’s up and coming and at least I finally get to present. I’ve taped the first three shows already and they’ve worked out well."

"Mark," Fiona called, "Did you hear the good news, Kate has her own show. She’s going to be famous."

"Finally. Well at least now you won’t have to worry about her so much," he said, sitting down beside his wife and putting his arm around her.

"Fiona! What are you doing worrying about me? I’m thirty for God’s sake, I’m fine."

She shrugged, "I can’t help it, its habit."

I smiled at her. She’d been worrying about Derek and I since Mum died twenty two years ago. Dad, heartbroken, had thrown himself into work and left Fiona, aged twelve to look after her younger siblings. I was eight and Derek was only four, so Fiona had become our surrogate mother. I always felt guilty about the way she had given up her youth to make our sandwiches and do our homework with us. She was twelve going on forty.

"Well you can stop right now," I said. "I’m an overnight success after eight years grafting."

"So like can Gonzo and me come on your show and try out some of our new material?" asked Derek

"No."
"What happened to families helping each other out?" he grumbled
"She doesn’t want the show to be cancelled," said Dad

"You’re stuff isn’t good enough yet, it needs more work," I said, trying to be tactful.

"We’ve actually been working on some new songs. You’re going to be blown away when you hear them. We’re recording a CD on Friday so I’ll send you a copy and you can slot us in to your show," said the wannabe rapper as he headed out the door. "Thanks for the grub Fiona, I’ll catch you later."

"Oh God, I groaned, how am I going to get him off my back. He’s going to hound me about this every day."
"Couldn’t you put him on the show for a few minutes?" asked Fiona

"Have you heard his rapping?" I asked

"Is it that bad? I thought some of the lines rhymed well," said the ever supportive oldest sibling.

"It’s absolute tripe and the lad needs to cop on to himself and get a proper job," huffed Dad.

"Well Bill, you’re the one who’s funding his delusional music career," Mark pointed out as Dad bristled.

"I’ve told him, next year when he turns twenty-seven the finances will dry up. Besides, he’s working part time at the moment so I’m helping him less. I can tell you now when you’re two boys grow up and beg you to support their pipe dreams, you’ll find it a lot harder to say no then you think."

"Our boys will be mathematicians like their parents," said Mark as we watched Jack rubbing his birthday cake into Bobby’s hair.

"Now who’s delusional," muttered Dad.

"So, how’ve you been?" I asked Fiona, changing the subject as quickly as possible.

"Good thanks. You know, busy with teaching and the boys. Actually we have some exciting news too, Mark’s been asked to submit a paper for the Goldwin prize."

"Sounds great, "I said

"Tremendous," said Dad

Mark nodded "It’s big honour. I have been asked to prepare a paper for the Conference on Statistics, Mathematics and Related Fields which will then be submitted for the Rodney Goldwin Prize."

"What do you get if you win?" Dad asked in his usual blunt manner.

"If he wins he’ll get a huge grant for the department and worldwide recognition for his work, it’s a really big deal, there’s a lot of pressure on him," said Fiona smiling proudly at her husband.

"Wow, well good luck with it all," I said

"Thank you Kate," said Mark. Then turning to Fiona he said, "Actually Darling, speaking of the Prize, I need to slip away now and do a couple of hours work if that’s alright?" said Mark.

Fiona looked a bit crestfallen.

"Now? On the boy’s birthday," I asked.

"It’s fine Kate," said Fiona firmly.

"This paper is going to make a difference to the way people think. Not as important as interviewing teenage singers perhaps, but important none the less. I’ll be back to read the boys a bedtime story," he said kissing Fiona as he walked out.

"Who’d like tea?" asked Fiona

"I’d love some," I said as she went into the kitchen to boil the kettle.

"Imagine how insufferable he’ll be if he wins this prize," I groaned

"Perish the thought," said Dad, shuddering.

The phone rang. Fiona mustn’t have heard it in the kitchen, so I picked it up.

"Hello"

"Hello Mrs Kennedy, your biopsy results have come through and Doctor Summer needs to see you right away. I’ve scheduled you in for nine tomorrow morning."

"Ok" I said as the phone went dead.

What the hell was going on?

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