Always and Forever by Cathy Kelly

Sheila Malin added. ‘That’s hardly bad for a week night.’ Everyone but Cleo smiled at this clear proof of the hotel’s success.
    ‘Make that twenty-two covers. Or even twenty-three.’
    Sondra patted her bel y happily.
    ‘You don’t have any steak, Jacqui?’ cal ed Barney. ‘I’m ravenous.’
    ‘Chef does not have time to whip up private meals for you, Barney,’ Cleo snapped at her brother. ‘You’ve been up here four times in the past week for dinner. Can neither of you cook?’ ‘I’m pregnant,’ Sondra said, looking daggers at her sister-in law. ‘Cooking makes me sick. I don’t know why they cal it morning sickness, when it’s al -day sickness.’
    ‘Lots of women have to work when they’re pregnant and they can’t afford to give up their jobs at the drop of a hat because their husband’s family business wil keep doling out! money to support them,’ Cleo said, taking the gloves off. She I knew that her parents supplemented Barney’s income with handouts. Handouts that Barney felt were entirely his due. ‘It’s a loan,’ snarled Sondra.
    ‘Four loans in the past two years?’
    ‘It’s none of your business.’
    ‘It’s my business when the hotel profits are being siphoned
    “I off into your pockets.’
    ‘Cleo.’ There was a warning in her father’s tone but neither Cleo nor Sondra took heed.
    ‘You could be contributing something if you were stil working on reception, Sondra,’ Cleo went on. ‘We al know that Tamara is hopeless. She spends the whole time doing her

    nails.’
    ‘How dare you talk about my sister like that?’ shrieked Sondra.
    ‘Don’t, please,’ Sheila begged her daughter.
    ‘Yeah, who do you think you are, Cleo?’ Barney said, remembering his husbandly duty. ‘Apologise.’
    Cleo was just about to say that she had no intention of apologising because every word she’d said was true, when Harry interrupted. ‘Yes, apologise, Cleo.’
    Stunned, she spun round to look at her father. ‘For tel ing the truth?’ she demanded.
    ‘We don’t have big rows in this family, Cleo,’ Harry went on.
    ‘That gets nobody anywhere. Please apologise to Sondra.’
    Cleo felt betrayed. Her father rarely interfered in squabbles and it was hardly a family secret that she and Sondra didn’t get on. They were grown-ups; they were entitled not to get on if they didn’t want to. She loved and respected her father but he wasn’t always right. Al she’d done was tel the truth and she was being punished.
    Although she knew why: her father hated rows and tried to avoid conflict at al costs. His mother had been what he euphemistical y cal ed ‘fiery’ and Harry had grown up watching his parents face each other like bul fighters, circling in rage, screaming insults several times a week. A person could have too much plate-throwing in their life, he used to say. Cleo knew she’d inherited her grandmother’s passion - although not her harsh tongue. She would never hurt anyone with a rash word - she knew better than that, no matter how passionately she felt about something. Her grandmother’s way was not the right way to do things.
    ‘You’re right, Dad,’ she said calmly now. ‘I went about it the wrong way. I’m sorry for talking about Tamara like that,’ she said to Sondra. But not sorry for the other parts. ‘That wasn’t fair. I’m going out for a walk.’ And she got up to go.
    Her father muttered something about going into the office for a few moments, and he left too, by a different door.

    Cleo went and sat where she’d always gone when she was wildly annoyed but trying to hide it. Down at the bottom of the garden, behind the orchard wal , on the cracked stone seat under the apple tree. The bark of the tree was coated with silver and there were no acid-green buds appearing.
    The tree was dying from neglect. Nobody in the Wil ow knew the first thing about trees and the men who worked on the garden had their hands ful sorting out the front in the limited