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“I go away for a little holiday—and Flove only knows I deserve one—and the whole story falls to pieces. What a mess!” muttered Finnley crossly.
“I do think you are being a little harsh, Finnley,” sniffed Liz huffily. “But then you always were prone to exaggeration. It is all those ridiculous Lemonolol novels you read.””I had a funny dream last night”, said Mater when she eventually found Dido clearing up in the kitchen. Or more accurately perhaps, ’supervising’ as it was clearly Finnly doing the bulk of the work.
”It was very peaceful. A man and a little boy were fishing in a stream. “Fishing is what a true man does,” said the man to the boy. At that moment there was a tug on the line and the little boy pulled a huge trout out of the water. Enormous it was,” gesticulated Mater, flinging her arms wide to demonstrate. “The trout fought hard and got away, but not before … what on earth is the matter with you, Dido?”
“A trout,” murmered Dido looking strangely at Mater.
“Where the dickens is everyone?” muttered Mater, popping out of her room to get herself a cup of tea. “And what’s that stink? Has Dodo burnt something again?”
“Hmmm, I must have miscounted, three more old farts and a baby,” said Clove sounding slightly perplexed. “It is still way too many though.”
“And have a good Christmas!” she shouted to their departing backs, just in case she seemed uncompassionate.
Peace at last.
She sighed happily and went back to bed.
“Elizabeth has gone and this is my thread now, so get the fuck out of here, both of you!” said Finnley, who had adamantly refused to go to the Australian outback.
“Will someone get rid of that old woman with the horrible accent?” hissed Finnley, ungraciously.
“What on earth for? She is doing a splendid job. I must say though, Finnley, just as a side note, it is good to hear you sounding more like your normal ungracious self.”
“I found dust,” muttered Finnley, glaring accusingly at Haki.
Elizabeth look unaccustomedly thoughtful. “Do you think you need a break, Finnley dearest? You really must be exhausted after all the splendid proof reading you have been doing for me this year. Why don’t you go home for a while, on full pay of course.”
Finnley burst into tears. “Where is my home though?” she snuffled. ”I am not good with descriptive details. I just found myself in this stupid story doing your stupid cleaning. And now I have a Bulgarian sister, to boot. And,” she looked witheringly at Elizabeth, “ proofreading is one word”
“Crikey, matey,” said Norbert patting her awkwardly on the shoulder. “Christmas is a killer, in’t? Family coming out of the woodwork like blimmin worms. Keep ya chin up though, eh. Ya can’t be letting things get to ya like this. Ya wouldn’t be able to carry on like this if ya were in bloody China ya know. Like bloody robots they are there. I don’t think they know the meaning of the word feelings over there.” He shook his head in wonder at their philistinism.
“And ya right about that one,” he added quietly, with a conspiratorial raised eyebrow and a slight nod of his head towards Haki.
Elizabeth leapt up and rushed to the bookshelf. “I know what you need! some Lemon Juice! I will pick one at random; they are all absolutely superb.” She opened the very small book and closing her eyes stabbed the page dramatically with her finger.
”Let’s not be overachieving fucks.”
“Wow,” she mouthed, awestruck. After taking a moment to recover herself, she looked sympathetically at Finnley.
“The oracle has done it again. Do you hear that Finnley? You are an overachieving fuck.”
Finnley rolled her eyes.
“Oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god,” mumbled Finnley, head in hands and rocking strangely.
Elizabeth was startled by this strange behaviour from the normally quiescent Finnley.
“What on earth is wrong with you?” she asked irritably.
Finnley raised her head from her hands and regarded Elizabeth with tired, bloodshot eyes.
“What’s wrong with me?” she snarled. “I will tell you what is wrong with me. All these fucking batshit crazy characters making mess and expecting conversation is what is wrong with me. What’s going on? It’s not fucking Christmas is it?”
”Don’t worry, Lady Elizabeth, Your Royal High Goddess, you go and take an aspirin. I will keep an eye on him for you,” smirked Finnley.
“Despot,” messaged Finnley 8.
In the character of all true Finnleys, she was programmed to be succinct.
Finnley snorted. “Madam Liz now, is it. Next she will be having us curtsey.”
“MUST you snort and mutter all the time, Finnley? It really is most distracting, not to mention unattractive, and I need my wits about me to sort out this unexpected husband fiasco. It really is not a good time, not with my bum looking like this.”
”What exactly are you still doing here, Finnley? I have Haki to do the cleaning and look after the baby and Sonia. And what a beautiful job she does too. Without any unnecessary complaining,” Elizabeth added pointedly.
Finnley rolled her eyes. “And I suppose you expect her to do your proofreading as well?
“Oh yes,” Elizabeth conceded gratefully, always amazed at Finnley’s perspicacity.
”By the way,” said Finnley, ”I know you miss Godfrey but you might want to stop with all the comfort eating. Your bum is starting to look obese.”
’Okay, bye, gotta go,” said Finnley, already walking quickly away.
After a few steps she stopped, paused reflectively for a moment, sighed deeply and turned back to Godfrey.
”She misses you. She is back into reading her friggin’ ‘Lemon Juice for the Soul‘ rubbish again. She always was a nutcase of course, but yesterday she was walking around shouting ‘We are like Tolkiens of the nonsense and marvelous!’”
Finnley was glad Elizabeth had hired that old maori woman as a replacement maid. Especially if there was to be a baby to look after. She did a quick search to find the meaning of guano.
“Gross,” she muttered.
”And that’s another thing,” she continued. ”Why do all your characters have to be in some form of servitude to you?”
She looked accusingly at Elizabeth.
“I’m a lowly cleaner and Godfrey’s sole purpose in life seems to be to agree with everything you say and now poor old Norbert is a gardener! From New Zealand! Of all the godforsaken places you could have chosen.”
“Steady on, Finnley …” began Godfrey
Finnley ignored him.
“You could have made the poor man anything and yet you made him another slave to carry out your every warped whim. Granted, that was rather an obscure comment I made about him liking smelly old fish. Perhaps that did narrow your options somewhat.”
Exhausted, Finnley lapsed into a thoughtful silence.
Elizabeth gazed at her in awed admiration. ”Finnley, your perceptiveness has rendered me speechless.”
Nobody heard him so he tried again.
”knock knock”
”Who’s there?” called out Elizabeth
”Norbert”
”Norbert who?”
”Nor, bert ya shudn’t cull out uf ya don’t wont mey tu carm knuckin”.
”Friggin kiwi accents,” muttered Finnley. “I can’t understand a word they say.”
”Here’s one for you!” cackled Mother Shirley. She was in a great mood now her headpiece fitted so comfortably. Finley 21 was going to be very useful. ”Knock knock”
Finnley 21 rolled her eyes again.
”Who’s there?”
”Shirley.”
”Shirley who?”
”Shirley you must know. You’re a computer!”
Mother Shirley broke into guffaws of raucous laughter.
That wasn’t the slightest bit amusing. The voice in her head sounded very stern.
“By the way, how DO you spell your name? Is it Finnley with one “n” or two?”
“Either way is fine by me”, grunted Finnley, rolling her eyes.