Getting in the Way
By Daniel Addercouth
July 15, 2024
July 15, 2024
“There’s going to be a solar eclipse while we’re in London,” Steve says, turning from his computer. “Do you know what that is, Debbie?”
Why does he have to be so annoying, Debbie thinks. Just because he’s living with them doesn’t make him her dad. “Of course,” she says, without looking up from her phone. Her physics teacher talked about nothing else this week, but she can’t be bothered telling him that.
“Can we watch it?” Mum says, looking up from her book.
“It says we need special glasses. But I’m sure we can get hold of some.” Steve opens up a new window on his computer. “By the way, Debbie, could you come over here for a second?” He’s using that special calm voice that means they’re going to have one of their Little Talks. Debbie puts down her phone and goes over. She hates the desk with the PC and two monitors that Steve installed in the living room when he moved in three months ago. He says he needs the computer for his IT business, but it takes up so much space.
Steve points to the screen. Another one of his famous spreadsheets. “I’ve made a budget for our trip to London. I thought we could look at it together.” He always wants to include her in these conversations, but Debbie wishes the adults would just decide things. Most of the time Steve already knows what he wants to do. It was better when it was only her and Mum, and they made decisions together.
He runs his finger along the columns of numbers. “So you have the Tower of London, the London Eye and Madame Tussauds on your list,” Steve says. “The tickets are around 30 pounds each. We can’t afford to do all three, but you can choose two things.”
Debbie feels a twinge of guilt. The TikTok videos she watched made the attractions sound cool, but didn’t say anything about prices. She knows Mum doesn’t earn that much in her job at the council and they have to be careful, now that Dad’s not around. At the same time, she doesn’t understand why Steve is so fixated on saving money when he always has plenty to spend on his gadgets. Or why he gets to be in charge of the trip budget.
Mum comes over to look at the screen. “Are they really charging 30 pounds for the London Eye? It’s a glorified Ferris wheel.”
“Daylight robbery,” Steve says.
Debbie has an idea. “Maybe I could do some things with Mum. Then we’d only need two tickets.”
“This is our first trip as a family,” Steve says. “We’re going to do everything together.”
You living with Mum doesn’t make us a family, Debbie thinks. They were already a family before, when it was the two of them. She wishes it was her and Mum going to London by themselves. They had so much fun that time they went to Blackpool after Mum and Dad got divorced, eating chips on the beach and lying awake in the dark chatting in their twin beds.
Steve’s waiting to see what she chooses. She wasn’t that bothered about going on the London Eye. But now that Steve has said it’s daylight robbery, she wants to. “I suppose we can do the Tower of London and the London Eye and skip Madame Tussauds,” she says.
“Fine,” Steve says, putting a line through “Madame Tussauds” in his spreadsheet.
“I was looking forward to Madame Tussauds,” Mum says. “Are you sure we can’t do all three?”
Steve gives her a look. “We’ve been over this, Evelyn. We need to keep an eye on our finances, now that interest rates have gone up and my business is slow.”
Mum doesn’t say anything, which is just like her. Debbie wishes she would stand up for herself more.
“At least the solar eclipse is free,” Debbie says. “Or do we need tickets for that too?”
It’s the first full day of their London trip. At the Tower of London, they wait for an hour to see the Crown Jewels, then get whisked past them on a moving walkway in a few seconds. Steve’s grumpy because he isn’t allowed to take photos. They have lunch at Pizza Express, where they bicker over what to get, with Steve going on about his budget and wanting to share a margherita. He gets annoyed when Debbie orders a funghi di bosco for herself. They take the Tube to Regent’s Park, which is on Steve’s list of free attractions, and wander around. Debbie doesn’t understand what the fuss is about. It’s just a big park, no better than the ones in Leeds. When it starts to drizzle, they decide to head back to the Premier Inn, as no one has a better idea.
The rain gets heavier until the drops bounce off the pavement. They try to shelter in a doorway but it doesn’t offer any protection. Debbie wishes they’d never come to London. Then she spots a familiar logo on a nearby building. “Look.”
“Madame Tussauds,” Mum says. “That was on your list, wasn’t it?”
“Can we go in?” Debbie asks.
“It’s so miserable out here,” Mum says.
Steve checks his smartwatch, then nods his head. “Yeah. OK. Why not.”
They rush inside the building, grateful to be out of the rain. Steve buys three tickets and they go into the exhibition. But it’s not as cool as it looked on TikTok. It’s just a bunch of wax figures in different scenes. Half of them don’t even resemble the people they’re supposed to be. But Steve and Mum are like a couple of kids, getting excited when they recognise celebrities. Mum slips her arm around Steve’s waist as they walk through the rooms. Debbie lags behind so nobody will know they’re together. Steve insists on telling her who the figures are, even though she knows most of them already. She’s sure she’d be having more fun if it was her and Mum together, without Steve getting in the way all the time.
“Let’s ask someone to take a photo of the three of us with the Royal Family,” Mum says.
“No way,” Debbie says. Then, seeing Mum’s face fall, she adds: “I can take a picture of you two if you like.”
After that, they keep asking Debbie to take pictures of the two of them. Steve and Mum with Shrek. Steve and Mum with David Beckham. Steve and Mum with Darth Vader.
The gift shop is the most interesting part. Debbie finds a kaleidoscopic lens that fits onto a phone. None of her friends has got one. She thinks how cool her London photos would be if she took them with the lens.
“Can you get this for me?” she asks Mum.
Mum looks at the price. “Fifteen pounds? That’s what you have pocket money for.”
Debbie has 20 pounds holiday money in her purse. But she doesn’t want to spend three-quarters of that in one go. She puts the lens back on the shelf without making eye contact with Mum. If it was just the two of them, Mum would have bought it for her. All this stuff about pocket money is Steve’s influence.
Later, they sit on a bench in the square near the Premier Inn, eating the Tesco sandwiches they got for dinner. The rain has finally stopped and the sun has come out from behind the clouds. Everyone is quiet as they eat their sandwiches. Debbie finds the silence awkward. “I’m looking forward to going on the London Eye,” she says.
“Oh,” Steve says.
“What?” asks Mum, her tone sharp.
Steve rubs his mouth with his hand. “Well, we can’t go on the London Eye now. We went to Madame Tussauds instead. We have to reorganise our budget.”
“Oh, Steven,” Mum says.
“You never said anything about that!” Debbie says, suddenly furious. “I only went to Madame Tussauds because you wanted to!”
“We all wanted to,” Steve says, in that voice he uses when he’s trying to calm her down.
“I’d rather have gone on the London Eye,” Debbie says, close to tears. It was going to be the highlight of the trip.
Steve holds up his hands, as if to show there’s nothing he can do.
“At least there’s the solar eclipse tomorrow,” Mum says in a comforting voice. “That’ll be nice.”
“We didn’t need to come to London to see that,” Debbie spits. “We could’ve watched it in Leeds.”
Steve decides Primrose Hill will be a good place to watch the eclipse. They hurry to get there on time, and in the end arrive 20 minutes early. Groups of people are hanging around in the park holding special protective glasses. Steve finds a spot he’s happy with and hands Debbie and Mum their glasses. He bought them from a man on the street after deciding the ones in the shops were too expensive.
“Are you sure these are OK?” Mum asks, examining the glasses. “They look a bit flimsy.”
“The bloke said they’re good quality,” Steve replies.
Debbie puts on her glasses, which do feel flimsy. Everything is dark with them on. She stares up at the sun, which is just a white circle. Debbie doesn’t really trust the glasses to protect her eyes, so she looks away after a couple of seconds. Mum told her she could damage her eyes if she looks at the sun directly. Her Dad would have made sure to buy proper glasses.
Debbie takes off her glasses while they wait. Steve checks the time on his smartwatch every couple of minutes. It’s hot in the sun and there’s no shade. Steve explains, yet again, how the Moon is going to pass between the Sun and the Earth. Debbie wishes he would stop talking.
Eventually the sunlight starts to dim. There’s a wave of “oohs” around the park. “Here we go,” Steve says. He swaps his Oakleys for the protective glasses. Debbie and Mum put on theirs as well.
Debbie stares at the white circle. A black sliver intrudes from the right and grows slowly bigger, a circle within the circle, until it almost blots out the sun. Steve taps Debbie on the arm. “Take off your glasses for a second and look at the park.”
Debbie looks away from the sun and removes her glasses. The light is dim, as if it’s halfway between day and night. It’s the strangest thing she’s ever seen. She takes hold of Mum’s hand. “This is really creepy.”
Mum squeezes her hand. “It’ll be over soon.”
Holding on to her mother’s hand, Debbie takes another look at the sun – the black circle is slipping off to the left now – then remembers she’s not supposed to do that. She releases Mum’s hand and puts on her glasses again. The shadow disappears and the circle is whole once more. People clap.
Debbie, Steve and Mum take off their glasses and look at each other.
“Pretty good for a free event,” Debbie says.
Debbie’s head has been hurting all afternoon, but by the time they get to McDonalds it’s really bad. As they wait in the queue, she realises she can’t read the writing on the menu behind the counter.
“I can’t see properly, Mum,” she says. “Everything’s blurry.”
“That bloody eclipse,” Mum says to Steve.
“But she was wearing the protective glasses, Evelyn.”
“They probably didn’t work,” Mum says, peering into Debbie’s eyes. “You shouldn’t have bought them from some random guy on the street.”
“Am I going to go blind?” Debbie asks anxiously, remembering the warning about looking at the sun.
“You’re not going to go blind,” Mum says. “We’ll take you to the doctor. They’ll make sure you’re OK.”
“Where are we going to find –” Steve begins, but stops when Mum looks at him.
They have to wait more than two hours in Accident & Emergency before a nurse calls them through. A doctor examines Debbie’s eyes with a special torch. “I don’t think there’s any lasting damage,” she says. “You’ve probably strained your eyes a little. They should be back to normal by tomorrow.”
Mum gives Debbie a hug. Steve rubs her arm. Debbie wonders why he’s touching her, then sees his relieved expression and realises he was worried.
The next day is their last full one in London. They’re supposed to be going to the British Museum, one of Steve’s free attractions. But when they’re having breakfast in the Premier Inn basement, Steve tells Debbie there’s been a change of plan.
“What are we doing instead?” Debbie asks, hoping Steve won’t say they’re going home early to save money. Her head still feels a bit sore, but her eyes seem OK again.
Steve holds up his phone. There’s a barcode on the screen. “I’ve got you and your mum tickets for the London Eye,” he announces. “As a treat. Seeing it’s the last day.”
“It was all Steve’s idea.” Mum smiles as she lays her hand on Steve’s arm.
“But what about your budget?” Debbie asks.
“It looks like I have a new client. So we can afford to spend a bit extra.”
Steve leans over and gives Mum a kiss on the cheek, then winks at Debbie. Maybe he’s not so bad, Debbie thinks.
The sun comes out as they reach the front of the queue for the London Eye. Mum holds Debbie’s hand as they step into the moving compartment. They find spots next to the glass wall and wave at Steve as they rise into the air. Soon he’s so tiny Debbie can’t make him out in the crowd. She feels guilty that he can’t go on the London Eye with them. But it’s nice to be doing something just with Mum again.
Mum points out landmarks. Debbie identifies Big Ben by herself and feels pleased. The cars on the bridges seem impossibly small. Most of all, she’s fascinated by the sunlight glinting on the river. It’s strange to imagine the Sun being blotted out by the Moon.
Mum’s going on about which buildings she recognises. It’s getting a bit boring. Debbie remembers how in Blackpool Mum kept telling her the same stories about going to the beach with her parents when she was little. If Steve was here, Mum and him would be talking, and she could have some peace to look out the window.
Steve’s waiting for them when they get out at the bottom. “How was it?” he asks.
“Cool,” Debbie says.
Steve holds out a paper bag. “I got you a little present.” Debbie takes it, thinking it’s probably maths flash cards or something. But when she opens the bag, it’s the kaleidoscopic lens she wanted. She looks at him in surprise.
“I went back to Madame Tussauds this morning,” Steve says. Mum’s beaming, and Debbie realises she knew.
“Thank you.”
Steve asks Debbie if she’ll take a photo of him and Mum with the London Eye in the background. But when Debbie gets into position, an old American woman wearing a floppy sun hat tied under her chin offers to take a picture of the three of them. “You’re such a lovely family.”
Mum and Steve look at Debbie. She shrugs. “Why not.”
Debbie shows the American woman how to use her phone, then stands in the middle between Mum and Steve. Mum puts her arm around her as the woman prepares to take the picture. Debbie wonders if she should ask the woman to use the special lens, then decides against it. She’d rather have a proper photo of the three of them together.
Why does he have to be so annoying, Debbie thinks. Just because he’s living with them doesn’t make him her dad. “Of course,” she says, without looking up from her phone. Her physics teacher talked about nothing else this week, but she can’t be bothered telling him that.
“Can we watch it?” Mum says, looking up from her book.
“It says we need special glasses. But I’m sure we can get hold of some.” Steve opens up a new window on his computer. “By the way, Debbie, could you come over here for a second?” He’s using that special calm voice that means they’re going to have one of their Little Talks. Debbie puts down her phone and goes over. She hates the desk with the PC and two monitors that Steve installed in the living room when he moved in three months ago. He says he needs the computer for his IT business, but it takes up so much space.
Steve points to the screen. Another one of his famous spreadsheets. “I’ve made a budget for our trip to London. I thought we could look at it together.” He always wants to include her in these conversations, but Debbie wishes the adults would just decide things. Most of the time Steve already knows what he wants to do. It was better when it was only her and Mum, and they made decisions together.
He runs his finger along the columns of numbers. “So you have the Tower of London, the London Eye and Madame Tussauds on your list,” Steve says. “The tickets are around 30 pounds each. We can’t afford to do all three, but you can choose two things.”
Debbie feels a twinge of guilt. The TikTok videos she watched made the attractions sound cool, but didn’t say anything about prices. She knows Mum doesn’t earn that much in her job at the council and they have to be careful, now that Dad’s not around. At the same time, she doesn’t understand why Steve is so fixated on saving money when he always has plenty to spend on his gadgets. Or why he gets to be in charge of the trip budget.
Mum comes over to look at the screen. “Are they really charging 30 pounds for the London Eye? It’s a glorified Ferris wheel.”
“Daylight robbery,” Steve says.
Debbie has an idea. “Maybe I could do some things with Mum. Then we’d only need two tickets.”
“This is our first trip as a family,” Steve says. “We’re going to do everything together.”
You living with Mum doesn’t make us a family, Debbie thinks. They were already a family before, when it was the two of them. She wishes it was her and Mum going to London by themselves. They had so much fun that time they went to Blackpool after Mum and Dad got divorced, eating chips on the beach and lying awake in the dark chatting in their twin beds.
Steve’s waiting to see what she chooses. She wasn’t that bothered about going on the London Eye. But now that Steve has said it’s daylight robbery, she wants to. “I suppose we can do the Tower of London and the London Eye and skip Madame Tussauds,” she says.
“Fine,” Steve says, putting a line through “Madame Tussauds” in his spreadsheet.
“I was looking forward to Madame Tussauds,” Mum says. “Are you sure we can’t do all three?”
Steve gives her a look. “We’ve been over this, Evelyn. We need to keep an eye on our finances, now that interest rates have gone up and my business is slow.”
Mum doesn’t say anything, which is just like her. Debbie wishes she would stand up for herself more.
“At least the solar eclipse is free,” Debbie says. “Or do we need tickets for that too?”
It’s the first full day of their London trip. At the Tower of London, they wait for an hour to see the Crown Jewels, then get whisked past them on a moving walkway in a few seconds. Steve’s grumpy because he isn’t allowed to take photos. They have lunch at Pizza Express, where they bicker over what to get, with Steve going on about his budget and wanting to share a margherita. He gets annoyed when Debbie orders a funghi di bosco for herself. They take the Tube to Regent’s Park, which is on Steve’s list of free attractions, and wander around. Debbie doesn’t understand what the fuss is about. It’s just a big park, no better than the ones in Leeds. When it starts to drizzle, they decide to head back to the Premier Inn, as no one has a better idea.
The rain gets heavier until the drops bounce off the pavement. They try to shelter in a doorway but it doesn’t offer any protection. Debbie wishes they’d never come to London. Then she spots a familiar logo on a nearby building. “Look.”
“Madame Tussauds,” Mum says. “That was on your list, wasn’t it?”
“Can we go in?” Debbie asks.
“It’s so miserable out here,” Mum says.
Steve checks his smartwatch, then nods his head. “Yeah. OK. Why not.”
They rush inside the building, grateful to be out of the rain. Steve buys three tickets and they go into the exhibition. But it’s not as cool as it looked on TikTok. It’s just a bunch of wax figures in different scenes. Half of them don’t even resemble the people they’re supposed to be. But Steve and Mum are like a couple of kids, getting excited when they recognise celebrities. Mum slips her arm around Steve’s waist as they walk through the rooms. Debbie lags behind so nobody will know they’re together. Steve insists on telling her who the figures are, even though she knows most of them already. She’s sure she’d be having more fun if it was her and Mum together, without Steve getting in the way all the time.
“Let’s ask someone to take a photo of the three of us with the Royal Family,” Mum says.
“No way,” Debbie says. Then, seeing Mum’s face fall, she adds: “I can take a picture of you two if you like.”
After that, they keep asking Debbie to take pictures of the two of them. Steve and Mum with Shrek. Steve and Mum with David Beckham. Steve and Mum with Darth Vader.
The gift shop is the most interesting part. Debbie finds a kaleidoscopic lens that fits onto a phone. None of her friends has got one. She thinks how cool her London photos would be if she took them with the lens.
“Can you get this for me?” she asks Mum.
Mum looks at the price. “Fifteen pounds? That’s what you have pocket money for.”
Debbie has 20 pounds holiday money in her purse. But she doesn’t want to spend three-quarters of that in one go. She puts the lens back on the shelf without making eye contact with Mum. If it was just the two of them, Mum would have bought it for her. All this stuff about pocket money is Steve’s influence.
Later, they sit on a bench in the square near the Premier Inn, eating the Tesco sandwiches they got for dinner. The rain has finally stopped and the sun has come out from behind the clouds. Everyone is quiet as they eat their sandwiches. Debbie finds the silence awkward. “I’m looking forward to going on the London Eye,” she says.
“Oh,” Steve says.
“What?” asks Mum, her tone sharp.
Steve rubs his mouth with his hand. “Well, we can’t go on the London Eye now. We went to Madame Tussauds instead. We have to reorganise our budget.”
“Oh, Steven,” Mum says.
“You never said anything about that!” Debbie says, suddenly furious. “I only went to Madame Tussauds because you wanted to!”
“We all wanted to,” Steve says, in that voice he uses when he’s trying to calm her down.
“I’d rather have gone on the London Eye,” Debbie says, close to tears. It was going to be the highlight of the trip.
Steve holds up his hands, as if to show there’s nothing he can do.
“At least there’s the solar eclipse tomorrow,” Mum says in a comforting voice. “That’ll be nice.”
“We didn’t need to come to London to see that,” Debbie spits. “We could’ve watched it in Leeds.”
Steve decides Primrose Hill will be a good place to watch the eclipse. They hurry to get there on time, and in the end arrive 20 minutes early. Groups of people are hanging around in the park holding special protective glasses. Steve finds a spot he’s happy with and hands Debbie and Mum their glasses. He bought them from a man on the street after deciding the ones in the shops were too expensive.
“Are you sure these are OK?” Mum asks, examining the glasses. “They look a bit flimsy.”
“The bloke said they’re good quality,” Steve replies.
Debbie puts on her glasses, which do feel flimsy. Everything is dark with them on. She stares up at the sun, which is just a white circle. Debbie doesn’t really trust the glasses to protect her eyes, so she looks away after a couple of seconds. Mum told her she could damage her eyes if she looks at the sun directly. Her Dad would have made sure to buy proper glasses.
Debbie takes off her glasses while they wait. Steve checks the time on his smartwatch every couple of minutes. It’s hot in the sun and there’s no shade. Steve explains, yet again, how the Moon is going to pass between the Sun and the Earth. Debbie wishes he would stop talking.
Eventually the sunlight starts to dim. There’s a wave of “oohs” around the park. “Here we go,” Steve says. He swaps his Oakleys for the protective glasses. Debbie and Mum put on theirs as well.
Debbie stares at the white circle. A black sliver intrudes from the right and grows slowly bigger, a circle within the circle, until it almost blots out the sun. Steve taps Debbie on the arm. “Take off your glasses for a second and look at the park.”
Debbie looks away from the sun and removes her glasses. The light is dim, as if it’s halfway between day and night. It’s the strangest thing she’s ever seen. She takes hold of Mum’s hand. “This is really creepy.”
Mum squeezes her hand. “It’ll be over soon.”
Holding on to her mother’s hand, Debbie takes another look at the sun – the black circle is slipping off to the left now – then remembers she’s not supposed to do that. She releases Mum’s hand and puts on her glasses again. The shadow disappears and the circle is whole once more. People clap.
Debbie, Steve and Mum take off their glasses and look at each other.
“Pretty good for a free event,” Debbie says.
Debbie’s head has been hurting all afternoon, but by the time they get to McDonalds it’s really bad. As they wait in the queue, she realises she can’t read the writing on the menu behind the counter.
“I can’t see properly, Mum,” she says. “Everything’s blurry.”
“That bloody eclipse,” Mum says to Steve.
“But she was wearing the protective glasses, Evelyn.”
“They probably didn’t work,” Mum says, peering into Debbie’s eyes. “You shouldn’t have bought them from some random guy on the street.”
“Am I going to go blind?” Debbie asks anxiously, remembering the warning about looking at the sun.
“You’re not going to go blind,” Mum says. “We’ll take you to the doctor. They’ll make sure you’re OK.”
“Where are we going to find –” Steve begins, but stops when Mum looks at him.
They have to wait more than two hours in Accident & Emergency before a nurse calls them through. A doctor examines Debbie’s eyes with a special torch. “I don’t think there’s any lasting damage,” she says. “You’ve probably strained your eyes a little. They should be back to normal by tomorrow.”
Mum gives Debbie a hug. Steve rubs her arm. Debbie wonders why he’s touching her, then sees his relieved expression and realises he was worried.
The next day is their last full one in London. They’re supposed to be going to the British Museum, one of Steve’s free attractions. But when they’re having breakfast in the Premier Inn basement, Steve tells Debbie there’s been a change of plan.
“What are we doing instead?” Debbie asks, hoping Steve won’t say they’re going home early to save money. Her head still feels a bit sore, but her eyes seem OK again.
Steve holds up his phone. There’s a barcode on the screen. “I’ve got you and your mum tickets for the London Eye,” he announces. “As a treat. Seeing it’s the last day.”
“It was all Steve’s idea.” Mum smiles as she lays her hand on Steve’s arm.
“But what about your budget?” Debbie asks.
“It looks like I have a new client. So we can afford to spend a bit extra.”
Steve leans over and gives Mum a kiss on the cheek, then winks at Debbie. Maybe he’s not so bad, Debbie thinks.
The sun comes out as they reach the front of the queue for the London Eye. Mum holds Debbie’s hand as they step into the moving compartment. They find spots next to the glass wall and wave at Steve as they rise into the air. Soon he’s so tiny Debbie can’t make him out in the crowd. She feels guilty that he can’t go on the London Eye with them. But it’s nice to be doing something just with Mum again.
Mum points out landmarks. Debbie identifies Big Ben by herself and feels pleased. The cars on the bridges seem impossibly small. Most of all, she’s fascinated by the sunlight glinting on the river. It’s strange to imagine the Sun being blotted out by the Moon.
Mum’s going on about which buildings she recognises. It’s getting a bit boring. Debbie remembers how in Blackpool Mum kept telling her the same stories about going to the beach with her parents when she was little. If Steve was here, Mum and him would be talking, and she could have some peace to look out the window.
Steve’s waiting for them when they get out at the bottom. “How was it?” he asks.
“Cool,” Debbie says.
Steve holds out a paper bag. “I got you a little present.” Debbie takes it, thinking it’s probably maths flash cards or something. But when she opens the bag, it’s the kaleidoscopic lens she wanted. She looks at him in surprise.
“I went back to Madame Tussauds this morning,” Steve says. Mum’s beaming, and Debbie realises she knew.
“Thank you.”
Steve asks Debbie if she’ll take a photo of him and Mum with the London Eye in the background. But when Debbie gets into position, an old American woman wearing a floppy sun hat tied under her chin offers to take a picture of the three of them. “You’re such a lovely family.”
Mum and Steve look at Debbie. She shrugs. “Why not.”
Debbie shows the American woman how to use her phone, then stands in the middle between Mum and Steve. Mum puts her arm around her as the woman prepares to take the picture. Debbie wonders if she should ask the woman to use the special lens, then decides against it. She’d rather have a proper photo of the three of them together.
Daniel Addercouth grew up on a remote farm in the north of Scotland but now lives in Berlin, Germany. His work has appeared in New Flash Fiction Review, trampset and Vestal Review, among other places. His story “The Good Prizes” is featured in Best Small Fictions 2024. You can find him on X at @RuralUnease.
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Author’s Note:
I find it interesting how a decision made at the level of language can sometimes affect plot. Originally I had Debbie going on holiday with her two parents, but I found the constant references to “Debbie’s mum” and “Debbie’s dad” very repetitive. Then I had the idea of them going away with the mum’s new boyfriend, which would allow me to just use his name. And so the focus of the story shifted to the tension between Debbie and Steve as the family takes their first holiday together under the new constellation.
Sometimes I use writing as a way of working through my own issues. Although the character of Steve is absolutely not based on myself, I do find myself fretting about the budget sometimes when I’m on holiday. It was quite therapeutic to address that in a story and see how annoying it was for the other characters.
It was important for me to get the character of Debbie right, as the central figure in the story. I wanted to capture that sense of a teenager who often craves independence but sometimes also needs to be protected, like when she hurts her eyes. I also wanted to convey how funny teenagers can be; I especially enjoyed writing Debbie’s caustic little ripostes to Steve.