CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: Barbecue
The plan was to thank as many people as possible that had helped Tommy/Bob in the last three weeks. Despite the short notice, most of his new friends responded positively to the invitation with their intention to attend a barbecue at the Morris residence on Saturday evening.
New friends. Everyone who was coming was a new friend to Tommy, except, of course, his Mum. Everyone else knew him as Bob, a person he still did not recognise.
The only thing worrying Tommy more than the very idea of having a barbecue at this late time of the year was that the old Bob was apparently an acknowledged expert at outdoor cooking. He had catered for large numbers on countless camping expeditions, using all kinds of equipment from highly sophisticated to simple open fires and a few sticks for utensils. At home, he had built a barbecue grill in the garden to a high specification. The family possessed several gas patio heaters, which also served to supplement the lighting, and an awning attached to the conservatory, which could be easily erected to keep out rain from above and wind from the side. From the investment involved, Bob clearly entertained in the garden a lot.
Jennifer had shown him where everything was kept, in the commodious shed, where he noticed that Bob had kept all the equipment and utensils meticulously spotless. Tommy was able to see where everything fitted, but as far as he could remember, the 23-year-old Tommy had never even boiled an egg. His mother had always cooked at home and Sally had prepared very basic meals in the tiny galley kitchen at the flat where they briefly resided early in his marriage. Tommy had never even toasted bread by an open fire before. Phoebe had said that with familiar surroundings his memories should come flooding back but so far nothing had risen to the surface after three weeks of living Bob's life.
Tommy finished dressing and joined Jennifer in the kitchen. With Tommy still not confident in his abilities to drive, and yet to be signed off by the doctors in this regard, Jennifer was taking him to the supermarket to select and purchase the food that was going to be required. JJ had helped her Dad with the cooking in the past so she accompanied them too, to help with the provisions.
They had a light lunch after completing the provisions shopping, before Tommy and the boys erected the awning and got the folding chairs and tables out of storage and laid out on the enclosed decking.
"I take it your Dad did a lot of this cooking and entertaining?" Tommy asked the boys, who were clearly proficient at the task.
"Yeah, you did this a lot, Pops," Tig grinned. He thought it was amusing that his Dad spoke of himself as if he was a different person prior to his hospitalisation. Tig had accepted early on that his Dad was different to what he used to be, by a long way. In fact he preferred the cool new dude Pops to the stuffy old one.
Tom was less accepting however, it disturbed him that his Dad, who had been so serious, steady and reliable before, was now jokey, inconsistent and casual about everything. It was disconcerting for him at a time when there was so much insecurity already in his life. Tom was worried about his impending marriage, setting up house with his girlfriend, the coming baby and his tense relationship with his future in-laws. Faced with all that, in the ideal world, he wanted his stable old home life back, including Bob his father, unchanged. He couldn't help wondering how long his parents would stay together, once Dad got his memory back. At the moment it all seemed too fragile to be real.
Tom envied Tig, who apparently accepted whatever happened with the innocence of a child. Even JJ cheerfully clung to her father, assuming that once the shit hit the fan she would simply leave with her Dad if or when he decided to up sticks.
Once the tables and chairs were set out, wiped down, and covered with the gingham tablecloths they had removed from where they were stored, Tommy thanked them for their efforts and dismissed the boys. He got on with assembling the grills and mixing up a couple of barbecue sauce recipes that JJ had sourced for him from the internet.
Like Tig, JJ also seemed to accept the new Dad, loving him just as much as she ever did, even though she now had another male figure in her life, one increasingly occupying her thoughts. That was the reason why JJ wasn't helping Tommy with the grill in the afternoon. Instead she attended a football match that Brick was playing in. She promised her father to be back as soon as dusk fell to dress the tables and assist with the cooking and serving.
Tommy's mother Ann was the first of the guests to arrive, brought as usual by Ralph, an hour or so earlier than expected. She was keen to help with whatever preparation was needed for the party. Jennifer was able to find her something to keep her occupied in the kitchen, while Ralph watched Tommy as he tried to get the charcoal to light.
"Sorry, I'm not au fait with this outdoor cooking malarkey either," Ralph apologised, sucking another mouthful from his bottle of cold beer. "I could only heat up ready meals in the oven or microwave, or would fall back to ordering takeaways. I'm surprised Mike got any nutrition at all while he was growing up."
"Hopefully JJ'll be along soon to help me out. She should be back any time now."
Tommy had one more go at lighting the charcoal and managed to get it to light in one corner. Well, it was a start. Clearly there was a knack to it, which he had yet to acquire.
Ralph was getting to the end of his first bottle of beer, so Tommy pulled a fresh one out of one ice bucket and popped the lid, handing it to the retired policeman. Then he pulled a bottle out of a different bin and took off the lid.
"What are you drinking?" Ralph asked.
"Ginger beer, Ralph," he laughed, "I seem to have lost the taste for beer over the years. I did drink a couple after getting home, once I was off the meds for a few days, but didn't enjoy how they made me feel. Apparently Bob hardly ever drank alcohol. I've not missed it at all."
"Started running again, yet?"
"Yeah," Tommy grinned, "Not long distances yet, and only in daylight. My night vision is still shot, and the doctors say it may never fully recover to the extent it was. So I just jog around the park during the day. I enjoy it, you know. Gives me plenty of time to think."
"Any memories come back, yet?"
"Nothing I can put my finger on, Ralph, really. I get flashes of images, snippets of conversations, sometimes I get both things together. But I can't figure out whether they are real scenes from my life or not. I can't help thinking, are they remembered from movies that I've seen? For example I keep getting sea-borne images with sunsets reflecting off the water and stuff like sailing into port or up estuaries or major rivers. Jen tells me we have been on just three cruises in twenty years, all of them in the Med. I hear people speaking German, which I cannot understand, and Ben told me I was speaking German in a dream just after coming out of my coma. Again Jen says we met lots of Germans on package holidays, but she never saw me in conversation with any of them. Those are insignificant snippets, nothing important. I haven't had one single image of the children being born, for example, and I attended all three of them according to Jen. The brain works in really mysterious ways, Ralph. Or more like, doesn't work at all!"
"You can say that again, Tommy!" Ralph grinned, "Your Mum, though, remembers everything and you coming back from the dead, so to speak, has really given her a boost. You know, Tommy, back when I first knew her," he dropped the sound level of his voice, "All the life had gone out of her and she seemed to live only through Brett. And then even Brett was taken away too, when Sally left these shores for Down Under. Your parents were brought closer together by your loss but I think when Alan died she was starting to give up on life. When Mike and I went round to tell her you had turned up, she really looked frail. But now look at her!"
Just then, Ann, Jennifer and a couple of near neighbours stepped onto the patio, all carrying their drinks from the kitchen. The neighbours waved in greeting to Tommy and settled at one of the tables, close to a patio heater. His Mum walked over to the cooking area and kissed him on the cheek, complimenting him on the house.
"Jen's given you the five bob tour already, Mum?" Tommy grinned.
"She did, Tommy, or Bob is it now?" Ann replied, "It's a lovely house, you should be proud of what you've done here."
"I would be, Mum, if I could remember doing any of it!"
"It looks pretty impressive out here, too, Tommy," Ralph added.
"Bob was really keen on cooking outdoors, everyone tells me. I really don't know what I'm doing. Not sure if I can do justice to this lovely food that the girls have sorted for me. At least the barbecue is hotting up at long last. I should be able to start cooking soon. What do you fancy, Ralph, chicken, gammon steaks, beef steaks or burgers?"
"Steak, through and through, for me, Tommy, very well done if possible," Ralph grinned, pulling another swig from his bottle.
"Chicken for me sweetheart, cooked through but not too crisp, though. Your Dad was always overcooking everything when he ever tried cooking outdoors, if you can call a balcony outdoors! But then we never had a set-up as grand as this."
Ralph and Ann moved away chatting away to each other. Moments later JJ bounced up to the barbecue.
"Sorry I'm late, Dad, I had to wait for Brick to get showered. Boys, they take so long to get ready, what with getting their hair waxed and clothes changed after the match. Honestly, most of my girlfriends get ready quicker than he does! Except maybe Shazza, of course."
"Where is Brick? I er haven't really had a chance to talk to him properly, yet, sweetheart."
