WEAK END

It is Sunday night 11.30pm and Rachel knocks on my bedroom door and comes in.

"There's something wrong with Dad" she says anxiously

I get out of bed and follow her and Lara who is awake by then to the bathroom where Rod is kneeling in front of the toilet bowl throwing up.

"Are you ok?" I ask

"SHUT THE DOOR WILL YOU?" He shouts and I do.

We all shrug our shoulders and go back to our beds. After a while he comes into the bedroom and goes to brush his teeth in the en suite.

"It was those prawns that were left over from Sarah's Holy Communion Buffet yesterday. I ate loads of them today and I think they were gone off" he says taking his pillow from the bed.

"I'm going to sleep on the couch downstairs in case I get sick again" he says as he leaves the room.

I fall back asleep thinking of the side plate full of prawns I ate today too and after about one hour I wake back up. BECAUSE I FEEL SICK. So I rush to the en suite and offload all I'd eaten and drank that day. I brush my teeth and go back to bed.

15 minutes later Sarah comes into the bedroom crying. SHE FEELS SICK. AND SHE IS. AND IT'S ALL OVER HER HAIR, AND ME and I clean her up and put her into the bed beside me and we go back to sleep.

In the morning I put the kids into the shower after me and I blow dry Sarah's hair and curl it and pin it up on top of her head because her class are having a party to celebrate having made their Holy Communion and she insists on going even though she has stomach cramps. She slips into her Holy Communion dress just as Rod slips back into our bed and I curl Audrey's hair so she doesn't feel left out.

Rod feels too weak to go to work and goes back to sleep while I bring the kids to school.

I drive to Dunlaoighre to put my painting of Marilyn in the gallery there to replace one I've sold and when I get back he's still in bed and Lara is drinking soup. She's not at school as she has an appointment with the Doctor at 2.45pm because of stomach cramps she has had these past two weeks.

I stand in the kitchen and think.

THIS IS A PRETTY SICK DAY.