With the exception of Uncle Sam who hanged himself in a hotel room, the preferred method of suicide in my family has been to succumb to the pleasantly numbing qualities of spirits, a destructive flirtation that swiftly degenerates into a scramble for oblivion. Angus consumed prodigious quantities of whisky, shambling down to the shops on pension day to return with a clinking bagful of bottles, tormented by visions of the Devil (Auld Nick) leering malevolently as a reminder that it was only a matter of time before he would rip my Grandfather’s reluctant soul out of his breast and drag it off to his fiery domain. His son, Uncle Ally (my Father’s half brother) similarly sought alcohol-induced solace until he awoke with chronic indigestion. As his GP was on holiday he didn’t want to disturb his locum (I have inherited this typically Scottish working class unwillingness to “bother the doctor” until I am literally on my last legs, an attitude that cost the life of my dear Uncle Ian, whose pale skinny frame was ravaged by pneumonia aged 33), determined to endure the agony over the weekend. The following morning, the main artery into his stomach exploded and he bled to death in front of his eldest son.

Then Uncle Ronnie, the gifted architect whose breath always stank of the finest single malts, who traded both prosperity and success for the stuff, indulging in his other great passion of fly fishing was crossing the suspension bridge over the Schiehallion burn when one of the half-rotted planks gave way under his bulk (his immense belly swelled proudly, straining at the shirt buttons). A rusty wire inflicted a deep gash on his leg, septicaemia set in, his liver so assailed by the drip-feed of peaty intoxicants that it was unable to cope with the infection. A domineering bully, I did not shed any tears over his loss. We shared our holidays with him every year, my parents sleeping in one bedroom with Rory, my Aunt and Uncle with their sons in the other with me in the single bed at the top of the landing where their conversation lulled me to sleep as they played whist.

Ronnie idolised his elder son Martin, whom my brother and I nicknamed “the Vulcan” because he seemed devoid of human warmth or emotion. His skin tone was straight off the embalmer’s table with mannerisms to match; he never did anything spontaneous in our presence, let alone rash and seldom smiled. It did not help that Ronnie pitted Martin against me in competition (in which he invariably came worse off), insidiously poisoning our relationship. His brother Mattie, by contrast, with his chaotic mop of gleaming blond hair, tumbled through the fields, clambering up the den, conquering the precariously balanced stacks of hay bales without fear. Mattie was the youngest, the smallest and, in the cruel hierarchy of childhood, always the loser in the game of tig, kick the can or hide-and-seek. However, being the lightest, when the adults pushed us on the tyre swing he could stretch out his hand and tear fistfuls of ripe black cherries from the branches of the tree, a triumphant grin spreading across his angelic features.

Ronnie treated him abominably, constantly picking on him and blaming him for his brother’s misdeeds. Once at New Year Ronnie and his wife went first-footing, leaving the boys at home unsupervised. Martin, who had been given responsibility for looking after his ten-year-old sibling, plundered the drinks cabinet, downing half a bottle of vodka before puking up and passing out on the living room floor. On arrival back, Ronnie took out his anger and disappointment on Mattie, bellowing as he lashed out at him repeatedly with full force that he must have been at fault for encouraging such uncharacteristic conduct.

Another trauma for Mattie resulting from his Father’s insatiable appetite for exercising power over the subordinate members of his household involved Ronnie’s variation on the fondue. He would melt a three pound block of virulently orange cheddar, chop up tomatoes and force Mattie to eat it until he was physically sick. Walking down the cheese aisle in the supermarket still causes him to shudder.

During his teenage years Mattie often took refuge in our house, where he would crash out on the floor in my brother’s room. Rory’s best friend Spike was another regular visitor and the unluckier of the guests would be assigned the pile of jackets (the more fortunate securing the camp bed, which resembled an elongated deckchair with springs). On what my brother has dubbed The Night of the Japanese Soldier, Mattie’s cheekiness proved his downfall. Having brought in freshly brewed tea for his companions, Rory decided to punish some random and long since forgotten act of insubordination by squirting a mouthful of coffee at him. Mattie responded by launching his entire mug of scalding liquid straight into my brother’s face. Realising that a retaliatory battering was imminent, he locked himself in the bathroom, Rory eventually coaxing him out without waking our parents. Once he could see that Mattie’s guard was lowered, Rory took revenge by gobbing at him, astounded and incensed when Mattie objected to such coarse treatment by responding in kind. His self-preservation instinct having kicked in, our cousin attempted to flee impending chastisement, but was thwarted by the camp bed. At each corner of the fold-down contraption was a hole, though one of which he inadvertently stepped, trapping himself with no possibility of escape. When my Father eventually dragged himself downstairs (he was a light sleeper and had in all likelihood been aware of the disturbance, intervening only when he could tolerate the extraneous noise no longer) he interrupted Rory scolding Mattie, meting out one slap per syllable in a vicious parody of an interrogation in some god-forsaken prison camp.

On another sleep-over Mattie inexplicably submitted to my brother and Spike mummifying him in pink Andrex, five to six sheet deep Rory reassures me, with each leg requiring an entire roll, enough to ensure that he would be pursued by an entire pack of floppy-eared Labrador puppies if the advertising is to be believed. Their painstaking work completed, my brother issued dire threats of a beating coupled with the generous offer of a head start (on a count of three they would come after him). To their great amusement, Mattie, with superhuman effort, managed to struggle out of the front door to seek shelter outdoors. His persecutors raked out a stick from the shed and set off on his trail. Just down the road they spotted him sitting on the neighbour’s wall, smoking a consolatory cigarette, evidently having dismissed the notion that they might actually follow through, the humiliation of appearing before the public gaze swathed in toilet paper quite sufficient to his mind. Their raucous laughter immediately goaded him into cumbersome motion, driving him downhill towards the roundabout. Every time they caught him up, Rory would whack him on the backside, prompting a sudden spurt and more hilarity. Halfway through the estate, noticing that their antics had attracted unwanted attention, they threw their weapon over a fence to avoid being charged with assault as a police car drew up beside them. “What the fuck do you think you are doing?” enquired one of the occupants of the patrol car (this was in the days before officers had been trained in the fine art of addressing members of the public with courtesy). The boys replied that it was all harmless stag-night fun and surely preferable to handcuffing him naked to a lamppost), an explanation which was accepted, however reluctantly. Rory and Spike abandoned their chase, leaving the wretched Mattie whose ears, muffled by their two-ply bandaging, had remained oblivious to the exchange to shuffle off into the orange glow of the street lamps. Approximately half an hour later, he put his head round the door, his trepidation ousted by relief as Rory and Spike released him from his bindings.

The officer in question had crossed paths with my brother before, the latter nicknaming him Bernard due to his striking resemblance to the actor Mr Cribbins. During a stint on a Manpower Services Commission scheme beautifying one of the sprawling public parks, Rory and Spike’s boss had joked with them about how the statue of Prince Albert in a haughty pose with hands on hips looked for all the world like an element was missing. My brother took a notion to correct this deficiency, he and Spike creating a large penis from toilet roll tubes held together by duct tape, two table tennis balls for testicles, with fishing gut through the base. The only problem left for them to rack their brains over was how to secure this proud display of manhood to the monument. Undaunted, my brother devised a solution involving draping one brick (through which the gut would be threaded) over each shoulder. Whilst they were hoisting the adornment into place, PC Bernard’s voice came booming from the vehicle they had been too preoccupied to spot approaching. Fortunately for Rory, the car was not on the main road, but the pathway, giving him time to reduce the hard-on to a shrivelled caricature of its former erect glory. “What’s that piece of paper?” Rory shrugged, “Dunno”. “If the pair of you are not gone by the time I come back I’m lifting you!” So it was that Albert’s smug look was never justified, the token of his masculine prowess ignominiously discarded in the works compound.

Although he performed well in his Highers, Mattie never received the encouragement lavished on his brother to pursue his education further. Dull and steady Martin seemed destined for the civil service (ending up as database manager in a bank), a wife, two children and an adoring mutt with no single speck of dust being permitted to settle on his sideboards in a household run with clinical efficiency. Mattie by contrast had been infected by the restlessness implied by his surname and boarded a flight to New Zealand, putting literally as much distance between himself and his family as humanly possible, surviving as a casual labourer, moving on whenever the risk of settling loomed in the blissful tangle of a lover’s arms. At some unspecified stage during these periodic roamings, he was seduced by his true love, that insatiable mistress from whose tendrils there is no easy extrication, the vine. Over the years he built up a formidable expertise (indulging a little more than was good for him in the practical side of his researches) of wine, which qualified him as the perfect candidate for managing the various off-licences he has taken charge of.

Mattie has never been able to resist the lure of the loch and the soft greens and purples of his native land, turning to Rory for succour and support when the disappointments and inevitable lows overwhelmed him, the well-worn contours of the sofa constantly available to him. Spike would join them and they would go camping almost directly opposite Chamberbhan, the object of longing so close yet out of bounds. The local landowners harbour a fierce dislike of casual tent-pitchers (which, when they spray-paint their names on the silver birches, arguably more humane than carving hearts and initials into the bark to leave a permanent scar, I can empathise with), drawing no distinction between the responsible ones such as my brother who carefully clear away the ashes of the bonfires they light on the shore rather than scorching the tree trunks and grass, leaving no evidence of their sojourn in the form of litter and the less considerate. Some have resorted to drastic dissuasive tactics, such as vandalising the shoreline to a greater extent than those they are bent on excluding ever could by gouging huge holes out of the earth with a digger to leave no space for a stopover. Burning with the righteous indignation of the dispossessed (stoked by booze to that incandescent state where inaction is no longer an option) Mattie, when confronted with a sign haughtily proclaiming its multiple prohibitions “No Camping, No Fires, No Fishing”, decided to demonstrate his disapproval in highly practical fashion by demolishing it. Kicking achieved little, prompting him to snatch the hand axe and start digging to uproot it. Having finally excavated the lump of concrete holding it in place, Mattie dragged it over to what he intended would be its funeral pyre, neglecting in his state of advanced inebriation to let it go as he hurled it into the flames, accompanying it on its final journey. Rory had to drag him out to safety, yet the agent of his misfortune also proved his protectress and he emerged unscathed.

In one of those strange coincidences that gnaw at us with doubt concerning the possibility of inherent meaning, Mattie called my brother in despair at some shattering news just after our arrival at the cottage. He had finally admitted that quelling the bleak recognition of purposelessness with nine bottles of wine a day might be detrimental to his health. His doctor had explained that if he scored one to two on the liver function test it would mean he was a seriously heavy drinker on the verge of dependency, four to eight would classify him as a serious alcoholic. His reading was off the scale and Rory swears he let slip the word “oncologist”. “Why are you so determined to emulate the Father you despised?” A choking sound on the other end of the phone a more eloquent reply than a thousand rhetorical flourishes. There was no argument: he would quit the indifferent surroundings of Brighton and soak up the tranquillity of the shore in the company of those who loved and appreciated him with all his flaws rather than for what he could provide. He also vowed to begin the agonising process of cutting back under Rory’s watchful eye.

Afflicted by the same destructive self-loathing, a curse not unique to our family, yet one which has impelled so many of us to premature demise, I instructed him to help himself to the cans of Tennents (ordinary strength), which we traditionally buy for G, politely ignoring the tremble of his hands as he dealt out the cards for our game of whist.

He and Rory set up their rods, my brother catching three perch (one of which he was able to release as it has not swallowed the hook), Mattie a medium pike, which he gutted and salted with consummate skill, kindly leaving it in the fridge for the Hungarian to use as a base for fish soup. Privately, Rory remarked on how subdued he was, not launching into the customary deliberate provocations to push away anyone who might otherwise stray close enough to convince him that in spite of the blank and intimidating futility there might still be reasons worth lingering for.

In the fading light, Mattie pitched his tent between the empty cottage and the secret garden (the fluctuating water levels in the loch, dictated by electricity generation needs, would haunt the sleep of anyone camping on the shore, the unnatural rising tide more than any groundsheet could withstand) and he, Young George and I stood signalling with the beam of the large torch that took a day to charge yet which (frustratingly) ran out of power almost instantly to the current occupants of the unofficial site on the other side, lamenting our lack of knowledge of Morse code. From the gloom to our left came an unearthly rasping sound, which Mattie reassured us came from no more menacing a source than a stag. We joked about that mythical beast the “kohachle” (a spelling based on my Father’s pronunciation), part man, part deer lurking in the depths of the woods to abduct naughty children refusing to pay heed to their parents’ summons to be tucked into bed. When, however, our ears were again assailed – from closer proximity – by a strangled cry evoking images of axe-wielding maniacs from the goriest of low-budget horror flicks even Mattie was spooked and we retreated to the safety of our temporary home. I absolutely forbade him from spending the night in the tent and he graciously accepted the offer of one of the bunks in the children’s bedroom. After a few rounds of whist, he mustered enough courage to venture outside for a cigarette. “If I’m not back in five minutes…” a sentence which G uncharitably completed “…we’ll lock the door!”

In the diffident morning sunshine, Mattie sipped coffee from the flask, peering over at the rusted corrugated iron roof for marks of the youthful contests with his brother firing air gun pellets at the chimney, physical proof of past residence. Setting off on one final bittersweet survey of our childhood domain, he visited the swing hanging from the ancient cherry bough, no longer a defunct tractor tyre with a cushion pillaged from the sitting room to stop the rubber digging into tender skin, the ferns snaking along the course of the burn, the gap between the barn and the abandoned cottage across which the rats leapt frantically, terrified by the thunder of low-flying military jets, the former dwelling where the Old Bull would stare forlorn from his confinement at the fields he had grazed in, damp nostrils snorting as we scurried past, awed by his strength, down to the bench, green paint peeling in the spot where his Mother and mine would spread their blanket and distract themselves from the mundane tasks of later hours with tales of adversity overcome and romance whilst we paddled in the freezing water.

If only the warmth of my parting embrace could suffice to save him, to banish the impulse that likewise corrodes my soul. Come back, little cousin, to the one place that can pierce through the layers of abjection, come back to those who remember your childish fury and the ghost of a smile on your lips.

The Greylag geese strutted officiously around in the back field amongst the newly shorn sheep as I filled the kettle, retrieving an individual filter from the silver vacuum pack. Both bedroom doors were open onto the landing and I had switched off the light that had burnt lonely, protective, all night (electricity and sundry bills included in the cost of renting the cottage), questioning the wisdom of recounting the tales of the taciturn visitor (the irony being that he unfailingly appeared in the early morning, lingering just long enough to smoke his pipe before the sway of the tall grass and the cold barrenness of the empty barn impinged upon such comfort). The Hungarian’s snore did not travel the length of the extension into the old cottage and I unlocked the conservatory door to take my place on the green bench and watch the blue tits and finches do the rounds of the empty feeders, bored of insect prey.

I had already determined that today would be the one opportunity during the stay, either that or the next occasion on which I would see him would be once he had been laid out in his coffin, the Balmoral, having promised that I would not spend more on his than I had on my mother’s. The weeks somehow slipped by, never picking up the phone in spite of having resolved to do so whenever an event of slightly greater significance occurred. At the weekend, yes, but somehow once the weekend arrived it remained a mere intention. I had resolved never to set foot in the shared dwelling, as this might imply endorsement. No memories resided there. The music blaring out of our competing stereos (Rory was into Madness, whereas I had been seduced by the New Romantics) had not seeped into its bricks, the desolate peal of the Academy bell did not intrude through the kitchen window, it was as blank and meaningless as the concept of their relationship. I abhor compromise.

I did not wish to warn them of our impending arrival, as this might unwittingly provide her with sufficient time to invent some excuse or “remember” a prior commitment. Even with Fancsi and G combating their travel sickness by surrendering to sleep, the tension during the journey was palpable, manifesting itself in more frequent than usual stops to avail myself of the roadside facilities. The Hungarian has likewise nurtured a deep antipathy towards her since she attempted to deny all knowledge of his existence as he attempted to persuade her to pass the phone to my Father (keeping her new husband firmly in his place by never, ever permitting him to answer the phone, it is her house, after all, and he is there by virtue of her generosity and indulgence). Had he not adopted a more than persistent tone she would simply have hung up on him (though, refreshingly uncontaminated by timid British politeness, such a response would have rebounded on her, as the Hungarian is especially tenacious when riled). Nor did the snub represented by the conspicuously empty top table seat at the wedding with her nameplate and the individual gift box of Cornet Port-Royal endear her to him.

Three hours of narrow roads winding through rain-misted valleys and distilleries and we approached our destination. A handful of drab streets in the typical Scottish council house style, white paint succumbing to the relentless assaults of briny air and gales. The designated parking space unoccupied, but the Hungarian returned from his scout to report that washing had been pegged along the line, from which we could deduce that they were unlikely to have departed on a holiday or even a day excursion given the imminent threat of a downpour. As we drove to Buckie in search of sustenance I reflected on the story my brother had recounted concerning their car, purchased on the basis of a mobility allowance, yet she was extracting payments from him for it, instalment after instalment. Even the Devil himself could not have devised a more exquisitely excruciating punishment for a man who had squandered every penny on used cars, none of which he could bear to keep for more than six months.

We walked the length of the main street before settling on the inhospitably plastic-looking chippie (Emma’s tearoom would have been my preference, but I had no desire to dissipate my energies on a minor skirmish), which possessed greater charm than anticipated and I lapsed back into my native habits with a traditional fish tea (haddock, chips, pot of the beverage, bread and butter) of the kind I had last eaten in Dundee, served by a no-nonsense waitress in black uniform complete with gleaming apron and thinning white hair. G reiterated his disgust at the newspaper clipping my father had saved for us. Whether it should have won the award for the greatest number of factual inaccuracies per line or for the most groanworthy puns had never been satisfactorily resolved (“love at first site” and “they just clicked” being but two examples in the snippet recording their Internet romance).

As I sipped my still scalding tea, G and Fancsi headed for the shore (like so many of his compatriots the Hungarian too is unable to resist the lure of the sea, enchanted both by its vastness and unaccustomed capriciousness) beachcombing amongst the jagged rocks near the fish processing plants that constitute the town’s livelihood and permeate its air. Huge posters proclaiming Jesus’ love evangelically looked out of place in an environment so utterly devoid of tenderness (yet an unmistakable and unsanitised whiff of brimstone clung to every word beneath the message of salvation – embrace Him, or else burn, burn, burn for all eternity). A pair of wellies washed up on an earlier tide and a few shells to slip into the pocket and take back home, nothing remarkable.

Upon return the blue Renault indicated their presence and I dispatched the Hungarian to ring the doorbell. My Father invited us in, forcing me to abandon any notion of enticing him to neutral ground. Zs first, then Fancsi and G. She sat in an armchair, dressed in a turquoise lounge suit. “Pleased to meet you,” she greeted the children, this sparse formula more than adequate for her to convey the utmost insincerity. As soon as she set eyes on me, however, her unsmiling, wart-spattered face assumed a curdled expression of undiluted contempt. I proceeded straight to the kitchen, grateful to my Father for the temporary escape of his offer of a cup of tea. What struck me immediately about the flat was how tiny it was compared to the home he had left behind. No unshared, private space, just the cramped kitchen, living room, bathroom and bedroom. Barely enough floor for a single mattress. Hence the caravan squatting in the back garden for her children and grandchildren (she had assumed that she would be spared the unpleasantness and inconvenience of our visiting in my case because we live abroad, in my brother’s because the petrol would devour too substantial a proportion of the fortnightly budget).

I braced myself when the inevitable could no longer be postponed, but she had already scuttled off into the bedroom having sensed (quite correctly) that her presence was unwanted. A few paltry tokens of the past decorated the walls – his Korean veterans commemorative plate, a photograph of my brother’s children sent by my Aunt as it showed them alongside her granddaughter.

Soon afterwards, she slipped out through the front door to take refuge in the caravan, scrupulously avoiding any contact with us (it would have been quicker and easier for her to walk past us into the kitchen and through the back door, but that would have necessitated the risk of having to acknowledge my existence, even worse of having to exchange a few platitudes to maintain a pretence of politeness). Part of our antipathy towards her stems from her pathological possessiveness, her desperate efforts to isolate him, to erase every vestige of our involvement in his life, to expunge us even from memory. His Red Cross uniform has fallen victim to the purge, banished to the car ostensibly because it takes up too much room, a more plausible reason being that it symbolises an activity outwith her control (or participation) and, more unpalatably for her, one which he engaged in long before they met (and hence tainted by association with my Mother). As long as we are nothing to her, as long as we remain but an abstraction, she can absolve herself of any responsibility and casually dismiss the idea of having caused any pain. The abruptness with which we had shattered this illusion of her boundless ability to manipulate no doubt went some way towards explaining the reception she gave us.

As G later remarked, he had not changed in the slightest, as if the year and a half that had elapsed, even the clothes he wore were the same. He had been out walking Sammy the dog, adopted from his previous owners when he grew too boisterous for them to handle. My impression was that the animal has proven a better, more attentive and loving companion to him (after the loss of Tighson the Border collie he had sworn never to find a replacement, yet another source of bitterness to my brother, who recalled my Mother’s complaints of loneliness that could perhaps have been alleviated by a pet) than his new wife. Sammy’s unflagging eagerness to retrieve his rubber ball prevented the silences from becoming too awkward.

Breaking her self-imposed exile in the caravan, we heard her boil the kettle and stir the tea, interrupting the flow of conversation. Again, she retreated without putting her head round the door. I deflected any serious discussion of sensitive topics, such as G’s future as I was in no mood to talk about any issues of substance with her hovering in the background. Similarly, when we enquired as to whether he was flourishing in his new environment his reply was diffident. He told us that he leaves the bedroom window open every night as he finds the sound of the sea battering against the defences soothing. In spite of all her endeavours, his old surroundings were still on his mind: he informed us that our former neighbour Tam (the Bam) had suffered a stroke and was no longer able to drive. None of us knew whether the new occupants of our former home had demolished the Berlin Wall (as we referred to the tall wooden boards my Father had erected rather than putting up with his prying and general unpleasantness – he has always eschewed open conflict and this was the ultimate cop-out).

As I listened I thought of how he had resolved to spare me the pain of clearing away my possessions and his even before my Mother died, a gradual severing. When I left for university he decided to throw out all of my old toys, books and records, my Mother every bit as stubborn in spiriting away to the boley hole the ones she knew I loved best (which are now stored in my attic here). The process has long since been completed with my custodianship of the precious scraps of paper with my Grandfather’s writings alongside the love letters sent during the months when my Father was stationed in Germany before being shipped off to Korea (her side of the correspondence has not survived), when the dread that she might abandon him for a rival constantly agitated him.

Having eased the front door closed unnoticed, the movement of the bedroom door alerted me to her return. Leaving it half open to eavesdrop proved a most effective method of censorship. It saddened me that my access to him would from now on be limited by the whims of a hostile stranger. That the intimacy of our home was lost, that a certain uneasy formality would henceforth inhibit display of deeply felt affection merely as a result of the setting. This painful realisation was mitigated by the knowledge that her power does not extend to eradicating the past. Her flimsy association cannot wipe away the decades we spent together and no amount of jealousy can dissolve the bond between father and daughter.

It was raining lightly as he accompanied us to the car and we wound down the windows to wave. I could just make out her shadow behind the curtain once we had withdrawn to a safe distance. His voice choked slightly as he reminded G that he was welcome to spend his entire summer in the caravan, knowing (though not openly acknowledging) that as long as it would be on her terms and on her territory his grandson would never accept.

As we passed the entrance to the street he was still there alone against the concrete backdrop. My residual anger had subsided, confronting me with the impossibility of spending anything like the amount of time with him that I otherwise would have. My brother and I had whispered cathartically that scattering our Mother’s ashes on the shore would be more appropriate than carrying her to the peak of Schiehallion, mingling her remains with his in one final union.  Now it seemed like cruelty even to contemplate separating them in such a petty and childishly spiteful act of retaliation.  My Daddy, who gave me cuddy-backs, who rattled his dentures to play the Lone Ranger theme, who pulled his cardigan over his head and rolled his solitary eye in its socket, lurching forward to send us shrieking upstairs fleeing from the monster, was torn from view, leaving me with that visceral, searing love that, if you approach it too closely, singes your eyebrows like a public bonfire on Guy Fawkes Night.