Feast! Pure Slush Vol. 9 by Susan Tepper & Gill Hoffs & Kyle Hemmings & Matt Potter & Andrew Stancek & Gloria Garfunkel & Walter Giersbach & Michael Webb & Cindy Matthews & Desmond Fox

Author:Susan Tepper & Gill Hoffs & Kyle Hemmings & Matt Potter & Andrew Stancek & Gloria Garfunkel & Walter Giersbach & Michael Webb & Cindy Matthews & Desmond Fox [Tepper, Susan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pure Slush Books
Published: 2015-03-31T21:00:00+00:00

4.30pm

a suburb of Manchester, northern England

Tea for One

by Gill Hoffs

No-one at the window. No-one at the door. Bulbs she’d planted flowering pretty and unpicked in the garden, curtains exactly as he left them, and nothing but spiders scuttling within the cold dark house that had been their home. And when he gets to the door, no keys in his pocket.

“Fiddlesticks,” then, louder, because she isn’t there to hear. “Fuck fuck fuckity fuck.”

Marie had always carried a set in her bag or the pocket of the heavy red wool coat he gave her one Christmas. Her ‘Mrs Claus’ coat as she called it, the one that meant he could refer to her as a scarlet woman while they were out at whist drives or meeting their son in Morrison’s for a meal after they’d completed their weekly shop, their way of thanking him for a lift home with the messages and just staying in touch with them when they knew from unhappy friends that grown children often don’t. He’d have to call him for the spare.

He checks his watch: half four. He’d be unreachable until five at least.

The rain comes on heavier and he doesn’t like his neighbour’s dog, a slavering incontinent beast with ridiculously enormous balls and a greying muzzle, so he shuts the gate and starts retracing his steps to town again.

He could buy somewhere else to live if he wanted. Somewhere closer to his son, or in the heart of town where the constant noise of traffic will distract him from the silence inside. Somewhere bigger or smaller, more modern or like his mum and dad’s when he was a boy. The funeral director had said generally it was best to wait at least two years before making any big decisions, like giving up the family home, until the bereaved adjust to their loss and settle into their new role of the one left behind. But everywhere he walks inside, every drawer he opens, every piece of clothing he wears or washes or throws out reminds him he is on his ownsome. He might as well be somewhere more com-fortable, where he doesn’t have to trundle up the stairs a dozen times a day just to pee, and be miserable there instead.