Tales of the Decay by James Barton

Author:James Barton
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: Zombies
Published: 2019-10-26T04:00:00+00:00

Stay at Home Mother

Laura never watched the news. She tried to avoid it, lately it only put her in a bad mood. It didn’t matter much anyway, hardly anything ever happened in the quaint little town of Le Nord Côte. Her husband worked long hours and she used to get lonely, that was before baby Fiona came into her life. Now things were different, things were better.

Her friends had told her she was living in the past; something to do with progressive rights and how being a stay-at-home mother was basically akin to indentured servitude. Laura’s only response was to smile and let them talk. She was happy; it was what she had always wanted.

The blue and white baby monitor that rested next to their old hand-me-down lamp had a sudden spike of red dots. There was a rustling in the crib, followed by a frustrated grunt. Laura put one hand on her chest, all the breast feeding caused her a slight tinge of soreness. As she sat on the living room carpet with her back against the couch, she peered between the slats of the blinds. The sky was so blue, Laura wondered if she had ever taken the time to appreciate it.

Laura looked up at the monitor and the small red dots lifted and then disappeared as Fiona moved, the sound of a crinkling diaper drifted mechanically into the room. Laura had been a good mother. She would normally have already been in the room ready to change and feed her, but today, today she put it off. The television still played one of her favorite soap operas. Today she was hoping to find out if Sabian’s twin would finally admit that he was in love with Veronica. She looked up at the TV and it was a scene with some of the characters she didn’t care too much for. This was normally her chance to fold laundry or make a second cup of coffee. At the moment there were only commercials on her television.

Laura took a deep breath and blinked hard. She was so tired and if she didn’t have Fiona to care for, she would have taken a nap right there on the carpet. Mothers don’t get to take naps, they have responsibilities and too often their own needs come second, or even third. There was a loud and sudden crash against the door. It shook the small apartment hard enough to make the family pictures shake on the wall. Laura would have jumped or been startled, but this had been going on for … minutes, maybe hours? She couldn’t remember anymore.

Paul, her neighbor always walked his dog at the same time every morning. She would wave to him as she checked the black mailbox that hung on the exterior wall. He was the one slamming into her door. Only Paul didn’t have his dog with him, and he was very sick. When she saw him, she raised an arm to wave to him, but the polite smile quickly faded from her face.

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