Too Easy by J. M. Green

Author:J. M. Green
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FIC050000, FIC031010, FIC000000, FIC062000, FIC022000
Publisher: Scribe Publications
Published: 2017-08-14T04:00:00+00:00

A bank of numbered mail boxes lined one wall of the foyer. I located the numbered slot that matched Blyton’s apartment number, then folded my card in with the note and slotted it.

The cab was waiting, metre running. In less than ten minutes, I was returned to Ascot Vale and had re-joined the masses on Union Road. All up, my detour to Blyton’s cost me thirty bucks. When the time came, I’d bill Copeland.

Now, my attention returned to the matter at hand: pumpkin curry. I shopped for groceries like a pro. After choosing a fresh lime, I made a study of the pumpkins, knowledgeably flicking specimens with my finger, smelling the skin, shaking them next to my ear. The results were mixed, and a lot of shaken-up pumpkins. Then I saw one with grey-blue skin, cut in sections along deep ribs, showing golden-orange flesh. The magnificent Queensland Blue it would be. I shoved half a dozen pieces in a plastic bag and grabbed a packet of unsalted butter on my way out.

I made like a Sherpa up the Roxburgh Street incline, carrying two bags of shopping, my coffee, and an entire pumpkin, cut into pieces, in a plastic bag. Remonstrating with myself all the way home. As if Phuong would place a bullet in her own letterbox. What kind of person accused their friend of faking a death threat? Answer: the most horrible person possible, a complete monster. Was that who I was? I didn’t know who I was anymore.

My progress was stopped by a block of granite. A chap, more refrigerator than man, obstructed my path. He wore a cut-off leather vest, over a black t-shirt. I spotted a couple of fabric badges sewn on the vest: a skull, two crossed rifles, a bent flower with ‘CF’ in gothic script. His biceps bulged out of the t-shirt, tatt-sleeve arms. His head was shaved save for a tuft of orange fluff on top, wafting in the breeze. His do put me in mind of those Troll Dolls.

‘Stella Hardy?’

‘No.’

He sighed. ‘But she lives here, right?’

‘I know of no such person,’ I announced, and tried to step around him.

He stepped in front of me, face right up to my mine. ‘You sure?’

I reeled back, one arm cartwheeling. The pumpkin bag slipped from my hand, and sailed up into the air. We watched the pumpkin pieces fly from the bag, spin upwards, pause, and descend. Falling, falling, and hitting the ground. I stood there like a dummy, and all the emotion of recent events got the better of me. Tears spilled onto my cheeks.

The giant troll looked horrified. ‘Sorry,’ he muttered. ‘I’m a bit clumsy.’

‘It’s not your fault,’ I said idiotically. ‘It’s the bags they give you.’

‘I know, right? I usually take me own,’ he said. ‘Not that I’m judging you; I don’t trust their bags. Give us some sheets of that paper.’

I put down the shopping and pulled out the real-estate section of the newspaper. At the same time, Brown Cardigan’s Shih tzu came trotting out of the foyer of my building.

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