Five Years Ago
The farm stirs to life. Cocks crow. The horses champ. Farm-hands pull on rough working clothes and from the farmhouse, the scent and sizzle of bacon emerge.
Brett makes his way to breakfast, but as he passes the stables, pulls up short. “Chad? What are you doing? That’s Jenny’s job. Is she ill?”
Chad tosses the fork into a straw bale, taking the handles of a wheelbarrow destined for the muck-heap. “Jenny’s gone.”
“Gone? What do you mean gone?”
Chad puts the barrow down, grief on his face. “What part of the word ‘gone’ don’t you understand? She’s left.”
“She won’t be coming back?”
“No. She won’t.”
Brett digests this then, “She didn’t say anything, didn’t say goodbye to everyone, but you knew?”
Chad shudders a sigh, only a heartbeat from tears. “She wanted to go. She didn’t want to make a fuss.”
Brett lays a hand on his shoulder. “Chad, I…. Don’t know what to say. I know the two of you had problems but….”
“Leave it,” he snaps, then, “Sorry Brett. I’m upset. Do me a favour would you. Tell everyone else for me. I don’t think I can face it.”
“Yeah, sure. Of course. Would you like me to bring some breakfast out to you?”
“No, I couldn’t stomach it right now. But thanks.”
Brett vanishes into the farmhouse to relay the news.
In the background, Tom, unnoticed, pulls back into a barn. “Christ. Oh, Christ….”
And dropping onto a bale, he sits, rocking, his hands covering his face.
*****
James
more, unbearably, we
And it is excruciating.
Green-Eyes. My beautiful
does it take to
survive entirely on coffee, pacing the
something
“I don’t want it.”
it. You’re stressed to hell and wired on caffeine…. And you’ll
of course, and I choke the thing down,
me, I think mainly to make the point. His face is normally…. I
Guilt?
with him when they were
…. Not his fault….
anything. We
phone. And when he’s not looking at it, he sits with
In case it vibrates?
drumming endlessly
up, “It’s
our way. How long before you
in his eyes he knocks off the
know where they were taken, and it’s not far away. Can you believe it? We’re almost on top of
Now to finish it….
*****
Five Years Ago
hard, narrow beds, each fully clothed and with a single thin blanket wrapped tightly around against the
with dirt, but on the inside, frost traces its lacy filigree over the
dorm is silent. The occupants know better than to make noise
is a tapping
nearest bed startles, jerking fearfully
Not me….