Wishbone Soup Cures Everything

This April I have signed up for the A-Z challenge: thank you to Mr Arlee Bird for thinking this up, I tried it last year and it was tougher than I had expected: for each day in April that is not a Sunday I will be pasting up a post that starts with consecutive letters of the alphabet: from A to Z. This first post is a random piece of flash fiction: the next 17 are installments of one short story. That's as far as I have planned: but being British one expects to stop for T. Athena's Dive Down to the deepest point of the lonely ocean, where compression draws straight through me, there is no strength to resist it. Flattened, with such ease. All the reasons, they are drowned too, they are saturated, dissolved. They are simply part of where I am. A secluded part of who I am. We all sink, sometimes. This deep, no other voice can reach. I must speak with myself. Is this reversible? Or am I drowned forever? That will depend on what you choose. I don't

Hot fat meat fizzing in the high heat oven: all the house has the smell of it. Bellies rumble. Dog, damp and sandy, sleeps in her basket. Mr Grandad has two eyes half open: less than half open: shut. Little Grandson has a Grandad for a pillow. Outside, where the wind has a chill and fine rain now falls, tide-lined boots stand untidy. Inside, there's a timer set, to remind us to peel up potatoes. 

Little Grandson helps his Uncle Boy to build an aeroplane. Boy says 'These are the tail wings.' Little Grandson says: 'Tail wings?!' Laughs. Observes askance. Hands over a spanner. Boy flies the aeroplane. 'Do you want a go?' Little Grandson considers the options. 'No.' He knows how to use a spanner now, tucks into the deconstruction. 'Shall we build a car?' Boy asks. 'Yes!' They flick through the manual. A serious little face studies each picture, points out a ship. 'That one?' Boy checks. They build a jeep.

Yesterday if I was stilled, everything was calmed, peaceful, as it should be. By the day's end I had almost the hang of it. Today if I am still, a cold draught stings at comfort. When this happens, it is time to go walking in the woods. Warmth blossoms in layers as we stride in that direction. The wind must approve, for it moves clouds and lets the sunlight keep some heat. Down at the base of the river valley trees, it is sheltered and full of history: tunnels and ditches and collapsed stone. Trunks of wood float ominous in the dark quarry pools: light and breeze sweep the surface, make a net of polished glass, a mosaic of sky. Back at the table in the living room of our little cottage, I sit to write. Mr puts bread and cheese under the grill. I hear the grill pan clatter. The wind moans as it catches on wires, it blows a black cloud of starlings out of an oak. I hear the frantic arm of the lucky waving cat, ticking like an over wound clock.

In the last stretch of morning run, I push legs to a sprint. Tiredness catches up with inconvenient ease. Stomach hurts and brain only thinks in blinks, it can't concentrate at all. Lie on the sofa, sleep light. Get up to drink some tea. Marvel at the dog hair stuck to my clothes. I look like a feather. Washing goes in machine, washing up goes under the tap… I have too much enmity for inactivity. My stomach hurts. This evening I do not go to work. I may even watch some television. For the last push of this lap, oomph must be revived.

Another whirl of a day: Lawhitton, Exeter, Weston-Super-Mare, Launceston, Plymouth, Home . I have made notes, or I would not recall the half of it. Messages and emails ping through my phone and oh the lovely feeling when I say, 'Excuse me, I must just show how brilliant my life is by returning this query from my printer. You know, because I am a publisher as well as all those other talents I have lying around here.' Which is an accurate paraphrasing, I assure you. On the way Home Eventually it is dark, the moon is big and the headlights frequently dazzle. Nothing expresses childish delight like a delighted child.

Found a new tunnel!  Sun streams down barely warm in the glacial sky. In hope, washing is pegged to line. The woodpile is low so coal chugs on a damped down fire: enough to keep out ice, not quite enough for comfort. Dog lies on the sofa, watches everything from one bored eye. Cat drifts in, to sleep in a corner. Outside the wind is sharp, light, quiet. The printer's invoice arrives, and is paid. Dog is right, it is time to go to the woods and wander off the path. It cold, I think, as I first leave the house steps, but I do have gloves, two pairs of socks, a sense of adventure. Path or ditch...?