Friday Frippery: If you can’t beat ’em…

First draft working title: Gone, Lass!

A Misery-fest Domestic Noir novel

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Chapter 1

I wake. I groan despondently. I had hoped today would be different. But this isn’t heaven, or even hell. It’s worse than that. I’m in my bedroom, this room which has seen so much trouble, with my head on my old, lumpy pillow, mouldy now from the dampness of tears. I ache all over, but I know it’s just a response to the pain in my heart.

I stumble to the kitchen. 8 a.m. Is it too early to have a drink, I wonder? A bottle is open on the table – there’s a couple of inches of red at the bottom. I pour it, still unsure whether to have it or coffee. I notice there’s a dead fly floating in it. Oh well! I put the kettle on.

I take my coffee to the computer. I haven’t showered. It seems so pointless to be clean, today of all days. My mind is pulled back to THAT DAY, ten years ago, when…. but no, I mustn’t think of it. I desperately want a drink.

I think about phoning my daughter, but she hates me calling in the morning. Or the afternoon. Or evening. In fact, she hates me. Ever since that day when she was five and I made her go to school. I remember the scene vividly. “WTF, Mum!” she yelled. “Why the flock would you make me do this? If I learn to flickering read, one day I’ll find myself reading The Girl on the Bus or Babies, You’re Dead! You’re a bad mother, you flubbing titch!” (We had taught her to swear early in the hopes she would write crime novels one day, but she still had some work to do…)

I think sadly of my hopes for her and my disappointment at what she’s become. A politician. I groan and bury my head in my hands, the grease from my unwashed hair leaving an oily deposit on my hands. I think about vomiting, but decide to leave it till chapter 2. I desperately want a drink.

Breakfast. I must eat. I had some leftover pizza last Tuesday but since then I haven’t been able to face food. I look in the kitchen. The bread is mouldy. The milk is mouldy. There’s jam. I scoop the mould off the top and eat it from the jar with a dirty spoon. I remember those happy mornings when David and I were first married and we would gaze at each other lovingly over lightly boiled eggs and buttered toast. It’s six months since he left. With that floozy. And the dog. I miss the dog. It’s dead now. He forgot to feed it. I knew he would. I desperately need a drink.

I open my e-mails – 600, all from Nigeria. I think about moving there. It appears I have lots of rich relatives over there, though apparently they’re all dead. Here I only have my daughter. And my mother. She hates me. Ever since the social services made her take me back after she abandoned me at the recycling centre.

I spot an e-mail that’s not from Nigeria! Though I know better, my hopes rise. Could it be from a friend? Unlikely. I only have one friend, and she hates me. Ever since she asked me “Does my bum look big in this?”, and I told her the truth. I open the e-mail. OMG! WTF!! It’s from him! The man from THAT DAY, ten years ago, when… My mind recoils from the memory. I rush to the kitchen for the wine and chug it down in two gulps. The dead fly gives it added body. I put my head in my hands and groan. Can this day get any worse, I ask myself? But I know from experience – it can…

HAPPY FRIDAY! 😉