Chapters 21 and 22-The Day After They Walked Purposefully….

The day after they walked almost purposefully towards their destination, towards the day that would change their lives irrevocably, Dot-nose and E but D were in their own Places They Call Home. ( https://dotknows.wordpress.com/2014/02/16/chapter-11-and-12-in-one-well-they-are-short-chapters-moving-on-from-the-kitchen-table/ )

What’s happening with them and what are they up to??

Chapter 21-E but D and the Imaginary Beautiful Garden

As she sat in her chair smoking and wondering why her life felt so empty, E but D’s brain slowly orbited the earth, clandestinely beautiful against the universe.

The void in E but D’s mind tried to summon up a picture of her life at a time before Sound Advice rescued her from Ghostly Ilf. She knew her supposed friend Dot-nose lived down the road and she vaguely remembered her ground floor flat with its’ iron and coffee table….a coffee table that someone like E but D sometimes used as a bed. As the tears plip-plopped down E but D’s face into her brandy she thought too of her hemmed in garden and the bitter disappointment it was to her. In her mind’s eye she recalled the dense tight bracken and brambles creeping ever over her small grass patch until they obliterated it and she sobbed on, recalling a strange lost dream of a proper garden, the kind that led to a great stretch of green, with trees and water and even possibly ducks. If only poor, stupid E but D had done any gardening she would have realised that behind the overgrown labyrinth of weeds lay the most beautiful park for miles.

Chapter 22-Dot-nose, the Hard Chairs and The Dwarves

Dot-nose sat down on one of her hard chairs and pulled out the 8.4% cider bottle that she liked to keep underneath her in case of an emergency. It was 9.32pm and she felt her life was slipping away, as she did every evening at 9.32pm.

Dispensing with the glass she tilted the 2 litre plastic bottle carefully to her lips and sucked hard. Two minutes later she stopped swallowing and carefully rested the bottle against her belly. Her eyes glazed over and her mouth formed the letter ‘o’. While her mind was thus disengaged, Dot-nose’s brain soared into overdrive. Almost entirely independent now it calculated and clicked, sorting things out in its endeavour to remain above sinking level. In its secret store it kept hold of all the Important Things marked with a special code of access.

‘One day,’ it thought, ‘With any luck,’ it added, ‘All of this will be useful to the poor messed up soul who is a shadow of her former self.’

Dot-nose woke up the next morning to find herself on one of the hard chairs, her head resting on an empty cider bottle. She let out a low prolonged mournful sound expressive of suffering or pleading as she righted herself to an upright position with the intention of heading to the toilet. A night spent in a hard chair is good for no one and Dot-nose’s legs, reduced to a state of catalepsy, were as good as anyone else’s in this position….they crumbled underneath her, dead and useless as a walking vehicle. Through those agonising moments of blood re-circulation, Dot-nose could hear the voices of the two dwarves spilling around her and in the stupor of her dehydrated mind, they seemed to be saying ‘Goodbye, see you’.

‘What now?’ thought Dot-nose, ‘What now?’

By 9.47am Dot-nose could be seen clutching two full black bin liners and her two pet stuffed dogs, Tired and Withdrawn, and purposefully heralding a bus, destination Gobblegook.

Dot-nose exited the bus with some difficulty, swearing profusely and headed for the sign that said ‘Home from Home-Doggy Delight’. Cursing the two black bin liners she forced her way through the doors and insisted on the best possible rooms for her two dear darlings, quite oblivious to the chortles and stares of disbelief echoing around her.

That’s All!

See Ya xx