A Life Well Lived #shortstory

Freddie was with the boy for only a very short time on this earth, but he watched him from the shadows for more than eighty-five years.

In those misty, forgotten days just before the 1939 war, Freddie would follow the little boy up the dark, narrow stairs to his bedroom, a journey made by candlelight; there was no electricity in the old Suffolk farmhouse.  Freddie sat beside his bed during childhood illnesses, walked with him down country lanes, and silently persuaded him against the more outlandish boyhood pranks that flitted through his young mind. 

He wept alongside him when his beloved cousin was killed in Northern France in 1940; he hoped the boy could feel his arm about his shoulders.

Freddie watched him grow into a solemn, hardworking lad who became head boy at his senior school, silently congratulated him when he landed his first job, and was delighted when he met the outgoing, affectionate woman he would marry.  She smiled a great deal; everyone agreed she brought out the best in him.

He watched the boy become a man, make his way in the world, gain a fine reputation amongst peers and superiors, always respecting the traditions and values of his upbringing.  Most of all, though, Freddie was glad he and his wife had a happy marriage.  Everyone liked him and enjoyed his company; that was more important to Freddie than anything.

The couple had three children.  Freddie felt great pride when they brought their baby son home from the hospital to complete their family; he stood in the quiet shade of the lilac and laburnum trees, smiling as the boy took photos of his wife holding their new baby on that warm afternoon in early summer, with their daughters standing on either side.  

He kept a watchful eye on man and wife as they made the most of their leisurely autumn years by travelling abroad.  Later, Freddie shared the boy's pain during the difficult time when his wife's mind began to falter, and his sense of loss when she was moved into residential care.  He knew, though, that he would receive great comfort from his friends and family, for the boy was a wonderful father, uncle and friend who never failed to reach out a helping hand to those in need in his small village community.  His children said he had a more active social life than they did.  Freddie was with the boy and his children all through those last five years, and was warmed by all the happy moments they shared.  

He knew when time was running out; he gently pushed the boy to visit the places of his youth with his son and older daughter, and the home of the younger daughter who lived many miles away.  To do all he would want to do for one last time.  The boy was becoming frail, but Freddie was determined he should not suffer, or become dependent on others; he would have hated that.

The end came out of the blue one ordinary Thursday afternoon, a great shock to all who loved him, though they derived no small comfort from the knowledge that he had suffered no pain.  The son talked to him at his hospital bedside and Freddie listened, too, so moved by his words; he knew his boy, though unconscious, could hear them, too.

Freddie was with them all on the beautiful, golden autumn day when they laid the boy to rest.  The son and the favourite nephew helped bear the coffin into the ancient village church, and Freddie walked beside the two daughters as they followed behind, arm in arm, the younger woman struggling to hold back tears (she cried easily, like her mother), the elder one bearing her grief with stoicism, as her father would.

The congregation was one of the largest the vicar had seen at that church, and her address honoured her friend, as did the tribute and bible reading from his children.  At the graveside the men with medals saluted him; once a sapper, always a sapper.

The family and friends moved off, and Freddie waited.  He stood with the boy's aunt and uncle who had cared for him in childhood, with his beloved cousin who died in battle over seventy years before, and his brothers and sisters.  The boy walked towards them; he was smiling, he looked younger, and though he still used his walking stick he no longer seemed to need it.

 

Freddie held out his arms.

"Welcome home, son; it's been a long time."

 My grandfather, Frederick, who died around 1931

In memory of my dear father, Douglas Gibbs.

25 June 1929 ~ 28 September 2017

Aaron: #NewWorldProblems ~ a post apocalyptic short story #MondayBlogs

Aaron 
#NewWorldProblems

     That day in the pub with Nick and Greg was the last of the old world.  28th July, 2024, sat in Aaron's memory like the final day of a perfect holiday, a snapshot from childhood, a golden era when nothing was wrong in his life.  Of course, there was plenty wrong; he was bored rigid with being a financial whizz kid, and adjusting to life after Luisa was taking time—she'd wanted wedding bells and he wasn't ready to commit.  Sometimes he felt gloriously free, but other times bored and lonely, guilty about hurting her, and not sure how long he could go without a regular shag.  He had a brick wall of credit card debt, too, but such irritations were laughable now.

     He missed social media, a lot.   
     On Twitter and Private Life there was a popular hashtag: #FirstWorldProblems.

The Bluetooth in my car has stopped working so now I have to listen to the radio like a peasant. #FirstWorldProblems

 Best last minute holiday deal EVER and d-bag boss says she can't spare me!   #FirstWorldProblems

     If the internet still existed, Aaron would start a new hashtag. 

Sell-by date on this tin of sardines is four months ago.   

Should I live dangerously? #NewWorldProblems.

      

Back in the pub on 28th July 2024, they weren't taking bat fever seriously.  So there was an outbreak in some one-horse town in East Anglia, but quarantine conditions were in place, and all news reports were positive.  Holidaymakers were posting vids on YouTube saying 'Yay!' about getting an extra week off work.  Mind you, as Nick said, if you were sad enough to go on holiday to Shipden in the first place, it probably didn't take much to make you get the yays out.

     That was the last day when their world was normal.  On Monday evening, Nick's girlfriend, Evie, phoned to say that Nick was seriously ill, that she'd looked up his symptoms on the NHS website, and he appeared to have bat fever.

     By the next evening, Evie was in a similar state.  She'd dragged herself to the unit for her vaccination that morning, and was turned away.

     At gunpoint.

     The weird thing was that Nick had his vaccination early that Sunday morning, but he still died.  So he must have contracted it before he got the shot, but how?  Where from?  Wasn't the only case supposed to be in Shipden?

     A week later, nobody cared.

     Everyone was dying.

     Greg breathed his last breath the day after Nick, followed by almost all of Aaron's colleagues.  Everyone in his apartment block.  Except him.

     He couldn't work it out.

     Londoners were dropping like lemmings off a cliff.

     Each morning, he expected to face his final countdown.  But it didn't happen, and it kept on not happening.  On waking, he would do a quick check to make sure he didn't feel ill, then luxuriate in the fact that there was no work to go to and his landlord was probably too dead to notice that he wasn't paying the rent anymore.  He would make coffee and log onto Private Life and Twitter to see the latest, check in with his buddies to make sure their hearts were still beating—sometimes he got no answer—then flop in front of the TV and stick on YouTube to catch the newest batch of videos showing the downfall of civilised Britain.  UK news maintained that everything was peachy, so he'd seek out news sites from around the world to get the truth, only to find a strange silence.  Weird.

     Later, the BBC showed colour coded maps to indicate where in the UK the disease was at its most virulent.  Big mistake.  Everyone in the red areas jumped into their cars and headed for the pale pink.  Result: traffic at standstills, mile long queues at petrol stations, punch-ups at the pumps.  Further spread of disease as people in the traffic jams became ill.

     South London was one big glob of deepest crimson.

     His mother rang from Cornwall to say that Truro was in the pink zone, urging him to drive down, but he declined.  He hated driving at the best of times, and if he was going to die he'd rather do so in his own flat, not in his childhood bed with his mum faffing around, and her idiot husband vying for her attention.

     He knew he should contact Luisa.  It bugged him every day, but he just couldn't face it.  He remembered Nick saying he thought she'd had the vaccine, so Aaron told himself she must be okay.  He told himself this several times a day, then drove her from his mind with whichever bottle was at hand.

     Staying at home alone was the key to staying alive, he deduced, but during Week Two he ran out of food.  Headed out to Tesco Express to stock up, with a scarf over his face.  It was like a war zone down there.  Most of the shop windows were smashed, and half the streets were empty, others a battle between army and civilians.  Joyriding kids whooped as they screeched past burnt out cars.  Aaron didn't understand that.  Why did people burn cars, just because the world was going to hell?

     A burst of panic sent him dashing round to the car park at the back of his block.  No worries; his car was still there, with its full tank.

     Tesco Express was empty, but he found a tatty corner shop down a side street with plenty of tins and packets, filled a holdall and a backpack with all he could carry, and headed home.  He locked himself in and pulled down the blinds, drank more than was good for him, binge-watched all his favourite series and messaged with the friends that weren't dying (yet).   He slept a lot and read for hours at a time.

      Next time he went to check on his car, it was gone.  Which was inconvenient, but he was surprised to find that he didn't care.  Never been a car fiend, not like Nick and Greg.  Perhaps he could nick another one from somewhere.  A car showroom.  Wasn't sure what he'd do about fuel.  Maybe get a bicycle, instead.  Or a motorbike.  Yee-hah.

     Before the TV, phones and internet stopped working, he had a call from his mother to say that she was ill, along with her idiot husband.

     He spoke to her before she died, and offered, reluctantly, to find a way of getting down to Cornwall.

     "Don't come," she said.  "It's bad here now.  They're breaking into shops, turning those units over, raiding hospitals.  We're okay; we've got each other."

     By the time he ran out of food again, the electricity had fizzled its final spark.

     Tablet ran out of juice when I was half way through a ten book 

zombie apocalypse series.  Bummer.  #NewWorldProblems.

     Now, his biggest worry was boredom.  What were you supposed to do, when there was no power, and most of your friends had snuffed it?

     Luisa.

     Stop thinking about Luisa.

     After establishing that nobody was answering the doors of the other six flats in his block, he broke into the janitor's office to nick the keys.  Found bodies in two of them.  Gross as hell.  With scarves wrapped tightly around his nose and mouth and two pairs of rubber gloves, he dragged the bodies out into the car park and set fire to them.

     And still he didn't get ill.

     Now he had five more kitchens with food cupboards and alcohol.  He cleaned out the fridges and freezers, which was a pretty disgusting task, but it was something to do.

     Logic—and the first few chapters of the unfinished zombie apocalypse series—told him the water would go next, so he filled all the baths, every available vessel, with water. 

     Much of the time, he felt kind of okay.  He meandered between flats, helping himself to food, examining his dead neighbours' possessions, getting drunk and listening to music on an old Sony Discman.  Found one of those solar powered chargers for his tablet and stuck it on a window sill; he could finish that series after all. 

     He slept in beds that were more luxurious than his, and he bloomed with health.

     He hardly dared to hope, but he couldn't help wondering if nature had been kind enough to make him immune.

     On his birthday, in the middle of September, he helped himself to a bottle of champagne from flat number six, relaxed on the L-shaped sofa, and raised a glass to his mother, to Greg, and the rest of his friends who'd died.  Then he stuck two fingers up to Nick, who, to be honest, had always been a smug prick.  Always had to know about the latest whatever, and get it before anyone else.  Shagged the prettiest girls.  The bigheaded, handsome bastard.

     "And you're now a dead bigheaded, handsome bastard," he said, out loud.  "Who's the daddy now, eh, Nicky?" he said.   A moment later, out of nowhere, he plummeted.  He stood up, took his glass over to the window, looked out on the devastation in the streets below, and wondered what the hell he was supposed to do next.

*****

     Fast forward six months.

     Holed up with my ex, 'cause she's the only person I know 

who's still alive.   Sucks. #NewWorldProblems.

     For a while, Aaron didn't fancy his chances outside (too many lunatics around), but as the weather grew colder the streets cleared, leaving only a silence so complete it rang in his ears.  Even in London.  When he was down to his last bath tub of water, though, he knew it was time to go.  He shivered his way through a cold one, shaved, put on sensible clothes—the former resident of number two had been a keen hiker, and had some excellent walking boots—and filled a backpack with provisions and basic survival gear.

     Aaron was going out into the world, to see if anyone he knew, anywhere, was still alive.  If they weren't, he would find some other people.

     There were two cars left in the car park; one was trashed, the other out of fuel.

     Okay, so he'd walk.  He didn't mind; quite fancied it, actually.  Walking the streets of London was something you never did, normally.

     He tried flat after house after flat, and found no one.  Didn't want to kick any doors down in case he found bodies, like in his own block; they'd be in a pretty gruesome state by now.  Two friends who'd had the vaccine had left doors on the latch, and notes, saying where they'd gone.

     'Mum and Dad.  Meet us at Auntie Linda's.  Be safe x.'

     'Erin.  Heading for refugee camp in Richmond Park.  They got food & water.  C u there?'

     He left Luisa's place, in Cricklewood, until last.

     He wanted to know but he didn't, at the same time.  If there was no answer at her house he would have to break in, because he still cared for her.  Didn't love her anymore, just cared for her.  But the feeling ran deep enough for him to baulk at the thought of seeing her decomposing body.

     Luisa was alive, and hunkered down with Ginny, one of the friends with whom she shared her house; the other had died.  She'd given house room to two girls he didn't know, too.  One vaccinated, the other not.

     "You found me," she said, when he walked through the door, and the look on her face made him feel like her saviour.  "I knew if you were alive you'd get here, eventually."  She turned to Ginny, her eyes shining.  "Didn't I say he'd come and find me?"

     The once cute house was dark, cold, and smelled a bit rancid.  Luisa was thinner, her hair was dirty, and Aaron's eyes watered when she fell into his arms.

     "I'm so glad you're safe," he whispered, and he was, but when she took his hand and introduced him, proudly, to the strangers, he felt a tiny twinge of unease.  The memories crowded back into his brain.  How badly she'd taken the break-up.  She'd sobbed, begged, told him she felt like 'ending it all'.  For a while she phoned him on a daily basis, until, about a month before bat fever, he'd managed to make her understand that the relationship really was over.

     That, despite all they'd been to each other, he didn't see himself spending the rest of his life with her.

     "You said you'd die for me!" she'd cried, during that last conversation.  "Do you remember?  You said, I never want to be without you.  I'd do anything for you, I'd die for you.  Why would you say that if you didn't mean it?"

     Being reminded of such over-emotional sentiments embarrassed him.  Yes, he'd felt that way, meant every word, during their first few, passionate months, but times changed, and he hated that she couldn't see this.

     Now, Luisa boiled water on her aga, made him a welcome cup of coffee, fussed around him.  He had to admit it was rather nice.  He'd had no company of any sort for three months, let alone of the female variety, and he hadn't had sex since a few weeks before the outbreak, either.

     That night, he shared her bed.

     In the morning, in her chilly bedroom, she wound her cold, thin arms around his body and gazed into his eyes.

     "I knew you'd come back," she said, and gave a little giggle, the one he used to find so attractive.  "So it's taken the end of the world to bring us back together; I can deal with that!"

     And somehow he couldn't find the will to hurt her all over again.  Not now, when both of them had lost everyone.

     Soon afterwards, the non-vaccinated girl died, and her friend drifted away.

     Luisa thought Aaron's immunity was a sign that they were 'meant to be'.

     Aaron thought smiling and saying nothing was the best course of action.

     Tempers frayed between Luisa and Ginny.  Ginny said she was scavenging most of the food, but only eating a third of it.  Luisa was reluctant to go out onto the streets, where gangs roamed and you never knew who or what might be waiting for you round a corner, and she didn't like Aaron to go out, either, in case anything happened to him.

     In private, she told him she thought Ginny was jealous about his presence in the house.        

     "Three's a crowd, isn't it?"

     Aaron disagreed, in fact he wished there were more of them, there being greater safety in numbers, but they woke up one morning in January to find Ginny gone, along with Luisa's car and most of the supplies.

     The sight of her empty bedroom filled him with gloom.  He'd never meant to be with Luisa again, as a couple; he was not sure what his intention had been, but it wasn't this.

     The days moved slowly.  Aaron wanted to up sticks, find one of those refugee camps he'd heard about, but she wanted to stay put.

     "You and my house are the only stability I have left," she said, often.  "I hate the thought of someone breaking in, ransacking the place.  It's my home!"

     She seemed happy, muddling through their humdrum days, laying fires, boiling water and cooking, reading, listening to talking books and snuggling up to him.  She washed clothes, cleaned and tidied, even painted the spare bedroom.

     Aaron was less content.  Every few days he went out scavenging, and each time he was tempted to keep on walking.  Find a car somewhere, and just drive.

     Then she became ill.  They didn't know what it was; she had pains in her stomach and felt nauseous and thirsty all the time.

     She'd cling to him, and reminisce, obsessively, about the good times they'd shared.

     "Don't," he'd say to her.  "You're talking as if everything's over.  It's not.  You're just weak and ill, that's all."

     She retreated into the past.  When her pain receded, she would get out photos of the two of them in happier times, show him mementoes of random evenings of which he had little recollection.  A ticket from a gig, a napkin from a restaurant.

     And, over and over, she would remind him of the things he used to say.

     "You told me you'd love me forever.  Do you remember, that night in Barcelona, on the hotel balcony?"

     He didn't, but he stroked her hair and told her he did.

     "You never want to be without me, and you'd die for me," she said, often, with a dreamy smile on her face.  One day, when the stomach pains were particularly bad, she clung onto him, and asked him to say it again.

     "Tell me now," she said.  "Tell me that again.  Let me hear you say it, now."

     Aaron felt foolish, and didn't want to say it because he didn't mean it, didn't feel that way about her, was only with her because he felt sorry for her and there was nothing else.

     "Say it to me," she said.  "Make me happy."

     So he did.  "I never want to be without you," he lied.  "I'd die for you."

     They had so little in the house, and he told her he must go out and find food, and, most importantly, fresh drinking water.  Even when she couldn't eat, he knew she must drink.

     "I don't want you to go out," she said.  "Stay with me."

     He stroked her head, kissed her forehead.  "I have to.  I'm hungry, Lu.  And we've got to have water, haven't we?  If I let you dehydrate, you could get seriously ill."

     "We have lucozade!  That's better, because it's got glucose in it."

     "You know fizzy drinks give you guts ache."  The sight of her lying there, so frail, made him want to repeat the lies, just to make her happy.

     "Rainwater, then!"

     "No.  I don't want to risk it, not with your stomach.  Don't worry.  Suck some mints; they help, don't they?  I won't be long.  I'll go to a chemist, too, see if I can find something."

     When he closed the front door, the weight lifted from his shoulders.   Oh, to be alone, without her cloying attention; he remembered why he left her in the first place.  He zipped along the silent streets, kicking up the rubbish that lay across the pavements, the dirty, empty bottles.  The odd dead rodent.  He wondered what was the matter with her.  Gallstones, maybe.  His mother had them.  Painful, but easily dealt with in the old world.

     Not so much, now.

     Whaddya do 'bout gallstones?  Can you die from them if they're not treated?  #NewWorldProblems.

     He hoped it was nothing worse.  He should find a medical encyclopaedia.  If he could make her better, she might be persuaded to leave.  Being in that house, just the two of them, never seeing anyone else, made him feel as though he didn't exist.  He wanted air, movement, the sky, roads, space.  He longed for other people.  Just someone different to talk to.

     I never want to be without you.  I'd die for you.

     But he didn't want to die.  He wanted to live.  

     In a pharmacy he found a large, white bottle of chalky medicine that looked as though it might be good for stomachs.  He passed a corner shop.  Plenty of useless cordial, bottles of fizzy drinks, but no water.  He took four Dr Peppers for himself.  A Sainsbury's Local: no water.  A pub: no water.  A garage: no water.

     He walked.  Shop after shop, no water anywhere.   Other stuff, though.  One tin of chilli and three of potatoes, soup, yogurt covered flapjacks, toilet paper, biscuits, batteries, a carton of orange juice.  Sod it.  He'd just decided to go back, boil the rainwater and hope for the best, when he spied an small Indian supermarket that must have been on its knees even before the fall.

     Worth a try. 

     The door hung off its hinges and the windows were smashed, which was good, because it let a little light into the store, but he flicked on his torch as he walked slowly up and down the three dingy, narrow aisles.  Picked up the last packet of noodles as he aimed light onto the almost empty shelves—which was when he saw them.  Three of them.  Litre bottles of beautiful, perfect, crystal clear, still mineral water.

     The relief spread over his face in a bright smile, and it was an alien sensation.  He put his torch in his mouth, heaved his backpack from his shoulders and unzipped it, resting it on the empty shelf below the water.  As he did so, he was vaguely aware of a shuffling noise behind him, but he allowed it to pass into his subconscious.  Probably a cat, a dog or a rat; he'd seen nobody.  No worries.  He reached for the first bottle, and was just placing it in his pack when a thump on his back sent the torch flying out of his mouth, rolling down the aisle into the darkness.

     "Water's ours."

     There were two of them.  One grabbed him by the arms, the other, smaller, wrestled away his backpack.

     Aaron could scarcely see them, but he could smell them.  Unwashed bodies, cigarette smoke.  Youngsters, he thought. 

     "Fuck you!" he yelled, and kicked out at the one holding the pack.  He thrust his elbow into the lad behind him, heard him gasp as he staggered back, and wrenched the pack out of the other boy's hands, hurled it over his shoulder.  One bottle, that was all he'd managed to stow away; he reached for one off the shelf, and pushed at the smaller boy.   The bigger one grabbed at him, and Aaron flung his arm out, wildly, surging towards the daylight at the front of the shop, but somehow everything turned upside down, and the floor came up to meet his face.

     Thump!  As his forehead slammed onto the lino, he cried out; he couldn't move.

     Hands gripped his ankles.

     Aaron summoned all his strength, kicked, caught the ankle-holder in the face, heard him yell, kicked again, felt him lose his grip—but the other hands were grabbing at the strap of his pack, still hanging off his shoulder.

     "I said, the water's ours," said that voice again, the big boy, and his hands tightened around his ankles once more.

     "I need it," Aaron gasped, reaching out, blindly.  "My friend—she's ill, she needs water, she can't drink anything else, just let me take one bottle—"

     With a mighty effort he kicked out again, lurched up, swung round and punched the little 'un in the face, grabbed the straps from him, but as he did so he felt an acute pain in his side, so sharp, so intense that he shouted out, fell back, and somewhere in a blurry corner of the pain he was vaguely aware of the smaller boy regaining control of the backpack, reaching up for the last bottle.

     "No!"  He threw his arm out, knocking him to one side, but the pain was back, in a slightly different place this time, and suddenly he had no strength; he tried to reach out, to fight back, but his arms were like wads of wet cotton wool, and the pain came again, round the front this time, over and over.  He clutched at his side, at his stomach, and he knew he was bleeding.

     "You're alright, he's done," he heard the bigger one say, as Aaron's knees collapsed beneath him.  "Get the other bottle, then."

     "He got much else?" said the other.

     "Yeah.  Fair bit.  Whoa—chilli!  We're sorted for tonight, then.  Don't know what this is, though."

     Aaron was vaguely aware of the bottle of chalky medicine landing with a thump beside his head, so he knew he must be lying on the floor again, and the lads' feet were pattering away, their voices growing fainter and fainter until he could hear them no more, and it was just him, bleeding out all over the floor of a mucky little supermarket.

     Down there on the floor was a smell, a familiar smell that reminded him of something in the past, but he couldn't think what it was.

     He pulled himself up onto his hands and knees and crawled towards the light, because it was still the afternoon outside, and if he saw someone they might help him, but even if nobody came he badly didn't want the last thing he ever saw to be the inside of this shop.  He smelled the outside, the air, felt the cold pavement underneath his bleeding stomach, and he was glad that he had made it out of the shop that smelled of dust and cumin seeds.  Ah—that was what the smell was: cumin seeds.  Like in the restaurant where he and Luisa used to eat on Friday nights, long ago.

     I never want to be without you.  I'd die for you.

     He wondered, in a floaty, distant sort of way, what would happen to her, if she would think he had just gone away and left her, but part of him didn't care because if she hadn't made him say those words they might not have come true, he might have made her better, and they could have packed up and gone, found a camp, met other people, made some sort of life.

     Lying on a pavement bleeding to death after a fight over three 

litres of bottled water.   #NewWorldProblems.

This story can be found in my post apocalyptic short story collection, Patient Zero.  

All stories are completely stand alone, and feature side and back stories from the characters in The Project Renova series

Short Story: Ten Minutes Late

During a two day period with no internet (it's okay, we survived...) I clicked on an old folder marked 'Story Ideas', and found this, a story I wrote about two years ago and had forgotten all about.  I wrote it when I came back from shopping one day; on the bus journey there, I alerted the driver to hang on for someone who was running to catch it 😀

Ten Minutes Late

October 1974

Danny was late.  Seriously late.  He could just make out Ruth and Steve boarding the bus as he turned the corner, Ruth with her huge sketching folder, Steve with his camera bag.

            "Ruthie!" he screeched.  "Tell him to wait!"

            Alas, the noise of the dense morning traffic ensured that Danny's cries went unheard.  He hoisted his bag onto his shoulder and started to run, zig-zagging round a mum with a pushchair and a group of dawdling schoolgirls.  His bag fell off his shoulder and he stopped to hoist it back on; he had to catch that bus.  Missing it would mean an eighteen minute wait for the next, which meant he would be ten minutes late for his photography class.  Monday mornings were bad enough without disapproval from photography tutor Jim Duncan, the worst stickler for punctuality in the whole college.

The traffic was slow.  Maybe he could make it.  When he was about twenty yards short, though, he heard the whoosh of the doors closing, and the wretched vehicle began to move off.

"Wait!" he shouted, helplessly, knowing no one could hear him.  He quickened his pace, and was only feet away as the bus pulled slowly out.  Running alongside it, now, he looked through the window.  Ruth and Steve were deep in conversation and didn't see him, but in the seat behind the driver, a woman was looking his way.  He waved to her; she could alert the driver, ask him to hang on, and open the damn doors.

The woman met his eyes and he signalled to her, waving like a crazy man, pointing at the driver, but she turned her head.  She looked away as if she hadn't seen him, but she had, he knew she had.

Why didn't she help?  It wouldn't have hurt her, would it?  All she had to do was call out to the driver that someone was running to catch the bus; Danny had done that very thing himself, for other passengers.  The drivers were always happy to hang on for a couple of seconds.  But that bloody woman just couldn't be bothered.  

"Stop!" he shouted.  But the bus moved into the traffic and Danny bent over, hands on his knees, huffing and puffing.  He eased the weighty bag off his shoulder, and mooched into the shelter to sit down and wait for the 8.48. 

The other students stared as he burst in, red-faced; Jim Duncan just gave him one of his 'looks'.  A quick glance round the room told Danny that there were no spare seats apart from one at the front, next to a geeky kid he hardly knew, so there he sat.

~ ~ ~

The late arrival had no detrimental effect on Danny's college career, annoying though it was at the time.  He finished his foundation course eight months later, then went on to do two years specialising in photography.  He felt enthused, inspired, but once he had his shiny new diploma, he found that jobs in his field were hard to come by, and settled for a position on a local paper that paid a meagre wage.  When he discovered that his girlfriend, Julie, was pregnant, he took a job as a supervisor of the photography department in a large store.  Less interesting, but it paid twice as much. 

He doubted he would have married Julie had she not been pregnant, because he was not in love with her, but back in the 1970s parents of unmarried pregnant daughters still insisted on shotgun weddings.

Julie gave birth six months after the wedding, followed by two more children at three yearly intervals.  Money was always tight, but they were content enough, give or take Danny's occasional dalliances.  With the demands of a family, photography took a back seat.  He joined a camera club, and even had a few arty black and white landscapes featured in books of local interest, but his hobby never paid him more than pocket money.

"It's a shame Danny never did anything with his talent," his mother said, often.  "Still, Julie and the kids have to come first."

Danny took early retirement at fifty-five, and joined a second photography club, which was where he met Sally.  For Julie this was a dalliance too far, and she left him.  By this time the children were grown, and his betrayal of their mother soured his relationship with them.  Living with Sally did not turn out to be as much fun as their illicit affair; five years on, he was no more happy with her than he had been with Julie.  As he sank into his autumn years, he sometimes wondered if he'd missed some vital turning point somewhere, not made the most of an opportunity that might have made his life more satisfying.  Just happier would have been nice.

He had forgotten all about that Monday morning in 1974; just a few weeks after it occurred, it disappeared from his conscious memory.

Had he but known the effect of that morning on his entire life, he might have thought about it every single day.

If the woman on the bus had seen fit to alert the driver, Danny would not have been late for his class.  He already knew that - but if he'd arrived at class with eight minutes to spare, instead of ten minutes late, he would have been able to choose his seat.  Instead of sitting at the front by the geeky kid, he'd have sat further back, next to a girl he'd chatted to once or twice.  She had two tickets for an exhibition by a local photographer of some national reknown, that night; had Danny sat next to her, they would have gone for coffee together at break time, and she'd have asked him to accompany her.  Because he didn't, she asked someone else.

If Danny had gone to that exhibition, he'd have been introduced to the photographer, a woman called Laura; a friendship would begin.  Through Laura, he'd have found evening and weekend work as an assistant to a friend of hers, Guy, who ran a successful business doing portraits and weddings.

Julie would never have become part of his life, because he'd wouldn't have been at the barbecue where they met, because he was working at a wedding reception.

Eventually, he'd have dropped out of college and worked full time for Guy, discovering he had a real affinity with the customers as well as a talent for portrait work.  In time, he'd become Guy's partner, helping him to expand the business, and in his thirties he would allow Guy to buy him out, on good terms, so he could go it alone.  After entering his portraits into competitions, his work would gain critical acclaim.  He would branch out into fashion photography, become sought after, and, at the age of thirty-eight, would marry one of his favourite models.  They would have two children, an idyllic marriage, and move to New York.

By the time Danny was fifty, he would be lauded as one of the greatest fashion and beauty photographers of the age.  He and his family would holiday on Capri, and in the mountains of Aspen.  In the autumn of his years, he'd consider how blessed his life had been, and want to share his wealth.  Opening his string of hostels to care for runaway teenagers would gain him respect, and make him feel that he had done something truly worthwhile with his good fortune.  He would have been a happy man, indeed.

But none of this happened, because Danny failed to catch the 8.30 bus.

~~~

Back in 1974, the woman on the bus ignored Danny because she was bloody fed up with people who couldn't be on time.  What was so difficult about getting up when the alarm went off?  'Running late', indeed; too damn lazy to get out of bed, more like.  She'd had enough of selfish people who ruined things for others because they were too bone idle to get out of bed in the mornings.  Like her husband, and her two useless sons.

That, however, is another story.

~~~