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by Lewis

The last gasp of his torch light splodged off into the darkness. He expected nothing less. Sighing he waded on. He wasn’t sure if he was wet from top to bottom or bottom to top but he could feel his damp hat creeping down the side of his head, weighted down by the rain. Each step was like wading through a chocolate river. If by chocolate you meant mud, rotten leaves and god knows what else.

Obviously the car hadn’t started so it was this 30 minute trudge through the woods, a bad idea during the tail end of a storm. Finally he saw the distant light and headed into the overpriced and under performing circus of the train to town.

There was a certain smell about the carriage. When mixed with his own rotten, mud fuelled musk it almost bought him some space. Almost.

He was off to see Janey, another of life’s constant disappointment, so full of ideas and promises and so consistently letting him down. Cancellations, false promises, cauliflower as a main course. It wasn’t her fault she could never fill the void that had been left.

He wondered how it had come to this. He was sure he’d done everything right, got the right education, the right job, the right phone, found the perfect partner. Helen had always been there for him well for the last two years. Beautiful, soft eyes and heart, that’s not to say she could be prickly at times. But he’d loved that too. Quietly calming him after work chaos or making him laugh at just the right time.

He had happily been ticking off every box society laid out for him. But now he felt so wholly and utterly alone. Scrunched against the carriage side wall like half a mackerel, skinned and boned in a can full of assholes. He dreamed of the simpler frontier days when a simple token of a sheriffs badge could justify the murder of idiots like these. He was always angry. At people. Running around wildly, driving like idiots without a thought or care for others. Angry at Janey for just that. She hadn’t even looked back, just driven off as if nothing has happened. Helens dead eyes staring after her, once beautiful features distorted, flattened.

Games night Friday Janey had shouted as she pulled out the drive. Helen must have popped out the back for some food, he thought thinking back to that night, dusk was always her favourite time.

Well now it was payback. If it was Games night she wanted, she’d get one. A new game for every prickle, every spike. But there would be no winners.

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