Clouds Part Three

Part three of a seat-of-the-pants short story serial

Chas: when we got back I was so upset I forgot to lock the door. How could this happen? In spite of all my precautions? Gone – all gone. I needed to get on top of this but I didn’t know where to start. I paced up and down the kitchen thumping cupboard doors and swearing. I was making so much noise that Cindy came down before it was even time to cook. Of course I wasn’t going to tell her what happened so I pretended to have a headache. ‘It’s all that fresh air,’ I said. ‘I can tell you one thing. We won’t be doing that again.’

She said nothing but ‘it was good to see the clouds. I’m glad we went.’ Of course we’d had an argument up there because as soon as I’d seen the email I needed to leave – and besides, there were too many bees around.

‘What’s the problem with bees?’

‘They buzz, and they sting.’

‘Without bees we wouldn’t have any food, you do realise that?’ ‘

We’d have meat and fish, that’d do me. Anyway, they’re developing drones.’

‘Drones? What for?’ ..

‘To do the work of bees.’

She shut up after that. Technology wins every time in my book. I was feeling sick now; I needed to get home and figure out what to do. But Cindy made me wait another hour before we could leave. Well, I thought on the path down, no way was I coming up here again. When we got to the bottom my trousers were covered in mud. ‘These are dry clean only,’ I complained; she said nothing. I drove home like a maniac and when we got back I was so distracted I didn’t even lock the door.

Cindy: I nearly packed my bags and left then and there. I should have; I knew something disastrous had happened and I knew Chas wasn’t going to tell me until the last minute when I couldn’t do anything about it. But there’s a lot he doesn’t know. I’ve been planning for this moment for a long time. When you take someone for an idiot you’d better be sure they actually are one, or you might get a nasty surprise.

I cooked dinner and then I said he’d better tell me. ‘I knew you got an email up there and I knew it upset you.’

‘Oh all right. The hedge has gone.’

‘We haven’t got a hedge.’

‘The hedge fund!’

‘Oh, is that all! I thought we’d lost the house at least.’

‘You just don’t get it, do you? It’s security! We’ve lost our security.’

‘Anyone would think we were Palestinians!’ He stopped short, trying to figure out what I meant. Chas takes no notice of the news unless it’s about the economy.

Remember, I have no idea where this is going.

Kirk out