Moss

I hurled myself through the window. I was late.

It was no surprise when a rip tore itself into the inner thigh of my tights. I gave out an exasperated, miserable laugh and added this new punishment to the list of the others that had occurred since arriving back to the from my venture to the big supermarket with Alastair.

My mobile phone, which hadn't seen life in days was resuscitated back to life after many hours plugged into it's beloved charger. Multiple missed called, text messages and voice mails nearly caused the old ruddy thing to breakdown - I couldn't afford to buy a better one with modern day technology and functions beyond the belief of those living back in the day. I'd managed to achieve a phone call to Susan at best and our conversation had become an instant damper on my day.

Susan Slater. She, much like Ruby McDonald, did not like fuss and craved organisation, but the difference between Susan and Ruby was that she had a lack of patience and had a infamous knack for physical violence.

Ruby was the opposite, she set out to please. In the conversation Susan had basically stripped me of our beauteous friendship and informed me that I was to focus and actually turn up to work. I didn't like the sound of that. The whole point of working for my best friend was so that I actually had fun and didn't lay a finger on a single thing that required unnecessary energy wastage.

When I mentioned this she grunted like a baboon, and bellowed, "I have a knife in my hand Poppy Lee. Do you want to know what I'm thinking of doing with it? It involves your head. Take a guess, go on, I dare you," with a sinister eerie cackle.

It was then that I'd decided my friend, no my boss, was a maniac. How I had ever become friends with her in the first place was Chinese to me!

"Be a good girl and make sure to come to work tomorrow morning,' Susan had said, a twisted tone of eeriness as she spoke. I almost imagined that cheesy thriller music in horror movies.

I had been about to protest. Work. Who in their right mind liked to actually work? But it was the sound of what I thought to be many knives clacking and scraping against one another in the background, ringing in my ear, that took a hold of my better judgment. And so I monotonously confirmed that I would in fact go into work tomorrow morning and that I would focus till death do I part from this horrific world.

"Great babe," her voice suddenly joyful and bright, "Can't wait to see your lovely face tomorrow!"

"Bye"

And that was that. We both ended the conversation happy as can be - or at least semi-happy, if at all really.

It wasn't until one minute later that I analysed the situation and almost called Susan back, for she was the reason I had missed two weeks of 'work' as she called it. I say almost, because although I was extremely angry at her, embarrassment overrode that anger.

Instead I imagined Susan was stranded in the Sahara desert, exempt of her beloved kitchen knives. But then I rethought that little aspiring dream of mine and settled for Haven's death; a collapsed heap of rubble on the ground.

I had hardly noticed the sky as it had grown dark, nor had I heard the arrival of the McDonald's guest - well guests in this case. But it wasn't as though I wanted to actually go over there, for supper, not anymore. In fact I was all for the supper, but the guests, well not so much.

With this in mind, I idly walked around the perimeter of my shack over and over again, thoughts of nervousness swarming my head until it bled. I didn't really have anything to be afraid of and it was once I'd finished the eleventh walk around the shack, dismally passing the long drop as I came to my somewhat epiphany.

Enough was enough!

I was going to go to the McDonald's home, barge in and just be my good old self. Alastair's brother, Liam, could choke on Ruby's delicious beef stew for all I cared.

I'd enjoy the meal, have jolly good banter with Alastair and his mother - possibly his father too - and pretend that Liam and his wife and kid just didn't exist. Although I'd possibly jab at him for leaving the farm a few times, but not directly, all for good measure, but mostly to satisfy myself.

That, I had decided, was the best way to go about it.

However, before I trekked the short four metres to get to the McDonald's, I ran around my shack one last time. To settle the bubbling nervousness in my stomach that threatened to burst.

I'd finished and no longer could I dilly dally. I was already late enough, any later and I might as well have stayed home. A little part of me wanted to go Alastair's home desperately only to peek a look at Liam alone, whom I hadn't seen in years, and then trot off on my way. But that was a secret. I was going for Ruby's beef stew, nothing more, nothing less.

I knocked on the door and waited impatiently, nervously humming a tune to myself. I coughed, shuffled and coughed some more. I looked down at myself purely for something to do. I stretched my arms out still inspecting myself. I hardly looked tasteful, but that was me, I had never been one for looking nor being proper or pristine.

I contemplated pulling off my tights and tossing them away somewhere, where they'd be buried in the muddy dirt and the drizzling rain that primped the farms earth.

Nobody had answered the door. I listened hard and heard laughing inside. My nose flared. I slapped a fat smile onto my face and barged into the McDonald's household. My muddy shoes led the way, leaving their mark, a hassle for Ruby to mop clean later.

I had flung the kitchen door open.

"Nice to see you're all having so much fun!"

"Poppy. You're here. Finally"

They had all frozen, clearly surprised by my intrusion. Intrusion, that's exactly what it had felt like as they all stared at me momentarily shocked. Liam McDonald stood up from his wooden seat and walked towards me with his arms wide open, smiling. I dashed past him and stole his seat.

"Thanks," I muttered, "Where's the beef stew at?"

"There's none left Poppy, sorry," Ruby said. She quickly scurried from her seat and carried a tub out of her freezer, "We're having vanilla ice cream for dessert right now"

I didn't want ice cream. Heavens, I had come for the stew.