Monday 8 June 2020

'Emily' by Tilly Greenland


Emily stood at the window and watched as her family got into their car and drove away.  She nodded her head, trying to shake the tears as she watched them disappear down the road.

She walked to the kitchen and sat, just sat and looked around her.

She looked at the chair the other side of the table and cried.

Abruptly, Emily got up knocking a chair over as she did so.  She ran into the front room and stood at the window again.  She stood there, looking out, waiting.  She had been doing this all week, waiting, as she always did.

It was getting dark now, she must have been there for hours.  At some point she sat down.  At some point she lay and slept for a while.  But then she was alert again and stood, waiting, staring out of the window.

She didn’t need to be able to tell the time to know when Martin would be home.  She just knew.  But he hadn’t come home.  Not last night, not the night before.

Emily had noticed that the others, the rest of the family, were really sad.  They cried a lot and hugged a lot.  She recognised Martin’s name as she listened to their conversations.  She didn’t understand why he wasn’t here.

Emily lay down on the floor again, next to the window, and waited; a devoted loyal dog waiting for her master.  She couldn’t understand that he wasn’t coming back.

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