'Beans for the Giant from the Boy who Missed his Dad' by David X. Lewis

Dad came home drunk again. Mum kicked him out. The cupboard was bare, except for a bag of dry beans well past their use-by date. Mum told me to go foraging.

I swept the beans into my hoody and wandered into the lane, hoping to sell them for some cows — the opposite of what Beanstalk Jack did in a story Dad told me when I was young. 

Nobody was interested in giving me anything for them, let alone a cow or two. Until a giant strode into the lane from the forest. "I’m hungry," he roared.

"Would you like some beans?" I asked.

The Giant said yes, he would plant them and grow a beanstalk to climb back to his mother. He gave me a fat white goose in return.

I took the bird back to my Mum, who strangled, plucked and cooked it.

I was sad, because the way it nuzzled me with its orange beak reminded me of how Dad tickled my chin with his yellow fingers whenever he returned from the pub.