Sometimes, she wished him dead.
It usually only happened in those hazy, sleep-drugged moments between dragging herself from her dreams andthe start of her day, though.
Once she was awake, her emotions were generally more rational. But awake or asleep, there was no arguing that if he was dead, she would hurt less. Lucie squeezed the crystal pendant strung on a leather thong around her neck. The quartz— for destroying negative energy while storing positive intentions— would need cleansing next full moon: it got a pretty hard workout whenever she thought of her father.
She eased out of the back door of the two-storey townhouse, letting it close quietly behind her so as not to wake the sleeping household. The tiny courtyard was bathed in a peachy ruddiness she told herself was sunrise, though she knew it was more an ambient glow from the Melbourne city lights.
As the ivy swallowing the garage rustled, she flinched, then hissed, ‘Scat, cat.’ Her neighbour defended, with a wooden spoon, a lot of gesticulating and what were very probably Italian curses, the black tom’s right to roam the entire suburb, so Lucie kept the four-year war strictly between her and the cat.
The tom shot straight up the smooth bark of the magnolia and sat on a naked branch, glaring balefully down, his tail swishing…
Leave a Reply