Podding Peas

I knocked and after several moments she came to the door.  But before she opened it she said in the smallest voice

“Hello?”

“Hello, Miss B­­­­,” I said, “It’s me – Chris – I’ve got your shopping.”

No word from inside.  But after another moment I heard the door chain slide and the door cracked open a little.  Then wider and wider.  Then there she was backing quietly away into the room.  Gently smiling her way back into the debris, muttering.

“Can you… would you just…?”

“Shall I put it here?”

“Please.”

She’d left a space among the clutter on a side table by the door.  Just the right size for the box.  It was the same every time – one box-sized space left sacrosanct to save the muddle of having to create one under the pressure of the moment.

I showed her the bill and she turned to find a pen for the cheque.

“How are you today?” I asked, “how have you been doing?”

“Oh, not too bad.”

“That’s good.”

“Not too bad.”

She paused for a moment, her pen poised over the space for the date.

“Oh, what day is it?” she was mildly irritated that she didn’t have it there at the tip of her mind.

“It’s the twentieth,” I said.  “I should know that!  It’s my big girl’s birthday!”

“Oh, how lovely.  Which one?”

“Naomi, the one who’s up in Edinburgh.”

“Oh yes.  Lovely.” 

She carefully wrote the date.  The soft white whiskers on her chin twitched a little as she pushed her lips together.  Then suddenly she said:

“I sometimes think I’m dying,”

“Oh!  No.  Really?”

“Sometimes.  Then I think, oh, I could live another ten minutes.  And I do.  And so I’m still here.”

“Ah, yes, you’re still here.  My wife’s grandmother used to say ‘I’m not well but I’m not lying down.’”

“Oh yes.  I remember my grandmother when she was very old.  She lived with us but she couldn’t get out of bed and I remember her sitting in bed podding peas for my mother.  So she wouldn’t be a burden.”

She paused a moment.

“They were tough back then.  Tough old birds.”

“I have to say I think you’re a pretty tough old bird, yourself, Miss B.”

She gave a small giggle and handed me her cheque.