Chapter Six

BARBARA

Just a couple of miles down the road from the beach, Barbara stop at the entrance of the small charity shop she’d been manager of nearly sixteen years now.  She looked puzzled.

“Where the shittin’ hell did that go?” She half muttered to herself.

“What?” Came a voice from somewhere inside.

“I said where did that go?”

“You said where the shittin’ hell did that go!”

“Well if you knew what I said why bloody ask me?

“What?”

“I said if you knew…”

“No!  What can’t you find you daft cow?”

“That bag!”

“What bag?”

“The black bag that was out here.”

“You brought them in.”

“There was another one”

“What?”
“There was another one.” She rolled her eyes “Christ almighty” she whispered under her breath.

“What other one?”

“There were three by the door and then one I put down infront of the window to keep separate when I got here.”

“By the window?”

“Yes!”

“Well how the hell should I know where it was?”

“I didn’t ask you if you knew!”

“You did.”

“I was talking to myself, you just happened to answer.  It wasn’t aimed at you.”

“You said it out loud.  How was I supposed to know you weren’t asking me.”

“Christ, Mother!  Just make the tea will you.”
“I’ve made the tea.”  

Barbara turned to find her mother standing right behind her, tea in hand.  Barbara jumped.

“How do you do that.  You were at the back of the shop a moment ago.  You never move that fast when I need you to.”

“I didn’t want your tea going cold.”  The little, more delicate looking lady than you might have imagined from the way she spoke, handed over the tea to her daughter.  “Don’t choke on it!” She gave a little smile as Barbara reached out and took it from her..

She gulped down a mouthful, the heat of the tea immediately warmed and calmed her.  The loud exhale of breath and slump of shoulders matched the hit of relief she felt in that moment.  Only a cup of tea can ever have that effect.

“Now what bag are you talking about?  Show me?” Her mum said.

“I can’t show you, Mother, it’s not there!”

“I know that.  You said that.  Show me where it was?”

“How will that help?”  She pointed anyway to the spot “Just over there infront of the window.  It was one those bags with a pull-tie.”

“Fancy! We don’t see many of them.  The occasional tie-top!  Probably had some nice bits in it a bag like that.”

“I thought that.  I think I know who dropped it off, I was looking forward to seeing what was in it.”

“Well, we’ll never know now I guess.”

“No.  I doubt we ever will.”  She took another sip from her cup.  “Who steals from a charity shop?”

“The manager!” Her mother said, a slight twinkle in her eye.

“I pay for everything I take!”

“You must have some lovely fifty pence items you would have priced at ten pounds”

“Well I didn’t steal this.”

“There’s plenty from round here that would steal.  I pointed out that one the other day.  She looked like a thief.”

“She did not”

“I can tell these things.”

“No you can’t, you say you can, but you can’t.”

“She never made eye contact.  She looked shifty with her green coat and supermarket carrier bags.  She was after something.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I always get it right.”

“No, mother.  You accuse everybody.  Just because occasionally one of them does try to steal doesn’t mean you have some detectorist skill.  Law of average if you say everyone’s a thief you’re going to be right at some point.”

“I was still right.”

Barbara sipped her tea.  She needed this conversation to end.  Every day the same thing.  Round in circles.  She’d never win an argument or debate because her mother could never be wrong, even if she was she’d find a way of being right.  And she was getting worse.  She was eighty two now.  She was quite old when she had given birth to Barbara.  She never wanted children, she’d said that more than once.  Not out of malice, more that she never really thought about the impact on Barbara and that it might, you know, hurt her a little bit to know that.  She liked to call herself pragmatic.  Barbara just called her a bit an unfeeling cow.  She did love her daughter, she wasn’t very good at being a parent.  She drove Barbara mad, but she loved her and despite the bickering they got on very well for the most part.  And for eighty two she was still fairly mobile, she liked to help out at the shop, not that she really did anything other make tea and complain about or accuse the customers of something.  But she was hear, and Barbara didn’t know how much longer she would have her around for.  So she didn’t mind the argumentative side, she embraced it and kind of enjoyed it at times.  

“I know the bag was there this morning.”

“You still banging on about that bag?”

“I saw it and I moved it there so I could check it out.”

“You’re obsessed.”
“No, I’m upset that someone took it.”

Her mother retired back in to the shadows of the store.  Barbara walked over to where the bag had been.  She looked around, just incase it had somehow moved.  She looked up and down the street.  Nobody to be seen and no black bag.  She looked at the window.

“We should change this window display today.  That trouser suit needs swapping out.”

Her mother said nothing.  Just gave a little grunt and a smile.  That trouser suit had been in the window for atleast three year now.  The request to swap it out came out of her daughters mouth every two or three weeks.  If she doesn’t notice the trouser suit is still the same one there’s no way that bag existed she thought to herself.  She made a mental note to keep an eye on her daughter and her memory more frequently.