New Story - With new ideas and directions to hand. I'm writing this and posting it straight onto Steemit - You can not get more exclusive than that! 19

Ash stayed all day at Justin’s and cleaned the kitchen, the bathroom and the living room.

Justin didn’t say anything except when she went round the living room with the vacuum.

“Noisy little bleeder! I’m watching this,” he grumbled.

Ash looked up at the television. A film she’d seen before was showing.

“Have you seen this?” she said, switching off the noise.

“No, but it’s the only thing on that’s not reality TV junk,” he said.

“So you don’t know what happens?”

“I’ve just told you I don’t!” Justin said, flicking glances at Ash and back to the action on the television.

“The ship sinks,” she said and switched the vacuum back on.

Justin slapped his hands on the arms of the chair and was just about to berate Ash for giving away the end when his mind clicked to what she had said.

“You dozy bugger! Of course the ship bloody sinks! It’s the bloody Titanic,” he said and threw the pen from the side table.

Ash ducked the pen and laughed.

Justin looked up as a shadow passed the window. Ash noticed too.

“Rob’s back. You’d better not let him see you’re enjoying yourself,” she said.

“You’ve done a cracking job, Ash,” Robin said, looking around.

“Yeah, it smells better too, but I’m not surprised, look.” Ash pulled a black plastic bag from just outside the kitchen door. She opened it and Robin looked in. He pulled back swiftly and grimaced.

“Where the fuck was that?” he asked.

“What? What did you find?” Justin said.

Ash took the bag across to Justin and showed him the carcass of a large rat, desiccated, just skin and bones left.

“Under the sideboard. It was a big mass of fluff when I found it, I put the fluff in the bag and then found the rest,” she said. “I’m glad I bought those gloves. That Brenda wasn’t too good at cleaning, was she?”

“No, she’s a fucking lazy bitch!” Robin said.

“I hope you’re not talking about me, you little bastard,” Brenda said, walking right into the house without a word of greeting to any of them.

“Actually, I am,” Robin said. “You didn’t find this, did you?” He snatched the bag from Ash’s hand and thrust it close to Brenda’s face.

She took a look inside it and screamed. “Get that filthy fucking thing away from me!” she said and slapped Robin’s hand away.

“You were paid to take care of a man that can’t look after himself. You were supposed to keep his house clean. You were supposed to find dead rats and take them out,” Robin said, looking and sounding older and more confident than his twelve years.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about, you little shit!” she barked at him. “There weren’t no rat when I’ve been here.”

Justin watched the little scene in silence. When the argument came to an uneasy halt, he turned back to his television and said in a theatrical voice, “You had one job, Brenda…”

Ash cracked up. She tried not to, but the tension and then Justin’s dead-pan delivery just did it for her. She turned away and took out the bag with the rat inside.

“You’ve no need to laugh, you little fucker,” Brenda turned on Ash then.

Ash composed herself by the time she came back to the living room. She smiled at Brenda in a ‘You got nothing on me’ kind of way.

“So, do I get a key or not? I’ll come back in tomorrow and carry on, we can forget the last few days’ wages, cos I’ve not been in to clean,” Brenda said directly to Justin.

Justin took his time taking his eyes from the film on TV.

He studied her for a long moment. Then he smiled.

Brenda smiled too, and she looked at Robin with a smug expression.

“You want a key? To my house?” Justin asked.

It was then that Brenda started to realise she wasn’t getting the key.

“So you’re sacking me?” she said. Her voice sounded like she really didn’t believe it. “Who’s going to do the cleaning then? Not him, surely? A little bloody kid, cleaning up after you, a cripple?” she sneered.

“Get out, Brenda,” Justin said with a weary sigh. “That little bloody kid has done more cleaning in the past few hours than you’ve done over the past eighteen months. He found a dead rat that’s been there for months! That’s more than you did. No, you’re not getting a key, no you’re not getting paid for the time you didn’t come in, so don’t ask, and please don’t ask for a reference.”

Brenda didn’t say another word, she turned and left.

She did bang on the window next to Justin’s chair as she left and they heard the snippet of a curse, ‘cocksucker’ or something.

“Lock that door, lad,” Justin said. “We don’t want any other uninvited guests today.”

Ash felt grubby and tired when she finally left Justin’s. The house was far from spotless, but she had done a good bit towards it. If the nurse showed up, she’d see that Justin was coping well on his own and would be able to stay for at least a little while longer in his own home.

Ash looked forward to a nice long bath and perhaps a bit of supper and then bed.

Ash was a little too tired. The cold she was just beginning to shake off had taken its toll on her. Pushing herself to escape the creepy guy the day before, then walking all that way before she found enough money to get a bus hadn’t helped and her energy reserves were low.

She just wasn’t concentrating and she didn’t notice the person following her, keeping to the shadows.

The lane where Mike had spoken to her was approaching and she looked up as far as she could see, there was no one there and she didn’t think she could see anyone at the end, either.

Head down, trudging along, looking at her feet as she went, a little satisfied smile from a day’s work…

Images from google