There's None So Blind

"Oh, and just how did you overstep the mark?"

"Well, I kissed her and.... Oh, Christ. I touched her inappropriately. Can we leave this subject?"

"No, I don't think we can. So what did she do to make you stop?

"Nothing. Look, I had drunk too much...."

"Why don't I find that a surprise?" the old boy interjected.

"Well, anyway I suddenly realised what I was doing and stopped myself."

"So Sheila didn't stop you? You stopped yourself?

"Yes!"

"If she didn't stop you, why did you stop? Perhaps she wanted you to continue."

"And she might have let me out of gratitude for saving her and her family's life. I don't want a woman to sleep with me out of gratitude."

"Did you by any chance discuss this with Sheila?"

"Don't be silly. It would have been too embarrassing. She was embarrassed enough being in the house with me after that anyway."

"Oh, so embarrassed that she didn't move herself and her children out of your house."

"Well, she didn't have anywhere to go."

"Rubbish! The insurance company paid you for accommodating her and the children, didn't they? Sheila could have moved out anytime she liked."

"But why did she stay then?"

"Think. Could it be that she had fallen in love with her guardian angel?" the old boy said and then quietly he added, "It's such a shame that that has never happened to me."

"She never said anything to me."

"And I suppose you told her how you felt everyday?"

"Of course I didn't. If I'd told Sheila how I felt and she didn't have the same feelings towards me - well, that would have been too embarrassing for her to stay living at my house."

"You don't think there's the slightest possibility that Sheila was thinking the exact same thing, by any chance. Do you, Ray?

"But!"

"Tell me why haven't you accepted her invitations to dinner."

"How do you know I haven't? Come to that how do you know she's asked me."

"Lets just say it's obvious to me, shall we? But you are really making a mistake. That woman has fallen in love with you."

Suddenly the pub doors flew open and a massive party crowd entered the pub. Conversation became an impossibility and for a few minutes I turned my attention away from the old man. When things had quietened down a little, I was surprised to find he was no longer sitting on the stool beside me.

"George, where'd the old boy go?" I asked as he came over to refill my glass.

"What old boy?"

"The old fart I've was talking to."

"Christ, Ray, you've had e-bloody-nough for one night. You've been sitting there talking to yourself all bleeding night. Time you went home, I think." George pulled the pint away from me again and poured it into the slop's tray. "Do you want me to call you a taxi, Ray?" he added.

"George I think you'd better cut down on the sauce yourself!" I said to him as I got off my stool. Once George decided you'd had a skin full, I knew that I'd get no more from him that night.

Christmas Eve I woke up without a hangover. I found it pleasant but it didn't take me by as much of a surprise as it would have done if Sheila hadn't lived with me for a year. Before she and the children had moved in hangovers were the norm for me.

Like a lot of people I had the day off work and spent it wandering around the shops. I'd already bought the children and Sheila's presents and they were going to be delivered by the couriers in the morning. But I found a couple of other things I thought they would like. Having wrapped them up, I took them to the courier's office to be added to the delivery. Then I went back to the hotel with the couple of bottles of booze I thought should keep me pretty senseless until after Boxing Day. Back in those days the pubs didn't open for long on Christmas day.

As I came out of the dining room in the hotel that night, one of the other residents, a guy everyone in the hotel knew as the Major, collared me.

"Mr Stark, I say old boy do you play bridge?" he asked.

"Well, I have done but I'm not that clever at it," I replied without thinking, having been taken by surprise by his question.

"Wonderful, you're just what we need. We don't take it too seriously ourselves. But Mrs Brant has got visitors this evening. Would you mind making up a fourth until her visitors go?"

You know I didn't know how to say no to the old bugger. Damn it, what is it about officer types, that they just seem to be able to get you to do things without really trying. So the next thing I know I'm sitting down with three old farts playing bloody bridge instead of going down to the Rose and Crown.

"Still it's only until the old girl's guests leave," I thought to myself.

Some hopes; the old girl never showed at all and we were still playing at midnight. The Major and the other two thanked me for sitting in, as the game broke up and they made their way off to bed. By that time, they knew how bad I was at bridge but they didn't comment. Lucky we weren't playing for money; I'd have been broke.

After they'd gone I sat in the lounge for a while and watched the TV for a bit. It wasn't until I had gotten into bed that I realised that all I'd had to drink that night was a couple of sherries with the Major and his cronies. I'd fancied a pint or two, but it didn't seem right to drink beer at the bridge table.

I was up early for breakfast on that Christmas morning. God knows why; possibly because I'd had nothing to drink the night before. But as I came down the stairs from my room, there was I surprise waiting for me in reception.

"Mr Stark, there's some parcels here for you!" the receptionist said as I came into view.

I did a quick double take as she pointed to the little pile of brightly coloured packages. Christ, they were my presents to Sheila and the children. What the hell were they doing at the hotel? Assuming the couriers had fucked the delivery up, I called them to demand that they deliver the parcels to the correct address. But all I got was a recorded Christmas greeting and a message that the office would be open again the day after Boxing Day.

"You know the old man who delivered them seemed a bit senile to me!" the young receptionist commented, having kindly ignored the blasphemies that I muttered as I put the telephone down.

"Don't tell me. A short rather plump guy with white hair and a beard," I said looking at her.

"Why, yes, that sounds like him. Do you know him?" she asked with a smile on her face.

"Regretfully I think I do. Can you call me a taxi and ask them to deliver these for me?"

"Certainly, Mr Stark. Go and have your breakfast and I'll call you when the taxi gets here, so you can pay him."

The girl still hadn't called me when I came out of the dining room after my leisurely breakfast.

"I'm sorry, Mr Stark, it doesn't make sense but I've tried every taxi company that we normally use and none of them have a car available."

"It might not make sense to you, but where that old man is concerned it definitely is starting to make sense to me, young lady. Would you mind helping me carry these out to my car?"

+++++++++++++

As I pulled into Sheila's drive, the front door opened and all three children rushed out to greet me. I won't go into the rest of the day, but I will say that although I had said I wasn't going to be there, my attendance did appear to have been anticipated. I noted the dining room table had already been laid to seat five. It was after the children had gone to bed that I asked Sheila.

"You knew I was coming then?"

"Of course!"

"But I told you I wasn't coming."

"Yes, you did, but I saw your friend yesterday and he told me that you would definitely be here today."

"Don't tell me, the little tubby bloke."

"Yes, the man who came to the hospital last year."

"Did he by any chance say anything else?"

"Only that I should lock the door after you came in and get my hands on your car keys."

I looked at the coffee table where I'd put my keys. They were gone!

"Looking for these?" Sheila asked. She held my car keys up for me to see.

"Yes, can I have them please?"

"Of course. Just come and get them." Sheila replied as at the same time she pulled the dress she was wearing away from her chest and dropped the keys down her cleavage. Then she sat there and smiled at me.

"What am I supposed to do now?" I asked.

"Come and get them." Sheila said as she jumped out of her seat and headed for the lounge door at a run. "You know where the bedroom is, don't you!"

+++++++++++++++++

Sheila and I were married less than a month later. Well, you knew that was coming even if I didn't. But there are none so blind as those who won't see.

We've been living in this house together happily now for the last thirteen years. I'm sitting here this Christmas Eve with my loving wife beside me, looking at an old scorched photograph hanging over the fireplace.

It was just after our wedding when some photograph albums that had been recovered from Sheila's burnt out house were finally returned to Sheila. They had been damaged by water and the fire itself; the insurance company had sent them off to specialists to see if any could be saved.

"Sheila, who's this a picture of?" I asked as we looked through them for the first time.

"My grandfather, my father's dad. I love that picture. Doesn't he remind you of Father Christmas?"

"I thought he looked like the old guy. You know the one you call my friend."

"No, I don't think so. He's much shorter than grandfather was. Strange though, when I was younger I seem to remember that he had a sterner look on his face. But he's positively beaming there. I suppose the memory plays tricks on us."

Life goes on