Setting myself a lunchtime task...

Task: write a short story in the remaining 40 mins of your lunchbreak...including a tree, an owl, a sink, a yellow lego brick, an ant and a kite.

Start the story with: "Bisto isn't necessarily the best brand of gravy."

Bisto isn't necessarily the best brand of gravy. Why does it think it is superior over Tesco's own brand or Paxo or any of the other gravy granules? So self-important. It's almost like someone re-named gravy 'Bisto' with the capital B. "Any Bisto to go with the chicken?" my husband often asks over dinner.  The identity of gravy has been clouded in a commercial coat. Gravy has lost it's true identity. This is what is running through my mind as I spray the runner beans with cold water under the sink. They sit limply at the bottom of the colander. One small stringy one slips through the hole and into the sink. One man down.

I look up from the basin and out of the kitchen window. The sky is watery blue and black and the moon is hanging low over the egremont russett apple tree. It is almost a full moon, with a chunk missing from the top of it. The illusion of the dark makes distances disappear. It seems as if the moon is sitting on top of the tree like a hat. If I was to climb up to the top branch of the tree and perch there with my legs dangling down, I am almost sure I could fly Neeta's kite up to touch the moon and say hello.

Jimmy should be home soon. I chuck the beans into the saucepan on the hob. I check my watch. He always arrives between 7.30 and 8, briefcase in hand, the cold plastered against his cheek like icy clingfilm when I kiss it. The blue fire flickers to life underneath the pan as I ignite the hob. Strange how I can control fire by twisiting a metal knob. Neeta is staying at Grandma's tonight so it's just Jimmy and I for dinner. I wander whether there will be idle chatter over dinner, 'how was your day' type talk. Or will we sit in awkward silence, the cracks plastering our mouths shut. I pray that there is some kind of delay, that he has been held up at work or that someone has jumped on the train tracks delaying all of the trains. A horrible thing to pray I know, but it happens all the time anyway doesn't it?

An ant is crawling along the fridge door. He pauses as I approach like a predator, as if his black little body can seek camouflage against the bright white plastic expanse. He's got no chance. I pick him up and let him run frantically along my palm. I go over to the window and grope for the gold handle, keeping my eye on the ant's whereabouts. As I push open the window an owl coos from the wilderness beyond the glass that separates our linoleum tiled kitchen from the whispering night outside. A sharp cold creeps into my fingertips as I shake the ant into the night. I close the window behind him, barring his entrance. My eyes are adjusted to the light of the fluorescent bulbs in our kitchen, making it difficult to decipher the shapes beyond the window. I shudder, there could be anything out there.

8.13pm. This is unusual. Jimmy is always home by now. Maybe my praying paid off. I suddenly feel afraid, maybe I have ushered in some curse with my shameful prayers? What if the trains are delayed, and he is the one on the tracks? I check on the beef, it is probably drying out. A pungent smell like burning hair screams from the oven when I pull open the door. A melted pool of primary yellow sits at the bottom of the oven, putrid fumes rising into the beef on the tray above. What on earth is that? I step back and cough. My foot hits something sharp and hard. I look down to see Neeta's lego bricks scattered on the floor. Yellow, green and red. No wander Jimmy's late. Yellow lego-brick-beef, potatos and beans doesn't sound that appetising, and we're out of Bisto too.