Yellow Paper: Part 6

She forgot about Granma, and played the piece the way it should be played.When she turned round, she saw her Granma looking out the window. So she hadn't been paying any attention after all?

'Granma, how did I do?'

Tessa blinked several times and looked at Ava. She looked like she'd just seen something beautiful.

'Ava, you played that so well... it was just how it should be. Almost. Of course, you do keep making little mistakes. You'll have to fix them up.' Ava felt the happiness grow in her. If Granma said it was good that was the highest praise.

Kathy turned into the driveway and stopped just outside the garage. She turned off the ignition and took the key out. Leaning her arms on the steering wheel, she thought back on the day. Most days the work was hard and the hours long, but today things had been worse than usual. The line of people who came up to the customer service desk and complained about some purchase had been longer, and they'd had a hard job keeping up with them all. It wouldn't have mattered if she was being paid a decent wage. That was the problem.

She'd thought she was going to get the managerial position, because she was the obvious next choice after the last manager left. A week ago a new person had come. The supervisor had been pleased with this new person's work, and had given her the job Kathy had wanted.

Kathy gripped the steering wheel. Why? She thought. She'd needed that job. She'd worked hard, hadn't she? She could have done it. If they'd given her the chance, she would have proved it. If she hadn't run away with Paul, she would likely have gone to Uni, done a degree in something, got a decent job. She wouldn't be getting paid pittance for hard work now.

Paul. She remembered the night they'd run away, hopping into his run down car, and getting married. The first house they rented. A small, dark house with an over grown garden. It was beautiful for a long time because he was there. And then he changed. The nights she spent, sitting on the porch outside among the beer bottles he'd left there, waiting for him.

The times he laughed at her when she told him to stay at home with her, not to go out. And then went anyway. How he promised her he'd do things and then never made an effort to do them. And slowly, the house became ugly, the property became ugly. She stopped waiting for him to come home. She started to nag him, said things that made him angry. Then felt better when he was angry, because she was paying him back for hurting her. When he leaned over the piano, the dark hair falling down over his eyes, his fingers moving over the keys. He played with everything he had, perfectly, and with feeling. They told him he could have a career in it, and he wanted the career. He tried, but never hard enough, to pass the examinations. So he gave up, and it was one part time job after another, he never stuck to anything, except the piano. She knew now that he hadn't changed, that he'd always been like that.