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Sad to hear about your Ron.

Yes, it was all so sudden.

Must have been a great shock.

Oh, it was…….and then again it wasn’t.

How so?

Well just between you and me I was glad to see him go.

That’s a terrible thing to say.

I know, but it’s the truth.

I could never say that about my Carl.

Well no, he was such a good man.

Still is, I expect him to come walking through the door any day now.

Do you really think he will?

Yes, it’s not like Carl to be away so long.

But it’s been a year; don’t you think he’s a lost cause by now?

Never and don’t you even think such a thing.

But they found his backpack and his wallet in the jungle.

People drop such things in places far odder than jungles.

So you think he’s still alive?

Of course, I do, he’s just a bit lost is all. People get lost all the time.

I prayed Ron would get lost all the time.

Well, I can understand that, after all, Ron was a bit of a bastard, if you don’t mind me saying.

Oh, of course not, I called him far worse.

Still, it must have been a shock.

Yes, it was, one minute he was watching the races, cheering on his bet in the 3.15 and then plop, he was done and out. I came in from getting the washing off the line, and I thought he was having a nap. Took me twenty minutes before I realised he wasn’t breathing and by then I decided mouth to mouth was not an option, you know, let sleeping dogs lie and all that.

All the same, it was a terrible business. Carl went off with a few mates for a boy’s weekend. The boys came back, but Carl didn’t. The search went on for weeks, but they found nothing. The boys said they got up the morning he went missing and found his tent empty, his backpack and wallet laying on the track a few hundred metres away. Just vanished, but then he never had any great sense of direction. Some nights he’d get lost going the to bathroom. It’s why I think he’ll come home any day now.

I admire your positive thinking. But by now there can’t be a lot of hope.

I know what you mean, but I have to hold onto something, I can’t give up, if he is dead I’d like to lay him to rest. We had a plot picked out in the cemetery, lovely view and all that, and I know he’d like it to know he was buried there to keep me company when my turn comes.

Carl’s ashes are still sitting on my mantle piece. I look at them from time to time and tell him he was a miserable old bugger.

Are you going to leave them there?

No, I plan to flush him down the toilet in the same way he flushed away all my dreams and aspirations. Just haven’t got around to it because I know that act will be a sort of closure.

Cleanse him from your life.

Yes exactly.

Anyway, fancy a cup of tea?

That would be lovely.

Written for: https://mindlovemiserysmenagerie.wordpress.com/2020/01/26/sunday-writing-prompt-death/