Remants

The syrup falls in viscous droplets to the floor below. Two chairs, one on either side, are overturned. Pills lie in an untidy heap, spilled from a small orange bottle. The smell of food is fading.

On the mantelpiece, pictures: graduations, a wedding, increasing numbers of children. The oldest photographs are monochrome.

The door will open again in a few hours. Perhaps it will be with smiles and nervous chatter. Perhaps it will be only one pale face and grim silence. The house pauses, between states. The latter scene is inevitable. Perhaps this will be the time.

But perhaps not.