PICTURE PROMPT WEEK - SANTA'S THRIFT SHOP

This is picture prompt week. Our stories must be no more than 300 words. I am starting a new story, too. The tentative title is "Santa's Thrift Shop." Scroll down to return to Tuesday Tales. Thanks for stopping by. 

   Giselle stood at her living room window. Holding up binoculars, she could make out the Christmas tree in the window across the street. Her poor vision prevented her from distinguishing the people moving around. She guessed it was Cal and his son, Bobby. Pain pierced her heart. That should have been her son with him. She sighed.

   “You’d think after dealing with this crap for four years, I’d be used to it by now,” she said out loud to herself. Early onset macular degeneration had disrupted her life, robbed her of her profession and forced her to sell her family home.  

   She made her way to the kitchen and plugged in the electric kettle. The beauty of it was that it stopped boiling and kept the water hot with no open fire. With help from her aunt, she’d laid out the kitchen and memorized it. Find the tea? Easy peasy, she went right to the correct cabinet. Sugar? Milk? Giselle pulled things together for a hot cuppa to chase the winter chill away.

   Aunt Julia had picked out this house, a two-bedroom ranch. Giselle couldn’t handle stairs. She’d instructed her Aunt to tell no one about her condition, especially not Cal Morrison. She could take his hostility, but never his pity.

   Julia said he’d never forgiven Giselle for taking the job in Europe. She’d thought she told him it was only for a year, but he didn’t listen. Within nine months, he’d knocked up a woman and gotten married. Cal’s wife, Jane, had drowned in the Delaware two years ago.  

   Did Julia not know this house was across the street from Cal’s? Giselle didn’t think so. There would be no reunion with him. Between his anger and her disability, the gap was as wide at the Atlantic Ocean.

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