YRKB
04-08-2018, 08:27 PM
1030 Melrose West..
At lunch, one hostess and familiar guest;
early March afternoon,
Suburban sun -
sat on the patio to the lawn
he'll walk up and kill them both from.
A pretty, sprawling white house,
two stories, wood floors -
stained glass windows
French garden doors..
leading out to the table sat sisters,
in cashmere jumpers -
barefoot,
part-eaten cheese board,
open, down facing books.
Dusky blonde hair,
the same smile lined eyes
with the pretty variations
of Mom and Dad otherwise.
3 plus decades together,
one now with a baby on the way
musing, remarking in conversation
on all aspects of this change.
But the idyll is shattered
when a man jumps the wall
grey haired, red eyed
not walking straight
at all.
Midway through talking,
one sister trails off
and hostess follows her eyeline
since she has stopped..
Both women rise,
not too fast
but not slow
and under her breath
hostess says 'Ok, I think we should go.'
She knows him. Her husband runs Audley & Hare -
a solicitor's firm, that in the last year
took on a case, a business dispute
where two partners over their joint company filed suits.
They'd started friends but bad blood turned rife
and so sought to ruin each other in life.
Both played dirty, but this man had lost -
and since then his cold calls to the office hadn't stopped.
Mostly she'd been sheltered and so hadn't thought about
'playing up' the issue and sounding off about
her niggling concern that something was amiss
to anyone except her husband over this...
But seeing him coming
towards them like he was
she flushed an instant ice cold,
felt an electric buzz
the body's low hum of danger,
of needing to go
and knew that her sister
did too also.
Her husband was not here,
a life was still growing inside;
God, Jesus, if you're there,
provide. Provide.
Watch over my sister,
both her and me.
Not here and like this -
let me see my baby.
And when he screamed -
'Where is he? You don't know what I've done!
Murdered my wife,
killed my kid son -
they can't suffer on skid row when I've lost everything.
Bring him outside,
the next bullet's for him!'
Her sister stepped forward,
slender palms spread out
and he fired 4 times
separating part of her mouth.
Hostess sank to her knees,
urine cascading her legs -
no time to grieve.
No time to beg.
At Audley & Hare, a man eating late lunch his desk
received a call, asking if he lived 1030 Melrose West...
where 3 people were found, needing to be identified-
2 in the garden, 1 in the bedroom inside.
Copyright Yafeu-Khamisi Rodway-Brown
At lunch, one hostess and familiar guest;
early March afternoon,
Suburban sun -
sat on the patio to the lawn
he'll walk up and kill them both from.
A pretty, sprawling white house,
two stories, wood floors -
stained glass windows
French garden doors..
leading out to the table sat sisters,
in cashmere jumpers -
barefoot,
part-eaten cheese board,
open, down facing books.
Dusky blonde hair,
the same smile lined eyes
with the pretty variations
of Mom and Dad otherwise.
3 plus decades together,
one now with a baby on the way
musing, remarking in conversation
on all aspects of this change.
But the idyll is shattered
when a man jumps the wall
grey haired, red eyed
not walking straight
at all.
Midway through talking,
one sister trails off
and hostess follows her eyeline
since she has stopped..
Both women rise,
not too fast
but not slow
and under her breath
hostess says 'Ok, I think we should go.'
She knows him. Her husband runs Audley & Hare -
a solicitor's firm, that in the last year
took on a case, a business dispute
where two partners over their joint company filed suits.
They'd started friends but bad blood turned rife
and so sought to ruin each other in life.
Both played dirty, but this man had lost -
and since then his cold calls to the office hadn't stopped.
Mostly she'd been sheltered and so hadn't thought about
'playing up' the issue and sounding off about
her niggling concern that something was amiss
to anyone except her husband over this...
But seeing him coming
towards them like he was
she flushed an instant ice cold,
felt an electric buzz
the body's low hum of danger,
of needing to go
and knew that her sister
did too also.
Her husband was not here,
a life was still growing inside;
God, Jesus, if you're there,
provide. Provide.
Watch over my sister,
both her and me.
Not here and like this -
let me see my baby.
And when he screamed -
'Where is he? You don't know what I've done!
Murdered my wife,
killed my kid son -
they can't suffer on skid row when I've lost everything.
Bring him outside,
the next bullet's for him!'
Her sister stepped forward,
slender palms spread out
and he fired 4 times
separating part of her mouth.
Hostess sank to her knees,
urine cascading her legs -
no time to grieve.
No time to beg.
At Audley & Hare, a man eating late lunch his desk
received a call, asking if he lived 1030 Melrose West...
where 3 people were found, needing to be identified-
2 in the garden, 1 in the bedroom inside.
Copyright Yafeu-Khamisi Rodway-Brown