Our House

I grew up in a small suburban house; three bedrooms and semi-detached. The neat manicured front garden was claimed by my mother and she was always out there; gloved and clipping away. The rear patch of grass was relegated to me and my dad – not that he ever entered. One bedroom was mine, always dishevelled; my mother complaining, what did she expect? One bedroom for my parents; full of chintz and my dad hated it. And one more for guests; the vaingloriously named Guest Room - only we never had any guests. The room seemed so desolate, full of junk, the clutter of loneliness. I longed for my parents to use this room, to have another child. Though I could never imagine how; they never seemed to talk.