Nancy could never remember when pruning roses, whether one cut above the joint on the stem or below. The secateurs wavered in her hand for a moment and then she heard the postman’s motorbike roar towards her house. Christmas was only a week away and although she was in the autumn of her years, Nancy still got a childish thrill when the cards and letters arrived. She rose slowly from her knees, waited until the postman had taken off – he always liked a chat and she wasn’t in the mood  – and got the mail.

She put the kettle on, threw an English Breakfast tea bag in her favourite cup as Fat Elvis, the family Labrador, lay on his back asleep with his legs in the air. Elvis’ antics helped quell but not extinguish her grief. Her husband had left her to ‘commune with this own thoughts’ in India after the suicide of their son, Christopher. The last she heard of him, he was sitting at the feet of a guru in Rishikesh. Fat Elvis was her sole companion and confidant.

She let the teabag steep and opened the envelopes. Every year there were cards from her former next door neighbours, Maurice and Stella, who had settled in Shropshire. Every year they reminded her how fortunate they were travelling the world and how sorry they were she was on her own. Nancy felt machined gunned by pity.

There were cards from old students she had taught at Montserrat College, an exclusive private school. They still called her Mrs Noble, which was endearing but unnecessary. The children who faced her for Year 12 Geography all of those years ago were adults now, with children of their own.

Nancy opened all of the cards except one and arranged them in a row on the bureau over the fireplace. Above the bureau hung a picture of Christ carrying his cross to Calvary. She opened the last card. The afternoon sun cut a brilliant diagonal shaft of light across the bureau. The large kitchen clock ticked loudly above the refrigerator. It was a card from Paul Lindquist, complete with a dove and gold embossed olive branch on the front. He would be in town in two days and wondered if she was free to catch up at the Ikea coffee shop near the airport.

Paul was a popular teacher at Montserrat. Christopher liked him very much. He taught English Literature and History in the senior years. He was an expert on the romantic English poets and had presented papers in symposiums on Keats and Wordsworth. He was 25, handsome with a mop of foppish blonde hair falling over his eyes. He rode an old Triumph Bonneville motorbike and wore his leather jacket in the common room. Her husband, who also taught at Montserrat, never took a shine to him.

Paul left Montserrat a year before Christopher hung himself. Nancy had paid little heed to the rumours about Paul entertaining some of the senior boys with alcohol and marijuana in his flat. The college was a liberal institution and while it did not turn a blind eye to ‘extracurricular activities’, neither did it chastise non-conformists. The students were almost adults and were treated as such.

Paul and Christopher had met at an intercollegiate chess club play off. Christopher had beaten the senior year chess champion. Paul put his hand on Chris’ shoulder and said, “to the victors go the glittering prizes” and gave him a copy of Oscar Wilde’s poems. It was a new edition, wrapped in expensive paper sold from The Textual Treat Bookshop in the seedy end of Bent Street. The red light district was off limits to students. The book had the faint scent of sandalwood.

Nancy put the card on the table and looked at Fat Elvis who was now staring at motes of dust dancing in the morning sun. Paul had left his cell phone number on the bottom of the card.  She had liked Paul but didn’t know him well. She didn’t feel like regurgitating her personal history starting with Christopher’s death, the Coroner’s inquest, the blinding rows with her husband, his flight to India and her resignation from Montserrat. But as he was an old colleague, it was good form to meet him. She texted saying she would meet him at Ikea.

The glass walls of the new Ikea showroom stood 30 metres high, with long blue banners hanging from the ceiling to the floor, with the words IKEA printed on them. The coffee shop was near the crèche and popular with young mums. Nancy sat at a table in the corner and watched as an Emirates 747 landed silently on a distant runway.

There were cushions covered in highly coloured fabrics in premade bedrooms, lounges and kitchens. Families of multi-sized serving bowls nestled inside one another. There was something life affirming about a kitchen, she thought, where gleaming pots hung from hooks and wooden spoons were separated from bottle openers.

She took a sip of coffee as her throat constricted, forcing her to regurgitate a little of it in to her mouth. Her hand flew to her bag to retrieve a hankerchief but she swallow it without anybody noticing. Ikea was busy for a Wednesday morning. A young couple wandered around a queen size double bed. Next to the bed sat two blonde side tables, which Nancy knew from past experience, took an engineering degree to assemble. They looked a nice couple, holding hands and laughing. The bed was more than they could afford but they’d buy it anyway, she thought. A good bed is the cornerstone of a young marriage.

A small boy about five years old ran around an elephant shaped slippery dip in the crèche. His mother was talking to a friend by the checkouts. The boy had straw blonde hair and dimples. He wore a white t-shirt with the words ‘Master of the Universe’ printed on the front. He looked like Christopher on his first day of primary school. His blonde hair was neatly combed with a part on the left. He wore grey school regulation shorts and Roman sandals.

Paul walked through the checkout against the tide of people. He was tanned and had grown a Van Dyke beard. He wore white cargo pants and a light blue shirt and looked as if he’d spent a month walking around one of the Greek islands. His eyes darted left as he held out his soft hand.

“Good lord Paul, is that really you?” Nancy said.

Paul smiled and nodded. “I’ve spent couple of years teaching in outback Western Australia. I’ve lost my English flabbiness and quite probably, most of my mind. I came back via Berlin where I saw some old friends.”

An international 737 Qatar flight passed over the store, momentarily drowning out their conversation.

“… I said I think ‘down under’ must have agreed with you,” Nancy said, “but you still have the hands of a writer.”

Paul winced, looked at his hands and placed them palm down on the table. He ordered a hot chocolate and tried to smile. But something went wrong. It was as if he had managed to create the grin and failed, forcing him to recollect what a smile might look like.

“I’ve been thinking about you and Chris,” Paul said. “Teaching at Montserrat was one of the happiest times of my life. I’m probably going through one of those mid-life crisis phases, you know, looking up people who were special to me. Probably a sign of impending imbecility.”

Nancy studied his face. He had grown older and his features had filled out. His shoulders were straighter and he had stopped wearing that awful aftershave. It was curious she thought, that Paul would consider her a friend. They were not close. She knew Paul hoped Christopher would be with her.

Paul made polite conversation. His hands moved like a flight of pigeons taking off as he described the sandstorms and the sheer size of the farms.

“I got lonely for England after a while. I missed the colour green. I’m going to the Brecon Beacons next week with some children who have cancer. I do volunteer work – well as much as I can. Did you know I wrote a book in my last term at Montserrat?”

Nancy feigned surprise. “You always said you were going to write a book. What was it called?”

Paul’s hands fell in to his lap and then danced on top of the table. He finally knitted them together. His eye caught the young boy Nancy had been watching, and turned his head away as he could feel Nancy staring at his profile.

“‘The Shadow Within’. I don’t suppose you’ve heard of it. It sold very well in Germany for some reason. It was a love story. Unrequited. Lots of tears and angst. I suppose there will always be a market for that sort of stuff. It just poured out of me. Anyway, the upshot is the money has allowed me to take time off from teaching and write a second book.”

Nancy had read ‘The Shadow Within’. Christopher had a much-thumbed copy by his bedside. It was about an illicit lesbian love affair between a teacher and her student. It was so bad, she couldn’t put it down. There were some very graphic sex scenes. The teacher was exposed by a jealous student and had to flee England. It sold well.

Paul bent down and retied a loose shoelace. He pushed back the mop of blonde hair from his face, took a deep breath, sighed and then locked his fingers around a raised knee.

“So tell me, how is Chris? He must have finished university by now.”

The tannoy speaker above their head cracked to life. “Cashier five. Can I have a price check on the black adjustable study chairs. Price check on black study chairs, thankyou.”

Nancy placed the coffee spoon on the side of the saucer and sat up straight.

“Christopher killed himself a year after you left Montserrat,” Nancy said watching his face carefully. “He started hanging around with kids who used drugs. His personality changed from a carefree young man to someone I couldn’t recognise. He’d come home drunk and stoned and he’d terrorise us. We had to call the police some nights.”

Paul’s head fell in to his hands. Nancy thought of placing a hand on his shoulder but instead looked at the shadow of a Qantas 737 racing across the car park.

Paul lifted his head, took a sip of lukewarm hot chocolate and wiped away a tear. His facial expressions were right, Nancy thought, but he would have done the same if she’d told him Fat Elvis had died. She swept the thought aside.

They sat in silence for ten seconds while Paul composed himself. He pulled a handkerchief from his pants pocket. Nancy could see another international plane coming in the distance. It’s wings waggled as it straightened up on its approach to the run way.

“I’m so sorry, Nancy. I didn’t know. I didn’t know Chris all that well. He liked poetry and we both loved The Clash.”

“How did you know he liked poetry? It wasn’t something he talked much about.”

“As an English teacher I know what students read, what they were interested in. He read books that weren’t on the syllabus. That made him stand out – an original.”

“But he wasn’t in your class. He was in the intermediate year. You taught seniors.”

“Yes, that’s right but he told me that day he beat the intercollegiate chess champ that he liked Keats, Yeats and Wilde.”

“But you gave him the book of Wilde’s poems at the chess club. That suggests that you two had met before.”

“We had met briefly at the school swimming carnival.”

“That was in June, the chess match was in September…”

“He was very good at freestyle…”

“So, you had known each other for some time.”

“Yes, about three months. I’m starting to feel like I’m being interrogated Nancy.”

“I’m sorry. I suppose it’s still a mystery to me. I’ve never been able to reconcile the loss.”

Paul reached out and put his hand over hers but kept his eyes on the table. It was then she knew.

“Of course, Christopher loved to swim,” she said. “He was like a fish in the water. We went to Spain on holiday when he was seven and he never got out of the sea. He always got a rash after swimming in chlorine. It’s funny how one remembers the small things.”

Nancy looked up and saw a British Airlines plane, less than 1000 feet off the ground, coming in to land. It looked as if it was going to plough through the glass wall of the building.

“Yes, he showed me. I had to put antihistamine lotion on it once …”

The four turbines of the British Airlines flight roared over the top of the building as Nancy saw Paul’s face fall apart and reassemble in fear. The blonde wooden floor boards of the cafeteria vibrated. He pulled his bag on to his lap.

“But Paul, the skin irritation was on his groin. I can hardly see how Chris would have allowed that unless …”

“Our relationship wasn’t like that at ….

“Relationship? He was 15. You were a grown man.”

Paul stood up quickly and placed his chair under the table. “You’ve got it completely wrong, Nancy. I came here to see you and Chris. Now you’re accusing me of something horrific. I’m so sorry for your loss. It was a bad idea coming to see you.”

He clutched his bag to his chest and moved quickly down the aisle towards the preassembled bookcases. The blonde haired boy was playing with the spotlights while his mother talked to a salesman in kitchenware. Nancy ran after Paul and picked up a box cutter sitting on top of a preassembled study desk.

“Paul, come back! Tell me what happened. Paul!”

A man with a sack truck loaded with flat packed modular TV units accidently blocked Paul’s way.

“Get the fuck out of the way you old cunt!” Paul yelled as the child swivelled the light in to Paul’s face.

Nancy grabbed his shirt and swung the blade across the side of his head, slicing his left ear off. Blood poured on to his blue shirt. He fell to his knees. A salesman took the box cutter from Nancy and pinned her arms behind her back. Paul’s eyes fixed on Nancy as he tried to smile. “I’m sorry” he said, “I’m sorry” as he crumpled to the concrete floor.

“Cashier two. Can I have a price check on a black halogen lamp and would the store manager please call the police.”

The woman police officer was very nice, Nancy thought. She bought her a cup of tea and a coffee scroll. A large crowd had gathered around the medics as they worked on Paul.

“Please stand clear and move back,” said a policeman who was also trying to get a statement from the man with the modular TV units.

The medics carried Paul on a stretcher to the back of the ambulance. There were no lights or sirens. The blonde headed boy pointed to the large pool of blood and laughed before being pulled away by his mother. “But mummy, it’s like TV.”

Nancy dunked a portion of her coffee scroll in to the tea and lifted it to her mouth. It was warm and sweet. Over the horizon another plane loomed – a Cathay Pacific flight from Hong Kong. She had always wanted to go to Hong Kong but now that would have to wait.