The Sugar bowl

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Lucy went up the stairs and looked at the sugar bowl, it had been 3 months it was first put there; 7 steps up, 5 steps down. If it had a face, no doubt would it have been frowning at her, or staring at her accusingly.

‘Why haven’t you taken me home, reunited me with my friends,’ it would say if it had a mouth.

But she wouldn’t take it, she couldn’t. It wasn’t her job to pick it up. She had to leave it exactly where it was hoping that Zac would understand the symbolism of it.

What a coward, what a wanker he turned out to be. Not only did he end the relationship via text, not only was he sleeping with Chloe but he didn’t even have the guts to knock her door to return her bowl. No, instead he crept around, making sure he didn’t bump into her and left the bowl on the 7^th stair like the coward he is.

She knew getting involved with the guy downstairs was a mistake, it was shitting on your own doorstep. Of course when you embark on something new like that, you don’t think it is going to end, so you don’t consider what it will be like for your ex to be living in the flat below. But when your date a low down dirty rat, of course it will end, and then the nightmare becomes reality.

They’d met over that sugar bowl. When he moved in she’d taken a bowl of sugar down as a way of introducing herself. He’d accepted it despite the fact he was sweet enough without added sugar. They’d slept together that first night, and dated for around six months, but then she got the text, and soon she began to hear noises she didn’t want to hear coming from downstairs. She recognised the voice immediately as Chloe’s and buried her head in the pillows when the voices became groans.

So she’d leave that sugar bowl there, where he’d left it, a symbol of a lover scorned; a symbol of her hatred.

Zac let himself into the house and switched on the light. He had to move quickly, he didn’t want to bump into Lucy. He looked up the stairs to make sure she wasn’t around. That bloody sugar bowl was still there. Bloody hell she’d nagged him like hell about returning it when they had been together. And now he had returned it, she didn’t even take it in.