A Chance Of Happiness

A CHANCE OF HAPPINESS.

                John Myers watched as the spider wove her web of silver upon the drain pipe opposite his flat. He was thinking about how his life had changed and it was all his own doing. John had never been one for superstition he thought about Robert the Bruce and how a spider had changed his life. He had to feel confident like the spider if the web broke the spider would always be ready to weave another one.

                His thoughts went back to his wife Mary she had wanted him to spend more time with her and the girl’s weekends. If there was the chance of overtime weekends driving the buses, he would have been a fool not to have taken what was offered. If only he had thought things through, instead of taking Mary and his two daughters Jodie and Clare for granted.

            One day he had come home from working after a late evening shift, to find his belongings packed into brown two suitcases waiting for him on the drive. Mary had had the locks changed on the front and back doors of their semi- detached home. She had taken their two daughters to stay with their grandmother in Dorset for the weekend.

        After that John, had rented the flat above the Chinese restaurant he had missed his girls Jodie seven and Clare fourteen. Also, the way that Mary had everything in their home to a routine the washing and meals prepared. Now if he was late home from work there was the fish shop, a Chinese take away and the launderette. He felt the pounds weighing him down when he climbed into his cab at work. Too many curries and the odd pie when he finished a late shift and could not be bothered to cook or shop. Ironing was a chore that he had learnt fast after a few holes here and there in his shirts and vests.  

     His mind went back to his meeting with Bella at the Woodcutters Arms. Bella worked the bar at the pub were he occasionally dropped in for a pint and a game of darts after work and the odd pint of bitter weekends if not working. It had only been a mild flirtation with Bella if circumstances had been different, he probably would not have looked twice at her she had wavy red hair and pale blue eyes. Bella had noticed that he was deep in thought they had got chatting at the bar. They were just two lonely people passing time together. later a cup of coffee after the pub had closed its doors had led onto other things, Bella was divorced and wanted a steady relationship.  All as John needed was a brief affair to liven up the routine that had become part of his daily life.

     He had to say that Bella had a good figure and she seemed very experienced in other matters and a good listener to his woes. With Mary talk was always about the girls and her mother Beth. There had been many times, when they had slept together like they were strangers, getting up ready to start their day again. Their time together had become tedious. John just needed a brief affair to balance things out. He had no intention of leaving Mary and his two beautiful daughters to become a weekend dad.

    It was a pity that someone had tipped Mary off about John staying behind after the pub had closed. John’s shifts did not help the situation the overtime added to the girls having the latest mod cons, laptops, iPads, bicycles and fashionable clothes, to keep up with their mates. Mary had a nice home maybe that was the problem? She was becoming too much like her mother Beth. He remembered when on his arrival home how in the early days of their marriage they could not keep their hands off each? other, the food could wait till later it often did. Oh, for those days there was hope and he had plenty of that his life was lonely, he could not wait for the weekends to see his girls the other days were pretty nondescript.

    He had let the girls down again, about making a fish pond at the weekend that was when Mary and the girls had left to stay with her mother for a few days. If only he could turn back the pages in time. John had stopped going to the Woodcutters Arms. Optimistic that Bella would get the message loud and clear, that he was not interested in her the affair was over. She was an attractive woman and she would find someone else.

     Mary still let him take the girls out to MacDonald’s and to the local park. Jodie and Clare were not too keen on the flat with the smell of curry from the Chinese restaurant below, neither was John. It was close to the park and Mary still lived a few streets away in the family home she would not take the girls away from their school and friends. John had to admit that Mary was an excellent mother. Why had he been such a fool to throw everything away

   Recently he had taken the girls shopping his younger daughter had remarked that he looked like father Christmas with his shaggy beard. The girls had helped John to choose new clothes and waited while he went in the barbers to have the beard removed. Whether the girls had told their mother about daddy growing an awful beard and getting cake crumbs stuck in the beard he did not know.

   A few weeks later he had attended parents evening at Clare’s school to chat with the teachers and Mary had remarked how smart he looked in his navy new suit. Neither of them had met anyone else. It had been like old times John and Mary had laughed and joked together like teenagers remembering their courting days how strict her father had been if John had brought Mary back late from the High School prom. He had offered to buy her a sherry; she had refused stating “I must get home to the girls.” Mary had not invited John indoors; she had accepted his offer of a lift home.

      Johns thoughts came back to the present, he must try to get his marriage back on track. Looking at the spider he noticed that there was a small fly trapped in the spider’s web. He did not know or understand why, these memories kept coming. He thought about Napoleon when he had been exiled to a strange land, he had made friends with the Balcombe family. Has he unlocked his front door the phone was ringing John picked up the handset to cancel working over- time this weekend someone else would do his route on the bus? He would be spending more time with his family. John had promised to assist Mary in the garden the girls were excited they would all go to Walkers Pet Shop together to get fish for the pond that John was going to make. Has they entered the pet shop Jodie had noticed a black hairy spider in a tank,  

“Can we give him a home?”

“How do you know it’s a he?”  Said Mary.

“Best leave him be,” darling remarked John.                                                                                                                     Why he had gone back in time to his childhood to reminisce about folklore? That’s what John did not understand? He was glad to be back with his family. If this weekend went well, John hoped to be moving back into the family home.

   Three months later it was as if John and Mary had never split up. They had put the bad days behind them. Their daughter Jodie had got this obsession with spiders they had tried to tempt her with a kitten but she had refused and was happy to visit Fred the African spider at Walkers Pet Shop.

  Whistling John watching the fish dart between the water lilies in the garden pond. He felt like the frog that had become a prince he was a lucky man he had three beautiful princesses. Clare come and put her arm around him “You’re the best daddy in the whole wide world.” At fourteen years of age she was going to become a stunner like her mother.  Soon the boys would be beating a path to their door. Clare looked up at a tree branch where a small garden spider was weaving a web.

“Oh, look there’s a spider weaving a web?”

“Well don’t tell your sister.”

“It’s such a beautiful web of silver,” said Jodie running into the garden.

  Mary had joined them in the garden they had watched the small spider in wonder before going indoors for their breakfast. Months later John was still working on the buses he felt happy dealing with people on a day to day basis, finding more time to be with his family at the weekends. John very rarely went to the pub these days. If anyone from work had asked him to go for a drink after work, he had refused. It wasn’t that John had become tea total he and Mary had the odd glass of wine or a beer when the girls were in bed.

    John could not believe that they had ever split-up that he had lived in that grotty flat above the Chinese restaurant, with the peeling white paint on the window sills and drain pipe. He and Mary were all for celebrating what they had achieved as a family over the last few months.

    One day the television had announced that in Australia a famous Author John Keneally had seen the death mask of Napoleon. He had been there when it had been found in Melbourne. John had forgotten all about Napoleon. John was amazed that the past, could still come back into his present life unexpected.

  There were those who believed in fairy stories. Napoleon all was about history. It was the spider that had got him thinking about Thomas Bruce and the Scottish legend about the spider. John smiled with three fairy tale princesses in his life he must be one very lucky man to be given a second chance of happiness. This time he would not let Mary and the girls down they would always come first in his life from now on. Could this all be a warning that once the door was shut, you may not be able to open it?

    Mary had watched John stir in his sleep he worked hard. He had fallen asleep in His favourite arm chair bless him. He had been mumbling something about spider’s fairy tale princess’s frog princes, some stranger called John Kearney and Napoleon maybe it was some sort of midlife crisis or a dream that he was having? Very gently she touched John on the shoulder several times giving him a little shake. “Wake up sleepy head,” she had remarked, John had rose from the arm chair in the lounge, switching off the lights before following his wife upstairs to bed. “Mary, I had the strangest experience, I dreamt that we had split up and I was living in that grotty flat above the Chinese restaurant on Rosamond Street.” “Pipe dreams,” replied Mary before turning over in bed to sleep.

   John gave a sigh; it had all seemed so real maybe it was his mind playing tricks or an over active imagination he would not worry over it there was always tomorrow. He was a very happy man, there had been times when he had come home tired from work and dropped into the pub for a drink after work or for a game of dominos weekends. He had noticed the new licensee of the Woodcutters arms. Who, wouldn’t with those long legs and rich lustre locks of gold? He was letting his mind wonder he would not go there?  John let go of his thoughts wrapping his arm around Mary as she slept.