“Oi, Gary, Gary! Wake up, will ya? Blimey, you’ll sleep your whole life away if I let you. Look at him, would you? Still snoring… Gary, get up now or you’ll miss your chance!”
“Margaret Elizabeth, give us a break, let me sleep for once.”
“Sleep? Youll sleep when youre retired!”
“Yeah, or when Im six feet under.”
“Not likely. Up you get, come on!”
Gary rubbed his tired eyes and glared at his reflection in the mirrorred-eyed and dishevelled.
“Well?”
“Youre not even dressed! Go wash up, shave, and make yourself presentable. Theres still time. Move it.”
“What time, Margaret Elizabeth?”
“The right time.”
With a sigh, Gary shuffled to the bathroom, muttering under his breath. One wrong word and hed get a slipper to the head. Bloody womaneven as a ghost, she still bossed him about.
“Gary, did I ever tell you I can hear your thoughts sometimes? No? Well, now you know,” Margaret said, hovering cross-legged over his bed. “Side effect of being a spectre, I suppose. Now go scrub that stubble offyou look like a vagrant.”
Arguing was pointless. Shed been impossible in life, and death hadnt softened her.
Margaret Elizabeth wasnt just a ghostshe was his ex-mother-in-law.
One day, shed just appeared. After the funeral.
“I hear what youre thinking, you know,” she said, drifting closer. “Honestly, how did my Linda put up with you? Youre a dinosaur, Gary. A proper relic.”
Gary waved her off and went to shave.
He and Linda had divorced a year ago. The kids were grown, living their own lives. Linda had snapped one day, called him a tyrant, accused him of stifling her growth as a person, packed a bag, and slammed the door behind her.
Gary had been left bewildered.
Hed called her, but shed ranted about him being a “neanderthal” and a “misogynist”words hed never even heard before. How was he supposed to stop being a “neanderthal” when his job was literally building houses? Bloody absurd.
Linda had gotten tangled up with some self-help gurusome bloke named “Ezekiel Miracle” or some such nonsense. Decided her life with Gary had been a prison. As if hed forced her to cook for him!
Though, her roast dinners were legendary
Gary nearly choked on his own spit as an idea struck him. Half-shaved, he bolted into the hallway.
“Margaret Elizabeth! Margaret Elizabeth!”
“Whats all the shouting for?”
“Will you teach me how to make a proper roast? Please?”
“Ha! As if Id hand over my secret recipe!”
“What do you need it for? Entertaining demons?”
“Cheeky sod.”
“Lindas was better anyway.”
“What?!” Margarets form flickered indignantly. “I taught her everything she knows!”
“Sure, but the student surpassed the teacher.”
“Listen here, you daft gitwhat meat does Linda use in her roast?”
“Beef, obviously.”
“WRONG! Its lamb!”
“Right, and I suppose you cook it in that pot, not this one?”
“Of course in thatwait, youre mocking me!”
Two hours later, Gary had scribbled every detail into a notebook. Sitting at the kitchen table, clean-shaven, he took a bite of the most divine roast hed ever tasted.
“Blimey, Mum… youre a genius.”
“What?”
“This roast its unbelievable.”
“What about Lindas?”
“Pfft, doesnt even compare. Are you crying? Can ghosts cry?”
“Dunno,” Margaret sniffed. “You rotten little weasel.”
“Hold onwhatd I do wrong now?”
“Nothing. Just you called me Mum.”
“Yeah?”
“Its just” Her voice wobbled. “I was trying to set you up, Gary.”
“Set me up?”
“Aye. I was supposed to make you take the bins outclean-shaven, looking properat half six. Thats when Gladys from next door would come out. Forty-seven, never married. Youd bump into her, and well”
“Wait. So this whole year, youve been haunting me to play matchmaker?”
“Had to make you happy, didnt I? That was the deal.”
“What deal?”
“To move on, you pillock! But no, you had to go and ruin it with your roast nonsense!”
“Oi, this is on you! If youd just let me sleep”
“Enough!” she wailed, vanishing into the wardrobe. Muffled sobs echoed from inside.
Gary shook his head and got to tidying.
“Honestly, how do you mop a mirror? Use that cloth, Gary!”
***
Linda hadnt slept well. Shed dreamt of her motheryoung, beautiful, reaching for her.
She tried watching another of Ezekiels videos, but the page wouldnt load. Frustrated, she video-called him.
The divine man whod “awakened” her was always available.
Except now.
A groggy, furious voice snarled, “Who the hell calls at seven in the bloody morning?!”
Linda slammed the laptop shut. That wasnt Ezekiel.
Something tugged at her. She didnt know why, but she needed to see Gary.
***
Gary and Margaret were playing chess, laughing.
Linda stared. Her ex-husband was talking to thin air.
“Your move, Mum! Check!”
The chess pieces moved on their own.
“Gary are you alright?”
“You look peaky, love. Mum says youve lost weight. Fancy some roast? Her recipe.”
“Gary whats going on?”
“Everythings grand! Mums even teaching me her Yorkshire pudding trick.”
“Gary Mums been gone a year.”
“Aye, and shes spent it haunting me.”
Lindas hands trembled. “Prove it.”
“Ask her something only shed know.”
“Fine. Mum what did I confess to you when I was eight?”
“That you fancied the milkmans son,” Margarets voice chimed.
Linda went pale.
More questions. More answers.
Thenjust for a secondLinda saw her.
“Shes fading,” Gary said. “But she loves you. Wants you happy. Wants us happy?”
Margarets form flickered. “Ive got to go, love.”
“Mum?!”
Gary woke with a gasp. Linda bolted upright beside him.
“Linda?”
“Gary was that a dream?”
“Aye. You dreamed Mum haunted me?”
“And that I left you for some fraud”
A pounding at the door.
“Up already, you layabouts! Were going to the cottageplenty of work to knock some sense into you, Linda. And Gary, youre learning to roast properly. Just in case.”
***
“Gary whyd you never call me Mum in thirty years?”
“Dunno Mum.”
Sometimes, the things we take for granted are the ones we miss the most.
