Violet Hepples kicked off her shoes as she walked through the red door to her house. She slipped her feet into a pair of hard-soled slippers and hung up her coat beside the door. It was almost four o'clock now. She'd spent all afternoon in the café down the street, gossiping with Meredith over hot tea and Victoria sponge. When Violet got to the living room, she lowered herself into her armchair, switching on the TV from where she sat and picking up her knitting needles. One of her old foster children was expecting, and so she was planning on knitting a few baby blankets for her.
She had just begun her second row of stitches when her carer emerged from the dining room carrying a tray of tea and biscuits. When the occupational therapist who'd taken care of her after her hip replacement suggested she move into supported living, or a bungalow, she had flat out refused.
The large house on the border of the city was where she'd grown up. She couldn't remember living anywhere else but there, apart from the few years she'd lived in Wales during the war. It was her family's home, it belonged to them, and when she ultimately passed away it would go to (Y/N) and James. Then she was recommended a live-in carer, an idea her friends and foster children supported.
The idea of having a stranger live in her house hadn't appealed to Violet Hepples at first, but with the loss of her husband, and the distance between her and her cousin, she supposed it would be nice to have someone around, and she could always refuse to let them help her bathe or go to the toilet. Now, she couldn't imagine living alone in the big empty house.
'Did you have a nice afternoon?' her carer, a middle-aged brunette lady asked, pouring them both a cup of tea once she'd taken her usual spot on the right side of the settee.
'I did,' smiled Violet, 'Meredith's granddaughter is expecting again.' Not being able to have children had never upset her too much when she was younger, she had her career to focus on, and a loving husband. Now that she was getting older though and relying on a nurse to help her up and down the stairs, Violet Hepples couldn't help but wonder how less lonely her life may have been had she been able to conceive a child.
She put down her knitting needles and picked up a digestive biscuit, dipping it into her tea before taking a bite which knocked her a little sick. The only thing she'd had to drink that day had been breakfast tea, and now she quite fancied something different.
When she'd finished her biscuit, she took the knitting needles off of her lap and placed them on the coffee table, making to get up. 'Everything alright, Mrs Hepples?'
'Oh yes, I think I've just drank my fill of tea,' she explained, 'think I'll make myself a coffee.'
'Let me do that,' the carer told her.
'Oh, it's alright,' Violet tried to argue, but her nurse was already on her feet.
'Hey, what do you pay me for,' she smiled, 'eh, hun.'
'I suppose,' Violet nodded, letting herself be taken care of.
She continued her project, the needles in her hands clicking together, almost distracting her from the strange, almost tickling, sensation she began to feel in her feet.
'Milk and too sugars?' the nurse asked from the kitchen. Violet peered over the small blanket forming on her lap, noticing her feet disappearing, crumbling into a fine grey ash. She shook her head, believing she'd just taken too much of her pain medication. The illusion spread though, affecting her legs and hips.
'Erm,' she stuttered, feeling her body disappear, 'just milk please Agnes.'
YOU ARE READING
The Red Soldier: Rise of the Red Soldier
Fanfiction(Y/N) (L/N) had finally found peace, away from the horrors civilisation held. He'd found a solace when surrounded by his own grief, but a jet plane parked outside his front door changed all of that seventy years after the death of his two friends.
