The Builder

Copyright: © CJ Morrow 2023Tamarillas Press All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the author.This book is a work of fiction. All characters, locations, businesses, organisations and situations in this publication are either a product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, or circumstances, is purely coincidental.This book is written in British English.This book is only available on Amazon, both ebook and paperback. Any other copies are illegal.Cover image: stuartbur/istockphoto.comCover design: © CJ Morrow ContentsOneTwoThreeFourFiveSixSevenEightNineTenElevenTwelveThirteenFourteenFifteenSixteenSeventeenEighteenNineteenTwentyTwenty-oneTwenty-two OneI used to feel sorry for Micky.I don’t now.Looking back I realise that the signs were there even at the beginning. The first time I saw Micky leaning on the bar in The Carpenters I was immediately drawn to him. He was tall, dark-haired and tanned. I learned, as the evening wore on, that he’d just come back from a riotous two weeks in Ibiza. A tan suited him. It went with his eyes. Made them shine.‘Hello, Callie,’ he said after we’d been introduced. He twinkled those deep brown eyes at me.I smiled and nodded back as I pulled his pint. I wasn’t shy but I’d met enough of his sort before. Charming. Slick. Drinkers.He was, so John the landlord told me, a regular. He and Jez always sat at the end of the bar. They weren’t rowdy, they weren’t trouble; they were a regular income for the pub, a reliable one. I had to keep them sweet and keep the drinks flowing.It was the start of my third week working behind the bar and Micky’s holiday explained why his mate Jez had spent the last two weeks looking so glum. Now that Micky was back Jez had cheered right up. He was grinning and laughing as Micky regaled him with his Ibizan exploits. I remember that night with fondness.They were an odd-looking couple, not that they were a couple, Micky made it clear to me that first night that they were just mates, drinking buddies.Micky Fisher was a charmer. He had a ready smile, a quick wit, an ability to make whoever he was talking to feel like the most important person in the world. He certainly charmed me. By the end of the evening I’d accepted a date invitation from him. And I couldn’t wait.Now look at me.I’m trudging along carrying a heaving shopping bag in each hand, at least I’m evened out, weighted equally on both sides. My handbag is slung diagonally across my body and slaps against my heavily pregnant belly with every step. I really should have been more careful; having a baby so quickly into our marriage wasn’t the best of ideas. But we are where we are. I’m looking forward to meeting the little man jumping about inside me. And after he arrives, I have plans.Ours was a whirlwind romance, me and Micky Fisher. We’d been out a few times, had a few dinners and gone back to my tatty studio flat and slept together. To be fair Micky was not a bad lover, definitely better than the few I’d had already. And he was keen to look after me. After our third or fourth date he told me that he didn’t like the way men ogled me in the pub.I laughed.‘Don’t laugh,’ he said. ‘I mean it. They leer at you, especially those hardened drinkers. If you’ve noticed it’s a boozers’ pub, not a pub grub pub.’I smiled. He was certainly right about it being a boozers’ pub, but I knew that when I took the job. No food was served, not even cheesy chips or a limp club sandwich. The only edibles were crisps, peanuts and pork scratchings. We sold them rarely because proper drinkers aren’t that interested in edibles. If sales, beer sales especially, were slow, John would break out a packet or two of peanuts, tip them into a bowl and have me wander around offering customers, or punters as he slyly called them, a little handful. He knew only too well that the salt would make them thirstier, and they’d be more inclined to take a few salty snacks from me than him.‘It’s okay,’ I said to Micky. ‘I’m fine.’‘No, you’re not. I don’t want you working there when we’re married. I want you home in the evenings with me.’I’d stopped what I was doing and stared at him. Married? Did he just say married? Was this some kind of cackhanded proposal?Even now I’m not sure if he meant to say it or if it just slipped out, but he could tell by my face that I’d heard the word. The M word.I just stood and blinked at him; I must have looked as though I was malfunctioning. In all my years of dating I’d never had the M word said to me and I never really expected to. I was thirty-one, still thought I had plenty of time and was happy flitting from one man to the next, or not if none took my fancy.‘Did you hear what I said?’ he asked, his face taking on a soppy look.‘I think so.’‘Not very romantic, sorry about that, but I’m asking you to marry me.’ He grinned then. ‘What do you say?’Wow, I was flattered. I really liked Micky. He obviously really liked me. But marriage? It was way too early for that, surely. I just couldn’t answer because I was so taken aback.He dropped down onto one knee and still I continued staring and blinking.‘Trying to romantic the moment up,’ he said. ‘What do you say? Callie, my darling, will you marry me?’What could I say? I liked him, really liked him. He made me feel special. I wanted to continue spending time with him and if I said no that would be it. Micky Fisher wasn’t the sort of man to shrug off a marriage