It was a rainy Sunday, with lots of mist and a few puddles in the streets. The sky was a bland grey - a dull, depressing sort of sky. John sniffed as he passed under a roof, feeling the rainwater drip onto his thin felt hat and seep into his hair. Unlucky, he thought, that he was at that point in his life where he had too little hair to matter but just enough to get that unpleasant wet feeling on his head. Perhaps it should have irritated him, but he had decided to stop caring about most everything some years ago.
“Good morning, sir,” a young girl chirped brightly as he walked into the café. John grunted in reply, grudgingly accepting the coffee from her hands. He was really too old to appreciate chipper young girls anymore - for such small creatures, they were awfully loud, and became happy or excited or upset over most anything.
Grumbling, John took a sip of his coffee - hot and black, just how he liked it. Except, there was a singular unpleasant taste in there, making it rather… sweet. Sugar, perhaps. That girl insisted on adding a spoonful of sugar to his coffee despite his repeated demands not to. Oh well, he supposed he’d have to put up with it. It wasn’t worth the trouble getting up and going back to the counter and asking for another brew.
With a rusty creaking of the limbs, John straightened up and looked round the little café. His table was set slightly apart from the others, giving him a full view of the room. The floor was a dull, slightly filmy white-and-orange checkered pattern; the walls were a sallow green, the ceiling a watery grey, like the sky. Funny, he remembered it used to be a rather pleasant shade of white. The tables were small and round, a dusty brown colour, he supposed, to cover up all the coffee that foolish girl must spill. About half were occupied by people - couples, mostly - sipping their cloyingly sweet-smelling coffee and chattering like silly school girls in the hall. Why, he wondered, couldn’t people just come in, have their coffee, and mind their own business? Really, he considered himself the most decent person in the shop.
John pulled his dark trench coat tightly round his shoulders, drawing the collar up to his chin. He shuffled slowly to the far side of the room, making his way through the buzzing tables. “Sorry, mister,” a curly-headed urchin said, peering up at him apologetically, having lost its ball between John’s shoes. At least the rat had the good sense to realize the inconvenience it was. John grunted and continued on his way.
At last, he reached his destination: a pile of papers, sitting on a little wooden table in the corner of the room. John grunted something of approval as his eye scanned headlines: “Guinness heir saved girl’s life in crash―MR. TARA BROWNE, 21, heir to the £1 million Guinness fortune, was fatally injured…” There’s something you don’t see every day, John thought, picking up a paper and shuffling back to his table. The urchin was careful to avoid him this time.
As he read the front news article, John was aware of the reaction playing in his mind. He thought to himself, Oh boy. Lucky man, that one was, heir to one million pounds… that’s an awful lot of money for such a young lad, John thought bitterly. Poor chap was killed in a car accident in London only yesterday… and all for that little nineteen-year-old model, Susan or Suki or whatever her name was. Though the news was rather sad… John found himself suppressing a chuckle rising in his throat. Shapeless nose, pouting lips, a dark mop of hair falling into two sad-looking eyes… she was a sorry-looking model if he’d ever seen one. Well, he supposed that was the fashion these days. He didn’t care much for the way these youngsters looked nowadays, anyhow.
John squinted at the little photograph of the lad’s face. It was an average sort of face, with swept-back hair, mild brows and sideways-peering eyes, a rounded nose and slightly toothy grin. He’d seen that face before… hadn’t he? Somewhere. Why yes, hadn’t he been that little boy in the House of Lords, he recognized the grin. It made sense, of course, him being the Guinness’s heir.
Poor lad, thought John to himself. Having finished his coffee, he rose from his table, tossing the paper into a dustbin on his way out the door. Poor lad…
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