Winter
Copyright© 2025 by Mike McGifford
Chapter 4
We left the café and went to Mabel’s apartment. It was both less than I’d expected and more.
Less because it’d been well lived in. With 3 kids, even though Mabel and her family had only lived there less than 2 years, the carpets were in bad shape and there was stuff on every open surface. The dining room table had what looked like a month’s worth of accumulated stuff on it from bills to toys to plates and drink tumblers.
Mabel had proudly told me they always sat down together for supper so it couldn’t have been a month’s worth of ‘stuff’ at all. It was simply that her table immediately became a catch all, like a junk drawer, for anything Mabel, Derek, or the kids put down when they needed their hands for something else.
The coffee table had magazines, empty soda cans, more paperwork, maybe someone’s homework, a little rubber ball and 2 headless barbies. An extension of the dining table.
A curio cabinet without doors that had once held pride of position in the living room and I’m sure had been the home of something special but whatever that something was, was now a mystery. It was overflowing with children’s toys. Laid on top of the original contents.
The other big feature of the open-plan layout was the huge TV mounted to the wall opposite the well-used couch covered in pillows and scrunched up blankets. Mabel had told me they snuggled up to watch TV in the evenings. Family bonding time. Hubby Derek loved his big screen for sports, too, she’d told me.
In a corner was Mabel’s gaming equipment. Her pride and joy. It looked like Mabel needed to give her electronics a good dusting, though.
Living with kids. I don’t have any, but it seemed natural to assume that the existence of them made in the apartment made it not a place that could look immaculate without constant work and Mabel was short enough on hours of the day to keep it perfect herself.
It might have been less than I’d expected but it was a home, not just a living space. It was so very Mabel. And it was more than I’d expected by being bright with a tremendous view. Like a million dollar view. Large windows let in the sun and gave the place a warm, comforting vibe, even more than I’d expected.
Derek and the kids weren’t home when we arrived. I knew Derek was at work and Mabel explained that her son had taken his sisters to the mall.
“Want the grand tour?” Mabel asked with a proud smile.
“Sure!” I agreed enthusiastically.
I’d never seen Mabel’s apartment other than what showed through the lens of her phone, always located in her bedroom.
Mabel showed me the kids rooms first. Her son’s room was the tidiest room of the apartment while the twins’ room made the dining and living room look immaculate in comparison. The kids’ bathroom looked ... well like a baby tornado had hit. A clothes hamper in there was empty while the floor around it was littered with clothes.
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