Menthol Pecans
It was night
Winsome Winnie walked into the kitchen stealthily, careful not to wake the rat sleeping behind the cans of baked beans. As she opened the fridge door and peered in, the kitchen became softly aglow. Her back hunched in secrecy, the sweeping glance of Winsome W told her what she already knew. The food was kept in the fridge and cabinets, but their wispy arms and fingers had like many nights before grown long and extended up the stairs, past the other bedrooms and into hers. There was the half of the pumpkin cake, bag of apples, two blocks of chocolates from her recent trip to Switzerland (for cousin Christine), cans of coke, a container of condiments and some left over dinner. The freezer held more frozen dinners and vanilla chocolate chip ice-cream. As she reached for the tray of cake, she took a long breath of it, daring it to disappear and leave her starving. Her first few bites were ravenous but timid. But as the second hand of the clock moved its round, all reverence for the cake, chocolate, ice-cream and microwave meals melted and she only concentrated on filling her stomach to bursting point.

Winsome Winnie crept back upstairs, past the other bedrooms and into her own where under a blanket she didn’t need, she slept, full of troubling resolves.


It was after lunch
At last lunch hour was over. The workers packed the leftover cake and chocolate into the fridge and yawned back to their seats. Fantastic Fiona said she could clean up a little. She had turned down the pumpkin cake her colleagues were passing around. Also the block of Swiss chocolate Christine had brought. It was an apple for lunch for Fantastic Fiona. She had eyed the cake and chocolate hungrily as she bit into it. Her colleagues asked if she was “on a diet”. “Why! no, of course not! It’s just that I get sleepy if I eat too much. Especially in the heat these days. A cold apple would satisfy.” And so it did.
Peering into the passageway leading back into the office, it was found empty. Would there be footsteps coming up that precise minute? No they were hard at work. As Fantastic Fiona wiped the table and washed the dishes (she needed only to rinse her own with water), it only kept her sufficiently from opening the fridge door to where the pleasing items were. For as soon as she dried her hands on the hand towel, it happened.

Fantastic Fiona ambled back to her seat where she hunched just a little lower, the beads of sweat on her forehead like the condensation on her cold apple before. For the rest of the day, her smile and lighthearted banter masked some heavier thought.


It was stressful time
Able Amber looked at the stack of papers on her table and bit her lips. The stack wasn’t an overflowing mountain as often portrayed in pictures or described in writing. It was a neat file of readings waiting to be read. Able Amber herself had tidied the file up, that’s how she knew. Each reading was categorized and tagged. Yet when it came to the actual reading and the report due strictly at 3p.m. tomorrow, she was stuck. Her physical body showed otherwise. She paced, she ran down to the library to print yet more readings she knew she wouldn’t be able to read. She made trips to the bathroom and sat there apparently awaiting inspiration but the only inspiration that came was a sore bottom. As she looked at the clock now showing 9.15p.m, she felt the familiar sensation of dismay and helplessness. Her heart frantic, she ran to the student pantry and surreptitiously opened cabinet doors. There were the bread and cookies she could help herself to. The fridge held a few frozen pies and a family-sized tub of vanilla chocolate chip ice-cream. It was of inferior brand and cast aside by her hostel mates. But as she dipped into it with a huge metal spoon, she was filled with a sense of wellbeing. It soon happened
Able Amber was back at her desk, her file still as neat, her Microsoft Words white and blank. She would call in ill tomorrow and ask for an extension. But for now she needed to talk to someone. She called her best friend, Winsome Winnie.

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