Winter’s evening

You’re ready to go, to go and get the groceries. You do it once a week, go by car.

She gave you a list, scribbled on a piece of paper torn off the corner of the newspaper.

Everything’s jumbled up, not a proper orderly list. She never needed a list when she went shopping, had a picture of the fridge in her mind, what was in the fruit bowl, the empty spots in the larder.

You don’t complain, but re-write the list, make a proper list, something you can read in the shop, so’s you don’t forget anything.

It’s a winter’s evening. You grab the bags and the empty bottles. When you open the front door, a flurry of snowflakes blows inside as you tighten the scarf around your neck, and, for a moment, you wonder whether you should take a cap. 

You say to yourself that you should have gone earlier, you knew it was going to snow, the BBC had said so. Just as you’re closing the door, she says something about the avocados. You can’t hear her clearly but know what she always says, that you should only buy the ones that are green and shiny, not the brown dull ones. As if I didn’t know by now, but still.

You turn the car radio on, you drive off to the supermarket. The car park is virtually empty, who would bother shopping in this weather, at this time of night. You should have gone earlier but you like going when the shop’s empty, empty aisles, empty car park, so’s you can park near the entrance, especially in this weather.

A voice on the radio catches your attention so you sit in the car for a bit there in the carpark, intrigued by what’s being said. The snow starts to settle on the windscreen, it blocks your view, shuts you in. You’ve turned the engine off, all is quiet except this voice on the radio. 

You’re startled when you hear a second voice, not from the radio. Where’s that coming from? You peer out into the darkness, through the snowflakes on the side window, see a stranger gesticulating, waving his arms, a man, almost completely covered in snow.

You wonder what to do. Should you let the window down, just a little, hear what he has to say? Surely that’ll do no harm, just a small gap so that you can understand him.

He says he can’t start his car, needs help, asks whether you have a starter cable.

Of course you do, you’re well organised, you don’t want to get stuck yourself, don’t want to have to depend on others. But you could easily say you haven’t got one, he wouldn’t know otherwise. Then you’d be done with him, he’d go away, not bother you.

You’d leave him here in the snow in the dark if you did that. You ask which car’s his. He points but you don’t look that way, you look at his face, bring the window down a little more, look into his eyes. They tell you he could be reliable but you still want to be careful. You say you’ll drive over to his car if he’ll lead the way, but you don’t mention your cable, not just yet. The man opens his car’s bonnet, gets behind the wheel and you hear a slow grinding noise as he unsuccessfully tries to start. You know it’s hopeless. You start to feel sorry for him and get out your cable.