“ Slice of Life ”
When Enid were a young lass back during the war and when the family lived up north , she had been the same - dreaming romantic dreams , pining over one lad or other . Who were it again ... oh aye , there was Tommy Fighfield , who used to come round with black market bacon or lamb chops for Mam ' s table and a bunch of flowers for seventeen year old Enid . Tommy with his line of patter and his spiv suit , always the charmer . Now what had become of him ... maybe he were the one who died at ... Monte Casino , were it ? Someplace in Italy any road .
Nay , her memory were all mixed up again . Tommy had been a shirker who pulled every dodge in book t ' stay out of forces . He ' d laughed when she called him a coward and told her dying for yer country were a mugs game . After that she ' d had little to do with Tommy Fighfield and he ' d hooked up with Mavis Plummer from over on the Crowley Estate , a brassy little Madame if ever Enid had seen one , but her old man had been summated at the brewery and Tommy had liked the connection . Hadn ' t he been done up for selling knocked off booze in ... 53 were it ?
So who were the lad that had got himself killed ... a memory snapped into place . Patrick ... Patrick Cohnlan . Irish lad he were though born n raised in the north but Dad still didn ' t approve . ' Workshy paddies ,' he ' d called them . “
Enid hadn ' t really liked Patrick all that much but her father ' s strong dislike of the lad had improved his prospects with her .
Patrick and Matthew used to bring her flowers , each on a different day . Friday nights for Patrick and he had to come to the window so her parents didn ' t know ... she ' d wait impatiently for her suitor at eight o clock , but as soon as he ' d brought the flowers and entreated her to meet him up at the Roxy one night , she ' d find herself impatient to get rid of him . Saturday were the day she ' d arranged with Matthew Henshaw ...
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