post office
once a month i cash my housing benefit cheques at a tiny post office 10 minutes from my flat, which has somehow survived the close-down holocaust. it's the size of a broom-cupboard; space just enough for me and the tumbleweed passing through...4 people in there would be a queue out the door. but notice i have to imagine them - there's never such a thing.

up til a couple of months ago the place was run by a little indian woman and her giant husband. one would attend at the counter whilst the other would potter around behind, moving parcels from one table to the next or sit counting out pound coins into plastic bags. there was no standard as to which of them would be standing behind the perspex, ready and waiting to scribble over my cheques and hand out the cash, but whomever it wasn't would be just a footstep behind, dithering like an extra on a film set. if it was she, the service came with smiles - sometimes small talk - and i always felt a little warm in my belly when i walked out the door. otherwise her incredibly tall husband with the  bony hands would have to crane himself down from the ceiling so as to see me through the counter. occasionally i would forget where i was and imagine myself at a museum, peering through the glass cabinet at a waxwork of frankenstein's monster. nothing about his manner discouraged my reveries, for he moved as steadily as a tomb would open in an expressionist horror film. the skin on his face was primarily yellow, with a grey undertone - near on silver round the eyes. and because he was closer to seven foot than six i would be looking right up into the grey foliage of his nose as his downcast eyes appeared closed in prayer, counting out the twenties on the table. his eyes would only look straight into mine when he was finished and only then would i read humanity in him. thankyou, i would say and he would nod graciously. often as i passed by the window i would look back in at him, standing stock still where i left him, all skin and bones...'less a presence  from a distance'  i would think.

last month there had been a queue. one woman besides myself equals two and two in a shoebox is a queue. the wife was at the counter but something in the scenery was off. the tall man to her right was a mere boy - 6'8 surely, but honey-cheeked where  i'd expect him ashen. the black caterpillar over his lips and the downy fur striping across his cheeks were no testament to his manhood; indians begin to shave, if at all, aged 11. and besides - though he resembled him in stature, this was not my waxwork man.
'where's the other man?' the brazen woman in front of me asked.
'my husband passed away last week.'
'oh i am sorry to hear that.' the woman said.
'his heart.' the little indian woman said, staring back at the customer with wide, entreating watery eyes.
the brazen woman just shook her head, whilst the indian woman stared back at her hoping for more.
when it came to my turn at the counter i had wanted to speak. not about her husband, for i know well enough that it is nearly impossible to talk to others about their own suffering - but about the weather, the post being late, the usual tidbits. in the end i handed over my cheques in silence, saying only 'thanks' when they were rewarded.

i remember reading a quotation someplace which i can only paraphrase, given my dim memory. it must have been uttered by someone clever, for its truths are subtle. anyway - it was something like 'we are more shocked by the deaths of people we barely know, than those of our immediate kin.' it struck me at the time as fanciful, but as i've aged a bit - experienced my own losses - i get the gist. there's no denying the devastation the death of a loved one can wreak. but in some corner of our hearts we have planned for it already. the unconscious has prepared us to lose the ones we love - it all happens off-stage the moment we begin to love them. when it does, our fears have only been confirmed - and the death may be someone else's but the loss is ours. when we hear about the death of someone we do not especially care for, death itself as an existential truth must be faced. there are no furious emotional connections to pass through, no grief. just the raw actuality that someone we saw around now and then, breathing in and breathing out has stopped. a moment's thought and it's hard not to think of the dead man without seeing a mirror shining back.

this month i cashed my cheques same as always. the tall furry boy was gone, leaving the woman at the counter by herself. as i entered the post office, a woman and a postman snuck in just before me. the postman pushed a card through the counter and said: can you see if i've left this parcel back here. must've luv.

the little indian woman looked flustered, getting up from her chair and muttering something about there being three parcels on the table. as she stood up i could see that her sari had come unpinned at the top. her dishcloth coloured bra was half on display and appeared to be cutting into her flesh quite painfully. underneath it were three or four folds of youthful looking fat, punctuated by a very wide belly button. i watched as she slowly checked the information on the card against the parcels behind her, turning back to say that none of them matched.
'well i'm sure i left it here luv.' the postman said.
'it's not here. there's only 3'
'well can you check again please? i left it here day before yestdi. remember it plain as day.'

reaching round toward the parcels she lifts them one after the other on the counter.
'is it seeds?' she asks the woman, lifting a box with a portrait of some pansies on the front.
'not seeds? well are you jennifer?' she says, lifting the next box.
i notice how pale the flesh on her belly is compared to her face, almost as light as mine. except for the belly button which puts me in mind of a badly stained teacup.
'not jenniffer? well are you john? no? well then it's not here.'
the postman is getting angry by this point, rapping his knuckles on the counter in agitation ' i bloody left it here.'
he turns then to the woman who is neither jennifer or jack and tells her to hang onto the card and he'll chase it up for her.

as they leave they shake their heads at one another, and i step up to the counter with my cheques.
'if it is not here, it is not here.' the woman says, still unaware that her bra is on display and that her belly button, like a black baby's mouth is gawping at me.
'he's probably just made a mistake.' i say as she counts out the cash.
she nods to say yes and looks at me dead in the eye sorrowfully.
i think about telling her to do up her sari but am terrified to add to her humiliation. her brown soulful eyes tell me they've already had enough, so i turn and say goodbye, quietly hoping she notices soon and whilst alone.