The Piper 27

At first there had been disbelief, then tears followed by the inevitable sense of betrayal.

Had it not been enough that she had been subjected to ridicule, had her life turned upside down and been dispossessed of her belief in love? No, obviously some god, a god of snide remarks and practical jokes thought it fit to visit one more assault upon her attempts to live a normal life.

Michael hated her, that was obvious from his diary. She had a vague memory of him starting it just after his father’s death. Had equally dim memories of him slinking off to his room to compose his fetid little thoughts and now she remembered each of the very sly looks he thought she had not seen him give her.

She had sat there in the coming light of the early morning reading his ramblings, digesting every morsel of malcontent, and wondered…