Morning all. I hope you are set for a fun April Fool’s day. Mine is a busy one so I am ready to kick things off with the morning prompt. Timers set and off we go.
Not where I thought this would go but I kind of want to see where it ends up.
Wednesday, April 1st: The pictures confirmed my worst fears.
The pictures confirmed my worst fears. I tried not to frown. By a casual observer there was little to see in the photos. Two men of a similar age who happened to be in the same place at the same time. There was little to connect them. On the surface it was nothing to get worked up about.
But I knew better.
Ollie promised me he retired. That there would be no more meetings with shady underworld characters. Admittedly looking at the photos no one he met with looked shady. Their clothing was tailored, pricy, but understated. No one wore the flashy bits that movies always showed those with nefarious wealth indulging in. These were not the sort of criminals who got caught because they parked a high end car outside a low end apartment building.
These were the sort who dressed for the situation, morphing into whatever would let them pass with a minimum attention. They were chameleons but I knew the faces. Had seen them enough times growing up to recognize them no matter what clothing they wore. Ollie was one of them.
As I flipped through the photos I had to admit I was a bit impressed. In one set of photos Ollie and the man he was meeting looked like high powered business men who ran in the same circles and happened to recognize each other enough to exchange pleasantries when they passed on the side walk. In another Ollie had morphed into an old man in a threadbare cardigan feeding the birds in the park. The man he exchanged words with, a different one this time, was in a running suit and power walking through the park.
There were several familiar faces Ollie met with. It let me know that retirement was just for show. He hadn’t given anything up. I was just the one being duped. I looked at the faces. I knew them well. I also knew what each of them did. Given the date staps for each of the photos I could not only put together a time line of meetings, but I could even see the shape of the game.
‘Doesn’t matter,’ I thought.
I put the photos in my bag. I told Ollie I would only stay as long as he was through. He tried to play me and now I would walk. My bags were packed and it was when I realized how little I kept in the house that I knew I never believed his story of retirement. Not really. Most of my stuff was in storage. I brought in only the day-to-day essentials. Some part of me always knew Ollie was lying. I unthreaded the keys to the apartment from my ring and placed them on the kitchen counter where he would be sure to see them.
I thought about leaving a note. But there was nothing left to say and I knew any words I left behind he would twist into his own version of reality. Instead, I reached back into my bag and pulled out the photographs. I placed the collection of them in a stack on the counter next to the discarded keys. He would know why I left and there would be no words to twist.
Satisfied I moved to the door. I opened it, stepped through and pulled it closed, hearing the lock sound sharply as I did.
I was done trying to believe Ollie’s lies. He could get on with things without me. I walked down the back staircase ad left the building. That his betrayal came after he was healed enough not to need me around somehow stung worse than anything else.
Ten til Midnight 