Clear Day – Daniel 48

 

For back story go here: Story so far, and maybe this one.]

[Relevant back story links also within text.] 

She’d gone. It was a little remarkable and Daniel wasn’t entirely certain she’d gone but gone she had. The night before Daniel had had to carry out their first ever Covid test in order to get Daisy safely to school. They sang their way through hand washing, hummed through the nose blowing and even giggled through the wiggling the swab up the nose bit. Daisy’s eyed had watered but she’d got through it. They’d got through it and half an hour later she had the all clear to attend the next day.

And so Daniel looked at his empty house and decided now was the time to hit work. But first he might just tidy up a little because he certainly hadn’t had time to do so recently. So he started in the front room with a little light dusting and the hoover. Unfortunately things became a little involved when he tried hoovering up some things that wouldn’t hoover up under the sofa. This led to the wholesale shifting of the sofa so that he could find out what was under there and decide what to do with it all.

As he suspected Mr Sparklehat’s battery powered LED sparkle wand was under there. And one of the batteries was under there too, now no longer part of the wand. There were half a dozen toy cars, five mouldy grapes and an incredibly dried up piece of streaky bacon which Daniel assumed had escaped from a breakfast butty. A breakfast butty from October because that was the last time Daniel could remember making one before tastes changed and Corn Flakes staged a come back.

Further time was needed when Daniel found a patch of general stickiness behind the television complete with a baseball sized globe of dust stuck to it. There was no real explanation for this stickiness, but that was unsurprising. Kids and sticky went together like online retail deals and irritating security passcodes that were impossible to read, even if you scrunched your eyes right up.

Having sorted out at least some of the living room Daniel decided he should really sort out some of the kitchen. The washing-up machine was already full and while he waiting for the water to fill the sink he took a sponge and tried soaking some of the worst caked on spillages from off the job. It wasn’t Thr best job in the world and was positively horrendous when the gunk would only shift if you got your fingernails involved, but there was something rewarding in the gradual cleaning process. This done the washing-up beckoned and then a snack or possibly lunch - Daniel had lost track of time a little but it didn’t really matter because Daisy was at school and he wasn’t following any timetable. The luxury of it.

He considered having a shower but then realised what he really wanted to do was clean the bathroom sink, encrusted as it was with toothpaste and sparkles - and indeed sparkly toothpaste and soap. Another quarter of an hour disappeared in the blink of an eye but Daniel felt considerably better for it. He was reclaiming his space - not to make it exclusively his own, but to give him a shot at keeping it more clean and tidy with daisy around. They could look after it together. She could learn to hoover. Maybe.

He was hoovering the last few stairs when the call came in. It was Trinny and she was in a bit of a state.

“Can we promote this, do you think?” she asked. “Only the more I think about it the more dodgy it becomes. And I think it needs to be fun rather than the answer to relationship troubles...”

Daniel said he thought he knew where she was coming from but didn’t really have the time to address it right now. Could he call back perhaps later or more likely tomorrow because hey, Daisy would be at school again. Amazingly.

“Do you think you’re working for us still?” asked Trinny.

“That sounds ominous,” said Daniel with half a smile, “or is it a trick question?”

“It’s a straight question,” said Trinny. “I’m serious and I need an answer pretty soon.”

“Oh, OK,” said Daniel. “Can I get back to you, only I need to go get Daisy.”

“Yes...” sighed Trinny. “I guess there’s always something.”

“Tomorrow,” reiterated Daniel. “I’m free all day tomorrow.”

At least he thought he would be. But there were still two bedrooms and a few floors to do.