my darling rose
Those who know me personally (and possibly intimately) will be aware of the bitter sweet love story of myself and my now ex-wife Rose. For the purposes of public education I feel it necessary to share this story with those who are unfamiliar with it.
I first met Rose in a hospital. I had had a kidney issue which for a long while meant i frequently urinated uncontrollably and had just come through the painful operation to repair this issue. Rose was sitting across the ward from me. A small bracelet had been worn around her wrist and the skin had actually grown over it, leaving the bracelet embedded in her body and it had to be removed. Our eyes met across a crowd of nurses and people in white coats. Rose would often visit my hospital bed and soon, over my piss soaked bedsheets, she proposed to me and i said yes. She was Rose by name and Rose by nature.
So that was it, we were wed and moved to Wittering in Peterborough where we planned to have an extension or conservatory and think about setting up a family. My middle of the road job as an IT specialist at a local radio station provided sufficiently for our family and gave Rose the opportunity to work part time at her dream job as a professional cucumber peeler.
Throughout the relationship it became apparant that Rose had a strange obsession with hamsters and in particular the capacity and expandable (almost elastic) quality of their cheeks. It was this aspect of her personality which would unfortunately lead to her innocent demise.
Robert Gray was an ex-disc jockey who had experienced small scale fame on the club scene in Ibiza. He was now resigned to his part time job as a blind and curtain fitter and was a militant animal rights enthusiast. Robert disagreed with many of Rose’s experiments on live hamsters. She would often leave spirit levels, dog tails and recently germinated cress in the hamster’s cheeks. Robert had long stalked rose since before the bracelet embedding incident and had travelled to Wittering to foil our extension, save the hamsters and kill Rose.
It was a misty autumnal evening and the sun was setting over our patio and combined gas and electric barbeque. Rose had gone out to buy some double cream for a pre-bedtime trifle she was planning on preparing for us. Unfortunately when she went out to get the double cream, i didn’t know then, but that would be the last time i saw Rose.
Robert knew which shop Rose bought her dairy products from. He knew who she was and which car she drove. He knew all the about the pre-bedtime trifle we had planned. He waited until she’d purchased the cream and then killed her, stuffing her cheeks to the point of death with miniature sausage rolls and vol-au-vents. Rose never made it home and neither did the cream.
The trifle base of jelly, custard and cake pieces is still in the kitchen. I can’t bring myself to move it, even after all these years. The house is still conservatory-less and Robert Gray is still on the run, owing me a pot of double cream or 59p to compensate for the loss.
So it just goes to show when you think you’ve got it all (loft insulation, a patio, a timeshare in scarborough) life can change in an instance.
This tragic story serves as a commemoration to the fragility of love, relationships and symptomless kidney defects.
