Homesick

Prologue

In the end, he put all the remaining furniture out on the street. A friend was supposed to come with a van and pick it up. So he waited there. Sat down in an armchair and nibbled on a pear. A neighbour was washing his car, a hose in his hand. He remembered that when he was a child, he used to watch the streams of water running off the cars to see which would be the first to land. Now he looked at the time. Half-past eight. His friend was fifteen minutes late. That wasn’t like him. Maybe, in the meantime, he should arrange the furniture the way it would be in a living room. Maybe not.

A woman whose bags he once carried from the shops made her way between the sofas and smiled at him as if she had something to say.

Another woman stumbled against the cabinet and grumbled: you’re blocking the way.