Letter From The Other Side by Cynthia Part 3

Dear Del,

You will remember I finished my last letter at the stage when Monica and Tony had left the farm after a disastrous day during which their car ended up in a creek. Aunt Alice had been seeing ants if upset, and Tony was ready to wring her neck.

They were driving in a small hired vehicle.

About three quarters of an hour later, the four travellers grunted and groaned as they tried to straighten their cramped limbs getting out of the car. Uncle Rodger supported by his frame and glad of the stop, headed for the ‘gentleman’s conveniences’. After inspecting the facilities and chatting to a few fellow travellers he returned to the restaurant.

He stood looking about him as they waited in a line to give their orders. ‘Never been in one of these places before.’ He conceded.

‘That’s because you say they charge like wounded bulls.’ Aunt Alice reminded him. ‘Though how you’d know having never been in one I don’t know. I only want a cup of tea anyway, so I’ll go and sit down, you can carry mine over.’ She walked supported by her cane, her head held in a haughty manner toward a table. She bent to dust the seat carefully with her handkerchief which she took from her coat pocket, checked the cleanliness of the plastic table top while muttering about the lack of decent table cloths in eating establishments these days and sat down ready to be waited upon.

A spotty youth asked Uncle Rodger for his order. ‘Well what have your got?’ he asked innocently.

The youth pointed upwards at all the colourful displays along the boards over his head.

‘What are they? Eh?’ he questioned, indicating by putting his hand behind his ear that he couldn’t hear. ‘It’s so noisy in here I can’t hear what your saying.’

The young man repeated all the foods available.

‘What no roast beef?’

The young man’s composure showed its first crack. ‘We don’t have roasts.’ his smile faded.
‘No roast beef! Well I never.’ Uncle Rodger was mystified. ‘What sort of place was this?’

Slowly he took his glasses from his pocket, undid the case and put them on. He stood back and peered up at the various menus above him. The queue lengthened by the second as new people arrived from the highway for a fast meal and quick get-away.

With care he laboriously read each board. His confusion increased as he watched others leaving with trays loaded with food.

‘Do you have a Senior’s Specials menu?’

The young man jiggled on his feet and drummed his fingers in a tattoo on the bench top.
“No.”
‘Oh, no Senior’s Specials, dear me.’ he hummed and hawwwed some more
‘Oh that looks nice.’ he pointed at a passing tray ‘I might have some of that. What’s that?’ he queried.

The young man’s smile split his face once again as he explained what had been in the order.

‘Oh onions. No,……… I can’t have onions.’ Uncle Rodger was back to square one.

Tony stood behind him pretending he didn’t know him, enjoying the pleasure of hearing someone else being harassed by his uncle instead of him.

Eventually Monica, unable to cope with the comments of people in the queue, came forward and helped Uncle Rodger choose a piece of pie and a cup of tea. ‘You go and sit down Uncle Rodger I’ll carry the things over to you.’ After all, she had to keep reminding herself of his age.
‘That was mean of you Tony.’ she said as she passed him carrying the tray.

Tony, not feeling so forgiving, ordered a large hamburger with the lot, a piece of pie and two cups of coffee for himself. They could sit and watch him eat.

For the next twenty minutes that is exactly what they did as he slowly and deliberately chewed his way through the food. Occasionally he stopped to make conversation and offered to get more drinks for everyone.

Unfortunately, the mention of onions reminded Uncle Rodger of his last visit to his doctor. He began a word for word replay of the visit for his companions and because of the carrying power of his voice, also the people sitting at the tables surrounding them. Everyone was treated to a vivid and explicit description of Uncle Rodger’s health and the intimate workings of his bowels.

Monica could feel the blood rushing to her cheeks as she watched the giggling and shaking shoulders of the teenagers sitting at a table beside them. She didn’t blame them really but kept wishing the old man would stop.

Eventually they rose to leave and one of the young men winked at her saying. ‘Bit too much detail there at times wasn’t there?’

Aunt Alice had been so quiet during the meal Monica was feeling concerned about her. The day had been disastrous enough to make anyone tired let alone a woman of her aunt’s age. She saw the old lady looking at the floor.

Uncle Rodger running out of medical anecdotes turned to his wife and asked. ‘Why are you looking at the floor? Do you see any ants here?’

She nodded. ‘Yes, but there aren’t quite as many.’

The young waitress wiping a table near them looked up, she had overheard the remark.
‘Are there ants here madam?’

‘Yes .’Aunt Alice replied before Monica could get a word in.

‘Oh my goodness, I’ll go and get the manager.’ she rushed off and disappeared into the depths of the restaurant.

‘No, No!’ Monica called.

Tony put his head in his hands. He could feel the day slipping away from his grasp again.

A short man with a paunch equal or perhaps even larger than Uncle Rodgers walked swiftly across the gleaming floor toward them.

‘I know where he eats all the time.’ Tony muttered as the fellow approached their table.
His smile reached across his flabby face and he rubbed his thick little fingers together. He bent as far as his figure would allow as he quietly asked the group. ‘Is there a problem here? The waitress tells me you have an ant problem.’ He beamed at them as though it was the happiest news he had heard all day.

‘My wife is seeing ants.’ Uncle Rodger explained unhelpfully.

The man’s eyebrows rose above his puffy eyes. ‘Ants! Goodness Madam, where did you see these ants?’

‘There.’ Aunt Alice, pointed at the clean and bare floor tiles.

“Well, there are no ants there now that I can see.” The man walked slowly across the floor examining the details of the tiles he saw every day.

“Well I can see some.”

“No madam you can’t. There are no ants on our floor. I assure you we have the highest standards of cleanliness here. There are definitely no ants on the floor. You are mistaken.”

“Oh Oh.” groaned Uncle Rodger.

“That was the wrong thing to say mate.” Tony smiled, touching his chin carefully.

“How dare you call me a liar, young man!” Aunt Alice was furious. Her little grey head shook with rage.

“I’m not calling you a liar madam I’m simply saying you are mistaken.”

“Well I’m NOT!”

“I really think you should just agree with the lady.” Tony told him. Monica nodded in agreement.

The manager could see that the rest of the patrons and staff were interested in the goings on at the table. The idea suddenly occurred to him that these people were in some sort of conspiracy to defraud him. They were claiming ants and vermin in his restaurant and might be trying to gain legal compensation.

“Madam.” He tried again, took a deep breath and lowering his voice. “You do not see ants!”

“I’m a country woman, I’ll have you know and I know ants when I see them!” Aunt Alice now had the attention of everyone.

Newcomers from the highway wondered what they had walked into. Some suspected there was some sort of crime going on in the place there was so much tension in the air.

“Believe me mate; you’d be better to agree with her.” Tony sighed.

“So. You sir are the brain behind this conspiracy are you?” The manager pointed an accusing finger at Tony.

“What conspiracy?” Tony asked puzzled.

“Yes.” Monica questioned. “What conspiracy?”

“Don’t you try and deny this is some sort of extortion thing you have dreamed up.” The man’s chins wobbled and his cheeks flushed pink. “Brenda! Call the police!”

“What?” everyone chorused?

“I don’t believe this.” Tony stood up. “We’re going.”

“Oh no you’re not!” The manager called for re-enforcements and Tony was flattened by a few over eager teenager’s who had watched too may police movies.

They held him down on the floor while Monica screamed at them to leave him alone and Uncle Rodger and Aunt Alice held hands, cowering together on their chairs. Tony’s right arm was forced painfully up his back and he yelled in agony. “Get off. Get off.” He choked hoarsely. “It’s all a misunderstanding we can explain.”

“You can explain to the police.” The manager feeling forceful and manly, his latent testosterone finding an outlet at last, felt he had handled a potentially catastrophic situation for the company very well. There might even be a promotion in it for him. He patted his paunch lovingly.


The police who had arrived with screaming sirens laconically eyed their potential criminals.
One of them had a glint in his eyes which reminded Tony of Rodney. He looked up from where he still sat on the floor trying to get his arm back into a normal position.

The officer stood allowing his gaze to drift across the group in front of him, calculating the ages of the accused as the manager, his arms waving excitedly, described his extortion theory to him.
The manager claimed the group had tried to extort money from the company and Aunt Alice kept interrupting him by saying she knew what she had seen and knew an ant when she saw it.

Eventually the police spoke to Monica who explained Aunt Alice’s little hallucination problems and the matter was finally cleared up. Tony was released by his teenage captors, brushed down and apologized to and the price of the meals refunded.

Turning to the fat man, Tony poked his ample chest hard and said “I never thought I’d say this to anyone mate. But after the day I’ve had. I’m going to sue you.” He strode from the place with as much dignity as he could. His chin throbbing and his arm refusing to unbend and straiten into a natural position.


The manager watched them make their way slowly out the door wondering what sort of money the company would now have to pay for wrongful accusation and false imprisonment.

The police ambled out to their car muttering and laughing quietly.

The episode gave the rest of the people a good topic to laugh about for the remainder of their trips.

The four were feeling so tired that no- one wanted to speak. Tony helped the old people into the rear seat, his arm paining him as he tried to do the seat belts up.

“Bloody little Rambo’s have hurt my shoulder.” He complained to Monica who was in tears. “I don’t think I have ever been so embarrassed in my life. This is the worst day I have ever had.” She sobbed.

Tony agreed but didn’t say anything more.

“You could have explained much sooner you know Tony.” Aunt Alice said.


“It might have been good if you hadn’t kept insisting the ants were there in the first place.” Tony nearly side-swiped a car as he entered the traffic while looking around into the rear to yell at her.

“Tony, look out! Watch what you’re doing!” Monica screamed.

“Yes Tony. We all want to get home in one piece.” Uncle Rodger mumbled.

Within a short time of leaving the roadhouse debacle, the old people had returned to discussing the family and somehow the subject of a friend’s funeral came up. After a little more discussion Aunt Alice was heard to say, “I’m not going to get buried; I’ve decided I’ll get cremated.”

“Maybe they’ll let me turn the gas on.” Tony muttered.

The conversation slowed and the two old people began to doze.

Monica was still wiping away the occasional tear.

They reached the outskirts of the city and Uncle Rodger woke up enough to give directions to the retirement village. After an hour and feeling as though it had been a year since they had left in the morning they were back.

His arm was aching and his bruised chin throbbed painfully. Tony slowly unwound his legs out of the car and tried to stretch to take the kinks out of his back before he unpacked the old people’s things and took them shuffling along the path to their unit.

‘What a straggling ill-kempt little group we must look.’ Monica thought as she dragged her feet along in Rebecca’s sandals.

As soon as they entered the unit, Aunt Alice pointed at the floor. “They’re gone. Look!”

“What are?” Monica asked wearily.

“The ants they’re gone.”

“That’s good Aunt Alice. I’m glad they’ve gone. What a shame they couldn’t have gone sooner. I’ll come in tomorrow and check on how you’re feeling but I must get home. Get yourself to bed you must be very tired. I know I am.”

The old lady nodded and Monica and Tony left hurriedly.

Goodness knows what they’ll say about us to everyone there.” Monica worried. “They might not let us take them out again if Uncle Rodger keeps stretching the truth the way he does.”

“Let’s hope that’s a definite possibility.” Tony answered.

She didn’t tell him to shut up.



The whole of the following week Monica thought about the dreadful day. It had been a day from hell. The only good thing to come out of it was that Aunty Alice’s ants disappeared.
She realized the Vicar had planted the right thoughts in Aunt Alice’s head and she had settled down enough for the hallucinating to stop. How she could settle after such a day Monica couldn’t understand but ‘the oldies’ didn’t seem to realize the problems she and Tony were having without the car either. They only had her small car to rely on.

She supposed they were losing touch with daily life.

From the kitchen, she could hear Tony on the phone.

He was saying. “You mean I’m not covered? But it wasn’t my fault! Yes, I know I was the driver but the road wasn’t maintained and the passengers assured me it would be alright…..Well thanks for bloody nothing.” He threw his phone onto the couch.

She waited as a wild eyed Tony turned to her. “We aren’t covered by the insurance. They say it was driver error and my decision to drive into the water on a private road. So we don’t get a cent back.”

“How much will it be to fix?” she asked hardly daring to hear the answer.

A few thousand dollars!”

“Oh. No! There goes our holiday.” she gasped.

The phone ringing interrupted them and Monica slowly turned to answer it.

“Hello?..... Yes,….. yes Aunt Alice,……. I’ll tell him but I…..don’t know.” she faltered.

Monica looked at Tony waiting for him to ask what the call was about.

“Well? What was it?” he could see it was something she needed to tell him.

“Uncle Alf died today. The funeral is next week. They want to know if we will take them.”

Tony’s eyes widened. He began to shake. His whole body shook from side to side in his denial.

“Oh NO. Definitely NOT.!. NO!.... NO.!..” Tony bellowed walking out slamming the door.

That Del, was a day I am very glad I wasn’t present, but I’m sure will go down in the family history as the high water mark of the journals which included the Life and Times of Aunt Alice and Uncle Rodger.

I hope you have enjoyed it in the way a person can when it doesn’t happen to them.

Teddy and I will take over duty from now on.

From your ‘flower child friend’ Cynthia.