100 Word Stories: The Ritz

At eighty, Mrs Candley’s morning walk was rather less brisk than it had been at seventy. "Not old," she would mutter to herself, "not old"…as though somehow saying the words would make them true. She loved her little house, and its abundant garden, and the memories of Edward that were in every room.

“We live in the Ritz!” he’d say, surveying the kitchen, and the view of the vegetable garden beyond. She still grew herbs, and tomatoes, and energetic scarlet runner beans, with help from the boy next door. I’d be scared of somewhere grand, she thought. This is home.