SHORT FICTION: 'TRAFFIC ISLAND'
Flora waits on the plantation in the centre of the road. She has managed to cross four lanes of traffic and is waiting to cross the other four. She is on an island in a sea of traffic and can go neither forward to her home nor back to the shops.
When Flora first settled in this suburb with Luigi she was young and fit and could race across the road to the shops and back, dodging the traffic, laughing at the fun of it all. Luigi has been gone a long time now, she is 75 years old and the road is eight lanes wide. Where she once danced her shopping jeep across the lanes of traffic when a gap appeared she now moves tentatively. And these days the gaps are fewer and shorter. The unbroken stream of speeding trucks, buses and cars is enough to make anyone feel unsure.
Earlier today she crossed the road to show Mr J. J. Bullfinch, chartered accountant and tax agent, a letter she received from the pension people. It said she appeared to have worked more than ten hours in some fortnightly periods during the last financial year and must therefore repay $10,000.
No matter how many times she counted the zeros, there were still four. In her whole life she had never owned as much as $1000 at any one time. The idea of 10,000 was beyond her. And the letter contained lies; she had not worked for money since she finished her job at the market 20 years ago. She showed the letter to her neighbour who agreed that something must be done, and that Mr J. J. Bullfinch would know how to deal with this matter.
Flora had read the words Chartered Accountant and Tax Agent on Mr J. J. Bullfinch's window many times but had never imagined going inside the door. She had never even peered through the bits of window around the big white letters. She knew accountants did things with money but she found the other words mysterious.
She would treat this trip as an adventure. While she was out she would buy a red capsicum, two onions, and a small loaf of bread. And a box of the mango and guava