Benjamin cried the moment he saw the note on the fridge. He wept throughout the day. At school, no one asked him what the matter was - even though he was sobbing continuously and it was disrupting the lesson. They kind of thought it would be awkward and more time that passed the more awkward it got. There was a substantial puddle of salt water around his seat by the end of the day.
It was only as he was leaving the building to return to his empty house that the lollipop lady took pity. ‘Maybe you should stop that.’ She advised Benjamin, helpfully, passing him a lollipop as she always did to the students that crossed the road in obscenely dangerous ways. He looked up at her blearily as he took the sweet.
‘My mum.’ He wept. The lollipop lady stared at him. (This was not enough information, even for her.) ‘She’s gone to Iceland. You know, the shop.’
‘Oh.’ Said the lollipop lady, in sudden understanding. ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’
‘It’s okay. I thought it would happen sometime. It just surprised me.’ Benjamin said, still crying.
Everybody knows that when mums go to Iceland, they don’t come back. The reflective windows of the stores gleam as you walk by, and everything is covered in brambles. You can only imagine how many of them are crammed inside. It must be quite a large number since there are only so many shops.
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