I creep to bed on tiptoes whenever Shirley has gone to bed before me and last night as I crept towards the twin strident cacophonies of harsh voices on the radio and lady-snoring I knew from the years of experience which have turned me into a nervous wreck that even something as imperceptible as one of my eyelashes falling out and crashing to the floor will wake her instantly and she will let fly with a tirade calling my parentage into question and highlighting my selfishness !
I NEVER listen to the radio in bed because I like silence and for me there's nothing worse than being kept awake by Shirley's radio which blasts, somewhat muffled, through her torso until two in the morning and tuned into 5 Live, a talk programme dedicated to sport and politics and phone-ins which attract every sleepless nutter in the world !
The oddest thing is that Shirley can't stand the radio during the day and becomes suffused with anger if the sound from mine permeates the two thick walls and twenty feet that divides us as I work in my room and she sits with her laptop on a disability tray that leaks polystyrene balls searching through at least five hundred Google pages to satisfy her insatiable hunger to discover weather patterns across the North East of England and the South West of Scotland !
Last night I didn't want to go to bed at nine thirty as she did and stayed up until the witching hour of ten thirty to sort out my millions of photos before my creep to the bathroom !
I swear that I made no noise whatsoever, didn't flush the toilet or clean my teeth and got undressed in the lounge before entering the bedchamber and without breathing lifted the quilt with the lightness of touch of the fairy I'm often accused of being and slipped beneath into my regulated position of ramrod straightness with nothing touching any part of her body !
Her radio was blasting out at top volume and I hoped, really beyond hope that my actions would go unnoticed but NO, as my head touched my pillow I got bellowed at even though she had been deeply asleep until that instant, "Who's turned my radio on ? Why have you done that ? I was fast asleep and now my night is RUINED ! I can't believe you've done that AGAIN ! You know what a light sleeper I am ! You're going to have to sleep in the other room and I might as well get up because my night's ruined thanks to you !
And with that she was instantly asleep again and denied any memory of the incident this morning !
I lay there, not daring to move and forced to listen to the appalling Edwina Curry boring the life out of the country with Shirley's freezing left foot rammed up my crutch !
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