“And the soldier?” Edith asked.
A van with a faded yellow logo and the smell of coffee and grease arrived within the hour. The man who stepped out was named Kev. He had the weathered face of a Birkenhead docker and the calm, unshakeable patience of a plumber who had seen God only knew what congealed in the pipes of Wallasey. unblocking drains wirral
Kev smiled. “That’s just a kid who wanted to see where the water went.” “And the soldier
“Right,” he said, wiping his hands on a rag that was more stain than fabric. “That’ll be eighty-five quid.” He had the weathered face of a Birkenhead
“Number 14, Princes Road,” she murmured, dialling the number on a damp card she’d kept under the fridge magnet for ten years. “Drain Unblocking Wirral – 24/7.”
For the next three hours, Edith watched from her kitchen window as Kev became part archaeologist, part surgeon. He dug a pit in her prized dahlias without complaint. He uncoiled a high-pressure jetter that screamed like a jet engine, blasting away the calcified fat and the writhing, pale root hairs that had snaked through the crack like fingers reaching for a meal.
“You know,” Kev said, pausing at the gate. “Unblocking drains on the Wirral... it’s not a job. It’s a geography lesson. Every pipe tells you who lived here. The grease from the chip shops. The hair from the girls getting ready for the Pyramids Centre. The lost rings.”