Looking out my back door: Spiders in the Toilet.

Another Daily Prompt 🙂
The back door is ancient, thick and warped slightly with age. Flakes of red paint fall away when you slide back the bolt. Well, you jam it back with as much force as you can manage, because it likes to stick. It’s got black plastic handle which doesn’t turn anymore. You just have to pull it towards you, sharply, and try not to punch yourself in the face. I find that ducking to the left is usually the best option, but try not to tread on the cat who is inevitably sat on your feet, refusing to go through the flap.
The back door opens over two concrete steps, the edges chipped with age. Stepping down, your faced with the outside lavatory that was built with the house. The flush chain dangles lifeless and half-snapped off. The toilet seat is dark and thankfully shut. Who knows what could crawl up from the pre-war plumbing. We used to use that toilet, when we were children. In the summer time we’d run in, skidding with our bare feet on the icy on the concrete floor, vision green and speckled from the sun. It was a favourite habitat for spiders, even then. Once, I forgot that we shouldn’t lock the door and I was stuck. My own, white-washed cell and a lock that wouldn’t budge. I panicked and my poor father tried to climb in through the skinny window. He must have been standing on a ladder because even now, the window is well above my head. Just as they were about to cut the door away from its hinges though, the lock gave. It’s game was up.
After that summer, it became a home for kittens. Our cat made her bed there and had her litters. I remember sitting on the dusty floor, cradling fluffy bundles on my knees.
Next to the toilet is the coal shed. I think, it was only ever used for coal one winter and then never again – because we gas installed. It’s still lined with the dust but it’s where the ice-cream freezer lives. Yes, we make you work hard for your dessert in my family.
There’s supposed to be another door, between the outside and the shed and the toilet. But it came off years ago.
Now you just step out, into the garden. Overgrown, filled with flashes of pink, purple and yellow wild flowers. The giant hydrangeas’, the strawberry plants, sweet pea and blackberry bushes. You can lie on the soft green grass and imagine you are anywhere in the world.