Freckles

My vet's assistant has freckles. Not real freckles, mind. Fake ones. A big cloud of brown dots painted across the bridge of her nose and the top of her face. I wasn't sure they were fake until I checked with my son – an as yet undiscovered expert on the veracity of freckles – and he assured me that they were not real.

She also has red hair. Bright orange hair. I suspect that this too is fake, though the only way of checking (perusing her pubes) is probably out of the question.

Red hair and a sea of freckles, then.

I discovered today that her name is Geraldine. In other words, the female equivalent of Gerald. Though she doesn't in the least strike me as being a Gerald. Geralds are stamp collectors and train spotters.

Maybe that's why her parents christened her Geraldine rather than Gerald. Maybe they don't like trains. Maybe they don't like stamps. 

If you don't like trains, it's easy to avoid them. You simply use a different mode of transport. Though you'd be hard-pressed to avoid stamps. Unless you always wrote e-mails and text messages. But have you tried sending a cheque by e-mail? Or a bunch of flowers – let alone a dead body?

As I said before, Geraldine is my vet's assistant. Or co-worker. Or whatever they call them in the trade. I call him "my" vet even though I don't possess him any more than his other customers/clients do. He's his own boss, I guess. Unless he's married. And then God help the poor hen-pecked bastard.

Perhaps Mrs Vet has freckles too. Perhaps that's why he hired Geraldine. Because she reminds him of his wife. Or ex-wife. Or lover. Or mistress. No, wait: what if Geraldine is his mistress, lover, wife?

Spooky.