Dear God Read Online Free

plank and in through the window. It took several attempts but in the end the cat did manage it. This was a major achievement and he and the cat celebrated with another bit of chicken. When he left he put the cat out into the garden and told it to stay there.
    It had been a highly successful day and he set off for the pub with almost a spring in his step, except that he lurched a bit at the end of the road, by the traffic lights. However, Jimmy wasn’t in the pub, and his attempts at conversation with other people were met with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. After a few pints he decided to turn in, as he felt tired anyway.
    When he got home, he discovered that the cat had remembered his way in and had discovered the sausages; it was in the sitting room chewing its way through one on the rug in front of the telly. Damn animal! But he was secretly quite proud of it. He looked nervously at the computer. It was no use. He would have to see if there was an email for him from Top God.
    There was. It said:
    Mrs. Brenner needs further TLC.
    That was all. Nothing about his money problems. Nothing about having been the originator of Mrs Brenner’s crack on the head. Just a curious directive about the old bat’s state. Why and how he, William Penfold, was supposed to assist her was a mystery.
    Disappointed, angry and fed up, he and the cat settled down for the night on the sofa. William’s mind was buzzing, swirling with more-than-half-forgotten events from the past and the present, all mixed up. Was he a write off? A man who had once been an administrative manager – whatever that was – who had had, perhaps, a home, a car, a future. Maybe even a family. What had turned him into this seedy, drunken, shambolic shadow of a man? A man in filthy trousers, with a run-down garden and no money? A man who ordered things he could not possibly pay for? A man who lived downstairs because he was too idle and too drunk half the time to climb up to the bathroom or front bedroom?
    As none of these questions could be answered, he wondered briefly about his mother. He hadn’t thought about his parents for months. There was an indistinct memory of warmth and an enveloping tenderness; she always gave him ‘TLC’, as Top God phrased it in his email.
    But these emails were winding him up, like the Social people tried to do, he decided, making him confront things he didn’t wish to remember.
    He suddenly perceived the acute difference between ‘didn’t wish to’ and ‘couldn’t’.
    Sod ’em all. He would have another little drink or two and go to sleep. So he did.
    Next day dawned grey and showery. The cat was up and about early, climbing through the toilet window to the wider world outside, taking another sausage with it. William was woken by the postman knocking on the door loudly. Three parcels. One contained a pair of trousers, cream with the red stripe, bright, clean and new. The next one contained a long and colourful umbrella. He couldn’t remember ordering an umbrella at all, but it seemed very sensible. It also seemed like a present, as he had no recollection of buying it. The third item was somewhat problematic. He had meant to get the cat a nice basket to sleep in but it appeared he had ordered a carrying basket instead, the type you saw people taking their pets to the vet’s in. It was well-made and had a little cover, with a hole for the handle, so as not to upset the animal.
    Well, it would have to sleep in that; just as good as a sleeping basket, provided you didn’t click the front bars up.
    He liked the look of the trousers but a thought occurred to him. If his current trousers were dirty, could he put on clean ones without having a shower or bath first? It was a thorny question. There was hot water, he knew. Would there be enough for an all-over job? Did he have any clean underwear? Or a shirt of some description?
    Where was all this leading him? He had a presentiment of impending change, which was alarming. But the