“Bricks.”

My older sister Jill and her husband, nick named Jake, decided to split from the family firm and start up on their own. They collected their collateral and moved miles away. They bought a run-down nursery from a retiring couple named Shepley. Mr Shepley was diabetic. He’d been that way a long while. His wife was worn out looking after him. They welcomed the new owners with unusual warmth. My brother-in-law was the same age as their dead son Danny. I guess it made an emotional impression. They liked my sister too. The Shepleys bought a bungalow in the nearby village. They declined an option to buy the adjacent lot with it. They didn’t see the point. It wasn’t as if they needed the space for grandchildren to play in. Both couples kept in touch.

Mr Shepley made frequent visits to his former home and business. Jill and Jake welcomed his feedback about the lay of the land and what might grow best where, and what wouldn’t grow at all. The bank made loans. Buildings mushroomed as old ones were torn down. Eventually only the old Victorian barn remained. It was well built of good brick and a rather fine structure but of little use in the new scheme of things. The Shepleys seemed to say little about the barn. My sister realised later they avoided it. They hardly mentioned Danny either, but his name kept cropping up with neighbours. His story gradually came to light though the still grieving parents were reticent.

Danny had come home from the doctor with bad news. He’d been diagnosed diabetic at only eighteen. I guess he had a fair idea of the long term implications, only the doctor seemed to think his case scenario would be far worse than his father’s. Perhaps blind within five years and the loss of legs, starting gradually from the toes up. Danny was distraught. He needed to talk but Mr and Mrs Shepley were busy when he returned. They had a business to run, a future for Danny. It would be their legacy to leave him. They couldn’t really stop just then, to listen to they son.

Like most of his neighbours, Mr Shepley kept a twelve-bore shotgun. It was handy for shooting rabbits and occasionally picking off an unfortunate fox. Danny fetched it from the cupboard and went to the barn where he blew his brains out. It couldn’t have been that easy considering the length of the barrel. Perhaps it wasn’t really his brains, just the story someone told to avoid details. His parents heard the bang but didn’t figure things out. After all, it was probably only a rabbit. At dinnertime Danny was missing. The Shepley’s customers had all gone home, presumably to their families, an evening meal and probably relaxation after. Mr Shepley was the one who found his son. He never really recovered. Folks said he simply soldiered on. But ever after the barn was out of bounds.

My sister and Pip decided it had to go. Neighbours watched the bulldozer work and said they had wondered why Mr Shepley let it stand so long. The workmen were careful. They cleaned the bricks ready for a builder. He’d bought them to build on a local plot, though no one knew where at the time. The bricks stood in expectant stacks for several weeks. Eventually lorries arrived in my sister’s yard. The bricks were loaded and hauled away. Soon after Mrs Shipley’s husband died. She said her husband never left the house once the bricks arrived on the lot next door.