◉ 029 | Red Broom. Green Bucket.

They had been together

for as long as either could remember.

Though,

neither remembered much.

Red, all bristles and posture,

leant against the brick wall,

surveying the laneway

like an old poet

watching the tide roll in.

Green, low and steady,

never far,

catching whatever the world

spilled.

Water. Soap. Cigarette butts.

Crumpled receipts

from a bakery

that no longer existed.

They had an understanding—

as much as a broom

and a bucket

could.

She would sweep.

He would hold.

Sometimes

she would complain

that no one appreciates

the quiet work

of cleaning up after others,

and he would listen,

because what else

does a bucket do.

And so it went.

One morning

Green was lifted,

carried away,

without so much as a glance back—

not that he had a neck

to turn with.

Red remained in the laneway,

bristles fraying

in the afternoon heat,

a cigarette rolling by

like a tumbleweed

in a western

where the hero

never comes back.

Days passed.

Green found himself

in a supermarket storeroom—

humming refrigerators,

nervous teenagers

stacking tins of peaches.

She stayed.

Leaning.

Lower each day.

Without Green, the hours stretched.

She watched the laneway mouth—

every shadow a chance,

every footstep lifting her bristles

a fraction.

A truck passed.

A trolley rattled.

Twice she rose,

then settled.

Maybe a broom is just a broom,

a bucket just a bucket—

but meaning lives in the space

between them.

She waited.

That evening,

just before dark,

a pair of hands

brought

a different bucket.

Red stood

a little straighter,

let the night air

catch in her bristles,

and thought—

perhaps it was time

to stop waiting.