So this is weird. A while ago, the house nearing completion (finally), we had a visit from Sean the painter. Initially, due not only to the fact that nobody seemed to know who engaged his services, but also that he turned up at the door in the dead of night and because of his slightly morose appearance (his ruddy face is terribly sad and he walks with a shuffle, his gaze permanently on the floor) he was nicknamed ‘Sean of the Dead’ and it kind of stuck. Actually when you get to know him, he’s incredibly chirpy and not at all funereal; fond of spinning a yarn and passing on tips for horses to back (’Leon Knights’ 8pm tonight at Pontefract - each way, not to win) he’s frankly a right laugh. The trouble is, he’s kind of hard to pin down. The first time we met him, he appeared at the door, introduced himself to us and proceeded to wade in with his paintbrush fully loaded, giving the bathroom a complete coat (none of this rubbing down and sanding nonsense: no priming or preparation, just straight in, down with the floral dustsheet and away - oh, and I mean complete - bath, taps, sink, you name it) before disappearing back into the night with a baleful ‘I’ll see ye again, so’. I tried, unsuccessfully, to resist the temptation to look out of the window to see if he drove a hearse or a big black sedan, but nope, he’d vanished.
The next time we saw him was several weeks later, long after we’d given up hope of seeing him again, when he reappeared, announcing that he’d been in Scotland and that his daughter had had a baby, luzzed on another coat, stopped for a quick chat and promptly vanished into the night once again. Imagine our surprise, then, when my Mum and I returned from a medicinal recce to the unfeasibly large shopping centre to discover a rather painty Sean of the Dead giving the bathroom another go.
After a quick cup of tea, we set off on the school run, leaving Sean of the Dead splattering paint around and humming in his sinister fashion. When we came back, it was as though he’d never been there, apart from the fact that mine and Hubby’s bathroom had turned a violent shade of yellow and all our towels and toilet rolls were piled up in the sink. ‘Spooky’, said Hubby. ‘Hmm’, I agreed, ‘bet nobody else has got an otherworldly, disappearing Lord of the Dead painting their bathroom’. Sure it’s probably just as well.