Empty sockets stared forward sightlessly as the ground shook around them. The underground was always humid, nothing had bothered what was left of the body under there until the building work started.

Inching towards where it lay, deep enough not to be found by chance, but quite high up enough to be found when foundations needed to be laid, only the occasional insect bore witness to any of it. The sour smell of fire burning, cement being mixed and the shouts of labourers got steadily closer.

The body waited.

“You’re impossible!”, shouted Alice, as Tom glared at her, having exploded at her again about how the neighbours were parking far too near her car, demanding to know why she couldn’t just move hers forward an inch or two, two more steps to the front door were not going to kill anyone. On top of which, she could sort it out when an accident happened, the damned neighbours drove like maniacs anyway.

Angry words jutted out jarringly into the silence of the otherwise quiet residential area, with no audience to hear them; old Tom was just in a mood again. It was the same every day, the building work was interrupting everyone’s sleep, nerves were frayed all over the estate. House prices were being pushed down as the council had made the electioneering move to build affordable housing.

Tom could make the words affordable housing sound like an affront to anyone’s civil liberties, as well as something that was quite dirty, unclean. Not the sort of thing you could chat about politely over lunch.

He slammed the door shut behind him, one hand twiddling the car-keys in his pocket, the other tapping all over his coat to look for his cigarettes.

He walked to the edge of where the building work was going on, sat down on an old stone structure, remnants of another time, lighting up and taking a long drag, eyes drawn instinctively to the same spot.

The body waited.

image: https://www.stockvault.net/photo/213212/earth-section