Huey’s Foreword: I was going somewhere with this short story, but I can’t remember where. Keith, the subject of the narrative, may have been a character outlined in a now forgotten novel. Perhaps I was exploring his personality. Again, it was probably my ambition to aspire to be Alice Munro!
I clearly remember many ‘Keiths’ – by different names of course – from my formative working years; those times when a job was for life. I wonder how Keith would cope today? It matters not, he’s long since dead. But not forgotten. I hope he would be pleased to know that.
It’s a short 600-word, five-minute read.
I hope you enjoy. Don’t forget to like and share. Thank you.
Huey Hawke, 2025
Keith’s Beard
Keith was the kind of man you felt warmth for if you were predisposed to human kindness. There was something about him that must’ve generated a little heat in everyone. He was short, up to my nose. His overgrown patchy salt and pepper beard, and specs like magnifying glasses, gave the impression of a mask, Keith hiding from something. But he wasn’t, I don’t think. He walked quick, but rigid (an uncorrected club foot, Tony said). You knew when he was on his way because office manager Christine would shout, ‘The lad’s shifting’. Or she would send an instant message by phone or computer to Keith’s intended destination if he were headed upstairs. You’d hear his feet shuffle, heels catch the carpet floor with a regular scuff, drag, scuff, drag. ‘Keep an eye out for Keith,’ Christine would say to new starters. I never understood for whose benefit.
I’d stand up when he reached my desk. It hurt him to lean forward. He’d talk to my chest instead of over my head. I thought it rude of Deborah and Lesley if he came saw them because they were young and he wasn’t, and they sat, looking at their screens, may be listening. I gave Keith time, didn’t mind he talked to my chest. Although Stuart would tease me about it. Said Keith wanted to see me in one of those postcards bought at the end of the pier. Nonsense, I’d say; Keith’s eyes drooped with weariness, he could barely see me. Besides, Keith was more concerned with tax return figures which he’d hand to me as carefully as if a midwife passing a newborn to a mother. Upon these sheets were umpteen garish sticky notes with his meticulous observations. He’d explain their meaning to me like he was shouting for attention in a noisy pub. Determined to make his point and that I understood. Then he’d touch his specs and shuffle off with a scuff, drag.
I do remember he had amazing white teeth, a lovely smile – when he had something to be happy about, which wasn’t often since his mum past away and he was going home lunchtime, a new routine, to cook for his ancient dad. I believe he’d never vacuum cleaned, mown the lawn, or cooked a meal in his lifetime, ’til the day she died and he had asked Judith, who always won prizes for her vodka chutney and amaretto honey, how long he could leave a microwave meal in the oven for. The whole office heard the question and mostly everyone answered, with barely concealed laughter.
Keith had lived at home with his parents, and since he joined Hortons in ’78, his routine had been the same all his working life. Leave home 8.29 am (although by his own admission this had gotten earlier as he had gotten older). Arrive 8.42 am. Make a cup of tea. Start work 8.45 am. Leave for lunch, at home, cooked by his mum, 1 pm. Back for 2 pm, leave 5 pm. Forty-two years. Never married. One brother, Reg. A business man. Successful, according to Stuart. We all knew when Reg had come stay with Keith and his dad. Keith would wear a white shirt, starched collar, trim his beard. Then one day these idiosyncrasies stopped. And since that day, Keith’s beard had never stopped growing. The following year, Keith had stopped work. I never knew if he retired – or something else – he was never mentioned in the office again.
The End