Gary wiped his hands on a rag. "Fat, soap, and a small washcloth," he said, as if diagnosing a cold. "It happens."
Standing there with a plunger, I felt less like a modern man and more like a medieval monk diagnosing a humoral imbalance. The blockage was a demon, a hairball of wipes labeled "flushable" but built like polyester, congealed grease, and the ghost of a child’s toy soldier. It was lodged somewhere in the dark vertical shaft, a clot in the house’s deep vein. soil stack blocked
It began, as these things often do, not with a bang, but with a gurgle. A deep, bronchial sigh from the downstairs cloakroom toilet, as if the house itself had developed a chest infection. Gary wiped his hands on a rag