Day 525

It was the kind of mould that clung to your every breath and was damned impossible to kill off.
Her grandmother's house had been coated in it.
The place she remembered clearest though was the downstairs bathroom.
Well, the basement en-suite rather but granny always called it downstairs instead.
She thought it would make us happier to stay there the night but it never did.
Not with the rate the mould grew.

Granny never went to the basement as her knees were too old.
Her parents never went down there either, refused to "pander" to their"overactive imaginations".
These were in the days when giving kids cheap cameras was unheard of.
Even disposable cameras were strictly a holiday treat so they never managed to document its growth.
Each time they visited for long weekends the mould stain was bigger than last time.
The first time the siblings were both old enough to go away by themselves was when it all changed.

They'd been planning it since childhood, since the mould first began to grow.
Instead of spending their nights anxiously watching the en-suite door for movement they'd stay home.
Their back-up plan was a friend's place in the next town which was where they ended up.
It left their parents visiting granny alone for the first time since before the siblings were born.
Their trip marked the last time both parents and grandparent were seen alive.
The siblings received a call from the hospital nearest to granny's house.

By the time they arrived their parents were comatose and granny was dead.
The hospital called it some kind of hyper-aggressive cancer and refused to let the sibling inside.
When they eventually did it took them a fair while to recognise the people who'd raised them.
Their skin was several shades paler than usual with bulbous black lumps practically bursting through,
They heard the nurses mutter that granny was far worse - no skin in sight.
When they took the road home past granny's house they saw the garden full of black mushrooms.