{"id":1402,"date":"2022-10-22T20:45:21","date_gmt":"2022-10-22T20:45:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/?p=1402"},"modified":"2022-10-22T20:45:25","modified_gmt":"2022-10-22T20:45:25","slug":"the-uninvited-visitor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/the-uninvited-visitor\/1402\/","title":{"rendered":"The Uninvited Visitor"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

As Clare put her key in the lock, a sense of foreboding overcame her.\u00a0 She slowly turned it and pushed the door wide open.\u00a0 Her flat was in disarray. Everything she owned seemed to be scattered all over the floor. As her knees collapsed, she grasped the doorframe as her body slid down to the floor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without bothering to get back up, she phoned the police.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

\u201cI want to report a burglary.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After giving all her details, Clare was informed that she should not go into the flat just yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere have been a number of burglaries in your area today and there is already a forensics team working at those crime scenes.  I\u2019ll contact them and give them your details.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHave you someone you can stay with living close by?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYes, I can stay with my sister.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe will call you when you\u2019re allowed back in, and you\u2019ll need to make a list of anything that\u2019s missing.  This is the Crime Number for your Insurance Company.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Clare burst out crying as she told her sister what had happened.  It seemed to be a comforting fact that the burglary was most probably carried out by an organised gang, rather than by someone she knew. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Danny and Clare had split up a few month previous after they had been going through a bad patch. This time there had been no going back, no big bunches of flowers or cards saying he was sorry.  It really was over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She thought her new flat would be her safe haven, but now even that had been violated.  She couldn\u2019t bear the thought of sleeping there anymore.  As soon as she was able, Clare intended to move out.  Her life seemed to be in continual turmoil.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t until the following Monday that she had the go ahead to assess the damage in her flat.  Anne, her sister came with her in order to provide some moral support, and to help put the flat back together. They took time to list all the missing or damaged belongings for the Insurance Claim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It had been lucky that Clare had had her computer with her the day of the burglary, so there would not be an issue with any of her data being misused.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Clare was reshelving her reading books on the bookcase she noticed a small piece of paper fluttering to the floor. It was her missing lottery ticket.  She picked it up and checked the date of issue. It was still within the six month deadline to claim any prize, she grabbed her computer and crosschecked the numbers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBingo, she shouted.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her sister came rushing in from the kitchen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019ve won on the Lottery!\u201d  Clare told her excitedly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They hugged each other tightly and danced around the living room. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWho\u2019d have thought that being burgled would have a silver lining?\u201d Clare said, \u201cPerhaps my life is finally changing direction.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As Clare put her key in the lock, a sense of foreboding overcame her.\u00a0 She slowly turned it and pushed the door wide open.\u00a0 Her flat was in disarray. Everything she owned seemed to be scattered all over the floor. As her knees collapsed, she grasped the doorframe as her body slid down to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_10158782359051062_103813597863211":"","twitter_1225722811282530305_1225722811282530305":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[597,676],"tags":[7,14,11],"class_list":["post-1402","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-597","category-oct-2022-the-visitor","tag-her","tag-she","tag-was"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbrNJE-mC","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1402","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1402"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1402\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1404,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1402\/revisions\/1404"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1402"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1402"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1402"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}