'The 24-hour potato service' by Shelley Roche-Jacques

Suddenly it’s kicking out time and through the dark street shineth the ungodly vision of a pizza vending machine. A wave of the contactless and an animated pizza does a little dance and yells that our delicious food will be dispensed in just 3 MINUTES.

Nan looks unimpressed.  She remembers in the 60’s there being a 24-hour baked potato machine – a choice of toppings on a nutritious hot spud. Oh Lord, she says, we had it all back then – we had it and we let it slip through our fingers.

The cartoon pizza wields a pizza cutter, is manically excited about eating itself.

The pizza slides out. Uncooked.

Back at Nan’s, we go to heat it up and Nan doesn’t know which dial works the oven and which the grill. Grandad was the cook. He would make her anything she wished for, anytime, she says. Since he’s gone, she’s been living on toast.

We sit round in our jackets with greasy fingers, chewing the rubbery cheese and saying you can call on us Nan anytime, 24-7, night or day, we won’t let you down.

Meals on Wheels, Nan says, isn’t that what old people have?  We look it up on our phones. A woman can’t live by toast alone.

We had it, Nan says, as we help her up the musty stairs to the empty double bed, we had it all, and we let it slip through our fingers.