More sequence.

The Black Clock Arms

II.

Karen takes a dirty rag-mop to the front of the Black
Clock Arms before opening: the extra half an hour she
has to work now is enough to kill her, what with her back
and knees giving her jip, but she does it anyway.

There is a slop and trickle every half metre for the kicked
up rain and boot prints. She doesn't bother scouring the dimples
in the paintwork, and almost thinks how strange it is to have
pride about this sort of work; but she does it anyway.

The punters queue a full twenty minutes before opening
and they all have the pain of sleep in their hair and cardigans.
Karen takes her rag-mop to the front of the Black Clock Arms

around them and hardly thinks these things before she's back
staring into pint after pint of mop-bucket beer, listening for rain
and fights and readying herself for tomorrow's dirty walls.