Cutting Wakefield — Drain Root

He finished his coffee, grabbed his drain rods and the electric eel—a vicious-looking coiled spring with tungsten-carbide cutting blades—and headed out.

He lifted the manhole cover in the back yard. The smell hit him first—that sour, primordial stench of stagnant water and decay. He shone his torch down. The channel was choked with a writhing mass of pale, fibrous roots, like the veins of some buried monster. They’d broken through a joint in the pipe and were now weaving a thick mat, trapping wet wipes, congealed fat, and the dark silt of years. drain root cutting wakefield

“All done,” he said. “Flush the loo a couple times. Should be fine for another year, maybe two.” He finished his coffee, grabbed his drain rods

The address was a small terraced house, the kind with a yard no bigger than a postage stamp. The woman who answered, Mrs. Hartley, was in her seventies, with worried eyes and a floral apron. He shone his torch down

Frank nodded. He’d heard that story a hundred times. The unsung heroes of Wakefield, the Harolds with their makeshift rods and their stubborn pride, keeping the roots at bay. Now it was his job.

“Frank, got a blocked drain over on Denby Dale Road. Customer says the toilet’s backing up. Sounds like roots.”