The appointment ran fourteen minutes over schedule. Sandra noted this on her way out, because noting things was easier than feeling them.
Outside, the Compliance Centre smelled of rain and exhaust. March in Manchester. She pulled her coat tighter and walked, because the form she’d signed said walking is encouraged as a mood-regulating activity and she was, above all else, a person who followed instructions now.
Continue reading “After”
The old man’s hands didn’t tremble anymore. That was the first thing people noticed, though they rarely lived long enough to mention it to anyone.
“Hold still, dear,” he murmured, tilting her chin upward with one weathered finger. The brush, so small, so impossibly fine, traced the curve of her lower lip. Vermillion. Always vermillion.
Continue reading “The Finishing Touch”
The child places the coins on the counter. Copper, not credit. The shopkeeper doesn’t look up from her screen.
‘Just this,’ the child says.
The apple sits between them, bruised along one side. Through the window, the grey towers catch the afternoon light, their upper floors bright with panels that drink the sun. Down here, the queue stretches into the street. Nobody speaks. The shopkeeper’s fingers move across her screen, logging, calculating.
Continue reading “The Cost of an Apple”
Margaret has been watching the fish tank for forty minutes. Three goldfish circle endlessly. The water needs changing.
“…said it was benign but I don’t trust…”
The woman in the purple cardigan shifts her handbag from one knee to the other. She’s been doing this every few minutes. The leather handle has left a red mark on her wrist.
A child drops a wooden block. It rolls under the radiator. His mother doesn’t notice. She’s staring at her phone, thumb scrolling, scrolling.
Continue reading “The Queue At 10:47”
Sarah found Marcus in the Gardens Between, where the newly dead learn to let go.
“I’ve been waiting,” he said, extending skeletal fingers she recognised instantly, the same hands that had held hers through forty-seven years of marriage.
Continue reading “Until Death Do Us Start”
