Fran Macilvey's Blog, page 27

Short Story – Mum – Part Four

Short Story – Mum – Part Four

 

“Where is the key, though? I must’ve spent the last fifty minutes looking for it!”

That morning, Pam had been at the hospital with her small daughter, Susie, a fragile infant susceptible to every illness, who was currently suffering from chicken pox. With Susie off from playgroup and rather listlessly amusing herself at her mother’s heels, Pam was at Naomi’s house, trying to find a key into the bureau which stood in its usual place under the window in the loun...

Short Story – Mum – Part Three

Short Story – Mum – Part Three

 

Companionably, the two women worked together, Audrey staying by the wardrobe and Pamela opening the top drawer of the bedside chest. That way, they could each be together, but not so close that they fought for space. At first they gathered and sorted gently, carefully considering each item and then gradually picking up speed, so that before long, six large bags had been filled with an assortment of personal items no-one would want: old stockings and tights, u...

Short Story – Mum – Part Two

Short Story – Mum – Part Two

 

Naomi, who had fizzed through her years with ferocious elegance, ended up eking out her last days in a small, two-roomed council house with no garden. Pretending to enjoy the cigarettes to which she was so badly addicted, she hardly ate; and as throat cancer took hold, grew and blossomed darkly inside her thin body, Audrey watched in despair. Her sisterly arms could only hold hands and wordlessly pray. Nor was there a cure to whip up from the chemist’s or the w...

Short Story – Mum – Part One

Short Story – Mum – part One

***

Mum

“Mum? Are you packing up already?”

“It might be a good idea to make a start.” Audrey, 62, swept a tired gaze over the bedroom where she stood, knee-deep in boxes, bags and piles of slightly mildewed linen.

“It’s what she would have preferred, don’t you think?”

“Yes, no, not really” agreed Pam wearily. In the kitchen across the hall, Audrey’s daughter was rooting about, lighting an ancient kettle which had always boiled on the gas hob. Naomi had insisted on...

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Six

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Six

She considered what to do.

“There are few things that cannot be tackled after a bath.” Her mother’s words startled Edith.

“Mum? Are you there?”

“Of course! Go and get yourself tidied up, girl.”

Pleased to be told, Edith retraced her steps, pausing as she reached the half way mark up the stair, gladly removing her clothes which caught round her neck and made her sweat uncomfortably. Her hair could do with a wash, too. She left the bathroom door ajar as...

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Five

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Five

Edith straightened and pulled her hair off her forehead, aware that time was passing so fast. She had come to the garden just minutes ago, and now, look, it was going to be dark soon. Glancing up at the lowering skies, she grimaced, collected her tools and basket and carefully went indoors. Her knees and fingers were stiffening and her feet ached. Good.

She slammed the back door and locked it, twice, checking to see that the window was bolted shut and...

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Four

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Four

“I suppose I should write and decline their kind offer…” she muttered crossly.

She sighed, dropped the communiqué onto the carpet and went to the back door to look out into her beloved small garden. A few blackcurrant bushes, an elderberry and a hazel clung on around the boundary fence, while dandelions populated the border. Edith also grew nasturtiums and poppies, which liked the space and seemed to take neglect in their stride. When the shrinking b...

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Three

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Three

Edith didn’t really care for safety. She was well aware that she had few friends remaining – the sensible ones had all died years ago and she had no dependents, not at her age. On the contrary, everyone else seemed so quietly determined to point out her growing dependency.  She ate only a little food and knew her carbon footprint was very faint. A dozen commendations sat in the drawer of the kitchen table. No, what Edith cherished most, what lay in h...

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Two

Short Story – Changing Times – Part Two

When her husband and only son had still been alive, the small family had kept together here. Before Harold had passed on (they had said it was “cumulative toxicity” a diagnosis she thought surprisingly honest) he had worked all across Europe. He was lucky, since his work carried options to travel on business from Paris to Moscow, and Edith had sometimes gone with him. She cherished vivid, child-like memories of the grand, old government charter planes,...

Short Story – Changing Times – part one

Leaving Edinburgh under a grey sky and arriving in London for the Book Fair under the same blanket of low cloud, I was reminded of this short story I wrote some years ago.

 

Changing Times – Part One

 

Here was soft, muffled silence. Elsewhere, she knew a shining sun hung suspended in a vast, clear sky of shifting blues. She hoped faithfully to see the stars again, The Plough, Andromeda, Great Cygnus. Meanwhile, Earth waited, wrapped in grey, protective cloud beyond which playful starlight h...