#FridayFlash – Broken Windows
I’m feeling too despondent about the results of the General Election in the UK to write a new flash, so I thought I’d repost this old one from 2013 – dystopian future seemed all too apt. Enjoy.
When we used to watch the apocalypse on TV, we always saw people finding shelter. Old schools, houses, hospitals – anywhere you could lay your hat. Domesticity was restored in unlikely places – heck, plenty of post-apocalyptic shows had people living in houses beset by zombies, while their lawns always looked freshly mown. We all figured “if it ever happens, we’ll be fine. Don’t worry.”
Then the apocalypse happened, like some of us always suspected it would. It wasn’t fine – far from it. Sure, we found places to hide out, to get out of the punishing sun and away from the hundred-mile-an-hour gales that threw sand in your face. But we didn’t think about the windows. When we went looking for new homes, we couldn’t find buildings with glass intact. The walls kept out the sun, but the wind? You need windows to shelter from that.
So we did what we could. We boarded some windows up, or made makeshift shutters. Occasionally we’d duct tape the larger pieces of glass together, but some windows ended up more tape than glass. Mostly we used tarpaulins we hauled out of the vans that didn’t run any more, or plastic sheeting we found in skips or abattoirs. Bin bags were especially useful, and they became a weird kind of currency as we hunkered down in our reclaimed homes, squatting in town halls and shopping centres, trying to reboot society with whatever we had to hand.
It’s funny, we used to watch the world through television screens. Now we watch it through plastic sheeting.
Original image by beermug. Edits by me.
