When You Disappeared

by John Marrs

It was better to remain on my island than drown in somebody else’s sea.

You can either learn from your parents’ mistakes, or repeat them and use them as an excuse for your own behaviour.

And the three pairs of arms that had held me up for so long without me noticing gave me more strength and support than a bottle of wine ever could – or would – again.

And what better country in which to begin again than one at whose gateway stood a landmark with broken chains at her feet and a torch to light my way forward?

He’d been the architect of his own misery.

She had everything she’d ever wanted in the people she surrounded herself with.