Fiction – Seite 2

How Lovely

Content warning. May contain spoilers.

death, dementia, miscarriage

a short story by Liv Hambrett

The baby, and she was a baby, no more than eight or nine months old, was sitting on a towel, eating sand. She was a beautiful little thing, the first curls coming in, her tiny feet resting sole to sole. A few metres to her left, a girl who must have been her sister was squatting, digging judiciously, the hole big enough for her to hop in and out of as she dug. She was completely focussed on her work, salt-water matted hair dried in strings across her freckly forehead. Occasionally, a wave would sidle up the shore and threaten to fill her hole with water and she would quicken her digging, heaping wet sand onto the dam wall she had built.

Penny watched. She was sitting quite close to them, very close to them actually, almost sharing their big picnic blanket. She didn’t know why, she was simply there. On a chair, at least, which was going to make getting up easier. The thought was fleeting, a willow’s bend, a wisp, before Penny looked at the picnic blanket again and wondered where she was. She looked at her feet, tucked into the warm sand, and thought they looked very strange. She looked at the children again and wondered whose they were. One thought after the other, willows, wisps. The children were very pretty. Lovely curly hair. Penny looked at her feet again and wondered why they were covered in sand. Always wondering, Penny muttered to herself, and the words slipped and slid around her face with the briney air. She must have said the words out loud, because a baby was looking at her. A baby, Penny thought, how lovely. What was it doing there, sitting on a blanket all alone. But there was another child, Penny saw, a little girl digging a big hole in the sand, big enough for her to hop in and out of. How fun.

Penny had children. She knew that. She knew a lot of things and all of these things she knew, the words and names and ideas, they fluttered and flapped, tiny moths with their dusty wings, hiding in the dark, in the corners, the recesses, slippery dippery little things. They had been disrupted, the moths, or were they more like bees, buzzing and furious and sucked from their hives at some point, sucked into vacuums and voids, where nothing had structure, where gravity did not exist to allow for knowledge to be laid down like slabs and built upon, so it became immovable, known. Sometimes the moths, or were they bees, sat still in plain sight, quiet and calm, and Penny would reach out a hand, try to touch them. But they were never still for long. The wings fluttered, the walls slid, Penny watched. Children. Children, Penny, she said out loud, watching the baby’s sandy fist. She had children. She closed her eyes, fished in the gloom, found his face. Within reach, always. A big old tree, a shitty old motorcycle, she could still see that too, that stupid thing, clapped out and rickety. A knock at the door at 3 o’clock in the morning, John’s unbearable fury. (Where was John?) He had been lovely, tall, skinny, a silly little beard, just beginning to grow into himself, a sapling, a willow’s bend.

After him, clots and clumps and ideas, those moths always sat still. John – where was John, actually, he loved the beach – would find her in bed, crying, but he had told her it was all normal, his patients had miscarriages all the time, it was just the body getting itself in order. Penny hated those words: miscarriage, the body, order. The next one, he had said, the next one will take. The next one didn’t take, nor the one after that. John – where was he? He loved the beach. – stayed positive. After the fifth one – Penny counted them by scratching a little tally on the pantry wall – they stopped trying. The pantry wall was somewhere nearby, it must have been. Just around the corner perhaps, four strokes and a slash down the middle for five, not far from the shelf with flour and the baking powder which the shop down the road never had enough of, although it always had mangos, big trays of them and they smelt like heaven. John always said, it’s okay, we have… Penny frowned. We have… but there was a wall there, now, and Penny couldn’t get past it. She had someone, they had someone, a silhouette, a shape-shifter, could be anywhere, could be anyone. But a mango, Penny thought, a smooth mango with its soft flesh, how you could press their golden rumps right up to your nose and inhale. Penny smiled.

A cry, carried on the air, as a seagull wheeled down to land on the shoreline. The girl glanced at it. The baby watched it. There was a clump of seaweed the sea was relentlessly trying to reclaim with each wave and the seagull poked its redcurrant beak in amongst the slimy, salty innards. Penny watched. Hello, she said, and the seagull’s beady eyes flashed in the sun. Don’t feed the gulls and it was her father’s voice, out of nowhere. She looked around the cavern of her skull, which contained everything she had ever known, this big, black nothingness with its wings and walls and wisps. She did know a great deal of her life lay beyond the walls. But she was used to them now. There were so many of them, moving and sliding, stopping Penny from getting anywhere. Some faces stayed within the walls, resolute. Her mother’s face, her father’s. Her son’s. John’s face. But all of the other faces, she saw them, but they never came into the room. They never stayed. They were too late. She looked at them, she tried to hold them, but they refused to stay with her. Like woodpeckers on concrete, they couldn’t imprint and they would get so frustrated, so tetchy. How dare you not remember me? They didn’t know that sometimes, not even Penny herself stayed.

Movement caught her eye and she glanced up. A dog and a surfer were walking towards them. The baby watched them, fistfuls of sand momentarily forgotten. The surfer looked at the baby, then at the little girl in her hole, then at Penny. He smiled at Penny and Penny smiled back. The dog moved towards the baby but the man called him back. They kept walking. The baby watched them go. Penny had a dog, he was a lovely thing. She looked around for him but he must have gone home. Red. His name was Red. She smiled warmly at the moth that had sat still. Where’s my dog? She asked the baby, but the baby was impassive. You’d like Red, she said, he won’t bite. He only bites snakes, Mum says one day he’ll lose a fight but he hasn’t yet. She said these words out loud, she knew that because she could hear them on the air, they sound different to when they’re just in her skull, shooting between the canals and cavities. And the baby was watching her, gimlet-eyed. After much consternation, the baby made a very loud sound and Penny smiled.

Penny looked out at the water, flashes of light, soft sighs. She liked water. She had always liked water, even when that kid around the headland had drowned and her mother forbade her from swimming for an entire summer. Mum. Mum, she said. I’m here. I’m right here. Come and find me. Her house must be near here, she suddenly thought. This was her beach, of course it was, there was the pine tree, there was the pier. In a rush, she knew where she was. She looked at her feet again, then her legs. She hoped she wasn’t late for dinner, her mother always worried. Where was her mother? Her mother had probably asked her to watch this baby. Penny sighed. She was always being asked to watch babies. One day, her mother always said, you’ll have some of your own. Penny wasn’t sure if she even wanted babies.

The baby had rocked herself forward onto all fours and was wobbling a little, to and fro, her nappy barely contained by the hot pink lycra of her swimming costume. An awful colour, Penny thought, so brash. Who had chosen that awful colour. So brash. The baby lurched forward suddenly, a little uncertain on the sand, but finding her rhythm as she moved. She crawled a few metres and stopped, sliding her feet under her bottom so she could sit back up and continue eating sand. Then she did again: lurched forward, crawled, slid her feet under her bottom and sat. The process gained her a metre or two every time. From her hole, the older girl suddenly looked up, eyeing off the baby.

‘Stay.’ She said, loudly, as if the baby were a dog. The baby smiled at this and tipped forward onto all fours again. A game. She took off again, but the older girl wasn’t watching anymore. She was crouched down, moving handfuls of sand, eyeing off both the waves that had become a little louder as a wind had picked up, and the seagull that had been joined by a friend.

Strawberry jam, Penny thought suddenly. Would the young girl like a sandwich, perhaps. Penny loved strawberry jam. Her mother’s, in particular. She was sure she had packed some sandwiches, she always packed sandwiches for the beach. She looked around to ask her mother, but couldn’t see her anywhere. Her mother didn’t really like the beach, she reminded herself, remember your birthday by the sea, your ninth birthday it was, when Dad nearly drowned and cousin Judy got stung by a bluebottle? Penny smiled. Ah yes, she said, out loud perhaps, I remember that. Her mother never went back to the beach after that day. It’s always taking people, Penny. Her mother’s voice.

Penny looked out at the water. The sun had passed its highest point and was now sitting low and fat in the sky, bouncing lazily off the water. But the wind was making the water short-tempered. Penny shielded her eyes. Where was she, anyway? Why was she on a beach? Penny frowned. Her mother must have let her come down alone, but where was John? He loved the beach. Did her Mum know John? Yes, they must have met, John must have come around for cake. Where were they, then? And then, the panic, quick and cold, wet. Where was she? Where was she? This can’t be all of her, surely, this wisp, this fragment on a chair, on a picnic blanket, on a beach, the wind whistling. She had come apart, somewhere, there had been a split, there must have been a split. She turned to a young girl who was digging a hole, not too far from where she sat, on a picnic blanket, on a chair, on a beach.

‘Where’s the rest of me?’

The girl paused in her digging and looked up. ‘Huh?’

‘Pardon, not huh,’ Penny murmured. The girl returned to her digging.

There was a shout. Penny turned to see a woman running across the sand. As she got closer, Penny could see her terror on her face.

‘Lily,’ she was screaming, ‘Lily, your sister!’

Lily. The name got sucked into the vacuum. Penny cast about for it, but it was gone.

Penny watched as the woman ran past the girl in the hole – why was she in a hole? – towards a baby who was, by now, sitting right where the waves whooshed up to shore, their frothy white hems breaking over her chubby knees. Why was a baby sitting so close to the water, Penny wondered. Oh dear. Her father could swim very well, he should have come over and helped. She looked around for her father, but couldn’t see him. Perhaps he didn’t know where she was. But she had told him, hadn’t she? Perhaps this woman could help her find him and then she could tell him where she was.

The woman looked at Penny and there was a hint of exasperation in her eyes, around her taut mouth. That was familiar, Penny suddenly thought, that look, that pull of skin. The baby was annoyed at being stopped and flapped her arms, squawking like a bird, but the woman clasped the baby to her hip, her side, hoisted her away from the whispering sea. After a moment, the woman exhaled slowly, closed her eyes, then opened them and smiled. She looked Penny in the eye and Penny wondered if she knew her. Probably from school. Penny was a primary school teacher, she knew that. Husband John, dead son, primary school teacher, house by the beach. Mangos, strawberry jam, Mum hated the beach. Penny knew all of those things, sometimes all at once, sometimes not at all.

Eventually, the woman reached out and touched Penny’s arm, and said, ‘Okay Mum, come on, let’s get the kids home.’

Oh, thought Penny. Yes. Of course. Perhaps she would know, then. ‘Where’s John?’

The same blink, the same smile. ‘Dad’s dead, Mum, he died ten years ago. You’re at the beach with me, Bec. And my kids. They’re your grandkids.’

The list of facts, ticked off, one after the other. She had said them a thousand times before. Penny was sorry. She knew she couldn’t remember. John, the pantry, the clapped-out motorbike, strawberry jam, mangos, the cavern of her mind. She knew it all even when she didn’t, even when she came apart.

‘Oh,’ Penny said, and she followed her daughter, her feet in the warm sand. She watched her feet until they reached the road and then she looked up. A woman was standing at a car, looking at her. Penny knew the look, expectant, hopeful, terribly, terribly sad. So she knew this woman, then. She smiled politely as she got closer to the woman, motioned at the two children, the baby on her hip, the young girl with the sun-streaked hair.

‘Are they yours? They’re lovely. Aren’t you lucky.’

The woman closed her eyes, briefly, then opened them and smiled. When she spoke, her voice was bright and patient. ‘Mum, it’s me, Bec. I’m your daughter. These are your grandchildren. Let’s get in the car and get you back home, okay?’

As they drove away, Penny saw her house out the window. She tapped the window. ‘But that’s my house. Can you take me home? My parents will be waiting for me.’

Somewhere, a baby began to cry. A baby, Penny thought, how lovely.

BBQ

Content warning. May contain spoilers.

Cannibalism

a short story by Lea Köster

Everything is glowing bright in the setting afternoon sun, the light covering the world in a million shades of red. Smoke is hanging thick in the air, making the heat of the disappearing day even more unbearable for those that bother to notice.

Bowls of salad, fruit, bread and other delicious looking and smelling things are passed along the tables, losing something with every hand that touches them. The sound of meat sizzling on the grill mixes with laughter and light conversation. Everyone is enjoying themselves. On the second floor of the house, behind a window, paper birds seem to fly effortlessly through the air.

‘Hey Carol, where’s Mallory?’ In the wind, her ocean blue dress, moves like waves, as she approaches her childhood friend who is dressed in black.

‘Hi dear, you look lovely.’ Carol’s voice is smooth and calm, as always. Her eyes take in every little detail, even those that shouldn’t be seen, like the necklace that is hanging around her friend’s neck which Carol had seen being bought by one of her friend’s students. ‘How is the party? I feel like I’m just running around. I haven’t even said hello to everyone yet.’ A smile covers Carol’s lips, amusement and exhaustion her eyes. She holds out a plate of burgers, stuffed with meat from the grill, that she was about to take over to a table in the shade of the house. The woman in blue gratefully takes one and praises the cook, Carol’s husband, for his excellent work at the barbecue.

‘Everyone is wondering what kind of meat this is, it’s so good.’ But before she can get an answer, the woman in the black dress is called by her husband and she turns, swiftly, leaving her friend standing there.

The moment Carol places the plate of burgers on a nearby table, two of the neighbourhood boys take one, thanking her. As she walks up to her husband, she watches the people – her neighbours and friends – who seem to not have a care in the world.

‘Could you get more meat? I ran out.’ Her husband whispers in her ear. His breath is cold in the heat of the day. With knife and plate in hand she goes through the kitchen, into the living room, down the hallway and opens the door to the basement. The air goes cold and damp, the laughter inaudible, as she descends the cold concrete steps, with the sharp stone walls, into the cellar. The door behind her, now closed, doesn’t let in any light. Her nose involuntarily twitches in disgust as the light bulb on the ceiling stops flickering.

Kneeling down on the floor she takes the knife and cuts parts of the meat into smaller pieces. With caution she places a few slices onto the plate. The meat is still fresh. The bones white. She is about to leave the room, but before she does, she takes a last look, but there is nothing the person in black hasn’t seen before. The floor is covered in dried blood. The flesh is cold. Chopped off parts lay around. Letters written with the last breath and blood read I’m sorry… followed by something illegible on the white tiled floor. Eyes, still filled with fear, seem to look at her, asking for help they will never receive.

Her daughter was a disappointment, a disgrace, like her sister before her. Weak.

Maybe the next one will be better, Carol thinks and places a hand on her not-yet-showing belly, before ascending the stairs without another look back.

Who?

Content warning. May contain spoilers.

cheating, swear words

a short story by Paula Solterbeck

The gallery on my phone doesn’t get any more interesting as I scroll through it for the third time. The café doesn’t have wifi and this way I look somewhat busy, while sitting alone at the table, waiting. Putting my lips to the brim of my cup, I realize it’s still too hot for me to drink and I wonder if the other people are looking as I put it back down. I think about deleting the pictures I took with my friends on my last night out, which was months ago, and then my mother’s number lights up the top half of the screen. I tap the green icon and start to whisper into my phone, feeling the anxiety and anger start crawling up inside of me.

‘Where are you? It’s been fifteen minutes,’ I manage to whisper into the speaker in a calm voice.

‘I’m so sorry, sweetie. Something came up at work, I can’t make it today. Could we maybe do this another time?’

I don’t respond, partly because I don’t know what to say, partly because I don’t want to make a scene in front of these strangers.

‘I would love to see you, we miss you, honey, I am truly sorry. You know how it is, the ER doesn’t clock off. They still need me here. Tell me how I can make it up to you.’

I lift the phone off my ear and my finger presses the red circle, as if moving on its own. I should have known better than to agree to this. He told me not to meet her, that she was trying to get into my head and get me to go back to them. The blood starts boiling in my veins, but first and foremost I am angry at myself. What would he say?

I choose not to think about it and focus on something else, as I fear I might cry. A fly lands on my saucer and I try to shoo it away, when a woman around my age enters the backroom of the café. Aside from clocking that there are two — now three — other people in the room with me, I hadn’t really had a look at the place. For the first time, I really take it in; the walls are painted in several earthy tones of green and brown, the tables and chairs don’t fit together and the dark colour someone once put on the hardwood floor is chipping off in the places most people walk or the chairs are always being pulled back. My mother chose the place; it suits her.

In the meantime, the new woman has found who she was looking for and hugs the other woman, who was already seated at the table beside mine. They exchange the common small talk and I figure that they are friends. Is the man behind me also waiting for company? I was stood up and they know, they’re probably secretly making fun of me or, at the very least, pity me.

I should have listened to him, he always knows best and it’s so embarrassing to be here alone. They probably think that I don’t have any friends, which is true, technically.

The women talk to each other in lowered voices, show each other things on their phones and laugh in between. They look like copies of one another and the way they talk doesn’t make them unique either. I wonder who copies whom and if they talk shit and spread rumours about the other with different friends. As that thought crosses my mind, I pull my phone back out and start deleting the pictures. The people I called friends back then, whose pictures were taken that night, dropped me when I got engaged. They tried to turn me against him and claimed he was unfaithful.

The damn fly again.

The waitress comes up the steps to the backroom with a single coffee and passes me.

‘The Latte Macchiato with oat milk?’ she exclaims in a shrill tone, to which the man at the table behind me replies by thanking her.

Though I can’t see him, I still get second-hand embarrassed. Oat milk was something I drank too, when I was younger, due to my inability to digest the real thing, but now I’ve realized how embarrassing it truly is. My fiancée told me early on that he wouldn’t go out with me if I ordered it — as a joke obviously — but still, people could think I was vegan and we hate vegans.

The man must be embarrassed too: the stupid waitress let everyone know about the milk and we also know that he’s here alone, probably not by choice either. Who would be? Alone, that is. In public!

I have to get out of here. The guests, the waitress and this damn fly have cost me my last nerve, they take up all the air in this place and I can feel my chest tighten. I decide that I will not suffocate in this place, so I throw the rest of the bitter fluid down my throat and put enough money next to the cup. It would have paid for my mother’s drink as well. Good thing I didn’t tell him about the amount of money I keep for myself for these kinds of affairs. Affairs indeed, because I feel like I am betraying him. He doesn’t deserve this; it makes me sick to think about how disappointed he would be in me, if he knew that I was sneaking around. Maybe he would even be ashamed to be with a woman like that, which would be fair; shame is what I feel right now. Good thing he doesn’t know I meant to meet my mother. I am out for groceries, that is what I am doing.

As I stand up the waitress comes in and collects the tip. She thanks me with a smile that makes me want to punch her. I wonder what it is she is compensating for.

On my way out of the café I see the first leaves falling from the trees out front. On the bus I feel like crying. On the stairs to my apartment, I try to shut everything out and get excited about seeing him. I hope his day was okay, so I get to talk about mine.

When I unlock the door, I see a pair of shoes and a jacket on the ground. Both women’s, both not mine. I hear shushing from the bedroom and my stomach drops. Holding my purse with both hands, I am stuck in motion. He is going to twist this. I am overreacting, as always. He will have an explanation. I open the door and it turns out he doesn’t.

His eyes look up and meet my gaze, as do hers.

The Day at the Lake

an early chapter from the same novel project by Jule Heyen

‘Days in summer are apt to linger.’ I remember that line. Oscar Wilde, as I learned much later. There were quite a few days that fit that description. Me and my sister as children playing, unbothered by the changing times around us; not knowing or caring about any problems more pressing than what we’d have for dinner. Laughing with my parents, in one of the rare moments they weren’t fighting. Back then, before my father started working more and more, until we barely saw him anymore. And Lucy, again and again. Swimming in the lake, sneaking out at night to watch the stars, riding our bikes through the forest. Lying on the grass in the garden, just talking and talking for hours, without a care in the world. Most of my happy memories were moments with Lucy. It made looking back quite painful after she left. It seemed as if she’d taken a big part of my childhood and teenage years with her. There was now a gaping hole where she and her smiles and her secrets used to live.

One particular day always came back to me. Although the season had turned to autumn, the memories of warmer days were still close enough that we missed it every day. For me, it didn’t really matter that much. Summer or winter, sunny or rainy, warm and pleasant or cold and harsh. What I missed was how vibrant Lucy seemed in the sun, how she seemed to come alive when the wind was warm and the fields green. Lucy was never as happy as on endless summer days, the sun competing with her smile for who could shine brighter. Something always seemed to pull her outside, to run around as if we were still children, laughing under the endless blue sky. Once the days turned shorter, you could almost see her withering, like a flower without water. She always took longer than most to let summer go and prepare for autumn.

‘Let’s go outside.’

‘What?’

‘Let’s go outside. To the lake.’ I smiled up at Lucy sitting on my bed from where I was sitting on the floor. ‘It’s much too nice a day to sit inside and stitch.’

‘What are you talking about? It’s raining cats and dogs.’ She cast a miserable glance at the window, where it was, indeed, raining.

‘Exactly. Just lovely, isn’t it?’

‘Sometimes you confuse me.’

‘We can be confused outside,’ I responded. She smiled at me at that, and although we didn’t go outside, I felt like I had reached my goal. It was a mad idea, I suppose. Even though autumn had barely begun, the air was already colder and the wind freezing. But my mother had gone to one of her friend’s houses for tea, and my father never came home from work before it was dark. Even the maid had left to go to the market. Lucy and I were all alone, and that always brought out a kind of restlessness in me. A recklessness, almost, though it was hard to tell the difference in the moment. And yet, we silently continued with our embroidery until Lucy interrupted the silence.

‘Why do you always insist we go out in the rain?’

‘Always?’

‘Yes, every time. Summer is over and it’s all dark and grey and cold and ugly…’ She stopped herself. ‘And you want to go out in the rain.’ She sounded almost accusing.

‘I guess I…’ I didn’t really have a response to that. ‘I guess I just don’t want summer to end.’

‘You don’t even like summer all that much. Not more than any other season at least.’ But you do, I wanted to respond.

‘No particular reason,’ I quickly said instead and broke eye contact. I desperately tried to focus on my stitches. Lucy, being Lucy, didn’t relent and kept looking at me. After a while she laid down on her belly and took my embroidery hoop, ripping the needle right out of my hand.

‘Hey!’

‘You can have it back after answering my question.’

‘Lucy!’ I climbed onto the bed and tried to get my materials back. Lucy just turned onto her stomach, hiding them under her body.

‘You’ll stab yourself with the needle if you aren’t careful!’

‘Then you better tell me, before I do and bleed out.’ She started weeping dramatically. ‘It’d be your fault, yours alone.’

I couldn’t stay serious with the sound of her over-exaggerated crying in my ears and fell on top of her, laughing. In just that moment, she turned onto her back to look at me. We both froze at the same time, suddenly realising how close we were. Just looking at each other, as if time had stopped for a moment.

‘Sophie…’ I could feel her breath on my face as she said my name, our noses almost touching. I didn’t dare move, afraid of what exactly I would do if I did. Many seconds passed like that, Lucy, too, seemingly trapped in the same trance that had overcome me.

‘Do you…’ Lucy finally broke the silence. She didn’t finish her sentence. If I moved, just a little, I could… As if waking up from a dream I abruptly moved back and off the bed, retreating to a safe distance on the carpet. Lucy sat up, too, my embroidery still in her hand. For once, she seemed to be out of words to say.

‘If you don’t give it back, we’ll just have to go to the lake.’ I tried to change the subject, make her laugh, anything. It sounded forced even to my own ears. Nevertheless, she handed me my hoop, looking to catch my eye. I desperately tried to avoid hers, instead focusing on detangling the tablecloth that got wrapped around itself in our scuffle.

‘Maybe if it stops raining,’ she responded finally, ‘if it’s meant to happen, it will.’ She looked out the window, where the raindrops were still racing down the glass. The atmosphere felt charged. Something had changed, and we could both tell, even though I, at least, couldn’t quite put into words what exactly it was.

We kept up with our embroidery after that – or at least I did; Lucy kept looking out of the window, unusually quiet – and I soon finished my second flower. Lucy was still on her first, so I started up another one. I had almost convinced myself that it was just because that would mean an earlier lunch for both of us and not because I’d do anything to help Lucy.

‘It’s okay, you know. Whatever you want to tell me.’ Lucy was still staring out of the window. She bit her lip as if deeply lost in thought. My breath suddenly came irregularly, my thoughts swirling in my head so quickly I felt dizzy. But before I could think of something to say, she continued.

‘I mean, I also don’t tell you everything, even if I want to. I think we might…’ She shook her head, breaking out of the strange mood that had overcome her and quickly turned towards me with a laugh.

‘Oh, never mind. It’s also okay if you don’t. Tell me, that is.’

I wanted to say something, anything, but at the same time, I was glad she seemed to move on. Putting this – putting everything – into words felt almost dangerous. Like standing on a cliff, knowing that the ground under my feet would fall away at any second. Expecting the drop, not knowing if something would catch me or whether I would keep falling forever. I let out a deep breath. After a while, Lucy went back to her embroidery, but she barely got two stitches in before her thread ripped. She groaned and threw her hoop away.

‘I don’t know how you stand this.’

Relieved everything seemed to be back to normal, I looked up at her.

‘It’s calming.’

‘Infuriating, that’s what it is. I wish your mother would finally arrive in the twentieth century…’ She glanced at the window again, before quickly turning towards me with a smile.

‘Well, would you look at that? Maybe it’ll be a lovely day after all.’ In a stroke of luck – or fate, Lucy always believed in fate – it had stopped raining. We packed the remaining biscuits and our stitching – no matter how unlikely it was that we’d actually finish it today – into a picnic basket, packed a blanket, and snuck out of the backdoor. We didn’t really need to sneak – no one was home after all – but at this point, it was second nature for us to watch our every step. The sky was still grey and we spent the way to the lake in almost complete silence. Lucy seemed once again lost in her thoughts.

‘What’s up with the sombre mood?’ I asked her, glancing at her from the corner of my eye.

Lucy just rolled her eyes at me. ‘Just thinking.’

‘About what?’

She turned to me, the usual glint returning to her eyes. ‘How I could convince you to go for a swim with me.’

‘Oh dear, you’ve completely lost it now.’ She laughed and I wanted to drown in the sound. ‘Completely gone. Fallen to her madness, may she rest in peace.’ As she glared at me again, I couldn’t keep serious anymore and started giggling.

‘Hey!’ She bumped her shoulder into mine in mock offence. ‘You were the one who wanted to go out in the rain! Are you suddenly afraid of water?’

She bumped into me again and again, still laughing, until I fell off the path and had to cling to her to avoid slipping down into the muddy trench. Like that – pushing each other, clinging together, giggling – we finally arrived at the lake. We spread out our blanket on the still wet grass, taking off our shoes to avoid getting mud all over it. Despite how grey the sky had been all day, a few rays of sun had broken through the clouds. I sat and took out the tablecloth to continue embroidering it, but before I could even start, Lucy once again stole my needle.

‘Hey!’

She just laughed.

‘Come on, my mother will be angry if we don’t get it done.’

‘That’s not true. Your mother has never been angry at anyone except your father.’

I tilted my head to the side, admitting she had a point. She grinned.

‘She’ll be disappointed,’ I said, ‘which is worse.’

‘Lighten up a little, would you? She’s not going to kill us for enjoying a nice afternoon outside. Going for a swim…’ She looked at me out of the corner of her eye, a wicked smile on her lips.

‘Have you met her? She absolutely will. It’s not proper.’ I rolled my eyes at the last word.

We did finish the flowers we started after that, albeit, at least on my side, quite a bit less orderly than I would have usually done it. We had our picnic after that, just talking and laughing, the weird mood of the morning long forgotten. I always lost track of time with Lucy, but this afternoon especially I couldn’t tell whether it had been minutes or hours. I was so lost in the conversation that my heart almost jumped out of my chest when the first drop of rain hit me. Then Lucy stripped off her dress and my heart stopped beating entirely instead.

‘What are you doing?’ My voice sounded unnatural even to my own ears, higher than usual, breathless.

‘What does it look like? I’m going for a swim, obviously. Join me if you want.’

Then, with that same wicked smile from earlier on her lips and only wearing her underwear, she turned around and ran off towards the pier. And without a second thought, I, too, stripped and ran after her. When I caught up to her, she was already standing on the edge of the pier, looking out at the gently rippling water of the lake. She turned around with a dazzling smile so bright it took my breath away for a moment. I stood there, shivering when I felt it again. Something I couldn’t – or didn’t dare – put into words. The same charged feeling from this morning returned and I found myself back on that same cliff, looking out into the endless drop below me.

‘What’s stopping you? We’re already wet, might as well go for a swim.’

There was no choice there, of course, and she knew it. If she jumped, I would follow.

As she took my hand and pulled me over the edge, I thought to myself that I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. Jumping into the cold water, I felt at peace for the first time in months. We stayed in the water for what felt like hours, even though it could only have been minutes until the sound of thunder scared us out. We just about managed to collect our clothes before they were completely muddy and ran for shelter among the nearby trees.

‘See, we shouldn’t have bothered to do it after all’, Lucy said, holding up the soaked table cloth, ‘it’s ruined anyway.’ We looked at each other for a few long seconds and burst out laughing. When we finally fell quiet, my stomach hurt from all the laughter, but my heart was beating more than it had in a long time. I grinned at her. We spread out the blanket again, sitting on half of it and pulling the other half over our heads to protect us from the rain. Lucy had opened her braid and her long curls, now hanging over her shoulders, dripped water onto her skin. I stared, transfixed by the way the raindrops drew patterns on her dark skin. She pulled the blanket further over us. The brown plaid pattern turned the dark grey light into something softer, warmer.

‘We will probably have a cold tomorrow.’

‘I think that’s worth it.’ She grinned at me. ‘And it was your idea, anyway.’

Her eyes were a deep brown, almost black at first glance. I knew I was still staring, but I couldn’t find the strength to look away. Days in summer are apt to linger… I breathed in, and out. She did, too. I felt it on my skin. There, under the protection of the blanket, hidden from the world, I somehow found the courage to move closer. Her breath hitched.

‘What did you mean this morning? What might we both…?’ I asked her.

‘I think you know.’

‘Do I?’

She kept looking at me. I moved even closer.

I said her name, my voice barely more than a whisper, my eyes closing. Lucy moved and finally closed the gap between our lips. When she kissed me, I forgot how to breathe. The last coherent thought I had was that her lips tasted like the lemon filling of the biscuits we had eaten earlier. After one impossibly long, impossibly short second she pulled back. When I came back to myself, she was already looking at me with a strange look in her eyes. I glanced at her lips. She took my cheek in her hand and all I had been holding back came out at once, a tidal wave of suppressed feelings and late-night thoughts, and we were kissing again. I was no longer standing on that cliff. Instead, I was flying.

Maybe, I thought later, it wasn’t that I didn’t know how to put my feelings into words. Maybe I knew exactly what it was, and was afraid that there was no way back, that this whole façade I had so carefully kept up would break apart and leave me drowning in the chaos of the aftermath. But all I thought at that moment was that even if I’d never remember how to breathe, I didn’t need to. I only needed her.

Prologue: Lucy’s Eulogy

Content warning. May contain spoilers.

death, funeral

an extract from a novel project by Jule Heyen

If this were a movie, I think, it would be raining.

In the movies Lucy and I had watched together the weather always matched the proceedings of the moment: sunshine for seemingly never-ending happy days, storms coincidentally breaking just as the big fight is resolved, and rain for every funeral. Not here, however, and thus I make my way along the lonely path over the graveyard with the bright sun shining and no rain to wash away my tears.

I twist my shoulders self-consciously, aware of how constrained they are in my dress, resisting the urge to swash away my veil. There are other groups of mourners here, too close for me to forget about them, but not so close that I could take comfort in being part of their group. If I stumble now, I think, would they run over and catch me, or would they simply watch me fall from afar?

‘Long black dress, veil… Don’t you think that’s all a bit… over the top?’ I had asked Lucy once. ‘What’s next, mascara tears?’

‘Come on, you only get to go to my funeral once, at least try to look appropriately dramatic!’ She paused for a moment. ‘Mascara tears aren’t a bad idea actually.’

Flower petals fall as I continue my progression. I make my way from the gate to the very back of the graveyard to the lonely coffin waiting for me, waiting to be buried, waiting. I grip the single peony in my hand tighter, like it’s the lifeline that could pull me out of this moment.

‘It’s going to stand right here and you will walk down the path slowly with music playing… Do you know how to play the violin?’

‘Uhm, no.’

‘Are you willing to learn?’

‘What? Absolutely not!’

‘We’ll have to hire someone or get a recording. I know just the right guy…’

We had picked the flowers together too. Before. Not Lucy’s favourite – she’d always preferred sunflowers, marigolds, lilies… everything yellow and bright and happy. Too happy for her funeral, Lucy had said. She wanted something more dramatic, a flower that would lose its petals so that they’d swirl around the mourners like in a movie. We’d picked the rosy white colour to match the dress Lucy was going to wear.

I don’t know if she is wearing that dress now, with the coffin closed already. I hold my breath, quietly thanking the gods Lucy didn’t believe in that it was.

‘I want to invite the whole city and have a gigantic funeral progression! I can see it before me, just filling up the entire graveyard!’

‘Do you even know that many people here?’

‘Well, not really, but we’ll just post it in the newspaper saying there’ll be free food, someone is bound to show up. They don’t need to actually know me.’ She paused with a giggle. ‘Actually, I think I prefer it if they don’t. Let them make their theories. They couldn’t guess the truth even if they tried.’

‘You’re incorrigible.’

‘Oh, you love me, really.’

No one came, of course. I’d never posted the ad. I couldn’t stand the idea of anyone else here with me today, particularly strangers. Even the other mourners here, far away as they may be, seem to trap me. I can almost feel their breath on the back of my neck and their staring eyes on me, judging me silently.

For a few long moments, the only sound I can hear is that of the wind and the birds. I want to scream at them to keep quiet, to understand the gravitas of the moment, to behave like in the movies. But they have no concept of my pain, no incentive to pause their singing on such a pretty day, and I am left to quietly envy them instead.

Okay then, I think, just as Lucy told me. I raise my head and throw back the veil. We’d practised that when we finished sewing it. It dramatically catches in the wind, almost being pulled off my head completely. I feel the mascara tears I had so carefully painted on like lines of ice on my face. With one last heavy breath, I start with Lucy’s eulogy, written for no one’s ears but my own:

‘Lately, many people have expressed their sympathies about my loss and I never quite know what to say to them. Everyone is sorry, everyone feels my pain, everyone is there for me, should I need them. But no one ever finds the right words.’

‘You’ll need to memorise the speech, obviously. You can’t just stand there with a piece of paper in your hand.’

‘You just like giving me extra work.’

‘It’s my funeral, the least you can do is put in some effort!’

I smiled at the offended look Lucy gave me. ‘Okay then. Let’s write you the prettiest eulogy ever. You’ll have to help me, though, I’ve never actually been to a funeral before.’

‘Well, neither have I, but it can’t be that hard. Just say something like “I brightened up every room” and call me your sunshine or something.’

‘Of course, you would say that I say that about you!’

‘Just because I know it’s true, darling,’ Lucy said with a wink. At that, I just rolled my eyes.

‘That’s exactly my point.’

‘Lucy and I met only three years ago, through good friends of ours. I would love to tell you long stories about a will they / won’t they romance, but truth be told, it was pretty much love at first sight, at least on my part. When I, against all odds – and in some friendly competition – managed to win her favour and her love, it made me the happiest person on earth.’

‘What are you talking about? Not one word of that is true.’

‘Well, no one needs to know that, do they?’

‘Anytime someone you love passes away, there is a strong temptation to remember them perhaps a little too well. Misdeeds are forgotten, offences forgiven. Only the most shining characteristics make it into the version of them that we keep with us when they’re gone. But despite knowing how memory embellishes character, I just can’t seem to…’

‘That’s when the practised bit stops and you start saying what your heart tells you to.’ Lucy placed her hands over her heart.

‘But we are still writing that down, right?’

‘Of course we are, but that’s the story you have to convey. It’s like… directions on how to act. It’ll really move people if they think you prepared a speech but then went off script, so overcome with emotions you just couldn’t keep up the façade…’ At that, Lucy had flopped down onto my bed, dramatically closing her eyes and placing the back of her hand on her forehead.

‘You really are serious about this, aren’t you?’

‘Of course I am!’ She sat up quickly to look at me. ‘Frankly, you should be taking this a lot more seriously. I’ll only get one funeral. It needs to be perfect.’ Her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes.

My voice breaks – I had practised that sound for weeks to perfect it – and I pause to reach my hand towards my eyes; facing the coffin, facing Lucy. If anyone were here with me, if anyone were watching… they would only be able to see my hands, hear my voice, and assume I’m crying, gathering my thoughts, finding the will to keep going. They wouldn’t assume I practised. Who would?

‘Do you think we should put in a moment where I say “is” and then stop and switch to “was”’?

‘Aww, I knew you care.’

‘Oh, stop it, I’m just trying to brainstorm!’

‘She brightened up every room she walked into. Where there was chaos and uncertainty, she brought order. She made every house a home and always made everyone feel welcome, wherever and whoever they were. She could make the whole room laugh with just a look or gesture and told the most amazing stories. She is… was what my heart always needed, my sunshine on a gloomy day.’

More mascara flows down my cheeks. We’d bought the least waterproof one we could find. I couldn’t quite tell if those were the tears we’d practised or the ones belonging to me, sneaking out when they should stay hidden. I pause to look around the graveyard, beyond her grave, beyond her.

‘I guess it just hasn’t really sunk in that she isn’t here… isn’t with us anymore.’ It has, I think. After all, I have been preparing for it for months now.

‘Isn’t all of this very… impersonal? I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s pretty, for sure, but it isn’t really about you, is it?’

‘It doesn’t need to be. That’s easier, don’t you think? For you? To just say all these phrases without any meaning? Then I’ll have my pretty funeral and you can keep your composure. I’ll know what you actually mean, anyway.’

‘It doesn’t have to be easy on me, it’s your funeral!’ At that, I pause for a second, caught up on my own words, before continuing more slowly. ‘I don’t think it could be, really, no matter how well we plan.’

There’s the sound of birds, still singing, of children screaming joyfully, of the wind gently rustling the leaves. There’s that wind moving my veil and hair and the sun shining down on me. There are people on the other side of the street, beyond the graveyard’s fence, just going about their lives as if nothing happened at all, as if it is a day like any other because to them it is. There are other people in the graveyard, not actually watching me at all, too consumed by their own grief to pay attention to me. For a brief second, I can almost feel Lucy, still by my side. But the moment passes and I am all alone again.

‘I am grateful for every moment I was able to spend in her company —and although it was many less than I had selfishly hoped for, I still treasure every memory. This is how I want to remember her. Lucy… may you rest peacefully. You’ll always have a place in my heart.’

I place the peony on the coffin and step back.

‘And then everyone else will place their flowers, it’ll be a gigantic pile on top of my coffin!’

‘Why not just bury you in flowers, then?’

‘Do you think we can do that?!’

No one else is there to step forward to place their peonies on top of the coffin, of course. No one else is there. We’ve taken so much effort in planning exactly how this would go, that I’m almost surprised to see things diverting from our plan. We’d even gone to the market to ask the woman selling flowers which ones lose their petals easily so that they’d all get blown away by the wind. Lucy did always love a bit of drama. Now, there is only one flower, and it isn’t losing its petals, no matter the wind. We timed everything, right down to the music – pre-recorded – so I just stand there, waiting, until the music tells me I can leave.

I can’t help but remember the day Lucy showed up at my door, crying, and just fell into my arms. We sat there on the doorstep for what felt like hours, no one saying a single word. What was there to say? She would die, nothing to be done, no stopping it.

‘If there’s no stopping it, there’s no point in being sad.’

‘I don’t think that’s how feelings work, Lucy.’

‘We just have to keep busy, then it’ll be over in no time.’

‘Over for you. And what about me? What am I supposed to do without you? I need you!’ I had screamed the last words, immediately feeling regret. But suddenly, as if some gate had broken, there was no stopping the tears I’d been holding back for days.

We had made dinner in silence that night and never spoke of it until the day Lucy showed up at my door again, this time with a bright yellow folder titled “My Funeral”.

I listen, quietly, to the song Lucy picked. It’s one I’ve always hated.

‘It’s easy, we’ll just plan it all now. I know I’m dying, so there’s really no point in waiting and leaving all the work to you alone. I’ve already chosen dresses for us. We can plan your speech, the invitations, the flowers… All you’ll need to do is show up.’

‘Why… what? What are you talking about?’

‘My funeral, silly. We’ll have it all ready by the time I die. I got a heads up on dying, so I might as well have some say in how my funeral goes!’

The wind is picking up even more now, finally ripping the petals from the flower as we had planned. Lucy would’ve liked that. She wouldn’t be watching though. She’d been adamant about that after I had mentioned that she could at least watch from heaven.

Slowly, the music starts to fade out. I missed my cue to leave, and it’s too late to leave now. There’s the sound of birds, still singing, of children, still screaming, of the wind still blowing through the trees, all seemingly from far away. The world is moving on, I think. And yet, here I stand, a single lonely figure, surrounded by flower petals falling.

Author’s note

This is the prologue of a romance novel I am currently writing. It’s the story of Lucy and Sophie, childhood friends who fall in love in 1920s Germany. Lucy dies, of course – you just read about her funeral. But a lot happens before and after. The two girls find and lose each other over and over again while trying to realise who they are and how they fit into the world they live in. Much later, in contemporary times, a group of university students finds Sophie’s diary. With only the diary to guide them, they begin to dive deeper into the story of Sophie and Lucy.

Prologue I

an extract from a novel project by Myra Sophia Dedekind

The day evil died, screams filled the air. Cries of defeat and destruction. Shouts of happiness and victory. The menace hovering over earth had been defeated. No more lives would be sucked away. No more creatures had to quiver in fear of being suddenly torn from their world. Their children could dream and awaken once again.

Yes, screams filled the air and with them spread power. The nightmare’s soul had been released from its body. It disappeared to the place where all conscious must one day end their voyage. As evil as the soul had been in the eyes of the living, after death it would be sucked away as any other, ceasing to exist, leaving nothing but the pure spirit, the energy of life. It would spread through the world becoming the fuel for the newly born that would always continue to appear. Earth was a planet full of spirit. Not all could sense it. But it blessed each and every living thing.

However, the spirit balance had been disrupted. The cause was now defeated. Their sacrifices had been great. But little did they know it was just beginning. As the nightmare stole spirit from where it belonged, the balance of life fell into disarray. With its death the stolen force was finally unshackled, exploding into the atmosphere, racing to fill the voids its theft had once created. Masses of spirit washed over the earth. But instead of giving life, it had now turned fatal. As cheers of celebration echoed through the world, the lives of countless new and unborn were sapped. Only the strongest could survive. Only a born spirit wielder had a chance to withstand this force.

And so the next generation was born. The smallest in history. The greatest in history. For power was the gift of all who survived.

Author’s note

A few years ago, the question came to my mind of what happens after the main villain dies. Would it be simply a happy ending? What would the fallout be? In my novel Beyond Zero (working title) I began to, and continue to, explore this question. Prologue I describes the day on which the main villain threatening the story’s people died and the immense casualties that immediately followed. It sets the background from which the story and its society is built and gives the first insight into the trauma that any and all characters have experienced or inherited.

The novel explores the first 20 years following day zero and will likely span over three books. Its genre is Sci-Fi.

Durian

Content warning. May contain spoilers.

alcohol, swear words

a short story by Luc Salinger

Cathy had disheveled hair. Her cotton clothing was riddled with little holes and patches. She was greasy and she smelled like a dirty damp rag left to simmer outside in the heat of a summer’s day. I didn’t exactly hate her, but she wasn’t a person I would want to hang out with or be close to in any way. Foul odor aside, being near Cathy would tank your reputation immediately. As if she had a disease that you could contract just by opening your mouth when standing near her.

‘See that girl over there? You have to make her invite you to her place.’ Maddie was pointing at Cathy.

We were leaning against the concrete wall of the school building, our eyes darting over to the old wooden bench where a girl sat by herself. Immediately, I felt as if bile was just waiting to come out. Like most games, truth or dare perverts the longer it goes on. The desire to pay someone back for what they made you do and the need, almost in a moral sense, to go through with demands because you have inflicted so much pain and shame on the other person; that was what kept the game going. I had made Maddie drink a bottle filled with toilet water from the boy’s restroom, so it sort of put the onus on me to do whatever she wanted, even if, arguably, Cathy is more disgusting than the dirtiest toilet there has ever been.

‘A dare is a dare. Don’t be a wuss. And tomorrow, tell me what kind of disgusting rat hole she lives in,’ she said.

So off I went, taking one last deep breath of fresh air before I got into the vicinity of the garbage girl. She saw me approaching and I slowly waved at her.

I actually had no idea how to make her invite me to her house. Maddie must have thought Cathy was so desperate for any social contact, it would be just a matter of asking her and she would say an emphatic, yes! Maddie really knows how some people tick.

Cathy and I went to Pinecrest, a neighbourhood which my parents had always talked badly about, saying every house there was dilapidated. Not just them. It made headlines in newspapers and there had even been a documentary about it on TV once. Living conditions there were “inhumane” and “criminal” it said. The multi-story buildings there had issues with bursting pipes, mouldy ceilings, water outages, all the stuff that would make you want to move out, but people in those apartments just couldn’t, for whatever reason. Maybe they were too stupid to realize what kind of shithole they live in or they didn’t have the money to look for something better. When we went to the neighbourhood, walking past the uncut lawns and the trash bags scattered in front of the houses, I hoped that Cathy would at least exceed my expectations insofar as that she wouldn’t live in one of the notorious apartments. Then again, maybe they just looked bad, ugly and not cared for on the outside. Honestly? I desperately hoped so, because they really did look disgusting and stepping inside of them seemed like something I really didn’t want to do.

‘I have to warn you, my place isn’t exactly in good condition right now,’ Cathy said as she turned her keys to open the door.

We were on the seventh floor of the building and the staircase had a musky, pungent odour to it, like urine, that made me almost puke. I hoped that at least inside her apartment it would smell better, but once she opened her door, it was worse. I don’t think I could attempt to describe it, because every scent description would need to refer to something else to get across how it smells. It just smelled uniquely bad, horrific, awful.

It was dark. A lightbulb that hung on a string dangled in the air, shining light on a kitchen island. The counter was scattered with plastic wrappers, dirty plates and a thin layer of grease that made the light reflect in a nice way. Cathy entered the apartment and, as she stepped foot inside, her feet were scooting away glass bottles that laid on the ground. They made a wave of sharp tinkling sounds, as one bottle smacked against the other.

‘Sorry, my mom is a drunk,’ Cathy said as we both walked towards the kitchen.

My eyes darted around the sea of empty bottles on the floor, trying to take the situation in. An idea was niggling.

She opened a cupboard. ‘You want something to drink?’

I tried to play it as casually as I could. ‘Oh, you must have wine here then or something, right? What does your mom drink?’

She looked at me incredulously. ‘Um… I think I have some vodka here somewhere.’

I had never drunk hard alcohol before. I wasn’t allowed to, so the prospect seemed too enticing.

‘That would be nice!’ I said as I waited for her to reach for the bottle of vodka that was stashed underneath the kitchen sink and two glasses from a cabinet where the bottom hinge was completely ripped off, making it dangle in the air. Cathy filled the two glasses to the brim with vodka and set one of the glasses in front of me on the counter.

‘Just straight vodka?’

She gave me a weird look, as if I said something stupid. ‘Do you want to add something to it?’ She took her own glass and quickly drained it, as if it was a cold glass of water.

Hesitantly, I took the glass she had prepared for me and tried to drink it, but my face immediately scrunched up by the horrific taste. It tasted like poison. She looked my way and began to cackle.

‘What’s wrong? You don’t like it?’

‘It tastes terrible!’

She reached for the bottle and poured herself another glass. ‘P-Pussy…’ she slurred with a sly smile.

Now mad, I gritted my teeth and emptied my own glass. A strange warmness was filling my lungs, and I felt a burning taste that went further than my mouth. I coughed, which prompted her to laugh at me again.

‘Fuck you.’ I grunted, trying to act tough, but I couldn’t stop myself from beaming a little.

She laughed even harder. ‘F-Fuck you too!’ She said it mockingly, grinning from ear to ear and then pressing her lips on the rim of her glass again.

After we had emptied the bottle, she got another one and we just began laughing together. I didn’t even notice anymore how bad the apartment smelled or how it looked. I just had fun as we were cracking jokes. She brought out a packet of cookies, too, which we occasionally dipped inside our glasses and laughed about how bad it tasted.

‘You know what, you are more fun to be around than I thought.’

Her face was red. ‘Th- thank you so much!’ She took another sip of her glass. ‘You are the first real friend I have ever had. I am so happy right now.’

I just laughed. ‘You see me as a friend?’ I sipped from my glass again.

By that point, she was completely wasted. She put her glass down.

‘Of course!’ Then she looked at me and her eyes were glistening. ‘Why wouldn’t I? Nobody has ever been so nice to me.’

She got closer to me and I could smell her vodka breath as she wrapped her arms around me.

I stood in shock, my arms dangling to my sides. ‘Nice to you? What did I do?’

She hugged me tighter. ‘Just everything. You are nice to me. You don’t make fun of me. You don’t make fun of the place I live in. You don’t make fun of my clothes…’ She continued to melt into me as I felt an incredible sense of disgust wash over me. Not just because Cathy was now hugging me and she seemed not to have washed herself in a week. No, it was disgust with myself.

‘Yeah… sure…’ I murmured and gently wrapped my arms around her too.

‘I just wish you would’ve approached me sooner.’

I didn’t have the heart to tell her about the dare or anything, about how disgusting I had always thought she was or how much shit I talked behind her back. Even while being completely drunk, I wasn’t brave enough to do so. I just stood there, letting her hug me until she let go. She looked at my slightly parted lips with a completely flushed face.

‘Can I kiss you?’

The next day at school was horrible. I didn’t know a hangover could hurt my head this much. Cathy didn’t come to school at that day, and I totally understood why. I got annoyed by every tiny thing. Even Maddie’s enthusiasm as she kept on teasing me, trying to make me tell her about Cathy and what I did.

‘Honestly, I can’t remember.’ I told her as I kept my hands on my head like a wise monkey.

‘You’re kidding right? Not even a tiny detail?’ She gave me a look of suspicion. ‘Are you sure you even did the dare like I asked you?’

‘I did.’

‘Got any proof?’

My mind wandered, trying to find anything. ‘Nope, no proof.’

‘Geez, I should have told you to take a picture or something. You could just lie to me right now. Don’t you think it’s unfair? You saw me drink the toilet water right in front of you and you won’t even give me anything to laugh at now? You’re such a terrible friend.’

‘Pick a better dare next time,’ I said. My head felt like it was being stung by hundreds of hornets.

‘No, no. This one was perfect. You just messed it up. You have to do it again.’

‘Fine, whatever,’ I slurred as I lay my head on my school table, taking a deep breath of air.

I felt sick.