
Well met by Dominic Reed
They want to wash you first, but I can’t wait. I’m greedy for you. You smell bone-broth soupy. I tell them how bears lick their babies clean. How grass-eaters do this too. I wonder if it’s the only time they taste meat. That spooks them. Suddenly they’re everywhere, giving us pretending-not-to-look-looks.
Until the small one, the kindest, says it’s fine. Sends most of them away. The door, not locked, not quite closed. The ones who stay are dressed-down, wearing Chucks, uniform of this-is-not-a-big-deal, but they look nervous.
It’s explained again. A kindness. Some breathing space. Back-on-track time. When they say track they can’t help but look at my arms. Most glance but one stares, his face a stone.
Another, neck swinging symbols, talks Moses-in-a-basket and the kind one cuts her off with a snarl. I talk chicken-in-a-basket. Lady-Moses leaves the room.
I try to think of something to tell you. Something about having a better life. Know that’s what they’d like. Wrong. They’d like it over. In their heads they’re counting to a hundred.
I feel the change. They expect a fight, approach carefully on each side, two breaths away from easy girl, easy. I imagine them in cop dog training suits. I hand you over. No fight. Someone asks why I’m smiling. Another says please hurry in my voice.
They take you out and I droop, your unweight crushing me. The kind one senses, pats my hand, croons over now’s. Outside, something is decided. Lady-Moses flings the door wide, enough to see them carry you away.
Then something bends in me and I’m after them, my mouth spilling oaths to you, one after another. They wince, try to hobble me with stares but I’ve gotcha I’ve gotcha and we’re running for it, both grinning like planets.
Dominic Reed is a 31 year old health researcher living in London. His fiction has been published in Thi Wurd and Flash Frontier. He was also shortlisted for the 2020 Alpine Fellowship Writing Prize and won third prize in the 2021 Fractured Lit Flash Fiction prize.
18 October 2024
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