Contact — FICTION

Doomed

How peculiar your way of referring to death. As if death in itself was the unique boundary of life, the sole state in which life is life no longer. You could reference the quietude of a heart, the coldness of a body, the emptiness of a gaze, yet that only reminds me of the heaviness in my chest, the blackness of my dreams, the numbness of my mind. Aren’t these too manifestations of lifelessness? I lack a doctor’s expertise, but I feel confident when I say I have barely ever been alive.

Jimena RubioSophie BlakeApril 11, 2023Narcissism, Contact, boundaries

Porridge

It was wet. Unformed. The oats swam apart in the milk, drowning piece by piece. They were small islands in a vast sea, bobbing up and down as they floated apart and then back together.

Anna CroslandJonty Jacknelle-ReesApril 1, 2023Contact

The Cats are Fine

“How about here? The lady I was chatting to on the plane said that if you’re not going to try food fresh from the sea, then there’s no point coming.”

Ben BlackwellGuest UserMarch 7, 2023Perception, Contact, romance, dialogue, infidelity

Mourning Sun

Wit. Wit. My love, my heart, where are you? You have left me to die? To rot? To mourn?

Caitlin ParryRachel BulmanFebruary 27, 2023Contact, Perception, love, mourning

Let Me Tell You the Story

It has always been so easy for people to forsake witches as wicked.

Catherine HurcombeGuest UserFebruary 13, 2023Contact

Dancers

The music starts up. I grit my teeth and paste on a smile.

Catherine HurcombeGuest UserDecember 23, 2022Contact

A Change of Life

Mrs. Willen wiped off the 14th February from the whiteboard with the rag. She felt a flush of heat and put down the rag. In its place she wrote, quite deliberately, quite carefully: 15th February. Her handwriting was large, square and clear. Then she took up the rag once more and erased the 15. A lone th was left, looking blankly at her from the whiteboard.

Charlie PriceIsabel LondonDecember 2, 2022Perception, Contact

Mists

Sitting on the wall, she lets her feet hang into the old chapel. The congregation fell silent long ago, their passionate adorations no longer giving the place purpose, for what are walls without people? The priest continues longer so the histories say, staggering through life on a pitiful wage, trapped on that savage land so remote and distant from company. But he was loyal to his duty and his lord and so stayed as he was bidden.

Caitlin ParryMia MantonNovember 1, 2022fiction, Contact