Waiting to Die: Alien Liberty

 

The mantelpiece clock ticked, 6.14 in the morning. Pale waited. A pine – scented candle glowed in the darkness, the summer sun concealed by heavy beige curtains. Pale faced the blank television, fighting nausea and headache, winding thinning hair around her fingers. The radiotherapy failed, she touched the dull beige hair above her right temple, still there.

The dying candle flickered, Pale caught a reflection of her settee in the television, it was unoccupied. “I’m not here.” She peered at the dark screen, an image of the moon stared back at her. Startled, she sat back. “It’s my home!”

She looked at the mantelpiece photos in dark wooden frames, her wedding. Charles wearing a smart grey suit, stood in the church porch, smiling and alone. His family, her mother, stared at the camera. “Was I ever there?”

Tears in her eyes, she remembered, “I was so happy. Charles…” She sniffed back the tears and peered at the photos, seeing herself. “I look so young, smiling, holding Charles’ arm, wearing makeup. I can’t remember the last time… My lips were almost red, my eyes, so bright.” She gazed at her hands, “Now my skin is as pale as my name. And these lips Charles so tenderly kissed, as white as my face. I would scare a ghost.”

Alien Liberty the Unseen Woman:  opening pages.