Luminescence

Grandma turned blind the day Grandpa died. It was a big mystery considering her vision used to be quite good.

She had been alone with him that day.

When we got there, Grandpa was gone and she was sitting beside him, her face bathed in beatific light, her vision completely gone. As though she had been given sight just to watch him live.

On her death-bed, she told us the secret.

“As Grandpa lay dying, he began to burst with the light of a thousand suns. He turned into an angel.  From then on, that’s all I needed to see.”

ARE WE GOING TO DIE?

Grandpa, are you going to die?

No, why do you ask?

Mummy said a lot of old people are dying.

No, no. I am well and safe. I eat my veggies daily.

Grandpa, am I going to die?

No, my dear, if you stay inside and eat your veggies you will be fine. You are only six, you don’t need to think about death so much.

Then why was Mamma crying?

When?

Yesterday. She was talking to someone on the phone and crying.

What was she saying?

That she lost her job. I told her I can help her find it. I always help her find things, Grandpa.

I know, you’re a fine young man.

She also said she will lose the house. How can she lose the house if we have already found it Grandpa?

Yes, I too would like to know that.

Then she said she could lose me. But I am already here, how can she lose me?

Lose you?

Yes, lose cus …..something.

Custody?

Yea, yea, that, that.

Where’s your mamma? Give the phone to her. Let’s get to the bottom of this losing business.

She’s asleep, Grandpa.

What? It’s 12 noon and she hasn’t woken up?

No. And I am very hungry.

Ok. Give her a good shake, or better still, sit on top of her and shake her.

I tried. She’s not moving and she’s very cold.

Good Lord!

Is Mamma going to die, Grandpa?

THE COLOUR OF SOUND

“I can see sound,” she tells her boyfriend of six months.  

“Songs make curliques in the air—in blue when they drip sadness. Joy is yellow. Rage flies out of mouths in clotted scarlet. When I see grey wisps in the air, I know death has been visiting.

The Love Yous, sliding off tongues are mostly mottled black or grey white. Never the peachy rose that bloomed from my Mama’s lips when she whispered to Papa. Nor the crimson Love You Too that he bestowed on her.

It’s been a while. Yours are still white. I think we should breakup.”

The misleading light

Deep carpeted silence. Deepest void of a moonless night.  On a deeply forested mountaintop – an enchanted glow. Tribals in the outlying hamlets seized by deep terror chant trembling invocations to forest spirits.

Months later when summer melts mountain mists they see, in the stark light of day, the mountaintop has been cleared, plundered of precious sandalwood and teak. The helpless tribals realise it wasn’t any poltergeist lusting for blood it was the even deadlier human lusting for profit.

It’s only a matter of time. This lust will reach their doors, flatten their roofs.

It’s only a matter of time. This lust will reach their doors, flatten their roofs.

The god of greed is the loftiest. 

The hand

He couldn’t get the image out of his mind. For months.

It kept dragging him back, by his collar, to his childhood. Bounced, bloodied and bruised, between foster homes, like a battered ball. An apt analogy, considering the kicks he had endured.

There was only a single, faded photo of him from back then. His last girlfriend had mused about it, “Even though you had your hands in your pockets, it looks as though you were begging desperately for help.”

That’s exactly what it looked like – the white, bleached, skeletal hand sticking out of the sand.

Crying for help! 

The vase

It’s her favourite vase. Although, I wouldn’t call it that. It looks to me more like a baboon’s bottom. “Have ya seen a baboon’s bottom?” you might ask. “Yes, else how would I know?”

My delicate sensibilities always sing out when I get close to the hideous thing, ‘approaching baboon’s bottom!’. Hunh, fancies itself to be an aircraft pilot.

I’ve hatched a plan to destroy the eyesore, without her suspecting. But I needed to know why it’s so special to her. “It’s a magic urn”, she said, dead serious. “Half my soul’s hidden in it. Like Voldemort.”

Check-mate, I guess….

The eSCAPE

Rapunzel is miffed. The dude, supposedly a prince, is standing at the window looking out instead of at her. Why did he even bother coming?

His visits always gave her headaches. Real ones. From his climbing up her hair.

She’s had enough – of the drudgery, the isolation, his stinky kisses, his wandering hands.  

At least, after innumerable requests, he brought a rope.

A dog barks. Horse hooves clip-clop on cobblestones.  

His back gives her an idea. Not one to dawdle, she tiptoes up to him.

One push.

She leans out the window to see him land squarely on the witch.