September
A very short story I wrote for Ad Hoc Fiction. The theme was ‘Spray’.
Nine in the evening, and the sun starts to dip below the rooftops, the dust and heat of the day, turning the sky a ruby red. September, though it feels like high summer. There’s the same lazy slowness in the air and it has her reaching for the cool of a water glass which she holds to her temple.
From the end of the street she hears laughter, the neighbourhood kids outside still. They jump through a spray of water from a garden hose and she watches the tiny figures silhouetted against the evening sky.
‘Like Indonesian shadow puppets,’ she thinks.
The memory perfumed with the sweet scent of jasmine and childhood. So long ago.
But it’s ephemeral, elusive, and she cannot hold on to it . Though for a second she saw him again – her father. Behind the screen, manipulating the puppets as she whooped with glee.
