A few published stories by me. Hoping this will be added to in the not too distant future:
Abigail (p22)
This Man Alone (p17)
Long Goodbye (This site is down at the minute – the story is below for now)
They found them on the beach, behind the sand dunes, back where the water never reaches. A dog discovered the first one, digging so deep with its nose that it revealed first a single rib, then the whole ribcage, and further down, the rest of it, bones, places where the flesh still clung.
The news spread through our small resort town in minutes, not hours. Many people were there before even the police. A crowd thronged the dunes as the sun slipped down the horizon and left a pink stain in the sky. Sirens started to sound.
She told me quietly, the waitress in my café. Her eyes turned downward, unable to meet mine, her cheeks red, glistening moisture by her tear ducts.
I took my coat from the peg and walked slowly, not trying to keep pace with the others who rushed and pushed on their way to the spectacle. An answer to the town’s long unanswered question.
I saw those exposed ribs in the light that shone from the emergency service vehicles. Four thin white blades sticking up like balustrades. I didn’t know if they were her’s. Those particular ribs. But I knew then, that hers were somewhere nearby, as was all else that was left of her, all that she’d ever dreamed of or wanted to be, all she’d hoped for, sucked downwards through sand and soil, earth and crust. Gone.
Goodbye, I told her. Goodbye at last.
Fran Slater 