FLASH FEAR

It’s our first date and he arrives wearing a designer blazer, jeans, and holding a bouquet of roses. He gets an eight for appearance and a nine for thoughtfulness. We’d never met before. And first impressions are key and this guy showed up looking like a million dollars and acting chivalrous as hell. He holds the taxi door open for me. And that is exactly what you would expect from a man. He orders a sparkling wine which is expensive but also shows knowledge of wine. He pronounces his words carefully, doing his utmost to not overwhelm them with his New York accent. He picked the restaurant and it was expensive. The food was delicious. His eating manners were correct. He used a knife and fork. He didn’t slurp the pasta and he didn’t have half the dish down his shirt. Ladies pick up on these kinds of things. As a woman, you should definitely study everything about the man. Because we shouldn’t settle for less. He was polite to the waiting staff. He tipped. He offered to pay the bill. And

I didn’t have the best parents growing up. Who does though, right? I can forgive them now for a lot of neglect. Well, I try to. They’re dead anyway. But forgiveness isn’t just about somebody hearing it. It’s about the feeling of forgiveness. My sister has tried forgiving too. I can forgive many things. But it’s hard to forget. It’s hard to try to forget. What’s that thing they say about white elephants? They say - don’t think about white elephants, and then it’s impossible NOT to think about white elephants. I try to forget. But the more I forget. The more I remember. I remember when our parents left us home alone for a week. I was eight years old. My sister was eleven. You don’t leave kids that young home alone. They had a wedding in Scotland and my mother didn’t want the inconvenience of taking me and my sister with her. It was easier to throw down £50 and stock the fridge full of food than take us. My sister Lucia was in charge. She was older and we just had to get on, not kill each

You wake up and see that you’re tied to a reinforced substance that binds you in all kinds of trouble. You try to move your arms and legs and they just won’t budge. You try to flee and fly away from whatever is holding you down. You scream and nobody hears the scream because your scream is too muted to normal ears. Is this a dream? Are you having a nightmare where you can’t move anything in your body? Do you even dream? You’ve never dreamt before? You’re stuck. The substance is hard and sticky and it’s slowly engulfing your entire body. Rising up higher and higher to just above your head. You can barely breathe but you’re making buzzing noises to try to do something. ANYTHING. This is horrific. The worst kind of fate. And then you realize that struggling only makes it worse. The more you move the harder you’re stuck to this murderous blanket. You need to stay still. The more you struggle the more you’re trapped. It’s that simple. You try to recount what exactly happened to make you stu

 “I got something for you,” Barry said. It started in a rundown pub in East London. David was losing everything. The breakdown had cost him his job. His wife had taken full custody of his daughter and was now living with some damned postman. A postman. David was once a millionaire MD, and he’d been dumped for a postman. Now he spent his time in East London dives lamenting over everything he’d lost. And it was all because of her. Ashley Miles. That was her maiden name of course. That was what she called herself now. And his daughter is now called Chloe Miles. She wasn't Miles. She was an Edwards. Chloe Edwards. Not Chloe Miles. Just saying the name Miles made him sick. And the postman was called Fabio Galardo. And no way was his daughter taking an Italian name off an Italian bum. He drowned himself in whiskey. It was all he had. He desperately missed his life before the bottom fell out. Sat opposite him was Barry. His oldest friend. His biggest confidant throughout all of this. Ba