A lone shoe sits by the side of the road.

The Mad Man of Red Hill Road picks up the shoe – the lone shoe, practically new – and tries it on for size. With the back of his foot hanging off the back of the shoe, the lone shoe fits.

He looks around for the other, having now decided that the shoe suits him. But there is no other shoe. Just an unkempt bush in an unkempt ditch by the side of the road.

***

Agatha practically sloughs the skin off her hands taking the potato dish out of the oven. What she finds is not as golden brown as the recipe had suggested, yet she’d followed the instructions to the T. At least she believed she had. She considers popping the pale sorry-looking lumps back in, but a chanced glance at the blinking LED clock on the counter lets her know that she doesn’t have the time. She sticks a toothpick through one of the potatoes instead and favours it edible – just enough, anyway.

“It’ll be the meat stew,” she then decides, “that will be the star of the show.”

***

It smelled oddly beautiful. The Diver thinks to himself that he must have been too far for too long from the living to have such a thought. But there it was, like wilted roses. He pulls the neck of his shirt to his nose, takes a deep whiff and finds his own day-old sweat beautiful too.

His nose must be broken.

He wonders if it were a meagre blessing – a sort of recompense from the gods for allowing so much youth to decay.

***

The meat stew would not thicken.

***

His makeshift gloves threaten to pull away from his hands. The Diver holds on ever tighter to what he imagines to be the elbows as the two men swing the bloated weight onto the burlap sack laid out on the dumpsite’s murky beach. The neck of the Diver’s shirt slips off the bridge of his nose. That bouquet rises up again to meet him.

***

The Mad Man of Red Hill Road spots the other shoe – the companion to his lone shoe – sitting squarely on a stiff greyed foot atop a burlap sack. Possibly hundreds of pairs of sandals, battered brogues and browning sneakers mill about his prized shoe. The fear that someone would steal his newfound possession seizes him. So, the Mad Man of Red Hill Road nimbly and hastily makes his way through the tightly packed crowd, noting as he goes that none other was a match for his own lovely pair.

***

The Diver splays out his arms to keep the crowd at bay but the ever-growing beast with its macabre-seeking eyes spills out all around him nonetheless. The people are angry. This young man lying on the ground before them would make the fifth missing boy within the span of a week whose mutilated body had been disposed of in the sprawling dumpsite. The crowd vibrates with restrained nervous energy, and like a tightly coiled snake, they hang back waiting, waiting. For permission perhaps? For any sudden movement even, before they can strike…

The Diver spots a pile of rags emerging from the crowd. As he watches, an arm darts out of the rags and reaches for the body. The Diver jumps up at the pile of rags but it slithers out of his grasp, disappearing into the crowd once more. The scuffle stirs up some commotion. When the Diver realizes what he has done, it is too late. The beast has already reared its head having sensed the disturbance. Permission has been granted. Within seconds, the crowd erupts.

***

At half hour past six, Agatha realizes that she will have to settle for a soup instead of a stew. Everyone loves soup, she assures herself of this. Stews are her sister’s specialty anyway.

If Agatha were to serve a stew too, it would just pale in comparison – as though there wasn’t enough about Agatha that hadn’t already paled in comparison to her elder sister over the years. Even now, settled as she was, having snagged herself a job after a decade spent hopelessly searching, with her own space and place in the world, and the tides having finally turned her way, Agatha suspected that she was still considered a rung beneath her sister by her family. She had been ‘poor Agatha’ for so long, the black sheep to be pitied, that the status had clung onto her like a smell.

That was then, however. Her life was good now and this dinner (sans a subpar stew) would prove that

Soup will have to do.

***

5B2 sees 6A1 step out of her apartment with a phone glued to the side of her face. It must have been the fifth time that day that she’d seen 6A1 out and about, often with bags of groceries or clumsily carried water canisters. She suspected 6A1 was preparing to have a party of sorts, which was odd.

Who would have people over at a time like this? Since morning the entire building had shut down. All the doors remained closed, and if one listened closely they would hear the quiet drone of several televisions playing the news.

As 5B2 looks on through her kitchen window, 6A1 paces back and forth across the length of building A’s sixth floor corridor. Every once in a while, 6A1 raises her phone over her head as she moves from one end to the next. 5B2 considers calling out to her neighbour to tell her that all calls have been dropping for a while and that there were rumours online that the internet might be shut down soon too, but she doesn’t.

Instead 5B2 focuses on the task at hand. With her basket of ropes and ribbons, she studiously wraps her young son’s body. She thinks, maybe if she bound his limbs he would not grow to be a young man. She thinks, maybe if she bound his limbs he would be safe.

***

Her mother’s calls finally get through. She informs her that they are not able to come as the road into her neighbourhood has been blocked and there seems to have been an incident.

Agatha cuts her off to say, “Oh, that’s a shame! I was really looking forward to hosting you all tonight.” Her mother asks her if she’s heard anything. Agatha asks, “About what?” Her mother sighs wearily at the other end of the line and reiterates – about the incident? – and insists that her daughter be careful, and perhaps she could find a way to get out of there and come home.

Agatha’s cheeks hurt from smiling so widely as she says, “You worry too much. Okay then, you should all visit soon. I’ll cook up a feast. Goodnight!” just as her mother is saying, “It’s on the news now. Oh my god, Agatha, they have tanks. The police are riding into your neighbourhood with tanks–”

***

The lights go out just as she sits down to eat her ostentatiously spread meal. Agatha pulls out the taper candles she’d bought for a bargain at the trader market. She thinks the cream wax looks beautiful all lit up. She settles in her chair and reaches for the water pitcher. She finds that her hand is trembling and pulls it back down, tucking it between her knees. With one hand Agatha digs into her plate.

Outside her drawn window, the dark sky flashes red with the light of a flare.
Agatha thinks to herself that the food turned out wonderfully, even the soup. She pictures her family being impressed by her cooking and decides to invite them over again for dinner on the weekend. She wonders if her sister will ask for the recipe and makes a mental note to bookmark it later.

 

 

 

 

 

Photo by Alice Triquet on Unsplash