The Winter of her Deep Content by Adele Evershed
When Olwen gazed in the mirror the day after her sixtieth birthday, she saw tiny icicles clinging to her eyelids. At first she assumed it was sleepy dust, but as she rubbed her fingers over them, her eyes felt gritty, as if she’d forgotten to remove her eye makeup—though she hadn’t worn any in years. Eye shadow settled in the crease of her eyes, emphasizing what David, her husband, called her crow’s feet.
Downstairs, David whistled tunelessly, but the minute he saw her, his whistling faltered into a slow hiss, like a balloon deflating. His eyes widened, and he commented, “Wow, Olwen, isn’t it a bit early in the day for glittery eye shadow, girl? You look like a disco ball.”
Olwen touched her eyelids, but her fingers came away empty.
“Just me, I guess,” she said, giving him a half-smile.
David gaze narrowed, the same way it did when he tried and failed to solve Wordle. Olwen couldn’t stop the rush of satisfaction she felt—So, I’ve finally become a puzzle he can’t solve, she thought.
David had begun to grate on her nerves and lately, everything he said or did caused a blizzard in her head. For years she had asked David not to comment on her appearance in front of their friends, but he couldn’t seem to resist, claiming it was just banter. At her party the day before, she’d overheard him telling his brother that since menopause, her breasts had become “like mounds of slush—white, empty, and cold to the touch.” She had pretended not to hear, but later lying bed, with her hand on her menobelly, banked like a snow drift, she’d realized she was turning into a frigid landscape.
Olwen opened the patio door. Stepping outside into the sunny July morning, she felt a strange chill. The tiny icicles from her eyelids had returned, and as she looked around, everything seemed blurred as if she was looking through a sheet of ice. As she walked past the peonies, they became dusted with frost, and Olwin realized with a jolt, the cold wasn’t in the air; it was in her.
Her breath came in sheets of sleet, covering David’s perfect lawn like a secret. His startled face appeared at the kitchen window, and Olwin erupted in giggles, sending a hailstorm against the glass that made David duck down. She walked toward the stream at the bottom of the garden, her footprints leaving puddles of black ice and as she tossed her newly frosted locks over her shoulder, they tinkled like wind chimes. Shedding her clothes in a pile, Olwen froze over–an ice sculpture sparkling in the sun. Then, as she stepped into the water, there was a deafening roar, and Olwin was cleaved in half. Out of the crevice of her, a snowy owl emerged, spreading its wings Olwin took off into the deep-red sky.
Adele Evershed is a Welsh writer who swapped the valleys for the American East Coast. You can find some of her poetry and prose in Grey Sparrow Journal, Free Flash Fiction, Anti Heroin Chic, Gyroscope, Janus Lit, and upcoming in Poetry Wales. Adele has two poetry collections, Turbulence in Small Spaces (Finishing Line Press) and The Brink of Silence (Bottlecap Press). She has published two novellas in flash, Wannabe and Schooled (Alien Buddha Press), and has a forthcoming novella, A History of Hand Thrown Walls, with Unsolicited Press.
Find her on X @AdLibby1, Instagram @ad_libby and Blusky @adlibby.bsky.social
Turbulence in Small Places Wannabe ( Available from the FFF Bookshop! ) The Brink of Silence
Read more of her work @thelithag.com.
Collage courtesy of Adele Evershed
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