We Were Dispirited by Anika Carpenter
We gave up on protests, turned to retail therapy. We shopped for matching green pantsuits, orange backpacks, purple beanies. In uniform, party-bright outfits we travelled to Manchester, Liverpool, London; embedded ourselves in the grey-brown hum of city rush hours. We stood desperate-still in the hurried flow of commuters, absorbed the brush and bump of shoulders. We waited, patiently, for someone to look us in the eyes, then dropped to our knees and wailed, shook our fists at the sky, twisted our faces in abject misery, flooded the scene with our ugly despair. Repeatedly.
Our demonstrations made headlines. Our numbers multiplied. Aerial photographs captured the colourful markers we made, the blossoming disquiet.
Shedding tears, sharing tales of eviction notices, school closures, unobtainable care, none of that was an arrestable offence. But it was troubling. Our Government was agitated. ‘The hard-working majority must be allowed to go about their business undisturbed by these indecorous displays of emotion. This theatrical harassment shall be bought to an end.’ It promised.
Every citizen was issued with red shoes, white socks, smart blue overalls. Wearing anything else became, under new laws, an act of malicious nuisance.
A father of three got six months for leaving the house in grey jogging bottoms. A schoolteacher was arrested for wearing a hot pink scarf. It was of no consequence that it was knitted especially for her, that it still smelled faintly of her mother’s perfume.
We studied the concessions made for the grieving. The strict guidelines – traditional mourning dress was permissible, provided the wearer could produce certified supporting paperwork.
We faked death certificates, printed orders of service. Posted them through letter boxes, placed them under windscreen wipers, slipped them between the pages of magazines. We stitched coal-coloured dresses with skirts stiff and angular as riot shields and suit jackets with high collars that framed our faces. We spread like black mold through the city. Marched the ordered streets, weeping.
Anika Carpenter lives and works in Brighton, UK. Her stories have been published by Ellipsis Zine, Fictive Dream, Gone Lawn, 100 Word Story and others, and have been shortlisted for the Bath Flash Fiction Prize and the Bridport Prize.
*
Photo by Henry & Co. on Unsplash
FLASH FICTION / LIBRARY / MAILING LIST / SUBMIT / CURRENT COMPETITION / PREVIOUS COMPETITIONS / CRITIQUE SERVICE / BOOKSHOP / TWITTER / INSTAGRAM / BSKY.SOCIAL / DONATE / LINKS/COMPS/INFO / THE FREE FUTURE FOUNDATION
*
Tags: