Skin

I opened the wardrobe and swept my hand along under the clothes. There were two little girls, on their knees facing each other, hugging each other. I got them out, but I know they didn’t make it. The next time I went to put my gloves on they still had pieces of skin pushed in to the fabric, bright pink. I threw the gloves in the wheelie bin and I lay there all night and I could still smell that skin. I heard the rubbish truck coming and I went down and wheeled that bin out so he did it first. He was looking at me like I was crazy and when the bin went up and tipped in I swear I saw those gloves, watched tiny pieces of skin floating down to the street. I threw up, right there in the gutter, and every glove I put on, straight out of the packet, I can see that skin pushed into the fabric.”

He turned back then towards Andy and there was a coldness in his eyes that made the older man sit back again against the rock.

“I was going to come and see you because I thought I should do whatever it was that you needed to get back to work. You can’t help me. Especially now. I don’t need your kind of help. I can do this, carry on, even if I have to see the skin of a little girl on my gloves forever, I can do this because it needs to be done.”