[Fiction] Minding the Gap

Read the second place entry for our week of November 24, 2024 prompt, Kindness.

Minding the Gap
by

Michaella Parkes

Cecile wished there was a sign she could wear on the tube to mark the emotions she was carrying.

‘I haven’t slept in weeks,’ it might say; ‘my world is crumbling’.

Until one month ago she felt like nothing was moving, then her life changed with a single sentence.

‘Break-up on board,’ the badge would read.

When she jumps on the misery line from Charing Cross back to Balham, she can feel it coming. The panic. People pack in around her, rucksacks balanced between feet, white-shirted arms overhead, the closest she’ll get to someone embracing her after a long day at work. A long day holding back her feelings in the office, answering questions about her weekend. She said she watched Netflix. She really watched her husband pack his bags and leave again; this time she knew it was the final time. Then, she stared at the ceiling. Fourty-eight hours straight. Numb, motionless, suspended in fear.

When gets offered a seat at Elephant and Castle, she feels the panic rise in her throat, holding her lungs closed with its spiky, torturing presence.

The screeching on the track drills into her brain; a distraction, at least, from the agony of her mind. She puts her headphones in. Shuffle. First, a song from this week’s charts. The track reminds her of pummelling a boxing bag in a HIIT class, but the upbeat revenge ballad starts to irritate her. She hits next.

Their wedding song.

Nick Mulvey. A Spanish finca. The best day of her life. Now the worst figment of her memory. Relics of their time unravel, taunt her, she can feel her spirit drowning. She starts to weep. First, it’s subtle. A sniffle, a single saline drip. She bows her head; she prays she can hold it back. Just a few more stops. People around her notice the crying. They look towards. They look away. They look at their phones. It’s normal for people to have bad days, they think. There’s an unwritten agreement. This carriage is extinct of emotion. The only feeling welcome here is haste.

And then, a small girl, no older than fifteen sits opposite. Headphones in, toe tapping, head nodding. She looks straight at Cecile and smiles. One of those sweet, warm invitations. Her doe eyes veiling a pure soul which sits right behind them.

She mouths, “you okay!?” across the carriage. Cecile nods. She isn’t. A man on a phone signing off messages ‘cheers, M’ obfuscates their view of one another, beer belly protruding. He burps. Cecile and this girl giggle, craning their heads either side to coalesce their reactions. Cecile gives a thumbs up, rolls her eyes and snuffs a laugh.

The girl reveals a post it from her bag. She scribbles something and hands it to Cecile as she alights at Kennington.

You’re gonna be okay :), it reads.

Moved by the might of pocket-sized hope, for the first time in months, Cecile actually believes she will be.

A Note From Our Guest Judge,

Natalie Lue

“Minding the Gap” conveyed the simultaneous invisibility and misery we grapple with in the midst of deep pain and grief—and how we need to feel seen. I felt like I was right there on the tube with her and appreciated the poignant mix of the sorrow of her inner journey with the intensity and hopefulness of the hellish but funny tube journey, reminding us that life’s experiences can’t be boiled down to just one thing and there’s kindness to be found amongst our pain.

About

Michaella Parkes

Michaella Parkes is a writer and journalist from London. She writes food and interview features for London publications and publishes weekly on Substack with her introspections and observations (@michaella). An aspiring novelist, she regularly joins LWS sessions to work on short stories and longer form fiction. Her short fiction has been selected for feminist magazine, Ache. She is currently working on her first novel.

This piece was written in response to the prompt Kindness.