Loving Milly

Milly lined up the pills on the windowsill. The furniture went with the bailiffs. She remembered the thunderous knock at the door – the bell hadn’t rung since the power was cut. The children were safely dispatched to their father’s new house, where they could play in the enormous garden. Milly didn’t even have a window box.

She’d planned it carefully, had her hair and nails done, put on clean underwear. She pulled up the bean bag, the only item in which the bailiffs had shown no interest, made herself (relatively) comfortable and reached into her handbag. She couldn’t leave without a goodbye.

Feeling around for pen and paper, she found a postcard tucked into the side pocket, on one side a view of Brighton pier, on the other her mother’s handwriting and the words: ‘You will love again the stranger who was your self’.

Kim M. Russell, 19th August 2019

Image result for Brighton pier postcard Pinterest
Brighton Pier postcard found on Pinterest

My response to dVerse Poets Pub Prosery #3: Love After Love

This Monday I am hosting the third ever Prosery prompt, when we write a very short piece of prose that tells a story, with a beginning, a middle and an end, in any genre of our choice, with a limit of 144 words, incorporating a complete given line from a poem. This time the line has been taken from ‘Love After Love’, by Derek Walcott:

‘You will love again the stranger who was your self’.

43 thoughts on “Loving Milly”

  7. I agree with the others, but I’m going to be pedantic and I’m sorry. There are limits on what bailiff’s can repossess. Items such as the dining table (they have to leave somewhere for the family to sit and eat) and other items can’t be removed from the house as they are considered essential to a basic standard of living.
    Sorry, I did like the story, my brain just caught on that one detail.

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    1. Thank you, Carol. I wasn’t aware of that. I’ve never experienced bailiffs personally, I’ve only heard about other people. If I were to use this piece of flash fiction as a basis for a longer story or even a novel, I would research it better. That’s the great things about prompts – they’re springboards for future ideas and development.

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  13. Wow, more of us diving down into darkness, writing poetics like blind angry prehistoric fish. Mine tackled Jim Crow, started dark and then was blasted with white light.

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    1. Thank you, Oliana. Please, do give it a try. It’s 144 words including the line from the poem. I’m off to bed now, but I’ll be up early to read and comment.

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      1. Yep, I decided to add it to my other blog at Tournesol dans unJardin as I am trying slowly to wean off here but then again when things are too personal I stay here like for Dear Emma or for a good rant. This idea of prosery gives me an idea for my flash ficition I wanted to collect and see if I could publish…wonderful idea and great way to inspire writing too.!!

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