Lucy Brown was shortlisted in the 2006 5photostory.com competition and her story, 'Weddings and Wisdom', was subsequently published in their anthology, ‘39 Emergency Exits’. Lucy is an English student at Lincoln University, currently in her second year. Originally from Wakefield, she is enjoying the freedom university has to offer and is writing lots! She attributes her good points to her parents, though the negatives are all her own doing.

LUCY'S INFLUENCES

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SARAH WATERS - Fingersmith

Click image to read the novel online on the EText Library website; to visit the Virginia Woolf Society of Great Britain website, click here or for related items on Amazon, click here

Click image to read a review of the book on the Book Bag website; to read a review of Atkinson's 'Not the End of the World' on the New Review section of this website, click here or for related items on Amazon, click here

Click image for an overview of Rossetti on the Victorian Web website; for a profile of Rossetti on the Wikipedia website, click here or for related items on Amazon, click here

Click image for articles on Mew on the Spondee website; for a Charlotte Mew Bibliography on the Middlesex University website, click here or for related items on Amazon, click here

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FORUM

SHOWTIME

by
Lucy Brown

The lights dim, the curtain draws back. She emerges from the gloom in all her glory; the audience falls quiet.

‘She looks,’ whispers my Auntie Margaret, her lower lip quivering.

‘I know,’ I answer.

‘It isn’t her,’ she continues. ‘It’s.’

‘I know,’ I say.

She is dressed in the thinnest of garments, periodically splattered with her own particular colours, fashioned by her loves and loathes. For instance, she never eats mushrooms. Her hair follows its recent tradition; the style is ruffled, unusual. It is what Uncle Peter is focussed on. I wish I was, her eyes are too piercing, as if she knows the secrets of the world.

The serenade is an old one; Uncle Peter hums. At the chorus Margaret inexplicably joins in. Something comes over the audience; no more passive, they express emotion, the type this place saw more of in the distant past. Now, of course, emotion is almost forbidden her- it isn’t British. These circumstances are hardly unique yet. Well, we shall battle with the gods and show what is deserving.

Ellen claps twice with her little fat hands. She is too young to understand the etiquette here and her troublesome behaviour engineers a tear in Peter’s eye. It took a child to do that!

Now we can’t see her. They have her in a sea of a green I don’t recognise. There is uproar in the galleries: this is not why we are here! They smile apologetically - the plot must be followed.

We are left with her footwear- slender, red, no heel. I am completely absorbed even while Ellen elbows me in the kneecaps. Auntie Margaret tears her gaze altogether, perhaps she cannot bear the party to be lacking. They are taking her offstage now - that isn’t their right. I think my Uncle Peter protests but I concentrate on the figure until the curtain drifts closed.

So I notice the fragrance. What is it? It’s putrid, I immediately loathe it. Sterilised, bland, what has she left behind? Nothing good, I note with a note of irritation.

As an audience we are unsure what to do. Applauding feels wrong, despite what Ellen is obviously itching for. Peter will allow his tears to fall freely, Aunty Margaret will stifle a sniff. I will lift Ellen up and hold her tight against me. I shall inhale her sweet childlike fragrance that incorporates her youthfulness and pray she doesn’t recognise the situation for what it truly it.

Finally, Aunty Margaret speaks. ‘˜She’s dead. She’s really dead.’

I squeeze Ellen until she squeals. ‘I know.’

© Lucy Brown
Reproduced with permission