Grey and damp, damp and grey, she spends hours propped up against the sink, staring out of the window. The turbulent swell beyond her garden is an ocean grown from her tears.
Her beloved spouse built this house with his bare hands: barnacled seafarer’s hands accustomed to scrubbing decks and pulling ropes. In the kitchen, the windows stretch from one wall to another, so she can watch the horizon for his ship’s return and race along the beach to the harbour to greet him.
She has waited so many years, she’s a wreck and her legs have turned to flotsam.
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Friday Fictioneers: 100 word stories
Photo prompt: image (c) Rochelle Wisoff-Fields
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Sarah Potter Writes 
Oh so well done. I could never be a sailor’s wife…
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Nor I. My daughter goes through absolute emotional agony every time her sailor returns to sea and she’s without him for months on end.
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I feel for her…
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The pathos of the flotsam legs–as well as the lovely barnacled hands image–really give me the shivers (in a good way). Beautiful melancholic vignette/microfiction, Sarah!
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Thank you, Leigh:-) I’m glad you liked the flotsam legs and barnacled hands. I had a very strong picture in my head of these things.
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They were awesome; your diction is stellar.
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How sad this is, Sarah. Quite heart wrenching actually. 😕
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Sorry to make you sad, Sylvia, in what’s meant to be a joyous season!
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No problem, Sarah. Happy Christmas. 🙂 xx
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Happy Christmas to you, too, Sylvia 🙂 xx
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Dear Sarah,
Fortunately my sailor had done most of his sea duty when we got married. The garden grown with her tears…beautiful metaphor. Poetic prose well done.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Dear Rochelle
I am glad for you that your sailor had done most of his sea duty by then. My daughter is gut-rotting just now, as her sailor partner’s leave is ending a couple of days before Christmas.
Glad you liked my prose.
All best wishes
Sarah
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Beautifully done Sarah.
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Thank you, Louise 🙂
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The sad image of a sailors wife cannot be described better. His barnacle hands, and her flotsam legs are very effective, just as the big windows facing the sea.
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The barnacled hands and flotsam legs seemed to be several people’s favourites. I felt deeply sad for the sailor’s wife when writing about her.
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So many families make so many sacrifices and we forget, get aught up in our own lives. It’s good to be reminded.
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I think that often we feel helpless to change the lot of others, or, in the case of grief-stricken people, we have a fear of saying the wrong thing, so say nothing.
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Really enjoyed this. Loved the descriptions.
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Thank you, Sandra 🙂
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Loved this Sarah. I can feel her half-anticipation, half-despair. Happy Christmas from Jersey.
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Thank you, Roy. Am glad you loved the story. Happy Christmas to you, too, from Sussex:-)
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Beautifully written, Sarah.
Happy Christmas to you.
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Thank you, Jean. Happy Christmas to you, too 🙂 x
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Excellent, Sarah. The last line, with ‘wreck’ and ‘flotsam’, is perfect imagery
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Thank you, Geoffrey. From an ex-seafarer that is praise indeed!
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oh this is wonderful and poignant! It conjures up so many stories! Merry Christmas!!
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Thank you, dear Cybele. I’d love to know what those stories are! Perhaps you could conjure them up on your blog sometime. Merry Christmas to you, too 🙂
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oh dear! a challenge lol! Many good wishes your way this season!
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So sad, but beautifully written. You have captured so much in so few words. Wishing you all the best for the coming New Year!
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Thank you, Naomi. For some reason my flash fiction either ends up melancholy, or darkly comic. I must try to write something “normal” one day! Wishing you all the best for the coming New Year, too 🙂
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Wuthering Heights might not have been nearly so successful if everyone had lived happily ever after! And Romeo and Juliet would’ve grown old and content, and their story would’ve been tossed into obscurity with all the other Happily Ever Afters. Just keep doing what you do so well, and what your muse dictate. xoxo, n
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And there are all those novels by Thomas Hardy, with plenty of tragedy.
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