Human Remains

like that?’
    ‘I don’t have access to that sort of data,’ I said. ‘Maybe the investigation will get to that quite quickly.’
    ‘I can’t imagine it’s something that simple.’
    ‘No. I think – ’ I stopped myself.
    ‘What?’
    I looked away for a minute, then down at the table. ‘I think I should go. I have so much that I need to do.’
    ‘That wasn’t what you were going to say,’ he said.
    My cheeks were flushing and to cover up my discomfort I stood up. ‘Thanks for the coffee.’
    ‘It was awful, wasn’t it? I’ll buy you a decent cup next time.’ I wasn’t going to agree to another meeting, no matter what excuse he came up with.
    ‘I’ll walk back to the car park with you,’ he said, not giving me any sort of opportunity to refuse.
    I walked as quickly as I could, hoping to leave him behind. But my fast walk was a similar pace to a normal person’s stroll and he kept up with me easily. ‘My car’s over here,’ I said at last, breathless, ‘See you another time.’
    ‘Annabel,’ he said, ‘you know I’d like to help if I can. I remember what it was like when I lost my mum. There’s so much to do, you miss things. Let me know if I can help – alright?’
    ‘You’re very kind.’
    ‘Have you still got my number?’
    ‘Yes,’ I said, but I’d hesitated for a fraction of a second before saying it and he’d whipped a business card out of his pocket and handed it over to me. ‘I’ll see you soon, then,’ he said. ‘Ring me. Yes?’
    He was walking backwards through the car park, which was a stupid idea – someone hooted at him and he jumped out of the way of a 4x4 on the desperate hunt for a parking space.
    Despite the misery of the last few hours, seeing him had done the unthinkable – it had cheered me up. But, in those moments after he left, I felt more alone than I had ever done before. There were people all around me, cars driving past, but I was completely and utterly alone. I felt fear, and then a wave of sorrow followed it.
I have no one
, I thought.
No purpose, nobody to take care of or strive to protect. I have nothing left
.

Colin
     
     
    After the orgasm last night, I didn’t sleep well.
    Waking in the early hours in a state of agitation, I ran a warm bath and found myself wondering whether Mr Thomas Stearns Eliot caused, or contributed to, my own fascination with the subject of death and transformation, or whether my interest goes back to my father’s death. Or maybe further back still.
    Sitting back in the bath, eyes closed, attempting to relax, I recited the first two verses of ‘Whispers of Immortality’, lingering over the words, tasting them. I am still thinking of them now, hours later.
    Sex and death, I think, so inextricably bound together. Dead limbs, lusts and luxuries. Sex, desire, decomposition. And such erotic words, so smooth on the tongue: ‘tightening its lusts’… ‘clings’… ‘breastless’… ‘lipless’… So perfect, so obvious, so beautiful. I think of Janice, who also inspired me to travel down this path… think of her buried (even though she was cremated, I imagine her interred), lovelier in her time of decay than she ever was breathing.

Annabel
     
     
    On the way home I went to Mum’s house. Force of habit almost diverted me to the supermarket on the way but there was no need for any of that any more, was there? I sat in the car outside for a little while. The house already looked empty. I wondered who had turned all the lights off after the ambulance had left with my mother.
    Well, this wasn’t achieving anything, and I had so much to do. The front garden looked neglected – when did that happen? – the weeds growing through the cracks in the cement path, the grass of the tiny front lawn high enough to be growing in unsightly tufts. I would have to bring the lawnmower over and cut it back before the winter really set in, especially if I was going to have to sell the house.
    I mentally added it to the rapidly growing to-do list.
    The house was warm, which I hadn’t been expecting. But of course, the heating was still set to come on at the usual time. I should turn it off. But then maybe the pipes would freeze if it got unexpectedly cold. That reminded me about the freezer – I should empty it and turn it off, defrost it. And the fridge. I should turn off all the electrical appliances, in fact, because they were all just wasting money now. Maybe I should turn the electricity off at the mains? And the