Sarah Salway
Associate Editor Molly Reid: This one-sentence story is not a gimmick, and it is not sorry. An honest, almost-cruel moment opens out into wonder and uncertainty. Read this one out loud and let it take your breath away—and then do yourself a favor, and listen to Sarah read it.
To hear Sarah read the story, click below:
Not Sorry
He is so much smaller than her that she gets embarrassed, wondering if from behind he looks like her child, a hunched-up boy in adult clothes like some kind of war refugee, and if so, when he kisses her, will strangers gasp, hurry past so they can see her from the front, and he does kiss her often because it makes him smile to stand on tiptoe, to reach up and take her by the shoulders that are so much wider than his own, and though in anyone else, her reluctance to meet his lips would be cruel, it seems to make him more determined, although she’s never told him about the child thing, or how once, when she saw their shared reflection in the glass, he looked like a little wizened monkey climbing up her great stout oak of a tree, and how she would have pushed him off straight away but he stopped kissing her suddenly, bent down to wipe the dust off the tips of his black leather shoes, such small shoes, and she stood still, looking at the reflection, just her now, alone, the moon making a perfect halo around her head, and her lips were tingling so much that in the window she saw her hand come up and touch them, her tingling lips, her fingertips smoothing her mouth like applying a salve, searching in vain for the one spot, any spot, he’d missed.
Sarah Salway has published three novels, one book of short stories and two poetry collections. Her work has appeared widely including on railings, in financial newspapers, plant pots, literary magazines, and on national radio. Her latest novel is Getting the Picture. She lives in Kent in the UK and works with writing and well-being. Follow her on Twitter @sarahsalway.
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