The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!
The Girl Below Us
by Marge Simon
She lives in the compartment below us with the potter. She is not his wife, she’s much too young for him. Many nights I hear her screams. I try to block them out. I keep to myself, as is the way of all good citizens. Last night it went on too long.
I find her naked and there is blood on the floor. Stop say her eyes. She doesn’t want my help. Something is very wrong. It is Civil Law here: Whatever you do to those in your Keep is okay as long as it is for the good of the people. That’s what they say.
“I’m all right.” She turns her head away. There are rows of stoneware on the shelves, some of them broken. Her Keeper is a craftsman. Working with clay is supposed to get rid of your aggression. She says he went to the tavern.
I hold her in the staccato hammer of my heart when I look at her. I know her from dreams that I could never share with my girlfriend. Not a one of them makes sense. But she belongs to the potter, so I don’t stay.
Fiction © Copyright Marge Simon
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com
More from Marge Simon:
Cast from Darkness
by
Cast from Darkness is another triumphant collaboration between award-winning Speculative poets, Marge Simon and Mary Turzillo.
The poetry includes themes running the spectrum of the speculative genres and forms ranging from the haiku through many nuances of vere libre to the prose poem.
Spreading the Writer's Word 
A subtly powerful story.
Thank you, Anita!
Wow! So much to unpick here – a whole, horrible world in so few words – bravo!
Thanks, Alex!