Crush by Simone Corletto

Author:Simone Corletto
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: MidnightSun Publishing

Mhairi brought two of her neighbours to retrieve him. By the time they arrived at the shoreline he was standing, a little unsteady on his legs, but able to walk with assistance. She instructed that he be taken to the nearest croft.

‘Seamus is away in Inverness,’ she said by way of explanation. As she watched the three men make their way back across the dunes she felt the weight of the calling lift.

The stranger’s leathery coat, slashed to pieces, lay nearby. She took it back to her cottage and laid it across the chair nearest the fire. Stroking it, as if to heal it, she realised it was not cowhide but seal skin. She tasted its salt. Catching sight of her bare ring-finger she drew back, resolving to return his coat and retrieve her ring the following day.

The shrill ring of the telephone startled her but she was happy to hear Seamus’s voice. It was not the news she wanted however.

‘I have to stay a bit longer. The Minister has asked to see us. I think we can secure our fishing rights if we meet him in person. Is that alright?’

He and two other islanders were at the annual crofter’s meeting. They’d been fighting to regain the right to extend the boundary of the waters they were allowed to fish. They only asked to have what their great grandfathers had once had, a right taken away during the Clearances. Seamus was their spokesperson; he was the only one who’d been to the mainland to complete his schooling. But this year Mhairi had asked him not to go.

‘It’s my time Seamus. We need to…’ She’d left the rest unsaid; he knew well enough. The doctor determined there was nothing wrong with either of them. IVF was an option but not yet. Mhairi and the local midwife had worked out her cycle and she’d marked her fertile days on the calendar that hung on the wall above the kitchen table. Seamus’s scrawled ‘Crofters Meeting’ left little room for her crosses.

Since the trip to the specialist six months ago Seamus had refused to discuss their troubles and whenever Mhairi drew him to her he’d pull away. They’d come together last month on her days but two weeks later her blood had flowed as fresh and defiant as always.

‘I’m the spokesperson Mhairi. I have to go,’ he’d insisted. ‘I promise to be here next month.’

‘Next month might be too late,’ she’d snapped back. At thirty-eight her body was running out of time but that was not what she’d meant, and he knew it. And now here he was making excuses again. She could hear the loud voices of the other men in the background. The crofter gathering was held at the castle in Inverness and there was always plenty of whiskey.

‘Are you asking me or telling me Seamus?’ she asked. ‘You know you’ll stay as long as you need to, with or without my approval.’

‘Aye, lass I will. As long as I need to but longer than I want,’ Seamus replied.

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