We scramble first around seven, back, refuel, rearm. They bring us sandwiches. We scramble again, then a third. At dusk, those of us who are left stay on readiness. They want us to fly at night now we are so few. Porter nodded off in his cockpit. When I do sleep, my mind still flies.
Peter presses his wedding ring into my hand. ‘Send her this,’ he says. ‘I know I won’t be coming back.’
I visit Harry. His feet are burnt, and his hands are burnt. His nose, eyes, lips.
I watch Burrell nosedive into the waves.
We say we’re not scared, but who in England ever prayed for bad weather? We pray very hard. The sky stays blue as eternity.
I will never send you this, Ma.
Glorious weather. That’s all I can say.
Sharon Telfer’s flash fiction collection, The Map Waits, is published by Reflex Press and was longlisted for the 2022 Edgehill Short Story Prize. Her stories have won prizes including the Bath Flash Fiction Award (twice) and the Reflex Fiction Prize, and been selected for Best Small Fictions and Best Microfiction.
'Undelivered' was first published by AdHoc Fiction (2015), and reprinted in The Map Waits, Reflex Press (2021).
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