Saving Face

By N. M. Sirett ©

Saving Face

Everything is OK until the Wi-Fi drops, the electricity cuts out, and the world goes silent. That’s when they come. In the quiet and the stillness, we hide. Barricading ourselves into cupboards and tight spaces, like under the stairs if you’re lucky enough to be indoors when it happens. If outside, you might take refuge in a wheely bin, somebody’s shed or – desperate measures – sliding beneath a parked vehicle. I remind myself of a skittish mammal in dinosaur times, hiding from some Jurassic giant.  

            The Wi-Fi signal on my mobile dies. I hear a porch door slam shut. And the street mutes. Even the birds stop chirping. I am in the kitchen, so I slide into the built-in cupboard where I keep my bins. Careful not to make any sound. But, tragically, Katie next-door is hanging washing on the line. I hear her running for the patio doors. It is the only sound for miles. Until the screaming. The hideous agony of her cry when her face is shredded to bits.

            It’s over now. The Wi-Fi returns and my cooker-clock flashes red zeros. Katie’s husband, Evan, is in his garden. Cradling his wife in his arms and screaming. I won’t go out there. Peer over the fence at the neighbour with no face. All flesh and gristle and blood and skull. Her features sucked off by those reptilian mouths that cyclone down through the clouds to feed upon us.

            Nobody knows how those things discovered us, but I believe it was the scientists’ fault. Cosmic calling into deep space. ‘Come to Earth – the all-you-can-eat human buffet!’

They arrived in a flurry of clouds. The heavens are hell. It’s their sky now. They only descend to feed.

            Remember – silence saves face.