Tales of Disturbance

Dishes

There is no moon tonight. Through the kitchen window, the garden is dark and still. There is only her reflection staring back, the surface like black water. 

She hasn't bothered closing the blind, even though she is crying and somebody might see. 

She stares at her face blotched and puffy. She looks terrible. 

There are so many dishes, she doesn't know what she is going to do. The disbelief when she opened the envelope was overwhelming. It was like rejection from a lover - only worse. 3 years of no life at all. 3 years of the Library and slogging her guts out for this. There must be some mistake. There could still be some mistake, she thinks. But she knows she is kidding herself. 

Dish water spills over on to her thin green jumper waking her from her daydream; it is warm, but there is too much of it. The wet is uncomfortable, rough on her skin. 

She keeps on assaulting the dishes with a cleaning sponge anyway, and more water slops out around her and on to the floor. Something is blocking the sink-hole. Tomato sauce has formed a an orange scum on the surface; gaps reveal bits of something else, maybe chopped peppers and further food particles are illicitly swimming around. She hates touching it at all, the water. It is swamp like. Sinister now. She runs the tap over the remaining dishes to rinse off the soap. She can't drain it, because that would involve putting her hand in. 

This morning she received a 2.2 from Oxford. 

She doesn't want to die – but she is not quite sure how much she wants to live either. 

It's been very hard on social media. Her friends, it turns out were always sharp and clever in a way she could never be.  

'Oh man. Can't believe it. Best news ever. I got a first!'

'Double first. (And a wad of cash because of a bet with a mate. Does it get any better than this?)' 

'2.1 but happy with that'

'2.1 Gets me on to my masters anyway.'

She picks up a plastic ladle and fishes through the opaque water for the stopper.