It's Still Life

Dead Men Don’t Drown: #3

Episode #3

The charity van arrives just after ten, driven by a narrow man with a nose sharp enough to open letters and eyes that know the profitable function of grief before I have finished carrying the boxes to the gate.

He lifts the flaps and peers inside at the resale value of grief: the crockery, linen, books, chipped ornaments, and all the small useful survivals of a life, rubbing his hands together as if warmth might be found in other people’s leavings.

“Bread for the hungry, this lot,” he says, hoarse with approval, then looks past me to the windowsill where the Staffordshire earthenware spaniels sit facing the harbour.

“Those as well, eh?”

“No,” I say, so quickly the word leaves my mouth before I know why I have chosen it, and when he bends to lift the nearest box I snatch back a white porcelain pill box with one brass hinge and three pink roses my grandmother painted on the lid.

He shrugs, takes the rest, and drives away with half the house rattling in the back of his van, while I stand at the gate holding something too small to explain.

Written for Denise’s Six Sentence Story including the word “Function”.  Some images created with Midjourney; all writing is authentically my own original work.©Misky 2006-2026.