Published 08/05/2021 in Issue 13, The Uncanny, Haus-a-rest
The Uncanny: the theme for issue 13 of Haus-a-rest inspired me to write my prose The Manky Shirt for inclusion in their online publication. The Manky Shirt is about that uncomfortable feeling we all get when encountering abandoned clothing found on the pavement or in parks.
The Manky Shirt
Prose by Lucy Lilley
A hand me down
A forget me not
A throw away piece
Laying down there
Like a murder victim.
The creepiest piece of rubbish I ever did see.
What fleshy boned creature did once fill your fibres?
A passionate fling
In a moment of abandonment
You black jersey deformed rag
Oh once were you a gloriously oversized sweaty sweatshirt
Now thrown off your fleshy recipient as they hurl themselves onto their lover inside a Skoda or a Rover or anything metal with wheels
You manky shirt, sentenced to death
They then mindlessly reversed over you with their
dirty
muddy
sludgy wheels of neglect
Oh you were never loved
You were just worn to keep one warm
And now you’re flacid and splayed out on the sidewalk
Soaking up the drain water
Looked upon with disdain
You creepy
Manky
Shirt I ever did see
The further I walked, moments before you could become a black hole that would suck some other suckers mind into a dark and lonely place, I had thought about saving you, gagging a little as I´d picked you up with a hand encased in a placky bag from Aldi.
You’d look like a turd knotted up and taken home in a responsible fashion.
I´d sling you in the washing machine and you’d come out resurrected and redefined as
The most beautiful and stylish shirt you ever did see
Noone would know but me.
I’d lie and say i’d bought you, erase your sad beginnings or maybe even better I’d be a hero,
I´d be the only one who could love you like you had never been before
But I couldn´t, I just couldn´t!
What if you were a cloth from a murderous fool or evidence of a most hideous crime and your insidious web would entrap me and I’d become possessed?
The police would come knocking and my DNA would have already mutated into yours and that of the real criminal owner and I´d weep away my days in a cell and mutter over and over to myself..
“Damn you,, you manky piece of shit i ever did see, i wish i had never tried to save you.
You’ve destroyed my life!”
Abruptly interrupted in my moment of madness, I hear my sister call..
“Hey, slow down! Have you seen my jumper? It was tied around my waist whilst running and I can’t find it anywhere.”
Written by: Lucy Lilley
Copyright. © 2021 Lucy Jane Lilley
Thanks to the Haus Team for including me in this strange and eerie issue! Morrrrhahahaha.
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