Fuse by Amy Mackelden

I give every phone number I have because I hope you’ll find me when I’m unfindable. Every time we shut this down, like parents preventing afterschool hangouts between bad influences, we know, or I do, that eventually there’ll be something that needs saying, urgently. Like an inspirational meme or the death of a celebrity. There’s nothing I wouldn’t tell you; I’ve inboxed all of my secrets, anyway.

Did you know, you’re dynamite? And I don’t mean destructive, because you didn’t impact on foundations or walls which weren’t rejuvenation-ready. You’re an after-effect, dynamite in the popping candy sense: unexpected, lifting a mundane moment outside the corner shop to sparkles.

I don’t break with you like Bible-study exes or hierarchy high school friends picking others, over me, for their cast off clothes. Instead, it’s a breather between box sets, the pause in the playlist, lining the next song up. The silence in the cinema when the reel stops and the audience have left and the usher’s late to screen clean. That.