Soul Mates by Arlo Evans

Soul

By Hollie Downie

I like trying to see what people were like by looking at their graves.

Bonus points if they also have a bench.

I think it’s weird how we memorialise people after they die. It’s like we trap their souls in benches or headstones.

I feel no connection to my body; I am a literal bundle of spirit and when I die,

I don’t want to be trapped. I want everybody I’ve ever known to forget me. I don’t want to have any tethers or ties, I just want to be free.

No grave, no headstone, no bench, no loving memories. Just let me be.

Extract from The Picture of Stars

he curtains were drawn back from the T windows and pinned against the walls, letting the last of the summer sun shine through and cast scattered shade upon the ancient wooden desks. This room was nice. More than just nice, but nice. It was a rather comforting room, at least, in their opinion it was. Bookshelves lined the back wall, all the way from the floor to the excessively high ceiling (that weren’t really half as high as they felt them to be, they were just not that tall). They loved the books; some were old and the binding worn away, others newer and the rest somewhat battered, but they just thought of those ones as well-loved.

They plucked a small paperback that read ‘Orlando’ in faded font down the spine. The paper was going yellowy-brown and the pages were crinkled and dry. They let the book fall open in their hand and flicked to the first page: “He - for there could be no doubt of his sex, though the fashion of the time did something to disguise it - was in the act of slicing at the head of a Moor which swung from the rafters”.