And finally I was alone. Away from the city and away from the constant noise.

I grew up in Fionda, one of the new towns the Government had built under their new scheme to reverse the climate crisis. I had lived in a small town on the outskirts of London prior, but as I was forced to move at just 5 years old, my memory is hazy.

In Fionda time alone was rare, expensive. Fionda is one of nearly 1...

Suffocated. Smothered. Strangled by the ever present, ever expanding crowd of people that now inhabit the growing metropolis I call home. I spend my days fenced in by an overburdened infrastructure that was not designed to sustain a populace of this magnitude. Lakeview was a small, some would say sleepy, little town that boasted a population of a little under 10,000 residents. Most recent counts s...

The rest of the day was spent deep inside her head. Everything seemed a long way away off; unreachable. Going through the motions with a fake smile so well practiced everyone thought it was real. The posters on Whitaker's wall were so true. You really could be standing next to a depressed person and never know. At work she amused herself on this one.

Sandwiches to the elderly chap on table five...

Lei runs through the bustling crowd, concealing the box under her jacket, and holding the note in her hand.

She glances at her reflection in the window of a small store, and is underwhelmed. How long have I been doing this, she thought.

Her brown eyes looked sunken, sad. Her once pale skin was the color of dirt. And her black hair now looked like an old mop. It had been a while since she had seen...

There was the constant footfall of scuffling feet, the breathfall of sour lips expectorating their hungry bile on the back of your neck or directly into your weary eyes. There was the constant vile touch of everybody rubbing against your body and mind. We had learned not to look each other in the eyes, to lower our heads, only to keep our chins down positioned on the steady movement of our feet.

...

During the third hour of my two-mile commute, I thought of a field trip to a chicken farm I took as a child. Before the Bearing, kids always used to make those random trips. Farms, factories, museums, whatever the school could spin as educational. These days, a trip like that would take weeks. I remember the farm worker opening up double metal doors, and he revealed a room of which I couldn’t see ...

Looking out the window, Michael stared down at Earth. He revelled in the weightless sensation, but it paled in comparison to being alone. It was the first time in his life, and it was glorious. He let out a loud cheer and stretching out his arms filling up the space around him. He was on his final rotation as they call it back home. To help keep the population in check, when someone gets to 60 yea...

Im worried

About trusting them with my

Words

Spilling pink contents

Onto the couch

Don’t feel around them

Don’t slip

Precious details

Don’t exert your aching bones

In their presence

Don’t

Find your grounding

Hop into a lavish green meadow

With spring posies

Pocketful

Of deceit and forthcoming knives

No safe space has to be released

Somehow.

Are you safe even in

your own Pocket? ...

Don’t touch me

I like my privacy

If I don’t know you

You won’t have that liberty

Please respect

It’s my personal space

Less than one metre

Is too close to my face

Why your hand on my waist

When you talk to me?

I’m not deaf if it stays away

Just leave me be.

Don’t come hug me

If i have just met you

I hate that invasion

I didn’t authorise you.

You say you’re being friendly

But now I ask you why?...

A carriage full of strangers,

Each going about their day,

Each one a Lone Ranger,

With no time to stop and say,

“Please” or “thank-you”,

“Excuse me, if I may,”

For as long as they see you,

You’re standing in the way.

But sitting in the corner,

You’ll see her if you look,

For she has found solitude,

With her nose in a book....