Gone With the Wind Gods

Date: 12/10/2025

The wind gods seem to have a personal vendetta against me today. Not a mild irritation — an actual blood feud. I can barely keep my feet on the ground. One mighty gust and I’ll be whisked off to some random destination like a discount Mary Poppins. I’m gripping my pull-along trolley like my life depends on it. “People will be getting their post today!” I shout into the gale, though the wind steals my words and hurls them back at me. I plod on — one precarious, wind-battered step after the other — while the wind lashes my cheeks raw and my hair whips back and forth like Willow Smith circa 2011. “Thank you for my parcel,” a man says, swiping a packet right out of my trolley and sprinting off. Oh. Hell. No. Not today, Mr. I charge after him, propelled mostly by righteous fury and gale-force pressure up my backside. “You can’t just steal parcels, sir!” I shout. “And you can’t take pictures of me and never send them!” “What are you talking about?” “The nudes, Amanda.” Oh perfect. Another oddball. Another eccentric soul drawn to my softness, my vulnerability, my inability to tell people to just piss off. “I took no such thing,” I say — stern, defensive. But then — A flicker. A flash. How could I forget? The cowboy. A studio. Lights. A backdrop. And him — standing there in full cowboy gear. And I mean full: Cowboy boots, hat, belt buckle the size of a satellite dish. Chaps. The whole shebang. Like Clint Eastwood meets budget calendar model. Suggestive hip pops. Leaning against the backdrop like he owned the place. At one point, he put his finger in his mouth and sucked it. Like he was auditioning for Cowboy Vogue… kink edition. No actual nudity, thank god — his bits stayed firmly in his chaps. I had every intention of emailing him the not-nudes… until I looked at them. Oh lord. They were hideous. Unusable. A genuine crime against photography. Every shot was a distorted nightmare. Too many teeth. Cross-eyed. Blinking in half the shots. Full blur in the others. I dragged them straight to the recycling bin icon. The digital crunch was almost spiritual. “The nudes?” he repeats. “They must’ve gone to your junk mail,” I lie. “Check when you get home.” He droops, utterly deflated. Poor sod. So desperate for his cowboy-not-nudes it’s almost tragic. A gust blows so strong it practically rips the scene apart. I’m at a picnic. Triangular sandwiches, crisps — the whole gingham blanket romance. We’re fully committed. Just me, Mat… and Rachel, my manager. Like an awkward spare part nobody invited. Although judging by Mat’s relentless flirting, maybe someone did. Rachel’s cheeks burn the same colour as the tomato I’m biting into. He’s embarrassing himself now. She’s clearly not interested. “I’m so sorry,” I whisper to her. “He’s… going through things. Not quite in his right mind.” She smiles politely. Her eyes scream otherwise. Then the bomb drops: “Shit! I was meant to pick Maxi up from school.” My blasted, traitorous memory. Rachel’s eyes lock onto mine: “Please don’t leave me with this weirdo,” they whisper — no sound, just sheer desperation. I panic, gathering myself up and apologising profusely before fleeing the scene — uneasy about abandoning my dismal flirt of a husband with my visibly shaken manager. The picnic blanket folds. The scene collapses. I’m peeling garish pink paint off a wall with a young woman I’ve never met… yet somehow feel I’ve known my whole life. She looks both familiar and not — a memory half-remembered. We peel the paint with our bare hands, flakes gathering under our nails, bonding over being only children — apparently a rare breed. We pick and chat, chat and pick until the wall is a crisp, beautiful white. “We did a great job,” I say, smiling. Her face drops. “It’s not over. We have to repaint it.” She lifts a tin of the garish pink. The exact same shade we just peeled off. My brain screams into its meninges and the scene crumbles like old paint. The black beast has returned. That wretched black fur ball of terror is devouring Monkey’s dinner again. “Get out!” I yell. He looks up, narrows his eyes, and continues eating. Son of a bitch. I shoo him out with a broom up his backside. “Get out, you bastard cat!” He vanishes. Only to return seconds later. Scrounging. As always. A bottomless pit stealing everyone else’s dinners. Monkey sees him. Their eyes meet. A tense duel. The Black beast snarls, baring his sharp white teeth. Monkey’s tail puffs up like a feather duster and he bolts for the door. The wide-open door. The door I forgot to close. Again. I chase after him, yelling “Monkey, Monkey!” down the street like a lunatic, passersby giving me a wide berth. He darts over walls, under cars, and dissolves into shadow. I lose him entirely. Then — A yowl. My heart drops. “Monkey?” I whisper. But when I turn… He’s there. Standing in the doorway like nothing had happened. Tail upright. Perfectly calm. “Good boy, Monkey,” I sigh, scratching behinds his ears. He struts inside as if I was the one who ran off. And that’s when I see them. Photographs. Trailing up the stairs. One by one. Like breadcrumbs for the memory-impaired. I pick the first one up. It’s blurred — smudged shapes that feel like half-remembered moments slipping between my fingers. Another. Still blurred. Still beyond recognition. I climb the stairs cautiously. At the top is a wall. I stop dead. The garish pink wall. Pinned across it — Are nudes. Of me. Vulnerable. Exposed. Raw. And I have no memory of ever taking them. A sudden gust of wind blasts through the house. I whirl around. The front door is wide open again. Of course it is. I turn back to the wall — But it’s gone blank. Pure white. Not a single trace left behind. Monkey rubs against my legs, purring softly. And I ponder: Ephemeral as the wind, memory bends and warps… and only when it clears does the madness reveal itself.