Here’s a little something to give the Work Health and Safety people nightmares! Please enjoy safely!
You only needed one finger to work the furnace that burned the bodies. Of course, you didn’t want people thinking you were clumsy. Seth sat in the machine room behind the oven on his break. The funeral home had kept him on out of a sense of duty after he lost the first finger. Seth loved the crackle and roar of the flames. When he died, he wanted to be cremated. Obviously: he’d already started cremating himself. He’d expected to feel it, though he’d lopped the finger off first: a “phantom pain,” but there had been nothing. He’d told Mr Sims the furnace door had done it.
He’d almost managed to keep the second missing finger quiet, until Mrs Sims said, “Oh, I thought it was the left hand it happened to?”
He told everyone he’d been too embarrassed to admit he’d lost another one, insisted the best thing to do was to get straight back to the furnace. Like riding a horse again as soon as you’ve been thrown. Seth reckoned it must have been when he threw in the third finger, and they kept him on, that they had become complicit. As long as he had a finger he do his job, nobody would say anything.
The flames were so bright. He was sure it must hurt, but it must be wonderful, too. To be dissolved by so much power. He’d have to keep his finger, but there were other bits he didn’t need.
This Saturday is Newsletter Saturday. This month my newsletter features the exclusive short story, “The Ladybird Queen”. Don’t miss any more!
Eigentlich wollte ich eingeäschert werden.
Aber wenn das Personal infolge Missachtung des Arbeitsschutzes Finger einklemmen bzw. Verlieren kann.
Ob ich noch dazu bereit bin?