Blinded by the Light
by Dianne Bown-Wilson
As a long-term WM subscriber Dianne Bown-Wilson has won a few prizes over the years and is delighted to see this story make the grade. She enjoys writing character-led short stories and has drafted two novels. A new collection of her prize-winning short-stories, Degrees of Exposure was published in 2021. She has a PhD in a subject unrelated to writing. Twitter: @BownWDianne
‘ Anything she says. Mummy’s voice, while always gentle, is husky from that cough. The boy look to his father, anticipating disagreement, but finds that he too is smiling, warm as melty cheese. ‘You can buy a lot with thirty pounds,’ he chuckles. ’Just make sure it’s not all sweets.’
Mummy holds out his coat, and reluctantly, he pulls it on. He ought to be euphoric; birthday money usually gets funnelled into a savings account for unfathomable ‘future needs’. But fear has obliterated excitement. All he wants now is to lose himself in building Lego castles in the safety of his room.