In the afternoons a warm wind blew in with the storks as they rose up from the banks of the river and flew inland. On the porch, rocking back and forth, she liked to turn her face towards the current of air and inhale memories:  cardamom from her mother’s kitchen, line-dried linen on her first lover’s bed, the warm straw of her babies’ heads as she laid them down to sleep.

She closed her eyes and the shadows of the storks passed over her face and she was still, the only movement, the chair rocking in the afternoon breeze.

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This is a Friday Fictioneers 100-word (exactly again this week!) story inspired by the picture supplied by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. Friday Fictioneers is organised and run by the wonderful Rochelle. Click here to join in, and here to read other pieces. I’d love to know what you think of mine – please leave a comment!

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It’s just two weeks until my novel, Our Endless Numbered Days, is published in the UK by Fig Tree Penguin. And until early tomorrow morning (12th February) Goodreads have five copies to giveaway to UK residents. Click here to enter. Canadians have until 14th February to enter to win (click here). Sorry if you live somewhere else!