• The Girl Whose Ear Came Off


    In a small town near Yorkshire an indeterminate amount of time ago, there lived a girl who always aspired to be different from the other residents of the town. However, I do not mean to say that the other residents of the town possessed certain qualities that made them unsuitable role models; it was just the girl who simply disliked their honesty, their candor, and their pure simplicity. The children in the town were perfectly satisfied playing noughts-and-crosses and knucklebones on the pavement; the men concerned themselves with working in the mine or the factory to provide for their families; and the women occupied their time by sewing, cooking, and caring for the children so that they would grow up to be as virtuous and hardworking as their parents.

    But this girl, our protagonist, was simply different. The circumstances of her birth did not differ greatly from that of the other children; and her mother was a housewife and her father a miner. Despite this, she spent most of her time just looking at colourful images of glamorous figures on the computer, imagining that one day she could leave the town and live a life in the city. And it would be not be uncommon to find her wearing headphones, listening to techno music at outrageous volumes from her sleek, nicely designed music player.

    Basically, by our standards, she would be nothing more than an ordinary teenage girl. But to her peers, she was rather strange, and they stayed away from her; but she didn’t really mind because she despised the simplistic lifestyle that everyone around her led.

    It was a chilly Wednesday afternoon. The girl, walking home from school, was bundled up in designer scarves and boots and other articles of clothing that she had ordered from the internet.

    Right then, she felt a sudden vacancy at the side of her head, followed by a faint plop beside her. She looked down, and saw that her left ear had come off and was lying at her feet on the cold pavement. Beside it was a tiny suitcase made of earwax. She gave the ear a rather pained, sorrowful look, and said: “Oh dear, it appears my left ear is off.”

    As she bent down to pick it up, the ear bounced up, and with much malice and ill intent, jabbed her in the eye. She cried out and jumped back.

    “What’d you do that for?!” she whined, clutching at her eye, “I demand that you reattach yourself right now!”

    “Why should I?” said the ear, looking very indignant, “All day and every day I’m forced to put up with having to pick up that awful techno music of yours and send it to your brain for processing. I’m sick and tired of it, good madam, and I shall be bidding you farewell!”

    And the ear turned on its heel and soon disappeared into a nearby bush.

    At this, many of the girl’s appendages and extremities began to murmur among themselves.

    Upon hearing the susurration, the girl said: “The rest of you aren’t thinking of leaving me, are you?”

    “Norbert was right,” said the other ear, “You don’t treat us nicely enough. I’ll be taking my leave now. My permanent leave.”

    The girl’s right ear detached itself and walked off into the forest.

    “We’re leaving, too,” said the girl’s arms in unison, “You spend all of your time inside and never use us. We want to experience the great outdoors! We want to be used to climb the monkey bars at the playground, but all you do is type away at the keyboard of yours. Frankly, you’re a terrible employer.”

    In a moment, the girl was left armless, and the sleeves of her £100 coat hung limply at her sides.

    “We quite agree with the others,” said the legs, “It’s always go this way, and go that way! You’re quite heavy, you know, and we don’t appreciate having to carry you all day long without so much as a ‘thank you’.”

    “But you’re my legs!” cried the girl, looking rather silly indeed with no arms or ears, “Carrying me around is your job!”

    “Oh, it’s our job, is it?”

    “Yes, it is!”

    “Well, you can sod off for all we care.”

    The legs made a rather rude sign, detached themselves, and hopped away into the forest. The girl’s torso, for it was one of the only things she had left, dropped to the ground and lay there haplessly.

    “You won’t leave me, will you?”

    “I’m sorry,” said the torso.

    “What have I ever done to you?!”

    “Nothing,” it shrugged, “But it would be kind of lousy to be part of a body with no arms or legs or ears, wouldn’t it?”

    The torso shook itself violently until the girl’s head popped off, and bounced away into the distance.

    “Not my head, please,” pleaded the girl, “Not my head.”

    The head made a somewhat remorseful facial expression, and rolled away, leaving behind only a wisp of consciousness, which floated up into the sky, getting smaller and smaller, until disappearing into a point of light.

    THE END.