Martha looked at her reflection, hardly recognizing the old
woman who looked back. The eyes were
hers, but they were hooded, crumpled at the corners and had a weariness she
resented. All those potions and pots of
miracle cream hadn't worked, not as she'd hoped anyway. Most people said she looked fabulous for 56
years but not in her own eyes.
Her cheeks were still smooth and barely drawn down by
gravity at all. Her neck was slim,
showing no sign of an extra chin. Martha
hated the phrase ‘double chin’ and had been determined never to have one. The skin was a little sun-worn, particularly
closer to her chest. She rued not
discovered SPF-infused moisturizer years sooner.
Martha raised her hands to her face, placing one near each
eye. Her hands showed her age more than
her face, creped and spotted. She hated
them, hid them from view whenever she could.
Now she pulled at the skin around her eyes, lifting it outwards,
tightening the wrinkles and altering the shape of her eyelids.
Some of her friends were proud of their lines and lumps,
attributing them to a life well lived and charting the progress they had made
in raising a family. Tomorrow Martha
would book into a clinic in an anonymous London street and submit to the knife
that would remove proof of what she had lived through, leaving hardly any
evidence at all.
Inspired by “Plans to remove ‘Granny Flat’ council
tax”
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