I See Electric
The first time it happens is a Wednesday, before work. I’m about to straighten my hair when a neon thread crackles into life and reaches for the plug’s pins, catching me by surprise. Surprises are good.
I start leaving switches on, sweeping my toes close by sockets and feeling the surge of energy pull at my core. Everywhere I look, I see networks of bright blue veins and the walls pulsing with life. Every time I flick on the kettle or dim the lights, my temperature rises a notch and my breathing picks up its pace.
It tingles and teases, tempting me to stick my fingers in fixtures and fuseboxes. We need to connect.
The craving for bigger, better buzzes controls my mind and my body. I take to standing beneath pylons for stimulation. The air is supercharged and fizzing; ions zap my skin and the mammoth structures hum with potential.
I want the ultimate high, so I start climbing. I get up quickly, and gaze at the ruby red beacons of the city’s towers. The power lines purr in my ear tantalisingly and I reach up, thrilled and throbbing.
Sarah-Clare Conlon is a Manchester-based editor and writer, and her short short stories have been published by The Pygmy Giant, Spilt Milk, Rainy City Stories, 330 Words, Other Magazine, Bad Language and Roy Keane’s Lucky Scarf. She is the editor of flash fiction anthologies Quickies: Short Stories For Adults and FlashMob, and she proofreads for a number of authors. She organises literary events and works for Manchester Literature Festival, and she writes about the arts on her award-winning blog Words & Fixtures.
