He thought everyone saw these. His first memories were of blue sparkles, twinkling at the periphery of his vision. Later in life, he described them as starbursts. Why would anyone care for fireworks, he wondered, watching his own light show intently.
‘Concentrate, Olly,’ his mum said repeatedly.
‘Concentrate, Oliver,’ Mrs Wright pleaded at school.
‘For God’s sake, look up, son!’ An angry, repugnant sibilant flying off the letter S. Son.
He knew he was their son. Named Oliver after his grandad. He’d been a big shot in the RAF, and the stories he told at tea time, of faraway places, of the planes, of the pilots, entranced Olly from a young age. His granddad choked up as he recounted the roll call of names.
That’s the life I want! A dream Olly kept to himself, never telling a soul. He did concentrate; he looked up more than ever. Now the blue sky was in his field of vision, as he imagined jets thundering past, helicopters thudding down to land and grenades shaking the ground. That will be my life.
Amy got him. Beautiful Amy and one of the few people who suited the royal blue school uniform, her jumper ironed with perfect creases, her tie the neatest of them all. Her aquamarine eyes sparkled in the sunlight as they waited in the playground for their first registration.
‘Do you see them too? The blue sparkles?’
She smiled, the smile of one being saved, of being seen.
‘Yes! Always. And you?’
Olly nodded solemnly. From that day on, the kindred spirits were never far from one another’s side, and they entered secondary school as one, existing inside their own bubble. Of blue, of course, they whispered, laughing in unison.
Here, they wore black blazers with the school’s red emblem on the pocket, but Olly and Amy took heart in their blue PE kits. It became Olly’s favourite lesson.
‘I need to be fit for service,’ he declared and Amy nodded in earnest as she saw him head off for yet another cross-country run. An endurance test that proved elusive to her, her strength waning by the years.
‘You’re like a willow, so wan and thin,’ said Olly early on in Year Ten. Their final exams were due in one month and he’d barely seen or heard from her for days, the afternoon he popped round to see Amy. Her unwashed hair hung in thin strands upon her red jumper, a blue scarf tied loosely around her neck. ‘How are you, Amy? I’ve been worried and now, seeing you, more so.’
With a puff of air and a deep sigh, Amy slid slowly down the doorframe, landing with the slightest of thuds on the doorstep.
‘They’ve gone, my sparkles. They disappeared! I’ve lost … everything.’
The blue lights of the ambulance accompanied the screaming siren, searing his soul as it pulled away from their house, with Amy inside, her Mum holding Amy’s hand, reassuring her. It was in her brain, that’s all they told him. A tumour he learned at the funeral, as around him the mutterings continued. ‘She had it for life.’ ‘How sad!’ Sad! The smallest inconsequential word for the earth-shattering loss. Olly clenched his fists.
Sitting on the church pew, Olly looked at the coffin. He refused to think of Amy in there. She was everywhere but in that box. The coffin was adorned with pink roses, purple freesias and, for God’s sake, who still sent white lilies? Where was the blue? Olly stood with the mourners and queued for the final goodbye, a farewell bouquet in his hands, the forget-me-nots a final sparkling starburst of blue.
The End
©Annika Perry, 2026
Note: Starburst image by Gerd Altmann . at https://pixabay.com/users/geralt-9301/
Forget-me-not image by Buntymum.
Annika Perry 