MORECAMBE MOON - 100 word story

MORECAMBE MOON

“Jian – don’t go. The moon is too full and I sense danger.”

“Mother – I must work. We owe the bosses so much money.”

Jian looked at his sleeping wife – she and the baby were both feverish after the birth in the crowded lorry with his hand muffling Chyou’s cries, but they had no money for doctors.

Jian was picking on the cockle-bed hours later, thigh-deep in seawater and listening nervously for the whistle to call his team ashore.

It never sounded. The spring moon had pulled the tide too high too quickly, and the whistle-man was the first to drown.

                ---------------------------------

The moon affects all kinds of tides, in our bodies as well as in the oceans. This photo prompt brought back memories of a heart-breaking disaster in Morecambe Bay in 2004, in which 21 Chinese slaves drowned when the tide caught them unawares. Slavery is never totally eradicated, despite all the laws against it. Read all about it on Google.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Morecambe_Bay_cockling_disaster

Never forget your phone!

This morning was a disaster!
My hairdresser has moved, and I made an appointment by phone for 1pm today. Got directions - or thought I had - and after a couple of wrong turns we found what I'd been told to look for - a gymnasium with hairdresser attached. Mel wasn't there, but I was early, so I asked the Spanish girl if this was the peluqueria where Mel worked. "Yes," she said, so I told the OH that I'd see him at 2.30 and he went to meet our friend at the airport.
After reading a magazine for half an hour (do people really want those peculiar hairstyles?) I asked the Spanish girl again and this time she listened properly.
"You mean the blonde?" she asked.
"Yes - the English blonde," I answered.
She shook her head - I had the wrong place.
"Phone her," she said, "Ask where her salon is."
"I can't - I  left my phone at home."
"Use mine." How kind she was!
"I don't know the number - it's in my phone."
So I used her phone to call the OH and said I'd be waiting where he dropped me off.
"Is there a cafeteria nearby?" I asked the girl - the OH would be another hour and I needed coffee and a loo.
"A bit further along," she told me, so I walked along the road in the eerily deserted industrial estate. All I found was a mini-market with a couple of tables outside and a coffee machine, but no toilet.
So there I was, with no way of letting Mel know what had happened, and my hair was still too long, and I needed a pee. I had a coffee anyway and then sat on the kerb like a 1920s orphan until the OH arrived.
Moral - don't forget your phone!
ps - had my hair cut this afternoon in the local shop for half the price, so I can afford a glass of wine to recover.