Second Life - By Kayla Smith writing as Mia Haven

Written By: Kayla Smith writing as Mia Haven

Category: Short Story

Competition: Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026

In the captivating short story "Second Life," Kayla Smith, writing as Mia Haven, navigates the intricacies of life's transitions and the beauty found within endings. As a participant in the esteemed Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026, Smith presents a narrative that artfully captures the melancholy and hope inherent in embracing change. Through "Second Life," readers are invited to reflect on the significance of second chances and the emotional landscapes that accompany life's inevitable transformations.

About the Work

"Second Life" offers readers a deeply introspective journey through the protagonist's perspective on life, change, and acceptance. The narrative is imbued with a poignant sense of realism, as it delicately balances themes of loss and renewal. Mia Haven's literary style is both evocative and reflective, employing vivid imagery and a gentle, yet steadfast, tone. The story's emotional depth invites readers to ponder the inevitability of change and the quiet strength required to embrace new beginnings.

Second Life

Original Submission by Kayla Smith writing as Mia Haven

Second Life

By Mia Haven

People think I’m morbid because I exclusively wear black sweaters and speak quietly in situations where everyone else loses control of their vocal cords alongside their emotional stability. And I get it – there’s a certain poetry to assuming the soft-spoken girl in a dark hoodie must spend her evenings whispering to ghosts or alphabetising her existential dread. And with a name like Jada, how could I be anything but jaded.

But honestly? I just like sweaters. And black goes with everything.

Running errands and get invited to lunch? My sweater matches the restaurant vibe check. Grocery trips turn into an impromptu backyard braai? It’s okay, my black hoodie fits the occasion. Full day shift merges into drinks at the bar? No outfit change required.

A black t-shirt could pull the same weight, sure, but then my arms would get cold. And when I say cold, I mean I shiver at the concept of a breeze. If the weather app so much as hints at a ‘light wind,’ my body reacts like I’m trekking across the Arctic.

But try explaining all that when you’re also the kind of person who can feel a goodbye long before anyone says it.

Not through any psychic visions or some tragic soundtrack of violin music. I’m not special. I’d just watched enough things end to recognise the shape they make as they leave. The way someone’s eyes stop meeting yours. The way a room grows heavy, like your presence no longer fits the space it used to occupy.

It’s not prophecy. I’m not making astrology charts on Sunday nights.

I simply notice ending.

They arrive quietly. They settle in. They hum – low and persistent – on a frequency most people don’t tune into.

As a kid, it got me into more trouble than it was worth.

The goldfish incident is a prime example.

In grade three, my friend Melissa got a goldfish for her birthday. At first, Bubbles was energetic. Darting around his tank like he had somewhere important to be. But over the weekends, I watched him change.

He stopped darting.

Then he stopped swimming straight.

He started drifting sideways, like he’d lost a bet with gravity. The water grew muggy with uneaten flakes. Every time Melissa walked past, she’d feed him again. She was generous to a fault. Or more accurately, generous to the point of aquatic manslaughter.

The pump wheezed constantly. A tired, rattling sound, begging to be unplugged and allowed to rest in peace.

To me, the signs were obvious.

To Melissa? Apparently, they were a threat.

“Have you noticed Bubbles is swimming really weird?” I asked one afternoon. “He might be… you know. Nearing the end of his little fish life.”

I meant it gently.

She screamed as if I had accused her of something criminal. Told her mother I’d cursed her. Her mother called my mother. By the end of the day, our friendship was over.

Bubbles died the following week.

By high school, I had learned the first major rule of my life:

People don’t like hearing about endings.

Not before they happen.

Not while they’re unfolding.

Even when I’m right.

Especially when I’m right.

I dated someone once.

Her name was Cindy.

Sweet girl. Soft voice, soft sweaters, soft heart. The kind of person who smelled faintly of vanilla and freshly baked bread.

We lasted six months. Which, in all fairness, is basically a lifetime in hight school.

The beginning was lovely.

The middle was decent.

Then the signs arrived. Subtle at first, then increasingly impossible to ignore. Like neon arrows flashing this way.

First: her texts.

Cindy hated excessive punctuation. She believed exclamation marks were emotional crutches. But suddenly her messages were full of them.

Can’t make it today!!!

So sorry Jada!!!

Will explain soon!!!

Three exclamation marks isn’t enthusiasm. Its panic, dressed up as cheerfulness.

Second: She began cancelling plans with excuses so flimsy a teaspoon could shred them.

“My aunt is visiting,” she’d say.

I’d met her only aunt several times. She lived in our neighbourhood, and was not the type who required multi-day visits. She was the kind of person who popped in with coffee and chatted for an hour before carrying on with her day.

Third: Her laugh changed.

Cindy’s laugh was warm and full. But in those last weeks it thinned out. Became an outline instead of a sound. A memory of a laugh rather than the thing itself.

But the real giveaway?

She posted an inspirational message on her status.

The only people who use inspirational messages are people trying to convince themselves of something.

So when I saw “Sometimes letting go is the strongest thing you can do,” I knew this was the week.

And it was.

She broke up with me after maths on Thursday. Tried not to cry. I handed her the pack of tissues I’d been carrying since Tuesday.

She stared at them. Then at me. “How did you know?

“Your exclamation points gave you away,” I told her.

And that was when she started screaming.

“If you knew this was going to happen, why didn’t you try fix things. Why didn’t you try change. Why did you just watch me suffer and fall apart like some morbid sadist.”

But she didn’t understand.

When I see an ending clearly, it isn’t approaching anymore. It’s already arrived. People just haven’t turned around to face it yet. But I’m the kind of person who gets a death sentence and spends my remaining days living instead of fighting.

By the time I was in my twenties, I’d become, well, careful. Quiet. A professional at emotional tidying. I learned not to tell people what I saw.

I let them run their race. Even when I could already see the finish line rushing towards them.

Which is probably why I ended up working in a shop called Second Life.

The universe has a sense of humour. A dry one. I respect that.

Second Life is a thrift store tucked between a laundromat with perpetually broken machines and a bakery that burns everything except its reputation. Inside, the air smells like dust, burnt sugar, and second chances. The sign above the door alternates between reading ‘S COND LIFE’ and ‘SECOND LI E’, depending on the weather and the mood of the adhesive.

The entire centre has been hovering on the edge of existence as long as I’ve known it. But I applied for the job anyway because the listing said ‘quiet, patient individual preferred.’

I felt it the day I walked in for my interview.

Not fear or urgency. Just the low hum beneath the flickering lights and mismatched furniture. The feeling you get when something is still standing but on borrowed time.

I ignored it.

I needed the job.

Also, the employees got a discount.

Working there suited me in a strange, perfect way. It settled into my life like a cat deciding my lap was acceptable seating.

Second Life was full of people’s memories. Mugs that had been loved until they weren’t. Scarves discarded with the change of fashion. Jewellery abandoned after break-ups. Lamps that had witnessed more family drama than Egoli or 7de Laan. Everything on the shelves had survived an ending and were waiting for a new beginning,

Rudi, my co-worker, was my opposite in every possible way.

Loud where I was quiet. Enthusiastic where I was realistic. He believed most problems could be solved with positivity and a good attitude. He was a blast of sunshine that my sweater-wearing soul was not emotionally prepared for.

Sometimes I suspected the job listing existed purely to prevent our boss from ending up with two Rudi’s.

But he was kind.

“If enthusiasm was a sport,” I once told him, “You’d cause injuries.”

He took it as a compliment.

We fell into an easy rhythm. I sorted donations with reverence and ceremony. Rudi greeted every customer like they were family. I admired his spirit. And his ability to talk non-stop without passing out.

Which meant we worked in peace.

***

One morning, I drove up to the centre with my usual cautious optimism. The day felt strange, like the universe had forgotten to smooth out a wrinkle. The laundromat’s sign flickered, dimming against the sunlight as if it didn’t quite belong there anymore.

“This is not an omen,” I tell myself, circling past my usual parking.

I end up further down than normal and walk back to inspect the plastic cone sprawled dramatically across the bay. Burnt croissant crumbs dust the cone and the ground around it – the bakery’s unmistakable signature. The laundromat sign gives one last attempt to shine before giving up entirely.

I pause.

My cautious optimism fleeing into the arms of its suspicious bigger sister: pessimism.

A shriek echoes over from the park next door. A boisterous little boy is chasing a pigeon with the kind of chaotic confidence only small children (and possibly Rudi) possess. The pigeon escapes easily, jumping underneath the bench at the edge of the playground. The one that creaks like an elderly man with too many opinions every time someone sat down.

Today, it was crooked. One leg has sunk into the soil, quietly opting out of participating in society.

The bench bothers me.

Things don’t tilt for no reason.

Things don’t tilt without something pushing them.

And the hum of the centre buzzed louder than usual. It was as if someone had turned the volume from ‘background ambience’ to ‘mildly concerning.’

Still, the park was full of noise. Kids playing on the merry-go-round. Swings squeaking. Loud. Chaotic. Unapologetically alive. Nothing says ‘the world is still spinning’ like a toddler’s unburdened shrieks.

Inside, Second Life greets me with its usual blend of dust, nostalgia, and the kind of decay that almost feels affectionate.

Rudi arrived a little while later, whistling some upbeat tune that comforts me a little bit more. He dumps a bag of donations onto the sorting table with all the grace of a man whose happiness consistently arrives before his coordination.

“The other day,” I say, pulling on my sorting gloves, “someone brought in a box labelled HIS STUFF in aggressive kokhi.”

“That bad, huh?”

“The handwriting alone told me the breakup was fresh. Probably sparked by some combination of unwashed dishes and emotional unavailability.”

“Poor fella,” Rudi sighs.

I reach into the bag, lifting out a chipped mug shaped like a fox.

“Oh,” I breathe, cradling it carefully. “You were loved way too hard.”

Rudi looks up mid snuggle. “You talk to objects more than people.”

“Well, maybe if society didn’t treat the little guy like a disposable plot twist, then they wouldn’t keep ending up in my hands to be rescued.”

“You’re weird,” he snorts.

“Aw, thank you.”

It was true. But someone has to appreciate the tiny funerals objects go through in order to arrive here. Someone has to acknowledge the future grief of an owner who, on a bad day months from now, will reach for this beautiful fox mug, only to remember it’s gone forever.

I place the mug tenderly on a shelf, patting its little ceramic head.

“Not all endings are the end of our story,” I whisper to it.

Rudi stares at me like I’d just offered counselling to a cheese grater.

Whatever.

We all grieve differently.

The day never fully settled down. Not horror-movie strange, just off, like the background music was playing slightly too loudly to hear the dialogue properly.

Around one, I stepped into the back alley of the centre to empty the bins.

I expect the familiar soundtrack of mundane dysfunction. The dryers roaring like a dragon with asthma, the bakery timer shrieking for attention, traffic rushing past, the echoes of children laughing in the park.

Instead, the alley was quiet.

Suspiciously so.

The laundromat door sits propped open, but all three dryers are silent. Their clocks blinking 00:00 in panic. Mrs Pillay – the laundromat owner – stands just inside the doorway, staring at their betrayal.

“You okay?” I ask gently.

“This morning the sign died,” she replies, pressing a hand to her forehead. “Now all three machines have stopped. At the same time.”

Her voice cracked on the last few words.

I felt it then. The ripple spreading.

The universe is moving pawns on its chess board and is waiting to see if I noticed.

I always notice.

“I’m sorry,” I say, because it’s inappropriate to say your situation is just a part of a slow-moving existential collapse.

She sighs. “It’s okay, Beti. What can I do? Maybe it’s time to move on.” Then she waves me off and went rummaging for her emergency incense sticks. She believes lavender smoke could uncurse electrical appliances.

I admire her optimism.

“Everything okay?” Rudi calls out from behind the counter.

“The laundromat died.”

“It does that every other week.” He replies. “Those machines are ancient. They probably remember the birth of electricity.”

“This was different. It died-died. All three machines at once. And the sign out front.”

He considers for a moment, before shrugging. “Coincidence.”

My eyebrows lift. “Have you ever known this place to do coincidence?”

He doesn’t answer.

I pull on my gloves again, ready to tackle more donations. But there wasn’t more. The work sat finished, awkwardly premature.

My attention drifts towards the street outside.

Something cracked today.

A small thing.

A hairline fracture.

But even hairline fractures leak.

***

The park closed on a Thursday.

Not with ceremony. Not with outrage. Just quietly. The way things do when no one wants to admit they’re finished.

I notice, of course.

The pigeons that gather near the sealed gate in entitled little clumps, wings twitching, waiting for children who are never coming. The swings hang perfectly still, seats tilted, abandoned mid-thought.

Some has looped a heavy chain through the gate and fastened it with a padlock so new it still looks proud of itself.

A laminated notice has been zip-tied to the fence.

PARK CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.

I hate that phrase. Further notice is a lie people tell so they can keep breathing normal. It’s a maybe offered in place of a no. A promise made by people who don’t want to say goodbye yet.

Inside the store, Rudi is reorganising a shelf that has already been reorganised twice this week. He did that when he was anxious. He moved things with care, as if the universe might take the hint and rearrange itself too.

“They closed the park,” I announce.

He doesn’t look up. “Temporarily.”

I lean against the counter and wait.

“Probably maintenance,” he rambles on. “Or budget stuff. Councils love pretending things are on purpose.”

I watch him for a moment longer. The careful optimism. The effort it takes.

“Rudi,” I say gently, “parks don’t get padlocked for maintenance. They get construction crews.”

He laughs, sharp and quick. A laugh that thinks it can outrun bad thoughts if it moves fast enough. “You’re reading into it again.”

I was always reading into it. Into crooked benches. Flickering lights. The way the centre hums differently when no one is paying attention to it. I didn’t mean to do it. It was just like noticing an itch coming from your shirt when you’re hours away from being able to go home and change. Once you feel it, it becomes all you can feel.

I can’t ignore endings.

“It’ll reopen,” Rudi blurts suddenly. “Everything is fine.”

That’s my cue to stop arguing, to not push at his fear.

The day dragged after that. No customers. No one. The bell above the door stayed silent as if it had taken a vow. We drank too much tea. We dusted shelves that didn’t need it. At one point, Rudi suggested rearranging the books by colour instead of genre, then apologised immediately, like he’d insulted a religion.

Outside, the park sat empty behind its chains. Even the pigeons eventually gave up and scattered. The centre’s lights stuttered, just once – not enough to fail, just enough to warn.

I find myself straightening the counter near the door. Clearing a space to lay out the selection I keep aside for our usual Thursday lady.

She would come in just after lunch, always looking slightly apologetic, and bought spoons. Not sets. Just one or two at a time. She said she like how they felt in her hand. I started keeping the nicer ones aside for her.

I didn’t have a big selection today. Some of them were worn thin from decades of stirring.

I lined them up anyway.

She never came.

Endings weren’t cruel. They were just honest.

And honesty like that was rarely welcome.

Not until there was no one left to pretend for.

***

The next morning, the park is still closed.

Rudi is leaning against the counter, arms folded, staring out the door at the closed park like it might blink first.

“I was thinking,” he says, too casually, “if the park traffic dips for a bit, we could do more window displays. Maybe brighten things up. People always notice a fresh display.”

I don’t look up from the mismatched mug display I’m setting up. I don’t respond immediately. Instead, I place the little fox mug on the shelf, angling it so that its little ceramic head catches the morning light through the window. I touch it lightly, as if tracing the edges of someone else’s grief. The story it carries seeps out through the chips in its glazing.

“People aren’t coming,” I say softly, keeping my voice low and steady. “Not because the display isn’t interesting.”

He doesn’t look at me. “Well, maybe they’ll notice anyway. Maybe we just need something new and eye-catching.”

I sigh quietly and straighten another mug. Aligning them with a precision that only matters to me.

“Rudi, you’re trying to fix a problem by making it attractive. That won’t change the fact that we’re in a dead corner of the world. I’m sure Sally and Sue from the bakery are going to love the new display.”

He frowns. “I’m not fixing it. I’m… responding. Being proactive.”

“Proactive is when the problem is something you can control. This isn’t something you can control.” I tap the fox mug lightly, “Sometimes people don’t show up. Traffic dies down. Things close. Do you think this little guy stopped being loved? He’s still adorable. He’s attractive. But he’s sitting on our shelves because his previous home is not home anymore.”

Rudi pushes off from the counter, pacing. “So, we just sit here and do nothing?” His hands wringing together and his frustration grows. “But we can try, right? Surely there’s a way.”

I tilt my head, letting the silence settle between us. “We do what we can. We keep the shelves in order. We make sure what’s here is respected. And we wait. That’s all we have for now.”

He groans and drops onto the stool behind the counter.

“You’re impossible.”

“Maybe,” I agree. Lifting the next mug and setting it precisely in line.

Rudi stays silent the rest of the morning. Frozen behind the counter. No more rearranging.

I finish the mugs and move on to lining up the next shelf.

By mid-afternoon, the quiet has pressed in harder than ever. Rudi hasn’t moved from his perch behind the counter. Staring at the park as if willing it to come back to life.

I’m finished reorganising the shelves. Every chipped edge, every lost memory now lined up in neat rows.

I hover by the shelf with the fox mug, sunlight basking it in a halo of hope.

“I’m going out for a bit,” I say suddenly.

Rudi blinks out of his stupor. “Leaving?”

I shrug. “Just… to clear my head.”

“You sure? The display –?”

“I’ve done what I can here. Everything else is out of our hands.”

“Fine.” He mumbles. Leaning his head on his arms and resuming his vigil over the closed park gates.

I step out into the afternoon sunlight. Pulling up my hoodie sleeves, the sunlight sends warming tingles up my arms as I drive to the small print shop a few blocks away. I have an idea. A little silly perhaps, but it feels necessary. Something to warm the soul the way the sun was warming my skin. Something very un-Jada.

When I return a few hours later, Rudi is still holding his watch. I walk in quietly, fetch the tape from the supply closet and head back to the display window, unrolling the posted I just printed.

It isn’t much. Just some bright coloured letters that spell out:

SECOND LIFE: WHERE EVERYTHING HAS A STORY!

I tape it to the window with shaky hands, feeling a strange pulse of… pride? Possibility?

When I step back, for a moment, the shop feels different. Alive. And grateful.

Rudi rounds the counter and comes outside. Stopping short at the view. “You… made that?’

Pulling my sleeves down, I sigh. “It’s not much, but, figured it couldn’t make things worse…”

He smiles. The first smile today. “It’s actually kind of brilliant.”

And I want to believe him.

I want to feel it in the bean of sunlight that hits the sign, the faint reflection of the fox mug in the glass.

I want to hope that this little act matters.

For a while, it does.

The shop feels warmer. Not physically – the air-conditioning still wheezes like it resents being alive – but emotionally. It feels like the store has released a breath it’s been holding for too long.

Rudi stands beside me, hands on his hips, admiring the sign like it was a small miracle we’d coaxed into existence with tape and stubbornness.

“See?” he says. “That’s all it needed. A little effort.”

I don’t argue. I don’t point out that effort and outcomes aren’t the same thing. I just let the moment sit, fragile and unexamined.

The next morning when I arrive the centre seems at peace. Mrs Pillay has the laundromat door open, the bakery is not polluting the air with burnt pastries. I park in my usual spot outside the store.

Rudi is busy rearranging the front table again. Not compulsively, but with intention. He’s brought over a knitted blanket and some of the mugs and cutlery to create a little picnic display. It screams hope.

“You okay with this one being in the centre?” he asks, pointing to the fox mug.

I study the display, looking at his little chipped ear surrounded by the cosy blanked. Then nod my consent. “Yeah. He’s earned the view.”

The bell above the door stays silent all morning, but somehow it bothers me less now. The shop feels present, aware of itself, like it’s standing a little straighter, even if no one was watching.

Around noon, someone slows down outside. Just one person. A woman walking past, eating a pastry from next door. She stops, tilts her head while peeping at the main display.

Rudi freezes.

We both hold our breaths like idiots.

She smiles. A small one. Then takes another bite of her pie and keeps walking. Crumbs falling to floor behind her.

Rudi exhales, laughing softly. “Okay, but still, that counts.”

“It does,” I say, surprising myself with how easy the words come.

The park stays quiet. Closed, chained, patient. But it doesn’t feel as hostile.

We eat lunch behind the counter, legs dangling off our stools, swinging with the carefree joy of freedom. Rudi talks about nonsense all day. His aunts dog, a documentary he fell asleep to last night, a plan he once had to open a food truck that only sold soup. I listened. Actually listened, not just measuring the hum in the walls.

For once, I wasn’t listening for the crack.

When the afternoon light shifts, it catches the sign again. The letters glowing softly. Not with triumph, but just letting the world know that they were there.

“Look at that,” Rudi states proudly. “Feels like we did something good today.”

I swallow.

“Yeah,” I say, “It was a good day.”

And for the rest of the afternoon, I let myself believe it.

When Rudi asks to go grab a beer after work, I don’t have the urge to run home and hide. So I go. We laugh. I stay for a few beers.

And the whole time, some reckless, newly softened part of me kept thinking.

Maybe, just maybe, this is how things start to turn.

Or how they convince you they will.

***

The construction crew arrives just after ten on Monday.

I noticed because the morning had been dragging, as Mondays do, the world resenting having to start again. This particular day heavy with the residue of a weekend that had almost felt like hope.

And because Rudi’s optimistic picnic display started to rattle. Not dramatically. Not enough to fall. Just a low, irritated shiver through the shelves, like the shop itself had flinched.

I reach out, automatically steadying the fox mug. Two fingers pressed against its chipped rim until the vibration passes.

Outside, a machine has taken up residence where the bench used to be.

A yellow cab with darkened glass, its telescopic arm folded in on itself like a resting limb. It was large in the way things are when they don’t need to be polite about it.

A crew of men got to work. Hard hats and reflective vests surveying the site. One leaned against a truck sipping an energy drink entirely unbothered that he’s standing exactly where toddlers used to sip on their juice boxes.

Rudi hasn’t noticed yet.

He’s behind the counter, counting change that doesn’t need counting. Lips moving silently as he tallies the same numbers twice. Numbers that haven’t changed since Thursday,

I don’t say anything.

Neither does the shop.

We give him a few more minutes.

Then the machine wakes up. A low mechanical growl of life.

Rudi looks up. “What was that?”

“Probably nothing,” I counter.

He comes to the window anyway. Standing next to me, squinting at the crew.

“Oh!” he exclaims after a moment, “So they are doing something.”

The arm of the machine lifts, extends. Pauses. Drops.

“CLANG.”

Metal screams against metal – a sharp ugly sound that cuts straight through the glass. The swings are lifted clean out of the ground, legs dangling uselessly, seats jerking in the air like they’d been surprised mid thought. They’re then carried over and set down on the waiting truck without ceremony.

Rudi leans closer, excitement sparking.

“See? Maintenance.”

I don’t respond.

The slide goes next. Then the merry-go-round.

A flock of pigeons burst into the air, indignant, flapping away from the chaos.

Rudi nods, as if confirming a theory for himself. “They’re probably putting in something new. You know. Safer. More modern.”

“Maybe.”

I’m not lying. I’m just not contributing my own tainted thoughts.

Not asking when last a random municipal park had been renovated just to make it more modern.

The shop begins its hum again. That low electrical sound I’ve learnt to listen for. The kind that means things are functioning out of obligation, not enthusiasm. The air-conditioner coughed once, then settled back into its familiar wheeze.

Outside, the machines keep working.

At exactly one-fifty-two that afternoon, everything goes quiet.

Not gently or gracefully.

A bang tears through the air. The lights cut out mid-flicker. The hum dies. The air-con gives one final offended rattle and surrenders. The bell above the door releases a thin, apologetic ding, unsure what role it is meant to play in the chaos.

Then we are standing in the dark, the silence loud enough to lean against.

Rudi blinks against the change.

“Did… did the power just go?”

“Looks like it.”

Outside, the machines have stalled. Someone swears. Another voice answers back. The yellow arm is frozen mid-air, caught in the act.

Rudi laughs reflexively. “Of course.”

I take out my phone and switch on the torch. The beam catches on dust motes startled into the air. The shop looks different like this. Less curated. More honest.

“This happens,” he says quickly. “All the time. They probably hit a cable. Eskom will – “

He stops. Starts again. “Well. Someone will fix it.”

“I’ll put a sign on the door,” I offer.

“What sign?”

“The one that says we’re open but invisible.”

He doesn’t laugh.

I tape a handwritten NO POWER – BACK SOON note to the glass. It feels important to keep up the ritual. To let the world know we are still technically here, even if we’ve been unplugged.

Behind me, Rudi paces.

“I should call the owner. We need to find out about the generator. The bakery has one, I think. It’s been a while since we needed it.”

“You call,” I tell him, “I’ll hold down the fort.”

“The fort,” he echoes, looking around. “Yeah. Great.”

Outside, the park loses another piece.

The fox mug catches my eye in the window’s reflection. Its little face warped by glass and shadows. Brave and stupid and chipped. Still smiling in the eerie torch lit scene.

Rudi’s voice rises through the store, too loud, too cheerful.

“Hi, yes, hello sir. It’s Rudi from Second Life – yes hi! We’ve lost power and I just wanted to check –“

I turn away from the window.

In the dark, the shop smells different. Older. Dustier. Like it has finally exhaled a breath of truth that it usually keeps to itself. I trace the shelves with my light. Nothing has shifted. Nothing has broken. Everything is still waiting exactly as it had been.

“You can’t?” Rudi’s voice drops. “Right. No, I understand. Of course.”

He hangs up.

“Boss can’t help right now.”

“That’s okay,” I reply. “We’ll manage.”

“He says we should lock up and head home. He’ll come by in the morning.”

“Alright,” I say, already gathering my stuff. “Want to grab a beer?”

He looks at me then. Really looks. As if he expects me to say something heavier. Something truer.

Outside, the machine powers down again. Silence fills the air in a way that only true silence can. Peaceful. And terrifying. And unfamiliar.

I adjust the fox mug one last time, angling it towards the shaft of light coming through the window.

“See?” I point towards it. “Still standing.”

Rudi nods and together we leave.

For now, that’s enough.

***

The park is no longer just closed.

It has been claimed.

A metal barricade runs along the fence, cold and unapologetic. The kind used when discussion is no longer on the table. A fresh sign has been bolted to it.

NEW HOME OF BRIGHTSTONE DEVELOPMENTS

Luxury Living Coming Soon

Luxury, apparently, is what happens after swings are torn out by their roots.

I park and sit in my car longer than usual. Watch a plastic bag drift across the empty space where children would kick balls too hard and scream and laugh without permission.

I take a breath, Then another. Then get out.

The laundromat is closed.

A neatly printed sign taped inside the door:

CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE

I stop in front of it.

Further notice.

Last week, Mrs Pillay still believed in incense and small interventions. Today, the machines are dark behind the glass, their round doors staring back like unblinking eyes. The sign isn’t an apology. It’s a pause stretched thin enough to pass for hope.

I nod to myself.

Right.

Inside Second Life, the air is still. No hum. No wheeze. Just quiet, settled calmly where sound used to be.

Rudi is already there, perched on his stooled behind the counter. Jacket on, hands wrapped around a takeaway coffee like it was doing emotional labour. He looks up when the bell rings.

“You saw it,” he says. Not a question.

“The park,” I reply. “Yeah. Hard to miss.”

He exhales. “They work fast.”

“That they do.”

I don’t add anything else. Today isn’t for commentary. Today is for containment.

I flick on my phone torch and move through the shop, checking the fridge where we keep our lunch and other foods. The milk has turned. And there’s a random cup of yoghurt that’s halfway to being something philosophical.

I start sorting.

“Hey,” Rudi says, watching me dump things into the bin. “We could probably save some of that.”

“Probably,” I agree. “But probably isn’t great with dairy.”

He winces. “Fair.”

I work methodically. Calm hands and decisive moves. No rush. This is familiar territory. The quiet competence in the midst of other people’s panic. The store doesn’t need optimism right now. It needs someone to decide what stays and what goes.

When I am done, I pass Rudi a packet of biscuits from the stash of save items. He takes them without comment.

“Thanks,” he mutters.

Then, softer, “Thanks.”

We sit like that for a while. Eating dry biscuits in the dark. Listening to nothing.

The bakery next door stays closed. No clatter. Not burnt sugar. The absence of smell is louder than anything they’d ever produced.

“Maybe they’re just late,” Rudi says, unconvincingly.

“There’s no point in them coming in when there’s no power and they can’t bake,” I say, because today isn’t a maybe day.

The morning drifts on. A woman walks by, glances at the barricades and keeps going. A delivery tuck slows, then speeds up again. The world adjusts its routine around us with impressive efficiency.

“You’re very calm,” Rudi says suddenly.

“I’m holding the storm,” I reply.

He blinks. “Is that a thing?”

“It is today.”

He smiles. Small. Tired. Grateful.

Just after noon, a familiar car pulls into the centre.

Rudi straightens immediately.

I watch the owner step out and walk over. Expression set carefully. Practiced.

The quiet in the store shifts. Tightens.

The owner doesn’t sit.

That’s the first sign.

Instead, he stands just inside the door, keys still in his hand.

“I’ll get straight to it,” he says.

Rudi nods too quickly. “Yeah. Sure. Of course.”

I stay where I am. One hand resting on the counter. The other still slightly dusted with biscuit crumbs.

“The centre has been sold.”

Silence.

Rudi lets out a small, startled sound. “Okay. And?”

“And Brightstone Developments will be taking over the entire block.”

He speaks like he’s listing facts. Clean. Polished. Final.

Rudi blinks again. “Right, but, that’s the park. The apartments. We heard about that.”

“Yes,” the owner says. “And this centre as well.”

He finally looks at me then. Just for a moment. Like he already knows I won’t ask him to repeat it.

I nod in acknowledgement.

The store seems to lean in. The walls tilting towards me.

The boss nods back.

Rudi’s smile doesn’t drop. It slips – twitching away from his face.

“So this is, like, a temporary closure? During construction? Or are we moving. If it’s just during construction, we can do a pop-up store, or try attending some markets. We could rebrand. I’ve got ideas –“

The owner waves him down. Taking a step deeper into the store.

“Rudi. Rudi. I’m sorry. But we’re closing down, we have until the end of the month to be out, I’m sorry.”

That is it.

No cushion. No further notice.

Thirty days. A responsible amount of time to end something. Long enough to pack. Short enough to prevent negotiation.

Rudi turns to me. Searching.

“You knew,” he says. Not accusing. Just, realising. “You felt this.”

“I suspected,” I say.

He shakes his head. “No. No, it can’t be. We just put up the sign. People noticed. That woman the other day. She stopped.”

“She kept walking.”

The words land between us. Solid and unavoidable.

“That still counts,” he pleas.

The owner clears his throat. “Anyway, I don’t have long to stay. I’ll email the paperwork. The councillor says the power should be restored by tomorrow. Can I leave you to manage things here?” He locks eyes with me again.

I nod.

“Right. Well then. That’s all.”

The bell rings once as he leaves.

Rudi stares out the door. Watching the car disappear past the barricades, Past the promise of luxury where laughter used to live.

“We can rebrand,” he says again.

“To what?” I throw back, “Third Life?”

He turns to me then.

“They can’t just erase us! This place matters.”

“It mattered,” I correct softly. Because it did. “And it will matter again. This store will be reborn as someone’s home. And that will matter in a whole different way.”

“Why do you do that?” he demands, walking towards me. “Why do you always say things like that. Like its mercy? Like it’s a kindness just to accept the death of things!”

“Because pretending doesn’t keep anything alive. It just delays the pain.”

“So what?” he snaps. “We just roll over? We pack up and say thanks for the memories?”

“No. We pack up and say thank you to them.” I gesture around the store. The shelves. The objects. The fox mug, still steady in the sunlight.

Dragging a hand through his hair, he lets out a harsh breath. “You talk like this is a funeral.”

“It is.”

“For a shop.”

“For a life. For a place that held memories when people were done with them.”

He slumps against the counter. The fight draining out of him in uneven waves. I reach out and touch his arm.

“Funerals aren’t for the dead.” I say. “They’re for the living. They’re a reflection on what is gone, a respect owed, before life moves on. Before the story changes direction.”

We stand there in silence for a while. My phone’s torch flickers out.

“I hate that you’re right,” he mutters.

“I know.”

Outside, a truck reverses. The beep-beep of progress filling the air.

“Thirty days,” I state. “That’s enough time to do this properly.”

Rudi gulps.

“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, okay.”

He doesn’t believe it yet.

But the ending has arrived.

And this time, there is no pretending it hasn’t.

***

The last day doesn’t feel special when it arrives.

It isn’t marked on the calendar with anything dramatic. Not circling or underlining. It just shows up like every other day has – quietly, unapologetic, already decided.

We come in early.

The centre is hollow in a way that feels deliberate now. The bakery windows are dark, their signage gone. The laundromat is locked, the machines removed. Its CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE sign curls at the edges like it has grown tired of pretending.

The park is gone. Where swings had once been is now a flattened scar of earth and tyre tracks.

I park in my usual spot.

Habit is stubborn like that.

Second Life smells different. Less dust, more cardboard. The shelves are bare now, everything packed and stacked neatly, waiting for the movers. We are sending it all to storage. What happens after that is no longer ours to decide.

Rudi arrives ten minutes after me.

He doesn’t whistle.

He nods once when he sees me, before setting down his bag carefully, in case sound itself might break something.

“Morning,” he whispers.

“Morning.”

We work without much talking. There is nothing left to sort. Just the final rituals. Checking the boxes and waiting.

The movers come at nine. Everything is loaded with quiet efficiency. Every now and then, Rudi pauses, looking around like he is trying to memorise the room from the inside out.

I let him.

At lunchtime, we sit on the floor with packed sandwiches. Our backs against the wall, surrounded by empty space. No ceremony, just hunger,

“You remember that woman who came in every Thursday?” Rudi asks suddenly. “The one who only bought teaspoons?”

I smile. “She said forks felt aggressive.”

He snorts softly. “Yeah. I liked her.”

We trade small memories like that until the owner arrives to collect the keys.

When he arrives, he shakes Rudi’s hand before giving me a sharp nod, and thanks us for our hard work. He says something about references and future opportunities. The kind of sentences that sound useful but don’t actually do anything.

We lock the door one last time. Hand over our keys, and watch him leave.

We stay looking at the shop for a moment longer.

“I kept thinking,” Rudi says quietly, “that if I tried hard enough, this wouldn’t happen.”

I don’t answer right away, but then say, “Trying hard doesn’t stop endings. It just changes how you walk through them.”

He nods. Once. Like that landed somewhere important.

“You taking him?” he asks. Nodding at the reflection of the little fox mug peeking out from my bag. It’s chipped ear catching the afternoon light the same way it had on the first day. Brave, a little ridiculous, and smiling.

Rudi picks it up, turning the mug in his hands. “Good. He deserves a decent home.”

“So do you,” I say.

He looks at me fully then. No denial left. Just tired gratitude.

“I hated you a little,” he admits, “When you were always so honest.”

I smile faintly.

“But,” he continues, “if you’d let me believe longer, it would have hurt worse.”

I nod. Not having any words left to say.

He holds out the mug to me.

“You were right. It did finish.”

“Yes,” I say, taking my mug.

I look at the darkened shop one last time. In the glass, my reflection stares back. A girl in a black sweater, tired eyes, fox mug clutched in her hands.

“That doesn’t mean it didn’t matter.”

Rudi smiles.

And so do I. Real, fragile, and earned.

We walk away from the store together.

Two people stepping out of an ending that had been bigger than us.

Fox mug sitting in my palms.

Ready,

For its second life.

About the Competition

The Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026, hosted by Hashtag Kalakar, is a prestigious platform celebrating literary excellence worldwide. This competition fosters creativity and innovation, providing a stage for writers and poets to showcase their talents. The event draws participants from diverse backgrounds, uniting them in a shared passion for the written word. Through such initiatives, Hashtag Kalakar continues to promote the transformative power of literature and the arts.

We extend our heartfelt thanks to Kayla Smith for her poignant short story, "Second Life," submitted under the pen name Mia Haven. Your participation in the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026 enriches the literary landscape and reminds us of the profound beauty in life's transitions. Thank you for sharing your narrative with us and contributing to the world of creative writing.

About Hashtag Kalakar

Hashtag Kalakar is a creative platform dedicated to providing artists, writers, singers and other creative talents with opportunities to showcase their work and reach wider audiences through competitions, features and creative initiatives.