Betty, married almost fifty years and tired, stares at the spiral made on the beach from rocks and shells. She’d seen two women on the beach last night – had they made this? Taking her annual holiday at the beach with her husband, she doesn’t know yet, but the spiral, symbol of regeneration and transformation, is going to make itself felt in her life. The tide is turning...
I've read all of Kate's short stories and novellas. This short story (free, by the way) came from Kate's desire to write a story which spoke to being alive and being a woman. It left me in tears, sighing and breathing in rhythm with the sound of the waves on the seashore, and holding the sound of the sea in my mind's inner ear.