I used to think it was funny when Bobby called my arrangements a bunch of severed heads. It’s not so funny now, when he’s thirty six, leader of an ultra-vegan revolution that’s just taken the country by storm, and I’m the severed head on what used to be my coffee table.

All he’s ever seen is a handful of plants that have been cruelly ripped apart, life-force left to drain through open wounds and stew in the pot of stagnant water in which they’re left and forgotten, a flash of brief colour in the corner of an eye. If they’re lucky, nobody ever changes the water and they die with blessed haste. A more attentive recipient only prolongs the agony with their selfish care. That’s what he tells me on his rare visits to the couch. I’m sure he’s there other times too, on the threshold of the kitchen, looking at the back of the shrivelled stump that is all that’s left of my body, mocking my limitations. I can’t turn any more. The view’s gotten pretty boring these past two months. I should have gone with patterned wallpaper.

But when he’s there, or when I think he is, I tell him things too. Bobby doesn’t care that the flowers fed him, clothed him, bought him toys on birthdays and Christmasses. And he doesn’t seem to care that this, the home in which he was always welcome and the home which is now all his, the fridge and the toaster and blankets and sheets and cavity wall insulation, all of it was paid for with blood money. Or sap money, I suppose. So why doesn’t he burn it all down like he did with his mother and sisters, and go and live under a big leaf in a rainforest somewhere and not cause anything any harm?

That’s the bit I really can’t stand. The short-sightedness of his vision. I brew my thoughts, bide my time and wait for the perfect moment to strike. Then it comes.

It’s a Saturday night, I think. The days all meld into one when the only thing you’ve got to do is try and blot out the pain. Flowers don’t feel pain, I’ve told Bobby many a time. That’s the difference. And then he launches into a manufactured rant about the nature of conscience and the planet as an organism and so on, and I pretend to listen, if only to waste his time. If he’s lecturing me, he can’t be pulling down a supermarket or ordering another execution. I’m doing the best work I can from a vase.

But anyway, it’s a Saturday night, and the cabinet are all round celebrating the rounding up of the final florists. They’re crowding the couches in a wasteland of bottles and polystyrene trays, watching their work on the party channel on my forty inch flatscreen. They ignore me the first few times. Then Bobby, more attuned perhaps to my paper whistle of a voice, relents. “What, Dad?”

“I said, Mister Prime Minister, what’s in those boxes?” I try to roll my eyes in the direction of their meal, but the replacement blood burns the capillaries when I move, and it gives my vision a hazy blue glow. I might have missed, but Bobby gets the message.

He stands up, swishing his blue cape like an actor. The cabinet scrabble to stand too, but Bobby waves them down. Then, he leers closer. I smell garlic and beer on his breath. “This is the most ethical food ever known by man,” he slurs. “The mycoprotein made artificially in vats, never knowing the pain of extraction. The wheat and peppers, ethically maintained with the richest compost ever created by science, living out the longest life possible. All stamped with the Blue Seal of the revolution, mandatory on all farms come April. All ethical.”

I pant out the rhythmic bursts of air that have to serve for laughter, now that I don’t have lungs. “For all your overuse of the word ethical,” I wheeze, “You just don’t see it, do you? Humans need living things. Did the fungus in those vats ever consent to a lifetime of slavery? And for all that talk of happy crops dancing in the fields, they’re still getting torn away from their families and plunged through the chopper in the end. Farmers are just like those butchers you burned at the start. We’re all murderers, and it’s all we’ll ever be, because that’s how humans work. Your policies were doomed from the start.”

Bobby opens his mouth to speak, then he sits back down and watches the parade. The other men and women turn obediently too, pretending like they’ve not been listening. But I know they have. Oh yes, they have. It’s no surprise when the Minister of Productivity defects to the rebels the next day, as I gather from the reports piled by my prison shortly after. They forget severed heads can read.

Like I said, I try to do the best work I can, from a vase.

And that short conversation awakens me.

I might not have arms to lift weapons against my son, or even legs to run away. I have to admit the legs would be preferred, because opening my mouth gets me a special dose of nutrients fed into my base of tubing as punishment, the bare minimum to keep me functioning. My vision turns from shit to shite. My thoughts jumble like dreams. But I’m beyond physical, have to be now. And, like the entire bloody chaos, they haven’t thought things through. The dulling of the senses dulls the pain.

Yes, I am awakened, and I still have a mouth. After a month without a glass of beer, I’d kill for a smudge of lip balm.

With only a murmur of a TV and shadows on the excruciating off-white wall, I start talking.

I don’t know if anyone’s there, at first. And I don’t know if the ideas come from something I’ve actually read, long ago in a working world with a working body, or just a fever dream from a mind drained of blood and slowly failing from whatever inadequate thing comes up the tubes into my throbbing stump of a neck. But it doesn’t matter that what I come up with is insane; what matters is the sanity of whoever might be passing by.

Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

I babble on and on, alone, a head, a table, a couch. About tiny creeping things at the bottom of the ocean, feeding directly from the dead chemicals that leak from the core of our world. I strain to raise my voice, praising the sea spider for so simply achieving what the revolution cannot. I drone on about unseen ores on the moon, on the tops of mountains, locking in the means of survival without death. Crazy things, loose ends, visions of pure fantasy, time sinks so deep they’ll never claw their way out. And while they’re scrabbling at the bottom of the pit, the people will shovel the dirt down on their heads. I repeat the same things hundreds, thousands of times, as the sun rises and sets as fast as Bobby, five years old, flicking the lights on a school night when he should be in bed and his mother should be in my arms. My teeth crack. I’m withering away.

And someone was listening, because one day Bobby is there in front of me, even if it takes a second or two to recognise him. He looks tired, troubled, and I feel a touch of regret because he’s still my boy. I wonder briefly if someone’s been trying to hurt him, and if that’s a bad thing. Confusion.

Then he’s spinning me round and I feel a wave of vertigo, desperate to stretch out and steady myself, but I can’t and the room spins and spins until a wall of light anchors my vision. It’s the TV. My TV, and my umbrella plants on either side and dear Lord, Bobby’s mother in the frame in the corner. Spain, I remember. Before all this. Before Bobby, even. A happiness that seemed it would never end.

Someone in a suit was talking. A white pedestal, the party symbol, a guard with a machine gun off to the right. For a moment, I screw my eyes tight, as if he’s in the room pointing it at me. But he isn’t pointing at anyone. I hear words and don’t understand. Christ, I feel terrible. How long have I been here?

But I understand Bobby, as he murmurs softly in my ear, with breath I no longer feel. “I’m sorry I haven’t been to visit much, Dad. But I’ve been busy. Because you’ve been very helpful. I’m sorry I got mad the last time we were together. But you were right. We are still murderers, and you made me listen. And now you’ll see how we’re going to fix everything. It all started with those undersea vents you talked about. Just like the model we made out out tissue paper for my homework, you remember?”

I don’t remember. I hardly remember who I am, or who I was. All I keep thinking is that I’m a head. A dead head in a vase. But I remember Bobby, and I feel something inside what’s left of me, a slow-spreading happiness, I think. So he was there, and he listened. I watch as the man in the suit raises his arms. He’s saying something, explaining something, and now there’s a diagram with arrows overlaid in some horrible knock-off slide show thing. They don’t know what they’re doing. What I said could never work. Whatever I said , humans need to eat. Even ones that sit on coffee tables.

“We’re going to show everyone the errors of the human race,” Bobby goes on. “We need never hurt anything again. And as thanks for leading us, Dad, I’ve got a surprise for you. The first distillation. I’m sorry for cutting your fluids, I really am, but you know how... impulsive I can be. Of course you know. You’re my Dad.”

Does he sound desperate? Scared? I hope so. And then hate myself for thinking it.

“So I’ve got rid of everyone for tonight, even though it’s a big day for us. We’re going to watch this announcement as a family, celebrate what we’re going to achieve together. Might even pour you a beer, if the doctor says it’s okay.” A nervous tinkle of a laugh. But for me or for what’s going on out there, who knows? I still can’t see him to judge. Only the glare of the TV and whatever’s being shown to me. I don’t know any more. Don’t have the energy to think.

There’s silence from Bobby for a moment as my mind buzzes with slow static. “I’m going to get your new blood now, Dad. It’s going to make you better, and everyone will see, and everything will be perfect.” I rock back and forth sickeningly as he rises and hurries out. I just catch his last words as he goes. “... rest of the family in.”

I’m alone again. And with no voice at my ear, no stimulus to interfere, I turn my will inwards and I understand.

I’m withered. Done for. Just a severed head, ready to be tossed in the bin. Another used flower. The vase readied for another - god forbid!

And I can’t be the only thing done for. A sudden burst of clarity as I strain to steady the dizziness and concentrate. I smile, or at least I think I do, who knows if the mouth can move any more, and let out a sharp bark of laughter to myself. They actually took the bait I suddenly recall leaving them. This merry dance I’ve led them! This wild goose chase I’ve conjured! All those wasted hours of fantasy as the sensible of England rally round and prepare to strike. And when they actually show their insanity to the world, their endgame to this deadly farce, everything will be over.

Or will it?

Shadows dance about the room as something bobs at the corner of the tunnel of sight left to me. Shadows dance in my mind. Because if that liquid works... or even if it doesn’t, and they still have the strength to force it upon the people... have I done enough? Have I done right? Why did I speak? Was it to do what little I could to stop my son? Or was I just begging for my pathetic life to linger on?

Finally, the shadow solidifies. It’s in front of me now, looking up. I wince and force my eyes downwards. Max. So this is what he meant by the rest of the family. The rest are dead. The dog lives on. He’s jumping, trying to lick my face. He still knows me. I’m still Daddy.

And my eyes go everywhere then. To the cable, coiling about the foot of the cabinet. To the papers growing about the table, up the couch. Secrets, files. Party documents. I hope.

Bobby’s still gone. If I wait, let him pour whatever’s to come, then perhaps I’ll know what I’ve achieved. But I can’t know. Because what I can do is now. Now. Now.

I force my dead, choked throat into action. “M-Max. Walkies. Walkies.” Dead words from a dead head. Just a little more life. “Walkies!”

Max is whipped into frenzy. Up, up, higher. Panting, slavering, scrabbling, leaping.

“Come on, Max. Walkies. Walkies with Daddy!”

The paw reaches my stand. I jerk. I fall. And, with what can only be the last and final calories of life, I roll.

The stained liquid pools about my neck, across the carpet, all across the transformer. I stare up at the TV as the man warbles soundlessly on. And then, into a friendly, familiar face. I don’t feel anything from my plunge, but I do feel the warmth on my cheek as Max slobbers on my face. A sudden absurd stab of amusement at the hopes that this shrivelled legless lump is actually breezing off for a trip to the park.

“Good boy. Now go pee, go outside, get out!” He is a good boy. My best of boys. And as he trots off and darkness swims closer and my mind shudders to a standstill, I see the spark take hold and the flames burst into life.