“Some friend you turned out to be,” she murmured as the cameras rolled. So many; did there have to be so many cameras? The din of the film spooling through them all was overwhelming. She couldn’t think; maybe that was the idea.
Category Archives: Short Stories
Hounded
I left him tied up outside the polling station while I went in to vote. The queue was short, but there were only two booths and a lot of slips of paper. More in hope than in expectation, I voted Labour all the way. I’m dyed-in-the-wool, I’ll never change and it almost doesn’t matter what the party does. Is that wrong?
Forever Home
Oh isn’t this nice?” said Mole, tickling round the last nested table with a duster. “All clean for Spring.”
“It’s snowing,” observed Weasel. He sipped at his tea. “It’s been snow, hail, thunder, rain… Call this Spring?”
“Yes,” said Mole, firmly. “Spring is a season of surprises. Imagine a Spring that was just one type of weather all the way through! Heavens, we’d be bored of sunshine.” Mole thought about Summer, so bright it was impossible to look out of his molehill without heavy sunglasses.
“Well, I could get used to it,” Weasel picked up a biscuit. “I enjoy sunshine. Keeps my fur dry and sleek.” Mole sighed. Weasel would never agree with him, not once. He disagreed just to be disagreeable.
“Was there are reason for your visit, Weasel?” In irritation, Mole found a pile of teatowels that he started unfolding in order to refold. “Was it just to drink tea and discuss the weather?”
“I have business in this part of the wood,” Weasel’s drawling voice was setting Mole’s teeth on edge. “It may concern you, you know. It may interest you to know that…” A noise interrupted the conversation at this point. A huge thump shook dirt from the ceiling.
“I JUST CLEANED THAT!” screamed Mole.
“Ah,” said Weasel. “I think it may have begun. Surprise!”
Just a Chicken.
I’d never intended to become a butcher. Frankly, the smell of raw meat repulsed me. I was a delicate child, and the thought of handling animal carcasses all day filled me with a kind of visceral horror. But the inertia of reality prevailed and when the time came I inherited my father’s spotless white apron, and the name “Webber and Sons” ceased to have real meaning.
HOTLINE
The phone didn’t so much ring as bleat, a shrilling electronic honking accompanied by a steady pulse of light. Emergency. Come quick. Pick up the phone. In daylight, or on a clear night, it meant as much as a night-time projection on the clouds.
A Dream of a Room
The idea of it pricks his conscience, if he has one. It certainly interests his wallet. He sinks back into the chair and pulls at a loose thread on the embroidery of the arm. He looks blankly across the room and away from the hopeful faces, shining in the lamplight. He is relaxed, unreadable. Inside he boils. A girl, the age his daughter was.
Piratical Practices
Aaaarrrr, me hearties!”
“Oo-arrr, me hearties!”
“No,” Captain Greyflash sagged, his voice returning to normal. He pinched the bridge of his nose with his left hand. “Not ‘oo-arr’. We’re pirates, not farmers.” Continue reading Piratical Practices
Stillness and movement
Everything is broken. I don’t even know how we got here. Last I knew, we were zipping together down the dirty-yellow plastic flume at the local leisure centre. Now we’re here, adrift in clear shallow water at the foot of a cloud-smocked peak in god knows what part of South America.
I’m not complaining, per se. I am wondering how we return. Did we move through time or space? Have I forgotten our journey here, or did we never make one? After the leisure centre, my mind is a blur, a scramble. A mundane last memory, but one that melds perfectly with our situation. Did we tumble from the slide into this dream?
Another day I might remember. Give me another day here, and I might forget more. I sweep my arms above my head, sending swirls of ripples across the lake. They fan out and, from high on the mountain, perhaps someone can see an angel in the water.
A Blank
“You’re drawing me again,” she said. A simple, flat statement of fact which remained unacknowledged. She continued to stare out of the window and his pencil continued to drift across the paper, settling down to create borders around the soft off-white, shaping her face.
Continue reading A Blank
Two Wheels Bad
They came overnight, and we did not notice. Not at first, no, because their brothers and sisters were already here, a discreet phalanx of unobtrusive invaders. An expeditionary force, embedded deep cover in our towns and cities. Our villages. Everywhere. Waiting for the signal.