Wanted. Crib. Last one sold prematurely.
What's this?
Dad showed me the picture of the orangutan splayed on the grass.
A monkey, I said.
It's you, he said.
Neither of us laughed.
Remember that time you asked me for a Coke and I stood at the soda machine filling it with Root Beer imagining Homer Simpson saying Mmmmm Root Beer?
Dad laughed.
I laughed.
It's silent most of the time now. I don't think to text and neither does he.
"Clung to" means everyone in the house knowing when I am there and when I am not. A friend is dropping off some cookies she made...
Laugharne - pronounced "Laaarnn" to rhyme with yarn, but rolled out a little further - at night, with the graveyard gently graced by the occasional working street light and our torches. Us searching for interesting stories told on the tombs and plaques of the interred locals, who at times had meant something to the small church community that regularly overflowed the tiny, overgrown car park. My wife spooked at times by sounds and smells of Rectory Barn farm next door. We share imaginings of ages past, whispered in chiseled words on stone. This one died young. That one, an alderman,...
Face down on the cold floor of the cathedral, Brother Fidelis whispered his prayers. Though his lips brushed the dust and filth of the stones, his eyes were angled forward, watching the door. Though he lay in front of the altar, he faced away from it.
The flat light of dawn was pushing through the open spaces where the stained glass had been, the thin, watery edge of light creeping slowly across the burned and broken pews. There were no noises yet. The day was not far enough advanced to bring them home. When the clear light rose above the...
Light.
Fuck light, right? Right.
Light just shows what I don't want to share, it takes away my CHOICE. Isn't that abusive or some such touchy-feely bullshit?
"Teacher? Light is taking away my choice!"
Yeah well, "teacher" would just tell me to STFU so...
Thing is...think is I, well, I crave it, yk? I crave it. I crave the light like I crave sugar or coffee (not caffeine - there's a difference).
Damn thing. Always seems to fling a little clarity at exactly what I've hidden so carefully away. I take care with my secrets hide them good. Keep them...
The writers club - writer's club? writers' club? - started amicably enough. Geoff (Murder Mysteries and Historical romps) had searched his family tree back to the 1500s. Seranne (interesting name. A story there...) was nervious that we'd fit round the long raised table, with laptops and notepads, etc, and threw the odd curt look at the young couple inhabiting the corner, uninvited, and unaware. Jen set to work, with numerous hand written notes, while Rachel tapped discreetly away on her duck egg blue Huddl; only the second I'd ever seen not forlornly sat on a Tesco back shelf. Non-fiction and...
He told me to sit here.
So I wait. Waiting for what? I don't know.
The suspense is killing me. Wait. No it's not. That Mountain Dew I drank is killing me...and all the other GMOs that I consume because my brain tells me I need them. That's not important right now...why am I rambling? I'm in the middle of nature, waiting for him. I should be calm and peaceful. Solitude does that to people. Most people. But not me. I can't sit still. And. Do. Nothing. Maybe that's why he told me to wait here?
He told me to...
I never realized just how high the flats in this area stood. Concrete giants standing over this urban world which I am unfortunate enough to call my home. Just last week a local boy was beaten up because of drugs, or money, or girls or whatever is the driving force behind the yobs that unfortunately for me call this area their home too.
Berkley Estate. Full of Highrises but empty of hopes, that about sums up this place.
As I continue my daily journey from work to home through the grey streets filled with grey people I am unfortunate enough...
There was only a sliver of space between the floorboards and the door under the stairs. It wasn't even really a door. To the naked eye, it appeared to only be another wall, another wasted space in the sprawling mansion. They crushed their faces to the hardwood floor, straining to see beyond the door, but they couldn't. It was just to thin.
"Let's pry it open," Jason said, pointing to one of the banister arms. It hung onto the rest of its siblings by a sliver of fragmented wood, conveniently shaped similar to a crowbar. "I'll even do it myself....
The conversation lasted two words: "Too much." Too much pain? Too much regret? Too much suffering. And who's? From twenty nine hour a day parenting to none, in the space of one brief, bitter phone call. "We don't want to live with you, Dad. We want to live with Mam, fulltime." And then a long overdue pause of a pregnancy, waiting for the response. Not sure if it would be explosive rage, reprisals and recriminations, or sad acceptance. All that came was the dialing tone. It spoke more eloquently than any words would have done. One more abandonment, in a...