Category Archives: June 2021 – Afterwards

After the Event

Posted on by under 2021, June 2021 - Afterwards

Just afterwards, we managed to leave the event with some aplomb, a modicum of dignity intact-or at least faked. Torn between hooting with laughter over council-man’s trifle covered shoes and lower trouser legs, and seriously thinking over the consequences of the action, we rested languidly in the warm evening light of the nearby park to consider the position.

I have known my good friend Alice for years. We’ve shared holidays and secrets as well as heartbreaks and terrible times. I’d say she’s a pretty good humoured person, except for her occasional explosive outbursts. I’m not saying she’s bad tempered, not at all, and rarely has a bad word for anyone.

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You Do What You Can

Posted on by under 2021, June 2021 - Afterwards

Morgan Ratcliffe locked the car door, opened the allotment gate wearily, and crept like a snail on Mogadon up the rise. Long Covid wasn’t going to beat him.

            Alice Rees had lent him a small part of her allotment plot to assist his recovery. She’d also lent her neighbour – he lived several doors down from her – a few long-handled tools. Ratcliffe came daily in all weathers, scratched at weeds with a rake, turned a few inches of earth with a hoe, and half an hour later limped back to his car. Occasionally Alice discreetly removed clumps of weeds and sowed a few seeds on the strip. Otherwise Ratcliffe’s labours would’ve been wholly in vain.

            Three months after starting, Ratcliffe’s health was unchanged. His walk was still laboured, his actions and thought as if made in slow motion. ‘I do what I can,’ he muttered. He was a tall, elderly man, his rugged features putting Alice in mind of a rocky steep. His cheekbones were hollowed out, his shoulders sunken, his expression as bleak as hard snow in the Brecon Beacons.

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Local Newsletter

Posted on by under 2021, June 2021 - Afterwards

Returning to office camaraderie was a major life event: arguably third after marriage and buying your first property? Edwin savoured the anticipation. Jumping the steps 2 at a time, he reached the colonnaded entrance of Mean Streets Communications; a.k.a Moan Streets Miscommunications by fellow trainee journalists.

That first regrouping was a creative recoil against 18 months of enforced house arrest and Zoom meetings. Piotr, old- school consulting editor, was in the “control” chair directing the pent-up tsunami of creativity. Fountain pen in hand, he wrote each suggested scoop-in-the-making on a physical clipboard. Retro-style reporting values he called it. Meanwhile the trainees tapped electronic devices desperate not to miss the opportunity of reporting tomorrow’s leader.

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The Conclusion

Posted on by under 2021, June 2021 - Afterwards
Hookers with fifties mother presenting a cake

I can see that I had been manipulated from the start, but what choice did I have when it was my wife doing the manipulating?

It had all started when we were driving alongside Streatham Common, on the way back from Beryl’s sister’s place.  Although it was early evening, there were already some working girls about.  I hoped that the wife wouldn’t notice them, but she had.  I saw her neck whip around as we passed one.  I was just waiting for her to pass a derisory remark.

‘Gosh, did you see that one?’

‘What, sorry love, I was concentrating on my driving’ I lied.

‘She was really pretty.”

‘What?’I thought I’d misheard.

‘That last one, she was so pretty, a bit thin though.  Didn’t we have any sandwiches left?’

            ‘Yes, there’s a few left and a spot of tea if you’re thirsty.’

            ‘Not for me, for her.’

             ‘She’s working luv, you can’t just drive up to her and offer her a sandwich.’

I was wrong, Beryl had a new mission, I had to do a U turn and head back to the common. As I stopped at the kerb, the prostitute jumped into the car. She looked startled when she saw Beryl in the rear seat.  After an awkward moment, they started chatting together like old friends.

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Black Cat

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Panther ready to pounce

Afterwards, when Maureen’s body was slumped over the table, Geoff had thought about the cat. For some reason, it was the first thing that had popped into his head. Even before the guilt had begun to wind itself around his insides like ivy.

And now, there it was again: the black cat. It had appeared every morning since she died five days ago, its yellow eyes piercing his soul through the glass. He shivered.

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Changed

Posted on by under 2021, June 2021 - Afterwards

March 2016 – Houston, Texas: Mark and Scott Kelly are identical twins, both are captains in the US Navy, and both spent time on the International Space Station. Scott spent nearly a year orbiting the Earth, returning in March 2016. On his return, they compared his DNA to his twin’s. During his flight it modified so much they were no longer considered identical twins. He had changed.

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