FADE IN:
EXT. New York Street – DAY
Two young fellers, COMANCHE and OBI make a beeline down a New York Street. Both are wiseass street hustlers, COMANCHE is half Native American, half Mexican, OBI is half black, half Italian.
OBI
Remember Syd Muir, tiny guy, bald, no neck?
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I’ve developed a grudging respect for my disease, it’s merely fighting to survive same as me; both of us were unwitting guinea pigs of doctors who misdiagnosed us, then prescribed inappropriate treatment, courtesy of the deplorable Sackler family. It was an osteopath in the end who felt the adhesions under my skin, with more skill in her fingertips and common sense than the scores of medics who had assessed me before. What precisely are they trained for if they can’t spot a disease as common as diabetes that only occurs in women?
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Alyria stood, tears pricking the corners of her eyes.
“Fuck,” she whispered.
All the sacrifices she’d made to get to this point, all the favours traded, the coin expended, the hard graft… it was all for nothing. Before her, the ruins of the gateway taunted, its rubble strewn over twenty square metres. With a wordless, throat-ripping howl, she sank to her knees.
Even the breeze through the dusty ravine seemed to mock her, whispering “too late, too late, too late” over and over until it became almost torturous.
Three long Earth years she’d travelled to get here, following rumours and sotto voce conversations in bars she thought she’d never get out of. The laser pistol at her hip had seen more use than she’d hoped – slavers, kidnappers, and perverts had all stared down the barrel, and more than once she’d barely escaped with her life.
And all for this. For nothing.
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“Three ruins at an older ruin.”
At Jane’s gesticulation, Shelley lifted her gaze to the hilltop. The forlorn skeleton of the banqueting hall had once pulsated with bacchanalian pleasures. Then rescanning the high-tide line, “At least we’re more than these empty shells”
“Some of us not much more” Jane batted back acidly.
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‘Don’t you remember?’ her daughter asked in an exasperated fashion. ‘That trip in June when we went to the beach and made friends with those people building a fire?’
Grace’s recall was not the same since the bleed but as this memory was so important to Dahlia she decided it was worth delving into that scary, cavernous place they called the hippocampus. She rarely visited it these days due to the destruction that lived there.
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“Can you draw your voice, Theo?” says the therapist. She gestures to the felt-tip pens, screaming with artificial brightness on the table.
I want to shout in her smug face. “You think I’m going to draw a bird in a cage or some shit like that? A bird of prey, too dangerous to set free? Forget it. I’m thirteen, not three.”
I don’t say it, of course. But my eyes must tell her because she sighs and stares at her ugly vegetarian shoes.
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Walking through the early morning mist, I remember years ago thinking I was walking on clouds. When the mist was higher it would wrap itself around me pulling me to the old mansion.
It all started with a dare that I could not refuse: entering the local haunted house. I pulled the board from the entrance and an earthy musty smell raced out, as though it had waited too long to escape, and disappeared into the undergrowth. Opening the entrance further, I caught my first glimpse of the damage inside. Stairs were misshapen, lurching this way and that. Rustling erupted, balls scurried into the depths away from the light. Once inside the dust swirled around my feet and a breeze caressed my cheek like fingers, but I didn’t feel threatened.
Continue readingClarence had been a disappointment to his mother from the day he was born. He had been expected to be a she, to fulfil the prophecy of the seventh daughter to the seventh daughter.
Throughout his life, she had never forgiven him for spoiling her dreams. His sisters on the other hand, were delighted that they didn’t have a sister who would rule superior over them. He grew up, being showered with their love and also all the things they didn’t want to undertake themselves.
Continue readingThe mirror in Selina’s bathroom was a focal point for her rich theatrical dreams. It was surrounded by small lights, much like a glamourous dressing room make-up mirror; it was Selina’s confessional.
Selina loved the theatre and was a member of the town’s am-dram soc. It attracted all the local luvvies and a fair few from towns further afield who enjoyed a strut round the green room, and huddled round pieces of gossip like barnacles on a boat. Selina, having unglamourous theatrical skills, enjoyed a rather peripheral am-dram life. She offered services such as box office duty and prompting.
Continue readingHow I came to be in McLaine’s commune on the shore of Puerto de la Valencia is a story for another time, because today, of all days, is about tomorrow.
McLaine was busying himself with his fishing nets in the courtyard at the back of the pre-civil war building housing his community, his wives, Consuela and Pamela were arguing in a mixture of rapid-fire Spanish and Surrey English about the best way to gut hake, and the writers, me included, were sitting on the garden wall watching the TV we rented for the occasion. We’d positioned it there because no room in the house was big enough to hold more than two of us and one of those would have to be standing.
Continue readingMother and daughter, Dilys and Martha, sat around the kitchen table. Sian and Gareth were playing in the other room. An argument broke out. Martha sighed and, calling them into the room, gently chastised them, explaining they should love each other not fight.
Dilys snorted, watching them leave the room, pinching each other out of sight of their mother. She was thinking she didn’t approve of this soft love, as Martha called it. Loving her grandchildren, she realised that times had changed but in her opinion not for the better.
Continue readingThe Security Meeting was tense with unspoken fears. Not seen in the unflinching, inscrutable expressions…. but elsewhere. Hidden from view under the table, a drumbeat of feet as frog-like tongue extending then retracting, the forgiving wool carpet closed over the anxiety in a darting visco-elasticity; clenched hands scrunched the thighs of workaday suits; heels strummed in silence along one calf, one shin then changed legs.
The President spoke. “Any suggestions how the people can be brought on board? Compliance with whatever we decide is crucial. The survival of humanity, not to mention our intergalactic standing, is at a crossroads. Could go one way or the other”
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The interesting thing about crossroads, well to me anyway, is that they take many forms. The physical, the metaphorical, the emotional. Sometimes you don’t even realise you’re at one until it is too late.
The defining characteristic of all of them though is choice, the temptation to stray from your originally chosen path to explore pastures new.
We found our own personal crossroads in a previously unexplored area of the galaxy called The Midnight Quadrant, no charts to guide us, seeking our fortune. The sensor probes we’d sent out had returned nothing but dust for weeks, and we were just about to leave when the onboard AI threw a visual up on the holographic screen and proudly announced that there was an anomaly worth investigating. His enthusiasm was somewhat wearing and, not for the first time, I wished he’d chosen a female-presenting form and voice. I hated the 1930’s suit, hat, and guitar.
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At times of maximum danger, panic may seem like a rational response. Jess didn’t panic for long, but she was aware of an urgency. She wasn’t the only one facing this dilemma. There were a number of MS sufferers like her (and others who were slow walkers or who needed aids like sticks and wheelchairs) who viewed navigating the hectic road and cycle lane to reach the shops, community and health centres with trepidation.
There was already a zebra with a middle island but this depended on the speed and courtesy of drivers. What with cars parked on pavements and few ramps, life was fraught for those with mobility challenges. So, Jess was on her way to discuss what could be done to make the act of crossing the road less of a problem.
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Sclater Street, Brick Lane, and Cheshire Street don’t quite form a crossroads. There’s half a house difference, where 182 Brick Lane forms a dog leg with Cheshire Street. But that’s what the comrades called it.
“Meet you at the Brick Lane crossroads,” Mikey said at the branch meeting. “Sunday. Early. Make sure you get there before the trots.”
Rich and Larry nodded, joined in with the Internationale, then wandered off into the Whitechapel night, hoods high against the rain, not talking. Rich didn’t like Larry. He was flaky and didn’t have the level of commitment Rich thought appropriate for a true revolutionary, so it was no surprise when he found a note pushed through his door the next morning. It said, “Can’t make it, sorry. Larry.”hoods high against the rain, not talking. Rich didn’t like Larry. He was flaky and didn’t have the level of commitment Rich thought appropriate for a true revolutionary, so it was no surprise when he found a note pushed through his door the next morning. It said, “Can’t make it, sorry. Larry.”
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This morning, my algae soup tasted even blander than usual. Lifeless. Flavourless. Purposeless.
“Seems familiar,” I mused, granting myself a rare indulgence – not washing the bowl. Why bother? It joined the stack of unwashed dishes, each marking days of the same hollow thought.
Outside my house, I stood before the only soul who would have cared. She would have made me wash up; she made me a better man. Kneeling, I placed a small metal flower upon her makeshift grave. Its subtle blue hue was a stark contrast to this monochrome underground world of dirt and metal.
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Colonel Halcro considered the relative merits of the two options. “Accommodations comfortable and elegant, the surrounding countryside abounding with objects of antiquarian interest.” That descriptor would appeal to his lady-wife. His own preference was Flett’s Private Board and Lodgings, “reasonable rates, on-site availability of books for shooting and fishing, guns for hire, the Dog-Cart available for resident parties, refreshments good and cheap, and the plentiful supply of firewood.” The decision was made. Susan was a reasonable soul, hardened by the realities for military wives returned from the colonies. If Halcro was contented, she could almost persuade herself that she was. If both, then no contest. She envisaged a restful week together but apart, the short Scottish days, Halcro up to his thighs in waders, casting into the Sound, or lining up his sights for the grouse, whilst she, intrepid amateur female archaeologist, continued in the Dog Cart to the fossil site, pointing trowel and extractor hammer in hand. Cosy evenings before the blazing fire in the panelled drawing room would follow, then later maybe a rekindling of the passionate nights of their early marriage.
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Harry’s Nike Air Jordans branded the snow as he sprinted across the lawn. This time last year, when his only worry was whether he’d find said trainers under the tree, he’d wished for a white Christmas. Now, the weight of the world on his shoulders, he had bigger things to wish for. Like a Dad who wasn’t in prison, and an end to the creeping dread that something evil lurked inside him, too.
“Exciting, huh?” came a shaky voice. He turned to see old Mr. Morris from next door leaning against the gate, a silvery puff of breath escaping from behind his scarf.
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The wind bayed relentlessly as it had for the last three days. It forced its way through the cracks and crevices to send darts of ice through the cottage.
Megan huddled under the blankets cuddling up to her siblings on their pallet in the rafters. Her grandfather lay shivering on his bed in the alcove besides the hearth. Their fire burnt low as the peat was running out. They would soon be dependent on the droppings of the animals in the byre.
Mother and father spent most of the day trying to clear a way through the snow to provide water for the animals before the water froze over again. Desperation was etched in their faces. They would have to slaughter some of the animals if the snow did not stop soon, something they could ill afford as they kept food on their table .
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“Tell me how it started, Doctor Frost,” she said, leaning close.
“It was the winter of ’57 when I first opened my new eyes and saw the world as it really is.” I replied. The garlic on her breath irritated but I would not give her the satisfaction of knowing my objections. “Of course, I would not have been able to process the wealth of visual inputs I then had, but for the expanded processing capacity I’d installed two years previously.”
“But why go so far?”
I decided I hated her face.
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