Tag: #fiction

[I belong to an online writing group, and each month we write a story with a theme and a word count. This time, we were asked to write about ‘Cutting the Strings‘ in exactly 1000 words.]

Everyone has a number. What’s yours?

I know mine. We all do, of course: it’s something we’re born with, indelible, immovable, inked into our DNA. Our number is as much part of us as the frizziness of our hair, or the slope of our nose, or the way our skin burns in the sun as we’re heading Anywhere on the back of a bike, while we still can.

I could guess your number, looking at you, although there’s no guarantee I’d be anywhere close. That’s my earliest memory, in fact: trying to guess someone’s number. We’re in a circle: the light is butter-soft, my mouth full of chocolate, my dress a gauzy pink, floating out, dreamlike, when I spin.

“Seventy-seven,” I sing, “My number is seventy-seven,” and I pirouette on velvet toes. I want to spin seventy-seven times on the spot, to show everyone how long-lived and lucky I am, but after counting seventeen I stagger, disorientated, into the sofa. The room is wheeling, and Mei is watching. Mei only comes up to my shoulder.

“What’s your number?” I ask her.

Mei whispers something, like a bird.

“What?” I say, too loud, but I saw the way her lips moved; and even before the tears, I know something is very wrong.

Continue reading “What’s your number?”

[I belong to an online writing group, and each month we write a story with a theme and a word count. This time, we were asked to write about ‘The Rules‘ in exactly 1000 words.]

The sea was uneasy. I watched the sunset spill across the water and fragment into frothy shards.

Don reached over for his glass, brushed away a mosquito.

“Let’s stay here,” I whispered. “Please,” but my words melted in the heat. I slid down into the rattan chair.

A waiter appeared, barefoot. A westerner. He glanced at Don, twice.

My husband’s fingers tightened white around the glass.

Continue reading “The Rules”

The doorbell rings again, and “Hey,” I mutter, as Bodice Ripper quivers up against me.

Miss Laura comes into the bedroom holding a box.

“It’s Miss Laura’s birthday,” I remind everyone.

“I love birthdays!” cries ChickLit, shimmying on the shelf. “Happy birthday to -”

“Knock it off,” snaps Cop Thriller.

Encyclopedia clears his dusty throat, and intones: “On this day in 1888 – “

“Guys!” I hush them. We all wobble to the edge, and peer out.

Miss Laura is unwrapping –

“Another one of us!” breathes Bodice Ripper.

“Ooh!” cries ChickLit. “What genre?”

“I hope it’s fiction,” murmurs Encyclopedia.

Miss Laura holds the new book up to the light. It’s remarkably slender, with an alluring metallic sheen.

ChickLit scowls, and says, “Way too thin for a real book.”

“Very little substance,” declares Encyclopedia, puffing up his pages.

Then Miss Laura does something strange: she attaches the new book to a long white tail, and watches, intently. It glints in a most peculiar way.

“What kind of book is that?” whispers ChickLit.

Continue reading “Shelf Life”

We feel sorry for Justine because she has a – I’ll keep my voice down – boyfriend.

Mimi and I have long been Free, but Justine’s still shackled to a man. She’s tied. She’s tangled up. She is – in other words – Trapped.

“She’s late,” says Mimi. “What’s her big news, anyway? Has she seen the light?”

“About time!” I say. I was Trapped once. Last year, I spent several weeks entangled with a green-eyed guy called Sam. He kissed me up against the fridge, but left trails of laundry everywhere. When I found his dirty socks in the sink, I saw sense.

Continue reading “Trapped”

[I belong to an online writing group, and each month we write a story with a theme and a word count. This time, we were asked to write about ‘White Lies‘ in exactly 2500 words.]

I knew something wasn’t right when my mother stopped abruptly by the kiosk, clapped her hands lightly, and said, “Let’s have an ice cream!”

I looked up at her, squinting in the summer holiday sun.

“Ice cream!” shrieked Peggy in delight, and tried to spin around, but stumbled.

I caught my sister’s arm, and said, “We’ve only just had breakfast!” but my mother was already clinking coins over, distracted. Somewhere above us, a seagull began its harsh, halting cry. With a cone of whirled white in her hand, my mother glanced up.

“Be careful,” she said, eyeing the gull, “Or he’ll take it. – Wait!” she added, as I reached out, “Ladies first.”

Peggy took her ice cream, and bit into it with relish. Her eyes slid closed, and she swayed a little, humming.

“Patience is a virtue,” murmured my mother, in a far-off voice, handing me the second cone. I watched it coming with indifference. My tongue stung of metal snow.

My mother didn’t seem like my mother today. At breakfast she had sat in silence, tearing her napkin into tiny shreds. I’d taken another slice of toast while she wasn’t looking.

Continue reading “White Lies”

[I belong to an online writing group, and each month we write a story with a theme and a word count. This time, we were asked to write about ‘New Life’ in exactly 1000 words. This story is, in fact, an extended take on my microfiction story, Terminal.]

The iced wind seared my patchy scalp, and I coughed again, a raspy, racking ache. My fingers stung. Perhaps we should never have walked all this way to the hospital, but when I was little, March never used to be this bitter. I remembered sunshine. We’d even drive over to the beach sometimes, and –

“Mum,” sighed Amy, “How much longer will this take?”

I caught us frozen in the glass front opposite: my daughter, a sliver of sulky green; myself, a sharpened stick. It would be the last time I set eyes on either of us.

Continue reading “The Door”

[I belong to an online writing group, and each month we write a story with a theme and a word count. This time, we were asked to write about ‘A Conversation with your Spouse’ in exactly 1200 words.]

I knew it instantly. You were there – then half a second later, you were gone.

“Stand back!” shouted the doctor, that antsy one you never liked, and “This way,” said Agnieszka, doe-eyed,“This way, Mrs Johnson,” guiding me out through the swing doors to the empty corridor, as behind us they worked away on you, in vain.

I made a sound. Agnieszka squeezed my shoulder.

“It’s too late,” I told her.

She looked at me with those big brown eyes of hers. Like Bambi, I’d said to you yesterday, when you’d cracked a smile, and said –

“They’re doing everything they can,” soothed Agnieszka.

“But it’s too late,” I explained to her, as gently as I could. “I know he’s gone.”

You’d surprised me, like you always did, before I’d had the chance to tell you one more time what I wanted you to know.

Continue reading “The Conversation Garden”