250 Words: Shouting across the bar

She shouted across the bar, pointed to the little map.
He listened, didn’t hear and shouted back. 
It went back and forth.
They got nowhere. 
Well, they got lost.


They asked for Becks, he gave them Metz. 
They got irate, refused to pay and stormed off. 
He, shamefacedly, had to explain to his boss. 
And paid.


He didn’t recognise them.
He couldn’t understand their annoyance.
He let someone else take over.


He didn’t see them.
For over forty minutes.
No wonder they soaked him.


Immediately after, a frequent customer smiled kindly and asked for his number.
He gave her a flier, underlining the bar’s number.
She asked again, he gave an annoyed look and jabbed the flier.
She pushed it back and walked away, normally he had much more to say.
He shrugged, carried on.

It was only later he realised it was her.
And, while pouring her usual for someone else, he wondered… and spilt the drink.
And was ordered away from the bar.


It was just one of those shifts, one spent well outside the required zone. 
One not taking in anyone’s words or faces, just order, fulfillment, order, fulfillment.
A buzz filling his head.
Why did they play the music so loud? 
Often he dreamed of sleepy seaside tavernas. 


While collecting glasses outside he spotted his regular drinking alone across the street. 
In the relative quiet of the nightlife he crossed toward her preparing his apology.
Hoping it was necessary. 
He had often dreamed about her too.

---

Written for Faber Academy's QuickFic from the following picture prompt (there was actually a choice of three...).  
Well done to the winner and and runners-up! (including me!)

250 Words: I punched the picture and left

I focused on the Elvis poster to avoid the painting.  I’d only wanted a quick browse of the LPs, not the dredging of my mind for something I can only speak about in dreadful rhyme:

In an old house in a distant place it occurred. 
A terrible memory my mind has often demurred,
Pushed back, buried deep,
Inescapable only in sleep;
When nightmares return me -
Thank God, though, not nightly.

But the picture there
Laid it all bare,
Brought back our host,
The malevolent ghost
And its countryside mansion
With bloodied flesh stanchions
Flanking the door -
And corpses of creatures lining the floors,
Its terrible eyes,
The blood curdling cries
Its birdlike fingers and thighs.

It touched my head,
Brought out all my dread
In glorious technicolour.
It drew from my mind
Every awful unkind,
Scenes that could not be any fuller -
That it made me relive,
My soul drained through a sieve
Leaving little left to use.
Shaved my brain with a chiv,
Unwilling gifts I did give
As a base for all its abuse.

This ghoul was no fool
It gave me a rule
To send others into its school.
The experience has past,
But what I then did shall last
And is why I don’t like to remember.
Those dreams in my sleep
All concern the poor peeps
I have sent to it for to dismember.

*

I lost a year after that, and have spent each since trying to forget, getting angry and frustrated when I remember. 

---

Written for Faber Academy's QuickFic from the following picture prompt (there was actually a choice of three...).  
Well done to the winner and and runners-up!

250 Words: No explanation

I was leaving the day behind, but not our tail. 

In my peripheral vision lay the gun I had feared I would need but knew would be useless.

In the rearview I could see my baby son, blissfully and ignorantly asleep.  As would always be the case where this incident and I, especially, were concerned.

I thought again about switching off my lights once night fell, of going off-road.  And again wondered why I harboured hope.

For the two hours they had been following me I had known running was futile.  Once in sight I could feel their presence, just as they could mine; and, with their amplification technique, they were too powerful now. 

And my son too important.  His father killed with no explanation, I had run. 

Yet all I was doing was driving until the fuel ran out, spending as much time with the boy as I could. 

We sung for a hundred miles, ate crumpets in a frozen, remote, layby - now I would watch him sleep with the time and distance left to me, switching on the interior light once night fell. 


With the car’s momentum lost, I got out and fired shots to make me feel better, the bullets forced from their targets.


As I knelt and waited, I contemplated the red and white tableau to be created and how my son would one day connect these colours with this time of year but in very different ways; and for that, at least, I was pleased.

---

Written for Faber Academy's QuickFic from the following picture prompt (there was actually a choice of three...).  Well done to the winner and and runner-up!

250 Words: Reveille

In the clarity of the morning light I began to make sense of the images in my mind: events from the previous evening that had been flashing before my mind’s eye during fitful sleep.

A shadowy figure at the window.

Rushing to get my keys in the door.

Raised voices, a shrill cry.

Running on the stairs.

The plunging, cutting, tearing of a knife.

A thick red mess on the floor.

Frantic digging.

Frantic cleaning.

The memories made me nervous, worried of what I might have done.  My memory takes time to reboot each morning, to extract itself from the fug of sleep and start to join the dots.  But the light quickly awakening me was soon joined by singing from the shower and remembrance became easier.


I saw the silhouette from the gate, fumbled with the keys in the lock, shouted as I came through.  A shrill cry of welcome was returned and Mike bounded down the stairs flashing the spare keys.

He knew I’d been having a hard time since demob, had sensed something in my voice, had brought cake, prosecco and a plant to cheer me up. 

As we drunk more, our division of the cake got worse, leading to the contents of several doughnuts meeting the floor.  We even tried to plant the plant, quickly as it was freezing, creating more mess, so much we felt we should clean before finally collapsing into bed.


Nothing to report, then.  I wish my mind would be less dramatic.

---

Written for Faber Academy's QuickFic from the following picture and quote prompt.  Well done to the winners!

Note: I actually entered the story with the title Stand To but decided to change it before blogging (Morning Report was also considered).

250 Words: Losing sight of you, gaining insight

Your red hat and your height have always helped.  I could always pick you out in a crowd, even before my eyes began to fail.

After they told me I began to memorise every part of you, linking sight to touch and smell, learning to feel changes to alter that memory, keep the image up to date.  And where I couldn’t, I studied your tattoos, the formations of your unraised moles until they were as familiar as my own. 

“I won’t ever forget a single feature.”

As the black curtain began to draw in, I ramped up my efforts to recreate you perfectly when I closed my eyes.  I tested myself frequently, described you to yourself while seated in another room, drew pictures, wrote stories.  Created an avatar to serve in your stead.

“You won’t ever want another creature.”

“I don’t want to.  But what if I do forget?”

And now that I cannot even see your entire face at the same time, my hands and fingers trace your face evermore desperately while you kiss me to reassure me, tell me not to worry.

“I will be here.  By touch, by smell, by ear
Memory does not matter once love has beget.
(And when it doesn’t need to make sense.)”

I knew I feared the unknown more than anything, that an avatar was never needed when I had you.

Your worn hat full of your smell will always help.  And I’ve always been pleased that I am taller than you.

---

Written for Faber Academy's QuickFic from the following picture prompt (a few lines down).

This week I won and got featured on their website!  Thanks so much for picking my story!  

I should say that I was also very inspired by the memory of a column I used to read in the Guardian Weekend by Rebecca Atkinson called Losing Sight, Still Looking (I've linked to an example column, I can't seem to find a page for the whole series).

250 Words: Walled Garden

Sat in the dark, dank shadow of the garden’s wall, Tom pressed his ear against its damp, cold face.  He listened to the sounds beyond, imagined the actions that made them, wondered how it was possible to do likewise.

Tom did not understand summer.  He knew about it, saw people getting excited about it, don shorts, go outside, listen to their summer soundtracks, cook meat and drink outside… while he remained outside that walled garden, listening, imagining.  

He thought of it as a music service he couldn’t afford, and so could only listen to snippets of songs.  Or film teasers that were never replaced by trailers, let alone the full feature.  He knew these things but did not know them.

In his heart and mind, Tom knew he would sit there always.  The darkness within the wall would confirm his insecurities and keep him there, listening, waiting for the winter when he would be alone again, the revellers’ noise gone until the sun returned.


Jane would often sit and look across the park, watching the lovers walk by, the dogs chase balls, the children running and playing… and a curious man across the way would always catch her eye.  Always sat alone, he would stare as if unseeing, as if there were a wall between him and everyone else.  

If she had more confidence, perhaps she would have gone to talk to him.  She guessed everyone had their own walls they would not cross; and certainly she knew her own.

---

Written for Faber Academy's QuickFic from the following prompt, a summery Spotify playlist. 

This week I was featured on their website as  runner-up!  

250 Words: It was too strange (plus two variants of Only the start)

Normally there were only seeds inside, gunk and pumpkin flesh.  We would toast the seeds and make pies from the flesh before carving a spooky, crooked face into its hard side and placing a candle within to create a lantern.  A jack-o'-lantern I think they were once known as; a Halloween holiday tradition. 

You wouldn’t know about these things, you were born after. 

Not enough people talk about before.  Nor about what happened.  I think it was just too strange.


That year it was different, you see.  That year my brother reached in and scooped out human flesh.  His own flesh I quickly guessed as the blood poured from his stomach.

He refused help and began to eat the raw meat.  Dumbfounded, my mother and I watched on as he said, “Hmmm, delicious,” and continued to eat as his wound, and a pool of blood at his feet, grew.

Then, and perhaps this was the strangest part, my mother, seemingly regaining her senses, instead took my pumpkin and began to eat herself. 

I shouted at them both, I screamed, angry tears streaming from eyes, “STOP!  STOP! STOP!”  But they carried on, ecstatically happy, eating until they felled themselves, falling face down onto the table.

So many died before word got round, the madness too contagious to contain. 


It was too strange, what caused the breakdown in society.  I think that is why no one talks about it.  And our life before was too good, too charmed to be believed anyway. 

---

Written for Faber Academy's QuickFic from the following picture prompt: 

 

Before the above, I also tried with a more straight forward zombie take, and did a couple of versions:

Only the start

Normally there were only seeds inside, gunk and pumpkin flesh.  We would toast the seeds and make pies from the flesh before carving a spooky, crooked face into hard side and placed a candle where the insides had been to create a lantern.  A jack-o'-lantern I think they were once known as; a Halloween holiday tradition. 

You wouldn’t know about these, you were born after.  Not enough people talk about before.  Nor about what happened.


That year it was different.  That year my brother reached in and scooped out human flesh.  His own flesh we quickly surmised as the blood poured also from his stomach.

It all happened so quickly that word did not get around until it was too late.  For me, we watched my brother die from that wound, my mother failing to stem the flow while I failed to reach 911.  As her screams at his death began I returned to room to find him returning to life and killing her.  Fortunately I had the presence of mind to just flee. 

And that is only where my story of survival begins.
 
*

Normally there were only seeds inside, gunk and pumpkin flesh.  We would toast the seeds and make pies from the flesh before carving a spooky, crooked face into hard side and placed a candle where the insides had been to create a lantern.  A jack-o'-lantern I think they were once known as; a Halloween holiday tradition. 

You wouldn’t know about these, you were born after.  Not enough people talk about before.  Nor about what happened.


That year it was different.  That year my brother reached in and scooped out human flesh.  His own flesh we quickly surmised as the blood poured also from his stomach.

He collapsed, white as a sheet.

My mother tried, vainly to stop the flow.

I tried, again and again, to get anything other than a busy tone from 911.

Until my mother began to scream the most horrific scream I have ever heard.  And I have not stopped hearing screams ever since. 

Upon my return I smiled at first.  My brother was not dead after all, I could see him moving.  An odd, jerky movement.  One I would come to fear.  But then I did not know.

Before I could tell my mother, I long still to let her know and stop her screaming, her screaming was stopped by my brother biting into and ripping out her throat.

Fortunately I had the presence of mind to just flee. 

And that is only where my story of survival begins.

Every day since has been the same.
 

250 Words: The Coffee Ceremony

Save for the tools of their routine, their desks were always clear.  It was in the space between, created by their pedestals, that they kept those tools and would perform their ritual three times a day. 

Always carefully, always in silence.  Talk was reserved for after the tasting.  Even the selection of coffee occurred in silence: a language of subtle gestures and nods formed the decision making and selection process.

Then, gently, they would weigh out the beans, transferring them slowly into a container that had been carefully selected for the roast during their initial period of experimentation.  These would then be poured into a grinder as if precious pearls, just as the resulting powder was moved and poured as if gold dust, as if anything lost would equate to the loss of hundreds of pounds. 

The brewing was the most baffling part, though, so much so it would bring the office to a standstill.  A collective breath would be held as we watched them watching the pot; all of us  wondering how they knew, when to the rest of us it seemed nothing had changed, that the coffee was ready.  It was never quite the same amount of time, but they would always be just as pleased with the result.


As I wondered about them then, I wonder about them still.  Do they still sit side by side and perform their ceremony together, or did they lose each other along the way and find others? 

The former, I hope.

---

Written for Faber Academy's QuickFic from the following picture prompt: 

 

250 Words: 20.8.5.14 17.6.13.4.8.3.21.6.15.4.22.19.6’7.8 9.1.15.15.23.3.1.13

2.14.14.20.18.23.16.10 13.8.10 23.2.19.8.1 12.13.23.17 18.22.20.7 22.17.16 25.4.7.10.17.8, 20.8.5.19 16.11.2.13.24.11.13 3.21.1.18.10.1 11.12.8.25.19.6.16 9.12.19.2.13 4.25.10 17.1.8.14 2.16.13.5 3.5.22.13.18.2; 16.3.19.6 3.22.14.7 22.20.11.7.6.15 10.22.13.22.9.18.3.16 1.16.20.12.26.4 13.16.17.26.3.16.4.  23.20.15 24.19.3.23.8 9.21.6.20.9 15.13.16.26.12 26.1.22.25.16.12.26.3 11.24.14.12 2.23.10.16.23.15.21.9 24.25.20.23.14.10.24.6; 19.16.19 1.22.13.24.9.23.1 7.26.25.1 13.11.26.25.20 14.15.23.8.5.18.5.14. 

19.10.19.6.13.8.22.2.21.3 10.22.22.4.10.5 8.5.7.1.5 15.16.15.20.6.15.20.6.8 10.2.5 22.19.17 21.23.20.9.26.8.10.24.12 5.6.11.25.26.5.24.20 19.16.17 4.7.14.11.7.24.7.21.15 11.25.22.2 3.14.23.26.24.12.2 18.10.16.7.25.11 18.15.17.11.17- 22.18.7 9.8.6.19.7 9.6.14 18.4.10.1.19.11 11.14.15.23.19! 

12.26.23.6.18, 11.22.22.1 26.17.18 4.2 24.26.9.9.10.19.18, 5.2.5 10.11.22.21.6 3.24.23.22.19 2.6 4.8.6.6 7.2.2 8.9.16.3.19.15 5.20.5.22.24.8 (13.26.16.1 26.14.12.15.18.20 12.3.12.21.3 13.18.15.11.4.13 24.20 3.26.11.11.3.22.12).  4.7 23.15.4.18.25.14.3 15.12.17 1.12.13.7.12.14 12.7.2 25.8.14.25.12.4 12.13.12.17.3.12.17.3.16 8.22.15.8.18 19.15.13.14.26.9 25.10.8.9.19 17.22.2.26.17.15.3.13.6 19.2.3.9.21.22.12… 9.20.9 2.14.14.22.14.13.17 2.15.20.8.8 10.26.17.20.20.17.9.22.2.19 2.15.5.10 4.5.6.1.20.15.13 25.18.16 8.22.19.15 22.4.16.8.11 8.23.1.19.20…

“20.13.2’1.15 7.18.16.17.7 12.19.20.9.16 3.14.2 12.14.11.18.11.7.1.15.8 5.15 11.24.20.22.13.2.8.7.16,” 17.14.8 11.25.26.5.2.10.10, “13.6.21’20.16 25.6.7.22.12 23.11.8.2.1, 5.24.16 6.25.21.13.14.11, 13.6.1.10.6 17.6.25.7.”

**

12.7.16 2.16.13.17 2.17.24.15.19.14.6.17.26.15.7.4.17.18 3.6.13.22.6 20.24.16.7 5.7 1.16.3.17.16.14.5.11 1.10.5.3.9.23.15.  8.19.16.25.17 10.7.2 10.9.16.16.17 1.10.13.2 17.5.2.2 12.14.18.19.12 5.12.23.16.25.5.16.15.1 25.17.25.14.17.4.18 19.10.13 25.26.10.13 7.16.5.23.23.20, 6.3.5 9.18.24.17.7.7 19.4.9 23.2.25.25.2.22.14.5.13.2 15.10.5 3.15.13.16.18.5.8.5.14.4.7 9.12.6.22.21.11.2 2.3.1.18.23.16.2.10 8.25.5 10.15.5.6.4.10.17.9.6.19.2.3.13.6.8 12.17.10.1.10.12.3.14.1.2.14.  22.2.17.1 18.6.3.15 26.2.5.18.15 10.7.7 2.3.10.1.14.13.19 3.5.20.17.21.21.18 14.2.25.19 5.2.2.26.9 23.16.11 15.12.25.4, 5.19.16.3 1.3.6.19.10 6.3.4 23.16.6.7.20.21.22.17.17.6.7; 15.24.1.20 11.8.9 20.13.16.2 20.3.9.2.18.14 22.10.7.9 22.16.10.18.


23.18.15 5.19.3.23.3 3.26.13.14 10.6.10.1.14.12 10.1.2 5.6.16.14 16.9.20.4.5.16.25.14.16.14 7.4.18 23.6.9.4.22.21.15 7.3 12.24.13.14.12.  9.10.15.17 1.26.17.15 2.20.3 7.19.17.20.16.13.7.5.24.9.8.6 11.3.9 12.1.24.13 3.7.25.14 23.21.10.21.10.21.22.6.25.8 17.8.8, 20.5.3.4.14 17.13.11.3.18.6.7.12.5.13 17.6.25.9 21.8.24.14 1.17.21.24.20.13.2.  19.4.17 24.2.20.6 1.15.12.9 3.21.9.9.17.23.21.18 2.16.9.2.16 21.13.19.10.2.6 17.5.24.24.9.22.19 10.12.16.17.13 18.15.2.15.1. 

12.3.24.16.15.16 24.10.21.9.5 7.20 3.15.4.5.23.8.5.5.12.17 18.5.21.2 20.3 26.5.1.12 16.13.15 16.13.2.9.9.2.1.6 12.23.11 3.9.8.9:

From.5 the.10 boy.8 at.8 B2.3; a.18 nothing.17, a.8 pawn.18; who.19 seeks.12 you.3 to.8 be.3; my.12 Ada.7, my.15 Queen.


20.6.17.5.6.11.3 1.11 8.16.16.22.5 9.24.21.2 26.19.22.3 1.10.16.9.25.20, 16.3.19.20 2.3.10.1.3.14.13.11 14.9.4 19.12.21.7.12.2.15, 21.18.5.4 6.14.5.5 2.11.6.4.10.24.17. 

**

3.2.17.19.2 10.8.17.4.9.2.17.10.21.20.13, 23.11.8.13 13.8.25.10.21.8.14 1.19.18.8.9.22.9.8.17 15.10.11 14.15.19.25.11.18.12.20, “4.15.5.19.14 7.3.1.19.3.2.19.6 24.9.7 21.9.10.20.9 15.6.15.2.9.4 13.19.15.6?”

---

Written for entry in The Bridport Prize, 2016.

250 Words: Tempus Fugit

Oh yes, son, Time really does, quite literally, fly.  He lives in the Moon, you see, because, well, he is The Man in the Moon.  And he flies it around the earth, causing the earth to rotate and makes time flow.

That’s right, yes.  It’s all true, your father wouldn’t lie!

There’s a hollow in the middle, you see, that’s where he sleeps during the day.  Then, at night, well, at dusk - in the gloaming he be a’roaming, if you...
no?
Okaay, well as the sun is going down, Time gets up because, well, at that point the earth is slowing down, so he has to get into his cockpit, start up the motors and get everything going again so we can build up momentum again over night and have another day.

Of course it makes sense. 

It’s a bit like a bike, winding up and letting go, there’s an invisible band linking the Moon and Earth, how else would the earth rotate?  How else would we get day and night?

Oh... you’ve covered it at school. 

And you prefer the story of Ra, anyway?  Yes, I like that too, poor old Ra, but you asked if time really flew, so I told you about Time living in the…

Oh.  I’ve already told you the story of Mother and Moon, thus contradicting this sorry tale.  And Saturn starting time, too? 

Well, there are different tales, different myths, my boy.  Perhaps we shall eventually work through them all.

Sleep well.

---

Written for the Light and Shade Challenge from the written prompt: "Tempus Fugit."

250 Words: Shards

I stopped as shattered glass rained down ahead.  A short, sharp shower, its terrifying sound was interrupted by a worse one: the sickening thud-crack of a man hitting the pavement.

As others rushed to him I stayed still, a statue able only to think of himself and how close he’d come to injury.

I was told he’d died on impact, yet a glimpse of the dying man’s eyes snapped me back round.  Full of pain, both for what had just happened and all that had gone before, they bore into me and, expiring, the man mouthed, “You must find my medal; put me to rest.”  Only then did the pain and the life leave his eyes.


When I got home the next day, I set to work researching what he might have meant.  I remained in my bedroom for days until I found the answer in an old photograph. 

It took me back to the scene of the accident, where we’d planned to celebrate by diving from the cliff.  He “won” the toss but never made it to the edge because it took him away.  I dived forward but was helpless then as well.

The area got cordoned area, they wouldn’t let me retrieve his medal.  I screamed and kicked before slowly putting the idea away. 

Now it hangs on his gravestone.


Ever since that day my family had been nervous around me, more worried by each episode.  Only now, as I return smiling, will they be able to relax.

---

Written for entry in The Bridport Prize, 2014.

250 Words: The Acephalous Rider

Her hitched-up and ripped ballgown flowing behind, she thundered through the open gates, not daring to look back, hoping against hope she would not be followed.

Pushing her horse on through forests and fields, her immaculate hair fell slowly apart and itself took flight.  Her only thought was to keep on taking routes randomly while ultimately heading east, for the border. 

Her closest servants were to thank for this chance.  Feeling she was too innocent to face the mob’s blade they ushered her away from the party (slapping her into sense when she initially refused) and helped her onto a horse (ripping her dress and changing her shoes) before ensuring a clear path to the gate. 


She first heard them behind as her ride began to tire.  Louder and louder their galloping grew as hers lessened.  She looked out for a new route or solution but she’d taken a road that would only let her go straight on, swamps blocked all other directions but back.

As they drew up alongside she cursed the effects of the afternoon’s hunt before the sword swung and removed her head.

They stopped her horse, fixed the headless body in its seat and hung the head from her steed’s bit rings before thwacking its behind and sending them on toward her goal.


Now every night on that same stretch of road, each lost and lonely little toad will see her form once again in full flight, her complexion now and ever a bright ghostly white. 

250 Words: Stuff inspired by phrases picked out from 250 (Jumbled) Words, No 4: Remember pages

Remember pages,
Remember stages
Of my days of diary.

Remember pages,
Remember wages
Paid to keep my diary.


Forget the details,
Forget the fails
Listed in my diary.

Forget the details,
Forget the wails
Littered through my diary.


I remember they kept me prisoner for years, those leather bound volumes kept hidden away.  Each night they would call and I’d slave away with pencil or pen transferring my travails onto paper. 

I’d glue clippings too, and crudely drawn pictures of things seen, those loved; slogans, poems, quotes... 

I remember there were changes as time went by, as I moved between bands or pen preference, styles, magazines, newspapers; the whole epoch itself was divided into eras. 

It took its toll, though, ground me down as I wore the pencil’s nib or drained the pen’s ink.  I carried on because it felt vital to me, it carried me through.  I paid to crest along neatly.


Looking at them now, talking to others, I realise I’ve also forgotten much.  Wrongs committed are barely mentioned or not listed; the endless whining of inaction and the absence of real life: everything that made me stop, everything that makes me glad those days are done. 

And yet I fondly remember pages hidden in my diary and the release- the abandon that
was all the liberation I needed and desired.  My room was all the world, all the stage, I required.  I adored those times at the time, and I survived those times thanks to those pages.

---

FYI: 250 (Jumbled) Words - follow Jumbled tag for others from it, too.

250 Words: What happened when we summoned the Biblical Beast

We dabbled a lot at Uni and for a few weeks it was with the occult that we concerned ourselves.  It started with ouija boards run by us before we started to explore the darkest recesses of the oldest libraries to find and explore further the arts of the dark.  And after one too many Hammer Horrors, we decided to summon the Beast of Revelations.  And to slay him.

We did it in the middle of a rainy, stormy winter’s night, sat in a chalked circle on the hard floor of the basement laundry room.  As the rattle of the windows in their frames grew evermore, and the candles flames flickered more violently, so our chanting grew more determined, finally fixing itself on the repeating of the numbers,  “616.  666. 616.  666...”

On we went, continuing even as the Beast began to appear: a dim, ghostly pillar of light that slowly transformed to take the rough shape of the Beast, before becoming more solid until he was formed in completeness. 

He was not what we had expected.

Before us stood a man dressed in a blood stained toga (so he had already been slain!) who jabbered in what we presumed was Latin.  Fearful and scared was his tone, and the look on his face grew with concern, then horror, at his modern, and very non-Roman, surroundings. 

As was soon the case for those surrounding him as we began to look to one another mouthing, “How do we send him back?” 

250 Words: Banishing the Nightmare

The final showdown came after several nights in which I got closer and closer to either snatching the creature out of the thin air or swatting it with dreamed up weapons.

Soon, though, I resolved that I could never get quick enough and that what was required was something more real and the following occurred:

I dreamed I was in bed trying to sleep.  I couldn’t regain sleep because something was scratching at the glass covering a print hanging above my chest of drawers.

I was once more confused about the sound I heard every night and slowly eased myself up to take a look.  As I caught sight of the creature, it stopped the scratching and turned to look at me.

This time, though, rather than look back at it, I summoned all the strength I had within me and moved my eyes, just my eyes, toward my bedroom door.  Curious, the creature looked across and so, before it had time to leap at me, I did; or started to at any rate.

I stood up on my bed, bringing the duvet with me so that as the creature sprang at me I was able to capture it.  The last thing I saw before I woke was its surprised face.

I woke up when I hit the floor on top of a duvet, under which was a writhing mound.  I took the cricket bat I’d left on the floor and bashed the mound until the writhing stopped.  Problem solved.

250 Words: The Nursing Home Nightmare

Fran’s Grandfather lived in a nursing home in Kent and I pretended to be an oral history interviewer in order to get in.  Once alone with the man I came clean and asked him about the creature.

“You are the first to believe me.  The staff here said we’d made the scratches ourselves,” he told me.  “Well, it’s hard not to when I’m living it.  I guess I wouldn’t have before.”

He told me how the creature had been visiting a different room each night, frightening the inhabitant and leaving its mark somewhere in the room.  “Often destroying cherished photographs,” he added, looking away at where his had presumably once stood.

“In the end my desperation grew to the point I felt all I could do was fight back.”

“I’ve tried that but it’s always too fast.”

“You must become the master of your own dreams.  I know it’s hard-  it took a death here before any of us could bring ourselves to take it on.  It’s like in Inception: you must not be scared to dream creatively, even if no one’s dreams are quite as epic.  It is on your ground, young man, and that is its weakness.  It can only win while fear rules your dreams.”

I went away with hope in the knowledge that one of these creatures, at least, had been defeated, though not knowing why it was there.  “I wish I knew the answer to that.  Just a case of bad luck it would seem.”

250 Words: The returning Nightmare

Over the following weeks similar episodes occurred, each time the creature appearing in a different place in my room: various parts of the wardrobe, each drawer in turn, under the bed, on the lampshade, behind the teasmaid, even on the landing- entering the room slowly, its eyes shining brightly in the gloaming: always appearing accompanied by the awful scratching that would keep me awake in the dream and cause me to look up in its direction- and always the marks when I woke up: gradually my bedroom began to resemble that of someone who’s taken against the walls with a pair of scissors.

I began to become too scared to sleep, trying to stay awake all night in the hope of avoiding the creature.  Always, though, I would eventually succumb; always it returned.

I tried dousing myself with sleeping pills, hoping to dull my brain’s senses enough to halt the dream but that didn’t work either.

I googled the problem, visited forums.  Nothing.

I even started to try and take the creature on in my dreams but it was always too fast for me to even move.

In the end the answer came at work.  Gradually I became more despondent during the day.  Plus I was looking worse and worse.  Most people ignored this, kept their distance.  Not Fran, though; dear Fran.  She told me I was looking like her Grandfather had until recently, “Said it was all down to some night-time spirit, the mad old coot.  Fine now, though.”

250 Words: A nightmare in the corner of the room

I dreamt I was in bed trying to sleep- one of those vivid dreams you get sometimes after waking up early and drifting back to sleep.  I couldn’t sleep because there was a scratching sound coming from the corner of my bedroom.

I tentatively sat up to have a look.  Just as I caught sight of the creature it swivelled its entire body round to look back at me.  It was two foot high, green with a spiky head and long arms and as I stared in disbelief it grinned a huge, nasty grin full of sharp teeth.

While I thought about the fact I’d been watching Gremlins the day before it suddenly leapt across the room and landed on my chest knocking the air clean out of my lungs.  It then dropped onto its own chest, wrapped its arms around me and began to squeeze very tightly.

I tried my best to breathe but couldn’t move my chest muscles at all, the creature was holding on so strongly.  I began to panic, feeling my life ebbing away until…

I woke up, taking in a lungful of morning air in relief.  Though it felt like the creature was still on my chest, it was not, thankfully.  However, I looked across at the corner of my room, which, although it was also clear, I thought I could see… unless I was mistaken… I left my bed for a closer look… yes, claw marks in the wallpaper.

This was the first time.

250 Words: Strutting Simon

“Actions speak louder than words,” his father had advised when he became a teenager and asked about ways to impress girls.  And so the teen-boy developed a strut and a swagger as he tried to set himself out from the other boys parading the school corridors. 

It worked for a time, girls noticing this confidence in him and pausing by his locker to speak with him.  There were hands held, kisses between classes, kisses at the back of buses and cinemas.  He became a sort of a stud in these early glory years.  Nothing lasted but he didn’t mind at that point at all. 

As time wore on he did want more, though, as the girls quickly became women but he remained a boy, a preening peacock they grew sick of.

School discos and corridors gave way to pubs and clubs and he took his gait into town on a Friday night but no one took any notice so he took solace in drinking and dancing.  He tried to turn the latter into a new swagger, to match that of earlier days, but his discotheque coquetry got him nowhere.  He tried to turn his father’s advice on its head but the slaps showed his talk was worse than his walk.

Over the years he tried different tactics, slowly honing his vocabulary and sharpening his interpersonal skills- until the swagger disappeared and he became more like the person he’d been before he became a peacock, eventually finding someone to be with.

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See also: ≤140 Characters, or Tweet Repeat: 14, from whence this was expanded.

250 Words: Invitation to the game of pelota

It was lunchtime and he was eating his usual loaf as he wandered the streets aimlessly, ensuring at all times to keep it from the dog that would appear each day like clockwork and hover alongside while looking up hopefully.  Normally he would look about him to see what was happening on that particular day but keep always apart, as if in a bubble: watching and never taking part.  On this particular day, however, having glanced across at a heated argument between a stall owner and his customer, he was stopped in his tracks by a smiling face looking straight up at him.

“Would you like to play?” its mouth said in a welcoming, cheery sort of way.  A girl’s mouth- something he’d made a point of avoiding before now in the belief that all girls were as troublesome as his sisters.  “Typical,” he thought, “Let your guard down for a moment…” 

But let his guard down he did all the more as he took in the expression on this girl’s face.  And also because she was pretty in a way he had never noticed before.  That smile, though, on its own was such that he could not help but say, “Alright- looks fun.  How do you play?”

And as the ball flew back and forth along with the exchange of words, something began to change in them both.

A chance meeting became the start of a friendship that would flourish into a love that would survive against the odds.

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Note: I went to a taster session one work lunchtime for a creative writing course I then never got round to signing up for.  We did an exercise where we were given postcards with pictures and tasked with coming up with a story for it.  I had, or at least saw, one bearing the painting Invitation to the Game of Pelota by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (Pérez) and wound up later writing this.