Category Archives: short stories

Anger Mismanagement

poems, short stories

When it came to the anger management classes, Deano thought he had it sussed. In his last session, he kicked through the doors, eyes popping and fizzing like inflatable light bulbs. Deano was bloody furious! Spewing words out like a fleshy sick gun. Words Like, Flipping twerp!

Git!

Swine!

Bastard!

Rotter!

And maybe worst of all, twats!

Barking such demonic filth at individual class members sent him crimson, his spit drenched chin shone (a la Rhubarb and custard).

Meanwhile the class slid from their chairs, coughing lunch out of their holes. The Laughter shook them in the room like a child shaking a box of mewing kittens.

The sound of laughter only made it worse for poor old Deano. Through his fingers, he looked at what he’d created. Deano slumped to his knees, cried into his hands and screamed, “I am so angry!”

Then there was a round off-beat clapping from the darkened corners of the room.

The Class was over.

Customer vs Shopkeeper

creative writing, poems, short stories, , , ,

‘Hello, I wondered if you c—‘

‘Help you? Yes I can’

‘Oh…ok great, well, are you able t—‘

‘Yes, yes I can do that for you.’

‘I’m sorry but can you please s—‘

‘Stop Interrupting! Sorry, no, I can’t possibly do that!’

‘Ok, well I’ll–‘

‘Go somewhere else?’

‘Yes! Sorry but, but do you do this t–‘

‘All my customers…yes I’m afraid I do, is it–‘

‘Annoying! Yes! Yes it bloody well is!’

‘Ah, but you’ve been here before you see, not five minutes ago, asking me for the same thing. Actually, every-day, you come in everyday and ask for something, we always have this conversation.’

‘Oh, sorry I–‘

‘No its fine, really, please come again.’

‘But I’ve forgotten what I came in for now!’

‘Precisely, it’s your conscience you see. I have lots of other customers identical to you and they never come in for the reason they thought they did. They just feel they need to.’

‘Really, what shop is this anyway? What do you sell?’

‘Shop! This isn’t a shop! No, no, no, this is, I mean to say I am…This is your conscience, like I was saying, we, we together are your conscience. It’s always like this. You see, your real-self is actually out there, outside of here, somewhere.’

‘Ok. Well if that’s the case I’m gonna go now, out there, Ok, get some air.’

‘Goodbye yes, goodbye, you were going earlier as well weren’t you, but then, yet again you needed some filling in, as always, anyway, goodbye it is then.’

‘Hello, I wondered if you can –‘

‘Help you? Yes I can.’

.

Losing It (Dementia Poem)

creative writing, poems, short stories, , ,

I have a comb in my hand

What do I do know?

I have a comb in my hand

I have a wallet in my hand

What do I do know?

I have a hanky-chief in my hand

I have a comb in my hand

What do I do know?

(Bang!)

What was that? What was that?

What’s was that noise?

What’s that noise?

What do I do know?

What do I do know?

I see a face

I can’t remember

What do I do know?

What do I do know?

She’s smiling

I can’t remember

I have a wallet in my hand?

What do I do know?

It’s all gone

Can’t remember

I feel so tired

What do I do know?

Tired

What do I do now?

I have a comb in my hand

She’s talking to me

What do I do know?

Can’t remember

Ok

What do I do know?

Put my coat on?

Oh oh oh

Where are we going? Where are we going?

Doctors, oh oh oh

What do I do know?

What do I do know?

I have a hanky chief in my hand

I feel tearful

What do I do know?

 

Dream Sequence (Return To Form)

creative writing, short stories, , , ,

I’m sitting in my form classroom, at a table nearest the aisle.  There seems to be nothing outside the window, nothing except fog. I sense the classroom is full; figures mimic the blackened wood, the heads of smoking match’s; I am a match in a box of fire.

My name is called. The room is emptying, the fog knocking clumsily against the large never-ending windows. My form tutor walks to my desk in complete silence. As I recall, she was cold and unapproachable. As she hovers, ever closer, her icy atmosphere envelopes my personal space; hanging around me like poisoned oxygen.

 ‘What was her name again?’ ‘Bulchin, yes that right, Mrs Bulchin.’ Only a teacher would be called Mrs Bulchin! A name such as Bulchin could be appropriately used for the act of vomiting.

She speaks calmly with her Lancashire accent. Her voice grates my skin, decays my eardrums as so they rattle; slightly destroyed from their comfortable function.

“Nice to have your company again… Kevin. We wondered if we would ever see you again. There seems to be no account for your poor… recent… attendance.” Her last three words, so heavy, they fall and scatter; the consonants have grabbed my feet while the vowels have chained them to my school desk.

But I feel so disconnected to everything.

I’m barely able to reply, “I didn’t realise, now being thirty-five, that I needed an explanation!” My voice has played slow. The low decibels fail to carry happily through the fake, stagnant air.

Without blinking, without recognising that what she is saying to me is absurd, she stoops to my eye level and says, “You do realise you will be charged? The total you owe, currently stands at, ten thousand pounds!” She says monotonously, empty to the core.

“That’s not right, I shouldn’t be here now.” I’m passive, each word as equal as the next that follows it.

“You didn’t finish your exams Kevin…you will be charged.” Her words nail me to my alleged crime like I’m the newest brand of criminal. I’m desperate to escape, leave the flimsy set with a sharp retaliation of words than can cut me out the shape of an exit as hastily as a wrecking ball.

Then, I hear a voice barely audible from a gender unknown, within the room.

 I can sense that I have stood up. But I’m not sure. Maybe I’m just looking down. There is some comfort injected into my heart before my visuals collapse about me like blurred shards from a metallic imagery montage.

Good Morning!

The Party’s Over

creative writing, short stories, ,

At the slicing of the cake, Biff stealthily took shape as a hunting feline and inhaled all the helium that his lungs could muster.

Standing back, he felt repelled by the deafening scenes of frenetic gluttony. He opened his well-rested mouth to release some verbal pressure that impounded in his head.

The sound of his very first syllable caused the surrounding windows to shatter into thousands of shark-like teeth. Consequently, an almighty vacuum of air sucked him out of the house as if he were suddenly grabbed by a colossal hand. Up, up into the gaping void of turquoise sky he floated.

As he rose into the sky with his elation from escape, he could hear the sweet slow fade of lung-bursting screams; expelled from the children’s unending hellish choir in the house below him.

Wailing from their distress of flaccid balloons and exploding glass, Biff had gone too far this time; he floated higher than he had foreseen, Biff froze as hypothermia set his body.

His helium had long expired, he plummeted towards terra firma at over a hundred miles an hour and landed face up on the lawn of a children’s garden tea party. With Biff’s brains and guts having covered the sweet treats; a limp balloon remained frozen stuck to his hand, with two frosted words, Happy Birthday!

When the children screamed, Biff lay with a magnificent smile.

Is There Anybody Out There?

creative writing, short stories, , ,

“I see.” Replied the Apprentice, he was unnerved.

“No, I don’t think you do see! I’m not dead yet! Get me…to…the…Hospital!” croaked the Dying Man.

His apprentice did as he was told; he hadn’t driven for a good few years, but felt the time was right to get back behind the wheel.

The Apprentice held the Dying Man upright, until he threw him into the backseat of his car, the Dying Man was now semi-conscious; with his treatment that bore resemblance to raw meat on a butcher’s slab.

The Apprentice then drove to the hospital with extreme caution. Slowly through the traffic he went, every wrong turn possible, he even began to enjoy the drive, he slipped an old John Williams Film Soundtrack tape into the cassette player for old time sake.

The Apprentice screamed, “Yeeees!” Suddenly, maniacal to the nostalgic sounds of Indiana Jones; whilst somehow, simultaneously, surprising himself at his over-reaction to joy.

He sang along, “Da dadada daa da da, dada dadaa da da da da da!” He cracked his imaginary whip out of the driver’s window and bucked his hips into the distressed driver’s seat of his knackered Ford Mondeo. The Apprentice had become somewhat hysterical; a middle-aged demon away with the fairies.

The music, so thunderous and active, so out of sync to his Mondeo’s pathetic speed that a mini epidemic of voyeurs were gathering like bacteria, and with more pace than the car itself.

Finally, two hours later they arrived at the hospital, music still blaring.

As soon as the passenger door was opened by a passing paramedic, the paramedics face rippled with distorted brass notes as she then bellowed, “He’s dead!”

As the day’s passed the result from the autopsy concluded that the Dead Man wouldn’t have died had he not spooned his own eyes out with his seat belt latch plate, and consequently stuffed them into his despairing ears; he simply lost the will to live, his illness was a mystery to all except one.

For many years after the Dead Man’s death they continued with their tempestuous relationship. To the Dead Man’s indignation his colleague had become one of the most successful entertainers on earth, and revoltingly rich.

The Apprentice was no longer the Apprentice, for he had gained worldwide fame and made an absolute killing from his live and often violent televised séances as Jenson De’ath.

What’s on the Telly? Logi Boyd

creative writing, poems, short stories

IMG_2879

Logi stood in line with the fake TV over his head. The intro music began; his heart, trying to break free from where it was lodged; decaying in his throat.

The fact that he couldn’t see or hear clearly was edging Logi ever closer to an unlikely case of spontaneous combustion.

The on-looking Snoxall pointed Logi out of the room, appearing briefly as a human signpost; he had seen enough and heard little that pleased him.

In the evening, Snoxall sat at home, as usual. He sat, hard as granite, in front of the TV, as usual. He gauged himself; spooned microwaved additives through a small entry and exit hole in his face, as usual.

And, as usual, his eyes were stinging everything like angry wasps. Snoxall was bloated; full of repeats.

Repeatedly, throughout the years, Logi’s TV had become portable. It was apparent to him that at many segments of his life, this box, lowered, over his head; a televised helmet that added doctrine to his fear.

Logi’s portable TV screen always flickered, both inside and out. The re-formed, distorted face of Snoxall morphed seamlessly into Boygall. Boygall then became Bagnall, then Logi’s own aging face.

This continued till his eyes fixed, his mind went blank. And his mind always stayed blank. Until, one moment of release allowed him, slowly, to grasp at his own personal and portable TV’s remote control; Logi could now pause anything and everything he wanted to with a…click!

When the world was freeze-framed, Logi took his TV off his head and walked serenely through the army of real life actors. Occasionally he’d walk around his statuesque foe and look into their fixed eyes (looking for life). He’d then become an extra to his own play as soon as he pressed play on his remote control. And at moments like these, Logi would be instantly forgotten. His portable TV screen faded to black…click.

 

 

Small Talk

creative writing, poems, short stories

(Man)

“You’re very tall?”

(Woman)

“Yes.”

(Man again)

“What I mean is you’re very tall for a woman!”

“Yes I know what you meant, yes suppose I am.”

(Awkward silence)

(Woman again)

“You’re quite small really…for a–“

“For a man, yes I know.”

He then shrinks to a size of which she can inhale him, and as a result, the woman grows one millimetre taller.

Every time this happens she finds her new size amusing because she never really found the time to grow-up.

Originally the man was never really into her, but now he was.

 

 

Jeff’s Hair

creative writing, poems, short stories

IMG_2818

Jeff hated his hair,

It looked ridiculous,

never looked right, ever.

He had tried many styles

and many colours to suit.

 

One day he simply had enough,

Jeff let his real hair grow.

Finally, he braved the world,

and the world was horrified.

 

From the sight of his real hair,

he was stunned by laser-gun

egged and kicked,

pushed over and spat at.

And then kissed, passionately,

by a young girl dressed in red.

 

Jeff was then arrested

by masked men in black;

for disturbing the peace

and exposing himself in public.

 

If that wasn’t enough

he then found himself hair-cuffed

And led away,

quarantined as soon as thrown

into a pulsating orb.

 

Suddenly the town was

back on program.

As for Jeff,

He really did hate his hair.

Apocalypse No!

creative writing, poems, short stories,

Last weekend, Carol and Denny were a right randy little twosome.

They moaned together, writhing in their heavily soiled bed for two days straight.

All the while, stumbling about in their front garden, were rotting neighbours Bob and Jess.

Of which, were also moaning; all lumpen, stinking like mouldy old human paste in a bin full of used dog-s**t bags.

Apparently Bob and Jess had completely escaped Carol and Denny’s attention.

Until the next morning that was, when Monday’s blues bit them harder than usual.