He was dead before his eyes closed. That they closed was a blessing, the whole thing was so devastatingly awful that to have him slumped in the seat with staring eyes would simply have added to the nightmare.
Author: literallystories2014
Literally Stories Week 15
It has been another week on Literally Stories. Began Monday. Went through several days and ended Friday.
I could review it all for you but I am inclined not to as I’ll no doubt make a hash of it.
Least said soonest mended is my maxim. Strictly speaking I didn’t actually think that one up.
Anyway. I’ll belt up. Keep schtum (I cannot repeat what my spell-checker suggests.)
Say nada, zip, or nowt as we say in my native city of Seven Hills.
Not Rome, Italy folks. No. Sheffield, England.
Say nothing and let others do the talking…there, I’m done now.
Talk!
Monday – The Hobby by LS Editor and master of dirty realism, Hugh Cron. Tobias Haglund said: A very, very interesting experiment with the format. Placing the unsettling feeling of discomfort in the head of the reader. Something unsaid or intangible is often scarier.
Tuesday – Cor Pulmonale by Todd Levin. June Griffin said: The river, the bus stop, the poppy designs, the constant cold and the broken heater were just some of the vivid elements in this fine story of two lost souls snatching at a comfort never meant to last.
Wednesday – Pater Noster by Bi-lingual LS Editor and master of a multitude of genres, Tobias Haglund. Some grinning buffoon who seems to have spent too much time in the sun said: PK Dick renowned as a science fiction author would have approved of this Tobias, the line: One misstep. Two paths in a forest. If both lead to the river how can either be wrong? There aren’t shades of darkness. epitomises the central, arguably spiritual theme to his philosophical writing.
Thursday – Son of Violence by LS newcomer, Michelle Assaad. Vic Smith said: Whatever happens next, it won’t be good, will it? I enjoyed this, Michelle, and I’m looking forward to your next story.
Friday – Ray’s Vision by LS Editor Adam West. Richard Ardus said: A very satisfying short; the pithy one line admonitions; the sinister identification of the protagonist with the son of God, knowing that there’s a kind of get-out clause – like Christ, he’s doomed.
Forgot to mention there is a poll. A new one (see link below), and there is/was an old poll and that poll was a tumultuous battle. Two T’s – Todd and Tobias – an Englishman and a Swede – went to war. And it was terrible. Titanic. Turbulent. Like two people called Titan fighting and someone (called Titan) had to win, and someone had to lose (unless it was a dead-heat then it didn’t have to end in defeat). Was it a dead-heat? No. Who won? Tobias won that’s who. But Todd won too. It was his third story to be published on Literally Stories which puts him one behind Des Kelly as most published author on the site.
Ray’s Vision by Adam West
For the first thirty-two years of his life Ray Gaffney did not know who his father was.
He did not care either.
That all changed at a party. After he had sex. When he had a vision.
Son of Violence by Michelle Assaad
Freddie knew there were some people you could disrespect and others you had to treat with reverence. He was in a restaurant looking at a man sat at the bar. He knew instinctively that this was a man who was not to be fucked with.
He looked back down at his bowl of spaghetti and ordered his wife to do the same. She did but every once in a while peeked up at the man from the corner of her eye.
She had a bad feeling about him.
Cor Pulmonale by Todd Levin
I always had trouble seeing the signs despite the signs always pointing in the right direction. One day I left home and walked down to the next town and decided not to walk back. As it turned out this was a place that didn’t have signs and I was alone.
2:45 am by Todd Levin
I stood on the bottom floor waiting for the elevator. There are two elevators and when one reaches the bottom floor, the other makes its way to the middle so that, when it’s called from no matter where, it’s as close to all floors as it can be without keeping the caller waiting. I’ve often thought of the vanity of that, especially here in a building where the people move out as quickly as they move in. I’ve been here for two years and it feels like I’ve been waiting just as long for this damned elevator. I don’t mind because I have nothing to get up there for, up there on the 7th, where like all the other floors, the doors are white, the people don’t talk and the night is longer than the day. It’s midnight and it’s a Tuesday in November so I travel to the 7th alone. I stare at the bulletin board for the building and it’s empty. It has notices and pictures but it’s empty. I haven’t slept properly from nearly three weeks, a successful push of late being four and a quarter hours last Monday, the effects of a bad day, a dirty gin and an over the counter sleeping pill that just made my eyes feel heavy and like they couldn’t open when I finally woke up at 02.45am.
Horses Riding in upon the Waves by Des Kelly
Sitting atop dunes looking out across the sea with wild breakers racing in like horses riding in upon the waves, keeping a watch for invaders; wild berserk axe men steering their longboats ashore to pillage, rob and kill.
The wild breeze whips the surface off the sand to send it spiralling like a crazy snake all across the ground; with sea weed patches scattered never to be redefined, spits and spots of rain cascade in the wind, some of it salt and some ill-defined.
Diving beneath the cover of walls built by hard faced men long vanished from the earth, searching out the hollows, collecting pebbles for one last dash & defence towards the approach to Castle keep, splashing through fast flowing water, scattering fat sheep and whooping a warning the boy drops breathless and excited onto the sandy soil.
Continue reading “Horses Riding in upon the Waves by Des Kelly”
Aunt Miranda by Diane M Dickson
When the blow first fell it was devastating. Grandfather roared and blustered around the rooms. He used words such as wanton and strumpet. Strumpet, it’s a ridiculous word, it doesn’t fit, sounds silly and theatrical. There was nothing silly about the situation and if it was theatrical it was a Tragedy.
Mummy and Nana sat in purse lipped silence. Their hands wrung and squeezed, white knuckles straining against aging, tightened skin. Aunt Miranda was “In Trouble, Disgraced, a Ruined Woman.”
Literary Stories Week 13
The task of writing Week 13 News fell to someone (me) who has made a habit of late of staring at blank pages. Bereft of inspiration (I tidy up and make tea and send out a load of emails to make myself useful) I’ll leave the wordy stuff to the reader/writers of Literally Stories.
Waiting For Francis by Todd Levin
I stood at the bathroom door of The Shield waiting on Francis. It had been a long Friday night like most of them had ended up being. This old place had been standing longer than we had but somewhere along the path between here and the hospital visits it stopped feeling that way. But we were alive. More than can be said for our beloved Shield.
