I once dated a girl who was a good friend of Baron Pizza King’s daughter and she told me this sad but enlightening tale.
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The Wolf and the Lamb by João Cerqueira
Ruth is forty-six, of medium stature, with brown hair and blue eyes. She is a biologist specialising in wolf behaviour. A week ago, she received a scholarship from a private institution to write a book about these animals. Ruth maintains that by means of howling, communication can be established between our species and theirs. Wolves can pass on lessons of cooperation, solidarity and affection. The Secret of the Wolf is the title she intends to give the book. This is why she is living alone in a cabin in the woods. Having gone through two divorces, and having no children or close family, wolves became her only passion; she even confessed to a colleague that she prefers their company to that of humans – “wolves don’t lie,” she said.
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Sunday Whoever
This week’s whoever is a long-time friend of the site, with his first piece published in 2019, and he is possibly the most adventurous. When we hit Marco Etheridge with a humungous questionnaire he answered quickly while sitting in the sunshine in very exotic climes Have a look at his back catalogue, he is one of our finest writers. So this is what he had to say:
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Week 471 – I Wonder What The Executives Called It? The Fear Should Be After And Falsetto Ain’t For Me.
Week 471 is the week that was.
And when you think on it, it’s also the week that is.
And as I start to type, then it’s also the week that will be!
Don’t you just hate it when someone hasn’t a clue about their tenses?
I read this week that Mary Poppins has been re-classified due to an obscure reference.
I don’t want to go into this again but I do wonder where this is all going to end?
Actually, I don’t think it will. I reckon all films will soon be classed as unsuitable if any of the characters light up a cigarette.
Continue reading “Week 471 – I Wonder What The Executives Called It? The Fear Should Be After And Falsetto Ain’t For Me.”
Treehouse by Hanwen Zhang
The front door is already locked but I find Dan hanging around the tree in the backyard, legs curled up around the topmost branch as if he’s the Cheshire cat or something. No stripes, but the swagger to pass as one, all smug and smiling. Eminently punchable. He gestures at me to come up, casually, the way someone might give orders to a dog. The last time I saw him he owned a slobbery mastiff he would feed Grade A beef to.
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When the Sun Dies by Tathagata Banerjee
The thing that you need to understand is, living beings die.
It’s not welcome, yeah. It is not something to look forward to, but it does happen. And, at times, it is kinda funny.
When daddy killed the deer, I found it funny how she toppled over the ground and crumpled on its back. There is something intricately funny about tragedy, seeing something regal just fall and shatter. When, at the end, the sun dies, I think God will also sit back and have a merry little chuckle.
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Sixty a Day Man by Andy Larter
“Put ’em on t’ side,” Grandad croaked. He must have heard the kitchen door click open and shut.
He’d sent me to Mrs Byrne’s on the corner of Wightman Street for twenty Senior Service. “You can earn yer tea,” he said. “But mind I want change.” He gave me two half crowns. “Should be a bob.” He jabbed the stem of his briar at my face. “Think on.”
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My Unimaginary Friend by George Oliver
My friends had always been transparently envious of Molly, even if they weren’t verbalising this. But it was obvious.
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Just Give It Time by Matthew J. McKee
Saudade: (n.) a nostalgic longing to be near to something or someone that is distant; the desire to be near again to what has been loved and then lost, “the love that remains.”
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Sunday Whatever: The Lady and the Lumberjack by Tom Sheehan
This week our most published writer, Tom Sheehan presents a little thing that is not exactly a short story but is wonderful it its own right. Tom is a master of the craft and language and we hope you take the time this Sunday to let him speak to you.
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The Lady and the Lumberjack
Lottie Littlejohn had worked the lone general store in Clint Falls, Montana, by herself after her husband fell across the counter and died from a heart attack, no family near enough to help her, now approaching five long years at the task. And she never looked at a man out of the corners of her eyes, not with hope, interest or hunger of the tricky sort, two ways of getting together, her to him or him to her.
It all popped loose one day when a lumberjack, a regular monthly customer, Daniel Ranford, brawny across his shoulders, forearms and wrists carrying near-emblems of his trade, took an extra look at the lady behind the counter.
If ignition was ever spontaneous, this did the errand at hand, cracked open another door as though it came loose of hinges, or the last swing of an ax sharpened for the deed.
In a manual world, lamp lonely lit when necessary for late hours or the darkest of days, it was singular, open, a notion or an idea on the run and delivered as such. For a woodsman whose life and success were explosions of energy, the drop of a tree was not the final act of the deed but there came endless splitting of logs and succeeding piles of stove wood or construction lumber in a daily mix. Destination went in every direction, sundry routes, defined needs as demands chased his energies.
Ranford fired all barrels of his attention, and managed to slip in an extra visit to the store to move the concentration, Lottie wondering if he had lost a brace of supplies or let sourness make an extra invasion.
Lottie began to pay attention to her appearance, stayed with an attractive hair-do, changed her clothes as often as she could, do a last-minute fix when she saw him coming or figured he was due for a visit; all possibilities checked and doublechecked to her satisfaction, and, hopefully, his.
Both ends made improvements, the way they would look at each other, without saying a word out of sync, like love warming up to a noble task for a lumberjack or a store clerk. She marked one minor problem with gout on one of his knuckles, and the other was an ear for soft country music in an occasional recording he purchased, as if every other visit had worn the records out, down to the nub, or, if possible, down to the last lonely tear in his eyes. the soft music finding a soft heart. And Lottie noting changes and impacts from her observation on the one man now attracting her attention.
When Ranford spun loose a soft country song from memory, “When Love Makes the Mountain Taller,” Lottie was home with a new energy, herself near drawn down over the counter, her heart now wide open with remembrance of a known love that carried her for lovely years, wrapped her in its hunger, let the topic rush the richness of old thoughts, new advantages for old souls.
Life on the upswing; nothing else like it, for storekeeper free of the counter, lumberjack free of the forest. The world can turn around in the smallest sphere; love and hunger make the drawing, the pairing.
literally stories 