Autumn Competition, 2010

First Place - 'Five Senses' by James Stevens
Second Place - 'Danny Jack's Chase' by Emma Melville
Third Place - 'The Shallow End of the Sea' by Martha Williams

                 ----------------------------

James Stevens

James Stevens lives in London and writes of the darker side of human nature. He is a keen reader of horror and speculative fiction, and believes that if vampires are real that they wouldn’t sparkle.

Five Senses

The wall of perfume hit him as hard as a sledge hammer. Why did they always have to have the cosmetics section right at the entrance? He tried to avoid department stores like this if at all possible, but since the operation he found he had the need to urinate more frequently and public toilets, however sordid, had to be used.

            Hot blood thumped in his ears as he fought his way through the invisible clouds of pheromones. The faces of the saleswomen, caked in inch-thick make-up leered at him in grotesque smiles – their red lipstick as bright as blood. Twenty feet to the stairs and his escape, that was all. He could do that. Another surge of the sweet musky aromas assailed him, and the world closed in – his breath coming in rapid gasps, the throb in his ears getting louder and louder. Twenty feet, but the way there stretched out before him. In the blink of an eye the twenty feet became a hundred – there was no way he could make it.

            He stopped and fought to control himself. Deep breaths, he muttered, deep breaths. His head grew light and the acrid sting of bile bit at the back of his throat.

            ‘Excuse me, sir,’ one of the painted whores said, her face warping and twisting into the semblance of a psychotic clown. ‘Are you alright?’

            He turned to her. Her words were distorted – baritone-deep, as if spoken at half speed, her smile of concern transformed into a leer of disgust.

            ‘Sir?’

            His throat tightened, the ragged breath coming in increasingly sharper gasps. The wall of fragrance closed in tighter on him. It became suffocating. Sweat beaded on his brow and with a sudden, jerking spasm of his chest the woman’s crisp white uniform became stained orangey-green with his vomit. The last thing he heard as he fell to the floor and darkness took him, was the shrill scream of the saleswoman.

In the darkness distant, muffled voices teased him with unidentifiable words. A brief snap cut through the fog of indistinct noise, followed by the stinging bite of a sharp scent in his nostrils, and he was brought back to the world.

            He opened his eyes to find himself lying on the cold tiles of the cosmetics hall, two paramedics kneeling over him – one holding a small plastic vial to his nose. A crowd of people surrounded them, desperate to gawp at the vomiting madman. Some of them were sniggering. He shied away from the vial but was instantly assailed by the coma-inducing waft of a myriad of perfumes. He gripped the paramedic’s hand and forced the plastic bottle back to his nose. Anything was better than the sickly aromas around him.

            In the far corner of his consciousness he could hear the weeping wails of a woman. He glanced around and through the throng of people caught sight of her – the saleswoman’s uniform stained and wet, being towelled down by a colleague. Tears had streaked the woman’s mascara and made her appearance even more terrifying.

He tried to sit, but the paramedics restrained him.

‘Are you alright?’ they asked.

He grunted that he was. He struggled to get to his feet and noticed the large wet patch on the front of his jeans. Another female snigger cut through his consciousness. He snapped at glare at the woman onlooker – his eyes burning hatred. Perhaps in her late fifties, dowdy, she reeked of cheap fragrance and trowelled-on make-up. Her snigger stopped cold with his scowl. There was something in his eyes, something alien and terrifying which made her back away from him and try to lose herself in the crowd.

A stinging sensation at the back of his neck pricked at him – a feeling he was more than familiar with. The colour of the people around him; the paramedics, the leering on-lookers and the department store itself all faded away, leaving him in a monochromatic world. To his eyes the now black and white features of the people around him gave them a two-dimensional quality. The paramedics spoke to him, their mouths forming soundless words. The only noise he heard was the renewed pulsing throb of blood in his ears.

            Where was she, that sniggering bitch? Where did she go?

            He scanned the floor – her footprints shone red and blue to him, almost as if the heat of her steps had left a trail for him to follow, their lurid colour in sharp contrast to the bland world around him. Pushing away from the paramedics he stumbled through the parting crowd, all of them desperate to avoid being touched by the vomit and urine-stained lunatic.

            Across the cosmetics hall he followed the glowing footprints, and moved out through the glass entrance doors onto the street. The chatter of passers-by, the roar of cars and buses driving past were all lost to him. Only the rhythmic thud, thud, thud of the hot blood sounded in his ears.

            He scanned the pavement for her tell-tale steps. There they were, heading down the high street. Stumbling, almost drunkenly in his anticipation of catching her, he pushed his way through the mass of shoppers. No doubt they objected and cursed him as he forced his path through them, but he was deaf to all of their protestations. The prickling sensation deepened – it was an unquantifiable sense which he had come to learn meant that he was nearing his prey.

            There she was!

            The woman paused as she stepped into the doorway of a multi-storey car-park, and glanced back along the way she had come. Their eyes met and for a frozen moment terror flooded her face. As she darted inside the building his gait quickened. He ignored the hot footprints which glowed bright against the dull paving slabs; he knew where she was.

            Now her scent came to him, a trail of third-rate fragrance carried to him on the breeze, and all other distractions were closed off – he could smell her panic. The distance between the exchanged look and the car-park passed in a blur. Bursting through the entrance doors he followed the now blazing footprints up the stairs, taking them three at a time, and out onto the fifth level. The door banged open with a boom and he focussed instantly upon his target. Thirty feet away, she was frantically searching through her purse. With the crash of the door the aroma of panic intensified – its musk far more intoxicating than anything the painted whores in the department store pedalled.

            The woman, desperate to open the car door, fumbled with her keys and dropped them to the floor. Her shrill cry of anguish cut through the silence of his world – three senses down, he trembled at the thought of touch and taste to come.

She scrambled at the concrete floor, breaking off a false fingernail as she fought to retrieve her keys. Got them. She thrust the key into the lock, but was flattened by his rushing bulk before she could turn it.

            His hands clamped around her throat and silenced her to all but a whimper.

Oh, the touch.

The warmth of her soft neck bled into his rough fingers. She raised her feeble hands in a futile attempt to pry him off, but his state of adrenalin-fuelled ecstasy was far too much for her.

            The sight of her struggle, the sound of her choking whimper, the sweet, sweet aroma of her terror and the electrifying touch of her constricting neck sent a wave of euphoria through him. You should always save the best ‘til last, his mother had repeatedly told him as a child.

            And so he would. Taste.

He pulled her up so that her eyes were close to his – he had learnt from experience that it was even better if they saw him at their end. Her eyes bulged, almost popping out of their sockets as he squeezed tighter and tighter. She kicked and thrashed in her fight to live, her black shoes scuffing the grey concrete. Her mouth opened and closed like a fish stranded on a riverbank, her tongue pushed out over the teeth.

            Now, his internal voice ordered. Now.

            He pulled her closer and bit deep into her teasing tongue. Her cry of pain lost in the vice of his crushing hands. Twisting and pulling he became an animal, tearing off her lying, dirty flesh. He chomped at it a few times before swallowing. Nothing, absolutely nothing in the world could compare to the sweet ecstasy the taste of her warm flesh gave him.

            Blood pumped out of her open mouth, her teeth and chin gleaming red. With a final contraction of his hands her throat cracked, and then snapped. Her eyes, as wide as saucers at the last, dimmed as her life seeped away in a slow whisper through her cracked and bloodied lips.

After a minute the adrenalin thrill began to ebb away and his grip on the woman’s neck weakened. He turned her face to one side and peered closer at her bulging eyes. Bloodshot and impossibly large – she was a bug, an insect and he was right to crush her.

            Another minute passed before his breathing slowed enough for him to relax. Colour returned to his world. He dropped the woman to the blood-slick concrete and rotating his hands slowly, he inspected them. Her blood had traced thin lines over his fingers and palms. He licked at one line and his face contorted into a grimace. The blood was cool and its metallic tang bit hard on his taste-buds. He spat out frothy red spittle.

            He climbed to his feet and gazed around the car-park – it was empty, just him and the dead insect. He wiped his chin free of her cold blood and dragged his palms across the back of his filthy jeans. The sounds of the traffic outside returned to him, people went about their business, the world continued.

            He shuffled to the stair-well – the only thought on his mind was the desire to document this event before the fire of the memory had left him completely.

**************

Emma Melville

Emma Melville lives and works in Warwickshire. She is a school teacher of students with special needs who writes in her spare time, concentrating mainly on fantasy short stories. She has published several short stories in anthologies and won the Deddington Arts Festival prize in 2009. Danny Jack’s Chase was inspired by a piece of music written by Ric Sanders of Fairport Convention and ties together strands of legends from traditional folk songs.

Danny Jack’s Chase

Early morning sun through the shutter cracks woke Danny and he lay listening to the bird song greeting the summer.

The bluebells would be out in Spinney Wood and Rosie Hawkwood had smiled at him in a certain way just last night and suggested jumping the fires together. The day was full of possibilities and Beltane blessings.

‘Church,’ Matty said throwing the shutters open.

‘What?’ Danny sat up blinking in the sudden glare. His friend had already been to the pump; his hair hung in damp curls framing his thin features.

‘Church,’ Matty said again. ‘Holiday today, no work and everybody will be at church.’

Danny groaned recognising signs he’d seen before. ‘Who is she?’

‘She?’ Matty feigned ignorance and then sat heavily on the end of Danny’s bed. ‘A beauty, the fairest in England – no, in all the world.’

‘You said that the last time.’

‘I was wrong, so wrong.’

‘You don’t say.’ Danny had never known Matty’s infatuations to last longer than the time it took the lady in question to decide that she wanted more than a man in her bed. The words bride or proposal were usually enough to douse Matty’s flames of desire.

‘Come on,’ Matty wheedled, ‘Rose’ll be at church too.’

‘Oh, all right.’ Danny resigned himself to a morning listening to Matty’s rapturous descriptions of his latest love. ‘Church it is.’

The small building was crowded, most of the village had left field and forge, home and hearth to welcome the summer. This morning they would do so in the new way – listening to the elderly priest declaim in Latin to a foreign god – but later they would light the fires and dance and sing to the worship of the Goddess.

Danny and Matty squeezed themselves into a pew at the back and craned their necks to see who else was there. Rosie stood two rows in front of them with her parents. Danny let his eyes linger on her cascade of golden curls and the curve of her figure beneath the green gown she wore.

‘Look,’ Matty nudged him, ‘there she is.’ He pointed towards the front of the packed building.

Danny rolled his eyes and wondered which of the dozen women in the general direction had caught his friend’s eye this time.

What held his own gaze as he studied the women on show was the new lady from the manor. Lord Arnold’s new bride, recently returned with him from the city was in church for the first time. Several of the patrons of The Festival Bell had been discussing her over the past week – how she visited old Meg when she was sick, how she’d given Sally Butcher money for her new baby. If Danny had been told once that she was ‘as kind as she is pretty’ he’d been told a dozen times. All of which meant, he decided, that she must be the most generous person in the world because the slim girl dressed in Arnold red and gold was breathtakingly beautiful. Long tresses of raven black hung down her back and framed alabaster features, exquisitely drawn.

He nudged Matty. ‘Lord Arnold’s wife, look,’ he hissed, ‘by Janet.’ They’d grown up with Janet; her father was steward at the manor and she was devoted to Lord Arthur. Danny wondered what Janet thought of the new lady in his life when all her childhood dreams had been of her master sweeping her off her feet and into a raised position as his wife. She stood, unsmiling, to the right of Lady Arnold while the lady whispered in conversation with the young blonde woman to her left. This was someone Danny didn’t recognise but assumed it to be her own maid brought with her to her marriage.

‘We ought to ask Janet about her,’ he realised he was talking to himself. Matty was staring, enraptured, at the three women.

‘Oh no, not the lady of the manor. Matty, tell me it’s not her.’

‘She’s perfect,’ Matty said, ‘and he’s old enough to be her father.’

‘She’s married and, however old, he’s her husband.’

Several voices hushed them as the vicar began the service.

Matty never took his eyes from the petite figure at the front while the sermon dragged on; the vicar making the most of a full church.

A couple of times Danny was sure she looked back though he didn’t blame her; Matty’s persistent stare was probably burning into her skin.

As the last blessing and Amen faded away, Danny dragged his friend outside though Matty wouldn’t go further than the churchyard.

‘Wait here, we’ll have a word.’

‘You’re mad. What sort of word?’

‘Nothing wrong,’ Matty slapped Danny’s shoulder. ‘Don’t worry so.’

The three women eventually emerged blinking into the sunlight and paused in the porch. Danny watched in growing alarm as Lady Arnold looked round until she found Matty and then headed for where they stood by the wall. Her two maids – the old and the new – trailed in her wake.

‘She knew you’d be waiting,’ Danny accused his friend.

‘Of course, we’ve met, we’re … friends.’ The briefest of hesitations.

‘What have you done?’ Danny tried to make his friend towards him.

‘Nothing,’ Matty pulled away. ‘Made her welcome, nothing more.’

Matty swept an extravagant bow. ‘My lady, so good to see you again. Your husband didn’t come to church?’

‘Alas,’ she said dramatically, ‘I am abandoned. The sheep are much more in need of attention than I.’ She included Danny in her radiant smile. ‘A beautiful day for the beginning of summer.’

Danny found himself smiling back. ‘There’ll be fires later, my lady, and music and dance.’

‘And I will sit all alone in my big hall waiting for my husband to have enough of the sheep. I shall think of you.’

‘You could join us,’ Danny suggested, some inner alarm telling him that this conversation was being orchestrated and was heading in entirely the wrong direction.

‘Alas, I fear not, but maybe,’ and now the smile was all for Matty, ‘some will be persuaded away from the fires to join me in my solitary meal.’

‘Of course, my lady. I myself would be honoured.’ Matty offered her his arm. ‘May I escort you on your lonely way home?’

The ease with which she placed her slim hand on his, the assured way he slipped it through his arm spoke volumes.

Danny caught Janet’s eye and read there his own thought; they’ve done this before and we’re supposed to be witness to the innocence and spontaneity of the invitation. He thought he saw something else; a flash of triumph in Janet’s hard green eyes before she dropped her head and hurried after her mistress.

Danny stood there and watched them for a while, a strange procession across the village green where the following two might have almost been invisible trailing along behind. When they showed no signs of needing his company, Danny went in search of Rosie in the front bar of The Festival Bell.

It was nearly dark and John Gaudie was fiddling his third set of reels when Janet arrived in the bar. She was cloaked and booted, her face set.

Danny watched her push her way through the crowded bar an dlean in to yell at Rosie’s father where he ruled behind it. After some minutes negotiation the two of them left through the back door.

Danny waited, his heart sinking, ignoring Rosie’s arm around his waist and her head on his shoulder until her father returned alone a little while later.

‘I wonder what Janet wanted,’ he said.

Rosie shrugged. ‘Face that curdle cream, that one. Expect her new mistress told her to go and scowl someplace else.’

‘Matty went up there tonight. She invited him.’

Rosie sat up so she could look him in the eye. ‘Matty?’ She knew what that meant as well Danny did. ‘And Janet sent away?’

She leapt up and hurried behind the bar, wrapping her arms round her father’s neck to lean close and whisper in his ear.

After a brief conversation she pushed him towards the back door before hurrying back to Danny.

‘Janet borrowed a horse. She said she had to get to his lordship.’

‘Now? Why?’

‘Why do you think, stupid? She’s gone to tell him what her new ladyship’s up to. You know she carries a candle for him?’

‘Matty. I need to warn him.’ Danny straightened.

Rosie shook her head and pulled him to his feet. ‘So like a man. I’m way ahead of you. Dad’s gone to saddle you a horse.’

They began pushing through the crowd.

‘I could run to the—’

‘Not the hall. You’ve got to stop Janet.’

‘But if—’ He stopped in the doorway to argue and Rosie pushed him outside.

‘Arnold knows Matty, he’ll believe Janet, and you know what he’s like. If he hears it, Matty’s dead – tonight or later, no matter which.’

‘You’re right,’ Danny took a deep breath of May evening air filled with woodsmoke and hawthorn blossom, ‘Janet can’t tell Arnold. I’ll follow her. I’ll convince her. We grew up together; she isn’t thinking.’

Rosie sighed, ‘She’s thinking very hard, Danny Jacks, but only of herself and her lord and not a whit to spare for Matty Groves. Go and remind her what her hate for her ladyship will do to an old friend.’

He spurred the horse away, heading north out of the village for where the Arnold sheepfolds nestled in the lower fields of the downs on the far side of the Cherwell brook. The hedges passed in a blur as he leant low, the horse’s hooves crushing new growth as he passed to release the smell of summer.

Soon the confined fields gave way to the slopes of the downs heading up towards the Spinney.

He plunged through, the trees whipping at his face and catching at his clothes as he forced his mount to maintain speed. There was no sign of Janet; she’d pushed ahead on John Hawkwood’s best mare.

Once through the trees he let the horse have its head, charging for the crest of the down and then hurtling down the other side.

Ahead, he could just make out Janet in the rising moonlight and she’d almost made it to the brook.

Beyond the stream the flames of campfires showed where Lord Arnold camped.

Danny kicked his heels in, driving greater speed from his panting horse.

It was too far and Janet rode as if demon-driven. She barely paused at the stream bank, splashing across into the firelight and calling for Lord Arnold.

Danny dragged his horse to a stop and watched her, a brown-haired servant girl on a borrowed nut-brown mare facing her lord as if she were an equal. He felt a momentary stab of pride for his childhood friend before he pulled his horse’s head round and pointed it towards home.

Nothing he did now would stop Lord Arnold from knowing. He had to get back to warn Matty.

Pleading with his already tired beast for more speed he charged back the way he’d come.

He’d scarcely reached the crest when he heard sounds of pursuit behind him. He glanced back. On rested horses Lord Arnold swept towards him, his men carrying flaming torches pulled from the campfires.

Danny dug his heels in and slapped the reins down across his mount’s neck. ‘Come on, come on,’ he urged, ‘I’m sorry but we’ve got to get to Matty.’

He bore to the left of the cluster of lights which marked the village, making for the looming shadow of Arnold Manor. The sounds of pursuing hooves thudded nearer. He didn’t dare risk the time to look back, just lay himself lower across the horse’s neck willing it to greater haste.

The beast was flagging; its steps laboured. ‘Please,’ Danny whispered, knowing it was a forlorn hope, ‘just a bit further.’

It finally gave up at the fence which surrounded the Arnold Estate and stopped abruptly almost catapulting Danny from its back.

He knew that nothing was going to make its tired legs leap the wooden barrier so he slid off and scrambled over the fence for himself.

Lord Arnold’s group were almost upon him, veering neither left nor right. He’d hoped they’d take the detour round to the main gate and give him a little more time but they rode straight for the fence.

Danny leapt down, ran across the manicured lawn and round the fish pond towards the manor. His breath came in great gasps, his blood pounding.

Too late; always too late. He wasn’t going to make it.

A brief hiatus in the chasing hooves told him when they cleared the fence. Danny managed another five paces before a blow took him from his feet and sent him tumbling to the ground.

Luck, which had been so against him, briefly nodded in Danny’s direction and saved him from the flying hooves as half a dozen horses passed over him.

They hurried on without a backward glance as Danny wearily pulled himself to his feet. Then he hesitated, uncertain what to do now and was still rooted to the spot when the shrill scream cut the night minutes later.

Exhaustion and sorrow took his legs from him and he collapsed, sobbing, to the ground.

He had no idea how long he sat there but the moon was beginning its journey to the horizon when a hand on his shoulder roused him.

He looked up into eyes as red-rimmed as he was sure his own must be.

‘I appreciate your loyalty to one you loved,’ Lord Arnold said, ‘I wish my wife had shown me same courtesy.’

He looked away and Danny noticed the bandage round his left arm.

‘Is Matty—’ He couldn’t put the thought into words.

‘He died bravely,’ Lord Arnold said, still watching the moon.

Danny waited in awkward silence until Lord Arnold eventually took a deep breath and offered him a hand to help him stand.

‘Take him home,’ he said. ‘Take them both.’ He met Danny’s gaze briefly and for the only time. ‘He may lie with her in death as he wished to in life.’

Lord Arnold walked away leaving Danny to take his heavy burden and heavier heart home.

**************

Martha Williams

Martha Williams lives and writes in the UK, in a small house overlooking the sea. Her stories have been included in print journals and online, including Writers’ Forum Magazine, The Linnet’s Wings, Metazen, The Pygmy Giant and more. Martha’s website is here: www.marthawilliams.org and she tweets as @marthawriting.

The Shallow End of the Sea

Amy’s fingers tremble as she pours jasmine tea and I pretend not to notice the death rattle of cup on saucer; a porcelain pain worse than the screech of nails across a blackboard. An echo of morbidity. I think, if I were in her shoes, I’d use mugs.

A cloud of sweet steam dampens my chin. “I used to find ginger tea helped with sickness …” I tail off. Amy looks up, trying to remember when I needed ginger tea. I can’t remind her, 'when I was pregnant' – that would be cruel, Amy would have loved children. I flounder in my silence and stutter, “... have you tried it?”

“Yes, it’s lovely. I ran out.” Her voice is light and flowery. She’s the epitome of girl, always has been. Patchouli-scented, lace top over purple skirt with lilac trim.

I am a sow beside her. “I’ll bring some next time.”

“Would you like a biscuit?”

“Ta.” I skipped breakfast because I am starting to bulge over my jeans. Now I’m starving and I snort my way through a cookie.

Amy nibbles hers.

“How are you?” I have to ask, even though it sounds so thick. “I mean, how’s the treatment?” We grew up a part of each other, but her illness has built walls around our words.

“It starts again on Monday.” Amy abandons her biscuit, “Mum’s coming to look after me.”

“I’ll help …”

“It’s okay. Mum wants to.” Amy doesn’t pull the faces I’d pull, if my mother wanted to move in. Amy and her mum are like sisters. Now she’s telling me how she’s going to let her mum do all the housework so she can paint, as if she’ll be able to. “But not the cooking. Well, she’ll probably insist. Hey, Gem, that’s how you can help. Come round with food. I’ll say you want to help; that we should let you. Don’t make me eat her cooking!”

When Amy grins her skin stretches between her cheekbones and chin.

My mind flashes back to an hour before I came here, over-boiled pasta spewing from the sieve into a glutinous heap at my feet. A moment of absent-mindedness washed away by the trickle of boiling water from the edge of the counter, splashing my shins. Pain.

For a moment my face twitches as I wrestle to stop its collapse. Amy is the one I’d always tell anything, but I can’t now. I’m desperate to cry on her shoulder, have her make six vodka limes and slam them back together until my woes bring forth snot and laughter instead of the dull ache that makes my day feel like mud up to my neck.

But her illness has robbed me of my best friend already because you can’t ask a dying person for help, can you?

Amy senses a problem, “It’s okay, you don’t have to, I was only joking.”

“No, of course I’ll bring food. We’ll see what you feel like at the time.”

“Sure.”

I’m still struggling with my face and Amy is watching me quizzically but doesn’t ask what’s wrong, in case it’s just that I’m seeing her dead already. She sees that in her mother’s friends. Looks that say, 'so young, it’s so sad'. It makes her want to scream.

“I’m not being old and thick.”

Amy laughs because she knows I understand. We both read the silence. She eases it, “Hey, guess who emailed?”

“Who?”

“Well, she said she’d seen you looking peaky the other day…”

“Suzie Shithead?”

Suzie. The piranha of small town gossip. The wet toilet seat at your party. The blob at the bottom of your drink.

“She’s around for a few days. Gonna drop in.”

We both know what that means; Suzie will dine out on the descriptions of lost hair and prominent bones.

“What did you say?”

“Said fine, be nice.”

“Why?”

“She’s got no friends…”

“Because she’s vile!”

“Even so, what harm …”

“God, Amy.” Amy frowns at me. I’ve never said it, but I’m going to. “Haven’t you got enough on your plate?”

Amy shrugs, “At least she’s obliged to be kind to me, now.”

No. I crumble. A weird part of me can’t cope with the fact that I’ve never seen Amy rant about her disease. She’s dying without a shout. How? How come I’m boiling over about her illness, and my marriage, whilst she remains equable? The thought of Suzie taking up Amy’s valuable time, the thought of Amy being as polite to Suzie as she is to me, kills me.

“How … how do you ..?” I start to cry. I know I am being a selfish berk, but I can’t help it.

“Gem?”

I can’t stop. Amy is reading emails from stupid Suzie while I am reading my husband’s emails to another woman, about how much he loves her. Amy aches all day with the pain in her belly, I ache with the pain of loss. She’s been battered by the injustice of a random God, I by the infidelity of a mate who never loved me after all. Amy and me. Babies in the bath together. Now, our remaining few weeks stained with horror. Not fair. Amy needs me, like she needs air. To be there. Not me wanting to run home, to check for more emails. Check mail, check mail, check mail, just so my stomach can lurch again when I read, 'I want you, I feel like I’ve always loved you ...’

Amy puts down the tea that warms her belly and staves off her pain; instead her fingers brush my wrist. For the first time I am denying her relief, yet suddenly we feel close again.

I look into her eyes, “How do you stay so … sane? How do you stay calm?”

She grips my wrist now, and I am flooded by Amy. Years rush through my veins as disease and pain are buried for a moment beneath the tidal wave of old friendship.

“I’m just too stupid to be unhappy.” She smiles, “You remember when I was little, whenever something upset me, I fell asleep. By the time I woke up, it would usually have gone away. When it rained, I thought rainbows would shelter me. Or on the beach, I always felt lucky to get a spot by the shallow end of the sea.”

I laugh my first proper laugh of the day because although she’s practically my sister, I hadn’t known that.

Then I tell her about the emails.

And she pauses. As her mind works through it, I sigh with relief because my own brain can stop swirling; Amy and I are interchangeable. I bow my head and only look up when I feel her skinny arms around my shoulders, and then Amy is hugging me.

She talks as only she can, “It’s only words.”

She has captured me, of course. She holds my hand.

“He might just be testing things on email, to see if he’s still attractive. Checking in a safe way. He might not even mean it, might not even be doing anything. It’s possible he’s just had a drunken moment and been a bit of a prat. I’d keep an eye, but I wouldn’t panic.” In fifteen seconds, Amy rebuilds my world.

I’d give my right arm to rebuild hers.

Suzie never does drop in. Her trip’s postponed and then Amy dies. Amy’s mum comes to visit but gets flu and has to go home, so I look after Amy, in the end. Except I can’t really help – not like I want to. But I hold hands and talk.

The emails stop, and most days I think Amy was right; it was a meaningless mistake. Other days, when I’m haunted by doubt and panic but too stupid to work out what to do, I wipe my tears, walk down to the beach, and stare at the shallow end of the sea.

                        ****************

Summer Competition, 2010

First Place - 'The Stanley Cheetham Cup' by Paul Curver
Second Place - 'The Madonna of the Basement' by Lena Gazey
Third Place - 'The Inlet' by Emma Timpany

                  -----------------------------

Paul Curver

Paul lives in London with his two cats and understanding wife. The Stanley Cheetham Cup was inspired by the stories his grandfather used to tell him
about the Village Shows he had exhibited in, in rural Suffolk. After writing numerous short stories Paul has decided to ‘cross over to the dark side’ and
 is currently half way through writing a novel. This is his first published work.

The Stanley Cheetham Cup

It was worse than having to get up and feed a new born baby every hour of the night, but that was the price Geoff Pierce was willing to pay. He had been on the same routine for the last month now and it had become second-nature to him. He never really slept anyway if the truth be told, not this close to the Netherbury Show. Too many things could go wrong and there just wasn’t enough time to start again.

This years’ Show would mark his tenth year as the undisputed champion of the Stanley Cheetham Cup and he wouldn’t let a little thing like sleep deprivation get in his way. He lived and breathed for his veg; Fennel, Runner Beans, Onions – both from sets and seeds, Potatoes, Garlic, Swiss Chard – you name it Geoff was recognised as the best at growing it.

As like the previous thirty-odd nights, Geoff was in his garden at three-twenty in the morning. He picked his way between neat rows of wonderful green and red leaves with a flashlight in one hand and plucked little grey-white slugs off his prized vegetables with the other. They all went into his bucket   of death. He didn’t like killing them himself – he didn’t really have the stomach for it – but he had no compunction in feeding the little pests to his chickens.

‘They’re a great source of protein, you know,’ he took pleasure in telling his wife of forty-two years, one afternoon, ‘and the chucks give fantastic eggs once they’ve gone through a full serve from the bucket of death.’

She answered his comment with her customary thousand-yard stare, returned to her ‘Hello’ magazine and continued to read about the intricacies of whether Angelina really wanted to adopt another baby.

Geoff didn’t mind the rain, he didn’t mind the cold and he didn’t really mind the lack of sleep. Only two things in this life really got on his goat; the slimy little slugs that wanted to eat his no doubt prize-winning veg, and the even slimier Derek Matthews who wanted to beat him to the Cup. Derek bloody Matthews! The little squirt.

Ever since mild-mannered Matthews had moved into the village four years ago they had been bitter rivals, after Derek had the audacity to challenge him as the overall winner in the Netherbury Show and claim the Stanley Cheetham Cup. After four years of trying and four years of coming second, Geoff was damn well sure he wouldn’t let Derek beat him this year and spoil the prestige of him becoming the Man of the Decade.

Half a mile away, and by the light of his new Maglite torch – the one with the NASA designed rubber grip – Derek Matthews picked his way through immaculate rows of Dwarf French Beans and inspected them all for signs of slug-attack. Nothing; his beer traps had done their job yet again. They’d seduced all of the little critters with a yeasty promise, and lured them off to a foamy death. This would be his year; he could feel it in his water. Five was his lucky number, anyway. Although, to be fair, he did say that four was his lucky number last year, but still; this would be his year. Definitely.

He’d lived in the village for five years now and they still referred to him as ‘the new boy’. This was the year that he would show that grinning idiot Pierce who was the better man. Everyone knows that it takes time to establish the right strain of veg, and the soil quality needs time to get just right – it’s not something that you can do overnight. The last four years were just dry-runs for this years’ Show, then he’d wipe the smile of Pierce’s fat face.

The day before the Show both men spent hours selecting the best of their respective crops and ensured that they conformed to the very specific rules on Showing and Presentation; Longest Bean, a Trio of Onions, Five Vegetables on a Tray. The list was almost endless and even included a section on flowers. Flowers!

‘This is supposed to be a vegetable Show for heaven’s sake, not Chelsea,’ Geoff muttered to himself as he read the Show guide. ‘Only girls grow flowers; real men grow veg.’

            The day of the Show dawned clear and bright, and both men were up before the sun, bathing and shaving. After a last minute check that everything was still tip-top they packed their vegetables into their cars with great care and drove the short distance to the village Hall and the scene of the showdown.

They entered the Hall like some ancient Roman gladiators, the contents of their stacked boxes their weapons of choice.

Derek stood surveying the battleground and got nudged from behind by a passing stick-thin old man carrying a bunch of white Chrysanthemums. ‘Oi! Watch where you’re going, Skeletor.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ the man replied with an apologetic smile.

‘Silly old fart,’ Derek muttered as he watched the man shuffle off, and then set about getting his offerings ready. As Fate would have it, in nearly all of the categories Geoff and Derek placed their exhibits next to one another.

‘Derek,’ Geoff said as his bitter rival placed trimmed and tied Onions onto the display table.

‘Geoffrey,’ Derek answered, without an ounce of warmth in his voice.

They stared at each other for a few moments like two gunslingers before Geoff broke off and finished the placement of his Onions. They continued like this for nearly an hour; carefully placing their chosen vegetables and looking at their opponents offerings through snide sideways glances. They took no notice of any of the other displays. What was the point? It was only going to be down to the two of them, anyway.

            The time for the judging to begin came around. The exhibitors were ushered out of the Hall and the doors firmly closed behind them. They had done all they could do – all of the hundreds of hours of sowing, nurturing and growing their little darlings had come down to the thoughts and opinions of the Show judges, and as far as the Netherbury Village Show was concerned, their decision was Law.

An agonising and nail-biting ninety minutes later the doors were opened and the competitors let back into the Hall. Geoff and Derek were like Greyhounds as they raced around the room looking initially at their result cards, and then at their enemies. It seemed like an even spread of Red Firsts and Blue Seconds for them both, with a few surprising – and not to mention, alarming – Yellow thirds thrown into the mix as well. It was impossible for them to gauge which of them had won, it was that close but each felt, deep down in their hearts, that they had snatched victory from the other.

The moment of truth had come, and the Head Judge with the all-important results attached to a clip-board called for attention. Mrs Valerie Cuthberts stood next to the presentation table and beamed at the ensemble, her eyes sparkling through horn-rimmed glasses. The Stanley Cheetham Cup gleamed on a velvet-covered table behind her.

‘Ladies and Gentlemen,’ she began. ‘This is the one hundred and seventh year of the Netherbury Show and I must say that we Judges have not seen a year like it. The quality of the displays has been quite outstanding, and you should all be extremely proud of yourselves for your efforts.’

A faint ripple of applause drifted throughout the Hall. Geoff shook his head and sighed.

‘Not only has this year been exceptional for quality,’ Valerie continued, ‘it has also proven to be the closest result for the Stanley Cheetham Cup ever. Indeed, we had to make two recounts to be sure, with the winner only doing so by five points. So, without further ado, I take great pleasure in announcing the winners in reverse order.’

This is it, Geoff thought, the Man of the Decade.

‘He won’t be calling me New Boy after today,’ Derek muttered under his breath.

‘In joint Second Place; Mr Geoffrey Pierce and Mr Derek Matthews,’ Valerie said, holding out a small plastic trophy cup to them. ‘I’m afraid that you’ll both have to share,’ she gave an embarrassed laugh; ‘we’ve never had a tie before.’

It was like some dreadful nightmare; the sound of the applause hardly permeating through their blanket of disbelief. Both men stood open mouthed, hoping that the old bat had made some mistake. Joint second!

‘Well, come on,’ she beckoned with a smile, holding the awful cup out to them. ‘Come and collect your trophy.’

They shuffled forward like zombies and each reluctantly took hold of a handle on either side of the cup. A photographer from the local newspaper moved in front of them and held up a camera. ‘Nice big smile, boys.’

He took three flash photographs in which the only person smiling was Valerie Cuthberts.

When they didn’t move off Valerie took them each by an arm and guided them away from the presentation table. ‘There you go.’

They stood next to each other, forgetting their enmity, both in a daze of disbelief and confusion.

‘Now, it is with great pleasure and delight,’ Valerie said as she moved back to the gleaming Cup. ‘That I award the Stanley Cheetham Cup, two thousand and ten, to Mr Brian Mildew.’

Brian Mildew? Derek and Geoff screamed inside their heads. Who the bloody hell was Brian Mildew?

The assembled group began to applaud, and some even cheered, damn it. A stick-thin man, who was easily in his eighties, made his way through the throng to accept the shining Cup from Valerie.

‘Skeletor...?’ Derek uttered, and turned to his rival. ‘How the bloody hell did he beat me?’

‘Sod you, newbie,’ Geoff replied. ‘How the bloody hell did he beat me?’

‘Thank you, thank you,’ Brian said to the crowd, barely strong enough to be able to lift the trophy. The newspaper photographer took various flash shots of the triumphant winner.

This is wrong, Geoff thought, this is all so very wrong. He let go of the plastic runner-up trophy and stomped over to Valerie. ‘How the hell could that old sod win the Stanley?’

‘I’m sorry?’ she replied, taken aback by his sudden anger.

‘Methuselah, there, how the bloody hell did he win the Cup? I think you’ve got that wrong, love. You’ve made a mistake.’

‘Excuse me, but we Judges do not make mistakes.’

‘That old codger only had four entries at most,’ Derek added, joining Geoff’s side. ‘How the hell did you make it that he scored more than us?’

‘I can assure you that Mr Mildew had a great deal more than four entries,’ Valerie retorted, her lips pursing with indignation. ‘He scored more points than either of you because he entered in to seven categories which had no other entries, and so was awarded maximum points for each.’

‘What?’ Geoff said. ‘What categories?’

Derek and Geoff turned as one, their brows furrowed in confusion. The photographer was still taking flash pictures. The bright explosions were lighting up Brian’s beaming smile as well as the magnificent white Chrysanthemums he held in one hand, and the Stanley Cheetham Cup tucked under the other arm.

‘Flowers,’ Derek muttered; his jaw slack. ‘Bloody flowers.’

The End

Lena Gazey

Lena is a Yorkshire lass who has lived in Cambridge, Birmingham, Southampton, rural Gloucestershire and even more rural France, before returning to her roots a year ago.  She now lives close enough to Leeds for the theatre, and close enough to the Dales for walking.  Interests outside of literature include playing the recorder and dressmaking amongst (many) others.  She has read since she was two years old, and written since somebody asked her if she did and she thought “no, but I really ought to”.  This is her first published work.

The Madonna of the Basement

He was well known in the area, an eccentric character even by the standards of that cosmopolitan student quarter. I’d often seen him go past, in shirt sleeves and bare feet in summer, a shabby-looking dark overcoat in winter, hands in pockets and shoulders hunched. His soft brown hair was romantically long and his pale face serious.

            When I started at the shop I only worked Saturdays and we were so rushed off our feet all day with people collecting their orders of bread for the weekend that I don’t recall seeing him. There were three of us mind you and he could have been served by one of the others without my noticing.

            The first time I did serve him he flustered and worried me. Mrs Evans had asked me to begin coming in on a Friday after school for an hour or so to give her a chance to prepare for Saturday. I was a quiet, responsible girl and as it wasn’t a busy time she felt quite happy to leave me alone in the shop. The counter was L-shaped. One side, at waist height, was where we wrapped the bread and took money; the other side, about level with my forehead, had display shelves behind a glass front. I was behind the higher part tidying piles of paper bags when I heard someone come in.

            I turned the corner – and didn’t believe what I saw. He was behind the counter. Was he going for the till? Or for me? Or what? I was seventeen and full of the responsibility of being left in charge. My throat was so dry and constricted with panic that it ached. I must have looked at him with eyes like saucers, mouth probably open, unable to say a word and he smiled back at me as though this was the most normal situation in the world.

            ‘It’s alright,’ he said, ‘I know where she keeps them. This is what I want.’

            He took two individual sachets of instant coffee from a box on the shelf – I don’t think you can buy them anymore – and placed them on the counter while he dug in his pocket for some money. I put the coppers he gave me in the till and watched him leave. I had never before seen anyone buy their coffee in two-penny sachets, but somehow it seemed all of a piece with his general differentness.

            He came in regularly on a Friday afternoon after that and would usually stay chatting for a few minutes. He might ask about my school work, or my taste in music, or what I was reading at the moment. He listened seriously to my opinions, commented and made recommendations. It never occurred to me to consider it at all odd that he should bother to talk to me, although I learned that he was a painter and part-time lecturer at the Art College and I must have realised that he was considerably older than me. Ten years older, I later discovered.

            Finally one day, he invited me to visit him for coffee and to see his paintings.

            He lived in a dank little basement room – I could recognise squalor even at that age. But squalid or not, to me it was a fascinating place. The only furniture was a bed in one corner, a kitchen table with a single chair, a chest of drawers and a half barrel, unturned as a coffee table. In the corner by the window, which looked onto the “area”, was an old stone sink with a metal drainer on which stood several jam jars full of brushes. The walls were almost completely covered: there were shelves of books, and where there were no books there were pictures – sketches, pieces torn from magazines, postcards of all kinds. It was as if he had opened a door for me to a brighter, more alive world, like the land inside the mountain that the Pied Piper took the children of Hamelin to.

            On that first visit he say me down on the bed and made me coffee. He would show me his paintings, he said, but not while I had a mug of coffee in my hand. So I drank, and looked around me, entranced. Later he pulled a portfolio out from under the bed and showed me his work. He explained: the colours, the forms, the progressions from one piece to the next, his inspirations and his love of the Italian masters.

            I went away with my head reeling and an invitation to come again – just to look in after school whenever I wanted to. I was ecstatic. I had girl friends at school but I certainly wasn’t tempted to tell any of them about my new friend.

            I went to see him once or twice a week throughout the whole of my ‘A’ level year. In fact a lot of my homework was done sprawled on that bed while he worked at the kitchen table. We enjoyed a companionable silence much of the time. Other times I would make coffee and if he was not in a working mood we’d talk. I learned about his family and he about mine, I learned a lot about art and artists and about books – any mention by me of what I happened to have out of the library at the moment would lead to a long reading list of writers I should be acquainted with. He told me stories too, little fairy tales, snippets of mythology, moral and philosophical tales.

            The people in the ground floor flat above him had a baby which he often looked after. I would quite frequently arrive to find the pram parked within sight of the basement door and he’d say, ‘Can you bring him in if he cries? I’ve got a bottle for him.’ On those days I would sit on the bed and feed the baby. Or we might push the pram around the park, especially in the late spring and early summer when I was on exam leave and could spend more time there. I do remember thinking that people would imagine that we were a family and feeling a slight and quite pleasant embarrassment, but I didn’t realise I was falling in love with him, fascinated though I was.

            It was during the summer that he made the sketches. The baby was nearly a year old by then and beginning to be really fun – he loved you to play ‘This Little Piggy’ or ‘Round and round the garden like a Teddy Bear’ and I would sit for ages with him on my knee, the pair of us chuckling at one another.

            Now that I had left school I no longer had to plait my hair or tie it back and I was quite proud of my flowing locks. He called it a fleece and said that I was pure Pre-Raphaelite. The baby liked my hair too. I don’t know if it was the springy, curly texture or the colour – auburn if you want to be polite, ginger if you don’t. Anyway, one day he’d grabbed a handful and I was laughing at him laughing at me, and trying to prise his little fingers open. I looked across the table to where Jack had been working, hunched over a large piece of paper and saw that he has put down the pastels he’d been using, picked up a sketch pad and a piece of charcoal and turned to face me.

            ‘What are you doing?’ I asked. ‘You’re not drawing me, are you?’

            ‘Don’t look at me, look at the baby. I’ll show you in a minute.’

            Through the remaining weeks of that summer he must have made dozens of sketches: in pencil, in charcoal, sometimes half worked up in paste. Never of me alone, always with the baby. I thought they were lovely, he seemed to capture the spontaneous joy that the baby’s chuckle and laughing eyes brought to me. When I asked him what they were for – because I realised that they could hardly be considered works of art in themselves and I had learned by now all about sketches and studies and cartoons – he said, ‘Nothing in particular, future use maybe. I don’t know.’

            The summer slipped away and the ‘A’ level results arrived. I passed, not spectacularly but well enough to make it onto the college course I had chosen, and the time came to leave home. I went to say goodbye to him of course but I didn’t make a production of it. It seemed as inevitable a parting as the one from my parents, part of the inexorable progress towards adulthood. I didn’t give him my address or say that I would write but I did ask if I could have one of the sketches.

            He sifted through and gave me one of the more detailed ones. It was one I particularly liked and I was pleased – the baby was just reaching a podgy little hand out to grab my hair and I had my head tipped back, laughing and trying to stay out of his reach. It was done in pastels and the colours were soft and muted – my hair, a blue dress I’d worn that summer, the baby’s pale green rompers. I thanked him, near to tears, said that I would treasure the picture, and left.

            I had a new life to adapt to; new people, new places, and I didn’t really miss him. I enjoyed my first term. I didn’t even think about going to see him when I came home for the Christmas vacation. In fact I didn’t see anyone to begin with. Term didn’t finish until a couple of days before Christmas so when I first arrived home I was kept busy with last minute shopping and helping my mother. Christmas Day and Boxing Day were the usual round of family visits and it wasn’t until after that that I began to move outside the family circle.

            It was a school friend who contacted me. Her mother was having a New Year party, would I come? My parents were not very happy – they disapproved of the girl and even more so of her mother, a large jolly divorcé with a circle of ‘arty’ friends. My mother referred to her as ‘that hippy woman’ which made me giggle as I was never sure whether she was referring to her bohemian style of her generous figure. I had got used to being able to please myself by then and went anyway.

            It was a good party; it had always been the sort of place where you could call in anytime and be made welcome and probably find half a dozen other ‘callers in’ drinking coffee. Several of my former school friends were there and we were standing in a group comparing our experiences of college life when I saw him come in. I turned to my friend, ‘I didn’t know you knew Jack.’

            ‘Jack? He’s a friend of mum’s. Why, do you know him too?’

            But already I regretted having said anything. I didn’t want to share the previous year with anyone. I mumbled something non-committal and then turned back to the group and joined in the general conversation again.

            He was moving from group to group, greeting people. He seemed to know everyone. Then he saw me. He came straight over and stood beside me and we fell easily into the old comfortable way of talking. We talked all evening and when midnight came he saw that I had a full glass to toast the New Year.

            Shortly after midnight he said, ‘Shall we go? I’ve moved. Do you want to come and see where I’m living?’

            We left and walked through the quiet streets, not talking very much. At some point along the way he took my hand and it was not a surprise when, at the entrance to another basement room, he took me in his arms and kissed me gently. Inside the room he lit the gas fire, took off my coat and led me to the bed. He was very gentle and tender and what happened between us in that chilly, damp little room was sweet and welcome and felt as if it had been meant since the day we met.

            He walked me home at three in the morning, his arm around me and my head on his shoulder. We stopped under the street light and he turned me to kiss him, kissed me once and said, ‘I’ll wait until you’re inside.’

            I walked up the short path to the front door, three steps up, unlocked the door and looked back at him as I closed it behind me. I sensed an end as well as a beginning and I was too sad for tears. I just crept away to bed and slept as though I never wanted to wake up.

            But I did wake up, and life continued. I went back to College and finished my first year. My daughter was born at the beginning of October of what should have been my second year. My parents proved to be an unexpected tower of strength – undeserved too, considering how bolshy I was, refusing to name the father and insisting that I wanted my child and would somehow manage to bring her up on my own. I took a year out from my studies and lived for that year with my parents before transferring to a College nearer home to finish my course.

            Life as a student mother wasn’t easy of course, even with a lot of help from my mother and from fellow students to whom a baby was a novelty. After I graduated it was a struggle even getting a job, let alone keeping one and balancing it with the demands of single parenthood. But she was an adorable child and worth every minute of heartache and hardship. I called her Lizzie, after Lizzie Siddal the Pre-Raphaelite artists’ model. She had my hair but she grew tall like her father with long, slim hands and feet and grey eyes in a long pale face.

            It all seems very far away now, that time of making do, of stretching every penny to the length of tuppence, of haunting jumble sales and patching jeans out of necessity, not fashion. Life did get easier. Children grow up, a job becomes more secure with every week that you manage to hold it down, what starts off as a struggle becomes a routine that gets easier by the day. In the end I found I’d built up quite a nice comfortable little life around us. I had friends, I was busy, and above all I had my darling daughter. There were men in my life at times, but somehow I never seemed to need anyone enough to want to let them all the way into my world. No one quite measured up.

            I never saw Jack again. That is, I never met him again. I saw him last week, on television. Some boarding school had commissioned a picture for its chapel and the local news programme interviewed both the Headmaster of the school and the artist. I don’t suppose they’d have made such a fuss about it if he hadn’t been both a student and a teacher at the local Collage of Art. The picture was a Madonna and Child, the pose the same as my sketch. The interviewer asked about the identity of the model, insisting a little, and I could see Jack was irritated. In the end it was obvious that he was going to have some kind of answer.

            ‘She’s someone I once loved,’ he said.

            The interviewer was obviously not going to let go now.

            ‘Once? What happened?’

            ‘What happened? I ditched the reality in order to keep the vision. Artists don’t make very good husbands, you know. I knew I couldn’t give her what she deserved, so I opted out.’

            I heard the front door open and turned the television off before Lizzie came into the room. She has the Madonna and Child sketch now. She has always loved it and has pestered me for a long time to know about it. I’d avoided telling her so far, but she was eighteen and going to Art College in September. I suppose that was when I decided that it was time I faced the fact that she did, after all, have two parents.

            I don’t know what I thought Lizzie was going to do with the knowledge I thrust upon her. I surely can’t have imagined that knowing her father’s identity would be enough in itself and she would do nothing about it. Of course she made contact. Of course they met, and of course they got on. And that is why I’m in the kitchen, on a Sunday, preparing a meal for one, because Lizzie is spending the weekend at her father’s.

            Jack is overjoyed with his daughter. He has also asked to see me. And it has taken every scrap of willpower I can muster to refuse. I’d give anything to see him, but having kept him from her for so long, how could I bear to take him away from Lizzie now?

Emma Timpany

Emma was born in the far south of New Zealand and finds that the wild, remote scenery of her birthplace inspires much of her writing. She recently completed her first novel Under The Wave on the theme of loss and is currently writing her second. One of Emma’s stories was a runner-up in a competition and is published on-line. Another story was highly commended in this year’s Frome Festival Short Story competition and Under The Wave was long-listed for the Cinnamon Press Novel Award 2009. Emma will be reading her published story at the Port Eliot Literary Festival this year.

The Inlet

The hammering at the door woke him. Cameron sat up, his head throbbing. As he reached to turn on the light, his hand knocked over the empty bottle by the bed.

            A voice shouted, ‘Cameron – you’ve got to get up, mate.’

            ‘I’m coming.’ No need to get dressed; he’d crashed out in his clothes. As he stumbled down the hallway, the hammering started again. ‘What is it?’ He opened the door to find Tim standing on the veranda. Cameron squinted in the early morning light; his eyeballs felt scratchy, as if they’d been scoured by wind-blown sand.

            ‘It’s Marama. Beth can’t find her.’

            ‘Oh God …’ Cameron’s heart pounded and he struggled to push his feet into the boots that stood by the door. His girl was out there somewhere, in the surrounding tracts of farmland, on the coastal beaches, or the wild wetness of the estuary. ‘What could have happened to her?’

            ‘I don’t know.’ Light mist drifted over the shallow basin of the inlet. Tim pointed to a small figure below them, labouring across the mud. ‘John’s gone out on the sled. If she’s out there, it’s the only way to bring her back. Tide’s turned.’ John was the only one that still went out at low tide and dug for pipis by hand, as his father had done, and his father before him.

            ‘I don’t believe it.’ Cameron put his hand to his forehead and squeezed; it felt like his brain had swollen and was trying to break out of the rigid confines of his skull. Stupid idiot; now he would have to think clearly.

            ‘At least it didn’t freeze last night.’ Tim shook his head. ‘Where could she have gone?’

‘What about Beth?’ As he said her name he felt a tightening around his heart.

‘She’s beside herself. Why don’t you go down and …?’ Tim bit his lip.

‘If you see her, tell her I …’ Cameron’s throat was dry. Drawing a long breath in through his nose he worked his tongue to moisten his mouth, ‘tell her …’

Cameron pulled his checked woollen Swandri closer to his skin – the morning air made him shiver – then stamped his heavy boots on the boards. He couldn’t wait any longer. ‘I’ll start checking the farm. Marama could have come up here, she sometimes does.’ He tried to think. ‘I won’t stop looking for her until I find her.’

‘None of us will.’ As Tim jumped down onto the grass he nodded towards the flat margin of land surrounding the inlet. A narrow gravel road ran along the shore. Six scruffy wooden villas huddled by it, half-hidden in manuka bushes, toetoes and flax. Opposite them, three rickety boathouses hovered above the mud on rotting stilts. ‘I’ll head down now. I’ll tell Beth you’re out looking.’

‘Go. It’s okay.’ Cameron paced, his numb feet needling back to life.

‘Sure?’

Cameron kept his eyes on the battered hide of his boots. Then, raising his head, said, ‘Tell her …’ But Tim had already gone, running down towards the inlet, his feet leaving dark holes on the surface of the dew-stained grass.

Cameron jumped off the veranda and hurried up the steep, sheep-tracked hillside; a weak sun struggled to break through the mist. Six o’clock. How long has she been out here? He got a sniff of sea as the wind picked up, and he turned towards the low humps of sand dunes at the mouth of the inlet; beyond the dunes was a bone-white beach. The wind was a menace; it travelled across the Southern Ocean to make its first landfall here – a lateral wind, loaded with ice. It knifed through clothes, stripped the heat from you in seconds, it even reached the inside of your teeth and made them ring like bells. But for once he was glad of it; it would blow the early morning mist away and it would clear his head faster than anything else – it would be his ally.

He raced up the hillside, eyes scanning the paddocks for a sign of her, but there were none. His leg muscles burned and he turned to rest for a moment. Below him he saw the lights come on in the houses as Tim woke the sleepers. One light already burned. Anger twisted inside him like a fraying rope. Why hadn’t Beth told him sooner, why hadn’t she noticed?

He and Beth had only been together a few times. It had been one of those things that should never have happened because she was already married. He’d always hoped that someday Beth would find her way back to him. The brief time they spent together was the only time in his life that he had felt, in any way, complete. But whatever else he might regret one good thing had come out of it all – Marama.

He took a deep breath and started to run, slipping with every step on the wet hummocky grass, calling her name. What if she had got stuck on the mud-flats; had fallen and twisted her ankle? Had she been crying out but no one had heard? It was overcast now, a fraction of drizzle; the lambs were calling for their mothers. The dogs, smelling the morning, began to bark.

He heard the sound of a tractor starting up, saw it out of the corner of his eye moving down the gravel road beside the inlet; for a moment he thought it must be old Watside rumbling along on his ancient red machine. But, of course, it couldn’t be, because Watside was dead. The poor bloke had been on that scenic flight to Antarctica that had crashed into Mt Erebus in 1979. He’d sold most of his land up Tui Creek to raise the money for the flight; he’d even lived in his old, creaking boatshed before he’d left.

Cameron reached the boundary fence. Here, where the paddock turned into a cliff and sheered down to the beach below stood a half-ruined cottage. He ran inside, looked around, taking deep, ragged breaths; but no, there was no sign of her. Some art students had lived here once (they thought the place romantic until the first winter set in) and had put a stained glass window on the western wall. It was like the austere wooden church over the hill he went to with his grandmother when he was a child. But he could never believe in the idea of a kind and loving God. His life on the farm was a relentless struggle for survival, against weather and accident. If God existed then surely he, or it, was something fierce and elemental and unquestionably inhuman – like the wind that came up from the ice, the relentless ocean, or even Antarctica itself, home of that wind; alone, inhospitable, extreme.

The south facing window had blown out and from it Cameron could see the ceaseless shrugging of the sea. Light fell in dusty shabby beams across the broken dirty floor. It came to him then that he was about to lose the thing most precious to him; the thought, like a blow in the stomach, made him double up. He was a big man, and he knelt down awkwardly, as if it was hard for his body to bend.

His eyes closed and he tried to think himself into her – wasn’t she part of him, after all? And he saw her, paddling into the shallow waters of the inlet, her long, skinny legs flecked with mud; with her long brown hair, brown eyes and tanned skin, she blended into the estuarine pallet seamlessly, like a curlew. He heard her squeals as her toes dug into the warm ooze for pipis, her triumph when she felt them and bent double to scrabble them out with her hands. How old was she now, six or seven? He did his best to watch over her; when he heard the school bus groan over the crest of the hill he would look up from his work and follow her progress down the dusty road – usually she’d fossick on the shore before going home. So many times he had seen her wading and playing around the boatsheds; he had warned her not to go near any of them, but especially Watside’s, worried the rotten posts might give way.

Cameron lurched up and started running down the hill towards the inlet. Water gushed in as the tide rose, rapidly filling it. A group had gathered on the narrow shore of pebbles between the road and the mud. Cameron skidded as his feet hit the gravel, but instead of running towards them he made for the nearest boatshed, the one that had belonged to Watside. It was more derelict than the others, its stilts almost rotted through, home to hanging gardens of barnacles and weed. Cameron shouted and waved his arms to the group on the shore then swung himself up onto the wooden bridge that connected the boatshed to the road. Rotten pieces of wood came off in his hands, and the bridge trembled, as if it was about to collapse. He grabbed the door handle, pounding the wood until it splintered, the blood banging in his ears.

‘Marama!’ No answer. He stepped back and slammed into the door with his shoulder, tripping over the threshold as the door broke free of the frame.

‘Marama!’ It was dark: he couldn’t see. He wanted to call her again but his voice died in his throat – he’d felt certain that he’d find her here. Reaching his hand out blindly, Cameron felt another panel. His fingers, working in the darkness, traced the frame of an internal door. He found the handle and pushed it open.

The interior of the inner room dazzled him. Light poured in through an open window: he saw that the walls were covered in maps of Antarctica; its white plains, its dry valleys, its islands, its mountains. As he stared at them he heard a whimper.

‘Marama?’ His voice reverberated around the space. His body shook, every nerve and muscle straining for an answer.

‘Here.’

Faint, so faint. Had he imagined it?

He followed her whisper to the corner below the window. Marama crouched behind some boxes on a pile of old blankets. She held her arm against her chest and her face was taut with pain, the freckles prominent against her skin. Relief flooded him, a warm, powerful tide, and he swayed, steadying himself on the wall.

‘My arm, it hurts.’ She winced as she tried to move.

‘Hold on, my love,’ Cameron crouched then lifted her, worried she might be dehydrated, in shock still and pain, but when she was in his arms something fell into place inside of him. It was as if he had finally fitted the last, uniquely contoured piece of a puzzle that he had been struggling for over years. ‘You’re safe now. I’ve got you. Did you fall, love?’

Marama nodded towards the open window.

‘Don’t worry.’ For a few moments she was his. As he stepped out onto the bridge he shouted again; not a word, just a sound rose from the very center of his chest, loaded with anguish as if he, not Marama, was the one suffering, the one in pain. The pebbles in front of him seemed to explode as a flock of godwits abandoned their camouflage and flung themselves into the air. He saw someone turn and start to run towards him. Beth.

‘Ambulance,’ he gasped.

Beth’s legs gave way beneath her and she sank to her knees, arms outstretched.

‘Marama’s all right; everything’s all right now.’

The mist had cleared, the inlet filled with the rising tide; he could see their three reflections on the surface of the water. He carried Marama a few steps further, bridging the space between them, then he knelt on the dusty road and, with a sure, tender gesture, placed his child back into the arms of her mother.

Spring Competition, 2010

First Place - 'The Fury of Gracie May' by Claire Godden-Rowland
Second Place - 'The Un-Shriven' by Carla Leach
Third Place - 'Gathering Senses' by Luke McGrath

                   ---------------------------

Claire Godden-Rowland

Claire is a fledgling author, poet and vocalist, based in Bristol and currently working on her first novel. She has had several short stories published in various British publications including exciting new online magazine, ‘Paraphilia’. This is the second time Claire has won first place in the Meridian Writing competitions along with several other prestigious and well known contests.

She is trained in ancient history, marketing and sales, and is currently working for St Brendan’s sixth form college. Claire is also involved in a writing group working with Bristol University along with several other literary ventures. She is now actively seeking representation and publication

______________________

The Fury of Gracie May

Everything must be perfect. Check again. Straighten the towels. Light the candle, summer meadow, no, the other one, she prefers the other one now. He stopped, took a deep breath, and started the breathing exercises he’d got off the internet. Do you know how many suicides assisting websites there were? Too many to count, I mean, who needs help with that really, it’s pretty simple, but then, he supposed, people do like to be inventive, to make a statement in their final moments.

There, that’s better, he was calmer now. He looked around a tidy house and smelled the enticing smells wafting from the kitchen. She’d be pleased, he loved it when she was pleased, how he loved it. When she was happy it was all so good, when she wasn’t having a bad day.

The low growl of her car engine on the drive, silenced following a final snarl, then the cracking, turning, sound of a key in the front door lock.  His body went icy cold with anticipation. Breath held awaiting her mood. God, let today be a good day, don’t let her be having one of her dark days.

The door slammed shut behind her, for a moment she was shadowed in darkness, a spectre in the gloom, and then she stepped forward into the dim light of the hall. She sighed and gave him an unreadable half smile. His heart swelled with happiness; it was a good day. She looked exhausted, poor dear, such a long day being a doctor. He immediately took her heavy bag and placed it in the office, next to the left side of the desk, where she liked it.  He hurried back in time to take her jacket from her exhausted hands and place it carefully on a hanger in the downstairs closet, as she liked it. Her handbag went on the hanger beside it.

She inhaled the cooking smells emanating from down the hall and moaned with an almost sexual pleasure. ‘Oh, that smells good Baby. Is it casserole?’

‘It is,’ he confirmed, brimming with pleasure and pride at his success.

‘Oh perfect, I am just in the mood for one of your chicken casseroles.’

His heart froze in its chest, fluttering, holding it’s breath like a frightened child. ‘Gracie May?’

‘Yes dear heart.’

‘It’s pork.’

‘What?’

‘It’s pork.’

‘It’s what?’

‘I’m so sorry Gracie May but its pork.’

‘Pork fucking casserole!’ She balled her fists by her side and closed her eyes impatiently, her lower teeth protruding as she attempted to control her bubbling temper. ‘Pork casserole … When you knew I wanted chicken, you did pork. Jesus, why do you do this shit to me? I’ve had a really long day and …’ She took a deep breath, eyes closed once more as if seeking patience behind her agitated eye lids. ‘Alright, that’s okay; we’ll have bastard pork casserole. Who cares what I want right?’

She marched toward the kitchen; painted toe nails opaque through the veil of nylon which shrouded them. She muttered over and over ‘pork fucking casserole’ and he flinched every time, foreboding growing like a cancer in his chest, making it hard to breath.

When he realised what she was doing it was too late. He gasped but before he could stop her she had wrenched the cupboard doors and flung them open. Her eyes grew wide with utter horror as she took in the wine bottles before her, labels cast haphazardly in every direction, some completely turned around, the whole cupboard just jumbled beyond all recognition.

She stumbled back, covering her mouth in disgust. ‘My god …’ she whispered.

‘Gracie May I’m sorry, I haven’t had time …’

Her hand connected with his cheek with a resonating slapping sound and he stumbled back. She was glaring at him with wild eyes full of fury.

‘Why do you do it?’ She screamed, incensed with rage. ‘Why do you do these things to me?’

‘I’m sorry Gracie May,’ he whimpered stumbling back away from her.

‘Do I deserve this?’

‘No,’ he pleaded meekly, shaking his head. ‘I forgot … I’m sorry …’

‘Must I do everything myself? Get no support or help at all? Do I really ask so much of you?’

‘No …’ Another slap assailed him and he stumbled back.  She gave him a kick to the thighs sending him sprawling across the floor, banging his head against the wall where he cowered.

‘You think I want to come home to this?’ She demanded, stepping over him. ‘Why do you make me do this?’

‘Please Gracie May …’ He whined.

‘I’ve been at work all day, and then I have to come home to this.’ She reached down behind the comfy chair and pulled out a dark brown belt, coiled like a serpent in her claws. She turned to him. ‘I don’t deserve this, I’ve had such a long day and then I have to come home to this. It’s like you hate me, do you hate me, why? Why?’

He held up shaking hands in surrender. ‘Please Gracie May, I’m so sorry; I know I’ve let you down.’

She slowed in her assault and lowered the belt a little, eye brows raised, expectant, and waiting.

‘I know you don’t need this, to come home to my failures. I’ll do better, I’ll make it better. I swear I will Gracie May.’

She dropped her head and placed a hand to her face, her shoulders trembled as she began to sob.

‘Oh don’t cry Gracie May, please don’t cry. I can’t bear to see you cry.’

Her whole body shuddered furiously and high pitched animal-like keening sounds came from beneath her hand which still smothered her face. ‘Oh god, I hate this, I hate that you make me like this. I hate myself for hurting you, you must know that.’

‘I do, of course I do. You have such a gentle soul. I push you to this, I know I do.’ He went to stand but froze as her crying stopped abruptly. She lifted her face from her hand, dry eyes glistening. She sniffed. She glared down at him. She sniffed again.

‘Baby?’

‘Yes Gracie May.’

‘Is that summer meadow I can smell?’

‘No Gracie May,’ he answered excitedly. ‘No, it’s the other one, the new one.’

It was too much; he’d pushed her too far, why did he torment her like this? Fury burned so hot it scalded her insides, pained her aching chest. What kind of a man tortures his wife in this way, pushing and pushing with his vicious brand of mental cruelty? That’s what it was, it was a form of abuse, no wonder she got so upset, she was really just protecting herself, fighting her corner; any woman would do the same. How dare he treat her this way, it was unforgivable, and although she knew she’d be terribly sorry later she knew what she had to do.

He fell to the floor face first as she tore his shirt open. Across his back was a lattice of angry welt marks spider-webbing across the ruined flesh.  He cried out as the searing pain tore across his skin, the belt lashing down opening the scars like hungry little lips revealing blood red tongues gleaming within. His cries were pitiful  and anguished as the red hot pain tore through him; humiliating torture burning in every vein and artery which raced like electricity through his body.

Gracie May wielded the belt like a gladiator’s whip as her attention was stolen by the distant vibrating call of her phone. She threw the belt at him and he curled up into a foetal position, clutching his knees to his chest.

‘Why do you have to put my bag away, it’s like you want to piss me off?’ She shouted as she hurried down the hallway, throwing open the closet door and scrambling about in her bag. She snapped the phone open, ‘Doctor Gray …. Hmm, I see … No, don’t be silly, it’s fine to call me at home … no, not at all, I’m happy to help. I’m on my way; I’ll be there in ten minutes. No, please calm down … she’ll be fine, keep her temperature down … How old is she?  … Six, then yes, please do give her some pain relief … I’m on my way, just try and keep her cool and comfortable.’

Gracie May snapped her phone shut. ‘I can’t do this now okay?’

He pulled himself to his knees and crouched there as if praying submissively before her. She touched his cheek tenderly and he didn’t flinch for he knew it was over now. ‘You know I love you right? I’m sorry we’ve had our little fall out, it’s probably my fault. It’s just that I love you so much and I so badly want things right between us. You know I love to air any disagreements straight away to stop them festering, to make things good between us. You know I hate to hurt you Baby, it hurts me so much more than it does you, you know that, right?’

He nodded.

She sighed. ‘Alright then, clearly you don’t.’

‘I do!’ He answered quickly. ‘I do Gracie May, I’m sorry; I hate it when we quarrel.’

She shook her head sadly as she buttoned her coat up. ‘It’s hardly a fair fight now is it? I’m a woman and you’re a man so you’ll always physically over power me.’

‘I’m sorry Gracie May,’ he muttered for want of anything else to say.

She smiled down at him. ‘Lets not say any more about it, I forgive you, you silly thing. I always do don’t I? Now be a dear heart and clear up that mess on the carpet. That will stain something chronic. Salt water should fix it. And here, I have some cream to ease your back, should stop it scarring.’

She handed him the little tube and kissed his forehead. Then she wafted out of the front door, slamming it behind her.

For a moment he stayed crouched on the floor, his back throbbing and burning, his shirt torn and ruined in his hands. He glanced around at the blood spatters on the cream carpet. She’d be very upset if they were still there when she got home. He sighed and pulled himself to his feet. It wasn’t problem, he’d tackled these stains before, and he knew exactly how to make the carpet appear clean once more.

Carla Leach

Carla recently retired from Counseling work in the Social Care Sector. She has three short stories published and is currently revising the first draft of her detective novel, set in the 1930s. Apart from writing, she also lectures for an Adult Education Project and enjoys spending time with her grandchildren.  

________________________

The Un-Shriven

I’m an old woman now. Glad of it. All that urgency and longing passion brings can never butcher my heart again. It wasn’t always so. A different story then, not one I care dwell on but one I can’t forget. You don’t forget being instigator of your own misery, even if you never admit it aloud. Not that I articulate much of anything nowadays. Especially in this flat, enforcedly cosy if you don’t mind touching two walls at the same time with both hands, or wedging yourself on the toilet next to a three-quarter bath.

I’m not complaining very loudly. Lucky to have my own small space and be able to heat up the ready meals I can still shop for. I have a home-help once a week; Brenda, chatty but nothing of relevance to impart. Not to me, anyhow, but she’s amiable enough.

‘What a bookworm you are, Mrs Turner. Have you really read them all? If you don’t mind me saying, you could get rid of some and have shelf space for nice ornaments and that.’

Humming away, she dusts the bookcase – speedily and inefficiently as usual.

‘Got your libraries there, I see. Into crime, are you? My Malcolm’s keen on the library. Every Tuesday, regular as clockwork. Spies and government cover-ups. Me, I like a bit of romance. The old-fashioned kind. You open some of ‘em now - whew! Hot stuff or what? Enough to make my granny blush. Love isn’t what it used to be, that’s for sure. Well, that’s me done.’

She slips on her coat and puts the duster in her bag. Apparently I share a duster with Mr Allenby downstairs who has ailments aplenty to keep Brenda’s tongue from running out of conversation.

‘Bye bye, Mrs Turner. See you next Thursday, take care.’

Bang! The door closes and I’m alone. Something Brenda said is running through my mind; ‘… romance. The old-fashioned kind’. Naturally, there’s no way she could have guessed the irony in that for me. As far as Brenda knows or cares, I’m just an elderly childless widow living on benefits and often crabby with it. So what? A situation repeated endlessly across the land as old people come to terms with themselves and life – or perhaps not. Makes no difference to me either way because I’ll carry my guilt into that simple pine box. Ah … if only, if only. But when we’re young we think we’re strong, fire-proof, fierce in love. Was I really all those things?

I recall loving Jimmy so much that my heart lurched every time his hand held mine. The touch of his fingers seemed a marvel of tenderness. We met when I was seventeen and he was twenty. In those days you didn’t tend to go ‘all the way’ if you could help it – though sometimes you couldn’t, and a baby got started with all the complications that you’d hope to avoid; angry parents, sniggering siblings. Plus a few nosey neighbours gossiping in the corner shop at your expense.

I went through all of that because I loved Jimmy so intensely. I urged him on so far that he couldn’t stop. I didn’t realise at the time how much he resented it. I just knew that afterwards he seemed more remote, less loving. I told myself it would be fine once the baby came. He’d feel proud – a grown-up dad to his little boy. Because of course, I was going to have a fine son. And he’d like messing about in boats, like his father and my brother Colin.

Jimmy married me one chilly October afternoon – cloudy and wet, not unusual in our seaside town. Mum was there with Colin but dad refused to attend, saying he wasn’t interested in a daughter who’d shamed him. He hardly ever spoke to me again, even when I miscarried at six months. A tiny girl, her little life lost.

I’d had the feeling the nurses thought I was just another young woman in trouble and my cheap wedding ring a pretence of respectability. Jimmy hadn’t been to see me in hospital and when I got back, he wasn’t at home.

I remember slumping in an armchair, crying for my baby and not being able to share my grief with the man I loved. I must have fallen asleep because it was pitch black when Jimmy finally came in. the light hurt my eyes as he switched on the lamp.

‘What on earth are you doing here, Irene? I didn’t think you’d be out of hospital yet. You’d better lie down. I’ll fetch you a cup of tea.’

‘No, don’t bother. I’ll probably doze off straight away. Where have you been? You’re not on lates this week, are you?’

‘Er … no. I was round at a mate’s, helping him with a bit of decorating. No-one you know. He’s doing up the place to sell. I promised I’d give him a hand this weekend, if that’s okay. You’ll want to rest up anyway, won’t you?’

I felt sic with disappointment and the knowledge of how little the loss of our baby meant to him. Standing there tall and handsome, looking freshly scrubbed, indifferent.

So we jogged along for a while, sharing a few meals, some shopping, a bed. But now all we did in it was sleep. It took me a few weeks to feel ready for love-making again, but then the night came when I reached for him and he didn’t respond, he turned away.

‘Leave it, Irene. I’m whacked. We’re snowed under this week.’

There was always some excuse after that; ‘Not in the mood’, ‘bad headache’, ‘problems at work’, until the refusals ran threadbare and I stopped trying the direct route to my husband’s body.

I decided to make myself so desirable he wouldn’t be able to resist. I’d been back at work a while and there was plenty of overtime available. I saved and went for an expensive hairdo. My breasts remained fuller since the baby and the new dress I bought fitted like a glove. It was just the right shade of blue – Jimmy’s favourite. Excitedly I chose a new lipstick and eye-shadow. Strange now, when I look back at that eager pathetic girl so in love and hopeful. Love and hope are far vistas these days.

I planned a special meal that weekend and booked a table for Saturday night at The Cedar Tree, a classy restaurant with a menu that Jimmy was sure to like. He was working during the day but promised to be home in time to get ready. I remember taking a long while over my preparations, carefully setting my hair, dabbing perfume in all the right places.

Seven o’clock came and went and still no Jimmy. Perhaps he’d popped in the pub and forgotten the time. I phoned The Feathers but the barman said he’d not been in all week. I cancelled the table at the restaurant and by eight-thirty I was really worried. Where was he? Could he have forgotten a date with his own wife so totally? Yes, it was possible, of course it was, given Jimmy’s apathy where I was concerned. I knew he often called round at mum’s to see Colin for a game of cards. A long shot but I was frantic.

I changed into trousers and sweater, grudgingly hanging up the blue dress. Mum didn’t have a phone, but she only lived a fifteen minute walk away. I left a note for Jimmy, telling him where I’d gone. Mum and dad would be playing bingo as usual, but Colin might be in. when I reached the house it was in darkness apart from a faint light upstairs. Perhaps Colin was in bed. He’d always been on the frail side, though he went sailing with Jimmy when he felt up to it. I sometimes went as well if I as asked.

I had an old key in my purse. I unlocked the door quietly, not wanting to disturb my brother. I’d switched on the kitchen light and started to fill the kettle when I heard a muffled groan from upstairs. Odd. Perhaps Colin had the radio on. I ran quickly up the short flight. As I paused outside Colin’s door, I recognised a  sound that made my blood freeze; Jimmy’s voice saying, ‘I’d better be gone soon, Col.  Irene had big plans for this evening and you know how she is. But I can’t resist us being in a proper bed. Christ, I’ve needed you this past week.’

There were tears in his voice. Emotion trembling in words he’d never said to me, and never would.

I stumbled downstairs, somehow without making a sound, emptied the kettle, turned off the kitchen light and got out fast. I walked home like an automaton, seeing nothing, aware of no one. At the cottage, I burnt the note for Jimmy in the back yard, watching the scraps float away into the night, just like my dreams. Undressing slowly, my limbs seemed stiff and jerky as I climbed into bed. Jimmy arrived about forty minutes later. I heard him whistling as he closed the door. Upstairs, I burrowed under the blankets, icy cold, nauseous, full of hate. Funny how love can turn like that. I suppose he thought I was asleep as he slid beside me, the smell of my brother still musky on him.

Husband, brother – I didn’t want to think about how they had become lovers, only that they were. I’m convinced now that I went a little insane during that dreadful time. Only dealing with the consequences pulled me back from the brink of lasting madness.

I began to plot revenge. The actual mechanics need not be difficult. But would I have the nerve to go through with it, carry t off with no suspicion? The more I brooded, the likelier it seemed. A clean and final sweep of the two men who had made my life hell, betrayal absolute.

My chance came the very next week. It was a hot Sunday fro early May and ‘the boys’ suggested a late afternoon sail around the bay, with a home-made picnic tea later on the beach.

‘You know we love your baking,’ Jimmy said. ‘Don’t we, Col?’

‘Am I invited then?’ I enquired, smiling.

‘Of course you are. It’s a grand day, we’ll have fun. And some of your meat pasties would be great.’

And the bastard laughed again as he winked at Colin. I made pasties while Jimmy went out for beer. Colin said he’d get the boat ready and we arranged to meet him there. We set off in a good breeze. The small craft zoomed along in the sunshine, passing a couple of other boats but soon there was nothing on the horizon but ourselves. We relaxed, enjoying the warm air. Jimmy had already raided the picnic supplies and he and Colin had two beers each in quick succession.

My brother was leaning over, trailing his hand in the waves and Jimmy was watching him, perched on the side, when I did it; up-ending Colin into the water with a mighty push. Before Jimmy could stand up, over he went as well. As I sailed on, I could see the naked shock on Jimmy’s face, as he went under for the last time. Colin had already disappeared.

Still euphoric, I began tacking towards shore and raised the alarm. Everything happened in a blur after that. Shaking with reaction, I managed to explain that Colin had lost his balance and fallen overboard. He couldn’t swim very well and Jimmy had jumped in to get him but must have got cramp. The lifebelts I’d thrown were no help.

The authorities immediately began a search and rescue operation – useless, of course. The bodies were washed up in a small cove about a week later. I went on my own to identify them. Mum was too upset and dad was too ill.

Everyone was very kind and helpful; especially those who knew I’d recently lost a baby. There was no problem with the inquests and the verdicts of ‘accidental death’ were as I expected.

‘What a tragedy! So young to be a widow,’ people said. ‘Still, she’ll probably marry again and be happy.’

Not in my life. Happiness as eluded me, the potential as still-born as my poor dead child. I moved away and never once went back. Dad died a year after the drowning and mum went to live with her friend Hilda. I phoned occasionally but didn’t bother much. Colin had always been the favourite anyway.

I sometimes see Colin in my dreams – carefree, with that lop-sided grin of his. Jimmy always figures in my nightmares, towering over me, dripping wet, ghastly.

But that’s what I live with, that’s the reality. A spiritual canker can be every bit as devastating as the organic variety. It just takes longer, that’s all. Down all these arid years. What twists the knife though and keeps it sharp, will never free me; when they found Jimmy and Colin they were locked in each other’s arm. Even in death, I was and still am, the outsider.

Luke McGrath

Luke lives in Newcastle upon Tyne and finds writing very tiring.  He wrote Gathering Senses as part of his MA in Creative Writing.  The story is an experiment in lyrical style and originated from an attempt to write a piece of prose without a plot.  Well received at university, it has become his first writing credit and success story.

Luke writes weekly film reviews for www.bullet-reviews.com – a site he set up with an MA course-mate.  He has recently finished his first novel, The Whole of Youth.  When something interesting happens to him, Luke records it at http://lukemcgrath.tumblr.com.

____________________

Gathering Senses

A giant bearded face peers down from the sky. I stare back at him through my bedroom window but his gaze won’t be broken.  His eyes are wispy, like they’re too sad to hold themselves together.  They sit beneath a forehead that wrinkles the more I look at it.  A woolly beard covers his round cheeks.  His mouth seems to be forever parting yet unable to speak. 

The world is fresh against my face as I lock my front door.  Looking up, I can only see the back of the giant’s head.  He has turned from me even though I’ve done as he asked.  I quicken my footsteps towards the hill so that I can confront him. 

Turning into the park, I see the path before me stretching upwards to the cold blue sky.  Behind me is grey and noisy, ahead silent and lonely.  Looking over my shoulder, I see the city shrink away like the tide from a winter beach.  The grey is matted with a million different shades of itself.  The city lies like a lake at the bottom of the hill; every ripple is different, but it’s all water.

I leave the city trembling and stirring up silt.  The hill is only one colour; all the grass is a gentle green, like someone had used green chalk.  Above it is only blue, the light blue that they wisely call sky blue.  And the only thing breaking the blue is the giant’s head.  He still won’t look at me.  I’m determined to prove myself to him, prove that I’ve done what he wanted.

The hill is quiet.  I can usually see a few people from my window either playing with bright kites in the wind or pushing plastic prams over the summit.  Maybe the wind is wrong for kites, I wouldn’t know.  All wind makes me cold.  Maybe it’s the wrong time for prams.  All prams make me feel guilty.

About halfway up I hear a voice run behind me.  I feel like a trader broadsided by pirates in an ocean of pointed waves.  I stop and turn around twice, and then I feel silly for it is clear that I’m the only person on the hill.  The hill has no time for ghost ships or stalkers.  The hill doesn’t know any such stories; they are for the city.  The city is a scattered kingdom of stories.  Wherever you look there is a new chapter falling from the rooftops of a concrete block.  On the hill there is only the giant’s head, refusing to acknowledge my efforts.

As I pass the tree line, I can see everything.  The simple sky has no end, the chalky grass surrounds me.  The hill is an island.  Two colours dwarf me, and the giant head dwarfs the two colours.  The air grows colder and I find that besides the head there is nothing else in the sky.

At the top of the hill I stop.  The head is almost directly above me and I gather in my misty breath before confronting him.  In front of me the hill falls back down to a different part of the city.  I can see a hundred different ripples sloshing against each other, sounding like slaps of hands on faces. 

 The giant head is turned away, so I gulp down the dry air that hangs around my tongue and step forward.  But the head has changed.  He’s still looking away from me.  I circle the summit of the hill in vain; wherever I stand, I cannot see his face.  The face that had implored me to leave my home won’t allow me an audience.  The answers he offered are gone.

Regarding his stubborn skull, I see for the first time that he isn’t what he promised.  I thought that he’d been drawn upon the sky by the same hand that spread the endless green and the everlasting blue.  He’s an absence rather than a presence.  It’s not that his white is drawn on the blue, but that the blue had stopped.  That’s why he’s alone.  No one is drawing him and no one is drawing anything like him. 

I laugh to myself and turn to head back down to the untidy city.  Before I get to the trees, I stop.  Already I can smell the anarchy below; it comes at me like rotting driftwood.  I shudder and the scent is gone.  Back at the top of the hill, the giant is still alone.  I lie on my back in the chalk grass and wait with him awhile.

I’ve found myself lost again.  It wasn’t until I stopped that I realised I’m not where I should be.  I should be almost at the end, but I’m only halfway home.

            I can see the river behind a row of warehouses to my left; the blue line worms across my vision.  If I can get over to it, I can follow the bank until I know where I am again. 

            Above me, the sun beats down like a solitary eye staring intensity.  It highlights me out of place, follows me around and stains my skin yellow.

            I can see green in the distance that reminds me of something.  It’s a coiled snake basking between rocks of city life.  For a moment I long to be swallowed up by it.  But, no, there are still things I can do.

            I need to go between two warehouses.  They look abandoned, but it’s just the wrong time of the week or year.  As I get closer I realise I was only half-right.  One is securely locked and fastened against the wandering nameless.  But the other; the door swings in windless air, fanning my unease.  The chipped red peels to rotted wood.

            I quicken my steps as I pass between the buildings.  I walk the line between two worlds, facing one but with the other always at my back.

            The river runs away to my left, curving out of sight behind billows of browning trees.  I realise that I don’t know which way to go.  I picture the map in my head and deduct that left must be east.  But I can’t remember which side of the city I’m on.

            I look around for clues and my eye lands on something I hadn’t seen before.  Sitting with his back against a tired willow is a fisherman.  His knitted blue jumper and green waders make him more of a character than a person.  I didn’t know people looked like him anymore.

            Sure enough, as I approach him and his face comes into focus, his red cheeks and greying beard fall into place.

            ‘Excuse me,’ I say, leaning against the tree. ‘Could you give me some directions?’

            He doesn’t say anything for a moment.  Instead, his eyes meander round to meet my face and the edges of his thin mouth itch towards his ears.  I think about repeating myself but he breaks the silence.

            ‘Fishing,’ he says. ‘Been fishing here nearly nine years now.  I spent my whole life just sitting here on this riverbank.’

            ‘Sure,’ I say. ‘Did you come from the city?’

            ‘No, no,’ his head shakes and his curly hair bounces.  ‘I walk here every afternoon.  Fish ‘til the sun goes, then I go.  Can’t want for more than that.’

            I’m torn between talking to the old man and pushing for an answer.  I figure that listening to an old fisherman’s tale isn’t going to hurt, and there’s no real reason to be home.

            ‘Mind if I take a seat? I’ve been walking for hours.’

            ‘No, no,’ he smiles, and slides over.  The grass where he has been sitting is flattened like a great weight has forever lain there.  As I sit, the grass rises up around us to our heads.  We’re in a dimple, removed from the outside and hidden from passers.

            ‘You’ve been walking a long time alright,’ he says to me. ‘I can see you’ve been walking almost as long as I’ve been fishing.’

            ‘I don’t think you -’

            ‘Now don’t interrupt.  You want your story or don’t you?’

            I keep quiet, take my eyes away from the man and look out over the river.  The water looks darker than it was before; the willow casts a shadow over things.  A hundred ripples bounce off one another, arguing over which way to flow.  I can’t hear much but that’s the thing about rivers; unless they’re hitting rocks they don’t need much noise.

            The old man laughs and pats me on the shoulder.

            ‘Don’t take too much notice of me,’ he says. ‘I’m just an old fisherman with bad manners, I don’t mean to hush you but you aint a born listener.  You just watch that river and make sure it’s going the right way.’

            I nod, keeping my eyes fixed on the water.

            ‘Course it don’t matter where you’re looking, you see the same bit every time,’ he says.  ‘Something you should take heed of this.  You see, your problem is that you worry about how deep you are.  That’s why you ain’t going nowhere.  You just sit alone trying to work out how far up you’d need to swim to find the sky.’

            The old man’s words soothe me; his voice is gentle and seeps into my ear as I watch the water.  The birds and leaves only make their noises when he speaks, like he is the outside world and his sounds are all sounds.

            ‘Take these three people,’ he says.  ‘Sisters they was, sisters since the day they was born.  The eldest, she learns to swim real good.  She takes lessons and travels the world swimming and winning medals.  One day she meets a man who dives to the bottom of the sea without no air.  They make a wager over who can go deepest.  They dive in and the man comes back after four minutes with a rock from the bottom.  The woman, she’s still under trying to pick a bigger rock.  Six minutes go by and the man gets nervous, he dives in and finds the woman dead with her hands wrapped around her rock.  The water is so dark that there’s almost no light on her face.

            ‘Now the sisters they are broken up about the whole thing and they don’t ever go in the sea again.  The middle one though, she’s stubborn.  She won’t swim in the sea but she thinks “what harm can a river do to me?”  She thinks that she is in control.  So she swims until she gets tired and decides to get out.  On her way back she gets ripped under by an eddy and caught up in some weeds.  They wrap around her legs and she can’t kick out.  She dies just under the surface, looking upwards.

            ‘The youngest sister, she’s the smart one.  “I’ll never go in water where I can’t reach the bottom” she says.  She swims in her pool and nowhere else.  She’s safe as if she was on dry land.  One day she’s swimming and in her pool and sipping on a drink.  She bobs under for a moment but the water it’s against her and it jumps down her mouth with the drink.  She coughs and half pulls herself out of the pool.  But the water chokes her hard and she drowns just the same, with only her legs in and the rest of her already drying under the sun.’

            Only when he finishes do I realise what he’s been telling me.  I jump up from our little hollow and stumble backwards with words falling from my brain and bouncing against my lips.

            ‘Now what did I tell you?  Keep your eyes on the river I said.’

I’m a different person to who I used to be.  Most of my memories went away with her.  Without them I can’t remember who I am, all I know is that I am different.

            I’m not old enough to have used a typewriter when I started out.  I worked that much out.  There’s an idea that if a person saw a drop of water they could describe the entire water cycle.  They would know that rain, rivers, oceans and clouds existed without ever seeing them.  This is called deductive reasoning.  I have deducted that I’m not old enough to have used a typewriter.

            Maybe if I did have a different way of writing I wouldn’t be sat in my bedroom looking at a computer.  I don’t have the light on when I write so the glow of the screen is all that illuminates my world.  It’s tinged with blue and spreads past me and over the bare floorboards, absorbing everything in its way.  The light is soaking into the dead lamp by the bookshelves. 

Over my shoulder the blue has reached the far wall.  I can see the copies of my book about her lined up next to each other on the top shelf.  They came after.  I didn’t have anyone to give them to so I just let them nest up there.  I had twelve at first but then I gave one to my postman and another to my doctor.  I keep one on me in case I recognise someone.  I’ve had nine on the shelf for a few months.  They’re dusty and like the shade.

I can’t sit still any longer so I stretch myself up to the ceiling and leave the room.  As I reach to close the door I catch sight of the screen.  There’s only one word on it.  I don’t want to close the door and trap her up here.  I leave the door open with the sad hue creeping its way towards my feet.  The more it tries to leave, the thinner it becomes until almost all trace of colour has gone.  By the door it is anaemic and gasping for life.

I plod down the stairs and into the kitchen.  It’s winter again so the moon is already up and sending down its backwards day.  It’s not musty here but it doesn’t smell right.  I imagine a heavy scent leaking from somewhere beneath the floor.  It wears on my nose like a bruise and puffs up my eyes.

The fridge light is on.  The door is closed but the bulb is screaming out yellow.  I try flicking the bit inside that should turn it off but it’s not working.  There’s no way of getting it out so I leave it alone.  ‘Let it be’ I say to myself.  The sound reminds me of sound.  The house has been so quiet I forgot how many dimensions I live in.  I’ve come accustomed to every noise except my voice.

On the fridge there is a picture.  I don’t always see it but this time I do, it’s lit up from the space around the door.  She must have drawn it a few days before.  She was always drawing the hill; she loved to watch the kites flapping in the wind.  Sometimes I think that if I look at it long enough I’ll see myself there, walking away from her for the last time.

My shoes are by the door so I put them on.  I climb into the driver’s seat of my car and aim the headlights into the kitchen.  The whole house bursts open like a firework.  Each room glows brighter than the last but only for a moment.  My whole life burns in front of me until it is sucked into the engine.  Soon the house dims and I drive away.

On the road I have time.  I pass a sign that says six miles.  The rest of the world is asleep.  The first mile is through my silent estate.  It’s too early for anyone to get up, too late for anyone to be awake.  Every home I pass is dark and every house looks the same.  The people who move around inside them are all the same too.  Nothing changes except yourself.

I don’t know why I live here anymore.  I’m not adjacent to the world, I’m below it.  The best reason I have deducted is that it is only six miles from where I’m going.  I’m always going there.  A part of me is driving there forever. 

Leaving the estate, there is more life on the open road.  Signs from international companies turn to watch me pass.  Some of them wink at me like we’re in cahoots about the whole thing.  All the way into the distance, different colours are waving me on.   

Looking up at the sky, I see a misty red reflection from the loose clouds.  I speed up, realising why the world was brighter before.  The sun destroys everything; it sprays a disinfectant over the world and blinds everything that loves the night.  My time grows short.

The gentle sea greets me with muted fanfare.  I drive onto the sands and my wheels struggle against the dried grains.  My engine roars out and shatters the calm as it struggles to move.  The wheels find grip and the car lurches onto the hard, flat sand nearer the water.  I pull on the handbrake and it clacks upwards.

The moon is low this time of year; it’s almost hidden by the waves.  I flick the switch to my right and my full beams burst out towards the white disc.  My life flies out over the sea and on to greater places.  The blue and yellow join and shoot away from the two blazing headlights.  But the moon is sinking and there is still much to do.  The clouds are bathing in red and the sea burns in the distance. 

I release the break and crawl forward.  The brightness still flows over the swells.  I push on until the wheels refuse.  The sun creeps over the line of the surf and water swills around my feet.  The lights go out.