100-Word Fiction: ‘This Is a Possible Fiction’

Demands were made to sack them. If they excercised their legal rights, employers should be able to ensure workers had no job on their return: strikes should become illegal. The show must go on. So, shunt private cars from the roads, disrupt public services and tell the citizens to walk. Call for an exodus –Continue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘This Is a Possible Fiction’”

100-Word Fiction: ‘I Chase Bicycles’

There is something in human nature, I heard it said, that is disruptive. We favour the underdog, laugh too loud, stare too long, make stupid remarks. We are drawn to sarcasm, cynicism and hypocrisy. We tell little lies, become brave and boastful or lazy and stubborn. We accelerate too fast, brake too late, take theContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘I Chase Bicycles’”

100-Word Fiction: ‘A Crossing (4)’

All is quiet. A little girl runs out into the street. She is smiling but her eyes say something different. From somewhere a man is shouting her name. Then a woman shouts it too. But she is looking at me, on the other side of the street. She stops, then steps towards me. The voicesContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘A Crossing (4)’”

100-Word Fiction: ‘A Crossing (3)’

No. There is a tightening in my chest. Something is wrong. My brother’s frail arm disappears into the dark. I step back and pin myself to the wall. Some voices are shouting from the rooftops – then a whistling sound, like a mechanical scream – it comes. The billowing dust – three streets away –Continue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘A Crossing (3)’”

100-Word Fiction: ‘A Crossing (2)’

The street is empty. There is no petrol for cars anyway. Across the street my brother waits, his head peeking round a doorway, ushering come, come. I see the whites of his eyes but can’t tell whether he is pleased to see me, or scared, petrified. The rule is that if you leave and returnContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘A Crossing (2)’”

100-Word Fiction: ‘A Crossing (1)’

The food is ready: vegetables and chicken, cous cous. Mint tea. Auntie is still taking the washing down from the line and the children are playing with a ball and a stick. I am hungry too. It was an early start this morning, avoiding any trouble on my way to get sugar, just after light.Continue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘A Crossing (1)’”

100Word Fiction: ‘They Came Here’

The world is painted black and red. It runs down the walls and across the dusty floors. They came here. I tell the man. They came here, can you not see? Are you colour blind? Look at the walls. You can touch them now, go on, get it on your fingers. They have dried ofContinue reading “100Word Fiction: ‘They Came Here’”

100-Word Fiction: It Comes

At first it is just a haze on the horizon but then it grows: a cloud of dust, moving fast, skittering across the desert sands: and then the noise: at first a hiss, or a sucking sound, and then a clattering and a rat-a-tat-tat. Soon the noise degenerates into a succession of booms and cracklesContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: It Comes”

100-Word Fiction: International Day for Biodiversity

It is the international day for biodiversity and the ants are back in their colony; the dust mites sleep still; a shoal of mackerel flashes by; lions yawn; a lone curlew prods the shoreline with its bill; cows head towards the gate; a sheep chews dry grass on a high promontary; the bats hang tillContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: International Day for Biodiversity”

100-Word Fiction: ‘Unjust’

Oh no, not me, not me, because you see I can’t remember, I was perhaps not there and there are circumstances, if I could explain, but of course, and also… Look, I am a smart person, I must be, it was said, to be ambitious… Are you not my friends? Why are you looking atContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘Unjust’”