Wearing this jacket, which bears witness to the grand public schools, the British Empire, Kipling and Kitchener, Ypres, the Somme and the Western Front, brassy medals, Chelsea bombings, fighting in Norway, Palestine, South Africa, Iraq, Afghanistan and the Balkans, the Order of St Patrick, the ‘Troubles’, Brian Boru, the kid cadets still named ‘mini Micks’,Continue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘That Wedding Dress’”
Tag Archives: literary
100-Word Fiction: ‘The Prime Minister Speaks’
The sun is out and a flurry of cars pass the end of the road, windows open. Mr and Mrs Bluebird are hopping through the velvet branches of the staghorn tree and there is laughter in the little park. At the corner, a man with his shirt sleeves rolled up arranges a drink with aContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘The Prime Minister Speaks’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘For the Kids, RIP’
In a bedroom with a notebook and biro. Turning words into lyrics. The radio on. Up-and-coming stars. Thoughts of playing gigs and getting on telly. The songs to be sung and the power to change the world. All those guitars. Rips in jeans and hair falling over eyes. A plaid shirt. Some jotted down chords.Continue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘For the Kids, RIP’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘Over’
I’m over it, said John. But how could he be? It was still fucking going on, still in the air like, ah what the fuck. You couldn’t fucking tell him, he just turned away, the old head in the sand. Things had to be confronted, dealt with, even if it meant facing the worst. TheContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘Over’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘Driftwood’
The boy’s thoughts were taken with a small piece of driftwood lying on the pebbles. A line of seaweed marked where the tide had reached earlier that morning. He stepped across it and picked up the piece of wood. It looked like an antler, but bone white, smoothed and polished by the sea and sandContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘Driftwood’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘Nude, Green Leaves and Bust’
I don’t know, said Paul, staring intently at the painting. Me neither. I don’t get that face in the picture, with its long nose and narrow eyes, gazing down upon the naked, reclining girl. The face is so white, it’s like a ghost. And she is so pink, so fleshy and naked, her arms open,Continue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘Nude, Green Leaves and Bust’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘Moomer’s Tent’
Moomer believed that happiness came in small things. If you couldn’t lift it yourself, then it was too unwieldy, too weighty. You should be able to pack happiness into a rucksack. But happiness was also infinite. The hills were happiness and you couldn’t lift them. Moomer packed his tent into a rucksack and walked forContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘Moomer’s Tent’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘We Have An Ethical Policy In Place’
The skies shudder in the midday heat as fighter jets screech overhead. Desert sands are crushed and churned by the caterpillar tracks of tanks. Localised conversations centre on canisters of teargas – security solutions, experts say, or ‘battlefield management’. Elsewhere we see stun grenades, fragmentation bombs, rubber ball shot… armoured personnel carriers rumble along whileContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘We Have An Ethical Policy In Place’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘The Julian Calendar’
The Julian calendar. That antiquated thing? Was it so imprecise? Is it so outmoded? It is reckoned that its faults caused our horological measurements to be incorrect by about three days every four centuries. But no calendar is precise. We divide up time as best we can and then continue to tell our stories, fillingContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘The Julian Calendar’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘In the Museum’
We are waiting for something to happen. It has been weeks. What will be the endpoint of this struggle? There is no point in asking. Not now. Everywhere becomes a museum, eventually. We should know, we live in one. Grown out of the craters of the past. There is a natural cycle. The museums areContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘In the Museum’”
MW Bewick 