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)’”
Tag Archives: short
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)’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘A Dowry’
Their little hands reaching out into the sunlight and clear Clutching scrunches of silver and white, like crumpled tenners, scores – Unfolding the mottos of fortune cookies, notes of remembrance, promises Made one to another, they to us, winter to summer. The first gesture of the year is an embrace changing Studded green to garlandsContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘A Dowry’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘If the World Was a Little Different’
At first it happened slowly, blistering the skyline and the dusty roadside only occasionally. People turned to look, crying out. But soon, more and more little outbursts came, a ceaseless bombardment, and the city became quickly transformed. The past was forgotten. There were little explosions of colour all across Homs, cherry blossom firing spring intoContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘If the World Was a Little Different’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘Open Stage Directions for a New Play’
The reporter speaks to camera from the steps, recently swept, across the churchyard where huddles of tourists peer at maps and hold up camera phones, squinting into screens. A TV is being watched. The camera’s banal gaze focuses on the grey flagstones. Everything is clean as if a uniformity has returned, a natural order resumed.Continue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘Open Stage Directions for a New Play’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘Those Pathways’
Kirsty was very tiny and those paths were wide and sometimes she would feel scared but then she would have her dinner and feel full and forget. And soon she was growing and the paths were all thick with flowers and weeds and then some of the paths she couldn’t see so well. And thenContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘Those Pathways’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘On My Mind’
It was on my mind to tell you that I’d booked us a meal. We could maybe take a holiday in France this summer; I’d like some peace and quiet and you’ve been working so hard. The kids were coming back from school the other day and my how Olivia is growing. She’ll be asContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘On My Mind’”
100-Word Fiction: ‘A Softer Word’
I saw her once – in person. A proud mother I thought, she stood calm and tall with such an open and steady face. I am drawn to use the word resolute, but it needs a softer word than that. She listened to speakers and clapped at the end. Eyes, mouth… as if every senseContinue reading “100-Word Fiction: ‘A Softer Word’”
MW Bewick 