Tag: Short Story

Midnight Rowing

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Twenty four attempts. That was the total for the year and it was a record.

At least five of them, he knew, could be accounted for by Gregg Sullivan. Five times that fool had gone under, and five times he’d somehow been hauled to the surface. One of the attempts he’d managed to scupper himself, and he remembered wondering at the time whether Gregg looked around first before jumping, just to be sure that someone would hear him hit the water, see him go under and would rush to help him.

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Tea and biscuit days

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He’d been dead a long while now of course, your dad. But that didn’t stop you thinking about him.

Looking at the photo, it was easy to bring him back. Easy to remember him. Crisp cream trousers, with a neat, stylish pleat. Cool white shirt, long sleeved. Braces and belt. Black leather. Brown sandals with a big thick buckle and clean white socks somehow. A cigarette always in his hand, wrapped between yellow-stained fingers, a permanent feature. That would get him in the end, those cigarettes, but he never knew it then that day when the photograph ws taken, his hair slicked back, all glossy and black, and only just greying at the sides. A beaming, cheeky grin, sparkling eyes, alive and grey. That was your dad, all of this.

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Freedom

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He closed his eyes and imagined the sea. The smell was wrong, the dryness, the sootiness of the air, it was all wrong. But if he closed his eyes and just listened, then the sound, the sound was just right.

The sound of the sea.

He stood still underneath the tower block, eyes firmly shut, just listening. If anyone had seen him, they’d have thought he was mad. Someone dangerous, swaying in the half light. Someone it was safer to avoid.

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The Portfolio

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I’m creating a portfolio. Day by day, bit by bit. Have been for many years now.

What I do is this.

I visit the train station and I sit and wait. I’m looking for expressions.

There’s one in particular I have yet to find. I want to capture that look in a person’s eyes when they imagine they are being watched. An uncomfortable moment that verges on fear and makes them look around reflexively. That’s the one I am looking for – that unease.

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