Christmas Eve

Jeff pulled into the pub carpark and parked with difficulty, his tyres slipping in the snow. With his engine safely off, he glanced up at the darkening sky in dismay. It was still falling thickly, landing heavy on the icy ground, and it didn’t look like it was stopping any time soon. He knew he should turn back and go home. Instead he looked longingly at the alluring light of the pub’s sign, before popping off his seatbelt. It was worth the risk.

As he trudged through the new snow he thought back to his childhood, and the excitement it had brought. School’s closed – snowmen – snowball fights – a bleak forecast had brought a world of fun, even as a young man. There had also been extreme pleasure in stepping in fresh snow – somewhere no one’s feet had ever been before. Instead of this momentary power, now he just felt bloody cold. He reached the door and hurried inside, away from his bitter memories and the pain they brought to his chest.

The pub was a welcome heat, the air sticky with the smell of beer, tobacco and old men. Do I smell like that too now? He wondered. Am I classed as an old man? He scrunched up his face at the thought, before swinging himself into his regular barstool. Ricky sidled along almost immediately, his face sporting what he probably thought was a welcome grin.

“The usual?” He asked, to which Jeff nodded. Ricky shuffled off to get him his beer, and Jeff glanced around. The pub was a little rough around the edges and always needed a clean, but it was normally still packed with people. Today there was no one. But then again, it was Christmas eve. Everyone is probably home with their families, Jeff thought, prematurely reaching for his glass, his hand coming down and slapping the bar.

But then there was Ricky with his beer, sliding it along the surface like an hockey puck as he always did. Jeff took a sip of his frothy friend, his eyes closing a little with the bliss. Ricky disappeared into the back – he’d never been much of a talker. But then again, neither had Jeff – he was more than content to sit here in miserable silence, sipping his drink…that’s why he’d come, was it not?

Minutes later he set down the empty glass. The sound was like a dog whistle to Ricky, who bounded forward to offer another. Jeff glanced at the window, the falling snow illuminated in the nearby streetlamp. Perhaps this wasn’t the best idea after all. Did he want to sleep in the pub? But just as he pondered this, the door behind him opened, the wind blasting in both white flakes and a hurried human being.

He was chubby, old and red faced. There was snow caught in the rim of his cap, and he was sporting a rather impressive cough. He smiled toothily as he threw off his large coat, hobbling forward on unsteady feet. Jeff stared. Ricky gave him his winning smile.

“The usual?” he asked.

Jeff looked up, confused. He was in this pub almost every night, and he’d never seen this man before in his life. How could he have a “usual” if he was never here? But the man had nodded, and Ricky bustled off. Jeff eyed the new man with suspicion and slight annoyance – this was his pub. Who the fuck was this guy? He was filled with a sudden misplaced rage, and he couldn’t understand it… all he knew was that this guy was a moron, and he really should give him a piece of his mind.

But at that moment, Jeff again stopped by circumstance, Ricky came back with the man’s drink. Well, he had two drinks with him actually – and they were both pints of Stella. Jeff watched incredulously as Ricky slid them both like pucks along the bar: one to Jeff, one to the new man.

“I presumed you’re staying, Jeff, thought I’d save you the trouble of answering me,” Ricky nodded.

Jeff nodded back. It was true – maybe he’d considered leaving for a moment, but he wouldn’t have done.  What did he have to go home to? Fucking nothing. Not even on fucking Christmas eve. He might as well stay here, in the warmth, and get a little drunk. Plus, this new man had started to intrigue him – he wasn’t angry any more. Stella? Great choice mate.

As Ricky wandered off again, Jeff stole subtle glances at the man at the other end of the bar. He had taken off his hat now, revealing a crown of wispy grey hair. The contrast of the warm room against the cold night has caused his cheeks to redden further, and his wrinkles looked like deep crevasses on the face of Mars.  He sipped his beer, closing his eyes in bliss – just like Jeff did. Then his eyes opened, suddenly shifting to Jeff, and he quickly dropped his gaze.

“Hey there, how come I’ve never seen you around here before?” Jeff glanced back up – the man was speaking to him! His voice was rough, like sandpaper on skin.

“I come ‘ere every day between 5 and 9. How come I never seen you? You seem to know Rick.”

The distance between the two men was comically large, their glances to the other stretching all the way across the bar.

“Oh aye I do, he’s a great barman. Pulls a good pint, probably the best in Yorkshire,” the man chuckled. “I come here in the mornings, 12-3, and then I go to work in the afternoons.”

He went to work on a belly full of beer? Jeff’s intrigue was starting to build, but he was still awkward. He barely spoke to anyone any more – not at work, not even at the supermarket. If the checkout lady asked him how his day was going, he stared her down, daring her to speak another syllable. But, fuck it.

“Oh? And what do you do? I’m Jeff by the way. Jeff Parkinson.”

“Peter”, the new man nodded, and with both feelings of relief and slight apprehension Jeff saw he was hobbling off his barstool and coming over. He sat down directly next to him, and the men simultaneously sipped their beers.

“Where do you work?”

“At the scrap heap. Help with loading an unloading, an’ that. What about you?”

“Oh, I work in an office, down in Sheffield.”

“Oh wow, that’s quite a way! Watcha doin’ comin’ all the way up here for a beer?”

Jeff thought for a moment.  It was a long way. His house was half way to Sheffield too, hence his concern about the weather. But did he want to disclose the real reasons for his daily commute to this dank and dirty pub to this stranger? Not quite yet.

“It’s just a great pub, and as ya said – Rick, he’s a top lad. Pulls a good pint. Its ma place,” he said curtly. Peter nodded, though he seemed to know this was not entirely the truth. Another sign of a decent bloke, thought Jeff. Knows not to pester.

“What ya doing here on Christmas eve?” Peter asked, as soft as he could with his sandpaper voice. That did it – he was pestering.

“Cos I fancied a pint, didn’t I?”

There was a small silence, before Jeff sighed. He was being an arsehole, he knew that. It was just that it was so much easier to be an arsehole than not to be.

“’m sorry. I…I have no family to be with. This – this is ma place. Might as well be here. Whatcha doing here?”

Peter looked down at the crumpled beer matt in Jeff’s fingers. “I have no family to be with either. Fancied a pint, jus’ like you I guess.”

There was another silence, each man pulled away by his own train of thought. Jeff continued to crumple the mat. Peter sipped his beer until it was gone. Then Jeff did the bravest thing he had done in years.

“Mate, I don’t suppose you want to meet here. You know – tomorrow. We could – we could get a bit of food n’ that, maybe have a beer together…” his voice trailed off. He’d just met this bloke. He was definitely going to think he was a complete crackpot and decline.

“The pub is closed tomorrow,” Peter said, and Jeff’s heart fell. Of course it was, how stupid. “But – I always cook on Christmas day, even when I’m alone. You should come over. I’ll have enough for two, and I have some Stella!”

J

eff smiled, a rare occurrence. “I’d love to!”

So Peter wrote down his address and passed it across. An important friendship had begun.

Love for life

A mother watched her baby sleeping. 

His two tiny feet were kicking the air, his hands holding his blanket, his little mouth the shape of a perfect ‘o’. He had a birth mark under his left eye and a small amount of wispy ginger hair; he had rosy cheeks and adorable sticky-out ears. He was barely the span of her two hands in length, so astonishingly light – and to think all adults were once this small.

She found herself doing this more often than she thought was normal – just staring at him, drinking in his chubby face. She would catch herself and go back to whatever she was doing, but she’d always find herself back beside his cot watching his little chest rise and fall.

It wasn’t as though she worried for his safety – not really - she knew it wasn’t worth it to play those games in your head. She thought perhaps she feared his genuinity, because he was too perfect to actually exist. She felt she had to keep her eyes on him at all times, because then she had evidence of producing something so beautiful – it had to be believed. He was there. He was hers.  Her gorgeous, helpless baby.

25 years later she waited anxiously at the airport, scratching her fingernails up and down her arms in anticipation; she’d waited two long agonising years for this moment.  She cried into her husband’s shoulder at every letter and prayed to a God she didn’t believe in more times than she could count. ‘Please, let him come home safe. Let my baby come home safe.’ She felt bad about the war, and she was proud of everything her son was doing, but the selfish side of her just wanted him back. Her motherly instinct wanted him away from everything and anything that could hurt him.

As the men in their uniforms started to pour through arrivals, running into crying girlfriend’s arms and throwing squealing children into the air – she waited. Her husband lay a hand on her arm as the line of soldiers started to trickle – he could feel tension radiating from her like heat. He said he was on this flight – where was he? Where was her baby?

Then, around the corner, pushed by another burley soldier, came a wheelchair – in it was her son. He only had one leg. A mix of emotions flooded through her – he was alive, he was okay…he wasn’t okay. He was in a wheelchair for life. The war had broken him…how dare they send him somewhere so dangerous, how dare he be such an idiot for going! She saw him as she saw him in his cot: his hands holding the sides of the wheelchair, the birthmark under his eye, his ginger hair, his mouth the shape of a perfect ‘o’ when he saw her tearful face. But there was only one foot swinging in front of him.

He was a man now. His hair was in the short back and sides of a soldier; his eyes reflected war crimes he’d never forget, scenes to wake him at night in years to come, screaming about things he could not change.  There was stubble across his lip, and a cut on his cheek. Others would never think of him once being so small.  When he grabbed her hand and explained how he hadn’t wanted to tell them about his injury…hadn’t wanted to worry them…how others had lost their lives and how lucky he was…she’d held on for dear life, staring at him, never wanting to let go again, never wanting to look away.

The Day I Met Gatsby

It was one of those lukewarm nights at the start of summer. The beach was dark, the only light coming down from the dock, leaving the sand and the water in an eery green glow. You could just about make out the horizon, a thin line against the sky, marking the start of what seemed to be eternity. I was sitting on the bank staring out into the nothingness.

Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him. He walked slowly, deliberately, as you would expect. His hands were placed lightly in his pockets, but his arms were stiff at his sides. He was wearing a pink shirt and a pale blue suit, so light it almost seemed to make him shine out of the darkness. He saw me – and smiled. That smile. You know that smile. It glinted, his pearly teeth reflecting in the half light, so perfectly straight they would make you question their genuinity.  But of all things, the smile belonged to Gatsby: it had built him. I didn’t smile back but just stared, watching his every move: analysing him.

He was right in front of me. He seemed unfazed by the fact I had ignored him; he simply hitched up his crisp trousers and sat down lightly beside me. He was so close I could smell his sweet cologne, no doubt the most expensive kind money could buy. I continued to stare as he thoughtfully gazed out across the water, where my eyes had been but a moment ago. He had freckles speckled across his cheeks and nose, I noticed, and his eyes were framed with soft lashes. Those eyes! It wasn’t so much the colour of them that would strike you, but their intensity. They were desperately searching for something, but I doubt even Gatsby could tell you what that was.

I’m not sure how long we sat in silence. I was afraid to speak to him, afraid of what he would have to say. But it was a comfortable silence, for me at least. He sensed my reluctance, and after all, he’d come to me, not the other way around. I noticed his small white hands peeking out from the immaculate suit, shaking slightly as they sat in his lap. He wasn’t at ease, even now. But would you have expected him to be?

Suddenly, he turned. Those eyes stared into mine, and he smiled again. My heart melted a little and I felt reassured, as I expect most people would. He extended one of those pale hands.

“Jay Gatsby. It’s a pleasure to meet you, old chap.”

“I know who you are”, I nodded. But all the same I took his hand and shook it, because to be impolite was by far the biggest crime you could commit against him. He seemed to appreciate my effort.

“So, you’re lost?” he hedged, looking back up towards the horizon.

“Lost?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t think I quite understand what you mean.”

I wondered if perhaps I was dreaming. Was this one of those visions, like ‘Beauty school drop out?’ Was he going to try and point back in the right direction and tell me to stop ‘dwelling on dreams and forget to live’? I feared this I think more than anything. Dreams were all I had.

The Day Joel Broke Down

Joel had been acting a little strange for weeks. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen him smile or make a genuine joke; he was nearly silent when I saw him in person, and he never answered my messages. He never had been the most outgoing or the most talkative, but I was still worried about him. He seemed to have been absorbed into a world of his own, and the distance between us scared me. 

One night he came over out of the blue, which was unnerving; he would never just turn up like that. It wasn’t him. He’d usually take days to plan anything. I beckoned him in and asked him what was wrong, but he treated me to more of his now almost trade mark silence.

We went into the living room; both my parents were out. I perched on the sofa, and Joel sat himself uneasily in the armchair across from me. His face was white and gaunt; he looked thinner than he ever had. His clothes too were creased and untidy, like they’d been thrown on in a hurry. He was losing himself, that much was clear. I clenched and unclenched my hands nervously, anticipating what was to come. Was he going to explain? Was I going to be able to help? We sat in more silence for a little while, and I resisted the urge to fill it with meaningless babble just because culture said I should. But no – this silence was important. This silence spoke to me; it was a message in itself.

 I waited, and then the tempo of the situation suddenly changed. Joel got up wildly and paced the room, running his hands together and then through his hair, his shoes clipping the wooden floor. I sat and watched as insanity seemed to pour out of him like an overflowing cooking pot. He looked out of it, dazed; I laughed at him because I didn't know what else to do. His agitation made me anxious. He was breathing deeply, scratching marks into his arms, continuing to stride from wall to wall. He didn't even seem to acknowledge that I was there; it was just him and this invisible, improbable quest.

All of a sudden he lashed out with his fist, pummelling it into the wall. It was so sudden I didn’t have time to shout out, and at first I thought he was attacking me. My yelp of shock a second later was almost comically delayed; it was like it suddenly hit me what had just happened.  I know he'd never hit me – I do know that – but it’s in the moment, when things happen so fast and there’s such anger in the air, that you can never be quite sure what’s going on. He wouldn't have it in him though; he is such an angel. I know him. I do. He pulled his bloodied fingers from the plaster wreckage and there was a pause as he stared down at it. He seemed bewildered, and I was fucking bewildered too I can tell you. It then dawned on me that my parents were going to kill me; there was a Joel’s fist sized hole in the wall beside the mantel piece, but that was a bridge I would have to cross later.

He went passive. He sat himself down on the floor, cross legged like a child sitting in assembly at school. I half expected him to put a finger to his lips to prove his obedient silence: a regressive move to revalidate his goodness. But the blood was running down his arm onto his jeans, dripping onto the floor even - this wasn't angelic. It was crazy and terrifying. I wondered if perhaps I should ask him to leave. But no - I knew him, and this was odd. His freckled face was blank; he seemed to not know what to make of it himself. I saw with a pang how much he was shaking, as though he'd dived into the snow without a coat. There was more silence and more silence - did I ask? Did I wait? Did I go? There was no handbook for this, no one to tell you what to do or what to say. One wrong step could be drastic when someone was clearly teetering so close to the edge. Still - to say or do nothing would be more of a crime, I decided. This boy needed me. He really did - right now more than ever. 

I moved slowly, and he glanced up at me, terrified, like a rabbit in the headlights. I slammed on the brakes, taking a moment to gauge his reaction, but he seemed okay with me coming closer. He was still breathing as though he'd just done a 100m sprint. I sat down slowly, sitting in front of him cross legged, so our knees were almost touching. He was staring at the ground, so I took his hands in mine, being careful of the injured one. We sat for a moment like this, and his breathing slowed slightly. I felt as though some of the angst he was feeling was passing down his arms, through his hands and into mine, where they could then escape into the atmosphere. I was draining him of his fears somewhat, and for that I knew I was a decent person. 

Eventually he looked up and stared intently into my eyes, and I've never had a moment like it. They were a vibrant blue, and I saw everything I needed to see, heard everything I needed to hear. He was hurting; he was lost and confused. I saw in the pupils the pain he was feeling and how much pressure he was under. In the swirling iris I saw fear - of himself, of the future, and of the world. They explained to me the erratic behaviour, the silences, and the anger. The colour hit me like a tidal wave of emotion, trapped in his soul, encased in him - thoughts bottled and blood boiling, all crammed together in one fragile human existence. In the white I saw a reflective purity which spoke of the goodness he aspired to, which he so often failed to obtain and hated himself for it. In his eyes I experienced and empathised with everything: I finally understood. 

He recognised my understanding. He licked his bleeding hand like a cat or a dog, and then he began to cry - great, heaving sobs which seemed to almost shake the room. He lay his head on my shoulder and he soaked my t-shirt with his tears, and I simply lay a hand on his head and stroked his hair. We'd come so far; he'd come so far. I was glad more than anything that I hadn't asked him to leave; that would have been the worst thing. He needed to let this out, and the tears were the biggest blessing he could have asked for. 

I realised we hadn’t spoken a word for nearly 45 minutes. We hadn’t needed to. I may not have been told in explicit details the extent of his problems and what was bothering him, but for now that didn’t matter. We could get to that later. What mattered was that he knew he had me, and I would do anything for him; we would get through it together. And I, after being so scared and confused by his behaviour, found peace in his admittance of pain. He had come to me and I could at least try to help. 

My favourite things

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens.

I scooped up a stone and threw it violently into the ocean - there was no skipping, just a clunky splash, and then silence.

Bright copper kettles and warm woollen mittens.

I sat myself down on the pebbled beach. The grey sky pressed down on me and the wisps of wind ripped through my jacket like invisible knives. It looked as though it could rain - as though it needed to. It seemed as though the sky was holding on, it's knuckles pressed tightly together, yearning to just let go. The water lapped nervously, anticipating the storm, and I sat stubbornly on the shore. I was refusing to leave.

-When the dog bites, when the bee stings -

Maybe I should go back, I thought, as the approaching clouds grew darker and the wind blew harder. No. Instead I hunched myself forward, wrapping my arms around my knees, telling myself I wasn't afraid. The first bullets fell from the sky, hitting the lake like - like - drip drip drop little April Showers. Murderous showers. Du du de du du de da de du - de de da du de da du de de dum. It was December and the rain was cold as ice.

Brown paper packages 

A raindrop rolled down my cheek like a tear. Or maybe it was a tear - I wouldn't know any more. The rain started to hiss, splattering around me, sounding like a melancholy New York city. I felt glued to the stones - there was no way I could leave now. I had to wait it out.

tied up with strings

"Martin! MARTIN!" It seemed as though the wind itself was calling me. Wait - "Martinnn! MARTIN IS THAT YOU?" - it wasn't the wind. I was shaking. I refused to turn around. I was in the storm - I was the storm. Thunder growled overhead and lightning flashed as though on que, illuminating the lake and the desperation it appeared to be hiding. "Martin?" Something like an arm touched my shoulder, and I sat rigid as a rock. Perhaps I had become a pebble. I was the same as all the others on the beach. They'd never know which was one was me. They could throw me into the ocean - clunky splash, silence - and they still wouldn't know.

I was being dragged to my feet. I looked down at my hands, noticing now that they were covered in blood. Mingling with winter's rain and dripping maliciously onto my boots... every part of me was covered in blood.

These are a few of my favourite things. 

Emptying my brain

I tremble as I observe the world, so splendidly horrific in everything it presents to us.

“Why write? Why read? So pointless. So…unnecessary.”

I reach out a hand on an icy night, and note the billons of cells combined together to create its nervous whiteness. I watch the knuckles flex, and I feel a pointlessness so strong it physically strikes me. My hand snaps back. Why have hands? Why have anything at all? Why think these thoughts?

With imagination there is everything and anything. With reality we are limited: we are held back by particles, laws, morals, and existence, but with a story the possibilities are infinite. There is an exquisite, uncontrolled power in a writer; they can veer one way then sprint another, before taking to the sky like a firework and exploding the universe, ripping out the fabric of time and space - if they so wish. They can coax a wimblowicket out of its dusty hollow, whatever that may be. They can make love blossom in the most unlikely places, or they can paint misery into the eyes of characters we then come to think of as real.  As a writer you have the whole world and more at your fingertips; you have time, space, reality, surreality, emotion, life and death to knead with. You can dance and play with everything we know and everything we don’t…you understand this world is splendidly horrific. You love this beautiful pointlessness.

Others may pretend to know. Professionals present themselves as smooth, knowledgeable and damn smart – smarter than these writer lunatics. But they are just as damn stupid and damn scared as the rest of us. They will never admit they know that hollowed out feeling, as though they are capable of nothing and can do nothing to make anything right – because everything feels wrong. Writers can write what is right; they can sculpt what is wrong. They can make peace with futility.

You tell me it is pointless – well tell me, when you glance into the obscene blackness that is the sky tonight, do you understand? We are on a rock hurtling through a void, but yet you stand here, as still as anything, watching black water lap over black rocks in this black night. Where were you in the daylight hours? There was colour then, I promise. The rocks were grey, the sky blue, and the water as colourless as crystal. I wish you’d seen more than this shadowy black. Have we just never seen our world in what I will call “day”? Are we believing black when colours do exist? Perceptions, determinations, brains, infinity. I am blown away with possibility, yet chained and calloused with the clasps of your damned reality.

Madness. What a strange, strange word. How can one not be mad, when you regard seriously our position? We turn our backs on the inevitable and smile; we sweat and labour until our eyes close for the last time, never to reopen – and even then, on the borderline, we will have no idea. And yet, despite all this, you still believe my words are pointless. Their words are pointless. Their reflections of this stupid, bewildering, terrifying group of existences are to be discredited as nothing? There is never nothing…nothing comes of nothing. I am stepping forward into nothing and yet I know I shall fall into the hands of something, and perhaps something shall save me, or perhaps it shall not.

Never shall it mean nothing. Because never shall anything mean anything. We are running in the dark – we always were, we perhaps always will be…if dark can mean anything to us at all, can mean anything to us who know nothing. 

Jack, Jake and the Lake

He soared with his wings wild and wide, whistling in the wind and wavering above the wintry waters. The frozen hands of Jack had touched the lake below, and with a weary white face it offered up no break from the fall. The span of the once watery surface was acres and acres, and Jake flew for his life. The wind still tried to take him down, to be crushed against the ice, to be blood on snow with broken bones. He shook and looped as clouds covered his view, and his heart cascaded to the depths of his internal reality. He descended like a dart, dropped from the heavens, damned to death by the Gods above.

Down he went, the wind acting like the ice, breaking into his skin and freezing his blood, stopping his organs and grinding them to a fearful halt. They no longer sloshed but crunched, a noise like metal on metal, like mechanical parts striking clunking cogs. The noise deafened him as still he fell, the world spinning, the white icy face coming closer, calamity upon calamity, he knew for certain he was set to die. Though he was entire three dimensional, he felt only like an unreachable ball of fiery emotion headed to the centre of the earth like a burning meteor, which would chomp through the surface as if it were mere cheese.

He blinked. Back in the sky, the wind held him. There was, there had been, no drop; he was flying as sturdily as ever. His gorgeous, glorious unrivalled white wings stayed true, as they had never failed to do. They felt not a part of him, but a part of the sky itself, as though the universe was holding him tightly. Perhaps that meant the universe could decide to drop him, if the wings were not his own, but for now he trusted in them and continued his courageous course. He smiled, for he was but more than emotion, more than fear, and more than a wreck upon the cold and stone like ground. He was more than even he knew, there in the hands of the world itself.

The snowy face of the lake lost that look of bleak weariness; Jake could see the love in its invisible eyes. Jake could see contrast. He could see science and he could see art. He could see death and life, love and hate, pain and happiness. He could see dark and light, fear and courage, anger and soft serenity. He could see it all. Perhaps to see is not to understand, for he understood not why he did not fall. But see he did, and fly he did, for joy, for tears, for the want of never knowing, for the want of never coming within the safety of the ground. 

The red in the river

The river flowed red between the autumn leaves, and no one seemed to want to look upon it. Isaac shifted uneasily with his arms tucked across his chest, and Max and Mark stepped away with their backs to the scene. Whatever had happened upstream, it was definitely not good. Isaac glanced at the others, but they refused to meet his gaze; it seemed this one was on him.

He stepped cautiously over the ground, each step crunching crisp underfoot. The sun was setting at the bottom of the valley, and everything around him seemed to glow gold, red, orange, and brown; he absently thought how beautiful it really was. It shook him to note that the beauty he was commending came from the decay of the nature around him, and soon the trees would be bare, the sky grey and the air a damaging cold. With a heavy heart his eyes swayed to the maroon tinge spiralling through the river to his right. As he walked, its width and colour thickened.

Darkness gathered around him and still he was walking, until in the hazy half light ahead he saw a shape sprawled across the rocks in the centre of the river. Ah, so there it was. He slowed somewhat; after such a build up, after taking one for the team, his reluctance was really starting to kick in. What if it was someone he knew? What if the person who had done it was still around, watching?

As he drew closer, his heart started to rage in his chest; it was definitely the shape of a person. It seemed as though they had been thrown, with their limbs splayed out over the rocks; the blood seemed to be coming from a wound in the head. From what he could see it was a man, wearing what appeared to be a black tuxedo. They were face down, the head almost underwater, so he could not see if he recognised them or not.

He waded in and checked for a pulse, with the attempt being met with a silence that confirmed death. Isaac did not do anything else to the body, but simply waded back out onto the other side, and sat himself down onto the earth. Forensics would kill him for this – there could have been clues, tracks or footprints where he was perching. But for christ’s sake, there was a man dead. He would sit himself down, because he was human and he had a heart. 

A day in the life of the field of a time

She was sitting amongst the long summer grass cross legged and looking at the ground. The day had thrown itself over the edge of the horizon, the sun the forefront of the crusade, rearing its fiery head in anger at the quivering and retreating darkness. She regarded this as if it were merely nothing – this major breakthrough of nature, this occurrence of magnitudinous strength. Her eyes followed the path of the grass tails as they darted to and fro in the breeze, never content it seemed with one position or the other. Millions upon millions of them swayed in the field – if you were 100 metres in any direction, maybe even 50, you would not have been able to see her at all. But there she sat, like a Pixie of nature, but one that had in her countenance an unbearable sadness that led her to be blind to all beauty.

How long had she been there? It seemed like all of eternity. How long would she stay? That was yet to be decided, and only the decider knew that, and herself, of course. She could move, if she wanted, but yet she seemed almost attached to the ground on which she resided, her palms pressed into the grassy, dusty ground. Where had she come from? She was borne out of nature – everyone was, and nature was where she would die. It didn’t matter from which area she came, where she had been, or what she had previously done – she was here, at this very moment, as it was exactly meant to be.

Hours later the clouds sauntered in – they did not roll, it was slower than this, and much less joyful. They were almost as miserable and as dark as herself. They covered the glorious sun momentarily, and this at last dragged her pretty eyes from the ground, causing her to glance up, interested in a change. Finally, some life in this life – even the very grass seemed to dart faster in answer to this decided moment…but then her eyes dropped again, and all was as it was.

Time passed. Time always passes. There is never a time when time does not pass. A rumble sounded in the summery field – thunder? No, this rumble was more subdued…it was her stomach. She was hungry. She was only human, and a need for things other than one’s own thoughts would put an end to any fanciful notion of stepping outside the realms of humanity. But she did not respond to her bodies protest at her stance…she merely stared on, as if watching an army of ants fight the battle of the Roses. Except of course there were no ants. Just her, the grass, and the sun.

Was she really, truly, to stay here to her death? The sun had reached the height of day and it towered proudly above her, probably hindering not helping her defiant situation. She shuffled around and shifted herself forward, so she was half lying on her stomach, her arms supporting her, her back to the sun. Perhaps in hundreds of years time they would find her skeleton in this position, and with a shiver they would feel the sudden overwhelming presence of her emotion and the strain she seemed to be under.

As the sun sulkily started to sink, melting into the darkening horizon like it was almost unwilling to leave her, she sprang up. Her eyes were wide, her hands muddy, her body stiff and her joints robotic. But she shook not from cold, but from what had happened – what had almost begun to happen. Her eyes went wider, her mouth stretched - as if it had not thought of doing this before- and she smiled. The smile pained her muscles, but it was the most beautiful thing the grass had ever seen, and for their dancing tails she would smile a million times. She stretched her arms above her head, and such sudden movement after so long on the ground caused the world to almost falter. It was unexpected, spontaneous and entirely joyous to watch.

She took to running. She ran and ran, silently thanking the world as it beamed back at her motionful body, and the being that had inhibited that field for as long as this story became a spec on the horizon, where it disappeared, her journey yet to go on. 

Something magnificently beautiful

Words and expression, articulation through a formation of letters, communication through extensive, infinitive vocabulary, is the most beautiful thing the human mind has to offer in this world full of flaws. A moment of true raw emotion, evoked from somewhere within, drawn from something that science cannot explain, written down, scratched out in pen or hastily, shakily typed – that is one of the great wonders of all. The capture of something magnificently beautiful, not necessarily uplifting but perhaps ugly or devastating or disturbing, should never ever be taken for granted. There is nothing greater or more powerful than true human emotion; it is unstoppable and incomprehensible. It shapes, creates and regulates our world and everything we achieve. It is the sole reason we fail, but it is what makes us moral and what makes us alive. It gives us life. To feel emotion is to be on the brink of despair, to be in flight with joy, to be falling with passion, to be sick with overwhelming jealousy. It is to feel burning, feverish rage, to feel unbearable sadness. To feel emotion is to feel and be alive. Love. Love, love, love. It shall break us, only to join us back together again in a new and previously unseen formation. We are not strong enough to understand or contain it; it will always, always control us. What would we do without you, our sweet love? You cause our heart to beat daily for the things we desire; you cause us to make sacrifices that make no logical sense. Love has no rhyme, no reason; it just is as it is. It is raw and it is beautiful, and to express it in words is glorious and apt and true.

What am I, sitting here, giving these words their moment? What do I mean, as this emotion overspills out of my brain and onto this page? I feel we have a connection, these words and I; they know me and I know them. I come to them to make sense and gather meaning, or to unravel my thoughts. They come to me for this raw emotion, which I give to them; for as a human, as we all are human, we cannot deal with it. And this is why I am as crazy as I am. And this is why the world is as it is. This mad, crazy world. 

The elimination of scepticism

I stared up at the temple, white against the black of the sky, arched above my head. There were stars in the air and stars in my eyes as I took a breath, my hands held out in front of me as if in prayer. I felt alone, I didn't quite know what to do. The temple was empty, its large pillars colder than the air, its beauty marred almost by its bleak void of life. I, on the marble steps, breathing in and out, felt isolated from everything. What was I even doing here? My hands shook as the stars wavered through the slats in the stone roof.

Then, out of the darkness, floating as if on a cloud, came a mermaid. Her skin seemed grey and her face was bloodless, like the ghost of a sea woman. Her face was pained, yet there was contentment in her pearly eyes. Her scales glistened like silver in the precious starlight, but her tail flicked impatiently and nervously from side to side, searching for something.

“What do you pray for?” I asked hesitantly, and her eyes seemed to notice me for the first time. My hands were still clasped before my chest, my feet planted on the steps. She floated up and down slightly as she answered.

“To swim,” she murmured simply, before closing her eyes. Then, she sighed and started to fade, 'til all I could see again was black and white and the stars. As doom set in, another figure emerged, and soon I had a man hovering before me. His face was equally as grey as the mermaids, but his eyes were a summer sky blue. His legs were stumps, with ripped trousers revealing smooth scarred skin around the knee bone, where the calf and shin should begin.

“What do you pray for?” I asked, fearing him almost. But his reply was placid; he did not hate the world for what it had done to him.

“To walk,” he nodded, as he too started to fade and leave me, I waited for another figure, and at first I thought perhaps I was truly alone, but then he appeared. This man had black holes for eyes, and my initial instinct was to run. They were darker than anything I had ever seen and seemed to shine out of his pale face, questioning me. Sight, I knew he prayed for sight, and that I could not give him. My throat and tongue dried in my mouth as I shook, ready to cry, unable to ask. But he spoke to me.

“Not sight. I do not pray for sight. I only pray to have had the ability to see, so that when I sense the world, I can imagine it as it is. I only wish for visual knowledge and memory.” He bowed his head, the holes gaping hopelessly at the floor.

My heart thudded as he faded, and my hands left their pose of prayer to reach up and trace the rims of my own eyes. I wished, crazy as it was, that he could borrow them to see the world. But maybe, perhaps, he was better off believing its brilliance, than forever brooding on the darkness and the stars. I stared down at my own feet then, the feet made for this world, the feet able to take steps and run. As if on que they jolted forward, carrying me up into the temple, 'til I was standing in the middle, my eyes wide. Everything was as it should be. My body held no ailments, no cuts, no bruises, and no breaks. I had scope to dream, scope to live, scope to achieve. Yet, I was praying. What for? What was it that I required?

All of a sudden I felt alone again. There was no helping this. It was as swift as a dagger to the heart, that sadness. It struck when you were wavering like the stars. Then, the figure of myself floated down from the darkness. It looked grim and tired, weary from wanting. But I could not guess what it would say, so I asked; I had to ask.

“What do you pray for?”

It's eyes opened – my eyes opened. They were silent for a second to the point where I thought perhaps I would not receive an answer. But then, the mirrored me spoke, and I felt a sense of gratitude for this strange night and my own mental madness.

“The elimination of scepticism,” the figure said. “Hope. I pray for hope.”

Indescribable

Just for a moment, I felt tremendous hope, and I saw all the beauty in the world that surrounded me.
 I saw it, how wonderful it all was, as the setting sun stretched across the landscape, the trees shining in the light. The leaves as they trembled in the quiet breeze, the grass with all it's beautiful shades of green, growing long against the shackles of humanity. I see the spring as it splashes with such vigorous yet gentle dexterity, carving it's way through the landscape, searching for something that perhaps it will contentedly never find. The end of the day throws fantastic fiery colours
across the vast sky, the edges tainted by the coming of dusk, but yet everything is bathed in this beautiful light still, and there is an indescribable glory in it, a joy that can't be put into words. Yet I try- because that is what we do with our words.We try to express what was truly felt, and I felt calm and peaceful, yet ignited and excited by the serenity and perfection yet diversity of the nature that I was breathing and living in. I ran like a madman down the lane, my feet pounding the dirt, the cold
air stinging my cheeks. I smiled and I smiled at the landscape, and the sunset smiled back at me. Someone, something, gave us this world. And its at moments like this that it has to be appreciated. There may be hate, death, scandal, sadness, grief. But there is love and there is beauty and sometimes we just need to take a moment to take it all in, to feel it, to know it, to appreciate it. I saw the trees
and I thought how misunderstood they are; they may be silent as lambs but they've seen way past our years, and they grow towards the clouds for what to us seems like eternity, seeing it all, adding layers to their soft brown skins, tough to our human imperfections, watchful of our failures and our cute
successes. They give us their fruit, like gifts dropping from above, and we take it. And we live. But here I stood, in this field, feeling the world, loving things, just loving things, not expecting anyone to understand me. And I write this knowing that to read it will pronounce me crazy, but
I know, and so do the birds as they sing, and the sheep as they float in the fields made by man, what it is to be here and to be alive and to want to be alive. Nature overflows here, it's not controlled, but loops over its boundaries, ready to be discovered. I waited and waited, breathing and watching, until
the sun finally set, and the landscape was coloured with grey. But this was okay, because I knew that the colours would come again, it was okay that they were not there. I ran and ran and ran back to the house for safety, high on my adventure and the weirdness of my brain, happy with my mad moment with nature. I'm mad enough to be a writer, I thought. I'm crazy enough for this. I need to write this down, because that is what I do: so here I give this snippet through my telescope to you.

Stupid Things

Stupid things that don't matter twist emotions...twist them like steel hands around a candle, moulding it into waxy mush, with concaving finger indents. Strange things pull your heart down, 'til there's that slight lump in your throat and your limbs are heavy and your head is tired. Weird occurrences you should not care about but they throw your thoughts into turmoil, leaving you grieving what-could-have-been moments, crying over unreal ideals, smiling over forgotten loves.

The most bizarre of all is that when the real things go wrong, you notice. The world falls in, like a castle of cards, tumbling down to the table top, leaving you crushed by their papery bodies. There's a longing and a sense of guilt for ever feeling so bad when things were right, because now things are really wrong: properly wrong. You beg to return to a time when the strange things pulled your heart down, so you can be free to pull it back up, without cards catapulting through the air, and tears flying like daggers from your face.

But, its no use. The stupid things make up my mind and make me tick over, like an impatient clock. And waiting for things to fix themselves while I stand perfectly intact with muscles bulging and breath clear as daylight, is ludicrous. Emotions may be superficial, but the world itself is superficial. The stupid things will break us, like the trojan horse, or Achilles heel. Emotions take our immortality; they are our vulnerability. But this is what makes us human; this is what makes us alive. Without these strange things, to make us happy as if we're birds in flight, and sad like stones in the ocean, what would life be?

Nothing but sky

The sky is dark blue, like a summer crystal with a shade of night exploding in the dark dust above him. He's on a cliff, which throws him into the air above the ground below, until all the trees look like broccoli and the men like action figures from a children's toy set. It's winter, so with this summer sky with it's purple and fiery blue colours comes his breath, pale as death into the air, like the smoke from a dragon's throat as he coughs and sneezes with a seasonal cold. He stands there, taking all of this in, rubbing his white and pink hands together, contemplating what it all means.

Here, there is nothing but sky, it outstretches over everything, cuddling the corners of that tiny earth. And here he is, standing in it, breathing into it, giving it life as it floats around him like bubbles from a boiling bath; one that would wrinkle your skin and warm you to the bone. The broccoli sways below in the strong wind that soars through the earth and the little plastic men totter from place to place with these realistic aims and ideas. Look at them go, look at them live! He cannot see their smiles, he is too far away, but he knows they are there. Protruding from their ageing faces, like shining beacons of hope.

He should go and join them, he is one of them. But yet, he is not. There is no shining beacon of hope splashed across his face from summer rain; only hard crystal eyes sent from the fire of winter, sent with what he's seen and what he understands. He stretched out his cold hands and closed those eyes, and the lights went out in the world. Everyone, everything, was still. Time seemed to pause, holding it's breath, waiting, as this one man stood and contemplated everything and nothing, the end and the beginning, life and death, happiness and distress.

Tears that seemed black in this bright night dropped like tiny silver bullets onto the dark grass below him, and he watched them as they soaked like daggers into the brown ground. The figures were tottering again, though the trees still seemed frozen and waiting. He lowered his hands and clenched his teeth, the wind blowing his jacket, gnawing at his chest. What were they waiting for? Nothing. They could do without him.

And then with a bang and a crack and a blinding flash which fired up like morning and then burned out like dusk, he was gone. There was a sizzling black singed mark where he had been standing, and the birds in the nearest tree gaped with their beaks open in wonder. One moment he was there, the next he was gone. The men, the women, they tottered. The trees, they bent and swayed. The wind howled as the night wore on, but the man was gone. He just didn't hope to understand. It was beyond everything he knew.  

Wheelchair bound

Wheelchair bound, who needs legs when you can fly around on wheels? I take the world by storm, rocking over pavements and rolling over pathways like a broken racer. But a racer just like anyone. Give me a helmet with a visor and I'll take you on anyway, young rookie. You'd wished you'd never asked.

Age is just a number and I'm wiser than you sonny boy, you can snigger all you like but the things I've seen, the things I've done - you've no clue. My life is in the past but now I'm a racer, and a bloody good one at that. I race to bingo because I like to conform to stereotypes sometimes, but then I race to the co-op to buy alcohol so I can get bloody silly drunk. Too old to drink my arse, I'd beat you at a boat race Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday - any day kid!

Maybe when you're older you'll understand why I am so batty. Why I never slow down as I whiz along the footpath, regardless of old folks or women with buggies. I'm old kid. It happens, sometimes, but you gotta keep racing. Never jog, never take your hands off your wheels, because it's not over til the fat lady sings. My friends fat and she's not a singer, no sir she ain't that at all.

See me riding, cut me some slack for the wrinkles on my face. I never put them there I'm telling you. But I'd still take you on the final lap of a Grand Prix, and be home in time for my supper and coronation street on the box.

"The eyes are the windows to the soul."

Soft, Everything about him was soft. His hair, his skin, his heart - though that I could not see. All soft, all except those jewel-like eyes, which were stony hard: rough orbs of glassy mirror which shone like angry disaster, peering out of a velvet, beautiful, creamy white. Not his corruption, but the swimming memory of sickening horrors past just by, witnessed by this mere boy and trapped inside his tiny skull.

When asleep he was perfectly picturesque, but awake you could read his past and feel your own stomach turn. He's not old enough to see, to understand, such pain, but it's plain from one glance that he knows more than is imaginable. Unforgettable images in an irretrievable mind; damned to psychological hell when life was just beginning.

Life - what was the future when the past was filled with all that ever was? What was there to dream about when every nightmare was ignited, erupting in a flamed fury every minute of every hour, never letting go? He needs his mother's arms around him, for he's as soft as he seems. If you look into his eyes, you see he's breaking at the seams.

The broken man

He was a broken man, but a man just the same as any other in the world. His grey clothes hang loose on his skinny body, and dust had gradually gathered in the thoughtful creases of his face. He had his hood up to protect himself from the cruel London cold but his fearful eyes were still visible through the shadow. They told a story of one who was crushed, defeated and cheated by life, left in the gutter to die: unloved and unwanted by anyone. He was like glass; seemingly he was hard and tough, but so very breakable and fragile. He had been dropped and shattered, his dreams lay in useless puddles at his feet, trodden on and sniggered at by all passers by.

He was past crying. Now, he simply existed. When people saw him they usually turned away, embarrassed, and picked up the pace just to be free of the guilt. He could hardly blame them; he was the poster boy for the disregarded societal problems, the ones they didn't know how to deal with, so they threw them aside with hard eyes and an aching heart. It was delusional, but to them he was nothing, nothing but a bad image on a perfectly respectable city.

When you've hit the bottom, how do you find the strength to pick yourself back up? Sitting, hunched in a darkening street, cold autumn rain running down the back of his neck, he had no idea. There was nothing to be done, nothing more to give. He would sit here until death took pity upon his soul and swallowed him up.

Drowning in his own miserable thoughts, he was almost oblivious to the black car that pulled up just beside him, spitting rainwater from it's tires as it grinded to a halt.

A woman got out in a hurry, holding the door open impatiently as a small child came tumbling out behind her. Dressed in a dainty red raincoat, the girl ducked away from her mother's opening umbrella and slipped into the rain, a smile on her face. She lifted her tiny head to the dark angry sky, her palms in the air to feel the rain as it splashed playfully around her. She then spotted the man, sitting there in his corner, and she stopped. Her smile froze. Her mother made to grab her and drag her away; to pull her away from what would poison her view on reality, but the child stood fast.

“No mummy. Look at that man. Why is he out in the rain? Tell him he can come to our house, mummy. We have lots of spare rooms that he can stay in,” she pointed, and the mother desperately tugged at her daughter's arm, her eyes flitting from the man's haggard face to the puddles at his feet.

“You don't understand, we can't,” she hissed angrily. The child started to cry, hot tears wetting her already dripping cheeks, the shrill sound piercing the cloudy air.

“Why mummy? Why? He shouldn't be out here in the rain,” the child squealed as she was flung onto her mother's shoulder. She watched the broken man with sad brown eyes, her face a picture of despair and simple anger. There was no understanding, because it made no sense: this man should not be out in the rain. He smiled as they disappeared into the night, appreciative of the beauty of the mind of the young. If all could see like children, the world would be a better place. Sometimes we just need to start looking, and with our hearts as well as our badly trained eyes.

Under the setting sun

Dusk was falling over the city, cushioning it in a soft and sleepy glow. The hot lazy streets were slowly coated in darkness as night descended. The city didn't hush, in fact, it seemed to brighten, and when all that was left of the light was a few streaks of sun on the horizon, it was unrecognisable.

The hot and humid day had faded, and at last the people could emerge from the safety of their shade. Music that seemed almost to have no source began to play, joyfully reaching out through the city, touching every corner, every window, every doorway. Exasperated parents tried desperately to control their excited children, but they still hung from their windows and waved at the people who had started to dance below. They laughed at the clowns – the men with painted faces who juggled and fought playfully with each other, rolling around in the dust.

One boy did not laugh. Dusty and dirty, perched on a rooftop, he watched the celebrations with cold hard eyes. So much happiness, so much fun, but yet he couldn't even crack a smile. Instead, a single tear escaped him, cutting a clean path down his blackened cheek. He thought about wiping it away and pretending that he hadn't let the wretched emotion affect him, but no one could see him. It had happened, despite his best efforts to contain it, but that was that. So he let the tear stay; an emblem of momentary weakness.

Quite suddenly, he leapt away from the edge, whirling around and running in the opposite direction. Lithe and nimble, he jumped from rooftop to rooftop, desperate to be rid of the music and the contagious feeling of joy wafting in the air. He ran until the light was all behind him and all he could see was darkness. The city wall was impressive, but this didn't faze him; he came and went as he pleased. Tonight it was especially easy to scale it, as the officers had left it unguarded and had gone off to join the party. He calmly climbed his tree, swinging onto the wall, daring even to pause and catch his breath before he leapt over it.

The sand, crumbling and silky, was there to catch him. It still held some heat, but nothing like the burning ferocity that it had during the day. He dug his toes into it and his lips trembled, almost as though he was willing more tears to fall. But none did, so he started up again running across the sand.   

Jessica's Cliff

It's windy up here - I'm telling you, it's windy, and I can't go down and I'm scared. My cheeks are red raw from the cold and my fingers have gone numb. Where am I going? I shall sit down here, in the frosty grass, in the gathering darkness, and decide. The water looks so nice from all the way up here, like a soft silky blanket on top of the earth, curled around the cliff edge. But it's so windy, that's the problem. The wind is really what's getting me.

Where am I going? Why am I here? Will they be looking for me, I wonder, down there in the town, so far back behind into the black? They should know this is the only place I'll come, they should know that this is where they'll find me. Momma will think I'm going to jump, of course she will. The water does look so nice, but no. I am not ready to die. I'll sit here, cold from the wind and decide where I'm going to go. Somewhere, that's for sure. But not up to God just yet.

I left because they were shouting again, always shouting and screaming. I ran out the door and now I'm here and oh, it's windy. I feel sad for Momma but I shan't go back, unless they find me and then I'll have to. And they really should, where else would I go? This is Jessica's cliff, this is her cliff I tell you, but it's not her wind. She jumped last year, the water looked nice to her too I suppose and now she's gone. But this is her cliff and this is where I go, but now I'm so cold and I've nowhere to turn to.

 Jessica, Jessica, I can't take their shouting, it's too much, make them stop, please. I'd go back then, I swear. Then Momma would be happy. She's always happy when I come back, but today I won't. I'm getting up, running in the black, not too close to the edge, down along the road. I'm down, it's warmer but Jessica's not with me. It was HIS wind, it has to have been, who else would send it? It was like cold blades against my pale, bare skin.

I'm running now, who knows where to. God does, I'm sure, but he won't tell me right now. Goodbye Momma, goodbye Jessica. I love you both very much.

White phantom faces

The white phantom faces whimpered and wept. She strolled among them, draping her darkness, cradling them close to her with those cruel long fingers. They flinched, but still seemed drawn in, fascinated almost. She was the only light in this god forsaken place, but yet darkness followed her like a faithful bloodhound. She smiled crookedly at her trapped phantom faces, but couldn't help but look beautiful. Like a God, they adored her; they unwillingly lay down their lives before her. Why?

All she did was hold them back. She trapped them here, in this darkness, that seemingly had no end or purpose. There was a whole world out there for them to explore, but yet they stayed and stared and cried at her, and she smiled back so lovingly with those perfect pearly white teeth every time. She was almost a sorcerer of some kind, she had them under a spell – a trance, yes – they didn't know what they were thinking. They knew no life without her, and were as faithful as the darkness that trailed behind her in the shadows.

And those on the outside, those who could barely peer in through the dim grimy windows, had no real understanding. It was too dark to really see anything properly, it was almost understandable if they missed her perfect glowing face from where they were looking. Just a bunch of faces, cowering over nothing, hovering together like newborn sightless kittens. How strange, how unnerving. But swallowed up on the other side, from the very jaws of a very real surreal danger, the faces can say nothing, do nothing. They just stare back through the windows and sigh, deep sighs that sound like howling wind on a stormy summer night shuddering through the trees.

After some time, the people will walk away. Something else will catch their attention, because humans are much like that. They will walk away, and the faces will fade from their memories. It was like they never existed, not in the real world. They were made in some fantasy dimension, and that was where they would stay.