In vino veritas, isn't that what they say? From wine comes truth. From the drunk comes enlightenment. Bullshit, in my view. Absolute bullshit. What I said last night wasn't truth, wasn't enlightenment. Nothing more than sludge emerged from the drunk slug I'd been. Not as bad as that idiot, Jon, though. Jon the Judas, the … Continue reading Short Story: Cup of Wine
#ShortStory
A Pitched Effort
A short short story: -It’s 2245 on Monday 4 July 2022. My name is Detective Inspector Jan Bricker, and with me is Sergeant Milnet and George Dulmer. Please state your name and address for the record, George. -Why am I here? -Come on, George. You’re not under arrest. We just want to have a chat. … Continue reading A Pitched Effort
It’s a Story this Week
Salt Lake Blues Pink lakes are down south. There's a red lake on the south-east coast. Here, in the badlands of salty sands and nothing to hold water on the surface, there's only the blue salts. Like a cloud of colour. Insubstantial drifts of colour. Blue, the type of blue that comes with summer skies, … Continue reading It’s a Story this Week
And What is a Story?
In the beginning, it was savage and stern, a blackness of soul. It began like a tree of precocious growth, with rings of power and leaves of glinting copper, with fruit of gems and shafts of light that stabbed the night. The story I conceived was full-term, ready to burst forth, yet not developed enough … Continue reading And What is a Story?
NDE
Fiction, short. The Fall Two days ago, I went into the bloody hospital. Hate those places. People go there to die. Doctors who don't look you in the eye, nurses who talk so fast the words don't make sense until they've been gone ten minutes. All those machines, all those things to fill out, all … Continue reading NDE
Dreams of Light
A short story, under 500 words, fiction with a different perspective. From the deepest bowels of the well within the basement, Illustro strove upward. His six legs worked mud and wood fibre into a tunnel to lead him from the darkness of below to the lights from above. More than anything, Illustro wanted to see … Continue reading Dreams of Light
A Wall is not a Heart
A 500-word (ish) short contemporary fiction. Colour king-hit the wall. Blue. Not a soft blue, not eggshell blue, not sky blue. This was a black-hearted pirate blue, deep oceans, hidden secrets blue. “I didn’t want blue.” Dani stared at the scar it created against the undercoat grey. “It’s too dark. We don’t want dark.” Not … Continue reading A Wall is not a Heart
The Game
of attraction. Not between people, but toward a purpose, an end point. This is an experiment, so here goes ... Photo by Mitchell Luo on Pexels.com The Door The sign was for a new style of massage, with an image of strong masculine hands shaped to knead muscles. Hands with no callouses, short nails, no … Continue reading The Game
Slip
A short story (500 words-ish) Same, but different. After all this time, all this distance, and only Innes remained the same ten-year-old she’d been then. Her best clothes now worn to rags, her feet bare since the sandals turned to scaly flakes. She was back at the place, but not the moment. The fishing market … Continue reading Slip
The Empty Wall
A short story based on this prompt: from here. The walls are dry, dusty and cobbled with webs. My hands shake as I shove the torch to make a way through. How could such a large space not be noticed from the outside? The next step slopes down. More steps, darker and deeper, the moisture … Continue reading The Empty Wall