Author: janetstockwriter

I’m going to Mslexicon! Not the full weekend, unfortunately, but I have bought a ticket for the Sunday. Can’t wait. Anyone else going?

@mslexicon

mslexia.co.uk

Here it is, 500 words on the theme of Spring

‘It’s called season creep.’
The comment halted the conversation that was taking place below and slowly, one by one, all the faces turned to look up at him.
He felt very smug. He liked that.
Rex was the last to look up, as usual, but it was Pip who spoke first. His voice was squeaky with nerves, as well it might be.
‘Season creep you say?’
‘Yes,’ he replied flatly. Then he twitched his shoulders and stretched his neck as he settled into a more comfortable position.
He could hear them murmuring amongst themselves and he patiently waited for the next question. He could hear the loud deep whisper from Rex, the measured voice of Felix, and Pip’s shrill and sharp intonations punctuating the conversation. Then the jittery tone of Belle came through, her offspring were in attendance, but he assumed that they would be too scared to speak, and he didn’t blame them for that.
As he sat there, the warm evening breeze surrounding him, but it had an unsettling, foreboding feeling about it; not comforting and full of promise as it normally was. He wondered how long it would be before they wouldn’t be able to recognise the seasons at all.
He heard a fresh noise below and looking down again he saw Erica waddling towards the group. She was Rex’s partner, and out of all of them, he liked her the best. He could never quite muster the sharp tongue or sarcastic manner that he inflicted onto the others when he spoke to her. She wasn’t pompous, like some of them. When she spoke, she was calm, self-assured and always made perfect sense. He could respect that.
After a short discussion with the group, she spoke.
‘Good evening Walter, do you have the time to talk a little more? We all, as ever, would value your knowledge in this matter.’
Respectful.
‘Good evening Erica. Yes, I will explain further, but you must all listen carefully, time is not on our side. It is getting warmer earlier in the season and this, as we are experiencing, is causing problems. The flowers are blossoming, and trees are coming into leaf too early. The bees – we know how important they are – are confused. One minute they’re working, then boom, there’s a cold snap.’ Everyone nodded in agreement. ‘Hibernating animals are roused dangerously early, and our young are being born at the wrong time. We are all feeling the effects of this.’
‘But what can we do Walter? Who is to blame for this?
‘Erica, there is nothing we can do I’m afraid, we just have to try and adapt as much as we can, but there will be casualties. And as for blame Erica. It is the fault of man, I heard it myself from their very mouths as I was hunting not two nights ago.’
He fluffed his feathers angrily and looking down at the scared faces of the woodland creatures below, he wondered who if any would survive.

Did you have a go yourself?

I’m still reading Pet Sematary, and I’ve been ploughing on with my novel and novella The Rue Stone. But I also need to make a start on a short story to enter into the Aurora writing competition (www.writingeastmidlands.co.uk), as the winner is presented at the Lincoln book festival in September. As I’ll be there anyway I might as well throw my hat into the ring.

Have a think about a topic for May…

April’s flash is Spring, and this invites thoughts of lightness, new beginnings, new starts – nice happy things. Unlike the book I’m just about to re-read, Stephen King’s Pet Semetary. It was the first horror book that I read, and I read it as a sort of dare to myself. I couldn’t believe that someone could write a story based around dead pets and make it that scary. Well some of you will know how wrong I was. From then on I was hooked on Stephen King and he is still my go to author when I have the time, and need a good read which I know I will become immersed in and always enjoy.

My short piece, Death by Testing, in Dark & Fluffy II, is, I’m sure influenced by the great man himself. Read it here for free!

They wheeled him through the DNA activated doors on the latest model of the Crimiport trolley. He wasn’t gagged, he wasn’t blindfolded, and he wasn’t strapped down. There was no need. As part of his sentence he had already had his tongue removed, his eyelids had been glued open and he was paralysed by drugs.

He could still feel pain of course. That was the whole point.

As a tried and convicted perpetrator of seven child rapes and murders, he had received the maximum sentence. Death by human testing. Vis-à-vis, new developmental drugs would be tested on him as a precursor to him being subjected to a lethal dose of DBP, death by pollution. He would then be autopsied by the best medical minds of the age. The results would be analysed, and the findings used to develop drugs to help mankind deal with the increasingly lethal, and biggest scourge of the 23rd century.

Pollution.

The senior of the two porters, Bab, propped up the convict, tapping the base of the trolley a little too harshly and stared at the convict in an intimidating way, a little longer than necessary. His rooky assistant Erron watched his every move.

Erron had only been in the job a month, but this was already his second maximum sentence prisoner. He looked up to Bab, respected him, and was keen to be as good as him at the job, and it was the best job he’d ever had. The bastards deserved everything that they got, and it made him feel proud that he and Bab were part of that.

The professor gestured for them to lift the prisoner onto the stark stainless-steel table, well slab really, that sat in the middle of the white clinical room. As Bab and Erron lifted him, Bab threw a serious glance at Erron
‘In my grandad’s day they tested drugs on animals. Rabbits, monkeys and the like.’
‘Barbaric,’ Erron responded breathlessly. Bab had told him this before, but he would never remind him.

‘Come on now, I haven’t got all day,’ remonstrated the professor.
And even before Bab and Erron had left the room, the testing had begun.

Yes I’m late, I blame the clocks going forward. Anyway, moving on, here is The Canada Goose. (Yes, really :-)).

The Canada Goose

She put the last touches to the snowy landscape, smiling at the result.
Then he was behind her, the serene moment shattered as he snorted.
‘Here, some post came for you,’ he said handing her what was obviously junk mail. ‘What on earth is that?’
‘It’s a Canada goose,’ she clipped.
‘Looks more like an over grown pigeon.’
He walked out of the room chuckling, pleased with himself.
She decided to escape, go into town.

Looking through the bay fronted window of the new travel agent, she saw two women carrying a large advertisement for the place she had always wanted to visit, Canada.
‘Special deal! Too good to miss!’ It declared.
Standing in front of the window, she thought of all the things she hadn’t experienced. They hadn’t had children because he hadn’t wanted them, they hadn’t travelled. They’d had no life at all really. The realisation of this suddenly hit her in the stomach as if it were a physical blow. She saw one of the women looking at her with concern in her eyes, and she moved away, embarrassed.
When she got home, he was snoring in the armchair.
She went upstairs and threw a few things into a suitcase. Then she pulled out a dresser drawer and feeling underneath it, she took out an envelope, it contained £8,200 and a passport. Then she grabbed the picture, covered it, then carried the lot back to her car.
Sitting in the High Street cafe, a tap on the window next to her startled her. Looking round she saw Tom, a fellow painter. He looked very handsome; wearing a light blue checked shirt, open at the neck, and a lovely blue linen jacket.
‘Hi,’ he breathed as he sat down in front of her. ‘How are you?’ He was looking at the items around her.
She suddenly felt foolish, wondering why she hadn’t left her things in the car, and she blushed. She felt sad, small and foolish.
Picking up on her distress, he moved round next to her, once there he put his arm round her and gave her a squeeze. It felt good, and that made her feel even more upset.
‘Is everything ok?
She looked into his brown eyes and saw nothing but compassion. He gave her another squeeze.
‘Look, why don’t you come to my place, I was just headed home. I won’t pester, you can just take a bit of time and have a bit of space to think things through.’
At a loss as to what else she would do, she nodded in agreement.
He stood up and picked up her case, she picked up the painting. He lifted the cover slightly.
‘Ah lovely, you’ve finished the Canada Goose, I’m glad. What a wonderful painting.’
‘You know what it is?’ she asked surprised.
‘I do. It’s one of my favourites. I have a special interest in wildlife, I’d love to visit Canada one day. How about you, ever fancied it?

So, the last day of the month, and that means it’s time to publish my attempt at Feb’s flash fiction piece. 500 words on the theme of Love.

Love
She sat down on the grass and nestled her back into the trunk of the large oak tree, until she had found a comfortable position.
The early afternoon sunlight filtered through the trees and branches, the rays warmly caressing her youthful skin. Her hair shimmered, the colour of palest wine and her brown eyes had a depth to them, like the earth she sat upon.
She took in a deep breath and then sighed slowly and contentedly whilst running her finger tips, as softly as a lover’s, through the grass and tiny daisies she sat upon. A fast flowing stream nearby was chattering away to the rocks submerged in it; telling them it’s secrets and dreams. There was an intermittent drone of mayflies, as they flew near her and then flew away.
Her father’s castle stood like a young warrior at the top of ae hill to her left. She looked at the castle with mixed feelings, it was her home, yet it had always felt like a prison to her, until now.
Two months ago, she had been a young naïve girl, giggling in corners with her sisters, acting like a child; talking of courtly love with eyes wide with expectation and dreams. Then a party of knights, fresh from the Holy Wars had arrived to pay their respects to her father. She had heard the arrival of the group while she had been sewing with her sisters and ladies, and while it caused great excitement amongst them all, she was the only one brave enough to investigate this distraction from the daily monotony.
She had crept down the curving stone steps into the great hall and seen the group being attended too by the servants. Arriving nervously at the bottom, one of the younger knights had turned to face her and everything else around her was forgotten.
Her dreams exploded into reality.
The rise and fall of her emotions had scared her; there was the uncertainty, the surety, the belief and the doubts. What emotion was this? To throw her heart around as if it were a ship on the sea. It was raw. It was pure.
Then one morning she awoke to find that he had gone. But that was just as he said it would be.
He had left at daybreak to tell his family of their marriage plans. The wedding notice had been posted on the door of the church, and today he would return and they would be wed.
So, here she waited under the tree where he first kissed her. Her sisters were also watching, from the tower, and she saw one of them suddenly pointing. Then she heard the thunder of hooves, building as they approached. She jumped up and there in the distance was her love riding back to her.
She waved. He slowed his horse as he saw her and grinned. Waving back, he trotted his horse up to her, he dropped from the saddle and pulled her towards him.

Now I’m going to propose something really random for next month – The Canada Goose!
It’s something that I’ve just briefly mentioned in another story I’m working on, but it gave me the idea for short to put on here. Fancy trying it as well?