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Well I’m not too sure where May went, but it got past me without seeing it, so although I have finished Resilience, and this is below, it has become June’s flash! In my defence I have been busy.

I was going to Mslexicon, but the Newark book festival falls on the same weekend, and as that is closer to me and I have managed to bag some space to sell some Dark & Fluffy’s on the Sunday, I’m going there instead. I haven’t been before, but there is a packed programme to look forward to.

Myself and my son are volunteering on the Saturday morning and we’ll be part of the Newark Town Hall front of house team. It looks to be a great event and I hope some of you will make it if you can. It’s on from Friday 12th July- Sunday 14th.

www.newarkbookfestival.org.uk | 12-14th July 2019| @newarkbookfest

There is also Lincoln book festival to look forward to. This kick’s off on the 23rd September for the week and it’s theme this year is V for Victoria. They are running a competition this year in conjunction with Writing East Midlands, and I’ve entered in the short story category. So I’ve been busy working on that. It was submitted just before the deadline, after I changed my idea late on. The story I submitted is called Dunia Kita – Our World. A story with a climate change theme set in Malaysia. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

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I have decided to wrap up the 500 words now. I am intending finishing the Rue Stone before the Newark festival, then I really want to plough on with my novel The Wait’s Son, and at least get A Tale of Two well on the way to completion this year, so I’m going to be busy.

So here it is, a year on from when I started this writing journey, the last flash – Resilience.

She had been sat at her desk, in front of her bedroom window for thirty minutes. She wanted to go out, and she could see and hear her friends down below laughing and having fun, but she could also hear Shannon.
Shannon was the new girl in her class, and it had taken her less than a week to worm her way in. She now hung-out with Mercy’s friends, and even more annoyingly was always fawning over Dwayne, Mercy’s on-off boyfriend.
They had been going through a good patch lately, that was until Shannon turned up; she had batted her eye-lids at him and annoyingly, Dwayne had fallen for it.
When Mercy protested, Shannon had rounded on her, planted her hands firmly on her hips and proclaimed.
‘You don’t have a right to him you know, he’s a free agent. Isn’t that right Dwayne?’ The absence of any protest from Dwayne seemed to confirm it.
Mercy felt her cheeks burn as she remembered how Dwayne had just shrugged his shoulders. Why hadn’t he said anything! Her stomach flipped, reliving it again, in minute detail.
Since then, she had been sat here studying for her A levels, which pleased her mum, instead of being down there with her friends. It was the weekend, she should be laughing and joking with them, like she did before Shannon appeared. Annoyed, she slammed open her Psychology revision book hard, and it fell open on a new topic. Resilience.
She half-heartedly read the definition at the top of the page.
The ability to ‘bounce back’ from difficult experiences.
She read on.
‘Resilience exists in people who develop psychological and behavioural capabilities that allow them to remain calm during crises and to move on from the incident without long-term negative consequences.
So, you could be upset, but respond positively and move on.
In a way it was just being cool wasn’t it, and wasn’t that what Dwayne was always saying. ‘Be cool?’
She took in a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Be cool.
She went downstairs.
‘Where are you going love, I thought you were studying?
‘I’m going outside, where I should be on the weekend, and besides, I am still studying.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes really. Do you know what resilience is?
Her mum shrugged.
‘Well, watch and learn, you’re about to find out.’
Moments later, her mum was peeling carrots over the kitchen sink. She could see Mercy talking to Dwayne, and that new loud girl standing at the side of her, looking on with her mouth open. Dwayne was relaxed leaning against a low wall and smiling. She hoped there wouldn’t be trouble. She wanted Mercy to study, and she didn’t want her upset again, not when exams were coming up.
Within a few minutes though, the loud girl had walked away, flicking her hair behind her as she went, and Mercy and Dwayne had joined their larger group of friends and were walking away hand in hand.
So that was resilience; her mum smiled.

Yes, I’m well behind the curve, but we will go with Resilience for the topic of this month’s flash fiction. It will be a tough one but in the absence of any other ideas we’ll plough on :-)

I will decide on June’s and post that when I post my 500 words titled Resilience.

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.