Pulp Idol - Firsts 2020

Pulp Idol - Firsts

Writing on the Wall Toxteth Library Windsor Street, Liverpool L8 1XF Published by Writing on the Wall, 2020 Š Remains with authors Design and layout by Katrina Paterson ISBN: 978-1-910580-41-7 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

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Contents Foreword - Mike Morris and Madeline Heneghan

V

Editors’ Introduction

IX

Kim Wiltshire - SAD Day

3

Natalie Denny - The Girl with the Words

15

Lewis Jennings - She Dreams in Colour

23

Andy Billinge - Green Willow

37

Em Coombes - The Pier

61

Jack Hook - Moloch

67

Louise Muddle - A Corpse for Christmas

81

Roisin O’Grady - Haley Ran Away

97

Chris Radcliffe - The Children of Good Friday

107

Duncan Ross - The Rage

127

Peter Swindells - Morbid Paramour

137

Magaly Tawakoni - The Sacred Tea

151

Contact Details for Writers

162

Afterword

163

Foreword We’re proud as ever to present the first chapters from twelve new, unpublished novelists, discovered through our Pulp Idol writing competition, which we host during our annual writing and literary festival, WoWFEST. The diversity within the publishing industry has undergone a seismic shift over the past two years, with more new voices from diverse and working-class communities being heard and read. This is something Writing on the Wall has pioneered since we were founded twenty years ago and was the reason why the Pulp Idol competition was launched in 2006. We identified the need for these new voices to have opportunities to be published and to provide pathways to bring their writing to the attention of mainstream and independent publishers.

Our belief that new writers need these opportunities has been proven accurate, with hundreds of applicants each year vying for a place in the finals.

The quality of the winning entries has led to many successes, including mainstream publishers Hodder and Stoughton offering a two year book deal to one of our previous winners, James Rice, and independent publisher Bluemoose Books signing up finalist Ariel Kahn’s debut novel Raising Sparks, which was published in 2018 to much acclaim and success and achieving runner up in The Guardian’s Not The V

Booker Prize competition after topping the poll to reach the shortlist. 2019 Pulp Idol winner Jacob Riley is now represented by JK Rowling’s agency, with his debut novel The Boat.

A special thank you as always to the people who work tirelessly to make the competition and this publication possible each year - The Writing on the Wall Staff and Trustees, our volunteers, our judges, editors and proof-readers, in particular the writers who were our judges and editors from this year’s competition: Deborah Morgan, John Donoghue, Colin Watts, Helen Dring, Jim Friel, Penny Feeney, Sally-Anne Tapia-Bowes and Clare Coombes, who generously gave up their time to judge the heats and who edited these twelve first chapters. They also gave invaluable feedback to all the writers who didn’t make this year’s final. We’d also like to say a special thank you to our final judges: Laura Campbell of Greene & Heaton Literary Agents and Charlotte Humphery, editor at Chatto and Windus. These are the people who, with Writing on the Wall, have helped create the pathway to bringing these new voices to these pages.

The quality of the writing is as high as it’s ever been. We have no doubt readers will enjoy these first chapters as much as we have. We hope our 2020 writers achieve the success of previous Pulp Idol winners and finalists and have their work recognised by publishers across the UK. We wish them all the success they deserve and offer our sincerest thanks VI

to all of the writers who enter Pulp Idol and continue to help us make it one of the most successful writing competitions in the UK. Mike Morris and Madeline Heneghan, Co-Directors, Writing on the Wall

VII

Introduction Kim Wiltshire, who won this year’s Pulp Idol competition with SAD Day, gives us a moving story of grief and the erosion of trust, rendered all the more shocking by its ordinary setting. A mother comes home from an early morning shift to discover she cannot wake her teenage son; tension builds as the house fills with figures of authority. The taut simplicity of the writing and the sharpness of the dialogue make this a situation every reader will relate to and find harrowing.

The Girl with the Words, by Pulp Idol runner-up Natalie Denny, is a compelling, magical story, with fifteen year old Saphy at the centre of a battle between the Helicon, descended from the Muses of Ancient Greece and The Guild, in a story told with a compassionate, keen voice, that is imaginative, bold and intriguing.

In She Dreams in Colour, Pulp Idol runner-up Lewis Jennings examines attitudes to gender identity and mental health. Cain is 11 when he first tries on a woman’s dress and by adulthood has discovered the liberating effect this can have on him. This first chapter sees him preparing for a night out as alter-ego Cheree, along with sparky companion Paula. However, there is a darker side to the story and, at the end of the evening, trauma to be faced.

Green Willow by Andy Billinge is a vibrant story IX

set nine hundred years after a great plague. New civilisations are threatened by the Corsairs who have captured a young woman calling herself Orca. She ‘escapes’ and is picked up by a group of Valers, whom she joins in their fight for survival.

In Em Coombes’ The Pier, the mystery starts, as the title suggests, with a pier, the central point of a small town being closed after an incident. The locals swear they know what has happened, that they’ve seen it, but do they? This is the beginning of a gripping mystery that will hook you in and keep you longing to read more.

Jack Hook’s Moloch begins with a mysterious prison guard arriving to run a notorious prison. A prisoner defies all attempts to punish him. Moloch is intriguing from the first word, and Jack’s writing doesn’t let go from there.

A Corpse for Christmas, by Louise Muddle, set on the 50th anniversary of the cult horror movie Servant of Shiva, in Penkerro where it was filmed, immerses the reader into a world filled with mystery and tension; an enticing mix of suspense and glitz that will appeal to a wide range of readers.

Haley Ran Away by Roisin O’Grady, fast-paced and exquisitely laced with subtle, dark humour, draws the reader into the frenetic world of Ruth and Haley in this dark, haunting story about love and the complexity of relationships.

Life in Derry holds few attractions for Sam in Chris Radcliffe’s The Children of Good Friday. His one X

way out might be the betting slip in his pocket, the only thing his dad left him when he died. If Derry win, the betting slip will change his life, but when was the last time McNamee scored?

Duncan Ross’ The Rage, a day in the life of dreamer and struggling musician Jay Parker, is a dark comedy with a heart full of passion, that pits Jay’s future dreams against the harsh reality of life in this well-crafted tale with a moral dilemma at its centre.

In Morbid Paramour, Peter Swindells has set up an intricate tale of stark reality mixed with fantasy and the occult. Sometime after the death of his daughter, Doctor Tod Orm has a near-death experience, becoming convinced thereafter that he can resurrect her with magic.

The Sacred Tea by Magaly Tawakoni is set in the time before the arrival of Europeans in South America where Tainá, a young woman of the rain forest, leads a life in harmony with nature, which is now under threat. Many years later, another young woman drinks a sacred tea and unwittingly discovers Tainá’s story.

Debbie Morgan, Colin Watts, Helen Dring, Penny Feeny, John Donoghue and Sally-Anne TapiaBowes – Editors

XI

Pulp Idol

Kim Wiltshire

Kim Wiltshire is a playwright who creates political theatre through her theatre company, the Laid Bare Theatre Project. She was also co-writer and co-editor of Scenes From The Revolution, a book exploring 50 years of political theatre for Pluto Books & Edge Hill Press. SAD Day is her first novel.

SAD Day

SAD Day follows the story of Sarah and Andy Rourke after the death of their 15-year-old son, Drew, from Sudden Adult Death Syndrome. Finding her only son dead on her return from work, Sarah and Andrew fall into a nightmare of police questions, interference from family members and the realisation that they might not, after all, know the person they’ve been married to for eighteen years at all.

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SAD Day

Kim Wiltshire When they told her Drew had died from Sudden Adult Death syndrome, she laughed.

She told them they’d got it wrong. That it couldn’t possibly be Sudden Adult Death syndrome because Drew was only fifteen. There was a moment of silence. Andy put his arm around her and gave her a squeeze.

‘What?’ She couldn’t understand what they didn’t get. ‘He was fifteen, he wasn’t an adult. So it can’t be, can it? They’ve got it wrong, Andy, that’s all there is to it.’ Andy said something to her about getting caught up in semantics, that the doctors knew what they were talking about. She shook his arm off. Why couldn’t he just for once take on board that what she was saying was right. Drew was not an adult.

And then she cried.

‘I am so sorry,’ said the woman.

That morning played on repeat in her mind. Over and over. Glorious HD and Dolby surround sound.

Over and over and over.

She’d had an early shift at the bakery, but Andy was on the late shift at the hospital – again – so he’d been in charge of making sure Drew got up and got to school on time. But as she came in she noticed the schoolbag was still on the table, stuff all over the 3

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place. She tutted and called up.

‘Drew, you messy little sod, why are you still here?’

There was no reply. She called up to Andy.

‘Andy, it was your bloody job to get him up and out!’

He didn’t respond either, so she put the kettle on.

This was like three o’clock in the morning for Andy, so she’d let him sleep on, but Drew needed to be up.

She made two teas, Drew’s too milky and too sweet. He’d look at it and go, ‘Aw mum, come on, I’m not a bloody kid anymore!’ But he’d drink it.

Upstairs was still and quiet. She thought about getting a sheet out of the airing cupboard, pretending to be a ghost and shouting ‘boo!’ at him but dismissed the thought as too silly. Andy was snoring away, so she pulled their bedroom door to, pleased she would have Drew to herself for a while. A rare occurrence these days.

She opened his bedroom door.

It looked wrong.

No, he was just asleep at a funny angle.

‘Drew, love, I’ve brought you a cuppa.’

No, it was wrong. He looked wrong.

Her eyes began watering and she was holding her breath. She tried to take in what she was seeing.

Tried to work out what it was her eyes were showing her brain.

Drew lay on the bed, half dressed, head on his pillow, but at such a funny angle. She shook his 4

SAD Day

shoulder but withdrew her hand immediately. The heating was on, he couldn’t be cold. She touched his face. Cold.

She stared at him.

She opened the curtains, stared some more.

No, he had to be mucking her about. ‘Drew, honey, wake up, stop pissing around.’ He didn’t react. She got angry. ‘Drew, you’re bloody well annoying me now, will you please wake up, and get your lazy arse downstairs?’ Nothing.

She opened her mouth to speak again, but all that came out was one long, despairing howl.

Andy came tearing in, mumbling, ‘Jesus, Saz, what the fuck is going … oh fuck! Oh Jesus, fuck, Drew? Drew?’ He fell onto his knees, cradling Drew’s head in his arms, searching the face for some sign of life. He looked up at her.

She knelt down, the bed between them, and threw her arms around Drew. Drew. Between them.

Their boy. Their only boy.

She was young, fit and healthy, so it shouldn’t have been a difficult birth, but it was. Something had gone wrong, and just as she woke from the void, just as she recovered from sixteen hours of madness that she now understood to be labour, she fell into another void. She emerged from this one womb-less.

When they told her what they’d done, in one swift moment all thoughts of creating the massive, unruly, loud, mad as a box of frogs family, the one 5

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they began to plan as soon as she discovered she was pregnant, were chucked out of the window. She’d been given no choice, no option; they’d just done it. Of course, that wouldn’t happen nowadays, the practice nurse had told her during her last smear test.

When she asked them what they’d done with her womb, they told her they’d incinerated it. She’d wanted to keep it. Knowing it had gone, knowing she had to say goodbye to all the kids she’d never have, that had been hard. The two girls, who’d have been Holly and Amy. The twins, maybe Harry and Mabel. Her other boy she would have named after her dad, Edward. She made these children real and kissed them each goodbye. But her womb? It was a physical part of her, her flesh, her meat. It was her.

She never quite got over that loss.

Her eyes refocused and she looked at Andy. Neither could find words. People in these situations often say: what happened next was a blur. It wasn’t. It was remarkably clear, and stayed remarkably clear.

They sat on the floor either side of the bed and held Drew. All the time, she was hoping they were mistaken. But they weren’t. Andy was the first to speak.

‘We should call someone.’

‘Who?’ ‘Police or something? Ambulance?’

‘Why?’ ‘Because… that’s what you do, isn’t it?’

6

SAD Day

They sat for a while longer. She didn’t want to let anyone in. This was Drew’s space, private. She thought about ways they could keep him. Perhaps bury him in the garden? But she knew these were mad thoughts. She looked at Andy and nodded.

Andy made the call.

Later, they’d both be questioned about this gap in time, Andy questioned harshly, as if they were hiding something. But what everyone seemed unable to grasp was all she wanted to do was sit with her boy. Just for a while longer. She didn’t want intruders in hi-vis jackets coming in and taking her boy away. Which is exactly what did happen after Andy made the call.

A lot of people came. They were kind at first, but she could see them whispering in corners. Whispering suspicions, creeping around her house, staring at her, staring at Andy. She wanted it all to go away.

Andy’s big sister, Margaret, came over as soon as he’d called her. They all sat with ever more cooling cups of tea - God knows where all those mugs came from. People talked, asked questions, came in and out of the house, her house. Then Margaret got practical.

‘We need to tell people.’

She looked at Margaret for a long while, unable to fathom what on earth she was talking about.

Margaret continued. ‘School, both your works, his mates, your mates, family. I suppose we’ll have to do something with his Instagram account, is he 7

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still on Twitter or Facebook? There’ll be other stuff online we know nothing about. Where’s his phone?’

As Margaret busied herself, the doorbell went again. Andy looked at her in panic – what now? But Margaret was already bustling towards the door.

She counted the cups of tea on the table. There were twelve.

‘It’s the family liaison officer,’ Margaret announced, as she led in a youngish Asian woman.

‘Hi, is it Andrew and Sarah?’ They nodded. ‘Hi, my name’s Yaz, and I am so sorry to have to meet you in these awful circumstances.’ The young woman spoke in a gentle but professional manner, the empathy training emanated towards her in waves. Even so, she only half listened to Yaz’s explanation of the role of the family liaison officer in such a tragic situation.

More tea was made, and then the door went again.

Yaz was clearly the vanguard, with two lowgrade detectives bringing up the rear. One male, one female. Plain clothes. Caring expressions on their faces, but careful with their words. Where were you?

What were your movements? Can you give more precise timings? There seems to be a gap of around ninety minutes between you arriving home, Mrs Rourke, and Mr Rourke contacting the emergency services. Can you explain what was happening in that gap, please? And as they questioned, drank more tea, sat on her sofa with their little notebooks out, the thought struck her that this wasn’t looking good for Andy. She watched him, realising he didn’t 8

SAD Day

see it. It was obvious they thought she was fine – in the clear: she’d gone to work, she came home, she found her son dead and an hour or so later called 999. She’d been out of the family home for a total of seven hours. Seven hours during which Andy had been alone in the house with Drew. She could see how it might look. Of course, they said, they were waiting on the outcome of the post-mortem.

A screech escaped her.

‘No!’ Her beautiful, gorgeous boy. No, she could not allow that. They were not going to cut him up, slice into him like so much meat like so much offal like so much blood and guts and – god no! No, they couldn’t, they shouldn’t, she would not allow it! Fuck no!

Yaz put an arm around her and Margaret brought in another cup of tea. But now there was an actual physical pain, inside, something was going wrong with her. Maybe she was dying too. No one should touch her boy except her, no one. She sobbed and screamed and the pain got worse and worse and worse.

She opened her eyes. She was in bed. It was a dream, a nightmare, everything was OK. Her brain knew life couldn’t possibly be that bad.

Then she heard the voices. Outside her bedroom.

Too many unknown voices. Too many people in her house. She remembered. It was that bad. It was as bad as it could ever get.

9

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People were talking, moving about, upstairs, down the stairs, people in her house. People who were alive. What right did they have? She hated all of them, even the ones she didn’t know. She hated Yaz for being alive. She hated Margaret for being alive. She hated Andy. What right did they have to be alive when Drew wasn’t?

She pulled the covers up around her neck, she wanted that feeling of being wrapped in warmth.

She would never be warm again.

When he was little, Drew always used to say that he wanted to be wrapped. Instead of asking for a cuddle, he would say, ‘Wrap me, mummy, wrap me!’ She would wrap herself around him and hold him tight.

Her heart hurt.

Someone opened the door, obviously to check on how she was. She feigned sleep and heard the conversation on the other side of the door as it was gently shut.

‘She’s still asleep.’ Margaret’s voice.

‘I get that, but we do need to talk to her.’ Female cop’s voice.

‘Literally hours ago she found her only son dead.

Like six hours ago.’ Margaret’s voice again.

‘It would just move things along quicker. If something has happened…’ Yaz’s voice.

‘We don’t know that.’ Margaret.

‘But if it has, talking to her now will move things along more quickly than if we…’ Female cop.

10

SAD Day

‘For you maybe, but not for her. This will never move quickly for her. You have to give her time.’

Margaret was putting up a fair defence to the female cop. Unusual for Margaret to defend her sister-inlaw, she was normally the one pushing and needling.

‘I understand everything you’re saying Margaret, I really do, but…’ Margaret was not letting that female cop get a full sentence out.

‘There is no but, love. You’re not talking to her, end of. She’s asleep. You know the basics, there’s your lot crawling all over, I really don’t get what you’ll gain from waking her now. Leave her be, come back tomorrow, OK?’ She heard footsteps retreat downstairs. Where was Andy? Andy wasn’t standing guard outside, it was Margaret, so where was he? She couldn’t slow her head down, and she couldn’t move her body.

She felt dizzy.

Did Drew know he was dying? Did he call out for her? He was alone, all alone, how did he feel?

When did he stop feeling? When did he stop being Drew? Could she believe in reincarnation? Could she believe there was a heaven? If she could, then she could believe that she might she see him again one day. But she’d never believed in that shit, why would she start now?

And what were all those people doing, why was there so much noise, what the fuck was going on?

11

Natalie Denny

Natalie Denny is a 33-year-old writer and Service Manager in the NHS. Her interests include reading, activism, writing poetry and prose and live entertainment. She graduated with an open degree at the Open University. This included an advanced creative writing module which was the catalyst for her commitment to writing a novel.

The Girl with the Words

The Helicon; direct descendants of the nine Muses of Ancient Greece and responsible for all inspiration in the modern world. The Guild; a powerful organisation that seeks to control artistic creation. Saphy; a fifteen-year-old girl inextricably bound to both. After a series of Helicon murders, Saphy is thrust into the dark and magical world of the Muse Legacy.

13

The Girl with the Words Natalie Denny

The granite structure of The Guild building looked like any other. No defining features, or anything of interest, which of course was exactly what they wanted; to be hidden in plain sight. The Job Centre, Youth Offending Service, Citizens Advice and a whole array of public services were all housed in these walls. A front of course. The Guild had little interest in the wellbeing of the common people.

Grey clouds hung lifelessly over a tired clothesline of sky. A gloomy and overcast day, like so many of its cousins in Mother England. Rain drizzled in the spaces between skin and coat, giving hunched pedestrians that little injection of joy they needed on a Monday morning. The whole place reeked of despair. Des wrinkled her nose and pushed her scarf further over her face. At least the smell suited her mood.

The spirit of the building had leaked out on to the surrounding streets. A whole area of colourless monotony infecting any vibrancy it encountered. Gazing at the threshold, Des felt all joy drain out of her.

She was tired, worn in and out like an old shoe.

Her young body had endured much in the last few months. Her young mind much more. She thought of the last time she had stood in this spot and shuddered. Shadowy images crept into her head, liquid 15

Pulp Idol - Firsts 2020

slick and insidious. Her breathing quickened. She felt a rising heat and a familiar dangerous pulse in her chest.

‘Please,’ she begged under her breath ‘Not now.’

On cue the squiggling mass of chubby cheeks and sunlight strapped to her chest gurgled, chasing the frown across the planes of Des’s face.

Saphy. She breathed in her daughter’s fresh scent, resting her hands over the delicate curve of her head. Saphy, her rhyme and reason, prompting a return to the ugly building in front of her. Des had run from the secrets contained within its walls for what felt like forever. Was coming back a terrible mistake?

No, she reminded herself, she needed to do this, for Saphy’s sake.

Des ran her fingers through the budding curls of her baby’s head and planted a kiss on her crown.

Her breathing and temperature steadied as Saphy raised a chubby cinnamon fist to her mother’s chin and sensing her unease, omitted a small whimper.

Des glared at the grey door standing between her and her past, before she could convince herself to leave she stepped forward.

‘Let’s do this, little one.’

The baby’s owlish eyes stared at her mother solemnly and, in keeping with the mood of the occasion, blew a sloppy raspberry much to their mutual delight. Their mingled laughter floated down the street to the ears of the figure that was watching 16

The Girl with the Words

them. He allowed himself the pleasure of their secret company for one last time.

A syrupy voice floated out from behind a wooden desk and scuffed plastic divide.

‘Welcome to the Hive. Can I help you?’

The rigor mortis grin of the receptionist exorcised the ghosts of Des and Saphy’s mirth. She was wrapped in a cloud of powdered pink, sporting a platinum blonde bob and matching pink lipstick which had found its way onto blindingly white teeth. Things certainly had changed around here, Des thought.

The receptionist’s voice and dress were at odds with her eyes. They peered out through false lashes, lifeless. Des wondered if she knew or cared. She didn’t judge her. There’s only so long you can play dead before you actually are. If Des had stayed in this depressing place she would probably be exactly the same.

‘Excuse me?’ The receptionist repeated her earlier greeting.

The room they had stepped into smelt of stale cannabis and staler bodies. A notice board full of outdated information hung above battered seats. Big globs of aged chewing gum and suspicious stains dotted the whole expanse of the threadbare carpet.

A lanky boy was folded in halve in one of the seats.

His eyes glued to the mobile phone in his lap, fingers moving ferociously across the screen. The only sign 17

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that betrayed life. It made Des think of icebergs, still on the surface with worlds, no, universes operating below. She hoped that was so for the receptionist.

For her.

‘I…I’m here to see the Master of the Guild,’ she managed to stutter, bringing her attention back to the woman in front of her.

‘There’s no one of that description here,’ the receptionist said, an edge to her saccharine.

Angry with her faltered opening, she drew herself together and said her next sentence with the conviction of her name.

‘I’m his daughter, Odessa.’

The receptionist blinked slowly. A slight tremor of her lips accompanied a sharp intake of breath. Perfectly manicured nails moved shakily to the phone at her desk. This woman and her pristine workspace were the only thing that would alert outsiders to the fact everything was not as it seemed. Des made a mental note to raise it with Glade when she saw him. He was the only thing she missed about her old home. Her Father’s best friend, practically her Uncle and what was called a Guild Perceptioner. The man responsible for shielding the activities and presence of The Guild.

‘Excuse me f-f-for a moment,’ it was the receptionist’s turn to stutter. The part of Des’s ego she thought had been lost preened in delight. The receptionist had turned a nice shade of wraith white as she spoke into the receiver and listened to her instructions. She 18

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put the phone down and rose abruptly.

‘Lady Odessa. This way, please,’ she said unlocking her office door to join Des. The boy stuffed in the corner raised his head slightly to watch their departure, an unfathomable look on his face.

The receptionist looked aggrieved that she had to leave her pink world, Des felt sorry for her and a bit ashamed of exerting her power. Pinky was only the help after all.

She led Des through a metal door and down a long drab corridor. Her heels clacked against the floor and echoed off the walls. Saphy had remained quiet but Des could feel her little body fidgeting as a hauntingly familiar voice called her name.

‘Odessa?’

19

Lewis Jennings

Lewis Jennings is a journalism graduate and has previously featured in WoW’s What’s Your Story? Mental Health and Me anthology. He is the editorial assistant at Index on Censorship and is a board member at Scottie Press. Though his career has steered towards journalism, his true love is creative writing.

She Dreams in Colour

Liverpool, 1989. After dark, when his parents sleep, Cain Gleeson becomes Cheree. As a woman, he feels the sense of identity he has craved his whole life. But, when his father’s mental health deteriorates after the events of Hillsborough, he fears his secret may tear his family apart forever.

21

She Dreams in Colour Lewis Jennings

The clock struck twelve. It was time. I applied the finishing touches to my painted face and drowned myself in Helen’s prized bottle of Giorgio. If she knew I would probably be dead. More to the point, if she knew her little brother was dressed to the nines in her gaudy wardrobe, caked in her most expensive makeup, I would definitely be dead. From a secret compartment in my drawers, I pulled out a crimped yellow wig and suffocated it with copious amounts of lacquer. I glanced at my reflection in the mirror. There she was, smiling like always. Sometimes I smile back. As much as she is me, she isn’t.

Her name is Cheree, my name is Cain. While I dream in monochrome, she dreams in colour.

I first met her, albeit briefly, when I was eleven years old. It was an unpleasant day during the Winter of Discontent, just before Margaret Thatcher rose to power. I guess the bitter winds were a warning for what was to come. Despite the weather, I walked home from school in unusually high spirits, eager to listen to the new records that I had picked up from the Jacaranda on the weekend. Before I made it home, I stopped off at the Green Man to see my parents.

‘Want a juice, son?’ said dad, although I could barely see him through the clouds of smoke.

‘Nah, I’m alright. Going to listen to some music.’

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‘Don’t be listening to that punk shite,’ warned mum, ‘I’ve read in the papers it’s a bad influence on kids.’

Dad looked at me, his eyebrows raised, and we burst into laughter. ‘Get going then, kid,’ he smirked.

‘Yer ma’s left you out a pan of scouse and some cobs.’

Stan Krueger and his gang would always hang about behind the back of the Green Man smoking pot and guzzling bottles of Woodpecker Cider. He had taken a particular dislike to me for no apparent reason and as I crept past, hoping not to be on the receiving end of his jibes, I tripped on a shoelace, face-planting the cold concrete. The squawking laughs that followed could be heard around the whole of Scottie Road. ‘Faggot!’ they shouted in menacing unison, pelting stones at me as they jumped up and down like chimpanzees. Though their stones hurt, it was their words that bruised. I hurried away in horror, locking myself in my bedroom and breaking into tears. You’re not a faggot, I told myself repeatedly.

I despised that word with a passion, especially at that age, when I was still in denial of my sexuality, and the thought of being a faggot terrified me more than a Public Information Film on escalators. To this day, I still use stairs where possible in fear of being swallowed up by mechanical jaws.

I shuffled through my new records to brighten the mood – the mix included Blondie, The Clash and Suicide – eventually deciding on the latter.

Mum would always leave a stash of ciggies hidden 24

She Dreams in Colour

in a brown sock beneath her bed and, if any went missing, Helen would make the perfect scapegoat, being the eldest. As I lit one, I gazed into a mirror on the wall. A scrawny boy looked back. His face was freckly and his hair was curly. He was down, but that was nothing new. The boy that looked back didn’t know who he was or where he fitted in. The thought of dressing as a woman, at that point, had never crossed my mind, which is why when I became fixated on a floral-print dress hanging besides mum’s wardrobe, the urge to try it on felt peculiar. I began to envision myself in the dress, the feeling of the satin texture on my skin, soft and warm, like one of mum’s hugs. It felt as if a thousand eyes were staring at me, hearing my thoughts, and judging my unrequited desires, yet somehow none of that mattered. I reached out to the dress and yanked it, quickly putting it on before I had any more time to drown in dread. Immediately I felt liberated. It was the sense of identity I had been craving my whole life. That was when I got my first glimpse of her. She swayed to the dreamy sounds of Suicide’s Cheree. I was lost in a trance, mesmerized by her every move.

‘Cheree, Cheree. Je t’adore, baby,’ she sang. Then came a perturbing creak. I turned around. Dad stood behind me, his face painfully still.

‘Hurry up,’ came a voice from outside the house, bringing me back to reality. It could only be one person.

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‘Shurrup, Paula!’ I hissed, craning my neck out the window. ‘You’ll wake me ma up.’

She cackled and lit a ciggy. ‘Get yer glad rags on, queen! We’re going Jody’s.’

Nothing more needed to be said. I crept downstairs and out the front door, leaving any traces of Cain behind. After dark, when my parents sleep, one mask comes off, another comes on.

‘What’s this wig like on me?’ I asked, snarling at myself in a compact mirror. ‘I reckon it’s a bit too patchy. Makes me look like I’ve got roots down to me elbows.’

‘You look fab,’ said Paula, passing me a bottle of Coke that had been mixed with far too much vodka.

‘Here, Princess Diana.’

‘Did you see Brookie on Wednesday?’

‘Don’t, it’s had me up the wall.’

Paula was my best mate and had been since I came out to her when we were fourteen. She wasn’t bothered one bit when I told her, one of the reasons why I adore her so much. Our shared love of Brookside is another.

‘I’ll have kittens if Sheila and Billy don’t get together.’

‘I’ve got a confession to make,’ Paula had a devious grin etched on her face. ‘I had a sex dream about Jimmy Corkhill.’

‘You what?’ I nearly spat my drink out, mortified by the thought.

‘Hear me out,’ she said, snatching the bottle from 26

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me and taking a lengthy gulp. ‘It starts off in the old Blacklers. He asks me if I’m courting and what not.

Next thing you know, we’re in the toilets, I’m riding him like he’s Blackie the rocking horse.’

‘You’re taking the piss out of me now.’

‘Hold on to your wig, it gets worse. He ends up getting me pregnant, doesn’t he?’

‘Shurrup! Was it a boy or a girl?’

‘A boy and I had a name,’ she said, stopping in her tracks and taking hold of my hand. She looked me dead in the eye. ‘Sinbad.’

‘Get out my face,’ I screeched. ‘Like Sinbad off Brookie?’

‘Mm. I think it’s a gorgeous name. Me mother was beetroot, when I told her.’

‘Hang on, didn’t she have you when she was like sixteen?’

‘Yeah, but she was married.’

‘Why was she so arsed? What the hell!’

‘She’s Catholic!’

‘She’s about as Catholic as a gang-bang with Monty Python.’

‘You’ll go to hell for that.’

‘I’m a man in a dress. I’m already going to hell, apparently.’

Everyone is Catholic on Scottie Road when it suits them. Love thy neighbour, says the Bible. Jangle about thy neighbour, says Scottie Road. It’s why Cheree leaves the house after midnight. Too many prying eyes of a day that would clock me in a heartbeat 27

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and, before I could know it, I would be front page of the Echo.

‘Well, anyway,’ continued Paula, ‘I had to get rid of Sinbad and Jimmy jibbed me.’

‘Sounds like you had a right mare,’ I said sarcastically.

‘Is it bad that I still fancy him?’

‘Are you well, girl? He looks like me da!’

‘I’m not saying anything.’

‘Carry on, I dare you.’

Paula had a mouth like the river Mersey. Filthy and full of shite. She reminded me of Chubby Brown, except swap a flying helmet for a whalespout ponytail.

‘How is yer da, anyway?’

‘He’s still not speaking. It’s been two months and not one word.’

‘What, since Hillsborough?’

My heart sank. Just hearing the word made me shudder. Waiting for that call with mum and Helen, not knowing whether dad had survived or not, is something I can never forget. Hours felt like days.

When he finally came home, he couldn’t look us in the eye. He doesn’t talk about that day, in fact, he doesn’t talk at all now. Some days he won’t even get out of bed unless the ale cupboard is running dry.

The man who went to that match is different to the one who came home. Before Hillsborough, there was only ever one time I had experienced dad in a state of dismay and that was the worst day of my life: 28

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back in 1979, when dad caught me in mum’s dress.

The hurt in his eyes pierced through my soul.

‘I was just playing around,’ I cried.

Back then, whenever dad was angry or upset, he would make it loud and clear by employing his most effective weapon: silence. His drastic change of character scared me more than ranting and raving, which was how mum would usually react if she was upset. Although he remained mute, the writhing expressions on his face spoke volumes.

‘She was right, yer ma,’ he suddenly spat, ‘that punk is a bad influence.’

‘It’s nothing to do with music. That Stan Krueger and his mates were bullying me.’

‘Is it any wonder they bully you when you get up to stuff like this?’

‘I was just having a laugh with myself. I needed it after nearly getting stoned to death.’

‘You’re a right little comedian, aren’t you; who do you think you are - Lily Savage?’

He moved away from the doorway, meaning I could have made a bolt for it. I would run away to live with my cousins in Canny Farm where he would never come looking for me. He hates my uncle too much. Or I could stay and be beaten to death. Dad picked up on my flickering eyes and clicked his fingers right beneath my nose.

‘I’m sorry,’ I muttered, ‘what else do you want me to say?’

‘Don’t get funny with me now, lad.’

29

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‘Do I look like I’m laughing?’ I was surprised myself by my snappy reaction. I never answered dad back. Ever. I had only worn a dress for five minutes and already the attitude of Cheree was beginning to form.

He gripped my ear and pulled me into my room, throwing me against the record player. The sound of my Suicide record being scratched shook me to the core. Dad had never been violent with me before.

He was the person I would run to for protection whenever mum was handing out smacked arses.

‘You’ll never listen to them again. Yer going to be a normal kid and listen to the Beatles.’

‘Charles Manson killed Sharon Tate because of the Beatles,’ I retorted.

He paced up and down the room, large veins pulsating on his forehead, the colour gradually draining from his face. Without warning, he grabbed my throat and pinned me against the wall. He wore a new face, one I had never seen before, grimacing and grunting as I squirmed, struggling for breath. Slowly, but surely, I began to fade out of consciousness.

‘Come on, tiny tears, it’s too early to ruin yer mascara,’ said Paula squeezing my hand and pulling me back into the present. ‘We’ll have a cry at the end of the night.’

‘Sorry, girl,’ I said, ‘just worried about me da. If he finds out about Cheree, it might push him over the edge.’

30

She Dreams in Colour

‘He never has to know, not if you don’t want him to.’

‘What if I don’t want to be Cain anymore?’

‘Whatever happens, you’ll always have me.’

I half-heartedly smiled before taking another gulp of vodka. She could be as brassy as the roots in her ginger hair when she wanted to be, but behind Paula’s big gob was a heart of gold.

After downing what was left of the vodka, smoking about twenty ciggies each, and causing murder with just about anyone who dared to look us sideways, we had made it to the end of Vauxhall Road.

Paula had pushed for a quick pit-stop at the chippy, although I waited outside. It was a warm enough night. Besides, even after spraying myself with half of Helen’s Giorgio, nothing gets rid of the smell of chippy grease. I would only have to stand in there for two minutes and I would be stinking all night.

A group of lads walked past, eyeing me up, some fascinated, others not so much. The leader of the pack, dressed in a yellow shell tracksuit, had a menacing look in his eyes and spat on the floor besides me in disgust. It was none other than Stan Krueger, still the same gobshite he was back in ’79.

The only thing that had changed by a substantial amount was the number of arrests on his criminal record. He didn’t seem to notice me, perhaps due to having one brain cell to his name. The others quickly followed suit and spat at me, bar one, who seemed spellbound. He wasn’t the nicest looking, 31

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but he didn’t have to be. Lads in a tracksuit were my thing. He could look like Ken Dodd for all I cared, I would still be sucking him off in a seedy alleyway come the end of the night. When the others picked up on his prolonged gawking, he began shouting vulgar comments and threw an empty can of Coke at me. I felt sorry for him if anything. Like me, he was trapped in the closet, but at least I had the nerve to come out every once in a while.

Paula had spotted the lads’ antics and scurried outside to my defence. ‘Leave him alone,’ she screamed, waving a cone of chips at them.

‘Fuck off, four-eyes,’ snorted Stan.

‘Rather have four-eyes than four kids to four different mothers, you dragged-up get.’

Stan retaliated with a two-finger salute, before signalling for his boys to leave.

‘You’d give Pansy Potter a run for her money, you would,’ I cackled to Paula.

Dressing as a woman is a revelation. It has taught me how to deal with unsolicited attention, something I had never really thought about as a man. Of a day, whilst Cain, no one bats an eyelid. I feel invisible.

Come night, when it’s time to put on six-inch heels and red lipstick, everyone wants to know. I become the complete opposite of invisible when I’m Cheree.

Whether it’s the perplexed stares from passers-by, or the creepy older men giving back-handed compliments. You’re gorgeous, for a man, they will tell me.

And if I don’t react accordingly and thank them for 32

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their comments or stares, they simply spit at me.

There is no in-between.

‘What’s that noise?’ gasped Paula.

A Ford Sierra skidded past, coming to a grinding halt right before our feet, causing Paula to fall to the pavement in shock, her cone of chips flung up into the air like a bouquet of flowers at a wedding.

‘I’ve been shot,’ she bawled pointing to a red substance smothered on her top.

‘It’s tomato sauce, you daft cow!’

The driver jumped out, discernibly distraught.

Her cries were familiar. It was Helen. I pushed Paula out the way and leapt into the chippy, praying Helen wouldn’t notice me or, more incriminatingly, her dress.

‘Thought I’d find you here,’ I heard Helen say, struggling to catch her breath. ‘Have you seen our Cain?’

‘Haven’t seen him, Hel,’ lied Paula. ‘What’s up?’

‘It’s dad,’ she wept. ‘He’s tried to kill himself.’

I held my hand over my mouth to prevent me from screaming.

‘H-H-Hel, I’m so sorry. I haven’t seen…’

‘Cut the bullshit,’ snapped Helen getting back into her car. ‘Tell him to get home, me ma’s in bits.’

Paula ran to my aid, catching me as I fell and descended into a rabbit hole of hysteria. Nothing felt real. I began having flashbacks of dad with his hands around my throat. The struggle to breathe, the numbing of reality, the feelings of horror and 33

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despair – all too similar to what I felt in the present.

‘No son of mine is a faggot,’ he had roared.

‘I can’t breathe, dad, let me go.’

He’d dropped me like a sack of shit and stormed out the room. I chased after him, begging for his forgiveness, pining for the dad I knew, the one that laughed and made me feel safe.

‘How has this happened? You were a good kid.

Are you on the smack?’

‘Dad, behave! I would never take drugs.’

‘If I ever see you in a dress again, or smoking, well, I don’t know what I’ll do. I can promise you this, though, it won’t be nice.’

‘I don’t know what got into me. It won’t happen again, I promise.’

‘Too fucking right it won’t happen again. What will I tell the lads about you, eh? Me son’s a crossdresser. No chance, mate. This ends now.’

‘Are you going to tell mum?’

There was a long pause. He turned to me, his face full of embarrassment, and sighed. I was his only son. He had always talked fondly to others about me growing up to be a boxer or a footballer. It was at that moment he knew I would be neither.

‘Just leave me alone.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I could barely hold back the tears. ‘I love you, dad.’

He slammed the door on his way out, leaving myself and the house trembling in fear. He never did say he loved me back.

34

Andy Billinge

Andy Billinge was born in Liverpool in 1948. He has a B.Sc. (hons) in Physics from the University of Liverpool and went on to teach Maths in secondary schools until retiring in 2007. He has been married, divorced and married again. Andy has two children, three stepchildren and two grandchildren. He is an active member of the Labour Party.

Green Willow

900 years after a great plague, returning civilisation is threatened by the Corsairs. A girl, escaped from enemy slavery, and a boy from a pacifist village, are treated with suspicion, but join the fight. There are successes and victories and both sides claim success.

35

Green Willow Andy Billinge

Shrimp, Hasita and Orca Primrose and wolfsbane, the clockflower’s sun-time, Puppy and kitten and fledgling at play.

The Green Man is crowned by the queen of the spring-time, The world is reborn in the brightening day.

Green Willow has dawned. It’s the den-time, the nest-time.

See hawks on the wind, hear the thrush on the spray And the laugh of the Trickster. It’s fire-time, it’s torch-time, With cuckoo’s first song and the blossoming may.

Songs of the Months: Willow No animals had ventured out since the Corsairs had ridden away. The morning rain had passed and the sun had burned the mist away from the Ford but the clearing on the west bank of the Ribble remained empty – except for the bloody and battered figure of Shrimp. She was making herself lie still, telling herself that, this time, she had to stay awake. The slightest movement brought agony and she had already passed out twice.

And I have to be able to see. The light scares me. I’m lying here helpless and there’s some kind of threat out there, something I have to deal with. I need to remember 37

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what it is! I need to look for it. If I could just see!

She tried again to force her eyes open, but they remained stubbornly closed.

What’s happened to me? I can’t remember anything except my name. I don’t even know where I am. And why does the light scare me? I have to think! I can feel sunshine on my face. I can smell grass. I can hear a river lapping and wind in the trees.

Grass and trees and a river! Memory came flooding back and she had to stop herself from shouting with relief.

I’m at the Ford! I remember! I’m Shrimp and I’m at the Ford!

She felt a warm glow of success, but it quickly faded: the unknown danger was still waiting for her.

She strained to open her eyes and the pain returned, worse than ever. Feeling herself drifting away, she desperately made herself relax.

Think of something simple. A teaching rhyme. Try Arabella Gronday.

She smiled at the memory of her mother teaching Sam the days of the week.

‘Arabella Gronday, born on a Wonday, fell in love on Toosday...’

She smiled. The familiar words had already driven the pain into the background. ‘...married on a Threeday, had a child on Foursday, sickened on a Fieday...’

She was calm now but not quite ready to return to her painful present.

38

Green Willow

‘...Sixday was her end day, they buried her on Senday.’

That’s today! Senday! It’s the seventh day of Willow.

Willow! My favourite month!

She knew her mind was beginning to wander but she let herself sink into memories of childhood.

There was a verse about Willow month in one of her mother’s poems. It was about baby animals and flowers and birds and may blossom and the den-time and the nest-time.

Willow is always beautiful. It’ll be a good month to die.

The unexpected thought jolted her back to reality.

A good month to die? Am I going to die? I know I’m bleeding and I can’t move but...

Bleeding? Can’t move? Why do those words sound so familiar? They’re something to do with Mam. It’s something she told me and Sam. She felt herself begin to panic.

I have to move. I have to open my eyes. I really have to! Eyes, please, open!

When she finally managed to force her eyelids apart, the effort left her trembling and staring blearily at the sky. Her vision cleared, slowly, and she groaned as a dark shadow appeared against the brightness. Now she remembered! The bird was directly above her, moving lazily, low enough for her to make out its shape. Her eyes could move without too much pain and they followed it as it descended in slow circles.

This was what had been terrifying her. She remembered a day in River Year, the year her mother 39

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had taken them exploring in Ribblesdale. Her little brother had been learning about birds. She remembered Mam pointing at the sky and saying, ‘Look, Sam. Look at the shape of that bird’s tail. That shows that it’s a red kite. It’s a carrion bird, a bird that eats dead animals. It doesn’t like opening them up by itself, though. It prefers to wait for something else to do that for it. There must be something torn and bleeding near here. It’ll still be warm, whatever it is, but it won’t be moving – do you see how low the bird is?’

I can certainly see how low this bird is. There must be something torn and bleeding near here. It’ll be warm but it won’t be moving. Now what could it be?

She tried to stop herself from chuckling but even a small movement brought a stab of pain and she lost interest in everything else for a time. When she opened her eyes again, the bird had landed. Two more had taken its place overhead.

She made herself think calmly about her choices.

If she lay still the birds would wait around for her to die and then they would eat her. If she tried to frighten them off, she would probably pass out and they would eat her anyway. She gave the matter serious consideration and decided that, on the whole, she liked the idea of being conscious for as long as possible.

She watched the bird move toward her and away.

Another one landed. Fighting down a desperate urge to yell at them, she willed herself to lie quietly 40

Green Willow

without moving.

I have to hope those horsemen come back to save me.

Are they still chasing the Corsairs? That wasn’t in the plan! They’ll see the kites, won’t they? But will they be in time to save me? I’m really messed up. Those goonies weren’t stupid enough to break any bones, of course – they wouldn’t have dared – but they’ve left me helpless. It’s being helpless that’s going to kill me.

She stared at the birds and they stared impassively back at her. One of them took a step toward her just as the silence was broken by a distant noise.

What was that? Voices? No, the birds haven’t flown away. I’m starting to imagine things.

She heard the noise again, closer. This time the kites flew off. There were voices.

‘Over here! It’s a woman. Dead, by the looks of it.’

There were hands. They were holding her face and touching her wrists to find a pulse. They were testing her bones for breaks. They were picking her up and carrying her. She never quite lost her fear of the carrion birds, never quite allowed herself to lose consciousness, but she found herself calmly watching events from a great distance without taking part in them. The hands laid her on the ground and she felt something soft cover her. Gratefully, she allowed herself to drift away.

She half-woke in darkness, wrapped in a blanket, dimly aware that she was lying next to a campfire.

Two dark figures moved around nearby and spoke 41

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quietly.

A male voice: ‘She’ll be fine. No fractures.’

A female voice: ‘That sounds about right. Here’s a woman lying broken and bleeding and here’s a man saying fine.’

‘You know what I mean.’

‘Yes, yes, all right. Look! I think she’s coming round.’

Screwing up her eyes, expecting pain, she moved her head slowly and carefully. The pain was still there but it was bearable. Relieved, she tested her arms and legs and found that she could move them without any danger of passing out. She tried to touch her wounds but they were covered with bandages.

Finally, ready to face the drybacks, she opened her eyes.

The woman, looking older than she sounded, was sitting on a log, smiling sympathetically. Shrimp stared back at her, trying to see her as an enemy and failing. The only word that sprang to mind, looking at her, was motherly.

The man, even older and almost bald, held Shrimp’s wrist and counted as the woman talked.

‘You’re lucky,’ she said. ‘Not all Companies have a full Herber. The Alders have Solmon here. He’s stopped some of the pain and he’s patched you up.

You won’t be going on any long journeys for an hour or two, though, so he’ll have time to ask you a few questions. I’ll see to the horses.’

She walked away. Shrimp gave the man a wary 42

Green Willow

look as he dropped her wrist and put his instruments away. Questions could be dangerous. Expecting an interrogation, she was relieved when he turned back to her with an expression of interest and concern. He gently moved her head from side to side, watching her eyes and nodding.

‘I don’t think they were thieves,’ he murmured, ‘because you still have your scrip on your shoulder.

Your clothes look much the same as theirs so I’m assuming you came from the same place as them.

They don’t seem to have liked you very much, though. I’m thinking that you were trying to escape from them. Yes?’ She tried to answer but he held up a hand and said, ‘No, don’t try to talk yet. Can you shake your head and nod? Good! Were you their prisoner? Right!

For how long – was it recent? No? But less than a year? No?’ He looked surprised. ‘More than two years?’

She nodded and he sat back, staring at her. ‘More than five?’

Beginning to feel ridiculous, she decided to speak whether it hurt or not.

‘Four,’ she managed to say. It was more of a croak than a word, but he nodded.

‘That’s a long time to be a prisoner.’ He checked her dressings. ‘Here’s what I can tell you. You don’t seem to have a concussion but you took a real battering. What really surprises me is that no bones were broken. It’s almost as if they were trying to spare 43

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you from too much pain.’

‘They were!’ She clenched her fists and forced the words out. ‘They wouldn’t want me to pass out.

Corsairs like their victims to be conscious. They like to hear the screams.’

‘I see.’ He looked away and sighed. ‘The horsemen were Corsairs then? We wondered.’ He turned back to her, frowning. ‘I suppose you’d know all about them if you’ve been a slave for four years.’ He hissed through his teeth as he thought about this.

‘Four years ago? That was 906. I remember that year.

It was a bad time for everyone.’

She looked away as she fought down the old helplessness and rage.

‘It was the Wolf Year,’ she whispered, hoarsely.

‘Bandits burnt my village. They killed Sam. They killed my Mam.’ Fury was making her voice grow stronger. ‘All my friends were butchered. Some of them were tortured. No one escaped but me.’ She gave a low growl. ‘I tried to follow them. I was captured by Corsairs.’ She was speaking clearly now.

‘One day I’ll find those sandcrabs. It’ll be soon now.

I’m going to find them and...’

She trailed off, wondering if she had said too much. The man raised an eyebrow, but he nodded again.

‘Good for you! I’m Solmon, by the way, and the woman with the horses is Lyana. You can meet the others when they get back.’

He gave her a questioning look and she thought 44

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quickly.

This stranger wants my name, but he’s not going to get it. I won’t tell him either of my names, especially not the real one. I don’t like Hasita but it’s what my Mam and Da called me. That was their gift to me. I won’t be sharing it with a bunch of dryback bandits.

She smiled as a silly thought struck her.

My other name was a gift too. A gift from the Corsairs, the stinking goonies! They kindly gave me the name Shrimp! I’m certainly not telling Solmon that. I don’t want to be Hasita or Shrimp. I want to be...

Solmon was waiting patiently for an answer. She closed her eyes for a moment, took a breath and said, firmly and clearly, ‘It’s good to meet you, Solmon.

I am Orca.’

He stood, bowed formally and said, ‘It’s good to meet you, Orca. That’s a strong name. It suits you.

That beating should have killed you.’

She kept her face straight, trying not to show how much this pleased her. He was telling her that she was strong! They sat for a time in silence, but he seemed determined to talk.

‘You called it the Wolf Year? Do all years have names?’

She licked her lips and wondered what she could tell him without giving too much away. Deciding that she had to take chances if she wanted information, she made herself smile.

‘Not all of them. I started naming them when I was four. That was the Storm Year.’

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He nodded as she stopped for a moment to rub her aching throat.

‘I know that one,’ he said. ‘I remember the storms.’

She had to swallow, painfully, before she could continue.

‘The year after that didn’t really have a name.

Nothing happened except work. We rebuilt everything. Sometimes I called it the Boring Year.

And Sam’s Year was when my brother was born.

And the one after that was the Cold Year.’

‘I know that one too,’ he said, pulling a face. ‘It was a hard year for everyone. Children died. Old people died. We thought the ice was coming back.’

She gave him a puzzled frown. ‘I heard people saying that but I didn’t know what they meant. They were wrong anyway. The cold went away and the next year was Plenty Year. There were two harvests and everyone had enough to eat. We even had visitors from other villages.’

‘That hadn’t happened before?’

‘No. We’d always kept to ourselves. But we met lots of people after that. The year after Plenty Year, a man from Downvale taught me things. How to cook.

How to look after animals. I called that Training Year.

Next was Outside Year. My Mam taught me to hunt and climb mountains and survive by myself. Then River Year. That’s when we explored Ribblesdale.

Mam took me and Sam walking on the fells and up the side valleys.’

46

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She stopped and smiled at those memories, full of warmth and beauty and love. He smiled with her, but he held up a hand and said, quietly, ‘And then the Wolf Year?’

Her smile disappeared. ‘Then the Wolf Year.

And some of the years since then have names.’ She narrowed her eyes. ‘But I’m not going to tell you what they are.’

He nodded gravely. ‘Then I won’t ask!’

He frowned and began to count on his fingers.

‘That should make you sixteen. I thought you were younger.’

She gave him a ferocious glare and he held up his hands, laughing.

‘I’m sorry. Of course you look sixteen. Size isn’t everything.’ He looked thoughtful. ‘How about before the storm? Did those years have names?’

‘Only one of them. I don’t really remember my father because he died in the fighting when I was one. That was the Corsair Year.’

He tried to ask more questions but she closed her eyes and ignored him. Talking about River Year had made her think of everything she had wanted to do with her life, all the new things she had wanted to learn, all the new people she had wanted to meet.

There was a place in the Westland, Scorton, where she could have learned to sail on the Shallow Sea. There were weapons masters in Ripon, on the New Sea, who could have taught her how to be even better at staff and bow. And there were rumours of a 47

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place called Helensisle, somewhere south, that had hundreds of books just waiting to be read.

There were so many things to do, so much to learn, so many places to visit, and she had spent a long time deciding which of them was going to be first. It was the thought of all those books that had made up her mind for her: the next year was going to be Travel Year.

Instead it had been Wolf Year.

She opened her eyes to find that she was alone.

Solmon must have decided that she had gone to sleep. She gazed bitterly into the darkness.

That’s a shame. I wanted to tell him how some of my dreams came true. I never found those hundreds of books but I certainly learned how to sail. And I found my weapons masters.

She clenched her jaw and glared into the fire, rehearsing her vengeance.

Nothing is going to stop me. I’m Orca now. The bandits are going to pay. All of them.

She tried to stay awake to nurse her hatred but Solmon’s Herbery had done its work well and she slowly drifted into sleep.

She woke underneath an oilskin in the light dawn drizzle and watched figures moving about, doing all the small tasks of breaking camp. There was too much movement for her to be able to count them but there were at least ten men and women, a well-organised team working fast and efficiently.

They were all dressed in loose shirt, trews and boots 48

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and they all had their hair tied back. As Orca lay quietly, listening to their easy talk and laughter, Lyana strolled over, smiling.

‘I’ve just noticed that you’re awake,’ she said.

‘That’s good because we have to leave very soon.

Solmon thinks you should be able to ride a horse.’

Struggling to sit up, Orca muttered, ‘How would I get on a horse? I can’t even stand!’

‘You’ll get your strength back quickly enough.

Anyway, you don’t have much choice. You can’t stay here and you’re in no condition to walk.’

‘I’ll be walking soon. Just give me a minute. I should be up now, helping. I shouldn’t be lazing by the fire while you’re all working.’

She managed to get to her feet but Lyana had to hold her up. Solmon saw them and came over, shaking his head. He made Orca sit down on a log and refused to allow her to move away from the fire. He brought her some breakfast – a large bowl of seeds, nuts and milk – and he left her warming her hands on a jar of tea.

A tall grey-haired man came across to the fire, leading one of the horses.

‘Hi,’ he said, shaking her hand. ‘I’m Ralf and this old fellow is Driver. You need to get to know him because you’re going be riding him.’

She looked doubtful but he helped her to her feet and stood her in front of the horse.

‘Stand here and pat his nose,’ he told her, ‘then look into his eyes and say, ‘Hello, Driver.’ Make a 49

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fuss of him when he answers you.’

The horse was huge and Orca stared nervously up at him as she tentatively patted his nose. Feeling a bit ridiculous, she looked into his eyes and said, in a deep voice, ‘Hello, Driver’. He looked back at her, making a soft noise, and she grinned happily.

She reached up to stroke him, realising too late that her legs were weaker than she had thought.

They started to give way and she had to put her arms around the horse’s neck to hold herself up. The sensation was surprisingly warm and pleasant. Letting herself relax, she smiled at Ralf and murmured, ‘I don’t know what this does for the horse but it’s making me feel a lot better.’

He smiled back at her. ‘Good for Driver,’ he said.

‘He’s a magnificent charger and we’re all knights in shining armour, rescuing a damsel in distress!’

She stared at him, mystified.

‘A damsel? What’s a damsel? And what’s a knight?’

He winced. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t expect a stranger to know about that Camelot stuff. It’s just that a friend of mine is obsessed with it and he likes to tell everyone about it.’

‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’

‘I’m not sure myself! My friend tells stories about a place, thousands of years ago, where men in iron clothes rode around rescuing women from danger.’

She thought about this as she patted Driver’s nose.

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Green Willow

‘So Driver’s a charger and you’re all knights?

And I’m a distressed damsel? Is that it?’

‘I wish I hadn’t started this. Let’s talk about something else.’

‘No, no, it’s interesting. What happens if the knights are distressed? Do damsels put iron clothes on and rescue them?’

‘I don’t think it worked like that. Anyway, it’s only a story.’

She shrugged and patted Driver’s neck, turning to watch other horses being loaded with sacks and boxes. Ralf explained.

‘We didn’t really come down here to rescue fair damsels, or to chase Corsair raiders. This is a housekeeping trip. We leave supplies in hidden places and we check on isolated Steads.’

‘Housekeeping? That doesn’t sound much of a job for knights and chargers.’

He looked serious. ‘It’s something that has to be done. But you’re right – it’s not usually very exciting.

The Riders were glad of a bit of damsel-rescuing and Corsair-chasing.’

As he turned away to adjust Driver’s harness, he said, just a little too casually, ‘Of course, we’re all happy that we were here when you needed us.

Those Corsairs really wanted to hurt you.’

Orca managed to stop herself from turning round to stare at him. This was not a casual conversation.

The man wanted information. She thought quickly and decided to go along with him.

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It’s fair enough. I can’t really complain about being questioned. After all, I’m trying to find out about him and his friends. Who they are and where they come from and what they’re doing here. Let’s see which of us can find out the most.

Ralf took far too long fiddling with the straps, but he finally turned back to her and said, with a faint air of embarrassment, ‘That was a vicious beating they gave you. Whatever you’d done, they really didn’t like it.’

‘Beating?’ She gave a bitter laugh. ‘That’s not the way Corsairs beat people. It’s the way they kill them.

They take their time and they enjoy themselves. I’m lucky you saw them.’ She looked around the clearing.

‘I’m surprised to find there’s anyone living here.’

‘There isn’t,’ he told her, sadly. ‘These days, the Ford would be a dangerous place to live. We’re from up in those hills.’ He pointed west, away from the river. ‘You’re right – you were lucky we happened to be just here, just at the right time. How did you get here?’

‘I ran. There’s a track from Airebay that goes almost to the Ford. It’s one of the Straight Tracks. The Corsairs won’t use them because they go through the haunted places. That lot had to go the long way, up and down hills, so I should have had time. The Track goes straighter and it cuts through the hills.’

She wondered why Ralf looked amused every time she used the word track. He was staring across the river with narrowed eyes, as though he could 52

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see all the way to Airebay.

‘That’s an impressive run,’ he said. ‘And they were right behind you when you got here?’

‘I would have lost them if I’d made it into the hills.’ She pointed at the trees. ‘Did you say you live up there? Is there a town in those hills? It just looks like a thick forest to me.’

‘There aren’t any towns, no, but there are plenty of Steads in open valleys. Was it one of the towns on Airebay that you escaped from? There are two towns, aren’t there?’

‘Not really. People live all along the coast but the only real town is Castle. It’s on the south bank at the mouth of the bay. An unpleasant place. Do you live somewhere nice?’

‘Yes, in a village called Gatherton.’

He turned to look up into the hills and she saw his quick, glad smile.

‘I lived in a village once,’ she murmured, sadly.

‘The Corsairs don’t have villages.’

‘No villages? What about people who work at the same craft? Don’t they live together?’ He narrowed his eyes. ‘Isn’t there a place where ships are built and repaired?’

‘Well, most of the fleet is kept in Castle harbour or out on the New Sea. There are deep docks on the north shore but workers and slaves have to be taken over there every day.’

‘Slaves? Don’t the Corsairs have a special town for slaves?’

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‘Not a town, no. There’s a place on Northmire, at the west end of the bay, but it’s more of a camp than a town. The Corsairs think it’s haunted. They don’t like going there but they don’t care if the ghosts kill a few slaves. Where are slaves kept on this side of the river?’

He laughed. ‘We don’t have any, as far as I know.

Somehow, we manage to get along without them.’

He glanced at her. ‘Surely slaves are guarded. How did you escape?’

She avoided looking at him. She was determined not to lie but this was a dangerous question and she could hardly answer it truthfully.

‘There was a big celebration. Four or five slaves saw the guards drinking and they ran off into the mire. They thought they’d be safe but they were seen.

The guards made a big game of chasing them. That gave me a few hours start.’

‘You knew a different way?’

‘I knew about the places the Corsairs are scared to go. I ran for the rest of the night. I had to walk for a bit, when the moon went down, but I ran all yesterday morning. They must have known which way I’d gone and they went the long way round to cut me off.’ She looked at Driver. ‘And their horses are faster than yours.’

He gave Driver’s nose an affectionate pat. ‘Don’t be too sure of that,’ he murmured. ‘This old guy is one of our work horses but he’d probably surprise you.’

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She was watching him carefully and it seemed to her that this was important to him. Still patting Driver, he looked over at the other horses and said, thoughtfully, ‘It’s strange. We’ve never known the Corsairs to have warhorses before. Is this a new thing?’

‘I think so.’ She shrugged. ‘There weren’t many horses around when I was captured. A lot of them suddenly appeared. I heard someone talking about the place they came from, somewhere in the south.

It sounded like Dern.’

‘It’s a pity you couldn’t have stolen one. Airebay to Ribblesdale is a hell of a run.’

He carried on talking but Orca was no longer listening. She was trying to stop herself from shaking at the memory of the muscle-breaking misery and pain of that night, a night that had seemed to go on forever. He was right – it had been a hell of a run.

She raised her head when she realised that Ralf had stopped speaking. He was holding out his hand and she smiled gratefully as she allowed herself to be helped on to Driver’s back. Lyana joined them as they set off but Orca was surprised to see that most of the Company were already far ahead of them.

Ralf and Lyana must have stayed to look after me.

That’s nice. But I don’t want to start liking anyone around here. There’s a job to do. It’s time to start making calculations.

The horses are heavily laden. They’re not being pushed too fast so we’re not moving much more than walking 55

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speed. It’ll be easy to work out distances. The sun is behind me so I know what direction we’re moving in. I wonder how far it is to this village of theirs.

‘Do you often come down to the Ford?’ she asked Ralf. ‘This is a very good road.’

‘There was a road here long before there was a Ford,’ he said. ‘In the days of the Forbers, the Ribble was much smaller. Just a stream, really.’

She looked at the road with even more interest.

It was hard and smooth, with a better surface than any road she had ever seen.

‘You mean the Forbers made this? Doesn’t that make it nine hundred years old?’

‘No, no, the original road is long gone. Nothing made by the Forbers survived the ice and the floods.

We do try to keep the highways in good condition, though. What are roads like in Airebay?’

‘Roads?’ She laughed. ‘The Corsairs don’t have roads, even in Castle. They have muddy tracks.

Nobody tries to move around when it rains. There’s nothing like this.’

He nodded. ‘We keep the roads up because we need to use them all the time. Patrolling. Keeping in touch with outlying Steads. Watching for Corsairs.’

‘And housekeeping?’

‘We don’t do that all the time, just on the first Sixday and Senday of the month. Every Company takes its turn. They bring in supplies from the Steads and check on the secret stores.’

‘I see. So Willow month is your turn?’

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‘No, it’s the Alder Company’s turn. Lyana and I just happened to be with them.’

Looking ahead, Orca saw that the other riders were no longer in sight. When she turned back to Ralf, he was holding out a piece of black cloth.

‘I’m afraid you’re going to have to wear a blindfold from here on. We won’t force you to wear it, but we’ll take you back to the Ford if you refuse.

We’d leave you supplies, of course, but I wouldn’t recommend staying there. I don’t think you’d survive another beating.’

Orca took the cloth and held it up. It was a thick woollen cap, long enough to reach to her shoulders, and she pulled it over her head without a word. Ralf continued to talk to her as he led Driver forward, but she ignored him. This was something she should have expected but it was still humiliating and she was not going to speak to any of them while the cap was on her head.

They were riding under trees for most of the time but she could tell, when she could feel the sun, that the road was taking them west and south. After about an hour, Lyana touched her hand.

‘We’ve caught up to the Alders,’ she said. ‘This is a water stop. ‘You can get down and take that thing off. We won’t make you wear it while you’re drinking.’

Orca gratefully took off the blindfold and scrambled down from Driver’s back. As she’d expected, they were surrounded by dense woods and there was 57

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no way of telling where they were. Lyana tried to talk but Orca fussed over the horse, making a point of ignoring her and everyone else. Irritatingly, Ralf found this very amusing.

Soon she had her cap on again and they were on their way. The pace was still slow, though she had the impression that they were no longer climbing.

They had all given up trying to talk to her and she was soon bored. She was relieved when they stopped again after another hour. She felt Ralf’s hand on her arm and heard him say, ‘Leave the cap on. I’ll help you down.’

That surprised her because they seemed to be out in the open. She swung herself from the saddle, wondering what she was going to be allowed to see.

‘We’re going to walk from here.’ That was Lyana’s voice. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll be leading you. I won’t let you fall.’

Orca found herself being led by the hand. They were under trees again and the ground had become difficult. Progress was painfully slow and she had to concentrate on where she was putting her feet but Lyana’s murmured instructions stopped her from tripping up. She counted two hundred and twelve steps before Lyana said, ‘We’ll stop here. You can take the blindfold off now.’

58

Em Coombes

Having written poems and short stories when younger, Em Coombes had not written for years until taking part in a short evening creative writing course in 2015 where she wrote the first page, and has been writing it since. Life itself, travel and imagination are her true sources of inspiration.

The Pier

A woman was last seen on Cressington Pier. The impact this event has on the small coastal community reveals the vulnerability of human relationships, as each character grapples with the complexities of their own lives, discovering both fragility and resilience, and how the power of nature dominates them.

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Em Coombes Cressington, Present Day Cressington Pier had almost always attracted visitors. It had a long, wooden boardwalk where in some parts the gaps were so wide you could see the water below. Repairs seemed a far cry as the Council and Cressington Pier Preservation Society were at loggerheads over who should foot the bill.

There were iron seats dotted all along, an elaborate curved design in its metalwork presumably to resemble fishes. The black paint on the end arm rests was rusting away- often on a weekend you’d see members of the preservation society lovingly touching it up with tiny paint-brushes. Although their actions were well-meant, there was inevitably a complaint made by a mother from the neighbouring village whose child came home in paint-stained clothes, despite the hand-written ‘Wet Paint’ cardboard notices. Except now there were fewer volunteers to paint, as rheumatism and looking after grandchildren took over the increasingly ageing preservation society.

On the beach below, dogs bounded excitedly once leashes were unfastened, oblivious to the straight undrawn ‘lanes’ of the joggers. Couples strolled hand-in-hand, unless the cold dictated hands were kept firmly in pockets to prevent fingers turning blue or losing blood altogether. The smell of 61

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chips and seaweed was never far away, guaranteed to arouse the senses.

Halfway along the pier was the ‘WOW Cafe’.

Not WOW as in grandeur for it was more a beachhut. Hard wooden benches made substantially more comfortable by an odd assortment of cushions, the kind your gran would have created out of left-over curtain material. No, WOW as in ‘Words On Water’, an apt name for the combination of talk, reading and coffee. But it could easily describe the view, for on a clear day you could see for miles. With the sun glistening on the water, listening to the excited voices of children playing in the rock pools on the beach whilst tired parents turned a delicate shade of lobster red, you could even close your eyes and transport yourself to the Canaries rather than Cressington.

But the wind blew you back to reality. It would come up the beach with a force that would stop even the most hardened, robust dog-walker in their tracks.

Rain that stung your face whilst the planks became even more slippery and treacherous. The roar of the ocean under an immense dirty grey sky. But once the winds receded the pier and beach would be restored to a peaceful calm... until the next time.

Whilst the tide ebbed and flowed against the base structure of the pier’s walkway, the inhabitants of Cressington were mostly drifting on the ebb tide between one life phase and the next. Between childhood and the inevitable young teenage angst; youth and post-school or university but pre-parenthood, 62

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before the train to middle-age. The journey alarmingly fast for some, laboriously slow for others. These passengers look at the youth with the same cynicism and jealousy that they were shown at that age - when they were ‘free’, in theory, to do whatever they wanted, be whoever they chose, experimenting and exploring in the pretext of ‘finding themselves’ to the disapproving and knowing glances of all those who’d ridden the train already and not been able to jump off the track. Or missed the platform altogether.

Whilst on their individual journey of self-discovery, they were all unknowingly united by the uneasy awareness that their options within Cressington were steadily narrowing; that unless they acted soon, they’d be sucked into the same uneventful, mundane and routine existence of Cressington middle-age.

That day hadn’t started out a particularly memorable or remarkable day. The usual grey sky with the odd glimpse of blue teasing to break through, but rarely managing it, instead just creating an air of dampness without actually raining. Some say they’d seen her, a stranger, just standing there. Transfixed, statuesque. Others say they recognised her by the pink floral scarf she always wore all year round, either as protection from the summer sun or the brisk winds. Others say the scarf was found on the pier later. And there were others who’d even failed to recognise her existence at all, even before. After all, she was from ‘you know, one of those countries with all the troubles’.

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No one could really say for sure, though.

The pier had not previously been closed at night.

Not before the incident anyway. That was how the police who cordoned off the entrance referred to it through gritted teeth in an attempt to dismiss any lingering passers-by. The council’s sign just read ‘Closed 8pm to 8am’. No reason. But it wasn’t long before all the inhabitants knew.

64

Jack Hook

Jack Hook is a Liverpool-based author and creative writing student. His history teachers would probably be disappointed in him. He looks suspiciously similar to Tsar Nicholas II and is available to play him in any possible biopics.

Moloch Moloch is a historical crime novel based on true events. In 1917, Charles Murphy takes command of the Oregon State Penitentiary with plans for radical reforms. He soon encounters Prisoner 7390, Carl Panzram, unrepentant and unbroken by the prison system’s brutality. Murphy takes the young criminal under his wing in an ultimately doomed attempt to rehabilitate a sociopath.

65

Moloch Jack Hook The Beast Now: April, 1917 Murphy was there to change everything. The gates of the Oregon State Penitentiary opened for his Pontiac, the two guards on duty craning their necks to try and get a look inside. They’d heard the rumours, of course, just like everyone else. The prison was a cluster of squat, stone buildings surrounded by a wall of concrete, twice the height of any man. The sunlight never seemed to make it past that wall. A stout young man was waiting outside the main entrance, hands clasped firmly behind a straight back, flanked by two others in identical uniforms.

‘Mr. Murphy, sir.’ the man said in greeting as Murphy unfurled his tall frame from the car.

‘Edward Burns?’

‘Ed, sir.’ the man nodded.

Murphy stepped forward and held out his hand.

‘A pleasure to meet you.’

‘I’ll be your Deputy Warden here at OSP, sir.’

Burns took the hand and gave it one firm shake.

‘Excellent.’ Murphy clapped him on the shoulder. ‘I’ll be relying on you for the first week or two to make this transition as simple as possible.’

‘Understood.’ Burns nodded once again. Murphy 67

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noted he had a habit of looking straight through a man. Or maybe that was just for him. ‘I’ve prepared documents pertaining to the most urgent matters.

I can escort you to your office and we can make a start on them.’

‘I would like that very much, Mr. Burns, lead on.’

Murphy gave a nod to the guards, touching calloused fingers to the brim of his hat, before following Burns into the building.

One guard turned to the other and raised an eyebrow, to which the other gave a small, wary shake of the head.

Murphy felt like Burns was watching him intently, even though his new deputy was striding ahead of him. If anyone could have eyes in the back of their head, Murphy would put a bet on a man like Burns. It was lunchtime for the prisoners and Murphy got a good luck at them from a walkway that bordered the mess hall. At a glance their swollen stomachs may have looked healthy but their sickly pallor betrayed the illusion. They were malnourished to a one. A few looked up to see him pass, most paid him no attention. To these men, one fellow in a suit wasn’t much different than any other. The air hung heavy with the acrid, too-human stink of unwashed bodies and aggression. On the opposite side of the walkway, a guard sat and watched every movement.

A rifle rested in his lap.

‘What are they fed, Mr. Burns?’ Murphy spoke in low, almost reverential tones.

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Burns didn’t break his stride as he said, ‘Potatoes.

Beans. That sort of thing.’

Murphy took one last look down into the mess.

There was the scraping of spoons on plates and the occasional muffled grunt but the room was otherwise silent. It was so quiet that Murphy could hear the nearby guard drumming his fingers on the stock of his rifle.

‘This way, sir.’ Burns held open the door at the end of the walkway.

‘You must have one hell of a poker face, Burns.’

Murphy said as they passed into another corridor.

‘Sir?’ ‘I’m sure you’ve heard all sorts of things about me, you’re not curious if any of it’s true?’

‘I’m plenty curious, sir, but I’m a patient man.’

‘An admirable trait.’ after a pause, he said ‘Not a trait that many have these days.

‘Not from memory.’

Burns knew that well already. Before Murphy had even set foot in Oregon, he’d demanded that a dozen of the guards be fired. That dozen may or may not have been to Burns’ taste but prison guards were a fraternal bunch, by nature and by necessity.

Burns had heard the muttered curses passed like illicit notes from man to man, all aimed solely at this Charles Murphy.

The Warden’s office was mostly bare, stripped of the previous owners possessions, just a wooden desk 69

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and a window with a view of the scrubland and flax fields to the south of the prison. The flax was blooming in shimmering purple waves.

‘I’ve heard you called a ‘reformer.’’ Burns said as Murphy walked to the desk and took a seat. ‘May I ask what that means?’

‘Of course.’ Murphy looked at the stack of documents on the desktop, yellow pages filled with a cramped, officious script, ‘But first I have to ask you, do you believe in rehabilitation or retribution?’

Burns hesitated for a moment. ‘I believe in whatever is proven to be most effective.’

Murphy nodded and gestured for Burns to sit in the chair opposite him. ‘Very smart. Very measured.

But what if one approach hasn’t yet had the chance to be proven?’

Burns settled in the chair as Murphy gave him an expectant look. Eventually, he said ‘Then it should be given that chance.’

‘Exactly. A writer, one of my favourites, said ‘The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons’ and those words have stayed with me.’ Murphy paused, looked around the office.

‘My predecessors, they believed in hard punishment, didn’t they?’

‘They did.’

‘In breaking a man?’

‘Yes.’ ‘And look where they are now.’ he spread his arms, gesturing around the empty room. He let the 70

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silence sit for a moment before he said, ‘I realise you’re hesitant. I understand that, you’re not the first.. You should hear what my wife thinks about all this.’

‘It’s not personal, sir.’

‘Of course.’ Murphy looked out the window, the vast view of nothing but nature. ‘But I would like you to think about that quote. If you were a stranger to this place and you walked through that mess hall today, what would you think of America?’

Burns followed his new boss’s gaze and then back. ‘I wouldn’t think that much of it.’

‘Exactly.’ there was the briefest flash of a smile under Murphy’s moustache. ‘So I’m asking for a chance.’

‘I’m your deputy, sir. You say the word and I make sure it gets done.’

‘Perfect.’ Murphy returned to the stack of files in front of him but raised a finger before perusing them. ‘One thing. I’ve heard a lot about one prisoner in particular, a... Jefferson Baldwin?’

Ed Burns wasn’t a man that displayed emotion often but occasionally he had no choice. At hearing the name, he could only let out a sigh.

Then: June, 1915 ‘Prisoner 7390, Jefferson Baldwin, step forward.’

Baldwin didn’t move an inch, except for a slight curl of the lip. The sneer fit his face well. He looked 71

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like some sort of circus strongman gone feral, all bulging muscles and sharp eyes. Everything about the man said ‘Walk away or regret it.’

‘Baldwin. Forward.’ the admissions officer repeated, tapping his fingers on the handle of a steel-tipped cane. Jefferson gave him a brick wall of a glance and then complied, to be handed his uniform and bedding. The uniform was nothing special, baggy and rough, black-and-white striped.

The bedding might as well have been sackcloth.

They’d already stripped him of the ragged suit he’d arrived in. Some men struggled at that point, fought for every scrap of clothing. They’d stand there shivering, covering their genitals with their hands. Some took it in their stride, tossed the clothes away like they’d already tossed their freedoms. Those were the ones that made the guards uncomfortable and a shrewd few, of which Baldwin was one, knew that and enjoyed it.

Baldwin was relatively docile as he was escorted into the main body of the prison. The cadre of guards surrounding him may well have been the reason for that. They walked in lockstep, an impromptu cage of bodies around the prisoner, each with their own cane at hand. The admissions officer slumped as the procession moved away, letting out a breath.

‘What’d he do?’ another guard asked, approaching the officer’s desk.

‘Huh?’ 72

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‘The guy.’ he pointed just as the doors closed behind the last of the group. ‘What’s he in for?’

‘Robbery.’ the officer said. ‘Seven years.’

‘All that for a yegg?’

The officer shrugged. ‘Must be one hell of a yegg.’

Cell-block B smelt of mould and ammonia, that cold chemical stench that sunk deep into the lungs and stayed there. Baldwin’s new home was the last cell on the left of the ground floor. A metal bed and a chamber pot. No window. Wouldn’t be anything to see even if there was.. They shoved him inside, those men with the pressed uniforms and heavy sticks to hide behind. Iron bars closed on him. It wasn’t the first time. It wouldn’t be the last. The muttering started, the whispered threats, the scratching at the walls. He placed the threadbare bedding down on his bunk, sat, and waited.

The morning routine at the Oregon State Penitentiary wouldn’t be unfamiliar to those with military experience. At 6am sharp, a bell rang throughout the complex. In all three of it’s cell-blocks, doors would simultaneously grind open and their inhabitants were expected to be dressed and stood at attention by 6:10. If a prisoner was yet to leave his cell, as was the case that morning in block B, then a guard would soon enter and convince the prisoner to do so with the tip of his cane. In this case, the guard never got the chance to exercise his particular brand 73

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of persuasion. As he stepped inside, a cast-iron pot swung at his head. The pot missed. Its contents didn’t, showering the man in Jefferson Baldwin’s piss and shit. The other guards heard a strangled yell and came running, canes ready in the air, ready to crack heads. That was how Jefferson met the boss.

The bruises were starting to swell when Warden Harry Minto came to see his newest reprobate. Jefferson was strung up in one of the rooms deeper into the building, designed for this very purpose, his arms chained to the ceiling and his feet to the floor.

It was a dark place. Nothing but a kerosene lamp out in the hallway and a bolted steel door that only opened when the man in charge decided.

‘Prisoner 7390.’ Minto said, adjusting his shirtcuffs ‘Were you trying to set a record?’

‘Who’re you supposed to be?’ Jefferson said through a thickened lip.

‘I’m Warden Minto, the man who will be teaching you your lesson for the next seven years.’

‘Minto...’ Jefferson rolled the name around his mouth like he was tasting it. ‘What kinda peg-house punk name is that?’

‘Excuse me?’

‘How do you take it, Minto? You a fruiter or a rooter?’

Harry backhanded Jefferson across the cheek.

‘First thing you’re gonna learn is to keep a civil tongue in your head when you’re on my property.’

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Jefferson spat out a string of pinkish drool that narrowly missed the Warden. ‘You wanna teach me?’ he licked his lower lip. ‘Wouldn’t be the first one who tried.’

‘I assure you, I’ll be the last one who needs to.’

Warden Minto locked eyes with the prisoner, summoning every bit of steel a life of law enforcement had given him.

‘That’s what they all say.’ Jefferson spat again.

‘Never made a bit of difference.’

‘Well, I think you’ll find that the Oregon State Penitentiary is a very different animal than any other prison you may have experienced.’

Two guards entered the room to stand on either side of the prisoner, tapping their canes on the clammy stone floor. ‘And I would like to show you why.’

‘Go ahead then, Minto.’ Jefferson let out a low, clogged laugh. ‘Show me.’ he lurched against the chains, making them creak under his weight. ‘Try and make me do your seven years.’

‘Let’s start with a day and we’ll go from there.’

Minto gestured to the two guards flanking Baldwin’s hanging form. ‘You know the routine. put him in a two-bed once you’re done.’ and then he walked away, as cold and as lethal as the Arctic. The guards went to work.

Another corridor. Another hand on his wrist.

Another cell. Another bed rising up to meet his battered face.

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‘New fish?’

A grunt and the rattle of iron. The bedding was rough against his cheek but blessedly cool. He kept his eyes closed. The carbolic stink of the cellblock cut through the blood in his nostrils.

‘Christ, what did you do to ‘em, son?’ Baldwin ignored the voice and pressed his face into the bed.

‘What, they bust your ears too?’

‘I can hear you.’ he said.

‘What’s your name?’ came the voice.

‘Baldwin.’

‘That your real name?’

‘Is what it is.’ Baldwin opened his right eye, the left still buried in the bedding. Distant evening light splayed across the iron bars, just enough to show the skinny, older man sat on the bed opposite.

‘Mine’s Curtiss.’ he said ‘You look like shit.’

Baldwin grunted and heaved himself into a sitting position. ‘It’s nothing.’

‘Sure it is.’ Curtiss said ‘It’s always nothing on the first day.’

‘They do this often?’

‘If you give them a reason to, which I don’t.’

Curtiss ran a hand over his stubbly scalp. ‘Don’t want to be the next one dead of syphilis.’

‘Huh?’ Curtiss laughed. ‘Sorry, New York joke. You ever been?’ Baldwin shook his head. ‘It’s just as big as they say it is...’ Curtiss looked at the last dregs of light fanning through the cell bars and then caught 76

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himself. ‘Did a stretch there, years ago now. It’s what the screws would say when they went a little too far, ‘He died of syphilis.’’ From the walkway, the clicking of boot-heels approached. ‘Knew a lot of fellas who died of syphilis in New York.’

The two were silent as the patrolling guard passed by their cell. The burly figure tapped his cane against the bars as he glanced in and then was gone.

Curtiss counted the guard’s steps under his breath until they were out of earshot. ‘Question is, Baldwin, are you gonna keep on giving them a reason?’

Baldwin was as still as stone, his bed almost entirely in the shadows now. Finally, he said ‘I’m thinking so.’

Curtiss sighed and rolled his head back to rest against the clammy stone wall. ‘Then may I kindly ask you to do it in someone else’s cell? I don’t need that trouble.’

Baldwin stood up from his bed with some effort, joints complaining as he dragged them into place and stretched to his full height. ‘Nobody needs trouble.’ his bulk seemed to fill the cell, soaking up whatever remained of the light. ‘But it still finds ‘em.’

77

Louise Muddle

Following her graduation with Combined Honours from Manchester University in American Studies and Sociology, Louise followed her love of acting and started working in theatre marketing. After a career that included writing press releases, pitches and copy for the National Trust and ITN, Louise finally discovered a liking for writing fiction. Influenced by a variety of subjective reading material, often political and concerned with the modern condition, she embarked on a creative writing course at Liverpool University.

A Corpse at Christmas

On the 50th anniversary of the cult horror movie, Servant of Shiva, film-maker Lena MacIntyre, trying to produce her first solo documentary about the film’s principal star, Jean D’Souza, is struggling with reluctant interviewees, her own self-doubt, silence, lies, unpalatable truths and, a dead body on the beach.

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Herring gulls are a triumph of Darwinism; as fishing stocks dwindle, and humans encroach on breeding habitats, they have adapted to survive and are now a common sight on municipal waste dumps miles from the coast. In Canada, they have been observed shepherding other birds into glass skyscrapers where they are stunned by the collision before they are scavenged by gulls. A newspaper recently reported that in Cornwall gulls killed a pet dog, and a tortoise, and hospitalised a small child.

The gull, on this particular Cornish beach, was observed struggling to balance on the chest of a sodden human corpse - its wings outstretched both above and behind its straining neck, vampirically, as it gouged the eye sockets.

Monday 23 December Lena stepped from the taxi and took a deep breath.

Salt stung her lips. The driver unloaded her luggage and frowned as she struggled to pick up her rucksack, camera bags and tripod case.

‘Are you sure you can manage lovee? P’raps I could take your luggage closer to wherever you’re staying if you really want to walk down the Combe?’

Lena smiled politely but shook her head of greying curls. ‘I’m used to carrying all this kit,’ she lied, ‘and I’ve got a low centre of gravity! I’m too early 81

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to get into the house just yet anyhow. Thanks for the offer though. Bye. Oh! have a happy Christmas!’

She set off from the large visitor car park, aware that the taxi hadn’t moved. Sensing that the driver was watching to see which bag she dropped first, she tensed her shoulders to ensure nothing slipped. From somewhere above, a seagull laughed: the strap on the tripod case inched over her dodgy left shoulder, tangled with her camera bag which then banged her wonky right hip, causing her to stumble. She kept on walking.

Half-hidden behind a stand of Scots pine and large rhododendrons, stood a green-stained terrace of modern houses with tell-tale uniform doors and windows - not exactly the Cornish cottages featured on picturesque Penkerro postcards.

The Combe acted as a funnel, drawing visitors down the narrowing lane towards the harbour. Close to the car park, after the council houses, a scattering of sixties suburban semi-detached homes had also evaded the chocolate box aesthetic, offering Bed & Breakfast (Kettle in every room!), using optimistic names like Sea View and Almost Heaven.

Outside Kendor Guest House, there was a bed of Pampas grass which triggered in Lena a brief bitter smile. Emma, Lena’s recent ex-partner in both her business and personal life, had discovered pampas was a covert signal, a botanical flag that advertised that the residents were swingers.

Following the semi’s, as she crossed another 82

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invisible line closer to the villages’ historic core, came the thirties bungalows. Lena pictured the retired colonials who had opted for these wooden verandas beneath stained glass sunbursts and enamelled name plates, Merry-Lea and Happy-Lea. She hoped they lived up to their billing.

As she rounded the bend, all the property suddenly conformed to tourist board clichés: wooden and slate cottages, jauntily painted window frames, nautical references on every house – Davy Jones Locker, Pilchard Cottage, Smuggler’s Rest.

She had only decided to make this trip two days ago and was not well-prepared. She had mistakenly assumed that, having watched the cult-horror movie Servant of Shiva several times, she would easily find the main location – a house called White Horses, which was where she was to stay. Looking around now, it dawned on her that the film featured few daytime external shots. Outside a bakery that was producing enticing smells of hot pasty, Lena spotted someone in the back of a post van.

‘Excuse me, I wonder if you can help? I’m looking for a house called White Horses, and somewhere I could get lunch before I check in. I think it’s one of the big white houses, up on the hill above the harbour. I hadn’t realised that there would be more than one!’

A woman in shorts, with a straw-coloured ponytail, emerged from the van and sized Lena up from head to toe.

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‘Most people staying up there don’t carry their own bags, they have everything delivered via the top lane and use the steps down.’

Lena wilted before letting the bag straps slither with all of her belongings, except her rucksack. She watched them settle on the floor.

‘Oh, I didn’t know there was another route in.

I’ve arrived early, so I asked the taxi driver to drop me off in the main car park.’

The postwoman turned her back to Lena and used her arms to illustrate her directions – much like airline cabin crew. ‘It’s all one road actually, but the houses jut out and about so you wouldn’t know. Just follow this way down to the harbour. If you want some food and a drink I’d suggest The Last Post; it’s the pub on the rock....turn right when you get to the front. Tourists seem to prefer it. Or turn left and go on up to White ‘Orses ‘.

Some of the other guests have already arrived.

You can’t mistake it once you’re down there, it’s the last house above you, looking out to sea. There’s a steep set of steps climbing up from the harbour wall, although those bags might slow you down a good bit.’

Lena forced a smile and dropped her voice to a conspiratorial stage whisper; ‘Well perhaps I should have a drink in the pub first - just to make the climb easier.’

Apparently reluctant to conspire, the post woman turned back to her work.

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Lena felt dehydrated, dispirited and dizzy. Perhaps this trip was as ill-advised as her friends and family had stated. The bowl-shaped harbour was encircled by white-washed buildings that hung over the water’s edge and Lena paused to take it all in.

The tide was out and there were few people about.

A man in yellow waders was sorting through fishing nets on the quayside and another man was down on the mud inspecting the hull of a boat. Outside a couple of the picture-perfect cottages, where key safe boxes hung beside tourist board ratings, there were parents hauling luggage whilst dogs and children squealed and ran in and out of doors.

To reach the pub, which was set precariously into the rock above the harbour mouth, Lena passed another pasty shop, art gallery, gift shop and a tearoom. The last of these was open but empty, and the others had signs in the window saying they would re-open for Christmas but were unspecific about when.

At the foot of the steps that led up to The Last Post, Lena stood aside to allow a dog-walker pass onto the cliff path. The elderly man wore bright red corduroys, a sage green fedora and a scarf that matched his Golden Retriever. He thanked her politely and wished her good day in the clipped tones of a Reithian continuity announcer.

She managed to negotiate the steps without stumbling and with a last great effort heaved her good shoulder at the heavy door into the bar.

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Unexpectedly, the door swung easily inwards and the weight of the rucksack propelled Lena headlong inside, landing in a heap on top of her tripod and cameras.

The glow from a pot-bellied wood burner, to the right of the door, was reflected in the copper-topped bar where an old man, the solitary customer, was sitting silently with a newspaper. The barman watched as Lena stood and tried nonchalantly to gather her possessions whilst loudly reassuring both of them that she needed no help. Finally, she turned to her left and started stacking her bags at the farthest corner table.

The pub door crashed open again and a big man charged in wearing a balding fleece jacket and baggy jeans, shiny with a veneer of dirt. Lena guessed he was about her age but it was hard to be sure under the bristling stubble and shaggy hair.

‘Morning Polly, you’re early today. Not taking the boat out then?’ said the barman.

The man flung himself onto a stool at the bar; ‘No I’m bloody well not! Gi’s a pint John, not earache.’

The elderly man at the bar visibly shrunk and put his head deeper into his paper. Lena decided to take a longer time searching for her purse.

The barman picked up a glass; ‘It’s on its way Pol, what’s the tearing hurry for?’

Polly produced a brown envelope from his back pocket and tossed it on the bar top: ‘That’s what for. Another bloody threatening letter about child 86

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maintenance. I give ‘em every penny I got and they still harassing me. It’s not bloody fair, everyone knows how much I love my kid. I’d do anything for her.’

‘Sorry to hear that mate. Sometimes it can feel like they’re all out to get you. I know, I bin there.’

Polly took a long swig of his pint, ‘But I bet your ex didn’t set her bloody family on you as well? Last time I tried to see my Jodie both of Joanna’s brothers threatened me with a beating if I went near the house again.’

‘They shouldn’t have done that. A man’s got a right to see his kid. Did you tell the police Pol?’ John asked as he took glasses out of the washer.

Polly snorted, ‘Don’t be daft! Think about it, who’s our local bobby? Colin is Joanna’s cousin i’n’t he? I report them for threats, and I’ll be locked up in no time.’

‘I don’t think so Pol, what charge could Colin bring against you? He has to have a reason, family or not.’

Polly made a high-pitched squawk: ‘Ha! Are you mad? Bald tyre or broken headlight or drunk and disorderly – he’d make up some bullshit thing.’

The barman moved around the L shaped pub putting out beer mats and said casually; ‘P’raps you should go and talk to Jed about taking the boat out mate? Then you’d have some money to get them off your back?’

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bloody genius you are John. I hadn’t thought of that!

Jed won’t let me anywhere near the boat until I give him a load of money he says I owe. Only if I don’t fish, I don’t have any money to pay him. It’s a bloody vicious circle I’m trapped in and I’m sick of it!’

He drained his glass, slammed it down and grabbed up the envelope before he strode out the pub without looking back. The barman looked at Lena who was trying to make herself invisible in the corner; he whistled quietly before he slowly shook his head.

The elderly man sat up and spoke as if nothing had happened. ‘D’ye hear who’s staying up at White Horses for Christmas then?’

Lena’s ears pricked up as she approached the bar.

The barman answered over his shoulder, whilst waiting for Lena’s order: ‘I’d heard from Charlie at the farm it was someone famous, but I didn’t recognise the name.’

The old boy harrumphed from his stool. ‘I don’t know as you’d call her famous ‘xactly but she was the star of that film they made back in the sixties.

Jean D’ Souza she’s called. You’re too young boy, that’s your trouble!’

The barman rolled his eyes at Lena. ‘I’ve heard all the stories about that film Frank, but I’ve never seen it.’

Lena thought she’d better speak up. ‘Can I have a pint of whatever the local bitter is please?’ She turned to the other customer, ‘I hope you don’t mind me 88

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butting in but I’m staying at White Horses too.’ The old man looked deep into his pint glass once again.

‘And I’d really like to talk to anyone who can remember Jean D’Souza back then or the film being made here. It’s for a television documentary I’m making about Jean’s life.’

The barman answered first; ‘I wasn’t being rude about the film I just don’t watch old films; I don’t have the time.’

Lena smiled at him; ‘Don’t worry, I only met Jean six months ago. I don’t remember her heyday either – I’m nearing fifty and I’m too young!’

She turned to the old man: ‘If you were around when they filmed Servant of Shiva, perhaps I could ask you a few questions?’

The old man pursed his lips and shook his head; ‘I’ve got nothing to say about it. Bad film. Bad business. I used to like her though – Jean Do Whatsit.’

Lena tried again; ‘Did you live here in 1969 when they were filming?’

‘I’ve lived here all my life’ he said emphatically but nothing more was forthcoming.

‘Perhaps you could suggest some other people in Penkerro who were about then?’ Lena pressed.

‘I’ve got to go ‘ome for my dinner. See you tomorrow John.’ The old man stepped down from his stool and left without a backward glance.

The barman looked at Lena and shrugged: ‘So when’s this programme going to be on the telly then?’

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Lena held up her hands, ‘Oh it might never get made.’

She instantly realised this wasn’t something Emma would have ever said. It made her sound like an amateur, so she quickly added: ‘I’m here to shoot enough material to put together a pitch for commissioners. If they like what I’ve got, I can make a full documentary about Jean’s career. She was a big star back in the day.’

‘On Christmas week though! Don’t you get time off?’

‘If I don’t work, I don’t get paid. I’ve got quite a lot riding on this!’ Clinging to the last shreds of her dignity, she didn’t say anymore. She knew she’d probably given too much away.

‘Ah well good luck getting people to talk then.

You’ll find the locals can be quite suspicious of visitors.’

Lena sat on one of the blood-red velour topped stools; ‘Don’t ee think moy arkcent can fool ‘em then?’

The barman stopped polishing the glass he was holding and stared at Lena; her smile froze and her face turned scarlet in the silence.

‘Sorry. No. Um…. are you not a local yourself then?’

The barman shook his head; ‘Me and my brother took over this pub twenty years ago, but I grew up in Plymouth. I’ll never be a local! Six generations in the graveyard they say, 90

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before you qualify!’

‘It is beautiful here isn’t it? I’m quite jealous!’

Lena said over-enthusiastically.

John stopped a moment and looked at her: ‘Oh it has its moments, I’ll give you that. Did you want to order any food? Only I have to get on.’

She ordered pie and chips just as a group of walkers came in with dogs and saved her from any further inappropriate accents or embarrassment. She left the barman to serve, returned to her corner and scrolled through old text messages on her phone. Ritual humiliation by SMS was scab-picking, and something Lena knew she shouldn’t do. Her friends, her therapist, even her mother, had all said she should delete the texts and look ahead, not behind, but they were her last tangible connection with Emma. Deleting the digital thread would also erase an invisible connection and deprive her of hours of tortured analysis of who said what to whom and when. Two days ago she had been admirably self-controlled and the text had been curt but practical. Need to collect kit for Cornwall. When will you be out?

Emma’s reply had succeeded in adding yet more salt to the wound: Not working at home for the foreseeable, so any day during the week is good. Think you should keep the kit permanently. If all your stuff now gone can you put keys through letterbox?

But a month or so ago Lena hadn’t been able to sound so controlled: Your flat. Your company. I’m 50 and sofa-surfing. Mum wants me to move home. Therapy 91

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useless. I can’t do this. There had been no reply to this text, or a string of subsequent similar messages, and every time Lena re-read them, she wavered between self-righteous indignation and straight-forward humiliation.

In October she had still been trying to salvage something: Sorry I hadn’t realised how big the kids’ issue had become for you. We had so much. I know I need to change. Can we talk? X Despite the therapist’s best efforts this still made Lena wince at her tone of desperation and the embarrassment of Emma’s reply: There is no going back.

Please stop. I didn’t plan this but it’s happened. Think we both need clean break. Truly sorry.

Prior to this there were ugly, petty, vicious texts from September, full of accusations and counter accusals. The shouting match through the front door of the flat was a particularly mortifying memory that Lena relived frequently, alongside the hours of recriminations she’d poured down the phone - often to Emma’s voicemail. She had at least deleted the worst of the sometimes obscene and always misspelt drunk texting she had done from friends’ spare rooms, in the early hours of the morning.

If Jean D’Souza hadn’t called her to ask if she was going to pursue the documentary, Lena would probably have still been on her friend’s sofa-bed or spending Christmas with her parents and nauseatingly perfect brother’s family. Jean had vaguely threatened that someone else was talking to her 92

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about a television documentary; Lena had been forced to grab the only lifeline she had.

How would she convince any channel to commission her though? Her previous work had mostly been for Sky with Emma, and that door had closed when Emma stopped sleeping with her and started sleeping with the commissioning editor.

She had to establish her own reputation, set up her own company, forge her own networks and come up with her own programme ideas. She had slipped into an easy reliance on Emma’s greater experience and coasted for far too long. With hindsight, she could see when she should have taken more trouble to ingratiate herself at meetings, conferences and awards functions but Emma was so much more confident. It had suited Lena to stand back.

And of course, in retrospect, she had been completely foolish about the flat. Property prices in London had escalated at such a rate that she had missed any opportunity of buying something for herself. Meanwhile she had lived rent free in Emma’s inherited home.

Thoroughly nauseated, Lena put the phone down.

She had to move on. She needed to learn from Emma’s ruthlessness. Television was cut-throat and she needed to develop a tough business sense quickly. Jean D’ Souza was absolutely perfect for a biography: audiences loved the ghoulish frisson whenever they realised an old star was still alive.

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There was glamour, sex and tragedy in her story; she could exploit the pathos of Jean’s current straitened circumstances, in order to really tug at the heartstrings. She had exclusive access to Jean this week and she had pegs to hang the story. Perhaps she should have another pint after all, and something else to eat before she set off.

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Roisin O’Grady

Working in textiles, Roisin has recently moved to Liverpool from the West of Ireland. Tiring of trawling through the library shelves, she lacked in finding modern material that she connected with as a reflective 26-year-old female, and so started writing a novel, compulsively, late into the nights.

Haley Ran Away

Haley will always pose unanswerable questions.

Such as why are we drawn to the wild ones? Ruth never thought of her life worthy of a story, yet here she is as the protagonist, grappling with every life decision ever since she first met Haley who was lying on the communal kitchen floor, dying.

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Hayley Ran Away Roisin O’Grady

The Mourning Nights A girl named Haley you met six months ago won’t let you say no to stroking your hair whilst you lay on her lap as she sings Caledonia. It’s a head you see from outside your own body because you’re still stumbling over last night’s mumblings with her friend Tom who gave you a drink. You drank it freely choking on the basic taste swirling in acidic peach liquid. He popped the pill in too late that it fizzled out on your tongue once you sucked it through the straw. It’s three o’ clock the next day, your body is dead and mind wild awake in stars, ‘HALEY’s great’ is written on your arm like your five-year-old friend branding you playfully as their own. Add twenty-two years and it all lacks cohesion. Still, your mouth tastes like vinegar so you can’t dispute her manic pleading eyes. You are not wild, she is, if you deny her this, she will act like the animal she is. You can’t say what it is you want from anyone else but it’s not this and never has been. But her feelings are needier than yours could ever be. A game of trumps.

The boy she loved, Mike, let her fly for the nights then would clip her wings next light. I think she liked it, this pain, as she never had to feel it before, his power was a danger that was endearing always taking her by surprise. Finally, a man more 97

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manipulative than herself. Both were only children so they were like each other’s first sibling that involved sex you could hear two ceilings above. Hardware accessories were involved, and limits reached that their love could not. Mike, as three years her junior, died in a way that was dismally unaligned with his lifestyle through a series of events. It started with him missing the bus to a tax adjustment appointment, taking a taxi, and said taxi’s passenger door being crushed by a public city bus. Derrick at the tax office got an early lunch though, getting the new seasonal drink at Starbucks that he ended up hating.

He doesn’t understand why people put root vegetables in everything nowadays.

Mike’s funeral is in two days and we’re only getting started on the festivities. We must ensure Haley cannot see his corpse on the day through extensive bodily chemical abuse. It is her idea that came to her in some cosmic dream that she couldn’t even remember. Since we heard the news, she often says if only she drove him to his appointment, when in reality; he blocked her number a month before the accident and her daddy hadn’t paid for a driving lesson since summer last year. He was dying either way I thought to myself, at least you don’t have the guilt to deal with. It had been a fun few nights considering I had nothing to be unhappy about.

Everyone in Mike’s friend group loved us again in the remorse of his passing. Haley had seven males orbiting her like a mourning orgy. All I did was lay 98

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my head on the wet tiles of Dublin Declan’s bathroom floor for most of last night. I listened to his alternative playlist wail and vibrate through all the walls on a five-euro speaker. I was half alive, but the depressingly atmospheric music suited my situation better than the drunken dancing girls banging behind the door. I watched these girls throw cat eye looks in our direction when we first arrived, they moved in a group and spoke as one, I imagined them now swaying to the music together shouting the same profanities at the bathroom door simultaneously laughing at their own catty ferocity. These girls were thinner as if from the 1920’s, when women’s bodies were slighter except, now they held none of the class.

I didn’t even feel bad for taking the facilities, I knew these girls would excrete on the lawn just to excite the lads; letting them know they had no lady lawns themselves with beaming Gillette pride.

When did these possibly sweet girls trade in all their good attributes for a flaccid Penis for three minutes of the night they won’t entirely remember?

Was it before they put on tan at six o’ clock the night before or months ago when they started to eat only two meals a day? There is being young, and they are young; nineteen on average and there’s just being dumb. I’ve gotten to be so judge-y when I’m drunk or whatever I am feeling. If I took a second to look down, I would see that I am twenty-five and my dress is down entangled by my own ankles. I’m officially publicly naked on a male dominated floor that 99

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has never been properly cleaned and I’m not even getting fucked for it. Maybe I need to start tanning so I won’t match the floor tiles either, someone may even notice my body through the keyhole.

Ok maybe this night wasn’t fun, but Haley beamed about Swedish Frédéric this morning so much I didn’t want to bring her into my bleak reality. He had been on an Erasmus student exchange with Mike four years ago for about two months and only really saw the glowing life reel of Mike since then on Facebook. This included pictures of goofing power rangers poses with young cousins at a christening, a few competitive Frisbee photos, Mike graduating with a master’s with his very old parents and of course updating people on his non-existent PhD paper once every month and lest we forget; his death. Frédéric had been on a group chat with Mike that hadn’t been answered in two years with hopes of meeting for a pint in Dublin sometime. I think maybe Fred wanted to be friends with him, but Mike was afraid to ruin his I’m Mr. Fantastic not sadistic at all illusion. However, comforting his ex-girlfriend’s vagina with his tongue probably isn’t a best friend thing to do either, Fred. Who knows Sweden is new to me and they do export fishy things? He has gotten us McDonald’s which we are now eating and my admiration of him has fluctuated greatly. Fred can stay as long as he would like, if he’s basically a constant fast food chain of a human. He started massaging my feet about half an hour ago and I’m 100

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not sure any man has rubbed me anywhere for more than fifteen minutes in one sitting. Do I like him? If I do it’s unfortunate because I spent the whole of last night as a bathmat rather than an attractive girl flirting with him, being a good distraction from his inappropriate level of grief. I haven’t liked a man in what feels like my whole adult life. I think as a teenager and a child, you have an idea that people can be anything, we are told it all the time as an inspirational mannerism of all humans. That idea never ever strikes you to be literal, as in they can be anything. Amazing and all the good stuff or incredulously disappointing too.

This is why I do love Haley. I don’t hold her to any standards so she can’t ever truly disappoint. I have yet to find someone else to remove my blind faith from.

I still remember waking up this morning because of the big bruise punctually pulsing on the left side my forehead. It’s so sore that my eye has started twitching in unison. I was sleeping on the ground beside the bed Haley and Fred were sleeping in. The space would have been ideal if the top drawer hadn’t been opened whilst I was asleep. Fred denies he left it open, but I know the 5 a.m. struggle to find condoms left him unbothered to shut the drawer. So, as I tried to wake up with crusted shut eyes to get to the bathroom, my head hit the side of the drawer corner at such a force that felt it may knock me out.

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that and not crack open. It’s foggy how I got from the toilet to sleeping on the floor but considering what I last remember, I can only applaud myself for at least finding a blanket and pillow to sleep with.

I sent a snarky joke Fred’s way about finding what he was looking for but he is sheepish and easily confused with a lacklustre understanding of the English language, so I’m left with a bruised ego and face. I can see as the day goes on that he feels guilty and gives me side glances every time I refreeze the bag of garden peas soothing my forehead.

Later into the evening I fully drip dry out of alcoholic influence. better odds than I guessed but passing out so early on last night gave me a head start on recovery. I parted ways with Haley and Fred as they were leaving for her apartment to get food and have sex no doubt. He arrived into Ireland two days ago with nowhere to stay and Haley has become his free air-b&b host and complimentary whore that comes with the room. I am glad to have a break from her for at least a few hours. I am laying on my sofa in fluffy overall pyjamas sipping on a bottle of water infused with rehydrating Dioralyte watching ‘Friends’. I am acting like a sick child in a hospital cot, except I’ve done this to myself. I was getting bored of ‘friends’ repeats and started scrolling through Facebook at Haley tagged in a selfie with Fred, captioned ‘Found a beautiful Galway girl’. I cringed so loud waking my housemate’s cat lying on top of my dead legs.

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Sleeping with your dead ex boyfriend’s foreign friend a few times before his funeral doesn’t sound like a normal way to heal or mourn but I am not surprised by it. I wouldn’t do it, but I am not her. Her mind works differently. It blocks the bad things out with other things. Black distractions, she called them. Ignoring his death with sex, alcohol and unprescribed drugs isn’t what’s worrying me about Haley. It’s that she looked at me this morning so blankly, like a stranger. Why me? I am here for her in whatever capacity needed and I always am.

Why am I being ignored like I am dead too? Haley told me she hadn’t noticed my disappearance at all last night. I was forgotten about as quickly as I was asked, or rather, forced into accompanying her to Mike’s weird send-off party that made no sense in terms of guestlist, atmosphere and lacking mention of death. Maybe I ended up by myself in the toilet, sad and alone because of something she said that I simply can’t remember?

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Chris Radcliffe

Chris Radcliffe is an Irish writer from Derry in the North West of Ireland, living in Liverpool for over seven years. He predominantly writes about the working class in Ireland and the North of England and likes to tackle current political and social issues in his work. He views his writing as stories about nothing.

The Children of Good Friday

The Good Friday Agreement was signed in 1998, and yet twenty years later the hangover from the peace process still humbles on. Told through the eyes of four Derry friends in their late teens and early twenties, we follow them as they grow up in a city doused in the history and blood of civil war and how their parents and family’s experiences have impacted on their lives today.

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The Children of Good Friday Chris Radcliffe Skint Hill His shoes wrapped in blue plastic bags, Sam sat on a fishing chair and read over a bookie slip. He drank Super Value cider from a two-litre, careful not to spill any over his black trousers. Beside him, cross-legged on the grass, their shoes caked in muck, Thomas and George shared a bag of chips, grease speckled across their white shirts and black ties.

‘Animals.’ Sam folded over the slip and stuffed it into his pocket.

The crowd in the stadium below cheered as players in candy-striped shirts walked out of the tunnel of the new stand and Teenage Kicks played through the PA. It was a sell-out. His uncles had got their tickets days before. His cousins had spent all day messaging around for any spares. Sam had sold his dad’s season ticket to one of them for three times the price on the gate.

‘Where’s everyone else? They’re gonna miss the kick-off.’

‘Casey and Gina will be here in a bit, like. I’ve no clue where Sheamus or Stephanie are and ye know Conor is wi’ his brothers.’ Thomas rubbed his hands together, licked his fingers and ran them through George’s hair.

‘Fuck off, would ye.’

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‘Here, you can’t swear in a cemetery.’

‘Why the hell not?’

‘It’s like swearing at mass. It’s just not on.’

‘Since when do you go to mass?’

‘I don’t, but that’s not the point, is it?’

The whistle sounded and the ball was played backward, but to whom, they couldn’t tell. Skint Hill, as they knew it, was the little spot in the cemetery where you could see right into the Brandywell stadium below. The cemetery connected the Creggan and Brandywell estates and overlooked the entire city. From the top end, you could make out the graffiti on The Walls and follow the lines of terraced houses from the Bogside to the city centre. St Eugene’s Cathedrals spire hung in the sky, a legacy of gothic ancestors. You could trace any car’s path from the Craigavon bridge on the River Foyle across to the Waterside and up to Top Of The Hill on the other side of the valley.

‘They’re our inside men,’ Sam’s dad told him once as they stood at the highest point in the cemetery, ‘next time we’re over there take a look at the footpaths.’

He wasn’t sure who’s funeral they were attending that morning, but he remembered that hundreds lined the paths and his dad told him more than once not to stare at certain faces. It was only a couple of days later when they were looking for a chemist that kept Sam’s brand of inhaler that they ventured into 108

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Top of The Hill. Straight away Sam clocked the green white and orange kerbs, the murals on the sides of houses and the tricolours flying on lampposts.

‘It’s like our street, Da.’ ‘Aye, what did I tell ye?’

He wasn’t quite sure what his dad meant when he referred to them as his inside men until they took the New Bridge across the Foyle and he noticed some of the kerbs painted red, white and blue.

‘It baffles me why they keep starting McNamee,’ said George.

‘Don’t be knocking wee Barry,’ Sam protested, as if he knew the player personally. ‘He’s some boy.’

‘He’s been a bit poor recently. When was the last time he scored?’

‘Aye, it’s been a while, but I fancy him to turn it around soon. Be alright if he bangs the first one in.’

On Skint Hill, you could just make out the drums and the songs from the fans. They sang along to most of them, even offering a nice rendition of the fans’ Bad Moon Rising rework.

Sam had learnt them when he was a kid, back when he used to watch the matches inside the stadium. Every Friday after school, he and his Dad would go up to his Grandad’s with fish suppers.

He’d read the Journal, pick out his football teams for his Dad’s Saturday acca, and walk around the corner to the stadium. They’d stand at the front of the old Glentoran stand with the green roof, that 109

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offered only a little shelter from the rain and wind.

After the match finished, Sam would make cups of tea while they listened to their Grandad moan about how useless the team was, but how much a credit Mark Farren was to the side. Them days felt like a long time ago now.

As was always the case, they heard Casey and Gina before they saw them. ‘…and I told her, I’m not paying thirty quid for a haircut and that she can fuck right off.’

‘And what she say?’

‘She told me to fuck off and gave my booking to Nicole Deery. NICOLE DEERY! Who does she think she is?’

Casey came around the bushes with two blue bags filled with vodka and pop. Casey’s cheeks were red and he gasped as if the walk up the hill had been a hundred-meter sprint. Sam couldn’t be too hard on him. He’d stopped ordering those late-night chippys and he’d even started joining in the five a-sides.

By the end of the summer maybe some would stop calling him Chumbo.

‘Alright fellas. How we getting on?’ Casey took a seat by Thomas and George who grumbled back.

Kitted out in matching Nike tracksuits and luminous green trainers, they looked like a middle-aged couple out for a power walk. Standard Skint Hill attire. Sam was almost kind of jealous of their comfort until he remembered how Gina had had a full-on tantrum in the middle of Sports Direct when Casey 110

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refused to buy the shoes they were now wearing.

He supposed it was fitting that Casey wore them to Skint Hill, since they had almost emptied his bank account.

‘Sam, do ye think you’re at a murder scene or something?’ Gina smirked, and looked around the group expecting her to be congratulated on her hilarity.

‘What’ve ye done to your eyes, Gina?’ Thomas squinted up at her. ‘Ye look like ye’ve still got Casey’s cock stuck up your arse.’

That brought a chorus of laughter.

‘Ye not like them?’ Sam said. ‘I reckon they look better than yours to be fair,’ he stuck his feet out as if to show off his own genius. ‘Naw, ano, I look like a right header, but I promised my Ma I wouldn’t get the shoes dirty. Have to go to the solicitors tomorrow, so I do.’

‘Oh, sorry, I didn’t—’ ‘Naw, it’s alright, don’t worry about it.’

‘Want a drink, Sam?’ Casey held out a bottle of Glen’s vodka. The sight of it almost made Sam sick.

He was just about over what it had done to him the other night.

‘Maybe in a bit.’

‘I’ll take a bitta that, Casey.’ Thomas took a halffilled plastic cup and the bottle of fizzy pineappleade.

‘That’s the stuff.’

‘Thomas, have ye heard from Sheamus or Stephanie?’ Casey asked.

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‘Naw, nothing.’

‘Bet he’s wi’ that one Caolan. Probably cutting everything into wee bags now.’ Gina cut invisible lines on her phone screen with her debit card.

‘Don’t be starting that chat,’ Casey groaned. ‘I’ve told ye before Gina, he’s knocked all that in the head.’

‘Aye, especially since what happened to Dylan, anyway.’ said Thomas.

‘Exactly. It was shite craic that. Now can ye leave the fella alone, Gina?’

The way Gina stared back at Casey was a look that Sam had seen before. It was the look she gave him before she went off on one in Sports Direct. Sam readied for himself for another shouting match, but Gina didn’t start. No, what she did was much worse.

She just raised her hands apologetically and reached over for the bottle of vodka. Casey would get it later.

Sam hoped he wouldn’t be around when he did.

‘Did I tell ye, I seen Dylan the other day?’ George said. ‘He was in the Iceland in Foyleside. Should have seen the state of him trying to carry a couple of them Chicago Town Pizzas. He almost fell into the freezers.’

‘Did I ever tell ye about the time he tried to go wi’ me?’

‘Jesus, only all the fucking time, Gina,’ Thomas said.

‘It was traumatizing.’

‘Aye, as bad as when ye saw Casey’s cock for the first time.’

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‘Oi, leave me out of this!’

‘Fuck off Thomas. You’re just jealous you’ve still got your V plates.’

Sam was used to this. Every week it went the same way and he knew what he had to look forward to. He’d have to listen to Thomas wind up Gina until she cracked up and caused a row. George would become agitated, shout at the pitch as if the players could hear him and drink his cans quicker than everyone else. Casey would get bored and try to have a serious conversation with him about life and the future and all that shite that he wasn’t in the mood for.

‘I’m gonna pop for a piss.’

He walked past the bushes they used as a toilet and continued until he reached the Lone Moor Road.

He tore the bags off his shoes and turned off his phone. He walked down past the Gaelic stadium and on till he stopped outside Bull Park. It used to be their old meet up place before the council installed higher fences and decided to lock the gate at nine. It was also where he’d spent most of his childhood playing on the swings or games of football in the cage. It was where he used to practice playing basketball, and where his dad spent a few Sundays teaching him how to do layups.

He crossed the road and walked down the street past Jerry’s shop and knocked on Conor’s door.

Conor opened with water dripping from his long black hair. Still fully clothed, he looked like he’d just 113

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stepped out of the shower.

‘What’s the craic? Thought you were up at Skint Hill wi’ the rest?’

‘I was, but they were starting to fry my head.’

‘Fair enough. Want to come in for a bit? I’ve to warn you though, James and Aaron are watching Harry Potter.’

‘Which one?’

‘The Order of The Phoenix.’

‘I don’t mind that one.’

The familiar smell of microwave popcorn filled the house. James and Aaron held a bowl each on their laps and paid him no attention as he and Conor sat down on either side of them. The twins looked more identical than normal, both dressed in the same Avengers pyjamas with their wet hair slicked back like American gangsters from the twenties. Sam kicked off his shoes and let himself sink into the leather.

He’d seen this one in the cinema. It was during one of the family trips around the coast. They stopped off in Sligo, and while his ma and sister went shopping, he and his dad hid in the cinema. He hadn’t seen any of the films before, but he remembered enjoying that one. Afterwards, his dad bought the earlier films on DVD and they stayed up late watching them in the hotel.

‘Wasn’t that great?’ his Dad said before they went to bed. ‘Would you want to be a wizard?’

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‘Maybe; that way I would be able to use my magic to unite Ireland.’

His dad laughed the entire way back to Derry.

James and Aaron had to be carried up to bed before the film finished. Conor put them in the bunk beds in the spare room and came down with a bag of weed triple wrapped in tin foil and elastic bands.

‘Thank Christ. I’ve been dying for one of those.’

Sam said.

‘I’m sure you have.’ Conor placed the buds into the grinder and span the lever on top. ‘Sorry I’d to leave early. My mum could only get the morning off.’

‘Don’t worry about it.’

‘How was it all in the end?’

‘It was odd.’

‘Odd? How so?’

Sam watched Conor lay a thin layer of tobacco on the skin, tap the crumbled flakes in, and top it with more tobacco. It was only a couple of months ago he’d taught Conor how to roll. His dad used to smoke hand rolled Golden Virginia, and during cold beer garden winter nights, Sam was given a crash course. Over time, it became his job to roll while his dad went for piss.

‘Yeno, just odd. You’d all these people, sitting around and sharing all these stories. Just all this crap about how much he loved this and that. It was just a load of nonsense. A load of balls. Half of them knew fuck all about him, like. You must know what I mean.’

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‘Kinda. I was a bit younger though. I don’t remember much about Cline’s.’ Conor licked the edge of the big skin and effortlessly rolled the paper over onto itself. He took off his glasses and poked the tobacco and buds to make room at the top, where he tied a bow.

‘You’re getting too good at that.’

Conor shrugged as he led them out to the extractor fan over the hob. He lit an incense stick and a lavender-scented candle. ‘How’s your mum and sister?’ he asked.

‘My Mum’s been trying like. She was thanking everyone for coming today like it was a birthday party. To be honest I didn’t think she expected the turn out to be as good as it was. I didn’t anyway.

Sinead’s pretty much the same as ye seen her at the wake the other night. She was a bit better with my Uncle Tony today like. That’s where they are now.

They’re staying out in his with my aunt and that.’

‘I was talking to your Uncle Tony earlier. Bit of a weird fella.’

‘He’s a bit of a knob isn’t he? His house smells of oranges, too.’

‘Oranges?’

‘Oranges. It’s the only flavour of cleaning products he buys.’

‘I don’t think flavour is the correct term. You don’t drink that shit. I mean, you could, but I wouldn’t advise it.’

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their mandated two toke system, but Conor didn’t show any sign that it bothered him. ‘Aye, but my Uncle Tony. He wanted me to come down to his for tea tomorrow. Wants to have a chat or something.

Am I fuck in the mood for that shite in that citrus shit hole. So, I’ve got him to take me out to Frankie’s for a fry instead.’

‘What’s he want to chat about?’

‘Dunno, but it’ll be more bullshit no doubt. It’ll be all about Da, like. Some extra crap on looking after my ma and Sinead. You know the sort. It’ll be like a scene in one of those films on Channel Five I bet. Fuck me, as if I need that now.’

‘Sounds like fun.’ Conor’s phone vibrated on the counter. ‘Two seconds, mate. Alright, mum.’

Sam threw himself back on the sofa and flicked through the channels. He wasn’t paying attention, he was just looking for something that wasn’t loud, English or American. He settled on the Irish country music channel. The studios were just green screens with awful projections. He thought about the shit he’d done in art and how it would fit in on this channel, which in turn, reminded him of the time his father came to his art show at the College’s open night. This time though, he stopped himself from following that memory and turned the tv off.

‘Nothing on the telly, naw?’ Conor handed him warm blackcurrant cordial in a mug.

‘Cheers.’

Conor pulled a pack of chocolate fingers from 117

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behind the sofa and offered them to Sam. ‘They’ve only been there for a few hours. James and Aaron kept trying to stick them up their nose.’

‘Aye, sounds about right.’ Sam took a couple.

It had been a while since Sam had been able to do this. Afternoons watching the footy on the laptop while they put in hours of FIFA on the Xbox and smoked joints until they monged out on the sofa in front of a John Carpenter film had been replaced by listening to his mother cry in her room while he tried to coax Sinead into eating more than a bag of Wotsits a day.

‘How’s your Tranmere career getting on then?’

Sam asked, mouth full of crumbs.

‘Grand aye. I’m in January. I’ve made some good transfers. Got Poulson up top and the boy Diop from West Ham in. Going to try and make champ league winners outta Tranmere. You’ll have to get around at some stage to have a rattle against them.’

‘Want to get a game now?’

‘Can’t. Aaron broke my controller.’

‘Of course he did.’ Sam could have run over to his to grab a controller. It was only ten minutes up the road, but he knew he’d not make the walk back.

Besides, his mum and Sinead wouldn’t be home yet.

He thought about what they would be doing now. No doubt they’d be sitting by Tony’s fire pit and listening to David Bowie. His mum had been playing him all week. His Dad was a fan, but even he would have got tired of listening to Drive In Saturday after 118

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the seventieth time. A part of him thought that he should be sitting there too, drinking bottles of Coors from the shed and trying to guess one of Tony’s footy trivia questions. It’s not like he’d got much of a choice though. Once Thomas and George had mentioned the Derry match, his mum had practically chased him out of the function room of the Bluebell. She was all smiles as she handed him twenty quid, but she let it slip just before she kissed his cheek and told him to enjoy himself. He thought how it was such a sad kindness, and not only because in that moment, it was the most she could do for him.

‘Oh aye.’ Sam cleared his throat and sat up straight as if to make an announcement. ‘I didn’t tell ye, I was talking to Amy the other day.’

Conor almost choked on a chocolate finger.

‘Alright, why? I mean, what was she saying?’ ‘She was just saying her bit really, sorry for your loss, my dad was sound, all that jazz. Tell ye though, trust it to take a death for the girl to get in touch.’

‘Aye, I know what ye mean. She’s been busy to be fair.’

‘How do ye know? Youse talking again?’

‘I was on the phone to her the other week,’ ‘Fuck ye. Ye kept that one quiet. Tell us the bars.’

Sam learned forward. Like any Derry fella, he loved the bars. After all, gossip was richer than sterling.

‘There isn’t really any. Ryan told me he ran into her the other day. Said she was asking about me, then later on, she rang me outta the blue. I think she 119

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was drunk.’

‘Shit, it wasn’t one of them calls was it? I mean, it be difficult with the fucking ocean between the pair of ye, but whatever. Facetime’s a thing, like.’

‘It’s a sea, not an ocean,’ Conor said. ‘But naw, it was like eight on a Wednesday. She was going out wi’ her mates and they were getting ready. She was just a bit bored I reckon.’

‘Was that it then? Just some shite talk?’

‘Pretty much.’

Sam could smell there were bars he wasn’t being told. Conor was keeping something from him and Sam knew that usually meant Conor had made a fool of himself or been an arsehole. Either way, Sam had to know. ‘Well, she’s back in a couple of days, like,’ he said.

‘Really?’ That got him. Conor’s right eyebrow raised, as if he was trying his best impression of The Rock. He straightened his shoulders and his voice squeaked like an altar boy. ‘She told me she was probably staying over there for a while yet.’

‘Aye, she’s back all summer apparently. Plenty of time for you to finally ask her out, unless you already have, and she’s told ye to jog on.’

‘Fuck off.’ Conor chucked the biscuits at Sam. He deflected them with a cushion, and they spilled all over the floor.

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and whether the footy was finished. He took the bookie slip out of his pocket and loaded up the scores app.

Whenever the football season wasn’t on, Friday night Brandywell footy trips were swapped for Saturdays in the bookies down the road from where his mum got her hair done. In between gorging on complimentary sausage rolls and cups of tea, his dad shouted at horses on tv screens. Sam used to gauge how well his dad got on based on if they got a takeaway or not. The good days, they’d gorge on chicken ball specials; The bad days, Sam would spend his evenings with Sinead eating Lidl branded chicken nuggets in front of the telly while their parents spoke loudly in the kitchen.

The older Sam got, the more regular those Saturdays became and take-aways were swapped for pints in the local. It was during the last of these days that his father wrote out the teams on the slip Sam was now holding. They’d done well enough to drink their fill and afford one last drunk bet on the way back from the pub.

‘We’ll forget about this one until it’s in,’ he told Sam as he handed the bookie a bundle of twenty quid notes.

Sam had to squint to read some of the names of football teams. His dad’s handwriting always caused him hassle. There were a few occasions where his teachers thought Sam had signed his dad’s name under the teacher comments in his daybook. He’d 121

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even missed couple of dental appointments by confusing his dad’s ones and nines.

There were about twenty teams in total, sprawled all over the world. Some of teams played in leagues he didn’t even know existed. He couldn’t pronounce the team from the Columbian third division, and he spent ages trying to find out how the Turin Ladies Reserves got on. No matter where they were though, team after team they all won. A couple only by the one goal a few others by five and six. As he went down the list, he mentally crossed them off until he was looking at the last team.

Back when he was only a kid, and it was one of the first days he picked his dad’s teams in his grandads, Sam said how he wanted to back Derry.

‘Nah, kiddo,’ his dad had said. ‘I’ve one rule.

Never back your own team.’

Yet here on the bottom of the slip he’d written Derry City as clear as he could. The easiest to check out of the lot, it took him seconds to see how in the last minute of injury time, Barry McNamee had scored the only goal of the game.

‘Fuck off!’ Sam leaped off the sofa and punched the air.

‘Woah, calm it.’ Conor flinched as if Sam was about to jump on top of him. ‘Don’t forget about the wains.’

‘Fuck the wains! I just won ten grand!’ Sam kept punching the air, like he was at a rave.

‘What? How?’ Sam dangled the bookie slip in 122

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front of Conor until he snatched it off him. ‘I can’t read half of this.’

‘All that matters is that wee bitta paper you’ve got there is worth ten grand.’

Sam bellowed out laughing. He was bouncing on the balls of his feet. He felt like he could run through Conor’s wall and into the neighbours. The fact that he’d be able to afford the damage made it even better.

‘Fucking hell.’ Finally it hit Conor.

They grabbed each other’s shoulders and hopped around the living room shouting any noise that just came out. They only stopped when they became too dizzy to go any further.

‘I’ll tell ye one thing.’ Sam fell back on the sofa and let the room spin around him. ‘We’re going to have a fucking cracker of a summer now. Fuck whatever plans you had, and fuck whatever happens come September. Who needs Ryan now? Now roll a fucking spliff.’

Sam read over the teams again and again, his cheeks almost sore from the size of his grin. For a brief second, it felt as if the past week had been worth it. It didn’t stay long though, and he pushed the notion as far out of his head as he could. Instead, he remembered that night after the pub. His mother made him and his father fish finger sandwiches and they watched Match of The Day in silence. They had an unspoken agreement; she didn’t ask how much they won or lost and in turn they complimented her on the same haircut she’d been getting for the past 123

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twenty years. As his parents went up to bed, and behind his mother’s back, his father had tucked the bookie slip into Sam’s top shirt pocket.

‘Say nothing til’ ye see Claude,’ he told Sam with a wink, and a finger pressed to his lip.

Sam folded the slip back into his pocket. He wondered if his mother’s opinion on gambling would change when he showed her the slip tomorrow.

‘Conor, can you believe it? Ten fucking grand.’

‘Ten fucking grand.’ Conor shook his head.

‘Ten fucking grand.’ Sam said louder.

‘Ten fucking grand.’ Aaron rubbed the sleep from his eyes in the doorway. ‘Ten fucking grand.’

124

Duncan Ross

Following his move to Liverpool in 2001 to play guitar and write an album with Lotus Eaters’ singer Peter Coyle, Duncan Ross continued with his musical journey and performed in Europe and the USA with the likes of Cerys Matthews, Wendy James and John Power. After graduating with a BA in Music from The Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts in 2008, he also discovered a love for creative writing.

The Rage

The narrative of this black comedy, with a moral dilemma at its heart, takes place during a day in the life of struggling musician Jay Parker whose lifelong quest for success is put into sharp focus as, while evading the police and a psychopathic crime lord, he must choose between playing a lifechanging gig or saving an African family from a human trafficking ring.

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Duncan Ross Kodak Theatre, Los Angeles - Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame Music Awards The glare of the spotlights was blinding. Through a haze of cigar smoke and dry ice, Jay could just make out muted silhouettes and occasional movement.

The sound of creaking chairs, clinking glasses and a garble of conversation punctuated the silence. He strained his eyes trying to identify faces. Was that Bono? And next to him, Christina Aguilera with her shimmering blonde hair? It looked like them. One thing was for sure, it was a full house, packed to the rafters with the royalty of music and entertainment.

Now he was finally here, the Kodak Theatre was not how he imagined it would be. The dull, maroon velvet seats seemed a little dated, for such a prestigious venue. The carpet looked rather tatty and cheap too, like an industrial nightclub rug; cigarette-burned and stained by the spilled drinks of award winners and losers from the history of music and film. The room smelled a little like a church too, stale and cold.

Jay licked his lips. Isn’t this the place where the Oscars are handed out? It felt more like a tired bingo venue. He couldn’t clearly remember the walk up to the stage; just sort of arrived there. Then the award - a sleek small black figure of a woman holding aloft a miniature record disc - Jay immediately labelled it 127

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the Devil’s Oscar - was passed to him, and before he knew it, he was unfolding a piece of paper containing the names of all the people he had promised himself he would publicly thank when he finally made it the many good friends - and of course, family who had stuck by him through thick and thin. When the chips were down, and it had looked like the band was going nowhere, these people had kept the faith.

This was their night too.

He stepped up to the podium and adjusted the microphone. It objected with an insolent screech of feedback and drew a deep and disapproving Ooohhh from the audience. On closer inspection, Jay was shocked to see that the mic was only just being held together by black gaffer tape. Something didn’t feel right, but when was anything how you’d expect it to be in the heady world of fame? Oddness prevails at all levels.

He sensed the audience, now a rumble of fidgety shuffling and coughing, was getting restless; their minds, no doubt, occupied with egotistical thoughts about why they themselves had not won an award, and which party they would, or would not, be invited to later on. None of it fazed him; he was a talented musician and had worked damn hard. Lady Luck had finally been kind to him, but deep down he felt he deserved to be here, among equals. It was his time, The Rage’s time.

‘Oh well, here goes,’ Jay sucked in a breath of stuffy auditorium air and prepared to speak. It was a 128

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speech he had rehearsed in front of the mirror a thousand times, and now, at last, he was about to deliver it for real. It was unusual that the famous English game-show host Sir Bruce Forsythe had handed the award to him. Jay knew of Bruce’s light entertaining skills, his tap-dancing abilities, and his unparalleled knack of being able to tell a bad joke kind-of-well, but what business did he have in Hollywood? Was he a goliath in the American entertainment industry too? Hadn’t he in fact passed away a few years back? It didn’t fit, but once more he reasoned with himself - the world of show business was a bizarre place where wacky things happened: giant craziness.

‘And now ladies and gentlemen...um um…,’ Brucey mumbled, ‘I give you Jay Parker of The Rage.

The earliest induction ever into the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame...um um um um um… didn’t he do well, folks? Good game, good game!’ He tap-danced away in his black and white penguin suit, then stood muttering to himself like an idling petrol lawnmower.

Um um um um.

Bonkers! Jay thought to himself, looking sidelong at Brucey. He never imagined that his chin would be so big in real life. As a matter of fact, it was beyond big; it easily accounted for two thirds of the area of his face. It had a hypnotic pendulous quality when he tilted his head from side to side, and Jay found himself contemplating how he would navigate his head through the neck hole of a t-shirt.

Tearing his eyes away, he composed himself and 129

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began. ‘Thank you, thank you. It certainly has been a crazy year: three Ivor Novellos, two Grammys, and now an early induction into the Hall of Fame.

This really is a huge honour.’ There was thunderous applause before Jay cut in again. ‘Not to say that the band doesn’t deserve it. We know we rock and it was just a matter of time before the world caught on. It’s not our fault you’re all a little slow on the uptake.

Here’s to peace, love, music, and freedom!’ Jay thrust the award above his head and shook it as though it was the Jules Rimet trophy. The whoops of approval told him he had won the room over. Although a little unwilling to admit it, the acceptance felt magnificent; after all, the people before him were the big players in the music world, and now his contemporaries.

They had all trodden this tough path at one point. It was one thing to be adored by your fans but another thing altogether when one’s musical equals appreciated your hard work and talent. Eric Clapton’s Layla riff played at full blast sealing the occasion with a thick helping of classic rock.

Jay closed his eyes and let the music and applause course through him. Music was everything. It was the only language he truly understood or wanted to understand. Everything else came second. He loved every aspect of it, from the quiet personal moments of creation, to the raucous bedlam of a live show. The harmony he found in music, equated to harmony in life. One night he had tried to describe this to The Rage’s Northern Irish drummer, Pat. He was shouting 130

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over a nightclub sound system.

OOMPH OOMPH OOMPH ‘There’s a place where you’re transported to when the music comes together on stage, Pat...’ OOMPH OOMPH OOMPH ‘...You’re a live band and you’re functioning as one...’

OOMPH OOMPH ‘...The whole is infinitely greater than the sum of the parts....’ OOMPH ‘...It’s as if there’s a fifth, unseen member, bigger than all of us but also…also part of us. You’re hypnotised, you’re no longer thinking, you’re just being, growing, expanding together, like the universe...’ OOMPH OOMPH ‘…That ‘look’ that band members give each other on stage says it all. You know the one, Pat...

It’s an unspoken understanding. Telepathy...yeah, a kind of telepathy’ OOMPH OOMPH OOMPH ‘...

It’s a magic...a magic that can only be experienced in music. It’s why even movie stars want to be in a band. There’s no buzz like it, mate.......know what I mean, Pat?...’ OOMPH OOMPH OOMPH. Pat stared vacantly at Jay with his watery, drugged-out eyes as the music boomed at an ear-splitting level. ‘Your ma’s fit, Jay. Have I ever told you that?’

Jay continued addressing the Kodak Theatre crowd. ‘I’d like to thank everybody that has helped us, including our families, God, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix and our record company. You’ve all helped us to achieve our dream and we’re indebted to all of you.’

A voice came from behind Jay. It was Brucey.

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‘Higher or lower, Mr Parker?’ Excitedly, Brucey nodded his head, his eyes and mouth wide open and cartoon-like. A little tap dance followed. Clickety-click.

Dumbstruck, Jay looked back over his shoulder. He tried to respond but couldn’t find the words.

‘Um um um um...higher or lower son?’ Brucey pressed on. His thin silver moustache glittered under the stage lights. ‘And remember you get nothing for a pair in this game. Nice to see you’, Brucey faced the crowd and flung his arms into the air. ‘To see you.’

‘NICE!’ Jay automatically blurted out in unison with the theatre. The awards ceremony was morphing into Play Your Cards Right. As Brucey whipped the room into a frenzy with slick 70s clubland skill, Jay spied someone familiar approaching him from stage left. It was his mum dressed as a clown. She clomped towards him in oversized red shoes, frothing champagne flutes in either hand. Her sky-blue satin suit shimmered and rippled with each step. Red pom-poms ran from her waist up to an enormous white ruffle at her neck.

Cheered on by the likes of Ozzy, Marilyn Manson and Ice-T, Brucey was now tap dancing behind him, clattering away on the floorboards at breakneck speed. Smoke and flames were coming off his feet, but Jay’s clown-attired mother had drawn all of his attention.

‘Toast, son.’ She clumsily bounded forwards with the fizzing glasses. ‘Toast.’ The bright red foam rubber nose made her voice squeaky and nasal. The 132

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top of her head was egg bald with a clump of bushy orange hair at either side.

Jay scratched his head. ‘It’s not time for a toast just yet, mum. I’m a bit busy doing my awards speech, but thanks. Maybe afterwards?’

She wasn’t listening to him. ‘Toast, Jay, toast.’

He sighed as he looked down at the Hall of Fame award. It had turned into a weird mix of a pigeon and a spatula.

‘Toast, lazy bones....and tea!,’ Liz clanged the cup and plate down beside him on the bedside table.

‘I’m too good to you.’ She threw open the curtains, sending Jay retracting back under his duvet like a tortoise into its shell.

‘It’s a big day for you today, time to get a move on. You really don’t want to blow this!’

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Peter Swindells

Peter Swindells is an author from Liverpool. He has a degree in Psychology, two children, a disabled pigeon and a cat. He is allergic to cats. Work on his first novel has been transformative, fostering eclectic interest in diverse subjects including philosophy, religion, poetry, myth and magic.

Morbid Paramour

Following a near-death experience Doctor Tod Orm becomes convinced he can resurrect his daughter with magic. Bonded to an entity that appears as his ex-wife, he stumbles into a world of occult societies, werewolves and vampires with conflicting agendas.

Tod’s obsession may unravel the universe, but will he care?

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Morbid Paramour Peter Swindells

I try to make sense of it with the clarity of hindsight. I tell myself that the murder of my mother was as necessary as that of the little girl. That there was no other way to subvert the path of the destroyer. I tell myself that, but I don’t believe it.

- Memoir of Salvation Belle awoke with a yelp, gasping and sweaty from a dream of drowning. Her lip throbbed, head swam.

She prodded her lip ring and hissed. Licked blood from her fingertip and cursed. The afterimage of the dream lingered: a feeling of physical submersion and struggle for life. Her blonde dreadlocks weighty and oppressive; she pushed them about, here and there, then quit and lay still.

A minute passed before she noticed her bed guest was not beside her and the candles had been relit. A faux-fur rug served in place of a duvet; she tossed it aside and swung her feet to the floor. The breeze from her movement caused the candle flames to flicker and the shadows danced. She looked about the studio apartment: the bed was beneath the window and a dining table and four chairs occupied half of the room; a tiny kitchen and windowless bathroom adjoined. Clothes were heaped on the floor. Books were stacked everywhere practical. On the walls, nebulae imaged by Hubble hung alongside angels 137

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and psychedelic art prints. Emaciated Jesus agonised and bleeding above a chubby laughing Buddha.

Coloured crystals tinted the light they caught and sprayed lattices of pink, purple and blue on their surroundings. Belle noted an ashtray was spilled and wondered if she or he were culpable. His suit draped on a chair suggested he had not left. She listened, couldn’t hear him; studied the room, hair raised on the back of her neck. She spotted bare legs outstretched in a patch of deep shadow near the foot of the bed. She stared into the gloom. There was a whiskey bottle on its side, open and empty. Then she saw the tourniquet on his arm.

Belle dived to Tod and called his name. She inspected his features for signs of life, but in the dark could not see his pallid complexion. When she held his stubbly cheeks in her hands his flesh was cold and clammy. She pulled open his hazel eyes and called again his name, then slid her fingers through his dark greasy hair, tried to reposition him onto his side, still calling, ‘Tod! Tod!’ She took a slow breath, calmed her thoughts; tried to recall procedure. She rubbed her knuckles into his chest bone without response; checked his breathing and found none. She jabbed her fingers into his mouth searched for obstructions, tilted his head, pinched his nose and gave two quick breaths into his mouth. Tod was stone cold and tasted of whiskey and bile; she gagged. He had no pulse.

‘Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.’ The word became 138

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a mantra. She dashed to the bathroom, opened the cabinet, pulled out a small box and ran back to him.

Friction grazed her knees as she landed and yelled ‘Tod!’ into his ear. Inside the box were a sealed syringe and a bottle of naloxone, an opiate antagonist. She popped the cap on the bottle, tore open the syringe, attached the needle and loaded it with 1cc.

She stabbed his thigh and plunged. She pinched his nose again and gave another deep breath. Still no pulse. She began chest compressions then repeated mouth-to-mouth. He was lifeless.

Tod’s chest jumped with strangled sobs. A glasswalled room, a table taller than he was; the sun had no business shining there nor anywhere, nevermore.

The doughy secretary smiling and friendly, sought to sooth, but she was not his mother, gone forever.

Dad’s heavy hand upon his shoulder drove him to the door. Be a man, he said. Tod began to wail again.

An old-fashioned suit of red and gold obscured the view; cast a shadow over the little boy’s world. The magician squatted on his haunches, flashed pearly teeth, contrast against deep tan. ‘Would you like to see a card trick little man?’ The cards were shuffled, flicked and turned. The trick was done, all but one.

The final card was no card at all: a photograph of dark-haired parents and red-haired little girl. It made no sense. No sense until...

Tod stood back from the hospital bed. He felt like a ghost, present but not really there. Marissa had 139

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been in labour for sixteen hours and was exhausted.

Her black hair was gathered in a messy bunch and strands clung to her glistening, pale skin. Sucking on nitrous oxide had made her lips puffy and cracked.

The crash team had been summoned and the delivery room was cramped. The doctor said, ‘I can see her now. Marissa I need you to keep going. When I say, give one big push.’

On cue, Marissa roared through clenched teeth.

The baby’s head appeared, went back in, then she was out into the doctor’s hands where she hung like a rag doll. She did not cry or wriggle. She was blue.

The world trembled; threatened to fall.

Marissa cried, ‘What’s wrong?’

The nurses rushed with a towel. The cord was clipped and cut. The doctor laid the baby on a trolley where they forced a tube up her nostril. The lights glared. Tod echoed the mother, ‘What’s wrong?

What’s wrong?’

‘We need to clear her lungs.’

Behind him Marissa wailed, ‘Why can’t I hold my baby?’

Tod said, ‘It’s okay. They just need to clean her up first.’

‘But is she really okay?’

Looking at the baby, blue, he said, ‘Yes.’ He watched them withdraw the tube and hold a miniature oxygen mask that swallowed his daughter’s face.

A female nurse said, ‘You can help. She needs stimulating. Keep rubbing her gently with the towel.’

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Tod reached to the tiny creature on the trolley, limbs as slim as his fingers. The world rocked and rolled around him. Pulsed. Ached.

Behind him Marissa begged for reassurance; demanded to know what was happening. Tod watched his only child, lifeless.

They took the mask from her and observed.

Someone said, ‘No.’ They tapped Tod’s hand away from the towel and inserted the tube back up her nostril, sucking and slurping.

The world was breaking, shaking itself apart.

The medics jittered and split into a cascade of multi-exposures. Glitter sparks hung like mist. Only Tod was preserved as the world came undone. He relaxed and cleared his mind. In madness it seemed that all possible futures stretched before him and his daughter always died. He begged God, the Devil, the Great Programmer in the Sky, Take me instead.

Not her. Don’t let her die. I will do anything. Anything.

The medical staff persisted. God did not answer.

He was out of his mind and the world was ending.

Let it end. I would burn the world for her. He focussed, tried to force the universe to obey his will. Into his mind came a forgotten image: a photograph of a man with a black-haired wife and red-haired daughter. It was an impossible photograph that had never been taken; a snapshot of something that had never been.

Yet he had seen it. In the eye of the storm Tod had a moment of clarity. He could not force the universe to change; it only needed permission.

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The doctor said, ‘She’s breathing. You helped.

Well done.’ The room was filled with smiling faces. A nurse wrapped the pink, wriggling baby and passed her to the crying mother; the infant began to squawk.

Tod smiled through his tears and banished the delusions from his mind.

Belle studied Tod and counted to seven. He refused to breathe independently. She would have to call an ambulance for an OD in her apartment and they would ask questions. Maybe they would call the police. She kicked herself for not knowing if California had a Good Samaritan law or if she was going to end up in jail because some guy she only met twice used her apartment to shoot up without even asking permission. She wondered if burned-out reefer stubs could get her arrested, or her bong in the kitchen.

She screamed abuse at Tod and punched him in the chest. Then she apologised, held his nose and continued sharing her lungs.

It was Christmas. The tree was nine feet tall and a foot short of the ceiling beams. The tree lights flared, danced and dimmed, cast rainbow colours over the room. The glitter sparkled as stars turned. It was 6 a.m., dark outside and snow had chilled the house.

Ariana kneeled before the fire in her bathrobe with red hair hanging loose and wild to the luxurious rug.

Tod focussed on the camera in his hands, smiling at the image of his family as he moved for a better shot.

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Marissa passed the present to their daughter. It was a long box and not well disguised considering it was just what had been requested.

Ariana peeled the tape carefully so as not to tear the cartoon wrapping paper, which she always insisted on preserving. She squealed, ‘A clarinet!’ and grinned so wide Tod could see all of her teeth. Face beaming, she dived onto her mother, embraced her, then wrapped her arms about Tod and declared him the best Daddy in the whole wide world. Camera in hand he barely returned the hug, eager to preserve the moment for posterity.

‘Tod put the camera down for one moment,’ said Marissa.

‘You’re right. I’m hardly in any of these. Let’s get one of us all together.’

Ariana squeezed her father’s legs as he pressed buttons. He placed it on the mantelpiece. ‘I set it to ten seconds. Hurry!’

Marissa said, ‘Will it even be a good shot?’

‘Stand right here, next to me.’ He lifted his daughter into his arms and positioned her in the middle as Marissa snuggled up at the side. The camera flashed.

Tod stepped forward and examined the view screen.

He had seen the photo before. For a moment he was swept up in déjà vu.

The fire cracked. Everyone jumped. A plume of sparks exploded and a log leapt from its place and rolled, flaming across the rug. Tod dropped the camera onto the mantelpiece. He lunged at the 143

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burning log, grabbed it with his bare hands. His flesh cooked as he lifted it back into the hearth. He ground his teeth and swallowed a scream. When he turned back to his wife and daughter he was smiling and laughing so that they would too. Waving his fingers about he made noises like a monkey, ‘Ee-ee, ooh-ooh, ah-ah.’ He wanted to cry, but he laughed instead.

They all laughed together.

Marissa took his hands, frowned at charred blisters. ‘Doesn’t that hurt?’

‘No,’ he lied. Ariana tugged at his sleeve.

Marissa kissed his fingers; licked the tips. The pain was intense wherever she touched him. To him she was beautiful beyond words; the font of all joy and goodness in his world. He smiled at her. ‘I don’t think I can hold the camera anymore.’

‘Good. Now maybe you can hold us for a change.’

He continued to smile despite the pain.

Belle curled into a ball and gnawed her dreadlocks.

She cursed herself for not calling an ambulance immediately. She sat up. A candle sputtered out and the darkness grew. How long had she been trying?

She looked down at him, cold and dead. There was no sign of life; nothing. She rolled onto her back and hugged her knees to her chest, stared up at a Jolly Roger she had pinned to the ceiling. She hoped to God that she still had cigarettes somewhere in the apartment. ‘Well, this sucks.’

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Morbid Paramour

Tod lay on the bed beside his daughter as she slept.

He looked as though he shared her illness; muscles atrophied from lack of nourishment and rest, eyes hollow and sore. The data ran through his mind as clearly as if it were displayed before him: height, weight, fat percentage, muscle density, metabolic rate, nutrient balance, the three-dimensional chemical structure of the markers absorbed by the cancer cells and the frequency of ultra-sound that made them vibrate and trigger cellular apoptosis causing the tumours to self-destruct. The imaged internal structure of his daughter’s body turned and zoomed in his mind’s eye. Finding the cure had consumed him as the cancer consumed her.

Ariana stirred. ‘Daddy?’

He forced a smile, held back his tears. She had always been pale, but now she was grey. Red hair that had never in her eight years been cut spread out over the pastel duvet. ‘Yes honey?’

‘Can I have a Dr Pepper please?’

‘I’m sorry my darling, but we have to be very careful with your diet. Remember? It’s part of the process to get you better.’

She smiled a cheeky smile. ‘But you said I am getting better.’

‘You are.’

‘Am I really?’

‘Yes.’ ‘Promise?’

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of them is better now. Completely better.’

‘What’s a Nobel Prize?’

Tod laughed. ‘Who have you been talking to?’

‘I heard Mummy and Jonathon. They said you were getting a Nobel Prize.’

‘I don’t know about that.’ He shook his head and wondered when that conversation had occurred without him around. He decided to distract himself from the subject and began to sing. ‘Incy Wincy Spider...’ He made a square with his outstretched forefingers and thumbs, touching tip to tip, rotated them as he sang. ‘...climbed up the waterspout.’

Ariana nudged him, giggled. ‘Daddy I’m not a baby anymore!’

‘It’s your favourite song. Come on, we used to sing this all the time. Down came...’

She grabbed his hands with her cold little fingers.

‘It’s a baby song!’

‘Okay, okay!’ He tickled her bony ribs. She laughed.

‘Please can I have a Dr Pepper? I really want one.’

He sighed and got out of bed, still smiling. ‘I shouldn’t, but alright. Alright...’

Then: déjà vu within déjà vu within déjà vu, as though he had been doomed to repeat this moment for eternity. He remembered giving in to Ariana’s demands. He remembered the sound of Marissa wailing and the icy tin in his hand. That same chill ran through him again. ‘No. I can’t leave you.’

She pleaded.

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He remembered the funeral.

The walls pulsed to the beat of his heart.

‘Please?’ she said; extended the middle vowels so that the word carried on and on, drifting through his mind, testing the limits of reality.

He trembled. ‘No. If I stay I can save you. This time I can save you.’ Or am I dead too?

Ariana’s smile dropped. Her face slackened. She collapsed into the pillows. Red hair engulfed her.

Tod rushed forward and the moment he touched her she opened her eyes and began to scream. ‘Daddy help me! Pleeeeease...’ The endless vowels sliced and cut.

He hugged her tight like he always should have done every single day. She withered. He looked into her eyes as they rolled back and ruptured, melted into tar. Dark veins swelled and her flesh loosened, slackened, peeled from bones. Putrescent stench choked his airways. He howled defiance and hugged her tighter still, desperate to keep her life from escaping. Liquid oozed from her skin and soaked through his clothes. The slime sunk in and he felt the pain as his own living flesh began to rot. His hands shrivelled, dissolved, meat dripped wracked by agony.

The horror repulsed, threatened. Common sense warned him to let go, but he renewed his vows of, Never! His daughter’s remains crumbled and still she screamed. With skeletal hands he hugged the memory of her, pulled her shade into his heart. The room exploded, the floor became dust.

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Fleshless falling into the Abyss a grit upon which darkness pearled.

148

Magaly Tawakoni

After a voyage of discovery around South America to reconnect with her native roots, Brazilian Magaly Tawakoni settled in Liverpool, England. The city, and the birth of her new-born son, inspired her to write The Sacred Tea, her debut novel.

The Sacred Tea

At a time when only indigenous people occupied Brazil, Tainå follows her own intuition when faced with the object of her tribe’s fears. Years later, her story unravels itself to another young woman, every time she drinks a sacred tea.

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The Sacred Tea Magaly Tawakoni The Crocodile Tainá left her spear on the shore and brushed the tiny stones in the shallows with her bare feet. Her warm body shuddered contentedly as she felt the coldness of the water. Streaks of light filtering through the forest canopy allowed her to see through the muddy waters of the Amazon river. Shoals of yellow Lambari fish danced around her.

The air above the narrow tributary was raucous with the squawking of birds, the chirping of crickets and the hidden croaking of frogs. Lush forest draped itself over the edge of the red ochre riverbank, a secret sanctuary for the young woman and the children she looked after.

Tainá plunged into the water. The red urucum paint she had on her body dissolved. She looked tribeless. The river cooled her naked body and calmed her mind. For a moment, she forgot who she was.

A pink dolphin jumped by her side, splashing her.

A good omen. She emerged from the water with a smile and raised her hands, signaling the children to join them.

Cauã dived from a tree trunk. The black stripes on the bottom half of his face made him resemble a man, despite his youth. A few strokes brought him to the middle of the river where he turned on to his 151

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back, waving to call the others. ‘No, Cauã,’ Tainá called, ‘Peri is too young to go out that far.’

Nina swam towards her. ‘Auntie Ta,’ the young girl said, ‘Peri doesn’t want to come. He is afraid of crocodiles.’

‘Ah, Peri…’ Tainá smiled. She reached to brush Nina’s wet hair away from her eyes. A stranger would take them for sisters, though Nina was the daughter of Tainá’s best friend.

‘I told him we’re safe here, but he never listens to me.’

Tainá pushed Nina’s hair back from her face, revealing the red star painted on her forehead. ‘I will talk to Peri. Go play with Cauã and keep an eye on him for me. Don’t let him go too far.’

Peri was standing rigid, eyes fixed on a clump of trees across the river when Tainá popped up at his side. The brown spots painted on his face and his chubby belly made her think of a jaguar cub. He ran into her arms. His heart thumped against her skin like a drumbeat.

‘Tie Ta, wokodile!’

‘Pepê, we come here almost every day and we never saw a crocodile before.’

‘Wokodile eat Ta!’ Peri blubbered.

‘Be brave, little warrior,’ she said. He raised his head to look into her eyes. She ruffled his hair and smiled. ‘There’s nothing dangerous here, I promise.’ ’Promise?’

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she said. ‘And you can show them how brave you are. You’re not scared of anything.’

Tainá lifted Peri in her arms and swung him out over the water. ‘Cro,’ she sang. ‘Co,’ the little boy giggled. ‘Dile!’ she threw him in the river. The little boy splashed through the shallows, delighted to join his friends. Nina and Cauã followed him.

‘Crocodiles…’ Tainá smiled while the sun’s heat dried her skin. She was always so happy here, watching the kids play. She couldn’t understand why they had to move on so soon. They had countless fish, many types of fruits and medicinal plants.

Everything they needed was here.

The warriors of the tribe, however, were worried. For the first time in four summers, they sensed unknown people nearby. It was only a matter of time before their paradise was attacked, their shaman had said. Past wars with other tribes had left them with only thirty men. They were brave and skilled yet they could ill afford to lose more. The Sun God would always help them find favourable land: it was easier to leave Mooka, seek a new settlement.

There must be a better way? Tainá thought. Her fondest memories were from their current village.

She remembered Peri’s first steps and the animals the children befriended. She recalled dancing to the enveloping soundscape during their ceremonies.

Tainá even thought of one of her favourite aromas, the reassuringly familiar scent of Caapi tree in the forest.

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In Mooka, Tainá had watched as the children grew and explored the wilderness in their own ways.

Nina tucked bird feathers on the path to mark the way. Peri copied Nina but used crystals instead: the colours that blazed when the sunshine hit their surface fascinated him. Cauã strutted everywhere with his spear, on the lookout for danger or something for the cooking pot. For Tainá, Mooka was the sound of the breeze as it sighed through the forest trees at night; the scent of water on leaves after the rain; it was the melody of the songs they sang for the gods under the full moon: it was these things and more.

It was home.

She sat down under a palm tree. She knew that the time was soon coming when she would not be able to spend time with these kids. A tear fell down her face. Soon she would marry. She would have her own family. Her husband would insist that she live with his people. I want to stay. Perhaps if I wasn’t a woman…I would have a say.

An açaí fruit fell from the tree into her lap. ‘I am still here,’ she thought, chewing it, trying to lift herself. Then, she rehearsed in her mind the steps she would dance with Nina at the next full moon. They would swirl and punch the air with their hands like the orange flames rebelling out of the Sacred Fire.

Cauã was watching Tainá. ‘I think Auntie Ta is planning our next adventure.’

‘Don’t be silly. She’s thinking about her wedding,’ said Nina.

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‘Wedding! Peri marry Ta!’ The little boy giggled.

Nina rolled her eyes. ‘No Peri, she will marry a handsome warrior from another tribe. After the wedding they will be our friends.’

‘My father told me that there will be lots of food when Tainá marries. Her husband’s family will send us cassava and cupuaçu,’ said Cauã.

‘I will eat all the cupuaçu, it’s my favourite.’ Nina licked her lips.

‘Peri marry Ta,’ the toddler crossed his arms, unhappy with the idea of Tainá with a man. He turned his head to the trees he had been contemplating before. He opened his mouth halfway. Something was moving behind them.

‘Tie Ta, wokodile,’ Peri yelled, making for the shore as fast as his arms would take him.

Tainá peered at the far bank of the river. A shadow moved. Her eyes widened. What could it be? ‘Come back, children,’ she shouted as she helped Peri out of the water.

Cauã climbed a vine to have a better view. He saw the same shadow. ‘Ghost!’ he yelled and jumped down.

‘Curumins,’ Tainá said. ‘Be calm. It is probably only monkeys. I’ll take a look anyway. Go and wait for me in our secret place.’

‘I will mind Peri,’ Nina said, excited to feel in charge.

Cauã walked in circles with his head down. ‘I ca—ca—can come with you,’ he said.

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‘Don’t worry, Cauã. I promise I will be back soon.

Go now.’

The children, sensing Tainá’s serious tone, obeyed without question; this wasn’t playtime anymore.

What should I do? Tainá knew it wasn’t a crocodile.

The shadows shifting in the trees were too high, as if a person were there. But who? Someone from another tribe? A spirit of the jungle, perhaps?

Her curiosity overcame her fears. Tainá picked up her spear and hurled it at the root of a large palm on the opposite bank. She swam at full speed. When she reached the other side, she used the spear to climb up a small ravine. Then she entered the forest.

The forest was dense; trees, vines and leaves folded together to create an impenetrable veil. A bough creaked not far away. She stepped back, then stopped, stilling her breath to listen.

Tainá plucked the branches from the bush in front of her to create an opening. First with her hands, then her head and finally her feet, she pushed through it.

Ahead of her, purple bromeliads lined a path.

Two bushes had been cut down the middle and laid on the ground. Someone had been there. Tainá looked around. I can’t see anyone. She followed the path. A couple of steps ahead she froze. Fresh blood was smeared on a Kapok tree. Exactly where Tainá heard the bough creaking moments ago. She held her spear firmly.

‘Throw the spear on the floor,’ a hoarse voice came from inside the Kapok.

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‘Who is there?’ Tainá turned to the tree.

Silence.

From nowhere, a sharp kick on Tainá’s foot made her fall. The spear flew away. She writhed. A pointed branch made a small cut on her shoulder. She looked up.

A young woman stood over her. An imposing blue feather headdress showed her hierarchy in her tribe. Cacique’s daughter, Tainá guessed. Red paintings over her breasts resembled spider webs. The black contour of her lips was like the colour of her hair.

Tainá pushed herself up from the ground, eyeing the woman warily. The veins on her neck throbbing.

She grasped the girl’s long hair and pushed her against the tree.

‘I didn’t mean any harm, I just wanted to take the spear from you, so no one is hurt,’ said the woman.

Tainá clenched her jaws. ‘Who are you? And whose blood is this?’ she pointed to the smears.

‘It is mine.’

Tainá narrowed her eyes. ‘What happened? This land belongs to my tribe. What are you doing here?’

‘I am called Spider. My tribe is camping not far from here. I’m menstruating. They can’t talk to me. I marked this tree so our women can find me.

They bring me food before the sun comes up in the morning.’

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isolate herself from their men too. Since she became a woman five winters ago, Tainá would go to a tent outside the village with her girlfriends. It was their time to rest, to pray. Everything became more vivid during that period: the sunlight, the giggly chats, the texture of the pottery they made.

Spider approached Tainá and touched her hair.

‘I wonder if we are more alike than your elders say,’ she said.

Tainá stepped back. ‘How do you know what my elders say?’

‘I have been here for days. I heard you talking to the kids.’

‘Are you a spying on us? Stay away from them.’

Tainá said, her voice rising with alarm.

‘Easy. I don’t mean to harm anyone. I would have liked to play with them, but I didn’t know how you would react.’

Tainá stared at Spider for a moment. She remembered her mother’s tales as a child telling her about tribes that lived in harmony, helping each other, building shelters together. Since then she secretly dreamed of meeting new people. She was curious about how their customs differed from hers. How did they paint their bodies? Did they prepare their food the same? How powerful were their gods? Did they fear outsiders as much as her tribe did?

‘Are you all right?’ Spider asked.

‘The children! They must be worried. I need to go back,’ said Tainá.

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‘Wait. Stay a little longer. I know you and the little girl are making a dance together. I love to dance, too. I can show you how a woman dances in my tribe, if you like.’

‘I can’t stay very long though,’ Tainá said.

Spider reached for Tainá’s left hand, guiding a dance. Tainá smiled, beginning to feel comfortable. Spider lowered her knees and slowly raised her hands in a circular motion. Then she made the same movement with her head, her hip, her legs.

She leaped like a long leaf dancing with the wind.

Tainá imitated her. The two looked at each other and laughed. Tainá hummed a tune.

They began to dance more closely, writhing together. Spider slid her fingers from Tainá’s cheeks to her breasts. From her breasts to her hips. Tainá felt Spider’s breath on her neck, smelling her. They kept dancing, lost in the moment. The sky became a mixture of orange, blue and pink shades.

The girls were swinging their hair into the air when an arrow flew past Spider’s face. She took Tainá’s hand and led her into the hollow inside the Kapok tree. Together, they clambered up to the top.

Through a crack, they looked across the river. Three men were standing on the bank, bows aimed in their direction.

‘How foolish of me,’ Tainá said. ‘They are my brothers. The curumins must have become frightened and gone to fetch them. They mustn’t see you,’ Tainá said.

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‘Curse you!’ Spider hissed. ‘I’ll hide. Make something up, don’t let them find me.’

Another arrow thudded into the top of the kapok tree.

Tainá trembled. She scrambled down, shouting, ‘Don’t shoot. It’s me. Tainá.’

She ran as fast as she could to the riverside.

The men lowered their bows and breathed a sigh of relief. Tainá dived into the river and swam towards them.

Iberê, her youngest brother, ran to the water and pulled her out.

‘The curumins were scared. What happened?’ he asked.

‘Nothing to worry about. It was just monkeys making more noise than usual.’

‘Why did you take so long? Let me guess, you needed to think about the wedding, am I right?’

‘Yes,’ she replied, bewildered.

‘Tata, you’re always scaring us,’ Raoni, her oldest brother reprimanded her. ‘Peri is crying. How can you leave the children waiting for so long? ‘ ‘I’m sorry. I’ve been anxious with all this talk about the wedding.’

‘I forgive you, but you will have to explain this to the elders, including how you got that cut on your shoulder.’

Tainá hugged her brothers, ‘Sorry about this.’

They believed me; Tainá crinkled her eyes and nose.

She felt the warmth of Spider’s hands on her skin as 160

The Sacred Tea

if she was still there. She looked up in silent prayer to the forest. I wish I can see her again.

Before walking back to the village, she glanced back across the river. A crocodile was basking under the last sunrays. Tainå’s eyes widened. Was it smiling at her? The crocodile opened its jaws and yawned, revealing rows of wicked teeth. It had smiled. She was sure of it.

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Note for agents, publishers and anyone interested in contacting the writers in this publication or finding out more about Pulp Idol please email: pulpidol@wowfest.co.uk If you are interested in contacting or finding out about Writing on the Wall: info@writingonthewall.org.uk 0151 703 0020 @wowfest

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Congratulations to the Pulp Idol writers for creating such brilliant first chapters and good luck - we hope to be reading your novels in the future.

Writing on the Wall is a dynamic, Liverpool-based community organisation that celebrates writing in all its forms and works with a broad and inclusive definition of writing that embraces literature, creative writing, journalism and nonfiction, poetry, song-writing and storytelling. We work with local, national and international writers whose work provokes controversy and debate, and with all of Liverpool’s communities to promote and celebrate individual and collective creativity. WoW’s creative writing projects support health, wellbeing and personal development.

If you have a story to tell or would like to take part in or work with WoW to develop a writing project, please get in touch – we’d love to hear from you.

Mike Morris and Madeline Heneghan, Co-Directors

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