The wind calls your name, get out of your bed

‘What was that tune, the one we heard at the Cart and Horse, just off Marrow Road at the back of Wheel’s stocking factory, the one they knocked down for those council flats. You know, we heard it around the time of the Coronation when we had a street party but not a telly as your Mam fall out with Aunty Grace over who had the last pork chop. Anyroads, the hospital is bigger than when I was rushed here to have Trevor, do you remember that night, you drunk down stairs with my Dad and me screaming out to me mother up in the bedroom. Dr Hoods was so nice – warm hands and a smile. Not like the ones today all beeps and cold questions. So was it a rock and roll song? Did we have them back then? It might have been country, but how would we have heard songs like that on the wireless? We had to listen as a family so none of our parents would have let us play what they would have seen as smut.  Where was I, so yes where I come in, the entrance is all glass and metal with lots of people sitting around waiting for other folks to call them to wards and clinics? I could see in the glass that wearing my best, shop brought, not catalogue were a mistake. The dress and hat made me look that I missed the church and had popped in for directions. Last time I was early, so I fancied a bit of ham and lettuce with tomatoes, no chance. The café there only served chips and fry-ups; you’d think it would be better than that in a hospital. Didn't the tune have something about wind and being lonesome? Mine you, a boy like that would wouldn't he! So that does that sound country? Did we call music like that a name back then? We said it was American or Irish ballads like your Mam belted out after a gin or two with heaving bosoms, and your mother could heave with her being broader then she were tall. Anyroads, I found the nurse, or she found me with her clipboard and papers. She was, you know, one of those from abroad but her English was good. Well I say she was a nurse because she was in uniform but nowadays it could just means she wipes you know what as full nurses are as snooty as what the doctors are. Didn't we have a record once with singing doctors on; it was hit in the sixties, from one of those Doctors in the House films. The one with a big voice was in charge, and the nice one with dark hair and charm was the junior.  The loud one had had a moustache you could hang your washing off.  Or was that someone else? Perhaps that’s the song I were thinking of? Where was I? I’d forget my drawers if I had a fur coat, so she brought me up to your ward. They are better now than those mixed ones where you try and avoid seeing bits you don’t see in a decent home. And hearing noises that they think are as normal as passing around a bag of boiled sweets. I thought the tune mentioned stormy weather so it would have been ‘sitting out the dance’ music as we would had said in those days. I know that what’s our marriage has been like at times but you don’t start off with thoughts like that unless you’re in the family way and want to get wed before the kid turns up as a page boy. Mind, Nowadays, they get wed with five in tow like our Wendy.Perhaps I'm remembering the wrong tune and time. Anyroads, no matter, I found you and I can hold your hand until we work out what our song was in those days. Oh it’s coming back to me now, what was that lonesome song by those American comedians, the fat grumpy one and the thin stupid one. They were in the old movies and didn’t we see them one in the Albany Music Hall, long since gone, it’s a supermarket now, but would we have heard that song in the fifties?’

‘Mrs Whitfield…Mrs Whitfield. I'm so sorry but he-‘

‘I know love, I know, he slipped away as I sat down but we haven’t finished our song yet.’

Every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future.

In summer we walk in my garden. 

You see a tangle of brambles, wild grass, and weeds stretching back to broken walls. I see a garden of neat lawns,  rose-beds and tucked away vegetable patches.

We stand together by a solitary yellow rose; I smell the past and you a future.

---

A Missed Opportunity

Filla bent down to wash her hair in the spring. To amuse her Ombi cheekily shouted to a passing white woman, ‘Longapela winim!’

Lady Southfields, asked the guide, ‘I'm sorry, what did he say?’

Looking at the ground, he replied, ‘Erm...him saying you looking good.’

She turned, rolled her eyes and smiled at Filla before continuing her walk.

Ombi laughed and trust his body to and fro before shouting, ‘Pilai wantaim meri?’

Lady Southfields would indeed but she preferred softer flesh.

---

listen to ‘A missed opportunity’ on Audioboo

Remains of the day

The slammed door told her go.

Outside, warmed by the morning sun, she saw again the snow dusted fields of the first time. The tearful promises wanting compassion.

Not this time.

She knew what he would wake up missing. He did say he wanted to stop being a cock.

---

listen to ‘Remains of the day’ on Audioboo

Memories

Alf always enjoyed dancing even after Annie's death he danced alone to scratchy 78s.The Warden was not happy at the 'disturbance' so Alf was forced to stop until Mary opposite noticed.

Then a knock on the wall let him dance as she made the Warden too busy to hear 'Got A Date With An Angel' She loved him enough to accept it would never be her.

---

listen to ‘Memories’ on Audioboo

Until the light was gone

In the dank gloom, he saw Camelot.  It's a pile of old rocks,was all he could get Sally to say. Perhaps she was right.

Yet sword clanged on sword.Turning to kiss her, he said, 'Princess, it's what you make it.'

The silence told him, which was the fairy-story.

---

listen to ‘Until the light was gone’ on Audioboo

First Kiss Miss

It had been Martin’s first. It wasn’t a great kiss - stars stayed in the sky, and lips slithered but it was love. At least to him it wasn’t a sordid mistake, a drunken lark.

His angry ‘Bleeding hell, no!’ to the band’s new name was only understood by Kris.

---

listen to ‘First kiss miss’ on Audioboo

Love of 1921

Random word: May 1921

---

Sometimes its the spider that gets caught

 

 

 

 

'I mean it's not lady-like.'

Mavis always acted lady-like. She loved the disappointment in men when her twentieth century body followed nineteenth century rules.

Sadly, Rob proved to be a gentleman. She'd so wanted him to say then don’t be a lady.

Rob smiled, and left - the plan was working.

 

 

 

Random Word:Tight-laced.

---

if you want to listen, click on below

a kiss away

I saw a castle broken into bones of grandeur, scratched with screams and clatter, damp with the mist of autumn rain. Strength still for protection but a kiss away from love. I turned to her, eyes filled with fluttering flags and looked.

rainy grey
empty
moor cold

And saw nothing.

Random word: Mismatched

---

Wonder Boys by Michael Chabon (2006)

Story of a weekend that goes very badly wrong as Grady Tripp, a writer stuck with a book he can’t finish, and relationships he can’t stick to, manages to get drunk and high in all the wrong places, as wife, girlfriend, best friend, new rising writer, Jewish-Korean in-laws are caught up in ever shady dealings and shock revelations. And yes it’s now a film! The story unfolds from his point of view and memories with clearly delineated characters with their own voice from the mid 90’s. My only hmm moment with the plot is a drunk, pot smoking professor has a female student lodger from his own course and gets drunk with one of his male students, getting him laid. Were USA colleges that liberal back then? Leaving that aside, the story builds a fast and jaw dropping set of events with a wonderful light and shade of farcical humour and subtle loss.



: Good - read it again and loan it out or give to friends when shelves full.

---

Just another love song

Visit Mr.Knowitall to post your own Friday Flash Fifty-Five Fiction!

'Do you know what soundtrack you are?'

The question caught my attention, which is more then she did. I liked them blond and pretty – young was only an option. I had some morals.

Nodding for a refill, I asked, 'Which?'

She leant over to hum some old song.  I missed the warning by laughing.

   

Random Word: Old Song

---

if you want to listen, click on below

He was buried in a potter’s field

Random Word: potter’s field

---

She sat on a bare mattress

---

Return to sender

 

Random Word: Decision

---

So when will he notice?

Random Word: Jangles

---

The camera never lies

 

Random Word: Rubies

---

To the grave will it go

 Random Word: Absolve

---

Alas he loved elsewhere

Random Word: Colly

---

Christmas Serial - Episode 5: Christmas Love

 

 

‘What the effing hell, said Deb rushing by.‘He’s worth two of you.’ She told Pete where to go by kissing Al and giving him Christmas back.

 

 

 

 

---

Twitter episode story for The Writing Bomb