First step...

So far, the front cover! Done very very quickly I should add, and with no sense of direction...

However, someone (who will remain unnamed) has given me a good idea for its direction. Initially this was going to be a writing project but it seems I have too much university stuff to do. I do though, have LOTS of pictures from my time in Paris. So, going on this persons idea I am going to construct a book of photos as postcards with the writing reflecting the photograph. All will make much more sense when I'm done. The title suitably I thought should be in French and hopefully catch the eye of more people! Shameless, I know...

Tom woke up to his hand burning.
*
“Can you pass the peeeeas pleeeease” chuckled Mary.
“Now Mary, you must be very nice to your brother. He’s going through a tough time at the moment aren’t you baby” said their mother.

Tom grunted and walked off, remarking he wasn’t hungry, before his mother could tell him again, ‘You must eat something ’.

Tom sat on his bed and looked down at his bandaged hand. Annoyed he’d done it punching a wall and not the boys making his life hell. High school was different he’d been told, new people, new start. No nicknames and sly kicks when the teacher wasn’t looking and even when they were sometimes.

He lay back on his bed and closed his eyes. Tom thought about doing it with a toaster in the bath, like he’d heard about once. However, Danny told everyone in R.E class about how he dropped a glass of water on his and instead of making a big bang it fused and shut off. ‘To stop people doing silly things’ Danny’s mum had said. Tom hated bathes anyway and thought ‘what a way to be found’.

With the absence of hooks and a high ceiling, that was off too. You could also get that one wrong he’d read online, be paralysed for the rest of your life. He couldn’t do that to his family as much as he hated them.

Pill’s were tricky. The doctor’s anti-depressants weren’t strong enough and they made him sick. The thought of being found in is very own pool of unhappiness, alive, was too much to stomach. Tom felt a push on his bladder and flashed opened his eyes, getting up to go to the toilet. Small tasks that keep you going seemed pointless to him and he walked out not bothering to flush or wash.

He contemplated his other options for a while and laughed out loud. Living, he thought, was his very own suicide it seemed.

“It is so nice to hear you laughing again honey, mummy worries when you come home with hands like that” said his mother appearing at his door, bending to kiss him on the head.

Tom grunted again and rolled over. He stared at the prayer candle the vicar had given him on Sunday, locking eyes with a carved out Jesus drawn in black wax. ‘Even he had troubles’ the vicar had reassured him. Reaching out to retrieve it, he strained his bad hand and let out a yelp. The matches in his pocket would do, since planning to start smoking hadn’t got off the ground yet.

Lifting his body up he bent to reach the candle, gazing at it up close. The vicar told him to pray with it and he’d know Tom was doing this and pray back. Tom wasn’t religious but lit it anyway. It was something to watch. It’s immediate destruction and power, fascinated him.

He leant back and closed his eyes. Tears drifted down and felt warm on his cheeks. The pills wouldn’t work as long as the kicking, name calling and punching were happening he knew. Lifting his eyelids and he grabbed the brown chunky bottle with his name on and threw it at the wall.

“Night smelly” said Mary giggling.
“Mary! I heard that, apologise now!” said their mother.

But she wouldn’t and Tom shut his eyes again and fell into a sleep he hoped to get stuck in.

Five in the morning, Tom awoke to the smell of burning. His bandage lay balancing on Jesus’ face, burning in unison. Tom jumped up and ran to the bathroom. Hesitating he dangled his burning bandage over the sink.

‘This is it’ he thought. Tom began crying and returned to his bedroom. Laid back and watched it burn.

Shit.

Sketch book Project

A quick post to let you know about my future project...as the writing seems to have come to a messy standstill. My boyfriend recently told me about this website http://arthousecoop.com/projects/sketchbookproject . The basis is you pick a theme and they send you a sketch book and away you go! You do not have to stick rigidly to it nor do you have to draw neccessarily, so for me this is kind of perfect. I picked 'The greatest story ever told' and will be experimenting with voice and narrative in a diary esque style throughout (atleast that's the plan). If time allows I will also attempt to illustrate or photograph. For now, I think I am just a little bit shitting myself over the pressure of a whole book to fill. I will scan and upload entries as they happen if anyone out there is interested! (They also offer a digitalising service at an extra $20 or $40 later, but I think that's a little too optimistic for me). So if you fancy it do! The books will tour cities in America and you will be notified when somebody reads it, all very exciting and good for the ego!

*Have now been informed this is a reference to the Bible. I feel very stupid but will continue regardless

unexpected

Terry carried on down the road. Forty eight doors and not one ‘yes’ yet. He knocked hard this time to match the grandeur of the door. This door had one of those neighbourhood watch stickers on its window, reminding him he wasn’t welcome. His charity collection box remained empty and he began welling up. It seemed pointless to continue.

As Terry walked away he heard what he thought was a woman shouting. Plagued by sleepless nights, tossing and turning (in-between crying), Terry shook it off as mild insanity. The shouting became screaming and he ran back to his previous competitor, attempting to latch his ear on its highly polished surface. Sure enough this woman was screaming, screeching, adding to the inhospitable feeling surrounding Terry.

“Hello! What’s happening? Are you in pain?” asked Terry. Unsure sure why he’d asked the last question, it seemed the obvious culprit for such a well behaved road.
“I’m having a BABY, you idiot. Call me an AMBULANCE!” shouted the woman. Terry didn’t carry a mobile phone after his wife died. Too many calls of sympathy and encouragement. And they weren’t going to get her memorial garden that he’d promised, completed any quicker.

Terry sought help from the neighbours he hadn’t yet tried, cut short by an expected silence. The road’s peculiar stillness once again ran through him. He'd only just begun getting back to “normal”, as promised.

He caught sight of a middle aged man walking his dog towards him and looking again, making sure it wasn’t a mirage. The man didn’t have a phone either but if he told him the house number he’d go home right away and ring them. Terry agreed and trotted back to the house.

His ear once again met the finely lacquered door, checking the woman was still OK. The front and back door couldn’t be opened and Terry told her he wasn't going anywhere until proper help came. Her crying grew louder and Terry couldn't help but think only about his wife Mary now. She didn't cry once.

Twenty minutes and several panicked exchanges passed, the ambulance finally arrived. Terry briefed the men and thought best not to hang around now they had the door open.

He could no longer continue collecting for Mary’s cause and dropped the bucket on the expecting woman’s wall. This was Mary’s purpose all along.

Expecting

Helen was going to walk home. Instead the bus came at the very point she made this decision and so she quickly changed her mind. It was rush hour and she hadn’t realised until suit after suit surrounded her. There was something quite comforting she thought about this enclosure but knew it would be only minutes until it turned to discomfort.

Seeing a seat Helen squeezed past, pardoning as she went until she made it sat down successfully. Guilt creeped into her as she sat watching others sway from each other as the bus moved along and she wondered why nobody had sat there to begin with.

Shit, she thought glancing over to the sticker next to her seat. She was in the priority seat. Reserved only for the disabled and the elderly. Neither of which at the age of 27 and fully able, she could really qualify for. Helen looked up to see a young tall smartly dressed man scanning her over, looking she assumed for her disability. She looked over at the picture next to her seat at the funny looking block coloured people and thought how nobody really looked like them anyway. One body sat sideways in a wheelchair, one body hunched over with a walking stick and aha', one body stood sideways pregnant. She looked at the body sat in the wheelchair again and wondered how hard it would be to illustrate it from the front.

Too embarrassed to get up she only had one criteria she could really qualify for. She thought how disabling pregnancy would be for her at this point in her life, especially after her scare only a month ago. Helen had never been able to put on weight as a teenager, something her mother had told her would catch up with her and never did and thus lacking the resemblance to the blooming block person she needed to fit.

Now, further sets of eyes were on her and scanning her body harder. Helen grabbed her bag and placed it in front of were she assumed her womb lay, smiling.
“Excuse me but there is an old man standing here and you’re sitting down as if...well as if you don’t care” said a suited woman.

Helen hadn’t noticed the old man at her seated level and began flushing with shame. She had to decide there and then whether to tell them she was pregnant and feel like a horrible person inside or get up and move for this man who probably was having real difficulty standing and make known to everyone she was a horrible person.

“Oh...oh...I’m sorry” Helen replied, making the woman smile. The old man in question looking oblivious throughout this action.
“I’m sorry but I’m pregnant you see. 3 months only, but the doctor told me to avoid crowded areas” Helen continued, transferring her blushing to the woman. Others around began chattering in whispers, the accusing woman turning away.

Helen sat riding the bus to the last stop clutching her bag, relieved she hadn’t let everyone know what a terrible thing she’d done.

Two weeks later Helen had another scare.

About this blog space...

Hello to anyone who may be reading....

This blog has been created out of a want to write flash fiction, short stories and small snippets of fiction. As a recent exchange student in Paris I stumbled upon and undertook 2 fantastic workshops at Shakespeare&Co concentrating on Voice and Plot/Narration in fiction. From this I have been encouraged and thoroughly inspired to continue with writing! Please feel free to comment with feedback, all is very welcome as everything I publish will be first (maybe second) draft!

Kathryn