To Whom it May Concern You are not my son. I am not your father. You trod a path that is alien to me. We are not family. You took household commodities and fashioned out of them violent and indiscriminate death. No son of mine would do that. No son of your mother would do that. No son of any Lord that I know of or that I can imagine would do that. You are not my son, your mother’s son, our Lord God’s son, nor any son of this beautiful, wonderful humanity of which we are part. You are … Continue reading Letter to a child

Out on the terrace of their friend’s rather magnificent home following their 10 year class reunion, Damian stole a glance at Sonja, her dark hair pulled back and plaited so that her neck and shoulders were exposed. She was statuesque, Athenian, he thought, drawing uncertainly on a largely forgotten classics module at university. Tonight would be the night. Definitely. He had seen how she looked at him, confirming his view that, even at school, there had been a special ‘something’ between them. Once, giddy with a raft of successful exam results in their hands, they had taken over her parents’ … Continue reading Reunion

Maude ran a finger along the shelf ‘Nurse Simmons!’ she called out. ‘More attention to the dust and less to the new registrar if you don’t mind!’ Her senior staff nurse glanced briefly at Dr Tate, raised an eyebrow and hurried back to give the shelving another wipe over with a damp cloth. ‘All done Sister Jenks’ she announced a few minutes later, inviting inspection with a drift of her eyes towards the unit. Maude raised her chin and looked down under her glasses, a formidable matron-in-waiting whose middle name must surely be ‘Dettol’. She swept down the centre of … Continue reading No Place Like Home

The ice rat scuffed at the frozen tundra, came up with something apparently satisfactory, and scampered off to its burrow. Four more days of filming and we could head north to the Serengeti, that would be warmer for my old bones. I hitched up and rearranged my knees as discreetly as possible, sending two of the juveniles tumbling back into the burrow and ruining the shots we’d been waiting for all day, shit! Mutterings from the crew; the words ‘past it’ and ‘decrepit bloody baggage’  were allowed to float my way. So much for respect. Thirty years of wildlife filming, … Continue reading Not David Attenborough

Dennis is a case alright. Big, thick-set, yellow hair thinning on top now he’s hitting forty. I’ve known him for years; first when his exasperated mum hauled him into the Centre hoping to get him fixed and him trailing behind with a wicked grin tweaking his mouth in which was stuffed the Mars Bar he’d half-inched from our shop. Dennis was a LAD. Any smarter and he’d have been real trouble but, his style cramped by what his dad had referred to as ‘defective head-gear’ before clearing off to leave his mum with it all, he was limited to shouting, … Continue reading Dennis

Andy wriggled in his seat, stretching his legs, or trying to, in the cramped space that was Dress Circle. In his head he tried out phrases such as ‘Well, who’d have thought a Carstairs play would turn out to be this tedious!’ and ‘I’m happy to cut and run if you are!’ but one glance at Alison, leaning forward as far as possible and with eyes like saucers, told him that this was already a non-starter. He grappled for a substitute. ‘I think my bleep just went off’ he hissed to Alison’s shoulder. ‘Ssssh!’ she hissed back. Then ‘How come? … Continue reading Mismatch