“In our home town, in the nursery where we played and fought like adults. I find it deep in a box of toy cars, remnants of your blood on the plastic, a motorway pile-up in miniature.”
My story “Open Heart Surgery” is published today over at Ellipsis Zine.
http://www.ellipsiszine.com/open-heart-surgery-by-paul-thompson/
It will be our secret, deep at the bottom of the reservoir. We will meet the others, the boys from town. Buy alcohol with fake identification, from a shopkeeper who has already seen the end of days. Cider sweet and nostalgic, as we go to the water park, where dusk will paint us with mosquitoes and laughter. And many years from now they will find us, when the reservoir is dry. They will find us and our fake identities, and finally treat our bodies as adults.
***
A version of this story recently appeared on Paragraph Planet
“Packing a suitcase is easy. Keeping to the essentials, less so.“
I have something new on Spelk today. It’s called ‘How to Pack a Suitcase with Zero Baggage’
https://spelkfiction.com/2019/09/13/how-to-pack-a-suitcase-with-zero-baggage/
The sun is low, obscuring figures on the pedestrian crossing.
You look up from your phone as they come into focus, slam the brakes hard.
Bam.
You open your eyes at the wheel. A sensation of waking up.
Is this a dream?
Your phone bleeps, answering your question. You approach the same crossing. Everything replays. You slam the brakes hard.
Bam.
Towards the crossing once more, into the low sun.
To wake is to escape this loop, but in the safety of the dream car, no one gets hurt, and everyone gets to keep their limbs.
***
This 100 word story first appeared on the The Drabble
“She reaches the house at dusk, unfashionably late for the party.
The venue is illuminated and noisy. As she approaches the front door a cocktail glass is thrown from above, shattering on the driveway behind her. Laughter comes from the rooftop terrace, followed by further objects that all miss her as she walks.”
My story, “Pool Party” can be found over at The Cabinet Of Heed.
https://cabinetofheed.com/2018/02/01/pool-party-paul-thompson/
“The sound tower is silent, abandoned in the dunes, windswept and dated. Conditions are calm, nullifying its function. On still days like these, the tower finds itself a relic.”
My story, “In The Shadow of the Sound Tower” can be found over at The Cabinet Of Heed.
We all have the best of intentions. Like these teenagers in the park, holding a silver balloon. On it, the words RIP Dad. You can’t release that here, someone says, it’s not biodegradable. It is a middle aged man, dressed in running gear. They argue as he tries to take it from them. In the struggle the balloon bursts, ashes exploding into their eyes and mouths, scattering up into the air and across the city.
***
This 75-word story first appeared on Paragraph Planet
Things to delete before I die. Everywhere. My laptop and tablet. An old PC in the attic. My phones with their obsolete connections. And now the cloud, and social media. My blueprint on data warehouses. Years of work all going to waste. Nothing illegal or shameful. Embarrassing perhaps. Private insights, internal things, the things we all keep secret. So much stuff and so little time. And this paragraph. You must remember to delete this paragraph.
***
This 75-word story first appeared on Paragraph Planet
“All the other kids call him the snake. At first behind his back, but now to his face.”
My story, “The Stillness of Fields” can be found over at Ellipsis Zine.
http://www.ellipsiszine.com/the-stillness-of-fields-by-paul-thompson/
“I carry you through the fields of rapeseed, wearing you like a rucksack. Sounds follow in our wake — the flattening of the crop, the distant motorway, the evening birdsong.”
My story ‘All the Way to the Coast’ is published over at Spelk today.
Paul Thompson 