Short Story

Some of my Best Work is Done on the Toilet

/ michaelwynnauthor / 26 Comments

I’ll be honest, sometimes I’m a little scared to post, I don’t wish to upset anyone or bring about compaints, but then I think, hell, it wasn’t me who put the picture up in the first place.

PHOTO PROMPT © Trish Nankivell

Inspiration tormented Brian; it ambushed him at inopportune moments. This time he mustered resistance.

Pulling a pencil from behind his ear like an old newspaper editor, he tugged the toilet paper towards him.  

The ideas flowed perfectly formed, faster than he could write. Careful not to tear the tissue, he scrawled a la Jack Kerouac, until a loss of tension signalled the roll’s end.

He combed the toilet before shouting, “Clare, where’s the loo roll?”

“That’s it until the Tesco delivery, haven’t you enough?”

“I’ll never reproduce it so perfectly,” Brian groaned, as he sacrificed the cerebral to the faecal.

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here.

The Elephant in the Room

/ michaelwynnauthor / 57 Comments
©Susan Eames

The doctors were amazed at the damage caused to her foot by simply dropping the iron on it, but Sadie still didn’t mention the elephant in the room. Bemused, they’d tested her synapses and brain functions extensively, as this was the third time Sadie had dropped the iron in three months.

She didn’t like lying, especially to authority, but she didn’t want them taking Ella away. Ella was clumsy but it wasn’t her fault, she was still young and a living room in a terraced house can be an extremely small space if you have big feet you’re still growing into.

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here.

Some Cannot Be Satisfied

/ michaelwynnauthor / 37 Comments

I must confess, I struggled today but here goes:

PHOTO PROMPT © Sarah Potter

In a burst of frenetic inertia, Spellow flopped down on the sofa and lazily flicked through the Netflix menu. “No, no, seen it, seen it and crap, no, no, perhaps, if I can’t find better, no, not again, no…” and then the strength in his finger absconded, his eyelids developed the weight of dumbbells and he was asleep.

When he awoke, the shadows outside had lengthened, but the sun still hurled fury.

“This heat,” he complained as he peeled off a sticky T-shirt. “I’m not built for this infernal post. Why did the firm have to give Dale the Canada job?”

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here.

Expropriation and Hopelessness

/ michaelwynnauthor / 45 Comments

PHOTO PROMPT © Dale Rogerson

Charlotte clamped a fist round her locket and contemplated the Christmas lights for the last time. Since the advent of the new order, everyone wore lockets. When uncertain of seeing your loved ones again, photographs are everything.

On turning sixteen in September, the law demanded Emma report to the ‘Citizen Development and Assignment Programme.’ She’d instead joined her brother in hiding.

Charlotte wept for the memories, the lifetime investment in their little house now scheduled for reallocation. They were obliged to move to government, ‘Third Stage Life’ apartments.

Her husband had planned their flight, but she knew, they were too old for resistance.

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here.

I Know What I Like!

/ michaelwynnauthor / 36 Comments
copyright – Dale Rogerson

Grandma helped herself to another slice, “What’s this? Don’t mind if I do have another.”

She winked conspiratorially at little Suzie, who giggled.

“Garlic bread, Mum,” said Arlene.

“No, what’s it really?”

“Garlic bread, like I said.”

“But I don’t like garlic.”

“I can assure you it’s garlic.”

“Not real garlic though. Not like they have in France and places.”

“It’s real garlic like they have abroad, mother.”

Suzie giggled again, ‘grandparents are funny,’ she thought.

“It can’t be. I know what I like and I know I don’t like garlic, never have done.”

“OK mother…Another slice?”

“Go on then.”

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here.

On the Origin of Names

/ michaelwynnauthor / 27 Comments

I’ll apologise for this one in advance.

PHOTO PROMPT @ A. Noni Mouse

Paris set her spoon down, “India’s a lovely name, how did you get it?”

“My parents adored the subcontinent. They honeymooned there. My middle name’s Jasmine. It grew everywhere and they could smell it while they were making love. What about you?”

“You know, cliché romantic weekend, middle name champagne.”

“Because they were drinking it at the time?” India giggled.

“Yup. And you Kit? That short for Christopher?”

“Er…no…Kitchen.”

The silence gauge hit ‘extreme awkward’ so they moved the conversation swiftly to second name.

Kit hesitated, “Stew.”

“Nice. Short for Stewart?”

“No, just Stew.”

“Hmm…your parents..?

“Yes.”

“OK, who wants coffee?”

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here.

Egg Thieves

/ michaelwynnauthor / 31 Comments

Has everyone’s WordPress changed? It’s taken me ages to work out how to post this. I suppose I’ll have to get used to it.

PHOTO PROMPT © Todd Foltz

Old Harry hailed me outside the village shop, “Your kitchen window’s ajar, so I left them eggs on’t sill. You wanna be careful you’ll get burgled.”

“Not round here, surely,” I replied.

“Not locals, they comes from the town to rob us. Soft touch see, with people leavin’ everything wide open.”

I hastened home, Harry had me worried.

Sure enough, the kitchen resembled a war zone. Smashed crockery, dislodged cooking implements and on the windowsill, broken eggs.

I shooed two screeching magpies back outside.  Bloody security conscious Harry! Those eggs were the surest invitation to thieves and locals to boot.

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here

The Problem of Fast Food.

/ michaelwynnauthor / 38 Comments

 

 

 

 

Copyright Ted Strutz

Red shouldn’t live on takeaways, but fast food is so convenient. The health implications of such a diet are horrendous. He was laying down trouble for the future, but Red didn’t understand. Why would he?

He’d learned his poor habits and now it was a lifestyle, which he’d hand down to his offspring. Blissfully unaware of consequences, Red knew no better nor did it worry him, quite the opposite. Red enjoyed the satisfaction of the ignorant.

It’s laborious chasing rats, there’s no rabbits for an urban fox. Scavenging is easy. Amongst the general litter left by humanity, there’s a guaranteed larder.

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here.

Launching on Kindle 6th June.

When the Train has no Brakes

/ michaelwynnauthor / 39 Comments

 

 

 

 

PHOTO PROMPT © CEAyr

Listening to the record wasn’t as charged as being there, but as a fuse it sparked her memories to explode like fireworks. She could see him vividly now, strutting the stage, enslaving the audience, owning the world. She never loved him so much as in that instance. She dragged her knees up to her chin and crushed a cushion to her breast, sobbing.

“He was so high that night. Why did he need to chase more? He already had it all, why wasn’t that enough?”

She sighed. It was it seemed he’d always known. Ever since, he named the band, Icarus.

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here.

Available now from Amazon.

DIY Private Investigation is not for the fainthearted. What could the inhabitants of a rural Essex village possibly know about hunting down and defeating a violent drugs gang?  Where do you start? Why would you even contemplate starting?

Neither a Doffer nor a Doffee be

/ michaelwynnauthor / 51 Comments

PHOTO PROMPT © Jan Wayne Fields

Carl was a stubborn man. He refused to doff his cap and inexorably, a situation would arise requiring such an act. Carl never lasted long in employment after one of these episodes.

Crazily, he didn’t need the work. His family was big in business and his inheritance was enough to support him dining on the finest, five lifetimes over.

But he rejected the money. He wouldn’t be doffed to either. If you decline to be doffed to and refuse to doff, you find yourself in a kind of a no man’s land.

Tough for the heir to a millinery empire.

Written for Friday Fictioneers – a 100 words story based on a photo prompt. Hosted by Rochelle. Read the other entries here.