Sitting at the bottom of the garden is everyone's little box of shame. That small, wooden structure with its cobwebs, its toys and its strange junk that nobody seems to want to claim.
The garden shed.
Each one has its own story. The creation of a robot, built from parts in an overly-priced magazine. The patio that will never be lain. The rusting bikes of that family who are always complaining about the price of petrol. But my shed is different. We don't talk about it. Not because of the UPE (Unfinished Project Embarrassment) or even the OUB (One Use Barbeque) but because of The Incident. One Tuesday evening, Mum was writing a letter of complaint to the grocers and Dad was baking for the Church fete, I got bored. Yes, bored. Blue Peter's origami Barrack Obama had grown frustrating and the algebraic equations set by Ms O'Brian were no more inviting, so I wondered into the garden. The apple trees were bursting with fruit and the grass was overgrown. I picked up a disused, moulding cricket bat and walked through our personal jungle, dragging it beside me. I saw a pigeon fling itself from one of the trees, squawking manically, and noticed something odd. We have a shed? I ducked under the laden branches and walked the seven paces to the shed door. It was pretty big. It covered about the width of our garden but I couldn't see how far it went back. I rapped my small fist on the door and only got a hollow echo in return. The back of my neck began to prickle and my arms went cold. Why didn't I know we had a shed?
After about five minutes I plucked up the courage to try the door. It wouldn't budge. Why was it locked? The only door Mum and Dad ever locked was the one to their bedroom, for when they were doing 'Special Prayers'. I took a step back and tried to determine the distance between the floor and the window. I can reach that, I thought, I just need a kitchen chair. I walked back to the kitchen, dumping the bat by the back door. Dad was still baking his Victoria Sponge.
"Can I use the chair?" I asked.
"Yes, Ben" he replied sharply, "Just don't take up any space in the kitchen, I'm trying to bake". I knew Dad was serious when he used the B word. His ultimate dream was to get on the Great British Bake Off. I walked down to the shed, lugging the chair in front of me. I placed it in front of the grimy window and stepped up. I leant in, straining my eyes to see something in the dark shed. Nothing. Perhaps I need to be higher? What else could I use.
I went to step down.
My foot slipped.
My head hit the floor.
It took them three hours to notice I was missing. Then one hour to find me. By the time they did there were already bugs all over me. The blood had dried a crown in my blonde hair, a halo in the dirt around me. They cried, of course. But then they realised what had happened. I was moved into the shed but now I couldn't see what was really inside. The tools and the boxes which surrounded me. They watered the ground I had lain on for so many hours and then went to bed.
When people ask they say, "He's with his Aunt, we just can't cope sometimes." Mum still writes her letters and Dad still bakes his cakes. But they never, ever talk about the garden shed.
Oliver Pilcher. Any criticism would be great! Thanks! :D
Thursday, 26 September 2013
It Could Happen to You (Jane Doe draft two)
I sit alone in
the café, my legs are crossed under the small round table. It is snowing
outside and all the birds have gone south for the winter. I watch the flakes
settle leisurely on the windowpanes. After a while I pick up the menu which has
been left for me by the waiter, his sweaty hand imprinted on the black, plastic
spine. I scan over the poorly printed pages and sigh. Nothing.
The man on the table next to me laughs loudly as he pushes a forkful of sweet, dark chocolate cake into his mouth. His wife sits invisibly next to him, her grey hair pulled tightly into a bun. The third member of the table is a man with plum red cheeks and hair to match. His form didn't fit the chair, his sides spilling off like an overfilled bath.
I'll just have a salad I suppose.
The room is hot and I can feel my brow getting a little sweaty. One small bead of sweat slips down my face and hangs on my chin before dropping into my lap.
Has Madame decided? Of course, a salad would be lovely.
I watch the waiter shuffle back to the kitchens and then glance around. The café is small. Tiny windows framed with damp let in little light, dusty cushions sit on matchstick chairs and a fire roars in the hearth under the large portrait of a wiry man. He is in the process of unsheathing a large sword from his hip and stands next to a regal looking horse. As I gaze at the painting I begin to absentmindedly crack my knuckles, earning me a reproachful glance from the grey-haired woman. For something to do I reach into my handbag and pretend to search for something. My hand closes over my diary and so I take it out and start to read it.
Saturday 3rd September: Bake cake for Lou- Visit Mum
Sunday 4th September: Recycling bin- Clean out birds- Visit Mum
Monday 5th September: Early Shift- Complete forms for H.W and C.N
Tuesday 6th September: Visit Mum- Food shopping
Your salad, Madame. The waiter clunks the bowl on the table and walks swiftly away. I lift my fork and look at my meal. Mottled brown lettuce leaves, shrivelled peppers and oily black olives. I sigh, pushing it around my plate, not wanting to eat it. I look up and see the waiter watching me from the kitchen doors so I press my fork into the salad, smiling hesitantly at him. I slide it into my mouth, trying not to think of what was going in. I bite. My teeth slip over the lettuce and press into something gelatinous. An olive perhaps. I push harder and the outer flesh suddenly gives way and my teeth sink right through. It explodes in my mouth, runny and stringy all at once. I gag as I swallow, feeling as though it were half in my mouth and half in my throat. I press my chin to my chest, eyes closed as I feel it slip down.
I breathe when it's gone. I open my eyes slowly and lift my fork from where I dropped it on the table. I pick over one of the salad leaves and my stomach lurches. The salad rests on a bed of live slugs. My eyes begin to water.
I look up and try to shout for the waiter but my mouth won't open, the waiter is showing a young couple to a table across the room from me. I bang my fists hard on the table but with each strike the room seems to elongate, the waiter now seemingly in the distance. My chest fills with a scream that can't escape and when I feel I am about to burst the window behind me flies open. A strong wind slices through my body and flakes of snow litter my table. I stand and turn to close the window, my jacket is ripped off by the wind, my shirt blown open and the wind seems to scream at me. Goose pimples cover my bare skin as I reach in vain for the window, my arms keep being blown back, my shoulders start to ache. I lose my balance and my back smashes onto the table. I lay there sobbing as the light swings above me, making the shadows dance.
My body has gone numb, I can only hear the rushing of the wind now. Even the slugs, as they slide over my naked stomach, only exist in my eyes. The tears are frozen on my cheek, the cold is so bitter that my legs feel like a dead weight. I try to close my eyes, to block it out, but the tears have frozen my lids open.
My hand closes around the fork again, it feels warm, inviting, a part of me. I lift my hand above my face, still lying on the floor, and examine the fork, perhaps if it were inside me I would feel warm? I lift my other hand up, skin touching metal, metal caressing skin. I trace the prongs of the fork against the veins in my wrist. Don't veins lead to the heart?
I press the fork harder and harder with each sweep up my wrist until the warm blood begins to spatter on my blue cheeks.
The man on the table next to me laughs loudly as he pushes a forkful of sweet, dark chocolate cake into his mouth. His wife sits invisibly next to him, her grey hair pulled tightly into a bun. The third member of the table is a man with plum red cheeks and hair to match. His form didn't fit the chair, his sides spilling off like an overfilled bath.
I'll just have a salad I suppose.
The room is hot and I can feel my brow getting a little sweaty. One small bead of sweat slips down my face and hangs on my chin before dropping into my lap.
Has Madame decided? Of course, a salad would be lovely.
I watch the waiter shuffle back to the kitchens and then glance around. The café is small. Tiny windows framed with damp let in little light, dusty cushions sit on matchstick chairs and a fire roars in the hearth under the large portrait of a wiry man. He is in the process of unsheathing a large sword from his hip and stands next to a regal looking horse. As I gaze at the painting I begin to absentmindedly crack my knuckles, earning me a reproachful glance from the grey-haired woman. For something to do I reach into my handbag and pretend to search for something. My hand closes over my diary and so I take it out and start to read it.
Saturday 3rd September: Bake cake for Lou- Visit Mum
Sunday 4th September: Recycling bin- Clean out birds- Visit Mum
Monday 5th September: Early Shift- Complete forms for H.W and C.N
Tuesday 6th September: Visit Mum- Food shopping
Your salad, Madame. The waiter clunks the bowl on the table and walks swiftly away. I lift my fork and look at my meal. Mottled brown lettuce leaves, shrivelled peppers and oily black olives. I sigh, pushing it around my plate, not wanting to eat it. I look up and see the waiter watching me from the kitchen doors so I press my fork into the salad, smiling hesitantly at him. I slide it into my mouth, trying not to think of what was going in. I bite. My teeth slip over the lettuce and press into something gelatinous. An olive perhaps. I push harder and the outer flesh suddenly gives way and my teeth sink right through. It explodes in my mouth, runny and stringy all at once. I gag as I swallow, feeling as though it were half in my mouth and half in my throat. I press my chin to my chest, eyes closed as I feel it slip down.
I breathe when it's gone. I open my eyes slowly and lift my fork from where I dropped it on the table. I pick over one of the salad leaves and my stomach lurches. The salad rests on a bed of live slugs. My eyes begin to water.
I look up and try to shout for the waiter but my mouth won't open, the waiter is showing a young couple to a table across the room from me. I bang my fists hard on the table but with each strike the room seems to elongate, the waiter now seemingly in the distance. My chest fills with a scream that can't escape and when I feel I am about to burst the window behind me flies open. A strong wind slices through my body and flakes of snow litter my table. I stand and turn to close the window, my jacket is ripped off by the wind, my shirt blown open and the wind seems to scream at me. Goose pimples cover my bare skin as I reach in vain for the window, my arms keep being blown back, my shoulders start to ache. I lose my balance and my back smashes onto the table. I lay there sobbing as the light swings above me, making the shadows dance.
My body has gone numb, I can only hear the rushing of the wind now. Even the slugs, as they slide over my naked stomach, only exist in my eyes. The tears are frozen on my cheek, the cold is so bitter that my legs feel like a dead weight. I try to close my eyes, to block it out, but the tears have frozen my lids open.
My hand closes around the fork again, it feels warm, inviting, a part of me. I lift my hand above my face, still lying on the floor, and examine the fork, perhaps if it were inside me I would feel warm? I lift my other hand up, skin touching metal, metal caressing skin. I trace the prongs of the fork against the veins in my wrist. Don't veins lead to the heart?
I press the fork harder and harder with each sweep up my wrist until the warm blood begins to spatter on my blue cheeks.
Slowly the wind
becomes a voice, calling out to me, the dancing shadows take the shape of human
arms. I reach for the swinging light but a hand pulls my arm back down. I
glance down as a pair of rubber gloves prod my stomach, the grey-haired woman
stands at the end of the bed with a clip board. She looks at me gravely. A wiry
man with a cleaner’s trolley plods past, led by the waiter, seemingly
distressed, his hair still greasy. A tight leather band holds my mouth closed,
it bites into my cheeks bringing tears to my eyes. I don’t understand. I want
my mum. Where’s Lou? Who are these people? Where am I?
Why is the window open?
Why is the window open?
PLEASE give me feedback, I am not sure if the end weakens it?
Thanks guys! :D
Thursday, 19 September 2013
House
You approach me and I know who you are.
Your eyes. Your beautiful eyes. They say eyes are the window to the soul. Your soul is perfect.
You demand it of me. You demand to be let in without words, without gestures. I know it and it terrifies me.
If eyes are the window to the soul then skin must be the bricks and mortar. The mouth the door. Only good leaves your house. Every noun is a Saint and every verb a philanthropist.
The garden of your hair makes me weak. You and all your good begin to break me apart. They say the kitchen is the heart of the home. You've left my gas on and now I 'm burning to the ground. Every part of me is heat and butterflies. Destruction and beauty. Is that love?
How is it you posses the keys to me? You can open me as easily as one does a book. Your words are the code to my safety deposit box, your movements are those needed to open my safe. I let you enter without thinking of the consequences. What evil could come of an angel?
You are Lucifer.
I try to flee but you know all the secret passages of my heart, you can find the light switch of my soul. I wish our doors had never met and yet I am glad they did.
My paint has begun to flake. Mould has destroyed my floorboards. My windows are black with dirt. My kitchen is abandoned. Yet you sit on the hill next to me. Warm and glowing. People come to your parties still. My door is nailed shut. My garden is full of weeds. My path grows longer each day.
No one has come with filler, nails and a hammer. I am the shack in the swamp, the cottage on the moors. I sit in the bath and watch the last of the power drain from me as my final light goes out.
Oliver Pilcher.
333 Words.
Your eyes. Your beautiful eyes. They say eyes are the window to the soul. Your soul is perfect.
You demand it of me. You demand to be let in without words, without gestures. I know it and it terrifies me.
If eyes are the window to the soul then skin must be the bricks and mortar. The mouth the door. Only good leaves your house. Every noun is a Saint and every verb a philanthropist.
The garden of your hair makes me weak. You and all your good begin to break me apart. They say the kitchen is the heart of the home. You've left my gas on and now I 'm burning to the ground. Every part of me is heat and butterflies. Destruction and beauty. Is that love?
How is it you posses the keys to me? You can open me as easily as one does a book. Your words are the code to my safety deposit box, your movements are those needed to open my safe. I let you enter without thinking of the consequences. What evil could come of an angel?
You are Lucifer.
I try to flee but you know all the secret passages of my heart, you can find the light switch of my soul. I wish our doors had never met and yet I am glad they did.
My paint has begun to flake. Mould has destroyed my floorboards. My windows are black with dirt. My kitchen is abandoned. Yet you sit on the hill next to me. Warm and glowing. People come to your parties still. My door is nailed shut. My garden is full of weeds. My path grows longer each day.
No one has come with filler, nails and a hammer. I am the shack in the swamp, the cottage on the moors. I sit in the bath and watch the last of the power drain from me as my final light goes out.
Oliver Pilcher.
333 Words.
Jane Doe
I sit alone in the café, my legs are crossed under the small round table. It is snowing outside and all the birds have gone south for the winter. I watch the flakes settle leisurely on the windowpanes. After a while I pick up the menu which has been left for me by the waiter, his sweaty hand imprinted on the black, plastic spine. I scan over the poorly printed pages and sigh. Nothing.
The man on the table next to me laughs loudly as he pushes a forkful of sweet, dark chocolate cake into his mouth. His wife sits invisibly next to him, her grey hair pulled tightly into a bun. The third member of the table is a man with plum red cheeks and hair to match. His form didn't fit the chair, his sides spilling off like an overfilled bath.
I'll just have a salad I suppose.
The room is hot and I can feel my brow getting a little sweaty. One small bead of sweat slips down my face and hangs on my chin before dropping into my lap.
Has Madame decided? Of course, a salad would be lovely. I watch the waiter shuffle back to the kitchens and then glance around. The café is small. Tiny windows framed with damp let in little light, dusty cushions sit on matchstick chairs and a fire roars in the hearth under the large portrait of a wiry man. He is in the process of unsheathing a large sword from his hip and stands next to a regal looking horse. As I gaze at the painting I begin to absentmindedly crack my knuckles, earning me a reproachful glance from the grey-haired woman. For something to do I reach into my handbag and pretend to search for something. My hand closes over my diary and so I take it out and start to read it.
Saturday 3rd September: Bake cake for Lou- Visit Mum
Sunday 4th September: Recycling bin- Clean out birds- Visit Mum
Monday 5th September: Early Shift- Complete forms for H.W and C.N
Tuesday 6th September: Visit Mum- Food shopping
Your salad, Madame. The waiter clunks the bowl on the table and walks swiftly away. I lift my fork and look at my meal. Mottled brown lettuce leaves, shrivelled peppers and oily black olives. I sigh, pushing it around my plate, not wanting to eat it. I look up and see the waiter watching me from the kitchen doors so I press my fork into the salad, smiling hesitantly at him. I slide it into my mouth, trying not to think of what was going in. I bite. My teeth slip over the lettuce and press into something gelatinous. An olive perhaps. I push harder and the outer flesh suddenly gives way and my teeth sink right through. It explodes in my mouth, runny and stringy all at once. I gag as I swallow, feeling as though it were half in my mouth and half in my throat. I press my chin to my chest, eyes closed as I feel it slip down.
I breathe when it's gone. I open my eyes slowly and lift my fork from where I dropped it on the table. I pick over one of the salad leaves and my stomach lurches. The salad rests on a bed of live slugs. My eyes begin to water.
I look up and try to shout for the waiter but my mouth won't open, the waiter is showing a young couple to a table across the room from me. I bang my fists hard on the table but with each strike the room seems to elongate, the waiter now seemingly in the distance. My chest fills with a scream that can't escape and when I feel I am about to burst the window behind me flies open. A strong wind slices through my body and flakes of snow litter my table. I stand and turn to close the window, my jacket is ripped off by the wind and my shirt blown open. Goose pimples cover my bare skin as I reach in vain for the window, my arms keep being blown back, my shoulders start to ache. I lose my balance and my back smashes onto the table. I lay there sobbing as the light swings above me, making the shadows dance.
My body has gone numb, I can only hear the rushing of the wind now. Even the slugs, as they slide over my naked stomach, only exist in my eyes. The tears are frozen on my cheek, the cold is so bitter that my legs feel like a dead weight. I try to close my eyes, to block it out, but the tears have frozen my lids open.
My hand closes around the fork again, it feels warm, inviting, a part of me. I lift my hand above my face, still lying on the floor, an examine the fork, perhaps if it were inside me I would feel warm? I lift my other hand up, skin touching metal, metal caressing skin. I trace the prongs of the fork against the veins in my wrist. Don't veins lead to the heart?
I press the fork harder and harder with each sweep up my wrist until the warm blood begins to spatter on my blue cheeks.
Oliver Pilcher.
890 Words.
The man on the table next to me laughs loudly as he pushes a forkful of sweet, dark chocolate cake into his mouth. His wife sits invisibly next to him, her grey hair pulled tightly into a bun. The third member of the table is a man with plum red cheeks and hair to match. His form didn't fit the chair, his sides spilling off like an overfilled bath.
I'll just have a salad I suppose.
The room is hot and I can feel my brow getting a little sweaty. One small bead of sweat slips down my face and hangs on my chin before dropping into my lap.
Has Madame decided? Of course, a salad would be lovely. I watch the waiter shuffle back to the kitchens and then glance around. The café is small. Tiny windows framed with damp let in little light, dusty cushions sit on matchstick chairs and a fire roars in the hearth under the large portrait of a wiry man. He is in the process of unsheathing a large sword from his hip and stands next to a regal looking horse. As I gaze at the painting I begin to absentmindedly crack my knuckles, earning me a reproachful glance from the grey-haired woman. For something to do I reach into my handbag and pretend to search for something. My hand closes over my diary and so I take it out and start to read it.
Saturday 3rd September: Bake cake for Lou- Visit Mum
Sunday 4th September: Recycling bin- Clean out birds- Visit Mum
Monday 5th September: Early Shift- Complete forms for H.W and C.N
Tuesday 6th September: Visit Mum- Food shopping
Your salad, Madame. The waiter clunks the bowl on the table and walks swiftly away. I lift my fork and look at my meal. Mottled brown lettuce leaves, shrivelled peppers and oily black olives. I sigh, pushing it around my plate, not wanting to eat it. I look up and see the waiter watching me from the kitchen doors so I press my fork into the salad, smiling hesitantly at him. I slide it into my mouth, trying not to think of what was going in. I bite. My teeth slip over the lettuce and press into something gelatinous. An olive perhaps. I push harder and the outer flesh suddenly gives way and my teeth sink right through. It explodes in my mouth, runny and stringy all at once. I gag as I swallow, feeling as though it were half in my mouth and half in my throat. I press my chin to my chest, eyes closed as I feel it slip down.
I breathe when it's gone. I open my eyes slowly and lift my fork from where I dropped it on the table. I pick over one of the salad leaves and my stomach lurches. The salad rests on a bed of live slugs. My eyes begin to water.
I look up and try to shout for the waiter but my mouth won't open, the waiter is showing a young couple to a table across the room from me. I bang my fists hard on the table but with each strike the room seems to elongate, the waiter now seemingly in the distance. My chest fills with a scream that can't escape and when I feel I am about to burst the window behind me flies open. A strong wind slices through my body and flakes of snow litter my table. I stand and turn to close the window, my jacket is ripped off by the wind and my shirt blown open. Goose pimples cover my bare skin as I reach in vain for the window, my arms keep being blown back, my shoulders start to ache. I lose my balance and my back smashes onto the table. I lay there sobbing as the light swings above me, making the shadows dance.
My body has gone numb, I can only hear the rushing of the wind now. Even the slugs, as they slide over my naked stomach, only exist in my eyes. The tears are frozen on my cheek, the cold is so bitter that my legs feel like a dead weight. I try to close my eyes, to block it out, but the tears have frozen my lids open.
My hand closes around the fork again, it feels warm, inviting, a part of me. I lift my hand above my face, still lying on the floor, an examine the fork, perhaps if it were inside me I would feel warm? I lift my other hand up, skin touching metal, metal caressing skin. I trace the prongs of the fork against the veins in my wrist. Don't veins lead to the heart?
I press the fork harder and harder with each sweep up my wrist until the warm blood begins to spatter on my blue cheeks.
Oliver Pilcher.
890 Words.
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