A room with a Glasgow View
By celticman
The past is not past, but just lurking.
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- 5582 reads
Bill and the UFO
no UFO sited-as yet.
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- 9 comments
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- 3857 reads
bully for you
away from the footie. a bit rough. go on feel free to point out the errors of my ways.
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- 12 comments
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- 4615 reads
Coal Bags
More grime and grimness
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- 10 comments
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- 5707 reads
The best f**** team in the world
There are winners and losers in all walks, but only one team can be the best!
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- 14 comments
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- 8523 reads
Too late to talk to Benny
It was everybody’s local -if you were local-an old man’s pub, that had been slapped about a bit, with paint, tarted up, to look younger.
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- 2236 reads
Milk Boy
re-edit 31/1/ visions of the Clyde
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- 7 comments
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- 3425 reads
Uncle Stephen
old sea dog tale
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- 8 comments
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- 3970 reads
Tommy Turner
you need faith
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- 10 comments
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- 4083 reads
The matchmaker
short story-long tail
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- 5 comments
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- 2877 reads
Harley Street
‘Mary,’ Ma shouted up the stairs, ‘there’s somebody at the door for you.’
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Harley 2
more of the same nonsense
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- 1717 reads
Hughie Gringo
Opportunity Knocks
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- 9 comments
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- 3801 reads
on the last day of Christmas
Sometimes it’s better not to be born. I’m a dreamer. That’s worse than being normal. I play that tune in my head and look out the eight floor window...
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- 6184 reads
Life in bits
I picked up a photo of Billy Quinn the other day. Don’t ask me where I got it. He’s handsome. I don’t remember him being handsome. I never remember...
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- 3853 reads
Cadogan Street
‘Hi, it’s me. Phone me back.’ ‘Hi, it’s me. Phone me back.’ ‘I’m a bit worried. Can you phone me back?’ ‘Is there something the matter with this...
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- 3895 reads
uncovering oneself (3)
The downstairs bar shut. I bought a bottle of Buckie from the Off Sales. It was more expensive than usual, but I was more flush than usual...
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- 3364 reads
uncovering oneself (4)
Bogey was glad to see me. Charlie wasn’t, but he held the back door open to let me in. Mum stood in the doorway between kitchen and hall and frowned...
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- 7213 reads
uncovering oneself (5)
With money in my pocket I walked quickly to the Atantis bar. Sammy Small Talk was perched in his usual seat at the bar, a half pint of lager in front...
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uncovering oneself (6)
My head throbbed like a man stuck upside down on the Big-Wheel carousel. Blackouts were called blackouts for a reason, not knowing which way was up...
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- 2864 reads
Hope Street
She loved that story of how they met. Telling it to her friend Julie on a rare night out made her smile and her voice shine. She is tender with...
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- 2751 reads
Shadow
Dan’s birthday. Their bedroom stinks of stale fag smoke, booze and the acrid burn of hash. After giving him his present, and another kind of treat,...
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- 3325 reads
the tug boat
The Tug Boat pub was infected by McAllisters. He turned to go before he was spotted, but he made his move too late. ‘Happy Anniversary’ went the war...
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- 2576 reads
flockers 2
‘You were in the wrong waiting room.’ The lawyer shook my hand, introduced himself as John Cameron, Charlie’s advocate. ‘I’m sorry,’ Myra apologised...
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- 3587 reads
flockers 3
Judge Morrie adjourned for lunch. Just as the big cheese advocate said he would. Stood outside on the stone steps with Myra. Lawyers and normal folk...
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- 2762 reads
flockers 4
The day hadn’t started the way I’d hoped. I wasn’t late for work, which would have been a bad thing. But I was late for court, which wasn’t too bad a...
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- 2559 reads
flockers 5
Had a few days to think about how wronged I’d been by the court system. Off work. Phoned in sick cough, cough, with the flu that needed careful...
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- 3668 reads
flockers 6
Days passed in a shuttle of discomfort. My skin went to war with my body. Blisters appeared round the skin in my hands, soles of my feet and toes...
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- 3263 reads
flockers 7
Myra’s studio flat had heating and hot water. I could have cuddled her. She ran a bath with all the suddy and splashy smelly stuff. She dipped her...
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flockers 8
When Myra told me she went back with Charlie after he raped her I didn’t understand it, but in a way I did. She made a bed up for me on the settee...
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- 4166 reads
flockers 9
Felt better. Scrubbed up as best as I could in the morning, a complexion like boiled pink ham, showed a face no mother would kiss. Breakfast a...
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flockers 10
Must admit the journey home was constrained, especially on the train. Didn’t see much of Myra in the next few weeks. Neither of us had a phone. Put...
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- 2617 reads
flockers 11
Swirled whisky around my tongue. Listened to the shrill see-saw cadence and frenzied excitement in his voice and the little gulps of silence. Poured...
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flockers 12
Went to see Myra the next day. Wasn’t sure if it was the right thing to do. Wasn’t sure she’d want to see me. Whenever I appeared things got worse...
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- 1103 reads
Bible John 2
I clutch the handle of my holdall, with my purse secure inside. ‘I’m not sure,’ I say. I hold a leaflet out as a shield. ‘Perhaps she’ll get some of...
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- 703 reads
quickie
I’d a bad night. The guy upstairs had a burst pipe on Tuesday, which he didn’t know about. Next thing it’s Thursday, the ceiling comes down, and I’m...
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Countdown
Countdown When Helen got the telephone call that her Da was dead she was curled up on one end of the couch watching Countdown, painting her toenails...
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- 1925 reads
Plot without a story
The note flapped through the letterbox and lay on the linoleum. I pulled open the door, just in time to see a denimed back sauntering up the street...
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Blood is thicker than water
Rain splatters the pavement when I set out. My sister, Teresa, doesn’t live far, but then the moon isn’t that far, and I don’t particularly want to...
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- 3400 reads
Forbidden Fruit.
‘Put your false teeth in,’ I said, ‘maybe then they’ll believe in you and believe in your prophecies more’. Old Joe had taken up a position between...
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the things that we buy and don't know why?
The thought came like a First World War telegram – he assumed that she’d thought his family were marvellous. His mother was short and plump as a...
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Last Call
She clumped up the middle of Singers Road ignoring the pavements, damp and slippy with the mush of fallen leaves darkening pools against the wire...
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- 1950 reads
Don't talk back
I slept through the Russian missile crisis when John F Kennedy called the Russian’s bluff and sent them homeward to think again. It was a simpler...
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organist and monkey
The organ, off-kilter as a bagpipe chord, begins the first hymn. Major keys and minor key dance around the usual dirge. Funeral music. The...
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bergy
It’s strange when you get out hearing soft, whispering womanly voices – he’s been sick—licking of soft strawberry lips to create a sympathetic sound...
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shitehouse to shitehawk: a user's guide
I jot things down. Sometimes I order them later, or they order me. Usually, I don’t. That’s called the first draft. It’s full of grammatical mistakes...
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the gothic line
Dinner begins with a closed door Smell of mince and totties Worse than the dentist’s chair Shut-up and sit over there Plate piled high as a rabbit...
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ghosts not spirits
The pale green Audi with a ladder strapped to the roof jerks to a stop in the angled strip of road before the bus stop and the Irish Pope bursts into...
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Le Cock: My Struggle.
I’m reading ‘The International Literary Phenomenon’, Some Rain Must Fall: My Struggle, Book 5 , by Karl Ove Knausgaard. Cliché after cliché so it...
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IQ 2
Cinders Disco was bound to be hoaching, Tina Turner so loud that it vibrated through the walls and brought out goosebumps on my eardrums. Tony, Boaby...
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IQ test 3
Somebody had flung a scratchy blanket over my body to bury the unwashed. I woke up to the stench of my own body bathed in sweat. Eyes plumped by lack...
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Jimmy Savile and me
I was lying in bed when my mum rushed up the stairs, barged into my room, mouthed that it was Sir Jimmy Saville on the phone. I had to shoo her away...
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Grimms
Dad pushed the room door open. I hadn’t heard him, or the door going. I was sitting side saddle on my bed, one leg a comfortable numbness, bare feet...
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Grimms2
Dad was better fun than an alarm clock. I used to watch him before I was old enough to get locked up in school. The light in my room was on the death...
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Grimms3
Pizza Face is smaller than me, but with a big square head, so we’re really the same size. We’re standing in the smirry rain with duffle coat hoods up...
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Grimms4
Pizza Face ducked his head down when he took a drag on a fag and hid it behind his leg when he wasn’t smoking. He’d stolen a dout, almost a full...
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grimms6
Light shimmered and shed its hat of cloud and shadows. Snowfall drifted down setting the world to white. Our street was smaller and larger,...
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grimms7
The hall is not much warmer than the landing, but the light left on in my room lets us see each other a bit better. Angela looks up at me, her golden...
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grimms9
We’re playing statues in the hall. I’m at the front door, trying to sneak up on Angela in her house. Her mum has come into some money and bought her...
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grimms10
Outside the wind carries the rain and it spills against my room window, but it’s not really that cold. I’m tucked up cosy in bed. I know all the...
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- 1045 reads
grimms11
Despite smirry rain, Jaz and his two pals, Godge and Rab are drinking bottles of wine and messing about on the canal. They've hollowed a shallow boat...
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grimms12
Pizza Face has a size- 4 Mitre ball at his feet, keeping it under control, caressing it into going the way we’re going by touching it with the instep...
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- 3273 reads
grimms13
Traffic sloshes through the rain on Dumbarton Road. We pass a woman holding a brolly at forty-five degrees against the wind and to keep her permed...
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- 2718 reads
grimms14
Jaz didn’t like wearing a hat, even though it was raining hard, because he thought it made him bald. Not that anybody would laugh at him. They wouldn...
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- 2534 reads
grimms17
Jaz and Rab guard the bottom of the close, the wind scouring the back courts. The bins are on fire again. Flames leaving smouldering debris, the...
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- 2423 reads
grimms18
It’s closing time when Dermot leaves the pub. The last round of drinks with his mates he’s downed a couple of goldies, the whiskies flowing through...
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- 2914 reads
grimms19
Dermot picks up Angela and carries her into his wee boy’s room. His son, a step ahead in the lobby, slips into the room picks up his book of fairy...
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- 2051 reads
grimms20
The fog lifts from the tops of the buildings leaving them stranded in light rain. By the time Dermot gets back to his close he spots pedestrians...
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- 1711 reads
grimms22
Tony is lying in bed sleeping. It’s a Saturday, no school, and a long lie. But he hears his Da arguing with Geordie the milkman outside the front...
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- 2354 reads
grimms23
There’s nothing else for it. Jaz decides to go and see Rab. There’s been talk – Rab’s old man wittering, he might be able to do something for them...
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- 3479 reads
grimm24
‘You’ll never guess who the Rhetor was?’ Jaz says to Rab. Despite the dim light, Jaz had recognized Chief Inspector Collins at once. He was a tall...
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- 2470 reads
grimms25
The chaffing of barmaid’s singing lullabies, ‘Last orders,’ and deftly nicking the glass out of their hand before they are finished, Jaz and Rab are...
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- 1968 reads
grimms26
Jaz can’t find his house keys and hammers on the front door, flipping the letter box with an untimely rat-a-tat-tat, echoing through the close. Karen...
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- 2087 reads
grimm27
The school nurse’s grey hair resembles an unkempt blackbird’s nest, with a pokey wee white hat stranded on it. She has squeezed into her white...
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- 2082 reads
grimms28
When Dermot answers the door, he’s not sure what to expect. ‘I’m Marie,’ she says, holding a soft hand out for him to shake. ‘And I’m a social worker...
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- 2466 reads
grimms29
After a while Tony and Angela get sick of hiding from a giant dinosaur under the bed and crawl out dusty and uneaten, which is just as well, because...
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- 8 comments
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- 2551 reads
grimms30
Jaz catches Pizza Face a slap on the back of the head when he catches him and Tony smoking a roll-up at the bottom of the stairs. ‘Go up to Rab’s and...
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- 2403 reads
grimms31
‘Shouldn’t you be going up the road, about now?’ says Jaz, smiling into his pint. ‘To get ready for your big date.’ Rab’s bottom lips droops and he...
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- 3157 reads
grimms32
Charlie the barman hovers around the five-foot mark and looks like King Louie from Junglebook , a comic figure, who knows everybody that is anybody,...
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- 1071 reads
grimms33
Jaz is standing chittering at the bus stop outside Ramsay’s Fruit and Veg when a beige Morris Marina sweeps through the puddles, making an old guy...
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- 1785 reads
grimms34
Crossing Kilbowie Road Jaz negotiates the tooting horns of cars and buses with the absent-mindedness of a three-year-old toddler and seems startled...
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- 2121 reads
grimms35
Jaz panting and out of breath runs uphill, the dark street a whetstone underfoot, and the unexpected urgency of the chase sobers him. It makes him...
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- 3953 reads
grimms36
Angela nips across the landing and rattles the letterbox. Dermot answers, swinging the door wide in welcome. He’s wearing his old work coat and work...
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- 8 comments
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- 2876 reads
grimms37
With no telly to watch, Tony changes quickly into his jammies, and because of the cold dives under the covers of bed. He sleeps clutching his book of...
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- 3176 reads
grimms38
Tony doesn’t decide to go to school, that’s just where his feet take him. The class has already garbled morning prayer, sung the time table and moved...
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- 14 comments
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- 4044 reads
grimms39
Tony hunch-shouldered, tethers himself like a human-shaped balloon on the edge of familiar things, the chair his da usually sits in, watching the...
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- 8 comments
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- 2538 reads
grimms40
There is a vacancy in the way Tony looks out the car window at the sweep of tenement building they pass and a sense of unease that they are going in...
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- 3302 reads
grimms41
Tony remembers a parade of uniforms and much mumbling just outside of hearing. He forgets who has come or who had gone. Memories and dreams mixed up...
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- 8 comments
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- 2773 reads
Grimms43
On the second landing, Jaz can’t wait. He nips into the cludgie and pulls the door over, stands leaning, left hand splayed against peeling paint of...
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- 3448 reads
Grimms 44
Jaz sprawls on the couch, a Woodbine in his hand and has a few nips of whisky and sparks a can, leaving it at his feet. Angela, cross-legged in the...
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- 1774 reads
Grimms45
The smelly cupboard is the ideal place to hide the guns until Jaz can find somewhere better. He’s thinking ahead of ripping up floorboards and...
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- 4 comments
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- 1730 reads
Grimms46
Jaz quickly shakes off hangover the next morning with a quick blow job. He pulls his cock out of Karen’s mouth before he comes and his jizz squirts...
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- 1838 reads
Grimms47
Outside the snooker club, a black Hackney cab across the road lets somebody off. Jaz pulls his collar up against drizzling rain, decides since he’s...
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- 1104 reads
Grimms48
Rab cashes his Giro the next day and agrees to meet Jaz and the Tash back in the pub. Jaz sits waiting, nursing a warm pint, the Tash beside him...
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- 2580 reads
Grimms49
Tony shares a room at the top of the stairs with Bruno. ‘He’s a bed-wetter,’ whispers Julie. ‘We may get him up during the night to take him to the...
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- 5927 reads
Grimms50
Tony places the fork carefully back down on the table, beside the butter dish. Clutching his eye, a colourful arabesque, milky with red veins, half-...
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- 2852 reads
Grimms51
Bruno is hanging about waiting for Tony when he comes out of the office. ‘An ambulance came and took Hunter away,’ he explains. ‘Hunter swears he’s...
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- 8 comments
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- 2361 reads
Grimms52
The cook looks up from a pile of dirty pots and dishes, rolls her eyes at Tony and comes walking towards him standing just inside the kitchen door...
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- 9 comments
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- 2377 reads
Grimms54
The social-work meeting takes place after lunch. Tony lies on top of his bed, with belly ache, paging through a stained Readers Digest he’d found on...
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- 1029 reads
Grimms55
Pizza Face sits on the floor in the living room, his back against the wall, tilting his head, gnawing at his thumbnail until his cuticles redden and...
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- 2967 reads
Grimms56
Angela stands, waiting. Bob shouts again. ‘Jesus,’ he rants, when there’s no reply and no sign of footfall. ‘You better come in, then.’ She cranes...
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- 4 comments
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- 1798 reads
Grimms57
Pizza Face pulls his duffle coat hood down, to show he is serious, even though the rain is coming down horizontal. He does a feint and step-over, is...
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- 2 comments
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- 1156 reads
Grimms58
Bruno perches on the bed in the muggy heat of his room with his jacket zipped up, and the leather strap of his school bag over his shoulder, waiting...
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- 4 comments
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- 1649 reads
Grimms59
On the day of his dad’s funeral Tony gets himself ready early while the care staff busy themselves having a meeting to decide who is to accompany him...
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- 10 comments
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- 2882 reads
Grimms60
Karen answers the door tugging the belt of her flowery nightgown tighter, smiling, and giving a little wiggle as Dougie towers over her and ogles the...
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- 8 comments
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- 2393 reads
Grimms62
Jaz tries to erase the memory of the snivelling shadowy self he’d been earlier by tearing into the booze. But Del isn’t hanging about either. They...
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- 14 comments
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- 3890 reads
Grimms63
In the late bloom of spring, snow scars the Old Kilpatrick hills. Seagulls swoop above Angela’s head, screeching along the bins on Risk Street. A...
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- 10 comments
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- 3924 reads
Grimms64
Jaz is gagging for the first pint of the day, but is stuck in traffic, enclosed in a bubble of the front seat of a red Volkswagen. Del is driving...
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- 2352 reads
Grimms65
Angela’s eyes are splintered with not sleeping, she lies scrunched like a question mark at the bottom of the bed, blankets tight around her shoulders...
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- 6 comments
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- 2058 reads
Grimms66
Del fits false number plates to the white Volvo, stolen to order for the job, in the early hours of the Friday morning, from Bearsden. Dougie lounges...
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- 9 comments
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- 2971 reads
Grimms67
Bob rolls up the sleeves of his frayed, green, checked shirt, and uses the side window of the dining room as a temporary seat. No wind, slow moving...
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- 4 comments
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- 1835 reads
grimms68
Angela stands sulking in the driveway, near the dining-room window, anorak brushing against the wall, out of sight of everyone, poking at something...
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- 5 comments
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- 2049 reads
Grimms69
Tony dashes up the stairs without meeting anybody, but Bruno, who has been searching for him, spots him from the lobby and clunks up the stairs after...
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- 3 comments
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- 1527 reads
Grimms 70
Jaz figures he’ll need to take driving lessons, not right away, but sometimes soon. He could buy one of those fancy Jaguar cars now. Pay cash. He’s...
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- 5 comments
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- 2045 reads
Grimms71
A couple of days pass, then a week, in which Jaz does little more than alternate between pubs and empty glasses follow him. Maggie Scott’s for...
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- 7 comments
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- 2247 reads
Grimms72
Jaz ganders out the kitchen window and sees Pizza Face playing outside, kicking a ball against the bins. ‘Hi,’ he calls through to Angela, but it’s...
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- 4 comments
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- 1777 reads
Grimms73
‘You don’t need to be daft and drown yerself. You can just drink the poison to kill yerself.’ Bruno is deft at sneaking up on people and has big lugs...
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- 7 comments
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- 2144 reads
Grimms 74
Jaz hears the loud screeching and the rising harangue which follows. It woke him up. It wakes the whole tenement block. The smell of cigarette smoke...
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- 4 comments
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- 1996 reads
Grimms75
With all the cash Jaz is carrying and the hurry-scurry Rab is surprised to be standing beside him at a bus stop waiting for a bus. Jaz has brought...
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- 9 comments
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- 2510 reads
Grimms 76
Awash with pints and halfs and even mouth puckering gin, with a slice of lemon and whisky in the same glass. Cocktails of his own devising. His day...
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- 7 comments
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- 2059 reads
Grimms77
Junior hurries home. Tired and hungry, his hair sun-washed and lighter than his brothers’, he finds virtue in manual labour, skin lightly tanned and...
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- 7 comments
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- 2048 reads
Grimms 78
Fag smoke drifts above Pizza Face’s head. His is a frightened silence amid bickering conversation and accusations of neglect. The last of the sun...
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- 8 comments
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- 2393 reads
Grimms 79
Tony’s social worker, Marie, arrives on an official visit. She waits for him in the office. Dayshift-staff circle around, Julie flustered, leaves her...
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- 8 comments
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- 2846 reads
Grimms 80
‘What’s been the crack then?’ Del stands at the front door, a cigarette jammed between his lips. A clean white open-necked shirt sleeves contrast...
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- 6 comments
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- 2128 reads
Grimms81
Lizzie is as lovely as Jaz remembered her, perhaps more so, with her chiselled cheekbones and hair untamed as a burning bush. The room is stuffy and...
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- 6 comments
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- 2061 reads
Grimms82
Jaz sits in his usual table in the corner of Maggie Scott’s, with a view of the door, nursing a pint. He’s been reduced to mooching about in his Y-...
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- 7 comments
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- 2845 reads
Grimms83
‘I’m here to see Tony,’ says Angela. Bob stands elephantine in the doorway of the Home with his checked shirt buttoned up to his neck, glasses off-...
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- 8 comments
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- 2256 reads
Grimms 84
Five days after robbing the Securicor van Jaz pulls a mask over booze coloured ruddy red cheeks and face and, hungover, is back at work. Del and...
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- 8 comments
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- 2260 reads
Grimms 85
‘This big gigantic guy with an eye is trying to kill him,’ Bruno says, with exaggerated affect. ‘So he can eat them.’ His voice rises and he gets...
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- 4 comments
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- 1654 reads
Grimms 86
Jaz sits in a haze of cigarette smoke in his usual perch in Maggie Scott’s, back against the wall, watching the door. Rab stumbles in and weaves...
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- 5 comments
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- 1706 reads
Grimms87
Rab finishes his pint and follows Jaz out of the pub. He feels woozy, as if he could lie down for a lunch-time nap. A few minutes’ walk through...
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- 10 comments
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- 2889 reads
Grimms88
Jaz squats on his haunches at the door to the smelly cupboard in the lobby. Under the light of a thirty-watt bulb he inspects the Starr pistol in his...
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- 2 comments
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- 1016 reads
Grimms 90
A stilted walk to the car, flared denim flapping in the wind, guns pressed one-handed, hard, against their bodies, but concealed in their coats. Del...
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- 11 comments
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- 3028 reads
Grimms 91
Angela sits on the top steps on her landing, waiting. Tugs have been pulled and combed from her blonde hair and skin been scrubbed pink in the...
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- 7 comments
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- 2265 reads
Grimms 93
Jaz is a different man on the Larne Ferry, a man that now suddenly believes in the hereafter. The crew wear uniforms, blue shirts and grey trousers,...
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- 8 comments
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- 2893 reads
Grimms 94
Jaz tries to work his way out of the seat and buy a round, but a hand goes on his shoulder and Bri in a voice that merges pity with outrage shouts...
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- 5 comments
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- 1598 reads
Grimms 95
Karen isn’t sure how she feels. She looks over the rooftops hoar frost has picked clean of grime and burnished glistening white. Outside the kitchen...
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- 5 comments
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- 2368 reads
Grimms 96
At the top of the Cressie Stairs, just before Angela crosses the road to go to school, she bends away, follows the black train of crows in the sky...
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- 8 comments
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- 2129 reads
Grimms 97
Jaz’s handler is waiting for him underneath the clock and the monument of remembrance. A gold-leaf list of the Clydebank dead from the First and...
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- 6 comments
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- 1832 reads
Grimms 99
‘Weet, weet,’ says an man at the bar, the cuffs of his gabardine coat falling down his thin wrist as he necks down the last of a Grouse whisky. ‘Aye...
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- 5 comments
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- 1876 reads
Grimms 100
Bedcovers deaden Tony’s hearing, seals him in the tomb of his dreams, but when he sticks his head out of his bed, he’s alive to the wind rattling...
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- 5 comments
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- 1792 reads
Grimms 101
‘How are we gonnae dae it?’ The idea feels jaggy, sticking in Bruno’s gullet. He shakes his head, wets his mouth with saliva and begins again. ‘I...
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- 6 comments
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- 1907 reads
WMD 2
‘You want me to add some vinegar to this water?’ I asked. ‘For old time’s sake.’ ‘Nah, just give it to me straight.’ He tried to raise His head, but...
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- 11 comments
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- 3353 reads
Grimms 102
From Dalmuir train station to Glasgow is a distance between not far and life changing, the the High Court an Intensive Care Unit of the Criminal...
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- 8 comments
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- 2642 reads
Grimms 103
Representing the Crown and prosecuting for the Fiscal Office, Queen’s Counsel Montrose appears born to the era of wigs and absentmindedly fingers the...
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- 3 comments
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- 1349 reads
Grimms 104
Detective Inspector Grier knows his place and sits smoking, which gives him something to do, in the soundproofed room away from the stage of the...
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- 6 comments
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- 2288 reads
Grimms 105
The forensic expert, Mr Cleary, wears a baggy brown cardigan with bulky pockets he jams his fists into. He shadows the Macer, but is smaller, hitting...
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- 6 comments
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- 1645 reads
Pretending to be me.
You worked in that video store beside the Cressie Stairs. A grey shop, a belly-flop of unordered Betamax tapes and dust that made me sneeze. Bless...
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- 8 comments
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- 2187 reads
The Rock
The bell rang for the end of recreation and tally count of heads throughout Barlinnie. Prisoners milked it, flinging down the last domino in disgust...
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- 6 comments
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- 1997 reads
the gothic line
He offered drunken prayers for the dead Wanted to call his pals on the blower Those who knew How artillery weighs the soul Keeps you in touch with...
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- 2 comments
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- 924 reads
Sammad
One of his shoes was missing, his cheek face down in wet, overgrown, weeds. A man in his early twenties, wearing an oversized leather jacket, his...
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- 7 comments
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- 1848 reads
two-faced
I pushed my glasses high to rest on my forehead and stared across the road. I saw her outside the paper shop on Dunbarton Road, recognised her by her...
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- 11 comments
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- 4183 reads
twelve-noon-two
Two things pissed Marie off, getting phone calls in the middle of the night and life in general. What made it worse was she’d been in a deep sleep,...
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- 8 comments
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- 2323 reads
twelve-noon-three
‘You mind if I smoke?’ Paddy rested his back against the headboard. He’d woken early, hadn’t really slept, had thought of sneaking away, but then...
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- 11 comments
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- 4637 reads
twelve-noon-four
Paddy came spruced up and fully dressed, out of the shower, and dropped the wet towel on the bed. He adjusted his tie and polished his shoes by...
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- 8 comments
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- 2109 reads
twelve-noon-six
Paddy stood outside the church, he’d found it almost impossible to get a parking space and had circled for fifteen minutes before parking on a corner...
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- 5 comments
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- 1279 reads
twelve-noon-seven
After Sarah used the toilet and flushed, she put the toilet seat down, and washed her hands and doused her face in cold water. No soap. No towel. She...
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- 3 comments
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- 1132 reads
twelve-noon-eight
In the early hours, a ghostly presence in a billowing black dress with sleeves gathered at the cuff, Sarah pushed heavy furniture aside and hoovered...
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- 4 comments
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- 1309 reads
panjandrums
I’d wrapped up for a winter walk with woolly hat and gloves even though it was just the beginning of May. Clydebank meteorological charts being...
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- 7 comments
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- 1741 reads
Pandora's Box
I lost my wallet somewhere between buying a black pudding supper at the chippie, a seagull swooping down on my head at the shortcut to Dickens Avenue...
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- 8 comments
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- 2024 reads
samsara
A man of unsolid muscle stands You could call fat But nobody would tell him that He gies me the eye Yatters on his epiphany about scum The cosmic...
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- 342 reads
Angel
‘I’ll get us some coke,’ shouted Kimmie above the disco beat. ‘Nah, I’m alright, I’ve got a can there.’ Angel dinked the red tin on the table with...
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- 13 comments
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- 3271 reads
Angel 2 (home)
Angela crouched and pulled her chair closer to the electric fire. It had four bars, twin sets in curved reflectors, but only the top bar worked. The...
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- 5 comments
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- 1481 reads
Angel 3 (disco)
Kimmie hooked up with the ginger-haired boy. The blast of Temptation - Higher and Higher- Temptation blasted from the speakers. On the dance floor...
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- 8 comments
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- 1946 reads
Angel 4 (at the dump)
Wind whipped rain into Angel’s forehead and high cheek bones and made her look like a sixteen-year-old waif. More like herself than the make-up she’d...
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- 13 comments
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- 4099 reads
Angel 5 (houseparty)
The guy with the moustache searched through his coat pockets, pulling out his fags and the bit of hash and then his hands diving into the side and...
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- 8 comments
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- 1711 reads
Angel 6 (rape)
Kimmie groaned and threshed like a fish on the line as they bundled together. Angel didn’t know where to look. She concentrated on holding the glass...
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- 15 comments
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- 4356 reads
Angel 7 (after the music stops)
Kimmie’s hand on her friend’s shoulder grounded Angel, brought her back to herself, but she moaned loudly, dry retching. Her muscles rippled along...
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- 6 comments
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- 1483 reads
Angel 8 (work)
Angel struggled out of her bedclothes, she’d fallen asleep exhausted with her clothes on, expecting the knock on the door at any minute. The radio-...
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- 6 comments
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- 1758 reads
Angel 9 (and Pizza Face)
Angel stayed in all week and also the following week, barely venturing from her room, other than to go to work. Kimmie had chapped the door a few...
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- 6 comments
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- 1598 reads
Angel 10 (bromance)
Angel lit another cigarette, more for something to do, and she rolled down the window. ‘Sorry,’ she blew out the smoke sideways, fanning it with her...
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- 10 comments
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- 2841 reads
Angel 11 (Edinburgh)
Pizza Face parked in his usual spot and smiled as Angel rushed out of her house, crossed the road and rushed to meet him. Sunday, her day off, and...
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- 8 comments
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- 2353 reads
Angel 12 (the tramp)
‘You hungry?’ he asked. ‘We could go for something to eat along there.’ He waved his hand in the direction of the traffic behind them. ‘Not really,...
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- 8 comments
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- 1874 reads
Angel 13 (mum and Mattie)
The living room door was open. ‘Can I have a word, m’lady?’ Karen leaned sideways in her armchair, almost knocking over an overflowing glass ashtray...
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- 6 comments
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- 1367 reads
Angel 14 (getting to first base)
‘Sorry, I was delayed,’ said Angel as she stepped into the car and pulled her seatbelt on. She sniffed and turned her head away, looking back at the...
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- 6 comments
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- 1605 reads
Angel 15 (return of Kimmie)
Kimmie’s cat’s-eyes makeup was smudged. She hopped and skipped in front of Angel in a pale blue, zip-up hooded top and gripped the top of her denims...
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- 7 comments
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- 1503 reads
Angel 16 (second base)
Pizza Face waited religiously for Angel parked in his Jaguar every night and weekends before work. The main roads and backroads they’d travelled like...
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- 7 comments
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- 1453 reads
Angel 17 (Wotsits)
‘Where you going?’ Angel asked when Pizza Face started the car the following night. ‘Going?’ he took his foot off the clutch. ‘I never really thought...
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- 5 comments
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- 1355 reads
Angel 18 (portrait)
Pizza Face parked the car in a layby off the street, and at the end of the building. He clutched Angels hand and frog-marched her down the hill and...
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- 4 comments
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- 1008 reads
Angel 19 (bad dreams)
‘Jesus, that’s minging.’ Angel sat up in bed, her face had been pressed against the wall. Disoriented, not sure where she was, until she felt Pizza...
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- 4 comments
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- 1029 reads
Angel 20 (fizzing)
‘Did you hear Diana Dors died?’ Kimmie tried to make conversation. She was sitting on the couch in their flat in Partick, had a mug of tea in her...
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- 4 comments
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- 1074 reads
Angel 21 (making a hash of it)
The tall cop kept a hold of Angel’s arm. Clean shaven with a bony boyish face it was difficult to tell what age he was, but with a dimple on his chin...
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- 4 comments
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- 1135 reads
Angel 22 (time)
‘We can dae this the hard way, or we can dae this the easy way,’ said the stout officer doing the fingerprinting and he rifted. His breath smelled of...
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- 5 comments
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- 1390 reads
Angel (change and charges)
Angel’s time had been taken up with crying and trying not to, when she had riches bestowed on her, a puff of a smoke—she had to bang on the door for...
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- 4 comments
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- 2102 reads
Angel 24 (Corton Vale)
‘How’ve you been?’ Karen stumbled and pressed her face against Angel’s neck and a male prison guard patrolling the passageways around the tables and...
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- 7 comments
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- 2158 reads
Angel 25 (prison time and design)
A wee boy held his brother’s hand. With intense concentration he guided a blue Dinky car up and down the curves of the chair and table as his family...
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- 4 comments
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- 1076 reads
Angel 26 (church and children)
Most of the prison jobs were taken, but Angel hoped to get something soon. She got free- association a few hours a day and out for meals, sitting at...
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- 3 comments
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- 922 reads
Angel 27 (tony and bruno)
Everything about prison quickly became routine and depressing. Visitors and visiting- time, bucked that trend and gave Angel a share of the communal...
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- 6 comments
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- 1628 reads
Angel 28 (proposal)
Angel glanced around at the clock. There wasn’t a lot of time left. She took a deep breath and just came out with it. ‘I don’t know if you heard, but...
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- 2 comments
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- 814 reads
Angel 29 (amnesty)
Angel smiled when she saw Tony waiting for her in the visiting room. She wanted to hug him, but sat across from him grinning. ‘You came.’ ‘Aye,’ he...
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- 6 comments
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- 1644 reads
Angel 30 (hard to say no)
Angel looked over and Tony followed her gaze. A kerfuffle in the corner of the room, close to where some kids were playing with a plastic Thomas the...
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- 6 comments
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- 1361 reads
Angel 31 (hard knocks)
Angel was shaking all over when she got back to the cell. She could feel her heart beating, her bones knocking together. Lisa had some crap on the...
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- 4 comments
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- 1054 reads
Angel 32 (causality)
Carol Anne’s hand reached into her jacket pocket for her tobacco tin. Her fumbling fingers had a hard time forcing the lid and anger flickered across...
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- 4 comments
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- 1130 reads
Angel 33 (on report)
Angel didn’t see what happened to Carol Anne. Before he dashed away to use the phone Peter had taken her by the arm into one of the workrooms and...
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- 7 comments
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- 1746 reads
Angel 34 (Jonah)
Val made a point of meeting Angel outside her cell door after her meeting with the governor. ‘Some of the girls have been talking. C’mon back to mine...
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- 4 comments
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- 1124 reads
Angel 35 (scan)
Angel had hoped her mum might have been at the baby scan. She’d written and told her and then she’d phoned to remind her. But Karen hadn’t turned up...
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- 10 comments
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- 3166 reads
Angel 36 (every picture)
Angel didn’t need a black cab to take her back to Corton Vale. Flying, she clutched the black-and-white, print-out of the twins, and studied it again...
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- 5 comments
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- 1395 reads
Angel 37 (rift)
The screws weren’t in a good mood. Angel wasn’t sure what happened but the girls had kicked off because visiting time had been delayed and the time...
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- 4 comments
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- 1120 reads
Angel 39 (returns)
‘You’ve another visitor’s request.’ Church stood in the door of the cell, with a slip of paper in her hand. ‘That’s great.’ Angel made her wait...
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- 7 comments
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- 2195 reads
Angel 40 (earrings)
Her shoulders dipped and she sighed, staring down at the table. ‘I’ve got to listen to most of the girls in here talking non-stop about what they’re...
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- 6 comments
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- 2044 reads
Angel 41 (Lisa's)
During visiting hours, when Angel was downstairs, staff had taken Lisa away. Her cellmate seemed so happy when they had burgers and chips for lunch,...
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- 10 comments
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- 2166 reads
Angel 42 (return ticket)
While Mickey was out, scratching around looking for a bit of dope and visiting one of the other prisoners in their cell, Angel tried writing a letter...
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- 4 comments
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- 1103 reads
Angel 43 (midwife)
Carla had been chatting, fag in her hand, the debris of breakfast on the table. Angel mentioned that she was to see the midwife that day. ‘Fuck sake...
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- 4 comments
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- 1468 reads
Angel 44 (birth)
The midwife made sporadic visits over the weeks and months and she’d told Angel there was nothing to worry about, which was worrying itself. Angel...
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- 5 comments
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- 1538 reads
Angel 45 (mercy)
Sunlight filtered through the vertical blinds, the room bright and airy, Angel yawned. The night-shift guard, who introduced herself as Sarah, was...
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- 4 comments
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- 1160 reads
Angel 46 (new ward)
Angel was moved by the nurses to a four-bed ward that smelled vaguely of disinfectant, pee and talcum powder. Her bed faced the double doors. She...
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- 4 comments
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- 1802 reads
Angel 47 (scrap)
Angel could see from her mum’s face that Karen was in huff when she spotted Pizza Face. Karen made a point of cuddling Lisa and kissing her wee face...
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- 4 comments
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- 1411 reads
Angel 49 (getting acquainted)
Angel heard the click of a switch from the room next to her and the bump and sound of a hoover. The twins didn’t notice, but it buoyed Angel, the...
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- 6 comments
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- 1493 reads
Angel 50 (dinner and dates)
After Angel fed the twins her nipples were chaffed, but she wanted to make sure they had settled. To distract herself, she picked up the remote and...
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- 4 comments
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- 1208 reads
Angel 51 (good cop, bad cop)
Angel quickly established a routine with Lisa and Adam. They quickly established their own counter-routine which included staying up all night and...
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- 4 comments
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- 1316 reads
Angel 52 (compromise)
‘There’s nothing as cruel as folk,’ muttered Angel, kissing the tops of the twin’s heads and hugging them tight to her breasts. They didn’t let up...
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- 5 comments
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- 1425 reads
Angel 53 (baby-shaped hole)
When Angel woke it was still dark outside and, for a moment, she thought Jaz was coming to get her and she wondered where she was. It was the sounds...
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- 8 comments
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- 2195 reads
Angel 54 (new deal)
Angel heard the shuffle of feet coming up the stairs. She could still taste fried food in the air and the dank smell of unwashed kiddie clothing...
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- 8 comments
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- 1788 reads
Angel 55 (advocate)
Angel’s mum had come to visit, but it hadn’t ended well. Stacey asked her to leave because Karen was blitzed and shouting abuse at anybody that came...
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- 7 comments
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- 2330 reads
Angel 56 (old wounds)
Angel had kept in touch with Bruno by phoning him. They skittered around where Tony was like two drunks trying to find loose change to pay for a...
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- 4 comments
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- 1167 reads
Angel 57 (Pizza Face and Tony)
Angel was late getting the twins dressed when Stacey came to tell her there was somebody on the phone. Adam clenched his fists like a boxer who was...
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- 4 comments
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- 1006 reads
Angel 58 (cruel symmetry)
‘Coming,’ rasped Angel. Stacey hovered at the top of the stairs, but Angel heard her clumping away to her room when she answered. Outside a dog...
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- 4 comments
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- 1042 reads
Angel 59 (QC)
‘I’m not too worried,’ Angel, a slight edge in her voice, caught Stacey hurrying out of the kitchen with a folder in her hand. ‘But Lisa is beginning...
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- 4 comments
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- 1568 reads
Angel 60 (Bruno's confession)
The following weeks were the longest Angel could remember. The twins were fractious with the sudden heatwave and didn’t sleep very well. One night...
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- 4 comments
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- 1085 reads
Nanny Anna 2
Nanny Anna rifled through the cupboards for biscuits. She tended to stuff them into the back of the cupboard after she’d opened them and forgot about...
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- 7 comments
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- 1492 reads
the butterfly bush
‘Explain to me how you came to drown?’ His dark eyes twinkled as he peered at her over round glasses that sat squinty on his broad face and a bush of...
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- 8 comments
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- 4022 reads
Drop Off
The phone goes and I answer it, ‘Come and get me. Come and get me, Coach,’ he says. Befuddled with sleep. Think it’s the work and I’ve slept in –...
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- 3 comments
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- 1069 reads
Spaghettio
‘What’s this?’ Molly asked. Before Spaghettio had time to answer the phone rung, which was unusual, but not unknown as they were ‘courting’ as Molly’...
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- 1578 reads
good tears and bad.
I used to have the run of the house, said Nanny Anna. When I was wee I was always with my mammie’s mammie and she kept me right. I always got my own...
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- 2752 reads
Visiting Time
The torso of the hanged man hovered about his bunk, a dark cloth hood over his head, his lower limbs appearing and disappearing into a grey misty...
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- 1109 reads
Lockclown
During lockclown, other people get bored. He never gets bored. It gives him more time to talk about his favourite subject— You know the type, we...
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- 993 reads
Tour de Falkirk
Bod, my wee brother, was still in lockdown mode, hoarding Digestive biscuits and t-bags, but he lived in Grangemouth and they’re used to that kind of...
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- 1074 reads
Ramadan
I’m trying to find a piece of paper with the dates of Ramadan on it. The Muslim religious festival. For those of you that know me, you’d be right on...
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- 4071 reads
creative writing for losers
Our creative writing class was full of the usual kind of beatific-faced losers. Most of them elderly. There was one girl with brown hair and bad skin...
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- 988 reads
Cloudy at the bar.
I was stuck on my usual perch, the high-stool in the Club Bar with my back to the Gent’s. Got for free the usual waft of warm humanity as the toilet...
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- 535 reads
Cloudy still at the bar.
I grabbed my glass and guided them to a table on the main drag. Santa’s little helper and Santa, Lisa and Jane, should have been sitting with the...
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- 720 reads
Cloudy going home
Lisa gave me her perfumed hanky to stem the bleeding. But I clutched at my hand when we came out of the door of the pub. The girls had no coats. They...
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- 1087 reads
Cloudy goes to the Boulie.
Spending loose change was the easy part. Chips and suppers, a bitter pickle. A bottle of ginger-beer, which reminded me how young they were. Standing...
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- 967 reads
Cloudy gets on like a house on fire.
Cloudy kept an eye on the driver. He moved Jane’s hand away from his cock and placed it on the side of his thigh. Her tongue was down his throat and...
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- 939 reads
Cloudy and good night
Ken sounded chirpy, ‘Alright?’ He motioned with his head at the blackened door. ‘Let’s get some timber from my hut. And we’ll board that up.’ ‘No,...
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- 629 reads
How Harper Lee helped me to gain admission to Harvard's Creative Writing MFA
‘The only time I ever came close to Jesus was the calm after her orgasm.’ This was the first line in my portfolio of stories. During lockdown, I...
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- 830 reads
A Pile Up of Boys
The secretaries behind the sliding-glass panels of their office space watched us with sidelong glances as they went about their business. I guessed...
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- 3289 reads
Dade Simpson
David (Dade) Simpson had been one of my best mates at school. But he hadn’t started that way. He’d challenged me to fight on our first days at the...
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- 1198 reads
george devine
George Devine died before lockdown. He wouldn’t have known what it meant, or recognised it as a historical event of before and—I hadn’t seen him in...
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- 521 reads
June Collins
Tam Collin’s mum’s funeral was during lockdown. Tam was around the same age as me, so I guess that put her in her eighties. I knew Tam’s son too, Tam...
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- 879 reads
Dav Prentice.
I shouldn’t have laughed when I heard Dav Prentice was dead. We were talking about football in the Horse and Barge, but then Brendan took off on a...
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- 975 reads
Stevie Tait
Morrisey sang The Last of the Famous International Playboys on the radio and I quickly turned it off. Some windows were blacked out with yellowing...
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- 894 reads
Tam McSwiggan
Tam McSwiggan 1961-2001 R.I.P. When Tam was born Rangers’s supporters in the enclosure rioted and tore down the green, red, and white flag at Ibrox...
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- 696 reads
Jim Welsh (Largactil) 13/3/1964—6/10/2012.
I didn’t go to Jim Welsh’s funeral. I didn’t hear about it until later, and I think it was Sharpie that told me. I wasn’t upset, just sad about the...
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- 612 reads
Benny Hagen
Press reports are structured like a triangle, the weight of information balanced on the first line. Nobody much called Benny Hagen, Bernard, until he...
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- 2050 reads
Davie McCallum 1971-
When Davie McCallum, aged 31, went missing on 28 th March 2003 his son David (junior) was aged five and about to start school. Now he’ll be twenty-...
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- 17 comments
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- 3442 reads
Hamish Murdoch 1964-2007
‘Hi-yah Hamish,’ the kids at the back lane used to shout at me as I wandered down off the canal path to buy a paper from the shop on Dumbarton Road...
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- 6 comments
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- 842 reads
Stevie Mitchell 1966-2009
The talk was Stevie Mitchell found a body down the canal when he was running, underneath the Erskine Bridge. Not all jumpers make the water. I know...
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- 773 reads
John Mitchell 1965—21st September 2020. RIP.
I live in Dalmuir, but my brother who lives in Falkirk phoned me to tell me that John Mitchell was dead. Then the house phone went and my partner’s...
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- 615 reads
Watsons and McNeil, drowning 25th August 1972.
The boys that drowned in the nolly, Dalmuir canal, on 25 th August 1972, were much the same age as me. Children of the Cuban Missle Crisis. We went...
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- 1641 reads
Phyllis McFadden 1931-1986
I was twenty-three when my Auntie Phyllis died. She was fifty-five. I’m older now than she was when she died. Back then, in 1986, I thought anyone...
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- 4 comments
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- 752 reads
Pat Powell 1936—2014
Pat Powell 1936—2014 My da was over ten years older than Old Pat, but I asked my da if he knew him, and he gave a shake of his head and glowered. He...
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- 3 comments
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- 632 reads
SEV 2
My brother watched me playing for the Boy’s Guild on St Stephen’s gravel park. He stood under a tree with his mate Billy Quinn, both of them wearing...
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- 721 reads
SEV 3
I was sixteen when I stole my brother, SEV’s, identity. I’d nipped into the lounge of the Glen Lusset and ordered a pint of lager. I was tall enough...
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- 4 comments
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- 782 reads
John Ferguson 1/12/1929—11/1/2020
John Ferguson slipped me twenty-quid and I went to the Oasis, loosely termed a nightclub, with the cash. He was about five-foot-five tall, and he...
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- 754 reads
SEV 4
I was still at school and watching Space 1999 on the telly, when SEV wafted into the living room stinking of booze and fag smoke. He slapped the back...
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- 3 comments
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- 668 reads
Ernie Platt 1940—2015
Ernie Platt 1940—2015 Ernie was born in 1940. No football, no rugby, no golf, and the Scottish Grand National won by ‘no race run’, but at least...
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- 1401 reads
Damian, Damien and demons.
Mum was aged thirty when she had me. She’d already lost her first-born son, which sounds like a form of carelessness, as if she’d put him in a reed...
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- 1003 reads
The Omen
Mum and Da weren’t to know that Damien would become synonymous with the devil. David Seltzer the screenwriter for supernatural horror The Omen ,...
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- 564 reads
Uncle John and Jimmy.
Da didn’t believe in noise. He’d be sitting at the grill with the wireless on the window making toast and listening to Radio Athlone. Even from the...
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- 7 comments
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- 1060 reads
g81
I lived in the armpits of the world, but it wasn’t like me to leave work early. I’d a good job at Boots the Chemist, with prospects, but my skin...
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- 7 comments
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- 1286 reads
Sooz
It all started as a bit of a joke. Eddie was toying with his cheesecake and having a smoke. His ginger hair had begun to retreat from his forehead...
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- 10 comments
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- 2673 reads
Sooz 3
Fatty Patty got quite a reputation on the rig, and Eddie got the nickname Fast Eddie because he had to play detective. Track her down, pronto. Hose...
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- 5 comments
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- 1235 reads
Sooz 6
On a three hour train journey, with drink involved and money on the table, fights broke out with the frequency of barroom brawls in The High...
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- 8 comments
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- 1294 reads
Sooz 7
Breaking into at trot at Partick Cross, a rumble of thunder and squall of rain followed Badger and Eddie as they crossed Dumbarton Road and pushed...
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- 8 comments
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- 1014 reads
Chris Alexander 1958-2009 RIP.
Gordy reminded me of the time Chris Alexander got lifted. He’d been coming back from the Boilermakers on Dumbarton Road, Chris was always a smart...
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- 7 comments
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- 951 reads
Sooz 9
The best place for a walk in Clydebank was down by the Clydeside. Eddie could get out from under his wife’s feet and take a dander down to Cable...
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- 9 comments
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- 1370 reads
Archie McDougall 5/7/1958-12/5/2021. RIP.
My brother, Bod, phoned to tell me Archie was dead. It was quick. I rolled out the platitudes. He was his pal, much more than mine. Archie only came...
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- 5 comments
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- 957 reads
JOHN MCLACHLAN (Kojak) 1962-2011
Tony Quinn opened the living-room window and shouted me into Kojak’s house on Lilac Avenue. It had one of those boxy silver wheelchair ramps taking...
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- 5883 reads
Penthouse
‘Awright lads,’ Cooper’s da was bald with a booming voice. He shouted a derisory greeting as we dodged furniture in the living room. He’d the comfy...
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- 7 comments
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- 1054 reads
You and Me—forever—Anne.
You and Me—forever—Anne. Anne kept her eyes shut and waited for her number to be called. A whiff of cigarettes made her grimace, even though it was a...
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- 8 comments
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- 1141 reads
You and Me--forever--Donnie
Donnie stretched himself out on the marital bed he’d once shared with Ann and stared at the ceiling. Waited for the pills to kick in. Smirnoff choked...
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- 6 comments
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- 830 reads
Sooz 11
Eddie headed down to the Clydeside. A blue plastic bag cutting into his hand, clanging against his leg as he walked into the rain. Fatty Patty wedged...
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- 12 comments
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- 2327 reads
What did Jesus do?
Ian came in from the gym earlier than usual. ‘Guess what I saw or heard? Jesus has landed.’ I was sitting in my comfy chair reading The Snow Leopard...
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- 13 comments
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- 1770 reads
What did Jesus do? 2
‘Jeez, wae the electricity, all the stuff in the freezer will go aff.’ Ian ran his fingers through his hair. And he pouted. His beard was patchy,...
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- 4 comments
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- 774 reads
What did Jesus do? 3
My dad used to tell everybody how smart I was. He used to show me off, tell me to memorise things like long poems that rhymed. (And that was no crime...
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- 4 comments
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- 768 reads
What did Jesus do? 4
Peter the Apostle brought a more to life than life attitude and his faith was like flying fish. He couldn’t sit on his arse for a minute. We lit a...
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- 2 comments
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- 580 reads
Depression
I am what I am not That’s what I’ve been taught The timekeeper in my head keeps each tick of the day He feeds me guilt pain on not going away, again...
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- 9 comments
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- 1165 reads
Vermin
The gaunt old man in the pinstripe suit hovers over the microphone and starts speaking in a strange accent before they are ready. ‘It’s a ridiculous...
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- 11 comments
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- 1929 reads
Glasgow's Necropolis
I didn’t sleep that night. My wife clung to me in our bed and whispered to me not to go. She was pregnant. Her belly pushing against me, her smooth...
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- 7 comments
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- 866 reads
The Rules of Leviticus.
We had an extended breakfast. His eyes crinkled with laughter watching me make a pig of myself and eating for two. My eyes jerked open, when Etian...
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- 3 comments
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- 554 reads
Cancer ward
‘I’ll be back for lunch,’ I sat on the side of his bed and squeezed his hand—‘someone’s got to make sure you eat something.’ The two policemen...
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- 13 comments
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- 1412 reads
You are not your illness.
The girls left a heady brew of perfume behind. I poured Etian some water and he was well enough to sit up in bed and sip it. He began coughing and...
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- 7 comments
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- 835 reads
Tuesday Club
The Tuesday Club wasn’t what it looked like, older men in short and sannies panting and out of breath after playing three-a-side fitba on the wooden...
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- 10 comments
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- 1549 reads
Sometimes forever
I wore a beanie beneath another two-tone wool hat. The colour of my hair was a snapshot of fashionable black and white. The Weird Fish logo and the...
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- 17 comments
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- 2313 reads
Tuesday Afternoon.
Swat away the murky day Clasped hands upwards to pious heaven Exchange it for sniggering and hee-hawing Sharp hinterlands and hard-ons Feet that can...
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- 11 comments
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- 1183 reads
the eleven-minute bore.
My jacket was in the bar. She’d little more than a blouse, with a red bra playing peek-a-boo. The wind cut through thin clothing and buffeted our...
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- 9 comments
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- 903 reads
Ugly Puggly
Agnes said, ‘Did you see The Clydebank Post ?’ ‘Nah, why would I?’ I shook my head. Sitting on the stairs, pulling on my work boots. A snarled lace,...
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- 10 comments
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- 1344 reads
Ugly Puggly 2
I waited until we were stranded between traffic lights on Great Western Road before I spoke. People thought Ugly Puggly was being ignorant, because...
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- 15 comments
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- 1641 reads
Ugly Puggly 3
‘I’ll need to nip hame to get my Keycard,’ I told Ugly Puggly. He stared out of the window and said nothing. Drifting snow camouflaging the kerb...
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- 12 comments
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- 1569 reads
Ugly Puggly 4
Ugly Puggly closed his eyes, but I wasn’t sure he was asleep. We bounced along thin cobbled lanes, his thigh rubbing against the young lad's. He’d...
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- 13 comments
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- 1650 reads
Ugly Puggly 6
I fell asleep in the chair. The telly was on mute and a finger of whisky left in the bottle of Glayva. I’d slobbered down the middle of my dark...
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- 7 comments
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- 966 reads
Ugly Puggly 7
Dave said with the kind of accent that rubbed your nose in wealth, ‘Makes you think.’ I hadn’t noticed that before. I didn’t care what he did with...
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- 8 comments
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- 2097 reads
Ugly Puggly 8
I took Agnes a sausage-roll for lunch. Seventy pence from Villa Bakery. You couldn’t beat that. She’d rolled out of her bed, and she wasn’t looking...
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- 10 comments
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- 1521 reads
Ugly Puggly 9
I wandered through to the kitchen. While the kettle was boiling, I picked out a mug from the debris in the sink. Tap water was boiling hot. I ducked...
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- 9 comments
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- 902 reads
Ugly Puggly 10
I used to go to my local, three or four times a week. I caught the odd cry of ‘Hi, Jim,’ but that was from old timers like Jock. He didn’t wait for a...
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- 7 comments
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- 792 reads
Ugly Puggly 11
The shopkeeper said he was very sorry to hear about Agnes. ‘Cheers,’ I could never mind his name. I’d called him Raj, when I was drunk and he smiled...
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- 9 comments
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- 884 reads
Ugly Puggly 12
Ugly Puggly was a surprisingly good cook. By that I meant he could do more that toast and beans. He baked his own bread and could even do vegetarian...
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- 12 comments
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- 1729 reads
Ugly Puggly 13
I was in the depot and it was near knocking-off time. So I was trying to look busy by opening and shutting the back of the van doors, and skulking...
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- 7 comments
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- 785 reads
Ugly Puggly 14
Ugly Puggly’s room was messy and and stunk of urine and weak bleach. Clothes were piled on an unmade bed. A half-eaten bread roll in the bin. He...
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- 12 comments
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- 1417 reads
Ugly Puggly 15
I couldn’t get the electricity to work. I tried everything but paying for it. Flinging my arm around Dave’s shoulder in a rough clutch, he turned his...
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- 6 comments
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- 649 reads
Ugly Puggly 17
We balanced plates of linguine dappled with parmesan on our laps in the living room. Ugly Puggly sat in his armchair across from us and sipped green...
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- 7 comments
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- 849 reads
Ugly Puggly 18
Ugly Puggly was doing something with broad beans and peas, boiling them to death. ‘Whit have you got in the oven?’ I smacked my lips together, after...
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- 9 comments
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- 1075 reads
Ugly Puggly 19
The newsagent asked how my wife was doing, which put me on a downer. I guessed I was being racist, thinking Asian folk shouldn’t be trained to read...
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- 8 comments
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- 962 reads
Ugly Puggly 20
Ugly Puggly’s garden may have been a death trap with all that broken glass running down the slope, and the turning frame of a windmill, but the...
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- 12 comments
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- 1145 reads
Ugly Puggly 21
Ugly Puggly was slicing his way through roof tiles with a long knife, with a sickle hook halfway down the blade. ‘Hi, watch whit yer daeing,’ Grey-...
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- 9 comments
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- 1324 reads
Ugly Puggly 23
Molly made macaroni and cheese, with a side dish of oven chips for dinner. I stared out the window. She sat snug at the table and played Candy Crush...
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- 12 comments
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- 1095 reads
Ugly Puggly 24
‘Whit’s this?’ I sniffed the plate Ugly Puggly put down on the table. Screwing up my eyes, I shook my head and prodded it with my fork. ‘It looks...
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- 8 comments
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- 982 reads
Ugly Puggly 25
I came into the kitchen, yawning. ‘Whit’s that yer daeing?’ Ugly Puggly was up before me. His body slumped sideways, his eyes asked as he glanced up...
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- 5 comments
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- 642 reads
Ugly Puggly 29
Ugly Puggly stared into space. Dave stroking the back of his neck, brought him out of his reverie. ‘I need the money,’ he said, ‘to place a bet.’ ‘...
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- 4 comments
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- 480 reads
Ugly Puggly 31
Jeff put the suitcase he was holding on the table. He edged forward and tapped at Harry’s leg with the toe of his shoe. ‘Fuck sake,’ he said, ‘he’ll...
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- 8 comments
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- 969 reads
Ugly Puggly 32
Ugly Puggly got four mismatched mugs out of the cupboard, and stepped over Harry’s body. ‘Whit kind of tea you wantin, Camomile or Green?’ ‘I just...
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- 4 comments
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- 464 reads
Ugly Puggly 33
‘Won’t the body start to stink?’ I clutched at my freshly made cup of Tetley’s. Ugly Puggly took his time answering. He was making porridge for...
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- 10 comments
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- 992 reads
Ugly Puggly 34
I met one of my out-of-work colleagues, Bob, in the lane. I’d stripped down to my T-shirt and felt the sun burn the top of my head and back of my...
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- 7 comments
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- 652 reads
Ugly Puggly 35
Ugly Puggly's skin was gritty with dirt. He was making fancy chips and grilling pieces of duck on the bone. He’d their vegetable relation, chickpeas...
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- 9 comments
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- 951 reads
Ugly Puggly 36
Fat chance,’ I said. ‘Whit dae yeh hinks worse, a fat poof or a fat murderer?’ Ugly Puggly answered for Dave. ‘Look, I know yer gettin nervous. And a...
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- 6 comments
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- 649 reads
Ugly Puggly 37
I went home for a few days. Not home, home, just to see Molly, my wife, or ex-wife, but it was really to get away from them. Dave wasn’t sure if...
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- 8 comments
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- 1003 reads
Ugly Puggly 38
When I did the weekly shop, now Ugly Puggly wasn’t cooking, I brought back lots of booze to compensate. The local shops knew to expect me at any time...
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- 7 comments
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- 849 reads
Ugly Puggly 39
I’d one of those terrible dreams, where I dreamt I couldn’t sleep and left the car engine running. Drifting over to the window with a quilt dragging...
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- 6 comments
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- 906 reads
Ugly Puggly 40
I’d a fry-up for breakfast with all the works: mushroom, tomatoes and two potato scones. It was enough to sober me up. Not that I’d been drinking...
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- 7 comments
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- 685 reads
Ugly Puggly 41
I filled a mug with tap water. Drank it. Rinsed the mug and wandered through to the living room with Dave at my back. I took the seat near the window...
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- 8 comments
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- 943 reads
Ugly Puggly 42
‘I’m gonnae nip oot to get a carry-oot,’ I said. ‘You want anythin?’ ‘Nah,’ Dave screwed up his face. ‘We need tae get this done.’ Ugly Puggly rubbed...
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- 12 comments
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- 1387 reads
Ugly Puggly 43
‘The last time I was up here, it was my aunt’s funeral—and it always freezin’. I hadn’t brought a jacket and tried to rub some warmth into my arms. ‘...
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- 10 comments
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- 1055 reads
Ugly Puggly 44
‘Och, alright,’ Ugly Puggly said. ‘The locks werenae up tae much. Just as you’d expect. They looked solid, but they’re chocolate. You could open up...
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- 10 comments
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- 1002 reads
Ugly Puggly 45
I checked the bedroom for booze, I might have missed, before going into the toilet. My face in the mottled mirror above the sink wasn’t pretty. ‘Who...
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- 589 reads
Ugly Puggly 46
A slight tingling was in the tips of my fingers, pins and needles in my left hand. I didn’t want it to turn into an irregular party and me doing the...
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- 498 reads
Ugly Puggly 47
Things were going better than I hoped. I’d gone to the shop and got a Daily Record and rolls. The shopkeeper was waiting for me, edging forward to...
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- 907 reads
Ugly Puggly 48
I went outside to have a gander at where we’d buried the body. The grass around the decking was overlong, more like weeds. A chestnut tree on the...
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- 762 reads
Ugly Puggly 49
Cold outside with a hint of rain. Smirry. Our conversations usually involved the weather, even though most folk now worked inside. Dave was at my...
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- 8 comments
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- 948 reads
Ugly Puggly 50
I heard the playboy’s phone ringing. I was tempted to answer before the answering machine kicked in. Put on one of those female robot voices (perhaps...
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- 534 reads
Ugly Puggly 51
I felt on the other side of chaos. It was in my head and bones. And I couldn’t catch a breath. Tears gather at the back of my eyes. I heard myself...
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- 910 reads
Ugly Puggly 52.
It was the wee small hours when Ugly Puggly got home. I was sprawled on the couch, having fallen asleep. Sober enough to know I was drunk. I pulled...
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- 1162 reads
Ugly Puggly 53
Ugly Puggly’s jaw stuck out, and he ground his teeth. A sputtering noise came from the back of his throat. ‘Would yous two stop fuckin about? I’m no...
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- 572 reads
Ugly Puggly 54
I dreamt about my mum. Usually, she was giving me something, but it was her I wanted and not the gift. I clung to her legs. My bladder got me up. I...
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- 482 reads
Ugly Puggly 55
I’d an appointment with the doctor. I know you’re not supposed to have preferences, because mine would be for Dr Finlay. Someone that made up a fire...
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- 754 reads
Ugly Puggly 56
I went semi-regularly to AA meetings. There were all over the town and cities. In church halls and social clubs. There was even one in the backroom...
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- 473 reads
Ugly Puggly 57
I came in the front door after work, the living room was empty, the kitchen was empty. A pleasant woody aroma wafted in from outside. Dave came in...
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- 565 reads
Ugly Puggly 58
Our fellowship gave me a medal for being sober for a month. It was a wee plastic disc. I kept it in my side-pocket beside the van keys. I rubbed it...
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- 678 reads
Ugly Puggly 59
Seagulls squawked and fought aerial duels with each other outside before it got too dark to pick up a bin snack. I was getting ready to go out to a...
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- 769 reads
Ugly Puggly 61
‘We’ve always got a choice,’ said Ugly Puggly. ‘That’s the kinda shite you always read in those self-hate books dressed in pretty words. That’s like...
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- 10 comments
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- 1013 reads
Ugly Puggly 62
My phone rang. Dave seemed almost as surprised as me. He thought my phone so ancient naval flags would operate it. I took my Noika into the lobby to...
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- 7 comments
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- 856 reads
Ugly Puggly 63
‘It’s the police,’ Ugly Puggly whispered and giggled. We were soon rolling about the floor laughing as if we were hiding from the Provy cheque man...
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- 548 reads
Ugly Puggly 64
We walked over to Molly’s. It had been warm that day and I wanted to stretch my legs. Ugly Puggly gave us a couple of slices of blue-moulded bread to...
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- 822 reads
Ugly Puggly 65
I’d been sleeping in the Bongo. It was a better home than some of the guys I drunk with during the day had down by the canal. We were off grid, near...
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- 9 comments
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- 1668 reads
Ugly Puggly 66
I stumbled past ranks of wilting bracken and tepid water turning green with algae. Tenement buildings in straight lines and a clutter of housing...
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- 528 reads
Ugly Puggly 67
Molly had a hand draped over my shoulder as we sat in the back of the Bongo. Her musty perfume stirred me up. She dressed like we were going for a...
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- 4 comments
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- 527 reads
Ugly Puggly 68
We drove back along the way we came. The nearest petrol station was just off Crow Road. The engine chugged and wheezed before it cut out. I flicked...
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- 7 comments
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- 674 reads
Ugly Puggly 69
I drove home. Molly, in the passenger seat beside me, rocked backwards and forwards clutching her stomach and urging me to hurry. But the traffic...
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- 8 comments
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- 1156 reads
Ugly Puggly 71
Rain bounced off pavements and roads, but it had mostly stopped when I caught up with Ugly Puggly. I didn’t have a jacket on and was drookit and...
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- 11 comments
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- 1077 reads
Ugly Puggly 72
Ugly Puggly’s house was familiar and unfamiliar as an aged aunt. We crept up four stairs near the door, looking and listening like kids learning the...
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- 5 comments
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- 543 reads
Ugly Puggly 74
We did a lot of crying in the kitchen, in the living room and even in the bedroom. Dave got my bedroom. And Molly let me sleep beside her and cuddled...
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- 6 comments
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- 593 reads
Ugly Puggly 75
Some dirty bastard had been sick in the close, on the first steps to the half-landing. It stuck to the wall and the pitted surface of the stair. A...
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- 5 comments
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- 706 reads
Ugly Puggly 76
Molly made toast, but she’d only brown bread which was like cheating at breakfast, and eating low-calorie cardboard because it was good for you...
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- 5 comments
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- 528 reads
Ugly Puggly 77
When they left for Drymen, I went to the shop and bought a bottle of Vladistock. I cracked it open on the main road and took a quick slug. It burned...
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- 6 comments
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- 555 reads
Ugly Puggly 78
Ugly Puggly told me a drunk was like a Russian novelist. Always close to tears. I rambled on. ‘I don’t believe in God or that kinda stuff,’ I told...
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- 6 comments
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- 653 reads
Ugly Puggly 79
I used my good (non-wanking hand) to angle the telly. But I wasn’t sure how it worked. Whatever channel I flicked it onto seemed to drone extended...
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- 4 comments
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- 484 reads
Ugly Puggly 81
Wee Jim came up to the hospital to visit me. I’d have ducked him. But I’d haemorrhoids. My ducking days were over. I’d enough grief to deal with and...
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- 8 comments
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- 707 reads
Ugly Puggly 82
Because it was late when I got home, I thought I’d fall asleep right away. But Molly wouldn’t let me sleep beside her. She put me in the room next...
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- 7 comments
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- 691 reads
Ugly Puggly 83
I holed up in Ugly Puggly’s house with a litre of vodka and some cans. The electricity was still gubbed. Rain washed up against the windows like a...
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- 11 comments
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- 1033 reads
Ugly Puggly 84.
My throat was sore from breathing and I made whistling noises in the back of my throat as I trudged along towards Dalmuir West. I stopped for a...
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- 6 comments
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- 709 reads
Ugly Puggly 85
I was gagging for the meeting to be over even before it had begun so I could collect the cash. In my head, I slipped in and out with nobody noticing...
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- 5 comments
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- 560 reads
Ugly Puggly 87
‘Whit happened tae the camper van?’ I ran my hand across the bodywork and locked doors and looked in the windows. ‘I washed it,’ Dave said. ‘I got...
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- 7 comments
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- 885 reads
Ugly Puggly 88
I’d put on an old pair of my pyjamas. But I had to cinch them tighter at the waist when I went to bed. Cotton and thin stripes reminded me of the way...
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- 5 comments
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- 657 reads
Ugly Puggly 89
Wee Jim turned up earlier than I liked. But I shouldn’t have been surprised. He was always early. Molly made him a cup of tea while I got ready. I...
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- 8 comments
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- 701 reads
Ugly Puggly 90
Molly didn’t get up and say she was an alcoholic. She seemed content just to blend in and listen. She was no longer an AA virgin. I remembered the...
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- 6 comments
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- 546 reads
Ugly Puggly 91
I slept for a few hours, haunted by the ghost of Bradley Walsh, or I might just have left the telly on. But I gave up and got up about six. Molly was...
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- 9 comments
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- 819 reads
Ugly Puggly 92
It wasn’t often I was glad to get out and go to an AA meeting—it didn’t matter where it was, I’d have went—but I was glad to get out the house. I...
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- 14 comments
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- 1357 reads
Ugly Puggly 94
A crunching sound, metal on metal. My foot almost to the floor on the brake, motoring down Mountblow Hill. At the end of the fence where the...
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- 9 comments
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- 854 reads
Ugly Puggly 95
‘I’ll hink about it,’ I tried palming him off with an excuse, but he wasn’t for letting me off so easily. ‘What’s there to think about?’ he asked. ‘...
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- 10 comments
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- 1146 reads
Ugly Puggly 96
There was a glow from the kitchen. Molly had left the lights on. She was sitting with her back to me at the table playing Candy Crush. I wondered if...
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- 11 comments
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- 1237 reads
Ugly Puggly 97
‘How’d it go?’ wee Jim sprung up from his seat. He didn’t wait for an answer. He was already racing towards the door and out into the carpark as if...
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- 6 comments
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- 803 reads
Ugly Puggly 98
‘You look nice,’ Dave told Molly. He wanted to take us out to dinner, but I’d said it was stupid and we could just eat in. I found myself glancing at...
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- 5 comments
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- 597 reads
Ugly Puggly 99
Molly said if a job is worth doing it’s worth doing right, or something along those lines. It suited us both. She hadn’t trusted me to pack the...
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- 14 comments
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- 1313 reads
flowers you made
I buried those knickers knuckle deep in the earth to cover the shame of my soul. Some things are bigger than how you remember them. Evictions used to...
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- 9 comments
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- 733 reads
Ye Olde Christmas Story
I never knew what to get Jesus for His birthday. He was good at batting away stupid questions like that. He’d been on a bit of a downer. I didn’t...
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- 12 comments
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- 1208 reads
Old Prejudice.
I tripped over Old Prejudice when I came over the bridge at the canal. ‘Whit yeh daeing there?’ I cried. ‘Yeh gie me a fright.’ He looked up at me. ‘...
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- 6 comments
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- 560 reads
British Bulldog.
My eyes closed on the train journey home. I’d jumped out of my seat, pulling my rucksack from the rack above my head and made a run for it as the...
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- 13 comments
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- 1365 reads
Grace
I held out a fish supper, warm in my hand, still in its wrapper. ‘Here, yeh want this?’ Local Joe was standing in George Square, emptying a black bag...
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- 10 comments
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- 1194 reads
Maddy.
She could have laughed—her daughter, a mother. Madeline had been a fat baby. A happy baby with a heart like a sounding harp. She missed combing her...
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- 6 comments
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- 514 reads
Goatie 2
I ponder my sleep-walking predicament. Apparently, I’m superhuman able to drink a glass of water without waking. I remember a case in which a man had...
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- 13 comments
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- 1319 reads
Goatie 3
I slept tranquilly. It gets to the stage where you become acclimatised to anything. Even prisoners at Auschwitz slept soundly. I’m in pretend mode...
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- 8 comments
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- 723 reads
Goatie 5
All of a sudden your life is not what it was. Your brain does its best to catch up. I don’t know what’s happening. I feel like greeting, or giving...
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- 4 comments
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- 511 reads
Goatie 7
The Securicor Guard is mid-thirties, dark eyes, high cheekbones, and Roman nose. ‘They were going to ship you to Peterhead, but it’s too much hassle...
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- 5 comments
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- 531 reads
Goatie 8
The prison governor came to see me in my cell. Late forties, bags under his eyes, dressed in a grey suit. ‘I don’t know what you’ve been doing, or...
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- 8 comments
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- 649 reads
Big People, Small Island, Small Boats.
Malky phoned me to come and have a pint. I was surprised he was still alive. He was a wee guy with the fuzz of a ginger beard. He dressed funny, even...
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- 12 comments
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- 1116 reads
Goatie 10
I was in bunk, rattling with not sleeping. Footsteps on the landing. I waited for them to pass. Jangling keys. Under observation. If it wasn’t the...
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- 8 comments
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- 640 reads
Goatie 11
Acne face as he swung the torch around poked it in my face for the umpteenth time. He pried open my eyes. Wouldn’t let me sleep. Even Goatie was...
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- 6 comments
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- 604 reads
Goatie 12
The governor was smoking when I was pushed into his office. He didn’t try and hide it, like he did with civilians. He might have tried to blow smoke...
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- 5 comments
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- 464 reads
Goatie 14
Sometimes you’re aware of an absence when you come round. Sometimes, but less often, a presence. He wasn’t much to look at. Shaved cue-ball head...
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- 5 comments
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- 432 reads
Goatie 16
Boner reminded me, Vic was a great believer in you wouldn’t wish it on your worst enemy. It could even happen to a friend, or someone not coming up...
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- 7 comments
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- 623 reads
Goatie 17
Graham Greene,’ she said. ‘He’s one of you, too.’ ‘I thought yeh said, yeh didnae know if I hud epilepsy,’ I replied. ‘Noo, yer piling famous guys on...
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- 10 comments
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- 990 reads
Goatie 18
Pushing the panic button, meant code blue. Never my favourite colour. Prison guards alerted all over the prison. Tumbling into the medic’s room as if...
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- 8 comments
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- 659 reads
Goatie 19
Reverend Souttar had the soft shuffle of a sleepwalker. Code Blue had come and gone. Droopy Eyes took his arm and helped him sit down on the edge of...
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- 8 comments
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- 815 reads
Goatie 20
‘What’s the matter with you?’ she said when she came back. ‘You look a bit jumpy?’ ‘Nae wonder, that was fucking weird.’ I was lying in bed, with the...
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- 7 comments
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- 507 reads
Goatie 21
I didn’t know what to think when Droopy Eyes left. I was stuck with Marie Osmond’s classics. I’d the Medic’s room to myself for whole weekend...
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- 5 comments
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- 398 reads
Goatie 22
Droopy Eyes came back to work in a good mood. It was half-five before she got back to me in the medic room. And she’d soon be knocking off for...
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- 12 comments
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- 1265 reads
Goatie 23
Being in prison was like dossing under a motorway bridge. Constant noise and always something going on. Shaking you up. Droopy Eyes talking about...
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- 7 comments
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- 763 reads
Goatie 24
‘Yeh hink dogs can by psychic?’ Archie pondered. I wasn’t sure if he was talking to himself or me. I was going to keep silent, but muttered, ‘Dunno...
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- 10 comments
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- 784 reads
Goatie 26
The screech of the prison panic alarm had me going. The sound of running feet. Hardened souls flexed their muscles. I hid under the sheets until they...
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- 8 comments
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- 929 reads
Goatie 27
Cramp below my right knee, shuttled my torso along the soaking mattress. I twisted and turned and cursed to fuck and back. A memory bobbed to the...
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- 12 comments
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- 937 reads
Goatie 28
I woke up choking with terror, and felt like a good drink, or even a bad drink like Eldorado, the way a gourmet chef dreams of the perfect meal. Even...
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- 7 comments
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- 791 reads
Goatie 29
‘Are you alright?’ she asked. My head felt fuzzy. I tried to laugh it off. ‘I don’t suppose yeh can get wee apocalypses in the same way you get a wee...
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- 8 comments
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- 819 reads
Goatie 30
Leslie groaned, her face was flushed. ‘Are you quite alright?’ she asked, looking over my shoulder. I could no longer see the shapeshifter, only her...
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- 6 comments
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- 439 reads
Goatie 31
I’m that age. Got confused. Get easily lost. But it seemed the screw was leading me away from the medical block. I’d grown used to and familiar with...
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- 9 comments
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- 623 reads
Goatie 32
I tried to save Jordan. Went through the motions of trying to block and unlock death. Pulled the wire of out his mouth and got a jolt that shook me,...
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- 6 comments
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- 546 reads
Goatie 33
I was getting good at getting beaten up. I curled into a ball on the bed and let them hit me. Bounced about and squealed. That way you didn’t get hit...
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- 6 comments
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- 554 reads
Goatie 34
I was the only prisoner to get out of the van when we reached the Police Station at Clydebank. A car blocked the entrance so the van couldn’t reverse...
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- 5 comments
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- 531 reads
Goatie 35
Another cop appeared juggling two steaming mugs of tea. He wore a short-sleeved shirt taut over a thick red neck and round ball face. He plonked a...
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- 9 comments
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- 804 reads
Goatie 36
Being tired, didn’t mean I’d sleep. I was always anxious about it, which didn’t help. I’d heard all the usual stuff about being too tired to sleep...
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- 4 comments
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- 498 reads
Goatie 37
‘Tainted Love,’ I belted it out and gave it a kind of twist at the end for extra kudos that Mark Almond in his pomp couldn’t have managed. It helped...
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- 4 comments
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- 551 reads
Love story
My wee girlfriend had no neck, no shoulders, no breasts and untamed gorgon hair. Ali wasn’t really my girlfriend but lived beside me. She flicked her...
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- 12 comments
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- 1592 reads
Love Story 3
The furrows on my da’s forehead stood like stepping stones to his thoughts. The measured way he lowered the back paged of the Daily Record’s sports...
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- 11 comments
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- 860 reads
Love Story 4.
I tearfully confided in Colin in a side room in the church, where we stacked extra chairs we never used. But God willing, might someday. I didn’t...
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- 11 comments
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- 927 reads
Love Story 5
Her underactive imagination had me thinking for both of us. How we should behave since we kinda agreed not to get formally engaged until I could...
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- 8 comments
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- 619 reads
Love Story 6
I vowed to God I’d work hard and turn myself around and no longer look at the stuck-together catalogue pages even if they were just sitting there...
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- 5 comments
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- 412 reads
Love Story 7
‘I’m not going to school,’ I said. ‘How no?’ she asked. ‘Cause,’ my voice cracked and went up a notch. ‘I’m no well.’ Her arm shot out and a cupped...
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- 6 comments
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- 778 reads
Love Story 9
Jealousy was an accidental sin. Like stabbing your mum in the eye with a fork, while explaining something which you’d forgotten to mention, but she...
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- 11 comments
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- 893 reads
Love Story 10
Mum floated about smoking between the kitchen and living room. Da ruffled the sports’ pages of the Daily Record to show he was reading and didn’t...
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- 8 comments
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- 620 reads
Love Story 11
‘She would notice,’ I bit down on my bottom lip to show that was our conversation over. Ali recovered quicker than a whiplash victim cashing a cheque...
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- 9 comments
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- 678 reads
Love Story 13
Da came through for his dinner. He glanced at us talking and laughing, grunted something, as he drowned the fish in salt and vinegar. Picked up his...
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- 8 comments
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- 780 reads
Love Story 14
Mum made us both a pot of tea and put out a plate of Digestive. We sat at the table, knee to knee. She had her fags. I’d my biscuits to dunk in my...
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- 12 comments
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- 960 reads
Love Story 15
Ali came to my room after dinner. It was too cold to do anything. So we rolled about my bed, cuddling and kissing. She moaned a few times. Flashed...
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- 10 comments
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- 1048 reads
Love Story 17
‘Ali come back,’ I hissed. Too late as her big feet connected with metallic bucket making it ring out. She peered back at me and put a hand over her...
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- 5 comments
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- 596 reads
Love Story 18
I zigzagged down the hill towards the phone box. It always smelled of pish as if somebody had used it a toilet, which they had from the damp stains...
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- 8 comments
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- 600 reads
Love Story 19
I piled my shirt and trousers on the chair beside the window and crept shivering into bed with my socks on. Tossed and turned. Yawned, throwing my...
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- 11 comments
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- 947 reads
Love Story 20
I wore my smartest clothes and shined my shoes before we set off to the Police Station at Hall Street. Nobody else hurrying along the canal in the...
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- 9 comments
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- 714 reads
Love Story 21
Da groaned and leaned on me as he lowered himself to the floor and shut his eyes. ‘Don’t die, Da,’ I wailed as he sucked in each breath in and blew...
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- 10 comments
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- 1057 reads
Love Story 23
It rained every day and everything closed in before the funeral. Mum had time for a fag before we got into the chauffeured car. The cortege set off,...
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- 5 comments
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- 509 reads
Love Story 24
I’d kissed Ali’s cheek when we left the church. Felt the novelty and glad feeling of having done the right thing. Even though Mum didn’t say so, I...
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- 11 comments
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- 1171 reads
Hellish Heaven
The Receptionist answered on the third of fourth ring, giving out the same information in a robotic monotone. There were no doctor’s appointments...
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- 8 comments
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- 894 reads
Hellish Heaven 2
The examination couch had greenish paper towels covering it. I was scared more than humiliated. Cool and sticky. My presence on the couch soon to be...
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- 5 comments
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- 551 reads
EAT YEH
Chained outside McGinlay’s coal yard—a dog called EAT YEH, the size of a small bison. Howling, choking and mad eyed to get at you. EAT YEH had a...
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- 10 comments
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- 1095 reads
Sweaty
Sweaty was jumpy. He reached for a wrench. Rubbed grit from the window and squinted his one good eye to look through plastic into the yard. Neither...
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- 2017 reads
Uncle John's Popemobile.
Black specks were moving on the stacked plates of uneaten leftovers and the casual smears of a man that had tried to tidy up. Casualties lay on the...
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- 28 comments
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- 3288 reads
Tilly cut loose from the day
Tilly cut loose from the day Brightness like a red balloon Utterances dumbstruck with gravity Details don’t matter Holding onto her giggling A...
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- 1782 reads
Missed You.
My junkie girlfriend sold her body to feed her habit. ‘I’m no doing any harm,’ she said. ‘I sold myself tae you. Look how that fucking worked oot?’ I...
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- 1155 reads
The Little Lady
I think I deserved a little whisky and water to help me through the interviews. We’d agency doing the cleaning, but I’d told my wife it would be...
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- 6 comments
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- 860 reads
Shug Happens 2
‘I want Shadow!’ Sean wailed and cried so much he choked like an asthmatic on his own last breath. Mum had to hold on to her son or Sean would...
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- 489 reads
Sean Happens 4
Sean hugged himself in the back of his Uncle’s van. He squatted,shuggling sideways, breathing through his nose the musty smells. Human debris withthe...
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- 414 reads
Sean Happens 5
Mum sent Sean up to the Potter house to apologise. When she’d heard what happened, ‘I’m black mortified,’ she’d said. She’d waved away the idea of...
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- 590 reads
Sean Happens 7
We went to see The Poseidon Adventure at the local Odeon. The Spider paid me in and put an arm around my shoulder. We sat in the back seats. His feet...
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- 835 reads
Sean Happens 8
'He dropped me off around the corner from my house. I stood holding open the car door to prolong the moment, but I couldn’t think of anything good...
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- 6 comments
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- 527 reads
Sean Happens 9
Mr Martin gave Sean a little nudge on the back of his shoulder. ‘Go on then,’ he said. Mum stepped out to meet him. ‘So this is yer little friends,’...
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- 845 reads
Sean Happens 10
Tiredness and fag smoke glazed Sean’s eyes. He was falling asleep leaning against the work surface, but he wouldn’t give into it or go to bed. His...
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- 660 reads
Sean Happens 11
‘You can’t kill The Spider as easy as that,’ said Miss Dill. ‘He was already dead in a way. He was born without a soul.’ Mr Martin pursed his lips. ‘...
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- 7 comments
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- 524 reads
Sisters.
I didn’t know I had a sister until it was too late. Snow muffled sound and the weight of the outside world. We didn’t have money for the electricity...
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- 11 comments
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- 617 reads
Sean Happens 12
Dad staggered into the kitchen like his legs were encased in iron struts. He held out a primitive crossbow. A kind of spike in the narrow crosspiece...
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- 718 reads
Sean Happens 13
Miss Dill went to run the bath. She sat smoking on the on edge of the tub, dipping her fingers in to the water to test the temperature. Mr Martin...
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- 241 reads
Sean Happens 14
Mr Dill wiggled his eyebrows. ‘A hole didn’t use to be a place where you took money out of…It could have been much more painful than that.’ ‘Could...
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- 7 comments
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- 357 reads
True Love
God, as I knew, was very unforgiving. Most folk think of prophets as old guys with long beards. She said cheerio to half the people in the room. That...
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- 10 comments
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- 461 reads
the claimant.
That morning, a husband and wife team—physiotherapist and psychologist—shot him a glance in the stairwell. Dr Sim always took the stairs. He knew...
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- 4 comments
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- 233 reads
After the Wedding.
We arrived tired and late at the hotel. Rush hour traffic on the M8. Tailbacks. Too few petrol stations and endless road blocks scoured what was left...
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- 2 comments
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- 170 reads
Atrocious
The phone rang. I was reading up in a cupboard. In the hallway, at the top of the stairs. It was full of books, and I’ve a lamp and desk, but it...
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- 296 reads
the lost manuscript.
A self-confessed failure at writing. It made it easier if anybody asked, but they never did. Kittiwakes and guillemots were an orchestra for Damien’s...
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- 17 comments
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- 714 reads
the lost manuscript 2
He didn’t set out to be a slob. It was just easier not to care in a flat-footed way to wear the same clothes until they were like twins with an...
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- 6 comments
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- 311 reads
The Lost Manuscript 3
Dark was darker than death when you were younger. Light a flashbulb. No fat kids. No coloured kids, unless it was the black babies’ pictures you...
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- 10 comments
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- 344 reads
Awake
Almost the worst thing A face that no longer speaks Warfarin and medical wattle One that makes you weep Sloshing around is somebody No need for an...
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- 7 comments
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- 304 reads
silent as need be
Rain battered down. A give-and-take. They walked side-by-side, silent as need be. They crossed Kilbowie Road, watching for traffic, listening for the...
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- 272 reads
Pick Up
Almost home. Angel hurried up in the hill at Byron Street, pulling her coat tighter around her flowery Boots' blouse, the high winds catching in her...
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- 11 comments
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- 298 reads
what comes after Christmas 2
Carl grew so weary sitting beside her bed his shoulders were mudflats. It seemed so long ago. He couldn’t remember how it came to this. The world...
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- 4 comments
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- 75 reads
what comes after Christmas 3
The basement smelt damp and faintly of pee. A knot grew in Carl’s gut. He hurried with Naama in his arm. He was a wee man and she was no weight at...
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- 4 comments
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- 63 reads
Comments
A wise sentiment, indeed!
A wise sentiment, indeed!
True
The older I get, the more time feels like a loop or a mobius strip: the past replays, morphs, things end, different things begin, patterns are repeated, and gradually, the past 'composts' to become fertile ground for future growth. This short but sweet piece conveys much of this in few words.