Intermission Part 2

Thanks for dropping by 101 Very Short Stories... always good to see you! To coincide with the launch of my new book and game design The Trellborg Monstrosities, I've launched a full, brand new site over at John-Houlihan.net - I'll keep posting intermittently here no doubt when a new v short story slips into being, but by and large most of my efforts will be over at the new site. So do swing by and say hello for all the very latest including news, info, interviews and art. Toodle pip!

#28 Consumer protection

Caution: Hot beverage may be hot. Do not eat this cup. These nuts may contain traces of nuts. Processed in an environment that contains deadly nerve agents. This packaging is made out of recycled babies. This warning is designed to give the impression of concern for your wellbeing  –actually we don’t give a fuck; we just want to cover our arses. Please continue to consume until you expire.

#27 T and Cs – a cautionary tale for the digital age

The devil’s in the detail, so they say and so next time you’re flicking past pages of bumf before blithely hitting that Accept button, my advice is: take care.

On a whim, I installed a harmless little amusement and accepted the Terms and Conditions without even perusing the fine print.

The result? I sold my immortal soul for the princely sum of 69p. The devil didn’t disappear in the digital age, he just became a rather devious app developer – and apparently, he doesn’t do refunds.

#26 20-20 Hindsight

40 years, five kids, twelve grandkids, five houses, a fleet of cars, six dogs, four cats, umpteen goldfish and one fortunately undetected murder later, I think I can safely say, I married the wrong sister.

#25 Dumped

They were only two battered old stools, but unloading them at the recycling centre, I remembered how we had bought them together, how we had sat at that old breakfast bar in our first home and ate and drank and talked and laughed till the wine ran out of our noses.

Did we make a mistake I wonder? But then you can't be here and I can't be there and that will never change and sometimes, love is not enough.

Wearily I turn the wheel and head for the solace of home.

Yet as I drive away, I see a young couple pull them from the scrapheap and giggling, smuggle them covertly into their van. Their new journey begins, like our own.

#24 Time's Great Healer

"How I long for the ravages of time to consume me, to see the lines and seams steal over this angelic mask, a fine filigree of fleshly decay.

I yearn for the spread of crow's feet around these bright eyes, for time's arrow to whither these sublime cheeks, for this sultry Cupid's bow to bend no more.

Then this wondrous nymph's body will sag and fray and settle into a comfortable middle age spread.

And then, only then, will I be free of the cameras, the lights, the public's never-ending Gorgon gaze. Their fascination, like this beautiful curse, forgotten."

#23 Animals

"We're animals man, nothing more than fucking animals, smart ones sure, but the beast's skin tight cage can get stretched awfully thin.

"Don't you ever want to go on the hunt? Run rampant, run with the pack, stalk through the shadowed night, howling at that moon, embracing the beast within?

"On the prowl, senses primed, child of the inner dark. Your blood surges as you catch the scent and muscle, bone and sinew answer. Pulse hammers, the chase is on, then the catch, the kill and you tear, rend and feed on the fallen, snout bloody and red.

"Content, belly full, a new scent emerges, one that whispers of heat, attraction, desire. You circle, teeth bared, wary, until the first bite, the taste, then you curl, writhe, go at it, fuck like animals. After, you curl up asleep in your lair, dozing uneasy dreams of your lost human self."

Intermission

Just a quick break in the 101 very short stories transmission today to let you know my first novel, Tom or the Peepers' and Voyeurs' Handbook has just been published on Kindle, iPhone, iPad and Kindle for PC and Android. You can buy a copy direct here on the Amazon store, or why not head on over to the Facebook page here and show it some Like love? Thanks!

#22 You have a new message...

"It is you who create our heart of darkness. You with your unquenchable thirst for the new black gold. You with your LOLs, your Facebook updates, your petty Twitterings, the empty all-consuming social media addiction which passes for your lives.

"There is no connected world here, no network, just the tears of our brutalised women and the silence of our dead children. 'Never again' you said, but Africa is not Europe and our untold millions never part of that equation.

"Resource cursed, our wealth has become our bane and I should hate you for what you have done to my country, my people, my beloved Kivu. Yet instead I pity you, for the stain of your crime can never be washed away, only atoned for.

"Act now, otherwise this is truly what you will have brought out of Africa."

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#21 Light

"What do I know? Perhaps much, probably little. Human relationships? Ah yes, them. So complex, so fragile, each swinging precariously on a silken pendulum, translucent, almost invisible, in a world of sharp edges.

One cannot truly find oneself in another, but we must become a slave to be set free, be able to look each other in the eye, be able to look each other in the soul and be content, fulfilled by what we see.

So if you would see these tender threads survive, flourish, even mature, only one piece of advice would I give: always be a light to each other, for all else is shade."