Life's a Beach - flash fiction

 Life’s a Beach

Alex saw the crab first. It was on its back, deposited on the pebbles by a rolling wave, eight legs flailing in the air, claws grasping at nothing. Before Alex could get there to right the poor thing, there was a crackling of pinions over his head and a massive black-backed gull descended, its wingtips brushing his face. That was the end of the crab.

He sat down on one of the wooden posts on the breakwater and pulled out his phone. Still no message from Cally. Three days and nothing from her, had she lost her phone again, or was she ghosting him? Alex decided he didn’t care. He was only really going out with her because you had to have a girl, or the guys in the class would mock you. He knew this from experience.

Alex wasn’t especially interested in Cally, or any of the girls round here. Maybe if he could get into one of those London art colleges, the girls would be better, somehow.

He tried skimming a few stones, but that wasn’t something he was good at, any more than he was good at dating girls. His first stone bounced a couple of times before it sank. The next few were no better.

The monster gull had finished eating the crab, it flew off, ignoring Alex. The crab shell was lying empty on the stones, picked clean by the gull. Although its beak looked huge the bird knew how to use it with precision, to completely eviscerate a crab. Alex turned the shell over with the toe of his trainer. Now the crab looked whole again. He photographed it, then piled random stones over the body and arranged alternate black and chalk-white stones in a circle around the pile. A cairn for a crab, he photographed his work and posted it.

The wind was getting up, Alex had decided to abandon the beach when a guy in a dark wetsuit walked past, carrying a huge board. His dark hair was whipped by the wind and his face looked full of joy. Alex watched as he assembled a windsurf board and sail, the guy’s movements were skilled and lithe, he was fit.

Before he launched, the guy turned and waved to Alex, then he launched and almost before the board hit the waves, the wind caught the brightly coloured sail and he was off.

Alex sat on the pebbles and watched the wind-surfer hurtling across the waves, almost flying. He took out his phone to take a photo, then stopped. He stuffed the device back in his pocket and rummaged in his backpack. His sketchbook and pens were right at the bottom, he hadn’t used them for weeks. He began to draw the man in the dark wetsuit as he conquered the waves with his rainbow sail.

Guliver's Tales and Gulliver's Verse - published

 It's taken nearly a year but I have gathered, edited, designed, collated, constructed and published two pamphlets of creative work from the St Leonards Writers. Pamphlets were first suggested early in 2023, everyone else in the group seemed very happy for me to take on the task, so eventually I did.  Never quite realised how much work would be involved, but here they are. The cover drawing of Gulliver the gull was drawn by multi talented John Ballard, artist writer, musician and a life-member of the group.

Gulliver's Tales is 50 pages of flash fiction, we agreed a limit of 500 words. Stories range from serious to very humourous.  Gulliver's Verse is the group's first ever poetry book and has everything from short personal verse to ballad and Milliganesque comedy.

The St Leonards Writers are the publisher, ISBN's paid for.

We decided to charge £4.50 for the pamphlets. Members get a free copy and can buy others at cost price.

Coronation Trifle with Extra Ducks - flash fiction

Georgia watched the Maître D for the signal, wishing he would get on with it. Her gilded brass tray wasn’t light, with its load of sixteen cut glass dishes containing Coronation Trifle.

One of the waiters brushed past her headed for the kitchens. He was showing off with a huge stack of used plates and silverware balanced confidently on one hand. As the heavy swing door closed behind him there was a huge crash.

“Extra ducks!” With a click of fingers the Maître D summoned two waitresses who were clearing serving dishes and directed them toward the kitchens. He then waved peremptorily to Georgia to begin serving the desserts. She was only carrying enough trifles for the top banqueting table where the Mayor was seated. She then had to return to the kitchens for more.

Behind the swing doors, chaos reigned. An extra duck had slipped in spilled gravy and gashed her knees on broken crockery, the other duck was trying to stem the bleeding with her apron. 

Georgia sidled around the mess. It was being made still worse by the waiter who had caused it sweeping around with a broom already impregnated with duck skin, gravy and spinach. The floor was becoming a skating rink. The kitchen staff were ignoring everything, their shift was almost over.

Georgia could not possibly cross that floor carrying another heavy tray. She sat down and began eating Coronation Trifle.

Biscuit - Flash Fiction

Mike just wanted to have his cake and eat it and I wasn’t the cake. I was just a biscuit that he liked to nibble on sometimes. I didn’t even know if I was the only biscuit he liked and was I a Bourbon cream? Or a Lincoln biscuit, the one you nibble the dots around the edges? Hope I wasn’t a Garibaldi, all those squashed flies!

I first met Mike down the Bull Hotel. Not at the bar, girls didn’t go in bars then, it was in the back room where there was a folk night every Friday.  The Folkies weren’t welcome in the bar either, not really but the landlord wanted their money so he sent a boy in to take orders, then carry them back on a mucky tray. If you didn’t have the right change for your drink it would cost you. Pints of mild or bitter was all they’d sell. I drank a half of mild, it was ten-pence and I could make it last all night. I used to go with Billy, he’s my brother and he’d buy me the half and tell me to make it last. I didn’t really mind, I was only sixteen and I wasn't that keen on the beer anyway.

I did like the music though. There was a girl singer, she had long, dark hair. I so wanted hair like hers, mine’s ginger and fluffy and I can’t hardly tie it in a ponytail, like the other girls there. Anyway this girl, she sang like Joan Baez and she was good but I preferred the guys singing. Then that night Mike appeared, with his guitar, he wasn’t a boy he was older and he had a man’s voice and he sang like Johnny Cash.

I got off with Mike, even though Billy said he was married and I should stay away from him. So when he came back, after I hadn’t seen him for weeks,  I just told him we was finished. So that was that.

Come to think of it Mike probably had thought I was a biscuit,  I was his ginger nut.

Flash Fiction - Just Fish

           Westway is never deserted, even at three-fifteen in the morning. I’ve driven up from the coast, two hours on empty motorways, but London roads are never empty. The squad cars are bored, one has decided to tail me.

           The ice is melting.

            I’m travelling at a steady thirty-eight, the limit is forty. My lights work, other things don’t, including the refrigeration. That shouldn’t interest the police. But the blue light flashes in my wing mirrors.

Weeeooooooow, weeeeoooow.

The ice is melting.

The Atlantic Ocean surrendered their lithe, goggle eyed grace to the net, the gaff, the ice packed hold. Trawlers gathered around the jetty like remora around a welcoming shark, unloaded their cargo. Trays of dead and dying fish surged along the rollers, a mechanical death rattle to agonised gills fighting for water in the cold, arid air.

Weeeooooooow, weeeeoooow.

They are so beautiful, these fish. Mackerel glisten, shimmer in a hundred shades of green and gold between gloss black stripes. Herring pour from tray to tray, a priceless cascade of silver, tainted gut red, some crushed by the weight of tons of their companions in the bowels of the ship. The majestic cod flicks its huge head feebly, in death its silvery sheen and snow white belly will bland to grey.

‘Is this your van, sir?’ Menacing tone, a torch deliberately shone in my eyes.

            ‘Yes, officer.’

The ice is melting.

            ‘Going somewhere nice are we, sir, at three o’clock in the morning?’

            ‘Billingsgate.’

            If the ice melts too fast, these exquisitely streamlined creatures will not be fresh. They’ll be rejected by fishmongers, restaurateurs and go for cat food; all that beauty and death for the delectation of the city’s pampered moggies.

            ‘So your van is full of fish fingers, is it?’

            ‘Just fresh fish.’

            ‘Yeah right! Have you got sole, or are you floundering?’ He’s a joker, this cop.

            The ice is melting.

            ‘Would you like to take a look, officer?’

            I open the back of the van. Semi-frozen water slops onto the policeman’s feet as he stands too close to the rubber seal when it sucks free of the door. He steps back, swears. The second policeman shines a torch in. A thousand golden, alien eyes glint, a million perfect scales glimmer.

            Striped Mackerel, they have clouds named after them, the mackerel sky you see at the end of a long, clear day. The humble herring, destined for kippers, rollmops and fertiliser, swirl in the water like smoke, the seals and whales make no impression on their numbers. Codfish were the kings of the northern oceans, once.

            ‘Just fucking fish,’ says the cop with cold, wet feet.

‘Yes, officer. Just fish.’

            The other cop likes fish. He gets three glossy mackerel, wrapped in yesterday’s Express.  I get on to Billingsgate. The cats will go hungry tonight.

                                                                               *

What is Flash Fiction?

This is a question which writers seem not to have agreed to agree on. The name Flash Fiction first emerged in the early 1990's, according to Wikipedia, so who knows when it actually emerged. As for what flash fiction is, short certainly. How short is up for grabs. I've seen competitions which ask for one sentence and other places which say 750 or even up to 1,000 words, so anywhere in between could work, depending on context. However for me, over 500 words seems too long, flash fiction should certainly fit on one page.

I suppose the generally accepted idea of Flash Fiction is that it should be sparing with words. A flash fiction story should be pared down until it says exactly what it must to form a perfect story and nothing more. Flash fiction is not a prose poem, there's little room for lyricism and it's more than anecdote, because anecdote lacks a sense of journey and completeness. Flash fiction's different to the traditional short story, because by definition flash lacks the rounding out of place and the minutiae of personality which can be so pleasing in a good short story.

I've tried consciously writing flash fiction, but more often than not I've been displeased with my results. I do better if I just write and let the short story find its own length. However writer David Gaffney has suggested taking existing stories and paring them down to the bare essentials, he should know, he's had a book of flash fiction stories published. So I will give that a go. I'll post some efforts here later.

Flash fiction can be sharp and devastating. I've read some very short ones - micro fiction - tweet length or less, which can make me draw a short breath. But I don't remember them. The memorable ones are a bit longer, with a bit more substance, a character I can empathise with. 

Some interesting pages/sites about flash fiction :
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/may/14/how-to-write-flash-fiction - article by David Gaffney

http://365tomorrows.com/about/ - good site with lots of flash science fiction. The genre seems to appeal to a lot of sci-fi writers. This page has a great comment by Kathy Kachelries about how to create good flash fiction.

 http://www.chester.ac.uk/flash.magazine - a university based magazine which publishes flash fiction, essays and articles all up to 350 words.