Determination

when all else fails
dig deep inside
retrieve the strength
you always hide

you have it in you
to pull through
you know just what
you have to do

don't take to heart
the sly remarks
thrown around
like playing darts

rise above
the mockery
you're better than
you think you'll be

set you sights
upon the prize
and strive to reach
those all time highs

In the attic

The fresh topic of discussion at school had moved from Miss Harris's bird's nest hair do to the cool new website that took photos of your street. All day kids were logging on, checking out the streets of Bickertown.
Tyler was desperate to check out his house, to show off his parent's palacial pad. But his pleas to the kids in the locker room to look at his laptop were drowned out by the guffaws coming from the crowd surrounding Gavin Baxter.
"It's Mickey Finn," said one kid. "On Morrison Street."
"Who's he snoggin'?" said another.
"I reckon it's Penny. She's the only girl I know that piles her hair on her head like a pineapple."
Tyler left the locker room during the chorus of snickers.
When he got home that afternoon the nagging curiosity of seeing his house online drew him to log onto his computer. He entered his address, clicked the mouse and up popped an image of the outside of his house. But the novelty of the innovation quickly wore off when, on closer inspection, he saw a face in the attic window that didn't belong to any of his family.

Curiosity killed the cat

Janie Johns had always been far to nosy for her own good. When told not to do something, she always did the opposite, like the time Mickey Grayling in Year 1 told her about Mr Vincent's back garden cemetary-or what he believed was a cemetary. Janie just couldn't help herself. She had to take a look. She had to be the one to prove the rumours. True, or false, the outcome didn't matter.
That time she got away with it, but her luck was about to run out.
It had been a while since she visited her Great Aunt Violet. Janie didn't do relations, but as she was on her death bed Janie's mother dragged Janie along for her last visit.
While she was there she overheard her Great Aunt talking to her mother.
"There's something I need you to do, Flora," croaked Aunt Violet. "There's something in the attic I need you to get. I need you to destroy it. It's important."
Janie could tell Aunt Violet was anxious. Her desperate, spluttered speech, her deeply wrinkled frown. Whatever was up there Janie wanted to see it before her mother did.
She listened closer.
"Of course, Violet, anything," replied her mother.
"Jig Saw," were the last words Aunt Violet uttered before her last gasp of breath.
Janie ran upstairs, choosing to find what she shouldn't rather than console her whimpering mother.
She crept up the wooden ladder and flipped over the attic hatch.
There lying on the floor of the empty attic, bathed in the orange glow of the setting sun, streaming in through the window, was a flat box. Janie brushed the dust from the cover.
'Jig Saw', were the words fainted scribed on the box.
"Why was she so worked up about this?" Janie crowed as she prised off the lid. "It's just a box, full of bits of jigsaw."
Janie tipped them up onto the dusty attic floor, but as she tried to sort them out, flipping each one over to its picture side, she noticed that all the pieces were blank.
"That's weird," she said and tried to clip two together.
As the pieces interlocked part of a picture formed on the surface of both of them.
"Wow," Janie gasped. "It must be magic."
Eagerly, Janie put the pieces together, matching the shapes as best she could. As she did the picture took shape in front of her eyes.
She couldn't tell what it was a first as the colours were too muted-soft browns, tans, creams and oranges, blending in with each other. But working her way from the edge of the jigsaw inwards she noticed the picture forming was of an empty room. The lower half of a person was next to form-a person crouched with their back towards her. Above the person was a shiny object, curved and sharp, glinting in the sunlight.
As Janie's mother called to her from below Janie shakily placed the last two pieces of the jigsaw and realised to her horror, it was a picture of her in the attic.

Fur..evenge

In a land turned upside down
humans didn't wear the crown
all those years subservient
animals were discontent

Tired of being stripped down bare
just so humans wear their hair
animals now in control
turned the tables on their role

Sitting meek below the chain
humans now no longer vain
made to atone for their deep sin
for animals now wear their skin

Claire de lune

Claire de lune
Claire of the moon
shining bright
celestial sunlight

Looking down
on every town
this nightly guard
of the sun's backyard

Tracking the sky
with stars on standby
til morning time
when the sun does climb

The last drop

It clung onto the branch for life. A child of the trees. The last of a thousand leaves. A destiny of mulchy brown sludge beneath orange skies, beckoned. The last drop to the roots of the slender Silver Birch.
From the first, fresh Spring rains it had blossomed, the earliest bud, yolking the branch of moisture and breathing in the heady energy of divine air. It had seen the warming glow of the summer sun, felt the patter of April showers, heard the drumbeat of hail, smelt the seasons on the breeze. Smelt all but one, all but winter. Its last wish, its dying wish was to see, hear, taste, touch and smell the last season of the year.
Steadfast and resolute, its purpose no longer to feed the tree with life giving breath, it chose to follow its own path. It clung on to the branch and wouldn't be shaken. No galeforce wind, no driving rain, no frost, no fog, no burning heat would make that leaf let go. It wanted to see snow. Then, as luck would have it, when all the trees stood bald and bare, the weather took a turn. A day of Autumn sun suddenly turned to a biting Winter frost-sharp and arresting. The little leaf, yellow with age, trembled in the chill air. And just as it drew its last gasp a delicate snowflake-brilliant, crystalline white-fluttered from the sky and landed on its tip. Now the leaf let go and like a cradle, it gently floated the snowflake to the ground-it's journey complete.

The impossible dream

Every Christmas Eve she sat in front of the Christmas tree staring at the twinkling lights, admiring the coloured baubles.A different colour scheme every year-once red, then green, then purple, then pink and white. Her pilgrimage to the lounge, from the comfort of the attic, had become an annual ritual. She lost count of how many times she'd done it-was it ten, twenty, a hundred years?
Although dazzled by the opulence of the decorations, she wanted nothing more than to taste the mince pie on the plate and the glass of warm milk beside it. She wanted to relish the sweetness of the fruit, the delicate hint of warm spice, the crunch of the shortcrust pastry. She wanted to feel it tickle and tantalise her taste buds and send her gliding round the room on a sugar merry-go-round, before sliding down her throat. If only she could have it.
But alas when she reached out her wispy, white hand it swept clean through the pie, like a drifting mist, for she was nothing more than a forgotten ghost.

One moment in time

With thick waves of ebony hair and a voice as smooth as warm honey it was difficult to see why anyone wouldn't fancy Carson Nicoll, but Astrid didn't. Whilst other girls swooned and followed him around every lunch time like love-struck zombies, Astrid sat in the locker room eating her ham sandwiches. She tended to avoid him, she didn't want to get sucked into the swirling vortex of sexual tension that seemed to encircle him. So she averted his gaze, paid no attention when he spoke in class, walked the other way if walked towards her, and gave him a wide berth in the school yard. Half the time though the swarm of girls with fluttering eyelashes put enough distance between them to render her attempts as pointless.
From her distant vantage point she could chuckle as girls made futile attempts to attract his attention with rising hemlines and blood-red pouts. But his eye would not be turned.
When the nip of winter was welcomed with posters advertising the Christmas Dance the race to net the 'new' hunk cranked up into high gear. With competition high, the battlelines were drawn. One by one the girls retreated to the comfort of toilet cubicles with their suitcase sized school bags containing an arsenal of decorative weaponry designed to beguile the most asexual of boys. But whilst they trowelled their faces with orange goo and marinaded their skin in cheap perfume that could easily strip paint, Astrid sat quietly with a book in one hand and a Granny Smith in the other. She watched as they paraded like cattle in front of Carson. Astrid couldn't help but snigger. He was more interested in his football or chatting with his friends to notice them flicking their hair and draping themselves over benches in front of the footy pitch. But although Astrid was sure, from her observations, that he had not been bewitched by anyone, his eye had been drawn.
The rainbow of girls around him was dim in comparision to the brilliant beacon of beauty he struggled to attract the attention of. She was clumsy, for sure, always dropping her books, or walking into doors, walls or any obstruction in front of her but that made her all the more dazzling to him. She had an identity all of her own, a uniqueness that set her apart from the gaggle of girls he couldn't get rid of. All he wanted was a look, a glance, but whenever he saw her she seemed to turn away.
One afternoon a chance presented itself. She was sat on the steps outside the school, with her coat buttoned tight and her gloved hands clutching a book. As he walked towards her dodging, girl after girl, she looked up and locked eyes with him. The first time.

Holly, on ice

Holly raised her hand to stop the badged prefect, striding toward her, from delivering her with another verbal assault. She'd had enough for one day.
"I know, I know," said Holly, preferring to stare at the linoleum than look into the prefect's eyes. "I've just come from the Deputy's office. That's why I'm out of class, so save your breath for someone who's really bunking off."
Holly huffed as she readjusted the strap of her bag on her shoulder, waiting for the prefect to let her continue on to her geography class. An eternity seemed to pass before the prefect finally spoke up.
"Are you okay?"
Holly locked eyes with the prefect; the statuesque girl standing in front of her. Her blue badge glimmered in the sharp fluorescent light of the locker room. She was well turned out with not a blonde hair out of place and her blazer buttoned fully; just the kind of goody-two-shoes that Holly had no time for.
"What's it to you, anyway?" Holly snapped.
"Just trying to help that's all. You seem upset," replied the girl.
"Yeah, well, so would you be if you'd just been given detention."
"What did you do?"
Holly was indignant. What gave her the right to ask these questions?
"Like you care," said Holly. "You're as bad as them."
The girl folded her arms. "You're just sore because you got caught doing whatever it was you were doing," she said.
As much as Holly hated to admit it, she had a point. She wasn't mad at the teachers, she was mad with herself.
"I was caught smoking, in class, if you're that interested," Holly sneered and waited another remonstration. Like she needed to hear it. The Deputy's words were already rolling inside her head: 'disappointed', 'disrespectful', 'bringing the reputation of to school into disrepute'. Every 'dis' word ever invented was laid on top of her like a hundred ton weight, and to add to her burden was the knowledge that her parents were sure to hear about it, if not from her own mouth but most assuredly in letter form from the school. She was 'blackmarked' something that had never happened before.
"Well, if it's any consolation, I was caught smoking once too," proffered the prefect. "It wasn't in class though. I was outside the school grounds. The teacher strode up towards me, snatched the ciggie from my mouth and stamped it out. I was more pissed off that it cost me a quid, than getting caught."
A sympathetic smile curled the corner of Holly's tightly drawn lips.
"When was that then?" Holly asked.
"A few years back. I was in first year," said the girl as she sat down on one of the rows of benches beneath the lockers. Holly sat on a bench opposite her. "You in first year too, yeah?"
Holly nodded. "My folks just moved up here."
"Ooh, that's tough."
Holly nodded.
"What's your name?" asked the girl.
"Holly."
"I'm Janie," said the girl offering her hand.
Holly took it. Janie had a firm, self-assured, confident shake, the kind that gave you comfort, that let you know exactly where you stood.
"You a sixth year?" Holly asked.
"Yep. And still sane. How about that? Though to be honest I've shocked a fair few teachers on the way."
"Why?"
"They thought I wouldn't amount to much. I sure showed them," Janie said, flicking her badge with her finger.
"Why did you change?"
"It wasn't a conscious decision," Janie said with a frown, as though she'd never been asked the question before. "It just happened."
"There must have been a reason."
Janie's shoulders slumped. She leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. Her self-assuredness seemed to waver as she struggled to find an answer. "I dunno. I s'pose I was like that all through first year. You know, unsure. I didn't have many mates or at least none I could rely on. They were all deadbeats like me. I s'pose I just gravitated toward them, like a magnet, you know."
Holly felt her skin tingle. What was that? Sympathy? Empathy?
"I was loyal though, to a fault. Like, at the start of second year, this new girl came into the class. A geek, I s'pose you'd call her, you know, hair in pigtails, books clutched to her chest like they were a life preserver. She was an easy target, easy to break. I never teased her, like, but my mates did. Systematically broke her down by daily taunts. She moved schools in the end. Although I never said a thing to her, I s'pose I felt...responsible."
"Then you changed?"
"Not instantly no. By the end of second year most of them had been given so many suspensions from school I hardly saw them. I drifted. Again," said Janie.
Holly was so preoccupied with the resonance of what Janie had confessed to she didn't realise she was staring right into Janie's eyes.
"Looks like I've just scored a turkey!" Janie said, tilting her head to one side.
Holly frowned at her. "Whadda ya mean?"
"Third strike!"
Holly stared, still confused.
"I guessed you were upset, that you're a first year and now I think I've just tapped into the contrite and introspective part of your brain."
"I'm not feeling guilty," snapped Holly.
"Maybe not for something you've done to someone else, but you're definitely feeling guilty for wronging yourself."
Holly jumped to her feet. "How do you know?" she spat.
Cool and calm. Janie smiled at her. "Because you're just like me. Except you're currently on ice. In limbo. You have two choices, head down that clear rocky road you're at the head of, or take a leap of faith into the dark unknown."
Holly readjusted the bag on her shoulder and strode out of the locker room. Janie's voice echoed all around her, "What'll be Holly, on ice?"

Collecting the dead

The smog filled streets of old London were thick with merciless thieves, pick-pocketing from dawn to dusk, but their victims weren't just the living, the dead were plundered too.
"Where dare's a will, dare's a way, Willie," said Charlie Stubbs. He thumped his tankard on a table in the Dog and Duck pub and leaned forward and scratched his chin. "Dat's my motto. Dem richies are brimmin' wiv gold and little treasures. An I'm 'avin some."
"'But Charlie, what if we get caught?" whispered Willie.
"Caught?" said Charlie. "'Ow many people, d'you fink are wondrin' about in da middle of da night, in a cemetry?"
Willie shrugged his shoulders. Charlie clipped him round the ear with his flattened palm.
"Nun, stoopid."
Charlie took another swig of his beer. "Nah listen up. Dem tombs are tough. Old Bludger told me da doors are made of iron. So we'll need a crowbar.You got one?"
Willie thought for a moment. "I fink so. I'll 'ave to 'ave a look."
"Well, get to it," Charlie said before downing his beer. "I'll meet ya at da gate, da chapel gate."

As the tinny chime of Big Ben rang twelve times through the 'pea-soup' air Willie Edwards stomped up the cobbled street to the chapel gate entrance of Marsden Cemetary. Charlie was already there rubbing his arms to stave off the cold.
"Where you bin?" spat Charlie.
"Sorry, Charlie. Couldn't find a crowbar," said Willie.
"You ain't got one?"
"I 'ave now. 'ad to borrow one from Georgie."
"Da Blackie?"
Willie nodded.
Charlie stepped closer to Willie, his eyes narrowed and serious. "You didn't tell 'im 'bout wot ya wanted it for, did ya?"
Willie hurriedly shook his head. "No Charlie, cause not."
"Right den," said Charlie. "Dat's alright den."
Charlie marched past Willie and grabbed hold of the high fence that skirted the cemetary. He hauled himself up, got a foot hold between the fence post and leapt down on the other side, landing heavily amongst the roots of a thick trailing ivy. Willie followed.
"So who are we lookin' for den, Charlie?"
Charlie climbed over a felled tree and entered a high stone gothic arch, with smooth stone columns either side.
"Joseph Franks. He was a tradesman, in gold and silva. Sold stuff to da Indies and de Americas. Right ol' richie he was. Prime for da pickin'."
Charlie marched through the darkened archway and up a avenue of tombs enclosed overhead by the boughs of tall cedars. Willie tried to stay silent while Charlie checked the names above each tomb but his curiosity got the better of him.
"Wot's da picture on da doors mean, Charlie? Da upside down torch?" he asked.
"S'posed to mean deaf. The extinguishment of life. De end, in uva words," Charlie said as he stopped outside the last tomb in the avenue. He studied the carved names, carefully running his fingers over the stone. "Dis is the one," he snickered.
"It is just 'im in dare den?" asked Willie.
"Don't be stoopid. Dare's 'bout twelve folk in 'ere. Two 'undred and sixty guineas day cost, accordin' to old Bludger."
"Two 'undred," Willie gasped.
"Yeah, nah 'urry up an give me da crowbar."
Willie reached inside his tattered coat and pulled out a long black metal bar and handed it to Charlie.
Charlie wedged the bar between the door and the door frame and pushed his weight against it. He heaved and heaved and gradually the door inched open. When it cleared from the frame enough to get a grip of the door Charlie dropped the bar and clasped his hands round the door. "Give me a 'and, will ya?" he said as he placed a foot against the stone front of the tomb, for leverage, and pulled.
Willie grabbed it and pulled and the door creaked open. A puff of musty air escaped and made Willie cough.
"Dat's the stench of deaf for ya," said Charlie with a wry smile.
"It's 'orrible," said Willie, waving a hand in front of his face.
"Ah quit ya whingin' an' come on inside," Charlie said and squeezed through into the tomb.
Inside Willie saw the shelves either side upon which laid wooden coffins. Some were already showing signs of age; their brass fixings tarnished and the wood damp and mouldy.
"Which one is it, Charlie?"
"Dunno," Charlie replied.
"We'll just have to open 'em all and take whatever's in 'em."
"But, dare's bodies and stuff," said Willie, timorously. "Dey'll be all decomposed an' rotten an' 'oribble."
"Oh don't be such a jelly legs, 'an help me wiv dis one," Charlie said as he pulled out the end of the coffin on the lower shelf.
Willie grabbed the other end and helped Charlie rest the coffin on the stone floor.
"Now what?" asked Willie.
Charlie ignored him and used the crowbar to prise the lid off the coffin. "Almost dare, almost off," said Charlie as the last nail popped from the coffin. "We're 'bout ta become richies ourselves now."
As Willie helped Charlie lift the lid off the coffin the black suited man laid inside suddenly sat bolt upright and gasped, as though struggling for air.
Willie screamed and bolted out through the door, hotfooted by Charlie who called after him.
"Never again, Charlie. I ain't comin' 'ere ever again. He can keep 'is gold it's 'is," said Willie.
That was the last time Willie, and Charlie, ever went graverobbing.

The brief encounter

IZZY
She was literally feet away from her idol, Marc Donovan the green eyed, sandy haired god, and could hear his voice. But something wasn't quite right. The voice didn't fit in with the image in her mind. She'd heard him talk on many occasions on TV and radio interviews but the tone was different. It was strained, sharp, indifferent, impatient.
"What's yer name?" he said to one girl without even looking her in the eyes. The girl was too wrapped up in the moment to notice his disaffected manner but it cut through Izzy like a serrated knife through cardboard. Was he going to be so cold with her? His destiny?
As she approached the desk she dug into her bag and pulled out his auto-biography that she'd ordered two months ago.
He gave her a cursory glance and dragged the book across the table toward him.
"My name's Izzy. Short for Isobel," she said. She wanted to say more, to say something interesting, profound, something to get his attention but her mouth was so dry and her mind so fogged that nothing came to her. All she could do was look at him. But again his appearance wasn't what she was used to: his porcelain skin was orange and pitted and caked in so much makeup she couldn't see the real man underneath; his fingers were dry and yellow, and a waft of stale smoke emanating from him drifted across the table toward her. Suddenly her attraction to him waned. She didn't want it to. She tried to grab hold of her previous, bubbling excitement as it dropped through her stomach and into her feet. He hastily slid the book back toward and looked to the girl behind her. Her moment was over. Thirty seconds, nothing more.
As she walked down the steps from the podium she heard him speak to someone behind her.
"How many more have I got to do?" he asked impatiently.
Someone gave an answer she couldn't make out but his response was clearly audible.
"For god's sake," he huffed.
And that was it. Izzy opened her book at the title page and studied his signature. It was so illegible it looked like an army of ants had just crawled across the page. She felt empty, nothing. A huge void had just opened up inside her heart where he had previously taken residence.
As she was guided out by yellow-shirted staff she spotted a large plastic bin filled with plastic bottles, crisp packets, chocolate wrappers and general trash. Without a thought or deliberation she dropped the book into the bin.
"What a waste of thirty seconds!" she said.

MARC
Marc's driver pulled up outside the back of Flick's book store. "You'll need to dash in, Mr Donovan. It's raining pretty heavily out there," he said.
Marc checked his mobile phone-a text from Mike, his manager, flashed up on screen. "Already inside. Make up artist and stylist here too. Hurray up," it read.
'Typical,' Marc thought. 'All he can think about is his damn schedule.'
Marc clicked the car door open and dashed through the puddles and teeming rain toward the open delivery entrance. A tall man with frameless spectacles, wearing a bright yellow t-shirt ushered him inside and into a large, smoky room with soft seats and a small kitchen in the corner.
"Marc, over here, hurry," said his manager as he guided Marc toward a high chair in front of a lit mirror and the tall blonde woman who stood beside it.
Marc choked his way through the foul stench of smoke and checked his watch-11.50am, almost thirty hours since he last slept.
"Just touch him up," Mike said to the woman.
She nodded at Mike before she scrutinised Marc's face and then busily sorted through bottles of foundation, selecting various tones.
"Take a seat," she said.
Yet another layer of tan make-up was smoothed onto Marc's face. His usually milky white complexion took on an ever deepening shade of orange brown. Marc flinched inside, all to aware of how he was starting to look. The bags of sleeplessness underneath his eyes were evident. He felt like he looked eighty not eighteen.
As he slid of the make-up chair another woman handed him a lemon yellow shirt that was rolled up at the sleeves. At least there was something he was being forced to wear that he actually liked.
He'd only just done up the last button when Mike grabbed him by the elbow and dragged him toward the door. "Come on. Show time. You've got to make about five hundred screaming girls' dreams come true," he said.
Marc knew exactly what he had to do. Ordinarily he would have done it without question, without thought as he never once felt like he had short-changed a fan that had taken the time out to see him. But today he had neither the energy nor the compunction to go through with it. All he wanted to do was sleep and it was the one thing he couldn't have.
As he stepped out from behind a black panel the glaring, red-hot lights from the podium shone in his eyes and a cacophony of screams temporarily deafened him.
A girl in a yellow Flicks t-shirt guided him to a solitary chair behind a black desk. He took his seat and waited as the first girl approached him. She was hiding behind her book, giggling and trembling.
"What's your name?" Marc asked her.
"M...Melanie," she stuttered.
Marc carefully wrote her name on the title page and signed it 'love and prayers, Marc' like he always did.
The first hundred girls or so Marc had no trouble giving his undivided and careful attention, but as he approached two hundred and then two fifty his diligence waned. The burning hot lights that beat down on him were making him feel sleepier and sleepier until he lost all willingness to carry on. He didn't care anymore.
When a girl with pouffy blonde hair approached he was close to giving up.
She handed him her book and he snatched it from her.
"What's your name?" he said without even looking the girl in the eye.
She answered and he scrawled her name across the page, barely caring whether it made any sense and slid the book back towards her.
As she delightedly trotted down from the podium, cooing about finally meeting him, Marc felt the sting of guilt in his heart. He looked across at the next girl who confidently strode up to him.
There was something about her that set her apart from all the other girls. He was used to them scream and grabbing at his clothes but she appeared unaffected by all that hoopla. She was cool and confident with long glossy brown hair and a delicate pink sheen to her lips. For the first time in a long time he felt a flutter inside his stomach. He glanced up at her and instantly looked down. It was a totally involuntary response. He hadn't been that shy in the presence of a girl since he fell head over heels for the girl that lived next door to his parents when he was ten.
The girl handed him her book open at the title page.
"My name's Izzy. Short for Isobel," she said.
Marc tried to write her name as carefully as he could but his fingers cramped up like a crab's claw and all he could manage was a scrawl across the page. He couldn't have been more disappointed with himself. Ashamed he skimmed the book across the desk toward her and lifted his head only high enough to smile at her midriff.
As she moved off the podium he walked her walk away. He'd had enough.
"How many more have I got to do?" he asked.
"Another fifty or so," said the book store Manageress.
Marc sighed. He was so exhausted he could barely feel he was in the room.
"For god's sake," Marc's manager hissed. "Just do it, Marc."
Marc looked across the throng of girls and spotted Izzy walking through the crowd. She was looking down at the book he had signed as she passed a large black bin. His heart wrenched when he saw her dump the book inside it. Of all the girls in that room that he wanted to impress she was the one he seemed to disappoint the most. It was a harsh realisation that for some people the line between fantasy and reality was too wide to be ignored, and he couldn't ignore it either.
When he left the book store that afternoon he rang The Times newspaper and gave them an exclusive interview out with the direction and guidance of his manager. He announced to them, and soon to be the rest of the world, that he was quitting the music business, forever.

30 hours: A tale from the other side

Marc Donovan wanted nothing more than to play his guitar for people and make them happy. Ever since his father bought Marc his first guitar at the age of three he'd been addicted to making music. It was what he thought about before he went to bed at night and what got him out of bed in the morning. Over his childhood years he perfected his craft and began to write his own lyrics and music when he turned eight years old. He performed at school concerts, choral competitions, at music nights in the local theatre and even did a spot of busking outside the supermarket in his home town of Camberwell to earn extra pocket money.
It was while he was busking that a talent scout spotted him when Marc was twelve. The scout instantly signed Marc up to a local record label sealing his fate as a soon to be pop megastar.
Marc had no way of knowing how meteoric his rise to fame would be, but his boyish looks and unaffected, humble charm won people over in the music business, the media and more importantly the fans. By the time he turned eighteen he had three platinum albums and millions of female fans all over the world vying for his attention. Although Marc was pursing his dream he quickly realised that that dream would come at a price; loss of privacy and loss of control.

It was 6am on Wednesday morning.
"Wake up, Marc," his manager said, rocking Marc's shoulder to wake him. "You need to get up. We've got a breakfast TV interview to get to."
Marc rubbed his eyes. "Since when?" he said sleepily.
"Since I just got a call from the BBC. They've got a slot and I reckon we should fill it. You got a lot to promote with the new single and the book."
Marc dutifully hauled himself out of bed, unaware it was going to be another thirty hours before he'd sleep again.
Straight after his television interview he was whisked away to a hotel conference room for newspaper and magazine interviews. They dragged on until noon the same questions over and over again, and mostly focussed on his love life. From there he got a twenty minute bite of lunch before being driven to the recording studio to put down new tracks for the album his record company were pressuring him to complete before the Christmas rush. Although it went well, despite a few technical hiccups with sound, and he was pleased with the result, when it turned 4pm he was told that the studio booking time had run out and he needed to get down to Docklands in London to shoot the video.
"Why now?" Marc asked his manager. "We weren't scheduled to."
"I know, Marc, but the weather today has been great and it would be a shame not to take advantage of it. Besides the video editors would really like to get to work quickly on it so we can officially release it on the weekend."
"I don't understand the rush. The single not's going to be released for another month," Marc said as he was ushered out of the studio doors, through a small crowd of screaming girls, to the silver Mercedes waiting for him.
"It's all down to marketing, Marc. If we can drum up enough interest well in advance we can increase our pre-release sales. The single will be platinum before it's even available to download," his manager said with a twinkle of avarice in his eyes.
Marc sighed. There was no point in arguing. He didn't understand the business side of music and didn't really want to; playing his guitar was all he wanted. As long as he could continue to do that he was happy.
But when the video shoot dragged on and on through the night Marc started to flag. By midnight he was struggling to keep his eyes open, so the caterers were instructed to ply him with coffee to keep him awake. Take after take was shot and each one had some problem or other, whether it was lighting, position of props, angle of the camera, misdirection of the dancers, sound, whatever. It just dragged on and on. Marc's manager stepped in at 5am and decided to postpone the rest of the shoot, much to the annoyance of the director, in favour of a live satellite interview with an American chat show host.
"It'll only take half an hour, or so," Marc's manager explained."Just think of the exposure it'll give you across the pond. Everyone knows how hard it is to crack America. They're literally handing us an opportunity on a plate. We'd be, or I should say you'd be, nuts to turn this down."
His manager made a convincing argument that Marc had no energy to refute. So in spite of his fatigue, the fact that he was feeling nauseous from dining on junk food all day and the fact that he was freezing from being in the cold September night air Marc sat through an hour of makeup and then sat under hot studio lights as a broad accented American asked Marc numerous questions about aspirations to dominate the American music charts. Marc tried to answer his questions as lucidly as he could but his brain wasn't engaging. He fumbled his way through his answers and on a couple of occasions had to have questions repeated when they lost all meaning and became just a string of random words floating in his head. When the interview was over he felt dazed and frustrated. His head was so fogged he couldn't even remember what the interviewer had asked him.
"That wasn't good, Mike," Marc said to his manager as he stormed off toward his trailer. "I must've looked like I was stoned or something. I need some sleep I can't go on."
"You can sleep later. Right now we have work to do."
"I haven't slept since 6am yesterday morning. I'm tired!"
"You have a photoshoot. You have obligations. You can't wimp out now. I've been awake just as long as you you know."
Marc stopped and turned to look at his rotund manager.
"Yeah but you're not making an arse of yourself on camera to millions of people. I'm the one that's gonna be gossiped about. I'm the one that's gonna have his picture across the papers with headlines claiming I'm on drugs because I can't string a sentence together," he said just as a paparazzi photographer sneaked out from behind Marc's trailer and took a series of snaps of Marc mid rant.
Marc tried to shield his face but he'd been caught. He dashed into his trailer and slammed the door.
When 9am ticked by Marc refused to come out.
"The photoshoot is cancelled, Mike," Marc hissed through his trailer door. He was so fizzed with pent up anger he paced up and down his trailer. He wanted to rest, to get some sleep if only for a few moments but couldn't calm himself down, and the fact that he knew he had to be at Flicks book store in Lexley for a 12noon book signing made him all the more anxious. He hated letting down his fans. He knew they were the reason he was able to make music and perform.
"Are you intending on going to Lexley, Marc?" his manager asked with barbed directness.
Marc pondered the question. He knew what he was going to say but wanted to make Mike sweat on it.
"Of course I am," he said finally.

The story continues in The Brief Encounter

30 seconds: A tale from one side

Izzy had been waiting to meet him from the moment she first set eyes on him-a sultry pose on a sunkissed beach that adorned the cover of MegaHits Magazine. That moment was indelibly printed on her brain; the moment she lost all grip on reality.
There wasn't any one thing that drew her to him, it was a combination of things: his green eyes, his porcelain skin, the sweep of his strong yet elegant nose and the air of graceful strength he projected from every photograph of him. He had been carved into perfection by a heavenly artist, that was Izzy's only explanation for the effect he had on her.
"He's coming," yelled Bess one morning as she tore down the locker lined corridor at school towards Izzy, darting between other pupils and waving a magazine in the air. "He's coming to Lexley, to sign copies of his book."
Izzy's heart wrenched and her breath caught in her throat. She knew Bess had just as big a crush on Marc Donovan as she had and needed no confirmation as to who Bess was referring to.
"When?" asked Izzy, snatching the magazine from Bess like a ravenous wolf.
"Thursday. At noon. We'll have to bunk off school."
"No problem. I'll tell mum I'm ill or something," said Izzy.
Frantically she flicked through the magazine to locate Marc's interview: a double page spread. There he was, perched on the edge of a tattered office chair in a disused warehouse; his acoustic guitar resting against his thigh. Oh how she wished she was that guitar.
"He's just a god, isn't he?" said Bess dreamily.
Izzy wasn't quite so vocal or obvious with her infatuation. Marc was her private obsession and only she wanted to know how deep it ran. "Yeah," she replied, casually and handed the mag back to Bess, but not before making a mental note of which magazine it was. She'd stop by Bensons Newsagent on the way home and buy her own copy.
The entire afternoon was lost on her. By the end of the day she couldn't recall any of her classes or what the teachers had taught, all she could see in her mind, with pixel-perfect accuracy, was the photograph of Marc Donovan in that magazine. If quizzed she could've easily recounted its composition: the number of windows in the warehouse, the colour of the chair he sat on, the folds of his shirt. It was an image that stayed with her and was made even more real when she finally got her hands on a copy of the magazine. It was her opportunity and was able to study the photo in minute detail and analyse the interview word for word, grappling for any scrap of new information about him.
What did he mean when he said he wasn't looking for a relationship? Did he mean never? Did he mean not serious? Did he even like girls? She couldn't figure it out, and it was the one thing she wanted to know over all the other stuff she knew about him (what toothpaste he used, the first song he bought, what he did with his toenail clippings).
When Thursday finally ticked around she put her plan into action (a heated flannel to her forehead, translucent powder to her cheeks to wash out their rosy tinge. It worked, perfectly.
"You'd best stay here today," Izzy's mum said. "I'll phone the school."
The moment her mother clicked the door shut Izzy leapt out of bed, already dressed: hipster skinny jeans and white t-shirt. All she needed was lip gloss and her red military jacket and she was ready to go. She grabbed her mobile and called Bess.
"You ready?" she asked. "Okay I'll meet you on the corner of Crompton Street at 9."

By the time Izzy arrived at Flicks Bookshop the crowd of kids was already spilling onto the streets.
"God, it looks like half the school's here?" said Bess. "I bet the teachers have twigged and are down here scouring the shop for truants."
"Well, I'm not about to change my mind," Izzy said resolutely. She'd be happy to get a weeks detention for it. It would be worth it.
"Me neither," said Bess. "What time is it?"
"Nine thirty."
"We've got a long wait then," said Bess glancing up at the leaden sky. "I hope it doesn't rain-my hair'll go frizzy."
"Bess, this is Lexley. It always rains in Lexley."
Sure enough by eleven the heavens opened and down came the rain.
"Told you," said Izzy as she opened her umbrella.
Soon though Izzy could feel the crowd start to move. Ahead of her were bookshop staff dressed in yellow t-shirts guiding kids between metal barricades.
"We'll be inside soon, Bess," said Izzy as the excitement and anticipation began to rise inside her. She imagined what he'd be wearing, wondered how he smelt, dreamed that there would be an opportunity for her to brush her fingers across his peach-skin face.
Once she was inside everything else and everyone around her paled into insignificance. For once in her life she was grateful for being tall, for being able to see across most people's heads and down to the black panelling at the far end of the shop and the long desk in front of it. 'He'd be there soon enough,' she thought.
"What can you see, Izzy?" said Bess.
Izzy barely heard her and grunted a reply. She was in no mood for idle chatter now, all her energy and attention was focussed on that long desk.
When the clock ticked twelve there was a sudden buzz of activity at the front. Bookshop staff appeared at each end of the desk to the delight of the crowd that suddenly erupted in cheers of "We want Marc, we want Marc."
They and Izzy soon got what they had waited in the rain for.
Marc Donovan glided into view from behind the black panels to rapturous screams so loud they temporarily deafened Izzy. She didn't care, she was screaming with them.
As the crowd quietened to a general, excited hubbub, Izzy prepared herself. She dug into her bag for her mirror and checked herself-hair looking smooth and glossy, mascara not running. She re-applied her lip gloss, smacked her lips together and took a deep breath.
The throng of expectant girls inched forward. Izzy jockeyed for position behind a girl whose hair was so wildly back-combed she looked like she'd been dragged through a hedge. Again she was glad she was tall as the girl would've obliterated her view altogether. As the crowd thinned toward the front and was filtered into a lane ready to meet their hero Izzy got her first solid glimpse of him: sandy hair flopping over his eyes, lemon yellow shirt rolled up at the sleeves and unbuttoned just enough to elicit excitement. She could barely contain the beating of her heart that quickened the closer she came to him. She knew her encounter was going to be brief, probably only a matter of seconds but she was going to savour it forever.

The story continues in The Brief Encounter

The envelope

It came on a Tuesday. All brown and official looking, with an ink stamp on the back, glaring up at me. I could almost hear its mantra, 'you're gonna fa-il, you're gonna fa-il'.
"Is that it?" mum asked, expectantly.
I nodded.
"Well, aren't you going to open it?"
She looked at me as though the envelope was just another random piece of junk that pops through the letter box, like letters that say you could win a million if you fill in an accompanying form, or party political propaganda, or letters from Glazers offering to replace all your windows for a fraction of the cost of competitors. Could she not sense my inner turmoil? Could she not see the fear on my face, the tension in my jaw? I thought mothers were supposed to be intuitive.
Mine clearly wasn't. My heart beat so hard I swear it was in training for a marathon and my blood pumped so fast I could've whitewater rafted on it. Did everyone in my class feel the same way that I did at that moment. What did they do? Did they instantly tear it open? Did they steam it and gently prise it open, hoping to preserve the perfectness of the moment? Did they throw it in the fire, collapse in a nervous heap, perform a rain dance around it? I never knew. It was everyone's own private secret.
What did I do?
I carried it upstairs to my bedroom, calmly, against the protests of my mother who's own burning curiosity meant she couldn't help but stamp her feet like a defiant child, demanding that she know the contents.
I didn't bow to her demand. This was confidential. For my eyes only. And the fact that it gave me, Mitsy Packer, sixteen year old daughter to an Architect and a Barrister, a sense of power, was another reason not to open it. So I propped it up against the angle poise lamp on my desk and laid down on my bed.
I stayed there pretty much all day, reading, playing snap with the dog (the only opponent I was able to beat at that game given my really rubbish reflexes) and enjoying the frustration on my mother's face when she periodically came into my room and realised the envelope was still unopened. Her excuses for the constant intrusion went from mundane to ridiculous-laundry, lost jewellery, supposed infestation of ants, sniffing for a gas leak (implausible for the simple reason that everyone in the village is on electric!).
Though if I'm honest I used my enjoyment at torturing my mother as a diversion from the real reason I didn't want to open the damn letter. I was too afraid.
It wasn't the contents that scared me it was the finality of them. The fact that this was it. No going back. No resists. The results would be a permanent, indelible record. In a slightly twisted way, I suppose, it was like having a criminal record. No matter how much you redeemed yourself after the event, that past record would always be there.
But I knew I would have to end the suspense, if not for the reason that pretty soon I knew I'd be inundated with phone calls from friends curious themselves to know what grades I got. That was when I reached for the envelope and before I could give my mind a chance to conjure up another reason to abstain I tore it open.
The certificate was laminated: pristine and shiny. I cast my eyes down the right hand side of the page, just registering the grades and not the subject they related to. A,B,B,C,B.
I gave the air a punch, slipped the certificate back inside the envelope and wondered how much longer I could torment mum.

Forty winks in forty words

Released from the weight of the day I drift on cotton clouds. I’m five, ten, fifteen. I see warm eyes, smiles, smell cut grass, strawberry lollipops, feel wrinkled kisses, mother’s pride, father’s joy. In the dark I’ve found happiness again.

Unearthing Harry Sands

Holly powered her mother's Vauxhall Astra up the M6, her hands tightly gripping the steering wheel, her right foot maintaining a steady 65 mph. Her mother was sure to have reported it missing by now and Holly couldn't afford to be caught. She had to get across the border.
As she passed the turn off to Blackpool and the traffic started to thin out she relaxed her grip and sat back, deep into the bucket seats. She took a deep breath and glanced over to the passenger seat. It was littered with newspaper cuttings, print outs, an Ordnance Survey Landranger map number thirty-three and, sheathed in a clear plastic folder, a photocopy of an advert with a poem scrawled across it.
"Mum will understand. I'm sure," Holly said to herself. "I know she doesn't believe me but if there's a chance, even a slim one I know Aunt Morag will be grateful."
Her crossing into Cumbria was welcomed with leaden skies and heavy rain. Almost an omen, she thought. She checked the fuel gauge. Almost empty.
When she reached Carlisle she pulled into a service station, filled the tank up and plucked two ten pound notes from the wad in her purse.
'Gonna have to pull double shifts now to make my savings up again,' she thought.
After she paid up she drove into the almost empty car behind the garage and parked by a deserted burger van. It looked as lonely as her.
"Why is it just me on this crusade?" she said, thumping the dashboard with her fist. "Why does nobody over the age of nineteen believe anything anyone under the age of twenty has to say?"
She snatched up the sheathed advert and read over the poem once more.

If red but not found most certainly de parted
You'll find I'm third in line on the shore
Dressed in white, trimmed with these trees,
Nine plus or more

Silver's unsettled
Stolen kisses, no more
I bow in shackles

"You certainly were brave, cousin, to write it in code so he wouldn't understand," she said. "Sadly its pretty safe for me to say that you have 'de parted'. But not forever. I promise."
She started the car and turned the fan heater on trying not to dwell on what befell the cousin she never met. But as she reached for the road map to assess her route one of the newspaper cuttings slid off the passenger seat into the foot well. Holly reached down to pick it up but was unable to stop her eyes from catching the headline.
'Local Fifteen-year-old missing after party.'
Holly sighed and ran a finger over the date of the article. 'November 8, 1984.' She could hardly believe it all happened so long ago.
'Local schoolgirl, Harriet Sands, went missing on Monday November 5th. She was last spotted at approximately 11.30pm, standing at a bus stop on Fenchurch Street, by a couple walking their dog. Ms Sands had been at a party with friends who reported the missing girl left early to return home. She is described as intelligent and lively with shoulder length blonde hair, approximately five foot three inches in height and wearing a denim skirt, pink blouse and pink shoes. If anyone has any information in connection to her disappearance please contact Chester police on 456 2309.'
"Third in line on the shore," Holly mumbled. "Harry Sands."
Holly placed the article on the seat and then folded up the map. "If I could just get passed Glasgow by nightfall. I could find a service station and sleep on the backseat, " she said.
She rejoined the motorway and fiddled with the tuner on the radio. All she seemed to be able to find, apart from boring debates on speed cameras and the economy, was thrash metal. She left it tuned to the brain pounding beat of MetalPetals. She felt it matched her mood.
By the time she cut through central Glasgow, cursing the fact that the motorway scythed the city in half resulting in endless traffic jams, she finally reached the A82 and a quiet service station just outside Dumbarton. She parked up, finding a suitable spot shaded by a line of trucks that presumably pulled in for the same reason she did, and climbed onto the backseat.
As she snuggled up under a blanket she grabbed her papers and Harry's poem from the front seat.
"Dressed in white and trimmed with these trees. These trees," she muttered and scanned the advert the poem was written on. It was an advert for a holiday home in Sandaig. Harry's words were written on blank area of the advert that was the skyline above a hillock of trees. In front of the trees was a shale shore with a couple of old fisherman cottages. "He, they, whoever, took you to Sandaig forest. But what does dressed in white mean. You were wearing eighties denim and pink. And what does the rest of it mean," she said. "Okay nine plus or more. That's gotta be the length of time it took to leave Chester and get to Sandaig. I've already done five hours. Four plus to go, which means you must have been awake the entire time."
Holly shivered at the thought. Eight hours of not knowing your fate. How could anyone bear that?
She placed the pages on the mat and curled up to sleep.
Hours later there was a rapping sound at her window. It gave her such a fright she jerked awake. Her heart was pounding so hard she could feel it at the back of her throat and when her eyes acclimated to the light and who was peering through the window she gasped. It was the police.
Holly wound down the passenger window.
"Hello, Officer," she mumbled.
"Are you okay?" he asked.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. Just catching forty winks," she said, noticing his eyes were surveying the inside of her car.
"Is this yur car?"
"Erm. No. It's my mum's I'm just borrowing it to visit a friend," she said hesitantly, praying he would believe her.
"D'ya have yur licence or some form of ID?"
"Yeah, of course," Holly replied as she scrambled through her bag and thrust her licence at him.
As the policeman peered at it all Holly could think was 'so close. I'm so close. Please let me go.'
He handed her licence back to her. "I wudnae recommend sleepin' in your car. Next time you're up here book intae a bed and breakfast. It's no safe. Alright?"
Holly nodded and when he left and got into his squad car she sat back and let out a long, gasp of a breath.
After a quick wash at the services Holly checked her map. "Straight up the A82, then left onto the A87 at Shielbridge."
It was just after noon when she passed the picturesque town of Eileanreach, five miles from Sandaig, and found herself on the deserted, bleak A82. She trundled past banks of trees on either side of the road wondering if they were the forest she had driven over four hundred miles and nine hours for. Her body twitched with a mixture of nervous excitement and apprehension. 'Will I find anything or nothing?' she thought.
Ahead she spotted a farmer herding sheep and as she neared she slowed and wound down her window.
"Can you tell me where Sandaig forest is, please?"
"'Bout two miles down on the right. There's a sign post," the farmer muttered beneath his bushy moustache before turning attention back to his flock.

As the bare wooden sign with white lettering that read 'Sandaig Forest' came into view Holly began to shake. There was no turning back now. The pathway into the forest was a dirt track that was slightly overgrown indicating not much traffic every went down it. 'No wonder he or they brought you here,' Holly thought.
Cautiously Holly turned onto the track and followed it as it wound through the mature coniferous wood. On a more inauspicious day she would love to walk through these woods and marvel at the majestic pines but her mind wasn't on sightseeing. She kept her focus on the road ahead instead. She had no idea what she was looking for but rather hoped that something would fatefully draw her attention.
When the road ended she found herself parked in front of a crumbling white house.
"Could this be it?" Holly said. "Dressed in white!"
Every nerve and fibre in Holly's body was screaming at her to stop. To go back. She was terrified of what she might find in that house, but her heart was in control.
"This was my cousin. My defenceless cousin," she said and stepped out of the car.
Outside the air was warm and the sun was shining through the tops of the conifers. 'A good omen,' she thought.
She crept up to the wooden door hanging off its hinges and pulled it open. Inside it was dark and damp. A strong musty smell of damp wood and earth mixed with charcoal hung in the air like a shroud. She took a left and stepped into a room with a wooden floor and a window that looked out toward the islands in the distance. Such a beautiful location, tinged with horror. In the middle of the room the floorboards had been lifted and Holly could see a fast flowing stream running beneath the house.
"No wonder nobody lives here. This place is probably condemned," she said as she looked up at the beams of sunlight streaming through the gaps in the roof. They shone down on something that glinted faintly on the floor.
Holly bent down and noticed a delicate bracelet, a little tarnished but otherwise in good condition, beside a broken chair. But when she picked the bracelet up her eyes were drawn to something else behind it. Something that filled her body with gut twisting terror-a coil of rusted chains bolted to the stone wall.
"I bow in shackles," Holly cried. She shivered violently and tried to swallow the lump in her throat but it was too big. Tears poured down her face as she reached for the chains. "What happened, Harry?"
No sooner had she said it a black crow landed on the stone frame of the window. It took one look at Holly, squawked and then flew off toward the shore. Holly watched as it landed on a large grey driftwood log beside a rise in the grass banking that didn't look natural.
Holly dashed outside and bounded over rocks, streams and mounds of mossy grass. Upon reaching it she knelt down and started to claw at the grass, slicing back the layers of time until she felt something smooth that rustled between her fingers. She leapt back.
'Plastic bag,' she thought.
Her heart thumped in her chest so fierce she could hear her blood pumping in her ears. She knew what she had to do but part of her didn't want to do it. Part of her wished she was back at home, on the sofa watching TV and not knelt down in a desolate place in a different country on her own searching for what she knew would just be bones. She reached out to tear the bag.
"Holly!" a voice screamed.
Holly spun round and saw three policemen and her mother standing by the crumbling white house. A heavy wave of relief swept over her that made her feel so weak and lightheaded she almost fainted.
"Mum," Holly cried and stumbled towards the open arms of her mother. "I've found her. I've found Harry. I've found her."
Holly threw her arms round her mother, desperate to feel the warmth and comfort of someone she loved, desperate to feel alive and reconnected to the world again.
"I thought I'd lost you too," said her mother, tearfully.
"Never. I just wish I knew who did this to her?" she said as she watched the three policemen make there way towards the remains of Harry Sands. One of them took off his helmet to reveal a shock of white blonde hair that glinted like silver in the sunlight.
Holly froze. "Silver," she gasped. "Silver."
"What's wrong, Holly?" asked her mother.
"Harry's diary. Silver. Silver hair. Silver Penny. David Penny. He's the one who killed her," Holly blurted.
"Holly you're not making any sense."
Holly delved into her bag and pulled out the wad of news clippings and frantically riffled through them.
"The newspaper report a two weeks after her disappearance. It mentions entries in Harry's diary. Here," she said holding it up to her mother. "It says her diary mentioned a person Harry had a bit of a crush on but Harry didn't call him by his real name in her diary. No girl would. She called him SP. The police couldn't work out what that meant. But look at the photo beside the report. It's of Harry and her friends. She has her arm around someone called David Penny. But look at his hair. It's bright white. Like Silver," Holly gusted with excitement as she rustled in her bag for the sheathed copy of the note Harry left. "And look at this. This was her message in a bottle, which I reckon she threw into the stream that runs under the house, it says 'Silver's unsettled. Stolen kisses, no more.' Silver Penny. SP"
Holly's mother took Holly's head into her hands and kissed her forehead. "Well, give this to the police. Let them take it from here. They'll get him. You'll see," she said as Holly watched a tear trickled down her mother's cheek. Her mother brushed the hair from Holly's forehead. "Your Aunt Morag will be very proud."

The Black Band (parental advisory: sexual references)

Kayleigh stepped out of the school into the brisk autumn afternoon feeling content that, apart from one of the rebellious boys snapping one of her jelly bracelets, her day had gone well. Top marks in her English essay. Her mother will be delighted. And acceptance into the school photographic club. Her father will be delighted. She fiddled with the thin multi-coloured bands round her wrist and cursed Marc Donnell for breaking her only black one.
"How can he say I owe him, when he's the one that snapped it? Boys are so lame," she muttered as a voice behind her called her name.
She spun round and saw Stewart Walton trotting across the road towards her. Her heart fluttered and her mouth went dry.
"Kayleigh, I need your help. Glad I caught you," he said breathlessly. "There's a...um...fox, in the woods that's injured. Could you give me a hand? I'm gonna get it out and...um...take it to the vet."
"Sure," she said, her parched lips grating against each other. "But we have to be careful. Sometimes injured animals are more aggressive when they're hurt than when they're not."
Stewart gave her a shaky nod and marched back across the road towards the silhouette of Hanley Woods. Kayleigh followed briskly after him. She had been in Hanley Woods a few times since she moved to the town, with her camera. It was a great place to get shots of the sunrise bleeding through the majestic Scots Pines.
"So where about is it?" Kayleigh asked as they wove between bare Chestnuts.
"Oh, it's down there, a bit," Stewart said hesitantly and gestured with a hand that it was deeper inside the woods.
As they trudged over bracken and fallen trunks Stewart never spoke a word. Kayleigh felt awkward. She was having to do all the talking and whenever she did answer him a question his answers were always terse. Did he like her at all? If he didn't why did he single out her help, there were a few other kids on the street walking home for him to ask?
But when she was deeper into the dwindling light of the woods a strange nervousness overcame her that stopped all analysis of his feelings toward her. She had no idea where it came from or why but something inside her said that what she was doing wasn't quite right. Stewart was acting strange enough, not talking to her, but every now and again he'd stop and look around.
"Do you know where you're going?" she asked.
"Yeah, its...um...over here," he said. He didn't even glance round to look at her.
"I think it must have gone, Stewart," Kayleigh said. "Look, it's getting late and dark. I think I'm just going to head back."
"No, I swear it's over here. It was all bloody and stuff," he said.
But as Kayleigh turned back two other boys sprung out from behind a couple of trees. It was Marc and David.
They were staring at her, nodding with crossed arms and malevolent grins on their faces.
Kayleigh froze as her eyes darted from Marc and David to Stewart who was staring at the ground with his hands in his pockets and the toe of his trainer scuffing the needles on the forest floor. She wanted to scream, to cry out but her head was telling her to stay calm in spite of the burgeoning terror within her.
"What do you want?" she said trying to control the quiver in her voice.
"You owe me," said Marc bluntly.
Kayleigh chose her words carefully. All too aware that she was in a delicate situation and that plucking Marc's strings in the wrong way could rile him. "I don't know what you mean. I haven't bought anything from you."
Marc laughed. "You didn't buy anything, you offered it. Now I'm here to collect."
Kayleigh frowned at him, still perplexed.
"Your bracelet, stupid," he spat. "You know what they mean. You're wearing them."
Kayleigh stared down at the thin rubber straps around her wrist.
"Black means you do everything," said Marc as he spat a phlegmy gob on the carpet of needles. "I snapped it that means you owe me sex!"
"What?" Kayleigh cried as she clutched at the buttons of her coat. Her heart was pounding so strongly she could feel it through the thick wool. "That's not why I wear them. Holly gave them to me. They were a gift. "
Marc and David burst into hysterics.
"And you thought they were being nice to you. Oh, here you are Kayleigh. You're such a nice girl. We want to be your friend," Marc cooed prancing round a sapling in as close an imitation of a girl as he could manage, "here have these bracelets."
Kayleigh swallowed the lump that rose in her throat, barely able to believe the foundations on which she built her life in Hanley were now crumbling beneath her. How could those she trusted have betrayed her so cruelly? Was she just their plaything?
"Nobody told me that's what they mean," she said coolly, keeping her crushed feelings and her body under wraps.
"Then you're stupider than you look."
"Where have you been living for the last year. The arctic?" said David. "Yellow means hug, purple means kiss, orange means love bite, and...mmm...I can't remember the others."
"If I'd known that I would never have taken them. There's no way I'd do any of that. And least of all with you," she said, hugging her coat closer to her.
"You better watch what you're saying. You're outnumbered."
"Are you part of this gang too?" Kayleigh asked, staring at Stewart.
Stewart finally looked Kayleigh in the eye. She held his gaze for what felt like an age before he flicked his eyes to look at Marc and David.
"I did what you wanted," Stewart said.
Marc dug a hand into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a piece of paper. "Five quid. As promised," he said and handed it to David. Stewart hesitantly took it from David's hand and stuffed it into his jacket. "You can go now."
Kayleigh glanced at Stewart. If there was a sliver of decency in his body she wanted to connect to it. If there was a hope at all that he might read the desperation on her face and come to her aide she wanted to show it. But he turned from her and schlepped through the forest.
Kayleigh turned to Marc and David. "I'm not scared of you," she said shaking her head in a display of defiance.
"Doesn't bother me," said Marc as he stepped over the fallen branches towards her.
"The fact that you have to lure girls into the woods is pretty pathetic," Kayleigh said.
In spite of Marc's advancement she didn't flinch. She didn't move a muscle. Her defiance seemed to rile Marc.
"Grab her and hold her down, David," Marc said.
David rushed behind Kayleigh and before she could turn and take a swipe at him he had her arms in a lock behind her back. He was pulling on them so forcefully she could feel her shoulder blades rubbing against each other and the muscles in her arms stretch to the point of snapping.
"No, no, she screamed, get off me, don't please," she begged.
Marc grabbed her coat and tore it open. Two of the plastic buttons pinged off and ricocheted off a tree trunk. Kayleigh watched as one landed amongst a clump of withered bracken. That was all it took. The ease with which those buttons snapped from her coat mirrored Kayleigh's sudden breakdown. She could be as strong mentally as she could possibly be but without the physical strength there was no way she could defend herself. The weight of the realisation of her situation tipped her over the edge and a torrent of tears poured from her eyes.
Marc sniggered triumphantly as he shoved her to the ground.
"Told you I'd get what you owed me," he said as David leaned over her and pinned her arms to the floor making it impossible for her to move her upper body.
Before Kayleigh could kick out Marc knelt down in front of her using his legs to pin her legs down. She wanted to scream, scream at the top of her voice but all that came out was air. Her chest tightened and soon even breathing became difficult. As Marc slid his hand up her skirt Kayleigh fought as hard as she could. She writhed and struggled against the power and weight bearing down on her but her efforts were fruitless. All she could do was wish it would end quickly. But just as Marc's hand was at the top of her thigh there was a flash of colour and Marc was suddenly lying, dazed and confused at the foot of a tree beside her. David, who was so taken aback by seeing his friend in a crumpled heap didn't look up quick enough and took a wallop across his jaw. He cried out in pain as he toppled over and smacked his back onto a tree stump.
Kayleigh pulled herself up onto her elbows. Through her teary, swollen eyes she looked up and saw the outline of a boy standing over her, holding out a hand.
"Are you okay?" he said.
Kayleigh wiped her glassy eyes and soaking cheeks and saw it was Stewart.
"You came back," she whimpered.
Stewart nodded as he helped Kayleigh to her feet. "I'd never have been able to live with myself if I didn't."
"I'm glad you did."
"And I'm sorry," he said, wringing his fingers and shaking his head. "I'm really sorry. I had no idea what he was going to do. I really didn't. He told me he wanted to have a word with you."
Kayleigh could see tears in his eyes threatening to burst their banks.
"It's okay," she said, pulling her coat back over her shoulders. "I forgive you. "
Stewart dug a shaky hand into his jacket pocket and pulled out the five pound note Marc had given him and threw it on the ground.
"If you like. I'll walk you to the police station. You should report them, and me too."
Kayleigh grimaced at the moaning, fleshy lumps on the forest floor that were formerly Marc and David.
"Them, definitely. They deserve everything they get. But I can't report someone that saved me. That wouldn't be right."
Stewart offered a nervous, awkward smile. "Will you be okay?"
"I'll be fine," she said. "Tough as old boots!"

A slice of Sky

My name is Kerry Henderson. I'm seventeen years old, and yesterday my best friend killed himself. Nobody in the town understood how such a strong, confident, gifted and personable rugby player leapt so far off the rails. Nobody saw the signs. I did, but there was nothing I could do to stop it. I was in fear of my own life.

Connor Willis was fifteen years old when he was injured in a serious house fire. It killed his sister and father and left his mother so disfigured and distraught she abandoned Connor. Nobody ever heard from her again. Connor had seventy percent third degree burns over his body and was kept in an isolated chamber in the Victoria Hospital to minimise infections getting into his open wounds. I was only able to visit him a few times but to be honest it could have been anyone lying in that bed. He was wrapped from head to toe in bandages. If it wasn't for his piercing blue eyes poking through I'd have never known it was him. He was always sedated, because of the pain he was in, so I never spoke to him until he finally got out of the hospital. That was a year after the accident.

Because I wasn't family I was never told the details of his treatment but the Aunt that cared for him said the doctors had found a suitable and compatible donor for skin graft treatment. She said that he didn't have enough of his own healthy skin to cover his wounds. As far as the doctors were concerned the treatment was a complete success. The skin took to Connor well, although the doctors said that he would never look like he did before the accident. I accepted that. I was just glad he was alive.

When I saw Connor for the first time it wasn't his appearance that worried me, it was whether he'd recognise me or not. I turned up at his Aunt's house unannounced. I hadn't planned to. I was going to let Connor get settled back to normal life before I descended on him, but I was desperate to see him, to hear him talk again. I felt like a part of my life had been on hold the whole time he was in hospital. His Aunt was a little reluctant to let me in but Connor insisted it was okay. When I walked into the sitting room he greeted me as he always did with a hug, but instantly I knew something was different. His hug was nothing more than cursory. Cold. I knew Connor. We'd been friends since we were toddlers. I knew him better I think than he knew himself. He was always the warmest of my friends. I put it down to the fact that he'd been through a terrible ordeal and so wasn't quite back to normal. So I sat on the couch and caught him up with all the gossip in the town, like who was hooking up with whom-I included the teachers in that as they all seemed to be at it as well. He laughed but as I continued talking his attention seemed to drift. He'd nod his head as though he was listening but I knew he wasn't. A couple of times I caught him looking out of the window. I didn't know what drew his focus.

I didn't know, when I left Connor's house, that his recovery wasn't going to be pleasant. The weight and strength he lost during his hospitalisation never returned. Before the accident he was always the athletic type. Rugby was 'his' game as he called it. He was passionate about it to the point where he coached younger kids to play. It gave him purpose in life. But he'd lost all interest in it. They say after a traumatic experience you're never quite the same person. For Connor it wasn't that he was never quite the same, he was completely different. He'd become lazy, slobbish, unwashed. He'd gotten into a couple of fights at school and his studies began to suffer as he failed test after test. I did what I could to help him improve his grades. I even sat with him once to help him write his English essay. When he gave up on it and slumped down on the crumpled sheets of his bed I pulled his laptop towards me and finished it for him. It was never my intention to pry, but something within me was curious to see what he'd been looking at on the web. I felt so disconnected, so distant from this new Connor I was desperate to know if a sliver of the old Connor still existed, if he still had his whimsical passion for pointless road signs (I remember him showing me a photo of one that read 'This sign is not in use'. I almost broke a hip laughing at that one. He laughed with me and before long we were rolling on the floor in uncontrollable fits of giggles). But when I flicked through his laptop I was horrified by the links on his favourites to crimes, criminals, murders, weaponry, even hardcore sex. When I challenged him about it he became defensive and angry. He leapt off the bed, grabbed me by my shirt and shoved me against the wall.
"Butt out of my business," he roared.
In all the time we'd known each other we never had a cross word. We disagreed plenty of times but it never came to the point of verbal or physical abuse. I will put my hand on my heart and say that in that moment I was scared to my core. Every bone and fibre in my body trembled and all I could think about was getting out. I packed my bag and left him to finish his paper himself.
The next day at registration he was all apologetic and promised it wouldn't happen again. I told him we needed to talk.
That lunch we sat down by the old oak in the park.
"What's going on Connor?" I asked softly, not wanting to rile him.
It seemed to take forever for him to answer. He kept staring at the ground, fiddling with a blade of dry grass.
"I don't feel like I know you anymore," I said.
He glanced across at me. His eyes were swollen and heavy. He wanted to cry but didn't seem able.
"I don't know me either," he said. "It's like there's something inside me. Something evil, crawling around, consuming me from the inside out. I can feel it. I'm...I'm loosing control."
"Well, I can't disagree with you on that score. The question is how do we put this right?"
"People, doctors, medics, keep telling me that I'm traumatised. That its the accident that's altered me. "
"That's inevitable Connor. Even I accepted you'd be a little different."
"That's just it," he said. "A little different. Not a lot different. I feel like another person."
Suddenly I felt a breakthrough. He'd admitted the extent of his change. That was surely a good thing.
"I'm ashamed of it," he said, his chin slumping against his chest.
I rested my arm delicately across his shoulders. "It's not your fault. You didn't start that fire."
"That's not what I mean," he said, shying away from me. "I...I did something. Horrible."
"Connor you don't have a horrible bone in your body. Whatever it was it couldn't be that bad."
"I killed a cat!" he spat.
The revelation rocked me but I knew I had to remain calm, not because I was afraid of being hurt myself, I was afraid of loosing the connection I had finally managed to make with Connor.
"Why?"
Connor shrugged his shoulders. "It annoyed me. It kept meowing at the patio doors. So I let it in. And," Connor shuddered as he continued, seemingly horrified himself by his actions, "strangled it."
I was horrified and upset myself, especially for Mrs Higgins, the cat's owner. Mogsy was all she had.
"That's not all," Connor said.
I braced myself for another revelation, another confession of abuse.
"While I was at the doctor's surgery, having my monthly check up I swiped a bunch of hypodermic needles. I took them down to the river and threw them at the rats, like they were darts."
"We need to get you some help, Connor. I mean psychological help," I said, rubbing his arm to reassure him I was on his side.
"It was the doctors that made me this way, Kerry. I'm not trusting them to do anything."
"What are you talking about? If it wasn't for the doctors you wouldn't be here. You'd be dead."
"I'd rather be dead than...than this. Than be this thing."
"You're not a thing, you're my friend."
"I'm loosing the fight, Kerry and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it."
At this point I was getting confused by what he was saying. It was like we were both having two completely different conversations. "What do you mean, loosing the fight? Loosing the fight against who?"
"Him," Connor spat with disgust. "The one who made me who I am."
"Connor, I'm confused. You're not making any sense."
"Sky Keppler," he said. The name vomitted from his mouth like poisoned food.
"Who's that?"
"The man who donated my skin," said Connor.
The name rolled in my head trying to find the hole in my brain in which to connect with the rest of the useless knowledge that floated around in there.
"Why do I recognise that?"
"He was in prison for murdering school kids around Birmingham," Connor said.
He pulled the sleeves of his shirt up over his elbows and began feverishly scratching his skin, like he was trying to tear it off.
"He's consumed my body, Kerry, and he wants my mind next. He's already in there. I can feel it. He's a poison that coursing through me, infecting everything."
"That can't be right. That's science fiction stuff, Connor," I said.
"You don't believe me," he roared. "I knew I couldn't trust you."
He leapt up on to his feet and glowered down at me. His eyes were burning with rage, his fists were clenched ready to deliver a blow and the wafer-thin skin on his face was taught like stretched cellophane.
I could see the struggle in his eyes. His body was ready for a fight but his eyes were pleading for peace. I wanted to cry; not for me but for him.
He ran off across the park.
I tore after him but lost him through the trees. I searched for him all day and in a last attempt to find him I decided to go down to the rugby clubhouse. The place he spent most of his life.
The lights weren't on but I figured even Connor wouldn't have put them on if he didn't want to be found. I skulked round the building, peering into the windows, looking for any signs of a forced entry. Then I heard muffled cries. Not the cries of a man.
"Why have you bought me here, Connor?" snuffled a young boy. "Are we playing rugby in the dark?"
"Quit your whinging!" Connor snapped.
He was in there. My heart dropped into my feet. I had no idea what he was going to do. In the fragile state he was in he could do anything. He'd already come close to smacking me twice and I'm sure it was only the history we had together that stayed his hand. How would he fair with a child he had very little connection with? I daren't think. A wave of nausea swept across me.
"What do you need a knife for?" cried the boy.
Hearing that sent me into a blind panic. I had to get in. I had to save the boy and try and save Connor, if that was at all possible. I found myself now actually believing what Connor had told me about Sky Keppler. It was the only explanation.
Without hesitation I scrambled around for something I could use as a weapon and happened upon a heavy branch that had snapped from a tree. I pulled of the leaves and twigs and gingerly approached the door. Connor must have had a key as the door was unlocked. As quietly as I could, I unlocked it and crept inside. I had no idea what the layout of the building was and so had to feel my way around, down and round the corridors until I could hear Connor's deep voice penetrating the walls. The boy he held was now terrified and began to scream for help.
"Shut up you whiny little brat," yelled Connor.
There was then a thud that sounded like something falling, followed by screams of pain from the boy.
My hand curled round the handle of the locker room door, my sweaty palms struggling to grip it, and opened it. I was so scared my heart was thumping in my chest.
I dropped the branch realising that any weapon would be useless to me. I had to use my wits instead.
"Connor," I called out. "Are you here?"
"Get away, bitch," Connor yelled.
"I'm not going anywhere," I said. "I'm here to help you."
"No chance of that now. I've got what I want. I'm free again."
"You're not Sky Keppler, Connor. You're name is Connor Willis. You're seventeen years old and you're my best friend."
Connor grabbed his head with both hands and shook it. "No, no, no," he yelled.
"You live with your Aunt Flora. You love rugby and play golf really, really badly. You love to laugh and you love to make people laugh with you."
Connor smacked back against the wall and slumped down on the floor. While he was distracted I grabbed the little boy and told him to run home.
When the boy disappeared through the door I approached Connor. He thrust the blade of his knife toward me to keep me at bay.
"He's mine," he shouted.
"No he's not Sky, he's mine. He's my friend."
"Kerry!" Connor cried.
"I'm here, Connor. It's me," I said, tears streaming down my face.
"I want peace," he pleaded, then his face contorted. "No, no, freedom."
Connor lifted the knife up, the blade glinted in the streetlight. Before I could stop him he plunged the knife into his throat.
"No!" I yelled. "Connor!"
Blood poured from the wound in his neck, staining his rugby and forming a syrupy pool on the locker room floor. But his life hadn't yet ebbed. I knelt down beside him and looked into his eyes. It was him. Connor. Pure Connor in those piercing blue eyes. In that last moment I saw the friend I knew two years ago. Then his eyes closed. Forever.

Hope in the dark

When Jimmy Mackie opened his eyes he thought he'd died. He was surrounded by darkness. Not the darkness of night time but the thick, shapeless, infinite void type of darkness that he thought sucked you up to heaven, or down to hell. He took a breath and choked. The air was thick with dust, smoke and the acrid smell of burning. It scorched his throat. He lifted a hand to cover his mouth and saw it was grey with dust and dirt and caked in congealed, crimson blood. What had happened?
Through the fog of his mind he caught faint slivers of a memory that he'd gone to the front room of his mother's house for sugar but after that, nothing.
As the darkness gradually began to take shape he realised the horror of his predicament. His right arm was pinned against the stone hearth by exploded chunks of cast iron. His head was nestled on the lower shelf of his mother's bookcase-the wooden shelf above, still intact, was precariously holding up blocks of masonry. His body was lying on its side, with his back against the smashed remnants of the porcelain wash basin from the floor above and his legs were bent; one he could move a little whilst the other was wedged between two wooden struts that Jimmy assumed used to be roof trusses. Beneath him was solid ground but above him, resting on piles of rubble and wood was the tin bath from the bathroom. It was the only thing protecting him from the crushing weight of the rest of the house.
It was at that point that Jimmy knew it was a bomb. He'd heard folk talking about the nazis dropping parachute bombs, or D.A's as some were calling them, on England. He never thought for a second they'd hit Clydebank. But was it over now? He held his breath and listened. All he could hear was the air raid siren wailing in the distance. Too late for him and probably a load others as well. For all he knew the entire town had been levelled. Was he the only one left, alive?
"Ma?" he quivered as tears began to pour across his nose and onto the dusty stone. Was she alive? Was she dead? He couldn't bear to think. He blocked it out and took a deep breath, gathering as much of his energy as he could and yelled at the top of his voice. "HELP, HEELLPP. Somedae HELP."
As he screamed he felt the ground beneath him shudder. Fearful that his cries had caused the house to shift he clasped his free arm round his head and gasped. With his heart pounding and his chest heaving, inhaling more of the chalky air, his eyes darted across the space looking for signs of movement. If he was going to be crushed he wanted some warning. Then there was a thud and a crash to his right. The tin bath above him rocked causing stone dust to rain down on him. He screwed his eyes shut and curled into as smaller ball as he was able. The house settled back down again.
He was helpless. The daren't call for help again. But if he didn't he'd never be rescued. No-one would know he was there.
'I wish I kent Morse code,' he thought. 'I could tap the bath. But then the vibrations might cause the hoose to shift again an crush me completely.'
He scanned around to see if there was any sliver of daylight poking through the rubble.
'If there is," he thought. 'Ah could poke sommin through it. Somedae might see it and ken I was 'ere. ' But everything was shrouded in the velvet sting of blackness.
The sense of utter despair germinated in his mind. He couldn't block out the thoughts of impending doom. How was he going to die? bleeding, thirst, starvation?
Thirst would catch him out first, or bleeding. Either way he didn't really care. At least it would be quicker than hunger.
He reached round his back to scratch an itch and felt a small tin on the floor behind him. It was open and some of the contents had spilled out. They were small and cubed. His heart skipped a beat. He knew what it was. Gingerly, he grasped the tin and brought it in front of him. It was the sugar cubes his mother wanted.
Jimmy smiled. Someone was watching over him. 'Wiz is da?' he thought.
Jimmy counted up the cubes and felt round his back for the stray ones that had fallen out. He then dusted off a patch of the stone hearth by his chest and counted the cubes as he lined them up in front of him.
Seventy-six. If he rationed himself to seven cubes a day he could last for eleven days; unless thirst claimed him first. Rationing he was used to. His mother taught him all he needed to know.
'Ah hope she's awright. Or if god has 'er I hope she didnae suffer,' he thought.
He said a little prayer for her and for everyone on Bally Street before he ate his first cube.
He savoured the grainy sweetness on his tongue, enjoying the brief moment of bliss before despair took over. That night he cried himself to sleep.

The next day he was awoken by the sound of muffled voices. They were distant, but definitely recognisable as voices.
"Help," he cried. "Am doon here. Help. Help me."
He wasn't sure if anyone heard him at first but when the voices grew quieter, his beacon of hope was snuffed out.
If it wasn't for the gentle sound of trickling water he would have given up and shuffled about until the house dropped on him. He listened and saw, down by the knee of his free leg the slow drip, drip of water.
In sheer desperation to relieve the stabbing pain in his throat from every dry breath he took, he reached his hand down and tried to cup a few droplets. Hurriedly he brought it up to his parched lips and sucked and licked up every molecule. He repeated it over and over again before realising that he had to somehow capture it in something. He felt around and found a spoon near to where his other arm was still pinned to the floor.
He drank spoon after spoon of the gritty water before wondering where it had come from. He noticed that since he'd been awake the air wasn't quite as smoky as the day before. 'Mibbe they've put the fires oot.'
That instantly terrified him. He realised that if the fires were out there would be no reason for them to come back.
"Help. Somedae, please, help me. HEELLLPPPP," he bellowed.
But no-one came.
Another day passed and out of sheer depression and hopelessness Jimmy scoffed twenty of his cubes-at least three days of his ration. He scolded himself afterwards for being weak.
"'That's no wit da widda wanted, Jimmy," he said as he struggled to stop his lower lip from quivering.
A lone tear fell from the corner of his eye. In his heart he knew his plight was without a miraculous ending. He was hungry, he was thirsty, the numbness in his right arm was creeping up towards his shoulder, his left leg was stiff and right side was in agony from laying on it for two days.
He prayed for death, and while he waited he sang the only hymn he could remember that would cheer him up.
"Aw things bright and beautiful. Aw creatures, great an small..."
The words lift his lips with a distracted stupor, as though he wasn't really paying attention to what he was singing.

The next day, as he sucked on a sugar cube, his mind wandering into and out of consciousness, there was a distant rumbling sound outside the house. At first he paid no attention to it. His mind was so addled with fatigue he thought it was playing tricks on him. Then the rumbling was accompanied by sounds of muffled voices, and sounds of crumbling rubble. Minute by minute the voices grew louder and sharper. His heart suddenly started beating faster than he had ever felt it. His eyes pinged open. A renewed sense of hope had recharged his entire body. He took a deep breath and drew up as much energy as his weak body could muster.
"I'm in here!" he yelled.
He listened.
"Ah hear him. Ah hear him. Over here. He's over here," shouted a voice from the other side.
Terrified they might leave, Jimmy continued to call out until a sharp spear of brilliant white light pierced the darkness of his prison. He held his hand up to his eyes to shield them from the blinding sparkle.
"Get a stretcher, noo," Jimmy heard someone shout.
Within half an hour his rescuers had removed most of what was on top of him, including the tin bath that saved his life and he was out in the sunshine.
As he was carried out to the waiting ambulance he glanced down his street. As he'd feared every one of the houses that had once been filled with people were now just piles of stone.
"You're lucky you've got a singin' voice, laddie," one of the men said. "If ah didnae hear ya last night youda probably been doon there fer ever."
Jimmy smiled. "Thanks," he said.
"Dinnae thank me. Thank yer ma. She wiz the one that tole me ta come doon an see if ah cud find ye."
"Ma," he said, sitting bolt upright. "She's alive."
"Aye, she's fine," the man said, pushing Jimmy back down on the stretcher. "She's in the hospital. You'll see her in a wee while."
As the ambulance chugged down the street, weaving around the demolished buildings, Jimmy mouthed the words 'thank you' to the heavens and vowed to himself that he'd learn more hymns.

The yellow house

As the skies darkened, the birds retreated to the comfort of their nests, and the streets in the harbour town of St Andrews emptied, the speculation began...
"Yellow...Yellow...are you awake?"
Yellow's curtains fluttered through his broken windows.
"Wha? Humpf," he moaned as he stretched his brittle joists and yawned through his lopsided, rotting front doors that hung by the last thread of their rusty screws.
"Look, there's a sign by your rose bed," said Found, eagerly.
Yellow stretched to peer over the sign that was staked into the thorny mass of parched roses. A fresh crack cut through his dry roughcast. Like fork lightening it chiselled its way from Yellow's buckled guttering to his weed-ridden paving.
"Ahhh...can't...read...it...too...far...away," he strained and slumped back. A puff of asbestos dust expelled from his foundations like warm breath in cold air.
"Oi. Leonard. Wakey, wakey,” bellowed Found. “Look's like Yellow's got a buyer, finally."
"Oh, Found, I do wish you wouldn't address one as though one was one of your roughshod friends," said Leonard haughtily as he swept open his red velour, linen-lined curtains. "I'm a quality residence, for quality residents. It doesn't do to have you roaring as though you're Arsenal football stadium."
"Listen, Prissy Pipes, you're not on The Links you know. You've not quite reached the Million pound price tag yet."
"It's only a matter of time," snuffed Leonard. "Anyway, whom did you say has a buyer?"
"Yellow has," piped Found. "He's got the sign!"
"Where? Oh you mean that tiddly, white thing? Oh that's nothing. I had a billboard when I was sold," said Leonard. "So, what does it say?"
"Err...This Property is the Pits...I think. The letters are a bit small," said Found.
"Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha," snorted Leonard. "Never was a truer word said. Ha. The pits. I like it. Marvellous."
Yellow sighed. His bricks walls slumped so far into his foundations he lost four feet in height. "I'm never going to have an owner. Never going to feel the lick of fresh magnolia, the skim of moist plaster, the warmth of deep pile carpets, the..."
"...stench of fresh vomit," piped up Stu as a sudden boom, followed by a tinny rattle and a wail that sounded like a cat being strangled burst through every drafty hole in his crumbling facade. "Think yourself lucky you don't have six twenty-somethings puking down your copper plumbing, stubbing joints out on your linoleum and playing that godforsaken doosh, doosh, doosh music til your windows rattle and your floorboards hum. I tell you. There are far worse things in life than being lonely."
"Yes, like rising interest rates causing a slump in the housing market creating negative equity and turning a buoyant seller's market into a buyer's free-for-all. Oh it doesn't bear thinking about," kvetched Leonard. "No vetting, no getting the highest offer from Merchant Bankers from Surrey. They'd take the first offer they got from people from Manchester or Liverpool or...Dundee."
"I'd be happy with that," said Yellow. "Perfectly happy."
"So would I," concurred Stu.
"Well, dream away the pair of you. But pretty soon Yellow will end up as a branch of 'Burger King' or something equally disagreeable and tawdry."
"He might not be," said Found. "He could be something really cool...like a halfway house for criminals…or a brothel."
"Or an old folks home," speculated Stu. "Though I think I'd be happier with the students. At least they're not incontinent...most of the time."
"What about an amusement arcade? Perhaps that's what he's going to be."
"Oh yes like we need something to attract pimply teenagers who drop their cans of Pepsi on the pavement and stick their gum on the walls. Fabulous way to tempt tourists with money. 'Yes, come to St Andrews. We have seven golf courses, a six hundred year old university, so much history we make the Great Pyramid look like the Millennium Dome, but don't sit down anywhere unless you have a bag of ice and a chisel.'"
"Leonard, if you get anymore cynical you're going to need an exorcism," said Stu.
"I've said my piece," said Leonard. "Personally I reckon Yellow's about to get the wrecking ball."
"What!" wailed Yellow. "Oh it gets worse!"
"On what basis do you make that assumption?" quizzed Stu.
"Well, the sign did say he's the Pits. What more confirmation do you need?"
"Erm, well, I think I made a slight error in my interpretation," said Found cautiously.
Yellow raised his lintels with hope.
"What do you mean?" asked Stu. "You mean he's not the pits!"
"Well, I hardly think that's the case," interjected Leonard. "I mean look at him he's hardly Buckingham Palace or even Crystal Palace for that matter. Broken windows, graffiti on the walls, birds nesting and doing god only knows what in his plasterwork."
"No," corrected Found. "I mean I read the sign wrong. That's not what it says."
"Well, what does it say? Seeing as you're the only one who can read it."
Found began to laugh so heartily his concrete foundations bounced out from their brick surround and the loose earth around him shook as though it was in a giant sieve.
"Oh fantastic. Oh, Yell’ you're going to love this. In your face Leonard, in your face."
"What?" chimed Leonard, Stu and Yellow. "What does it say?"
"It says 'This is the property of the Pitts'," cried Found.
Stu was so stunned he barely noticed the drunken students dangling from his drainpipes and Leonard became so taught with jealousy his roof popped like a champagne cork causing a tidal wave of befuddled flat owners in Barbour jackets and Hunter Wellingtons to spill out into the Parky tiled driveway.
It seemed all but Yellow knew exactly what it meant. His slate roof wrinkled into a frown and he stared at Found through the only intact window in his entire mansion.
"You've been bought by Brad and Angelina!” cheered Found.
Yellow’s architraves curled into smiles. He had no idea who they were or where they were from. All he was happy about was the fact that he was about to be loved, again.