Contemporary

  • Greening the Blue

    The north end of the Piccadilly line sounds so bucolic – Wood Green, followed in short succession by Bounds Green, Arnos Grove, Oakwood. So perhaps it was just a transformation waiting to happen. A surreal end to a no-longer-normal working day. I blame the international flights at the other end of the line – something…

  • The Eye of the Beholder

    Anna ran a fingertip over the smooth quartzite cabochon in her palm.  Her reflected face looked rounder on the stone’s convex meniscus, her eyes almost protuberant. Flecks of gold, caught in streaks of river-brown, winked in the weakening Sunday afternoon sunlight.  She addressed the taciturn stallholder. “What’s your best price?” she asked, feigning mere half-interest. He…

  • Stuck

    Cheryl was stuck in a lift. Alone. The date hadn’t gone well. After three years of solitude she’d signed up to a site where love was ‘only a click away!’ and began her dating adventure: starting with Tim and the Black Lion pub. The date was dull. Tim was dull. Possibly, after so much time…

  • Transubstantiation

    We stopped for coffee and discussed our purchases: shoes, dresses, tops, frilly knickers. ‘Perfect,’ we told each other, sipping our lattes. ‘You’ll look terrific in it,’ we said. We had been saying these things for decades. Sometimes they were even true. Traffic whizzed round Marble Arch, with its towering sculpture of the horse’s head, chopped…

  • Siege

    We always went to your flat in Walthamstow, but this time there was a problem with the tube. “We’ll get out and walk.” You said. I asked why it was called… “There’ll be a reason for it” You cut in. There’s always a reason for it. There’ll be some bloke who does talks in the…

  • Emeralds & Diamonds

    He called me his Queen. I never called him my King. Except once when he gave me a brooch. “You listened?” I said. ” I thought you were asleep.” One night, when the world was at its coldest and darkest, I awoke sweating from a nightmare. It was then I whispered my one and only story into…

  • Yes

    Under the thick wolf sweater, the stays of Andrea’s corset had flexed with every movement of the carriage. We went to a fancy dress party once as geologists. I had a rock hammer and a leather bag; Andrea wore the sweater and carried a field guide to the sedimentary beds of southwest England. Everything seems…

  • The Left Eye

    The operation had been a success. The Ophthalmologist had shaken her hand. “Enjoy your new life,” he’d said. Leaving Moorfields she headed for the Old Street roundabout, a vortex that sucked people under and round and out again, blue tubing holding an advert for the latest phone above. On her way, a mother and her…