We have received substantial feedback following the announcement of our winner for the Short Story Competition 2013 - and so, due to popular demand, we have decided to publish the stories of those who made the shortlist, in addition to the stories from the three winners.
In the following series of blog posts, you can find the stories from the shortlist of twenty. This particular post will feature the stories from Louise Chivers and Amina Mughal.
Freedom by Amina Mughal
It was a cold frosty day, a day lost in the depths of white winter snow. The air was filled with frothy pollution that covered the skies in thick black darkness. Caliya was making her way through the dark arched gates, worn out and covered with rust which resembled the heart of an oppressed Barcelona.
Inside the building, the putrid smell of dampness irritated the noses of Caliya and the reluctant juniors, who waited patiently for their microchips to be scanned. Banners and leaflets were displayed on the walls depicting the events of campaigning hour of each day. A shrill alarm sounded, the defenceless man standing at the front of the seemingly endless line, was roughly grabbed and forcefully pulled away by three hugely muscular men. Caliya wearily continued forward, her tall slender figure pacing slow steps towards the monitors. Caliya gave her microchip to be scanned in the next aisle; she waited patiently as the receipt came through.
The WFL party had powered Barcelona since the revolution in 2040. Caliya had vague recollections; of how her uniform used to stick to her skin in the summer heat. The breeze of Barcelona was warm as the echoes of the past swam to the forefront of her mind. Caliya’s mother sat opposite her, ranting to her about the WFL party. Caliya could remember the dramatic hand gestures her mother used as she spoke, but it soon got hard to remember the details as the memory faded. Outside stood the WFL juniors in long clean red robes, strolling passed crowds of protestors with huge banners chanting “Juniors WFL debe ser liberado”. As they came towards the building the soot from the chimneys clouded the skies.
Caliya walked into the dreary room that to her looked depressing and damp, the usual placards and banners were arranged on the walls. She strolled towards the desk near the window pane and set her powerless eyes towards the bitter world. The noise had calmed down and the protestors shrieking voices had faded away, all was silent. Caliya sat on the stiff wooden chair and flicked through the papers noticing the instructions of the day’s work which were clearly highlighted with purple markers:
Listen to Reverend Johns: speech about the WFL achievements and future ambitions
Analyse the database of WFL dated 19/12/48
Rewrite the WFL regulations in italic capitals
Attend conference for juniors in campaigning hour
Caliya dialled the bright bold buttoned number and forwarded her recent duties. It was transmitted and a brilliant Verdi flash appeared before her screen. She knew she had received an exceptional. More juniors overcrowded the room, filling it with vile body odour. Caliya was greatly attached to her mother and when she was neglected by her, she did not want to respond to anything that reminded her of the women in anyway. As soon as Caliya took her eyes off the screen she was automatically shifted to press the triangular button. A deep piercing voice awakened Caliya’s thoughts .The words from the speech ignited new fury into her, making her palms sweat. She bent her head low to avoid being seen. Caliya had realised now that work was the only option.
After hours of work, the miniscreens automatically switched off as the juniors hurried off to their minibreaks, they overcrowded the doorways and Caliya collided with Andres who forcefully held her from falling.
“Lo Siento” said Andres
Caliya looked at him with a pale expressionless face and turned away from his piercing emerald eyes. She could not remember the last time she had heard someone speak Spanish. Definitely not since her parents left her in an attempt to save their own lives. The palaces were taken away and used as the WFL headquarters. The juniors were often punished severely there for any unauthorised actions involving the WFL. Caliya often heard the screams of juniors from the head quarters as she concentrated on her work, vivid images of chain saws and wooden planks filled her mind.
On the side a monitor stood ready with the ugly looking machine connected to it. Caliya got her microchip scanned and went to take a small platter. As soon as Caliya had collected her food she found an unoccupied table near the drink bar. Once again she had seen Andres, he looked at her, but she looked away. He made his way towards Caliya’s table and seated himself opposite her; his elbows pressed against the solid wooden table. Caliya forced herself to look down; Andres reached out and gently touched her hand.
Theresa by Louise Chivers
Cybil watched me eagerly as I walked into the hall. I taunted her cruelly, hesitating beside the hook where her lead dangled. The optimistic silence was suddenly split by an urgent rap at the door. Cybil seized the opportunity to release some pent up excitement and broke into ferocious barks. The knocker rapped again trying fruitlessly to compete with Cybil who was now clawing at the letterbox in the hope it was the postman.
“Ok, ok I’m coming,” I called over the din. It was Irene from next door. Her cragged face, silver hair and stooped posture always managed to produce sympathy from me, despite my knowing she thought me a malingering dole scavenger. I forgave her ignorance, as she didn’t know we had been trying for a baby since I lost my job eighteen months earlier.
“You’ve got to help me Jenny, Theresa’s stuck up the tree again!” she screeched urgently.
“Why don’t you call the fire brigade? I’m not too good with heights.”
“They won’t come again.” She looked down at her wringing hands. “I’m sorry Jenny, I wouldn’t ask you, but I’m…..”
“I’ll see what I can do,” I interrupted before she could say “desperate”.
The tree was an old oak. I craned my face skyward; the first of its boughs was a good twelve feet from the ground, and another fifteen feet from there I could see the faint ball of fur. I almost laughed as I spurted,
“There is no way I can get up there. I’m not a bloody spider monkey!”
I saw myself sprawled limp at the foot of the tree with a broken neck. God, no wonder she doesn’t want my help. What use am I to anyone, engulfed by defeat at the first sniff of effort?
“I’ve got a ladder,” she offered pointing to an old, wooden set of steps she’d probably had since the First World War.
“Those? I wouldn’t get on those if you paid me!” Defeat had a firm grip.
Although Irene said nothing, my imagination conjured a vision so vivid I could actually see her face contorting, wrinkles swarming to her mouth like rippling clay, pushing the lips into a poisonous protrusion and spitting, “No wonder you can’t get pregnant, what child would want you as its mother?”
I felt bile fill my throat as my mind’s eye grabbed my inadequacies and ran full pelt at my heart.
“You haven’t left the house in two years except to walk Cybil. When are you going to get a job eh? Wallowing around in your own self-pity as though the world owes you; well it doesn’t owe you a jot. Get off your scrawny arse and do something with your life!”
“Eighteen months,” I said feebly.
“What?” Irene’s voice split through my vision like a headache. “What are you on about eighteen months for? She hasn’t been up there that long, but if you don’t get a move on she might be!”
My stunned brain stumbled while Irene stood; the unwitting perpetrator of my internal wrangling. Dazed, I took the ladder and leant it against the trunk. With each tentative step I tormented myself further with memories and questions swimming in my head. How did I get here? I don’t mean leaning against a tree on a ladder formerly used in the trenches – but here?
It had been Mark’s idea to have the tests done. I was convinced time would bear fruit, so it was with total disregard for my opinion that we walked into the clinic that day.
I looked suspiciously at the other patients as though they were zombies. I wasn’t like them, I felt sure of it. I turned to Mark with a fleck of desperation straining my voice.
“Why are we here Mark? All we need is time.”
“We’ve given it time, now we need to know.”
I noticed his leg bouncing involuntarily, his usual anxious tell. I reached for his hand to comfort him, but he picked up a magazine and began studying the pages.
“You really want to read that, a six year old copy of Mother and Baby?” I said peering over his shoulder.
“Bloody hell, that breast pump looks like a torture implement from the dark ages; I hope they’ve made improvements by now!”
My attempts at easing the tension went ignored as he discarded the magazine and stuffed his balled fists into his jacket pockets and set his gaze dead ahead.
Mark’s name was called over the tannoy prompting us to leap to our feet as though we’d been zapped with cattle prods. As we walked towards our allocated room I said, “So, shall we take bets on which of us is blocked then? Ten to one it’s neither of us.”
“Ha, you wish!” he said without breaking his stride.
I stopped and grabbed his arm, forcing him to look at me, “Shit, you think it’s me don’t you?”
With averted eyes he said, “Don’t be silly Jen; let’s just get this over with.”
He didn’t come with me the day the results came in. I told him that all was normal, that the doctor’s advice was to keep trying. It was so much easier than facing the truth.
“For crying out loud, how long does it take to climb a ladder? You’re only on the fifth rung, will you get up there before we all die of hunger!” Irene was shouting.
I looked down and was surprised to find myself five feet from the ground for a moment before I remembered my task. Theresa.
I reached the top of the ladder and looked up at the first bough still a couple of feet or so away from an easy grasp. I stood on tiptoes, made a lunge for it and found myself dangling with nothing but air between my feet and the lush lawn below. Deploying every muscle I possessed in my arms, I hauled myself up. The relief that came with the relative safety of the bough surprisingly stitched my shredded spirits. I hadn’t expected the surge of triumph that came with conquering that initial hurdle; in fact, I barely recognised the sensation; but there it was, pumping my heart with a thrill that rendered the tree no more threatening than a shrub.
I swung for the next branch and then the next. With each conquered bough I felt my spirits inflate like a hot air balloon.
I finally drew level with Theresa.
“Meow,” she said.
“Well that’s original Theresa,” I said.
I sat astride the branch she was clinging to with all claws and held out my hand in the hope she would accept her lift down without a fight. She dug her claws deeper into the bark and eyed me suspiciously. I was exhilarated after conquering the tree; my spirits could not so easily be dampened, especially by a cat. I would need to try a different tack and attempted to prize her from the branch. I heaved and I yanked until eventually she released her grip and came flying at me like snapped elastic. I tried to grab her before she fell, but felt my own balance falter precariously as I reached for her. It was either her or me. With the sting of failure deflating my misbegotten victory, I chose me.
As I tried to muffle the sound of her awful, screeching yowl punctuated by Irene’s scream, I felt a buzzing in my chest and thought I must have been having a heart attack. I closed my eyes and prepared for death to take me.
The buzzing continued. Come on death, I thought, get on with it! I’d rather go with you than face Irene again.
It was as I began to look upon death as my saviour that I realised it wasn’t the Grim Reaper scratching at my flesh, but my mobile phone vibrating in my breast pocket. I didn’t know whether to cry, or cry uncontrollably with remorse that I had been spared to live another excruciating day in my life.
I held the phone gingerly to my ear, the caller ID already telling me it was Mark. I could find no words; they were trapped in a prism of my own self-loathing.
“Hello, hello? Jenny, are you there? Hello?”
“Yes, I’m here,” I whispered.
“What’s the matter? You sound strange.”
“I’m up Irene’s tree.”
“What!”
“It’s a long story.”
“I should have known it would be something stupid! You can’t be doing something useful can you, like looking for a job?”
“I….I didn’t know you wanted me to look for a job. I thought you were happy for us to keep trying for a family.”
“Ha! A family! That doesn’t seem likely anymore does it? I’ve suspected for ages that the test results weren’t normal and I’m fed up of you taking the piss! It’s obvious your tubes must be blocked but you kept it to yourself so you could carry on sponging off me. I’ve had enough Jen. Thank God I never asked you to marry me! Did you hear me? I’ve had enough!”
Although the temptation to release my grip on the branch and allow gravity to determine my fate was formidable, something stopped me. It came from the very depths of my gut. And as it fought and struggled its way up to my brain it gathered pace, and with it, strength. It reached my throat and exploded from me as I heard myself say, “My tubes aren’t blocked Mark – yours are.”
“Mark?”
The silence at the end of the line was empty. I had avoided the truth for months to spare his feelings. That he could so easily throw the blame at me shocked me to my core, releasing my previously caged self-esteem in an eruption to rival the most ferocious of volcanoes…. And he hadn’t bloody heard!
Only a few moments ago, death had seemed my only escape, but now I throbbed with the instinct of survival.
I slowly lowered myself back down the tree until I found myself dangling from the bough once more. Before I could change my mind, I let go. The grass greeted me like an old friend.
There was no sign of Irene or Theresa; although sadness at the cat’s fate stabbed at me like an accusing finger, I had no time to dwell; my freedom was calling.
Back at the house Cybil yelped and twirled at my arrival in renewed anticipation of her walk.
“Not long now Cyb.” I comforted her with a pat on the head. “I just need to grab a few things and we’ll go for a really long walk.”
The stairs carried me to the bedroom with the ease of an escalator where I began the task of packing my life into my old, battered suitcase.
I soon came to pack my jewellery box; finding the urge to look inside irresistible, I took out the ring; a simple, platinum band holding a solitary diamond in its clasp. Mark had hidden it in my box of disgusting muesli the morning after my redundancy; a symbol of his commitment to me he’d said, but not a proposal of marriage. I vowed not to wear it until I became pregnant. He never even noticed.
I closed my suitcase and left it at the front door.
“Hold on Cyb, just one more thing I’ve got to do.”
I took Mark’s box of Frosties from the cupboard, lifted the flap and let the ring slip from my palm into the sugared flakes. Perhaps there was a chance the spoon would reveal its presence before it choked him – or – perhaps not.
As I was about to leave the kitchen, I heard a thump against the window. I looked back and there she was – Theresa, cleaning her whiskers with her paw. She paused for a moment to fix me with a stare. I gave her a wink and a smile and she was gone, with eight more lives to live.
If you enjoyed reading these, you might like to try:
Shortlisted Stories for 2013 Competition
Good luck with the Competition everyone.