Fiction

The pipe went round a few times, with the usually intensity of a crack sessions with strangers. Conversation was stilted and forced and tended to drift off as we watched each other load the pipe and take a hit with starving eyes. Things only relaxed when the pipe was in my hand and I could concentrate on putting a rock on the gauze, holding a light to the stem, filling my lungs with the smoke, bellowing out plumes of white cocaine fumes, feeling the rush dizzying me and almost as quickly starting to fade as I passed the pipe on and resumed watching intently and awaiting another turn.

By Tony O’Neill.

Beware. The balding curator of the Morrissey Exhibition sees everything. Watching over the proceedings, wryly, from a raised platform in the foyer, maintaining an impenetrable mask of enigma. (Is that a smile on his face? A tear in his eye? Who can truthfully tell? And what is his ultimate purpose? How does he spend his free time outside of the Morrissey Exhibition?)

By HP Tinker.

I needed to drink fluids, while my bucking, talcum-smelling passenger clearly needed to dispense with them. Another old woman clearly needed to also, as she too fortunately passed us on her path for the Ladies, stopping aghast with a vein laden hand across her mouth at the sight of myself and the first good lady floundering in the huge armchair. ‘Help me!’ cried my bony-elbowed old woman of good intention, thrusting her hand out to the other woman who was only slightly in less need of a pee than her good self. Well, wouldn’t you know it?

By Paul Ewen.

Hugh transfers his cigarette from right to left, then lays his hand briefly on top of Tom’s. Too briefly. More like a pat. Damn. The gesture of a distracted nurse, he thinks, registering the slight tightening of Tom’s jaw and deciding, quickly, to bring that hand to his mouth as if he were about to cough again, as if the withdrawal of his hand had been some sort of politeness reflex. Clearing his throat unnecessarily, he waits for the moment when he can replace his hand on Tom’s. ‘How about some music, instead?’ he asks.

By Tony White.

Jayne sang along to a backing tape, what?, four or five songs. “Cream in My Jeans”, “Fuck Off”. Some others. The anorexic girl and I danced around, shaking our arses at the audience, showing our knickers, being totally unafraid, free, the coolest kids in the world, absolutely triumphant! Then we disappeared down into the depths of the club on that stupid fucking stage. It was over pretty quickly.

By Charlotte Cooper.

It sucks being dead. I can’t find new facts for you. But I can remind you of the sordid little facts you may have forgotten. My life was threatened after I survived the first media barrage. They didn’t like that I was back, and that my stories would be republished in your paper. On the phone, they said, ‘watch your back, watch your wife, watch little Adriana.’ As easy as phoning in a bomb threat to your high school, and we’ve all been there, right? But I’ll be damned if I didn’t take it seriously.

By Sander Hicks.

She told him to go upstairs and get ready. She told him she wanted to be close to him. She told him she wanted him. He rose with a wicked grin and moved towards the stairway, one of those cheap staircases with white painted metal railings. When he was a few steps up, she pulled out the gun and put two bullets in his back. The first was the calculated strike, the second an almost accidental reaction to the surprise she felt at the incredible noise the first had made. She dropped the gun, stunned.

By Jim Martin.

Private cloaking systems had kicked off when an inventor found he could go anywhere and be ignored so long as he carried a charity can. Now Failsafe walked invisibly out of the night and through the crowds at the crime scene. It was a media event, all harsh arc lights and generalisation. He followed unseen behind Chief Blince and a trooper as they approached the chapel.

By Steve Aylett.

Some funding is allegedly imminent. Rocco submitted sheaves of documentation explaining in a hundred different ways that it wasn’t going to be essentially a Playboy Channel thing like the last one. Cal starts whining about wanting to go. He’s hungover from AM drinking. Courtney wanders off into the kitchen while Rocco is distracted.

By Alistair Gentry.

Le Urge advertised itself as a European Gentleman’s Club, which meant it wasn’t run by Armenians like most of the clubs in Hollywood and the Valley. The owners, full-blooded Germans, staffed the place with still more Germans. All the bouncers were big fleshy Teutonic golems with hair the color of bleached teeth.

By Jim Ruland.