I’m heavily into short stories at the moment, and seem to be bashing them out every few days. Perhaps it’s the heat. Perhaps it’s the semi-lockdown. Who knows?! But I’m enjoying them.
But having written one, my next target is to read them out and publish them on my podcast, Words In Your Ear (it’s at kevhwilson.podbean.com, if you’re interested).
If you thought writing was a lonely self obsessed life, you should try talking into a microphone, all alone in your shed!
Anyway, no more self analysis (for now!). Here’s the opening of the next short story I will be recording. It’s called The 2350 from London Euston. Hope you like it and thanks for looking…
There was a deep dirty darkness you could almost smell.
Far away, a suggestion of a scream. Then the sound of feet scuffling on gravel. Someone was following me!
I had to get away. I ran with the clumsiness of a toddler chasing a beach ball… my heart jumping around like it was trying to escape … Running, faster, faster, my mouth opening to gasp in the dank dark air that caught in my throat like soot … my eyes open wide, staring like a lunatic and sprinting stupidly towards the screaming, which got louder and louder and higher and higher until it made me wince and stop and start to cry… Stop, stop, stop …
The nightmare had lived in my head since I left her. It came calling every few months, injecting me with a virus of fear. It would settle deeper inside over time, and I could pretend it wasn’t there. But not for long.