A room with a Glasgow View
By celticman
The past is not past, but just lurking.
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- 2864 reads
Bill and the UFO
no UFO sited-as yet.
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- 6 comments
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- 1241 reads
bully for you
away from the footie. a bit rough. go on feel free to point out the errors of my ways.
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- 12 comments
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- 1783 reads
Coal Bags
More grime and grimness
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- 10 comments
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- 2781 reads
The best f**** team in the world
There are winners and losers in all walks, but only one team can be the best!
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- 14 comments
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- 4624 reads
Too late to talk to Benny
It was everybody’s local -if you were local-an old man’s pub, that had been slapped about a bit, with paint, tarted up, to look younger.
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- 1046 reads
Milk Boy
re-edit 31/1/ visions of the Clyde
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- 7 comments
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- 1577 reads
Uncle Stephen
old sea dog tale
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- 8 comments
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- 1539 reads
Tommy Turner
you need faith
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- 10 comments
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- 1667 reads
The matchmaker
short story-long tail
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- 5 comments
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- 1252 reads
Harley Street
‘Mary,’ Ma shouted up the stairs, ‘there’s somebody at the door for you.’
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- 8 comments
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- 1610 reads
Harley 2
more of the same nonsense
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- 841 reads
Hughie Gringo
Opportunity Knocks
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- 9 comments
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- 1529 reads
on the last day of Christmas
Sometimes it’s better not to be born. I’m a dreamer. That’s worse than being normal. I play that tune in my head and look out the eight floor window...
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- 2533 reads
Life in bits
I picked up a photo of Billy Quinn the other day. Don’t ask me where I got it. He’s handsome. I don’t remember him being handsome. I never remember...
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- 1247 reads
Cadogan Street
‘Hi, it’s me. Phone me back.’ ‘Hi, it’s me. Phone me back.’ ‘I’m a bit worried. Can you phone me back?’ ‘Is there something the matter with this...
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- 1293 reads
uncovering oneself (3)
The downstairs bar shut. I bought a bottle of Buckie from the Off Sales. It was more expensive than usual, but I was more flush than usual...
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- 1141 reads
uncovering oneself (4)
Bogey was glad to see me. Charlie wasn’t, but he held the back door open to let me in. Mum stood in the doorway between kitchen and hall and frowned...
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- 2467 reads
uncovering oneself (5)
With money in my pocket I walked quickly to the Atantis bar. Sammy Small Talk was perched in his usual seat at the bar, a half pint of lager in front...
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- 1908 reads
uncovering oneself (6)
My head throbbed like a man stuck upside down on the Big-Wheel carousel. Blackouts were called blackouts for a reason, not knowing which way was up...
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- 940 reads
Hope Street
She loved that story of how they met. Telling it to her friend Julie on a rare night out made her smile and her voice shine. She is tender with...
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- 854 reads
Shadow
Dan’s birthday. Their bedroom stinks of stale fag smoke, booze and the acrid burn of hash. After giving him his present, and another kind of treat,...
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- 1003 reads
the tug boat
The Tug Boat pub was infected by McAllisters. He turned to go before he was spotted, but he made his move too late. ‘Happy Anniversary’ went the war...
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- 835 reads
flockers 2
‘You were in the wrong waiting room.’ The lawyer shook my hand, introduced himself as John Cameron, Charlie’s advocate. ‘I’m sorry,’ Myra apologised...
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- 908 reads
flockers 3
Judge Morrie adjourned for lunch. Just as the big cheese advocate said he would. Stood outside on the stone steps with Myra. Lawyers and normal folk...
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- 9 comments
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- 881 reads
flockers 4
The day hadn’t started the way I’d hoped. I wasn’t late for work, which would have been a bad thing. But I was late for court, which wasn’t too bad a...
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- 742 reads
flockers 5
Had a few days to think about how wronged I’d been by the court system. Off work. Phoned in sick cough, cough, with the flu that needed careful...
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- 1054 reads
flockers 6
Days passed in a shuttle of discomfort. My skin went to war with my body. Blisters appeared round the skin in my hands, soles of my feet and toes...
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- 13 comments
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- 912 reads
flockers 7
Myra’s studio flat had heating and hot water. I could have cuddled her. She ran a bath with all the suddy and splashy smelly stuff. She dipped her...
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- 2835 reads
flockers 8
When Myra told me she went back with Charlie after he raped her I didn’t understand it, but in a way I did. She made a bed up for me on the settee...
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- 13 comments
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- 1060 reads
flockers 9
Felt better. Scrubbed up as best as I could in the morning, a complexion like boiled pink ham, showed a face no mother would kiss. Breakfast a...
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- 10 comments
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- 935 reads
flockers 10
Must admit the journey home was constrained, especially on the train. Didn’t see much of Myra in the next few weeks. Neither of us had a phone. Put...
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- 9 comments
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- 794 reads
flockers 11
Swirled whisky around my tongue. Listened to the shrill see-saw cadence and frenzied excitement in his voice and the little gulps of silence. Poured...
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- 906 reads
flockers 12
Went to see Myra the next day. Wasn’t sure if it was the right thing to do. Wasn’t sure she’d want to see me. Whenever I appeared things got worse...
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- 403 reads
Bible John 2
I clutch the handle of my holdall, with my purse secure inside. ‘I’m not sure,’ I say. I hold a leaflet out as a shield. ‘Perhaps she’ll get some of...
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- 328 reads
quickie
I’d a bad night. The guy upstairs had a burst pipe on Tuesday, which he didn’t know about. Next thing it’s Thursday, the ceiling comes down, and I’m...
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- 631 reads
Countdown
Countdown When Helen got the telephone call that her Da was dead she was curled up on one end of the couch watching Countdown, painting her toenails...
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- 626 reads
Plot without a story
The note flapped through the letterbox and lay on the linoleum. I pulled open the door, just in time to see a denimed back sauntering up the street...
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- 729 reads
Blood is thicker than water
Rain splatters the pavement when I set out. My sister, Teresa, doesn’t live far, but then the moon isn’t that far, and I don’t particularly want to...
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- 1150 reads
Forbidden Fruit.
‘Put your false teeth in,’ I said, ‘maybe then they’ll believe in you and believe in your prophecies more’. Old Joe had taken up a position between...
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- 808 reads
the things that we buy and don't know why?
The thought came like a First World War telegram – he assumed that she’d thought his family were marvellous. His mother was short and plump as a...
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- 787 reads
Last Call
She clumped up the middle of Singers Road ignoring the pavements, damp and slippy with the mush of fallen leaves darkening pools against the wire...
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- 606 reads
Don't talk back
I slept through the Russian missile crisis when John F Kennedy called the Russian’s bluff and sent them homeward to think again. It was a simpler...
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- 1949 reads
organist and monkey
The organ, off-kilter as a bagpipe chord, begins the first hymn. Major keys and minor key dance around the usual dirge. Funeral music. The...
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- 844 reads
bergy
It’s strange when you get out hearing soft, whispering womanly voices – he’s been sick—licking of soft strawberry lips to create a sympathetic sound...
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- 750 reads
shitehouse to shitehawk: a user's guide
I jot things down. Sometimes I order them later, or they order me. Usually, I don’t. That’s called the first draft. It’s full of grammatical mistakes...
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- 1038 reads
the gothic line
Dinner begins with a closed door Smell of mince and totties Worse than the dentist’s chair Shut-up and sit over there Plate piled high as a rabbit...
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- 717 reads
ghosts not spirits
The pale green Audi with a ladder strapped to the roof jerks to a stop in the angled strip of road before the bus stop and the Irish Pope bursts into...
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- 1194 reads
Le Cock: My Struggle.
I’m reading ‘The International Literary Phenomenon’, Some Rain Must Fall: My Struggle, Book 5 , by Karl Ove Knausgaard. Cliché after cliché so it...
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- 865 reads
IQ 2
Cinders Disco was bound to be hoaching, Tina Turner so loud that it vibrated through the walls and brought out goosebumps on my eardrums. Tony, Boaby...
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- 1284 reads
IQ test 3
Somebody had flung a scratchy blanket over my body to bury the unwashed. I woke up to the stench of my own body bathed in sweat. Eyes plumped by lack...
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- 454 reads
Jimmy Savile and me
I was lying in bed when my mum rushed up the stairs, barged into my room, mouthed that it was Sir Jimmy Saville on the phone. I had to shoo her away...
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- 486 reads
Grimms
Dad pushed the room door open. I hadn’t heard him, or the door going. I was sitting side saddle on my bed, one leg a comfortable numbness, bare feet...
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- 983 reads
Grimms2
Dad was better fun than an alarm clock. I used to watch him before I was old enough to get locked up in school. The light in my room was on the death...
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- 795 reads
Grimms3
Pizza Face is smaller than me, but with a big square head, so we’re really the same size. We’re standing in the smirry rain with duffle coat hoods up...
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- 654 reads
Grimms4
Pizza Face ducked his head down when he took a drag on a fag and hid it behind his leg when he wasn’t smoking. He’d stolen a dout, almost a full...
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- 631 reads
grimms6
Light shimmered and shed its hat of cloud and shadows. Snowfall drifted down setting the world to white. Our street was smaller and larger,...
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- 1097 reads
grimms7
The hall is not much warmer than the landing, but the light left on in my room lets us see each other a bit better. Angela looks up at me, her golden...
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- 615 reads
grimms9
We’re playing statues in the hall. I’m at the front door, trying to sneak up on Angela in her house. Her mum has come into some money and bought her...
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- 596 reads
grimms10
Outside the wind carries the rain and it spills against my room window, but it’s not really that cold. I’m tucked up cosy in bed. I know all the...
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- 237 reads
grimms11
Despite smirry rain, Jaz and his two pals, Godge and Rab are drinking bottles of wine and messing about on the canal. They've hollowed a shallow boat...
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- 949 reads
grimms12
Pizza Face has a size- 4 Mitre ball at his feet, keeping it under control, caressing it into going the way we’re going by touching it with the instep...
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- 829 reads
grimms13
Traffic sloshes through the rain on Dumbarton Road. We pass a woman holding a brolly at forty-five degrees against the wind and to keep her permed...
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- 633 reads
grimms14
Jaz didn’t like wearing a hat, even though it was raining hard, because he thought it made him bald. Not that anybody would laugh at him. They wouldn...
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- 8 comments
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- 653 reads
grimms17
Jaz and Rab guard the bottom of the close, the wind scouring the back courts. The bins are on fire again. Flames leaving smouldering debris, the...
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- 8 comments
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- 417 reads
grimms18
It’s closing time when Dermot leaves the pub. The last round of drinks with his mates he’s downed a couple of goldies, the whiskies flowing through...
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- 8 comments
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- 669 reads
grimms19
Dermot picks up Angela and carries her into his wee boy’s room. His son, a step ahead in the lobby, slips into the room picks up his book of fairy...
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- 6 comments
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- 481 reads
grimms20
The fog lifts from the tops of the buildings leaving them stranded in light rain. By the time Dermot gets back to his close he spots pedestrians...
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- 4 comments
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- 396 reads
grimms22
Tony is lying in bed sleeping. It’s a Saturday, no school, and a long lie. But he hears his Da arguing with Geordie the milkman outside the front...
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- 8 comments
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- 455 reads
grimms23
There’s nothing else for it. Jaz decides to go and see Rab. There’s been talk – Rab’s old man wittering, he might be able to do something for them...
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- 10 comments
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- 598 reads
grimm24
‘You’ll never guess who the Rhetor was?’ Jaz says to Rab. Despite the dim light, Jaz had recognized Chief Inspector Collins at once. He was a tall...
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- 7 comments
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- 646 reads
grimms25
The chaffing of barmaid’s singing lullabies, ‘Last orders,’ and deftly nicking the glass out of their hand before they are finished, Jaz and Rab are...
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- 5 comments
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- 582 reads
grimms26
Jaz can’t find his house keys and hammers on the front door, flipping the letter box with an untimely rat-a-tat-tat, echoing through the close. Karen...
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- 6 comments
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- 531 reads
grimm27
The school nurse’s grey hair resembles an unkempt blackbird’s nest, with a pokey wee white hat stranded on it. She has squeezed into her white...
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- 6 comments
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- 479 reads
grimms28
When Dermot answers the door, he’s not sure what to expect. ‘I’m Marie,’ she says, holding a soft hand out for him to shake. ‘And I’m a social worker...
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- 8 comments
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- 539 reads
grimms29
After a while Tony and Angela get sick of hiding from a giant dinosaur under the bed and crawl out dusty and uneaten, which is just as well, because...
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- 8 comments
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- 493 reads
grimms30
Jaz catches Pizza Face a slap on the back of the head when he catches him and Tony smoking a roll-up at the bottom of the stairs. ‘Go up to Rab’s and...
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- 8 comments
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- 448 reads
grimms31
‘Shouldn’t you be going up the road, about now?’ says Jaz, smiling into his pint. ‘To get ready for your big date.’ Rab’s bottom lips droops and he...
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- 7 comments
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- 850 reads
grimms32
Charlie the barman hovers around the five-foot mark and looks like King Louie from Junglebook , a comic figure, who knows everybody that is anybody,...
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- 231 reads
grimms33
Jaz is standing chittering at the bus stop outside Ramsay’s Fruit and Veg when a beige Morris Marina sweeps through the puddles, making an old guy...
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- 543 reads
grimms34
Crossing Kilbowie Road Jaz negotiates the tooting horns of cars and buses with the absent-mindedness of a three-year-old toddler and seems startled...
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- 6 comments
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- 507 reads
grimms35
Jaz panting and out of breath runs uphill, the dark street a whetstone underfoot, and the unexpected urgency of the chase sobers him. It makes him...
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- 14 comments
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- 929 reads
grimms36
Angela nips across the landing and rattles the letterbox. Dermot answers, swinging the door wide in welcome. He’s wearing his old work coat and work...
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- 8 comments
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- 436 reads
grimms37
With no telly to watch, Tony changes quickly into his jammies, and because of the cold dives under the covers of bed. He sleeps clutching his book of...
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- 12 comments
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- 648 reads
grimms38
Tony doesn’t decide to go to school, that’s just where his feet take him. The class has already garbled morning prayer, sung the time table and moved...
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- 14 comments
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- 816 reads
grimms39
Tony hunch-shouldered, tethers himself like a human-shaped balloon on the edge of familiar things, the chair his da usually sits in, watching the...
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- 8 comments
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- 485 reads
grimms40
There is a vacancy in the way Tony looks out the car window at the sweep of tenement building they pass and a sense of unease that they are going in...
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- 9 comments
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- 808 reads
grimms41
Tony remembers a parade of uniforms and much mumbling just outside of hearing. He forgets who has come or who had gone. Memories and dreams mixed up...
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- 8 comments
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- 552 reads
Grimms43
On the second landing, Jaz can’t wait. He nips into the cludgie and pulls the door over, stands leaning, left hand splayed against peeling paint of...
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- 12 comments
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- 688 reads
Grimms 44
Jaz sprawls on the couch, a Woodbine in his hand and has a few nips of whisky and sparks a can, leaving it at his feet. Angela, cross-legged in the...
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- 4 comments
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- 599 reads
Grimms45
The smelly cupboard is the ideal place to hide the guns until Jaz can find somewhere better. He’s thinking ahead of ripping up floorboards and...
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- 4 comments
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- 514 reads
Grimms46
Jaz quickly shakes off hangover the next morning with a quick blow job. He pulls his cock out of Karen’s mouth before he comes and his jizz squirts...
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- 6 comments
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- 548 reads
Grimms47
Outside the snooker club, a black Hackney cab across the road lets somebody off. Jaz pulls his collar up against drizzling rain, decides since he’s...
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- 353 reads
Grimms48
Rab cashes his Giro the next day and agrees to meet Jaz and the Tash back in the pub. Jaz sits waiting, nursing a warm pint, the Tash beside him...
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- 8 comments
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- 443 reads
Grimms49
Tony shares a room at the top of the stairs with Bruno. ‘He’s a bed-wetter,’ whispers Julie. ‘We may get him up during the night to take him to the...
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- 1574 reads
Grimms50
Tony places the fork carefully back down on the table, beside the butter dish. Clutching his eye, a colourful arabesque, milky with red veins, half-...
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- 10 comments
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- 692 reads
Grimms51
Bruno is hanging about waiting for Tony when he comes out of the office. ‘An ambulance came and took Hunter away,’ he explains. ‘Hunter swears he’s...
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- 8 comments
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- 593 reads
Grimms52
The cook looks up from a pile of dirty pots and dishes, rolls her eyes at Tony and comes walking towards him standing just inside the kitchen door...
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- 9 comments
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- 558 reads
Grimms54
The social-work meeting takes place after lunch. Tony lies on top of his bed, with belly ache, paging through a stained Readers Digest he’d found on...
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- 286 reads
Grimms55
Pizza Face sits on the floor in the living room, his back against the wall, tilting his head, gnawing at his thumbnail until his cuticles redden and...
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- 10 comments
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- 618 reads
Grimms56
Angela stands, waiting. Bob shouts again. ‘Jesus,’ he rants, when there’s no reply and no sign of footfall. ‘You better come in, then.’ She cranes...
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- 4 comments
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- 623 reads
Grimms57
Pizza Face pulls his duffle coat hood down, to show he is serious, even though the rain is coming down horizontal. He does a feint and step-over, is...
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- 2 comments
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- 403 reads
Grimms58
Bruno perches on the bed in the muggy heat of his room with his jacket zipped up, and the leather strap of his school bag over his shoulder, waiting...
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- 4 comments
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- 539 reads
Grimms59
On the day of his dad’s funeral Tony gets himself ready early while the care staff busy themselves having a meeting to decide who is to accompany him...
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- 10 comments
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- 551 reads
Grimms60
Karen answers the door tugging the belt of her flowery nightgown tighter, smiling, and giving a little wiggle as Dougie towers over her and ogles the...
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- 8 comments
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- 585 reads
Grimms62
Jaz tries to erase the memory of the snivelling shadowy self he’d been earlier by tearing into the booze. But Del isn’t hanging about either. They...
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- 14 comments
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- 764 reads
Grimms63
In the late bloom of spring, snow scars the Old Kilpatrick hills. Seagulls swoop above Angela’s head, screeching along the bins on Risk Street. A...
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- 10 comments
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- 774 reads
Grimms64
Jaz is gagging for the first pint of the day, but is stuck in traffic, enclosed in a bubble of the front seat of a red Volkswagen. Del is driving...
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- 7 comments
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- 509 reads
Grimms65
Angela’s eyes are splintered with not sleeping, she lies scrunched like a question mark at the bottom of the bed, blankets tight around her shoulders...
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- 6 comments
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- 495 reads
Grimms66
Del fits false number plates to the white Volvo, stolen to order for the job, in the early hours of the Friday morning, from Bearsden. Dougie lounges...
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- 9 comments
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- 714 reads
Grimms67
Bob rolls up the sleeves of his frayed, green, checked shirt, and uses the side window of the dining room as a temporary seat. No wind, slow moving...
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- 4 comments
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- 420 reads
grimms68
Angela stands sulking in the driveway, near the dining-room window, anorak brushing against the wall, out of sight of everyone, poking at something...
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- 5 comments
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- 487 reads
Grimms69
Tony dashes up the stairs without meeting anybody, but Bruno, who has been searching for him, spots him from the lobby and clunks up the stairs after...
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- 3 comments
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- 322 reads
Grimms 70
Jaz figures he’ll need to take driving lessons, not right away, but sometimes soon. He could buy one of those fancy Jaguar cars now. Pay cash. He’s...
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- 5 comments
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- 376 reads
Grimms71
A couple of days pass, then a week, in which Jaz does little more than alternate between pubs and empty glasses follow him. Maggie Scott’s for...
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- 7 comments
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- 481 reads
Grimms72
Jaz ganders out the kitchen window and sees Pizza Face playing outside, kicking a ball against the bins. ‘Hi,’ he calls through to Angela, but it’s...
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- 4 comments
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- 419 reads
Grimms73
‘You don’t need to be daft and drown yerself. You can just drink the poison to kill yerself.’ Bruno is deft at sneaking up on people and has big lugs...
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- 7 comments
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- 492 reads
Grimms 74
Jaz hears the loud screeching and the rising harangue which follows. It woke him up. It wakes the whole tenement block. The smell of cigarette smoke...
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- 4 comments
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- 441 reads
Grimms75
With all the cash Jaz is carrying and the hurry-scurry Rab is surprised to be standing beside him at a bus stop waiting for a bus. Jaz has brought...
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- 9 comments
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- 447 reads
Grimms 76
Awash with pints and halfs and even mouth puckering gin, with a slice of lemon and whisky in the same glass. Cocktails of his own devising. His day...
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- 7 comments
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- 456 reads
Grimms77
Junior hurries home. Tired and hungry, his hair sun-washed and lighter than his brothers’, he finds virtue in manual labour, skin lightly tanned and...
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- 7 comments
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- 419 reads
Grimms 78
Fag smoke drifts above Pizza Face’s head. His is a frightened silence amid bickering conversation and accusations of neglect. The last of the sun...
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- 8 comments
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- 502 reads
Grimms 79
Tony’s social worker, Marie, arrives on an official visit. She waits for him in the office. Dayshift-staff circle around, Julie flustered, leaves her...
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- 8 comments
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- 667 reads
Grimms 80
‘What’s been the crack then?’ Del stands at the front door, a cigarette jammed between his lips. A clean white open-necked shirt sleeves contrast...
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- 6 comments
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- 443 reads
Grimms81
Lizzie is as lovely as Jaz remembered her, perhaps more so, with her chiselled cheekbones and hair untamed as a burning bush. The room is stuffy and...
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- 6 comments
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- 510 reads
Grimms82
Jaz sits in his usual table in the corner of Maggie Scott’s, with a view of the door, nursing a pint. He’s been reduced to mooching about in his Y-...
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- 7 comments
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- 754 reads
Grimms83
‘I’m here to see Tony,’ says Angela. Bob stands elephantine in the doorway of the Home with his checked shirt buttoned up to his neck, glasses off-...
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- 8 comments
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- 531 reads
Grimms 84
Five days after robbing the Securicor van Jaz pulls a mask over booze coloured ruddy red cheeks and face and, hungover, is back at work. Del and...
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- 8 comments
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- 459 reads
Grimms 85
‘This big gigantic guy with an eye is trying to kill him,’ Bruno says, with exaggerated affect. ‘So he can eat them.’ His voice rises and he gets...
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- 4 comments
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- 315 reads
Grimms 86
Jaz sits in a haze of cigarette smoke in his usual perch in Maggie Scott’s, back against the wall, watching the door. Rab stumbles in and weaves...
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- 5 comments
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- 387 reads
Grimms87
Rab finishes his pint and follows Jaz out of the pub. He feels woozy, as if he could lie down for a lunch-time nap. A few minutes’ walk through...
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- 10 comments
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- 495 reads
Grimms88
Jaz squats on his haunches at the door to the smelly cupboard in the lobby. Under the light of a thirty-watt bulb he inspects the Starr pistol in his...
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- 2 comments
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- 269 reads
Grimms 90
A stilted walk to the car, flared denim flapping in the wind, guns pressed one-handed, hard, against their bodies, but concealed in their coats. Del...
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- 11 comments
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- 677 reads
Grimms 91
Angela sits on the top steps on her landing, waiting. Tugs have been pulled and combed from her blonde hair and skin been scrubbed pink in the...
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- 7 comments
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- 443 reads
Grimms 93
Jaz is a different man on the Larne Ferry, a man that now suddenly believes in the hereafter. The crew wear uniforms, blue shirts and grey trousers,...
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- 8 comments
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- 460 reads
Grimms 94
Jaz tries to work his way out of the seat and buy a round, but a hand goes on his shoulder and Bri in a voice that merges pity with outrage shouts...
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- 5 comments
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- 352 reads
Grimms 95
Karen isn’t sure how she feels. She looks over the rooftops hoar frost has picked clean of grime and burnished glistening white. Outside the kitchen...
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- 5 comments
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- 473 reads
Grimms 96
At the top of the Cressie Stairs, just before Angela crosses the road to go to school, she bends away, follows the black train of crows in the sky...
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- 8 comments
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- 364 reads
Grimms 97
Jaz’s handler is waiting for him underneath the clock and the monument of remembrance. A gold-leaf list of the Clydebank dead from the First and...
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- 6 comments
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- 396 reads
Grimms 99
‘Weet, weet,’ says an man at the bar, the cuffs of his gabardine coat falling down his thin wrist as he necks down the last of a Grouse whisky. ‘Aye...
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- 5 comments
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- 434 reads
Grimms 100
Bedcovers deaden Tony’s hearing, seals him in the tomb of his dreams, but when he sticks his head out of his bed, he’s alive to the wind rattling...
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- 5 comments
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- 366 reads
Grimms 101
‘How are we gonnae dae it?’ The idea feels jaggy, sticking in Bruno’s gullet. He shakes his head, wets his mouth with saliva and begins again. ‘I...
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- 6 comments
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- 497 reads
WMD 2
‘You want me to add some vinegar to this water?’ I asked. ‘For old time’s sake.’ ‘Nah, just give it to me straight.’ He tried to raise His head, but...
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- 11 comments
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- 811 reads
Grimms 102
From Dalmuir train station to Glasgow is a distance between not far and life changing, the the High Court an Intensive Care Unit of the Criminal...
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- 8 comments
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- 500 reads
Grimms 103
Representing the Crown and prosecuting for the Fiscal Office, Queen’s Counsel Montrose appears born to the era of wigs and absentmindedly fingers the...
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- 3 comments
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- 309 reads
Grimms 104
Detective Inspector Grier knows his place and sits smoking, which gives him something to do, in the soundproofed room away from the stage of the...
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- 6 comments
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- 331 reads
Grimms 105
The forensic expert, Mr Cleary, wears a baggy brown cardigan with bulky pockets he jams his fists into. He shadows the Macer, but is smaller, hitting...
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- 6 comments
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- 379 reads
Pretending to be me.
You worked in that video store beside the Cressie Stairs. A grey shop, a belly-flop of unordered Betamax tapes and dust that made me sneeze. Bless...
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- 8 comments
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- 561 reads
The Rock
The bell rang for the end of recreation and tally count of heads throughout Barlinnie. Prisoners milked it, flinging down the last domino in disgust...
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- 6 comments
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- 475 reads
the gothic line
He offered drunken prayers for the dead Wanted to call his pals on the blower Those who knew How artillery weighs the soul Keeps you in touch with...
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- 2 comments
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- 201 reads
Sammad
One of his shoes was missing, his cheek face down in wet, overgrown, weeds. A man in his early twenties, wearing an oversized leather jacket, his...
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- 7 comments
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- 251 reads
two-faced
I pushed my glasses high to rest on my forehead and stared across the road. I saw her outside the paper shop on Dunbarton Road, recognised her by her...
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- 11 comments
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- 450 reads
twelve-noon-two
Two things pissed Marie off, getting phone calls in the middle of the night and life in general. What made it worse was she’d been in a deep sleep,...
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- 8 comments
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- 212 reads
twelve-noon-three
‘You mind if I smoke?’ Paddy rested his back against the headboard. He’d woken early, hadn’t really slept, had thought of sneaking away, but then...
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- 13 comments
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- 414 reads
twelve-noon-four
Paddy came spruced up and fully dressed, out of the shower, and dropped the wet towel on the bed. He adjusted his tie and polished his shoes by...
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- 8 comments
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- 246 reads
twelve-noon-six
Paddy stood outside the church, he’d found it almost impossible to get a parking space and had circled for fifteen minutes before parking on a corner...
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- 5 comments
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- 129 reads
twelve-noon-seven
After Sarah used the toilet and flushed, she put the toilet seat down, and washed her hands and doused her face in cold water. No soap. No towel. She...
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- 3 comments
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- 142 reads
twelve-noon-eight
In the early hours, a ghostly presence in a billowing black dress with sleeves gathered at the cuff, Sarah pushed heavy furniture aside and hoovered...
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- 4 comments
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- 106 reads
panjandrums
I’d wrapped up for a winter walk with woolly hat and gloves even though it was just the beginning of May. Clydebank meteorological charts being...
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- 7 comments
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- 146 reads
Pandora's Box
I lost my wallet somewhere between buying a black pudding supper at the chippie, a seagull swooping down on my head at the shortcut to Dickens Avenue...
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- 8 comments
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- 163 reads
samsara
A man of unsolid muscle stands You could call fat But nobody would tell him that He gies me the eye Yatters on his epiphany about scum The cosmic...
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- 37 reads
Angel
‘I’ll get us some coke,’ shouted Kimmie above the disco beat. ‘Nah, I’m alright, I’ve got a can there.’ Angel dinked the red tin on the table with...
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- 13 comments
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- 128 reads
Angel 2 (home)
Angela crouched and pulled her chair closer to the electric fire. It had four bars, twin sets in curved reflectors, but only the top bar worked. The...
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- 5 comments
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- 56 reads
Angel 3 (disco)
Kimmie hooked up with the ginger-haired boy. The blast of Temptation - Higher and Higher- Temptation blasted from the speakers. On the dance floor...
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- 7 comments
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- 101 reads
Angel 4 (at the dump)
Wind whipped rain into Angel’s forehead and high cheek bones and made her look like a sixteen-year-old waif. More like herself than the make-up she’d...
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- 12 comments
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- 94 reads
Angel 5 (houseparty)
The guy with the moustache searched through his coat pockets, pulling out his fags and the bit of hash and then his hands diving into the side and...
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- 7 comments
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- 58 reads
Angel 6 (rape)
Kimmie groaned and threshed like a fish on the line as they bundled together. Angel didn’t know where to look. She concentrated on holding the glass...
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- 13 comments
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- 113 reads
Angel 7 (after the music stops)
Kimmie’s hand on her friend’s shoulder grounded Angel, brought her back to herself, but she moaned loudly, dry retching. Her muscles rippled along...
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- 4 comments
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- 43 reads
Angel 8 (work)
Angel struggled out of her bedclothes, she’d fallen asleep exhausted with her clothes on, expecting the knock on the door at any minute. The radio-...
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- 4 comments
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- 36 reads
Angel 9 (and Pizza Face)
Angel stayed in all week and also the following week, barely venturing from her room, other than to go to work. Kimmie had chapped the door a few...
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- 4 comments
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- 40 reads
Angel 10 (bromance)
Angel lit another cigarette, more for something to do, and she rolled down the window. ‘Sorry,’ she blew out the smoke sideways, fanning it with her...
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- 8 comments
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- 52 reads
Angel 11 (Edinburgh)
Pizza Face parked in his usual spot and smiled as Angel rushed out of her house, crossed the road and rushed to meet him. Sunday, her day off, and...
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- 6 comments
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- 54 reads
Angel 12 (the tramp)
‘You hungry?’ he asked. ‘We could go for something to eat along there.’ He waved his hand in the direction of the traffic behind them. ‘Not really,...
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- 6 comments
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- 46 reads
Angel 13 (mum and Mattie)
The living room door was open. ‘Can I have a word, m’lady?’ Karen leaned sideways in her armchair, almost knocking over an overflowing glass ashtray...
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- 4 comments
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- 42 reads
Angel 14 (getting to first base)
‘Sorry, I was delayed,’ said Angel as she stepped into the car and pulled her seatbelt on. She sniffed and turned her head away, looking back at the...
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- 4 comments
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- 46 reads
Angel 15 (return of Kimmie)
Kimmie’s cat’s-eyes makeup was smudged. She hopped and skipped in front of Angel in a pale blue, zip-up hooded top and gripped the top of her denims...
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- 6 comments
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- 51 reads
Angel 16 (second base)
Pizza Face waited religiously for Angel parked in his Jaguar every night and weekends before work. The main roads and backroads they’d travelled like...
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- 6 comments
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- 51 reads
Angel 17 (Wotsits)
‘Where you going?’ Angel asked when Pizza Face started the car the following night. ‘Going?’ he took his foot off the clutch. ‘I never really thought...
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- 4 comments
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- 54 reads
Angel 18 (portrait)
Pizza Face parked the car in a layby off the street, and at the end of the building. He clutched Angels hand and frog-marched her down the hill and...
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- 3 comments
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- 43 reads
Angel 19 (bad dreams)
‘Jesus, that’s minging.’ Angel sat up in bed, her face had been pressed against the wall. Disoriented, not sure where she was, until she felt Pizza...
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- 4 comments
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- 33 reads
Angel 20 (fizzing)
‘Did you hear Diana Dors died?’ Kimmie tried to make conversation. She was sitting on the couch in their flat in Partick, had a mug of tea in her...
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- 4 comments
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- 47 reads
Angel 21 (making a hash of it)
The tall cop kept a hold of Angel’s arm. Clean shaven with a bony boyish face it was difficult to tell what age he was, but with a dimple on his chin...
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- 4 comments
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- 53 reads
Angel 22 (time)
‘We can dae this the hard way, or we can dae this the easy way,’ said the stout officer doing the fingerprinting and he rifted. His breath smelled of...
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- 5 comments
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- 55 reads
Angel (change and charges)
Angel’s time had been taken up with crying and trying not to, when she had riches bestowed on her, a puff of a smoke—she had to bang on the door for...
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- 4 comments
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- 44 reads
Angel 24 (Corton Vale)
‘How’ve you been?’ Karen stumbled and pressed her face against Angel’s neck and a male prison guard patrolling the passageways around the tables and...
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- 7 comments
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- 52 reads
Angel 25 (prison time and design)
A wee boy held his brother’s hand. With intense concentration he guided a blue Dinky car up and down the curves of the chair and table as his family...
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- 4 comments
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- 40 reads
Angel 26 (church and children)
Most of the prison jobs were taken, but Angel hoped to get something soon. She got free- association a few hours a day and out for meals, sitting at...
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- 3 comments
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- 40 reads
Angel 27 (tony and bruno)
Everything about prison quickly became routine and depressing. Visitors and visiting- time, bucked that trend and gave Angel a share of the communal...
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- 6 comments
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- 85 reads
Angel 28 (proposal)
Angel glanced around at the clock. There wasn’t a lot of time left. She took a deep breath and just came out with it. ‘I don’t know if you heard, but...
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- 2 comments
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- 20 reads
Angel 29 (amnesty)
Angel smiled when she saw Tony waiting for her in the visiting room. She wanted to hug him, but sat across from him grinning. ‘You came.’ ‘Aye,’ he...
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- 6 comments
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- 36 reads
Angel 30 (hard to say no)
Angel looked over and Tony followed her gaze. A kerfuffle in the corner of the room, close to where some kids were playing with a plastic Thomas the...
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- 6 comments
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- 37 reads
Angel 31 (hard knocks)
Angel was shaking all over when she got back to the cell. She could feel her heart beating, her bones knocking together. Lisa had some crap on the...
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- 4 comments
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- 29 reads
Angel 32 (causality)
Carol Anne’s hand reached into her jacket pocket for her tobacco tin. Her fumbling fingers had a hard time forcing the lid and anger flickered across...
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- 4 comments
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- 29 reads
Angel 33 (on report)
Angel didn’t see what happened to Carol Anne. Before he dashed away to use the phone Peter had taken her by the arm into one of the workrooms and...
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- 3 comments
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- 19 reads
Angel 34 (Jonah)
Val made a point of meeting Angel outside her cell door after her meeting with the governor. ‘Some of the girls have been talking. C’mon back to mine...
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- 3 reads
Comments
A wise sentiment, indeed!
A wise sentiment, indeed!