Jean liked washing the dishes. It gave her time to think. With her hands soaking in suds, she considered her relationship with Brian, looking for a sign about how to proceed. Then, when she pulled the plug and watched the grubby water gurgle down the drain, she found her answer.
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland. His mind soars across all of space and time, breaching dimensions and quantum realms in its search for truth and beauty. His body likes to sit on the sofa.
Hope is reaching out to her after a huge argument. Hope is trusting that she’ll see it was all her fault. Hope is going to a restaurant together and waiting for her to apologise. Hope is believing something out there will remove a red wine stain from your good shirt.
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland with his partner, daughter, dog and a gypsy curse he can’t quite shake off.
Her tears wake me up.
There’s not much I can do about cerebral palsy, spinal scoliosis, epilepsy. Those are for hospitals and doctors.
The tears, though. Those are a father’s domain. Making silly sounds, singing favourite songs, I distract her from the discomfort.
Tears fade; a smile begins.
Hope endures.
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland, with his family and a nagging sense that he has forgotten somethin, but can’t quite remember what.
Lionel woke up one day and realised he was made entirely of spiders.
“We’re all part of you,” the spiders said, “and you’re the sum total of us.”
Aghast, Lionel doused himself in bug spray. The spiders died and Lionel with them, for, without community, how can an individual survive?
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland. Although the city has been his home for decades, his heart lies elsewhere – beating once a century, within a small, ornately carved wooden box, bound by dark magicks, guarded by an ancient order of warrior monks, in a hidden monastery deep within the Forbidden Forest that now covers the ruins of the Lost City of Lemuria. That place.
I admire my garden, which, like my life, I have brought into a state of concinnity, all parts fitting together with breathtaking elegance. Sometimes perfection requires an eye for construction; other times we must remove that which does not fit.
You were that offending piece. Removed. Now resting in peace.
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland, vainly chasing his muse, who is always one step ahead.
Jason turns and runs backwards.
“Come on, Peter! Even running backwards I’m still faster than you!”
For years, I’ve had to endure his condescension. Jason’s better than me at everything and not shy about letting me know.
He can’t see the lamppost coming, though.
Perhaps there’s a God, after all.
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland. His writing regularly amazes and astonishes readers, but usually for the wrong reasons.
The little boy runs out into the garden, throwing shards of bread onto the lawn. He watches as sparrows come and feed. After five minutes, he nods with satisfaction. The formula works. He skips back inside, leaving behind a dozen small corpses, wondering who he should try it on next.
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland, yet another time-travelling refugee fleeing from the Ant Dictatorship of the Twenty-fourth century.
An ancestral memory of the pack around her, inhaling the musky scent of prey, barking their excitement, eager for the chase.
Ahead, a Deer leaping, crashing through Gorse. In the distance, her name being shouted by an anxious owner.
Sandy’s pet Chihuahua Tiddles has, once again, returned to the wild.
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland, with his partner Hilary, their daughter Catherine and Peggy, a Border Collie who frequently hears the call of the wild.
From the bridge, I watch the fishermen that line the riverbank. I left you again this morning, battered and bruised as always. I think that this time I’ve left for good, but I wonder. Am I like those fish, pulling for freedom, but tethered to the mistakes of the past?
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland with his partner Hilary, daughter Catherine and four-legged she-devil Peggy.
He holds the tweezers unsteadily over her finger, attempting to pull out the dark splinter that protrudes minimally from her whorled skin. She curses at his clumsiness, wonders aloud at his ineptness. He silently wishes for tweezers that could reach into her soul, to pull out the dark sliver there.
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland, where he navigates the collapse of society with a forced cheerfulness that hides the screaming void within.