Amanda caught the first tube into work every morning. It was sometimes hard getting up in the dark and not seeing sunlight until lunchtime, but the alternative was unthinkable. There was only ever a handful of other people on the platform. The regular five. A nightshift-dishevelled man, resigned to
Read MoreI went to Cornwall to escape broken things. I thought it was my work, a doomed quango project to build the unbuildable database that no one wanted, but Marie assured me it was our relationship. Do you really want to do this? I’m sick to the eye teeth of your back-end issues. We were both strung
Read MoreTara sat in front of the washing machine. She looked at the way the clothes moved in circles, sometimes showing a little bit of colour but mostly just black; she listened to the machine, a constant hum that echoed in the room where she waited. She thought about the way the clothes resembled a hurric
Read MoreEdge of town, near the sandy beach that stretches for miles. Here, in an area of wasteland frequented by alcoholics, wastrels, drug addicts, homeless people, rats and stray cats, stands an old door, propped up against bricks. A white door, almost-new door, what-is-it-doing here door. Not a door,
Read MoreAnd you’re happy to work? she asked, repeating my phrase back to me. Yes, I said. I’ll be coming from a competition and just want to take a week somewhere quiet before classes start again. What kind of competition? I hoped my impatience didn’t carry down the line. Freediving, I said. She gave
Read MoreWhere do we come from - What are we - Whither are we bound?1 * My name is Big-Head, and this is my Tale. The World is Flat. This is what I was told when I was little, and I knew it to be a truth once I had been taken to see it with my own eyes. There were some, very few, who held that the
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