Author Archives: chrisbuchananwrites

Tuesday Morning Visitors

by Chris Buchanan
Short story, 2012
A young woman goes to church to speak to God. Someone hears.

—

The ceiling is gorgeous. It’s not that it has some great artwork painted on it, or even that the wood is beautiful. It’s that it’s so high. I can barely see it and that makes all the difference somehow. It looks nearly black from here.

Swallow. Hm. It looks lovely.

Breathe. Nobody can hear. Breathe easier. God, why have I never come here before? I mean, ahh, ‘gosh’. Yeah. Sorry. If you’re, ah, listening. Ha.

Eva was unaware of her pupils expanding, didn’t realise how adorable it looked. Her hands were held together in an unconscious if right-spirited imitation of prayer, and the angle of her head made her straight mouth look like a perfectly innocent frown. She wore heels, a soft red overcoat and black tights. Had there been someone in the rafters to stare back at her, he would have smiled: she looked like a very sad cartoon puppy. Some footsteps from the street outside shook her concentration and made her notice the floor-tiles instead. They were good too.

She stood beneath the cathedral’s Lantern Window, although she never learned the name of it. To her mind it was ‘the big candelabra near the gift shop’, which was actually not a shop, but just a few leaflet-racks and a desk for conversation. Ahead of her lay twenty polished wooden pews leading to the Sanctuary.

It’s all very pretty.

To Eva’s right was the open doorway to Church Street. The city shopping district was the same as any in England, maybe a little greener and quieter than most, but here inside was a beautifully-made hall she had never gotten around to seeing. An older chap sat a few yards ahead, very still and reverent in a way that Eva felt her own generation were never quite able to replicate.

Something to do with attention spans.

It had nothing to do with attention spans. And although she would never realise, Eva was reverential enough, in her own way. She listened carefully when people spoke to her and she worried herself with it. In a roundabout way, she had learned this strength from her mother, who had been just the opposite. The standard rebellious stage people go through in their teens and early twenties had ended very neatly for Eva, leaving her strong and humble, and comfortable if a bit nervous. Her first dalliance with true love, via an excitable research student named Craig, had come to a more untidy end. This had all happened years ago, and Sheffield had grown on her, but often when annoyed she would think of Craig, sometimes without even noticing. She had a habit of giving the ‘silent treatment’ to her dog.

After a few minutes, just admiring the church hall didn’t entertain her anymore. She took a few steps forward and sat down, three rows behind the old man. Without noticing, she held one eye on the slab of sunlight laid by the door. Since stepping inside, she had carried herself like a newly-qualified teacher looking for a staff room, or someone proud asking for a bank loan. A little jumping nerve irritated the back of her neck very slightly, which she scratched absently, enjoying the satisfaction whilst thinking of other things.

I don’t want to be here after twelve and get caught up in the service. I have to cook today, and I’ll need to look around for bath towels. I need to do what I came here to do. Swallow.

Don’t breathe too loud. Don’t disturb that man.

And now I’m just looking at a stained-glass window. Jesus looks kinda weird here.

It was true. In the window the Messiah appeared silver-skinned, with his wavy hair and halo both dyed the same kind of off-yellow. The toga he wore was a bright, heavy red and he had a big sausage-hand stretching out to somebody invisible. To Eva, He looked grumpy, sick and alien. She was not alone, but a few people loved that window.

I don’t know what that facial expression is supposed to represent.

Ten minutes passed as Eva mused about ancient Rome, and then mentally replayed scenes from Ben Hur and Spartacus, confusing herself with the twisted plotlines. There was a weary kind of smile on her lips as she snapped out of it.

Okay. I want to talk to you. If you are there.

I haven’t prayed in years, and I’m not sure I believe in you. So, sorry. But for whatever it’s worth, I want to talk to you.

Ahead of Eva were three little altars. One was all but empty, just a pedestal. One was a mess of candles and the other held more stained glass. There was no need to light candles at this time of day.

The whole building is full of little bloody symbols I don’t understand. As if I’m visiting a little boy’s den. Ehhh…

The air feels cleaner in here, easier to breathe. Someone works hard to keep this place so austere.

As a matter of fact, the upkeep of the Cathedral was divided into three fairly simple shifts and shared gamely by friends of the building. It was a self-perpetuating thing: such was the cold beauty of the hall that visitors tended not to bring much dirt in, and were careful to leave no mess.

I want to ask what I have to live for.

Every morning I force myself to get up early…

Eva worked in the evenings, at the restaurant attached to a small theatre that used to be a cotton mill. There were no real demands, from engagements, conscience or social life: nothing to justify her getting up early.

…and I feel like I should take pride in it, in having some control, but I hate the mornings.

I don’t like my job anymore. I don’t exactly like the flat, but I don’t want to move. I’m not happy being single but I do not want to go on dates with strangers. I don’t enjoy myself anymore.

There was silence, as always, and unfortunately the Reverend Cowling, some way away by the Hunter’s room, chose this moment to cough. The sound immediately shamed Eva. She felt as if she ought to blush, but did not.

That’s all. I sound like a spoiled child who has to finish her homework. ‘I don’t enjoy myself any more’.

For a second she wished someone she knew had died. That she were grieving. She would have been more comfortable that way, for this moment at least.

Her mother used to say that God is everywhere and time and culture have no meaning for Him, but if you’re going to ask Him favours then you should go to His own house and dress up a bit.

This is a terrible prayer. I’m not used to begging. I don’t know how to do this.

I want to know if life is worth living, and if it is then why I don’t agree. It’s not that I’m complaining about my life… exactly. I feel as if I just don’t know how to use it.

I have a dry throat now. I should have had some coffee, but I didn’t know if there was a toilet near here. Swallow. Again.

And I hate what I’m doing here. These gaudy window-pictures of Christ don’t show him being crucified, but they remind me of it anyway.

‘A man who let himself be tortured to save strangers, and then spent two thousand years making them feel guilty and having them surround themselves with pictures of it.’ This is the description of Christ she would think of later that day and tell an atheist co-worker the next morning. When she did, she would think of this picture and get lost in thought.

I’m sorry. If you’re actually hearing this, I’m sorry. I just don’t feel like I should be here. I don’t really have anything specific to ask.

Ah… How is my brother?

He was fine. Lately he had reconsidered joining the military to ‘make something of himself’, and though their mother had neglected to mention this to Eva during Skype calls or email correspondence, her concern showed through. He still felt bad about the last argument he and Eva had before she left home. He was interested in a girl who he thought was too good for him, and this had made him spend more time alone.

Or… I guess… or how are, ah… I don’t know. I can’t concentrate. It’s one thing to walk into a church and start demanding answers, but another thing to walk out in a huff.

How’s Craig?

Craig was, exactly as she suspected, very happy with another woman. He was working a small office job which left him dissatisfied but he was able to delude himself very well, and when this didn’t work found joy in other things. He occasionally thought of Eva, but did not truly miss her anymore.

What am I supposed to live for?

The old man is leaving. He looks exactly like the people who sit in front of me on the bus. I think he just noticed me looking and smiled at me, and I missed it. Never mind. He looked happy. Probably got whatever he came here for. Whatever it is that people do come for.

It took a while, but the man (Bill)’s footsteps got quieter. She found his footsteps heavy, awkwardly-placed, careless, and didn’t know whether to be slightly annoyed or feel a little sorry for him. When she lost patience thinking about that, Eva trotted over to the candles in the right-hand chapel. This, more than any area of the Cathedral, looked untidy. There were rows of lit candles, some at slight angles and some straight but melted-down, all supported by a short wooden test-tube rack and all made into funny shapes by the way the wax had slid down and cooled at the bottom. There was a row of fresh ones, separated from the others. One was upside down, for reasons no-one knew.

And what’s the point of this? What do they mean?

They were a way to make visitors feel at home. As well, the light was symbolic of God’s presence. It was that simple.

I’m going to light one of the candles. Good.

She picked one of average length from the left and held it against the brightest flame, centre-second row. The look on her face and the slow breath through her nose challenged the act to mean something, to change something. As if she were threatening it not to.

Swallow. And put it back. In her grip the candle rattled against the wood, but the frictionless wax made it silent. She felt it.

What’s the point, here?

The point was very hard to explain.

I suppose there are just some things that people want to know.

Even when you won’t tell them.

 

Eva lost her interest in the display quickly but glanced at the top of the chapel archway before she left. Now that she had a good view of the old stonework, she lingered for a moment, frowning. And just like that, she was done thinking.

It took her a minute to reach the street again, during which she distracted herself by frowning until it hurt just a little and pushing her thumbs against her palms. Once she was off Church street and in a quiet spot outside a bar, she spat at the floor.

Michael, a nineteen-year-old boy with a large camera around his neck, briefly admired her figure before stepping into the cathedral himself. For a minute he stood and nodded, wondering if he would be allowed to take pictures, and then simply wondering if anyone would stop him.

The camera was expensive and new. At the time, Michael had an idea about pursuing photography as a career, and had already livened-up a few of his days wandering the city and finding unusual shots. He lacked skill but was at least serious enough to recognise that fact, and understood that he had a knack. In his way, he wondered if he might finally be able to impress his dad if one of his little hobbies turned out to be a bit more serious, and maybe even made him some money down the line.

Reverend Cowling shooed him out five minutes before time so that he could prepare for the afternoon service. Michael didn’t manage to take any photographs, but the fresh air was nice.

Stars

by Chris Buchanan
Short story, 2010
Dan welcomes his ex-wife to the horoscope segment of the BBC Radio Merseyside afternoon show. He does not care for horoscopes.

—

I was the funny host at Radio Merseyside. DJ’s there were divided into three distinct groups, as per BBC local broadcast policy. There were young lads who tried to be funny, old men who tried not to be, and me. That’s why I got the afternoon show so quickly, and how I kept it.

Don’t get me wrong, now: I was never anything special. I was never national quality, although I always suspected that if I was, then the accent would have held me back. Don’t hear too many Scousers in the top presenting jobs. But I didn’t belong up there by rights. I was right where I deserved, in the crumbly, understaffed halls of mediocrity, Paradise Street.

On the day of my last show, I remember staring at the clock until ten minutes before the end.

Jessica Jones finally mooched into the studio without anyone letting her in. She just hung up her very silly furry coat, sat down, pressed her knees together and made that stupid smile where it’s not really a smile so much as a deliberately bad impression of one. She thought it made her look innocent and sweet. It made her look like a liar, I had always thought. I smiled back. ‘Just in time,’ I mouthed. She pursed her lips in exaggerated confusion, then pretended to figure it out when I abandoned the charade and signalled to put her headphones on.

Simon and Garfunkel were faded-out prematurely and replaced by what was labelled ‘astrology ambiance medley’, but known in the building as ‘new age shite tape’. Pan pipes and chimes.

‘We say farewell to the wonderful Sound of Silence, there,’ I announced happily to the mic, ‘and welcome back to Miss Jessica Jones! Astrologer…’ and I paused there because she had written-in requesting me to, ‘to the stars.’

She hadn’t bothered with the make-up today, I noticed when she looked-up. It made a nice change. The milky, still glance she shot me was either to thank me for including her pun, or admonishing me for the little ‘silence’ gag, it was impossible to tell which. Even without them painted, I couldn’t read her eyes.

Come to think of it, she looked just about normal. No big ear-rings, no ten-years-too-young corset or anything. It was a black jumper and almost not-shiny trousers. She’d never been in the studio, not for the astrology anyway, looking like that. She looked nice. I did notice that.

‘Good afternoon, Daniel,’ she replied. Daniel. I didn’t know if I’d annoyed her or if we’d just become so formal that ‘Daniel’ seemed right to her. I suppose I wasn’t exactly calling her ‘Jess’ these days, so fair enough, but…

‘So what have you got for us this month?’

‘Well, it’s going to be a very busy time, at least for the next couple of weeks, for all of us. There are some very interesting… shifts, which I shall get to later.’ She sounded robotic when she recited her reports, as if she took no joy in the work. Like even she didn’t believe in what she was saying. I had to wonder about that. Shifts.

I nodded with the best dopiness I could muster. ‘Right,’ I said, ‘what kind of shifts are we talking about?’

‘Well we have a full moon starting tonight…’

Yes, much like every month. ‘Yikes. Is that unusual, Jessica?’ I grinned.

Boldly, she ignored it. ‘Now, you’re a Cancerian, of course.’

‘You remembered!’

‘I did. And the moon is your ruler, obviously.’ On the recording you can hear my chuckling at that point. It’s not me being spiteful; it was purely by accident. What I said afterwards was spite, but I thought I might as well after laughing at her.

‘Well, obviously, yeah. I never leave the house without consulting the moon. You can tell by looking at me. Funny thing is, whatever I ask, it always just gives me this sad face.’

‘Right…’

‘It’s depressing.’

‘The moon is your ruler, Cancer, and it will be full tonight and it will be in Taurus. Taurus is the part of your sign that deals with group activities, which seems lovely, but remember that the full moon is all about letting go. So, that’s maybe something you should think about now.’

Well how bloody specific. How nice of whoever created the universe to leave a complex system of stars and planets around the Earth in order to tell people born in June that they should maybe think about letting go around October.

Now before you start taking her side, thinking I was being a bit harsh, let me remind you that her last book was called The Venus Code, and that she bought a BMW with the profits. All right?

All right. ‘It could be anything,’ Jessica followed, still in her bored computer-voice, ‘a gathering of friends you no longer have time for, a work thing, or who knows, even your family. But you should say goodbye to whatever it is before it’s too late.’

Thoughts of gullible fools at home flitted through my mind. There must have been people at home who actually took her on, who sat at home with a pen and paper and based their lives around these random, vague platitudes she had strung together while waiting for a roast to cook.

She was vegetarian by then, actually, so no.

Some ‘Cancerian’ might just go and throw his family away, or something, because of this. Because the bloody moon was in bloody Taurus.

I stopped listening. My guest continued reading her fortunes as if they were shipping forecasts, while I slowly closed my eyes and smiled, tried to rise above the scene. Her droning and twittering dulled, leaving only the panpipes audible. The ill-fated listener in my thoughts was replaced by an image of stars against black. Five stars that apparently someone once thought looked a bit like a crab. They don’t. They look like the tips of great, shimmering mountains. Every one of those five is all we can see of a system of planets, like our own, or maybe different. We don’t know. Couldn’t possibly. Every one is unique, gorgeous, alone, except for that glassy, emotionless white dot that made it to our eyes. After all that time and space. Five of them.

‘Now, the Sun is changing signs now, moving to Mercury. This is veryexciting for Cancerians because…’

‘Awww, Jessica Jones, will you shut the fuck up?’

The astrologer frowned and creased her face at me, helplessly registering a mixture of caring and disgust. Honestly, it was wonderful for me to see that face again. That was Jessica Jones’ face. I’d missed it badly. I almost didn’t mind when I realised what I’d said on air.

‘Do you actually–’ I was sputtering now, but no plan of action came to me no matter how much time I bought myself. ‘Do you believe this stuff? That’s what I want to know. Are you in on the con, or did you somehow get sucked into this? Because the last time I knew you well enough, you were much, much smarter than this!’

I had known her well for seven years. I like to think I knew her better than anyone else ever did, but she’s changed so much that I suppose it doesn’t matter. And I understand she found a new fella the week after the divorce, anyway, so maybe I am just second-fiddle now. They’re still together, at time of writing. I certainly don’t know what the astrology was all about. We never talked about it, anyway. She wasn’t the type, back then.

I knew her well. Seven years. It was my fault she got interested in fame, and I’ll take the blame for that. I let her help on the show, made up the occasional comedy character for her to play. She loved it when I introduced her by her full name on the radio. It made her feel like a celebrity, I think. But I just haven’t got a clue why she went the way she did. Whether she believed in the horoscopes, or she just liked the celebrity. In our day she was brilliant. She used to wonder at everything she saw. Used to forgive too easily.

I swore some more while she watched, blank and empty. When I had clearly run out of steam Jessica walked out, very dignified. A few minutes later, Joe – Joe McCoy that is, producer at the time – politely asked me to do the same. Next time I saw her was on a street corner. She was shopping, I was looking for work. The conversation was awkward. We both kept our hands in our pockets.

But Jessica smiled a bit as we talked, a nice smile, like she used to, and even laughed at a few of my jokes. She always said she thought I was funny.

Amber’s Ward

by Chris Buchanan
Flash fiction, 2010

—

The stockroom is faded and blurred at the edges, like her. I don’t exactly know if it’s too dark in here or if I just need to blink. I don’t want to close my eyes so I try not to think about it.

She’s just sat here, barely glancing at me but holding me still with her silent shuffling. If I could concentrate I might be able to identify the specks across her cheek. It’s either mud or blood. It’s dark and it’s dry, so I can’t say, even at this distance. She keeps scraping off the spots, usually cracking or crumbling them when her nail hits their edges. Now she has gotten better at lifting them off in one piece. Whenever she successfully pries one away, she flicks it at me and mimes chuckling. They’re on my face now, too, but I don’t mind.

I had decided the stories about the A&E at night must be an outlet for the stress the doctors go through. They call it ‘the grey lady’s ward’ sometimes. I didn’t want to think that Preston Royal was staffed by crazy people, so I made excuses for them. In some jobs, maybe you just need to believe in an afterlife. Only the doctors and nurses ever claim to see her. Never the hired help, even those who have been here longer than me. Just those people who come to work each day knowing that they might fail to save someone’s life.

But now she’s right here, with me, next to an aluminium cabinet, smiling with her head cocked. How have I never noticed her? When she smiles at me like that, I don’t know what she means by it and my feet feel light. Sometimes I twitch and she turns her face as if to laugh. Maybe she just finds me funny.

She would have caught my attention even in life. Her hair is blonde, I suppose. I might be able to tell if I could just rub the sleep from my eyes or splash some water across them. I have to wonder what all this ‘grey lady’ stuff is about; she’s wearing a football shirt and I never heard of any Newcastle player named ‘Amber’. Has nobody spent enough time in her presence to look at her back?

They’re too busy, eh. I would have made a terrible doctor. I took the time to learn her name. And I’m staying with her. They’ll just have to run their own errands tonight. This is important. I wonder what happens to her during the daytime. I’ll stay and watch. I think she wants me to stay with her.

Another dot of mud-or-blood hits me, on the nose this time, but I don’t react. She stares at me and I try to read her expression.

The dots are on her shirt, too, only visible on the white stripes. They merge into a black splash on her legs, beneath the shorts. Finally I work it out; she’s been playing football. It’s just mud. With relief I move to cradle my head in my hands. There is more of the mud on my sleeves.

Of course it’s mud. She snapped the bones playing football. That’s why she came in. That’s why they needed me to hurry down here and fetch Doctor Hay. It was an emergency. She wasn’t here and I looked in the stockroom. But I never left. I couldn’t find her and I panicked.

After a while, I relaxed. It didn’t matter. She was with me. I was too careful, too nervous to save her, but she’s here with me now. Smiling.

There is a harshness to that smile now. The more I remember, the closer her face seems to come to mine. I am reminded of how small the room is. I think I hear the studs of her boots squeak a little against the floor.

The door opens above us, momentarily stealing my attention. When I glance back, she’s gone. A nurse is here and she looks frightened by something. She must have seen Amber vanish. I hate myself for missing it and I hate the nurse for disturbing me. She has to drag me out as I scrabble and try to flick the mud onto her. I feel myself grappling against her, determined to stay here and wait. She gets me out and I am still.

I have never seen Casualty this busy. As the night ends, the corridor is full of patients, each one’s image as colourless and undefined as the girl I have been watching. Each one grey in their own way. When the nurse finally sees them she loosens her grip and stares into the corridor, unblinking. Maybe she recognises somebody too.

The ghosts are everywhere, silently shifting into the rooms and into reception. Amber is by the vending machine, giggling. I run.

Smiler

by Chris Buchanan
Flash fiction, 2013

—

I got lucky straight off the bat. Third day on the job. Let me tell you though, those first two days were the stuff of adventure books: angst, falling in love, rising to challenges, making amazing discoveries, secret identity and learning all the beginners’ lessons about responsibility and stuff. All the stuff that they make the movies out of, before the capes’ lives start to get boring and the relationships beak up and after a while nobody thinks their powers are exactly ‘super’, just kinda cool. And they get their sponsorship deals fixed and everything. All the romance is gone and they’re just getting the job done.

We have three names. Not everyone knows that. There’s the name we got before we got lucky, you know, Whatever Man, Incredible Gal, The Human, you know, rhino or whatever. Then there’s our real, actual names, which even though they’re out in the open now we still only really use with girlfriends and so on, and nobody ever seems to remember them. And then there’s the names that we call one another. I guess we still like the idea of little secret names and underworlds, you know, like to pretend that we’re still disconnected from the public. Does any other profession still have this problem? It seems very adolescent, doesn’t it? Firemen, they’re heroic, right? As much as we are. They don’t have secret names.

My name among the fraternity is ‘the smiler’. The idea is that because I started in the seventies and I got lucky nice and quick, I’m some sort of wise old man who knows everything and watches over the other capes with a wry, old man smile, you know. You know. I’m not sure why they want to think of me that way. Back in the day the name was Captain Amazing of course. Seventies, like I said. Ha ha. Golden Age. That’s what we call the, uh, early days. Nowadays you’re not allowed to call yourself Captain-something if you’re not in the military or the police. Can’t complain about that.

They don’t call us super-heroes anymore, do they? Again, I don’t think I can disagree with that. I mean I’d like to say I was outraged and that nobody remembers what wonderful things we did for them and the world is such a miserable place these days, but that would be bull. Super-heroes was always stretching it a bit, and we always knew that. What we are is people born with birth defects or with very odd childhoods and exceptional skills who work on an independent basis as either vigilantes or an emergency service. Super, not really. Plus it’s not really a good attitude to describe people with strange abilities as super, is it? That’s one step away from special. Ha ha, poor old Ladybug Man used to complain a lot – said it was like being in a Victorian freak show, being called that. But he was the one who drew a little ladybug on his jumpsuit! I was always trying to paint spots on his, uh, ha ha ha. I don’t do that anymore.

And as for heroes, well pal, you hang out with some of these people, you know? Huh. You hang out with The… well I won’t embarrass him, but we call him Mister Stretch! They’ll all know what I mean. They’ll all know what I’m saying. And it’s not who you’re thinking, by the way. You don’t have to be heroic to get into the business. But I don’t even want to get into the whole issue of what heroes are, or aren’t. If you see people doing what they can instead of working regular jobs as heroes, then sure.

Maybe we were heroes when we had the secret identities, i.e. when we worked another job and had to juggle between the two. Is that what makes a hero – his financial situation? Back when we were constantly getting dumped for failing to show up to dates and not paying enough attention to our families. Heroic? I said I didn’t want to get into this. We certainly were different back then, when we wore the costumes under a shirt and tie. Some of them still do: I have no idea why. Naming no names, again. Let’s just say there’s a certain cape who never wears short sleeves and goes around pretending to be a newspaper editor and leave it at that! Let’s just say… nah, his name is kind of obvious, so. He’s a weird guy though.

I got lucky early. Third day of flying around and fighting crime on the streets of New York. I thought I was invincible and I thought I was brave. Yadda yadda yadda, a city block destroyed completely by what used to be called a super-villain. I fail to stop it, I fail to save my girlfriend’s life, I fail to save anybody’s life, and yes, I make it that much worse by floundering around feeling sorry for myself and getting in the way. Entirely my fault. Headline writers can’t quite bring themselves to call me Captain Amazing, not even in a sarcastic way. And why did I fuck it up? Because I was in a phone booth, getting changed, and I was late. I didn’t want people to know my real name. I was worried about the people close to me.

And every day since then has been quite dull, by comparison. Now that I know my limits, know what I’m doing, and prize doing a good job over any sort of sense of adventure. We all do a better job nowadays. We’re on call, all day every day, with sensible shifts and sensibly-structured teams and management, you know? Police protection for family and loved ones. And no secret identities. Names are all police checked. Nobody goes rogue any more and turns ‘villain’, in fact when was the last time you even heard of a villain? I guess we’re no fun to fight any more. Good.

Two days of high adventure and melodrama, one catastrophe, and a lifetime of solid work. Lot of lives saved. Very lucky, I’d say. There are a lot of youngsters still doing the job, and one or two still have the urge to come into the office and make out like there’s some huge emergency or impossible choice they have to make. We have counsellors and stuff. And we’re five days on, two weeks off now, too. They’re even talking about government funding! Which, honestly, would be a really nice relief. Just between you and me, here, I hate wearing ‘Duracell’ and ‘Vodafone’ and ‘Shell’ all over my uniform, you know? So even if there was a serious pay cut, I’ll be voting for that.

Yeah, it’s okay now. It’s all okay for us.

The Last Two

by Chris Buchanan
Flash fiction, 2013

—

It doesn’t matter when it happened for now. It happened. It will never matter whose fault it was, and it doesn’t matter if it could have been prevented. It was not. There were billions of survivor stories and all of them would have broken your heart or re-affirmed it and those stories meant everything to the people involved. But they don’t matter now. They are all dead and none of you have time or a special purpose to hear any of it.

If there really must be a eulogy, the ending was a nice story and fairly representative of how they all lived. The very last two human beings were a man and a woman. They had only known one another for a few days. Both of them were experiencing severe shock from their loved ones’ deaths, which made them appear calmer than they were. They had gotten themselves trapped in a collapsing building in what had been one of the first cities ever built, and they had lost the other people they were with. They had no energy left. They might have survived longer if they had found some.

What was nice was that neither one of them held any sort of illusion that their reasons for not running were anything other than exhaustion. They slumped down against a white wall covered in scuff marks that looked like a pattern, then they fell into place like discarded dolls in a toybox. They held eye contact but not because they were in love or holing onto hope, or telling themselves that they were having some sort of beautiful epiphany in the final moment: something that made it all worth while.

Nothing like that. They just slumped and looked at the most interesting thing in the room, which in both cases was another human, and thought about whatever they had to think about. No pressure, no urgency to say something important, no need to communicate. It was no great thing, but if the two people had been slightly more lucid, they would have thought that was quite good. They would have enjoyed something about the position they were in.

They never knew that they were the last two. There was so much they didn’t know, now that there were so few of them. The species had lost more than it understood with every set of lungs that stopped. Two didn’t do much.

It doesn’t matter what their names were, less still what they looked like or how old they were, what particular places they had fitted into and how. No-one would know the differences now, and they made very little difference to what happened.

Amid the familiar sounds of crashing glass and slamming concrete and metal, in a moment there was something harsher, some noise. Both of them jumped a bit and held their shoulders tense. it was the beginning of an electrical fire but they would never know it. For no reason other than that it seemed true, one of them said, “You have beautiful eyes”. That was the last piece of language. The ceiling caved in. The power went out and then, as though there was a consideration for modesty, we lost our last eye.

Empty House

by Chris Buchanan
Flash fiction, 2012

—

The ghost looked more like a drawing of a woman; not a breathing body but just a collection of dry ink lines or etched cuts, setting into the walls and furniture. Everything she touched was marked with her thin, sharp lines. Everything became part of her.

The walls and the floor seemed as though they were tilting upwards, like a silent and gentle earth-quake, like someone was holding the house very carefully between finger and thumb and watching through the window. The ghost, even blacker as the light sled away from her and into the corners, the ghost stretched. The movement of what she had marked gave the illusion that she was coming to me, and a shadow made it look as though her eyes were moving.

More than anything I had ever wanted, I wanted to get out of the house. I chastised myself, the way my mother used to do, for ever wanting anything else. For ever worrying or being afraid, when this was the only moment that would actually require these emotions, these wishes. I felt as though I had nothing left now, that I had wasted my life.

The ghost seemed to shriek, like a mad animal who thought it was marking its territory. The mouth gaped unnaturally downwards as the house kept tilting. The spidery mass that looked like the trunk of her body grew longer and blacker. There was a bitter taste in the air, like rust and water.

I wanted to get out of the house. I didn’t want to believe it was real. And I wanted so badly to forget this.

The Vampire of Three Acres

by Chris Buchanan
Flash fiction, 2012

—

It was late September when Michael slipped away from his family’s house and ran to the woods. With cold hands in his hoodie pockets he jogged down the main road, under the watch of street lights who looked as though their thin metal poles were drooping under the weight of their orangey heads and the white-yellow fog they emitted. In minutes he reached a little turn-off with a little second-hand car in it and a little handmade sign advertising it for sale. The Three Acres wood was not accurately named, for over the years it had shrunk to accommodate more roads like this, and more cars, but it was deep enough to satisfy the strange urge that had overcome our young hero.

He had burst out of the silence of his bedroom all of a sudden, and never really had the time or interest afterwards to explain why. But at that moment he was sure that he wanted to go to the woods and be alone, and perhaps to die. He had no plans for this death, but he felt that he would have welcomed it, were it to take him, and he thought it might dwell some place dark and unfamiliar. This mood held until he was deep enough that the lamplight fully faded. There was moonlight in fits and spurts, when the pinkish, purplish clouds passing overhead were thin.

There came a point, sooner than Michael would have liked, when he found he had no direction. He was surrounded thoroughly by trees. His fingers and nose were still cold. He was growing tired. He did not know the woods’ layout but he suspected that if he went deeper he would only encounter paths, stiles, coke cans and faded crisp packets. One of the trees ahead was short and full-black. Guided by curiosity alone he strode toward it. In five paces he realised that it was not a tree and he stopped.

The vampire’s teeth were less like a serpent’s thin needle-fangs and more like sharpened tusks, like a saber-toothed tiger’s. Its mouth was wide and angular and its ears were slight and pressed-back. The skin was off in more small ways than it is worth getting into, but these accumulated into an altogether inhuman appearance. The creature, all in all, looked more like some prehistoric cousin of mankind than any vampire Michael might have imagined or seen in films or pictures, and yet without doubt he knew that a vampire is what it was. It is impossible to say what clothes the creature wore, except that they were black and still. It never spoke but it moved decisively and strangely. It met and held the young man’s eyes from somewhere in its own face, and the lips moved briefly over the teeth.

Michael became aware of the sound of a distant stream he had not noticed, and he thought it was pleasant. He mused that during the day, or alone, he would not have noticed this, or if he had he would not have enjoyed it. But it sounded lovely.

The vampire approached, now, and howled. By all reports the sound was not especially like any animal howl we know, but it was loud and shrill. Michael’s body froze. He heard his own fast breathing, too fast to let him speak, and he thought that perhaps he smelled blood.

The monster’s eyes were visible in the moment before poor Michael lost either his consciousness or his memory; it is hard to say which it was. They were brown, the eyes, like anybody’s. They were round and unremarkable, and blunk when they needed to and had lashes. Michael watched them screw up in a snarl, and he thought of the eyes of school bullies and angry parents and excited soldiers.

He thought of how angry his father would be at the next parent’s evening. He thought of the new end-of-year exam that had been established in place of the old ones, and how frightening and important the newsreader had made it sound. He wondered what he would do at the weekend and who with, and what everyone else would think of him for it. He panicked about other things that were more private and which he would not have liked to see repeated here, the thought of which made a spreading, watery heat rise up from his bottom lip to the bridge of his nose and all across his cheeks.

He felt ashamed that he couldn’t stop that heat, and he felt paralysing anger toward the vampire’s brown eyes. He wanted to shout and swear at them.

That howl again. Michael collapsed, hitting his head and landing heavily on one arm.

He awoke in a uniform-designed, antiseptic-smelling hospital; the same one where he had been born, so he was told, and where he had stayed when his ankle snapped in that rugby match the previous year. The same place where he had always been driven by some frightened or miserable adult, whenever some friend or relative had been taken ill, and usually recovered shortly after their arrival. A nurse had noticed him waking before he had seen her, and as she towered over his bed she smiled.

Rescue Mission

by Chris Buchanan
Flash fiction, 2012

—

Mark sits on the sofa in what looks like an uncomfortable position. He’s online. Playing a VRS. He smells terrible and his boxers and hockey jersey are not so clean.

‘Don’t worry, Bel’iia,’ he says to a character who only exists inside his head. ‘Stay down and take a medpac. I’ll protect you.’ From the look on his face I can tell something serious is going on here. I’ve never played the game, you understand, but he’s swallowing his fear, there. I know that. He’s not confident.

There’s a little fizzly sound from his headset. ‘Mthou, ththmt! Taeewlnnnou DO THIS!’

He waves his arm, miming a laser gun. The first time I saw him do this I laughed. This time I just lean my head and study him. His body is taught and held in place. It looks like it hurts. His chin juts out a touch, too, a little Neanderthal. He’s hiding something from Bel’iia. I think she’s some sort of wizard princess. From space.

‘Trust me,’ he says. ‘I love you.’

I say I love him too and shuffle up to him. He doesn’t notice, which is good. I don’t want to spoil his immersion. Very slowly, over the course of the ensuing gun-battle, I wrap my arm around his shoulder and edge him backwards, trying to tilt him. Suddenly I hear some sort of explosion and he jumps up off the sofa. Without thinking or breathing I throw my left arm behind me, lean out and yank the cushion I was using. It flies out in the wrong direction but I grab it with my other hand and slam it in place behind Mark’s arched, sore back.

He lands on the edge of the seat, teeters dramatically and finally collapses backwards. There’s a familiar sigh and he looks very proud.

The F-Zero annotated roster

Lately, I’ve been playing a lot of F Zero X for Nintendo 64. It’s a grand old racing game, with a massive cast of thirty weird-looking comic-book-style characters. In most cases I don’t know their real names, and I don’t have an instruction booklet.
All I do know is – a lot of them look silly. And when I’m trying to race I find it impossible not to glance at the little portraits in the top 5 and come up with nicknames for them. Many of the names I came up with are lazy, and some of them are childish, and all of them are stupid. Nonetheless, I will now ask you to read them.

1 ) Dr Zoidberg
Dr Zoidberg, formally a local MD based in interplanetary deliveries, has fallen on hard times recently. Also something is stuck up his nose, I don’t know.


2) Those Guys From The Star Wars Cantina Scene
One of them doesn’t like you, and the other one doesn’t like you either. They’re wanted men! They have the death sentence on twelve systems! And so on.

3) Angry Father Christmas
This year nobody left him a glass of sherry on the mantelpiece. A life long alcoholic, Santa is now forced to go cold turkey, and he takes out his frustrations on his fellow F Zero racers.

4) Captain Falcon
A former crowd favourite, the Captain is doing poorly of late. His driving is fine, but every single race, without fail, one of the other racers will knock him off the side of the track, crying “Falcon punch!” and laughing as they speed away. Every single time.


5) Captain Palette-Swap
Push the button, Max!

6) Temuera Morrison
After so many years stuck in the role, New Zealand-born actor Temuera is now convinced he IS Jango Fett. With this in mind, he races around F Zero in a replica Slave 1. Nobody minds him.
7) Jodie Summer
My favourite character. I have nothing mean to say about her.

8) The Most Boring Character
I dunno. He smiles, he wears a red helmet. Be honest – you haven’t got anything either.

9) The Cruel Wizard Wrath-Amon
That’s more like it. Wrath-Amon is the leader of the Evil Serpent Men, who are from another dimension and will reveal their true form if you attack them with Star Metal.

10) Mister Hyde
Mister Hyde likes to tell people that he is the famous literary character of the same name and alter-ego to Doctor Jekyll. In fact he’s just a very ugly man with the surname Hyde.

11) Badly-Disguised Cylon
This unfortunate double agent still thinks nobody has noticed his infiltration into the F Zero ranks.

12) E Honda
Us Japanese fighters gotta stick together. CUZ WE’RE BROTHERS! HA HA HA HA!

13) Utahraptor
Most famous for his appearances in Dinosaur Comics – Utahraptor is seen here in panel 5.

14) I Have No Idea
I originally had a dirty joke here, but I decided it was too crude. Make up your own story for this fella.

15) The Cat
Lookin’ goooood!

16) Female, Black Character
That ought to mollify that demographic. Next!

17) The Noid
Avoid him. Or better yet, knock his car over the edge of the track.

18) Super Arrow
After Jodie Summer (#7), easily my favourite character. I just love the completely serious expression on his face despite the hat, and the even more serious expression on the bird. God, I wish the bird was also wearing a hat like Super Arrow’s, except maybe with a letter B on it. In the game, his suit is bright red, which makes him even funnier looking.
I love him.

19) Doctor Smugman
The good doctor is a leading light in the field of centre-partings and races just to show off.

20) Foetoid
Remember Foetoid? From the game Forsaken?
Sure you do. Foetoid, ladies and gentlemen. I call him that because he looks a bit like Foetoid. Comedy!

21) Mister Creosote
Hercule Poirot, the great Belgian detective, stretches all his little grey cells as part of his continuing investigation at the F Zero tracks. Finally after sifting all the evidence, he gathers all the other racers together in the drawing room to… oh shit, it’s Mister Creosote.

22) The Troll
The Troll lives underneath the Rainbow Road track and, when not racing, demands tolls from other racers trying to practice. He is sick of people calling him ‘Krang’ and he does not know what they are giggling about.

23) Mrs Arrow
This attractive young lady has the extraordinary misfortune of being married to Super Arrow (#18). She is never seen without her signature sunglasses, onto the backs of which she has glued a photograph of a less ridiculous-looking man.

24) Fake Cosplay Fox McCloud
FCFMcC likes to pretend he is Fox McCloud from the Starfox games. To this end he has modelled his car to look like an Arwing and dresses like his hero at all times. He has never won.

25) Lobotomised Starwolf
Can’t let you DO that, Fake Cosplay Fox McCloud!

26) The Cryptkeeper
Hello boys and ghouls! Tonight’s terrifying tale concerns F Zero racing! He he he he he! I call this nauseating number… Driven… to DEATH!!
In recent years the Cryptkeeper has lost his hair.

27) Handsome Jack AKA Not Tom Paris
This handsome young chap spends so much time preening himself in the rear-view mirror that he has yet to actually start an F Zero race. He seems happy enough.

28) Michael Chain
Michael Chain is only a part time racer. During the week he teaches Art History at Stanford University, and campaigns tirelessly against racial stereotyping. Also – Michael’s car looks like a big orange toast rack.

29) Absolutely Not Captain Picard
Nobody knows what this gentleman’s real name is because everyone is so used to calling him ‘Captain Picard’. He hates it, and even got a tattoo on his head, just to make him look less like the famous TV character. The irony is that if he didn’t get so annoyed every time, they’d stop calling him that. After hours, he likes to hang around with Handsome Jack (#27) so they can discuss how they are totally NOT Captain Picard and Tom Paris, respectively.


30) Doc Brown
F Zero tracks? Where we’re going we don’t need… F Zero tracks…

26 Deadliest Creatures – a guide for travellers

Below are the deadliest living animals on the Earth, arranged in alphabetical order for obvious reasons.

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Anteaters who mistake you for an ant.

Basking sharks on a bad day.

Cats.

Dolphins on a very bad day.

Earwigs, which actually do go into your ears, and then emerge from the other ear wearing parts of your brain as if they were a wig.

Fruit bats if you have eaten their fruit in front of them.

Ghost knifefish. They are actually ghosts with knives and not fish.

Herring, if associated with ghost knifefish.

Iguana. Their eyes are actually cameras, and the rest will self-destruct if tampered with.

Jackrabbits with guns.

Koala ‘bears’. Powerful friends.

Lemmings. Despite popular misconceptions, their real skill is in making it look like mass suicide.

Moth larvae if your body is made of cloth.

Naked mole rats who insist on naked fencing competitions.

Osprey. Described by their Wikipedia entry as ‘A large raptor’.

Parasite-hosting animals of any description. If they have that little respect for their own bodies, you can assume that they have none for yours.

Queen bees, which are occasionally brought out for particularly hated targets, and which only die if they sting you less than a hundred times in the eyes.

Robins. The red breasts are actually an affectation whose size reflects the amount of needless human blood spilled.

Sea lions. They are named that for a reason, and that reason is because they said so.

Tadpoles who become separated from the pack and lose their balance.

Unagi if they are allowed to live long enough to develop wings.

Vultures. Have you ever questioned how you always see vultures perched over large dead animals, and yet you never see the killer? Don’t.

Water buffalo outside of water.

Xenomorphs.

Yorkshire terriers, or rather one in particular. Just hope the one you see isn’t that one.

Zookeepers, driven mad by what they know about the horrors of the animal kingdom and the deep-rooted, primal savagery and evil which forms the heart of life as a concept and as the only truth in the Universe.

Or perhaps the deadliest animal of all is really MAN?
No. Unless that man is breeding ghost knifefish.