Category: Uncategorized

• Tower

  

  May 2014, Liverpool

  Jack ashed his spliff into the half empty Stella can, his eyes fixed on the burning air traffic control tower in his monitor. Russian-backed separatists had begun their assault on Donetsk Airport. Inside the terminal building, a few dozen Ukrainian soldiers began what was to be a desperate and legendary 252-day defence. Jack was thinking of the future. A thought bubbled to the surface; an inkling that his fate was somehow linked with this country, which had risen from the ashes of the Soviet Union into a nation where young people had confronted the geopolitical might of the largest country on Earth, and won. Jack had watched them fight and die on the streets of Kyiv for a brighter future, turning away from their historical oppressor and towards hope in a time where hope seemed to be a diminishing commodity. He was now watching, live and in full HD, the events that would define a century of humanity – if humanity could last that long. Mi-8 helicopters buzzed the tower, rockets screaming towards their targets. Jack’s screen flickered. The feed was cut. 

  May 2014, Donetsk

  Lena stood at her window, drizzle falling softly outside. She should have been thinking about her prom dress, which she still hadn’t chosen despite her graduation being only a few days away. For now though, her eyes were fixed on a burning air traffic control tower. The planes had been coming and going for so much of her life that she stopped hearing them, now their absence was deafening. It had been a month since the strangers had arrived in her city. The language on the TV had changed, the news reporters had begun saying things like “Ukrainian Nazis” and “the Kyiv Regime’s desire to keep us in cages”. She didn’t know what it meant yet, she was a sixteen-year-old girl who wanted to graduate high school. She had no interest in politics, but politics was fast becoming interested in her. For a second, a presence invaded her mind. Something from far away, an awareness of something looking at the same thing she was…in an instant the Mi-8 smashed through every single one of her senses simultaneously. The rotors roared, the hulking mass of metal lunged over the tower block and into her field of view, the acrid taste and smell of fuel as the rockets screamed towards their target. Two seconds after the orange bloom burst silently from the tower, the glass in the windows shook, as the thunder of the blast reached her. Lena stayed where she was, unafraid. She did not yet know what bombs could do.

  12th Sep 2023

  blog, diary, fiction, fragment, journal, love, melancholia, newwriter, poet, poetry, romance, story, travel, ukraine, war, writer, writing

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• Her

  

  “I’m here.”

  Jack wasn’t sure what to expect. For 6 months she’d lived on his screen and now he’d smashed through it and brought it into reality. This could be a pot of gold, it could be Pandora’s Box. Whatever happened, he knew that when she opened that door onto the baking Valencia street his life would never be the same again. A nagging fear of rejection dormant for so many years burned at the front of his mind. She’d seen his message but not replied. Sweat began to bead on his back – it was 10am and already 35°C. He hadn’t slept in almost 26 hours, and the rush of traffic mirrored the churning in his stomach. Reality and dreams were crashing into each other. There was an acrid smell being vented from the restaurant the cab had dropped him off at, the straps of the rucksack were digging into his shoulders. Maybe somehow she wasn’t real, maybe she was some kind of AI experiment, maybe she was a figment of his imagination, a brain tumour hallucination that-

  The door swung open, and there she stood. Time seemed to move in a different way around her. Pedestrians swept by like racing thoughts, blurring around the edges of an island of shimmering calm around her. 

  “Hey.”

  Her eyes shone despite them being the darkest he’d ever seen. There was a fire to them, something that screamed life out into the world and didn’t care what the response was. He moved towards her, and gently took her face into his hand. Her lips moved to his palm, across his fingers. He leaned his head towards her and her lips brushed his cheeks, his eyes. Instead of thoughts, instead of feelings, a single word came to Jack’s mind.

  Home.

  15th Aug 2023

  author, dailyprompt, fiction, fragment, heart, journey, melancholia, new, newwriter, notes, novel, online writing, original, people, poetry, real, romance, snapshot, travel, writer, writing

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• Taxi

  

  Jack wanted to tell the driver the whole story, to turn the cab into a mobile confession booth. “Forgive me driver, for I have sinned…”

  He wanted to tell someone, anyone. Tell them about the events of the past six months, the shattered hearts and the sadness that flowed like a torrent when he told her 

  “I’m sorry, but I can’t do this anymore.”

  He wanted to tell about the girl he had fallen in love with, the girl whose address he was now telling the driver to take him to. How he had met her, first as his Ukrainian tutor and now…

  He wanted to talk about the geo-political events that had to happen to bring them together. Her country invaded twice. The murder machine of the West spinning into full gear to provide an avalanche of weapons to fight the occupation. The bravery of the кіборги in Donetsk Airport, which she watched from her window and he from his laptop all those years ago. The men who had to die, just to bring her to him.

  “Wanna hear a mad story?”

  “Lo siento, chico, no hablas Ingles.”

  14th Aug 2023

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• Departure

  

  Jack didn’t know who was in charge of the music for the grim cafe he found himself in at 3am in Bristol Airport, but whoever it was must have learnt the art of playlist-creation from the guys who run Guantanamo Bay. Weird, no-label blues/jazz fusion from an album presumably named “elevator classics”. It’s as if they locked an AI in a room and fed it nothing but pre-jazz compilation albums and forgot about it for a few million years until, crazed, unblinking, snapping its fingers, it emerged to deliver its masterpiece solely to him; picking the remnants of his bacon (burnt) sandwich out of his teeth in sleep-deprived 4am departure-lounge drudgery. He’d yet to reach the coffee part of his cappuccino, Christ knows what a double espresso looks like here. He doubted it had the legs to climb out of the cup. Announcements blared out every now and again about security so he moved to the “quiet zone”. Actually it was more like the fucking twilight zone. Not a single soul there, and every time he nodded off the lights dimmed, and then blared back on again like he’d just jumped the fence at Colditz. 

  Airports are strange places. It’s impossible not to feel tired in one, even though time ceases to exist, relatively speaking. Double whiskey at 7am? Sure. Buy yourself a pair of sunglasses and a massive toblerone while you’re at it. It’s not any cheaper, it’s just bigger. Occasionally on farms they allow the cattle to wander around a field for a few days before they’re chucked back into their sheds. Apparently it boosts milk production. It’s not a perfect analogy however, for the cows know they’re in sheds. The most astounding thing about this 21st century neon plastic wonderland is that it’s not really anything truly new – the only difference between this and feudalism is that in the 15th century the peasants knew they were peasants. Today, the sleight of hand is so subtle that every year the free people of the world jet off to their fields, wander about for a bit, then go back to the sheds to create milk for the unquenchable thirst of the shadowy figures who govern their captivity; all without ever knowing they are prisoners. But if they did, what would they do? The crowds wandered around the departure lounge, gazing into the empty windows of shops due to open. What would happen if they knew about the whole thing? If, suddenly, they all saw the bars of their gilded cage surrounding them, would they believe it? The question that hit Jack however was, as the throngs of people drifted through the duty-free like bloated locusts, full of food that will kill them, on their way to destinations where everything is a buffet, to take photos they’ll never look at again – are they lonely? Do they feel it too?

  14th Aug 2023

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