Stories
Read stories by our community. Use the verse to share, heal and connect — or add your own voice below.
Submit your OwnYou can’t always get what you want
Whizzz, Bang, “blimey that one was close “ I stammered. “Na,” said eddie, “ the buggers’ are just trying to keep us awake”. “Whaddyamean Ed”. “It’s their way of stopping us getting any kip, they just lob a shell over to keep us awake, you can set your watch by ’em”. I...
Woolies for Jim
Under the grey shadows of a long, narrow room lay twelve little mattresses. Upon these rested twelve little forms, some curled up into foetal positions, some with an arm and a leg outstretched as if running a silent marathon, some on their backs with their mouths...
Home of the brave
The man who is going to kill me looks sad, sick and afraid. He stands a little off balance, leaning into the deed, right foot defaulting to a twitchy toe movement. He is afraid in a way we have no similes for. They always involve pi*****, sh******, soiling yourself in...
A never ending story
The boys sat cross legged in the shade. The older one wore a holed shirt, once white, now grey with the dust of rubble from the shattered house. His brother wore a man’s shirt he had found over his tee shirt. They had managed to gather some other loot from the ruin in...
Memories may fade but are always there, so lets prevent it – World War Three!
3,592 words He studied the stranger’s face in the mirror. Regardless of how many times he told himself otherwise he knew it was his own. Each individual engraved line crinkling across his face like an estuary told a story; they were a memory. He sat on the worn out...
War Land
For a million men may fall, And the world can remain, But the smallest of wars, The whole world can change. Sayid clambered nervously over the trench wall. He had been trained and tutored in the art of war, taught the principles of survival, but it wasn’t hypothetical...
To the beach once more
Jack sat up in bed his unseeing eyes staring ahead, his dream-strangled cry fading to nothing. When he reached for the warm comfort of his sleeping wife, as he’d done for fifty-odd years after one of his nightmares, there was only the cold white sheet. You’re a crazy...
Dead Man
Yvette walked around the war memorial pausing to read the names on each panel. Some were familiar but the name she sought was not among them. What had become of Papa? Had he been shot for mutiny? Or cowardice? Or desertion? She sank down on the seat that encircled the...
The bloody bike
Thirty feet of blood soaked tarmac separated the head from the body. I didn’t hear the explosion that threw me and the head across the road, you never do. Just the shockwave, that tosses you like a discarded wrapper, and slams you into the ground. Belfast was tumbling...
The last outlaw
He leaned on the broken down perimeter fence, and gazed across the deserted airfield. In the distance to the south west he could make out the old group H.Q. buildings, now occupied by a construction company. To his right toward the north stood what was left of the...