Talala looked down on the city square of Tantovar and smiled. Around her, people danced in a throng that filled the square. The rhythmic beat of hand drums and skirl of pipes filled the air with joyous sounds. “If only I could dance with them,” thought the goddess. But her body of carved stone was affixed to the temple dais. For deities could not enter the world of their own accord. They could only view it through the sta...

“Ah, yes,” she says, taping the old photograph, “that’s my father’s shop. The awning was green and, look, you can see Bevan’s Greengrocery painted on the window. Those boxes outside were heavy but I used to stack them and arrange the display.” “When you were a child?” “I wasn’t afraid of hard work,” she says proudly.  “And do you remember the shops either side?” “I remember the whole street. Mr Davison the fishmonger was...

Hartland Quay, North Devon. A place of absolute beauty. On a sunny summers day, with the tide gently splashing over the rocks, it is hard to imagine anything but a tranquil, restful scene. At low tide, however, there is much evidence of the destruction that can be wreaked by the ever-powerful ocean. It was on one such day that I found myself driving through the narrow streets of Hartland village. I hadn't been here for ma...

Lydia placed a meagre collection of coins into the taxi driver’s outstretched hand. “I’m a bit short,” she said. “I’m terribly sorry.” He sighed but closed his hand around the money without counting it. “Thank you,” she said quietly and fumbled with the door handle, eager to escape before he changed his mind. Outside was freezing. The weather had taken a turn for the worse, a bitter wind whistling while icy rain lashed do...

Breezes usher in on an orchestrated serenade of autumn. It enters cool and sedated, as subtle as the high notes of a summer song. Where once the raucous of beach-laughter and jubilant screams blended with crashing surf, they now trail off, dissipating into the scent of cozy fireplace bellows. I sit, chin on knees, and watch as the leaves’ brilliant folly comes alive. Colors held and hidden away from the heat, spring forth...

At Bronwig’s bookshop there's a notice on the door, in red capitals: IN LIQUIDATION. It’s devastating. I’d been a customer since I was too small to see more than the top of Mr Bronwig’s head behind the counter. His hair was white, even then; delicate as cotton candy. I didn’t come to Bronwig’s for the books at first. I came for the turtles. When you bought a book, Mr Bronwig would delicately fold a paper model to serve as...

White House Security Agent Mike Marsden stood respectfully next to the First Lady. She sat in a white chair underneath the table umbrella. “You must think him silly, Mike, for having an above-ground pool at the White House. He must appear quite common to you.” “It’s not my place to comment on the President’s choices, Ma’am, but the President is not a common man by any measure.” As the cabana door burst open, Mike’s hand w...

---“It’s not him, is it, Jack? It’s just not him.” My mother’s despairing words were a mournful poem that reverberated inside my head whenever I visited the hospital. She was so right. The wizened shell inhabited by something totally alien was a parody of the father I had known. Those chafing images implanted in my head threatened to bury the good that had gone before. Sitting there, in that clinical cleanliness, the odou...

As his band stepped onto the stage, Tyrone stole a moment to sip his dirty martini. He ran his tongue along his upper lip as he admired the glass, savoring the lingering taste of the alcohol. With a contented sigh, he got up and walked onto the stage. During his break, the din of the bar had swelled to a jumbled murmur. The restless audience had taken to chattering over clinking glasses filled with liquor to lighten moods...

Remember when we headlined at Alleycats, 420 East Street? Remember the heat, the buzz, the whole place packed to the rafters and reeking of liquor and cigarette smoke? Do you recall the spotlights cutting through the haze and the bone-shaking throb of the bass? Good times. The best. Our one chance to shine. Living on potato chips, cocktails, and laughter, we warbled passion to a lazy blues beat and the soulful crooning of...

  I sit on the beach, absently raking fingertips through the warm sand while listening to the cheerful clamour all around. My fellow holidaymakers laugh, squeal, shout to one another, their shrill cries mingling with the raucous shrieks of the gulls wheeling and swooping overhead. My gaze fixes on the waves lapping the shoreline. Each gentle splash and foaming spray is followed by the lulling jingle of shells and stones r...

This poem only available on Stories Space. If you are reading it elsewhere, it has been stolen.Face in the shadowsWhere eyes burn black candlesAnd wax in the waterHas armoured the lips,A soul freezes hellWith the loneliness cruel,And the silence is lostWhere the knife of noise slips.The buzz and the humOf the jostling friendsWho are not friends in truth,Nor are saviours of peace,Are a salve to the guiltyWho hide all their...

December 22, 2015 Ricky breathes deeply as he walks through the park. The air, sweetened by the scent of pine and cooled by the fallen snow, refreshes his lungs and spirit. It’s barely evening, yet it’s already dark out, the sun having slipped below the horizon. The snow on the ground is new and untrodden. It casts a luminous blanket all around, as if flying above the clouds at night. He and Crystal are all alone in the p...

 Connor Mulrooney sauntered into the members-only back room of the North Philly Irish Pub with his usual swagger, grabbed a Guinness and settled into a seat that may as well have held a Reserved sign. His chair, the one he always occupied during their weekly gatherings, notably sat right next to Billy’s — not that Connor or anyone else expected the boss to show up. He rarely did anymore, not since "The O’Sullivans," the t...

“Are you afraid of the dawn?” she asks, watching him with a half-smile on her face as he scrambles around the room, frantically pulling down the curtains. The new darkness bathes them both in soft candlelight. It smoothes out her angular lines and eases the sharpness of his jaw. But even gentle light cannot take the edge off a soul, and he grinds his teeth, while her nails tap out a nervous rhythm on her wine glass. “I’m...