Winning First Chapter 2023

1st Place:
Paradise Empire
by Athena Abrams

2034

Jayne Darling

 

This is not the yellow-sand, umbrellas, bikinis, and beer guts kind of Florida beach: this is a humid beach on a cloudy and therefore moonless night. An empty beach where tufts of dune grass roll down to meet the sea in their own undulating wave. Some light lingers though: the water itself glows faintly, a weak bioluminescence catching in the folds of the inlet’s waves, sparking and dying, an ectoplasmic bloom.

        I’m not watching the waves. I’m peering into the darkness where I know the parking lot to be, straining my ears for the sound of a car above the restless tossing of the psychedelic sea. I perch in the warm sand, arms about my knees, breathing in air laced with the seaweed tang of watery distance. Despite everything I know about the state of the world’s oceans, there’s something I love in that smell, something enticing that will remain forever wild and beyond the grasping hands of the human race on its sagging, bejeweled coastline.

        Tires crunch and hiss on the sandy asphalt; headlights sweep through the grasses. A car door opens, there are whispered goodbyes. It’s a matter of trust, these handoffs—my trust that one woman will arrive, alone, the woman’s trust that I will be the only one here waiting. Ninety-nine times I’ve done this. The door closes; the headlights reverse their sweep. The girl in the parking lot, a mere shape on this dark night, is undoubtedly more nervous than I. But routine as these drops have become, there’s always the chance that instead of a woman or girl shivering in the warm Florida air, police will arrive, or Whiteshirts with dogs and guns. I wait, listening to the rush and tumble of the sea, letting my eyes focus on the parking lot. It’s a girl. Alone.

        “Hello?” a voice calls, tentative. “I’m looking for my guide to watch the turtle hatching?” The girl clears her throat.

Ruby wishes I wouldn’t do this by myself, but it’s better this way. Easier to hide, easier to escape. Less frightening for the Turtle I’m collecting.

The girl takes a step back as I materialize from the dunes. “I’m Jayne,” I say, injecting my voice with comfort. “I’m glad you could make it.” She sags with relief as she recognizes that I am also just a woman, singular, on my own: tall with wavy dark hair and hazel eyes, tan skin. Though of course the girl, identified by my employer as Z, won’t be able to see details; to her, I must simply be a shape, a token—of safety, hopefully. I hold out a hand, and the girl takes it.

I lead Z back to the dunes, past the gently glowing inlet waves. If she notices the unusual water, she doesn’t comment, and I am quiet. After a little way, I aim us through the grasses to my own car, where I crank up the AC to drive off the nighttime humidity. Up the beach, the lights of Daytona gleam like a tumble of fireflies.        

“What’s Z short for?” I ask when we reach A1A.

        “Zinnia.”

        “Like the flower?”

        “Yeah, like the flower.”

        “You make it sound like that’s a bad thing.”

        “It’s, like, a flower. Not that original.”

        “Try being named Jayne. My parents spent all their creativity on my big sister, Ruby.”

        Zinnia shrugs rather than smiles, holds her hands to the AC vents. I imagine she is sweating with more than the heat of the summer night. “You can turn it up if you like,” I offer.

        Zinnia shrugs again, and I settle into silence. Sometimes the girls and women in my car need questions, sometimes they need stories, sometimes they just need silence.

        “Can I put the radio on?” Zinnia asks after a bit.

        “Of course.”

        Zinnia flips through radio stations, pauses on country, settles back in her seat. Not my favorite genre, but refreshing after the news I was listening to on the way: coverage of a clash between climate activists and Whiteshirts. While two of the former are dead, four of the latter are out on bail and, if recent precedent means anything, headed for an easy acquittal.

        Hours pass as we leave A1A, join the freeway, mark more miles on the 95. I wish I could stop glancing in the rearview mirror every second. This run is going to be just like every other run. I’m not going to jinx myself with useless superstition. 

As the parade of lawyers’ billboards, Waffle Houses, and neon gas prices flicks by, Zinnia falls asleep and a peculiar feeling descends on me. It’s a feeling I’ve had before, driving alone through the night: a feeling that everything is intensely beautiful, yet intensely delicate. Here we are, these ape descendants who are so complex we’ve fashioned string instruments on which to play symphonies, and there is country music that travels invisibly to my radio, and there are cement roads and air-conditioned cars and fast food. And it all feels so fragile, this moment we call civilization. Especially here, in Florida. It’s like we are existing in a flicker between swamp and ocean. It’s not going to last, not at all, not with the way the seas are rising and the Amazon is burning and the permafrost is melting. Florida is a pipe dream.

The expansive, almost transcendent feeling fades, and the worries creep back in.

        Sometime later, Zinnia stirs as I pull into a Flying J, one I haven’t stopped at for a few months.

I settle a baseball cap on my head. “Need to pee?”

Zinnia nods.

“Hungry?”

Zinnia shrugs.

In the aggressively lit parking lot of the Flying J, I can see the girl better. White. Blonde and brown-eyed, freckled. Sullen, or perhaps that expression is fright. She must be sixteen at least, but she’s scrawny and looks younger. I hand the girl a second baseball cap and a twenty from my wallet. “Grab a snack if you like.”

I watch her make her way inside. For a moment, I cross my arms over the steering wheel, lean my forehead on them, let out a long breath. North Carolina is still a state away, and I’ve already done this drive once this week. It’s nearly dawn and I’m tired too.

 

Back in the car, Zinnia peels the lid off a Styrofoam cup, releasing the spicy, homey scent of boiled peanuts. I fish for a travel mug and dump the last remnants of old coffee from it, prop it in the cup holder. “For the shells.”

Zinnia nods as I point us back to the freeway. Fortified by our stop, I am more alert and hopeful than I was twenty minutes ago. Regardless of all else that may be transpiring in my life—from my precarious relationship to the illegal contents of my purse—at least I am able to help this girl, here and now, and I don’t regret signing up for that in the slightest.

“Want one?” Zinnia asks.

“Open it for me?”

As Zinnia cracks the shell and extracts the warm, soft peanuts for me, placing each one in my palm, I sense something shift in her. “Have you done this a lot?” she asks.

“A few times.”

“Is it actually safe?”

“It’s safe. I’ll get you there. It’s going to be just fine.” So far, ninety-nine times, this has been entirely true.

“My parents think I’m in Tampa with my friend Jess’s family for a few days. Her parents are cool. They helped me. They knew about the Turtle Track. They’re even lying to my dad about this.” There’s awe in her voice, mixed with something else: jealousy—jealousy of a girl with parents who would send their daughter’s friend on the Track north. There’s a pause before she continues. “Jess and I took pictures last weekend and everything, so I can pretend to my parents that we’re just at the beach.”

“So, I guess your parents don’t know?”

“No way! We were being really careful—we didn’t mean to get pregnant. It was a total accident.”

It always is, girl. “Of course. Don’t worry. There’s no judgment at all in this car. This is a 100 percent judgment-free zone.”

“I wish my parents were more like you. Or like Jess’s parents. They’re teachers.”

Great, I look old enough to be her mother. Yikes, maybe I am old enough to be her mother. “They sound nice. I’m glad you had someone to help you. What do your parents do?”

“Well, a few things, but mainly my dad’s a politician. He’s in the state senate.”

There it is. I make a reflexive noise a bit too much like anger or disgust. This girl’s asshat of a father is one of my boyfriend’s colleagues. I’ve never actually spent time with Sebastian in Tallahassee, but the fact that so much of his life involves interfacing with people like Zinnia’s father is rather stomach-turning. “I’m sorry. I mean, I’m sorry your parents wouldn’t understand.”

I glance at the girl. That wasn’t what I expected. Hardworking, pious, poor—those were the words I would have used for my image of Zinnia’s family. Poor is usually what best describes the girls and women I help: women with money can find their own ways across state lines. But over the last two years, I’ve driven women who cross all points of the race, age, sexuality, and socioeconomic spectrums. Oddly, I tend to find the older women to be the most affecting, women into their fifties even who probably didn’t think they could become pregnant. The fact that the government would criminalize these women for daring to want intimacy when they are beyond wanting babies—these adults who have lived full lives and have already been mothers and are now being treated like naughty children who don’t deserve agency over their own bodies and health—feels beyond the bounds of sanity, let alone decency.

Yet every day brings more stories of women handed prison sentences for trying to leave states with the strictest abortion laws, even longer sentences for women who are caught performing successful home abortions. Of women dying from remediable pregnancy complications because doctors’ hands are tied. The Turtle Track, built on not just years but decades of work by activists bringing reproductive healthcare to underserved communities, is just one of the ways that women around the nation have risen to the challenge of ever more restrictions, but driving women across state lines brings more risks than helping women access pills. I’d be looking at a felony sentence and a five-year minimum if this trip turned sour, ruining a good chunk of my life and probably Sebastian’s electability in one night. And that’s not even counting the less defined dangers… There was the story of a woman working for a similar organization who was pulled from a Texas lake last month, nothing definitively linked to Whiteshirts, but…

“My father would think I’m some sort of whore, or like a Judas.” Zinnia’s wondering voice pulls me back from my thoughts, and I stifle a laugh, glad of the distraction.

“Jezebel,” I supply, but Zinnia carries on, now that the ice is broken.

“My cousin Ella had a baby last year, she’s eighteen and the birth was real hard for her, and my dad actually said that it would be better if she’d died, because now she’s an unwed mother and she’s not allowed in our church. And he said if anything like that ever happened to me or Riley, he’d…” Her voice fades. “But he wouldn’t, would he? He is our dad… I mean, sometimes… But he is our dad,” she repeats, unwilling to voice the reality of her father’s violent tendencies. “But anyway, I want to finish high school and go to college and nursing school.”

“It’s going to be okay. Your dad won’t find out,” I soothe Zinnia.

“He says the Lord always knows though. He says that all the time to my sister, Riley, since she started dating Chase, ‘the Lord always knows,’ and he tells her that even if nothing bad happened and that even if she lied to him, God would know. My dad doesn’t even know I’m dating Jayden, let alone… you know.”

“Well, do you believe in God?”

Zinnia hesitates. “Nah, I mean, it doesn’t really make sense, does it? Like some judge-y old dude in the sky? I think things would be different if there really were a God. Like really different. Like, I think a God would have made things more fair and made it so men could get pregnant too.” She laughs. “Do you believe in God?”

“If there were a God, he would have done something about Florida a long time ago,” I say.

***

2nd place:
Vampire Metropolis
by Robin Brown

 

 

‘Happy trails!’ The crewmember laughs at me, shouting loudly so I can hear him over the screaming wind and the roaring plane engines. Then he kicks me out the plane.

        I’m not surprised by this – actually I’ve been expecting it for quite some time – and yet the force of the wind still catches me off guard. The rushing air surrounds me and tosses me like I’m a ragdoll in a hurricane. It doesn’t help either that my arms are so tightly bound, but at least my legs are free to flail about uselessly.

        The plane was flying at six and a half thousand feet, so I’m now falling through black storm clouds on my way down. I can’t hear the plane anymore because I’m being deafened by my own descent.

        So, this is what it feels like to fall from the sky. I must admit, I had always wondered.

        I drop out of the storm clouds and see the metropolis below me. It is everything I imagined it would be. Dark windows, tall skyscrapers, the occasional fire dotted about the place, and most terrifying of all, the whole place is alive with activity. It’s like an ant’s nest down there (if ants needed high streets and big, pointy buildings… and a giant wall surrounding it all and keeping everything from leaving).

        All this I catch in the sporadic few moments where my eyes are pointing to the ground. I am, unfortunately, still being spun around by a vicious wind and, yes, I am still falling at what must surely now be terminal velocity. Those small buildings are getting bigger, and those narrow streets are looking thicker. It won’t be long before I say hello to Mr. Ground.

        But before that can happen, I’m lucky enough to bounce off the side of one of those tall skyscrapers I noticed earlier. And by bounce, what I really mean is I slam into it, shatter the windows around me, pulverise just about every bone in my body, crack my head on something hard, and then rebound from the sheer force of how hard I hit it in the first place, to then continue on my way down, down, down to the ground.

        When I land, I land hard.

        Every bone in my body now resembles fine sand, each of my limbs now has several new joints and, despite the fact I am definitely not moving, my head still feels like it’s spinning in a hurricane.

        I’ve landed on hard, flat concrete. This was always likely to be the case, but I can’t help thinking how nice it would have been to land in a green park area or into a nice, cool pond of water. The ideal scenario would have been falling through a roof and landing in a nice stranger’s living room. Of course, even if I had gotten that lucky, I would still be very much broken, but at least I would have been broken somewhere warm.

        I’m not sure how long I lie here for. As it turns out, it is quite difficult to contemplate the passage of time when my brain is in the process of knitting itself back together. It was dark when I arrived, that much I know for sure, and for a while it wasn’t dark at all, but when someone takes hold of my foot and starts dragging me away it is dark once again.

        I probably should be worried, but half my body is still mush whilst the other half of me has done just enough mending, fixing and knitting back together to realise just how much pain I should be in right now. It is a lot, unfortunately. But I won’t die, because I can’t die. You can’t kill that which is already dead.

 

We vampires don’t like light. It’s got nothing to do with sunlight being pure and burning away sin or anything like that. We just don’t like it. It’s kind of like how humans don’t like the darkness. Humans don’t like the dark because they can’t see what might be hiding in the shadows. For us, we don’t like the light because we’re the ones hiding in the shadows.

        After all, we are the scary thing that is hiding in those shadows. With emphasis on the hiding bit though, because the darkness is our safe space.  We’ve learnt that when humans can’t see you, they won’t bother you.

        And I suppose there is also the underlying feeling that the darkness makes us feel better about who we are, because deep down we don’t like ourselves, but that’s some therapist-mumbo-jumbo and a rabbit-hole without end.

        Regardless of whether the light is too bright, or the dark is too dark, or the contempt for one’s own existence runs too deep, it really doesn’t matter because it all adds up to the same thing anyway. Vampires don’t like the light. So, when some inconsiderate arsehole decides to shine a light right in my face, I tell him where he can go stick it.

        ‘That’s not very nice,’ A gruff and deep voice replies. ‘Specially as we’re the ones who saved you.’

        ‘Should be more grateful, eh?’ Someone else says, someone who stands further back and is therefore completely hidden in the darkness. Their voice is tinny and cracked.

        Wherever we are, we’re inside. I can tell from the way their voices bounce off the walls and the ceiling. It’s the way the stuffy air presses down on me though, that tells me we’re probably underground. Somebody’s basement, maybe? I don’t know. I’m barely conscious and it’s all I can do to keep myself sitting up on the chair they dropped me on.

        I can’t see anything beyond the bright lamp being shone in my face, but even so I can sense the one with the gruff, deep voice is the one holding the light in front of me. Whoever he is – whatever he is – he’s big. Very big.

        ‘You’re patching yourself up alright,’ He comments, and I get the unsettling feeling that he’s looking really hard at me, using the bright light to focus on all the damage I’ve sustained. ‘Definitely one of the lucky ones.’

        I know I shouldn’t say what I’m about to say. In fact, there are two very good reasons why I should definitely not say what I am definitely about to say. The first reason is Scenario One, in which these two people, whoever or whatever they are, have taken me in from the cold, they don’t intend any harm upon me and they are, in fact, helping me. If this is the case, I should be grateful to them. The second reason, as in Scenario Two, concerns the opposite being true. I’m completely at their mercy right now, so maybe saying what I am about to say will only turn an already bad situation into a far worse situation.

        So, I know I definitely shouldn’t say what I am about to say. But I say it anyway because I’m an idiot, and because I’ve got a chip on my shoulder, and because I’m scared of being vulnerable, and because I’m angry at the idea of being indebted to someone, but mostly it’s the idiot thing.

        ‘Drink your own piss and die, lughead.’

        For a second, nothing happens, and I actually feel pretty good about myself. I know I shouldn’t feel good about saying what I said, but in my weakened state I can’t deny how pleasurable it is to make something else feel small and bad.

        In the next second though, a fist the size of my head slams into my temple. The force sends me flying off the chair, which clatters noisily to the ground, and I’m left in complete darkness.

 

Vampires don’t have the luxury of losing consciousness and we also can’t fall asleep. There are upsides to this, like no bedtime, no missing anything, and no waking up feeling all groggy. The downsides however include no sleeping, even when we’re tired, missing everything because we’re so tired all the time, and spending every hour of every day feeling really groggy.

        This is why I’ve been awake and conscious this whole time. From being kicked out of a plane, to plummeting down, to hitting the city hard, to finally being dragged away and propped up (only to end up getting punched in the side of the head).

        This is why I’m still awake and completely aware when the big one picks me up and chucks me over his shoulder. Then we’re outside and walking and I get my first close-up look at the streets of Vampire City – albeit an upside-down close-up look, but still a close-up.

        Welcome to Vampire City. Incidentally, as vampires go, you can never trust the way they look.

        Take myself, for example. I look like a nineteen-year-old English country boy, with annoyingly blonde hair and irritatingly blue eyes (someone else’s words, not mine). I look like Dads would approve of me, Mums would fawn over me, but more importantly I look like girls would fall for me and other boys would wish they were me.

        What I actually am though is a nearly two-hundred-year-old predator, and as of only a few nights ago, I spent my nights skulking in alleyways, or behind poor warehouses, looking for my next fix. You see, the Dads who approved of me are now hunting me, the Mums that fawned over me are double locking their doors at night because of the likes of me, and the girls who fell for me ended up drained, and the boys who wished they were me ended up the same way or dead, or as good as. But I don’t want to think about that right now. The point is, we vampires are never what we appear to be.

        I wonder who these city vampires really are, as some of them watch me with curious and hungry looks, but most simply just ignore me. Are they like me? Did they once prowl the back streets of the world? Were they once hunting for blood, hiding in the shadows, desperate for ignorant prey? Not so long ago, no one believed in vampires, but now they all believe, hence why I know one thing for sure. Every vampire here arrived in this forsaken dead end city the same way I did. They were caught, tied up and kicked out of a plane… by humans. Humans are bastards.

        It’s a long and bright street. Electric neon lights banish the crushing darkness and heavy electronic beats cry out from the surrounding night clubs, merging their sounds together so as to drown out the endless silence of this cold and rain-spattered night. Seems like a nice enough place.

        The vampires in attendance are dressed to impress. Leather get-ups, pristine boots, some with grinning masks and others with long hoods, and it all screams excess, drama and danger. I used to have a therapist many years ago, and these were exactly the sort of people she loved to warn me about.

        We stop moving, there’s some conversation between the big, gruff guy carrying me and the one with the tinny and cracked voice, with some others who I don’t recognize but sound angry, mean and menacing. Whatever their conversation is about, it is a short one and it leads to a door being opened and the three of us going inside somewhere. It is my rotten luck however that just as my regenerated neck muscles feel strong enough to lift my head, I’m carried backwards through a doorway and end up cracking the back of my skull on the top of the door frame.

        I curse loudly and I get a swift clip around the earhole for my trouble. This is when I finally see an actual face, and it is the one belonging to the tinny and cracked voice. He holds my face to his own and growls angrily at me. It turns out he’s a goblin.

        His own small face is wrinkly and knobbly, his eyes are big and bulbous, and his hair is dry and weedy. His attire isn’t much better, consisting of a sodden coat, rank trousers and old, worn-out boots. He’s definitely an ugly fellow, but then all goblins are ugly (at least they are from where I’m standing, or rather, from where I currently am being carried over a shoulder, hanging upside-down).

        ‘Keep your mouth shut in here, you hear me!?’ He spits angrily in my face, but all I can think of is how he has to stand on tippy-toes just to be eye-to-eye with me. Goblins are short in stature, short on patience, and short for brains. Just for the sake of spite, I tell him this now and I get another clip round my ear. It was worth it though.

        Then my world spins and my view changes from the ugly, upside-down face of a goblin and the backside of the large chap who has been carrying me, to a world that is at least the right way up, if not entirely improved.

        The large lughead, who appears to be a companion to the goblin, looks down at me. And he really does have to look quite far down. He’s huge. Easily nine feet. Tall enough so that the top of his bald head skims the ceiling. Imagine a giant baby with big eyes and a dull face and this is what you’d get.

        ‘You’re a half-troll, aren’t you?’ I ask him.

        ‘I’m Needl.’ The half-troll growls, his voice a deep and echoing drone, and it’s immediately obvious that this particular half-troll doesn’t have two brain cells to rub together in that massive bald head of his.

        ‘Shut up, Needl,’ The goblin elbows the half-troll angrily, though he only connects with Needl’s kneecap. ‘And you too. What’d I tell ya?’

        ‘I think you told me to keep talking, no matter what you say to the contrary,’ I reply.

        ‘Proper smart-arse, ain’t ya!’ But just as the goblin is about to give me a good old-fashioned hiding with one of his tiny craggy hands, someone stops him. Someone with such an oily and meticulous voice that I not only hear it inside my ears, but I feel it run up my spine and chill my thoughts.

        ‘Not in here, Gawk.’

        Gawk the goblin deflates, and even looks a little sheepish, but he soon gathers what anger he has left to shoot me a final menacing glance. He then storms out of the room, dragging Needl along with him, but just before he slams the door shut, Gawk says something that piques my interest.

        ‘We got you a good one, we did,’ Gawk says to someone, probably the owner of the oily voice. ‘So that’s us paid up for the week.’

        And then the door is slammed shut and I am left in this room. This room. A wide, open room in which, unlike the streets and the clubs, the only light is the moonlight that enters through the large, archway windows.

        There are expensive-looking furniture pieces everywhere, on one side there is an unattended bar, and in a corner, a small stage. And here I sit on a long luxurious sofa, barely able to turn my head let alone explore this private lounge or pour myself a drink from the bar. I can just about look to the side though, and when I do I immediately wish I hadn’t.

        Sitting next to me is someone like me. As in, someone who also looks like they’ve just been kicked out of a plane and fallen six-and-a-half-thousand feet to land on some concrete that felt especially hard. Beyond this unfortunate individual is another unfortunate, and another, and another. There are several of us sitting here. Some with bones still solidifying, some with parts still growing back, and others that look more like humanoid bags of jelly. Upon seeing these others, I rather think Needl the dim-witted half-troll was right. I am one of the lucky ones.

        ‘We keep you here,’ The mysterious someone with the oily voice tells me. ‘Until you’ve healed. Sometimes it takes days, sometimes weeks, but by the look of you, you’ll probably be ready in a few hours.’

        ‘Lucky me.’ I croak weakly.

        ‘Look at that,’ the oily voice livens up, ‘You’ve even got your voice back. You’re practically a picture of health.’

        I turn my head back so that I’m not looking at the others, and I now see someone is in fact sitting at the bar. Not quite so unattended, then. He is tall and dressed in a smart black suit, with black slicked-back hair. Other than this, I can’t make out anymore because he has his back to me. He does look like he’s nursing a small drink though, one of the strong variety.

        ‘Ready for what?’ I ask, not sure whether I want to know the answer. And what I get for an answer is a mirthless chuckle and a question.

        ‘What do you know…’ He gets up from the bar and walks towards me, and as he steps into the pale moonlight I get a good look at him, just as a fly that had been resting on his eyeball flits away, ‘… of Vampire City?’

        He’s a snake. Not an actual snake, of course. But if Needl the half-troll looks like a baby, and Gawk the goblin resembles a street urchin, then this man has the feeling of a snake. No. Not a man. I can tell – call it a kindred sense – that this snake is a vampire, just like me. He has a long face, small eyes and dry skin. He looks older than me by a good dozen years, but we’re vampires so how old we look is almost definitely not our real age. He could be thirty, he could be a hundred. Hell, I’ve known vampires pushing a thousand.

        ‘All I heard,’ I say, trying to keep my voice tough and bullish. ‘Is that this place is a dead end. There’s no getting out.’

        He nods, thoughtful, then comes at me with another question, ‘Where did they pick you up?’

        For a moment, I’m confused, ‘Oh. You mean those two?’

        ‘Who? Needl and Gawk?’ He shakes his head. ‘They’re just the scum of this city. No. I’m talking about the humans who dropped you in this place.’

        ‘Oh.’ I realise, sombrely. ‘Them.’

        ‘You look European,’ His watchful eyes pass over me, taking me in, leaving me feeling like I’m on display (which, I suppose, I am). ‘Maybe American. But you don’t have an accent.’

        ‘Grew out of it a while ago.’

        ‘Ah, got a few years under you, then,’ He nods, just as thoughtful as before. He keeps looking over me. It’s unsettling to say the least, especially when another fly crawls across his cheek and passes over his lips, before eventually flying away. ‘I was picked up in San Francisco, oh, nearly seventeen years ago now. So, where was it they caught you?’

        ‘London,’ I tell him.

        ‘London?’ He raises an eyebrow. ‘Dangerous place for our kind. Lots of guards, with guns too, and cameras on every corner, and sixty thousand humans that hate our kind.’

        ‘Yep. Sounds like home,’ I say.

        ‘Why London?’

        ‘One back-alley is just like any other,’ I tell him, hoping he won’t pry.

        ‘A back-alley bloodsucker,’ He grimaces, obviously unimpressed with my recent (undead) life choices. ‘So many of our kind are reduced to such a pitiful existence. Out there, anyway. In Vampire City, you can be so much more.’

        ‘I can’t wait,’ I say with as little enthusiasm as possible, and then I try for even less. ‘I’ve always loved the idea of being trapped in one city for the rest of eternity, cut off from humanity’s pulse, with nothing else to do but waste away and wonder what might have been if I hadn’t been caught, if I hadn’t found myself tied up, and if some arsehole hadn’t decided to kick me out of a plane and to then forget about me forever.’

        ‘You misunderstand,’ The oily-voiced vampire smiles, and he moves a chair so as to sit across from me. Once seated, he stares at me, and he now looks like a hunter eyeing their captured prey. I shudder, which is still quite a painful thing to do in my still very broken body. ‘Just because you will be more here,’ He continues, ‘Does not mean you will be improved. For example, you could be more afraid, or you could be more content. You could find yourself under more pressure, or you could be more docile. Whatever you were out there, you will be that and more in this city.’

        ‘Oh… goody?’ I want to annoy him, but so far he seems unmoved by my childish teasing.

        ‘You can change, of course,’ he says, still eyeing me like a hawk eyeing a mouse stuck on the end of its talon. ‘But only if you learn to play by the rules.’

        ‘We’re vampires,’ I try to laugh derisively, but it comes out as more of a tired sigh. ‘We don’t have rules.’

        He stands up, looks down at me one last time, and smiles once again.

        ‘There are always rules.’

 

The oily-voiced creepy guy with the slick-backed hair has a name. It’s Serat. Other vampires, looking and acting like sycophantic subservients of Serat’s, come in at one point and they talk. This is when I overhear his name for the first time, but it’s not the last time over the course of the night. There are others who come to the lounge bar. Others who are just like Gawk and Needl and, just like them, they come to drop off others like me.

        Goblins, half-trolls, dwarves, and even a band of tiny pixies each visit Serat’s lounge bar throughout the night, and each bring with them an unfortunate individual they’ve happened upon. Some of these unfortunates are a little less broken than others, but most of them are pretty bad. The one dragged in by the tiny pixies is basically just a bean bag with body bits washing around inside.

        I can tell there is a real mix of sub-mortals in this city (a sub-mortal is what the humans call anything that isn’t human) but in this instance, all of the unfortunates are vampires, because only a vampire is truly unkillable.

        Oh sure, you can dust us with a stake through the heart, or chop off our heads or blow us up, or drown us at the bottom of the ocean, but we always come back. The dust eventually comes back together and undustifies, the head will eventually regrow a body (or the body will eventually regrow a head, it’s always one or the other), if close enough the little body bits will find each other and put themselves back together like a messy puzzle, and if we’re stuck anywhere, like at the bottom of the ocean, we’ll just wait. Sure, it takes a long time, but it’s not like we have any choice in the matter. And it hurts. It hurts exactly as much as getting your head ripped would hurt, and because we’re vampires we’re conscious for the whole thing, but like I said, we don’t have any choice in the matter and besides, we eventually get better. So, that’s cool. Right?

        Back to the here and now, and time is passing on by in this dimly-lit lounge bar. Every so often, a fly skitters over me. At one point, one of the blighters passes across my vision. It’s not too long though before my body starts to wake up. It starts with a finger here, and then a toe, then a twitch, and then I get more movement in my neck, and soon I’m shifting uncomfortably and groaning painfully.

        ‘You look ready enough, took a little longer than I thought, but you’ll do now,’ Serat nods at me. ‘Here. This is for you.’

        He offers me a square, white napkin. I just about manage to lift my arm, open my hand and grasp it feebly with my fingers. I stare down at it, wondering what the hell I’m supposed to do with it. I’m battered, bruised and bloodied. Every part of my body is in such tremendous pain that my mind is almost numb to it by now. And this snobby jerk has just handed me a tissue, as if my only problem is a bit of food around my mouth.

        I look up at him with angry eyes, ready to unleash a very snarky and witty remark, but when I do look up at him, for the first time in a very, very long time, words fail me.

        Serat’s fangs grow larger, his jaw stretches open, his eyes burn red and fixate on my neck, and he lunges down with a ravenous screech. The pain is indescribable, but I’ll give it my best shot.

        It’s like everything inside of me is being pulled out of me. My blood, my bones, my guts and my nerves are all being sucked through two tiny holes in my neck. I can’t move, I only spasm, I can’t breathe, I only gasp airless breaths, I can’t blink, my eyes are stuck open, and I can’t scream, I can’t find my voice.

        I can see my hand, rigid and immobile, but it becomes not the hand of a nineteen-year-old English country boy, but the hand of a withered old man, and then it becomes even thinner, feebler, and finally it is the hand of a corpse. And I can feel the same thing happening all over my body. My face sinks into itself, my torso shrinks and pulls tight, my mind is screaming.

        And then it’s over. Serat pushes himself off me and shakes a little with new energy, and I am left here, just as limp and helpless as I was when I landed with a thump the previous night.

        The vampirism in me brings me back quickly enough. I regenerate. It hurts like hell, like it always does, and it leaves me exhausted and drained, but within a few seconds I am back. My face is restored, my hand is my hand again, and I can just about scramble to my feet.

        ‘Now,’ Serat says in a dismissive, but energetic voice. ‘Get lost.’

        He’s back at the bar, turned away from me, and I don’t even have to think about my next move, I just do it. I charge at him. I’m going to tear him limb from limb –

        He’s quicker than me. I am a tired snail to his primal panther. Of course this is the case, because he drunk my blood. He has the energy that was once mine. So I am weak and he is strong. He catches my wrist, he grips my neck, squeezing painfully on the two holes he was moments ago drinking out of, and then he throws me. I fly across the entire lounge and smash into a wall. It hurts but I’m so used to pain right now I barely notice.

        I go again. Serat swipes me aside as if I were nothing but an irritating fly. Still, I don’t learn my lesson, so I pick myself up and try for a third time. He kicks me back down. I want to go again but my body gives up on me. I suppose my body has more sense than I do.

        ‘Get lost,’ Serat repeats. ‘And get used to this.’

        He crouches over me, peering down on me with an almost idle curiosity, and he sighs. I see the stolen energy behind his eyes, I can see the erratic twitch that always comes after a feeding, but he doesn’t look happy. He doesn’t look like anything actually. He’s as lifeless as the humans say we are.

        ‘You’ve got spunk, I’ll give you that,’ he says. ‘You got a name?’

        ‘Caiden,’ I splutter, too tired to lie and too drained to resist. ‘My name is Caiden.’

        Serat nods slowly, ‘Welcome to Vampire City, Caiden.’ And he tosses me a fresh, white napkin. But I don’t even notice because, for the first time since becoming a vampire almost two hundred years ago, I do something I thought was impossible. I pass out and lose consciousness.

***

 

3rd place:
The Line of Least Resistance
by Jeff Richards

PROLOGUE

KAMEMBE, RWANDA SEPTEMBER 14th 1994

They’d never get used to the smell of putrefying flesh. It blended horribly with the stultifying heat and the stagnant water and black mud that lined the roads. Bloated corpses lay here and there – men, women, children. The appalling insanity they’d seen everywhere they went. The patrol stepped cautiously along the baked-mud road, weapons held at the ready, safetys off.

“More bodies, Lieutenant,” Corporal Holbrook said. “Movement ahead.”

“Halt.”

The men crouched, moved into cover of the bush.

“Holbrook, Townsend, eyes on.”

“Yes sir.”

The two men leap-frogged the pointman, shucked their Bergens and crouched either side of the road. They uncovered their sniper sights, ensuring they were clear of condensation. Holbrook spoke. As a full screw, Townsend always waited for him to report first. “Jack Shits ahead, sir. I count seven. Group of civvies sitting, they look pretty chip.”

“Any weapons?”

“Three AKs, sir. I see Brownies and a lot of machetes.”

“Townsend?”

“No Ground Sign, sir. Don’t see a Dicker, but these fuckers blend with the mud.”

“Permission to give them the good news, sir?” Holbrook said.

“You do not have permission, Corporal Holbrook.”

“Yes sir.”

“Bergens off, all of you. Campbell, Hall – sideline the shooters. The rest of you, go lateral, stay out of sight.”

The men dropped their Bergens, and Campbell and Hall hastened to flank the snipers, training their weapons on the scene down the road. The others melted into the bush. Lieutenant Taylor thumbed his radio.

“Papa Two Echo to base, over.”

“Go ahead, Papa Two Echo.”

“This is Lieutenant Taylor. We have several armed hostiles at reference Quebec Alpha two seven six, menacing a civilian group, imminent threat to life. Permission to engage requested. Over.”

“Wait one.”

“Machetes are out, sir,” Holbrook said, urgently. “They’ve dragged a lumpy jumper from the group. Permission to engage? We can finish.”

“You do not have permission, Corporal. Do not engage.”

“Base to Papa Two Echo, over.”

“Papa Two Echo.”

“Do not engage unless threat to life against you. Repeat: do not engage unless threat to life against you. Do you read?”

“He’s chopped her hand off, sir!”

“Do you read, Papa Two Echo?”

“They’ve got her sprog, sir, holding it by the leg,” Holbrook said, his voice hard. “They’re going to dice it.”

“Fire!”

CHAPTER ONE

15th November 2022

“Come on, you buggers, shift,” Maggie muttered, gripping the steering wheel hard. “I can’t be late, not today.”

She craned to see. Traffic queued all the way to the crossroads and she watched the lights change, but nobody moved. Probably been a prang. Overnight rain and wet leaves, no doubt.

“I knew I should have taken the dual carriageway. Bloody Norah, where’s a uniform when you need them most?”

To grant her wish, sirens billowed from behind, and four motorcycle units swept past the line of traffic.  Must have been on a training run together, you never got four in one go. She hoped they’d have the congestion cleared sharpish, she couldn’t be late. Not today. She heard more sirens and turned the radio off, wound her window down a little. Maggie made out three separate sirens, and reckoned one could be an ambulance. She hoped nobody’d been hurt.  She thought about doing a U-turn and taking the back roads. Traffic had built up behind her and Maggie saw one car doing exactly that. For a second she dithered, and then saw a motorcycle officer up front turning a car, sending it back the way it had come. The crossroads must be completely blocked.

She smiled to herself as two police Volvos shot past her, blues and twos, and the motorcycle cop had to direct the car he’d turned onto the pavement, so they could get through. With a start, Maggie realised the second Volvo was a Trojan unit. She reached to undo her seatbelt and her hand froze over the release button.

Leave it to Uniform, it’s their job.

She edged the car forward, as those ahead of her were sent back. The motorcycle officer spun his hand in an agitated circle as she coasted up the slight slope. Turn round. She wound down her window. “What’s going on, Sarge?” she called.

He opened his mouth to blast her, and then recognised her. “Shit, Maggie, you’re quick off the mark.”

“What? I’m trying to get to Stockport for my DI induction interview.”

He looked up towards the crossroads, and shook his head. “You’d better get out, they’ll need you.”

“Why?”

“Shooting at the crossroads. Through the windscreen. We’ve radioed for a SOCO, but it’s a tad early for civilians, apparently.”

“Bloody hell.”

“Drive up, Maggie. Counter-terrorist squad are on their way, they’ll trample over everything.”

He didn’t wait for an answer, strode to the car behind hers. She drove up the slope and stopped behind the last Volvo.

“Counter-terrorist? Bugger that,” she said, frustrated.

Maggie switched the engine off and reached for her mobile, dialled HQ. She saw a young woman sitting in the back of a patrol car, crying, with a WPC comforting her. Material witness, hopefully.

“Chief Superintendent Jackson’s office.”

“Hi Sue, it’s Maggie Hardcastle. Not sure I can make my induction interview on time this morning, there’s just been a shooting in Wilmslow, looks like I’m SOCO until one gets here.”

An incoming text announced itself on Maggie’s phone.

“Oh. Right. Oh,” Sue said.  “Well, call me as soon as you know when you’re free.”

“Will do.”

Maggie rang off and smiled as she saw who the text was from.

Eyup, our kid. Knock ‘em dead today. Kate xx

Maggie got out of her car and saw the vehicle that sat blocking the intersection. Jaguar XF by the look of it, this year’s plates. Behind it, a  paper cup cavorted across wet leaves, and Maggie hunched against the cold wind.  Exhaust fumes from the police vehicles stuck in her throat, and she strode quickly past them. Uniform were everywhere, but it looked like organised chaos. One officer was rolling police tape across the road from the traffic lights to a post box. People held their phones up, no doubt social media would be alive with it by now, and the police would be appealing for any evidence on Facebook and Twitter. She showed her badge to the uniform Sergeant who moved towards her.

“Anyone outranking me?” Maggie said.

“No, ma’am.”

“Right, I’m SOCO, until they arrive. Traffic are sorting the approach roads, I hope?”

“Officers are at the roundabout to the A34 and we’re turning everyone into Swan Street from the south. Manchester Road is closed at Old Road.”

“Right.” She walked towards the Jag. “What’s happened?”

“I understand the car pulled away from the lights and somebody put a bullet through the windscreen into the driver’s chest. His passenger – she’s in the patrol car over there with WPC Gregg – says the airbags deployed, she thought they’d hit a car in front. A second shot burst the driver’s airbag and she’s pretty hysterical, naturally.”

“Is the driver dead?”

“Sir Nigel? Very.”

Maggie stared at him. “Sir Nigel Kenmore?” she said, gobsmacked. She’d attended a seminar he gave on recognising lies in the witness box barely two weeks ago. “The QC?”

“That’s him. His daughter was in the passenger seat.”

They walked to the driver’s side. Someone had opened the door, obviously to check on the victim, and Sir Nigel sagged towards it, held by his seat belt, his right arm flopping down. White-haired, overweight, his jowls flopped to the side, making him look as though he’d fallen asleep at the wheel. The red dripping down his arm and the gore on his chest and neck told otherwise. The deflated airbag looked like a shroud, pooling in his lap.

“Get a constable to stay here until you get a tent round it,” Maggie said. “Some  mobile phones are outrageously good, I’d hate this picture to be in the press tomorrow.”  

“Right, ma’am.”

The hole dominated the windscreen, about an inch in diameter, with white spiderwebs radiating from it. Two bullets through that was very skilful shooting. A professional kill. Maggie glanced over the road, looked up at Waitrose car park.

The sergeant caught her gaze. “I’ve despatched four officers to the car park.”  

“Right,” Maggie said. She had no idea if this was a random shooting, or a targeted attack on Sir Nigel, but it needed controlling. “Tell control to alert SCU, they’ll send a squad over. Get uniforms to move those people back, tape over all the approach roads, nobody within a hundred yards of this scene. Sergeant Bostock tells me counter-terrorism are on the way, get everything sealed before they get here and trample on the evidence – Jesus Christ!”

Maggie almost ran to the patrol car that had the witness inside, as a civilian walked past officers and raised a camera. Maggie grabbed his arm, hoping he hadn’t got a picture yet.

“Get off!” he yelled as he struggled to free himself. Maggie dragged his arm down, so his camera pointed at the ground. “I’m Press. Let me do my job!”

“My job is to ensure a crime scene isn’t contaminated with every jerk who wants a sodding picture,” Maggie growled in his face. She glanced at a male officer who’d come forward. “Get him back behind the tapes and take his details.”

She shoved the man hard, and he staggered.  

“Fuck you,” he said, and spat on the ground.

“Arrest him under Section 89, for obstructing a Police Officer,” Maggie said. “And if you gob up again, I’ll do you for assault, as well. Get him out of here.”

“I didn’t know you were a cop!” he shouted, as the Uniform pulled him away.

“Tough shit,” Maggie said.

She walked back to the sergeant blocking the open door.  

“Let’s close the door,” Maggie said. “I’m sure forensics will allow it. Shove it with your backside.” Maggie made sure she was in the way of any possible cameras as best she could, while he closed the door gently.  “If your guys find anything in the car park, seal it and call it in, otherwise get them looking for any CCTV cameras that might help. I imagine whoever took the shots was packed up in seconds and drove out of the car park damn sharpish. We need more uniforms, have you called HQ?”

“Yes, ma’am. Three truckies on their way.”

“Good work, use them to seal the perimeters.  Please don’t call me ma’am – DI Hardcastle or Maggie, I don’t care which.”

He grinned, and then listened to his earpiece. “There’s a camper van on the third floor, back door open,” he said. “Mattress laid on top of a table, shell casings on the floor.”

They turned and looked, and Maggie saw a Uniform wave his arm. She stared at the opening for a moment. “Tell them not to touch a bloody thing, they’re to seal off that floor in the car park,” she said. “I’ll go over, you’ve got everything in hand here. Call me via your men, if anything changes.”

“Right.”

Maggie started towards the car park, turned back. “If there’s nowt on that twat’s camera, let him off with a verbal. If he’s got pictures of our shooter hanging out the car park, give him an award.”

Maggie pulled into Stockport Police Station two hours later. She showed her ID, and the jobsworth raised the barrier for her after he made himself feel important by examining it closely and checking his list. She wondered if she could sneak into the canteen for a quick sandwich, her stomach had been complaining for the last hour. Better not.  Jackson didn’t appreciate tardiness. She told herself not to be sarcastic if he mentioned her lateness, but it would be bloody difficult.

        Detective Chief Superintendent Jackson surprised her by welcoming her into his office with a smile and a handshake.         “Come in, DI Hardcastle, come in.”

        It was the first time anyone had addressed her by her new title. Perhaps it was being so close to retirement that softened him, Maggie thought. Either that, or his blood pressure medication was working better than the last time she’d seen him, after Ken’s arrest. Maggie hadn’t a care that she’d stepped into dirty shoes with her promotion to Inspector – making DI was good enough for her, and Ken Etherden was as bent as they came, he deserved everything he got.

        Maggie had been in Jackson’s office twice before, and still felt uneasy at his choice of furniture. It was as if he’d trolled ebay, picking up free items, none of which matched. The pine shelving units loaded with books that stood out unevenly, the darkwood desk that didn’t go with the leather wing-backed chair. Rumour had it his wife gave him the chair as an anniversary present, and he’d had to keep it. Maggie was pretty sure the carpet had been replaced recently, it felt horribly springy underfoot, but the purple colour suited a porn studio more than a senior police officer’s room.

Must be why they call it shag pile.

        “Sorry I’m so late, sir,” she heard herself saying, mentally kicking her own arse as she did. She’d done a good job at the scene, she knew it.

        “That’s quite all right. Shooting in Wilmslow, I heard.”

        “More like an assassination, sir. Two bullets through the windscreen from a hundred and thirty yards. Sniper rifle recovered, it was a professional job. Counter-terrorist squad was called in sharpish.”

“Who was killed?”

“Sir Nigel Kenmore.”

Jackson stared at her, surprised. “Did you call SCU out?”

“Yes sir.”

“Might be your first case as a DI, then?”

“Possibly, sir.”

She sat in the seat opposite his desk, and he slid into his wife’s chair, opened the file in front of him. “It’s been a year since you passed the Inspector exams, did you not consider taking promotion elsewhere?”

“No, sir. I want to stay in the Serious Crimes Unit, I function best here.”

“Right. What will you do about team morale, in the wake of your promotion?”

Read them the bloody riot act and kick out any bugger who doesn’t want to conform.

“Initially, I’m meeting the whole team with DCI Harris tomorrow, then I’ll hold individual get-togethers with each officer, give them a chance to voice their feelings in a safe environment, off the record.”

Tell them they can leave SCU right sharpish if they want to support Ken Bloody Etherden.

Jackson nodded.

“Irrespective of the outcome of his trial, I’ll remind them all of their own responsibilities to the public and to the police force. They’re a good bunch, sir. The job’s more important than individual sentiment, they all know that. I’d be surprised if the team ethic is affected to any great degree, but I’ll have follow-up meetings, right after the trial.”

And I’ll watch them like a bloody hawk that wants roadkill for lunch.

“Good. Tell me how you want to organise the squads.”

Maggie could have kissed Jackson’s secretary when she brought in a tray with coffee, and a plate loaded with biscuits. It took a lot of control to only eat some of them as the interview continued. She hated leaving any, but she had to.

She gave the right answers for the rest of the interview. Maggie doubted Jackson was really interested, anyway, he was just going through the motions.

“Right, I think that covers it, Inspector Hardcastle.” He smiled, and Maggie knew she had to. “You’ve a good, solid team, there, and your experience in the serious crimes unit will stand you in good stead. I don’t need to tell you that morale is the highest priority, to get the team pulling as one.”

“No, sir.” Maggie said. You bloody don’t.

“Detective Chief Inspector Harris is there for you, whenever you need help. I’ll see you in six months for your secondary assessment interview. Make them good months.”

“Yes sir.”

Maggie stood and shook his hand. She wanted the biscuits on the tray, but wasn’t about to offer to take it through. A DI is not a tea lady, she reminded herself.

“Would you take the tray through?” Jackson said. “Give it to Sue, will you?”

Maggie hoped her face didn’t show what she was feeling, and she froze for a second. He wasn’t testing her, it was just his dinosaur mentality.

The door opened behind her, and Maggie turned. Sue held the door, looked round it. “Just wanted to see if you need more coffee,” she said, innocently, and Maggie tried not to smile.

“No, we’re all done,” Jackson said.

“Thank you, sir,” Maggie said, and he nodded benignly. She held the door open for Sue, as she collected the tray, and closed it firmly behind them, as they left.

Sue deposited the tray in the kitchenette area, and handed Maggie half a packet of chocolate digestives with a grin. “He’d never ask a man to bring the tray out,” she said. “You miss breakfast?”

“Second breakfast, anyway,” Maggie said.

“You going back to Stretford? Canteen’s open downstairs.”

“No, popping over to see Mum, today. First day in harness tomorrow.”

“You’ll be champion.”

Maggie liked her confidence. “Aye, I’ll give it my best shot.”

As she waited for the lift, the niggle that had been prodding her blossomed, and she stepped away from doors as they opened, retrieved her phone from her bag. She dialled technical division.

“Technical forensics. Colin Green speaking.”

“Colin, it’s Maggie Hardcastle, how you doing?”

“Fair to middling, Inspector,” he said, emphasising the last word. “What you want me to cover up for you?”

“Your support of Sheffield United, mostly, but I wanted to know if you’ve been called about the shooting in Wilmslow this morning.”

“Nothing yet. Why?”

“You will be, but I happened to be there minutes after Sir Nigel Kenmore was shot, at the crossroads at close to seven forty eight. It just occurred to me that the shooter wouldn’t have seen Sir Nigel’s car until the last second, the approach road has that steep bend in it. I’m thinking there was probably a spotter, and we’ll be going over every available CCTV in the area, but could you check the local phone mast, see if there’s any very short burst activity around that time?”

“This an official request?”

“Aye. Check with DCI Harris, if you like.”

“I’ll believe you. Thousands wouldn’t.”

“Thanks, Colin.”

“Laterz.”

The lift hadn’t been called away, and Maggie headed down to the car park. The benefit of leaving after the rush hour showed in the reduced traffic, and she hit the M62 over the Pennines inside an hour. Maggie knew her mother would be looking out the window for her, even though she’d phoned to say she’d be later than expected.  Google maps directed her to a car park four hundred yards from the train station, and she took a spot furthest away from the entrance. The wind tugged at the car, and she slipped a black woollen hat on, pulling it low over her forehead. She looked at herself in the mirror, shook her head.

“You look a twat.”

She shrugged the small backpack onto her shoulder. She had twelve minutes until the train left, if it was on time. Keeping her head down she trudged across the car park, trying to alter her gait a bit. As she walked into the ticket office she slipped the clear lens glasses on. She knew she was bordering on paranoia, but didn’t want a repeat of last time. The bastards were everywhere.

“Day return to Waverly Green, please,” she said, mimicking Jackson’s Welsh accent, hoping she wasn’t overdoing it.

The desk clerk barely looked at her. “Seven sixty,” he said.

Maggie pushed ten pounds through the drawer and retrieved her ticket and change. She used the surveillance glance to look at people as she made her way to the platform: quick look at the face, drop the head slightly if they looked at her, then look again as they turned away.  She only studied much older people, those who’d have been adults in the eighties.

Over thirty sodding years ago, and they still won’t let it go. Useless bastards.

She thought she’d be okay, getting the train this far out, but you never knew.  So many had moved away from Orgreave down the years, it would be just her bad luck to bump into someone who remembered her.

The train had double seats all facing forward and Maggie sat in the aisle side, one ankle resting on her knee, her arms on the front of the rests, leaning forward. The magazine in her hands almost touched the back of the seat in front, and she dared anyone to take  the seat next to her. Nobody attempted it.  As the train rattled on, she thought about the killing, hoped SCU would get it, and began planning the investigation. A high-profile murder as her first DI case suited her very well.  

As the train got closer she stared out of the window, drawn by the memories. The black and grime of her childhood now replaced with green fields, and new industrial units that were colourful and bright. Hard to believe the coking plant had even existed at all. The regeneration of the area looked wonderful, but she knew if you scraped the surface you’d find coal dust and broken lives still there. Too many to count.

She waited until the last moment to get out of her seat, and followed the other passengers onto the platform. Glasses on, head down, trying to look older than her years. No ticket inspector, just an automatic barrier, which was a blessing. Out into the street where the memories overwhelmed her, as always. If she concentrated enough, she could hear the shouts and the curses, the hatred that thickened the air, the thud of fist on flesh, bricks shattering against shields, the clatter of hooves and the fear and anger boiling over, again and again.

Maggie shook her head and focused on getting over the road safely. Five minutes walking and she became uncomfortably warm. She didn’t want to undo her coat, just strode on, hoping she’d make it to her mother’s without incident. The Spar beckoned her, and she paused to look in the window. A young girl sat behind the cash register, and Maggie could see a lad stacking the shelves. She didn’t need much, but she wanted to grab some barm cakes and full-fat milk. She took a deep breath and pushed the door open.

She had what she wanted in no time, and placed them on the counter for the girl to cash up.

“Hiya,” the girl said, smiling. Too much makeup, but nice eyes.

“Morning.”

She scanned the two items. “Is that all?”

“Aye.”

The total showed four pound twenty, and Maggie handed her a five-pound note. The girl rang it up, and the drawer opened.

“Don’t serve her!”

The shout startled the girl, who looked over Maggie’s shoulder, then back at Maggie.

“Too late,” Maggie said, as she grabbed the till receipt from the cash register.

She turned to face the woman who’d shouted.  Mrs bloody Allington. She might have known. She’d aged a lot since Maggie had last seen her, and that was only two years ago. Thread veins on her face, eyes screwed up making her look piggy, she was the typical scrawny bitch whose tongue forever run faster than her brain. She’d always been good for gossip, making it up if she disliked you enough. She must be over seventy by now, should have been put out to grass long ago. Mrs Allington raised the counter top and shouldered the girl away from the till, grabbing Maggie’s five-pound note from the girl’s hand.

“You had the right to refuse me service when I walked in,” Maggie said, as she slipped her shopping into the backpack. “But under the Consumer Rights Act of 2015 a contract now exists between myself and Spar groceries. I’ve bought and paid for these items. Got the receipt to prove it.”

Mrs Allington threw her five-pound note on the counter. “Now you haven’t paid.”

“Keep the change,” Maggie said. “Put it in the Miners’ benevolent fund.”

Mrs Allington’s face screwed even tighter. “Fucking scab,” she hissed. “Your father was a scab, you’ll always be a scab.”

“Is that the best you can come out with, after all this time? Seriously? You’ll give yourself a stroke, ’appen you’re not careful.” Maggie smiled at the girl, who’d stepped as far away from Mrs Allington as she could. “Thanks, love.”

Maggie knew it would enrage the cow. Mrs Allington snatched up the money and tried to tear it in two. The new plastic notes were almost indestructible, and Maggie tried not to laugh. She shook her head and walked from the store.  

Maggie’s mother stood at the dining room window, and waved as she walked into view. The weeds were taking over the driveway, advancing towards the bungalow like an unflappable invasion, one inch at a time. Derek next door saw to the lawn, but Maggie didn’t expect him to weed. Maybe there was some creosote left in the shed, that would kill the buggers. If the shed was still standing. By the time she reached the front door, her mother was there, leaning on her stick.

“I’ve put the kettle back on, Margaret, you must be parched.”

Maggie hugged her, feeling the bones through the thick cardigan, which seemed to weigh her mother down with its heaviness.

“Aye, a decent cuppa is what I need. How are you, Mum?”

“Fair to middling, you know. Come on in, that wind’s parky.”

She closed the door behind her and followed her mother to the kitchen. Maggie dragged the hat from her head, ran her hand through her hair to try and organise it.

“Have they given you a date yet?”

“Consultant says February still, though I’m on’t list for any cancellations. It’ll ’appen when it ’appens.”

The phrase Maggie had hated all her life. The acceptance of your lot without fighting to rock the system. Passed down from generation to generation, the marker of the down-trodden working classes after the Great War. Nothing we can do to alter it, so chin up and carry on. The swinging sixties and emancipation had passed her mother by, somehow. Happy to be a bank clerk all her working life, because female bank managers didn’t exist back then. The cheap mortgage she got, courtesy of sixteen years’ service allowed her and Jane to grow up in a bungalow, not a two-up, two-down terraced house. The home the bank had wanted to take away, when the savings ran out. The place that held no happy memories for her.

“Has Jane been over?” Maggie asked, dropping her backpack onto the kitchen table.

“She’s very busy with the nursery, and the boys.”

“Not too busy she couldn’t have two weeks in Tenerife.”

“Do stop, Margaret. She’s doing well, and working hard, and that’s right important, you know that.”

“Aye, but family is more important, she’s only twenty minutes away.”

Her mother mashed the tea bags like she was waterboarding them to death. “I’m not flaggin’ you know. I’ll make old bones and then some, so don’t mither.”

“I still think you should consider coming over to me after the operation. I’ll book leave, anyroad.”

“I’ll do fine, don’t wittle yourself over me.”

Her mother handed her the mug of tea, and they sat at the table. Maggie took out the full-fat milk and splashed a jot in. Her mother used skimmed milk these days, which tasted like gnat’s piss, but it was good for her cholesterol, apparently.

“Ran into Mrs Allington in the Spar,” Maggie said.

Her mother frowned, and Maggie held up her hands placatingly. “I didn’t do owt,” she said. “Bought my groceries, paid and left.” Maggie couldn’t resist the grin. “She tried to tear up a five-pound note, must have aggravated her hernia.”

“Oh, Margaret.”

“Don’t start, Mum. They’re the ones with the problem, not me. I just live my life and let others get on with it. Besides, I could have arrested her for aggravated hate crimes.”

Maggie flipped her warrant card onto the table between them. Her mother looked at it, puzzled, and her face lit up. “You got the promotion,” she said, smiling. “I’m so pleased for you, love.”

She reached out and grasped Maggie’s hand, squeezed hard.

“Damn right, I did. Stepped into Ken Etherden’s dirty shoes, but I don’t care a whit.”

Her mother raised her mug and they chinked them together.  

“Chief Constable of Manchester in another ten years,” Maggie said.

“Not with that barnstorm you call a haircut. I’ll get a brush.”

Maggie had to smile. “Gerroff, Mum.”

Maggie hoovered the bungalow and scrubbed the bathroom spotless. The walk-in bath Jane had paid to be installed needed sealing. It looked as though grout had been used around the edges, and it was crumbling. She got a silicone cartridge from the shed and did a proper job. Fortunately, her mother packed the barm cake butties with sausage and bacon, and three slices of her Eccles cake kept the wolf from the door as she worked.

“Mum? I’m going to dab some of the weeds in the drive with creosote, you’re not going out this weekend, are you?”

“’Appen I’m not. Tell Derek next door, will you?”

“Why?”

“His cat comes over when he’s out, wouldn’t want him with mardy paws.”

“I’ll not use the creosote, then.”

Maggie took a trowel and attacked the weeds. Dandelions, mostly. Her back ached after twenty minutes, so she resorted to kicking them out. Wouldn’t kill the roots, but she’d look into some cat-friendly weed killer. She checked her phone.

“That’s all you’re good for, you know. Kicking weeds.”

Maggie didn’t need to look up to know Billy Henty stood there. “Yeah, I learned it from you, Billy,” she said. “You were always handy with a steel toe-cap. Seemed to make you braver. Especially with your mates behind you. They coming along soon, are they?”