Nightfall (clip) (c) Duncan Faure
Short story collection
Some starter samples of short stories in Nightfall Anthology
Titles:
Deadly Vow (1045 words)
Muscle Memory (1566 words)
It's all a Matter of Luck (2015 words)
Billy Bull (727 words)
Dreamweaver (577 words)
The Box of Darkness (2838 words)
Lucid Dreaming (3255 words)
Dead of Night (849 words)
Indians and Cowboys (3330 words)
(and many other stories)
Deadly Vow
It’s late night shopping in the precinct but most of the shoppers have already made the journey home with loaded bags. Now the top floor of the multi-storey car park is almost deserted. The few remaining cars are scattered around the area, lit by regimented pools of light.
Seven floors up above the ground it’s eerily quiet. There would probably be more noise filtering in from outside in the summertime. As it is, this is a cold and misty November night.
In a dark corner, partly hidden behind a brick pillar, is the figure of an old woman dressed in a long heavy woollen coat. She is wearing a dark headscarf, loosely tied around her head, partially drooping over her face, and a large leather handbag is slung over one shoulder. She licks her lips and pulls up a sleeve to look at the time on her wristwatch. She sighs impatiently, shivers then shuffles her feet.
A faint breathy whoosh disturbs the quiet as the lift door opens. A young lady, carrying two bags of shopping, steps out. Smartly dressed in a three-quarter length yellow coat, with black faux fur trim matching her black high heel shoes. She looks around cautiously then starts clip-clopping her way across the concrete floor. The sound of her heels echoing around the floor reaches the old woman who presses her body against the pillar then peers around in the direction of the sound.
The young lady reaches her yellow Mini and places her shopping on the ground behind it with a sigh. She reaches into her handbag and extracts a key. She opens the boot, hefts her shopping bags into it then slams it shut. The sound echoes around the car park like a muffled gunshot. A pair of pigeons that had been resting on a roof beam flap away noisily. She moves around to the driver’s door and opens it then gasps as the old woman taps her on the shoulder...
The rest of the story is now available available on Amazon as Kindle and paperback in Nightfall Anthology
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Muscle Memory
Darkness is falling over the quiet suburb. Birds are settling down in their roosts in the trees that line the road. They fly up in a panic, though, when the peace is shattered by a car revving unnecessarily loudly as it races along the tarmac. Its progress is erratic, veering from kerb to centre line and back, slowing down then speeding up without reason. The driver, Karl Davies, hurls an empty beer bottle from the window then begins banging the side of his door, beating in time to the heavy rock music that blares from the speakers, as the car passes under the pools of orange light cast by the spaced out street lamps. Without any lights on the dark coloured car showing, it seems to appear then disappear.
A scruffily dressed man, carrying a bag of belongings under his arm, begins to cross the road, oblivious to the approaching vehicle. His head snaps round when he hears the car rapidly closing in. He attempts to jump out of the way. His legs are hit just below the knees and he cartwheels over the bonnet. His head smashes into the windscreen before his body flies over the roof, landing in a crumpled bloody mess on the road.
Tyres squeal as Davies slams his foot on the brake. The car slides across the road, leaving snaking black lines behind it. The kerb sends the car jumping into the air. It bounces on the grass verge before clipping a tree which flips the car onto its side. Davies’ arm, still hanging out of the window, is crushed as it rolls. The crumpled car finally comes to a stop back on its wheels. Agonised screams drown out the pounding music...’
The rest of the story is now available available on Amazon as Kindle and paperback in Nightfall Anthology
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It's all a Matter of Luck
Bill Renshaw had never really considered himself a particularly lucky man. He had what he thought might be a fair share, mostly good but always the odd bit of bad luck, too. He thought of himself pretty much as a grey man, very ordinary, not very special. He had gone through his fifty odd years of life working in a very ordinary job, earning an average salary. He had received the odd promotion over the years so expected to be comfortable once he reached retirement age. Not that he thought too much about retiring yet; that was a distant plan years away. All in all Mr Average who would never stand out in a crowd. He wouldn’t even stand out in a small group, come to that.
Things start to change when he visits his doctor’s surgery complaining of stomach pains, possibly indigestion, he tells Doctor Khan.
‘Let’s runs a few tests while you’re here,’ says Dr Khan. ‘Roll up your sleeve for me, please.’ He fits a cuff around Bill’s bare arm and switches on the electronic heart monitor. The cuff clamps tighter and tighter around Bill’s arm, forcing him to draw a sharp breath before the air starts hissing back out. Dr Khan looks at the figures displayed on the screen and tuts. ‘You’re blood pressure is very elevated, Bill. We’re going to have to do something about that.’ He taps the computer keyboard for a moment. ‘I’m prescribing these tablets for you and,’ he glares sternly into Bill’s eyes, ‘I want you to realise how serious this is. You must take these tablets regularly, without fail. And you need to look at your lifestyle. Healthy eating and plenty of exercise. Understand?’
‘Understood, doctor,’ replies a chastened Bill, getting up to leave. ‘I’m on it.’ After a brief stay in the waiting room he collects his tablets from the surgery pharmacy and steps out of the surgery door into the street. ‘Healthy eating?’ he mutters to himself. ‘Exercise? Me? I don’t think so. No cakes? No chocolate? No burgers? No way!’
For the next few weeks...
The rest of the story is now available available on Amazon as Kindle and paperback in Nightfall Anthology
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Billy Bull
“So anyway, I’d been up near the peak of K2 for a week or so. I was living off the land, eating roots and berries, together with the odd creature I could trap. Nothing new, really, as I used to run survivalist courses a few years ago – Bear Grylls was one of my best pupils.
“I was on K2 to complete my three peaks in a month, and had already done Everest and the Matterhorn, so was on the home straight. When the storm started I knew it was going to be bad and, sure enough, the lightning started hitting all around me. I was huddled up in my tent to shelter from the torrential rain. Next thing one massive lightning strike hit right above me. Huge rocks began bouncing down the mountainside, right through my camp.
“When one boulder the size of a house clipped the top of my ridgepole and bent it I decided it was time to get out of there. I scrambled down, dodging rocks falling all around me until I got down to where I’d parked my 4x4. Luckily it started on the first turn of the key and I sped off down the narrow track.
“I ran over a pile of fallen rocks and heard something crunch beneath my feet. As I hit the brake for a sharp bend ahead the pedal hit the floor. I realised that a rock must have busted a brake pipe. Luckily my experience as a stock car racer gave me the skill to take the sharp bend on two wheels. I dropped back onto four wheels and just managed to avoid going over the edge. I could see half the width of my front tyre hanging over the edge of the drop below, which must have been around two thousand feet.
“Lower down there were fallen tress I had to avoid but then, as I came round another bend, I was shocked to see...
The rest of the story is now available available on Amazon as Kindle and paperback in Nightfall Anthology
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Dreamweaver
I am a Dreamweaver. Quite literally a weaver of dreams. I don’t work alone, of course, that would just be ridiculous. We are legion. We must be; there are so many of you to deal with.
Let me explain. When you go to sleep at night sometimes you dream, sometimes you don’t. There must have been a time through the years that you’ve wondered where dreams come from. Some dreams are perfectly clear and obvious, others are bizarre and random. Some, of course, may have you waking up bathed in a sweat of fear. Do you really believe that these are all conjured up from within your own mind? If you do then you’ve been seriously misinformed.
When you go to bed, shut your eyes and fall asleep you are unlocking your minds to us Dreamweavers. We are unable to gain access while you are awake and conscious, but once you open the gate… well that’s a different matter.
We have no physical body to transport so it’s easy for our diaphanous tendrils of spirituality to wander around from synapse to synapse collecting a thought here, an image there. Once we have enough information we can then create your dream in whatever form we choose. It could be a nice dream or a bad dream. That’s our decision...
The rest of the story is now available available on Amazon as Kindle and paperback in Nightfall Anthology
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The Box of Darkness
‘Kevin!’ shouts Cheryl, ‘don’t you think it’s about time we had a clear out?’ She stands, hands thrust firmly against her hips, and gazes around the cluttered room. The room Kevin liked to call his office. Cheryl saw it more as his man-cave. It seems that every piece of available flat space had been used to stack something. There were piles of cd cases and vinyl albums, teetering mountains of car and music magazines, boxes bulging at the seams with who-knows-what, things hanging from hooks, and a myriad of items collecting dust on the shelves lining the walls.
Kevin pokes a tentative head round the corner of the doorway. ‘What’s up, hon?’
Cheryl huffs. ‘Don’t give me that what’s up, hon, line. How many times have we talked about clearing this room out? It’s just gathering dust. It’s obvious you haven’t touched some of these things for years!’ She rubs a finger over some books and holds it up in front of Kevin’s face. ‘Look - dust doesn’t get this thick in weeks; or even months.’
Kevin sighs. ‘But, baby-‘
‘Come on now, Kev. You know it makes sense.’
‘Well…’
Cheryl can sense that she’s getting through and presses on. ‘We could go to a boot sale. There’s one just down the road at the weekend.’
Kevin looks around the room wistfully. He picks up a cd case and looks at it. ‘Hey, I haven’t played this for years. Great band.’
‘Let’s make a start right there, then. Sort out the ones you really, and I do mean really, want to keep, then put the rest somewhere to start the goods for sale pile. If we put the stuff we don’t want into black bags we should be able to clear some packing boxes before long.’
Kevin releases a long breath through pursed lips...’
The rest of the story is now available available on Amazon as Kindle and paperback in Nightfall Anthology
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Lucid Dreaming
‘What the f-?' The last mortal words of the fat man are terminated early and abruptly by a forty-five caliber slug. After the initial explosion, the next sound is like a soft cowpat slapping onto a grassy meadow as most of the left side of his head splatters against the living room wall. His limp body slumps back into the armchair where he had been sitting. His head lolls at an unnatural angle, blank eyes staring at the ground.
Marty replaces the smoking gun in his shoulder holster. He looks down at his Gucci shoes and grimaces at the tiny spots of blood they are speckled with. He wipes both shoes on a curtain then checks his white suit, smiling to himself when he sees it is unmarked. He turns and strides out of the room. He steps onto the street, checking both ways before opening the driver’s door of the silver sports car parked beneath a street light. He drops in and looks at the blonde in the passenger seat. She smiles at him as he looks admiringly at her long legs stretching out from her skimpy white mini-skirt, and her pert breasts thrusting against the thin silk of her white blouse.
‘Take me home, Marty,’ she purrs. ‘I want you.’
Marty doesn’t need asking twice. He guns the engine and the tyres squeal as he speeds away from the kerb and barrels down the road. A short while later he throws the car between wrought iron gates and...
The rest of the story is now available available on Amazon as Kindle and paperback in Nightfall Anthology
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Dead of Night
John rolls over in bed, picks up his phone from the bedside cabinet and checks the time. It’s 2.45 am. He curses to himself. This is no time to still be awake. He should be fast asleep. He rolls the other way and looks across at his wife Angela, sleeping peacefully with her long dark wavy hair framing her head on the pillow. He listens to her regular, shallow breathing; then to his own, faster and deeper.
Something concerns him, though, which is why he is awake now. He keeps hearing someone else breathing. He holds his breath but all he can now hear is Angela. He starts breathing again, quietly through his mouth and listens intently.
There it is again. Tantalizingly close and barely audible. John’s heart beats a little faster, he can hear his pulse throbbing. He stops breathing again and once more the other breathing stops too. He sits up in bed, eyes wide open, trying to pierce the darkness.
Gradually, as his eyes become accustomed to the darkness, he can make out familiar shapes in the bedroom. There’s a faint reflection from the television screen on the wall, Angela’s dressing table in the corner. It has a triple-way folding mirror and one end is glowing a little brighter, picking up a reflection of the street light outside.
While John is looking at this glimmer it suddenly disappears for a brief moment. He frowns, wondering...
The rest of the story is now available available on Amazon as Kindle and paperback in Nightfall Anthology
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Indians and Cowboys
Chief Silver Cloud stares into the distance, towards the mountains on the horizon, lost in his thoughts of times gone by. Way back in time when his ancestors had roamed the country freely, as long as they kept within their own tribe’s clearly defined borders. Then the white invaders had arrived, taking the land, often by force after fierce battles between the under-equipped Indians and fully armed blue coated soldiers. On some occasions land had been peacefully coaxed from the hands of the hands of the trusting owners for nothing more than a paltry amount of shiny beads.
The Native Americans had been herded into reservations, confined in these newly created open prisons and treated as second class citizens, or worse, for decades. It seemed there was nothing could be done to change this until, out of the blue, everything changed.
One lone prisoner had escaped from his reservation, disguised as a well-tanned white man and going by the name of Frank Mason, and managed to make his way across the Atlantic to Europe where he studied law, achieving first class honours. On his return to his homeland he spent weeks, spiraling into many months, scouring land registry documents, contracts, and the old laws of one hundred and fifty years ago. Armed with his findings he arrived at the Supreme Court of Justice where he successfully sued the Government for the return of all the land illegally obtained.
The tables had then been turned as the white settlers were driven from their homes...
The rest of the story is now available available on Amazon as Kindle and paperback in Nightfall Anthology
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The books
Nightfall Anthology
Deadly Vow
The Glass Door
The Last Status
Also available
The Subconscious Mind - Dr Michael Kimberley
False Memory Syndrome - Dr Michael Kimberley
The Ouija Board - Dr Michael Kimberley
Coming soon
Rogue Seeker
