Clarke My Words

It can be quite difficult moving to a new town, particularly if you don’t know many people in the area. When I first moved to the city I quickly realised that because I had so few companions to call upon, I had inadvertently become something of a commuter hermit. I would scuttle from my flat to work and then right back again at the end of the day with very little deviation. In a bid to break out of this downward spiral, I developed a morning routine that initially made me feel wonderfully metropolitan but soon grew to be a tiresome waste of time. Rather than eating breakfast at home of a weekday morning, I would head to a cafe somewhere near my place of work for a cappuccino and a muffin. In order to keep this routine spontaneity fresh I changed the cafe I went to every week and after a couple of months settled into a rota after returning to the very first cafe I had visited. After all, there are only so many eateries within walking distance of work. This comfortable rut had an unfor...

[Just a quick note to preempt any confusion, this short story was written to be a part of the Machine of Death Volume 2 anthology . Unfortunately it didn't make the cut so I thought I'd publish it here. Enjoy!] To whom it may concern, I remember once hearing a story about a man whose cause of death slip read “Ripcord Malfunction”. This man had never been near a parachute before he received the prediction and had had no real plans to go looking for one in the future. His father clapped him on the back and laughed, “that should be easy enough to avoid, eh?” The story goes that this man, still just a boy of course, retreated to his room and thought long and hard about his prediction - I mean, who doesn’t? He thought about all he would need to do to put off his death by keeping himself away from the possibility of a “Ripcord Malfunction” for as long as possible. Basically, he would have to stay away from planes. And also lawnmowers. For that matter, any petrol-driven p...