This is the opening scene of a work in progress.  I'm posting it here to find out if anyone would want to read further...  So far I have 45,000 words and need some encouragement to get it finished!  Over to you.

Oh, shit!
I didn’t say it aloud.  Maybe I should have.  Although, knowing Lara, it wouldn’t have made the slightest difference, because she knows me well enough to read my mind and she knows ‘Oh, shit!’ is pretty much my default position whenever she turns up to wreck my life.  So I continued to serve coffee to a waiting line of impatient commuters and kept my thoughts and feelings to myself.  Three skinny lattes, four cappuccinos and a double espresso later and there she was, standing in front of me, her dark blonde hair tucked under a navy baseball cap, big green eyes, a megawatt smile and absolutely no indication that the last time she got me involved in one of her crazy schemes I nearly died.  Twice!  I was determined not to get drawn in again.
‘Help you?'
‘Hi, Red!  You look good.’
She always calls me ‘Red’, mainly because she knows I hate it and she likes to see me get mad.  It wasn’t going to work this time.
‘Cappuccino?  Latte?  A little steamed milk with a shot of cyanide to go?’
She smiled widely enough to bring the dimples out.  Double shit!  I’m a sucker for those dimples.  But I hardened my heart.  I was determined to keep out of whatever hellish plot she was working on this time.  The last time I saw Lara, she was skipping out of Nice with £2 million of assorted coloured gemstones in her pocket, leaving me behind to wrestle a rabid Alsatian who had a grudge against mankind and breath you could surf on.  I’ve still got a six inch scar on my inner right leg from teeth which came this close to leaving me singing falsetto.  No go this time.
‘I brought you a present, Red.  Happy Birthday!’
She handed me a small box, wrapped in shiny silver paper with a big blue bow.  There was only one problem.  My birthday’s in October, as Lara very well knows.  This was April.  I didn’t know how, yet, but she was doing it again.  Drawing me in.
‘What is this?  A bomb?’
The guy behind Lara looked up from his earnest perusal of the sports page of his newspaper, alarmed.  OK.  Maybe my voice had risen a little bit and maybe the modern world is not the best place to joke about explosive devices in crowded city centres.  But if you knew Lara, you’d know that anything is possible.  And then I caught the expression in her eyes and suddenly I knew the joke was on me.
She gave me the look which scares me most of all.  The one where she’s absolutely, deadly serious.
‘Good guess!  We need to talk, Red!  Now would be good.’
Not a dimple in sight.  And, just like that, I was in it.  Up to my neck.

150 word flash fiction from prompt word: "wave"

The smell made her gag.  The flood waters, far from washing everything clean, had coated every treasured belonging in a thick sludge of sewage.  A wave of despair threatened to drown her.  There was nothing left, nothing salvageable.

She needed air.  The door, hanging almost off its hinges, squeaked a sullen protest as she pushed past.  An echoing squeak responded.  Startled, she looked anxiously around, the age-old fear of rats clamouring in her head.  Silence.  No sign of movement.

Fear and grief battled for control, leaving her helpless.  She stood, immobile, and wept, a stricken woman in a sea of desolation.  The sound came again, from above.  Bleakly, she lifted her head.  A sodden cat, shivering, peered down from her shattered wardrobe.  She reached up.  The cat leapt into her arms, its bullet head thrusting against her cheek in thanks.  Warmth and a spark of hope.
 

The following is a transcript of a letter sent by my uncle, Frank Crookes Pepper, to his three brothers.  It's a glimpse into a past life & a past way of life.  Frank was in Hong Kong when it fell during WW2 & died as a POW aboard the Lisbon Maru in 1942.

Postmark:      Rochester & Chatham, 6pm, 2 Apr 1936
Royal Engineers crest on paper
                                                                                                            Sapper F. Pepper
                                                                                                            202 Part A.Company.
                                                                                                            Chatham
                                                                                                            Kent.
 
Dear Dib Dob, Hettypots & Mug,
Soon I will be enjoying 5 days’ leave for which I will be paid 2/9- a day. This I draw on the day I leave .  I have also been banking a little for a special reason.  I have a nice cab badge for Dib Dob & lots of love for the other two stick-in-the-muds.  Contrive to have all the work done at Easter, don’t stick any on me.

What you think of Sheff. U.  Poor old Arsenal.  I’ll bet it’s a close game.  It’s now 2.15pm. I’ve just been to the Doctor’s for medicine.  I collected the parcel this dinner-time & am overjoyed to find the dates & pomfret cakes in.  Of course the sweet cakes come first (and go first).  How’s the Jowett?  How far has she run, now?  How much milk is Arthur selling, any more?  What are you on with now, on the land?  How are the cows, horses, hens doing? 

Tell Mother the potted beef was grand as was the buttered cake.  I didn’t keep it long enough for any of it to spoil, tell her.  Which of you sent those jokes? There was only 1 I hadn’t read, but the boys enjoyed them.  That announcer looks some guy.  Freddie boy you make me laugh!

When I think of all the work I did on the farm & now compare it with a soldier’s lot I gurgle with glee.  You must be putting some hours in these days.  Soldiers finish work at 3.45pm but for polishing etc (when training only).  After training they get weekend leave, etc. etc., & every week we get Saturday noon & Sunday off.  We go to church Sunday morning, only marching to the band.  Never mind.  If you won’t take my word you won’t.  The N.C.O.s are chums.  We have pillow fights with the Lance corp. next door.  We made him a Spanish bed the other day & he tipped ours over after lights out then came & threatened to put us under charge for being out of bed.
​
Well so-long till next Thursday
from Frank.

The violin case stood open on the pavement, a few coins scattered like promises across the deep mulberry silk lining.  Passers-by did not pause, skirting the boy, who leaned against the brick wall of a derelict pub and placed the violin beneath his chin.  He drew the bow gently across the strings and notes cascaded across the street.  Around him, people straightened, their steps insensibly altering to match the rhythm of his tune.  Melody tugged at their hearts, reminding them of whispers and promises made before life had soured them.  A couple joined hands and a few strangers tossed a coin into his violin case.
            ‘I want him’, said Nick, from across the street.
His companion shook his head.
            ‘No!’
            ‘C’mon, Gabe.  Let me have one here.  I want him.’
            ‘For what?  What can you possibly offer him?’
Gabe’s voice was gentle, a breath on the air.
            ‘Life.  Fame.  Happiness.  That’s what he wants, Gabe.  Trust me.’
The figure beside him smiled briefly.
            ‘Trust, Nick?  You speak of trust?’
            ‘Well, OK, I’ll give you that one.’
The boy’s fingers caressed the strings of the violin, subtly altering the notes.  The plaintive sound changed, became demanding.  Commuters felt the music enter their bodies and travel to their feet.  It was hard to resist the lure of the jig.
            ‘He’s mine!’ said Nick.  ‘I need him.’
            ‘No!’
Gabe’s voice did not change but the word echoed in the street, twining around the music like a lover’s embrace.  The boy lifted his head as if he had heard.  The jig ended with a flourish and he stood, looking through the scurrying people, as if he glimpsed the couple opposite.
            ‘You always want to win,’ said Nick.
            ‘I always want what’s right.’
Nick snorted, shifting his feet on the stone pavement.  They struck hard against the stone, sending sparks into the air with a sour, sullen sound.  The boy winced.
            ‘He does not want you,’ said Gabe.
            ‘You’re not giving him a chance to find out,’ Nick challenged.
            ‘You can’t offer him anything he wants.’
Nick rounded on his companion, breath rising like steam into the air.
            ‘Are you kidding me?  I can offer him everything!’
Gabe looked across to the boy who placed the violin back beneath his chin.
            ‘It’s not what he wants.’
His voice echoed, twining around the first few notes as the boy began to play “Silent Night”.  For a moment, the air was full of strange harmonies.
            ‘And what you’re offering?  That’s what he wants?  Please!’
Nick kicked the pavement edge.  The sound splintered the air, discords breaking into the tune.  The boy’s fingers faltered.
            ‘He just wants to make music,’ said Gabe.
            ‘Whatever.  You think you can take him from me?’
Nick’s scowl seared the bricks, sent rats in the gutter scurrying for cover.
            ‘No.  The boy must choose.’
The two figures stood across the street from the boy.  He gazed at them, eyes flinching from the blinding light which surrounded Gabe.
            ‘He can’t look at you,’ said Nick, with spite.
            ‘He does not want to look at you,’ said Gabe, gently.
Gabe raised his wings.  For a moment the boy had a clear vision of paradise.  Disbelief became acceptance.  He bowed his head and played the last few notes of the carol.  The bow fell from his hands, the violin fell after, to lie broken on the pavement.  People sped by, oblivious at first, until one woman realised the boy had collapsed.  Uncertain, she glanced around for help.  A man stepped forward.
            ‘What’s wrong?’ he said.
            ‘I don’t know.  I think he’s ill.’
            ‘I’m a doctor.  Let me see.’
The man’s practised hands felt for a pulse.  He shook his head.
‘He’s so young,’ the woman said
She looked pityingly at the boy as he lay at their feet.  The doctor checked the boy’s eyes which stared blankly at the evening sky.
            ‘Pupils not reactive.  He’s gone.’
Nick growled and turned away, a column of flame unseen by the passers-by.  Gabriel opened his wings wide and gathered up the busker’s soul.  For a sliver of time, music echoed around the dull brick walls and the boy’s face was suffused with light.
            ‘Aneurism, probably,’ said the doctor.  ‘He wouldn’t know what was happening.’
Gabriel breathed words, like a whisper at the back of the mind.
            ‘He knew.  He made his choice.’

Flash fiction from a picture prompt of a half-decorated Christmas tree @faberacademy 11/12/15

If I could kill Santa, I would.  What has he ever done for me except screw up my life?  I had all the usual dreams, hopes for a career, wife, family, nice home...  But what have I got?  Zilch.  That’s what.

It sounded appealing when he first got in touch.  He was hazy on the details, murmured something about making people happy.  The job sounded OK, the hours were great.  Nothing to do for the first three months of the year.  Then a little light toy-making in Spring, bauble development in Summer and an intense period of sweet and candy production in early Autumn.  Admittedly, it got crazy for around a month from late November to the Big Day, but doable.

I signed up, hell, yes.  That’s when I discovered the downside.  You see, the thing about Santa is - he wants all the credit.  Everybody knows that what he does is impossible for one guy, right?  But he won’t share the spotlight.  The contract had a big confidentiality agreement.  No talking about the job EVER!  Do you know how that plays in real life?  I meet a nice girl, she asks what I do, I say: "Nothing".  What else can I say?  And what does she do?  Move on, that’s what.
​
I’d kill Santa if I could.  The kicker is, if anyone spills his secret, they disappear.  Gone!  The last guy was halfway through decorating the tree.  So I keep quiet.  Santa always has the last laugh.

Tweeting Bill
William Shakespeare @Wwm_Shakespeare:
Good words are better than bad strokes.
Lynne Crookes Pepper ‏@CrookesPepper  Nov 14 2015
And I've just hit my word count for today. Not sure if good but mine own
 
William Shakespeare @Wwm_Shakespeare:
How now, my headstrong, where have you been gadding?
Lynne Crookes Pepper ‏@CrookesPepper Nov 18 2015
Hairdressers, Bill. Foils and blow-dry. Be thankful they only had thumbscrews in your day.
 
William Shakespeare @Wwm_Shakespeare:
Now if you love me stay.
William Shakespeare @Wwm_Shakespeare:
Go!
Lynne Crookes Pepper ‏@CrookesPepper  Nov 23 2015
Make your mind up, Bill. Honestly.
 
William Shakespeare @Wwm_Shakespeare:
No more of that, I have noted it well.
Lynne Crookes Pepper ‏@CrookesPepper  Nov 23 2015
Just as long as you're keeping tabs, Bill. Don't want to think you're not listening.
 
William Shakespeare @Wwm_Shakespeare:
How now!
How now! do you hear this?
Lynne Crookes Pepper ‏@CrookesPepper  Nov 23 2015
Oh, Bill, I've missed you too. Was away at the weekend. No Twitter.
​
William Shakespeare @Wwm_Shakespeare:
The gifts she looks from me are pack’d and lock’d
Up in my heart, which I have given already,
But not deliver’d.
Lynne Crookes Pepper ‏@CrookesPepper  Nov 23 2015
Deliveries will only get worse on the run up to Christmas. Don't say I didn't warn you.
 
William Shakespeare @Wwm_Shakespeare:
Well, breathe awhile, and then to it again.
Lynne Crookes Pepper ‏@CrookesPepper  Nov 24 2015
As always you've cut to the heart of it, Bill. Time to gear up and start writing.

I didn’t notice her at first.  The hotel had several more interesting characters who occupied my attention.  The mahogany-tanned businessman, late fifties, paunch distressingly displayed beneath the beach umbrella, accompanied by the young mantis-thin blonde.  He read e-mails on the beach while she did her nails, yawning like a bored kitten.  She perked up each evening, after she’d downed a volume of alcohol which would have had me in a coma.  Mostly, they didn’t speak.

Less typical of this glamorised Barbadian resort were the two elderly women, stubbornly refusing to submit to the rising tropical heat, sitting uncomfortably hot in neat blouses and long skirts, embarrassed by the attentive service as if they felt themselves interlopers at a party.  I wondered about a Lottery win but something about their upright, self-conscious rectitude suggested stern disapproval of any such enterprise.  A retirement, then, or a sixtieth birthday celebration.  Maybe a sudden desire to see the world after a life spent toiling in education or the civil service.  At home, ordinary, but here, as exotic as the monkeys which patrolled the grounds of the hotel in the early morning.

I made covert notes.  People watching is a writer’s curse - noting the idiosyncrasies of our fellow humans, judging without participating.  I was happy to sit back with my rum punch and weave idle stories around my fellow guests, not caring to discover the reality of the lives I so casually scrutinised.  It was three days before I realised I was being watched myself.

The woman was unmemorable, drab even.  Small with faded brown hair, the beginning of a few strands of silver, head tilted in silent query.  She reminded me of a little brown bird, harmless and without interest.  When I caught her eye, she smiled but there was no invitation there and I found nothing to fuel my imagination.  I smiled back and dismissed her from my mind.

Next morning, I saw her again.  She had secured a shady spot in the garden and had set up a small easel.  Her head tilted as she observed the scene before her.  An artist, then.  Like me, an observer.  I hesitated for a moment before approaching, curious to know what she was painting.  I strolled casually across the lawn to stand a pace behind her, grateful of the shade from the lush hedge of tropical foliage which shielded us from the brazen sun.

She did not turn, but spoke in the manner of a college lecturer:
‘Nerium oleander, a member of the dogbane family.  A food source of the caterpillars of the polka-dot wasp moth, Syntomeida epilais, native to the Caribbean although the oleander is not.’

I inspected her painting.  She had captured the leathery texture of the plant’s leaves perfectly, creating a grey-green backdrop for the delicate pale pink flowers.  I felt I could reach across and pluck a bloom from the canvas.

‘It’s beautiful,’ I said.  ‘I hope you don’t mind my curiosity?’

‘Curiosity is a gift,’ she replied.  ‘Or, sometimes, a curse.  Which do you find it?’

I was startled.  The question seemed too probing for our casual encounter. My interest piqued, I moved forward.  Her face was hidden under the brim of the white straw hat she wore so I could get no sense of her intention in quizzing me.

‘A gift,’ I replied.  ‘I’m a writer and curiosity is a necessary tool.’

‘Curiosity allied with imagination.  A dangerous combination.’

She leaned forward to place a streak of deeper pink along the base of one petal while I puzzled over this reply.  The flower, already life-like, took on almost a hyper-real effect.  I could swear it fluttered in the breeze.  Before I could respond, she glanced sideways up at me, dark brown eyes boring into mine as if she read deep into my soul.  She nodded once, as if a question had been answered.

‘A gift, then.  I hope you always find it so.’

I stood, bewildered, the conversation surreal under the merciless sun.  The woman returned to her painting, placing delicate strokes of subtle colour with an artist’s touch.  She seemed to have nothing further to say and finally I turned away, oddly disturbed.

It was a relief to return to the beach and join the others baking and browning beneath the Caribbean sun.  The jewelled sea, kingfisher blue, calmed my unease, washing away the lingering oddness of the encounter.  I settled to my customary role of observer, watching the businessman, stretched like a walrus on the shore, as the blonde rubbed sun lotion into the broad expanse of his back, her nose wrinkled in disgust, scarlet nails as threatening as talons.  Nearby, the two elderly ladies whispered together beneath their parasol, one seeming to wipe a few tears from her eyes.  Sand, I thought, fine grains lifted by the onshore breeze.

Later I watched the businessman drink mojitos, green mint leaves verdant as emeralds among the frozen diamonds of the shattered ice.  Celebrating, I guessed, or merely desperate for the oblivion of alcohol.  He usually drank wine.  Beyond, I was intrigued to see that one of the elderly ladies had also ordered a mojito.  She stared at her glass, mesmerised, while her companion sipped water and absent-mindedly stroked her friend’s hand, like a mother soothing her child.
​
Hesitating over my own order, tempted by the iced mojitos, I heard a choking gasp.  The elderly lady fought for breath, her companion soothing, tears sliding down her cheeks.  A new sound drew my attention away.  The businessman clutched his chest, pale under the leathered tan, his blonde partner wide-eyed but oddly detached before his obvious agony.  The world seemed to tilt, things I had observed taking on a new significance.  As staff rushed to help the two dying guests, I looked for the artist.  Under the cold light of the rising moon her face was a graven mask and I remembered the one thing I knew about the oleander plant.  It is highly toxic and deadly if eaten.