by Peter Wild
‘Sorry,’ Craig says. ‘I wasn’t laughing at you. I just thought of something funny.’
‘Good for you,’ Emma says.
She touches the tree, running her hand up and down it, her back to him.
‘Someone should tell those wind chimes to shut the fuck up,’ she says.
‘I’m sorry,’ Craig says. ‘I love you.’
He sounds like a greeting card. Maybe everything he says from now on should be a rhyme. He could wear a T-shirt with a wide-eyed pink kitten on the front, and go round Piccadilly Gardens saying things like ‘Hope your day is filled with wonder and cheer / You make me happy whenever you’re near’. He’d probably get chased around by lads. Beaten up outside the Burger King.
She doesn’t say it back. She says, ‘Let’s go.’
Craig is unsure whether she means ‘Let’s go home’ or ‘Let’s go and look at the grave’.
‘Look, I’m sorry,’ he says. I hope your day is filled with wonder and cheer. ‘My life isn’t working out how I imagined,’ he says.
She sighs.
‘I’m getting a bit sick of your melodrama,’ she says.
‘Fuck’s sake,’ he says.
You make me happy whenever you’re near.
Later on they will go to Craig’s room and lie on a bed and hammer the final coffin nails into their relationship and then start to cry and say irreversible things and look on the Internet for the number of a local taxi firm.
But first Emma starts to walk back towards the grave and Craig follows her. The goth couple have left their bunch of flowers and gone home. It’s about to rain. They go up and have a look. Emma’s seen it before. It’s Craig’s first time. He doesn’t know what he was expecting, but this isn’t it. This is just a grave. An average-looking grey headstone, with carved white lettering. There’s no quote or lyrics. Craig was at least expecting lyrics or something. And it has his first name on it, too; he feels strange, he wasn’t expecting that.
‘I can’t imagine he’s actually buried here,’ Craig says.
He stands on the bit of grass that’s still newer looking than the rest. Six feet below his feet, apparently, is a coffin with Morrissey’s body in it.
‘All those people, all those lives, where are they now?’ Emma says.
‘What was that?’
‘Nothing.’
Contributors
Jenn Ashworth was born in Preston, studied in Cambridge and Manchester, and divides her time between her job as a prison librarian and her writing. Her blog www.jennashworth.blogspot.com won the 2008 Manchester Blog Awards, and her first novel–A Kind of Intimacy–is out with Arcadia.
Matt Beaumont has written six novels. His favourite Smiths song is ‘Asleep’. His favourite vegetable is peas.
Rhonda Carrier has always felt Mancunian but only became so, in an honorary capacity, three years ago, when she moved there with her husband, the novelist Conrad Williams, and her young sons. Although she works mainly as a travel writer, Rhonda, who was born in the Midlands in 1968, has had her short fiction appear in a wide variety of publications, including Neonlit: the Time Out Book of New Writing II, the Time Out Book of London Short Stories, Image magazine, the French Literary Review and ’68, New Stories from Children of the Revolution.
James Flint (www.jamesflint.net) is the author of the novels Habitus, 52 Ways to Magic America which won the Amazon.co.uk Bursary Award for the year 2000; and The Book of Ash, winner of a 2003 Arts Council Writers’ Award. He has also published a short story collection, Soft Apocalypse–Twelve Tales from the Turn of the Millennium. His short fiction has appeared in collections published by Penguin Books, the New English Library and the ICA. When it was published in France in 1992, Habitus was judged among the top five foreign novels of that year’s Rentrée Littéraire. In 2002 one of Flint’s stories (‘The Nuclear Train’) was filmed for Channel 4 by the director Dan Saul. Flint also scripted the film installation Little Earth (www.londonfieldworks.com/ little/main.html). In December 2006, Flint took a full-time position as Arts and Features Editor (Digital) at the Telegraph Media Group. In 2007 he oversaw the set-up and launch of Telegraph Earth. He is currently General Manager of Telegraph TV.
David Gaffney is the author of two collections of short stories, Sawn-off Tales and Aromabingo, and the novel, Never, Never. He lives in Manchester. See www.davidgaffney.co.uk.
Mike Gayle is the author of a whole bunch of books including the novels: My Legendary Girlfriend, Mr Commitment, Turning Thirty, Dinner For Two, His ’n’ Hers, Brand New Friend, Wish You Were Here, The Life and Soul of the Party and one non-fiction work entitled The To Do List based around the year in his life that he spent attempting to tackle a 1,277 item long to-do list. His journalism has appeared in the Guardian, The Times and the Daily Telegraph as well as FHM, and Girl Talk (the number one read for eight-year-old girls). Google him at your peril.
James Hopkin has lived in Manchester (the blue side), Berlin and Kraków, not to mention a few other towns, ports and dosshouses across Europe. His first novel, Winter under Water, is now out in paperback, as is a small book of two stories, Even the Crows Say Kraków. His new novel, Say Goodbye to Breakfast, is coming soon.
Nic Kelman is a novelist and non-fiction writer living in New York City. His first novel, girls, was an international bestseller published in the UK by Serpent’s Tail. His second book, Video Game Art, the first art history of video games, is available worldwide. He writes short stories and essays for a variety of publications and anthologies.
Chris Killen was born in 1981 and is currently living in Manchester. His first novel, The Bird Room, was published in early 2009. He also writes a blog: www.dayofmoustaches.blogspot.com.
Alison MacLeod grew up in Canada and has lived in England since 1987. She has published two novels, The Changeling and The Wave Theory of Angels. Her short fiction has been published in a variety of magazines and collections, and her story collection, Fifteen Modern Tales of Attraction, was released in 2007. She is the recipient of the 2008 Olive Cook Award for Short Fiction, and teaches English and Creative Writing at the University of Chichester. She lives in Brighton. For more information about her work, see www.alison-macleod.com.
Mil Millington is an English author with vaguely girlish wrists. He was named by the Guardian as one of the Top Five Debut Novelists of 2002 and has now written four books, the latest being Instructions for Living Someone Else’s Life. He is also the founder of the cult website thingsmygirlfriendandihavearguedabout.com and co-founder of the even cultier theweekly.co.uk. He writes for various newspapers and magazines and he is not remotely above appearing on radio or television to mouth off on subjects he knows nothing about. Mil lives in the West Midlands with his girlfriend and their two children.
Jeff Noon was born in Manchester. He was trained in the visual arts, and was musically active in the punk scene before starting to write plays for the theatre. His first novel, Vurt, was published in 1993 and went on to win the Arthur C. Clarke Award. His other books include Automated Alice, Pixel Juice, Needle in the Groove and Falling Out of Cars. His plays include Woundings, The Modernists and Dead Code.
Gina Ochsner is the author of a book of stories, People I Wanted to Be and a novel, The Russian Dreambook of Colour and Flight. She is now writing a novel set in Latvia.
Catherine O’Flynn’s first novel, What Was Lost, won the Costa First Novel Award 2007. She lives and writes in the middle of England. She very much hopes The Smiths never reform.
Kate Pullinger’s books include The Mistress of Nothing and A Little Stranger (both published by Serpent’s Tail), Weird Sister and The Last Time I Saw Jane and the short story collections My Life as a Girl in a Men’s Prison and Tiny Lies. Her current digital fiction projects include her multiple award-winning collaboration with Chris Joseph on Inanimate Alice, a multimedia episodic digital fiction–www.inanimatealice.com–and Flight Paths–www.flightpaths. net–a networked novel, created on and through the Internet. Kate Pullinger is Reader in Creative Wr
iting and New Media at De Montfort University. Find her online at www.katepullinger.com.
Graham Rae, originally from Falkirk in Scotland, is now resident in the Chicago suburbs. He lives there with his lovely wife Ellen, their beautiful toddler daughter Fiona Leah, and their dignified old man cat Bailey. First published in America at the age of eighteen in the horror film magazine Deep Red. Graham has also written for Cinefantastique and American Cinematographer, though how he managed this from Falkirk without a cinematic background he is still not entirely sure. The thirty-nine-year-old has also written for the English literary journal Pen Pusher and www.laurahird.com, among others. ‘Back to the Old House’ is his first published short story. He has also just finished his first novel.
Jeremy Sheldon is the author of two works of fiction, The Comfort Zone and The Smiling Affair.
Nick Stone is the author of Mr Clarinet and King of Swords. His favourite Smiths album is Strangeways, Here We Come.
Scarlett Thomas was born in London in 1972. Her novels include Bright Young Things, Going Out, PopCo and The End of Mr Y, which has been translated into twenty-two languages, and was longlisted for the Orange Prize. In 2001 she was included in the Independent on Sunday’s list of the UK’s 20 best young writers. She currently teaches English Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Kent.
Born and raised in Reno, Nevada, Willy Vlautin has published two novels, The Motel Life and Northline. Vlautin founded the band Richmond Fontaine in 1994. The band has produced seven studio albums to date, plus a handful of live recordings and EPs. Vlautin currently resides in Scappoose, Oregon, and is working on Richmond Fontaine’s eighth album and his third novel. An avid fan of horse racing, Vlautin can often be found writing behind a closed circuit monitor at Portland Meadows racetrack.
Helen Walsh is the author of two novels, Brass and Once Upon a Time in England. She lives on Merseyside.
Peter Wild is the co-author of Before the Rain, and the editor of The Flash, Perverted by Language: Fiction inspired by The Fall and The Empty Page: Fiction inspired by Sonic Youth (published by Social Disease and Serpent’s Tail, respectively).
Charlie Williams’s novels Deadfolk, Fags and Lager, King of the Road and Stairway to Hell are published by Serpent’s Tail. He has had many short stories published across various genres and has lately branched out into screenplays, his first short film ARK getting some attention on the festival circuit. He lives in Worcester with his wife and two children. Read more at www.charliewilliams.net.
John Williams lives and works in his hometown of Cardiff. His latest book is a biography of Michael X. He is currently at work on a book about the early years of Shirley Basset, of which he suspects Morrissey might approve.
Acknowledgements
The editor would like to thanks: The Smiths, John Williams, Pete Ayrton, Anna-Marie Fitzgerald, Niamh Murray, Ruthie Petrie, Janine Bullman, Simon Trewin, David Gaffney, Sarah Hymas and all at Litfest, Richard Evans, Nick Johnstone, Conrad Williams, Dave Swann, Matthew David Scott, Hannah Westland, Alex Holroyd, Jessica Axe, Angela Robertson, Anna Frame, Nicola Barker, Lil Gary, Pam Ribbeck, Merck Mercuriadis, Alison MacLeod, Matt Thorne, Laura Hird, Jess Walters, Jeanette Perez, Alberto Rojas and all at HarperCollins, Chris Killen, Sally Cook and all at No Point in Not Being Friends and, as always, Louisa, Harriet, Samuel & Martha.
About the Editor
PETER WILD is the coauthor of Before the Rain, and the editor of Perverted by Language: Fiction Inspired by The Fall and The Flash. His fiction has appeared in numerous journals, e-zines, anthologies, and magazines, including Dogmatika, 3:AM Magazine, NOÖ Journal, SNReview, Word Riot, Straight from the Fridge, Thieves Jargon, Pindel-dyboz, Pen Pusher, Scarecrow, The Beat, Litro, and Dreams That Money Can Buy. He also runs the literary blog Bookmunch.wordpress.com. He lives in Manchester with his wife and three children.
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ALSO EDITED BY PETER WILD
Noise: Fiction Inspired by Sonic Youth
Credits
Cover design by Milan Bozic
Cover photograph © Stephen Wright/Getty Images
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
PLEASE. Collection copyright © 2009, 2010 by Peter Wild. Copyright © 2009, 2010 for individual stories held by the contributor. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
EPub Edition © January 2010 ISBN: 9780061978470
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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