Clyde Laffan

“Call Me Sean” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #235

Sean runs down the rear stairs from his small apartment, stopping at the bottom to check his shoelaces. “I’m just going for a run,” he tells himself, as though hearing the words out loud makes his intentions truthful. And in part, what he tells himself is the truth. Sean runs most Saturdays; as the saying goes, rain, hail or shine. Today, however, is different. And Sean knows it. Still, lying to himself is easier than facing the truth. Sean tightens his shoelaces. He raises his left foot, landing the heel of his trainer on the third step f...

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“Jack & Jack” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #203

Jack & Jack Even before the gnarled knuckles of his brother’s right hand grazed the side of Jack's nose, Jack knew his brother Jack would hit him. Luckily for Jack, his reflexes were fast enough for him to roll his head back and miss the king hit. Jack's brother was blood red with rage and anger. Fair enough, figured Jack. From the outside, what he'd done was brutal but, in Jack's opinion, necessary. What surprised Jack was his brother's left knee, which was raised, so when Jack swerved to miss the fist, he drove himself into his bro...

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“My Hamster Massacred My Family” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #165

“Hey kid, no one blames you for this butchery, you know that don’t you?” The police lady speaking to Sam chews gum at a nervous rate of repetitions, picking dirt from under her painted fingernails as she does so; anything to avoid eye contact. She is as round as a beach ball, so round the top button of her khaki pants is unfastened. Her red hair is short, like the Marine sergeants Sam idolizes in war movies he and his dad stream. Marine sergeants, however, don’t wear pink lipstick. She smells too, but not like the girls Sam knows, which is j...

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“The Camp (Part Two)” by Clyde Laffan

Contain some coarse language and derogatory language "I remember. Okay, Jake? I will count backwards from 10 and then say the words I remember. When I do, I want you to remember Jake. I want you to take us back to the night you sat around the campfire, at Cedar Creek, with the other boy scouts, and you told a ghost story about a boy who discovered his own body. When done, you ran into the bush and disappeared for nine months." Barry, the hypnotist, takes two steps back from Jake and surveys the faces in the room. There's the Detective wit...

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“The Camp (Part 1)” by Clyde Laffan

PART 1 Jake opens his eyes. The light is blinding, forcing him to blink, rapidly several times until the shock subsides, and he focuses on the faces. He's unsure how many, but he sees two to begin with. The others, more distant, are blurred, ghosts caught in the windscreen of a speeding car, obscured by midnight rain. None were familiar, yet their familiarity gave him comfort; skin tones, their roundness, two ears and eyes, a single mouth and nose - human features that told him he was safe. At last. Am I? Who am I? Where am I? He cou...

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“No Strings Attached” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #138

Lee fills the picnic basket with more small goods than they can possibly eat in an afternoon: a truffle-spiked duck liver parfait, olives stuffed with Spanish anchovies, venison salami, imported Brie, oat crackers, and chocolate chip cookies. He takes a chilled bottled of Chardonnay, one he'd set aside for a special occasion, and places it in the wicker picnic basket loaned to him by his boss Helen. He changes the sheets, vacuums the carpet, scrubs the toilet, removes stray hairs from the bathroom sink, waters his houseplant and empties the...

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“Live and Let Die” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #137

With deliberate intention, Adrian Wallis had not answered the door to a caller in 30 years. Unless he needed a plumber to fix a leaking pipe or the gas man to read the meter, there was no reason to take visitors. And if a faucet did need mending, then Adrian supervised closely; no need for wandering eyes or feet, stumbling across a man's secrets. So, when the doorbell did ring on a Sunday morning towards the end of November, the jolt of surprise was enough for Adrian to drop the newspaper he read onto his lap. Several pages came loose and fe...

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“Stick to the Plan” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #136

I dunno if I should be telling you all this. Ma warned me if I go blabbing to folks like you, then others in these parts may say I've lost my marbles or some-such-thing. “Remember what happened to Billy Sanders,” she had said, then whispered, “God hates a sinner.” I promised to keep my mouth shut, and I did, but when I was awoken this morning from a fitful sleep by a flock of loud, squawking cockatoos perched outside my window, I knew I needed to reveal all. I’ll be quick. The doctor, the one with the crew cut and clipboard, will make his ro...

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“Eggs” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #134

    Eggs wasn't his name; I made that up after we had gone our separate ways, never to see each other again. From this distance - and time here is the geography; this story is 30 years old - some details are scant; pieces are missing, and I appear as a stranger even to myself. I remember the boy on the beach, the girl in the pink skirt and the sugar. Those parts of the story are clear.We had caught the same flight from London to Bangkok. For Eggs, Thailand was his destination; I was on a stop-over before returning home to...

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“A Lot Can Happen in Five Minutes” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #132

 CONTENT WARNING; STRONG LANGUAGE, SEX SCENES “11 minutes sir, until impact, that’s what CNN says.” Sir cowers on all fours, placing his desk between him and the nuclear warhead that is now minutes away from turning our school into a barbecue pit. He pokes his phone’s darkened screen hard with his index finger, tap, tap, tap. He’s trying to call his wife or kids or something; I doubt he has a mistress, not Sir. He’s going to tell them he loves them, apologise for being a lousy dad and a crap husband, sorry yet again for having ere...

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“The Smell of Hotdogs” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #112

Darcy grips the steering wheel of his Porsche Boxster so tightly his knuckles are white under his clammy skin. He zooms south, down the 101 with nail-biting recklessness, oblivious to the downpour swamping the City of Angels. The rain is Biblical and as hard as nails, hammering the windscreen with a smashing velocity, the noise so thunderous Darcy cannot hear himself think. He licks his lips, savoring the taste of blood that lingers and decides the best course of action right now is to cry, "WHAT THE FUCK!"  Screaming makes him feel hu...

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“The Girl with all the Tattoos” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #111

    "So, you are there," Jesse yelled, looking skywards. "I suppose I should be grateful you stopped the rain! Hallelujah!" For three days, Jesse and her friends huddled under a tarpaulin, sheltering from the elements. The Heaven's closing was nice, but it was no blessing. And it did not change Jesse's mood, which was best described as mad. They were in a pickle, and there would be no praising the Good Lord today. So: They were on the run; an evil person called The White Man was hunting them; they had escaped the Nest, w...

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“Lady Luck” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #110

WARNING! CONTAINS SOME COARSE LANGUAGE, VIOLENCE & SEXUAL REFERENCES. Lady Luck By Clyde Laffan     Danny had never hitchhiked before. Neither had Will, and it was his idea. One he would regret until his dying day, which was not too far off.  The two laid in bed, planning their move to Hollywood. Will was excited about hitchhiking; "We'll just be like Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassidy from On The Road." "I don't know who they are," his boyfriend lied. Danny lacked Will's enthusiasm. He picked up his phone and s...

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“Dave and the Monster” by Clyde Laffan

Submitted to Contest #109

 For optimum health and well-being, scientists agreed, after much discussion and a little trial and error, that the Monster should be fed nine pounds of meat every two hours. Many years ago, studies revealed the Monster to be a strict carnivore with a high metabolic rate and small stomach. Many terrestrial animals share similar traits. Take vultures, for example. They, too, are carnivores with fast metabolisms and tiny stomachs. However, birds of prey consume meat in various guises of decay, from roadkill to a maggot-infested carca...

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“The House” by Clyde Laffan

3 Redfern Tce, Arthurs Point New Zealand +64 211931114 Darrenclovell@gmail.com 2949 words The House By Clyde Laffan I am the only one who can hear the screams escape into the dark corners of the universe, free from the terror of what was the basement.  The neighbours, framing the burning house through the lenses on their phones, only hear the wailing of fire trucks dispatched to save the unsavable. That, and the crackling roar of the fire that now consumes the old house. This nightmare started ...

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