Duckie Carson

“See You At Snowfall” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #68

“It won’t be long,” I told him while avoiding eye contact.  Murmurs of George Harrison’s ‘All Things Must Pass’ from the car radio, and Elijah’s shallow breaths, where the only sounds. We sat in a dirtied cream sedan, parked up next to an empty gas station exactly fifteen miles from our hometown. It was 4:35 in the morning and the soft breeze was strong enough to blow fallen strands of hair across my cheeks. But, not heavy enough to cool down my body, and conscience, from Elijah’s scorching gaze. Sun rays had begun to pierce through t...

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“A City Of Lonesome Living” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #59

I thought I knew what I was doing. I believed to resolve my problems would mean leaving them behind. Temporarily forgetting them to live in a place overflowing with culture. A place void of the people I once knew.  My head teetered against the wall of the tube. Sunken brown eyes piercing reflections in the grubby window beside me. Parents huffed as their kids climbed over seats, playing ‘the floor is lava.’ Reminding me of my own infancy. The days spent with my brother and I pinching at my mum’s nerves, jumping atop of the couch cushi...

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“The Faultless Town That Is, Portico Mill” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #59

Portico Mill, a town of gossips, churchgoers and gloom. My parents, unfortunately for me, held all three qualities. Sundays were spent in church fawning over the Bible. Saturdays were spent with my mother’s ‘friends’ discussing the town’s failed marriages and reckless kids. Every day of the week was spent with a stiff spine and stoic expressions. It had been a year since my older brother, Ben, left for university and refused to visit over the summer. Every other night my younger sister and I would wait by the telephone hung on the kitchen wa...

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“Doris' Blunder” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #57

Ever since I released the painting, bile fills my cheeks daily. It hangs in the museum, along with some others, framed by gold and copper. Brushstrokes of navy blues, murky greens and burgundy reds form the quaint painting of a forest. Towards the middle of the picture, four witches standing in the shape of a crescent snicker and dance. Getting their own back on the people who chose to wrongly murder them. Their gowns are black and drag across dotted muck. Faces are covered by veils and the shadows of the moon. The more I stare at it the mor...

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“Above The Riot, In Flat 403” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #56

Raindrops slice through swollen eyelids as I prop myself against a printing shop’s gritty wall opposite to the, now completely alight, police station. Each thud of my sunken heart remains the only reminder of reality while I patrol every ripple of smoke greeting the failed summer’s air. A delusional part of me believed the downpour of rain could be enough to erase the fire altogether. I stand corrected. Hues of vicious red, whispered yellow and manipulating peach peel back wallpaper to bite at the hidden corners of interrogation rooms. ...

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“A Desolate Womb ” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #55

Charlie rests against the unsteady railing of the hotel’s balcony while his wife, Diane, patrols the sea’s waves from her place on a torn-up sun lounge. Diane’s ankle-length mint skirt surrounds her hips in order for the milky flesh of her legs to bronze, the first three buttons on her cream satin blouse fall unsealed to the side, allowing sunbeams to tap at her collarbones as well as the swells of her breasts. Brown, oversized, square sunglasses are propped on her nose, while French tipped toenails dig into the cushioned chair beneath her, ...

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“Could Love Be Enough?” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #55

The fly on the wall would tell you Grace was out of place sitting amongst eight burly men in a private, cornered off, section of the Speakeasy. When they first arrived Marcus told her to order herself a drink on their tab and try not to speak to many people; even he knew she didn’t belong here with him. It seems the minute she was spotted with her fingertips latched with his, her name was already tainted. Marcus and Grace had been dating for only a couple of weeks yet they were smitten with each other. At first glance Grace was aware Ma...

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“For Sally.” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #55

“Can you keep a secret?” Sally asked, one autumn evening. We had been sat in the waiting room for the last half hour waiting for information about her father, Brian. He had left the house, for reasons unknown, but he never returned on time. Instead, her mother, Louise, received a call from the hospital. Apparently, his brakes had failed to work so he went barreling into a convenience store a couple towns away. At the time, Sally and I were sitting on kerbs waiting for the cars to cover us in the rainwater from the road’s puddles, making...

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“Babybell and the Rollies” by Duckie Carson

It was a mistake. I know that now.I suppose it only took numerous sleepless nights, spent envisioning his face of distraught as I walked from the tour bus that held the history of our love, to finally grasp what I had done. So many mornings, starting with berry lips pressed upon sweaty necks, forgotten with only myself to blame. Kenny was the first to support my photography; he always wore his best shirts on stage so my eye refused to miss him. Being front centre of the stage and beaming charisma also made it difficult not to pictu...

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“To Kiss The Lips Of A Past Lover ” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #54

The storm outside had only gained more aggression as the day went on. What was supposed to be a quiet summers day turned into a thunder storm with lightning stabbing soil. Amber had spent the morning grooming the horses at the stable to prepare them for an evening trot over the stream. She had arrived back at the farm a week ago, surprising herself by finding time amid her busy London schedule. Amber hadn’t visited home since the day she left school, her internship stealing her from the family house. To say her parents were happy to have her...

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“The Queen Of Seldon College” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #54

Maggie failed to be startled at the news of her redundancy, the premonition had kept her awake many nights, but the call for a change of lifestyle had her feeling utterly lost. Searching the web night and day for a new career path seemed useless with her lack of work experience. From the age of fourteen she had worked in the same local coffee shop, even meeting her wife at one of the many tables she religiously tidied, keeping her bills paid until a couple weeks after her thirty third birthday. Maggie’s wife, Penelope, supported her during h...

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“Don't leave the house during a blizzard. ” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #52

Each snowflake pierces the tender skin along my cheeks with every slam of my heel on the frozen pavement. Tears that escaped due to frosty air, only minutes ago, turn to icicles mid drip beneath stinging eyes. No matter how much I dig my lips into my scarf they refuse to go back to the berry pink they once were. Instead, emanating fatigue within the violet blues. I head towards the nearest shop I can find in hopes of warmth as well as craving to feel my limbs again. I glance to my left, through a squint, attention aimed towards a bright blue...

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“Llandudno, hold me ” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #51

Waves of tranquility tease rocks, as well as my periwinkle painted toes, balancing on Llandudno’s shore. The spray of sea salt cools down sun scorches sizzling upon my skinny ankles. My urge to wade beneath the water reminds me of the many times, during my infancy, curiosity taunted me closer towards the shiny blue depths before my mother yanked me from stumbling too far. A time when my nose, not yet bumped, and cheeks, void of any blemishes, covered themselves ruby with the Welsh golden rays. Smudges of sun cream stained the straps of ...

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“A tear for the starry night lovers. ” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #51

Norah’s dress hid her lower body, seated near the edge of a pond, with golden hair cascading down her back as she tilts her chin towards the stars. A summers breath rubbed curls along the pillows of her cheeks, copper eyes welcoming specs of glitter decorating a coat of black. Numbness she once felt escapes her to be replaced by the serene sensation discovered in the back garden.  “Nor, it’s getting chilly. You shouldn’t be out here with no jacket.” The rasp in William’s voice rolls goosebumps along her arms, just as the tenderness po...

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“Mischief in the treehouse. ” by Duckie Carson

Submitted to Contest #50

One afternoon, during a summer of young adventuring and cut knees, five of us headed off toward the murky river. Passers by would see a group of eleven year olds galavanting to what they assumed was a park, unaware of our hidden place beneath the trees. We had found it mid May, visiting almost every day, even decorating the place as our own. School art drawings hung on to arms of wood balancing upon tree branches sixteen feet above the forest floor. Jagged gaps in the wood, which one of us would scrape the skin of arms or legs on, acting as ...

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