Lindsay Burns

“No Need to Explain” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #274

It’s not easy to explain living on the outside of a blue globe to something that has always lived inside a brown box, so it’s probably better not to bother. But more about this later.Gina Thomas walked down her street—an ordinary street with ordinary terraced houses and minuscule front gardens—and walked up the path of her far-from-ordinary end of terrace. A little boy that always kicked a football against her side wall asked her for the umpteenth time if she was a witch. Gina swished up to her door in her long green cardigan and didn’t both...

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“Let Me Out” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #272

Thud, thud, thud. There it was again, the noise from the attic. ‘Did you hear that?,’ Amber asked her husband, not for the first time.‘It’ll be the pipes knocking,’ Andy always said, ‘because of all the long, lazy baths you have when I’m not here.’ Although she’d tried to convince herself he was right, and even though over time she’d almost taught herself to ignore it, Amber couldn’t help feeling a sense of relief that their time in the old cottage was almost up. Just a few boxes left to pack…just one more night… ‘Well, that’s the attic empt...

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“From Beginning to End” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #264

The Proposal‘Yes…yes I will!’, said Lizzie. She’d never forget this day, this proposal, on top of a hill overlooking the town that she loved. The wind almost blew the tiny jewellery box out of her boyfriend’s…fiancé’s…hand. A simple solitaire, exactly what she would have chosen. It had only been a year, but he knew her so well. ‘Let’s not wait,’ said Rick. ‘Let’s get married this Christmas.’ Lizzie hesitated. That would only give them six months. It would be freezing in December, raining perhaps, but then again, this far north, the same coul...

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“Going Round in Circles” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #252

‘So, tell me, doctor, what is the difference between obsession and addiction? Because I’m not sure.’Dr Edmond put his finger to his mouth. He always did that when he was struggling for an answer.‘Well,’ he said, crossing his legs, ‘why don’t you tell me what you think the difference is, Francis?’He always did that as well. Sometimes Frankie wondered why she was paying for these therapy sessions when the doctor had her doing all the work.‘I’ll have to mull it over it and get back to you,’ she said, looking at her watch. ‘My time’s up.’***It t...

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“The Same, but Different” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #249

Who would have guessed that at this pivotal moment in her life, Cassie would be running? Not her, certainly not her friends. And yet here she was. Friday evenings had been the same at Cassie’s house for a long, long time. In from work, shoes kicked off, oven turned on, cat fed, ready meal and box set. But a chance meeting on a Friday morning had changed all that. ‘Gosh, I’m so sorry,’ said Cassie. She’d sauntered through her little gate with her face in her phone and her head in the clouds, and barged straight into the only person that happe...

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“A Day to Remember” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #241

‘Daniel, your phone’s ringing!,’ shouted Lisa up the stairs, holding the phone in one hand and hanging onto her Jack Russel’s collar with the other, trying to thwart his attempts to dash up the stairs. She didn’t recognise the phone number, with its triple digits at the end. ‘He’s in the shower,’ called her daughter Sophie from her bedroom. The phone stopped ringing, so Lisa went back through to the kitchen to finish her breakfast. A glance at the clock told her she should have already left for work by now. Two minutes later, as she was...

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“Guilty until Proven Innocent” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #218

Smooth, silky, cool to the touch. The piano keys had the same feel as the varnish her daughter had insisted on painting on Esther’s nails the night before. The nail varnish may have felt unfamiliar, but the piano she knew by heart, and the delicate sound of the notes carried Esther to another place. As her long fingers slid across the black and white keys, she was no longer just the cleaner taking her break in the sumptuous library of someone else’s house. She was in a magnificent dance hall in a different time and place, waltzing in a red d...

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“Come Fly with Me” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #206

‘Can’t we just have a luxury staycation? Apparently it’s going to be a hot summer.’ Sadie was casting around for excuses but Will was having none of it. ‘It’s more than a holiday, Sadie, it’s our honeymoon. And if my Nan wants to pay for our flights and hotel, then I want to go somewhere special.’ Sadie sighed and leaned her head on his shoulder, her eyes following the white trails across the blue sky, relieved she was sitting in her garden and not in one of the planes way overhead. He had a point, she knew. But after three years together, h...

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“Lost and Found” by Lindsay Burns

Marie lay in her bed, eyes stubbornly closed, though she was well aware of the moonlight filtering through her eyelids. A squint at her watch told her it was midnight, an hour after she’d last checked it as she’d tossed and turned, struggling to nod off even though she’d been on the go since early morning. Pushing the covers back, she dragged herself to the window and gasped at the beauty of the moon, full and yellow, and so big she thought she might almost be able to touch it. After a few minutes studying its craters and shadows, Marie relu...

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“Tunnel Vision” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #203

The well-worn soles of Katie’s trainers slammed down on the gravel track, the cold, damp air that she was desperately swallowing threatening to blow her lungs apart. It was funny to her, what she was thinking about in those crucial seconds, about how she was running so fast she felt like she could almost take off, and about how odd it was that the pounding of her feet had managed to synchronise itself with the hammering of her heart. She was paying less and less attention to the footsteps behind her, the ones that only a hundred metres ago h...

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“Getting a Taste for It” by Lindsay Burns

Hannah never said anything to anyone about anything. Not ever. Discreet was how everyone described her. ‘My lips are sealed,’ she’d say, in response to requests to keep a secret. At their habitual Friday night dinner out, while her friends oohed and aahed over tawdry titbits of gossip about people she neither knew nor cared about, she resorted to reading the news on her phone. It was distasteful to her. She was above all that. Until that Monday in April. She’d not been cleaning for the Davidson’s for long. It was the third house in her clea...

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“In Unexpected Places” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #199

Rose’s dad had constantly reminded his daughter to hold her head high. ‘Look like you’re proud of yourself, for goodness’ sake,’ he’d say, only just clinging onto his patience. As a child eager to please, Rose had reluctantly raised up her chin. As an indifferent teenager she’d simply ignored him. As a young adult she’d come back at him. ‘Do you really think I’d get from A to B if I looked up as little as you seem to think?’ Of course, Rose did look down quite a lot. Not due to shyness, or shame, or fear. None of those things. It was becaus...

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“The Olive Tree” by Lindsay Burns

Submitted to Contest #175

Cara stood up, shovel in hand, and leant against its splintering wooden handle. Towering above her diminutive grandma, Cara smiled to herself as Sally inspected the hole she had just dug, crouching down and scraping around the edges of it with her trowel. Cara was suddenly struck by the bones outlined beneath Sally’s t-shirt, convinced that she could see the pale spring sunshine shining right through her. ‘What’s up Gran, not quite right?’ Cara enquired, flashing Sally a grin. Sally carried on scraping away, flicking the fragrant damp soil...

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