Short Story: Camelot
Note: This story is not suitable for children.
Sam has spent 67 years searching for his brother, who was shot down over France in 1943. All he has to go on is a dream of his brother in a ruined castle, and the knowledge that his brother would never have abandoned him if their positions were reversed.
But now Sam is running out of places to search, and when he meets a strange woman, he starts to dream of things that never happened. His search is coming to its end, and the truth may be very different to that which Sam believed.
Coming soon in Interzone.
Read the opening...
Camelot (Extract)
When she finds me, I’m half-sitting, half-slouched, butt propped against the bonnet of my chunky old Volvo estate, shoulders hunched, flicking away madly at my fifty pence lighter, roll-up hanging from my mouth, boots still unlaced. Dignified, right? But sometimes the need takes you, and it doesn’t matter where you are or what you’re doing, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
I need a fag, and that’s that.
And, let’s face it, it’s not like it’s going to kill me.
The bonnet is still hot under my arse, and that’s something to be grateful for, because today’s bitch cold. The Volvo’s heater broke weeks ago, and I haven’t a clue how to fix it. My bones hurt.
I finally coax a flame out of the lighter. I take a drag and feel the smoke burn its way down into my lungs. Now that’s what I call central heating. I’d say it’s better than sex, but to be honest, it’s been so long since the latter that I can’t remember.
When I open my eyes, a whole coach load of fucking Japanese tourists have drawn up and are piling out, right into my view. Fantastic.
It’s while I’m watching them that she sidles up to me. Must have come from the other end of the car, because the first I know of it, she’s taking the fag out of my fingers and lighting one of her own with the end. She returns mine with a half shrug--very Gallic--then settles beside me.
“It never is,” she says.
Which is a funny fucking opening gambit, if you ask me. If it’s supposed to be a come-on, it’s not exactly ‘do you come here often’. But, to be honest, she doesn’t exactly need the lines. She’s gorgeous. Hair as black as burnt wood and cascading to the small of her back, which in turn sends the eyes you know where, and once I’m there, well, I’m not looking away in a hurry.
“Isn’t what?” I say, eyes still firmly where they shouldn’t be.
“Camelot,” she says. “It’s never Camelot.”
Publication Details
Soon to be published in Interzone.