TMA 01 Part 1
Prompt: What’s in your
pocket?
Cluster words sweets, fluff, bus pass, money, hankie,
ticket, wallet, drugs, knife, money, (more money, in a roll, bank notes,
elastic band, big) ticket, keys. What’s the deal with the drugs, the knife? Why
carry a knife? Bus pass, oyster card, travel on a bus. Bus travel, that’s safer
than walking, safer than driving maybe. Why, where would you be travelling? Do
a deal maybe, drugs. Wiki. Knife. Pocket? Carry a
knife in your pocket, maybe back pocket. Free. Freewrite. Pocket. What’s in
your pocket, my pocket, Bilbo’s pocket? Gollum. Riddles. What’s in his pockets? Police, Empty your
pockets, can they ask you to do that without a warrant, guess they can. Knife.
That’s a worry. Why the knife. Purpose of knife – to hurt. Purpose of knife-
for protection. Same difference. Drugs. Sniff.Nose. Daniella wossname
Eastenders. Nose. Pockets, Cargo pants. Do drug dealers where cargo pants!
Trackie bots and hood? Stereotype. Could be him, or him, Mr Nice, Mr smooth
suit. Smooooth suit. Smoooth. Smoothie.
Clean. Shaven. Boy next door. Nice boy. Nice to his mum.
Word
count: 176
TMA 01 Fiction Part
2
Standing
Up
Would I have acted any differently if I
had known? Who can know what’s going to happen. In the space between a second
your life changes. You can’t go back. Better to ask, did I do enough?
I
like to cycle back from the office over Chelsea Bridge. It’s a beautiful bridge
but this day the fog was hanging about and I didn’t relish the ride. So, I took
the bus.
‘Less of that, guys’ I said, quietly but loud
enough for them to hear.
They
ignored me and carried on. Louder. ‘Enough’.
Hoodie swung round, his face pushing forward into mine.
‘Whass that? You got something to say old man?’
‘Just leave off’
‘Fucking make me’.
Please, I so wanted to fucking make him; nothing would have given me more pleasure. I wanted to stand up, grab him by his hood, lift his feet off the floor and perhaps drop him down the bus stairwell.
Leaning over I would shout down ‘Are you alright mate? Sorry about that, my hand slipped.’
Over six foot tall, and well built, I was very capable of throwing him down the stairs but I didn’t want to light up this scene any more than it was already lit. So I stayed seated. The mother turned round and looked at me, a worried, tight face. The kid struggled off her lap and tumbled onto the litter crusted floor. Snake Neck bent down and roughly pushed the kid over onto his back. The mother leant forward into the aisle to grab him but Snake Neck got between her and the child. I looked down at my hands. I looked up at the ceiling. I sighed. And I stood up. Unfurl is probably a better description. Stood up implies I went from seated to upright in one move but in reality it was more like a black sail slowly being released from a mast. Sounds impressive but unfortunately, for me, it ratcheted everything up a notch. Hoodie’s face travelled upwards with mine as I rose and I could see his drug-ravaged nose and I could smell his breath, so bad it would have melted glass. Amazing observational skills! I’m a security expert; it’s my job to take note. I just wished I’d been more observant about what he was doing with his right hand! Shifting the front of his coat backwards, his hand moved into his pocket. I saw the glint of a knife. Shit. I felt a dull thud against my thigh. Not exactly painful, more like a punch. But a warm trickle down my leg was proof of the stab. He thrust the knife at me again, higher this time. Instinctively I raised my arm, my forearm towards him. The knife caught me again and this time I felt the pain.
‘Christ all bloody mighty!’ I shouted. The woman next to me started to scream. Or maybe it was me. I fell back onto the seat and everything went black.
Word count: 721
TMA 01 Part 3
After I finished
the cluster I researched the effect of sniffing drugs on your nose. The research I did for exercise 2.6 (p.41) gave me the idea for an attack on a bus. Browsing
for an interesting item, I found an online BBC article about a man who had been
attacked with a knife by a youth on a bus and nearly lost his life. So I had
the scenario of a knife attack linked possibly to drugs. After reading the chapter, ‘Writing what you know’(pp.
44-55) in the workbook, I thought about the experience of a recent bus trip
where a child had cried throughout and the true story of a friend’s son, who been attacked by a gang .
I made notes throughout the chapter and using
these and the freewrite I brought them together in this passage. It has
morphed from its initial form and has been re-written and over written quite a
lot but it is still the same basic story of a man who makes a decision. To
stand up. Unusually I also found myself
writing the scene as a man. This is not something I have done before.
Reading more
like a writer I have begun analysing what I read and looking at the devices
authors use. Harlan Corben writes murder mysteries, quite gruesome, but there
is always humour, sometimes dark but not always. He uses humour throughout his
novels and I have found it incredibly effective and enjoyable. I have used a
little humour in my piece and if I were to continue writing crime fiction I
think it is something I would try and include.
Word count: 273
Bibliography
Anderson, L
(ed.) Creative Writing: A workbook with readings, Abingdon, Routledge / Milton Keynes , The Open University.
BBC News (2011) BBC 1, 20 September 2011
