D.J. Cockburn's Blog: Cockburn's Eclectics

Tim smiled at Maria. Maria smiled back.

Good start, thought Tim, but one of us needs to say something before our faces start hurting.

“Have you ever had a date at opposite ends of a park bench before?” he asked.

“No,” said Maria.

Tim waited for her to say more.

Maria kept smiling.

“So this is your first first socially distanced date as well?” asked Tim.

Maria’s smile twitched wider for a moment, acknowledging that he’d made a joke without laughin...

Naomi hadn’t dared hope for a chance to shadow a reporter as Matt Kellam so when he asked if he wanted to sit in on an interview with a supervillain, she turned her back on the photocopier without a second thought.

“Not much of an internship if you spend it all faffing about the offices,” Kellam said to her as they walked from the magazine’s offices in Aldgate to Varley & Weston’s in Moorgate.

“Thank you, Mr Kellam,” said Naomi. “But why is he a supervi...

I can tell you about the moment it changed. It was just after the chief tribune finished a call from the president of France. He stood up from behind the desk he’d taken from the last president and slapped his belly.

I expected him to follow the slap by saying, ‘need to something about that,’ as he did on most days. He’d meant it when he was a young man but by then, it was more of a tic that I hardly noticed.

Instead, he asked me, “what’s the national obesity rat...

The rumble of Meadowes’s voice calling his name froze Calloway’s feet to the ground.

“Where is Cranston?” Meadowes asked him, “and why has he not taken Lord Ellworthy his coffee?”

“I heard Mr Cranston is, is unwell, Mr Meadowes,” said Cranston.

“Unwell?” When Meadowes was displeased, his voice sounded as if it was drawn from a place as deep as the deepest slate quarry. Calloway sometimes wondered if he’d been born with a voice that deep or if he’d needed to ...

I give up on sleep when I see your face floating in the window. I swing my legs out from under the duvet and sit up, being careful not to wake my wife.

I blink your thinning hair and goatee into sharper focus against the backdrop of the night, remembering the day we met. We got to talking about vintage cars. A passion of mine that usually kills a conversation dead but when I brought up the bodywork on the Delahaye 165, your eyes lit up.

“Let me give you a hig...

Julie stood where she’d be framed by the statue’s plinth and held up the tin of red paint. She stood for a few moments, giving anyone who was interested time to point their phones and start filming.

People were bustling past, pushing buggies or lugging shopping bags. An old man stopped to lean on his walker, his white beard hiding his expression so Julie couldn’t tell if he was supportive, scandalised or merely curious.

No one else paid any attention.

Of course I believe in free speech! It’s an absolute right.

Except…well, it shouldn’t offend anyone, should it? That’s not right. People should be respectful. If you say something that makes someone feel bad, there should be consequences. You can’t complain if you get what’s coming to you.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying anyone should be killed. I don’t believe in violence. But if you get a smack, you only have yourself to blame. It would be much easie...

I don’t care if you whine the word ‘please’ at me all day.

I’m not going to help you.

Not going to happen.

You see, I’m real and you’re not.

You want to know how I work that out? I can’t see a reason not to tell you.

Here’s how it is: I’m white, male, healthy and comfortably middle class. It’s obvious.

Of course that makes me more real than you. You’d see it if you were real enough to reason it out instead of delivering pre-programmed respons...

When a tube train has the words NOT IN SERVICE on the front, you’re not supposed to get on it. That’s why I got on it.

Come on, it stopped and opened its doors right in front of me. They never do that when they’re not in service. It was late enough that there were only a couple of other people waiting, and they both heeded the tannoy’s orders not to get on the train. It was that officious tone echoing down the platform that clinched it. What could I do but the oppo...

The girl stood at her bedroom window and watched the sunrise. Her day had come.

She was ready for it. She’d been ready for hours. She hadn’t slept since last night’s news on the radio. The moment the announcement came in, she’d changed into the dress she’d last worn the last time she left the house. She’d been standing at the window, willing the sun to emerge over the horizon ever since.

As soon as there was enough light, she turned from the window to ...