StoryTime Recent Stories
StoryTime Recent Stories
UK Lucy by Sarudzayi Chifamba-Barnes
Hands shaking and her whole body shivering from fear and anxiety, Maria quickly parked her car in front of the two-bedroom terraced house she rented in Coventry. Her eyes were filled with fear when she saw three show more...
The Land of Darkly: Act Five
Harabladi was woken by the gentle massaging motion of his new bed; it hummed and vibrated in delicious ripples up and down his body. Before he even opened his eyes, he smiled and thought this is the life, and went on to wonder when was the last time, before the gold coin, that he had actually been happy when he had first woken up. Perhaps it had been the first morning of his second marriage; which he remembered being just like the feeling he had now, barely awake with his eyes still closed. Excepting that last time, the feeling lasted only as long as he kept his eyes closed. Full Story
Choices by Esi W. Cleland
She is a dark, tall, beautiful, witty Senegalese young woman in her twenties, with white teeth accentuated by her dark healthy gums. He is a Caucasian Alaskan boy of about same age, with smiling eyes and a liking for humour tainted with sarcasm that it turns out mademoiselle Senegal digs. This boy is also a bit of a punk. He’s not a full blown punk but he has a punkish flair that somehow works. What does this Senegalese girl turned woman have in common with this boy turned man from Alaska? Full Story
Cost of Courage by Beaven Tapureta
When I was not with Brother I was with it again. Tonight it found me alone, away from Brother. It was like an incurable mental illness which came with voices and visions. It was like a nightmare yet I could not fathom how far it was from the real world. I kept walking on the dark deserted road. My eyes hardly blinked; there were demons playing wild soccer in the natural turf of my mind, howling 'Punch him down! Punch him down!' I knew it was it again. I whispered to myself that I was not going to fall or be punched down by whatever or whoever those demons were. Full Story
Still Going by Emmanuel Sigauke
I was going to the gathering and no one would stop me. Not even Mai, not Maiguru. Nothing, not even the duty to take care of the goats would get in the way. I was going to meet with Chari behind Chisiya Hill, join others like us on the road to Mototi Primary School, and arrive at the gathering before the dancing began. The only person who would have been able to stop me was Mukoma, but he was away in South Africa and no one knew when he would be back. With no one to stop me, I was sure going to that gathering. Full Story
Framed by Masimba Musodza
After Cleveland, the stretch of motorway to Marondera was clear of traffic and Abby felt that he had it all to himself at last. With an exultant chuckle, he really put his foot down on the pedal and felt the Land Cruiser shudder as it went in to Warp 9. On the vehicle's mp3 player, some new local act was chanting a mindless ditty in the vernacular, to the tune of a popular American RnB hit, Abby couldn't remember which. Outside, to the right, the lights of distant Chitungwiza shone like candles held by thousands of adoring fans at a rock concert. 'Hey, you're going too fast!' Full Story
The Lottery by Ivor W. Hartmann
'What are we now? Can we really call ourselves human any more? What of our souls, heaven, and hell?' -Emergency Online Transference FAQ's. Israel Sabula was a newly transferred and he did not like it. He had awoken from death in this white chair, to this white room and its barren smooth lines. A far cry from the bubbling and whirring room of machines wired into his dying body, which saw his lonely departure from that mortal coil. There was an utter silence in the room and even though he continued breathing from habit, there was no breath, no air, no sound, not even a deafening silence from real world ear feedback. He snapped his fingers and heard the click and then that weird silence. Full Story
In the Blood by Masimba Musodza
The urge to drink was strong, but there was nothing stronger to drink in the office than water. Batsi Makoni gulped down half a bottle before realising how refreshing, how calming it actually was. She stared at the bottle as if in wonderment, then at the rest of the displayed contents of the open fridge. The water had definitely cooled her down enough for her to sit at her desk and think. Leave the yoghurt and the cheese and the ice-cream and the cake alone. For now. It was late in the afternoon. From outside drifted the slow progress of down town Harare's traffic. The window behind her looked over Africa Unity Square. From somewhere within the huge edifice that housed her suite of offices emanated the gentle whirr of a copier. Mundane, familiar sounds. The assurance of continuity and comfort. But her eyes fell on the folders on her desk, and the shock that had seized her moments earlier began to return. Full Story
The Devil's Advocates by Ivor W. Hartmann
'The contents (sealed after these words of introduction), have been painstakingly pieced together from ancient data records. These records handed down the ages as inert sacred relics of another era, were preserved somewhat unwittingly, yet propitiously, by our order. After recognising that the relics were, in fact, ancient data storage devices, it has taken us fifty long years to reconstruct the technology, necessary to access them. Whilst the records are severely damaged, I do believe there is enough surviving, coherent content, to discern the nature of the events described.' Full Story
Yesterday's Dog by Masimba Musodza
It had been It had been a long drive, and Stanley was beginning to doze off. Harare was less than 20 kilometres away on the Mutare Road. The radio was not working, and he had exhausted the four tracks that made up the only CD, why did Zimbabwean record companies sell these as albums? And the air-conditioning wasn't working, leaving him at the mercy-or the lack-of the October heat. He would have gladly stopped somewhere, but the need to get to Chitungwiza was urgent. Already, the sky to the west was tinged with mauve.
Stanley had shut his mind from the outside scenery. So, when the man appeared on the road, he seemed to have materialised from another dimension of his consciousness, an apparition from a half-remembered and not very comforting dream. Full Story
Kennedy by Emmanuel Sigauke
The entrance to Kubatana was dotted with scantily-dressed women and peanut vendors, a curious combination about which I shook my head as we entered the flood-lit bar.
'Tonight youll see a side of me that will blow your mind away,' said Mukoma, my big brother.
'What hes saying is that he has something important to tell you,' explained Jakove, his friend.
'And to show you,' added Mukoma.
The beer hall was crowded. Shouting men waved at us. Mukoma and Jakove waved back at acquaintances scattered in the swaying crowd, where loud music competed with the loudest of voices. Full Story
The Land of Darkly: Act Four
When Harabladi disembarked from the gondola that evening, well staggered whilst Hacktar kept him upright by holding the scruff of his jacket, he felt nothing. Well not nothing, his body screamed at him all manner of abuse and his brain felt like a large bowl of pulsing cold porridge, but he felt not the beady red eyes of Grom, not even the merest twinge. For a moment, he wondered if perhaps that last heavy blow his skull endured from Hacktar was the one that finally shook something loose, permanently. Then he felt that familiar twinge, not like Grom, no that had its own unique suicidal butterflys kind of twinge, but definitely someone with ill intent towards him. Unable to deal, as he could barely see blearily, with any one or thing right now he chose the safest course of action. Hacktar barely paused as he felt Harabladi go limp and quickly whipped him up onto his giant-tortoise large shoulder. Full Story
The Land of Darkly: Act Three
Mrs Perkins, and her husband, Mr Perkins-Fiddle, were lying, snoring, in the shade of a large oak tree. They were halfway between the city of Darkly, and the village of Krep, which lay nearly three leagues south of the south gate of the city. They were thus at the four-mile marker, which itself lay in the shade of the large oak tree, a fact that made giving directions a hit-and-miss affair, since four-mile-markers were all there were, and the marker itself was nearly invisible in the shade. Full Story
The Land of Darkly: Act Two
The prince, in the meantime, went to his chambers for a lie down to recover from his meeting with his mother. Gelmernia, his manservant and best friend, awaited him with a cup of tea, and a cup of something else that glowed blue and occasionally released a bubble into the air of the expansive suite, where it would drift until encountering something solid like a wall or a window. After etching away part of the wall or the window, the bubble would pop and release an extremely noxious smell into the air. Full Story
The Land of Darkly: Act One
The king was in his counting-house, counting out his money - well, he was watching Fittle, his oldest and most trusted servant, count out his money. And, to make things even clearer, they were only counting out the NEW money. The rest of the money had already been counted and stored on the shelves around them, which stretched into the darkness surrounding the King and Fittle where they sat at the counting table. They had encircled the counting tables with candles, lamps, and few roaring torches - ostensibly to see better, but really because, of all the rooms in the Royal Castle, this was the one the King liked the least. Full Story
show less...
