Voodoo soul

There was no question what the crowd had come to hear. Southern rock. Done the Jasper Dan way.

The band were setting up. Noddy watched Daz play with the feedback from his guitar amp, getting the sound just right.

“She has to go, boet. You know what he’s like. I don’t want to have to deal with the kak if she doesn’t turn up.”

Noddy tried to focus on the stage. Tune out everything else. Especially Dirk. He reached absently for his beer, but found that it was empty.

“Not happening, boss man.” Janine slid a fresh drink into her boyfriend’s hand and grabbed the empty bottle without pausing on her way across the club.

“Aw, come on, Janine.” Dirk chased after her. “One visit. Just say hello. Put his mind at ease.”

Noddy couldn’t hear the rest of the conversation. Daz had started a solo, fine-tuning each string before the rest of the band joined him.

“She’s not going, is she?” Morag slid onto the stool next to him.

Noddy gave up on the stage. It was only a sound-check. “I don’t know. She has her own mind. Makes her own decisions. She won’t listen to me.”

“Or to Dirk, I hope. I wouldn’t go see him. You know what he’s like.”

Noddy turned to face her. “That’s what everyone keeps saying. But she doesn’t know, does she? I mean, she thinks he’s just another guy in the club. Bit rough around the edges, maybe, but with a heart of gold.”

Morag nodded. “Look, he was different around her, I’ll admit. For a while, he almost became a better person. He even got her that job at the print shop.”

“What? I didn’t know that.”

Morag shrugged. “You weren’t paying much attention to anything at the time, except Dirk’s bar stock. She changed you, too. Shit, she changes everybody. Maybe I should date her next.”

Noddy smiled and closed his eyes.

“Stop trying to see that in your head. It’s not actually going to happen.”

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And Shorty’s Poems and Hard Money are now available from ZaBazaar, supported by the Department of Sports, Arts and Culture.

What happens when reality TV ventures out into space and awakens ancient gods who would really rather be left alone?

Watch the human race tear itself apart in the face of cosmic forces unleashed after millennia.

Let Sleeping Gods Lie – my new science-fiction horror novelette – is available on Amazon and various other online retailers. I have some paperback copies if anybody wants one, or you can find them at Curiosity, in the Railways Cafe.

Finally, catch Big Day Out, a mad mercenary romp through the dystopian nightmare that Covid-19 might have become. Might still become, if we don’t keep our self-appointed leaders on a very short leash.

Available on Amazon, from BookDealers of Rivonia, or from Book Circle Capital.

Cheers.