Thomas Morris was born and raised in Caerphilly, South Wales. His debut story collection We Don’t Know What We’re Doing won Wales Book of the Year, The Rhys Davies Trust Fiction Award and a Somerset Maugham Prize. His stories have been broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and published and anthologised in Zoetrope; Best European Fiction; and The Penguin Book of the Contemporary British Short Story. His second book of stories, Open Up, will be published in August 2023. His writing is careful, controlled and observant, capturing the essence of how people, communities and families coalesce.
Listen to an audio extract from ‘Wales’
‘Wales’
It’s been three months since they saw each other, and Gareth wonders if his father will recognise him. He pictures his mother upstairs, sitting at her dressing table, practising her face. He wonders if his father will come into the house. He thinks: if Dad comes in, Wales will lose.
Hearing his mother on the stairs, he moves from the window and settles on the couch – the gap in the curtains the only evidence he was standing there, waiting for his father’s car.
Got your phone? she asks.
Yep.
Text when you’re on your way back, alright?
Yeah yeah, he says.
A car horn beeps outside: his father has arrived – and he isn’t coming in.
There’s a pause, then his mother smiles.
Well, have a good time, she says. And make sure you get something to eat. I’ve told your father, but you know what he’s like.
Gareth nods, absorbs it all. If Wales win tonight, everything will turn out okay. His mother will find a wad of cash stuffed in the walls and they won’t need to move out. But if Wales lose, the repo man – with his bulging muscles – will return and take Gareth’s bike. Or the ceiling will cave in and fall down on him while he’s watching cartoons on the couch.
Wouldn’t it be mad if you see me in the crowd on the telly? he says.
His mother grins.
I’ll keep an eye out for you, she says.
Outside, the March evening air is fresh on his cheeks.
Young man, his father says in greeting.
Alright? Gareth replies.
They drive up Caerphilly Mountain, Gareth secretly studying his father’s head. One day he’ll be able to read people’s minds. He just needs to learn to focus harder.
What you looking at? his father asks.
I think you’re going bald, Gareth says.
Wonderful, his father replies. Another thing for me to worry about.
They drive on. When they hit traffic, his father instructs Gareth to open the glove compartment, where he finds the two tickets, sacred and shiny: his first real match at a real stadium.
So what do we know about Northern Ireland? his father asks. Any predictions?
They’ve got some good defenders, Gareth says. But Wales will win. I’m gonna say . . . two-nil. Ramsey header and . . . a Gareth Bale bikey from the halfway.
His father laughs, then in a quiet voice explains that because it’s only a friendly, Ramsey and Bale have been rested and won’t be playing.
Oh right, Gareth says.
It’ll still be a good game. Just don’t get your hopes up, alright? And put those tickets back now, before you lose them.
His father refuses to pay for parking, so for twenty minutes they drive round one residential avenue after another, finally finding a spot in a street lined with trees.
–
Continue reading ‘Wales’ here. –
Explore more of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists.
Image © Alice Zoo
