{"id":24137,"date":"2026-05-05T08:40:44","date_gmt":"2026-05-05T12:40:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/?p=24137"},"modified":"2026-05-05T10:45:41","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T14:45:41","slug":"max-is-going-up-in-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/flash-fiction\/max-is-going-up-in-the-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Max Is Going Up In The World"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s 8am, and from the window of my rooftop apartment, you can\u2019t see The Shard\u2019s upper floors. They\u2019re hidden in the clouds. Fifty yards down the road, there\u2019s already a queue outside The Manna soup kitchen, where I used to eat. I swear a guy\u2019s looking up at me, pointing down and mouthing \u201cJump<\/em>.\u201d But I ain\u2019t jumping. I\u2019m flying. And I\u2019m about to show Dad how wrong he was.<\/p>\n

Standing in the church five years ago\u2014the silent reproach of Mum\u2019s coffin\u2014Dad said it was my bad life choices that drove her to the grave, that I was a born loser. I could\u2019ve got a proper job, kept a roof over my head; instead, I was living the dream, making art that no one looked at and begging for my meals. \u201cAngels\u201d crackled from the speaker, curtains closed over the coffin, and as I watched her disappear, I promised Mum I\u2019d rise from the ashes.<\/p>\n

When I moved out of the hostel, I began squatting in the basement. The soup kitchen customers looked down at me from street level, taunted me through the windows. Basement Max<\/em>, they called me. I was skint, sometimes stole the pigeons\u2019 bread, but always a crumb for me, a crumb for them. Whatever else my mum got wrong, she taught me to share. There just weren\u2019t much to go round.<\/p>\n

When my benefits came through, I moved up to the first floor, just a studio with a microwave, but now I could afford my own bread. I still put crumbs on the windowsill for the birds. One pigeon hung around after the feast, so I named her Phoebe. Then my neighbor posted a note through my letterbox: ‘This is not a home for vermin<\/em>.” Did he mean Phoebe? Did he mean me? I scrawled Fuck you<\/em> across the note, stuck it back through his door. Whatever else my dad got wrong, he taught me to fight back. Never fought at my side, though.<\/p>\n

I found work as a gallery attendant at the Tate Modern and moved into a one-bed flat on the third floor. My first wages paid for a pigeon-sized cage off Amazon for Phoebe, and on my day off, I took her to see some proper art. The doorman knew me, waved me through without checking my bag, where I\u2019d hidden her. First, I showed her the Impressionist section, then the Cubists. Pigeons are super-smart; they can tell the difference, but people call \u2019em rats with wings, cos humans are stupid. Which do you prefer?<\/em> I cooed into her purple feathers. Phoebe sat unmoved before Monet, bobbed her head at Picasso. When the exhibition closed, I begged a poster off the gift shop manager and bought a frame from a charity shop. The picture\u2019s called Le Pigeon Aux Petits Pois, which means the pigeon with peas. Phoebe loved it; she\u2019d stand in front and circle, like a man pigeon. I still called her Phoebe.<\/p>\n

Days later, she perched on the frame and crapped all over the picture. I wasn\u2019t mad at her- it was like when those Chinese guys jumped on Tracey Emin\u2019s bed – an emotional reaction. I figured she\u2019d improved it, took it to NotYourGrandma\u2019sArt gallery in Hoxton, where the auctioneer said it was more-than-human activist art, depicting how capitalism craps on culture. They opened the bidding at eight hundred pounds, and it went for three mil.<\/p>\n

Now I live next door, on the top floor. It\u2019s small, like a dovecote, but there\u2019s a room each for Phoebe and for me. I\u2019ve got my first painting in an exhibition. Yesterday, on the way home, I saw a guy queuing up for food, one of the guys who used to taunt me. I offered him half the sourdough croissant I\u2019d bought in Borough Market, compliments of Penthouse Max<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I got Dad\u2019s address off a distant cousin and invited him round. I\u2019d not seen him since Mum\u2019s funeral. Wait till he sees my fancy clothes, my view over the river, wait till he hears about my painting. I\u2019ll show him. I laid out some fancy food and shut Phoebe in her bedroom so\u2019s not to upset him.<\/p>\n

The intercom buzzes, and Dad\u2019s distorted face appears on the screen. Aw\u2019right, Max<\/em>, he says. My finger hovers over the enter<\/strong> button. I glance sideways out the window, where The Shard\u2019s piercing the sky. C\u2019mon!<\/em> says Dad, I haven\u2019t got all bloody day<\/em>. Can\u2019t you work yer own doorbell yet, yer pillock?<\/em> The cloud\u2019s lifted, and the Shard is touching the sun. I move my finger off the enter<\/strong> button, disable the video feed, and watch the screen go blank. I open the bedroom door, let my girl out. She flutters onto my shoulder, and I feed her toast crumbs as we look down on my father\u2019s tiny figure disappearing down the street.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A guy\u2019s looking up at me, pointing down and mouthing \u201cJump.\u201d \u00a0But I ain\u2019t jumping. I\u2019m flying. And I\u2019m about to show Dad how wrong he was.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":25101,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3530],"tags":[4648],"class_list":["post-24137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-flash-fiction","tag-quickasaflash-bsky-social","writer-gill-ohalloran"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24137"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25106,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24137\/revisions\/25106"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}