Author: weeks4send

The Six Daughters of Celine Cooper (part one)

Posted on by weeks4send

(Being the backstory of an extremely dysfunctional family from a story I wrote.  In verse form!)


Emerald, the eldest, was raised mostly by her gran,

Vanessa and Samantha were just pleased with what they had,

Lucy was her mum’s best friend (at least, that was the plan…),

And Love and Angel went back up to Durham with their dad.

 

Emerald was born when Celine was still at school.

She was proud to be a mother, but she soon got bored.

Though she fussed over her daughter, named her for a precious jewel,

Celine soon met a new man, and she quickly cut the cord.

 

Vanessa and Samantha’s dad ran off when they were young.

(His brother later said he’d died, but that may not be true.)

Celine went to her granddad’s house, and that’s where they were flung.

He was old for raising children, but he did what he could do.

 

Lucy’s father was once Celine’s brother-in-law.

He walked out on Celine’s sister soon as Lucy came along.

He was later jailed for arson, shocking Celine to the core.

He thought she would stand by him, but he turned out to be wrong.

 

Emerald, known as Emmy, was now about sixteen.

She still lived at her gran’s house, and that had worked out fine.

It had been nearly a decade since she last spoke to Celine.

She had her friends, she got good grades, she had no time to pine.

 

Celine’s grandfather passed on when Sam was nearly six.

She’s remember him in future as a funny, gentle man.

She moved back in with her mother, who was running out of tricks

For getting rid of children such as Emmy, Sam and Van.

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Extract From Something I Wrote When I Was Younger

Posted on by weeks4send

A month later, at a bus stop near the high street, Mark and the woman he now knew was named Stevie saw each other again.  It was June, and the country was in the middle of a heatwave.  The sun made it hard to look up without squinting, but it brought out the colour in the trees and the buildings.  Even the pavement, with the black blobs from discarded chewing gum all over it, was a pleasant crimson colour in the sunlight.  The people in and around the shops were tanned and cheerful-looking, although both Stevie and Mark knew that at least a few of them must have been uncomfortable in the heat.  They were.

It was too hot for full-length trousers today, but Mark was wearing his usual pair of tracksuit bottoms anyway.   Out of all the people waiting for the bus, he was the only one whose ankles weren’t on display, and the only one under thirty whose knees weren’t.  He felt like the odd one out, but he couldn’t help it if they were the only trousers that were clean, could he?  Besides, what was the point in dressing up nice if no-one was going to pay any attention?

Anyway, all that went out of his head when he caught sight of Stevie.  He wandered over, trying not to look too desperate for company.  “Alright?”

Stevie nodded, trying not to look at his face.  Mark bit down a sudden jolt of anger.  OK, Stevie was pissed off at him, but Mark had seen too many girls look away from his face in the last few months, and it always hurt.  He’d never get a girl again.  He’d never kick a ball around with his mates again.  He’d never have any mates again.  And he could forget about ever becoming a footballer or a TV presenter.  Oh, sure, people said stupid shit like “Believe in yourself, and you can achieve anything,” but Mark knew that in the real world, you didn’t get anywhere if you looked like bloody Frankenstein.  He might as well be dead.

“How’s Emily?” he asked.

“She’s a lot better now she doesn’t have to see you,” said Stevie.

Mark took a few seconds to decide what his reaction was going to be.  Eventually he nodded.  “OK.  I know I kind of deserved that.  I’m sorry I called you a dyke last time we met.”

Stevie looked at him.  “You know what, Mark?  I actually wasn’t that offended by being called a dyke.  I was a little offended that you called me a stupid dyke, but…  I’d probably have been more offended if I actually was a lesbian.  You know, because you were using it as an insult as if there was something wrong with it.  There’s nothing wrong with being gay, you know.”

Mark frowned.  This Stevie bird had a funny way of talking.  “So…  You’re saying you’re not gay?”

“Right.”  She sat down on the bench, and put her elbows on her lap.  “Who told you I was?”

Mark thought back to Danny pointing her out last year, back when Danny and the others still spoke to him.  My brother said he used to want to rub her face in the dirt to see if that would rub the ugly away.  He said he could tell back then she was a dyke.  But then, Danny’s brother wasn’t exactly Einstein.  So was she telling the truth?  Was she really a lesbian, or did she just not take care of herself?  That was kind of sad, if it was true.  “I kind of thought that you and Emily…  You know…”

“Me and Emily?”  Stevie grimaced.  “You can’t be serious!  Mark, she’s the same age as my baby sister!”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, OK?”  Mark put up his hands in surrender.  “I just heard some things, OK?  I can’t help what I heard.”

“OK.”  Stevie leaned back, a little less agitated.  “But the real reason I was angry with you was the way you’ve treated Emily.  Especially the way you acted when you found out she was pregnant.  I’m not going to give you a hard time about that, because Emily said all the things I’d have wanted to when you came to our flat, but you’ve spent the last year acting like a real jackass.”

Well, how would you act if your face had been smashed? Mark wanted to ask her, but didn’t.  It occurred to him that most of the jackass behaviour she was referring to had happened before the accident.  “I know,” he said, “And I’m really sorry.  Emily…  She’s an OK girl.  I shouldn’t have been so mean to her.”  He sighed.  “But I’m paying now, aren’t I?  I don’t have any friends anymore, no girl’s going to want me, my parents hate me, and now I want to help out with the baby, but Emily won’t let me.  She’s probably right.  Who’d want me as a father?  Nobody wants me as anything else.”  He should have known better in the first place, but all he’d been able to think about was the baby smiling up at him.  Maybe everyone hated him at school, but to that baby, it would be like he could do no wrong, because he’d always be its dad.

Stupid.  He didn’t know what he’d been thinking.

He’d known that life would be different when he got back to school in January, but he hadn’t expected everyone to turn against him.  Nobody wanted to sit next to him anymore.  Nobody would talk to him, either, and every time he did anything he heard people whispering about him.  He knew what kind of lies people were spreading about him.  Saying it was his fault Rob had died.  Blaming it on him being drunk.  He hadn’t been drunk.  He could still walk straight and he could talk without slurring, and from where he was standing, that wasn’t drunk.  But Gary and Danny had swallowed the lies.  “You knew you were drunk, you bullied Rob into coming along to meet Frankie and Jo,” they’d said.  Funny, it never occurred to them to blame Frankie and Jo for causing the accident.  It was as much their fault as his.

Stevie twisted round.  “Actually, Mark, believe it or not, I’ve been trying to convince Emily to let you help her with the baby.”

“Really?”  Was she just messing with his head?  He wouldn’t put it past her.  “You mean that?”

“Uh-huh.  I told her that whatever you did before, you’re trying to do the right thing now, and she should let you.”  She scratched her arm.  “Although I still think it was a dumb idea to ask her to move in with you.”

“Well, I didn’t know she’d react like that.  Talking about my mum and dad like that.”  He knew better than anyone else that they weren’t the easiest people to live with, but he’d still wanted to give her a slap.

“She was upset.  You can’t blame her.”

Mark nodded.  “Still, it was out of order, her saying that.  I’d like to hear what she’d say if I said things about her mum and dad.”

“She’d probably agree,” Stevie told him, “I know I would; I’ve met her parents.”

Mark laughed.  “Me too.”  He took a good look at her.  She was wearing the heavy eye make-up again.  Now that Mark saw her face close up, it looked as if her eyelids were red underneath.  Like she’d been trying to cover up the fact that she’d been crying.  It couldn’t be easy, being her.  “So you’re trying to talk Emily round?”

“Yeah, but it’s not easy.  She’s very stubborn.”

Mark didn’t say anything, but he thought, She never was before.

An image flashed through Mark’s head of Emily in the park, wearing that cute little skirt and hanging on his every word.  It had been perfect.  Just a few months ago, everything in his life had been exactly right.  Even the most beautiful girls had looked like nothing compared to Emily.  Even girls in magazines and that.  And she was with him.  He’d taken all that for granted, and now it was gone.

“So,” asked Stevie after a few seconds’ silence, “Have a lot of people you know been saying things about me?”

“Well, not about you and Emily.  But maybe people think the wrong thing about you, because…”  Oh, come on.  She couldn’t be completely blind to how she looked.  “Because of the way you dress.  Maybe.  Your dress sense is kind of… not like how girls usually dress.”

She looked annoyed.  “It’s supposed to be an androgynous rock & roll look.  Like Patti Smith or Annie Lennox, y’know?”

“Yeah, I get it.”  Mark didn’t know who either of those people were, but he got the idea.  And he thought he saw Stevie’s problem.  “Trouble is, men round here might not get that you’re trying to do a rock & roll look,” he said, trying to sound sympathetic, “You’ve got to be kind of ladylike.  You know, clothes a bit flirty, a bit revealing…”

“Hey, I’m not worried about whether or not lots of men find me attractive.  I’ll take quality over quantity any day.  I’m just worried that people think I date sixteen-year-olds.  I do not want people thinking that.  Just for the record, both the men I’ve slept with were over twenty at the time.”

Mark nodded.  Both, she’d said.  Not all.  It was a little surprising that she’d ever had one man, let alone two, but now that he thought about it, it made sense.  Stevie had probably been to university, and at the parties there guys got so drunk they didn’t care what they were shagging.  Still, two was pathetic.  She must be, what, twenty-one?  He’d managed more than that before the accident, and he was only seventeen.

What a sad life she must have.  Mark used to wonder what it was like, going through life knowing that you were a total reject, but now he knew.  He didn’t have to wonder what it was like being so ugly that nobody would ever want you, or such a loser that people avoided you.  Him and Stevie had both been spat on by wankers who thought they were better.  They were like two peas in a pod.

“Stevie?”

“Uh-huh?”

“I been thinking.  You and me…  Well, we have a lot in common.”  He looked her in the eye.  “And I think we should take care of each other.  ‘Cause nobody else is going to.”  He sat down beside her.  “I want to see you again.”

Stevie moved away from him.  “Mark, are you saying to want us to…?”

“Go out,” said Mark.  He thought for a moment, then smirked and raised his eyebrow.  “Or stay in, if you like.”

Stevie seemed to think for a moment.  You could almost see the cogs whirring round in her head and she tried to decide whether or not to take Mark up on his offer.  Then she turned back to him, a sad kind of smile on her face.  “Mark,” she said, “I will never, ever be that desperate.  And I dont think you should be, either.”

After that, they sat in awkward silence until the bus came.

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West of the Fields

Posted on by weeks4send

(Possibly the first in a series of drabbles named after R.E.M. songs, if I ever manage to finish any of the others.)

The second Jess got a bit of peace and quiet, she’d shut her eyes and think about that house in Devon- the sun shining through the leaves of the willow tree in the garden, the wood panelling with the funny-looking markings, the big brass knocker on the door.  Whenever something had gone wrong in her life, she’d imagine going back to that house and staying there for a while, and letting its natural power mend her life.  So she went back there, back to Auntie Rose, the old lady who’d told them stories all those years ago, and poured her heart out.  It was only when she looked down at her hand and saw only part of the wood panelling that Jess realised she’d been tricked.

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Enemies List

Posted on by weeks4send

(WARNING- disturbing subject matter)

Well, let’s see…

There’s the father who, completely out of the blue three months before she was born, told her mother (and then just about everyone else in town) that he wanted a divorce and a DNA test.

There are the paternal grandparents who, when her mother agreed to the DNA test, helped him to weasel out of it and disappear.

There’s the maternal grandmother who, not reacting particularly well to the scandal, never referred to her by her name (preferring “the baby,” and later on, “that girl”).

There are the neighbours who would tell her older brother and sister how adorable they looked, and walk on without acknowledging her.

There’s the Year Two teacher who, finding her irritating without quite knowing why, frequently lost her temper with her and punished her for things that she might have otherwise let slide.

There are the boys in her class who, knowing a sucker when they saw one, would frequently suggest to her that they play some trick in order to get revenge on the teacher, and, having done it, would leave her to take the blame.

There’s the Year Three teacher who, on the first day back, stood her up in front of the rest of the class and told her that he’d heard about what she got up to, that children like her were a drain on the school, and that if she tried that stuff with him she’d soon be laughing out of the other side of her face.

There’s the librarian who, whenever she brought a book back, picked it up by the corner as though it was toxic and flicked through it, checking meticulously for stains.

There are the kids down the road, who took her with them that time they went into town, caused a riot in the shopping centre, and all got arrested.

There’s the mother of her best friend, who decided that she was a bad influence and banned her daughter from spending time with her (something that her daughter, to her credit, ignored).

There’s the girls who spent the first week of secondary school telling her that, with her shabby clothes and psycho reputation, she’d better not think that she could sit with them at lunch.

There’s the older sister who was told to look after her when their mother was working late, who would take her out into town and leave her to entertain herself while she talked to her friends in the pub, and who would usually forget about her and go somewhere else, leaving her to walk home alone.

There’s the man outside the pub while she was walking home one night, forty years old with muscles on his muscles, who told her she was a beautiful angel when he thought she was interested and a worthless bitch when he realised she wasn’t, and who wouldn’t take no for an answer.

There’s the moody nurse at the hospital that night, who told her that the hospital staff referred to cases like hers as “Failure to Pay.”

There are the girls who giggled behind her back the next day at school, who left spiteful notes in her locker and speculated on whether she’d caught any diseases that she didn’t have before.

There’s the man she met outside a different pub some weeks later, when, wanting to avoid the harsh words and the pain, she decided to smile, thank him for his compliments and do exactly what he wanted.

There’s the one after him, and the one after him.

There’s the woman who turned up outside the school gates one day, screaming her head off and accusing her of having it away with her husband.

There’s the son she wasn’t developed enough to carry to term, who died almost immediately after he was born.

There’s the grandfather who told everyone else in the family that if he ever saw her again, he’d whip the skin from her back.

There’s the headmaster who called her into his office the day she came back, to tell her that he wasn’t legally allowed to expel her for what she had done, but that if he found out she’d said a word about her “predicament” to the good girls, he could make her life very unpleasant indeed.

There’s the Maths teacher who told her he could improve her grade, for a price, and failed her when she said no.

There’s the new stepfather who, upon seeing that she’d been accepted into the Sixth Form, spent the next two years complaining about how she was a burden, and why didn’t she just go out and get a job, after all she’d put them through?

There’s the mother who, when the time came for university applications, told her that the joke was over, and now she needed to work for a living.

There’s the manager of the supermarket where she worked, who sacked her for being off sick two days in a row.

There’s the boyfriend who told her he knew how she could make a little extra money, and who threatened to knock her teeth out when she wasn’t sure.

There’s the friend of her father’s who bought what she had to sell, and then told everyone he knew, “Like mother, like daughter.”

There’s the undercover policeman who arrested her, and the judge who sentenced her to six months in prison.

There’s the prison guard who hit her round the face, breaking her nose and giving her a permanent scar.

There’s the older brother who wrote a letter disowning her, and the rest of the family, who more or less followed his lead.

There’s the cellmate who got her hooked on heroin.

There are the companies, every one of them, who turned her CV down after she was released.

There’s the manager of the cafe where I met her, who only agreed to take her on when she agreed to be completely off the books and paid less than minimum wage, which amounted to less than half of what he paid me and the others.

There are all the customers who forgot to tip us, or who ran away without paying the bill at all (for which the manager made us pay).

There’s the woman who screamed at her for spilling her tea, calling her an incompetent, shit-for-brains little slut (for which, I’m pleased to say, she stealthily added two pounds to the service charge on the woman’s bill, telling me later that she didn’t look as though she could read).

There’s the shop attendant who, just after I first asked her out, spent the entire time we were in the shop following her around, looking at her suspiciously, not even bothering to be subtle about it.

There’s the doctor at A&E the night she narrowly avoided going into a coma, who told her that people like her were a waste of his time, and that she should go and die in the gutter and free up more medical care for people who really needed it.

There are the boys who lived near her and hung around on the street, who would follow her around when she left her flat, calling her “Scarface” and making rude suggestions.

There’s the guy at the vocational course she was on, who’d heard a few rumours about her, and who, after she disagreed with him in class that time, proceeded to spread them to all his friends on the course (fortunately, what with his personality and all, he didn’t have many).

There’s one of my friends at university, who told everyone that I must have gone insane (“Or blind,” he’d add with a low chuckle), and then acted hurt when I stopped talking to him.

There’s another of my friends, who came round to borrow some books while she was going through withdrawal, and who, when I told him she had the flu, didn’t even pretend to believe me.

There’s the man who stopped me in the corner shop one day and told me her entire life story (some of which I already knew), beginning with, “I thought you should know what you’re marrying.”

There are her co-workers at her new job, who made her do their work for them half the time, and laughed at her behind her back.

There’s my aunt, who refused to come to the wedding.

There’s whoever it was that cut out our wedding picture from the local paper, stuck in on a piece of paper, wrote a list of accusations (including that she’d only married me for my money), scanned off a load of copies, and posted them to all our neighbours.

There’s the co-workers who spread it around that she’d only got her promotion because she was sleeping with the boss, and the boss who, wanting to be thought of as a ladykiller, deliberately avoided denying it.

There’s the woman (and she may have been one of the other people mentioned above) who came and hung around outside our building on the day we moved away, apparently just so she could wait until we were driving out of the car park, spit in our parking space and yell, “Good riddance!”

There’s the person who, after we’d been living on the other side of the country for seven months, sent her a bunch of flowers and a card reading, “I’m sorry,” but who forgot to sign their name.

And there’s me, for not being able to forget about this stuff and see her in the way she wants me to.

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Oh Dear, Fifteen-Year-Old Me (part nineteen)

Posted on by weeks4send

Just four thousand words to go, and we’re free!  Freeeeeee!!!

“I’m afraid it doesn’t look good, Mrs. Wolf,” the doctor said as we arrived at the hospital, “Your husband has been savagely beaten, and this has lead to a severe heart attack.  Surgery will be necessary, but even with it he may not survive the day.  I’m dreadfully sorry to have to tell you this, especially so soon after your wedding.”

Cherry and Joe might have been crying, but I wasn’t.  I was busy staring into space, sickened at the thought of Jordan doing this to Gary. 

Heaven only knew how the evil stepbrother had escaped from prison.  Maybe James Foster had helped him, as Gary had worried he might.  That would make sense, because if he hadn’t, how would Jordan know where we lived?

Oh Lord.  I’d dismissed Gary’s fears about Jordan as paranoia, but as it turned out, they had been right on the money.

And Gary was as good as dead.  That news had almost caused actual physical pain inside my heart, and yes I do mean my heart.  Its beating was now so sharp that maybe I would be joining Gary at the end of the day.   That was my only hope, but I knew it wasn’t likely.  Not many sixteen-year-olds die of shock induced heart attacks, although one seventeen-year-old would probably do so that day.

I would never, ever be able to comfort Gary again.

This is the one thing she’s going to miss most.  Gary being in deep psychological pain so that she can comfort him.  Why do I get the impression that she’s going to be the sort of mother who deliberately makes her children sick for attention?

And I wanted him back, only for five minutes so that I could make him happy again.  My husband was probably going to die, that was bad enough.  What was worse was that the first real man in my life was going to die as well.  So was my best friend at Mark and Estelle’s in that last week of October last year.

Whenever bad things happen to me, there is always a faint voice in my head that whispers, It’s all going to be alright.  When I locked myself out of the house in Year Seven, I heard it.  When my friends were all angry with me, I heard it.  When Mr. Daly attacked me, I heard it.

I was still hearing it now, but I knew that it had no value.  It was lying.  I would never be able to believe it again.

Joe and Cherry were talking.  Why were they talking?  What gave them the right to talk when no sound came out of my mouth when I opened it?

“I’m sorry, guys,” Joe wept, “I’m really, really sorry.  If I could only turn back the clock…  It’s all my fault.”

Oh Gawd, here we go…

“Sh,” Cherry consoled, “We all feel like that.  We all could have been downstairs while it was happening.  But I’m sure Gary wouldn’t want us to feel guilty.  And besides, he might be OK.  You never know.  Miracles do happen…” But I could tell by her face that Cherry didn’t believe a word of it.  Ben, out of Cherry’s refusal to let him suffer any more than was necessary, was staying with his Auntie Melissa.  Jack and Emily had cut their honeymoon short, and were rushing home to comfort me.  Well, that’s what I thought Melissa said.  It was hard to tell, through the tears.

“No, I don’t mean that.  I mean…  I mean I was downstairs while it was happening, if you know what I mean.”

Because that’s how people sound when they confess to attempted murder!  “If you know what I mean.”

Cheery reared up in grief and rage.  “You mean to say that you saw Gary’s stepbrother kicking the crap out of him, and you didn’t lift a finger to help?  Oh, that’s low, Joe Foster, even for you, even for one of your stinking family…” 

You mean the stinking family you’ve just allowed to babysit your son? You’re not a very attentive mother, Cherry.

Joe signalled for her to shut up, apparently to defend himself.  Just you try, I thought, still unable to speak.

“It’s worse than that,” sniffed Joe, “Jordan had nothing to do with it!  It was me!  I’m sorry, Cherry, it’s just that I kept thinking about the way you’d kissed him at the wedding, and what you’d said to me a few weeks ago, and it just spilt out when I was alone with him, and…”

Cherry, her eyes wide open with shock, opened her mouth and then closed it again.  She told me later that nothing she could possibly say could do any justice to the magnitude of what Joe had done.  Gary had been a great help to everyone, always pleasant even though he’d been through a lot, and we had loved him for that.  Joe had shown no hint of a personality as sweet as Gary’s, and had been a pain in the neck almost since I’d met him.  Joe had no right to feel any anger towards Gary, and what he had done was, considering his and Gary’s respective worth, almost an act of blasphemy.   

Gary is Jesus, apparently. 

So Cherry couldn’t possibly articulate all the loathing that filled her brain at that moment.

I could.  I let him have it.

*** 

By the time that the doctor came back into the waiting room, Cherry and I both knew that we would never see Joe again. 

And that’s how the “Anja has a grudge against Joe” storyline is resolved.  With Anja being completely vindicated, even though her grudge made no sense whatsoever.  She’s the Mary Sue, after all- if she’s wrong about something, reality warps itself around her so that she’s actually right.

Although our main thought was one of “Good riddance,” I couldn’t help feeling guilty about the way I’d stopped trusting Joe after what his father had said.  Maybe if I’d trusted him about Vi, it would…  No, that was a ridiculous thought.  I couldn’t feel sorry for the bastard who had led Gary to an early grave.

“No, that was a ridiculous thought.  I’m never wrong!”

“Mrs. Wolf?  Miss Hughes?” asked the doctor; “I have good news and bad news.”

I looked up, my misery being replaced, if only temporarily, with curiosity and maybe even hope.  What good news could she possibly have at a time like this?

“The good news is that, thanks to the surgery, Gary is past the worst this time.  The bad news is that he will have to be careful from now on.  You tell me that he’s had a heart attack before?”

I nodded, but my brain wasn’t connected to my ears.  What did she mean, “past the worst”?  She was playing a cruel joke on me.  Yes, that must be it.  There was no way in the world that she could be telling the truth.  No way.

And yet…

“Well, I’m afraid that his heart has weakened terribly.  His life expectancy is much lower than it would otherwise have been.  Mrs. Wolf, I’m sorry to have to tell you that it will be a miracle if he lives for another ten years.”

I have no idea if this is a realistic diagnosis after a second heart attack.  It sounds like the kind of thing that might be true, but it’s awfully convenient- ten years is just enough time for Anja to put on her “brave martyr caring for her ailing husband” act, before neatly burying him and falling in love with someone healthier.

I don’t think there was a word to describe what I felt at that moment.  I knew that I was supposed to either be overjoyed that Gary had survived this time, or heartbroken about his reduced life expectancy.  The two feelings must have cancelled each other out, because try as I might, I couldn’t feel either.  The event, and the fact that I couldn’t produce the required emotions, made me feel as though I had suddenly slipped into a parallel universe where nothing was as I remembered it or as it seemed.  I almost understood how Melissa must have felt when she was told that the son whose death she had come to terms with was alive and well.  I began to hope that this was all a dream and that I could forget about all the confusion and stress it caused when I woke up.

Cherry clearly didn’t feel that.  I wish I was more like her.

“He’s alive!”  Her face lit up with relief like someone switching on a lightbulb in a gloomy shed.  She actually laughed, the cow.  “Oh, Anja, he’s alive!” she squealed, hugging me, “He’s alive!  It’s a miracle!”

“Wait a minute,” the evidently puzzled doctor interrupted, “I just said that…”

“Oh, I know it’s terrible about the heart and the ten years and…  But he’s alive now!  And when he eventually does… you know…  At least then you’ll get the chance to say goodbye and be prepared and Anja he’s alive!”  With that, she hugged me again.  This time, I hugged back with equal enthusiasm.  The joy had kicked in, which was a bad sign as it meant that the heartbreak might want its turn at any moment.  At the moment, though, the only negative emotion I had was slight guilt at the fact that Cherry had felt the emotions before I had, when I was the would-have-been-widow and Cherry wasn’t.  Did that mean that Cherry loved him more? 

Probably.  That would make this story more interesting, at least.

No, of course not.  What it meant was that we had different ways of reacting to a strange situation.  It wasn’t any judgement on either of our personalities.  It wasn’t.

Keep telling yourself that.

The bruises hadn’t spoiled Gary’s face any more than the bandages had his body.  They’d told me that Joe had broken his ribs, nose and left arm, as well as the superficial damage to his skin and the loss of a few of his teeth.  What a bastard Joe truly was. 

“And wasn’t I truly perceptive for treating him like crap for six months before he even did anything wrong?  I must be a genius.”

“Hello, Anja,” he managed in a cracked and tired voice, “I missed you.”

“Hello.  You’re looking a little worse for wear, eh?”  He laughed, more out of relief than humour, I think.

“Where’s… er…”

“Cherry?”

“No… er… Joe.”

I couldn’t respond quickly enough.  “He’s gone, Gary.  He’ll never hurt you again, I promise.”  Of course, I’d also promised him that nobody would ever hurt him while he was with me.  Maybe I’m just a liar.

“Oh.”  Gary looked upset.  He was being sympathetic to the one person who didn’t deserve it.  That can be very irritating at times.

“He should only be sympathetic towards me!”

This was the part I had been dreading.  “Gary?”

“Yeah?”

“The doctors said I had to tell you something.”  Here it came.  Telling unpleasant news is like ripping off a plaster- with both; it’s better to do it really fast so the pain is shortened.   “They’re saying that you’ll probably not last ten years.” 

“What?”

“I’m sorry!”  I yelled, almost crying.  You know the heartbreak I was worried about?  This is where it came in.  I suddenly realized what terrible cards life had dealt to Gary. 

“Suddenly”?  We’ve been reminded of it every time Gary’s appeared in the book!

Being born with a life-threatening condition, losing his mother at a young age, having no friends at school, being tortured by his stepbrother, seeing the friends he eventually did get killed by themselves or others, being separated from his decent relatives, and then, after he’d finally started to have a few friends and even get married, being told that he wouldn’t live to see thirty. 

Gary is the woobie to end all woobies!  Fear him, fear him!

Nobody on Earth would have switched places with Gary, not even me.  I wished more than anything that I could rewind time to that morning, so that I’d be able to stop Gary from getting out of bed and going downstairs to the room where he’d met Joe.

Gary was having the same thoughts.  “Well, that figures,” he muttered, “Some people marry beautiful women and live happily ever after, but not me.  I marry a beautiful woman, and the next day she tells me I’m dying.  But then, that’s just my life, isn’t it?  I’m the biggest loser anyone’s ever met.  I might as well give up and die here and now, then you’d be a free woman.  You’d get over it eventually.”

Something in me changed.

Ooh!  Did it cure you of Smug Drunk Sociopathy?

Maybe it was the way that Gary spoke, almost blaming me for something that I’d had no control over.  Or maybe I felt that he was fed up of me supporting his tiny ego.  Either way, for a few seconds I turned into my grandma.

Oh.

“Gary Wolf, stop this nonsense right now,” I snapped.  As soon as I realized what I’d just said, I clapped my hand over my mouth.  I really, really shouldn’t have said that.

“It isn’t nonsense,” Gary retorted, though with a little less anger than his previous comment, “It’s the truth.  Anja, think about it, I’ve only got ten years.  That means I’ll be gone before I’m twenty-eight, and you’ll be a widow by the time you’re twenty-six.”

“I can add up, Gary,” I responded testily.

“So… what I’m saying is, you can leave any time you like.  I’ll understand, honest.”

Passive-aggressive Gary strikes again.  “Yes…  I’ll completely understand if you walk out on me, in my hour of need…  I’ll understand if you leave me lying in a hospital bed with no-one to turn to…  You need your space; it doesn’t make you a heartless monster at all…  Don’t torture yourself with mental images of me strangling myself with the IV drip…”

“That’s enough, Gary!” I snapped.  I was beginning to suspect that he was trying to get rid of me.  With that, I left the ward in a huff.  Halfway down the corridor I was greeted by somebody who, if not exactly identical to Joe, certainly resembled him enough to make me jump.

“Honour!” said Vick, “I’m glad I caught you.  Cherry told me that Gary’s going to be OK.  I’m so pleased for you, honest I am.”

“Thanks, Vick,” I replied, deciding not to correct him on the “Gary being OK” matter for the time being. 

“Do you want me to give you a lift home?” he asked, “Only Emily and Jack took Cherry back to Ben while you were in the ward, so…  Unless you want to stay here for a bit longer…”

“Pfft, why would I want to do that?  It’s certainly not as if my terminally-ill husband needs me around, or anything!  I needs me beauty sleep!”

“No, I’d rather go home,” I said.  The sooner I could get to sleep and not still be in the same day that all these awful things had happened, the better.  At least tomorrow I could think of it all as something that happened yesterday.

“Right.  My car’s outside.”

In the car park, I began to wonder if Cherry had dumped Vick for the right reasons after all.  I’d always been suspicious of him after she mentioned his “obsession” with Vi, but maybe she’d just been exaggerating.  He seemed normal to me.  And even if she had been telling the truth, just because Cherry no longer wanted to be his girlfriend didn’t mean that I had to hate him or anything.  Besides, that had been two months ago.  He might have straightened up by now.

It was only when he turned the car in the opposite direction to Wild Cherry that I realized he hadn’t.

Serves you right!

I stared at the hotel outside the car window.  The Black Heart was, maybe by coincedence, maybe through some kind of plan…

Maybe through lazy writing…

…the hotel that James Foster had moved into after putting the house on the market.  According to Vick, he hadn’t chosen the same room as any of us had in November, but then he didn’t know which ones we’d been in. 

So…  How could he know it’s not the same one?

“So go on, Honour,” Vick grinned, “Go up and talk to him.”

I told myself to remain calm, which is a good bet in most situations.  Maybe if I spoke to him in an authoritative enough voice, he would listen to me.  He’d never struck me as being very strong-willed.  “Vick, take me back home right now.  I need to get some rest.”

“Get some rest in my Dad’s room,” Vick smirked (you know my feelings on the Foster males’ smirks already), “He’s always liked you, you know.”

“Since you were fourteen, in fact!”

“Vick!  How can you even say that, you pervert!”  The remaining calm strategy had fallen apart.  “I’m married, for Heaven’s sake!  What does this ring look like to you, Scotch mist?”  I waved my hand in his face.  Now it would be in the right position to slap him if he made any more insinuations.

“Please, Honour!”  He stopped acting cool and started to plead. 

“‘Please!’ he pleaded, pleadingly.”

That felt better, for me at least.  “Dad says you have to come.  He says something bad will happen if you don’t!  He says you’re the only one who can…” Clearly he knew what he was going to say next but didn’t want to say it.  He looked so pathetic that I gave in. 

It would have taken far too much effort to actually resist doing what the villain wanted!  That’s not the protagonist’s job!

Walking up the stairs, I wondered what the girl I’d been when I first arrived here would think if she saw me now.  I came here when I was still a virgin, when I was still on good terms with Joe, when Cherry was still Svetlana to me, and when I’d never even met James Foster.  And it occurred to me that, apart from meeting Gary, I might have been happier if I’d never caught that sodding bus in the first place.

No!  Really?  You might have been happier if you hadn’t completely lost contact with all your loved ones and made friends with a serial killer and his family?  Perish the thought!

“Come in, Honour,” said James’ voice after I knocked on the door of Room 202, “Or should I say Anja?”

DUN DUN DUUUN!

The room was similar to mine (and, I’m prepared to bet, every other room in the building) except for one crucial difference.  It wasn’t clear exactly what he’d done with the lights, but there was an iron pole fixed to them somehow, hanging above James.  His face wasn’t in the Foster family grin, but in the look of a man who has been overworked and had a lot demanded of him recently.  He was sitting in a pool of water, holding out the empty kettle from where the water had come. 

Electrical socket…  Iron pole…  Pool of water.  Electrical socket…  Iron pole…  Pool of water.  It will take Anja most of the rest of the chapter to put those three things together.  But if she just worked it out and wandered off, she wouldn’t be able to dramatically wrench her hands away, now, would she?

“I need to confess, Anja,” he gasped, “Many religions say that you need to, before you…  Well.  I know what you know, Anja.  And I know that you’re the same person as the sweet little blonde child who broke the nation’s hearts last year.  You’ve grown up now, though, haven’t you?”  A loving smile crossed his lips.  “I want you to understand about the bus, about the snail…  About everything.  Sit down, and I’ll begin.”

“Are you sitting comfortably?  Then here comes the Motive Rant.”

Before you what? I wondered as I sat down on the carpet next to James, avoiding the wet patch.  He was planning something for us, I could tell.  I hoped I could work out what it was before he did it.

The rest of us worked it out two paragraphs ago, Brain of Britain.

“As a child, I was always very close to my Aunt Jean,” he explained, “She was my father’s sister, and of course she’d never married or had any children of her own, so I was the closest thing she had to a son.  Jean had invested her money more shrewdly than my father had, and my parents always suggested that she would leave the money to me when she died.  Not that this was ever about the money, of course, but that would have been good security for me, especially when I had Melissa and the children to think about.  Jack and Joe were the eldest, you know that, but from when he was a toddler, Joe always seemed full of anger.  Melissa dismissed my fears as paranoia until Violet died.  You know that was his fault, Anja.  He was so jealous of that child, so full of life.  Maybe I mistreated him after that, but wasn’t I justified?  Jean thought I wasn’t, so she took him to live with her at Wild Cherry.  Now, she’d always put all her energy into her nightclub, Blaze, which she owned with Victoria Jewel.  Victoria knew glamour when she saw it; she wasn’t a film star for nothing, but such a cruel woman.  She proved that when she abandoned her lovely daughter to Jean’s care, while she went off to America with her new husband.”

This is a fascinating story, but you know what would have been great?  If we’d heard any of this before the final chapter!

“Was this Estelle?”

“Yes, Anja, Victoria doesn’t have another daughter.  Unless she had one and she swapped it for a Gucci dress.  Sweet little Estelle.  She was like a third sister to Joe.  If only Jean had known how Joe had treated his real sisters, she would have separated them quickly enough.  But no, not even Joe could fail to be enchanted by that gorgeous creature.  She was fourteen when she started living at Wild Cherry, and we saw her every time we went up to visit Joe. 

What is it with this guy and fourteen-year-olds?!?

You’ve met Estelle, Anja.  Can you blame me for only wanting the best for that darling girl?  When Estelle was… oh, eighteen or so, she would have been, Jean suddenly decided that the nightclub needed new talent, young people to give it a little more energy.  Only three people showed up. 

“Clearly, word had got around that the club attracted Smug Drunk Sociopaths.”

Now, I’ll never hear a word said against Emily or Svetlana, but the young man was simply awful.”

I pretended to be interested as I remembered something about electricity, metal and water.  With a thud, I knew what James was thinking.

“With a thud.”

“Mark Freeman is loud, volatile, rough and superficial, but somehow- I wish I knew! – somehow, he managed to sweep Estelle, his polar opposite, off her feet.  Never were a couple less suited to each other.  Can you blame me for wanting to stop the wedding and get rid of Violet’s killer at the same time?  And when the snail didn’t work…

More books should contain sentences beginning. “And when the snail didn’t work…”

and Svetlana knew about my thoughts, I knew she wouldn’t understand.  It was a stroke of luck for me when Joe decided to stay with Estelle and the man she’d married.  They lived in the same town as you; I knew that because Svetlana had mentioned it when she was told.  I heard Joe mention in a telephone call that they always stayed in the pub until a certain time- alcohol is evil, Anja, you must never drink it- and drove over to the town for the day.  It wasn’t easy to get into your school undetected, much less to put a fraudulent note into the box in the office, but all I could think about was scaring Svetlana with the death of a relative close enough to frighten, but not close enough to provoke real pain. 

“And obnoxious enough for her to not really give a toss.”

Oh Anja, can you ever forgive me for thinking such thoughts about you?  I didn’t know you then, I didn’t know that your sweetness equalled that of Estelle, Leah, and even Violet.  And you are the only person I would want to take with me, my scarlet-haired beauty!” 

“My scarlet-haired beauty!”  Try adding that to the end of all your sentences.

“I’d like to pay by debit card, my scarlet-haired beauty!”

“I think we should go and get some lunch, my scarlet-haired beauty!”

“These vomit stains are really hard to clean up, my scarlet-haired beauty!”

Hours of fun.

He grabbed my hands in his, and I knew that what I’d noticed would only help if I acted quickly.

I wrenched my hand from his and ran out of the door.  James grabbed the bar attached to the light before he noticed that I’d escaped.  I didn’t see him die, and I’m glad.  I was determined that there was only one person whose death I’d be present for, and if he was lucky he had another ten years on the clock.

James Foster had liked me a lot more than I’d thought.  He was going to die, so he decided to take the woman he loved with him, and I don’t mean his wife.  If I hadn’t noticed that the bar was in exactly the right place for him (us) to be electrocuted, I’d have fried along with him.

Very keen on electricity, was James Foster.

Yes.  Life would have been so much simpler if he’d just bought a gun like all the other homicidal maniacs.

Anyway.  On with the epilogue!

I’ve got a whole scrapbook full of newspaper and magazine articles that have something to do with the events that you have just read about.  It starts with the articles that marked the first anniversary of the “death” of poor little Anja Cleary.  “If Anja had survived, would she have fared any better?  Or would she have fallen victim to the drug abuse and casual sex that blight the nation’s youth?” 

The sad thing is, that’s a more-or-less direct quote from an article sixteen-year-old me read about two murdered teenagers.  Apparently, it didn’t matter if they were shot by a nutter, because black inner-city kids have a short life expectancy anyway.  Of course, the fact that I then turned around and made it all about a self-absorbed fictional white girl isn’t necessarily any less offensive.

No, she wouldn’t.  Honour Wolf might be a little different, but Anja Cleary wouldn’t have said boo to a goose, let alone do anything like that.  “The nation wept along with Anja Cleary’s parents last year…” And so on.

Yeah, let’s not dwell on Anja’s parents weeping.  It might remind us that Anja is a pustule on the arse of humanity, and we don’t want that.

Speaking of my parents, the next article is from my mum’s favourite magazine and entitled “Why We Can Smile Again.”  That’s nice to know.  I’m glad I don’t have to go around scowling all the time anymore.  There’s a photo of me at the top, along with others of my parents with my brother and this girl they’ve adopted, Sara.  Mum says in the article that she adopted Sara as “a choice of life, not death” rather than trying to replace me.  Hmm.  I just hope that they won’t expect this Sara to dye her hair red when she’s fifteen, or something equally stupid. 

Oh, screw you, Anja.  I hope your mother is so enchanted with her new daughter that she forgets you ever existed.

Apparently she calls me “Sister Anja in Heaven.”  In a way, she’s right.  I’m happy now.  Maybe I won’t be for long, but I am now.

There’s a short obituary of James Foster, a man apparently driven to a bizarre suicide in the Black Heart Hotel after his wife had left him.  He leaves the aforementioned wife and five children.  Apparently, the Black Heart might have to close down.  There’s an investigation going on into how safe their lights are.

There’s an advert for Blaze, which is doing really well under its new management.  Cherry now splits the work with Jack and Emily, on the grounds that the nightclub has been in their family for decades, so they’ve every right to it.  Jack and Emily were suitably delighted when she told them this.  Then there’s a photo from a tabloid, of 70s film star Victoria Jewel coming down to England to visit her beautiful daughter, Estelle, and equally beautiful granddaughter, Jean.  I still haven’t met Victoria.

No word on whether or not Victoria (or anyone else) still believes her son-in-law to be dead.  That would smack of actually resolving the plot threads I set up.

The next one is a strange article from a national paper.  Apparently, Keith Daly, a resident of a mental hospital in Essex, has been claiming that he has seen Anja Cleary since her death.  In fact, he’s saying that her spirit’s presence was so strong that it broke his wrists.  A group of American psychics keep asking the hospital staff for interviews with this interesting clairvoyant, but they haven’t had any luck yet.  Well, that’s a turn up for the books.

So Anja’s actions have got Mr Daly sectioned.  Good to know!

Then there’s something about Jordan Albright, the evil man suspected by conspiracy theorists of causing the Anja Cleary disaster. 

It’s not nice to call your husband a conspiracy theorist, Anja.

He’s been imprisoned for twenty years for the murder of Topaz Seaman.  His mother, who has recently given birth to a boy named Gary…

So Mr Wolf’s second son has the same name as his deceased first son?  That’s not creepy at all!

…has disowned him.  An older article that I found on the internet tells of a tragic event eight years ago, in which a small girl named Violet Foster was drowned after swimming out to sea in adverse weather conditions, much to the horror of her three brothers, who were present at the time.  It was suggested in the article that one of her brothers dared her to go swimming in the first place, but it wasn’t known which one.  I know which one.  Jack told Gary and me all about it shortly after his father’s funeral.  We both assured him that he was only a kid, and kids don’t usually think about consequences when they’re having fun.  Besides, Vi might have gone swimming anyway.

So, in conclusion, Joe did absolutely nothing wrong, and Anja ostracised him anyway!  Yay for Anja!

Finally, there’s an article with a picture of me, not as the cute blonde tragedy queen Anja Cleary, but as the worried, redheaded tragedy queen Honour Wolf.  The same magazine that printed the Sara article has told the story of a young girl who, while most of her peers are worrying about “boys and hairdos” (no comment) must look after the man she loves, a man without much time to live, and how she is now, to put it delicately, in the same “condition” that Estelle was when I met her. 

Oh, great.  Now she’s going to be raising a child in the ways of Smug Drunk Sociopathy.  And she’s eventually going to be a single parent.  I think we can safely say that kid is going to grow up to be a supervillain.

After the readers had read about me, the letters pages filled with comments like “Honour is a sign of self-sacrifice in a selfish world,” “I wept when I read about the man who did such terrible things to poor Honour’s husband,” and “It is a sign of great corruption in the world that a girl who should be out enjoying life is forced to take care of somebody who needs professional help.” 

…Hang on, if he needs professional help, why isn’t he getting it?  It’s not as if they can’t afford it- his wife’s cousin’s a millionaire!  Is it because Anja wants to play the martyr as much as she possibly can?  You know, I think it very well might be.

All in all, nobody paid Gary much attention.  Poor Gary.

Sometimes it irritates me that, even after changing my name, my hair and my lifestyle, I’m still destined to be a tragic figure.

Shut the hell up, Anja.

…Actually, she has!  That was the last sentence of the book!  We never have to listen to anything Anja says again!  We’re free!  Free, I say!  Oh, joyous moment!  Oh, happy day!

The thing I’m going to take away from this (other than things like “protagonists actually have to do stuff occasionally” and “sustained misunderstandings are a terrible way to add conflict”) is something I mentioned at the beginning:  Just because somebody’s written a terrible story doesn’t mean that they’re a terrible person.  Fifteen-year-old me had a series of cool-looking moments in her head, and she didn’t think too hard about how the characters got them.  I wanted a story where the main character was separated from her parents and had to survive on her wits… and didn’t notice that I’d made her callously ignore her parents’ grief.  I wanted a story where the main character got to live in a big, fancy house… and didn’t notice that an innocent woman had to be murdered in order to make that happen.  I wanted a story in which the main character brought her enemies to a stunned silence with her biting wit… and didn’t notice that some of the enemies didn’t really deserve it.  In real life, if fifteen-year-old me had been told not to contact my parents and allow them to think I was dead, I’d have ignored that and got in touch at the first opportunity.  If not because I was concerned about their feelings, then definitely because I missed them.  Anja Cleary might have been a Smug Drunk Sociopath, but fifteen-year-old me wasn’t.  At least, I hope not.

I leave you with a merry song, and a suggestion that you drink a large bottle of whatever it is you like best:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZ05LV…

(Fifteen-year-old me preferred the Robbie Williams version to the George Michael version.  So does twenty-eight-year-old me.)

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Things I found refreshing about “The Sandman”

Posted on by weeks4send
  • In “The Doll’s House,” Rose Walker is a sardonic, sexually active young woman with multi-coloured hair. She is not portrayed as a horrific failure of a human being for this.
  • Hob Gadling is a Medieval peasant who loudly proclaims that he never intends to die… while Death is in the room. He is not portrayed as a horrific failure of a human being for this.
  • In “The Doll’s House” and “A Game of You,” Barbie is a mildly airheaded blonde yuppie with a silly name. She is not portrayed as a horrific failure of a human being for this.
  • In “Dream of a Thousand Cats,” the narrator ventures into the heart of the Dreaming to avenge the deaths of her kittens. She is warned against going forward, but she does anyway, losing her identity at one point. She is not portrayed as a horrific failure of a cat for this.
  • In “Seasons of Mists,” Charles Rowland refuses to go with Death, because that would mean abandoning a ghost he has befriended. He is not portrayed as a horrific failure of a human being for this.
  • In “Brief Lives,” Ruby secretly wants to be incredibly rich. She is not portrayed as a horrific failure of a human being for this.
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Oh Dear, Fifteen-Year-Old Me (part eighteen)

Posted on by weeks4send

It’s funny how important a good ending is.  No matter how much you’ve enjoyed a book, a film, or a TV series, a lousy ending can retroactively taint the whole experience (no, I didn’t watch the How I Met Your Mother finale, but I heard the wails of anguish from miles away).  But on the other hand, if the ending’s good enough, it can raise a story from average to great, or at least from bad to passable.

Let’s say that Chapter Nineteen of Memory Lives On begins the morning after Gary’s proposal.  Anja wakes up to hear some strange noises downstairs.  She checks her alarm clock, sees that it’s only 4am, and goes down to check that everything’s alright.  When she gets to the living room, however, she sees a terrible sight.  Gary is lying on the floor, having been beaten practically into unconsciousness.  And on the other side of the room, Joe is grappling with an unidentified opponent.

Anja can’t see Joe’s opponent properly in the dark, but her first thought is that it must be Cherry- she must have caught Joe trying to kill Gary, and now Joe is trying to silence her as well.  She picks up a heavy blunt object (possibly a lamp?), and waits for the right moment to whack Joe over the head.  But, as she’s inching towards them, something sets off an epiphany.  Maybe Gary whispers something.  Maybe she sees the look on Joe’s face.  Maybe something triggers a memory of the time when she and Joe were friends.  Either way, she finally realises that Joe can be trusted, and decides to take a leap of faith.  The second she gets a clear shot, Anja whacks Joe’s opponent over the head, knocking them out.

And it’s just as well that she did, because as Joe’s opponent falls to the ground, she sees that it’s a blond man a few years older than her.  Gary identifies him as his stepbrother Jordan, recently released on bail while the court desperately tries to put together the remaining evidence for his trial.

Anja calls the police, and, while they’re waiting for their arrival, Gary and Joe fill her in on what happened.  Gary went downstairs to get a drink, and was pounced on by Jordan, who would probably have killed him if Joe hadn’t been woken by the noise and run to his defence.  The three of them speculate that Jordan had been in touch with James, who offered him money to kill Gary (and thus presumably take the rap for all his crimes).  Finally, as the police car appears in the driveway, Anja suggests that the investigation might go a lot more smoothly if they tell the police everything they know- including who they are and why they’re still alive.

That ending wouldn’t tie up all the loose ends- there would probably have to be a direct confrontation with James a few scenes later- but it would resolve a lot of plot threads.  It would conclusively end Anja’s grudge against Joe, it would involve the main characters actually making an effort to fight against their enemies, and it would mean that Gary’s backstory wasn’t a huge red herring.  In general, it would pull this whole mess of a book together into an actual plot.

Anyway, that’s not the ending you’re getting.  I just thought I’d taunt you with it.

It was a registry office, not a grand church filled with relatives. 

Because all your relatives think you’re dead.  No, I’m not going to stop harping on about that.  You are the worst person who ever lived.

And Emily, in her specially tailored pink and white wedding gown, looked for more beautiful than I did, in a dress that I’d picked from a local shop on the basis of it being the only white dress that I could find.  But, as anyone who was present and who saw the grin on my face can safely confirm, I didn’t care.

You didn’t care about your relatives, either.

I was marrying Gary Wolf.  The one person who loved, liked and fancied me exactly the same amount as I did him.  “‘Til death us do part” wasn’t a vow that everyone took to heart, considering the divorce rate around these parts, but I knew it would count for Gary and me. 

SPOILERS- “Especially since. in our case, ’til death us do part’ only meant ten years!  I could easily put up with him for that long!”

No matter whether we grew apart or not, we would always remember the unity that helped us through that troubling month in between our alleged death and Cherry’s inheritance. 

“Troubling,” she says.  In case you’ve forgotten, she showed how troubled she was by making jokes about being reincarnated as a porcupine.

We would always stay together, knowing that, in both a practical and emotional sense, united we stand, but divided we fall.

How cute.

I suppose that most people, whether their marriages end in divorce or death, have thoughts similar to mine just before their wedding.  Not many people walk down the aisle thinking, “Well, if this doesn’t work out, I can always marry someone else.”  At least, I hope not.  But, because happiness and egotism often happen together, I was convinced that nobody had ever been surer of keeping her marriage together than I was.  Don’t worry that I’m going to be happy for the rest of this story, though. 

Thanks for being so considerate.  Schadenfreude’s practically the only thing getting me through this thing, you know.

If you’re thinking (and, admit it, some of you were), “Oh great, Anja’s started on all this romantic garbage.  I only liked her when she was dealing with James Foster and so on.

“Started”?  “Dealing with”?  Which book do you think we’ve been reading, Anja?

I think I’ll throw this book away,” then take heart.  I’m not going to be happy for the rest of this story; that I can assure you of.  In fact, this is the happiest that I’m going to get, so make the most of it.

GOOD. 

Cherry, my alleged legal guardian, signed the permission slips and the vows began. 

“Permission slips.”  Because marriage is exactly like a school trip.

“Repeat after me- I, Emily Rose Jenkins…”

After giggling and forgetting their lines occasionally, Emily and Jack finally finished their vows.  Then it was my turn.

“Repeat after me- I, Honour Maureen Cleary…”

If anyone recognized the name, or worked out on their own that “Honour” and “Anja” sounded alike, it didn’t show.  Either Melissa had warned everyone in advance, or everyone had simply forgotten about what had happened the previous October.  Maybe, I thought as Gary put the ring on my finger, I’m a different person now.  In the past eight months, Honour had achieved a lot more than Anja had ever dreamed of. 

Like what?  Sitting on her arse while her cousin inherited a house and a nightclub?

Nobody needed to remember Anja Cleary, tragically killed before she reached the potential that she might never have reached.  In her place stood someone else, someone a great deal happier and more fulfilled.  Honour was more important.

“Insufferable,” Anja.  It’s spelled “insufferable.”

At some point, my eyes flicked over to the back of the registry office.  A man wearing a figure-concealing coat stood outside, furtively looking through the window.  Melissa looked at him, and smiled lovingly.

Joe Foster smiled back.

The tragedy is that, although that was the first time Melissa had seen her lost son in almost a year…

And we still don’t know why that is, by the way!  She could have been talking to him every day since she found out he was still alive.  She could have taken him home with her!  Nothing about this had to happen!

…she would never see him again.  For Joe left the registry office before the wedding was over, and within twenty-four hours, something happened that would destroy any hopes our story had of a happy ending. 

Your personality destroyed any hopes this story had of a happy ending.

Although we both know whose fault it really was, neither Cherry nor I can ever stop blaming ourselves for the disaster that happened after the wedding reception.

And so you should!

“Gareth and Honour, I now pronounce you husband and wife.  You may now kiss the bride.”

“Our dad is going to be so disappointed, Honour,” darling little Robbie chirped, before his mother dragged him into his place for the wedding photos.  So if, in that photo, I have a grim look on my face, that’s why.  An irritating fourteen-year-old had just given me some unsettling thoughts.  I didn’t want to think about James Foster on a day like this. 

You should have thought about that before you decided to have a double wedding with James’ oldest son, then, shouldn’t you?

This was supposed to be my day.  Well, possibly Gary’s, Jack’s and Emily’s as well, but that’s beside the point.

“Possibly.”  Possibly this day could be used for something other than unbridled Anja worship.  We’ll see.

Of course, I could have forgotten all about Mr. Foster if I’d wanted. 

No you couldn’t.  He’s at the wedding.  He’s giving a speech.  He probably paid for it.  Today, of all days, you’re not going to be able to forget about Mr Foster!

I could have thought that, now James had no chance of gaining the money, Estelle or me, and now that he’d even lost Melissa, he would just fade out of my life. 

Because that’s what people who are driven to murder to achieve their goals do.  They back down as soon as they encounter a minor setback.  Trufax.

After all, there was nothing he wanted from Cherry, Gary, Joe or me anymore.  We were safe.

But, if you remember, those had been my exact thoughts before Christmas, and he’d shown up to ruin everything then as well.

If by “ruin everything,” you mean, “invite you to a family dinner.”

From where I was standing, I could see him on the end of the group being photographed.  His grin was too white for the rest of his body.  James Foster should have had, by all rights, nicotine-stained teeth with a lot of fillings.  That would have fit with the rest of him.  Instead, his teeth were, if not exactly pearly white, around the colour of aged paper.  The other problem that I had with his teeth was that they looked (to me at least) more triangular than square.  Maybe I would have thought differently if he’d been a complete stranger, but from where I was standing, knowing what I did about him, James Foster seemed like a man with a shark’s teeth.

It wasn’t James who came up and hugged me after the photos were taken; you’ll be relieved to hear.  I didn’t even have time to remember who the cool-eyed, midnight-black-haired woman with the baby in tow was before she started squeezing.

“I can’t believe it, Anja!” said Estelle, “I knew you and Gary were right for each other!  I knew it from the time you were at my house.  You just needed a push in the right direction.”

“I want a word with you about that, Estelle Freeman,” I replied, “Giving us the same room in the Black Heart that time was a dirty trick.”

“Aw, come on!  You two would never have got into bed if I hadn’t intervened.  Think of me as your fairy godmother.”

“Hmm.”

So there you have it.  Estelle wanted these two spectacularly immature teenagers to have sex.  She’s happy that they’re getting married before they’re old enough to buy alcohol.  That makes her Gary and Anja’s fairy godmother, and certainly not a menace to society!

Gary noticed that Estelle had started talking to me, and walked across the registry office lawn to join in.  “Hello, Estelle.  Is this Jean?”

“Yep!” beamed Estelle, “You can hold her if you like.  But don’t drop her.”

“Isn’t Mark here?” asked Gary, picking up Jean.  She promptly threw up over his jacket.

“No, stupid, everyone here would think he was a zombie.  We still need to get Melissa to break it to them that he’s not.  This whole thing is way too complicated.”

AND WHOSE FAULT IS THAT!?!

“So Melissa told you that she knew?” I asked.

“Huh?  Oh yeah.  She said when she phoned up to invite me.  She said, I wouldn’t bring Mark if I were you, Estelle.”  She laughed.  “I was so shocked when she said that I couldn’t speak!  Then she told me about you revealing all.  That was very risky, Anja.”  She wagged her finger in a mock-stern way.  “But I’m glad that things are being sorted out.  Some guys, mentioning no names, have started to think I’m going to be a merry widow, if you know what I mean,” she said, nudging Gary and me.

Sixteen-year-old me certainly didn’t.

“Wow,” replied Gary, handing Jean back to her mother, “What does Mark think about that?”

Estelle was about to answer when Jack made an announcement.  He spoke in the tone of voice used by someone who doesn’t have a microphone and really wishes that they did.  “Erm, hello?  Hello, everyone?  The photos are done, so I thought we could all head over to Wild Cherry for the reception.  OK, so everyone, soon as you’re done chatting, head for the car park.”

Estelle started walking towards her Peugeot.  “Mark’s sorry he couldn’t make it to the wedding, but he says he hopes you both have long and happy lives.”

I wasn’t convinced.  “That doesn’t sound like something Mark would say.”

“That’s probably because I made it up while the photos were being taken.  What he actually said was more along the lines of Bring me back some cake.  But I think my idea was more romantic.”

 ***

If Wild Cherry House looked stately under normal circumstances, it was a scene from a fantasy novel for the wedding reception.  Cherry, as the hostess and therefore the person to whom it fell to do all the decorating, had gone nuts.  She had draped red tinsel over the tables, banisters and walls in the hall…

Tinsel!  Exactly what you want at a wedding reception!

…and the floor, under the pink tablecloths, had been polished to within an inch of its life.  It now looked as though the room was paved with gold, rather than just very expensive varnished wood.

I’m sure that the bride (one of the brides) isn’t supposed to feel underdressed at a wedding reception, but I did.  All the other women were wearing clothes that looked as though they were designed especially for models from one of the more snobbish fashion agencies, only to be stolen by the people currently wearing them in time for the wedding.  I, meanwhile, was wearing an off-the-peg dress that I’d bought from a shop (and not a particularly stylish or expensive shop) a few weeks previously.  Maybe I was imagining it, but I’m sure I saw some pretty sneering expressions on the faces of some of the Fosters’ relatives.

Because Anja is DOWN-TO-EARTH, got it?

At least, though, all the men were dressed in penguin suits.  But I could think of a disadvantage to that.  For one thing, it meant that Gary was wearing the same clothing as the man currently giving a speech at the main table.

“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,” James Foster smirked when everyone had shut up, “I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate Gary, Honour, Emily, and of course my son Jack.  I wish them every happiness in the future.  Marriage is an important step in anybody’s life, and, unfortunately, many people get it wrong.” 

“Like the time I alienated my wife by murdering one of our children.  Honestly, who would have thought she’d get upset about that?”

He didn’t look at Melissa at this point.  He didn’t need to.  She was fuming with rage anyway.  “But, young as they are, I feel that these four people have made, without doubt, the right choice. 

Stop enabling Anja’s boneheaded decisions, Mr Foster!  I know you’re a serial killer, but have some standards!

Look at Jack and Emily, never far from each other’s sides.  Emily is a family friend of old, and she and Jack have stayed together through the toughest times, comforting each other and giving each other the confidence to go on.  Losing our beloved Violet, as well as Joe and Aunt Jean last year, followed by the strain put on our, Jack’s parents’, marriage- None of these things have been easy on Jack, any more than they have been easy on his brothers and sister.  But he has survived, and why? 

“Because he didn’t get in my way!”

Because Jack has the love of a good woman.”

Or that.

At this point, James Foster turned his shark’s grin on us.  “Honour and Gary are, obviously, not people who I have known as long as I have my son.”  For some inexplicable reason, everyone laughed.  “But from when our very own wild cherry, Svetlana Hughes, introduced me to her dazzling younger sister last year, I was beset with a great urge to get to know her and the man in her life. 

“And by ‘know her,’ I mean ‘know her,’ if you, er, know what I mean.  Ahem.”

Their friendly conversation, their hardworking personalities…

Friendly?  Hardworking?  Are we talking about the same Anja here?

…their affection for both our younger children, Leah and Robert, and Svetlana’s dear Ben- All of these things combine to create two splendid young people.  They are a credit to their country, to their workplace, to their families and to one another.  Honour and Gary are two young people who are an example to us all, for unlike many people their age, they find no joy in promiscuity. 

Mr Daly’s been gone for eight chapters, so James will now briefly take up the mantle of Straw Daily Mail Reader.

Honour’s honour, if you will, is matched only by her love for Gary, and it is clear to anyone that these feelings are mutual.  Why, it was only last week that Vick was telling me about a beautiful picture that Gary had drawn of his bride.”

Gary went bright red, and looked away from the table.  He’d been very private about his sketchpad for the past few months, and if he hadn’t shown me any of his drawings then chances were that he hadn’t given Vick permission to look at them either.  It was more likely that Vick had snuck a look while Gary was in the loo, or something.  In any case, it was an extremely inappropriate thing to bring up.

“Who’d have thought a serial killer would be so disrespectful of other people’s privacy?”

“So,” James concluded, “I propose a toast to the two happy couples.  May they have long and happy lives together.”  As everyone toasted us, I wondered if Mr. Foster remembered that, if it had been up to him, Gary and I wouldn’t be alive at all.

See?  Serial killers are rude!

Ben’s voice broke through the laughter of the party.  “Told you, Robbie!” he shouted, “Am not a baby!  Am three!  Mummy, aren’t I three?”

“Sh, Ben,” Cherry whispered, “Robbie didn’t mean you were a baby, just that you were little.  Now why don’t you and Leah dance to the nice music?”

And that, I believe, is the final Cute Ben Moment of the book.  Didn’t they add such a lot to the narrative?

As it turned out, everybody in the room wanted to dance to the allegedly nice music (a compilation of the cheesiest love songs you’ve ever heard).  Cherry wouldn’t start, though, until she’d walked straight over to us and kissed us both on the cheek.  “Good luck, you two,” she smiled as she lingered a little too long on Gary’s face.  Joe’s furious glance apparently just spurred her on.

As Gary and I tried to dance heavily enough to drown out the music, he whispered, “I love you, Anja, really I do.  If it hadn’t been for you, I might have tried to kill myself by now.”

Because that’s a sweet thing to say to your (sixteen-year-old) girlfriend/wife!  Not passive-aggressive or manipulative at all!

“I love you and all, Gary,” I replied. 

Anja is suddenly Northern.

I didn’t realize exactly how much, though, until an hour later, when Gary showed me his sketchbook again.  After the drawing of the burning fortress, the one I’d seen before, all the dozens of sketches in the book were of me.

As you’ve probably gathered by now, fifteen/sixteen-year-old-me had a hard time distinguishing between “sweet” and “creepy.”

There were some traditional portraits, some racy ones (the most embarrassing of which I was sure was the one that Vick had sneaked a look at) and some surreal ones.  But the most surprising one was also the earliest, drawn right at the back of the book so that nobody would see unless Gary pointed it out.

It was a picture of me as I had appeared on the bus all those months ago.  I knew that had to be when it had been drawn- there was the same school uniform, the same bus seats, the same bored look on my face, everything.  That picture had been the one Gary had been drawing the first time I had seen him.

“Well, I’d heard that artists often do sketches of pretty girls they see, and I couldn’t afford a model…”

That’s a lot of words to say, “I’m kind of a creeper.”

Gary seemed apologetic.  When he’d drawn this, he hadn’t expected me to see the book (or him) ever again.

Gary had been interested in me from the minute he’d seen me, I knew that now.  And I’m glad that, whatever happened next, I knew that.

 ***

The sun set on the best day of my life, and it rose ten hours later on the worst.

(Grabs the popcorn.)  Go on.

There are some days that get off to a bad start from the minute you wake up, and the day after my wedding was one.  I was woken by Cherry tearfully shouting my name.  “Anja…  Anja wake up.”  She gulped down some air before her trembling hands started to shake me awake.  “Anja…  It’s Gary, he…”

As my eyes opened, I looked sideways.  Gary wasn’t where he should have been, and I couldn’t wait for Cherry to finish crying to find out where he was.  I pushed past her and ran into the living room.

I will never, if I live to be the oldest woman on the planet, forget the scene in that room as I ran in.

On the sofa sat Joe, his face frozen into a blank expression, cuddling a wailing Ben.  Opposite them were some paramedics, lifting a stretcher as they walked out of the door.

On the stretcher was a boy with his eyes shut, either with bruises or unconsciousness, his arm clearly broken, and his face bleeding.  I knew, as soon as I saw Gary like this, that my life had been ruined.

Join us next week for the final chapter and epilogue.  We’re nearly done!

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Oh Dear, Fifteen-Year-Old Me (part seventeen)

Posted on by weeks4send

Hello!  We’re in the seventeenth entry, but reviewing Chapter Eighteen.  Because that’s not confusing in the least!

“I’ve left him! Melissa sniffed.

“Surprised” is too weak a word. 

I know!  For once, somebody’s actually taken some sort of action against the villain!

(Yes, I know his wife leaving him isn’t going to do much to thwart his evil plans, but if Anja had been the one married to James, she’d still be glaring at the back of his head and hoping he’d self-destruct through her sheer hatred.  So I think Melissa’s done very well.)

Melissa had just charged into our house looking miserable (and terrified), then dropped the bombshell.  Cherry and I were wearing identical expressions of absolute dumbfoundedness.  Our mouths were so wide open that our faces looked distorted, and each of us was trying desperately to hide her joy behind shocked sympathy.

“Yay!  After six months of sitting around doing nothing, somebody else is doing our job for us!”

“Why?” I asked, though the answer was bloody obvious, “Had he been seeing someone else?”

“No,” Melissa replied, then looked at us imploringly.  “Listen, girls.  People will think I’m mad if they hear that I’ve said this, so I’m counting on you not to spread it around.  The fact is, when Joe died…  I’m beginning to think that the newspapers were right.  I’m even beginning to think that James might have had something to do with the accident.”  She looked down at the cup of coffee that Cherry had made her.

Before Cherry could stop herself, she blurted out, “Oh!  You mean because of the Sammy thing?”

Well, don’t act too surprised, Cherry.

“I think my husband might be a serial killer!”

“Oh yeah!  He did try to kill our friend’s husband that time, didn’t he?  I’d forgotten about that!”

Melissa nodded.  “Yes, Cherry, the Sammy thing.  And I can’t help but think that if I’d actually stopped to wonder why James looked so angry when you said you’d straightened it, Mark, Joe and Jean might still have been alive today.”    

Yeah…  Why didn’t you wonder about that?  It’s never actually explained.

She gulped back a sob.  “It’s Estelle’s baby that’s done it.  To think, that poor child will never know her father, and it’s all my fault…”

Now, that made me feel guilty if nothing else.  If only she knew, I thought, Jean Freeman’s dad is alive and well and ecstatic, and Melissa’s here torturing herself with guilt over his death…  I couldn’t let her go through all that unnecessarily. 

Pfft, why not?  You’ve already let your friends and family go through it unnecessarily for six months.  One more person won’t hurt!

It was bad enough dealing with Gary’s guilt over Topaz, Shell and me.

…You’ve completely forgotten about your parents at this point, haven’t you, Anja?

“Melissa?” I asked, “We need to tell you something.  Well, we need to tell you a lot of things, but we can only tell you if you promise that what we say won’t leave this room.”

Why not?  The whole reason you were being secretive in the first place was so that James wouldn’t find out you were alive, and she’s hardly likely to tell him now.

I looked at Cherry.  She must have worked out what I was up to quickly, because when our gazes met, she nodded.  We both knew that we had to tell Melissa, otherwise we’d regret the consequences.

Heh, Anja regretting something.  Or acknowledging the consequences of her actions.  That’s a good one.

“What is it?” asked Melissa.

*** 

By the time Melissa left for Jack and Emily’s place, she knew everything about what had happened over the past few months. 

She knew that Joe and Mark were still alive.  She knew that James had almost certainly tried to kill us, and succeeded in killing Jean.  She knew that Cherry and I were cousins, and that I was Anja Cleary.  Unless you’ve lived under an assumed name near people who you feel are bound to find you out eventually, you can’t imagine what a relief that was.

Oh, shut your face, Miss “This is so cool!”

“You’re that sweet little girl, Honour?” she asked, “Sorry, Anja.  Though I doubt I’d ever have guessed it on my own.  Never mind different hair colour, you’re far more mature than the girl they keep describing. 

(gagging noises)

I suppose that’s one of the saddest things about dying young, not getting enough time to show your full personality to everyone. 

Yes.  That is the saddest thing.  Anja not getting to persuade the lowly mortals to worship her adequately is much sadder than her parents losing their only daughter.  Much, much sadder.

Are you sure that Joe…?”  It seemed like she didn’t dare to finish off her sentence, just in case the answer was somehow “no.”

Note that Melissa isn’t strangling them.  They’ve spend six months allowing her to believe that her son was dead, and she isn’t angry at them at all.  Nor is she demanding to see Joe, even though there’s no good reason why she shouldn’t.  I think Joe would appreciate the chance to talk to somebody who actually likes him.

“Yes,” said Cherry, “I’m really sorry you had to go through all this.  We would have told you bang at the start if we could have, but at times like that…  Well, you feel like you can’t trust anyone.”  I decided not to tell Cherry that she was quoting Mr. Daly.   I didn’t imagine she wanted to be reminded of his existence any more than I did.

“Yes, I understand.”  I wouldn’t have. 

Me neither.

I couldn’t imagine having to live in a world where beloved relatives could apparently die and then, a few months later, just when I was beginning to come to terms with the loss, it could turn out that they weren’t dead after all, and the people who might be construed as being to blame implied that I was too untrustworthy to tell. 

“Might be construed as being to blame.”  “Might be construed.”

I would have wanted to hit someone. 

Oh, we all do.

But I think, on the whole, Melissa was just a better person than me.  It wouldn’t be hard. 

YOU CAN SAY THAT AGAIN.

“I don’t think…” she added, “Well, that is to say, I want to see Joe again, sometime soon, but I don’t think I could face him just at this moment. 

Fifteen-year-old me, this is not how humans act.  Just because you get embarrassed by any strong emotion that isn’t Anja and Gary’s schmaltzy love doesn’t mean that Melissa does.

Not after everything that’s already happened today.  Tell him I said…” She paused, unable to think of something appropriate to say.  “Well, tell him I love him, and I’m delighted that he’s still here.  Just tell him that.”

The sad thing is, this is the nicest thing anyone’s said to Joe in six months.

Cherry led Melissa out, offering her a lift and being turned down.  “I’ll just take the train, if that’s alright with you.  I need some time alone, you know, to clear my head.  I mean, it’s a lot to think about, isn’t it?” she offered as a parting shot, “I’ve been through what many people would call a mother’s worst nightmare, and now it’s almost as though I’m waking up.”

*** 

Melissa didn’t tell her children why she had left their father, or anything to do with Joe.  She spun some tale about them “growing apart and needing space,” I think.  Despite the fact that Melissa had not yet found a flat, James relinquished custody of the younger children to her without an argument.  He knew that she could get him locked up for life if he upset her.

…So why doesn’t she?

The plans for Jack and Emily’s wedding, scheduled for June, went ahead without him.  Emily gushed out every last detail of it to anyone she could stop for long enough.  “It’s like, so amazing, isn’t it Honour?  I mean, I’ve always known I’d end up marrying Jack, even when I was little I did, but now it’s all happening and it’s not far off anymore!  Hey, tell you what- you and Gary could make it a double, eh?  Two peas in a pod, you are!  Earlier this week Jack said you two remind me of someone, and you know what?  I just figured it out- you remind him of us!”

Emily, please stop encouraging the spectacularly immature sixteen-year-old to make a lifelong commitment.  I mean, it’s going to happen at the end of the story anyway, because fifteen-year-old me had read too much V.C. Andrews, but there’s no reason for you to rush it along.

“She’s such a bimbo,” said Joe, on one of the rare occasions when he came down from his room (made even rarer by the almost constant presence of his relatives), “So totally vacuous.  If Jack really marries her, I wouldn’t blame him if he ends up with a bit on the side within a month.  No, make that a week.”

“That is such a chauvinistic thing to say,” I snapped.  Cherry walked in at that point, giving Joe an evil look.  That was the one thing that could crush Joe’s serpentine arrogance.

“You know, Joe,” she told him, “Maybe if you didn’t say things to deliberately rile Anja, she’d be more friendly to you.”

When has he ever…?  Oh, never mind.  Cheap angst, that’s all this is.

Joe laughed defiantly.  “I tried that, remember?  I tried all that months ago, and it didn’t work.  She’d just been freezing me out ever since Aunt Jean died.  She probably thinks bereavement is catching.”

Aw, don’t take it personally, Joe.  Smug drunk sociopaths get irrational grudges all the time.  It’s not you, it’s her.

“That’s it, Joe!”  Cherry turned on him, practically steaming with rage.  “I don’t have to let you live in this house, you know!  All you’re doing is being spiteful to my cousin and her boyfriend…

Pot!  Kettle!  Black!

…and you’re making them both miserable!

To be fair, it’s not that hard to make Gary miserable.  It’s kind of his natural state.

Practically the only reason I asked you in the first place is because you’re good with Ben, and you don’t even pay him any attention anymore!”

“That’s because,” Joe grunted, “the blessed Saint Gary has taken my place in Ben’s eyes.  I’m not good enough for him anymore, same as I’m not good enough for…”

“Joe Foster, you are a waste of space!  No, I’m wrong there, you’re worse!  At least wastes of space just waste space!  You contaminate it so nobody else wants to use it again!  You’d better buck your ideas up, Joe, because I’m sick and tired of having you around!”

SPOILERS- You know what?  When Joe goes psycho-killer next chapter, Anja and Cherry completely deserve it.  Out-and-out mental cruelty, that’s what this is.

As much as Joe had been irritating me for the past few months, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him when Cherry flounced out.  There was something in his face that suggested that his heart was about to tear to pieces.

It’s about six months too late for a twinge of conscience, Anja.

The telephone rang at that point.  I was glad of the excuse to avoid Joe’s gaze, but I wouldn’t have been so sure had I known who was on the other end.

“Hello?” I said.

“And hello to you, Honour,” replied James Foster.

 ***

I froze for the next minute.  The world obviously didn’t stop, but one thought erased my knowledge of anything else.

It’s James Foster.  He tried to kill me once and he can do it again.

But he’s only on the other end of the phone, I considered as he began to talk; There’s no way to kill someone when you’re not even in the same room.

He’d find a way, Anja.  If anyone can, it’s James Foster.

That’s ridiculous.  Nobody can murder someone using…

Once again- no idea where to put the comic relief.

“Honour?” asked my enemy, “Are you alright?”

“My enemy”?  So is this James speaking, or Joe?

“Huh?  Oh, sorry.  I just dropped something.”

“That’s alright.  I don’t expect you thought you’d be hearing from me?”

“No.  I…  I was sorry to hear about you and Melissa.  You always seemed to be such a close couple.”  It’s hard for me to tell a barefaced lie…

MWA HA HA HAAAAA!  Oh, Anja, you kill me.

…especially if I suspect that my life depends on it.

“Never mind it,” he assured me, as though I’d been talking about a stolen television instead of an impending divorce, “To tell you the truth, Honour, our marriage had been on the rocks for years.  Almost…  Well, I dislike saying this, but almost since Violet died.”

“Really?”  So, he was blaming Melissa for Vi’s death as well as Joe.  What a creep.

“I shouldn’t talk about things like that, though.  After all, I’d hate to live in the past, not when I should be considering the future.”

“How come?”

“Ah, Honour.  Sweet, innocent Honour.  How long have we known each other?”

And now begins the part of the conversation where a middle-aged bloke attempts to hit on a sixteen-year-old.  A sixteen-year-old he started fancying when she was fourteen, remember.  Somehow, the fact that he’s a serial killer is the least creepy thing about James Foster.

It sounded almost as though he was flirting with me.  Suddenly, something that darling little Robbie had said to me on New Year’s Eve came back to haunt me.

“Since last November,” I answered, “Look, Mr. Foster, I’m not sure I like you calling me…”

“Call me James, call me James.  Honour, ever since I first met you I’ve entertained certain… feelings about you.  Was that so wrong of me, considering the age gap between us?”

Yes, I thought. 

I AGREE.

“No, Mr. Foster, I’m really flattered, but I should tell you that…”

“Would you come out for a drink with me tomorrow night, Honour?  I’ve been dying to ask you for weeks, but I’ve only just plucked up the courage.”

SHE’S NOT OLD ENOUGH TO DRINK.  ON ACCOUNT OF HER BEING SIXTEEN.  AND YOU ARE NOT YOURSELF SIXTEEN, YOU PERV.

“Look, Mr. Foster, I’m sorry, but I already have a boyfriend. 

“And also, you’re fifty.”

I…  I really love him, OK, so you can see how I can’t go out for a drink with another man. 

“Especially not one who’s fifty.”

Thanks for the offer, but I’m afraid I can’t.”

“Oh.”  For the first time in half a year, I noticed a resemblance between James Foster and his son.  James’ voice at that point had sounded exactly how Joe’s face had looked when Cherry had threatened to kick him out a few minutes previously.  “Well, one can’t blame me for trying. 

Yes one can!  And does!

Goodbye, Honour.”

At that point, he hung up, leaving me with a chilling (and correct) feeling that I had not heard the last from him.

Yeah, it’s strange how you always end up hearing from serial killers again after you don’t report them to the police.

I looked around, seeing that Joe had left the room.  Gary walked in, furtively checking every window as he came.  He’d been doing this for the past month, ever since he’d read about Shell.  As I looked at his hand, I saw that it was clenched around something, and trembling not only with his tight grip.  Gary looked even paler than usual, as though he was going to be sick with fear.  He looked, in fact, very similar to the way he had when we first met.  Unable to meet my eyes, he looked at the carpet.  It was almost as though he was afraid of me, or of something I might do. 

And so he should be.  You are, after all, a smug drunk sociopath.

He picked up a CD from the cabinet near the door, and put it in the CD player, turning the volume down so that the song that came on didn’t drown out what he had to say.

“Anja,” he asked, “I have something to ask you, and your answer could…  Well, just hear me out.”

I recognized the song as a romantic ballad that I had always liked.  It wasn’t one by a boyband, but by a respectable rock group who weren’t ashamed of being a little soppy occasionally. 

I love how sixteen-year-old me is attempting to differentiate Anja and Gary from those shallow people who like boybands, while, at the same time, putting together a sappy, clichéd proposal scene right out of a Westlife video.

As the chorus began, I guessed with a start what Gary’s question would be.

He was breathing so hard that any doctor would have wrongly diagnosed him as asthmatic immediately.  “Anja, I was worried in case I couldn’t ever get round to saying this.   I’ve never met anyone in my life who I’ve loved as much as you.”

And I was worried in case all this business with Jordan had caused Gary to panic and make sweeping generalizations.  “What about Topaz?” I asked.

He shook his head.  “Topaz wasn’t like you.  She just thought of me as her best friend.  To be honest, I don’t think she even noticed that I was a boy.  You, on the other hand…” Gary finally met my eyes and smiled.  “You’re a wonderful person, Anja. 

LIES!  LIES!  LIES!  LIES!  LIIIIIES!!!

I couldn’t have survived the past year without you.  I overheard Emily making a suggestion to you earlier this week, and I could have died happy only by considering it.  So I’ve got to do this before it’s too late.”

(vomits discreetly)

As he knelt down, Gary unclenched his shivering fist to reveal a plain, shining ring.

“Anja Cleary, will you marry me?”

Phew.  At least that’s over with.  Join us next time for the big wedding.  Be sure to bring your sickbags.

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