Tag: fiction

The Six Daughters of Celine Cooper (part one)

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(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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West of the Fields

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(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

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(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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Class of 2015 (4 of 4)

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Ursula- from the Latin, meaning “little bear.”

Ursula would probably be a panda, because she too is a docile creature who likes to eat her greens. She’s often tried to get a vegetarian society started at school, but one look at Fiona usually causes her to lose heart. At the weekend, Ursula volunteers at a stray dogs’ and cats’ home, and she’s often managed to rope Laura into going with her. Hopefully, this will give Laura the opportunity to be proud of something that happened in the last decade for once.

Veronica- from the Latin, meaning “True image,”

Unlike most of her classmates, Veronica more than lives up to her name- she’s a very talented photographer. More talented than the headteacher would have liked, in fact- it was Veronica who got those pictures of him and the Head of Geography. It probably says a lot about Veronica’s honesty that she didn’t try to blackmail the headteacher, instead choosing to send the photos to everyone else in the school the second she got them. We should all have such integrity.

Winona- from the Sioux, meaning “firstborn daughter.”

Quintana does not want to hear any of Winona’s whining.

Xanthe- from the Greek, meaning “fair haired.”

According to stereotypes, blonde women are all dimwitted bimbos. You might expect Xanthe to be offended by this belief, but in fact she encourages it in everyone she knows. It makes the look on their faces once they’ve realised that Xanthe has utterly outwitted them and stabbed them in the back so much more satisfying.

(Word of advice- never play cards with Xanthe. You will regret it. And possibly have to remortgage your house.)

Yolanda- from the Spanish, meaning “violet.”

Extracts of violets can be used to treat asthma and insomnia. This isn’t much use to Yolanda, though, because she’s never had either of those. In fact, she’s never been sick a day in her life. She sees any kind of ill health as a sign of weakness. She insists that you just have to exercise properly and have the right attitude. She says that you have only yourself to blame if your body lets you down. And if she says that to her more sickly classmates one more time, they’re going to work out how to infect her with the bubonic plague.

Zoë- from the Greek, meaning “life.”

And “life” is exactly what Zoë’s classmates say she should have got for what she did to that supply teacher. Zoë’s defence is that the woodwork room is full of dangerous equipment, and sending in somebody who doesn’t know what they’re doing is asking for trouble. The rest of the class maintain that people with much longer hair than said teacher have spent time in the woodwork room without their ponytails being caught in the sander. Of course, none of those people happened to yell at Zoë for a full ten minutes because her skirt was an inch too short.

Illustration:  http://camelwithout.deviantart.com/art/Class-of-2015-558398077?ga_submit_new=10%253A1441467997

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Class of 2015 (3 of 4)

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Niamh- from the Irish, meaning “bright.”

This is a little unfortunate, because Niamh is the sort of girl who falls for chain letters and Nigerian scams. For the last two years, she’s been breathlessly telling her classmates that if you can’t cover your entire face with your hand, it means you have cancer. So far, none of them have let her in on the joke, but honestly, it probably wouldn’t matter even if they did. Niamh would probably just decide that the conspiracy for the promotion of small hands had got to them, too.

Orla- from the Gaelic, meaning “princess.”

And, indeed, Orla has a tendency to throw tantrums whenever things don’t go exactly her way. Like when Amy was elected Head Girl instead of her. Orla took that as a sign that each of the other hundred and ninety-nine girls in the Sixth Form had a personal grudge against her, as opposed to a sign that, well, there were a hundred and ninety-nine other girls in the Sixth Form. Anyway, Orla decided that they were all just jealous. It’s not clear what of.

Paula- from the Latin, meaning “small.”

Paula is six foot tall and beats up smaller kids. Some parents just like to tempt fate.

Quintana- from the Spanish, meaning “the fifth girl.”

This, as you might imagine, has caused no end of resentment in Quintana as she’s grown up. She spends a great deal of time looking for ways to punish her four older sisters for the crime of being born before her. Said sisters often find notes pinned to their classroom door telling everybody their bra size, which boys they fancy, and the details of that time they wet themselves at the garden centre when they were six. Quintana is truly merciless.

Unfortunately, Quintana has so far failed to take into account the fact that she also has two younger sisters with equally insulting names, and they are plotting. Ooh, are they plotting.

Rachel- from the Hebrew, meaning “ewe.”

Ewes have four stomachs, but Rachel must have about twenty to deal with some of the crap she eats. It’s not just a matter of going down to McDonald’s more than once a week- it’s a matter of eating pickled onions for breakfast and eight Mars bars for dinner. Her teachers try desperately to point her towards the Healthy Eating queue at lunch, but she usually only goes there for the slush machines. Her favourite flavour is blue.

Saoirse- from the Irish, meaning “freedom.”

Saoirse hasn’t told anyone this, but as soon as school finishes for the summer, she plans to disappear. She’ll hit the road and travel through Europe, with nothing but her backpack and her imagination. She’ll send her parents a postcard now and then, so they’ll know she’s alright, but other than that, she’ll be carving out a whole new life, entirely her own. She can’t wait.

Theresa- from the Greek, meaning “harvest.”

This is odd, because Theresa is actually banned from the Harvest Festival church service because of what happened when she was in Year Seven. In her defence, it probably wouldn’t have been such a complete disaster if Reverend Underwood hadn’t developed a habit of sneakily helping himself to the wine from the donations table (rationalising that the poor were better off keeping away from alcohol anyway). One sip of the bottle Theresa had taken from under her dad’s desk, and the congregation were treated to a sermon on that well-known book of the Bible, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

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Class of 2015 (2 of 4)

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Hayley- from the English, meaning “meadow.”

Bambi’s mother once said, “You must never rush out onto the meadow. There might be danger.” Unfortunately, she wasn’t around to say it to Hayley, who rushes out everywhere. If she was attacked by a Great White Shark, her first instinct would be to cuddle it. Since there aren’t any Great White Sharks around at the moment, she makes do with setting fire to bits of paper in Chemistry and running across busy roads to meet her friends. Hayley’s classmates appreciate her spontaneity, but they are also running a betting pool on what will cause her inevitable gruesome death.

Ivy- from the English, meaning “faithfulness.”

This makes Ivy’s habit of stealing her friends’ boyfriends even odder. She says she doesn’t mean to. There she’ll be, minding her own business, when her best mate will suddenly bring a handsome boy to her table, and, well, Ivy will just lose her heart. She will also conveniently forget about her own boyfriend, stolen from her last best friend only to be callously discarded. Some say that Ivy does this because of a subconscious desire to prove that she’s the smartest and most attractive one in the group, but Ivy maintains that she’s just a romantic. A romantic who has thoroughly traumatised half the boys in town.

Jacqueline- from the French, meaning “supplanter.”

Jacqueline has probably taught more History lessons this year than her actual History teacher. The teacher will barely get more than two sentences out before Jacqueline interrupts with a new and fascinating fact about the Tudor Era. Did you know that Elizabeth the First was famous for flashing her boobs at her entire court? Did you know that Henry the Seventh’s wife used to wear cheap knock-off jewellery because her husband was too cheap to buy her the real stuff? The class will be mesmerised, and the teacher will have lost them for the rest of the lesson. This wouldn’t be so bad if not for the fact that they’re meant to be studying the Second World War.

Kathleen- from the Greek, meaning “pure.”

So is the cocaine she sells outside the school gates. Enough said.

Laura- from the Spanish, meaning “crowned with laurels.”

In Ancient Rome, war heroes were crowned with laurel wreaths to symbolise their achievements. Laura has a sash covered in Brownie Badges instead. Her classmates have gently tried to tell her that this is not an appropriate thing for a seventeen-year-old girl to wear, but the heartbreakingly proud look on her face when she tells them the story of how she won her Friend To Animals badge is just too much to bear. We all need something to make us feel good about ourselves.

Madeline- from the Hebrew, meaning “woman from Magdala”

Magdala is a place mentioned in the Bible. Madeline herself was not mentioned in the Bible, but try telling her that. You’ll just get a long, condescending lecture about how you’re blinded by your sinful nature, and if only you’d give your heart to Jesus, you’d see that Madeline is right about everything and the greatest person who ever lived. Interestingly, Madeline has been kicked out of three local churches for getting on the vicars’ nerves, which is probably about as close as anyone gets to literally trying the patience of a saint.

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High End

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Nina had been right- there wasn’t anywhere to park. Luckily, Harry had thought ahead and hired a more down-at-heel car than usual, so he didn’t stick out like a sore thumb when he parked halfway down Maggie’s road. Nina, of course, had taken her prize pink Bentley Continental and ended up having to wedge it in between a couple of the neighbours’ shabby Ford Fiestas. That was Nina all over. She’d had some idea about intimidating Maggie with her status, but at the end of the day she’d been screaming the house down because one of the local kids had put a scratch in the paintwork. Harry knew better. Harry knew how to play it cool.

Anthony had come down here, and then Nina had come down here, and now, finally, here was Harry. Here to bring things to their natural conclusion.

The house, which looked as if it may have had as many as four or five rooms, was at the bottom of a sharp slope, a little, mossy garden path cutting through the dead grass. “Try wearing high heels on that slope, and you’d probably break your neck,” Nina had said, in one of her heated little huffs, “That tells you all you need to know about the little cow.” Judging by the photographs Harry had managed to dig up, Nina may have been right about that. Well, even a broken clock was right twice a day.

Harry rang the doorbell and waited. She didn’t have to wait long.

There was a shuffling sound on the other side of the door (no window, just wood and chipped paint), and then it opened. Harry had only seen Maggie Glass once before, at the funeral four years ago, but he’d had the photos and he’d known what to expect. Nina had got it into her head that Maggie was making a play for her husband, but one look at her should have told her that wasn’t true. When Harry looked at this woman’s crow’s feet, hooked nose and lank, greasy brown hair, he almost laughed.  How could Nina possibly have thought Anthony could be interested in that? Even if he hadn’t had Nina at home, he probably saw higher-quality women every time they went out clubbing.

“Hello?” said Maggie, her little mouse-eyes squinting ahead at Harry’s face. She wasn’t even wearing any makeup. Her skin was as pale and blotchy as the skin on a bowl of porridge.

Harry smiled politely. “Maggie Glass? I’m Harry Croft, Anthony’s father-in-law. I believe my daughter came to see you a few days ago?”

Given Nina’s account of the meeting (or whatever Harry had been able to glean of it from between the screams of rage), he’d expected anger, snide smugness, or maybe even a door slammed in his face. He certainly hadn’t expected a pleasant little smile. “Oh yeah, Nina! How is she?”

How on Earth did you reply to that? After Harry had regained his mental footing, he decided not to. “Listen, I just came to say that I’m sorry for her behaviour.” He smiled. “It’s a little hard to hold down a marriage in the circles she and Anthony move in, and she can be a bit insecure. But that’s no excuse to take it out on you.”

Maggie raised her eyebrows. “Oh, don’t worry- I’m not angry. Do you want to come in?” She stood to the side so that Harry could come through. After a moment’s thought, he did.

Harry had been right- the downstairs part of the house was basically just one big room. Cheap Ikea sofa in one corner, fridge and cooker behind a counter in the other, uneven paint and scuffed wooden floors throughout. It was the kind of room that made you either want to laugh or cry. Denny had left her everything. Alright, next to Nina and Anthony he’d practically been a beggar, but he’d had some money. At the very least, Maggie could afford to upgrade a little.

“It’s the complacency that bothers me,” Nina had said after her visit, “Cause I’ve always been driven to make the best of things. There’s nothing that disgusts me more than people who do nothing with their lives.” Harry thought that it wasn’t so much Maggie’s “complacency” that had bothered Nina as the fact that she hadn’t risen to her bait. Nina had been ready for a fight, and Maggie Glass hadn’t given her one. That must have driven her crazy.

Harry sat down on the sofa, and Maggie went over to the kitchen unit in the corner. “Tea or coffee?” she asked, getting a couple of mugs out of the cupboard.

“Coffee, please,” said Harry, “Black, no sugar.” While she had her back to him, Harry took a long look at her. She was wearing old jeans with a black jumper that looked as though it might previously have belonged to a 90-year-old shepherd with no teeth. Nina had worn old jeans all the time until Harry had set her straight. With legs like yours, you should show them off. The boys won’t be able to take their eyes off you. That couldn’t be said for Maggie, by the looks of it- her body could politely be described as “athletic.” There just wasn’t much there at all. Of course, there was surgery available for that. There was surgery available for everything, as Nina could have told her.

“Like I said, I don’t blame Nina for being concerned,” said Maggie, “Anthony has been round here a lot. But there’s really nothing for her to worry about- he mostly just comes round to talk about Denny.”

Harry didn’t think that was likely- men didn’t take flights from New York in the middle of the night just to talk about their ne’er-do-well brothers- but he also thought that Nina had been way off the mark. Like I don’t know what’s going on there! she’d said, She’s already managed to snag one of the Manning boys, and now she’s developed expensive tastes. Apparently, she’d looked at Maggie and seen some sort of doe-eyed temptress, instead of a greasy-haired farm hand with a pair of dirty wellies sitting by the front door.

Besides, nobody had ever developed expensive tastes by spending time with Denny Manning. He’d been too pure-minded for that.

“I like talking about Denny,” Maggie said from the kitchen, “Do you know what he did once? He found out there was going to be a demonstration in town, an animal rights thing, so he spent all night making jam sandwiches and handed them out to the protestors the next day. Mad as a cat, he was, but he always had a big heart.”

Harry agreed with the first part of that. They’d all been sorry when Denny had died- it broke your heart to see how had it had hit Anthony- but good God, that man had been a thorn in everyone’s side. He’d always made sly little remarks about money, as if Anthony’s music was somehow tainted by him going with a major label. As if Denny was cooler and more authentic because his name had never appeared in the Sun. It hadn’t occurred to Denny that maybe the tabloids and the major labels had never come calling because his music just wasn’t as good.

Maggie brought the tea and coffee over. “I asked him, ‘Why jam sandwiches?’ and he said he had to rule out tuna and cheese because, you know, animal rights crowd, probably a lot of them are going to be vegan. He thought about lettuce and cucumber, but that tends to fall out of the bread if you hold it the wrong way. And too many people are allergic to peanut butter. It had to be jam.”

Harry smiled and nodded. Maggie’s pointless stories about Denny had driven Nina round the bend. God, I always knew men liked crazy girls, but I always thought they liked them a lot prettier than her. Nina been wrong-footed- by all rights she should have come to this woman’s door and blasted her away with the sheer force of her personality. After all, Nina was a big deal. Her name was its own brand. She’d designed fashion and swimwear, brought out her own perfume, and even thrown around some ideas for children’s products. When she went out at night, she went out with businessmen, footballers, film stars… high-end people. And yet, somehow, none of that translated into getting whatever reaction she wanted out of a little country bumpkin living in a ruined cottage. It was bound to be frustrating.

Two words that weren’t in Nina’s vocabulary- subtlety and patience. Harry gave Maggie an encouraging smile. “Listen, Maggie, I have a confession to make. I didn’t just come here to apologise for Nina- I want to talk about Denny, too. You do realise you’re his sole heir?” That was why Anthony had been round Maggie’s so often. Denny’s assets should rightfully have gone to his family, but getting Maggie on their side would be the next best thing. Getting her to see their point of view.

“Yeah,” said Maggie, mug in her hands and eyes half-closed, “I didn’t even know he’d made a will until I got the phone call. He wasn’t even forty.” She sipped her tea. “Sometimes I think he had a premonition of what was going to happen… but more likely somebody at the record label must have told him to do it. There’s always a romantic explanation and a rational one. Now, my mother would have said…”

“What ideas have you got in mind for promoting his back catalogue?” asked Harry. He pointed at the dirty wellies. “Seems to me like you’re more concerned with working at the stables.”

“It was complete luck, how I fell into that,” said Maggie, barely missing a beat, “I always thought I’d end up working in an office, maybe getting a teaching qualification… I never saw myself working with animals. But there’s something satisfying about clearing out a stable. Solid, tangible stuff. You don’t get that in most jobs.” She took another sip. “The animals, too. It sounds strange, but they’re good company. There’s nothing like trying to work with a sheep in the next field trying to jump over the fence and see what you’re doing.”

Harry couldn’t believe this. He stared at her for a moment, then said sternly, “Maggie, I want you to focus for a second. Now, you said yourself that you just want to talk about Denny. You want his name to live on. Well, I’m offering you a chance to make sure of that.” He cleared his throat. “I want you to come up and stay at our place in the West End for a couple of weeks. We’ll take you out, show you the best places to be seen. You can borrow some of Nina’s old things at first, then we’ll see about getting you kitted out at one of the boutiques in town.” He made sure to say “old things” rather than “pre-surgery things,” in case she took offence. But like he’d told Nina- you could buy yourself a padded bra if that was all you wanted, but to do things properly, you had to book yourself in for the surgery. That was just the way it was done. No use complaining about it.

Maggie sipped her tea. “No thanks,” she said.

Harry blinked. “Excuse me?”

“No thanks,” she repeated, perfectly politely. She didn’t offer any further explanation.

Harry clamped down on the rage that was threatening to flare up. Shouting at her would do no good. “Maggie, I don’t think you understand what you’re being offered here.” He’d thought it would be easy. Just bring her out to the West End and let her get her name in the papers, and she’d get a taste for it. Before you knew it, she’d be another asset, along with the ghost of Denny Manning. But first he had to get her out there, and that was turning out to be like pulling teeth.

Maggie sipped her tea. It was as if he hadn’t said anything at all.

“I can introduce you to people who know what they’re doing. I can get your name into the papers.” He paused, then brought out his secret weapon. “Yours and Denny’s.”

Maggie looked around, stretching up her neck like a swan’s. “I like it here,” she said, in her quiet, croaky voice, “It’s just far enough from town to be completely quiet at night. Well, I say ‘completely’… Sometimes you hear animals rooting around in the garden.” She smiled. She still wasn’t looking at him. “Once I opened my curtains at night and saw a badger, staring right back at me. Completely froze up, like a little kid who’d been caught doing something naughty.”

“Maggie, I’m here as your friend.” He looked at her with big, sad eyes. “I thought you loved Denny.”

Finally, she looked him right in the eye. Inwardly, Harry allowed himself a little smile. He’d touched a nerve.

“He was here two nights before he died,” she said. No expression on her face, but the fingers were tightening around her mug. He had her. “He looked completely healthy. I racked my brains afterwards, trying to remember if he mentioned having a headache, but I don’t think he did.”

Harry nodded in sympathy. “You weren’t with him when he died, were you? I expect things like that hurt the most.” He cleared his throat, and added (before she had a chance to jump in), ” I can’t give Denny back to you. I can’t give back all those mornings when you’d wake up next to him. All I can do now is help you honour his memory. Will you let me do that, Maggie?”

For a few seconds, he just listened to her breathe. Then she spoke again. “I used to dream about a place like this, when I was a kid. Well, I used to dream about peace and quiet, I guess. I mean, there were five of us- three girls and two boys- and every inch of the house would be full of my brothers and sisters and their friends, with their music and computer games turned up full blast. I used to… There was a park just a couple of streets away from our house, and I used to sneak out and go and sit on a bench near the ornamental flowerbeds. There’d be no-one there except maybe a couple of old ladies passing through, and I’d just sit there for an hour, thinking.”

Harry’s temper finally got the better of him. “I know what you’re doing, you know.”

It was as if she hadn’t even heard him. “There was this one really frosty afternoon…”

“Stop it, alright?” Harry stood up, knocking his cup of coffee to the floor. He didn’t care. Let her clean it up. “I get it. You don’t trust me. Anyone who dares to be successful is pure evil, right? Better to just hide in the shadows and record albums that only five people will hear.”

She hadn’t moved. He’d smashed one of her mugs against her precious driftwood floor, and she acted like it was nothing. “That’s not why I don’t trust you.”

“So you can follow a conversation!”

Maggie frowned. “Anthony came here to talk about Denny, Mr Croft. No more, no less. And I think you should leave.”

“Of course!” Harry stormed off towards the door. “Why show you success when you’re perfectly satisfied with mediocrity? How rude of me!” He wrenched it open and went out onto the path. Nina had been right. It told you all you needed to know.

Her ugly face appeared at the door. “Tell Nina she can come back whenever she wants. I know she doesn’t want to talk about Denny, but I get the idea she might need a break.” And then, before he had a chance to ask her what that was supposed to mean, she closed the door. Closed it right in his face. Him.

Harry saw red.

He stood on the garden path and raged at her, banging on the door with both fists and cursing a blue streak. He could see the locals coming out of their houses to stare, but he didn’t care. They didn’t intimidate him, and neither did Maggie. Whatever hold Maggie Glass had over people, she’d met her match in Harry. Just as soon as she opened that door, he’d send her off with her tail between her legs.

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Class of 2015 (1 of 4)

Posted on by weeks4send

Amy- from the French, meaning “beloved”

More than anybody else in the class of 2015, Amy believes that names are very significant things. And can it be a coincidence that her own name means “beloved”? Of course not. The class just wouldn’t be the same without her. She’s always organising things, helping people with their problems, and working hard to get everyone to do their best. She always has something interesting to say and something important to give. In fact, Amy may very well be the most well-liked member of the class.

Amy’s classmates don’t quite agree with this version of events, but, as Amy says, no-one asked them.

Beatrice- from the Italian, meaning “traveller.”

If by “traveller,” you mean “gets lost a lot,” then this is pretty accurate. Beatrice not only has no sense of direction, but a ridiculously short attention span to boot. The last time her mother sent her down to the corner shop to buy milk, she was gone for five hours and eventually turned up on a farm two miles away, sitting on top of a hay-bale and looking dreamily up at the sky. Apparently, she’d vaguely remembered that she’d been told to do something related to cows, and after that, one thing led to another.

Chandra- from the Sanskrit, meaning “moon.”

This may or may not be the reason why Chandra, at the age of nine, managed to convince herself that she was secretly a werewolf. It all started the morning she found a reddish-brown stain on her pyjama top, and decided it must have been the blood of one of her victims. Her parents and brother told her that the stain looked a lot like chocolate, and that it hadn’t been a full moon last night anyway, but Chandra chose to ignore this. Some people say you can defeat a werewolf with silver bullets, or by shouting its human name three times, but Chandra was only cured of werewolfism when her mother threatened to stop letting her read Goosebumps books.

Deborah- from the Hebrew, meaning “bee.”

Some people say that, if you don’t tell immediately the bees in your hives about all the births, deaths and marriages that take place in your house, they will stop producing honey out of sheer spite. Deborah can relate to this. When her friend Theresa’s older brother got married, she spent a month demanding an invitation, followed by five months of demanding to know why she wasn’t invited, whether or not she and Theresa were still friends, and if Theresa actually had a whole other group of friends with whom she laughed at Deborah behind her back. Theresa’s protests (that the wedding was taking place in Thailand, and that Deborah had only ever met her brother twice) fell on deaf ears.

Emma- from the German, meaning “universal.”

Emma says that the universe is millions of years old, expanding in every direction, and no human being will ever see more than a tiny fraction of what it has to offer unless– and this is important- they take a whole lot of mind-expanding drugs. Not everybody in her class follows Emma’s logic, but she generally seems cheerful, at least when she’s not being attacked by invisible spiders.

Fiona- from the Scottish, meaning “white.”

In China and Korea, white is the colour that symbolises death. Fiona keeps up this tradition by killing as many insects as she possibly can. Whenever a moth, a spider, or a bumblebee comes into the room, Fiona lets out a scream of terror and punches it to smithereens, much to the horror of her more tender-hearted classmates. Fiona usually responds by asking if they want to get the plague, much to the horror of her History teacher.

Geraldine- from the English, meaning “rules by the spear.”

Actually, Geraldine rules by the Facebook group. She has at least five different accounts under separate names, and she uses them to ask… questions. Simple questions. Questions that require answers. Questions that shouldn’t threaten anybody with nothing to hide. And if some of those questions lead to half the school wishing for another girl’s death for her supposed misdeeds, detailed in the “Is our school harbouring a known terrorist?” group, it’s certainly not Geraldine’s intention.

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“Almost”

Posted on by weeks4send

(Being a short story I wrote after my friend Dave gave me the first sentence as a prompt.  It doesn’t really have an ending.  I thought about adding a punchline when I typed it up, but I couldn’t think of one that would do it justice.)

“Your operation was almost a complete success!”
“What do you mean, ‘almost’?”
“We managed to remove your appendix without any damage to the surrounding organs! Apart from one minor detail, you’ll be as good as new!”
“One minor…?”
“I know you were worried about going under the knife, but our excellent team of surgeons…”
“Why did you say ‘almost’?”
“…worked diligently through the night…”
“Why did you say ‘almost’?”
“And considering that we’ve just saved your life, I must say that it seems a bit nitpicky for you to keep harping on about…”
“Where the hell’s my nose?!?”
“Ah.”
“Where’s my nose? What happened to it?”
“Yes. That would be the ‘almost.’”
“How do you remove someone’s appendix and end up cutting off their nose?”
“Look, Doctor Williams is very young… it’s a mistake anybody could have made.”
“They’re at different ends!”
“Yes, but after twelve Carlsbergs…”
“Why was he drinking…?”
“Now, don’t you go blaming Doctor Williams. It’s not his fault that Doctor Barnes dared him.”
“Dared him?”
“Look, do you think it’s fun being a surgeon? Believe you me, it’s not. We have to find ways to amuse ourselves, and in Doctor Williams’ case… Well, halfway through the operation, somebody said, ‘Hey, doesn’t this guy look a bit like Voldemort?’, and, well, after that one thing led to another…”
“I’m going to sue you for every penny…”
“Honestly, you’ve got no sense of humour. I thought you said you liked Harry Potter.”
“Where’s this Doctor Williams? I’ll kill him!”
“Honestly. Well, if you really want to find him, he’s usually down at the mortuary this time of day. We like to put on a nice puppet show.”
“What?”
“Yes, something for the kiddies. Well, it’s a bit intimidating for them, being in hospital for the first time, and we want to cheer them up.”
“…”
“Good old Corpsey the Dinosaur. All the have to do is use their imaginations, and he comes to… Well, not ‘life,’ exactly, although there was that time with old Mrs Hannigan. I still get the shivers whenever I see a pair of false teeth, you know.”

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Bearskins

Posted on by weeks4send

There was a booming noise coming from the pillow just below my ear, as if a tiny army were marching through the bed and up to meet me. I’d thought this before- the image was already in my head, ready for me to summon and use for exactly this kind of situation. A tiny army, inside the pillows and mattress just below my head, marching upwards, dressed in shiny red uniforms and black hats (bearskins? I think?), marching up a white spiral staircase until they reached the top. And then what would they do? Would they want me to join them, or would they attack me? I didn’t know, and I wasn’t in any position to do anything about it. I was already under. The soft white haze was sucking me in, and there was nothing I could do about it. Everything else would have to wait.

*

I don’t know how much later it was when I heard the howling. I was in bed again… or maybe still in bed. I don’t know which. A lot of time could fly by without me noticing much of anything. But I was in bed, with my eyes still closed, when I heard the noise. Ooo-ooo-ooo, ooo-ooo-oo. I’d heard that noise before, lots of times. When I was little I used to think it was wolves howling somewhere in the distance, and when we were camping out in the woods I knew it was. I kept expecting a wolf pack to suddenly appear behind the next tree, chasing after one of those little deer things (monkjacks? Jack Russells?). But then I’d got a bit older, and found out that…

Nope. It was gone again. I went back to sleep.

*

The next time, I was sitting on the sofa and watching TV. The man was beside me- he’d been the one who’d turned the telly on. I hadn’t seen him do it, but I knew he had. On the TV screen, I could see an old woman limping down the road with a walking stick. “I couldn’t run,” she said, in the voiceover, “I could barely walk…”

Bearly? No, barely. I knew what that meant. If it meant that she couldn’t walk at all, she wouldn’t have bothered saying she couldn’t run. It must mean that she could walk, but not much. She was talking about why she had to use the stick. Barely. I could barely bear it. I could barely bear the bearskins. Barely.

The man was looking over at me, so I wiped the smile off my face and looked down. Shouldn’t have done that. Should just close my eyes and sink down, as usual. Noticing things and smiling at them just led to trouble.

The man said something, but I didn’t hear what it was. He probably wasn’t talking to me, anyway.

*

I was back in bed, listening to the army marching up the stairs. Getting closer and closer to my ear. I wasn’t scared. Not now, anyway. I had been once. I’d laid in bed for about an hour, listening to the sound of marching- this would have been when I was about six or seven- and worrying about what it was. Because there were no such things as tiny armies that climbed up spiral staircases through your bed- or at least, there shouldn’t be. And I couldn’t even pluck up the courage to go downstairs and tell my mum (no, wait, this was later- it would have been my gran), because either she wouldn’t believe me, or she’d come up and hear it as well. So I stayed there, listening, knowing that if they ever actually reached the top and broke through so that I could see them, I’d probably drop dead of fright.

*

I knew my routine now. I didn’t know how long it had been this way, but it had happened enough for me to notice it now. It was the same every day. First the woman would come into my room and bring me a cup of tea (which she’d have to press into my hands, or I’d forget it was there), and then, when I’d finished, she’d help me out of bed and get me dressed. I wore the same sort of clothes pretty much every day- long-sleeved shirts and jeans, with shoes that she had to lace up to get them to stay on. Then she’d take me down to have breakfast, and the man would be there. He’d always have something for me to look at when I’d finished eating. Once it was one of those cradle things where you had four little silver balls hanging on strings, and if you pulled one back and made it crash into the others, the one on the other end would move. It had a name, but I couldn’t remember what it was. On another day, it had been one of those games with a black-and-white board made out of plastic, with little plastic Xs and Os to go on it. Noughts and crosses. He’d sat me in one of the armchairs in the living room, and shown me how you played it. He’d played game after game against himself, turning my face back towards him whenever I looked away. It wasn’t until later that I realised he’d probably wanted me to join in.

Sooner or later, the woman would come back and take me to the table to have lunch. After that, she’d take me into the garden and sit me down on the bench for a while. She’d talk to me a bit while we were out there, saying things about the plants and the weather. And sooner or later, she’d always sit down next to me on the bench, and squeeze my hand so tightly that I thought she was going to twist it off.

*

We were out in the garden when I realised something was wrong.

The woman was beside me, squeezing my hand as usual, when I started listening out for the howling. I wasn’t worried about it- I knew it wasn’t really a wolf (or, if it was, it was too far away to do me any harm.) I was just interested. I couldn’t hear it, but I heard other things- birds chirping in the trees, planes flying over us, the wind going through the grass…

As soon as I heard the wind, I felt it, too. It was ice-cold. It felt like a knife being held against my face.

The woman had let go of my hand. “Look at those clouds,” she said, pointing up at the sky, “I think it’s going to rain later on. Hope it’s not when I have to go to Tesco. I guess I could…”

I didn’t hear the rest of what she said, and I didn’t see the clouds when I looked up. All I saw was the sky, blue and wide and surrounding me from above and all around, sending down the wind to slice at my face. And behind the sky was infinity. Anything could come from there. I was completely exposed.

I’d made a mistake. I shouldn’t be out here with the wind and the sky, looking at things outside of me. I should be safe in my own head, where I couldn’t see anything and nobody could hurt me. I had to get back in.

The woman saw my arms go up on each side of my head. “Danny? What’s wrong?”

Back in. Back in. Turn off. It wasn’t working. I didn’t know how to do it.

“It’s OK,” said the woman, putting her arm around my shoulders. I wished she hadn’t. The sleeve of her jumper was rough and scratchy. It felt wrong against my skin. “It’s OK. Do you want to go back inside?”

I nodded. Yeah. Back inside, away from the sky and the wind. It would be safer in there.

“OK.” She stood up, her arm still around me. “Come on, back to the house.”

*

I was in bed again. From downstairs, I could hear the man and the woman watching TV. It was that sitcom theme, the twisty saxophone one that sounded like it should be a detective show instead. A cool, film noir kind of theme tune. I couldn’t remember what the show was called. I used to know.

The man and the woman hadn’t left me alone all afternoon. They’d taken me into the living room and laid me on the sofa, and then the man had made me a cup of tea that tasted funny, and I’d gone to sleep. They’d woken me up to have dinner, which was spaghetti with melted cheese on top. They didn’t have to feed me anymore- I was OK with knives and forks now. They’d had an argument. I’d tried to keep track of what it was about, but I kept tuning out. Something about the garden and the TV. Something about me. They’d just got to the point where one of them was about to shout or burst into tears, when the woman looked over at me and put her hand on my shoulder. I must have looked as if I was panicking, because they both started to make a fuss of me. “It’s alright. We’re sorry, we didn’t mean to upset you…”

Both of them came up to help me in the bath. They weren’t arguing this time- just talking to me, making sure I was alright. I don’t really remember what they said. Then they dried me off, made me another cup, and put me to bed. And that’s where I was now.

The theme tune ended, and the actual show began. I couldn’t hear that. I pressed my ear up against the pillow, to see if I could hear the army marching again. Marching already. As we go marching on. I curled up in the middle of the mattress. It was warmer there than around the edges. In the middle, it was like a little radiator under my body. It felt a bit like my legs were melting. I remembered another time, a dark, shadowy time, when it was so cold that my blood felt like it had turned into ice, even the spit in my mouth, when my skin stung and my stomach shook and squirmed about, when I tried to curl up and get warm, but it didn’t work because the freezing wind got in everywhere, and all I was lying on was the hard grey ground. I curled up as tightly as I could in the middle of the mattress. The wind couldn’t get in here. There was no room for it.

I could hear the marching going on under my head. The army marching up the spiral staircase. I could hear every step, and they all sounded the same. Wouldn’t one of them trip, if you listened for long enough? Nobody could stay that perfect forever, no matter how well-trained they were. But every time I put my head on the pillow, it was exactly the same. Because there wasn’t actually an army, was there? There couldn’t be.

I sat up and looked at my pillow, then put my hand up and pressed it against my ear. I could still hear the marching, just as loud as I had before. There wasn’t any army. It was my heartbeat. It was me.

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