A Certain Irregularity

The Magic Season

2011-11-25T13:13:00.004Z

Every year, in the village hall, they put on a Christmas play. Not a pantomime, a christmas play. Henry - the headmaster of the local school usually directed it. Antibus Pill always wrote it. Antibus Pill who lived right in the middle of Hardmans Wood and made charcoal. To be perfectly honest, this wasn’t really a job that anyone needed doing, but he liked it. Lengths of cord wood were placed in a large dome shape with a chimney in the centre. Antibus covered it with turf, leaving little vent holes all the way round it. Then he dropped some glowing embers in through the top, so the whole thing fired, and he placed an iron lid over the hole and then pulled up a chair for four days as it quietly burned, and watched the sweet smelling white smoke pour out of the vent holes. As he sat and watched the charcoal burn he would read. Then, when the burning was done - you could tell it was ready because the smoke turned from white to blue - this is just one of the ways in which making charcoal is similar to choosing a pope - he would allow the charcoal to cool for two more days. And during all of this time - he would also read. His cabin, built in the middle of the woods was filled from floor to ceiling with books. A good proportion of the books were collections of theatrical anecdotes, so don’t start thinking he’s some kind of intellectual. And if he wasn’t reading he was writing. Mostly poetry, but from Hallowe’en onwards he was writing the Christmas play.

How Antibus got the job of writing the Christmas play was a mystery. A mystery almost as great as who the hell was buying all this charcoal. But he had been doing it for a very long time. And every year he came up with a brand new twist on something. One year, he wrote a modern version of the nativity. It was set in a brothel.

Aggie Pendragon, head of the WI nearly pulled the whole venture after she saw the dress rehearsal. Antibus and Henry both objected (though Henry’s heart really wasn’t in the project that year - he’d never been the same since his cat had been killed by that boy). Antibus told Aggie that he’d told her two months ago that the thing was going to be set in a brothel. Aggie - rather a simple soul, had to admit that she had been labouring under the misapprehension that a Brothel was where soup was made. Which makes Joseph Campbell the world’s most successful pimp. Anyway - the show went on and it was a massive success.

To be honest - the show was always a massive success, and to the whole town, it signalled the start of Christmas. Everyone turned up to see the shows. Mr Hockle, Mr Trice and Mr Chandler, who owned neighbouring shops on Perrigrew Street often took leading roles. The fact that everyone thought that Antibus Pill was an oddball, and they never invited him to their summer barbecues was pushed under the carpet and a wonderful night was always had by all.

You can picture the scene - christmas tree in the entrance hall, and a trestle table with plastic cups filled with orange squash. Aggie, and the lower orders of the WI selling raffle tickets. The raffle prizes were nearly always supplied by Peter Binkleman of Binkleman’s toys. Heaped high under the Christmas tree, wrapped in shiny paper with tags dangling off them saying things like ‘I’m Yours’, and ‘Shake Me, I Love it’. Neat rows of children would sit in front of them cross-legged and mesmerised. It’s worth mentioning that Peter Binkleman always made sure that every child won a present in the raffle.

He’d always arrive late, just before the show started, wearing a christmas cracker hat, holding a tray of mince pies that he would hand out in the aisle. PB basically wore a christmas cracker hat through the whole of December, and was definitely of the opinion that Thursday the 24th of November wasn’t too early to start being Christmassy. The fact that he was late annoyed Antibus Pill. He was doing it to attract attention. Just like Laurence Olivier did later on in his career. When arriving at the theatre to watch a play, he would wait until the house was full, then make a conspicuous entrance into a box, garnering a round of applause from the audience. Antibus knew this because he had read several books full of theatrical anecdotes.

Anyhow - this year Antibus Pill was writing a version of ‘A Christmas Carol’ set in Hamlet’s castle, but in modern dress. This was a complicated undertaking, and one that would definitely go over the head of 90% of the audience. But this wasn’t a consideration for Antibus. He pored over his books of theatrical anecdotes, and the various versions of ‘A Christmas Carol’ that had been produced over the years. Many of them drew attention to the wonderful Victorian special effects - and in particular reference made to Pepper’s Ghost.

If you haven’t heard of Pepper’s Ghost, then here is a quick description of how it works. The effect is a ghost appearing on stage. The way it works is that a sheet of glass, or a half silvered mirror is on the stage at a precise angle - that the audience cannot see. Hidden away somewhere in the wings is an actor dressed as a ghost. When the effect is needed, the ghost actor is lit, or steps into the light. And he is positioned in such a way that he is reflected on the glass which is on stage, and a ghost seems to appear, who disappears when the ghost actor is no longer lit. It is essentially a very simple effect, but one that is incredibly effective.

So - Antibus was reading about this, and became slightly obsessed with creating the Pepper’s Ghost effect in his production. He had cast himself as the Ghost of Hamlet’s Father slash Jacob Marley figure, and this, he decided would be the perfect appearance with which to attempt the Pepper’s Ghost illusion. It also hadn’t passed him by that theatrical legend would have it that Shakespeare himself played the Ghost. This kind of thing was right up his alley. Antibus feared technology. He didn’t own a car, nor was his house connected to the mains. But he knew he could create magic nonetheless, and he set to work building his illusion.

Six weeks into rehearsals, and things were going as well as could be expected. The two lead characters - named Scramlet and Ophelabelle were really rather good, and it seemed that perhaps Antibus’ idea wasn’t such a bad one. They couldn’t help feeling however that they would get more done if Antibus didn’t insist on practising the Pepper’s Ghost illusion for basically most of the time. He had rigged up a glass sheet with a wooden frame that was indeed invisible to the audience. And the cast. Henry kept walking into it, and had insisted that they put stickers on it or something. Antibus didn’t. He has also created a tiny dark booth, hidden right in the corner of the wings, tucked away behind the Safety Curtain crank. No one could see him, and he was perfectly happy. He could control his own light source, and it had been decided that he would record his lines, and they would be played out over the sound system, while he acted away as the ghost, while the illusion mesmerised the audience.

There was only one problem. It didn’t work. Not once. Whether it was the angles. Or the light source. But it just didn’t work. Sometimes his legs would appear on stage. Sometimes his head. Sometimes nothing appeared at all. On one occasion, and no one knew quite how this had happened, Mr Chandler appeared on the glass whilst he was having a pee in the Gents.

This upset Antibus in such a terrible way. He had such a passion for the old ways. For the old things. Mr Trice said he had a multi media projector that could probably do the same job, and they could record the footage on his phone.

This was enough for Antibus to nearly break down. He didn’t know why. He didn’t know why he had placed so much importance on this thing. He was so tired. Tired of the modern world. Tired of living outside of a community that barely tolerated him. Tired of making charcoal that no one wanted. He realised that he desperately wanted to impress them. Make them gasp. Make them squeal. Make them point, and wonder if, for one brief moment, magic was real, and reason banished.

But Henry, in an uncharacteristic show of force made the decision. Mr Trice’s projector would be used, and the effect would be just as good, and far more reliable. He asked that the pane of glass be removed forthwith from the stage. He rubbed his reddened nose as he did so, and even glowered in Antibus’ direction.

Rehearsals continued, and though progress quickened, Antibus’ heart was no longer in it. He had filmed his piece on Mr Trice’s phone in ten minutes. It’ll be fine, said Henry. But Antibus knew it wasn’t magic. This wasn’t what he wanted.

And he glumly went back to his cabin in the woods. For an hour or two he lay on the turf dome of the last batch of charcoal of the year. It was warm on his back. Natural warmth. The white smoke puttered out of the vents. And Antibus closed his eyes.

The night of the show arrived, and true to form Peter Binkleman arrived late, and handed out mince pies. Everyone was excited about the show. ‘The Melancholy and the Ivy Dane or To Be or Not To Be Christmassy’ was quite the talk of the town.

But backstage there was panic. Yesterday, Mr Trice had dropped his projector. The bulb had broken, and whole thing was out of commission. They were going to have to resort to plan A. Or Plan bloody awful as Henry had called it. Antibus, and Pepper’s Ghost were back on. Without rehearsal. And it had never gone right.

But Joe Public didn’t know a thing. And the show started beautifully. People laughed, people clapped. People wondered who Horatio Cratchet was, but went along with it anyway.

Then came the point in Scramlet’s chambers where Jacob Marley was set to appear.. Darkness fell across the set. Silence in the audience and in the wings. Would it work? No one had even spoken to Antibus, and by now he would be tucked away in his little darkened booth.

Suddenly, a sharp intake of breath rippled across the hall, as the flickering figure of Antibus appeared, twirling and dancing, bathed in smoke and glistering light. His voice boomed across the sound system in the hall.

“I wear the chain I forged in life. I made it link by link, and yard by yard. I girded it of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it.”

And as image of Antibus danced impossibly on the stage, wreathed in smoke and unearthly light, the gathered crowds gasped. They squealed. They pointed, and wondered for one brief moment, if magic was real, and reason had been banished.

Mr Trice watched from the back of the hall. His hands clasped to his mouth, pleased that he had made up some cock and bull story about his projector.

The rest of show was a triumph.

The audience got to their feet and roared their applause, their tummies full of mince pies and Christmas cheer, and their heads dizzy with awe.

No one noticed that Antibus didn’t come on to take his bow with the others.

A few hours later they went to his cabin. Or what was left of it. A few charred remains of Antibus’ life. A stray ember from the charcoal dome had flown down the chimney, into the cabin and set it alight.

Antibus was trapped inside, and burned alive, dancing impossibly through the flames wreathed in smoke and unearthly light.

He had never made to the village hall that night.

But his Pepper’s ghost had.

The Side A Theory

2011-11-25T13:06:00.006Z

When Lawrence Pip was born at his parents’ house in Pilthorp in 1978, the radio was turned up loud. What was playing on the radio was this : ‘Born Free’. The theme from the film ‘Born Free’. The 1966 recording my Matt Monro.

This story became family legend, and for the rest of his life, Lawrence Pip had an umbilical connection to music.

As he grew up, music became everything to him. I know what you’re thinking. Lots of people like music. But Lawrence Pip felt that music spoke to him in a different way. That songs were about him, and for him, and could affect his life in ways that others simply couldn’t understand. But only the songs from side A of a record. He felt uncomfortable about the songs on side B of an album. Side A was all about hope, excitement, the thing wasn’t even halfway over. Side B is the decline, the relentless downward slide to the end. And Lawrence wanted none of it.

Even the thought of side B could depress the young Lawrence Pip whose initials are cleverly LP in case you hadn’t noticed.

So the music obsessed Lawrence Pip grew up only ever listening to the Side A of every album he owned. But that was all he wanted. He carried with him a little notebook, and would write the titles down of songs that spoke to him at particular points.

One day. When Lawrence Pip was eleven years old, he was waiting outside the school gates. It was early November. It was half past six. It was getting dark. Lawrence Pip was expecting to picked up by his mother in her little blue Renault 5. He was expecting her at six o’clock after the rehearsal for the school play had finished. But she wasn’t here. A little worried feeling crept up from his small feet, up his legs and into his tummy. Soon it reach his eyes, and then he would cry. This was one of his fears. That his parents would forget about, forget that they ever had him, or maybe decided that they didn’t want him any more. And now maybe - this was the day, this was the time.

The school wasn’t in a busy part of town. It was in rather a remote location. Only the church nearby, and Hardman’s Wood behind, where, as night descended, you could hear the foxes bark in the eerie way they do.

Lawrence decided that this was to be the last moments of life as he knew it. And as tears pricked his eyes, he began to hum ‘Don’t You brackets Forget About Me close brackets’ by Simple Minds, from Side A of The Breakfast Club Original Soundtrack album. Somehow he felt that this would make his mother remember him. The songs speak to him, after all. He pulled out his little notebook, and wrote ‘Don’t You - open brackets Forget About Me close brackets’ . Then he did a peculiar thing.

He ripped off the sheet of paper, and ate it.

About thirty seconds later, a Renault 5, which he and his mother had named ‘Little Blue’, screamed round the corner, and a breathless, and nearly crying mother jumped out and squeezed Lawrence Pip so tightly he farted. She’d lost track of time, and was he all right, and he could have whatever he wanted for supper.

So LP was all right. All his worries had been for nothing. Apart from one of them. He had lived the last moments of life as he knew it. Because he had started something he couldn’t stop.

These songs were more than simple melodies. He could control his life with them. And so began what Lawrence Pip called ‘The Side A Theory’.

Whenever he wanted or needed something, he would simply find the appropriate song, on side ‘A’ of an album, write it down in his little notebook, and eat it, and it would, as far as he was concerned, come true.

Now - it is fair to say that a lot of his little miracles were self prophesying. On a trip to the circus with his parents when he was just a little too old for it, he made quite the show of eating a piece of paper with ‘Send In The Clowns’ written on. And on the train to Cornwall with some school friends in 1994, he smugly ate a piece of paper with ‘Go West’ written on it.

But other times were more inexplicable. When, at seventeen years old he fell in love Carmel Diskens (initials CD) in the year below him, a girl so very very far out of his league, he scribbled ‘Love Me Do’ on his notebook, and swallowed it. A week later, Lawrence and Carmel were found kissing on the bench outside Our Price in the High Street. It was during that week that he also ate a piece of paper with ‘I wanna sex you up’ written on it. Which also came true. He did want to sex her up. He wanted to sex her up very much. But Carmel didn’t want to sex him up. So he wasn’t sexed up. But his faith in ‘The Side A Theory’ held firm. When he wrote things down on pieces of his paper from his notebook and ate them. They came true.

And this didn’t stop as he got older. Instead of using an alarm clock, he ate pieces of paper with ‘Wake up Boo’ written on them. Or on occasions where he wanted to rise before his house guests left, ‘Wake Me Up Before You Go Go’.

He even tried to record his own album - and the first track on Side A was called predictably ‘The Side A Theory’. But this was a project he soon gave up on. Music was made for him. He didn’t have to make music.

Once, his girlfriend at the time - Molly Prandle the Third (initials MP3), tried to talk to him about this over dinner. She was pretty convinced that he had a serious psychological problem. He ate a piece of paper with ‘Don’t Speak’ written on it, and poor Molly almost immediately started to choke on a fishbone.

Lawrence Pip was unshakable in his theory. And it worried the hell out of his friends. Clearly there was something wrong with Lawrence Pip. By this time it is 2010, and Lawrence Pip is 32 years old. A 32 year old man who eats bits of paper so that his wishes came true.

So, in December of 2002, a gathering of 8 of Lawrence’s closest friends staged what an American would most likely call ‘An Intervention’, and what we would call a “jolly good talking to.’

This was it. Enough was enough. Lawrence Pip was never going to grow up, get married, have children or even a proper career while he leaned on this ridiculous crutch.

So one Tuesday night, with a light sprinkling of pre christmas snow on the roads outside , Lawrence’s friends gathered in the Saloon Bar of ‘The Walnut Tree’, a nice little pub just a couple of doors down from the taxidermists. They sat a table a decent distance from the Jukebox, and waited for Lawrence.

When he arrived, they laid it all out for him. How illogical it all was. How inappropriate it was that he dumped his longest ever partner by eating a piece of paper with the words ‘Leave Me Alone’ written on it.

He had to stop all this. Leave it all behind. Grow up. Be a Man.

But Lawrence was furious. They didn’t understand. They never had. What he had was a gift. They had seen it in action. They had seen the miracles. Just last month, at a party he had demonstrated the magic. But - his friends said - eating a piece of paper that has ‘Do The Conga’ on it is not a miracle. The people did the Conga - said Lawrence. Yes. They said. But ‘Do The Conga’ was playing. You had nothing to do with it.

But just as Lawrence started to write ‘Shut Up’ on a piece of paper, the notebook was snatched from his hands.

Aha. He said. Why would you take the notebook, if none of it is true? You believe it.

We don’t. They said. But you do, and that is the problem.

Lawrence opened his bag and pulled out a much larger notebook. I can make you believe it. He said.

And pulling a marker pen from his pocket he scrawled ‘The Side A Theory’ in capitals on the paper.

This piece of paper was much bigger than he was used to. So he ripped it up in to smaller pieces, and popped the first one in his mouth.

And within ten minutes he was dead.

The autopsy confirmed that Lawrence Pip was a sufferer of Pica - an illness which is characterized by an appetite for non-food items. It usually occurs in children, but passes. Not so in Lawrence’s case. The massive amounts of paper he had eaten over the years had eventually killed him. He hadn’t realised that paper contains trace amounts of mercury, and is deadly to humans in large quantities.

But there was one peculiar little twist. Before they piled Lawrence into the ambulance, on that December night, the paramedics pulled a piece of paper out of his mouth. The little ripped bit of the ‘SIDE A THEORY’ note.

The central piece of the note.

Which simply said. ‘DE A TH’.

The Dark Room

2011-08-03T13:01:00.006+01:00

Here is a new story for you all, called 'The Dark Room', first performed on July 28th 2011 at 'Tall Tales' at 'The Good Ship' in 'Kilburn'. I wrote this one whilst on holiday. I went to France and it rained for two weeks which made us cross, but I don't think you can tell in the story.

In other housekeeping news - there is a 'Tall Tales' style podcast available called 'Listen and Often' which is available at www.listenandoften.com and in iTunes here - my first story 'What Peebee Did Next' is read on it, aswell as lots of other things.

Anyway - here is the story - I hope you enjoy it. Do leave feedback, and tweet it and facebook it and all that shizzle. Even print it out and leave on benches for curious tramps if you wish.

---

The Dark Room

Augustus Pike woke up covered in sweat and shuddering with shame and regret. He was remembering a slightly stupid remark he had made at a party in 2005 to some people who he didn’t really know. They gave him a sideways look, and he was desperate for the ground to swallow him up. The remark was something about Rob Schneider being in ‘Jaws’. One of the others in the group corrected him - saying that Roy Scheider was the actor in ‘Jaws’. Rob Schneider is the actor in the film ‘Deuce Bigelow Male Gigolo’, and ‘Deuce Bigelow - European Gigolo’. And now the embarrassment was flooding back over him at eight thirty three in the morning.

This was not uncommon for Augustus, who frequently encountered crippling bouts of latent embarrassment - for things that had happened up to two and a half decades ago. The fact that he was in unfamiliar surroundings was possibly not helping. But he had more important business on this fine Thursday at the end of an unexpectedly damp July. When some people were returning from holidays in the south of France where it had just rained the whole time and they might as well have stayed at home.

Augustus was conducting research for a book entitled ‘Unexplained Pictures’, which was going to largely be about unexplained pictures. It was also going to be largely awful, but he was contractually obliged to his publisher to write a book this year, and so that was what he was going to do.

There was only one unexplained picture he was interested in anyway. One he had bought from an auction several years ago. It was a Mezzotint of three men. One of the men seemed to be in 18th century clothing, and one in 19th century clothing and the other man had his back to us, so it was hard to work out what he was wearing. The only distinguishing feature on the third man was a square symbol with three letters clearly visible. H T D. The picture, though badly drawn and unspectacular, had intrigued him because he couldn’t work out who on earth could be bothered to do it. And what on earth was the symbol? It was an unexplained picture, and fell neatly into the brief of his book which, in case I hadn’t mentioned it was called ‘Unexplained Pictures’. It will be in bookshops in November. It won’t really. This is all fiction. All of it. I’m not even real.

Anyway.

The research period fell into the exact same period in which Augustus was moving house. He had sold his property but hadn’t got round to buying a new one, and so decided to rent a place for a few months in the village of Specksham, which was known locally as the home of taxidermy. The place he had rented had last belonged to a photographer who specialised in taking awful photographs as far as Augustus could tell when he searched through the boxes of snaps left in the backroom. There were also a number of amateurish charcoal drawings - nearly all landscapes, apart from one which was part landscape, part scratchy drawing of a moustachioed man looking surprised. Imagine what Tom Selleck would look like if you dropped a Cornetto in his lap. That’s what he looked like. The photographer himself had apparently done a runner, leaving the landlord with lots of unpaid rent, but the place itself was perfect. Augustus moved in with a load of boxes, a laptop, and several crates of excellent wine.

He woke up with with shuddering embarrassment at the time he had jumped into a friend swimming pool with white shorts on in an attempt to appear spontaneous to a pretty lady. When getting out of the pool it became clear that his shorts also became clear when in put contact with water and everyone could see his balls. Not to mention his penis. This memory made Augustus curl up a little in his unfamiliar bed, then uncurl, get out of it and get the old photographer’s studio feeling a bit more like a home.

A few days later, and everything was going swimmingly. He hadn’t unpacked his boxes and cases, but he had lined them neatly up against the walls and decided that they were basically chests of drawers like that anyway. All of the wine he had painstakingly unpacked, and put in the tiny cupboard-like room that the photographer had clearly used as a darkroom. The room was surprisingly cool and smelt faintly of the chemicals used in developing photographs. He was sorting through hundreds of unexplained photos a day for his book entitled ‘Unexplained Pictures’, and conducting hours of research into the pictures which supposedly contained images of ghosts and ufos. Well - hours of research if by research you mean ‘making shit up about them’. Augustus was surprised by the fact that he was enjoying himself. The book was fun to write - the images in turn spooky, then laughable, but never not interesting. He worked tirelessly through the whole day - if your definition of ‘tireless’ is ‘with only two or three naps’, which luckily Augustus’ was, and on into the evening, the ‘research becoming more and more exciting, with the more red wine Augustus drank.

His mood was so good that he didn’t even shout at the elderly man on the high street who asked him for money, whilst shaking a collection box.

“What For?” asked Augustus.

“To Help The Donkeys.” said the old man.

“Help them do what?” said Augustus, not unfairly.

“Um. Be Happier Donkeys?” Said the old man.

“Fair enough” acquiesced Augustus, and thrust a pound coin into the pot.

“Here’s your sticker.” said the old man.

“I don’t like stickers” said Augustus, taking one, and immediately tried to wrestle it from his fingers. “I’m not putting it on me.”.

“I made those stickers myself” said the old man, who really did like donkeys.

Augustus was long gone however, and was stocking up on biros and Post-Its at the newsagents, because that definitely counts as work.

That night, Augustus put aside the peculiar Mezzotint and drained his glass. He picked up a shoebox of his own private photographs and wondered if this was an untapped seam of mystery. It wasn’t. The box contained hundreds of uncategorised, un-albumed pictures that spanned at least four decades. With pictures that were actually square and over exposed cause they were taken in the seventies, and pictures taken a few months ago that had used expensive equipment to make them look like that. He leafed through them and discovered that with every image came another burst of latent embarrassment. Mispronouncing things in French Restaurants, producing unflushable items in other people’s lavatories whilst attending dinner parties, trying to get off with women who were trying to pity him. He needed another drink, and half staggered towards the Dark Room clutching a school photograph. As he made his way towards what was now his wine cellar, he pondered his eleven year old face in the middle row of the class photo in the scratchy school uniform. And he remembered the day. And he remembered the fart that he thought would slip out un-noticed. And he remembered the actuality of the fart in question, the implausibly ripe and noisy that made him the laughing stock of Mr Hayes’ class, and ensured that no one ever wanted to play kiss chase with him again. He shuddered at the memory, and opened the door to the dark room.

He was surprised to find himself standing in the middle row of Mr Haye’s class photo wearing a scratchy uniform. He looked down at his eleven year old body, and felt a desperate urge to break wind. He looked around at his classmates of so long ago, and would have felt more able to asses the extraordinary situation he found himself in had the rumbling in his little belly not felt so urgent. Perhaps he could let it...slip out. But he remembered. He remembered the familiar shudder he had felt only moments ago, and held it in. He clenched and wriggled and smiled as the photographer who seemed so old, but was clearly about 24 took the photo, and Mr Hayes smiled. And a flood of nostalgia swept over him as the scent of the school hall, and the feel of the little blazer crash his senses. And then.... It’s gone. He was standing outside the Dark Room door. He no longer held the photograph in his hand. He pushed the door open and stepped inside. The wine store was there as usual. He grabbed a bottle, and went back to his desk, thoroughly discombobulated.

After another half a bottle, he decided to give the Dark Room another try. He picked up another photo. This one backstage at an amateur production of ‘Charlie’s Aunt’. He was 23, and trying to smoke a cigarette to impressed the short haired girl who put the things on the props table. He had missed a cue, and failed to appear on stage at the correct time. The ridicule he could take... It was the disappointment that really shook him and made his inside twist with chagrin.

He stood outside the door to the Dark Room, and held the photo in his hand. He couldn’t work out whether he wanted it to work again, or not. Or would he rather the school photo incident was a hallucination brought about by too much wine and not enough food. But he couldn’t not know. Holding the backstage photograph, of his 23 year old self dressed as a footman inexpertly smoking a Marlboro Light, he stepped into the Dark Room.

And coughed. And blinked in the darkness. And looked around at the hushed hubbub of the amateur cast and crew. A few paces ahead of him, the short haired girl arranged the props on the trestle table marked out with masking tape. In his white gloved hand, the cigarette rested, smoke twirling into the darkness. He could hear the play going on somewhere in the distance.

He crushed the cigarette out, and went straight to the wings. And it all came flooding back. The set, the lines, he knew the cue. He stepped out onto the stage and took a breath.

He didn’t know his line.

He exhaled at the door of the Dark Room. His hands empty.

The door creaked open in front of him, and he could see the racks of wine bottle shining in the darkness.

He allowed his mind to wander. And there was no shudder.

The enormity of the situation crashed over him like a wave in a storm, and he ran back to his desk.

Then he ran back to the Dark Room and grabbed another bottle of wine, and then he ran back to the table, and flung all the photos for the book to the floor and concentrates solely on his own back catalogue. The back catalogue of shame.

And so Augustus began the night of his life, time-travelling within his own lifetime, leaping from photo to photo, putting things right that once went wrong. You know, a bit like Quantum Leap.

It was incredible. Somehow, somehow he had been given this chance to cast away the hundreds of tiny embarrassment demons that shook him daily. He revisited parties, and holidays and public events and family Christmases for tiny fractions of times, seconds sometimes, and with each visit he removed another gremlin from his subconscious.

By four thirty three in the morning, he was exhausted. He had revisited over a hundred periods of his life, and it had taken it out of him.

He piled his photographs back in their shoebox, and drained another bottle. As he did so, he spilled a few drops on the Mezzotint of the three men. Annoyed at his clumsiness, he wiped the paper, and thrust it in his jacket pocket, out of harm’s way and set off for another bottle. The Dark Room still served two purposes.

Pushing the door to the Dark Room open, he stepped inside, expecting to grab a bottle from the cheap rack near the door.

What happened was that everything stopped.

Three weeks later, the landlord came by. No rent had been paid, and he wanted to know why. The place was empty. Not a soul inside. Just like the photographer - the guy who looked like Magnum who did the terrible charcoal landscapes. Now this one had disappeared.

On the floor of the darkroom was a curled and stained Mezzotint of three men. One of the men seemed to be in 18th century clothing, and one in 19th century clothing and the other man had his back to us, so it was hard to work out what he was wearing. The only distinguishing feature on the third man was a square symbol with three letters clearly visible. H T D.

When showing the drawing in the pub that night, an elderly man took an interest. He tapped the symbol on the back of the third man. ‘H T D. He said. Help The Donkeys’. I designed that myself.

At least one of Augustus’ unexplained pictures got explained. Home made stickers really are very sticky.

The Pecking Order

2011-05-31T16:44:00.003+01:00

Hello all,

Here is another story, first performed at 'The Good Ship' on 26th May 2011.

Again - if you enjoy it, spread the word, let me know, let others know, have a love in, etc.

This one is called :

The Pecking Order

On Perrigrew Street, just a few minutes from the municipal gardens and a twenty minute drive from the lake and Hardman’s Wood, there were lots of smart little terraced houses, and three shops. They were a butchers, a bakers and a candlestick makers. Mr Hockle the butcher and Mr Trice the baker did a roaring local trade, and did very well, due to excellent fresh produce, local sourcing etc. The candle stick maker - not so much. It’s not that his candle-sticks weren’t good. No - they were extremely good. It’s just that there wasn’t much call for them, and the candlesticks he supplied were of such good quality that they didn’t break, so generally people only bought one. Not like chops and buns. Mr Chandler, who owned the candlestick makers couldn’t help feeling that he’d entered into a bit of a niche business. It is worth noting that Mr Chandler, Mr Hockle and Mr Trice have been in a tub together. It was at Mr Hockle’s summer barbecue in 2009, and the outdoor spa pool was his brand new purchase, and they were more than happy to have a go in it.

So - Mr. Chandler was grateful that he had such a reliable tenant in the rooms above his shop. The rooms were also rented as a business to a spindly little man called Dr. Federin. His doctorate certificate hung above the door at the top of the stairs, but the writing was rather smudged, and it was hung in a very dingy corner. But there was a shiny brass plaque mounted next to the door. It read - ‘Dr Federin - Reincarnationalist’. Because that is what he was. Dr Federin was a professional reincarnationalist, and proud to be the only one in the world. And he did a slow but steady trade.

On the morning that we too ascend the creaky stairs to Dr. Federin’s office, we are joined by an elderly lady. She is called Quenelle, but she has never eaten a quenelle. She is on her own, and has been on her own for a little over two months, because a little over two months ago, her husband of 58 years passed away. And a little over 8 years ago, on their 50th wedding anniversary, Quenelle and Horace had been given a voucher for Dr. Federin’s Reincarnation service, and they had taken it up. And now Quenelle was walking up the stairs to fetch her reincarnated husband.

Dr Federin always dressed in the same way. Black narrow trousers, a bright yellow shirt with a thin black tie and a bright blue jacket. He darted around the room with quick efficient movements, and stared at you with shiny yellow and black eyes and pale complexion. His yellow shoes were pointy, his legs seems to be permanently bent at the knee, his chest puffed out, and his little goatee beard immaculately trimmed. His office, which had been his premises for more than thirty years, was wood panelled, with books and armchairs scattered all over the place. The fireplace was normally active, and the smell of woodsmoke filled the room. There was a counter of sorts that he had bought from a gentleman’s outfitters that was closing down like an island in the middle of the room. One wall was filled with enormous leatherbound ledgers.

When Quenelle entered the office, Dr Federin greeted her with open arms and hot tea. He consoled her for her loss. He marvelled at what a wonderful man Horace was. And he confirmed that the reincarnation had been a success. And with that he disappeared into the back room and re-entered with holding a cage with a cloth covering it. He whipped off the cloth to reveal a blackbird, sitting on a perch and eying Quenelle with undeniable affection.

‘Hello Horace’, said Quenelle, and as Dr Federin opened the cage, Quenelle’s husband of fifty eight years hopped onto her shoulder and started to sing. It was hard to make out, but you could just about hear the melody of ‘Fly Me To The Moon’. ‘His favourite song’, cooed Quenelle.

‘Here - it’s nearly lunchtime. Give him some of this’. Dr. Federin held out a plate with three biscuits on it. A bourbon, a pink wafer and one of the cow ones. Horace twitched his head from side to side. Dr Federin twitched his head from side to side. Horace hopped onto the plate, and started to peck away at the cow one, now and again pausing to sing ‘Fly Me To The Moon’. ‘He loved those cow ones’ whispered Quenelle.

‘No. He loves those cow ones’ said Dr. Federin, smiling as Horace hopped onto Quenelle’s shoulder and affectionately pecked her hair.

A delighted Quenelle left Dr Federin’s office an hour later, after hearing all the aftercare instructions. She left with her husband sitting on her shoulder, and a heaviness gone from her heart.

She passed on the stairs a young couple, bounding up two steps at a time. This was Angela and Mortimer who had been married for a little over 58 days. One of their wedding presents was a voucher for Dr. Federin’s Reincarnation service, and they were coming to claim it.

It is worth noting at this point that Dr. Federin’s service did not come cheap. It was not ridiculous, but it was not cheap. He had a steady trade, nearly always from couples who had been bought the service as a gift - normally at a wedding, or wedding anniversary or civil partnership or engagement party or whatever. He saw couples very much in love, and was pleased to be able to offer them a little peace of mind. It is also worth noting that many of them never claimed their final product. But some did. Like Quenelle.

When Angela and Mortimer arrived in the office, they were excitable and frisky and found the whole thing hilarious. They found Dr Federin hilarious, but he didn’t mind. He talked them through the process. How they would be reincarnated. Firstly they must fill in ‘THE QUESTIONS’. ‘THE QUESTIONS’ was an enormous questionnaire to be filled in by the partner or spouse. It covered everything from favourite songs and movies and books and foods, to allergies quirks and habits. It was an exhaustive and exhausting process, but, Dr. Federin claimed. Vital.

He encourage Angela and Mortimer to do it while sitting in his office. He prepared a fresh pot of coffee, and served it to them as they giggled and scribbled on the telephone directory sized document.

He sat in his favourite armchair and pulled out an enormous copy of ‘Ulysses’. He had never managed to finish it, and felt that this was a failure on his part. He opened the book, and started yet another battle in this seemingly never-ending war.

When Angela and Mortimer had finished ‘THE QUESTIONS’, Dr Federin lead them into the backroom - pretending not to see them mock his darting walk, or steal kisses from each other when they thought he wasn’t looking. He didn’t mind. They were very much in love.

The second part of the procedure then took place - THE DRAWING OF FLUIDS. He sat them down one at a time in what looked like a Dentist’s chair, and clamped them down. He took a needle and promised it wouldn’t hurt a bit, and proceeded to draw fluids from the ‘ascendral points’ of their bodies. Elbows, little toe, the scalp, behind the ears These were the points where the soul could be reached. The thin spots. He drew the fluid from them, and they were surprised to see multicoloured tubes filling from the thin spots.

There are things that medicine doesn’t know. Claimed Dr. Federin. There are things only I know.

When they were finished, Dr Federin gave them a certificate that was a sheet of metal ostentatiously engraved. It had a unique number on them that was the ticket to their everlasting life. He gave them the rules. The reincarnation would always be in a bird. The bird makes the best host. And they must allow at least two months for reincarnation to take place in the even of one of them passing. Angela and Mortimer giggled as they half listened, and ran down the steps two at a time.

Dr. Federin watched them from his window. He watched them run out of the office door beside Mr Chandler’s shop, and into the road. And he watched as Mortimer was hit by a van and killed instantly.

This was where things started to go wrong for Dr Federin.

Dr Federin was special. He was extremely special. He did know things that other people didn’t know. He could talk to birds. He had a power over birds. He could make them do all kinds of things. What he couldn’t do was reincarnate people.

It is also true that he had hundreds if not thousands of extremely happy customers. Widows and widowers and bereaved partners with a bird that was to them their dear departed. A comfort.

This is what Dr Federin did. THE QUESTIONS was the important part of the procedure. With those answers he knew exactly what the partner thought of the other. What their favourite colours and books and biscuits were.

The stuff in the chair was showmanship and sleight of hand. A little prick from a needle, and a trick tube and voila. The racks of coloured water capsules were nothing, but he felt that he needed to show his customers something visceral.

Then he entered everything into a database. He used an extremely powerful computer and search engine to monitor the progress of all of his clients. He knew if they went to see their doctors, or were going mountain climbing. He knew if they were ill or had a bungee jump coming up. And when he thought there was a possibility of death coming up - he would start the training.

First of all - he would catch a bird from Hardman’s Wood. He didn’t have to catch them. They came to him when he sang. And then he would start the process. Using his avian communication powers he would train them to sing, train them to recognise and show affection for the client. Train them to be attracted to green rather than blue, Emmerdale rather than X factor. This process took the time. So as not to be cruel to the birds, two months was the minimum time it could take. A bird is very easily overloaded.

So why did Dr Federin tell Angela that it could be done in a week? Because she cried. Because she looked as though her world had fallen apart, and it had. Because he didn’t know if she could last two months.

Deep down he knew he couldn’t do it. But he couldn’t say ‘no’ either.

And so the process began. He went to the woods and caught several birds. He would try this on a few specimens. One of them might take.

He combed through Mortimer’s file, each answer a little heartbreak of it’s own in Angela’s not even grown up handwriting. And he tried the process.

He tried to make the birds understand too quickly. Tagliatelli alla Vongole, Turquoise, The Fast and The Furious Tokyo drift. Seriously. That was Mortimer’s favourite film. Don’t judge him, he’s dead.

But the information was too hard and too much and much much too fast. What happened wasn’t pretty. The birds popped. They just popped. He had a backroom full of popping finches. And each time Dr Federin would have to start the process again. Like reading Ulysses - he was fighting a losing battle.

On the sixth night Dr Federin couldn’t sleep. He had failed. He got through nearly 300 birds. And he hated himself and he hated his business.

He was going to have to tell Angela that she would have to wait, and he would have to look at her face while he broke his promise, and it was all too much.

At four o’clock in the morning, he eventually drifted into a comatose slumber.

But he didn’t have to tell her. Because later that night, very quickly, and very quietly, the rooms above Mr Chandler’s shop filled up with birds. The birds had flown from the lake and Hardman’s wood, which really is much quicker as the crow flies. Takes about five minutes. The birds crept in through the open window in Dr Federin’s room, and soon the floor was three feet deep in a sea of fluttering hopping, disquietingly calm birds.

They washed up onto the bed like a bristling feathery tide, over the bent legs, over the puffed up chest, ever the goatee beard.

They smothered Dr Federin in his sleep. He didn’t even wake. They filled his lungs with feathers and he died right there.

Then the birds left. Apart from one. A bluetit remained, sitting on Dr Federin’s chest where his heart would have been. The bluetit, with its beautiful yellow chest and bright blue jacket. It hopped over to the open copy of ‘Ulysses’ and stared at the text for a few minutes, and then just seemed to give up.

In the coming days, Dr Federin’s fraud was exposed as his office was taken apart. It made the local papers, and Angela had to have it explained to her. Don’t worry - she gets over it.

But in a kitchen in a different part of town, with the radio on, and a blackbird on her arm, Quenelle glimpsed the article and threw the newspaper into the recycling bin without reading it. She shared a cow biscuit with Horace and smiled as he sang ‘Fly Me To The Moon’.

Some things, she decided, you don’t have to know.

UPSTAIRS

2011-04-11T18:22:00.005+01:00

Hello all,

It has been a few months since the last story - I didn't do the last 'Tall Tales' but one, so no story to deliver.

But now, you can at last stop holding your breath. The new story is here. I hope you enjoy it. If you do, please comment, and link to it on Twitter and Facebook etc, as it is nice to get a wide readership.

Here we go...

UPSTAIRS

I’m a bit worried that this is about half a story, but here goes.

H. G. Wells had always wanted to be a writer. I guess it’s important at this point to stress that I am not talking about that H. G. Wells, but a different one. One you don’t know. And he always wanted to be writer.

Cause, you know. He knew all that stuff about writers that everyone thinks. You know, that’ they’re really handsome and admired by everyone. You know, that they can just like hold an audience in the palm of their hands, and like everyone in the room really looks up to them, and maybe gives them you know, like spare tenners.

You know, all that stuff that everyone knows about writers? That they dress really well, and even though they’re going a bit bald, they still basically look really good cause they can carry it off. You know. All that stuff about writers that everyone says. You know?

Anyway. H.G. Wells did not become a writer. Well, that one did, obviously, but this one didn’t. I realise that this is confusing. On reflection, I could have chosen a name that wasn’t already a writer, and made this whole bit, you know, easier.

But you know what they say about writers. They basically make really good decisions all the time vis-a-vis all of the writing and whatnot, even if all the evidence points to the contrary.

Well. H. G. Wells. Do you know what? I’m going to call him by his first name. Umm. H. Umm. Hadrian. If you’re wondering why he was christened Hadrian, you need look no further than his father who was a builder by trade, and was thus a big fan of walls. His middle name is...Gaydrian. I have no idea why his mother insisted that his middle name be ‘Gaydrian’, but perhaps she wasn’t keen on the idea of grandchildren, and thought a gentle nudge in the right direction was a good idea.

No. Hadrian Gaydrian Wells did not become a writer. He got a normal job. The kind of job that writers have to really research properly so that they don’t sound like their characters work in a nonsense job and their creator is entirely divorced from real life. Hadrian was an office under-cleric for a company called Bonkington and Son and Son, which made piltroons for the Paradeemax industry. The industry that is largely concerned with the manufacture and use of Paradeemaxes. Paradeemaxum. You get the point.

But Hadrian Gaydrian Wells as we meet him for the first time, is moving into a new flat. Well. Not a new flat. The ground floor of a large old victorian terrace, with a communal staircase and front door that he shared with the flat upstairs.

Hadrian had looked at hundreds of flats before choosing this one, if by hundreds you mean three, and by choosing, you mean settled for. During the short search Hadrian had quietly lost the will to live. He had been instructed to imagine his potential flats with his possessions in. He definitely owned a loaf of bread, and half a jar of Marmite, so he imagined these in the quiet ground floor flat, in the quiet house in the quiet road, and was basically satisfied.

The house seemed quite well looked after. New gutters. The number of the house painted on the side of the wheelie bin. All the classy things. As he moved in his loaf of bread and a third of a jar of Marmite some workmen were there repairing some of the brickwork at the front of the house. Hadrian said hello to the workmen, and hoped that he didn’t sound like he wasn’t the kind of man who wasn’t comfortable talking to workmen. He offered them some marmite sandwiches, which they accepted. So the eventual moving in business was pretty light work.

The thing that was quite interesting about Hadrian was the fact that he had OCD. He had been told this by someone who was ‘doing a course on it’ at a party after he had spent some time arranging the cucumber batons into a damp grid. Obviously having the OCD is supposed to be a bad thing, but Hadrian took to it with relish, and before long he was flicking the light switches on and off, and throwing soap away after only one use, and lining everything up, checking things and counting things. Yes. All the counting. Counting was a good one. Counting and measuring.

Six windows on the front of the house. His ceilings were eight feet high. Twelve cupboard handles in the kitchen. Eighteen steps in the staircase in the communal hall leading up to the first floor each of those eight inches high. 23 maltesers, 22, 21, 20, 19 maltesers, 18, then 17, 16, 15, I‘m sure you get the general idea. Hadrian liked maltesers.

The good thing about the OCD was that it gave Hadrian something to do while he waited for iplayer to buffer which it did a lot.

Over the next few weeks, Hadrian settled in, and bought himself such luxuries as a bed and a chair, and his little flat became a home. With eight foot high ceilings. And five doors.

And just after that the trouble started. Hadrian was woken, in the middle of the night, by his upstairs neighbour, whom he had naturally never met. He was stomping around on the floor so heavily it put Hadrian in mind of a giant killing ants while trying on a pari of massive clogs made of dark matter. He stamped up and down, and up and down. This was peculiar. He had never heard a peep from him, or her, before. And when the stomping stopped, the dragging began.

The dragging of furniture up and down the floor, dragging what sounded like hugely heavy bits of bed or sofa across the floor.

And when the dragging stopped the scratching began. The scratching was quietest of all, but the most penetrating, scratching and scrabbling and scrabbling and scratching. It screeked and scrunched and scraped and scrippled and sckreeked on and on.

He couldn’t understand it. Why this sudden change in his formerly quiet upstairs neighbour?

He thrust his head under the pillow, and with some effort got back to sleep.

He vowed that if this happened again, he would definitely say something. Or at least, get cross about it and say nothing but feel righteously indignant.

It did happen again.

And again.

Night after night of stomping and dragging and stomping and dragging and stomping and dragging and scrippling.

Hadrian Gaydrian Wells was getting no sleep at all, and his work in the Paradeemax industry was suffering as a result.

He finally decided to address the issue.

At 2.32 a.m. on a Thursday night, in the midst of a particularly vigorous stomping and scraping session Hadrian went up the eighteen stairs and, taking a deep breath, knocked on the first floor door.

At that moment, the noises stopped.

He waited.

Then a male voice called out.

“Come in. It’s not locked.’

Confused, frightened and a little bit empowered, Hadrian twisted the doorknob and pushed.

The door opened, and he was met with a sight that confused him.

The flat upstairs was very different to his. He stepped straight out into one very large room. Wooden floors. Open plan. A neat kitchen at on side. Hand rails on all the walls. A large LCD TV mounted on the wall. In the middle was a large bed. And in the bed was a man.

‘Hello.’

Said the man in the bed. But he didn’t get up.

‘Hello’ said Hadrian. ‘I’m H.G. Wells’.

‘Oh.’ said the man. ‘Is this a dream?’.

‘No. Sorry. I can see how that might have been confusing. My name’s Hadrian. I live downstairs. I’m sorry to come up so late, but I couldn’t go on any longer without saying something. I’ve not been able to sleep.’

‘I’ve noticed.’ said the man.

‘I’m Jules, by the way. Jules Fern.’.

‘Jules Verne?’

‘No. Jules Fern, like bracken. It’s less confusing than your name by quite a long way.’

‘Yes. Yes. Um. Listen. It’s all the noise’. Hadrian continued. ‘All the dragging of furniture, and, um...’

He looked around at the almost entirely furniture free space in front of him.

‘All the stomping around.’.

The man sat up in bed, he was wearing a light blue T-shirt. He looked at Hadrian.

‘And what is your explanation, Hadrian?’.

Hadrian was staggered. ‘What’s my explanation? What’s your explanation? Why so much noise. Why all the stamping around.’.

Jules pulled back the crisp white duvet to reveal two things that weren’t there. Namely his legs. Hadrian remembered another count he’d done. One stairlift.

‘I haven’t been stamping around. You’ve been stamping around.’

There was a silence for a moment.

‘Well. I’m stumped’. Said Hadrian. And he was.

‘Me too.’ Said Jules, waggling them. He was stumped aswell, but in two ways.

That’s the kind of clever thing writers do.

So the mystery remained. And the noises continued. Often, when they couldn’t sleep, Hadrian would make the trip up the eighteen stairs and he and his upstairs neighbour would meet and talk. Mainly about what on earth it could be.

A fortnight later Hadrian did the maths.

18 stairs, eight inches high. 144 inches. His ceiling was 8 feet high. 96 inches. Somewhere the house was hiding 48 inches of space.

A few days later, the workmen returned, and after a round of marmite sandwiches they opened up the floor of the upstairs flat and discovered where the four feet had disappeared to.

In between the two flats was an extra half a storey. Inside the dark and musty little space were piles and piles of dusty broken furniture. PIles and piles of paper, and towards the front wall of the house, the skeletal remains of a man. A very small man. Whoever it was, there was very little left of him. He had been dead for many years. the bones lay crumpled on the floor, large boots covering what was left of the feet. A section of the wall was covered in deep scratches. The patch of newly repaired brickwork.

When all of this was cleared out, the noises stopped, and Hadrian could sleep again. He continued to see his friend upstairs, and neither of them ever said the word ghost. But he couldn’t stop thinking about the dead man. He had saved a few of the papers they had found in the weird little half a flat. Pages and pages of an unfinished novel. The little man had evidently been a writer. Living all his life with Half a story in half a storey.

Hadrian Gaydrian Wells didn’t ever wish he was a writer again. And in years to come he became the best goddamn office under cleric Bonkington and Son and Son had ever seen.

Pressing On

2010-11-26T09:38:00.004Z

This is story number four in the 'Tall Tales' series. For those of you who are checking back every single day for an update, I apologise that it's there's only an update every two months. For those of you who happen to check in once every two months, you must think I update with massive efficiency.

So - here's the story - enjoy, leave feedback, retweet etc.

Pressing On

One morning, when Gregory Samuels woke up from particularly normal dreams - his normal dreams consisted of him picturing himself in the throes of a bare knuckle gypsy fight with Des Lynam, being egged on by a noisy gang of anthropomorphic ZX 81’s, while a brass band played entirely by his sister refused to play any music that wasn’t an exam. But when he awoke that morning, from his particularly normal dreams, he discovered that he was no longer there.

He was no longer there.

He wasn’t dead. He sat up in his bed, which felt like he was sitting up in nearly set jelly, and moved gently through the duvet. He stood up, feet squishing into the hard bare floorboards of the spare room, and he couldn’t help noticing that there was nothing of him. He was entirely transparent. He couldn’t see himself. And the world was behaving oddly around him. He couldn’t touch anything. Trying to pick up his glasses was like trying to pick up a draught.

Gregory tried to remember everything that had happened the night before. Had he done anything the previous evening that would make him go invisible. He came to the conclusion that he hadn’t. Though he did remember the fight he had with Sarah right before bed. Which explained why he had woken up in the spare room. OK. So now he could start to piece things together. He had got back from the little office he rented in town. He was so near the the end of his book, but not quite there yet. When he arrived, he and Sarah had a late supper, and watched a little television. He’d gone upstairs to give Henry a goodnight kiss, being careful not to wake him. He and Sarah had drunk most of a bottle of red wine, and then they had argued about...now that he couldn’t remember. But they had clearly felt strongly enough about it to sleep in separate bedrooms. So - he’d gone to sleep, and then..somehow....during the night... had gone invisible. It wasn’t very satisfying.

His thoughts were interrupted by the door opening, and Sarah entering. She looked like she was still cross. Gregory spoke to her, he tried to say he was sorry, for whatever it was they had argued about. HE tried to hold out his arms and stop her, and say ‘Let’s forget everything. I love you, and I love Henry, and I love our life’, and then kiss her, and then make everything the same as it was yesterday.

But he couldn’t touch her. And she couldn't hear him. She walked through him with only the slightest resistance, and threw the duvet from the spare bed.

‘GREG!’

Yes, said Gregory. Yes.

‘GREG!’ she called again, and picked up his glasses from the bedside table with an ease that Gregory had always taken for granted. She looked at them, and went through to the bathroom where Gregory also wasn’t, but in a different way. Later on, she cried.

Gregory noticed that he was sinking slowly into the floor and went downstairs to make that stop happening.

He thought, of course, that this was the dream. Not all the other stuff. That he would wake up. Wake up and be normal and there and visible and in his family. But it wasn’t.

Gregory Samuels wasn’t there anymore, and that, it seemed, was that.

He stayed in the house for the next few weeks, and watched his beloved wife Sarah try to piece together what had happened. He listened as the police came and took down statements, and saw in their eyes that they thought this was just another case of a husband running away.

He watched Sarah cry and cry and cry and cry, as the endlessly cheerful Henry gurgled from his cot, unaware that the first eighteen months of his life were going to be different to the rest of it.

He learnt the rules of his new life. He didn’t need to eat, to sleep, to drink, to breathe. He was made of nothing, and needed nothing. But his shape was still the same. No one could see it, so what was the point, but his shape was the same. He could feel all the way down his legs, and round the back of his head, and feel that everything was just where it was before.

He watched Sarah’s parents come, and watched her regress to a little girl who needed her mummy, because her world had fallen apart. Where had he gone? Had he left her? Had he been kidnapped? Run down in the road? Was he alive? How could he do this, how could he do this? How could he do this?

He watched his own parents visit, and hated the fact that there was shame in their faces as they tried to placate their daughter in law. They didn’t say it, but he could see it. How could their son do this? Was she still even their daughter in law? His mother held Henry like she’d never see him again. That was what had happened when her sister’s husband had left her. When he’d just upped sticks and gone never to return. Stupid Uncle Frank, she used to call him. Stupid Uncle Frank who couldn’t face up to his responsibilities. They hadn’t wanted Frank’s parents to call. She hadn’t seen their side at all.

Weeks turned to months, and nothing changed. Gregory lived silently in the house, watching his son grow older, and his wife change. Change from a woman who’s life felt like it was all finally there. It had all finally dropped into place, into a woman who no longer had any faith in the world, that it could shake her up so badly.

Gregory decided that he must die. His lack of being showed no sign of abatement, and he must do the right thing. Not literally you understand, He wasn’t thinking about killing himself. He wasn’t entirely sure how that would work. No. He knew he must find a way to convince Sarah that he was dead. That he hadn’t left her. That he hadn’t left her for someone better. There was no one better. But that he had died, tragic, but true, and she should move on. And then so would he. Because he wasn’t sure how much more he could take.

So he set about trying to find the way to convince her that he was dead, and found it to be impossible. He couldn’t touch anything, he couldn’t write anything, he couldn’t hold anything, he couldn’t carry anything. What could he do? He was existing in this world, but not existing.

After seven months, he left the house for the first time. The front door was locked but he found that he could push through it, if he tried hard enough. He walked through the door, and into the the world that no longer had him in it.

He went to where his office was. The little office he rented. Where he used to write on his little old typewriter. He typed onto paper, before sending it in to his literary agent, where his assistant would type it into the computer. He’d long ago decided that that would be his thing. His quirk. He was the typewriter guy. You know that guy? He still uses a typewriter? Wow! He must be interesting! Is how he imagined all the conversations went behind his back.

He pushed through the office door, and looked at the room. It was still Gregory’s. The standing order was still paying the rent. Maybe if he hadn’t stayed here so late the night before it happened, it never would have? He looked at the typewriter, and the manuscript that sat next to it. He looked at the blank sheet of paper in the roll of the typewriter.

Then he put his non existent finger about the letter ‘D’ on the typewriter, and concentrated. And concentrated.

And nothing happened. But he had a little faith. If doors and walls had a tiny bit of give in them, perhaps this would too.

So he concentrated, and concentrated.

And he did nothing else for thirteen hours. And at the end of the thirteen hours, the letter ‘D’ depressed, and a faint little ‘D’ appeared on the page. Fourteen hours later, and the letter ‘e’ appeared next to it. The first two letters of his suicide note.

He supposed that sooner or later someone would come into the room, and if they found his note, maybe that would be that. He had simply taken his own life. Sarah could move on.

The electrician. That’s what the argument had been about. It suddenly came to him. The wiring in the office was condemned, and he had promised Sarah he would call an electrician to have it sorted. But he hadn’t. Maybe if he had, and they hadn’t argued, non of this would have happened. But it had.

Some letters took thirteen or fourteen hours to press and some took nearer forty eight. But time was something he had. By the end of what used to be a fortnight he had complete the first line of his note.

He predicted he could do it within the year if he tried. And if he didn’t procrastinate. Which , if he was honest with himself was mainly what he used the office for.

But now he had focus. This was the most important thing he would ever do, and he had to get it done.

Eleven months of concentration later, the note was nearly completed. He was glad he hadn’t rushed it. It was the best thing he’d ever written. Moving, convincing. Final.

And later that night the office burned down. Due to faulty wiring. Taking with it Gregory’s hundred word masterpiece.

Gregory didn’t die in the fire however. He’d given up hope of that ever happening.He decided simply to walk.

So he did. He walked as far as Britain would let him, and then he walked out into the sea. And he didn’t get wet, and he didn’t get cold, and he didn’t drown, because he and the sea lived in different worlds.

But he kept on walking. Across the sea bed. In the darkness. And he didn’t get tired. And he didn’t get scared.

He didn’t know where he was going. He thought he might just keep on going. Round and round. In and out of the oceans.

For years, he walked, now and then changing direction.

Finally, he saw the light. dim and distant, but definitely there. They all saw the light eventually. In the darkness.

He walked towards the light. For days and days.

And then. Nearly fifteen years after he had woken up from his normal dreams, Gregory Samuel saw something he didn’t expect to see.

Uncle Frank.

He was standing with several other people in the glow on the ocean bed. I say several other people. Several hundred thousand other people. A little blonde girl. A crew of sailors.

‘Greg. Greg is that you?’ Said Frank.

‘You can see me?’

‘Yes.’

‘You can hear me?’

‘Yes. Oh Greg. You’re one of us.’

It seems that some people just disappear. No one knows how, or why. Like a virus. Some people just disappear. The crew of the Marie Celeste, Glen Miller, Amelia Earhart. Other people you can read about on Wikipedia.

And this is where they gathered. Under the sea, in a place they called Atlantis.

I’m only telling you this so you know. If you wake up and you have disappeared. You know where to go.

If I Stop Believing Will It Stop Being True?

2010-10-01T12:41:00.004+01:00

Hello all,

Here is the third short story that I have written for 'Tall Tales', an evening held every two months at the Good Ship in Kilburn. I hope you enjoy it. if you like it, or don't do leave a comment - they're very interesting to read. But you know - nothing personal. Do point others in the direction of these aswell. If they are not read, these poor stories will die.

If I Stop Believing Will It Stop Being True?

Euston Rhodes did not believe in the supernatural. In fact , he barely believed in the natural and spent a large part of his twenties suspecting that kiwi fruit were manufactured, and the little hairs put on after to put people off the scent. He still thinks that sea-horses are animatronic. He may be right.

I’m aware that I skimmed over his name. I’ll say it again. His name was Euston Rhodes. His father, Walter B. Rhodes, insisted on it, not because he was a massive fan of London, but because he was a massive fan of Monopoly, and considered Euston Road to be his ‘lucky square’. It was odd that he should think that, as he had never, ever won a game of Monopoly despite the fact that he played it twice a week without fail, and had invested in a large hardback book entitled ‘How to Definitely Win at Monopoly’, and read it twice, even though it had more spelling mistakes than it would have been thought possible to miss. Including a spelling of the Old Kent Road, that, if read aloud, would sound like he was insulting the elder members of his family tree.

But still - his love for Monopoly continued, and his son was called Euston Rhodes. Except by his best friend Len who insisted on calling him ‘A501’.

Anyway. All this is irrelevant. Euston had decided to buy himself a house. He was finally fed up with his flat in London, largely because its lack of largeness. He once tried to measure his record-breakingly small galley kitchen with a shatterproof metre ruler, only to find that the kitchen was less than a metre wide. So determined was he that he couldn’t possibly have been living in a place where the kitchen was less than a metre wide that he wrestled and squeezed with the inflexible ruler until it became firmly wedged, between the side of the microwave and the laminated picture of a kitten in sunglasses with the legend ‘Lighten Up Dude’ underneath it. Even the sight of the louche kitten couldn’t make Euston ‘Lighten Up’ when he realised that the metre ruler’s claims of shatterproof were not empty words, and he had made his kitchen even harder to get in and out of. After six weeks of being forced to limbo with hot pans, Euston decided to move. And not to a differently small flat in London, but a differently big house, somewhere in the country. Because, as we all know, if you sell a tiny flat in London, you can buy a massive house anywhere outside the M25, and still have enough change left over to buy a Bentley or a Picasso, and lunch. Actually - it turns out that if you sell a tiny flat in London, you can afford to buy a two bedroom terraced cottage in Suffolk. If they are available at an amazingly low price. And there was one that was.

So this is what Euston Rhodes decided to do. He put his Euston Road flat on the market. I realise know that I forgot to mention that his flat was on the A501. It did cause some problems when it came to giving his address to people over the phone, particularly if the people on the other end of the phone were idiots, which they sometimes were :

“Yes, it’s Euston Rhodes, Yes with an ‘s’, Like the colossus. 9, no I’m not German, I’d have said ‘no’ - ‘9’. No, I’m not German. A, no - not ‘pardon’ - ‘a’ - Euston Road. No, not with an ‘s’. No, not like the colossus. No, my name is not Colossus. Tell you what, I’ll email it.”

With the metre ruler eventually shattered by Len, who was surprisingly strong, the Euston Road flat sold very quickly to a man called Paul Mall, who’s father was not a fan of Monopoly, though you’d have been forgiven for thinking this might have been the case, but was in fact a fan of Paul Hogan, the star of Crocodile Dundee 2, and at least one other film.

So, within a matter of weeks, Euston had bought a beautiful 2 bedroom cottage in a tiny village in Suffolk. His cottage was on the quiet main street, and it suited him down to the ground. It is worth mentioning a this point that the village in question was called Euston. And the main street in the village? Well - I’m sure you can guess. It was called ‘High Street’.

By the way, there is definitely a village in Suffolk called Euston. You can check it and everything.

Anyway. Again. About a thousand years ago I mentioned something important. That Euston Rhodes did not believe in the supernatural. But this belief in lack of belief was pushed to the limits the moment he moved in to the cottage in Suffolk.

The cottage was a little run down, and had been empty for some years. So Euston set about redecorating the place and did his best to ignore the massive things that clearly needed replacing. Like the ancient and deadly wiring. And the roof. But he could very quickly make this house a home with paintbrushes, a wobbly stepladder and a healthy disregard for sugar soap and masking tape. After all - it was only he who had to look at the scrappy edges.

Soon the sitting room, with large windows looking out on the high street, was spick and span and cosy, the chimney swept, and a fire set in the grate. The kitchen, though old fashioned, cleaned up a treat, and was well over a metre wide. In fact, it was about four metres wide, which to Euston seemed like a tennis court.

He then stripped the carpet from the stairs to reveal the wood, but left the beige carpet on the landing. He sanded the boards as much as he could be bothered, which was about half as much as he should have done, and painted them a beautiful glossy black from bottom to top. He stood at the top of the landing, and stared at the shiny black river tumbling downwards from his feet, proud of himself, and his move, and his decisions and his new kitchen and staircase and everything.

It was then he realised that the paint would take at least eight hours to dry, and in the meantime he was stuck upstairs. It was at this moment of realisation that he heard the unmistakable sound of breaking glass behind him. Turning around he saw a small blue bottle, apparently made of extremely fine glass. He bent down to inspect it, and was struck by a powerful smell of lemons. It was most peculiar. It was not a bottle he recognised. The landing was entirely empty. There was nowhere for the bottle to fall from, no shelf, no cabinet. But Euston was not one for thinking far fetched thoughts, and so assumed that it had simply fallen out of a cupboard in one of the bedrooms, one of the ones he had not yet emptied, rolled into the landing and promptly smashed itself. He cleaned up the bits and went into the bedroom he had decided to call the master bedroom. He threw the bits of glass in the bin, and lay down on the bed. And shivered.

Because the temperature had noticeably dropped. Even though there was fire crackling away downstairs, and the heating was on. The room was cold.

And when he went to stand up. He was actually going to check on the stair paint. I mean - It says eight hours, but it might be fine after 25 minutes, mightn’t it - when he went to stand up, he found that he couldn’t. At least, not without a great deal of effort. There was a resistance. Like trying to push your hand into putty, except of course there was nothing there. He felt pressure on his hands, his legs, his shoulder, the side of his face. Now and again a sensation like, and this is how he thought of it, chilled smoked salmon slices being pulled across his cheek.

Tiredness of course. Tiredness and paint fumes. That was it. That was why it was hard to get up. That was why his head felt heavy. That was why, now and again his vision went blurry, as if suddenly glimpsed through a smeary window.

It didn’t cross his mind as to why a beautiful two bedroomed cottage in a picturesque village in Suffolk was available at such a low price. Or why it had stood empty for so long.

Because to anyone else it would be clear. Euston’s Euston house was haunted.

With great effort, Euston pushed himself up from the bed and staggered into the room, feeling as if he had forgotten how to balance himself. He shivered again, and grabbed the radiator. It was burning hot. Overcome with too many sensations at once he whipped his hand away, stumbled backwards into the room, knocking a box marked ‘Games’ flying from the dressing table. The contents included a Monopoly set which opened and scattered tiny cars and shoes and hats, and tiny red and green buildings, and showered pastel coloured money all over the bedroom floor. He noted but ignored the fact that some of the tiny red and green buildings hovered too long in the air before hitting the floorboards. Because the air was thicker than it should have been.

Not feeling well enough to tidy up, Euston grasped the wall, and demanded that it stay still. He stared at his own reflection. In a mirror obviously. He stared at his own reflection and willed everything to suddenly be all right again. Like the first signs of a toothache, it might just all go away, mightn’t it? He stared and stared at his own face until all the various parts of it became abstract. He found the very idea of focussing on it peculiar and wrong, in the same way that a word becomes nonsensical if you repeat it over and over again. But still he stared at himself. And continued staring when his vision started to cloud over. Misting in from the outside like a vignette. Creeping further and further towards the centre of his eyes. He found that he couldn’t focus anymore. He shook his head to make it go away, but it didn’t.

He felt a creeping pressure around his waist, snaking sausages of cold pressure creeping around his ribs and under his armpits, meeting at the back and squeezing.

Indigestion, he thought, perhaps they really meant the best before date on the pork pie. It was just having an adverse effect on him. Squeezing him. Then he realised that this was exactly what Ebenezer Scrooge thought, whilst being visited by ghosts, so he put the though out of his head, and decided it was a heart attack. Or Scurvy. He certainly didn’t eat anywhere near enough limes.

HIs mind racing, Euston wriggled free of the too thick air, but blundered around the room. The space was still unfamiliar, and his vision still murky and impenetrable.

Shaking his head, which now felt like it was full of night, he hazarded a squint. He found that the image of his face in the mirror had been burned into his eyes like the green trails that follow a camera flash. He saw his own face floating in the air.

It was at this point that he thought. ‘Hang the bloody stair paint - I’ll give it another coat tomorrow’.

Euston made for the landing, feeling like he was leaving a trail of himself in the hot and cold air, and grabbed the wooden newel cap at the top of the stairs to steady himself.

Again, he felt the gelid sensation creep around his ribs, and press against his chest. He shook himself free again, stamping his feet to clear his head, to clear his body. His left foot found the underside of the Monopoly board, which had been flung clear of the bedroom and onto the landing floor.

The shiny playing surface moved swiftly on the beige landing carpet and took Euston with it. The back of his head smashed meatily against the wall, sounded like a toddler stepping on a bag of Rice Krispies. He grasped at the air desperate for a hand hold. He found nothing, but noted in the fraction of a second that it took to do so that it felt like draping his hands through a puddle.

He tipped backwards, and thumped his back on the newly painted stairs, and emitted a further crunch as his body pivoted and slumped against the greasy blackness. Euston tumbled down and down, the life jetting from him with every bump and grisly thump until he landed on the bottom, covered in sticky black streaks, and a ruined Monopoly board. Euston Rhodes was dead. As no one took in this information, and a little green monopoly banknote landed on the Euston Road square. His father’s lucky square.

The profound sceptic was surprised to wake up a few moments later in what can only be described as an afterlife. The thing that was Euston Rhodes was asked his name by an unseen creature to which the thing that was Euston Rhodes was silent for a moment before replying ‘A501 I think.’.

A501 learnt that the afterlife consists of myriad decisions. What would A501 like to do. A501 thought for a moment again and tried to piece together what his life had been before, and could only see the briefest of images. All he knew was that the thing he had been had died too soon.

“I should like to save my life, if I may”.

“You may. What is the last thing you remember of this life?”

“A long black shining tongue reaching out in front of me. Him.”

“Then that is where you shall go to.”

“I can travel in time?”

“I don’t understand the question. By the way - have you tried your welcome hamper?”

A501 looked down and saw a little wicker hamper where his feet would have been on where the floor would have been. He took a small fine blue bottle of homemade lemonade and did what he did instead of swallowing the liquid inside.

“I shall go to who I was, and hug him and squeeze him to make it all right. I shall stop him from falling into the black river.”

“Then go.”

And with that A501 disappeared. Back to our world. To save Euston Rhodes’ life.

Certain Sacrifices Must Be Made

2010-07-30T11:07:00.001+01:00

Morning.

It's been a little while since I posted, but I got married and everything in the interim.

But I have done a new story - performed at 'Tall Tales' at 'The Good Ship' in Kilburn on 29th July.

This one is called 'Certain Sacrifices Must Be Made', and I hope you enjoy it. But if you don't - you know - you got it for free.

Certain Sacrifices Must Be Made

Henry scrunched back in his chair and watched the television. It was later than it needed to be, and he probably didn’t need the glass of wine that sat on the table beside him, but he was going to have it. He nested down further into the chair. It was a good chair. Old, but extremely comfortable, unless you weren’t Henry, in which case it was very uncomfortable.

He turned the volume up slightly on the television. It was a good television. New, and expensive, and with very many different menus contained within it. Henry found the menus to be confusing, and once, completely by accident, changed the audio profile to ‘Village Hall’, and the colour and contrast settings to “Autumn’. Terrified that if he continued to press buttons in such a fashion he would end up with ‘Space Cathedral’ and ‘Pointillist’, he settled for the settings he had landed on. He was a fatalist in that way, and if the programmes were to sound like the tombola announcements at a fete, and look like they were being viewed through a puddle, then that was the way of it, and that was just symptomatic of improvements in technology.

It didn’t really matter what the sound or picture quality were like at this point in time however. Henry was watching a film he had seen many times before. It was an okay film. You won’t have seen it. It was the third film in a series featuring an inspiring teacher character, played by the Dutch-Irish-Italian-American actor Julio Smunt, and two of his most admiring pupils, played by Tilly Banks and Freddy Over. In the films, the inspiring teacher figure would get into scrapes attempting to do good, or foil a ring of smugglers or some such thing, and his two eager students, noticing his absence from registration, would embark on a series of daring escapades to rescue him, and once reunited, they would solve the mystery/capture the crooks/save the world, or whatever was necessary.

Henry was drawn to these films again and again. He looked back over his teaching career and wondered if, at any point, any of his students would have come to rescue him, if he had been taken by a gang of Puerto Rican Jewel thieves. He doubted it. Still, he was, in teaching terms, a success. He had climbed the ranks with all the speed and inevitability of a glacier, and now he was the head teacher of a middle-sized school, with some nice old buildings, and some horrible new buildings, and just over a thousand students, and a lovely school house on the premises in which he now sat, watching television, with a cat on his lap.

It was not a good cat. Even in cat terms, it was not a good cat. Bad-tempered, liable to scratch. Liable to ignore you, or push its hind quarters in your face. The only time it would lick you was immediately after consuming some particularly pungent catfood. An evening of stroking said cat, whom Henry had named ‘Vinyl’ because he scratched so much, so easily, would result in the kind of forearms you would expect to see on only the most dedicated self harmer. But Henry liked Vinyl, and sometimes, Vinyl liked Henry, and in either case they were stuck together. Vinyl came with the school, and so now did Henry.

Henry lifted his eyes from the screen to the window behind it. He could see the older part of the school silhouetted against the night, the chime-less bell tower, and the empty eyed large windows of the main hall. Beyond it were the flat-roofed sixties buildings housing the art rooms and drama studios, and beyond that the old fives courts, shortly to become careers and mixed-media suites, just as soon as someone figured out what the hell they were, and beyond that the sports pitches, and beyond that the main road and beyond that the rest of the world that Henry didn’t have any time for any more. Because he was the head teacher of a medium sized school.

And it was not a good school. Largely because Henry was too soft. And the students knew it. And so they ran wild. For a decade or more, behaviour had steadily declined, respect and discipline had fallen away like the edges of an over-baked quiche (I include this metaphor only because I have recently attempted to make a quiche. I over-baked it, and when I took it out of the dish, the edges of it fell away like respect and discipline at a not very good school). For Henry it seemed like there was no way back. There was graffiti everywhere except the graffiti encouragement area, books were destroyed, teachers terrorised, and supply teachers all but skinned alive. Students stole the white line making machine from the caretaker’s office and used it to write swearwords in 10 metre long letters on the cricket pitch. You know the words. The rudest ones. Not that one. Not that one. That one. Windows were smashed, and the faculty had no recourse. There were no punishments or deterrents available to them. Nothing in their armoury except detention - which would involve the staff member in question simply spending their precious free time with the offending student.

And Henry watched the school crumble out of his control. He knew he was betraying those who had come to learn, and those who had come to impart knowledge, but he didn’t know how to fix it. He sat in his office at the far end of the school, listened to the distant burble of people not listening and contemplated the situation, while Vinyl idly tore at the hems of his trousers, and was quietly sick into a houseplant. The framed black and white faces of previous headmasters looked scornfully upon him. Ashamed of him and his comfortable chair. And mounted above the door in a long glass case, was a cane. Patriotically painted red, white and blue in 1981 to celebrate the wedding of Charles and Diana. It served of a reminder of how things had got better. Somewhere near the geography block, there was the sound of something smashing. Henry pretended not to hear it.

It is most likely that nothing would have happened had Levi Stribb not joined the school, midway through the autumn term. Levi Stribb, with a terrifying display of fiery red hair, too short trousers, white socks, and teeth you could hang your keys on. He was a kicked wasps nest of a boy, constantly returning to his own lit touch paper. You would have thought he was the kind of child that would be bullied, but ‘no’. Levi Stribb bullied the world. And the world let it. He slashed tyres on cars, and stole from the tuck shop. He installed a channel showing nothing but extremely powerful European pornography on the sixth form common room television, but point blank refused to do the same for the staff room. He inspired terror in everyone who crossed his path. But still, there was no punishment, no recourse, no consequences.

The school turned from an unruly mess to a tiny country under a violent dictator with ADHD. But still Henry did nothing. He attempted letters home, sure, and detentions, but Levi Stribb was not the sort to be affected by correspondence on headed notepaper, or the offer of staying late. He continued his reign of terror.

It was only when Vinyl was found, one morning, nailed to the wall of the Main Hall that Henry changed. Levi Stribb admitted it was him. He said the cat ‘went for him’ and scratched him. He showed the scratches on his arms and legs. He said the cat deserved it, and he had only nailed it to the wall in self defence.

Henry didn’t shout. Henry didn’t scream or turn red. He was the calmest man you’d ever seen. He gripped Levi Stribb by the arm and pulled him to his office. Henry seemed bigger somehow. Stronger. A couple of the other teachers looked worried - what was Henry about to do? He shouldn’t be in the office alone with a boy like Levi... But Henry took Levi into his office, and closed the door behind them.

For a while there was silence. And then the sound of breaking glass. And finally the swish crack of a cane, and the scream of Levi Stribb. The swish crack continued for what seemed like forever, and the screams of Levi Stribb grew more and more pained. No words were spoken.

And at the end of forever, Levi Stribb left Henry’s office, silently. Limping. Where his trousers didn’t meet his shoes you could see a couple of inches of blood-stained white sock, and little flecks of patriotic red, white and blue paint on the seat of his trousers.

Silence fell over the school, and speculation as to Henry’s fate. He was a fatalist after all, and what would happen would happen. The police came, of course, the chairman of the governors, and Levi’s parents. They all huddled up in Henry’s office for hours on end. The school awaited the prosecution of Henry.

But all that happened was that Levi left, just two weeks after he arrived, leaving behind him one less cat.

But the school was a markedly different place. Because the student body had seen a different side to Henry. A darkness, an edge. They could all be the next Levi, couldn’t they?

And so began a new start for the school. The students began to listen. They still didn’t use the graffiti wall, but what they wrote illegally wasn’t so bad, and in some cases was quite funny. The classrooms once again became a place where the adult at the front was, for the most part, in charge. The story of Levi, the cat and cane was handed down from year to year, growing in ferocity and exaggerated detail. The one thing that didn’t change was the silence of Henry just before the storm. People knew to look out for the silence. That was the danger zone.

Years later, Henry retired from his position. He ducked out of his party in the main hall, and snuck into the sitting room in the school house. He sat in his chair, the good chair, and switched on the television. There was a gentle knock on the door, and Clara, his assistant entered with two glasses of good sherry.

They didn’t speak for a while.

“You’ll be moving out then, Henry.”

“Yes, Clara.”

“Off to Suffolk?”

“Yes Clara.”

“Henry?”

“Yes Clara?”

“What did happen with Levi Stribb?”

Henry chuckled and sank down lower in his chair. He indicated the television. Julio Smunt, Tilly Banks and Freddy Over were off on another adventure. They seemed so hopelessly dated now.

“You see the boy there.”

He indicated Freddy Over, who was attempting to untie Julio Smunt in a cave.

“Imagine him. With a fiery ginger wig, and buck teeth you could hang your keys on.”

Clara squinted at the screen. A slow realisation crept across her face.

“You don’t mean...”

“I for one think it was his finest performance. Don’t you?”

“You didn’t beat him, did you Henry?”

“Of course not Clara. It’s illegal to cane a child. But it’s not illegal to pretend to cane a child, now is it.”

Clara slumped down in the second best chair in the room.

“Well. Well. And that was the beginning of... Well. That, Henry, was incredibly clever.”

“That the beating of a child should create harmony is not clever, Clara, it is incredibly depressing, whether the beating is fictional or not.”

Clara said nothing, but put her sherry to her lips.

“All the same, not a word to anyone, do you understand?”

“Of course.”

Silence for a moment.

“And Vinyl, Henry, what really happened to Vinyl”

Henry looked over at her, illuminated by the television. He unthinkingly rubbed a network of tiny white scars on his wrist.

“This was a war, Clara. And sacrifices had to be made.”

What Peebee Did Next

2010-05-28T17:28:00.004+01:00

Yep. Been over a year since I posted anything.

Seems about right.

Anyway - last night I performed at 'Tall Tales' - a night of stories and such at 'The Good Ship' in Kilburn.

This is the story that I read - for you to read you no actual cost.*

*Cost of time will occur.

Enjoy!

What Peebee Did Next

Peter Binkleman, ‘Peebee’ to his friends, and the more grown up members of his family, ‘Binko’ to his colleagues at Binkleman’s Toys, apart from those on the factory floor who called him ‘Mr. Binko’, or sometimes ‘Sir Bink’.

Nordberg, the extremely formal middle-aged Swede who drove Peter, and also took care of a lot of the day to day running of the house in Specksham called him ‘Mr Binkleman’. Nordberg once attempted a ‘Peebee’ but found the informality to be so distressing that he had to spent three days in a bed and breakfast in Edinburgh to get over it. The bed and breakfast in question has a notoriously formal landlady who once ejected a guest for starch reasons.

His children - Ivor, Douglas and Esme called him ‘Poppa’, and his wife Emily, for reasons long forgotten called him simply ‘Oscar’.

I shall call him Peebee.

Peebee was the loveliest man you could ever hope to meet. He couldn’t help it. There was something in his make up that made it impossible for him to be disliked. And several people tried very hard to dislike him, only to fail miserably and then be invited round for Christmas.

His children adored him, and believed for many years that he was in possession of magical powers, for when they were with him, they could feel their hearts bursting from their chests with joy, and he hadn’t even given them sweets, or horsey-rides, or let them stay up late. His wife Emily did not think Peebee possessed magical powers; She knew it. But not the magic of fairy stories. Real magic. The magic that made her sadness go away, and everything all right. The magic of mummy kissing it better, but at a thousand times the strength. The magic of just the right patch of dappled shade and and the last page of an excellent book. The magic of a perfect yorkshire pudding, or a particularly fascinating rockpool. He was the sun of the household, and the rest of them were blissfully happy satellites.

He would have loved you too, you know. And you would have loved him back. And when your birthday came around he would have given you the most perfect gift. Try to think now of what would be the most amazing thing for someone to give you. Think of it now. Go on. Imagine opening it. And seeing it there. Well - he wouldn’t have given you that. When you opened the haphazardly wrapped parcel from ‘Your friend, Peebee’ you’d discover that there was something else you wanted. Something else you didn’t even know about . Something that made you smile for the rest of the week and kept forever.

Peebee’s house was a house that groaned with joy.

And when his heart stopped beating the morning before his fiftieth birthday, the joy was instantly replaced with emptiness, and an impenetrable grey fog. The world had caved in and left the family without their sun. So darkness fell.

The funeral was predictably well attended. Nordberg wailed so hard throughout the service that he had to be removed from the church, but his Scandinavian laments could be heard even over the choir. The family remained silent thoughout. Unable even to grieve. Unable to accept their loss. At the end of the service, in a touch of posthumous generosity, Peebee made sure that everyone took away a little present. Nothing ostentatious - a handsome pocket knife, or silver plated napkin ring, that sort of thing.

Days later, Emily, Ivor, Douglas and Esme made a discovery. That they would never recover from the loss of their beloved Peebee. They knew that the happiest section of their lives was over, never to return. The thought of never seeing him again was too much to bear.

But they did see him again. The following thursday. When he arrived at the house. He had been stuffed by a taxidermist in Pilthorp who had done an excellent job. Standing his full five feet eleven inches tall, with one hand in his pocket, one hand holding a crystal tumbler, and an expression of glassy benevolence was Peebee. Accompanying him was his solicitor from Tackett Tackett Hedgeworth Shander and Prigg. Peebee’s last will and testament was very specific in its peculiarities. And the exhumation, preservation and taxidermation of his body was just the beginning.

The family were under strict instructions to keep Peebee in whatever room they were in. Facing them.

Stunned, upset and horrified the family did what they were told. They sat that night in the drawing room, staring at the late Peter Binkleman not knowing what to think.

They were further surprised to discover that the munificent cadaver, once filled with laughter and light, now with a mixture of polyester resin, sawdust and plaster, also contained a surprisingly effective loudspeaker, fitted in the late Peebee’s throat.

It sprang into action a few hours after delivery of the body, and then would activate every seven and a half minutes. It seemed that Peebee had recorded some special messages for his family. Three in total. In rotation. Every seven and a half minutes.

“I’m still here!” He would bellow. And just four hundred and fifty seconds later : “Scotch Please”, and finally and most irritatingly “I’m sorry, would you say that again, Darling”. After which, whoever had last spoken was under strict instructions to repeat, loudly, and to the ear of the carcass whatever it was they had just said.

“We must do it”, the family insisted. “If it’s what he wanted, then we must do it. He did so much for us.”.

And so they did what Peebee wanted. There he would stand, demanding scotch and attention at all hours of the day and night. They took turns in keeping Peebee in their bedrooms at night, watching over them, demanding to hear things again, his rictus grin always finding a patch of moonlight to be illuminated in.

For the family the grief turned to horror and frustration.

Several weeks later, one of the house cats attacked Peebee, after his sixteenth request for scotch since breakfast. The normally placid Persian, a sweet tempered little thing called Orpheus, went for Peebee in a terrifying way, scratching at first his trousers, then his arms, and finally, in a surprising display of athletic prowess hitherto unseen, his smiling face.

Emily, Douglas, Ivor and Esme all swore they were just about to call her off, but were expecting one of the others to, hence their hesitation.

What was left of Peebee was not a pretty sight, and they universally agreed that wishes or no wishes, Peebee should be buried again, never to return. This was swiftly arranged, and they felt no need to alert the good men of Tackett Tackett Hedgeworth Shander and Prigg.

After the extremely quiet second burial of Peebee, things got back to normal in the house in Specksham. Houseguests were invited, the garden opened for the summer, and Orpheus was given a new and extremely comfortable bed.

Peebee’s final act of generosity was a triumph.

Emily, Ivor, Douglas and Esme didn’t miss him anymore.

A cake for all occasions...

2009-05-06T13:42:00.003+01:00

Between my house and The Black Lion lies a party shop. For a very long time they had a lot of novelty celebrity masks in the window. Paired up together sitting comfortably together as per were what appeared to be Whoopi Goldberg and Bob Monkhouse. And I'm not trying to be hilarions. I honestly think that's what they were supposed to be. I did take a photo, and meant to put it up, but it came out all dark, and I deleted it from the phone, thinking, they will never change the display. Then - guess what viewers, they changed the display! Groo!

Anyway - they have changed it to this:

Which seems to be a cake specifically for Lucy or Barbie to congratulate them on being run over by a cartoon bulldozer.

But, I can see why they've done it. That happens a lot in Kilburn. That and decapitations.

Google Search Poetry Fit The Second

2009-04-08T12:45:00.003+01:00

Here are a couple more examples of Google Search poetry. You really have to work the inflections on the these, with the full teenage angst, for the best effect.

Here's an ode to the future with 'Children'.

And another very questioning piece entitled - 'Was There Ever...?'

Google Search Poetry

2009-04-07T11:57:00.004+01:00

I've noticed that Google has started suggesting things that I might be searching for. I don't know why the good people at Google think I have suddenly lost the wherewithal to know what it is I'm actually looking for, but there you have it. The upshot of their suggestions is that the list of Google search suggestions very often looks like a piece of sixth form poetry.

Here are some examples...

A touching piece entitled 'I Can't Believe...'

Or a more political one entitled 'Why Does Everyone...?'

Plenty more where these came from...

Why not try your own?

2009-04-06T20:39:00.000+01:00

I'm pretty sure this is genuine. I'll definitely answer with all my details.

I missed the other 49...

2009-04-05T15:29:00.004+01:00

Now I like dat movie - de one with Susan Sarandon plays dat vicar, and Harvey Milk plays dat...dat guy on the death row.

I wanna do a movie that's fifty times better dan dat movie. Is dat possible?

Is it? Is it? How would you go about making a movie dat's fifty times better dan dat one?

Dat's it!

Jesus Spends

2009-04-05T15:22:00.004+01:00

I was in Waitrose yesterday. That's right recession, I said Waitrose. I'm giving the credit crunch the treatment with my wilful spending. Anyway, I was admiring the chutneys (I eventually only bought some mustard) when there was an announcement on the tannoy. 'Would Jesus please come to customer service.' Which I enjoyed. And then, a few moments later it came again with a small change. 'Would Mr Jesus please come to customer service.' And that was it. Jesus may be the ever loving son of God, but he likes to be addressed by his proper title, or he's just not going to go to customer services.

I wondered what the problem was. Maybe it was...heh...heh....maybe they'd...heh...run out of bread and...heh...heh...fishes....

Sorry Mr. Jesus.

Oh yes. When I got to the checkout, I ended up standing behind Miss Popoff off of from Rentaghost. Coincidence? I think not....

2009-02-17T11:05:00.000Z

I posted this up on Twitter a little while ago, but I thought I'd post it here as well. It's a stretched canvas print of Paul Ross being sold on Amazon. What's great about it are the 168 reviews of people who claim to have bought it. It really starts to make up for all those dreadful comments you read on You Tube videos and the like when you see lots of people being genuinely funny. I'll quote a couple...
Please note - 74 out of 77 people found that last one helpful. That means that three people read the whole thing and then decided, on the whole, it was unhelpful.

I posted my own. What I did was, copy Bill Paxton's biog from Wikipedia and do a 'Find and Replace' with 'Bill Paxton' and 'Paul Ross'. I think it came out rather well.

I'll post again. With a certain irregularity.

From the Archives

2009-02-17T10:42:00.001Z

When digging around in the back of my hard drive, I found amongst the foreign coins, unsharpened pencils and souvenir keyrings from a school trip to Lullingstone Roman Villa, a little film of stills I had made to illustrate a song from my second musical Yeti - An Abominamusical. The song - Brotherhood of Five - is sung by a mixed sex fraternity who protect the secret of the existence of the Yeti. A joke that Grant and I decided we really liked is that the brotherhood sing of the many brilliant things that exist in fives. But shortly into the song they run out of things that come in fives and branch out. Anyway. It turns out that's a pretty hard joke to sell on stage. Never mind. It's a good song. The music is by Grant Olding, arrangement by Chris Huntley, and performed by the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. Enjoy. I shall be back. With a certain irregularity.

2009-02-06T13:32:00.000Z

This is the kind of thing I waste my time with.

Jon Taylor, Chris Pell, Me, Mark Evans and David Mitchell playing the game that became a sketch, that became me procrastinating and using Imovie.

Tut.

2009-02-06T13:31:00.000Z

Is this a threat?

2009-02-05T15:23:00.000Z

I got a sinister email from Real network the other day. They were generously offering me the opportunity of buying some software from them. Though I had no interest in buying the software, I clicked on the link anyway. Why not? It's better than doing any actual work isn't it? Isn't it? And sometimes clicking on links in emails is work too - such as when I receive Ergent Massages from the various banks that I must have joined at some point. I always respond to those, and thank my lucky stars that Unsightliness T. Infield, a bank employee has worked through his obvious dyslexia to inform me of problems with my bank security,

Anyway - this software from no such useful application, but did contain some hidden messages, or 'massages' as 'Chaffinches I. Bolder' and his colleagues insist on calling them. The software - the Morpheus Photo Morpher - I was told, could 'morph a photo of my baby into me' - in case I was so narcissistic that I could only bear looking at a picture of my baby if I was safe in the knowledge that it would eventually turn into a picture of me. No, under these options was the offer to :
I'm sorry - what? Transform my partner into a cat! Not a photograph of my partner. Just 'my partner'. The Real Player organisation are witches, it turns out, hell bent on felinising spouses. It goes to go show that not everyone is as trustworthy as Shriven V. Hotheadedness and the other member of the Abbey Notional Building Society.

One Year (and a bit) On....

2009-02-02T12:57:00.001Z

I noticed that I set this blog up more than a year ago. No doubt fired up by the fact that it was my birthday. Predictably, I've done nothing since. But, as the snow settles outside, and work beckons, the idea of posting an entry here, in this dusty old attic blog space seemed more and more attractive. You may read into this that I cannot even be bothered to make tea. And that is saying something.

Ah. I've just heard the kettle boil. That means Anna is making tea. Excellent....

We went this week to see 'On the Waterfront' - the Berkoff directed adaptation of some film, the name of which escapes me. Now then. That was a difficult watch. I imagine it might be all right if you've never seen a play before. You know - the excitement of some lights being on, the joy of there being a bit of the room at the front higher up than the bit of the room that you're in which as got chairs in it, one of which you're sitting in, the thrill of there being some men talking and moving (v-e-r-y) slowly around the place in hats, doing physical theatre bits here and there with varying degrees of enthusiasm (It is worth pointing out here that the correct amount of enthusiasm for physical theatre is 'none' - congratulations to those who knew this). But, bloody hell, I really thought it was awful. But you know, lots of people seemed to like it around me, mainly because the Brando impersonator was sweaty - and we all know - you can't fake sweat so that's acting.

Here's a tip for getting through the show by the way. Keep telling yourself that the lead actor is in fact doing an impression of 'The Fonz'. It makes the whole thing a bit funnier. It also makes you aware of what the Fonz (notice I couldn't make a 'The Fonz'/the Fonz decision - is 'the' a self appointed christian name for Arthur Fonzarelli - and therefore worthy of capitalizing?) might have been like had he been severely autistic. He even did the impression through the slow motion bow at the end. Which cheered me up - partly because it was over, and partly because they were being actively pretentious at this point, which I could properly dislike without feeling bad.

Still - I did hear a tremendous theatrical anecdote which I shall impart tomorrow.

Good health, dear reader, I shall report again with a certain irregularity.

2008-01-24T00:55:00.000Z