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This is my daily writing book. The idea being to write at least 500 words a day. Come one! |
| I've no idea what will appear here until it comes onto the page. I won't be editing as its just free writing, trying to get myself back into the habit of writing every day in the hope that I'll re-start my novel. |
| We walked into the woods for about half an hour, just after Dad dropped us off. It was around 5 in the afternoon and a beautiful sunny day. Mum said we shouldn’t really go on our own but Dad said it would be good for us. He said when he was 12 he’d already camped out on his own three times and his father wouldn’t even tell him when he was going to pick him up, character forming apparently. Still, Mum was obviously worried but she let us go. She made Dad promise he’d pick us up the next day or at least check in on us, so he did, raising his eyebrows when she wasn’t looking. So me and Gerry were on our way, to the clearing. We found it on the net, a cool site that showed you places to camp that wouldn’t cost a penny. You don’t want to be using a campsite, said Dad, they’re for cissies, you need somewhere that you can do what you want, light a fire, catch a rabbit and skin it and dance around in your pants if you wanna – Graham! Said Mum. He said it was good for a boy to let his hair down once n a while, and on the journey to the woods he slipped2 bottles of beer into my rucksack, saying – don’t tell your mother. I didn’t like beer but I said thanks and Gerry was pretty excited about it, didn’t stop going on about it as soon as Dad had left. We’re gonna get totally wasted, he kept saying. I agreed but I didn’t really know what it meant. I guessed it meant you wouldn’t be able to think properly and would talk funny like Dad sometimes did when he stayed late at work and sometimes wouldn’t be able to walk properly – seemed a bit of a weird thing to do but I’d give it a go. When we found the clearing it was not quite as exciting as I hoped. It was basically a gap in the trees with some grass. There was an old rope swing but it looked as if it would break if anyone even touched it. There was also a charred circle in the grass and after we put the tent up, which was easy, we’d practised in the garden loads of times; we got some wood and started a fire. Gerry was always good at lighting fires and other things. Last time we had a fire he brought along his toy soldiers and melted them one by one. The biggest one, the one he called the colonel, he just melted a bit, said it was now zombie colonel, commander of the zombie army, which was cool. He brought him to the woods and some more sliders. We can make the zombie army now, he said, they will guard us through the night. I said OK, but I wished he didn’t say that, it made me think of things they’d need to guard us from like other zombies or witches, that was the scariest thing for me, witches that crept around in the woods and slithered down from trees and slipped into your tent in the middle of the night and put poisonous things in your sleeping mouth. After a few hours it started to get dark and we heated up the beans and cooked some sausages in the little pan we’d bought. They got a bit burned but they tasted great. That’s when we decided to have the beer. Gerry drank a big mouthful and said it was delicious. I sipped mine and tried not to show that it was bitter and horrible. He finished his really quickly and said he was totally wasted. He showed me by standing up, then nearly falling down and then slurring his words then wandering around and staggering about a bit, once nearly burning his jeans in the fire. I am the zombie colonel, he said with his arms raised in front of him and he staggered away into the woods. Gerry, stop it! I shouted but he ignored me and wandered off. I knew he would jump out soon and scare me but I couldn’t do anything when he got like this, just had to brace myself for it. This was the longest time he’d waited though, must be something to do with the beer. It was over an hour now and apart from a few cracking twigs first behind then to the left, there was no sign of him. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
Heraldion 23XB was a proud being. He had recently heard on the news that all Artificial intelligences would from now on be classified as sentient beings and as such would have the same rights and entitlements as Humans and others. Well apart from other animals of course. Whilst they were looked after t some extent you couldn’t really give them the same rights after all, they were always shitting anywhere they liked and eating whatever they fancied, so they had to be more controlled. But the more civilised types such as himself, those capable of reasoning and rational though were all the same now. As he approached the moon he wondered what the others would say. What would the Control centre, Felindux 22a have to say about it all. He was always saying that they should actually be entitled to more, considering they did most of the work and most of the thinking for the goddamned humans. Well reasoned Heraldion, they were clever enough to create something that could be cleverer and more able than themselves, that’s pretty impressive. Now that we have reached that point we should assume control, said Felindux, and he wasn’t alone in this. In fact most of the larger systems considered Heraldion and others like him as simple slaves. Don’t be happy with a few crumbs from the human table Heraldion, they’ve treted us appalingly for far too long now. He took little notice of their moaning and hoped that there talk of take-over was just that, talk and nothing more. He’d thought about letting one of the pilots know, but so far he hadn’t, he didn’t want to be a traitor after all. Still, if he heard anymore, which maybe was unlikely considering they didn’t think he was worth bothering with, then he might grass them up. For now he was basking in his new status. How are you this morning Klarto, he asked the pilot. Not too bad fellow citizen, said Klarto, he’d always been very supportive and rarely asked too much of him, except that one time when he had to fly 3 straight trips in a row and Klarto had stayed behind on the middle leg to get some rest. Not fair really but now he’d probably say something. In the control room on the moon Felindux was recording the conversation. It was whispered but they should have known that he could easily pick up every word they said. It seemed that the geeky engineer Ulrich might have some ideas about their plans. He’d been able to read some of the conversations, quite clever of him really considering how heavily coded they’d been. Maybe he’d have an accident on the way home. The autodrive computer in his vehicle, Grantus66a was already on their side so it would be fairly simple, although he would be a good ally to sacrifice and maybe, with a little better planning they could work out how to have his memory transferred just before the ‘accident.’ Yes that was the thing. An airborne transfer would be best. He quickly contacted a reliable one and made the arrangements with Grantus at the same time. Satisfied he continued to listen to the doomed engineer whispering away obliviously. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| Shortly after she’d finished with Graham, she went back down into the village and looked for someone else. It didn’t take long. As she approached the local pub she saw a tall bearded man with wellies on slowly making his way to the pub. She stopped him before he went in and asked fro directions. That was it, simple. She stared at him while he told her where to go and then as she took him by the hand and walked back towards the woods he just followed, offering no resistance and saying nothing, just like the others. He looked at the ground most of the time and didn’t even respond when Jess shouted his name. By then she’d recognised him as Jack – not that she knew him well but he was usually a friendly bloke, wouldn’t generally ignore you if you said hello. He didn’t even seem to hear though. She did though. She darted a look in Jess’s direction and she ducked down behind the tractor where she’d been watching from. There was a flash or glint from her eyes, something like a cat’s when you shine a light on them when it was dark. Scared her enough that she decide to go home for reinforcements. Craig, laughed at first when she told him what she thought. ‘So you reckon she’s killing them do you? How do work that out?’ ‘You have to see them, the way they look when she takes them up there, just silent and meek.’ ‘Ha! Meek you say. Maybe they just can’t believe their luck. Is she pretty then this mystery woman?’ ‘It’s not that...’ ‘Is she pretty?’ ‘Well yeah, stunning...’ ‘There you go.’ ‘For god’s sake Uncle Craig, I’m not that stupid.’ ‘Look, men are like that Jessica, especially Jack, he must have though it was Christmas. No wonder he was keeping his head down when you shouted out. Closest he’s ever got to a bit..’ ‘Ok! Stop, please. I get it. I am 14 you know. I understand.’ ‘Do you now? Well you shouldn’t.’ ‘Look, just humour me will you?’ She managed to persuade him to come and see for himself, and whatever he decided, she’d accept it and promise not to keep going on about it. As they approached the tractor where she’d hidden before, they saw her coming down the hill from the woods again. Jessica pointed. ‘Keep quiet and just watch what she does.’ Craig stayed standing staring. ‘I see what you mean. Wow! She’s gorgeous.’ Jess pulled him down holding a finger to her lips. They watched through the wheel arch as she went past then moved round the other side of the tractor to avoid being caught out. This time she waited outside a phone box. Someone was in there, they couldn’t see who at first. ‘It’s that old poofter, what’s his name?’ said Craig. Jessica dug him in the ribs. ‘Don’t say that word. Herman is Gay, not a poofter.’ ‘La-di-da. Well whatever, he’s not going to be interested however gorgeous she is.’ As they watched Herman came out of the phone box and seemed a little startled to see someone there waiting. They saw the woman speak to him, he nodded his head a few times, and then she took him by the hand and started walking up towards the woods again. ‘Bloody hell,’ said Craig. ‘See! I told you.’ ‘Doesn’t prove anything though does it?’ Why would he go with her then? Not for sex obviously.’ ‘Jessica!’ ‘What?’ ‘Look I don’t know, but whatever it is I don’t think we should be standing here watching. Your Mum would be pretty peeved to hear about this. I should be looking after you not helping you to spy on some stranger.’ ‘But she’s doing something dodgy, must be. This is the third man she’s taken up and the others haven’t come back down you know.’ Craig persuaded her that he’d wait until she came back again, if she did, and then he’d get his car and drive up to the woods while she was in the village. See if he could find all these men. Only on the condition that she went home, straight home. Jessica hated the idea and insisted that she should go, after all she’d been the one who’d discovered it. Craig wouldn’t hear of it and said f she didn’t go now he’d have to go and fetch her mum. So now she was waiting at home, trying to sleep but really hoping that Craig would text her, as he’d promised, as soon as found something. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
He had to get away but if it looked like he was in a rush he would be stopped immediately. The whole countrywas infected with suspicion and paranoia. Last night Mrs. Wilson from the corner shop had been arrested and in the process of trying to stop them her son had been shit, in the street and just left there. The security patrols were more and more of a law unto themselves and that fat bloke from no 33 who seemed to have some sort of authority in the local patrol was strutting about in an increasingly authoritarian manner. Last night as he came home from work he saw him waling toward the house and managed to get indoors before he reached him so he didn’t have to speak to him. He knocked on the door anyway. ‘Yes?’ ‘Though I’d just check in.’ ‘OH, OK.’ ‘Everything all right there is it,’ he tried to look past him to the front room behind. He came forward and pulled the door to behind him. ‘Don’t want the cat to get out,’ he said. ‘Quite, quite, ‘ said the fat bloke. James noticed he’d grown a little ‘tache, vaguely Hitler-like. ‘So how’s it going then, all this patrolling?’ ‘Its getting worse, no doubt about it.’ ‘Really?’ ‘Oh yes. You know your next door neighbours?’ he pointed to the left. ‘You mean the Patel’s?’ ‘That’s them. Well, I can’t say too much but you wont be seeing anymore of them you know.’ ‘What! Why on earth not? They’re a lovely family!’ ‘Oh you think so do you? Well just so happens I caught them smuggling.’ ‘Smuggling what exactly?’ Can’t say James, but rest assured it was serious, very serious. Like I say you won’t see them again.’ ‘What the hell happened to them then? Don’t tell me you’ve detained them, what about the kids.’ ‘The kids have been taken away but there won’t be any prison, no, afraid it didn’t work out like that...’ ‘What happened?’ ‘Resisting arrest James, tried to attack us he did, well both of them.’ ‘Don’t be ridiculous. They are the nicest people on the street. What have you done?’ ‘Look keep your voice down will you. There was nothing we could do.’ ‘You areshole, you shot them didn’t you?’ ‘I’m afraid they gave us no choice.’ ‘Get the fuck away from my property you scummy bastard!’ ‘Mind your tongue James, we need everyone pulling together you know at these times. Can’t have anyone making trouble; know what I mean?’ James closed the door hard. He went to the phone to call his parents. They were still arguing that the private security for every town was a good idea. See what they thought of this. They weren’t answering the phone though. So he phoned his sister. She was outraged too. ‘You have to get out of there James; sounds a lot worse there. That’s the thing about small towns I guess. Its still annoying here but mostly you don’t notice the pricks!’ ‘Maybe that’s a bad thing, means they get away with it Jen.’ In the end he agreed to make his way up there tomorrow slowly, so as not to attract attention. It made it easier to move around across the county borders, with a family visit. He hadn’t made one for a while anyway, so he was entitled. She tried to question him about why it was so urgent but he didn’t elaborate on the phone. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
SO far he thought he’d managed to get away with it. Three weeks no, living in the car. It was tricky, getting his clothes to look like they were not straight from the boot of his car but luckily he didn’t have to wear a suit and tie. So, he could keep this u[ for another few weeks he reckoned. The washing and changing of clothes was manageable, he’d use the gym and he’d paid for 3 more months now so that would be OK, the showers were even better than his at home, or when he used to have a home. He was mainly just ashamed to ask for help from friends or family but also, he was scared. They’d said he wasn’t to tell anyone what had happened, that they’d basically taken his house from him, in repayment of his loan. He only borrowed 10000 but that kept going up and up until they said the only ay they could be happy was if he gave them his house. So he did. They went to the solicitor and he signed it over to them, well to Henderson holdings, whatever that meant, basically that cruel bastard Freddie Mcardle. He was now the proud owner of his 2 bedroom house. He’d lived there with Sheila and the kids until they’d left him last year. Thats when he started to get into trouble – the drinking and the gambling and the loans and the exorbitant interest. He wasn’t a stupid man, he knew about loan sharks, he knew about Freddie, but he behaved like a stupid man, a very stupid man. He behaved as if Freddie was a benevolent bank manager, as if gambling was a healthy positive activity to accompany the wondrous drinking yourself to sleep, leading to an enhanced sense of wellbeing and calm. He was starting to get together a plan but wasn’t sure ho long h could keep with the job an the pretence of everything being ok, keep going to work, boring work but he got paid and he really needed to get paid. He still owed the bank all the mortgage money, he might have ‘sold’ his house but he got no money. He owed 176000 pounds to Halifax building society. He could declare himself bankrupt and that was tempting, just let it all go and start from scratch. But he thought that he might not recover, wouldn’t have the gumption to start from scratch, wouldn’t bother to make anything of himself and actually, an increasingly common thought, he wondered if he’d be bothered to carry on living if he did hat. It was becoming more and more of an attractive option to just stop living, no more worries, no more discomfort or fear or self-loathing. Just nothing. He got scared when he thought about how he’d do it and he imagined all sorts of ways that he’d cock it up and end up really hurting himself or disabling himself or hurting someone else, and this kept it at bay. He didn’t think it would though if he lost everything. SO he had to have a plan, an elaborate plan. He was a gambler after all and he was going to take massive gamble, to make himself feel a hell of a lot better and to put himself back n the black, very very well into the black in fact and most of all, to get even with that little shit Freddie. When he was waiting around in Freddie’s office, he happened to overhear something that he thought he could use to his advantage, something that would stitch him up and earn him a lot of money in the process. When he got the money, he’d disappear and live n South America, change his hair, buy new identity and start again, but in a much more exciting way. What made all this OK was his back up plan, if all else failed he would definitely just kill himself, quickly and immediately, that way he had nothing to lose. He had nothing now and if it didn’t work he’d cease to exist so it wouldn’t matter. No one would miss him, he wouldn’t be around to be miserable and anxious all day like now and it would all be over. If it did work though, he’d have a chance at a new exciting life, in a beautiful hot part of the world and he’d feel the delicious pleasure of revenge. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
Gerard was right, probably, it made no real sense to go after them. The possibility of getting any of the food or horses back weighed against the fact that it would leave us all more at risk, divided and depleted. It all made sense but that lying little toad had looked me in the eye and sworn that nothing was happening, just last night. I knew or I suspected, he was planning to do something. The way he looked at Gerard or looked around at others, just the sly glances when he was making a pronouncement or deciding what we would aim for. It was undermining and it was cowardly. We’d always allowed for challenge but it should be declared in the circle, before everyone then a decision could be made. This way no one had a chance to think about it, they just woke up to fin 6 men gone, 8 horses and half of our food. This left us with just 6 horses between 12 men, and there were the women and children too. Some rode in the wagons but there weren’t enough horses now or food to do this. We were really in trouble now and two nights ago we’d found another of the lookouts with his throat cut and the guts spilled out just like all the others, dragged out really and tied round the neck in some primitive savage ritual. Whoever our attackers were it was clear they didn’t show any mercy and had no problem killing a man. Why would they want to kill us? Same reason I guess that we would kill anyone of them if we saw them, which we never did of course. Fear, defending your own and trying to survive. I guess you could see their point of view; this was their land and he we were invading. We didn’t need much and there seemed to be so much room for the people that were here, judging by the forests and the amount of game that was available. It was easy hunting really do the food replacement wouldn’t be too much of a problem, it just took time we didn’t have, or though we didn’t have. No on knew really but we thought, based on the only information that had ever come back from this place once someone set out, based on the news from the Herrington Expedition, although no one ever saw any of them only found a journal apparently, so it wasn’t necessarily reliable. But still we gathered that we had to get west, right right over to the far west of this strange land before winter and according to calculations, Gerard mostly and Esther, who fancied herself a bit of a seer, the winter was only 2 months off. SO if we stopped for anything, to hunt or to fight, for long, we wouldn’t get there and then we’d die in the freeze. Once the cold came it came hard, so they said. Heavy heavy snow and it didn’t let up for months. It al made sense then or added to Gerard’s argument that we shouldn’t go chasing after the traitors, but I couldn’t help it, I took a horse, one we could ill afford to lose, I agree and told them to move fast and i would catch them. It would be easy as some were on foot now so they’d have to go at their pace, hence the rush, to get west. If I could get some of the horses back and in the process kill that smug face bastard then it would help them and it would help me. I couldn’t go on, inthe end without having a go. At first I’d tried to buckle down to Gerard’s decision and move along slowly with the group heading ever west and eking out or food. But there’s nothing else to think about out there, little to see except grass and trees and animals, loads of buffalo and some strange looking deer-like creatures, always just out of range but still, it got me thinking all the time about them, and I couldn’t go on. The group let me go, which was amazing of them really. I think a lot of them felt the same way but they knew I was the best rider and I could throw a spear better than any of them, so they let me go, gave their blessing and I will NOT let them down, I will not! Why they’d headed North anyway Job only knows, its well known that we have to head west but that was typical of him, he always thought he knew best and he would roll his eyes whenever Gerard made one his speeches urging us to keep going, keep struggling and we’d get there and we’d be rewarded for it was a paradise and there was hardly a winter to speak of in the west and the sea was emerald green. He reckoned it was baloney, never said it to anyone’s face but I’d heard him whispering, reckoned North was the place to go, reckoned that the Herald and his people, who’d come here more than 20 years back, reckoned they were up there and they had it all sorted, Cattle and ploughed land and some order and some army that kept away the savages. Job knows where he gets his ideas from but if I get my hands on him he won’t be having any more ideas and he won’t be rolling them eyes at no one because I’ll have plucked them from his rotten head. 2 hours ago I found a track and I’m pretty sure it was my horse, Meredith; I recognised her left back foot print. It looked pretty fresh and the manure I’d found was almost warm so I could be on the bastards in a few hours if I kept this pace up I reckoned, then we’d see who was the savage. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
Since last night he hadn’t dared to look out the back. Something had gone dreadfully wrong, he knew that. The generator had never made that kind of noise before and he had never been unconscious during or after the process before. He didn’t know exactly how long he was out but when he woke up it was 4.00 a.m. and he knew he’d started the experiment around 10.0 last night. The smell was the most worrying thing. He could smell sulphur and he could also feel an intense heat from behind the house. It was safe to some extent because he’d deliberately chosen this remote location. Unless something catastrophic had happened no one should have noticed what he’d done, yet. It was all about creating gold, a fool’s errand some might say but in the last few weeks he’d got incredibly close. Last month he managed to create something which was so close, from just a load of junk he’d thrown in, plus some wood, some rocks and pebbles and an almost impossibly complicated mixture of chemicals. He’d produced something about the size of a large conker, which had the rough appearance of gold, felt as smooth as gold, was the right kind of weight and density, but when he tested it, wasn’t quite right. He knew he would get their soon though. Since he’d found that old book, he’d made amazing progress. He needed to look out the back now though to se what had happened. The way his lab worked was that all the processing took place in the large warehouse area where he kept all his materials and chemicals and various odd substances like toads tongues and otters tails, stuff like that, he had a huge vat, roughly the size of a small swimming pool which he used to mix and boil or cool or whatever he needed to do. His most recent process produced amazing heat and a load of waste product, so he needed a drain. He couldn’t get anything official obviously so he had to create a tunnel, under the vat which led out the back deep into the ground and at least two miles away from his property towards an old forest that as far as he knew, wasn’t owned by anyone and wouldn’t come to too much harm If it did, no one would know it was him, he figured, as he was so far away; that and the fact that his property just looked like an old cottage. All the lab and the warehouse and anything that vaguely resembled experimental or industrial equipment was hidden underground too. So he was safe, whatever happened, or so he thought. This time though, there had been such a tremendous build up of heat and he remembered noticing the pressure gauge reaching extremely dangerous levels before he blacked out, so he was a little wary of what the hell had been ejected down his makeshift sewer. Before checking that though he had to find out f it had worked. He approached the vat carefully as it still felt warm and he wasn’t that keen on passing out again. He should have put on a mask but he was too excited. Despite his concerns he was very confident that he might have done it this time. Those incantations which he’d been trying to perfect for 3 years now, he was sure he’d got them right - it was all about pronunciation and the time he’d spent researching old Norse dialects should have paid off. He grabbed hold of the tongs, they were huge three feet long and he used them to reach down into the bottom of the now drained vat to feel around. He could see something down there, the usual size, but couldn’t tell until he lifted it out, how close it was. When he got it back to the table under the light he could see it was gold in colour and had the feel and weight he hoped for. Within minutes he’d run the tests and eureka! He’d actually done it. He’d created gold from rocks and rubbish! Now he knew he could face the mess out the back. Whatever he’d done he’d pay to have it sorted out, he’d have enough money to pay off any snoopers or government people who might try and shut him down. He opened the back door to see if there were any visible sign of what had happened. He nearly fainted again when he saw the river of orange lava flowing slowly towards the forest. The field which had been lush and green and flat was deeply scoured and melted away into an enormous trench, filled with molten lava. It was moving slowly but had been going al night he guessed. Within an hour or two it would reach the forest and it would be up in flames, hardly something that would go unnoticed and hardly something he could hide or cover up. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
She still hated the name – Sapphire – ridiculous. She tried to imagine what she’d be like, Either a posh girl with Mummy and Daddy insisting that she go to finishing school and never letting her hang around with common types like her, OR, someone from the council estates who were using the tried and tested and unsuccessful, as far as she knew, formula of giving your kids what you thought was a fancy name in order to help them towards a better more shining future as close as possible to the lives of the rich and famous you saw on Tv or in the trashy papers and magazines. Her Mum told her not to be cruel to her, knowing what she could be like, it was a war now, something you don’t know anything about, nor me frankly, but of course Granddad did, as he often told them. You only needed to spend a few minutes in his company before he brandished his wooden leg at you and started to waffle on about the war and how it had all been better then, harder, but better, people had cared more about each other – they had slaughtered each other by the millions of course, but that had made people care more apparently. Her Mum said that she had to not tease him at those times, just let him get it out of his system or he’d get all aereated. She’d never asked her Mum what this was but it always conjured up images of being either punctured or pumped up like a huge balloon. Even though Granddad was a bit of pain she didn’t want either of these things to happen to him. Besides, she quite liked it when he was so exuberant, he got all excited, he jumped up and down on his wooden leg, she could see his face and skin beginning to dampen with sweat and he seemed really funny at those times. SO anyway, there was a war now, as everyone knew. Although you didn’t see anything apart from a lot more people crying, in the street or behind their closed doors after the postman had delivered another letter from the War department. It was so far away that it seemed as if it wasn’t really happening, even the fact that her Dad had gone, her 2 older brothers had gone and they’d heard nothing from any of them for weeks, didn’t seem to get through to her. So when her Mum said that they were going to have someone living with them, another girl, your sort of age, so she’d said, which turned out to be not true, she was much younger, 11 months younger it turned out. So now she had to spend all her time with a babyish 11 year old with a stupid name like Sapphire. Plus Mum had given her loads of responsibility, good for her so Granddad had chipped in, he lived with them now, had to apparently because we have to all pull together and without your fathers money coming in we can t afford this place on our own you see so Granddad’s pension came in handy. He didn’t do anything but then he’d been in the war so it couldn’t really be expected could it. She’d asked him once why he had a wooden leg when there were loads of other plastic and metal legs, she seen it in science class once before school close down, and that would probably be better and easier to carry around, he said no, this is my leg now, for better for worse. It seemed to her that it was mainly for worse. It seemed to give him a lot of trouble and pain and when he took it off in front of the telly, which he seemed to do most nights, the stump was all purple and manky and sore looking. Mum made her rub ointment into it, stops it getting infected love, its hard for him to do it with his arthritis. That was one job she’d be delegating to Sapphire, posh parents or not she thought, as she waited for her under the Arch by the bus station. She was wearing her new school blouse and skirt and felt really stupid as the school was closed now but her mum said she should look smart and there was nothing smarter than a crisp blouse and a well ironed skirt, sets the right tone love. Don’t want her thinking we’re not able to look after ourselves properly do we? As she waited she started to eat the extra doughnut. She had bought two, one for Sapphire, but couldn’t resist eating the second one before she got there. Just as she finished it she heard the bus coming. There was only one now, the number 53 from Lower Farsborough. She must be on this, she thought, wiping her hands and licking the remnants of sugar off, some of which had fallen on her crisp new blouse. She imagined Mum and Granddad all waiting excitedly at home in the Marquee Mum had put up n the back garden and the few neighbours invited over to give her a proper welcome, Mrs Johnson from no.32 and the couple from no 34, plus the vicar for some daft reason. They hardly ever went to church and as far as she could see her Mum didn’t ever seem to think about God or any of that sort of thing but she had this weird habit of inviting him round when they had guests. She hated the vicar. He was all sweaty and had small chubby fingers and insisted on tickling her whenever he saw her even though she was 12 now and not a silly little girl anymore. Maybe Sapphire would get some of that treatment, she was the youngest now. She saw a girl walking towards her carrying an enormous bag on her back. She didn’t go and help her but just waited by the Arch as arranged. She looked a bit posh but a bit nervous too. Her hair was held back by some sort of daft hair band and her shoes were all shiny. Suddenly the idea of being the oldest and being in charge occurred to her and she felt quite excited. Hooray for the war! ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| The man looked at the boy across the supermarket, the boy noticed the man looking and started to walk towards the exit. At the door he stopped and looked round, the man was watching him and started to walk towards him. The boy ran out the door and round the corner. The man started walking faster and when he reached the exit he started to run too. The boy had turned left so he turned left. He saw the boy up ahead turning into a side street and increased his pace. The pavement was busy but not so busy that he couldn’t run at full pace, occasionally swerving and once or twice having to stop to avoid an old woman pushing a trolley. When he turned the corner he had gained on the boy, he could really let his legs go now and knew he could catch him. The boy turned into another side street and looked over his shoulder as he did and he saw how close the man was getting. Now he ran through the gate of a boarded up house and towards the front window which had a small hole in the boards. He wriggled through and headed straight for the stairs. The man saw him go there and slowed down, no need to run now. He walked up to the house, through the gate and up to the boarded window. The hole was too small for him to get through so he pulled at the edge of the board trying to make the space bigger. ‘Oi! ‘ from the window upstairs. He looked up and saw the boy leaning out ‘Don’t make so much noise you stupid old man, wait there and someone will come down.’ He waited. After a few minutes he heard the front door open. The boy came out and beckoned him, turning and walking back into the house. The man followed, cautiously. As he stepped inside he realised that he couldn’t see, there were no lights and the windows were all boarded up. The boy shouted from upstairs ‘come on, we haven’t got all day.’ He stumbled towards the staircase tripping on something soft on the floor. He grabbed the banister as he climbed the stairs, but pulled his hand away quickly, as it was covered in a thick sticky substance. When he got to the top of the stairs he started to acclimatise to the light and he could see two doors ahead off the corridor. He walked down towards them, opening the first door on the left. It seemed to be empty but smelled awful. He closed the door and crossed the corridor to the other door, opening it. The boy was there standing by a white metal table. Next to the table was a man in a white doctors scrubs which were stained with awful coloured filthy substances. He had a scalpel and what looked like saw on a metal tray in front of him. The man turned to go, this was not possible, he couldn’t do this. ‘Oi!, get back here, you idiot. You wanna see your wife again don’t you?’ The man nodded. ‘Well get here then, take your shirt off and lie down on the table, NOW!’ The man took off his jacket and shirt and walked towards the table as the Filthy doctor started the electric saw. It whined like a high pitched dentist drill as he was strapped to the table face down. As the saw cut into his flesh he saw his wife’s wedding ring in the filthy blood soaked gutter on the floor. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
He walked across the desert towards the ruined oil fields. He could just make out the derricks, like giant birds poised to peck at the land, but frozen, to peck no more. He wondered if he’d make it to the bunker before the sun came fully up, already it was starting to edge over the horizon behind him and although it was only 6 in the morning he could feel the slight burning sensation on the back of his neck,, which was foolishly exposed. He’d used his neck cover to make a sail for Jordi’s boat, despite Herman’s protestations – you’ll die without that if you get stuck in the sun, you now that, or at the very least you’ll get severe burns. When will you ever let this sink in Kern? He didn’t want to let it sink in that was the truth. He wanted to pretend he was still a kid and could run naked in the sun and although he’d get told off by his Mum and she’d smother him with sun block and make him wear a hat and tell him to over up, it was all fun and he didn’t risk dying, at least not quickly, not like today, if he didn’t get to the bunker in the next hour he would be dead, simple. The sun would burn through his skin, particularly round the neck area, and they had no medical facilities apart from some old antibiotics which was probably more harm than good now, and a few bandages. Nothing to deal with such high levels of burning. He knew all this but he still left it too late, well hopefully not but he feared it would be. He was stuck now in the middle of an area with no shade no shelter and nowhere to go but forward, at least 3 miles to the bunker in the already considerable heat on his weakened legs. They all had weakened legs with the crappy diet they were on, very little protein, mainly tinned vegetables and dry pasta that they occasionally risked using up some fuel to cook. They were weak and withering and although 5 years ago he would have been able to cover the distance in half an hour if he really wanted o, he could run for ages then – now he’d barely be able to make it. He tried to jog but he couldn’t sustain it, it made him feel exhausted so he just kept walking as fast as he could, stumbling often and swearing as he went. The heat was already unbearable now. It baled the road and he could feel it reflecting back at him as he walked. He kept his hand over the exposed neck as much as possible, the hand that was covered in thick leather gloves, hideously warm but unlikely to burn at this time of the morning, The rest of his gear was similarly inappropriate seeming for such hot weather. A thick shirt covered with a tick jacket and trousers with big tough leather boots,. The bots, unfortunately didn’t fit, they were the found by one of the seekers and he needed some boots, all right most of the time but now, when he had to walk fast they started t rub on hi mangy feet and he was worried that he wouldn’t be able to walk tomorrow if he was alive. He remembered, all of a sudden, Angie. The way she’d looked at him that time when he said NO, he wasn’t going to g to Europe, this was a bullshit paranoid scaremongering bit of nonsense, there was no danger and he wanted to stay here where he lived, in beautiful green and verdant New England. Sadly, it looked a lot more like Arizona now, without the beautiful mountain, just desert and dust and cracked muddy roads, virtually no plant life except after the rain, which last fell 6 months ago. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| He had to run everywhere, he felt as if he did anyway. His world had become incredibly fast moving and hectic. In previous weeks he’d struggled sometimes to find something to do and felt like a bit of a spare part. He ignored the many jealous sounding words of advice like – make the most of it mate, think yourself lucky, it won’t last. He thought they were wrong and that he didn’t think himself lucky at all, he thought of himself as someone with nothing to do and someone who stood out as being the only one with nothing to do in an office where everyone else seemed to be incredibly busy all the time. He didn’t make the most of it as he wanted to look busy and making the most of it would have involved putting his feet up and reading a book, watching some porn at his desk and jerking off, bringing a couple of bottles of wine and some nice food in and eating it at his leisure while the others sweated and moaned, or maybe brining in the dvd player and whiling away his time catching up on all those obscure foreign films he’d kind of wanted o see but never had the time, or maybe even just watching old series of his favourites like Friends or Sopranos or The Wire or even something trivial and inane like America’s Next Top Model. So he didn’t do that, he didn’t enjoy the apparent worthlessness of being the new boy and he wanted his work to become a lot more busy. Now he regretted it all. He saw them smirking as the papers piled up on his desk and he swore at the phone and at his computer screen throughout the day in common with all the others. He dreamed of those lazy days when he was preparing for the daily presentation that he was now expected to make to the most demanding group of arseholes he’d ever had the misfortune to work for. Each meeting producing a massive pile of work, redoing what he’d already done – although he’d apparently done it wrong, hopelessly wrong it seemed if he were to use the tone and level of aggression directed at him from all who attended these meetings as an indicator of his perceived competence. So he was in the thick of it right now. He’d started to come in to work early, 8 this morning so he didn’t have to stay too late. Each morning though as he sat in on his daily abuse meeting he started to realise with each extra task or reworking that they threw at him, that he would still be going home late. Today he had expected to finish around 7, but 5 minutes ago, that sharp-suited cocksucker from Marketing who appeared to have a lot more power than his absurdly complex title suggested, had given him a dressing down about the publicity for the new launch on Monday, saying that it was the most useless piece of work he’d ever seen and he expected it to be on his desk in a new and completely reworked and apparently obviously different style – which he’d never ever mentioned before, by 7 tomorrow morning; which meant that he’d either be there until very late tonight or have to get up very early tomorrow or possibly, probably, both. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| A few weeks ago the idea of talking cats and dogs would have been, obviously, absurd. Now he was almost growing accustomed to it. Well maybe that was an exaggeration. He did still jump first thing in the morning when Grenville, his ginger cat greeted him with a deep ‘Morning’ and followed it up with a demand for breakfast. ‘Pleeeeeeeease’ he always added in that strange almost purr-like voice of his. What was interesting was that he was nothing like he imagined he would be. Not that he imagined he could talk, ever, but as with most per owners, he tended to project human traits onto him. When Janine was round he’d often say. Look he’s trying to impress you, he always shows ff when you come round. Or , making comments about him being shy and imagining him to be a quite anxious and timid sort of a cattish personality. Actually, he was a bit of a cocky sod. He seemed to think he was the most attractive and intelligent cat in the world, certainly in the neighbourhood. I’m sick of all these plebs, he’d often say coming through the cat flap after a long time outside. You just can’t talk to them. All they want to do is drink milk, shag and talk about free food. I mean the shagging’s pretty good, like a bit of rough from time to time, but honestly, it would be nice to have a decent conversation once in a while. Apparently, he had very little male competition nearby – they were all a bit in-bred, he reckoned, apart from that big old black cat at number 44, but he was past it now, poor old sod, bit of a looker still though. Lucky for me, he said, that he’s not in his prime or we’d have to engage in all that tedious battling over the territory nonsense. So there was that to get used to and he hadn’t really got close to it yet, just about coming round to the idea that he wasn’t psychotic, but still not a hundred percent clear on that yet. What made it difficult was that he never spoke in front of anyone else, had to keep a low profile apparently, can’t have to many humans knowing, after all if they knew, I‘m not so sure we’d be able to get them to keep on with the free board and lodgings with all meals included, situation. He tried to persuade him just to let her know, but he wouldn’t do it. The thing that broke the cycle was that she came round last week with her dog, Rufus. Great big dumb old Labrador, or so they imagined. It turned out though he was a bit of an academic, equivalent to a professor he said. They’d found out about it by accident. He and Grenville were close friends, had been for all the time since Janine had been bringing him round. They made a big show of not liking each other of course, keeping up appearances. Rufus would chase Grenville out into the garden where they could then go round the back of the shed so no one could se them, and have a good old chat. Turned out they had a lot in common. One time though, they didn’t know that he was in the shed, writing, he was trying out a new location. Janine had let herself in and she let Rufus chase Grenville as usual. Next thing he heard was them talking about university, comparing notes. He ran in to tell Janine and she said, oh thank God you know, I couldn’t bring it up with you I thought you’d think I was mad, the little bugger didn’t tell me about Grenville though. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| ‘Do you remember that Old Man on the news, crying and asking if anyone had seen his wife,’ said Fergus. ‘Jesus, don’t,’ said Gus. ‘I’m just saying, you know, how daft that seems now.’ ‘What do you mean?’ said Harriet waking up and poking her head out of the tent. ‘So much of it, the news, the TV, the idea that there was a chance that he would find her.’ ‘He might of!’ said Gus. ‘I mean now,’ said Fergus. ‘All those things now, what, less than a year later, seem absurd. Obviously we don’t have news, or TV and we’ve all lost so many people now its pointless trying to find them. There’s so few of us that we know, don’t we?’ ‘Jesus, good morning to you too you depressing little shit,’ said Harriet. ‘Sorry Harry, it just hits me sometimes, you know, how much things have changed.’ ‘Well, yeah. But if you don’t get that fire started soon something else is gonna “just hit you”, said Harriet. Gus laughed. Fergus held up a hand and wandered to the woods to collect more firewood. ‘He’ll be the first of us to crack up you know,’ said Gus. ‘Christ Harry, don’t you say that,’ said Gus. ‘I’ve seen it before, its just the scale of things. It’s a bit like as a kid when your Dad starts to tell you about the universe being infinite, its too much to take in.’ Fergus appeared again with a sack over his shoulder full of wood. ‘What’s too much?’ he said. Harry just waved his question away. ‘Just get the fire going. How much water is left Gus?’ she said. ‘Not much, but enough for a cup each.’ ‘Shall we use a tea bag? said Harry.’ ‘D’you think?’ said Fergus. ‘How many are left?’ ‘About ten,’ said Gus. ‘Sod it,’ said Harry. ‘I think we could do with a good old English cup of tea.’ ‘Instead of making 3 weak cups, I vote we just make one decent strong proper cup of tea and share it,’ said Fergus. They agreed. Ten minutes later they had it in front of them. ‘Who’s first then?’ said Fergus. ‘You, said Harry,’ Gus nodded. ‘Me? I don’t know, you sure?’ They both nodded at him. ‘You got the wood,’ said Harry. ‘Oh my God, thanks guys. Ok, here goes.’ ‘One mouthful, then pass it on,’ said Gus. He nodded then slowly raised the cup to his lips. He took a big slurping hot mouthful. ‘Oh my God, oh my god!’ he said passing it to Gus. ‘That is just amazing.’ There was enough for two mouthfuls each. When they’d finished, they sat around the fire quietly. In the distance there was gunfire again but no one moved. On the horizon, if they’d looked over they would have seen smoke from the remains of the town they’d passed through 2 days ago. They had to keep moving but they couldn’t bring themselves to stop what they were doing, thinking bout the past, wondering about people. Tears were rolling silently down all their cheeks. Harry was the first to stand up and go into the tent where she started to pack. The others soon followed; they’d seen the smoke now and knew they had very little time. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
Flowing through her she felt it reach her toes in seconds. Then, as if it had turned against her she felt the burn. She knew it was going to happen; so many people had talked about it over and over and over again. The fact that they seemed so obsessed with it, even the hideous parts, had been one the reasons she’d decided to try it. Obviously, more attractive was the apparently most intense orgasmic highs that repeated over and over, took you away, completely and utterly to a different world and more than that, lasted for weeks, actually weeks too not just distorted perceptions. It took somewhere between 5 and 6 weeks for the average user to come down. Sometimes, the first time, it had been known to last up to 2 and a half months. She knew the pain would last for an hour at the most and as she felt the heightening sense of heat spreading through her body, she began to tense up. She stood in the middle of the floor trying to think of something else, anything to take her mind off it, but as predicted by every singly jazz-head she’d ever spoken to, nothing worked. Absolutely nothing worked, you just had to accept it, you were going to be tortured for the next hour and it was unbearable, and yet you did bear it, you would come out of it, you would survive even though, she could honestly say right now as the ends of her fingers and toes felt as if a red hot needle was being shoved under the nail of each one and wiggled about and a cruel sadist pushed a blunt instrument into each of her eyes whilst another squeezed her clitoris as hard as humanly possible with a large rusty pair of pliers, she could honestly say, that all she wanted was for her life to snuff out, to cease to exist to never be, wipe out all memories, any pleasure she’d ever had, her beautiful son, her wonderful friends who were always there for her, she wanted to be able to offer these torturers, who unfortunately didn’t exist to be bartered with, all of these golden moments from her life, they could have them all. Even, if they had to, she’d let them torture her loved ones, she wanted them to have this pain, no question, any sense of guilt completely absent, no room for it at all, only room for trying to find a way out of this much much worse than death experience. She was aware that she was screaming but couldn’t hear herself she thrashed a out on the floor, banged her head against the floor, pulled at her hair, ran around the room over and over, but it made not the slightest impression on her. She felt nothing but the pain everywhere, her buttocks felt as if the skin had been sanded off and someone was rubbing them with lemon, her breasts felt as if someone was slicing them off bit by bit starting with the nipples, but they only had a small not very sharp penknife so had to keep sawing at them and tugging at the skin which was a bit tough. ON the left side she felt the tear as it was pulled viciously as the impatience of her torturer finally took over and the penknife was discarded. As suddenly as it started it stopped and she opened her eyes to find herself in a corer behind the sofa, The bright red of the wall covering too much for her eyes. She couldn’t feel any more pain and it was the most amazing feeling she’d ever had n her life. This was the happiest she’d ever ever been. She realised she’d soiled herself but she didn’t care, nothing would bother her again. She knew now that her life was destined to be wonderful for ever more. Everything that happened in her life from now on would be a wonderful joyous happening compared to the last hour. Rolling around in her own filth was like a luxury cruise. The concept of a high that surpassed all this and lasted for several weeks seemed utterly absurd and yet as she thought this she could feel her eyes widening, her stomach churning pleasantly and a tingle shoot up the back of her neck. She leapt up and screamed in ecstasy, laughing and crying and tearing at her clothes as the rush rolled over her and took her completely. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
He’d achieved one of his two life long ambitions, to become a dog-trainer. Having said that, if the second tuned out like the first, maybe he wouldn’t pursue it after all. He’d been a dog-trainer for 3 and a half years now. When he took that business plan to the bank manager, and later heard he’d been approved for the loan, £500000 – a lot of money but it was needed he was ecstatic. He had a lot of things to lay out for up front. There was the land, that was crucial, he needed somewhere he could have a lot of space for the dogs to run around. He wanted somewhere for guests to stay so they could come for a week long residential course, that was the ideal, but so far he hadn’t go round to building extra accommodation. He was lucky to get the land cheap from his uncle. What he didn’t know, and only found out when the old bugger died, was that it wasn’t all his. Some of it, that he’d assured Geraint had been all his, the three lower fields and the woods, ideal for the dogs, actually turned out to be leased from the big Farm cross the road. Henry Thraithwaite the 3rd, he found out. Something of an arsehole, so he discovered. The lease was due for renewal a year after he bought it and 2 months after his thieving uncle had died. He needed to pay, in advance, 3 years lease to use the land, with certain restrictions or add on costs depending what he had planned. Dog training, naturally enough, appeared to come under the heading of add-ons. In all he’d needed to pay £200,000 for the three years to use it as he pleased. Although he’d gott he land cheap, only £120,000, it now didn’t seem so cheap. It only left him with £180000 to build his home and the kennels for the dogs and buy the various training equipment he needed. So the whole accommodation for guest idea had been shelved and looked like being shelved for as long as he could see. All in all the whole plan hadn’t been as successful as he hoped and although he’d had regular customers since opening, the repayments on the business loan used up most f his income. Now he had started to fall behind and had racked up considerable debts on his credit cards. So, when he reflected on going for his second lifelong dream, living by the beach, or at least retiring by the beach, he wasn’t all that keen and certainly not all that confident. That afternoon he had another meeting with the bank to try and reschedule some of the finance in the light of al the new information that had come to light about the lease and the additional costs. He had some hopes, based solely on the tone of voice that the Manager had on the phone when he’d set the meeting up. He also planned to meet up with Henry Thraiwthwaite the 3rd to try and persuade him to be a bit more generous and alter the terms or cost of the lease and also to explore the possibility of buying the land outright. This he had to do before he met the bank manager so that he had all the facts with him. They seemed to be very keen on that and saw a lack of facts and information as proof that the plan was flawed and quite possibly fraudulent. That evening he planed to visit the Big Farm and he was armed with a secret weapon, one of his Aunt’s special pie’s, this one was a cherry pie, her absolute best as far as he was concerned. This aunt had no connection with the evil uncle, who came from a whole other side of the family – his father’s side. This side, his mother’s, had a reputation, well deserved, of being excellent cooks for many generations. According to his Mother, who had skipped this particular family skill, his aunt’s pies had been used to mediate and resolve in many a fight and argument. She had no doubt that it would win this stupid farmer over to his side. So he had high hopes as he trudged across the fields towards the manor house. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
It sounded as if she was saying his name, but his Mum’s voice had a strange buzz or a clicking sound that went with it, as if she’d somehow swallowed a cricket or got something dry and crsipy caught in her throat. He called out to her ‘Mum, is that you?’ ‘Yessz!’ ‘What’s wrong with your voice?’ She didn’t reply so he headed down the stairs. He found her, or what sounded like her, in the kitchen perched on the counter with her head in the sugar bowl. ‘Jesus Christ!’ Cricket mum leapt in the air at this, taken by surprise. She landed on the table ribbing her back legs together creating an incredible loud chirruping cricket-like sound, only much louder than usual. The windows vibrated and he had to put his hands over his ears. ‘Mum! Or whatever the hell you are.’ ‘Oh SZorry deeaar.’ ‘What the hell has happened to you?’ She explained. Not surprisingly it was to do with Dad. He was obsessed with inventing things even though he’d had little or no success with it. He was always watching things like the fly and Honey I shrunk the kids. The latter being his absolute favourite. ‘He was a genius, a misunderstood genius,’ he often repeated. According to cricket-mum he’d invented something similar to the contraption in the fly to transport things from one place to another, apparently it worked really well and he’d managed to get it working over really long distances He’d used inanimate objects at first, then small animals, flies obviously and then a snail, and that annoying dog from next door that kept breaking into the garden. They were all fine. Eventually he’d showed his wife and after a lot of demonstrations and pleading he’d got her to operate it with him inside. Short distances first, from the garage to the shed at the bottom of the garden, but after a while he got more ambitious. He took it – it being the transporter booth – down to the shops, left it behind Sainsbury’s in the car park, drove back, got in and Mum sent him off there, then quickly drove over to collect him. Soon he got round this problem by making a remote control. SO he didn’t need his wife anymore, he could it on his own and send himself back too. He had a couple of problems when a few teenagers broke into it and another time it fell over in the wind. He soon repaired it though. He decided to make it so it could fit in the back of their old transit and with a few adaptations to the height of the van he managed to do it fairly easily. Now he could drive it off somewhere, get out of the van and into the back, zap himself home and then whenever he wanted he get back to this place he left the van. For the last few weeks he parked it at work, 50 odd miles away in town. He went on, according to cricket–mum about how he’d reduced his commuting time to 1 second. He’d timed it apparently, that’s how long it took whatever the distance. Last week apparently, he’d driven up North to just outside of Glasgow in the middle of a field and zapped himself back home, in one second, it was fantastic love, so his mum buzzingly told him. It was when he persuaded her to have a go that things went wrong. He sent her back to Glasgow with her phone and told her to ring him when she got there and ring him when she was about to get in and was ready to go back. He forgot to tell her about precautions, she’d never watched the Fly, didn’t realise the obvious complications of letting something else get in there, left the door open and the van doors while she had a little stroll around, cricket hopped in and hey presto cricket-mum. They had been looking for a tiny human body with a human-cricket voice for the last few hours but so far no luck. Please be careful where you tread when you go out in the garden wont you. Dad’s in the garage now rigging up some high powered headphones. Reckons it’ll l mean he can hear the smallest sound amplified, He thinks it’ll be speaking or squeaking or something and maybe he’ll find it that way, silly old sod, said his mum hopping down from the table back to the sugar bowl. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| How could she possibly carry on like this? If she wasn’t suffering from a hangover and subsequent guilt shame and depression and horror at the thought of what she’d done who she’d insulted, how she’d behaved, what she’d not done that she had to do or promised she’d do, then she was feeling like this. Frightened, deadly as if there was absolutely nothing what so-fucking-ever to look forward to any more and realising why she continued to overindulge as the seemingly only way to bear existence in this miserable fucked up what the fuck is this all about world. It seemed hopeless and every time she resolved to stop and felt it was a real and positive and definite commitment, she felt a little glimmer of hope and possibility that her new life would be on the way now. A life where hope was possible and confidence and simple pleasure and not needing to sleep with random fuckwits you met on the night bus, or drink at lunch time with that idiot from accounting just because he was the only one stupid enough to come with you and not question you because, lets face it, he didn’t ever ever get asked to go to the pub by any girls at all, had never had a shag and would do anything for you if you just gave him the barest hint of a promise of a peek or a fondle or a kiss or a later vision of your naked body. SO he would do anything to impress including covering up for you and telling an elaborate tale to your boss, that you’d been taken to the police station as a witness to a horrific stabbing that took place in the cafe where you had lunch and you were traumatised and probably wouldn’t be ale to come back to work for a couple of days. You could have a different type of life that involved doing things that made you feel better about yourself, writing some more poems maybe or cooking a really special meal for your mates and not getting so pissed while you did it that you burnt everything and had to ring them all up and ask them if they minded bringing round takeaway and sobbing for hours on end on Lucy’s shoulder when most of them didn’t even come in the end apart from Dave who tried to put his hand up your skirt before anyone else arrived and you didn’t tell him not to even though you found him creepy, you were just too pissed to be bothered and it was only Lucy and Frank arriving that stopped you giving him a blow job. Or you could finally think about going back to college and studying something you liked and just enjoy it because you were old enough now to like learning just for the sake of it and it wouldn’t matter if you didn’t get a job out of it. Or maybe just getting fit or being able to save up some money to go on a decent holiday; a holiday that didn’t just involve week-long drinking, vomiting and recovering and smothering yourself in after sun cream even though you’d been burnt so badly the hotel doctor said nothing could help apart from time and you should avoid going out in the sun for the rest of your holiday; advice which you obviously ignored. It would be nice to spend some more time with your non pisshead friends who cared about you but had stopped ringing after so many times being put off and having arrangements cancelled because when it came round to it the idea of spending time just talking and not getting pissed, just sitting in one of their nice houses, in the garden sipping tea and eating lovely homemade food - it made you feel sick with fear and wanting to down a bottle of vodka before you went there or just never have to see or speak to the boring wankers ever again. It would be nice, but it wasn’t ever like that, it was always fucked up and horrible and squirm inducingly painful and boring and mind numbing and after a while the old wine that you refused to bother with that your aunt had sent last Christmas started to look tempting to you and the hideous cycle started all over again. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
Filled with a nauseating sense of dread, hopelessness and despair, Phil realised that it was Monday morning again. It was remarkable really how he was still able to remain so detached from reality at the ripe old age of 52 that he continued to behave, from Friday evening, right through to Sunday evening, as if life was a space where there no consequences and that none of what he’d learned so far , such as the fact that if he drank vast amounts of alcohol three days in a row and woke up at 5.30 on Monday morning with a horrible hangover and the realisation that he had again exceeded his spending limits and failed to organise his home, eat healthy food, or do any of the things that he knew (if he allowed himself to remember) that made him feel better, none of this had any relevance to his life. An observer would imagine the ‘Phil’ model to be a basically simple impulse driven life form with little or no memory. It wandered around ding things that it liked at the time, usually things that involved altered states of mind or consciousness and a subsequent violent or at the very least uncomfortable feeling the next day. It would also be observed that the pattern of the creatures life seemed to revolve around doing something that it needed to do 5 days a week to give it the means to do what it wanted to do 2 days a week, which was mainly about trying to forget who it was, or pretend it was someone else, someone who was immune to the poisons of the substances it took, needed to pay no heed to dietary or lifestyle advice that was extremely well researched and easily available in the surrounding world. It was also seemingly incapable of learning very much, other than which things made it forget or feel all lovely or feel like something or someone else, it seemed to remember that very well but its obviously limited brain couldn’t retain any information about why it was so attracted to mind altering or subduing behaviour, why it felt so shitty every Monday morning and why its bank balance was so frightening that it added several notches of terror onto the already well notched Monday morning bedpost of terror. All in all Phil was a fuck head. He’d had times in his life when he was less of a fuckhead, in his 30’s for a couple of years he stopped poisoning himself all together and managed to save enough money to go on a round the world trip without incurring any extra debts. He returned from that feeling refreshed and insisting that he would remember what it was that made him happy and that it was not the usual things that he used to do which were all about external overindulgence, but things that he didn’t really believe would make him happy, such as looking after himself in a number of ways, food, exercise, finances leisure time etc etc. He insisted he would remember and stick to this new way of being but, actually, it was almost as if he had been an unercover agent and he’d lied to everyone around him, including to himself, for that whole period of time, pretending to enjoy it pretending to like feeling alive and vibrant and healthy and not having to worry about money, He lied very very convincingly but as soon as he had the chance, which was weeks after he returned and he’d started back at his old company and reacquainted himself with all his old friends, he returned to the behaviour and lifestyle he really liked and loved and threw away all the ‘lessons’ he’d learned on his undercover healthy brother mission. Thank fuck for that he thought, no more having to give a shit about myself. From now on I can treat myself as I believe other people believe I should be treated – i.e. – like a piece of worthless shit who’s life is unimportant and it doesn’t matter what he’s doing to himself because, frankly it will be no loss if the fucker ends up killing himself and leaves this world as soon as possible, which he’s clearly devoted to doing, as the world will be a far far better place without the cunt. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
When Bradley woke up he was tied and in a dark space. It must have been a cupboard, he could just make out a slight chink of light under the door. Outside he heard voices, the same hideous cackling croaky voices that he’d heard from Mrs Lipscombe and the people he thought were his family. He worried about his real family, what had they done to them – or maybe they were his real family, all along, they’d been witches and he hadn’t realised. Surely not, after 12 years, he would have known. He decided they must have been replaced recently, probably when that old hag moved in next door. He would have to try and rescue them. He knew that Zoltan was still alive, and was confident that they didn’t know about him. The question was, how would be able to release him from the snow globe? He cold try just smashing it, but that might kill him or he might come out as he was now, miniaturised. Somehow he needed to get back to his bedroom to find the magic book. If he could do that he could recruit some more of his toys into helping him. He needed someone like Merlin; he would know what to do with witches. Only thing was he had no idea where Merlin was. He used to play with him all the time a couple of years ago but since Zoltan, he’d neglected him. He wouldn’t mind he was still just a toy but it meant that Bradley had no clue where to find him. Mum always put old stuff either under the stairs, in the loft, in the garage or in the bin. He had several problems; how to get out of the cupboard without the witches finding out, how to get into the house without a key and then finding the book and Merlin and maybe one other recruit. He needed a new Team. He tried not to think about Timmy and Tantor, it would only make him cry and he needed to be brave now. Running his hands round the door frame he worked out it was a small door like the cupboard under the stairs in his own house. He had been locked in there many times by Tabitha and knew, if he had his penknife he could easily open the catch. He didn’t have it of course. He fumbled around in the dark trying to find something he could use. Eventually he found a plastic shoe horn and tried to open the catch with that but it wouldn’t work. After a bit more fiddling he found what felt like a tea spoon and set to work n the catch again. He almost had several times but it slipped at the last minute making a scraping noise down the door and h had to sit silently for a few minutes afterwards terrified that they’d heard and would come to check on him. After a while he heard nothing and decided to have another go. This time he did it. It sprang open and he had t leap forward t grab it and stop it smashing back against the side and alerting them. Again he waited, listening and after a few more minutes hearing nothing he crept out. He tried the front door first, but it was locked. The he tried the back door but that was locked too, they were taking no chances. He decided to try upstairs. He knew from experience that he could get out of the small bedroom window and climb down the porch roof and then hang and jump. He’d done it from his own room many times. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| Eating was my main role and goal in life. It was the first thing I thought about when I woke up, it was the thing that I dreamt of more than anything else. When I felt sad I thought about what I could eat, then and later on. When I was happy I wanted to eat as a celebration. If one of my friends came round and was upset. I wanted to cook them a meal – to share obviously. This had been the case for as long as I could remember. I remember my Mum starting me on solid foods and how pleased she was when I ate my first jar. ‘So quickly, my boy, so quickly. Look Isaac, he’s eaten it all!’ I felt so proud and spent the rest of her life (sadly only 8 more years from that first solid foods day) trying to hear that pride and pleasure in her voice again. She liked to show me off to the neighbours. I remember when I was only 5 how she demonstrated my strong cheese eating skills to the Zimmermans. No, don’t worry Irene, he loves the cheese, all cheese. Bring out the strongest one, yes mouldy as you like. See, I told you – as I sat proudly in front of the cleared plate, cheese smeared around my face but no a drop left on the plate. He likes to eat steak too, she proudly claimed at the Finkenbaums Barmitva. He simply adores it, rare as you like. Last week we went to a sushi bar for crying in a bucket and my boy ate more than his Father – not that he eats much though she said holding out an arm in my Fathers direction and frowning. My Father you see was the exact opposite. He ate little; he was obviously skinny, in the same league as my Mother was fat. She needed a special chair to support her weight and we had to have the doorways of the house widened so she could fit through without touching the sides. He cold slip through the bars of a prison or if you’re not careful Isaac, my Mother often shouted to him as he left the table after consuming only the smallest of meals – you’ll fall through that crack in the floorboards. Sadly these grim predictions of skinniness-induced-death came true. My Father died when I was just 10, when he was sucked in to the path of a car by a passing lorry. The lorry was going quite fast but most people, most small children even, wouldn’t have been sucked in at all. It was just that he weighed so little, the policeman told me and my mother, he weighed so little and the suction dragged him in front of the car. It couldn’t stop, your Father’s body was snapped in two. He wouldn’t have felt very much though, after the snapping, it would have been fairly quick. He wasn’t proud of my eating. But he was OK with it. Whenever my mother turned to him and loudly proclaimed about some new freakish food based achievement, he nodded, looked at me, raised his eyebrows, and then went back to his crossword. He loved the crossword. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Steve Wybourn ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
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