The Clockwork Ballerina

She jumps regularly.  There are many who have seen her, the clockwork ballerina.  She walks through the halls of this old castle, up to the ramparts, and pauses for a while, contemplating the view.  Then she climbs up, with an expression of terrible peace, and lets herself fall.  She fades in mid-air.

She has never been caught on camera, but anyone who wishes can see her.  It’s not timed by the calendar or the clock.  It’s not at the same time of day, or the same time of year, not every month, but most of them.  Every so often, she will begin her journey again, as if for the first time.  Sometimes, sun shines through her, or rain, or snow.

Many have seen her jump.  Only I have seen her dance, as far as I know.

The castle came into my family via an uncle, or a distant cousin or some such, long ago.  It had fallen into disrepair then.  My family had kept it, but it wasn’t one of the properties we used.  Who would want to live here, knowing that she will walk frequently, and jump over and over again? 

Well, me.  I didn’t know.  I didn’t believe.  There are no pictures, no recordings, she cannot be caught on film.  There is only word of mouth, and, forgive me, I thought they were crazy, or stupid, or gullible.

I wasn’t scared of her, the first time.  It was August.  I was out in the grounds, near the lake, and I saw her from a distance.  I was surprised, of course, but not frightened.  It’s hard to be frightened in August, in the sunshine.

When it came to return to the castle, to the few rooms which are still habitable, I began to feel nervous.  I barely slept that first night.  I know her journey is always the same, and that she doesn’t enter my room  - as far as anyone has ever witnessed, a thought which was not comforting – and that thought eventually allowed me to sleep.

I didn’t see her for three months after that, though I looked.  I read up on her.  There were books here, in the few habitable rooms, including histories and diaries.  Veronica, I learned, though no one knew much else.  The diaries and letters reporting her went back dozens over years, perhaps a hundred.  Perhaps the story had been hushed up by an uncle or a cousin, someone far removed.  None of my close family knew; like me, they’d dismissed her as village gossip, the imagination of those who never stray beyond their own back garden.

It was November when I next saw her.  The snow had begun to fall.  I was on the ramparts, a blanket wrapped around me, watching the sunset.  I turned to see her, walking behind me, her gaze fixed on her part of the wall, on the sky beyond it.  Goosebumps came up on my neck.  I followed her, terrified that she would turn around, a ghostly Orpheus to my Eurydice.

She never did.

She stood contemplating the sky for so long that I was able to grip my courage and move in front of her, to gaze upon her face.  It was calm.  She smiled.

She turned and climbed up, in quick neat movements.  She looked up at the sky as she let herself fall.  I darted forward to catch her, forgetting, for a moment, how late I was.  How late she was.  I could see the trees and the lake through her, as she fell, as she faded.

I had been sent to the castle to convalesce, to return only when I would no longer embarrass the family with my hysterics, my upset, my inability to cope.   Mother paid someone to bring food from the village once a week, and all bills were taken care of.  I had no worries, or cares, beyond those I created, which were quite enough to keep me occupied.  I had my piano, my music, and time to devote to it.  It seemed to help.  I hadn’t sought out a blade, though I wouldn’t have found one if I had.  No food arrived which required anything sharper than a butter knife, and I travelled down to the village every so often to be shaved by the barber.  Mother cared, in her own way.  Father liked to pretend I had succeeded.

I started writing music for her.  I tried to capture her peace, her ethereality, her ungraspability, both in concept and reality.  She could never be touched.  I would never solve her mystery.

When June came around again, I had seen her on three more occasions.  I had seen her fall from five different viewpoints now, and was still no closer to understanding why she looked so peaceful, so sure, when she was doing something so terrible.  My death would not have been a tragedy; hers must have been.

I had moved the piano to one of the rooms which was no longer habitable, one in which a wall was missing, opening it to the elements.  The wilderness had begun to encroach and daisies grew through the gaps in the floor.  I liked it, in summer, in the sunshine.

I was playing her song when I saw her.  She was not on her walk; this was a side of her I’d never seen.  Her hair was plaited instead of loose, her face open and bright.  I stopped playing and watched her in silence, a movie I’d never seen before.

She gripped something invisible at the wall – a barre?  - and began to perform movements I recognised from my sister’s childhood.  She was warming up.  When she stepped away from the barre, I regained my senses and began to play.

She was a wonderful dancer.  I had noticed her grace, her serenity, in her walk.  Now I saw those, and more besides.  I saw joy.

Watching her dance I knew I could never keep with her.  I was a hundred years behind and losing more ground every day.  I could never dance with her, speak to her, hold her.  I could only be her accompaniment.  It was enough.

She faded as the music reached a crescendo, though I kept playing through to the end.  I hoped she would return.

I kept the piano there as winter rolled around again.  I played for her at midnight, as the wind blew autumn leaves around my feet.  I played for her when my fingers began to numb with the cold, when my mother had long since grown tired of me and threatened to stop keeping me if I didn’t begin doing something, anything.  I didn’t know how to tell her that I was doing something.  I played her into spring, through rain, and sunshine, and snow.  The scars on my wrists stopped hurting.

I saw her jump again, several times.  From that room, I had a view of the ramparts, and of the lake.  Sometimes, I would look up, startled, to see her fading, her long dark hair streaming out above her.  Other times I would watch her as she stood, contemplating the sky.  On more than one occasion I ran towards her, despite knowing that I would be too late, that I would always be too late, that I had always been too late.

I recorded the music.  Veronica’s song.  I began to play the phonograph when she came in.  As she began to dance I stepped into the circle of her arms, following her movements.  I wasn’t quite right; I had watched her enough to be in time, to predict her movements, but still there were times when we were not in sync, when our arms passed through one another.  Her eyes were closed.  She felt of nothing.

There was once last time that I saw her, when summer came around again.  Now they dismiss her like they do all other ghost stories.  They believe that she is the product of fevered minds, of boredom, of some gossip that has had all the detail leached out, like a photograph left in the sun.

I was lying by the lake, as I had been when I first saw her.  I lay on my back, contemplating the sky.

When I looked up she was there, sitting beside me, looking up as I did.  She turned to smile at me; I smiled back, my heart pounding.  Had she sat here with someone else, a hundred years before?  Had that lead to her walk, to her leap?  What else could this be a recording of?

I saw that her eyes were brown.  I had never been close enough to know that before.

She said one word, before she disappeared from my life forever.  She said my name.  “Sebastian,” she said, and I realised she was seeing me, really seeing me, like no one has in a very long time.  Not in the years I’ve spent living here with her, and not in the years before either.  Perhaps that’s what I did for her.

She smiled again and added “goodbye….”

I reached for her like a drowning man and grasped only common air.

Let Me Defy Gravity

The snow glows white on the mountain tonight
Not a footprint to be seen
A kingdom of isolation,
And it looks like I'm the queen.
Too late for second-guessing
Too late to go back to sleep
It's time to trust my instincts
Close my eyes and leap!

Let it go, let it go,
can't hold it back any more
It's time to try
Defying gravity
I'll let it go, I'm defying gravity
and you won't bring me down

I'm through accepting limits
'cause someone says they're so
Some things I cannot change
But till I try, I'll never know!
It's time to see what I can do
To test the limits and break through
No right, no wrong, no rules for me I'm free!

Let it go, let it go
I am one with the wind and sky
I think I'll try
Defying gravity
Kiss me goodbye
I'm defying gravity
And you can't bring me down:

So if you care to find me
Look to the western sky!
As someone told me lately:
"Everyone deserves the chance to fly!"
And if I'm flying solo
You'll never see me cry
I'm never going back,
The past is in the past!

Let it go, let it go,
and I'll rise like the break of dawn
I'm flying high
Defying gravity
Here I stand
In the light of day
And nobody...
Is ever gonna bring me down!

...the cold never bothered me anyway.

Breathe In/Out

So this was it.  I was finally desperate enough to respond to the advert, the to-good-to-be-true advert.  I knew what the catch was, I wasn’t stupid.  I was just desperate.

My heart was hammering as I picked up the phone.

Don’t do it I kept thinking, there must be another way.

But there wasn’t another way.  I’d spend weeks going over and over my meagre income and my substantial debts, and there was no way the two would ever work out.  Not unless I sold my body, the most lucrative thing I owned.

Someone picked up.  I was so distracted I barely heard her greeting.  Somehow, I pulled myself together when it was my turn to speak.

“I’m calling regarding your advert,” I said, only a slight hesitation in my voice. 

The advert was circled in the newspaper I clutched to myself.  Breathe in/out, it said.  £500/£250 per breath.  Easy money.

I got the job, not that there was ever any question about it.  The interview would have been less of a joke if they’d just held a mirror up to my face and waited to see if it fogged up or not. 

There were ten of us starting together that day.  Most of us seemed to be about the same age, my age, mid-twenties.  A few were older.  One girl looked to be about sixteen.  The road that lead her here was built from the tracks on her arms.

Half an hour of training.  The guy was manically cheerful, grinning his head off, telling us all how lucky we were to be here.  How fortunate we were to have this chance.  How we were going to make ‘a wad’. 

That afternoon we were lined up outside in our safety gear, waiting for our chance to hop on and join in.  I fidgeted as I waited, taking in the amazing sight.  The breeze – it was always blowy here – rustled my hair.

I’d heard of it, of course – who hadn’t?  Even seen pictures.  But to see it up close like this was something else entirely.  The sheer size of it; the way its body stretched over the horizon.  I’d have been awestruck if I wasn’t also paying attention to how shattered my new co-workers looked as they walked past us, heading home after a brutal shift.

Shifts were twelve hours long.  Twelve hours of hard, back-breaking work.  If you fell off, you didn’t get paid, not a penny for the entire shift.  Not even if it was the eleventh hour when you slipped.   Four shifts per week, twelve on, twelve off.

I came to the front of the line, watching the little teenager hop on ahead of me.  That was the official terminology, “hopping on”.  What she actually did was more like an undignified shuffle, climbing across people until she reached her space.

Then it was my turn.  I climbed up into the space recently vacated by another worked, the weak link in the chain.  I hooked my limbs around the people around me, holding myself in place.  Then I braced myself.  My core muscles were aching within the first ten minutes, but I had no choice but to hold on, now I’d committed myself.

Just think of the money, I thought to myself, trying desperately to distract myself.  The money.  £500 to breathe in.  £250 to breathe out.

I had plenty of time to think over those twelve hours.  What I thought about most was it.  The giant thing I was performing CPR on.

I wondered what the aliens had been playing at.  It was five years ago now, when they’d first arrived, dragging it behind their spaceships like one of those giant balloons you used to see at parades.  It’s as big as a mountain range.

The transcript of the conversation is available online.  I tried to remember it, line for line, as I braced myself there in a mesh of other people.

Our ruler is dying they had said, in their strange language, full of beeps and boops.

If you do not save our glorious leader they added we will raze your planet and revive benevolent with the blood of your species.

Then they had left, leaving their ruler behind them.  But not without first destroying Australia, just to prove they could.

And that brings you to me, and to all my co-workers hanging beside me.  They were right when they said their ruler was dying.  The world’s best doctors – within those first, frantic, 24 hours – realised that he needed CPR.  And that was exactly what we were doing.  Over and over.  Breathe in, breathe out.

Each of the giant alien’s breaths took 5-8 hours and you’re paid based on how many of those happen in each of your shifts.  A lucrative shift might get three – one right at the beginning, one halfway through, and one right at the end - while the next rota would only manage one.  It was a lottery. 

A few times, over the years, we’d tried building a machine to replicate the task we were performing by hand, but none of them had worked.  After the last disaster had culminated with the Glorious Ruler almost dying it had been decreed that the wages would be doubled.  It was hard, tiring, back-breaking work.  There was no respect and no joy.  But the money was good.

Every time the breaths slow down beyond one every ten years, every world leader is lit up by a red spotlight.  The same red spotlight which heralded the destruction of Australia.

Sometimes, they try a different approach.  Sometimes, when the breaths slow down, they light up a billion or so people instead of the world leaders.  One in every seven or eight.  It’s never been me, but once it was my mother.  It’s a lot scarier when the person destroyed might be you or your family than when it’s happening to a stranger halfway around the word.

So we breathe.  Or we die.  Sometimes, it’s hard to tell the difference.

The After Lives of Lydia Montmorency

I hate my body.

I really hate my body.

It's not in bad shape, I guess.  Comparatively speaking.  I'm thinner than I've been in years.  This new diet - hahaha - is the first one I've ever been able to stick to.  Funny that.  I've stopped bothering with make-up, though.  And fashion.  Any interest I had in fashion has long since fallen by the wayside.

"When's the last time you washed your hair?" I ask myself.  Rhetorical question.

I sigh, and float through a wall so I don't have to look at myself any more.  Stupid body.  Despite this part of me having long since evacuated that shell, I still feel attached.  We would resemble sisters, I suspect, if there were anyone who could see both of us.

I stuck my head back through the wall.  My body looks over at me.  Like a dog.

"Come on," I say to my own rotting carcass, with a sigh.  "Let's go get you some brains."

I Hold Your Hand

I hold your hand.

It's so warm.  Your veins stand out across the back, from all the exercise you've done.  There are calluses from gripping, climbing, pulling, clinging on to life and vibrancy in a way that so few do.  The nails are bitten.  Your fingertips have those sensitive teardrops on them, though you've numbed them through repeated exposure.  So do mine.

I'd give anything to hold your hand, but now that I finally am, I wish I couldn't.  It's hurting you.  I see your frustration, as you learn how to do simple little things, like eat, and type, and tie your shoelaces, without the use of your left hand.  I'd give it back to you if I could.  I'd give you anything if I could.  But letting go of your hand now won't give it back to you, and I've been starved of you for so long that I can't let go.

It was two years before we met that I...that I became cold.  It was an accident, a tragic accident.  You were never meant to be without me.  Your life wasn't supposed to be this hard.  We could have been great together.  We will be one day.

For now, because of that accident, I can hold your hand.  I know you know that, because when you feel my cold fingers on your warm phantom limb, you jump, sometimes, startled.  Then you smile, a hopeful smile, and I feel reassured.

One day, we'll start over together, in two new lives.  For now, I'll wait.  For now, I hold your hand.

Marvellous to Me, Second Draft - with Singing!

Imagine if Pietro and and Lorna 
Dane got together.
It would be like
"You can't hit me, I'm too fast and
Can you imagine standing behind the 
slow guy at the atm forever?
...and you remind me of my dad".

Or pretend Colossus and Kitty Pryde
Well, made it work together, or tried
It'd be like
"My strongest grip can't hold you
You're slipping right out of my hands
But still you get through
Every defence that I ever had, so maybe
Maybe we should just stay friends".

But I wish you knew
I wish you could see
You're marvellous to me
You always were
You always will be
Marvellous to me.

Gambit and Rogue tried to work it out
Though he
He couldn't touch her and if he tried,
Well she -
She would kill him like you're killing me.
So maybe -
Baring a miracle maybe
Maybe we should just stay fiction.

But you're
Marvellous to me
You were always were
You've always been
Marvellous to me.
I wish you knew
I wish you'd believe
You're marvellous to me.

You asked me to look you in the eye
but like 
cyclops without his visor
I can't do that
You don't want that
But still
You should believe

You're marvellous to me
You always were
You always will be
Marvellous to me
Even though I know
We will never work
You're still marvellous to me
To me
You'll always be
Marvellous to me.
You can hear me singing it here.

Marvellous to Me OR Pun Intended

Imagine if Pietro Maximoff
And Lorna Dane got together.
It'd be like
"You can't hit me, I'm too fast
Can you imagine standing behind the slow guy at the atm forever?
You remind me of my dad".

Or pretend Colossus and Kitty Pryde
Made it work together, or tried
It'd be like
"All my strength can't hold you
You slip through my tightest grip
You get through my defences like no one else
Maybe we're better apart".

And it's like
I'm sorry I ran
I'm sorry I couldn't catch you
I'm sorry I tried to keep you
But you're marvellous to me.

Gambit and Rogue tried to work it out
Though Remy couldn't touch her and she -
She'd kill him if he got too close
Like you're killing me.
So, baring a miracle, maybe -

Maybe we should just stay fiction.

And it's like
I'm sorry I wanted to touch you
When you kept warning me "no"
I'm sorry I couldn't leave you
When you warned me, and told me to go
Don't you know?
You're marvellous to me
You've always been
Marvellous to me.

This little fragment might fit in somewhere too;

you asked me to look you in the eye
but I'm like cyclops without his visor
you don't want that,
trust me

Original Draft of Nobody Died, After All

The sun still sets over land and sea.
The wind still blows, the rain still falls
You are no longer in love with me
But nobody died, after all.

The world remains, though I heave a sigh
You heart no longer answers to my call
I can no longer reach you, however I try
Still, nobody died after all.


When I am I and no longer we
When my heart no longer rises but merely falls
When you turn your back to me
A part of me dies after all.

Tragic Limerick

I wish you all the best
though you tore my heart from my chest
and ate it while it was still beating
Metaphorically speaking
And an empty shell's what's left

Nobody Died, After All

The sun still rises
The world still turns
you said you didn't love me any more
and it hurt like acid burns
but nobody died, after all.

I get through the day
Faking a smile
you tore my heart from my chest,
and ate it while it was still beating
Metaphorically speaking
but nobody died, after all.

The moon waxes and wanes
like your love for me
you took away my favourite drug
the world doesn't make sense any more
I think a part of me died, after all.

Summat Dead Weird

I dreamt this.  I literally dreamt it, then woke up and typed it out, just as it is below.

----

Summat dead weird's been 'appening round here recently. Tek this new school we been going to. It's reet posh like, proper gothic with towers an stuff. Posher than anywhere I ever thought I'd be going, any road up. And get this, reet. This dead famous director was standing reet by the gates t'other day. He'd just got out of his limo and was just standin' there, looking confused.

“Y'awreet mate?” I said to 'im, 'cause you would, wouldn't you?

“Excuse me, young man!” He said. Think he were a bit excited someone had spoke to him, you know. “Could you tell me where I am?”

“Yer at me school!” I shouted back over me shoulder. I was late y'see. “But god only knows what yowm doin' 'ere innit mate!”

The next day, I saw that dead famous actor roll up, in his limo. The director was there, and they hugged like brothers. Least, I think they were like brothers. My brother says only poofs hug, but I don't think they were. Our dad's a proper man, my brother says, and we ain't seem him hug anyone in his life.

There were summat wrong with that actor's leg. He were limpin' a bit.

The next day, t'were more people millin' about, lots of people with cameras and those mic-boom-things an' stuff, so I figure, reet, they must be makin' a movie. One of them looks properly ill; he's kneeling on the ground and droolin' and I wonder why none of 'em ain't got time to 'elp him.

Any road up, that dead classy actress strolls up to 'em, looking like something off the red carpet, all long dress and gloves, with her hair all pinned up dead fancy-like.

“Hello boys,” she said, in that accent she has. “Waiting for me?”

“I suppose we were,” the director said. I didn't hear anythin after that, 'cause I was nearly late again and had to leg it dead quick.

The other weird thing is what happens on the way home from school. Me and me brother, we always see the same people on the way home. Neighbours an that. None of them go into t'pub any more! They look at it, reet, with this dead snooty look on their face, like they're thinking “we ain't going in there no more, no way” reet, and then, as they walk past, they look back, dead longing like. I dunno why they don't just go in if they want t'.

These two old biddies, I know they'm 'omeless because me mam used to 'elp 'em out, I said, “Y'can've me fiver if you like, I saved it fer y', 'cause I war'n't 'ungry. Y'can 'ave it fer y' tea.”

And they said “thank you”, and then they said “no thank you”, and carried on. But they did that dead longin' glance at the pub and all.

Next day, I was walking along behind 'em again, and our other neighbour shouted across to 'em. “y'can come and 'ave a sandwich if you like, loves!”. She's dead kind, that neighbour. She makes 'em for the church, for all the other 'omeless, but she was letting these two have first pick.

They looked up at her, all surprised, like they didn't expect her to speak to the likes of them. She's not spoken t'me in a while, truth be told. Anyroad up, they said “no thank you duck", and kept walking. The neighbour looked all confused after they'd gone, and looked after the way they'd went for a while. She didn't look at me though. Not many people seem to look at me any more.

I'm always cold these days. I can't seem to turn the heating on. My brother can though, he can do all sorts. Says he don't need to though, an' he says he won't teach me. Says I'll figure it out for meself, one of these days.

'course, he's been dead a lot longer'n I have.

You Owe Me!

This story owes a lot of it's tone to Simon Rich's collection of short stories, The Last Girlfriend on Earth.  Take a look - it's really cheap on Kindle, and it's awesome.

----

The banker sat behind his desk, shuffling papers.  “It  looks like all this is in order.  How would you like to start making repayments?”

Caitlyn sat in shock.  The idea of being in debt was completely new to her; until today, she hadn’t realised she’d borrowed anything, not until this banker had got in touch and told her she had to start paying her loan back.

“What exactly am I supposed to have borrowed?” she asked.

“Well, let’s see,” he said, steepling his hands and looking up at the ceiling.  “There was my time for a start.  All those years I spent paying attention to you and running errands for you.  That could have been spent elsewhere.  All the time I spent thinking about you.  All the things I bought for you, all those birthday and Christmas gifts.”

“What?”

“You don’t even remember, do you?  Our first year of uni.  I spent the whole year spending my time on you, paying attention to you, and then, when I finally got up the courage to tell you how I felt, you said you only wanted to be friends!”

“...Thomas?”

“Yes, Caitlyn, of course it’s Thomas.  Or do you make a habit of taking up people’s time and attention?”

“I thought we were friends.”

“We were friends all right, but did you even consider going out with me?  Giving me a chance?  In fact, I’m going to add compensation for emotional distress onto this debt.  You can pay it off by giving me a chance.  Date me for a year – that same year I’ve already spent on you – and we’ll consider it even.”

“Are you insane?  I don’t owe you a relationship, Thomas.”

“You owe me time, attention, and money.  You took all those things from me, Caitlyn, and now I want them back.”

“I didn’t take them!  You gave them, of your own free will!  I can’t believe you’re acting like this, Thomas.  We were friends.  I wasn’t madly in love with you, no, but I didn't owe you that!  You can’t just demand that I give you a year of my life!”

He continued gazing at her over the desk in silence.  With disgust, she’d remembered how he’d do that at uni; go quiet and hope the awkward silence would net him the answer he wanted.

“What if I did give you a year of my life and I still didn’t want to be with you?” Caitlyn demanded.  Despite knowing the trick, the silence got to her.

“You’d have made me waste another year,” Thomas said, “so, obviously, you’d have to pay that back.  You can’t just play with people’s hearts like that Caitlyn.  I’m a nice guy, which is probably why nothing ever works out for me.  I did everything I could to make you happy, and you just wouldn’t even give me a chance.”

“Fuck you, you self-centred, entitled wanker.”

Caitlyn stormed out.  Left alone in the office, Thomas sighed.

“Nice guys always finish last,” he said, glumly.

The Edited Eugene Morris

My first version was written in a rush, as soon as I found the right voice.  This is the edited version.

Eugene Morris

I swear to god, someone up there has got it in for me.

For fuck's sake.

It's not like I've got some kind of issue with dead bodies or anything.  Really, in my line of work?  Might as well be allergic to money.  Or drugs.  Or to lying itself.

Seeing the corpse of someone I knew and whom I'd never expected to see again?  That fucking threw me.

The chief's looking at me expectantly.  I give a grave nod, and the mortician pulls the sheet back over her face.

"Those bastards," the chief says into the silence.  "It'll be a damn good day when we finally bring them down."

'They' are the local mob, who I've been investigating undercover.  Me?  I'm Eugene Morris, bullshitter extraordinaire.  The truth ain't black or white, and neither am I.  And nor is that corpse on the table.  We were two of the only three mixed race kids growing up on our street.

She - Javina - was my next door neighbour when we were kids.  Her big brother - the third kid - and I were close. Right up until we were all teenagers, and I suddenly found his little sister a lot more interesting.  It didn't even last that long, just a month or two, but that was long enough for Troy never to speak to me again.

Goddamit it.  Thinking of Troy, and his mama, and his mama's baby girl under that sheet?  Christ.  My mum taught her mum how to braid Javina's hair, for fuck's sake.  Her mum was white, and didn't have a clue how to deal with mixed hair.

"It's their style," I said to the chief, commenting on the state they'd left Javina's body in.  Fucking christ.  "Any idea of motive?"

"Nope."  The chief slapped a hand to my shoulder.  "That's your job."

Of course it was.  I'd better get some kind of bonus for this.

***

Finding the motive, it turned out, was the easy part.  Practically handed to me on a silver fucking platter.

It was later that same day; yesterday now, must be.  I'd nipped out for another pack of fags when I'd seen Ernie looming at me out of the shadows.  And trust me, Ernie can fucking loom.

I'd greeted him, with a dash of curiosity.  Ernie didn't normally approach me in public.  Ernie didn't normally come out in daylight.

He'd grinned, asked what I'd come out for, then offered me a cigarette.  He was holding out a match when someone came up behind me and dropped a sack over my head.

I spent what was probably the whole night having the fucking shit kicked out of me.  Eventually, during one of his fag breaks, he found the time to explain it to me.

"The boss found out about you, Eugene," he said, lighting another fag.  Fucker.  I'd never even got to take a single drag of mine.  I glared balefully up at him from the floor, my head turned sideways.  I was trussed up like a turkey.  Ernie'd never been one for fighting fair.  Probably why he was so successful at it.

He didn't wait for me to reply.  I wasn't fucking planning to.

"So this," he continued, "is your punishment.  The girl," he grinned at me, "was your warning."

"You killed some girl to warn me you were going to kick the shit out of me?" I wheezed.  I could taste blood.

He waved the match out, and sat there in silence, grinning at me, like a goddamn pumpkin.

"Or are you planning to kill me too?"  I continued, when it was clear he was just going to carry on sitting there with that fucking look on his face.

"We're not going to kill you, Eugene," he said.  Well, thank fuck for that.  "We're going to keep you.  And if you don't do what we want, we'll kill another one.  Who was next?  Natasha?  Tia?"

I was having trouble breathing.  Not because of what he'd said, because he'd broken a few of my fucking ribs.

He finished his fag, then stood up, rubbing his hands together.

"You could just offer me fucking money," I suggested.  "Instead of brutally slaughtering your way through a chronological list of my exes."

"Nah," Ernie said, picking up a baseball bat.  "We'd never trust you if we had to buy you."

Well, shit.

At the Edge of the Wood

I've never been very good at poetry.  Except comic limericks - I can write those!

Young ladies make their way past me
Over dale and stile
Oh, won't you come and lie with me?
Just for a little while.
It is cold, and I am all alone
You will be my queen on gilded throne
As long as you don't go.

Later now, a colder season
Young men ignore the voice of reason
And urge each other to imbibe more
and more, not knowing what's in store
And when they stumble over me
They'll be scared sober, you wait and see.
I am the bones at the edge of the wood
I waited and called to those who passed
Until those drunken, frightened lads
Freed me from my bed of grass.

Eugene Fucking Morris

A short for the Blakenhall Writer's Group.   The original specs can be found here - essentially, a bit of background, and instructions to write a short story or poem.  This is mine.

Eugene Fucking Morris


I swear to god, someone up there has got it fucking in for me.

For fuck's sake.

It's not like I've got some kind of issue with dead bodies or anything.  Really, in my line of work?  Might as well be allergic to money.  Or drugs.  Or to lying itself.

Seeing the corpse of someone I knew and whom I'd never expected to see again?  That fucking threw me.

The chief's looking at me expectantly.  I give a grave nod, and the mortician pulls the sheet back over her face.

"Those bastards," the chief says into the silence.  "It'll be a damn good day when we finally bring them down."

'They' are the local mob, who I've been investigating undercover.  Me?  I'm Eugene Morris, bullshitter extraordinaire.  The truth ain't black or white, and neither am fucking I.  And nor is that corpse on the table.  We were two of the only three mixed race kids growing up on our street.

She - Javina - was my next door neighbour when we were kids.  Her big brother - the third kid - and I were close. Right up until we were all teenagers, and I suddenly found his little sister a lot more interesting.  It didn't even last that long, just a month or two, but that was long enough for Troy never to speak to me again.

Goddamit it.  Thinking of Troy, and his mama, and his mama's baby girl under that sheet?  Christ.  My mum taught her mum how to braid Javina's hair, for fuck's sake.  Her mum was white, and didn't have a clue how to deal with mixed hair.

"It's their style," I said to the chief, commenting on the state they'd left Javina's body in.  Fucking christ.  "Any idea of motive?"

"Nope."  The chief slapped a hand to my shoulder.  "That's your job."

Of course it fucking was.  I'd better get some kind of bonus for this.

***

Finding the motive, it turned out, was the easy part.  Practically handed to me on a silver fucking platter.

It was later that same day; yesterday now, must be.  I'd nipped out for another pack of fags when I'd seen Ernie looming at me out of the shadows.  And trust me, Ernie can fucking loom.

I'd greeted him, with a dash of curiosity.  Ernie didn't normally approach me in public.  Ernie didn't normally come out in fucking daylight, for christ's sake.

He'd grinned, asked what I'd come out for, then offered me a cigarette.  He was holding out a match when someone came up behind me and dropped a sack over my head.

I spent what was probably the whole night having the fucking shit kicked out of me.  Eventually, during one of his fag breaks, he found the time to explain it to me.

"The boss found out about you, Eugene," he said, lighting another fag.  Fucker.  I'd never even got to take a single drag of mine.  I glared balefully up at him from the floor, my head turned sideways.  I was trussed up like a fucking turkey.  Ernie'd never been one for fighting fucking fair.  Probably why he was so successful at it.

He didn't wait for me to reply.  I wasn't fucking planning to.  

"So this," he continued, "is your punishment.  The girl," he grinned at me, "was your fucking warning?"

"You killed some girl to warn me you were going to kick the shit out of me?" I wheezed.  I could taste blood.

He waved the match out, and sat there in silence, grinning at me, like a fucking pumpkin.

"Or are you planning to kill me too?"  I continued, when it was clear he was just going to carry on sitting there with that fucking look on his face.

"We're not going to kill you, Eugene," he said.  Well, thank fuck for that.  "We're to keep you.  And if you don't do what we want, we'll kill another one.  Who was next?  Natasha?  Tia?"

I was having trouble breathing.  Not because of what he'd said, because he'd broken a few of my fucking ribs.

He finished his fag, then stood up, rubbing his hands together.

"You could just offer me fucking money," I said.  "Instead of brutally fucking slaughtering your way through a chronological list of my exes."

"Nah," Ernie said, picking up a baseball bat.  "We'd never trust you if we had to buy you."

Well, shit.

Why I Couldn’t Kill Hitler

You don’t know me, but I love you.

We’ve never met, but I know everything about you.  I know the way you stretch and yawn in the morning, and the face you make when you’re grumpy, and the kind of tea you like.  I'll hold the colour of your eyes when no one else in the world remembers your name, and I know you'd understand that reference, because you introduced me to that book.

It was another lifetime. We worked together and lived together.  I didn’t realise how special it was till it was gone.  I didn’t know it wouldn’t last forever.

You’ll never know that, because I’ll never tell you.  I won’t send this letter, or any of the hundreds of others I’ve written to you.  I can’t.  I couldn’t bear for you to know what I’ve done.  I just pretend to tell you, over and over, so that for a brief moment, I can pretend that you’d understand, and you’d forgive me, and we could be together.

We won’t ever be together, and you wouldn't ever understand, like you wouldn't ever forgive me, but at least you’ve alive.

We were both physicists.  We met at university, and were lucky enough to find a job together afterwards, studying time.  It took twenty, thirty years, but we did it; eventually, we learned how to time travel.

I know how that sounds.

I’m not going to tell you how we did it.  Suffice it to say, it couldn’t have happened without both of us, working as one, devoting all our time to the study.

You had a specific reason.  Killing Hitler.  You had relatives who’d died in concentration camps, and your goal was to go back in time and prevent the second world war, prevent the horror suffered not just by your family but by millions of others.

My reason was less noble; I wanted to succeed because you did, and I love you.

We did it eventually.  There was a lot more to it than killing the man himself, of course.  We had to go right back to the First World War and make careful changes in order to fix Germany’s economy.  We had to lance the boil before it had a chance to fully develop.  Otherwise, someone else would have arisen to take his place, and it would have been different, but it would have been just as bad.  We couldn't measure how long it took; either years or no time at all, really.  To go back and forth and carefully make all the necessary changes.

When we finally succeeded, when we came back after making the last change, you weren’t here.  You never had been.  Your parents had only met in the first place because of the way your grandparents had escaped, and where they’d ended up afterwards.  Without the war, they never met, and you never existed.  You and millions of others were simply never born.  

The entire world was different.  There was technology which didn’t exist without the war, medical advances that we’d never been pressured to develop.  There were people who hadn't ever been born because their parents had been slaughtered.  I didn't care about any of it.

I can’t live in a world without you.  Even if I have to live in a world without you by my side, I can’t live in a world without you in it.

So I undid what we’d done.  It only took one simple step; I went back and doctored my own university application, so I went somewhere else and we never met.  You never found that job posting without me buying that one specific journal, and I purposefully ignored it.  Without us, they didn’t succeed.

I can’t be with you without giving you everything you want, and I can’t give you what you want without killing you.  Worse than killing you. In that world, I was the only one who knew you’d ever existed.

I sentenced millions of people to death.  I know.  In many ways, I’m worse than the man we set out to defeat, because at least he believed he was doing the right thing.  I don’t.  I sentenced the millions who died in the holocaust to a death I could have prevented.  I killed the millions of people we’d brought into life by preventing that war.  I let Germany’s economy be ruined when I could have prevented it, and caused people starve to death when I could have saved them.  When I already had saved them once.

I could argue that I also saved all the people who were only alive because of the war.  I could argue for the medical treatments we developed throughout that war and the people they’ve saved.  I could argue for the internet and the shared knowledge we have because of it, something that only exists because of the code and communication requirements of that war, but I know – and you’d know, if I ever told you any of this, which I won’t – that none of that was the point.

I couldn’t.  I couldn’t sentence you to not existing.  I just can’t.  No matter how much you’d tell me that it would be worth it to prevent that horror.  I love you, and I can’t, and I’m sorry, but I can’t.  

 

I just can't.