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.

Limericks: A Collection

There once was a dino named Tim

Who decided to go to the gym.

He ran for a bit

To try to get fit.

But decided it wasn't for him.

There once was a girl who read too many books

And there were many who told her she would lose her looks

She just rolled her eyes

And said, to their surprise

“You know, I just don’t give a fuck.”

There once was a hedgehog named Jo

Who wanted to learn how to row

She got a small boat

And a waterproof coat

And said, “now how do we make this thing go?”.

The way to win the heart of a fella

Is not to scream or yeller

But to smile demurely

And learn how to curtsey

And giggle beneath an umbrella.

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.

The Organ Donor

Elizabeth stood in the endless queue.  The last thing she remembered was dying, but fortunately the memory wasn’t too clear.

She appeared to be in a tunnel lined with gold.  It looked vaguely Egyptian to her, an impression that was confirmed when she turned a corner and saw a set of scales.  On one side was a feather.  She saw a god she recognised as Anubis weighing the hearts of those in front of her on the scale while Thoth recorded the results.

Finally it was her turn.  Anubis reached an ethereal hand into her chest, and came out empty handed.

“Where’s your heart?”  He asked.  “I see no jars with you.”

“I’m an organ donor,” Elizabeth said, proudly.   "I gave all of my organs away."

Anubis and Thoth looked at one another, then at the length of the queue behind her.

“We’ll let you through this time,” said Anubis, after a moment of silence.  He looked disgruntled.  “But next time, you really need to bring it with you.”

The Devil Jones and Two Minutes

“Two minutes of your time sir?  Just two minutes.”

He was a nondescript looking salesman.  His suit, eyes and hair were brown, or maybe grey.  No one really looked.  He had no distinguishing features.  We can call him Jones, though it really doesn’t matter.

Jones could generally be found in the middle of a crowded street, near where you live.  It wasn’t quite clear what he was selling, but then, who pays attention to salesmen on the street?

The offer he made was always the same.  “Two minutes of your time, sir, ma’am?  Just two minutes.  Two minutes of your time, for whatever you want.”

...

The most subtle deal Jones ever made was with a woman named Christina.

She was on a train.  She wasn’t sure how she’d gotten there, but that didn’t surprise her because she also knew she had a migraine.  She was in too much pain to try to remember anything, or to be surprised that she couldn’t.

The world swam around her, and she fought off the temptation to throw herself out of the window.  She’d give anything to make the pain stop.

She staggered down the train, trying to find somewhere where she could sit and rest.  The majority of the seats were full, and the ones that weren’t were facing backwards.  The migraine made her nauseas enough; she couldn’t handle motion sickness as well.

As she walked past, one of the other passengers looked at her sadly and shook his head.  She couldn’t quite figure out who he was, or why he seemed familiar.  She couldn’t spare the attention to try to figure it out. 

Christina kept walking, practically on auto-pilot, knowing she couldn’t stand in the aisle and unable to find a place to stop.  She’d walked nearly the entire length of the train before she ran into Jones.

“You don’t look well,” he said, stating the obvious.  She was pale, slick with sweat, and swaying slightly.

Christina didn’t risk speaking.   She didn’t want to make any noise.  She shielded her eyes and nodded gently, trying not to jolt her pounding head.

“I can help you,” he continued, with a sympathetic look.  “Would you like a migraleve?”

Christina couldn’t think of anything better.  She knew from past experience that migraleves were one of the few brands of pill that could take the pain away.

“It’ll just took two minutes of your time,” Jones told her.  “Two minutes.  Okay?  Nod if you agree.”

Christina nodded.  She’d agree to anything for that pill.

Jones handed it over with a grin that Christina missed, because she was still shading her eyes.  “Wonderful,” he said.  “Pleasure doing business with you.”

Christina took the pill.

Christina was walking down the train again, her head pounding.  Jones had taken the last two minutes, and she repeated the journey and the deal endlessly, never getting any further, never realising that she was making the deal in a dream.  Unfortunately for her, deals with the devil still count even when they take place entirely inside your own head.

On the outside, her body seemed to be in a coma.  Her family watched helplessly as her life ticked away in two minute increments that she didn’t realise she was selling over and over again.

...

Jones met Tom at a party.  Drunk on cheap champagne, Tom was discussing his plans with anyone who’d listen.

“Look at her,” he said to Jones, holding out a mobile.  On the screen was a picture, of Tom himself standing with his arm around a beautiful woman.  “We’re getting married!”

“Congratulations,” Jones said.  “You must love her very much.”

“I do!” Tom took another swig of champagne.  “I’d give anything to make her happy.”

“Two minutes,” said Jones.  “Would you give two minutes?”

“Two minutes?!” Tom slurred.  “In a heartbeat.  I’d do anything to make Caroline happy.”

“It’s a deal,” said Jones, and shook Tom’s unresisting hand.

Caroline was happy, though she never met Tom.  Jones had taken away the two minutes in which he was conceived, and Tom was never born. 

...

“Two minutes sir?” Jones asked the businessman rushing past.  He was back on his street, where he did most of his business.   “Two minutes of your time?”

“Get out of my way!” The man snarled.  “I can make a fortune in two minutes!”

“You’d give two minutes for a fortune?”

“Of course I would!”

“It’s a deal,” said Jones.   The man would have found his smile sinister if he’d taken the time to turn and look at it.

The man made his fortune, but, only two short years later, Jones took the two minutes in which he could have escaped, and the man burned alive when his mansion caught fire.

“Two minutes?  Sir, ma’am?  Two minutes?”

Son of the Moon

A short story inspired by the Mecano song of the same name. Lyrics and translation.



Ego

There, Afterwards.

I once met the moon.

It was a dark night – how could it be light, with nothing in the sky to illuminate it?

She came to me, out of the dark. A cold-faced, solemn woman, wrapped in a silver cloak. Her skin was pale, so pale that it seemed to shine. And in her arms, she carried a baby.

Her

I am alone.

It is not that I am not surrounded by people. It is that my ties to them are loose, and could be broken with scarcely a thought. It is that I am alone, and none of the crowds around me have any responsibility for me, and would waste little time in missing me, if I were gone. It is that I need a husband, one to bind me to this group, these people, to keep me safe.

She

Late at night, she climbs to the top of a nearby hill. She kneels before me.

And she asks for a favour.

She asks me for something I may not have for myself. Something which I cannot have, for who would be my equal?

So, in return, I ask the same. I ask for something which I cannot create for myself. After all, if one would give this up, in return for the other, surely they are not worthy of it in the first place?

Her

And I say to her “Silvered lady, what do you intend to do with a child of flesh?”

And she looks back at me, still smiling that calm smile, and says not one word. She waits for my answer.

I say yes.

The next day, a man rides into our encampment. A strong man, one who would not usually be bound to one woman. But he is, bound to me.

And I know this is her doing, his passion, his restraint, all hers, and I know what I am expected to give in exchange.

She

She would seek to deceive me.

Her

I have no intention of keeping my vow.

This is foolish, perhaps. She can find me, anywhere. I look upon her every night, save for those few days a month when she disappears. But I can make it work, I am sure of it. I make plans over those months, endless plans. Stay indoors at night, save when she is not in the sky. Hide myself, and the child. Raise him so that he never looks upon her, for if he does, I know her power is greater than mine, and that he will leave me.

She

Every month I wax, and then I wane again, with nothing to show for it.

Other women wax the same way, their bellies growing full and round. Yet when they wane, there is something to show for it. Blood, admittedly, sometimes, in a rushing flow over their thighs, as they cry and mourn for lost chances. More often…hope. A child. Something which they have created, deep within themselves. As I cannot.

Her

There are hours upon hours of screaming, sweating, crying. The pain is like nothing I’ve felt before. It tears me asunder, and I fear I will break in half.

He waits, outside. Waiting to see his child, the child he insists will be a son. I do not care what it is, as long as it is out of me before it kills me. Still, I know I will not give him up. I will not give her my child.  Luna, you wish to be a mother, but this child is mine.

She

...this child is mine. I engineered his birth. We made a deal, a fair trade, a love for a love, and she attempts to fool me, to hide from me.

She has broken her part of the promise. I will no longer uphold mine.

He

The scales fall from my eyes as the child is born.

She had me bewitched, but no longer, not when I see this creature that comes from her. His skin is white, white as the fur as an ermine. His eyes are grey, instead of olive. This is not my child. This vile witch, she who captured me, has deceived me. But no longer.

She

The man mistakes the white skin. He believes it is a sign that the child isn't his. Instead, it is a sign that he isn't hers.

The intent to create this child was mine. Before he was ever conceived, he was mine.

Her

He comes to me with a knife, as the child cries at the end of our bed. He asks “Whose son is this?” and does not give me time to reply before burying the knife within me, up to the hilt. He does not give my life time to bleed out by itself, gushing between my fingers. He hastens its departure with further blows. I whimper, try to whisper. Luna...

He

I cannot bear to look on this small child, this milk white monster born of the witch I married, who lies now in a pool of her own blood, her eyes fading as they become glassier. I take him to the forest, to the hill, and leave him lying there. Let the wolves have him. Let the moon take him. I do not care.

She

My son.