Fantasy

Hi all, I’m back with another piece of slightly weirder fiction. I think this might be what the experts refer to as a “mood piece.” (They’re wrong, of course. This is exactly what happened, exactly the way I remember it.) Enjoy!

---

Ma hated it when Da went to the allotment. It meant she had no one to fight with. He’d sneak in, swap flat-caps at the hall stand and, with a soft click of the front door, he’d be gone again.

Me and Ma would have tea together, with the radio filling in for Da’s silent place. Her head twitched every time someone walked past the front door.

I wanted to have my own allotment when I left school. A patch of land, the cosy, tobacco-ey shed, a kettle, and glossy magazines of ladies in their knickers. Then Ma said she wanted a baby, and they’d disappear up to the bedroom, creaking the old bedsprings for hours.

Ma would come down to potter around for a while, angry in a happy way, which is as happy as she ever got, poor thing. I started going to the allotment. Took my homework with me, but mostly I just sat in the shed, smoking cigarettes. Eventually, I took to looking after Da’s vegetables. I’d bring them back in a crate and leave them in the hall. Ma would keep the vegetables with tattered leaves, or bruised or soft spots for us, and sell, or swap the rest.

It stayed like that even after Ma got pregnant. I’d thought Da would want to get back to his vegetables as soon as he’d done the business, but he stayed in the bedroom. The springs creaked all day and all night, even when Ma was downstairs. I got his old job at the factory and went to the allotment in the evenings.

It was a baby girl, plump as a potato. Me and Ma buried Da in the allotment one night. I buried his magazines with him, and a packet of cigarettes. Ma thought I should be around the house again for the young one. But I worried Da would get back up if I didn’t keep an eye on him.

---

My newest newsletter is released this Saturday. If you’re not signed up, then you’re missing out on: a short story; a fantastic live-stream recommendation; two very special offers, and more! This way to sign up, folks!

This week’s flash fiction is something I don’t write too much of: a kitchen-sink drama. Let me know what you think!

---

It’s a blizzard outside, the whole world has disappeared. Except, I think it means the whole world is there, except me. I’m in the static between television channels, waiting for the cathode-ray tubes to warm up and send me back to one channel or another.

There’s a knock at the door, in the middle of the blizzard. It’s nothing, really. All that talk about TVs and static is me being dramatic.

It’s a man outside. He’s not a neighbour, you understand. I don’t know him from Adam. But, when I opened my door he was backlit by the white blizzard, and it was only right to let him out of the storm.
He tells me it was like being stuck between TV channels out there, and that was my thought. I don’t like that a bit. It bothers me as we sit, each of us with a cup of tea that I made.

The storm has been going on for a long time, and I still have tea in front of me, even though I’m drinking it. Both of us sit side-on to the kitchen table, looking out the window for the world to appear.

He’s familiar, like someone who’s been on a show that you can’t quite recall the name of.

This feels like a dream. We sit in comfortable silence though we don’t know each other.

I’m waiting for the cathode-ray tubes to warm up. I think he is, too.

---

I see the grown-up versions of Tweedledum and Tweedledee thirty years after Alice forgot them and the magic of Wonderland drained away. What about you?

Hi all,

it’s grey and cold outside (although only about -9 degrees at the moment so not bad for January). I fancy a cup of coffee. You coming? Good, let’s go in here. I like this place, there are always interesting people around.

Let’s ask the waiter what we’ve missed.

---

“Could I get a spoon, please?”
The customer looked respectable in a suit, with soft, fuzzy hair. An economics professor perhaps, or the owner of his own small business. But I’d already brought him two spoons. On top of the one that had been on the table already, when he sat down.
I brought a spoon, but I made a big thing of it. Everyone in the café watched surreptitiously to see what would happen.
He stirred his coffee with it, put it down on the table, and looked out the window onto Bridge Street. Nothing happened. Then a hand reached out of the bag he’d brought with him and sneaked the spoon away. He was stealing the spoons! Or at least aiding and abetting their theft.
“Can I have another cup of coffee?” He asked when I went to clear away the cup. “And a spoon?”
The cheek! “I’m sorry, sir. We don’t have any more spoons.” Just then my colleague came past with a coffee and Bircher muesli for table eight.
“That man is getting a spoon!” he said.
“That’s the last one.”
“Ah? Well… maybe a fork,” he said after looking into his open bag.
“I’m sorry, sir, we don’t have forks either. There is another café just down the road. Or a Starbucks in the other direction.”
“I see.” He threw some money on the table, hoisted his bag – still open, but I couldn’t see what was inside – and left.
I’m glad he didn’t make a scene. I hate it when they do that.
It was only after he’d gone that I noticed the little pile of silver coins under where the bag had been. Disgusting!

Hi all, last post of the new year, so here’s a little story about how great it is to get a second chance to start again. Happy New Year to you all, and enjoy!

---

Fosdick sprayed money. Came up the hard way, but when he found oil in his back garden that was all behind him. A crowd of hangers-on followed him everywhere. They were lucky he was a nice guy, he could have made them do anything to stay within the rain of his wealth.

The first time he died there was a panic among his hangers-on. And pretty much everywhere else too, let’s be honest: he had controlled enough oil to bring continents to a stop (he never did).

His son wasn’t as nice. So they brought Fosdick back to life. The newspapers wanted to know where the “parts” had come from. Not from any of Fosdick’s friends, that was for sure. Some people got real rich, real quick.

Mind you, Fosdick wasn’t as good as he used to be. He was still kind and looked after his people. But his smile was off, and he seemed tired. Even his hangers-on found it draining to be around him. He’d been through a lot, though. It was only to be expected.

I met him in Fosdick 111, his tower block. He had a Texas drawl, and he was charming, but he made me tired, Like everyone had said. A man stood beside him the whole time, and I swear his lips never moved. Maybe on words with “B’s.”

I recorded the interview, and it sounds like Fosdick says he is a “gillionaire.”

He didn’t want to talk about his resurrections. Experimental therapy was all he’d say (sounded like “egskerimental theragy”). And it still rains wealth all around Fosdick. But it pours on his friends and not much splashes elsewhere these days.

---

That’s it from me for 2020, see you in the ’21!

This one is short and sweet, like a dwarf working in the mines of Candy Mountain. Enjoy!

---

Prof Twinings ignored the police line around his house. People crowded the pavement for a glimpse of his home. He hoped it hadn’t escaped. Again.
The twins were delighted, as usual, that he might be in trouble. “You’ve done it this time,” crowed DeborA. DeborB clapped her hands.
No one else could see or hear them. They were useful if was playing poker, but too exhausting otherwise. Twining edged his way out of the crowd to Collins Avenue, where there was another path home. Or rather, to the towering Inferno where he had until recently lived.
His suits were in there.
Twining was the world’s leading demonologist. It was thanks to his hard work that the world had improved so drastically over the past 40 years. Seeing as he had the Devil trapped in a special room in the basement, and everything.
But something had gone wrong.
He crept through the hedge near the rear of his property, slipped through the side door where there were no flames, and opened the basement with a key which mortal eyes could not see. The devil was surrounded by flames. A fork with a charred lump of something lay on the floor in front of him. He didn’t look triumphant. Awkward, rather. “I just wanted to toast the marshmallows for Christmas,” he said.

---

Happy Christmas!

Hi all, I’m still in a bit of a funny mood.

If you liked last week’s fiction you might like this one. If not, see you next week!

Enjoy!

---

“I’ve never seen it before,” I say.
“But you’ll admit it’s your hand?” says the policeman.
“I know what my hand looks like, officer. This isn’t it, it’s not even the right size!”
“Reviewing the evidence, which is to say, it’s attached to your arm, sir…”
“This isn’t my arm, you fool, I don’t have tattoos!”
“You have one right there on your biceps, sir. Who’s Trisha?”
“That’s not my arm,” I say. “My God, is there anyone else I can talk to?” Eventually, I get to see someone higher up the chain. Not because they believe me, but because I’m starting to scare the other prisoners. Although I don’t know what they’ve got to worry about. They aren’t the ones who woke up with body parts replaced. I mean, who would do such a thing?
“This way sir,” says the officer. He’s one of those big solid men. Unflappable, if you want to put a positive spin on it. Unimaginative. Not necessarily a bad thing in a police officer, I suppose. We sit in an interrogation room. Me, and the arm, leg and ears that don’t belong to me. It’s the ears I’m most worried about, as they might start working against me.
“What seems to be the trouble?” The policeman gives me an encouraging look, but I hear the other officer shift against the wall behind me. Any sudden moves and he’ll be only too happy to restrain me. I sit on my right arm, then wrap my left leg tightly around the leg which doesn’t belong to me. I don’t want them threatening the police and getting me in trouble.
“Officer,” I say. “I woke up this morning and somebody has taken my leg and arm and given me these in their place.” I nod towards my restrained limbs.
“And who do you think might have done such a thing, sir?”
He’s got me. Who would do such a thing. I don’t have any enemies.
“We get this a lot, sir,” he says. “Oh yes.” He leans back in his chair. I shift my weight. I think the arm that doesn’t belong to me might be suffering pins and needles and I don’t want to hurt the thing. I just want my own back. “People wake up, and it’s usually a Thursday, say. Like today. Say their legs, or their arms, or their eyes, or whatever doesn’t belong to them. And I always ask: ‘who do you think might have done it’ and what do they say?”
“I don’t know,” I say.
“Exactly, sir. ‘I don’t know.’ I’d love to help, if I could. I woke up feeling funny myself one morning so I understand. But you get used to it. The alternative would be for me to drag in the entire population, and ask them where they were last night, and whether they hold a grudge against you. The majority won’t even know you, and then I’ll have to describe you, sir. And go into your life story, until they get a feel for who you are as a person. Sir. And do you know what? It takes quite a while, and you’ll find that people who had never heard of you, and didn’t hold a grudge against you, sir… well, after a few weeks of hearing about you in this room, they pretty much all hate you sir. And we’ll still have no evidence. Would you like that, sir? Maybe we’ll even find out who stole your leg and arm, but the entire population of the country will hate your guts.”
“But—”
He held up a hand. “Hear me out. I’m not saying we won’t proceed, I’m saying maybe you’ll get used to the new arm and leg. This the new arm? Looks quite nice, sir, and if you ever meet a girl called Trisha, well, you’ve already got the tattoo. Some other poor bugger had the pain of that, and you’ll be the one to profit.”

He stood up and, although I wasn’t happy, it made a certain sense. My new arm, my false arm jumped out to grab his arm and they shook. It felt like an unusual shake, one of those hidden handshakes you hear about. Then he leaned in and whispered something. I’m sure it was important, but they weren’t my ears—they didn’t work for me—and I couldn’t hear it. He walked me to the door. He walked a little lopsided. I noticed a lot of people looked strange. It seemed to me that that man’s eyes were too wide for his face. That man’s mouth kept muttering, as if it wasn’t completely under control. That lady definitely had one shoulder higher than another. Behind the front desk, the lady had two shades of hair: brunette growing up under the blonde.
Outside, people stumbled along to work. Two young boys in school shirts and shorts, and surely those couldn’t be their real knees and elbows? So knobbly? A man in a tan suit had jowls too large for his thin face, and a pot belly that belonged to a much fatter man.
I’d be late myself, if I didn’t get a move on. The sun was hot and when I looked at it, it seemed to waver, as if just settling in. Almost right, but not quite.