The Denier (At the Barbecue)

Abe lounged in the bed, the duvet tucked up between his bare legs, and listened to Elsie taking her pills in the bathroom.

‘Don’t forget your new one,’ he called through.

She came to the door, wrapped in his navy robe. She smiled and shook her day-by-day pill case. ‘It’s already in.’

‘Why are you wearing my dressing gown?’

‘Mine’s in the wash.’ She turned back into the bathroom. She was up to five pills per day now, to Abe’s three. This concerned him, then concerned him double, for showing a symptom of Unphased Medication Suspicion; treatable, to be sure, but with a few side effects. None of his current medication gave any adverse effects, and he could drink on them, sweet relief. Mick, who was coming later, was on Blockadorol for his protoaudio-hallucinatory tendency, which may have been no more than tinnitus, but you did wrong to take a chance on that. So he couldn’t imbibe.

Elsie padded wetly back into the bedroom. She looked lovely with her freshly washed hair combed back and the skin on her neck glistening.

‘I’d better get moving to the market,’ Abe said, ‘I’m going to get the biggest rack of ribs they have.’

‘I’ll get Samuel up and look in on Rachel.’

A thrill ran up from the soles of Abe’s feet. Just looking in was fine, it wasn’t like before the new pill, when the dismal signs of Child-checking Illness has started in Elsie, during in the few weeks after Rachel’s birth. The child had been premature, four precious weeks of gestation missed, like jet-lag time slippage; she came out disorientated and with fluid in the lungs. The time in the incubator, a plastic inverted prison that kept the parents out, worried Elsie. Her checking up was deemed as overly anxious by Dr Lomas, and the pill was prescribed. The dark gathering around her eyes was fading; Elsie was pretty much all levelled out. In a way, today’s party was a celebration of this. It was also an excuse to get Rog round. Rog was Elsie’s brother; long since the edgy sheep of the family. He provoked arguments with his playing devil’s advocate, he was critical and unsympathetic. On the other hand, he was merry and good company. Plus, Rog had a new girlfriend, and Elsie very much wanted to meet her.

‘She’s medication free,’ Rog had told Elsie on the phone.

‘Really? A perfectly-adjusted human being? Genetically and mentally clean? Those people freak me out a little,’ confessed Elsie.

‘It’s not that. Tessa’s a pill-denier.’

‘No F-ing way!’ (Swearing was all but prevented by Elsie’s tablet for Ungraded Elatism.) ‘Well, bring her over. I’d love to pick her grey matter.’ Elsie almost said cook her grey matter, after a stupid childhood joke between her and her brother but thought he wouldn’t remember. Especially with his treatment for Borderline Gender Confusion, which worked by repressing memories of his casual bow-wearing and go in high heels as a boy. So it was set. Elsie would have a pill-free person in her house, the first adult in many years. The only other would be little Rachel, only five months and thankfully born without any genetic traits that needed early intervention. Samuel, aged six now, was already on a couple of pills, one being the fairly generic, among boys anyway, treatment for Pre-Anger Syndrome, which held off any grumpy tantrums and, his teacher said, really kept him focused.

Also coming to the barbecue would be Mick and Sandy, childless and both on medication for Reproductive Anxiety Condition; and Leia and Riz, with their toddler Oona. She had been screened using amniocentesis, and found to have the Instant Vulnerability trait, so had been on monthly injections since birth to guard against overly demonstrative outbreaks. Running through the side gate into the garden, Oona brought forth a bottle of wine and Leia followed her with a bowl of limp salad.

‘Hi!’

‘Hi!’

‘Hi Oona!’

‘Hmm.’

Abe was fiddling with coals and a bottle of flammable something. Elsie was using her fingertips to rub olive oil into chops, after the fashion she’d seen on TV.

Abe handed out lemonades. He plucked a sprig of mint from the plant in the border and ceremonially placed it in the top of Riz’s glass.

‘We’ve got a pill-denier coming,’ Abe said conspiratorially. Riz bent towards him.

‘No.’

They were interrupted by Mick and Sandy’s arrival.

‘Hi!’

‘Hi!’

‘Hi!’

‘Hi.’

All so breezy and gleaming, well-adjusted, the end-point of the long creep of diagnosis, the medicalisation of the human emotional range.

‘How’s your week Mick?’

‘Great. We demolished Du Pont Court at last.’

‘You pressed the button?’

‘That’s right,’ he said proudly.

‘Boys and toys,’ said Sandy, flouncing off to play badminton with Samuel and Oona. Was it a performance? An effort to show the pills were working, a self-fulfilling cure perhaps.

The chops, ribs, sweetcorn and so forth were charring away when Tessa and Rog arrived. Tessa walked in first, without Rog, a move Abe immediately, and in spite of himself, saw as evidence of antisocial controversial maladjustment. She wore a bright, floral summer dress with narrow straps, which on one side frequently fell down to encircle her upper arm; the other women eyed this distrustfully. Her dark hair had streaks of grey, her small dark eyes slipped mischievous, moving glances all over the garden, taking in the barbecue pit, the tablecloth, the swing seat, the conservatory. She wore no make-up.

Elsie approached her first, the keen hostess and one most attracted to the unusual. At the Tate Modern, which now had to rely on retrospectives in the absence of new modern art, when Abe and she were first dating, she had spent the longest time with the Cremaster Cycle films.

‘My brother ditched you already?’

‘He’s parking, hope you don’t mind I came ahead.’

‘Of course! Welcome! That’s my husband, Abe.’

He waved his tongs and went back to turning, toying, checking where the children were.

Elsie introduced the others and got Tessa a drink. ‘Wine, if it’s going!’ Rog burst through the gate, a cynical wave of sceptical energy, garrulous as a kick against his natural guardedness, hopeless with his status in the family, but now embracing it with what his and Elsie’s parents would no doubt call a reckless attention-seeking decision. He was always popping up in some faraway land, never married; he should have been on treatment for Commitment Aversion. He was on pills, ‘But only a couple,’ he would say. ‘They’re all pretty much the same molecule as it is,’ he would add offhandedly. He put his arm around Tessa’s waist and smiled at his sister. ‘Met everyone?’

‘Yes, except the children.’

‘Food’s up,’ yelled Abe. His forehead shone as he brought two big plates to the table, pushing salads and bread aside to plonk them down.

‘Dig in,’ he said, quietly soaking up the admiring noises.

‘Come and get a sausage,’ Elsie called at the children and Samuel slotted himself in, standing, at the gap between Tessa and Leia. He grabbed the ketchup bottle and squirted it at his hot dog; a bubble forced out a great glot of it onto Tessa’s leg. She immediately pressed her thigh with both hands, unconcerned at the mess, and put on a southern drawl.

‘You got me cowboy. Great shot kid. Tell … little … Rosie … to … be … good,’ she finished her improvised death scene with a prolonged groan, then slumped back in her chair.

Samuel looked around, uncertain of how he was supposed to respond. Abe, the peacemaker, started clapping his hands and Samuel gratefully laughed. The other grown-ups looked slightly perturbed.

‘Say you’re sorry,’ warned Elsie.

‘Sorry.’

‘Great food Abe!’ Rog changed the subject. The group listened politely to recipes for marinades being intoned, fact checking (‘Was it black mustard seeds or nigella seeds?’) throughout. Then they listened to Sandy and Mick share their issues finding a suitable kitchen fitter.

After they’d finished eating, Tessa played a version of badminton with Samuel where the aim was to his the shuttlecock as high into the air as possible. Rog was sitting on the swing seat with his sister, watching.

‘So things are good.’

‘Yes. Tessa is just so … liberated. You know, I’m thinking of joining her. Weaning myself off. All I’m on now is Zealess and something for Slipped Disc Paranoia.’

‘Zealess? Isn’t that for Improbable Religious Fervour?’

‘Yup, apparently.’

‘I didn’t know you even went to church,’ murmured Elsie.

‘It was only a few times. I think I got it because I got baptised.’

‘Wow .’

‘So what do you think?’

‘No medication? It is insane. Why is Tessa a denier anyway?’

‘Her dad was Ernst Pauli.’

‘Who’s that?’

‘He was the last great psychologist, before it all went so … medical and psychiatric. A talking cure man, through and through. I have some of his books actually, he has a lot of interesting stuff to say.’

Elsie wrinkled her nose. Samuel and Tessa were on the grass in heaps, giggling at their failed attempt to retrieve the shuttle from the pear tree. Abe was going for a broom. The others made daisy chains with Oona.

‘I thought that was all bunk.’

Tessa wandered over while Abe and Samuel tried to knock down the shuttlecock.

Elsie said, ‘Sounds like you’re going to lead my brother astray.’ She didn’t deliver it good-humouredly.

‘Astray?’

‘No pills.’

‘Rog, you told her? Well, I don’t mind. And he’d be doing himself a favour. Everyone on this generation of medication is subject to mind-control. Every little human foible has been catalogued, pathologised. Have you seen the size of DSM-15? It fills nine volumes! Nine! Let me guess, you are on, what, five or six different pills? It’s a joke! You are just a person. It makes people stultifying, uninterested, robotic.’

‘It makes the world safer, more peaceful,’ said Elsie, a little lamely.

‘It makes it boring. Are you medicating your kids too?’

‘Samuel, yes,’ said Elsie carefully.

‘Horrid. Brainwashing …’

‘That’s enough, I think,’ cut in Rog.

Elsie was staring at him furiously. She was insulted by him, not her. She was reminded why they rarely saw each other, why her mother would complain about him for hours on the phone, why his reputation preceded him. Rog looked at his sister, trying to mask his hurt. He sighed.

‘We better go.’

Tessa was quiet now. She wanted to rail against misunderstanding, unquestioning, against dulling drugs, disengagement, to just explain. But the cult of reason was deafened by its own dogma; her father had taught her that.

‘Bye.’

‘Bye!’

‘Oh, bye!’

‘Nice to meet you!’

Abe closed the gate behind them. The remaining adults congregated back at the table, some unspoken compulsion acting. Elsie blew out her cheeks.

‘Sorry about them, everyone. He’s always been a wildcard.’

Leia’s eyes were bright. ‘Are you kidding? She was fascinating.’ Leia’s day job was writing press releases for a major pharmaceutical company. ‘She needs so much medication! I’m not an expert, but I’d say for Heightened Argument Sensibility …’

Riz leaned forward and chipped in: ‘Ungraded Elatism, definitely. You saw that giggling?’

‘Potential Superegoism,’ suggested Sandy. ‘She walked in just like that.’

‘Unbounded Communicative Trait,’ added Mick.

‘Silent Psychosis.’

‘Personality Protocrisis.’

‘Insufficient Demureness.’

While the lampooning continued merrily, Elsie sat back in her chair and smiled; now they really had something interesting to talk about. 

a thirty ninth new poem... 'beta male'

Ged was the proud owner of

A Sports Direct mug, a heavily

Thumbed almanac of Scottish

Football, a four door Mazda

Saloon, more than thirty six

Frank Sinatra records, as well

As five DVD editions of Oliver

Stone’s Platoon.

Class of 74

Char was new, she’d washed up on the wrong side of the canyon. She’d been told to shorten her name to Char. ‘Like the lord of Iran,’ she had said to the oily man in the Centre. He had stared at her impassively and sent her off with a slip entitling her to a room in number 72. No cars lined the street; it was isolated, furtively squirrelled away from robust civilisation. Overhead cables chopped the sky into polygons, some with laced trainers silhouetted against the grey. The terraces either side flaked, crusted, shed tiles like dead skin, stumbled forwards on degrading foundations and fluttered little white handkerchiefs, or net curtains, out of open windows.

Tiff was not new, she’d lived here all her life. She was a local wonder, a human citizen’s advice bureau. The deckchair oracle, reclining now in her low-walled front yard, drinking from a white mug with the word TWAT on the underside, visible when she lifted it to her lips. Char came upon her, next door to number 72. On the other side, in one of the only front yards with a gate and intact wall, a dog was barking irately.

‘Don’t mind her,’ said the woman named Tiff. ‘You’re moving in.’ She nodded at Char’s holdall. She made statements, not questions.

‘Yes. I just moved to this area.’

‘You mean you were moved here.’

Char didn’t comment on that. ‘The landlord said he’d meet me here.’ Tiff laughed bulbously, and set her cup down on the concrete.

‘We better get you a seat. Name’s Tiff.’ As in, have a … Char thought instantly.

Tiff opened the door to her house and vanished inside. Char could see neat piles of sealed cardboard boxes, all labelled in marker, lining the narrow hallway. The labels said things like ‘dresser’, ‘desk’, ‘linen piles’ and such like, although they were clearly too small for these things. Char waited outside, studied the pair of rusting beer cans in the gutter, imitating Sarah Lucas’s penis. She pushed away the thought that no-one would find that funny around here. Tiff might’ve, if Char had bothered to point it out.

Tiff had some hope at one time in her life. She was with Lexi, who was in a band called Corgi’s Revenge, and who was still in school. Tiff wasn’t musical, but she became the de facto band manager after booking a decently attended show at the Nag’s Head. She thought Lexi was a free spirit and a glorious rebel of wild taste and glittering scorn for convention. She played Tiff music by Suicide and the 13^th Floor Elevators while she smoked butt ends in her room. Tiff was in awe; she’d never heard anything so original. She had that heart-bursting teenage hopefulness for the future that eclipsed her standard-issue teenage melancholy.

At seventeen, Lexi applied for university. Tiff did not, could not, and that was the end of that. It wasn’t that neither of them wanted to be friends, or lovers, anymore, but a combination of shame, pride, and sheer inconvenience made them peel off into different, unequal, directions. Last Tiff heard, Lexi was working as an area manager for some food retailer or other.

Tiff’s job, like everyone else on the street, was getting paid. There was an unspoken agreement: the Centre would pay, just a few questions asked to keep the file hanging together. A narrative of misery kept the wolves from the kerb, the bailiffs from the gate. The people took the remuneration, did their bit for keeping inflation rates down. Not one person could explain why this was necessary; it was as though stating this fact was an explanation in itself, rather than just a description of the state of things. The progress from Victorian moral ideals was non-existent; perhaps that’s always true. The pay was predictably poor, unless you had a chronic illness. It wasn’t worth making that happen, for Tiff, so she had her bit on the side. Let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, indeed. She had seen it all, heard it all; she was the curator of a museum to human angst. People came to her wailing with all the sickness of their souls. The tales she heard, all coming out over a tiny cup of kindness.

On the deckchairs, Char and Tiff watched the approach of a young man wearing an unwashed sweater. It said University of Life – School of Hard Knocks on the front in cracked applique.

‘Morning Tiff-wah,’ he said. ‘Who’s your mate?’

‘Char.’

‘Hi,’ Char said.

‘What’s happening Lynyrd.’

He was called Lynyrd because he had a skinhead.

‘Ah, just come for some room fillers from you, Tiff. Desk, shelves, lots of books, stuff like that. Gaana make me a study.’

‘Right you are. Sure you have plenty to do in there.’ He smiled at the joke. ‘Special offer today Lyn, since we have a new friend here. Nine bob for a three-day loan, enough inflatables to fill your spare bedroom.’

Tiff hoisted herself from her deckchair and went into her hallway. She gathered boxes, selecting from different piles.

‘When’s inspection,’ she asked Lynyrd.

‘Prob tomorrow, maybe day after, so our lad in the Centre said.’ He took the boxes, set them on the low wall and handed Tiff a pile of coins. ‘He wasn’t certain, so I’ll set up today.’

‘See you later then.’

‘Bye Char,’ Lynyrd winked over his shoulder as he sauntered away.

‘Here, it’s a full time job, getting paid,’ mused Tiff.

A kind of rising boil sent bubbles up through Char’s consciousness, bursting with realisation at the surface. She was the kind of person who was often told she read too many books, or else watched too many documentaries. She took the ideas, distilled them into soundbites, and impressed her friends. You needed a different kind of intelligence here, she realised. Char, a stealthy anthropologist by circumstance, did not fit in. She was a set dresser, for God’s sake! The job had gone with the theatre. She would get paid for three months, no questions, and her house was paid for too. Next, she’d been told, she would need a doctor’s note. Accreditation of her worthlessness: the more useless you were, the more you got paid. Char needed therefore to foster a disability – bad hand (wandering hand?), perhaps chronic stress, or buy into the school of thought that said the more embarrassing the better, since the exams were more perfunctory. She could go for psoriasis: it was easy to fake, if you didn’t mind rolling around in the nettle bed in the rec.

Tiff supped at her cup, pointing the word TWAT at the world. Clara had bought her this mug, knowing Tiff’s sense of humour. Clara, in fact, was next to join the two women in the crummy front yard. Tattoos of angels and cherubim honoured her arms. A dolphin leapt up behind her ear.

‘Lyn’s been by,’ said Tiff. ‘Bedroom inspection coming up.’

‘Sure. I got paid today Tiff! Only a two hour queue at the Centre.’

‘Did you. What about little Daniel’s…’ she paused and glanced at Char. ‘You know.’

‘Oh, some make-up on his eye was fine. No questions. Green was really sorry about that.’

Green was named green for his tendency to throw up on nights out, or heavy nights in.

‘Won’t be the last time,’ the oracle spoke. Char tried to take it in her stride.

‘Maybe. Anyway, here’s what I owe you.’ Clara did not speak to Char. ‘Are you out here for the funeral?’ she asked Tiff.

Tiff sighed. I suppose, she said.

Clara took a seat on the wall. Gradually, people up and down the terraces came out of their houses and stood in their yards, or sat on walls or the dusty kerb.

Presently a man with long sideburns and a ten-gallon hat came slowly along the street. He was leading a procession. Next there were some children in boots, ponchos and the like. Country music played from a portable stereo carried by a crying woman in a waistcoat and a string tie. The hearse crunched slowly behind. Instead of flowers around the casket, there were spaghetti western accoutrements: saddles, lassos, some animal skulls and more ten-gallon hats.

‘Len loved the wild west,’ explained Clara. ‘Shame he never made it over there. Charles Bronson was his favourite.’

Char was struck by the effort for the costumes, the procession, contrasting baldly with the pride over homes.

‘He really didn’t deserve this.’ Clara continued. ‘He died too young.’

This made Char talk, properly, for the first time since arriving.

‘You are saying that because you think you should. People always say that people don’t deserve death, but we all deserve it just by being born. You haven’t a cat’s chance in hell of not meeting it, and it doesn’t matter if you are good or bad or just normal. Your … Green, or whatever he’s really called, may be a child beater, but it doesn’t mean he deserves death more than the rest of us. It’s a cult, we all buy into it, that each of us are special individuals. We are not. We just are not. All of us, we are a species of animal. You wouldn’t talk about individual … rabbits, or something. It’s a mistake as old as, I don’t know what. Old as people, maybe. There is nothing, nothing that sets us apart from that there wild barking dog.’

Tiff whistled slowly through her teeth. She idly wondered which book Char had got that from.

a ninth new reflection...'philosophy and presentation in politics'

Politicians may have a philosophical basis for their politics but they need to present the philosophical grounds for their policies to the electorate before discussing the ins and outs of the policies themselves.

There is apathy in the UK towards politics or indeed a lack of understanding because the average Joe, you or I, find it hard to translate what government, or the opposition or the Liberal Democrats are really saying.

Policies form the basis of electoral manifestos but who outside of government that is not directly affected by a deleterious ‘initiative’ such as the bedroom tax can really begin to comprehend the significance of Labour’s 2015 election pledge to abolish it? Or why it matters for the future of the economy that the UK stays part of the European Union when one isn’t able to unpick the acronym FDI? Or get a handle on the free schools debate without being intimately involved or without reading the broadsheets and political blogs whilst taking notes?

All three from Cameron, Miliband and Clegg could benefit by explaining the politics of their respective parties on a more emotive basis. For example, Miliband could put first his belief in the old leftist philosophy of politics being concerned with the support and wellbeing of the less well off, the marginalised, the weak foremost in explaining his desire to scrap bedroom tax which has left thousands of less-abled people in arrears on rent, scrimping on basic foodstuffs and being under constant bombardment from local authorities.

Beginning with the philosophical grounds for politics when engaging with the electorate is something the recently maligned Natalie Bennett, leader of the Green Party, in part understands. It is little wonder that Green Party membership has shot up in the last five years. Yes, green issues (small ‘g’) are increasingly rising up the political agenda (and rightly so in my opinion) but the Greens have also been able to present themselves as an alternative to the ‘big three’ by advocating their politics on a strong, or at least comprehensible philosophical and emotive level.

That the Greens will not threaten Westminster this summer is not down to the presentation of their political philosophy, or perhaps even their cringe-worthy manifesto launch at the end of February, but because they have proved consistently unable to communicate very well the practical application of their philosophies and ideals in real terms.

It is crucial that politicians understand the need to gen up on the ins and outs, facts and figures that will determine whether their policies will be able to be implemented if ever they get the chance, however, to re-iterate, I feel the communication of this information to you and I – the electorate – should come after they have explained why on a human level, a base philosophical-political level, they are trying to or will try to action a particular initiative.

Recently I was told by someone in the same ‘social group’, belonging to much the same socio-economic background – ABC1 – that Nigel Farage ‘had some interesting things to say’. He does have some interesting things to say but they are only interesting in the Noel Coward way – Coward used to use the term ‘interesting’ in response to people, their opinions, their art he thought diabolical.

But Farage appeals to people, in spite of what should be seen as his underlying racism, xenophobia, homophobia and sexism, not to mention his complete misrepresentation of a number of important statistics (see his recent comments on ‘immigrants with AIDS’ and drugs money used for ‘their’ treatment) because he has an emotive, quasi-philosophical element to his presentation, the ‘everyman’ with views and feelings ‘just like you and I’ (heaven forbid!).

While it may make Farage cry into his Weetabix, these days we live in the UK in a multi-everything society.  The 2011 census confirmed that we are a nation of nations with over 20% of the population coming from ethnic and cultural backgrounds other than White British. This is increasingly the case in Europe, and indeed across various parts of the world.  While it is true the diverse elements of society in the UK would likely benefit from becoming more integrated this will only happen with a larger interest, understanding and involvement in political discussion that begins from the bottom up. But, in turn, this somewhat relies on those at the top – our political leaders – better engaging and communicating their core beliefs before (though absolutely not excluding) the detail in their politics. After all, politics and the consideration and debate thereof should concern (and I associate the word concern with compassion, empathy, inclusion and involvement) as many people as possible; it might encourage the UKIP voter to look beyond the bridge of his or her nose and over the garden fence.

an eighth new reflection...'my cat'

My cat, Smudge, died overnight. She reached a decent age for a feline – eighteen by my calculation. She arrived wide-eyed at twelve weeks with her brother, Sooty, just after Princess Diana expired in a car wreck in Paris. Cars to humans and cats are a violence: Sooty suffered death by automobile in 2003, Smudge narrowly avoided the same fate a year later and spent much of her life with hind leg pinned - when she sat, her hind leg stuck out like a furry black and white bookend! Nevertheless, it didn’t render her an invalid and she had three litters of kittens, all farmed out to friends and relatives, and went to cat heaven a happy, albeit slightly wasted, snaggle-toothed old woman. At least the water-boatmen, painted ladies and the dragon flies that regularly dive-bomb the garden pond are safe again this summer. All there will be left behind is malted and matted animal hair on the upholstery of every living room chair, pale wisps of undifferentiated nothingness; the low-edged, cream coloured plastic bowl I used to feed from as a baby, that Smudge gobbled IAMs for two decades, will return, rinsed and washed to the kitchen cupboard ready for grandkids (?). And life may come full circle once more.

a twenty eighth new story...'short sad ballad of jon bon jovi'

They found Jon Bon Jovi slumped against a wine palette in one of the back rooms at Majestic. He was sound asleep, passed out, surrounded by the detritus of the previous night: two half finished bottles of red wine, the chewed over remains of a ham and cheese baguette, and a supermarket salad bowl of tabbouleh – JBJ hadn’t made a start on dessert, a now defrosted, and slightly dewy cardboard packet of Viennetta.

Staff in their air-tex shirts tried to wake him: first with gentle cajoling, then with rather less gentle slaps to the face, left, right, then an ice bucket (which one of them filmed for social media), and when this didn’t work, Ivy suggested messianic chant; she had been reading up on black magick and or the Carthusians once again.

Finally JBJ came around, blinking determinedly.

Chris offered him a banana, Ivy stopped chanting and blushed crimson. JBJ rubbed his face, it was stinging for some reason.

And then he remembered his wife, and the dispute over pancakes, First it was lemon, sugar or Nutella (JBJ favoured the latter), then she wouldn’t let him toss the damned things! And then awkwardly he recalled how he had thrown a cake tin at her head. Not strictly rock and roll. There would be making up to do. And probably some extra demands for Lent (JBJ and his wife had already agreed to give up Swiss cheese, and JBJ had promised to stop watching television in the lounge with nothing on. ‘You are trivialising the news!’, exclaimed his wife, as another article on Putin and the Ukraine unfolded before JBJs naked eyes).

‘Where am I?’, slurred JBJ, pulling himself into a sitting position and adjusting his faded blue jean jacket.

Ivy bit her lip, and Chris, in between mouthfuls of banana, told him: Majestic, Richmond Road, Putney. 

‘How did you find me?’, JBJ asked woozily.

Chris pointed to the bowl of tabbouleh and the trail of wheat grains leading to the fire exit.

JBJ looked accusingly at the tabbouleh.

If hadn’t been on special offer, he thought miserably, regretfully.

Then his mobile phone rang: it was Richie Sambora.

‘I wanna rejoin the band’, Sambora spluttered from speaker phone.

And JBJ spewed into his lap.

a twenty seventh new story... 'act of killing'

Corey rolled over on his side, woke and felt the flayed skin on his knuckles.  He lay for a while gazing obliquely, half open eyes, at the flaking, red-brown paint on the bedroom wall. Trudy was mumbling in her sleep, deep, drunken sleep. He hated himself when he got angry, when frustration and aggression came hurtling out of him, and he hated the way he let Trudy’s patronising pleas for him not to get beaten up, not to fight, spark him into action.

He had won alright. But it didn’t feel right, it wasn’t who he was. Corey prided himself on his kindness, and his kindness protected both himself and others from the worst parts of his nature. Whisky, beer, whisky, beer several times over. Now he was left with guilt, and a busted fist. He had heard the man’s jaw crack, and his teeth shatter like brittle ivories, and he had hit the man on the floor and the man’s blood had covered his best, Saturday shirt, speckled his hot, red face. It took three to pull him off, four to kick him out the door, with Trudy, distraught, stumbling behind.

He knew his friends would look at him funny next time. ‘That Corey …’ The boys would forgive him. The girls would question his character, and Trudy for staying with him. And one by one he would apologise to them. ‘I’m a scrapper’, he would say, ‘an’ I never amounted to much besides. I’m sorry’. And he would give them a bear hug as warm as he could. But he would never tell them of his silent fury, always close to blistering up through the freckles on his skin, broiling just under; the everyday struggle to be gentle, the effort it took to be with Trudy, and how down and wounded he got when she was flighty, when she didn’t love him back, when she slept with Chase, how for that reason he knew he could not hurt Chase, and how he was too vulnerable to change anything real for the better, for himself or for Trudy.

It was getting light, and the blue grey dawn was breaking across the low ridge of hills seen from the trailer window. Trudy would not stir for a while, and he left her sleeping, snoring, mumbling, childlike, and laced his boots, pulled on a heavy jumper and stepped out into the yard. From the rusting, corrugated iron outshed he took his rifle, and a box of rounds from the high shelf at the back, put on his cap and headed up the clay track, bordered by young pines, marching down the valley. He was looking for rabbits, or grouse, dim, stupid pheasants, anything as worthless as he felt at that moment; something to shoot, take home to prove he wasn’t just a scrapper; to prove that Chase meant nothing, that Trudy was the world to him, that in the act of killing, she meant life and his undying sacrifice.