Author: Alexander Fawn

She sat at the kitchen table finishing her shopping list.

It was unusual, in that most of the items were for other people. Despite this, she would need to visit a number of shops. There were only five items on the list, and they all needed to be ready for later. More specifically, during the early hours. The first three should be purchased some distance away from the area. The others needed to be ready, waiting for her, in the cupboard and the fridge. These she would buy from her local convenience store, on her return. For her, a can of red spray paint. For him, a small container of brake fluid. For them both, a large kitchen knife with a sharp point. Naturally, she knew where her boyfriend lived. She had recently carried out an internet search to discover the address of the girl he was two-timing her with.

For her, the paint, to be used to write something large and unpleasant on her front door. She didn’t know what, but was sure to think of something when the time came. For him, the fluid, this, she’d been told was particularly good at destroying a car’s paintwork, because of its extremely corrosive nature. She would target the car’s hood. For both of them, the knife, to puncture a back tyre on each of their vehicles.

For herself – a small bottle of her favourite Babycham and a packet of salt and vinegar crisps.

These, by way of a being a brief, yet thoroughly enjoyable celebration…

The old, dried-up wishing well stands in a quiet corner of the park, hardly ever visited.

The old man visits it from time to time. Usually, on his way back from the shops. Neither the children playing on the equipment in the central play area, nor their mums watching them, ever took much notice of him. They never noticed how he would pause momentarily to look at it, before moving on with his shopping bags. Why would they? None of them knew his secret. In fact, nobody did. Not his late wife or his children had ever been told about it. He simply couldn’t tell anybody what had happened that day, so long ago.

It all started in the school playground. He must have been ten years old. The school bully came up to him one day, totally out of the blue, and began pushing him around. This went on for a while, before he fell over and the nasty kid had walked away, laughing. He remembers the shock of it, rather than the pain. That was just the beginning. He must have been an easy target, because after that first incident, it went on and on for weeks!

He remembers telling the old pensioner, who lived a few houses up the street from where he lived, all about it one day, on his way home from school. The old man had never hidden the fact that he thought of himself as a wizard. Most people thought he was potty, but as a boy he had always liked him. He would call in and chat with him, at least once a week.

On the afternoon he had let the old guy know what had been happening at school, he was given a token. It looked like any other penny he had ever seen, but the man had told him that it was a powerful artifact, quite capable of granting a wish, if the wish was strongly felt. He listened intently as the old man had explained that using the wishing well in the park would do the trick. He went on to describe what needed to be done before tossing the coin in. Although he didn’t know at the time, that was to be the last occasion the two of them would spend time together, because the old man would pass away that night.

So, with all these instructions in mind, he went home knowing what he was going to do at morning break at school, the next day.

When the time came to confront the bully with the offer the old man had told him to make, using the exact wording to do it, he was amazed at how interested his tormentor was. The thought of the wishing well allowing the boy to become wealthy within only a few short weeks had easily done the trick.

It had just so happened that on the day in question he had left home without his lunchtime sandwiches. This meant that by the time the boys got to the park he was feeling desperately hungry. Not wanting anything to distract him from carrying out the instructions he’d been given, he concentrated on what he had to do. At the well, they stood on opposite sides, both leaning on the wall.

With the token in his hand and peering down into the dark water, he let it go. At that same instant, he felt his stomach rumble and he was momentarily distracted. First, he heard the plop, this was followed quickly by an even louder pop. What happened next, he had never fully understood. When he looked up, the boy was gone! In his place sat a small, individual pork pie, just like the ones his mother buys.

What followed was a bit of a blur. He remembers how, in a daze, he had walked back further into the park, where he found a seat. He recalls sitting there looking down at it for a long time.

Then, he ate it!

For his homework he had to write a short essay on City Governance.

He began to write:

Anna had to get the civic stats on human migration done by noon. Wow! she thought. That particular tenet, pushed so hard by the council, defied all logic and took pedantism to a whole new level. Her boss was such a ‘madam’! Her face grew redder when she thought about it. If she couldn’t listen to her favourite pop music radio station, with its regular feature of guitar solos with her Bluetooth earbud, she’d go nuts! She thought back to a time when she had dreamed of becoming a nun, but that was no longer on the radar. Even her mum agreed that it was all an unnecessary saga. Well, she’d do the deed, if that was what she had to do in order to keep her job, but she would refer to the matter in her next staff report.

He looked at what he’d written, in just eighteen minutes!

he knew it didn’t make much sense, but he just loved palindromes!

It was nighttime and they were some distance from the coast, when their engine failed.

The two men began to worry when they realised that they had no flares onboard. They had deliberately set sail without their mobiles. It was to be a ‘complete getaway’ for the afternoon. A complete disconnection from the world at large. No outside intrusions or interruptions, just a few hours of peace and quiet. They had been planning the afternoon for several weeks. The only thing they did have was a torch, that luckily had been left behind on a previous occasion. This would be the only way they could attract some attention to their plight. It was only a small torch, but they thought it would be bright enough to send some kind of signal.

The older man asked the other if he knew morse code.

“Not really,” said the other. “Why, don’t you?”

The older man shook his head. “Never had any need for it, I suppose.”

The younger man remembered something from his student days. “When I was studying Chronology, I do recall some interesting statistics about morse, but it wouldn’t help.”

“Really? What was that.”

“I’m afraid it wouldn’t help.”

“Well, tell me anyway.”

“OK. As I said, I was studying Chronology… that’s the science of arranging events in their order of occurrence in time. Anyway, this interesting stuff came up about the units of time spacing when using morse code. There are five basic points regarding this. The length of a dot is one unit, while a dash is three. The space between parts of the same letter is one unit, between letters it’s three and between words it’s seven units.”

The older man just shook his head.

The younger man shrugged and said, “I did say it wouldn’t help.”

Getting frustrated, the older man said, “Look, you must remember some of it, just give it a go. We don’t want to be stuck out here all night.”

The other picked up the torch and sat thinking for a few moments, before sending out a sequence of flashes

Meanwhile, two late night beach anglers became aware of the flashes. One said to the other, “See that? Do you think they’re in trouble?”

“No. they’re probably just signalling to a friend on land somewhere.”

“Who are they talking to?”

“Dunno… You don’t know anyone called Oso, do you?”

The investigators were attempting to figure out what had led to the woman’s death.

She was laying on the loungeroom floor with the cord still around her neck. According to neighbours, she was a quiet sort, not known to have many friends visit her at her flat. Yet, here she was in the room. The door hadn’t been forced, indicating that she must have let the perpetrator in. Why would she do that? There wasn’t much to go on. The only eyewitness, a woman just a few doors along in the same block, had seen a man walk past her window. This hadn’t helped; all she could say was that it could have been a man. This had been a short time before one of the other tenants discovered the door open. Because of how private the occupier had always seemed, she called out and stuck her head in.

Later that evening, the woman who had been questioned by the police as a witness, was on the phone telling her mother about it. She thought it was all rather exciting and had her feeling like some kind of celebrity. She was still talking about it several minutes later, when the doorbell rang.

She said “Hang on a minute mum.”

A short time later she came back on. “Sorry, mum, there’s a guy here with car trouble and needs to use the phone. I’ll call you back.”

She looked forward to their weekly chats.

It was fascinating to hear about how it was going over there. He was a nice enough guy, but she knew there were some things he got really touchy about. Being aware of this, she did her best to steer away from certain sensitive topics. When this did happen, he would simply clam up. This meant that the opportunity to find out more about what it was like over there and hear more stories about what the people were like, would be lost. Some of the people there had truly amazing stories. It was almost a year since he left, but their nighttime chats kept them in touch. She sat looking at the clock. It was almost time to see if he was available. She understood that there were times when he wouldn’t answer, but understood his situation and would have to leave it for another evening.

On this occasion, she got through easily

He said, “Hi! How’s it going?” She smiled; he sounded quite chirpy.

After spending a few minutes, generally catching up with all the latest, she went on to describe recent events at work. She was telling him about the girl who worked in the same office, and how they had become pretty pally. She said, “We went to the club the other night. Wow! We certainly did a lot of dancing that night.”

After a pause, he said, “Yes, well, I miss that.”

She said, “Do you mean the dancing, or not being there?”

She sat, looking down at her lap with nothing happening. After a long-drawn-out silence, she shook her head.

With a sigh, she put the Ouija board back in its box and slid it under the bed.

For some peculiar reason, his coming across himself was not a surprise.

It had happened when he was perusing the CDs in his local music store. At first, he didn’t recognise himself, but turning the corner at the end of an isle devoted to reduced items for sale, they momentarily came face-to-face. However, it was surprising to note that his other self, showed no sign of recognition. As they passed each other, he caught sight of the items the other was carrying. At least, the title of the one that was showing. Lady Gaga? Surely not. Had he read it right? Of course, he was no fan of her music, being more of a classical man, himself. Lady Gaga, wasn’t she banned from some clubhouse in America for turning up only dressed in her underwear? Whereas, it was only a question of taste, but, Lady Gaga?

That encounter had a profound effect on him.

It was less than a month later that he was taking a shortcut through a park, on his way back to where he had left his car. That was when he spotted himself again. This time he saw that he had a dog! It was obviously him, and the dog was clearly his. He had never been fond of dogs. He hated it when they jump up at you, even worse, when they bark nonstop late into the night. He had a growing sense that he would not like this other self.

He found a seat and sat watching for a time as his other self kept throwing a ball for the animal to chase and bring back. It was then that it came to him. The music store and the park were quite close together, indicating that his other self probably lived somewhere around this part of town. He decided that he would not use this shortcut again.

In fact, in future, for his own peace of mind, he would stay away from this end of town, altogether.

It was only a few thousand years ago that they began to pop up.

They showed up in various parts of the world, once the general idea got spread around. They were called holy men. Their role was to be a religious leader. A holy man. A person who came to be recognised as such. Each achieving a status that enabled them to claim that their belief system was the one true faith, it being the religious concept that claims superiority over other religions. There’s the rub d’you see? Right there! Anyway, over time the number of followers of these systems grew. Some more than others. Each one worshiping their own forms of deity, while the dark one, he who worships none of them, but looks on from the shadows. Shadows cast by fire.

For him, the contest between those striving to assert their one true faith leads to competition, power and struggle. He who lurks in darkness grows stronger as rivalry leads to war…

It’s all a bit of a mess, really.

Just saying.

The five-year-old girl possessed two quite remarkable attributes.

The two qualities in question were bravery and circumspection. These powerful attributes had never been put to the test until the night she heard the whispering coming from beneath her bed. She hadn’t been in bed long and was just becoming comfortable when the hissing sounds began. Something down there seemed to be asking her to join it; whatever it was. Pulling the covers off a little, she flopped over the side with her head almost touching the floor. It being naturally dark under there, she could only just make out some small thing that appeared to be moving around. With a sigh, she reluctantly climbed out of bed. Opening a cupboard, she took out a torch. Crouching down, she sent the beam from side to side, until finally finding the source of the troublesome noise that had disturbed her settling down to a proper night’s slumber.

Shining her torch directly at it, she came face to face with a tiny creature no more than two inches high. It was wearing rags that seemed to be in tatters. It was frightfully ugly, with large pointy ears. It appeared to have talons extending from its fingers and a wide mouth full of an extremely large number of sharp, spiky teeth. Raising its little arm, once again it whispered its invitation to join it.

She clambered to her feet and stood thinking for a while.

Returning to the cupboard, she searched around the shelves before finding a small plastic bag full of coloured play blocks. These she tipped out onto the shelf, as quietly as possible. Back at the bed, she switched the torch on and put it down on the floor, directing the light to where she had seen the thing. She laid down on her front and peered in. It was there, glaring at her with a wicked smile.

What happened next took only seconds. Holding the bag open with one hand she scooped it up and threw it into the bag with some force. Then, squashing as much air out from around the wriggling thing, she spun it around to form a twist that allowed her to make a tight knot.

Not wishing to disturb her parents, she crept out of her room and made her way to the upstairs bathroom. The creature’s scrabbling around made only a soft rustling noise as she made her way by the light of her bedroom’s open door.

At the toilet bowl, she opened the lid and dropped it in. Hoping that she wouldn’t have to do it twice, she selected full flush and pushed the button. After a short spell of gurgling, it disappeared.

Back in her room, she settled down under the covers. After a brief consideration concerning the possible repercussions of the night’s activities, she closed her eyes… within moments she fell asleep.

Under the circumstances, her bravery was not in question; and her circumspection was evident by her deciding to keep the whole annoying business to herself!

Throughout his entire life he’d been plagued by the same dream.

He couldn’t remember how or when it started; it just did. It wasn’t a bad dream, on the contrary, it was the entrancing image of a face. A lovely face. It was the face of a beautiful woman. Occasionally, she appeared to be looking at him through bars. These appearances he found particularly disturbing. Surely, this couldn’t mean that she was looking out from a prison cell! A face like that could not belong to such a person. As time went on, he became less sure about his ideas concerning the images. Finally, in his old age and knowing that the end was near, with each occurrence of it, on waking, he would try harder and harder to make sense of it.

It only became clear to him during the brief moment he drew his final breath.

It was the face that smiled at him as she sat beside his cot.