Author: Alexander Fawn

It was the snoring that actually caused the problem.

Had he not snored, had he just slept quietly at the back of the lecture hall, the entire incident would have unfolded in a different way. As it was, the professor felt that the student was taking up a place in the university that so many other more worthy applicants would have benefited from. This particular lecture was, as was totally recognised by the rest of his attendees, a pivotal one. Whether it was the feeling that the young man was depriving someone of the opportunity or simply the embarrassment he felt when the sound from the back of the room turned heads and caused a low titter around the room, was debatable. Either way, he made sure his annoyance was voiced when the last slide finished and students began making their way out.

He approached the student, who seemed to be slowly taking in his surroundings. He berated the young medical student the way any professor of medicine would. Pointing out what a waste of space he was and how important it was to attend lectures in a fit state. He also forcefully explained that it was also the professor’s importance in this student’s life that was not fully recognised. The admonishment went on until the student became teary, at which point the professor felt that he had said enough. In an angry mood he abruptly left the lecture room, leaving the offending student to gather up his books. Some of which had fallen to the floor.

It came as a shock to the professor on the following day to note that the student was missing from his class, being convinced that his hefty dressing down would have had quite the opposite effect. It was not until late in the afternoon that he had an even greater shock when he received the news that the student in question had passed away.

After making enquiries, he learnt the student had suffered from a medical condition. It had been sickle cell anaemia, a case of irregular sickled cells blocking blood vessels causing tissue and organ damage, along with a number of symptoms, including daytime sleepiness.

The professor asked himself whether he had been too harsh. Did this in some way have an unseen effect on the boy’s health or did the medical condition simply run its natural course? He came to the conclusion that the latter was bound to be the case.

At which point, he decided that he would keep telling himself that.

The sleeper stirred in the bed, groaning softly.

In his dream he was a soldier. There was a lot of noise going on, and he was running across an open field waving a flag. When he tripped and fell it had woken him up. He was now waiting at table. He glanced across at the Eifel Tower. He was a French waiter taking an order from English-speaking tourists, he was thinking that their accents could be German when a departing customer bumped into him. This caused him to wake and find that the pigs that surrounded him in the pen were making so much noise he could hardly hear what his young daughter was saying. She came closer and shouted that lunch was ready. He was obviously a pig farmer. He waved as he closed the gate. It came down on his thumb and it jolted him awake.

Now, he stood listening to a strange noise that he didn’t recognise. He looked around. A gush of wet concrete began to pour onto a metal grid. He was holding a shovel, and like several others was about to spread it out to create a floor. He was a construction worker on a building site. No sooner had he started spreading another man’s shovel clipped his leg. The pain snapped him wide awake for him to find that it was night time and the torch he’d been using was beginning to flicker. As a security officer, he was checking that the doors around the outside of the building were locked. When he tried the next one it opened, setting off an alarm. The piercing sound of the siren shook him back to consciousness, where he discovered that a train had pulled into the station and passengers were getting off. He was holding a small red flag.

He was aware that as a station guard he had to wait until everybody was clear before waving the all clear to the driver. When this was done and he was returning to the guard’s room he tripped on something and fell forward. He put out his hands to save himself and the impact with the ground brought him out of his sleep. He was still lying on the ground, but this time he was crawling under a car. When he reached the spot he needed to be at, he turned over and started to use the spanner he held to check that several nuts were tight. As a motor mechanic, he knew how important this was. As he was checking the last one the spanner slipped from his hand and fell, hitting him on the forehead. This caused him to wake with a start, to see his room! His room, yes, he was finally, properly awake and back in his room.

He laid still for several minutes. He was looking up at the bedroom ceiling trying to shake off all the images from his dream. Of course, he wasn’t any of those people, all of this had been a silly dream. All these different personalities had been conjured up by his imagination. However, he was suddenly shocked by the realisation that he couldn’t remember what he himself actually looked like! He stayed there even longer, trying to figure out how it could be that he had absolutely no memory of that!

Now, fully awake, he got up and stretched. This strange state of affairs could be solved in an instant. He went into the bathroom, switched on the light and looked in the mirror.

To his utter astonishment, he was a rather tubby, grey-haired woman in her fifties.

The first is the first of twenty six,

And this is easy enough,

But looking for two that appear at noon,

Is when things start to get tough.

–

You may say “Oh! Gee!” when looking for this.

Phonetics play a big part.

While seeking a pair in a vacuum,

Try not to pull them apart.

–

When looking for this,

It’s not so easy to miss,

Just how common can you get?

And what is to come,

Although rather humdrum,

Is the nastiest of them yet.

–

So, when digging so deep

Into what nexus we keep,

It’s hardly worth the fuss.

The statistical measure of the linear relationship

Between a dependent and an independent variable

Can be simply represented thus.

For most of his working life he had been a dedicated employee.

For twenty-seven years he’d been with the company, working in their large production facility. He was always on time never arrived late, never left early, and rarely took sick leave. He did the cleaning, sweeping on the workshop floor, and spent most of his time cleaning the toilets. There were a lot of them. He dealt with the terrible smells, the slippery floors, and the complaints from staff when they have to be temporarily closed for cleaning. All of these issues he handled in a most polite and professional manner. However, all these ongoing problems paled into insignificance compared with the issue that he confronted every Friday.

On this day each week, he made his way down to the large noticeboard fixed to the wall near the main offices at the far end of the building. It was titled, ‘Employee of the Month’.

His name was never on it!

He was thinking about her as he made his way home.

They weren’t happy thoughts. They never were. Truth to tell, it wasn’t long after their marriage that he realised what a horrible mistake it had been. Two people, agreeing to share the rest of their lives together really had to think long and hard about the commitment they were making. Sounds simple, he thought, despite knowing how wrong they themselves had got it. It wasn’t until they were living together that their differences, in other words the things they didn’t like about each other, started to show up.

For him, it was probably the bathroom thing that had started it. It was the way she would always leave the bathroom in a mess, specifically, leaving her towel on the floor when there was a towel rail right there. As for the cap of the toothpaste tube, she didn’t use it, never put it back on, would leave it sitting on the side of the sink.

Also, she was such a noisy eater and often talked with her mouth full. Then there was the really annoying habit she had of tapping her shoe against the kitchen’s table leg. Then there was the way she was always exaggerating the most trivial matters. The way she spent too much time on the internet, and too much money placing orders on it, for stuff they simply didn’t need. The way she would sit continually clicking her pen. When they were out, the way she would leave her shopping trolley in the middle of the car park. The way she would stop and hold a conversation right in front of a doorway. He didn’t want to think about how many years he had put up with it.

As he opened the front gate, he told himself how much he hated it when these acrimonious thoughts came tumbling in.

However, as he unlocked the front door and entered the house, all these negative and disturbing thoughts where quickly blown away, as was often the case, with the comforting realisation that the woman was dead.

People ask, is it a place you visit?

An accounting, while passing through,

Part of some endless cycling thing,

Where you move on, after paying your due.

–

Do we want to know the truth of it?

Could the answer be divine?

Is our questioning even relevant?

Are we just searching for a sign?

–

Do we go to an endless sleep;

To a mortal’s final rest?

An instant state of oblivion,

With no pause for a moral test.

–

Are we meeting life’s deadline?

Doubts are commonplace.

Do we struggle there on hands and knees?

Or, do we walk with grace?

–

Is the final journey a lengthy one?

Do we need to cross a border?

How are we judged, if at all?

Is there a weighing of chaos and order?

–

What kind of judgment waits?

Is it a balance of love and hate?

Who made the reservation and when?

Do we want to know the date?

–

When the man with the scythe whispers,

As he does, again and again.

You can make your own enquiries.

You’re bound to find out then.

He was sitting quietly, waiting to be questioned about what he saw.

Once he’d seen it, he knew he had to report it. He wished he hadn’t seen anything. He wished he hadn’t been there when the meeting took place. It was only by accident that he was in the toilet cubicle when it happened. He hadn’t bothered to lock the door, that’s why the indicator showed vacant. They didn’t bother to check. It wasn’t much of a meeting. The whole thing took about a minute. Two clear plastic bags full of powder going one way, and a fat envelope going the other. All he saw through the crack of the door was two men. He couldn’t see their faces, just arms making the exchange. The only thing he could tell them was that one of them had an anchor tattooed on his arm.

He thought back to that moment, seeing the tattoo. Popeye the Sailor Man flashed through his mind, from comic books when he was a kid. They’d want to know about that! Just that tiny bit of information could help the police crack the case. But, of course, these people were ruthless. If they knew he was talking to the police, he’d be dead. One thing he knew about the bosses in the illicit drug trade, was that they would stop at nothing to protect their operation. There was so much money involved that they would make anyone who knew too much simply disappear, forever! If he made a statement, they would have to protect him as an unnamed witness.

He seemed to have been in the room a long time, since being told that a detective would be along soon. He was becoming more and more anxious as the minutes ticked by. He could hear his heart thumping. Was he doing the right thing?

The door opened and a man entered. Pulling up a chair, he smiled as he put paperwork down in front of him. He pushed up his sleeves and began shuffling papers around.

That’s when the other caught sight of it.

Popeye!

There’s an old adage that says what I say three times is true.

His routine was to take a break from his work on his laptop, by stepping out onto the patio, where he had a chair. Over time, it became evident that his cat, a large male, also found it a comfortable place to sit. Although, in his case, a comfortable seat cushion to curl up on and go to sleep. At first the man would see it as somehow cute and went to a nearby garden bench instead. Again, over time, he reconsidered his attitude and took on a more practical view. He felt that he had been too soft. With his new approach, he found it necessary to give the animal a few nudges before it jumped down.

The next stage of the affair occurred when, on occasion, he would find the cat on the chair and would only have to approach, talking to it, to have it reluctantly give it up, without him having to do anything. The final phase came when, on his opening the door to come out, the cat would look up and instantly hop off. At first he couldn’t believe his eyes. Then, he did it again. When he did it a third time… well, you know what they say about that. Anyway, when his pet did this, it invariably settled down next to the chair. It was this last development that had the man wondering.

He pondered over the idea that this was a most un-catlike thing to do. They, as a species, and being the way they were, tended to do exactly what they wanted, at least most of the time. Maybe it was a sign of respect? No. Give me a break, he thought. Maybe it was his age. After all, he was getting on a bit. Because he was getting old, it could be that he wasn’t up to making an issue of things; he was just looking for a quiet life. He wondered about that. What would his age be, compared to humans? He’d have to look it up. The whole thing had him puzzled.

Oh! Well, he thought, there’s another adage, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

The soldier was sent to make an adjustment, like so many before.

The year was 1171 and Genghis Khan was his target. The ruthless founder of the Mongol Empire. A brutal conqueror, responsible for the deaths of tens of millions. The Time Agency had sent him back to undo that part of history that saw so much suffering and so many needless deaths. The agency had calculated this to be the best time. The would-be warrior was nine years old and had just lost his father. He was about to become something that modern time travel and history patching could stop from happening. It could be put right; before it happened.

The man was crouching in a thicket of trees, watching the lad. Although several kilometres away, he could see him clearly on the screen of his super scope, mounted high on his long range sniper rifle. He had been given the precise moment to take the shot. A small timer on his wrist was counting down. The people at the agency had calculated exactly when the thread of time should be cut, followed by the man’s removal back to his own time, ten seconds later.

Like all these missions, a lot of time was spent preparing for it. He had been training for months for what was to be a ten minute mission. So much of the course had been given over to video lectures about all that was known about the empire builder. Surprisingly, the conqueror had shown extraordinary tolerance towards other religions. He even granted exemptions for tax relief on places used for their worship. After so much background information, some inkling of a bond had formed, along with strange doubts that the man was who history said he was. He considered that the fact that shooting a child didn’t sit well with him and no doubt explained much of his apprehension.

The assassin, having spent a number of years with the agency, had heard that several returns had been made to this place and time. There was definitely a great deal of extra security and there were so many stringent rules of confidentiality. These had been insisted on from the very beginning of the mission.

He blinked several times and focused on the boy, who had moved to the shelter of a tree, taking something from under his upper garment. The something appeared to be some sort of device. With trembling fingers he stroked the screen to increase magnification even more.

It was a mobile phone.

His mind raced as the timer beeped down the last ten seconds. He lowered his rifle. During the few seconds that remained he realised there would be one hell of a stink when he got back.

Then… he was gone.

He had the feeling that something was wrong the day he bought it.

His old coffee mug had seen better days, much like him. It was when it got chipped during the washing up that he decided to treat himself to a new one. It was definitely time for an upgrade. Whenever he was up at the shopping centre he would see what was on offer. It was on one of these occasions that he came across the shop by taking a different route to the bus stop. It was a strange little place that at first looked like a second hand shop, but at the same time everything in it looked new. Peering in through the front window he saw it. He went in. A very old woman, dressed entirely in black, appeared from somewhere. She came across as rather creepy. Anyway, she took the mug out of her window display and let him hold it for a while. It was white enamel, the right size with a nice handle. It was not at all expensive, so he bought it.

When he got home, he couldn’t wait to try it. He felt like a child again. He made a mug of coffee and sat drinking it. That was the first day. It wasn’t until the following morning that he noticed that the mug had some very strange symbols around it. They were faint and only just visible. He didn’t recognise any of them. The next thing he saw, when the cup was empty, that the thing had gone back to being white. There was not a mark on it! Day three was even more peculiar. Pouring boiling water into it brought all of the markings back. They were clear now, although undecipherable. He realised that the temperature was causing it. If this was a sales feature, the weird shop owner hadn’t mention it.

Over the next few days the symbols stayed. It was as though it had been primed somehow.  It was around a week later that the first incident of the mug moving took place. He had been sitting reading the paper when he had put the mug down on the coffee table and left the room. When he returned it was gone! Bewildered, he hunted around and finally found it sitting up on the shelf in the cupboard. He was absolutely sure he hadn’t put it there. He lived on his own; no one else could have done it. The next morning he was surprised to find it missing from where he had left it the night before, next to the kettle, where he always left it last thing at night. Eventually, he found it in the dishwasher.

The following day, it moved twice. It went from the middle of the kitchen table, were he had left it, to the narrow space between the kitchen sink and the window. He would never put it there! Then, because he left it there, in such a strange place, to go away and think about it, it was gone when he came back. This told him that it only moves if you take your eyes off it. So, when he finally found it, in the microwave of all places, he just simply never did that because he was not convinced that it was a safe thing to do, he decided to put his theory to the test. He would sit down with it right in front of him, for an hour if he had to, and not take his eyes off it.

He made his drink and took it through to the living room. He made himself comfortable, drank his coffee, and then placed the empty cup in the middle of the coffee table. He sat watching it. He was determined to keep his eyes on it all afternoon if he had to. More than an hour had gone by when a loud bang came from the street. Quite naturally, he glanced out of the window for the briefest of moments. It had probably been a car backfiring. He was thinking this when he realised that the mug had gone. In that tiniest instant, it had moved. He had proved his theory. As time went on, this evidence of it moving only when it was out of sight, made the whole thing a lot easier to live with somehow.

Shortly after this discovery, the lady from across the street, a friend he’d known for a number of years, called in to let him know she’d be away for a few days. Her son was picking her up and she’d be taking a holiday with his family. As usual, it was a request for him to keep his eye on the house while she was away. He said he was happy to do it and invited her in for a cupper. They’d been sitting for a while, with her telling him how much she enjoyed spending time with her grandchildren, when he decided to tell her about the mug.

Without describing the peculiar circumstances of how he had bought it or the gradual appearance of the strange symbols, he gave her a detailed, blow by blow account of its remarkable movements. Finally, he sat back, waiting for a response.

The elderly woman’s face crinkled into a smile. “Oh! I wouldn’t worry about that,” she said, “I have a teacup at home that’s always doing that!”