Author: Alexander Fawn

You would certainly consider them a strange couple.

As young adults, both working, both living solitary lives, they had met quite by chance in a hospital waiting room. At that time, without fully understanding how it occurred or why, something magical happened. Something that neither of them would find at all easy to explain. So, they didn’t. There was no need. They were simply a match, and being such, married very soon after this and set up house. They found a great deal of enjoyment being in one another’s company and lived what they both considered to be a simple and contented life together. There were times through the years when one or other of them would question the whys and wherefores of it, but such delving always ended with the mutual agreement that it really didn’t matter.

On this Sunday morning, such a conversation had just taken place in their front living room. It was where they liked to eat breakfast on a weekend. The room’s large bay window gave a view of the street with its passing pedestrians and local traffic. A view that suited them both.

He said, “Pass the marmalade, pet,” without speaking.

She handed him the jar, without hearing.

Her girlfriend had arranged the meeting for her.

This would be her first blind date. Her friend had told her so much about him. It was as though she knew him already. She knew his hair colour and height, along with his place of work and the gym where he worked out. She’d been given a full rundown on his schooling, where he grew up, what sort of movies he liked, the type of books he’d read, She knew about his favourite sports and the type if car he drives, his favorite drinks, his taste in music and his hobbies. She was told about the pets he grew up with, where he’d been on holiday and where he banks. She knew about his preferred cologne, along with his views on politics, who he voted for, which charities he donates to, even his sleeping habits. She knew all this!

She was in the busy shopping centre sitting on a bench seat opposite the florist shop as arranged, when she caught sight of him. He looked even better than the photo her girlfriend had given her. She got up and stood at the end of the seat to allow the shoppers to go by. As he approached, he seemed to be smiling. As she stepped forward, he walked straight past her, off into the crowded mall.

Was he meeting someone else or did he not like the look of her?

She would never really know.

Do we know just what it shows,

That mirror, mirror on the wall?

Do we really need to know

Who’s the fairest of them all?

–

What is seen, when we look?

Do we ever wish to hide?

There is a feature we can use.

Turn it to the other side.

–

Do they show just what they see?

Or do they see far more than that?

Are they looking at our soul,

Or just whether we are thin or fat?

–

Do they mirror what they see?

Do they really tell us much?

Are we ever brave enough

To let a friend act as such?

–

If facing an opposing wall,

A moving image will fulfil its role,

With its face, facing back and forth,

Allowing it to meet its goal.

–

Are we at one with what we see,

Standing, standing, staring there?

A summing up of what we are,

Far more than tweaking an odd stray hair.

–

Is the obvious all we see?

And since it never makes a sound,

Is it telling where mysteries lie

Or simply where the truth is found?

–

Do we ever really doubt,

That a faithful reflection is showing there?

Or that a mirror, mirror on the wall

Could ever possess the will to care?

The old man in the purple robe looked out of place on the busy sidewalk.

He was there all day. He didn’t seem to be bothering anybody, just strolling back and forth, summing people up. It looked as though he had a question and was trying to make up his mind who to ask. Most of the time he stood in front of a doorway to a small shop that appeared to be vacant. The door behind him seemed to glimmer slightly, looking as though it was once the entrance to a night club. The rest of it was boarded up. The old man kept watch. He just randomly wandered away for a while now and then, checking people out.

The young man, dressed in an office suit and carrying a briefcase came into view and the man in the coloured robe stepped forward. He held up a hand and smiled. “Excuse me, may I have a word?” he said, his tone soft and polite to the point of being mesmerising.

The young man paused, trying not to make it too obvious that he was checking the time. He said, “How can I help you?”

The old man’s smile widened. “Well, now, that’s very nice of you to ask, but I was in fact thinking that I could help you.”

Slightly confused the other said, “Erm, I’m on my way to work right now. What’s it all about?”

“Yes, I can see that. I wanted to make you an offer.”

With eyebrows raised, the other said, “As I say, I am on my way into the office.”

“It really is something quite special,” the old man said.

“I’m sure it is, but…”

The old man, quickly said, “This offer only comes once in a person’s lifetime!”

Checking the time again, the young office-worker said, “Look, will you be here after five?”

“Yes, I’ll be here.”

“OK. I’ll look for you when I leave the office, I promise.”

The old man saw the younger man’s good nature and honesty. He bowed gracefully, saying, “That will be perfectly fine.” He stepped back, gracefully waving him on.

The man’s day moved slowly at first. He was continually thinking about the morning’s incident. However, these thoughts were dismissed abruptly when he was called into the boss’s office. He was told yet again that his calculations on one of the estimates he’d prepared was wrong. He was further told that if it happened once more he’d find himself out of a job. Needless to say, the rest of the day was miserable. He couldn’t wait to get out of the place.

He was making his way back to the train station. He hadn’t forgotten his commitment to the strange old man, but it nevertheless took him by surprise when the robed figure stepped out of the shimmering cavern of the doorway to greet him. With a kindly smile, he said, “Do you have time now?”

Feeling awkward, he replied. “Yes, of course I have. Thank you for your patience. Can we start again?”

“Most certainly,” came the reply, “as I said earlier, I would like to make you an offer.”

The man nodded. “Go on.”

He turned and pointed at the mysteriously flickering curtain that was obviously an entrance of some kind. “Would you like to enter paradise?”

The young man brought his case up to his chest and hugged it. He just stood still for a while, before realising the old man had placed his hand on his arm. “It is entirely up to you.” He stepped to one side. “Your choice alone,” he said.

The young man said nothing, but walked slowly into the portal.

Throughout the year there had been several killings.

All of the victims were young women. A nervous public was being asked to stay alert and feed any information, using a dedicated number, to a squad of detectives working round the clock. The stabbings had all been carried out in the same way. There was no doubt that they were up against a serial killer.

One of the officers working on the case was concerned about his girlfriend. She didn’t seem to understand the risk involved working nights and walking home from the hotel during the late evening. He had provided her with mace spray and a small personal alarm; both items were easy to carry in her bag or pocket. She reluctantly accepted these, but mainly to keep him happy. They also had an agreement that she would text him the minute she was home. The time she arrived home was regular and consistent, and he would be waiting for her message.

This worked well for several months, putting his mind at rest. The night she failed to text for several minutes beyond her normal time, he went into panic mode and eventually called her mobile. After several rings she answered. “Honey!” he blurted, “are you OK? You’re late.”

He heard her giggle. “Oh! You old worry guts. I’m fine. I just spent nearly twenty minutes trying to find my phone. I really thought I’d lost it for a while. Found it under the bed! I must have dropped it getting changed then kicked it without noticing. Sorry, I know how uptight you get about it. I promise, I’m perfectly OK.”

He blew out air with relief. “OK. Just make sure you keep your phone handy. You just never know when you might… well, you know.”

“Need it? Yes, alright Sweetie, I promise.”

“Is your door locked?”

“Yes, of course it is. Now do stop fussing honey. OK?”

After a moment he said, “Sure. OK. Sleep tight, honey.”

She whispered, “Goodnight, my knight in shining armour” and blew him a kiss down the phone.

She removed her latex gloves, dropped them into a plastic bag along with the switchblade, emerged from the alley, and with smug contentment, made her way home.

It was the rumour that the B&B was haunted that made it so popular

The couple, who were avid ghost hunters, were staying overnight with their young daughter. When they came through for breakfast in the morning, the elderly landlady went through her regular spiel about disembodied spirits wandering around during the night. She rambled on about the child that had often been seen wandering around with her teddy bear held tight against her chest who never stops crying or the lady with the lantern who goes through the house from window to window waiting for her lover to return. She smiled with pride when she said her most popular ghost was the black knight who clanks around in full armour with his head tucked under his arm.

“Did any of these visit during the night?” She asked, obviously enjoying her regular morning performance.

The couple looked disappointed. “No, nothing,” said the man. He looked at his wife. She shook her head and said, “Me neither.”

As she served food to the table, the old woman said, “Oh! Well, never mind. They don’t come every night.”

A small voice said, “I did.”

The mother turned. “You did what, darling.”

The precocious child spoke up. “Have a visit,” she said, matter-of-factly.

Both parents stared at her.

“Yes,” she went on, “A man came into my room last night. He had red hair and a big moustache. He was very dirty and there was blood on the side of his face. I think he was lost. He looked very angry.”

Excited, the mother said, “Wow! Honey, aren’t you the lucky one? Did he say anything?”

“Yes. He said he would never forgive her for what she had done.”

With this, their host turned very pale, looked across at her late husband’s photo on the shelf, then slowly walked across to the window and looked out at the flower bed. Her guests looked on as she moved to the kitchen sink and leaned over it, obviously feeling faint and sick.

As she hung there, she considered her options…

She stood in a special place, allowing the joyful feelings of a decade ago to wash over her.

She embraced the living thing, pushing her cheek into the patterns of its rough surface. An outer skin that hid the living power deep within. Her arms held the trunk in a tight embrace. With eyes closed, she breathed in the tang of sap and the surrounding woodland. This was her favourite tree. This was a return; this was a confirmation of a special love pact made by a child, and this was goodbye.

It was only a tiny wood, so very close to her old home. Such a small patch of shrubs and trees, but a place full of magic all the same. It had been her wonderland before they moved away. Her father no longer having work when the old timber mill closed. The family having to resettle elsewhere. Even now, she recalls the bitter sadness of it at the age of eight. She remembers the response when she had begged her parents to stay. Their insistence that it was simply part of life that sometimes you had to move on, was at the time, and is seen now, as perfectly reasonable. Back then, to a young girl first learning about nature, it was a wrench away from some kind of newly found ownership.

She smiled softly into the old craggy bark, remembering the jibes from her playmates, who without any real malice, called her a tree hugger.

She had passed the big yellow machines and the men in their bright jackets on the way to her reunion. Skirting the main activities she had manage to get to the spot unseen. She knew there was no stopping it. She had seen it time after time on television, demonstrators chanting, protesters chained and padlocked to machinery, people up trees; all to no avail. Land clearing for a road, a new housing development, just about anything where trees were not needed, it was just something that had to happen. She wasn’t entirely comfortable with her acceptance of such things. To be here now, half waiting for some gruff voice yelling and ordering her to leave the area was proof enough that she cared. For her now, it was simply a matter of letting go.

As she made her way back to the bus that would take her home, the hum and rattle of machinery and the buzz of chainsaws slowly faded.

He had always found it ironic that his powers made him an outcast.

The young man wasn’t able to live among others. He wasn’t able to make friends and enjoy the social life that other eighteen-year-olds could. Even if he could become fully in control of his abilities, he’d be nervous of inadvertently letting loose with a burst of magic that would be his downfall. He could so easily slip from the status of outcast further down into the status of being undesirable, unwanted, and eventually, criminal. Most of the time he was able to regulate his supernatural abilities, but there were times when his concentration faltered and he’d inadvertently demonstrate something in public. Like the time he’d sent a tiny fireball into the magazine rack in the news agency, when the man behind the counter had been rude to him. Fortunately, he was able to put it out, leaving only a few blackened edges and a stink of smoke before quickly moving on.

That was quite a while ago now, and he’d moved away from the location, but it had been a wakeup call for him and he had since spent a great deal of time practicing. The previously, little-understood mind control aspect of it all, was now much better managed. Although he derived a lot of pleasure from using his powers to make things happen, he was very careful to perform these in total privacy. Sitting now, at the back of the old, abandoned warehouse, he concentrated on the discarded plastic shopping bag that the wind had blown his way.

Idly, and with very little effort, he began the process of heating the bag up. He smiled, when after a few seconds, it stopped rolling around. It shrunk and became still. He watched as it gradually melted down into a grey, blistered ball. After sitting looking at it for a while, he had it rise slowly into the air and then hover on the spot. Then he had it catch fire. It was now a small black ball of melted plastic, wrapped in flames and spinning slowly in mid-air.

He willed it to travel up further before drifting off to one side. It kept moving until it was directly over an old oil drum. It hung there, burning. Not knowing what the drum contained, he decided to put it out. Moments later, a small raincloud appeared above it and a steady rain fell, soaking it for a few seconds. Once out, he let the thing drop into the bin with a clang that made him grin. However, at that moment, his look turned to fear as he realised the man standing at the corner of the building must have witnessed the whole thing. He had to think fast.

The stranger looked older than him and gave the impression that he was a fellow street person. He staggered forward, clutching a bottle with his mouth hanging open. He would obviously be curious and full of questions. The younger man stood and faced him. He smiled and said, “Hello, friend. You’ve seen nothing strange here.” The man blinked a few times and said, “No, you’re right. I’ve seen nothing strange here,” and kept walking, taking an occasional swig from his bottle. The young man had long felt that he had the ability to perform mind control, but he had never before had the opportunity to put it into practice.

One thing was for sure; day by day his powers were growing.

He had never been a smoker, but watching others provided a lot of entertainment.

His office was on the third floor and his window gave him an excellent view of the spot where smokers gathered regularly. He would often sit, staring down for untold minutes, observing the comings and goings. It was his own private one-man gallery. He knew what his window looked like from down there. It was a large, tinted and impenetrable square of shiny glass. In short, no one knew they were being watched. He had his favourites, of course. He could sit in on mild seductions as they played out. People smoking and flirting at the same time. He had read somewhere that the word ‘smirting’ had been dreamt up to describe the practice.

Then there were the swaggerers that moved about puffing and flicking ash; these he called the posers. Occasionally he’d be treated to the furtive character with a guilt complex; continuously checking up and down the street, presumably looking out for anybody that might recognise them. He had been watching all this drama unfold for several years, and had only occasionally had twinges of conscience, regarding the amount of time he spent doing it. That was, until recently, when he had an uncomfortable experience with the young guy whose job it was to distribute any papers, mostly legal, that needed to be in hard copy format.

The truth of the matter being that he was caught. Caught in the act of gazing out of the window for a number of minutes, the exact timing of it unknown, instead of carrying out those duties for which he was paid. The lad had only just started with the company and had obviously entered without knocking. He just stood there smirking. That’s when it began. After that, the smartarse would knock, but only after walking up to the door very slowly, and making it quite obvious that he was trying to catch a glimpse through the frosted glass of his office. The whole affair had taken the shine off what had been a most enjoyable pastime. Meanwhile, it had to be said that the kid wasn’t well liked around the offices, owing to his cocky attitude and his general smugness.

The manner in which this all got turned around in such a brief and unexpected moment a few weeks later, was truly remarkable. It was fairly late in the working day when he happened to be indulging himself, peering out onto a quiet street. Two lads walked to the spot and both lit cigarettes. They were obviously not happy with each other. Body language alone told the watcher that they were arguing. It all became heated and fists started to fly. He looked on for several minutes as they rolled around on the ground exchanging wild punches. It all stopped suddenly when one of them stood up. The other lay still, very still. It was only at this point that it became evident that the one on the ground was the smarty pants from his office.

At first, as he watched the boy bend over checking for a pulse, he had a natural urge to phone the police and report what he’d seen. The boy stood again, looking sickly pale and looking franticly for any potential witnesses. After looking around, making sure he was leaving nothing behind, he walked away slowly, disappearing out of view.

Naturally, ongoing enquiries were made, following the discovery of the body and the immediate headlines. Several people in his office were spoken to with the hope of finding any possible witnesses. He himself was questioned, but not in his office, not near his window. He made sure he was elsewhere in the building when he spoke to the police. To further put himself out of the picture, he told the officer he was in a meeting during the estimated time of the attack. Of course, such a minor falsehood went by unnoticed. In the weeks that followed, any feelings of guilt or remorse regarding his silence slowly faded. In fact, it was all he could do to refrain from thinking kindly about the boy that got away.

After all, watching others provided such a lot of entertainment.

When the elderly lady in number fourteen went to her mailbox she got a surprise.

She nearly missed the small piece of paper folded neatly in half. She could just make out that it was a handwritten note. She took it back inside and found her glasses. She was feeling curious and a little excited. She nestled into her armchair and read.

Hello

I just wanted to say that I’ve always been impressed with the way you keep your front garden looking so lovely. You probably find my note rather strange, but I live a few streets from here and walk past it sometimes when I return home by bus, like today. My husband past away recently and as I was leaving for his funeral this morning, I ran over my cat. When I arrived there I was told that I had the wrong date and the service was yesterday. Then, when I went to leave, my car wouldn’t start and I had to have it towed to a garage. That’s why I came home by bus today, past your beautiful garden.

I hope you understand,

I just had to say something really positive, to alleviate all the negativity of my day.

Thanks.