Little Liar
By Lizzie Jarrett
The naughtiest thing I did when I was a child was to lie to my parents – on a fairly consistent basis. I can’t narrow it down any more than this. My rationale at the time was that if I admitted to what I just done then that would mean a “telling-off” and I was absolutely not ready for a telling-off. After all, in my mind I certainly did not deserve a telling-off. Lying was the only option.
I would continue to lie barefacedly even if the evidence was firmly against me. So, when being asked if I had eaten all the mini Mars bars, carefully hidden in the highest cupboard in the kitchen, I replied ‘No, I had not’. ‘But why is there a growing pile of wrappers outside your bedroom window then’, my inquisitor asked. ‘I have no idea, the wind must have driven them there’, I answered, without a single pang of guilt.
If you asked me now whether I ever shoplifted as a child I would have to admit ‘Yes, I did officer, several times’. But if you had asked me as a child of eight or nine, ‘Have you just been shoplifting?’ then I would swear blind that the reason for the profusion of cheap portable tack hidden in my bedroom was that I had won it in a competition. And in a way I had; if you mean a competition to see who could nick the most rubbish from the local hardware shop. I even weighed my ill-gotten gains on the bathroom scales. In my head I reasoned that the owner of the hardware shop had it coming to him for always looking so bad-temperedly at me when I came into his shop. Obviously, in retrospect, he looked at me like that because he was fairly sure who was responsible for his loss of takings, but probably couldn’t believe such an innocent looking curly-haired cherub could be responsible.
My reckless inattention to the rules of the well-brought child went on. The next-door neighbour had a friend to stay, this “friend” offered me £5 to go down to the shops and buy him some cigarettes. I cheerfully obliged, but was turned down when I arrived by a concerned shopkeeper, who was unreasonable enough not to sell cigarettes to nine-year olds. During my absence one of my playmates (the daughter of a local lay preacher) had “turned me in” to my parents. I could lie all I liked, but on returning I was caught red-handed with £5 still in my possession. I can still remember the massive whoppers that had been forming in my mind. ‘No, I hadn’t been attempting to buy cigarettes, I had done the man a favour and he had simply given me the money to buy myself some sweets’.
In my childish mind I was so unaware of all of the implications of taking money from strangers, especially taking money for sweets, that I was shocked at my mother’s reaction as she rushed next-door to confront the “stranger danger”. As I sat in our front room trying to drink my glass of milk, I could hear my mother, a tiny woman of 5’ 1”, giving this slimy toad a piece of her mind. For a small person she could make a substantial noise when goaded. If she had used karate on the man, the effect could hardly have been more impressive; he and his friend left the house the following day never to return.
Possibly for this very reason, my mother usually dealt with all the “tellings-off” and punishment in our family. It wasn’t just the noise she could make it was the way her usually greeny-blue eyes turned to lumps of cold blue steel as she interrogated you before the great “telling-off”. Nevertheless, despite the risks, I was once again easily persuaded by my friend, Gaz, to trespass into our garage, whilst my parents were out on very rare joint shopping trip. The express purpose of the joint trespass was to let Gaz “examine” my dad’s car battery.
As we know now, the seventies were “different times” in so many ways. Many dads like to tinker with cars, my dad more than most. He was an engineer – another word for “he/she who likes to tinker with stuff”, so perhaps he should have understood. Why he had a car battery in his garage I really don’t know, but to Gaz it was temptation beyond endurance. I also knew perfectly well that I was not allowed to go into the garage without an adult. I had been told several times, I knew I was crossing the line. But Gaz, of course, had the power to persuade me otherwise.
It was only as the family Ford Cortina Estate drew up on the drive and Gaz and I emerged guiltily into the sunshine outside, hands dripping with battery acid, that I realised how right my parents were and how wrong Gaz and I were. There was no lying my way out of this one…
Names have been changed to protect the not-so-innocent.
At the eye clinic
By Lizzie Jarrett
Sitting in rows
Staring at walls
No sign of the sky
Waiting, waiting, waiting…
People come and go
Nurses call names, take details, record blood pressures
There’s an announcement….
Your consultant is running late
Guess who arrived early today?
Waiting, waiting, waiting…
A name is called, but it isn’t yours
Suddenly a flurry of activity
Drops are inserted, pupils dilate to a monstrous size, anaesthetic is applied
Your name has reached the top of the list
A lady in blue scrubs arrives
You go off cheerfully like you always do, charming the ladies
See you soon, even if it’s in blurry vision
The Killer
By Kev Neylon
If someone had asked me why I did it then my response would be what it always is. I did it for the money. That is what drives the majority of people on the planet to do anything. Money. We need it to live in these crazy times. The more we have however, the more we want of it. It’s one of life’s little paradoxes. The line between us working to live and living to work is so blurred it is difficult to tell if it is even there anymore.
So yes, I did it for the money. I did it because it was my job. I don’t need the money. Hell, I’ve got enough to last several lifetimes. I’m extremely well paid for what I do. And up to today I was very happy in my job. Anyone who only has to work a couple of hours a month would be; and when you get right down to the nuts and bolts of it, mine isn’t the most difficult job in the world. The biggest problem is usually getting away from the job at the end of the day. It’s like that for most people isn’t it?
I was always a good shot. I didn’t grow up in an environment that had guns on show. My early experience was with fairground stalls. Shoot the ducks; hit the target, that kind of thing. I instinctively knew how to aim and hit the target. How to ignore the deliberately poor sights on their guns, designed to make the paying suckers miss. I did a couple of years in my teens doing the whole laser quest thing. Twenty years down the line, I’m still the record holder for most points and kills in a single session at my old regular haunt.
Somehow along the way I transitioned from targets and toy guns to shooting at real live people. And getting paid to do so. For the last seventeen years, that has been my job. A hitman for hire, a contract killer, an assassin. I’ve never questioned the deeper reasons why that target for any hit I’ve done. On the whole it’s been old white males, perhaps an occasional woman, and even some twenty somethings along the way. But this was the first time ever I’d been given a target that was a child.
I should have known there was something hinkie about this job when I got a deposit on it twice the size of my usual fee, before I’d been given the target’s details. A six-year-old girl. When I saw the pictures, I had baulked at doing it. What the hell could a six-year-old child have done to cause someone to shell out a total of two million euros for the hit? The money wasn’t enough here.
I tried to refuse, only to have pressure applied on me. I saw the dossier they had, all the evidence from years of executions. Enough for me to never see the outside of a jail cell for the rest of my life. Granted, I probably deserve that. Then they took all my money. Every account cleared out in seconds, only to be repaid once the job was done. Finally, the “in the crosshairs” pictures of all my family and friends. All targeted if I didn’t do what they wanted me to.
And so, I shot that little six-year-old girl. I took aim and pulled the trigger. I closed my eyes and prayed for the first time in my life as the bullet flew through the air on its way to embed itself in the little girl’s head. I didn’t watch it as I had so many times before. I heard the thud of the body hitting the ground, and the screams of the people. I knew the bullet had found its target.
Did I believe the reasons those that had hired me had given as to why the girl was targeted? Not at all. I didn’t like the fact they had insisted on telling me. I’ve never asked before. And their reasons were just plain crazy talk. How on Earth could they know that this girl would grow up to be anything, let alone the woman who would spell the end of mankind by starting a nuclear war as the Prime Minister of the UK?
That was pure fantasy talk. There was no such thing as time travel. I had read a lot about it. Theoretically it was possible, but it wouldn’t be possible to come back to change the world. As soon as there was a change then the future where the time travel was discovered would be altered and it wouldn’t exist. Then they wouldn’t be able to travel back to make that change. It had taken me a lot of time and damaged brain cells to get my head around that loop. If they were claiming clairvoyance then I would laugh at them, it was just a myth. Something used by tricksters to prey on the minds of the weak.
My money had all reappeared along with my fee. I was a rich man. But I was tainted now. I have spent the last few hours setting up the required paperwork to give it all away. I wouldn’t need any of it anymore.
And now I sit here with a gun in my mouth. I can’t forgive myself for what I did. I press the trigger and the bullet travels through my head, and I’m dead within a split second.
Just long enough to have one final thought. What if that was the plan all along? The girl was collateral damage. I was the target all the time. Play with my mind to push me over the edge. It had all been a play and I had been paid to kill myself to prevent me killing anyone else in the future.
Damn.
Aging
By Kev Neylon
I try not to think
I try not to stink
I do well most of the time
Sometimes it just occurs
Sometimes my bowels stir
It’s not as if it’s a crime
I try to be kind
I try to use my mind
Yet there are occasions I fail
And my thoughts slip out
And my mouth does shout
And I see other people’s faces pale
I like silence more now
I like my furrowed brow
I’ve changed a lot as I’ve got older
I hate being in a crowd
I hate when it’s too loud
My attitude to other people has grown colder
I’m not nearly as nifty
I’m not admitting I’m fifty
Old age has crept up on me
My body is full of aches
My body would prefer cakes
Yet my bladder only wants to pee
In the morning I mumble
In the morning I stumble
It’s always too early to function
I sleep walk through work
I sleep walk wanting to shirk
I never seem to work properly until luncheon
I feel that I’m old
I feel I should be bald
But hair sprouts out of every pore
I’m happy to do nothing
I’m happy not to sing
And now I’m just turning into a bore
Brigid
By Neal Murdoch
Brigid was in trouble. It seemed like Brigid was always in trouble, at work and more significantly at home. It was open day at the university & she had far too much work awaiting her at the office. She took her normal stroll through Richmond Park soaking in the natural splendour before arriving at the concrete cuboid that was depression HQ or Harrison House as it was known to the rest of the world. Her stomach cramped from the beating it had taken last night but she shook her head in an attempt to sweep those memories away. As she walked into the lobby, she planted a smile onto her face to greet the receptionist & then trudged up the stairs to her office. She shut the door & turned the lock. Mondays were always the worst. Two solid days in a row with Simon and Friday & Saturday nights he was invariably drunk so, using any excuse to start a fight. On Monday morning she would be ready to leave him. She would spend most of the morning Googling the various organisations that could help her. She would draft an email to her Mother who she was banned from speaking to. Then by lunch her resolve would be broken, the email deleted & she was once again reconciled to the fake smile on her face whilst she died within. Contact with her mum, her friends, her brother all denied to her. She daren’t keep a diary lest it be discovered. Her thoughts and despair remained unexpressed and imprisoned within her mind. It was the shame that was affecting her most today. She held a doctorate in philosophy, she spoke Mandarin & was a successful lecturer albeit at a tarted up polytechnic, yet she found herself trapped. Alone with little chance of ending the situation outside of the large quantity of sleeping pills that she had hidden in her desk drawer. Alastair breezed past her window. He had once been her salvation but had recently married so that particular fantasy had been taken from her also. She took the pillow that she kept in her bottom drawer pushed it into her face and screamed.
The Russian Officer
By Neal Murdoch
“Your country is going to die, and you speak of poetry?” my Father yelled at me “The Tsar needs you!” I was quite surprised that my first reaction wasn’t one of anger. I think Napoleon had broken my heart and my spirit. In Moscow, my fellow students and I were entranced by the French revolution. It inspired us to demand from our fathers more from this life than the servitude and feudalism that they offered the common man. We wanted Beauty, Art and peace. We didn’t love the Tsar as our parents did and we felt no Fealty to him. Now Napoleon had betrayed us all. The French were coming & they were not bringing liberty, equality or fraternity. They were bringing invasion, war and death. My father was right. My poetry of a better future lay in ashes. So, I laid down my pen, put on the uniform of an officer and commanded the soldiers who had once tended the fields of my father’s land. Russia had once again become my mother and I was ready to fight for her. However, I still had the desire to write, in the same way that I had the desire to breathe. So, I wrote of the bravery I witnessed in battles & how it contrasted with the fear I felt and displayed. Men of little breeding facing down the cannons of the French conqueror whilst I cowered in a tent under the pretence of redrawing tactics. Perhaps the day would come when the peasant soldiers would no longer tolerate the distinctions between us and them & would rise up as their Gallic brothers had done so these several years past. I could only hope that if that day came, then their revolution would not also be betrayed by little men with little heart using revolution as a path for their own vainglorious ambitions.
The Red Dress
By Ines Manning
Her ballgown shimmered in the evening light, it was magnificent, like a picture from Gustav Klimt. The jewels caught the last sun beams as she purposefully stepped into the water. What had brought her to this decision? An ocean is not the most logical place to wear your finery. How did she get there? Her hair was as spun gold piled on her head, she had pearls around her neck, a diamond brooch reflected the light and contrasted with the deep red ballgown.
She was my friend, my best friend walking towards those waves and I wondered why. What had brought her to such a point? Anxiety? Depression perhaps? Or even the belief that she could walk on water? As she walked, I could not believe it, she stayed buoyant on the waves and I could see the hem of her dress, it did not even seem wet! There she was walking on the water Eleni my best friend was not sinking. What was this vision in front of me? She glimmered and shimmered, flashed and then she was gone, without a struggle she sank beneath the waves.
I called Eleni do not leave us and her body was replaced by a beautiful dolphin that glided towards me and with a flick of its tail seemed to wave goodbye. She was gone, she was happy, like a selkie from the myths and legends my beautiful Eleni had left this earth and I had a wish. I wished for toast exquisite ballgown which was washed up by my feet, not a grain of sand or drop of water had touched it.
Crawley Made Me
By Ines Manning
I was born in Southgate, a council house in Wakehurst drive, was where I lived with my parents and three siblings. We were surrounded by roads and trees, and we walked everywhere. The top shops had a baker, a chemist, a newsagent, a laundry, fish and chips, the hard ware, hairdressers and opposite was the pub and the church.
We were catholic so we did not use the church but walked about a mile to the Friary to the centre of town. We walked down the old Brighton road which had no pavement, so we used to dodge the traffic, and keep to the right facing the on coming traffic. It was in a cutting and there was a pavement, but you had to go up the hill and my mother was always pressed for time. I remember trips to Sainsbury’s carrying bags of food back home with her. That was how we lived when we did not have a car.
In the 60s when the Beatles were popular, we had a Citroen Safari which was a very pretentious name for the rust bucket it was. It was a lemon yellow, so we used to sing we all live in a yellow submarine and it was used for trips to my grandparents in Worthing and visits to Ashdown Forrest, Arundel Castle and Wierwood reservoir, my father drove like a maniac and my mother had failed her test. She was a teacher, very sociable and great fun. Tragically she died of cancer in the 70s.
We were lucky to live in Crawley with Tilgate Forest and park, Goff’s Park and Broadfield Park all in walking distance and what adventures we had in all of those. Many of those involved mud and water or ice. As a child I believed I was capable of crossing any barriers and climbing any tree, l had a casual regard to the laws of Physics.
Tilgate Park was next to the Forrest, which was dark and mysterious and had lakes with giant steps Andre heard stories about people who had drowned because they were very deep and they got sucked down, these stories came from Bernice, our next-door neighbour. I lost a shoe in mud by the giants’ lake and mummy made me go back with her, and find it when I came home without it. It was from Clarke’s, but I did not like them.
Bernice was the Stegers only daughter, they were a half Dutch family, as we were half Spanish, and we were close, as they had a tv we were able to watch the moon landings in their living room fifty years ago. Mummy and Aunty Pat met at the council offices where the houses were being distributed to teachers and other key workers and they said let’s be neighbours. So, the Stegers lived at 101.Wakehurst drive and were part of our lives. Uncle Jan (we wrongly called him uncle John) and Aunty Pat were so familiar I thought they were relatives.
The Stegers were very much part of our lives. Bernice the eldest, was a teenager when I first became aware of her. Theo and Jan were her younger brothers. Jan was a year younger than my sister Julia and a year older than my brother Joseph.
Crawley was a fun place of possibilities, I like the motto I grow and I prosper. We had no idea that our town was going to expand at such a phenomenal rate, it was 40 thousand when I first became aware of how big it was and now it is over one hundred thousand.
What I like best about Crawley is the countryside and parks. They are all in walking distance or at least cycling distance, I lived in Furnace Green after Southgate and I could walk out of my flat over the woods to Pound Hill crossing streams and woods, it was the wildness I loved. Sadly, now it is covered with the sprawl of Maidenbower.
When we lived in Wakehurst drive, we used to play in the woods the other side of the Brighton road, which we called the dump, I remember catching frogspawn there and bringing it home in a jam jar. Also, there were rumours that Sally Elliot who lived in Thatcher close had taken all her clothes off as a dare. Those woods and pond are now Southgate West.
Ifield Mill pond which stretches to Gossops Green and Bewbush is wonderful for a walk and now an island has been created I have seen cormorants and herons there. However, the best has to be Ifield meadows along from the church and the barn and if you want you can walk to Rusper across our glorious Countryside. It is beautiful and we must protect it.