Tracy
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“The law is an ass, Godfrey,” Elizabeth said, extricating a bit of sag paneer from between her teeth that he had drawn her attention to. “I have no intention of wasting my time in court. As a matter of fact, I’ve written the critic out of the story. And the court. Waste of fecking time, fecking gobshites, the fecking lot of them.”
“You seem to be developing an Irish accent, Liz,” he replied, signalling the waiter for the bill.
“What did you do that for? There was no bill to pay until you introduced the fecking waiter into the script!”
“If you don’t pay the bill or turn up in court, the police will come and arrest you, Liz, have you considered that?”
“What fecking police?” she replied.
“Who are you talking to?” asked Finnley. “I wrote Godfrey out of the story this morning.”
“Whatever for?” Liz asked in surprise.
“He kept talking. I hate talking.”
Wisely, Elizabeth said nothing.
The blast ricocheted throughout the town. It set the dogs barking, chickens squalking and babies crying. Folks dropped what they were doing, in many cases literally: dishes and beer bottles crashed to the floor, as the towns people ran outside to find out what was going on, or ran for cover.
Bert, sitting on top of Plater’s Rock watching it all, slapped his thigh, whooped and then laughed until the tears ran like rain season creeks through the desert dry creases of his face. The unaccustomed unbridled mirth provoked a coughing fit: Bert balled up the phlegm that rose in his throat and catapulted gobs of it towards the creek below.
Well, that’s finally got that off my chest, he said to himself with another choking cackle.
The creek itself after the explosion was obscured from his sight by a thick pall of smoke, but the sputum projectiles were aimed with deadly accuracy at the bridge ~ or where the bridge had been.
There was no bridge there now though, not that anyone would have noticed its disappearance if he hadn’t made sure they did. Years he’d spent making that bridge, a bit at a time, with what he could find or chance upon, working on it as often as he had time for. He’d found what he could only describe as a “special place” over on the other side of the creek, it spoke to him and seemed to call on him to bring others. The only way to it from the town was to swim the creek, or drive almost 200 miles by road, via the closest bridge at Ninetown. So Bert decided to build a bridge across, so people could go back and forth with ease and enjoy the place on the other side.
Bert had finished the bridge three years ago during the dry season, and invited everyone over upon it’s completion. Four people turned up, even though he’d set up a picnic and brought coolboxes of champagne and beer, and a big bag of weed. Less than a dozen people used Bert’s bridge in the first two years, and he was the only one to cross over since the last dry season.
Finding the dynamite in the old mine shaft a few months back had given him the idea. An impulse had seized him after the unexpected encounter with Elizabeth. He blew the bridge up. It was over. He could breathe again.
“What I really love about this, Godfrey,” Liz said, “Is that it really is complete rubbish. I mean, it’s not cleverly pretending to be rubbish, it really IS rubbish. But I am feeling the energy, and I feel that I enjoy such utter rubbish, and that’s the feeling that counts.”
Deep in thought, Devan didn’t notice Finly watching him from the end of the porch. As he clumped down the steps and made his way towards the clapped out banger that served as transport to work, she weighed him up, pausing for a moment with the window cleaning cloth poised in mid air.
He was young, but then, she liked them young. Virile, energetic, easily controlled. The rebellious ones were not so rebellious towards an older woman of experience in their bed. Not that she was all that much older than he was, but the difference in age was enough to create an air of experience. Finly liked to keep on top of things ~ both her cleaning duties, and her young men.
Nice ass, she said to herself, with a warm tingle of anticipation, rubbing the windows with renewed vigour. She licked her lips, smirking at her reflection in the glass, and then blew herself a kiss. A slight movement caught her eye. Prune bobbed her tongue out, and then disappeared from view.
Corrie:
I woke up this morning with an idea in my head, and I don’t know if I was dreaming about it or if it just popped in, in the brief moments between sleep and waking. I made a connection with the topic I was doing an anthropology report on, and something I’d forgotten. No, not forgotten, it wouldn’t be true to say I’d forgotten it as it was always there at the back of my mind niggling at me that there was more to it somehow, but I hadn’t made the connection so obviously with the current project.
My research was about disconnection, and the separation agenda of the American channeling dream. At first I felt driven to explore particular areas and then piece by piece the puzzle that had nagged at me for years ~ I say years, it felt like years, but maybe it wasn’t so long ~ started to fall into place.
At first when I woke up the idea of censorship was in my head and the idea to start a petition and public awareness campaign about certain channeled texts that were withheld from public viewing, despite repeated requests for them to be public along with all the other texts. But then it occurred to me that censorship and omission wasn’t always deliberate. I mean, not a conscious choice to keep information secret, but something else. Almost like a case of some information not being seen clearly through the filters, yet for some reason dismissed as not fitting, and pushed away, almost unconsciously, and suppressed.
The text was about disconnect mainly, and there was some stuff about Nazi’s although the part about animals was the part that had stuck in my head, probably because I felt more connected to animals than Nazi’s. There were more animals growing up here than Nazi’s after all, Nazi’s was only something I’d heard about. But then it occurred to me that I’d been hearing more and more about Neo Nazi’s, in Europe mainly, forming groups and having protests. So that got me wondering about that too.
Anyway, the disconnect part: it was the reaction on the American channeling forums to the Ferguson riots that started me on this project, and Aunt Idle was full of encouragement when I started to explain to her what I was noticing. She said she had noticed similar things in her remote viewing circle online. Everyone seems to think Aunt Idle is losing her marbles, but don’t you believe it. She seems vacant and scattered but that’s only because her mind is occupied elsewhere.
The gist of this suppressed text was extreme separation, but it was the part about using words to seem enlightened to hide extreme disconnect that seemed to fit my project.
I did have to chuckle though, I wondered if I was being a racist by calling Americans disconnected as if it was a racial characteristic. More of a cultural thing, I suppose, can one be called a culturalist as if it’s a bad thing? I don’t see how you can study anthropology without a certain degree of separating into cultural groups though, even if it is shift anthropology. I’ll think about that a bit more later.
Yogi’s teleporting classes in Camden Town had been going on for about 6 months, a small group of people determined to master the art, each member dedicated to the pursuit for particular reasons of their own.
Freya wanted to be able to travel, but was restricted because of her dogs and cats. He aim was to “lunch travel” and have lunch in a different country every day, being home in the mornings and evenings to look after her pets. John wanted to retire to the south of France, but keep an eye on his book shop in London, without the tedium and expense of airline flights. Justin, however, was a black bloc anarchist, and wanted to be able to teleport to protests all over the world, and be able to evade police kettles, and escape from Jail should he ever find himself in that position. Samantha was writing an exposé on the nefarious goings on of government ministers, but was for obvious reasons denied access to the places and documents that she needed to see. Fred missed his children and wanted to visit them, an impossibility in his current homeless destitute situation. Luckily for Fred, Yogi didn’t charge a fee for the classes, more interested in determination and commitment than monetary rewards.
Fred had managed on several occasions to project his awareness to the Flying Fish Inn, but had not yet achieved a full physical materialization. He had blinked in and out a couple of times, but had become nervous of frightening the children when he’d unintentionally startled Mater.
Aunt Idle:
Well I’m not one to complain, as you know, and I’m not the competitive sort at all, but I did have to raise an eyebrow when everyone agreed to Mater’s suggestion of getting some help with the cleaning. It’s a wonderful idea, but it wasn’t her idea, I’d been planting the seeds for ages. She never would have suggested if I’d carried on doing it all myself, I had to let it go a bit, get in a mess. When they started talking behind my back about me drinking, I played along with it, splashing gin on my hair and leaving an empty bottle laying around. I had to keep retrieving the same bottle from the bin, so I could pretend it was another bottle I’d drunk. They were all easily fooled, and I started to enjoy it.
“I do think, Elizabeth,” remarked Finnley, somewhat cautiously, “That you rather over~egged the brûlée.”
“Oh there you are Bert!” Mater said, trying to push aside the odd feeling that Bert had materialized in front of her, rather than walking into the room in the usual way. “Flora wants to spend a penny.”
Bert raised an eyebrow at Elizabeth’s obvious sarcasm, which unfortunately caught her eye and put him in the spotlight of her penetrating gaze.
“How about you Bert? Were you listening?” she asked, raising an eyebrow of her own to match Berts.
Finnly, always on the lookout for an opportunity to out do Liz, raised both of her eyebrows simultaneously; then looked quickly down, pretending to examine her nails.
Bert decided that in this case honestly was the best policy and replied “No. I was wondering if Prune had cleaned up the blood spattered corridor.”
While Liz was momentarily speechless, Finnley quickly interjected another line from the book she had hidden under the table.
“Then why did none of us hear the blood crazed howl?”
“Ah! Aha! I’ll tell you why nobody heard the blood crazed howl!” Elizabeth had become alarmingly animated, leaning forward and rapping sharply on the table with her cigarette lighter. “The walls of isolation that surround you, the windows you keep closed and shuttered for fear of a draft of passion, the fences of barbed trotted out dogma you use as protection ~ but I ask you, protection from what?”
“Buggered if I know, Liz. Can I go now?” said Bert.
“Ah, there you are Bert!” Liz smiled graciously. “Do sit down, you look harassed and all of a dither. But the kettle on first though, there’s a love.”
Bert glared at Liz resentfully. “I thought I was a bit part, not a jack of all threads.”
“Oh cheer up, Bert! When you’ve made us all a nice cup of tea we’ll all sit down and talk about it, won’t we Finnley?”
Corrie:
I wasn’t snooping, I swear, and I wasn’t looking for anything either, it just popped up on my side bar on Spacenook and caught my eye. I mean, the title was so peculiar it kind of stood out ~ “Martian Pig Pruning” ~ so I clicked on the link, thinking it might be a diverting Pythonesque parody of all the aliens and other dimensional vibrations bollocks that seemed to be the latest #trendingtrash to swamp the newsfeeds, because sometimes you just have to laugh and find the funny side.
Bert really had his hands full at The Flying Fish Inn, fecking freak fest it was turning into, what with the comings and goings in room 8 ~ but what could he do? Refuse, and get written out altogether?
“There’s a very fine line, Finnley, between feckless drivel, and fecking snivel, and to not put too fine a point upon it, it’s all fairly pointless anyway,” replied Liz, smiling amiably into the curmudgeonly scowl. “Bert will put the kettle on, I’ll call him over from the thread next door.”
“Typical!” muttered Finnley, “Never a thought about waking the poor bugger up, that it might be night time over there. Bloody inconsiderate, if you ask me.”
Flora came to her senses muttering something about a coachload of American tourists in Italy. Bert had been the first to arrive at the scene of the accident. Not one to flap in a crisis, he calmly picked up the injured woman and carried her to the sofa in the living room, instructing Prune to fetch the mop and clean the blood off the floor. By the time Bert had seen to the wound on Flora’s head, she was starting to come round, muttering gibberish and apparently confused.
“Where am I? Is this Florence or Rome? Am I late?” she asked, telling Bert she was perfectly alright now thank you, although she clearly wasn’t.
“No, you aint late, dear, it’s still quite early,” Bert replied soothingly.
“But I must get to the Vatican Library, I must be getting on now,” she said, trying to stand up.
Bert gently but firmly pushed her back down, saying, “Have a nice cup of tea first, plenty of time for that later.”
“What the dickens is going on now?” asked Mater. “What’s all this about Rome? Anyone seen my reading glasses?” she asked, peering around the room from the doorway.
Bert explained briefly, and asked Mater to sit with Flora while he went to make the tea.
Flora, rising late as was her custom, and feeling the relaxing glow of being on holiday, strolled leisurely out of her bedroom door in search of coffee. As she stepped into the corridor, one of the twins, not watching where she was going, collided with her surprisingly forcefully, knocking her to the ground. She knocked her head on the door frame, felt a rush of noise and the sweet metallic scent of blood before losing consciousness.
“Flora! Miss Fenwick! Oh my god, Flora!” Corrie cried. After getting no reaction from the inert body and seeing the pool of blood spreading alarmingly, she sped off to find Aunt Idle.
As soon as Corrie was out of sight, Prune emerged from the broom cupboard opposite, saw the body on the floor, and ran in the opposite direction in search of Bert.
Corrie:
“Get away from that door Prune, you nosy parker!” It wasn’t the first time I’d caught her eavesdropping outside room 8.
“Begone, thine tawdry wench, spaketh not thus to thine majesty or I’ll have thee hung drawn and quartered!” she replied in a whisper as she slid past me and ran down the corridor.
It suddenly dawned on me that this funny speaking Prune had been doing lately was something she was picking up on from behind that door. I inched closer to the door, bending down to press my ear to the keyhole. I was slightly off balance when the door flew open suddenly, causing me to stagger right into the room. Caught red handed, I could feel the blush rising as my hand flew to my mouth. There sitting on the end of the bed was what can only be described as an Elizabethan wonder woman superhero.
I backed out of the room quickly, but not so fast that I didn’t see what was on the bed behind the woman. It was the flying fish that had gone missing from over the fireplace.
Aunt Idle:
Tattler, Trout and Trueman. Where had I seen that before? I squinted at what was left of the business card that Flora had been ripping up to use as roaches last night. I could make out tel: 88 , but the rest of the number was missing. There wasn’t much left of the card, no other writing left to see. But where had I seen that name before?
I shivered; there was a rising mist and it was damp and chilly on the veranda, gloomy as the sun hadn’t quite risen yet. I like it first thing, before anyone else is up. Bert’s usually up, but I never see him, he goes off out the back somewhere. I stood there for awhile watching the mist rise and wondered whether to go and fetch the camera.
And that’s when I remembered where I’d seen Tattler, Trout and Trueman. It was on that note that I’d hidden inside the camera manual.
Could it be a coincidence? Should I ask Flora where she got the card, whose card it was? Or did Flora have something to do with the note?
My hand flew to my mouth. Automatic reaction so you don’t suck any flies down with the sharp intake of breath.
“Got toothache, Aunt Idle?” asked Prune.
“Jesus Christ, Prune! You made me jump out of my skin! What are you doing up so early?”
“Who is that man your friend brought with her? Is he from the desert?”
“What man? She came on her own.”
“Well who’s that tall man in the blue robes then? He said his name was Sanso.”
“WHO?” I could almost hear myself say that in italics. “Where? Where did you see him?”
What did he say?”I could see Prune was weighing this up, she wasn’t called shrewd prunes for nothing. I wasn’t at all surprised when she said “He told me not to tell you anything,” and ran back inside, slamming the door behind her.
Aunt Idle:
Flora arrived, hot and dusty from the travelling, in the late afternoon. A shower and a well iced gin and tonic soon revived her, and I got the girls to see to supper and the oddball in room 8, and asked Bert to keep an eye on them while Flora and I sat on the porch. It did me a power of good to sit chatting and joking with a friend, a woman of my own age and inclinations, after the endless months of nothing but the company of kids and old coots.
She looked pretty much the same as I’d gathered from the videos and photos online, although her bum was a lot bigger than I expected considering her slender frame, but she was an attractive woman with a merry gurgle of a laugh and warm relaxing energy.
I asked her about the video she was planning to make, but it all sounded a bit vague to me. “Frame” it was to be called, and there were various period costumes involved and a considerable amount of improvisation, from what I could gather, around the theme of “frame of reference”. What that meant exactly I really couldn’t say, but she said we were all welcome to play a role in it if we liked.
We’d been sitting out there until well past sundown, enjoying the cool evening air and a bit of Bert’s homegrown pot, posting selfies together on Spacenook and giggling at the comments, when we heard an ear splitting scream coming from an upstairs window. Flora looked at me with a raised eyebrow, and I just cracked right up for some reason, don’t ask me why. I laughed until the tears were rolling down my cheeks, and my ribs ached. I tried to stand up and fell back in the chair, which made me laugh all the more. I was wiping my eyes with a paper hanky when Clove appeared, saying Prune had had a nightmare.
“Oh thank goodness for that!” I exclaimed, which set me off again, and this time Flora joined in. I did wonder later when I was getting ready for bed what she must have thought about it all, me having hysterics at the sound of a screaming child. But it did me a world of good, all that laughing, and I was still tittering to myself when I lurched into bed.