NUTS
‘Choice! That’s the key.’
The speaker looked around at those gathered close to him. To his front, the object of his words. ‘What action do we choose to any event? We think we decide, but how much is down to the event itself? Are we really of our own mind, or that of the society to which we belong?’
The man to his front seemed awkward, as if facing a crisis. His eyes darted from left to right. A slight perspiration appeared on his brow.
The speaker continued: ‘Nuts! Insane! Mad! A Lunatic! Simple words, but meaning so much. Labels we place on those whose behaviour is different from the norm. But who decides what behaviour is normal or abnormal? What IS insanity?’
The man to his front seemed on the point of running. It was not how it should be. Paranoid thoughts raced through his mind, and he had no idea what he was likely to do next.
‘It is down to those choices we make – or are made for us. How we behave is so often the key. But are people’s opinions of our actions down to the behaviour in the person, or their discomfort at what they see?’
At last the man to his front saw a conclusion to the situation. The nurses appeared. He said to them, ‘all I asked is nuts or fries,’ and carried on serving the next patient.
A tear appeared in the speaker’s eye as he was escorted to his room. The choice had been too much today. Which was increasingly normal.
Stories 37 – 43
(37) Gone (38) Spirit of the Underbaby (39) Misguided (40) The Richest Man In the World (41) Smiler (42) Window On Death (43) Money For Old Rope
GONE
It feels good. I can’t tell you how good it feels. For so long it’s been with us – all of us. Clinging to us, restricting what we do.
Of course, it was Pete who came up with the solution. ‘We catch it,’ he said. ‘We collect it all up.’ He produced a box. ‘And we place it all in here.’
At first, we looked at him, astounded – we thought he was mad. But he insisted - which immediately presented the problem of how to collect it all up.
‘Well, it always begins with a wish – a hope that we can do it.’
So that’s what we did. We wished it to be so, and in no time at all, it was banished to the box, and Pete firmly taped it up.
We looked from one to the other - said: ‘What now?’
Pete collected lots and lots of stones. ‘We stone it,’ he said. So, there were we, repeatedly pummelling the box with stones.
Soon we were exhausted, and in a way refreshed, changed, as if we had said farewell. And when Pete took out the battered box and set it alight, we knew there would be a celebration, for it had finally gone. And we would forever be grateful to Pete for allowing us to conquer our fear.
SPIRIT OF THE UNDERBABY
To say Johnny was confused when his son was born is an understatement. After all, he was only eighteen, and not ready for fatherhood. And he always had the suspicion that she got pregnant on purpose, anyway. He had been warned that there were women who just had to have kids, no matter what.
Of course, he tried his best to be a good father, but no matter how hard he tried, it just didn’t seem to be for him. Baby seemed to sense it all, too. He just never seemed to relax in his father’s arms, and Johnny soon became convinced his son just didn’t like him.
Hence, it was inevitable that Johnny would take flight. And I mean literally. After all, he had always wanted to go backpacking around the east.
It was in the fourth month of his travels that he found himself in the middle of nowhere, a chilling sound coming from behind the bushes. Oh, no, Johnny thought as he heard the cries of a baby.
He soon found it, and decided it must have been abandoned. With no one else around, his first thought was to leave it, too, but there was some humanity deep down, and it seemed to stop crying straight away when he picked it up …
Well, to cut a long story short, Johnny looked after the baby for two weeks, using all manner of initiative to feed it, change it, love it. And he managed to take it out of the wilderness and to civilization.
It was a totally new Johnny who arrived back with mother and son, ready and willing for fatherhood. Of course, it would take her some time to accept her partner back, he knew. Indeed, he supposed he had to prove himself. And for nearly a month he tried to work out how to change the nappy before baby did poo all over him; how to pick him up without baby screaming; and how to move him aside before projectile vomit covered him. But somehow he never managed to perfect it.
Maybe that’s why Johnny took flight once more. And as mother cuddled her contented son the night he left, and vowed she would not have him back, you could almost see the sense of triumph in baby’s eyes.
MISGUIDED
The private detective entered the hotel with a sense of completion. As soon as the beeper had gone off and he’d called in, he knew his associates had found him. And even though he felt something of a social worker, he knew it would be a profitable enterprise.
He found him, scruffily dressed, in an ante-room to the kitchens, mop in hand, washing the tiled floor.
As the detective coughed, the man stopped. The blank expression was soon replaced by a realization. ‘You’ve found me then,’ he said, aware of the kind of man in front of him.
‘Yes,’ said the detective. He paused. ‘You know you’ve got to go back, don’t you?’
The man stopped what he was doing – walked off down the corridor, the detective following. Finally entering the staff quarters, he sat on the bed in his hotel room.
‘Why did you do it?’ the detective asked.
The man thought a while. Said: ‘Desperation. Is that it? Yes, I suppose it was.’
‘But there were consequences.’
The man laughed. He remembered his life up to that point. And he remembered what he had done to escape it. But what now?
He thought quickly, aware that he could not go back. Finally, he lunged at the detective, pushing him over, and on his way out he pressed the fire alarm.
He escaped in the confusion, but knew he had to hide himself even deeper now. He took the press cutting from his pocket – Billionaire Tycoon Missing – and realized they would never stop searching. How could they? Only insanity could have made him turn away from it all like that.
Later, he left the town and sat in a wood, peace and tranquillity all around, and realized he may well be the last sane man alive.
THE RICHEST MAN IN THE WORLD
That’s right, you be jealous of me. And so you should be. What wealth I have, what splendour I can create. Yes, your jealousy makes me feel good, for I have become greater than any of you.
Oh, I know you think I had it easy. Born into a rich family – a silver spoon in my mouth. Oh, get over yourselves!
I rose way above that. My business empire is the envy of all. Millions? Billions? Petty cash. Even trillions doesn’t give true justice to what I am.
I am the head of a global empire, you little minions. Yes, you may hate me, but you scurry to buy what I offer, don’t you? You perform like good little serfs.
It is always the way, with people like me - GREAT people – of which I, of course, am the greatest.
And in that greatness, just look what I’ve created! Look at my palaces, my castles, my COURT!
And the politicians come to pay homage to me. They come to gain my favour so I’ll invest in their little economies. Not for nothing am I also the most POWERFUL man in the world …
What did you say? You can’t be serious? Well get the best doctors you have. I have money. I have power. What is cancer to me?
What’s that? You mean – I can die?
SMILER
He sat, remembering the past. So many events, so many relationships, so many intrigues. Yet, despite it all, he couldn’t help but smile.
So much that he couldn’t deny …
He smiled as he thought of the women – of the brunettes, the redheads, the blondes. He’d had relations with them all. And he remembered
them all with equal gratitude.
His mind turned to his adventures, then. Some of them were uncomfortable – most of them, infact – but his smile remained as he remembered the locations – so far and wide he had travelled.
His smile became grim as he thought of the murders. Again, so many, in so many ways. He remembered intimately the stabbings, the strangulations, the shootings … and all without regret.
And then he remembered the things he didn’t want to remember so easily. The hauntings, the ghosts, and terrors beyond imaginings. And his smile bordered on insanity. Yet, he could not resist. YOU could not resist – the writer of short stories with a twist.
WINDOW ON DEATH
He was walking, slowly, the weight of the world upon him. It was night, and the dark shrouded him like a veil of death.
He had to stop by the shop window. His legs could have carried him no further. He looked at the window, but not through. What was in there had no interest for him. Only what was happening in his mind. This was of another order. Stark. Vivid. Yet, at the same time surreal.
A picture formed in the window, and reflected back to him.
And a tear formed.
The door opened and she came out. She seemed so full of life, and so beautiful, her long blonde hair, her shapely figure, her sheer elegance, tinged with that mystical sexuality.
The tear ran down his cheek. She had been unfaithful, and always there was eventually a price. But …
He saw it as if a shadow floated and stood close to her. Momentarily, she looked in that direction, but as the gun materialized from the shadow, the shock hit home.
And seconds later, she laid dead, a pool of blood around her.
The image disappeared from the window, but the tears continued to flow.
How long he waited before he heard the door open, he didn’t know, but she seemed so full of life, and so beautiful …
He turned as he raised the gun …
MONEY FOR OLD ROPE
His mother told him, when he was a little boy, that he’d be a great businessman. ‘Money for old rope,’ she said, referring to the old English saying. And he certainly believed her.
He first made money selling vinegar-soaked conkers at school; which immediately put him in the top league of tycoon – you know, not quite legal. And when he opened his first stall at the market, the pirated CDs went down a treat.
He moved into his first shop after the owner understood he had no choice but to sell. After all, could you argue with a baseball bat?
He won his first enterprise award shortly after that, the public not realizing the tangled web he weaved to keep his assets in profit.
Shop after shop followed, then a factory or two; a hotel and haulage firm made him a pretty packet.
Of course, it was handy that the bank was prepared to lend him so much money, and even as his debts ran into the millions, he knew he was a rich man, not caring for the people he trampled on, nor the fact that the pressure turned him to drink, and stopped him from sleeping at night.
Private life became a fleeting affair for him as the millions turned to tens of millions. Indeed, it seemed that whenever he acquired yet another corporation, he did so by shedding yet another wife.
But that didn’t matter to him, for his business acumen was true - until, of course, the inquiry, then the trial, then the bankruptcy.
He wasn’t sure how many lives he ruined in his search for profit, except his own, for which he now cried and cried.
He didn’t take well to being a pauper, so it was with his last one pound that he bought the twine that held up the trousers of the down-and-out. And as he slung it round the beam, placed it round his neck and jumped, his mother’s words echoed in his buzzing ears.
‘Money for old rope,’ she had predicted. And it was true.
POETIC INTERLUDE 1
TELLING TALES
Began at the camp fire
Stories told
Tales to inspire
Make us bold
Became a reflection
Of who we are
For closer inspection
We go far
Best with a sting
To challenge the mind
Or enticing fling
For morals to find
They bare our soul
Revelation sought
Make us whole
Cut a long story short
THE ORAL TRADITION
Poetry thrives, it always will,
Man can never have had his fill,
Of words that say so much to all,
Making us great and never small;
Sometimes it seems this isn’t the case,
Poets, after all, have been displaced,
By radio, TV, CD and more,
Getting your words heard becomes a chore;
Oral tradition seems a thing from the past,
No one wanting to hear, alas!
But it’s so alive, a magnificent success,
Everywhere you hear it, and not under duress,
From its beginnings by the campfire, creating heroes and myths,
Through Medieval ballad it continually exists,
Perfected by Romantics, the hippies of old,
Going on to be song lines, oral poetry unfolds,
Changing its medium, but not its zap,
You hear it always, from ballads to RAP;
So often the poet feels maligned,
Searching, searching, an audience to find,
Speaking the verse to echoing halls,
Few people there to be enthralled;
But competing with its success needs ventures anew,
To popularise its pure form, break through,
And the answer is never, ever, be glum,
Reinvent, adapt, make poetry fun!
TAKE IT EASY
Take it easy, you’re doing too much,
You’ve got to do less, as such
Good advice, I know it’s true,
But I love to write for me and you,
Stories and poems with endings hidden,
How can they become forbidden?
So a poem, today, will not be done,
Even though it would be such fun …
Damn
PARADOX IN A POEM
You’ll find it here, or maybe not,
It depends, I suppose, on what you’ve got,
Eyes to read, mind to think,
An answer there within a blink;
If, of course, it’s really here,
And not a mystery upon which to fear,
An enigma with no answer at all,
A psycho-maze to enthral;
But that’s the thing about a paradox,
Hard to wrap up in a box,
It’s here, it isn’t, can we interdict?
Maybe, or not – I must contradict
BOOK MARKET
Buy this book, it’s very good,
Sometimes I think it’s written in blood,
So much effort has been expelled,
I really think I have excelled
It’s all very well to say it like that,
But as a publisher I have to ask,
Are you an expert, or maybe a celebrity?
If not, it’s not a publishable entity
But look at the words, the form, the style,
It really goes the extra mile,
Original in all it says,
A whole new way it does display
But will it get an audience, I ask?
That is really the only task,
You writers come here with ideas anew,
But what of my profit margins? Now shoo
But profit comes from originality,
The reader finding something new with glee,
That’s how culture marches on,
Singing to the writers’ song
What a load of romantic crap,
The reader is someone to entrap,
If you want to really get on,
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Do something sensational, excite the throng
This is not how literature should be,
But it’s clear you’re not going to see,
So I’ll take your advice, they’ll say I sang,
Do you like my gun? Bang!!!
ECO-FUTURE
The eco-message is still too thin,
The real endeavour yet to begin,
Reducing the intolerable carbon footprint,
We haven’t, yet, got the hint;
Tech must change, that’s for sure,
In order that we can ensure,
An acceptable future for our kids,
No matter what Big Biz forbids;
But how to do it, that’s the key,
How to make people really see;
It’s down to the message, draw a line in the sand,
Reveal carbon footprint through literary hand
THE EXPERIENCE
The greatest experience I ever had,
Crowning my life, never sad,
Changing the way I can be,
Fulfilling my ultimate destiny;
Before it I was simply a man,
Knowing my life, having a plan,
But now the world is changed for ever,
Bending to my ultimate endeavour;
Never can life be the same for me,
For now I think I really see,
It’s laid before me, in my sight,
The day I realised I could write
IF ONLY I HAD TIME
I’ve got to rush, I’ve got no time,
But I want to make it so sublime,
I want to get it absolutely right,
Before the seconds start to bite;
If they do I’ll have to leave,
‘Cos once they’re gone you can’t retrieve,
That part of life is in the past,
All you can do is offer a gasp;
I’m almost there, nearly done,
Rushed, I know, but so much fun,
No time, even, to rehearse,
But tell me, did you like this verse?
Z IS FOR … ?