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In a word: Incline

When you first think of this word, it is with a slippery slope in mind.

I’ve been on a few of those in my time.

And while we’re on the subject, those inclines measured in degrees are very important if you want a train to get up and down the side of a mountain.

For the train, that’s an incline plane, the point where traction alone won’t get the iron horse up the hill.

Did I say ‘Iron Horse’?  Sorry, regressed there, back to the mid-1800s in the American West for a moment.

It’s not that important when it comes to trucks and cars, and less so if you like four-wheel driving; getting up near-vertical mountainsides often present a welcome challenge to the true enthusiast

But for the rest of us, not so much if you find yourself sliding in reverse uncontrollably into the bay.  I’m sure it’s happened more than once.

Then…

Are you inclined to go?

A very different sort of incline, ie to be disposed towards an attitude or desire.

An inclination, maybe, not to go four-wheel driving?

There is another, probably more obscure use of the word incline, and that relates to an elevated geological formation.  Not the sort of reference that crops up in everyday conversation at the coffee shop.

But, you never know.  Try it next time you have coffee and see what happens.

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Writing about writing a book – Day 2

Hang about.  Didn’t I read somewhere you need to plan your novel, create an outline setting the plot points, and flesh out the characters?

I’m sure it didn’t say, sit down and start writing!

Time to find a writing pad, and put my thinking cap on.

I make a list, what’s the story going to be about? Who’s going to be in it, at least at the start?

Like a newspaper story, I need a who, what, when, where, and how.

Right now.

 

I pick up the pen.

 

Character number one:

Computer nerd, ok, that’s a little close to the bone, a computer manager who is trying to be everything at once, and failing.  Still me, but with a twist.  Now, add a little mystery to him, and give him a secret, one that will only be revealed after a specific set of circumstance.  Yes, I like that.

We’ll call him Bill, ex-regular army, a badly injured and repatriated soldier who was sent to fight a war in Vietnam, the result of which had made him, at times, unfit to live with.

He had a wife, which brings us to,

Character number two:

Ellen, Bill’s ex-wife, an army brat and a General’s daughter, and the result of one of those romances that met disapproval for so many reasons.  It worked until Bill came back from the war, and from there it slowly disintegrated.  There are two daughters, both by the time the novel begins, old enough to understand the ramifications of a divorce.

Character number three:

The man who is Bill’s immediate superior, the Services Department manager, a rather officious man who blindly follows orders, a man who takes pleasure in making others feel small and insignificant, and worst of all, takes the credit where none is due.

Oops, too much, that is my old boss.  He’ll know immediately I’m parodying him.  Tone it down, just a little, but more or less that’s him.  Last name Benton.  He will play a small role in the story.

Character number four:

Jennifer, the IT Department’s assistant manager, a woman who arrives in a shroud of mystery, and then, in time, to provide Bill with a shoulder to cry on when he and Ellen finally split, and perhaps something else later on.

More on her later as the story unfolds.

So far so good.

What’s the plot?

Huge corporation plotting to take over the world using computers?  No, that’s been done to death.

Huge corporation, OK, let’s stop blaming the corporate world for everything wrong in the world.  Corporations are not bad people, people are the bad people.  That’s a rip off cliché, from guns don’t kill people, people kill people!  There will be guns, and there will be dead people.

There will be people hiding behind a huge corporation, using a part of their computer network to move billions of illegally gained money around.  That’s better.

Now, having got that, our ‘hero’ has to ‘discover’ this network, and the people behind it.

All we need now is to set the ball rolling, a single event that ‘throws a cat among the pigeons’.

Yes, Bill is on holidays, a welcome relief from the problems of work.  He dreams of what he’s going to do for the next two weeks.  The phone rings.  Benton calling, the world is coming to an end, the network is down.  He’s needed.  A few terse words, but he relents.

Pen in hand I begin to write.

 

© Charles Heath 2016-2019

365 Days of writing, 2026 – 92

Day 92 – Holidays – Bah, humbug

…

The Blank Page, The Burnout, and the Necessity of Leaving Your Desk

There is a specific kind of romanticism attached to the image of the “tortured writer.” We envision the solitary figure, hunched over a desk in a dimly lit room, surrounded by stacks of paper and empty coffee mugs, finding their ultimate bliss in the quiet hum of creation.

If your ideal scenario—your slice of heaven—is sitting in a silent room with nothing but a blank sheet of paper and a pen, you might be wondering: Is there something wrong with me?

The short answer? No. But there is a danger in confusing “solitude” with “stagnation.”

The Comfort of the Void

For many of us, the blank page is the ultimate sanctuary. It is a space of pure potential, untainted by the messy, demanding realities of the outside world. When the world feels loud, chaotic, or overwhelming, the blank page is the only place where we can impose order. It’s a controlled environment where we are the architects of the universe.

However, that sanctuary can quickly become a cage. When you retreat into the vacuum of your own mind for too long, your writing begins to suffer. It loses its vitality, its texture, and its connection to the very thing it’s supposed to reflect: life.

The Myth of the Perpetual Engine

We feel guilty when we stop. We worry that if we step away from the desk, we’ll lose our momentum, our “voice,” or our discipline. But here is a hard truth every writer needs to internalise: To write about life, you must actually live it.

If you spend every waking hour staring at a blank page, you are not refilling the well; you are just watching the bottom of the bucket. Eventually, the well runs dry.

When you force yourself to stay in that room, you aren’t just risking a “writer’s block” or a mediocre draft; you are risking a breakdown. Writing requires a massive expenditure of emotional and intellectual energy. It is an act of extraction. If you never replenish, you begin to run on fumes. You become irritable, exhausted, and—perhaps worst of all—your writing starts to sound like a rehash of a rehash.

Why You Need to “Get Out”

Taking a break isn’t an act of laziness; it is a vital part of the creative process. Here is why you need to leave the room:

1. You need input to create output. Inspiration is rarely found at the desk. It is found in the way a stranger speaks on the bus, the changing colour of the leaves in the park, the frustrating delay of a train, or the taste of a meal you didn’t have to cook yourself. These experiences provide the “raw material” for your stories. Without them, your writing becomes abstract and hollow.

2. The subconscious needs room to breathe. Have you ever noticed that your best ideas come in the shower or while you’re out for a walk? That’s because your brain is a problem-solving machine that works best when it’s distracted. By stepping away, you give your subconscious permission to connect the dots that your conscious mind was too stubborn to see.

3. Perspective is a cure for perfectionism. When we sit in a room for too long, we lose our sense of proportion. A single paragraph feels like a life-or-death struggle. A week away from the work allows you to come back with fresh eyes, seeing the flaws you were blind to and the potential you had buried under anxiety.

The Holiday is Part of the Work

If you are currently feeling like the “ideal situation” of the blank page is starting to feel more like a prison cell, take it as your sign: Go on holiday.

It doesn’t need to be an exotic excursion. Go to a museum, sit in a crowded cafe, take a hike, or simply spend a weekend completely disconnected from your project. Give yourself the gift of being a person for a few days, rather than a “writer.”

When you return to that desk, you won’t be returning to a cage. You’ll be returning with pockets full of observations, a rested nervous system, and a surplus of energy.

The blank page will still be there. It’s not going anywhere. But it will be waiting for a version of you that has something new to say.

Searching for locations: The Kingston Flyer, Kingston, New Zealand

The Kingston Flyer was a vintage train that ran about 14km to Fairlight from Kingston, at the southern end of Lake Wakatipu, and back.

This tourist service was suspended in December 2012 because of locomotive issues.

However, before that, we managed to go on one of the tours, and it was a memorable trip.  Trying to drink a cup of tea from the restaurant car was very difficult, given how much the carriages moved around on the tracks.

The original Kingston Flyer ran between Kingston, Gore, Invercargill, and sometimes Dunedin, from the 1890s through to 1957.

There are two steam locomotives used for the Kingston Flyer service, the AB778 starting service in 1925, and the AB795 which started service in 1927.

The AB class locomotive was a 4-6-2 Pacific steam locomotive with a Vanderbilt tender, of which 141 were built between 1915 and 1927 some of which by New Zealand Railways Addington Workshops.

No 235 is the builder’s number for the AB778

There were seven wooden bodied passenger carriages, three passenger coaches, one passenger/refreshments carriage and two car/vans.  The is also a Birdcage gallery coach.  Each of the rolling stock was built between 1900 and 1923.  They were built at either of Addington, Petone, or Hillside.

I suspect the 2 on the side means second class

The passenger coach we traveled in was very comfortable.

This is one of the guard’s vans, and for transporting cargo.

The Kingston Railway Station

and cafe.

A poster sign advertising the Kingston Flyer

The running times for the tourist services, when it was running.

“Surely there’s a better way…” – a short story

When you have secrets, sometimes it’s very hard to hide them from others.

It was something Henry had to do since the day he could speak.

The fact that his parents had been murdered because of their profession, something his grandfather told him, was akin to ‘working for the government’.

The fact that he was from a very wealthy and influential family.

The fact that he was heir to a fortune.

The fact that he was anything other than just another boy, who grew up to be just another man.

His whole life, to this point, had been ‘managed’ so that no one, other than a selected few chosen by his grandfather, knew who he was or what he represented. And more to the point, he had been told to just live his life like any other of his age.

Yes, he went to a private school, but it wasn’t an exclusive one, yes he went to university, but he had got into Oxford on his own merit, and yes, he was smart, smart enough to create his own business and make a handsome income from it. And no, he never drew upon the stipend he had been granted by his parents’ will, so it just gathered dust in the bank.

Henry was an only child, and to a certain extent, introverted. It was a shyness that his grandfather knew existed in his son, Henry’s father. It could be an asset, or it could be a liability. With Henry’s father, it had been an asset, a means by which many had misunderstood him. It might even serve him well for the next phase of his life.

Today, Henry was meeting his grandfather at Speaker’s Corner at Hyde Park, which was an unusual meeting place because in the past it had always been at his grandfather’s club. At his grandfather’s request, he had undertaken a three-year program, one that his father had, and his father before him, and a prerequisite for a profession that would be explained to him.

And it was all because Henry said he was bored. The business he’d built could run without him; his attempts at relationships with various girls and women hadn’t quite achieved what he was looking for, even though he had no idea what he was looking for, and, quite frankly, he told his grandfather, he needed something more exciting.

It was, he’d been told, the way of the MacCallisters. Ever since the British tried to put down the Scots.

Henry was listening to a rather animated man preaching the word of the Lord, but he was not sure which Lord that was. Anything he quoted from the bible resembled nothing he had read and remembered. Perhaps the man was on drugs.

Two or three people stopped, listened for a minute or two, shook their heads, some even laughed, and moved on.

“It’s the last bastion of freedom of speech, though I can say this man is not about to gather an army of insurrectionists any time soon. Let’s walk.”

His grandfather was getting old, and walking was getting more and more difficult. More scotch was needed, he had told Henry, to ward off the evils of arthritis. And, he added, ‘I should have had a less devil-may-care attitude when he was younger.’

It was a slow amble to the Serpentine, which, being a bright sunny day, if not a little chilly, was alive with people.

He waited until his grandfather spoke. One lesson he had learned was to speak when you’re spoken to, and if you’ve got nothing to say, best to remain silent.

“I have found a job you might like to have a go at. Nothing difficult, mind you, but perhaps, at times, hard work. I think you’d be good at it.”

“Is that meant to be a hint, and I have to guess?”

“I think you’re smart enough to know what it might be yourself, young Henry.”

I think I did too. Everything I’d been doing over the last three years led me to believe I’d been training to walk in my father’s footsteps. It was with the Army, and I had imagined my father had been a soldier, though I’d never seen him in a uniform. But my Grandfather had said he worked for the government, so I wondered if that might be some sort of policeman, or some sort of internal agent, like MI6. It had not been boring, and the exercises had been ‘interesting’, but no one had said what the end result of this training might be; in fact, no one had said who they were.

“Something hush, hush as the saying goes.”

We had gone about fifty yards and reached a cross path. As we did, a youngish woman dressed in leather appeared and walked towards us.

“I’d like you to meet a friend of mine, Henry. Her name is Marion, though I suggest you don’t call her that.”

She smiled. “Call me Mary. There’s only one person in the whole world who would dare call me that, and he’s standing here. Your grandfather has spoken a lot about you.”

Henry’s first impression; she had been to the training school he had. He could see it in her manner, and in the way she scanned the area, even though it didn’t look like she was. He’d been doing it himself, and he had seen her earlier. What made her stand out, she didn’t have a bag like all the other women.

“I hope it was good, not bad.”

“You have no bad traits?”

“Everyone had bad traits. You’ll just have to get to know me if you want to know what they are.”

“Well,” my grandfather said, “enough chit chat. Mary has a task, and she needs a little help. I thought you might want to join her.”

“Doing what?”

“She’ll explain it on the way. When it’s done, come and see me.” With that, a hug from Mary, and a handshake from his grandson, he turned and walked back the way they had come earlier.
“So,” Henry asked, “What’s the job?”

“I have to pick up a computer.”

“That doesn’t sound like something you would need help with.” In fact, if he was right in his assessment of her, he was the last person she needed, if at all. She looked to him as if she could handle anything.

“It’s one of those just in case situations.”

They walked a circuitous route back to Park Lane and crossed both roads, up Deanery Street, left where Tilney Street veered off, and then a short distance to Deanery Mews. Henry noted this was an area with a lot of expensive real estate and scattered Embassies. If he was not mistaken, the Dorchester Hotel wasn’t far away.

Walking down the mews seemed to Henry to be walking into a trap. When he looked back towards Deanery Street, he thought he saw two men position themselves, not quick enough to prevent him from getting a glimpse of them.

“You do realise that getting back out of here could be a problem.”

“It’s why I asked for help. Just in case.”

No visible sign of fear, or of what the consequences might be if this went south. Perhaps his grandfather had considered this a test. But what sort of test?

They reached the end, and, just around the corner, a van was parked with what Henry assumed was the driver standing by the open driver’s door, smoking a cigarette.

Mary stopped about ten feet away from him. “Have you got the package?”

He reached inside the car and lifted up a computer case. There didn’t necessarily have to be a computer in it. I looked up and around. It was a good place for a meeting. No witnesses. But there were CCTV cameras. I wondered if they were working.

The man tossed the bag back in the car. “Have you got the money?”

She held up her phone. “Just need the bank account details.”

“OK. Just step over here and let’s get this done.”

She moved closer, and in a flash, he had grabbed her, holding her by the neck with a gun to her head. The two men Henry thought he’d seen at the top of the mews were now within sight, and both had guns trained on him. A trap, indeed.

“What do you want?” Henry asked.

“Tell your boss the price just doubled. Two million. You’ve got five minutes.”

I shook my head, not to clear the cobwebs, but to calm down and think rationally.

Talk first. “Surely there’s a better way to do this. You don’t need to hold a gun to her head.”

I held my hands out just to show I wasn’t a threat.

“No, probably not.” He released his grip and lowered the gun.

A very, very bad mistake.

—-

© Charles Heath 2020-2026

An excerpt from “If Only” – a work in progress

Investigation of crimes doesn’t always go according to plan, nor does the perpetrator get either found or punished.

That was particularly true in my case.  The murderer was incredibly careful in not leaving any evidence behind, to the extent that the police could not rule out whether it was a male or a female.

At one stage, the police thought I had murdered my own wife, though how I could be on a train at the time of the murder was beyond me.  I had witnesses and a cast-iron alibi.

The officer in charge was Detective First Grade Gabrielle Walters.  She came to me on the day after the murder seeking answers to the usual questions like, when was the last time you saw your wife, did you argue, the neighbours reckon there were heated discussions the day before.

Routine was the word she used.

Her fellow detective was a surly piece of work whose intention was to get answers or, more likely, a confession by any or all means possible.  I could sense the raging violence within him.  Fortunately, common sense prevailed.

Over the course of the next few weeks, once I’d been cleared of committing the crime, Gabrielle made a point of keeping me informed of the progress.

After three months, the updates were more sporadic, and when, for lack of progress, it became a cold case, communication ceased.

But it was not the last time I saw Gabrielle.

The shock of finding Vanessa was more devastating than the fact that she was now gone, and those images lived on in the same nightmare that came to visit me every night when I closed my eyes.

For months, I was barely functioning, to the extent that I had all but lost my job and quite a few friends, particularly those who were more attached to Vanessa rather than me.

They didn’t understand how it could affect me so much, and since it had not happened to them, my tart replies of ‘you wouldn’t understand’ were met with equally short retorts.  Some questioned my sanity, even, for a time, so did I.

No one, it seemed, could understand what it was like, no one except Gabrielle.

She was by her own admission, damaged goods, having been the victim of a similar incident, a boyfriend who turned out to be an awfully bad boy.  Her story varied only in that she had been made to witness his execution.  Her nightmare, in reliving that moment in time, was how she was still alive and, to this day, had no idea why she’d been spared.

It was a story she told me one night, some months after the investigation had been scaled down.  I was still looking for the bottom of a bottle and an emotional mess.  Perhaps it struck a resonance with her; she’d been there and managed to come out the other side.

What happened became our secret, a once-only night together that meant a great deal to me, and by mutual agreement, it was not spoken of again.  It was as if she knew exactly what was required to set me on the path to recovery.

And it had.

Since then, we saw each other about once a month in a cafe.   I had been surprised to hear from her again shortly after that eventful night when she called to set it up, ostensibly for her to provide me with any updates on the case, but perhaps we had, after that unspoken night, formed a closer bond than either of us wanted to admit.

We generally talked for hours over wine, then dinner and coffee.  It took a while for me to realise that all she had was her work; personal relationships were nigh on impossible in a job that left little or no spare time for anything else.

She’d always said that if I had any questions or problems about the case, or if there was anything that might come to me that might be relevant, even after all this time, all I had to do was call her.

I wondered if this text message was in that category.  I was certain it would interest the police, and I had no doubt they could trace the message’s origin, but there was that tiny degree of doubt about whether or not I could trust her to tell me what the message meant.

I reached for the phone, then put it back down again.  I’d think about it and decide tomorrow.

© Charles Heath 2018-2020

Sayings: Irons in the fire

There is an expression you hear a lot, here, there, and everywhere when referring to someone who is very busy, ‘oh, he has a lot of irons in the fire’.

These days we use it as an analogy not to have too many things on the go at the same time, and, in the end, none of them will be finished properly, or finished at all.

There are two old-time literal meanings that can apply to this analogy, the first being that in laundries, they used to have their irons in the fire, warming so that clothes could be ironed. Having too many meant sometimes one would be left too long, and end up scorching the clothes being ironed.

Hopefully, that didn’t happen to a very expensive dress!

The second meaning came from a blacksmith’s foundry where he had iron bars in the fire, heating up so that they could be worked on. Having too many in the fire at once sometimes meant that one became overheated, and ruined.

Conversely, having too many pieces of iron in the fire might cause the fire to be too cool to heat any of the metal bars.

These days, a lot of people need to have a lot of projects on the go at once, in the hope that one or more might suddenly become a winner.

Sadly, that doesn’t happen very often.

And, no, buying a lot of lottery tickets hoping one will win, that is not very likely either.

An excerpt from “One Last Look”: Charlotte is no ordinary girl

This is currently available at Amazon here:  http://amzn.to/2CqUBcz

…

I’d read about out-of-body experiences, and like everyone else, thought it was nonsense.  Some people claimed to see themselves in the operating theatre, medical staff frantically trying to revive them, and being surrounded by white light.

I was definitely looking down, but it wasn’t me I was looking at.

It was two children, a boy and a girl, with their parents, in a park.

The boy was Alan.  He was about six or seven.  The girl was Louise, and she was five years old.  She had long red hair and looked the image of her mother.

I remember it now, it was Louise’s birthday and we went down to Bournemouth to visit our Grandmother, and it was the last time we were all together as a family.

We were flying homemade kites our father had made for us, and after we lay there looking up at the sky, making animals out of the clouds.  I saw an elephant, Louise saw a giraffe.

We were so happy then.

Before the tragedy.

When I looked again ten years had passed and we were living in hell.  Louise and I had become very adept at survival in a world we really didn’t understand, surrounded by people who wanted to crush our souls.

It was not a life a normal child had, our foster parents never quite the sort of people who were adequately equipped for two broken-hearted children.  They tried their best, but their best was not good enough.

Every day it was a battle, to avoid the Bannister’s and Archie in particular, every day he made advances towards Louise and every day she fended him off.

Until one day she couldn’t.

Now I was sitting in the hospital, holding Louise’s hand.  She was in a coma, and the doctors didn’t think she would wake from it.  The damage done to her was too severe.

The doctors were wrong.

She woke, briefly, to name her five assailants.  It was enough to have them arrested.  It was not enough to have them convicted.

Justice would have to be served by other means.

I was outside the Bannister’s home.

I’d made my way there without really thinking, after watching Louise die.  It was like being on autopilot, and I had no control over what I was doing.  I had murder in mind.  It was why I was holding an iron bar.

Skulking in the shadows.  It was not very different from the way the Bannister’s operated.

I waited till Archie came out.  I knew he eventually would.  The police had taken him to the station for questioning, and then let him go.  I didn’t understand why, nor did I care.

I followed him up the towpath, waiting till he stopped to light a cigarette, then came out of the shadows.

“Wotcha got there Alan?” he asked when he saw me.  He knew what it was, and what it was for.

It was the first time I’d seen the fear in his eyes.  He was alone.

“Justice.”

“For that slut of a sister of yours.  I had nuffing to do with it.”

“She said otherwise, Archie.”

“She never said nuffing, you just made it up.”  An attempt at bluster, but there was no confidence in his voice.

I held up the pipe.  It had blood on it.  Willy’s blood.  “She may or may not have Archie, but Willy didn’t make it up.  He sang like a bird.  That’s his blood, probably brains on the pipe too, Archie, and yours will be there soon enough.”

“He dunnit, not me.  Lyin’ bastard would say anything to save his own skin.”  Definitely scared now, he was looking to run away.

“No, Archie.  He didn’t.  I’m coming for you.  All of you Bannisters.  And everyone who touched my sister.”

It was the recurring nightmare I had for years afterwards.

I closed my eyes and tried to shut out the thoughts, the images of Louise, the phone call, the visit to the hospital and being there when she succumbed to her injuries.  Those were the very worst few hours of my life.

She had asked me to come to the railway station and walk home with her, and I was running late.  If I had left when I was supposed to, it would never have happened and for years afterwards, I blamed myself for her death.

If only I’d not been late…

When the police finally caught the rapists, I’d known all along who they’d be; antagonists from school, the ring leader, Archie Bannister, a spurned boyfriend, a boy whose parents, ubiquitously known to all as ‘the Bannister’s, dealt in violence and crime and who owned the neighbourhood.  The sins of the father had been very definitely passed onto the son.

At school, I used to be the whipping boy, Archie, a few grades ahead of me, made a point of belting me and a few of the other boys, to make sure the rest did as they were told.  He liked Louise, but she had no time for a bully like him, even when he promised he would ‘protect’ me.

I knew the gang members, the boys who tow-kowed to save getting beaten up, and after the police couldn’t get enough information to prosecute them because everyone was too afraid to speak out, I went after Willy.  There was always a weak link in a group, and he was it.

He worked in a factory, did long hours on a Wednesday and came home after dark alone.  It was a half mile walk, through a park.  The night I approached him, I smashed the lights and left it in darkness.  He nearly changed his mind and went the long way home.

He didn’t.

It took an hour and a half to get the names.  At first, when he saw me, he laughed.  He said I would be next, and that was four words more than he knew he should have said.

When I found him alone the next morning I showed him the iron bar and told him he was on the list.  I didn’t kill him then, he could wait his turn, and worry about what was going to happen to him.

When the police came to visit me shortly after that encounter, no doubt at the behest of the Bannister’s, the neighbourhood closed ranks and gave me an ironclad alibi.  The Bannister’s then came to visit me and threatened me.  I told them their days were numbered and showed them the door.

At the trial, he and his friends got off on a technicality.  The police had failed to do their job properly, but it was not the police, but a single policeman, corrupted by the Bannisters.

Archie could help but rub it in my face.  He was invincible.

Joe Collins took 12 bullets and six hours to bleed out.  He apologized, he pleaded, he cried, he begged.  I didn’t care.

Barry Mills, a strong lad with a mind to hurting people, Archie’s enforcer, almost got the better of me.  I had to hit him more times than I wanted to, and in the end, I had to be satisfied that he died a short but agonizing death.

I revisited Willy in the hospital.  He’d recovered enough to recognize me, and why I’d come.  Suffocation was too good for him.

David Williams, second in command of the gang, was as tough and nasty as the Bannisters.  His family were forging a partnership with the Bannister’s to make them even more powerful.  Outwardly David was a pleasant sort of chap, affable, polite, and well mannered.  A lot of people didn’t believe he could be like, or working with, the Bannisters.

He and I met in the pub.  We got along like old friends.  He said Willy had just named anyone he could think of, and that he was innocent of any charges.  We shook hands and parted as friends.

Three hours later he was sitting in a chair in the middle of a disused factory, blindfolded and scared.  I sat and watched him, listened to him, first threatening me, and then finally pleading with me.  He’d guessed who it was that had kidnapped him.

When it was dark, I took the blindfold off and shone a very bright light in his eyes.  I asked him if the violence he had visited upon my sister was worth it.  He told me he was just a spectator.

I’d read the coroner’s report.  They all had a turn.  He was a liar.

He took nineteen bullets to die.

Then came Archie.

The same factory only this time there were four seats.  Anna Bannister, brothel owner, Spike Bannister, head of the family, Emily Bannister, sister, and who had nothing to do with their criminal activities.  She just had the misfortune of sharing their name.

Archie’s father told me how he was going to destroy me, and everyone I knew.

A well-placed bullet between the eyes shut him up.

Archie’s mother cursed me.  I let her suffer for an hour before I put her out of her misery.

Archie remained stony-faced until I came to Emily.  The death of his parents meant he would become head of the family.  I guess their deaths meant as little to him as they did me.

He was a little more worried about his sister.

I told him it was confession time.

He told her it was little more than a forced confession and he had done nothing to deserve my retribution.

I shrugged and shot her, and we both watched her fall to the ground screaming in agony.  I told him if he wanted her to live, he had to genuinely confess to his crimes.  This time he did, it all poured out of him.

I went over to Emily.  He watched in horror as I untied her bindings and pulled her up off the floor, suffering only from a small wound in her arm.  Without saying a word she took the gun and walked over to stand behind him.

“Louise was my friend, Archie.  My friend.”

Then she shot him.  Six times.

To me, after saying what looked like a prayer, she said, “Killing them all will not bring her back, Alan, and I doubt she would approve of any of this.  May God have mercy on your soul.”

Now I was in jail.  I’d spent three hours detailing the deaths of the five boys, everything I’d done; a full confession.  Without my sister, my life was nothing.  I didn’t want to go back to the foster parents; I doubt they’d take back a murderer.

They were not allowed to.

For a month I lived in a small cell, in solitary, no visitors.  I believed I was in the queue to be executed, and I had mentally prepared myself for the end.

Then I was told I had a visitor, and I was expecting a priest.

Instead, it was a man called McTavish. Short, wiry, and with an accent that I could barely understand.

“You’ve been a bad boy, Alan.”

When I saw it was not the priest I told the jailers not to let him in, I didn’t want to speak to anyone.  They ignored me.  I’d expected he was a psychiatrist, come to see whether I should be shipped off to the asylum.

I was beginning to think I was going mad.

I ignored him.

“I am the difference between you living or dying Alan, it’s as simple as that.  You’d be a wise man to listen to what I have to offer.”

Death sounded good.  I told him to go away.

He didn’t.  Persistent bugger.

I was handcuffed to the table.  The prison officers thought I was dangerous.  Five, plus two, murders, I guess they had a right to think that.  McTavish sat opposite me, ignoring my request to leave.

“Why’d you do it?”

“You know why.”  Maybe if I spoke he’d go away.

“Your sister.  By all accounts, the scum that did for her deserved what they got.”

“It was murder just the same.  No difference between scum and proper people.”

“You like killing?”

“No-one does.”

“No, I dare say you’re right.  But you’re different, Alan.  As clean and merciless killing I’ve ever seen.  We can use a man like you.”

“We?”

“A group of individuals who clean up the scum.”

I looked up to see his expression, one of benevolence, totally out of character for a man like him.  It looked like I didn’t have a choice.

Trained, cleared, and ready to go.

I hadn’t realized there were so many people who were, for all intents and purposes, invisible.  People that came and went, in malls, in hotels, trains, buses, airports, everywhere, people no one gave a second glance.

People like me.

In a mall, I became a shopper.

In a hotel, I was just another guest heading to his room.

On a bus or a train, I was just another commuter.

At the airport, I became a pilot.  I didn’t need to know how to fly; everyone just accepted a pilot in a pilot suit was just what he looked like.

I had a passkey.

I had the correct documents to get me onto the plane.

That walk down the air bridge was the longest of my life.  Waiting for the call from the gate, waiting for one of the air bridge staff to challenge me, stepping onto the plane.

Two pilots and a steward.  A team.  On the plane early before the rest of the crew.  A group that was committing a crime, had committed a number of crimes and thought they’d got away with it.

Until the judge, the jury and their executioner arrived.

Me.

Quick, clean, merciless.  Done.

I was now an operational field agent.

I was older now, and I could see in the mirror I was starting to go grey at the sides.  It was far too early in my life for this, but I expect it had something to do with my employment.

I didn’t recognize the man who looked back at me.

It was certainly not Alan McKenzie, nor was there any part of that fifteen-year-old who had made the decision to exact revenge.

Given a choice; I would not have gone down this path.

Or so I kept telling myself each time a little more of my soul was sold to the devil.

I was Barry Gamble.

I was Lenny Buckman.

I was Jimmy Hosen.

I was anyone but the person I wanted to be.

That’s what I told Louise, standing in front of her grave, and trying to apologize for all the harm, all the people I’d killed for that one rash decision.  If she was still alive she would be horrified, and ashamed.

Head bowed, tears streamed down my face.

God had gone on holiday and wasn’t there to hand out any forgiveness.  Not that day.  Not any day.

New York, New Years Eve.

I was at the end of a long tour, dragged out of a holiday and back into the fray, chasing down another scumbag.  They were scumbags, and I’d become an automaton hunting them down and dispatching them to what McTavish called a better place.

This time I failed.

A few drinks to blot out the failure, a blonde woman who pushed my buttons, a room in a hotel, any hotel, it was like being on the merry-go-round, round and round and round…

Her name was Silvia or Sandra, or someone I’d met before, but couldn’t quite place her.  It could be an enemy agent for all I knew or all I cared right then.

I was done.

I’d had enough.

I gave her the gun.

I begged her to kill me.

She didn’t.

Instead, I simply cried, letting the pent up emotion loose after being suppressed for so long, and she stayed with me, holding me close, and saying I was safe, that she knew exactly how I felt.

How could she?  No one could know what I’d been through.

I remembered her name after she had gone.

Amanda.

I remembered she had an imperfection in her right eye.

Someone else had the same imperfection.

I couldn’t remember who that was.

Not then.

I had a dingy flat in Kensington, a place that I rarely stayed in if I could help it.  After five-star hotel rooms, it made me feel shabby.

The end of another mission, I was on my way home, the underground, a bus, and then a walk.

It was late.

People were spilling out of the pub after the last drinks.  Most in good spirits, others slightly more boisterous.

A loud-mouthed chap bumped into me, the sort who had one too many, and was ready to take on all comers.

He turned on me, “Watch where you’re going, you fool.”

Two of his friends dragged him away.  He shrugged them off, squared up.

I punched him hard, in the stomach, and he fell backwards onto the ground.  I looked at his two friends.  “Take him home before someone makes mincemeat out of him.”

They grabbed his arms, lifted him off the ground and took him away.

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see a woman, early thirties, quite attractive, but very, very drunk.  She staggered from the bar, bumped into me, and finished up sitting on the side of the road.

I looked around to see where her friends were.  The exodus from the pub was over and the few nearby were leaving to go home.

She was alone, drunk, and by the look of her, unable to move.

I sat beside her.  “Where are your friends?”

“Dunno.”

“You need help?”

She looked up, and sideways at me.  She didn’t look the sort who would get in this state.  Or maybe she was, I was a terrible judge of women.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“Nobody.”  I was exactly how I felt.

“Well Mr Nobody, I’m drunk, and I don’t care.  Just leave me here to rot.”

She put her head back between her knees, and it looked to me she was trying to stop the spinning sensation in her head.

Been there before, and it’s not a good feeling.

“Where are your friends?” I asked again.

“Got none.”

“Perhaps I should take you home.”

“I have no home.”

“You don’t look like a homeless person.  If I’m not mistaken, those shoes are worth more than my weekly salary.”  I’d seen them advertised, in the airline magazine, don’t ask me why the ad caught my attention.

She lifted her head and looked at me again.  “You a smart fucking arse are you?”

“I have my moments.”

“Have them somewhere else.”

She rested her head against my shoulder.  We were the only two left in the street, and suddenly in darkness when the proprietor turned off the outside lights.

“Take me home,” she said suddenly.

“Where is your place?”

“Don’t have one.  Take me to your place.”

“You won’t like it.”

“I’m drunk.  What’s not to like until tomorrow.”

I helped her to her feet.  “You have a name?”

“Charlotte.”

The wedding was in a small church.  We had been away for a weekend in the country, somewhere in the Cotswolds, and found this idyllic spot.  Graves going back to the dawn of time, a beautiful garden tended by the vicar and his wife, an astonishing vista over hills and down dales.

On a spring afternoon with the sun, the flowers, and the peacefulness of the country.

I had two people at the wedding, the best man, Bradley, and my boss, Watkins.

Charlotte had her sisters Melissa and Isobel, and Isobel’s husband Giovanni, and their daughter Felicity.

And one more person who was as mysterious as she was attractive, a rather interesting combination as she was well over retirement age.  She arrived late and left early.

Aunt Agatha.

She looked me up and down with what I’d call a withering look.  “There’s more to you than meets the eye,” she said enigmatically.

“Likewise I’m sure,” I said.  It earned me an elbow in the ribs from Charlotte.  It was clear she feared this woman.

“Why did you come,” Charlotte asked.

“You know why.”

Agatha looked at me.  “I like you.  Take care of my granddaughter.  You do not want me for an enemy.”

OK, now she officially scared me.

She thrust a cheque into my hand, smiled, and left.

“Who is she,” I asked after we watched her depart.

“Certainly not my fairy godmother.”

Charlotte never mentioned her again.

Zurich in summer, not exactly my favourite place.

Instead of going to visit her sister Isobel, we stayed at a hotel in Beethovenstrasse and Isobel and Felicity came to us.  Her husband was not with her this time.

Felicity was three or four and looked very much like her mother.  She also looked very much like Charlotte, and I’d remarked on it once before and it received a sharp rebuke.

We’d been twice before, and rather than talk to her sister, Charlotte spent her time with Felicity, and they were, together, like old friends.  For so few visits they had a remarkable rapport.

I had not broached the subject of children with Charlotte, not after one such discussion where she had said she had no desire to be a mother.  It had not been a subject before and wasn’t once since.

Perhaps like all Aunts, she liked the idea of playing with a child for a while and then give it back.

Felicity was curious as to who I was, but never ventured too close.  I believed a child could sense the evil in adults and had seen through my facade of friendliness.  We were never close.

But…

This time, when observing the two together, something quite out of left field popped into my head.  It was not possible, not by any stretch of the imagination, but I thought she looked like my mother.

And Charlotte had seen me looking in their direction.  “You seem distracted,” she said.

“I was just remembering my mother.  Odd moment, haven’t done so for a very long time.”

“Why now?”  I think she had a look of concern on her face.

“Her birthday, I guess,” I said, the first excuse I could think of.

Another look and I was wrong.  She looked like Isobel or Charlotte, or if I wanted to believe it possible, Melissa too.

I was crying, tears streaming down my face.

I was in pain, searing pain from my lower back stretching down into my legs, and I was barely able to breathe.

It was like coming up for air.

It was like Snow White bringing Prince Charming back to life.  I could feel what I thought was a gentle kiss and tears dropping on my cheeks, and when I opened my eyes, I saw Charlotte slowly lifting her head, a hand gently stroking the hair off my forehead.

And in a very soft voice, she said, “Hi.”

I could not speak, but I think I smiled.  It was the girl with the imperfection in her right eye.  Everything fell into place, and I knew, in that instant that we were irrevocably meant to be together.

“Welcome back.”

© Charles Heath 2016-2019

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365 Days of writing, 2026 – 92

Day 92 – Holidays – Bah, humbug

…

The Blank Page, The Burnout, and the Necessity of Leaving Your Desk

There is a specific kind of romanticism attached to the image of the “tortured writer.” We envision the solitary figure, hunched over a desk in a dimly lit room, surrounded by stacks of paper and empty coffee mugs, finding their ultimate bliss in the quiet hum of creation.

If your ideal scenario—your slice of heaven—is sitting in a silent room with nothing but a blank sheet of paper and a pen, you might be wondering: Is there something wrong with me?

The short answer? No. But there is a danger in confusing “solitude” with “stagnation.”

The Comfort of the Void

For many of us, the blank page is the ultimate sanctuary. It is a space of pure potential, untainted by the messy, demanding realities of the outside world. When the world feels loud, chaotic, or overwhelming, the blank page is the only place where we can impose order. It’s a controlled environment where we are the architects of the universe.

However, that sanctuary can quickly become a cage. When you retreat into the vacuum of your own mind for too long, your writing begins to suffer. It loses its vitality, its texture, and its connection to the very thing it’s supposed to reflect: life.

The Myth of the Perpetual Engine

We feel guilty when we stop. We worry that if we step away from the desk, we’ll lose our momentum, our “voice,” or our discipline. But here is a hard truth every writer needs to internalise: To write about life, you must actually live it.

If you spend every waking hour staring at a blank page, you are not refilling the well; you are just watching the bottom of the bucket. Eventually, the well runs dry.

When you force yourself to stay in that room, you aren’t just risking a “writer’s block” or a mediocre draft; you are risking a breakdown. Writing requires a massive expenditure of emotional and intellectual energy. It is an act of extraction. If you never replenish, you begin to run on fumes. You become irritable, exhausted, and—perhaps worst of all—your writing starts to sound like a rehash of a rehash.

Why You Need to “Get Out”

Taking a break isn’t an act of laziness; it is a vital part of the creative process. Here is why you need to leave the room:

1. You need input to create output. Inspiration is rarely found at the desk. It is found in the way a stranger speaks on the bus, the changing colour of the leaves in the park, the frustrating delay of a train, or the taste of a meal you didn’t have to cook yourself. These experiences provide the “raw material” for your stories. Without them, your writing becomes abstract and hollow.

2. The subconscious needs room to breathe. Have you ever noticed that your best ideas come in the shower or while you’re out for a walk? That’s because your brain is a problem-solving machine that works best when it’s distracted. By stepping away, you give your subconscious permission to connect the dots that your conscious mind was too stubborn to see.

3. Perspective is a cure for perfectionism. When we sit in a room for too long, we lose our sense of proportion. A single paragraph feels like a life-or-death struggle. A week away from the work allows you to come back with fresh eyes, seeing the flaws you were blind to and the potential you had buried under anxiety.

The Holiday is Part of the Work

If you are currently feeling like the “ideal situation” of the blank page is starting to feel more like a prison cell, take it as your sign: Go on holiday.

It doesn’t need to be an exotic excursion. Go to a museum, sit in a crowded cafe, take a hike, or simply spend a weekend completely disconnected from your project. Give yourself the gift of being a person for a few days, rather than a “writer.”

When you return to that desk, you won’t be returning to a cage. You’ll be returning with pockets full of observations, a rested nervous system, and a surplus of energy.

The blank page will still be there. It’s not going anywhere. But it will be waiting for a version of you that has something new to say.

“What Sets Us Apart”, a mystery with a twist

David is a man troubled by a past he is trying to forget.

Susan is rebelling against a life of privilege and an exasperated mother who holds a secret that will determine her daughter’s destiny.

They are two people brought together by chance. Or was it?

When Susan discovers her mother’s secret, she goes in search of the truth that has been hidden from her since the day she was born.

When David realizes her absence is more than the usual cooling off after another heated argument, he finds himself being slowly drawn back into his former world of deceit and lies.

Then, back with his former employers, David quickly discovers nothing is what it seems as he embarks on a dangerous mission to find Susan before he loses her forever.

Find the Kindle version on Amazon here:  http://amzn.to/2Eryfth

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NaNoWriMo – April – 2026 – Day 19

As a result of a sit-down with Chester, who has been keeping an eye on the progress of the project, or at least that’s what he thinks, we’ve decided that there’s going to be a slight change.

Plan or not, writing the story was always going to go the way the characters want to go, and I’ve decided that the two protagonists are not going to have a happily ever after.

They can’t.

It was a pie in the sky notion that they could, given the nature of their professions. But it’s not only that; it comes down to the plans their employer has for them, and it certainly isn’t for them to be together.

So, the way it’s written, they were about to have that intimate moment when common sense took over, and instead of being together, they are apart in her apartment.

She wanted him to stay, he wanted to stay, but there are forces in play that dictate caution.

Then the plot twist no one saw coming.

I’m excited about the next ten days.

Stay tuned

The story behind the story: A Case of Working With the Jones Brothers

To write a private detective serial has always been one of the items at the top of my to-do list, though trying to write novels and a serial, as well as a blog, and maintain a social media presence, well, you get the idea.

But I made it happen, from a bunch of episodes I wrote a long, long time ago, used these to start it, and then continue on, then as now, never having much of an idea where it was going to end up, or how long it would take to tell the story.

That, I think is the joy of ad hoc writing, even you, as the author, have as much of an idea of where it’s going as the reader does.

It’s basically been in the mill since 1990, and although I finished it last year, it looks like the beginning to end will have taken exactly 30 years.  Had you asked me 30 years ago if I’d ever get it finished, the answer would be maybe?

My private detective, Harry Walthenson

I’d like to say he’s from that great literary mould of Sam Spade, or Mickey Spillane, or Phillip Marlow, but he’s not.

But I’ve watched Humphrey Bogart play Sam Spade with much interest, and modelled Harry and his office on it.  Similarly, I’ve watched Robert Micham play Phillip Marlow with great panache, if not detachment, and added a bit of him to the mix.

Other characters come into play, and all of them, no matter what period they’re from, always seem larger than life.  I’m not above stealing a little of Mary Astor, Peter Lorre or Sidney Greenstreet, to breathe life into beguiling women and dangerous men alike.

Then there’s the title, like

The Case of the Unintentional Mummy – this has so many meanings in so many contexts, though I imagine that back in Hollywood in the ’30s and ’40s, this would be excellent fodder for Abbott and Costello

The Case of the Three-Legged Dog – Yes, I suspect there may be a few real-life dogs with three legs, but this plot would involve something more sinister.  And if made out of plaster, yes, they’re always something else inside.

But for mine, to begin with, it was “The Case of the …”, because I had no idea what the case was going to be about, well, I did, but not specifically.

Then I liked the idea of calling it “The Case of the Brothers’ Revenge” because I began to have a notion there was a brother no one knew about, but that’s stuff for other stories, not mine, so then it went the way of the others.

Now it’s called ‘A Case of Working With the Jones Brothers’, finished the first three drafts, and I am at the editor for the last reading.

I have high hopes of publishing it mid 2026.  It even has a cover.

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