Month: January 2022

In a word: Double

I was watching a TV program and the words ‘double standards’ kept being thrown about with little attention being paid to what it really means.

Like statistics, words can be used in any manner to support or debunk what someone else will call a fact.

Fact, of course, is another word that’s thrown around like a football.

But double standards, what does it really mean?

“a rule or principle which is unfairly applied in different ways to different people or groups”

Put simply, if you own a cat, and I hate cats, I’m likely to say to you I like cats because of who you are and what I might want from you.

It has far more reaching consequences in reality because some of us might profess they regard everyone as being equal ‘in the eyes of the Lord’ but have a very different private view.

Personally, I believe everyone should be treated equally.  The problem is, a great many people around me do not, and it seems that I am slowly becoming a minority in my own country.

How do we rectify this?

I don’t think we can.  Politicians are now running scared in their own constituencies because of the increasing multicultural population, and cannot be seen to favor one group or another.

Until lobby groups come into play, campaign funding to the politician is discussed, and very subtly, votes are bought.

Does your political representative work on the basis of double standards?

Maybe it’s time to find out before it’s too late, and you too will be living in shanty huts on a reservation.

The cinema of my dreams – Was it just another surveillance job? – Episode 1

Always the unexpected

I was walking past a fast food outlet, minding my own business when an explosion behind me firstly threw me about 20 feet along the sidewalk and then dumped a whole lot of building rubbish on me.

So much for minding my own business.

Dazed, half deaf, and bleeding from several shrapnel wounds, I slowly got to my feet and looked back in the direction of where I thought the explosion happened.

Wrong. It was in the other direction. No surprise with the disorientation.

Not far from me I could see several others on the ground through the settling cloud of dust, bodies lying on the pathway, not moving. A number of cars that had been driving past had got caught almost directly by the blast and had been severely damaged. Other cars behind had crashed into them.

The storefront I had just past was now just a pile of rubble, much like photos of houses during the blitz and anyone caught in it would not have survived.

Still slightly disorientated, I could hear sirens in the distance, and then, above that, as my hearing slightly improved, screams from people who had taken the full brunt of the explosion.

I headed towards the nearest of the injured when I was knocked abruptly to the ground by two men running away from the scene. It took a few moments to realize these men must have had something to do with the explosion and were fleeing.

I scrambled to my feet and started running after them. They were some distance in front of me as was an oncoming police car, and I thought they could take up the chase, and stopped.

Instead, it drove straight past the two men and stopped opposite me, and before knew what was happening, I was on the ground with four weapons trained on my head, and three of them yelling that if I moved they would shoot me.

I tried telling them about the two fleeing men I’d been chasing but no one was listening.

I had a knee in my back and a gun to my head. This wasn’t going to end well for someone.

© Charles Heath 2018-2019

“X marks the spot…” – a short story

I hated playing games.

I hated it when I was younger, namely because my brothers always cheated, and that had been carried through to adulthood.

Now, I just avoided them.

It left me wondering how I managed to paint myself into a corner, and agree to do the one thing I assiduously avoided.

You could chalk it up to being persuaded by a pretty girl.  Yes, I am the typical male, a sucker for a pretty face and a little flattery.

It would not have happened if I’d just gone home, instead of being asked to go and ‘just have one drink’ on the way home from work.  I used to, once upon a time, before I got sick.  But, perhaps it was a combination of cabin fever, and the monastic existence I’d adopted since that saw the one visit a chink of light at the end of a very long tunnel.

Whatever the reason, had I not gone, I would not have met Nancy.  I’d seen her before, off and on, at work, and had noted, probably with a degree of disdain that where she was, was the most noise.  You know, the one who talks loudest in the elevator, or the one who was the center of attention at a dining table.

And yet, underneath that, if or when anyone got close enough, there was something else.  Something that fascinated me.  But, having become reclusive had made me more reticent, and even though I was sitting at the same table, almost within arm’s length, I was too shy to strike up a conversation.

Until it was time to go home.  I had moved out of the way so she could get out, and as she passed me she said, “You’ve been very quiet, Brian isn’t it?”

“Yes.  And I know it’s rather lame but I don’t have as extensive knowledge of sports, which I guess I should.  Ask me about old movies, and I’m your guy.  Anyway, I pride myself on being a good listener.”

“Old movies eh.  I’ll keep that in mind.”  A smile, she went to leave, and then turned.  “Look.  I have this thing I have to go to, and I don’t want to go by myself.  It’s not a date or anything like that, I just need someone to come with me.  You might even find the people interesting.”

“I’m sure there’s someone else here more qualified than I am.”  It was lame and I was floundering.  It was not every day a girl asks you to go out with her.  Even if it was, to a certain degree, an unflattering invitation.

“They all seem to have something else to do.  Look, here’s my phone number,” she handed me a piece of paper with her cell number scrawled on it, “Call me if you change your mind.  It’s not going to be as bad as you think.”

I should not have picked up the phone.  I definitely should not have called her number.  And I knew I was going to live to regret telling her I would go to her ‘thing’.

Before I walked out the door I looked at myself in the mirror.  It seemed to be telling me, ‘you are a fool, Brian’, and I agreed.  This had disaster written all over it.  I hadn’t been out for a long time, and if anything, those few hours last evening were a sign I was not ready to face the world.  Not after being so long away from it.

A lot had changed in the fifteen months I’d been in a coma.  It was a miracle, the doctors said, that I came out of it with very little damage.  I’d lost a chunk of memories, particularly surrounding the accident, and perhaps, I’d been told, that was a good thing.  Cameron, the guy I worked with had summed up the change in a few short words, ‘you’ve gone from being the biggest dead shit in the world to something that resembles a human being’.  I didn’t remember that person, though others did.

Maybe she remembered who I was, and, if she did, that didn’t explain why she asked me.  The person Cameron described was not a person I would want to be with, so I guess the answer to my rhetorical question would soon be revealed.

Nancy was bright, talkative, and, at times, over the top.  She was the loudest in the room and the center of attention.  I wondered if the old Brian had been like that because if he was, I wouldn’t like him.  It begged the question, why did I agree to go with her?

Curiosity?  Maybe.  That I might find some people who knew the old Brian?  I certainly hoped not.

I had barely gotten out of the car to go and knock on her door when she came out, a small gym bag on her shoulder, dressed casually.  I had to admit, in the morning sun and surrounded by an idyllic setting, she looked almost like an angel.  She jumped in the car and all but slammed the door shut.

“You’re early.”

I looked at my watch, then the clock on the car’s dash.  Both said the same, Eight a.m. exactly.  “You did say eight a.m. and not p.m.”  I couldn’t remember what she said, not right then.

“I mean most guys who come to collect me are always late.”

“Then I guess, by inference, I not like most guys.”

She smiled, one of those impish smiles I’d come to recognize from another woman I’d dated somewhere in a distinct past, and who was trouble.  I did, for some strange remember the night we spent in jail, though I couldn’t remember why, except the impish smile.

“I suspect you’re not.  Cam said you were different.”

“Cam did, did he?”  The mentioning of his name raised a red flag in the back of my mind.  Cameron was not above playing complex pranks and I was beginning to see indications that this might be one.  I would have to be careful.

“Not in a bad way, I mean.  He had nothing but good things to say about you, though I had the feeling there was something he wasn’t saying.  You’re not an ax murderer or anything like that?”

“Shouldn’t you have done some more research before asking me along?”  I had also heard from another source, actually, a chap named, rather aptly, Jones, who was also at the party.  He had left earlier but was still in the carpark, apparently his car parked next to mine, smoking a cigarette.  A suspicious man might say he was waiting for me.

He had some ‘sage’ advice.  “You want to be careful when you’re with Nancy.  She’s not what she seems.”

I asked him to elucidate, but, cigarette finished, he stubbed it out rather violently under his blood, and left.  He looked angry, sounded angry, and it was an angry warning.  Perhaps he was a current or, more likely, ex-boyfriend.  That ‘advice’ only added to the intrigue value.

Someone else, when he asked them about Nancy, had told him she was ‘brilliant’ with computers.  Was that in programming, or hacking, or simply data entry?  He only knew she had helped the website programmers when the company had built its intranet.  Computers and I never got on, and I was the only one who got a weekly visit from the IT help desk, just in case.

“I did.  Do you remember anything from those fifteen months?”

“Like what?”

“They say that when you’re in a coma you can still hear people, you know, that sort of stuff.”

I thought about it for a minute.  I wasn’t one of those lucky ones, though I did have one of those out-of-body experiences, where I suspect I’d nearly died.  Just not my time, I’d thought, later.

“I’d like to meet the people who have that ubiquitous title of ‘they’.  They have a lot of opinions, most of which are about the unknown.”

“So would I, to be honest.  All you ever get to do is read about them.  So, are you ready?”

“For what?”

“A weekend away.  It will be fun if you want it to be.”

“Otherwise?”

“It’ll be fun.  You have my promise.”

“And where is this ‘fun’ going to be?”

“Rhode Island.  A friend of my parents, the son is having a party and a few side events.  There’s about 40 of us, so there’s no shortage of interesting if sometimes eclectic people.  I’ll put the address in the GPS.”

Rhode Island, the other home of the New York rich, as well as others, and I hoped it was the others we were going to see.  The host was the son of possible millionaires, so that was an interesting description for me to mull on.  Would he be an ex?  It seemed to me that Rhode Islanders would be less likely to mingle with the paupers, and if they did it would be for their own amusement.

There was a memory on the back of his mind, that popped up, albeit briefly when she mentioned the destination.  The fact it didn’t want to come to the surface told me it was a bad memory.  One from ‘old’ Brians days.

Nancy’s beauty, manner, and the fact she was clever might just win over the son of a millionaire, an heir to a fortune, whereas it would intimidate a lesser man.  As for me, I was a means to an end, so it didn’t matter what I thought, other than it was better than staying home.

It was the house with all the cars parked out front.  Multi stories, with towers that no doubt overlooked the ocean, and extensive gardens that seemed to be shared, that blocked the sightlines from the street front to that invisible ocean.  I was willing to be, once on the other side, the never-ending sound of the sea might be heard.

In winter, this would be bleak.  In summer, well, what was the saying, anyone who is anyone would be here.  Well, the sons and daughter thereof, perhaps.

I had expected the moment I parked the car she would be out, and gone, like a proverbial schoolgirl dying to get back to school after the holidays.  She was not.  She stood there, at the front of the car, and looked at the scene before us.  To me, it was just a building, with trees, shrubs, and grass around it.  To others, it was a portal into another world, one that would never be available to that 95% of the rest of the world.  It was a phrase that popped into my mind, again, randomly, that said, the top 5% of any country held as much if not more of the wealth belongs to the other 95%.

I came up beside her and looked in the same direction, at one of the towers.

“Having a Rapunzel moment?”  I hoped she had some memory of fairytales or it would seem an odd comment.

“I used to have long hair once.  But, the last time I was here, I can’t remember.  My mother’s hair was always long, some sort of hangover from hippy days, you know, the 1970s.  She was here once.  The stories she used to tell me about the houses, and the people she used to know.  I’m ready.  Are you?”

It was like a walk through the park, getting to the front door.  There was a driveway, but there must have been a rule, no cars on the property.  Or perhaps the front gate was locked and the owner had thrown away the key.

Or, more than likely, the butler, standing at the front door, welcoming guests, had it in his pocket.  He was a tall, severe-looking man, with a military bearing.  I somehow knew he was more than just the average butler.

Nancy gave him our names, and in return, he gave us a sheet of paper.  The rules and the room number where we would be staying the night.  I had thought that we would be given separate rooms, but that wasn’t the case, and it didn’t seem to worry Nancy that I would be staying with her.  The only other words he said were, “The rotunda, 11 a.m.”

The room overlooked the ocean, today more or less a millpond, and a number of yachts were out making the most of the weather.  There was a pier at the end of the property, and, yes, a reasonably large boat attached to it.   There was also a view of a croquet lawn, the rotunda beside the rose garden.  On the other side was a large pond, and seats where, no doubt on days when people like us were impinging on their solitude, they sat and contemplated how to make more money.

I didn’t realize I was that cynical.

The room had two beds and its own bathroom.  She had thrown her bag on one, checked out the bathroom, then dashed past saying, “I’ll see you at the rotunda.”

I followed her down about a half-hour later, descending the stairs at a more leisurely pace, looking at the paintings on the wall as I did.  Forbears, and landscapes that were from around here.  The one with the lighthouse was of particular interest.  It brought another memory to the surface.  I’d been there before, sometime in the distant past, and it was significant.

The Butler was standing at the bottom of the stairs, having stopped there when he saw me descending.

“It’s nice to see you again, Master Brian.”

“Not Master Brian, anymore, Jeffery.  Sadly, I had to grow up.”

“We all do, sooner or later.  Pity we can’t say the same for Chester.”

“Where is he?”

“You need to ask.  I hope you’re up for a little X marks the spot.”

I groaned.  Chester and his treasure hunts.

My last memory of that he had hidden a fluffy bunny stuffed with money.  It was the weekend I had the crash the result I was told of too much booze, too much alcohol, too much of everything.  I was just glad the girl I had brought up with me had left with another chap, a decision, I told her when she visited me in hospital, was probably the wisest thing she would ever do.

I just shook my head.

“Even if you don’t think so Brian, we have missed you.”

Another look around, I sighed, then went outside.  My doctor had been right.  Coming back had stirred up the mush in my brain, those thoughts, feelings, and memories of who I was, and what I was.  And who I would never be again.

Nancy was waiting by the rotunda, talking to a more youthful version of myself, Chester.  It was an awful name, one that our mother must have come up with in one of her drug-fuelled dreams, and he had taken a ribbing at school, and a willing participant in many a fight.

Chester looked surprised to see me, no, that wasn’t surprise, but shock.

“I thought you said you would never come back.”

Nancy looked from him, then to me, then back again.

“I’m not here, Chester.  It’s just Nancy and Brian, here for the treasure hunt.  And this time there better be more than a hundred dollars in that stuffed animal.”

Chester looked confused for a moment, then smiled his brand of childish smile, that of a child that would probably never grow up, the result of what I did to him, and would spend the rest of my life trying to earn forgiveness for.

“OK.”

“What was that about?” she asked.

“Long story.  Remind me to tell you one day, if you stick around that long.”

In the background, I could hear Jeffery calling the treasure hunt participants together.

Like it had ten years ago when I came home…

…

© Charles Heath 2020-2021

Memories of the conversations with my cat – 25

As some may be aware, but many not, Chester, my faithful writing assistant, mice catcher, and general pain in the neck, passed away some months ago.

Recently I was running a series based on his adventures, under the title of Past Conversations with my cat.

For those who have not had the chance to read about all of his exploits I will run the series again from Episode 1

These are the memories of our time together…

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This is Chester.  He’s trying to keep a low profile.

He thinks that he had found a new hiding spot that I don’t know about.

He’s the scoop news, my friend, you leave a trail of cat hair.

But…

That’s not the main reason we need to talk.

He seems to have forgotten what mice are and what his primary job is.  It’s a subject that we seem to discuss a lot these days.

I wonder if that is because he’s 16 years old and now a senior citizen, one who now thinks he can milk the selective memory, selective hearing thing.

That’s my excuse, mate, not yours.

I can see he’s trying to keep that look of contempt off his face, but it’s not working.

You’re the cat, there’s a mouse, get to work.

I leave, shaking my head.  It’s like talking to a brick wall.

 

 

An excerpt from “Amnesia”, a work in progress

I remembered a bang.
I remembered the car slewing sideways.
I remember another bang, and then it was lights out.
When I opened my eyes again, I saw the sky.
Or I could be under water.
Everything was blurred.
I tried to focus but I couldn’t. My eyes were full of water.
What happened?
Why was I lying down?
Where was I?
I cast my mind back, trying to remember.
It was a blank.
What, when, who, why and where, questions I should easily be able to answer. Questions any normal person could answer.
I tried to move. Bad, bad mistake.
I did not realise the scream I heard was my own. Just before my body shut down.

“My God! What happened?”
I could hear, not see. I was moving, lying down, looking up.
I was blind. Everything was black.
“Car accident, hit a tree, sent the passenger flying through the windscreen. Pity to poor bastard didn’t get the message that seat belts save lives.”
Was I that poor bastard?
“Report?” A new voice, male, authoritative.
“Multiple lacerations, broken collar bone, broken arm in three places, both legs broken below the knees, one badly. We are not sure of internal injuries, but ruptured spleen, cracked ribs and pierced right lung are fairly evident, x-rays will confirm that and anything else.”
“What isn’t broken?”
“His neck.”
“Then I would have to say we are looking at the luckiest man on the planet.”
I heard shuffling of pages.
“OR1 ready?”
“Yes. On standby since we were first advised.”
“Good. Let’s see if we can weave some magic.”

Magic.
It was the first word that popped into my head when I surfaced from the bottom of the lake. That first breath, after holding it for so long, was sublime, and, in reality, agonising.

Magic, because it seemed like I’d spent a long time under water.
Or somewhere.
I tried to speak, but couldn’t. The words were just in my head.
Was it night or was it day?
Was it hot, or was it cold?
Where was I?
Around me it felt cool.
It was very quiet. No noise except for the hissing of air through an air-conditioning vent. Or perhaps that was the sound of pure silence. And with it the revelation that silence was not silent. It was noisy.
I didn’t try to move.
Instinctively, somehow I knew not to.
A previous bad experience?
I heard what sounded like a door opening, and very quiet footsteps slowly come into the room. They stopped. I could hear breathing, slightly laboured, a sound I’d heard before.
My grandfather.
He had smoked all his life, until he was diagnosed with lung cancer. But for years before that he had emphysema. The person in the room was on their way, down the same path. I could smell the smoke.
I wanted to tell whoever it was the hazards of smoking.
I couldn’t.
I heard a metallic clanging sound from the end of the bed. A moment later the clicking of a pen, then writing.
“You are in a hospital.” A female voice suddenly said. “You’ve been in a very bad accident. You cannot talk, or move, all you can do, for the moment, is listen to me. I am a nurse. You have been here for 45 days, and just come out of a medically induced coma. There is nothing to be afraid of.”
She had a very soothing voice.
I felt her fingers stroke the back of my hand.
“Everything is fine.”
Define fine, I thought. I wanted to ask her what ‘fine’ meant.
“Just count backwards from 10.”
Why?
I didn’t reach seven.

Over the next ten days, that voice became my lifeline to sanity. Every morning I longed to hear it, if only for the few moments she was in the room, those few waking moments when I believed she, and someone else who never spoke, were doing tests. I knew it had to be someone else because I could smell the essence of lavender. My grandmother had worn a similar scent.
It rose above the disinfectant.
I also believed she was another doctor, not the one who had been there the day I arrived. Not the one who had used some ‘magic’ and kept me alive.
It was then, in those moments before she put me under again, that I thought, what if I was paralysed? It would explain a lot. A chill went through me.

The next morning she was back.
“My name is Winifred. We don’t know what your name is, not yet. In a few days, you will be better, and you will be able to ask us questions. You were in an accident, and you were very badly injured, but I can assure you there will be no lasting damage.”
More tests, and then, when I expected the lights to go out, they didn’t. Not for a few minutes more. Perhaps this was how I would be integrated back into the world. A little bit at a time.
The next morning, she came later than usual, and I’d been awake for a few minutes. “You have bandages over your eyes and face. You had bad lacerations to your face, and glass in your eyes. We will know more when the bandages come off in a few days. Your face will take longer to heal. It was necessary to do some plastic surgery.”
Lacerations, glass in my eyes, car accident, plastic surgery. By logical deduction, I knew I was the poor bastard thrown through the windscreen. It was a fleeting memory from the day I was admitted.
How could that happen?
That was the first of many startling revelations. The second was the fact I could not remember the crash. Equally shocking, in that same moment was the fact I could not remember before the crash either, and only vague memories after.
But the most shattering of all these revelations was the one where I realised I could not remember my name.
I tried to calm down, sensing a rising panic.
I was just disoriented, I told myself. After 45 days in an induced coma, it had messed with my mind, and it was only a temporary lapse. Yes, that’s what it was, a temporary lapse. I would remember tomorrow. Or the next day.
Sleep was a blessed relief.

The next day I didn’t wake feeling nauseous. Perhaps they’d lowered the pain medication. I’d heard that morphine could have that effect. Then, how could I know that, but not who I am?
I knew now Winifred the nurse was preparing me for something very bad. She was upbeat, and soothing, giving me a new piece of information each morning. This morning, “You do not need to be afraid. Everything is going to be fine. The doctor tells me you are going to recover with very little scarring. You will need some physiotherapy to recover from your physical injuries, but that’s in the future. We need to let you mend a little bit more before then.”
So, I was not going to be able to leap out of bed, and walk out of the hospital any time soon. I don’t suppose I’d ever leapt out of bed, except as a young boy. I suspect I’d sustained a few broken bones. I guess learning to walk again was the least of my problems.
But, there was something else. I picked it up in the timbre of her voice, a hesitation, or reluctance. It sent another chill through me.
This time I was left awake for an hour before she returned.
This time sleep was restless.
There were scenes playing in my mind, nothing I recognised, and nothing lasting longer than a glimpse. Me. Others, people I didn’t know. Or perhaps I knew them and couldn’t remember them.
Until they disappeared, slowly like the glowing dot in the centre of the computer screen, before finally fading to black.

The morning the bandages were to come off she came in bright and early and woken me. I had another restless night, the images becoming clearer, but nothing recognisable.
“This morning the doctor will be removing the bandages over your eyes. Don’t expect an immediate effect. Your sight may come back quickly or it may come back slowly, but we believe it will come back.”
I wanted to believe I was not expecting anything, but I was. It was probably human nature. I did not want to be blind as well as paralysed. I had to have at least one reason to live.
I dozed again until I felt a gentle hand on my shoulder. I could smell the lavender, the other doctor was back. And I knew the hand on my shoulder was Winifred’s. She told me not to be frightened.
I was amazed to realise in that moment, I wasn’t.
I heard the scissors cutting the bandages.
I felt the bandage being removed, and the pressure coming off my eyes. I could feel the pads covering both eyes.
Then a moment where nothing happened.
Then the pads being gently lift and removed.
Nothing.
I blinked my eyes, once, twice. Nothing.
“Just hold on a moment,” Winifred said. A few seconds later I could feel a cool towel wiping my face, and then gently wiping my eyes. Perhaps there was ointment, or something else in them.
Then a flash. Well, not a flash, but like when a light is turned on and off. A moment later, it was brighter, not the inky blackness of before, but a shade of grey.
She wiped my eyes again.
I blinked a few more times, and then the light returned, and it was like looking through water, at distorted and blurry objects in the distance.
I blinked again, and she wiped my eyes again.
Blurry objects took shape. A face looking down on me, an elderly lady with a kindly face, surely Winifred, who was smiling. And on the opposite side of the bed, the doctor, a Chinese woman of indescribable beauty.
I nodded.
“You can see?”
I nodded again.
“Clearly?”
I nodded.
“Very good. We will just draw the curtains now. We don’t want to overdo it. Tomorrow we will be taking off the bandages on your face. Then, it will be the next milestone. Talking.”
I couldn’t wait.

When morning came, I found myself afraid. Winifred had mentioned scarring, there were bandages on my face. I knew, but wasn’t quite sure how I knew, I wasn’t the handsomest of men before the accident, so this might be an improvement.
I was not sure why I didn’t think it would be the case.
They came at mid morning, the nurse, Winifred, and the doctor, the exquisite Chinese. Perhaps she was the distraction, taking my mind of the reality of what I was about to see.
Another doctor came into the room, before the bandages were removed, and he was introduced as the plastic surgeon that had ‘repaired’ the ravages of the accident. It had been no easy job, but, with a degree of egotism, he did say he was one of the best in the world.
I found it hard to believe, if he was, that he would be at a small country hospital.
“Now just remember, what you might see now is not how you will look in a few months time.”
Warning enough.
The Chinese doctor started removing the bandages. She did it slowly, and made sure it did not hurt. My skin was very tender, and I suspect still bruised, either from the accident or the surgery, I didn’t know.
Then it was done.
The plastic surgeon gave his work a thorough examination and seemed pleased with his work. “Coming along nicely,” he said to the other doctor. He issued some instructions on how to manage the skin, nodded to me, and I thanked him before he left.
I noticed Winifred had a mirror in her hand, and was somewhat reticent in using it. “As I said,” she said noticing me looking at the mirror, “what you see now will not be the final result. The doctor said it was going to heal with very little scarring. You have been very fortunate he was available. Are you ready?”
I nodded.
She showed me.
I tried not to be reviled at the red and purple mess that used to be my face. At a guess I would have to say he had to put it all back together again, but, not knowing what I looked like before, I had no benchmark. All I had was a snippet of memory that told me I was not the tall, dark, and handsome type.
And I still could not talk. There was a reason, he had worked on that area too. Just breathing hurt. I think I would save up anything I had to say for another day. I could not even smile. Or frown. Or grimace.
“We’ll leave you for a while. Everyone needs a little time to get used to the change. I suspect you are not sure if there has been an improvement on last year’s model. Well, time will tell.”
A new face?
I could not remember the old one.
My memory still hadn’t returned.

Searching for locations: New York from a different perspective

It is an amazing coincidence that both times we have flown into New York, it is the day after the worst snow storms.

The first time, we were delayed out of Los Angeles and waited for hours before the plane left.  We had a free lunch and our first introduction to American hamburgers and chips.  Wow!

I had thought we had left enough time with connections to make it in time for New Year’s Eve, like four to five hours before.  As it turned out, we arrived in New York at 10:30, and thanks to continual updating with our limousine service, he was there to take us to the hotel.

The landing was rough, the plane swaying all over the place and many of the passengers were sick.  Blankets were in short supply!

We made it to the hotel, despite snow, traffic, and the inevitable problems associated with NYE in New York, with enough time to throw our baggage in the room, put on our anti cold clothes, and get out onto the streets.

We could not go to Times Square but finished up at Central Park with thousands of others, in time to see the ball drop on a big screen, exchange new year’s greetings, and see the fireworks.

Then, as luck would have it, we were able to get an authentic New York hotdog, just before the police moved the vendor on, and our night was complete.

The second time we were the last plane out of Los Angeles to New York.  After waiting and waiting, we boarded, and then started circling the airport waiting for takeoff permission.  We stopped once to refuel, and then the pilot decided we were leaving.

This time we took our eldest granddaughter, who was 9 at the time, and she thought it was an adventure.  It was.

When we landed, we were directed to an older part of the airport, a disused terminal.  We were not the only plane to land, at about one in the morning, but one of about four.  The terminal building filled very quickly, and we were all waiting for baggage.  The baggage belts broke so there were a lot of porters bring the baggage in by hand.

One part of the terminal was just a sea of bags.  To find ours our granddaughter, who, while waiting, sat on top of the cabin baggage playing her DSI until the announcement our bags were available, walked across the top of the bags till she found them.  Thankfully no one was really looking in her direction.

Once again we kept our limousine service updated, and, once we knew what terminal we were at, he came to pick us up.  This time we arrived some days before NYE, so there was not so much of a rush.  We got to the hotel about 3:30 in the morning, checked in, and then went over the road to an all-night diner where we ordered hamburgers and chips.

And a Dr. Pepper.

“The Things We Do For Love” – Coming soon

Is love the metaphorical equivalent to ‘walking the plank’; a dive into uncharted waters?

For Henry the only romance he was interested in was a life at sea, and when away from it, he strived to find sanctuary from his family and perhaps life itself.  It takes him to a small village by the sea, s place he never expected to find another just like him, Michelle, whom he soon discovers is as mysterious as she is beautiful.

Henry had long since given up the notion of finding romance, and Michelle couldn’t get involved for reasons she could never explain, but in the end both acknowledge that something happened the moment they first met.  

Plans were made, plans were revised, and hopes were shattered.

A chance encounter causes Michelle’s past to catch up with her, and whatever hope she had of having a normal life with Henry, or anyone else, is gone.  To keep him alive she has to destroy her blossoming relationship, an act that breaks her heart and shatters his.

But can love conquer all?

It takes a few words of encouragement from an unlikely source to send Henry and his friend Radly on an odyssey into the darkest corners of the red light district in a race against time to find and rescue the woman he finally realizes is the love of his life.

The cover, at the moment, looks like this:

lovecoverfinal1

Ideas come from everywhere

I have an electronic note book on my smart phone and writing pads at the ready at home in my office/writing room/library.

As soon as one hits, I get it down, either on paper, or on the phone app. I use SomNote as it’s easy to export the text to an email, or have a version of the app running on my computer and just copy and paste. SomNote is great because I can used it anywhere.

Of course, it doesn’t work so well in the shower, so I’m still waiting for a waterproof phone. Or perhaps it can wait for a few minutes until I’m finished.

But, the trouble with that it, these ideas come so quickly and are sometimes so vivid that they need to be put down as quickly as possible. I have come up with the perfect dialogue for a tricky scene, and played it all out in my head, and by the time I got to the paper, it was almost gone.

Perhaps a whiteboard and a permanent marker on the wall.

Or is that going to far?

A long time ago, I received a portable tape recorder for a present, you know, the one you can hold in your hand, and the tapes so small you wonder how much will fit on it. The gifter said that when ideas came to me, all I had to do was speak. It was also voice activated.

Needless to say that conjured up a few ideas right there.

But, I used it, but I found it quite weird to be talking, ostensibly to myself, in the car whilst driving home, or go to, work, and the curious looks I’d get from others. One thing it did teach me was that when a conversation was repkayed, it would sound ok or like most of the time, hardly what one expected a conversation would really be like.

So, because of that device, I learned to read out all conversations, and if they sounded stupid, they were.

So, ideas come in the shower, ideas come while driving, ideas come when reading the newspaper, ideas even come when reading books.

Which leads me to another point that I learned early on. Writers must read. Not only novels of their chosen genre, but any reference books that go with it. Research was, a friend and more successful author than I told me, was mandatory.

So too was the reading to the classics, old English, and sometimes American, literature, to gain an appreciation for the written word. We might not follow those styles, but we can learn the majesty of the English language.

That author taught me a lot, though at the time I didn;t realise it. Perhaps I thpought I was already smart enough to write, but I’m guessing that it took a long time before I felt my writing was worth reading before publishing it.

I don’t profess to have a fully understanding of the language. I might have loved that school subject called English, and later in University, creative writing and literature, but not all of it soaked in. But writing is one of those odd things, that it can take many forms and styles, but at the end of the day, if the reader understands where the story is going, and when at the end, is satisfied that it was ‘a good read’, then the author’s work is done.

The only trouble is, getting the next idea, and then the were withal to write a second book, or third. It is said everyone as one book in them. For those who can write more, well, that might be what might be called, a gift.

My trouble is, I have too many ideas, too many starts and brief outlines to work with, I don’t know which story to start on next. I guess being spoinlt for choice is a good thing, yes?

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 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 mold 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 modeled 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 image 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 Brother’s 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 went the way of the others.

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

I have high hopes of publishing it in early 2021.  It even has a cover.

PIWalthJones1

The cinema of my dreams – It’s a treasure hunt – Episode 43

Here’s the thing…

Every time I close my eyes, I see something different.

I’d like to think the cinema of my dreams is playing a double feature but it’s a bit like a comedy cartoon night on Fox.

But these dreams are nothing to laugh about.

Once again there’s a new installment of an old feature, and we’re back on the treasure hunt.

 

For a thug like Alex to actually have something that resembled a good idea, perhaps it was more the people he surrounded himself with that made him look clever.

Boggs had not mentioned anything about the people who owned the land before the Naval yard had been constructed. Perhaps he had maps dating back to then, or maybe he didn’t. Boggs didn’t exactly confide in me everything he knew.

Maybe he didn’t trust me.

But there was a new lead now, courtesy of Alex, and it was one that I was going to chase down and bring it to Boggs at the appropriate time.

I need to find information about the Ormiston family, and whether or not there were any descendants in the area. But first, I would have to go to the library and talk to the ‘old biddy’, Gwendoline Frobisher, Gwen to her friends. Fortunately, I knew her well from the days of studying in the library.

And on some of my free days, helped her out with cataloging and returning books to their shelf positions. She only had one helper then, and she was older the Gwen, and not a lot of help putting books back on the higher shelves.

The rest of my shift was uneventful, and I closed and locked the door at precisely 11 pm. On the way to where I left my bicycle, my cell phone rang. Boggs? He knew when I finished, and how punctual I was when leaving.

I looked at the screen. Private Number.

I was going to ignore it, but, in the end, curiosity got the better of me.

“Yes?”

“Smidge?”

Nadia. What was she calling me for at this hour of the night?

“I told you not to call me Smidge.”

“Sorry, a force of habit. It sort of suits you though.”

“Then I’m hanging up.”

I went to press the disconnect button, but I could hear her saying, ‘don’t do that, I have some news.”

I waited a few seconds before I answered, “What news.”

“Not the sort you talk of over the phone.”

But it is the sort of hook someone would use to lure you to a place where Vince could beat you up. She had done it before.

“Not if it’s a trap. Sorry, but too many bad memories of your treachery, Nadia.”

“It’s not like that, now. You know what I think of Vince these days.”

“I know how you’d like me to think you think of Vince, but that could be all show. You are, after all, a Cossatino, and you can’t change those spots.”

“I can, and I have. Promise. Meet me at the hotel.”

“Now?”

“It’s not as if anyone’s going to notice, and, if they do, you can guess what they’ll be thinking.”

I sighed. It was giving me a headache. “Half an hour,” I said, and disconnected the call.

Half of me was saying not to go, the other half was intrigued, not so much for the news, but visiting Nadia in the middle of the night. Many years ago, I used have dreams about Nadia, not ones that were spoken of out loud. Now I had the chance to fulfill one; not so sure.

Near to midnight, everyone should be in bed, everyone except those staying at the hotel. Lights we on in several of the rooms, and a customer was in the office.

I parked the bike near the office and walked quickly to her room, knocked on the door lightly, and braced myself for the ‘surprise’, Vince waiting for me.

She opened the door and I looked over her shoulder. It looked empty but there was a lot of space I couldn’t see from that position.

“There’s no one here.” She grabbed me by the shoulder and dragged me in, looked up and down the corridor, then closed the door.

I quickly checked the bathroom. Clothes hanging from the shower rail, a very messy room. My impression of her was shattered.

“You see anything interesting in there?”

I assumed she was referring to the underwear. There might have been a momentary stray thought, but it was not one I’d admit to.

And in her dressing gown, it was hard to suppress the shive down my spine.

I sat on the end of the unmade bed. An odd thought, didn’t she let the housemaids in to tidy up, or, had she spent all day in bed? Scrub those thoughts.

“What is this news?”

“What were you doing at the mall?”

Was that Nadia in the yellow? I glanced around her room and then my eyes rested for a second on a yellow jacked tossed in a corner on the floor. Damn.

“What mall? I tried to sound convincingly surprised.

“You know what mall. You were with Boggs. What were you two up to?”

“I thought you had news for me?”

“I have. Stay away from that place. Otherwise, you might get buried there. That’s the Benderby’s torture chamber, and where they bury the evidence of their crimes.”

“Those are only rumors.”

“Not according to Vince. He reckons he’s seen a body there.”

“Perhaps he was mistaking it for a dressed mannequin. Even I’ve seen that.”

“You’re a fool. Don’t keep following that Boggs around like his little lap dog. He’s eventually going to get you into a mess you can’t get out of. There’s a lot of his father in him. Doesn’t know when to let it go.”

“This coming from Vince or you, because it sure sounds like Vince trying to put us of the scent.”

“What do you think happened to that archaeologist they found on Rico’s boat?”

“Well, my first thought was the Benderby’s did for him. As far as I can tell, the Benderby’s got him to verify the provenance of the gold coins they found on the ocean bed.”

“You mean the two surfers?”

“The Benderby’s bought them off them.”

“You mean the Benderby’s paid them, then two days later they turn up in a dive hotel having overdosed on heroin and not a cent to their names? That event was not widely known because Benderby bought off the reporter for the local paper.

“If you know about it, why did the Cossatino’s make some noise?”

“Because it was their heroin.”

This was terrifying, to be caught between a turf war with either side willing to stitch up the other, for points, or for their silence. Boggs and I were two small fish in a very smelly pond, with no chance at outwitting these two.

“Life’s complicated,” I said.

“It doesn’t have to be.”
© Charles Heath 2020