Month: April 2023

The cinema of my dreams – Was it just another surveillance job – Episode 55

This story is now on the list to be finished so over the new few weeks, expect a new episode every few days.

The reason why new episodes have been sporadic, there are also other stories to write, and I’m not very good at prioritizing.

But, here we are, a few minutes opened up and it didn’t take long to get back into the groove.

Things are about to get complicated…

We took the underground to Lancaster Gate and parted company before crossing the road and going into Hyde Park.  Severin had designated the meeting place as the rotunda, as he called it, in the Italian Gardens.

It was dark, although there was adequate lighting, which made it a good cover for anyone else skulking nearby.  And making it easier for Jennifer, who sensibly dressed in black, to scout.

It took my time heading slowly towards the stone building.  I was deliberately early so he might not be there yet.  In the intervening time I could hear the odd comment from Jennifer, as she looked over the various suspects who were also taking in the aesthetic beauty of the gardens, which would look so much better in daylight.

Oddly enough in all the times I’d been to Hyde Park, these gardens had never been a point of visiting, such was the allure of the pedal boats on the Serpentine.

I did a slow circuit of the building and saw three people seated inside.  Two women, together, and a man on one side.  It could be him.

“I think he’s already here, just going to check.”

“Nothing stirring out here, so far.”

“Keep alert.”

It was odd hearing a voice almost in my head as if she was next to me.

I came up to the seat in full view of the person sitting on one end of the bench, so as not to alarm them.  I could feel their eyes on me as I sat down.  If it was him, he would talk to me.  I was not going to talk to him.

Something else I noted, there was no direct line of fire from anywhere hidden, so if there was an assassin out there, he would have to do it in the open.  Severin had scouted the place earlier.

“You alone?”  The man spoke after about three, or four minutes.  I’d seen him look around, checking for himself I was not followed.

“As far as I’m aware.”

I moved a little closer.  He was talking very softly.

“What happened to Maury?”

“Tortured and murdered by Dobbin I believe.  If he knew where the device was, he didn’t give up its location.”

“He wouldn’t.   Dobbin you say?”

“As far as I can tell.  He was running O’Connell, but you knew that already.”  To save time dancing around the truth, and lessen the time being a target I added, “Everyone believes O’Connell is still alive.  He didn’t have the device when I searched him.  Who shot him?”

“Not us.  If he is alive Dobbin must have usurped our cleaners, and spirited him away, which means it’s likely Dobbin has the device.”

“He doesn’t.  He co-opted me into his section.  O’Connell appears to have done a runner from him too.  Did you know O’Connell was on mission to pick up the device from an intermediary?”

“Yes.”

“Did you know that Anna Jacovich was there too?”

“Then you know what’s on the device?”

“I wish I didn’t.  Or that you two were security guards at the Laboratory where Erich stole the data.  What took so long for him to decide to sell it?

“When he was fired by the company after they lost the military contract.   He had no intention of selling it, just getting it into the hands of the public so they would be forced to stop.”

“Except he was killed, and Anna decided she needed an escape plan.”

“Which O’Connell provided by wire transfer.  The money’s gone, and the data didn’t arrive.  It’s still out there.”

“Who was you boss in all this?  Monica?”

“Who.  No.  It’s….”

I heard the phutt sound of a bullet passing through a silencer, and just caught the edge of the barrel retracting from behind one of the pillars.  No need to check him, he was dead, still sitting upright as if nothing had happened.

I got out of the seat and moved towards where the gun had been, trying not to alert the other two sitting on the other side, facing the other way, fortunately.

When I reached the outside, there was no one.  A quick scan in the darkness, my eyesight hampered by going from light to dark making images blurry at best.

Then I heard a thunk, and a triumphant “Gotcha.”

I hoped that was Jennifer with the shooter.

…

© Charles Heath 2020-2023

‘What Sets Us Apart’ – A beta readers view

There’s something to be said for a story that starts like a James Bond movie, throwing you straight in the deep end, a perfect way of getting to know the main character, David, or is that Alistair?

A retired spy, well not so much a spy as a retired errand boy, David’s rather wry description of his talents, and a woman that most men would give their left arm for, not exactly the ideal couple, but there is a spark in a meeting that may or may not have been a setup.

But as the story progressed, the question I kept asking myself was why he’d bother.

And, page after unrelenting page, you find out.

Susan is exactly the sort of woman that piqued his interest. Then, inexplicably, she disappears. That might have been the end to it, but Prendergast, that shadowy enigma, David’s ex-boss who loves playing games with real people, gives him an ultimatum, find her or come back to work.

Nothing like an offer that’s a double-edged sword!

A dragon for a mother, a sister he didn’t know about, Susan’s BFF who is not what she seems or a friend indeed, and Susan’s father who, up till David meets her, couldn’t be less interested, his nemesis proves to be the impossible dream, and he’s always just that one step behind.

When the rollercoaster finally came to a halt, and I could start breathing again, it was an ending that was completely unexpected.

I’ve been told there’s a sequel in the works.

Bring it on!

…

The book can be purchased here: http://amzn.to/2Eryfth

…

In a word: Park

We mostly understand that a park is an area set aside for recreation, and can have trees, flowers, a lake, and vast lawns.  These parks are also sometimes called ‘gardens’.

A great example of a park is Central Park in New York.

Nearly every city has a park or some sort, some have more than one.

But the word park has a number of other uses.  For instance,

You can park a car, or bike, or yourself; in other words, it’s a place where you stop for a while.  For cars, it is a carpark.

You could say ‘it’s just a walk in the park’, which means that the job is going to be easy.  I never understood that analogy because quite a lot of parks have walks that are difficult, and not so much ‘a walk in the park’.

It is also used to describe a place where animals are kept, other than calling it a zoo, it can go by the name of a wildlife park.  Zoos though are more for cities.  Wildlife parks can be quite huge and many are found in Africa.

A park can also be used to describe a sporting arena or field.

You can park a bag in a locker.

You can park an idea in the back of your mind and come back to it later, or if you are like me, it disappears into the ether.

It can be an area of land around a manor house, but there are very few of those left now.  The most notable of these are in England, and were designed by a man called Capability Brown.

 

Inspiration, Maybe – Volume Two

…

50 photographs, 50 stories, of which there is one of the 50 below.

They all start with –

…

A picture paints … well, as many words as you like.  For instance:

And, the story:

Have you ever watched your hopes and dreams simply just fly away?

Everything I thought I wanted and needed had just left in an aeroplane, and although I said I was not going to, I came to the airport to see the plane leave.  Not the person on it, that would have been far too difficult and emotional, but perhaps it was symbolic, the end of one life and the start of another.

But no matter what I thought or felt, we had both come to the right decision.  She needed the opportunity to spread her wings.  It was probably not the best idea for her to apply for the job without telling me, but I understood her reasons.

She was in a rut.  Though her job was a very good one, it was not as demanding as she had expected, particularly after the last promotion, but with it came resentment from others on her level, that she, the youngest of the group would get the position.

It was something that had been weighing down on her for the last three months, and if noticed it, the late nights, the moodiness, and sometimes a flash of temper.  I knew she had one, no one could have such red hair and not, but she had always kept it in check.

And, then there was us, together, and after seven years, it felt like we were going nowhere.  Perhaps that was down to my lack of ambition, and though she never said it, lack of sophistication.  It hadn’t been an issue, well, not until her last promotion, and the fact she had to entertain more, and frankly I felt like an embarrassment to her.

So, there it was, three days ago, the beginning of the weekend, and we had planned to go away for a few days and take stock.  We both acknowledged we needed to talk, but it never seemed like the right time.

It was then she said she had quit her job and found a new one.  Starting the following Monday.

Ok, that took me by surprise, not so much that it was something I sort of guessed might happen, but that she would just blurt it out.

I think that right then, at that moment, I could feel her frustration with everything around her.

What surprised her was my reaction.  None.

I simply asked where who, and when.

A world-class newspaper, in New York, and she had to be there in a week.

A week.

It was all the time I had left with her.

I remember I just shrugged and asked if the planned weekend away was off.

She stood on the other side of the kitchen counter, hands around a cup of coffee she had just poured, and that one thing I remembered was the lone tear that ran down her cheek.

Is that all you want to know?

I did, yes, but we had lost that intimacy we used to have when she would have told me what was happening, and we would have brainstormed solutions. I might be a cabinet maker but I still had a brain, which was what I overheard her tell a friend once.

There’s not much to ask, I said.  You’ve been desperately unhappy and haven’t been able to hide it all that well, you have been under a lot of pressure trying to deal with a group of troglodytes, and you’ve been leaning on Bentley’s shoulder instead of mine, and I get it, he’s got more experience in that place,  and the politics that go with it, and is still an ally.

Her immediate superior and instrumental in her getting the position, but unlike some men in his position he had not taken advantage of a situation like some men would.  And even if she had made a move, which I doubted, was not the sort of woman she was, he would have politely declined.

One of the very few happily married men in that organisation, so I heard.

So, she said, you’re not just a pretty face.

Par for the course for a cabinet maker whose university degree is in psychology.  It doesn’t take rocket science to see what was happening to you.  I just didn’t think it was my place to jump in unless you asked me, and when you didn’t, well, that told me everything I needed to know.

Yes, our relationship had a use-by date, and it was in the next few days.

I was thinking, she said, that you might come with me,  you can make cabinets anywhere.

I could, but I think the real problem wasn’t just the job.  It was everything around her and going with her, that would just be a constant reminder of what had been holding her back. I didn’t want that for her and said so.

Then the only question left was, what do we do now?

Go shopping for suitcases.  Bags to pack, and places to go.

Getting on the roller coaster is easy.  In the beginning, it’s a slow easy ride, followed by a slow climb to the top.  It’s much like some relationships, they start out easy, but they require a little work to get to the next level, follows by the adrenaline rush when it all comes together.

What most people forget is that what comes down must go back up, and life is pretty much a roller coaster with highs and lows.

Our roller coaster had just come or of the final turn and we were braking so that it stops at the station.

There was no question of going with her to New York.  Yes, I promised I’d come over and visit her, but that was a promise with crossed fingers behind my back.  After a few months in the new job, the last thing she want was a reminder of what she left behind.  New friends new life.

We packed her bags, threw out everything she didn’t want, a few trips to the op shop with stuff she knew others would like to have, and basically, by the time she was ready to go, there was nothing left of her in the apartment, or anywhere.

Her friends would be seeing her off at the airport, and that’s when I told her I was not coming, that moment the taxi arrived to take her away forever.  I remember standing there, watching the taxi go.  It was going to be, and was, as hard as it was to watch the plane leave.

So, there I was, finally staring at the blank sky, around me were a dozen other plane spotters, a rather motley crew of plane enthusiasts.

Already that morning there’s been 6 different types of planes departing, and I could hear another winding up its engines for take-off.

People coming, people going.

Maybe I would go to New York in a couple of months, not to see her, but just to see what the attraction was.  Or maybe I would drop in, just to see how she was.

As one of my friends told me when I gave him the news, the future is never written in stone, and it’s about time you broadened your horizons.

Perhaps it was.

© Charles Heath 2020-2023

Coming soon.  

NaNoWriMo – April – 2023 — Day 19

“The Things We Do For Love”

…

It’s time to get some experienced help.

Often Radly his friend from the ship had regaled him with stories of his exploits in the red-light district.  Henry never quite believes most of it, but he was prepared to accept that he might know enough to be of some help.

Henry didn’t want to be visiting the parlours on his own.

But it does mean he has to tell him the true nature of the girl he met and wanted to go after.

Radly is honest, knowing a lot of the girls in the area, most either were not worth the effort, or more likely content with their lot and didn’t want to be rescued.  Poor souls who tried often ended up on the wrong end of a bouncer’s fist.

Exactly what Henry wants to avoid.

So, is Radly up for the challenge.

To find her, yes, but if she is trouble, or in trouble, or likely to cause trouble, then no.

Henry has to be prepared to walk away.

He accepts the conditions, and the quest begins after dark.

…

Words written 3,729, for a total of 66,306

The A to Z Challenge – 2023 — P is for Post-Mortem

…

I stood on the front portico and looked down at the array of cars parked, waiting to take guests home.  A lot had already left, and both Darcy and I were among the stragglers.  I had let her say goodnight to her new friend.

“So, the car hasn’t turned into a pumpkin yet.”  She came up behind me, perhaps hoping her sudden arrival would scare me.

It might have if I had not had thoughts about the last dance with Emily.

“Oh, ye of little faith.”

“I saw you with the lass on the dance floor.  You should take up the competition ballroom dancing.  You two would kill it.”

“Or it would kill us, probably by one of the other contestants.  It’s worse than rugby.”

“It was nice to see you enjoy yourself.”

“That wasn’t enjoyment, Darcy, it’s bloody hard work.  I don’t know where this is going, but she’s going to be impossible, incorrigible, irritating, and in… well, I need a dictionary to find the word.”

“The joys of being a woman, Roger.  We’re here for the specific reason to make your life impossible, to be incorrigible, and irritating beyond words.  I’d be disappointed if she wasn’t”.

If and when I got the time to reflect on what just happened, it was going to be somewhere between living in a fairy tale and being caught up in a nightmare.  My father had once told me, love, was one of those things that happened when you least expected it, usually with a woman that is way out of your league and is full of highs and lows, mostly lows,

But, he added, when there were highs, they could take you into the stratosphere.

I was still coming down.  The morning was going to be like the night after a very alcoholic party.  A morning that was going to be in about five hours.

The car stopped at the bottom of the stairs, and the chauffeur got out to open the doors.

“Our ride,” Darcy said.  “And no, when I get home, I will not be singing, I could have danced all night.”

I looked at the bedside clock and it said it was 3:22 am.  I couldn’t sleep.

It might have been the endless twirls of the Viennese Waltz, or I might be still dizzy from being so close to Emily.  It might also have been that stolen kiss in the alcove on one side of the ballroom.  The image of her in that ballgown was burned into my brain.

Why on earth did I go?

How could she possibly like me, let alone love me.  I still had a feeling all of what happened was another of her dastardly plans to cause me grief.

And then, in the very next moment, I felt the exact opposite about her.

God, I was happier when I simply hated her.

My cell phone vibrated with an incoming call. ‘Private Number’.  The torment begins.

“Who is it?”

“You know who it is.” 

Emily.

“I can’t sleep,” she said.  “I’m lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling.”

“It was the waltz.  I can’t sleep either.”

“What are we going to do.  I feel like I’m on a runaway train.”

“Haven’t you been in love before?”

I suspect she had, many times, but who knows what love is, until the actual ton of bricks falls on you?

“Not like this.  I don’t even know what this is, other than I feel sick, great, dizzy, sad, happy, sometimes all at once.”

“Don’t worry, when reality sets in you’ll hate me again, and everything will be back to normal.”  Did I want that?  What did I want?  She had described almost exactly how I felt, and it bothered me that someone could do that to me.

It was better when I loved her and she didn’t know how I felt.  That way I could suffer in silence, generally mope, and lament my station in life.

“Things can’t go back to the way they were.”

“I’m not going to treat you any differently, Emily.”

“I don’t expect you to.  I realize now all the simpering suck-ups were only after one thing.”

“How do you know I’m not the same as all the rest?”

Xavier had made it quite clear when we first started University, one of the principal aims of all young men was to sleep with as many girls as possible.  It was, he said, a rite of passage.  Along with the parties, drunkenness, and acts of stupidity.

I tried to avoid all of them, except for two girls who for some inexplicable reason, seemed interested in me.

But, my university studies were over, and we were all about to graduate, some in better shape than others.  I had concentrated on studies and achieving and had the opportunity to choose a job rather than be offered one.

“You know why you’re not.”

Perhaps not asking her to take me up to her room to show me her doll collection, yes, she really had one, with other ideas in mind had moved me up in her estimation.  In fact, I had not tried to kiss her, either, and that solen moment was something that just happened, which made it all the more poignant.

It was how my mother said love would happen, suddenly, out of left field, and I would be totally unprepared for it.

“OK, so I’m a little slower than others.  I think, tomorrow, we’ll just avoid each other, and see what the wagging tongues have to say.”

“There was a reporter at the ball.  She saw us together.  And she doesn’t like me, or my family.  I’m sure you’ll get ambushed.  It’s the price of having anything to do with us.  We’re not going to say anything.  You just be your usual grumpy incommunicative self.”

“Thanks for the compliment.”

A flash of memory, an article I read several weeks back, decrying the vanity, selfishness, and stupidity of the city’s wealthy offspring who brought no value to the city, and who set a bad example to others.  Emily had been at the top of the list, a character assassination, one that postulated her worth given her wasted time at university, and easy ride into her father’s business, starting at the executive level, when there were others, out of work, and far more qualified.

It was a bandwagon my father had jumped on, too.  It was a surprise he allowed me to sup with the devil.  Perhaps he had wanted me to see how the other half lived, and that it would make me contemptuous of them.  It made me wonder what the Ball had been in aid of, other than just to bring together the rich to indulge in their privileged position.

“I forgot to ask, what was the Ball for?”

“Some charity things.  All the people donated a few thousand towards a special children’s wing at the hospital, or something like that.  Every year someone comes up with a good cause, and everyone contributes.”

More likely to ease their consciences after taking advantage of their workers, and charging extortion for products and services.  My father explained it all once, and I couldn’t believe they were that cynical.

“A good cause.”

“Some don’t think so.  Anyway, I’m tired now.  I’ll try not to run into you.  Night.”

Dealing with the reporters, and Angela Simpkin no less.  I knew her, we spent a few days together, and it didn’t work out.  She didn’t hate me, but now I was associated with Emily, and that could suddenly change.

I sighed.  Going to the Ball was going to change my life forever.

…

©  Charles Heath 2023

It’s cold out there

But…

It is, but it isn’t.  Oddly enough after two weeks in temperatures ranging from -21 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit, I think I’m finally used to it.

My early morning walk after leaving the hotel is both for exercise and exploring.

Looking for locations, observing people, watching and learning what it’s like to live, work, and hang out in a city like New York.

It’s so much more interesting than where I come from.  There it would be impossible to spin a story in such a small city.  You need to be able to hide in plain sight among millions of people over a very large area that encompasses Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and everything else in-between and beyond.

I was looking at going to a Walmart in Secaucus, about three and a half miles from my hotel in Manhattan.  Three and a half miles.  In my city that’s way beyond the limits of the city and in the outer suburbs.

Here I can spin a tale that could live within the confines of 35th street, 85th street, 2nd Avenue and 10th Avenue, and have so much material, I could probably write a trilogy.

Pity is, I won’t be here long enough to gather enough background.

Still, it’s like being in literary seventh heaven.

I’ve written one book based in New York, I’m sure another is currently writing itself in my head and will be on paper over the next year.

Then, maybe I’ll be back.

A photograph from the inspirational bin – 30

This is a rotunda at Newfarm Park in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.

We were here a week or so ago to attend an open wedding in the park, in fact, under one of the majestic Moreton Bay Fig trees which is shaped much like an umbrella.

Weddings are conducted in the rotunda only if it is wet.

So, my first inclination is to write a story about a wedding that doesn’t quite go to plan, which I venture to say would be quite a few.

The one I attended had a few hiccups along the way, the odd bout of nerves, and a little tension from the lack of planning, or a practice.

But, in the end, all is well

Our story though will be slightly different. I have always wanted to attend a wedding where:

-The bride or groom or both didn’t turn up

-The celebrant got lost

-Someone had an objection when asked I’d someone had any reason why the wedding shouldn’t take place and the reason

-A fight breaks out between the bride and groom’s families, though that’s usually at the reception after when more alcohol has been consumed and feelings are running high.

-The bride or groom, at the last second, says ‘I don’t’.

But if it’s not a wedding, I’d use it as a meeting place for two old lovers who had made a pact seventy years before, no matter what happened, and if they were still alive, they’d meet there.

How much water would there have been under that bridge?

And conversely, two new acquaintances, in a stolen moment, decide to run away together and meet at the rotunda before leaving … only one of the siblings told their parents.

The wrong time!

The cinema of my dreams – I always wanted to see the planets – Episode 12

Well, who are you people?

…

It was a distraction.

One minute I was looking at three people holding two of the freighter crew hostage, then next I was watching the three disintegrate into a matter stream, and disappear.

It was not possible, and yet I saw it with my own eyes.

I pressed the transmit button on my communicator and said, “What the hell was what?”

“A ship, twice the size of this vessel, came out of nowhere, appeared on screen for about a minute and then disappeared.”

“Along with our friends over here. They just dematerialised. It seems they can transport people whereas we can only transfer matter. On a good day.”

Another voice came over the freighter’s internal communications system, “Cargo supervisor to captain, it seems we have just lost a container of plutonium fuel rods, sir.”

“Did you hear that, sir?” I said.

“Those would be the rods needed on Venus we were sent to pick up. Without them, they’re about to go offline. Get back here now, we now have a humanitarian rescue mission. Out.”

I looked over at Myrtle. “We have to leave, I’ll be along in a minute.”

I walked over to Jacko who was looking far more relieved now he didn’t had a space gun being held to his head. “How did you get to be hauling Plutonium?”

“Only ship available, I guess. Freighters are stretched thin with this new building program on the outer planets. Can you call up head office and tell them we need repairs.”

“No comms?”

“No anything at the moment, except life support, and that’s likely to become a problem if they take their time. You know how it is.”

I did. Repairs never seemed to be a priority, not considering how much a ship cost.

“I’ll get the captain to get space command to put a rocket up them. Any idea who those people were?”

“Not any of us I reckon. I think we’ve just made first contact with a new species. And if they know what they can do with the plutonium, things might get a little interesting out here.”

Interesting indeed.

…

© Charles Heath 2021

NaNoWriMo – April – 2023 — Day 18

“The Things We Do For Love”

…

The old sparring partners keep their distance.

Henry because he doesn’t believe Harry has changed, Harry because he knows if the old rivalry restarts, Henry will leave, and he doesn’t want to be the one to cause it.

It takes a week to break the ice, and, finally, the two can talk.  Harry knows Henry is pining over a girl, so he asks the question.

For Henry, as far as he’s concerned, that ship has sailed. 

But Harry has a piece of advice for his brother, don’t let Michelle be the one that got away.

So begins the Odyssey.

It starts with reading up on the circumstances and reasons for the existence of such places where Michelle works, and why women finish up there.  It branches into drug addiction, of course from a medical view, with his father having an excellent library of books on the subject.

He then does a tour of what is broadly called the red light district, during the day, where it seems hidden away.  Then he branches into the newspaper archives and gets a different perspective.  Research can only do so much.

After getting a call from Villiers, a relative of Michelle’s she had once mentioned to him, he goes to see him, and they talk.  Villiers says she has contacted him and asked him to pass on a message that she will contact him when she needs his help, and it is the first indication she had not given up on them.  Villiers gives him another perspective on her.

It also means that the notion he goes looking for her, to see her, or rescue her, he wasn’t quite sure, was the right one.  Villiers wants him to go and rescue her.  The question is, is she worth rescuing?

…

Words written 4,548, for a total of 62,577