Over the past year or so I have been selecting photographs I’ve taken on many travels, and put a story to them.
When I reached a milestone of 50 stories, I decided to make them into a book, and, in doing so, I have gone through each and revised them, making some longer and into short stories.
50 photographs, 50 stories. I’ve called it, “Inspiration, Maybe”
It will be available soon.
You comb it every day, or brush it, it can be tangled, fine, smooth and silky or shiny.
It can fall out, you can have none, it can be red, brown, black, blonde, white, and a million shades in between.
Yes, it’s hair.
It can be pesky stuff, especially from animals who tend to moult and leave it everywhere. We have a cat and well know the foibles of hair loss.
You can get it cut, get it coloured, trimmed, permed by a hairdresser in a salon, where lots of subjects are discussed, and even movies have been made around salons.
I haven’t been within a hairsbreadth of either living or dying, but I’m sure someone has. That hairsbreadth is not very wide, and I’d rather have bullets, arrows or fists missing by that margin.
You can be in another’s hair, that is, being a pest.
There’s the hair of the dog, supposedly a hangover cure.
And, going to scary places will make your hair stand on end.
This is not to be confused with the word heir which means something completely different, namely it described the legatee or inheritor of the family fortune.
Or not. Ages ago, only sons were seen as heirs, and that was even more prevalent among royal families. It also applied to heirs when it came to titles, and the family wealth and property, which went to the eldest son.
It makes a good plotline for many a murder mystery.
Also, let’s be clear, there is also an heiress and an heirloom.
Then there is another, hare, which is a cousin of the rabbit and considered a pest.
I’m not quite sure how someone came up with the descriptor harebrained, which has nothing to do with the hare.
It could mean to run quickly and usually in a careless manner.
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 instalment of an old feature, and we’re back on the treasure hunt.
I was taken to the hospital, despite the fact the paramedics deemed that I might not be as badly concussed as they first thought. At the very least, I got a ride in the ambulance and painkilling pills that were very effective.
They kept me in the emergency department in between being taken for X-Rays, and I think something they called a CT Scan. Whatever it was, it didn’t help my claustrophobia. When that was completed, my mother was waiting in the cubicle. Benderby, looking concerned, stood behind her.
After the attendant left, he said, “I’ll be going now. Take all the time you need to recover Sam; I’ll make sure you don’t lose any wages over this. And you can be assured that it will not happen again, and we will get the people who did this.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“I’m just glad nothing worse happened to you.”
He said something to my mother in hushed tones and then left. My mother had got over her initial reaction, and a more curious look had replaced the one of fear.
“Tell me you didn’t try to apprehend those thieves yourself, Sam.”
“No, I didn’t. I didn’t know there was anyone in the building until I was hit from behind. I’m not sure what they thought they were going to find there that was of any value, it’s just parts for some of the products built there.”
“People will steal anything for money these days. You should know that. Times are not as good for some. Perhaps it’s not a good idea for you to work there is this is going to happen again.”
“You heard Mr Benderby. He’ll make sure security is improved, and I suspect I was in the wrong place at the wrong time because I don’t normally go into the warehouse itself, that someone else’s purview. So, stop worrying, and go home. I’m fine.”
I wished she would go. I wanted to check if Boggs had been brought in and see what had happened to him. I also wanted to know if the perpetrator was Vince. If it was, Nadia was first on my list for a visit when I got out of the hospital.
It seemed to mollify her concern.
“Mr Benderby said to tell you if you need a ride home, to call this number,” she gave me a piece of paper with a phone number on it, “and a driver will come. He’s been very nice about everything. You will thank him.”
“I will. Yes. Now go home. Get some rest. And stop worrying about me.”
Ten minutes later, I got off the bed and stood. Well, I tried to stand, but my head wasn’t quite ready to accept that it was in command of everything else. It took only seconds for the room to start spinning, and I had to lie down again.
My reconnaissance was going to have to wait for an hour or so.
A nurse came and checked my blood pressure and pulse, both high but not off the chart, and she went off looking concerned.
A few minutes after that an orderly went by with another bed, empty but recently used, and I recognised him as another of the boys Boggs and I went to school with. He was destined for bigger things, but it seems he, too, never got out of the neighbourhood.
He saw me looking at him, stopped, and his expression told me he’d recognised me.
“Sam?”
“Angelo?”
“The same. I’ll be back after I’ve dropped off this bed. Won’t be long. I won’t ask how you are, you must be sick if you’re in that bed.”
True. And it was natural to ask, ‘How are you?’ when you see someone after having not seen them a while, even if you are in a hospital. A weird custom indeed, which occupied my thoughts till he returned.
Angelo had been the smartest kid in our class, and we had all assumed that he would become a doctor, or a lawyer, one of those jobs that made piles of money. He was also the boy whom all the girls swooned over.
Being his friend had benefits.
Unfortunately, Boggs and I, not being the two brightest kids, didn’t register on his friend’s scale. In his favour, he was not a bully like Monty was, but I guess that went with being one of the school’s star athletes, but he did simply ignore us.
Now, it seems the mighty had fallen. It was a destiny that seemed to befall anyone who came from our neighbourhood.
The same could be said for Monty, who got a sports scholarship to further his sporting career, but he too stumbled at the second hurdle, being done for performance-enhancing drugs, and banished to the boondocks from whence he came.
Now, as far as I knew, he was working for the Colosimo’s.
Angelo seemed bright enough. That impression was confirmed when he returned with two bottles of soda and handed one to me.
“Hopefully it won’t kill you,” he said, sitting down.
“Shouldn’t. I’m here because someone hit me over the head.”
“Bar fight?”
Once, in the old days, that might be the case. “If only I could take the bragging rights, but no. I work over at Benderby’s warehouse, and someone broke it. Seems I got in the way.”
“Benderby’s eh? Thought you said you’d die before ever working for them.”
True, we all said the same, in school, as naïve children who hadn’t yet learned how tough the world was going to be.
“Needs must. My mother isn’t getting any younger, and it’s a struggle. But I guess you already know that. You were going to be a doctor, not a trolley pusher.”
His shook his head. “As you say, reality trumps dreams. Education costs, my parents couldn’t raise the money, and, well, I think you know the rest.”
A minute’s silence for the death of whatever dreams we may have had passed.
“Have you seen Boggs. He’s here somewhere.”
“I saw him in ER, didn’t look too good, but I think it was mostly superficial wounds. Apparently, some unknown assailants beat him up. You two still hang out together?”
“Off and on.”
You weren’t with him when this happened.” He nodded towards the bandage on my head.
“No.” but, I thought, it was most likely the same person who inflicted both injuries. Had Boggs set us both up for some reason? It had to do with the treasure, and now Vince was in on the act.
“Does Boggs still go on about that Pirate treasure he reckons is buried here somewhere? I mean, his dad used to bang on about it, and there’s no doubt it got him killed. You reckon someone went after Boggs over it?”
Angelo hadn’t forgotten that even in school, Boggs had said he was going to be a treasure hunter when he grew up, and he had a map that would be the basis of his first quest. That same map he told me was his father’s.
That same map that had got both of us beaten up.
“Is he here, somewhere?” I asked.
“Next ward. Last I saw he was out; they gave him a sedative so he could rest.”
Squawking sounds came out of Angelo’s communicator, and only he seemed to know what it meant.
He stood. “Got to go now. Perhaps we can catch up later.”
© Charles Heath 2019
John Pennington’s life is in the doldrums. Looking for new opportunities, prevaricating about getting married, the only joy on the horizon was an upcoming visit to his grandmother in Sorrento, Italy.
Suddenly he is left at the check-in counter with a message on his phone telling him the marriage is off, and the relationship is over.
If only he hadn’t promised a friend he would do a favor for him in Rome.
At the first stop, Geneva, he has a chance encounter with Zoe, an intriguing woman who captures his imagination from the moment she boards the Savoire, and his life ventures into uncharted territory in more ways than one.
That ‘favor’ for his friend suddenly becomes a life-changing event, and when Zoe, the woman who he knows is too good to be true, reappears, danger and death follows.
Shot at, lied to, seduced, and drawn into a world where nothing is what it seems, John is dragged into an adrenaline-charged undertaking, where he may have been wiser to stay with the ‘devil you know’ rather than opt for the ‘devil you don’t’.
Purchase:
I’ve been on roller coasters, and they actually scare the hell out of me. It might have something to do with watching the news and hearing about a breakdown. High up and usually hanging on for dear life upside down.
My fear is it’s going to come off the rails, or that I’ll lose my grip!
A bit like my life really.
I’m in an abyss and free falling. The first thousand yards is exhilarating. I’m not sure if everyone has done skydiving, but it’s like that time before you pull the ripcord.
Absolute adrenaline rush.
Followed by a single thought. Will the parachute open? I’ve seen too many TV shows where ripcords don’t work, and strangely I have actually seen a skydiver whose parachute didn’t open, and it’s one of those moments when your heart is literally in your mouth.
Ok, I get it, if you don’t like the heat in the kitchen …
But, it’s hard to get that thought, that the metaphorical parachute won’t open, and I’m at a point where I’m starting to think about the landing.
You dash headlong into a job, thinking yep, you’ve got it covered, but, what if you haven’t. What if there are variables you never thought of, what if the people around you, so happy to cheer you on at the start, are now starting to change their tune.
It’s like jumping into an abyss; starting a new job, or the first day after a promotion, your choice of vocation, the sort of lifestyle you want to have, whether you are following a dream that could quite easily become a nightmare, it seems there’s very little difference conceptually.
I think about writing, and it’s an individual thing.
Are we writing for ourselves first, or are we writing simply to make money? If it’s the latter, it ain’t going to work, at least not until you’re established. If ever.
But, here’s the thing. It’s where I feel the most comfortable.
Now, I’d better get back to work.
There are good days and bad days
This is Chester, a cat looking for trouble
Bad days, today, trying to make the bed and the cat decides to get under the sheet and chase imaginary mice.
Peel the sheet back, toss the cat off the bed, go to remake it, and, you guessed it.
OK, we’ll come back to that.
Good days, sometimes occurring, but not often, he’s off the bed and on the prowl, though what he’s looking for is a mystery.
Perhaps there’s a gecko somewhere.
Good news, he’s out of my hair and not sitting on the keyboard trying to make a statement.
Working on the new chapter, I hear the patter of cat paws on the steps down into my office.
I turn to give him the ‘go away’ icy stare.
He returns it, in equal measure, tentatively puts his paw on the ground, ready to run if need be.
I shrug.
He goes over to the rug and flops down.
Under the fan.
Yep, they are lazy days of spring for some of us.
You know how it goes, somebody breaks into your house and they steal the family jewels, which means, they’ve taken something that’s not theirs.
Baseballers will be well familiar with the term steal a base because that sneaky second base runner is trying to get to third, before the pitcher fires in a curveball.
But then there’s that same thief trying to rob you is stealing his way downstairs.
You come across a bargain, that is the seller doesn’t quite know what they’ve got and assumed it’s junk, that’s a steal.
On stage, one actor can steal the limelight from another. if a film, an actor with a lesser part, can, if their good enough, steal the scene.
And if you’re lucky enough, you might steal a kiss, or just get slapped.
Then there’s the government, using a certain event to change the laws, and it might just steal your liberty.
This is not to be confused with the word steel, which means something else entirely, like a very malleable metal that’s low in carbon.
Or like most of our heroes, they have nerves of steel, or if they are like us, they need to steel themselves with a suitable fortification, rum is my choice.
But for me, I like the phrase, he had a steely look on his face and it was hard to tell if that was good or bad.
Except I was in the heart of suburbia.
Yes, in our city we have parks surrounded by housing, but when you’re in the middle of them, the sounds of suburbia are gone, and in their place the rustling of the leaves, and the sound of wildlfe scurrying across the forest floor.
It’s been dry for a few weeks now, and no rain on the horizon, so everything is quite dry. That made it easier to hear any animals, and, we came across a wallaby, and I’m not sure who scared who.
For the children, it was an experince because usually when you live in large cities, there are no animals except for cats and dogs. Of course, if there are any cats on the loose, the animals suffer because of the cat’s predetorial nature.
A wallaby is a bit large for a cat to take down, but that doesn’t man it might be able to get a hold of a ring tail possum, or any of it’s relatives.
There are supposed to be koalas, but we didn’t see any. Koalas and suburbia don’t mix, and they are frequently hit by cars, firstly because they can be quite small and un-noticable, and secondly no one has told the koalas about cars so they think they’re just walking across an opening in the forest.
Next we find a lizard, almost camouflaged by the log it’s stranding on. Not much further along, we find another lizard, green this time, not quite the colour of the forest floor, and we get some great photos.
Of course the writer in me is always on the lookout for something to write into a story, and plots were running thick and fast, a plane crash in the jungle and trying to find a way out, looking for a rebel camp, being separated from the rest of the group on a trek, one tree looks the same as the next, and the next, etc.
Perhaps i should just soak in this little part of natural forest, because before long, some crooked councillor will change the zoning for an equally corrupt businessman to build shoddy apartment blocks on it, each making a killing, and leaving the poor residents to clean up the mess.
Oop, I thinks that’s already happened…
For a story that was conceived during those long boring hours flying in a steel cocoon, striving to keep away the thoughts that the plane and everyone in it could just simply disappear as planes have in the past, it has come a long way.
Whilst I have always had a fascination in what happened during the second world war, not the battles or fighting, but in the more obscure events that took place, I decided to pen my own little sidebar to what was a long and bitter war.
And, so, it continues…
Marina drove the truck slowly and carefully, without the benefit of headlights on a night that have become very dark when cloud cover moved in. A good night to be out on foot, but not in a few tons of metal.
It seemed to take longer to go back to the old factory, if that was what it was, or it may have just been my imagination. Certainly, it was rather tense in the cabin.
I wondered if what Chiara had said about not trusting me had made Marina have second thoughts of taking me back. From where we were, I would have no idea where it was, and if she dropped me off, I could not find it again.
And that fear came true a few minutes later when she pulled off to the side of the road, near some trees, and stopped, turning off the engine.
The silence crept over us like a fog.
Such was the atmosphere I found myself whispering, “What’s wrong.”
“Lights. Appearing briefly and disappearing. Like someone is following us.”
She sat still for about five minutes, looking intently at the rear vision mirrors, and at times turning around to stare of the small window at the back of the cabin.
I did too, but I couldn’t see anything, nor had I, but I hadn’t thought to look in the rear vision mirrors because I thought we were safe. How wrong I was, to assume that. If there was one lesson I should learn from what I was doing, was that I should know what’s going on around me and that at no time could I ever believe I’m safe. The moment I did and let my guard down, I would be dead. I’d been told that in London, and in a relaxed moment, I’d forgotten it. How many others had done the same and died?
A shake of her head, she got out of the truck, and quietly closed the door. I did likewise and joined her at the rear.
“What’s happening?”
“I’m going to check back over the road, see if there’s anyone following us. There have been too many instances of lights for it to be coincidental.”
“Since we left the church?” In thinking that, it meant that either Chiara or Enrico may have inadvertently, or deliberately, told someone about the meeting.
I hope it’s just my imagination, but it was shortly after we left I saw the first light.”
“Could be a local farmer stumbling around at night.”
“It could, but no one is that silly to be caught out after dark. There was a curfew, and most of us like to believe there still is.”
She looked back down the road, but all I could see was inky blackness. The moon was still hidden by dark clouds above, and it looked like there was going to be rain.
“I’ll come with you.”
“You’d be better off staying here. The last thing I need is a soldier stomping around in the dark.”
Thanks for the compliment, I thought. “Then I’ll have to be quiet, and try not to stomp.”
Even in the darkness I could feel rather than see the scowl on her face.
“As you wish, but don’t get in my way, and don’t make me shoot you.”
Short and wiry, she was built for stealth and speed, unlike the bulky soldier I was. Not that I was overfed and fat, but I was still a larger target than she was. I could just see her outline in front of me, and she was moving very quietly.
I was trying very hard to emulate her.
Then I saw it. A light going on briefly, then off, definitely in the direction we had just come from.
She had stopped and I nearly ran into her.
“You were right,” I said quietly.
“I was hoping I wouldn’t be.”
So had I. The last thing we needed was trouble, trouble that would have to be eliminated. She couldn’t have anyone else knowing about their hiding places, and meeting points.
A few minutes further along, we both heard a strange sound at the same time.
A wheel scraping against a fender? There was no engine noise. It became louder, then we saw what it was. Someone riding a bicycle. Close to the edge of the road so as to remain hidden from view because of the turns in the road, which would account for seeing the light at odd times. At the front, there was a light that was taped to show only a thin slit of light.
I saw her look around, then take hold of a long branch that had recently fallen off one of the trees, pared it down, and then waited. I could see what she was going to do.
When the bike came alongside, moving slowly because it was up a hill, and the rider was labouring hard, she poked the stick through the spokes of the front wheel, the rider just seeing her at the last moment, and not being able to avoid her.
The result was predictable, the rider went flying over the handlebars and crashed into the hard ground with a thud and a loud grunt.
My role was to jump on the rider so he, or she, couldn’t escape. Marina was right behind me and jammed a dirty rag in the persons mouth as I held them very tightly under me.
“Now what?”
This was not going to work for very long as the person under me was beginning to kick and thrash about. In a few seconds, the gag would be spat out and the silence would be shattered.
I heard the gun before I saw it, a whooshing sound near my ear just before it hit the head of the captive, and suddenly there was no more movement or sound.
“A moment’s silence.”
We rolled the figure over, and looked at the face, just visible in the near darkness. We had just been blessed with a shard of moonlight for a few seconds.
A man.
“You know him?” she asked.
Another look, just as the clouds shut off the light, and I thought so.
“One of the soldiers from the castle. How would he know we were meeting at the church?”
“He might not. Nor might he be following us, but just unlucky.”
“How so?”
“Chiara sometimes entertains men from the castle. Part of our eyes and ears. She was not part of the resistance when Fernando was in charge so they would just use her like any other enemy soldier would.”
“So this was a mistake. If he doesn’t return, then they’ll get the wrong idea.”
“Unfortunately. He has to be dealt with.”
“Killed?”
“No time to get squeamish on me. He’s an enemy soldier.”
An enemy I preferred to be some distance away from before shooting to kill. Up close and personal makes it so much harder.
“Come on. Grab his shoulders. There’s a gully over there, so we can make it look like he ran into a tree, tipped off the bike and hit his head on a rock.”
“Or a gun.”
“A few hits with a rock will fix that. I’m sure there’s no one up there that can do autopsies on bodies.”
No, there wasn’t. I just hoped I was not going to be the one that had to hit him.
Ten minutes later it was done.
We carried him to the gully, and at a suitable place laid the body as if it had landed off the bike and onto the rocks, where Marina picked up a large one and hit him several times with a lot of force the last making a sickening sound, and the blow that killed him.
I went back and collected the bicycle and staged it to meet the crash criteria, and then left.
For all intents and purposes, he had died falling off his bike after wandering off the road in the dark.
Both of us hoped it would not cause Chiara any trouble.
And, it was the first person I’d seen killed up close, and I doubted, in the coming days it would be the last. It was not a sight I was going to forget in a hurry.
© Charles Heath 2019
And why is a coyote baying?
Oh, that’s right, were in Canada, and the ice hockey channel is running in the background while I’m trying to work.
it’s an interesting concept, the movement through time zones, and how it is possible to live the same day for nearly two days, as close as I’m going to get the ‘Groundhog Day’.
It’s not something that I’ve considered when writing stories because usually we are grounded in one particular time zone, or if we’re travelling, we just go from one chapter to the next, each a different location, and the reader is no wiser.
Except the editor is and pulls me up when it appears I think it’s during the day, when in reality it’s really 3am.
But, just to illustrate my point, the following is what I wrote last Christmas, and boy was it confusing at times.
Alright, we’ve arrived in Lake Louise from Kamloops, and there’s been a time change. Being from Australia, we lost or gained so many hours I don’t know whether I’m coming or going.
Yes, I left on the 26th December, travelled around half the planet, and it’s still the 26th, after a stopover in Shanghai where it was the 27th.
Can someone tell me what the hell is going on?
Today it is the 30th. Yesterday was my wife’s birthday in Australia and we got a number of calls on the 29th, which was amusing, to say the least.
Now, we’ve gone from Kamloops to Lake Louise, and apparently now that we are in Alberta, it’s an hour later.
The rental car we’re driving didn’t get it, and we’re still an hour behind.
My phone didn’t get it, but it is understandable because I didn’t connect it to the Canadian network to give us an internet connection because it will cost money.
It did on my wife’s phone which is connected to the network and it’s the only device we have that tells the correct time.
And why do we really need to know what time it is?
So we make the plane the day after tomorrow, from Calgary to Toronto.
I never realized that time was so important, and I wonder how people who travel the world remain sane with all the changes to the time zones.
Just how do road warriors get on?
