All stories

Miriam read Sal’s email on her phone, squinting at the picture of the scruffy old van, at what looked to be six tanned young men in high vis waistcoats and not much else beneath the words “The Greatest Erections in South Wales!”. After the picture Sal had written - ‘Saw this on the back of a van, what do you reckon for Julie’s hen? Too much for your chandeliers and fire drills?’

Miriam fetched out the laptop and brought up the email in glorious widescreen. Her gasp was loud enough to wake the cat slumbering on the sun drenched windowsill.

The young men had their arms stretched tall above their heads in best jazz hands pose. They were all bare headed, yet they were all wearing hard hats.

---

Roger thought it hilarious, eight women the wrong side of fifty watching men younger than their sons cavort about on stage. But he reckoned go for it, but not in the house. So in came some men in hard hats and high vis waistcoats to put them up a tent on the back lawn big enough to hold a stage for the show. She’d never seen Roger so worked up as when the swarthy man with the neck tattoo was taking him through all the detail of how the in-structure X45 fire alarm system worked.

Alone at last and there was a real glint in her husband’s eye when he saw the stage from where muscled men would dance. He whispered his idea to her, and before long he had her up there, him with the stopwatch and her acting out the part of the panicked masses fleeing a mock conflagration.

---

But just to have the van with that picture reversing up the drive was enough to make Miriam blush. She fled through the house to wait for them out back, three men dressed as builders coming around the side of the house, one with a pot belly, but the others were beautiful young men, and they even carried bags of tools.

She waved them on to the lawn, but pot belly didn’t move towards the large tent. He folded his arms, and jerked his head towards it.

‘We could have done that for you.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘We’re not just gazebos. Any size you want, any occasion. Satisfaction guaranteed.’

‘Pardon?’

He dug around in his shirt pocket then handed her a crumpled business card. The side with the contact details said Gary’s Gazebos on it, and on the other were the same six scantily clad men beneath the van slogan.

She gaped at the grinning face of Gary.

‘Just a bit of fun,’ he said. ‘Some people say it’s rude, but I say, it got you ringing.’

She nodded faintly.

Gary looked around the empty garden.

‘Hey, where’d my lads get to?’

‘I’ve got a card for you, somewhere,’ Miriam said. ‘He’s a therapist, he mainly deals in victims of traumatic stress.’

From the white tent rose a raucous cheer.

His reflection

My brother and I are two peas in a pod. We do everything together; where he goes, I go. Even my mother can’t tell us apart. She watches how we behave to tell who is who, because although I am his reflection, I am everything Jacob is not.

He is, you see, exactly as he appears. There’s nothing behind those honest eyes, the clean, white grin, the gentle fingers - that’s literally it - he is bland, he is good, he stands in the sun and he is loved.

I, on the other hand, hide in the shadows to watch the girls undress; I steal; I cheat; I live. Truly live and damn the consequences. Where Jacob is content to please, I insist on being pleased. He is the golden boy, I the wolf perpetually dogging his steps.

Lucinda loves Jacob, so of course I have to have her. It would be humiliating if I didn’t, but do you think she will let me near her? Not a chance, even when I swear I’ll never tell, when say I’ll marry her. She chooses Jacob and so I have to get devious - what choice do I have, really?

Their wedding will be a summer one. They will take their vows under the apple tree, where the blossom chandeliers hang heavy, scenting the air like expensive incense. The birds will be their orchestra, matching tattoos will seal their love in place of expensive rings and all the other platitudes that turn the necessities of my brother’s poverty into nauseating virtues.

The day of the wedding arrives. I lay my plans and time them perfectly: just after the vows and the kisses, I raise the alarm - smoke is rising from the distant cottages. The men are dispatched and in the confusion I sneak up on the blushing bride to snatch her away.

She panics at first, but when I let her glimpse my face, she sees only Jacob. A married woman now, keen to cast off the shackles of her virtue. The animal inside me is waking, excited at what is about to happen, at the thought of my brother finding his bride already willingly ravished.

She barely struggles as I lock the door and drag her towards the bed.

“Why do your hands feel rougher than usual, Jacob?”

I take her by her brittle, corn-sheaf waist. The animal is slavering, I am containing it inside my skin, but only just, now. Only just.

“All the better to hold you with, my darling.”

Her skin is butter-soft, but she doesn’t melt. Her lips are tender, red, plump with blood but she still does not offer them up for me to taste.

“And your teeth - I’m sure they were whiter once. And straighter, too. They seem all crooked, now I’m this close.”

I lean in, closer now, impatient, hungry. If she doesn’t come to me by herself, there is no saving her.

“All the better, my darling, to gobble you up…”

As the fire engine screeched on to the drive, two tight, round buttocks disappeared into the rhododendron half way down the garden to the rear of the huge property.

The crew of slightly overweight firemen charged at the front door with a battering ram – a few energetic thumps later saw the oak frame in shards on the marble hall floor. With breathing apparatus covering their faces, the emergency response team trampled over the tiger print rug and forced their way through every room on the lower level of the property, pointing their hose like a sniper sighting a deadly killer.

The fire alarm continued to shriek as the men pounded their way up the spiral staircase to the landing. Looming over them was a six foot portrait of an entwined couple wearing nothing but matching butterfly tattoos on their inner thighs.

Continuing upwards, the first fire fighter reached out to open the closed door in front on him. He rattled the handled but it wouldn’t turn. Under a little pressure from the 16 stone figure, it yielded and flew open to unveil a scene of confusion. Dangling from a chandelier in the centre of the room was the figure of a woman, barely cloaked in a silk dressing gown. Her eyes were covered by a velvet mask, her hair tied back with what appeared to be a gymkhana rosette.

The alarm finally fell silent as the threat of fire had been ruled out. As he pulled the mask from his face in amazement, the rest of his team piled into the room. One by one masks came off and heads tilted back – mouths open like guppy fish waiting for bait.

A pair of fur lined mules balanced on the dainty feet protruding from beneath the gown which then began to wriggle and kick. Jolted out of their daze, the men acted as one in moving forward to reach up to the suspended figure. A bedroom chair was dragged to the centre of the room and one of the uniformed men sprang up to untie the knotted rope which went from her wrists in a clever formation up her back, around her neck and over the main body of the light fitting. With no resistance, the woman fell quickly into the arms of the men below. The gag was carefully pulled from her jaw – all eyes and ears looking expectantly at her face for some kind of response. Her eyes opened slowly against the glare of the light.

“Can you speak?”

She coughed a little – her mouth having dried up from the gag. She nodded, not daring to talk.

“Are you ok?”

She nodded again. “I’m OK….it was a game….with my husband…we like to…”

A noise parted the crowd and a flustered suited man ran into the room.

“Honey! Are you OK? I came as soon as I heard the alarm was going off. I….”

He looked down at his wife…

Samara was sat staring at her computer screen, a noise somewhere in the background was getting louder and louder. People all around began to move slowly, like zombies waking up. She trudged down to the car park for the fire drill. ‘Hi, Samara is it?’ asked a familiar voice from behind. A cold fear flashed up from her stomach, snaking itself around her throat. She turned around. She could have mistaken the man stood in front of her for Frank from a distance, but close up his eyes were darker and his nose much straighter. ‘Are you ok?’ the man asked. ‘Sorry, you made me jump’ said Samara. ‘Sorry’ the man said, seeming flustered. ‘I’m Mark, just started here and Tony told me to come and see you about a pass for the building.’ ‘Oh yes’ she said, ‘I’ll grab you one when we get back in. ‘Thanks’ Mark said and smiled. People started to shuffle back towards the door, Mark turned to look and Samara escaped into the crowd.

Samara couldn’t shake the feeling of dread that had been stalking her all week. It had been almost 10 years since she’d moved; away from her family and what friends she had left, but she hadn’t looked back for the fear of Frank creeping up behind her. Running was the only coping mechanism that could really drag her up out of the depths of her own mind. The evening was still light so she went out. As she rounded the corner into the park She near collided with someone coming out. ‘Frank’ she exclaimed, her breath catching in her throat, ‘what are you’, before she could finish the sentence her eyes came into focus. ‘Oh hi,’ Mark said, ‘sorry about that’ he gestured awkwardly. When she didn’t say anything, he ventured, ‘it’s Mark, from work’. Samara noticed the blue-black edges of a tattoo that flashed from a t-shirt sleeve as he raised his arm. She wondered if it was the same tribal mess that Frank had, it couldn’t be…

The end of the month was marked with the office summer ball. Samara went out of desperation to feel like a normal person. She sat alone beneath a huge chandelier drinking the free table wine. People around her were chatting animatedly with each other in a blur of cuff links and cleavage. She may have had too much already. Frank came over and sat down in the empty chair next to her. ‘Hi’ he said nervously. ‘Hi Frank’ she said and shrunk back into the chair. ‘Oh er it’s Mark’, he said and tried to laugh it off. ‘I er I just wanted to ask if you’d fancy going for a drink some time?’ he asked almost wincing. Samara looked at him levelly. ‘I’ve got one already’ she said holding up the almost empty wine bottle. She couldn’t understand what he was doing there and so clutching the bottle to her chest, did the thing that came instinctively; she ran. Mark stared after her.

‘Hello Nan, in yer get.’ Nathan lent across the passenger seat of his car to open the door. Elsie carefully lowered herself in. She put her handbag on her lap and let Nathan clip the seatbelt buckle in whilst she patted down her hair. ‘Where are we going?’

‘St Patricks’ said Nathan, easing the car back into the road. Elsie smiled. It was one of her favourite churches.

‘Tom Scarrot today.’

Elsie frowned, her already wrinkled brow puckered in concentration. ‘Did I know him?’

‘Might have. He was 86. Widower. Went to school at St Cuthberts. Worked at Cartwright's most of his life.’

Elsie trawled her mind for a memory of Cartwright's. ‘It was a glass factory, wasn't it? Made beautiful chandeliers.’

Nathan nodded. ‘Long gone now. Turned into shops back in the 80’s. Bit rough. Tattoo parlour, betting shop, that kind of place.’

Elsie sighed. ‘Family?’

‘One wife, died about twelve years ago. Four kids, nine grandkids. And four dogs when he died. Loved ‘em.’

Elsie clutched her handbag tighter. Nine grandchildren? She only had the one, Nathan, but he was a good boy. Picked her up and took her places. And working at the funeral home he was a mine of information.

He dropped her outside the church. ‘Good turnout.’ Elsie said, watching people file inside.

‘Yep, should be a good un.’ Nathan undid her seatbelt. ‘You go on in. The do after is next door at the church hall. I’ll pick you up at four.’ He looked at his grandmother. ‘Any problems, you know what to do?’

---

After the service she followed the crowd into the church hall. It was damp from lack of use, in the way these places normally were. Decent spread though, Elsie thought, eyeing up a trestle table groaning under the weight of food. She sat at the end of a long table, as the room filled up around her, the chatter rising.

An elderly man next to her asked ‘How did you know Tom?’ and Elsie offered sparse details of the early years working at Cartwright’s ... not seen him in years ... paying her respects… She was loving this, reminiscing with all the mourners, sharing stories. When it looked like people were getting ready to leave, Elsie took a plastic bag from her handbag. ‘It only seems right’ she said ‘that we have a whip round for charity. The Dogs Trust, considering how much Tom loved his dogs.’ She stood up and with a flourish took a twenty pound note from her purse and dropped it into the plastic bag. ‘I'll get it started.’ She passed the bag to the lady next to her who paused before putting in a five pound note. Elsie watched as the bag moved around the room, coins and notes being put in. Finally it ended up back with her. ‘Lovely’ she muttered. ‘Very generous’

She stood, nodded a goodbye and walked to the doors of the hall. ‘Hold on a minute.’ A man’s voice from behind shouted out ‘How did you say you knew Tom?’ She didn't stop or turn. With a sharp prod of her elbow, she smashed the glass on the ‘In case of emergency’ fire alarm panel before carrying on outside. The noise was instant and deafening. Nathan was waiting.

‘How did it go?’ he asked, hastily pulling the car away without waiting for Elsie to fasten her seatbelt.

‘It was beautiful’ said Elsie, poking her nose into the plastic bag. ‘There’s easily £300 in here.’