Whodunnit?!

The theme of this weeks creative writing group was 'Whodunnit'; here's my effort at a short story on the topic....


A crime had been committed in Broadley Avenue last night, of that there was no doubt. What was in dispute amongst the residents was the exact nature of the said offence.

“Disturbance of the peace” proclaimed Audrey Daley from the throne of her mobility scooter. “The amount of banging and clattering that was going on in the street; my poor Roger didn’t sleep a wink.”

A small mutt gazed dolefully out of the basket, whimpering as if on cue.

“There, there Roger” said Audrey’s neighbour Eric Jones. Although Eric personally couldn’t stand dogs he’d always held something of a soft spot for the redoubtable Mrs Daley, and it was with this in mind that he forced himself to stroke the hairy beast.

“There was certainly some kind of affray;” Mr Jones declared to many nods of agreement from the crowd that was continuing to mass on the meticulously tended lawn of number 23. “Raised voices, foul language, certainly nothing I would repeat in the company of ladies. The kind of behaviour you might expect in the estates, perhaps, but certainly not what we’re used to round here.”

“I didn’t hear anything” said Patricia Fleming; “But I can tell you for a fact that there was some kind of pervert on the prowl last night. Why, I had my best undergarments hanging out to dry and when I went to fetch them in after watching the end of my soaps they’d disappeared from sight! The dirty scoundrel hadn’t touched Albert’s Y-fronts; they were only interested in my flowery bloomers!”

The thought of a pervert in their midst sent the ladies of Broadley Avenue into a chattering frenzy.

“Certainly sounds like a most unsavoury character;” proclaimed the most recent new addition to the avenue. Jacqui was a bottle blonde whose addiction to injecting botulism into her face and weakness for toyboys several decades her junior did little to mask the fact that youth was long behind her. She languidly swept her peroxide fringe out of eyes whilst pouting at Bill; something of a silver fox and although several decades older than her usual prey the only man on the street that she considered worthy of her well honed flirting skills. “And I thought this was such a lovely safe neighbourhood....”

Bill forced out a small smile, not having the heart to tell Jacqui that her talents were wasted on him. Pedro the postman had been providing Bill with a very efficient early morning service for a number of years, although they’d both cursed the day that they scrapped the second post.

“Not just an unsavoury character, Jacqueline, but an outright criminal!” butted in busybody and resident of thirty years Wendy Walker. “The most terrible damage was inflicted on my hedges last night. You all know how much time and effort I put into trimming my ornamental bush; it’s not for nothing that I won the Winfordshire Topiary Championships in 1989, 1994 and, on appeal, 1997. What kind of man would do such a thing?”

“Who’s to say that it’s definitely a man though?” pondered Bill. “It could be a woman...”

“A lady knicker pincher? Pretty unlikely I would say;” argued Patricia. “Oh, the very thought of some stranger getting his filthy hands on my drawers; it’s enough to make me shudder.”

“The thought of her drawers makes me shudder too;” whispered the long suffering Albert to his neighbour and drinking companion of many years Eric. “But not in a good way. Whoever it is that’s been on the rampage, they’re welcome to her extra extra large smalls.”

Tony and Albert’s mirth was met with disapproving stares from the assembled ladies. “Not sure what you’re laughing about;” said Wendy sternly. “This is a very serious matter.”

“AGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

A wail came from five doors down. With the maximum speed possible on Zimmer frames, mobility scooters and dodgy hips, the group made towards its source.

Penny, the owner of number 11, was stood on her drive in front of a large red stain.

“I just came outside to see what was going on and; and; and this!”

“Is that?”

“It looks like...”

“Blood?”

“Blood!”

Screams and gasps filled the street. “I’m calling the police!” exclaimed Wendy, fumbling in her handbag to try to find the mobile phone that her daughter had passed on to her but she never actually bothered to turn on.

“Wait a second;” said Bill; pressing a single finger to his lips. “Can you hear something?”

Ignoring him, the women kept on shrieking.

Eschewing Bill’s polite style Albert bellowed; “Look, for one godforsaken second can you ladies just shut up?!”

In an instant, silence fell on the street. A good ten seconds must have passed before Jacqui whispered “I can’t hear anything?”. The rest of the group were in the process of opening their mouths in a chorus of agreement when a loud sneeze came from inside the garage.

“He’s in there! The pervert’s in there!” Patricia cried.

“The dog disturber!”

“The noisy hoodlum!”

“The bush saboteur!”

“The murderer!” Penny shrieked hysterically.

Wendy pressed her mouth to the garage door. “The police are on their way; there’s no point in trying to escape” she shouted, although in reality she had still failed to locate her phone, and was beginning to question whether it was even in her cavernous bag at all.

“Right, let’s find out exactly who we’re dealing with;” declared Eric. “Put your hands up, whoever you are, we’re going in!”

The women gasped as the men edged forward. Eric turned the handle of the door then pushed it open with a single determined shove. Audrey, Wendy and Patricia covered their eyes, afraid of what they might see, and even Roger, who certainly would never have made a guard dog, buried his head.

Jacqui leaned forward with morbid curiosity whilst Penny peeked through her fingers, fearful of what dreadful act had been committed on her property.

“Derek?! Derek!” repeated Penny. “What are you doing here? I thought you were still working down in Banbury?! You look like you’ve been dragged through a hedge backwards!”

“Happy anniversary, love;” said Penny’s husband, stepping out of the garage sheepishly, a pale red liquid trickling between his legs. Draped from the ceiling was some DIY bunting made from some flowery material that was suspiciously familiar to Patricia; and the bucket normally used to wash the car housed a particularly feeble attempt at a flower arrangement which creatively combined some of Penny’s own begonias with the phallic horn of Wendy’s unicorn hedge. “I came back a night early to try to surprise you, but whilst I was trying to set things up I managed to get myself locked in!”

“Derek Fish, you’ve always been a tight bastard but this truly takes the biscuit!” Penny exclaimed.

“Oooh, language;” injected Eric. “Clearly runs in the family.”

“Too bloody right it does;” Derek replied; “and I was certainly cursing last at 4 o clock this morning when I tripped over that bleeding ugly garden gnome you insist on keeping guard outside your house, Eric. I’d parked round the bloody corner so Penny didn’t realise that I was home; didn’t realise that the 1 minute walk from Chapel Drive would be so fraught with danger, did I?. And the air certainly turned fifty shades of blue again when I was trying to string up this bollocking bunting that our Penny’s so fond of and managed to knock a whole crate of Mateus Rose on the floor. It’s your favourite too, isn’t it Pen?”

Blushing redder than her usual tipple of choice, Penny gave the slightest of nods.

“Well, get on your way, the lot of you, get back to your Daily Mail’s. There’s nothing more to see here;” Derek said with a dismissive wave of his hand.
“And having heard all your accusations” – he looked from face to face before landing on his wife – “I might as well prove them true. After what I’ve bleeding put meself through last night I could really MURDER a beer.”

38,000 Words

When I was just a little girl,
I asked my mother, what should I be.....

As a child I would spend hours reading and writing. From a very young age I created characters and stories that I would share with my family, friends and teachers, and everyone who had the (perhaps dubious) honour of experiencing my burgeoning literary ambitions agreed that without a doubt I would one day have a book to my name.

Now at the tail end of my twenties, that debut novel is still a distant dream and my career to date has been based around crunching numbers more than playing with words. A couple of years ago however I was lucky enough to get introduced to a merry band of Savages who have ensured that as well as Excel Spreadsheets and Powerpoint presentations there is still room in my life to enjoy the pleasures of putting pen to paper (or the slightly less romantic sounding finger to keyboard).

Since joining the Leeds Savages and its pre Savage writing group incarnation I've had the honour of meeting many talented, interesting and above all creative individuals. There are a number of 'regulars' at the meets but their writing (and art) is anything but - the contributions showcased every other Wednesday never fail to surprise and entertain. One of the biggest joys of the meets is that although a set topic or theme has been prescribed in advance, you really have no idea of what aural treats you will experience on any given occasion. Poetry and prose receive equal weighting; deeply personal and moving narratives sit comfortably alongside fantastical tales of other worlds. More likely than not the big topics of love and death (well, death in particular) will be featured somewhere; and it's rare to not experience a few belly laughs at some point.

Whilst listening to the contributions of others is always rewarding, the greatest sense of satisfaction comes from creating and sharing your own work. I am continually envious of those who produce something for every single task, with many of the members being prolific way beyond knocking out a fortnightly masterpiece. I can sometimes feel a bit despondent, disappointed in myself even, when I fail to find the time / motivation to write something for a meet, however its not the be all and end all. The experience of listening to others, offering constructive criticism and encouragement, is just as key to being a 'Savage' as putting pen to paper; it is after all not simply a writing and sketching group but a 'social and developmental forum for artistically minded people'.

Virginia Woolf stated that in order to write a woman needs 'A Room of One's Own'. Nice sentiment, but I have a house of my own and still I can never finrd the space to write. To me, rhe issue isn 't physical space, but mental space. A state of mind where one can be free of distractions; where the realities of life both profound and mundane melt away to create the perfect conditions for productivity.

This weekend was yet another where I had intentions to get writing but other things got in the way - washing, ironing, mowing the lawn, preparing for holiday - doing anything other than write. What I did get round to doing however was reviewing everything that I've written in my two and a bit years with the writing group, and after I copied all of completed poems and stories into a single file I was pleasantly surprised to find that they came to an almost respectable 38,000 words. 26 short stories and 16 poems later I've got a 100 page file to which I can turn whenever I feel like my creative juices have run dry and say - 'In the first four years after you left university and entered the big wide world you didn't write a single thing. Look how much you've achieved since then!'

Admittedly 38,000 words over 28 months might not be much compared to those who knock out a few thousand every day, but as someone who works long hours and leads a busy life, I think that's still something to be proud of. I've got at least another 10,000 words of unfinished work kicking around, so my aim now is to complete some of those pieces that for one reason or other were cast aside and get that total up to 50,000 words by the end of the summer. . Time to recapture the spirit of that little girl who would frantically write about talking pigs and entire worlds within filing cabinets, writing for the sheer joy of it rather than anxiously fretting about deadlines and word counts.

Who knows, I could even hit 100,000 words within the next twelve months.....

Summertime Blues

So here it is, yet another damp, dull bank holiday weekend where dreams of BBQS and sunbathing are cast aside for cagoules and sturdy shoes... Last week presented us with a freakish treat in the form of almost tropical temperatures and a brief escape from reality. Today it's business as usual and the flipflops and vest tops look like they can go back into storage for a while. Anyhow, the joys of British weather inspired a short and hopefully sweet poem that I wrote for this week's writers group. Enjoy.....


SUMMERTIME BLUES

The second the thermometer passes 20 degrees
There’s far too much flesh on display
From the kiddies park to the supermarket aisle
The short shorts have come out to play
Boob tubes and bare moobs are pounding the street
Young and old parade round without caring
For the daily routine, swept aside as they strive
For their white bits to get a good airing  

Like mad dogs they flock to secure a good spot
Blankets spread stake their claim on the sun
Some drift away to blissful dreams
Others revel in Bacchanalian fun
Glorious days rush by; summer’s sweet haze
But alas, all good things come to an end
Seven days later the memory fades
Washed away by a wet weekend

An Argument / Waiting for Spring

For the most recent writing group meetings I've been turning my pen to poetry. Here's my contributions for the themes 'Argument' and 'Waiting for Spring'; as ever all feedback very welcome...

AN ARGUMENT

Sage advice given to us long ago

By one of those ostensibly perfect pairs

“Never go to bed on an argument;” they said
“And if you’ve problems, be sure to share.
Now we’re here and there’s been not a sole angry word
No voices raised, certainly no punches thrown
But laid back to back a deafening silence reigns
Mere inches apart, yet completely alone.

The gentle murmurs of semi sleep
Your heartbeat keeping time
Slow and steady its constant pace
Next to the anxious race of mine.
And I wish I knew where your thoughts go each night
When the whirring cogs of your dreamtime are turning
Could creep into your skull and know once and for sure
Whether the flame I once lit is still burning.

No union is impenetrable
It’s not rare to grow apart
Yet how can we already have reached our end
When we’ve barely passed the start?
You just go through your routines; flannel, teeth, bed
Then slip taciturn under the sheet
Telling me all that I need to know
Through the distance of your heat.

We lived by the advice passed on years ago

By a seemingly perfect pair
But I wish we’d gone to bed on an argument
For at least there’d be some passion there.

WAITING FOR SPRING

One by one russet leaves fall

Cast away on autumns chill
Night consumes day; memories slip
Further and further from reach
And the sun barely tries - she knows her place
When arrogant winter cracks its whip
And I am still, anaesthetized
As frost dances over my skin
Numb is my natural state, these days
So long since I felt anything at all
That I revelled in the simple touch
Of a comfortingly familiar other
So long it seems since I lived a life led
By trusting heart not fearing head
Bathing in the light of those eyes
That used to bathe on me.

The certainty of the seasons has gone
Green shoots seem an impossible dream
How could anything possibly grow
When frost permeates so deep?
Yet through it all; the longest nights,
The challenge of the cruellest days
You are there, not even caring
If your promises fall on deaf ears
Fertile friendship grows stronger yet
In the darkest, most bleak of times    
Telling me there’s no point in dwelling
On that taken, but embracing the given
Whole world spread out, an infinite road
A new life to begin living
A once creative mind begins to stir
To awake from hibernation

And suddenly the clouds disperse
And I look to your smiles and it’s clear
I’ve spent so long waiting for spring
Yet summer’s already here.

Free-falling

Written for the Leeds savages writers meet on April 4th; inspired by a photograph by the documentarist Daniel Meadows


FREE-FALLING

Her husband would scoff if he knew how often she would leaf through the yellowed images which documented her sixteenth summer. If he could see her now, sat on the window ledge with one hand smoking an illicit cigarette like a teenager and the other holding the precious album, he would no doubt shout at her not to be so bloody stupid, to get down and get back to the important business of ironing his shirts.

Sometimes she found it hard to believe that almost forty more summers had passed since that time of ice creams and daydreams, so fresh in her mind were the memories. On other days however she struggled to reconcile the life-worn face that stared at her out of the mirror from beneath hooded eyes with the girl pouting in the photographs. With wrinkles now pursuing a relentless crusade from forehead to décolletage, it was hard to believe that she was carved of the same flesh as that girl who was all smiles and lean brown limbs; that long ago, decades before she gave up on hair dye and perms, she had once spent hour upon hour teasing her hair into those bouncy dark curls that were all the rage. That girl had turned heads; whereas this woman; well, this woman might as well be invisible.

It was to be the last holiday that she would take with her Ma and Pa; her next vacation being her honeymoon with Del on the Isle of Wight several years later. They’d been going to the holiday parks for a good few years; what with Pa usually spending nearly every waking hour at the factory where he was a supervisor; it was the one opportunity that the four of them got to spend any length of time together. At twelve her sister Karen had still been enthralled by the whole experience; donkey rides, competitions, hours spent splashing in the pool.  Helen on the other hand considered herself to be past such childish things. What she really wanted to get out of the holiday was a boyfriend; or at least the opportunity to lose the cumbersome burden of virginity before she started at Sixth Form College.

Ma had awkwardly broached the subject of sex with her just a few weeks prior to the holiday. She’d basically made out that it was a thoroughly unpleasant business that a woman would have to endure for the sake of her husband, and under no circumstances should she ever let a boy do anything to her beyond a chaste peck on the cheek outside of wedlock. Helen politely thanked her for her advice, and then promptly retreated to her room to re-read the hot sex tips column in a well thumbed copy of Cosmopolitan. If the contents of her favourite magazines were anything to go by, Ma clearly hadn’t ever done ‘it’ right. Cosmo and its many imitators had informed Helen that a great sex life was the right of every modern, liberated woman, and a wedding ring was certainly not a prerequisite these days. Deciding to follow the mantra of the magazines rather than her mother, she set off to Skegness with every hope that she would arrive there a girl, but leave a fully fledged woman.

Turning the pages of the photo album, Helen considered whether her Ma had perhaps been right all along, and that the whole bedroom business was hugely or, in her Derek’s case, averagely overrated. Fair enough it had given her two sons, but in last couple of decades it had played little part in her life. The screaming and shouting and swinging from the chandeliers type of activity still advocated by the magazines in the 21st century might be all well and good for the young ‘uns, but was not exactly an options with paper-thin walls and children prone to entering the bedroom at any time of night. The boys had both left home now; one at university and the other working; but the distance that had grown between herself and Del over the years was so great that it seemed unfeasible for them to just flick a switch, cast off the ‘Mum and Dad’ personas and rewind thirty years.

The next photo still never failed to send a shiver down her spine. Johnny Fish; oh so cool, oh so handsome, with his fashionable long, slick hair and hypnotic dark eyes. He was probably fat and bald these days, but in Helen’s dreams he would always be seventeen. She’d first laid eyes on him the afternoon that they arrived in Skegness; she’d been reluctantly playing tennis with Karen and he’d been stood by himself watching, smoking a cigarette. Helen blushed as she recalled how she had hitched up her skirt then deliberately bent over slowly to pick up the ball, ensuring that the mysterious stranger got a good flash of her knickers. Later on she’d plucked up the courage to go speak to him at the evening disco; to be honest once he started talking about the obscure bands that he was into and his passion for fishing and cars it was quickly apparently that they had very little in common, but that did little in the way of diminishing her attentions towards him. She remembered hurriedly taking the photo of him at the end of the night, her parents dragging her back to the chalet at 10pm much to her embarrassment. “I’m not a kid; I’m not a kid” she repeated with little effect as they took her by the hand and steered her away from Johnny.

The next day she sat next to the lake reading “Women in Love”; a book she’d borrowed from the library mainly on the grounds that she knew her Ma wouldn’t approve. She was struggling to get into it; Lawrence being a somewhat more challenging read than her usual boarding school or pony club yarns; but was persevering in hope that she would eventually stumble on the promised dirty bits.

“What you reading?”

Helen looked up to see Johnny and three of his friends, all boys of a similar age though none as visually appealing. 

“Oh, nothing, just a romance.” Blushes spreading across her cheeks, she scrambled to her feet.

“I’m not really into books;” one of Johnny’s friends replied. “Remind me too much of school.” Helen, in reality a voracious reader, shrugged her shoulders in what she hoped was a cool, nonchalant way.

“Do you fancy a swim?” Johnny asked. “Me and the boys were thinking of going for a dip”

The blush spread further at the thought of Johnny in his swimming trunks; messing about in the pool together, bare flesh touching.

“I’d love to but I don’t have my costume with me. I could go back to the chalet and get it though.”

“What do you think, lads?” one of the nameless boys asked. “We’re kind of in a hurry; places to go you know?”

“You don’t need a costume;” Johnny replied with a wink. “Just take off your dress and in you get!”

Beginning in spite of herself to feel a little uncomfortable with all the attention; Helen glanced around to see if her parents were nearby.

“I think I just heard my Ma calling; I’d better go see what she wants;” she said hurriedly.

“Don’t you go worrying about your Ma, you’re not a kid anymore, are you?” Johnny grabbed her wrist and held her in place. “If you want a swim, you don’t need your Mummy’s permission.”

“Like I said, I’ve not got my swimsuit;” she replied. “I can’t. I’m sorry.”

The boys glanced at each other; a silent plan passing between them.

“Oh yes you can;” responded one of the boys who had until now been silent. Before she could even catch a breath to object Helen found their hands on her arms and shoulders, pushing hard. In an instant she was flying backwards through the air towards the cold water of the lake. The experience of freefalling through the air was exhilarating; in that brief moment between land and water the combination of fear and excitement created a sensation of intense pleasure that she had never felt before and, to be truthful, had never felt since. The last thing she saw before she hit the water, screams rising in her throat, was Johnny holding the camera that never left her side, beckoning her to smile as he pressed the shutter.

Pushing soaking hair away from her face and rubbing water from her eyes; screams of protest quickly transformed into shrieks of joy.

“Woo; it’s fresh! Are you boys not going to come join me?!”

“Helen Walker, get out of there this instant!” Stood on the bank with expressions of horror on their face were her parents; her Mum clasping her forehead, her Dad’s arm outstretched towards her. Reluctantly she took his hand and clambered out of the water. All eyes were on her as she stood there, soaking wet.  

“You’re a disgrace to yourself and to the family, Helen;” her father shouted. “Go dry yourself off then pack your things. This holiday is over. We’re going home.” Her mother gathered up her things and snatched the camera from Johnny’s hands.

Looking back Helen smiled as she recalled just how powerful she had felt for that minute; every boy and man seemed to be staring longingly at the thin cotton dress clinging tightly to every inch of her body, every woman trying and failing to disguise their envy at her youth. Her father’s anger was of no relevance – all that mattered was the way in which Johnny was looking her up and down.

“Nice knowing you;” he shouted as she was dragged away from him for the second time in as many days.

“Pity I didn’t get the chance to know you better;”she replied with a laugh.

She’d never seem him again, although he was the subject of many a fantasy over the next two years until she met Derek and instead channelled her energies into breaking his resolve to save himself until marriage, a resolve which lasted approximately 4 weeks after their first date.

Oh what she would give to have the chance to feel like that again, to be that person again! Legs swinging from the window ledge, she closed her eyes and imagined letting go, taking flight, freefalling.

Opening them again, she slammed the photo-album shut and climbed down from the ledge. Falling would be easy, sure, but there was a pile of washing to be done and the beds wouldn’t make themselves. She put aside the album and the promise it held, and set to work before her husband got home.

Lurgy and Turkey

I’m in the process of recovering from a bout of one of those stomach bugs that strikes without warning and provides an uninvited detox, a ruthlessly efficient purge of the system to put any health kick to shame. The house reeks of the delightful combination of bleach and febreeze with which I’ve doused every inch in the hope of eliminating all traces of the traumas recently passed. Solid food is making a hesitant but welcome return and with it energy and the ability to stay awake for more than an hour.

Fortunately the lurgy didn’t strike until Thursday, so I was able to make this week’s Leeds Savages writing meet. I hadn’t managed to complete anything on theme (‘A New Start’ being the topic of choice, and one on which I have more than a few ideas that i’ll try to put to paper soon), however the five minute writing task at the beginning of the meet resulted in the following random little piece – the subject was ‘It was cold’ and inspired a variety of weird and wonderful stories and poems. This effort is neither but quite fun!

IT WAS COLD in the gloom

Of the ice encrusted tomb

Where Boris came to take his final rest

Frozen with claustrophobic fear

Too bitter to shed a tear

Or voice the horror in his increasingly icy breast.

Only yesterday morn at the crack of dawn

He’d been running ‘round without a single care

A quick wring of his collar and Boris was a goner

And soon they’d plucked him bare.

He always knew it was his duty

As a much vaunted thirty pound beauty

To come to such a tragic Shakespearian fate

And come December’s winter chill

He’d inevitably be topping the bill

The prize turkey on the honoured Christmas plate.

Not at all autobiographical.... (hmmmm)

A light hearted piece written for the most recent Leeds Savages writing group meeting...


'Me, My Sofa and I'

Top of Form

The rain beating outside made her feel
That staying in was really no big deal
Why pound the sodden streets in uncomfortable clothes
When you could be living vicariously through TV dating shows
Come Sunday's early hours no better place
Than wrapped in a duvets warm embrace
As she pondered the quizzes in Heat Magazine
She tried to convince herself that this was living the dream
Trying not question whether she was onto a winner
Living it up with a microwave dinner
But slowly crept upon her a nagging fear
That if it continued like this where would she be in a year?
If only she had a crystal ball to see
If she was building an inevitable destiny
Of no boyfriends, no parties, no semblance of fun
But online bingo, a dozen cats, less social life than her mum
She didn't want the epitaph when she came to die
To read  'True friends to the end, Me my sofa and I'

So the following weekend she lovingly polished her finest dancing shoes
Invited all her contacts out for a night of gossip and booze
Come 2am when by habit she’d be curled up snug in bed
She was downing shots and trying to ignore the swimming in her head
And at 3am outside Chicken Cottage crying into cheesy chips
Her paralytic friends were offering sage advice whilst thinking 'get a grip'
Sunday morning texts flew to and fro, filling in the gaps
That somehow she’d managed to almost forget, a convenient memory lapse
A cigarette burn in her favourite dress, an empty wallet and blistered feet
Her favourite shoes and dignity discarded on some unknown city street
Her appetite for a more exciting night, and her liver more than sated
By an experience she wouldn’t rush to revisit; living it up was clearly overrated
So when the next Saturday came round she decided there was no shame
In admitting that clubbing was really not her game
Ten years ago she’d have carved up the floor
But now she didn’t care who thought her a bore
Alcopops and sticky floors could never contend
Now she’d found the recipe for the perfect weekend
And she couldn’t care less if her gravestone read ‘She loved pinot, pyjamas, trash tv
But not the company of me, my sofa and I, but my sofa, my friends and me.’