Sorry, but the show's over, folks. Some of you may be aware that, unfortunately, our blogsite has been plagued with technical problems for quite some time now. Could it be that perhaps the spooks that haunt our internet objected to being discussed? We were forced to shut down this site for major repairs back in August and after we were given the go ahead again, we started it back up for a few months only to find more difficulties lying in wait. With frustrations galore standing in our way, we've made the sad decision to close permanently. We're disappointed to be going, but sadder by far to wave farewell to our lovely authors who've been the highlight of our time editing the submissions. Since Dorothy Davies kicked off the blog back in November 2010 with her wonderful story, "Forever England," we feel it's a just and fitting finale for Spook City that we end with one of hers as well. Please sit back and enjoy, "The Tourist." Bye bye, everyone.

"THE TOURIST" - Dorothy Davies

He was just like any other mark, you know? Scruffy sort of guy, tweed jacket, slacks with not much of a crease, bit of a stubble thing going on. Balding a bit but who isn’t? Big nose, I remember the big nose. Washed out sort of eyes, not much colour there. Looked like he hadn’t got two pound coins to rub together, if I were truthful with you.

           

He gets in the cab at Liverpool Street Station, wants a trip round London.

           

OK, I says, let’s go! Where do you wanna start, sir?

           

He says, that thing near the river, that tall thing you see from the sky.

           

I says, do you mean the Monument?

           

He says, I do that.

           

So we goes to the Monument. I sits in the cab while he climbs the 300 odd steps to the top, I sees him go round the viewing platform, I wait while he climbs back down the 300 odd steps and I think, rather him than me. I’d rather sit here in comfort, off me feet, watching the meter tick on. This is the good one; I remember thinking, the rare good one. The one we all talk about getting and few of us do. Go round London seeing all the sights. Usually from the windows, mind you, this one was different, getting out to see places, leaving the meter running.

           

Oh be sure I kept the meter running. I might have had Princess Diana in my cab and I would have kept the meter running. Fat chance of that, before or now. Oh but I loved that woman...

Enough! Just gotta say no one would have made me drive that fast and kill the one true beauty who walked our planet. Oh hell, here I go again...

           

Forget it. Let’s get back to the weird one.

           

I’ve been driving a cab in London all my working life, me. Love it, I do, all the people, the sights you see out the window along the streets, them’s as wanna talk to you about London and all it has to offer, them as hates it, only here on business or ‘cos they gotta be.

Not this mark, though, he was - different.

           

He wanted the Tower next, so we went to the Tower. And I sat outside and waited while he did the tour round, seeing those – what do you call them, the ones in the outfits? Can’t remember. Anyway, he went there.

He wanted the London Eye after that, wanted to see, what was that strange new building called? Can’t remember. Well, we went there.

He wanted Buckingham Palace, wanted to see the – damn it, where’s my memory gone! The men in red outfits and tall hats? Well, we went there.

           

And we went on like that. All day we went round and round London and all day ... I just realised ... my memory got worse and worse till I could hardly remember how to get from one place to the other. Like I was in a fog, you know?

           

And come to think on it, he got –

           

Smarter and smarter as the day went on, clothes got better, he got more hair, he got less beard. His eyes got more colour. And I got – older.

And I forgot things. It was like – he was some kind of vampire and he was draining me of all my knowledge.

           

Next thing I know he’s driving the cab and I’m in the back, watching the world go by, wondering where the hell I am.

           

We went back to the Monument and I got out and he drove off. I opened the door and climbed up the 300 odd steps to the top and when I got there, I thought, how odd, he said ‘the thing you can see from the sky.’ How did he see it from the sky, I asked myself. And I asked myself who he was to drain me like that.

And I found myself on the viewing platform of the Monument and everyone who came up walked right through me and I knew I wasn’t human any more.

Then I realised he wasn’t human either or he wouldn’t have been able to take over like that and put me in the back of my own cab and then drive off in it and I’m lost, lost, lost and only you’ve seen me in the last ten years.

I’m right bored with the view, but that ain’t the real problem.

It gets damn lonely up here, I can tell you.

BIO: Dorothy Davies is a writer, editor and medium, who lives on the Isle of Wight (Isle of Spirits) where she writes her strange stories and channels books directly from spirit authors.

(So long, so long and thanks for all the fish.
Col, Trev, Mark and Gaz.
- Spook City)

The Last Picture Show

"THE LAST PICTURE SHOW" - Dorothy Davies

It mattered not that the curtains looked the worse for wear, the hem hanging down a little, the runners showing where the weight of the curtains had dragged holes over the years. The fact remained they were temporarily hiding the reason the building had an existence – the huge silver screen. Fly speckled, marked here and there, it mattered not. The anticipation from the audience in the auditorium was palpable, a hush of unspoken words, a withholding of the rustle of popcorn and other comestibles, that indescribable smell and atmosphere accumulated over many years: bodies' clothes, food, sighs, tears, cries, held breath, screams and laughter. 

           
This was the last picture show. At the end of tonight’s performance the doors would close for the last time. In future, films would be shown in the new multi screen complex across town, bright, glittering place with chrome and fine flooring, with carpet and seats that tilted and did not move when you leaned back. Move as in their moorings had come adrift from the floor. It added something to the ambience of this old, much loved building.

           
I crept in quietly, almost on tiptoe, not wanting to disturb anyone’s breathless anticipation of the curtains gliding open and the screen being revealed in all its tarnished glory. I found empty seats, which I didn’t expect, and sat three in from the side aisle. It was not the best of positions but it would do. There was room for two others if they chose to come and share the rest of the row with me. On my other side someone grunted and shifted, but did not look round.

           
The music blared, the numbers began rolling, white on black and the pre-feature programme began. I allowed myself to submerge all thoughts in the magical moment, the losing of self in the actions on the screen. Someone crept in as quietly as I did and sat down next to me. We nodded to one another in the darkness, nothing said, eyes swiftly turning back to the screen. A sigh seemed to come from my new companion, one I echoed. Contentment. Filmgoers of the world unite!

           
All too soon the interval came and music blared out of ancient speakers. There was chatter and laughter, a sense of heightened emotion, anticipation, eagerness, a mixture of so much unclassified, indescribable. My companion, an elderly man I had seen many times before, nodded in time to the nonsensical piece of rhythm which ended and began again, same record. A few people laughed. It ended, it began again. This time whistles and shouts had erupted, there was stamping of feet and yells of laughter. By the time it began again, when it was obvious to all that the impending closure had left the cinema with just one record, the entire audience was in uproar, laughter shaking ancient dust from ancient carvings and light fittings. I smiled; the sense of the absurd was beyond belief and unbelievably funny. My companion was laughing so hard I feared for his heart.

           
It took a while for the audience to settle down after the nonsense with the record, but the main feature began and the theatre became silent. Clint Eastwood strutted his stuff across the screen many times larger than he actually is –or was – shooting all and sundry, fighting his way out of this battle and that. It was almost a shock when the film finally ended. The credits rolled and we were on our feet, some ready to slide out, others prepared to stand and show respect as the National Anthem was played.

           
It was then I smelled smoke.

           
It was then I realized three things, as I did at this point every Halloween. First, the theatre had caught fire, second, judging by the frantic screams and yells of trapped people, the fire doors would not open and third, recalling the local newspapers I had seen afterwards, not one of us survived.

           
Where we were is a block of flats, ugly, functional, utilitarian and dull. We died because some idiot, anticipating the closing of the cinema, locked the doors. This I knew, this I could accept, if only…

           
…We were not summoned back from our graves every Halloween.

           
I just wish that the dead could be allowed to sleep in peace.

          

Author's Note: The first part of this story actually happened, but not on the Isle of Wight where I now live. Here there was a very old cinema and someone who used to entertain the waiting audience with a glove puppet around the side of the curtain…

BIO: Dorothy Davies is a writer, medium and editor. She writes her strange stories, usually with the help of spirit authors. Dorothy is a full member of the Fictioneers, and editor and contributor to many Static Movement anthologies. She loves to write. You can read more from Dorothy here:www.oneinspecyal.com and here www.circle-of-light.co.uk

Beauty Sleeps

"BEAUTY SLEEPS" - Dorothy Davies

It is the strangest thing that someone can be the love of your life, the one you cherish beyond all others, the one who holds your very soul in their fine delicate fingers that are like chains, so tight do they hold your priceless gift of love, and yet you look at others.

           
It is so because I can do nothing else but go with what nature made me – male.

           
Talk to me not of those who stay devoted to one person their entire married lives, talk to me not of those who fall in love, lose that loved one and never ever look at another person as long as they live.

           
 I disbelieve them.

           
We are all born with the driving need to perpetuate the species.  It is true, this I acknowledge, that men and women have used that excuse for eternity to justify their dalliances outside their relationships which were supposed to be everlasting.  It is an excuse.  It is also valid.

           
There are some of us who are driven by darker needs.  Those of us who rise and fall with the waxing and waning of the moon phases, those of us who respond to the call of nature in different ways, those whose bodies change and whose physiometry is not entirely under their control.  Ah, do you think, even now in this enlightened age, that such mythical creatures as werewolves, vampires, shape-shifters and the like are no more than that, myths? Do you not understand and accept that every myth, no matter how strange, has its basis in fact somewhere in the distant past, even if that past is as distant as the Stone Age and beyond?

           
Think on it now.  Know that dragons once existed as dinosaurs did.  Likewise unicorns and werewolves and all the other mythical creatures, mer-people, centaurs, need I go on?

           
You are asking about the other realms, fairies and the like. They have been with us since the world began; they are timeless, immortal and real.  Ask no more.  It is fact.

           
The facts are these.  For the first time in my existence I fell in love.
She was amazing, so beautiful the sun hid its face when she walked the earth.

So intelligent that philosophers stopped their philosophising and listened to her instead. So joyful that the very birds stopped singing to let her celebrate life.

           
How trite are these descriptions, how cliché ridden! How truly awful! And yet there is no other way to describe the effect she had on the world – and on me.  I was lost.  Completely. For the first time I thought I had found someone who would truly hold my love and life for eternity.

           
In some ways I was right.

In other ways I was not.

           
We courted, we married, we lived.  Within a year I was bored.  Beauty at that level is boring as it has no imperfections.  Perfection is hard to live with as you constantly measure yourself against it and find yourself lacking.  I stared hard at the mirror some mornings and knew, handsome as I know I am, that I could not match her perfection.  When we had dinner parties or entertained in other ways, everyone looked at her and not at me.

           
The male ego is very easily damaged.

           
Her knowledge outshone mine. I could not hold an intelligent conversation with her; she would pin down my obvious faults and pour scorn on them.

           
I looked for others, less beautiful, less intelligent, less knowledgeable.  I began to recover my equilibrium.

           
She suspected, of course. 

I denied it, of course.

           
We continued in a state of truce for a further year when, to my horror, she announced the one thing I had not thought of – she was to have my child.

           
I should explain that I am not the kind of man who seeks perpetuity through a bloodline.  I am not the kind of man who relishes the thought of his home being wrecked with baby items and his sleep wrecked through baby wailing and adoring fluttering people gushing over its every smile, burp and frown.

           
I took care of that.  Knowledge she might have, sense when it comes to the male ego she does not.  I took care that she did not discover what had been fed to her and mourned with her at the loss of the child.

           
But possibly not good enough, for soon after I realised her eyes had turned to another.  For a while I encouraged it, the pressure being taken from me, which suited me well but then it galled me that she would look elsewhere.

           
It was time to take the next step.

           
The person who supplied the material to induce the miscarriage supplied further material for me. 

It worked.

I had her buried, so we had a grave to mourn over and cherish, those of us who professed to love her.  I had her buried because I liked the idea of beauty asleep in a grave.

           
 I imagined her rotting, slowly, everything eating her away, slowly.

           
I played the field, after a due period of mourning had passed, I had fun, something I had forgotten about and could do. 

           
But something was troubling me.  Something I felt I had overlooked.  Something I should have known – but didn’t.

           
A friend commented that I knew, of course, she was not dead, but sleeping. This is a religious comment and I ignored it.  At first.  He persisted, telling me over and over that she was not dead but sleeping. The word ‘vampire’ was mentioned.

           
I laughed.

           
Then I recalled the time I cut myself and she fastened onto the cut and sucked it until I thought she would take the finger clean off my hand.

           
 I wondered why I had been foolish enough not to recognise my own kind.

 I had to do something.  My mind would not rest.

           
One dark overcast storm tossed night I took shovel and courage and went to her grave.  I dug and dug until I uncovered the coffin, untouched, unscarred by its internment.

           
When I prised off the coffin lid and looked down at her perfect face, she looked up at me and smiled.

BIO: Dorothy Davies is a writer, medium and editor who lives on the delightful Isle of Wight, a small island off the south coast of England. There she writes her strange stories, usually with the help of spirit authors. This one, she says, was written with the help of Bela Lugosi who was not only a talented horror actor but also a very good writer with an infinite supply of strange and chilling tales. Dorothy is a full member of the Fictioneers and editor and contributor to many Static Movement anthologies. She loves to write. You can read more from Dorothy here:
www.oneinspecyal.com and here www.circle-of-light.co.uk

I Will Wait For You

"I WILL WAIT FOR YOU" - Dorothy Davies

The City of London, ancient as the ground it stands on, modern as the towering strange buildings it has seemingly manufactured out of nothing, has more than its share of graveyards.

The worker and casual visitor to the Square Mile, where money changes hands at an alarming rate, where fortunes are made and lost, where the Bank of England sits like the old lady she has been likened to and holds on to the riches she has acquired over the countless years of being in the centre of the Square Mile of commerce, are not always aware of them.

Most cities never sleep, but this one does. This one closes down at night, leaving the rats and strays to haunt the narrow alleyways, the wide affluent streets, the banks of the great never sleeping river Thames. The vagrants shuffle into marked chosen doorways with their newspaper blankets and cardboard walls, which they zealously and jealously guard; newspapers, cardboard and doorways, that is, to settle down for the night; so much litter swept to one side, so much misery wrapped in paper and tied with string.

In Temple, haunt of barristers and clerks and worried litigants, the gas lamps sing their litany of warmth and light to nothing but empty courtyards and silent Chambers. The drinking place alongside the great City church lets its lamps invite in those who have money to buy their way to oblivion, if that be their wish, but who close early most nights for lack of custom.

Into that strange half-haunted world come the non-people.

The City, graveyards, buried rivers and deep sewers once worked in by men called toshers who searched the murky disgusting depths for money, rags, bones and any other treasures that could be found, is a natural place for the non-people to live. Their homes have long since been disturbed, their memorials left leaning against walls or built into the walls themselves, a token nod to their memory. They come seeking revenge and retribution and remembrance.

It is surprising how few know that the bodysnatchers plied their trade there, resurrecting corpses for the anatomists in the great City hospitals, especially Barts.

Few know that among those who called themselves non-people are those who live on blood. Non-people who take on the cloak of humans in order to get what they want and need. Humans that are mostly ignored or scorned.

Those who trespass into the City at night find this out at their cost – the ultimate cost, their lives.

***

The night was drawing in when Karl stumbled into the City from the West End, drunk, heartbroken and lost. He had one thing left in his pocket, the ring his bride-to-be had thrown in his face during a bitter argument in St. James’s Park. She had stormed off in one direction; he had stormed off in the other, and sought consolation for his sorrows in the nearest pub. He then ended up walking without realising or even caring where he went. The words they had thrown at one another over some stupid, infinitesimally small item were of such bitterness and ferocity it was clear they could never speak to one another again. Somewhere in his drunken stupor, Karl realised that it was not the item which had caused the row but long built up tensions which had finally exploded. Better before the wedding than after, he tried to console himself.

It didn’t work.

The City was quiet, only his heels disturbing the night as he stomped his way down Cheapside, heading for who knew where? Alone in a city of towering heartless buildings, shuttered and barred for the night, offices which held the secrets of millions of people in its archives and databases, vaults which held wealth beyond belief, especially those of the jewellers in Hatton Garden – ah, if he only had the skills to break in, to handle the beautiful gems and elegant pieces, if only, if only...

In a moment he was stone cold sober. The ring in his pocket seemed to be burning its way through the cloth, heating his skin. He pulled it out and went to throw it, but stopped. The diamond was worth something, the gold was worth something, why throw it away? Why not choose someone worthy of having it as a gift ... one of these vagrants, stinking and snoring in a doorway? Why not be truly magnanimous and give the gift of a lifetime to someone, change their future forever? Well, perhaps that was going a little too far but still...

He had no need of it. He could not bring himself to walk into a jeweller's and sell it, for they would know what had happened, and pride, that all enveloping sin, would not let him do that, not allow someone to smile sympathetically and wish him better luck next time. Best to give it away and start over again – if there was a next time.

But which one of the human flotsam could he give it to? Why was one more deserving than another?

Random luck, he told himself, like winning the lottery, sometimes they draw the lucky number, the rest of the time, for some, the rest of their lives, they don’t.

He stopped by a particularly savage looking drunk, long grey hair tied back with string, huge shaggy beard, incredibly lined face and gnarled twisted hands clutching the newspaper tightly to his body. The night was not cold, but habit dies hard.

‘Hey you!’ Karl nudged the sleeping man with his highly polished shoe, provoking a grunt that could have been ‘clearorff’ or something vulgar. He couldn’t quite make out the words. He tried again. ‘Look, I’ve got something for you.’

The eyes flicked open and for a moment Karl felt intense fear for they were black and soulless. Then the man blinked and the face changed.

‘What’d’r’yer want then? I was kipping.’

‘I want to give you something. I don’t want it any more, it’s worth a lot of money and I chose you to give it to.’

‘What is it?’

‘This.’

Karl held out the ring and the man took it, suspiciously turning it every way he could.

‘What’s the catch?’

‘No catch. I broke up with my fiancé and that’s it, end of relationship. I don’t want to sell the ring, I want to give it to someone else to sell.’

‘No one gives someone sommat for nuffink. What do you want me to do for it?’

‘Nothing.’ Karl was beginning to despair; the man was not grateful, just suspicious. ‘Look, it’s not stolen or anything, just take it and in the morning see if you can trade it for money to help you live.’

‘Now who’s gonna believe I got this legit?’

Karl was baffled. It was something he hadn’t thought of, not for a moment. Of course, how could someone looking and smelling like that walk into a jeweller’s and trade the ring for cash?

He made up his mind in that moment. ‘All right. I’ll remember you. I’ll be back in the morning. I’ll sell the ring myself and bring you the money.’

The teeth were stained and black but they still showed themselves in a grim smile. The vagrant grabbed Karl’s arm in a tight vicious grip. ‘I’ll wait for you.’

‘I will be back.’

‘Don’t you go ratting on me. You don’t promise me a lifeline and then rat on me. I’ll wait for you.’

Nodding, Karl stuffed the ring back in his pocket and walked swiftly away. He knew the doorway, he knew the man; he would return.

He thought.

Taxis disappear at night from the City, for there are no passengers to hail them and be taken to distant destinations. The taxi drivers can make a killing by driving by theatres and nightclubs instead. Karl knew he would have to get to the Underground to go home. Mansion House, perhaps? But his footsteps were not taking him to an Underground station. He didn’t quite know where he was going; it seemed drink and sorrow were combining to send him wandering aimlessly down narrow streets that held menace in every darkened window and doorway, taunting him with glimpses of civilisation, street lights and occasional cars, but he could not quite make his way to them.

He stumbled into what he thought was a small park, until he saw the gravestones around the walls. Oh what the hell, he thought, I’ll just...

The morning sun touched his red rimmed eyes and woke him. Dishevelled and hung over, he somehow staggered to his feet, trying to brush dirt and early morning dew from his once fine suit. His throat was raw and his stomach screamed for something, anything, to stop the sick feeling which was consuming him. Too late, it had to come out.

‘Sorry,’ he muttered to whoever the headstone commemorated. ‘You know how it is...’

He reached for a handkerchief and realised the pocket was empty. The ring had gone. Somewhere in the dark hours someone had robbed him; his wallet, his watch and the ring had gone.

‘NO!’ he roared into the silent morning, startling the birds into frantic squawking song in the trees. ‘NO!’ Fear gripped him, turning him to ice. He saw the soulless eyes of the vagrant, heard the menace in the voice, ‘I will wait for you.’ A voice that in that moment was not that of a vagrant drunk, but a cultured being, one with strength, one with purpose ... one who meant what he said.

I have to go and explain...

Was that not foolish? A sane voice in his head questioned the decision. The man knows not who you are. Go home. Walk if you must. Report the theft to the police at least, get them to take you home. Forget the vagrant.

‘I will wait for you.’

He couldn’t. Something was drawing him back to the doorway, to the man whose life he promised to change – and would dismally fail to do so.

Somehow he got himself moving; somehow he knew he had to find his way back. He had no idea where he was, but he thought if he let his subconscious work out the direction, he would be there in no time, not like the meandering aimless walk he had taken the night before. That was nothing but a jumbled memory anyway.

The sour taste of vomit in his mouth, hair awry and clothes wrecked, Karl staggered into the street and began to walk, letting his feet take him where they would.

And sure enough he was heading back to the building he remembered. And sure enough the vagrant was there, sitting up, alert, anticipating.

‘Too damn early for you to have sold the ring,’ he growled as Karl walked up to him. ‘And you look like sommat the dog brought in from the dump.’

‘I ... fell asleep in a graveyard last night and someone robbed me.’

‘Right. Good story. Some ghoul came out of his grave and took the ring, did he?’

‘Ring, wallet, watch, everything.’

The vagrant began to laugh. ‘Right, mister, like I believe that story. Going back on your promise, then, are you?’

‘I can’t – I need to go home. I can find money and bring it back to you. I promise!’

The man stood up, towering over Karl. He had not appreciated how tall the man was; curled up in the doorway he looked small, almost insignificant. Now he revealed himself as over six foot and broad with it. The fear Karl had experienced in the graveyard was nothing to what he felt in that moment.

‘You know what the old highwaymen used’ta say, dontcha? Your money or your life. You tell me you got no money, so – ’

Karl’s lifeless, bloodless body lay in the doorway for several hours before someone found him and reported the death to the police. The autopsy revealed not a drop of blood remained in his veins.

BIO: Dorothy Davies is a writer, medium and editor who lives on the delightful Isle of Wight, a small island off the south coast of England. There she writes her strange stories, usually with the help of spirit authors. This one, she says, was written with the help of Bela Lugosi who was not only a talented horror actor but also a very good writer with an infinite supply of strange and chilling tales. Dorothy is a full member of the Fictioneers and editor and contributor to many Static Movement anthologies. She loves to write. You can read more from Dorothy here:
www.oneinspecyal.com and here www.circle-of-light.co.uk

.

Will You Walk With Me A Way?

"WILL YOU WALK WITH ME A WAY?" - Dorothy Davies

Will you walk with me a way?

Not far, just to the end of this road. 

I am...empty inside and need a few moments of interaction with someone.  Oh my, that sounds so formal, doesn’t it? In truth, though, to ask you for a few moments of idle chatter, or gossip would be nonsensical.  Especially with what I have in mind.

You look wet, is it raining? Oh I see, it’s that fine drizzle that no umbrella can ward off, so you didn’t bother.  Me? No, I don’t get wet. Call it a shield if you like, rain tends to avoid me.

Tell me, how are things at the nursing home these days?  Does the garden bloom as fine in spring and summer as it used to? I recall the days of sitting out there, listening to the birds that would be singing as if their lives depended on it, the insects buzzing and flitting hither and thither as if their lives depended on it … come to think of it, they did.  But us, the static ones, we stayed where we were, in our wheelchairs or sun loungers or wherever the staff had put us, there to bake in the heat until they took us back into the coolness of the home once more.  Not a word of complaint from any of us, you know that, but oh the longing at times for shadow, cool water and rest from unremitting sunshine was overwhelming.   But it was life and despite its many, many drawbacks, we clung to it tenaciously.  Why?  I wonder now why I did not just give up and drift away.

The big problem really, for all of us, is memories.

They hurt.

‘Sometimes memories walk a little hard.’ The wisest words I ever heard, from the most wonderful person I ever knew, my maternal grandmother.  Oh she was right! How hard do the memories walk when your means of perambulation is either wheels or a walker? You recall the times when three strides would take you to the door, the cupboard, the TV, whatever/wherever. You recall the way you could walk freely down the road, wander round the shops, visit restaurants and museums, libraries and stately homes.  Can you even begin to imagine not walking?

Of course not.

It doesn’t come to all of us but enough … oh yes, enough.

But look at me now. Do I not walk well? Proud, tall and easy?  Not so much as an ache in the hip joints or knees, the ankles flex and move as they should. Ah, the joy of it.

You? You are too young still, in terms of experience, to fully understand the joy I feel at being free to walk again.

I have to ask … do you not remember me?  The old cantankerous lady who sat in her wheelchair in the garden and demanded cool drinks and ice cream and got neither?  Do you not recall how I asked for shade and had none offered to me?  Do you not know the suffering you put me through, you who were paid to care and didn’t?

Well, I got you to walk with me a way.  And look, here we are, right by the cemetery which is now my home. Oh, you will not escape me this time!  Now I see the horror on your face as I cast off the mask of humanity and show you what I am.  A skeleton.

Bony hands can grip harder than flesh covered ones, can’t they?

Will you walk with me a way? Let me show you where I lie, here in the cold earth, with not so much as a snowdrop to lighten the darkness of the earth. No one cared, did they … and you, you were one of the worst.  Did I not see you laughing behind closed doors at those who pleaded for respite from sun and thirst and were ignored?

Oh, you did not know, did you, that after I left your side of life I returned, over and over again, to watch, to record, to – all right, stalk you if you like.

Here we are. This is my narrow bed.

Will you share it with me for a while?

Like, eternity?

BIO: Dorothy Davies is a writer, medium and editor who lives on the Isle of Wight.  Her horror output has increased tenfold since a horror writer decided to come and work with her from the other side of life.

Crossroads Blues

"CROSSROADS BLUES" - Dorothy Davies

 

Hey, thanks! Been walking that road forever, breathing everyone’s fumes and not one cared to stop for me. Damn thumb near enough aching from being stuck out so long and being ignored, too!

This is one fine car, I have to say. Nice. What’s the music ... oh, OK, never mind. I can live with it.

What? What do I like? Blues. Old style blues. Let me tell you a story, then, how I got to be where I was when you picked me up, you being a damn fine person and all, let me tell you. You up for that?

Well, like I said, I like the blues and I had this ambition, you know? Man, did I ever want to sing the blues! You know, like the old ‘uns, none of this wailing guitars and sobbing violins and screaming keyboards … anyone can make a blues song outta that. No, me and the old guitar, a voice and a song and a heartbreak, that’s what I wanna do. Like Robert Johnson, like Blind Lemon Jefferson, like the Reverend Gary Davis … they didn’t need no backing, did they?

So there I was, sat in the park – ‘cos the family done got sick of me plucking the same chords over and over and I got jokes like ‘I didn’t wake up this morning’ and stuff like that – crooning to myself about lost loves and too much drink and roads that go on forever especially when you’re walking them, when this guy strolls up to me. Smooth like, slicked back hair, slicked back clothes come to think on it, and shiny shoes like they just came out of the box but he walked like they were slippers. That shouted money to me; you gotta spend a lot of money to get new shoes that soft and well fitting. I just drooled over the shoes.

Yeah, I know, supposed to be the females who are shoeaholics, but I do like a good pair of shoes and I had ambitions, oh yes, to go buy me handmade soft leather shoes one of these days, when the right person finds me and promotes me and I sell records by the million …

You gotta have a dream, aintcha?

And here he was, the dream, right in front of me.

‘Cos this here guy says, in a voice as slicked back as his hair, ‘You got something there, son, I’d like to hear more.’ Before I could answer he snaps open a silver box like you’d keep smokes in, but thinner, you know what I mean? And out comes a smart piece of card, embossed with silver and all, wouldn’cha know. Record Producer it said. His name? Don’t ask, I didn’t see. When you want a recording more than you want the next breath, well, sort of, who sees names? You see what you wants to see. I saw Record Producer. My heart near enough stopped in its rhythm, that it did.

The funny thing is, now I think on it, he never got impatient, no shuffling of feet in those fine leather shoes, no sigh of impatience as I stilled my heart and my thinking and my sudden desire to gush madly all over the place which wouldn’t have been good, now would it? Who wants sycophantic gushing, I ask you...?

So I got myself together and I said, calmly and quietly, like, ‘Thank you, sir. I would really appreciate a chance to show the world what I can do.’

‘Oh you will,’ he said, so quiet like I wasn’t sure I heard him. Even more slicked back than before. I started to think he was all oil inside, he was that smooth, that liquid, that – do you know, the word gloopy comes to mind? Now why would that be, I wonder?

So we goes for a drink, like, he ordering some fancy cocktail the like of which I’d never heard nor seen before, and man, having seen how it looked in the glass, all sort of fiery and wild and dark and menacing – now there’s another odd thing, menacing? A drink? well, it was, and right glad I was I asked for a straight pint. I know where I am with beer. You can keep the fancy stuff. He tossed the drink back and went and got another. Then I got to look at him proper like for the first time.

You know how some people’s eyes are so black they show nothing? No? Well, that was how his looked to me. Couldn’t read a thing in them, not a thing. Worried me a bit but I kept thinking ‘record producer’ and tried to overlook the almost blank face, the expressionless eyes, the cut of a mouth – hardly any lips, you see – and concentrated on the oily slicked back voice, which was talking of demo discs, of expensive recording time for free, of introductions to top people, of air play and of money.

‘What do you want of me?’ I asked eventually. Nothing comes free, there’s always a price.

‘Ha, about time you asked that.’ There was an edge to the voice that hadn’t been there before. I sat up a bit and wondered why the change.

‘Well ... nothing is free, is it, not really...’

‘A wise person, for a change. You’re right, friend, nothing is free. I don’t want much of you, actually. I would ask that the first recording we make be out in the open, is all, with a hand held recorder, we can clean it up later, be assured of that, but I want real blues, dirty down low and gutsy blues, I want – you to come to the crossroads at midnight and sing for me.’

Do you know, I fell for it? How stupid is that? You can ask yourself that question as I did and get no answer. It was the oily voice, you see, which held glittering promises in its depth, bit like oil that’s spilled shows up as a rainbow. That kind of thing.

Damn me if I didn’t go. The crossroads he specified were miles from anywhere, my beat up old car only just made it before it coughed its last and expired in a heap of rust right there on the side of the road. I had just pulled over in time. I got out, guitar rescued from the back seat, song in my head and my mouth, and went over to the crossroads – where he was waiting.

I still didn’t fall in with knowledge, you know. Even though I had his card in my pocket and wondered why he spelled Damon as Daemon.

He had this fancy recording thing in his hand. I felt pretty damn stupid, standing at a crossroads singing a blues about standing at a crossroads, a sort of interpretation of Robert Johnson’s which I rather liked, but then I got into the spirit of it, sang my heart out and all but made my fingers bleed on the guitar strings.

He said I did just fine, it was exactly what he wanted. He said he would get in touch with me. I said thanks, don’t you want to write down my name and address and stuff? No, he said, I know where you live and he reeled off my address, my phone number, my mobile number, my security information ... man it were scary, I tell you.

I ain’t been the same since. Something’s gone out of me. Now I don’t believe in this soul thing, but there might be a grain of truth in it, since I sang that song and stood on that crossroads, I feel different.

Empty.

Did I hear from him again? No.

What am I doing hitching? Trying to get back to the crossroads to see if I can get it back, whatever ‘it’ is.

Not holding out a lot of hope, but hey, thanks for the ride. This is one lonely old road when you have to walk it.

The crossroads are right here.

Don’t fancy staying with me, do you?

Thought not.


BIO: Dorothy Davies is a writer, medium and editor who lives on the Isle of Wight, a small island off the south coast of England which is said to be the most haunted place in the UK. There she channels books from spirit authors and stories from a horror writer who says he isn’t done telling stories yet. She is a proud member of the Fictioneers and has appeared in many Static Movement anthologies, as well as editing one of her own. She is the author of ‘Death Be Pardoner To Me’, the life of George, duke of Clarence, given to her by the duke himself.

Danse Macabre

"DANSE MACABRE" - Dorothy Davies

The silent figure on the gurney twitched, moved, sat up and looked around. The tag on her toe said JANE DOE which annoyed her very much.  I’m not a Jane Doe, she thought, I’m Lydia ... Lydia ... the rest of her name had escaped her, much as her memory seemed to have done.  Why am I on a gurney with a tag on my toe? Why am I cold and my veins look blue and stark and my flesh look like marble? I am NOT dead!

           

But – one chilled hand at her throat said otherwise. There was no pulse, no heartbeat, no warm blood rushing around a body that was beginning to sag. That annoyed her too. My boobs never sagged! Now look...

           

Look. She looked around, this dead Lydia, and saw she was in a morgue. A cold lonely desolate morgue that held no comforts for anyone, least of all those who were delivered there on a gurney and left overnight because the staff had gone home and not bothered with yet another stiff.

           

She swung her legs over the side and stood up. Well, I can still do that. Now, can I walk?

           

She could. Dead Lydia staggered across the room, round the dissecting table and got to the cabinets.

I need company! She pulled and tugged and reluctantly the first drawer slid open. The man inside, elderly, lined, haggard and half starved, blinked and looked up at her.

           

Is it time to get up?

           

If you want.

           

I do. It’s boring lying here like that. Nothing to look at.

           

I need the company.

           

The man sat up and pushed himself off the tray which had been holding him. 

           

That’s a good idea. Let’s find some more people.

           

With two of them tugging at the handles, the drawers came open a good deal easier. The young girl, anorexic and pathetic, clawed at their arms as they lifted her up. Look at me, look at me, aren’t I elegant and slim and beautiful?

           

The truthful answer was no, but they did not say it. You are, you are! She beamed and spun round, her flimsy hospital gown billowing around her. I can dance!

           

We all can but right now we want company!

           

Lydia pulled at another drawer with the help of the old man and the anorexic. A dark handsome youth smiled shockingly white teeth as he sat up. Thank you! I thought I would be stuck in there forever! One easy movement and he got up too, swaying to an unheard rhythm. Is it time to dance?

           

Let’s get everyone out first. Lydia was in charge and didn’t know how she had become in charge, it had just – happened. She liked it though, she had never been in charge of anything.  Always the underdog, always the low paid worker following orders. Now she was issuing orders and these people were obeying her. It was a miracle and she was not about to let go of the good feelings it was generating.

           

I’m naked! The shock ran through her but no one had said anything, no one had ogled her, no one had touched her. Maybe, but it isn’t right! She went back to the gurney and took up the sheet lying there, wrapped it around her body and tucked the end in securely under one arm.  That felt better.

           

Oh, elegant, the old man observed, without a trace of sarcasm. You wear it well, dear lady. Swan-like, I would say. What’s your name?

           

Lydia.

           

Now if I remember my Greek mythology, there was a swan who went to Leda, which is close enough to your name, dear lady. I want to change that, you are a swan, wrapped in white as you are, as elegant as you are and as thoughtful as you are. Let us call you Leda instead of Lydia. It sounds so much more romantic.

           

Leda. Lydia. She turned the names over in her mind. Leda will do fine, she said eventually, with a big smile. Thank you. No one has ever said anything that nice to me in my whole life.

           

Well, they should have done. I mean, there you are, you had every chance to walk right out the door and leave, instead you opened drawers and let us out.

           

Well, it was because I wanted company, she confessed, rather than take credit for something that was not right.

           

He shook his head. Maybe, maybe, but you had your chance and you chose to stay. Now, let’s get everyone else out, shall we?

           

Combined effort, they all worked at it, opening the drawers, releasing a white cheeked old lady with sharply knowing eyes and a loving smile, a middle aged man still looking for his pens and papers, the reason for his existence, the little girl who had collided with a bus or a bus had collided with her, either way she was not pretty any more but no one said a word, they took her hands and they all danced round the dissecting table and laughed a great hollow laugh that no one else could hear but them.

           

The dark man told them jokes at which they all roared with laughter, the old lady told them of her children which brought tears to their eyes, the old man spoke of sunny days on a river bank fishing with grandchildren and some of them grew nostalgic. Then they danced again to refresh their senses and their spirits and their energies and told one another this was the best night they had ever had in their entire existence.

           

Dawn touched the sky with pink fingers. One by one, without saying a word why they were doing it, they climbed back into their drawers and one by one Leda, still in her white robe which made her look like a swan, closed the drawers with a supreme effort.

           

When they were all sleeping again, she gracefully danced a solitary dance around the room, remembering the feel of rhythm making the feet move, the thrill of a tune running through the head, the sway of arms and hands.  Then she grew tired, it had been a long night and an exhausting one, but oh what fun she had experienced!

           

She climbed back onto the gurney, laid the sheet out and stared up at the ceiling, remembering how it felt to dance.

           

Just before she fell asleep, she wondered what the mortuary attendant would think when he found her tag on the floor.

          

BIO: Dorothy Davies lives and works on the Isle of Wight.  It is reputed to be the most haunted place in the UK, which could account for the strange stories she writes and the fact she became a medium after she moved there ...

Autumn Leaves

"Autumn Leaves" - Dorothy Davies

Ellie studied the pattern made by the golden leaves which had drifted from the multitude of twigs and branches on the ancient horse chestnut trees. Every year Nature created a carpet to walk on, every year the pattern was completely different.  Yet no one seemed to notice, no one seemed to appreciate the talent, the artistic flair shown by the different designs.

Autumn leaves.  In Autumn everyone leaves.  She shivered suddenly as a cold breeze played with her hair and tinged her cheeks with colour.  Everyone leaves. In Autumn her father had left, walked out of the door to go to work and never came back.  Left them bemused and concerned, then afraid and finally desperately lonely.  No police ever came to report a body; no visitor mentioned his not being there.  It was as if he had never been.  Like Autumn leaves, he had come and gone and few had mourned his passing.  Ellie remembered the aching loneliness more than the sorrow, if she had experienced that emotion at all.

Her brother had left in the Autumn, with back pack of books, writing pads, pens, pencils, all the paraphernalia imaginable to study.  Virtually no clothes, she recalled, only books and writing things.  She had commented on it at the time and had nothing in return but raised eyebrows and a look which said ‘don’t be stupid.’ So she didn’t.  She let him walk away to University without so much as a hug or a kiss on the cheek or a wish for his future.  She had not been on his wavelength at any time during their joint lives, a goodbye would not have made any difference to the way she felt.

They were two then, two people in a house made and furnished for four.  Two people who managed to avoid speaking about the things which mattered, the way they felt, the loneliness they endured, the hollow holes in their lives, but instead spoke of late mail delivery, the quality of the food in the local supermarket, the fact that next door were playing their music loud again, even though they had complained.  Several times, in fact.  Trivial talk.  Light talk.  As light, as ephemeral as the Autumn leaves which fell, rotted, became one with the earth and enriched it.  Their talk would not enrich anything, it added nothing to their lives, to their understanding of life and how to live it, their need to overcome their inhibitions and talk of pain and hurt and suffering and emptiness.

Autumn was an aching time of sadness, melancholia, withdrawal, the windows full of Halloween trivia, as trivial as the talk which sometimes passed for companionship.  Autumn was a time of sharp frosts, of rich scents of bonfires, of fruit, the true Harvest Home, the season of richness and of ending.  Autumn was a time of dying.

Her mother had died in the Autumn.  One day she had sat down in a chair, complained of not feeling well, touched her head theatrically as if in a silent movie melodrama – and stopped breathing.  Ellie had, for the longest time, done nothing.  She had watched the life empty out of a body and depart and she stood and did nothing.  Did not dare to touch the hand, the arm, the shoulder or the face for fear of drawing the life back, for she knew, without being told, that the life had wanted to go, that since her father had walked out of the door and not returned, life had become as melancholy as the season itself, but lasted all year.  Only when she grew stiff and her legs ached with standing did she move to the telephone and dial the local surgery, repeating the information to the bored hassled impatient receptionist.  Yes, she would wait for the doctor to come.  Yes, she would wait for a call.  No, it was not a problem.

Only then did she sit down, tucking her feet under the chair, hands in her lap and stared at the person she had called mother but for whom she had no affection whatsoever. Somehow that had dried up, fallen from the branch of family life that was her, drifted to the ground and become compost which, sadly, had produced nothing. At least the Autumn leaves produced fungi and new shoots for wild creatures to sustain themselves.  Ellie felt she had been unsustained for many years.

When the men came and took the body away, leaving her with nothing but memories, Ellie blinked a few times, looked around the room and began to catalogue in her mind that which she would keep and that which had to go.  There was much to do, so much to do, but she did nothing but look around the room and make her decisions.  That would go to the charity shop, that would go to the antique dealer, that would go—

Ellie walked on in the glorious Autumn sunshine, aware of the colours, aware of the brightness of the day, watching other people enjoying the weather, envying the thickness of their padded coats, their boots, their hats and scarves and gloves. Such things she had once and had no longer but the memory of their warmth, their comfort, their sheer – pleasantness, had stayed with her. It was a day for walking and many were doing just that.  No one glanced at her as she passed them, absorbed in their own lives, their own words, their own memories.

Ah, that word.  Memories.  They came with the ability to cut, to hurt, to heal, to please, to fill the heart with joy.  There were few of the latter and many of the former.  Why was life like that, why was it so hard to find the good in life and so easy to remember the bad?  Surely the golden days should stand out, days like today, when the weather was perfect and the carpet freshly laid for all to see and admire?

Everything has to end.  Everything has an end.  Ellie had reached the end.

She walked and the Autumn leaves were not disturbed by her passing over them.

BIO: Dorothy Davies, writer, editor, medium, lives on the Isle of Wight (Isle of Spirits) where she writes her strange stories and channels books direct from spirit authors.