THE OLD BOOK OF SPELLS (Part 2 & Last)

 THE OLD BOOK OF SPELLS (Part 2 & Last) 

By Richard Banks  

At 2 pm I set out and by evening I’m crossing the Tamar Bridge into Cornwall. The campsite’s near Bodmin, but it’s not open until the morning, so I pull up in a lay-by on the A38 and spend the night there. Come morning I buy a tent in Liskeard and drive the rest of the way to the campsite. It’s in a field, next to an old manor house where the local toffs live. Buy a ticket at the gate and join the early arrivals at a fast food van that’s serving breakfast.

Nothing to do now but put up the tent and suss out the new arrivals. There’s a girl called Lorinda in the next tent who’s came with her best friend, Trish, and Trish’s boyfriend. She’s not best pleased with the arrangement and spends most of her time outside the tent, while Trish and boyfriend cavort energetically inside. 

When it starts raining I invite her in for a coffee. Ask her what she knows about The Anointed Order, but she’s never heard of it. Says she’s only come for the drugs and the chance to get her kit off during the maypole dancing, or whatever it is they do here. She says the organisers of the other events she’s been to are always on the look out for handmaidens and they get given the most incredible psychedelic drugs that you can’t get anywhere else - at least not in the club she goes to. She asks if I’ve got any drugs. I say no, but when the festival drug dealer turns up I buy a few spiffs, and arrange to meet Lorinda in the evening. 

Meanwhile, the site is filling-up with people and tents, but no one resembling the collector is among them. People are also arriving at the house, mainly in expensive cars. According to a guy who’s been here before they are the High Priests, who only come down to the site for special events. No one knows who they are because they keep their faces covered and have made up names like Incubus and Belias. As well as the usual guys on security they also have their own minders, and no one who hasn’t been invited gets inside the house. 

This isn’t good news. If the collector is a priest or a minder getting near him is going to be one big problem. But maybe he isn’t, so I spend the rest of the day by the way in, watching the latest arrivals. Come evening I still haven’t seen him and when Security close the gates for the night I go back to the tent. It’s not long before Lorinda joins me and we start chatting about all the things she’s been doing since we last met; the main news being that this guy from the house has asked her to be a handmaiden for a big ceremony they’re having there at midnight. 

It’s too good a chance to miss, so I tell her about the murder I didn’t do and how I need to get inside the house to see if the collector’s there. She thinks all this is terribly exciting and can’t wait to help me, especially if I let her have one of the spiffs I bought. Two spiffs later and we’ve hit on this plan, where she lets me in through this window on the first floor. I don’t know what I’m going to do once I’m inside, but if this pans out anything like the last film I saw I will not only prove my innocence but get back the book as well. 

The first part of the plan goes like clockwork. Lorinda goes into the house and ten minutes later she’s opening the window so I can climb in from this tree outside. The ceremony’s taking place in a courtyard in the centre of the house and I can see it all from another window on the first floor. Any hope I have of spotting the collector, however, is dead in the water; everyone, except for the handmaidens, is decked out like the Ku Klux Clan, in white robes that cover their faces. The handmaidens seem to be there mainly for decoration, but Lorinda has a starring role. She gets to lie on this marble table and writhe around, while the head priest anoints her from head to foot with linseed oil. Then he picks up a ceremonial sword and pretends to run her through with it, while she throws out her arms and does this cute little scream that’s probably not in the script. All this time the other priests are chanting ‘Comius, Comius, Prince of Darkness’ but he don’t come and after a while they give up and have a prayer instead. 

While all this is very interesting I’m no further forward than before. I get out of the same window I came in by and go back to the tent. Half an hour later Lorinda arrives back in her ceremonial robe, looking like she’s just drunk a brewery dry. Instead of the night of passion we were planning she falls down outside the tent and I have to haul her in. 

I figure it’s best to let her sleep it off, but midway through the night she has a dream in which she’s an oven ready chicken being chased across Bodmin Moor by a fox that sometimes turns into a fire breathing goat. Up she gets and races off, like she’s been shot out of a rocket. I go after her and when she trips over a power cable I grab her and, despite the fact that she’s as slippery as a bar of soap, drag her back to the tent. 

The disturbance, however, hasn’t escaped the notice of Security, and, by following the strong aroma of linseed oil, their man has no trouble in finding us. At first he’s going to throw us off the site but then we realise we know each other. It’s Ernie, who I shared a cell with for six months. I pump him for information about who's staying in the house, but he doesn’t have their names. All he knows is that their car numbers are cross referenced to their room numbers. But, as he says, if I can find out which room my man is staying in I can use the car number to hack into the DVLA’s internet site. I bung him twenty quid for his trouble and he says for another twenty he can let me have a ceremonial robe for wearing inside the house. I agree, and when everyone on site are back sleeping, he brings it along to the tent. 

In the morning, just before brunch, Lorinda wakes up, and I tell her what’s happened and that we have to get back in the house as soon as possible. She says that’s no problem because there’s another ceremony in the evening, after which the Order are having a slap up dinner. The significance of the dinner is that they have to take off their hoods to eat it, so I will be able to ID the Collector and follow him back to his room. What’s more, the priest who was rubbing her down with oil was also reciting stuff from a book that could be the one that belonged to uncle George.

At last everything’s going my way and I can’t wait for the off. But wait I have to because the ceremony doesn’t start until 8 pm. Lorinda’s got the same job as before, except that she’s been told to cut out the ad-libs. Anyway, she goes into the house about 7:30 and I follow her in, ten minutes later, dressed up in the ceremonial robe that Ernie flogged me. 

The sun is setting and when it’s nearly dark the ceremony begins. It’s the same old business as the night before, but this time there’s a thunder storm rumbling overhead. If ever the Order is going to conjure up the Dark Prince this is the night, except that when they get to the Comius, Comius bit a bolt of lightening comes down, strikes one of the minders and fuses all the lights. Needless to say this causes quite a stir, but once the lights come back on and the priests work out that the minder is still the minder and not the Prince, they all troop off to dinner, except the minder, who’s carted off to hospital. 

Sure enough, once everyone’s in the dining hall, the priests take off their hoods and park them on the floor under their seats. At first I don’t see the Collector, or anyone like him. Then he looks round at a waiter and I spot him. All I got to do is sit tight until the dinner’s finished and follow him back to his room. It should be a doddle, but it ain’t. After the cheese and biscuits, the Head Priest says something in Latin and everyone gets up and puts their hoods back on.

Keeping my eyes on the Collector is worse than the three card trick. Far worse! There must be at least fifty guys in robes and they’re all on their feet, going every which way. I’m trying hard not to take my eyes off him, but the hood I’m wearing isn’t helping because the eye holes are too far apart. However, once he’s out of the dining hall there’s less people, and by the time I follow him up three flights of stairs he’s on his own. Half way along a corridor he stops and gets out the key to his room, but, like me, he’s having trouble seeing, so he takes off his hood. Whoever this guy is he ain’t the collector. As if things can’t get any worse he susses out that I’ve been following him and asks me what my priestly name is. 

The game’s up, so I do a runner back down the corridor, hoping I can make it to the ground floor and duck out, through the back door, with the hired help. By the time I make the stairs, the security alarm is ringing, and the word is out that there’s an unwelcome visitor in the house. If the heavies get me I’m toast - the collector may not be the only one who wants me dead. Down below, two minders are running up the stairs towards me. There’s no way I’m going to get past them, so it’s right turn at the next landing, and along a corridor on the first floor. In addition to the guys behind, there’s another one running towards me. I put my head down and crash into him. He hits the floor but I’m still going. Ten yards on I see the window through which I came the previous night and climb out onto the tree. It’s dark and I can hardly see the ground, but the minders are almost at the window, so I take a chance and jump. I think I’m going to break an ankle but the ground’s soft and although I take a tumble there’s no damage done.

I need to disappear into the night but the robe I’m wearing is almost glowing, so I stop behind a bush and tear it off. My lungs are bursting, but stopping ain't an option, so I run hard towards the camp site. I’m nearly there when someone comes straight at me and shines a torch in my face. I zig-zag round him, nearly collide with a tree, and tumble down an embankment that slopes down to the camp site. By now I can hear dogs barking and they don’t sound like they’re going to lick my face. As they can run faster than me, I'm guessing it won't be long before they catch up. 

I’m in a panic. If I have a guardian angel this is the time for it to come to my rescue. Then it appears, except that it’s not an angel, it’s Lorinda. She’s packed a bag with all the money we’re got and on the assumption that a speedy exit is the order of the day, is haring off towards a hole in the perimeter fence that she nearly fell through the previous night. I follow on and we scramble through it and onto an unlit road that’s darker than the average coal cellar. We start running again but there’s no need. The dogs haven’t left the campsite and if their pitiful whimpering is anything to go by they’re not liking the pungent smell of linseed oil still wafting from our tent. We slow down, get our bearings and figure out our next move. 

What happens next is the arrival of the number ten bus to Plymouth. As get away vehicles go it’s not the fastest, but at ten pounds a head it’s definitely the cheapest. An hour later we’re in Plymouth and an hour after that we’re on an overnight coach to Poole. 

Why Poole? you’re thinking. The answer is logical, if not obvious. Lorinda knows a man there who owes another man a favour, and the last named man is Lorinda’s dad. What’s more, the man in Poole owns a yacht, and that’s our ticket out of the country, away from the Anointed Order, the police and everyone else that will do us down. And the good news doesn’t stop there, for Lorinda's old man owns a casino on the Costa del Sol, where he launders money for the same mob I used to work for. It’s a safe haven that might well have a need for my professional services.  

                                                            ********** 

So, it’s all ended well you’re thinking. Okay, so he didn’t prove his innocence to the police, get back uncle George’s book, or get even with the collector, but he’s met this really fun chick and now they’re going to get it together in a warm, sunny place that’s a distinct improvement on north London. While it’s better than a goalless draw at the Emirates I’m not sure how I should be feeling. Had it been down to Tom Cruise everything would have been sorted inside three hours, but real life ain’t like that. 

In real life there’s only so much a guy can do – sometimes, whatever you do ain’t enough - but a guy and a girl together, that’s different. Right from the start it felt different, the proof that it was came on the motorway, south of Exeter. That’s when Lorinda remembers she has something for me. She unzips her bag and rummages through it like she can’t find what she’s searching for, which is odd, because what finally comes out is nearly as big as the bag - it’s a book. I can’t believe what I’m seeing. “Is this the one you’re looking for?” she says, and sure enough it is. 

It turns out that when the lightning came down and the lights went out, my quick fingered little magician takes the book off the High Priest’s lectern and drops it down behind the table she’s lying on. It’s like taking candy from a baby. While everyone’s attention is focused on the stricken bouncer she gets off the table, slips the book into her bag, and as the Anointed Order go off to dinner she exits the house with the other handmaidens.

What happens after that you already know, so I guess this really is the end of the story. Lorinda says that it has more ups and downs than the Himalayas and that if I don’t finish it now while we’re on an up I will only have myself to blame. I take her point. What happens next I don’t know, but it’s a new start, a new story. The old one's over; there’s only one thing left to say - The End.

 

Copyright Richard Banks

THE OLD BOOK OF SPELLS (Part 1 of 2)

 THE OLD BOOK OF SPELLS (Part 1 of 2) 

By Richard Banks

When I first heard the news about uncle George I was sad. Not that I was ever close to the old boy, only met him three or four times, but he was family, Dad’s brother, the last of his generation. Then I got the letter from his solicitor and I felt a whole lot better. Turns out I was his nearest living relative and sole beneficiary. Thought I had won the lottery without buying a ticket. How big the jackpot was I didn’t know, but as Uncle George lived in a three storey house on the Caledonian Road I figured it was the nearest thing to a fortune I would ever see. 

After three years in Pentonville, and one on the dole, my lucky star was shining like never before. Then the clouds started rolling in and not even the sun was getting through. Should have known it was too good to be true. Uncle George hadn’t left me the house, it wasn’t his to leave; he only lived on the ground floor and that was rented. All I had was the stuff inside it and a bill for last month’s rent. Decided that the best thing to do was clear the flat before another month's rent was due and sell anything likely to fetch a price. With a bit of luck I could pay off his debts and still make a few quid. 

Wasn’t thinking that for long. One look around his pad was enough to tell me that there was better stuff on the local tip. Even then I thought there might be some money hidden away. Old people do that, especially when they don’t have bank accounts - whole wads of notes at the back of drawers or on top of cupboards. That’s when I found the shilling piece, and an old book of spells. At least I think that’s what it was. The old time writing didn’t make much sense, but the pictures were clear enough. It wasn’t no bible book, that’s for sure. 

I remember Mum saying that uncle George had a dark side, now I knew what it was. In the same cupboard I found his ceremonial robe and a certificate saying that he was member one hundred and thirty four of the Anointed Order of Gehenna. It didn’t seem right to take them down to the tip where they might get noticed, so I burned them in the back garden. Almost burned the book too, then thought better of it. Why not take it to that second hand bookshop in Camden Town, I thought; anything that old must surely be worth a fiver, so that’s what I did. 

As soon as I walk through the door I know I'm in the right place. This isn’t any old book shop, it's the Psychic Antiquarian Resource Gallery; the resource being books and magazines on every weird notion and religion that’s ever been invented. The guy behind the counter looks surprisingly sane. If he has a ceremonial robe at least he isn't wearing it. In fact he's better turned out than uncle George’s solicitor. What’s more he’s a real charmer. This is a man who can really close a deal, a born salesman, but I'm not buying, and at first neither is he.

He takes one look at the split in the binding and almost pushes the book back at me across the counter. Then something gets his attention and he opens it up. The guy would make a good poker player, but for a split second he lets down his guard and I can see he’s interested, really interested. Then he’s back to his poker face, sighs, says what a pity it isn’t in better condition, points out a creased page and a dark stain on another. Sighs again. I’m thinking that he’s going to offer me a fiver when it’s worth a pony or maybe fifty quid. Instead, he quotes me the full fifty. So how much is it really worth? I don’t trust him, so I say I’m not sure, that I think it might be worth more. He shakes his head, almost winces as he finds another stain in the margin of a picture; then his attention switches to the picture itself. It’s Old Nick himself, eyes glowing like they’re going to jump off the page. The guy can’t help himself, he’s almost drawling. Ups his offer to eighty quid, but by now he knows I’m on to him, that I’m going to say no and move on to other book shops.

When I do say no, he shrugs his shoulders like he’s none too bothered, but he knows a private collector who might pay more. If I leave my card maybe he will get in touch. I don’t have a card, so I write down my address and telephone number on a piece of paper he gives me. He smiles, wishes me luck and we say goodbye.

It’s 4:30, too late to find another book shop, so I head home. Figure if this book is as hot as I think it is then the collector will be on the phone before morning. I’m not disappointed, except that it’s not the telephone that rings, it’s the door bell. I open up to find this guy on the doorstep. His name is Mackenzie. He says he’s come about the book. I invite him in. This is dangerous, but he looks okay so I take a chance. It’s a chance too many. 

Not sure when he hit me, probably the first time I turned my back on him. All I know is that when I come round I’m lying on the parlour floor, staring up at Mrs B from the next door flat. Turns out that when I hit the deck, the old dear hears the bang and starts hammering on the wall like she does when she wants me to turn down the radio. Except that this time I don’t shout back, so she comes out her front door and finds mine open. 

Luckily for her, my visitor has grabbed what he came for and legged it out of the building. She wants to call the police, but the police and me don’t get along, so I say I’ll do it when I know what’s missing. What’s missing, of course, is the book, nothing else, just the book, and now I’m certain it’s worth serious money. I want it back and my devious little friend in the bookshop is just the man to help me find it. 

Next morning I’m there bright and early, half expecting the shop to be shut, but the sign in the window says ‘Open’, so I go in. It’s quiet, even quieter than a bookshop ought to be. Right away I’m smelling trouble and it ain’t long in coming. The door into the office is open and there’s books and magazines all over the floor. I ring the bell on the counter and, when no one comes out, I go in. 

At first I don’t see him, then I look behind his desk and there he is, flat out, with his head bashed in. He’s not breathing, and, unless his name is Lazarus, he won’t be getting up again. Cut and run, I’m thinking. You’re an ex-con with form for GBH. If the police find you here they won’t be looking for anyone else. Then I see this poster in his hand. It’s like he’s trying to give it to me; it’s stupid, but it makes sense. He’s holding the poster because it’s important, because it has something to do with the man who killed him - the same man who, but for Mrs B, would have done the same to me. This is all about the book and if I want to see it again the poster is my only chance. I take it from him and go back into the shop. There’s nobody there, or in the street outside. I slip out of the front door and walk back to my car several streets away. I mustn’t do anything to attract attention, and I don’t. 

By the time I get back home I’m thinking that the book is the least of my problems. I might have got out of the shop without anyone seeing me but my fingerprints are all over the counter and maybe some in the office. It won’t be long before the police find them and make the match with the ones I gave them four years ago. It’s not enough for a conviction, but if I’ve also been seen on CCTV then I’m definitely in the shit. What’s more the poster I took from the book guy also connects me to the shop and who’s to say his DNA isn’t all over it. Whatever else I do today, I need to burn it before the police find it. 

I take it out of my jacket pocket and go into the kitchen, intending to incinerate it in a saucepan. Then I think, no, slow down, if the book guy thought this important then it’s important enough to read. So I do. It’s about some sort of hippy gathering that’s taking place in Cornwall, 'The Festival of Gehenna and the Awakening Lights'.

Straightaway my mind goes back to Uncle George and the Anointed Order of Gehenna. Are they connected, I’m thinking, and sure enough they are; in the small print there’s an address, the same one that was on uncle George’s certificate. My mind’s working overtime and everything’s making sense. By holding on to the poster, the book guy was saying that his killer and the festival are connected, ‘go to the festival and there you will find him, book and all.’

And do I want to go? You bet I do. This guy is my get out of jail card. If I can find him, get his name and address, I might just be able to convince the police that it’s him, not me they should be looking for. But that’s a conversation for another day. Right now I’m wanting to avoid the police, and a festival campsite, in the middle of nowhere, seems like the perfect spot. 

There’s no time to lose. I change the plates on my car and get money from the bank. I also need a change of image. Appearances are important and I don’t want to be recognised, so I shave my head, wear a new age shirt I should have thrown out years ago and put on a big pair of shades. 

 (To be Continued)

Copyright Richard Banks

Franks Tyres

 Franks Tyres 

By Barbara Thomas 

7.30am The day has started well

8.00am had breakfast said my goodbye's then went to my car.

8.10am Driving off to work, roads clear for a change.

8.55am Driving steady down the road, traffic building up.

9.00am going towards Blackwall tunnel traffic has eased with a bit of luck I should be at my meeting in good time.

9.05am Suddenly there was something wrong as I was getting nearer the tunnel the steering wasn't right luckily there was a layby.

9.10am I got out of the car traffic whizzing past not to sure what the problem was, I walked round the car problem solved two tyres had burst.

9.20am I phoned the breakdown who said due to traffic they couldn't come for at least an hour thats when I was thankful my wife and children were not in the car, that's when it would become a priority. 

9.30am the sky opened up then there was an almighty flash. The rain became a deluge and there was I stranded! So I pulled up my coat collar and sat in the car at a loss.

9.45am the rain stopped, I was soaked through. I checked my watch thinking it must be time for the breakdown lorry to finally arrive. I pulled my mobile out.

9.50am  I phoned the building where my meeting was and spoke to receptionist explain I could be a little late  as I was having trouble with my car she said she would pass on the message and I thanked her hoping as I put my mobile away then low and behold the breakdown lorry arrived. 

10.00am I put my hands together looked up to the sky and thanked God.

10.10am the driver got out of the cab and we exchanged pleasantries, then he had a look at the problem.

10.15am The mans name was Dave. He scratched his head and said he was sorry but he didn't have that size tyre so unfortunately he couldn't help but he was willing to phone up for another breakdown lorry that would have the right equipment. Words failed me Dave apologised again before he set off into the heavy traffic.

10.35am once again I was stranded and the day has started so we'll.

10.50am I looked down the road and at last I saw the flashing lights of the second breakdown lorry the driver pulls in, gets out of the lorry.

“Hello mate my name is Frank. Now let me see what the trouble is.” after checking all my tyres he walked back to the lorry and, pulled out 2 tyres. Within 20 mins, the job was done.

I shook his hand and thanked him.

"That's alright mate only to pleased to be of service."

11.20am I sat in the car, turned the key. Watched the traffic, waiting for an opening then creped out into the flow.

11.30am I reached the tunnel now at least 2 hours late for my meeting I could only hope the people were still there, quietly thanking our lord for Frank. And his efficient tyre change.  

Driving along I wondered what the rest of the day would throw at me. Oh it had started so well 10 minutes to the meeting I must look a sight still soaked through, what a way to go to an important meeting. 

I arrive, I park the car rush into the toilet wash my face check my suit put my hands through my hair this is it I have arrived.  I went up to the receptionist and asked if she could tell me what room my meeting was being held in?  She looked up her appointment book asked me my name and after 5 minutes said she was very sorry but my meeting was tomorrow. 

Yes you guessed it I was a day early I walked out of the building got into my car and thought to myself that really takes the ticket let's hope tomorrow will be better. 

When I finally got home I checked all my tyres as I had been advised by Frank.  I couldn't go through that again.

Copyright Barbara Thomas

 

Riddles 24

 Riddles 24

 

By the Riddler

 

The Riddler has more puzzles for us today:

 

No 1.  1326 5210 4208 416?  (what is the missing No?)

 

No 2. Surveyed/Merchandise/Diagnoses/Vermouth

 

Which of the following belongs to the above group?

 

Cheery ~ Precocious ~ Charming ~ Heathens ?

 

 

 

Keep em coming Riddler

 

Life

 Life

By Len Morgan

  Life is all around us and, beneath each patch of ground we step on.  Insects butterflies moths and bugs inhabit the earth, air, and sky. 

Molds mosses grass and trees are inhabited by life.  Every time you place a foot on the ground you cover a microcosm of life far outnumbering the human inhabitants of the earth. 

Each breath you take contains more microbial life than there are grains of sand on South End beach.  

A disinfectant that kills 99 per cent of all known germs when used on your hands will leave more germs, outnumbering the population of the UK, and what of all the unknown germs?  We also have to realise that they were here first! 

We have always thrived living side by side with them.  The children we seek to protect from them are fast losing their natural immunity.  Asthma and other common allergies were rare when I was a child.  We played in the streets, amongst the dirt.  We swam in the local duck pond, climbed trees, picked mushrooms.  Accidentally dropping a jam sandwich on the floor, we blew off the dirt and ate it.

There were no sell-by dates on the produce we bought; yet we survived! 

The human body is host to trillions of inhabitants, ‘plant & animal’ alike; without them we’d be extremely ill.  They live inside our gut, helping us breaking down the food we eat killing off harmful germs that gain entry to our body. They coexist, and we live in harmony!

If we eradicate all the insects and micro-organisms (our allies), the world would be six feet deep in excrement.  Other living things are mostly our friends, and not to be eradicated! 

Everything dies, naturally, it is the order of things.  Death is a blessed release from pain anguish & confusion, it is a gift from Gaia.  Not to be spurned or feared, rather to be embraced as your reward for a life well lived…

Copyright Len Morgan

Shahai

 

 Shahai - Brandy hole, taken from SWF side of the river.

The pond surrounded Wollemi pines at Markshall estate in Coggleshall. (a species from when dinosaurs roamed the earth). The estate holds the biggest collection of these pines outside of their native Australia. 

 

 

By Robert Kingston

Cheap Lives

 Cheap Lives

By Jane Goodhew

If you are reading this then you have either purchased or picked up a copy of the magazine which contains the sort of stories that you would expect to find in an X rated movie or cheap novel but never to have been written by yourself.

Yet, this is my story; it may sound familiar to some of you who are reading this in the hope of finding inspiration and I do not mean to write for a group that you are in but the motivation to move out of the situation.  The one that so far you have not had the power to leave or anywhere to go that you will not be found and returned to the hell you were living in and continue to live and will do until you decide enough is enough.

There will be others of you who have such boring, mundane lives that this is how you get your cheap adrenaline rush, reading other people’s sordid, sad lives of sex, depravity, violence or even murder. You may think that this could never happen to your or any member of your family, but it can and does even to those who you think are in a happy and stable relationship they too can have their secrets.

Those who have high-powered and highly paid jobs, they are not exempt they can just disguise it more by sending you to a health spa until you have recovered or if really serious to a plastic surgeon to fix that broken nose or displaced jaw or to remove the scars from your wrists where you tried to kill yourself or just to replace one pain with another.

I can almost feel you cringe and blush as you realise, I am talking about you, and you wonder how many more are sitting at home thinking ‘Oh my god that is me! Yet you do not like to see yourself as a pathetic victim, so you allow such demeaning, despicable behaviour to continue and you continue to make excuse after excuse.

So, what do you intend to do? Continue reading in the hope I will save you from this hell by giving you permission or the method to leave. There is no magic answer, no fairy wand to wave away your misery, no wishing will make it happen, it must come from you. You could stop now and go upstairs and pack a bag, get your passport and any small treasured items you can carry and just leave but no you continue to sit there and imagine it will all go away so make more excuses such as it is coming up for Christmas and you don’t have relatives to take you in, you are not yet at the stage of desperation where a doorstep is preferable to being in your comfortable home so you continue to sit and sip your tea and read on until it is time to pick the children up from school. 

For others of you the children are all grown and moved on and have jobs and family of their own. They no longer bother to visit very often as their lives are too busy and anyway, Australia, the USA and any other far flung country is about as far from you and your situation that they could go as they knew no matter what they said you would not leave.   You had dedicated your life to being a martyr as you believed in the sanctimony of marriage and the vows you had taken. Harsh you may think, who is this person to say such things. But are your vows the real reason you stay?

Well, I cannot share my sordid pathetic life with you so pick up the phone and ask for help, find that refuge, I don’t say women’s because there are many men out there who are physically and mentally abused by the woman in their lives but are too ashamed to admit it.  They consider it a failure, that it would not be manly to admit that a woman hit them, or ridiculed them until they lacked self-esteem and believed that no one else would want them or love them as she did when she was not tormenting or goading or proving he was not a man as he cowered in the doorway as she moved towards him with that smile that meant she was about to strike.

The night before I had been prepared to leave, he came home struck for the final time. The police are here now and are about to take his body away. I had just the strength to type this concluding chapter and press send to wish you all a Merry Christmas and may your New Year be without fear, filled with love, health, and happiness even if it means alone. I am going to be at peace for the first time in years, for an eternity because they will find a second body and it is mine.

Copyright Jane Goodhew