Blueeyedboy

1

You are viewing the webjournal of blueeyedboy posting on:

badguysrock@webjournal.com

Posted at: 01.39 on Friday, February 22

Status: public

Mood: nasty

Listening to: Gloria Gaynor: ‘I Will Survive’

She has changed her name a number of times, but folk still call her Gloria Green. Names are like tags on a suitcase, she thinks, or maps to show people where you’ve been, and where you think you’re going. She has never been anywhere. Just round and round this neighbourhood, like a dog chasing its tail, running blindly back to herself to start the whole charade again.

But names are such portentous things. Words have so much power. The way they roll like sweets in the mouth; the hidden meanings inside each one. She has always been good at crosswords, at acronyms and wordplay. It’s a talent she has passed on to her sons, though only one of them knows it. And she has an immense respect for books; although she never reads fiction, preferring to leave that kind of thing to her middle son, who, despite his stammer, is brighter than she’ll ever be — too bright, perhaps, for his own good.

His own name, in Anglo-Saxon, means The Flaming One — and though she is terribly proud of him, she also knows he’s dangerous. There’s something inside him that doesn’t respond; that refuses to see the world as it is. Mrs Brannigan, the schoolteacher at Abbey Road, says he will grow out of it, and tacitly implies that if Gloria attended church on Sundays, then maybe her son would be less troublesome. But as far as blueeyedboy’s Ma is concerned, Mrs Brannigan is full of shit. The last thing blueeyedboy needs, she thinks, is another helping of fantasy.

She suddenly wonders what things would have been like if Peter Winter hadn’t died. Would it have made a difference for blueeyedboy and his brothers to have had some fatherly influence in their unruly lives? All those football matches they missed, the games of cricket in the park, the Airfix models, the toy trains, the fry-ups in the mornings?

But there’s no use crying over spilt milk. Peter was a parasite, a fat and lazy freeloader good for nothing but spending Gloria’s money. The best he could do was die on her, and even then, he’d needed some help. But no one walks out on Gloria Green; and surprisingly, the insurance paid up; and it turned out so easy, after all — just a pinch on a tube between finger and thumb as Peter lay in hospital —

She wonders now if that was a mistake. Blueeyedboy needed a father. Someone to sort him out. To teach him a sense of discipline. But Peter couldn’t have coped with three boys, let alone such a gifted one. His successor, Mr Blue Eyes, was never even an option. And Patrick White — who, in all ways but one, would have made the perfect father — was, sadly, already spoken for; a gentle, artistic soul whose offence was a lapse of judgement.

Guilt made Patrick vulnerable. Blackmail made him generous. Through a judicious combination of both, he proved a good source of income for years. He found Ma a job; he helped them out; and Gloria never blamed him when, in the end, he let her go. No, she blamed his wife for that, with her candles and her china dolls, and when at last she saw her chance to serve Mrs White a backhanded turn, she told her the secret she’d kept for so long; setting in motion a chain of events that resulted in murder and suicide.

Butin spite of his parentage, blueeyedboy is different. Perhaps because he feels things more. Perhaps that’s why he daydreams so much. God knows, she has tried to protect him. To convince the world he is too dull to hurt. But blueeyedboy seeks out suffering like a pig rooting for truffles, and it’s all she can do to keep up with him, to correct his mistakes and clean up his mess.

She remembers a day at the seaside once, when all her boys were very young. Nigel is off somewhere on his own. Benjamin is four years old and blueeyedboy nearly seven. Both are eating ice cream, and blueeyedboy says that his doesn’t taste right, as if just watching his brother eat is enough to diminish the flavour.

Blueeyedboy is sensitive. She knows this only too well by now. A slap on another boy’s wrist makes him flinch; a crab in a bucket makes him cry. It’s like some kind of voodoo; and it brings out at the same time both her cruel and her compassionate side. How is he going to manage, she thinks, if he can’t cope with reality?

You have to remember it’s only pretend, she snaps, more harshly than she means to. He stares at her from round blue eyes as she holds his brother in her arms. At her feet the blue bucket is already beginning to stink.

‘Don’t play with that. It’s nasty,’ she says.

But blueeyedboy simply looks at her, wiping ice cream from his mouth. He knows dead things are nasty, but he still can’t seem to look away. She feels a stab of annoyance. He collected the damn things. What does he want her to do with them now?

‘You shouldn’t have caught those animals if you didn’t want them to die. Now you’ve upset your brother.’

In fact, little Ben is completely absorbed in finishing his ice cream, which makes her even more annoyed (although she knows it’s irrational), because he should have been the susceptible one — after all, he is the youngest. Blueeyedboy ought to be looking out for him instead of making a fuss, she thinks.

But blueeyedboy is a special case, pathologically sensitive; and in spite of her efforts to toughen him up, to teach him to look after himself, it never seems to work, somehow, and she always ends up looking after him.

Maureen thinks he is playing games. Typical middle child, she says in her supercilious tone. Jealous, sullen, attention-seeking. Even Eleanor thinks so; though Catherine White believes there’s more to him. Catherine likes to encourage him; which is why Gloria has stopped bringing blueeyedboy to work, substituting Benjamin, who plays so nicely with his toys and never seems to get in the way —

‘It wasn’t my fault,’ blueeyedboy says. ‘I didn’t know they were going to die.’

‘Everything dies, ‘Gloria snaps, and now his eyes are swollen with tears and he looks as if he is going to faint.

A part of her wants to comfort him, but knows that this is a dangerous indulgence. To give him attention at this stage is to encourage him in his weakness. Her sons all need to be strong, she thinks. How else will they take care of her?

‘Now get rid of that mess,’ she tells him, with a nod in the direction of the blue bucket. ‘Go put it back in the sea, or something.’

He shakes his head. ‘I d-don’t want to. It smells.’

‘You’d better. Or God help me, you’ll pay.’

Blueeyedboy looks at the bucket. Five hours in the sun have brought about a rapid fermentation in the contents. The fishy, salt-water vegetable smell has turned to a suffocating reek. It makes him gag. He begins to whimper helplessly.

‘Please, Ma—-’

‘Don’t give me that!’

At last, now, his brother is crying. A high, fretful, icy wail. Gloria turns on her hapless son. ‘Now look what you’ve done,’ she says. ‘As if I didn’t have enough to deal with already.’

She shoots out a hand to slap his face. She’s wearing cork-soled sandals. As she snakes forward to hit him again, she kicks over the blue bucket, spilling the contents over her foot.

To Gloria, this is the final straw. She dumps Benjamin on to the ground and grabs hold of blueeyedboy with both hands, the better to take care of business. He tries to escape, but Ma is too strong; Ma is all wire and cables, and she digs her fingers into his hair and forces him down inch by inch, pushing his face into the sand and into that terrible, yeasty mess of dead fish and fake coconut, and there’s ice cream melting over his wrist and dripping on to the brown sand, but he dare not let go of his ice cream, because if he does, she’ll kill him for sure, just as he killed those things on the beach, the crabs, the shrimp, the snail, and the baby flatfish with its mouth pulled down in a crescent, and he tries very hard not to breathe, but there’s sand in his mouth, and sand in his eyes, and he’s crying and puking and Ma screams: ‘Swallow it, you little shit, just like you swallowed your brother!’

Then, suddenly, it’s over. She stops. She wonders what has happened to her. Kids can drive you crazy, she knows, but what on earth was she thinking of?

‘Get up,’ she says to blueeyedboy.

He pushes himself up from the ground, still holding his melted ice-cream cone. His face is smeared with sand and muck. His nose is bleeding a little. He wipes it with his free hand; stares up at Ma with brimming eyes. She says: ‘Don’t be a baby. No one got killed. Now finish your fucking ice cream.’

Post comment:

Albertine: (post deleted).

blueeyedboy: I know. Most of the time, words fail me, too . . .

2

You are viewing the webjournal of Albertine.

Posted at: 01.45 on Friday, February 22

Status: restricted

Mood: uncertain

At last, a version of the truth. Why bother, at this stage in the game? He must know it’s too late to go back. Both of us have shown our hand. Is he trying to provoke me again? Or is this a plea for compassion?

For the last two days both of us have stayed indoors, suffering from the same imaginary bout of flu. Clair tells me by e-mail that Brendan hasn’t been to work. The Zebra, too, has been closed for two days. I didn’t want him coming here. Not before I was ready.

Tonight I came back for the last time. I couldn’t sleep in my own bed. My house is too exposed. So easy to start a fire there; to set up a gas leak; an accident. He wouldn’t even have to watch. The Zebra is more difficult, built as it is on the main road. Security cameras on the roof. Not that it matters any more. My car is loaded. My things are packed. I could set off immediately.

You thought I’d stay and fight him? I’m afraid I’m not a fighter. I’ve spent all my life running away, and it’s far too late to change that now. But it’s strange, to be leaving the Zebra. Strange and sad, after all this time. I’ll miss it; more than that, I’ll miss the person I was when I worked there. Even Nigel only half-understood the purpose of that persona; he thought the real Bethan was someone else.

The real Bethan? Don’t make me laugh. Inside the nest of Russian dolls, there’s nothing but painted faces. Still, it was a good place. A safe place, while it lasted. I park the car by the side of the church and walk along the deserted street. Most of the houses are dark now, like flowers closing for the night. But the neon sign of the Zebra shines out, spilling its petals of light on the snow; and it feels so good to be coming home, even for a little while —

There was a present waiting for me. An orchid in a pot, with a card that reads: To Albertine. He grows them himself; he told me so. Somehow that seems very like him.

I go inside. I log on at once. Sure enough, he’s still online.

I hope you like the orchid, he writes.

I wasn’t going to answer him. I’d promised myself I wouldn’t do that. But what harm could it do now, after all?

It’s beautiful, I type. It’s true. The flower is green and purple-throated, like a toxic species of bird. And the scent is like that of a hyacinth, but sweeter and more powdery.

Now he knows I’m here, of course. I expect that’s why he sent the orchid. But I know he can’t leave until his usual time of a quarter to five, not without alerting his Ma. Leave now, and she would ask questions, and blueeyedboy would do anything to avoid making Ma suspicious. That keeps me safe till four thirty at least. I can indulge myself awhile.

It’s a Zygopetalum ‘Brilliant Blue’. One of the fragrant varieties. Try not to kill it, won’t you? Oh, and what did you think of my fic, by the way?

I think you’re twisted, I type back.

He answers with an emoticon, a little yellow smiley face.

Why do you tell these stories? I ask.

Because I want you to understand. His voice is very clear in my mind, as clear as if he were in the room. There’s no going back from murder, Beth.

You should know, I rattle back.

That emoticon again. I suppose I ought to feel flattered, he says. But you know that’s only fiction. I could never have done those things, any more than I could have thrown that rock — my wrist still hurts, by the way. I guess I’m lucky it wasn’t my head —

What is he trying to make me believe? That it’s all coincidence? Eleanor, Dr Peacock, Nigel — all his enemies wiped from the board by nothing but a lucky chance?

Well, no, not quite, he answers. Someone was working on my behalf.

Who?

For a long time he does not reply. There’s nothing there but the little blue square of the cursor blinking patiently in the message box. I wonder if his connection has failed. I wonder if I should log on again. Then, just as I am preparing to sign out, a message arrives in my inbox.

You really don’t know who I mean?

I have no idea what you’re talking about.

Another of those silences. Then comes an automated message from the server — Someone has posted on badguysrock! — and a note which simply says:

Read this.

3

You are viewing the webjournal of blueeyedboy posting on:

badguysrock@webjournal.com

Posted at: 01.53 on Friday, February 22

Status: public

Mood: hungry

Listening to: The Zombies: ‘She’s Not There’

He calls her Miss Chameleon Blue. You can call her Albertine. Or Bethan. Or even Emily. Whatever you choose to name her, she has no colour of her own. Like the chameleon, she adapts to suit the situation. And she wants to be all things to all men — saviour, lover, nemesis. She gives them what she thinks they want. She gives them what she thinks they need. She likes to cook, and in this way she feeds her need to nurture. She can recognize all of their favourites: knows when to add or hold the cream; senses their cravings almost before they themselves are aware of them.

It is of course for this very reason that blueeyedboy avoids her. Blueeyedboy used to be fat, and though that was twenty years ago, he knows how easily he could go back to the boy he used to be. Chameleon knows him too well. His fears, his dreams, his appetites. And he knows that certain cravings were never meant to be satisfied. To look at them directly would be to risk the most terrible consequences. So he uses a series of mirrors, like Perseus with the Gorgon. And, safe behind the darkened glass, he watches, waits, and bides his time.

Some people are born to watch, he knows.

Some people are mirrors, born to reflect.

Some people are weapons, trained to kill.

Does the mirror choose what to reflect? Does the weapon select the victim? Chameleon doesn’t know about that. She never had any ideas of her own, not even when she was a child. Let’s face it, she barely has memories. She has no idea of who she is, and she changes her role from day to day. But she’s trying to make an impression, he knows. She wants to leave her mark on him.

Impress. Impression. Impressionist. What interesting words. To provoke admiration; to make a statement; to leave an indentation. One who pretends to be someone else. One who paints a picture using only little dabs of light. One who creates an illusion — with smoke and mirrors, with portents and dreams.

Yes, dreams. That’s where it all begins. In dreams, in fic, in fantasy. And blueeyedboy’s business is fantasy; his territory, cyberspace. A place for all seasons, all seasonings; a place for all flavours of desire. Desire creates its own universe; or at least it does here, on badguysrock. The name is nicely equivocal — is it an island on to which penitents are cast away, or is it a haven for villains worldwide, in which to indulge our perversions?

Everyone here has something to hide. For one, it is his helplessness, his cowardice, his fear of the world. For another, an upright citizen with a responsible job, a lovely home and a husband as bland as low-fat spread, it’s a secret craving for dark meat: for the troubled, the wicked, the dangerous. For a third, who yearns to be thin, it’s the fact that her weight is just a kind of excuse; a blubbery blanket against a world she knows will eat her otherwise. For a fourth, it’s the girl he killed the day he crashed his motorbike: eight years old, on her way to school, crossing on a blind bend. And along he comes at fifty an hour, still tanked up from last night, and when he skids and hits the wall he thinks: That’s it, game over, dude. Except that the game keeps on going, and just at the moment he feels his spine give way like a piece of string, he notices a single shoe lying on its side in the road and wonders vaguely who the hell would leave a perfectly good shoe in the gutter like that, and then he sees the rest of her, and twenty years later, that’s all he can see; and the dreams still come with such clarity, and he hates himself, and he hates the world, but most of all what he really hates is their terrible, fucking sympathy —

And what about blueeyedboy? Well, like the rest of the tribe, of course, he’s not exactly what he seems. He tells them as much; but the more he does, the more they’re prepared to believe the lie.

I never murdered anyone. Of course, he’d never admit the truth. That’s why he parades himself online; strutting and strumming his base desires like a peacock’s courtship ritual. The others admire his purity. They love him for his candour. Blueeyedboy acts out what others barely dare to dream; an avatar, an icon for a lost tribe that even God has turned away —

And what of Chameleon, you ask? She is not one of blueeyedboy’s closest friends, but he sees her, if sporadically. They do have a kind of history, but there’s nothing much here to move him now; nothing to hold his attention. And yet, as he comes to know her again, he finds her more and more interesting. He used to think she was colourless. In fact, she is merely adaptable. She has been a follower all her life, collecting ideologies; although so far she has never had a single idea of her own. But give her a cause, give her a flag, and she’ll give you her devotion.

First she followed Jesus, and prayed to die before she woke. After that, she followed a boy who taught her a different gospel. Then, when she was twelve years old she followed a madman into the snow just for the sake of his blue eyes, and now she follows blueeyedboy, like the rest of his little army of mice, and wants nothing more than to dance to his tune all the way to oblivion.

They meet again at her writing class when she is just fifteen years old. Not so much a writing class as a kind of soft-therapy group, which her counsellor recommended to her as a means of better expressing herself. Blueeyedboy attends this group primarily to improve his style, of which he has always been ashamed, but also because he has learnt to exploit the appeal of the fictional murder.

There’s a woman he knows in the Village. He calls her Mrs Electric Blue. And she’s old enough to be his Ma, which makes it quite disgusting. Not that he knows what’s in her mind. But Mrs Electric is known to have a predilection for nice young men, and blueeyedboy is an innocent — at least, he is in matters of love. A nice young man of twenty or so; working in an electrical shop to pay his way through college. Slim in his denim overalls, no pin-up, but still, a far cry from the fat boy he was only a couple of years ago.

Our heroine, in spite of her youth, is far more adept in the ways of the world. After all, she has had to endure a great many things over the years. The death of her mother; her father’s stroke; that hellish blaze of publicity. She has been taken into care; she is staying with a family in the White City estate. The man is a plumber; his ugly wife has tried and failed many times to conceive. They are both fervent royalists: the house is filled with images of the Princess of Wales, some of them texturized photographs, others paint-by-numbers kits in acrylic on cheap canvas. Chameleon dislikes them, but says very little, as always. She’s found that it pays to keep silent now; to let other people do the talking. This suits the family just fine. Our heroine is a good little girl. Of course, they ought to know by now: it’s the good little girls you need to watch.

The man, whom we shall call Diesel Blue and who will die with his wife in a house fire some five or six years later, likes to be seen as a family man; calls Chameleon Princess and at weekends takes her to work with him, where she carries his big box of tools and waits while he chats with a series of jaded housewives and their vaguely aggressive husbands, who all think that plumbers are rip-off merchants and that they themselves, if they so desired, could easily fix that gasket, that tap, or put in that new storage heater.

It’s only Health and Safety gone mad that does not permit them to do so; and so they are sour and resentful, while the women make tea and bring biscuits and talk to the silent little girl, who rarely answers back, or smiles, but sits with her oversized sweatshirt hiding most of her body, and her little hands poking out of the sleeves like wilted pale-pink rosebuds, and her face as blank as a china doll’s under the curtain of dark hair.

It is on one of these visits — to a house in the Village — that our heroine first experiences the furtive joy of homicide. Of course, it wasn’t her idea; she lifted it from blueeyedboy at their creative-writing class. Chameleon has no style of her own. Her claim to creativity is based on imitation. She only attends class because he is there, in the hope that one day he will see her again, that his eyes will meet hers and stay there, transfixed, with no reflection of anyone else to mar his concentration.

He calls her Mrs Electric Blue . . .

Nice move, blueeyedboy. All names and identities have been changed in the hope of protecting the innocent. But Chameleon recognizes her; knows the house from her visits. And she knows her reputation, too: her taste for young men; her erstwhile disgusting liaison with our subject’s elder brother. She finds her pathetic, pitiable; and when Mrs Electric Blue is found burnt to death in her house a few days later, she cannot find it in herself to grieve, or to even care about it much.

Some people like to play with fire. Other people deserve to die. And how could a tragic accident have anything at all to do with that good little girl who sits so still, and who waits so patiently by the fire while her father fixes the plumbing?

At first, even blueeyedboy doesn’t guess. At first he thinks it’s karma. But, with time, as his enemies falter and fall at every stroke of the typewriter key, he begins to see the pattern emerge, clear as the flowered wallpaper in his mother’s parlour.

Electric Blue. Diesel Blue. Even poor Mrs Chemical Blue, who set the seal on her own demise by wanting things so nice and clean, beginning with that nice, clean boy in her fat niece’s therapy group.

And Dr Peacock, whose only true crime was to find himself in our hero’s care; whose mind was half-gone anyway, and whose chair it was so easy to push off the little home-made ramp, so that next morning they found him there, his eyes jacked open, his mouth awry. And if blueeyedboy feels anything, it’s a dawning sense of hope —

Perhaps it’s my guardian angel, he thinks. Or maybe it’s just coincidence.

Why does she do it, he asks himself? Is it to safeguard his innocence? To take his guilt and make it her own? Or just to attract his attention? Is it because she sees herself as executioner to the world? Is it because of that little girl, whose life she collected so eagerly? Is it because to be someone else is her only means of existing? Or is it because, like blueeyedboy, she has no choice but to mirror those around her?

Still, in the end, it’s not his fault. He’s giving her what she wants, that’s all. And if what she wants is guilt, what then? If what she wants is villainy?

Surely, he’s not responsible. He never told her what to do. And yet, he feels she wants something more. He senses her impatience. It’s always the same: these women, he thinks. These women and their expectations. He knows that it will end in tears, as it always has before —

But blueeyedboy can’t blame her now for what she is considering. He was the one who made her, who shaped her from this murderous clay. For years she has been his golem; and now the slave just wants to be free.

How will she do it? he asks himself. Accidents happen so easily. A poison slipped into his drink? A humdrum gas leak? A car crash? A fire? Or will it be something more esoteric: a needle tipped with the venom of a rare South American orchid; a scorpion slipped into a basket of fruit? Whatever it is, blueeyedboy expects it to be something special.

And will he see it coming, he thinks? Will he have time to see her eyes? And as she stares into the abyss, what will she see staring back?

Post comment:

JennyTricks: THINK YOURE SO CLEVER, DONT YOU?

blueeyedboy: You didn’t like my ficlet? Now why am I not surprised?

JennyTricks: BOYS WHO PLAY WITH FIRE GET BURNT.

blueeyedboy: Thank you, Jenny. I’ll bear it in mind . . .

4

You are viewing the webjournal of Albertine.

Posted at: 02.37 on Friday, February 22

Status: restricted

Mood: angry

He calls me a golem. How hatefully apt. The golem, according to legend, is a creature made from word and clay; a voiceless slave with no purpose but to do its master’s bidding. But in one of the stories the slave rebels — did you know that, blueeyedboy? It turns against its creator. What then? I don’t remember. But I know it ended badly.

Is that what he really thinks of me? He always was conceited. Even when he was a boy, despised by almost everyone, there was always that arrogant side to him; the enduring belief that he was unique, destined some day to be someone. Perhaps his Ma did that to him. Gloria Green and her colours. No, I’m not defending him. But there’s something twisted about the idea that boys can be sorted like laundry; that a colour can make you good or bad; that every crime can be washed away and hung out on the line to dry.

It’s ironic, isn’t it? He hates her, and yet he’s incapable of simply walking away. Instead, he has his own means of escape. He’s been living inside his head for years. And he has a golem to do his work, moulded to specifications.

He’s lying, of course. It’s only fic. He’s trying to breach my defences. He knows my reluctant memory is like a broken projector, incapable of processing more than a single frame at a time. Blueeyedboy ’s account of events is always so much better than mine, high-resolution imaging to my grainy black and white. Yes, I was full of confusion and hate. But I was never a murderer.

Of course, he knew that all along. This is his way of taunting me. But he can be very convincing. And he has lied to the police before, incriminating others to hide his guilt. I wonder, will he accuse me now? Has he found anything in Nigel’s flat, or at the Fireplace House, that he could present as evidence? Is he trying to play for time by drawing me into a dialogue? Or is he playing the picador, taunting me into making a move?

Boys who play with fire get burnt.

I couldn’t have put it better. If this is his plan to disorient me, then he is treading dangerous ground. I know I ought to ignore him now, just get in the car and drive away, but a feeling of outrage consumes me. I have played his mind games for far too long. We all of us have; we indulge him. He can’t bear the sight of physical pain, but he thrives on mental suffering. Why do we allow it? I ask. Why has no one rebelled before now?

An e-mail arrived a moment ago. I picked it up on my mobile phone.

Re: Everyday care of orchids.

In my absence, I would be grateful if you might agree to care for my orchid collection. Most orchids do better in a warm, humid environment away from direct sunlight. Water sparingly. Do not allow the roots to soak. Thank you. Aloha,

blueeyedboy

I don’t know what he means by this. Does he expect me to cut and run? All in all, I don’t think so. More likely he is toying with me, trying to put me off my guard. His orchid is on the back seat of my car, anchored between two boxes. Somehow I don’t want to leave it behind. It looks so inoffensive, with its clump of little flowers.

And then a thought occurs to me. It comes with the scent of the orchid. And it seems to clear, so beautiful, like a beacon in the smoke.

It has to end somewhere, don’t you see? I’ve followed him down this road too long, like the crippled child after the Pied Piper. He made me like this. I danced to his tune. My skin is a map covered with scars and the marks of what he has done to me. But now I can see him as he is, the boy who cried murder so many times that, finally, someone believed him . . .

I know his routine as well as my own. He’ll set off from home at four forty-five, pretending, as always, to go to work. I’m sure that’s when he’ll make his move. He won’t be able to resist the lure of the Pink Zebra, with its warm and welcoming light, and myself, alone and vulnerable, like a moth inside a lantern . . .

He’ll be driving his car, a blue Peugeot. He’ll drive down Mill Road and park at the corner of All Saints’ Church, where the snow has been cleared away. He’ll check the street — deserted now — and then he’ll walk up to the Zebra, keeping to the shadows around the side of the building. Inside, the radio is playing loudly enough to mask the sound of his entry. Not the classical station today, though I have no fear of music. That fear belonged to Emily. Now even the Symphonie fantastique has no power over me.

The kitchen door will be on the latch. Easy enough to open it — glancing up at the neon sign as he does — the strobing words; PINK ZEBRA, with their phantom smell of gas.

You see? I know his weaknesses. I’m using his gift against him now, that gift he acquired from his brother, and when the real scent assails him, he will simply dismiss the illusion as he has so many times before — at least until he walks inside, and lets the door close after him.

I have made an adjustment to the door. The handle no longer turns from the inside. And the gas will have been on for hours. By five any spark could ignite it: a light switch, a lighter, a mobile phone.

I won’t be there to see it, of course. By then I will be long gone. But my mobile can access the Internet, and I have his number. Of course, he has to choose to go in. The victim selects his own fate. No one forces him inside; no one else is responsible.

Perhaps, when he’s gone, I’ll be free again. Free of these desires of his that mirror desires of mine. Where does the reflection go after the mirror is broken? What happens to the lightning after the storm is over? Real life makes so little sense; only fic has meaning. And I have been fictional for so long; a character in one of his stories. I wonder, do fictional characters ever rebel, and turn on their creators?

I only hope it’s not over too soon. I hope he has time to understand. Walking blind into the trap, I hope he has a moment or two to cry out, to struggle, to try to escape, to beat his fists against the door, and finally to think of me, the golem who turned on its master . . .

5

You are viewing the webjournal of blueeyedboy.

Posted at: 04.16 on Friday, February 22

Status: restricted

Mood: optimistic

Listening to: Supertramp: ‘Breakfast In America’

No sleep tonight. Too many dreams. Some people dream in Technicolor. Some only dream in film noir. But I dream in total-immersion: sound, scent, sensation. Some nights I awake half-drowned in sweat; others, I don’t sleep at all. Then, too, the Net is my solace; there’s always someone awake online. Chat rooms, fan sites, fic sites, porn. But tonight I’m lonesome for my f-list, my little squeaking chorus of mice. Tonight, what I need is to hear someone say: You’re the best, blueeyedboy.

And so here I am, back on badguysrock, watching perfidious Albertine. She has come so far — I’m proud of her — and yet she still feels the need to confess, like the good little Catholic girl of old. I’ve known her password for some time. It’s really quite easy to find out, you know. All it takes is a careless gesture: an account left signed in on a desktop while someone pours a cup of tea, and suddenly her private posts are open for that someone to read —

Are you checking your mail, Albertine? My inbox is crammed with messages: plaintive whimperings from Cap; tentative noises from Chryssie. From Toxic, some porn, snagged from a site called Bigjugs.com. From Clair, one of her memes; along with a dull and cretinous post about Angel Blue and his bitchy wife, about my mother’s mental health, and about the wonderful progress she thinks I made in my last public confession.

Then, there’s the usual junk mail, hate mail, spam: badly spelt letters from Nigeria promising to send me millions of pounds in return for my bank details; offers of Viagra; of sex; of intimate videos of teenage celebs. In short, all the flotsam the Net brings in, and this time I welcome even the spam, because this is my lifeline, this is my world, and to cut me off is to leave me to drown in air like a fish out of water.

At four o’clock, I hear Ma get up. She doesn’t sleep well either, these days. Sometimes she sits in the parlour watching satellite TV; sometimes she does housework, or goes for a walk around the block. She likes to be up when I leave for work. She wants to make me breakfast.

I select a clean shirt from my wardrobe — today it’s white, with a blue stripe — and dress myself with some care. I take pride in my appearance. It’s safer that way, I tell myself; especially when Ma’s watching. Of course, I don’t need to wear a shirt — my uniform at the hospital consists of a grubby navy-blue jumpsuit, engineer boots with steel-capped toes and a pair of heavy-duty gloves — but Ma doesn’t need to know that. Ma’s so proud of her blueeyedboy. And if Ma ever found out the truth —

‘B.B.! Is that you?’ she calls.

Who else would it be, Ma?

‘Hurry up! I made breakfast!’

I must be in her good books today. Bacon, eggs, cinnamon toast. I’m not really hungry, but this time I need to humour her. This time tomorrow I’ll be having breakfast in America.

She watches me as I fuel up. ‘There’s my boy. You’ll need your strength.’

There’s something vaguely disquieting about her mood this morning. To start with, she is fully dressed: discarding her usual dressing gown for a tweed skirt-suit and her crocodile shoes. She’s wearing her favourite perfume — L’Heure Bleue, all powdery orange blossom and clove, with that trembling silvery top note that overpowers everything. Most curious of all, she is — what can I say? I can’t quite call it happy. In Ma’s case, you could count those fleeting moments on the fingers of a one-armed man. But there’s a cheeriness in her manner today; something I haven’t seen since Ben died. Quite ironic, really. Still, it’ll soon be over.

‘Don’t forget your drink,’ she says.

This time it’s almost a pleasure. The taste is a little better today, perhaps because the fruit is fresh; and there’s a different ingredient — blueberries, blackcurrant, perhaps — that gives it a tannic quality.

‘I changed the recipe,’ she says.

‘Mmmm. Nice,’ I tell her.

‘Feeling better this morning?’

‘Fine, Ma.’

Better than fine. I don’t even have a headache.

‘Good of them to give you time off.’

‘Well, Ma, it’s a hospital. Can’t be bringing germs to work.’

Ma conceded I had a point. For the past few days I’ve been sick with flu. Well, that’s the official story. In fact, I’ve been otherwise engaged, as I’m sure you can appreciate.

‘Sure you’re all right? You look a bit pale.’

‘Everyone’s pale in winter, Ma.’

6

You are viewing the webjournal of blueeyedboy.

Posted at: 04.33 on Friday, February 22

Status: restricted

Mood: excited

Listening to: The Beatles: ‘Here Comes The Sun’

I bought the tickets on the Net. You get a discount for booking online. You can choose where to sit; order a meal; you can even print out your own boarding card. I chose a seat by the window, where I can watch the ground fall away. I’ve never been in an aeroplane. I’ve never even caught a train. The tickets were rather expensive, I thought; but Albertine’s credit can stand it. I snagged her details a year ago, when she bought some books from Amazon. Of course, at that time she had fewer funds; but now, with Dr Peacock’s legacy, she should be good for a few months, at least. By the time she finds out — if ever she does — I’ll be nicely untraceable.

I haven’t packed much. Just a satchel with my papers, some cash, my iPod, a change of clothes, a shirt. No, not a blue one this time, Ma. It’s orange and pink, with palm trees. Not much in the way of camouflage; but wait till I get there. I’ll blend right in.

I log on for the last time, just for luck, before I set off. Simply to read my messages; to see who hasn’t slept tonight; to check for any surprises; to find out who loves me and who wants me dead.

No surprises there, then.

‘What are you doing up there?’ she calls.

‘Hang on, Ma. I’ll be down in a sec.’

And now there’s time for one more mail — to albertine@yahoo.com — before I’m ready to go at last; by noon today I’ll be on that flight, watching TV and drinking champagne —

Champagne. Sham pain. As if sensation of any kind could ever be anything other than real. My guts are afizz with excitement. It almost hurts for me to breathe. I take a moment to relax and concentrate on the colour blue. Moon-blue, lagoon-blue, ocean, island, Hawaiian blue. Blue, the colour of innocence; blue, the colour of my dreams —

7

You are viewing the webjournal of blueeyedboy posting on:

badguysrock@webjournal.com

Posted at: 04.45 on Friday, February 22

Status: public

Mood: anxious

Listening to: Queen: ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’

She must have taken off her shoes. He never even heard her. The first he heard was the door as it shut, and the sound of the key as she locked it.

Click.

‘Ma?’

No answer. He goes to the door. The keys were in his coat pocket. She must have taken them, thinks blueeyedboy, when he went back upstairs. The door is pitch pine; the lock, a Yale. He has always valued his privacy.

‘Ma? Please. Talk to me.’

Just that heavy silence, like something buried under snow. Then, the sound of her footsteps receding softly down the carpeted stairs.

Has she guessed? What does she know? A finger of ice slips down his back. A tremor creeps into his voice; the ghost of the stutter he thought was lost.

‘Please, Ma!’

In fiction, our hero would break down the door; or failing that, crash through the window to land unharmed on the ground below. In real life, the door is unbreakable — though, sadly, blueeyedboy is not, as a leap from the window would surely confirm, sprawling him in agony on to the icy concrete below.

No, he’s trapped. He knows that now. Whatever his Ma is planning, he thinks, he’s helpless to prevent it. He hears her downstairs; her steps in the hall; her shoes on the polished parquet floor. The rattle of keys. She’s going out.

‘Ma!’ There’s a desperate edge to his voice. ‘Ma! Don’t take the car! Please!’

She hardly ever takes the car. Still, today, he knows she will. The café’s only a few streets away, down at the corner of Mill Road and All Saints’; but Ma can be so impatient sometimes — and she knows that girl is expecting him, that Irish girl with all the tattoos, the one who has broken her little boy’s heart —

How did she know what he was planning? Perhaps it was his mobile phone, left on the hall table. How stupid of him to have left it there so invitingly. So easy to open his inbox; so easy to find the recent dialogue between her son and Albertine.

Albertine, she thinks with a sneer. A rose by any other name. And she knows that it’s that Irish girl, already to blame for the death of one son, now daring to threaten the other. A wasp in a jar may have killed him, but Gloria knows that Nigel’s death would never have happened but for Albertine. Stupid, jealous Nigel, who first fell for that Irish girl and then, when he found out his brother had been following her, taking photographs, had first threatened, and then used his fists on poor, helpless blueeyedboy, so that Ma had had to take action at last, putting Nigel down like a rabid dog lest history repeat itself —

Dear Bethan (if I may),

I suppose you must have heard the news by now. Dr Peacock passed away the other night at the Mansion. Fell out of his wheelchair down the steps, leaving the bulk of his estate — last valued at three million pounds — to you. Congratulations. I suppose the old man felt he owed you something for the Emily White affair.

I have to say I’m surprised, though. Brendan never told me a thing. All that time he was working for Dr Peacock, and never thought to tell me about this. But maybe he mentioned something to you? After all, you’re such good friends.

I know our respective families have had our differences over the years. But now that you’re seeing both my sons, perhaps we can bury the hatchet. This business comes as a shock to us all. Especially if what I’ve heard is true; that they’re treating the death as suspicious.

Still, I wouldn’t lose any sleep over that. These things blow over in time, as you know.

Yours sincerely,

Gloria.

Yes, Ma wrote the letter, of course. She has never flinched from her duty. Knowing that Nigel would open it; knowing that he would take the bait. And when Nigel came round that day, demanding to talk to blueeyedboy, she was the one who deflected him, who sent him away with a flea in his ear — or at least, with a wasp in a jar —

But now her only surviving son owes her a debt that cannot be repaid. He can never leave her now. He can never belong to anyone else. And if he ever tries to run —

Post comment:

blueeyedboy: Comments, anyone? Anyone here?

8

You are viewing the webjournal of blueeyedboy posting on :

badguysrock@webjournal.com

Posted at: 04.47 on Friday, February 22

Status: public

Mood: devious

Listening to: My Chemical Romance: ‘Mama’

She ought to have seen it coming, of course. She ought to have known he would end up this way. But Gloria is no expert on child development. To her, developing is something he does in his darkroom, alone. She doesn’t like to think of it much. It’s like the nasty old Blue Book, she thinks, or the games he likes to play online with those invisible friends of his. She has looked into it once or twice, with the same faint dutiful distaste as when she used to wash his sheets, but only for his protection; because other people don’t understand that blueeyedboy is sensitive; that he is simply incapable of ever standing up for himself —

The thought makes her eyes mist over a little. For all her steely hard-headedness, Gloria can be strangely sentimental at times, and even in her anger, the thought of his helplessness touches her. It’s always been at these moments, she thinks, that she loves him best of all: when he’s sick, or in tears, or in pain; when everyone else is against him; when there’s no one to love him but her; when all the world thinks he’s guilty.

Of course, she knows he’s innocent. Well, of murder, anyway. What else he may be guilty of — what crimes of the imagination — is between blueeyedboy and his Ma, who has spent her whole life protecting him, even at her own cost. But that’s her son all over, she thinks: sitting in the nest she has built, like a fat and flightless cuckoo chick with his beak perpetually open.

No, he wasn’t her favourite. But he was always the luckiest of her three unlucky boys: a natural survivor in spite of his gift; a chip, she thinks, off the old block.

And a mother owes it to her son to protect him, no matter what. Sometimes he needs to be punished, she knows; but that’s between blueeyedboy and his Ma. No stranger raises a hand to him. No one — not his school, not the law — has the right to interfere. Hasn’t she always defended him? From bullies and thugs and predators?

Take Tricia Goldblum, the bitch who seduced her elder son — and caused the death of her youngest. It was a pleasure to take care of her. Easy, too: electrical fires are always so reliable.

Then Mrs White’s hippie friend, who thought she was better than they were. And Catherine White herself, of course, so easy to destabilize. And Jeff Jones from the estate, the man who fostered that Irish girl, and who some years later, in the pub, dared to raise a hand to her son. Then there was Eleanor Vine, the sneak, spying on Bren at the Mansion, and Graham Peacock, who cheated them, and for whom the boy had feelings —

He was the most rewarding of all. Tipped over in his wheelchair and left to die alone on the path, like a tortoise half-out of its shell. Afterwards, she went upstairs and relieved him of his T’ang figurine, the one with which he taunted her all those years ago, and which she carefully placed in her cabinet along with the rest of her china dogs. It isn’t stealing, she tells herself. The old man owed her something, after all, for all the trouble he has caused her son.

But in spite of everything she has done for him, what gratitude has blueeyedboy shown? Instead of supporting his mother, he has dared to transfer his affections to that Irish girl from the village, and worse, has tried to make her believe that she could have been his protector —

She’ll make him pay for that, she thinks. But first, to take care of business.

Now, from upstairs, she hears his voice, accompanied by a banging and slapping at the bedroom door. ‘Ma! Please! Open the door!’

‘Don’t be such a baby,’ she says. ‘When I get back, then we can talk.’

‘Ma, please!’

‘Don’t make me come in—’

The sounds from the bedroom cease abruptly.

‘That’s better,’ says Gloria. ‘We’ve got a lot to talk about. Like your job at the hospital. And the way you’ve been lying to me. And what you’ve been up to with that girl. That Irish girl with all the tattoos.’

Behind the door, he stiffens. He can feel every hair stiffening. He knows what’s in the balance here, and in spite of himself he is afraid. Of course he is. Who wouldn’t be? He is caught inside the bottle trap, and the worst of it is, he needs to be caught; he needs this feeling of helplessness. But she’s there on the other side of the door like a trap-door spider poised to bite, and if any part of his plan goes wrong, if he has failed to compensate for any one of those minute variables, then —

If. If.

An ominous sound, tinged with the grey-green scent of trees and the dust that accumulates under his bed. It’s safe under the bed, he thinks; safe and dark and scentless. He listens as she puts on her boots, fumbles with the front-door key; locks the door behind her. The crump of her footsteps in the snow. The sound of the car door opening.

She takes the car, as he knew she would. His begging her not to do so now ensures her cooperation. He closes his eyes. She starts the car. The engine ratchets into life. It would be so ironic, he thinks, if she had an accident. It wouldn’t be his fault if she did. And then, at last, he would be free —

Post comment:

blueeyedboy: Still no one here? Right, then. I guess that leaves me all on my own for Stage 4 . . .

9

You are viewing the webjournal of blueeyedboy posting on :

badguysrock@webjournal.com

Posted at: 04.56 on Friday, February 22

Status: public

Mood: cautious

Listening to: The Rubettes: ‘Sugar Baby Love’

I think you must have guessed by now that this is not an ordinary fic. My other fics are all accounts of things that have already happened — though whether they happened quite as I said is up to you to determine. But this little story is more in the way of being a work-in-progress. An ongoing project, if you like. A breakthrough in concept, as Clair might say. And like all conceptual work, it isn’t entirely without risk. In fact, I’m more or less convinced that it’s all about to end in tears.

Five minutes to drive to the Zebra. Five more to see to business. And after that — Whoops! All gone! — here comes the explosive finale.

I hope they’ll look after my orchids. They’re the only things in this house that I’ll miss. The rest can rot, for all I care, except for the china dogs, of course, for which I have special plans of my own.

But first of all, to get out of this room. The door is pinewood, and well-made. In a movie, perhaps, I could break it down. Real life demands a more reasoned approach. A multi-tool with a screwdriver, a file and a short-bladed penknife should help me deal with the hinges, after which I can make my exit unimpeded.

I take a last look at my orchids. I notice that the Phalaenopsis — otherwise known as the moth orchid — is in need of re-potting. I know exactly how she feels; I, who have lived for all these years in the same little, airless, toxic space. Time to explore new worlds, I think. Time now to leave the cocoon and to fly . . .

It occurs to me as I work on the door that I ought to be feeling better than this. My stomach is filled with butterflies. I’m even feeling a little sick. My iPod is packed in my travel bag; instead I turn on the radio. From the tinny speakers comes the bubblegum sound of the Rubettes singing ‘Sugar Baby Love’.

When I was a little boy, mistaking baby for B.B., I always assumed that those songs were for me; that even the folk on the radio knew that I was special, somehow. Today the music sounds ominous, a troubling falsetto sweeping across a fat layer of descending chords to a mystic accompaniment of doop-shoowaddies and bop-shoowaddies; and it tastes sour-sweet like acid drops, the ones that, when you were a child, you poked into the side of your mouth to make your tastebuds shudder and cramp, and if you weren’t careful, the tip of your tongue would slide over the boiled-sugar shell and snag on the sharp-edged bubbles there, and your mouth would fill with sweetness and blood, and that was the taste of childhood . . .

Nyaaa-haaaa-haaaa-ooooooooooooooh

Today there’s something sinister in those soaring, sustained vocals; something that tears at the insides like gravel in a silk purse. The word sugar is not sweet: it has a pink and gassy smell, like dentist’s anaesthetic, dizzy and intrusive, like something boring its way into my head. And I can almost see her there — right at this moment, here and there — and the Rubettes are playing at migraine volume in the Zebra’s tiny kitchen, and there’s a smell, a sickly-sweet, gassy smell that cuts through the scent of fresh coffee, but Ma doesn’t really notice that, because fifty years of Marlboros have long since shot her olfactory organs to hell, and only the scent of L’Heure Bleue cuts through, and she opens the door to the kitchen.

Of course I can’t quite be sure of this. I could be wrong about the radio station. I could be wrong about the time — she might still be in the car park, or by now it might even be over — and yet it feels completely right.

Perhaps there was something, after all, in Feather’s tales of walk-ins and ghosts and spirits and astral projection; because that’s how I feel now, lighter than air, watching the scene from a place somewhere on the ceiling, and the Rubettes are singing — aaaah-oop shoowaddy-waddy, doop-showaddy-waddy. And now I can see the top of Ma’s head, the parting in her thinning hair; the packet of Marlboros in her hand, the lighter poised above the tip; and I see the superheated air ripple and swell like a balloon inflated beyond its capacity, and she calls out — Hello? Is anyone there? — and lights a final cigarette —

She has no time to understand. I never really intended her to. Gloria Green is no wasp in a jar, to be caught and disposed of at leisure. Nor is she a seaside crab, left to die in the simmering sun. Her passing is instantaneous, and the hot draught sweeps her away like a moth — Pfff! — into oblivion, so that nothing, not even a finger, remains for blueeyedboy to identify, not even a measure of dust large enough to rattle inside a china dog.

From my room I can almost hear the dull cr-crumpf of the explosion, and it’s like crunching a stick of Blackpool rock, all sharp edges and toothache, and although there’s no way I can know for sure, I am suddenly certain, in a surge of wonder and indescribable relief, that I’ve done it at last. I’m free of her. I’m finally rid of my mother —

Don’t tell me you’re surprised, Albertine. Didn’t I tell you I knew how to wait? Did you believe, after all this time, that this could have been an accident? And did you really believe, Ma, that I didn’t know you were watching me, that I hadn’t clocked you from the first time you logged on to badguysrock?

She appeared on the scene some months ago in response to one of my public posts. Ma isn’t what you’d call computer-literate; but she accessed the Net through her mobile phone. After that, it can’t have been long before someone, somewhere, steered her towards badguysrock. My guess is Maureen, via Clair; or maybe even Eleanor. In any case, I’d expected it; and I’d expected to pay for it, too, though I knew she would never make any direct reference to my online activities. Ma can be strangely prudish at times, and some things are never mentioned. All your nasty stuff upstairs is about the closest we ever got to discussing the porn, or the photographs, or the fics that were posted on my site.

I have to admit I enjoyed the game: playing with fire; taking risks; taunting her to reveal herself. Sometimes I went a little too far. Sometimes I got my fingers burnt. But I had to know the boundaries; to see how hard I could push them both; to calculate the precise amount of pressure I could exert over the mechanism before it began to break down. An artist needs to understand the medium in which he works. After that, it was easy.

Don’t feel guilty, Albertine. You had no way of knowing. Besides, in the end she’d have gone after you, just as she did with those others. Call it self-defence, if you like. Or maybe an act of redemption. Anyway, it’s over now. You’re free. Goodbye, and thank you. If you’re ever in Hawaii, call. And please, look after my orchid.

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10

You are viewing the webjournal of blueeyedboy.

Posted at: 05.17 on Friday, February 22

Status: restricted

Mood: sick

Listening to: Voltaire: ‘Snakes’

At last. The door pulls away from the hinge. I’m free to leave. I pick up my bag. But the ache in my guts has worsened; it feels like a piece of bramble scoring my stomach lining. I go to the bathroom; I wash my face; I drink a glass of water.

God, it hurts. What’s happening? I’m sweating. I look terrible. In the mirror I look like a corpse: deep shadows around my eyes; mouth bracketed with nausea. What the hell is wrong with me? I felt so good at breakfast.

Breakfast. Ah. I should have known. Too late, I remember the look on her face; that look of almost-happiness. She wanted to make me breakfast today. Cooked me all my favourites. Stood over me while I ate it. The vitamin drink tasted different — and she said she’d changed the recipe.

For God’s sake, it was obvious. How could I have missed what was happening? Ma up to her old tricks again — how could I have been so careless?

And now it feels like shards of glass are grinding away at my insides. I try to stand up, but the pain is too bad; it doubles me up like a penknife. I check the status of my f-list. There has to be someone awake by now. Someone who can help me.

A message through WeJay should bring help. Ma has taken my mobile phone. I type out my SOS and wait. Is there nobody online?

Captainbunnykiller is feeling OK.

Yeah, right. The fucktard. Too scared to leave his house now in case he runs into the boys from the estate. In passing, I notice that kidcobalt has been removed from Cap’s f-list. Oh, well. Colour me surprised.

ClairDeLune is feeling rejected. Well, yes, probably. Angel has finally had enough, and has written to her personally. His tone, which is cool and professional, leaves Clair with no illusions. Rejection hurts at any age; but to Clair the humiliation is even more of a blow. sapphiregirl is gone from her f-list. So, I see, is blueeyedboy.

And Chryssie? Once more, she is feeling sick. This time, I almost sympathize. Looking at her f-list this morning, I notice, with diminishing surprise, that azurechild has been deleted. I immediately check for blueeyedboy. There, too, I am absent.

Three strikes? It’s more than coincidence. I scroll quickly through the rest of my f-list, checking accounts and avatars. BombNumber20. Purepwnage9. Toxic69. All my friends. As if they had all decided as one to leave me marooned on badguysrock —

Of course, there’s nothing from Albertine. Her Webmail account is marked as dormant; her WeJay as deleted. I can still look up her old posts — nothing online is ever lost, and every word is hidden away in caches and encrypted files, the ghosts in the machine. But Albertine is gone now. For the first time in over twenty years — perhaps for the first time in his life — blueeyedboy is quite alone.

Alone. A bitter, brown word, like dead leaves caught in a wind trap. It tastes like coffee grounds and dirt, and smells like cigarette ash. Suddenly I feel scared. Not so much of being alone as for the absence of those little voices, the ones that tell me that I’m real, the ones that say they see me —

You understand it was fiction, right? You know I never killed anyone? Yes, some of my fic may have been in bad taste, even a little sick, perhaps, but surely you don’t believe I could ever have acted out those things?

Do you, Chryssie?

Do you, Clair?

Seriously. It wasn’t real. Artistic licence, anyone? If it sounded genuine, if you were nearly convinced, then — surely that’s a compliment, proof that blueeyedboy kicks ass —

Right, guys? Toxic? Cap?

I try to get down the stairs again. I need to call a taxi. I have to get out. I have to escape. I have to be on that plane at midday. But I feel like I’ve been cut in half; my legs can barely hold me. I make it to the bathroom again, where I throw up until there’s nothing left.

But I know from experience that this doesn’t help. Whatever she used is in me now, working its way through my bloodstream, shutting down all systems. Sometimes it lasts for days, sometimes weeks, depending on the dosage. What did she use? I don’t know. I have to call that taxi. If I crawl, I can reach the phone. It’s in the parlour, with the dogs. But the thought of lying there, helpless, with those china dogs looking down at me, is more than my brutalized nerves can take. The snakes are loose in my belly, and now there is no stopping them —

Damn, I feel sick. I feel dizzy. The room is spinning choppily. Black flowers open behind my eyes. If I just lie here, quietly, then maybe things will be OK. Maybe in time I can regain some strength, enough to get to the airport, at least —

Bip! It’s the sound of the mailbox. That bittersweet electronic sound. One of my friends has messaged me. I knew they wouldn’t leave me here. I knew they’d come round eventually.

I crawl back to the keyboard. I click on the symbol for message.

Someone has commented on your post!

I flick back to my most recent entry. A single line has been added there. No avatar. Just the default pic; a blue silhouette inside a square.

Post comment:

JennyTricks: NOT BAD AT ALL FOR AN AMATEUR. NOT TOO REALISTIC, THOUGH.

She ends it with an emoticon: a little winking smiley.

No way. No way! A finger of sweat runs down my spine. My stomach’s filled with broken glass. It has to be a joke, right? Nothing but a bad joke. Right from the moment she first logged on, thinking she was so clever.

Oh, please. As if I could have missed her, with that ridiculous username —

JennyTricks.

Genitrix.

And its colour is sometimes Virgin-blue, and sometimes it’s green, like market-stall baize, and it smells of L’Heure Bleue and Marlboros, and cabbage leaves and salt water —

Post comment:

blueeyedboy: Ma?

No. No. Of course not. I heard the explosion, for God’s sake. Ma isn’t coming back, not today, not ever. And even if she had escaped somehow, then why would she choose this medium, instead of simply driving home and dealing with me face to face?

No, someone’s trying to mess with my mind. My guess is Albertine. Nice try, Albertine. But I’ve been playing these games for much too long to be freaked out by an amateur.

Bip! Someone has commented on your post!

I consider deleting the message unread. But —

Post comment:

JennyTricks: SO HOW ARE YOU FEELING, blueeyedboy?

blueeyedboy: Never felt better, Jenny, thanks.

JennyTricks: YOU NEVER COULD LIE TO SAVE YOUR LIFE.

Well, that’s a debatable point, JennyTricks. In fact I’ve survived for as long as I have by doing precisely that. Like the princess Scheherazade, I’ve consistently lied to save my life for rather more than a thousand and one nights. So, Jenny, whoever you are —

Post comment:

blueeyedboy: Tell me, do I know you?

JennyTricks: NOT AS WELL AS I KNOW YOU.

Seriously, I doubt that. But now I’m beginning to be intrigued, in spite of the pain that comes and goes like the waves under Blackpool pier. In pain. What a phrase. Like a mouse inside a bottle. In any case I’m trapped here, and rather than think about my circumstances — which, let’s face it, don’t look good — it’s easier to stay here, to grab the line that’s being offered, to keep up the dialogue, which at least is preferable to silence.

Post comment:

blueeyedboy: So, you think you know me?

JennyTricks: OH YES. I KNOW YOU.

blueeyedboy: Is that you, Albertine ?

She responds with another smiley. The pixellated yellow face looks like a grinning goblin. It hurts to type, but the silence is worse.

Post comment:

blueeyedboy:Albertine ? Is that you?

JennyTricks: NO, THAT BITCH IS GONE FOR GOOD.

Now I’m convinced it’s Bethan in there. How did she get Ma’s password? Where is she logging on from? It’s good she doesn’t know I’m sick. She may not even know I’m here. For all she knows I’m at the airport, logging on from the business lounge.

Post comment:

blueeyedboy: Well, it’s been fun, but I have to go.

JennyTricks: YOURE NOT GOING ANYWHERE.

blueeyedboy: Oh, but I am. I’m flying south.

JennyTricks: NOT IN THIS LIFETIME, YOU LITTLE SHIT. WE HAVE THINGS TO TALK ABOUT.

Bitch, I’m not afraid of you. In fact, I’m feeling better. I’m going to get up in a minute, pick up my bag, call a taxi and then I’ll be off to the airport. Who knows, I may even find the time to deal with those dogs before I go. Still, for the moment I think I’ll stay here, crunched up like a contortionist, keeping the pain at bay with words as it opens its jaws to swallow me —

Post comment:J

ennyTricks: YOU WAIT HERE. I’M COMING HOME. I’M COMING TO TAKE CARE OF YOU.

She’s bluffing, of course. She has no idea. But if I didn’t know better right now, I might even feel a little afraid. She has Ma’s voice down so accurately that I can feel my hackles trying to rise, and the back of my shirt is clammy with sweat. But all the same, it’s just a bluff, based on what she knows of me. She knows it’s a weakness of mine, that’s all. She’s shooting in the dark. I’ve won, and there’s nothing she can do about it —

Post comment:

JennyTricks: THINK YOU’RE SO SMART, DON’T YOU? YOU SHOULDN’T HAVE TRIED TO CHEAT ON ME. AND IF I FIND THAT YOU’VE LAID AS MUCH AS A FINGER ON ANY OF MY CERAMICS I’LL BREAK YOUR FUCKING NECK, OK?

OK, game over, JennyTricks. I think I’ve exhausted my tolerance. Places to go, people to see, crimes to commit, and all that jazz. There are plenty of opportunities for a man of my skills in Hawaii. Plenty of places to explore. Perhaps I’ll message you from there. Till then, Jenny, whoever you are —

11

You are viewing the webjournal of blueeyedboy

Posted at : 05.32 on Friday, February 22

Status: restricted

Mood: scared

Listening to: Abba: ‘The Winner Takes It All’

OK. Joke over, thinks blueeyedboy. This isn’t funny any more. She knows too much about him, of course; it’s almost beginning to get to him. He stands up, though it hurts terribly. The room does one of those choppy swoops. He holds on to his desktop to keep from falling over.

Bip! That mailbox sound again. This time he ignores it. He slings his bag across his shoulder, still leaning on to the desk for support.

Bip! Another message. Someone has posted on badguysrock!

But he’s halfway across the landing now, leaning on the banister. Badguysrock is an island from which he is suddenly desperate to escape. Each step he takes is an effort, but he’ll walk out if it kills him. No crawling for blueeyedboy. He’s going to make that fucking plane —

He’s concentrating so hard that the sound of the car hardly registers, and when it stops on the driveway it takes him some seconds to react.

Police, here already? thinks blueeyedboy.

A car door slams. He hears the crunch of footsteps approaching in the snow. A door key ratchets and turns in the lock. The front door opens quietly. He hears the sound of boots on the mat. A double thud. Then the sound of bare feet across the parquet hall floor.

They found the keys. That’s all, he thinks. They let themselves in. Two detectives. He can see them in his mind’s eye: a man and a woman (there’s always one). He will be plain and businesslike; she will be kinder, more sensitive. But — why did they take their boots off, he thinks? And why on earth didn’t they ring the bell?

‘Hey!’ His voice is rusty. ‘Up here!’

No one replies. Instead, a scent of cigarette smoke winds its way up the stairwell. Then comes a small and slithery sound, like a snake — or a long piece of electrical cord sliding across a polished floor.

Panic wrenches at him now. He falls against the banister. He tries to get up, but his legs are on strike. Cursing, he crawls back into his room. Not that that will protect him now; the door is off its hinges. But there’s always his computer, he thinks; his refuge; his island; his sanctuary.

He logs back on to badguysrock. Two messages await him.

He reads them as the room spins dizzily around him. His eyes are streaming; his head sore; his stomach filled with razor blades.

From the stairs, relentlessly, comes the sound of footsteps.

‘Who’s there?’ His voice is raw.

‘Ma, please? Is that you?’

No reply but those feet on the stairs, coming up so steadily. With shaking hands, he begins to type. The footsteps reach the landing. A slithery sound on the carpet. Blueeyedboy types faster. He cannot, dare not, stop typing. Because if he stops, he’ll have to turn round, and then he’ll have to look at her —

But of course, this is only fic. Blueeyedboy doesn’t believe in ghosts. Even as he types the words he knows that this is Albertine. She couldn’t leave him after all; she stopped to read her mail, then turned back, knowing that he needed her help. And the phantom reek of Marlboros is only in his mind, he thinks, and the scent of L’Heure Bleue is so powerful that it cannot possibly be real. No, it’s only Albertine, who has come to save him —

‘I knew you wouldn’t leave me, Beth.’ His voice is weak and grateful.

Albertine makes no reply.

‘You gave me a hell of a scare, though. I thought you were my mother.’ He tries a laugh, which sounds more like a scream. That slithering sound comes closer.

‘I guess that makes us even now. I’ll even admit I deserved it.’

Still no reaction from Albertine. Behind him the footsteps come to a stop. He can smell her now, a rose in the smoke.

She says: ‘I brought your medicine.’

‘Ma?’ he whispers.

‘Ma? Ma?’