Insularfield

In the dimming twilight I’m inside.

Cats and dogs outside.

Stuffy hot and vanilla and pine in here.

In through the bathroom window left ajar. Mucky footprints on the windowsill. Broken figurine on the carpet floor.

Not as able as I once was.

Agility being lost, waistline being gained.

The specks of rain wiped from my glasses. The zip from my paper boiler suit being loosened. Uncomfortably warm. Bathroom window left open in the growing dimness of the twilight.

Blackening by each sniff from my cold.

Cats and dogs outside.

Stuffy hot and vanilla and pine in here; making me feel like puking.

I take the nub end from my pocket and drop it through the open window on to the concrete below. Blue nitrile gloves. Hiding the truth.

I leave this room and the heavy patter of rain from outside. Its lingering threat to slice open a gash in the clouds been ever present all day.

I move in to the corridor, deeper in to the belly of the house.

Darkness. I fumble around for my maglite. The place spotless.

Cats and dogs outside.

Stuffier and hotter and suffocating from vanilla and pine the further I tread. Droplets on my brow; soaking in to the hood from my paper boiler suit. Dirty and damp oversized 11’s on the immaculate pile; swept in the same direction.

For her pleasure.

This house a shrine to house proud middle aged grandmothers. Where son’s-in-laws dread to tread. Their heads screaming from vanilla and pine. Their minds elsewhere thanks to the stuffy hot that makes them want to puke.

This house in the twilight that passes over to darkness, on a sodden Friday night in March.

The weekend when the clocks go forwards.

1996.

Chatsworth Drive.

Berry Hill.

Mansfield.

Nottinghamshire.

In this place it shall continue.

Where foul deeds are necessary to dust away dirty fingers and mischievous acts.

Cats and dogs and fortunate windows helping a task. Keeping bodies off the streets. Prying eyes behind eagerly drawn curtains. Window panes remaining intact and preventing unfortunate accidents for my less able body.

Agility being lost, waistline being gained.

-‘Take what you want’ he’d said ‘Just don’t be stupid. I know I can trust you’.

I’m not a needy person. They call me simple. In the nicest of terms though, you must understand.

I have no use for such nice things. Just paying the bills.

I walk past the silverware and gadgets. I pick up the lying money. Be foolish to leave questions by just letting it sit there.

The nice things are for other people to fawn. These things I have no use for in my life.

It’s my life that they call simple. It’s not me that they call simple. They can trust me. You must understand that.

Cats and dogs outside, knocking at the windows.

Wishing they were inside with me and the stuffy hot and the vanilla and pine.

Aggravating my sinuses and my cold.

Making me want to puke.

Making me prefer being out there. In the dark on Chatsworth Drive.

Berry Hill.

Mansfield.

Nottinghamshire.

1996.

On the final Friday of March before the clocks go forward.

-‘Break a few things’ he said.

-‘Take a few things’ he said.

-‘Make it look like an unfortunate interruption’ he said.

-‘I know I can trust you’.

Foul deeds are necessary to dust away dirty fingers and mischievous acts.

In a bedroom I turn out some draws. I sniff some knickers, in my shame. They smell of vanilla and pine.

I pull a mattress from the bed.

I strip a wardrobe of its wares.

The same in the following bedroom.

The same in the small study that is full of papers and locked filing cabinets that bust with the knock of a lump hammer.

I pay no attention to what’s inside. I’m not a needy person. Just a simple man with simple needs who’s not as able as he once was.

Lights sweep the walls of the dining room, like a flash from the heavens on this black and stormy night.

A night when the cats and dogs would sooner be inside amongst the stuffy hot and the vanilla and pine, the purposely swept carpets and the ransacked rooms. Filled with nice materialistic things that doesn’t interest a man of simple needs; and the unpleasantness that is about to unfold.

Just paying the bills.

A key in the door.

A dropping of carrier bags.

A sharp wafting of a soaked umbrella.

The mutterings of a needy bladder.

The positioning of a middle aged man, who is less able than he once was.

Agility being lost, waistline being gained.

Balanced in the darkness of a hallway corridor doorway, dressed in a paper boiler suit and blue nitrite gloves. For her pleasure.

Spectacles poised on the bridge of a prominent nose. Face circled by the drawn paper hood. That zip pulled back tight. Uncomfortable from the stuffy hot and the vanilla and pine. Uncomfortable from the cold that had lingered for days.

The flashing of a blade from my side as she approached, turning on a hallway light. An energy saving bulb excusing itself as it begs its pardon to shine its initial dim beam.

A dim beam that glints in the steel briefly as it leaves my side and greets her neck; burying itself through the flesh under her flabby chin.

Agility being lost, waistline being gained; but still possessing an unnerving swiftness.

I shush in to her ear. My arm wrapped around her as I ease her to the purposely swept carpet.

Big saucer bloodshot eyes staring back at me.

Bubbles of red flecked saliva from the corner of her lipsticked mouth.

A horrible acceptance across her ailing features.

She smells of vanilla and pine.

And as I ease her to the purposely swept carpet I hold her in an embrace that allows her a comfortable plummet.

She of nice material things.

Me a simple man unrequiring of needy wares.

Lowering her to the ground in an embrace where we might as well be lovers.

Shushing in to her ear.

A blade inside her neck.

Those saucer-like bloodshot eyes and the last ebbs of her life focused solely on me and my thick rimmed spectacles.

Us embracing where we might as well be lovers, down here on the purposely swept carpet, amongst the vanilla and pine.

A commotion by the front door.

An unexpected visitor.

Cats and dogs following them inside.

A breathy call out.

A question unheard.

A disbelieving silence.

An unspeakable and unexpected horror.

A middle aged man losing his agility and gaining a waistline swiftly across the hallway corridor.

A blood covered blade in his hand.

An apologetic energy saving light bulb welcomed on.

Through the vanilla and pine and over by the gaping door, where the stuffy hot loses its effects and the cats and dogs are scrapping for attention.

A blue nitrine gloved hand to a mouth of a younger woman.

A blade plunged in to a belly.

Eyes like saucers; only fuller and brighter and not searching for an embrace.

Not needing a lover, only an explanation.

Where foul deeds are necessary to dust away dirty fingers and mischievous acts.

A body pinned to a wall by a large man of simple needs and brute strength.

An energy saving light bulb coming on. Another life going out.

An unexpected visitor.

Slipping to the doorway floor amongst the cats and dogs.

A knife in her midriff as another soul departs. Without an explanation. Not needing a lover.

Just paying the bills.

I stand and peer outside in to the black evening.

A car on the driveway.

Headlights off. Internal lights on.

A boot open.

Nobody else in sight.

A blood-soaked middle aged man of diminishing agility but a gaining waistline is away on to the soaking tarmac. Feet splashing amongst the deepening puddles.

Orange glow from the humming street lights, flickering blue glows of TV sets and the pattering feet from cats and dogs are the only signs of life.

I rip off the paper boiler suit at the corner of Chatsworth Drive and Southgreen Hill.

Berry Hill.

Mansfield.

Nottinghamshire.

1996.

The last Friday in March before the clocks go forwards.

I take off my thick rimmed spectacles and wipe the blood from them with the paper boiler suit.

Black Scotch Lane, just past Berry Hill Park. I have left my Lambretta beneath an oak tree on the yellow No Parking zigzag lines outside of the school.

It has a baby blue powder paint finish and cut polished chrome.

Original Italian built.

Innocenti of Milan.

1965.

A much loved project for a man of simple needs.

I lift the seat and wrap the boiler suit inside.

I add the blue nitrite gloves. Ribbed for their pleasures.

I put on my faceless helmet and wipe the cats and dogs from my thick rimmed spectacles.

Kick up the machine.

Look over my shoulder.

Signal.

Manoeuvre.

Away.

Foul deeds used to dust away dirty fingers and mischievous acts.