Day 174 - Upside Down- Chapter 22 - (1577 words)

©Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 22

After

The money was at once larger and smaller that they thought. A million dollars, there certainly was a lot of it, notes everywhere in large denominations. Most of the smaller notes were gicen out in change, the larger ones snagged early on and deposited into the cash boxes. Mostly fiftys and twentys were here, so it was tagged and bound neatly in five thousand dollar clips, then into bundles of fifty thousand. That took a little less thah half the cash they had managed to take away. It must have been more than the days takings even with all the pre christmas sales that were on.
James had counted it all twice. So much more than they expected, more than they thought possible and yet here it was. Had they collated a few days into one, were they laundering money illegally through the sales? It didn’t make sense, there was so much of it here.
And yet it was not a room full of money, it all fit into a 3 large bags, stuffed to the edges but none the less fitting inside them. It didn’t seem real, this amount this endless repetition of pictures that individually excited but en masse seemed to lose their appeal. Psychologicaly of course this was a lot of money, but you had to get around the idea in your mind. This bundle was fifty thousand dollars, right here in James hand.
Fifty thousand.
What couldn’t you buy with fifty thousand dollars?
What could you buy with it? What could you buy with it and not be suspicious? Drugs, illegal goods, stolen stuff maybe? What kind of store would accept this kind of cash? You could easily spend fifty, a hundred even a couple of thousand at once, but anything kind of like maybe five, maybe less than that? The thought of the guilt it implied that people may look at them, see what they did and see the sanguine colour of it’s personality and history. They’d have to buy things worth four thousand dollars, two hundred and fifty times over. That would take a while and be equally suspicious.
They’d need a lawyer to help them hide the money, and then they would charge for that. Probably a lot as they would know it was illegally come by. Then Ivan would undoubtedly complain or object, maybe even block them from doing that. He’s going to insist he can launder it or something, he must know people right? James was panicing over possibile outcomes already, yet none were a certainty.
Property, property was the right thing to buy. Again the problem is converting the cash, once you need to buy a legititmate item like land or a house you can certainly find bargains, but you start to leave trails every where. If they bank it then at some point the interest is lodged with the Inland Revenue and then questions are asked. Where did the money come from? They could claim Lotto of course, like they would when Manisha asked – but she was easy to hide the truth from, she couldn’t check and would not think to do so. The Inland revenue though, they were a different kettle of fish.
It’s so tempting to just move it all somehow and get out of the country.
How do you move cash like this? They check one bag, one time and it’s all over. They could convert it to foreign cash, but then again they’d have the same problems, they’d have to use small amounts to convert at a time and then they’d still have an unexplained million dollar equivalent in foreign currency.
“You would not think it was so hard to be rich all of a sudden right?” James tossed a bundle of fifty’s in the air catching it each time. It represented so much and yet was completely alien and unavailable to them at the same time.
“Not if you didn’t earn it I guess.” Sam had been thinking the same thing. Their plans had been for much smaller amounts. Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, split three ways, minus expenses it was not a big deal to hide or transfer. But three hundred and fifty thousand dollars each? That was all of a sudden insurmountable to them. Any excess cash would have had to been dealt with carefully, but now it seemed like a burden that could not be lifted.
“You know we’ll have to move this right? And soon yeah?” James was stuffing the bundles and clips back into the bags, looking at the foor the whole time.
“We could turn this in I suppose.” Sam rubbed his head as he said it he knew that would be a mistake.
“Then we are murderers. Not thieves or scammers or lovable rogues piulling off a Guy Ritchie–esque caper. Then we are actually seen as murderers. You know we are already, but then that’s all we’ll be and everyone will know we are. For the rest of our lives, murderers.”
“Yeah.” Sam knew they had to deal with the money anonymously. It could never go back to the owner, it could never be seen or discovered in it’s current form. That would put lie to the deceipt they had worked so hard to make truth.
“And Ivan is a murderer. Stone. Cold.” James didn’t look at him, but he meant every punched syllable to hit home as if it was stared down.
“You don’t know for sure, you can’t know.”
“Unless we ask him of course.”
“Oh yes that makes sense, hey Ivan? Silly question, you’ll laugh really you will, but were you trying to kill us instead that day? Really? Must have been a bit of a surprise to see us in a non crispy capacity later on yeah?”
Neither man followed on from the sarcasm.
They kept packing the bag in silence until all the money was away. Not a single clip, bundle or solitary note had been removed from the bag. The haul was intact as it should have been. No one dared to break the holy seal of communion with the crime. To cross that line was acceptance.
Acceptance of death and a violent, tortuous end.
Sam sat down on Jame’s couch with a soft thump of air and rubbed his head, it was fast becoming a natural state to deal with his stress and frustration this way. Rub his head till the the thoughts rushing about calmed down.
He looked at his friend, as scared as he was. “Where do we put it if we can’t leave it here?”
“I have a key to Ange’s storage locker. She gets me to check on it every couple of months or so. I have two keys, mine and a back up. The third is with her in London. She’s… well she’s probably never coming back, not to me at least.”
“That’s a shame, I liked her.”
“Well she was fun, but unpredictable and hard work, but fun. And … well you know what she would get up to. I certainly got the ride of my life. I wasn’t the only one. I stopped minding when I knew it was temporary. She was open about being a slut. I mean I would never call her one, she was just free spirited and adventurous and didn’t care what people thought. I, well you know how that went. You were there, you saw some of that. I can’t believe the things we did, the things I went along with. Fun. She was definitely fun.” James was lost in a reverie of his sexual past.
“Yes. I belived I already said I liked her.” Sam shook his head, James always over explained things. It didn’t matter too much to him, they knew each other so well. The repeated stories, the tales that grew with the telling. That sense that James was always on the look out for life’s big adventures, but Sam knew that he was simply waiting for things to happen to him. Sometimes they did, most times they did not.
“We should move this tonight. Now. I’ll give you the key.”
“You know, we could afford to do a bit of travel with this kind of money. When the heat dies down.”
“Yeah, how long will that be though?”
“Who knows, but not forever. Maybe I’ll go look her up in London.”
“Ange?”
“Yes, Ange. I’ve always fancied a go.” Sam kept a straight face, it was a gift from his parents early death.
“Oh?” James wore his heart on his sleeve and was easy to wind up.
“Yes, I’m sure by now the mandatory waiting period is over for the Bro Code.” He was saying this thoughtfully, as if seriously considering the waiting period. Like he really would walk in his friends footsteps.
“Um, it’s like 2 years or…” Then the realisation. “You creepy bastard.”
“Lighten up James. We’re rich.”
“Fat lot of good this will do us if we’re dead.”
“Why would you even think that?” Sam knew the answer, he said nothing but James knew that they both saw the reality of the threat. They had partnered with an unstable man. One who would gain an extra seven hundred thousand dollars from their demise.
Seven hundred reasons. One million reasons.

It did not bear further thought at all.

Day 173 - Upside Down- Chapter 21 - (1599 words)

©Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 21

After

Detective Sherry knew there was something wrong.
He knew it. There was definitely something odd here.
But the evidence, such as it was suggested otherwise. The case was closed as an accidental death because it obviously was. Suspicious behaviour? Yes. People with things to hide? Definitely.
Guilty? Of what?
It could be as innocuous as screwing the wrong persons wife, maybe that’s whats setting off his alarm bells. Greg Nixon was a cock and no one was really that upset about him being dead.
They all knew they had to be of course, social expectations and all but even the widow did not seem that affected. She was covered, the company was covered and the guy who lost a million dollars up in smoke and his supposed best friend was also covered.
Then there’s these two guys.
Something about them is off. Can’t put my finger on it. Something is just … wrong.
Sherry laughed suddenly at a random thought.
Two guys, single in their early thirties spending a LOT of time together, no girlfriends visible. Why didn’t he think of that before.
He shook his head, I thought we were all open about this kind of thing these days? Whats the problem. Closeted idiots, made me think they were plotting the death of the boss for a minute there.
And just like that the closed case was now closed to Detective Sherry.
Nothing makes sense until it makes sense.
Day 20

Before

The walls of his daughters room were white, but everything else in the room was pink and yellow, Jennifer Nixon's favourite colours from when she was able to name them onwards.
She was 4 years old and very well mannered, a mixture of her mother's demeanour and her father's drive to get things done. As he sat on his haunches and listened to her lecturing him on how important it was to be nice to people and how the food pyramid worked Greg marvelled at how this amazing, cute and friendly child was related to him at all.
Was he like this once? Not according to his mother who had labelled him a holy terror for as long as he could recall. He had worked his whole life to live up to that moniker and she never ever gave him a moment to forget it. He visited her once a week in the home she was in, her health had improved over the summer but it was shaping up to be a bad winter, maybe it would be bext if she stayed a little longer there.
Maybe it would be better if she didn't poison his daughters mind any further against him, she always found an opportunity to label him in some way, whether it be for control or for an effort to "help" him be a better person, it didn't matter. It didn't stop. He'd never be good enough.
His wife was barely better than that. She was cool and calm in front of the kids and others of course, but he felt less than grateful for such small mercies. She too had taken every available private opportunity to push him into a corner and ensure what it was that she wanted, needed for her children.
My Children, she had called them from day one, like Greg didn't fit in the equation. Yes they bore his surname as did his wife, but it had always felt temporary, like it was a loner while waiting for the luxury car that was in the shop.
His daughter on the other hand, she loved him unconditionally. This was something worth fighting for, dying for, working for. The demands of others were needles in his side, pinpricks that were sharp to the point of being painful, but not long lasting. His daughters future though was the Damoclean threat that cut gaping wounds that would never heal. That inadequacy frightened him terribly. Each new school term, each must-have item that made his daughter the elite child she deserved to be - each one of those costs reminded him how successful he needed to be.
This home, the moated castle where all could be defended cost a lot of money. Mortgaged and leveraged beyond belief but comfortably held for now. Months, years they come and go. Contracts were inked in the blood of his responsibility to her. She was bright and bubbly, incandescently perfect in his eyes and nothing would denied to her.
She would not be spoiled, oh that would never do. She wasn't the type to let it go to get to her head anyway, she was too nice. Where did she get that from? It befuddled him constantly.
She would prance about granting wishes to her toys and to her friends, the ones that he allowed in the house. Beneficent in her majesty, a queen on the throne at such a young age.
He listened to her without really hearing what she was saying, it was unimportant the content of her words after all. They likely meant everything to her right here and now but in five minutes she will have easily moved on to a new topic and that will be her next all consuming passion.
What mattered was her tone. It was earnest and unreserved for him, her father. Others, strangers and the grandparents were held at a shy distance, not a long way to most people but a cavernous chasm to Greg who could see it from the same side as his daughter. That was immense to be there, a position of privilege, influence and therefore responsibility. It's true she held the same affection for her mother, but she hugged and cuddled with her father more. The trust and the attention were less structured in Greg's mind and he loved her all the more for that.
His phone rang.
Work trunk line, he recognised the numbers an extension at work.
"What the..."he looked at his daughter and curtailed his language. That clipped his tones when he answered the call.
"Yes?" He did not identify himself, after all they called him.
"No. No. Are you... joking? What makes you fuc... uhh, what makes you think I'll do that?" His temper is rising. Stupid decisions, decisions that affect the company because morons can't think ahead. Here he is providing for his family and he can barely leave the office for 5 seconds before someone takes a knife to the support for his daughters future.
Why can't people think for themselves, instead of being stupid and then calling him to confirm how stupid they are? What is wrong with people? Are they that fucking selfish?
Greg's blood pressure is ramping up steadily and he can feel the flush in his cheeks and his temples. He can't let them do this, dammit, he'll have to go in.
"Just don't do anything. Leave it alone you'll only make matters worse. Can you do that? Huh? Can you? Can you manage to do nothing and not completely fucking ruin my business in the 15 minutes it'll take me to get to the office to clean up your mess? Jesus of all the runs to be late on, I'll have Hansen's guts on a ... " he looked at his daughter and tailed off the descriptive evisceration he had been about to detail.
He stabbed at the phone, but his anger didn't translate to the touch screen nature of the smartphone he had recently upgraded to. He wanted something he could slam down, or click off in a physical way with more emotion than the light skin contact required.
He stood up and tried to drain the flushed anger out of his voice and out of his face.
"Daddy has to go to work darling, Mummy will look after you ok?"
"Ok daddy." Her voice has saddened, another crime by those morons at work. They're killing his family and his daughter for their incompetence.
"It's ok darling, Daddy will be home later."
His wife Gail appeared at the door and looked at his slowly whitening face, draining of anger but visibly still tense. She looked at Jennifer and saw disappointment, a mirror appeared in her own expression.
"Daddy has to go to work darling, we'll have fun and see him later." She shot him with a look. "If he can find time for his actual family that is. Are you ok honey bunny?" She is over solicitous in her remarks to accentuate the void of distaste he placed between her and her husband.
"Daddy has to go. He was playing with the angry box." Jennifer twirled a comforting finger in her hair
"The angry box?" Greg was startled by the term.
"Silly! The angry box, you know!" Jennifer pointed to his phone and repeated her logic, "The angry box."
Gail smeared him with a look that painted a picture of too many negative emotions for Greg to process.
He had to go, he could deal with it later, he would deal with it later.
"Okay, we'll play later yeah? Daddy will bring you home a treat tonight ok?"
"Hey! Don't try and buy your way out of this mister." She had instinctively turned her daughter away from him, trying to shield her from him as if this was somehow hurting her. Jennifer frowned at her mother, then smiled over to her dad.
His frustration melted away and he smiled back.
"See you tonight little bear."
He waved and walked backwards to the door.

Jennifer's final memory of her father was the way she knew him, the way no one else did.

Day 172 - Upside Down- Chapter 20 - (2635 words)

©Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 20

Before

“Look out!” Manisha’s voice cut in shrill and piercing in the cab of ivan’s truck.
Ivan had already seen the child out of the corner of his eye as he frolicked dangerously close to the intersection he was approaching. Instinctively he had raised his foot from the gas pedal, slowing slightly and allowing the car behind, already tailgating to edge closer.
The thinkable had happened and the child, half balanced on the wheeled board shot randomly ahead and the look of terror and excitement on his face was amplified by the situation. Ivan had already slammed on the brakes before Manisha had opened her mouth to scream.
A squealing burning of road and tyre later and the truck was halted, hard bouncing to still a few metres from the child. The releif lasted less than a second as the truck jolted forward a few meters as the tailgating car behind slammed into the rear and pushed them forward.
The child, a few feet from the front of the truck was struck by the second collisions movement and thrown off the board, which flicked up and out from under him. The child’s father was on the way to get him and had felt that same relief as he saw Ivan stopping in time, and the same polar switch when the truck shunts forward again. He cannot stop his son from being jolted off the board, or from landing roughly on the sealed road. The child is on his feet before the father grabs him and picks him up, even though he had not done so in years since he had grown so much.
The impact, the grazed elbows and hands, the sudden violent snatching up from a frightened father and the location of all this sent tears to his eyes and he started crying out of fear and shock more than pain.
Manisha was out of the truck and around the front trying to see the damage to the child, her phone already in her hand calling for an ambulance. The child would probably just walk it off eventually but she was in full protection mode and she inserted her self into the parents embrace, simultaneously checking for wounds and dealing with the emergency operator.
Ivan was staring into the rear view mirror at the car that had rear ended him.
He wondered briefly if he could get some work out of this accident. The child looked ok, and that car behind looked like a last year new, luxury saloon car. The parts and labour could make this Sunday drive profitable.
Then the driver of the car behind exited and Ivan could see his face. He knew that look straight away. This was not going to go well. There were telltale signs in his face, the stride he took to come forward and that he was focussing ahead on the parent, the child and his wife. The driver had not even looked sideways as he passed the trucks cab to see the driver.
Ivan waited and as the man started screaming and abusing the people in the intersection he opened the driver door and stood down to the tarmac.
Taking position behind him the driver of the car that had rear ended him was about Ivan’s size and shape, even match apart from the vicious anger that seemed to be frothing out of him. Manisha looked frightened and angry at the same time and inctinctively put herself in front of the child anf the father who were still trying to make sense of the childs state of mind and health when this holy angel of rage descended on them.
The man was gesticulating wildly while screaming about the stupidity, the thoughtlessness and the damage to his car, his brand new car that cost more than anyone here made in a year. Or so he said more than once. He raised his arm quite some way when Ivan casually, to any observer, fastened to it and held it firm.
The sudden change in velocity of this arm over balanced the man and he stumbled forwards towards Manisha. Ivan yanked him back towards him, and given the mans weight and position, this was not comfortable or easy to manage.
He still moved, pivoting clumsily on his heels and seeing Ivan eye to eye calm and clear of purpose. His anger still peaking, but a cold reality seeping into it the man decided that fight was a better option that flight.
He swore and cursed as he tried to strike blindly. His centre of gravity was off, his arm trapped in a grip he had not accounted for and the fist glanced off of a shoulder and Ivan never took his eyes off the man.
He saw it coming.
The police arrived minutes later and took control.
Ivan was a picture of control and self assurance. Manisha was gushing about her husband and how his reflexes and level headed ness had saved lives and prevented further hurt. The father of the child was apologetic to everyone.
The police understood what was going on.
The man that Ivan had punched had figured out the lay of the land already and was silently lead away, guilt and reason were for other days and better legal minds than his.
Ivan and Manisha got home much later and inspected the damage to the back of his truck. It was built strong and durable. It was a dent or three that Ivan would probably give to an apprentice to deal with if he had one this year. He did not, he could not afford even the cheap labour that a government scheme would bring. He could not afford an extra pair of eyes that would see what else fueled his business.
His father came in from his room above the garage, Ivan had finished it the year before so that his Dad would always be around to be watched when he was at work. Years in the wasteland had taken their toll.
A look from the old man asked many questions about the dents.
Manisha told the whole story breathlessly, the villain of the piece becoming more dastardly and maniacal in the retelling.
“He was just an asshole who thought too much of his car and himself than made good sense, Dad. That’s all.”
“Did you give him your card? Business is busines boy.”
Ivan shook his head and nodded towards Manisha, if she had not been there then it could have been different, but lines were crossed. Men understand these things, husbands and fathers. He got a nod in return and a proud pat on the arm, swelling pride flooding in from all sides.
“What an interesting day. What time is your brother coming over babe?”
“Oh shit, yes. I mean, oh yes, yeah. Sorry, must mind my language. It’s been a weird day. He’ll be at ours in – an hour or so, and he’s bringing James.”
“Ah, it’ll be good to meet him.”

After

A cold spinning, sinking depth fell on the cab of the truck.
There was no way out. It was now obvious, death was coming in this space.
The doors would not budge, the windows not even a crack, and bulletproof.
Bullet resistant, how many times had he been corrected on that fact?
So the windows, again no purchase and no escape. The truck was on fire, he could see the flames but not yet feel them. How yellow they were, real beyond real and the heat. Could he feel the heat, yes of course he could.
Sweat was dripping off him in rivers. A crazy second and the though occurs that it could dampen the flames or slow it’s progress, like burning a damp cloth.
There’s no smoke.
There’s no smoke in here only flames. Flames getting closer and closer.
He can see people outside, banging on the window and they can see him shouting at him to get out, get out.
He can’t get out.
His leg catches fire, the flames licking up the trousers and burning into him, he can barely fell it – is this shock, is this the inevitability of death? The world is spinning and all of his clothes are on fire, he is breathing in and out flame.
Death must come soon, it will be all over.
I don’t want to die.
I don’t want to die.
He starts crying and the tears are liquid flame, lava running down his cheeks.
The van explodes and he is thrown, forcefully, gracefully outwards and upwards. Trying to catch on to anything, trying to avoid the thump of gravity as the ground will surely crush him
How high is he goig, how far is it up? So far he knows the fall will kill him, break bones and snap his burning body in half.
The elation of flight is replaced by a leaking fear as the apogee of his flight is reached and his full weight is returned to him via a single moment of perfect weightlessness.
Suspended in time and space, floating waiting to fall.
But he doesn’t.
This is a dream.
There is no comfort in this thought, he can know it’s a dream and fear the outcome as much as the reality. In a dream you can repeat this again and again. In reality you get it once.
But in reality this has already happened, and not to him.
How many times has he had this dream.
Knowing it is he is returned to earth with a gentle kiss to the ground.
There is a body, a charred body shape outlined in crackling roasted meat.
This is not his fate, because it was someone elses already. The nausea tips him aside, as air rushes around him, a wind of no source that shivers the corpse and the dreamer.
The corpses shudders after the wind has stopped and opens his eyes.
The whites are perfect and the pupils are blue. They stare accusingly at the dreamer.
Of course they do, he thinks. This is a dream and this is guilt.
But is his death really on my hands? Was this the plan? No. Was this man even supposed to be here? No.
“You brought this on yourself.” The dreamer states and feels the assurance of control in his own dream state.
With alarming speed the corpse closes the gap and grasps the dreamers throat and squuezes until the blackened and charred hands snap and crackle under their own force.
The dreamer can do nothing but cave to the pressure, unable to resist and out of control again.
I can’t breathe!
And then he awakes.
Sweaty and heart racing and gulping in air, feeling about his throat even though he knows what he was thinking and that not a second of it is real. That split second between dream and reality can be a massive divide that the body takes a long time to recover from.
“Are you ok?”
“Yes I … bad dream. I’m ok.”
But he’s not okay and he’s lying to his wife.
Ivan stands up and mumbles about getting water and he moves through the living room to the kitchen. This was going to unsettle him unless he settled with James.
That little punk was the reason for the bad dreams, he knew it. This had only happened after he had freaked out about Nixon buying it, after the police questions stopped and his questions started.
James. James had the upper hand, that bastard had his money and his manhood. He had Ivan doubting his own certainty. Him and his fucking moral high ground. This whole thing has James’s dirty hands on it the whole way through and one accidental death is the thing that tips him over?
Is it? Is it really? That fucker.
Where’s my money James? You may have my brother-in-law wrapped about your finger but you won’t have me.
I will get my powert back. I am in control.
You want nightmares son? I’ll give you fucking nightmares.
Ivan strode to the garage through the internal access door, lights never going on. He had memorised the route in the dark, just in case it was ever necessary. No fumbling, no stumbling everything in it’s proper place the drawer, third from the bottom on the metal tool chest was first to his touch, it felt natural to find this place now. He had practiced and practiced it with blindfolds and in the dark. The semi glow of the pale moon assisted of course, but his eyes were on things in his mind and his body, his sense memory operated automatically.
The gun. The power in his hands. It felt heavy, it felt hard.
It was loaded, kept that way. Safety on.
The power cam back to him. This was the stuff of nightmares, not the pansy imaginings of weak willed fools who didn’t know when to shut the fuck up about their pathetic consciences.
Conscience, he didn’t even do anything. Ivan, Ivan was responsible. Ivan made this happen, Ivan had the plan, the device, the skill, the know how, the drive and the guts. Ivan was the man, the man with the plan and the will power to make it happen.
Fucking right.
You want nightmares? Ivan closed his eyes and caressed his cheek with the gun a broad grim grin splitting his face into cruel halves. While Ican knew no one could see him, he wished that someone could. It was evil, powerful and it had presence, satisfyingly so.
I’ll give you nightmares James Hansen. Then back in your fucking box and you can take your money and fuck off.
Maybe not a full third. You don’t call the shots Mr Hansen, I call the shots.
Ivan chuckled at the apt pun.
You’ll pay for the trouble you’ve caused. You could have ruined this whole fucking thing.
I have nothing to feel guilty about. I’m good. I’m definitely good.
Ivan put the gun away, in the dark, in the third drawer and locked it away again.
He came back into the kicthen, pouring himself water from the jug in the fridge. Cold and clear and the pounding flood of blood in him subsided and his natural sense of the world returned.
Whats that smell? Leftover smell from dinner? Steak?
Steak. He had smelt it earlier that night, had connected the dots.
Burnt meat, burnt flesh.
It had killed his appetite. He had eaten, but not much.
The corpses crusted hands dropping flakes of ash onto his neck and squeezing came unbidden into his mind and what dinner he had came up along with it.
Retching into the Kitchen sink and his knees buckling below him, his elbow slammed into the sinks edge and the pain drove a wedge to him once more. A body blow to the stomach and all the water and food emptied out of him noisily.
“Ivan? Are you…” Manisha had heard the vomiting splash and the heaving of his chest, sent her out of her light sleep to come and find him.
He was huddled over the sink pale and terrified.
“Oh babe, you’re sick, here let me.” She fussed about with towels and clothes, cleaning him and the sink, settling him on the couch and sorting him out.
He knew how it looked, how bad he felt and how it made him weak and vulnerable. He was ok with Manisha thinking he was ill. Better than the truth.
Another thing that bastard will pay for.
Who does he think he is? Does he think he’ll deserve any of the money after all this? Has he got a death wish? Doesn’t he know who he’s dealing with?

Fucking Hansen.

Day 171 - Upside Down- Chapter 19 - (2111 words)

©Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 19

Before

“So what did you think?” Manisha looked at Ivan expectantly. He figured this was some kind of test, but he did not know exactly what it was.
“Well it was long?”
“Yes, they all are, the good ones anyway.”
“I liked the main guy. He was very good.”
“Which one?”
“The Father, the one with the beard. The singing and dancing, I don’t know – it’s not really my thing, but you know it doesn’t bother me if you are into that kind of stuff. I can always get on with whatever while you watch your movies. I want you to be happy, to have the chance to do what you want. I don’t have to … uh … you know …”
Manisha looked at him again, slowly examining him.
This had been her parents favorite movie, and in it they had seen a blueprint for life. It’s not really that they were that shallow, it was more that when htye had seen it they saw what they wanted their daughter and son to see in their lives. That was back in 2001, they year that they had died. Manisha was in her early teens and long came this movie, this film that somehow encapsulated all the values and goals that they wanted for their children. So they made her watch it, again and again. She was young and she enjoyed the dancing and the singing and the handsome lead actors.
But it was the father that her parents drilled her on. The duty, the care the stern attention to caring and providing the right thing for his children. Even in his stubborness and inflexilbility they saw a nobility and majesty that set this man apart. It carried the family to success and was an aspirational goal for his children and the men and woman that were around him.
The father, the man, the leader and provider.
Manisha knew it was fiction. A fantsay and stylised version of reality that in itself was never real. She also knew that her parents knew this too. She knew inside that if they had lived longer there would have been more lessons, more examples and more movies even that played to the ideals just as well, if not better.
But they did not live. They died a few months after the movie was released on VCR cassette and that original, now unplayable tape was the link she had to her parents principles.
If they had still been alive she thought that by now she would have rebelled and reviled against that dominant philosophy.
They were not alive, and there was no one to fight. She grew up fast and looked out for her little brother the same way that Amitabh looked out for his family. She did not bend or break and she always knew better. That was the man, the kind of head of a family she wanted.
She did not see that she had become that herself. It was still an external force to her, one she desired and sought.
Ivan saw something of a kinship in the older man in the movie. He knew better and did better. Yes he made mistakes, but no one ever knew him as anything but the strong and capable man. The father, the leader. Everyone obeyed, even when they didn’t like it.
Respect, pride and power.
“He was like my father. When I was young, before my mother ruined it all.”
Manisha did not expect that and sat stunned, saying nothing.
“I would be happy if I were even a quarter as good as that man. Of course it’s just a movie.” Ivan shrugged the thought away, he had seen a kindred spirit yes. A fictional one, the real world as nothing like that he knew. If he had that kind of money, that kind of power and that kind of respect. If he had them. He certainly wanted them. He wanted that look in her eyes, the way that Nandini had looked at yash. Manisha had dropped careless nuggets of trivia when she had seen his patience for the musical numbers waning, that the head actors, the parents, were married in real life. He saw past the fiction, to the reality that she looked at Amitabh they way he wanted Manisha to look at him.
She was looking at him now with new eyes, and he felt a connection back to that sensation of respect he picked up on from the film. He leaned towards her, deliberatley accentuating his height over hers and kissed firmly but without force.
He felt he body melt into it and her eyes, which had been tracking his facial exprressions, his body language and looking for anything, closed slowly and stayed closed until well after the kiss had ended.
She opened them again slowly as if waking up for the first time.
Day 18

After

Neither said anything for a long while, Sam was sitting forward his hands clasped, Manisha sitting sideways her knees and feet pointing towards the door.
Manisha breaks the silence.
“I can’t stay here. There’s too much here.”
Sam still says nothing but his hands clasp tighter.
“Do you have anything to say to me?”
“Like what? Do you want me to say something?”
Manisha sighed, she wasn’t sure if she wanted him to talk her out of it or if she wanted to talk her brother into coming along. This thing with James, it was complicating matters.
“What do you think about me leaving? Do you think I should? Do you want me to go?”
Sam paused a long time after opening his mouth to speak, but closed it again in silence, unsure himself.
“Jesus Sam say something.”
“Where will you go?”
“I don’t know, maybe back to India, you know to the grandparents house in Mumbai, they’re quite well off. Mum always said we could always go back there if things were bad here. You met them at the funeral do you remember? You were still quite young?”
“I remember them.” He wasn’t that young, but his memories of the funeral were still very vivid regardless.
People he didn’t know wanted to talk to him, ask him how he was feeling and hug him. It was very confrontational and far from the intended comforting the fellow grievers thought they were imparting. At first he had answered their questions, truthfully because he was confused and didn’t quite understand. He knew what death was of course, but the connection to reality that both of his parents were dead. That was a hard thing to accept, to understand. Everytime he made mention of wanting to see them again, whether it be a wish or a passing desire to think them aloive but elsewhere, he was confronted again.
It took him years to process the funeral in his mind, and he did it alone. The one thing he learned from the death of his parents was to understand how people lie. When he shared the primitive feelings of fear and isolation he had, he was given either a dose of comforting lies with gentle embraces or hard truths with gentle embraces. When people had a hard time dealing with something it always came with physical contact for some reason. They told the “sleeping forever” lie with a hug and a kiss, and usually tears. They told the “death means no longer alive and you’ll never see them again” truth with the exact same acoutrements.
There were so many tears that almost everyone he spoke to cried when he did.
So he stopped talking to people.
He still had said words of course and answered questions, but he stopped touching people and when people touched him he hardened up. It was like hugging a rock in his mind, he had become as stone. He had been a mirror reflecting what people asked or wanted, but now he was merely surface and things skidded off of him with no effect.
People stopped crying near him and were worried about his state of mind at first but the more they tried to say there was something wrong with him? The more Manisha pushed back and drew a cricle around his behaviour.
He had retreated to his keep, but she had dug the moat around and filled it with cold deatchment that only she had the bridge over.
Now she was leaving.
He didn’t need her anymore, had not for years but he had always assumed that she had needed to look after him, that he had filled that need in her that their parents had created. She was the barrier to the outside, and being that was more fulfilling than being in touch with whatever he was feeling.
Symbiosis.
Now she was going.
“India? It’s a long way, is it best to bring up your son there?”
“I have a name for him, I’ve been talking with our grandparents a lot. They started calling when the trial started and news got back to them. They were very concerned for you. They insisted on talking to you and making sure you were good.”
Sam looked at the floor.
“I told them not to worry about you, that you were fine. “
“Thank you.”
“Well they would have just gone on and on until, well this was easier.”
“I never say thank you to you enough.” He had decided in his mind.
“If you hadn’t been there to protect me when I was young?” She should go, start again.
“When I was a boy, when I needed you, you were there. You were like them then, you still are.” She should refocus on her son, whatever name they had chosen. She did not need to be encumbered by the past, a past he had brought on her. A past with a dead husband she didn’t really know and would not be happy to find out about.
“Your son…?”
“Manprasad. It means gentle and calm in mind, apparently.” Manisha felt him letting go, her decision to leave and start anew was like a child leaving home. His letting go was taking that first step out of the home, even though it was her departing.
“Manprasad, that’s a good name. Manprasad needs you to be his mother, it’s time for me to be on my own. Time for me to stand tall and be me.” He warcked his brain for a line from that movie she was obsessed with but he could only recall the songs right now, so that hastily delivered line would have to do.
Manisha nodded, she felt all sorts of things welling inside of her, pride and fear, hope and despair. They all meant very little. She felt so very small, standing on the edge of a cliff, the wind whistled about her and her world view suddenly zoomed out and she felt the distance between her brother and herself that would soon be a gulf of time and space.
“You will come visit?”
“Of course I will.”
“We’ll send money, for you to come.”
“There’s no need. I’ll send money to you.”
“Sure you will, whatever Sam.”
Manisha rolled her eyes and patted her thighs, she needed to check the baby, the monitor had been silent this whole time.
“I’m very good at saving you know. Who knows I might even win the lotto.”
“Haha? My little brother gambling? You’re not the type.” She scoffed a little noise to accompany her words.
“There are things about me you don’t know, Manisha.” Though he knew that she didn’t believe that for a second. It laid the groundwork, she would get her share, Ivan’s share.
She could never know how or why, but she had to have it. James and he agreed like they almost always did.
“When will you go?”
“When the case is over, I want to see it through and see James out of prison.”
“Sam?”
“Yes sis?”
“when you come to India to see Manprasad and your sister?” Manisha paused, unsure she was going to finish the sentence or not. She started to cry just thinking about asking, but she could not, not ask. It was too much. She may owe the man her life, but proximity was not something she could stand.
Sam understood, and patted her hands on top of her thighs.
“I will come alone.”
He hugged her with a gentle embrace.

Day 170 - Upside Down- Chapter 18 - (1150 words)

©Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 18

After

The Television News Reader was speaking over a video picture outside the High Court in Auckland. The brick and tree exterior that looked so much more colonial than new Zealand admitted about it’s national character seemed self conscious and out of place. Much like the bowed head of James Hansen as he is bustled through a crowd of cheering supporters bearing placards calling for his release. The camera tracks them through the crowd and with him is a legal team, a camera crew from another news channel trying to get in his face, policemen and at the back of them all, shadowing, was Sam. The footage changed to show a very unflattering picture of Ivan with a nasty sneer on his face.
The trial enters it’s third week today and there’s no sign that the defence being mounted by the group Family Focused Sentencing has any chance of being finished soon. The judge in the case has already warned the group to maintain respect for the courtroom and while antics inside the court have reduced to a minimum, the protests, the demonstrations and the ongoing attention that the lobby group have been organising has moved the trial to be one as much in the court of public opinion as much as it is in the high court itself.
The founder and chair of Family Focused Sentencing Glenn Chambers spoke at length today on 1ZB about the record of the courts in sentecing hardened criminals, and the groups opinion on the Maxwell killing.
“Of course criminals should be punished and harshly, but this is not even a crime. This is self defense and of course as we have all seen defense of a pregnant woman. Time after time we have seen slap on the wrist sentences handed to rapists, murderers – and I mean real murderers, not like James Hansen who is in my mind, and in the mind of millions of kiwis, a Hero – and… and what was I saying… yes. Wet paper bag jail sentences for the kind of criminals the country needs to deal with and they get out an kill again. There’s no doubt in anyone’s mind except in the PC Lobby’s and this liberal and weak willed courts that this man is absoultely no threat to anyone in this country, any one at all. In fact what he did do was save us all from the murderous rage of a man who is without a doubt an evil son of a bitch and what do we do? We put him in jail, he’s been in there what 18 months now? Awaiting the outcome of a trial that should never, ever have happened. How dare we? How dare we say it’s not okay to defend your family from violence?”
“Except, it wasn’t his family was it?”
“You’re spiltting hairs, if it were your sister pregnant and beaten by an animal like this, an animal that lived and died by a creed of violence and dominance, a mysognistic dinosaur that cared nothing about anyone but himself and what he could get from other people? Then what? Would you care that the man who saved her was not related to you? You know what? I’m not only happy to call him a hero, I’d be happy to call him my brother.”
“So you think that it’s ok to commit murder in this case?”
“There you go again, the liberal lefty Politically Correct media painting a picture of lies that fits your narrative of what you believe. This is not a murder trial, it’s manslaughter one, and that it itself is a joke.”
The defence will be calling more experts today in an effort to bolster the case for a justifiable homicide. Relatives of the deceased have argued that the lobby group is twisting the history of the man, though no one called to court has yet denied that he had a violent temper at times. Ivan Maxwells sister, who moved to Australia over a decade ago when their parents split up had this to say to Channel 9 earlier.
“You don’t really want to know the truth now do you? I mean Ivan – I didn’t know him that well, he was my younger brother and he stopped talking to me when Mum ad Dad split up. He left home as soon as he could and went to find Dad, and they just cut themselves off from Mum and me. Mum never got over that, losing him to that… that way. So no I don’t know if he was capable of the kind of thing you want to know about. He was my little brother yes, but I didn’t know him. I’ll tell you what though, I think you are all just vultures and you’ll hear what you want to hear and say what you want to say and what I think and what really happened? I don’t think you’ll ever know or care. Now I’ve given you a statement can you please levae me alone?”
The crown prosecutor has face repeated calls to drop the case, but so far has remained steadfast that it is a matter for the jury to decide and that the legal system needs space to fulfill it’s function in society. Mr Chambers has not confirmed how much has been spent on the defense of James Hansen, but the team of QC’s and consultants engaged by the lobby group are far from affordable for normal defendants. Family of Mr Hansen’s have publically thanked and praised the group and their spokes person for taking the case on and doing their best to save their son. Hansens mother spoke to our own Jessica Stevens a few days ago and made her own plea to the Attorney General to reconsider dropping the case. That clip was uploaded from our Sunday show to You Tube and soon spread on Social Media and was viewed over 10 million times. Attention for this case has reached international levels and reporters and documentatry makers have flown in this week to examine this, one of the biggest trials affected by Social Media in the history of NZ courts. Earlier today the judge banned all cell phones and tablets from the court in an effort to stem the tide of live blogging and tweeting from the court that he said was making a mockery of the legal system.
It’s unlikely that this will affect much of the close attention the trial is getting and seems to have only increased the twitter traffic around the trial and has raised questions of the transparency of the courts and the excessive censorship powers of the legal bench. The hashtag #freejameshansen was trending today after a link to the Sunday article with Mrs Hansen was retweeted by various famous actors, comedians and social commenters.

The trial resumes tomorrow morning.

Day 169 - Upside Down- Chapter 17 - (2063 words)

©Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 17

After

“You don’t say?” The detective was getting frustrated with this old woman, she had been talking about everything else except the reason he was here. She was the Maxwell’s neighbour and had told the uniforms that she had heard Ivan threatening someone only a day or so before the shooting.
So now they were back to follow up but she had wanted to chat more than she had wanted to help. Was she going to have anything useful to say ata ll? It was hard to know. She certainly lapped up the attention, he could interrupt her and ask her to get on with it but that hardly seemed fair. She was obviously lonely and missed her late husband dearly.
The way she talked about him was so endearing, it felt wrong to cut across that, a few more minutes and then gently lead her back to the subject matter.
She had started another story, one about how they had met. Dear god, I hope this is not as long as the last one. Perhaps I could get the subject matter back to the Maxwells?
“So about your neighbours, the Maxwells? You had told…”
“Yes, my husband never trusted them, never.” And then she was off on a tangnt again. At least the origin story of how they had met had disappeared, he’d have to be careful not to reignite that one. She seemed easily distracted and maybe have trouble focussing or remembering things? How valid would any information she had be? Not that it mattered for a court though, Mr Hansen had confessed, this was beging thorough. Defence would try and paint a rosy as picture as possible of the defendant and demonise the victim too.
Not that would be a hard job, he thought not for the first time.
I mean the look of that guy, poor scared small guy against this goliath of a man, with a bit of a history for… let’s say roughness shall we? The thought amused him and he chuckled out loud, wishing he hadn’t immediately.
The older lady didn’t regsiter and just kept talking over whatever he may have said or noise he may have made. The dectective got the feeling that little would make it through and that which did would have little to no impact.
Wait? Did she just call me Insector Morse? Did I hear that right?
Behind him a door opened. The distracted detective turned in his seat looking to see who had let themselves into the house. A relative perhaps a family member checking on her? Maybe they could help focus her on the subject matter.
An much older man walked through the door.
A brother perhaps? Or a neighbour? Perhaps he knows something too?
“Oh hello, I didn’t know we had company dear.”
We? Dear? What is this?
“Oh John, this man was just here. We wanted to know about the Maxwells and about you.”
“Oh? And you are?”
“Confused. I’m sorry are you this lady’s husband?” Detective Sherry was very confused. He had assumed, no he was sure she had said he was dead.
“Yes, and you?” The man looked between the two of them suspiciously.
The detective finally remembered his procedures and flashed his ID and identified himself.
“I’m sorrry but the way she talks, it was … I assumed you were … you had passed on.”
“Oh don’t be silly dear. He was always alive, he never died. Whatever gave you that idea.”
“You… everything you said, was in the past tense?” Was it now? This was confusing, and all he wanted was to hear about the Maxwells, but now he had tea, cake and a weird idea about a man who was never dead in the first place.
The husband shook his head and touched his wife on the shoulder. She was still chatting away as if the men were listening to her and not conversing with anyone but her.
“Yes thank you dear, I’d love one.” The old lady stopped in her tracks at his touch and stopped talking while she processed this. A swicth seemed to throw behind the haze descending in her eyes at the interuption and then she perked up again and bustled off to the kitchen.
“Sorry about that, Detective Sherry did you say?”
“Yes, uh am I imagining something or does she think…”
“It’s a thing, at our age, things just happen. You adjust I guess, I adjust. She’s always had an issue with tenses, with memory past and present.”
“Alzheimers?” Sherry guessed with what he thought was some delicacy.
“No.”
A raised eyebrow.
“As I said, age. It comes for us all.” The man glanced at the window that opened the view of the Maxwells driveway, and the detective came back to his original line of questioning.
“Some sooner than others.”
“Yes. I guess you want to know about the fight the other day, the one with that lad the one that… well you know who he is.”
“Yes, were you there?”
“We both were, Agnes told me she had spoken to the police. I wasn’t really expecting you to be honest. I was going to call later today and tell you all about it, I didn’t want to bother you too soon, I’m sure your busy. Usually when she tells her stories, well people thinkn they are just that. Stories. But they’re not, they’re memories and they come to her upside down and back to front. It all make sense when you see the big picture with her.”
He sat down.
“You need to take the longer view, you see more that way and you realise that it’s not just a story it’s a puzzle, you put it together and figure out what happened when. Then it makes sense. Then she makes sense. I gave up trying to re-order her when I realised. That’s just the way she sees, the way she talks and it does’t hurt to learn to listen for all of it.”
“Right. Kind of like my job.”
“I would suppose so. Just without the death.”
Again he looked sideways at the Maxwell’s.
“Usually. Usually…”
“So what can…”
“Oh yes, yes, sorry. It was the day before the … incident. We had just come in and only heard pieces of it as Ivan as shouting. We didn’t hear what James, that was his name yes? I saw it in the papers, and I had seen him here before. He was with that Indian fellow, the big one. Her brother.”
“Samir.”
“Yes. Very quiet, but I liked him. He came in and reprogrammed the VCR for us, she kept forgetting how to set the timer. He was very patient and had tea with us if he had the time”
“Milk and two sugars.”
Agnes had returned with two cups of tea, both earl grey with lemon as the detective had had previously. She had already spoken at length about how her husband used to love his tea the same way when he was around.
“Um, yes.” He looked at the tea and then at Agnes.
She looked him quite directly up and down as if he was stupid in some way.
“Milk and two sugars, he was a big lad I don’t think the sugar did him any harm.”
Ah, it was Sam’s tea she was referring to. He had know way to know that this was right or wrong. He was sure though that it would be. When you stepped back and took that long look, perhaps she was sharper than she looked. Sharper than most others even.
“Anyway, the day before that night?”
“Yes, it was late in the afternoon, it must have been after 4:30 as we were coming back from dancing.”
Another activity he had loved to do when he was around, teach Sherry to assume too much.
“Ivan was talking loudly about something, we thought it was about money.”
They didn’t really have money, so why were he and James arguing about that? Though the more he thought it was more often the lack of money that caused fights wasn’t it? Money truly did not buy happiness, but the lack of it could easily buy misery and despair.
“What makes you say that?”
“What?”
“That they were arguing about money?”
“Oh, isn’t it always about money? The kids these days.” Cliché had lead him to the concusion, not any particular clues. “Anyway, yes. Ivan, he was nice enough. He was very determined to do well. When we spoke it was always about business and family. It was never chit chat, he seemed very driven to protect his family, provide for them.”
“So he’d not be the type to hurt them?” This was different, other views had painted a very different picture.
The man looked at his wife and she was staring out the window, away in a memory of her own. In a room where they were not present. Her fingers were dancing in the air in front of her.
“I don’t believe that’s what I said detective.”
“Then what?”
“Well, then he said it. Very loud and very clear. I’m going to kill you. Do you hear me? I will … kill you if you don’t.”
“If you don’t what?”
“I don’t know? He obviously realised that he could be heard because I could hear voices, muffled but just as violent, just as intent – just not as loud or clear. We looked out the window and there he was. He had a knife to the poor boy’s throat.”
“Why didn’t you call the police then?”
“He put the knife away and tried to make like it hadn’t happened. But that poor boy, he fled, white as a ghost. I think maybe Ivan knew he was being watched and wanted to put on a show. I was not sure, and Agnes, she had stopped watching what was happening in the present when the shouting got to the death bit, she wanders you know. Not physically.”
“You could have called and let …”


“I could have, yes. But I did not, Ivan has a bit of a temper, he raises his voice and he drinks quite a lot, but I didn’t think this boy was a real threat to him though, so we said nothing.”
“But perhaps he was a threat to the boy, Ivan I mean?”
“No, I don’t think so, or I didn’t think so. I meant what I said, he was so intent on protecting and being the guard in his family. The law in his four walls, and to anyone who came into them. I had always said he would do anything to protect what was his, his family and home. Anything. You would not want to get involved with him if you were a threat to his world order, his home order.”
“Did you ever feel threatened by him?”
“Me? No, heavens no. Why on earth would I be a threat to him? Like I say he was not an aggressive man. He was a defensive one.”
“So what did you hear on the night?”
“Nothing, we were not here. We came home to see the lights and the police, come to think on it? Weren‘t you there? I seem to recall your face that night. You had on a trenchcoat, very Inspector Morse like we thought.”
“Yes, I was.”
“Yes, we saw you taking that young man away. That’s when the nice men in blue came and asked us what we knew. Agnes started telling the whole history of us and the Maxwells, she mentioned the fight in there somewhere, in no great detail. I’m surprised that he remembered it. He was very nice as I say, but he looked like he was humouring her. Serves me right for assuming about him eh?”
Indeed thought the detective.
“You know what they say about assume-ing don’t you?”
“No? What do they say?”

Oh dear he thought. How do I get myself into these situations?

Day 168 - Upside Down- Chapter 16 - (1775 words)

©Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 16

Three

That was interesting, I think she may suspect things are up. She always thinks she knows, she has instinct but no idea.
I’m still a baby in her mind.
What’s going on? I don’t know James was here, what the? I thought he was hiding, I thought…?
He looks scared, did he come here? Did Ivan go and get him? Why on earth… What is going on?
He looks unhinged.
I can’t trust him, we need to get him away from Manisha soon. Get her out of the way and deal with him, make him see reason. Make him understand. Make him stop.
Or stop him. By god I will stop him if it comes to that.
How? I can see what James meant, he really does look like he could go through with it.
Did he set that fire for James, did he make sure those doors would not open? He couldn’t have known that Greg was going to be in there, right? Look at those eyes, he is away with the fairies.
Don’t get out of my sight.
I can hear a tone in her voice, dammit. She’s in a mood, this can’t end well.
She needs to leave.
Now.
Why is James looking at me like that? Yes, thanks I can see he’s dangerous thank you very much.
Why is he looking at me?
Why is his hand behind his back?
Oh it’s empty.
There it goes again?
Is there something in his …oh no, it can’t be can it?
Step in between him and Manisha, before it’s too.
Jesus he’s unhinged, he’s really unhinged.
Fuck it is, no, no, no!
Manisha! No! You bastard, there’s no way you are going to. You cunt, I’ll fucking stop you – I don’t care you bastard, that’s my sister, you hit my sister! She’s fucking pregnant, I don’t give a fuck how big you think you are, that’s my … whats this? I have the gun.
The safety is red.
It’ll never stop. He’ll hurt her again. He has to be stopped.
Brain.
Don’t muck around, pull the trigger.
Don’t think, do.
What’s that noise?
What’s that smell.
Oh. He’s right there.
Dizzy, I … did I pull the trigger.
There’s smoke coming out of the end. My hand hurts. It kicks, it punches you back. They say it does that. I feel it now.
Did I?
James?
Ok.
What are you doing?
Fuck that’s so loud. I’m going to be sick. Why?
Don’t touch him, don’t.
I, it’s so bright in here. Why can’t I hear properly? What’s he looking for? Who is he calling?
No. No.
“You can’t.”
“I did. YOU can’t. You have to look after her. I won’t have a job, she won’t forgive me – but you can’t be the guy that killed the father of her child.”
What is he saying? Why is he doing this?
Jesus, the police, the police will be on their way.
We should leave, we need to go, get the money and go.
Go where?
Manisha? Oh my sister, are you ok? Is the baby, did he hit you there? Did he, oh I think I’m going to be sick again, the floor is moving.
Why is this happening.
“It’s done Sam, trust me. Just trust me please.”
Of course I trust you. I just don’t understand.
Is that siren?

Four

Oh that’s just fucking great, of all the fucking times to turn up. Shit.
This pissant little shit bag better keep hims mouth shut.
Dammit, I can’t think straight.
How did I get here? We had this all planned out. I’m losing control. I’m taking it back.
Now, I’m taking it back now.
Anger, get your temper in control. People will follow your lead, be decisive. Be a man.
Be the man. Be the man in chage.
Don’t wait for things to happen, take charge.
That’s it, see who I am. I am the man, I am the husband and the father.
Oh.
Father.
My baby is in there. My baby. He’ll look up to me, I won’t make the same mistakes my dad made. I’ll do better, I’ll do it better. I will be in control, I will be in control.
That’s better, that’s right.
Yes you look at me, look into my eyes. Fear what you see. You know who I am, what I am.
I am to be obeyed.
All of you will respect me.
You eyeballing me? Are you? Seriously? Look at me, LOOK AT ME! That’s right.
That’s who the fuck I am.
Why are you arguing? This is being settled.
No, no, no.
How dare you talk to me like that? Are you pushing me? Pushing me?
I push back.
Hard.
What do you think is going to happen? You’re not thinking this through woman.
You think he matters? I AM your family now. Me! And my son, we ARE you family now.
He’s an in-law now.
Respect, love? Sure but me first. US first.
Oh my god! What are you saying? Are you not fucking listening?
You need to get out of here and let the men deal with business.
What? What? What!?!
Jesus you sound like her, you look like her.
Don’t you fucking dare leave!
Why are you on the floor? Get the fuck up. There’s no time for dramatics.
Did I pull the gun out? Why is it not in my waistband.
Is she bleeding? What happened.
Fuck, he’s so heavy. Get off of me, I have to help her. Jesus, stop trying to make things worse.
She’s pregnant and that’s my baby. Why?
Manisha? What is going on.
Did I give him the gun?
Don’t look at me.
Black, Fire & Gravity.

After

The white room.
Where am I?
Ow? My head hurts.
“How are you feeling?”
“I… my head hurts.” Manisha raised a hand to her head and there was a cloth lump where her forehead should have been. It was wet, gummy with – is she bleeding?
The nurse motioned for a Doctor to come over and he appeared, from nowhere all white coated and serenely disinterested.
“Hello, I’m Dr Williams, do you know where you are?”
Manisha looked about. It was a hospital. She felt the fabric on her head and realised it was likely a bandage. Why is she here.
“Not exactly. I mean this is a hospital right? I don’t know why I am here?”
“Umm, hmm. Can you tell me your name please?”
As she replied he flicked a pen light in and out of her eyes, making he blink and shake her head. Jolting in the pain of whatever wound there was in her. Then a layer of numbness fell like a warm waterfall down her arms and legs. She roiled sightly.
“Whats the last thing you remember?”
“I was… I was…” Everything was blackened with soot in her memory. That’s oddly uncomfortable.
“He, had a gun.” That’s right. What the hell was Ivan doing with a gun in a house with a pregnant woman?
What was he doing with a gun at all.
A woman in a police uniform replaced the doctor. She could not see more than a few feet before things greyed out and tunneled in.
She felt very murky, muddied by the tide.
“Mrs Maxwell?” The policewoman spoke to her, but quickly looked back to the doctor for reassurance that she was good enough to talk to.
The doctor was reading his chart and making notes, checking his logic and leaving the communication to the police until he knew what his road was.
“I’ll kill him!”
“Excuse me?”
“I’ll kill him, he brought a gun to my house! A gun, I’m pregnant! I’m going to have a baby and he brought…” Even through the fug of the pharmeceutical adjustments, she felt the cold of that thought.
“The baby is fine, vitals and natal checks all work out ok for now. We’re more concerned about you.”
“What have you given me?”
“Something for the pain, don’t worry it won’t harm your child. But you need to rest to make sure that it stays that way.”
The doctor never once looks up from his chart.
It’s not an easy job, and the number of domestic violence cases he had seen that week with pregnant women was getting to him. Professional distance, get it and maintain it. Don’t memorise the name, just deal with the facts.
She’ll be back, they always are. It was that expectation of disappointment in humanity that made it easier to ignore the individual when you needed to.
It was that or start drinking.
“Oh. Good. How’s Sam? Did he hurt my brother?” Her indignation rose again.
“He held a gun on me and threatened my brother! If he’s hurt my baby boy… I mean my baby brother… I will honestly kill him. Where the hell is he? Is he under arrest?”
The policewoman looked at the doctor who finally returned her look with a shrug. The bump on her head was not that bad, the dull ache would last longer than an ill effects. Concussion maybe.
Maybe she won’t be back after all, he thought. Not that it made the dealing with it any easier.
But good on him for protecting his sister.
She obviously can’t protect herself.
“Be quick and let her rest.”
“Be quick about what? What’s going on? Where’s Sam? Where’s Ivan? That stupid man, what the hell was he thinking? A gun? In my house. I will, I mean it I will…” Manisha finally registers the look the policewoman is giving her.
“Manisha Maxwell, there’s know easy way to say this but your …”
What? What is she saying? The rubbed out feeling in her mind was only getting worse. Dead? How can he be dead.
There’s no point in just thinking, it’s too cramped in here.
“How can he dead?”
“A…” the policewoman checked her notes, “.. Mister James Hansen, an associate… or colleague of your Brother Samir…”
“James? Why would James do that? He can’t have. He wouldn’t have. He didn’t?”
“He told us he did. Your brother confirmed it.”
“I don’t understand.”
“We’d like to ask you a couple of questions if you’re okay?” she looked up again at the lab coated man. “Is she okay?”
“Yes, yes I’m fine ask anything you want. This isn’t true, this isn’t happening.”

Before anything more happened that night though, she fell asleep.

Day 167 - Upside Down- Chapter 15 - (1376 words)

©Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Wayne Webb and constantwriting.blogspot.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 15

After

"Ivan."
"Dad." The nurse had left the room and his father's voice was thin and as translucent as the pallor of his skin.
"Don't make the same mistakes I made. Keep your family in line, keep them close and protected and under you. They'll stand by you, if you stand up for them."
"I know dad. I know."
"Do you? Do... I did some shitty things to your mother, I didn't ... I wasn't standing up for her, or you."
"You always stood for me Dad, you made me what I am today." Ivan had tears streaming down his face. It's too soon, so soon.
It's never long enough.
"I need to sleep, so tired."
"You rest Dad, you need rest. When this is all over we'll take you somewhere nice, where there's sun and air and ... we'll go to the islands for a holiday. Just the family."
"Sounds."
"Nice."
"Family."
Each breath was drawn out and came one per word until he fell asleep.
His breathing was regular and steady, flowing in and out as his unconscious mind took control of this essential mechanism and returned it to a regular if somewhat lessened pattern.
Ivan sat next to him on the bed and brushed the wisps of hair that seemed to have thinned away in only a day and left him looking even more vulnerable.
His father stopped breathing and the room went so quiet even as Ivan screamed for help from the nurses, who knew long before it was declared that this was it.

At the moment.

Jesus. What do I do?
What if he snaps? Sam, Sam? Look at me Sam, look at me! I’m trying to tell you something for fucks sake. Your nutter of a brother in law has a gun.
How the hell do you tell someone without telling them?
If I just come out and say it – it’ll all go to hell.
Does she know? Does she know what a prick he is? That he has a gun in the house?
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
What will I do if he pulls it out again, I can see the veins in his head and neck throbbing still.
Maybe he’ll have an aneurism.
Dear God please let this man have an aneurism. I’ll donate all my share to charity, to the church, any church, I’ll burn it tonight if you just send one bolt on lightning directly to his brain.
Please?
No? Thanks for nothing… there’s still time right? Bolt of lightning anytime now.
Why does he keep looking at me and Sam, she’s the one talking to him. What does he think we’re going to do?
I don’t know what to do. If I wait and see what happens?
Something bad.
If I do something, any thing? Something bad.
Dammit.
Why is Sam arguing with him now? What the hell, can’t he read this situation? Doesn’t he care? I know he’s a big guy and can tae care of himself but this guy is mad, insane.
This guy IS mad.
He IS insane.
We have to do something, if we don’t it’s just a matter of time before something happens.
She doesn’t realise, she’s winding him up. She needs to stop, but what ca I say that won’t make matters worse?
I hate this, if it was just me then let the insane fucker do whatever he wants.
My best friend, a pregnant sister, HIS pregnant wife.
Oh my god, is he going to …? What the – he can’t can he?
He won’t, she’s …. There’s … no.
Holy Shit. Sam? No, oh god I’ll hold him down, I’ll help, I can grab his leg, that one there and pull it back and that will throw him of balance.
Almost there. Stay still for a second, everything is slowing down.
Why am I swimming?
What the hell is that noise.
There’s a ringing in the air, there’s a stillness in the room.
There are two bodies now.
Jesus christ he killed her.
Sam? No. No, No. NO!
I’m a fucking coward. I could have stopped this, I could have … fuck knows what I could have done.
She’s alive, I can see her breathing.
Oh my god, please be dead, please be dead.
He looks dead.
I can’t let this stand the way it is. This is my fault, no it isn’t but… Sam can’t take the rap for this. He’s going to have to look after her.
Oh god I hope the baby is okay.
I’ll tell the police that I did it. Confess, straight up.
I’ll claim self defence and that he was going to kill us all. If that doesn’t work then I’ll take my lumps – I’ll take it for the team. They don’t deserve this.
I wound him up.
He’s insane I know.
The gun? Oh the gun, I need to have gunpowder on my hands. Gunshot residude, will they test for that if I confess? Will they? Is it worth the risk?
It’s not.
Two more shots, wildly out of the way and aiming down. One from my hand. One from his.
Oh my god. He’s dead, he’s really dead.
I’m touching a dead man’s hand, it’s heavy with death.
It’s done. I’m sure the neighbours have called, but I may as well get it on tape.
Where’s the phone?
“111, Fire, Police or Ambulance?”
“Police. I’ve killed someone. I shot him, in the head.”
“Sir, where are you?”
“We also need an ambulance, he tried to kill his wife … before we… before I stopped him.”
“Sir?”
Shut up now. Remember your lines and stick to the script. It doesn’t matter what anyone says, I did this.

Two

Why is James here? What’s going on?
I don’t like this at all. Something is going on.
I know when someone is lying to me, I can tell, I can feel it. Sam is hiding something, not something good. I could always tell when he was a boy if he was ashamed or upset. He looks different if he’s hiding a good thing.
I can read him like a book.
Why is Ivan so red in the face? Has he been drinking?
Have I see him drunk before? I don’t think I really have. A couple of beers here and there, but never like this. Is this drunk?
Is he an angry drunk?
Can’t be … it’s too early.
Why is James here. Why does he look like that? He’s so pale, he keeps staring at Sam, what’s going on?
I will get to the bottom of this.
This is my house and I will not have little boys acting this way in my house.
There are no silly little games. This is a grown up house and we have a baby on the way, there’s not any time for nonsense.
Why is he so angry? I can hear it in his voice. I can’t smell alcohol – what is going on?
Why is no one answering me?
Am I here? Can they hear me?
I will not be ignored in my house!
What kind of look is that, how dare you? Who do you think you are? What kind of nonsense is this.
This will stop now. I will not abide this ruffian like behaviour from my husband, whatever this is it needs to stop and stop now.
What did he say to me? Watch your tone Ivan, I am not a child and I will not be spoken to in this way.
Sam, you need to stay out of this, I’ll take care of this. This is my house and my family, and I will simply not accept this.
I think you need to be reminded of your responsibilites here, this is unacceptble.
This language and tone stops now! What does he think this is? The 1950’s?
He’s got another think coming.
I’ve heard enough, had enough.
Wow.
Where is this coming from?
What the hell?
Hey! You leave my brother out of this, hey keep away from my baby brother.
Oh, he is going to kill me?
What have I done? Who is this man?
Where’s …

Red misty swaying to the floor.