Small Poisons

Catherine Edmunds

Description

The Contemporary Novel for Midsummer Night's Dreamers "With charm, wit and magical style, Catherine Edmunds conjures a fairy tale for grown-ups, a fantasy with its feet firmly on the ground ... in a place where dreams and stark reality meet." - Neil Marr, BeWrite Books.

Sujets

• Fantasy (canción de Mariah Carey)
• Fantasy

Informations

• Publié par: Circaidy Gregory
• Date de parution: 01 janvier 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781906451417
• Langue: English

Extrait

Small Poisons
by Catherine Edmunds
Circaidy Gregory Press
www.circaidygregory.co.uk Independent Books for Independent Readers

Dedication
To Charles Ross


Contents Don’t tell Joe The newcomers Demented demons and barking beetles A trip to the seaside Ben and Sally Creeping destruction Random destruction Greed Politics and jewellery Channel hopping Once upon a time The wind Breaking up Steven eats breakfast Dear Joe The boyfriend Death of a sparrow Seeking the advice of caterpillars Steven and the sausages Cicindela Conflagration A change of attitude A goddess arises A poet falls What is mine will be mine The return Explanation Fruit pie and clotted dreams Jackdaws Visiting time Cause and effect A glimmer of hope Happy families Apple trees and memories An old friendship Night terrors Knife Who to believe? Fred Just be nice Whatever In control Losing control Shut down Questions Excision Impasse Solution A new friend Death in the garden Awakening Moving on


Chapter one
Don’t tell Joe
The messenger appeared in a haze of floor polish as three buffing machines swept across the ward. Nobody noticed his presence. The nurses were going about their duties with their customary tunnel vision, the cleaners were melded to their machines like cyborgs, anxious to finish this ward and move on to the next, and the patients were attempting to snatch a last few minutes of sleep.
There was one exception to the general rule – one long stay patient whose mind was alert and questioning even at this early hour. In a side room, Joe had been reading Kafka since three o’clock this morning. He’d reached Metamorphosis in the collected works, and was engrossed. Although he’d read it many times before, he still hoped that this time the ending would be different. Only another five or so pages to go, and he’d know.
The messenger drifted towards his room.
In the small office attached to the ward, Jean was briefing the new girl.
"Don’t tell Joe."
"Why not?"
Cheryl was puzzled. What was wrong with telling a patient he was getting better and his medication had been reduced?
"He’ll start seeing things. It always happens. If he thinks he’s still on full strength tablets, he remains stable. The minute he thinks there’s been a change, he becomes delusional."
"Oh, I see, one of those. Powerful imagination?"
"That’s putting it mildly."
"Okay, I’ll remember. Heaven’s sake, look at the time. We’d better shift this lot."
The sweet wrappers that had accumulated overnight needed to be tidied away before rounds began. Dr Philips and his team wouldn’t be concerned, but Sister was another matter. The two nurses squatted on the floor, buxom Cheryl nearly splitting her uniform with the effort as they gathered up the detritus. It was no good leaving it to the cleaners. They were only allowed to polish the floors. More than their jobs were worth to pick anything up – Health and Safety, and all that – as they’d smugly informed the nurses on several occasions.
"Ooh! Stray strawberry crème here, Jean."
"Only one? Damn. Not that I could manage any more. Shouldn’t anyway."
The nurses rummaged through the pile of cellophane and foil, hoping against hope that there might be another soft centre lurking.
Twenty yards away, Joe put down his book and beamed as a diminutive figure in a purple robe seeped through a crack in the curtains and approached his bed. Unexpected visitors helped break the monotony of Joe’s two years’ incarceration. Any stranger wandering around at this early hour had to be a patient or a doctor.
Joe addressed him with enthusiasm.
"Good morning. I don’t think we’ve met, have we? Always good to see a new face. This is a friendly ward – I think you’ll like it here."
"Thank you, Joe, but I can’t stay long, I’m afraid."
"You can’t?" Joe’s face fell.
"No; you’re delusional at the moment, thanks to the cutback in medication, so I’m likely to disappear at a moment’s notice."
"Aha! Lowered dosages. Excellent. We could be in for an interesting time. Hallucinations can be so enlightening."
The stranger smiled in tacit agreement and drifted into the high-backed chair next to the bed. Joe’s eyes were drawn to his braided hair, which crawled with luminous head lice. Rather than being repulsive, their shimmering light formed an attractive halo around the messenger’s head. Joe was about to comment on this when he was distracted by the sight of a nurse flying past, aerosol in hand.
She tripped over a buffer that was moving surreptitiously across the ward in thoughtful circles as if with the express purpose of blocking her path. The nurse skated across the high-gloss floor on her backside, but still had the presence of mind to blast the wasp in passing. She missed. The pungent aroma of insect spray drifted across the ward.
"Was she real, or am I already delusional?" asked Joe.
"Oh, the nurse was real enough. As was the wasp, poor thing. I’m afraid its days are numbered. See the hope dying in its eyes as it flees its attacker?"
Joe looked, but couldn’t sense any hope, dying or otherwise, in the wasp. The nurse scrambled to her feet and pursued the insect with single-minded fury, while the wasp attempted to escape by flying in random zigzags.
Joe imagined being chased by a wasp of monstrous proportions armed with a can of human spray. That really would be terrifying. Luckily for the wasp, it was an insect, so didn’t have the consciousness of its destiny that a human might.
"You think not?" asked the stranger.
"Are you reading my thoughts?"
"Yes, they’re leaking out all over the place. But what if …"
He stopped and turned suddenly, shedding a flurry of bright head lice.
"Nurse approaching with medication. I’d better be quick. What if I’ve been sent to tell you that all things – from beetles to apples, woodlice to sausages – have a consciousness of their destiny and the ability to reason?"
"Well I don’t think they do," replied Joe, "but it’s an interesting concept. Thank you. Most intriguing. It begs the question: who would send you? And why? After all – no, wait – did you say sausages?"
"Yes."
"That explains it."
"It does?"
Joe didn’t reply. He was thinking of last Tuesday’s bangers and mash; the way the sausages, undercooked, pink and mean, had slithered off his plate and onto the bedcovers as if to teach him a lesson for trying to puncture their shiny skins with his fork. The grease marks were still there on his sheets, but he didn’t have the heart to ask the nurses to change the bed. They had enough to do.
"I have to go now – staff on the warpath. You’ll be discharged soon, Joe, but I’ll be back before then to discuss this further. There’s so much to talk about. Secrets: theories and options never before considered."
He stood up and bowed.
"Good luck, my friend. Remember – always keep an open mind."
"I will; have no fear."
Joe waved respectfully, impressed by the gravity of the words, as his visitor faded. The nurse, fresh from her victory over the wasp, waved back. They all liked Joe. He was a friendly chap who’d be missed.
The wasp, meanwhile, kicked its legs in impotent fury as the paralysing effects of the spray took hold. With its dying breath, it cursed mankind for subjecting it to such a cruel and unnatural death.
Joe ignored the plight of the wasp, and thought about the words of the mysterious messenger. Secrets? Theories? He hoped the angelic presence would return soon to expound further. More immediately, he needed to get his head around the possibility of imminent discharge from the hospital. What would he be returning to? He’d been here so long now, under such heavy medication, that he’d forgotten how he’d come to be in a psychiatric hospital in the first place.
He had a family – he was sure of that. A wife presumably. Kids? Maybe. Vague memories drifted in and out of focus. He remembered pain. There’d been another hospital first; one where he’d been amongst people with horrific injuries. He remembered blood; lots of blood. This place was different. He wasn’t in pain. Hadn’t been for ages. They must have healed him. Good. He fingered a long scar between his ribs. It hadn’t itched for a very long time, but such habits are hard to break.
Had that wasp felt pain? He looked over to the dying creature. Its legs had stopped moving now, apart from the occasional twitch. Poor thing. It wasn’t fair. There was so much suffering in the world. Phoebe must have suffered, or she wouldn’t have … wouldn’t have … what was it she’d done? The memory vanished. Who was Phoebe, anyway? Nice name. Feebs for short, perhaps. Or perhaps not. He suspected it wasn’t wise to call her anything other than Phoebe. There was something about her though; a sense of danger. It slipped away before he could grab hold of it. So frustrating. Perhaps the memories would return as the medication left his system.
"Come on Joe," he said. "Be strong. Deal with the fear. After all, you have a new ally. An angelic messenger, no less."
He cheered up at the thought, and then beamed with joy at the sight of the approaching breakfast.
Ahhh … rice crispies. This was more like it. And a spoon. Spoons were safe, unlike knives. He never felt comfortable around knives, even the plastic type, which was all they were allowed in here.
Joe settled down to munch his way through the soggy mess that was his daily treat, and ceased to worry about pain and the consciousness or otherwise of wasps. As the pre-breakfast drugs kicked in, he drifted quietly back into the hospital routine and gazed with contentment at all around him.
Cheryl picked the last bit of caramel out of her teeth and smiled at Joe. She’d only known him for a short while, but she’d miss him when he le