NaNoWriMo

I have taken up the NaNoWriMo challenge this year and will post first drafts of my efforts here. I usually reread, rewrite constantly, so by all means these chapters are not finished and will be added to and rewritten throughout the challenge. The nature of blogs being as they are I have decided it is easier (read less time consuming - I have 1600+ words to write every day!) to just post the rough versions of each chapter for now, so buddies and anyone stumbling across this can leave feedback. The chapters will obviously be in reverse order, so if you drop in a bit later into the month, make sure the scroll all the way down to chapter 1. Happy reading.

Up Tempo Song

Swirling dust in the beam of light. He looked at it and a moment of stillness came over him. He regretted having to disturb the tiny particles that undoubtedly liked nothing better than to settle down and rest. No rest for the wicked, he had plenty to do. Grocery shopping, the laundry, putting the bins out for collection, file tax returns (two weeks late), change the bed, pay the rent on the new apartment, call the dentist for an appointment and wistfully, he added, read the newspaper. Humph, he thought, if only there was any time left in the day. The days were too short. Or maybe not too short, maybe he should just face up to the fact that these days things just took a bit longer to accomplish.

Having opened the hatch to the loft, he now resolutely climbed the rungs of the ladder, one by one. His children had insisted they would clear it all out for him, but he had refused. The loft was full of memories and he needed time to store them, quietly. He had insisted and his children had relented. A small victory, but it had given him immense satisfaction. Now where to begin? His eyes wandered around, briefly settling on a piece of furniture (ah, Nan’s chair), boxes (there’s a timeline for you) and a pile of books (a good place to start). Did I really read all these or were they hers? He pushed that thought away quickly. He would deal with her when this was all over and done with. He carried the books down, placing the ones he remembered reading in one box and the ones he didn’t and liked the look of in another box. The leftovers went into the first box - for the charity shop. A thought stirred and he walked over to the wall. He’d had sleepless nights trying to remember the doctor’s appointments and people he’d promised to visit, until he had found an old calendar, lost in a pile of her magazines. She had been good at keeping him organised. He looked at the neat rows of squares, one for each day, and changed the time of the meeting they had called about this morning. He noticed the party invite. Oh, sugar. He’d forgotten about the party. Maybe he could still buy something online. I may be old, but I ain’t stupid, he chuckled, something else to add to his to-do-list. He read his daughter’s name in the square for Friday. Was he going to meet her, or was she coming round to see him? He couldn’t remember. Must improve my diary keeping - another thing to add to the list. On his way back to the loft he stopped by the bathroom. Some things really couldn’t wait, be postponed or forgotten. Imagine. The last thought made him shudder. I ain’t that old!

This time he didn’t feel apologetic towards the dust. His eyes rested on the boxes, some stacked, some randomly dumped. Eighties stuff was written on one of them. He remembered and smiled. He’d been in his thirties. He’d just met her – no, no time for her now. He pushed her back again. Lifting the box (best for the tip), the bottom fell out and the contents spilled onto the floorboards. He picked up a sheet of paper and read it. A bucket list they would call it these days. He couldn’t remember what they’d called it in his days.

Dye hair green (tomorrow!)
see the new Fellini
watch sunset in Japan
see jungle in bloom
swim in the Pacific ocean
steal something off an Italian
triple jump on the moon
get fit
leave this place

And scribbled right at the bottom: holiday Valkenburg or Aachen? Looking at the pictures down by his feet it had been Aachen they’d settled on. He laughed out loud when he saw himself posing in front of the Dom with his black hair. He remembered the look of horror on Eric’s face when he showed up at work with green hair. He had had to dye it black in order to keep his job.

He sat down on the floorboards and picked up a note. Her handwriting:  We need to discuss jobs around the house! She had always wanted him to do some of the cooking and cleaning. He never had though. If only he had learnt how to prepare a few meals than his children would not have insisted he’d go to a ‘senior village’ where people would look after him. For goodness sake he’d only just retired. They didn’t want him to be lonely and they needed him to be healthy, he understood perfectly, and so he’d given in.

He looked back at the bucket list. Leave this place. He would, after a lifetime spending it in the house they bought when they found out she was pregnant. All their savings had been spend on renovating and decorating it instead of the trip of a lifetime to the Amazon. Weren’t they merely postponing it? He sighed, they’d never gone and now they couldn’t. He tried to get up, but his legs were stiff. Maybe he should settle down and rest, like the dust gathered once more on the memories around him. Or maybe he could ask his children to clear the loft out for him, maybe he would book a holiday and swim in the Pacific Ocean and then perhaps he could walk the Chinese Wall or see the Pyramids. The house was sold, he would leave this place. There was still so much to add to his list.

Toontje Lager – Zoveel te doen
written by: Bert Hermelink

Nelly and Connor's song

Nelly relished getting up in the morning. Getting up was so much better than going to sleep. Things were possible when you got up. Nights were not. They were for impossibilities. There was the impossibility to ignore her thoughts about him. The impossibility to fill the huge double bed. The impossibility adjusting to not feeling a warm body next to hers. The impossibility of being comforted by the sound of Connor’s regular breathing when he was asleep.  There just seemed to be no getting away from him at night. But the days, the days were great. They were fun-bloody-tastic without him. She looked at herself in the mirror, stupid grin on her face. In the bathroom she found the toilet seat down, room enough for all her soaps, salts and lotions, no wet towels thrown on the floor. And in ten minutes time she would eat buttered toast, without the horrid smell of bacon and eggs. Such a relief!

Warm water splashed on her head, soap ran down onto her toes. She replayed the events of the previous evening. It had been good, in fact for the last two weeks evenings in general had been good. She had gone out every single one of them, starting with dinners in fancy restaurants with friends Connor never approved of, then out clubbing and dancing, which Connor never liked doing. It was good to catch up with her friends enjoying all the things she did before him. It was good to do whatever she wanted with whomever she chose, without anyone moaning about it. She smiled and closed her eyes to begin doodling on the steamed up glass walls. As a child she started it, always surprising herself with the result. It was a small pleasure she had not given up during the Connor era. He had found it endearing, once.

Nelly opened her eyes. A picture of two people kissing... Oh, no! She remembered now. How could she have...?  Her hands covered her face. She felt so ashamed. It had been a drunken dare. Putting her arms around every boy she’d seen and snog their faces off. They reminded her of him. She sat down on the floor of the shower cubicle. Warm water running over her back, lonely tears rolling down her face.

That’s how her mum had found her. Nelly didn’t know how long she’d been sitting there. It had enveloped her, all of a sudden, the harsh truth. There was nothing she could do to take away her blues or the loneliness she felt without him there. “You’re like a bird without a song” mum said. Mum had a way with words, though she couldn’t really tell her where she’d gone wrong with Connor. “You just found living with him hard. Why don’t I make an appointment for you with Doctor Rogers?” As if the doctor could bring back Connor. “No, dear” mum had said patiently, “he can’t. But he might be able to give you some pills and make it easier to move on”. Nelly had been aghast, but she went anyway.

                She had always thought of Dr Rogers as a kind and understanding man. Once, when she was little she had to have a blood test. She had come out of the phlebotomist’s room kicking and screaming. She was so terrified in that small room with trolleys and shelves full of needles and glass tubes and a skeleton in the corner. The doctor had taken her into his cosy room, calmed her down with a story and a song until she felt brave enough for him to take the sample. Yes, Nelly thought, talking to him might help. It was her turn, his warm hand gently squeezed hers when he greeted her and she felt hopeful. He asked her how long it had been since she and Connor had split up. Nelly looked at her watch and replied: “Seven hours and fifteen days”.

Still fuming Nelly phoned her mother as soon as she got back home. “Guess what he told me?”, she raged. “He said girl you better try and have fun, no matter what you do. He’s a fool!” Nelly’s mum started to talk but no one was listening to what was being said on the other side of the line. Nelly was staring at the flowers in the garden. Connor had planted them for her. She had loved the surprise to find him in her garden one day, digging away. He had moved in the day after. The flowers had died when he had left. Why? Why? She sighed.  “Sorry, mum, I’ve got to go”.  She dialled Connor’s number and got through to his voicemail. Here goes nothing, she thought. “I know that living with you baby was sometimes hard, but I’m willing to give it another try. ’Cause nothing compares to you”.

Sinéad O’Conner - Nothing compares 2 U

Songwriter: Prince Rogers Nelson

My song - something interesting about me

Years ago when I was still a member of the corporate world, our Surrey based office travelled to a very nice hotel slash conference centre for a team building exercise with our Irish colleagues. I viewed it as a bit of a jolly and it turned out to be just that for the first half an hour. On the first morning we gathered in a light, air conditioned room and we were told to each take a seat randomly around one of the five carefully arranged tables, laden with posh bottles of water, biscuits and sweets. We were a very merry bunch, chatting and laughing, or to put it in corporate speak, we were ‘building bridges’. Objective achieved. I felt really relaxed until the facilitator jovially told us to introduce ourselves by sharing something interesting, something only a handful of people would know. I gasped silently, my stomach contracted and fluttery nerves filled it. Instinctively I knew this exercise was designed to separate the popular and creative people from the dull and incapable ones. I counted the number of people who had to tell a good story before me. Why, oh why had that stupid man started as far away from me as possible?  The first few people were always able to get away with the less interesting stories on account of the limited time they had had to think of something. Pressure was on. I listened and laughed half-heartedly to stories of alcohol induced accidents and lots of ‘Top that!’ remarks, racking my brain for something good. I do not drink often or very much and I was certainly not going to share anything about my sexual life like the girl two chairs before me. It finally came to me...

... when I was in bed that night. I should have told them about the trip to Brussels!
One summer, when I was still a child, my parents took us there for a day trip. It was a really nice day and my sister and I had been bouncing excitedly for most of the journey on the back seat of our old Mazda. Apart from visiting an uncle in Germany once, we had never been abroad.  The car radio had been on playing pop songs to which little sis and I had been singing along as well as we could. When we entered Brussels however, the radio was turned off. Maybe because my sister and I were getting overexcited, shrieking and laughing loudly. My parents might also have gotten fed up with our constant asking ‘are we there yet?’ But, probably, the music had to be switched off because traffic was busy, very busy, and my parents were looking around impatiently for a parking space. To my child’s eye the streets seemed utter chaos. Cars were moving in different directions, appearing out of small roads or disappearing into wide streets and round bends. People were crossing the road, running and motorbikes were zigzagging between cars.

All of a sudden we went from utter chaos to complete standstill. In my memory, there was a lot of noise one moment and the next it went dead quiet. Cars had stopped moving, people had vanished. It was as if the world had stopped for a few seconds. I have no idea what my sister was thinking during those moments, but I was holding my breath and was on full alert. Something that only ever happened on television was happening right here, right now. Never before had I heard such loud bangs, not even fireworks. I was certain I had heard gunshots. I looked through the window on my right and saw that we were gridlocked right outside a bank. Some men with masks were running away. Oh, wow! My dad must have seen it too, because he shouted – actually shouted at my sister and me to get down into the foot well.  I was rather disappointed having to miss all the action, but did not dare disobey my father. Luckily for me, my mum was scared stiff and provided some form of running commentary. ‘Arr, there’s a policeman.... he’s got a gun... No! Get away from there! Ted, do something, they’re crouching next to our car!’ (That’s when I became scared.) Honk! Honk! My dad mentioned a few expletives, never before heard from his mouth, egging the car in front of us on to move forward and cursing the Belgian police force. The car started rolling and after a while my dad said it was safe to get back up again. We were all quiet. Then, someone turned on the radio and a self assured, happy voice sang:                

Young man, what do you wanna be, I said young man....

I resolved then and there I was never going to be a police officer or a bank robber or even work in a bank. We all joined in with the chorus singing at the top of our lungs: 

It's fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A. It's fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A-a.

We soon found a parking space and got out of the car, safe and sound and happy.

Virtual Reality

Nearly home, nearly home. It was almost a mantra as the thought repeatedly went through her mind. Round the corner... quick, quick. The mantra changed as she parked her scooter and took off her helmet. Keys, keys... she opened the front door to her small cottage, ran through the living room to the back door, simultaneously grabbing her laptop off the kitchen worktop and unlocking the door. Out in the garden she switched on the computer and sat down. Impatience reached the summit when a message flashed on screen demanding a restart due to an unexpected error. “Aargh, stupid old thing!” Making the best of a bad situation, she decided to nip to the toilet to avoid anymore interruptions.

Finally, online, she found the Planeet icon and clicked on it. Time to see if her virtual Mr oh so Right would be there.  She’d only known him for a while. His user name was OldOak and his avatar was a dragon like creature she’d shared some adventures with and some really good conversations. They’d seen each other every day for the past fortnight. She tried not to be disappointed. She could see he wasn’t online, not yet. She’d just have to wait. Last time he didn’t enter Planeet until 9.22pm. Enough time to cook dinner or enjoy the sunshine or, Georgie sat upright, skype her sister in Australia. After all, her sister had given her her old laptop with build in camera so they could continue their chats while she spend six months working in the bush.

Tossing the keys on the side table, Phil kicked off his shoes. It had been a long day. He poured himself a drink and looked round his flat. Its extreme tidiness was testament to how little time he spend home and when he was home his work usually absorbed him. Looking outside through the window he could see his neighbour sitting in the kitchen with her laptop. She’s working too hard too he thought. She was one of the best account managers he had, but lately she just looked tired. Maybe he was setting impossible targets, maybe she didn’t enjoy her job anymore. Maybe a new company car would cheer her up. Maybe, horror struck, she was pregnant. He couldn’t afford to lose her, apart from being good at her job, he liked her. Besides, he thought, he’d never seen her at home with a guy. He had decided to get to the bottom of it and had called for a breakfast meeting early tomorrow morning.

He needed to eat something and then find a distraction. He glanced at his laptop. No, he’d made a resolution this morning. Online gaming was no longer an option. He had to be firm, this had become almost an obsession. PinkScooter79 was on his mind day and night. He’d liked to believe he’d found the woman of his dreams. Someone who made him laugh, someone he could talk with, confide in. Their friendship had taught him to be brave and no matter where he’d go he wouldn’t find a better prize. Well, he’d have move to Australia off course. He’d slowly fallen for a girl called PinkScooter79, whose avatar looked like Wonder Woman. Madness. Today he’d even asked the guys from IT to see if they could track down where she was from. Somehow one of them had been able to remotely log onto her PC and discovered the country settings as Australia. Realising she was miles and miles away, he had given up all hope of meeting her in real life and resolved to stop pursuing his fantasy of marrying Miss PinkScooter79. It was time to go. Time for OldOak to go away from the virtual world of Planeet. He sighed disappointedly, just his luck. He’d have to contend himself with a fantasy. Maybe it wasn’t so bad. All he had to do was close his eyes and they’d be together. No matter have far it seemed.  At least that way he couldn’t get dumped and their love would last forever.

After a short distracted chat with her sister and hours of playing games she wasn’t really into, Georgie decided to call it a day. Maybe he’d be there tomorrow. Just as she moved the cursor to the sign out icon her heart skipped a beat. OldOak had just gone online. Shame it was too late, just too late to stay. She’d have to get up early again tomorrow. Meeting her boss, Phil, The Dinosaur – as he was nicknamed. A real workaholic, judging from the bags under his eyes he worked day and night. It made him look old and grumpy, which he wasn’t. She’d recently learned he was only a few years older than she was and she thought he had a wicked sense of humour. A message from OldOak flicked on screen: In never saw your smile. Georgie’s heart skipped a beat, she grinned and quickly typed How do you make an avatar smile?

Were Georgie and Phil to scratch the surface hard enough they’d know. Sometimes it’s hard to recognise and love comes as a surprise. Sometimes it remains an electric dream.

Human League – Electric Dreams

Songwriters: Giorgio  Moroder and  Philip Oakey