4. Kill Your Parents

Daniel sat crossed legged on the brown carpet. In front of him stood his parent’s huge Hi-Fi stereo system, the volume knob turned all the way to thirty, its highest setting. Daniel listened to the constant fizz from the speakers as it waited patiently for a record or cassette to be put into it.

Daniel tilted his head slightly as the living room filled with the dead static sound, for he was sure he could hear something, something beyond the dull white noise that surrounded him. A voice, so quiet and distant not even the full volume of the stereo made it clear.

For four days now before school, he had flipped the knob up to maximum, convinced that there was a sound hidden deep in the black plastic and metal of his mum and dad’s sound system. And today, he was in just the right position to hear it. He clenched his eyes shut, and listened as hard as he could.

There, he had it. It was the same phrase repeated over and over again, but what was it?

It took another minute or two, but eventually, Daniel was certain he could make it out.

kill your parents.

Daniel’s eyes shot open, but he didn’t move an inch, not until he heard his mum coming in the room. He quickly spun the volume knob round to a reasonable level, and pressed the on/off button.

Daniel’s mum got on her knees and wrapped her arms around him.

“You know, it sounds a lot a better when you put something in it to play. Come on, time to get dressed.”

She stood up, lifting him up as she did.

Daniel left the living room to change out of his A-Team pyjamas and into his school uniform.

While Daniel is at school, and his mum and dad are at work, the living room lays quiet. Dust floats in the lines of light from the windows. The palm tree, too big for the room, cranes its neck against the ceiling, while a lone fly darts back and forth in the centre. The pictures on the walls and shelves of Daniel and his family smile brightly at no one, and all the while the Panasonic Stereo sound system, stacked up like a tower, sits in the middle of the far wall.

Bought five years earlier, it was one of their first luxury items. For they both had extensive record collections, and hoped that one day Daniel would inherit their love of music. And what better machine to fire that love than a top of the range Hi-Fi.

Shortly after four o’clock, the front door opened, and in came Daniel, followed by his best friend Kevin.

After each getting a drink from the kitchen, they went into the living room.

“Why won’t you tell me?” Asked Kevin.

“Because it’s horrible, and I want you to hear it for yourself.”

Daniel pressed the on/off button and turned the volume knob to thirty. The familiar hiss filled the room. Kevin clamped his hands to his ears.

“Does it have to be that loud?”

“Yes, ‘else you can’t hear it. Put your hands down.”

Kevin took his hands away and scrunched his face to the noise.

“You get used to it really quick.”

Daniel tried to put his head in the exact position it had been in that morning. The voice came easily now.

kill your parents.

“There! Can you hear it?”

Kevin, who was still standing, couldn’t hear anything except the incessant white noise.

“I can’t hear anything.”

“Come here, come here, put your ear exactly where mine is.”

He moved over to let Kevin into position.

“Now listen for a voice.”

After a moment or two, all Kevin could hear was his ear drums ringing.

“There’s nothing-” but he stopped himself, because he could hear something.

kill your parents

“Wait.”

His eyes went wide.

“I think I hear it.”

“What does it sound like to you?”

“It sounds like…” He couldn’t say. As he moved back from the stereo and sat on the faux-leather sofa he began to feel very cold.

Daniel immediately took position back in front of the stereo.

kill your parents

“It sounds like…I think it’s a woman’s voice.”

Over the din of the hiss, they almost didn’t hear the front door opening. Daniel was able to put the volume right, hit the on/off button, and switch the television on in what Kevin thought was a blink of an eye. Daniel was well rehearsed in this.

“Hello boys,” said Daniel’s mum.

“Hello,” Kevin smiled up at her.

“I hope you two aren’t planning on staying inside all day, not on a day like this.”

“No mum, we’re going out in a second.”

She smiled and went to the kitchen.

“What do you…can we turn the telly off…what do you think it means?”

“Well,” said Daniel, flicking the TV button, “just what it says.”

“But is she talking to us?”

“I don’t know, I guess so.”

“Should we do it?”

“What, you mean-”

“Yeah.”

Daniel thought for a moment.

“I don’t want to.”

“Neither do I. But she might get us if we don’t.”

They both turned towards the black tower.

The next day was Saturday. Daniel’s mum and dad were sitting on deck chairs in the garden, leaving him alone to sit in his familiar place in the living room.

“Why” Daniel spoke at the stereo, hoping for some reply, or at least further instructions.

None came. No answer, no response, not even a break in the mantra, just the same three words repeated over and over again.

Looking out of the window, Daniel could see his mum and dad sunbathing, his mum’s face covered with an angular's hat.

He sighed and turned back to the stereo. He wished he could turn the volume up higher. Maybe there was more to hear.

“How?” he said at last.

At night, the living room still lays quiet. The dust, invisible in the darkness, still hangs in the air, the pictures on the wall still smile brightly at no one, the palm tree, too big for the room, still cranes its neck uncomfortably against the ceiling, as if its trying to listen to something upstairs. Only the fly is gone, off to explore some corner of another room.

For yet another day, Dan sat in his pyjamas, the hiss surrounding him and filling the room. He couldn't hear it any more, the voice had gone, gone when he needed it the most.

Three loud knocks came from the front door. Dan got up and slowly opened the door.

“Hello Daniel.”

It was Missus Bannis, Daniel's English teacher. She smiled at him. He had always loved her smile. It soon faded as she looked at his unwashed hair, his bloodshot eyes.

“Daniel, we haven't seen you at school for the past few days, is everything ok?”

Daniel nodded.

“You don't look very well Daniel. Are your parents in?”

3. 10 o'clockish

Allow me to tell you a little bit about the empty warehouse that is number Ten Barnaby Way, for it has something of a colourful past. During the 1980’s it was the home of ‘Mega-yo,’ the largest producer and distributor of yoyos in Great Britain. If you’ve owned a yoyo in the past twenty years, chances are it came from there. In 1996, four years after Mega-yo’s collapse, the warehouse became part of the ‘Bed and Breakfast’ murders investigation, when the bodies of two tenants of the same building were discovered bundled together in a packing crate by a passing tramp.
And as recently as 2002, the dank, bleak interior of the now derelict building proved the perfect location to film certain scenes of the gritty British gangster movie ‘The Good Boys.’ I saw it. It was shit.
But as of the last six years, Ten Barnaby Way has been used for nothing, save for the home of thousands of pigeons, as documented by the amount of shit on the walls and floor. And as the venue for the game.
The game, no one ever told me its name, if it even has one, has been played once a week for the last six months or so. Only the five players ever find out about its existence, and to be a player, you have to have earned it. Or at least, everyone else had to.
I was invited to play, I don’t know why, I never asked. To be given an invitation is to accept. I was the fifth player. I was the wild-card.
I was also the last to arrive, and as I crossed the vast floor of Ten Barnaby Way, I saw the faces of the four other players, illuminated by a single lamp that sat on the middle of the pentagonal table.
From what I could tell, the table was placed bang in the centre of the warehouse. The floor stretched away into darkness in all directions, and only the battering of the wind against the corrugated iron walls let me know that there was any world outside at all.
I took my seat at the table. Directly to my left was the master of ceremonies; a massive man in an expensive suit. As soon as I sat down, he stood up. Condensation escaped his mouth as he talked.
“Good evening gentlemen. Thank you for coming. As we are all here, we shall begin the game presently. But first some housekeeping.”
He removed from his back pocket a single piece of paper.
“As some of you may know, last week’s topic was films that have colours in their title. This raised some controversy as to what constituted a colour, and while it may be argued that black and white are only colours in an achromatic and non-achromatic sense, for the purposes of the game, they are acceptable, hence both White Christmas and Black Christmas were allowed.”
The two men opposite me nodded slightly.
“However,” he continued, “After more discussion, it was decided that The Shawshank Redemption was not acceptable.”
He remained standing. Despite my Parker jacket, I had to try hard not to visibly shiver. The four other men around me seemed as still as rocks. Only their eyes appeared to move as they sized me up. I can’t imagine their conclusion was favourable. They were all older than me, and seemingly more ready to die.
“So without further ado, let tonight’s game commence.”
He pulled out another piece of paper.
“And I can reveal the tonight’s topic is; 'comedy duos'.”
From the back of his trousers, he pulled out a large handgun, loaded it, and pointed it at the head of the man to his left. I had never seen a real gun before, and found it hard not to get taken in by its beauty.
“Go,” he said simply.
The man whose head the gun was pointing at thought for a moment and then said; “Morecombe and Wise.”
“Good, you.”
The aim of the gun moved to the head of the next man.
“The Two Ronnies.”
“Good.”
Again the gun swung one man to the right.
“French and Saunders.”
It was my turn. In the speed the game had moved around the table, I hadn’t thought about any answers. I looked at the barrel of the gun, about one foot away from me. From what little I knew about firearms, I reckoned that a shot from it would remove my head completely and leave it across several metres of floor. The man holding it looked at me with no hint of malice or violent intent, just the urge to carry the game through to the end.
“R-Reeves and Mortimer,” I blurted out.
“Good.”
Now it was his turn. He placed the gun under his chin, his finger resting gently on the trigger.
“Armstrong and Miller.”
The game had made one complete sweep of the table, now it was the first man’s go again.
“Hale and Pace.”
“Good.”
“Noble and Silver.”
“Yes.”
“Adam and Joe.”
“Good.”
Damn, that was the one I was going to say.
My go again.
“Errrrr.”
“Five…four…three…”
He was counting down, and I was pretty sure what to.
“Little and Large.”
“Very good.”
Again he placed the barrel of the gun under his chin.
“Newman and Baddiel.”
Round three.
“Cannon and Ball.”
“Punt and Dennis.”
“Walliams and Lucas.”
This time the one I prepaid hadn’t come up.
“Laurel and Hardy.”
“Whitehouse and Enfield.”
Round four.
“Baddiel and Skinner.”
This did not go down at all well. The man to my right spoke.
“May I ask for clarification?”
“Of course.” Said the man with the gun.
“Are we allowed to use the same man twice? David Baddiel came up before.”
The offending player retaliated.
“It's two separate comedy acts.”
“Yeah, but comedians work with different groups all the time, are we allowed to mention any collaboration ever?”
“No of course not, but Baddiel and Skinner, and Newman and Baddiel are two separate entities in their own right.”
The debate continued. During the brief respite I look down at my watch. My hand is shaking too much to make out the time clearly, but it was about ten o’clock, ish.
Letting out a deep sigh, I begin to wonder what I was doing here. I never even asked what the prize was. Things seem so much more inviting when you’re drunk.
“Aaron?”
All eyes stared at me.
“I’m sorry?”
“we’re taking a vote, what says you?”
“I think Skinner and Baddiel should be excepted.”
“Well I say it shouldn’t. That’s three to two against. Sorry Mac.”
Mac lifted his hands in protest.”
“Wait a-”
The gun fired. Mac’s body instantly hit the floor. Flocks of pigeons took flight in the black distance. For a moment no one, including the MC, moved. The bang of the gun rattled in my head long after it had stopped echoing off the walls.
The MC reloaded and pointed it at the man next to the now empty chair. He had flecks of Mac’s blood on his face, all outward appearance of coolness now gone within him. His bottom lips visibly trembled.
I looked at his eyes and knew, knew that in the bloodshed just witnessed, he hadn’t used the time to think of a duo.
“Five…four…”
“Erm, ermmm.” A tear rolled down his cheek.
“Three…two…one.”
“Oh…ermmmm.”
Again the gun fired, the bullet hitting him square in the face, crushing his nose, and turning bits of his head that really should have been internal, external. For the briefest of seconds I saw the whole of one of his eyeballs.
His body gurgled and rasped before eventually slumping off its chair and onto the floor. Like Mac, the last sound he ever made, was the wet squelch of meat hitting concrete.
“Ok lets continue.”
The gun was now pointed next to me. but unlike the last contestant, he was ready with his answer.
“Frost and Pegg.”
“I’m sorry, who?”
“Nick Frost and Simon Pegg, you remember Spaced or Shawn of the Dead?”
“Oh, yes, I do remember, very good. Ok you.”
For the fourth time, the gun was pointed at me.
What was that programme form the nineties I used to like?
“Five, four.”
It sounded a bit like that source.
“Three, two.”
He was counting faster now.
“One.”
“Lee and Herring!” I couldn’t help but shout.
“Yes, well done, a near miss.”
The gun found its way again under the MC’s chin.
“Right, my go.”
He said nothing.
“I can’t actually think of one myself.”
“The countdown,” the man next to me said.
“Yes, of course, my apologies. Five…errrm”
I watched him intently as he both struggled to think of a duo, and counted down to his own death.
“Four...three…errrrrrrrrrm how about…oh no, not that one…two…one.”
He pulled the trigger. The top of his head exploded like a party-popper. The pink mist remained in the air as his body fell to the ground. As he fell, the gun left his hand, bounced on the table, and hit the lamp, plunging us into total darkness.
All I could hear was the heavy breathing of my last remaining opponent. Was it over?
I felt like I was being snowed on, but with a shudder knew that it was only the blood and brain from the MC falling back towards the earth.
After a moment, the lamp plinked back on. The other man had found the switch. We both looked at the table, now sprinkled with a light dusting of human remains. On it was the gun.
Tentatively, he reached out a hand and picked it up.
“You don’t have to do this,” I said.
“We have to finish the game.”
In one move, he reloaded it and pointed it inches from my face.
“Five…”
“Wait.”
“Four…”
“It’s your go.”
He stopped counting.
“My God, you’re right.”
With that, the barrel of the gun rested on his temple.
I started counting. “Five…”
“Kiernan and Hemphill.”
“Who?”
“From Chewin’ the Fat.”
“Chewin' the Fat?”
“Yeah.”
“What is that, some sort of sketch show?”
“Yeah, it’s massive in Scotland.”
“I’ve never heard of it.”
“No, it was never that big here, it’s good though, you should check it out.”
“Oh, I will.”
For a moment, neither of us spoke.
“Will you take me word that there is a comedy duo called Kiernan and Hemphill?”
I nodded. “Yes, it doesn’t seem like the kind of name you’d make up.”
“Quite.”
Yet again, the focus of the gun’s attention changed.
“Smith and Jones.” I couldn’t believe that one hadn’t come up earlier.
“Oh yeah.”
Back to the temple.
“Five…four…three…two…one.”
“Ren and Stimpy!”
“Ren and Stimpy?”
“Yeah?”
“The cartoon characters?”
He nodded.
I thought about it for a moment, could they be classed as a comedy duo? They had certainly provided me with much laughter when I was a child. But then, they are both fictional characters, and the game specifically called for 'comedy' duos, not cartoon ones.
“I’m sorry, I can’t in good conscience except Ren and Stimpy.”
“Oh. Shit.”
He pulled the trigger, and the left half of his face disappeared.
I sat alone, surrounded by four disfigured bodies.
What do I do now?
I half expected someone to appear from the darkness with my prize, grinning and offering me his congratulations.
No one came.
Was there anybody there, hiding in the black, watching me?
I felt no relief at having won, and certainly no sense of victory. The only thought that crossed my mind, other that fact I had just almost died, was the fact that four people, had. It is a curious feeling, being surrounded by dead bodies, not one I would recommend.
The wind continued to batter the thin walls.
Under the circumstances I took the most sensible course of action.
I stood up, and ran away. Very fucking quickly.

2. Dead Elephant

I had never been the type to consider my own fragility. I've never been the type to consider much of anything. Not until last week, on my way to work. Before that I knew only three things; that I have one of the dullest jobs in the world. That the only reason I keep going, other than the excellent pay, is Samantha. And that she is hopelessly beyond my grasp.

The day in question was a Monday. An ordinary, busy London day. The only thing different was the sun in the sky, a rare thing in this day and age.

I always liked days like these, it seemed the city was designed for it. A chance to show of its colours. The people too had a tendency to look more beautiful in the sun, and I wanted nothing more than to take in the sights of London and the crowds around me, but thanks to a tube delay I was running late, and the knowledge of how little my boss tolerates unpunctuality rushed me forward.

As I bounded up the stairs from the dark station below, the bright, cloudless sky caused me to squint. Unable to see and with no time to waste, I dashed right, hoping that my muscle memory from taking this journey thousands of times before would led me in the right direction.

By the time I could see again I was already at the newsagents with its papers, its magazines, its caramel bars. I looked at all the people around me. The girls with bare shoulders and the men in tight t-shirts. I looked down at my own body and hated myself again. My silver tie hanging slightly to the left from my collar and, straightening it with my hand, wondered what I must look like to Samantha. She never sweated or had ruffled hair.

The warmth in my suit was stifling, and although there were many other business men and women dressed the same as me, I still couldn't help but feel woefully out of place and self conscious. Who was I to waste such and amazing day by wearing inappropriate clothes. I didn't want to be at work, I wanted to be out with the young people, throwing a ball in a park, making love on the grass.

I remembered wondering what Samantha would look like lying on the grass next to me, her flowing yellow dress and brown hair blowing in the gentle breeze. Me propped up on my elbow, slowly running the back of my hand down her arm and feeling the goosebumps as she reacts to my touch.

I realised I had stopped walking, people moved around me with tuts or shaking heads, I was always drifting into fantasy like that, and it always depressed me, not because I would get lost in daydream, but because I would get found back in reality. And who wants to end up there?

I started moving again, tragically aware of the fact that I now knew I wouldn't make it to work on time no matter how much I wanted to, which wasn't much.

I picked up my pace, thinking that I could at least look like I made an effort to get in on time. But as I now know, none of that really mattered, not any more.

It happened just before I turned the corner in Stall street. It's hard to describe the sound. 'Bang' doesn't really do it, I suppose the nearest thing I can think of is the noise of a car crash, with all the scraping and glass smashing, only much, much louder.

The sound knocked me off my feet, slamming my head onto the concrete. I think I must have blacked out. The last thing I heard was a woman screaming.

As I came to I saw the blurry outlines of legs running in the direction of where the sound had come from. Slowly I got up, nobody checked if I was ok or alive, I felt like a true Londoner. After a shake of my head I stood up and followed the people around the corner into Stall street.

A crowd had gathered in a circle, all stood looking into a shallow crater in the earth. A burst pipe sprayed water high into the air, but nobody cared about that, for everyone was looking at what had caused the crater. Sitting in the middle of the newly formed hole was an elephant, a fully grown, fully tusked, and fully dead elephant.

“Shit,” I remember saying. I had never seen an elephant in real life before, living or dead, and I was instantly struck with confusion and sadness. That creature didn't deserve to be in a crowded London street, it deserved to be running free and, well, alive.

He was sat on his hind legs, slouched forward, looking like a giant toddler's stuffed animal left in the corner of a playroom.

I looked up at its face, its wrinkled eyes closed, and with a thin stream of blood coming from its mouth.

How did it get here? The crater it sat in meant it appeared as if it had fallen from the sky. Looking round I saw that others thought the same, and joined them with my neck craned looking straight upwards. There was nothing of course, no clouds, no answers.

The elephant became surrounded by the inevitable video-phones and digital cameras.

I wanted to get away, to show more respect. I walked backwards out through the crowds and around the elephant's back where the crowd was thinner.

I turned to take one more look at the creature, and that's when I saw the leg, a human leg, sticking out from under it.

Thinking back now it was obvious that a thing that size falling in an area that busy was going to land on someone. I remember feeling sick.

I walked back towards work, no longer caring that I was late.

Funnily enough, my boss didn't believe me when I told him why I wasn't on time. Not until Samantha and Thomas rushed into his office and told him to put on the news.

I found a different way home that evening.

1. The Strange Little Man

This is the story of a strange little man sat at his computer desk.

Perhaps not realising the full potential of the information before him, ready to be discovered, he sits, chin nestled in the palm of his left hand, and simply stares at the small black line of the cursor as it blinks in and out of sight.

And for every second that passes, the feeling of self-hatred grows, for he knows that the pure white rectangle that is a blank word document can easily be filled. So why then can he not write anything?

This question has plagued the man for years now, and the only way he could avoid it was to trick himself, make his mind believe that he had no pretensions to be a writer at all.

For a while this even worked, and had it not been for his girlfriend, he might have been happy never writing a word again.

But here he sits, in just a pair of boxers and black t-shirt, trying desperately to think of something to commit to screen, and loathing himself for not being able to. It had taken two weeks to get even this far. Two weeks since his girlfriend, knowing that he would never turn down a challenge, said to him;

“Why don't you write all your stories in one go, get it out of your system. You could do one a week for the whole of next year.”

With her successfully forcing him back to the computer screen, he could not feel more adrift, for it seems that his power of creativity (what little there ever was of it) has left him entirely.

Finally, the strange little man sits up straight in his swivel-chair, pulls it closer to the desk for a more comfortable position, and puts his fingers on the keyboard.

By the time anything of length appears on the white rectangle, he groans, for all he has done is write about why he was trying to write again. He would have to do better than that. But at least for now, it was something, and upon looking up the word count and seeing it read 385, a moment of profoundness seemed to sweep across him, and spoke out loud;

“Fuck it, that'll do for this week.”