The Pedant

The man waited in a queue in the busy lobby of the cinema. He still believed in buying his snacks there and not sneaking in cheaper alternatives from the nearby supermarket as so many others did.

His turn came.

“Can I help you, sir?” smiled the assistant.

“Yes, what kinds of candy do you have?” asked the man.

“Firstly, it’s which kinds. And secondly, it’s not called candy. This isn’t America. We call them sweets here.”

“Ok. Which kinds of sweets do you have?”

“They’re all on display. You can see them quite clearly.”

The man sighed. “There’s not much choice. You have less things than the shop down the road.

“Fewer.”

“Excuse me?”

“We don’t have less, we have fewer.”

“Whatever. Can I get some of those mints?”

“You can have some of the mints, yes.”

The assistant passed the man a bag of mints. The man looked in his wallet only to find it was empty.

“Oh, I appear to have run out of money. Is there an ATM machine nearby?”

“ATM machine?”

“Yes, you know, to withdraw some cash.”

“So you want an automated telling machine machine, do you?”

“I…”

“I’ve had enough of you. Go away!”

The man was shocked.

“NEXT!” boomed the assistant.

Sunday Morning

Where am I?
He awoke with the familiar taste of stale budget vodka in his mouth. He was cold and his bed didn't feel right. He unglued his eyelids and was greeted by the bright sun.
I guess I didn't make it home last night.
He was lying in a field and his back was wet. He couldn't feel anything from the waist down.
What's that smell?
He sniffed like a Bisto Kid and turned his head in the direction of the petrol aroma. There was a partly-crumpled car, upturned with one wheel spinning lazily about 50 metres from where he now found himself.
Shit.
He tried to piece together the events which had led up to this, but his mind was blank.
He could see blue flashing lights arriving by a gap in the fence a short distance away.
He would have some explaining to do.

The Barn

The rain started without warning. He ran across the field, desperate to find cover.

Darkness was falling and he could see a small barn-like building up ahead.

The door was thankfully unlocked and he stepped in before slamming it shut behind him. The rain hammered relentlessly on every side of the building. The wind was starting to get up too. It felt like he was in a carwash.

He felt his way around and sat down on a bale of hay in the darkness. He’d just have to wait it out.  He placed his rucksack by his feet.

A groaning noise made his skin crawl. He thought it must be the wind in the roof, but he couldn’t shake off childhood campfire stories of ghosts and horrible happenings out in the country.

The groaning noise seemed to intensify. His entire body was covered in goosebumps. Headless horsemen and escaped murderers filled his thoughts.

The groaning stopped and so did the rain.

He picked up his rucksack and headed for the door.

A noise disturbed him just as he was leaving and he snapped his head around to see.

The moonlight shone through the open door and revealed a ladder in the barn, leading to a mezzanine level. Climbing down the ladder were a man and woman, as naked as the day they were born.

He headed across the field to the footpath.

Time

The clock struck 6.
He knew this meant he had another hour in which to sleep. He turned over and attempted to drift into the land of nod.
The clock struck 7.
He was still awake, but felt sleepier than he'd ever felt before. He knew he could stay in bed a while longer without being late.
The clock struck 8.
He was fast asleep. He would now be late, but didn't know it yet.
The clock struck 9.
He was still asleep. It was also the time he should be getting off the bus right outside his office.
The clock struck 10.
He'd just phoned his boss who'd luckily bought the tale of an all-night sickness and diarrhoea session. Now he had a day off to do with what he pleased.
The clock struck 11.
He was still in bed. He couldn't decide what to do. There was no way he could go into town; somebody might see him and the game would be up.
The clock struck 12.
He sat in his dressing gown watching a film. He'd seen it a hundred times before and knew every word. He was barely concentrating on it anyway.
The clock struck 1.
He was bored, bored beyond belief. He went into the kitchen and opened a cupboard. He found the bottle of 20-year-old malt he'd been saving. He broke the seal and took a swig. Divine.
The clock struck 2.
He was quite drunk. Actually, he was the most drunk he'd ever been. He couldn't focus on anything and he was quite close to losing consciousness.
The clock struck 3.
The nearly-empty bottle slipped from his hand and bounced on the floor. He didn’t hear it. He was covered in vomit and he was no longer breathing.
The clock marched on.

Park Life

Ducks in the pond.
A man sits on a bench eating sandwiches, throwing an occasional crust into the water.
The ducks fight over the food.
The man opens his bag. There is a smell of marzipan.
The bag is thrown into the water, a long trail of wire behind it.
Depth charge.
No ducks in the pond.

Morning

Why is there superglue in the bed?
I don't mean there's a tube of it in here, or whatever it comes in these days; I am merely suggesting that I've been stuck to the bed with it and that the duvet has possibly been stuck over me in the same way. The point is that I can't get out anyway.
I can smell smoke.
I could get out if I wanted to, but I don't want. I just want to turn over and go back to sleep for the rest of the day.
I know that renders my superglue theory pointless, but I don't care.
It's getting quite hot.
Nothing will get me out of this bed. I don't even need to be up. Day off, you see. Sure, there are chores to be done, but so what? It's my day and I'll do what I want. And what I want to do is nothing, nada, zilch.
There are flames licking around the doorway.
I'm staying in bed.

Road Rage

The car reversed out of the driveway without warning. He swerved and narrowly avoided it. He had just enough time to apply his entire bodyweight to the horn and show the inconsiderate motorist his middle finger as he manoeuvred.

He had just about calmed down by the time he stopped at a set of traffic lights a little further up the street.

The lights changed to green and a little old lady stepped on to the crossing, making everybody wait. He seethed, but took no action.

Right at the moment he was setting off, a cyclist flashed past and cut in front of him. This was too much and he opened his window.

“Hey, dickhead,” he yelled.

The cyclist showed him the finger.

Right! He squealed away from the lights and drove straight into the lycra-clad moron, flattening his cycle and possibly the man too. He didn’t hang around to see what had happened.

Passers by were making big, shocked Os with their mouths and several were frantically taking out mobile phones, either to call the police or to take accident scene selfies.

He sped away, his heart beating like an amphetamine-addled percussionist.

He needed to get away.

He reached the motorway and sat in the outside lane, his foot pressed against the floor.

“Out of my way!” he yelled at nobody in particular as multiple vehicles swerved to avoid him.

His heart was beating faster and faster, like a broken metronome.

He glanced down and saw he was doing 150mph. Everything alongside him was a blur of colour.

His chest shook as his heart continued to accelerate.

There were a series of blue lights in his rear view mirror.

The chase became futile as his chest exploded, making the car resemble a macabre kind of blender.

Ra

It appeared in the sky again and they celebrated.
They toiled all day as it shone down on them, taking minimal breaks for food, drink and evacuation.
Eventually it disappeared. They were sad and stopped working.
They slept.
The next day it appeared in the sky.
The cycle continued until one day they'd had enough. They were treated like slaves and they weren't going to stand for it anymore.
They formed a union. There would be no more pyramids after the third, they said.

H2O

The tap dripped.

Sam sat in the chair, listening to the drops ricocheting off the metal sink every thirty-six seconds. He couldn’t do anything about it because of his broken leg. More accurately, he couldn’t be arsed. The leg was in plaster and was healing quite well, but he still couldn’t get the hang of using the crutches. He enjoyed sitting in his favourite chair, watching TV and being generally waited on. He was thinking of asking the hospital to leave the cast on when his leg was healed so he could milk it for a while longer.

He was home alone for at least the next two hours. His wife had gone to the bingo and he was buggered if he was going to get up because of the tap.

Three hours passed and she hadn’t returned. The tap was now dripping every thirty-two seconds. It was hindering his afternoon nap routine and he felt like he was being waterboarded subliminally.  He decided it had to be fixed.

He pulled himself out of the chair and grabbed the pristine, hardly-used crutches before hobbling out into the kitchen.

He stopped by the sink and leaned forwards to tighten the tap. He twisted it and heard a slight cracking sound. A thin jet of water squirted out of the side of the tap. He tightened it some more and the tap came off in his hand. It was like having a water cannon in his kitchen.

Sam panicked and turned to leave the room. He slipped on the lino, went to ground and smacked his head on the side of a cupboard. The position in which he found himself unconscious provided just the right angle for the water to squirt up his left nostril.

He became the first man in his town to ever drown on a kitchen floor.

The Tenant

The dogs howled in the yard.

He watched them through the window as he swigged from his can of strong lager. He loved the animals but he couldn’t have them in his house. His landlord said so.

As he drank more and more cans of a drink that was more commonly known by a name which suggested its drinkers were domestic abuse enthusiasts, he thought it seemed like a good idea to defy his landlord.

He opened the back door and called to the two bulldogs. They were beside themselves with joy as they raced into the kitchen.

He sat on his sofa with the happy canines and cracked open another brew.

Minutes later there was a knock at his door and he went to see who was disturbing his Saturday.

“What are you doing?” It was his landlord and he seemed annoyed.

“I’m just relaxing, you know, like people do on a Saturday.”

“You know what I mean. Those fucking dogs are in the house.” The landlord barged past him.

“How did you know?”

“I know because I’ve got cameras in the house, you fucking retard. I see everything you do.”

This news was quite a revelation. He wondered what his landlord had seen him doing.

“That’s right. Everything.”

He felt embarrassed and ashamed.

“I’ve got hours and hours of footage of you doing quite depraved things. It’s quite a goldmine.”

He felt sick.

The police arrested them both a few days later.