Day 295: Describe a person you’ve never met.

They called them the Whispersmith.

No confirmed descriptions exist, with every hair colour available in the rainbow framing a face that’s been called narrow, oval, moonshaped, round. In some stories they’re a 7 foot tall man in a pinstripe suit, blue eyes burning coldly from below the brim of a trilby hat. A thick moustache, peppered with silver and grey clings to their top lip as those unhearable truths flow from between them, a thick waterfall of secrets continually threatening to drown the eager listener.

In other stories, a woman with hair of fire lets delicious lies flow from decadently painted lips, cherries that sit either side of that river of words that bathe you in delights, allow you to soak and bask in the sweet knowledge of those sweet falsehoods. Sky blue nail polish sits as the capstone to piano-player fingers, weaving through the air as her tales spin past you, lifting you and turning you in the air like an autumn leaf in a tornado, eventually laying you to rest in a green field of unearned comfort.

I heard a tale once of a short, angry gentleman in a leather jacket, covered in tags and badges and lost symbols of home. Curses and spells are spat from his jaw, saliva hanging from teeth as spittle runs along his lower lip, carrying with it untold secrets that fall and are washed away in winter rain. Thick gloves cover hands that live in a forest of coarse brown hair, with clearings of scars that work their way up to the wrists.

Or the cold, distant woman with freezing snow cloud eyes, sitting in her armchair wielding the weapons of her chosen hobby making loops and purls, clicking and clacking through a relentless stream of valid criticisms and witticisms, all being woven into the scarf or jumper that she forms around a kernel of truth. The pearl of wisdom forms around that kernel of truth, an aggravation and irritation in an otherwise warm and cosy place.

They called them the Whispersmith.

They say that they know everything. Every lie ever told, every truth, every concealment. Each secret, revealed to them by eldritch and mystical means. That the winds contrive to carry the secrets to them, stamping them onto the rain as it washes over the world and flows back to the rough sea of truths and lies that is the Whispersmith.

They say that they exist outside the flow of information, simply anglers waiting for their catch of the day, dangling lesser truths and enticing fictions to draw in those inescapable definites and corrupting rumours that swim in this turbulent river of information and disinformation.

They say that a whisper in the right ear can start a war. That it can end it. That it can kill hundreds, or save them. Steal the very breath, that same breath used to share in the Whispers, and place it deep within a vault. Trapped away beneath a shroud of silence, pushed down by the weight of emptiness compressing the misformed carbon of truth and lies into the diamond of peace and comprehension. Of enlightenment.

They called them the Whispersmith.

They say that they’ve lived everywhere. From slum to penthouse, shack to mansion, from dream to twisted nightmare. All of these places, the brightest and most comfortable to the twisted, jagged reflections from a cave deep below the ground. The Whispersmith resides in all spaces, concrete and liminal.

They say that they choose to roost in the darkest spaces and seek the brightest lights. That they tape their whispers to pigeons flown from city rooftops and use the starlings in the autumn sky to write messages that none can understand. Graffiti on the wall is simply another flavour of their passing of knowledge, from school desks to bathrooms to ancient ruins.

They say that they crave comfort, seeking the pleasures in life. They say that they live humbly, surviving off nothing but donations and the goodwill of others, paid for in those unpleasant truths and beautiful lies, each worth its weight in gold.

They called them the Whispersmith.

But one day, they stopped. They didn’t talk of the Whispersmith at all. It was as if overnight, they just vanished from everyone’s collective memory.

Everyone’s but mine.

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 293: Begin with “It didn’t seem like much at the time…”

It didn’t seem like much at the time…

A flutter. As I walked down King Street and locked eyes with her on the 25th October 2017, I felt the flutter. Gentle as the wings of a butterfly alighting on a sunflower, the softest of kisses in my chest. Barely a burp, but it stopped me in my tracks. Unfortunately, those tremors had no effect on the young lady in question who continued her walk down the road. But that flutter was still there. The curl of her hair to frame her face, the autumn drizzle floating down as a cool reminder of how warm I was getting. All of these things and there it is. The flutter.

The second time I saw her on the 4th November 2018, the flutter returned as a thump. Physical contact, her hand touching mine as she passed me some paperwork. What felt like an electric shock passed through my entire body, setting me on fire with her touch. She smiled at me and a thousand icicles speared through my heart, freezing my smile to my face as sweat slowly approached my upper lip. At this point, I bravely ran away, the thumping still continuing like drums in the confines of my ribs.

The third and last time I saw her was a sombre affair. On the 5th December 2019, we actually spoke. Her voice was like rain on a summer’s day, calming and refreshing against the relentless heat of her words. She held my hand between hers and looked deep into my eyes. I noticed small freckles in her grey eyes, creating perfection by being imperfections. She licked her lips and spoke again.

“Mr Mayhew, I’ve got some bad news. I’ve been looking at your EKG and I’ve noticed some abnormalities. Tell me, have you been experiencing these palpitations long?”

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 292: Something You Found

When I was 10 years old, I found a cave in the mountainside. Stalactites and stalagmites forming jaws that threatened to swallow me whole, with a cool breeze that emanated from deep within. I would sit and wait by the entrance, daring the cave to reveal its secrets to me. The sound of rushing water would occasionally come to meet me. Sometimes it would be the sound of distant machinery, whirring and clanking. But I never saw another soul.

When I was 15 years old, I returned to that cave in the mountainside. Moss and lichen clung to the stalactites that had grown more menacing in those intervening 5 years. That cool breeze carried scents and silence with it this time, a bitter, burning smell evoking a memory of a motor running its way down. Followed by a soft, gentle smell of damp greenery, a forest after a heavy rainfall when the first rays of sunshine break through the canopy. I waited, from the first light of dawn until the first stars began to shine in the evening sky, but I never saw another soul.

When I was 20 years old, I went back to that cave in the mountainside. The stalactites and stalagmites growing towards each other until the cave now presented me with a rictus grin, with the smallest of gaps between them. No sounds, no scents but this time the sweet taste of sugar floated from the back of the cave, like icing sugar caught on the tongue. My mind flashed back to baking with Nana, great clouds of the stuff in the air as fairy cakes cooled on the counter behind us. Her laugh, harsh as broken glass but music to my ears, echoed through that haze. This time, I had brought a tent with me, as well as a sleeping bag. I didn’t just wait a day, I waited through the night as well. But I never saw another soul.

Now I am 25 years old, I have just come back to that same cave in the mountainside. The jaws of that cave have now closed, sealed tight against the world outside. In some time, there will be no trace of the cave at all, just a small scar in the face of a mountain. There is no breeze this time. The stillness is chilling, the silence crushing. The darkness begins to fall and my shovel strikes the earth beneath my feet. As I begin the foundations for my new home, the first of the cracks appears in the face of the mountain. With the cracks comes that familiar breeze, overwhelming my senses with those memories, firing my senses as I drive the shovel down again.

And I smile.

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 291: Write a love scene from the point of view of your hands

 

We are explorers in an unknown place. We have delved across fabrics and navigated buttons, danced across lines of lace and satin. From hills to valleys, we search throughout this fair land. Beneath us, the beautiful landscape stretches as we glide across its naked surface, drawing ourselves up and down in spirals of pleasure.

We are the harbingers of wonder and excitement. Our arrival calls forth memories of pleasures gone by as we sail across the skin. We navigate past old scars, take a moment to appreciate them then continue onwards. Our journey takes us all across this surface, this unknown, bringing pleasure anew.

We are firm. As everything moves around us we are firm, gripping and holding tight. We are a constant reminder of the power, the gentleness, the soft caress. We exist only to serve.

All love is from the viewpoint of us.

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 290: Ethan Canin said that he wrote “The Accountant” (in the Palace Thief) because he wanted to write a story in which a pair of socks seemed important. Pick an ordinary object. Make it someone’s obsession. Write a story about the obsession.

The figure sneaked through the darkened halls, soft shoes on small feet that danced along the tiles. It stops every now and then, raising its head like a meerkat on the prairie, searching for any indication that the rightful inhabitants, for this place was not its own, were awake.

It continued on its journey, pausing by an open door here, a small cabinet there, constantly searching for something. It was determined, focused on its goal. Whenever a pale shaft of moonlight swept across the floor, the figure would glare towards the offending window before skulking around the patch of light.

It reached a wooden door and stopped. This was what it had been looking for. With the slightest creak, the figure stepped through the door and shook a small bat from its sleeve. “It’s time.” It said, glaring at the cold tableau before it before striking down with the weapon. “She’ll be the only one. And the best.”

***

“Who, in God’s green earth, cares enough about Barbie to club a collection into oblivion?”

The Idiot in Tin Foil

I know, I know. I’m slacking. But my aim is to be back on track by the year point. I think I can do it. Wish me luck, friends, Romans and countrymen!

Day 289: What did you wear to prom? How did you get your outfit and what happened to it?

Do you know what really sucks? Spending decent money on a dinner jacket. You’d think that you could get one relatively cheaply, but Mum insisted. “You’ve got to look your best,” she tells me. “You never know who you might meet.” Well, she certainly got that one right. Only instead of her pretty vision of me meeting her future daughter-in-law, I met the Outcasts.

I also managed to antagonise them enough that I’m writing this from a small crawlspace in one of the old IT classrooms, covered in dust and cobwebs. It’s all getting torn down, so at least it’s gonna be an effort to find me. I can hear them occasionally, the gentle thud of a combat boot on broken tile. It’s not a good noise.

I can’t believe that four hours ago, Stacy was passing me a drink and now I’m here, without a dirnk and with a murderous gang of thugs trying to find me so that they can, and I quote, “Rip your fucking heart out and feed it to you.” I was tempted to tell them that ripping my heart out would leave me dead and unable to eat, but my legs decided that that wasn’t the time for sassy comments and was, in fact, time for running. Far.

Did you realise that a dinner jacket isn’t great to run in? The trousers didn’t help, being slightly too tight, but they ripped shortly after I started fleeing down the corridor. That made life far easier. In that I had a greater range of movement, but less so as I’d be mortally embarrassed should I come across anyone I know.

Still, you win some, you lose some.

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 287: Five ideas for a novel that you’ll never write.

 

The day that the demons came, I was making pasta bake for Suzie Macmillan and Edwin Hall. Our lectures had finished at three on Tuesdays, so it was only right and proper that one of us made food before we all headed to the bar. This particular Tuesday, the wheel had turned once more to point to me and my sub-par culinary skills.

“Do I have to cook?” I asked as we walked away from Professor Edward’s talk on Demons in Fiction and Fact. We figured it would be an easy way to make up some credits, thus allowing us to spend more time in the pub. It turned out to be very dull and uninteresting, just Edwards droning on about representations of demons in the Catholic Church.

“Yes, Darwin.” Suzie replied, tossing her hair over her shoulder. She had a habit of doing that, as if she were using it to flick away a fly or something. Either way, her tone made it clear that I would be cooking.

I hate cooking.

Edwin had moved off to one side, squinting through his thick glasses as if he were staring at the tip of his nose. “I’ll see you guys in a bit. Meet you at Darwin’s, yeah?” Then he just ran across the green, clutching his books to his chest.

Suzie stared after him, then shook her head. “I’ll never understand that boy. Right, I’m off. I’ll be round at six, yeah?”

“Yeah. It’ll be ready.” I said, knowing two facts perfectly well. Dinner would not be ready and Suzie wouldn’t be at my place for six. She preferred to arrive… Fashionably late.

It was one of the reasons I knew something was wrong, actually. Five to six and Suzie was banging on my door and swearing at me to open the door. She’s never been on time for the past three years.

Something was definitely wrong.

The ideas here are: 

• The demon invasion
• The odd love triangle
• The strangely specific story telling
• The mentor Professor Edwards
• The character called Darwin

I’ve had a few of these ideas floating around for a while, so I thought I’d throw them all in together and see what came out.

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 286: Write a scene in which a women is fired after only a week on the job. Just a week earlier, the same person who is now firing her was very persuasive in convincing her to take the job.

 

Grakus Ironskull, of the Dark Isles Ironskulls, has never been very comfortable at a desk. His armour is designed for battle, not a war of words and intrigue and as such keeps catching on drawers. His six foot seven, broad-shouldered frame also doesn’t help, as the desk itself is built for a clerk, or a dogsbody, or anyone that has never seen battle in their life.

Somebody knocked at the door. “My lord Ironskull!” Arden Shipman, his second in command, called through. “Captain Havisdotter has arrived.”

“Send her in.” He shouted back, looking down at the reports before him. This was not going to be a fun meeting, to say the least.

Fjonna Havisdotter stepped into the room and snapped to attention. She was every image of the dutiful soldier, leather armour moulded to her body to allow for greater range of movement, hair cut short to prevent the enemy getting a handhold in close combat. By her side hung two blades that danced on the line between long knife and short sword, both singing as they cut the air as she walked.

“General Ironskull, Sir.”

“Havisdotter. Take a seat.” He raised a mailed glove, gesturing to the seat before the desk. She broke from her rigid pose and sat down, placing her hands on her knees and giving every impression of being as at attention as before. “Last week, I asked if you would become Captain of the Seventh. What did you tell me when I first asked?”

“I said no, Sir.” She swallowed, not in a fearful way, more of a challenge. “I specifically requested I stay with the Valkyries.”

“Indeed. I then asked once again. I told you I’d not seen a warrior of your prowess since my own youth. You then told me, what?”

“That I had much more to learn and that the best place for me was the Valkyries.”

“Exactly.” Grakus lifted his hand to his chin, scratching the rough beard covering a healing wound. A close call with a Mallian death squad had nearly taken his jaw off. The Seventh, his chosen warband at the time, had almost let him die. Their captain, Mors Stormsearch, had disappeared at the first hint of battle. “I then insisted. I said that the Valkyries had other capable leaders rising through the ranks and that you, personally, should be commanding. Not following the orders of Niamh Seacrest. I instructed you to take charge of the Seventh.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“So, Havisdotter, I’d like you to tell me what happened at Barock Pass. Then I have to make a decision as to whether I release you from your duties or kill you where you sit.” Grakus smiled as he slid the plate gloves over his hands. “Move for the knives, you die. Move at all, you die. Talk and I’ll make my decision.”

Fjonna thought for a moment. She was considering making a run for it, making an attack on the General. Here at Portin’s Keep, she wouldn’t make it fourteen yards before there were three crossbows pointed at her. Those options were out. She analysed other possibilities, going for the window, calling to her sisters in arms. None of them came through.

“Very well. Barock Pass.” She took a deep breath.

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 284:Write a message in a bottle. Write about the person who finds it.

Stanley Livingstone leaves his house at thirteen minutes past seven every morning. He is dressed in his high-visibility jacket, his running trousers and his bright red trainers, a Christmas present from a well-meaning but fashion unconscious relative. He checks his fitness tracker and starts his music playing as he sets off.

The sounds of repetitive bass fills his mind, pushing out all his thoughts of the day ahead. There is nothing but him and the music as he heads towards the beach. Stanley loves it at this time, when he doesn’t have to dart around tourists and dog walkers. He can even, should he so wish, get right down to the water and run through the spray.

On this day, he does so. His trainers sink slightly as he powers across the sand, pushing himself to the limit. He feels like he has to work the stress out this morning, as he’s got a very full day ahead.

Suddenly, his foot strikes an object hidden in the sand and he goes flying. He sees the ground rushing up toward him, barely with time to swear to himself before he’s sprawled in the sand. He flips onto his back to look at the thing that tripped him, to find a green bottle sitting in the sand. He starts to get up, only to pause.

There’s a piece of paper in the bottle.

He pulls the bottle from the sand’s grip and peers inside. The paper is tightly rolled, held in its coil by a lady’s hair tie. He considers, then decides to head home. His routine has already been disrupted and at forty-four minutes past seven the crossroads always gets blocked.

When he gets back to his flat, he places the bottle on his breakfast bar as he makes his food. The paper is sitting in his mind, niggling until he can’t take it any more. He picks the bottle from the table and slowly eases the cork from the neck. He’s never been one for mysteries but this has caught his attention.

The paper slides from the bottle easily and lands in his accepting palm. He quickly unfurls it and begins to read…

To whomever finds this note,
I had to write this down. I had to get my story out in the hope that somebody trustworthy will find it. My partner and I have followed this as far as we can, but the Molly May is sinking. We are far from the shipping lanes between the Cape of Good Hope and the Western tip of Australia. We thought that we’d found it.
We were wrong.
Now, if you find this note and I pray that you do, go to Hannigan’s in Perth. Take this note and apologise to Hoskin that we lost his boat.
We must have made a mistake with the Verses. Hoskin has a copy. Get them and go to Isobel McCluskey at ANU. Maybe she’ll find something in the physical copy that we missed.
Whoever you are, I hope this works out for you. I’m sorry.
Anna Harris and Peter Williams

Stanley looked at the note. He was still looking at the note when his mobile phone began to ring.

“Stan? It’s Jerry. Look, there’s been a change of plan. We need you to go to the Perth office.” Stanley said nothing, just looked at the phone then back to the note. This couldn’t be a coincidence. This was all a hoax, a big joke that they were playing on him. Perhaps everyone would be waiting at this Hannigan’s bar to laugh at him. “Stan? Stan? You gonna say something or you just gonna leave me hanging?”

“Yeah, sure. I’ll do it.”

“Great, we’ll send you the email ticket. You’ve got the company card still, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Excellent. You’re meeting some of our top clients out there, so take the good suit.” With that, Jerry hung up. No goodbye, no sign off, just the end of the conversation and a dead phone line.

“Ask for Hoskin. The Verses.” He muttered to himself as he went to pack. “Hmph.”

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 283: Why your boss should give you a raise.

“Marisa, please send in Mr Carmichael.” The voice that came through the small speaker was tinny and distant, but still drove fear into Geoffrey’s heart like a spike. He rose slowly from the small plastic chair that seemed to belong in a child’s classroom than the waiting room of his boss, then headed through the door with a gulp.

Inside, there was a second small plastic chair in front of a large mahogany desk. Behind the desk sat his boss, Mr Zebub. Geoffrey couldn’t see his face as he was shrouded in darkness, but upon the desk lay mounds and mounds of food. It ranged from fantastical creations of spun sugar and delicate chocolate all the way through to a sad, lonely McDonald’s cheeseburger, deflated in its wrapper. “Mr Carmichael,” he said, slurping his way around the words, “I understand you’re here to discuss your pay?”

“That’s right, Sir.” Geoffrey moved forward to the small chair, briefcase held in his white-knuckled hand. “I’d like to petition for a raise.”

“This should be interesting. Go on.” A hand appeared from the darkness, folds of fat bulging around a ruby ring on every finger. It snatched up the cheeseburger then disappeared back into the dark. The sound of a cheeseburger being swallowed whole echoed around the large office.

“Well, Sir, I’m the best employee here. I’m a good worker.”

“Pah, none of you are good enough.”

“I’ve been effectively running my department following the budget cuts. I seamlessly integrated O’Leary’s role with my own following his termination.” Carmichael hesitated on the word termination, feeling his Adam’s apple move in his throat like a target for a hungry wolf.”

“Well, that’s in the job description.”

“Was the Uprising in the description, Sir? Seeing as I led the seventh floor in the charge that “won the day”, including the retaking of the prints and supplies cupboard, along with the break room.”

“True, I’m not sure how we’d have coped without the coffee. Jenkins barely survives without the stuff.” Zebub slurped and snorted, the hand once again emerging to snatch a precariously balanced muffin. “Then there’s Donna and her staples. She’s a madwoman with that bloody stapler.”

Carmichael gave a small cough, raising his slender fingers to his mouth. “Indeed. I also redirected the attentions of Miss Kimberley Watts, age seven and a quarter, away from the more secretive aspects of the building. Even after she was most insistent.”

“I did tell the higher-ups that “Bring Your Child To Work Day” was a bad plan. Even so, it’s definitely all there in the description. Take a look.” A piece of paper unfurled from the desk, rolling down to stop at Geoffrey’s feet. At the bottom were four lines of writing, detailing everything he’d just said. He pressed his finger against it and found that the ink was still wet. “See, right there in the description. Now, if that’s all, I’ve heard rumours about the Ninth having a party after work and I want to see if there’s a buffet.”

Carmichael stood up and turned to leave. He looked around the dark office, the portraits hanging on the walls, then wheeled back round. “Actually, Sir, that’s not all. You see, I also have a number of photos to show you.”

Zebub’s chair creaked as he leaned forward. “Photos? I’ve never really been one for art.”

“I think you’ll like these.” The briefcase popped open and the first photo was removed. It showed a shadowy bedroom, with Zebub’s secretary lying naked on a bed and a fat hand with a distinctive ruby ring on each finger working its way up her thigh. “How would your wife feel about this photo, Mr Zebub?”

Zebub’s laugh shook the windows. “She knows! You think you can come in here and blackmail me with some pictures of me screwing the secretary? My wife sometimes joins in! Come one, Geoff, either try harder or get the fuck out of my office.”

Carmichael smiled to himself. His next photo was a surefire raise winner. He passed it to Zebub, who snatched it from his trembling hand.

Fifteen minutes later, Carmichael walked out of the office holding a signed agreement for an increase in his salary. He looked down at the photo of an extremely fat man holding an oversized cheque for £1,000,000. The recipient, in this case, had been the British Heart Foundation. The photo below showed another cheque going to UNICEF. Then one for Make A Wish. Fifteen photos in all. He looked back at the glass-fronted door and the words etched in gold on its frosted surface.

B. L. Zebub
Prince Of Hell (Gluttony)

It wasn’t always a fun job, but Geoff got by. There were certainly worse places to work than Hell.

The Idiot in Tin Foil