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 264: A storm destroys your uncle’s shed and kills his six-year-old son. Describe the color of the sky right before the storm hits.

Nathan,

This is the note found in the lodgings of Mr Harold Harvey. It seems perfectly normal and yet… Have a read.

Clear skies are simply a canvas awaiting dark clouds. That’s what Uncle Aloysius always said to us. He never was the same after Frederick died.

I was thirteen years old, the day the storm came. Freddie and I had been playing out on the beach, playing catch with a tennis ball. Freddie was a good kid, always scrambling to explore and to learn and living by the beach gave him everything he wanted. Every time we went to visit, he’d rush back from the beach, blue eyes glittering with a smile and whatever new treasure he’d found clasped in his hands.

His smile gleamed in the sunlight. The world got a little bit darker after the storm.

We came back in, Freddie covered in mud and scrapes from the rock pools we’d had a look at and me in my strange combination of shorts and wellingtons. We must have looked a right pair.

By this point, I was about twice the size of Freddie, all arms and legs and the beginnings of teenage angst. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be at Aloysius’ beach house, but Freddie could still pull me into being a child again. He could make anybody feel that way, like his energy was a virus that infected you and made you think like him. I loved that kid.

His mum, Auntie Suzanne, sent him out to the shed to put his clothes in the washer. I always wondered why they kept it out there, but hadn’t bothered asking before. Of course, there was never really a right time for it afterwards.

He did his best to wheedle out of it, but you can only argue with Auntie Suzanne’s stern face for about three minutes, then he stuck out his bottom lip and said “Fine.” He rushed out to the shed.

That’s when I heard the argument. Aloysius and Dad, just raised voices to start with, but it quickly devolved into shouting. I snuck through the house towards the lounge, where they had a few empty bottles kicking around.

“Your son needs an education! He needs a strategy! You can’t just abandon him to the wilds because you don’t know how to deal with him!” That’s Dad. A man who looks as though a brisk wind would send him flying away, but if you got him riled, you had to be on the lookout. He’d use words like a lumberjack used an axe; swift, effective and you’d be the one falling over at the end.

“He’s my son and I’ll do what I damn well please. You get that? Just because your boy is a waste of space.”

“Say another word about my son, you piece of shit.”

The blue sky outside was descending into a grey haze and a wind began to swirl around the house. The beams of the old cabin rattled as their argument raged on. My heart was beating as if it were trying to shatter my ribs, something I firmly believed it would accomplish if I didn’t do something. I pushed the door to the lounge open, only to have it pushed right back by a gust of wind, screeching through the house like the breath of a vengeful god. People hurled themselves from the walls to the relative safety of the floor as the grey haze outside faded into black, ominous clouds.

I looked up, directly out of the back door towards the shed. I saw Freddie curled inside, eyes wide with terror. I knew that once again, I had to do something. My heart was striving to escape now, hammering away as my breath came faster and faster. I crawled towards the door and his eyes met mine.

He nodded at me, then bolted from the door towards the house. There was a wet thud, then where Freddie had been, there was nothing but a long scrape in the ground. I closed my eyes, tears rolling uncontrollably down my face as I curled into a ball on the hardwood floor.

I don’t know how long I lay there crying, but by the time I stopped the skies had cleared again. Uncle Aloysius had found his son, down by the rock pools he’d been searching earlier that day. Or at least, he’d found what was left of him. A sign, proclaiming Freddie’s favourite beach to be the most beautiful spot on Marie Le Noon had been torn from its foundations and flown through the air like a kite.

Freddie would have gone instantly.That, and the fact that the shed had come completely apart as well, were the only small comforts I had. That freak storm, as the media called it, tore our family apart. My grades hit the floor, Aloysius and Suzanne broke up, Mum and Dad even moved to Russia. It wasn’t far enough though.

That freak storm wasn’t the only one I came across in my lifetime. They followed me, everywhere I went. Every time I got scared, or angry, or upset, the skies would darken and the storm would rise. Which always put me into a downwards spiral as I would remember what happened to Freddie and the vicious cycle would continue.

So today, I close the circle. I’m sorry, everyone. But I can’t hurt anybody else. By the time you find this, I’ll be dead. There are no storms in Heaven.

I’ll see you soon, kid.

Harold Harvey, 12th December 1990

Beside it was located a diver’s knife, a bottle of prescription painkillers and a noose, very neatly laid out on a small stool. The confusing matter is the fact that the knife was clean, the bottle still full and the noose untouched and of course the fact that there was no bloody body at the scene either. The story of Harold Harvey requires some digging. Are you up to the challenge, brother? 

Meet me at the Docker’s cafe, three o’clock on Monday. I’m sure we can come to some arrangement. 

Victor

In my head, I have this as a mystery story. A puzzle to be solved by my protagonist, Nathan. Of course, this also means I can bring in either a supernatural element by saying that Harvey’s has weather controlling abilities, or I could make him the victim of an attack by somebody else who can. It could be science, it could be magic. Either way, this is one I intend to check in on again. 

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 207: Tenth anniversary

It’s been ten years. Ten long years since the fall of the Paragon Dam. I thought about what had happened during those years, all the trials and tribulations we’d been through. That the world had been through.

I always drive in silence on this day. Usually, I’d have my music loud, letting the beat take me away. But not on this day. Today, the reigning sound was the wind rushing by. I wanted to think.

It was brutal, that day in ’88. Six of us against all of them, that whole bunch of rebels and criminals. And we were winning. We were pushing them back. The dam was the perfect place to fight.A shining symbol of unity between the districts, hiding the best excuse for rebellion. A chokepoint, throttling them into a narrow line for easy pickings.

A prison camp, hiding inside sixty stories of gleaming marble, full of slaves.

Of course, we had no idea about any of that when we were standing on top of the damn thing, laying down fire to keep the rebels back. We were just six men, holding a position for eight days after we’d been told reinforcements were arriving in twelve hours.

I slammed my hand against the steering wheel. Every time I made this drive, just as I passed Hawley Rock, that’s when the memories really hit. Cutting deep like knifes, kept as sharp as ever by the whetstone of remembrance. As I hit the steering wheel, Job’s weathered face appeared on the screen.

“We’re here.” Direct as ever. “Timings?”

“Five minutes. Just passed Hawley Rock.”

“Hurry.” Then that was that. He’d cut me off and I was in silence again.The road disappeared quickly after that.

I arrived at the dam in four minutes and checked out the assembled group in the courtyard. Dayton, Maxwell, Job. They nodded their greetings, then turned to climb the stairwell. I know those damn steps off by heart. They’d set me to be the runner, picking supplies from the cache and taking them back up top. Carrying weapons, ammunition, food, all of it up every single one of those steps.

Walking up those steps every year, just made it more clear to me that old habits really do die hard. Job, still taking command of everything even though he’d been a civilian since the Dam. Maxwell, scouting ahead, always the first one up to do anything. Then Dayton. Strong, silent. More like a part of the furniture than a person.

“Still hanging behind back there?” Maxwell shouted. He hadn’t aged a day in the last ten years, full of vim and vigour, practically skipping up the steps. He breached the top and stood in the sunlight, sharp eyes flashing around to take it all in. Then stood around tapping his foot until the rest of us hauled our aged bodies up there. Job was suffering the most, wheezing and spluttering. His years since the Dam had been far more unkind, stealing the colour from the man and leaving a withered thing in its place. But he was still in command with his hoarse voice.

It was as if the man had done all of his shouting years ago and finished its quota. He never spoke above a gruff whisper these days. But we still listened. Dayton especially, whose abs had deflated into a soft podge of fat.

We gathered at the top of the stairs and looked out over Paragon Valley. It was beautiful, still. Then we cast our eyes across the chasm before us.

“We are here to remember our friends.” Job began, removing a bottle and four glasses from his pack, pouring a small measure of the amber liquid into each and passing them out. I took one from his frail hands and held it between my own.

“We are here to hold their memory to this place.” Maxwell followed, nervously shifting from foot to foot as he took his own glass.

“We are here to drink in their honour.” Dayton rumbled, seeming to shake the ground just as it had shaken ten years ago when the dam fell. He raised his glass, Maxwell and Job following suit.

I lifted my own and let them clink. We took a long, slow draught, then I finished our ritual. “We are here to avenge them.” In unison, we hurled the glasses from the dam, watching them tumble and spin in the bright sunshine. Just as Job had done when we first got the intel that the rebels were on their way.

The bridge had shone with such majesty that day, as I’d been sat by the radio. I’ll never forget when they called it in. “Echo Zulu, Echo Zulu, this is Overlord. Come in, Echo Zulu…”

Well, not a romance story. The anniversary of a disaster, as opposed to a romantic one. But I like where this story is going, so I may well be returning. 

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 172: Something you had that was stolen

Jeremiah Knox, twenty eight years and three days old, steals through the fog. He looks furtively from side to side as he lopes down the cobbled streets, listening to the heartbeat of the city through his soles. Down Smithson Lane, take a right at the bank, a job for another day, no time to dally, not now.

He checked his pocket watch, stolen of course. This particular piece was silver on a looping chain, one he had lifted with a simple collision. The incredibly fat former owner hadn’t given it a second glance, focusing instead on Jeremiah’s left hand, patting his chest in apology. He’d looked suitably affronted and couldn’t wait to get away from this strange creature that had accosted him in the street. The fat man had disappeared down the street, leaving Jeremiah the proud new owner of the silver pocket watch.

‘Twenty past the hour. Gotta run, gotta run.’ His speech matched his gait, loping and out of time. He’d avoided the Peeler hanging about the church. Bloody policemen with their uniforms and whistles, always hanging around trying to disturb good folk like Jeremiah. He might have added honest, but that’d be lying and lying was a sin.

He arrived, after ducking through alleys and jitties, at his target. The home of Mister William Woodruff the Third. Squeak and Flannigan had said that it would be a pushover tonight, what with Mister Woodruff being on a ship to the New World. Three weeks he’d be gone, all told.

Three weeks meant twenty one days where Jeremiah could get into that fancy townhouse of his. Get to rifle through all of his lovely possessions. A man like that, he wasn’t going to miss a couple of trinkets.He had more than he could count comfortably anyway, Jeremiah could relieve the burden of possessions on Mister Woodruff’s gentle soul.

He drew his skeleton key from his breast pocket, pausing for a minute to let a coach rattle past him in the fog, more furtive glances around before he carried on. Three minutes, that was all it took to get into Mister Woodruff’s lovely townhouse.

Jeremiah was in. He prowled through the hallway, removing his burlap sack from his shoulder and stuffing valuables into it. A candlestick here, a platter there. All of them into that sack that he brandished over one shoulder.

He stole into Woodruff’s office, seeking out the desk. In it would be papers, other such items that many would pay good money for. He opened the top drawer of that fancy, mahogany structure sitting in the middle of an office on the third floor. Of course, Mister Woodruff had a third story on his pretty building.

He found exactly what he was looking for. Papers in bunches, held together with twine. Hundreds of individual pages, in print so small that Jeremiah struggled to read it. Not that it mattered. He didn’t need to read them to sell them on.

He pilfered every item waiting within, paper, shiny, it didn’t matter to him. He just took it. All the pretty trinkets, all the paperwork. Suki had given him his letters, he might as well make use of them. He got everything into that sack.

Then, without a sound, he left the building. Just as he had entered in fact.

***

William Woodruff the Third, magnate for the Woodruff Conglomerate, arrived back to his house to find the door swinging easily open. His wife had been travelling with him, so it wasn’t her and Daisy and Phillip had been working at his mother’s house.

He rushed up the stairs.He pulled every drawer out, turned the whole office upside down.

His wife heard his cries from downstairs in the sitting room. Cries of frustration, rage and everything inbetween. He would have cast himself from the window, but for the fact that his wife would suffer.

The Abacus had gone. That was all he wanted. Everything else, the papers, the money, all of it could be spread amongst anybody and anything but the Abacus… That was holy ground. Now sullied by the improper actions of one secretive thief in the night.

He would see somebody pay for this.

The Idiot in Tin Foil

 

Day 165: Write a single paragraph that conveys a lot about a character’s life. Think about how this can be achieved with voice and rhythm and repetition.

Stand by your beds, hands off rocks and on with socks, it’s time to go, slacker. That’ll force me from this prison of comfort. I need my drill sergeant back, he wouldn’t be letting me waste away in this place. Wish I could clear the cotton wool from my ears. Like the damn stuff’s alive, burrowing and chasing and… I gotta get it out. Wish I could move my hands, or get off this bed. Something’s going on out there. I can sense it.

Just a short one today as I’ve got to be up in… Just under five and a half hours. I think I’ve managed to convey something about the guys life. What do you think happened/is happening to my character? 

The Idiot in Tin Foil

Day 140: Two guys walk into a bar…

‘Jaysus, Carl! What the fuck are you playing at? The door’s right there ya dozy shite!’ Patrick picked Carl up from his heap on the ground, brushing the dust from him in vicious strokes, ignoring his protestations. ‘Now, get in there. We’re looking fer Mister Pentos, ’cause he’s got a job for us.’

‘Yeah, but, Paddy…’ Carl looked confused. This was his normal state of being, mind you, but this was an extra layer atop his usual stupor. ‘How do we know what he looks like? I mean, we can hardly walk in and say “‘Scuse me, but are you Pentos?”, can we?’ Carl’s face settled into a smug smile. He loved thinking he was right.

Patrick’s rebuttal was swift and merciless, shattering Carl’s illusion. ‘We’ll know, because I know what he looks like ’cause he told me. It’s a need to know basis and you, thick as pig shit and half as attractive, don’t need to know! Now, get your arse in that bar and look menacing. Less like you’re trying to force one out and more like you can crush someone’s skull, yeah?’

The inside of the bar was much like any other. Dark, dingy, with neon lights strewn carelessly around the building. Small booths lay hidden in corners, wreathed in secrets and cigarette smoke. ‘I thought there was a smoking ban?’ Carl asked. Patrick rolled his eyes at the thought of explaining the point of a criminal to Carl. Thankfully, a break in the smoke gave him the excuse he needed.  In the corner booth, nursing a full glass filled with melting ice cubes. A trilby sat perched on his head, while leather gloves emerged seamlessly from the sleeves of his greatcoat. All just as Ratface Jim had said it would be.

They walked cautiously towards him, small steps in case they needed to get the jump on him. ‘Ere, he must be boiling in that get-up. Who does he think he is, Al Capone?’ Carl prodded Patrick and sniggered.

‘No, Mr Brox, I do not think myself to be Al Capone. Mr Capone was sloppy and allowed himself to get caught for tax evasion. He also managed to contract syphilis, a feat I do not wish to replicate. I apologise about the word syphilis, it appears its multi-syllabic nature has confused you.’ Pentos removed his hat and placed it daintily on the table. He didn’t move or turn around, just guided his words against a new victim. ‘Mr Sumner, I believe? I would stop talking but I fear that would give your companion time to process his thoughts and say another moronic utterance. Can you muzzle him, as I don’t believe this establishment sells lollipops?’

Even Patrick looked shocked at the onslaught of words. His body moved quicker than his mind however, so he shoved a ten pound note into one of the shovels that Carl called hands, pointing him towards the bar. ‘Lager. Pint. Quick.’ He slid into the booth opposite Pentos and ran a hand through his greying hair. ‘So, this job of yours…’

Pentos smiled, bright white teeth gleaming in the smoky room. He looked as though he was made of wax, moulded into shape instead of growing naturally. ‘Yes, the job. The wolf would be the hungry one, eager for the prize. Do you not want to wait for your bear in idiot’s clothing?’ He raised his glass to his suspiciously red lips, taking a slow swallow. ‘Though I assume you make the decisions and he does as he is told, surely?’

Patrick nodded. He’d never taken kindly to people who were more intelligent than him, let alone a man like this, hurling it into his face. There was something nagging at Patrick, screaming into his ears that he should leave and not look back. Unfortunately, the siren song of sixty thousand pounds drowned out everything else. ‘Carl’ll do as he’s told. Like you said. So if we get down to business, as soon as we can, then we’ll get underway.’

Pentos’ grin seemed sure to break his face in two. ‘Very well, my eager wolf, let us begin. You’ve heard, I’m sure, of the Amethyst Panther on display at the Museum of Natural History? Well, I have been reliably informed that there will be an attempt to steal it in the coming weeks. As it stands… Do you have a question, Mr Sumner?’

‘Look, I hate to interrupt but me and Carl, cheers pal.’ Patrick said as Carl returned with his lager, ‘Where was I? Right, me and Carl, we ain’t exactly finesse burglarisers. Smash and grab raids, kidnap, extortion, torture. We’re good at those.’

Carl belched. ‘And murder, can’t forget that.’

‘Thanks, Carl. Murder too. But finesse? Or grifting? Not really our style, guv.’ The smile was really starting to jar with him now. He hadn’t called anybody guv for years, not since his first stint in Her Majesty’s Prisons. But that smile wasn’t wavering in the slightest and Patrick was having to fight for control. He couldn’t swing for this guy, not yet anyway.

‘Do you honestly think, Mr Sumner, that I would consider hiring you for an undertaking to which you weren’t suited? I’m not even remotely interested in the Panther. It’s one of thousands, for those moving in the right circles.’ Pentos placed his gloved hands on the table and leaned towards Patrick. Patrick and Carl unconsciously leaned in to learn whatever secret he was going to impart.

‘I want the Thief.’

So, I considered starting with a joke, but then this story took a whole different turn. A longer one today, which just goes to show what happens if I start writing earlier and have a character that can use as many words as he damn well pleases. Any comments on the story or if, god forbid, you spot any mistakes, let me know!

The Idiot in Tin Foil