At the entrance to Brenda’s little apartment Robert paused again. He was a little less gung-ho than Effie. He tried the door and it opened.
“Brenda?” He called out softly.
Her domain was a tip. There was no other way to describe it. Robert was aghast. It was like the worst kind of burglars had violated her inner sanctum and left her for dead. The skylight was covered up and it was dim, but at the end of the room, in her big double bed, he could see Brenda’s head sticking out of the duvet. He approached tentatively, “Brenda love? You OK?”
Never more had the stories surrounding Brenda’s origins seemed more apt. She lay there, black beehive hair lacquered and stiff, her motionless face a criss-cross of scars, her skin looking sickly and jaundiced. Robert put out a hand to touch her, she was as cold as the grave. As he touched her, her eyes flickered and Robert recoiled, his heart in his throat.
“Robert!” Effie wailed from downstairs. “We need to get out of here!”
He didn’t need telling twice. As Brenda convulsed there was a scratching sound, like mice behind the skirting board - bloody large ones! Bounding down the stairs two at a time he got to the landing and realised the scratching, shuffling was increasing. At the bottom of the stairs, clutching Brenda’s appointment diary, Effie frantically motioned at him to hurry.
“We can’t be here after sun down, now get a blinking wiggle on!”
The doors, as one, started to push against the litter on the landing and Robert, with what he thought was a manly scream, didn’t stop until he reached the pavement.
It never rained but it poured, thought Robert, as he was ushered into Effie’s antique emporium and dusty home. Now this was truly uncanny: dead eyed dolls stared soullessly at him from the rusty hulks of Edwardian prams, a rocking horse lurched amongst large ornamental and oriental vases, every surface covered in ancient tat. No wonder they usually congregated at Brenda’s or at Cod Almighty.
“Here we are. Yes. I thought I recognised the name.” Effie was up to her elbows in dusty tomes. A quick glimpse of the cover and Robert thought it was some sort of bestiary that Effie was comparing to Brenda’s guest book. “The sons of Kalevala. When the Norse gods killed the giant Ymir, blah blah blah, maggots feasted on the body. The black maggots became trolls and were sent by the gods to live under the ground. Yadda yadda.” She dragged her bony finger along the tissue like page. “If they came into daylight, they were punished by petrification.” She flung the bestiary down and excitedly went looking for more.
Robert just stood there, feeling a bit redundant. “Trolls? Brenda’s B&B has been taken over by - what - internet trolls?”
“Literal trolls, duckie. Listen to this....The Kalevala clan was run out of Sweden in the ninth century, people couldn’t stand their idle, un-Christian ways. People felt their tardiness was catching, that moral degradation would infect them.”
“But they weren’t talking metaphorically either, were they? The trolls are like a meme, infecting everyone they come into contact with. And now they’ve got to Brenda!”
“I bet those brothers have been wandering ever since. They might get a foothold in one place or another, for a while... depressing tower blocks, pit towns, tumbledown tenement buildings. Well I tell you what, I am not having a nest of trolls on my doorstep and if they think they can take over my best friend with their misery and apathy they’ve another think coming.” Effie closed the book with a thud, but the cloud of dust that erupted from it could not disguise the glint in her eyes that told Robert she had a plan!
A plan? A plan! That usually meant something with structure, with a chance of success... Instead Robert found himself parky as a brass monkey stood outside of Brenda’s door at six in the morning. Behind the door came a muffled hullabaloo. The sons of Kalevala were definitely up and about.
At his feet rested two sturdy ‘bags for life’ containing a tangle of extension leads, a portable UV light and a glitter ball: all bits and pieces he’d borrowed from the Miramar’s basement club. Bless her, Sheila had raised an arched eyebrow but she never said a word as off he traipsed lugging the electronics.
He dragged deeply on his cigarette, blowing smoke into the early morning air. Anything to get some fire in his lungs and keep his misgivings at bay. It was still dark, which was part of the plan, so hooray for that. He put a hand through his hair, massaging his neck while Effie came toddling up the street. She was late and she only lived next door! Typical.
‘Morning,’ she cooed, as if they were meeting for coffee, not mounting a rescue operation to save their friend. “Ready?”
“This was all I could get,” he waved a pack of glowing shot glasses at her and two pairs of novelty sunglasses with each frame a pink glowing heart. Feeling like the worst ravers ever, they kitted up.
Effie tutted disdainfully, a cut-price Dame Edna Everage. “Well, what are you hanging about for?”
She utilised Brenda’s spare key and caught him noticing the bright yellow marigolds she wore on her hands. “Remember, don’t let that stuff touch you,” she warned and crossed the threshold. Taking one last drag Robert flicked away the cigarette butt.
Inside there seemed to be even more rubbish than earlier. Was it multiplying? Robert scanned the skirting board looking for a socket. Effie had her head cocked, listening to see if anyone had noticed their presence. Whatever console game they had going on it seemed to be occupying them in the guest lounge. Cheers, bellows and belching emanated from the room.
Effie edged closer, peering around the door. The three brothers slobbed amongst empty bottles, cans, cartons, crisp packets, jostling over the controls. At the other end Brenda was deep in a tub of greasy chicken wings, barbecue sauce dripping from her hands, her chin and along her thick arms where she had tried to wipe the excess away from her mouth. She guzzled and glugged at a fizzy pop bottle and burped loudly. As she did the boys cheered and Brenda caught Effie’s goggling eyes.
“Effie!” Brenda roared in a voice that was not her own. It was deep and bellowing. The three trolls looked up, surprised. They scrabbled to their feet as Effie lobbed the UV shot glasses at them. Arcs of fluorescent light made them howl. Effie smiled at their pain, she had been right. It was the ultra violet spectrum that they couldn’t stand. She dodged away as one hawked and spat at her, a splatter of sage bile on Brenda’s magnolia walls.
The trolls were surprisingly nimble and were clawing at her scrawny heels as Effie darted for the stairs. She cried out loud and kicked back, losing one of her loafers in the process. Effie got to the landing, panting and bleeding.
The trolls bore down on her and she tried to ward them off using her heart specs. “For goodness sakes Robert, do something!”
The gloomy stairway shimmered into light as the glitter ball and portable light sent out a snowstorm of rays. The trolls cried out, distracted from ravaging Effie, each refraction was like a knife in their rubbery guts. The disco inferno did its job and sent the unnatural kin up the stairs and into the shadows.
Robert grabbed hold of the electrical kit and waddled towards Effie, meting out coils from the extension lead. He was glad he’d raided lost property, brown leather golfing gloves kept his hands from burning on the equipment.
“Are you alright?” He went to help Effie up but she shoved him away.
“You took your time!” She snapped and dusted herself down.
“Onwards and upwards?” he grinned, climbing the stairs towards the trolls.
“Effie! Robert!” They had forgotten Brenda was still down there. At the best of times their friend could seem imposing but now she seemed immense, bloated and jowly. The light didn’t seem to have any effect on her.
“She hasn’t been fully converted,” Robert hissed joyfully.
“But she knows where electricity comes from.” Effie pointed as her friend went to pull out the socket. Robert looked at where the trolls cowered but curiously so, seeing how this would play out.
They both shouted out her name. Brenda paused and
looked up.
“Don’t you see what they’ve done to you? Do you really want to be like them?” Effie implored.
“Why not?” she slavered. “Easy innit?”
Robert could tell that whatever force had control over Brenda, it wasn’t going to be reasoned with. It had almost forced reason out of her. So as Brenda went to reach for the plug Robert took the glitter ball and bowled it down the stairs at her. Strike! It smashed into the side of her head in an explosion of mirrored glass. Robert stifled a whoop, he had defeated the monster, but the creature was one of his mates.
“Oh Brenda love!” Effie winced, clutching Robert’s arm with a thick marigold hand. She released him and clumped down the stairs to tend to their friend.
He couldn’t bear to look at what had happened to Brenda and anyway he needed to brandish the UV light at the Kalevalas who could move more freely now the beam was focused.
Robert lashed out with the light in front of him, the way you might try to disperse a cloud of midges in a summer field. The trolls backed away slowly, wincing occasionally when they were caught by the glare. Robert could see the patches where the luminosity hit their skin, flaking away like crumbling masonry. They were nearly there. At Brenda’s inner sanctum.
Moving into what had been such a homely little apartment before it had been trashed, Robert grinned. “Thought you could bully and inveigle your way into Brenda’s? Thought you’d take advantage of her good nature did you? Well...” He swung the light at them. And instead of offering some hilarious riposte, Robert faltered as the light packed up. The plug had come out and the cord was taking up the slack. He’d run out of extension cable. “Oh shit!”
The Kalevala brothers didn’t need a second chance. They leapt at him as a pack. Robert ducked and smacked one with the lantern as they moved. They had the weight advantage but he was faster. Robert darted around the lumbering trolls and opened up the skylight. The dawn light came flooding in in a shaft of brilliance.
The trolls came at him: arms outstretched to rip him apart, murderous expressions on their snarling faces. Robert took a deep breath and closed his eyes. There was no way he wanted to see his own entrails spilling onto the floor. But nothing happened. Nothing at all. He squinted and then was relieved to see Effie had been right all along. The sunlight had turned them to stone.
Effie had briefly toyed with the idea of having the petrified Kalevala brothers on show outside her antiques emporium, but had thought better of it. She didn't want people taking selfies and peering through her shop windows and gawping. She didn’t believe in gimmicks. And heaven forbid if anyone should recognise their true potential and make her an offer.
No. The simplest thing had been to hire a van and take the cumbersome statues to the Bitch’s Maw and shove them into the underworld. That's where they belonged after all. She had to admit, Robert did have his uses and he was able to lay his hands on a couple of strapping men quite easily - fancy! Though off-loading the trolls had been down to just the three of them. Robert and Brenda tipped them out of a wheelbarrow into the swirling vortex of the Maw with gusto.
Still, Effie had been concerned about her friend. She watched her for signs, but she had to concede that Brenda was as tough as old boots. There didn't seem to be any lingering troll inheritance. Effie invited herself over to the now gleaming B&B on any pretext - it was handy for suppers - just to check. All trace of the trolls mopped up, rubbed down and disinfected away.
And then there were nights like tonight, gadding about at the Christmas Hotel. She couldn’t imagine those ugly roadie brutes bopping into the early hours to Donna Summer and Baccara. They tottered along the road, arm in arm, a little worse for wear. The cold sea air slowly shook them back into their senses, but for now they still glowed with the memories of the night.
As if picking up on her stream of consciousness Brenda looked at her friend and smiled gravely. ”You're still worried?”
“No ducks, not really.”
”They were dreadful days. Nothing but gloom invading your head. And the most frightening thing? It was so persuasive. So easy to give up. That scared me the most.”
“You, give in?” Effie snorted. “You could have given in years ago if you'd wanted.”
Brenda reflected for a moment. It was true. You could say she was built that way. Built to last. Look at Frank. He'd been going for centuries. But she hoped that wasn't just it. That there was something more, in her character. Nurture vs unnatural nature.
“Thank you,” Brenda said suddenly.
“For what?” Effie stopped, the whole of Whitby below them picked out in light.
“For looking out for me. You didn't give up on me.” They shared a smile. That was all that was needed between these ladies of an uncertain age. Tomorrow was another adventure and the dawn was already coming up.
Crystal Balls and Clackers
Neil O’Brien
Clack, Clack, Clackety, Clack. I can still hear that noise rollicking through my head and now my phone is beeping. I reach out from under the duvet and find it on the bedside table. I’ve got multiple messages from Effie. It’s not like her to text, usually she’s banging on my front door if she wants a chat, but then I have been non plus for thirteen hours. My head is throbbing and all I want to do is curl back up under the covers and not even blink. I read Effie’s text through blurry eyes. She’s booked us in for Glenda’s show – TONIGHT!
Something happened the night before which rocked my parts all over. Effie and I were en route to a Seventies themed tea dance at the Pavilion. We were tottering along, all dolled up, bracing the icy sea front wind when we reached our destination. Before going up the steps Effie juddered to a halt. She pointed up to a poster displayed by the main entrance with the headline Psychic Glen –Tell Me When! The poster was a bit gaudy to be honest I thought and showed a glamorous woman with a silvery bubble perm hovering over a shimmering crystal ball. Turns out Effie knew Glenda from old, from before I’d arrived in Whitby and there had been some difference between them over a card reading on the West Pier. The crystal ball must have had some holographic special effect printed onto the poster paper as it shimmered and glowed magnificently in the night. I just wanted to reach out and touch it. I had an urgent desire to do so. So I did. I walked across to the poster and reached out my knitted mitt and stretched upwards. Turns out I started screaming almost instantly until Effie knocked me flat over backwards with a good wallop. That did the job all right – bringing me back to my senses as I lay there on the pavement. I’d had another flashback. I was strapped to some kind of device with my hand pressed down over the ball. Was it Glenda’s ball? It looked the same and there was something else. A terrifying invasion in my mind. A presence digging and rooting around. It was terrible whatever it was. Whatever had occurred in my misty past shook my parts all over and wiped me out for a couple of hours. I’m a tough old bird as you know and a while later, replenished by a few Babychams, I filled Effie in on what I’d seen as we tucked into the vol-au-vents. And it wasn’t long after I was up on the dance floor giving it my all. I wasn’t going to let one of my flashbacks stop me having a fancy foxtrot. But all the same what happened to me touching that poster paper crystal ball had knocked me for six. We made it home later, tottering down the cobbled streets and stopped off at Cod Almighty for a midnight supper. But all night long I’ve had a restless sleep with images of that ball spinning in my mind and this clack, clack, clackety, clack racket going off in my head. Lying there in my lovely cosy bed, the last thing I feel like doing is taking off again for another night out.
I got out of bed tentatively and jumped out of my skin when I saw a dead spider on my pillow before realising it was one of my false eyelashes come off from the night before. It was a good night out last night but I did feel rough this morning wiping lippy and crusty dried batter off my face in my little bathroom with a wet wipe. I made myself a round of toast with a couple of fried eggs on top and a large coffee before getting dressed and making myself look hal
f decent with a bit of lippy. I was so looking forward to a couple of days in sorting things out, spring cleaning with the radio on and a bit of TV. Just me in my lovely little attic flat before my first guests of the year arrived in a couple of weeks. Oh well, my couple of days at home could wait a while. I went round to Effie’s Emporium. She was up and running and raring to go when I knocked on her front door.
“The show starts at 7pm,” she said pulling on a shaggy gilet over her mustard trench coat and tugging on her fleecy lined boots. “I managed to get last minute tickets. We’re up in the Gods, but it’s all I could get. She’s booked out solid. Besides, I’m not spending £65 per ticket on an old fraud like Glenda.”
“Thanks Effie,” was all I could muster.
“I’m off out to get a few bits,” said Effie, “Care to join me? We’ve only got a few hours before we need to get ready, anyway.”
I groaned again. But I did have to get a few groceries and some cleaning bits so I smiled at Effie and we headed off to the shops.
Off we went, striding along the cobbled streets. It was still mighty chilly but the sky was big and blue with mountainous clouds rolling past like herds of migrating beasts. I felt beastly too with my head groggy from too much sleep and Babycham. As we approached the shops we heard a noise like chanting, a rumble of a crowd and then we came across a group outside the Public Library. The group was holding placards with slogans that read ‘LEAVE OUR LIBRARY ALONE’ and ‘STOP SHELVING OUR LIBRARY SERVICE’. And there at the front of the group was Top Bun – this older lady I’ve affectionately nicknamed because she wears her hair all pulled up into a bun. Usually I see her in the upmarket supermarket where I pop in for my spicy tea. She’s a little bent over, a bit huffy and puffy and drives a spritzy little car that she always parks by the plant display out the front. We always have a few words.
[Brenda & Effie 00] - A Treasury of Brenda and Effie Page 15
