by Tim Ellis
I sat up sweating, my heart doing the rumba in my chest. God! A dream! I don’t have dreams. That Bloody Doctor Gail was messing with my head.
The door opened. Lexi’s smiling face peered round the white-painted wood. I looked at the clock and steadied my breathing. It was four-thirty. When she saw that I was awake, she ran in and clambered on the bed. Christmas has started early, I thought. Last Christmas, I had been consumed by grief, so this was our first Christmas together without Angie. I held Lexi close.
‘Harry won’t let me open my presents until you get up and we’ve all had breakfast,’ she pouted.
‘Then I had better get up, hadn’t I? Has Santa left lots of presents under the tree?’
‘Yes there are lots and lots of presents, and he left some ‘graphs as well.’
Once Lexi had gone to bed last night, I had dressed up in a hired Santa suit and beard. Harry had taken photographs of me climbing into the flat through a window – we didn’t own a chimney – carrying a sack of toys through the living room, stacking the presents under the tree, eating the mince pie and drinking the wine, then half out of the window waving goodbye. We had left the photographs next to the empty plate and glass.
‘One of Santa’s elves takes the ‘graphs,’ I said. ‘And he leaves them so that we know Santa is real and not make-believe. Some people don’t believe that Father Christmas is real.’
‘They’re the ones who don’t get presents,’ Lexi said wagging a small finger.
‘That’s right beautiful. If there are lots of presents under the tree, then you must really believe in Santa?’
With a serious expression she said, ‘I do, daddy, I do.’ She started tugging my hand. ‘Come on daddy, get up.’
I wondered why I couldn’t remember a Christmas with my parents. The first one I remember was with Aunt Miriam and Uncle George. I climbed out of bed, put my dressing gown on and, holding Lexi’s hand, we waddled to the kitchen together for breakfast. All the way down the hallway my mouth watered like a desert spring at the smell and sound of bacon, eggs, sausages, and bubble and squeak sizzling in frying pans. That was my breakfast, Lexi wasn’t having any, she was far too young to be subjected to unsaturated fats, and Harry’s chocolate diet prevented her from indulging. A cooked breakfast was a rarity. Sometimes, Harry cooked it on a Sunday, and then plied me with compensatory salad the rest of the week. I usually cheated by eating the unhealthy options in the canteen.
After breakfast, the three of us went into the living room. We sat on the floor around the tree and distributed the presents. I had three, Harry had five, and Lexi had nine.
‘Santa obviously had one sack just for your presents, Lexi.’ I said.
Too excited to talk, she squealed and began ripping at the first one.
I took it off her. ‘Don’t be so impatient, young lady. Let’s see who has been kind enough to give you a Christmas present.’ I found the red card with a Christmas Robin on and opened it up. ‘Ah, this one is from Harry.’ Her face was a picture, and talking of pictures, Harry had the foresight to have prepared the digital camera and was busy taking snaps from all angles. I passed the present back to Lexi, who started pulling at the loosely wrapped paper. At last, she managed to free a Little Princess pink hat from its plastic constraint and put it on.
Lexi got up and hugged Harry, giving her a big kiss. ‘Thank you Harry.’
‘You’re very welcome, Lexi.’
‘Harry’s turn now,’ I said and pointed to the one I wanted her to open.
She picked it up, unwrapping it warily. Inside it contained the PhD prospectus and a faxed copy of the receipt for three years’ fees. Confusion clouded her face as she looked at it.
‘You start in January,’ I said.
Tears gushed from her eyes. ‘I don’t know what to say, James.’ She knelt, hugged me and planted a kiss on my cheek. ‘Thank you,’ she said.
I smiled and turned to Lexi. ‘Which present next?’
She picked one from the pile the size of a book wrapped in green paper with mistletoe pictures on it, and passed it to me. I found the card and read it without the words registering in my brain first: ‘To Lexi from Uncle Daniel.’
‘Oh yes, I forgot to tell you,’ Harry said. ‘We were walking back from the park yesterday when a dishevelled man with long hair stopped us. He said he was your brother, Daniel, and Lexi’s Uncle.’
My heart began thumping, but I kept outwardly calm. What Daniel had whispered to me in the hotel room, as I lay protecting Suzie, came back to me: Goodbye brother. I dismissed it at the time thinking I had misheard him, or it had been the wind whistling through the broken windows, but now I wondered what he meant by it. I cast my mind back to Lisa Connell and the missing baby. Surely it couldn’t be possible, I thought. Why hadn’t Social Services rung us back?
‘I don’t have a brother,’ I replied.
‘That’s what I said to him. I told him to go away and stop bothering us, or I’d call the police. He started laughing when I said that. Anyway, he gave me the present for Lexi, and said he had to go away, but he would come back to see Lexi soon.’
I didn’t enjoy Christmas Day after that, and I was glad to have an early night.
As I was drifting off to sleep, my mobile rang. I picked it up hoping it wasn’t him. I knew I should have thrown the damned phone away.
‘Harte.’
I have a lovely niece, I’m glad I didn’t hit her.
I had no idea what he meant by that. ‘Stay away from my daughter you sick bastard.’
You stopped me from raising the Princes of Hell brother, but I’ve still got Solomon’s Key and the Monarchia Daemon, so I’ll be trying again sometime in the future.’
‘You’ll be locked up in a padded cell by then.’
You know that isn’t true, brother.
‘And stop calling me brother,’ I shouted into the phone. ‘I don’t have a brother,’ anger consumed me. I hurled the phone against the wall, it shattered, the pieces flying around the room like tiny missiles.
Chapter Twenty
Friday 27th December
‘Did you have a good Christmas, James?’ Doctor Bloody Gail asked. She sat in her noisy chair dressed in a kaleidoscope of, what looked like, second-hand clothes and accessories. Even her hair had been sprayed orange and green. Surely there must be a hospital dress code? If she were allowed to get away with offending patients through her appalling dress sense, where would it end? I made a mental note to speak to the Hospital Chief Executive. I was officially on leave, but I knew the cow would ring the Chief if I didn’t make an appearance, so I was here keeping up the pretence of co-operation before I went to Highgate cemetery to speak to Angie.
‘Yes, thank you.’ I’d decided to be polite today, but if she thought of me as a lone resistance fighter struggling against her as the evil enchantress, then that’s what I’d become. Grinning like an undertaker, I passed her a Christmas present wrapped in white paper with some silver angels on.
She took the gift, but didn’t open it. ‘Still fighting me, James? I thought we had come to an understanding, but it is obvious now that we are locked together in a battle of wills.’
The only way she could have known about my membership of the resistance was if she had read my mind. My body language wasn’t defensive in any way. I maintained eye contact with her. I wished she wouldn’t look at me over those ridiculous fluorescent green glasses. I was beginning to feel unnerved at her uncanny skill to see through me. ‘You’ve only asked me one question, and I answered you politely. How did you arrive at that conclusion?’
‘The truth of your opposition towards me shines out from your eyes like a beacon in the darkest night.’
I’d have to start wearing sunglasses. ‘Ah yes, the windows to the soul? That’s an old wives’ tale.’
She smiled wistfully. ‘Is it, James?’
My eyes must have told her something, because she could read me like a child’s picture book. I kept my thoughts to myself whilst she o
pened the Christmas present I had given her.
‘A notebook James, how thoughtful? It’s rather large and… thick.’ She smiled. ‘So this is how you see the little notebook I write notes in is it?’ She opened the monolithic notebook I’d given her and began writing on the first page.
Oh shit!
‘Tell me about your dreams, James.’
Not my bloody dreams. She’s going to try and interpret my dreams. I’ll have to make sure the one about her being naked in my bed doesn’t slip out. ‘I’ve told you, I don’t remember any of my dreams.’
‘You know that’s a lie, James. Your mouth twitched when you spoke and you looked away briefly. If you won’t let me help you, I’ll have to bring the sessions to an end, and report my failure, due to your continued opposition, to the Chief Superintendent. As you know, what we can achieve without dream interpretation and hypnotic regression is limited.’
Crap! The Chief would probably suspend me until I co-operated. I was being forced into doing something against my will. Hell, the two of them were ganging up on me, and it was probably illegal, unethical, and immoral. I could report them both to the Ethics Committee; take them to the European Court of Human Rights. I could imagine the Chief’s unsympathetic face at my cry of foul play. If I still wanted my job, I had no choice but to let myself be skinned, dissected, and analysed.
‘You’re evil,’ I said.
‘Excellent, James,’ she beamed. ‘On Monday I will begin my expedition into your subconscious.’
‘You make it sound like a journey into the darkest reaches of the Amazon.’
She grinned. I’d obviously made her day. ‘If I meet Dr Livingstone, I shall give him your regards, James.’
I was dreading it. God knows what she might find hidden in the nooks and crannies of my subconscious mind.
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About the Author
Tim Ellis was born in the bowels of Hammersmith Hospital, London, on a dark and stormy night, grew up in Cheadle, Cheshire, and now lives in Essex with his wife and five Shitzus. In-between, he joined the Royal Army Medical Corps at eighteen and completed twenty-two years service, leaving in 1993 having achieved the rank of Warrant Officer Class 1 (Regimental Sergeant Major). Since then he has worked in secondary education as a senior financial manager, in higher education as an associate lecturer/tutor at Lincoln and Anglia Ruskin Universities, and as a consultant for the National College of School Leadership. His final job, before retiring to write full time in 2009, was as Head and teacher of Behavioural Sciences (Psychology/Sociology) in a secondary school. He has a PhD and an MBA in Educational Management, and an MA in Education.
Discover other titles by Tim Ellis at http://tim-ellis.yolasite.com/
Warrior
(Adult Historical Fiction)
Path of Destiny
Scourge of the Steppe
The Knowledge of Time
(Young Adult Science Fiction)
Second Civilisation
Orc Quest
(Young Adult Fantasy)
Prophecy
Adult Crime:
Solomon’s Key
Body 13
The Graves at Angel Brook
A Life for a Life
Jacob’s Ladder
Collected Short Stories
Untended Treasures
Coming in 2011
The Wages of Sin
(Sequel to A Life for a Life)
The Knowledge of Time: Verloren
The Timekeeper's Apprentice
