The Neil Gaiman Reader

by Neil Gaiman

  So my dad made potato salad. Here is the recipe.

  My dads potato salad is made with tiny new potatoes, which he boils, then while their warm he pours his secret mix over them which is mayonnaise and sour cream and little onion things called chives which he sotays in bacon fat, and crunchy bacon bits. When it gets cool its the best potato salad in the world, and better than the potato salad we get at school which tastes like white sick.

  We stopped at the shop and got fruit and Coca-Cola and potato sticks, and they went into the box and it went into the back of the car and we went into the car and mum and dad and my baby sister, We Are On Our Way!

  Where our house is, it is morning, when we leave, and we got onto the motorway and we went over the bridge over twilight, and soon it got dark. I love driving through the dark.

  I sit in the back of the car and I got all scrunched singing songs that go lah lah lah in the back of my head so my dad has to go, Dawnie darling stop making that noise, but still I go lah lah lah.

  Lah lah lah.

  The motorway was closed for repairs so we followed signs and this is what they said: DIVERSION.

  Mummy made dad lock his door, while we were driving, and she made me to lock my door too.

  It got more darker as we went.

  This is what I saw while we drived through the center of the city, out of the window. I saw a beardy man who ran out when we stopped at the lights and ran a smeary cloth all over our windows.

  He winked at me through the window, in the back of the car, with his old eyes.

  Then he wasnt there anymore, and mummy and daddy had an arguement about who he was, and whether he was good luck or bad luck. But not a bad arguement.

  Their were more signs that said DIVERSION, and they were yellow.

  I saw a street where the prettiest men Id ever seen blew us kisses and sung songs, and a street where I saw a woman holding the side of her face under a blue light but her face was bleeding and wet, and a street where there were only cats who stared at us.

  My sister went loo loo, which means look and she said kitty.

  The baby is called Melicent, but I call her Daisydaisy. Its my secret name for her. Its from a song called Daisydaisy, which goes, Daisydaisy give me your answer do Im half crazy over the love of you it wont be a stylish marriage I cant afford a carriage but youll look sweet upon the seat of a bicicle made for two.

  Then we were out of the city, into the hills.

  Then there were houses that were like palaces on each side of the road, set far back.

  My dad was born in one of those houses, and he and mummy had the arguement about money where he says what he threw away to be with her and she says oh, so your bringing that up again are you?

  I looked at the houses. I asked my Daddy which one Grandmother lived in. He said he didnt know, which he was lying. I dont know why grownups fib so much, like when they say Ill tell you later or well see when they mean no or I wont tell you at all even when your older.

  In one house there were people dancing in the garden. Then the road began to wind around, and daddy was driving us through the countryside through the dark.

  Look! said my mother. A white deer ran across the road with people chasing it. My dad said they were a nuisance and they were a pest and like rats with antlers, and the worst bit of hitting a deer is when it comes through the glass into the car and he said he had a friend who was kicked to death by a deer who came through the glass with sharp hooves.

  And mummy said oh god like we really needed to know that, and daddy said well it happened Tanya, and mummy said honestly your incorigible.

  I wanted to ask who the people chasing the deer was, but I started to sing instead going lah lah lah lah lah lah.

  My dad said stop that. My mum said for gods sake let the girl express herself, and Dad said I bet you like chewing tinfoil too and my mummy said so whats that supposed to mean and Daddy said nothing and I said arent we there yet?

  On the side of the road there were bonfires, and sometimes piles of bones.

  We stopped on one side of a hill. The end of the world was on the other side of the hill, said my dad.

  I wondered what it looked like. We parked the car in the car park. We got out. Mummy carried Daisy. Daddy carried the picnic basket. We walked over the hill, in the light of the candles they set by the path. A unicorn came up to me on the way. It was white as snow, and it nuzzled me with its mouth.

  I asked daddy if I could give it an apple and he said it probably has fleas, and Mummy said it didnt. and all the time its tail went swish swish swish.

  I offered it my apple it looked at me with big silver eyes and then it snorted like this, hrrrmph, and ran away over the hill.

  Baby Daisy said loo loo.

  This is what it looks like at the end of the world, which is the best place in the world.

  There is a hole in the ground, which looks like a very wide big hole and pretty people holding sticks and simatars that burn come up out of it. They have long golden hair. They look like princesses, only fierce. Some of them have wings and some of them dusnt.

  And theres a big hole in the sky too and things are coming down from it, like the cat-heady man, and the snakes made out of stuff that looks like glitter-jel like I putted on my hair at Hallowmorn, and I saw something that looked like a big old buzzie fly, coming down from the sky. There were very many of them. As many as stars.

  They dont move. They just hang there, not doing anything. I asked Daddy why they weren’t moving and he said they were moving just very very slowly but I dont think so.

  We set up at a picnic table.

  Daddy said the best thing about the end of the world was no wasps and no moskitos. And mummy said there werent alot of wasps in Johnsons Peculiar Garden of Lights either. I said there werent alot of wasps or moskitos at Ponydale and there were ponies too we could ride on and my Dad said hed brought us here to enjoy ourselves.

  I said I wanted to go over to see if I could see the unicorn again and mummy and daddy said dont go too far.

  At the next table to us were people with masks on. I went off with Daisydaisy to see them.

  They sang Happy Birthday to you to a big fat lady with no clothes on, and a big funny hat. She had lots of bosoms all the way down to her tummy. I waited to see her blow out the candles on her cake, but there wasnt a cake.

  Arent you going to make a wish? I said.

  She said she couldnt make any more wishes. She was too old. I told her that at my last birthday when I blew out my candles all in one go I had thought about my wish for a long time, and I was going to wish that mummy and Daddy wouldn’t argue any more in the night. But in the end I wished for a shetland pony but it never come.

  The lady gave me a cuddle and said I was so cute that she could just eat me all up, bones and hair and everything. She smelled like sweet dried milk.

  Then Daisydaisy started to cry with all her might and mane, and the lady putted me down.

  I shouted and called for the unicorn, but I didnt see him. Sometimes I thought I could hear a trumpet, and sometimes I thought it was just the noise in my ears.

  Then we came back to the table. Whats after the end of the world I said to my dad. Nothing he said. Nothing at all. Thats why its called the end.

  Then Daisy was sick over Daddys shoes, and we cleaned it up.

  I sat by the table. We ate potato salad, which I gave you the recipe for all ready, you should make it its really good, and we drank orange juice and potato sticks and squishy egg and cress sandwiches. We drank our Coca-cola.

  Then Mummy said something to Daddy I didnt hear and he just hit her in the face with a big hit with his hand, and mummy started to cry.

  Daddy told me to take Daisy and walk about while they talked.

  I took Daisy and I said come on Daisydaisy, come on old daisybell because she was crying too, but Im too old to cry.

  I couldnt hear what they were saying. I looked up at the cat face man and I tried to see if he was moving very ve
ry slowly, and I heard the trumpet at the end of the world in my head going dah dah dah.

  We sat by a rock and I sang songs to Daisy lah lah lah lah lah to the sound of the trumpet in my head dah dah dah.

  Lah lah lah lah lah lah lah lah.

  Lah lah lah.

  Then mummy and daddy came over to me and they said we were going home. But that everything was really all right. Mummys eye was all purple. She looked funny, like a lady on the television.

  Daisy said owie. I told her yes, it was an owie. We got back in the car.

  On the way home, nobody said anything. The baby sleeped.

  There was a dead animal by the side of the road somebody had hit with a car. Daddy said it was a white deer. I thought it was the unicorn, but mummy told me that you cant kill unicorns but I think she was lying like grownups do again.

  When we got to Twilight I said, if you told someone your wish, did that mean it wouldnt come true?

  What wish, said Daddy?

  Your birthday wish. When you blow out the candles.

  He said, Wishes dont come true whether you tell them or not. Wishes, he said. He said you cant trust wishes.

  I asked Mummy, and she said, whatever your father says, she said in her cold voice, which is the one she uses when she tells me off with my whole name.

  Then I sleeped too.

  And then we were home, and it was morning, and I dont want to see the end of the world again. And before I got out of the car, while mummy was carrying in Daisydaisy to the house, I closed my eyes so I couldn’t see anything at all, and I wished and I wished and I wished and I wished. I wished wed gone to Ponydale. I wished wed never gone anywhere at all. I wished I was somebody else.

  And I wished.

  The Facts in the Case of the Departure of Miss Finch

  1998

  TO BEGIN AT the end: I arranged the thin slice of pickled ginger, pink and translucent, on top of the pale yellowtail flesh, and dipped the whole arrangement—ginger, fish, and vinegared rice—into the soy sauce, flesh-side down; then I devoured it in a couple of bites.

  “I think we ought to go to the police,” I said.

  “And tell them what, exactly?” asked Jane.

  “Well, we could file a missing persons report, or something. I don’t know.”

  “And where did you last see the young lady?” asked Jonathan, in his most policemanlike tones. “Ah, I see. Did you know that wasting police time is normally considered an offense, sir?”

  “But the whole circus . . .”

  “These are transient persons, sir, of legal age. They come and go. If you have their names, I suppose I can take a report . . .”

  I gloomily ate a salmon skin roll. “Well, then,” I said, “why don’t we go to the papers?”

  “Brilliant idea,” said Jonathan, in the sort of tone of voice which indicates that the person talking doesn’t think it’s a brilliant idea at all.

  “Jonathan’s right,” said Jane. “They won’t listen to us.”

  “Why wouldn’t they believe us? We’re reliable. Honest citizens. All that.”

  “You’re a fantasy writer,” she said. “You make up stuff like this for a living. No one’s going to believe you.”

  “But you two saw it all as well. You’d back me up.”

  “Jonathan’s got a new series on cult horror movies coming out in the autumn. They’ll say he’s just trying to get cheap publicity for the show. And I’ve got another book coming out. Same thing.”

  “So you’re saying that we can’t tell anyone?” I sipped my green tea.

  “No,” Jane said, reasonably, “we can tell anyone we want. It’s making them believe us that’s problematic. Or, if you ask me, impossible.”

  The pickled ginger was sharp on my tongue. “You may be right,” I said. “And Miss Finch is probably much happier wherever she is right now than she would be here.”

  “But her name isn’t Miss Finch,” said Jane, “it’s——” and she said our former companion’s real name.

  “I know. But it’s what I thought when I first saw her,” I explained. “Like in one of those movies. You know. When they take off their glasses and put down their hair. ‘Why, Miss Finch. You’re beautiful.’ ”

  “She certainly was that,” said Jonathan, “in the end, anyway.” And he shivered at the memory.

  There. So now you know: that’s how it all ended, and how the three of us left it, several years ago. All that remains is the beginning, and the details.

  For the record, I don’t expect you to believe any of this. Not really. I’m a liar by trade, after all; albeit, I like to think, an honest liar. If I belonged to a gentlemen’s club I’d recount it over a glass or two of port late in the evening as the fire burned low, but I am a member of no such club, and I’ll write it better than ever I’d tell it. So here you will learn of Miss Finch (whose name, as you already know, was not Finch, nor anything like it, since I’m changing names here to disguise the guilty) and how it came about that she was unable to join us for sushi. Believe it or not, just as you wish. I am not even certain that I believe it anymore. It all seems such a long way away.

  I could find a dozen beginnings. Perhaps it might be best to begin in a hotel room, in London, a few years ago. It was 11:00 A.M. The phone began to ring, which surprised me. I hurried over to answer it.

  “Hello?” It was too early in the morning for anyone in America to be phoning me, and there was no one in England who was meant to know that I was even in the country.

  “Hi,” said a familiar voice, adopting an American accent of monumentally unconvincing proportions. “This is Hiram P. Muzzledexter of Colossal Pictures. We’re working on a film that’s a remake of Raiders of the Lost Ark but instead of Nazis it has women with enormous knockers in it. We’ve heard that you were astonishingly well supplied in the trouser department and might be willing to take on the part of our male lead, Minnesota Jones . . .”

  “Jonathan?” I said. “How on earth did you find me here?”

  “You knew it was me,” he said, aggrieved, his voice losing all trace of the improbable accent and returning to his native London.

  “Well, it sounded like you,” I pointed out. “Anyway, you didn’t answer my question. No one’s meant to know that I was here.”

  “I have my ways,” he said, not very mysteriously. “Listen, if Jane and I were to offer to feed you sushi—something I recall you eating in quantities that put me in mind of feeding time at London Zoo’s Walrus House—and if we offered to take you to the theater before we fed you, what would you say?”

  “Not sure. I’d say ‘Yes’ I suppose. Or ‘What’s the catch?’ I might say that.”

  “Not exactly a catch,” said Jonathan. “I wouldn’t exactly call it a catch. Not a real catch. Not really.”

  “You’re lying, aren’t you?”

  Somebody said something near the phone, and then Jonathan said, “Hang on, Jane wants a word.” Jane is Jonathan’s wife.

  “How are you?” she said.

  “Fine, thanks.”

  “Look,” she said, “you’d be doing us a tremendous favor—not that we wouldn’t love to see you, because we would, but you see, there’s someone . . .”

  “She’s your friend,” said Jonathan, in the background.

  “She’s not my friend. I hardly know her,” she said, away from the phone, and then, to me, “Um, look, there’s someone we’re sort of lumbered with. She’s not in the country for very long, and I wound up agreeing to entertain her and look after her tomorrow night. She’s pretty frightful, actually. And Jonathan heard that you were in town from someone at your film company, and we thought you might be perfect to make it all less awful, so please say yes.”

  So I said yes.

  In retrospect, I think the whole thing might have been the fault of the late Ian Fleming, creator of James Bond. I had read an article the previous month, in which Ian Fleming had advised any would-be writer who had a book to get done that wasn’t getting written to
go to a hotel to write it. I had, not a novel, but a film script that wasn’t getting written; so I bought a plane ticket to London, promised the film company that they’d have a finished script in three weeks’ time, and took a room in an eccentric hotel in Little Venice.

  I told no one in England that I was there. Had people known, my days and nights would have been spent seeing them, not staring at a computer screen and, sometimes, writing.

  Truth to tell, I was bored half out of my mind and ready to welcome any interruption.

  Early the next evening I arrived at Jonathan and Jane’s house, which was more or less in Hampstead. There was a small green sports car parked outside. Up the stairs, and I knocked at the door. Jonathan answered it; he wore an impressive suit. His light brown hair was longer than I remembered it from the last time I had seen him, in life or on television.

  “Hello,” said Jonathan. “The show we were going to take you to has been canceled. But we can go to something else, if that’s okay with you.”

  I was about to point out that I didn’t know what we were originally going to see, so a change of plans would make no difference to me, but Jonathan was already leading me into the living room, establishing that I wanted fizzy water to drink, assuring me that we’d still be eating sushi and that Jane would be coming downstairs as soon as she had put the children to bed.

  They had just redecorated the living room, in a style Jonathan described as Moorish brothel. “It didn’t set out to be a Moorish brothel,” he explained. “Or any kind of a brothel really. It was just where we ended up. The brothel look.”

  “Has he told you all about Miss Finch?” asked Jane. Her hair had been red the last time I had seen her. Now it was dark brown; and she curved like a Raymond Chandler simile.

  “Who?”

  “We were talking about Ditko’s inking style,” apologized Jonathan. “And the Neal Adams issues of Jerry Lewis.”

  “But she’ll be here any moment. And he has to know about her before she gets here.”