Imbroglio

by Andrew McEwan

Lust. A taut length of elastic between tonsils and testicles, wrapped about lungs and heart. Makes it difficult to breathe…

  The horse was where he’d left it, almost. The balustrade against which it had come to rest was mostly consumed. The pineapple munching beast teetered on the brink of a fall, eyes black and gleaming, coat shimmering under the light of several moons, each with its face turned away, unwilling to witness the warrior’s exit or, more likely, observing moments of greater import beyond a horizon stacked with colour, serene.

  It greeted him with a shake of head and mane. Moonbeams scattered off the sword above.

  Ramch wiped his hands on his chest and began to climb.

  Reaching the sword he pulled it free, feet braced on the castle’s irregular skin.

  The cupola turned, its cropped head-dress of leaves menacing.

  Ramch grinned, and in a few brisk strides took the blade to it, further truncating the once lush crown.

  He set to then on the castle, hacking its soft flesh beneath the hoary rind and shaping the inner rings, from top to bottom, in the image, hundreds of feet high, of himself; only not a self he recognized.

  His war-horse urinated, a thick yellow stream that together with the pineapple’s juice formed an adhesive residue, one permitting their circumnavigation of the massive drupe, Ramch cutting and horse pissing, fruit and skin tumbling, spinning away as the pair made their way round, sculpting a route to the castle’s base and the indigo plinth on which it stood. From there a stairway led into the rock, broad and steep, unlit. They made their way down, listening as the castle hardened overhead, the adhesive curing to a glassy film that cracked, dusting the stairs with crystal…

  Michael opened his eyes.

  Had he imagined it? He lay on his back in the rain, not knowing where it had come from, warm sluices polishing his face and bending the long grasses. His blouse stuck to his chest and his skirt clung heavily about his thighs. Neither hand held the Holsten umbrella.

  All he could see were grass stems and clouds. He had no recollection of where he was, of what might lie beyond the constraints of his vision. The only noise was the rain spattering his lashes, the gentle soughing of green and yellow stems as water and air passed through them.

  Something tickled his ankle.

  A chasm…

  He was late for work. Bedraggled. The supervisor turned purple, pulling at her collar to vent her anger, necktie company issue, suit regulation; smart, respectable, what was expected of employees of Hubert Mason.

  Michael didn’t have the nerve to apologize, scurrying instead to his shared locker and a pair of flat shoes, straightening his hair and adjusting his breasts before venturing out onto the shop floor, where he busied himself with customers, taking particular time with old gentlemen at the cosmetics counter. ‘Hmm, I think this is more your shade, sir. And some anti-wrinkle cream, is it? No problem. There. Yes. Look in the mirror. Perfect.’ He loved patronizing the old dears. His smile covered everything.

  ‘What time’s your break?’ asked Rod, inserting a till roll with painted fingers. ‘I hate this. I just know that bitch is watching. She’ll be over in a minute, telling me I’m useless, sending me off to dust shelves or rearrange coat-hangars.’

  Michael laughed, trying not to make it obvious. ‘Eleven. Do you reckon she’ll dock me?’

  ‘How late were you?’

  ‘An hour.’

  ‘An hour? Shit, Tom, you’re lucky she hasn’t hauled you off to the back office.’

  The back office. Tales related to it. Fables…

  ‘Time yet,’ opined Michael. ‘It’s upside-down and backwards!’

  ‘What? Fuck!’

  ‘Here, let me do it.’

  ‘Thanks – see you at eleven.’ And he was off, ducking behind hosiery.

  Michael took the till roll and re-fitted it in seconds.

  Two teenage boys hovered, wide-eyed and nervous. Twelve or thirteen, they bobbed and weaved, all skittish.

  His smile became triumphant. A bra fitting! How he loved this rite of passage; even better with two initiates. He had fond memories himself of his first brassiere, the pride in his father’s eyes as the little bow was positioned across his gaunt sternum. He’d worn it to bed, A-cup bursting with shredded newspaper, straps indenting shoulders and back for all to see in the changing rooms. Such temporary scars spoke volumes.

  He’d become a man, with the welts to prove it. Soon the girls would start bothering him, hungry for his penis.

  Michael sighed and wandered over. ‘Need any help?’

  ‘What? No – I mean. Maybe…I don’t know. Maybe he does.’

  Elbows were pulled and feet shuffled.

  ‘Who? Me? I just came with you. I don’t need anything.’

  ‘Ah, don’t be shy, boys; we’ve all been there. The first time should be special.’

  They looked terrified.

  ‘Seen anything you like?’

  ‘Well…’

  ‘Yes?’

  The braver of the two, a scruffy blond, pushed his chest out. ‘I’ve got mine already; but I don’t have it with me,’ he boasted.

  Michael was confused. He sensed a lie. ‘You don’t?’ What was he, some kind of radical? ‘Doesn’t your old man believe in them?’

  The boy shook his head, attempting familial pride yet unable to sustain it. Definitely something missing.

  ‘Support,’ the love apple intoned, ‘is vital.’

  Blond kid nodded. ‘It’s just…’

  ‘I understand.’ And the other? His eyes were bright buttons. ‘What about you?’

  ‘Something in chocolate, with frills.’

  ‘No problem. Follow me, gentlemen, to the fitting room…’

  Replete with mirrors.

  ‘Now, a small selection. Let’s see.’

  Rod made an appearance, seemingly desperate.

  ‘The back office?’

  Rod nodded, lip bitten.

  ‘Take care of my friends here, will you? I may be some time.’

  And that was it. If he’d expected ceremony there was none, no public dressing down or humiliating Tannoy. Just this: a verbal message, delivered by a friend. No joke, surely. Rod was incapable. Too serious…

  But the doubts persisted, gnawing at his backbone as he made his way down long corridors of stock for disposal, last year’s fashions boxed and shelved, hung on rails. The years’ before, going back decades, items of apparel assembled in reverse chronological order down the improbable length of passages that broke at right angles and meandered forever, this historical maze lit at its nether end by a 40 Watt bulb and marked by a sign on a door reading OFFICE.

  He knocked. Swallowed.

  ‘Come.’

  He entered. Stood. There wasn’t much room, what there was occupied by a desk of black wood, scarred by some heavy object. The supervisor sat with her legs crossed in an ample leather chair behind it, impatiently tapping the pads of her long, steepled fingers.

  ‘How long have you worked here, Michael?’

  ‘Two years.’

  ‘And do you like it?’

  ‘It’s okay.’

  Her eyes widened and her head tipped forward. She lay her palms on the desk and peered for a moment at her nails. Sharp nails.

  He found he needed the toilet.

  ‘We haven’t spoken much,’ she continued. ‘That’s usually a good thing. But with you…’ She got to her feet, buttoning her jacket. Unbuttoned her jacket and sat on the desk’s edge. ‘Perhaps we should have talked earlier.’

  Michael said nothing. He didn’t think it wise to reply. He had an uneasy feeling.

  ‘Got a girlfriend?’

  Eh?

  She rose. Moved closer. ‘I could have you fired.’

  Oh.

  Her breath stroked his ear, her hand his stomach, pulling gently at the blouse, teasing, making its way down his thigh and round to his buttock.

  ‘I�
�d like us to be friends, Michael. What do you say?’

  He was speechless; throat arid.

  ‘Shy?’

  ‘No,’ he croaked.

  ‘You’ve not been with a woman?’ The expectant look in her face was too much. Gleefully wrongdoing, she turned him till his back was to the desk and lifted his skirt. ‘Just leave everything to me…’

  She wanted his semen, and would pull it from him, first sucking him hard, arousing him against his will, then laying him on the desk, trousers about her ankles as she squatted over him, vulva pumping, milking his groin. She threw her jacket off and loosened her tie, rolled her sleeves up. This was business, her actions seemed to say; needful, desirous. He did not enter the equation as anything other than a tool, a means to an end, her body in control of his, bending him to her carnal wishes.

  ‘That’s my boy!’ the supervisor encouraged, riding him. ‘Keep it stiff now. Wouldn’t want to hurt you.’

  He took the threat seriously, believing he had no choice.

  ‘There…yes…there…oh, you are a good boy, Michael…’

  Her eyes closed, teeth bared. Nails incised the black table.

  He emptied his balls inside her.

  ‘There,’ she repeated, leaning over to kiss him. ‘Good boy, Michael. Now, get yourself cleaned up, I’ve work to attend to.’

  Sliding off the desk he pulled his skirt down. The supervisor straightened her tie and fastened her cuffs, donned her smart jacket.

  ‘You can go now,’ she told him. And as he turned for the door, ‘Friends?’

  He made no answer.

  ‘Michael?’

  A chasm of stars superfluous, having no place in any sky, filled him with dread and wonder.

  ‘Why don’t you take the rest of the day off, hmm? You’re looking a little pale. Must have caught a chill or something.’

  The space contained many horsemen.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I think I must.’

  ‘Tomorrow then; be on time,’ the supervisor instructed, before shooing him into the bleak corridor.

  And a meeting of minds, contestants frozen, suspended, radiating the light in this firmament, lives fabulous yet unknown.

  The pink man, mounted, sword trailing, studied the closest.

  They were heroes, he saw, good and evil, separate and combined, individuals not dissimilar to himself in that they fought for desperate ends, at the mercy of gods and lesser beings, battles raging across continents and down years, men transported through life, death and time. Each carried many names. Like weapons, these titles were honed, forged, earned – carrying weight in distant realms and travelling before, the very mention of them enough to stretch gaits and loosen bowels. Each was terrible in his way. Even those that were kind.

  He stood among them, recognizing himself, seeing himself as changed.

  They gazed back, expressions fixed, giving nothing of their who or why. And that he understood, for knowledge of them, his kindred, was nothing, meant nothing…until, in turn, he was that hero, each alive.

  Sort of but not quite.

  It was how she said she loved him.

  It was his understanding of reality.

  Arrested for indecent exposure, she paid the fine.

  He wondered if he was still on for the cheesy macaroni.

  The were fire engines outside her home.

  She looked at him quizzically.

  Explain?

  I have absolutely no idea, he lied.

  The ginger cat was visible beneath a hedge, a sleek marmalade strand.

  Funnykins?

  It was okay, she said, she was insured.

  Michael, realized Michael, would be returning home.

  He gulped.

  Vanessa, in her way, held his hand.

  She was amazing.

  They got to his place, journeying by taxi.

  The last of her money.

  He had some in a vase.

  They bathed.

  She had no change of clothes.

  Those he’d worn were already soiled.

  She raided his wardrobe…

  They found Redbear dead in the garden, crimson like a rose.

  ‘We should bury him.’

  ‘You don’t want to call the police?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He’s dead. It’s deliberate.’

  ‘You think he committed suicide?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Thoughts of Mr Unger-Farmer haunted him. Had he come looking? ‘Maybe he was killed.’

  Vanessa insisted they not jump to conclusions. She had some experience in first aid from the Girl Guides. Although there had been no corpses, the nearest being Brown Owl in a state of collapse brought about through a half bottle of gin on a field trip, the consequence a guttering head wound via which she had earned her proficiency badge.

  She took a deep breath and made to examine the bearded man.

  Redbear’s protruding tongue was purple.

  ‘Looks like he choked,’ she opined.

  Michael admired her cool. Hands on, compared to his dispassion, which had no hands at all.

  Vanessa pulled open the great ursine jaws and stuck her head in.

  He waited for news.

  She removed her head and blew. ‘Doesn’t smell too good, whatever it is. Pass me that stick.’

  Y-shaped, she wedged his mouth open and disappeared one arm, found something and tugged.

  It was a little bicycle. Vanessa looked at him for an explanation.

  ‘Elves,’ he said. ‘I hadn’t thought them dangerous.’

  Her eyes were disbelieving; perhaps she saw something else. A coat-hangar perhaps, or the twisted remains of a pair of spectacles.

  ‘Wait; there’s more.’

  The bloody remains of the miniature cyclist.

  ‘Christ…’

  ‘They live in the garden, I think,’ Michael told her. ‘They’re dimensional beings given to mischief.’

  She was incredulous. ‘Mice?’

  ‘No. Elves,’ he asserted. ‘Little people, like that.’

  ‘Tom, this is a rodent.’

  ‘And the bicycle? How many rodents ride bicycles?’ He had, he recalled, seen a monkey ride a tricycle at a circus; but never a mouse, certainly not without stabilizers.

  Her head shook. ‘It must have climbed in afterwards, after he swallowed the wire.’

  Why was she ignoring the evidence? Couldn’t she face it, accept the truth?

  She tossed the elf over the fence.

  ‘Come on, help me get him into the house.’

  Inside, out of the sun while she washed her hands, he smoked. The cigarettes were Redbear’s, a shared weakness with which Michael did better to cope.

  Sat in a chair of crushed beer cans, his friend appeared alive. The vivid colours had drained, giving him a natural pallor. He looked well, in fact, something Vanessa mentioned on her return, knuckles on hips. But what to do with him? Michael didn’t want any more run-ins with the cops. On the other hand…

  ‘Where’s your car?’ she asked.

  ‘I left it in the woods.’

  ‘In the woods? Whereabouts?’

  He had to think hard. ‘Can’t remember.’

  ‘Shit. Know anybody with a van?’

  He had to think hard again. ‘Max.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘He ferries stuff around; stuff too big for the car.’

  ‘Can he be trusted?’

  They were behaving like criminals, he thought. ‘Sure – so long as we don’t tell him what it’s for.’

  ‘Fine. Give him a call.’

  Michael hesitated.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘He’s out of town. Removal job.’

  She mouthed an obscenity.

  ‘Why don’t we just leave him here?’

  ‘He’ll decompose. He already stinks.’

  ‘Yea
h – but we could leave. I need to escape. It’s not safe.’

  ‘And go where? Tom…Michael…what’s happening?’

  ‘Number fifty-nine,’ he confessed.

  She shook her head confusedly.

  ‘Mr Unger-Farmer,’ he said.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The Devil, who else?’

  ‘You don’t believe that.’

  ‘The homunculi must work for him. Look at Redbear. Look at what happened to your flat.’

  ‘The Devil did that?’

  She’d take some convincing, he saw. ‘It was your teddy bear; Funnykins; they got to him.’

  ‘Now I know you’re nuts.’

  ‘It’s the truth, Van. I wouldn’t lie to you.’ Had he in the past? ‘We need to go on the run.’

  There followed a terse silence.

  Then, ‘Right. Better pack.’

  Humouring him, but it would do for now. He needed to find his car and the package. He needed to find his spare keys. He had money in the bank from a recent spree of sales, particularly the roomgoyles with which he had established his reputation, crude corner pieces shaped from old railway sleepers, the oak yellow and hard. They peered at him here, a foursome in his own living space, ugly and malformed, creatures both evil and kind; impossible to judge, as they’d been friends in his hands, under the knife. And now? Snakes’ eyes and eagles’ beaks, they occupied four corners, wings furled and throats scaled, cracked and lined…

  ‘Under the stairs,’ he said. ‘A duffel bag.’

  Twelve: The Metal Lens