"The Three Annies" or "Saving Annie Carlin" by Tom Ashton (Prose)

Author's Note

"The Three Annies" (or "Saving Annie Carlin") is a collection of three very short stories, originally published in The Writer's Quibble (Edition Four - "Escape"), under my pseudonym Jack Sloane.

Each of the three stories are linked but should be read as though the previous outcome never happened.

The Three Annies

(Illustration by Jodie Wynne Jodiewynne.tumblr.com)

My Daughter’s Escape

The struggle to continue bears strong on the old man’s heart as he cocks the gun nestled in the girl’s golden locks.

‘Mister Carlin, put down your weapon and step away with your hands on your head!’

He looks away from his daughter, to study the flashes of red and blue around him. The sounds are of buzzing radios and screeching tires.

‘Mister Carlin - ,’ the megaphone is snatched away and he feels his ears recoil against the poisoned words of the Devil.

‘John, please, she’s your daughter and I love her, I do, I love her. She’s pregnant with your granddaughter, for goodness sake. Think about how your God sees this.’

The Priest’s hand quivers, his tears joining his daughter’s on the tarmac.

She curls her hands around those clasping the gun, feeling them cold but not dangerous, looking up at the dishevelled old man. As the police close in she sees surrender in his tortured gaze and softly whispers ‘Dad, I love you.’

‘I love you too,’ he replies through gritted teeth, his hand steadying, ‘and my God will see that I’ve helped my daughter and unborn granddaughter escape the forces of evil. He will welcome us all into heaven.’

‘Thank you, Duane!’ yells the Priest to the Devil before the bangs begin.

Blood from blonde and then more from black.

Melting into the tarmac, the Priest wonders why his daughter had been unable to escape the charms of the Devil before God had put the gun in his hand. 

My Mummy’s Escape

Teddy and I can hear my Mummy and Daddy shouting downstairs. Mummy’s saying its Daddy’s fault I’m gone. It is. Daddy hurt me and it made me sad so I ate Mummy’s sweeties, the ones she eats when she’s sad. I’ve kind of escaped; I’m still here but Daddy can’t hurt me anymore. Mummy flushed her sweeties down the toilet but I saved them. Daddy won’t let Mummy escape; he keeps her locked in the house and hurts Mummy. I put Mummy’s sweeties in her wine. Mummy always drinks a lot of wine after a big fight with Daddy. Mummy, will be with me soon and then we’ll both escape. Daddy will get into trouble for it. Good.

I don’t like Daddy.

Neither did Granddad.

Teddy, why do you think Granddad never helped Mummy escape?

My Love's Escape

He peeks above his cubicle wall, at his beloved Annie, bending down to read the ever present error message on the photocopier.

Brian didn’t just love her because she was slim, with long golden hair and the most amazing electric blue eyes, but for everything else about her; her adorable nativity, her non-judgemental nature and a kooky sense of humour that’d make her quite freakish if she wasn’t so beautiful.

All the dogs in the office are eager to claim her for their individual fan clubs, they can regularly be overheard discussing it by the water cooler, and the sad reality is, that if history’s anything to go by, they’ll probably succeed in their sordid mission.

Because of their consistent success with women, and his lack of it, Brian concluded that no woman was looking for security; they frequently insisted they were on social networks but, the sad reality was, that women preferred the danger element over security.

Suddenly, Chloe Collins is scowling in his direction. She’s been particularly upset since Annie’s arrival because, despite her beauty, she’s nice to everyone without prejudice, even Brian and his gang of mongs. Chloe can’t understand this and has assured everyone it’s merely an act, so Annie can appear more angelic.  

‘Brian! Oh my god, will you stop staring at Annie’s arse!’

Annie glances quickly up at Chloe and then follows her scalding gaze towards him, as he tries to hide his mortification behind the cubicle wall.

‘Urgh, he’s such a freak.’ Chloe’s insisting, ‘fucking hate little rats like him, looking at us like we’re pieces of meat all the time. Don’t you hate them?’

‘I don’t really know...’ Annie replies adorably, not wanting to be drawn into the negative situation.

‘But don’t you hate men who objectify women?’

‘I guess…’

‘Hear that Brian, she doesn’t fancy you, now stop staring at her, you’re creeping her out!’

Whilst Brian mumbles angrily, picturing Chloe’s hateful face on a stick, a nauseating sound penetrates the office hub bub; Duane Hoyland.

‘Alright, Chlo-tits!’

A spank is audible, followed by Chloe’s giggle, ‘stop it, you stinker.’

‘If I stink it’s just because I’ve just come from the gym, feel my bicep, go on…’

‘Oooh, it’s huge.’

‘That’s what she said,’ he chortles, ‘go on Annie, feel it.’

‘Oh, why…’ Annie whines.

‘Go on, Annie,’ Chloe insists, ‘it’s massive.’

Brian watches painfully, nose back above his cubicle wall, as Annie reaches up and squeezes Duane’s bulging arm, whilst he artfully slips a hand around her waist.

Suddenly, the rest of Chloe’s crew have appeared out of nowhere, ‘oh, Annie, are you flirting with Duane again?’

‘Why don’t you two just get it over with?’

‘You blatantly both like each other!’

‘What do you reckon, Carlin?’ Duane grins horribly as Brian grimaces; both men awaiting her inevitable submission.

‘I reckon…’ she smiles seductively, ‘that you couldn’t get me wet if you threw me into a swimming pool.’

Brian bursts into hysterics, with the rest of the office, watching Annie saunter away from a flabbergasted Duane.

She’s proven everyone wrong, and although Brian feels foolish, there’s solace to be found in Duane’s more public humiliation. Annie Carlin, that wonderful woman, who escaped the hounds of mischief without needing the aid of those who loved her. 

-

Tom Ashton (Originally published under the pseudonym 'Jack Sloane' in the fourth edition of The Writer's Quibble http://writersquibble.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/the-writers-quibble-4.html?m=1)

'Effugere Non Potest Daemones Innitatur' or 'The Lean Man' by Tom Ashton (Prose)

Effugere Non Potest Daemones Innitatur
(Cannot escape the demons lean)
 

(Illustration by Jodie Wynne Jodiewynne.tumblr.com)

The Lean Man’s roughed down a gravel path by three guards, towards the exit of Fairway Psychiatric Hospital, and pushed into the road. His suitcase is thrown into a muddy puddle, destroying the whites inside.

Nonetheless, he’s laughing, ‘well, thank you Gentlemen, but I won’t be leaving a tip as, upon arrival, I discovered no little mint on my pillow.’

Wallace, the largest guard, advances upon him, ‘I knew you hadn’t changed, you son of a bitch, as soon as you started jumping through their hoops. I knew…’

‘All I know, Wally, is that I haven’t had consensual sex for nine years. Are you gonna give me your mother’s address or should I just browse the small ads…’

Wallace, wheezing, punches him flat before his colleagues can intervene, ‘go find your own Mother! I see she’s not here to meet you. It’s because you’re the fucking devil!’

The Lean Man giggles and blows Wallace a bloody kiss before retrieving his case and slouching off into the rain.

*****

Barry chokes, as Carlo’s vice-grip tightens around his oesophagus.

He’d been alone with Carlo Sargatelli and his brothers, Frankie and Jimmy, but a bum’s just snuck in and started helping himself to slops. Frankie and Jimmy are eyeing him suspiciously, but Carlo’s still preoccupied with Barry.

 ‘Now you listen to me, wise guy, you get your booze from us now! Not Capone! Got that?’

‘Please,’ Barry’s gasping, ‘I buy from you and then I just get trouble from Capone’s family.’

‘Are you getting cute with me?’ yells the burly Italian, slamming Barry’s face onto the bar and whipping out a flick knife, ‘how about I cut your fucking tongue out and then we’ll see how well you crack wise?’

‘No, please, I’ll pay! Just…what about Capone?’

‘Capone’s inside now and his family’s in disarray. We’ll take care of them, ok?’

Carlo releases the bartender, steps back around the bar and points his knife across the room towards the slop-drinking bum, ‘forget my face, you hear, because I won’t forget yours!’

Barry watches the three brothers exit and picks himself up from amongst broken glass. Who’d run a speakeasy? Given the choice he wouldn’t, but no company wanted the father of the “Goldilocks Butcher” on their books. The money had to come from somewhere.

He remembers the slop drinking bum and slopes irritably towards the sodden wretch, to start a fight he can win.

‘Whatcha still doing here, Mister? Scram!’

His fist is caught in uncut fingernails that dig deeper than the broken glass had. A glistening smile’s shining up at Barry from beneath a mess of dirty blonde hair, ‘hello, Daddy!’

 ‘They certified me sane,’ The Lean Man’s laughing, still holding Barry’s fist, ‘I always knew what they wanted, but the effort involved, the restraint, you wouldn’t believe -’  

He’s interrupted by Barry’s wife who’s coming downstairs to berate him about the gangsters.

‘Barry, did you tell them this time? Jeez, you know, sometimes I think I married a–’

She recognises the fruit of her loins sitting there, grinning, shark-like, across the darkened room and becomes instantly hysterical. Barry can’t calm her and has to belt her out of the room.

‘Why are you doing this to us, son,’ Barry sighs, returning to his chair, ‘why did you hoodwink those doctors and screws at Fairway? Just to prove you could?’

The smile never leaves The Lean Man’s face, ‘I’m a fisherman and like all fisherman I’m pained by the one that got away. My hunger will never be sated until I catch it, Daddy.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Janey Walker.’  

The fat man’s glass hangs by his mouth, his eyes wide with dread.

‘No, son.’

‘Daddy, you were the only one who tried to help her. Poor little Janey at the bottom of the bottle but she was just too wild for you, wasn’t she? Although, I bet you keep in touch…I bet you know where she is?’

 ‘Why? That poor girl -’

‘They locked me in a cage with needles and pills because of her, Daddy. Tell me where she is and I’ll leave you in peace and so will those Italians who hassle you.’

The old man’s feeling desperate. If he refuses the Sargatellis they’ll kill and replace him. If Capone’s Mob regroups and they discover that he’s betrayed them, they’ll kill and replace him. If he assists his son, it’d solve his problem but another, one he once considered family, would inevitably serve as collateral.  

Should he sacrifice that girl to the sick molestations of this beast to save himself and his wife?

Yes…he had to protect the family he had left.

‘You do this,’ he says, ‘then you go back to that place and you don’t ever crawl out again, you hear?’

‘Oh, of course silly, the Devil must eventually go back to Hell!’ The Lean Man laughs, ‘so, tell me, where I can find these nasty men who torment my daddy so?’

*****

Carlo instantly recognises the ‘bum’ from Barry’s, crossing his club and entering the toilets. Without pausing to alert his friends, he’s right after the fool, pulling out his gun.

The Lean Man’s laughing inside.

‘What are you going to do? Are you going to shoot me with all those people just outside the door? You aren’t powerful enough to stop them all talking. You’re not Al Capone.’

Carlo’s gun arm shudders. The skinny fuck’s right. He needs to be dragged out the back and executed like the dog he is. He’s lowering his gun.   

‘The fear of incarceration,’ The Lean Man smiles and quickly plunges a razor blade into Carlo’s throat, forcing him backwards into one of the stalls, ‘I do not fear inevitabilities.’

After a few minutes, somebody informs the Frankie and Jimmy that their brother followed some guy into the toilets and they stumble in guffawing loudly.

‘Hey Carlo, you better have some pants on you finocchio, son of a bitch.’

‘Hey, is that–’ Jimmy notices his brother’s blood, pooling out from under the locked door of the stall.

‘Jesus Christ, Carlo, hold on!’

The Lean Man quickly rushes out from behind the stalls and jabs a syringe into each of their necks. It’s a mere dribble of street morphine; not enough to knock them out but good enough to disorientate them for a couple of minutes.

He quickly moves to the toilet door and uses a padlock and chain to fasten it to the plumbing. Nobody’s spoiling this party.

Frankie’s managed to stay of his feet, blundering drunkenly about the room. The Lean Man’s laughing.

He throws Frankie onto a toilet and seats his brother on his knees, so they’re facing nose to nose, then takes a hammer and nails their hands to the stall walls.

They’re starting to regain their senses; The Lean Man has some difficulty securing their eyelids to their eyebrows, with the diaper pins. Diaper pins for little babies.

Finally, he secures a sliver of tape across Frankie’s mouth and rips a paper towel from the dispenser.

‘What are you doing you fucking son of a bitch? Who are you?’

‘Shush, sillies,’ The Lean Man’s whispering, ‘you all want to be the boss, yes? Well, what better way to prove yourselves? Whoever wins the race to stay alive, can have the top job. No need to thank me, just buy me a drink sometime.’

The Lean Man kisses both the brothers on the forehead, shoves two little balls of toilet paper up Frankie’s nose and slits Jimmy’s wrists; the two men stare at each other in horror, as one suffocates and the other bleeds out.

As The Lean Man giggles his way out of the window, he enjoys Jimmy’s screams and the sound of his associates trying to bust the industrial chain.

*****

The Lean Man’s exhausted and pleased to be at the end of his weekend retreat. He has just one more attraction to visit. He’s grinning, fingering the number sixty-nine and then rapping his knuckles upon it. There’s a little squeal and the sound of swift footsteps. She’s so eager for some company. How surprised she will be. The door’s flung open. He’s enjoying the recoil of those pretty Bambi-eyes as she recognises him, his features souring those dark places in her brain that her therapist’s been trying to fill with rainbows and sunlight.  

 ‘Poor little Janey.’

-

Tom Ashton (Originally published under the pseudonym 'Jack Sloane' in the fourth edition of The Writer's Quibble http://writersquibble.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/the-writers-quibble-4.html)

 

(Illustration by Heavy Duty Illustration - Helen Kelly https://www.facebook.com/HeavyDutyIllustration?ref=hl)

 

Comments

I would greatly appreciate any comments you can leave me, critical or complimentary, both are incredibly useful to me as a writer!

Thanks all.

- Tom

'Dyspraxia' (Poem)

Dyspraxia

‘Finish your sentence!’ Teacher shouts, ‘Have the time in mind!’
I can hear pens drop, all around me. I’m still a page behind.

Scribbling faster, feeling desperate and my fingers begin to tremble.
Teacher says: ‘The doodles of a five year old’ my handwriting can resemble.

My hand does shake, my muscles ache, Teacher yells ‘For goodness sake!’

He snatches away my paper, ‘A stupid boy you’ll always be!’
And now I smile back, at his judgement, from University.

 

'Dyspraxics? Please.’
‘Daniel Radcliffe: talentless.’
‘George Orwell, couldn’t write.’
‘And as for that Albert Einstein, I’ll bet his IQ was shite.’




A snippet from 'Dyspraxia Is Not the End'.
By Tom Ashton (Creative Writing Student and Diagnosed Dyspraxic)

Non-traditional Haikus

Loafers

My worn, leather friends

Tread round the corners and bends

Of this bleak and lonely Earth.

Dream

There’s no purple skies,

Or pigheaded cats,

For the deprived insomniac.

'Vertigo' by Tom Ashton (Prose)

Vertigo

Let me tell you from where my distress originates. Let me make you understand.

Past my feet, I had seen the street; all so clear in the charming glow of summers’ sun, obscured only by an occasional flock of passing Sparrows.

I had seen the gym freak, with bleached blonde hair, dragging his small brunette behind him. I’d noticed she hadn’t commented as her beloved, Chlamydia-riddled rugby player had paused to admire a passing ‘Barbie’. They’d disappeared amongst a mass of chino-wearing lookalikes.
I’d seen a decent bloke scowl at the meathead ogling his girlfriend; ‘I hate lads like him, don’t you?’
‘Hmm,’ she’d murmured, slipping her number into the lout’s hand as he passed, ‘I don’t go for looks, I want a man who’ll look after me.’

On a bench, near a tree, I had seen a group of Tracksuits observe an approaching mouse. Beneath long and scraggly hair Mousey had worn a black trench coat and heavy Dr Martens. I’d seen dark mascara run down its pale face and flecks of claret within the savage, Nike Air storm. Outside the Victoria Tavern, I’d seen two football fans, one of them solemnly considering his watch. When the Police had arrived, the pair had looked resigned, as Her Majesty’s Finest raced past the mouse-stompers and brutally bludgeoned them both.

Below, on the balcony, I’d seen a glass eyed reporter scribbling as a politician’s lips moved in his ear. The headlines had run; ‘If you’re lusting after someone else, your partner isn’t fully providing. Don’t blame yourself.’, ‘Community proud, as local youths stand against the Emo menace’ and ‘Football Hooliganism; How Police heroes are winning.’

Past my feet, I can see the street; all so clear in the hateful glare of summers’ sun, obscured only by the occasional flock of passing Sparrows. Do you understand why my feet have brought me here and why they must take me one step further?

Tom Ashton