Black soul rose by John Jones... - HTML preview

Dorothy

Dorothy walked out into the back-yard of the house to see Sylvie down the bottom of the garden at the rabbit hutch.

“What’s that you’re doing?” she asked, approaching. Sylvie looked around. It was clear the pet was being fed.

The rabbit had the run of the garden most of the time. It was quite homely, and never strayed too far from its hutch. The garden wasn’t too big, but big enough at 15 by12 metres. Two thirds was taken up by a lawn, the rest by a patio with too many plastic chairs usually occupied by Peanut and his friends, who it seemed would be occupying them imminently as in the back room Dorothy saw men appear, and then step out onto the patio, Peanut among them. They were talking amongst themselves and barely noticed the two girls at the bottom of the garden who tried to ignore them. Peanut and his friends settled with their bottles of lager and their smokes, soon to be joined by their mother.

Dorothy noticed that Peanut had two new friends she had never seen before.

They seemed to be just clones of the others though. Peanut didn’t seem too happy. He was complaining, his face in a grimace, talking to one of the newbies.

He wasn’t angry at the guy, but complaining about something. Peanut was one 83

of those people that would take out anger on somebody even if it was nothing to do with them. His frustration always needed an outlet.

“…I told him a thousand fucking times…who does he think he is? Cheeky twat.

If he thinks he’s getting away with it…fuck no”. When Peanut was in a bad mood, those around him would be subdued until he’d vented his frustration.

They would be sullen within his ‘negative vibes’, and once those vibes had gone, they would perk up. Peanut simply spoke his mind all the time. There was no filter. Mouth and brain were not always in tandem.

Even though he came across as a ‘hippy’, with his dreadlocks, his summery shirts and knee length shorts which he wore all year round, one of those guys that wore them when the weather was freezing, the rest of him seemed to be the opposite, or gave up who he really was. He smoked, drank alcohol, was overweight, committing benefit fraud and ate meat.

If there was ever an exam to become a hippy, he would fail dismally.

He had raised his voice and was now pointing at his sounding board, the new guy.

“…and if I get grassed up to the dole it’ll be him, and I’ll be round there and smash the fucking place up I promise you…d’you get me?”. The other guy was nodding, supplicant, as though it was his fault. Then Peanut looked across to Corinna.

“Do us a favour love, make us a hot-dog”. Corinna leapt to her feet and went into the house. Dorothy just shook her head.

“What’s that?” said the other new guy, skinny with no top on, T-shirt tied around his waist, baggy trousers clinging on, the type who always looked half asleep, and was never seen without smoking a cigarette. He had had yet to sit down.

“Is that a rabbit? Let’s have a look,” the stranger approached as though he’d never seen one in real life before.

Corinna came out with Peanut’s hot-dog and he sat down with it and opened a bottle of lager.

“Can I hold it?” the new guy asked.

“Why, what’s the point?” asked Dorothy. “Are you thinking of getting one yourself and you want to practice how to handle one, or are you just fascinated by it for no reason whatsoever. Ooh, a rabbit, I must pick it up”.

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“Oi, cheeky bitch,” he said, still with his eyes on the creature nibbling its broccoli.

“Show him your rabbit Sylvie,” said Corrina. Sylvie heard her and sighed, picked up the rabbit and handed it to the man who cradled it like a baby.

“Aw little rabbit,” he said.

“It’s not little,” Dorothy said. For a few minutes he swayed the rabbit around the garden. Meanwhile Peanut’s friends had settled down and were talking and laughing amongst themselves, except Peanut who was drinking and eating his hot-dog. It was clear he was still in a bitter mood, so the others trod carefully around him.

Dorothy made her way slowly back to the house, then couldn’t help but ask Corinna, even though she was the same as them:

“What are they actually laughing at? They’re laughing at nothing”.

“Get back to school,” one of them said, and then laughed, as did Corinna.

“Fucking useless,” Dorothy muttered. She saw the man with the rabbit had swayed his way close to Peanut who glared at the animal. The man had clearly not picked up on Peanut’s negative vibes.

“Hey Peanut,” he asked, “seen this?” he said, proffering the creature.

“Yes I have, it’s Sylvie’s stupid rabbit so what?” The stranger looked back at Sylvie and shouted:

“What’s its name?”

“What d’you care what its name is?” said Dorothy, but nobody answered.

“Get it out of my face!” Peanut spat, and then the man picked up on those vibes, and it seemed, so did the rabbit, as it writhed and struggled. The man let go, the pet falling to the floor where it was like an out-of-control robotic toy, leaping around, panicking. It crashed into lager bottles, the brown fluid spilling over the patio, others getting to their feet, stepping back.

“Fucks sake!” shouted Peanut, looking at all the rolling bottles and standing up.

He took one step and reached down to pick up the animal by its neck.

“This fucking thing pisses me off, getting under me feet”, and with his anger causing his face to flush red, he squeezed the creature, lifting it above his head.

“I only want a bit of peace and quiet!” Peanut yelled, “I’ve got enough shit to deal with without this fucking thing getting in me way”, and he swung it down 85

at the floor, smashing it into the concrete, killing it instantly, stamping on it, crushing it beneath his boot.

Sylvie screamed and ran towards it, but Corinna grabbed her before she reached it, dragging her inside.

“Come on, let’s give Peanut some space”. The others followed her, except Dorothy. Peanut ran a hand over his hair, pacing around like a Lion. He then noticed that Dorothy hadn’t followed the others.

“Fuck off kid, leave me alone”. She simply stared at him, her mind confused as to what to do about him. She made towards the kitchen doorway, but rather slowly. Peanut picked up the dead rabbit and hurled it over the fence. It landed in a bed of lavender plants. Sylvie could be heard crying inside the house.

“I’ve got shit to deal with you skanky little bitch, now fuck off and leave me alone,” he said, hooking a thumb in no particular direction.

“You have to be the world’s shittest hippy,”

“Wha? What did you say?” even though he heard full well.

“I think you heard me,” Peanut stepped across, leaning down, face to sweat-sheened reddened large face.

“Don’t you fucking speak to me like that you skanky cunt,” but Dorothy just stared into his eyes with absolute hatred.

“I am so glad you are not my daddy,” she said, then turned and entered the house. Peanut just looked at the door as she vanished from view, standing up straight and running a hand through his hair. He had no intention to follow her.

Approximately two miles in front of the school gates. 1.98 to be exact, there was another gate which led onto a field. In that field was an off-white retired Clydesdale draft horse. That gate was at the back, where the animal hardly ever trod, and it had been locked for years, never used anymore. Simply part of the fence on either side that went into angry looking bushes. It was quite muddy beneath the gate which blended into overgrown field grass. Near the gate, with jagged twigs hanging over it, there was an old, rusty, white painted steel bath. In 86

the past this field had contained more horses, and they drank from it, but now it was filled to the brim with brown/green stagnant rainwater.

The field belonged to a horse-riding sanctuary beyond the fence at the other end, where the horse had most attention. Up this end there was not much activity at all.

Alongside the fence there was a public footpath that walkers sometimes took to go further out into the countryside.

Boyd and Ian were approaching the gate.

“Here we are,” said Boyd.

“What?” Ian asked, “you’ve brought me all the way out here for what?”

Boyd, not long after settling into school and family, in the firm belief he would inhabit the body until old age, walked around the area trying to get a mental map of the place he would be living in for many years.

One of those walks took him along this path and a little further out where he had to turn around because he guessed he could get lost out there, in the country.

Boyd stopped at the gate.

“I wonder,” he said, looking further along the path, “how close that would get us to that tree where we buried those seeds”.

“At some point we’ll need to check on that,” Ian said, “’cos if we do and the tree has been taken down and a car-park built over it, we’re fucked. We need to reconfirm exactly where it is. We all need to know.”

“Next to the clubhouse on the old bowling green, there’s a tree in the corner, and beneath that we buried the flask with the seeds in”.

Ian nodded. “Good, now why am I here?”.

“What do we need to do?” asked Boyd, and Ian looked around, then spotted the bath, and stepped across to the fence, looking over.

“Oh…I think I know what you have in mind.”

“We’re out of the way. No-one can really make out what’s going on from the horse-riding place. We can just have him missing for a while until discovered.

Then it’ll be suicide. He couldn’t take the trauma we went through and decided to top himself”.

“Like survivor guilt,” said Ian.

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“Yep, that’s it”. Boyd said, looking at the dank bath water. A haven for wildlife, the murky depths containing who-knows-what.

“Poor Brett,” said Ian.

It wasn’t too long in getting back to the urban area, as the path wound around back to the village for just over a mile.

“That will take Kieran’s mind off us for a while,” said Ian.

“Thing is though, he may at some point blame us, and probably ask a lot of questions as we’re his mates. Certainly he’ll ask us where he is, but when he’s found, we’ll just have to try our hardest to convince him it was suicide. If he kills himself because he felt guilty about us getting lost, then you know, it’s a child’s mind. Confused”.

“How are we going to kill Kieran, though? Once we kill Brett, then we’re left with him”.

“I don’t know yet. Things will intensify once Brett’s body is found, but after a while it will die down, and we deal with Kieran. Things will heat up then, but as long as we’re sweet innocent kids it will die down again, and that should be that”.

“Then we are set for life. We’re hidden until we become pensioners. No suspicions”.

“I hope not. As long as we act our age we are good”. Ian nodded. They walked along a quiet road and headed home.