OH MY GOD i have SO much to tell you.
WHAT a week.
For those of you who don't know, i'm in the Philippines at the moment, and have been here nearly a week. I arrived last Friday (after a fun fun few hours at Singapore airport with Georgie!) and our friend Rob picked me up. We got driven down to Batangas City where we got a boat over to Small Lalaguna Beach where Anna was waiting. Anna and I stayed there until yesterday, we both completed our PADI Open water and Advanced Open water diving courses, and are now fully qualified open water divers. As part of those courses we did a total of 9 dives including a wreck dive, a night dive, and a deep dive, to a depth of 30m. Once I sorted out how to properly empty my BCD (a very straightforward thing that made a HUGENESS of difference to my control of buoyancy!!!) and forced my brain to admit that if my mask is full of water I can still breathe (i had to show that I could take my mask off underwater, put it back on and clear it) we were all cool!!!
The Lalaguna and Sabang beach area is quite touristy, with hundreds of divers constantly filling the resorts there. There is also an abundance of old men with really young Philippina wives/girlfriends/bitches. One of the funniest things we saw was a "bitch bar," which is kinda like a strip club, except that the girls don't take their clothes off. They literally walk in a bikini and high heels in a circle around the stage. I have never seen a bunch of girls looking so bored or disinterested in what they're doing. However, the place was filled with men, both foreigners and Philippinos!
Yesterday we completed our last two dives, then got a public ferry and public bus (quite an experience for me!) up to Manila. We stayed in Manila for the night because it was too soon after diving to fly just yet. We arrived in Manila with no place to stay (anna thought we would play it by ear... had I been to Manila before, i would have insisted we had somewhere to stay!!!!) but an idea in mind of a place that was close to the airport and a hostel type place. We got off the bus, found a taxi driver who hopefully wouldn't murder us for our shoes and found the hostel. No room at the inn. We called a couple of other places which were all also booked out. So then I did what any girl in that situation would do, I called Uncle Rob. He called about 5 more places which were also full, by which point I am totally over it and would have been happy to pay $100 for somewhere nice rather than trying to find somewhere cheap. Eventually Rob found us a room, and after having our cab driver go up and down the same street three times, we finally found the hotel. Now I use the term hotel somewhat loosely here. Basically it was a room with two beds. And by beds, I mean two pieces of foam on bed sized wooden boxes. Anyway, it was a sort of clean and possibly safe place to stay.
We went and had dinner and sorted out printing out our tickets for the flight the following morning (have you ever heard of a PC that DOESN'T have adobe reader on it?) and went to bed pretty early. Then I had possibly THE worst night's sleep of my entire life. Our airconditioner made these MASSIVE crash bang clunk noises about every half hour. The first time it happened we thought someone was trying to get in our door. We set up an elaborate bag/cupboard door alarm on the room door so that if someone tried it again we would know. When I was jolted from my sleep the second time with the hugest fright of my life, I worked out it was the air conditioner. For about the next three hours I swear I was lying awake in my bed thinking things like "oh my god we're going to be murdered and nobody will know" and "oh my god what if there's a fire alarm? there is no way i am going outside in this city in my pyjamas and leaving all my stuff in this room - we're going to die in a burning building and nobody will ever know." Obviously I worked myself into a right panic. Eventually however, I did manage to fall asleep for at least a few hours in a row. If I never go to Manila again it will be too soon. The city is dirty, chaotic, so polluted and so so so poor.
At 4.45am we got up and went to Manila domestic airport, another experience in itself. Rob had a friend of his who's a taxi driver pick us up at Cebu airport and take us to his travel agent to pay for our tickets here and back, and we also got a GOOD proper coffee. We could leave our bags in his car while we went and organised things, and his car was clean and nice and he was polite and didn't once ask either of us if we were married! All of these things were a HUGE relief, but also a huge change from EVERY single other Philippino guy we had come across. He took us to the ferry which we caught where Rob picked us up in Ormoc City.
So by now we're up to yesterday afternoon. We got to Rob's, dumped our bags and went out on his funkarama boat, had an amazing afternoon, did a dive to the wreck of a Japanese ship that was bombed in 1944, and drank beers as the sun went down. This was suh a relaxed and fun afternoon, it was easy to forget that we're in this country surrounded by so much poverty. As we were on our way back in we could see all the shanties down the beach from Rob's house that thousands of people actually call home.
We went out for tea last night to a seafood restaurant (anybody who knows me well, this is cue to fall off your chair) where i ate raw marlin (SO yum), and Dorado (amazing) and cucumber salad. I never knew that fish could be so delicious. I have been totally converted to a seafood eater - just make sure it doesn't taste fishy! We drank some wine, went and had another beer under an umbrella in this temporary festival/bar/pub place, came back to Rob's where I had the best sleep i've had in ages.
Today we woke up to an amazing view out over the water and to find that Anna's bathers had been stolen off Rob's washing line. She got a bit shitty, but then remembered that she'd already brought them inside!!! We are just about to have breakfast, and then we're heading out on the boat for the whole day. Our first dive is going to be to 52m, which is a long way past what we've done before, and probably a long way past what we should be doing as inexperienced divers, but ROb is sure that we're both advanced divers, and given that both Anna and I have spent much of our lives in water and teaching other kids to swim, we're pretty confident. Also, Rob's boat has this amazing facility where we can do decompression with pure oxygen at 7 or 8 metres, so this pretty much rules out even the possibility of any problems!
In total we're going to do 3 dives today, sit on the boat, eat chicken for lunch and have a few beers on the way back. Tomorrow morning I have to leave at 5 to head to Tacloban airport to catch a plane to Manila, where i have a 4 hour wait before my plane back to Singapore, where I am meeting Georgie and Ed and then flying to Koh Samui to spend a long weekend there with them. I'm totally hookedo n diving now, and am planning on doing at least a couple of dives in Koh Samui each morning, before sitting by the pool sipping cocktails and shopping for knock-offs with Georgie. I am so excited about seeing them both and getting to spend an extended period of time with them!! I adored just sitting in Singapore airport and talking and talking and talking with Georgie last week, so it will be awesome to have a whole week of that!
ok, i'd best be off. The deep blue awaits, and some Philippino boys to sail the boat.
Love you and miss you (kinda!) all.
Love me.
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Off and away...
We're all going on a summer holiday... oh wait. We're not... I AM!!!!
That's right, i'm going. Away. On Holiday. As much as I love you all, and i'll try and keep you updated, i'm sure you'll get over it if i don't.
xoxoxoxox (just to make you feel loved)
That's right, i'm going. Away. On Holiday. As much as I love you all, and i'll try and keep you updated, i'm sure you'll get over it if i don't.
xoxoxoxox (just to make you feel loved)
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Ode to my love
In honour of this oh-so-special-and-not-at-all-cheesy-or-bitterness-inducing day, I thought I would write to you all about my favourite person in the whole world.
Witty and smart,
A lover of life and art,
A little mischevious
But good at heart.
She tries to listen,
Tries to understand.
She will not judge her true friends.
She'll just sit and listen and hold their hand.
Witty and smart,
A lover of life and art,
A little mischevious
But good at heart.
She tries to listen,
Tries to understand.
She will not judge her true friends.
She'll just sit and listen and hold their hand.
She always looks for the best in people
Though she'll be honest when asked her opinion,
See, she's always been very strong on those
Sometimes to her detriment and others' woe.
If she owes you money
She'll most likely forget.
But just borrow it back
she'll forget that too!
Her nearest and dearest are just that:
near and dear to her heart.
Though sometimes she does not remind them enough.
She hopes they know loves them.
I know sometimes she feels a little lonely,
A little different.
Then she remembers that's ok.
Who wants to be the same as everyone else anyway?
This is my ode to my love,
To commemorate this bizarre excuse for a day
Have you worked out yet who she is?
What gave it away?
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
Immobilate
Imagine you are me. Go on, I know it will be hard to imagine being as cool as me, but for the sake of this story, please at least give it a go.
OK, so you're me. It's 8.40am on a Tuesday and you're running slightly late. It's not a panicked kind of late like "oh shit i'm going to get fired because i'm late for the 29th day in a row." It's more of an "I'm going to be a bit late, but that's ok because i had a fabulously relaxing night sitting on my bed in my pyjamas drinking a slurpee with my airconditioning on watching that fabulous spunk of a British TV show Spooks, and when I woke up to my alarm and someone VACUUMING in my house at 7.30 i rolled over, put my pillow over my head and went back to sleep." THAT kind of running late, you know the kind.
Anyway, this was at 8.40. By 8.45 i was starting to try and hurry a little, but couldn't help noticing when i caught sight of myself in a mirror that i NEEDED a headband today. I went upstairs and got my headband, looked fabulous, and went to the front door. I know this is getting a little long-winded people, but stay with me.
Somewhere in between the bathroom and the front door, I lost my keys. It now being 8.50, I did what any normal person would do: i picked up my spare key from the drawer where all organised people such as myself keep "spare things," decided i didn't need a house key because someone would be home when i got home tonight, and walked out the front door (which, unamusingly, locks itself).
Now, I realised as I was sitting in my car listening to the engine turn over and over and over and over and over (notice the distinct absence of FIRING here), that my car was taking rather an unusually long time to start. In fact, it most definitely Would Not Start. My super-dooper-newish-but-new-and-exciting-to-me-beautiful car was broken. Unimpressed, i did what every girl does when her car breaks down, I called my dad. My dad however, had just got on a plane. So then I called my mum. Then I called the RACV. Then I waited. And waited some more. And WAITED SOME MORE DAMMIT.
5-30 minutes they say. Over an hour says I.
Anyway, at just before 10am, a lovely gentleman from the RACV takes one look at my car and says, "it doesn't recognise ya key, love." Long story short, my spare key doesn't un-immobilise the automatic immobiliser in my car. I CAN'T DRIVE MY CAR WITH MY SPARE KEY. The doors open, the power goes on, Hell, I can sit and drain the battery for an hour with no problems, but I can't go anywhere.
Thanks.A.Whole.Bloody.Lot.
So i waited another 45 minutes for my mum to come home with a house key (geez i'm glad there's a good coffee shop near my house, it was getting HOT by this stage!), so that I could walk in and find my full set of keys on the bathroom bench, right where I had left them.
That is THE last time i decide to wear a headband to work.
OK, so you're me. It's 8.40am on a Tuesday and you're running slightly late. It's not a panicked kind of late like "oh shit i'm going to get fired because i'm late for the 29th day in a row." It's more of an "I'm going to be a bit late, but that's ok because i had a fabulously relaxing night sitting on my bed in my pyjamas drinking a slurpee with my airconditioning on watching that fabulous spunk of a British TV show Spooks, and when I woke up to my alarm and someone VACUUMING in my house at 7.30 i rolled over, put my pillow over my head and went back to sleep." THAT kind of running late, you know the kind.
Anyway, this was at 8.40. By 8.45 i was starting to try and hurry a little, but couldn't help noticing when i caught sight of myself in a mirror that i NEEDED a headband today. I went upstairs and got my headband, looked fabulous, and went to the front door. I know this is getting a little long-winded people, but stay with me.
Somewhere in between the bathroom and the front door, I lost my keys. It now being 8.50, I did what any normal person would do: i picked up my spare key from the drawer where all organised people such as myself keep "spare things," decided i didn't need a house key because someone would be home when i got home tonight, and walked out the front door (which, unamusingly, locks itself).
Now, I realised as I was sitting in my car listening to the engine turn over and over and over and over and over (notice the distinct absence of FIRING here), that my car was taking rather an unusually long time to start. In fact, it most definitely Would Not Start. My super-dooper-newish-but-new-and-exciting-to-me-beautiful car was broken. Unimpressed, i did what every girl does when her car breaks down, I called my dad. My dad however, had just got on a plane. So then I called my mum. Then I called the RACV. Then I waited. And waited some more. And WAITED SOME MORE DAMMIT.
5-30 minutes they say. Over an hour says I.
Anyway, at just before 10am, a lovely gentleman from the RACV takes one look at my car and says, "it doesn't recognise ya key, love." Long story short, my spare key doesn't un-immobilise the automatic immobiliser in my car. I CAN'T DRIVE MY CAR WITH MY SPARE KEY. The doors open, the power goes on, Hell, I can sit and drain the battery for an hour with no problems, but I can't go anywhere.
Thanks.A.Whole.Bloody.Lot.
So i waited another 45 minutes for my mum to come home with a house key (geez i'm glad there's a good coffee shop near my house, it was getting HOT by this stage!), so that I could walk in and find my full set of keys on the bathroom bench, right where I had left them.
That is THE last time i decide to wear a headband to work.
Monday, February 12, 2007
Stumble across me shallow world
Last night I was having a look at who looks at my blog. That's right, you oh noble reader. OK so not so much looking at WHO looks (it's not like I have your names and addresses...or DO I?) but more looking at HOW people who visit my blog find it: did you do a google search? Or do you type in the name directly? Do you click on a link on someone else's blog?
Imagine my horror upon realising that rather a large number of people who have stumbled across my blog have done so by typing in the very strange name of a celebrity child into one search engine or another. Once upon a dim dark time, I wrote something in this here blog about the names of celebrity children. Now please understand... this could only have been in the wake of a Shiloh or Suri or some other such wondrous creation.
Now I am going to hang my head in shame and sadness at the fact the vapid and shallow people of this world are not interested in art and creativity. Oh no, they are obsessed by celebrities and glamour and style and odd baby names. Well, if YOU are one of those people BE GONE. There will be none of that here.
PS. Did you hear that supposedly Anna Nicole Smith's death had something to do with plastic surgery...OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!
PPS. two posts in less than 24 hours. What is the world coming to?
Imagine my horror upon realising that rather a large number of people who have stumbled across my blog have done so by typing in the very strange name of a celebrity child into one search engine or another. Once upon a dim dark time, I wrote something in this here blog about the names of celebrity children. Now please understand... this could only have been in the wake of a Shiloh or Suri or some other such wondrous creation.
Now I am going to hang my head in shame and sadness at the fact the vapid and shallow people of this world are not interested in art and creativity. Oh no, they are obsessed by celebrities and glamour and style and odd baby names. Well, if YOU are one of those people BE GONE. There will be none of that here.
PS. Did you hear that supposedly Anna Nicole Smith's death had something to do with plastic surgery...OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!
PPS. two posts in less than 24 hours. What is the world coming to?
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Stories of short
Argh i have SO much to do. on Thursday night I'm leaving to go to the Philippines, Thailand and Singapore for just over two weeks. This weekend, I had SO many things to do. Yesterday I did pretty much bugger all. Last night I drank ALOT, and thanks to AB and McSlurry for 4am pizza (told you guys i'd mention you!!!!!!!!!!). Today I had to do about 5 weeks worth of uni work, and I didn't even start feeling human again until about 3pm. I still think I did a good job... So while you read my short story, I'm going to go and try and get my life into some sense of order....
Nick glanced at his watch. His client was late, very late. He knew he should have escorted her himself, but she’d insisted on making her own way. She wanted to be inconspicuous. He sighed and shook his head at his own idiocy. He muttered a curse to himself and glanced out of the window at the front of the restaurant. No sign of her yet.
“What if she’s in trouble?” he thought to himself.
He was her bodyguard-to-be after all, and until she arrived, he wouldn’t know how much trouble she was in. Hell, he didn’t even know why she needed a bodyguard. There were, of course, several possibilities circulating his mind. Such possibilities included: she had a crazy ex-boyfriend; she had witnessed a mafia shooting; or she was just really, really paranoid. But until he met her, there was just no way of knowing.
His eyes strayed to his watch again before they wandered aimlessly around the room and come to a halt on a young couple in the far corner. She was angry. He was looking very, very sorry. Nick sympathised. Suddenly the girl picked up her glass of wine and threw it in the man’s face. She got up and stalked out, leaving him open-mouthed, gaping in shock. The rest of the diners stared after her, and quickly got back to their hushed conversations, pretending not to have noticed the scene. Nick groaned, feeling the other man’s embarrassment. For a little while longer he just sat, content with these few precious minutes. There was just so little time these days. Eventually, his gaze wandered across the room again.
His heart leapt in his throat as his eyes fixed on two cars making their way to the parking lot. They had both pulled in at excessive speeds, but were now slowing down. One car stopped and a woman got out, looking harassed and quite shaky. Rachel, he thought. He didn’t know how he knew that this creature was his soon-to-be-client; he just did. Nick looked more closely – she didn’t appear to have great control over the direction in which she was walking.
The other car cruised around the parking lot and started heading back towards where Rachel was stumbling across the road. Slowly seeing future events play out in his mind, Nick suddenly realized what was happening. Jumping up from his table, he knocked the contents over as he dived out the door.
_______________________________
She fumbled with her shirt buttons, her hands shaking. All she had to do was meet this guy and then he could take care of whoever had been stalking her. Simple. He was a professional. He would be able to help her. No big deal. She tried to make herself believe it, but with little success.
After securing the doors and windows of her house, she checked that it was all clear outside and made a run for her car. She leapt from the top step of her house and bounded across the front yard as quickly as possible, not caring how she looked. Before she knew it, she was through the door of her old car, safely locked in.
Inside, she breathed a sigh of relief and turned on the engine. She only lived ten minutes away from the restaurant. What could happen in just ten little minutes?
After driving for what seemed like an eternity, Rachel glanced into the rearview mirror. Her heart sank. She was being followed. Somehow she knew that the car behind her contained the twisted man who had been stalking her.
She pressed her foot harder onto the accelerator and forced her car to speed up. Her eyes widened as she looked into the mirror once more. The car behind had also sped up. She had the sinking feeling that the stranger was getting a thrill out of playing with her mind – if he had wanted to catch her, he surely would have done so by now. Her hands began to quake violently with every further second she drove. Her vision blurred slightly, and she began to lose control of the steering.
“Don’t panic,” her head told her. “You’re nearly there.”
Too late, her heart replied, and there were the headlights of the other car, gradually gaining on her. There was no chance that she could outrun this maniac! Rachel was sure that if she forced her car to go much faster, it would either blow up – she was no expert when it came to motor mechanics – or she would likely be arrested. Unfortunately, it hadn’t registered in her mind that she would actually be safer locked inside a jail cell for a while than she was on a deserted road with a crazy and likely dangerous stalker close behind.
As she began to wipe away the sweat from her face, she realized that in fact there were also tears there. Rachel had never been good at performing under pressure, this was about the most pressurized a situation in which she’d ever found herself. She shook her head and cursed, trying to snap herself out of the panic, but succeeding only in losing control of the car for a few moments. Brushing a sleeve across her forehead, she again looked into the mirror. The car was definitely gaining on her and getting closer by the second. She could just make out the shadowed silhouette of a tall, muscle-bound man. Well, either that or a woman who was very in touch with her masculine side.
“He’s just playing games,” she tried to tell herself. She wasn’t very convincing.
Abruptly, the restaurant came into view. She wondered if she would, having made it as far as the car park, even make it into the restaurant before the psycho caught her once and for all. She panicked and sped around the corner with little care for who or what scuttled out of the way. The restaurant was so close that some part of her just knew she would make it; yet, so far that it seemed miles away and impossible to reach before her time ran out.
She chided herself for being so dramatic and pulled into the restaurant parking lot, praying that the other car would continue on its way and pass her, that she was imagining the whole situation. It kept following close behind. She jumped out of the car, intending to make a run for it, but found she had little control of her actions. She turned to assess the other car’s progress, and froze. The other car was cruising lazily down to the other end of the car park, and was now turning back towards her. As it sped up, she desperately tried to get out of the way, but her body failed her. Rachel screamed momentarily before she was winded as she was knocked to the ground. A tall, slim, but heavy body of a man covered her completely.
“Good to finally meet you, Miss Smyth,” said a deep voice, presumably belonging to the man who was currently crushing her. How did he know who she was?
“Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Nick James, your new bodyguard.”
____________________________________
I watched her. For months, I watched her. She stole my life. She stole my job. She used me. Nobody does that to me. But she did. So she left me with no choice – I had to take away her life, her loved ones. That’s why I did it. That’s why people had to die. It was because of her. All because of her. It’s all her fault.
I tried to be nice to her. I tried to be a good neighbour. I thought she loved me – she’d never actually said it but then, women can be like that. Everybody knows that women say one thing and mean another. She’s just like all the rest of them. I knew that she was just being coy, that she would eventually admit her feelings. Didn’t she realize I gave up everything for her? I lost my job because they claimed that I was never there. Of course I wasn’t there - I had to look after her, to protect her. So I took a few days off now and then. She pretended she didn’t notice me following her on those days, but I know she did. I know she appreciated my level of interest and concern with her life. I wouldn’t have cared about the job, but then I saw her with a man, my brother. She cheated on me. She couldn’t deal with the depth of our relationship, and she didn’t know how to tell me. She should have talked it through with me. I could have made her understand that it was ok. She didn’t have to cheat on me, when she knew I was watching. She should have told me. I would have been ok with it, I’m sure. I’m a reasonable man. She made me end my own brother’s life. She forced my hand, and now she has to understand that I don’t like that. I am the master of my destiny, and I will not be manipulated.
I watched her coming home from work tonight. I watched as she locked all her doors and windows, as if she really though that a few locks would stop me. I’m sure she was just making a show of it, she knows I can get at her if I want to. She’s been rather jumpy lately. Mind you, finding your cat dead in your bed can have that effect on some people.
I’m following her now, in my car. Stupid bat hasn’t even noticed. I’ve been right behind her for almost five minutes so far, but she looks perfectly at ease. She isn’t even sorry! She should be dripping with guilt at the way she treated me – the things she forced me to do.
Her car is beginning to speed up. Her posture is stiff. Oh good – I hope she knows that she’s going to die, that dying is her punishment for being so heartless and stupid. She can’t outrun me; her car is far too slow. I can catch her in a heartbeat, but I won’t. Not yet. I want her to fear. I want her to be scared of me and of her short time ahead. She will never feel calm or happiness again. She toyed with me, and now I am going to have my fun, to seek my revenge. The irony is, that I’m doing this to teach her a lesson, but it will be her final lesson. There is no more learning to be done once this lesson is over.
I’m watching her car pull slowly into a parking lot and admiring the length of those legs! She is stumbles from the driver’s seat and starts towards the restaurant. She didn’t even close the door. Realisation of what’s happening must have hit her. She knows now that little things like that don’t matter. All that matters is being true, true to me. I notice the uncontrollable quaking of her whole body. It’s working. She is terrified of me, but not nearly as terrified as she could be. SHOULD be. Not nearly as terrified as she will be.
Slowly work my way around the other side of the car park. Turning towards her, I rev the engine. Has she realized yet? Aiming towards her, I plant my foot on the accelerator. Utter terror spreads across that pretty little face of hers. She doesn’t even try to run. She knows she deserves this.
A movement to my right has just caught my peripheral vision. A man is running for her – he looks slightly panicked. I seem to be having this effect on a lot of people lately. I glare at him as he pushes her out of my path and lands on top of her on the ground. I begin to berate him out loud. Getting angrier by the second. I look in the rearvision mirror: She’s still alive. Moving. She has learnt nothing. She is probably in shock.
I will get her.
I will get her.
It was with this thought running through my head, that I re-focused my eyes on where I was heading and saw the solid brick wall looming. My last moments should have been hers, and now it’s too late. She caused me to kill, and then, ultimately, she killed me.
Nick glanced at his watch. His client was late, very late. He knew he should have escorted her himself, but she’d insisted on making her own way. She wanted to be inconspicuous. He sighed and shook his head at his own idiocy. He muttered a curse to himself and glanced out of the window at the front of the restaurant. No sign of her yet.
“What if she’s in trouble?” he thought to himself.
He was her bodyguard-to-be after all, and until she arrived, he wouldn’t know how much trouble she was in. Hell, he didn’t even know why she needed a bodyguard. There were, of course, several possibilities circulating his mind. Such possibilities included: she had a crazy ex-boyfriend; she had witnessed a mafia shooting; or she was just really, really paranoid. But until he met her, there was just no way of knowing.
His eyes strayed to his watch again before they wandered aimlessly around the room and come to a halt on a young couple in the far corner. She was angry. He was looking very, very sorry. Nick sympathised. Suddenly the girl picked up her glass of wine and threw it in the man’s face. She got up and stalked out, leaving him open-mouthed, gaping in shock. The rest of the diners stared after her, and quickly got back to their hushed conversations, pretending not to have noticed the scene. Nick groaned, feeling the other man’s embarrassment. For a little while longer he just sat, content with these few precious minutes. There was just so little time these days. Eventually, his gaze wandered across the room again.
His heart leapt in his throat as his eyes fixed on two cars making their way to the parking lot. They had both pulled in at excessive speeds, but were now slowing down. One car stopped and a woman got out, looking harassed and quite shaky. Rachel, he thought. He didn’t know how he knew that this creature was his soon-to-be-client; he just did. Nick looked more closely – she didn’t appear to have great control over the direction in which she was walking.
The other car cruised around the parking lot and started heading back towards where Rachel was stumbling across the road. Slowly seeing future events play out in his mind, Nick suddenly realized what was happening. Jumping up from his table, he knocked the contents over as he dived out the door.
_______________________________
She fumbled with her shirt buttons, her hands shaking. All she had to do was meet this guy and then he could take care of whoever had been stalking her. Simple. He was a professional. He would be able to help her. No big deal. She tried to make herself believe it, but with little success.
After securing the doors and windows of her house, she checked that it was all clear outside and made a run for her car. She leapt from the top step of her house and bounded across the front yard as quickly as possible, not caring how she looked. Before she knew it, she was through the door of her old car, safely locked in.
Inside, she breathed a sigh of relief and turned on the engine. She only lived ten minutes away from the restaurant. What could happen in just ten little minutes?
After driving for what seemed like an eternity, Rachel glanced into the rearview mirror. Her heart sank. She was being followed. Somehow she knew that the car behind her contained the twisted man who had been stalking her.
She pressed her foot harder onto the accelerator and forced her car to speed up. Her eyes widened as she looked into the mirror once more. The car behind had also sped up. She had the sinking feeling that the stranger was getting a thrill out of playing with her mind – if he had wanted to catch her, he surely would have done so by now. Her hands began to quake violently with every further second she drove. Her vision blurred slightly, and she began to lose control of the steering.
“Don’t panic,” her head told her. “You’re nearly there.”
Too late, her heart replied, and there were the headlights of the other car, gradually gaining on her. There was no chance that she could outrun this maniac! Rachel was sure that if she forced her car to go much faster, it would either blow up – she was no expert when it came to motor mechanics – or she would likely be arrested. Unfortunately, it hadn’t registered in her mind that she would actually be safer locked inside a jail cell for a while than she was on a deserted road with a crazy and likely dangerous stalker close behind.
As she began to wipe away the sweat from her face, she realized that in fact there were also tears there. Rachel had never been good at performing under pressure, this was about the most pressurized a situation in which she’d ever found herself. She shook her head and cursed, trying to snap herself out of the panic, but succeeding only in losing control of the car for a few moments. Brushing a sleeve across her forehead, she again looked into the mirror. The car was definitely gaining on her and getting closer by the second. She could just make out the shadowed silhouette of a tall, muscle-bound man. Well, either that or a woman who was very in touch with her masculine side.
“He’s just playing games,” she tried to tell herself. She wasn’t very convincing.
Abruptly, the restaurant came into view. She wondered if she would, having made it as far as the car park, even make it into the restaurant before the psycho caught her once and for all. She panicked and sped around the corner with little care for who or what scuttled out of the way. The restaurant was so close that some part of her just knew she would make it; yet, so far that it seemed miles away and impossible to reach before her time ran out.
She chided herself for being so dramatic and pulled into the restaurant parking lot, praying that the other car would continue on its way and pass her, that she was imagining the whole situation. It kept following close behind. She jumped out of the car, intending to make a run for it, but found she had little control of her actions. She turned to assess the other car’s progress, and froze. The other car was cruising lazily down to the other end of the car park, and was now turning back towards her. As it sped up, she desperately tried to get out of the way, but her body failed her. Rachel screamed momentarily before she was winded as she was knocked to the ground. A tall, slim, but heavy body of a man covered her completely.
“Good to finally meet you, Miss Smyth,” said a deep voice, presumably belonging to the man who was currently crushing her. How did he know who she was?
“Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Nick James, your new bodyguard.”
____________________________________
I watched her. For months, I watched her. She stole my life. She stole my job. She used me. Nobody does that to me. But she did. So she left me with no choice – I had to take away her life, her loved ones. That’s why I did it. That’s why people had to die. It was because of her. All because of her. It’s all her fault.
I tried to be nice to her. I tried to be a good neighbour. I thought she loved me – she’d never actually said it but then, women can be like that. Everybody knows that women say one thing and mean another. She’s just like all the rest of them. I knew that she was just being coy, that she would eventually admit her feelings. Didn’t she realize I gave up everything for her? I lost my job because they claimed that I was never there. Of course I wasn’t there - I had to look after her, to protect her. So I took a few days off now and then. She pretended she didn’t notice me following her on those days, but I know she did. I know she appreciated my level of interest and concern with her life. I wouldn’t have cared about the job, but then I saw her with a man, my brother. She cheated on me. She couldn’t deal with the depth of our relationship, and she didn’t know how to tell me. She should have talked it through with me. I could have made her understand that it was ok. She didn’t have to cheat on me, when she knew I was watching. She should have told me. I would have been ok with it, I’m sure. I’m a reasonable man. She made me end my own brother’s life. She forced my hand, and now she has to understand that I don’t like that. I am the master of my destiny, and I will not be manipulated.
I watched her coming home from work tonight. I watched as she locked all her doors and windows, as if she really though that a few locks would stop me. I’m sure she was just making a show of it, she knows I can get at her if I want to. She’s been rather jumpy lately. Mind you, finding your cat dead in your bed can have that effect on some people.
I’m following her now, in my car. Stupid bat hasn’t even noticed. I’ve been right behind her for almost five minutes so far, but she looks perfectly at ease. She isn’t even sorry! She should be dripping with guilt at the way she treated me – the things she forced me to do.
Her car is beginning to speed up. Her posture is stiff. Oh good – I hope she knows that she’s going to die, that dying is her punishment for being so heartless and stupid. She can’t outrun me; her car is far too slow. I can catch her in a heartbeat, but I won’t. Not yet. I want her to fear. I want her to be scared of me and of her short time ahead. She will never feel calm or happiness again. She toyed with me, and now I am going to have my fun, to seek my revenge. The irony is, that I’m doing this to teach her a lesson, but it will be her final lesson. There is no more learning to be done once this lesson is over.
I’m watching her car pull slowly into a parking lot and admiring the length of those legs! She is stumbles from the driver’s seat and starts towards the restaurant. She didn’t even close the door. Realisation of what’s happening must have hit her. She knows now that little things like that don’t matter. All that matters is being true, true to me. I notice the uncontrollable quaking of her whole body. It’s working. She is terrified of me, but not nearly as terrified as she could be. SHOULD be. Not nearly as terrified as she will be.
Slowly work my way around the other side of the car park. Turning towards her, I rev the engine. Has she realized yet? Aiming towards her, I plant my foot on the accelerator. Utter terror spreads across that pretty little face of hers. She doesn’t even try to run. She knows she deserves this.
A movement to my right has just caught my peripheral vision. A man is running for her – he looks slightly panicked. I seem to be having this effect on a lot of people lately. I glare at him as he pushes her out of my path and lands on top of her on the ground. I begin to berate him out loud. Getting angrier by the second. I look in the rearvision mirror: She’s still alive. Moving. She has learnt nothing. She is probably in shock.
I will get her.
I will get her.
It was with this thought running through my head, that I re-focused my eyes on where I was heading and saw the solid brick wall looming. My last moments should have been hers, and now it’s too late. She caused me to kill, and then, ultimately, she killed me.
Thursday, February 08, 2007
EXTRA EXTRA READ ALL ABOUT IT!
Oh how I do love to write, but there seems to be too little time to do it these days. I've been pondering alot lately what my course of action in life is going to be. Do i want to be a writer?
I've decided no. Mainly because, when i HAVE to write on a certain topic, a certain amount of words, by a certain time, it tends to lose all it's fun.
One of my friends is sure that she's a dancer in a lawyers body, but i reckon that if she'd taken up dancing for a career, it wouldn't bring her as much joy as it does now as a release from her legal high flyer world.
Writing is going to be an extra, and i'm ok with that.
I've decided no. Mainly because, when i HAVE to write on a certain topic, a certain amount of words, by a certain time, it tends to lose all it's fun.
One of my friends is sure that she's a dancer in a lawyers body, but i reckon that if she'd taken up dancing for a career, it wouldn't bring her as much joy as it does now as a release from her legal high flyer world.
Writing is going to be an extra, and i'm ok with that.
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