I couldn’t ever remember that particular photograph being taken. If I couldn’t remember it being taken, then it never had been – not yet, anyway. The reason why I couldn’t remember posing for that picture with my dad was because, like Isidor’s photograph, it hadn’t been taken yet. So how was I holding it in my hands?
“Are you okay, sweet-cheeks?” Potter suddenly asked me.
“No, not really,” I whispered, unable to take my eyes from the photograph in the frame.
Potter came and sat beside me. “What’s wrong?”
“This picture’s wrong – it’s all wrong,” I told him.
“It’s just a picture of you and your dad,” he said, and again there was a dismissive tone to his voice, which made me wonder if he were hiding something from me.
“It’s not just a photo,” I said, looking at him, wanting to see the reaction in his eyes. “This picture hasn’t been taken yet.”
Potter broke my stare and looked down at the photograph. He didn’t say anything, not at first. “You’re in it.”
“But I don’t ever remember having this picture taken,” I told him, not taking my eyes from his.
“You could never remember all the photographs that you’ve ever been in,” he tried to reason with me.
“My dad had jet-black hair,” I told him. “In this picture, he has wisps of grey – he is older looking in this picture than when he died.”
“So what are you trying to say?” Potter asked, and again he didn’t make eye contact and lit another cigarette.
“My dad is alive in this world, and this picture proves I meet up with him again,” I whispered, praying that it was true – that I was going to see my dad again. If I had a heart it would have been racing with joy.
“Kiera, I found that picture in your flat,” Potter said, exasperated. “You would have never known about it if I hadn’t have gone and got it for you. That picture holds no significance to what we’ve been brought back to do. It’s a fluke that you’re even holding it now.”
I sat and stared down at the picture. Then, with my fist, I smashed the glass and removed the photograph from its frame and turned it over in my hands.
“I was meant to have this picture,” I whispered. “It’s a sign.”
“What are you talking about, Kiera?” Potter sighed.
I held up the picture with my trembling hands and showed him what had been written across the back. Someone had scribbled just one word, and it read,
PUSH
.
‘Dead Statues’
Book Three Kiera Hudson Series Two
Coming soon!
Author’s Note:
Isidor told Melody about his dream to write stories. He called them his
Penny Dreadfuls
– because he feared they would be so dreadful people wouldn’t even spend a penny of their money buying them. Shortly after Isidor’s death at that remote Railway Station, I woke one morning to find a brown envelope stuffed through my letterbox. I opened it to find four short stories. They were called, “
There Are tigers
”, “
Ratbag
”, “
Paisley End”
and “
A Story
”. These were the stories which Isidor wrote between the ages of fourteen to sixteen. After reading each of these dark little tales, I could see that each had been inspired by what Isidor had seen and learnt about the humans during his adventures above ground. When checking the envelope to see if there was any sign or clue as to who had sent them to me, there was only one word scrawled across the front...
Over the page you will find that collection of short stories by Isidor Smith.
The Penny Dreadfuls
By
Isidor Smith
For Melody Rose
Copyright 2012
Published by Endra Press
‘There Are tigers’
“Don’t go home via the underpass,” she said, looking at her grandson.
“Why not, Nan?” Michael asked.
“There are tigers beneath that underpass,” the old woman said, her false teeth loosening around her withered gums.
“Tigers?” Michael said, his stomach tightening at the sight of his grandmother rearranging her teeth with a grey coloured tongue. “There ain’t no tigers beneath the underpass.”
“Calling your poor old Nan a liar, are you?” she said, fixing him with a beady stare.
Shuffling from foot to foot, Michael snatched up his rucksack and threw it over his shoulder. “Nah, I’m not calling you a liar – it’s just that I can’t believe there are…”
“Children have gone missing,” the old woman cut in, her bones creaking as she sat further back in her armchair. “Boys and girls the same age as you – gone, disappeared, never to be seen again.”
With a nervous smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, Michael said, “Nan, I’m not six anymore – I’m fourteen. You can’t scare me with your ghost stories.”
“It isn’t a ghost story, Mikey,” she said, pointing at him with a finger that was crooked and bent out of shape. “There are tigers beneath that underpass. They hide in the shadows – no one ever sees them until it’s too late.”
“Ah c’mon, Nan!” Michael groaned as he headed for the door. “I aint afraid of no gang of hoodies. That group of low-lives that hang around beneath the underpass don’t scare me.”
“They’re tigers!” the old woman croaked, her voice sounding rasping and old.
Glancing back over his shoulder, Michael looked at his grandmother and said, “That gang of hoodies can call themselves the Black Panthers for all I care. I ain’t scared of ‘em.” Without saying another word, Michael yanked open the front door and left his grandmother’s house. There was a clicking sound and Michael wasn’t sure whether it was the sound of the latch locking as he shut the door behind him, or the sound of his grandmother pushing her false teeth back into place with her tongue.
Pulling the collar of his blazer about his neck, Michael lowered his head against the rain that spattered his face like needlepoints. The streets were dark and deserted as he made his way across town to his home. The rain hissed as it bounced off the pavement and tarmac. The sound reminded him of Clarence the family cat, spitting and hissing at the dog that lived next door. Listening to that sound and the thought of the family pet made his mind wander to thoughts of bigger cats – tigers, in fact.
There are tigers beneath that underpass!
Michael could hear his Nan’s voice in his head.
“Poor, old Nan,” he whispered to himself, as he cut through the darkness and across the park towards home. “Losing her marbles, I guess.” And his whisper was snatched away from his lips by the wind that circled him.
Screeeeech! Screeeeech! Screeeeech!
Michael stopped. The sound had been sudden. Had it been a wail? The sound of an animal close by? A tiger, perhaps? Michael peered over the collar of his blazer. The sound came again. A screeching sound, like an animal in pain.
There are tigers!
The voice whispered in his ear, and it was his grandmother’s.
“There ain’t no tigers!” Michael said aloud.
The sound came again – like fingernails being dragged across ice.
“Why did Nan have to try and scare me like that?” Michael groaned, his heart racing behind his chest like a trip-hammer. Then through the driving rain, Michael saw what it was that was making the noise.
The swings swung back and forth in the wind as if being pushed by the ghosts of children who had come back from their graves to have one last night of fun in the park.
“I knew there were no tigers,” Michael laughed at himself. Pulling his blazer tight, he set off again towards home and the underpass.
However hard he fought the urge, Michael couldn’t help but quicken his step. It was as if he no longer had control over his legs. At first his stride got longer, swallowing up the pavement in front of him like a ravenous animal. Then his pace got faster, a slow trot at first – then a quick jog – until his legs were pin-wheeling beneath him like propellers. Then he was racing through the evening streets, away from the swings in the park, but most of all from his grandmother’s rasping voice and her warning of tigers.
Michael reached the path that led home. He lent forward and sucked mouthfuls of air into his burning lungs. He buried his fingers deep into the flesh beneath his ribcage and tried to ease the stitch that smouldered inside him like a hot poker. Michael knew that just on the other side of the hill that stood before him like an ogre was his house, warm, dry and safe.
Michael eyed the hill before him, black, wet, and slippery. He could climb it, but he felt exhausted, damp, and cold. Rain ran down the hill in tiny rivulets and he could picture himself slipping, tumbling over and over in the mud and breaking an arm, or worse, a leg. He thought of the cup-tie he was playing in that weekend and didn’t want to risk an injury before match day.
There was another option. Michael didn’t have to risk climbing over the hill – he could go underneath it – he could take the underpass. Michael looked at the entrance to the underpass and it was dark and wide like the jaws of a giant beast – a tiger’s jaws.
There are tigers beneath the underpass!
His grandmother’s voice croaked in his ear again.
Forcing the sound of her voice away, Michael walked towards the entrance. He stood within its concrete jaws and the smell of urine, vomit, and stale cannabis smoke wafted under his nose and made him feel sick. Placing one foot in front of the other, he stepped inside. Only minutes ago, his feet had been unable to stop moving – whispering above the rain-soaked pavement. But now they felt like lumps of lead disappearing into quicksand. Michael forced himself onwards.
There are tigers…
his Nan’s voice started up again.
“Go away, will ya!” Michael hissed at the voice inside his head.
“There ain’t no tigers here!”
The underpass was lit with a strip of fluorescent lights, but most had been smashed by vandals, leaving pools of murky light every few yards. The tiled walls had been decorated with graffiti. Slogans and symbols had been painted. Michael could see a red line of paint that had been sprayed from a can in an arc across the wall of the underpass. He looked at it, and in the dim light of the underpass he thought that the paint could have been blood, sprayed from the throat of someone attacked by a ti…
Then there were shadows in the corner of his eye, and Michael turned away from the paint…
Blood?
and peered into the gloom.
“Who’s there?” Michael called out, his voice echoing off the underpass walls like drum beats.
Silence.
“Is anyone there?” he called again.
Silence.
Screwing up his eyes, Michael strained to see what was making the shadows ahead of him. They were tall, pointed, and moved slowly towards him. The shadows were far too tall to be tigers and a nervous laugh escaped him as he thought of how stupid he was being.
“The only tigers down here are the members of that gang,” he assured himself.
The shadows came closer.
“What do you want?” Michael called out.
Closer still.
“Look, if you think you’re gonna rob a mobile from me, you’re outta luck. I don’t even own a phone.”
Closer.
“Look, I’m just on my way home,” Michael said, and his voice sounded high-pitched and broken. He felt his innards tighten, and his stomach made an odd gargling sound like acid sloshing around in a bucket. “I don’t want any trouble. I just want to go home.”
In the darkness, inches ahead of him, six bright orange lights appeared. They glowed like hot coals on a roaring fire. Michael stared at them. At first he couldn’t figure out what they were. They blinked on and off like the indicators on a car. Then as they came nearer, he realised with dread what they were.
The eyes stared at him from the darkness. Three sets of blazing orange eyes.
But what or who would have orange eyes?
Michael screamed inside as he stumbled backwards down the underpass.
There are…
his grandmother’s voice began again in his ear.
“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up, Nan!”
Michael screeched, covering his ears with his hands. “There ain’t no…”
The last of his sentence was drowned out by a deafening snarling sound. The noise came at him like a wave and knocked him from his feet in a rush of hot air. Michael slammed into the ground, forcing the air from his lungs. The shadows before him began to change shape, growing longer and sleeker-looking. They sauntered towards him, powerful but graceful.
Michael tried to scream, but the only noise that came from his throat was a gagging sound. He didn’t even scream as the giant orange and black striped paw sprung from the darkness and opened his chest. Michael looked down in disbelief at the gaping crimson hole. He then looked up into the tiger’s face. For a moment he thought that the creature looked beautiful with its white and orange muzzle. Its whiskers glinted like lengths of silver thread in the murky light of the underpass. Then that glimpse of beauty was gone. The tiger opened his powerful jaws revealing rows of jagged teeth. Michael could feel the heat of the tiger’s breath against his cheek and the smell of dead things and flesh wafting from its slobbering tongue. Then that beautiful white muzzle turned red – brilliant red - as the tiger buried its face into Michael’s chest.
There are tigers beneath that underpass
, Michael heard his grandmother whisper in his ear one last time.
Ratbag
Frannie Lauderdale walked slowly down the long corridor. The echoey snap of her heels on the stone floor made a chattering sound like a woman’s teeth rattling together in the cold. Frannie suddenly stopped short, and a thin gasp of surprise slipped from between her lips as a sudden streak of purple lightning streaked the dark sky outside. A coating of luminous colours splashed Frannie’s face as her grey eyes grew wide with fright. She hastened her step.