Prose

Excerpt from ‘With Open Eyes’

With all the noise coming from the marquee I could not hear the chatter of the river. I was trying to retrace the steps of two nights ago, when Liz and I had stumbled on a disused path and lost our bearings momentarily. In the light of day the leaves, branches and trunks of all the trees stood out in vibrant colour, in unequivocal opacity. The sound of barking distracted me, and I turned to seek out its source. From my right came the two golden retrievers. The rear dog caught up with the one it was chasing, pinned it to the ground, and for a second looked as if it really would go for the other’s throat. The other dog made a whimpering noise, perhaps for my benefit, to make me think they were actually going to kill one another this time. Then they faced each other, squaring off, maybe trying to remember whose turn it was to run away. By this time I had lost track of which was which, and was quickly losing interest, but one of them turned and sprinted past me, utterly ignoring me, the other followed gleefully, and I was alone again.
         As the path divided I searched the right fork for opening Liz and I had discovered. The brambles on either side were thick - I pushed a .at forearm against them as I walked, thinking a little pressure might reveal a weakness, a cavity behind the green and brown screen. I only succeeded, though, in accumulating a series of chalk white, super.cial scratches along my bare arm, which disappeared but still stung slightly when I rubbed them.
         I was fairly certain the opening had been on the right-hand path, but when I reached the point where the two trails re-joined and still had not found what could in any way constitute a gap, I could no longer be so sure. I turned around and walked back towards the house, taking this time the other path, which reflected its counterpart’s arch, stretching out towards the lakes before leaning back to meet it, so that the two routes, if viewed from above, would trace the outline of an eye. The edges of this track were littered with holes of no more than a foot in diameter, attributed by the Pembrokes to foxes, which led, I suppose, to a complex of tunnels and passages far more intricate than their over ground equivalents.
         It occurred to me then that had Liz and I in fact taken, initially, the left fork, and subsequently broken off to the right, then the spot in which we stopped would be the centre of the eye, so to speak. What had made me certain, previously, that we had taken the right fork, was the fact that I seemed to remember Nick, Daisy and George, who were ahead of us that night as we walked towards the river, veering off to the left as they descended the hill. But the night had been so dark that I could not be sure of this. In any case, Liz and I never found the others. The only person I saw again that night was George, several hours later, sitting with his back against the wall in one of the winding corridors of the house.
         The brambles on the left-hand fork were much less thick, and I easily pushed my way through them. Still, though, the scenery around me failed to jolt my memory. There was a thick patchwork of branches above me that could never have allowed the clear, untouched view of the moon I distinctly recalled. Also, though in this area the hedge was considerably less dense, the embrace of the twigs and leaves gave you little room for manoeuvre. The site I was looking for contained a single, thick, tree that had asserted itself on its immediate surroundings suf.ciently that the hedge stood back from it a little, affording some space to stand unhindered by the foliage. Here I felt contact at every point.
         I crouched down and found at this lower level I could see through a kind of archway of brush into a small hollow that must have been located - though I confess my bearings were far from certain by this point - more or less at the very centre of the eye. As I rocked from my haunches to my knees I felt through my ripped jeans the touch of the hard earth, still cool, as the sun hardly reached these parts. Crawling through the narrow tunnel, I confess I felt a kind of exhilaration when I guessed this might be the spot.
         The hollow, roughly circular, was no more than four or .ve feet in radius. The tree at its centre, commanding the space, was much less thick than I had remembered. I tried to layer the clipped memories I had of that night onto the surroundings that now stood before me. In my mind’s eye I saw her figure above me, obscuring the moon and then opening it again. There was a dark patch on her skirt, which would slowly spread and then contract again as it dried. Her two front teeth bit a little into her bottom lip and whitened it further. I sprawled onto my back and looked up at the quilted sky, feeling the ribs of the tree dig into my spine, and picturing what had been.

Laurence Publicover

Meaning

It was an evil-looking night the night my husband died. It was dark, and cold, and the rain flung itself against the windows, begging to be allowed into the house: just as my husband flung himself at my feet, begging for his life. I watched him coolly as the tears and mucus ran down his face in a sticky and pathetic mess; we never loved each other, you know, and to say that our marriage was one of convenience would be to give too much meaning to it. So it was with very little regret that I brought the knife swinging down in a death arc, piercing the fat that gathered at the back of my husband’s neck. I felt it rip through each little fibre before feeling the warm ruby rain of his blood leap from his body and cling to mine, as if even his blood was so disgusted with being contained in such a weak body that it wished to be associated with me instead.

Well, I’d like to say that I watched him die, rather than that I was in a different country. I’d like to say that his death was quick and satisfying from blood loss from the jugular, rather than death from poisoning. I’d even like to say that the weather was the kind of terrible you’d expect with a dramatic setting, when in fact it was a balmy summer’s evening. You see, I dreamed of killing my husband in exactly this way – and it was so realistic that after I awoke, I threw myself out of my morning shower because I thought his blood was raining down on me. Yet though my body was clean, my mind was permanently bloodstained with evil and haunting memories of how much pleasure I felt in getting him out of my life. So I began to plot.

The facts appeared to me thus: our so-called ‘perfect marriage’ could quite plausibly have convinced me to treat myself to a foreign holiday. No one could have known that a separation period was exactly what I needed to restore some impression of life into our relationship. Also, bearing in mind that I was trying to salvage this role-play of a marriage, naturally I would cook and freeze his favourite meals so the poor little lamb wouldn’t have to work too hard at playing house whilst I was away. I even labelled them with each day of the week so he wouldn’t get too confused... and I decided that Wednesday was a good day to die. So I added a little extra ingredient to his lovingly home-cooked meal that I knew would restore my life – even if it was by taking his.

You see, my husband was an inoffensive man, and it was this that ironically led me to hate him. I was desperately trying to give meaning to my humdrum existence by being the perfect little wife, involving myself in lots of ‘suitable’ activities with my ‘suitable’ friends. But I soon learnt that we can only give ourselves so much meaning in life. After that, we need to rely on other people to help us, to tell us that we give them meaning in their lives; which I believe in turn gives us a meaning to live. Ah, I can tell you’re confused. But then, you’ve not thought about this as much as I have. Let us for now then simply say that I saw no meaning in my life. I existed day after day, but it was never for any reason other than I didn’t know what else I could do. I was an actor in this play, yet I was just reading the words and moving through scene changes. It just wasn’t enough. So I puzzled away at how to give my life meaning. There wasn’t much more I could do in my position to fill my time, and the people who featured in my life couldn’t care less about how I really felt. It seemed to be enough for them that they only saw one side of me. I realised I was stuck; stuck between a very dull rock and a desperately unfulfilling hard place.

The answer was eerily simple: that I should take matters into my own hands, and decide that it was time for people to see another side of me. Not just the people in my little village. I wanted more than that. I wanted the whole country to give my life meaning, to be thinking of me when they went to sleep at night. I wanted everyone in the country to know my name and to associate a meaning with it. It wasn’t enough to know that the village would be talking about what I had done, and my dream answered my own question of how I could achieve national recognition. I did not fear capture but I also did not want to look at the corpse of the man I had been linked to for ten years, just when my life was about to get interesting. So I took a break, broke my cage and flew free to an exotic island for just a little while.

Now I am happy. I have meaning to my life, because now everybody is falling over themselves to give me some. The police were squabbling as to why I would kill him when everyone in the village reported ours as a fairytale marriage. The busybodies in the village are all vying to get the most outrageous reason as to why I would kill my husband. The criminal psychologists were clamouring to draw up my ‘psychopathic’ profile. The papers have nicknamed me ‘the Housewife’. Now I have legend attached to my name.

I, ‘the Housewife’, have manipulated the entire country into giving me what I wanted. How many people can say that?

Consequently, my meaning to life will last throughout the centuries. How many people can say that?

I killed my husband, and went on holiday.

How many people can say that?

HKH Hummerstone

Back to Contents



Prose Excerpt from ‘With Open Eyes’ With all the noise coming from the marquee I could not hear the chatter of the river. I was trying to retrace the steps of two nights ago, when Liz and I had stumbled on a disused path and lost our bearings momentarily. In the light of day the leaves, branches and trunks of all the trees stood out in vibrant colour, in unequivocal opacity. The sound of barking distracted me, and I turned to seek out its source. From my right came the two golden retrievers. The rear dog caught up with the one it was chasing, pinned it to the ground, and for a second looked as if it really would go for the other’s throat. The other dog made a whimpering noise, perhaps for my benefit, to make me think they were actually going to kill one another this time. Then they faced each other, squaring off, maybe trying to remember whose turn it was to run away. By this time I had lost track of which was which, and was quickly losing interest, but one of them turned and sprinted past me, utterly ignoring me, the other followed gleefully, and I was alone again. As the path divided I searched the right fork for opening Liz and I had discovered. The brambles on either side were thick - I pushed a .at forearm against them as I walked, thinking a little pressure might reveal a weakness, a cavity behind the green and brown screen. I only succeeded, though, in accumulating a series of chalk white, super.cial scratches along my bare arm, which disappeared but still stung slightly when I rubbed them. I was fairly certain the opening had been on the right-hand path, but when I reached the point where the two trails re-joined and still had not found what could in any way constitute a gap, I could no longer be so sure. I turned around and walked back towards the house, taking this time the other path, which reflected its counterpart’s arch, stretching out towards the lakes before leaning back to meet it, so that the two routes, if viewed from above, would trace the outline of an eye. The edges of this track were littered with holes of no more than a foot in diameter, attributed by the Pembrokes to foxes, which led, I suppose, to a complex of tunnels and passages far more intricate than their over ground equivalents. It occurred to me then that had Liz and I in fact taken, initially, the left fork, and subsequently broken off to the right, then the spot in which we stopped would be the centre of the eye, so to speak. What had made me certain, previously, that we had taken the right fork, was the fact that I seemed to remember Nick, Daisy and George, who were ahead of us that night as we walked towards the river, veering off to the left as they descended the hill. But the night had been so dark that I could not be sure of this. In any case, Liz and I never found the others. The only person I saw again that night was George, several hours later, sitting with his back against the wall in one of the winding corridors of the house. The brambles on the left-hand fork were much less thick, and I easily pushed my way through them. Still, though, the scenery around me failed to jolt my memory. There was a thick patchwork of branches above me that could never have allowed the clear, untouched view of the moon I distinctly recalled. Also, though in this area the hedge was considerably less dense, the embrace of the twigs and leaves gave you little room for manoeuvre. The site I was looking for contained a single, thick, tree that had asserted itself on its immediate surroundings suf.ciently that the hedge stood back from it a little, affording some space to stand unhindered by the foliage. Here I felt contact at every point. I crouched down and found at this lower level I could see through a kind of archway of brush into a small hollow that must have been located - though I confess my bearings were far from certain by this point - more or less at the very centre of the eye. As I rocked from my haunches to my knees I felt through my ripped jeans the touch of the hard earth, still cool, as the sun hardly reached these parts. Crawling through the narrow tunnel, I confess I felt a kind of exhilaration when I guessed this might be the spot. The hollow, roughly circular, was no more than four or .ve feet in radius. The tree at its centre, commanding the space, was much less thick than I had remembered. I tried to layer the clipped memories I had of that night onto the surroundings that now stood before me. In my mind’s eye I saw her figure above me, obscuring the moon and then opening it again. There was a dark patch on her skirt, which would slowly spread and then contract again as it dried. Her two front teeth bit a little into her bottom lip and whitened it further. I sprawled onto my back and looked up at the quilted sky, feeling the ribs of the tree dig into my spine, and picturing what had been. Laurence Publicover Meaning It was an evil-looking night the night my husband died. It was dark, and cold, and the rain flung itself against the windows, begging to be allowed into the house: just as my husband flung himself at my feet, begging for his life. I watched him coolly as the tears and mucus ran down his face in a sticky and pathetic mess; we never loved each other, you know, and to say that our marriage was one of convenience would be to give too much meaning to it. So it was with very little regret that I brought the knife swinging down in a death arc, piercing the fat that gathered at the back of my husband’s neck. I felt it rip through each little fibre before feeling the warm ruby rain of his blood leap from his body and cling to mine, as if even his blood was so disgusted with being contained in such a weak body that it wished to be associated with me instead. Well, I’d like to say that I watched him die, rather than that I was in a different country. I’d like to say that his death was quick and satisfying from blood loss from the jugular, rather than death from poisoning. I’d even like to say that the weather was the kind of terrible you’d expect with a dramatic setting, when in fact it was a balmy summer’s evening. You see, I dreamed of killing my husband in exactly this way – and it was so realistic that after I awoke, I threw myself out of my morning shower because I thought his blood was raining down on me. Yet though my body was clean, my mind was permanently bloodstained with evil and haunting memories of how much pleasure I felt in getting him out of my life. So I began to plot. The facts appeared to me thus: our so-called ‘perfect marriage’ could quite plausibly have convinced me to treat myself to a foreign holiday. No one could have known that a separation period was exactly what I needed to restore some impression of life into our relationship. Also, bearing in mind that I was trying to salvage this role-play of a marriage, naturally I would cook and freeze his favourite meals so the poor little lamb wouldn’t have to work too hard at playing house whilst I was away. I even labelled them with each day of the week so he wouldn’t get too confused... and I decided that Wednesday was a good day to die. So I added a little extra ingredient to his lovingly home-cooked meal that I knew would restore my life – even if it was by taking his. You see, my husband was an inoffensive man, and it was this that ironically led me to hate him. I was desperately trying to give meaning to my humdrum existence by being the perfect little wife, involving myself in lots of ‘suitable’ activities with my ‘suitable’ friends. But I soon learnt that we can only give ourselves so much meaning in life. After that, we need to rely on other people to help us, to tell us that we give them meaning in their lives; which I believe in turn gives us a meaning to live. Ah, I can tell you’re confused. But then, you’ve not thought about this as much as I have. Let us for now then simply say that I saw no meaning in my life. I existed day after day, but it was never for any reason other than I didn’t know what else I could do. I was an actor in this play, yet I was just reading the words and moving through scene changes. It just wasn’t enough. So I puzzled away at how to give my life meaning. There wasn’t much more I could do in my position to fill my time, and the people who featured in my life couldn’t care less about how I really felt. It seemed to be enough for them that they only saw one side of me. I realised I was stuck; stuck between a very dull rock and a desperately unfulfilling hard place. The answer was eerily simple: that I should take matters into my own hands, and decide that it was time for people to see another side of me. Not just the people in my little village. I wanted more than that. I wanted the whole country to give my life meaning, to be thinking of me when they went to sleep at night. I wanted everyone in the country to know my name and to associate a meaning with it. It wasn’t enough to know that the village would be talking about what I had done, and my dream answered my own question of how I could achieve national recognition. I did not fear capture but I also did not want to look at the corpse of the man I had been linked to for ten years, just when my life was about to get interesting. So I took a break, broke my cage and flew free to an exotic island for just a little while. Now I am happy. I have meaning to my life, because now everybody is falling over themselves to give me some. The police were squabbling as to why I would kill him when everyone in the village reported ours as a fairytale marriage. The busybodies in the village are all vying to get the most outrageous reason as to why I would kill my husband. The criminal psychologists were clamouring to draw up my ‘psychopathic’ profile. The papers have nicknamed me ‘the Housewife’. Now I have legend attached to my name. I, ‘the Housewife’, have manipulated the entire country into giving me what I wanted. How many people can say that? Consequently, my meaning to life will last throughout the centuries. How many people can say that? I killed my husband, and went on holiday. How many people can say that? HKH Hummerstone Back to Contents
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