Mr Peregwin

A Story by BJS-C

An exact 2000 word short story that takes a tentative peek upon the ambiguous phenomenon that is the mysterious, perhaps even clandestine, "Mr Peregwin."

Mr Peregwin

This is one possible beginning of the story.

Mr Peregwin’s finger hovered over the mouse of his computer. He considered going onto Facebook for a moment, an addictive habit he exercised to while away the hours of a seemingly endless existence. However, Mr Peregwin found his finger hanging over the little mouse button like the blade of a guillotine ready to cut that habit out of his life for good.

He pondered. Could he exist without any social presence at all, even an internet one? Was he really prepared to send adrift his scores of Facebook friends (all six of them) into exile, never to hear his factual recounts of political events or his in depth analyses on the latest arthouse movie? Mr Peregwin struggled to think of what his disciples on Facebook would do without his pithy insights and shrewd philosophical theories. It was true, however, that he had grown weary of this little experiment that had been cooked up by his silly therapist, Mrs Shrewsbury.

Mrs Shrewsbury had the most peculiar ideas. She believed that Mr Peregwin needed company and acquaintances in order to lead a happy and fulfilling life that was productive for both him and the rest of society.

She'd said that as she sat in Mr Peregwin’s plush armchair in his living room one day. Mr Peregwin himself sat on the other one, facing her.

“I understand your reluctance to meet people, B " uh " Mr. Peregwin,” she had said as she began to rub her index finger unconsciously with her thumb. “However, it’s important for people to feel connected to one another, because it gives them a sense of security and comfort. I know you might not feel comfortable meeting people in person, and I know you’re not normally comfortable letting people into your home…”

“…It is not their intrusion into my home that I object to, Mrs. Shrewsbury, but rather the intrusion upon my time without prior appointment,” Mr Peregwin interjected. He added, “I’m a very busy man.” As indeed he was. Just this morning he had been researching the chemical composition of potatoes in his underground laboratory.

“Yes I’m given to understand that you’re very often…preoccupied with your studies Mr. Peregwin. I’ve seen the essays that you’ve written on the staple food source of the Incan civilization…”

“Potatoes.”

“Yes, Mr. Peregwin. Potatoes.”

“Do you like potatoes, Mrs Shrewsbury?”

“I eat them every now and then, I suppose…”

“Potatoes are a tuberous crop from the perennial nightshade Solanum Tuberosum. They were only cultivated in Europe four hundred years ago but have since grown to become the world’s fourth popular staple food after maize, wheat and rice. Rice, however, suffers from a deficiency of vitamin A and if it weren’t for Peter Beyer and Ingo Potrykus publishing a paper that for the first time depicted scientific details of a new form of bioengineered “golden” rice, then all rice would have this deficiency. However, even though golden rice would save 670,000 children from vitamin A deficiency each day if it were to replace regular rice around the world, it has been opposed by anti-globalisation and anti-genetic engineering activists who worry about frivolous things such as the ‘ethics of humans playing god’.

“Maize, on the other hand, leads to another deficiency, this time in niacin. Eating nothing but corn is also thought to cause a drop in serotonin levels and it’s been speculated that this is what caused the legend of the wendigo to be stirred within the icy vastness of the North American plains " the Native Americans who would become so starved and crazed with hunger that they’re bodies would warp and transform, seeking nutrition in the flesh of their neighbours. It’s speculated that an over reliance on maize and a drop in serotonin might be a factor in this behaviour.

“But you can live on just potatoes - so long as you eat a few pinto beans every now and then. That’s the amazing thing about them! They are pregnant with calories and nutrition and are fecund, with the ability to be grown in all sorts of conditions, and for this reason they reign supreme all over Eurasia and the Americas. Frankly, I can’t think of anything more positively British than the potato!”

Mrs Shrewsbury had nodded her head calmly as she listened, almost like a cautious life preserve bobbing on the waves of enthusiasm that rippled from Mr Peregwin.

“That’s very impressive, Mr Peregwin. I am amazed with the sheer depth of your knowledge on the potato…”

“Well, that’s not all. I’m -.”

“Have you ever considered…” Mrs Shrewsbury speedily continued. “…studying the creatures that eat the potato?”

“The creatures who…?”

“Us, Mr Peregwin. Have you ever considered studying us? Humans, I mean.”

Mr Peregwin stared back at her blankly. He had never considered there being anything worth studying outside the thrilling world of the potato. He blinked.

“Perhaps you could conduct an experiment " to observe the behaviour of people. You won’t have to talk to anyone you don’t feel comfortable with. In fact… Have you heard of Facebook?”

Mr Peregwin nodded. The word ‘Facebook’ did seem to rear itself out of the dankest corner of his brain.

“Good. Then I propose, should you feel comfortable doing so, that you open a Facebook account " purely to observe the creature who eats the vegetable that fascinates you. After all, it is just a small extension of your current studies, I’m sure.”

“I don’t like people.”

“Mr Peregwin, we’ve talked about this. Just…give it a go. See how it turns out and if you find you aren’t comfortable with it then you can always stop. How about it?”

And it was thus that Mr Peregwin had diligently constructed his very own Facebook account, which he entitled ‘Mr Peregwin’s very own Facebook account’.

After fastidiously typing in his own biography " an eighty three thousand word epic that mentioned the word ‘potato’ a record number of six thousand times " and thereafter jotting down the details of his birth, workplace and interests, he had leant back in his computer chair, picked up a cup of tea and awaited the friend requests to come pouring in.

After two hours had passed, and his tea had turned decidedly cold, he determined it would be a better strategy to send out these ‘Facebook friend requests’ himself, even though the thought of asking anyone to be his friend struck Mr Peregwin with a quivering lightning bolt of anxiety. However, as it happened it took only a few seconds, after sending his flurry of invites into the heart of cyberspace, for his patience to pay off. Mrs Tibbles, the old spinster who lived down the road, had accepted his ‘friend request’, followed close behind by her strange sister. At the end of the work day Mrs Shrewsbury had accepted her invite at roughly six o’clock. Mr Peregwin immediately calculated that she must live within a forty-five mile radius from her office, subsequently working out what the most populated areas within that area that a single woman who earned money within a therapists wage bracket could afford.

She therefore lived at 22 Oaks Crescent, Bulwark, Arwickshire with a statistical likelihood of fifty-seven percent. Mr Peregwin was very pleased to learn this.

The nerdy student with fierce acne who worked at Mr Peregwin’s Tesco superstore also accepted his friend invite, although with the added message, ‘Hoo the f-in f is zis.’ To which Mr Peregwin replied with sterling promptness, ‘T’is me, Mr Peregwin.’

‘Oh. Potato man.’

And thereafter all misidentification seemed to be adequately resolved.

Mr Peregwin was also startled to receive a friend request around midnight, sent from one Jamal Oakley. Mr Peregwin was pretty sure that he had never met or seen a Jamal Oakley in his life and so had hesitated to accept this invitation. He resolved to study the stranger’s Facebook page and found that Jamal Oakley appeared to be heavily invested in a club called ‘The Jihad’. Mr Peregwin ‘liked’ the club home page before proceeding to accept the charming gentleman’s friend invite.

About a quarter past three in the morning Mr Peregwin heard his butler, Bazza, arrive home and as per Bazza’s usual routine he toppled over the shoes in the hallway before drunkenly scaling the stairs as though it were the steepest slopes of Mount Everest. He then tip-toed past Mr Peregwin’s door, hoping not to wake him up, before crashing into his own room and exclaiming “Oh F**k!” as he landed in yesterday’s microwave curry.

“I sent you a friend invite,” Mr Peregwin called out, poking his head out the doorway.

“F****n’ curry…Bas’ard piece of…urrggh…”

This string of garbled lexicon didn’t make sense to Mr Peregwin as he stood there waiting patiently for a coherent answer to emerge out of the phenomenon known as ‘Bazza’. So he repeated himself. “I sent you a friend invite.”

Bazza seemed to cotton on to someone talking to him as he peeped out of his doorway and turned his bleary gaze to Mr Peregwin.

“Ah ‘eck! I haven’t woken you up ‘ave I?” He slurred as he fixed his curry splattered cap back in place.

“I sent you a friend invite,” Mr Peregwin reiterated patiently.

“Y’wot?”

“I sent you a friend invite.”

“What do you mean, ‘you sent me a friend invite’?”

“I sent you a friend invite.”

Mr Peregwin heard Bazza wade through the trash of his room like an explorer wading through the long grass of the African savannah. Mr Peregwin heard whirring as Bazza’s stone-age computer sparked to life.

There was silence for a moment, filled only by the gentle humming of the computer, before Bazza rushed back to the door.

“You sent me a friend invite,” he blurted, incomprehension lining his face.

“I sent you a friend invite.”

“Wot the bloody ‘ell ‘ave you done that for?”

“Mrs Shrewsbury elegantly suggested I make a Facebook profile. She seemed to think it would help.”

“Wot with?”

“Making friends.”

“You want friends???”

“No. But Mrs Shrewsbury wants me to have friends. She seems nice.”

“But,” Bazza jabbered, “I’m your butler. Wouldn’t it be against our social contract or summit for us to be friends.” Bazza in fact knew this to be the case " at least, in Mr Peregwin’s rather unique worldview that was currently lodged somewhere between the eighteenth century and an H.P. Lovecraft horror. But to Bazza’s dismay Mr Peregwin merely shook his head.

“I’m afraid it is, Bazza, and it is a terribly uncouth twist of fate to have thrust itself upon us so suddenly in our small pocket of civility cast adrift in this turbulent world, however it is the fair maiden’s wish and it would behove us to accept it.”

“…and that means?”

“Please accept the friend request, Mr Bazza.”

Bazza’s hopes buoyed for a moment as he considered the implications of this.

“’Ere!” He called as Mr Peregwin made to return to his room. “Does this mean I’m no longer you’re butler? Am I free?”

“Don’t be preposterous, Mr Bazza. You still have two hundred and thirty three years to go. Goodnight.”

And with that Mr Peregwin had turned on his heel and closed the door. He switched off his computer, then his light, and changed into his jam-jams before settling under the sheets of his bed. What a peculiar fellow Mr Bazza is, Mr Peregwin had thought before he’d drifted off to sleep.

And now, back to the present, Mr Peregwin had his finger poised like a dagger in a dark alley, hovering above the button that would end his pale and ghostly shade of an existence currently flickering on the computer screen in the ghastly form of ‘Mr Peregwin’s very own Facebook account’. It was a moment before he took the plunge. In one fell swoop he ended his own life, the only thread of existence that flittered about the world in desperate light transmissions and binary code that bounced from computer to computer at cosmic speeds.

He pressed ‘deactivate account.’