5. AN ESCAPE FROM WILLIAM

When all things seem to be possible there's quite a lot of putting straight to do

“I ought to feel confused, but I’m not,” sighed Elaine Blockley to herself as she wandered across a landscape that ought to have been grassy and tree-lined, but wasn’t.

“That’s the way to think!” chirped a cheeky girl with an enormous smile and pigtails. Or she might have had pigtails if she’d had hair, but suddenly she realised that nobody had hair so nobody could possibly have pigtails.

“Why, Piggy,” smiled Elaine, “I never thought I’d see you again!”

What am I saying and when did I see her before? That was what screamed through her mind as she looked at the pretty creature she’d called Piggy, which even in this Past place didn’t sound very pleasant as nick-names go.

“It was quite a party,” smiled Piggy, “everyone was so high we all nearly reached the sky in our own peachy bubbles! Do you remember?”

It never happened…

“And the way we danced,” she agreed, not understanding her own words and having no notion that anything of the sort ever happened. I never danced…

“I’m here to lead you,” went on the pretty girl called Piggy, all six or seven years of her, and her non-existent pigtails fluttered in a fragrant wind that wasn’t there.

“Lead me?” she asked.

“To the portal. You’re a newbie so you need to be shown. I show all the newbies. Go through the portal, and it’s so much fun and there’s nothing to worry about, you will be able to sort William out for good and all! Show him who’s boss. That’s what you can do, make him see plain as the nose that used to be on your face that you can do what he can’t!”

“What’s that?” asked Elaine, not understanding.

“Saying Boo in a scary voice, like ghosts do,” laughed Piggy, “go right up to the swine and screech boo in his ears until he jumps and bangs his head on the ceiling”

“You know William?” asked Elaine, wondering when she would properly understand this new life she was living. “And what happened to your pigtails?” she asked, curious.

“Of course I know William!” giggled Piggy, “he’s over there…” and she pointed towards a group of hippies with their guitars and songs about freedom. “They’re all like that,” she added, “the singers of silly songs, the preachers of love.”

“William never loved anyone unless he loved David,” murmured Elaine.

“Come and see!” laughed Piggy, and she took Elaine by what might have been a hand but wasn’t, and led her away, not towards the hippies who had mysteriously vanished but to the edge of all things.

“This,” she said knowingly, “is the portal. Come. I’ll show you. It’s fun!”

And the edge of all things was just what it claimed to be. Holding Elaine by a hand she didn’t have, Piggy stopped off the edge of things and fell into the abyss.

Elaine went with her. She had to. Their connection was complete.

“Where is this?” asked Elaine.

“The great divide, that’s what I call it, but you can call it what you like. Come on, over here.”

And the mischievous Piggy tugged Elaine’s absent fingers and led her across a carpet made of nothing until they were standing outside her very own front door. The cottage, her home, was there just as it had always been. And the steel plate that covered the coal hole, and the cobweb she’d noticed on the door frame only yesterday or last week or somewhen.

“Now for the fun part,” giggled Piggy, “knock the door. Go on, loud as you can, and see what happens.”

There was nothing for it. Elaine knocked the door and after a moment or two it creaked open like it always had.

Familiar, yet unfamiliar.

Like William, who stood there blinking at the sunlight (or was it moonlight?) and looked around.

“Yes?” he asked in that old superior voice of his, “is somebody there? Speak up!”

“He can’t see you,” giggled Piggy. “Go on, say something! Something he’ll know you by when he hears it!”

“William, I want retribution,” she said.

Now why did I say that, and what exactly is retribution, and do I want it? she asked herself. And instantly knew that she did.

“Who said that?” asked William, obviously baffled because a voice he recognised came from nowhere when he believed it had been silenced for good.

“Elaine. That’s my name. Elaine Blockley,” she simpered, enjoying the startled look on his face.

“But you … she’s … Elaine’s dead in the cellar…” he spluttered, dribbling.

“You always did dribble, William dear, especially when you whisper sweet nothings to sweet little David!”

“Don’t mention that devil!” shouted William, “he thought he could con me out of house and home! But he can’t, even if he does report your dead body to the police …. but no, it can’t be the real Elaine that I’m talking to… she’s dead and I didn’t get where I am today by talking to corpses. But if he does try to land me in the dung with the law they’ll take a look at those bricks and find his fingerprints all over them! I’m not as daft as I look, you know.”

Elaine felt suddenly brave enough to sort this dreadful husband of hers out, once and for all. So there hadn’t been a war, no nuclear bombs, but there might be tomorrow or next year or somewhen. Then he’d need his cellar to hide in or else he might burn in atomic flames. The silly boy!

“Oh, I’m dead all right,” she told him, “dead and never buried. And being dead I have eyes everywhere and I know your nasty little secrets.”

“Like what?” he sneered.

“Like where you buried Lisa when she died…” she said darkly, and only had one misgiving, because she had never known a Lisa and was quite sure she never heard of a woman with that name who had passed away.

“How did you know?”

Behind her Piggy cackled with glee.

“You hit a bullseye there,” she laughed, “try again!”

Elaine felt suddenly strong, her will reinforced.

“And the cat,” she said, “remember, the cat, the one you thought you’d operate on with a rusty pen-knife? The one that screamed itself to death when you were old enough to know better than do any such thing, you spiteful little urchin!”

“Spot on!” laughed Piggy as William gazed in horror at where he imagined the voice came from.

“And me,” said Elaine, her voice harder than iron, “the wife you bricked into a cellar so that you could play with your boy friend in secret!”

“No!” shouted William, “no I never, that wasn’t me, nothing was me!”

“I’ll come another day to remind you,” Elaine told him, “maybe when you’re in the bath, I’ll come and laugh at your tiny bits and pieces in the bath, or when you’re trying to forget how evil you can be… I’ll come then, if you like, and help you…”

“Come on!” whispered Piggy, “give him lots of time to think about that, and yes, come back and give him cause to grieve as many times as you like. But now it’s time for the portal and laughs in the glorious past!”

“Okay,” she said, and the two of them turned their invisible bodies to go.

But before she was gone altogether she turned and her voice, as if echoing along a tunnel in an empty room, called “see you again, William…”

She heard him gnash his teeth and sob as she floated on the portal back to the Past. But endless time was for fun, so she smiled and Piggy giggled as she gripped a hand that couldn’t possibly be there, but somehow was.

© Peter Rogerson 27.08.21

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