Out Damned Spot

Geoff Black rubbed at his paint covered hands as he waited for his pint in the Red Lion public house. Tina had wanted the boy’s room finished today, but lack of wallpaper paste and enthusiasm on his part meant it would have to be completed tomorrow. Tina was on her way to B and Q to buy the paste and he was taking a well earned rest from DIY home decorating.

The pint arrived on his table with condensation running down the outside of the glass. It was delivered by Sal, who waited on the tables in the Red Lion.

“Eerr Sal,” Geoff grunted as he lifted the welcoming glass up to eye level.. “This is a bit of alright. A’int it?”

“Yes Geoff, you can’t beat a good pint on a day like this,” she replied collecting a few empty glasses of the table.

As he sipped his beer Geoff began to daydream and as usual his thoughts returned to the streets of Bagdad where he had soldiered two years before.

He was immediately engulfed in the heat, the dust and the terrible stress of being under fire. The day dream gathered momentum and he imagined that he could hear the men, his army colleagues talking in hushed tones.

“We’re pinned down skipper,” hissed Ken James to the group’s leader, Tommy Danton.

“Yes, I know James, but we have to get passed this street,” Danton growled. “The rest of the boys are on the west side!”

Geoff sighted down his rifle sights and checked the empty street. Debris and burnt out cars lay all about and any of these piles of rubble or rusting metal could harbour a sniper.

“Looks clear to me, skipper,” whispered Geoff. “I think we should make a break for it.”

Gathering up their rifles and packs the soldiers crept out from where they had been sheltering. The silence was almost as bad as the sound of bullets. No one knew if and when the enemy would begin firing again.

Geoff was leading the small group of men towards a neighbouring street; Geoff kept watch on the approaching corner and then turned to check on the progress of the rest of the men.

“Black!” shouted Danton suddenly. “The corner……incoming!”

Geoff swung his rifle around and loosed off a shot at the figure that had appeared from round the corner. His aim was good and the bullet obliterated the head of the person, a small boy who fell to the ground with a sickening thud. Geoff dropped his rifle and ran to the small bleeding body.

A woman who had been standing at a doorway in the street began to wail and cry out. She ran to where the boy lay and picking him up began to cradle his headless torso to her breast. Very soon she was coated with his blood and presented a macabre spectacle.

“Black! Black!” shouted Captain Danton. “Get the medic! Quickly…!

“I don’t think the doc will help, skipper,” said Ken James. “Black’s totally done for him!”

A crash woke Geoff from his reverie and looking down he realised that he had dropped his glass, smashing it and spraying beer all around.

“Oh Sal….I’m sorry,” he said as he bent to pick up the bits of shattered glass. “I was being careless.”

“Just leave it Geoff, I’ll clear it up. I’ll get you another pint,” Sal said turning to the bar. “Don’t try to pick up the glass you’ll cut yourself and we’ll have blood everywhere!”

At the mention of blood, Geoff saw again in his mind’s eye, the little body clasped in the blood soaked woman’s arms. The little train, which the boy had been pulling behind him, was lying on its side in the dust, splashed crimson with the lad’s blood.

Geoff shook his head to clear the vision and then rushed out of the pub into the street.

People were about and some stopped in their tracks as Geoff rushed by, unsure as to the reason for his hasty retreat.

 By the time he got home Geoff was out of breath and feeling nauseous. The day dream had been so real. He thought that the time spent with the Army psychiatrists would have alleviated these hallucinations, these bloody loss of reality episodes. That was the reason that he had been shipped off back to Britain after the incident. The public outcry that had followed the shooting had threatened the stability of the country and the ‘top brass’ had decided he should be quietly ‘removed’.

His demob from the Army had happened six months later after a military court martial. Geoff was deemed to have overstepped his duty by firing on a civilian and after a suitable period of time with the Army Psychiatry team, he was drummed out of the Army.

“Geoff. Geoff!” came a cry from behind him. It was Tina. “Have you forgotten your keys again?” she said laughing, as she unlocked their front door. “I’ve got superfast paste so you may be able to finish Billy’s room tonight. Pretty please?”

Geoff and Tina looked round their son’s newly painted and papered bedroom.

It was well past midnight, but both parents felt the pleasurable tiredness that came with a job well done.

“Right Geoff,” said Tina. “We’ll get some posters for him and stick them on the walls. It will give Billy a real sense of his own room.”

“Yes,” said Geoff ruefully. “It may encourage him to keep it tidy!”

As Tina went through to the toilet to wash her hands Geoff took a last look round. Yes, he thought, they had made a really good job. They worked well together and over the years had become quite adept at the do-it-yourself projects.

Noticing something on the wall at about eye level, Geoff crossed the room and touched the small dark spot with his finger. As he touched it something like a small electric shock went through his finger and he stepped back. He touched it again but got no similar effect.

“The boy’s posters will cover it up and no one will ever see it.” He said to himself as he snapped the light off and closed the bedroom door.

By the time Mr and Mrs. Black got to bed that night it was 2 am and they quietly crept around the bedroom trying not to disturb Billy who lay on a camp bed at the foot of their bed.

“It’ll be nice to have Billy back in his own room,” Geoff grunted pulling the bed clothes over him. “We might manage to rekindle some of our animal passions.”

“Aye,” said his wife. “That’ll be right.”

Putting the light out, Geoff plunged the room into darkness. All he could hear was the steady susurration of Billy’s breathing. Soon it was joined by his wife’s and Geoff rolled over onto his side and closed his eyes.

It seemed to Geoff that he had just fallen asleep when he woke aware of something moving in the darkness of the bedroom. He leant over to the bedside light and switched it on.

The sudden burst of light caused Geoff to momentarily shut his eyes. Gradually he opened them and was shocked by what was before him.

He was back at the shooting incident in Bagdad. The woman covered with blood was holding out the boy’s decapitated body and screaming at him.

“Yo English devil! Yo will pay dearly for this murder! Katar will avenge my son! He will come for you!”

Suddenly Geoff felt himself being shaken and the scene in front of him vanished and was replaced by two very concerned looking faces, that of Tina and Billy.

“Geoff, what’s wrong? You were screaming and pointing across the room!” said Tina hugging Billy to herself. “You must have had a nightmare. What was it? All those paint fumes?”

The next morning Tina let Geoff lie sleeping as she got Billy ready for school. She had looked in on the boy’s bedroom and it seemed as if everything had dried out satisfactorily. Billy had looked in too and had admired his parent’s handiwork.

After seeing Billy off to school, Tina made Geoff a cup of coffee and took it up to him.

“Come on sleepyhead,” she said as she pulled the bedroom curtains open. “Time to get up.”

Geoff and Tina went down to one of the shops selling posters and bought a few for Billy’s bedroom walls. The boy was into “Star Wars” and the “Lord of the Rings”, so Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker, Bilbo Baggins and the Golum soon graced Billy’s walls. Geoff had noticed the mark on the wall was slightly larger today, but hastily covered it up with a map of Middle Earth in case Tina wanted the paper stripped off again.

Billy had been ‘over the moon’ with his newly decorated bedroom and as he snuggled under his duvet with Yoda printed on it, he gazed up at his new posters.

“They are so cool. Thank you Mum and Dad and I promise to keep my bedroom tidy.”

As Geoff closed his son’s bedroom door he leant over and kissed Tina. “Well, it looks like we did something right.”

The following week passed as weeks do with Geoff looking for work. When he had ‘left’ the Army he didn’t have a trade to fall back on and after registering at the Jobs Centre was put forward for various jobs. Although he carried them all out with equal alacrity and verve, Geoff always seemed to be the ‘last one in, first one out’ and was often in receipt of unemployment benefit. Tina insisted that he have a couple of pints a week down at the Red Lion. Often he picked up odd jobs and ended up digging a piece of ground or painting someone’s front door. It gave him pocket money and filled his time gainfully.

One evening he arrived home dirty and tired from helping to empty a house after the death of the occupant. One of his mates, Jackie Fuller had hired a van and for him and Geoff it was ‘cash in hand’ supplied by grateful relatives.

As he opened the kitchen door he heard Billy’s voice coming from inside.

“It scares me Mum. The poster is moving. I promise you, I’m not lying!”

There was a pregnant silence as Geoff stepped into the kitchen. Tina was standing at the cooker stirring soup in a pot and Billy was looking decidedly scared.

“What’s up Billy?” asked Geoff. “Someone bullying you at school?”

“Oh Geoff, he says that one of his posters is moving on the wall of his bedroom. It must be a draught,” said Tina with a small laugh.

“Come on,” said Geoff to his son. “Let’s go and see.”

Father and son climbed the stair and entered Billy’s bedroom.

“Now, which one is moving?” asked Geoff.

Billy pointed at the map of Middle Earth. “I noticed it a couple of nights ago, but thought that it was my imagination.”

Geoff looked closely at the poster but could see no movement. He opened and shut the bedroom door and window without any effect.

“I think you are imagining things, son,” said Geoff. “Now go downstairs and have your tea.”

When the boy had left Geoff carefully pulled the poster off the wall. It had been attached with Blutack and came away quite cleanly revealing a much increased mark on the wall. Geoff looked at the enlarged black mark and tried to imagine what it reminded him of. Oh well, he thought eventually, I suppose I will have to strip it back tomorrow. It must be damp or something.

That night Geoff returned to war torn Bagdad and to the corner of the street where the little boy had been killed. The woman stood as she had in all his previous visions of her, with the little corpse in her arms. Once again she screamed at him and he felt horrified at what he had done. It seemed as if his feet were in glue which stopped him moving away from the verbal barrage. His eyes fell to the little blood stained engine and he felt tears running down his cheeks.

The screaming continued unabated and Geoff felt bombarded by it. All of a sudden he realised he was back in his bedroom, but still hearing the screaming.

“It’s Billy!” shouted Tina. “Whatever is wrong….?”

Geoff threw open Billy’s bedroom door and was aghast at what confronted him.

The entire wall that had displayed the mark was gone and through it Geoff could see a dark sky with jewel like stars. A howling gale was sucking everything out of the room and Billy was clinging to his cupboard door as his bed and toys vanished out of the dark maw of the hole. Geoff could hear the voice of the Iraqi woman as she cursed him.

“Yo English devil! Yo will pay dearly for this murder! Katar will avenge my son! He will come for you!”

Geoff could see that his son was about to be swallowed by this avenging entity and knew that the boy was innocent of any crime. Quickly snatching up a carpet knife which had been left after the decorating, Geoff slashed at his wrists releasing gouts of blood into the hurricane.

“No Katar!” he screamed, as the blood flowed freely from him. “My son is not who you want. Take me, I am the guilty one!”

The tempest picked Geoff up and carried him out into the dark night where the stars shone down like menacing eyes. He was carried this way and that and pummelled as the storm took its revenge.

“Forgive me,” he whimpered. “Forgive me.”

He was back leading his Army buddies towards that fateful corner in that benighted place in Iraq. Why was life making him go through this again, he thought to himself.

Had he not suffered enough? Was it never to end?

Then he was back, this was purgatory and his punishment, to repeat this for eternity.

“Black!” shouted Danton suddenly. “The corner……incoming!”

Feeling like a puppet Geoff swung his rifle around, but unlike the previous times, did not fire a shot, but watched as a little boy appeared from round the corner and toddled off across the street towing a little engine. Halfway across the street the boy stopped and looking in Geoff’s direction, smiled and gave him a wave before hurrying off up the street.

The scene dissolved about Geoff and darkness descended on him like a cloak.

“When will he wake up?” a voice asked in Geoff’s night.

“He will wake when he wants to,” said another voice.

Geoff opened his eyes and saw that he was lying in a hospital bed. Tina and Billy stood by looking very worried.

“What happened?” Geoff croaked.

“Oh Geoff, you collapsed in Billy’s room,” said Tina. “We thought you were dead. I called an ambulance and on the trip over to the hospital, the paramedics had to shock your heart to get it beating again. Is everything OK?”

Geoff stretched out his hands to his wife and son and they held them tightly.

“Yes,” he said feeling a tear run down his cheek. “Everything is OK…now.”