| Purple Rules by David YayGrr |
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The Purple King has taken over the Land of We! See what happens when this evil king attempts to control the land with his color-based rule. Young readers will experience the ups and downs of this story, cheering for one brave citizen who attempts to squash the king with his clever cure. Will the Land of We be able to unite and outsmart the Purple King in time?
Immerse yourself in this tale as first-time illustrator, Gi P, brings the characters to life through her brightly colored illustrations and detailed imagery. This fun rhyming book is a great way to introduce the concepts of diversity and equality to all children, without preaching.
Kids will be on the edge of their seats starting from page one… how will it all end?
This book is best suited for ages 5-10.
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100% of “Purple Rules” profits will be donated to Artolution, a public arts organization facilitating art programs for kids around the world.
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Reviews:
“The history of the world is rich and colorful, and I am very grateful for the mesh of cultures that I am personally able to experience within my community. However, as a result of our surface-level differences, conflicts undoubtedly arise. “Purple Rules” explores this concept of segregation and discrimination masterfully, subtly delving into the cruel treatment of minorities from the Trail of Tears to Jim Crow Laws to Alien and Sedition Acts within American History…. This book is a unique coming-of-age venture for children to learn about the differences within our communities”
– Hannah Li, Artist
“The story is genius in every way and the pictures played in my head like a movie.” – Mackenzie Cox
“The story of “Purple Rules” is all about inclusivity and diversity, and it is very important to let the young readers know that.”
– K.
“Having experienced discrimination myself, I found the text to be incredibly powerful. Prejudice is a very difficult topic to understand, for children and adults alike. That’s why it’s essential to teach young children about it in hopes that one day, prejudice may be abolished. I think stories like these are the perfect way to do so”
– Sujana H
Targeted Age Group:: 5-10
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
I wrote this book when my daughter was still a toddler and I often imagined how I wanted her to see the world. I noticed that she learned better through stories, so I started working on a series of stories to teach the values that I believe in (equality, confidence, kindness) through rhyming adventure books. My hope is that I'll be able to keep children's interest with these exciting tales, while also helping them explore difficult subjects.
How Did You Come up With Your Characters?
Many of the events in "Purple Rules" are based on historical events like the Trail of Tears or Jim Crow laws. However, the fictional nature of the book allowed me to explore them in a way that is both exciting and interesting for young readers. The characters in my book represent the overall themes of right vs. wrong. For example, the Purple King represents the potential for discrimination and inequality, whereas Jefferson Blue represents equality and unity.
Book Sample
People once lived in a far away land,
That's closer to home than you might understand.
The place was called the Land of We.
People lived in peace and prosperity.
In We, the grass was green and the sky was blue,
And as strange as it sounds, some people were too!
Green people, red people, orange people too.
Yellow and purple, pink and blue.
There were baby blue babies and pretty pink girls,
And lovely green ladies with bright yellow curls.
Every color there is, every tone, every shade.
In this colorful land, that's how people were made.
And with all of their differences, they all got along,
No color was bad, no color was wrong.
But everything changed one fateful morning.
It all began without any warning.
Purple soldiers marched through all of the streets,
Making terrible noise with the boots on their feet.
Links to Purchase Print Books
Buy Purple Rules Print book for sale on the Author’s Website
Links to Purchase eBooks – Click links for book samples and reviews
Buy Purple Rules On Amazon
Have you read this book? Tell us what you thought! All information was provided by the author and not edited by us. This is so you get to know the author better.
Read more...
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| SOMETHING IN THE WATER Book One: DROWNING by Dean Comyn |
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A brilliant young scientist and his revolutionary discovery have disappeared. Has he been kidnapped or is he complicit in a terrorist plot to commit mass murder? SOMETHING IN THE WATER Book One: “Drowning” follows Charles Burns and a newly formed unit of the London Metropolitan Police as they search for a missing scientist, who has developed a potent new vaccine and radical mass-delivery method. Little is known about the scientist, but his work has attracted the attention of more than just the Health Ministry. The Major Crime Unit’s first mission is to find the scientist and stop his discovery from becoming a weapon against humanity.vThey must act quickly and quietly, and MCU2 has been put together to do just that: Act quickly, under the direct authority of The Home Office, and quietly, to avoid a panic spreading through the media. There is little time before that, or worse, happens.
Targeted Age Group:: 18+
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
Fear.
"Drowning" was inspired by humankind's insatiable appetite for 'making the world a better place' and our failure to do so.
Science and technology are advancing faster than we can deal with the consequences of this appetite.
Science, technology, and human overpopulation have caused catastrophic damage the Earth. What will save us from ourselves?
How Did You Come up With Your Characters?
I created Charles Burns, the protagonist of "the Something in the Water" series with the goal of him being something between Sherlock Holmes and Jack Reacher. I wanted to create a main character of superior intelligence and skills. I also wanted him to have likeable and un-likeable traits, giving the reader the choice to like/admire, or not. Likewise, the victim and the antagonist all have elements (I believe) that are both appealing and offending.
All of them think they're going to save the world but only one will.
Book Sample
PART ONE: FRIDAY NIGHT
23:41
“What do you mean he’s gone, Dawson?” Detective Chief Inspector John C. Wayne had not been expecting a call from Detective Sergeant Michael Dawson, only a text message to confirm his subject was in bed. And he was not expecting that for at least another hour. Wayne had hoped to be asleep before it came.
“Gone. From the opera,” Dawson panted. “Professor Veda, and Kaia. He— they’re gone, sir.”
Wayne could tell that Dawson wasn’t his normal self but somewhere between confused and exasperated. Or drunk.
“All right, Dawson,” said Wayne. He kept his voice low and even out of habit, as the calm voice of reason. “No need to panic. They probably left early, before the fat lady sang. Purcell isn’t for everyone.” Or anyone, really, he thought.
“All right, Dawson. What happened?”
Dawson sounded slow, but even. “I fell asleep, sir. I believe I was drugged.”
“You believe?” Wayne caught his voice and offered an excuse. “It’s Purcell, Dawson.” He wanted to believe the easy explanations. But the worst-case scenario kept needling him.
“Yes, sir it was. But…”
Wayne let the silence hang as he walked back to his office, phone in hand. He put it on the desk next to his touch pad.
Wayne tapped the pad and dragged his finger diagonally to pull a 16×16 grid of camera feeds onto the left-hand screen. Each image had a small dialogue window below it with an abbreviated address and the camera’s GPS coordinates. Wayne could see the last opera-goers still filing out of the Opera House.
He sent the link in a message to Special Analyst James Tully’s phone as he continued to scan the viewers:
You up? Need you on this. More to follow. Show it to HOLMES.
Wayne knew Tully’s expertise with the Home Office Large Major Enquiry System would come in handy one day. He hadn’t expected it to be today. He drew a deep breath and let it out slowly as he continued to toggle round the camera feeds. Each highlighted image bulged out of the grid in a 3D effect as he zoomed in on his target.
Wayne saw the block of feeds from the car park off Drury Lane and highlighted and dragged it over to the right-hand screen. He watched as life played in three-second clips on each of the fourteen cameras in-and-around the three-storey car park.
He could see Dawson, dressed in a tuxedo standing next to the Peugeot assigned for ferrying Dr Veda and his date to the Royal Opera House. Wayne noticed the passenger door was slightly ajar.
“Did you open the door?”
“No sir. It was open just like this when I came up here.”
This was a crime scene now, and Wayne went into management mode. The Home Secretary had given him Dr Veda exactly thirty-five days earlier when Veda had arrived in London from Oxford University. Wayne had no idea who Veda was before he got the call, and he said so. She explained that Dr Veda was doing important work for the Health Ministry, and his personal safety was of the highest importance.
The Home Secretary expressed concern that Veda might have difficulty adapting to life in London, so it was decided that he would have a plainclothes officer as his driver for an undetermined short-term transition period. Wayne accepted the Home Secretary’s explanation before considering whether the professor had value to anyone or faced any threats.
Wayne had assigned Michael Dawson to the first official posting of the MCU2. Dawson’s file was one of the first few dozen files Wayne had culled from his initial candidate search of the Met’s personnel database. One phone call to Dawson’s superior in the Intelligence Command had put him on Wayne’s short list. Still in his twenties, Michael Dawson was one of the youngest officers to earn the rank of detective. But Wayne was most intrigued by Dawson’s two failed attempts to join MI6. They met once, and Wayne revealed little about the task force he was creating before Dawson volunteered to request the transfer himself. He accepted his first assignment with few questions, and Wayne appreciated that. But it wasn’t a babysitting job anymore.
“Well, you did look, right Dawson?” Wayne didn’t wait for Dawson to reply. “What did you touch?”
“I pulled it open by the latch, but I didn’t get in. Just looked. No contamination, sir,” Dawson asserted.
“But you looked,” Wayne repeated without reproach. He was curious. “Well? Anything?”
“Yes sir. Looks to be two small drops, on the inside of the door next to the lock button. Right here.” Dawson held his phone at an angle and focused the camera on the pair of droplets.
“Looks like blood, sir.”
He used his free hand to point at them from outside the window, flexing his index finger and bending his thumb to pinpoint the spots and the small gap between. Dawson held steady and waited for the inspector to respond to his find. Wayne glanced at the screen on his phone. His eyes were busy as he pulled up a map of Greater London on the main viewer on his desk.
“Have you got a photo of them?”
“The blood stains?” asked Dawson.
“No, Veda and…”
“Kaia? Yes sir. A few,” said Dawson. “From tonight,” he added. “Shall I share them, sir?”
“Well, yes. Ms Rebane,” Wayne tapped his desk. “Send me the best one with both. Now,” he said. “I’ll send it out A-S-A-P.” He always spelled it out, like Duke Wayne would have done in one of his classic war films. Wayne disliked the way too many people had made the acronym into a single word.
He had already dragged and dropped the file photo of Dr Veda onto the centre screen and was preparing to send it out with an alert, but a photo of both of them together would make more sense. Besides, Wayne realised he hadn’t any photos of the girlfriend, despite her seeming to take up more and more space in Veda’s world since they first met a few weeks earlier.
Dawson’s message arrived and Wayne smiled at the attachment’s title as he opened it, but didn’t laugh at the irony until he saw the image of the couple standing in front of a phone box around the corner from the main entrance to the Royal Opera House.
“Dr Who, indeed,” Wayne wondered aloud.
“Sir?” asked Dawson. “Didn’t it come through?”
“It did, Dawson. I was referring to the caption you wrote. Dr Who?”
“Oh, that,” Dawson breathed heavily. “It was a joke. The lady at the box office asked Dr Veda to repeat his name when we were picking up the tickets. I took the photo just after.”
Wayne had a dossier on the young scientist. Now he regretted not performing due diligence on the woman when Dawson had first informed him about the budding romance in Veda’s life. But he had no reason to be suspicious before tonight.
After all, according to the memo from the Home Office Dr Nicholas Veda was a relatively unknown scientist from Oxford, working on a cure for typhoid or some such disease, and of little interest to anyone outside the Health Ministry.
Wayne had read the good doctor’s bio and was quietly happy to hear that spring had finally arrived for Veda when Ms Rabane entered his life.
But suspicion rang like a fire bell in Wayne’s ear as soon as he saw the photo of the stunningly beautiful Ms Rebane standing next to the meek and humble scientist. He knew full well it didn’t only happen in the movies.
“No, it’s fine, Dawson.” Wayne cornered his dubiety in the back of his mind and went on cordially, “Well, stand by, secure the scene, and I’ll get a team over there.”
“Yessir!” Dawson exclaimed, sounding relieved.
Wayne rang off, then opened his directory. He paused, his thumb hovering over the screen. His first instinct had been to request the Home Office to call in extra military, double or triple the street patrols in the vicinity of the Opera House and give them the order to detain Veda and his date on sight.
In a moment he could send out an alert to every level of the Metropolitan Police Service, have the photo in the phones of every uniform in the Greater London area, including transit and airports, through the Met’s COMS system. And have thousands of eyes scanning the city for the well-dressed scientist and the knockout that must be accompanying him.
If he was sure there was foul play involved, he had to act. But he wasn’t.
Wayne’s unit had been officially active for almost three months but in fact had yet to engage in any official action. At the administrative level of the Met, all the commanding officers had received a directive to cooperate in any way requested if called upon by the Unit and DCI Wayne.
Despite being active, the unit was far from operational. No need had arisen to engage any other branch of the Metropolitan Police to date. Wayne had his core of First Officers in place but had deliberately kept the unit offline at the Met, and had remained on standby with the Home Office since St Valentine’s Day, awaiting a direct order.
The directive to supply a security escort for the Health Ministry’s virologist had appeared to be an excuse to be logging active hours until Major Crimes Unit 2 went operational. Wayne grimaced at his phone and scanned his directory for his contact in the HO. He read the time.
“Almost midnight.” He put the phone down and sighed. But the grimace refused to loosen as his eyes roamed the map.
Wayne wasn’t ready to call the Home Office until he was certain that the two young lovers hadn’t simply slipped out of the Opera House for a little snogging. Even now they might be thinking about calling Dawson to pick them up. He was hoping the blood at the scene was somebody else’s—preferably nobody’s.
Either way, putting the Met Police ground forces and surveillance branches on it seemed prudent. He quickly typed a draft alert on his desktop.
Getting his team engaged and up to speed came first, he reasoned, if only by a few seconds. Wayne dragged their mobile numbers into the address box on the message pane. Then he paused to consider exactly who else needed to see the alert. How high, and how wide do I wave this flag?
His gut told him he was facing the Unit’s Inaugural Event, but his head reminded him of the potential for political disaster.
After being introduced by the Home Secretary at her Easter Tea with the Superintendents, DCI Wayne had reached out to every commander in the Service to get a read on their reaction to the directive. Most reacted with the proper acceptance, all with varying degrees of reluctance. Wayne had restated the delicately worded article that described the position of his MCU2-cum-Task Force in the Met’s hierarchy.
He had got a good read on many Commanders in the series of face-to-face meetings which he held after the Home Secretary announced Superintendent John Wayne’s reassignment to the newly activated MCU2.
They were labelled meetings in his calendar but Wayne had tagged some as chat and some F2F discussion depending on how confrontational he anticipated them to be.
His assumptions had proved right in all cases. Most of the leadership within the Metropolitan Police Service understood and accepted that the new directive was about action not authority.
Wayne knew all of them well enough to know it would be difficult for some of these capital ‘L’ leaders to see it as anything but castration should the need arise for them to step aside and let Wayne take charge of and deploy their assets.
There were a few too many in high places with designs on climbing higher before they retired. If he had to pull rank to get things done, it would mean inaction until the Home Office reacted, leaving Wayne paralysed.
Worse yet if the two escaped lovebirds were to turn up getting it off in the bushes at Lincoln’s Inn Park, a ten-minute walk from the Opera House…
He hadn’t dismissed the public sex fantasy solution, but had to consider all eventualities, including activating Charles Burns, but only if the situation dictated.
He decided to send the notice directly to Dispatch, to engage the eyes of the Met—at street level only. IT Guy and Tully will have to find answers to the bigger questions. As they arise, he thought.
Wayne drew his hands back from the keyboard, leaving them hanging stiffly as he considered the next steps to follow the general alert. He opened another window on the left-hand viewer that displayed the location of each team member’s phone on a smaller scale map.
He noted the locations and proximities to his primary points of interest. Wayne tapped on the touch pad to send the instant message—with the photo and details—to each unit member’s phone, and also to an officer in Dispatch he knew well enough to trust to be discreet.
He watched his phone, waiting only a few moments before the message read confirmation appeared on all message tabs.
He knew that within minutes the alert would be sent out to a few thousand Met police patrols, constables and special constables across all the boroughs of London.
By Wayne’s calculation, if the two young lovers had simply slipped away from Dawson, they would be spotted and quickly reported.
There was the real possibility that Dr Veda and Kaia Rebane were abducted from the car park, and the reality was that Wayne had no idea why, much less who.
An Albanian prostitution ring? Racists or terrorists? He fought off the impulse to call his contact in the HO and demand some answers about Dr Veda and his work.
Instead he opened the stream linking his computer display directly to Intelligence Specialist Analyst Tully and IT Specialist Inspector Guy Tellier and pinged them both for immediate response.
As a second thought, he sent Tellier another short message with Veda’s telephone number and email address. He quickly typed in the subject line:
And their tweets etc., leaving the message blank.
Wayne closed the phone and checked his watch, then turned his attention to the maps on his monitors. He confirmed his time and distance estimates and contacted three members of his team, sending each a message with an address and a brief directive.
He sent Detective Sergeant Semi Riza to the car park on Drury Lane, informing him that a forensics team should follow his arrival. Then he sent the address and Riza’s contact details in a second message to his ally in Dispatch requesting a forensics team and directing them to follow Riza.
In a separate message he requested dispatch of a wagon to take Dawson to the infirmary for toxicology tests and monitoring.
Wayne kept an eye on the message tab and shot glances up at the computer monitor as he typed and sent another message. He placed the phone on the desk and relaxed and flexed his digits, his arthritic index finger still slightly curved, as if reluctant to relinquish its grip on the phone.
The reply came in only a few seconds. He let out a long, satisfied breath and his grimace slowly turned upward, approaching a smile, as he read it.
Detective Sergeant Martin Blennerhassett confirmed he would take his car and meet up with a second patrol at Veda’s residence in Kensington. Wayne dispatched Detective Sergeant John Aitkens directly from Scotland Yard to Veda’s laboratory, as he was the only team member on duty. He determined that Aitkens and two uniformed officers would be arriving there before the others reached their destinations.
Wayne allowed himself a sigh of relief. The Incident Response had quickly become an investigation and his unit had it under control. His first steps had been sure. He felt confident that he had ticked all the required boxes if anyone in the Home Office asked to see the protocol.
The physical teams were in place or en route and the digital intelligence was being gathered and analysed. For the time being at least, he needn’t involve any of the Higher Ups in the Met or the HO.
Either his team would find Veda and Ms Rebane in the next few hours or he would get a call from whoever snatched the professor and his girlfriend.
The possibilities swirled in his head. Violent abduction, a disappearance at least—planned or coerced? And Kaia Rebane. Wayne had to ask himself again why no due diligence when Dawson first mentioned the Estonian beauty in his daily reports. He cursed himself for not ordering Dawson to do a background check on her.
But Wayne didn’t see a security threat when the details came down from the HO about this police escort assignment. The only potential conflict he could imagine would be in London traffic, and that was Dawson’s business. He turned to the window and gazed at the endless flow of traffic on the Embankment below.
It was supposed to be…nothing.
Wayne sent another message to Tully:
Need to see everything on Veda and Kaia Rebane A.S.A.P.
Something told Wayne that adding Charles Burns to the receivers list would be advisable. His eyes wandered to the short, two-drawer mahogany filing cabinet to the right of his desk. He inherited it when he took over as Superintendent of The Specialist Branch in 2002, and it was the only furniture that had survived the move to his new office at MCU2.
He visualised the folder in the top drawer containing the transfer papers for Charles Burns. He had been holding off on signing the order to make it official.
But the current situation was expanding rapidly, and the former Major Charles Burns had front line experience in many extraction and hostage recovery missions—all with unqualified success—during his years with the Canadian Joint Task Force and British SBS.
Wayne hoped it never came to that. He reasoned that even if it didn’t, he needed more boots on the ground, pronto.
Wayne located Burns’ phone at the Alexandra Ice Palace. He pressed the dial button. Wayne knew Burns’ experience in JTF2 could be valuable if the worst came to worst.
He rang off after he heard the first ring and stared at the number display. He calculated the distance to the Opera House and sent a text message directing Burns to call in A.S.A.P. then he set his phone down on the desk again.
Wayne arched his back and stretched, feeling the late hour.
“The night’s just getting started,” he mused aloud.
Links to Purchase Print Books
Buy SOMETHING IN THE WATER Book One: DROWNING by Dean Comyn Print Edition at Amazon
Links to Purchase eBooks – Click links for book samples and reviews
Buy SOMETHING IN THE WATER Book One: DROWNING by Dean Comyn On Amazon
Have you read this book? Tell us what you thought! All information was provided by the author and not edited by us. This is so you get to know the author better.
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| Note Worthy by Dhasi Mwale |
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“You don’t make it easy to love you, do you, Kitty?
Six days to the music festival that will make her career, events planner, Kitty’s meticulously scheduled life is thrown into chaos by the reappearance of charming but irresponsible Wezi, her deceased brother’s best friend.
It’s been two years since his disappearance. He’d abandoned her when she needed him most. She should be fuming. Right? But Wezi’s always been her weakness and maybe this time things will be different.
Targeted Age Group:: +16
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
My older sister is a big believer in love and romance. I on the other hand am a bit sceptical. I wanted to write a story about falling in love even when you don't trust your emotions. I suppose in that way, the heroine is a reflection of my doubt and my hopes.
How Did You Come up With Your Characters?
My heroine's love interest is a struggling singer. I know a few of those. Art isn't a great career choice in my country. The heroine seems to be his polar opposite, a business woman. A practical career? At face value but in a way just as risky as a singing career. The characters are a reflection of each other and a commentary on how different we perceive people even when they are quite similar.
Book Sample
Chapter 1
Katenekwa Mwaba stared at the poster on the wall without looking at the man in it. She had learned the skill when the Keystone Music Festival’s promotional posters and billboards appeared all over town. Her sanity depended on it. Everyday that she refused to acknowledge Wezi’s existence was a victory. Someday soon, she hoped, she’d be able to stare right at his face and feel no pain, force down no tears.
Katenekwa sighed, rolled her shoulders and turned her attention to her wrist watch. The minute hand marched steadily toward the hour. She had scheduled her daily debriefing with Lillian, Media GQ’s events manager, at four-thirty. That was a half hour ago. If she didn’t drive out of the premises by five-thirty, she’d be stuck in traffic and would lose two hours—the only two hours she had each day to do work for her other clients. Although planning the Keystone Music Festival was the biggest contract of her career, she still had other clients to satisfy. The closer the festival got, the less time she had. Sure, she could ask her assistant Gwen to take up more responsibilities, but she had a reputation to uphold, and Gwen wasn’t quite there yet.
Lillian popped out of her office jack-in-the-box style. “Hi, Kay. Sorry, sorry. Come in.” she said, all in the space of a breath.
Katenekwa stepped into Lillian’s office. What was supposed to be a stylish, modern office in minimalist style resembled a hoarder’s paradise. Well, if hoarders kept nearly pristine, shrink-wrapped bundles of fliers everywhere. She followed Lillian’s lead, squeezing past the stacks, and took a seat on the only unoccupied chair. “Did the printer run out of space?”
Lillian slid between a stack of papers and her desk to get around to her chair. Fortunately for her, her size six body could make the maneuver with only mild difficulty. Someone of Katenekwa’s size, however, would need a bit more space.
“The printer made an error and hasn’t come to pick them up. I put them in here so he’d have to face me. Busy talking about us covering the cost when it was his mistake. Idiot.” Lillian collapsed into her chair, ran her fingers through her honey-gold weave, and propped herself up with her arms. This was Lillian in her most relaxed state. That printer fella better watch out. In the two years Katenekwa’d known Lillian, no one had ever won a fight against her. The woman knew what she wanted and wasn’t above litigation if need be.
“Sorry for keeping you waiting. It’s our busiest season. I wish I had you planning Zig’s album launch. The planner is a nightmare.” She waved her hands at the bundles. “Case in point.”
Katenekwa shrugged. “It would have been a lot to handle, even for me.”
At the very least, the rapper would have been. His larger-than-life persona drained Katenekwa even in their brief encounters—imagine hours with him. What’s more, most of her interactions with Zig involved him hitting on her and her refusing his company while wondering what it would be like to let loose with him. She wasn’t going to lie, if she had to spend that much time with the way too charming and fairly attractive Zig, she’d end up in his bed. She’d lose her mind. Give in to her basest of instincts and unhinge. She was no super woman.. She expended maximum energy keeping the animal caged, and men like Zig the Lyrical had the pass code.
“Hmm. That’s unfortunate. So what’s the news?”
“I confirmed with all the vendors. We finalized arrangements for the booths, food, water, and merch. I just need the menu choices from the artists to give the caterer. Tomorrow,” She opened her day planner.“We’ll be setting up the marquee.”
“Wait. I thought tomorrow was the setup for the stages.”
“No, that can’t be right.” Katenekwa flipped through her binder. She scowled at her booking confirmations. Sure thing, she’d booked both set-ups for the next day. “How could I have made such a mistake?”
“Can’t you reschedule one?”
Katenekwa fought the urge to rub her temples. “Mike insisted that he needs the stages tested, and we booked rehearsals already. And I need the marquee erected if we’re going to have everything brought in and arranged in time for the gala. Besides, the marquee set up is in the morning, and the stage in the afternoon. I’ll manage, somehow.”
“Don’t push yourself. Don’t you have an assistant?”
“Gwen’s going to be busy with another client tomorrow. Don’t worry about it.”
“Okay, then, if you say so. I don’t have to remind you that we’ve both invested too much money in this.”
“It will work out.” It had to. Her career, reputation, and future depended on it.
Lilian leaned back in her chair. “When do you need the menu finalized?”
“The caterer is pretty flexible, but Thursday, latest.”
Lilian nodded, wiped imaginary sweat off her forehead, and reached into her drawer. “I have that invite you asked for.”
Katenekwa reached for it, but Lillian pulled it away. “What?”
“I recall you collecting your father’s invitation weeks ago. Imagine my surprise when you asked for this one. Bringing a date?”
Katenekwa snatched at the envelope in vain. Lillian leaned back in her chair and tapped the eggshell envelope on an armrest. “Is it the banker?”
Katenekwa shifted in her seat. First, Josiah was no banker. Second, it was none of Lillian’s business. Not that Katenekwa’d tell her that. Lillian may not have been her boss per se, but she was cutting most of Katenekwa’s paychecks these days. What was that about biting the hand that feeds you?
Katenekwa sighed.“Yes. I’m bringing Josiah.”
It was a decision she’d made after months and months of internal debate. In the end, she hadn’t been able to find a reason not to invite him. Although when she’d asked him, some wicked part of her had hoped he’d say no.
Lillian tossed back her hair and pushed the envelope across the table. “Hmm. He doesn’t seem like the party type. Are you sure? Why don’t you bring Zig? He has a monumental crush on you.”
“Aren’t you the one always telling me to stay away from the talent? And Zig? No. He’s not even my type.” Katenekwa palmed the envelope.
Lillian parted her full, plum-colored lips. “It’s one night. And I see you looking at Zig like he’s a forbidden candy bar. Besides, I’m starting to think you might need a little chaos in your life, missy.”
Kawana, Katenekwa’s twin and the Zed pop sensation known as Keystone, used to tell her that. Before…
“No one needs chaos.” Katenekwa shook off the memories and pushed herself to her feet. “I have to get back to my office. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Think about what I said.”
She did. All the way to her city-center office. It wasn’t the kind of thing she wanted to occupy her mind with, especially when she had work to do. Was planning out her life really so bad? Plans were good. She was a planner, she should know. Nothing messed things up like spontaneity. And guys like Zig, they were all spontaneity and no structure. She didn’t need any of that. Besides, technically she’d be working at the gala. What better place to make business connections than a party filled with all of the Keystone Festival’s sponsors and then some? She needed to be at her best, and Josiah would make sure she was.
Yet she couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like to have it all back. The fun, the laughter. Kawana had dragged Katenekwa out of her neatly folded lifestyle. Once upon a time, she’d dared to step out of herself. In the end, though, fun did what fun does: it took. It took Kawana, and it took Wezi. She’d stay in the slow lane, thank you very much. Life was safer there anyway.
Katenekwa pulled her silver Toyota Spacio, which she’d strong-armed her father into giving her, into her reserved parking space. The parking lot was almost deserted at this time. Lusaka’s central business district had emptied over an hour ago. Although her office complex was secured, she needed to be out in under an hour if she wanted to make it home before her overcautious neighbors locked the front gate.
She rummaged in the backseat for her Keystone day planner. Nothing. She stretched and wracked her brain. Of course! She’d been so distracted by Lillian’s ridiculous suggestion that she’d left it on the desk. She’d have to swing by Media GQ before heading out tomorrow morning.
Just great.
She waved to the night guard and began the two-story ascent to her office. Despite its shoebox-size, rent cost a fortune. The uptown location did its part to attract customers willing to pay a little extra for her services. Not to brag, but she was the best event planner in the business. Plus, the security meant she could work late when the need arose. And lately, the need arose.
She wrinkled her brow at the laughter that met her at her office door. She checked the sign. Yep, this was definitely her office, and that was Gwen’s I-like-this-man-so-much giggle. A deep, sexy-in-a-musical-kind-of-way baritone said something to make Gwen snort and then hiccup.
Katenekwa pushed down the rising irritation with a deep inhale and a short mantra, strode into the room, and met Gwen’s sheepish smile with a – hopefully – not-too-stern face. “Hi, Gwen. You’re here late.” She hung her bag on the rack and turned to greet – or rather, inspect – Gwen’s guest.
Her mouth became the Sahara, and she turned to stone.
“He insisted on waiting, and I couldn’t leave a stranger in the office,” Gwen said, her voice booming as usual, oblivious to her boss’s sculpture-like pose.
Katenekwa stared at the man in her visitor’s chair. Behind him, leaning against the wall, an all-so-familiar navy blue guitar case.
“Hi, Kitty. It’s been a while,” he said in a voice created for song.
“Wezi.”
So much for staying away from chaos.
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| Surviving on Longitude and Latitude: One woman’s journey to find her purpose through education and exploration by Dr. Magdalena Caproiu |
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As a child growing up in a small Romanian village, Magdalena Caproiu lived a simple life without any of today’s modern conveniences. She had a passion to learn and explore, but the shadow of World War II would attempt to derail her plans. Defying authority and tradition, she left home at just 10 years of age, traveling to new cities, new countries, new latitudes, and new longitudes, in order to follow her dreams.
As a young woman pursuing an engineering career in post-war Communist Romania, Magdalena would face new challenges. In a world of food shortages, loss of basic freedoms, and government spies, Magdalena would constantly need to adapt in order to keep her family safe. Despite the many challenges, she never lost her passion for education and ultimately earned a PhD in Mechanical Engineering
Surviving on Longitude and Latitude chronicles her struggle as an outsider. First as a Jewish child, then as a woman in a male-dominated field, as an enemy of the Communist party, and finally as a 60-year-old immigrant looking to start her life over in America.
A life-long educator, Dr. Caproiu finds purpose in touching the lives of her students with her unshakeable optimism. She refuses to look back, turns every setback into an opportunity, and has never stopped learning. She now shares her survival skills and life lessons in hopes of inspiring others, and firmly believes, “The difference between a good day and a bad day does not consist of a change in the day – It consists of a change in you.”
Targeted Age Group:: 18+
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
Across the decades of my life, I had to develop survival skills in order to overcome the many obstacles I faced. My intention for sharing my story is to show how I developed these life skills. It was a voyage that spanned many years, across war, politics, love, death, longitude and latitude. I had to learn to fight for what I wanted, trust my intuition, connect with others, and be grateful for what I had. These qualities are universal and apply today as much as they did eighty years ago.
Book Sample
"Everything I’ve done has been for the betterment of my students. As I look back across the decades, I think about everything it took to lead up to this moment… Some might hear my life story and be surprised that I consider myself lucky. However, I feel blessed to have had a crystal-clear vision of my life’s purpose from such an early age."
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| Practicing Meditation: How to Meditate to Reduce Stress, Improve Mental Health and Find Daily Inner Peace by Elvin James |
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Reduce your stress with only 10 minutes of meditation!
Do you know what meditation is? It is quite possible that you have heard of it and may even have heard of the benefits. However, unless you are properly taught how to meditate, you may never experience the many benefits that meditation provides. I have written this book so that beginners who don’t know anything about meditation can have all the information they need to meditate successfully and see improvements in their stress levels, their quality of life, and how they deal with their problems.
Many of your questions about mediation will be answered in this guide. It’s worth bearing in mind that I’ve worked with students all over the world. The questions covered with in the section are the most frequently asked questions and you’ll be given the answers you seek.
This book is a complete guide and does not expect you to have any previous experience. It teaches you what happens inside the body when you breathe correctly and helps you understand the process of emptying the mind of thoughts. You will find that your life will change if you simply follow the exercises provided and continue to meditate on a daily basis. It only takes a few minutes of your time but it is completely life changing.
So why is meditation so helpful and is the theory proven?
Over the course of the last twenty years, meditation has become streamlined. It is not simply an alternative way to relieve stress. It is effective because you learn to shut out the things that bother you and you learn to cope with your life from another aspect entirely. You no longer feel that you need to live up to the expectations of others. You learn to accept yourself and accept the changes that are inevitable within your life.
In fact, with the number of people now being treated with anti-stress medications, it is clear that other alternative methods of coping with stress are necessary. Those who meditate find that improvements begin within a couple of weeks, but the philosophy behind meditation lasts a lifetime. That means that they are better able to cope with problems when they happen, and that they suffer less from the effects of stress.
This book makes no assumptions that you have prior knowledge of meditation and thus takes you from the very basics through to the different types of meditation so that you can use this powerful exercise to improve your life beyond recognition. You will be happier, less stressed, and more capable of relating to the world around you. Your own personal development is in your hands, but once you realize why it works, you will be encouraged to keep up your regime of daily meditation, even if only for 10 to 15 minutes per day.
In this book you’ll discover…
What is meditation and why you should do it.
Why meditation works.
New breathing techniques.
Proper posture and its importance.
The answers to your most common questions and concerns.
What is a monkey mind?
How meditation can help you cope with COVID-19.
Perhaps even more relevant to today’s society, we have added a bonus chapter on how meditation can be a useful complementary treatment for the mental effects of COVID-19. COVID-19 doesn’t kill all of those who get it. However, it does cause a great deal of stress, which can be managed with the use of meditation. Read the bonus chapter to find out how!
Pick up your copy today and learn how meditation can change your life for the better – forever!
Targeted Age Group:: 12-150
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
Elvin James believes a healthy, fulfilled life begins in the mind. With thirty years of meditation experience behind him, he's doing his best to live a calm, happy life. He didn't stop with just one type of meditation, either; he learned several styles under a couple of life-changing teachers.
Elvin lives in London, where he spends his time focused on wellness, mindfulness, and physical activities such as cycling and jogging. He's well-versed in healthy eating and is constantly learning to improve his pool of knowledge. While his first book is on meditation and stress relief, he plans to write more books on living a health-conscious lifestyle. He hopes to inspire others to take charge of their lives and take control of their wellbeing.
Links to Purchase Print Books
Buy Practicing Meditation: How to Meditate to Reduce Stress, Improve Mental Health and Find Daily Inner Peace Print Edition at Amazon
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| Funny Britain by Funni Planet |
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Exclusive hand-drawn artwork which show funny and humorous aspects of people living in Britain.
This limited edition is an ideal gift or unique souvenir to keep.
– Many high quality pictures with funny antidotes
– Humorous quirks of British culture
– Fun quiz testing your British knowledge
Our design studio created this with Love and Goodwill in mind celebrating the British people and will delight all ages!
Targeted Age Group:: 0-100
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
Britain is one of the countries that have captured the imagination of the world, from their music to inventions, to humour. There is a unlimited supply of amusing things about Britain, considering few books focusing on this, it is great to share a small glimse into things that will make a person smile.
How Did You Come up With Your Characters?
Characters are everything from the strange invention of toilet to wonderful animals and strong personalities like the British royal family. All this and more are the characters that appear in this book.
Links to Purchase eBooks – Click links for book samples and reviews
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| As The Clock Struck Ten by Gill Mather |
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Have you ever experienced a life-changing event, after which nothing will ever be the same again? Has anything totally out of your control ever happened to you which, within just a few short hours, robbed you of your assumed place in the world and challenged your preconceptions? A person in As The Clock Struck Ten was the unlucky object of such an occurrence. It started when the clock struck ten and, by the end of the day, the consequences were irresistible.
Fashions change all the time. What seems cool one moment is suddenly ditched in favour of the latest new trend. The law isn’t any different. Like everything else it undergoes changes, often brought about by social attitudes and sometimes in the wake of notorious cases.
At one time, a girl hitching a lift or entering a man’s bedroom was “asking for it”. Of course almost no one hitchhikes now. And almost no one would pick up a hitchhiker. We’re all far too health and safety conscious these days.
Within a family, however, things are different. What goes on behind closed doors is less easy to interpret and probably easier to misinterpret. Authorities may get carried along, carried away even, by the need not to be seen to have acted dismissively or wrongly or too late. In the same way that health and safety concerns may have become exaggerated to the point of becoming stifling, rampant political correctness may result in a failure to carry out even-handed investigations.
And of course someone has to suffer.
The story follows the Morrison family and the Bennett family. Don Morrison has a new live-in girlfriend, Grace Bennett. His eighteen year old daughter, Emma, newly arrived home for her first summer vacation from university, isn’t happy to have her home invaded, as she sees it, by this other woman, especially so soon after the death of her mother, Carol, who was very ill for many years and was looked after by Don.
Grace is still married to Greg and has a twenty year old son, Luke, still living at home with Greg, his father.
The five main characters progress through the hot summer, some rather haphazardly, others with a more definite purpose. A young woman, Alex, known to some of them helps things along.
The law takes over at one point, its effects quite devastating for the unprepared.
Targeted Age Group:: 15+
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
I am a retired solicitor and always keep my eye on news and current affairs. The inspiration for the book was a subject which started to receive more attention in the media after Jimmy Saville died in 2011. The subject covered by the book was opened up and public figures came under scrutiny, both justly and unjustly.
How Did You Come up With Your Characters?
None of the characters are based on real people. They are all purely imaginary. Originally I called the book ‘Tunes & Fiddles’ and it was mainly intended to be about the differences in the relationships of an older couple and a younger couple. However, I usually don’t formulate a complete story at the outset for any of my novels but allow the stories to develop ‘organically’ the same as real life. I feel that that way, the characters and the stories are more realistic than if they have to be shoehorned into a pre-determined plot. Hence, with ‘As The Clock Struck Ten’ the story developed into a mystery or light thriller with a criminal element at its core.
Book Sample
AS THE CLOCK
STRUCK TEN
GILL MATHER
TABLE OF CONTENTS
About The Author
Dedication
Copyright
Also by the author
Preface
001 The Surprise
002 The Breakfast
003 The Restaurant
004 The Visitor
005 The Brainworms
006 The Step-Siblings
007 The Gift
008 The Initiation
009 The Return Match
010 The Unpleasant Shock
011 The Doubts
012 The Proof
013 The Escape
014 The Sun
015 The Intrusion
016 The Ordeal
017 The Meeting
018 The Aftermath
019 The Rain
020 Revolving Doors
021 The Family
Author's Note
About the Author
Gillian (‘Gill’) Mather has been a solicitor for several decades and at various times has worked in most of the basic areas covered by general practice in England (crime, family, employment, civil litigation, wills, probate and property). Gill ran a small solicitor’s practice from her home near Colchester until 2020. She is a member of several writers' groups in Essex and Suffolk, and is also a member of Dedham Players. Some of Gill's novels were previously published under the pen name of Julie Langham.
Gill has published seven novels on Kindle, the first five being a series of romantic-cum-crime novels set in Colchester around the same fictional law firm and featuring the same main characters over a number of years. As The Clock Struck Ten is the sixth novel. The seventh novel The Unreliable Placebo is a humorous account of a woman's struggle to come to terms with her sudden single state after her husband leaves her.
A series of six novellas have been published in booklet form for local distribution.
A new but unpublished mystery novel has recently been completed.
Gillian Mather – December 2020
To Freddie.
For the cover photo and for volunteering to help with the next book
(but did he help?)
And to proof-reading supremo, Dan
All rights reserved
Published in 2020 by Georfre Publications
© Gill Mather 2020
This second edition is published in 2020
Previous edition published 2016
ISBN: 978-1-8383806-0-1
The right of Gill Mather to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the author and publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author's or publisher's rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
This book is a work of fiction and except in the case of historical fact and actual place names, any resemblance to actual persons living or dead or to locations or places mentioned in the book is purely coincidental.
Also by Gill Mather
(In a series)
Internment
Threshold
Relatively Innocent
Reasonable Doubts
Beyond The Realms
The Unreliable Placebo
Cosy crime novella series
published as chapbooks
Compromised
Cut Off
Conflicts of Little Avail
Conjecture Most Macabre
Le Frottage
Confounded
Preface
Have you ever experienced a life-changing event, after which nothing will ever be the same again? Has anything totally out of your control ever happened to you which, within just a few short hours, robbed you of your assumed place in the world and challenged your preconceptions? A person in As The Clock Struck Ten was the unlucky object of such an occurrence. It started when the clock struck ten and, by the end of the day, the consequences were irresistible.
Fashions change all the time. What seems cool one moment is suddenly ditched in favour of the latest new trend. The law isn't any different. Like everything else it undergoes changes, often brought about by social attitudes and sometimes in the wake of notorious cases.
At one time, a girl hitching a lift or entering a man’s bedroom was “asking for it”. Of course almost no one hitchhikes now. And almost no one would pick up a hitchhiker. We’re all far too health and safety conscious these days.
Within a family, however, things are different. What goes on behind closed doors is less easy to interpret and probably easier to misinterpret. Authorities may get carried along, carried away even, by the need not to be seen to have acted dismissively or wrongly or too late. In the same way that health and safety concerns may have become exaggerated to the point of becoming stifling, rampant political correctness may result in a failure to carry out even-handed investigations.
And of course someone has to suffer.
The story follows the Morrison family and the Bennett family. Don Morrison has a new live-in girlfriend, Grace Bennett. His eighteen year old daughter, Emma, newly arrived home for her first summer vacation from university, isn't happy to have her home invaded, as she sees it, by this other woman, especially so soon after the death of her mother, Carol, who was very ill for many years and was looked after by Don.
Grace is still married to Greg and has a twenty year old son, Luke, still living at home with Greg, his father.
The five main characters progress through the hot summer, some rather haphazardly, others with a more definite purpose. A young woman, Alex, known to some of them helps things along.
The law takes over at one point, its effects quite devastating for the unprepared.
001 The Surprise
EMMA DAWDLED ALONG the garden path, noting the summer flowers in full bloom or just emerging, the old garden seat apparently newly stained, the lawns mowed, edged and re-shaped to be more curving and less rectangular, the neat beds free of weeds unlike last year and the year before and the year before that. In fact, she couldn't recall when she’d last seen the garden looking so tidy, though in an informal, tasteful, cottagey sort of way. Even the course of the path seemed to have been altered somewhat to a more meandering route through the long area at the front of the house up to the front door. After that, as before, the path led round to the left of the house to the back door at the side. Oh dear, she thought, change afoot. Indeed already in progress. The open aspect beyond as she reached the side of the house was out of focus, a heat haze distorting the fields and trees and hedges, and she realised she was hot and bothered and sweating.
She’d been rather dreading coming home now that Dad had a girlfriend. She couldn't think of her as Grace. What a stupid name anyway. So old-fashioned. She could only think of her as that woman. It was barely six months since her mum had died and here was Dad already shacked up with someone else. Of course, it had been a long illness and so the actual death of her mother hadn't come as anything of a shock. In fact, something of a relief if Emma was honest. Nevertheless, she was her mum who'd done as much as she could with Emma until she became really ill and hadn't been able to even talk properly any more. Emma still thought she’d been a super mother and she loved her to bits.
So to have to come home from uni for her summer holiday at the end of her first year and to have to share it with a strange woman was desperately uncomfortable at the very least. Her dad hadn't said much about Grace. Without realising it, actually, Emma had discouraged much talk about her, immediately switching to another subject if her dad ever said anything about Grace during their telephone calls; the calls which were normally at least twice a week, but which she’d cut down since the woman had come on the scene.
Emma had even stopped off on the way home at a friend’s house for several days so as to put off the home-coming. Now, as she was due to start her holiday job on Monday, it couldn't be delayed any longer. She rather wished she hadn't caught the earlier train today and had waited for the later one. She’d wanted to make sure of catching the connection and, as a result, the next train she caught was the earlier one too. She was therefore well over an hour early and had decided to walk the twenty minutes or so from the station since Dad wasn't due to be there for another hour to pick her up.
She was almost at the back door now. Being such a hot day, the door was open. She could hear music playing, possibly the radio or a CD, so presumably someone was in the kitchen. There was nothing for it than to try to make as cheerful an entrance as she could and she put her rucksack down on the doorstep and peered in, smile at the ready.
However, the sight that met her eyes wiped the smile instantly off her face and made her jaw drop. There was Dad with his arms round, presumably, the woman and they were in a tight embrace. The woman was slim and curvaceous from what Emma could see. Not the overweight quinquagenarian Emma had pictured. They were nearly sideways on to the back door though she could see more of her dad’s back and more of the woman’s face. The woman’s face! Her head was thrown back, her mouth was open and her eyes were tight shut apparently in the throes of ecstasy. Her father’s face Emma couldn't see. It was buried somewhere to the right of the woman’s head; his own head was moving. Doing something to the woman’s ear. Or her neck maybe? The woman was standing on tiptoe and had her hands on her father’s buttocks, pressing him to her. As Emma watched, the woman raised her left leg and her foot wound itself round her father’s leg.
And they were both making noises.
Emma was transfixed. Horrified. Nauseated. Nothing like this happened between her and the few young men she’d been to bed with. They went to bed and did it and sometimes it was quite nice and sometimes it wasn't really. Nevertheless, it was important not to be a virgin still at the age of eighteen. The appalling thought struck her that if they got up to this sort of thing in the kitchen, then what might go on in the bedroom itself, separated from her own room by only the bathroom? She really felt like being sick. She’d only ever thought in terms of herself needing privacy if she brought a boyfriend back with her to stay any time. Never in her wildest dreams had she considered having to give space to her father for the same sorts of reasons.
She’d mentioned to the friend she’d been staying with, and the friend’s parents, that her father now had a woman living with him.
“Oh, a new love in his life then,” said the mother.
“Oh no,” Emma had said confidently. “I should think it’s more companionship. He’s nearly sixty and so is the woman I think.”
“Oh well, when slap comes to tickle, you’d be surprised!” said the father chuckling.
“What?” Emma had said.
The friend’s parents were considerably younger than her own. Emma had no brothers or sisters because her mum was already forty when she’d had Emma and no other children had come along. The friend’s father had smirked and had made some remark about getting a good tune out of an old fiddle. Emma hadn't quite followed what he’d meant, or at least hadn't wanted to. It was sinking firmly in now, though, as she watched this couple in her family kitchen getting more and more steamed up.
At that point, the woman’s eyes opened a fraction and saw Emma standing there. Then they opened wider. At the same time, Emma’s dad was saying breathily:
“Shall we go upstairs. There’s time left.”
Well at least they weren't going to do it in the kitchen.
“Don!” the woman said and pulled away from him ever so slightly but he pulled her back against him and brought his face round to hers.
“Hmm?” he said. Then, oh God, to Emma’s horror he started to pull at the lips of the woman’s still open mouth with his own lips. Greedily. Then, oh no, his tongue came out! It was like something you saw on the TV after the nine o’ clock watershed.
“Don!” the woman said more loudly and pulled away, firmly this time. Her father’s eyes turned to look in Emma’s direction with a dazed expression. It took him a few seconds to collect himself.
“Darling,” he said. Emma wasn't sure if this endearment was directed at her or at the woman. He stood back then, looking uncomfortable, and sighed.
“Oh well. You’re back then. Welcome home.” He was smiling now while pulling a wry face at the woman who was herself composing her face into a smile as well. Emma knew if she just walked out that it would be awfully childish. She’d been trying to tell herself this last couple of months that she wasn't going to resent the woman on principle. But she was dreadfully embarrassed now and found she could only mumble “Hello” and, shouldering her rucksack, she walked through the kitchen and up to her room where she collapsed on the already-made bed (made up no doubt by the woman) and heaved a sigh of relief.
***
EMMA felt a little irritated later when her father knocked on her door and came straight in. Like she was going to be able to burst straight into her father’s bedroom any longer. Heaven forbid she interrupted any more overarchingly amorous scenes.
He made some general chit-chat at first about her course, the stay with her friend, the holiday restaurant job she was due to go back to on Monday for the rest of the summer. He said the restaurant had phoned earlier to see if she could start tomorrow, Sunday lunchtime, instead of on Monday as they were short-staffed. Good, thought Emma. It’ll get me out of the house at least.
At length he said: “Well, do you want to come downstairs and meet Grace properly?”
Emma rolled her eyes at that and her dad laughed, but Emma looked away quickly and her father’s jollity seemed to collapse.
“Come on then,” he said.
“Actually I’m all right here for the moment. I’m a bit tired. I think I’ll have a rest now and call the restaurant on my mobile.”
“It’ll only take a couple of minutes to say hello. You know. It’d be polite.”
“Polite!” Like it was polite to act out enthusiastic foreplay in the kitchen with another woman barely six months after your wife had died when your daughter might walk in at any moment!
“What’s that supposed to mean? If you’re talking about what happened when you arrived, well I can't help that. We weren't expecting you. I was expecting to have to go to the station and collect you later. You didn't ring.”
“Oh. So I’m going to have to ring now first am I before I can come to my own home!”
“Of course not. But…” Her father paused, apparently considering what to say. He continued: “Emma, Grace and I have become … very attached to each other. We’re happy. She’s here with me. That’s not going to go away. I hope you’ll be able to accept that and in time come to be happy about it too.”
Emma turned away.
“Dad,” she said, “please don't force me to do things just because you’ve got some woman living with you now. I’m an adult you know. Please try to treat me like one. I’ll come down when I’m ready.”
“Grace is not just ‘some woman’,” said Don. He looked and sounded angry to Emma. Very unusual for her father. However, he appeared to be fighting it off and at length he said quietly:
“Emma, I still love your mother and I always will. But she isn't here any more. I love Grace as well now. I hope you’ll come to like her a lot too eventually.” And he left the room.
Emma’s anger dissolved and she burst into tears.
***
DON plodded off downstairs. He’d been unprepared for this reaction and they had been some sentences into the conversation before he’d realised how serious Emma was. He’d wanted to tell her that he needed Grace’s love and affection, that he’d spent years nursing her mother which he didn't at all resent and would have carried on doing so to the end of his days if necessary. Still, he wouldn't live forever and now that it was over, he wanted to have some fun. And that what she had witnessed was only what men and women were supposed to do together. Unfortunately, it didn't appear he was going to be able to have that sort of grown up discussion with his daughter quite yet.
He’d had to shut up after Emma had rolled her eyes and he’d suddenly realised that her expression hadn't been meant as a sardonic stab at conspiratorial humour between them; that it was born out of real disgust.
His daughter’s face had closed down. He’d had to work hard to quell his anger at hearing Grace described as ‘some woman’. He’d felt like saying that if she wanted to be treated like an adult then she should behave like one, yet he so hadn't wanted to have an argument with her about Grace or indeed anything else so soon. Not that they normally argued at all. He’d thought they were so close.
He reasoned to himself that if Emma had been minded to behave like an adult, then on seeing him and Grace together, she might have tactfully withdrawn unnoticed and gone off for a walk for half an hour or so. Or she might at least have laughed it off instead of gawping at them and then bolting to her room and sulking. He reflected that all the effort and attention focused on the slowly dying Carol for so many years must have got in the way of giving Emma a rounded version of family life and coupledom.
He hadn't actually ever, now he thought about it, said anything at all to her about the facts of life, and Carol wouldn't have been able to, though whether that would have made any difference he wasn't actually sure. It would be a brave parent who went further than the mechanics of sex and lectured their offspring on the pleasures of the flesh. An old Harry Enfield sketch popped into his mind in which Kevin sits cringing while his father starts to have The Talk with him and Kevin soon disappears.
He walked towards the kitchen where Grace would probably be making a start on their evening meal. Together they would have to decide how to treat this unexpected turn of events and how to proceed henceforth.
002 The Breakfast
THE KITCHEN WAS empty. Emma was sure she'd heard the sounds of her father and the woman getting up, however there was no one downstairs. There was, though, a delicious smell of perking coffee mingled with newly baked bread. She saw a bread-making machine winking in the corner. This was new since her last visit and she decided to leave it. She poured herself a coffee and sat down at the kitchen table. She couldn't relax. She found she was perching on the edge of her chair, no idea what may happen next in this unfamiliar set-up.
She had barely left her room yesterday, apart from to bolt to and from the bathroom occasionally. Her father had brought her up some toasted sandwiches with salad about five-thirty. Then he'd looked in at tennish and, seeing her in bed, he'd come over and done what he always did on her first night back, which was to mock tuck her in, though he hadn't tickled her as he normally did. She hadn't responded as she normally would either. She didn't wriggle and giggle. She had merely lain on her back looking at him, but at least there hadn't been any harsh words and, thank the Lord, no sounds later of frantic activity from along the landing.
So now in the kitchen, she just sat for some time reading a book on her Kobo. She looked around the kitchen occasionally. It didn't seem like her house any longer. She hoped this feeling would pass, since she'd lived in this pretty cottage all her life and it was a shock to find the atmosphere and ambience of the place so different. Alien. It was like one of those horrid dreams where you walk down the street where you live but realise that small details have changed. You knock at a door and a stranger answers and claims to have lived there for the last fifty years and doesn't recognise you. You don't see anyone you know and everyone you meet looks at you weirdly.
She decided to stop thinking these uncomfortable thoughts and focus on the fact that it was another fine day and that she would soon be off to the restaurant to start to earn some much-needed dosh to get her through the autumn term, when it arrived, and beyond. With that in mind, to feed herself up for the long shift soon to start with only fifteen-minute breaks every three hours, she went and opened the bread-making machine and pulled out the new loaf. It smelled divine. She was in the middle of hacking off a large slice to have with some of the (apparently home-made) raspberry jam she'd found in the fridge, presumably from one of the local WI fayres, when the back door opened and in spilled her father and the woman.
Emma swallowed. She'd almost started to relax. Something you were perhaps entitled to do in your own home? However, now this woman was here with her dad. They both wore running shorts and T-shirts and were panting and leaning on each other for support. As they got their breath back, her father said:
“Grace and I try to go for a run several days a week.”
Emma could only stare at them. Her dad had never done this. Young people did it, yes. But they had bodies worth preserving. What was the point when you were her father's age? And the woman's? So far as Emma knew, her father didn't ‘do’ exercise.
Her dad and the woman unaccountably started laughing! They stood there panting and giggling and bending over and ‘phewing’. They looked at each other and seemed to know exactly the other's next move. Emma watched, mesmerised, yet also horrified.
“We'll just head off for a shower before we have breakfast. Glad you found the coffee and bread,” said her dad. “Oh,” and he stuck his head back round the door as they disappeared, “Grace makes the most exquisite raspberry jam as you've obviously discovered.”
Emma looked down at her breakfast with sudden distaste. Still, you had to eat something to bolster you up and provide the energy before a long shift in a hot restaurant with indifferent, sometimes unappreciative, clientele. She did so wish though that it hadn't been the product of the woman's efforts. This woman was turning into the essential, unassailable, unbeatable domestic goddess. A landscaping, gardening genius, a maker of firm but soft and alluring beds, an effortless producer of enticing breakfast smells and tastes and, of course, a sexual expert in the arts of the bedroom.
Far too soon, her dad and the woman were down again all fresh and washed and scrubbed, cutting up the bread into manageable pieces, cracking eggs into a jug and grinding in salt and pepper, heating the butter in a pan to an exact temperature and whisking the eggs to a perfect consistency and then turning them into the pan to stir on the heat into a light and ebullient foam of breakfast heaven. They did all this with big smiles on their faces, as though even these mundane tasks were huge treats. Emma sat with her head buried in her Kobo and felt, and no doubt looked, grumpy and sulky although, if they noticed, they didn’t say anything. And at least she wasn’t being forced into a formal introduction with the woman today.
“There you are darling,” said her dad cascading some of the gorgeous mass onto her plate. “Eat up. We need to clear away soon. Grace and I are going to church in a minute.”
Emma sighed deeply, but to no obvious acknowledgement so far as she could tell. She wasn’t sure which was worse; being ticked off or having her sour mood go completely unrecognised.
Going to church? When had such a thing become routine? Her father wasn't religious. In fact, quite the opposite to her knowledge. And his occasional trips to the church earlier in the year and last autumn she'd written off as a temporary reaction to the burden of her mother's worsening condition.
She wanted to say that she hadn't actually asked for any scrambled egg. Instead she scooped it up and ate it as fast as she could so that she could escape from this haven of domestic bliss. Of course, the egg was delightful.
***
DON sat on his pew and thought his thoughts. As his daughter correctly assumed, he wasn’t at all religious, that is apart from the spiritual feeling he had about his relationship with Grace, which seemed to him to be infused with something wholly unearthly and metaphysical.
He liked this time every week to ruminate as the vicar's sermon droned on. He liked to look around this beautiful building and recall how he had first seen Grace here, arranging some flowers on a pedestal at the front of the church when he'd turned up early the first Sunday he had attended last year. She had been in shadow and he hadn't seen her clearly at first. The sun had been glowing through the stained glass windows, dust motes floating and dancing in the beams cast by it. As he had taken a seat in a row halfway down the aisle, the sunshine was suddenly upon this woman, catching her shoulder-length fair hair and turning it into a golden halo, lighting up her slim, curvaceous form, bright enough to cause her to turn away from it so that her profile was towards Don now, rather than the back of her head. He saw her delicate features framed by her almost straight hair and just sat and sat, staring at the refulgent form there on her own at the front of the church. Soon more people had started to arrive and the woman had disappeared, presumably to sit down somewhere.
Later as he was leaving the church, he had looked for the woman but he couldn't spot her anywhere. As he shook hands with the vicar standing in the porch to see everyone out, he was told how encouraging it was to find a new face among the congregation and that he was welcome to go round the back of the church where tea and biscuits were served in the small hall adjoining the church. In fact, sometimes there was even cake too if they were lucky the vicar had said cheerfully in a tone that implied that this, when it happened, was the height of decadence and naughtiness.
Don had felt a terrible fraud as he had only gone to the church for something to do since he had suddenly had the offer of some help with Carol for a couple of hours on Sunday mornings. He had wondered how to fill this unaccustomed free time when he would actually be able to leave the house. He had intended to go for a walk and was in fact doing so when he had passed the church. Somehow the open gates and doors of the church, the timeless beauty and elegance of its interior and the look of sanctuary from within had beckoned him inside. He hadn't even intended to stay for the service at all, merely to sit down, be calm and soak up the atmosphere of the building for ten minutes or so.
Nevertheless he had stayed. And after the vicar's offer of tea and biscuits he had, as though almost under remote control, walked out of the porch into the bright sunshine and, following the others, plodded along the path at the front of and round the side of the church and thence into the little hall at the rear.
The hall was simple with rough white-painted walls, dusty looking and possibly distempered. It had dark wooden beams and arched cathedral-style windows. The tea urn was boiling fiercely at full throttle and ladies were already pouring out scalding cups of tea from large teapots on the table at the other end of the hall. One of the ladies was the woman he had seen arranging flowers earlier. She had smiled at him as he had collected his own cup and saucer and added milk. Help yourself to a biscuit he was told and then he had had to quickly move on to make way for more thirsty worshippers.
Shyly, he had stood in a corner, dunking his biscuit to avoid spraying crumbs everywhere, and sipped at his hot tea. But he wasn't alone for long. Church-goers were no different it seemed to any group when it came to curiosity about a newcomer. They soon had out of him where he lived, how he scratched a living working from home due to his wife's illness, that his daughter was away having recently started university and that, sadly, his wife's illness was getting much worse. He had received the appropriate amount of sympathy, together with enquiries whether he would be coming again next week and he had felt uncomfortable to say probably not, especially as he had had no cash on him for the collection, or now to place in the saucer as a donation towards the refreshments. So he had said that probably in fact he would. And in truth, he had found the experience calming and refreshing and interesting.
He had continued to attend thereafter every Sunday without fail, telling himself that it had nothing to do with the woman whom he had first seen arranging flowers in a flood of sunlight. He found out that her name was Grace and, some Sundays if he was lucky enough, he got to chat to her once the heavy tea drinkers had thinned out and she had less to do.
One Sunday after a month, as the vicar had promised, cakes were served baked by the church ladies as well as biscuits. He wondered which one Grace had contributed and asked for a slice of the carrot cake. It had tasted exquisite. Grace had come over later to the group he was talking to and some of them had complimented her on the carrot cake saying it was superb as always. She had looked pleased of course though a little shy to be receiving such praise and to be the centre of attention. She had looked, in fact, at Don and smiled quietly at him as he added his own tribute.
Don wasn't completely sure, but thought that that was probably the instant he had fallen in love with her, as opposed to having simply hugely admired her previously, as the sun once again had shone onto her hair, this time through the graceful hall windows. He had felt at the time that, although he was married, this was a pure and innocent emotion, an entirely theoretical romantic notion, like reading a book or seeing a film. Whatever fantasies were playing out in his middle-aged imagination, they would never come to pass in reality.
He had noted that her fair hair was sprinkled with some grey and that they too sparkled in the sunlight, heightening the halo effect. Indeed, she had very fine hairs on her face which reflected the light making her skin shine, the peachy complexion glowing like a teenager's. He wondered how old she was; probably a little younger than him. On the edge of his vision he saw she had on that day a tight knitted dress that hugged her body and was quite short, and high boots that her shapely legs, clad in black tights, disappeared into. The group of people had started to shuffle their feet collectively and cough and mumble, as Don realised that he was staring silently at Grace and that she was staring back at him.
He knew quite well why he was unable to drag his gaze away from her, but he had to wonder why she hadn't broken eye contact either. If she was even remotely attracted to him, that would have been a big surprise to Don. His own looks were of no great interest to him. He was tall and slim with a mixture of dark and grey hair; about 30:70 these days. He hadn't gone bald, therefore he hadn't had to resort to the modern habit of shaving his head which suited some men all right but made others look like desperados on the run, in Don’s opinion. He dressed neatly. He was, he supposed, fairly reserved. If Grace found herself attracted by these qualities, then that was simply his good luck. Though they were, of course, both married.
For something to say, he commented on the sermon, the subject having been drawn from a topical news story of the day, and the conversation started up again. As the talk ebbed and flowed, he ended up talking alone to Grace. She had of course heard about his wife and her illness and enquired politely about it. He found it difficult to speak of it because it had become clear that Carol was going to die and it was depressing as a topic of conversation.
God knew he spent enough of his time worrying about the practical side of things, how he would cope as her condition worsened, whether he should be more insistent that he try to get a bed in the hospice which she had so far resisted. How it would be in the end when her body started to fall apart completely as he knew it would since, on top of her core illness which she had had for decades, she had over the last few years developed various forms of cancer which her body was now powerless to fight off regardless of medication.
She hated hospital, however it was a temporary relief to him, the several times she had been hospitalised after operations, to have others looking after her. But it was too late for surgery now and she was at home, deteriorating seemingly daily.
Therefore, to Grace, he made a vague general comment and asked her whether her own husband never attended the church. He had heard, he thought, something about a husband though he noticed she wore no ring. Grace had given a short mirthless laugh, rather oddly he'd thought at the time, and had said that her husband had other activities to interest him.
***
BUT that had been then and this was now. As the vicar's sermon was clearly drawing to a close, Don's thoughts turned to the present day and the stroppy daughter they'd left at home gaping at them as they'd headed out in their not-quite-Sunday-finest. It was a relief that she wouldn't be there glowering when they got home to deliberately, or purely incidentally, spoil their lunchtime, afternoon and evening and that she wouldn't return until late that night.
The restaurant owner or one of the staff always gave her a lift back. Don was realising how little in fact he knew his daughter, or at least how little she really knew him. It must of course be difficult for her to have to witness her father with a new and, what must seem to her, full-on relationship. But the degree of awkwardness she seemed to want to allow to settle on her shoulders as a result and be plain to see was frankly puzzling to him. He would, personally, have wanted to hide such gaucheness. He thought she might put up some show at least of adult understanding even if she didn’t like it. Instead it was as though she was watching an embarrassingly cringe-making, hopelessly incomprehensible stage performance which she couldn't switch off or walk away from, but at which she was wholly entitled to express her astonishment and dislike.
He had watched on TV a mind-numbingly meaningless speech by Russell Brand recently about the state of the world and politics and had felt something similar, he supposed, except that the man's huge self-confidence enabled the audience not to feel they needed to huddle in their seats or try to disappear into a hole in the ground.
Poor Emma. He and Grace had decided together the night before not to push anything, nonetheless that they were damned if they were going to start to moderate their normal routine and the way of life they had built up and their joy in each other's company. Nor would they dance or edge round Emma's attitude so as not to hurt her feelings or make her somehow feel better, that is if such were possible. This life they had together was permanent and they revelled in it. Every second was a gift to be relished and enjoyed. Emma would just have to learn to hack it, as they say.
003 The Restaurant
SOME PEOPLE HAD so much dosh it was obscene. The two men Emma was serving had ordered three bottles of wine costing about a hundred and twenty pounds each and then decided they weren't quite right for the main course and sent them back. There was nothing wrong with them and they still had to pay for them. They ordered instead several more bottles costing nearly two hundred pounds each. Emma was sure it was mainly to impress the vacant-looking, over-made-up, designer-clad women with them.
So she trooped back to the bar and handed in the unwanted wine and gave the new order to the bar manager. He wanted to have chapter and verse, however, and wouldn't hand out the substitute order, worried apparently that the men would claim later that they had been badly advised about the first order and dispute the bill when it came to paying.
“I don’t think so,” said Emma, her take on it being that playing to the girlfriends was the major factor. The manager wouldn't have it and marched off to remonstrate with the men. Emma sighed, seeing her tip dissolve. It was nearly her break time anyway and she turned away to go and check whether her other clients' tables needed clearing yet, before setting off outside to chill for fifteen minutes.
As she swivelled quickly on one foot, she caught sight of an image in one of the tall wall mirrors and had to look again. For a split second, she wondered what the woman was doing here. Then she realised it was her own reflection, medium height, slim body, shoulder length straight fair hair gently turning under at the ends. She was saying a surprised “Oh” to herself when Alex hurried past her whispering out of the corner of her mouth:
“It's our break time now. You coming outside for a breather? I'm dying for a fag.”
“Yeah right.” Emma watched for a second Alex's small retreating androgynous form and smiled. Skinny legs, no hips, narrow shoulders, dark brown hair waxed into a spiky frenzy. From the front, Emma knew, Alex had no discernible bosom and a face that could have been either male or female. She'd watched in amusement on many occasions during her previous weekends and holidays working here as customers struggled to decide if Alex was a girl or a boy, searching for terms that didn't include waiter or waitress, such as ‘server’ since they daren't risk a gender-associated label. Diners would strain to hear what other staff called her, but hearing the name Alex didn't help at all.
Alex always wore black rather flappy trousers and low heeled black lace-up shoes and, really, you couldn't tell. Emma followed her out through the kitchen, chalking up on the board as she went through that she was starting her break and noting the time down. Alex collected a pack of cigarettes and a can of something out of her bag and Emma grabbed her own bottled water. They both sank down in the sun on the chairs in the outdoor rest area.
Alex lit up but didn't offer one to Emma. People didn’t do that much now that fags were so expensive and Emma was known not to smoke. Though she'd had a few since being at uni and was starting to appreciate the buzz and the calming effect they seemed to be able to produce at the same time. Her dad would have been horrified to know she smoked sometimes. Well stuff him. With her father in mind she said to Alex:
“Do you know a woman called Grace Bennett?”
“Dunno. What's she like?”
“Fair, slimmish, hair about the same length as mine, aged fiftyish, goes to church, two sons apparently.”
“I used to go to school with a boy called Bennett. He was in my year. I think he had an older brother. Could be his mum I s'pose. Actually it sounds like her. Why?”
“She's living with my dad. At our house. My mum died earlier this year and, hey presto, suddenly this woman's moved in. I thought for one horrible moment that she'd come to the restaurant just before we came out here but it turned out to be my own reflection.”
“You mean your dad's shacked up with a woman that looks like you? That's a bit pervy isn't it?”
“Well, I hadn’t thought of it like that. It's just a pain that she's there.”
“You sound jealous!”
“Course I'm not jealous. But it's my house where I've lived all my life and now she's changing everything.”
“Sounds like jealous to me. You and your dad close?”
“Not especially. Not really.” Emma thought about it but decided to move the conversation on. She didn't much like what Alex was implying. “What are the sons like?”
“The one in my class was a bit of a slob. Or at least that’s what he wanted people to think about him. The other one was older and I think he had a good job.”
“Well, at least she's not totally perfect then, I mean to produce a slob of a son,” Emma said sourly.
“Jealous. Definitely!”
“That's daft. Can I crash a fag off you. I'll pay you back.”
“Go on then.” Alex seemed pleased to share a single one on that basis. Smokers at uni, Emma reflected, almost always like to see others end up the same way, addicts like them. It must make them feel better about themselves.
“If you don’t like it at home,” said Alex, “we've got a small spare room. It's full of rubbish at the moment but we could clear it and everyone'd be happy enough. It'd put the rent down for the rest of us. It's a laugh living in a shared house. I left home when my mum got her present boyfriend. Couldn't stand it. He kept trying it on with me on the quiet.”
“Oh. Well I can't. Leave home. I’ve no choice. I need to save up this summer ready for uni next term. I'll have to put up with them. Dad and that woman.” I can't afford to get hooked on fags either Emma thought. She'd have to give Alex the money rather than buy some cigarettes to pay her back. If she bought a packet it would cost her well over an hour's wages and then she'd have to smoke the remaining nineteen by which time she had a feeling she'd be thoroughly hooked!
***
“CAN you stop daydreaming, Emma, and go and clear Table 6. There’s a stack of people waiting,” said Ginger the restaurant manager for today.
“Yeah, sorry.” She’d been thinking about what Alex had said. She supposed she and her dad had been close actually. In fact, they’d always got on well. And yet that didn't add up to being perverted, surely, for happening to meet a woman that looked superficially a bit like his daughter. Idly she’d been casting her mind back over the years, wondering if there’d been any inappropriate comments or even touching. She couldn't think of anything. There was the tickling at bedtime, but that was just a laugh, a hangover from when she was a little girl. She was sure her dad had never had any – she could hardly bare to think of the word – sexual motives for the tickling. Yuck! The mere thought made her feel sick.
It flashed through her mind that her father and mother can't have had a real married relationship for years. It was gruesome to think about such things and she’d never dwelt on them before. However, for years her dad had had a separate bedroom from her mother, though he’d moved back in when her mother had got really ill and he’d slept on a camp bed. None of this had ever bothered or concerned her before. Her father had never made a fuss or an issue of such things nor tried to get Emma involved to any great extent in her mother’s care, so her mother had remained just that to her; her mum. She had never felt like a burden to Emma. The relief when her mother had died mainly sprang from the knowledge that her suffering had ended. Emma wished that Alex hadn't stirred up such aberrant thoughts. It was sick and horrible.
Emma rather wished she could move out into a shared house for the summer as Alex had suggested, nevertheless it was out of the question. It caused her to give some thought to the house layout at home and wonder if she could create some private space for herself so she wouldn't have to be around her dad and the woman so much. There was a downstairs loo near the second back door. The house had once been two semi-detached cottages that her mum and dad had managed to buy much earlier on when they had more money before her mum became ill. The second back door was hardly ever used. The loo was a bit grubby and not used very often either. They’d tended to use it more like a cupboard for storing things in. It was old-fashioned with a cistern high up on the wall above the toilet and a long chain. She supposed it would still work.
Next door to it was a small room with more old stuff in it, also pretty grimy. If she cleaned them both up, she could make herself a little bedsit with a loo next door and her own entrance. When it was busy at the restaurant she mostly ate there too. She could thus pass the summer at home and preferably hardly ever see her dad and the woman. If Alex was a bit of a stirrer, Emma nevertheless silently thanked her for giving her the idea. She’d make a start on it one morning soon.
“Emma, what’s got into you?” Ginger was saying. “You’re miles away. Can you go and take Table 10’s order. They’re starting to mutter and look cross.”
004 The Visitor
DON WAS standing with his back to the window looking at the man with fascinated astonishment, some distaste and well-concealed (he hoped) hostility. The man had turned up ten minutes ago, announced who he was and Don had shown him into the sitting room and offered him a seat. Don hadn't taken a seat himself since the man had immediately made the purpose of his visit clear.
He had started mildly enough, trotting out what he referred to as a number of supremely irritating idiosyncrasies on the part of Grace, such as writing shopping lists on their sides instead of up and down like normal people. He was now assailing Don with many supposed facts about his wife, Grace. Don knew that this man was Grace’s husband from photographs Grace had brought with her of her sons, some featuring the husband as well. He’d also had a glimpse of Greg very occasionally collecting Grace from church months ago, remaining in the car and roaring off at high speed before Grace had hardly had a chance to shut the passenger door.
Don had been told so far that Grace hated cooking and housework, that she was a hypocrite for attending church when she was an atheist, that she hadn't been a particularly good mother and that he, Greg, had had to do much of the child-care despite working full-time. She was also a slob around the house, wearing old tatty clothes and he had mentioned flatulence from both ends.
Don had laughed at this and Greg had said yes, Don could laugh but that he, Greg, had had to put up with all that.
“And she swears like a trooper,” Greg continued.
At you no doubt, Don thought. But he had indeed noticed Grace muttering under her breath if something she was doing wasn't going right, and Don smiled to himself to think that his angel may at these times have been uttering profanities. However she had never turned the air blue in his presence.
“What exactly is it that you want, Greg?”
“Obviously I want my wife back. She’s my wife. She should be at home with me and our son.”
Still amused at that point, Don had asked: “But if she’s as awful as you say, I’m surprised you want her back.”
“She’s my wife. This is all nonsense, her leaving. It won't help in the long run, her staying here. It’ll all go wrong and then she’ll come running back to me anyway. She’s done it before.”
“Really!”
Greg started the tirade again. Now Don was learning that Grace was in fact delusional, that she had convinced herself that Greg had affairs with his PAs. She had turned up at the last PA’s home one day demanding to be let in and look for Greg. Greg assured Don that he hadn't in fact been there, having delivered some documents to Cindy earlier on and having left in a taxi after finding that his car wouldn't start, so that the car was still parked outside.
“It was embarrassing!” Greg was saying in an offended manner. “Then she sat in her own car outside for hours on end. She was still there when I came back with a mechanic.”
“So what was wrong with the car?” Don asked mildly. He’d already been told of the incident by Grace and that the car had started first time but he wanted to see what Greg would say.
“Oh, not much. It used to do that sometimes. I’ve had it looked at properly since then. But the point is that she imagines things. Cindy isn't even working for me anymore. Grace’ll probably start the same thing with you. I’m just trying to warn you.”
“That’s very thoughtful of you,” said Don.
“There’s other things too!” Don didn't reply but Greg hurried on listing two terminations of pregnancy and a bout of gonorrhoea, both of course before he had met Grace; drug-taking, again a past bad habit that she’d kicked before he met her; heavy smoking which he’d had to make her give up before they had the two boys; sometimes, quite often actually, drinking to excess; some cosmetic surgery.
Don felt himself becoming angry, very angry indeed. He was about to ask the man to leave but Greg was saying:
“And she was prosecuted for shop-lifting too a couple of years ago.”
Don was stony-faced.
“You didn't know that did you!”
“I think you’d better leave now,” Don said at last. He wished he hadn't let the man in or allowed this procession of Grace’s worst features, if there was any truth in them at all, to be verbally paraded in front of him.
“You need to let her come back home where she belongs. I know what she’s like. I understand her and know how to handle her. She’s round the bend. She imagines things,” Greg said again.
“Please would you leave.” Don walked to the sitting room door and opened it wide. He stood back, holding the door open and looking at Greg. Greg didn't move. He started to draw breath, no doubt to continue the catalogue.
“I’m asking you to leave. Now,” Don said loudly and at last Greg got up. With a superior air he walked through the sitting room door saying: “You’ll regret ever meeting her. She’ll make your life a misery. You won't know whether you’re coming or going in the end. She’ll make things up. Half the time she’ll be lying to you.”
Don was ushering him out of the front door by this time.
“Goodbye, Greg,” he said and shut the door without waiting for any reply. He leaned back against the door, shut his eyes and breathed out hard.
***
IN THE cramped confines of his office, Don was having difficulty concentrating on the website he was currently writing for a small recently established accountancy practice, trying to build as much SEO into the site as possible for the fee the firm was prepared to pay. What people didn't understand was that these sites subsequently required frequent tweaking, but people didn't want to incur a regular maintenance fee for that, or for their Facebook page, or anything else he could have done to help them attract more business. For heaven’s sake, parish magazines were now charging relatively huge amounts to include picture adverts so that if businesses advertised in, say, four or five of them, it could easily cost them five hundred pounds plus a year purely for modest local coverage, however they balked at paying him a reasonable thousand pounds to concoct a website that would attract business from a wide area.
Don didn't do what many web designers did which was to look at business’s websites and bombard with emails those whose sites could have done with more work. Neither did he make cold calls. Of course he used his own methods to promote his own business online, but a great deal of his work still came from personal recommendations. That was far preferable to him than finding himself in a bidding war against other designers as the prospective client, who had found him on the internet, tried to play one designer off against another for the cheapest price. He’d ceased to taking part in these unseemly scrambles some years ago. Now, he stated his price and what he could do within that price with the best explanations he could provide to those without much clue what went into website building. If they came back and contracted him to write their sites, then all well and good. If they didn't, or tried the bartering approach, it was good riddance to them.
He couldn't help thinking about Greg; his appearance – medium height, dark hair almost grey, well dressed – his noticeable West Midlands accent, his confident, actually rather unattractive, swaggering manner. Greg was a chemist turned sales manager in a large pharmaceuticals company. He negotiated contracts for the company. He had a large sales team working under him and Don could see that he obviously applied his tough negotiating skills to his personal life. The overall attitude he conveyed was that he would get what he wanted, that resistance was futile and would soon dissolve away in the face of his determination.
He was as nearly as possibly could be the case the absolute opposite of Don. Don wasn't lacking in confidence, but he didn't walk over people and tried to offer courtesy and accord respect towards everyone with whom he came into contact. And he certainly wasn't pompous. The man who had been in his sitting room earlier hadn't been exactly rude, however the things he said were extremely offensive and it surprised Don that he would relate such things to a complete stranger on first meeting. He had applied no delicacy at all to his descriptions of Grace’s alleged faults. He had clearly expected that Don would succumb to his demands which was odd in the circumstances, since Grace had left Greg at least two months ago. Most reasonable people would conclude that she wanted to be where she was and that there was precious little prospect of her returning in the foreseeable future at least.
Perhaps, in fact, it was Greg who was the deluded party in all this. Grace, while being economical with information about her troubles and past home life, which Don had understood to mean that it upset her to talk about it, had certainly painted a picture of an unreasonable man with an iron will, prone to bouts of violent temper when crossed. Of course, Don accepted that one of the possible responses to marriage breakdown might be to become more aggressive than usual, but it did sound as though this wasn't a temporary departure from normal behaviour for Greg.
Greg’s work had taken him away a lot, often abroad, hence possibly leading to the philandering. Both Greg and Grace were about five years younger than Don, though in today’s corporate world of early retirement, redundancies, outsourcing, cutting back et cetera, Greg couldn't be far off retirement himself. However, perhaps he was driven and wanted to carry on. Or maybe he was very good at his job.
Don understood Greg to be well paid and had worried to begin with that Grace wouldn’t be satisfied with his own modest income. But she seemed wholeheartedly to prefer their simple lifestyle built on shared pleasures and local pursuits which didn't cost a lot of money. Anyway, their joint income was actually quite a decent amount since she worked full-time. The money coming into the household had more or less doubled overnight on her coming to live with Don.
Previously his income had been low enough that Emma was able to receive a full grant and maintenance loan and, with bursaries, she had said she was able to live quite comfortably with no contribution from him. This had been at the back of his mind actually; he was going to have to broach the subject with both Emma and Grace soon that the higher income would mean that possibly the whole of the grant and some of the maintenance loan would disappear, and so might some of the bursaries too, or at least those reliant on parental income and not the degree subject and A-level results. He was putting this off for a little longer given Emma’s current hostile attitude.
Don was self-taught as a web designer. When Carol had become so ill, he had abandoned a promising career at the bar. Life as a barrister, in court every day and preparing overnight for the next day’s hearing would never have been completely compatible with looking after her. Incredibly to him at the time, he had been able to find out online most of what he needed to know for his new career and using a number of basic books he was able to buy.
With that in mind, Don had momentarily considered entering Grace’s name into Google to see if there was any mention of the supposed prosecution, perhaps newspaper reports, but it seemed like spying to him. Merely because such things were freely available and accessible, that didn't mean you had to avail yourself of them. Years ago, it would have been impossible to pry into what someone might have done in the past from the comfort of one’s small home office. Hacking, at least, had been proved beyond doubt to be illegal and so it should be. Public interest be damned. If Grace had done anything she regretted and wanted to tell him about it, then she would do so at a time of her choosing. It was pernicious to parade it on the internet in front of potentially millions of people to haunt the subject for many years to come.
Actually, he wouldn't have minded knowing something about her having left Greg previously and then gone back again if that was true. Had she gone to live with another man as now? Had she in fact had several lovers? Was he just the latest in a long line? Was she actually as bad as Greg? Was this some game they played to entertain themselves every so often when their relationship started to become stale? Would she leave him in due course? But he quickly cast such thoughts aside. To think such things was simply to surrender to the purpose of Greg’s visit, which was transparently to plant doubts, to corrosively break down Don’s wall of certainty regarding his and Grace’s life together, to attempt to inject poison into the relationship; by whatever means to bring about a situation that would make it more likely that Grace would return to him, Greg.
He, Don, should think logically. If he found Grace to be the ultimate, the last word in womanliness, more desirable than any woman he had ever encountered or ever expected to, then so would Greg have found the same qualities in her. And it was not outlandishly surprising that he should want her back and be prepared to pitch up at her new home and say such appalling things about her.
Whether true or not, Don should ignore what Greg had said and kick these destructive thoughts into touch. Much of what Greg had said could be accounted for by the unhappy state of the marriage. There would have been precious little point in Grace acting the part of the perfect wife and housekeeper if she thought her husband was ‘playing away’. Naturally, Grace would have sworn at a husband who constantly shamelessly paraded his relationship with his PA before her. He should do his best to forget it all and carry on as happily before.
And anyway, various sounds were intruding into his thoughts and attempts to work; thumping and bumping, scraping noises, crashes and bangs. He followed his ears to where they were coming from at the back of the house where the old toilet and storeroom, as he thought of them, were situated. He seldom ventured there normally, apart from the occasional sweeping and vacuuming.
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| Featured Book: Road to Freedom by Leigh Lincoln |
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 About Featured Book: Road to Freedom by Leigh Lincoln
Promotion: $0.99 From Feb. 17-24, 2021
A marriage which shouldn’t be. The path to forgiveness begins in unlikely places. And love can bloom among the thorns.
Immigrant Francisco has escaped the cruelty of Cuba, but has been a man without a true home. Now terminal cancer has driven him into the arms of Stacy.
Traveling half-way around the world together, they each have a journey to take. Francisco confronts his past. While Stacy tries to open her heart after a devastating first marriage. Both pushing each other in ways they are unwilling to accept.
Can he make amends and say he’s sorry for his wrongs? Can she learn to let go and be free to love again?
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| FOLLOWERSHIP-LEADING FROM BEHIND by Akin Odidi |
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The study of followership is important to the topic of leadership. For too long, followership has been a relegated topic whenever the subject of leadership is mentioned or being discussed. More often, the whole emphasis is on leadership and what leadership brings to the table without much or little consideration of followership’s inputs. This book is out to help readers to understand questions such as; the meaning of followership, characteristics to look out for in a good follower, how leadership can shape good followership and how followership can act as a catalyst for change. This book also gives detailed insights into the lives of notable men and women who by their lives ,examples and characters have added meaning to what it truly means to learn the followership ropes in order to become good and successful leaders worthy of emulation.
Targeted Age Group:: 18-70
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
I have been studying the topic of leadership for some time and feel that the role of followership has not been properly appreciated in the building or making of good leadership. This is my inspiration for writing this book; to emphasise the importance of good followership to effective leadership.
Book Sample
Introduction
Followership, The
Starting Point
I am an avid believer and proponent of ‘followership’ as I
have been fortunate to work with leaders in the real estate,
insurance and legal sectors who are keen to groom the
next generation of leaders by teaching, mentoring, training
and sometimes chastising others to be torch bearers
when their own tenures fade. These leaders have shown
me by their examples, experiences and characters that
the leaders I see today and want to emulate are not the
finished products as a result of one day’s promotion and
ascendancy to the leadership positions that they occupy.
Rather, they are the by-products of many falls, standoffs
and rough edges that have been chiselled into the final
shinning products by a considerable amount of seen and
unseen investments and sacrifices that are sometimes unquantifiable in human terms. This is my story, the story
of a constant and consistent pursuit of a topic that has the
potential to be life changing if only it is given its proper
recognition in the study of leadership. Let us, therefore,
go on this journey together. It is a fascinating journey into
the subject of leadership through the followership experience.
From my experience, I know that good followership
is truly leading from behind. There is no better time than
now to discuss the importance of effective followership in
the making of good leadership. The world is going through
a phase where no one wants to be known or referred to as
a follower; rather, everyone wants to be a leader either
rightly or wrongly. Good and effective leadership is not
about title. It is about the responsibility that goes along
with the title. Effective followership ensures that the
nitty-gritty of good leadership is studied and known and
then implemented when the leadership role beckons. This
book is not a comprehensive compilation of all the attributes
required of effective followership. I have discussed
only some traits that I think an aspiring leader should
possess. Leadership can be defi ned as leading a group of
people, a company, a business or an entity to achieve a
set common goal. It means carving out a strategy that
helps others to meet their targets. A leader is someone
that motivates, directs, inspires and communicates a set
idea or a set of ideas to others to achieve a set common
goal. Followership, on the other hand, is the capacity or
ability of an individual to actively follow and understudy
a leader. Followers play an important role in the success
or failure of a group, a team or an organisation. Effective
followers are, therefore, individuals who are enthusiastic,
intelligent, ambitious and self-reliant. Good followers
know that there is a common goal or an objective to be
achieved and they are keyed into achieving it.
Links to Purchase Print Books
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