It was at
times like this that Dail realised that the loss of one sense really does
enhance the ones that remain. He hadn’t actually lost any senses, strictly
speaking. He couldn’t see what had happened; he had only heard it. However,
this made his imagination have to work to fill in the gaps. The sound in
question had just casually strolled into his ear canal, kicked off its shoes
and plonked itself into it’s favourite armchair and was now waiting for
someone…no, anyone to come in and keep him company. But, alas, it was
not to be. Everyone was shunning his company since he’d reversed over Django,
the neighbour’s cat who was loved by the entire street (so named because it had
lost three of its toes, not because it was any kind of French gypsy guitar
virtuoso). How was he to know the bloody thing was “trying to read his number
plate”, no matter how many times he pleaded with everyone to “please, just
understand that cats can’t actually read” and that this was all a
horrible, horrible accident and was not intended in any way…even if he had complained about Django
repeatedly bringing him ‘gifts’ of half digested newspapers. Curiously, the
Sudoku on some of them had already been completed, and the birdwatching section
remained suspiciously legible…
To
backtrack slightly more considerably than Napoleon did in 1812, Dail had just
heard something (but, crucially, not seen something) that had set off his funny
gland. To set the scene: he had been walking along a quiet corridor having just
been to visit the friend from Chapters 4 and 9, when from behind a closed door
he heard the words “Oh god, it’s everywhere.” Already, to Dail, this was
amusing. But the sheer level of panic and unremitting terror in the voice that
said them, pushed him into a long forgotten realm of funny in which very little
laughing occurs, despite the utter hilarity of whatever has just happened.
This had
completely ruined his day. He had planned on going home, making a inexcusably
large pot of tea, loading up a plate of biscuits, setting up base camp in his
room and not leaving again until something that could pass as the start of a
book had been written. But how could he now? Knowing that everywhere, behind
closed doors, things were being said. Unseen and untouched words that were
being heard by unseen and untasted ears. Limitless possibilities and
combinations. For every action there is a noise but for every noise there could
be so…so many actions. Someone needs to write them down. ‘From Behind Closed Doors: a study in comic situational extrapolation.’ Someone...
“Someone…like-“
“Me?”
Dail
hadn’t noticed that by now he was at a bus stop, his mind too busy churning
over recent events, and therefore also hadn’t noticed that he was keeping an
elderly woman company. She may have been talking to/at him for quite some time
now…and was grinning at him in a manner that portrayed both enthusiasm and expectancy.
Clearly she wanted to be the kind of person that Dail had in mind, so he said
“Yes” back at her, with as friendly a smile as anyone can muster at a bus stop.
The change
in her facial expression could not have been more profound if neon lights and a
marching band had been involved. Now she look scared and handbag quiveringly
nervous. What kind of person does she now think she is?! Please tell me she
hadn’t been talking about victims of random murders that occur at bus stops…
This must be the dark underbelly of having no idea what’s been going on. The
propensity for inadvertently exacting terror on unsuspecting pensioners at
public transport pick-up points. As if public transport wasn’t already
traumatic enough without strangers possibly informing you in an amiable
manner that they intend to send you on a one way bus ride down the banks of the
River Styx (via Hampstead).
By the
time Dail had arrived home (thankfully, his bus had arrived fairly punctually,
whilst the biddy’s hadn’t; that or she was too frozen to the spot with either
fear or a very sudden, bizarre and localised weather event, that had welded her
feet to the floor, to get on the bus that had turned up) his day was already
taking, even by his standards, an interesting turn. On the ride home, a mother
had scolded her child for licking the window, her argument being “Don’t lick
the bus; you don’t know where it’s been.” The child’s response to this was one
of the greatest quick fire scones of logic Dail had and would ever have the
privilege of being privy to, and was simply “Yes I do, it says on the front.”
Impeccable. Clinical. Borderline Nobel Prize worthy. Loaded with tasty
sultanas. Mmmmm. Scones. No! No more bakeries, for at least a week.
To further
pass the time on the way home, he had sat on a park bench for a while, watching
the guy pigeons puff themselves up to impress the ladies, which caused him
endless delight; reassuring him that it wasn’t just humans that were always
doomed to failure in romance, as every single pigeon got rejected almost
instantly. Maybe I should put on loads of weight and start dancing and cooing
at women, Dail had surmised. But that could start attracting lady pigeons,
though that seems unlikely given recent evidence, but still. Better not to risk
it.
He left
very soon after spotting a sultry glint in the eye of a nearby pigeon, though
it is entirely possible that could have been mildly related to the bread he was
flinging everywhere.
So, intelligent children and failed romantic,
airborne vermin. Still, could be worse. There could have been clowns. Clowns
with deckchairs. The list of things more intestine-spasmingly worse than a
clown in repose is a very short one, indeed. This list was on the verge of
being written once he got home, but Dail managed to give himself a paper cut
and had subsequently given it up as a lost cause, deciding that either lists
were mocking him today or everything he wrote on the list would happen to him,
as paper cuts were indeed going to be top of his list. To avoid further injury,
he took an early bath and then an even earlier bedtime, but lost sleep over the
confusion that this led to.
