#newspired

This is a piece of flash fiction that I submitted to Newspired, inspired by a newspaper clipping about a cake-based theft from a police station’s fridge.

The detective walked into the interrogation room, a cup of coffee in one hand and a half-eaten chocolate bar in the other. After taking the final bite, he wiped his hand on his trousers. Inside the room, gaffer-taped to a chair, was the police station’s cleaner. She was squirming.

          “Tell me where you’ve hidden them!” he opened with. The cleaner failed to answer.

          The detective then realised he had taped her mouth shut earlier, so to let her answer he removed the tape, scrunched it up into a ball and dropped it onto the floor. The cleaner, now allowed to breathe properly, spluttered and gasped for air.

          “Tell me where you’ve hidden them!” he repeated.

          “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she eventually replied. “What could I have I done that justifies this treatment?”

          “Murder!” he yelled. “Of jam-filled pastries.”

          The cleaner now bore a confused look on her face. The detective’s smug-looking face then turned into one of concern as he read the cleaner’s expression.

          “Oh god, have I arrested the wrong person again?” he lamented. “I mean, it’s so confusing, what with the fact that more than one cleaner works here, I mean I hardly stop to look at their faces, what with them being of little consequence and…”

          “Oi!” she interjected. “I’m the only cleaner thank you very much. Why don’t you clean up your bomb-site of an office?”

          “Don’t get smart with me, I’m asking all the questions.”

          “Is that right?”

          “Stop asking questions!”

          By now the detective was riled. He was angry about the missing doughnuts, and he wanted to get a confession. He was getting more and more drastic.

          “So, have you heard of waterboarding?” he said.

          Her face was awash with terror. Her squirming intensified. He leapt over the table and covered her mouth as he thought she was about to scream.

          “Hush now. Just confess to the doughnut theft and this can all be over. You stole the doughnuts from the official police detective fridge – admit it!”

          “Ok yes!” she confessed. “It was me, if you really want to blame someone.”

          “Bingo!” he yelled.

          As soon as he wheeled away in glee, the Chief Inspector walked in finishing a mouthful of food. He had some form of red jam caked around his mouth but soon wiped it off. He then seemed confused as to why the cleaner was in the interrogation room.

          “What’s going on in here, Jonny? And why is Susan gaffer-taped to the chair?” he asked.

          “I believe she was the one who keeps stealing doughnuts from the fridge, I was just about to charge her.” The detective responded.

by Josh McGrillen

by Peter Jones

Dear Headteacher,

I know your school has a long history of independence from government control, and as a parent I have always been broadly supportive of this. Your unique curriculum prepares students well for adult life and, although unpopular with some, I have always supported your decision to teach the children literally no mathematics or English.  The school’s qualifications are also difficult to convert into UCAS points, although I still prefer them to GCSEs and A-levels.  I don’t even mind that your unusual method of correspondence always sends our cat crazy. I also have no problem with your long established tradition of labeling one quarter of your students as evil on their first day, but I do have one issue that I feel I must raise with you.  

I appreciate that, as an independent institution, there is no need for you to follow the national procedures for screening potential members of staff; I wouldn’t expect you to request full CRB checks from employees, however, may I suggest that next time you interview for the position of teacher for Defence Against the Dark Arts you may take the additional precaution of checking that the most evil wizard who ever lived is not ON THE BACK OF HIS HEAD!

Yours concerned,

An anonymous parent.

P.S. If you are curious about why the Dark Lord Voldemort is so angry upon his return, you might want to take the time to consider that for an entire academic year he has had nothing to read besides the washing instructions on the inside of that turban. I don’t know about you, but if I had to read about dry cleaning for that long I would probably want to kill all the muggle-borns too.

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Idea by Conor Bailey and Illustrated by Josh McGrillen

by Conor Bailey

Stealth. Light hands. Subtle feet. Dressed in black like the shadow of the night. These men have found their next score, they will rob from the rich to give to the poor. The two of them are at the door. Balaclava down, 45s out. One finger, two fingers, three fingers up. Boot to the door which breaks easier than an empty promise. Man wakes up in his jim-jams, cold sweats, shaking, swearing. Guns up, loud yells, “Where is your money? We know you have money! Where’s the money?” and with a short gasp, fearing for his very mortal existence, the sweaty man bellows out… “Panama”. He throws a book at them, specifically an atlas.

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by Fiona Kirton

It started when she was about nine years old. She told me she was fat and ugly. I was stunned; she was a gorgeous but skinny child. Being a great believer in positive thinking, I took her to stand in front of a full-length mirror and asked her to say "I am beautiful just the way I am" several times.

That's when she said it started, 'the voice' telling her I was lying and that what I said was not true. The voice in her head said she was fat and ugly, as well as lots of other horrible things, so horrible that she would never repeat them to me.

She would insist she was fatter than her twin sister, who though slender, was a healthy weight for her age. She thought at the age of fourteen it was an achievement to be able to put her hands around her waist and have her fingers meet.

On one occasion, not believing what she was hearing, a friend took a piece of string and put it around her waist, then repeated the process with her twin. The string showed that her waist was two inches smaller than her sister's; but she looked at the string and would not believe what it showed.

I did not know about the voice then, and did not understand what was going on.

Looking back she had always been a picky eater. Once, when she was five years old, we were going to have lamb for dinner. When she realised that this lamb was the same as the ones playing in the field opposite our house, she put her hands over her face in horror and instantly became a vegetarian. That would have been okay, but then more and more foods were not to her taste, and she would only eat a very restricted diet. Then her symptoms got worse. She did not like people watching her eat, and eventually would only eat if she could take food up to her room. She would draw the curtains so that nobody driving down the narrow country lane outside our house could look into her room and see her eating. There was no logical way they could see in, but I could not persuade her of that. I wanted her to eat with the family and there were intense arguments about the fact that she wanted to do this. Finally in desperation I let her eat in her room rather than have her not eat at all.

She stayed in bed a lot, her mood was low, and she was very irritable. Her relationships with friends and family began to suffer. Her 'friends' stopped getting in touch. She would see her sister getting ready to go out with the former friends who no longer contacted her and would turn her face to the wall crying.

Yet, no matter how many people - including myself - spoke to her about her weight, she would not acknowledge that she had a problem.

By now, I was certain that she was anorexic. I was very worried about her, and the more I read about eating disorders, the more my concern increased. Anorexia has a twenty per cent mortality rate, the highest of any mental illness. There was a real possibility my daughter could die if she did not get the help she needed.

Eventually she agreed to see and see the doctor. I got the feeling that this was more to keep my quiet, than any acknowledgment of the fact she had a problem. At the appointment her height and weight were recorded and the doctor told her body mass index (BMI) was very low and she was in danger of damaging her health. The doctor referred her to the Children and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAHMS). After the appointment she steadfastly refused to acknowledge that the doctor had told her she had a low BMI. This level of denial made me very anxious, as it seemed that in her head she was determined to be normal no matter what the evidence. I could understand her refusing to believe me, thinking that her mother was fussing too much, but to totally deny what the doctor had said took the problem to another level.

We waited months for an appointment from CAHMS; I was so relieved when it came through. She was then assessed by a Clinical Psychologist, who said nothing was wrong! I was incredulous. There clearly was something seriously wrong - any lay person could see that.

This added to the problem, because she would now say, "See, mummy, I told you there was nothing wrong. The Psychologist said so." It meant that her denial of her condition had been falsely vindicated. I was extremely worried, I had exhausted all the avenues that were open to me. In addition to that the incompetence of CAHMS had validated her belief that she was normal and therefore she was at even more risk from this devastating illness.

I wrote to my MP and put in a formal complaint, but nothing got immediate results or got my daughter the treatment she so clearly needed.

I was then told about a local charity that supported people with eating disorders. They would only see people from the age of fourteen, and she had to be ready to acknowledge her problem. She was thirteen and I was in a horrifying limbo, with no money to get help privately and a teenage daughter who would not admit she had a problem.

Then disaster struck. I was diagnosed with breast cancer. As a lone parent with no family support, the pressure on my small family was enormous. I had three operations, a double mastectomy and reconstructive surgery, and was not allowed to lift more than a cup of tea for two weeks or to do housework for six. We were looked after by Social Services, who put carers into the home to cook and do light housework. In all this chaos, friends did what they could to help, but many lived miles away and my daughters did not have enough support. They knew that if I died, they would go into care. This was a great worry to them and torture for me. I was terrified of leaving them without adequate support to get through their young adult years and they were afraid of being split up if they were put into care. Added to this, we lived in a country village with no bus service, so they were isolated at home with a sick mother and they were doing their GCSEs.

Not surprisingly, her anorexia got worse. Then one day in the kitchen, she said,

"It's not normal to hear a voice in your head, is it mummy?" My heart turned ice cold.

"No, love, it's not. Do you hear a voice in your head?"

"Yes. Does it mean I am mad, mummy?"

"It means something is wrong, but I don't think you are mad."

My daughter was now sixteen and finally, she agreed to go to the charity. The voice had been talking to her since she was nine; it had taken her seven years to talk about it. She was assessed her and started a weekly counselling program. This is when she learned about the anorexic voice. This is an internal voice that is common in people who suffer from an eating disorder and body dysmorphic disorder. The voice is cruel and critical, saying nasty demeaning things to the sufferer; it tries to control them and their eating, telling them they are not good enough or thin enough. It is possible for sufferers to gain control of this voice, but it can take a long time. Stress and tiredness tend to allow the voice to get stronger. Seven years is the average length of time it takes to recover from anorexia.

by Andrew Corsini

Rejected titles: Swandemonium, It’s a Swanderful Life, Swan of the Dead, Swan Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Star Wars: Episode Swan, Captain America: The Swanter Soldier.

Recently you may have seen something dazed-yet-apparently-aggressive, covered in feathers and wandering over the top of the lake, near the main house. No, I’m not talking about The Dean (although I’ve never actually seen The Dean so I’m willing to be proved wrong). Instead, a lone swan had been camped out above the above the lake for about a month, and a rampant obsession has spread the way I’m told STDs do. The swan has even received the exciting name of ‘James’.

The ‘Swanomenon’ can be traced to an email arriving in mid-February from Student Housing, advising students about a swan roaming the grounds, one having difficulty leaving its family. The email’s contents quickly gained tract, and since then “James the Swan” has become something of a permanent fixture in university life, with even talks of naming it as the university’s unofficial mascot.

Why were people so quick to latch onto the swan’s sudden appearance? Scientists have long demonstrated that birds and positive mental health are intrinsically linked. Fans of good television may also remember the first season of The Sopranos where Tony develops a strong emotional reaction to the ducks in his swimming pool, however there may be a factual basis for this plotline. In a 2005 study, birdsong was shown to synchronize human moods with the morning and create positive effects for sleep and recovery. According to an NHS article, an animal care centre in Scotland introduced a pigeon loft for “patients within the Learning Disability award where they were able to care for the bird initially… even patients with the most enduring learning disability were able to handle the birds gently. Their sense of achievement and wellbeing in successfully rearing young birds was remarkable and motivational.”

Swans have long provoked emotional responses. They are often a symbol of monogamy and everlasting love, as when a swan mates, it mates for life. The acceptance of the swan into lad culture then, seems a bit strange given the values at odds with each other. James has trended most on student sites that tend to promote one-night stands, as opposed to the “everlasting love” of the swan. Particularly in the atmosphere of a university, an obsession with a swan could actually be a subconscious desire for something more emotionally substantial.

(Editor’s Note: Since the writing of this article, James the Swan has been safely re-homed by the Secret World Wildlife Rescue.)

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