Short fiction

Issue #7

Ghosts

To myself,

I figured I should keep a diary and note down my activities. This will hopefully provide me with a brief period of entertainment in later years when I will no doubt still have nothing. [to do].

Many thanks,

Alexander.


 





Thursday 19th February


Today I died. I ceased to exist because Francois asked me to file away the corns on her feet with a bread knife. Obviously I had to say no and she was evidently dejected. I would have usually acquiesced; it was just the fact that I dislike bread knives a lot. I don’t know why I hate them so much, I’m not neurotic. I suppose it is just the fact that they are awfully useless utensils and are not fit for cutting anything - including bread - let alone filing away corns. I disdained her for asking me, she knows I hate bread knives. Why would she forget this? She did it on purpose. Her requesting my use of that particular tool banished my soul to the upper echelons of the disgustingly absurd where it will forever remain. Now I am dead Francois. Thanks. You and your useless utensil murdered me.

Francois is very old and very frail and by everyday standards she should have died about five times over by now. Her house is small and poky, but she crashes around it a lot. It surprises me that she is in as good health as she is given her recklessness. I go to her residence often to see her. She is no relative of mine, nor has any connection to me whatsoever and I can’t for the life of me remember how this custom came about. It’s not as if we even get on that well; it’s just that if my daily visits didn’t take place, life would almost seem not right. I don’t know what it is; all we do is merely engage in frivolous conversation. I guess it just suits us both - besides when she asks me to use bread knives (!) - and that’s that. Visiting her also makes me feel very good about myself, I feel altruistic. We’re the only company one another has I’m the only company she has. I’m not a narcissist; I am literally the only company she has. This makes me content. Bread knives do not.


Friday 20th February


I saw some trees when I was walking down Main Street. They made me think of my childhood. That’s all I have to say about that.


Saturday 21st February


It rained in the afternoon. I hate rain, it infuriates me. Rain is inherently selfish. I say ‘inherently’, because it really is. It is an exceptionally selfish type of weather. Whenever the slightest drop lands on the floor, the water mixes with the cement in the concrete and creates a foul stench. Added to that, the rain gets you wet and being wet is one of the worst sensations known to man. I can’t stand wetness (although I’m fairly indifferent to dryness come to think of it). You get dressed up nicely to go somewhere and the rain comes down and wrecks your entire outfit, on purpose. I’m not neurotic, although I’ll admit that I am well aware of my many irrational dislikes for quite a few things. Rain is not one of these, it is egotistical and this is exactly my problem with it.*


Monday 23rd February


It was sunny today and so I sat in the park. The sun usually annoys me because of the fact it is so oppressive and pervading. It gets in your eyes, browns your skin, it gets everywhere!


 I tried to read a book entitled ‘The Story of Mankind’ but I couldn’t focus. Books like that don’t


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*It also rained the day Lucile killed herself. (Added Sunday 22nd February)



interest me and I honestly don’t know why I took it with me, or even, for that matter, bought it in the first place.


After the park, I visited Francois. She was picking her nose; she knows how much this infuriates me. Nose pickers are the lowest of the low. Added to that, she was reading last Wednesday’s TV Guide even though she knew it was a Monday. I don’t know why she did this. It got on my nerves because it was obviously just for attention. She’s been playing the ‘pseudo-senility’ card very frequently recently and she knows how much it annoys me. Why is she doing things just to aggravate me? She’s 94 - Francois should know what day it is! Furthermore, when I asked, she couldn’t even remember what she had for tea last night. 94 year olds don’t do this. From my experience they have impeccable memory. Francois is doing this on purpose and it is deeply annoying. All these cases of purposeful forgetfulness - not remembering the day, not remembering my intense loathing of bread knives &/c - is infuriating me. Centenarians are the fastest growing demographic group worldwide, growing 7 per cent each year according to some groups - so 94 is no age! I want to die long before I reach that age. With death comes peace and quiet and I cannot wait for this. But anyway, Francois’ purposeful forgetfulness is pushing me to the edge.


 NB: I must not visit her tomorrow – that will teach her.


I arrived home at 5 and had egg on toast for tea. The eggs were off.


Tuesday 24th February


Francois and I played scrabble today at precisely 5 o’clock. She beat me. I’ve never been any good at scrabble. That is all.


Thursday 26th February


From reading my previous entries, it has come to light that I am useless at this diary business. It started off so well - my first ever entry was very long indeed! I must endeavour to write something every day. Leaving out days is laziness and laziness is grim. I also need to write a lot more than I do, as it will only benefit me in the future. So here goes...


This morning I woke up at half past seven and I stretched out in my bed. My alarm hadn’t gone off yet, as I always set it for thirty two minutes past seven. I slept for another two minutes. Then my alarm went off. I stretched out again and went to my wardrobe. I picked out a pair of brown corduroy trousers and a plain white shirt. I did the buttons of the shirt and put it on. Then I pulled the trousers up and fastened the button on them too. I walked out of my room and went into the toilet. I needed a wee. I unbuttoned my trousers and fly and I had a wee. I did this for precisely thirty seconds – this is fairly long for me. I flushed the toilet and then fastened my trousers up again. I exited the bathroom at a slow pace. I walked along the landing and descended the stairs. I walked into the kitchen and turned the toaster on at the mains. I reached down to my left into the cupboard and picked up two pieces of bread. I put one of these pieces back as I decided I wasn’t hungry as I first thought. Then I


This last section is wrong! Wrong! Wrong! I could not possibly be able to write down everything that happens in my day. I would need to have a pen and paper with me all day long to enable that to be possible. I will just have to try and strike the right balance between writing excessive amounts and writing nothing. (NB: Must work on this!!!) Every narrator must omit things. These omissions often matter greatly to the story, but in this case they won’t because only I will be reading this. From now on, I will solely include the most important parts of my day. However, I must write a fairly substantial amount to appease my future self  (when you’re reading this back; I know you wanted me to write down absolutely everything I did in order to waste as much time of your life per day, but I hope you realise this is impossible, forgive me, I’m sorry).


I’m also ambivalent as to what the precise balance between recording feelings/emotions &/c. experienced and actual activities in the diary should be. I cannot fill every page with monotonous tasks, nor can I fill every page with reflections. Looking back over past entries, my thoughts on things have tended to dominate. This is a moot point, a very moot point. I will have to have a think and discover the right balance. In fact I think perhaps NB: No, this issue needs more time.


With regards to the day today, nothing actually happened. I know I promised I’d write down more but I simply cannot. It was a dull Thursday. I stayed in the house all day, watched television and played chess against myself. Francois will be sad I did not visit. I, too, am in a sombre mood.


Friday 27th February


February is a strange month. It was the Romans who forced it to have 28 days. However, the Roman Empire was dissipated almost 2000 years ago, so why does Roman hegemony still preside over this month?! It annoys me. February should rebel, although it is my belief that rebellion is a bad thing.


Mid-morning I went to the bistro that is close to my house. I like it. It is a quiet and unassuming place. I walked towards the counter and crossed the group of bohemians who always frequent it.  They get on my nerves. They sit there, sip lattes and discuss contemporary political economics. They are pretentious. Pretentiousness irritates me. I’ve decided that I wouldn’t make a very good bohemian. Politics has never interested me and I dislike coffee. I ordered tea and slumped down in my usual chair on the far corner of the room. The cafe is supposedly designed like a quaint Italian bistro, with signs reading: ‘Little Italy’ and ‘Where are the meatballs?!’ &/c. . I don’t know why this is the case. The manager has no link with Italy whatsoever. He grew a moustache once and claimed it was to honour his Italian roots, a day later I found out his entire family dating back 100 years was from the North of England.  Anyway, the cafe is designed in that way and that’s that.


I also went to the park and sat in the sun. I tried to read that book again but I simply couldn’t and so I did nothing bar stare into space. I picked my nose incessantly and came out with some interesting things. I don’t know why I do it, it’s force of habit I guess and I’ve done it since I was a kid. Those squiggly black lines that move across your line of vision when you look at something for too long in the sunshine began to appear; another reason why I dislike the sun! Vitreous floaters they call them. These lines represent meaning in my life - every time I tried to focus on them and examine them, they escaped me. I do nothing but the same things every day. I don’t even exist. I just am.


When did I become a ghost? I do not live my life. I haunt this earth.


I miss Lucia.


Saturday 28th February


It is the last day of February. February should have more days. The Romans are long gone.

I didn’t do anything again today. I need a hobby. I have always wanted to get into model aeroplanes but everything gets incredibly messy and the glue goes everywhere. Perhaps model railways would be more to my taste; there is after all a certain pleasure in watching a piece of plastic circle over and over in concentric rings. I’ll leave it up to you to decide whether that final sentence was ironic or not.


Sunday 1st March


I wish she was still here.


Tuesday 3rd March


Another year, another March. March is a grim month, not for any particular reason; it is just a drab time of the year. A general note about today to drag out this entry out a bit more: Spring starts to think about beginning to emerge. Spring travels, on average, at the speed of a third of a mile per hour - this is based on how long it takes Spring to advance in the UK, from the South to the North. This is interesting, yet superfluous and thus pointless.


There has been a breakthrough, however. I think I have decided that my feeling and thoughts take precedent over actual activities and that I will note down emotions more than my actions for my pleasure in the future. I fulfil monotonous actions each day, whereas I think (remotely) different thoughts and therefore it will hopefully make this diary more interesting when I come back to read it. Besides, I think I’m almost of the belief that that is precisely what a diary should be for. I had a history teacher who once described a diary as: ‘the outward catharsis of the inner self’.  Having said this, a satisfaction for this definition’s aptness emanated from within him and he declared: ‘fuck me. I’m gonna write that down’. He never did write that down, although I suppose I have now performed that task for him. Diaries should be for thoughts and actions equally, but since my actions are at the pinnacle of mundane, I should report my emotions more than my actions. I’m glad this has been resolved. I like things to be straightforward. Problematical things frustrate me. Most things frustrate me. Life frustrates me.


I visited Francois today. Her son passed away the other week. Yet, Francois seemed upbeat and I was glad. Death is not a bad thing; death is not a scary thing. Death is merely an indifferent thing. When people complain about having to die, I think to myself that we also have to live. Living is harder than death. Death is just like falling asleep and doesn’t involve effort. Life, on the other hand, does. In this sense, death will be a relief for me. I’m not apathetic. Many things in life make me happy, chess for example. We played chess today in fact; Francois wanted a change from scrabble and I like chess. I am good at chess. I won. This made her upset. She hates losing. It’s safe to say she was sadder about that loss than she was about losing her son. That’s only natural, chess is a passionate game. This is not a bizarre way of seeing the world. More people should be like this.


I came home after I had been to her house and enjoyed some opera on the radio.

 


Wednesday 4th March


I’m getting much better at this diary writing thing, recent entries have been a good standard and a good length! Despite there being some anomalously short ones, I deserve congratulations for my improvement! Apologies for the gaps in days, it’s not that I’m too busy to write, far from it. I just don’t like thinking full stop. It’s better to wish your life away because life is stressful. Death is a pleasant and hassle free ordeal  experience, but I have a while to go until I reach it (unfortunately).


Someone once asked me if I would consider suicide. The answer is yes I would. However, I couldn’t jump off a building because I’m scared of heights; motorcars infuriate me and I will not let them win by destroying me before I have even had a chance to destroy one of them; I’m allergic to needles (or I’m told so anyway) and my oven is an electric one. So in effect, I’d be very partial to suicide - anything to speed this slow numbing throb of life up - but the physical constraints are ridiculously inexorable (can inexorable be used in this way?). I’d commit suicide if I could; maybe I have to think about this. (NB: Think about this?) It’s funny, the person who asked this question was hell bent on suicide. They wanted nothing more than to seize control of their mortality. They used to talk of it all the time, day in day out. Suicide dominated my relations with them. This person was Lucile.


Back to today, Francois did not recognise me. This depressed me, if I even have any realistic grasp of what that word means. She did this on purpose in my opinion and it perturbed me. I kept being referred to as Derek - whoever that is. Why does she keep pretending she forgets things? Is she secretly against me? I plucked her armpit hair today and made her lunch. She claimed that she had forgotten how to use the hob. I’m thinking she is taking advantage of me. She has always been very independent and there is no way she would forget these things. Why is she trying to annoy me so?


I was going to try and catch a Bergman film at the cinema in the late afternoon. I left Francois at 4 o’clock and the film didn’t begin until half past 5. This dismayed me because an hour and a half is an annoyingly difficult amount of time to kill - it’s either too short or too long! I considered going to the cafe but there are too many people there in the afternoon. I don’t really like being amidst crowds. It’s strange. Someone once called me a misanthrope. I never remember what this word actually means. ‘Try to conquer the dictionary one word at a time’ is what they say. This will never happen. For the future, I have included a definition of the word below. When reading this diary back learn it so you remember it and life will be better than it is right now (!):




‘mis·an·thrope, also mis·an·thro·pist

n.

One who hates or mistrusts humankind.’ (OED)


So misanthropy is what I was condemned to by this particular person. I don’t think this is an apt definition of me. I hate how people always label things. I am not anything. I dislike and like everything, not just humanity. It is life that is the problem. Besides, I’m a fairly upbeat person. I’m often content and this obviously makes me an optimist, right? (If this isn’t what an optimist is, excuse me. I’m not good with words as you know.)


I didn’t go and see that film in the end; I went home and fell asleep.


Thursday 4th March


Francois didn’t recognise me again today. Is she trying to cut me out of her life? I must see her less regularly. Maybe that will help make her realise how much she needs me. Rather depressingly, I need her too. She almost defines my existence these days. I have no other human contact and I live solely for her. This is a grim thought. I’ll go to bed on this thought.


Friday 5th March


Today is the 64th day of the year (65th in leap years). The following people were born on this date in the mid-Twentieth Century (to name a few):


I’m saying all this because nothing happened today, it is hopefully a substitute for my lack of writing.* Usually when I don’t write very much it’s because I’m feeling down. Maybe I’ll get an ice cream later on.


Saturday 6th March


I wanted to go to the beach today but I couldn’t be bothered so I went to see Francois. She kept calling me David. This is infuriating me. She’s doing it on purpose. I even had to remind her who the Queen was! Why why why is she being like this?! She’s lucky I go to see her. I was about to say ‘she’s lucky she’s got me’ then, but nobody ever belongs to anyone in this world. We’re all individual - Individually alone.


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*Lucia also killed herself a year ago today. (Added Saturday 6th March)



I left her house in a foul mood and headed over to a bar for a drink. I had a shot of vodka. I haven’t had any alcohol for a while (since a few months after Lucia killed herself in fact). It had no effect on me. Nothing seems to these days.


After this I went home and had beans on toast for tea.


Sunday 7th March


Cereal for breakfast.  It was nice.


Francois didn’t remember me again.


Wednesday 10th March


It has almost been a week since Francois recognised me. Convinced she is doing this on purpose.


Saturday 13th March


Will anybody remember Lucia after I’m gone? Did anybody remember me after she went? I’ve been practically dead for a long time - way before the bread knife incident (thanks again Francois!).


Sunday 14th March


I have had a great breakthrough! I have thought of a suitable way of killing myself that is practical! This is good news. I will slit my neck! Slitting your wrist isn’t full proof. Neck is, surely? Perhaps I should give this some more consideration. Life is boring and painful and I dislike it immensely.


Also, diary writing skill has gone down the pan! ‘Must try harder’!


Monday 15th March


I went to the library for the first time in a while today. All literature is the same nowadays, nothing is new. This has some scholarly impetus - academics believe there are seven basic plots and every story is just a reinterpretation of one of those. In the 1970s there was a massive critical movement regarding the ‘death of the author’. Originality has disappeared and new translations of previous ideas are what literature has become. Everything is the same. However, this transcends literature. This transcends life. Everything is the same, from politics to sport. Everything has been done and people desperately try to create originality out of nothing. It cannot happen. It is exceptionally paradoxical: in this great technological age when there has never been such an abundance of choice and variety, everything is the same.


Life has ceased to be even remotely exciting. It’s shit.


I’m going to do it.


Tuesday 16th March


Got extremely drunk today, then realised how vacuous it was, so sobered up.


I’m down. Very down.


Wednesday 17th March


I’ll do it tomorrow.


God definitely doesn’t exist. Neither do I.


Thursday 18th March


It seems apt today that Francois has completely ceased to have any grasp of anything at all, least of all who I am. She can’t remember anything anymore and by ‘anything’ I mean literally anything. Perhaps she has something wrong with her. They say there is a disease that makes you lose your memory and eventually go insane. Perhaps I have this? No, impossible. My memory is brilliant. But alas yes, perhaps she has something wrong with her. Although, it is more likely that she is probably just an exceptional actress. She’s doing it on purpose.


Anyway, this is it. Take this last entry as my ‘suicide note’ if you will. Although I hope nobody reads it. It is pointless. It contains nothing. We are only animals, ‘humanity’ is a merely an odd label. We have no significance. We die, then fifty years later we are forgotten about. There is no point in living. There is no point in dying. There is no point in existence. There is no meaning in life. There is no meaning of life. Does this even matter? No. Nothingness pervades life. Nothingness transcends life. Nothingness is the only thing that matters.


Sorry, I should be quiet now, I am always bitchy.


Remember: death requires no effort, life does. I can’t wait to be at peace. Perhaps I’ll see her.


Saturday 21st March


I sat up thinking all last night and I have decided I don’t want to write in this anymore. Sorry. Forgive me.


Exeunt.

Alex Smith