Something Unusual: Michael’S Collection of Short Stories

By Michael Montero

This is it, years had passed when I started writing these stories. Never had I imagined these could still be produced into a book. It has been forgotten for years and was kept inside a folder in my office. With your support, I am now able to fulfill everything which I thought I could no longer do, Thank you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Jun 28, 2018
• ISBN: 9781546294047

Michael Montero

Michael Montero was born in Madrid, Spain on the 4th of June. A true Gemini thrives in the inspiration given as a precious gift by the Gemini Sign. Writing comes effortlessly. By nature Michael lives in a planet without boundaries. His first book MANOLO A CHILD IN THE SPANISH CIVIL WAR is now republished with the title WAR NIGHTMARES which can be bought all over the world. There are some two hundred short stories and performance pieces yet to be published. Michael studied at the Cervantes Institute in Madrid before entering University. Came to live in England on an autumnal October day and made London his home. Authors other books: Maddison War Nightmares Pesadillas De La Guerra

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© 2017 Michael Montero. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 06/19/2018

ISBN: 978-1-5462-9405-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-9404-7 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

A Final Act of Friendship

A March Dream

A Mysterious Encounter

A True Story

Bus Stop

Carmina

Iguana in the Basement

Interlude

Journey to Paradise

La Cucaracha

Love is Not Forever

Lunch at Polvoroni’s

Sadness & Dice Die

Sadness

Saved by the Bell

Talking Through My Hat I

Talking Through My Hat Ii

The Dreaded To-morrow

The Editor

The Festive Season

The Holiday

The Importance Of Being a Parrot

The Last of Tommy Wallace

The Light Across the Trees

The Lovers

The Net

The Party

The Reader

The Reading Glasses

The Red Dress

The Sickle

DEDICATION

A man needs a woman that supports, that cares and that loves him fully without asking something in return. I am just so lucky I have someone like you, to Maria Cristina Antunes, this will never be materialize if it’s not because of you. Thank you for coming into my life when I needed someone to look after me. Thank you for staying by my side despite the several agony and thank you for the hard work and the dedication. This is it, years had passed when I started writing these stories. Never had I imagined these could still be produced into a book. It has been forgotten for years and was kept inside a folder in my office. With your support, I am now able to fulfill everything which I thought I could no longer do, Thank you.

A Final Act of

Friendship

Alec dropped the corpse onto the bed after removing the blanket in which he had wrapped it, arranged his head on the pillow, covered him with the duvet, pulled his mobile out of his pocket and keyed nine, nine, nine.

Then he sat on an easy chair at the foot of the bed looking at Charlie’s corpse, stiff. Immobile. With the imprint of a life that was.

Deep in thought he wondered how long the police would be.

‘No one will ever know’, he told himself, or rather he whispered to himself as if somebody else was doing the talking. Strange the surprises that can spring out of the hidden corners of the unexpected.

He was relieved that things had gone so well. So easily for him. He had been in a cold sweat many times during the journey but at last he was home and dry.

Charlie’s room was bright and colourful, more the setting for a teenager than for an eighty five year old man. But Charlie had always been young. At heart. And even in old age he had been supremely fit and vigorous.

Alec waited impatiently for the police to arrive. They were taking their time. Understandable after what he had told them. Not difficult to arrive at a logical conclusion. Why rush.? There was no point. He pondered. Had he reported a fight, an attack on somebody whose life was at stake, they would have come full speed ahead sirens blowing the traffic away from their path. But there was no danger. No fight. No violent attack. No life at stake.

He felt increasingly tired. After all, he had been driving for many hours. Solidly. That was enough to render anybody tired to the point of being drained of all energy, that made him feel the need to sleep beyond control. In spite of the fatigue of driving there was the agony of being caught that helped him in the struggle to fight off sleep.

It was late evening. The daylight a tenuous glimmer, a poor reflection of the streetlights filtering through the uncurtained window. In this setting the ambiance acquired a macabre appearance robbing the room of its colour and brightness.

Alec began to question the wisdom of his actions. Remorse started to creep into his system. What impelled him to do what he had done? There was really no need. He recognized that his mind must, somehow, have stopped working a fraction of time for his impulsiveness to compel him to act the way he did. He blamed his erratic quick temper. His inability to restrain his own impulses that had always been in his blood like poison. All that had really been unnecessary. A waste. But there was no going back now. What was done was done. Now a simple question had taken over his mind. How could he have been so very stupid? He wished he could put the clock back. But that was impossible.

Luckily there was no blood. Not externally anyhow. Putting the body in the Countryman had not been easy. Charlie weighed a ton and when he covered him with a sleeping bag he realized how tall he was. No doubt the quickness of his action had been a helpful ally. Had he delayed his plan, rigor mortis would have set in and then, carrying the body from Charlie’s room on the third floor of the hotel where he was staying, would have been an even more difficult operation.

Alec’s thoughts travelled back to the short holiday in Spain with Charlie. Why did it have to end in tragedy? Quite incomprehensible!

Sleep overpowered him. Worry woke him several times, like an interrupted journey into night and as the evening progressed there was no sign of the police.

Had he dreamt it all? Had he dreamt driving Charlie’s corpse in the back of his Countryman on a journey that lasted almost two days all the way to England in a supreme effort to get away from the Spanish police? He trembled at the thought of being caught in a situation that no one would have believed. A situation that undoubtedly would have ended up in a deportation order, a summary trial by jury and a prison sentence long enough to end his days behind bars. He bit his knuckles with a mixture of rage and despair. He had been a fool and for once he trembled with fear.

During the whole length of the journey he had thought of a feasible story to tell the authorities on his return to England. A story he thought was really full proof. A story that no one would question since it was so much like the truth. But now that the arrival of the police was imminent, now that fatigue had won the better of him, he felt different. He would tell the truth. Make a detailed confession. And to hell with the consequences.

Evening turned into night and still no sign of the police.

He keyed nine, nine, nine again.

Soon after he heard a car stop outside the house, foot steps on the drive, a key in the front door lock and a voice calling:

‘Charlie? Alec, are you back already?’

It was Graham’s voice, a mutual friend who had volunteered to feed Charlie’s tropical fish while he was away on holiday.

He climbed the stairs and entered Charlie’s room before Alec could prepare him for the shock.

‘Is Charlie not well?’ he asked looking towards the bed.

‘No, Graham, Charlie is dead’, he said sadly.

‘But how? What happened?’

Alec took a deep breath.

‘On the morning of our return to England I found Charlie dead in his hotel room. You can imagine the shock! He must have died shortly before my arrival. Was still warm. It would have broken my heart to leave him there on his own. Besides having to contend with the formalities of the Spanish authorities and all that. Plus eventually the body would have to be shipped over to this Country I couldn’t stand the thought of Charlie returning to England in a body bag. So I wrapped him in a blanket and laid him at the back of the Countryman and drove all the way here as fast as I could.’

Graham could not believe his ears. And although he realized the foolishness of his friend’s actions, made no comment.

‘I know that this can land me in a lot of trouble and I’m prepared to pay for it’

Graham looked at his friend with compassion.

‘He must have died of natural causes’

‘I suppose so. The cause of death doesn’t really matter. What matters is that we are going to miss him.’

‘Did anybody see you taking Charlie to the Countryman?’

‘No. It was very early in the morning. Nobody about. Also Charlie’s room was near the rear stairs leading to the car park. That made things considerably easy.’

‘What about the hotel bill?’

‘Settled the previous night.’

It did not take Graham long to appraise the situation. Alec had acted as a friend would in similar circumstances, provided he had his impulsiveness.

‘No one needs to know that Charlie died in Spain unless you tell them.’

A comforting thought that made Alec reconsider what to tell the police.

At long last they arrived. No sound of siren. No flashing blue light.

Two sympathetic police officers. They observed the sadness on the friend’s faces.

‘Not very pleasant to find somebody dead’, the officer in charge commented after a brief introduction. ‘I’ll need to take a statement.’

Alec braced himself.

‘There’s very little I can tell you. I came to visit my friend earlier on and I found him dead. There’s really nothing else I can say.’

The two friends exchanged glances. A final act of friendship they both thought.

Michael 21.5.2000 1320 words. @All rights reserved.

A March Dream

Last night I had a dream and as often happens it turned into a nightmare. But this dream was no ordinary one, in the sense that when I wake, it is forgotten. Neither it was a usual kind of journey into the unknown under the cover of nebulous consciousness that allows me moments of happiness or suffering. My March trail into the unconscious was not a new adventure but a RECURRENT ONE. One that I have gone through before many times invariably pacing on the same avenues, surrounded by the same veil of fog, by the identical muffled echoes of words that I can hear but not understand.

It is a mid afternoon in March when I border the underground to see a notary who has prepared a power of attorney to confer administration powers to a family member in Madrid where I have inherited a large farm in my mother’s village. This notary has his office in Hammersmith that is uncharted territory for me. The tube is not crowded and we set off to an uneventful journey. The monotonous rhythm of its progress releases a soporific influence that embraces me like an invisible mantel with all the comfort of a rocking chair and I drift into sleep.

An announcement over the loud speakers echoes through the train. An unwelcome message of a bomb scare. Therefore the train will pass Hammersmith without stopping. This was not unexpected in my dream.

An old lady, who I had not seen before, perhaps in her sixties, sits next to me. She looks calm and because of the circumstances we talk. She is going to the Charring Cross Hospital to visit her husband who has recently had a new valve inserted in his heart. I suggest that we make the way to our destination together.

Her name is Veronica who shivers under the moderate breeze that accompany us as we walk half of the way, as we travel by bus that heads to Hammersmith through solid traffic. The slow moving mass of vehicles for which the bomb scare and the hour of the day are responsible. Soon the bus stops. It cannot go beyond where the scare might become an explosion that will take lives, injure bodies. I can see a police cordon in the short distance. The largest policemen I have ever seen. Lots of Alsatians all tied to their handlers’ wrists with something that looks like a metallic chain in a leather guard. A helicopter appears in the sky. The noise of the rotors is now heard above that of an almost silent multitude.

I worry about Veronica who continues to shiver, whose voice leaves her throat as a fractured kind of waterfall of words most of them inaudible others unrecognisable. I take her hand. We are now by the cordon. A large dog less policeman stops us. I explain our need to get to the hospital. A look at Veronica and he escort us to the very entrance door.

Must have a coffee or something hot and a bun or something sweet for a quick replenishing of our energy. Veronica smiles. The smile of she