Angels, Fools and Horses

By RoyGee Symonds

This novel is to the greater extent based on true facts; the story of a life; the names have been changed to protect the guilty. A great romance unfurls, bringing a Passionate and Riveting Steamy Erotic Romance. A New Jersey investigative reporter finds out what true life, sex and

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookTrail Publishing
• Release date: May 19, 2022
• ISBN: 9781637677759

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Copyright © 2022 by RoyGee Symonds

Paperback: 978-1-63767-774-2

eBook: 978-1-63767-775-9

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022903894

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

This book is a work of fiction. People, places, events, and situations are the products of the authors imagination. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or historical events, are purely coincidental.

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Time, Distance & Speed

IT WAS A TIME, no not a Time; there was no time, only Distance and Speed. Distance that was infinite and Speed that was unbelievable. Relativity was not relative here.

I was somewhere waiting, I am somewhere waiting. It is hard to wait when there is no time. I was on an old dusty country road, in North America it seemed, right in the middle of fields of beautiful swaying wheat and corn. The wheat went on for miles and miles and the old road disappeared into a never ending distance, both ways. Was I waiting? The sky was vast and incredibly blue but there was a bright yellow hue all around me, maybe a reflection from the corn.

Colored Birds

I WAS STILL WAITING or maybe I was there in some eternal everlasting existence I did not fully understand. I could see birds, pretty colored birds flying around in the vast sky, and small animals scurrying around among this everlasting crop, but I was also bathed in a total silence. It was a place of serene calm.

I drifted forward some, and up the road a bit there was an old building on the left, it looked like an old gas-station from the 1930’s. It was an iconic scene I felt I had seen a hundred times.

This must be some nice dream I surmised, one I have probably had before, I’ll wakesoon somewhere. But where? And will I remember this delight, this calm serenity that hugged me close?

I can hear a horse galloping, and far off Banjo playing.

Hello!

A voice echoing comes out of the ether.

I turn and it is an old man.

Hello.

I say back and I know the man.

Tim?

The old man was maybe not that old he just had long hair and a long beard, and was smirking and gently shaking his head, as if pleased to see me. He was dressed in long flowing white robes, as was I.

Hello, Clarke, we’ve been waiting, we need you.

Tim Finn, is that you, so great to see you man, has it been so long?

We don’t know, how long just gets in the way.

Thank you.

I countered. …I continued.

Tim, you remember what you said to me when I lost Davina?

Yes, and was it true?

Well we’re here, aren’t we?

Are we here, or am I just a character in someone’s crazy dream?

I gently shook my head.

Come with me Clarke we must go.

BlackHorse

AT THAT, we drifted off forward up the road, faster and faster, and then we were on two large white stallions, riding along the road, faster and faster. We reached amazing speeds and Tim just smiled. I looked to my left at the miles of crops flying past. And then beside me on another huge white horse was a beautiful young woman. She placed out her hand and we held hands. She smiles a perfect smile.

Hello Daddy, do you still love me?

Sweet words echoed round my mind, I struggled to know who this child was but I knew I loved her with every fiber of my soul.

Then we slowed and up ahead there were three others also on giant horses.

My God, it was my aunty Doris whom I had lost, to Spirit, was it many years ago, or had I just seen her yesterday?

But I was not a child so I reflected on when she died and how happy she was, looking forward to that great journey; great adventures that lie before her, she hoped.

With her was a Nun, and another old man. Aunty looked quite young and the Nun looked so beautiful, bathed in an aura of brightness that surrounded her.

Aunty Doris, smiling, whispered hello, and the old man, who rode a magnificent black horse, spoke.

Hello Clarke, we need your help here, stay close.

It was Mr. Jones, God! I knew him also, Mr. Jones? Did I know a Mr. Jones?

Before I knew it Mr. Jones raced off and we followed at a remarkable pace, the never- ending wheat fields flew past, I did not care to wonder where we were going it just felt so great racing along, at an unbelievable velocity. The whipping wind took my breath away and my daughter smiled at me, and reached out and squeezed my hand tightly.

But I felt it darken, all around me was getting shadowy, the fields were cooler, not so bright a yellow and the sky was more of a drab dreary grey. I could see fleeting glimpses of people, the dead-like walking, or standing in the fields, like lost souls wandering or waiting where time did not exist, looking at me, with a deep longing, looking for an answer.

No birds flew in the sky, no creature stirred, my heart became heavy.

Up ahead there were then high mountains that grew in stature at every hoof-beat and then in an instant we were stopped. We were in front of the mouth of a huge cavern entrance, a gapping mouth that stood a thousand feet high, and a hundred feet across. The crops here were dead or dying and it was again indeed silent. So silent.

Without voice the girl, who declared I was her father, and my old friend had to stay and protect this entrance. The Nun spoke out calling to our God, the Holy Spirit, blessing us all and prayed that we were safe and protected from all that was evil. It crossed my mind, why was there evil?

We ventured into the deeper darkness of this large gaping cavernous fissure. Was the Heaven or was it Hell?

We tore off flying now even deeper into the darkness and the depths of this great dank cavern that gradually narrowed to a cave. Then we halted again and I felt my chest tighten and wondered if I would need to breathe. But whilst I felt fearful, I felt protected, by those in my midst.

Mr. Jones told the Nun and my aunt to take me with them. Dismounting in a second, gliding we hurtled racing forward and then descended diving deeply downward into a darkened damp chasm, an abyss. I became more fearful but up ahead was a magnificent bright light; a pure light that was excitingly provoking but also calming. We slowed and the magnificence became a person. In a voice that had a gentle echo Doris spoke to me in my mind.

Clarke this is your Angel, she was your Earthly protector and guide, her name is Ariel Augustina, and she loves you so much.

The Cosmos

I WAS WITHOUT SPEECH, as I was overwhelmed in every way you could imagine, but I was calmed and at such peace, tears filled my eyes and Ariel whispered to me.

We are here to seek and find poor lost souls, your work begins here.

Again I could say nothing but knew everything I needed to know about everything. All the answers in all that we call the Cosmos were mine to own, I just had to open my mind and heart.

Death was a gamble; we can be as good as we might. Death can take the measure of us when we pass, but many souls are not placed where they deserve. Some are trapped on Earth, some end up in Hellish regions that are dark, damp, scary and full of terrors.

The Angel seemed to bless us with Love and Hope; with a prayer to protect us against what enemies and fears were before us; her vivid brilliance glowed all the more brighter. We three warriors, without our steeds, drifted downwards further into the dark damp and the dank depths of I do not know where, lest this was Hell. I was petrified. Aunty Doris told me this was a Hell but not a Hell where the real pain and evil and hate were.

We would not dare go too deep for fear that we become entangled in a hateful malicious immoral malevolence that would take us and we would then be lost in nowhere and perhaps only a God’s power could find us. I wondered why there had to be hate.

We three reached a point, it was breathlessly dark but I could see, maybe through instinct alone. It was eerily silent interrupted only by distant and disconcerting screams of pain or groans of grief-filled despair and regret.

The Nun then told me to stop and safeguard a strategic point whilst she and Doris went boldly deeper into this cold damp stench. My way of thinking had changed.

She told me that if I was to see anyone, any lost soul, and if they were here they would indeed be lost, I should pray hard for myself, pray for mine own protection and then pray for them. I would know what to do. I felt proud of Doris and her Mother Nun, what courage they must have.

Soon I was alone, in a place that was the most disturbing, I think I had ever experienced, it was so dark. Distant whimpers made the hairs on my neck stand up.

I then heard a sound, a groan and a young man called out in pain, he was just ahead, but was embodied in the rock; he was part of it, captured and unable to break free.

Hello.

I whispered.

But all he did was whisper back in an incessant prayer like gibberish.

Bismillah hajj. Ya saeiduni Allah

I tried to reach out and touch him, but I could not. Something stopped me. In my mind I was praying hard, fear shrouded me.

Then further into this evil and vile tunnel, I felt hands grasping out to touch me, I heard a female child’s cry. I drifted towards her pleas of help.

There before me was young girl seemingly about twelve years old, but she looked older, pretty with blonde hair, she too was trapped inexplicably in the stone-work.

Hello

I whispered again.

She slowly looked up at me and I heard her in pained hushed tones speak.

Hello, where am I? Why is it so dark and cold?

Shhhhh, it is okay, who are you?

My name is Davina, I think, I was named after a great Aunt, I think.

Davina? Davina? . . . . How old are you?

Memories flashed threw my minds, a thousand pictures all at once.

I’m not sure, where are we, I’m all mixed up but I was born 8th July 2088, ……. I think.

What? …… 2088?

I enquired, feeling a bit mixed up myself.

I’m about 12, today’s a special day, it’s 01/01/01, first day of the year and it’s a new century; we did it at school today, sorry, I don’t feel well.

Crying she threw up. I could not make sense of it all; my instinct was to consider that the year 2101 was far in the future, and was I now really in some dream or nightmare. It took my breath and I was a fifteen-year old boy again worried about the unknown and life and everything being so complex.

The hairs stood up on the back of my neck again, I was being stroked by mysterious hands and a shudder went down my back.

My God, 2101, really; what? What are you doing here child?

I don’t know but that big horrid man was hurting me, he was touching me, and then my daddy shot him.

What? ….. What man?

She pointed and to her right was a disgustingly large equally trapped evil-looking man that growled and stretched out quickly to grab her.

She screamed and inexplicably I pushed him back into the rock with my mind. I then grabbed at the child and she was, before I knew it, released and in my arms and safe, I would hope. Her innocence protected her and this location was no place for her purity.

My Friends

I WAS SCARED and emotions flushed through me in waves and I felt timid. The voices and moans got more incessant. I gripped this child closer to protect her, her innocence felt serenely good and virtuous and this gave me a renewed strength. I moved away from the darkness and in the far off distance I could see a light.

I did not know what to do but at that point I could hear strange noises and echoing screams and a crazy yellings and before I knew it the child and I were scooped up and carried along in a moving torrent of energy, light and wind. My friends were back.

We were escaping I do not know what, but I wondered why we were fleeing for our souls, why is there always hatred and loathing that we need to flee, in life, and death?

In an instant we were all back on our trusty steeds flying towards the light, my angel at the rear defending us.

We tore into the brighter light, and we were happy and people or long lost souls flew from us like escaping white doves, into the light.

I was on an old dusty country road, in North America, it seemed, right in the middle of fields of beautiful swaying wheat.

The Sky was Vast

THE SWAYING WHEAT went on for miles and miles and the old road disappeared into a never ending distance, both ways. Was I waiting?

The sky was vast and fantastically blue but there was a bright yellow hue; a warmth all around me, maybe a reflection from the wheat, and the infinite fields of corn.

I was at peace.

Death Row Prisoner

I STIRRED from my peaceful thoughts and dreams of Heaven and took a really deep breath, and waking, I remembered.

Today is a particular day in history, a noteworthy day where the world might end, or Jesus might come back for a second attempt. As I hear the far off distant toll of a bell hitting its twelfth beat a new day had begun.

I know it is the start of 12-12-12; a Wednesday, it is one of those special dates, that we would always like to be born on, as we could spend our life nonchalantly telling people this simple fact, as if we were something out of the ordinary.

Outwardly, 12, a benign number that labels many human concepts, from a dozen eggs and the hours of day and night, to the days of Christmas. The astrological signs; 12/12/12 might be an important day today for some but I know it will just be a day of the same old shit I had been suffering for so long now.

This triple number date will not happen again until next century, and will occur again on 1st January 2101, or on 01/01/01. God, I will be long gone by then but what will or where will I be on 01/01/01, I wonder? Ghostly Dust to Dust?

Nevertheless, even though there is a tiny bit of hope in my heart as to what this day will hold, it is the winter of my discontent and the icy wind of a cold American night echoes in my mind; but then, these far off distant cries make me feel safe in my comfortably warm and secure chamber.

All the same, as I lie here, wading through my life, I can only feel despair as I know perceptibly that all I have now, my only possessions that matter, are my memories; all my life consists of, are the mulls that I visit every moment of every day.

My psyche is now only full of long forgotten sadness, and memories of long lost sex. Sex is great but it is only truly appreciated at the time of the act. Though I am now truly celibate sex was a skill I always had. And of course I know my name at least that will always be mine, after losing everything else.

Death Row Prisoner 331259 Bethlem, Clark Bethlem, a two time jail-term loser; a fool; distantly related to Jack Kennedy and one of the all American boys, who was in the year of our Lord 1953, actually born on the 4th of July, also now, ex-writer, ex-lover, ex- bouncer, ex-investigative star reporter, and nonetheless now a potential novelist, I am now, more importantly ex-human; dead man walking.

The hardest part of any story, or novel, for a writer anyway, is actually starting. This book started as a note to my tailor. I could always knock out three thousand, highly descriptive words of crap a day, and was okay once I got going; I was fine; I can do this all day, but starting is the obstruction.

I have been for the better part of my life, not the longer part but easily the better part, an investigative journalist in Atlantic City, New Jersey, USA; even though I and my dad always wanted me to work for the President, which, for him, disappointedly never happened. Atlantic City is a resort city in Atlantic County, New Jersey; famously known for its casinos, boardwalks and beaches.

One of my testimonial aims, just like you, was to write about my life by writing a book; the good, the sad and the ugly. Everyone wants to write a book about their life or whatever, just as at least one good memory, or achievement.

In between my journalist working hours, I would answer the odd bit of fan-mail I would get; letters from nut-jobs; women who wanted to marry me, and some from old girlfriends, most told me that they hoped I would get all that I deserved, but then some were quite sweet. Here I would put by best writing to the test.

Of course, if you are expecting prose of intellectual stature or philosophical verse worthy of Plato, then forget it. Stop reading this rant and sex filled tirade now. Use this book as a door stop, or to level a table, as all it will do is to take you deep into realms of your own depravity, sex and despair, and the occult.

I will tell you all about Fucking, in some great grotesque way only of a few of us know.

Did you know that Fucking was an Austrian Village, 33 kilometers north of Salzburg?

You could not make it up.

I am just an old writer wanting to put my ramblings down, before the US government kills me off, and as I struggle to recall nearly five decades of life data. I know my life is leaking away, drip by drip; so every day is precious, every moment sacred. One day, one time soon I will come into contact with my last drip.

The book that you are now reading could, should be imagined as if it was a film; I, like you, always wanted to write a script for a film and maybe one day this may become some obscure cult porn or occult movie, seen only in seedy venues, or on the Interweb.

Elyse Partridge

MY OLD AND DEAR FRIEND Elyse Partridge had donated an old small rammed computer that I had in my cell. I have been writing this book for some time now and my daily obsession is reading through it, adding bits, removing bits shaping it by remembering instances that meant so much to me; reliving my life, as you do. Remembering lovers.

A man has to be quick; as soon I may not have a chance to do anything more. God help us.

No more time to fine tune it further, or to get it printed out so that it might be read, by a passer-by in some library and not just held in the memory of my computer and cast out in the trash, as they clear my cell. Death looms as punishment for my crime. A crime that was not of my making and not by my hand, I believe, as the act eludes me.

Elyse was an old boss and an old love, she was a bit older than me and I often wonder if I should have cultivated our relationship further, as she always had money and would have always looked after me, and I would definitely not be here now.

She was a woman, a whole woman, she smelled so good, so clean, and she was so so soft but also so firm in all the right places.

She was probably, is, my longest friend in my whole life, from when I was a rookie hack, producing routine unoriginal writing for the newspaper she ran, until now; she told me if you have written a really good piece, or you were in deep shit, you would see a 60 Minutes News team waiting in your office, or cell maybe.

Mr. D. J. Fosset MA

IF A MAN would write this book for anyone though, it would be for Mr. Daniel James Fosset. An old English teacher, I would have to, because he never ever subjected me to his own personal bias. He was cool and sadly dead now but he liked my writing and announced that I had a unique style.

This I liked because I always felt most uncommon at the best of times.

He told me that one-day I would be able to write for a living, so to help me, as I often hallucinate lots of shit, and often see people and animals not there, I picture him sitting quietly up the corner of my cell, it will be him that I am talking to. The rest of you keep it down.

The figments of the imagination, my memories and my old teacher were the only real company I had, except for the horses that pounded in my migrained head and the monkeys on my back, that pulled at my hair; little black demons, mad malicious fools that had been with me since I was a child, and of course the angels in my thoughts, no, in my hurting heart. God help us.

I must have been about thirteen when I first met old Daniel, I was in a big school and you could not know everyone.

Anyway, it was best to keep your head down and not be noticed most of the time.

I always thought I was never any good at English; I mostly knew the American version and this apparently turned out to be somewhat different to the real thing.

Using any excuse to put it out there, I rebelled about this and thought it quite an indignity to conform to rules emanating from another country, especially as we were God-damn Americans and the Bethlems, my family were probably mostly Scottish, so why weren’t we speaking Scottish?

Besides, when I tried to write nobody ever told me that I had any merit, they just cussed about the bad grammar and the misspellings.

So I just plodded on and mused on mathematics, if that was the word. Anyway old Danny-Boy saw through the bad spelling and the smudged ink, he saw a talent. The only talent I thought I ever had was to be as obnoxious and weird as I could, to deter the cool wedgie-givers getting too close.

In fact, I was being particularly obnoxious to a smaller and younger guy than me, when this voice boomed over the commotion of recess, for me to go and see him. The whole yard stopped, as if life had been put on pause by God; everyone’s heart stopped, nobody dared to breathe, everybody excitedly wondered if they were the ones in trouble and if not, who was.

That overused but great German word ‘shite’, that Mr. Fosset often used when discussing someone’s homework, immediately came to my mind and I thought that my new English teacher was going to share a few great words of his own with me, just for picking on some four-eyed geek that had no right to be protected by anyone.

Sweated Ours Lives Away

"BETHLEM! That is your name boy?" He bellowed in that singing, booming great voice that he had.

Um! Yes sir. I whispered in contrast, eyes squinting and my body stooping over in acquiescence. Giggles rippled around the yard as I scurried toward him, everyone breathed that sigh of relief.

Apparently he was Welsh by birth and had a funny English accent and was not slow in telling us boys what a bunch of gangly girls we were.

And purely because we had not sweated our lives away in some coal mine in Wales, as his father had done.

Inside the class, he asked.

This is your work, Bethlem? He inquired.

I had never had anything I had done before referred to quite how he put it. Nevertheless, I was more than happy that the four-eyed geek I was picking on had not gotten me into trouble after all.

But I was in a quandary why did he not just scrawl on the bottom of this work what he had thought of it, just like every other educator I had met, and not drag me away from my real work in life; hurting little people.

This is quite good boy, quite pleased, I am.

He said. I smiled and my ears opened, a boy tensed up ready to receive the punch-line.

The year before my English teacher was, Heath ‘The Teeth’ Simmons, and he was a ferret looking little weasel whom I would have gladly castrated with a fork, as he was the most sarcastic moron I had ever met. Now he was obnoxious. I mean I was only a kid; he had honed his hellish teaching crafts over years of misery.

God help us.

The shit I did to others was like a hobby. He was paid for it and enjoyed crushing children’s hopes and fears into the dust; eradicating expectations that shaped us; our lives he made even the greyer.

He was always saying to me, that my work was quite good. Accept for the forty spelling mistakes, the bad grammar and the plot that did not make sense.

He would always finish by telling me that had he not added his comments to the bottom of the page, it would not have even been worth throwing in the garbage.

He then looked up to the sycophantic rabble that was his class; on cue, they would all laugh at me.

I said I think that this is quite good!

Mr. Daniel James Fosset proclaimed again, waking me from my fantasy, where I was feeding Heath Simmons into a destructively expensive bright blue wood shredder.

Um! It is?

I proclaimed back feebly, looking for the proof that it was mine and not Ben Clarke’s, who’s writing and name was uncannily like mine.

This fact led me to conjure up thoughts of how I could make this work for me financially one day.

No, it was mine unless Ben Clarke had written my name at the top, as some plot against me, but he would not dare.

It is boy!

Danny-Boy replied as if I was from some other planet. He went on to tell me that my turn of phrase was obscurely appealing and that my descriptive phraseology was written in a way that reminded him of him at my age.

Of him; fuck me, I thought. Mr. Fosset had had two books published, so I was impressed and warmed to the old boy instantly, he was no fool.

From then on he had always encouraged me and helped me and I suppose I would never have had become a reporter or writer if it had not been for him.

In addition, I would have never have met my wife, or indeed probably been lying here, the place where I am now had he not encouraged me, had I not turned down that particular crossroad of my life that he pointed out for me God.

Moreover, I wonder if I would be endeavoring with this novel; been here on Death Row, if it was not for Mr. Fosset encouraging me,to write for a living, all those years ago, and though I have written for a living, penned thousands of words, there is probably not one person on this planet that remembers one word I have put into print.

Accused of Plagiarism

IT IS ALMOST a natural consequence of any writer, star, mogul, or infamous murderer, that one day they will write a novel about themselves as some autobiography, or some confession about some over the top character, where the plot is taken from their life.

Or on the other hand, they will write up some story bound piece of faction that they will litter with wee tales from the past and from the past of others and from other’s imagined works.

Now I hope that I can never be accused of plagiarism but if anyone sees something that they recognize, tough shit baby, sue me.

When you’re only at the five thousand word stage in your book you don’t worry about being caught for plagiarism; you are spurred on, amazed you have come so far.

You hope that should you ever get this novel miraculously into print the publishers will sort that out. My problem is that so much of my life has washed together, become such a mix that perhaps I don’t really know what Ihave actually lived through, or indeed what I have heard from some drunk in a bar, reeling off his favorite anecdote for the thousandth time.

I am sure that as any would-be writer reads this, they will agree with my sentiments and likewise their lousy insignificant life will flash before their eyes; so use generously proportioned pinches of salt.

That is you, that is, own it.

We blame time as the biggest excuse for not completing this ambition. I never had time, not real time anyway. Not quality time, whatever that is. I only had real time for my ex and now late wife Davina, because without time we do not exist.

Davina

BEFORE Davina, time did not matter; it was just something that filled the days. A man was young and I thought that I would live forever. They are right when they say that adolescence is wasted on the young. How often have you commented, if I only knew then what I know now?

Before and obviously after Davina, my little Anivad, time had no meaning and my life was just something that I had to fill in each Groundhog Day again and again, living like we all do, in Loops. We all live in loops, doing the same things every day, again and again, a day nearer death?

And I did not fill my days with writing my memoirs; I then had too much time but no inclination.

However, for most writers, especially reporters, time was a great excuse for doing nothing. As long we met a deadline that revolved around a 24 hour clock, or weekly cycles, we never got too bored.

News-gatherers love sailing close to the wind; one step from danger; one stride from a point where they could never turn back; surviving on the edge, looking at life from a detached standpoint and living vicariously amongst the tragedies of others.

Virtuously I was at least, some kind of knight, often using my pen as a sword bringing so- called wrongdoers, analogous with politicians, and crooks, to task, albeit only in print though, for their crimes against society. I was just some shining knight, that was so holier than the many others, I ever dared to judge. I thought I, yours truly, was just wonderful; something just superior.

I was St. Clark, the patron saint of hypocrites, pretenders and charlatans. I had forgotten those wise words, that he who has never sinned must throw the first stone. I could have been, back then, a stone pitcher for the New York Yankees.

Nevertheless, however good I thought I was then, like all good shit, I have now sunken to the extreme bottom.

Here I lie, sweating in the relatively safe and comfortable surrounds of one of America’s finest prison institutions. God help us.

I am nearly sixty years of age, and whilst this does not matter too much to me, I mean, I’m not going anywhere, to men outside this is the end.

The top of the hill, and its downward from then on, and even if you are relatively rich, you know that all the money in the world will not stop the inevitable and if you have come this far being a failure before this middle age, you know you are finished.

You would have to discover a cure for Cancer, AIDS, and Ebola and world famine, for anyone to write about, and really notice you now.

Front Page News

FOR ME, my crime, the Millennium Murder, was reported on TV and on the top left of many front pages; it was mainly about the person I had supposedly killed, not about me. He was some Top Celebrity DJ who I had no clue about. Moreover, I had no clue why I killed him, if I did. But I must have done, I am I not?

The only person to notice me now, is the night-guard who has to make sure I have not dug myself out.

I had been in jail before but that was some years ago and for, well just a little crime; little compared to this. It was my pre-visit, as I call it now, was nothing, everyone should do it.

Now I’m here for the big one and I am innocent of course, like most of us here, so I feel so hostile about why I should be on Death Row, because I feel I am blameless of what I am accused.

The trouble is I do not know why I am guiltless; the police had shot and beaten me so badly on my arrest on that inimitable day the following weeks had been erased out. It is like it never existed for me, but it must have happened, it was in the papers, on TV.

Hypocrisy is another hurtful practice to be accused of, for any appellant, but in my position as a reporter, I had seen a human being put to sleep. No last minute reprieve came for this convicted child rapist and killer and he perished in front of my open-mouthed gawp. I was scared for him, wondering where he would end up, what afterlife he had to come, but I believed that it was right.

To some extent I even envied him, I have always been someone who has postured that he did not care about dying but like most of us when we are young we do think about it occasionally and wonder when it might be; soon under the wheels of a bus or in an old folks home aged 99.

This man was having the decision of life and death taken away from him and any thoughts on the matter were now over. Death Row is one of those places where not every killer ends up these days.

In our progressive liberal, twenty-first century ideals, our more tolerant society has had someone decide that a life for a life is not the way civilized gentlefolk should react against murderers and rapists.

And it is far more Woke and politically correct that the People should try to heal the ills of lost souls, not in turn annihilate them. But why did they want to slay me? Why not heal my lost soul? Who said that, an eye for an eye ends up with the whole world becoming blind eventually?

So I have found that I agree with this sentiment of soul rescuing a lot more since I had been given the death sentence. I used to be the kind of guy that would have tied the knot on the rope, switched the switch. I could not abide rapists or murderers. I am not a rapist though, but then I do not believe I am a murderer either, but would my victim concur; the poor guy who did die at my hand, but neither of us know why.

Yet we are such weak contrary divergent fools, I have come across this situation many times, I am now a prime example of how hypocrisy works. Let me tell you. Before I myself was adjudged a murderer, I was this hang them high kind of guy, an eye for that eye, and all that, you know.

But since then, I now believe in Human Rights and clemency, or at least the Restorative approach.

Anyway I am really sure that I’m not a murderer, it is just that the jury did not agree with me. Moreover, there was surely information that had not been seen, evidence held back, where’s the justice in that.

So my time is maybe shortly at an end, soon a man will know whether there is a promised afterlife or not. But I want more time to prove myself innocent, and finish my book, dream more about Davina, and thus my thoughts on the subject of corporal punishment have turned a half circle.

Conversely, this was just like the many pinkos or demi-socialists I had met in my life who always declared that if anyone ever killed one of their kin they would always look at it objectively. They would hope that they could have the good sense to forgive this criminal and assist in their rejuvenation.

Bullshit, herds of it. They had been bullshitting not only those poor saps like me who had to listen to such drivel but also to each other. I have found that if anything ever happened to anything of theirs they would go ballistic and be right there in front leading the lynch mob. I’ve seen it happen. This proved to me further that politics, and politicians like everyone, were all just full of crap. Even the crooks were hypocrites; the greatest prime example was a man we all could easily hate.

Carlioni the Cat

ONE DAY, a long time ago now, in those days that always started happy and in bright sunshine, I heard a report on the police frequency about a burglary in progress, it was in a nice neighborhood, and I was in the area.

The house might have belonged to some movie-star but I knew at once when I arrived that it was Carlioni the Cat’s house.

Now Carl was an erstwhile immigrant to our fair shores and thought because he was Italian that he could automatically be part of the Mob. Sorry. Nevertheless, he had carved himself out a fantastically good living breaking into the nice houses of the waspish English and the Blessed Blacks, stealing all those small sentimental valuables we all have.

When he first arrived, he was penniless and he had a big chip about all those pale pallid American bastards who had money. Therefore, he would not just steal but would enjoy spray painting big words on the walls, pissing into the back of the TV and crapping in the middle of the lounge carpet, which was always a contrasting white.

Once he scooped up a litter of kittens and put them all in the microwave for five minutes. He once poured pink paint into a two thousand dollar fish tank, I mean this guy was a mean son of a psycho-bitch, let me tell you.

Anyway when I arrived, Carl’s house had been trashed big time and the police had caught the kids who had done it; three other Italian mob hopefuls. Then Carl, who was on bail at the time, and his wife arrived. You heard the expression pissed off? To say Carlioni was enraged to see his lovely house defiled in this way was a gross and an entire understatement but also a wonderful work of art to watch.

Smoke and steam came out of every now quite red orifice and he ranted on at the teenage gang of kids about what he would do to them. Spitting out Italian and broken English profanities like, ‘motherfuckers’.

Good job the police were there. But the cops just laughed. A lieutenant told Carl, grinningly grabbing his arm, and whispering that had it not been the Carlioni household he would have thought it had his signature on things; his very own Method of Operation. Carl loved his work, but somehow could not compute the pain of it happening to him. He often wondered what all the fuss was about, did they not have insurance?

But now Carl knew; knew how it felt to be defiled and robbed of life’s savings and maudlin mementoes. And the officer laughingly sneered that he was going to let the kids go and lose all the paperwork, it was funny.

This burglary headed up many Television News items, it made the front pages of the Dailies across the country.

Not because some asshole’s house had been trashed but because the Cat grabbed the officer’s gun and started shooting at the three boys; he, luckily for them, missed and just created unlawful damage to the Kevlar protected police-car they were in.

Nevertheless, this is my point, we all have definite opinions on things until something happens to change our minds, like we grow up or someone shoots your mother. God help us.

Opinions

An Opinion is Subjective. It is generally a belief or judgment that relies on information insufficient to produce a complete certainty or substantiated fact. Or indeed it is a personal view or an approach or assessment established on something you may comfortably believe, based on information, hindsight or even rhetoric. An Opinion is an enigma where it can never be Right or Wrong, it is more of a individual estimation as to what something might be, without that thing being proved to be a Pure Fact using empirical evidence.

When I got home that night, Davina was highly amused that Carlioni the Cat had had his comeuppance. We had had a good day, we both worked for the newspaper by day and in a Nightclub at night. On that day we had the night off and we could do what we did best, and that was being alone together. It was a time when things were just great, the peak of my life, my insurmountably happiest times, a time when I wanted nothing else; I could not think of anything I wanted that could make me happier, I was complete.

She Smelled so Good

THE NIGHT Carlioni found himself in jail was a good night for many people; we are sure all those people who had their homes pillaged by our foul feline fucker were in higher spirits at the thought of some satisfying self- administered restitution.

We just lay on the huge sofa we