Nothing To See Here

By Matt Kelland

"Let me tell you a story…"

 

A mysterious immortal mourns lost opportunities…

A supervillain's henchman loses his job…

A rock star's son turns to art fraud…

A biker inherits a very old cat…

A dying millionaire faces down a hit man…

 

This diverse collection of twenty-eight powerful tales spans multiple genres and styles, from comedy, to tragedy, horror, sci-fi and fantasy. Each of the storytellers offers a unique personal reflection on life, death, and the moments in between. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Fool On The Hill
• Release date: Mar 26, 2024
• ISBN: 9798224695782

Book preview

FOMO

I found a new word on the Internet today. (Yes, I do use the Internet. I’m old, not stupid.) FOMO - Fear Of Missing Out. All these kids worried that they’re not going to get to do everything they want before they die. Don’t make me laugh.

Actually, no, please do make me laugh. It’s the only thing that keeps me going some days. The Dalai Lama recommends laughing every day, and he’s sort of immortal too, so I’d say that’s good advice. 

Where was I? Oh, yes, FOMO. Look, it’s simple. Life’s just too damn short. You can’t do everything. You won’t have time. Get used to it. Trust me, when you reach my age, you’ve missed out on more than you can count.

For some reason, nobody cares about most of the inspiring things I’ve seen. Everyone wants to know about the assassinations, the murders, the deaths, all the bad stuff. I missed them all.

JFK, that’s the one they all start with. No, I didn’t see it, not even on TV. Early 60s, I was hanging out in an artists’ commune outside Paris. Archduke Ferdinand, Rasputin, the Tsar... all that stuff happened when I was living in India, way before the hippies discovered it. Joan of Arc... are you crazy? Who in their right mind would want to be in France in the middle of that war? In my experience, all wars are best avoided, but that one was particularly brutal. I spent most of the 15th century in Cairo, which was a hell of a lot more civilized.  The Crucifixion? Seriously? How old do you think I am? I’m old, but I’m not that old.

The thing with so-called historical events like these is that they’re usually unexpected. The chances of being right there when it happens are pretty slim. I mean, were you there when John Lennon was shot? Or when they caught bin Laden? Of course not. So why would you think I’d be there for anyone else’s death?

Most of the time, the turning points of history don’t even seem like a big deal until later. Who would have guessed that Rosa Parks sitting at the front of a bus would change America? Or that a quiet man in a loincloth walking across India to protest about salt would bring down the mighty British Empire twenty years later? Or that an obscure German professor nailing his thoughts to a church door would cause hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions of deaths over the next few hundred years?  You’d have to be very perspicacious, or lucky, to have been there.

And obviously, I wasn’t. I was somewhere else, doing something else, getting on with my life, having fun. 

So yeah, I’ve missed out on almost every major world event in my considerable lifetime. Just never been in the right place at the right time. And honestly, I don’t care. What really bugs me, though, is the experiences I never had.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining about the life I’ve led. I’ve travelled all over the world. I’ve climbed mountains, I’ve crossed deserts on a camel, and I’ve been along every major river, from the Amazon to the Zambezi. I’ve seen the Pyramids, Macchu Picchu, Stonehenge, and Great Zimbabwe. I’ve sailed with pirates in the Caribbean, and I’ve ridden with nomads on the Mongolian steppe. I’ve stomped grapes in Champagne, and I’ve hunted bison in Montana. My first car was a 1903 Pierce-Arrow, and I learned to fly in a 1910 Farman. I’ve travelled by stagecoach, by clipper, by steamship, by Zeppelin, in a rickshaw and on a mule. So yeah, I’ve had a pretty full life. You can fit a hell of a lot into a thousand years. Well, nine hundred and seventy-eight, but who’s counting?

But still, however much you do, there’s always an infinite amount more that you didn’t do.

My single biggest regret is that I never saw Mozart play. I was in Bermuda, I think, when I heard about the kid, and I figured when I next went to Europe, I’d go see him. But of course, I left it too late. By the time I got back across the Atlantic, by way of all sorts of unexpected places, the Austro-Turkish war had broken out, and, as usual, I decided to stay well away until the hostilities were all over. Two years later, Mozart was dead, aged just 35. And that was that.

I never saw Beethoven either. I spent twenty-odd years in South-East Asia while Europe was consumed by the wars with Napoleon. And, as luck would have it, about the time peace was restored, old Ludwig van B fell ill, lost his hearing, and stopped performing. 

I could fill a whole notebook with the names of musicians I never saw. Josephine Baker, Hendrix, Joplin, Morrison, The Beatles... and those are just the ones you’ve heard of. I could throw in Thomas of Malmesbury or the flute player Yuo, but they’d mean nothing to you. But in their day, they were legends. And I missed them all.

You see, when you have eternity ahead of you, you lose all sense of urgency. You’re under no pressure to do things, so you forget that everyone else has such a limited lifespan. Artists in particular are really bad at looking after themselves. So you add them to your bucket list - and believe me, my bucket list is way bigger than yours - and next thing you know, a decade’s gone by and they’re dead or retired.

And don’t get me started on the books, the movies, or the music. There was a time when I’d read every single book that had ever been printed. All twelve of them. Well, more or less. Could have been as many as twenty, not that it matters. I’ve been playing catch-up ever since. I read a lot, maybe a hundred books a year. But in that time, over a million have been published, just in English. Almost two million, by the time you count all the other languages I read. It would literally take me a thousand years to read all the books published last month. Humans will be extinct long before I could get through them all.

The thing that really brings it home is when I visit one of the great libraries, like the Bodleian, or one of the world-famous art galleries, the Louvre, the Prado, the Hermitage. You see a collection of historical artifacts. I see my past set out on display. Every one of those books, every one of those paintings, was created in my lifetime. I could, if I had chosen to, have met every one of those writers or artists. I could have found a way to be friends with Dante, with Rousseau, with Monet, with da Vinci, with Hemingway... but I didn’t. I chose to spend my life in other ways. Even nine hundred and seventy-eight years isn’t enough to do everything you want to do.

So, you’re worried you’re missing out? Trust me, I’ve missed out on so much more.

Take it from an old... man. You can’t do it all. Just can’t be done. So enjoy your life, and stop worrying about all the things you didn’t get to do.

But if you get the chance to see the next Mozart, do it. Trust me.

Ben Something

Oh. My. God, said Susan, staring rapturously at the painting in my hallway. Jamie, that’s amazing. How much?

I laughed. Nah, I’m not selling it. It’s kinda special. Sentimental.

No, seriously, Jamie, how much?

I walked away, shaking my head. That was typical Susan. She’d walk round people’s houses and literally try to buy the art off the walls. The furniture. The clothes in the closets. Anything, if she thought she could make a buck off it. She’d put it in her gallery in Manhattan or Boston or wherever the hell it was and spin this whole story about how it used to belong to a celebrity so that someone with more money than sense would pay far more than it was worth. Mum and Dad bought all sorts of crap from her. They never tired of telling people how this armchair used to belong to David Bowie, or that mirror came from Gloria Swanson’s or Dorothy Lamour’s house. It might even have been true, I don’t know. And to be honest, I really don’t care. It’s just old stuff. 

While I’m being honest, I might as well admit I’ve always loathed Susan. I don’t know who invited her to my party. I sure as hell didn’t. Having her in my home felt, well, creepy. Like she was checking the place out, making an inventory. 

Not that I’m a celebrity, of course. Well, back then, I wasn’t. But when your dad is a bona fide rock star with an actual wall covered in platinum records, and your mum has almost as many Oscar nominations as Meryl Streep, people treat you like you’re special. Not in a good way. More like they’re waiting for you to follow in your parents’ footsteps and do something awesomely creative. Which, seriously, is never going to happen. Not to me.

Two days later, Susan called me. 

Jamie, your mother gave me your number, we have to talk.

Really, mum? You gave Susan my number? Thanks a bunch.

You went to art school, didn’t you?

Yeah, I said. In England. 

Where for three years, I got drunk almost every night, screwed people of every sex, took all the drugs I could afford, which was a lot, and learned that I don’t have a single artistic bone in my body.

I thought so, she said, triumphantly. That painting. I’ll give you eighty,

Eighty? That won’t even cover the cost of the frame. Not to mention, eighty bucks was literally not even pocket change. I rarely carried anything less than hundred dollar bills. 

No, sweetie, she replied. Eighty thousand. Just think of it, the first original Jamie Preston to hit the market. It could be the big break that we both need.

Well, I’ll give her this. Susan may be a mercenary bitch, but at least she’s up front about it.

And that’s when the idea came to me.

I’ll have to think about it, I said. Let me get back to you.

*

I guess this is where I introduce you to Ben, who’s like fifty years old and lives in the mother-in-law suite. I’m not sure what his real name is. It’s Something Something Ben Something. An Arabic name, I think. Or Jewish. I’m not really sure. All too much for me to remember, though, so he’s always been just plain Ben to me. Oh, and he’s an illegal immigrant. Don’t ask how we met or how he ended up living with me. 

Ben has two talents, which is two more than me. 

First, he’s an incredible housekeeper. He does everything round here. He keeps the place clean, he does my laundry, he makes sure the Maserati and the Lamborghini get serviced, he keeps the fridge and the pantry stocked, he takes care of all the bills, and he does a whole bunch of other things I don’t even know about. Ben basically runs my life for me. Which is damn useful, because I’m totally shit at taking care of myself. Never had to, never plan to, never learned how. 

Ben’s kind of like some sort of household elf. I hardly ever see him. He keeps himself to himself, and somehow, the place stays clean, food appears, and it all happens like magic. So it came as one hell of a surprise to discover his second talent one day, after he’d been with me for maybe five or six years. I was coming home unexpectedly from somewhere, and bumped into him in the garage, unloading a huge canvas from the back of the Chevy. A blank one. Like eight feet by five feet at least, Old Master size.

What’s that for? I asked. 

Ben shrugged. Nothing, he mumbled.

Well, it wasn’t nothing. Not even close to nothing. It took some persuasion - okay, bullying - but I eventually got Ben to show me his work. The man was an absolute master of psychedelic surrealism. He painted these huge, twisted landscapes, filled with bizarre details that you could look at for hours, always finding something new to blow your mind. My dad would have gone nuts for them back in the days when he sang about elves and wizards and shit and actually cared about what went on his album covers. 

He gave me one. I offered to pay him for it, but he wouldn’t take it. He grinned and told me I’d already paid for the canvas and paints, which I suppose I ought to have been mad about, but I was fine with it. It was like being a patron of the arts, supporting Ben.

As you’ve probably guessed, it was Ben’s painting that Susan coveted. She wouldn’t have given a damn if she knew it was painted by my housekeeper. Nobody would. But with my name on it? The vultures would be fighting over it.

This was going to be fun.

We settled on a hundred and twenty grand. Susan sold it less than a week later for a hundred and eighty to some rich prick who was a huge fan of my dad when he was a teenager and wanted to impress his drinking buddies in the country club. At least, that’s what I assume. Honestly, I have no idea who bought it or why. 

I put the money in a trust for Ben. I’m not an asshole. He earned it. He shouldn’t have to look after me his whole life. 

And that’s when shit got crazy. Susan called me asking if I’d got any more paintings I’d be willing to sell. So I fessed up to Ben about what I’d done. I told him I’d take everything he’d got, and give him all the money, but he couldn’t say a word to anyone.

I was expecting him to get all indignant and yell at me that he wasn’t going