Pompomberry House (14 page)

I found myself at my computer again. This time the forum had
already loaded by the time my cautionary voice stepped in, and I was far less
receptive the second time around.
Shut up cautionary voice. This is too
interesting to ignore.

Where should I look first? Maybe, ‘Author Arena’ or ‘Book Blog’?
I was surprised to find that I needed to look no further than the header bar.
There, above all the other posts, was an advert for our book.

Oh no.

They’d gone with Montgomery’s idea and called the anthology,
‘The Book of Most Quality Writers’. And apparently, the book had already been
published — this morning, in fact.

Hmm, isn’t that convenient?

Without really thinking, I followed the link. Oh good Lord!
The cover depicted Dawn Mann, draped over an antique chair, wearing a flouncy
cardigan and even more ridiculous skirt. She was clearly wearing stockings —
you could see the lace tops. Her legs splurged from her hemline, as if from a malfunctioning
giant sausage machine. She had managed to flatten some of the hair frizz by
tying a ribbon laterally around her head. The ribbon appeared to have some sort
of feather sprouting from its left — apparently from an emu or albatross. How
could anybody think that
that
would sell copies? It was hideous. At
least, because it was a Kindle book, it would be easy to avoid looking at the
cover ever again.

I found myself wondering how she’d got away with it. With so
many egos in the group, how was it that Dawn, of all people, had managed to
swing it so that she, and she alone, was the cover model? Well, there was only
one logical explanation — she’d been given sole responsibility for the artwork.
Wow, there was a decision that the others must regret.

With my gaze planted firmly on the right of the page, away
from the cover, I sent a copy to my Kindle. Already I felt soiled, having a
stocking-clad Dawn Mann on my beloved Kindle. I didn’t really want to read any
of the book, but somehow I felt I needed to own a copy. I had been there for
its birth, after all.

I googled ‘Bognor Regis Gnomes’. After negotiating ludicrous
quantities of gnome puns, I ascertained that the gnomes had appeared during the
early hours of Saturday morning. Nobody knew who was responsible, but a member
of the public had seen somebody dressed as a giant dog, carrying boxes down to
the beach.

The idea of delicate Annabel dressed as a dog made me laugh.
Perhaps she wasn’t the precious little princess that she had first seemed.

Unexpectedly, the doorbell rang. I almost jumped out of my
skin. People never visited without texting first. Had I ordered any parcels?

Then I recognised the unmistakable, lanky, slightly hunched
shape of my husband.

“Why didn’t you use your key?”

“It didn’t seem right ... now.”

“Right, well what do you want? I’m very busy.”

An advert for incontinence pads ended, and Noel Edmonds
began introducing
Deal or No Deal.

“You said I should come and pick up some boxes.”

“Three weeks ago, Gareth!
Three
!”
See, this is
exactly why I kicked you out.

“Well, I’ve been busy.”

“Doing what?”

“Where are the boxes?”

“They’re in the spare room.”

He nodded and began climbing the stairs. Although I had
asked him to collect the boxes five times, I didn’t feel the sense of
satisfaction that I had anticipated.

“Gareth?”

“Yeah?” he began reversing his steps, walking backwards down
the stairs in a comedy fashion.

I forced myself not to smile. “Do you think, if somebody
writes fiction, and it comes true, it’s a coincidence?”

“How could it be anything else?”

“Well, come and look at this.”

I showed him the article about Bognor Regis, and winced as
he chuckled at
every single
gnome pun. “I don’t understand, what’s this
got to do with your writing?”

“Not
my
writing. Annabel’s writing.”

“Which one’s Annabel again? Have I seen her on the forum?”

“The sex doll.”

“And she writes what...? Gnome porn?”

“It’s not porn! It’s a wedding.”

“And she wrote about it?”

“She wrote a story about a china doll that fell in love with
a gnome and got married on a beach. Then, suddenly, people have found a whole
stack of gnomes and a doll, hanging out on the beach at Bognor Regis.”

“She put them there. Obviously.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought. But why would she do that?”

“Maybe she wanted a cover photo.”

“It’s for an anthology that already has its own cover.”

“Publicity photo then. Or maybe she thought the gnomes
themselves would make great publicity.”

“What if it was the same scenario, but a lot more sinister?”

“What do you mean?”

“If a plot came true, and it wasn’t a few gnomes on the
beach, but something much more sinister.”

“How sinister?”

“Animal cruelty.”

“How cruel?”

“Throwing a pig off a cliff.”

“Smeg a leg!”

“Quite.”

“You think Annabel threw a pig off a cliff?”

“Not Annabel. Dawn.”

“So Dawn wrote about throwing a pig off a cliff?”

“Well, no. In the story, the pig falls.”

“How many times, in your lifetime, has a pig fallen off a
cliff?” he asked, looking at me with his serious eyes.

“I don’t know ... Maybe once there was a cow ...”

“Never! It’s never happened. Pigs don’t fall off cliffs. If
they did, we’d have heard about it.”

“So you’re saying she must have staged it?”

“Yes! No doubt about it.”

“Well, I think she’s in Spain and it only just happened.”

“She is? Well, she must have got somebody else to do it
then. From what you’ve told me about Dawn, she doesn’t sound terribly mobile.”

“I have to call the police.”

“Why?”

“Somebody tried to murder a pig!”

“Is that illegal?”

“I don’t know, but it’s sick.”

“Agreed. Look, Dee ...” he began. Then, he paused and
looked at me kindly.

“What?”

“Remember the last time you called the police?”

“Vividly,” I said, grimly.

“They didn’t take you seriously, even when you reported a
murder.”

“I know!”

“Well, how do you think they’re going to react if you tell
them that you think somebody may have thrown a pig over a cliff, on the basis
that somebody else put some garden gnomes on the beach.”

Was Gareth right? It sounded crazy. I imagined myself
telling D.I. Taylor, his pale, condescending eyes expanding with disbelief. I
couldn’t go through that again. Besides which, the police had better things to
do with their time than chase pig-tossers, no matter how unpleasant the act
might seem.

“I mean, don’t let me stop you from calling them if you want
to. I’m just trying to prepare you, in case you get another knob like Taylor.”

“No, you’re right. I sound demented.”

“You don’t sound demented. I just think that police are busy
people, and they might not take you as seriously as you deserve to be taken ...”

“Why did you take me seriously?”

“Well, I know you, don’t I?”

“Even so, it all sounds a bit ludicrous. I witnessed a
murder that nobody thinks happened and now I’m reading sinister goings-on into
the afternoon news.”

“Come on, Dee. Nobody has a firmer grip on reality than you
do. If you say somebody threw a pig over a cliff, then somebody threw a pig
over a cliff.”

“You really have faith in me, don’t you?” I asked, looking
at him with a smile, realising too late how it might be taken. Could it
possibly look as though I was doing the look of lust?

Oh no! He was looking back at me with the look of
acknowledgement. Oh good, was that the look of reciprocation? I mean, oh
no
,
not the look of reciprocation!

Must not have sex with my estranged husband again. Must
not ... Dammit.

* * *

I lay on my lilac cotton sheets, listening to Gareth
splashing about in the bath. I pictured him with his knees poking over the
sides; his legs were so long and gangly that he had to bend them out of the
water to fit in. I wondered if he was playing with the rubber ducks again. I’d
been given two as novelty hen-party gifts and I still frequently found them
sitting around the plughole after Gareth had used the bath.

He came rushing in, dripping bath water everywhere. “Dee!”
he cried. I noticed how cute his nose looked with a little droplet of water
hovering indecisively off its tip.

“What’s the matter?”

“Did you know that Bob has a battery compartment?”

“Who’s Bob?”

He held up the larger rubber duck — the one wearing a ball
gag. When Susan said it was a naughty duck, I thought she was referring to its
attire.

I chuckled. “Well, that doesn’t surprise me, it was from
Susan.”

“Can you get some batteries for next time I come around?”

Oh no, he thinks this is going to be a regular thing.
I wanted to remind him that we’d broken up and that regular sex wouldn’t be a
feature of this particular break up. However, as I watched him run Bob along
the windowsill, making ocean noises, I didn’t have the heart to break his.

He disappeared back onto the landing and emerged a few
minutes later wearing the stripy, blue towelling dressing gown that I’d already
packed for him. He must have taken it out of the box.

He perched on the bed next to me, and scooped me up in his
big, orangutan arms. Then he just held me, for ages. I looked over his shoulder,
gazing around the room, trying to work out what was happening. Usually he was
only affectionate
before
sex.

Eventually, his arms loosened and I inched back onto my
pillow. He got up, removed the dressing gown and began getting dressed. I took
a peek at his cute bum as he bent down and searched for his socks.

Then something weird happened. He picked up the dressing
gown, hung it on a hanger, and put it away in the wardrobe.

I was absolutely flabbergasted. Gareth hadn’t picked up
after himself for years. I hadn’t realised that he knew what hangers were for.

I realised that I was smiling. Having his dressing gown back
in the wardrobe felt comforting. It showed me that he planned to come back.

Tell him to take his dressing gown with him!
He saw
me looking at him and made a silly face.
Tell him it’s over!
I couldn’t
help laughing. He leant over and kissed me again.

“Call me if there are any new developments,” he told me.

“There won’t be,” I replied, resolving to be more
independent (again).

“I hope not,” he said. He studied me for a few moments and I
wondered what he was thinking, but ‘penny for them?’ wasn’t really my style.

“Goodbye.” I kissed him again.

“Goodbye Dee-light.”

It had been a long time since he called me Dee-light. I
waited until I heard the front door open and close, then I grabbed his navy and
turquoise striped dressing gown from the wardrobe, held it close to me and
sniffed. It smelt of Gareth, bubble bath and familiarity. What was that subtle
undertone? Did I also detect the scent of happiness?

* * *

After Gareth left I was calm — or at least, calmer than I
had been for a long time. I’d been on edge ever since that damned seagull had peeled
itself off my windscreen.

In fact, I was feeling perky enough to write. Since the
writers’ weekend, I had spent a lot of time getting acquainted with my shiny
new laptop and my confusing latest version of Word. However, most of those
hours had been spent hopelessly gazing at a blank page.

But not today. Today I felt inspired. Today I felt talented.
Today I felt special.
Oh, pull yourself together Dee, one shag does not make
you William Shakespeare.

Naturally, I stopped to check Facebook before embarking on
my burst of creation. How could I be expected to produce great things if I hadn’t
eliminated the possibility that there were notifications pending?

Little did I know that checking Facebook would kill every
creative vibe in my body — well, perhaps not kill, but certainly knock
unconscious.

Somebody had posted a news article of epic significance. The
sort of thing that would have made me drop my teacup, were I holding one,
letting it smash onto the floor shattering into a thousand pieces. It would
probably happen in slow motion and the sound of breaking china would seem
distant and muffled.

After reading the headline, I was no longer calm and
relaxed, but shocked, confused and very frightened.

‘Foot washes up on Bournemouth beach’ it said.

Chapter 8

A pig fell off a cliff, a gnome wedding was discovered on a
beach, and now a foot had washed up on the seashore. There was no way that all
three of those could be a coincidence. The short time frame in which the
discoveries had happened, made the ghastly situation even more suspicious.

Not only did the discovery of the foot confirm my belief
that the storylines from the anthology were coming true, but it told me that
the happenings were far more sinister than I’d first imagined. The gnomes were
harmless enough, but the animal cruelty had been a step too far, and now, a
human foot — well, whatever was doing this was clearly revolting, unadulterated
evil.

Interesting that I said ‘whatever’ and not ‘whoever’. Did I
really believe that there might be some sort of mystical force at work? No, of
course I didn’t. Some
body
was doing this. Somebody was making the
anthology come true. But who?

Well, I could think of one person who was capable of revolting,
unadulterated evil — Biff’s killer.

Oh hell! Could it have been Biff’s foot?

Then I remembered the other piece of writing that had come
true — the prediction in the hat. ‘I die tomorrow’. If the ‘I’ in that sentence
had been Biff, then that made
four
unlikely coincidences.