small stack of postcards from different exotic locations. Many of the postcards had been torn into several pieces and had been stuck together with now yellowing tape. She picked a postcard which had a colossal hotel shaped like a ship’s sail with Dubai printed in the corner. The photo was taken at night with a full moon set in a sky that ran from orange through to black.
The photographer’s viewpoint had captured the exact angle for the moon to appear like a giant golf ball on the hotel’s helipad. She flipped it over and read the faded writing. Uncle Shane always wrote in capital letters as if he knew his handwriting would be indecipherable to them. ‘To J&J…’ That was how he greeted her and her sister on everything he sent.
Her dad said it was because he forgot their names but she didn’t want to believe that. The man was famous for God sake; he needed some bloody privacy, who knows how many people read these things as they fly across the world? Why shouldn’t he make some feeble attempt at keeping his and their identities private? She scanned the few lines of standard postcard information, about what the weather was like and how shocking the price of the hotel was, nothing that gave much away. He always signed it Uncle S. Dad said that he never wrote the cards himself and that he had one of his floozy secretaries do it instead, but she didn’t believe that either.
One day, she’d been playing an epic game of hide and seek with Angela. She was fed up with being found within seconds, and so, even though it was forbidden, she had hid in the attic. She climbed up and managed to slide the hatch back in place before she realised someone else would have to let her out. It didn’t bother her; she’d just call out when Angela had had enough searching.
In the meantime, she shone her My Little Pony torch around the rafters and gazed in wonder at the only part of the house she’d never been in. It wasn’t very mysterious and there were no ancient valuable objects or secrets she could make out. Just a few boxes that had obviously been there years, some with her grandma’s writing on. As she pulled back the flaps, she saw crockery in one and china in another. She moved one aside when her eye caught a box that stood out from the others.
The design said it was made for some kind of spaceship toy. When she investigated and studied the box closer she read Return of the Jedi: Millennium Falcon. She knew of the films but had never really showed an interest in science fiction. She remembered her gran telling her that Uncle Shane had been into all that spacey Star Trek stuff so was excited at the prospect of discovering something of her uncle’s. The box, albeit covered in dust, was in immaculate condition so she opened it carefully. Inside wasn’t the grey biscuit-shaped spaceship of Han Solo’s but a stack of exercise books. The top book was blank except for the name of its owner ‘S. Colbert’. It was written in the same capital lettering that she would become familiar with. After testing the hardiness of a close by box, she sat down and opened the exercise book.
…I wish to Christ I knew what the fuck it meant but I haven’t the foggiest. No matter how hard I try I can’t bloody remember what happened. What if I am the guilty party, what if I’m the one who’s responsible? What then? The head fuckers want me to keep diaries of anything and everything since the accident, because they say something might show.
I’m a social pariah, the people in this redneck inbred cesspit of a village won’t be happy unless they see me prosecuted, exiled or publicly fucking flayed for the loss of their children. Don’t they realise I feel the loss too? My friends, my friends were my family; they were my brothers, my comrades, my co-conspirators. I miss them so much. I just wish I could turn back time and convince them to stay home that night, and that this constant whistling in my ears would shut the fuck
The photographer’s viewpoint had captured the exact angle for the moon to appear like a giant golf ball on the hotel’s helipad. She flipped it over and read the faded writing. Uncle Shane always wrote in capital letters as if he knew his handwriting would be indecipherable to them. ‘To J&J…’ That was how he greeted her and her sister on everything he sent.
Her dad said it was because he forgot their names but she didn’t want to believe that. The man was famous for God sake; he needed some bloody privacy, who knows how many people read these things as they fly across the world? Why shouldn’t he make some feeble attempt at keeping his and their identities private? She scanned the few lines of standard postcard information, about what the weather was like and how shocking the price of the hotel was, nothing that gave much away. He always signed it Uncle S. Dad said that he never wrote the cards himself and that he had one of his floozy secretaries do it instead, but she didn’t believe that either.
One day, she’d been playing an epic game of hide and seek with Angela. She was fed up with being found within seconds, and so, even though it was forbidden, she had hid in the attic. She climbed up and managed to slide the hatch back in place before she realised someone else would have to let her out. It didn’t bother her; she’d just call out when Angela had had enough searching.
In the meantime, she shone her My Little Pony torch around the rafters and gazed in wonder at the only part of the house she’d never been in. It wasn’t very mysterious and there were no ancient valuable objects or secrets she could make out. Just a few boxes that had obviously been there years, some with her grandma’s writing on. As she pulled back the flaps, she saw crockery in one and china in another. She moved one aside when her eye caught a box that stood out from the others.
The design said it was made for some kind of spaceship toy. When she investigated and studied the box closer she read Return of the Jedi: Millennium Falcon. She knew of the films but had never really showed an interest in science fiction. She remembered her gran telling her that Uncle Shane had been into all that spacey Star Trek stuff so was excited at the prospect of discovering something of her uncle’s. The box, albeit covered in dust, was in immaculate condition so she opened it carefully. Inside wasn’t the grey biscuit-shaped spaceship of Han Solo’s but a stack of exercise books. The top book was blank except for the name of its owner ‘S. Colbert’. It was written in the same capital lettering that she would become familiar with. After testing the hardiness of a close by box, she sat down and opened the exercise book.
…I wish to Christ I knew what the fuck it meant but I haven’t the foggiest. No matter how hard I try I can’t bloody remember what happened. What if I am the guilty party, what if I’m the one who’s responsible? What then? The head fuckers want me to keep diaries of anything and everything since the accident, because they say something might show.
I’m a social pariah, the people in this redneck inbred cesspit of a village won’t be happy unless they see me prosecuted, exiled or publicly fucking flayed for the loss of their children. Don’t they realise I feel the loss too? My friends, my friends were my family; they were my brothers, my comrades, my co-conspirators. I miss them so much. I just wish I could turn back time and convince them to stay home that night, and that this constant whistling in my ears would shut the fuck
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