This has been going on a long time. I keep entering and failing. For those who don’t know (most of you, I suppose) the competition is restricted by a time limit, a maximum word count and parameters of genre/character/topic. In this case I was assigned suspense/a shepherd/ clogged.
I don’t want to harp on about it but ….clogged????
I gave up and handed it to Alicia, my alter-ego and confidante
And this is what she spat out.
The Sea Shepherd
We’ve done everything we can, Susan,” the doctor said. “It will be only a matter of weeks. I can offer to help with something to ease the pain. I’m so deeply sorry.”
“Are you?” She stood, taking the prescription, and making way for the next patient. She exited the office without paying the bill and upon arriving out on the street hailed a cab, ordering the driver to find her the most expensive department store in town.
“Looking for something special?” he asked.
“Something to die for.”
She tried on a collection of clothing that she couldn’t possibly afford and knelt to stuff as much of it as she could into her backpack. A handbag lay on the floor in the adjacent cubicle. She reached under the dividing wall and slid it towards herself.
Then she was out the door, screaming. “Somebody tried to rape me in there!” In the ensuing chaos nobody paid attention to the alarm as she passed the scanner. Back on the street she disappeared into the sea of humanity.
An hour later, in her dingy apartment, she examined the contents of the handbag, extracting cash, credit cards and passport. The passport photo, she considered, might pass as a likeness for a healthier, though older, self.
She removed the scarf from her head before undressing and putting on a stolen frock, examining herself in the broken mirror that leaned against the wall. She was horribly gaunt. What remained of her hair was thin and shapeless. The frock looked ridiculous on her, as though somebody had dressed up a Holocaust survivor for an Academy Awards night.
Then, scrolling mindlessly through her phone at the fabricated reality of others, she stumbled upon inspiration. She called the number.
“Tomorrow?” the European voice on the other end was asking, “are you sure?”
“Yes,” she said. “of course I’m sure. I want to go on a cruise tomorrow.”
“Where to?”
“Anywhere else.”
After a silence there was a cautious response. “We have one ultra-luxury cruise going to New Zealand in the morning. It’s a smaller ship, seventy guests in total. Very exclusive. There’s been a last-minute cancellation, but the price is….”
“That’ll do. I don’t care about the price.”
“Sounds like you’ll fit right in, then.”
She booked as Mrs Clara Bowman and paid her fare with an AMEX bearing the same name. New Zealand? Whatever. She was going to die. Might as well do it in style.
She laid the frock out on the bed and packed an old suitcase with whatever else she had stolen, along with underwear, jeans, T-shirts, and more than enough prescription drugs to see the whole thing out. She opened a cheap bottle of bourbon and poured a little of the contents over the passport, further smearing the photo page with a dishcloth.
Later she sat on the balcony with the bottle between her knees, chain-smoking and sending out ambiguous text messages of farewell.
She was in another cab early the next morning and, after leaving a ridiculous tip for the driver, found a porter who escorted her and her baggage to the line for check-in and customs. The official asked her a few basic questions, the answers to which she had memorized and briefly examined her face and the blurred image on her passport.
“My hair and passport have both had a rough time lately,” she explained.
The official simply waved her through.
Once aboard she was greeted by a plastic faced concierge resembling a gameshow host from another era.
“Welcome aboard Mrs Bowman, is this your first voyage with us?”
“As far as I can recall.”
“Our job is to make sure it’s not your last.”
“Good luck with that.” She walked away without accepting the proffered handshake.
She joined the other passengers in the lounge where the Emergency Drill was to be conducted. They stood in small exclusive circles sipping champagne, exchanging insincere compliments and bad jokes. She stood alone in a corner.
She gazed around at glowing faces restored to a monstrous youth by surgery, atop bodies that betrayed reality. She was not in need of company and so had no difficulty choosing to despise each and every one of them.
A cultured weary voice came over the loudspeaker and introduced its owner as Captain Shepherd.
“Good morning, folks. I am Your Shepherd,” the voice said, “and thou shall not want. I thank you in anticipation of your briefly feigned attention for the Emergency Drill. We will be making a short stop just south of here to pick up supplies. All passengers are to remain on board. Following that I will shepherd you to exciting destinations such as, perhaps, you have never experienced.”
The supply stop was indeed short. She sat smoking on her private veranda and watched as the ship anchored and tenders took crew members ashore but was inside examining the contents of the mini bar when the sea began to move beneath her again, seemingly only minutes later.
Her cabin was spacious and appallingly decorated. Her bed had been turned down and there were chocolates and a dried flower arrangement on the bedside table. Her suitcase had been unpacked and clothing artfully arranged on hangers. Her underwear had been folded and packed into drawers. She wondered if somebody might, at any moment, knock on her door and offer to wipe her ass.
On the first night she dined alone in the restaurant. She sat by the window and ordered lobster. She had never eaten lobster before and struggled with technique. Eventually she took the crustacean up in her hands, dissecting it with her fingers. Glances of disgust floated in her direction. As she rose to leave she took the bottle of Chablis from the ice bucket and drank directly from it as staff stood aside and let her pass. “I’m not contagious,” she assured them.
Over the following couple of days and nights she avoided people and people avoided her. It was clear that she had been identified as some sort of imposter from the beginning. She was growing weaker and rarely ventured from her room other than to eat, though she had little appetite for anything other than vodka and pain killers.
On day five of the cruise things began changing dramatically. First it was the sewage system backing up. A woman was screaming in the companionway, “The toilet’s clogged! The toilet’s clogged!” as though venomous snakes had materialised in the bowl.
The issue was the same throughout the entirety of the vessel and, over the PA, Captain Shepherdadvised that, “everyone will just have to hold on,” sounding vaguely amused by the prospect.
The following morning brought warnings of “rough weather ahead….storms on the horizon,” and, within hours, seasickness was assuming epidemic proportions, the stench of human waste gradually overpowering the sickly-sweet aroma of expensive perfume.
Two nights later a lightning strike caused the lights to flicker and die. The swimming pool partially emptied itself and inundated cabins below. All forms of electronic communication went down, phone coverage and internet reception became non-existent.
“I have vitally important calls to make!” protested a man in a safari suit.
“I need to check on my cat!” groaned a blue-haired octogenarian on a walking frame.
The PA had also evidently failed, for no explanation was forthcoming, and when irate passengers ventured out with torches they found that the crew had seemingly vanished. Pounding on the locked door of the bridge prompted no response and demands to “see Captain Shepherd immediately,” went unanswered.
On the final night, within the roaring storm, a series of thuds could be heard below, followed by the sounds of screaming, tortured metal. The ship shuddered for a couple of seconds before falling into silence.
Panic quickly set in and conspiracy theories took hold. The ship had been sabotaged, obviously, and the crew disposed of. Communist terrorists. Massive ransoms demanded for the lives of the of billionaires aboard.
The only food available was that discarded from lunch. Refrigeration had shut down. Starvation, according to her bloated shipmates, was a genuine threat, but she was pleased to find that the main bar, though unstaffed, remained fully stocked. She discovered there, in the gloom, a tall, bearded man , dressed in shorts and Hawaiian shirt helping himself to drinks, so she did the same. As she was selecting a bottle he regarded her thoughtfully before speaking. “Mrs Bowman?” he asked, “how have you enjoyed the trip so far?’
“It’s been a hoot,” she assured him.
But there seemed no further point in the deception so she blurted out the truth, “It’s not Mrs Bowman. My name is Susan Smith and I’m here with a stolen passport and a ticket purchased with a stolen credit card. And I’m dying.” She raised her glass and waved it around the room, “This seems like as good a place as any to do so.”
“Well, that is so much more interesting. I knew that there was something special about you. How far were you planning to get?”
She was surprised to hear that he had even noticed her. She had certainly not noticed him.
“I assumed I’d be thrown off at the first port if I got that far.”
“I wouldn’t worry too much about that now.”
“I’m not worried about anything.”
His expression was one of admiration. “It shows.”
“Ice?” he enquired and pushed a tray of it towards her.
She examined the cubes as if being offered a prohibited substance. “where did you get these?”
He simply held a finger to his lips.
“I don’t suppose you know where there’s a functioning toilet?”
He reached into his pocket before pushing a key down the bar. “Deck two. Just forward of the lounge. A door marked ‘crew only.’ Be quiet about it.”
On her return, a bolt of lightning captured her reflection in the window and she was suddenly horrified. Why am I trying to look like them? She tore off her stolen frock and cast it into the ocean.
When she got back to the bar, dressed only in underwear, he was still there. She passed back the key and he acknowledged her only with a nod as she sat down beside him and refilled both of their glasses.
“So just who are you ,then,” she whispered, “and what’s your story?”
“My name is Ian Shepherd.”
“The Shepherd?”
“In the flesh.”
The Shepherd told his tale. He had begun as a cabin steward and worked his way through the ranks before eventual promotion to Captain. By then he had already become hypnotised by the wealth and power of the exclusive brand of passengers he carried. “I was a fool. It all looked so easy. I thought I could be one of them. But the only way into that club is to be born into it.”
He had borrowed enormous sums to invest in real estate. And when rates rose, he borrowed more just to pay the interest. Eventually it had all come crashing down around him. He lost his home and with it his family. All he owned was in a duffel bag in his cabin. And throughout it all he continued serving his masters.
“I was seduced, then I was screwed.” He pointed out beyond the door of the bar, “by the likes of them.”
As if on cue three irate men burst in.
“We’re making a citizen’s arrest,” one of them screamed, pointing at Shepherd, “You and the weirdo – on a charge of piracy! My wife just witnessed somebody throwing a woman’s limp body over the side! What have you done with the Captain? The crew?”
From under the bar Shepherd produced a gun. “The question is – what are we going to do with you?”
“You’re full of surprises,” Susan said after the intruders had hastily withdrawn, “but what have you done with the crew?”
“I left most of them ashore at the supply stop. The remainder have been locked in their quarters these last few days and will be released when I need them. Which will be very soon.”
“So, all this is your doing? This is revenge?”
He grinned. “Merely a gesture. Illustrating a point. Separate these people from their telephones and their lawyers and their servants – their notions of superiority, and they are rendered helpless.”
“And their bathrooms?”
“Clogged toilets are certainly a social equaliser. And I’m big on symbolism. These stinking turds can’t stand anything clogging up their own system, but they deliberately clog it up for everyone else. The world is a toilet bowl and they are what’s floating in it.”
“And how symbolic was all that noise earlier?”
He smiled again. “The engines were old. And maybe someone drained the of oil. They were tired of life anyway, and just let go. Blew a hole in the side.”
“Can you fix it?”
“Wouldn’t even if I could. We are already sinking.”
“Wow! More excitement then. Are you planning to drown everyone? Is that not a bit self-indulgent?”
“The world wouldn’t miss them much, but I draw the line at that. The storm will soon pass and we’ll launch the life rafts. Rescue is already on the way. Everyone will be fine.”
“What about you, Ian?”
“This Captain goes down with the ship. But for now, my dear, I have some work to do. It’s best that you return to your cabin and grab whatever is important to you.”
Nothing was important to her. She was very tired. She was ready.
He placed a hand on her shoulder as he stood and walked away. Less than thirty minutes later the PA burst back into life, as a familiar voice announced, “Good evening folks, I am The Shepherd, and you have arrived at Judgement Day. So, let’s find out who was listening to the Emergency Drill, shall we? All hands on deck! Prepare to abandon ship! Because, this time, folks, it’s not a drill!”
The hallways were full of stumbling old fools, clutching jewellery and wallets, dignity long discarded. She joined the stream much as she had when leaving the department store, less than a week before. Setting foot out onto the open deck she beheld Captain Shepherd, barely recognisable. He was clean shaven and somehow taller, standing in full uniform, shouting orders, herding terrified millionaires, along with crew, into lifeboats, and lowering them over the side. When he saw her he beckoned her more softly, “Your turn, Susan.”
“You think I want to die surrounded by this lot?” she asked him, “I’m staying with you.”
“That would be nice. Drinks on the sundeck, then?”
As the life-rafts drifted away they sat in deck chairs, side by side, silently watching. Shepherd raised an arm and waved, “Bon Voyage, folks.”
There was nothing else to say.
The sun had risen now and Susan felt its first warm rays brush over her skin as the ocean made its way across the deck and prepared to take them both on another journey.
Richmond Road 