I’m hearing you, I’m seeing you, for sure. I’m peeking through the slightly open door. You sing that awful Katy Perry tune. As if you’re free from shame you just ignore me and the world beyond your own cocoon. You must assume the door is shut as you’re just singing in your hairbrush like a loon. I’m hearing you, I’m seeing you, for sure. But then you start to dance across the floor right out onto the landing corridor. At last you see me watching from our room. You pose for me. I clap. I cheer for more. Still singing to your hairbrush like a loon “Bravo!” I cheer, I whoop, “Bravo! Encore!” You bow towards my light hearted lampoon. Performing through our open bedroom door. I’m hearing you, I’m seeing you, for sure. I’m peeking through the slightly open door. For hours and hours you hide in our bathroom. What is it there that makes you feel secure? An imaginary tropical lagoon? A respite, not to be my paramour? Or waiting ‘til the time is opportune? I’m hearing you, I’m seeing you, for sure. I said, “you are the one that I adore.” I said, “I love you,” on that afternoon. You told me that I’d said those things too soon retreated to your hide and locked the door. You’re singing but I cannot hear the tune. A melancholy song - of that I’m sure. Our final summer night that day in June, I’m kneeling at the keyhole of the door. Now staring at the empty corridor imagining you dancing there once more. Another lonely, winter afternoon. I’m seeing you, just like you were, before. Remembering that slightly open door.

The shrill seagull squawks, Disturbing our post lunch nap. Shh! This is our nest. Through the open door it peers. Hoping to get an invite.

“Tom-Tom, is dinner nearly ready yet?” 8 across ‘Cruel girl makes poet thrall.’ So it begins: The Sunday lunch duet. Try to ignore her and she might forget. 10 letters, anagram: LEVEL IN ALL “Tom-Tom, is dinner nearly ready yet?” “It’s in the oven, have a cigarette!” Concentrate Tom, you are starting to stall. And so it goes: The Sunday lunch duet. I can’t do the crossword with constant fret. Don’t want to buckle and give Mum a call. Always, “Is dinner nearly ready yet?” “I need a little snack. Don’t be upset.” Leaves the door open and the Yorkshires fall. And so it goes: The Sunday lunch duet. Her half-finished dinner left to sweat, Atop the paper now covered in scrawl. “Tom-Tom, did you finish the crossword yet?” There ends every Sunday lunch duet.

For three days it had seemed like the rain would never end but tonight it finally relents. Still, a wetness remains. A still wetness. I stare out of the window and watch residual droplets fall from the gutters to the street below, but my reverie is interrupted by the bleep-bleep and vibration of a text message. Withheld number? “Mr. Auster. Must meet you urgently. Will pay handsomely for your services. Head toward Central Park. More instructions to follow.” A dormant film coats the asphalt, reflecting the tall facades, the lampposts, the parked cars. There is an eerie depth that doesn’t belong in this otherwise superficial city. As I walk out into the dark mirrored streets to meet the mystery messenger, I begin to question what the hell I’m doing. Can I really blame this on curiosity? Or have times gotten so bad that I’m prepared to meet a stranger, in the middle of the night, to discuss a job offer that I know nothing about? I suppose if things go South, I do at least have backup. I tap my hand on the Glock tucked into my belt to reassure myself - Old Faithful. Then I turn up my collar against the wind, dip my Stetson down to my brow and head south out of my apartment in Washington Heights. Second message. Withheld. “Stay on foot. Make sure you aren’t followed.” Per instruction, I continue past the night bus that would have taken me all the way to the Duke Ellington corner of Fifth. Feel like I’m being watched. How can I make sure I’m not followed if the person who requested that is following me? The pit of my stomach groans with foreboding anticipation. This is all very odd. Approaching West Harlem, I walk alongside St. Nick’s park. It’s the middle of the night so I’m thankful I’ve got Old Faithful poking out of my corduroys. Not sure I have anything to worry about though. There’s not a soul around. The city is spookily quiet. I tread deliberately, avoiding the cracks like a schoolboy, gleefully watching the rainwater rise up between the slabs as my feet press down on the saturated sidewalk. Every day a little madder! Suppose I’m putting on a show for my mysterious voyeur. Soon I find myself at the corner of Frederick Douglas Blvd. and 124th Street. I turn right down Frederick Douglas, walk four blocks then turn right on 120th. I walk another two blocks and turn right to walk up Morningside Avenue. Four more blocks and I turn right on 124th. Before I know it, I’m back at the corner of Frederick Douglas and 124th. Why did I do that? There’s a blip. A momentary blackout. I find myself on Malcolm X Blvd. I turn left. I’m back on 124th. I walk two blocks. Left on Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Four blocks. Left again on 120th. Two blocks and turn left on Malcolm X Blvd. then I walk eight blocks to 128th before realising that I’ve been walking in the wrong direction. Another blackout. Did I sleep? I’m on the corner of Maddison Avenue and 124th Street. This isn’t where I want to be. I walk two blocks to Mount Morris Park and turn left. Four blocks to 120th. Left. Two blocks and I’m back on Maddison. I turn left and walk eight blocks to 128th. Going the wrong direction again. Is there some meaning to all of this? Odd! I shake myself back to reality. Stay on track. Just follow the instructions and head towards Central Park. Fifteen minutes elapse and I pass the Apollo. Not far now. My pocket vibrates. Message number three. “The plaza in front of the Guggenheim. Watch out for the man wearing a blue pocket flower.” Starting to feel the chill. I pull the breasts of my overcoat tight and hold them in place with folded arms. Another fifteen minutes go by before I see the Guggenheim rising up in the distance. Five more minutes and I’m standing in the centre of the plaza. There’s no one else here but even if there were anyone it’s too dark to see whether or not they have a pocket flower, let alone what colour it is. I find a bench and sit for a moment. Should I head back? What’s this all about? Then, there’s a tap on my shoulder. “Are you Paul Auster?” I nod at this thin, shadowy man who somehow seems more nervous than me. Then I look down at his tweed overcoat. Sure enough, left breast, he’s wearing a small bluebell sprig, tucked into the jacket pocket. He has an English accent. An alien in New York – like Sting. “I’m glad you came. I’ve heard about your detective work. I have a job for you.” “You’ve heard of my work? Which books have you read?” “Books? You write? I want to employ your detective skills. My name is Crispin Thomas but...” “Jesus!” I leap up from the bench, pull Old Faithful from my trousers and aim her at the thin shadowy man in front of me. I know that name. Everyone does. You’d have to be living in a cave to have missed the news reports. “Look, I’m armed. I don’t want any trouble. I’m happy just to walk away now. I won’t tell anyone anything.” The barrel quivers in my shaking hand. What am I doing? I could never shoot true with this much adrenaline coursing through me. Nevertheless, he holds his hands up; the way they do in the movies. I hadn’t even said “Stick ‘em up.” Wish I had, though. “No. Wait. Please. Let me explain. I’m not that Crispin Thomas. At least… I don’t think I am,” he pauses to quell the frenetic tension and slowly lowers his arms, “That’s where you come in, Mr. Auster. I need you to find out who I am.” “You don’t know who you are?” I lower my gun and sit back down. Even in the cold dark of night I can see he is too meek to be a danger to me. Crispin Thomas sits beside me. “Were you following me? Just now? It felt as though…” “I watched you writing the streets.” Writing? Did I mis-hear? “The route you were walking. Odd! Isn’t it?” He did say walking. Ha! A little madder every day. “What exactly is it you want from me, Mr. Thomas?” I see him shivering. Sure, it’s cold out, but I suspect he’s shivering from fear, and it isn’t me he’s scared of. There’s something sinister at play. “As I was saying, my name is Crispin Thomas, not the…you know…well you see…I’m a writer. The writer. I think. Mystery. Thriller. Detective stories about people like you.” I listen intently, though I suspect he’s not all there. “Things were all pretty normal until a year ago; I created a character and I gave him my own name; a fictional serial killer named Crispin Thomas but…that’s when…” his face was ashen, “that’s when the real-life killings started...” Maybe I’m starting to understand his confusion. His grip on reality might have faltered but this scrawny, nervous man is no serial killer. It’s more like he’s muddling up my books, with the stories on the news, and the narrative of his own life; like he’s melded them all into one. I had written some detective books some years back: The New Trilogy. I am the writer Paul Auster, but in my books, Paul Auster was also a character; he was a writer but he was also sort of a detective. Sounds nuts when I say it out loud but it’s all that post-modern, trying to be clever, kind of stuff. “I think you have me confused Mr. Thomas. I’m a writer, not a detective.” “Are you sure?” Weird question. I guess I have questioned my own reality at times. Odd things had been happening lately. Could it be possible that I am Paul Auster the detective? No! That’s ridiculous. Ha! A little madder every day. But what of Crispin Thomas? Which Crispin Thomas am I talking to? This character who believes he is a writer? Or the serial killer who had dominated the news these past months? Or am I talking to a different Crispin Thomas; just a madman who has read some of my books; who has lost touch with his own identity; blurred the lines between fiction and reality? Only one way to find out, I guess. “Ok,” I chuckle, “I am Paul Auster the detective really. I was just joking.” Crispin Thomas frowns suspiciously. “You mentioned handsome payment?” I test my luck. “Name your price. I need to find out who I am. Please!” “I’ll take the case. I’ll find out who you are. You leave it to me!” I pause for dramatic effect, “I’ll need three hundred dollars a day plus expenses.” “Thank you Mr. Auster. I knew you were the man for the job.” He shakes my hand vigorously. It’s like shooting fish in a barrel. It’s all too easy but something is making me hesitate. I doubt myself. Moral questions. Sure, I need the money, but I’m no detective. Can I really live with myself if I take his money? Then, the devil on my shoulder reminds me of my love of whimsy and the fact that I have just walked half the city to meet him after an anonymous, cryptic text message. Who am I kidding? I haven’t had this much excitement in years. I watch Crispin Thomas walk away from me, out onto the dark mirrored streets and when he is just about to disappear from view, I stand up and start following him. There is a pitter-patter on the brim of my hat as the rain starts back up again. He seems to walk erratically. I try to get my bearings. I follow him from the corner of Park Avenue and 86th. We walk four blocks along 86th to the corner of 1st. He turns right and I follow him, always half a block behind. We walk seven blocks to 79th and turn right again. Weird? Two blocks more then I follow as he turns left down 3rd. I follow four blocks to 75th and then he vanishes. I have another blackout and wake up on the corner of 3rd and 72nd and see him again. I’m at the point of a question but I can’t see it. Something is troubling me. “Stop!” I shout out. It’s strange. I don’t feel like I intended to do that. Suddenly I see myself, from above, like a departing soul looking down on his corpse. I look menacing. I frighten even myself. Crispin Thomas is cowering in a puddle on the sidewalk, and I am standing over him, Old Faithful pointed squarely at his head. I’m not in control as I feel my finger squeeze the trigger. Bang! The bullet fires through his skull. He has just enough time to croak out the words: “Who am I?” I stare down at his lifeless body and an unsettling, almost indescribable feeling washes over me. It’s like I’m watching myself lying there. Was I ever Paul Auster? Ha! A little madder every day.

People used to look at me funny when I said that my Dad was my hero; like I had something on my face. I suppose in their eyes a farmer doesn’t fit the stereotype. He wasn’t a fireman or a policeman. He didn’t tell exciting stories of his daring. Strangers didn’t recognise him in the street. He was just a plain ordinary farmer but to me at the age of nine he was superman and I wanted to do what he did; to be just like him. “Please Dad!” I’d beg each time he went out hunting and Mum would give him that look but not say a word. Then he’d pretend like he was thinking about it for a while and Mum’s look would get more intense until eventually he’d say what he said every time. “When you’re older son.” I’d watch him pack his 22 rifle and his 20 gauge single shot shotgun into the steel box in the back of his Land Rover and lock it with two heavy duty padlocks. All the while I’d be wide eyed, tugging on his trouser leg and pleading. Then he would look down at me, shake his head and leave. “When you’re a bit bigger son.” In early spring when the birds were at the seed he’d often come home with a brace of wood pigeon which Mum would cook up into a pie, with mash and peas. A few months later it would be rabbits, then later still as the weather started to turn again, he might bring us pheasant or deer. I looked on with pride and admiration each time he provided for us. Of course, I always asked to ride along and always got the same answer. “Maybe next year son.” This went on for a few years until the summer of my thirteenth birthday. It felt like the middle of the night when he woke me up but as we drove out to the fields the sun started to crest on the horizon and I start to wake up properly. That year had been one of those sweltering, arid summers and the yields were low. It was also a particularly bad year for rabbits. He parked up behind a willow copse at the top of the hill where the three crops met. Corn down the south-east face, carrots down the north-east face and cabbage (which likes the evening sun) directly in front of us, sloping away to the west. We nestled into the ground with the rising sun behind us and the tall blades of corn as camouflage. Dad loaded the rifle, set it on a hunting rest, and swivelled the butt around to my shoulder. “Now’s your chance son.” He pointed to tiny movements in the distance that I could barely see but when I looked down the sight, gently teasing the scope until I was focused on where he was pointing, a few hundred yards away, in the middle of the cabbages, I saw a fat brown rabbit, eating away, bold as brass. “Remember to breath. Let the rifle do the work” He was as calm as I’d ever known him to be. He breathed slow and deep, perfectly in time with the gently swaying corn. I’m sure I must have been panting. Nerves. Excitement. Adrenaline. I looked through the scope. “Don’t let him get away.” I eased my finger over the trigger and readied myself to pull but I found myself hesitating. I could see it crystal clear, this living creature in front of me, like I was watching it on HDTV. It could have been two feet away. I could see its whiskers vibrate as it chewed. I could see it’s mottled mocha fur ruffle against the breeze. “Quickly. If the wind changes, he’ll sniff us out - even from three hundred yards.” I froze up, both desperate to and unable to take the shot. Thirteen years old, having an existential crisis. The young boy was remembering reading Beatrix Potter stories as a child while the young man, desperate to be like his hero, tried to be mindful of the crop damage caused by a single litter of rabbits. “Take the damn shot!” Suddenly, and without thinking, I pulled the trigger. Reflex. Bang! There was a moment of nothingness before I felt the striking pain in my shoulder where the recoil had hammered back. I couldn’t cry in front of him so I put on a brave face, swallowed back the pain and looked back through the scope to confirm the kill. “Did you get him?” I could see the creature clear as day taking its final breath. I saw it’s giant black eyes drift away and I felt sick inside. Dad gave me a proud squeeze of the shoulder as I sombrely nodded the affirmative afraid to actually speak in case he noticed the catch in my throat. “Good lad.” Wasn’t this what I wanted? It was exactly what I’d wanted, for such a long time, but it tasted so bittersweet. It wasn’t Dad’s fault. He couldn’t have known I wasn’t ready. Something changed in me that day and I realise now that it wasn’t just a rabbit I killed that morning. That was the year I stopped telling people that my Dad was my hero.

Niobe was a monster and she lived alone atop a stark and barren mountain. She had made her home in a cave that Mother Nature had hewn from the rock with millennia of groaning tectonic upheavals, invasive bleeding rivulets, and pounding east winds. Her cave had one main room where she had built a nest against the back wall, away from the chilly winds, using leaves and twigs and many soft, plush objects that she had pillaged from other creature’s nests but that she did not know names for. On the south wall, one lone tree grew inside the cave, somehow without the need for sunlight and with barely any nutrition. It had a tall, smooth, thin trunk that seemed to rise indefinitely. Looking up from the base, not a sprig or bough could be seen growing out from its trunk, until way up in the darkness above, where the bats hung from the jagged roof, the tree blossomed and the trunk splayed out into a canopy that glowed with bioluminescent leaves. At the base of the tree, among the roots and debris a bright pool of bioluminescence collected all year round and when such time as her body yearned it, Niobe would visit the pool, kneel down at the water's edge and lap in the illumine shallows. Other times, when she crept past the pool, at certain times of day, she might just catch a glimpse of her reflection and see a grim, hideous creature with a wizened face and a crippled, hunched body. She had learned to avoid passing the pool at those times of day. Niobe had unkempt fur; a coal-black mane that started at the top of her face and continued down her back whilst also protruding out sideways in tangled, matted tufts that hung either side of her face like a waterfall hangs to the cliff-edge. Her skin was thin and papery but like all of her kind, she was a shapeshifter, and could, at will, shed her papery skin and moullt her black fur in favour of thick leathery skin and tusks, or perhaps long shimmering peacock-like feathers, or perhaps a taut covering of scales; slimy in appearance but dry to the touch. She could, in fact, choose any form that took her fancy, if only she could imagine it, or see it on another. Sadly, she didn’t know what was the natural form of her kind and she hadn’t met another, with whom she might compare, in centuries. On the north wall of her cave was a tributary passage that opened into a second smaller room and this was where she kept all of her precious things; her treasures; various interesting trinkets discovered during one of her rare journeys beyond the safety of her mountain; things she collected that looked pretty; things that glistened; a grass stalk that sang music when you blew gently across its cut edge; as well as many pelts, each a trophy of her conquests over lesser creatures unlucky enough to have crossed her path. Creatures crossing her path, however, were a rare occurrence. The only way in or out of her cave was to ascend the sheer rock face by navigating a naturally occurring staircase, formed out of plant roots and cracks in the stone. Loose shale made this journey dangerous even for those who knew the safest path, and only she knew the safest path. Sometimes though, every once in a while, a poor, lost creature would happen upon the route by chance and accidentally stumble into her cave. Such creatures, like the one she presently heard approaching, would enter her cave and would never be seen again. Crack! Her long wolf-like ears pricked up through her pitch mane, rotating toward the sound of a twig breaking underfoot. This was a rare occasion that must not be wasted. She crouched into her hunting pose. Her fangs slowly protracted, breaking through her gums on command as though they could taste the flesh already. She unsheathed her claws and sharpened their edges, drawing them slowly across the stone floor, creating four battle lines of dust either side of her poised body as she did. It had been such a long time since she had eaten. What a wonderful surprise this was. She could hear her unsuspecting quarry draw nearer, approaching the mouth of her cave. She moved as it moved, step for step, keeping close to the walls and using the shadows to her advantage. Finally, when both she and it were almost upon each other, she stealed herself into a shadowy crevice in the cave wall and waited...and listened. Tentative footsteps. A creaking. One...more...step... She leapt out on her her prey ready to attack but at the exact same time, her prey leapt out on her. It raised its huge partially clenched paws into the air, puffed up its chest, and while bearing its magnificent teeth, this creature let out an almighty roar - right in Niobe’s face. It gave her quite a fright! Niobe was indignant. Incandescent. The helpless creatures that wander into her cave aren’t supposed to scare the wotsits out of her. “No Daddy, you did it wrong,” she said to the creature, “I’m the monster. Go back and start again.” “Ok sweetheart,” the creature replied, “but this is the last one and then it’s bed time.”

There came a late-nochy collocoll at our dormy. Three gromky rasps tolled for the spectres outside. Set me zoobies on edge, it did. The gromky collocoll had been preceded by them clockwork goosesteps of orange boots on the slabs outside and we both knew exactly what that meant. Ade turned to me, wide-googlied with pog. Me tick-tock was down in me pit, thumping like jack. But had they come for him or me? I threw the covers off and reached for the lamp-switch but Ade grabbed me rooker and pulled me back. ​“Leave it off. The rozz don’t know we’re ‘ere.” The pog in his goloss was palpable but honest-like, I was just as poogly too. Accounts had circulated ‘mongst us blueberries, like kiddywink ghost stories; tales of blueberries being rounded up and taken to the London Lighthouse. It’s funny how things change, ain’t it? A century back, the London Lighthouse was a residential charity for blueberries with ‘the blue sickness’ – it made you pony a world of liberty and tolerance – but now-times them two words strike pog into the tick-tocks of all us blueberries. Laws change, public opinion comes and goes, and the clockworks bring us all back to the start with each revolution. I’ve known since I was in skollywol that I was a blueberry but it was always natural for me; it never entered me rassadook that the vecks would make blueberry lullibub illegal. ​“Evan, don’t.” Ade pleaded as I knotted me gown ‘round me pit and walked down the wall-to-wall. There was no point cowering under the covers. We’d both heard the stories of what happens to the cluck-clucks; a nosh in yer yarbles – let the scarlet moloko drain out. I gingerly googlied the spyhole and my tick-tock beat harder as the spectral figures ‘came crystal; three tough-looking orange millicents stood the other side of our dormy dor, backlit by the streetlamps outside. ​“Don’t make a sound.” I whispered back down the wall-to-wall. Then I swallowed me pog and opened the door. ​“Evan Newchild?” the first millicent yawped and I nodded trepid-like. “You depraved mongrel!” he spat. He waited a tick then lifted a tablet from his pocket, widened his pearlies with sinister joy and parlayed my writ. “Evan Newchild, you have been tried and found guilty of a contravention of the Orthosexuality Act of 2072. You will be taken from this place to the London Lighthouse where you will undergo conversion treatment.” So, they’d come for me. If yer believed the stories they told at The Korova Bar – And why wouldn’t yer? The stories had wormed into our rassoodocks like memes – like every blueberry, you was pogful for the day the orange collocoll came. They parlay that the London Lighthouse is in the old building of an actual lighthouse at Trinity Buoy Wharf. An actual lighthouse in London? Pony That! The stories parlay of this menacing orange doctor. Call him The Orthotist, they do. Yer get taken to a cylindrical room on the first floor – and that’s where The Orthotist straightens yer out – guess the oranges have a sense of irony at least. They parlay of blueberries, young blueberry men, strapped into a chair with bindings on their rookers and rocks –cathodes in their bonse and alligator snappers on their yarbles – orthotic instruments lined up, ready and waiting, like a torture chamber. They parlay that yer can hear the blueberry creeching, late at night, echoing ‘cross the wharf. The first orange millicent bound me rookers, then the other two man-handled me into the back of their van. I let ‘em take me without starting a drat. I were just praying to bog that they didn’t googlie inside – that they didn’t ooko Adam – but Adam didn’t make a sound, bless him, and as they closed me dormy dor, once I ponied him safe, I laughed gromky and bold. Earned me a kulak that near blew me googlies from their sockets, that did. “Trouble with you blueberries is your ticks are tocking, you’re out of sync, but we’ll soon have you straightened out – orange like clockwork. Wouldn’t that feel better?” He sat opposite-like, in back o’ the van, holding a britva to me like he was poogly ‘bout what I might do. ​“You should be happy, not every blueberry gets to go to the Lighthouse.” he spat as he poked the britva blade into me mouth and slit me goobers - made like I was smiling, “Once the orthotist is finished with you, you’ll be ticking straight like a good orange.” I googlied him viz-to-viz, and as the scarlet moloko dripped from me brow and me goobers, I grinned a defiant flash of me pearlies. “Clockwork oranges…ha!” tick-tock, tick-tock, “I’ll never be like you!”

It’s almost 4am and I’m starting to feel the effects of twenty-one hours awake. With my heightened senses I notice every movement in the corner of my eye - hear every creak and groan in this ageing former office block. ​“I’m going to start now.” David is shift supervisor; he’s behind me, listening to my call; I can feel him hovering there. His presence comes closer and he reaches over me; a gentle hand on my shoulder; a brief but compassionate smile in my direction. He places a fresh cup of coffee beside the telephone. ​“Forgive me.” Some callers are just lonely and need to talk, some are more-likely clinically depressed, and you do get some who are feeling physically lonely, (you can hear the distinctive sounds on the other end of the line, like they are unblocking a small plug hole with a miniature plunger). The toughest though, are the suicide-in-progress calls. We don’t try to stop them – it’s one of the founding principles of the organisation that no one should have to die alone – so we listen. “I’ve swallowed the last one.” I’m sitting down, sedately listening, not even talking, but my adrenaline is high, and my heart beats out of my chest. I couldn’t sleep now if I wanted to. I allow my mind to wander; my shopping list; what I’ll cook for lunch; seven-down in the crossword. ​“Thank you for being here.” It’s the last thing I hear before the disconnect tone.

We hadn’t had slept. The adrenaline rush was still pumping, gone 5am when Tower 327 burst into life and began projecting the dawn briefing into my visual cortex implant. How anyone is expected to sleep when the daily briefings are pumped in five times a day, I don’t know, but I was low on credits, so I had to watch the whole broadcast. Ellie had switched her implant off. She was pretending to sleep, but I knew she was awake. ​“Wake up. We made the news!” I was out of bed, though still naked, when the news report started. Ellie was still in bed, with the sheets draped over her mound, protecting her decency from…I don’t know who? She looked like an old oil painting, with her chestnut ringlets pinned back, and her voluptuous breasts falling out from under the white sheet. There was no reason to worry. We’d stayed awake all night, retracing our steps and checking our security protocol. Underground server. Double VPN. Stolen hard-link. They shouldn’t have been able to trace us…but were we sure? The news reporter appeared grave, like it was his wall that we’d bombed. Ellie switched her VCI back on. “This morning the national news agency has learned that late yesterday evening WCI was victim of a digital break-in. It is understood that a number of unknown terrorists hacked the WCI mainframe, and in an act known as ‘bombing’, wrote messages of descent within the network’s source-code. Warwick Charles himself was unavailable for comment but a representative of the company made the following statement: ‘We can confirm that a breech in our firewall occurred between 10pm and midnight yesterday. No data was extracted however some subversive code deposited by the terrorists was identified and removed within a few hours.’ No group has yet claimed responsibility; however, suspicions are growing that the anarchist movement known as ‘The Blue Square Collective’ may be behind the attack.” Ellie smirked. She seemed to think we were already in the clear. ​“We should go out and celebrate.” ​“It’s quarter to six!” ​“But we just got our first national ping. Bet they’ll let us in Dragon Bar free now!” She was right, it was a big deal for us, but I was less confident that we had covered our tracks. Part of me still expected, any second, to hear WCI private forces kicking in Dad’s front door and dragging us off to a discrete location where there were no Towers to see what happens. *** I tried to play it nonchalant and changed the subject. I knew she was watching me, so I repositioned my full-length swivel mirror until it framed my whole body, then I breathed in and plumped up my chest. “You know, sometimes they don’t look real.” Ellie didn’t reply. “I mean, I know they are real, but sometimes they just don’t look right. Yours at least look like they belong there, but mine are these little squished balls of raw bread dough, like they haven’t risen yet.” I massaged them together and squeezed them upwards to give myself the maximum possible cleavage and tried to find a good angle to admire them, but my hands seemed to cover them up. I let go with a disappointed sigh and they sprung back into position with barely any movement. Ellie got out of bed, came up behind me and wrapped her arms around my waist. ​“I get it. You don’t want to talk about our new-found fame,” she whispered into my ear whilst kissing my neck, “Anyway, I like your little boy tits.” “Oi!” She giggled and started to caress them. “With these little aspirins I’m sure some pillow-princess will look after you in prison.” “For fuck sake Ellie.” I wanted to explain how nervous I still was, and how un-funny I found that, but she distracted me as her hands slowly moved lower. She stroked down the gully between my ribs, past my belly button, and lower still, stopping just at the apex... Her fingers were poised. I gasped. “Girls. Breakfast.” Dad shouted up from the kitchen. Great timing Dad! I turned around, gave Ellie a quick peck on the lips, then we broke away and both scrabbled around my bedroom floor looking for our clothes. *** “Remember, be normal.” I said, pulling my boxers up over my bony bum. “What do you mean, normal?” “This isn’t easy for him.” “Oh you mean, be straight.” I checked her a momentary glare. “I could always flirt with him a bit. Give him a quick hand-job with his morning coffee. Would that be normal enough for you?” “Fuck off! You know what I mean.” “He should be more worried that his precious daughter is a digital terrorist!” she said with an ugly snorting laugh as she whipped my thighs with her knickers. *** Once we were both dressed, we joined my Dad in the kitchen. He’d made omelettes and God only knows how many credits he’d spent on the eggs; obviously trying to prove how ‘ok with us’ he was. Not that I was complaining, I hadn’t had an omelette in months, it’s just…I know if Mum was still around, she wouldn’t have made it weird. Nevertheless, I didn’t wait on ceremony. I was suddenly ravenous. Ellie wanted to be polite but when she saw me going at it, she started smashing in her breakfast too. I guess when you’re up all night on adrenaline you burn a lot of calories. ​“Did you girls see the dawn briefing?” Dad said in a vain attempt to strike up small-talk, “I just don’t see the point in some of the things these anarchists do.” Ellie looked like she wanted to retort, and I was just about to kick her under the table when we heard the thing that had kept us up all night: The dreaded rasps at the front door. ​“Security services. Open up!”

“Dad sends his love. He’d have come too but, what with his bad leg.” She sat down opposite. Method tried to look away, tried not to make eye contact, nevertheless, his mother leaned forwards, controlled the nerves in her voice, and she asked him what she had come here to ask. “The papers have said some horrible things about you but it’s all lies isn’t it? Tell me it’s not true.” “What people are ashamed of usually makes a good story.” Method replied with a low, sinister register, “F. Scott Fitzgerald said that.” “Ashamed?” she whimpered, “You mean…?” For the briefest of moments, as Method moved his head under the overhead spot-light, his mother caught a glimpse of his haggard face. Puffed up black bags. Wrinkles. She wondered if he’d always looked that old? Then she heard the subtle crackle of burning tobacco leaves and she tutted. He never used to be a smoker. Method blew smoke at the glass, before withdrawing from the spotlight, back to the shadows. ​“Please Timothy, talk to me.” ​“My name is Method!” he snapped back violently, “How many times?” She nodded sheepishly. It’s probably normal, she supposed, when a writer has a pen-name they want their family to call them by that name so that their ears can grow accustomed to the moniker. Still, she found it hard. ​“But I thought everything was going so well for you? Signings and readings around the world. TV interviews. You remember Mr Singh who owns the chemist where I get your Dad’s medication? He saw you on Parky and recognised you. He asked me if it was you. I said yes, proudly. Then he asked me to get your autograph. Said he’d put it on the wall in his shop and…” she paused, having veered off topic, to pick up her loose thread, “…I just don’t understand what’s gone wrong.” Method took a long drag. For a split-second the glowing embers illuminated his cheek and with it, the tell-tale tramlines of tears. ​“It was all I ever wanted. ‘Course it was…but I paid my thirty pieces for it, didn’t I?” A catch in his throat and a subtle sniff suggested he wasn’t so aloof after all and although it was a while before he spoke again – his mother waited patiently – when he did, his tone lightened. He was finally ready to open-up. ​“Do you know where I got the name Method?” ​“Well, it’s funny you should ask that because the other day on This Morning, Holly and Phillip were interviewing that tall comedian that your Dad likes. You know. The one with the suit. What’s his name? Well, whatever his name is, he was saying that it actually wasn’t his name anyway. He had to change his name years ago when he first started out because there was someone else who already had that name. Apparently, actors all have to get this Equity license thingy and they won’t let two actors have the same name. So, I thought it must be something like that but for writers.” ​“Jesus, Mum. No!” he said, fleeting distain in his voice, “although…it’s weird you should mention actors.” ​“Hugh Dennis!” she interrupted excitedly. ​“Do you want me to tell you or not?” ​“Sorry my darling. Go on.” ​“Four or five years ago…When my writing career was stagnant…Honestly Mum, there were so many times I thought about jacking it all in. I wrote and I wrote and I worked two part time jobs to cover bills but no matter what I did, the publishers weren’t buying my manuscripts and whenever I called my agent it was like she couldn’t put the phone down quick enough.” Method lit another cigarette from the smouldering stub of the last one. ​“So, I re-read everything I had ever written. Everything. Every story, every pithy line scrawled on a napkin, every paragraph on a paper scrap until I found out what was missing. It was my characters. They were shallow. Two dimensional. I didn’t know them at all. That’s when I had a kind of epiphany. Some of the best actors in the world are what they call method actors and when they are learning a new character, they try to become that character through every facet of their life. They eat what that character would eat. Buy the things they would buy, from the shops that they would shop in. When they talk, whenever they talk, they are talking as that character. Then, when it comes to actually playing the role, they know exactly who the character is and how they’re supposed behave.” Two deep puffs. He breathed the smoke out slowly. ​“It seemed so obvious. So simple. I just took the next logical step and I became the world’s first method writer. That’s why you don’t see me when I’m writing. You wouldn’t even recognise me if I did call. I’ve embodied every major character for years now. Twelve books!” ​“But…not all of them?” As soon as the implication of his confession clarified, the madness in Method was plain to see. ​“All of them. Day-to-day I go by the name Method, but I’m also Reckless and Carswell, the world-famous detectives, and Mary Harper, the murderous house-wife from ‘B is for Bludgeon’, and Julian Hearn who killed three hostages in a botched bank robbery, and of course, hailing from my most successful series, the serial killer known only by the nickname the tabloids gave him, I am The Smoking Strangler!” Method stubbed out his cigarette exaggeratedly while his shellshocked mother tried to smile away the nausea she felt. She shuffled anxiously in her chair, not sure if she should run away in fear or climb over the glass barrier to hug and comfort her son. Suddenly, the thick atmosphere was cut through, as a wall-mounted buzzer emitted a short, sharp alarm. ​“That’s time!” shouted the prison guard, “Everybody out.”