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Gangers

by Gerry 

Posted: 16 June 2011
Word Count: 697
Summary: For Dave's challenge. I know it's too long - I got carried away.


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Content Warning
This piece and/or subsequent comments may contain strong language.


Gangers

Looking into the dark by the mirror, Harry said, ‘Oh, my God.’
The figure turned, half hidden in shadow. ‘God, Harry? I’m the one who believes in God.’
Harry studied the face of this ... this what? Fiend? No, he thought. Sounds too much like something out of Poe, Lovecraft. This thing was real. He wanted to reach out now, touch the creature in the shadows that smiled at him, taunted him. Yes - maybe fiend was the word. Six months in pursuit of a fiend. Now this. The reckoning. He remembered the hotel register, seeing the name. Not the same name then, of course – that was later. He wrote Harry Holmes, and was about to put his address, when he saw the words on the opposite page: The same bold hand, the flourishing H’s, the very black ink, and - he knew it, he just knew it - the same broad nib of the same Mont Blanc. The letters slanting the other way, but the same. The very same.
‘Nice to have you back, Mr Hughes,’ said the receptionist, smiling. Then she looked down at the page. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, sir.’
‘Sorry?’
‘I thought you were ...’
‘You thought I was what?’
‘Somebody else, sir.’
Somebody else. If only the fiend had stayed somebody else.
The fiend was grinning now. He could see it knew it had turned his life on its head: when, for example, he’d come back from holiday and someone said they’d seen him yesterday at the hospital and playing golf at the club. And then - his whole body shivered now like a goose just walked over his grave - when he got an email from himself, asking how he was. Then more of them, five, six times a day. And finally, just two hours ago, the phone call: Hello, Harry. I think it’s time we met. Don’t you? Come over to my place.
My place: this wild, nightmare house on the edge of Dartmoor. Lovecraft and Poe would have loved it.
The fiend’s grin turned to a smirk as it stepped into the light of the moon. ‘Look, Harry.’
And he looked, stared.
‘Amazing, isn’t it?’ said the fiend, raising his eyebrows, wanting a reply. ‘Cat got your tongue, Harry?’
‘What the hell do you want?’
‘Isn’t it obvious?’
The fiend walked over to him till they were face to face. His own eyes, nose, lips. The same full lips. The fiend leaned forward and ... kissed him. Passionate, hard, trying to probe with its tongue – He tore himself away, wiping his mouth. ‘What the hell are you doing? I’m not bloody queer,’ he said.
‘Queer?’ said the fiend. ‘Is doing it with yourself queer?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, it bloody well is.’
‘You’re so tediously fucking straight, Harry.’
‘Normal.’
‘Normal, Harry? I could be normal, if I tried.’ The fiend walked away from him now, ten paces or so. Then stopped, turned back. ‘But I’m not sure that I could be a surgeon like you, though. I’m all thumbs, me.’
‘And you’re right-handed. I know from your signature.’
‘Clever boy, Harry,’ the fiend said. ‘And you’re a leftie. And, of course’ – a smile – ‘you’re good, Harry, aren’t you? Very good. And I’m ... now, what do they call it?’
Enough. He took out the Remington and cocked the trigger. ‘I’m not that bloody good,’ he said, and took aim.
‘Gosh, Harry. Now, here’s a coincidence.’ The same make of gun came out of the fiend’s jacket. The click of the safety.
‘But have you got the balls?’ said the fiend.
‘Fuck you,’ he said.
Bam.Two shots exactly together.
They stood facing each other for the very last time.
‘Oh, dear,’ said the fiend, frowning. ‘So, we’re not at all alike, are we?’
He sank to the floor as the fiend said, ‘You, I suspect, couldn’t hit a barn from the inside. Me, I just never miss.’
The fiend came over. The same oxblood brogues, cavalry twills. He looked up his own nose. ‘Help me,’ he said.
‘The Lord helps those who help themselves, Harry,’ said the fiend, and squeezed the trigger of the shiny automatic.










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Comments by other Members



Desormais at 11:07 on 16 June 2011  Report this post
This was great Gerry - had me captured right up to the end. There's very little descriptive prose in here and yet it's very atmospheric. A very original take on the theme. Well done.
Sandra

Gerry at 11:13 on 16 June 2011  Report this post

Thanks very much, Sandra. Really glad you liked it. I was having such a good time writing it, I shot past the word limit and couldn't stop meself ...

Cheers.

Gerry.

dharker at 13:39 on 16 June 2011  Report this post
I like this a lot Gerry! Doppelganger mayhem... and murder! (would this be suicide I wonder??) As Sandra says some lovely language used and an intriguing plot that held me to the end. As for the strict word count... well... what's an extra 294 words between friends eh!

Dave

<Added>

*cleans glasses* 194 words...

fiona_j at 18:19 on 16 June 2011  Report this post
Excellent story, very atmospheric and very sad at the end. The idea that he could take over his life too, very scary.

Well done.

Fi x

Gerry at 18:24 on 16 June 2011  Report this post

Thanks, Fi. Really glad you liked it.

Gerry.

Bunbry at 10:30 on 18 June 2011  Report this post
This kept me racing to the end Gerry - quite a tale!!

You have some issues with the Point of View changing which spoilt it a bit, although I'm sure that's easily fixed. I think because of the POV confusion I sometimes had to check who you meant when using 'he'.

Hope this helps

Nick

PS I'm on a bandwagon to outlaw ellipses (...) as they are naff! Anything you can do to help

Gerry at 11:27 on 18 June 2011  Report this post

I think what confused was the fact that I used 'Harry' in the first line, when it might have been better to say 'he' - so I've changed that, in the hope that the pov remains with 'he' for the rest of the tale, which I think it does, but I'd better check that, too.

Thanks,

Gerry.

<Added>


Or maybe that wasn't the problem and I need to fix it further. I'll delve a bit.

Bunbry at 10:05 on 19 June 2011  Report this post
Well done on the win Gerry. Regarding the point of view thing, part of the problem was that both characters had the same name which made things difficult for you! But that’s not really the point I was making. When writing short stories it has become ‘expected’ that you see the story from just one point of view, usually your MC. That means you see events through his eyes and know his thoughts. You can’t see events through the eyes of others, nor can you know the thoughts of others. This is I think to make the read more ‘real’ for the reader.

In this story you know the thoughts of the fiend, ie in this part -

The fiend was grinning now. It knew it had turned his life on its head:


in addition to those of your MC

Hope this helps.

Nick

PS The group’s etiquette seems to be that if someone reads and comments on your story, you read and comment on theirs. Helps keep things running smoothly!


Gerry at 10:26 on 19 June 2011  Report this post

I see what you mean, Nick. But I am aware of this convention - I would have thought that everyone here is - and thought I'd stuck with it. In the line you mention, however, I can see how it might be taken otherwise. I meant it as Harry seeing it from his point of view, i.e. Harry could see from the fiend's grin that the fiend was getting a laugh out of the damage he'd done - they are very close after all. Still, I'd be very happy to alter it for the sake of complete clarity.

I know I haven't commented on any other stories this week - something I nearly always try to do - I've been very busy. Apologies for that. It certainly wasn't my intention to cause any offence. It was an oversight. I hope nobody sees it as anything else.

Gerry.


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