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A Raold Dahl type story

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A Raold Dahl type story Empty A Raold Dahl type story

Post by Scruff Mon Jan 10, 2011 10:50 am

Was talking to DK earlier, and it inspired me to write a story ive had in my head for ages. Spent the aftertoon on the lap top writing this and drinking beechams lemon, lol

NIRVANA

It was a cold dark October night, the autumn of 1884 had been a cruel one. To the honest hardworking Lancashire families such as the Bastons’s it was particularly harsh. The Baston’s like many other families worked just to survive the mundanity of life in the cotton mills and mines of their little village of Westhampton. It wasn’t life in its truest sense, nobody here could actually call this living, but for the Baston’s living was a word that meant everything, they were a close knit group and they had each other and that was enough for the moment, for soon they may not even have each other.

Around the bedside of Amy their twelve year old daughter the Baston family were preparing for the inevitable. Blind since birth, Amy had never been of good health. She was born with a weakened immune system and battled many illnesses in her tender years. Amy had fought with great resistance this year of 1884 since February’s pitiless pneumonia epidemic that had struck Westhampton and surrounding villages. The courage of the child was legendary on the threadbare cobbled streets of the little mining community but even Amy could not fight it this time her world of darkness was about to enter its final cheerless moments.
Father Wright a close friend of the family was also at Amy’s bedside to guide them through what was surely to be their tragic loss, Amy was not expected to last the night, her mother Sarah sat tearful and broken clasping Amy’s shivering hand. Her father Joseph, a proud strong man had been allowed compassionate leave from the local mine, he had never showed much emotion as he didn’t believe that men should cry, he was their beacon of light in the middle of a vagrant ocean. He was fighting back the lumps in his throat, ruffling his raven coloured hair with his hand in an agitated manner but even at this point the would remain strong for Amy, he would not cry. Amy lay still, 2 hours passed without a single word passing her lips, then, with the hint of a smile she was gone.


The darkness was no longer upon her. Amy rubbed her eyes, her vision was clouded though she could see colours, she knew they were colours for they were not black. She had only ever dreamt of what colours must be like, then in a moment of clarity her vision was clear for the first time in her short life she could see everything around her.

Where was she? Only the sky above her and the grass below her could tell her that, she knew the sky and the ground because her mother had spent many hours telling her of the wonder of nature, she only ever imagined what they might look like but the moment she saw them she knew with natural instinct.
Amy suddenly felt stone cold she decided quickly in which of the four directions she should walk. Her coldness was as scary as it was surprising for this was a glorious summers day and dressed in her long petticoat dress and long ankle boots she wondered how indeed she could feel so cold.
Suddenly and without a hint of arrival a large thunderous booming noise filled the sky above her. Amy looked into the sky, what could only be described as a large metallic bird flew over her faster than anything she ever imagined anything could fly. Frightened by her new found vision and what images it was choosing to show to her Amy ran. And kept on running until she came to a road at the end of the field.

Having climbed over a wooden fence Amy started walking in a Northern direction still puzzled and shaken by her vision and still she felt so unnaturally cold with the sun beating down upon her. As she walked straight down the middle of the perfectly cemented flat road she was struck by the lack of cobbles and figured she couldn’t possibly be in Westhampton. She was shaken from her own little private world of though only too soon. Amy had had to dive to the roadside, as she picked herself up and dusted off her petticoat she saw the thing that had almost knocked her down stopped further on up the road, a giant red chariot. As she walked on past it all the people sat upon it waved at her and looked concerned and then it sped off again. Now to her complete amazement all she could see around her were chariots of many shapes and sizes, some had four wheels and some had two but they were not bicycles as her father owned to go to work upon, they were all much noisier and faster.
‘Where is this strange place “ she thought ‘What are all these strange and wonderful sights I am seeing’ Her mother had talked of the world in great detail but she had never described anything like this at all. Amy was still in bewilderment as she sensed familiarity in the streets she had negotiated blindly with her parents, surely with all these people around her someone must know her and tell her how to find her way home.
She looked upwards at the amazing buildings that seemed to touch the sky, she marvelled at giant coloured signs although she could not read a word printed upon them. She looked in awe as more and more coloured chariots passed her by including several more of the big red ones that almost injured her earlier. All of the signs which she could not read were so wonderfully pretty some even seemed to be lit by an invisible candle light, ‘how strange in the daytime’ she thought.
One thing alarming Amy was that nobody else was dressed like she was, their clothes were more colourful and the girls in particular wore skirts far shorter than Amy ever realised they could be wore. She was also alarmed by the fact that everyone seemed to be staring at her like she was some sort of museum exhibition, Never the less she started right back at them with exactly the same dumbstruck feeling. Amy followed a crowd of people across many busy roads and went into some sort of glass palace with all types of separate rooms, each of which had one of those coloured signs above its doorway. All she could hear was some sort of ungodly loud music which seemed to be coming from a doorway to her right, a cacophonous mixture of sounds and certainly unlike the quiet melody played by her father on his flute to help her drift off to sleep at night.
‘This music could wake the dead’ she thought and stared into the window of the shop it emanated from, lots of little round discs for sale, a young man approached her. “what is this” she asked… “man where you been” he said “its Nirvana dude, aint you ever seen a HMV before”.. he laughed and walked away smiling at Amy.
She carried on walking through her glass palace and even though now indoors she seemed to be growing increasingly colder. In the middle of the floor she saw a moving staircase going up to another floor, a fascinating site and beautifully decorated by a water fountain at its entrance. At this she felt to weak to continue and collapsed onto the floor. “let me help you” a man said

All she remembered after that moment was a man carrying her to a white chariot with flashing lights coming to take her away. She then remembered a clean smelling room with many bright lights above her. She was layed on a hard bed with little tubes attached to her body, many men in women with masks on their faces standing over her. Next thing she knew she was in a softer bed in a larger room with many other children her own age, some lay in beds and some played at the end of the room, but she found herself attached to a strange machine that made a beep noise every few minutes. Suddenly she saw the man who had found her by the fountain standing over her bed.

“I only ever wished for one thing” he said softly, yet in a voice she recognised but could not place in such strange surroundings. The man was crying and swept back his black hair with his hands as he did so.
With that the man placed his hands into hers, she noticed the ring he was wearing was just like the one on her fathers right hand. Amy had felt it lovingly on many an occasion and knew every intricate detail. He then leaned over and kissed her softly on the cheek and unnerving sensation filled her body and suddenly she felt life returning to her body like she had never felt it in all of her life
All she could remember after that was the machine she was attached to suddenly making a high pitched noise not unlike a continuous B note on her fathers flute, the last words she remembered were “its no good, weve lost her, I’m so sorry sir”


“Mother where are you” cried Amy.
Her visionless world had returned to haunt her. Her startled mother who by now was in utter despair could not believe her eyes. Just after Amy had passed away her proud father had died of a broken heart. Sarah Baston had lost both the people she treasured the most in the space of twenty heartbreaking minutes,. Yet suddenly her daughter was awake and needed her again. ‘this cannot be happening’ thought Sarah, Amy had died over an hour ago Father Wright had giving her the last rites, yet here she was out of bed looking healthier than ever before and searching for her mothers arms.

“I had a wonderful wonderful dream mother” she spoke in excitement. ”I saw everything you described to me, and so much more, some of it I cant even begin to understand”
Sarah had to fight back the tears her kind a kaleidoscopic clash of happiness for her daughter and grief for her loving husband. She had to tell Amy the tragic news.
“your father’s gone to heaven child” she wept, trying to speak softly to comfort Amy.
“I know mother, I know” how she knew she was not sure but her mother was only telling her something she was already at peace with
Joseph Baston was in the marital bedroom lying peacefully, and undertaker had been called by Father Wright to take away the body by horse and cart.
“take me to his bedside” said Amy.
Sarah watched as her daughter felt for her fathers peaceful sleeping body, she sat clasping his right hand and suddenly began to panic.
“fathers ring, its gone” she cried alarmingly as if the shatter the deathly peace around her.

A week passed by and Amy continued to astound everyone in Westhampton with her amazing recovery from the pneumonia, no mention was made of the hour she had slept peacefully. She still lived in her world of darkness but her health was so much better now.
She and Sarah mourned the loss of a loving father and husband and the village paid tribute to a much respected member of its community. Suddenly a knock on the door of their house interrupted the quietness of the day. Sarah answered the door to find a young man dressed strangely in a check shirt and holy blue trousers, he must be a ragamuffin she though and proffered to offer him some coins.
“No dude, I got something for you” the young man said. Sarah could not help feeling like she had known this stranger all of her life and Amy certainly recognised the voice yet could not place it.

The young man handed Sarah a small box, she thanked the young man and closed the door returning to Amy. Amy wanted the box, so Sarah handed it to her. She felt inside and her hands came upon a circular disc she did not recognise the texture off, sort of metallic, She put this disc down on the table and felt back inside the box. Inside the small box was an ever smaller box, Amy opened the second box and immediately felt a rush of happiness, she took out what could only be her fathers ring and showed it to her mother who by now was equally baffled by the circular disc Amy had discarded onto the table.
“it really is fathers ring isn’t it mother” Amy cried.
“it is child, it really is” said Sarah.

And then holding the larger gift in her hand said
“but who or what is Nirvana?”

JJM 10/1/11
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Post by the_hound Tue Jan 11, 2011 5:58 am

a giant red chariot???? - I thought she was from 1884, not from Roman times! Surely she was been more astounded by the horseless shiny red metal carriage which produced nauseating fumes and a terrifying noise?

An intriguing story, though I felt the HMV and Nirvana CD were kinda shoe horned in.
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Post by Scruff Tue Jan 11, 2011 6:56 am

kids have a strange way of describing things DK, something as big and unknown as a double decker bus in 1884 may well have been seen like that in a kids mind
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