It was a damnable day that Wednesday when we fell out.
She said I'd ruined the moment and often did.
"You spoil everything!" she'd shouted, as the door slammed shut on another bit of our marriage.
I felt so low I jumped in the Mini and drove to the Priory gardens, my favourite place, to be on my own. I felt crushed. I hated disappointing her. I did it so damn much.
I parked up and showed the volunteer my well-worn National Trust card.
"Thank you Mr.Fetley."
It was nearly Christmas itself and I walked into the vast, freezing gardens. Families were out in droves taking in the fresh crisp air coming off the estate's rolling lawns before going home to start the festivities.
I could see the gigantic Christmas tree near the Hall in the distance, it's coloured lights shimmering in the afternoon murk like a Georgian spaceship, as the sun began to fall behind the bear-pit.
"All this for one family! And who has a bear!" I always moaned when Martha was with me, the meanness completely out of place on our country walks round the Priory gardens and Hall grounds.
That was when we had gone on walks.
Like she said, I always ruined the fuckin' moment.
Being together properly had stopped ages ago. A dark cloud had lowered itself smack over our marriage. Maybe it had always been there.
The landscape of the Priory gardens was sensational and somewhere I'd often been as a child when my parents brought me in their old Wolseley for a summer day out.
Back then I never thought of the elitism of it all. Those incestuous blue-bloods rutting like stags whilst my folks scrimped and scraped.
My parents didn't either, they liked the grandeur of it all and brought a hamper laden with pork pies and cracker barrel, a flask of hot sweet tea and a tatty old picnic blanket, which my Mum spread out on the grass, flicking it up like a magician, while my Dad got everything out of the boot. Glory days. I didn't know how they did it. Stayed happy like that. They were blessed.
Long gone now, shadowy wanderers in my memories, I missed my parents so damn much. They had that inexplicable something so many of that generation had, a dusting of wisdom and verve, borne, no doubt from fighting in World War Two, their youth sacrificed for us lot, the kids, the progeny, the heirs. But were we destined to inherit. My tireless parents had been so happy before turning into heroic ghosts. I seemed to lose track of them in my river of sewage. It felt to me like a dark thing had emerged.
I wasn't happy. Neither was Martha my wife. We hadn't been for years, schoolyard sweethearts who's future was sealed by swapping a sucked refresher and a crumpled bag of sherbet. I got the sherbet, which I dipped my wet finger in and she licked it off in what was our first taste of sexual frisson so long ago, when we were fifth years at Wragby High.
Teenage fumbling followed and our innocence lost to each other at the back of the Pleasure Beach on school trip, grunting and huffing until we came for the first time, me wearing a Durex, which I'd got from the bogs at my Dad's local, when he'd sneaked me in for a swift half.
Where did it all go so fuckin' wrong? When did I fall into a black well.
Such sweet beginnings, like a sugar rocket zooming to Heaven, we'd stumbled somewhere on the way, I became sterile, it stopped and we we're bedevilled.
Martha hadn't loved me for ages. I knew that, sat there on the bench in the pull of the Victorian lights on the Hall, mocking my misery with their false promise of a grand old time this Yule.
Goodwill to all men, women and kids. But not us. No kids either. That went tits up sharpish. The doc said I'd lazy sperm. Yep! That had made sense to me. I was a lazy fucker all round, work-shy and way too fond of slobbing around drinking tea, watching telly and running to the Priory gardens, as if compelled by some maingy monkey on my back.
Martha got a raw deal with me really. Half a man, a dead loss as her Mum had whispered to her when she found out there'd be no grandkids to brighten up her tedious life from my hexed and empty bollocks.
I was 40 now and my clock was running out of steam.
A rosy-cheeked maid walked past. Must be an actress. She reminded me of Martha when we'd first met. Chaste. Cute as a button, the Martha I'd loved. She was holding a bowl of something hot, the rising wisps of vapour giving her pretty face a spectral look. Inexplicably, I felt aroused.
The National Trust we're clearly pulling out all the festive stops this year with, I assumed, volunteers dressed in period costume, doing period stuff like making steaming gruel a la Ebenezer Scrooge.
I smiled.
The maid ignored me as if I wasn't there. She buggered off, seeming to fade into the land. Who'd ruined the moment again. My manhood wilted.
I felt glummer than ever.
"That crotchety old bastard Scrooge and his fuckin' gruel. That'll be me in ten years when I'm fifty, one foot in the fuckin' grave!"
Scrooge.
"There's more of gravy than the grave here!"
I could hear my old English teacher, Mr. Spilt, roaring the line across his classroom in an ecstasy of adulation I'd never felt for anything in my life, save Martha back in the stone age.
"Dickens, the Victorian Shakespeare!" he'd bellowed, "and perhaps his greatest work, A Christmas Carol! I expect you to read it for the end-of-year test. That includes you too Fetley. Are you even with us boy?"
I'd hated school. A temple of bastard toil. A fuckin' workhouse. I couldn't wait to leave and get it on alright with Martha. Get shaggin' proper, get a job, get a place to live and get a life.
A bald butler rippled past like a reflection in the trees, another actor I guessed. This one was carrying a silver platter with one of those big silver domes. Raw liver for the old Lord no doubt. Or a devilled kidney or two. Mmmmm. Those rich entitled cunts knew how to party back then.
"We're raising .... raising a few pounds for some meat and drink for the poor," I'd stuttered from my desk, when Spilt, the vindictive twat, had made me read out loud in front of the class.
Even Martha had sniggered, the only time I thought she'd spoilt things, ruined the fuckin' moment. I'd never really forgiven her for that if I was being honest. It cast a blemish on our sweet puppy love and it lingered.
"Dickens! More like Dickless!" I'd shouted as I left the class. Everyone laughed, a brief flicker of acceptance by my fickle peers, but one which didn't last, it's soundtrack the smack of the cane as the School Head lashed my hand for insolence, my hand I did all my wanking with thinking about Martha. The fat bastard!
"Fetley, Fetley, Fetley, what are we going to do with you?" Sighed the Careers Officer in his crummy broom-cupboard of a room.
" You're a feckless slacker Fetley, with no fuckin' prospects whatsoever. My dog's dick's got more get and go than you!" He growled as if I was literally made of shit, a turd washed up in his godforsaken pisspot of an office. I fuckin' hated the Careers Officer and wished he was dead.
I hated the job he landed me with even more! Emptying cess-pits for the Council! For God's sake!
It seemed topical though, me being a turd and all and I almost laughed at the irony, if I'd known what that was back then.
I left school at sixteen. I was a cess-pits mate. Half a boy knee-deep in a pool of crap. I felt dejected, but as long as I had Martha I was OK. I was as horny as a grizzly back then.
"The Arse-sistant!" my Dad had chuckled, patting me on my shoulder with his broad smile, a smile which told me he was actually pleased as punch that I had a job, any job and earning some coin. My Mum was dead pleased for me too.
They were about the only fans I ever had really, my folks. They were fabulous parents, something I somehow knew I'd never be. A parent. There had to be something I was here for though.
Martha wasn't impressed with my job. Not one bit. Said I smelt like shitty toilets and dirty old men. And so it began. The royal disappointment that I was destined to be, a true genius of sweet Fanny Adams, whose greatest achievement was the laziest spunk in the history of jizzin', so fuckin lazy it didn't even hear the starting gun.
Like I said. Cursed. A shadow in a mirror.
The sun was nearly set when I sat down on a bench. It's reds and golds sloshing out like a Pollock painting over the sky. I thought of the endlessness of space and time and wondered if I was on any other planet somewhere in the universe, another me, doing better than I was. Maybe he's looking up too, sensing some true moment of oblivion we were hurtling towards, some twist of fate, no doubt the airless mouth of a demon's sphincter!
On the small stone bridge perched high above the boathouse I saw a silhouetted figure holding the rail. It looked like a man peering at the pool far below, where the old Priory regals had set off down the silver river running through the massive grounds. Another figure, a female, lay slumped on the bridge.
The figure appeared to be sobbing, but it was hard to tell, as the day was fading fast.
Someone approached him from behind. Another man I reckoned. A really really big man. He raised his arm and I was sure I saw the glint of steel in the dying sun, as his arm descended.
The smaller male contorted and screamed, a scream so blood-curdlingly chilling that I stood up, the hairs on the back of my neck rising and goosebumps breaking out allover my arms.
The victim turned and the huge man brought his knife down again and again, to which he screamed even louder, convulsing in agony, until he slid down onto the bridge, still and lifeless.
I realized instantly that he'd been stabbed to death right in front of me, slaughtered by some big fucker of a guy.
The big fucker then picked up the man's body as if it was a Ken doll and chucked it over the side, where it landed with a splat on the boathouse roof. He then walked off the bridge and climbed down to it. He grabbed the man's body, threw it into the pool and floated it into the boathouse, where they disappeared inside.
The female figure had crawled away out of sight.
I was electrified with emotion: terror, anger, anguish. It all rushed through me, my body primed with adrenaline. I had to do something. I had to confront that big bastard of a bloke and see if the man was still alive.
"Better check old boy! That's the ticket! Time to pitch in and show some spunk!"
It was the hairless butler I'd seen pass me earlier, sitting next to me on the bench, a mere skeleton with a pristine face, gazing at me with his silver service still in his hand, the big dome rattling as if something inside was alive. A baby's hand popped out and pointed at me.
"You're right! I will!"
As I stood up the big guy came splashing out of the boathouse back into the dark pool. It reminded me of my old cess-pits. The Arse-sistant.
He stopped dead and stared straight at me. His eyes were bright fuckin' red, like some goddamn demon from Hell.
I froze, unable to move, struck with terror.
The man got on the bridge and vanished into the night just as a woman arrived at the same spot, also silhouetted in the darkness and then disappeared as well.
I was stunned by what I'd seen and made my way to the bridge, leapt into the water and got inside the boathouse. Using the torch on my phone I looked around, but there was nothing but a manky arched brick-roof caked in natrine, a couple of ancient oars propped up and a mouldy widgeon on a hook. The water was shallow too and I could see there was nothing in it. Certainly no body, which would have been drenched in blood.
I staggered out and up to the Hall, which was now closed for the evening.
It was Christmas Eve and I'd been at the place all afternoon. For hours!
Fortunately the gates were still open and I drove home, dazed, terrified and angered by what I'd seen. I'd tell Martha about it, then phone the local nick.
Parking up, I noticed the front room was in darkness, save for the flickering tinsel and log fire, which we kept going in winter.
The curtains were slightly open and I was sure I heard voices in the dark room. I peered in and there in the firelight on the rug was a naked young woman, somehow glowing, being fucked silly by a huge guy, a fuckin beast of a guy judging by the width of his shoulders. He was pounding her like a mandrill, a potent ramrod of meat!
"Fuck me, fuck me you filthy bastard, I'm on fuckin heat!" The girl yelled.
And then it dawned on me in a moment of absolute and terrifying clarity. This was the same goddamn big bastard I'd seen stabbing the man on the bridge. The maid was the girl I'd seen at the Priory too! She looked like Martha did years ago, the Martha I'd fancied.
I gasped! Too loudly!
The brute stopped thrusting and turned slowly to face me. His terrible blood-red eyes bore into my own. He rose and I could see that the maid had been bitten and wrapped up in the fairy lights off our Christmas tree. As she groaned, he shoved a big glass bauble straight in her bloodied mouth. She squealed like a stuck pig.
The brutish man walked towards the window, where I was stood and threw open the curtains.
He smiled, his crooked mouth bristling with a million bloodied fangs. He pointed at me, nodded and mouthed a single word.
"Yours!"
I recoiled backwards screaming and knew I'd wet myself.
"For fucks sake Fetley, get a hold of yourself and sort that big bastard of a fucker out. He'll be banging and biting your wife Martha next for fucks sake! Have some fuckin' guts you little turd!"
It was my long-dead Careers Officer standing next to me under the wreath on the door, rotted and maggot-ridden, giving me advice I didn't need like he always fucking had.
"OK, OK!" I raged and burst into the front room to find absolutely nothing. No maid, no Martha, no monster, just the fire burning in the darkness and the fairy lights on the tree.
I was seeing things again.
I checked that Martha was asleep upstairs. She was. Sleeping fitfully but asleep. I slept on the settee downstairs; afraid I was losing my marbles, they were certainly coming loose! Three hallucinations and a big fuckin' monster of a guy in one night. What the fuck!
The next day, Christmas Day, having slept like shit, I took Martha a cup of coffee and some toast. I'd taken a sprig of mistletoe off the doorframe and put it on the tray too in some forlorn gesture of pagan hope.
I explained I'd had a really bad night and that I was sorry for the day before, buggering off like I did on Christmas Eve.
Yawning and stretching, rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she said she was sorry too. After all, it was Christmas Day and everyone deserved a second chance on Jesus's birthday. I lifted up the mistletoe, smiled and amazingly, we kissed.
Despite hating myself I couldn't stop thinking about the ape boning the Martha- maid the night before and, getting excited, one thing lead to another.
Martha reciprocated, heat glowing off her ripe body. She ripped off her night-dress and before we knew it we were making passionate love on the bed, more passionate than we'd ever been and ..... I'd even bitten Martha, something I'd never done before. I wore a Durex like I did for our first time. It felt nostalgic that little rubber sock.
"Wow!" She'd said afterwards smoking a fag. "Not so lazy after all Fetley! Your juice may lack some welly, but you certainly fettled me good and proper you filthy old beast!"
She was right. It had been a fantastic fuck.
After an unusually pleasant Christmas day, with Martha even adoring the gift I'd got for her, a Victorian Priory dolls house I'd bought at the Hall weeks earlier, the next few days passed quietly as the New Year beckoned with its promise of second chances, second helpings and second comings.
For the first time in a long time I felt hopeful for Martha and me, although both of us complained of feeling a little off colour. I made the sign of the cross, which I hadn't done since school chapel praying my parents would live forever.
New Year's Eve came like a high warm tide and after picking up some ginger biscuits at the Spar, because Martha was feeling sick, I stopped off at the Priory for a short walk and some time to think.
I'd felt anxious ever since Christmas Eve a week earlier, but my feelings for Martha were better than they'd been for years. She felt the same, despite her nausea, and we were suddenly doing well. It seemed like a bright new chapter after all. No more evil omens darkening our tomorrows.
I popped into the Hall and ordered Cappuccino in the cafe.
I nearly choked on the foam.
There, hanging above the far fireplace, was a large oil portrait of a huge bloke, the same one I'd seen on Christmas Eve when I'd been hallucinating. I'd put it down to stress back then, but here he was, the giant hunched man.
Approaching the painting I felt a chill gripping my bones like phantom hands , the very same as when I'd seen the brute the first time on the bridge. I stood before him and regretted it immediately. His scarlet eyes drilled into me once more and his massive arm rose out of the oil and pointed straight at me.
"You!" He growled, "I'll take what's yours!"
Terrified, I shambled backwards straight into a volunteer.
"He is rather dreadful I agree! Lord Gut, the bastard and only son of the fourth and final Count, to whom the estate had belonged at the time." The volunteer explained. She went on, "Gut was a fiendish malformed bear of a man, an abomination, vile in every way and capable of the most terrible acts. He was an embarrassment to the Count and incapable of bearing issue on account of his supposed semi-impotence, thus, after the last stillbirth to a servant girl, rendering the family lineage singularly dead, not that this affliction stopped Gut ravaging maids and female guests at every turn, victims of his roulette of sex and battery. On his deathbed he vowed to return every Wednesday night in the month of his 150th birthday, to claim a child from a ripe and fertile maiden on the day itself to continue the Gut line, the true heirs of the Priory and it's vast fortune. After the Count's passing the estate and it's monies we're held by the crown until bequeathed to the National Trust. Five hundred years of Counts came to nothing."
I was still shaken by the apparition in the painting.
"When is Lord Gut's 150th birthday?" I asked shakily.
"December is the month, his birthday was Christmas Eve, this year being his 150th, when, the legend says, he was at his most virile, then to claim his mistress for himself and take her home on the Eve of the New Year."
I left the volunteer and stumbled outside, pale and sick.
"Fuck, he's back, the old bastard son is back and I saw him on .... Christmas Eve .... Shagging ... The maid who looked like .... Martha!"
"FUCKKKK!"
I puked violently into a hydrangea bed and drove home.
I found my wife, relaxed, still in her nightie, arranging things in her new dolls' house, an exact match of the Priory, including part of the garden, which included the bridge.
Martha was enraptured by this miniature world. She carefully set up the dining room and the kitchen and moved onto the nursery. Here she became fixated with the tiny cot containing a small dark being. She hummed 'Away in a Manger' whilst walking a small wooden doll out of the house and into the garden.
It was then I saw another wooden figure stood on the bridge, bigger than the rest, bulkier, heavier.
"Jesus Christ! It's the swine, Lord Gut!"
I'd said it out loud, but Martha was in a trance and moved her own doll's likeness, the maid, towards the bridge.
I knew immediately what it meant! It was New Years Eve and Martha was to meet the monster on the boathouse bridge for God knows what, but I could guess!
I bundled my mesmerised wife into the mini, so I could keep an eye on her and drove like a madman to the Priory.
Once there, I locked my wife in the car and ran to the boathouse. I had to stop the brutish Gut once and for all.
He was there, his massive bulk silhouetted in the grainy dusk.
But so was my Martha. In her trance she'd got out of the car and taken a short cut. She was facing the beast, towering over her like some hunched Hadean troll. He had a long knife to her throat, slowly caressing her belly with his terrible palm.
I couldn't fuckin' believe it.
I ran towards them screaming and pushed Martha violently out of the way and head-butted the ogre hard in the stomach.
Despite him being strong, so damn strong, he dropped his weapon. He slapped me across the face with his knuckles and easily spun me round, where I grabbed the stone rail taking in deep breaths of the night air. I stared at the pool, lost in its depths, whilst Gut raised his huge fists above my head for the killing blow, growling like a fuckin' starved bear.
It was then I realised in a flash that all my yesterdays crashed into this single moment. This was the bull's-eye of my existence, his crushing of my fragile pointless skull. It hadn't been an hallucination I'd seen. It was a premonition, a vision of this very instance on the bridge, the pivotal arc of my destiny, my dead black hole.
But as his fists descended towards me, Martha crept beneath, picked up the long blade and thrust it deep into the ast's huge loins, severing his artery. Gouts of scalding blood poured over Martha's face like a baptism!
The bastard Gut clutched his terrible wound and pulled out the long knife. Hot red fluid bathed my wife completely, the gore filling her eyes and mouth.
She rubbed it all over her night-dress, rocking to and fro, laughing uncontrollably.
I stood over her and the bastard son in a state of shock. Fate had been fucked up the devil's arse and against all the many omens, the darkening blackness blurring our promise, Martha and I were still alive.
The brutish apparition of Lord Gut fell to his knees, his borrowed hate-fueled life-force spent and he writhed on the bridge clutching his bloodless groin. He began to fade to gas.
As New Years Eve melted away into New Years Day I kissed Martha on her bloody hair, the iron in Gut's spectral blood making me wretch.
"We survived Martha!" I sighed "we survived and thwarted the fuckin' demon from taking you away!"
"No, we didn't. He tricked us one last time. He'll return for me!"
"Why?" I shrieked.
"Because ...........
I'm pregnant with his ......
chiiiiiiiiiiiiiild!"
My terrible scream, growing louder and louder, filled her ears, the boathouse, the gardens and all the empty rooms of the distant Hall.
Holding my head in my hands I begged the hateful beast.
"Please Nooooooooooooooooooooooooo!"
And then I saw that it was true, the Bastard Gut smiling wickedly and widely at my Martha while Hell opened up and took him back.
