Nightmare

The phone is chittering. Gus picks up the lobster, carefully avoiding its claws, and puts it to his ear. Its feelers tickle, dislodging his bowler hat. It is the plasterer calling to say he'll be round later. Gus pictures the man smothering himself in plaster, becoming spherical, all Humpy-Dumpy.

Suddenly, Gus finds himself walking along the seashore. He looks out over the horizon where a pair of full red lips balloon across the sky. His vision, though, is suddenly obscured by a large Granny Smith rearing up in front of his face. As if it were a bobbing apple, Gus tries to bite into it, unsuccessfully.

Then he discovers that he is still holding the lobster. He settles it on the sand and watches it scuttle away on ragged claws. Gus, too, makes his way home, mounting a passing bicycle.

That afternoon, it is not the plasterer who calls, but the plumber. In his right hand, he holds a length of lead piping.

"According to Colonel Mustard," pronounces the plumber, "this pipe, found in the library, bears your fingerprints." As he finishes speaking, the pipe begins to writhe.

"This is not a pipe," declares Gus, "it's … it's a serpent!"

"Ugh" exclaims the plumber, trying to cast away the beast, but it secures itself to his arm.

Gus remembers the apple, still tucked beneath his bowler. "Here," he says to the snake, tossing over the apple, "have a bite of this alluring fruit."

"That's my line, isn't it?" replies the snake, looking down at the apple by the plumber's feet.

The plumber, following its gaze, is shocked to see the toes of his boots wriggling … like baby snakes. "There's treachery afoot," he exclaims.

"My progeny," declares the snake, releasing the plumber's arm and metamorphosing into a coil of rope.

Gus spends the evening at home, experimenting with his new iron, the gift of a friend. It is not good for pressing, he discovers, but excellent for shredding shirts and making bandages. Gus then composes some automatic poetry while sipping coffee from his favourite cup, sleek and fur-lined.

Bed next, he thinks, hunting around for his clock. He eventually spots it, sliding down the wall like a giant amoeba, a snail-trace in its wake. He's having trouble reading the numbers, though, for they're turning into ants and taking off across the wall.

Scratching his head, Gus finds the bowler there again, beneath which sits his apple. Feeling peckish, he eats it with some runny blue cheese. He hopes that, tomorrow, he'll find some interesting work. Last week, he'd been with the fire service, helping to hose down some blazing giraffes.

He soon falls asleep, but it's not a comfortable night. He wakes, stiff, in his chair. Somehow, things don't feel right. Through the window, he can see the sun alone in the sky--no baguettey clouds or botoxy lips in sight.

He goes outside, where lines of commuters marches in step along the pavement, furled umbrellas swinging. Gus falls in step, catches a train and then finds himself in an office tower block. He sits at a desk shuffling papers, making phone calls and signing documents endlessly. In the distance, typewriters clack until lunchtime, when a buzzer sounds and everyone troops out of the office. Gus feels strange and uneasy, venting his feelings in a cry: "Agh!" The noise wakes him. He'd still been asleep, he now realises.

The relief is immense. It had been just a dream … No: it had been a nightmare. He is safely tucked in his sardine can. With the key, he turns back his covers and, through the window, watches as a yolk-yellow sun shoots up into the sky as though catapulted from a trebuchet. Like a lidless eye, it stares seductively at him until a bumptious cloud slices across its centre. Above the trees, a few windmills buzz idly.

"Phew!" Gus sighs, resolving that never again will he indulge in blue cheese before he goes to bed.

Dr David Rudd is an emeritus professor who, after 40 years, turned from academic prose to creative writing and found fulfilment. He has published around 60 stories, several in Aphelion. These, among others, are collected in his 2024 book, Blood Will Out, and Other Strange Tales(available through Amazon and elsewhere).

Find more by David Rudd in the Author Index.

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