THE FEAR

He looks around him and sees how the old ways turn to ash at his feet, only to be disturbed by the march of progress. Change is inevitable. Inexorable, even. He understands the world around him can't stay the same forever - these aren't the halcyon days of youth, when time was liquid and five years was considered "a very long time". Is now the time for a five year plan? What sort of people have those, anyway? he wonders. Those absorbed in their careers, their own lives? Not absorbed: obsessed. Obsession begets compulsion, begets addiction. Start the weekend with a drink, but every month the weekends start earlier until there is nothing but weekend. Time has become liquid again. "I deserve it after the week I've had" they say. "I deserve some fun, to have my own little vice." But it could be drugs, or a loose temper, or a weakness for women. Or a more benevolent desire to collect shoes/stamps/books or any number of things. It becomes accepted only because it becomes standard. You don't expect change so change never happens, but it's there, waiting. What if they wake up and decide to change? Is it you or them? "Don't do it for me" you say. He replies "Change isn't always conscious" so is conscious change a bad thing, or even change in the first place? Or is it simply an existing vice, or facet, or quirk, slotted somewhere else, pushed to the side? Not ignored, but consciously forgotten - which isn't forgotten at all, of course. Change isn't the enemy. Change is progress.

Isn't it?

SEVERAL COATS OF PAINT: SEX AND VIOLENCE

Which of these is the colour of shame?

PART THREE (part one is HERE part two is HERE but if you can't be bothered to go there, here's a quick recap: Natasha Window is an art student. She's fallen in love inexplicably fast with the painter/decorator Chase Brick. He told her a terrible secret. Then we we were treated to a brief story about a sex-mad man called Johnny. Now we're back with Natasha and Chase, in bed...)

"Gasp!" Natasha gasped. Chase's secret was so earth-shatteringly mind-blowing and even boggling that it had caused her to have a flashback to a past life. "I just had a flashback to a past life!"

"I'm sorry I kept such a disturbing truth from you for so long," Chase said, guilt written on his face in metaphorical permanent marker. "Even though we've not been together for very long, really, it felt too long to hide something that shouldn't have been hid for so long."

"I'm glad you shared it," Natasha said. "Even if I now feel the bad kind of dirty. In my brain."

"I can't believe you temporarily regressed to a past life," Chase mused. "I can't say I have had any past life experiences, yet I sometimes feel like I'm living someone else's life."

"I think that's because so many people, especially when they're like us, share such intense experiences," Natasha said in a rare moment of mature self-awareness.

"What do you mean?" Chase asked, because he wasn't quite as intelligent as Natasha.

"We're apparently in love. We're in the giddy state of sharing secrets 'because we don't want there to be secrets between us' even though there will come a time when there are secrets between us. They'll start small, like fibbing about working an extra shift or feeling ill because you don't want to do something, then gradually build into complex and potentially damaging questions of trust and respect."

"Woah," Chase said, holding his hands out like he wanted her to calm down. "That's all a bit heavy. Can't we just enjoy the somewhat ridiculous buzz all young lovers experience when they first get to know each other before their foibles first amuse, then grate, then annoy each other?"

"And chat about our future together?"

"And our kids' names," Chase said with a nod.

"I'd like that," Natasha said, cuddling up to his buff body. He radiated heat like a radiator turned only partially on. "I'm sorry to get so serious, but my friend said a few things to me recently and they really made me think."

"I don't blame you for listening to your friends," Chase said, stroking her hair. "I know you'd put them before me."

"I say that," Natasha agreed, "but I think we both know I'd actually put you before them because you're new and exciting, and I'm currently convinced we're never going to split up despite my slightly negative vibes a few paragraphs ago, no matter what anyone says, or what drugs or liquids you put in your body."

"Plus you can't have sex with your friends," Chase added. "At least I hope you don't."

"Not now I'm with you," Natasha said, kissing him. "I love you. At least, as much as a desperate and horny young woman with low self-esteem can."

"Good enough for me," he said.

They made mad, passionate love. The kind of love that writers describe with words like 'heaving' and 'thrusting' and 'moist'. Afterwards, all their serious and sobering talk about their relationship not being impervious to criticism or time or logic was reduced to sweat on the bedsheets.

"This moment is what matters to me," Natasha decided.

Chase started to say something in return but was cut off by a heavy thud on the bedroom door.

"WHAT?!" Natasha yelled. Then to Chase: "I bet it's my friends complaining about our obnoxious sex noises. Again."

THUD! THUD! THUD!

"Bloody hell, mate," Chase shouted. "We've stopped!"

THUD! THUD! CRASH!

The door burst open and in the ragged doorway stood a hulking figure dressed in rags with a face shrouded in darkness despite the daylight filtering through the room.

"No, it can't be..." Chase gasped, pulling away from Natasha.

The figure raised a gloved hand and pointed at Natasha. "YOU, it said in a voice like gravel.

"Who the shitting bollocks are you?!" she shrieked.

"I AM THE ENEMY OF LOVE," it intoned.

"Fuck off, emo!" she retorted.

Instead, it took a lumbering step forward.

"I was worried this would happen..." Chase sobbed, pulling his trousers on. "We created the perfect conditions and summoned him! Oh god!"

WHAT NEXT?! FIND OUT...AT SOME POINT IN THE FUTURE!

SEVERAL COATS OF PAINT: THE SECOND COAT

PART 2: JONNY THE FOX [part one is here]
Written by Dave Thorpe

Jonny was in the park. It was a nice park, full of swings and goalposts, as parks tended to be back in those days. The goalposts reminded Jonny of his Dad from all those years ago. Jonny liked football, because he loved scoring goals. And the sorts of goals he loved involved penetrating women. Oh yes, Jonny liked to score. And when he couldn’t score with an actual woman, he spent many nights on his own, scoring own goals.

That summer passed quickly; it was all a blur to Jonathan Sebastian Door. He was a young man about town, with a point to prove and a wit as sharp as a blunt object. His father had taught him many things before he had left. Unfortunately, none of it had made sense to Jonny and he tended to flit from one meaningless sexual encounter to the next, living off the hopes, dreams and general income of others. But this was all about to change.

Jonny didn’t have many friends. He had always struggled to make a connection with people socially. That is if it wasn’t in a grubby club toilet or bent over a park bench. He saw himself as a sexual conquistador, and his passport was what he had dangling slightly to the left, between his firm manly thighs. Jonny knew that this was a potent weapon - the feeling he could arouse in a woman, the noise, the sweat, the pleasure. Sometimes it felt like a whirlwind to Jonny, seducing young girls, taking them, making them his, yet he was never really satisfied. They were all just a passing fancy. Jonny strived to further his depravity a little each time, but he would settle for vanilla if chocolate wasn’t on offer.

Jonny wasn’t the most eloquent of people, but in his own internal monologue he always had time for the odd innuendo. Another skill he might have learnt from his father, had he ever been at home. Jonny spent much of his childhood in the care of a nanny. This had probably shaped his view of the world more than he had realised. It also led to him roughly losing his virginity to a particularly young and perky Swedish nanny called Annika at the age of 14. She did things that previously he could only imagine and put things in places that he could never have imagined. This set him on course for a carefree sex-filled lifestyle of gay abandon (well of abandon anyway - he had not yet dabbled in the murky arena of man love).

Jonny knew that one day he would have to change his ways; he just needed something. He didn’t know what yet, but he was soon to find out. Until today Jonny didn’t know what it was. But today that was all about to change. It would be happening, today.

“Hey you, stop!” shouted Jonny as his eyes settled on the big burly man, speeding away from him. Jonny took flight in pursuit, knowing that he had to win this one. The man faltered and slipped, giving Jonny time to catch up, this was it, his moment. He dived forward, clutching at the air and landed in a crumpled heap.
“Oooh fuck aaaargghhh” screamed Jonny as his legs splayed apart and shattered, bone ripping through tendon, tearing through flesh...and the man was gone.

It was dark when Jonny awoke. He tried desperately to move but his body wouldn’t respond as it usually did. His eyes flickered open and he could just make out the bright fluorescent lights, the curtains, the starched white bed linen: yes, he was in his Mum’s spare room.

The pain he felt was dull, just like Jonny. He attempted to speak.
“Mrrph” he managed quietly, his mouth salty and dry. Is this it? thought Jonny. Have I been reduced to a dribbling vegetable? The answer was yet to be determined, but was probably yes. Or maybe it was actually no.

Jonny felt warmth between his legs and as he looked down he could see a head bobbing furiously. He now felt the sensation. Yes, it still worked, his cock standing proud and erect, filling this stranger’s mouth. What the hell was going on? thought Jonny. He could feel the soft, small hand working his man meat up and down, the warmth of the mouth and lips sliding gracefully along the shaft, harder, faster, and deeper. Then “ooh, aaahh, Mrrppph” and he was spent. Like all the other times, yet even less satisfying. The stranger rose, wiping their mouth clean. Jonny was disoriented but began to realise this wasn’t his mother’s spare room at all. Maybe he’d imagined it, maybe he was hallucinating or maybe it wasn’t real. Jonny just knew something wasn’t right. “Who, who, who are you?” he stammered, managing to elicit meaningful words from somewhere deep inside.

The figure took a step back, visibly aghast. Not expecting the young captive to wake just yet. This could pose a problem; the first stage hadn’t even been successfully completed. The figure scurried out of the room, to be replaced with another, larger, looming over him, breathing heavily: a man. Jonny could make out vague features, but couldn’t really focus.
“Hello Jonathan,” said the man. “I expect you’re wondering what all this is about?” Jonny tried to respond, all he managed was “please?” The figure laughed. “It’s okay, I’m here to help you”. Jonny struggled but could just about make out what it said on the man’s name badge: Mr B……..R…………I and then there was darkness and nothing.

TO BE CONTINUED! AGAIN!

If YOU would like to add to the terrible, terrible saga of Several Coats of Paint, get in touch!