FADE IN:

INT : TAYLOR’S HOUSE - DAY

Amanda, still in her blooded nightshirt, kneels by the mark left by George’s bed. She appears to glow yellow in the sunlight as though a visible aura surrounds her. No furniture is left in the bedroom, though the Peppa Pig border remains on the walls. The door behind her slowly opens.

ESTATE AGENT (V.O.)

..and here we have the second bedroom..

An Estate Agent leads a young couple into the bedroom.

ESTATE AGENT

..which you can see is an ideal child’s bedroom. The former owner’s young son chose the decoration.

MALE VIEWER

Is it true that the whole family were murdered in the house?

ESTATE AGENT

That was a couple of months ago, but since then the neighbourhood watch has been stepped up and as you can see all the windows and doors have

been fitted with deadlocks. There has also been a full sensor alarm system fitted with alarm boxes at both the entrance and at the top of the stairs. The house has also been priced for a quick sale and I’m sure that the administrators would accept a reasonable offer.

Amanda looks shocked and scared and as the estate agent speaks the aura surrounding Amanda turns from the golden yellow to an orange hue.

AMANDA

(shouting)

I’m not dead. I’m stood right here.

As she speaks, she glides towards them and as she gets close the three shiver.

FEMALE VIEWER

Gosh, what a draft, must be a window open.

The estate agent and the two viewers leave the bedroom, closing the door behind them.

MALE VIEWER (V.O.)

We do like the house, and as you say, the price is very attractive. We’ll discuss it tonight and be in touch.

Amanda sinks down to her knees, crying hard. She slowly pulls herself together and as she does her aura changes back to golden yellow. She stands, walks to the bedroom door and puts her hand out to turn the handle. Her hand passes straight through the door handle, then the door as she loses her balance, stumbles forward straight through the door. As her head passes through the door, her world goes dark as her eyes are engulfed by the wooden door and then she goes deaf as her ears follow through.

AMANDA

(whispers)

Oh God, I am dead.

She starts down the hallway, walking first, then slowly rising off the ground and gliding down the hallway with increasing speed. She enters her old bedroom, which is completely bare, the dust accumulating on the light fittings.

AMANDA

(whispering furiously)

They killed my family, they killed me, did the police get the evil bastards?

Amanda’s eyes harden with rage as she speaks the hate-filled words, her aura going from yellow, to orange, to red and finally scarlet.

FADE OUT

END OF ACT TWO

FADE IN:

INT. TAYLOR’S HOUSE – NIGHT

Amanda, wearing her knee length nightshirt, eases out of bed, the digital clock on her nightstand showing 2.19am, and quietly creeps to the bedroom door, silently opening it so as not to wake Jeremy, who is sleeping soundly. She walks down the corridor to George’s room, we see the handmade sign on his door confirming it’s his room. Amanda gently pushes open the door to peak in on her son. With the nightlight on she can clearly see he is fast asleep, snuggled up to his teddy-bear with his dummy next to his hand.

Amanda pulls the door to silently and then walks into the bathroom, closing the door gently before using the pull switch to turn on the light. After using the toilet, she silently turns the light back off, before opening the door and heading back towards her bedroom. She reaches the top of the stairs walks stealthily down them avoiding the creaking stair and heads for the kitchen to make herself a hot chocolate.

We see behind her the open lounge window and two shadowy figures making their way quietly into the room. So intent on their own tasks neither the men nor Amanda notice each other.

The men open their backpacks and pull out their nine inch steak knives, which glisten in the light of the street lamps, and then quickly make their way up the stairs. They push open the door to Jeremy and Amanda’s bedroom and Jack Grimshaw slaps his gloved hand over Jeremy’s mouth, plunging the steak knife into his chest. A geyser of blood jettisons its way from the damaged lung and artery of the heart, shooting over Jack’s arm. A low whistle emanates from Jeremy’s chest as he makes one last involuntary death spasm, before falling flat onto the bed.

JACK GRIMSHAW

(spoken quietly to himself)

Damn it, didn’t want that mess.

BOB REYNOLDS

(spoken quietly)

Fuck Jack, be careful when you stab these guys, you need to get the lung only, blood gives DNA and the cops love that shit.

JACK GRIMSHAW

(spoken quietly)

Well you can do anyone else then, as you know so much.

Bob leads Jack out of the bedroom and they head quietly down the landing, Jack heads towards the bathroom door, whilst Bob pushes open George’s room, looking in.

BOB REYNOLDS

(spoken quietly)

Ah damn it, I hate it when there are kids. Jack, I thought you said that there weren’t no kids here.

JACK GRIMSHAW

(spoken quietly)

Look Bob, I cased this joint all week and there were no kids here in that whole time, maybe they were away or something.

Bob walks across to George’s bed, raising the knife as he nears the sleeping boy.

BOB REYNOLDS

(spoken quietly to self)

Sorry kid.

Bob plunges the knife down into the sleeping toddler.

INTERCUT – TAYLOR’S KITCHEN – NIGHT

Amanda finishes her hot chocolate, rinses the cup and puts it into the dishwasher, heading back to the stairs she shivers as she notices that the lounge window is open. Shaking her head she walks across to the window, closing it.

AMANDA

(spoken gently)

Dammit Jay! I’m always telling you to lock the windows at night.

Amanda heads back to the stairs and quietly walks back up to her bedroom. She eases the door open and confused at not hearing Jeremy snoring she touches her side lamp, illuminating the room, she sees her dead husband.

AMANDA

(screams)

Jeremy, oh my God. Jay?

(quietly to self)

George, not George...

Amanda rushes to the bedroom door.

INTERCUT – TAYLOR’S BATHROOM – NIGHT

Jack hears the scream, lifts his knife in front of him at waist height, opens the bathroom door and heads into the hallway.

INTERCUT – GEORGE’S BEDROOM – NIGHT

Bob is wiping his knife on George’s curtains, when he hears the scream and turns towards the bedroom door, a confused expression on his face.

INTERCUT – TAYLOR’S UPSTAIRS HALL – NIGHT

Amanda rushes round the corner from her bedroom into the hallway just as Jack leaves the bathroom. Jack’s knife stabs deep into Amanda’s stomach, a terminal blow that she barely feels. The rage is so strong in her that she pushes Jack hard out of the way and he smashes through the bathroom door. Amanda rushes down the hallway and shoves open George’s bedroom door with a primeval scream.

INTERCUT – GEORGE’S BEDROOM – NIGHT

The door slams open and Amanda forces her way into the room, the knife still stuck deep in her stomach.

AMANDA

(screams)

Georgie!

Bob, knife raised high, rams it forward burying it in Amanda’s left shoulder, pushing her hard against the bedroom wall, before rushing out of the bedroom.

BOB REYNOLDS

(shouts)

Jack, let’s get the fuck out of here before the pigs arrive. She’ll never make it.

Amanda, the two knives still in her, falls to her knees at George’s bed, tears of rage and anguish flowing freely down her cheeks. Her head drops down onto her dead son’s chest as the life drains from her body along with the blood from the two knives. Her eyes, intense with anger, close and we hear in the distance the first sirens as the police respond to the neighbour’s calls for assistance.

FADE OUT

END OF ACT ONE

As the title sequence runs, photographs fade in and out of the screen, starting with photographs of Amanda and Jeremy as babies, handwritten captions below each picture showing their full names and dates of birth, which are within a week of each other. Full names being ‘Amanda Jane Bell’ and ‘Jeremy James Taylor’

The second photograph shows them in the same primary school uniform, captioned as ‘First day in school’.

The third photograph shows them together at a play park, captioned ‘New best friends’.

The fourth photograph shows them in their senior school uniform, holding hands, smiling, captioned ‘Secondary school – First Day for Mandy and Jay’.

The fifth photograph shows them in their prom clothes, captioned ‘The kids are growing up – Prom Night’.

The sixth photograph is taken at their joint graduation, in the full graduation dress, smiling, holding up their degrees, captioned ‘The superstars gain firsts!’.

The seventh photograph shows the couple standing in front of a semi-detached house, the sold sign still in the garden, a new handwriting for the captions now (Amanda’s) stating ‘Our first home together’.

The eighth photograph is of the couple on their wedding day, beaming smiles, confetti flying and the caption saying, ‘The best day of our lives.’

The ninth photograph is taken in hospital, Amanda lying in bed with a tiny baby swaddled in blankets, Jeremy cuddling them both (Jeremy and Amanda are now showing as the actors who will play them), captioned (in Jeremy’s handwriting) ‘George William Taylor arrives, at 2.31am, weighing in at 8 pounds 13 ounces. All exhausted but well’.

The tenth and final picture shows the three year old George with a Bob the Builder backpack smiling in front of the same house as in picture seven, with a few updates to the garden, and perhaps the cars on the driveway, with the caption (in Amanda’s handwriting), ‘Our little man grows up, first day at pre-school’.

FADE OUT

END OF TEASER – IN TITLE SEQUENCE

Google it!

By

Paul A. Roberts

Who needs it?

Google it!

Need to know who to vote for?

Google it!

Need to wire a plug?

Google it!

Need to cook a meal?

Google it!

Need to learn to dance?

Google it!

Need to do your tax return?

Google it!

Need to raise your children?

Google it!

Need to write a poem?

Google it!

Google it, watch it on YouTube, forget teachers, forget experts.

We get what we ask for.

Google life!

Knock

By

Paul A. Roberts

Boom, Boom, Boom

“What? Er? What’s that?"

Knock, Knock, Knock

“Ok, I hear you.”

Tap, tap, tap

“Who’s knocking? Where is that noise coming from?”

., ., .,

“Do you hear a knocking?”

“You were dreaming, honey, go back to sleep.”

“Oh, I guess so. Sorry, goodnight.”

., ., .,

“ZZZ.”

Tap, tap, tap!

Happy New Year one and all. As 2016 ends worldwide, and 2017 begins, it is often a time of introspection. A time for individuals to look at their life and try to find ways of enhancing them in the coming 12 months.

Now, many people look at it as a negative:

1. Give up smoking

2. Drink less alcohol

3. Join a gym (more a negative for the regular gym goers, who find January a painful time)

4. Eat less takeaway food

5. Read more books (though again, this surely must be a positive)

A Surtist view would be more a progressive target for the entire year:

1. Be more creative (paint a picture, pen a poem, write a song, scribe your novel)

2. Improve your health (a generic consideration, rather than a targeted giving up aim)

3. Being more considerate of the World at large

4. More time with family and friends

5. Read more books (sorry, had to include this one)

Accepting that not all the targets will be met is important, and not to get pulled to deeply into the details. Knowing that some days will be difficult to achieve any aspect of the targets, but other days will be particularly productive.

Not all my own 2016 targets were met, family ill health slowed down many aspects, but I have completed my first novel, proofread it time and time again, and it is now ready for my wife to go through it before I send it out there. This will happen at some point in 2017, and next I will go back to an older novel idea (I seem to recollect being about 20k words in to it), and look again at my comic styled children books.

As always, for me, January is an incredibly busy month, so my own targets will only begin in February. So I’ll be unlikely to write much more in the first month of 2017, but plan to do more thereafter.

I once again wish everyone a Happy New Year, and hope you all achieve some of your targets.

Best wishes

Paul A. Roberts

I push open the door

and the smell hits me.

That medicinal scent,

the scent of the ill and dying.

I walk forwards, quietly, lightly.

The inner door opens

and the odour intensifies.

Filling my nose like a plague.

I hug the man,

muttering my heartfelt concern.

I enter the room,

full of family, eyes filled with unsaid dread.

And then I see her, once vibrant,

once strong, once full of life.

Now a shell, body withered.

Her eyes are still bright,

looking at me from her skull like face.

In spite of it all, she smiles,

welcomes me warmly with soft words.

She cannot stand, her body too weak.

I sit, and share stories of my week.

We talk, her body sinking further

into the cushions. Hands held gently,

so as to keep from breaking them, so delicate.

Still she laughs, her spirit strong.

I look aside, and seem him there.

Some call him 'Death', others 'The Reaper',

but I know him as 'The Guide'.

He is ready to help her through to the light.

Through to everlasting peace.

Just not yet, he will wait patiently,

not until she is ready will he help her.

He is the presenter of peace, of harmony.

He is built from love.

Do not fear him, if you are good.

Ding dong!

Mother walked carefully to the front door, moving through the clutter left by her husband and younger son, who, even after years of nagging seemed incapable of picking up after themselves. She gently swings back the door, staring at, and then around the young man in front of her, “Where is she then?”

“Mother, it’s good to see you too,” the young man answers, stepping across the threshold and wiping his feet. “She’ll be here in a few minutes, she’s just finishing off at work.”

“Oh, ok David, it is good to see you, of course it is. Come on in, the table is already set up and your Father and Brother are chomping at the bit to eat.”

Mother led David through the maze of obstacles, and into the kitchen-diner.

“So where is this mystery girlfriend then?”

“She’ll be here in a few minutes Father,” and looking at the meat filled table, David turns to his Mother. “You’ve remembered that she is a vegetarian haven’t you Morher?”

“Of course dear, though it is very strange to us. I’ve got Madeline a few special extras.”

“So, what does she do, this girl of yours?” Dad asks.

“She works in a club, serving drinks and the like, in the evenings, and studying at University during the day.”

“What’s she studying?”

“Architecture, the history of, and how to progress through the 21st century.”

Mother laughed, “Wait until she sees this house!”

Ding dong!

“I’ll get it, you three wait here. I don’t want her freaking out before we’ve even eaten,” David announces.

He walks swiftly through the rubbish strewn in the hallway, opening the door to his new girlfriend, who being dressed for work was in black boots, a short skirt, and a tight crop top, revealing a fantastic figure.

“Sorry Davey, I left my change of clothes at home, I didn’t know whether to come or not,” she explained nervously.

“It’s ok, you’re here now, come on in. Just try not to give my Father a boner!”

“Oh Davey, you’re an animal,” Madeline growled, slapping him across the shoulder, as he giggled mischievously.

David took her hand, leading her through the mess towards the kitchen.

“Mother, Father, Richard, I’d like to introduce you to Madeline.”

“Fuck me…” Richard murmured, quickly receiving a slap across the back of his head from his Father and receiving a withering glare from his Mother.

“Do sit down my dear, and do call me Janet. And this is Peter.”

“Thank you, Janet, this looks delightful.”

“That’s kind, I’ve got you a special plate too, as David has told me that you are a vegetarian.”

Madeline sat down carefully, between David and his Father, smoothing her short skirt down.

“Would you like a glass of wine, Madeline?” Peter asked.

“Yes please, Peter, that would be lovely. Red if you have it.”

Father took the wine bottle from the side, unscrewing the cap, and carefully poured a glass for Madeline, David, Mother, himself, and a half glass for Richard. “There’s no school tomorrow, so a little glass is fine,” Father snorted, nervously.

“Ok, lets tuck in,” David announced, starting to dish up some food for himself and Madeline.

“So, Madeline, how was work today?” Mother asked.

“Oh, it was ok. I had the quiet shift, noon until 7pm, so it was quite empty today. I’m on tomorrow night,” Madeline gasped gently, feeling a hand moving up her leg, the leg closest to Peter, her boyfriend’s Father. “oh, erm, sorry, yes. I’m working tomorrow night from 7pm until 1am closing time, and it is normally really busy.”

Madeline looked at Peter, and saw the recognition in his eyes. Oh no, she’d seen him in the club, she’d danced for him only a couple of weeks previously. He’d paid for a personal dance, in the back room, and he’d paid for the class 2 special, the hand and blowjob. Oh cripes, David didn’t know how far she went, he thought that she was just a topless waitress.

Peter’s hand was moving closer to her panties, stroking her thigh, as he ate his food with a fork in his right hand. “So, Madeline, what type of work do you do at the club?” His fingers brushing her through her underwear.

“I serve drinks mostly, but I also do cleaning, tidying up, dealing with bad customers, including making sure that the CCTV is working in all the areas, and backing up copies online,” as she spoke, his hand moved away from her legs. “We had a data leak recently, and a great many copies have been downloaded, and some of our customers are a little concerned, as when they are drunk they do some embarrassing things.”

“Oh wow, that sounds quite exciting dear,” Mother began, “Peter, you’ve gone ashen, are you ok?”

My manifesto!

Make the World a Better Place

for all life forms.

The philosophy of Surtism - as a haiku!