Author: Dan Howarth

With the nights drawing in and Santa giving his sleigh an MOT before the big day, I’m winding down the writing ready for some time off with my family. I’ve set some goals for 2020 and taken plenty of time to reflect on the decade as a whole, not just this year.

It’s been a good one. I’ve met my soul mate. Spawned a beautiful daughter. Obtained a bonkers cat.

No doubt there will be more reflections on the writing side of it once we tick into the new decade.

To round off the year, I wrote a story about the best part of Christmas dinner. That’s it, sausages wrapped in bacon. Two of the most amazing foods out there having a cuddle and clogging my arteries. A dream come true

It was intended for a flash fiction contest, which it didn’t win but as Christmas is a good time for horror, what with dark nights, supernatural beings climbing down your chimney and hanging out with distant relatives, I thought I’d post it here to give readers a quick shudder.

This will probably be my last post of 2019 so enjoy yourselves over the Christmas break. Be kind to each other and enjoy the time off work. I’ll be back here to set some goals and kick off 2020 in style. Thanks for reading.

Dan

Pigs in Blankets

Until you make your own, you’d never guess how hard it is to make sausages. But when it comes to Christmas with the family, spare no effort. My arms ached from grinding the meat. It took an age to get it into the casing. Still. To see their faces when they eat them, it’ll be worth it. One of them has my own signature blend of herbs and spices in, just to make it extra special.

I wonder which of my guests will get to sample it? Perhaps I’ll even keep it for myself.

#

None of them want to be here. One less of us every year.

I open the door in my tuxedo, and they look at me as though I’ve gone mad again. They shuffle in. One at a time.

Grandma first. Bent and gnarled like a windswept privet.

Uncle Roger. Upright and corpulent. A blimp of a man.

Cousin Eric. Sallow skinned and small eyed. A ferret in a knitted jumper.

They sit in the living room and I pour the sherry. “Fairytale of New York” plays in the background. Grandma tuts and I smile. The others say nothing. What’s left of our family.

#

After the customary prawn cocktail, I serve the Christmas dinner. Everything in its own dish. Sprouts with bacon. Goose fat roast potatoes. Honeyed carrots. Pigs in blankets – four fat sausages wrapped in bacon.

I stand at the head of the table and carve the turkey. Not father, so sadly departed since last year. I give myself a leg. Grandma and Eric want breast. Uncle Roger wants a mixture of everything. And why not, he’s got enough room for it.

I keep the pigs in blankets next to me. Roger smacks his lips as he looks at them. My stomach rolls as he whets his lips. I’ve seen that look before. The look he had when he first took me to the shed in his garden. The look he had when he closed the door behind us. The look my father wore when we came back. Me white faced as I watched him shrug with agreement.

Grandma eyes them too. The same way she looked before she used to jab me with knitting needles when I stayed at her house as a child. Different to the look of innocence she gave my mother when the questions started.

Eric’s beady eyes rest on them too. Rodent eyes. Like the squirrel he killed with a BB gun and blamed on me. The reason I got sent away to boarding school. The reason no-one ever meets my eye.

Just four of us left. One large banger each, including the special one, laced with my traditional Christmas treat.

I pass the plate and watch it go from Eric to Grandma to Roger and then back to me.

Whose turn will it be this year?

I cut into the pig in its bacon blanket and hope it will be mine.

I’m leaving my current job at the end of November. It’s the usual mix of emotions. A high of optimism that the new job will be much better than the current one. The lows of leaving behind some brilliant colleagues and friends.

This time however, I’ve got a different pang of regret to deal with. Leaving behind a library. Weird? Probably. But let me explain.

I write in the library opposite my office every lunchtime. The hour is blocked out in my calendar. It’s non-negotiable. Two and bit years on, it is a well established habit.

But the time I spend in the library has become much more than just my writing time. Over the last two years, I’ve become part of a community in there. And now more than ever, I’ve realised what an important role a library plays in so many people’s lives.

A vast cohort of people visit the library on a daily basis, ranging from toddlers with their parents to the elderly attending reading groups and other social activities. A library isn’t a place of silent, sombre study – its a social hub. As I’ve written on my lunch hour, I’ve overheard book club discussions and choirs practising. For a while, there was even a piano by the entrance that people could come and play for free. Some of them were really good!

Upstairs, the free internet access computers are all in use, people using them to pay bills, search for jobs or to stay in touch with friends. Perhaps I’m speaking from a position of privilege here but I never realised what a vital commodity an internet connection is and how many people wouldn’t have access to one without the library. The library is their lifeline.

Yet now more than ever, libraries teeter on the brink of extinction. The one I write in has days where it closes early. Soon it will have days where it doesn’t open at all. The services are deemed unnecessary by a cruel and spiteful government that needs to put a number or financial figure on everything it touches. This government is incapable of empathy for anyone other than the rich or the powerful.

Libraries are judged on a number of things. Namely, how many books are taken out. They are also judged statistically on things such as how many computer printouts they charge for. None of this accurately reflects the impact libraries have on people’s lives and it certainly doesn’t reflect the footfall of people who use the facility every single day.

I’ll wrap this up with a little story about one of the regulars in the library. We’ll call him Mr P. He’s an elderly guy who lives locally. Lives alone. He goes into the library every day. Some days he will read books at one of the tables. Other days he might play the piano. Some days he does research on the computers. Regardless, he’s there every day. He knows the staff and they know him. They’ll make him a brew or grab him some lunch.

When he turns up late, the staff start to worry. They wonder where Mr P is. They phone his house. There’s even been times a member of staff has popped round to check on him.

Mr P has no family in the area and has never engaged Adult’s Social Care as he has no needs beyond the need for company.

Without the library, this man would be left abandoned and alone with little to no human contact on a day to day basis.

He doesn’t loan out books or print anything off so statistically, he contributes nothing to the library but six days a week it is the centre of his world. With further cuts to these vital services, they won’t survive much longer. We can’t let that happen.

Here’s how you can help.

1 – Use your library. Pop in. Check it out. Sign up. Borrow books. Hell, you don’t even need to read them, just borrow some (I’m kidding. Definitely read them.) Get those numbers up. Show the decision makers that the library is in use.

2 – Use your vote. This vicious government won’t stop at cutting libraries. Social care and the health service are already on the brink. Another five years of this government will cripple them beyond repair. It’s time for a change before these treasured public services disappear for good and leave so many vulnerable and needy people isolated and on the brink.

I’m not sure I intended this to become a political rant but until you’ve seen the impact of a place like a library or a children’s centre in action, it’s hard to quantify just how vital they are.

Find your local library. Take your kids or tell a friend. Borrow a book. Keep libraries going for everyone.

Dan