Fright Night! #Wattys2016

Revelations Part 1

"Imagine you are in a very dark room; a cellar" the undertaker tried to explain. His deep doom-laden voice brought a slight chill to cosy living room of the vicarage. The way his tone rumbled with the rich eloquence of a classical education mixed with a delicate blend of sympathy and depression was fabulously macabre, Nigel Timmis mused.

"Imagine you're looking for something" the funeral director continued. "But its pitch black in there and you can't see a thing. Now, you do have a torch but the batteries are almost gone. So when you switch it on the light it casts is very dim and you only have a few moments to search the darkness and learn what is hidden before the illumination is gone and you're once again blind to the treasure hidden just out of sight".

Outside the grey midwinter sun began to set. The fire in the open hearth crackled invitingly, sending flickering shadows dancing over the walls accentuating the speaker's deathly features. Nearly seven feet tall Guy Alderman of Alderman and Son's Funeral Services carried a thin gaunt frame. His black hair, greying at the temples was always combed backwards which, together with his sallow cheeks and sunken eyes, gave him an uncanny likeness to Christopher Lee's Dracula. Guy Alderman looked and sounded the archetypal undertaker and the vicar always believed he should have been in the theatre. Nigel had prayed his long term friend would join the church's amateur dramatics society on occasions too numerous to mentions but alas he had always bowed out. He didn't share Nigel's flamboyant disposition, which was a tragic loss both to the group and the entire community.

"What I am about to tell you, Nigel, must go no further than these four walls" his long-time friend intoned gravely. "That trip I was telling you about has been brought forward and I must leave. Tonight". Nigel had suspected something was amiss earlier when Guy telephoned to announce his visit. He never usually rang. Then when he arrived, Nigel had observed the surreptitious way his friend had scuttled into the vicarage after casting what looked like a nervous glance, if such an emotion were possible for Guy Alderman, around the snow covered churchyard next door. Outside the wind was picking up, rustling the branches of the fir trees that spread amongst the old crumbling gravestones. Flurries of freshly fallen snow danced through the air with the most intricate choreography that God could possibly conduct, before settling on the trees and headstones.

For a long time Nigel had suspected there was something his dear friend was hiding. It was that faraway look in his piercing eyes that suggested to the overly imaginative vicar that there was something lurking below the surface. God had failed to bless Nigel with a great capacity for patience and he often wrestled with his curiosity and imagination as to what macabre secrets his old friend harboured. His very active, if not eccentric imagination conjured up countless scenarios: Perhaps Guy Alderman had been a spy in a former life? Or maybe he was a serial killer? Or perhaps he was in some kind of witness protection programme? But no matter how hard he tried to coax it out of his comrade; he had not revealed a thing, until tonight.

The snow had begun to fall again and the wind outside blew stronger, rattling the window panes as if they were cheap stage props. Nigel took another sip of his whiskey and settled back into his seat feeling the fiery malt warmed his throat a pleasant hint of sandlewood and ginger. The aroma tingled his nose with its woody bouquet and making him long for one of the cigars he had given up at lent.

"I must insist you tell me what's brought this on" Nigel prompted. "You know I can be the very embodiment of discretion".

The other man was sat stiffly in his chair as if rigour-mortis had already set in. Nigel watched his companion examine his glass in the firelight, swirling the liquid around before continuing in his slow commanding yet regretful tone of voice. "Death has always terrified me" he confessed. "Ever since I was a child I remember lying in bed and worrying about what happens when we die".