This is an extract from book 3 of the first trilogy which has not been finalised at this point.
It was just past closing time. 6.05pm.
“Should you really be putting your finger in there?” said the younger of the two men.
“No no, Jake” said the other man, “you’re asking the WRONG question. And it’s okay I’ve got it tuned now. Look,” he said taking his finger out and using it to point at a small pile of half sized pencils.
“It was eating them at first, but now it works. I tried using ball point pens to start with but there was ink everywhere.”
“Okay…” Jake stood there in thoughtful silence for a moment.
The older man and owner of the electrical store watched Jake carefully. He was Bert Oner, and was uncommonly sprightly for a man in his seventies, as if he had an extra set of batteries he was running on. He’d opened the store in 1969, the year a man had first walked on the moon, and decided to call it Electron 2000 as it sounded such a cool and forward thinking name. Now that the year 2000 had come and gone it didn’t seem so forward looking any more, but Bert thought it was still perfect for reasons he kept to himself.
“So where does your finger go then?” said Jake finally.
“Aha lad! That’s the RIGHT question!” said the older man, almost jumping with excitement.
“Nip into the other room and you’ll see one of these on the table. It’s the other side of the hole.”
Jake walked through into the next room, which was as filled with electronic clutter and bits and pieces as the one he’d just left.
He’d been working full time at Electron 2000 since August of the previous year when he left school behind him – something he was glad to do as it had never suited him. He knew he was clever as he could see he understood things that the rest of his class were struggling over. But he always felt it was so boring and that he’d rather be doing something rather than just sitting there in class. He could never see what possible use to him all the endless learning was for. He felt that most of the things he was being taught had no practical value for him and so as a result he wasn’t interested and his exam results were poor. If there was a science and tech only track he could have followed he would have done it. He was a practical person and needed to do things and he was fairly sure that was why Bert had hired him. That and the fact that he was family. Jake was Bert’s brother’s grandson.
He looked around the room and there on the table was another one of the devices that Bert had his finger in, but it was smaller and looked less complicated. It didn’t seem to be plugged into anything. Clearly protruding from the hole was Bert’s wiggling finger and Jake was stunned at the implication.
“I can see it,” shouted Jake.
“Good. Now I want you to follow my next instruction VERY carefully or it could be a bit of a disaster and we wouldn’t want that. Are you ready?”
“Er, yes…” said Jake nervously.
“Pull my finger!” shouted Bert trying to suppress a giggle.
“Oh Bert!” said Jake, but didn’t spoil his fun and dutifully pulled the stub of finger poking through the hole.
Back in the other room, Bert shouted through “No-one’s ever done that before in all of history.”
“I think the ‘pull my finger’ gag has been done before” said Jake walking back in.
“You know what I mean,” said Bert.
“It’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen. But you know, I’m thinking, well, when the history books document this moment as the first time contact through one of these holes took place on these premises…”
“Yes?” asked Bert.
“Do you really want the ‘pull my finger’ gag as part of its history?” Jake said with a smile. “It’s not very glamorous is it? I’m thinking of the first voice recording on a wax cylinder, or the first telegraph conversation, or the first TV signal. This invention of yours is just as important as any of those and the first thing it was used for was a fart joke.”
Bert laughed out loud, long and hard, his shoulders going like jackhammers as he let his enjoyment run. It took a good minute for it to subside. Wiping a tear from his eye he said “Well I’m sure they had a good laugh too, but they left those bits out of the story when they told it to people. It can be our secret, eh lad?
“Okay,” Jake smiled, “How does it work?”
“It’s really simple and is sitting on the back of other, far greater work than mine. I’m just a tinkerer. What it does is it opens a window into another universe, then folds back on itself and opens one back in this universe. But the re-entry point doesn’t have to be in the same place. In fact if it was, then it might go boom.”
“Other far greater work? Another UNIVERSE? Boom?”
“Yeah… but let’s not worry about that. It works.”
“What’s it for? Why did you build this Bert? How long did it take you? How do you know what you’re doing?”
The older man stopped and leaned back against the workbench with a big smile on his face. “That’s a lot of questions.”
“I have more!” said Jake.
“Well, you’ve been working here for a while now and I trust you. I’ve always been a very good judge of character and I can see you’re the ‘right stuff’ as they say. You came well recommended you know,” said Bert.
Jake looked embarrassed but pleased.
“Thank you,” he smiled, and after thinking for a moment “by who?” he said with a puzzled frown on his face.
“Let’s grab a bite to eat and I’ll tell you anything you want. I’m going to let you in on all my little secrets, so to speak, hehe. I wanted to do this a few weeks back, but I have a time limit rule I stick to. It’s going to be late so you might want to ring your mom and tell her you’re having a sleepover – there’s a lot to talk about. Let’s get something to eat first though.” He chuckled as he turned towards the stairs to his living space, Jake trailing behind.
*****
It was early morning, April, a little while before the alarm went off, as Martha became slowly aware she was in a pre-waking dream and in it there were two men talking in the distance. She could just about make out what they were saying.
“So you’re saying the world isn’t what we all think it is?” said the louder, younger voice.
“The world is…” something mumbled she couldn’t make out “…we know about. It shouldn’t be a surprise to you by now with everything else I’ve told you.”
“And you’re going to teach me all this?”
“Yes lad, you’re…” mumble said the other voice.
“Thank you. Thank you…” said the younger voice.
Was it crying? thought Martha. Why would it cry? What was upsetting it? That’s a shame. No… It was happy. That’s good. The voices should be happy.
“So where do we start?” said the younger voice.
“We start by getting some sleep, we have to open at 9am.” said the other older voice.
Hmm-hmm, thought Martha as her sleep deepened. Don’t want to wake up yet… and she drifted away.
What seemed like a moment later but was probably a lot longer, her phone alarm started ringing – 7:15. Please, just ten more minutes… she thought as she hit the snooze.
And then suddenly she was awake. It was Saturday and she was helping Aunt Esme this morning! She hopped out of bed and made her way to the bathroom down the hall. Just before 7:30 she was showered, dressed and teeth cleaned and not a bit hungry as she was too excited.
She took one last look in the mirror and ran a brush impatiently through her wavy brown hair a few times.
“Good enough” she said out loud and made her way to the stairs.
In the kitchens at the back of the Hidden Delight sweet shop was Aunt Esme’s “laboratory” where she made all her delicious sweets.
Her aunt was getting some boxes out of one of the cupboards and turned as Martha walked in.
“Good morning!” she smiled, “Had a good night’s sleep and all ready for work today?”
“You bet!” said Martha. “I’ve been telling my friends you’re going to show me how to make boiled sweets today, and they’re all jealous.”
Esme laughed. “Well you can tell them how to make the base sweet if you like, but not any of my secret ingredients that make them special.”
“Oh no. Of course not Aunt Esme. I’d never dream of doing that,” said Martha.
“They wouldn’t be able to get the ingredients from round here anyway” chuckled Esme. “I have them shipped in. The specials aren’t your usual supermarket stock,” she said thoughtfully, then catching her mind drifting she said “let’s get started then.”
“After having clean hands, the main ingredient is sugar,” she smiled and pulled down a 2 kilo bag. “This will be enough for the small batch we’re going to make.”
An hour later and Martha had already learned a lot about making boiled sweets and realised that while it was simple in theory, it took plenty of practice to become as good as her Aunt Esme was.
And the science! She had no idea there would be so much science to learn. Temperature. Crystallisation points. Plasticisation! Thermal expansion! Where had her aunt picked all this up? She asked the question.
“Well, I had a good teacher when I was younger, and I’ve always thought of it as magic rather than science,” she smiled. “That way it seems more mysterious and just pure FUN to learn, rather than a chore.”
She leaned back against the counter and her smile broadened “Think of it like this. If you don’t get all the ingredients and the spells just right, then the magic isn’t going to happen.”
Martha was pleased with that answer and loved the idea of it being exciting magic rather than boring old science. They chatted about making sweets as they cleaned up and Martha asked about the “secret ingredients” that her aunt had mentioned earlier, and what they were.
“Well,” said Esme, “from time to time and in certain circumstances I’ll add special flavourings or things that give the sweets certain properties. Like today we added some barley I prepared yesterday to make this batch of barley sugar.”
“Yes,” Martha smiled, “but what about the secret ingredients?”
“Well, they’re mostly a secret… But. If you help me more like today, then I promise to start sharing the details with you.”
“Oh please tell me one today – I saw you put something in earlier when you thought I wouldn’t see you. What was that?” Martha begged.
Her aunt started to laugh. “Well there’s no sneaking things past you is there? That was very observant of you, and I know you had your back to me when I did it, so how did you catch me out?”
It was Martha’s turn to laugh. She’d seen her aunt do it in the reflection of a nice shiny palette knife / spatula but didn’t want to tell her aunt it was that simple, not without finding out what the secret ingredient was.
“I’ll tell you if you tell me what the secret ingredient was,” said Martha, which made her aunt laugh even more.
“Okay. It was a very small amount of ground root which I get from one of my suppliers. It gives the barley sugar sweets a refreshing tang to them because I find that barley sugars on their own can be a bit sickly bland, and the root itself helps to make you more alert. So after people start sucking one of these, apart from the very distinctive and enjoyable flavour, then because of the mild effect of the root they also get to enjoy the flavour more and generally feel better and more able to concentrate on what they’re doing. It’s a very gentle application, and I’ll eat one if there’s something important I’m working on and I need all my faculties to be on full alert. The only thing though is for some people it makes no difference whatsoever. They can’t taste the root and the magic has no effect on them. We’re all different and our physiologies work differently from person to person. What works well for one doesn’t for another. That’s what makes the worlds so wonderful. We’re all different.”
“Did you say worlds?” said Martha.
“Slip of the tongue. I meant world,” smiled her aunt. “There’s more to do today and I’ve got to open the shop. Mrs Levinson will be here in a short while. But first I want you to write up everything we did today in your new recipe book.”
Esme opened a cupboard and took out a very nice looking and very thick book, and gave it to Martha.
“Use two facing pages, put the title of the recipe at the top, and also the date and time you added it. Use the first page for the ingredients and the recipe. Draw a little circular thermometer with the temperature and the same for the cooking time. Like this.”
Her aunt drew two small circles and put little marks on the first one starting near the bottom left and then several more all the way round to near bottom right so that it looked like a gauge. Then she wrote a number inside it – 150. “That’s the temperature we took it off the heat. Do you remember?”
“Yes,” said Martha.
Then her aunt drew four small marks top, bottom, left, right and wrote 14 in the middle. “That’s the time it took to reach the right temperature from first heat. Use these notations next to your writing – as many as you need – and you’ll always have an at-a-glance reference for times and temperatures.”
“Okay. I like that, it makes good sense,” said Martha.
“Well you don’t get to be a clever old wi–woman like me if you don’t keep proper notes,” smiled Esme. “And thank you. Now chop-chop!” and Esme walked out to the shop to prepare for opening.
Martha did as she was told and wondered to herself what her aunt was going to say before she changed the word to ‘woman’ – maybe she’d ask later or maybe she’d let it go and wait to see if her aunt would make the same slip again and say the original word at another date. Martha could be quite patient when she wanted to be, and she noticed everything. Most of the time she kept it to herself though.
She heard the rattle of keys in the side door and looked up to see Mrs Levinson walking in. She was a pleasant looking lady with a ready smile.
“Good morning Mrs Levinson,” said Martha.
“Oh good morning dear. Is your aunt in the front? I’ll go through and help her set up,” she smiled, “I’ve told you before, you don’t need to be so formal. Call me Sylvia.”
“Yes Sylvia. It’s habit though.”
“Yes dear, and a very good and polite habit it is too. You’re a good girl,” said Mrs Levinson absentmindedly as she wandered into the front shop.
Martha finished her notes and started to clean up the remaining things. Her aunt had told her it was important to clean up as you go and make sure your work area is always spotless. There weren’t enough dirty implements to justify using one of the dishwashers so she put the few items in the bowl and cleaned them the good old fashioned way with liquid and a sponge on a stick.
Just as she finished up and started to dry her hands she felt and heard a soft explosion – “crump” – the strangeness of which made her jump. The world seemed to pause and everything went quiet for a moment. What was that? she thought. She walked through into the front shop to ask her Aunt and bumped into her coming the other way.
“Did you hear that?” they both said in unison, and then together again “What do you think it was?”
They smiled, but before they could continue the phone rang and Martha picked it up.
“Esme? It’s Bert. Don’t use the Doors. I think I’ve broken them.”
“Oh, I’ll just put her on” said Martha, “It’s Bert. He says he’s broken the doors?”
“I wonder what he means?” said her Aunt as she took the phone. “Hello Bert, what’s up? Yes we did. Ah. Okay. I can’t talk at the moment as I’ve… got to go open the shop” she said looking at Martha with mild concern on her face. “I’ll pop round in 15 minutes. Okay, bye.
Martha, please go and wake your mother. I know she’s run down and tired and needs her rest but I need to talk to her. I’ll go open the shop with Sylvia first.”
Martha had never seen her aunt so animated. Something had happened to do with the doors, and what did that mean? Or had “Bert” (whoever he was) said Doors with a capital D? Martha instinctively knew there was a difference between a door and what Bert was referring to even though they sounded the same. Was that the noise they’d heard? How could it have excited her Aunt so much and why did she have to wake her mother? It must all be related and she had a feeling she wasn’t going to get told what was going on. So she decided she’d keep her mouth shut and her ears wide open – she’d learned at an early age that you could often hear and learn things you weren’t supposed to by doing that. She ran up the stairs two at a time as she felt it was urgent, and saw her mom fully dressed coming out of the bathroom.
“I heard that,” she said, “what’s going on?”
“Bert has broken the Doors or something?” Martha used the same emphasis on Doors as she’d heard Bert use.
“Oh!” Her mother’s face was a mixture of shock and astonishment… and was that fear too?
“Everything okay Mom?”
Her mother’s face changed and she smiled, “Yes, everything’s okay. It sounds like Bert – Mr Oner next door at Electron 2000 – has run into the gates at the back where the deliveries come in. I bet that’s what’s happened.”
Martha knew when she was being lied to, especially by her mother, but decided to go along with it and act dumb.
“Shall I keep out of the way until it’s sorted? I have some homework I’d like to get done and I’ve cleaned everything up downstairs after helping Aunt, so there’s no reason for me to be down in the shop. I might be going out later too – with Trudi.”
The look of relief on her mother’s face told her all she needed to know. There was definitely something going on that they didn’t want her to know about.
“Er, yes, that would be great. I’ll go talk to your Aunt.”
Hmm… Well okay, Martha thought as she studied her mother’s face. She knew what to do.
“Okay Mom, I’ll be at my desk in my room if you want me. Please let me know what’s happened later and I’ll take a look at the gates when I get a chance.”
Her mother frowned slightly while still smiling, realising that Martha would want to see some broken gates or the story wouldn’t be believed.
“You say you’re going out with Trudi?”
“Yes, she’s going to pop round some time this morning. We’re going to have a walk and a chat and we might go up the town. I want to get my homework finished off first though.”
“Okay, I’ll fill you in later,” her mother said already turning to the stairs.
Recent Comments