Here is chapter 2 of Heaven Sent. If you need to read from the beginning of the story just hit the Heaven Sent link on the title banner.

2

The next Friday, having arrived early, Carlo sat on the same bench in that same park, his right hand in his pocket holding tight the money he had brought for her. It was chilly. Unwell clouds had been coughed into the sky, smokers splats to block out the sun. Behind him a line of terraces that were blue, into orange, into red, into white, two tall rooms high with skylights scattered into the roofs. Ahead of him young kids with their mums on the slide and swings. A little monkey on the climbing frame.

Fidgeting he looked for her, scanned all the entrances to the park in between continual glances at his watch. She had been on his mind all week. Every word they had said to each other he played out all over again. She had talked about the fella on the telly that had whipped his troozers off in front of that crowd and the judges belled im out, an it was funny as fuck, and he had asked why, and she had said cause folks can be right fools, I mean that cunt was a dad, like, think what his kids must think on him now.

As the week went on he began to change what he had said. This meant that he changed her answers too, so she said, that maybe they shouldn't have let the man on in the first place because it was clear that he was not right in the head, and he was so nervous and how desperate he was for some bit of fame that he could humiliate himself like that.

And then Carlo created new conversations with her, sometimes stopping in mid flow to repeat a bit or to change the direction of what they were saying or to alter the meaning. When he was talking to himself the voice he heard in his head mutated from hers to his as they discussed the issues that he believed were important in life, declaring that she was the reason for his living, over and over again, and this would bring her out in a smile, but not before she looked at him strangely because his words were touching her in a place that no one had ever reached. Carlo had never kissed a girl before, not properly in the flesh, but Daizee he showered in kisses. There was never any fantasies of sexual intercourse with her, even though the desire was there, Carlo felt that he might bedevil what they had and he wanted her to know that his intentions were honourable that he would act with decorum, having been brought up to behave in such a manner. When he got to that moment of his fantasy he would replace her with someone else. His French teacher usually, a petite woman of the Dordogne. She would wear a sleeveless blouse that, when she wrote on the blackboard, would reveal her unshaved armpits that looked liked vaginas. In the summer, when it was hot, her pits would glisten like nectar rich flowers.

Carlo took another look at his watch, it was still early. His hand held her cash tightly in his coat pocket as if it were a magic charm to summon her. Stretching his feet out he stared at the little children playing on the swings. Mothers were pushing them or standing around talking. A boy fell from the climbing frame and started crying, his mother rushed over and picked him up and the boy was crying uncontrollably so his mother held him tight and spoke to him softly. Carlo could not hear what she said, instead he looked at his watch, stood, walked the circumference of the park, looking at the houses, with their coloured graffiti painted on. Dawdling along he fancied that he was late and she was early, framed her sitting on the park bench waiting, dressed her in a white skirt, then a black one, then jeans, always in the t-shirt with the heart cut into her breasts. When he arrived at the bench he was no longer early but bang on time, looked to each of the entrances to the park to see if he could see her. But she wasn't there.

The traffic piled up at the lights at the junction on the main road, before changing. Vehicles came and went. For ten minutes there was an enormous queue that stretched back 100 metres, which dissolved as quickly as it appeared.

The boy that had fallen from the climbing frame was yelling at his mother because she wanted to go home. She snatched him up and bundled him off screaming. Carlo turned away he saw a red car pull up at the lights. Daizee got out of the passenger side, said something to the driver and shut the door. The traffic lights were still red. She ran in front of the car and crossed the road.

She was only an hour late. She had a black eye.

What happened to you? he asked.

Nothing, perk o the job, and putting her hand into his, said, shit happens.

She hung out with him for more than the hour, at one point putting her head on his shoulder, which floundered his conversation causing him to sit stiffly, in a formal Victorian black and white mode, so she took his hand and raised his arm around herself. They sat quietly watching the kids playing as she smoked a cigarette, and when they were done she said, same time, same place, next week?

No, he said, I've got somewhere special to go.

Whir?

He told her with a smile.

She winced before she said, sure, whatever.

It was then that he thrust the money into her hand, said this is for you and she looked at him like he'd said something hurtful but she took the cash anyway.

HEAVEN SENT

The last moult of a caterpillar is quite an event. The new skin of the organism is not the skin of before but a new form, the pupa. The dermal cells of a butterfly are trimorphic: caterpillar, chrysalis and butterfly are all the same. The pupa is a metamorphic transmorphification machine. The larva is dismantled chemically and the embryonic cells divide. Within hours of pupation the adult comes into being, its characteristics are formed, wings, mouth parts, thoracic muscles and legs. When the butterfly breaks free of the pupa haemoglobin is pumped into the wings and they expand and the hormone buriscon makes them hard. In the wind the wings twitch until they take command of the air and in a multi-coloured moment of self-expression the creature lifts, floats and flies.

1.

The first time he saw her a shudder passed through him like the word of God through a virgin. He was fourteen years old. She was the same age. On that first day she was dressed for work in a short skirt and a tight t-shirt with a heart cut into it to reveal the crest of her young breasts, her figure tall and slender, her hair short, spiked and fiery red, her eyes emerald volcanic gems. He was on his way home from school and lost in thought thinking about Christ and pain and torment, scourges, blood, demons and eternal damnation; all the subjects that dominated his life as he had grown up. Walking with his head down, not noticing the empty street. The rise of the black tarmac in the road. The foundation brush of dirt. Or the crisp packet in a crinkle twist on the wind.

His lips were mouthing an argument he was imagining he was having with his mother, who had started berating him for watching a movie on a friend's mobile phone, that lunch time, involving two naked girls writhing one on top of the other. The argument had escalated, as it always did, into a full blown ecumenical onslaught, as his mother frantically fought for the safety of his soul, an organ he felt sure did not exist, by employing ever more complex theological debate, veering further and further from the issue at hand, insisting that there was no other God but Christ, who is the light and the truth and his kingdom is full of angels who can pass through this world, under the nailed down lino of our dreams, to walk though walls because they are of another dimension, without their intercession the world would be a far worse place and his love is a beauty that transcends and renders all else inadequate.

With his head shaking he told her that this cannot be true, that angels and demons, gods and sprites just couldn't be and that all the problems and solutions of the world were man-made. Not come from above. And that there is nothing more beautiful than the human form, or the human imagination. The sheer complexity of our organism is God-like. So entangled was he in debate that he didn't see the girl ahead of him in a little skitter with her feet, flashing the pantless dimple between her legs at the traffic, high as a kite. His mother yelled no, you blaspheme, there is nothing more beautiful or perfect than Christ, born of the virgin. It was at that moment that the girl turned abruptly and he crashed into her, found himself looking into her eyes and, feeling the kiss of the wind flush him of all the baggage of saints and sinners, he heard his inner voice say, no mum, she is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. She is perfect. And when the girl said, look whir ya fucken go'en ya cunt, he saw the sun halo her and flash her hair with a gunpowder dance.

Later, when he got home, and his father said grace before supper, he hardly heard the long paragraphs of prayers or saw the saints nodding on the walls or the Christ grimace on the cross behind his mother. He was watching the girl as she walked away from him, the sass in her buttocks and back, the bounce in her heels, teasing him on, and he imagined that she stopped and looked back and smiled at him and it was a perfect smile. A holy smile, the kind of smile the virgin gave to the angel before he had his way with her. Yes, lord, yes, she said, I am willing.

And he lay in bed that night and thought of her, tossing and turning, through the darkness of the night, once more beguiled by the fireworks that rollicked in her hair, crackling with all the colours of spring. When he woke, the next morning, he did so with a start. The day began as his life had jolted awake the moment he first saw her. He came in for breakfast but just stared at it and rose early and left, without saying a word to his parents who talked around him. After retracing his steps back to the street corner, he placed himself on the wall opposite to witness the in situ re-enactment of his bump with her and shot in for close ups when he transformed her curse to a smile.

At school he was shut off, staring out into the playground, and when he should have been writing down French, he wrote poems to her. He prayed at church that he would meet her, he prayed even though he did not believe in God. In the bathroom, at home, he would stand in front of his mirror and practice what he would say to her, sometimes engaging in arguments so that they could kiss and make up. When he walked home from school he would loiter in the hope that he might catch a glimpse of her. And, more often than not, she was there, outside the old houses with big windows and bins outside, smoking cigarettes, laughing and chatting with the other girls working the afternoon traffic as he shuffled by with his head down. Pretending not to look. When he saw her a flash of anxiety would cut through him and he would cross to the other side of the road to avoid her and when she passed he would look back after himself and watch her.

One Friday afternoon, whilst engrossed in a phantom conversation with her, explaining that life was not exclusive to earth, but it might be that intelligent life was exclusive to our planet for this moment in time. When our time is done, he mused, a new intelligentsia may sprout into being in another cosmos millions of lights years away. Whose past light has taken whole extinctions to reach us. Giving us a snapshot of time at the birth of stars, heating into being new planets with whole new permutations of life, whose evolution was out of tick with our time. Turning the corner he stopped dead in his tracks. Under a wall that was painted with stars and a moon, ten metres to the left of a bin that looked like a docking pod with the number 1 on it, she stood in a short skirt with bare legs and a T-shirt with the words, heaven sent, embolden in gold across her breasts. At first she pretended not to see him keeping her gaze on something way off down the street, but when he didn't take his eyes off her she shifted her attention to him, scowled and said, fuck off.

He coughed, said, sorry, didn't know what to do, turned, felt her watching him, and, feeling like he was performing unrehearsed in a costume two sizes too small for him, he began to walk away.

Wait, she said.

He stopped and turned back.

You've gone red.

Have I?

Yeh.

Afraid of the silence he said the first thing that came into his mind. What school do you go to?

The question made her blink. Skol?

Yeah.

I don't go a skol.

You don't?

Nah.

How come?

Ain't no skol that wants I. It's a fucker.

She took a drag of her cigarette and blew the smoke out.

Whir you go? she said.

Bart's.

She nodded.

My name's Carlo, he said. What's yours?

Daizee, she said.

That's a nice name, he said.

Is et?

Yeah, it's a summer name like the flower.

She almost laughed. What you a fucken poet?

He felt limp with embarrassment.

What can I do for you then, Mr Shakespeare?

I'm going to get a coke, Daizee. Would you like one?

Carlo began to hear music. Her hips began to hustle. A coke? She said.

He couldn't help but smile as he watched her do a little jig. The movement of her hips made her breasts sway. Yes, he said.

I don't just go with any ole cock, she said. I'm no that sort o'... You got any cheddar?

Carlo had managed to save two days dinner money, which he planned to spend that weekend at the church youth club. Fasting to save was his parent's idea.

I got a righteous feelen about you my sweet, she said as she took what little Carlo had, like destiny just poke I.

Have you?

Yah, tis true.

They went for a walk. He brought her an ice cold coke and they sat in a park with swings, a slide and a climbing frame, crushed in by houses and the main road that ran by it that was rammed with the rush hour traffic. They chatted. It was like a real date. For a breath moment he almost heard is mother's voice but Daizee managed to pull him back by saying that his time was up, he said, can we meet again, and she said yeh, sure thing sweetz, I'm hooked all week but I can squeeze a bit of room for you on Fridi, so how about that?

Will Xavier Leret.

Will was alone, his ear to the door, the pain beyond it near splitting the wood. He heard the doctor issue orders and pushed himself away from the door as the Nurse, whose face and hands were covered in blood, dashed out of the bedroom to call for hot water. The sight of the blood made him shudder. Through the door he could see his wife lying pale and exhausted on the bed. The doctor was by her side talking, though she was barely able to listen. The whites of her eyes showed, her face contorted and then her whole body buckled in agony. Her scream wrenched the nurse back.

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BLOOD RUN

1.

When it happened Sal knew. It was late. Her parents were standing at the end of the bed looking at her. They came and sat beside her, put their hands through her hair. They kissed her. They hugged her. They told her that they would always be with her. That they loved her like the universe that was ever expanding. They said that it was up to her now to look after her brother and sister. That they were not going to be there in person, but their spirits would never leave them. Her mother then exclaimed, oh god, and held her as tight as she could and her father gasped, no not now, then quick, between a blink, they were gone.

Turn The Porn ON
An extraordinary collection of short stories.
An old man lies dying and all he wants is porn.
A ghost writer's subject is an award winning male prostitute.
A young girl lives a life she does not want.
A father takes extraordinary steps to protect a daughter from her uncle.
A Hooker with a God given talent.
A roundabout of sexual encounters.
Pitch black dark. Sometimes hilarious. Often moving.

Click here.

Here's a video of me reading the title story.

Turn The Porn On from Xavier Leret on Vimeo.

Latest tracks by Xavier Leret

Well, I am reading some work at the Standon Calling Festival, (6-8 Aug) a really lovely lovely shing ding and it looks like the weather might be humdinger too. I'm reading as part of the Book Club Boutique and I will be unveiling my novel, Caring For Daisy Byatt. Tis dark bring torch.

There will also be some great music and a swimming pool - oh and an entire weekend long license - yep the bars don't shut.

What other news is there? I've had over 50,000 downloads of my stories on Feedbooks, so many thanks to all those who have clicked that button.

Don't forget, Standon Calling - hope to catch you there my lovelies.

I'm on after 8 sometime.

1.
There's something I need to tell you, said Karen, it's about Fred.
John froze in the doorway.

2.
What did he say exactly?
Maddy told him and finished by asking him not to tell anyone.
Is that what he asked you to do? Not to tell anyone?
Yes, she said.
John nodded.

I'm on after 8 sometime.

Monday 8 February 2010, 6.30-8.15 pm, RADA Foyer Bar, Malet Street, London WC1E 7JN.

Maybe see you there.