Again sorry to spam...only posted on request haha

 

The Ice-Cream Man

 

A SHORT STORY BY SEAN COLLEDGE

 

 

The sun beat down on the lazy street, forcing its heat on the small town, but while the town sunbathed, slept, turned red, lying barely clothed in their back gardens, the ice cream man worked.

 

Jack drove into Atlan Road around the Toyota people carrier that some stupid resident had parked right in the middle of the road, and put a hammer through its window as he drove at 5 miles an hour past it.

 

“Shouldn’t have parked it there” he said, smiling to himself, his rough whiskers crackling as he did so, he hadn’t shaved in four days and it was getting pretty long. Maybe he would grow it into a beard, and style it when it grew longer. He looked into his rear view mirror to look at his reflection, a 50 years old man with pigeon hair that was mostly grey, with the odd speckles of black. His eyes were brilliant blue, and colder than an Eskimo’s nose, and as he grinned at the mirror, the reflection seemed menacing and violent.

 

He hadn’t wanted this job to begin with, and it was because of his menacing and violent reflection that he was landed with it. He had been wrongly convicted of holding up a nearby off licence in the village, and the police service that the village had was so pathetic they couldn’t find enough evidence to target anyone. It was just his luck, however, that before he had moved into the village he had been charged for petty theft, and so the police dug that up, and pinned this hold-up like an anonymous meeting name badge to his chest, and arrested him while he was watching “Fight Club”, eating a pizza. He was bombarded with police officers, one of which he later discovered had nicked the rest of his pizza while he was in nick. This irony had made him laugh, that they had stolen his dinner as well as his freedom.

 

Bastards

 

He had gone to court, hoping that the little evidence they had would be proof enough that he hadn’t done it, but the jury had decided that he looked just the sort who would hold up a liquor store, especially as the day of his hearing he was just recovering from a hangover, and they convicted him in less than two hours. He was given 18 months community service, in which, as he was unemployed. He was told to find work that helped the community himself; “Show that you have some kind of value to society” the judge had sniffed down his upper class ski slope of a nose, and Jack had wanted to punch him, but the officers either side of him had held him firmly in place.

 

So here he was, acting as a fucking ice cream man, driving around the streets of the people who had served him this injustice, serving their kids ice cream and ice lollies, taking money that barely paid for his bills let alone living. In fact, the money he got from this crummy job was less than he had received on the dole, and so he had been forced to work at the local high school as a night caretaker, which he would probably end up working during the day when term started again. That meant he would have loads of sixteen years old girls in their skimpy skirts and developing tits to ogle at. Man community service was sweet.

 

As “Teddy Bears Picnic” rang through Atlan Road, Jack reached into his glove compartment, and got out the little sachet of white powder. He parked in the middle of the road, right outside Miss Jones’ house. She was one of the teachers at the school he worked at in the evening, and she was extremely attractive. 5’3, long curly brown hair, enough curves to make Jennifer Lopez look almost masculine, and a Mediterranean skin colour to boot. Whenever he had seen her, he had needed to take a visit to the toilets.

 

Jack got up from his driving seat and went back into the serving area of his ice cream van, and lifted the top of the swirl ice cream dispenser. Into the still mass of cloud-like ice cream he emptied the cocaine mixed with sugar into the dispenser. It was lucky for him that he had, by pure coincidence been able to grow coca plants in his back garden, and this year they had especially grown, and he had been able to sell enough to keep him through his unemployment. But now the law was monitoring him, he couldn’t really afford to be dealing so he had knocked it on the head for a while. Now, revenge was his only motive for still growing the plants. He replaced the lid of the dispenser and walked over to his freezer at the back of the van.

 

He didn’t sell any of the brand ice creams, apart from the swirl ice cream, and so during the summer he was forced to make his own ice-lollies from berries picked from the pick your own at the far end of the village. He had made strawberry, blackberry, raspberry, apple cider and others berries such as gooseberry, black currant, melon and lemon, as well as many others. Some fruits he had had to buy himself, but they were popular enough so he hadn’t minded and had just reaped the profits.

 

However, his ice-lollies each had their hidden secrets. Some were laced with hydrochloric acid, some he had dipped in the blood of his Alsatian some bastard had run over, others had been mixed in with urine, crushed insects, detergent, dog shit, although the last one had been hard to cover due to the colour of it, but he had sold that by mixing it with some of the swirl and adding chocolate flavouring to it. The kids seemed to love them, and that was the general idea. The best way to stop the kids turning into their parents was to get rid of the kids in the first place, and as well as the ice creams he had his own assortment of weaponry should any body start to suspect, most of which he had bought while on holiday, reaping, of course, some of the benefits of growing the best damn cocaine in the country. He had bought muskets from Portugal, daggers and knives from Spain, samurai swords from Japan, rifles from Germany, Smith and Wesson pistols from America (God Bless America) all of which, remarkably he had been able to get through customs, although how he had managed it was beyond him. Obviously the country wasn’t as strong against terrorism as it liked to think. At the moment he had a dagger in his boot under his trousers, and a .44 in a hidden compartment in the back of his chair. These were, of course, only for dire emergencies. Jack didn’t mind going to jail, as long as he managed to reap his revenge first.

 

Finally Jack was ready, and he opened his window for his first customer. It was a little lad with a brown basin hair cut and hazel eyes, wearing a blue T-Shirt with a shark motif on the front. He also wore shorts of the same colour. Jack smiled at the boy, and the boy did not seem frightened by Jack. Excellent, Jack thought

 

“Yes lad, what can I get you?” he asked

The boy was gripping his money tightly, and at only about four years old, Jack could guess that he had badgered his mother into buying his ice cream as soon as he had heard the chimes from the van.

“Can I have an ice cream please?”

“A swirl one?”

“Yes please Mr” the boy nodded furiously.

“Juice and a flake?” The juice contained laxatives; the flake was the only safe part.

“Yes please Mr” the kid repeated. Jack made the ice cream up for the boy, and took his money. The kid would be high all day as well as have the shits. He smiled to himself. And his parents will never suspect they have a drug addict for a son when he constantly badgers them for more ice cream. Jack laughed to himself, and the boy grinned up at him, clearly thinking that he had amused Jack, but not knowing why exactly. The kid thanked him, and left, eating his ice cream.

 

Jack served 5 more kids swirl ice cream, several others urine covered lemon ice lollies, others more so affected ice lollies then left Atlan Road. He pulled out of the road, and turned right into West Bank Street. There was a young girl, about 15 years of age who ran up to the ice cream van first. She was the sister of Miss Jones, Jack was sure because there were definitely some similarities. She had the beautiful skin colour and curves, as well as the hair, only her body showed signs of being ten years younger, but still she took his breath away.

 

“Yes Miss, what can I get you?” he asked

She smiled a smile at him that made him melt, despite him knowing she was young enough to be his daughter.

“Can I have a strawberry lolly please?”

“Sure…No wait, I think we’ve run out. Would you like anything instead?”

“No thanks”

“Why don’t you come in then and I’ll have a look for you”

Jack knew that he had to make this sale. Her mother was on the jury of his trial, and so she needed to be learnt a lesson.

“Sure” Jack opened the back door of the van and let her inside. He locked the door behind him, and opened the freezer. The girl was standing beside him and he could smell the peach shampoo in her hair.

“Why don’t you dig to the bottom, and have a look for some strawberry ones, I would, but my back is killing me. What’s your name, by the way?”

“Kate” She leant into the freezer, and watching her Jack felt as he had done seeing her sister. He turned to the window, and closed and locked it quietly, Kate not realising he had done so, as she delved deep into the freezer. Jack licked his lips and walked over to her. He quickly grabbed her by the waist and thrust his hand down the front of her shorts

 

Kate gasped in horror, and elbowed him in the face. Sparks flashed in his eyes, as he felt blood gushing from his nose.

“What the fuck are you doing Jack?” she demanded, her beautiful face marked with disgust and contempt.

“What do you mean? What do you expect me to do, when you’re bent over like that?”

“You are sick, you know that? I’m only 15 and your 50!”

“So what?” he sneered at her, and he snapped up, and grabbed her arms, pinning her against the back door. She wasn’t very strong, and he could easily overpower her. He held her arms above her head with one hand, and with the other, he ran his hand down her body, over her breasts, across her smooth stomach, over the top of her legs, around her backside.

She kicked one leg up and got him dead centre in the balls.

 

He cried out in pain, and she began attempting to unlock the door, but her hands were shaking, and she merely fumbled with the lock. Jack got up again, despite the fact that his balls were beginning to swell up like watermelons, and again grabbed her, pinning her against the wall. He leant forward to kiss her, thrusting his tongue between her teeth. She bit down on it hard and as blood again filled his mouth he fell again to the floor.

 

He reached into his boot and brought out the knife. He held it behind his back, and as he began to get up, he thrust he knife into her stomach. Blood immediately began to pour from the wound. Kate reached up to the wound, as if expecting to be able to catch the blood, stopping it flowing. It flowed out of her like thick treacle. She gasped, desperate to get some air. Jack pushed the knife deeper into her, and then withdrew it. Kate collapsed, blood poured out of her in pints, its poppy redness painting the floor of the van. Jack leant over her barely living body, which was shaking and covered in sweat. The blood was smeared over her stomach as she had tried, unsuccessfully, to catch it. Jack leant down and whispered into her ear “If you’d have let me have you, you would still be alive”

 

He walked over to the driving seat of the van, and went home. He would have no more business today.

 

*

 

Jack arrived back at his two bedrooms semi-detached home fifteen minutes after the incident with Kate, her dead limp body still lying on the floor of his van, her blood spread thick and sticky like marmite around it. Oh well, he thought, at least I’ll have something new to add to my lolly recipe. He got out of his van and staggered towards the door, his balls still stung like mad since the little bitch had whacked him, and he would no doubt have to go to the hospital later if they didn’t heal.

 

He fumbled with the lock and finally got it. Jack walked into the hall, and went upstairs to get changed out of his ice cream man uniform. His balls ached whenever he moved, and it took him nearly five minutes just to strip down to his underwear. He looked into the full-length mirror by his bed at his reflection. His face was pretty messed up, dried blood had stuck his nostrils together, and when he tried to breath through his nose, he found he could not. Dried blood was also on his chin and down his neck. She had got him pretty bad, and his tongue felt like it had licked nails.

 

Looking down he could see that his genitalia had in fact swollen. He gently, but painfully removed his wide front briefs and could see that his penis had turned black, and that his left testicle had swollen to the size of a small orange, while the right one was a worrying bruised banana yellow. He decided that he would have no choice but to go to the hospital.

 

But first, he needed to clean out that van, and move Kate’s dead body out of his van and into the garden. He slowly replaced his briefs, and put on a grey tracksuit, with a T-Shirt bearing the motif “ You are the most beautiful woman in the world” on the front, and “ Can I have a shag” on the back. Then he thought again. If he got blood on his clothes, it would be more likely to link the murder to him, and he didn’t want to go to jail before his revenge could be completely fulfilled. So, instead, Jack removed his T-Shirt and tracksuit top, and changed his tracksuit top to some old trousers that he had used to paint his hall a few months back. He would then burn these and no one would be able to track him. He decided not to wear a top, as he didn’t have any spare that he could afford to burn.

 

Satisfied at what he wore, he ran, bare feet down the stairs of his house and through the kitchen into the garage where his van was kept. He opened the door of the van, and saw Kate’s sprawled body on its floor, her foot falling heavily out of the door as the pressure of the door relieved of it. He pulled her by her feet out of the van, and her body flopped like a dead weight on the floor of the garage, the blood of her wound not yet clotted and some ran out of her chest on to the floor.

 

“Damn,” he said, breathing heavily from having to drag her out of the van, “This is gonna be a bitch to clean up!” He laughed a rather eccentric and eerie laugh, which even scared him. He dragged her by her feet through the door of the garage into the kitchen, her blood running like a slug’s trail behind her. He let her go on the kitchen floor; her body lay lifeless.

 

He looked at the body as he leant himself, tired from the exercise of pulling it, and smiled. She still looked beautiful dead with a gaping hole in her, he thought to himself, and he knelt down and stroked her legs, expecting them to be cold. He was surprised to find they were still relatively warm. And if her legs are warm, he thought. He smiled to himself and pulled her shorts down to her knees. Then, he pulled down the lace knickers she was wearing. He was about to pull down his own down, then remembered what she had done to him, so he instead, put his two initial fingers up her vagina. She was warm, and very loose. Shit, the girl had been around, he laughed to himself.

 

He leant forward and kissed her dead pale lips and his heart leapt when he realised…

 

Shit! No way! It wasn’t possible. She was still breathing! She had been stabbed and mutilated, lost pints and pints of blood, and there was breath coming out of this girl’s mouth! Ok, it smelt like vomit, where she had no doubt thrown up when she had seen her own blood in the car, but he hadn’t smelt its rank pungent odour in the van. He hadn’t seen its pulpy matter in the van because it had been dark in the garage, and he hadn’t wanted to draw attention to himself, as no doubt Mr Foé, the French bloke next door just wouldn’t have been able to resist poking his long French nose in to see what Jack was up to.

 

God Damn It! She wasn’t meant to be still alive, it meant that she had seen inside his van, had seen the danger he was. She had seen the bottles of urine, faeces, and hydrochloric acid. She had seen his bags of cocaine, cleverly hidden in a box labelled “nails”, stored between the boxes of ice creams he had ready-made. Jack started to sweat. If he let her go now, she would expose him. He would easily get 15 years for the drugs, maybe as much as 20. He would get the same for attempted murder, and attempted GBH with all his chemicals, who knows, maybe the same again. He couldn’t afford to spend the rest of his life in the nick, especially when he still hadn’t finished his plans of revenge. He still had a lot of people he wanted to hurt, to make pay. After all, there were 12 people on that jury. There was a barrister, his clerk, the judge, the public in the docks who mocked him when he was sent down, the news reporters who made the public shun him, made him worse than he was. News reporters from 5 different TV channels, shown on millions of televisions. He had to make them pay, and if he let this little cow go, he would lose his opportunity.

 

Eyelids flew open, brilliant sky blue eyes stared up at him, and they’re own want of revenge piercing his, making them burn with fear and guilt. He was scared of a 15-year-old girl. She wanted to hurt him, he knew, make him pay for trying to kill her, but his strength would overcome her, he could not let her escape. She wouldn’t be able to get up right away, he thought, he could finish her off while she lay there. He got up, genitalia stinging, more painful than ever, that he thought he had almost been castrated. He went to the draw to the left of him, and took out a meat cleaver, that he’d used when he had been a butcher in his twenties. The cleaver was nearly 30 years old, but was still extremely sharp. He held the cleaver above his head, and turned around to where Kate was lying.

 

Or should have been lying. She had gone. She couldn’t have gone. She had lost nearly two pints of blood, had only just come round, and was now no-where to be seen. Jack heard a roar coming from behind him and thwack! He was hit over the head with the rolling pin. He saw stars, and felt a sticky mess seeping into his hair. He put his hand up to where the sticky mess was, and looked at his fingers. A rose red residue gave its realistic remark, and his heart leapt to panic rhythm. Again the rolling pin hit him, this time on the back, and he yelped in pain, falling to the floor, face down in Kate’s own, now substantially dried blood. He turned around quickly; to see Kate, beautifully deadly bring the rolling pin crashing into his face. For the second time that day, he felt his nose mash into the rest of his face, and his lip sliced by his teeth, and fresh, coppery blood filled his mouth. Because he was lying down, he was forced to swallow some before he could turn his head, and as he did so he felt his stomach turn over, threatening to be sick.

 

He realised that he still had the cleaver in his hand, and attempted to slash Kate with it, but instead Kate brought the pin down on the hand holding it, breaking two of his fingers, the fingers that, ironically enough he had assaulted her with just minutes ago. Again the rolling pin was brought up over Kate’s head and crashed down on his ribs, on his stomach, on his legs, on his neck and Oh Fuck! She brought the rolling pin right down on his balls, his previously injured balls. He yelped in pain, not for the first time that evening, and a mixture of blood and urine formed a tell tale mark on his crotch. He was going to die, he thought, the end was coming.

 

He tried to get up, but he couldn’t move. The pain was unbearable, especially from his crotch and if he had tried, the pain would have been so bad, he would have easily passed out. He looked into the wicked lightning blue eyes of Kate, arms poised above her head like some Amazon warrior, ready to land the final, death-delivering blow, most likely to his temple. Her mouth was twisted with contempt, and Jack winced in anticipation of her assault when there was a knock at the door.

 

Kate looked at Jack, lying pathetic on the floor of his own kitchen, battered and bruised. Satisfied that Jack could not move, Kate went out of the kitchen, and Jack heard the front door open.

 

“Shit, Kate what are you doing here?” It was the local police Inspector, Jack thought his name was Cole. “And what in the blue hell has happened to you? Where’s Mr Owen?”

“He stabbed me,” Jack heard her reply, her voice stammering, holding back tears, “then he brought me back here, he thought I was dead, and so was going to bury me in his back garden” She laughed a dry laugh, but it caught in her throat, “He realised I wasn’t dead, so tried to attack me with a meat cleaver. So I retaliated.”

“Good girl” replied Cole. “Where is he?”

“In the kitchen”

Jack saw the Inspector emerge through the door of the kitchen, accompanied by another officer, someone Jack did not recognise. Both men were hefty and broad, as well as a dominating 6’4” tall. Cole looked down at Jack and his face twisted in disgust. He reached for his radio that was hung on his belt and said “Operator, we’re gonna need an ambulance down to 34 Green Lane. The suspect is pretty beat up, over.”

 

The radio crackled “Roger that Inspector, Out”

“Jack, Jack, Jack.” Cole tutted at Jack like he was an infant, “What have you been up to? Did you really think you could get away with it? Kids are coming down with illnesses all after buying your products and you thought you couldn’t be tracked? How naïve did you think we are? How naïve are you?”

Jack said nothing.

“You’re gonna be inside for a long time Jack, I hope you realise that, and after your attempted murder of Kate here-“

“And sexual assault.” Kate added, sobbing.

“-then you’re not gonna come out Jack, at least not in your life time.”

Jack heard the siren of an ambulance approaching, and pretty soon two paramedics equipped with stretcher entered via the kitchen door.

Jack was lifted up, the rough handling of the paramedics causing him pain beyond belief. As he passed out he heard the practiced statement from the Inspector “Jack Owen, you are under arrest. You do not have to say anything, but anything you do say may be brought against you in the court of law.”

 

 

THE END

^bump

the intro was fantastic...the body of it too...but the ending...kinda weak...maybe there should have been some kind of deeper struggle?

 

 

Overall: I am really impressed and intersted in reading

anything else you might have :wink:

Yeah. I'm still not happy with it either to be honest...really that's about it at the moment, as many have been either lost or thrown out. I'm working on a novel at the moment, but that hasn't grown any legs yet.

ohh :wacko:

 

 

I and feel it is weak..but at the same time, can't really pin point where it starts going that way... I think :thinking:

 

 

 

Kate looked at Jack, lying pathetic on the floor of his own kitchen, battered and bruised. Satisfied that Jack could not move, Kate went out of the kitchen, and Jack heard the front door open.

 

 

there ^^ after that line... it was just ..not sudden but the dialouge was allright in some parts but she didn't sound as worried as she should (after the "trauma") ... the dialouge was too direct and choppy

haha yeah. you should have read it before. she was almost matter-of-fact...dialogue remains my weak point

at least you can se your weakness in writing...I don't know what mine is...but I feel like I am writing good material, then I reread it and can't see where the sparkle doesn't exist

 

 

that is a good trait in a writer, finding the weak parts and editing them...you have step one, now work on the second part. Let me know how it works for you.

 

Any tid-bits from the novel? :wink3:

hmm well it's going to sort of be about a load of people getting conned into what they think is a free holiday when it's instead going to be a bit of a hellish experience. I'd hate to say any more than that

sounds tingly :wink:

:D They're going to have to go through various ordeals etc. So far I've only done four or five chapters...just introducing the main characters...each have a reason why they'd use this holiday as an escape from the ordeals of their current lives

so, good start...introducing the characters is a tough part.

 

make sure to remember the character introductions when writing the rest. That way, things tie together...

 

maybe a little bit of irony (cuz of the way you've made the story soung so far) ..maybe one has a tough life..and realizes the holiday was a jyp...and that his/her past (bad lives) was way better than the one he/she is having on the holiday..

 

 

well now i am just talking and not making sense...

 

 

When it's all done..what do you plan to do with it?

Well believe me, by the time they all realise what this holiday is they're all going to be reminiscing about their past lives!!

 

Maybe try and get it published. I'm not sure.

:nice:

 

 

If you do..(which I recommend because all of your pieces so far I have enjoyed)

give me a when and where and how to purchase it :wink:

haha well that's a pretty good compliment I guess. Although I should probably get someone to buy my short stories first too

? me ?

Noooooo they need to be published for widescale viewing...hmm maybe some kind of Science fiction/horror magazine?

(for when you come back)

 

 

I say publishing them in a magazine is a swell idea :thumbsup:

Yeah I should look into it...I'm not sure how many still publish short stories...it seems to be a dying art hmm

I dunno about that one... if they still published them in high school literature books, then chances are... they still will and magazines are still a shot to be given...keep at it.. I want to see success :smug2: