by T K Foster
There was a.... thing.... in front of Billy, sort of cylindrical in shape, long and thin, with what appeared to be bristles of some sort bound together at one end. It stood against the wall in the gloom, bristles up. Billy wondered what it was.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“A broom,” Cetra answered softly.
“Oh! Oh yes, I can see that now. So you call them brooms too. We have them....”
“Yes a broom,” Barret whispered harshly. He had been peering outside through a crack in the wall, but had since come forward. “And that’s a pitch fork,” he pointed, “and that’s a shovel, and this is a fist. We Irish have a saying, shut up or I’ll punch you in the face.”
Billy shut up.
It was a good while before the calamity caused by the three Humps had desisted and been replaced once again by the hum of a busy marketplace. Stalls were quickly fixed, goods were picked up, and anything broken was either thrown away or marked down. Business continued as usual.
Although Billy never got to see the markets again, he could still smell its delicious aromas lingering about his nose, tempting him to return. Even in his head he could hear the pulpy skinned lizard whispering into his ear, “try me, boy, I’m sweet and tasty”.
What Billy had failed to notice was that his new friend, the angry Irishman, had disappeared, only to return shortly after and carrying a large bag clanking with what Billy guessed must have been the entire inventory of his stall. Barret confirmed this assumption with a grin. He dropped the bag in a corner and sat down on an empty crate.
Where they were was a storage shed, one of many owned by Barret, who went about from town to town selling, for want of a better word, old-wares. They were trinkets he would acquire from a man named Brock, a man who was as mysterious as the many things he collected; then Barret would sell them at market and make himself a tidy profit. He was always assured that every product was unique and could not be bought anywhere else, this made Barret’s a relatively prosperous business venture.
“So,’ Barret said, “welcome to Bradley.”
“No, it’s Billy”
“No, I mean, you’re in Bradley. You’re on Bradley.... One or the other.”
Billy was confused and therefore hesitated a moment before speaking again.
“This town is called Bradley?” he asked.
“No. This place, the whole thing, where you are, wherever you go, it’s all Bradley.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“I know....”
“Bradley’s a person’s name.”
“I know....”
Billy glanced over at Cetra who was dusting off an old chair she’d found. She sat down.
“Cetra,” he said, “Is this Bradley?”
“No silly, I already introduced you. That is Barret.”
“No.... I mean, Barret tells me we’re in Bradley.”
“We are? I did not know that. I never did take much notice of the names of the places I go to. I just know where I am going and I go there.”
Billy shook his head and turned his attention back to Barret.
Barret knew only too well the confusion Billy felt; thus he stepped forward to tell his own story.
1831 days prior, which equates to just over five years - though the very concept of years did not exist on Bradley - Barret had stepped unwittingly into a closet in the spare room of his grandparents new home one cold, wintery summer’s day. He had landed here, on a hard cobble floor with many roughly hewn stones surrounding him.
“That’s where I landed,” Billy interrupted, “But there were fourteen stones and they were all really smooth and straight.”
“Well....” Barret continued.
It had taken him some time to figure his way out of there. His landing place had been inside, with no visible doors to exit by, but he had found a way out by means of feeling for cracks in the surrounding wall. Funny enough, when he found his way through he stepped directly out of a closet and into someone else’s home. Best part of the confusion hit him when, from an adjoining room, two oddly shaped creatures found him there and chased him out a nearby window.
“You know,” Barret said, “I broke into that house one day to go back to the closet, but it was gone, and the house was empty.’
Billy and Barret talked for some time, comparing their stories. Barret was simply glad to be with someone he could finally relate to. Those who occupied Bradley were mostly simple minded folk; he had found it quite easy to incorporate himself into their lifestyle. Then Brock gave him a lucky break. He built a home, developed a business that saw him travelling a lot, and generally learned to be happy and make the most of his predicament.
“You know, Barret,” said Billy, “Cetra knows how to get into that place with the stones.”
“You do?” Barret jumped to attention and stared directly at her.
“Sometimes I do,” Cetra smiled, “but otherwise I do not. I feel it when I am near it.”
“What do you mean?”
“It is not in the same place all the time.”
“So it moves, like a space ship or something?” Barret questioned.
“What is a space ship?”
“Never mind. Why haven’t you ever spoken to me about this before?”
“Barret, you have never asked.”
She was right, he never had.
“Do you feel it now?” Barret hoped.
“No,” came her curt reply.
There was a short silence.
“So,” Billy broke in, “you’d be about eighteen then? You must have been my age when you got here?”
“I was seventeen when I stepped into that closet, now I’m twenty two.”
“You still look seventeen then.”
“Do I? I hadn’t really thought about it.”
This time there was a long silence. After a while Billy became restless.
“Well,” he said, “I need more answers than you two can obviously give me.”
“Hello, Billy boy, been there done that. You’re speaking to the veteran of how the hell do I get out of this place?”
“If there’s a way into this place there’s got to be a way out.”
“I gave up on that quest years ago Billy. Now this is my home. You may as well get used to the idea.”
Billy was visibly angry, “That’s not good enough....”
At that precise moment in time, just as Billy was getting ready to scream his frustration, they all turned toward a faint bump which came from just outside the window flap. Barret moved slowly and quietly nearer the window and paused for a moment to listen. Then in one swift movement of his arm he reached out and pulled back in through the window opening a funny, chubby, young pig-faced creature called Briar.
CHAPTER EIGHT