ORANGE SCREAM

ORANGE SCREAM

I'm going to do it today! The idea came to me a couple of weeks ago
whilst I was sitting upon the floor in the middle of this rat infested
room. Floors keep you attuned. They are cold and unyielding and they
suit my mood right now. I can not allow myself to relax and soften when
my purpose in life has finally revealed itself to me. So I torched the
sofa of this stinking flat along with the single mattress from the
bedroom out in the crumbling back garden. The mattress was so damp that
I had to douse it with gasoline to get it going. After that, I used the
cardboard box that the large quantity of drinking glasses arrived in to
waft the thick black smoke over the neighbouring gardens. It was some
spectacle. A number of the neighbours were having a barbecue several
doors down and they started to cough on my filthy emissions. They tried
to pretend it wasn't bothering them but I wafted so vigorously and the
smoke got so acrid that they began to gag and choke and all their food
got coated with my sooty marinade. Not one of them dared to confront me
though. Serves them right for never inviting me to any of the things
they do. They're scum the lot of them.

Perhaps my new haircut unnerved them. I paired it off with my dad's
electric razor which I stole from him the last time he was bumming
lodgings round here - after my mother turfed him out again. He
shouldn't have knocked two of my teeth out after he had been drinking.
Now it's got that amazing blue sheen that you get when the new hair has
just broken the scalp. It looks awesome. It yells don't mess with me.
You certainly won't after today!

Am I going to do something bad? What do you think? It won't be bad for
me because I see them everyday and the mere sight and smell of them
makes me nauseous. But it will be bad for you. Particularly so if you
are a woman because you all can't resist them and you turn to them the
instant things aren't going your way. You don't have a clue about real
misery.

Why do I want to do this? Why not? I just feel in that mood. Why must
we always be constrained by the expectations of society? Why must we
always feel inclined to act in a manner that we hope people will
approve of? Where does it say that people won't condone my hacking or
chopping or gunning somebody down for no better reason than it felt
good? But why attack only one when I have the opportunity to effect
hundreds maybe even thousands.

I certainly enjoyed myself when I watched that cat doubled up in agony
as the homemade poison I put out for it savaged its internal organs. It
died in a mesmerising dance of wriggling limbs, muscles knotting and
contorting; foamy saliva bubbling wildly around those needle like fangs
- you won't be biting me with those again will you cat!.

I was rapturous when I swung my boot heavily into next doors wheezy old
dog. I kicked it right in its sagging belly. Its eyes nearly popped out
of its head and its feet came fully an inch off the floor. It managed a
comical semi yelp as the air in its lungs exploded through its worn
down yellow teeth. It was so much fun that I swung at it again. I hit
it in exactly the same place even when it was trying to flee for its
life. Exactly the same spot it was. I could tell because even after the
second kick only the one ugly mark was evident. I can do that you know.
I'm terrific with my feet for I used to be a wonderful footballer. I
could do amazing things with a football when I got the chance. When the
coach wasn't on my back!

That dog just went down like it had been shot; like it had ropes tied
to its legs and they had all been yanked at once in different
directions.
"Football is a team game Jarvis! As talented as you undoubtedly are, we
can not succeed when you refuse to encourage and assist your
team-mates. Skill like yours should inspire them to better themselves,
not frighten them to death. Not everybody is as fast and as confident
and as naturally skilful as you are, but that doesn't give you the
right to forcibly take the ball from them. I'm afraid this latest
outrage is simply too much. Henshall is one of your teamates Jarvis;
we've had to send him to hospital. You broke his nose you frightful
boy!"

They didn't have to expel me for it though.

Now all I see is football stars being bought for millions of pounds,
and earning tens of thousands each week. The best of them are big
stars. They wine and dine the most attractive woman and enjoy the
adulation of millions. I could have been one of them if the school
hadn't made sure that every local team had been made aware of that
incident with Henshall. Not one of them would give me a trial after
that.

It wasn't my fault that he was so bleedin ungainly. The fat get! I
think he was all blood judging from the amount that poured from his fat
face. Like a swollen uncooked black pudding. Like them other fat gets -
everybody at work. I detest the fact that their sweaty lard filled
bodies are so grotesque that they overflow their allotted workspace and
their blubber drips into my stall. They perspire pure grease you know.
It's a well known fact! I have to wash it off my tunic everyday.

The company thinks it's being real smart when they escort new employees
to their little stall on the line and say, "Feel free to eat all you
want."
They think that based upon experience, you'll go mental on the first
few days and eat almost as many of them as you pack; that you'll get so
sick of them in your inevitable binge that you'll never touch another
after that. Well it hasn't worked with them other lard arses has it?
They're always scoffing them throughout the day.

You'll certainly go mental all right, but it won't be a sudden burst of
gluttony we're talking about. Do you know what they expect me to do all
day? They make chocolates. Not the bars, those are made at their other
factory. No these are the individual chocolates with different fillings
that go into selection boxes. The kind you unwittingly give out on
Valentines Day to cheating girlfriends.

Twenty different types of chocolate constantly stream along a conveyor
past my workstation. I have to pick out the Orange Creams for placement
in the plastic trays. Oh but that's only if it is a Monday of course
and at the start of the month. If it is a Tuesday then I have to grab
the Turkish Delights from all the others. If it's two weeks into the
month and a Friday, then I'm on Brazil Swirls and the following
Thursday its Praline Cracknel. In the course of the month I will have
picked out every different chocolate in the box and by the subsequent
Monday I will be back on Strawberry Creams again.

"We appreciate that the job can be a little tedious so we've tried to
inject a little variety into the process. It's our commitment to our
staff and we stick to it even when independent research has
consistently shown that over twenty five per cent more chocolates would
get packed if we kept you all on the same ones every day."
That dwarfish foreman with his baby blond hair curling up into the back
of his hair net always takes great pride in saying that to all the new
starters. They draft them in to replace those who have been driven
insane by the tedium. He must say it at least twice a week. All that we
need is a friggin tube dangling from the roof, slotting directly into
our mouths. Everytime we correctly select a chocolate, the management
can just shoot a peanut down that tube as our reward. Monkey boy that's
me.
"Why are there always damaged chocolates in amongst the ones you have
picked out Jarvis?"

That ear splitting sound is starting up again. The teenage daughter of
that Greek puff upstairs is playing her violin again. The sound is like
a cat having its whiskers pulled out ever so slowly. Believe me that is
exactly what it sounds like. How do they all sit there and listen to it
- and clap like they have been treated to a fine piece of classical
music? Every single day I hear it and the sound makes the skin on my
scalp tighten and I find that once it starts my fingernails
involuntarily begin to sink into the flesh of my palms.
"Won't you please stop? I have to go to work in half an hour and I'll
be late if I have to come up there and break your fingers. I can't be
late today. Not today."

It has stopped and the clapping has commenced. I will leave the house
before it begins again and walk to work. I pick up my sandwiches
wrapped in silver foil and the drawstring bag that I sat filling up in
the kitchen well into the early hours. It tinkles like a breeze blowing
through a chandelier. I am careful to hold it way from my leg, as the
material is very thin.

If she is sawing at that violin again when I get back then perhaps I
shall pay her a visit. I'll take along the hammer that is still sitting
on the kitchen table upon the folded teatowel. But better yet I might
go up and tell the family how much I adore listening to their
daughter's music and offer them a small token of my appreciation. A box
of chocolates perhaps?

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