The Indecisive Surprise.

Tracey was apprehensive about pressing the enter key. A gnawing feeling was making her drag her heels. John didn’t care anymore, according to her best friend Sinead, whom she trusted implicitly.

Tracey insisted that she knew John better than anyone, and that he would never cheat on her. Now she procrastinated by raising and lowering the leather chair. She sat alone in the office of the spacious country home. He was away with work again.

She had checked all the various nooks and crannies of the house, searching for any clue of infidelity. Tracey came up empty handed. Sinead's assertions were sounding hollow. As a backdrop to everything, Sinead and John never saw eye to eye. She rummaged through his credit card bills and spotted nothing untoward. He had two credit cards and not one transaction stood out.

And now Tracey was about to commit an act of treachery herself, without one shred of proof against her boyfriend of three years. She was trusting her best friend over her lover by even thinking he was adulterous. By pressing the large enter key she was entering into the online world of matchmaking website “Fix Me Up!”

She had entered all her personal details, personal preferences and hobbies. The website was quite detailed, asking for all your interests, no matter how often you did them. It was analysing your personality just so they could set you up with someone who could be like minded.

Her indecisiveness was stopping her now. She had always had a problem making any decisions. John normally made any of the important decisions in their relationship. He certainly was the more dominant personality of their partnership.

Regretting even sitting down now, Tracey suddenly got up from the chair at the office desk. She brushed off something on the underside of the large oak bureau. It scraped her bare knee. She hadn’t dropped the lever on the chair and now a sliver of blood rose to the surface of her skin. She lifted her shorts to stop from getting blood on them. Tracey grabbed a tissue to blot the wound.

Searching with her hand she felt around to see what had cut her. There on the underside of the desk was a single key taped up. Tracey didn’t recognise it and wasn’t sure what lock it fitted. Why would he do that?

Getting up from the office, Tracey walked around the house trying the key in all the locks she could find. It was smaller than many of the locks throughout the house, and as a result fitted nothing.

Returning to the desk, she sighed heavily. Maybe the key was never his as he had only recently purchased the heavy impressive oak desk. It was over sixty years old and had many knots and no doubt had stories to tell.

Maybe this was another that would never tell a tale. It probably had nothing to do with John. She plucked off a fresh piece of tape from the roll on the desk and went to place it back. Getting down on her hunkers, she spotted something that didn't look like it belonged there.

In the cavity where your legs go while seated, she spotted a small drawer at an awkward angle. It had a small lock too. Tracey tried the key. The lock opened.

She pulled the drawer out. Inside it were two folded sheets of A4 paper and reams of cash. She counted out over three thousand in fifty euro notes. Where was he getting this money from? Unfolding the two sheets, she saw that these were bills for a third credit card she knew nothing about.

Tracey ran her finger over each listed transaction. Each restaurant was somewhere she hadn’t visited. Each shop listed purchases that she had never received. Even the names of the florists were alien to her. It seemed to be happening at the beginning of every month - when he was away on business.

Her best friend was right – this bastard was up to no good. She didn’t want to initially believe it - but here it was right in front of her, in black and white.

How could she have been so stupid? Why didn’t she trust her gut and what her best friend had been telling her for months?

No more indecisiveness. She pressed enter on the keypad. Two can play at this game.

The website churned her profile and almost immediately came back with an instant match for her. It held back a picture of her ideal man and she read out his personality profile. He sounded really nice – kind, compassionate and generous. He was local too, which made him even more accessible.

Having read through the profile, she scrolled down to view his handsome image.

Staring right back at Tracey was her current boyfriend of the past three years, John.      

Pile Cream for Simon.

The twenty year reunion was going well. People were all having a good time. The canapes were going down a treat. Laughter and the sound of the background tinkly piano music filled the room. The warm seaside summer breeze blew through the open French doors, that led to the underwater lights of the pool. The waterfall flowed constantly into it, keeping the lights flickering at the guests above.

My mother stumbled over to the piano, asking the young Hispanic man to play one of her favourite tunes from The Waterboys. He looked at her watery eyes with a smile, paused and fiddled with his pink bow tie. I knew I needed to get her back to the hotel, to put her to bed. Making excuses and exiting around the back by the pool, I hailed a taxi. I felt a little woozy myself as the warm air brushed my face.

Back at the Waterside Hilton, getting my Mum back to the room was no easy task. The fresh air had made her legs more wibbily and wobbly than I remembered leaving the party. She fell into the bedroom, narrowly missing the stand that had two small bottles of mineral water atop. She started to make snow angels lying on her face in the plush carpet. Picking her up from the floor, I heard a knock at the door.

Standing in front of me was a pretty young woman dressed in a sparkly red dress. She was quite beautiful, with long legs and long straight jet black hair. Her red lipstick was smudged and eyes were dilated. She too, was unsteady on her feet. She knew, upon seeing my face, that she had knocked on the wrong bedroom door.

"Is Simon in there?"

"I think you may have the wrong room. Simon who?"

"You know that famous one?"

"Em, no.Are you okay?"

"I'm sorry to bother you Madam - but would you happen to have some eh, pile cream?"

"Would you believe, I think my mother does in her wash bag. Do you want to come in for a moment?"

"Okay so. Can I lie down here for a moment? Who is this here?"

"Eh, no don't lie down as that's my mother laying there. Who left the tap running in here?"

"Here you go. Do you know what room Simon is in?"

"Eh, I think it ends in a 23 or 36."

"Okay then - what floor?"

"Em, 36 or 23. Or is it the penthouse?"

"Well I don't know either so, lets start from the top down."

Waking my mother and taking her with our new friend in the red dress, we went in search of Simon. We meet a burly bodyguard in the hallway of the penthouse floor. He was sweating heavily in a pale blue suit. I notice how soft it feels as he brushes by me, ushering us back into the waterfall inspired lift.

Propping the two inebriated women up with the assistance of my new bodyguard friend in a small
space isn't easy. The silver mirrored handlebars at waist level help though. The elevator pings and we exit into the underground parking lot. The open door of a long black stretch limo greets us. I hear water trickling into a drain nearby.

And then my mother sobers up with the roar of a familiar English voice and four tersely spoken words.

"GET IN THE CAR!"

"That's Simon," whispers our friend in the red dress.

We slowly get into the car and I can see from my mother's face that she is starstruck.
Simon sat in the backseat, stirring an iced tumbler of clear liquid in his right hand.

"Are you here to apply the cream?" asks Simon of my mother.

"Cream? What are ya on about?"

"I think he means this stuff Mom."

"Pile Cream? Are you for real? Do you actually pay people to apply that for you? Are you that fecking lazy and up yer own hole?"

"I'm not sure you understand Madam."

"I don't care how rich you are or who you are, but I'm not putting my hands anywhere near your arse! I'm from Ireland and that type of behaviour isn't normal no matter where you're from! Whether we're here in LA or at home!"

"Excuse me? Do you know who I am?"

"Yes I know who you are - you're going to drop us back to the party and my mitts are going firmly back into the pockets of me holiday trousers."

"Madam - that cream is not for my bottom but for my.."

Our odd conversation took a sudden, odd turn like a 90 degree bend in a river.
The car had pulled out in front of the hotel and passed other high rise buildings. The driver screeched the car to a halt when the body impacted the front windscreen, smashing and frightening us all half to death.

I was seated behind the driver. I stepped out of the vehicle.

I stared at the semi-naked woman impacted into the front of the limousine. Her light pink camisole and small white knickers began to turn the colour of red.

Her hand was outstretched over the side of the car. Water dripped, mixed with blood from her fingertips. I watched those droplets fall to the tarmac and pool in the streetlight.

Then the dream ended.

I got up because I needed to pee - really badly.