Ever Dundas: Goblin

They all flicked on torches, focussing the light on David. They moved in, turning the torches on themselves, creating floating skulls. They all had a dead pet hanging round their necks like stoles. Simon kept his torch pointed at David’s face. The sun was descending, the clouds clearing as it sank down into the horizon, casting shadows and a strange orange glow across the scene.

I remembered I was gathering evidence, remembered I was going to take photos to prove the fat German bastards were here. I clutched at my camera and turned to Mac.

‘We’ll take photos,’ I whispered, ‘of the Nazis. Then we’ll make a plan and we’ll rescue David and we’ll go to the palace and we’ll have a feast.’

‘They’re not Nazis,’ he hissed, grabbing at my arm.

I shrugged him off.

‘Goblin, it’s Jack Alexander, Simon—’

Mac looked sick, he was shaking his head and backing away.

‘Goblin—’

I raised the camera and we fell like Alice down the rabbit hole tumbling in the darkness hail thee O lizards in the darkness in the depths. In a moment, in a second, with a click, it was over. I had pressed the camera shutter, Jack had pulled the trigger, David fell. When Devil barked they turned on us, another shot and Devil was hit. I dragged him behind the mound, found the hole from the time we played Frankenstein, Martians and Nazis, and down we went, the disappeared.

London, 27 January 2012

When I came back from Cornwall, I’d said, ‘Ma? You seen David?’

I’d witnessed his death, I’d taken a photograph of the exact moment, but I wasn’t sure what I’d seen. The light was fading, it had happened so quickly. I blocked it out and buried the camera, the only thing that could make it real. When I came back from Cornwall I still expected him to come walking through the door and say, ‘Goblin, who said you could go to the ocean without me, eh? Did you see the kraken? Did you swim in the sea?’

But he didn’t walk through the door. He wasn’t sailing with pirates, he hadn’t settled in Venice. He went down below, not with the lizards but with the pets, cradled in their paws, resting on their fur, rotting in their mass grave, sharing maggots and worms, holding paws with Charlie’s parrot-cat, going down down down, feeding the earth, leaving bones, leaving skulls cracked by a clumsy Goblin-child who blamed the enemy, the Germans, the Nazis, a Goblin-child who made up stories to keep from going down down down with David, with parrot-cat, with Ruby and Devil, with the thousands of pets who don’t matter, their paws pulling, holding, scratching, their glacial eyes glinting in the dark. To keep David and the no-matter pets at bay, Goblin-child made up stories, Goblin-adult drank it all away, what does it matter? Dead bodies everywhere. Dead things can’t die.

I buried the camera with Devil. I thought I’d never see that film developed, but here it is, evidence.

‘Ben,’ I’d said. ‘Have you ever seen someone die? Someone you love?’

It was final. I’ll never see David again, because here it is, the evidence, as simple as that, as plain as day. A decorated war hero’s first shot, and he hit the mark.

London, 26 March 2012

WAR HERO ON TRIAL FOR MURDER

The photograph has been leaked. All the major papers have picked it up. It’s all over the internet. There’s commentaries on whether it should be shown at all, discussions over whether it was doctored. Every news outlet in the country wants a piece of me. I’m the photographer who caught the exact moment David was shot in the head.

What’s the truth? I say. What’s the truth? David has gone. He went on an adventure to the sea. He escaped, like he said he would. That’s what I know. The photo is doctored. It isn’t David, it isn’t him, it isn’t anyone, it’s ‘let’s pretend’. All these corpses and we obsess over one. Bones and truth and DNA, it’s all a game. What kind of person wouldn’t bury the past? Who lives there in the stench in the flames in the rotting corpses? It is hoped, it said, someone will claim these bones. Time has collapsed and space has collapsed and they have emerged from the darkness below, Goblin and Devil and Monsta. Someone will come forward. It is hoped. It is thought. It is said. It is hoped, it said, someone will come forward. It was decided the photographs of family members should be published in the hope someone will recognise them. Although, it said, there is much debate about this. Because of the angle from which most of the photographs are taken, it has been suggested the photographer was a child. There are several of what are assumed to be family members. Some of the photographs, it said, could assist in identifying the photographer. Most importantly, there is a photograph depicting the aftermath of the pet massacre, an event which remains largely undocumented. Many of them record events in London during World War II. The developed photographs are particularly valuable. The film, it said, is in remarkably good condition. Bones, doll parts, a shrew head, a camera.

Thanks to:

My husband Paul Wilson (aka Cinnamon Curtis) for his love, support, and the beautiful Goblin cover.

Rach and Gav for helping me get to this point. I wish Rach could be here to share this.

Mum and dad for their support and café dwelling.

Manic Street Preachers for saving my life. Stay beautiful.

Book Group, Granny Club and Art Club for their friendship (Kristi, Carolann, Kathryn, Ser, Smu, CherryBee, Cat, Emma, Ollie, Dream, Jo, Megan and Stewart).

My writing group for keeping me sane (Catherine, Peikko, Ali, Frances, Alison, Sil, Mairi, Mark).

My readers, Nacho and CB, for suffering an early draft.

Nacho, Ryan and Dream for Venice adventures.

Deb, my Edinburgh Book Fest buddy.

Peter, for advice and delightful correspondence.

Sue Rew for her friendship and mutual gushing over Dirk Bogarde. She is missed.

Gillian for providing a second home through the Looking Glass when I needed it most.

Book Week Scotland, Jenny and Gillian for the pitch opportunity.

I will be eternally grateful to Jenny Brown and Adrian Searle for believing in Goblin .

Helen, Rodge, Ryan and Robbie for helping to make Goblin the best it can be.

All at Freight Books for helping to launch Goblin into the world.

My translators and good friends, Sil and Anna.

John Hughes for Queer Theory.

Em, for making my soul-destroying office job less soul-destroying with book, film and TV chat.

Julie at the Advice Shop for helping me navigate the nightmare of governmental bureaucracy.

Fellow MA students, and Sam, David and Stuart for their teaching, support and guidance. The MA changed my life.

Terry Gilliam for Tideland and Jenni Fagan for The Panopticon .

A tip of the hat to Shirley Jackson, Angela Carter and Nietzsche.

All freaks and goblins.

Jabba and Belle for owning us. Our lives would be barren wastelands without you.

Thanks to all who work to eradicate speciesism. Praise the lizards! A salute to Corporal Pig.

First published 2017

Freight Books

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Glasgow, G1 1TS

www.freightbooks.co.uk

Copyright © 2017 Ever Dundas

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