WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT CARL

Carl wakes up terrified....

By Nick Dwyer

If it wasn't a ghost that woke me, why am I scared? Sue stirs beside me but doesn't wake. I get up, pace the room a little to shake off the spooked feeling then go to the bathroom. It's a shared bathroom along the landing. Someone hasn't pulled the chain and I'm confronted with a floater that takes two flushes to dispatch. I have a piss and someone in the next room groans so I don't flush again.

I tiptoe back along the hallway into our room.

"Is that you?" Sue's voice startles me.

"Yes. Been to the bog. There was a turd the size of..."

"Go to sleep." she says.

"What's the time?"

She yawns. "My mobile's under the pillow."

I flip open my wife's sequinned Motorola and squint at the screen. Four thirteen. I won't get back to sleep now before the alarm goes off at six-thirty. This fear of ghosts keeps me awake. I want to pull the duvet over my ears and lie rigid till dawn. Once I got so nervous I stopped breathing and fainted.

"Remember when I fainted?" I ask as I pull the duvet over my ears.

"Uhh?"

"You got Maggie from down the hall to give me the kiss of life."

"I never did. Go to sleep."

"But why didn't you give me the kiss of life?"

"For goodness' sake Carl. Maggie was in the room." she replies, a little more awake.

"What was she doing in here? Sue, are you having me on?"

"You were lying on the floor and I thought she was kissing you. She seemed to be drunk. I don't want to talk about it." She turns over and I can see her back's all blotchy. I hope she isn't going to have one of her asthma attacks.

"I suppose it must have looked bad." I say. Her breathing sharpens and I find her inhaler under her pillow. She takes it and breathes a big gulp.

"Go back to sleep Carl."

She turns over and faces away from me. I lie awake, staring at a crack in the ceiling that didn't used to be there. There's a stain next to it, a long dark watery stain. Did that used to be there? I float away and don't dream of anything until my wife's phone rings.

"Susan?" Maggie's voice comes through the speaker. "Sue, are you there? It's Maggie. Wake up. We need to talk about Carl." I roll over and grab the phone.

"Maggie?" I say. She hangs up. My wife moans in her sleep. I get up and go to the toilet again. There's another one floating in there. I don't believe it. We have to move out of this place. Get set up on our own somewhere. I'll give Maggie a month's notice then we'll get away from here for good.