MONDAYS WORDS

i was found lying there on the line, not directly on the middle, but rather a little off center. what i was doing there was unclear and slightly unsettling.

"Wake up" they said, "Wake up, boy!"

And awake I did, the blinding lights burning my retinas as it crept in to my heads and latched on to my brain. Disorientation can be a deadly, deadly thing. Confused, I simply lay there, taking in my surroundings and the sillhouettes that surrounded me.

"Who are you? How did you get here?"

Still, I just lay processing this odd data that was being fed to me from this strange surrounding. A football pitch in the winter, unmelted snow even at a hundred degrees. Barely anyone moves, barely anyone makes a sound. They daren't. They know not of who I am or what I'm capable of. He repeats his questions.

"Who are you? How did you get here?"

"I...I'm unsure" I reply.

Silence again. White lights, black figures. Whether we're in a tiny room or the great outdoors, I can't tell. This place seems massive, this place seems tiny. Perspective destroyed, sentience removed.

"Am I dead?" I ask.

"Of course, you are boy! How did you get here?"

"I...I don't know. I fail to remember what I was doing as my last living act."

"God Lord, boy! You don't remember? Would you like to know why that is?"

"Yes, sir." I reply sheepishly. "Please."

"Boy, you never existed. Like the eggs that don't make it, unfertilised spawn. You are the sperm that never made it to the egg in time. Your brother is forced into a world as brutal and as benevolent as earth. You, boy, get to stay here."

"Where am I, sir?" I question.

"You are nowhere, boy, you are nowhere. You are doing nothing and you are surrounded by nobodies who, akin to you, are also nowhere doing nothing. Physics denies our existence and biology denies our entities. We are in and of love, we are in and out of luck."

"I see" I mumbled back, engrossed in perplexity. "And there's no way you can explain what's going on a little bit better at all? In any way at all?"

"Stand, boy, stand and come with me."

I stand.

I'm dressed in a suit, one of the really fancy ones with tails. I have a monocle, a top hap, a very respectable pair of mutton chops and I'm speaking in a well toned, effervescent upper class English accent. I am not how I imagined myself though to be fair I've only known myself since awaking in this encounter, full of knowledge and full of confusion. We walk further and with each step, the lights dim a little. The hundreds of bodies that had earlier surrounded me are ceasing to be; disappeared or fading away with the light. Eventually, it's just the two of us.

"I'm 4. That's my name, not my age. As I, like you, didn't make it to the egg quick enough, I have no age, though let it be known that I've been around these parts for a lengthy spell. "

"Hi. I'm..."

"You're Gerard".

"Oh. Okay. Hi. I'm Gerard."

"I know, I just gave you that name. Gerard, why do you think you are here? Why do you think that, instead of dying off and fading into the ground, fading away to mere dust as science would have you believe, you are here seemingly alive and well?"

"Sir, I have no idea."

"Call me 4. Sir is a little too formal for these parts."

"What parts, sir?"

"4. These parts. Where you are. The place where you may spend the next 4 minutes or where you may spend the next 4 billion years. Why do you think you are here?"

"I think I'm here for The Grand Party"

"Good. And do you know what you mean by that?"

"I have no idea, 4, it just came to me."

"Just as I thought. Gerard, your name is now simply G. You've moved up a rank. Well done. Now let me tell you, this party will be spectacular. A tasteful party. You'll be surrounded by the healthiest and wealthiest people you will ever meet. People who have experienced a feeling much superior to love. People with a million happy and well bred children. The kid of people that can not exist in the real world."

I'm now young, tight red jeans wrapped round my legs, and a tight black t-shirt. My body is the way I'd want it to be were I physical and I have a pair of sneakers on that look like they'd cost me a weeks wages in a full time job. A top of the range mobile phone sticks slightly out my pocket. It looks simple on the surface yet capable of many, many things.

4 is now a dog. A talking dog. This is really the last thing I need but nonetheless we continue.

"You'll notice I'm a dog."

"I noticed."

"Good. I'm no longer called 4 either, I'm not called Cat."

"You're Cat the dog?" I ask.

"Yes. Look straight ahead of you. What do you see?"

A trampoline. I see a trampoline. A huge trampoline. I swear you could fit a few hundred kids on there.

"I see a trampoline."

"And what do you think this means?"

"Is it...a metaphor?...for how life is up and down? Uncontrollable to some degree? It can be fun but you can get sick of it, grow weary with it. Though it offers comfort and enjoyment, one slip could inevitably lead to a great deal of pain, perhaps even death?"

"Eh..."

"Yes! It is, isn't it! And you're a dog; You're also a metaphor! That I, as a human, should treat all animals equally, regardless of size, intelligence or back ground. And that even I as a hip, young, handsome man should not take my looks and my clothes and my gadgets for granted. I'm right, aren't I?"

"No. It means the party is here. If you'd have looked a little closer perhaps you'd have seen the buffet table beside it and the bouncy castle behind it."