A
Spectrum Story for Valentine’s Day By
Caroline Smith “Is there anything I can do
to help you, sir?”
The
man whom some called Captain Ochre turned to see the assistant in the card store smiling
tentatively up at him. It was the same
young woman whom he’d spotted standing behind the counter at the mall entrance
when he’d walked into the store. He’d felt damn near foolish
- a feeling that didn’t improve as he trawled the rows and rows of cards,
pulling one after another off the shelf, only to return them with a frustrated
sigh.
Ochre
glanced at her nametag involuntarily – a habit of a lifetime. Jeanette. It was a pretty name, a bit like the girl
herself, with her shoulder-length bob and clear brown eyes. He shook his head with a
grimace. “Thanks anyway, but I don’t think you’ve got what I’m looking for.” Why was he even here, anyway? It wasn’t as if
he could do anything about the whole lousy situation. Not right now. And a
stupid, worthless piece of stiffened paper wasn’t going to make a difference of
one iota. What a dumb idea, he
castigated himself mentally, even though he knew he had only the best
intentions at heart. Heart. He might have found the
unintentional pun funny, in another place, another time. They surrounded him on
all sides, in vibrant red, hot pink, lurid fuchsia. They were stuck on cards, on fat silky
cushions, on the white vest of a big, brown Teddy bear that stared at him from
eye-level on a shelf stuffed with all sorts of February 14th
paraphernalia. Be My Valentine. If anyone
needed reminding, the legend was displayed on banners festooned across the
walls of the store. It was all so bitterly
saccharine it made him
want to throw up. There would be no more
Valentine’s Day for her. No cards, no bouquets, no teddies, no other overblown-overpriced
reminders of the love that they’d shared. For he’d left, like a thief in the night - to do the ‘sensible thing’. Only
he could sound so goddam self-important in
a way that made you want to punch his lights
out, even when you knew the goddam-awful risk that lay
behind the tight-assed way he said it.
Shit. “Sir?” Ochre almost jumped as the
assistant’s voice broke into his reverie. She was still there, hovering at his shoulder. “I’m sorry?” he said, almost
stupidly. She gave him a pitying
smile. “Well, as our motto says, we have a card for everything.” “Trust me; you won’t have
one for this particular….situation.” ”Well, I certainly won’t be
able to until you tell me what it is, will I?” Ochre felt an errant smile
tug the corner of his mouth. Oh, she was
persistent, he’d give her that. He glanced around, there were only a couple of
other customers in the store at this early hour, but that wasn’t the only
reason he was reluctant to divulge his thoughts. However, he was in civilian
clothing, in a city where no one knew him, or the person he was thinking of
buying the card for. Would it really do any harm to tell her his reasons for
standing here, feeling like a goyim at a Jewish
wedding? “So, tell me, what are you looking for?” she insisted.
Ochre met her eyes. “Something
for a woman who’s pregnant with another man’s child… only thing about it
is….he’s missing in action, probably dead.” Jeanette practically winced,
and her eyes widened. “Oh, boy, that is
a toughie,” He finally gave in to a wan smile. “I warned you.” “I’m so sorry,” “It’s okay. Not your fault.
Not anyone’s fault.” “How did it happen?” Ochre’s eyebrow lifted, and his
reply was acerbic – another old habit that refused to come to heel, even in the most
inappropriate
of moments. “Her getting pregnant?” he
said bleakly, “Thought that might be obvious…” She blushed. ”Don’t be
silly, of course I know that. I meant how did he die?” Ochre shrugged, ashamed of
his truculence, even as he knew it was a way of getting back at her. For her
ignorance. For being alive. “I can’t really talk about
it, you know. It’s…complicated.” Not to mention classified.
Jeanette unconsciously
smoothed her hands over her skirt. His cutting reply to her insistent
interrogation had knocked some of the smarts out of her. “Sure, of course, I
understand,” she said. Ochre kept his face neutral.
How could she possibly understand? How could anyone? He wondered about
Jeanette, what she did after she finished working her stint in this store. Probably
caught the metro home, maybe stopped at the grocery store, fed the cat, watched
some TV, went to sleep. Normality. A pattern shared by thousands, millions of
other individuals and families, from Detroit to Delhi.
Working, eating, shouting at the kids, watching sport, screwing, sleeping.
So few of them with any idea
of what was going on behind the façade of that normality – the dark, dirty
battle that had been waged on their behalf. “This woman, is she a good
friend?” It was the way she said it,
the unspoken sub-text, as if she could read his mind. His lips drew together in
a line, even as he felt his heart beat, just once, out of time. “Yeah, she’s a good friend.” And he had been a lousy one.
Insinuated himself into her head and body when neither of them needed that
shit. But ah, it had been good, while it lasted. So good it had spoilt him for other women –
for a while. And all the time he pretended it was nothing, inconsequential,
something that happens when two attractive, sexually active people work too close
together under pressure. He needed to believe that, to salvage his own stupid pride.
“I’m really sorry,” Jeanette
was blathering on. “And I didn’t mean for that to come out like it sounded. It’s
just… well, I
see lots of guys come in here, just like you, they look a bit sheepish, and
uncomfortable, all these cards, the stuff, they’re scary. I mean, not scary
like someone dying…obviously…” Ochre barely heard her,
struggling with his own thoughts and an annoying lump in his throat. This was an
idea of monumentally stupid proportions, and it was turning him a shade of maudlin
that he didn’t like one bit. He thrust his hands into the pockets of his heavy
jacket, insulation against the freezing weather outside, and stepped forward to
leave. “I appreciate your trying to help.” He felt he
owed the girl a little civility, after his unnecessary jibe. She placed a hand quickly on
his arm. “Don’t go yet, I might have something that fits – the occasion – oh,
you know what I mean.” Something in her pleading
made him delay his departure, and he followed her to a section near the back, his footsteps heavy on the
carpet, like the weight that pressed down upon his soul. He watched as she
quickly scanned the rows, and then pulled out a plain white card embossed with a
picture of a simple, but beautiful, yellow rose. “Yellow roses signify
friendship, unlike red, so it’s appropriate for a – let’s say - delicate
situation like yours. He flipped it open. “It’s
blank.” Jeanette smiled and touched
her chest, briefly, “Sometimes the best words are the ones that come from your
own heart,” Ochre blinked, still staring
at the white card. Perhaps he’d been wrong about the girl. For all her youth,
she was shrewd in the workings of the human psyche. Maybe, with her help, he
could actually carry this off.
“You ready to check this
out?” she asked him cheerfully. Nodding, he closed his hand
over the card. “Yeah, I am.” She’d been tempted to go out.
She knew she needed more clothes, her stomach was expanding at an alarming rate,
but she couldn’t face trawling around the shops, faced with the ever-present
reminders to exhort people to buy things for their lovers, boyfriends,
girlfriends, wives, husbands. All of it – mocking her.
He’d always tried to make
this day special for the two of them, and that wasn’t always easy. You couldn’t
just wander into the Spectramart and buy a bottle of
champagne, after all. But he was a master of invention, and Valentine’s Day was
often a highlight, a series of happy punctuation marks in her life. She winced as she felt a solid
kick against the wall of her stomach. The baby just had to be a boy, she
thought wryly, and most of the time he seemed to be wearing boots, the
pummelling he gave her. It wasn’t certain though,
and although she could have had the answer in an instant, some whimsy stopped
her. She couldn’t change anything about it, so she may as well keep the
time-honoured and somewhat old-fashioned surprise when the time came. She
hadn’t always been this accepting of course. But experience and circumstance have a cruel way of
softening the edges, of demanding submission to the inevitable. She passed a hand over her
face, feeling a wave of sorrow so raw, so painful, that it almost left her
breathless. Every day had been like torture, his loss so unbearable she wasn’t
sure she could carry on. But carry on she did, with a quiet stoicism. She
didn’t want to worry her ageing parents, who had
so desperately
longed for the grandchild that seemed never to arrive. In a way, it was
all so hideously ironic. Although history could not pin down exactly which one of
the many saints called Valentine was commemorated on this particular date, they were
all martyrs. Just like the man she had loved, and lost. Except that she didn’t
even know if he was dead, and for her, that was the worst thing. The not
knowing. She leant both elbows on the
desk, and pressed the heels of her palms against her closed eyelids, preventing
the scalding tears from flowing. He’d gone, with such high
hopes for all of them, and although his last
transmission was received when his ship landed on the red planet, there was
still a belief that he would return, successful. And indeed, success
seemed to follow in the wake of that fateful journey. The threats stopped
almost instantly. Naturally, at first there was justified caution; there had
been lulls in Mysteron activity before, but when month passed into month, and
those echoing, sepulchre-like tones ceased to boom through the loudspeakers, it
looked as if the gamble had paid off. After so many desperate years of fighting
against the odds, it truly seemed that the endless cycles of death and
destruction were over. There was
disbelief, and celebration. And for those who knew him best, any jubilation was
tainted with worry, then sorrow, when it became obvious that the man who had
gone into space to save Earth from its implacable foes was not going to return
to share that joy. For her, the
torture was doubled. Only a week after he’d left, she realised that her period
was late. In the run-up to the mission, she’d been so up-tight, her usually
rigorous planning had probably fallen by the wayside, and she soon found out that
she was pregnant. Fate was truly cruel, to play such a savage
trick on her. She’d agonised
about what to do, and some of her ‘friends’ even advised her to have a termination,
but in the end, she knew that would be impossible. What on earth was the point
of fighting for the human race, if one was so eager to destroy one tiny part of
it? The child would become the memory of
their love, however difficult raising it as a sole parent would undoubtedly be,
and she would manage, with her parents’ help. The chime made
her start, pulling her out of the sombre recollections, and she realised that
there was someone at the front door. She rose from the chair, and padded - she
wasn’t quite at the waddling stage yet - off down to the front door to see who
the caller was. To her surprise,
she saw a courier standing patiently on the welcome mat. He was a young lad,
barely in his twenties, who gave her a bright smile as he shifted the large
carton he held under one arm. “It’s okay, it’s
pretty light,” he said with a swift glance at her swollen belly, and obviously
noting her uncertainty at the size of the package. Nodding, she
took it from him, and laid it on the floor in the hall. “Sign here to
say you’ve had the delivery, please?” he asked, and she complied with his
polite request, somewhat bemused, for she hadn’t ordered anything online, and
she certainly wasn’t expecting anything this large in the mail from anyone.
“Thanks, ma’am,
you take care now.” Almost as an afterthought he gave her another smile. “Oh,
and, Happy Valentine’s Day.” “Happy Valentine’s Day,” she
echoed dully, and then she watched from the doorway, as he sauntered cheerfully
back down the mews lane to where his white van was parked on the kerb. She closed the door, and
stared at the box for a few seconds. Ouch,
another almost savage kick from the baby made her wince. She smoothed her
stomach, trying to calm the child within, for perhaps the stress that she felt
was in some intangible way, being transferred to the foetus. As if it knew it
was going to be born fatherless, and was getting even with that un-caring world
out there before it even came into it. She sighed, and began to
open the tall carton, tearing open the protective cellophane, and the clips
that held it shut. When she drew out what lay within, she blinked in surprise,
and a rush of emotion went through her. A dozen yellow roses, every
one a masterpiece of nature’s perfect design.
She stared at
them, not knowing what to think. On this day of all days, that someone should
send her roses - her favourite flowers. She was almost
afraid of finding out who
had sent them, and why. Instead, she busied
herself with automatic motions. Flowers needed to be treated properly, after
all, almost as soon as they were received. She found a tall vase in the
kitchen, filled it with clear, cold water, removed an inch from each stem with
a paring knife, and placed each one artfully in the vase. Then she carried them
through to the sitting room and placed them on the walnut low table between the
couches. Only then did she go back to
get the box, and as she peered into its depths, found a plain white envelope
tacked to the one of the tall sides. She
pulled it out, and carefully slit it open with her bone-handled paper knife.
A card, embossed with a
yellow rose. Her heart thumping, she
opened it up slowly to read the carefully handwritten note inside.
Dear
Dianne,
I
know that this gesture is probably not going to take away any of the pain, and
right now, you’re probably thinking I’m the crassest sonofabitch
that you ever had the bad fortune to know. But I had to send you these flowers
anyway, just to tell you that you’ve never been far away from my thoughts from
the moment you left Spectrum. I wish I could wave a magic wand and make
everything all right, but I seem to be all out of wishes right now.
I
do want you to know that I’m not giving up on him, and that goes for the other
guys too. The World President is refusing to let any of us go to Mars; there’s
a complete moratorium on the whole idea. They say that it’s better to let
sleeping Mysterons lie, and that Paul’s memory is better served by the peace
he’s brought to the world.
I
can’t believe he’s dead. I won’t believe
it. He’s survived an atomic explosion, for crying out loud! Like you, I can’t
sleep nights thinking he’s out there, maybe waiting for us to do something to
bring him back.
I’m
resigning my commission with Spectrum, and I don’t think I’ll be the only one.
We’re gonna fight this all the way, somehow, and maybe someday soon we’ll find
the father of your kid.
Love
and friendship, always,
Rick. Overwhelmed, the former
Rhapsody Angel of Spectrum blinked through the stinging tears that blurred her vision
and stared at the bouquet of yellow roses. “Happy Valentine’s Day,
Rick,” she whispered softly. Acknowledgments: This vignette was inspired by a very poignant story written by
Keryn, called
Twilight Memories. I’d like to thank her
and hope that she doesn’t mind me borrowing some of the ideas and incidents in
her tale for me to explore down a slightly different alley. Here is the link to
the story: As in previous stories, the usual disclaimers apply. This story
used characters from TV series “Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons” ©, which is
the creation of Gerry Anderson and Sylvia Anderson, and the rights of the
series belong to Carlton International, and/or other organisations, and no
profit was made from this fan-fiction whatsoever. My thanks to: Hazel Köhler, for kindly reviewing and
beta-ing and giving me a title! Chris Bishop, for running such a wonderful web-site for the fans
and writers. Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, for a wonderful show that still
inspires curiosity and wonder 40 years on.
OTHER STORIES BY CAROLINE SMITH Any comments? Send an
E-MAIL to the
SPECTRUM HEADQUARTERS site
|