Monstrous Devices

Welcome to our regular feature showcasing the talents of the nation’s best writers.

This one is special,” his grandfather had told him. And it was. Alex sat at his desk, alone in his bedroom, gazing at the old toy robot that stood beside his laptop, when he should have been looking at the screen.

The cursor blinked impatiently at him from his unfinished composition on the symbolism of the novel they were reading in English. He had started to write about decaying teeth, then given up. He didn’t know what decaying teeth were supposed to symbolise, except maybe decay. He couldn’t stretch that to eight hundred words.

The computer’s clock showed 11:34 pm. He leaned and pulled back the curtain. Outside, snow fell from a low and heavy British sky, grey clouds stained orange by drab suburban streetlights. A thin, grey-looking fox ran into the small back garden, something white in its mouth. The animal stopped, dropped whatever it was carrying, then lifted its head and barked out its harsh and awful cry.

As always, whenever he heard that shriek, Alex felt a chill crawl up his spine, over his scalp. The loneliest sound in the world. The fox stood, head cocked. It screeched again. Faintly, Alex heard another, higher, answering bark. The fox picked up its food and trotted off. The friendless sound was not so friendless after all.

His computer chimed and his phone vibrated. On each, eight new messages. From eight different people. All saying the same thing:

YOUR GETTING IT PATHETIC FREAK He deleted them, looked at his essay, typed some words, deleted them. He leaned back heavily in his chair. His eyes settled on the photograph of his father on the wall above his desk. The only photograph he had ever seen of him.

“Never liked anyone taking his picture,” his mum always said when she looked at it, in the same sad, apologetic tone.

It showed the two of them, his dad and mum, caught in a red-black party haze. His mum young and happy, with bad hair. His dad behind, half turned away, blurring in the shadows. A vague, tall man, black hair pushed back from a high forehead. For the millionth time, Alex found himself squinting at the picture, trying almost to will it into focus. For the millionth time, the man refused to become any clearer. ■