He was sitting at my computer next to the window, which was letting in the bright morning sunshine as I had opened the curtains before leaving the room three short minutes before. This light mostly shone through him, but the little that did catch his jowly, apparitious features made them look incredibly wise... but also thunderous. As in, thunderclouds - grey, foreboding thunderclouds that are the opposite of bright sunshine, really.
"Morning," he said, glancing down at the laptop. "Been reading your blog."
"Oh cool, what did you-"
He cut me off - dead - with the raise of a single eyebrow. He's good, I thought. No point denying it.
"Not posted much lately, I see?" he said. "Been busy with a new, full-time, permanent job?"
"Er..."
"Spending a lot of time with an alluring new lady acquaintance, then?"
"Ha! Um, no, no I haven't."
"Oh," he said, smugly. I decided there and then that this was a quality unbecoming of icons, unless they were Joey from Friends or someone. His expression changed suddenly to one of affected innocence. "Is it because you have no access to a computer of some kind?"
I sighed. "That... that one right there is mine, Winston. It's in my room. Look, you're pointing right at it."
My muse, with hump.
"Silence!" he roared moments after I'd stopped talking. "Choose your next words carefully, Stephen, as I will ask this only once: what is the reason for this indolence?"
Just then my phone rang. Winston nodded and I answered it. The person on the other end was an acquaintance of mine who had hidden his number. I ended the call immediately and turned back to my muse.
"Sorry. What were you saying?"
"What's with the indolence?"
"I don't know. What's an "indolence"?"
"Laziness, you dolt."
"Oh," I said, my mind kicking into high gear. I furrowed my brow slightly and looked sadly at the floor. Winston is a Shrewd Operator... but so am I. "Well, I... I don't think anyone's reading it." Finally, like it was a real effort, I looked up into his face, into his eyes. It was brilliant.
He met my gaze, I met his. It went on like this until I thought one of us was going to cry, probably him. Then he said: "Well, boo-fucking-hoo."
He'd bought it, but the ploy had backfired. I could either go with it or pull out, but if he knew I'd got him he'd be extra-cautious from now on, so I chose the former option.
Concentrating on making my eyes go shiny I muttered, "Sir Winston?"
"Look, we all know you're Mummy's super-sensitive special little guy..."
"Hey..."
"...And God knows you'd never be mistaken for a real man..."
"Fuck you, Churchill."
"...But you've got to get some balls on you, my friend."
"I've got balls. Ask your Mum." Your dead Mum, I thought. Zing!
"Whatever. Listen, do you think it was easy taking over from that appeasing Nazi-fucker Chamberlain? Well, it bloody wasn't. It was hard, Stephen, hard like rock-hard. But... every day you make progress. Every step may be fruitful. Yet there will stretch out before you an ever-lengthening, ever-ascending..."
And I have to admit I zoned out the rest. When I came back he had begun to fade, a sure sign he was leaving this earthly world. "Don't let me down, Stephen. You think I like coming back over to this side?"
"Er, you're here all the time? You watched Jerry Maguire with me last night." I could barely see him now.
"I most certainly did not."
"You were sat right there. You think I didn't notice you? You were smoking a cigar."
"He he. 'Show me the moneeeeeeeeey...'"
And then he was gone. But I knew I'd see him again. I just knew it.
