2. The Dream

GEOFFREY AND MAVIS

AND THE CREDIT CRUNCH

by Geoffreysmum

(this story is entirely ficticious)

2. The dream

Mavis was very upset after the meeting.

“What's going to happen to us Geoffrey? How are we going to keep the Company going with no money? What about our mortgage? And what about our staff? How are they going to survive? They've been with us for years and they only know the toffee business. Stan's sixty nine now, who else will give him a job round here?”

“Now now mother, don't you go upsetting yourself” said Geoffrey. “We'll work it all out somehow.”

“But how? You heard Mr Chargingbull and, to be honest Geoffrey, that young man strikes me as the kind of person who'd steal his Granny's teeth is he could get a few pounds for them, so I'm sure he's deadly serious about getting money out of us.”

Geoffrey just kept smiling and saying it would be all right, just like Burt Lancaster or Stuart Granger always did in the movies. And finally he calmed Mavis down and they went to bed. But, in the darkest hours of the night Geoffrey couldn't sleep and he raged inside to think of all the years of hard work he and Mavis had put into the Northern Block Toffee company and how easily Chargingbull could destroy it all.

At about five am Geoffrey finally nodded off but the days events were still with him. He fell into a deep sleep and he dreamt he went round to Chargingbulls luxury house and he begged him to reconsider and not to call in his loan. He explained about Stan being sixty nine and about Irene, who was an unmarried mother with nine children all under forty and about Reginald who was a few shillings short of a pound but who could stir a pan of toffee consistently to the rhythm of 'Dancing Queen' for up to six hours at a time in order to get perfect smoothness. But Chargingbull just laughed at him and what ever Geoffrey said, he just laughed louder and louder until he was in tears of laughter while Geoffrey was just in tears.

And then, all of a sudden, Geoffrey was overcome with an irrational and overwhelming psychopathic rage. He sprang at Chargingbull and locked his fingers tightly around the man's neck. Then he pressed as hard as he could and, big as Chargingbull was, he couldn't prise Geoffrey's fingers away. Geoffrey could see that Chargingbull was having trouble breathing and his eyes were beginning to bulge out of their sockets but still Geoffrey clung on and on until eventually, Chargingbull stopped struggling, his eyes did one last whirl and then dropped on to his chin and Chargingbull was finally just like a lifeless sack of Jamaican demarera sugar.

“You'll think twice before laughing at any more confectioners” Geoffrey snarled at him and then he left the house and woke up because Mavis was shaking him.

“Oh thank goodness Mother, I'm here at home” he said as soon as he awoke.

“Of course you are Fudge (which was Mavis's pet name for her husband). But you were obviously having a terrible dream. Where did you think you were?”

“You won't believe this Mavis” he told her, “but I've had the most terrible dream. I dreamt I went round to Mr Chargingbulls house and I strangled him!”

“Well that might have not have been a bad thing” Mavis said.

“No, you mustn't say that Mavis. It were terrible. I had my hands around his neck and I just kept pushing harder and harder on his wind pipe. And I knew I was killing him but I couldn't stop myself.”

“It was just a dream” Mavis assured him.

“But it felt so real Mother. I could feel the bristle of hairs on his neck and I could smell his breath as he was dying. It smelt like, like, well it's hard to say but sort of like Tia Maria mixed with Cointreau.”

“That's an unusual blend” said Mavis “but then maybe you murdered him at his cocktail hour.”

“It isn't funny Mavis” Geoffrey told her sternly, “it's deadly serious.”

To be continued..........

Copyright N Barton 2008