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Back Scared to Live Save as PDF
Chapters (44)
  1. Dedication
  2. Chapter One
  3. Chapter Two
  4. Chapter Three
  5. Chapter Four
  6. Chapter Five
  7. Chapter Six
  8. Chapter Seven
  9. Chapter Eight
  10. Chapter Nine
  11. Chapter Ten
  12. Chapter Eleven
  13. Chapter Twelve
  14. Chapter Thirteen
  15. Chapter Fourteen
  16. Chapter Fifteen
  17. Chapter Sixteen
  18. Chapter Seventeen
  19. Chapter Eighteen
  20. Chapter Nineteen
  21. Chapter Twenty
  22. Chapter Twenty-One
  23. Chapter Twenty-Two
  24. Chapter Twenty-Three
  25. Chapter Twenty-Four
  26. Chapter Twenty-Five
  27. Chapter Twenty-Six
  28. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  29. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  30. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  31. Chapter Thirty
  32. Chapter Thirty-One
  33. Chapter Thirty-Two
  34. Chapter Thirty-Three
  35. Chapter Thirty-Four
  36. Chapter Thirty-Five
  37. Chapter Thirty-Six
  38. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  39. Chapter Thirty-Eight
  40. Chapter Thirty-Nine
  41. Chapter Forty
  42. About the Author
  43. Also by Stephen Booth
  44. About the Publisher

There had been a train of thought in his mind that he couldn’t quite grasp. Too many distractions and distortions, that was the trouble. At moments, he almost got a clear view of some mental will-o’-the-wisp that ought to be followed and interpreted. His thoughts were connected, but the connections were slippery, so they escaped his groping fingers. At other times, he knew the illusion of meaningfulness was just that – an illusion. It was like a blurred or shifting picture puzzle. The content seemed to change the more you tried to define it, or get it into focus.

Someone had explained it to him once. They said that incoherence resulted from a loosening of associations, a dysfunction at the neuro-cognitive level. He had no idea why he should remember that, when he couldn’t recall things that had happened the day before. Especially when he didn’t understand some of the words that were used.

Or perhaps that was the reason – he remembered because he didn’t understand. Yes, that could be it. There was no solid meaning in the words to escape him. No soft, slippery undertones, no blurry significance. Only letters and sounds, and nothing else. Like bare earth, with no life in it. No humanity or feeling behind the words to confuse him. No voices at all, only noise.

But it was a voice that had distracted him again. He had no idea what he’d been thinking about before it came. That was the way his thoughts were – always shifting. Forever flitting this way and that. The flight of ideas. He liked the sound of that phrase. The flight of ideas. It sounded exciting and creative. It made him sound like some kind of genius whose mind soared above everyone else’s, light and fragile, a crystal bird. Reflecting the light like a prism, riding the currents of the wind, dipping and soaring. Never following the same direction for more than five minutes at a time.

He waited as long as he could, resisting the urgent whisper until it became intolerable. Then he left the apartment at about two a. m., rolled his car quietly on to the street and started the engine. All the people in their houses were asleep by now, except for those sleeping alone, afraid what might be out there in the dark, the burglars and rapists, and the crazed axemen.

‘You know what you have to do, Johnny.’

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Six

Friday, 28 October