The Safety Dance Read online

The very next day Crispin was walking down the high street of West Kington.

  He had never been in the country before, and so far West Kington seemed to be so very much in the country that he was walking in constant fear of getting lost in the woods should he wander more than a few feet from the road. It was true that the woods were, in fact, barely visible from the road, but he had seen enough horror films to know how easy it was to get lost in quiet English villages. The thought didn’t make his visit any more relaxing. Without the comforting sight of a bus stop every few feet, the constant drone of traffic, and the usual range of bad-tempered office workers passing him at all times Crispin was starting to feel very, very out of place.

  And yet, at the same time he was trying extremely hard to be both awed and inspired by his surroundings, by the mere thought that he was now walking in the footsteps of the same the artists who had conjured together The Safety Dance all those years ago. For the moment he was doing a very good job of convincing himself that this was an historic time in his life, but there was the constant second voice in his head telling him what he deeply suspected to be the real truth: that West Kington was actually really, really boring.

  In fairness to the unsuspecting town, Crispin’s expectations had always been predictably unrealistic. Where he expected to see wooden waterwheels and maypoles he saw hedgerows, cobblestones and artfully aging brickwork; where he expected to see medieval hustle and bustle he instead found peaceful village life; and - most damning of all - where he expected to see busty maidens he instead encountered Aud Simpson, the free bus-pass wielding proprietor of the West Kington General Store.

  “Ay, what can I get you, lad?” she asked with a note of gruff caution.

  “Do you have any sushi?” Crispin asked.

  Aud, who was instantly in the throes of deep loathing for her newest customer, which ensured she would treat him with exactly the same level of regard she offered to all her customers, found herself facing a familiar dilemma: despite owning West Kington’s only general store, and despite relying on the patronage of her fellow residents in order to make her living, she hated it whenever anyone came into her shop. She found it no more pleasing for a customer to enter her store than if they had walked in on her while bathing.

  Fortunately, for the sake of her livelihood, Aud was just about smart enough to realise that she needed to be nice to her customers if she expected them to come back and keep paying her money. Less fortunately, this internal conflict between necessity and misanthropy often spilled out into her external monologue.

  “Sushi?” she questioned. “No, don’t have any of that … why would anyone ask for sushi...?”

  “Okay, how about a sandwich?”

  Aud shook her head. “No, no sandwiches. I can sell you some bread and paste if you like ... why don’t you make your own bleedin’ sandwiches anyway?”

  “Do you sell any food?”

  “Course I sell food, this is a general store.”

  “Do you sell burgers?”

  “Frozen?”

  “No. Cooked.”

  Aud shook her head wearily. “Boy thinks he’s walked in at MacDonald’s... no, if it’s cooked food you want you’ll be needing to visit The Lodge. They’ll do you hot food there and a pint to boot.”

  Crispin looked lost already. Aud pointed to the door: “Left out of here, keep going, you can’t miss it.”

  “Thanks,” he said, nodding hesitantly, and wandered to the door.

  Just before walking out he stopped, struck by a rare moment of inspiration, and looked closely at Aud in a way which made her recoil slightly.

  “You’re quite old,” he told her. “Were you here when they filmed The Safety Dance?”

  Aud straightened up, avoiding his eyes for a moment. “I don’t recall.”

  Crispin shrugged. “Okay.”

  Before he could leave Aud walked over and put her hand on his arm. She stared at him pointedly. “I’ll say you won’t be wanting to go anywhere near the Nurseries.”

  “Probably not,” he agreed. “I’m not very interested in gardening.”

  After leaving the shop Crispin realised he couldn’t remember if he was supposed to turn left or right. He considered going back inside to ask for directions again, but the old lady was strange and unusual and he decided he didn’t want to talk to her any more.

  The only other person he had talked to in West Kington so far had been Nigel, the owner of the B&B Gloria had booked him into. He had been just about the friendliest and most helpful person that Crispin had ever met. Not only was he waiting expectantly by the door when Crispin arrived, but he had carried his bag upstairs and had even unpacked it for him. On reflection, Crispin was starting to think that Nigel had been a little bit strange; not to mention the way that he had kept on asking him if he had any plans for the night. Suddenly Crispin wasn’t so sure if he wanted to go back to his hotel room. He could only hope the other residents of West Kington were relatively normal.

  He was about to be disappointed.

  In the end, as Aud had promised, he found The Lodge without difficulty. He walked in and was greeted by an immediate hush, broken only by someone who continued to talk unwittingly in the corner: “... and I told him to hop on his bicycle and back on down to Jack Lane and - oh ...”

  Then there was silence.

  Everyone was staring at him. Not knowing what else to do Crispin slowly backed away and went back out of the door. Once outside he took a deep breath.

  Then he walked back in again.

  Once more there was silence, except this time everyone returned to their conversations after a moment. After a minute it was almost as if Crispin wasn’t even there.

  “You’ll be wanting some food then, will you?” the barman shouted over to him over the noise.

  “How did you know that?” Crispin shouted back.

  The barman rolled his eyes, and beckoned Crispin to come closer. “Aud called on from the shop. Said you were after some city food. I can’t do you none of that, but I can do you a toasted sandwich.”

  Then the man leaned closer: “And it won’t be at none of your city prices either, that much I can tell you.”

  Crispin nodded conspiratorially. The last sandwich he had eaten had been on the train from London and he would have actually paid the barman any price just to taste something that was merely edible.

  Instead he nodded enthusiastically: “Okay, thanks.”

  The barman grunted and disappeared into the kitchen without another word.

  Crispin realised he was being stared at again, just by one person this time: the man sitting to his left. The man looked away quickly when he realised he had been spotted, but by then it was much too late.

  “Hi, I’m Crispin,” beamed Crispin, holding out his hand.

  The man looked nervously down at Crispin’s hand, as if it might explode at any moment. He glanced around the rest of the pub for help, but everyone else was busy looking at anything else they could possibly find to look at.

  The man sighed. “I’m Pete,” he finally offered, trying to give his pint glass his full attention in the vain hope that this stranger would simply give up.

  “I used to have friend called Pete!” Crispin replied happily.

  “Oh yeah? What happened to him then?”

  “He was walking over the road and a four wheel drive hit him. Then he died.”

  Pete glared at him stonily: “Is that meant to be some sort of threat?”

  Crispin shook his head. “No, not at all. It was actually sort of sad... and also a little bit gross...”

  An old man with half a beard then appeared on his other side. “You wouldn’t be upsetting our young Pete there, would you?” he enquired. “Sensitive soul is our Pete...”

  Pete glared at him, then slunk away from the bar.

  “I’m Crispin,” offered Crispin.

  “I know who you are,” the stranger said. “I was standing right here when you told Pete.”

  “Oh.”


  “What’s your business then? We don’t get many strangers around these parts.”

  “Oh, but what about that bus load of tourists that we had by here that last weekend?” a woman’s voice interrupted from the man’s other side.

  “Shut your gobber, Nell!” the man hissed.

  “... and then there were those ones from the Heritage Commission - or was it Committee? Mike, do you remember what it was? Was it the Heritage Commission or was it the Heritage Committee? Almost half dozen of them there were - ”

  The old man, who was presumably called Mike, turned savagely to the woman. “Put a sock in it, Nell, or I’ll get you one of Barry’s steak and turd pies to do the job!”

  “Alright, Mike…” the woman replied sulkily. “No need to be a wanker...”

  The man gritted his teeth, clenching his fists, but then turned alarmingly to Crispin, pointing an angry finger directly at his nose. “I said: what are you doing here stranger?”

  “Uh, actually you said: what’s my...” Crispin began, then quickly thought better of it. “I’m here because of - have you heard of - I mean, do you remember The Safety Dance?”

  “The Safety Dance?!” Mike replied angrily. “No. Never heard of it. Bloody ponces wi’out hats...”

  Just then the barman reappeared, holding a paper bag. He handed it to Crispin. “You’d better take this along with you seeing as you’re getting on the wrong side of Mike. Be a shame for you to get hurt so soon - I mean, for you to get hurt - I mean, for you to get into trouble.”

  The barman looked nervously over at Mike. “Anyway, here’s your sandwich.”

  Crispin took the paper bag.

  He looked quizzically at the barman.

  The barman looked back.

  “What??!” he asked nervously.

  “Uh, how much is it?” Crispin asked.

  “Oh! Er, fiver should cover it.”

  Crispin handed over the cash. “Thanks.”

  Then he turned back to Mike: “Nice to meet you, Mike.”

  Mike nodded. “Yeah, nice to m- I mean... sod off you city git!”

  Crispin simultaneously nodded and shook his head, then left the pub.

  Outside it was starting to turn dark. Crispin was just trying to come to terms with the fact that he really didn’t know how to get back to his B&B when he heard a voice coming from the shadows behind him.

  “It were them ones from the Heritage Commission,” the voice said. “They’re the ones that gave them the idea.”

  Crispin turned and saw that the voice belonged to Pete.

  “Pete, what are you doing out here?”

  Pete put a finger to his lips, glancing nervously at the pub. “You’re in danger, and not just you, anyone who comes here.”

  “Danger?” Crispin whispered. “Then I must be on the right tracks...”

  Pete shook his head. “No, you must leave, right now!”

  “I can’t leave now - I’ve got a room booked till tomorrow morning.”

  “Then you must leave first thing tomorrow. And listen to me,” Pete urged. “Whatever you do: don’t go to the nurseries. Not tonight. Not ever!”

  “No, I won’t,” Crispin replied. “I’m not really interested in gardening.”

  “Right.”

  “Okay.”

  Crispin thought for a moment, then: “I don’t suppose you can tell me how to get back to The Waxed Bush Bed & Breakfast can you?”

  Pete scanned the road left and right. “Certainly, if you just turn left out of here, then keep going past the church, which should be on your right, keep going about another 200 yards and you’ll be right there.”

  Crispin smiled. “Great, thanks!”

  Just then the front door of the pub slammed open revealing Mike, his face twisted in anger. He glared at Pete: “That’s ENOUGH!” he bellowed furiously. “That’s! Enough!”

  “Oh, that’s okay,” Crispin interrupted amiably, “We’d just finished anyway.”

  And with that he strolled off, leaving Pete and Mike staring after him.

  To his own amazement, Crispin found his way back to the B&B without difficulty. Getting back to his room was less easy: Nigel was already waiting for him in the hallway. He stood up as soon as Crispin walked through the front door.

  “Oh, I wasn’t expecting you back already.”

  “Neither was I,” Crispin answered happily. “Do you often sit in the hallway like that?”

  “No... I mean, yes,” Nigel answered, cryptically.

  “It’s just for a minute I thought you were waiting for me.”

  “No. Of course not. Why would I be waiting for you? No, I was just ... passing through. I’ll just sit back down”

  Nigel sat back down.

  “Okay.”

  “Okay.”

  Crispin stood there awkwardly for a moment, then took a step towards the stairs, heading for his room.

  Nigel stood up again instantly: “But since I happen to have caught you, in passing, like this, perhaps I could tell you a few of the house rules. Firstly: there’s no curfew tonight - I mean, ever! We don’t have a curfew here, never have. You can come and go as you please.”

  “So what about that sign outside that says ‘All tenants must be back before 9pm’?”

  Nigel grimaced momentarily. “Oh, that... that’s just... hostelry humour. Yes. Bit of an in joke. We like our humour in the business here.”

  “Ok. Well, thanks, but I’m not planning to go out -”

  Nigel took a step closer. “I see you have a sandwich there. I’m just saying if you wanted to go out after you’ve eaten your sandwich and - oh, not with me, I didn’t mean that! Did you think I meant that?”

  Crispin shook his head. “No.”

  “Well, if you want to go out - on your own - and then come back again you can just come back, ohhh, any time you like, any time at all. Midnight even.”

  “Thank you, but I really -”

  Nigel continued regardless: “There’s plenty to do in West Kington, you know. it’s quite the lively little town...”

  Crispin thought about this. “Really? Well, I’ve been to the general store and the pub already. What else is there to see?”

  Nigel stood frozen for a moment, his smile fixed to his face. “Have you tried the general store?”

  “Yes, I just said -”

  “And what about the nursery? You have to go to the nursery...”

  “Well, I’m not really interested in -”

  “Good!” Nigel suddenly interjected. “Because what I actually meant to say is you definitely do not want to be going to the nursery. Whatever you do, don’t go to the nursery”

  “No, well I won’t then...”

  “Good. But as I said if you want to go out later, anywhere you like, you can. I’ll just leave the door open for you and you can go as you please.”

  “You mean come and go as I please?”

  “Yes, that’s what I said.”

  “No, you just said I could go as I please.”

  Nigel stared at the door, then back at Crispin.

  “I’m going to go and eat my sandwich,” Crispin said.

  “Right then,” Nigel said, slapping him on the shoulder. “Well, good night. Enjoy yourself where ever you go, and it’s been nice knowing you - I mean, meeting you.”

  “Thanks.”

  Once he was safely in his room Crispin finally unwrapped his sandwich. It was cold, limp and greasy, the cheese had begun to congeal and the toast was now more sweaty than toasty, but it was still a thousand times better than anything he’d eaten on the train. He took one bite and before he knew it the sandwich had been completely devoured. He was so hungry he even licked his fingers until he was sure there was no tasty residue left.

  Then he reached into the paper bag, hoping to find a napkin to wipe up with. All he found was a piece of paper, which he put it to one side while he resumed the napkin hunt.

  … safety dance ...

  If words could literally jump off the
page they would have knocked him off his chair. He threw the bag to the floor and grabbed the piece of paper with his greasy hands. On it was printed:

  13th Annual The Safety Dance Reunion dance

  Tonight: West Kington nursery

  No need for a partner - you can leave your friends behind!

  Crispin almost choked. The mere mention of The Safety Dance was enough of a shock, but his brain was also having to cope with a sudden and unusual rush of thought processes that ran something like this: the residents of West Kington had been trying to stop him going to the nursery; apparently this was so he wouldn’t stumble across their reunion; obviously this was another part of the conspiracy; clearly he had been completely right to come to West Kington!

  All he had to do was get to that reunion dance.

  He rushed to the door.

  Outside he almost ran into Nigel, this time busily straightening a painting in the corridor.

  He turned guiltily to Crispin: “Oh hello, you, I didn’t expect you to, uh, yes, I’m just sorting out this picture here... little bit wonky... yes, there we go that’s it now. All. Straightened. Up. So, you off out then after all?”

  Crispin nodded. “Yes, I thought I’d... get some fresh air.”

  He noted that Nigel was standing between him and the stairs.

  And took a sudden step forward.

  Nigel instinctively stepped back.

  Crispin took another step.

  Nigel, panicking a bit now, stepped aside.

  Crispin continued towards the stairs, then stopped as he had a second thought. Second thoughts were a relatively rare phenomenon in Crispin’s head, and the experience was making him a little exhilarated. He was also vaguely aware that, possibly for the first time in his life, he wasn’t actually the most stupid person in the room at that moment. He was trying not to think too hard about that in case he ended up fainting.

  However, he had an idea that Nigel might have something he needed.

  “You told me to stay away from the nurseries...” Crispin began.

  “I did,” Nigel replied, trying very poorly to make it sound like a question.

  “So,” Crispin carried on, “If I wanted to stay away from the nurseries... where exactly is it that I should stay away from?”

  Nigel began to look scared again. “Er, I’m not sure I... understand?”

  “What I mean is: how can I be sure that I don’t wander over to the nurseries by mistake? I wouldn’t want to do that, would I? Go there by accident? So, if you were to tell me exactly where the nurseries is - I mean, are - then I’ll know exactly where not to go, won’t I?”

  “Right, yes, of course,” Nigel replied, still looking deeply worried.

  Crispin, who was feeling quite dizzy himself now, leaned against the wall for support. “Okay, I’m glad you understood that.”

  “Um, would it help if I gave you a map?” Nigel asked.

  “A map of what?”

  “A map showing you where the nurseries are, er... is...?”

  Crispin nodded eagerly. Nigel reached into his pockets and, after a moment’s scrabbling around, handed Crispin a folded sheet of paper. On it was a map of West Kington with a red circle, drawn in felt tip, around an area labelled ‘West Kington Nurseries’. Also in red felt tip was an arrow pointing towards the nurseries with the warning “Don’t Go Here!” written in bold letters at the other end.

  Crispin briefly thought there was something strange about the man having, in his pocket, a map that was specifically designed to tell him exactly how to stay away from the exact place he was interested in. However, he decided not to bring it up.

  Suddenly Nigel leapt into action: “Oh! I’m supposed to give - I mean, ask you, er, would you like a cup of tea? Of course you would. Yes. Good. I’ll make you some. A lovely flask of tea. You can take it with you.”

  Then he hurried down the stairs.

  A few minutes later Crispin was standing by the front door with a flask in his hand, as promised.

  “Hot tea!” Nigel announced. “Hot tea and nothing else. We like it strong here in the country, so it might taste different to your city tea, but that’s because we, er, yes, we like it strong here... so remember, it’s just tea - just tea with nothing in it. Except for milk of course. You will drink it, won’t you? It’s chilly out there. You’ll be wanting something to keep you warm inside.”

  Crispin, who was thinking of nothing but the impending Safety Dance reunion that he was about to gatecrash, simply nodded and then made his way out into the West Kington night.

  The sign didn’t look like much, but just seeing the words on it made him feel giddy:

  The Safety Dance Reunion Dance

  Hear! Tonight!

  He thought it was strange that there was no one else around, and that the sign pointed to a door that was hidden away at the back of the West Kington Nurseries, but Crispin didn’t want anyone to know that he was here anyway so the fact that he was the only person here was already turning out to be quite useful.

  He took a last swig of tea from his flask. In the end he had been quite glad that Nigel had insisted he take it: the night had turned chilly and the tea had helped keep him warm during the walk (he had only gotten lost once, but he had managed to retrace his steps back to the B&B and, using the map that time, had found his way to the Nurseries).

  The long walk had made him light-headed, he felt almost drunk. It was surely just the excitement and the fact that he had only eaten two sandwiches all day. It’s not like a flask of tea would have made him feel strange, even if it did taste a little unusual just as Nigel had warned.

  He wondered whether to head inside, where it might be a bit warmer, or if he should wait and see if anyone else turned up. He could only imagine what might be in there: dwarves, maypoles, busty wenches. Maybe some of the townsfolk who had been involved in the original video shoot would be recreating their past performances. Maybe they’d even reassembled the original members of the band. No! He couldn’t wait.

  He opened the door.

  Inside it was dark. Darker even than the night outside. Crispin propped the door open with his flask. The door promptly slammed shut, propelling the flask at high velocity back into the night.

  Now it wasn’t just dark: it was black. He took a step forward and walked straight into the door, having forgotten that he was facing when it closed. While he was there he tried turning the handle, but quickly found that there wasn’t a handle on that side of the door, not one he could find in the dark anyway. He ran his fingers all around the edges, just to make sure he wasn’t trying to open the wall by mistake, but it was definitely the door.

  He was trapped, and he couldn’t shout for help in case any of the townsfolk realised he was there.

  He carefully turned around to face what he guessed was the rest of the room and took a few steps forward, holding his arms out in front of him. His foot brushed against something. He reached down to feel what it was - just a pile of sticks wrapped in cloth as far as he could tell. He stood up and took a few more steps, stumbling over another two similar piles as he walked.

  Suddenly he heard a loud click from somewhere else in the room.

  Then silence once again.

  Then, without warning, the opening bars of The Safety Dance came thundering through the room. The very air around him seemed to shake with the sound of it. Piercing flashes came from above, lighting up everything around him in split-second bursts like snapshots in a photo album.

  We can dance if we want to...

  It was like a disco: a terrifying, nightmarish disco that would even strike dread into the hearts of The Bee Gees. Crispin was paralysed, not knowing whether to try and run in panic or to start dancing.

  Because your friends don’t dance...

  He looked around and decided to panic.

  In the snatches of eye-meltingly bright light that were filling the room he could see what it really was that he had almost tripped over: the place was filled with dead bodies. W
hat he had thought were sticks were actually bones, and the cloth he had felt were the decayed remains of clothing (or flesh?) that still clung to the emaciated corpses.

  And there were more than three bodies in the room. Many, many more.

  And we can dress real neat from our hands to our feet...

  Crispin wanted desperately to run, but there was absolutely nowhere to go. The dance floor was completely enclosed by walls that disappeared far above his head and looked too smooth for any normal person to climb. The ceiling rose high above him. There were no doors, no windows; nothing that might help him escape. He tried to remain calm, to at least try and enjoy the music.

  And then the corpses started moving.

  We can dance

  We can dance

  Everything’s under control...

  The body nearest to him rose to its feet and started performing an horrific parody of a dance. It jerked in time to the music, flinging its arms about merrily, it’s jaws snapping open and closed as if it were trying to sing along. All around him there were dead bodies rising from the ground, summoned by the music, dancing their eternal dance to tune of The Safety Dance. He felt something touch his shoulder and turned around: one of the skeletons was reaching out for him, beckoning him to join it in its dance. It lunged forward and, to his horror, Crispin saw that it still had a pair of rotten eyeballs lolling uselessly inside around its empty skull.

  And then there was nothing but blackness and sweet, merciful silence.

  “What do we do with him now?” someone interrupted.

  Crispin heard the voice but couldn’t work out where it was coming from.

  “Should we kill him?” came a different voice.

  Crispin realised he was having a nightmare. Everything was black, his head was hurting and people were talking about killing him: it could only be a nightmare.

  “No, if we kill him we’ll never hear the end of it. There’ll be reporters, tourists, breakfast television...”

  “Maybe we could wound him instead, just a bit. Cut off a foot.”

  Finally Crispin worked out that the reason he couldn’t see anything was because his eyes were closed. He opened them carefully and saw there was a group of hooded figures surrounding him. Aside from that everything else was still black.

  Each member of the group was wearing a white hood over their head. Over their hood each person was also wearing a hat. Most of the hats were fairly ordinary - a few trilbies, a couple of woolly hats, some flat caps - but Crispin could also see a fireman’s hat, a policeman’s helmet and a chef’s hat among those gathered.

  “What’s going on?” Crispin asked, quite reasonably he thought.

  “He’s asking what’s going on,” someone with a familiar voice repeated.

  “We can hear him too, you nitwit!”

  “Oh go easy on him, Michael,” someone else protested. This time it was a woman’s voice.

  “Woman! Don’t use my real name - I told you to use my codename!” the man retorted angrily.

  “I thought Michael was your codename?”

  “Idiot! That’s Michael over there,” the man said, pointing to the person wearing the fireman’s helmet, who helpfully waved.

  ‘Oh, I thought that was Mitchell?”

  “I’m Mitchell,” someone else announced, holding up their hand.

  “And is that your real name or your code name?” the woman asked?

  “Er... I’m not sure, tell you the truth...” the person confessed.

  Crispin put up his hand. “Hello, I’m Crispin. Can someone please tell me what’s going on?”

  “Shut it!” said the Michael who wasn’t wearing a fireman’s helmet.

  “Hey, I thought he was supposed to be all drugged and stuff?”

  “That nitwit Nigel mustn’t have put enough of that stuff in his tea. Did you tell him teaspoons or tablespoons?”

  Never mind that, look - he’s wide awake now,” said the woman.

  Someone wearing a magician’s hat kneeled down next to Crispin. “Tell me son, were you scared in there?” he asked.

  Crispin nodded. “Yes. Yes, I was - I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared in my whole life.”

  The magician clapped his hands together in delight. “Oh wonderful. That’s exactly what I was hoping for.”

  Then he stood up again. “So, are we killing him or what?” he asked the others.

  Crispin blinked, only just realising that all the talk of killing him earlier hadn’t been a bad dream after all.

  “Oh, he’s not that bad,” suggested the woman. “Why don’t we just do what Brian suggested and break his legs or something like that?”

  “We ‘ave to kill him,” said the Michael who wasn’t wearing a fireman’s helmet. “If we don’t then there’ll more just like him turning up whenever they please.”

  “But, I’m telling you, what if he disappears? It’ll be a mystery and people love a mystery. They’ll be down here every weekend with their notebooks, their camcorders, their CSI -“

  ‘We’ll make a bloody fortune!” intruded another woman’s voice, before finishing with: “Bloody busybodies.”

  “She’s right! We should definitely kill him!”

  “No, we want people to stay away - bloody Safety Dance fans...”

  “We let him go and he can tell the rest of the work that the people of West Kington aren’t to be trifled with...”

  “We could make a video, just like that Al Caterer...”

  As the argument continued to rage Crispin, probably for the first time in his life, did the most sensible thing he could possibly do.

  He ran away.

  It was several days before Crispin returned to work. Having never done anything even remotely exciting in his life before, he needed some time to deal with with the emotional impact of having been drugged, psychologically tortured and almost beaten to death. He had the vague impression that trips into small English towns didn’t usually end that way, but he wasn’t in any rush to compare stories with anyone else. He needed to come up with a bulletproof story that would ensure no one would ever ask him the details of what had happened to him in West Kington or, more importantly, that no one else would ever be tempted to follow in his footsteps and go there.

  So, when Gloria asked him: “How was West Kington?” he already had the perfect answer prepared.

  “It was boring.”

  At least he thought it had been the perfect answer until Gloria continued: “And did you discover some sort of Safety Dance conspiracy there?”

  “It’s funny you should say that,” Crispin teased, before finishing: “Because you were right - there’s no conspiracy after all.”

  ”Hallelujah!” Gloria said, hugging him.

  ‘In fact, I haven’t even listened to The Safety dance since I got back,” Crispin told her.

  “No way!”

  It was true. When Crispin had finally managed to get back to his flat, following a cold night camped out in a bush at the back of West Kington station, the first thing he had done was put on his music. He hadn’t even thought about it: it was simply second nature for him to walk in through his front door and immediately play The Safety Dance on his hi-fi.

  Except this time, as soon as the song began, he had started to get flashbacks of supposedly dead bodies, locked rooms, passive-aggressive shopkeepers and men with hats who wanted to kill him. He had turned the song off even before the vocals had kicked in. A day or two later he had tried again, with the same result. To try and get the images out of his head he had started playing some of his other records instead and realised that they weren’t that bad after all. By the time he returned to work he had hardly thought about The Safety Dance at all.

  “You know it’s not such a bad song really,” Gloria said.

  “What?!”

  “Yeah, you left your tape here when you went away and - hang on...” Gloria reached over to a tape deck on her desk and pressed play. Suddenly The Safety Dance started booming through the office.


  “Yeah!” came a shout of approval from across the office.

  “Turn it off...” Crispin pleaded.

  “No way!” said Gloria. “This rocks.”

  She turned it up and, to Crispin’s alarm, a few of the other people in the office got up and started clapping along. Gloria started dancing.

  “Please, turn it off!”

  “No way. Leave it on!” shouted someone else. “Hey, Glor - when are we going to that - what’s that place called? - West Kingston?”

  Crispin turned in horror to Gloria. “No! You can’t go there!”

  Gloria shrugged, lost in her dance moves. “What the hell, Crisp. We’re going this weekend - we want to visit the birthplace of The Safety Dance too!”

  And then the singing started.

  We can dance if we want to...

  “Turn it off!” Crispin begged. But no one was listening.

  We can leave our friends behind...

  “We’re going to hire a coach - all of us are going!”

  Because your friends don’t dance...

  “Please - turn it off!” he shouted, but everyone ignored him.

  And if they don’t dance...

  “TURN IT OFFFFFF!”

  Well they’re no friends of mine.

  -- the end –

  Author's Note

  This is a work of fiction. The town of West Kington is real enough, but the version of West Kington depicted in this story is entirely fictional. I'm reasonably certain that the residents of West Kington don't have a psychotic vendetta against fans of The Safety Dance, and I'm sure they treat their visitors far better than the entirely fictional residents of the entirely fictional version of West Kington depicted in this story do.

  All the same I think it's probably best if I don't visit West Kington in the near future.

  But if you happen to go there be sure to say I said hello...

  Other stories by Justin Cawthorne

  One

  The Pumpkin Eater

  The Last Laugh

  Strawberries

  The Christmas Guest

  Bunnies

  Graves

  Colder Still

  Connections

  Come find me on twitter as @londonjustin, or visit my blog at https://justincawthorne.com/