The SiP Saga Chronicles

Bedtime Stories

In an old stone house at the end of a quiet lane in a small village outside the harbor town of Portsmouth, a boy named Jim was fumbling with the lock to his bedroom door.

The house had been built over a hundred years ago and creaked and groaned like a geriatric gymnast. The wind would howl down the chimney stack or whistle through window sashes, creating a draft that, on particularly blustery evenings, could blow dry your hair.

Barring the draft, the sound of complaining floorboards, and the odd smell of something ancient in the downstairs toilet, the doors had antique mortise locks, the type you needed a skeleton key for, the type the previous generations of owners had long since lost. The type Jim really needed right about now. Now, being bedtime.

Jim dreaded going to bed. He wasn't scared of the dark or the monsters hiding in the cupboard. He didn't suffer from nightmares or insomnia; no, he didn't worry about any of the things that some kids might because there was one thing that was worse than any of them - his Aunt Muriel's bedtime stories.

Aunt Muriel would look after Jim when his parents were away or out, and she was there far too often for Jim's liking. She was there far too often for Aunt Muriel's liking, too, as although she reluctantly liked her nephew, she was not precisely a child-friendly person.

That is not to say that Aunt Muriel was cruel or unkind. She never laid a hand on Jim or mistreated him in any way; she simply couldn't be bothered when it came to children.

Children took a lot of effort; they needed constant attention, feeding, entertaining, and cleaning up after. These were all chores that Muriel hated having to do for herself, so being made to do them for someone else was just a waste of time that could be better used for doing something more interesting.

Jim was ten and a half and not a helpless child anymore. He wasn't a bad kid or unruly. He wasn't needy in any way and was more than capable of putting himself to bed on his own, but for some reason, his Aunt still insisted on telling him bedtime stories. It was almost as if Aunt Muriel's brain stuck when Jim was five years old and couldn't update to the present.

So every night his Aunt was there, just as he was about to drop off to sleep, she would walk into his room unannounced, sit herself down at his bedside, and force classic fairy tales upon his sleepy ears.

To Jim, listening to any bedtime story was baffling; having to lay there listening to creaky old fairy tales Muriel couldn't remember correctly was even worse. She would make up new versions that were not very, well, entertaining.

'Once upon a time, there were three bears, and they caught someone breaking into their house, so they called the police, and Goldilocks was given community service in a porridge factory.'

'But auntie, that's not how the story goes,' Jim yawned.

'Yes, it is; everyone else tells it wrong. Now go to sleep.'

Each night would be a new twist on a familiar story, each as short as the next, and none seemed to have a happy ending.

'Three little pigs built houses of straw, sticks, and bricks. A wolf came along from the council and told them they didn't have planning permission, so they had to tear the houses down and....'

' Can you at least tell me a real story?' Jim implored, pulling the duvet over his head.

' That is a real story. It doesn't get any more real than illegal construction projects. Now go to sleep.'

Jim could never understand why his Aunt bothered coming in to tell him stories; she obviously had no interest in them. They weren't funny, scary, or exciting; they never lasted longer than a few sentences and were almost always based on the real world and not the fantastical lands of the originals.

'This is the story of Sleeping Beauty, a princess suffering from narcolepsy saved by a prince who happened to be trained in first aid.'

'Did I ever tell you the tale of Hansel and Gretel? Two thieving kids who vandalized a remote house in the middle of the woods only to kill the owner in a pizza oven.'

'Beware the tale of Jack and the Beanstalk. A foolish boy gives up dairy to become vegan, only to find growing pulses in your garden comes with its own risks.'

These terrible stories had gone on for the best part of a year before Jim could take no more and decided the only way to stop them was to lock himself in his room. What would Muriel do then? Tell the dreadful stories from outside his room? Shout them through the keyhole? She might. That wasn't out of the question, but it was a risk he was prepared to take.

So here he was, in his pajamas, trying to wiggle a pen with a paperclip taped to the end of it in the door lock. It wasn't working. He racked his brain, thinking of what else might work? A toothbrush? A screwdriver?

Suddenly, the floorboard at the base of the stairs screamed in agony, an early warning that his Aunt was starting her ascent. Jim looked around in panic, his eyes darting this way and that, searching for something to stop the inevitable. It was no use; the creaking on the stairs grew louder until, finally, the door opened, and there she was in all her miserable glory.

'Okay, Jim,' she said with a resigned sigh. 'Let's get it over with.'

'I don't feel like hearing any more stories, Auntie,' Jim said. Aunt Muriel looked at him gravely, her grey-blue eyes narrowing in suspicion.

'What's wrong with my stories?' she demanded.

Jim paused, trying to pluck up the courage to tell the truth. 'They are not very...fun,' he whispered.

'Not all stories have to be fun. Some are factual, and some are instructive. Maybe you might consider life isn't much fun?'

Jim lay there looking at his Aunt, her scrawny frame and hunched shoulders, her long, brittle bleached hair which turned mousier brown the closer it came to her scalp, tired eyes, and pale, gaunt face, and he smiled.

'It can be if you try,' he said quietly.

Muriel looked at her nephew lying there, tucked up in his bed, his eyes looking up at her, and her face softened, a small smile creeping tentatively over her face.

'Okay, kid,' she whispered, her voice mellowing. 'Once upon a time, there was a little boy named Jim. He was the smartest, kindest boy in the whole kingdom. He would go to bed every night, and his cruel Aunt would torment him with rotten bedtime stories. His Aunt didn't mean to; she wasn't very good at expressing herself. She wanted to tell the boy how special he was, how much she loved him, and wish him sweet dreams, but something deep inside her stopped the words. And for that,' Muriel paused, her eyes drifting off, staring through the window, 'the cruel old aunt was very sorry.'

Muriel sighed, her body deflating like a thin, wrinkled old balloon with a slow leak. Jim blinked in surprise, stunned, but remained silent for a moment. Then, very slowly, his hand crept out from under the edge of the duvet and squeezed the thin, bony fingers of his Aunt. She turned, glassy-eyed, gazing down at him with a tenderness he had never seen before, and said very quietly -

'Now go to sleep.'

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