New Short

Here is a new short, inspired by some gothic reading I've been doing lately for uni. This one is particularly inspired by John Harwood's "The Ghost Writer," quite a good read once you get into it. I'm only half-way through, but had to stop and write this.

A bit of a gothic romance, just experimenting with blending the two and using the theme of obsession. It's pretty prominent in the Harwood novel.

Her Scent
Tim Harvey


John had first noticed the scent when they sat quietly to lunch, just over a year ago. It was a sweet floral scent, but subtle and not at all overpowering. There were hints of citrus and mild spices in the aroma, and John inhaled deeply through his nose when he first caught a whiff. She appeared not to notice, quietly eating her sandwich, gentle little bites.
He had inquired into her interests and they both shared a passion for the theatre. John bit back his nerves and suggested they see a show, 'On the weekend, if you're free.'
She nodded and smiled.
During the play John sat quietly, watching the actors. His mind was elsewhere, however, indulging in the beautiful aroma that swirled around his head and left him intoxicated. After the play, he had walked her back to her apartment and kissed her on the cheek. She blushed and thanked him, 'For a wonderful evening.'
As John walked to the train station, through the city creaking of steel and crumbling concrete he noticed that the scent had followed him. Pausing in his walk, John turned his nose to the air, closed his eyes and breathed deeply. The scent was there, drifting lazily through the night's cool breeze.
He turned to see if she had followed him, but only her scent was present. She would be tucked away in bed at this hour. John continued his walk and the scent traipsed along beside him, always present.
It was just a scent. There were no pink mists of floral elegance swirling listlessly through the air. There were no visible signs of the sweet aroma that hovered around John's head. It was, after all, just a scent.

John spent most of his time tending the small book store that his uncle owned in the heart of the city. It was wedged in a tiny alleyway between two enormous, overbearing skyscrapers. John sometimes felt pangs of vertigo as he searched for the sky on his smoke breaks. He tilted his head up at an angle, making sure he kept sight of the cobbles beneath his feet to avoid the dizzying head spins that would occur whenever his eyes traced his smoke through the air.
As he stacked books in the shelves in the back of the store he was overcome by her scent. He flicked through the pages of the last volume he had placed, trying to find the source of the aroma. The book held no evidence of her, and he hurriedly took another off the shelf. Her scent became stronger with each book he flicked through until he felt a gentle touch on his shoulder.
Spinning around in a rush of embarrassment, John saw her standing behind him, suppressing a giggle. He felt his face go red and put the book down on the shelf. Her smile was vibrant and alive, and her scent was powerful in the way that it took over his thoughts.
She gave him a gentle hug, and John nestled his head against her shoulder, allowing his nose to rest near her neck, the source of the scent.
They arranged to have dinner and John found it painfully hard to watch her go. The scent fading as she left the store.

John ordered a salad, no pepper, no spices, just salad. She thought this strange and John wondered if she would take it as a compliment if he said he wanted to savour the aroma that she so casually emitted.
The salad was amazing, thanks to the sweet taste already infused in his senses. They spoke of their favourite books and she suggested that John read a volume of poetry that she adored. She told him that she had read it constantly since she was sixteen, and John felt his senses aroused to levels he had never experienced.
After dinner, when they had made the short walk to her building, John leant in to kiss her on the lips. She held him back with a reassuring smile, and instead invited him up for coffee. He gladly accepted and followed her up the flights of stairs to her apartment. With each step, John felt weaker and weaker, as her scent wafted down over him.
Her apartment dripped with the smell. Each item that she lovingly handled became infused with her aroma. John sat on her couch and was engulfed by a cloud of sensuous floral bliss.
She made them some coffee and brought out the book of poetry. John attempted to grab the book, but she held it back with a seductive glance, instead, curling up on the couch opposite him, reading aloud.
Her voice was sweet and soft, but her scent was raw and passionate. With each line, the poetry became dim, and eventually John couldn't hear at all. He rested his head against the back of the couch and closed his eyes, bathing in the fiery aroma.
It was just a scent. There were no vivid explosions of neon orange fireworks bursting above his head. There were no trails of shooting stars rolling towards him across the sky. There was no visible sign of the passion in his heart. It was after all, just a scent.

John awoke the next morning in his own bed. The copy of poetry sat on his bedside table. John picked it up and hesitated before holding it to his nose and flicking through the pages. The crisp breeze on his face and the rush of spicy floral passion left him drunk. He spent the entire morning doing this, each time feeling happier and stupider all at once.
After that night, she didn't visit him at work again. He saw her occasionally in the streets, but she seemed not to notice him. Her scent appeared in strange places, causing John to look around his to see if she was there, but she never was.
He would smell her in his bathroom, as he prepared to shave. Once he smelt her as he walked past a department store. He had to walk down every aisle to confirm that she wasn't casually spreading her scent around the store.
Eventually, at the beginning of winter, they met again. She smiled and kissed him gently on the cheek. Holding her warm hands against his cold cheeks, she stared uncertainly into his eyes. He reached into the pocket of his coat and wrapped his fingers around the edges of her book of poetry.
Her eyes filled with sadness as she took it in her hands. The cover was crumpled and bent, the pages loose and curled. She wiped a tear from her eye and offered John a weak smile. He leant in to kiss her on the cheek, but she shied away. The hand that she rested gently against his chest was enough to let him know that it was over.
She turned to leave, and a wave of her scent rolled over John, rocking him where he stood.

John saw her again during the worst of the winter, at a coffee shop near to his book store. She sat far away, and John sat near the door reading a newspaper. He didn't need to see to know that it was her. At first he could only smell her faintly from across the room, but with each passing day her scent became stronger.
It was only a scent. There were no instances where she sprayed some elegant perfume casually over her shoulder to attract him. There were no green particles of her scent gliding restlessly across the coffee shop, catching the light as they flew towards him, unnoticed by the other patrons. The mist of her allure didn't gather at his ankles and suffocate him in intoxicating bliss. It was after all, just a scent.

She left after the winter. Through the spring her scent remained in odd places. John smelt her on the train, and hiding behind parked cars. He smelt her when he opened his mailbox. Disappointment washed over him as he flicked through the letters, holding them to his nose. She wasn't there.
Her scent eventually faded in the summer, and John began to live his life once more. He became the manager of the book store when his uncle had retired. With the extra money that he had John bought himself a nice suit and a used car.
During the summer John began to socialise more. He introduced himself to a girl who had been a regular customer at the store for years. They got along well, and John eventually asked her out to dinner.
She had a scent of her own, but it was nothing like what John had experienced before. Despite his initial reservations, John asked the girl on another date. Eventually, by the end of the summer they were a couple. John was happy, and she shared his joy. They went out dancing together, and John took her for long drives to the beach in his car.
For John, there was something missing in their relationship, but she seemed truly happy and John didn't have the heart to tell her what was bothering him.
On Valentine's Day she told him that she loved him and John kissed her gently on the lips, saying, 'I know.'
He had scoured every department store and boutique on the weekend before the day, trying to find a perfume that matched the scent in his head. For hours, he sprayed all sorts of expensive smells onto testing paper provided by the salespeople. Each one failing to recapture the beauty and grace of the sweet floral aroma that he had once known.
After this, John had visited every florist trying to find the right bouquet, the right combination of flowers that equalled the passion he had felt. The bunch that he had eventually picked was a poor substitute, despite his girlfriend claiming she loved them with excitement. This excitement faded when he couldn't tell her that he loved her back.
It was just a scent. No perfume, or flowers could ever make up for what was lost. There was no way of trapping that magic in a bottle, no way that it grew from the ground. It was, after all, her scent.

She returned in the winter. He smelt her as he was walking and hastened his pace to see if she was around the next corner. She was indeed back, from wherever she had vanished to. John watched as she passionately kissed a young man, pressing him up against the wall of a building.
Her scent wafted around the two of them, and John watched on as their embrace lasted. Once they were done, the young man pulled a small parcel from his pocket. She eagerly unwrapped the brown paper and held her hands to her face when she saw what it was. John could see from the spine, that it was a freshly printed copy of her favourite volume of poetry.
She leant in and kissed him again.
John went straight home after this. He imagined the types of endings that would fit his story. He could kill himself, or murder the happy couple. He could marry his girlfriend out of spite. He could do all three in an unholy trinity of horror. But each possible ending exhausted him.
John spent a few days at home claiming he was sick. He apologised to his girlfriend and asked her out for a date on the weekend. She reluctantly accepted. He smoked heavily to mask the scent, but eventually quit.
The date went well and afterwards, in a moment of weakness, John explained the whole situation to his girlfriend in detail. He was surprised when she accepted his story with a smile and offered him a hug.
Eventually they did get married, and John sold the book store, making a considerable profit due to its prime location. The couple moved to the suburbs and after a few years, had a daughter.
Their marriage wasn't incredible, but it was, John thought, what a regular marriage should be. John worked from home, as a literary critic, and his wife worked as a teacher.
John felt safe that he was finally free of her scent, but he still smelt it occasionally. It hovered around when he went for a walk to the park. It followed him home as he came back from the supermarket. He smelt her sweet floral aroma when he tucked his daughter in at night.
It was just a scent. It wasn't following him around, it didn't lurk in the shadows waiting to strike. There was no visible signs of it hovering in the air, poisoning his house and everyone in it. It didn't choke the life out of John, until he couldn't think or breathe. It was, after all, just a scent.

New Short Draft

I wrote this one this morning. It's partly inspired by the Gothic course I'm currently taking and equal parts Poe and Stevenson. Just a little experiment in doing some Gothic writing.

This is still totally a draft, but I really enjoyed writing in a new style and using different language in the prose. Needs a good polishing, but here it is anyway. Enjoy.


Draft Gothic Story/I don't have a title yet.
Tim Harvey

The sun had just disappeared over the horizon as my coach arrived at the Carpenter's Tavern in Williamsburg. Vibrant pink and orange clouds streaked the sky as in a painting, causing me to pause. The stunning majesty of this image has remained with me for many years now. I was aware however at the time, that this picturesque image would be the last thing of beauty I would see that night. Having paid the coach-driver, I took a moment to breathe in the last of the sun's magnificence, and to reflect on my precarious position in life.
I would have been only a few years shy of my thirtieth birthday on that cold, Autumn night, in the year of 17--. My early adult life was spent at sea with my older brother Edwin. We joined the Navy and sailed together as brothers should. Edwin was lost at sea during a great skirmish with a privateer galleon. They had ransacked our ship and threw Edwin overboard as they plundered our supplies. I mourned the loss of my brother at the hands of these wretched villains and swore to seek revenge, however my military contract had been terminated not long after Queen Anne's War had come to a shaky close. The treaties wouldn't hold, I assured myself, however for the last few years they had certainly tried.
Left to my own devices, I had sailed from my home of Bristol, to Africa and then to India, in search of whatever work a soldier like myself could offer. Without the guidance of Edwin I felt deeply alone in the great wide world. The work was sparse and I refused to turn to a life of thievery for money, even if it meant that I had to endure many nights out in the cold without a meal. I could never end up like the cut-throats that destroyed my family.
I adjusted the sabre on my belt as I reminisced, and wondered how I had ended up here in Virginia. I had never turned to thievery, however my travels shed a wicked light on those that had. The tales of wild men of the sea filled my head at every port. Rumours of murder and malice followed me all the way to the Caribbean and I must admit, I had difficulty sleeping many nights with a head full of nightmarish images. I dreamed of Edwin being washed away in the black depths of the ocean. On these nights I would have to stifle a scream as I woke, my body covered in warm sweat.
An elected official in a port somewhere deep in the islands offered me work tracking down and eliminating a man who had given his town a great deal of pain. Initially I declined the offer, but as he told me of the horrors that the blasted rogue had inflicted to his citizens, I began to turn. He may not be the man who murdered Edwin, but if I was to seek revenge, he sounded like a good start. Eventually I accepted this assignment and began my search for the villain who had burned half of the town and made off with the Governor's fortune. For the previous year, I had been sailing up the coast of the New World following the dreaded bastard from port to port, always one step behind him.
On that dreary Autumn night, in Williamsburg Virginia, I had him cornered. Having just hours before, spotted him disembark his sloop, I had enquired as to his whereabouts with a dock-boy.
'The Carpenter's Tavern,' was his reply and before he could ask for payment for the information I was already on my way to securing a coach. The bastard rogue went by the name of Edward Tennant, and that night I was certain he would draw his final breath. By my sword, or my pistol, Edward Tennant was surely a dead man.
I had concealed my pistol in my belt, underneath my coat. Extra wadding ensured the lead slug would not slip out of the barrel as I moved about. Edwin taught me to conceal a pistol for my own safety. Being weary of the inhabitants of the tavern, I had guessed that entering the establishment brandishing a loaded pistol was not a bright idea and I kept it only as a last resort. Tennant would die by my sabre if I could have it.

My boots made a distinct click against the wooden boards of the floor of the tavern, seemingly drawing the eye of every person inside. I'll admit that despite the cold air, my brow was dotted with sweat. While the majority of the crowd appeared to be regular colonials, I could smell Tennant's dry stench through the place.
I approached the barkeep and inquired as to any irregular activity on that night. He informed me in hushed tones that a group of sea-faring men had entered not hours before my arrival and they were causing quite a disturbance. I could hear roars of laughter and violent clinking of glasses coming from somewhere in the back of the tavern. I had never seen Tennant's face clearly, and had only witnessed him through my spyglass from great distances, however I was confident that I could pick him out of the rabble.
'Where are they?' I asked the timid barman.
'Through there,' he gestured. 'In the parlour.'
He grabbed my shoulder as I began to head towards the parlour door, 'Sir, what do you intend to do? We needn't have any trouble tonight.'
'I'll make sure they cause you no trouble,' was my reply.
'Who are you sir? If you don't mind my asking,' the barman said, his hand still firm on my shoulder.
'My name is James Wright,' I gave him his answer and looked sternly to the hand resting on my arm.
He expressed puzzlement at the look but eventually released me. 'Are you one of them?' He asked as I again began to leave.
I turned back to him and glared intently into his eyes, 'I'm not, and I never shall be.'
He offered a weak smile and stood silent. I took this to mean that I was free to do as I pleased and finally headed towards the parlour.

I threw the door of the parlour open and bellowed, 'Which of you is Edward Tennant!'
The group of at least six merciless bastards paused at my grand entrance before breaking into a roar of laughter. They were gathered around a table gambling and I was relieved to see that none appeared to bear any pistols or muskets. All of the scoundrels carried various wicked looking cutlasses and hatchets, but I was certain I could fight them off if necessary. Sailing wasn't the only trick I had learnt from a life spent at sea.
A deep voice boomed from within the rabble, 'I'm Edward Tennant, who goes there?'
I couldn't make out where the villain was sitting as the crowd were gathered tightly around the table.
'My name is James Wright,' I called. 'I'm here to put an end to your wretched days.'
The crowd grew silent and all turned to look at me, hatred in their eyes. I heard a faint whisper and the men all backed away from the table revealing the bastard himself.
I struggled to contain my shock as I realised that sitting before me at the table was my own long lost brother Edwin. His appearance had changed, he wore a full beard and his hair hang lank in his face. I had only know Edwin to be clean shaven, and to always were his hair tied back, but his eyes were unmistakable.
'Brother,' Edwin began. 'It has been too long.'
I will admit I was truly speechless. Here before me sat a ghost. A man who I had presumed was buried at the bottom of the ocean.
'Speak, James!' Edwin bellowed, causing his men, and myself to shudder.
'Edwin?' I could only murmur.
'Aye, for my sins. It is me little brother.'
I drew my sabre and pointed the tip towards his heart. This action caused his men to stir uncomfortably and reach for their own weapons.
With a gentle gesture of his weather-worn hands, Edwin commanded his men to be at ease. 'There is no need for violence brother.' Edwin remained calm despite knowing what I was capable of with the sword.
'Edwin, is it really you? You are the dastardly rogue Edward Tennant?' I stammered questions at him and he only smiled.
'Aye! Yes brother,' he replied.
'But why Edwin?'
'I thought you were lost James, I thought you were surely killed in the skirmish. With nothing to live for I chose this life.' Edwin's answer caught me off guard and I felt a sense of betrayal at his reasoning. I was able to shun the life, why could he not?
'I must kill you brother!' I cried. 'You are already dead to me!' I lunged with my sabre but was caught off guard by one of the brutish thugs. The man ripped my sword from my hand and held his arm around my throat, strangling the life out of me.
'Let him go mate!' Edwin bellowed at the man, but he was too deep in his rage to hear the order from his captain.
A hideous crack of gunpowder deafened me and I felt the man's arm go limp. I turned to see what had felled the huge man and saw a clean round hole in the centre of his forehead. The image was grotesque and I'll spare you from and description, suffice to say the man was dead.
I turned back to Edwin to see him holding a smoking pistol in his outstretched arm.
'I must still kill you Edwin! It is my duty!' I cried at my brother.
He simply smiled and replied, 'Then we must do it as brothers.'

It was agreed upon that we would wait until sunrise and by the sun's first light we would duel outside of the Carpenter's Tavern. I didn't sleep a minute that night, always fearful that another of the dastardly rogues would attempt to murder me in my sleep. I assumed that Edwin may have felt the same way when I noticed that he looked deathly tired at first light.
We each loaded our pistols and remarked that they were a matching pair we had received many years ago. The memory had been forgotten when my brother was thrown overboard. The idea never occurred to me that my pistol's twin was still active in the world. Still performing its duty.
We each took twenty paces, and upon my twentieth I spun on my heel and raised my pistol at Edwin. The fear of the moment led me to duel as if I were facing God. I fired and managed a direct hit.
I cried out in horror as I saw the hole in the centre of my brother's back. He had not turned.
I rushed over to his side and held him tightly, gently resting him on the dusty earth. I cringed as I wiped his brow and realised the sleeve of my coat was covered in gore.
Edwin looked up at me, his face smeared with blood, and whispered his final breath, 'You are a fine man James.'

My thoughts go to my brother on most nights when I can hear the wind and the waves rip around outside my cabin. After at least twenty years of regret I am writing this letter as a confession. My guilt is immense and it haunts me wherever I go. I could swear by God that I had taken twenty paces, however seeing the hole in Edwin's back has caused me doubt. If I had only taken nineteen paces then I had committed a great injustice.
Tonight I will correct my wrongs and with one pistol in my belt and one at my temple, I will return them to the sea, once and for all, never to be apart again.