Ode to Erik
Minor Observations Of The 'Human' Psyche
"He's a crafty thing, that one called V, very crafty indeed. I've been watching him, snooping around the gallery like a crazed stalker, slipping in and out of the shadows. Acting very bizarrely I might add; he's been out of sorts for want of a better phrase.
I've caught him doing the strangest things, some which I hazard he wouldn't do if it weren't for the presence of a certain young lady. I'd risk my shine and go as far to say that I think he's trying to woo her!
Take this morning for example. It must have been no later than half past five, when I awoke to the sounds of someone creeping about the Shadow Gallery. My natural reaction of course was to battle this invisible creature into submission, but due to my lack of body and restriction of movement, I decided to stay perfectly still and waited for the fiend to reveal himself. After a few more minutes of doors opening and feet scuffling about, the mysterious wrongdoer exposed his identity. It was none other than that sneaky fop V! Acting most peculiar he was; I deduced that he was hiding something. Surely enough after he felt quite safe again in his surroundings, he removed his hat and his ridiculous cloak to reveal an armful of……beauty products!
Yes dear lord, bottles, tubs, lotions and potions, all kinds of them. I caught a glimpse of them and they were numerous! I knew they couldn't have been for himself; he's rather fussy about his beauty regime!
I mean why does such a little woman need so many products! There was Rose Hip & Organic Thyme Shine Enhancing Shampoo, Jojoba & Indian Honey Silkening Conditioner, Dead Sea Salt Exfoliating Body Scrub, Coconut & Peruvian Almond Enhanced Body Butter, Mint & Crushed Diamond Peel Off Face Mask…..oh so bloody many. And I could tell that V was just as stupefied as I! Shaking his head and muttering to himself, I felt a tinge of pity, but it didn't last! Then he disappeared into the guest bathroom and spent the longest time in there, no doubt arranging the products just so. Makes me glad I don't have to bother with all that! A bit of metal polish and I'm dandy!
Mmmm, very odd all this behaviour. There was the beauty episode, and then he took to ridding the entire gallery of his beloved Marvel and DC comics. Into a large black box they went and high on top of a dusty cupboard they now reside. How he put Batman and Wolverine into that box I shall never know. He'll have to stick to pretending to look intelligent now with his unused copies of Summa Theologica and Utopia.
And mercy knows what he's going to do with all those copies of Woman & Home and Cooking With Friends, he can't stash them…he needs them too much! Without them this place would eventually be the most sophisticated and learned bonfire in England! They have helped him prance about like he's a French master chef; impressing little Evey with his provincial wild monkfish and red onion marmalade or his hand-reared, sun-blasted, crushed, char-grilled chicken and minced black olive paste…bloody show off.
Yes, very very strange all this change and creeping about. This pretty young imp is obviously having some effect on him! Some of it I quite like; I mean, I'm not getting attacked quite so often and when he can remember he runs the duster over me. But some of this change I like a lot less. He's constantly spouting off all these high-to-do, fancy quotes that no bugger understands. He replays every old film in existence to impress her. His posture and walk is some what different, more assertive. And he tries to cook; deary deary me, that is another foible in itself.
I have observed many changes in the few days that the girl has been with us, many indeed. But some I can tolerate, others I cannot and I simply have to voice my concern. I can stand the idiotic prose and the constant smell of acrid food. I can stand the films (barely) and I can even at a push tolerate the façade of feigned intelligence.
But what I cannot stand is to be romanced by a lothario wearing a wig! There are barriers in life, ones which should not be breached. Codes to which we must live by and rules we must stick to, and I wish he could obey some of them! Trots over to me when the girl is asleep and tries to seduce me! Puffs his chest out like a courting peacock, raises his chin in pretend pride. Takes my chain mail hand in his, like he is holding her own and whispers sweet nothings to me and then….I can barely bring myself to say it….kisses my hand……uuuuuuuuuurgh!
Why Evey, you look ravishing today.
What's that Evey? You find me overpoweringly and amazingly attractive? Why you flatter me!
Yes my love of course you can massage me, I have no objections to that.
Oh Evey, you really ought not to say such things, we simply cannot do that, not there……….well if you insist!
(I really cannot divulge the last one….disgusting, makes my armour quiver.)
In the space of a few short days, I have gone from a metallic inanimate sparring partner of a masked terrorist, to the object of desire and affection of a man who pretends to be Guy Fawkes for a living! Try your chat-up lines and fantasies elsewhere!
I think I preferred him when he was decapitating me."
