ERIC’S LESSON

talking about others might just be silly...

When the sun failed to dawn properly on that cold April morning, Amy knew there was something very wrong because the nice rather sexy weather forecaster on the television last night at bed time had assured her there would b a hot abundance of sunshine this very day.

And she looked out of er bedroom window and scowled. The first day of her college Easter break… and wasn’t that a snowflake idly drifting past? She frowned. In her imagination the road turned white and the snow piled itself right up to her window.

“Oh well,” she grunted to herself and she dragged herself into the bathroom where she ran the shower, making sure the temperature was exactly right before stripping off her nightie and plunging in. Then, dried and dressed in what she thought of as her prettiest summer dress, blue with butterflies in white, she made her way to the dining room where Eric was sitting in the same chair as he had been when she’d gone to bed last night, his expression just the same, his eyes looking glazed, his hair dank.

“It looks like snow,” she said to him.

He might have looked up and greeted her with his usual dour expression and said something dark about the weather, but he didn’t. But then, she knew he wouldn’t because she was bright enough to be quite aware that dead men don’t ever talk. Or move at all: dead men just can’t lift an arm or a leg or make a muscle twitch. Dead men are dead. And to her Eric looked very dead indeed.

Sandra walked in and sniggered. “Careful, or you’ll wake the idle sod,” she said.

“I think he’s dead,” replied Amy.

“What, Eric? He wouldn’t know how to be dead, the oaf,” sniggered Sandra selecting a dish of cereals from the food table that had been set out by the kitchen staff, then hitching her skirt up and sitting opposite the corpse.

“He looked exactly like that when I left him here and went to bed last night,” confessed Amy, “and I’m scared.”

“Eric, don’t be such a fool,” urged Sandra, “or I’ll debag you and then think of what you’ll look like, Eric the college poster-boy, minus trousers!”

But the object of her threat sat immobile, open eyes not blinking, lips not so much as quivering with the threat of laughter.

“You wouldn’t,” gasped Amy, debag him, I mean.”

“Who wouldn’t?” grinned Sandra, “he’s looked up our skirts enough times!”

“He’s never seen much, though,” contributed Amy, “I for one never forget to wear my knickers!”

The two girls stared at the totally motionless Eric. He was unnaturally still, and Amy began to wish that she was anywhere but there as the boy’s very stillness had rapidly become frightening.

Then, “this is scary,” whispered Sandra, “what if you’re right? What if he is dead? I mean, how could he be dead, how could a young bloke like Eric who loves his football suddenly drop dead? People don’t do that, do they? I mean, not boys like Eric…”

“My granddad did, but then, he’s old. I mean, he was old when he dropped dead.” murmured Amy.

“That’s different, being old,” Sandra told her, “but then, my dad died, and he wasn’t that old. But he was poorly with a lump inside him, and it broke my mum’s heart. She’s not been the same since. She cries all the time.”

“But Eric’s still young,” said Amy, “he’s not much older than me!”

“There are nicer boys who aren’t dead,” Sandra suggested, “like David or Ricky. They never look up our skirts!”

“Like Eric did,” sighed Amy, unconsciously using the past tense. “But then, Eric was always rude. He was even rude to other boys! Ricky told me what he did in the shower after games! And it made me feel… sick.”

“I’d heard he could do things like that too,” confessed Sandra, “and to think he wanted to go out with me. It’s probably just as well that he’s … like he is, all still and cold and…”

“dead,” Amy finished the sentence for her.

“Exactly,” agreed Sandra, “And you’ll never know what he wanted to do last evening on the way back from the shops. He actually wanted to kiss me! On the mouth, he said, with tongues!”

“Poor you,” sighed Amy, “though I did hear tell that he was good when it comes to kissing.”

“Well, I never gave him a chance,” sniffed Sandra. “But look at him: what are we going to do? He’s as dead as a dodo!”

“We’d best get the police,” decided Amy, “because it’s not natural for someone his age to drop dead like he has. They’ll want to see if someone helped him to die.”

“You mean… murdered him?” gasped Sandra, “For looking up their skirt?​But who would do that?”

“Maybe one of the lasses whose skirt he looked up and maybe he even took a picture on his phone while he was doing it?” suggested Amy. “I’ve heard he’s got quite a gallery of up-skirt pictures.”

The body of Eric slumped to one side and both young women jumped backwards.

“I’ll phone the police!” hissed Sandra.

“I wouldn’t if I were you,” whispered the body of Eric, moving slowly into an upright position. “You know, girls, they say that if you really want to know what others think of you it would be best to wait until you’re dead and then you might learn something of interest if you can still hear things, that is… It’s been good to hear what you think of me… A lesson well learned!”

“You pig!” shouted Sandra, sliding her phone back into her pocket, “letting us gab on like that while you were listening!”

“Dead. I was… dead, and dead men don’t peer up young ladies skirts!” he said, and slowly stood up and went to the breakfast bar for some cereals and coffee.

“So I won’t do that again, not to you two, anyway” he added, and he returned to his seat deciding he’d best think his attitude to the fair sex out sooner rather than later.

The other side of the refectory window it was almost a blizzard despite the optimism of the weather forecaster only last night.

© Peter Rogerson 26.04.25