CASE REPORT 16703: Sin Matthews, age 35, disappearance of.

CASE CONTENTS: Statement written by Matthews. Two pence coin.

<Dr. Connors' note: This statement was written by the patient during his various periods of supposed lucidity. It's as crazy as he is. And yes, that is my professional opinion.>

Statement:

Name's Sin.

I always wanted to do that, but never got the chance. You know, sort of enigmatic. A bit like 'Bond, James Bond'... except it's nothing like that, really, is it? I don't know. Hey, I know what I mean.

Anyway - Sin. That's my name, don't wear it out, as I used to say once upon a very long time ago. I wonder if kids still say that now. The old ones are the best, eh? Actually, the old ones are not necessarily the best. The fact is, the old 'uns are quite possibly the worst. But such is life. That's another of my old favourites. I've got a whole pile of them. I can just keep chucking them out. Probably will too, knowing me, as you obviously do not. Yeah, I know you think you do, but you don't. Trust me on that particular little one right there.

Sin. It isn't short for anything. It's not a neatly trimmed Cincinnati or a Single-Cell-Organism that forgot half its name. It's not anything like that or anything else. Simple and short and not entirely sweet. Sin.

I blame the parents (see, there's another one).

Well, I do. My dear ol' ma and pa. It was their idea of a joke, I suppose. They thought it equally hysterical to call my sister Joy, except she didn't get the crap I did when I was struggling to grow up. She didn't get the beatings or the name-calling. She didn't get pushed or kicked or made a fool of. Oh no, that little pleasure was all mine. I don't even think my parents had the excuse of being drunk, drugged or insane. That last one is also my very own little pleasure. Insanity.

Am I insane? You bet your sweet little old botty I am. Loony as the glorious, big blue Sister Moon shining her sweet face down on me. Or so they tell me (don't you?). Crazy as a rootin' tootin' coot, that's me, yes sirree. What's a coot? No idea. Ask me another, and you might get an answer, except you know you probably won't. I don't get any, so why should you? Hey, I just do what the voices tell me to.

No. I don't hear voices. Well, there's my own of course, whether it's in my head or in my ears, except it's still in my head if I speak, isn't it? Anywho-be-do. I don't hear other voices, is what I meant, as you very well know. I don't hear demons telling me to get out of bed in the deepest darkest night and do unspeakable things. I don't get those voices. No. The demons are all out there anyway, doing their own unspeakable things. They don't need my help.

Even if I gave it to them anyway.

I never meant to! I'll stand up in the court of all Humanity and hold my hand way up high to that! I didn't mean to! But the jury is still out, I guess. Even though I'm locked up here, in my cosy little cell with that nice soft padding on the walls, all thanks to 12 good men and true, the jury is still out. The real one. The one that counts. The one that sits in session up in my head (where you thought the voices were). It's still out, wondering if I did mean to. But I didn't. Promise. Cross my heart and hope to... Well, you know how it goes.

Sin. That's me. Thanks mum and dad, God rest your weary souls.

I used to have a surname, once upon a time. I lost it back along the way. Can't remember when or where. It's probably lying around at the back of the settee with my car keys and the remains of a beef sandwich on brown bread. It's not important. I know me, and that's enough. Yeah, my parents had a surname. Yes, so did Joy. It was Matthews. Trouble is, that name just doesn't sit right with me, you know? It's like when you see someone, and you think they look like a John, or a Wendy, and hey! That's just what they are! Not Matthews. That's more like when you think the guy's a John and he's a Harry or a Wayne, or even, let's not be shy, a Wendy!

Sin Matthews isn't my name, and I know it. But it's only a name. Sin will do. Sin by name, but so not by nature. I think. Sometimes it's hard to remember. That's thanks to the drugs they give me, those nice men in their crisp white coats and their happy, happy lives. If only they knew.

Sometimes it's very easy, and that's the big baloozer of the problem. Sometimes I can remember.

Of course that's easy to sort out. I kick up a fuss and they very kindly come into my room with a needle. That sorts out the memories. Most of them anyway. And the noise.

It's hard to believe that this six by six box of nothing was my choice. Why did I do that to myself? What sort of crazy loon stands up and says "Hey! Stick me in a room with no handle on the inside. Lock the door, it's ok, I don't mind. You want to pad the walls? Knock yersen out, just so long as I don't, eh? Straitjacket? If I don't have to wear a tie with it, that's just perfectly fine and hunky-double-dory with me." What sort of durbrain no-hoper inflicts that on himself? Tell me that one, because I don't know. Ask me another, but don't ask me that!

Well, I do know, actually. Me, that's who. But later. Later I'll get to that, if I'm still here. If I have time. Time... Well, indeed.

I've a surprise for you. I'm not crazy. I never have been. Oh, maybe I might have gone a little loopy-doo on occasion, but crazy? Nah. Never fancied it. It's never floated my boat. Surprised? I can never remember if, let's say, 'eccentrics' say they are mad or not. I read it once. If you're a few raisins short of the full banana, do you say you're sane or is it the other way round? So, does that mean I'm crazy for saying I'm not, or sane for saying I'm batting on the wrong side of rational?

I'll leave that one for you experts. You guessed it, ask me another.

Why? That's a good one to kick off with. Why? Well, that's one I can answer. It's that damn coin, is what it is. That damn, stupid coin.

See a penny, pick it up and all day long you'll have good luck. How many times have I said that, knowing it was a great big shiny pile of doggy doo-doo? Hey! Maybe I was crazy to do that? Maybe, every time I bent down to pick up that solitary penny, I was actually offering my backside to the world to come and give it a right good kick?

See a penny. What about two pence? See two pence and pick it up? How long does the good luck last then? I'll tell you. It doesn't. In fact, all the good luck from all the pennies you've ever picked up gets sucked right off you and flushed down Life's big toilet. So now who's the lunatic? Me for saying that or you for actually pausing before you pick up that shiny two pence piece lying on the pavement?

You get one guess. Right first time! Me, 'cos I picked up that two pence in the first bloody place!

It's a coin. So what? Two pence won't even buy you a penny chew nowadays. It just adds to the shrapnel jangling about in your pocket. You still pick it up though, don't you? You bet you do. So do I, or I did. But not no more. I learned my lesson. You can't give an old dog new ticks. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it swim. That's what they say, isn't it, them who know? Well, hit 'em with a great two by four and you can! That was how I learned! I got hit by a metaphorical two by four. I've still got the bruises to prove it, except they're not the bruises you can see. They're the bruises to my metaphysical psyche, Dr. Connors me ol' china. That's psyche with an 'E', not with an 'O', thank you very much.

You say 'Tom-ay-to'...

I found it, or it found me, or whatever, on a Friday afternoon. Ah yes, I remember it well. It'd be about 3:30-ish. I was just walking along, minding my own, as you do, when it sure leaped up at me! Yeah, yeah, it didn't. Coins don't have legs. I'm crazy but not stupid, OK? But it was as if it had. It was bright - brighter than a mucky old tuppence should have been. Hindsight is a bloody terrible thing to have. Some idiots talk about the 'beauty' of hindsight. Personally I think that's crap. Sly Mr. Hindsight only tells you what you should have done if you'd known better. What's the good in that? It's obviously too late by then, else it'd be foresight, and I'm not psychic! Septic, maybe, but not psychic.

I was scoffing a McDonalds. Double cheeseburger, with just cheese. None of that salad crap thanks. Why ruin the taste of a perfectly good burger by splodging sauce all over it and sticking a gherkin of all things inside? And they call me mad! Anyway, such is life and all who sail in her. I was just finishing my burger, happily wandering along the street when I happened to look down. I think I was outside Woolworths, which isn't even there anymore. What's insane is when a shop that's been around forever and is part of the furniture of the town centre can suddenly go out of business and close down. That there is crazy. People were scooting past me and I was just standing there looking at that coin. I don't know why. Staring at a two pence piece isn't something I normally do to pass the time. Here, though, I couldn't help myself. It looked lonely. I forgot all about my cheeseburger (which kind of shows I wasn't entirely myself) and picked it up.

It was warm. I remember that. I could even feel the warmth later, when it was in my pocket. Now, of course, I know why, sort of. Cheers Mr. Hindsight, sir. Thanks a great big bunch. I owe you one.

For some people, it's a habit. They have a coin in their hand so they toss it. They don't even check to see whether it lands on heads or tails. Flip, catch. Flip, catch. Flip, catch. Flip... You get the idea. Sometimes they don't even know they're doing it. They flip it up and catch it down without even looking at their hand - it's just there under the coin, ready to snatch it out of the air. I'm not like that. Never have been, and certainly never will be, now. I didn't have that measure of accuracy for a start. If I tossed a coin, I'd have to watch it every spin of its way through the air, not taking my baby blues off it until it was safely in my hand. That's why I rarely did it. If a coin was in my hand, it went either in my pocket or in the coffee machine at work. The most I might do would be to run it through my fingers like Steve Martin in Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid. Well, not quite like that - it was a lot slower and took a few goes, but I'd probably perfect it one of these centuries.

Oh, my baby blues are green, sometimes. Depends on the morning light streaming lazy-daisy through the curtains. Depends on the lyrical tilt of my head on the pillow. Hey, that's what I'm told, more or less. Sometimes my eyes are green, sometimes they're blue. Baby green's doesn't quite roll of the tongue though, does it? Baby hazels. Baby browns. Dady Bavids. My arse!

Anywho-be-doo. I digress. No really? That's a habit of mine, a bit like tossing coins is for some. I start off on a subject, then end up about a gazillion light years and straight on till morning from where I began, with no idea how I got there. Done it again!

Where was I? Yeah, the coin. Always back to the coin.

So. Why did I flip this particular coin? Ask me another. I did though.

I think about four died that time.

Died.

That's what I said.

The bus (the number 5 - goes from Freeman Street to Saint Marks Church and back again, like a hyperactive yo-yo) swerved to avoid something that was never there. Luckily, the Post Office counters are mainly at the back, so there were very few people near the front of the shop. It could have been worse. If there wasn't this custom to have the entire front of shops as a massive window, maybe... I didn't catch on then. In fact it took a while. A good few more needed to die before I got the point. The number 5 smashed into the Post Office window and the driver, a young woman buying stamps, a sales assistant and a man who'd always been a nobody and didn't get chance to be a somebody, didn't get to check their lottery numbers that night. Their numbers were up, so to speak.

Am I making light of it? Yes. Got to. You've gotta laugh! So they say.

Afterwards, after the statements and the press and the ambulances, I found it hard to sleep. I've never seen anything like that up close. On the TV, sure. In movies and the news and the papers, there's much worse. But it's removed. It's distant. It's not there, full in your face. You're not in the middle of it, with breaking glass and screeching tyres and screams. You don't hear the screams. Should that make a difference? I suppose not, but it does. But it was only the beginning, wasn't it? Yes, Mr. Hindsight, I know.

I know.

Four days. I'd almost forgotten about it in four days. That was all it took. Like a day a death. It was like a fuzz. A blur in my head, smudging out what I'd seen. What I'd caused, though I didn't know it. Did I? No. I don't think so, not then. On the fourth day, God made Hell. So to speak.

I'd gone to work; an oil refinery. I was in the control room, a concrete and steel bunker built to withstand the blast of the refinery going pop. And wadya know. It works.

I was waiting for a permit to go on site. It's a pain and it can often take longer to get the permit than to actually do the job, but such is the will and the way. Necessary evil, that's what it's called. I wasn't even thinking when I took the coin out of my pocket. I wasn't even aware it was in there. Thing is, it should have been mixed in with the rest of my change. What are the chances of me picking that specific coin out of a pocket full of them? I guess pretty good, considering that's exactly what I did. It was already in the air when I realised what I was doing. I also, quite suddenly, remembered the crash. Even the jolt from the unexpected flood of images wasn't enough to prevent my hand from appearing underneath the smooth arc of the two pence piece as it lazily curved through the air. It was, you know. Lazily curving. Could almost have been a slo-mo replay of Beckham knocking one into the back of the net. Lazy. Carefree. All the time in the world, thank you very much.

Then my fingers closed around it. There was a dull thud, and the alarm boards all over the control room were ablaze in flashes of red. Screeching alarms made the air a solid wall of noise that had to be fought through. It was like wading through treacle. People were scrambling desperately.

That was inside, where it was safe.

Outside...

The death toll was two hundred and fifty one. The 'one' was my best friend, Dave. At least another eighty were badly injured, and that was without the damage to the environment. The Community Alarm went off, warning the surrounding villages, but it wasn't really needed. They heard the blast. They felt the blast. They saw the smoke. Cars five miles away jumped, startled. Windows eight miles away shattered, the glass falling like the tears of the bereaved.

Sounds quite poetic that, dontcha fink?

I've seen photos of Tunguska, in Siberia, where the meteor (or UFO if you believe Mulder and Scully) hit. It was like that, in a way. A real blast. Party on down to Hell's kitchen folks. Today's special, anything you can still recognise. Hurry, it's going fast!

The coin was warm. I could feel it in my pocket, where I'd apparently put it, although I wouldn't swear to that. The warmth was, I suppose, comforting, even though I barely noticed it in the midst of the melee. At least it wasn't the whole refinery. At least it was only a 'little' bang.

I'd be surprised if you thought I should have had an idea then. I should, you might think, maybe have had an inkling about what was happening. Nope. I was only tossing a coin - even though it was something I hardly ever did. That I'd been in two tragedies in less than a week was... unfortunate. It was devastating for those involved, yes. I'm not heartless. I do see that. But this isn't about them.

Well, it is. But it's about stopping it. It's about THEM, the 'them' that includes you, my dear Dr. Connors, not the 'them' of those already dead. I was the Big Bad Wolf come to blow their lives apart. But I didn't know it, not until Mr. Hindsight came along and shook me by the hand, and that wasn't for a while yet.

I don't know how long it took me to forget that one. Oh, I couldn't entirely wipe it from my memory - I had to work there, eventually, when they had made it safe again. But to forget the horror, to forget the impact? It wasn't long. Soon enough I was wandering around as if nothing had happened. Simple as that. Easy as sweet caramel and apple pie with lashings of vanilla ice cream, just like me old ma never used to even think about making. But I'm not heartless. It was the coin. The coin seemed to be making me immune. It seemed to deaden something in me, some essence of actually caring. Of course, me hearties, I didn't know. I carried on regardless, just like good ol' Sid James.

I had three weeks then. Three weeks of uninterrupted mundane brain drain. Normality was the norm, just as it should be. There were no nagging thoughts eating away at the back of my mind, like locusts feasting on a vast field of corn. I didn't look at myself in the mirror and see evil shadows running across my face, dancing gleefully at the carnage I was creating. Nope. Nothing like that. Everything was hunky-doodle-dory. Nice and normal.

Flip.

Catch.

The trains collided just outside of town. All on board dead. I was waiting in my car, impatient that they always closed the barriers about ten minutes before the train's going to arrive and about two seconds before I turn up. How was the coin in my jeans? Ask me another. How did it get into my hand? Ditto.

All on board dead. And the Post Office. And the refinery. They all screamed out to me.

Dead.

Say it enough times and it becomes just a word. Dead. Dead. Dead. Four letters thrown together to mean something that was so much more and so much less. Dead. An absence of life. An absence of anything. For the few days that it took my mind to wash away the spectacle of the train crash, I said that word to myself over and over. I didn't feel responsible for the accidents, for that was surely what they were, but I didn't feel quite... right. But, like I say, eventually it becomes simply a word. Meaningless. Emotionless. Dead.

Flip.

Catch.

An earthquake. Turkey I think. Somewhere over that side of the world, anyway. Rivers flooded their banks. Landscapes changed their features, as if they had suddenly frowned, angry at the little humans skittering over them. They don't know how many died that time. I do though. I know. Four hundred and seventeen thousand eight hundred and ninety two. Seems a lot written out longhand like that. Seems more than 417,892. Numbers are just numbers. Written out, it's more real, more horrific, more sorrowful. More like a kick in the teeth, to be honest. They estimated about 350,000.

They were wrong.

How do I know? How do you know the sun will rise tomorrow? How do you know that Sunday will follow Saturday? You just do, dontcha? You just do. Same here.

I just do.

I think it was around then that I started to wonder. I think I began to suspect something. I'm not sure. I mean, it's only a bloody coin! How can I, or it, influence world disasters? Besides, Turkey? I've eaten it, but I've never been there! I threw the coin anyway. Dropped it into the River Freshney on the way home. Here little fishies! It's a bit tough, but tuck in. Keep you going for weeks that will!

Flip.

Catch.

I didn't notice. I have all sorts of coinage passing through my pockets during the week. Newspapers, coffee machines, petrol, Mars bars all play their part in the ebb and flow of the Royal Bank of Pocket. How one particular two pence piece could manage to remain in there was a mystery. Why it hadn't been passed to a shop assistant in return for a bottle of Coke (diet) or a packet of chewing gum, I couldn't guess. How it came to be back in my possession at all after taking a swim in the river...?

WHY does the sun always rise? HOW does Sunday always follow Saturday? You know they will, but why? I don't know either. I don't want to know. It just does.

It was four days. The earthquake still dominated the news both on screen and in print. In my head, though, it was already fading. It was going the same dulled way as the rest. The feelings of being responsible were dissolving too, like sugar in water, diluted until, no matter how hard you looked, there was just a foggy liquid that tasted just a little too sweet. I didn't notice the coin in my pocket. I don't remember taking it out. I don't remember flicking it up. I just remember the arc of it through the air and the warmth as my hand closed around it.

A child. Perhaps four years old. Typical TV advert stuff to slow your speed. The ball bounces into the street. The boy runs after it. Laughing, naturally laughing. He doesn't see the car. The car doesn't see him. The driver feels, rather than hears, the thud.

The child bounces into the street.

It happened in front of me again, not thousands of miles away. Mere metres from where I stood. Hah! The ball even rolled to my feet! How's that? I turned and walked away. I could hear the young woman waiting for half a dozen first class stamps. I could see the drivers of the trains. I could feel the heat from the flames on the refinery. I could taste the water from the flooded, surging river as it swept away all that stood in its path. I could hear the laughter of the boy.

I just walked away. I think I maybe even whistled a happy tune.

That time the memory didn't fade. The horror stayed with me during the dark nights and darker days. As time went by, my oh my, my mood darkened too. I knew. I knew it was me. I knew it was the coin. I knew I was responsible. I went to the pier at Cleethorpes. It stuck out like a literal sore thumb, reaching away from the beach into the lovely waters of the River Humber, or is it the North Sea? Either way, it's muddy and murky. I certainly wouldn't want to swim in it - paddling when I was a kid was bad enough. Well, the two pence coin was going to find out if it could sink or swim. I knew which one I was betting on.

I held it in my hand for a second, then simply let it drop. It spun away to splash into the water. There was a brief flash of reflected sunlight just before it hit and it was gone. Good riddance.

I noticed that, as it spun, it almost looked like it would had it been flipped. I shook my head. Nonsense. Get a grip. Get a life. Get an ice cream. Yeah, I really fancied an ice cream at that point. A whipped 99, a chocolate and vanilla mix with a flake, juice and hundreds'n'thousands. I checked the change - the safe change - left in my pocket. Wouldn't you know it, I was two pence short! Typical. Oh well, that's the way the double-choc-chip cookie crumbles.

Ooh, I just had a brief Homer moment: Ahhh, cookiessss.

I felt a few spots of rain. Good job I didn't get the ice cream, really. My car was only a short distance away. By the time I'd reached it, the heavens had opened and it was heaving it down. Cats and dogs? Elephants and rhinos more like! By the time I was half way home, thunder was grumbling towards me with sheets of lightning to brighten its merry way. Remember that, Dr. Connors, me fella-me-laddio? Remember that? Rained for a solid seven days. Solid non-stop. Solid as Niagara Falls on a sunny Sunday afternoon. Except we forgot what that nice smiling sunshine looked like for a while there, didn't we? Too busy wishing our cars were like James Bond's so we could flick a switch and the wheels would turn in and we'd skim along like a boat. Too busy wondering if the insurance would pay to replace the carpets and suite and TV. Too busy eating your tea with ducks swimming around your ankles. Too busy watching your kitchen table float away like a raft with legs. It was as if the whole island, good ol' Great Britain herself, had been submerged under two feet of water. Someone had pulled up a zipper from Land's End to John O'Groats and the sea had come together from either side. It didn't matter that there was no electricity - the constant lightning lit up everything like a giant camera flash.

Remember Dr. Connors? Because I certainly do.

I don't think anyone died then, amazingly. Maybe there were one or two casualties, but considering what happened, it was a lucky escape. Did someone get struck by lightning? Can't remember. Maybe. Still, considering... Of course so many thought that their lives had ended, or wished they had. Houses were flooded, belongings were ruined. Most of the country had waded to a standstill. It took a mighty effort to get moving again. It took a mightier effort to shake the drowning feeling I was overcome by when the cries of my other victims echoed in my ears.

Anyway. I don't know why I ask if you remember it, Doc. I know you do. Everyone does. I just wanted you to think about it for a moment. Just hold in your mind's tiny grasp (or should that be 'tiny mind's grasp'?) for a second or three. OK? And on we go.

When things got going again and life returned to its quirky little ways, I bought a bus ticket. My car, the same as just about everyone else's, was knackered. It didn't want to play. Well, who can blame it, eh? How would you feel if you'd spent the best part of a week and a bit with your arse end submerged in water? It probably wouldn't do your plumbing any good either, now would it? I bought the bus ticket to town. I used to take the number 5, at one time. Never no more, oh no. 3C or 3F, they're the ones for me. No other number will do, thank you very much. The 3F costs 20p more each way and goes all around the houses (which all buses do, I know, but this one goes ALL around them) to get to the same place, so the ride lasts a good fifteen minutes longer, but it's not the number 5. The 3C costs about the same and only takes about five to ten minutes more, but it's not the number 5. What is it, every half hour for the 3F and every twenty minutes for the 3C? Something like that. The number 5 was every ten minutes. Of course, it still goes on its happy travels, round and round the same route it goes, where it stops everyone knows - all the bus stops and the Post Office. No, it doesn't. That Post Office stop was a little one off special, just for sweet little ol' me. Ain't it nice. Why, thank you ma'am. Thank you oh, so very much, indeedy. Still. Anyhow and anyway, the number 5's not for me, no way!

My friend, my chum, my pain in the bum was back to say a great big fat "Hello." Right on top of the ten pence piece, to make sure I couldn't miss it, was the two pence piece. Howdy, pardner.

Flip.

Catch.

You know how it goes.

Across town, apparently, a seventeen-year-old kid was fed up. He was bored with his life and himself. His dad was in a shooting club. The gun was locked away in a secure box hidden in the attic, in line with all the police requests. The boy knew where his dad kept the key. He got the key, then the gun. His name was John, which makes it every bit worse. I know his name. He's not anonymous. I know his name, I know him. He left a copy of Terminator in his DVD player to make it look like he was influenced by action films where every gun held a million bullets. He wanted them to think that, even though he knew it was crap. People, he thought, did what they did because they wanted to. A film was a film, that's what he thought. Sure, Arnie might waste a few bad guys, but that didn't make him want to do it. No, John did it because he wanted to. He was bored.

Besides. His dad's .22 pistol only made a little hole.

He would have taken the 9X bus to town, I guess. At least the number 5 doesn't go that way. The shopping centre was, naturally, packed. It was a Saturday, so it would be. John chose the Starbucks coffee bar to start his little performance. He didn't think it should cost nearly three quid for a coffee, even if it was a Mocca-Chocca-Locca-Shocka-Artery-Blocka. It was as good a place as any. It wasn't what he expected. There were the bangs. There were the screams. There were the crumpled bodies and the pools of blood, but it wasn't what he expected. He expected to feel and he didn't. He just didn't.

So he used his last bullet on himself. He yawned as he pulled the trigger.

How do I know so much about John and his thoughts? Ask me another.

I didn't feel so much from him, as he didn't feel much himself, but I felt the terror and pain of those around him. Oh, an old woman of seventy-three, with two children and five grandchildren, was trampled in the stampede as Starbucks and the shops around it emptied in seconds, the people scattering like birds off a telegraph pole. The window of Clintons Cards was shattered and the grandmother was showered in a rain of glass slivers. She didn't feel anything either. Her heart had given up the ghost, so to speak.

I was sitting third from the front on the 3C, on my way to the war zone. I was staring out of the window watching the world go by, wondering if the bus was staying still and the Earth was moving. I remember seeing a young boy jumping on the bonnet of a Mondeo. I smiled to myself, knowing if it was my kid or my car, I'd go mad. By the time the bus pulled into the station near the precinct, only a few minutes away from Starbucks, I was shivering. I wondered if perhaps I'd cried out, as a few passengers were looking at me strangely. Or did they know? I didn't want to go in anymore. I knew what I'd find. People were running about. Some were crying, others were standing there, dazed. One or two acted as if nothing had happened. Which one did I fall into? I don't know. I don't think I was crying. I didn't run. I couldn't stand still. I think I acted as if nothing had happened. I didn't want to go in, but that's what I did.

It was just as I'd thought. Just as I'd felt.

I walked past the bodies and pushed through the crowds. I bought some cookies from Millies - the assistant behind the counter looking at me as if I was crazy buying cookies at a time like this, but not willing to miss a sale. Maybe I was crazy, but I was also suddenly starving. All thoughts of why I'd actually gone to town in the first place were forgotten. I turned in the direction of Starbucks and said goodbye to my very good friend John, a young lad whom I'd never met. I dropped the half eaten white chocolate cookie into a waste bin and walked home.

I slept well that night. Like a log. I had a dream. At first I thought I was in the middle of the Never-ending Story, you know where Fantasia has been consumed by the Nothing? Well. The world had broken into thousands of pieces and each was floating about in space like lifeboats after the Titanic. I watched as families smiled and waved to me as their little pieces of Earth crashed into their neighbours' and they spun off into space. I awoke knowing, finally, that it was all me. I was responsible. Me and that damned coin.

Joy convinced me. That nice Mr. Postman only brought me one letter that morning. He was early for a change. It was a white envelope with my address elegantly printed in blue ink. Joy only ever used a blue pen. She thought black was rude. She didn't write to me very often. I can remember only a few times in our lives that I'd received so much as a postcard off my sister. My heart drilled its way through my chest like John Hurt's Alien as I sat at my kitchen table. Hey, it could have simply been a 'Hello'. I hadn't seen her in a month or three. She could have merely been dropping me a line saying she was fine, sunshine. But I knew she wasn't.

Joy was a joy to be around. Everyone liked her and she made everyone happy. As I held the letter in my trembling hands with my coffee going cold and my Weetabix going soggy, I thought about that. It had never occurred to me before, but Joy was joy, and I, Sin, was basically sin. Good and evil, light and dark. Two sides of everyone's favourite two pence coin. Oh, I needed to get a life! I was talking crap! Yeah, everyone liked my sister - she was a nice person! Why wouldn't they?

But, sitting there, forgetting to breathe, I knew I was right, at least almost. Maybe I was a little wide of the wotsit, but I was close. You know how I knew. That's right. I just did. I opened the envelope, pulled out the neatly folded sheets of paper and started to read. Joy's handwriting was smooth and flowed like water running across the page. Everything about my sister was... silken. Her skin, her walk, her voice. Perhaps that was why she was always so popular.

Ah.

Perhaps not.

I read the letter three times, then calmly laid it on the kitchen table. I stared out of the window. A sparrow was flitting about on the window ledge. Something busied the bushes at the bottom of the garden. It wasn't just me. I wasn't alone.

Joy, it seemed, had found a coin one day. It was years ago when we were children. A two pence coin. I'd never seen it, nor had I seen her toss it. She had, though. But whereas I ruined lives, Joy... Joy made lives. "I make people happy," she said. And it messed her up. She caused couples desperate to have children to become parents. She rendered poor people rich. She stopped accidents from happening and natural disasters from occurring. It was as if I was looking into the dead eyes of my mirror.

You see, Dr. Connors, Joy killed herself. I'm sure that's in my notes, or you've found it out, but rather than simply being words on paper (even as these are), I want it to mean something to you. Joy, my sister, committed suicide. She even told me exactly what she was going to do, something I won't go into, as I'm sure you already know. My first instinct was to ring her, to try to stop her before she'd had chance to jump but I knew there was no point. It was too late. Joy was dead. I wanted to feel sad, but I didn't. I wanted to cry, but I couldn't. I still want to feel something. I still want to cry. But I can't.

"I make people happy," she wrote, "and it's killing me."

I found my coin a mere few months ago. Joy had been found by hers years before that. She'd know almost straight away what was happening. I had only known, for certain, that morning - that morning when Mr. Postman kindly brought me the letter. At first it made her content. She was bringing happiness and good fortune to almost everyone around her. That was at first. Being contented I mean. Then it stopped being a pleasure and became a frustration. The frustration turned to hate. Joy was alone in her world. While everyone else was enjoying life, my sister was drowning in the responsibility of keeping it up. She felt stripped. One more good turn was one more piece of her torn away. Every smile was another knife twisting in her heart.

She had tried, early on, to rid herself of the coin. She couldn't. No, really? It kept coming back like the not-so-proverbial bad penny. That's almost funny, dontcha fink, Doctor? No, me neither. So she decided, if she couldn't get rid of the coin, she would get rid of herself.

Joy had noticed something. At first, she said, the incidents were erratic. Flip, catch. A man would not take the step into the road as the car burned around the corner. Flip, catch. The bully would see the error of his ways and would apologise to his victims. Flip, catch. The baby would smile at her father. Flip, catch. The mother of seven would win the lottery. Some were big, others were small. One would change the lives of a country, another would make a man feel good for a second.

It didn't stay that way though. The results of her coin levelled out, then began to increase in both momentum and... Joy left the word out. She couldn't find it. I knew what she meant. Each time, it would be more. She saw herself being eaten away. She saw herself living only for the world and not for herself. So she planned to leave. She planned to jump.

She had realised something. She didn't know if I would believe any of what she had written, but she had to tell me. She realised it wasn't the coin. The two pence piece was simply the catalyst. It was the trigger.

It was her. She was the cause. Joy was joy. She said that, when she understood, she could throw away the coin. When she understood, it was as if a floodgate inside her had been opened and a torrent of happiness was unleashed. That was how she put it. If she didn't end it, she would drown.

I took the coin out of my pocket, where I knew it would be, and placed it on top of the letter.

The coin was the trigger. It was her. It was Joy.

It was me.

I felt something inside me twitch at that point. It was as if I shook without shaking. For the first time, I noticed the radio was playing. I didn't realise I'd turned it on. I looked at the clock. It was almost half past ten. Time for the news.

Here's the headlines at ten thirty. Seven hundred die as freak tornado hits sleepy Essex village.

The coin was resting on Joy's letter. It regarded me lazily. It knew. Flip. Catch. I had flipped. I had caught. Not the coin, oh no. Me, myself and Ay-caramba!

It felt like someone was poking me in the chest from the inside. It would happen anywhere and at any time. Relaxing in the pub. Flip. Poke. Catch. A motorway pileup. Watching the TV. Flip. Poke. Catch. Etna erupts. Sitting on the crapper. Flipety-pokety-catch. Earthquake in Northern Scotland.

Doctor, doctor, doctor. You can check on each and every one, as I'm sure you already have. You want dates? Times even? I've got the lot. Even the earthquake in Scotland. Doesn't happen very often that, does it? Two in one week is just the gravy on the Yorkshire Pudding, dontcha fink? Yes, Doc. Check it out. Three days, four hours, twenty-two minutes after the first, a seismic hiccup way on down in Loch Ness was strong enough to capsize a survey boat on the surface. Now, Loch Ness is very deep and very wide. An educated man such as yersen, Doc, would know that it'd take a good ol' bounce to even ripple the surface. Course, the survey crew reckon it was dear Nessie herself, and they're going to be wasting a whole heap of money and time on searching her out. I reckon if Nessie was swimming about down there she'd have gone a-running with her kilt hiked right up to her hips.

So I had to make a decision. I had to choose. For Joy it was easy. Well, maybe not so easy, but she was always the one who could. Me? I guess I could have tossed a coin... John did it with a gun. I couldn't do that. No-Guts was my middle name, and I wanted to keep them exactly where they were. I couldn't jump off a bridge, although the Humber was just murky enough to be inviting. Driving my car into a wall was an option, but my right foot decided to have a mind of its own and not want to push that pedal-to-the-medal. A train mashing me to mush was another idea, but it would probably hurt.

In the end I did decide. I couldn't kill myself, but I figured I could take myself out of the loop. I could disappear. I could forget myself - become a John Doe-zee-do-your-pardners. Yeehah! That's when I came knocking at your door, Dr. Connors. That's when I rang your bell.

It wasn't difficult. Not that you're not good at your job, Doc. I don't mean to imply anything like that. I have enormous respect for your abilities. I bet that surprised you. Honestly, I do. Granted, you are so totally off base with my case that you're not even in the same time zone, but that's just me. I'm a special case, so to speak. A real vintage.

But it was fairly simple to get my own room-without-a-view. Act nuts. A little doolilly, a little doolally. A little 'I'm-a-little-teapot' thrown in for good measure. You practically welcomed me with open arms, didn't you? Thanks for that. Really. I mean it most sincerely folks. Yeah, there were no '12 good men and true,' were there? Just that nice, bespectacled, slightly balding (yes, Doctor, everyone knows) man in the suit creased so sharply it could cut butter.

Thank you. You took me in and doped me up. Helped me pack up all my troubles. What a guy.

Unfortunately...

Should have known, eh?

It's almost like aerobics. And, one and two and one and two and step and slide and flip and catch and one and two and on and on. That's why I throw a wobbler. It's why I go Lala every so often. Not because I'm a Teletubby, but because it's still with me, in here. I can't escape it. Even with the world a fading memory, I know! The brakes on Brenda Thomas's shiny new Audi failed as she was driving her daughter into school. Not a single one of the Humber Flying Club's parachute display team's chutes opened as they attempted, and failed, to build a pyramid three thousand feet up. Flight HB762, returning from Palma in Majorca, forgot to give its pilot control when they were landing back at Humberside. Or the pilot forgot how to land. Or it was the wrong type of snow on the tracks.

And step and slide. And flip and catch.

You see why I wanted the drugs? I think Jeremy (who really doesn't have to be so nice to your patients - half of them wouldn't even notice) knows that I'm not really crazy. When he comes to calm me down if I 'wobble', bringing his trusty syringe, I'm sure he sees it in my eyes. He's a clever one, Dr. Connors. You want to treat him right. He does the same for your patients, and most would prefer him to be the doctor and you to be the orderly. Hey, just saying it like it is.

But the drugs are not enough, not any more. Were they ever? I think at first, when they were new, I think maybe I fooled myself into believing that they were working. They kept me out of it enough so I didn't feel the flip, and I didn't see the catch. It was still happening though. So they are not enough. Joy knew. She understood that there was only one way.

I've figured something else out, Doc, and this one will lay you right out. You know how that damned coin always kept coming back? It was like a pet dog I'd been trying to get rid of. Kept nipping at my ankles, never realising I just wanted to kick it. I threw it away. I chucked it into the bloody sea! Yet it was always there, in my pocket, on top of the tens and the ones and the fifties. Always ready to wave and smile and say 'Hi!' I figured out that that was me too. I was bringing it back.

Yup-a-doozy.

Have you ever seen the film Phenomenon, with John Travolta? Very understated and quite excellent. I wonder if it's a bit like that, except my light from the sky was a two pence coin. I did, for a little while, hope that I'd have some brain tumour that was eating away at my central cortex wotsit and that was causing it all. No such luck. Fine and dandy and healthy as can be, that's me. So I couldn't hope for Him upstairs to help me out. Old Mr. Grim the Reaperman wasn't going to come a-calling either. I was on my own.

But the coin, yes indeedy. The coin was the trigger, but, bless its sweet little copper heart, it was also the key.

"What's he on about?" I don't hear you say. Teleportation, that's what. If you're a believer, let me hear ya say 'I BELIEVE!' A little louder, please. I can't hear you! Well, actually, it ain't that at all, I don't think. Don't you think? A question without an answer. Yes, I don't think. No, I don't think. You could go round in circles with that one. Anywho. Teleportation makes it sound like some cheap sideshow conjuring trick. Cups and balls-a-go-go. It doesn't feel like that, though. It doesn't feel like teleportation. I don't know, but the coin always ended up back in my pocket, safe and snug and warm. Maybe it's a flip without a catch? Ha. I just thought of that one. That sounds more like it. A flip with no smack-in-the-palm-of-your-hand catcheroony. By Georgy Porgy, I think he's got it!

So I'm going to try it myself. I'm going to flip, and I'm going to let the Universe catch-me-if-you-can. Sound metaphysical enough for you? I can't shoot myself, not that I could get a gun in here anyway (or maybe I could?). I can't jump. Hey, I wonder if I'd bounce or just splat? So I'm gonna flip.

Flipedy-doo-da, flipedy-hey, my, oh my what a helluva day!

I know just the place. I don't know why I didn't think of this before. I could have saved a lot of pain and death. If my mind had not been fogged by those won'erful drugs, would I have guessed? Who knows. Refineries are magnificent places, you know? Ever been to one Dr. Connors? I don't suppose you have. They've got all sorts of deadly chemicals and things that, if they went bump in the night, would certainly make sure half the county wouldn't wake up the next morning. Well, we've had a little preview of that already, haven't we? Furnaces. Loads of them. Temperatures exceeding a thousand degrees centigrade held captive in a little tin box. Oh, yes. You look into them when they are going, and the flames, fifteen feet high and more, look ready to jump on you for their morning snack.

Well, I reckon I might just be lunch for one lucky flame. It'd be quick, for a start. He didn't feel a thing, Miss.

I'm trying to avoid asking myself any questions about what might happen then. I don't know if I believe in ghosts or heaven or hell. Does reincarnation exist? Would I come back as a frog perhaps? I reckon sitting by a pond catching flies all day would be a pretty relaxing way to spend one's life. I wonder if Joy is driving a cloud way up there with a sticker in the back saying 'The Afterlife's a beach!' But enough of that. I don't know, so there's no point in worrying about it. Well, there is one worry. What if it doesn't stop? What if I'm actually stopping the bad things happening, apart from the odd one getting through? What if I'm some sort of dam with a few chinks in the armour?

No. If only that were true. It's not. I'm certain it'll stop. Just like with Joy, it ends with me. Which, in a way, is a good thing. I suppose. I've got to go to the great meringue in the sky, 'cos life here's a lemon, but at least it'll stop. So, yeah, it's a good thing.

Well, this is it. This is where I take my leave of Life, the Universe, and fish fingers. I wonder if it's true that the last thing the captain of the Titanic ever said was to ask for ice in his drink? I wish I had something deep and meaningful to say. Some inspiring words of wisdom to pass on. I don't.

This is one small step for Sin, and one giant leap for the rest of you Muppets.

So long and thanks for all the rotten eggs.

Take your pick, Dr. Connors. Take your pick.

<End of statement>

* * * *

Report by consulting psychiatrist, Dr. Henry Connors.

Sin Matthews was extremely paranoid and intensely delusional. His frequent bouts of erratic and often violent behaviour resulted in the need to keep Mr. Matthews sedated for much of the time. The claims made in his statement are obviously ludicrous, although it is clear he has researched these incidents thoroughly. Mr. Matthews's reasons for this are unclear. As he stated, Mr. Matthews voluntarily placed himself under this hospital's care. As yet, the investigation into his disappearance is inconclusive. That he 'flipped' out of his cell is naturally not being considered. It should be noted that, on the day of his disappearance, there was a fault in the CCTV system and it is my belief that Mr. Matthews took advantage of this to discharge himself. He has been reported to the police as a missing person. As he is no longer a resident of this hospital, my involvement with Mr. Matthews has come to an end.

Dr. Henry Connors MRCPsych, DPM

<End of report>

* * * *

It was Tuesday night. The rain beat down outside like the cast of Riverdance in a Sunday matinee. Jeremy "Jezzer" Jackson liked this shift. Some called it the graveyard shift, and in this hospital, that wasn't so far from the truth. A sea of zombies lay staring sightless into the darkness in the wards and cells. For Jeremy, however, it was calming. The outside world was a shade, a silent shadow beyond the large reinforced windows that lined the walls. Apart from the occasional call, a lone wolf's howl from the abyss, and soft sounds of snoring, everyone's favourite orderly could believe he was alone in the world.

He'd been thinking about Sin. Jeremy knew Sin wasn't entirely what he made out to be. He'd had an idea that the supposed insanity that he showed was enforced for some reason, as if he was running away, or trying to forget something that even the Foreign Legion couldn't help with. Jeremy liked Sin. They'd had long, intelligent conversations, something that the orderly missed. The doctors here treated him as if he was retarded somehow, not like the qualified nurse and ex-teacher that he was. He'd left both professions because he wanted something where he could make a difference. He knew nursing was rewarding, and he wouldn't disagree that teaching was indeed worthwhile, but this job was different. He made people who couldn't help themselves feel that bit better. He didn't really have to try either. Jeremy had a natural air of peace that could pacify the most tempestuous of patients.

But Sin was different. Sin had been a friend. Jeremy missed him. He knew that Dr. Connors wasn't really trying to find out what happened. Oh, the doctor was a decent man, but he felt he had enough patients at the hospital to worry about without having to chase one that couldn't sit still.

It was a quiet night. Hypnotic. Jeremy had been to Dr. Connors' office and had taken the Sin Matthews case file. He was sitting at his own desk, having finished reading both Sin's statement and Connors' brief report.

He picked up the coin. It looked brand new, shining fiercely in the glare of the strip lighting. He turned it over in his hands. It was hard to believe all that Sin had said. But what if...?

Jeremy blinked. The coin was turning a long smooth arc in the air. His hand was beneath it already, the fingers curled ready to close around the two pence piece.

* * * *