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Anorak: n [cagoule, windcheater] light-weight nylon overgarment to keep out the elements.

Anorak: n Rather ‘sad’ person such as train spotter, often seen wearing said item of clothing whilst enjoying outside hobby in unpredictable English weather.

It was ice-cream weather, but a shudder still started at my coccyx and spread along my spine until my whole body had shivered into jelly and disintegrated. Now a congealed mass seeping into the carpet, I gave up reading Apex stories and slithered to the patio doors rather like something from an early Star Trek episode; perhaps the one where those giant pancakes landed on poor Kirk and First Officer Spock. However, anoraks were a definite no-no that weekend — as I said, ice-cream weather, uncharacteristically hot, not a cloud in the sky — so maybe I escaped.

It was the weekend of 7th and 8th June and a Lancaster bomber had just flown over my roof, so close that if I’d had a chimney, it would have been no more.

The shudder was an early-warning of the return of the annual Biggin Hill Air Fair. I, of course, was too mean to pay the entry fee of £22 (about $40) so I spent the two days trying to work on the computer in my dining room whilst simultaneously wielding a camera in my back garden. Planes, from Spitfires to modern-day jets, zoomed only feet above my hedgerows. But sound, having this annoying habit of being that little bit more sluggish than light, meant I pretty-well managed to miss every single one.

My anorak days were numbered, thank goodness. Or maybe I’d already been reported as an ‘anti’ to the ‘Anorak Preservation Society’.

All this reminded me of a similar day, pre-Apex, when we as a family sat outside watching the Red Arrows and anything else that meandered into our airspace. The weather had been spectacular then, too. Our radio was switched on, tuned into the air fair radio station, and we were entering every phone-in completion, song-request, and phone opportunity offered in the hopes of winning that elusive British Midland (BMI) flight to anywhere in Europe. All phone calls were entered into a free prize draw. I rang up; my (as then) pre-teens son rang up; even my husband ventured to use the phone. My two oldest children thought we were exceedingly sad. Anoraks, even. But the sane three of us were gunning for it just like the Spitfires above us. We had the odd beer — not the youngest, I hasten to add — lit a barbeque, won a hamper, and then it came: the DJ dialled a number to ask his all-important question.

Someone else’s phone rang. They didn’t answer.

Sweat built up on my forehead. Not that I was feeling the pressure, you understand; we were just having an exceptionally hot day.

The DJ dialled another number.

Our phone didn’t ring, but someone else’s did.

They answered.

“Who’s hosting the Airfair Radio tent?” the DJ asked.

I held my breath. I knew the answer. I mean, don’t they just love to make these questions so easy that anyone who is anyone and has been listening to the station for more than thirty seconds would know the answer?

“Erm,” the gentleman on the line said. “Erm. I’m afraid I don’t know.”

Doh! He’d just thrown away two tickets to anywhere in Europe. The game was on again.

The DJ said nice things, hung up and dialled for the third time.

Our phone rang. In those days, caller display just wasn’t an option, so I answered blindly.

“Is Scott there?” a man asked, and I instantly turned down the radio volume. I was old-hat at anorak and knew feedback was a definite problem.

Heart rate going at a higher frequency than the radio waves, I cleared my throat. “Can you hold on a minute, please?” Now everyone would know it was us. The village is, by modern-day standards, small. I thrust the phone into my youngest’s hand.

“Hello,” he said.

“Scott, can you tell me who’s hosting the Airfair Radio tent?”

Silence.

“Safeway,” I mouthed, probably too loudly. “Safeway!”

Scott stared at me intently.

“Say-fe-way!”

“Safeway,” he said. Phew!

“Congratulations! You’ve just won two return flights to anywhere in Europe courtesy of BMI.”

It was over; we’d won. We had actually won.

But this is Apex stuff so I know you’ll expect an unhappy ending, and here it is:

Safeway got eaten up (nice phrase; very appropriate for a supermarket, don’t you think?) by a competitor and, even though we won the flights, we were never able to use the tickets. This ‘n’ that happened. Youngest did a Harry Potter and vanished off to boarding school complete with trunk (he’s back home now; anyone fancy an authentic British trunk and matching tuck box complete with keys? — they might be expensive to post, though); husband went through a phase of lots of long-haul work-related trips, all of which meant no two of us were ever in the same place at the same time.

But maybe sometimes it’s nice to add the shock element to Apex and end happily. We used the air miles accrued on hubbie’s long-haul trips to take youngest to Amsterdam the following summer. However that’s another story. Just imagine what you’d say to an eleven-year-old boy when a guy wearing stiletto heels, black fishnet stockings, and a Basque saunters past three times, hips swaying erotically.

‘He’s lost his way to a fancy dress party and it’s too hot to wear an anorak; would you like some more ice cream?’

Gill Ainsworth hails from Britain. She is known for infusing her writing with clever and sassy “royal” turns of phrase. Her writing has won several fiction awards and she has seen a number of her scientific papers published in respected journals throughout the world (notable in pharmacology). Gill was a 2006 Stoker Award nominee for her work on the Aegri Somnia anthology. She edited a second anthology with Jason Sizemore titled Gratia Placenti that was published in 2007.

Aegri Somnia and Gratia Placenti can be ordered from the Apex aStore.