Dear Carolynn
I decided to try creative short story writing. Just for fun. I had no idea what I wanted to write about, so I started out with one name and let my imagination go to where it wanted to go.
Below is the end result–a fictitious short story that I wrote in the style we used to flirt with often. Mixing historical events with current happenings, and offering a bit of social commentary along the way. You know me, I love to be the storyteller, but no way can I write just fiction alone.
I wonder, though, Carolynn, how much of it is or might be true? I look at things now and believe anything and everything has to be disbelieved until there is proof it can be believed.
Let me know what you think. I know you will find a way.
Love you 🙂 xx
Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Author: Mark Bolton. Subbing: Deepseek. Illustrations: Fotor.
Prologue
Summer 1987. Jeff Smith, renovating his house in Watton-at-Stone, Hertfordshire, stumbled upon a wax-paper parcel hidden beneath the living room floorboards of his Victorian era house that was, until Jeff purchased it in 1982, occupied by three generations of one family. Inside the parcel, a roll of pristine, handwritten papers. The neat fountain pen script hinted at a story, not a letter.
Curious and thirsty after a hard day of labour, Jeff took the papers to the nearby Waggon and Horses pub, ordered a pint, and began to read. By the time he finished, he was stunned…
Chapter 1: He Shall Be Leon
Leon Kusminski was a spoiled brat, the kind of young man who had never known a day’s hardship in his life. His parents, fabulously wealthy industrialists, had doted on him since birth, indulging his every whim and feeding his insatiable ego. Leon was no ordinary dilettante, however; he was a prodigy, a mind as sharp as a razor, with ambitions that stretched far beyond the confines of his plutocratic existence. He dreamed not only of ruling the world but of bending the very cosmos to his will—planets, stars, and galaxies would all bow to his genius.
By the age of three, Leon showed his knack for taking money from the poor for his own profit. He had convinced Jesus, a 12-year-old Hispanic boy, to blow up cartoon balloons for Leon to sell in Middle Park. He paid poor Jesus 1% of the takings.
His father, with a network of powerful friends, was particularly close to a banking mogul—a man who had clawed his way to fortune through shady deals and backroom alliances, also profiting from the hard work of others. This magnate, a larger-than-life figure with a penchant for ruthless ambition, had a son fifteen years Leon’s senior. The two boys had spent a lot of time together, their families vacationing in the same exclusive resorts and attending the same glittering galas.
The mogul’s son, Rory, a name to carry on his mother’s Irish ancestry, was egotistical, charismatic, cunning, and fiercely competitive—traits that Leon admired and envied in equal measure. Over the years, their friendship deepened, though it was less a bond of genuine affection and more a mutual recognition of their shared privilege and hunger for power, and what they could achieve together.
As they grew older, Rory began to carve out a path of his own, one that would eventually lead him to the highest office in the land: the Premier of the Unified Territories of Badasseri (UTB), and Leon and Rory would unite to create their shared visions of becoming gods.
Premier Rory hired Leon to cull as many jobs as possible from the UTB Authority (UTBA), which managed the running of the country. Leon, now an authority-contracted employee, saw this directive as meaning to privatise everything that was once part of the UTBA, except the department he was contracted to run. At the same time, Leon was tendering and winning the contracts created by the dismissal of UTBA workers. It was as galling as it was ingenious. The most open transfer of wealth ever seen, and, at first, the people of UTB believed Premier Rory and Leon were protecting the taxpayers money.
Chapter 2: He Gets His Kicks For Free
During his early teens, Leon had poured his intellect and resources into a single, audacious project: a portal device capable of bridging the gap between Earth and Mars. His parents spared no expense to help Leon enjoy his childhood fantasy, without understanding their son’s determination to succeed in this venture. As far as his parents were concerned, it was money for nothing. However, to fully realise his dream, Leon needed to find ways to further fund his ambitions and to prove his doubting parents wrong.
Over the years, he created an empire built on his technical genius mixed with his entrepreneurial skills, not only to become the wealthiest man in the world but to move between worlds and wield his power to create global and then interplanetary societies in his image. Leon was the modern-day Edison in every aspect, and Rory, now Premier of the Unified Territories of Badasseri, became his J.P. Morgan.
There was never any denying Leon was an inventive man, yet, for all his intellect, he was reckless, arrogant, and utterly convinced of his own invincibility. Hubris, of course, strengthens hubris. Leon and Rory were soon to discover that anything pushed to extremes will eventually explode.
After wreaking havoc because of the privatisation of the UTBA, which rapidly led to mass unemployment, millions having to fight for job scraps, lower wages, and shanty towns all over the UTB, the people rose up just before January 2028, and by the hundreds of thousands stormed Columbia, the nations capital.
However, Premier Rory and Leon escaped through the vast network of evacuation tunnels that lay under Columbia and hid out in a luxurious bunker beneath one of Leon’s twenty-six mansions, each named after a letter of the alphabet. He found that amusing. Leon chose mansion ‘X’ because it housed his laboratory.
Chapter 3: Time Is On My Side
Living under the false belief that the citizens of UTB would soon come running back, Rory and Leon put their exile time to good use. Rory worked on his manifesto titled My Struggle, and Leon went back to his teenage dream to build a portal to reach Mars.
By the time Rory had finished Chapter 728, Leon had finally cracked the code to the interplanetary portal. In his mind, he had beaten God, which convinced him that if he had defeated God, then he must have always been God.
Leon’s portal was a towering contraption of wires, chips, and stored-up glowing crystals harvested from the dangerous grounds by poverty-stricken children in a faraway country. It hummed with an otherworldly energy.
So excited by his breakthrough, Leon summoned Rory.
“When will you try it?” Rory asked, thinking Leon would send some poor unsuspecting servant to test it first.
“Tonight, I will go to Mars and come straight back,” Leon replied with great confidence in his abilities before leaving the laboratory to send out self-congratulatory tweets, the one place he and Rory had not been exiled.
It was sheer arrogance that led Leon to this fateful day. While in his office sending tweets exclaiming his brilliance, Rory had fiddled around with some of the portal’s coding so that it would fail. He could not have it that Leon succeeded before he had. His manifesto had only strengthened his disdain for the UTB citizens who turned on him, and now this upstart Leon Kusminski had upstaged him. He threw a little tantrum in his head, repeating over and over again, “Rory won’t have it!!!!!”
When Leon entered the chamber later that night to visit Mars, Rory was standing right there, offering him his best false wishes but with an awareness Leon will quickly step back out of the failed operation feeling like a fool
Chapter 4: Is There Life On Mars?
The machine shuddered violently, its components sparking and sputtering. The vortex expanded, its pull irresistible. Leon knew something was wrong and tried to shut it down, but it was too late. The portal engulfed him, dragging him into its swirling depths. He screamed, but no sound came out. He heard his Mother shouting “No,” and his Daddy telling him to “Go.”
The world around him dissolved into chaos, a maelstrom of light and sound that seemed to stretch on forever, and he fell into unconsciousness.
When Leon awoke, it was to a world that was both alien and eerily familiar. The air was thick with the acrid stench of coal smoke and rotting refuse, a miasma that clung to the back of his throat. The sky above was bleak, like a sickly smudge behind a veil of fog. At first, he couldn’t work out if he was on a dark side of Mars, or a terrible Mars day weather-wise.
Around him, he could just make out buildings that leaned precariously, their soot-blackened facades cracked and crumbling, like the teeth of some ancient, decaying beast. The streets were narrow and cobbled, slick with filth, and the clatter of horses’ hooves echoed through the gloom as carriages rattled past in the distance. It was that moment he noticed in horror that the portal wasn’t with him.
Leon shivered, his breath visible in the cold, damp air. He looked down at himself and froze. His hands were trembling, his clothes torn and stained. And there, on his jacket, was blood. Fresh, glistening, and unmistakable. He thought he must have injured himself, but he didn’t feel any pain.
Then a cry pierced the air, sharp and panicked. Down the street, he could just make out the figures of two men standing over a crumpled form lying in the shadows. One of them turned, his face pale and drawn, and shouted, “Get a Rosser! I think this woman’s dead!”
Leon’s heart pounded in his chest. He knew this scene. He had read about it, seen it in documentaries, heard it whispered in hushed tones. But it wasn’t possible. This can’t be happening on Mars!
He stumbled backward, his mind racing, and he felt something tucked into his belt. A knife, its blade long and sharp, still wet with blood. His stomach churned as the realisation hit him like a thunderbolt. He hadn’t traveled to Mars; he had somehow managed to travel back in time.
Chapter 5: Let Me Take You By the Hand
Leon’s mind raced as he quickly assessed his reality—he was on the streets of London. He stumbled through a labyrinthine alleys, passing an old man huddled under newspapers with only his worn-out shoes exposed. The old man was sleeping outside The Ten Bells pub. An avid reader of Charles Dickens, Leon knew exactly where he was in London, he just didn’t know the year.
The fog clung to him like a shroud, and the occasional gas lamp cast flickering shadows that seemed to taunt him. In the distance, police whistles blew, and people came running out of their homes. He knew he couldn’t stay in the open for long. His clothes—expensive, modern, and now stained with blood—were a death sentence in this time and place. He needed to blend in, to disappear. And he knew exactly where to go.
Though Leon wasn’t Jewish, he had grown up in a world where knowledge was power, and he had made it his business to learn about cultures, religions, and histories that fascinated him. Judaism, with its rich traditions and resilience, was one of them. He knew enough Yiddish to get by, enough about customs to pass as a lost Polish Jew. Leon had to find his way to Whitechapel’s Jewish quarter. It was his best chance at survival.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone to get directions, a reflexive gesture born of desperation. The screen lit up, but there was no signal, of course. However, what did surprise him was the date–31/8/88. Not 1988, 1888. The device was useless now, a relic of a future that felt impossibly distant. He stared at it for a moment, the glow of the screen a cruel reminder of everything he had lost, before shoving it back into his pocket.
Leon knew he had to shed his modern identity entirely. The suit, the jewelry, the smartwatch—they were all liabilities. He needed to look like he belonged here, in this grimy, impoverished world. Spotting a narrow alleyway, he slipped into the shadows and found a backyard cluttered with the detritus of daily life. Clothes were draped over a rickety old wooden fence, left to dry in the damp air. They were coarse and threadbare, reeking of sweat and mildew, but they would have to do. Leon didn’t realise it then, but a week later he would wake up again in that same backyard to face yet another nightmare.
He changed quickly, his stomach churning at the stench of the garments. The trousers were too short, and the shirt scratched against his skin, but they would serve their purpose. He bundled his modern clothes into a tight roll, along with his phone, wallet, watch, and jewelry. He couldn’t risk leaving them behind—someone might find them, and the last thing he needed was to draw attention to himself with evidence of his true origins.
Nearby, he spotted a small church, its spire barely visible through the fog. The graveyard was overgrown, the headstones leaning at precarious angles. It was as good a place as any to hide his belongings. He dug a shallow hole beneath a tangle of brush, his hands trembling as he buried the remnants of his old life. For a moment, he hesitated, staring at the small mound of dirt. It felt like burying a part of himself.
As he stood, a name popped into his head: Aaron Kosminski. He remembered it from his readings about Jack the Ripper—a Polish Jew who had been a suspect but never convicted. If he was going to survive in this time, he needed a new identity, and Aaron Kosminski was as good a name as any. What history didn’t know—what Leon didn’t know—was that Aaron Kosminski and his backstory had never existed until Leon became Aaron.
Leon—now Aaron—made his way to the address he remembered from his studies. The Kosminski family lived at Providence Street in a cramped tenement, its walls thin and its floors sagging under the weight of too many lives. He knocked on the door, his heart pounding. When it opened, he was met with the wary eyes of a middle-aged woman, her face lined with hardship but softened by a flicker of compassion.
“Ver bist du?” she asked, her voice cautious but not unkind.
Leon swallowed hard. “Ich bin Aaron,” he said, his Yiddish halting but passable. “Ich habe mich verlaufen. Ich brauche Hilfe.” The woman hesitated, but then took him by the hand and led him inside to safety.
The Kosminski family—poor, devout, and kind—took him in without question. To them, he was just another lost soul, a fellow Jew in need of shelter. They shared their name, their meager food, their cramped space, and their quiet prayers. Leon felt a pang of guilt as he accepted their family name and hospitality, but he pushed it aside. He needed time to think, to plan, to wait for him to find the portal to take him back home.
What troubled him was that, if he had murdered the first victim, then he did it when he was still Leon Kusminski. He also had no clue as to how long he has been in 1888 London, or where his portal is located. These thoughts he could not shake from his already desperately anxious mind. He was terrified.
But as the weeks passed, Leon began to realise something unsettling. The longer he stayed, the more he felt himself slipping into the role of the historical version of Aaron Kosminski. A man who, until Leon became him, was not real. By now, he had accepted he was Jack the Ripper but has no recollection of the murders. To add to his already high anxiety, as each new victim appeared, he slipped further and further into a psychological abyss, and as a consequence, the murders became more brutal. He’d taunt himself with the same question: “Am I Aaron or Leon?” And, “Why can’t I remember committing these murders?”
Following the murder and butchering of Mary Kelly, Leon had completely lost it. The Kosminski family took care of him as best they could, but he was losing control. Before too long, he took on the name Abrahams, citing that Kosminski was too hard to spell. Was this Leon trying to cover his tracks, or had Aaron taken over his every being?
During Leon’s more lucid moments, he knew the name Aaron Kosminski, once a convenient alias, began to feel like a second skin. And as he looked into the eyes of the family who had taken him in, he wondered if he would ever be able to leave this life behind—or if he was destined to become the very ghost he had pretended to be.
Chapter 6: He’s mad, mad, mad, mad, mad, mad, mad, mad, mad. Not quite right (not quite right)
Leon—Aaron—was losing his grip on reality. The portal had brought him here, but it had also shattered his mind. The line between past and present, between Leon Kusminski and Aaron Kosminski, had blurred beyond recognition.
The killings continued, but they were not considered Ripper murders. Each one was more brutal than the last, each one drawing him deeper into that abyss. He told himself it wasn’t his fault, that he was being controlled by forces beyond his understanding. But deep down, he knew the truth. This was who he had become. Or was this who he had always been? Had he killed before arriving in 1888?
Paradoxically, as the people of Whitechapel talked non-stop about Jack the Ripper, the mysterious killer who stalked the streets at night, and the newspapers were relentless in covering every angle possible for as long as they could, Leon felt a perverse sense of pride. He was no longer a lost soul, a man out of time. He was a legend, a monster, a force to be reckoned with. He had become God after all.
But the pride was short-lived. Again, the voices returned, louder and more insistent than ever. They told him he was a fraud, that Leon could never be Jack the Ripper, Aaron was, and that ‘Leon’ would never be anything.
Desperate to silence the voices, he began to tell people the truth.
“My name isn’t Aaron Kosminski,” he would say, his voice trembling with desperation. “I’m Leon Kusminski. I’m from the year 2028. I built a portal to Mars, but something went wrong. I’m not supposed to be here!”
But no one believed him. They laughed at him, called him mad. Even the Kosminski family, who had taken him in, turned their backs on him. They couldn’t understand what had happened to the quiet, lost man they had sheltered and shared their family name. To them, he had become just another lunatic, another victim of the squalor and despair of Whitechapel.
One night in July, 1890, Leon returned to the churchyard where he had buried his belongings. He needed proof, something to remind him of who he really was. But when he dug up the spot beneath the brush, he found nothing. The hole was empty. His clothes, his watch, his phone—all of it was gone.
He fell to his knees, his hands clawing at the dirt. “No!” he screamed, his voice echoing through the empty graveyard. “No, no, no!” “Am I Aaron Kosminski and created Leon, a time traveller, or am I Leon Kusminski who travelled back in time?”
But it was no use. With the uncertainty went his last shred of sanity.
Leon was arrested not long after. He had been seen wandering the streets, muttering to himself, his clothes stained with blood but nobody could work out why. He was declared insane, a madman who believed he was a time traveler from the future.
He spent the rest of his days in Leavesden Hospital, an asylum for the insane, screaming his name to anyone who would listen.
“I’m Leon Kusminski!” he would cry. “I’m from 2028! I built a portal! You have to believe me!”
But no one did.
Epilogue
Jeff Smith sat silently, taking a few moments to gather his thoughts. He grabbed another pint and stared out to the trickle of traffic on the High Road thinking about the elderly man he bought his house from five years earlier in 1982 .
The elderly man, Reg Williams, who by the late 1970’s was suffering dementia, would tell the villagers about a patient his father would look after during the 1910’s when he was a psychiatrist at Leavesden Hospital. Reg was a teenager when his Dad told him that he had grown close to a Jack the Ripper suspect who spent his last years at the asylum. When Reg asked his father if he believed the patient was Jack, his answer was, “I doubt it, lad–man can’t reach the moon let alone Mars, and he will never.”
The name of that patient was Aaron Kosminski.
Songs referenced:
Levon: Elton John — https://youtu.be/XhBsYZ5QOJo?si=zhdVBld4SUUG7uFV
Money For Nothing: Dire Straits — https://youtu.be/wTP2RUD_cL0?si=N0f2ywD7aoqxXobb
Time Is Own My Side: Rolling Stones — https://youtu.be/jOxHsuV83KA?si=wxNlxeJV-skjX9ag
Is There Life On Mars: David Bowie — https://youtu.be/AZKcl4-tcuo?si=s7CkMuzRZx5It4aW
Streets Of London: Ralph McTell — https://youtu.be/YKu4DaPi-qY?si=T5T3aQKMWxW9B7qd
Asylum: Supertramp — https://youtu.be/OHUF6dAudOg?si=PoC0msxHCwY9aoTT
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