The Players by Darren O'Sullivan

 

Mark Twain famously said, truth is stranger than fiction. And for the most part, I agree, after all, fiction has to make sense, follow an arc we can connect with and conclude in a way that allows us to feel not cheated. The truth need not worry about such things. However, that doesn’t mean fiction cannot and should not be based on something true.

I have been a novelist for four years, and for each piece of fiction I have written there might be a suggestion of truth, shown through what my characters say and do. But, the stories are exactly that, stories. Made up worlds and situations that I have joyfully crafted. I also do not know where these story ideas come from, they just appear, first in my gut, a tingling that I have learned to recognise, but has likely always been there, it then, with patience, places a question in my head. One I need to explore or I’ll not be able to sleep.

I cannot say the same with The Players.

I remember the exact moment the story came to me, because, with this novel, and its horrific questions around what you would do in a situation where you had to either kill or be killed, the truth really is stranger than fiction.

It was November 2019, an ordinary Thursday, and for a treat, we decided to have a Chinese. I ordered over the phone, and twenty minutes later, I left to go and collect it. Arriving, there was just one other man in the Chinese. Sat reading his newspaper, I told the woman behind the counter my name, and nodded and left to go out back to the kitchen to collect my food. Nothing odd, nothing untoward and certainly, nothing that would inspire and idea for a novel.

Then, it all changed.

My attention was drawn by the sound of the bell above the Chinese door ringing as someone came in. I turned to see a man, older than me, smaller, hood up, hands in his pockets, step inside. I’m not one to usually feel alerted by the presence of another person, but there was something that made me feel I needed to be vigilant. Something in the pit of my stomach. I tried to dismiss it, turn my attention back towards the kitchen and wait for my food. But, I was aware of him, we’ll call him the hooded man, stood in the doorway, blocking the exit. Looking back, assuming I was perhaps in his way I caught his eye, and then he spoke.

            ‘Only one of you is getting out of here alive.’

At first, I didn’t know how to react, so I just stood, looking at him sway side to side, like an animal pacing before it pounces. He spoke again. ‘One of you is going to die in here tonight.’

At this point, that feeling in the pit of my stomach erupted, making my heart skip and my body move into action. My fight or flight had been engaged. Stepping back, I looked over the counter and saw a telephone, my thoughts were not of calling for help, but grabbing it to hit him if he attacked. The other man, who had been quietly reading his paper had stopped and was looking at the host of our terrifying encounter. The hooded man repeated for the third time that one of us was going to die and I felt my muscles tighten, ready for a fight. The hooded man then smiled, opened the door to the Chinese, backed out and closed the door behind him. He held my eye from outside on the street, a look that suggested he wanted to hurt me badly, and then, he walked away. Myself and the other man laughed it off, more relieved than actually finding anything about that experience funny, he said he would call the police, I got my food, and I left.

I never heard anything again about that moment in the Chinese, nor did I get the man’s name who experienced it with me. It was so strange, so surreal that after returning home, I ate my food and continued my evening like it didn’t happen. Shock I guess.

That night, as I lie in bed, processing the day, the event left a question in my head, if I had to do it, if I have to play his game, what would I have done?

I pondered the answer for hours, going back and forth in my mind, playing out the event in multiple different ways, and then, fell asleep. The next morning, with the answers to the question of what I would do, kill or be killed, burning in my mind, I sat down, and I began to write The Players.

The Players by Darren O'Sullivan (HarperCollins) Out Now

In this game it's kill or be killed...  A stranger has you cornered.  They call themselves The Host.  You are forced to play their game.  In it one person can live and the other must die.  You are the next player. You have a choice to make.  This is a game where nobody wins...