It wouldn’t be fair for me to tell you the full story of how I came to be the most famous postman in the world and, yet, I care not for fairness.

In the city where I had grown up, my appetite was well known. They referred to me as the ‘orphan son who likes his bread and his butter and his Victoria Sponge’. I had eaten a Victoria Sponge every day for twenty-something years and, being a man of habit, I had no desire to stop. If that makes me predictable, sue me.

I’m sure it’s all starting to make sense to you now.

Last Tuesday, I slept with Mrs Frisbethee while I was delivering her post. I got there before the milkman. I suspected that poor punctuality was part of the reason he was on the way out, but he blamed globalisation. He was always whinging and full of excuses. I didn’t really like him, but I knew that he liked Mrs Frisbethee and that’s part of the reason I slept with her in the first place.

She was a desperate woman and she loved to gamble. She had gambled with the life of her first husband, and he had come out of it badly. I often visited him at the cemetery in an attempt to feel gratitude for the fact I was alive and well. It rarely worked, but there I was, sleeping with his ex-wife, and feeling rather good about it. I made a note in my diary, post-coital event, to visit his grave and apologise.

As for how I got famous… Well, I’ll let you in on a secret that will make you complicit. I stole Mrs Frisbethee’s scratch cards from under the sink and it turned out that one of them was worth quite a bit. Enough to let me retire, at least, which I’d been hoping to do ever since I’d left university. It was my parents who forced me into the study of Viking and Old Norse Studies. I told them it was a pointless degree, but they told me it was never a bad idea to have a backup plan. I told them a better backup plan would be for them to move into a caravan and gift me their house, but they refused and I threw a strop which resulted in the toilet being dislodged and a plumber being called out on a Sunday.

In hindsight, I blame my parents for the murder of Mrs Frisbethee. If only they’d given me their house, she would still be alive.

I admit that I did a poor job of murdering Mrs Frisbethee. I threw her out of the window and she broke her neck, which was quite an achievement seeing as she lived in a bungalow. Let’s just say that she fell out of the window at an awkward angle. Problem was, the street party for the Golden Jubilee was going on at the very same time and half the neighbourhood witnessed my socially objectionable act.

Garble Johnson – a large man who was known for having a nice lawn and a rampant saviour complex – chased me down the road as I tried to escape with a supermarket bag full of scratch cards.

“You’ve killed Mrs Frisbethee,” he kept shouting from behind me between heavy breaths. I didn’t need him to tell me that. I was the one who done it.

When he caught me, he punched me in the face.

“What did you do that for?” I said.

“You killed Mrs Frisbethee,” he remarked, resettling his wig.

“No I didn’t. She fell out of the window while trying to emulate Michael Flatley.”

He punched me again and tied me to a lamppost.

“I’ve called the authorities and they will be here soon. I’m going back to the street party. I won’t let you spoil my fun.”

As he jogged into the distance, back towards waves of bunting, I knew that I was in a sticky spot.

When the police arrived, they were confused. They’d never seen a postman chained to a lamppost before. I observed as they bickered amongst themselves.

“Where’s the man who called this in?” One of them said.

“What is it he’s meant to have done anyway?” Another asked, biting his nails.

I interjected and tried explaining that I still had parcels to deliver, and this confused them even further. I was known for having the gift of the gab when it suited me, and it came in handy on this occasion.

Within minutes, I had four policemen apologising to me as they used some cutters to set me loose.

“Happy Jubilee, officers,” I said to them before scuttling over a hedge and disappearing to Brecon.

The following day I was the lead on BBC News. ‘Fugitive Postie’. It was a story of police and Royal Mail incompetence, and therefore, British incompetence. Every major news channel of every major nation was leading with it. It was a black mark against the heart of Britain. It represented rot and decline. A fall from grace. The end of Empire.

I admit I felt a pang of guilt. Seeing the King’s forced resignation on his Golden Jubilee had never been my intention, but then again, I was glad to be rich and I’d never seen myself as a royalist. I was my own man and it had always served me relatively well. The same couldn’t be said for the former King.

In the end, the most disappointing thing was that by the time I went to cash it, the scratch card had expired. And nearly as troubling, the cashier seemed to recognise me.

He stared at me for a moment. I wondered if I was done for. I was too tired to run. I’d been running all my life. From dead end jobs and bad debts and essays about Vikings. I looked back into the cashier’s eyes. It was one of those moments where you can’t help but wonder if your luck has run out.

“You’re famous, aren’t you?” He said, broodingly.

“Yes, sir,” I replied.

“Remind me will you, what are you famous for?”

“I brought down the King.”

He extended a hand, and I shook it firmly.

“No charge for the coleslaw,” he said. I smiled and nodded gratefully, and a pang of deep, deep meaning swept across my entire being.