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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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Understanding Astrology part 5

Now I will look at Jupiter and Saturn. And before we get too far, perhaps I should explain why I think the direction that the outer planets are pointed in might affect us in certain ways. It’s time to look at the structure of our galaxy and also the way that astrology is based on cycles and seasons.

Jupiter, Saturn, and the cycle of change

These two gas giants are large enough to have a significant gravitational pull, despite their distance. Especially Jupiter, which apparently has been rumoured to have an effect on Earth’s weather and on the cycle of sunspots on the sun, according to some scientific articles.

Jupiter goes through its cycle of all 12 signs in a period of approximately 12 years, meaning that it tends to occupy a single sign for about a year, and that its cycle roughly corresponds to the cycle of Chinese years.

Saturn goes through a cycle of all 12 signs in a period of about 30 years.

Because of the time period of these cycles, Jupiter tends to correspond to the ebb and flow of trends in the arts and popular culture, while Saturn tends to correspond with the ebb and flow of political/social trends.

It’s probably time I talked about why the direction of the outer planets might correspond to the nature of the 12 signs of the zodiac.

Everything in astrology is about cycles really. And any cycle follows a particular pattern, precisely because that’s what a cycle of change is. Any cycle of change must surely have a spring period of growth, a summer period of greatest flourishing, an autumn period of decay or winding down, and a winter period of lull, or a break between cycles. Surely, that stands to reason, right? Any regenerative cycle (creation – destruction – creation again) must surely follow such a pattern.

And furthermore it makes sense that within each of those phases, those seasons, there must be a beginning, a middle and an end. A beginning is when the season begins, it is the bursting forth of that season into being. A middle is when the season hit a plateau, it levels out into fixed stability. Finally each season must have an end, where its energies and themes are broken down and reworked into new patterns, in preparation for the next phase.

Pondering on this matter a little further, we can even see why the elements are arranged the way they are:

It makes sense that the beginning of the beginning would be a fiery, dramatic start. It makes sense that its middle will be an earthy, practical thing, because it is the growth period of spring, so we’re building something. And during the end part of spring, will come a flourishing of ideas, new thoughts and questions, which is to do with the mental air element.

When summer comes, there will be a welling up of emotion, which is associated with the element of water, because this is the time of creative flourishing, and artistic creation requires emotion. When summer settles into a stable plateau, then of course it will be fiery Leo that governs this lazy summer atmosphere best. Leo is also very creative of course. Finally, before we can move into autumn, there needs to be a taking stock of what has been created, and a questioning and analysing of it, to bring us into the mature stage of autumn. That’s why the earth sign Virgo governs it.

Autumn begins with mental questioning, weighing up and balancing of different opinions, because this is the beginning of the breaking down and winding down stage of autumn. When autumn settles in, it is intense in its emotion, to the point of being dark and depressive, because this is the beginning of the end. Finally there is a quest for truth, travel, fun and experience. The last chance for fun before the winter starts and a sense of wanting to understand what it was all for.

Of course when winter begins it is time for earthy practicality. Serious business now, winter is coming. But then comes some of that peaceful reflection that the lull of winter allows. And so air comes back, in the form of quirky Aquarius, the wizened seer to seek insight during the death of winter. Finally watery emotions return, and there is a sense of insight, a gentleness but also a sadness, as regret for the lull we have fallen into inspires a desire for rebirth.

But how can we track when one cycle ends and another begins when it comes to Jupiter and Saturn? Their orbital periods don’t have any connection to the seasons or any earthly cycles, do they?

Well, interestingly enough, when a planet is pointed in the direction of the Galactic Central Point, it is in the earthy wintery sign of Capricorn. Sagittarius is the constellation where the centre of the Milky Way Galaxy resides, but because of the precession of the equinox, the sign of Capricorn is actually where the constellation of Sagittarius is. This is why some astronomers, when they’re scoffing at the pseudoscientific nature of astrology will say “perhaps you should look at the sign previous to your sign because that’s what the constellation actually is”. In other words, even though I’m a Leo, the sun was actually in the direction of the constellation of Cancer when I was born. In much the same way, when a planet is in Capricorn, it’s actually pointing towards the constellation of Sagittarius, which is where the Galactic Central Point is.

Likewise, when a planet is pointing as far as possible away from Galactic Central Point, and out towards other galaxies and into the unknown, it is in the sign of Cancer. The beginning of summer, the beginning of maximum flourishing and creativity, is when a planet is pointing out from our galaxy and into the great beyond, full of wonder and inspiration. The beginning of winter, the beginning of the long sleep between autumn and spring, is when a planet is pointing inwards, towards Galactic Central Point, grounded in reality and looking inward in quiet reflection.

#astrology #zodiac #jupiter #saturn #milky way galaxy

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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Understanding Astrology part 4

Looking at astrology from a rational, sceptical perspective, it’s hard to understand how the inner planets could possibly have any significant impact. Nevertheless, Venus Sign in particular seems to have a key role in personality and love life. I investigate...

Venus, Mars and Mercury

At first these seem like they would have relatively little impact on the earth or its inhabitants. They are not terribly big planets, so surely their gravitational or magnetic influence would be minimal to non-existent. Venus and Mars might be close to us at times, but it still seems to be stretching it a little to believe that their gravitational influence might affect us at all. And in the case of Mercury and Venus, they are so close to the sun at all times, that the sign they are in is always in the portion of the zodiac close to where the sun is.

Mercury is the easiest to dismiss. It’s only ever in the same sign as the sun, or a sign adjacent to it. It’s also very small and its impact would surely be drowned out by the sun at all times. Finally, it’s not even very noticeable in the night sky, so any psychological or cultural influence would be minimal too. Perhaps though this is why it only represents the mind or mental processing tendencies of the individual. We would expect that to be pretty similar to the sun sign anyway. Mercury isn’t particularly important in astrology actually, and a lot of astrologers overlook it.

However Venus and Mars are considered very important in astrology. And Venus in particular has a powerful impact on someone’s personality, because it governs their love style, love life, attractions and artistic tastes.

Why is this? Venus, like Mercury, is closely tied to the sun in terms of its position at birth. But it does stray a little further. It can be two signs away from the sun at times. If it were to exert a significant influence on us, then we would expect the influence it exerts to be somewhat related to the core sun sign personality. It would after all be approximately in the same season as the sun. Perhaps this is why it governs love life and artistic tastes. These are matters we would expect to be similar to the core personality, or at least at a similar level of maturity (youthful for spring signs, teenage-esque for summer signs, adult for autumn signs, mature for winter signs).

Venus is quite close to us at times. And it’s not as small as Mars or Mercury either. There are also reports, scientific reports, that Venus might be able to affect the weather. The effect on the tides might be minimal compared to the sun and the moon, but it is still ten times the effect of Jupiter, the next most gravitationally impactful planet on the earth. So actually Venus is not so trivial in its impact after all.

The Venus sign is therefore a kind of add on to the sun sign personality – a tweaking, a leaning in a particular direction of the core personality, such as we might expect for a person’s relationship style, romantic desires and taste for beauty.

There may even be a cultural or psychological effect of sorts. The sight of that bright star close to the sun shortly before sunrise or shortly after sunset has inspired poets and artists for centuries. This ties in nicely to its association with romance, art and beauty.

So what about Mars? Mars is the next closest planet to us after Venus. It is small, so perhaps whatever gravitational effect it has is minimal. But subtle effects are amplified if they are slow moving, so that their influence lingers in a particular direction over a significant period of time.

The funny thing about Mars is that it takes two years to go round the signs. In that time the earth also goes around the sun – twice. That means that if, for example, we start at a time where it is the same side of the sun as us, and so pointing in a direction opposite the sun, in the time it takes us to go round half of our orbit, Mars is a quarter of the way round, then we return to our original position and Mars is the opposite side of the sun and in the same sign as the sun. Then we go half the way round the sun again, and it’s just ahead of us. Finally we return to our original position and it’s back to being on the same side of the sun as us, and in the opposite sign to the sun.

There is a constant race of sorts. Mars is hidden behind the sun. Then it’s in front of us when we get round there. Then we catch up to it, and it’s on our side of the sun. Then we race ahead of it. Finally it is hidden from us on the other side again.

It’s like we’re always trying to catch up to Mars, then racing ahead of it, only to fall behind it again, and round and round it goes in a two year cycle.

Is it any wonder then, that whatever minute and subtle influence the gravitational pull of Mars might have, that it is said in astrology to relate to our energy levels, our primal urges, and our desire to get ahead in life? Worth thinking about.

#astrology #venus signs #mars signs #mercury signs

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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Understanding Astrology part 3

Continuing my attempt to understand astrology rationally, this is part 3: the ascendant and the houses

The Ascendant and the Houses

Whether the various influences on your formative personality at birth are interrupted by the earth itself or unaffected by the earth is obviously extremely important too. You would expect any planetary influences that are pulling in a direction beneath the earth to have their effects somewhat dampened by the effect of the earth being in the way, and those that pull upwards, towards the sky, to have their effects somewhat amplified because their influence is unobstructed.

As a result the ascendant is very important and the entire astrological birth chart is formed around it.

It works as follows. The sign on the ascendant will affect what planetary influences rise above the horizon and into the sky, announcing their presence powerfully after previously having their effects dampened, in the hours immediately following birth. Likewise the planetary influences that are setting below the horizon in the few hours immediately following birth, will also be among the weakest, their influence becoming rapidly diminished.

The sign on the horizon affects which parts of your astrology are the most prominent in their impact, and which are of reduced impact. Therefore that sign tends to colour the whole picture too, which is why the ascendant is also an important indicator of core personality.

If for example your ascendant is Aries then all the influences in the spring section of the zodiac will emerge in prominence during the few hours after birth, while all the influences in the autumn section of the zodiac will fade away in prominence during the few hours after birth. Similarly, if your ascendant is in Cancer, then all the influences in the summer section of the zodiac will emerge into prominence shortly after birth, while all the influences in the winter section of the zodiac will fade away from prominence shortly after birth. Thus you would expect a spring-type ascendant to result in a spring-type personality, and a summer-type ascendant to result in a summer-type personality.

Three core aspects of personality then result: the sun sign (basic outlook and attitude towards life), the moon sign (how you handle and process your emotions) and the ascendant (a kind of colouring of the extent of it all)

The planetary influences relevant to the ground beneath your feet, is an effect we can understand even better when we look at the Houses. Each House represents a portion of the sky at birth, either above or below the ground. There are twelve of them, like the twelve signs of the zodiac.

Let’s look at them in four quadrants.

Houses 1 – 3: These are the influences that rise into prominence in the hours immediately following birth. The first house is a powerful indicator of personality because these are the first influences to emerge into prominence shortly after birth. The moment of emergence, the rising above the horizon, is very powerful because an influence that was dampened, suddenly becoming unobstructed involves a bursting forth of energy, a powerful popping into prominence. Thus House 1 is very influential, and so has a connection to personality.

Houses 2 and 3 represent money/belongings and communication respectively. It is easy to understand why this is the case. Both of these factors are also enormous in their impact on a person’s core nature and outlook on life.

Houses 10-12: These Houses are already above the horizon at the moment of birth, already exerting their influence unimpeded. They remain unimpeded for many hours after birth, so these are also pretty strong in their influence.

The 12th house represents intuitional, subconscious influences. That’s because it’s not as strong as those that pop forth after birth, with that burst of energy, but it still carries a profound influence because the energies are unimpeded for the longest. As such it is also powerful on the personality, but in a more subtle way, hence the subconscious, intuitive influences on a person.

The 11th house represents friendship and social life, and the 10th house represents work life and career. This makes sense as these are very public personas related issues. They also sort of mirror the 2nd and 3rd houses. The 11th represents social life, while 3rd represents personal communication style. The 10th represents work life, while the 2nd represents relationship to money and belongings.

Houses 7-9: These are the influences that are unimpeded at first but soon fade below the horizon in the hours shortly after birth. Thus they are falling influences. Perhaps this is why they seem to represent things that you might spend your whole life searching for, because they exert their influence and then disappear below the horizon, tantalisingly out of reach soon afterwards. The most severely tantalising of these “falling” influences then is the 7th house, which represents relationships. The quest for love. This is followed by the 8th house, which represents many bizarre things like magic and the occult but also represents sex, another tantalising thing. Finally the 9th house represents travel, education and religion – more things we spend our lives seeking.

Houses 4-6: These are the influences that are obstructed and remain obstructed for the longest time after birth. The 4th house represents the home and the family, especially childhood family. Perhaps this is because it pulls directly below the earth, giving a sense of what is grounded, a stable base to work from. The 5th and 6th houses represent leisure activities and play (5th house) and health issues and mundane work (6th house). These are, I think we can agree, seemingly trivial and less important matters, which is why they remain obstructed in their influence for the longest time after birth.

The position of the sun and moon especially, but also all the other planetary influences, in the houses of your natal chart, are therefore also highly important to a nuanced understanding of your personality and the issues of your life.

#astrology #rising sign #ascendant #natal chart #houses (astrology)

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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Understanding Astrology part 2

Continuing my attempt to understand why astrology works and try to apply some rationality to it. This time I’m looking at the Moon.

The Moon

The phases of the moon are known to affect the tides, women’s cycles and presumably a lot of biological factors in various forms of life on earth. When the moon is pulling in the same direction as the sun (new moon) you would expect it to create straightforward, almost stereotypical individuals. When it pulls in the opposite direction (full moon), you would expect a complex but balanced individual to result. At right angles (half moon), you would expect complicated individuals but with troubles and difficulties due to being off-balance (like so many of us). The effect would no doubt happen at birth, because that is when you are exposed to these effects instead of engulfed by your mothers’ biological influence. It makes sense that when you’d expect stereotypical and straightforward individuals is when they were born with moon and sun in the same sign. Thus the sign is important for the kind of personality involved.

This is where it taps into cycles too. There are reasons why the signs are where they are and in some senses astrology is the study of cyclical change and the patterns it always takes. The moon cycle is a kind of cycle. And it is related to the sun. Because this relation to the sun is what determines what phase the moon is in. The new moon is always stereotypical – because the sun and moon are in the same sign. Thus the type of personality indicated by the moon sign, is the zodiac sign and not the phase. I will look at cycles and why the signs are where they are when I look at the outer planets. But for now think of it in terms of the seasons – and that cycles always have a spring (growth) phase, a summer (flourishing) stage, an autumn (winding down) stage and a winter (lull) stage. And the signs fit the seasons as noted in the list of signs above.

Thus moon sign and sun sign are the two most significant astrological signs. And because the moon affects biological processes and the effects of the tide on our bodily fluids, it is related to hormones and thus to emotions.

#astrology #moon sign

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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Understanding Astrology part 1

I’ve been trying to make sense of why astrology seems to work and trying to understand it rationally. This is the first part, about sun signs.

The Sun

The time of year in which you are born is bound to affect your personality in very profound ways. Birthdays are very important to children, as is the childhood economy of how long you have to wait between presents. Also your age relative to other children in your class at school tends to have a profound effect on you growing up. Finally the season of the year in which your birthday falls and its proximity to big celebrations such as Christmas, Easter and Halloween will also have a profound effect on you when you’re growing up.

It is therefore my belief that the time of year in which somebody is born will have a formative influence on their basic outlook on and attitude towards life and the world, such as with regards to self-esteem, personal self-image, emotional stability and relationships with money.

The ancient system of astrology may even have some wisdom to it with regards to these forces. The sun signs of the zodiac and the months in which they fall are as follows:

Aries (late March, Early April) – Birthday close to Easter and during the early stages of Spring. This might explain the energetic and self-important Aries personality.

Taurus (late April, early May) – Birthday in mid spring and around the time of the May Bank Holiday (May Day). Taurus tends to be stubborn and quite homely.

Gemini (late May, early June) – Birthday in late spring and around the time of the summer solstice, when days are longest. Gemini is quite restless, with a quick, versatile mind and incessantly talkative and difficult to pin down.

Cancer (late June, early July) – Birthday in early summer, tends to be one of the youngest in their class. Very moody and sensitive.

Leo (late July, early August) – Birthday in mid summer, tends to be one of the youngest in their class. Very attention hungry, warm and creatively expressive.

Virgo (late August, early September) – Birthday in late summer, tends to be either one of the youngest in their class or one of the oldest in their class. Humble, analytical, prone to worry.

Libra (late September, early October) – Birthday in early autumn, tends to be one of the oldest in their class. Very level headed and fair minded but a bit indecisive.

Scorpio (late October, early November) – Birthday in mid autumn and close to Halloween. Apart from Libra and some Virgos, Scorpio will likely be older than most other people in their class. Very intense, likes to calmly exercise power over others, can be grudge bearing and is secretive but intensely emotional underneath. Very magnetic and often quite sexy.

Sagittarius (late November, early December) – Birthday in late autumn, during the run-up to Christmas. Tends to be very intelligent, honest, adventurous and fun-loving. Wants to explore and experience the world.

Capricorn (late December, early January) – Birthday in early winter, very close to Christmas. Has to wait all year round for presents. This makes them very frugal. They are very career oriented, practical and serious minded.

Aquarius (late January, early February) – Birthday in mid winter. They tend to be very bizarre and unorthodox in their ways, but with an intelligence and wisdom, and a humanitarian, activist type of personality. The wise but scatty old wizard of mid winter.

Pisces (late February, early March) – Birthday in late winter. Tend to be sensitive, humble, dreamy and very spiritually in tune.

#astrology #sun sign

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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P.I.S.T. - Chapter 8

Christine doodled in her notebook as she sat in the circle of chairs and waited for the meeting to begin. She didn’t even notice when Sophie entered the room.

“Hi, Chris,” Sophie said, sitting down next to her. “What’s that you’re doing?”

Chris looked up and beamed a smile at her friend. Then she looked back down at her notebook briefly, feeling a little embarrassed. She had been drawing a picture of a ghost and another picture of a werewolf. In between the drawings she had written the words: “what’s next? Vampires?”

“Oh,” said Sophie, looking at the doodles and reading the words. “You’ve been thinking about what happened the other night.”

“It’s silly,” Chris said, hurriedly closing the notebook and putting it away in her bag. “I must be nuts. One drunken experience and a weird blood sample don’t prove anything. Vampires…” she laughed. “Of course they’re not real.” Then she looked up at Sophie again, a moment of fear and doubt in her mind. “Are they?”

Sophie looked as worried as Chris felt. She shrugged her shoulders, her eyes wide with bafflement. “I don’t know,” she replied in that beautiful Indian accent of hers. “If you asked me a few weeks ago I’d have told you that ghosts and werecreatures weren’t real too. Now I’m not so sure.”

“Any updates on the blood sample?” Chris asked.

Sophie tightened her lips and looked down at her feet. “I should never have told you about that,” she said. “Patient files are confidential.”

Chris let it go. It was none of her business really and she shouldn’t pry.

“It’s looking no clearer though,” Sophie told her. “I’m a woman of science. I always prided myself on not believing in superstition. I don’t even follow my parents’ faith. But now I don’t know what to believe.”

Chris felt sympathetic to her new friend’s plight. She felt much the same way about it. “Well, whatever it is,” she explained, as helpfully as she could. “It’s not religion or superstition, is it? If it’s real then it’s scientific. It’s measurable. It’s fact.”

Sophie looked up at her and smiled. “But I keep wondering.” She said, her eyebrows crinkling slightly in puzzlement. “What if the scientific facts turn out to support the idea of the supernatural? What do we do then? It will overturn everything.”

“Then we’ll just have to deal with that when it comes to it,” Chris assured her. “In the meantime there are lots of possible explanations that don’t necessarily involve ancient curses or souls surviving death.”

“It’s a problem for the philosophers in any case,” Sophie agreed, visibly relaxing again. “Not doctors and scientists. We just collect the data. It’s up to society to work out what it means.”

“Exactly,” Chris said with a reassuring smile. “Try not to worry about it.”

Eventually the meeting started. Wendy, the group co-ordinator, made some announcements and then got everyone to introduce themselves, going round in the circle.

“So,” Wendy said after the introductions were finished, and casting a sideways glance at Chris, “if we can avoid getting side-tracked by discussions about whether the transgenders count as women, there are several important activist concerns to attend to this month…”

There were a few murmurs and giggles around the room and Christine noticed Heather looking in her direction with a self-satisfied smirk. Wendy started talking about a woman’s march and the attention turned back towards the issue at hand.

But Chris found it hard to even listen to the meeting after that. She was starting to feel like she didn’t belong here and wasn’t welcome anymore. It was like playground bullying and it was horrendous. Why should she be humiliated and thought less of just for voicing a difference of opinion? She wondered, not for the first time, if this was really the right group for her after all. Should she side with the intersectional fourth wavers? Maybe they weren’t so bad and she had misjudged them all this time.

Sophie seemed to notice her discomfort. She felt the Asian lady’s slender hand reach out to touch hers. They held hands then and Sophie squeezed her fingers comfortingly in Christine’s palm. Chris looked up at Sophie. Their eyes met. They smiled.

At least she had a friend in Sophie. And they had experienced something that no one else here had seen. They had also shared something else very special, Chris thought to herself with a naughty rush of joy.

Just then the meeting was interrupted by a sudden low moaning sound, like a woman in pain. Everyone stopped talking. Chris and Sophie let go of each other’s hands, their faces no longer smiling but looking at each other in alarm. Chris remembered that groaning sound well.

“What the hell is that?” One of the other women asked, looking round the room.

“Is she alright?” Another said, also searching for the source of the sound. “Where’s that coming from anyway?”

“It’s probably nothing,” Wendy said, waving her hand dismissively, although her eyes looked as frightened as everyone else’s. “If we can just ignore it and try to carry on…”

They tried their best to continue the discussion but Chris suddenly found herself dragged away from the present moment, as if by a waking dream.

“I can’t believe this!” The young woman screamed at them all, standing up suddenly so that her chair fell backwards. “I was attacked!” She said, gesticulating wildly as she spoke. “I’ve experienced all the same things you have. And you talk to me about male privilege and how I’m not a real woman!”

Christine realised with shock as she experienced this that she had been here before. This had actually happened a few years ago. Looking round the circle of chairs, she could see that Wendy was there too, and Heather also.

“There you go again,” Heather replied with a rolling of her eyes. “You know, you’re giving off a lot of male energy right now. This is a woman’s group. And while I appreciate that you might also have been a victim of male violence,” she added in a smug voice, her eyes half shut, “your claim that you have experienced actual sexism and misogyny when you were socialised as a boy and experienced nothing of what it’s like to grow up as a little girl is quite frankly disgustingly insulting. You don’t know what it’s like to be oppressed because you have a womb and every man sees you as a baby making machine.” She continued, pointing accusatorily at the woman and looking her in the eye. “You’ve never had periods. You don’t have to worry that sex with a man might make you pregnant. You don’t know what it’s like to be a real woman and so maybe you should just sit down and listen to real women’s experiences, instead of talking over us like a man.”

The woman who had stood up to speak, a woman that Chris now remembered was called Jessica and who was transgender, looked utterly heartbroken and crestfallen as she sat down again. Somehow Chris hadn’t remembered that part from when it happened years ago. She had written it off as a weird bit of drama that happened in the group one month. She had only met Jessica that once and the memory had faded from her mind quite rapidly. Knowing what she knew now, Christine was honestly shocked that a vulnerable trans woman had entered her life for one brief moment and she had been so unaware of transgender issues at the time that she had been complicit in the group’s ill treatment of her.

“But I’m not a man,” Jessica said in a voice so hollow and wracked with pain that it broke Chris’s heart to hear it. “I am a woman. I was beaten and raped and…” She broke off, almost sobbing. “I thought I’d be welcome here,” she added, standing up again. “I thought I’d find some support. I can see I was wrong.”

Jessica turned round and left the room. Christine could hear now that she was sniffing back tears as she went, her high heels clacking hurriedly on the floor.

“Good riddens,” said Heather heartlessly. There was laughter. Christine noticed with shock that she also had been laughing, relieved that the drama was over.

Suddenly Chris was back in the present day. But no one was talking anymore. They were all looking at each other in fear and confusion. Had they all just experienced what she had seen?

The moaning got louder and then a wispy, indistinct shape appeared in the middle of the circle. It was in the form of a woman, her skin pale and white, red marks on her wrists. Although the woman’s gaunt face was wailing, the skin was drained of colour and her hair was draped over her eyes, Christine could just make out from the facial features that this woman was indeed Jessica, the trans woman from years ago.

Suddenly Jessica lifted her head and the hair fell back to reveal a look of fury in her eyes. The moaning turned into a growl of anger and an echoey, otherworldly voice sounded from that open mouth. “It’s your fault!” Jessica screamed at them all. “All of you! You did this to me!”

The lights flickered and blew. A gust of wind swirled around the room. And most horrifyingly of all, drops of red liquid fell from the ceiling.

The apparition flew wildly around the room, screaming incoherently at them all with a terrifying mixture of rage and torment, bleeding all the while from her thin wrists.

Everyone panicked and fled the room. Chris grabbed Sophie’s hand once more and together they ran outside, fleeing the building and running out into the street.

Panting for breath as they ran round the corner, they stopped outside a posh looking cafeteria. Chris turned to her friend and lover and spoke what was foremost on her mind. “That does it,” she said. “We’re going to grandma’s house.”

“What’s this all about, dear?” Grandma said as she opened the front door to greet them.

The sun was shining and the birds were singing outside Grandma’s quaint little house on the edge of town. There were pink roses painted on the white door frame and an array of real flowers, yellow, red and blue, in the flower beds of the front garden. The lawn needed cutting a little, but was otherwise neat and tidy. On the left hand side there was a driveway without a car and another door at the back that led to the kitchen.

Grandma was dressed modestly and simply, her feet still in slippers as she met them. “Who’s this?” She said, looking at Sophie.

“This is my friend, Sophie.” Chris told her hurriedly. “I need to see Grandpa’s old things.”

“Oh, Christine,” said Grandma in a disappointed tone of voice. She sounded just like Chris’s mum. “What do you want with all that junk?”

“I want to honour his memory,” Chris said fiercely. “Can’t a granddaughter reminisce about her dear old Grandpa?”

“Well, of course,” grandma replied, turning round to lead them inside, visibly flustered by the sudden outburst. “Far be it from me to stand in the way of your grief or your love for your Grandpa.” They followed her into the kitchen. A pot was on the hob, boiling what smelled like vegetable soup. There was an unmistakeable scent of leek. “You always were a strange girl. And you and your Grandad always got along so well. It was touching really. But that hobby of his…”

Chris didn’t want to hear it. “Down in the cellar, is it?” She asked.

“Well, yes…” said Grandma, again taken aback by Chris’s attitude. “It always has been. Do you and your friend want a cup of tea or anything?”

“Yes, thank you,” Sophie said, smiling and polite. “That would be lovely.”

“Yes, thanks Gran,” Chris said, more dismissively than her friend. There were important things at stake and no time for chit chat. She turned to leave for the cellar, taking Sophie with her. “We’ll be up in a bit. Just after I’ve shown Sophie all Grandad’s old things.”

“Fine, fine,” Grandma called out as they left. Chris could still hear her talking as they walked down the steps to the cellar. “I don’t know what you youngsters see in all that old nonsense but be my guest. I’ll get you some cake too, shall I?”

Reaching the bottom of the stairs and switching on the light, Chris and Sophie got to work, rummaging around in some old boxes, cupboards and drawers. Eventually Chris found all the paperwork for the Psychic Investigation Group, along with many old photographs of paranormal phenomenon, some measurements from archaic equipment the investigators had used and various correspondence and eye witness accounts of paranormal activity.

“This is amazing,” Sophie said, flipping through the pages and marvelling at what Chris showed her. “Did he make a lot of money or any kind of name for himself with all this?”

“He had a book published,” Chris told her. “I’ve got a copy in my room. And he was sort of semi-famous at the time, yes. But he didn’t really make much money from it, I’m afraid.”

“Well,” she replied, “it seems like an interesting life, anyway.”

“Junk she called it!” Said Chris, feeling that indignant need to defend her Grandpa from her family’s disapproval of him. “Ridiculous bunkum, my Dad said. Well, we know different now, don’t we?”

“You said the explanation might not be supernatural after all,” Sophie reminded her, putting down what she was reading to look Chris in the face.

“Maybe,” said Chris, collecting as much of the paperwork together as she could, “maybe not. But it still needs investigating, doesn’t it? That’s what he was about, and that’s what we need to do too.” Chris looked up, making eye contact with Sophie. “We both saw that ghost; not just once, but twice. And you found a man with corvid DNA in his blood, a man who said he turned into a crow every month at new moon.”

“Well, yes…” said Sophie, looking away slightly, her brow furrowed with doubt.

“So we have ghosts and were creatures to investigate,” Chris concluded, reaching out to touch her friend’s arm. “It’s time, Sophie. It’s time to honour Grandad’s memory.” Sophie looked up again and their eyes met, as Chris stated her intent with new confidence and determination. “I’m going to rebuild William McInnery’s Psychic Investigation Group for the modern age!”

This is the last chapter of the story that I’m posting on this blog. To read the rest of the book, please buy The Psychic Investigation and Study Team on Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

#fiction #fantasy #supernatural #writing #novel #lgbt #ghost

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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P.I.S.T. - Chapter 7

Emily had been a vicar for five weeks now. This was her fourth sermon. As she took to the pulpit and began to address the congregation, she noticed that one of her parishioners was absent.

She saw the woman’s husband, a tall, bulky man with messy hair and deep set eyes. He always stank of booze and she understood that he had a drinking problem. She had been concerned about this but didn’t want to pry, especially as she was new. But his wife often came in with bruises about her face. She had been meaning to find out what was going on there and if there was anything she could do to help the situation. But she meant to take a cautious, measured approach to the matter and gently tease out the facts without upsetting things too much. This week the wife was not in the congregation, which only made Emily more concerned than usual.

As she continued her sermon, the congregation hushed and attentive as she addressed the large room, she could feel the angel on her back stirring uncomfortably. “Focus,” it whispered in her ear. “You ask too many questions. You are wilful and rebellious, like all sinners. Focus on preaching God’s word. Stop looking for problems. That’s the sinful nature in you.”

For five weeks she had been learning to cope with her new companion. It was always with her. It never left her. And yet no one else could see it.

She still called it her angel, as she did not dare to challenge its nature openly. It knew everything she thought or said. It even seemed to sense her doubts when she tried her best to hide them, even from herself. She could feel it bristling with discomfort and annoyance whenever the merest hint of doubt or displeasure surfaced within her. If she openly questioned whether the thing was really an angel and whether the thing was even good, there was no telling what it might do. It chastised her and told her she was worthless, rebellious and sinful on an almost daily basis anyway. What worse thing would await her if she openly challenged it?

Emily was even starting to doubt her own sanity. Was the creature even real? Did she imagine the whole thing? Was she mentally ill? She could feel its presence and every time she looked around she could see its ugly face. But no one else noticed it or commented on it. The creature seemed invisible to all but her.

After the service, she shook the hands of all the congregation as they left. When Mr. Baines approached she asked him about his wife.

“How’s your wife, Cathy?” Emily asked. “I see she’s not here today. Is she ill?”

“She’s had an accident,” the big man replied. He looked ridiculous in his smart clothes, like he was too big for them, and he stank of alcohol and cigarettes. “She’s in hospital.” He was a man of few words and there was no visible emotion on his big, brutish face.

“Oh, what a pity,” said Emily with a fake smile, trying her best to be polite and professional even though she hated the man. “I will pray for her. Send her my regards when you see her. What happened?”

The man’s eyes shiftily darted left and right for a moment. She could almost see the cogs working in his simple mind. “Car crash,” he said at last. He’d clearly just thought of that on the spur of the moment. Why the sheepishness? What had really happened?

“Well,” Emily said, shaking the man’s hands and smiling again. “I hope she gets well soon. See you again next week.”

After all the hand shaking was done, Emily walked back inside the church with the intention of tidying up and eventually retiring to her chambers for lunch. But one of the congregation returned and called out to her.

She spun round. It was Cathy’s sister, Margery. She was a thin, wiry looking woman in her early forties. Her greying black hair was long and unkempt and her face was lined with worry and stress. “Might I have a word with you in private, vicar?” She said.

“Of course,” Emily replied, looking around at the empty chapel. “There’s no one else here now. What did you want to talk to me about?”

“My sister isn’t in hospital because of a car crash,” said Margery. “It was him.”

This confirmed Emily’s suspicion. “Does he hit her?” she asked, screwing up her face in concern.

“Drunken bastard,” Margery swore, her face scowling with rage, “without a scrap of compassion in his big, ugly body. Yes, he hits her. He gets drunk and he shouts at her, bashes her and worse. He’s horrible when he’s drunk. This time she ended up in hospital,” she added, becoming increasingly animated and passionate. “I’ve told her. I said to her many times to leave him. Move back with your mum, I’d say. He’s no good. She just keeps talking about her marriage vows and being a good wife.”

Emily was torn. Church teaching did hold marriage sacred. “Well, I…” she began but Margery cut her off.

“Begging your pardon,” she continued, “I don’t like to speak poorly of the church or anything. But Rev. Williams, the previous vicar, he spoke to her many times about the abuse she was suffering. He counselled her. But all he did was tell her to pray and to continue to be a good wife to her husband. He was useless in this matter. Don’t you think the church has a responsibility to keep its parishioners safe?” She paused briefly, letting the question hang in the air. “I mean if she is in real danger, then shouldn’t a compassionate Christian organisation be doing all it can to help her, instead of advising her to just put up with it and be obedient and good? What the fuck is that? Excuse my French.”

Emily took it all in, unruffled by the swearing. It hurt her heart to think of that woman suffering. “I’ll do all I can,” she said with a compassionate smile.

“Well, I hope you do,” said Margery. “I don’t come very often these days. Sick to death in my very heart with it all. But perhaps you’ll be better than the last vicar.” She almost turned to go but then stopped herself and turned back around. “She’s such a sweet girl,” she continued, love and concern on her stressed, haggard face. “It’s not fair that she should be married to a heartless bastard like him. We don’t even speak no more, me and him. He’s a vicious asshole. Sorry for the language, vicar, but it’s very upsetting. She’s my sister. And she’s in hospital because of him.”

“I understand,” Emily said compassionately. It was all very distressing. “And I hope I can change your mind and help you see that the church does care. I will do all I can to help.”

“Thank you,” Margery said with a smile. “What a joy it is to have a female vicar for a change.” Then she turned and left.

Susan, the church secretary, was printing out some letters when Emily walked into the admin office of the church. “Good sermon,” she said, barely even looking at Emily as she continued her work. The printer whirred away as page after page dropped into the tray. Susan took out the pages and started putting them into envelopes.

“Thank you,” Emily replied. “Do you know much about Cathy Baines and her husband? I’ve just been told she’s in hospital and the sister told me that it was her husband that put her there.”

Susan stopped what she was doing and frowned slightly. She was a plump lady, blonde and with long manicured fingernails. She was also the kindest, bubbliest, nicest lady that Emily had met in a long time. She looked up at Emily and answered. “Rev. Williams was counselling her,” she said. “The husband is known to be a violent drunk, it’s true. Very sad.”

“Well, can I see the notes from the counselling sessions?” Emily asked. “I think that now they’re my parishioners that I’m responsible for their wellbeing.”

“Yes, of course,” Susan frowned again, looking puzzled and worried. “Only I don’t know where he kept the notes. A lot of that old paperwork is down in the basement. You could look there I suppose. I never go down there myself.” She added the last comment almost as an aside.

“Why not?” Emily asked, suddenly intrigued.

Susan visibly shuddered. “I don’t like to think about it,” she said, avoiding eye contact.

Emily stared, puzzled for a while and Susan got back to work. “You should leave well alone,” said the angel on her back. “This is a distraction from the Lord’s work.”

“Did you hear that?” Emily asked.

Susan looked up from her work again. “Hear what?” She said, looking confused.

“Can you see it on my back?” Emily asked, turning round to show her.

Susan looked wide eyed at Emily, as if scared. The look in her eyes said that she thought Emily was touched. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said with a nervous smile. “There’s nothing on your back.”

Emily sighed. It was just as she thought. “Don’t worry about it,” she said. Then she turned to leave.

She passed Peter, the groundsman, on her way down to the basement.

“This way leads to the basement, right?” She asked the old man.

“Yes,” he said in an uncertain tone, stopping and turning to face her with one eyebrow raised. “But I wouldn’t go down there if I were you.”

She looked him up and down. His clothes were creased and his trousers and shoes were splattered with mud. His long, talon-like fingernails were dirty and yellowed. His beard was unkempt and he smelled of sweat. He wasn’t a very attractive man and he had a kind of leering creepiness about him that made her uncomfortable.

“What do you mean?” She asked, narrowing her eyes with suspicion.

“I just wouldn’t,” he replied, taking a deep breath. “There’s something nasty down there.”

Emily rolled her eyes. “Some dark secret that the Church keeps hidden?” She said, only half seriously, before adding angrily, “or paperwork that nobody wants me to see?” She was getting a bit fed up with all the games people were playing with her. Why couldn’t people just tell the truth?

“No, it’s not that.” He said, shaking his head. “There’s something lurking down there,” he added, widening his eyes dramatically and fixing her with a foreboding stare, “a dark presence.”

“Oh, please!” ��She said, mockingly quoting The Empire Strikes Back. “That place is strong with the dark side. A domain of evil, it is. Do me a favour and pull the other one. It’s got bells on.”

He merely shrugged and walked away. “I warned you,” he said, shaking his head.

“Look at yourself,” the angel said as she opened the door and descended the steps, “look at all your pride and arrogance. Your cocky rebellious streak is an offence against God. After all he did for you when he died upon the cross. You defy your elders, pry when you’ve been told to let it go. When are you going to turn your back on all your sin and wickedness?”

“Not now,” she whispered to it. “We can talk about this later. I just want to see for myself what Rev. Williams wrote.”

The place was dark, the walls slimy and it smelled of damp, but she turned on the light and it gave a dim glow to the surroundings. There were plenty of crates and bric a brac but there were also some boxes. She made a beeline for the boxes and immediately started rummaging around, rifling through the papers, looking for the notes.

The room turned suddenly cold as she searched the boxes and there was a dull kind of croaking. But she paid it no mind. Old buildings like this could often play tricks on you. If the creak of wind or a sudden drop of temperature was all it took to make people believe the place was haunted by some kind of “dark presence” then she knew she had little to worry about.

There was a lot of paperwork to get through, a lot of notes from various meetings and counselling sessions. It was going to take quite some time to find what she was looking for.

Suddenly she saw a black shape out of the corner of her vision. The barely perceptible croaking sound got louder and angrier until it was a deep growling. She turned to look at the shape. It was like a cloud of shadow with two red eyes. A mouth opened up and revealed large needle like teeth.

“What the…?” She said.

“It’s your fault!” It said in a deep, throaty voice, full of barely suppressed fury. “You brought me here! You killed me and then brought me back. Fuck all you priests and your evil church!”

It roared at her with rage and lunged towards her. There was a gust of wind and the papers flew everywhere. Suddenly it was upon her, all teeth and claws, eyes and shadow. “I will make you fall!” It screamed. “I will bring your religion down and eat your soul!”

It was insubstantial. The shadows moved through her like wind. It felt icy cold and she wondered if she could die just from the chill.

She turned and ran but it chased after her. It roared and screamed, incomprehensibly now, the frantic ranting having turned into non-verbal noise. “It can’t harm me,” she told herself. “It has no body.” Yet claws appeared and she felt them scratch at her while teeth gnashed angrily only inches from her face.

She wasn’t going to risk it. She dropped what she was carrying and hurried back upstairs and out through the door, with not a single piece of paperwork to show for her trouble.

She stood with her back to a wall, panting desperately until she got her breath back.

“Gone strangely silent now, haven’t you?” She said at last, speaking to her angel, who was still attached to her like a child riding piggyback on her shoulders.

“I told you to leave well alone,” it said. “You did not listen because you are still wicked and locked in sin.”

Later that evening, alone in her vicarage, she phoned Rev. Williams for his advice. She sat back on the sofa in her warm, cosy living room and picked up the phone. She dialled the number, he replied and they began to talk.

“You were vicar here before me,” she said. “You never told me about the ghost in the basement!”

“It wasn’t there for most of my career,” he said on the other end of the line. “It reappeared maybe three months ago.”

“What is it?” She asked. “Who is it?”

“A heretic they burnt as a witch centuries ago,” he explained. “He came back as a wraith to torment and destroy the preachers that burnt him. Or so the story goes.” Emily paused to think. She felt frightened that such a creature could be lurking in the church, waiting to attack her. “I only looked into it briefly when the hauntings began again,” Father Williams continued. “It’s an old fable from the 17th century. He’s not been seen for nearly three hundred years.”

“Until now,” Emily mused.

“It’s really best not to go down there.” Rev. Williams said. “Not even Peter likes to venture into the basement anymore. What were you doing down there anyway?”

“I was looking for some of your old counselling notes,” she said, slightly sheepishly.

“Why?”

“Cathy Baines is in hospital because of her husband,” she said, feeling suddenly angry. “I wanted to see what she said to you. What you said to her. She’s my responsibility now, you see.”

He sighed. “There’s nothing you can do, believe me,” he said. “Sad though it is. Marriage is a holy vow. Perhaps the light of Christ can help him reform his ways. But she has to submit to him in every way and stay loyal to her husband. It’s written in the scriptures that a wife must obey her spouse.”

“But she’s in the hospital with God only knows what injuries!” Emily protested. “Must she continue to endure such misery? Is that really God’s way? Is that the compassion of Christ?”

“I understand, I do,” he said. “But we have to abide by the strictures of our faith. Advise him to give up the drink and to love his wife. Advise her to help him overcome his weakness and to pray. You must pray for them both too. Offer her whatever counselling she needs. And him too. There’s really nothing else you can do about the situation.”

“I told you,” the angel added. “Turn from your sinful rebellion and wickedness. Walk in the way of the Cross.”

She sighed. It was true. There was nothing she could do about it. “This angel I met,” she said, changing the subject.

“I have one too,” he replied, as if reading her thoughts.

“Why can no one else see it?” She asked.

“They are invisible to all except the one who carries them.” He said.

“Does it scold and lecture you too?” She asked. “Does it criticise you constantly and tell you how you’ve fallen from the way? It’s almost constantly doing it with me. And the face! Why has its appearance changed from the innocent creature I saw near the woods? What is it really?”

His voice became hard. “It’s an angel,” he said in a no-nonsense way. “It’s your own personal guardian angel. All priests have them, in every denomination or so I’ve heard. It’s there to help you, to guide you, to keep you on the straight and narrow. And the less you question it and the more you obey, the less it will reprimand or criticise you. Eventually you’ll be at peace.”

“It never criticises you anymore?” She asked.

“I have my moments,” he answered.

“But didn’t God give us a brain so that we could question and think for ourselves?” She asked. “Isn’t that why he gave us free will in the first place? Isn’t that the whole point of his infinite grace and forgiveness? What’s the point of obedience that comes from fear of chastisement?”

“Oh, how you have fallen,” Rev. Williams replied. “I can see why it’s giving you such a hard time. We have free will, yes. But we must also repent and serve the Lord faithfully. I’m a good priest,” he added, his voice quivering with sudden anxiety. “I am good. I obey my Lord and saviour. All questions, all wickedness and rebellion have been taken from me.”

Who are you trying to convince? She thought. “Where’s your individual spirit, Rev. Williams?” She asked.

“It’s gone,” he said. The sadness in his voice was clearly audible. “I have surrendered it to the Lord.”

“Thank you,” she said. “I will try to follow your example.” She put the phone down. It was a lie of course. She was more worried than ever about the nature and intentions of the creature on her back. But she tried her best to bury the thoughts. It knew everything she did or felt.

It had been an exhausting day. She pulled out a bottle of whisky from her cupboard and poured herself a large one.

“And now you turn to drink,” the angel said. “A shepherd is supposed to set an example for his flock. See how deep in sin you are?”

“Oh, shut up!” She said.

I’m only posting the first 8 chapters of this story on this blog. To read the rest of the book, please buy The Psychic Investigation and Study Team on Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

#fiction #fantasy #supernatural #writing #novel #lgbt #ghost #wraith

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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P.I.S.T - Chapter 6

It was some high energy house song with a sample of Led Zeppelin’s Kashmir in it. Chris didn’t know the track but those Eastern flavours brought out something in Sophie. She danced so exotically in front of Christine, waving her arms about in that vague, belly dancing way, fixing Chris with a seductive stare while licking her lips and smiling. The shy, gentle young woman she had met in the feminist group had given way, with a little help from a few drinks and some good music, to a confident, sexually alluring woman. Christine felt suddenly in awe of her new friend.

When the song was over and some boring indie track came on, Christine took Sophie to a quiet corner of the bar for a chat. There were less people here and the music was more subdued. There was a gay couple at the bar, and another at one of the other tables, plus a couple of single women hanging about. It was a busy night at the Barley Mow.

“You like it here, I take it?” She asked her new friend.

“Yeah, it’s good.” Sophie said with a smile as she sipped her cocktail through a straw. “A bit small town and quaint compared with the clubs in London. But it’s nice.”

“Is that where you’re from?” Christine asked, taking a sip of her own drink. “London?”

“Originally, yes,” Sophie replied. “But I moved to Bedford shortly after graduating and never looked back. Small towns are quite relaxing after the hub bub of the capital.”

“How many years since you graduated?” Chris asked.

“Thirteen, fourteen,” Sophie replied, “something like that.”

“And all that time, you’ve never come to the gay bar?” Chris said, surprised.

“Well, being a doctor kind of saps all your free time.”

“How do you meet girls?”

“Oh, there are ways,” Sophie explained. “But truth is I’ve only had two romantic partners in my whole life.” She paused and sighed slightly. “A busy life is a lonely life.”

“Well, I hope you can make it out here again,” said Chris, smiling. “The feminist group is ok, but it’s no place for really getting to know someone. They have lesbian nights once a month here, so…”

“What about you?” Sophie asked, interrupting. “Have you had many partners?”

“Ah,” said Chris, turning away and blushing. “I wouldn’t want to make you jealous.”

Sophie laughed. “Oh, that many, hey?” She said. “What’s your secret?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Chris replied, looking Sophie in the face again, but still feeling a bit embarrassed. “I’m kind and pretty but kind of edgy and butch in my politics and fashion sense. It seems to be quite an attractive combination in a lesbian.”

“Well, yeah,” said Sophie, with a sudden grin. Then it was her turn to look away, embarrassed. “You are pretty fucking cool and awesome. I will say that much.”

“Really?” said Chris, reaching out to touch the doctor’s hand. Sophie turned her head back round in surprise. Their eyes met. There was a tense pause.

“Yes,” Sophie said with a vulnerability and tenderness that touched Christine’s heart. “Really.” Another pause. “In fact I would even go so far as to say beautiful.”

“I think you’re beautiful too,” Chris added softly, leaning in to kiss her and almost whispering, “very beautiful.”

Before their lips met however there was a scream from the other side of the dancefloor. The toilet doors burst open and a young woman came running out. Sophie and Christine both looked up to see the commotion.

“What’s going on?” Christine said, more as an expression than an actual question. She got up and started to walk back to where the dancing was.

“Ah, it’s the same old trouble we had five or six years ago,” the barman answered her. “It’s been happening again these last couple of months.”

“What trouble?” Sophie asked, also standing up.

Suddenly the girl who had ran out of the toilets, barged past Christine, putting on her coat and bag hurriedly. “I don’t know what the fuck that was,” she said as she bustled past. “But I’m going home.”

Back on the dancefloor, the DJ was urging everyone to remain calm. Not many people were dancing anymore and there were a crowd of people around the toilets, looking confused and troubled, arguing with each other.

Christine walked over to the dancefloor, past the gawping crowds and to the toilets. Sophie hurried along after her.

“I wouldn’t go in there, if I were you,” said some random gay guy. “Someone said there was a nutter with blood all over her.”

“Well, if someone’s hurt,” Chris responded, “don’t you think we should help them?”

“It’s not a nutter,” said a woman nearby. “It’s a ghost. You heard the way the girl screamed.”

“Where are we gonna pee now,” someone else asked, “if we can’t go in there?”

It was a good point. “Exactly,” Chris added as Sophie caught up with her. “So I guess somebody should investigate for everyone, shouldn’t they? So get out of my way, please.”

It was like something out of a horror film. The lights were flickering. There were drips of water coming from the ceiling. What kind of toilet was this? Inside one of the cubicles was a woman groaning as if in pain.

“Are you alright, darling?” Chris called out to the mystery woman. “Can I help at all?”

“Let me in!” The woman replied. Her voice sounded cracked and low in pitch, whether from age or for some other reason, Chris couldn’t tell.

“But you are in,” said Chris, creeping closer. Sophie stayed by the door. “Don’t you mean let you out?”

“Let me in or I’ll die,” said the woman behind the door. She sounded so miserable, as if empty and lost inside. “You are the reason. You are all the reason.”

“I don’t understand,” Chris said. “Are you hurt? The others said they saw blood.”

“Blood…” The woman replied. Her voice sounded kind of deranged, trance-like almost. “So much blood. It happened when I got home.”

“What happened?” Chris asked, reaching the cubicle door and tapping it slightly. “Can you let me in?” To her surprise it swung open. It wasn’t even locked.

She looked down to see a gaunt, frail looking woman sitting there, her blonde hair caked with blood, her body trembling. The woman looked up at her and slowly turned her wrists around so that Christine could see the deep cuts up the arms, the blood still oozing out of them in thick streams.

“It’s your fault!!!” She screamed. “You did this to me!”

The woman lunged at her, clutching Christine by the throat. She could feel the cold blood flowing onto her neck and chest. Why was it cold when it was fresh from the vein? She tried to fight off the bleeding woman but to no avail.

Then it flashed into her mind in a burst of disconnected images. A woman was turned away from the night club. Chris could feel the sorrow and loneliness as if it were her own, the rain on her face. A crowd of terrifying men harassed and assaulted her on her way home. Chris could feel the terror of that moment, the pain as strong, male hands smacked her across the face, the humiliation as they tore at her clothes. She opened the door to her house, ran upstairs to the bathroom and grabbed a razor blade. “I’ll never be happy,” she thought. “They’ll never accept me. No matter what I do I’ll always be miserable.” Then she put the blade deep into her wrist. Chris could feel the sharp shock of pain. She pulled the razor up her arm, causing thick, red blood to flow.

Christine cried out in alarm and sat up at the exact same time as a glass of water was thrown on her face to rouse her.

“Where is she?” Chris asked, looking round desperately. She was outside the toilets now. “What happened?”

“The ghost throttled you and you fell down limp on the floor,” Sophie explained. “Then it flew about the place screaming. I pulled you out of there as quick as I could.”

People were standing in a circle around them. Some were crouched down, trying to help. There was still music playing however. As Christine’s senses returned to normal, she was dimly aware that they were in a nightclub with people still dancing nearby.

“See I told you,” said the same woman from before. “Those toilets are haunted.”

“Come on,” Sophie said, pulling Chris to her feet. “Let’s go. I’ll get us a taxi back to my place.”

It was a lot calmer at Sophie’s house. Despite the trauma they’d both experienced they both felt much more relaxed when they got inside. The place was roomy and clean. There were black leather seats in the living room, metallic chairs and cupboards in the kitchen, black marble work surfaces. It was modern, minimalist, impressive.

“This is a nice place,” Chris said admiringly.

“Doctor’s earn well,” Sophie replied. “Do you want a drink? Something alcoholic or a coffee perhaps?”

“Coffee I think,” said Chris, sitting down on a stool in the kitchen. She was still sober. But after her shock she didn’t much feel like drinking.

“Well that was certainly eventful,” said Sophie as she switched on the kettle and got the cups ready.

“Yeah, I’m sorry about that,” Chris told her. “That’s not what it’s normally like in there.”

“I don’t know what to make of it really,” Sophie added, making the coffee. “I’m an educated woman from a scientific background. I don’t believe in ghosts. But there’s no denying what we saw, is there?”

“The funny thing is,” Chris said, pausing to think slightly before continuing, “my grandfather used to study the paranormal. The rest of the family think he was nuts. They view him as something of an embarrassment. But I loved the old man and admired him for what he did.”

“Where is he now?” Sophie asked.

“Dead,” Chris said sadly.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” said Sophie.

“It’s ok. It was years ago.”

“What are the rest of your family like?” Sophie asked, sitting down opposite Christine and putting the cups of coffee down.

“My parents think I’m a waste of space,” Chris told her, looking away. “They reckon I should stop drifting through life and get a proper job.”

“What do you do?” Sophie asked.

“I’m an art student,” Chris replied with a smile, turning her head to look Sophie in the eye. “And I work at a vegetarian restaurant.”

“Well, that’s an honest job,” said Sophie, raising her eyebrows in sympathy. “And at least you’re trying to make something of yourself.”

“I know,” said Chris. “And they’re such stiff, judgemental snobs,” she added with a frown. “They’re always looking down at the work I do for feminism and the LGBT community. I mean, it’s important. I believe in it.”

“I think you’re an inspiration.” Sophie said, fixing Christine with another admiring look. “I would be proud if you were my daughter.”

Christine felt her heart melt. She reached out and touched Sophie’s hand again. They looked in each other’s eyes. “I’ve never met a woman as kind and gentle as you,” she said. She leaned in again. This time their lips met.

The sex was wonderful. They rolled around in passion. They kissed, they touched, they ate each other out. They writhed together, face to face. They rubbed against each other with fierce, sweaty, blissful abandon. Hands and fingers probed into labia and vagina, rubbed against clitoris. They kissed and sucked each other’s breasts. They used toys, fingers and tongues to bring each other to pleasure. They thrust against each other until they both orgasmed. Then they lay in happy ecstasy in each other’s arms, talking and stroking each other’s hair until it was time to sleep. It was the best night Chris had experienced for a long, long time.

An urgent tapping as of fingers on a keyboard awoke Chris in the early hours of the morning. She rolled over with a groan, trying to get back to sleep. “What the hell?” Sophie said.

Chris tried her best to drift off again and might actually have managed it for a short while. But then she heard Sophie talking to someone.

“Are you sure?” Sophie asked. “Well, have you ever seen anything similar in other gene samples? Could there be any other explanation?” There was a pause. “No, I don’t want you to tell anyone else about this just yet. Let’s just keep it between us two until I’ve thought this through. I mean, when you say it’s dormant, is there anything in particular that could trigger it?” Another pause. “I see. Well I’d better let you go for now but one more thing, Michael. I know this might sound funny but can you run a test to see how the tidal effect of the moon might affect it? Well, do it anyway. Humour me. Ok, speak to you again soon.”

Chris sat up and opened her bleary eyes. She saw Sophie put her mobile phone down on the bed and then return to her laptop. “Oh, this is very strange,” Sophie muttered to herself. “Very strange indeed.”

“What is it?” Chris asked. Sophie turned round.

“Sorry to wake you,” Sophie told her. “It’s a work thing.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” said Chris.

“I’m not sure I can,” Sophie replied, “patient confidentiality and all that.”

“Well,” said Chris, sitting up, “I’m sure you could share with me the gist of the problem without giving away the patient’s name.”

Sophie looked at her screen and sighed. “I suppose,” she agreed, “especially after what we witnessed last night.”

That struck Chris as a very odd thing to say but the meaning of it soon became clear.

“I have a patient with delusions of turning into a crow,” she explained. “I took a blood sample from him, just to test whether the cause might be physical after all. He’s been on anti-anxieties, anti-depressives, anti-psychotics and the like for years. None of it helps, you see. The dreams persist.”

“Right…” Chris interjected, wondering where this was leading.

�� “Well, all the usual tests are negative.” Sophie explained. “There’s no diabetes, cancer, anything like that. But partly to humour him and partly to check for genetic conditions, I sent some of the sample to the DNA lab…”

“Yes?”

“Part of his genome is avian they tell me,” she said, “corvid to be precise. I mean they say it’s dormant but could be triggered to activate under certain conditions. I asked what conditions but they don’t know. I’ve asked for more tests.”

“I heard,” said Chris, raising her eyebrows. “Lunar tests.”

“They’ve never seen the like,” Sophie continued, her brow furrowing with concern, “not in any of the DNA samples they’ve studied. What if he’s right, my patient I mean? What if your grandfather was right? We’ve already encountered a ghost. What if there are were creatures too? What if everything we think we know is a lie and the supernatural really does exist?”

I’m only posting the first 8 chapters of this story on this blog. To read the rest of the book, please buy The Psychic Investigation and Study Team on Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

#fiction #fantasy #supernatural #writing #lgbt #novel #ghost

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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P.I.S.T. - Chapter 5

What a shame, Andrew thought as he turned the tin over in his hands, feeling the cold metal against his fingers. The label had long since come off, so he couldn’t begin to guess at the contents. But it was definitely a tin can. By the looks of it there used to be a ring pull that would open up the contents. But the ring pull had broken off in such a way that the contents were not reachable without a can opener. In fact, Andrew wondered whether that would even work with a tin that is supposed to be opened with a ring pull. He looked at the square shaped tin and reflected that it was probably corned beef inside. What a shame, he thought. He liked corned beef and this was one tin that would probably never be opened by anyone.

He put the tin down and then looked up at the field in front of him. It was mid-June. The sky was overcast but it was dry. The odd bird tweeted and fluttered in nearby trees while bees buzzed lazily around the wild flowers close by.

Andrew noticed a strange spot a small distance away in front of him where a fence actually blocked off a small region of bushes, trees and wild plants. It was only a tiny place, about the size of a small bedroom. But it was completely fenced off, with a combination of barbed wire and wooden fencing. No human could get in or out of that place.

Totally inaccessible places entirely blocked off from their surroundings had always intrigued Andrew. He couldn’t have told you why. Maybe it was a product of his mental condition or the weird workings of his mind. Speaking of which, today was the day. He had decided to avoid parks this time, and had instead come out to the countryside, to the nearby village of Wootton, to have his episode out in the fields, hopefully far away from people.

The sleepiness came over him, as it always did, and with the new moon high in the summer sky, Andrew lay down in the place where he sat and let his consciousness drift away.

He grabbed the tin can between his taloned feet. He remembered what he had been doing shortly before the change and it instructed his actions. Yet he did not act with conscious will but was instead compelled by instinctive desire. He flew over the fence, the barbed wire and wooden planks, and landed in a tree inside the enclosure. He put the tin down on a branch and pecked at it with his beak. It took several attempts to break inside, and the skin around his beak felt sore and bruised by the end of it but the tin can came open. He ate hungrily at the corned beef inside, cawing out as he did so in the language birds used to announce when they had found food.

The vaguest notion crossed his bird brain as he ate the delicious meat inside the tin. Was this a dream? He wondered. Or was it real? Real or not, was lucid dreaming relevant here? How much or how little could he control his actions when in bird form?

Instinct took over all notions or thoughts. He left the food, causing the tin can to topple to the ground below. He lifted his head back and cawed loudly, hoping to find a mate to breed with. But the other bird songs he heard were not from his own species.

Then suddenly his body began to change. He should fly back to where his clothes are, he thought. He tried to direct his bird self to act according to the thought. But he continued to caw loudly and then flew down to the ground where the tin can was, still pecking at bits of meat that had fallen into the mud. He started to change, he could not get himself out of the enclosure to where his clothes were. His crow brain was stubbornly resisting all attempts at rational choice. This was not a lucid dream, he decided. Beak became nose and mouth, wings became arms and before Andrew knew it, he was naked inside a fenced off piece of wilderness he could not get out of, with corned beef all over his bruised and bloodied face and an open tin can nearby that had previously seemed impenetrable.

Andrew couldn’t believe it. The evidence was undeniable now. It was real! How could he have possibly opened that tin or got into this place otherwise? This was not mental illness or a dream. How could he have opened the can with his bare hands or teeth? How could he have done it without tin opener or knife? How could he have got over this fence without wings and with no scratches or bruises on his arms or legs? He was naked after all, and his clothes were on the opposite side of the fence.

There was only one explanation. He had literally turned into a bird and everything he experienced about flying here and pecking open the tin with his beak, had actually happened the way he remembered it. His crow dreams were real!

So much for staying away from people! It turned out to be the most embarrassing experience of his life. A father and his young boy had discovered him, naked inside that place. The fire brigade and the police were called. They helped him out and also asked him a lot of questions. It was something that Andrew hoped would never happen to him again.

When he finally got home later that day, he immediately opened his laptop and googled for whatever he could find to help him with his condition.

“I think I turn into a crow every new moon,” he typed into the search engine. There was a bunch of stuff about crows of course, or phases of the moon, and even some links to popular TV programs, films or books that deal with either werewolves or crows. But then Andrew scrolled down and found something very interesting indeed.

There was actually an organisation called Shapeshifters Anonymous. “Do you suffer from unexplained episodes during certain phases of the moon?” It said. “Perhaps every full moon at midnight you change into a dangerous beast or have dreams that you change into a nocturnal beast. Or maybe it is new moon in the middle of the day that you transform into some kind of bird or animal. Do you have dreams or visions that you are an animal and that you mate or fight with other animals? Perhaps you even dream that you hunt and kill other animals, or worse still that you have attacked or hurt a human while in animal form. These are not dreams, and neither the police, the government, the medical profession nor the priesthood are going to believe or understand what you are going through. But there are others like you. You are not alone. Come and join us at one of our monthly meetings at a location near you. We are a nationwide organisation designed to help those afflicted with the condition of Shapeshifting and your membership of the group is strictly anonymous. We exercise a strict code of confidentiality so that no one will ever be able to link your name to your condition. The rest of the world may struggle to understand or accept us, but we can support each other. Do not struggle alone, come to one of our meetings, meet other shapeshifters and maybe learn some skills to help you manage and understand your condition. Oh, and don’t worry, our meetings never take place during either the full or the new moon.”

Andrew spent some time looking around the website. He found the list of local groups for shapeshifters. He found the local Bedfordshire group and checked when and where the next meeting was. That settled it, he must go along to it. He looked at some of the pictures of the group. They seemed like a mixed group of relatively ordinary looking people. He also read some of the information about different types of shapeshifter. There were owls and bears, cats and foxes, wolves and snakes and tigers. It was fascinating. Was this what he was then? Was he really a shapeshifter, a were-crow? It seemed hard to deny it after what had happened that day.

“Perhaps we should all start by introducing ourselves.” The leader of the group announced. She was an older lady with a grey bob and thick round spectacles. “My name is Helen, my animal self is an owl and I help to run this group.”

The large man who sat next to her spoke next. He had an American accent. “My name is Ted,” he said “my animal self is a bear and I also help to run the group.”

Then one after another, everyone introduced themselves, going round in a circle around the entire group.

The room they met in was in some kind of community centre. The walls were kind of pale orange with small framed watercolour pictures. The floor was wooden. They sat on wooden chairs in a circle in the centre of the room.

As people spoke about their experiences, Andrew was impressed by the variety of creatures that people shapeshifted into. He would never have imagined that something like this could take so many forms. It was also a relief to see how ordinary all these people were. None of them seemed like flaky, conspiracy theorist loonies or pretentious hippies or anything like that. Instead it was a real mix of people, old and young, male and female, black, white and Asian. Ordinary, hardworking people with average unremarkable lives who just happened to share the fact that they turned into some kind of animal once a month.

As people talked about their conditions, Andrew also became aware of two interesting factors that he didn’t quite understand yet but which threw an intriguing new light on things. Firstly he noticed that some people seemed to change shape at midnight on the full moon, while other people like him changed shape at midday on the new moon. He wondered what it was that made this difference, and why there should be a difference at all. The other thing he noticed was that there were roughly four individuals, all sat together at one end of the circle and occasionally scowling at the other members of the group, who referred to themselves as werewolves, wereweasels, werefoxes etc. They did not use the term “animal self” like the others, instead they said simply “I’m a werewolf”, or whatever their form of shapeshifter was. Andrew couldn’t escape the feeling, just by observing this difference and the body language of that small set of people, that there was some kind of division within the group that explained this different use of language.

In fact Andrew was musing on this when it got to his time to speak, so that the leader of the group had to prompt him to speak, which was a bit embarrassing.

“Oh yeah,” he said, “my name is Andrew and I…” He paused. How could he know whether to introduce his animal self or to state that he was a werecrow? He didn’t know what the difference in terminology would imply about his views. “I turn into a crow every new moon. It’s my first time at this group.” He smiled nervously. Several other members of the group smiled back at him. Some members of the group of four rolled their eyes instead. That was rude and so Andrew made a mental note of which ones had done it: a skinny ginger guy and a Latin looking young lady dressed in denim and with studded leather wristbands. The werefox and werewolf, he remembered.

He decided to ignore the troublemakers and focus on the rest of the group. He warmed instantly to the scruffy looking young lady and chubby Asian guy who described their animal selves as a rat and a pig respectively. Nice to know that he wasn’t the only one with a seemingly harmless animal form. The range of animals was interesting though. There were eagles, foxes, wolves, bears and owls. Then there were crows, rats, cats and pigs. One dark skinned guy even turned into a leopard, while another South Asian guy had a snake as his animal form. There was a real menagerie of shapeshifters here!

“Well, we’ve got a couple of newcomers in the group today,” the big American guy announced, the one who turned into a bear, “so perhaps you could tell us a bit more about yourself. How about you start, Andrew?”

All eyes turned on him and Andrew gulped hard. His palms started to sweat. “Well,” he said, “I always thought my condition was a mental disorder. I’ve been on medicine my entire adult life: mood stabilisers, anti-depressants, anti-psychotics, you name it. They keep on changing what I take and the dose I take. But whatever they gave me didn’t stop the incidents of what I always assumed were just dreams. Once a month, as regular as clockwork, I have to go somewhere by myself at midday on a new moon. It has to be somewhere out in the open. The one time I stayed indoors I regretted it. My house was a mess with so many things broken or damaged. But it also has to be away from other people. The looks people would give me!” He paused and looked around the room. Everyone was listening.

“So I learnt how to manage this over time,” he continued, “where to go and what to do. I never knew what actually happened to me. I always assumed I just had a delusional episode, took off all my clothes and dreamt or hallucinated that I was a crow. Then some things started to happen that left me in no doubt that this was actually a real experience and not a dream. I had a fight with another crow and it pecked my wing until it bled. When I got home with a bleeding arm and washed the wound, I found crow feathers inside the cut. Then another time I actually pecked open a sealed can of food with the ring pull broken off. There was no way I could’ve opened it without a knife or a can opener. And I managed to fly inside an entirely fenced off area in a field. The evidence was there when I came back to my human self. The tin was open, the corned beef around my mouth, I was naked without a scratch on me but trapped inside this fenced off piece of wilderness. I must have turned into a crow and done the things I experienced myself doing because there was simply no other explanation.”

“You’re lucky you’ve never killed anyone,” the girl in the denim and studs responded, screwing up her lips as if in a snarl and then taking a sip from a can of diet coke. “That shit makes it pretty obvious from day one.”

“We all have our crosses to bear, Sandra,” Helen reminded her. The girl simply shifted in her seat uncomfortably, crossing her arms and frowning. “Carry on, Andrew,” the group leader urged him. “Sorry for the interruption.”

“Well, when I found this group of course I wanted to meet others with the same condition,” he explained. “I can’t believe that I thought I was mentally ill all this time. The doctor doesn’t understand what’s going on. No one does. My wife left me over this. I feel like it’s made my life a mess all things considered.” He added, tears welling up in his eyes. “And it’s not fair. It’s not my fault I’m like this. It’s not right that I should feel useless, crazy, unlovable and incompetent at life just because of something I can’t help that nobody understands.” Tears rolled down his cheeks now. He never even knew he felt that deeply about this until he started talking about it with other people. He hadn’t expected to cry. It was a bit embarrassing really. He sniffed back the tears and continued. “Sorry,” he said. “I know I’m not crazy now at least.” Then he paused with a slight frown. “Even the doctor took a blood sample just to make sure,” he said. “She doesn’t know why the medication’s not working, so I managed to convince her that it might be worth checking out if there’s a more physical cause. Do you think she’ll find anything?” He added, looking round the group in concern. “I’m a bit worried about it to be honest.”

“You let her take your blood?” A short, round bodied Indian or Pakistani lady responded with horror. She had described herself as a werecat and she sat with the werefox, werewolf and wereweasel who were the other members of that breakaway group of troublemakers. “I can’t believe you’d let her do that!”

“You’ve put all of our lives at risk!” The girl in denim snapped at him. “You stupid half-were!”

“Half-were?” Andrew echoed in confusion.

“Now, now, Sandra,” said Helen, “it’s not as if none of the rest of us has ever had a blood sample taken.”

“Yeah, but not one where they’re actively looking for signs of our condition!” She responded.

“She doesn’t know what she’s looking for,” Andrew assured her. “It’s no different from any other routine blood test to establish the cause of an ailment.” He furrowed his brow and looked down at his feet with worry. “I didn’t realise I was putting us at risk. I didn’t even know for sure that I was a shapeshifter back then.” He looked up at the two leaders of the group. “Have I done something really, really wrong here? I’m truly sorry if I have.”

“Don’t worry,” Ted assured him. “They’ll either find something or they won’t. And if they do find something then chances are they won’t know what it means anyway. You know doctors. They always default to scepticism where the supernatural is concerned. They’ll probably just think they’ve discovered a bizarre new genetic disease or something.”

“And even if they do begin to suspect the truth,” Helen added. “Perhaps it will prove to be an opportunity to open up a dialogue with the general public. Perhaps it’s time we came out of the shadows and announced that we’re here, that we’re just people like everyone else and that we deserve rights and equality, tolerance and understanding.”

Sandra nearly spat her drink across the room as she burst out laughing. The others who sat with her sniggered or outright laughed with her. The Asian cat lady even cried out, “Oh my God, what the fuck?”

“No, that seems like a great idea to me,” Andrew said to the troublemakers. “Why shouldn’t we work towards being accepted by society? Why shouldn’t we try to raise awareness of our conditions? Who knows where that might lead or what might be possible in the future. God knows, I’ve suffered enough in my life. There has to be a way to make life better, there just has to be. I don’t want to be at odds with the rest of the world anymore. I want to be a valued part of it.”

“You stupid half-weres are ridiculous,” denim girl said with a sneer. “Just because you only eat dead animals or discarded leftovers in bins, you think it must be fine and dandy for the rest of us too. You try turning into a wolf every full moon! You try having vivid memories of tearing someone’s throat out or waking up with blood all down your chin and neck! See where your talk of tolerance and acceptance gets you then. They’ll never accept us. All true weres know this. They’ll never accept us because we’re dangerous and they’re always going to fear us. And for good reason too probably. If they ever found out about us and had scientific evidence to back it up, it wouldn’t be an opportunity for awareness and dialogue, it would be all out war between the humans and us. It would be werefolk apocalypse, like all those films and novels always told us it would be.” She paused and looked round the room accusatorily. Several people looked away or fidgeted in their seats.

“You use words like ‘shapeshifter’ and ‘animal self’,” she continued, “trying to whitewash who we are. But the medieval poets and writers had it right all along. We are were creatures! We are werewolves and werecats, we are werebears and wereeagles, werefoxes and werestoats. We are the creatures who lurk in the night, ready to sink our teeth into some poor, unsuspecting victims throat. There’s no whitewashing that. There’s no point in trying to ‘educate’ the public or ‘raise awareness of our condition’. It’s us against them, it always has been. We don’t lobby for our rights, we take them; enacting revenge if necessary. They’ll never accept us so we might as well accept ourselves, in every aspect, instead of lying to ourselves and trying to make the truth of our condition seem more tame and palatable. We are were creatures. We are red in tooth and claw. And we are magnificent just the way we are!”

Her friends all cheered and clapped their hands at her speech, the ginger haired werefox, the short Indian werecat lady and the thin, little spotty guy who looked about fourteen and said he was a wereweasel. Andrew finally understood. Those four considered themselves ‘true weres’ because they were carnivores and thought of the likes of him, who feasted off dead flesh and leftovers, as only a ‘half-were’. And they didn’t like the term ‘shapeshifter’ or the phrase ‘animal self’, preferring to use the term ‘were’.

The scruffy young lady that was sitting next to Andrew whispered in his ear suddenly. “I don’t like the term were,” she said. “It’s a slur. It’s the word people used all through history to hate and fear us. That’s why we promote the word shapeshifter instead. We’re human just like everyone else. It’s just that we change our shape.”

Andrew looked round at her and smiled. “Nicola,” she told him, shaking his hand.

“Andrew,” he said and shook hers back.

They both turned their attention to the rest of the room. A confident and opinionated black woman had spoken up about the issue. “You’d rather align yourself with their hatred and fear,” she accused them, “than challenge it and help them overcome it? This word ‘were’ that you embrace, and the concepts and ideas that you propose are exactly the kind of anti-shapeshifter propaganda that has plagued our kind for centuries. They would hunt and kill us, not because of what we are but because they have this idea in their minds that we are all vicious, ruthless killers and cannot be reasoned with or co-existed with but should only be feared and killed. It has to stop! And you are not helping.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” the ginger guy said. “When you’re at no risk at all of accidentally killing someone.”

“And when was the last time you, or any fox, actually killed someone?” She argued.

“Well, I have!” Sandra, the denim lady butted in. “I am the big bad wolf that they all fear, quite literally. Are you telling me that their fear is unfounded?”

“I’m saying it is a risk that can be managed or contained,” the black lady argued. “I’m telling you that the vast majority of us are not dangerous, that we can and should reach for acceptance and try to promote understanding. And maybe with greater awareness and understanding even those of us who do pose some risk can work with the authorities to try and achieve strategies where our condition can be managed without harming anyone. I mean come on, are you telling me that with the entire medical establishment, the government and the police on our side that there would be no hope at all of co-existing peacefully with other humans?”

“I’m telling you they’d never be on our side to begin with,” Sandra argued, “no matter what we do or say. It’s futile.”

“Well, it is bloody futile,” the black girl continued, “if you continue to promote the very propaganda we are working so hard to overcome! If you continue to nurture hatred in your bellies and continue to shamelessly use the very same slurs that were hurled at our ancestors when the witch hunters and villagers came after us with torches and pitchforks! It’s disgusting and I won’t stand for it. I’m not a were, I’m a shapeshifter. I have the animal self of a noble eagle. And I am proud of it!”

At that moment there was a sudden loud, flapping of wings. Andrew was astounded to see that Helen had changed herself into an owl, a large owl the likes of which Andrew had never seen. This big grey owl hooted loudly and flew above the room, the drama of her appearance immediately causing everyone to become quiet and stop arguing.

After she flew over the circle for two or three times she landed back on her seat and then transformed back into her human form. It was fascinating to watch it. Andrew had only experienced the transformation within himself. He had never witnessed it in someone else.

The rest of the meeting was fairly mundane. There was some chit chat about various aspects of people’s lives or more technical detail about the shapeshifting condition itself. After the meeting ended, Andrew got to talk to some of the people he had been warming to. He met Nicola, whose animal self is a rat, and her friend Wu, who’s animal form is a pig. They also introduced him to Honesty, the black lady who spoke. Her animal self is an eagle.

“How did Helen do that?” Andrew asked suddenly. “It’s not new moon or full moon, is it?”

“Well,” Honesty explained. “Some older shapeshifters can learn over time to control their actions when they change. If they harness this ability then eventually with a lot of practice and discipline they can even learn to change into their animal self in-between the times when it would usually occur. It takes a lot of work and dedication though, and some say a certain natural predisposition towards it. I’ve only met two shapeshifters in my lifetime that could do it. One of them is Helen, the other was someone back in Uganda who died about fifteen years ago.”

Andrew didn’t know what to say. The ability intrigued him. He had seen a development himself from unconscious, dreamlike experiences to almost believing he could act on his own free will when changed. Maybe he was one of the people who could learn to do what Helen could do. He wanted to learn.

“Excuse me,” he said after a while, “but I think I’d like to talk to Helen and Ted.” He left his new friends then and spoke to the group leaders. After a short preliminary chat about the group and his own story of being a shapeshifter, Andrew called Helen to one side. “That thing you do,” he whispered to her. “Can you teach me how to do it too?”

I’m only posting the first 8 chapters of this story on this blog. To read the rest of the book, please buy The Psychic Investigation and Study Team on Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

#fiction #fantasy #supernatural #writing #novel #lgbt #shapeshifter

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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P.I.S.T. - Chapter 4

“I wish you wouldn’t just turn up out of the blue like this,” she said, “I could’ve been in the middle of something. I could’ve been at work or in class.”

Her mother just waved away the complaint, quite literally. She actually physically waved her hand in response. “Oh Christine,” she said. “We know it’s only Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays you’re in college. And you only work weekends and evenings. Why can’t we come visit our little girl just to check on how you’re doing?”

Chris rolled her eyes and turned around to walk to the kitchen. Because it’s invasive, creepy and inappropriate, she thought. I mean I could’ve been masturbating or having sex! “Would you like a cup of tea or coffee?” She asked.

“Oh, that would be lovely, dear,” her mother replied. “Tea for me. And Jeffrey?”

“I’ll have a coffee,” said Dad.

Typical of him to be awkward, Christine thought. But she kept her frustration to herself and with a deep, calming breath, she put on the kettle and got the cups, coffee, teabags, milk and sugar ready.

“Hmm,” mother mused from the hallway. “This place could do with some work, and a good spring clean. I honestly don’t understand how you can live this way.”

Chris turned round with a frown and looked around at the kitchen and the hallway, where her mum and dad were still standing around, putting down bags and taking off coats. How long were they going to stay?

“It’s fine,” she said. “I tidied and hoovered two days ago. What else do you want?”

“Now, now, Christine,” her father replied, “don’t get testy. Your mother’s just concerned about your wellbeing.”

Testy? What kind of word was that? Chris sighed again and returned to the business of making the brews. It was best to let it go. “Go through to the living room,” she told them. “I’ll bring the drinks in shortly.”

They went to the living room. She finished making the drinks and then she brought them through.

She sat down. They all drank their tea or coffee. There was a weird, tense silence. Chris wondered what they objected to about the house. She lived here with two other students. It wasn’t super tidy but it was only usual household clutter. A few books and papers in haphazard piles on various surfaces. It was fairly clean too, especially by the standards of most students. She kept the kitchen as clean as she could and she dusted and hoovered once a week. Sure, there were some decorating issues but the house was perfectly functional for their needs. Parents could be so picky!

“How’s the course going?” Dad asked.

“Great, yeah,” she replied, “I’m loving it.”

“And the job?” He asked.

“Ok,” she said. “It brings in the pennies. And I love my customers and fellow workers. It’s really a lovely place to work.”

“Vegetarian restaurants,” mum said in a disapproving tone, “art degrees, feminist groups. When are you going to make something of your life, Christine?”

Oh here we go, Chris thought. Another annoying lecture!

“Now, now, Mary,” Dad interjected. “Let’s not start another argument.”

“I can’t help it, Jeffrey,” said mother, “it’s grandfather all over again.” She brought out a handkerchief and started mopping away a few tears. Chris was sure they were fake. “Do you know how much my mother suffered because of his half-baked ideas and crackpot ways? We were so poor growing up and all because he wouldn’t get a proper career to support us but devoted his time to that silly psychic group.”

Christine didn’t like to hear her grandfather spoken about in that way. She sighed deeply, inwardly furious. Why did she always have to bring that up? Chris had already heard the story a thousand times.

“They weren’t a silly group,” she argued. “They were pioneers. Grandad even got a book published on the phenomenon! He was a visionary.”

“Oh come now, Christine,” said Dad, “you know that ghosts and fortune telling aren’t real. It was ridiculous bunkum and he wasted his life on it.”

“Times were different back then,” Chris argued. “And Grandad was a success at what he was doing.”

“It didn’t help pay the bills though, did it?” said mother. “It didn’t bring the pennies in to support his wife and children. My poor mum had to scrub floors for a living. Such a disgrace!”

“Well, maybe men and women should work together to support the family!” Chris said, her pulse racing with sudden anger. “Maybe a man shouldn’t be expected to be the main breadwinner all the time. What was feminism for if not to fight against those sexist stereotypes?”

“Well, like you said,” mother replied, “times were different back then.” Christine fell silent then. It was actually a valid point. She could hardly hold past generations to the standards of today.

She sighed again and looked at her feet. She wasn’t unsympathetic to grandma’s plight, or her own mother’s unhappy childhood either. But Grandad was a great man in her eyes. He was so kind and funny, so creative and wise, so leftfield and interesting in his views and lifestyle. He was a lovely, old Irish man, who she loved to death as a child and his ideas and work inspired her.

“Look at your father and me,” mum continued, “we worked hard to support you and we’ve built a good life for ourselves. He works in a bank and I work for a respected legal firm. We’ve made enough money to have a comfortable life when we retire. But what about you, dear? How long are you going to coast through life, following impossible dreams of being an artist or wasting valuable time on activism, instead of putting aside money for a family or so you can comfortably retire when you’re older? When are you going to settle down with someone and have children?”

“Mother,” Chris said, “I’m lesbian!”

“I know,” she replied, “and I respect that. But lesbians can adopt, can’t they? Find yourself a good woman and settle down. Get a decent job and build a life for yourself. That’s all I’m saying. I know you loved your grandpa and were really upset when he died but please don’t follow him in wasting your life and your potential on crackpot ideas and fruitless dreams.”

“They’re not fruitless dreams!” Chris snapped, slamming her teacup down on the table so that the teaspoon chimed angrily against the china. “I’m not wasting my time on activism! Being a feminist or a vegetarian are not ‘crackpot ideas’! Art can change minds and hearts, mother. It can change the world. I’m helping women and the LGBT community with my activism. I’m doing good things with my life! Maybe I don’t want to conform to society’s expectations when society’s ideals are rotten to the core. Maybe I don’t want to work for the rich man and contribute to the continuing oppression of the poor, the disabled, people of colour, women and lesbian, gay and transgender folk. Maybe I want to make a difference to the world!”

“And how can you do that with no money and no power?” Dad said, calm as anything but with eyes so cold and disappointed. “Listen to your mother. She’s talking sense, Christine.”

Mum shook her head and placed her hand on her brow dramatically. “Oh, it’s your grandfather all over again,” she said. “We tolerated the haircut, the clothes, the lesbianism. But honestly, Christine, try to think of the future. You can’t just be a student and an activist for the rest of your life. You’ve got to pay your way in this world. That’s just how society works.”

Chris sighed again and looked at her shoes. There was no point arguing with them. They had a completely different outlook on life. She wondered how they had managed to be teenagers during the 60s but let the ideals of the hippy generation completely pass them by.

She barely tolerated the rest of the conversation. Once they had got their concerns off their chest and Chris had stopped arguing the point, they soon moved on to talking about aunts and uncles, weddings and children. Christine responded as best she could but her mind was elsewhere. Eventually they said their farewells, gave her a hug and left.

She crept up the stairs, exhausted and shook by the whole exchange. Why couldn’t they just let her live the life she chose?

She entered her bedroom and took a box from under her bed. She pulled out a photograph and an old paperback book. They smelled musty and old. The photo was of her and her grandfather. She was only a little girl at the time. They were both smiling so happily in the picture and his arm was around her so lovingly. She turned the photograph over and on the back were the words, “don’t let the bastards get you down” and it was signed “Grandpa Willie”.

She put the photograph back in the box and looked at the cover of the book. She brushed off the dust with her hand. The book was called “Psychic Phenomena and the findings of P.I.G.” That was the name of grandad’s Psychic Investigation Group. He had found it amusing that it spelled out the name of an animal. In fact Grandpa Willie had been the one who told her that pigs were highly intelligent animals and that we shouldn’t eat them.

And there was his name under the title: William McInnery. It was him who had formed the Psychic Investigation Group or P.I.G. to study mysteries and the paranormal. Suddenly a drop of clear liquid splashed onto the cover. It came from her eye. She was crying and hadn’t noticed.

She sniffed back the tears and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. Then she put the book away. Pull yourself together, she told herself. You can’t save the world if you break down in tears at the slightest setback.

The next day after classes, Christine went to the radical feminist discussion group that met up every Wednesday afternoon at Bedford College. As usual the room was a bit cold. They needed better heating in here. But it was a large room, the walls were white and the floor was clean. They sat in the centre of the room in a circle of chairs, the same kind of grey plastic chairs with metal legs that you get in schools.

There was a new member there this week, a cute, feminine looking Indian woman in her early thirties. Her name was Sophie, which seemed like an unusually European sounding name for a woman who was clearly from a South Asian background. Then again though, Chris thought, there was some Greek influence on certain parts of India during the time of Alexander the Great and after hundreds of years of Colonial influence, surely some Indian parents gave their children English names anyway.

It was nice to see a new member. The group was getting kind of stagnant these days. Radical feminism was hardly as popular as it used to be. It was intersectional, fourth wave, “choice” feminism that was all the rage now. Some members of the group were very vocal in their criticism of it. Even Chris had to admit that celebrating young women flaunting their bodies for cash and focusing heavily on the latest PC crusade with regards to race or disability did seem to have deflected the feminist movement from its primary aim of empowering women and challenging sexism.

Following a preliminary introduction, one of the group decided to raise a topic that reminded Christine that even her own side could annoy her at times though.

“I want to raise a serious topic that I don’t think we’re really talking about enough, to be honest,” said Heather, a plump, rosy faced middle aged woman that Christine knew well. “I want to talk about the current wave of ultra politically correct transgender activism and the worrying consequences of bowing to its demands too willingly.”

There was a tense pause. Christine knew that the room would be divided on this issue. She glanced over at the new member. Sophie was visibly squirming in her seat. She looked around at the room nervously and for a moment their eyes met. Chris gave what she hoped was a sympathetic smile. Sophie smiled shyly back and swiftly looked away again. Was she blushing under her brown skin? Had Chris accidentally made some kind of move?

“A key aspect of women’s oppression is to do with our reproductive rights and our bodies,” Heather continued, “and in an age where we cannot even talk about pregnancy or periods without treading on eggshells around the language we use, when we can’t even talk about vaginas as female organs anymore, our ability to even talk about this oppression is being eroded by politically correct transgender newspeak. This is a problem. Controlling our language and our ability to talk about our needs and our rights is a form of oppression in itself. And have you seen these videos on YouTube talking about how not being sexually attracted to women with penises is transphobic? How rapey is that? It’s not ok to be a lesbian anymore? It’s not ok to be repulsed by penises? Are they really saying that lesbians have to be ok with sucking some guy’s cock and if we’re not, then we’re the bigots? And then there’s the issue of women’s spaces being invaded by men who believe they’re women. Not just toilets, but prisons, changing rooms, rape shelters. They don’t even have to have had the surgery or been on hormones anymore. We’re supposed to just welcome them in because they wear a dress and high heels and call themselves women! Well, when are we going to speak out, sisters? When are we going to stand up and say it’s not ok for misogyny and entitlement to creep in through the back door in the name of trans activism?”

There were several cheers and murmurs of agreement in the room. But there were other women there who looked uncomfortable and uncertain. Chris felt like she should be the one to speak up.

“I agree about the erosion of language,” she said. “I’ve been a bit concerned about that myself. As you know, I have my own misgivings about language policing and the picky PC culture of the fourth wave. However…” She paused, trying to collect her thoughts. “I’m not sure we should be so eager to paint every single person who has a penis as part of some homogenous group of misogynistic male rapists-in-training. The thing about trans women in women’s spaces, is that these are not men we are talking about, and certainly not the same kind of men who would be any kind of danger or risk to us. Don’t we believe that gender is a social construct? Don’t we believe that there are no intrinsic traits that define someone as male or female other than those that come from biology? So if a trans woman, who by nature feels uncomfortable in a male role and desires to adopt a female role, needs to access a female space, what exactly are you saying the problem is with that?”

“They’ve still been socialised male,” said Heather, “they still have been trained to objectify women and view us as lesser. They still benefit from male privilege.”

“Do they?” Chris challenged her. “Do you even understand anything about the transgender condition? What privilege has been afforded them has been tarnished in their own eyes by the crushing limitations and pain of having a gender role forced on them that is utterly anathema to their own nature and desires. In short this should be something we understand only too well from having femininity forced on us! How can you sit there and claim that people with penises all think the same, feel the same, are the same? How can you imply that there would still be a risk from these people even after they have sought hormone replacement therapy or sexual reassignment surgery? Are you really claiming that there is something other than the physical that defines our genders? And socialisation? The whole reason that socialisation and gender stereotypes are so damaging is because men and women vary in their natures and our genitals do not define us. Do you not see how you are complicit in the very faulty thinking you claim to be fighting by stating that these transgender women are actually rapey, sexist men in disguise because they are somehow utterly defined by their evil male penises?” She paused for effect. Heather was frowning, as were some of the others, but they didn’t interrupt. Several other women were watching and listening with interest.

“I wonder when we lost our way,” Chris added, shaking her head. “I wonder which side of feminism has lost its way the most. There are many things about fourth wave feminism that cause me concern, that worry me that the feminist cause is in danger of being watered down or that we are being distracted by intersectionality and losing sight of our true focus. But when I listen to you assigning stereotyped, unchanging attributes to people based solely on what genitals they were born with, taking the most desperately miserable, most persecuted and most misunderstood demographic and vilifying them as no different from brutish, arrogant men purely because of the possession of a penis, I wonder if you truly understand anything about gender or what makes a trans woman different from a cisgender man.”

“Is this a ‘not all men’ argument?” Quipped Jean, a skinny young lesbian with short hair and crooked teeth.

“Yeah,” added Heather, “and what about the erasure of lesbians and the insistence that we should all be eager to sleep with a woman who has a penis?”

“Of course you don’t have to get sexual with a penis,” Chris responded, losing her patience with the tone of the discussion. “And of course it’s ok if you define your lesbianism as including a preference for vagina. But it’s also ok if other lesbians define their orientation differently. It’s ok to acknowledge that a trans woman is a woman and that in any case trans women do not relate to their penises the way men do. Many trans women do not even want to use their penis like a man would. Do you know that? Many of them do not even like to be touched there. If a lesbian can see beyond anatomy to the person beneath, then who are you to invalidate her identity? Isn’t that just as dangerous as invalidating the identity of someone to whom the genitalia of their partners is important? Both things are wrong and we should all support each other.”

Chris paused again and looked around the room. There was no verbal comeback this time. But several of the women looked shocked by her words.

“I don’t know how to explain this any better,” Chris continued. “When did this become a battle of words or an assigning of labels on people? Are we doing the same thing as the fourth wavers now? Man, woman, lesbian, gay, straight – these are all just words. It’s people that matter, not labels! ‘Not all men’, you say. Well, damn straight it’s not all men! Men are people too you know. They don’t all think alike, or feel alike. And I would’ve thought it obvious that a trans woman is the type of person, among those born with a penis, who is the most unlike the macho stereotype of the sexist man. There is no universally applicable attribute to what men or women are like, other than mere biology. That is what we believe, isn’t it? So how can you sit there and say that a trans woman is any more of a risk to women than a butch lesbian or a trans man? Even if you assume characteristics to those who have testosterone pumping through their veins, which may well be a reasonable assumption to make, then I’m sure you can see that once those factors have been altered then we are no longer dealing with a man. This is certainly the case after surgery. If you somehow think we are, then you no longer believe what you claim you believe. You are tacitly asserting that there is some non-physical, essential difference between men and women, a difference of the mind.”

Chris paused again and let out a long sigh. The room was silent.

“I remember the eighties and early nineties,” she explained, “even though I was only young at the time. I think we have badly lost our way. Not just the fourth wavers, but us radical feminists too. Socialisation or no, physical anatomy or no, we are all just people underneath. Whatever someone does with their own body, or their legal or social identity, it is not my place to judge it. Men and women come in a variety of forms. We are not defined by our genitals. There is no essential difference between one born male who wishes to transition to female and someone who was born female to begin with. If I were to believe that there was an essential difference then I would no longer be able to declare myself a radical feminist. I would’ve bought into society’s and patriarchy’s lies about gender.”

She sat back in her chair, breathed a long sigh and relaxed. All was silent for a while. Then Heather began to speak, a little less emphatically, about her concerns and the conversation continued. It didn’t matter though. Chris had said her piece. She had checked their bigotry just enough that they when they continued it was with more care and compassion than before.

After the meeting was over, Sophie came up to her. “I wanted you to know that I agree with you, wholeheartedly.” The Asian woman said with a cute little smile.

Chris looked down at those delicate features, those big brown eyes and that long silky black hair. Why were Indian women so beautiful? “Oh,” Chris said, blushing, “thank you.”

“It was a really great speech,” Sophie added, looking down and away with another shy little smile.

Chris didn’t know what to do with herself. She found herself fidgeting with her hands, not quite knowing where to put them. In my pockets, by my side, clasped together in front of me, where do hands go again? Suddenly Sophie looked up at her again and Chris stopped moving her hands, as if frozen to the spot.

“Are you a lesbian?” Sophie asked. Chris looked down at those big dark eyes looking up at her hopefully. She merely nodded. “Ah, good,” Sophie replied, looking down at the ground again. “Only I was thinking of going to the lesbian night at the Barley Mow on the weekend, and wondered if you wanted to come.” She looked up again, expectantly.

Chris smiled a warm, broad smile. “I’d love to,” she said.

I’m only posting the first 8 chapters of this story on this blog. To read the rest of it, please buy The Psychic Investigation and Study Team on Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

#fiction #fantasy #supernatural #writing #novel #lgbt

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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P.I.S.T. - Chapter 3

His heart was thumping in his chest as he washed the wound. Never before had he woke up with physical marks following an episode and this was a bad one. His arm was open wide with a long gash from elbow to wrist.

He should probably go to A&E, Andrew reflected as he held the arm under the cold tap in the bathroom. It didn’t seem very deep though even though it hurt like hell. Plus he always felt embarrassed about his condition and would rather talk to his GP about it. After all they had been friends since University and she knew a lot about his episodes already, so that he wouldn’t have to answer any uncomfortable questions about it.

He washed away some of the blood and then towelled it dry. Then he left the bathroom to find the first aid box in the kitchen.

He had rushed straight to the bathroom on his arrival. It was all so strange. It was the day of his episode. Regular as clockwork, they always struck at midday on a new moon. So he had taken the day off work and fallen asleep on a bench in the park.

He had experienced these episodes ever since his early teens and had been on medication all his adult life. Every month he had to go out to a park or somewhere else outside. On the one occasion when he hadn’t he woke up with bumps and bruises all over him and his front room was a mess, with furniture upended and books and papers all over the place. God only knows what he had got up to while he was having the episode.

He never remembered, you see. All he knew was he dreamed of being a crow and then woke up again unaware of what had happened. He had learnt long ago that if he wanted to avoid people looking at him funny and holding on tight to their children around him, then he would have to pick a secluded spot outside when the episode happened. The dreams seemed so real! But it was harmless enough usually.

But this time he had dreamed he got into a vicious fight with another crow. It had pecked and clawed at his wing until the feathers had come off and the flesh was raw. Then he woke up in the park with his arm bleeding.

What was going on? Was he genuinely becoming insane now? Had he deluded himself that his dreams were real somehow?

He sat on the couch in the living room and pulled out a bandage from the first aid box, using some of the antiseptic cream on his wound. Then he found something he didn’t expect to find. There was something stuck to part of the newly forming scab. He thought it was dirt in the cut, so he tried to remove it. Wincing with pain, he picked it out. To his surprise, caked in dried blood and all shrivelled up was a tiny feather, like the downy feather birds have on their bellies. What was that doing in his wound?

Andrew rubbed some more Savlon on the area he had pulled out the feather from and then he applied the bandage. He rang the doctor for an appointment and luckily got one for the following afternoon. Then he went back up to the bathroom to clean the sink.

As he returned to the bathroom sink he found three crow’s feathers, the large stiff ones that birds have on their wings. Two of them were on the ground and one was in the sink. How did they get there? What was going on? Had he really been attacked by a crow? Were the feathers his and the dreams were real?

He shook his head. Don’t be ridiculous, Andrew, he thought. I have a mental condition. I dream I’m a crow and get up to things I don’t remember later. Maybe I fought a crow. But I sure as hell didn’t become one. Start thinking that way and they’ll lock you up for sure.

But as he walked back out of the bathroom, he couldn’t help but wonder to himself. What if he actually did turn into a crow? What if the dreams were real somehow?

The next morning he felt miserable. He had been like this every morning for the past three months. He lay on the couch, watching the television in his pyjamas and eating a bowl of cereal.

“So tell us about your latest book, Marvin,” the TV chat show host was saying.

“Well, it’s all about how astrology can help you in your pursuit of happiness and success,” Marvin Edwards explained.

Andrew wasn’t really listening. TV psychics were largely full of crap. But this had become something of a ritual for him, to watch the Larry Evans show while eating his breakfast. He knew it wasn’t healthy. He knew he should let it go, but he couldn’t.

That was the man who stole his wife. Larry Evans, chat show host, preacher, charming smooth talker, wealthy breadwinner, romantic and virile, everything that Andrew wasn’t. The man his ex-wife was currently in love with.

Why did he do it to himself? Why must he continue to torture himself every day? But his heart was still bruised by the rejection. It had taken him several weeks just to stop checking his phone and his emails constantly for messages. He missed her. He wanted her back. But there was nothing he could do. Every time he tried to talk to her about it, to make things up with her, the more she pushed him away, told him all his failings, made him feel even worse about himself.

Andrew let out a deep sigh and stood up with his empty bowl. He turned away from the TV set and walked into the kitchen. Maybe that was why his episodes had been getting worse, he reasoned as he washed the bowl in the sink. Maybe the misery, the heartbreak, the obsessive inability to let go of the love of his life were causing his episodes to reach new heights of intensity.

It wasn’t his fault. He couldn’t help that his condition meant that he could barely ever hold down a job because he had to take days off every month. He couldn’t help that it meant they barely got to go away on holiday because he had to use his holidays to cover his illness. He couldn’t help that half the time he couldn’t even bear to make love to her because he suffered from vivid memories of dreams in which he had been fucking another crow, and it messed him up and made him go soft.

Why must he suffer all his life because of a mental illness that he never chose to have and that nobody ever understood?

He returned to the living room and looked at that big cocky face on the screen. The smooth, dark skin, the big cheesy smile, it made him feel sick in his stomach. He hated that man. He came swanning in with all his ego, all his slimy charm and all his money and he stole Andrew’s wife from under his nose. He wooed her and seduced her and won her heart and Andrew was left all alone.

Tears squeezed their way out of Andrew’s eyes and he switched the TV off in disgust. That did it. He must phone her up. It had only been three weeks since the last time.

He dialled the number, knowing full well that he really should learn to leave her alone now. “Yes, Andrew,” she said in a voice that made it clear that she really didn’t want to talk to him. “What is it?”

“I’ve hurt my arm,” he told her. “I had a really bad episode this time. I wish you were here.”

“I’m sorry you’re injured,” she replied, “but we’ve been over this already. I’m with Larry now. It’s over.”

“I just wish I had someone to confide in when things are tough,” he explained, “and somebody to hug it all better.”

“Then get a girlfriend,” she said, “or go see a therapist. You’ve got to let go, Andrew. I can’t always be there for you.”

“I know,” he said. “I just wish…” She hung up. That was rude. But what did he expect?

He sighed again and sat down in silence. Something had to get better for him soon. It just had to.

Sophie hurriedly closed a window on her computer screen as Andrew arrived but not before he had seen the cute, smiling face of the Chinese girl she had been speaking to.

“Was that Tina?” He asked. “How is she?”

“Oh, you know,” Sophie said, looking slightly embarrassed. “The same old Tina, obsessed with her gadgets and her comic books.” Andrew sat down and Sophie turned to face him. “But don’t tell anyone I’ve been messaging my friends at work.”

“Your secret’s safe with me, Sophie,” Andrew said with a grin. The doctor’s office was clean with white walls. There was a couch and a curtain on one side of the room, several desks and chairs, a computer and printer, much like any other GP office. There were posters on the wall about various medical matters, and some empty specimen vials on one of the desks.

“Please,” she told him, “call me Doctor Chandra when you’re seeing me in my professional capacity. Now, what can I do for you?”

“It’s my arm,” he said. “I injured it yesterday during one of my episodes.”

She unwrapped the bandage and inspected the wound. “You really should have got this checked out at the hospital,” she told him. “Still I can’t see any infection and it doesn’t seem too deep, mostly a surface cut. How did you do this?”

“I don’t remember,” he explained. “I was dreaming that I was fighting with another crow. Then I woke up with my arm bleeding.”

“You’re still getting episodes?” She asked, still touching his arm and tilting her head to examine it. “Are you taking the tablets I prescribed for you?”

“Every day,” he answered. “But the episodes are getting worse if anything.”

She began to clean the wound as she continued to ask him questions.

“Are they occurring with the same regularity as always?” She asked.

“Exactly the same,” he told her. “Regular as clockwork, once a month at midday on the new moon.”

“I’ve never known anyone with a condition like yours,” she explained. “And I can’t find any literature on it either. You appear to be something of an anomaly, Andrew.”

He couldn’t help but feel amused by that. “Thank you,” he said with a grin.

“Well, I’m not too worried about this wound,” she said, applying a new dressing. “Keep it covered and let it heal naturally. But what I am more concerned about is the ineffectiveness of the medication you’ve been taking. Can you explain in more detail why you said that you think the episodes are getting worse?”

“Well,” he explained, “I’ve never experienced anything as violent as this last one. That bird was really pecking and clawing at my wing until the flesh was raw. And then I woke up with this wound!”

“Have you been watching any violent nature documentaries?” She asked.

“Not really, no,” he replied. “I barely watch anything these days apart from Doctor Who and the Larry Evans show.”

She finished redressing his wound. Then she let go of his arm and he let it fall to his side again.

“Larry Evans?” She questioned. Her tone of voice suggesting that she wasn’t impressed. “Isn’t that your ex-wife’s current boyfriend?”

“Well, yes…” Andrew answered sheepishly. “But…”

“And does it make you feel sad, or angry?” She asked.

“Well, yes…”

“I think you should stop obsessing about it and move on,” Sophie explained. “It’s not healthy for you, Andrew. And I think the anger and bitterness you’ve been feeling has contributed to the violent nature of your latest episode.”

“But don’t you think it’s strange,” Andrew argued, “that I dreamed a crow was pecking at my wing until it bled and then woke up with my arm bleeding? It’s as if it really happened!”

“It’s possible that you were acting out your frustration while in a delusional state,” she explained. “Which is why I think it’s very important that we review your medication. You’ve already injured yourself. I don’t want you hurting anyone else.”

“And I found feathers in the wound,” he interjected. “What if it’s actually possible I could be turning into a crow every new moon? You hear stories about werewolves and the like. What if I’m a werecrow? I know it sounds crazy. But I actually had crow feathers in my arm, an arm that had been injured after I experienced myself fighting with another crow! What if my condition isn’t a form of psychosis after all, but an actual event, a physical change?”

Sophie looked at him with a look of scepticism and disbelief. “You’re an intelligent man, Andrew,” she said. “You know there’s no way that a human being could turn into a wild bird. It’s scientifically impossible. Maybe you really did fight with a crow. But as a human in the grips of a psychological episode. Now, I’m going to prescribe you some new tablets. These are powerful antipsychotics, ok? They should hopefully work better in suppressing any delusional beliefs or hallucinations.”

“I’m surprised you have any drugs left that I haven’t tried yet,” Andrew commented. “I’ve lost count of how many times my medication has been changed. Nothing has ever worked. What if you’re treating the wrong kinds of symptoms? What if it’s not psychological at all, but physical?”

Sophie seemed to give this serious thought. She sat back in her chair, put her hands together under her chin and made a pensive noise while staring into space. “Well,” she said at last, shaking herself out of her reverie and looking Andrew in the eye. “Take these new drugs I’m prescribing you. But since you raise the issue of an underlying physical cause, and to put your mind at rest, I will also take a blood sample for analysis.”

“I’ve not fasted,” he told her.

“If we need a fasting test for another sample, I’ll let you know,” she explained. “But for now, let’s see what turns up from this one.”

She got him to roll his sleeve up on his good arm. She placed the tourniquet around his bicep and tapped the skin on the underside of the elbow joint. Then she put the needle in and withdrew some blood into the vial.

It was over very quickly, just a sharp scratch and a few seconds wait, then she removed the needle, put on a tiny plaster and took off the tourniquet.

“If there is anything physical causing your delusions,” she explained, “then I’m sure we’ll find it. In the meantime, keep taking your medication and look after yourself. Not just physically but emotionally too. Stop dwelling on the past and things that make you angry or anxious, ok? And look after that arm.”

“I will do,” Andrew said as he stood up to go. “And thanks as always for the opportunity to talk about what I’m going through.”

“You’re welcome, Andrew,” Sophie replied. “I worry about you. Not just as your doctor, but as your friend.” She smiled. He smiled. They said goodbye and Andrew left the doctor’s office and returned home.

Maybe she was right and it was just a product of his own emotional issues. Maybe he had done something weird like fought with a crow as a human. But as he walked home, the possibility she dismissed still haunted his mind. What if those feathers had been his? What if he really was some kind of shapeshifter?

I’m only posting the first 8 chapters of this story on this blog. You can read all of The Psychic Investigation and Study Team by buying it on Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

#fiction #fantasy #supernatural #novel #writing #lgbt

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

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P.I.S.T. - Chapter 2

“Just through there and up the hill,” she was told. Emily looked through the gap in the trees, a doorway formed by branches, and out into the moonlit hillside beyond.

Her heart beat hard in her chest. She didn’t know what to expect. She hesitated for a moment and turned back to face the vicar, the church warden and the church secretary who had led her here. The vicar was a stern looking but kind hearted man in his early fifties, hair mostly grey and with incredibly bushy eyebrows. He wore the standard priest attire of cassock and clerical collar and Emily reflected with a strange mixture of trepidation and pride that she would soon be wearing it too. The church secretary was a lovely woman, plump and jolly usually, with a kind face and lovely long brown hair that she wore in a ponytail. The church warden tended the church grounds. He was a strange elderly man with perpetually dirty fingernails that looked like talons. He always seemed to be grinning in an unnerving manner that seemed almost lecherous. Their faces and gestures were encouraging her to continue and sighing, Emily turned round, took a deep breath and walked through the doorway of trees.

As she stepped out into the hillside field beyond, she looked upwards at the path she must follow and the top of the hill that was bathed eerily in moonlight. There they said, she would meet with her angel, the final part of her ordination as a vicar. No one had told her about this, she mused, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath before opening them again and putting one foot in front of the other to climb that path.

It had been a happy day, a glorious day, a day full of celebrations and ceremonies. She was being ordained as a priest. It was a big moment and a serious commitment of course, but it was also supposed to be a wonderful time that she would treasure forever, like a wedding or a graduation. So why must there be this strange, spooky ritual at the end of it?

The final step, they had said. You must meet your angel before you are truly a priest. Then they had led her out in the darkness, round the back of the churchyard, down a footpath through a tiny wooded area, and finally out through a doorway of trees, into this eerie hillside on this surprisingly chilly night in June.

There was a mist in the air. She heard the sound of a fox and the hoot of an owl. There was a forest nearby. This hillside field was next to it. She looked up again, at the peak of the hill, the place she was heading. That was the place they said the angels came. Why that particular spot, she couldn’t have told you.

No one had ever mentioned this. Nobody in all of her clerical training, all her years at college studying theology, all her time preparing for this moment in the church, nobody had ever mentioned to her that she would have to meet an angel.

Of course there was nothing especially worrying or scary about meeting an angel. They were beautiful, heavenly creatures. It was a blessing of course. But until tonight she had not even believed that they literally existed. She had considered them to be a sort of symbol or a metaphor, part of what might be termed ‘Christian mythology’. But as she climbed the hill, she pondered the matter to herself. If she was to believe in the literal incarnation of our Lord, the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection, then why not angels too?

Something continued to trouble her though. Why the secrecy about it? Why the long walk in the darkness? Why must it even happen at night? Why did she have to be alone? So many troubling questions and nobody to answer them.

Eventually she reached the place. Alone on a hill top and no angel in sight. The moon shone down on her like a spotlight. She looked around her. She could see the view of the village below her, the trees and fields surrounding it. All the lights from the houses, shrouded in a veil of mist. It was beautiful. The path split in two at the top of the hill and one way was simply more and more fields. She turned to look down the other way, where the path led into the woods. And then she saw it.

At the edge of the forest, just where the path descended into the woods, just in front of the first line of trees, there sat a naked humanoid huddled over with great white feathered wings draping its form. It didn’t quite look like the way angels are usually depicted. The creature was delicate and slender in form and had long black hair. But the wings were large and glorious, exactly as she would have expected.

She stepped forward cautiously, eager not to scare it away. Eventually as she neared, its wings unfolded to reveal its frail, naked form and it turned to face her. The creature looked neither male nor female. Its hairless skin was soft and its facial features looked androgynous, somehow halfway between male and female features. There were no signs of reproductive organs at all, not even breasts or nipples. The eyes were large and beautiful, the features soft and delicate, the face almost childlike. It looked up at her sorrowfully as she approached and then lifted up its arm. With shock and instant pity, Emily noticed that the arm was caught in a metal trap and that there were streams of blood flowing from the wound.

It fixed her with those large, sad eyes and she felt as if all her surroundings faded away in response to the mesmeric stare. There was only the round face with its perfect thin nose, tight lips and enormous beautiful eyes, the sense of sadness and sorrow penetrating and permeating her mind as if telepathically. She heard a voice in her head, although the creature’s lips did not move, and it said simply and in a voice as delicate and musical as a tiny ringing bell, “help me”.

She walked even nearer to the beautiful creature. All fear and anxiety had melted away now. She was consumed by compassion and an intense desire to help the poor, troubled being, this sacred, innocent creature that had been so cruelly injured. The eyes of the angel seemed both loving and sad and there was simply no other thing she could have done at that point but to aid the poor, trapped creature.

She reached down to touch the metal trap, trying to work out how to release its grip and free the angel so that its wounds could be tended. At the very moment she touched the metal though the angel’s appearance changed all of a sudden.

It let out a snarling hiss and its visage transformed from a form of childlike beauty into a wrinkled, hag-like face that opened its mouth to reveal sharp teeth and a writhing, snake-like tongue. Wings distorted and crumpled into torn and ragged bat wings and long tentacles shot out from its body and reached towards her with frightening speed. The trap was gone, vanished like an illusion and the arm’s skin darkened to a pale grey, the hand also sprouting vicious claws.

Before she could cry out or jump back in alarm, the creature’s tentacles had wrapped themselves around her, binding her arms to her side and then curling their way around her head and face. Her consciousness faded and she heard a voice in her mind, now growling and snarling in a sinister manner. “Leave your old life behind,” it hissed, “you are now a servant of Logos.”

by the way I’m only posting the first 8 chapters on this blog. If you want to read the whole book then buy The Psychic Investigation and Study Team on Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

#fiction #fantasy #supernatural #novel #lgbt

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faeriekim-blog · 5 years

Text

P. I. S. T. - Chapter 1

The man looked a mess, as if a bloody tramp had plonked himself down and decided to sit at a table in the most high class coffee shop in Bedford. It was honestly an embarrassment for Marvin to be meeting his old friend here. What if someone saw the two of them together?

He noticed with some relief that Lawrence had at least bought himself a coffee and a muffin and wasn’t just sitting there in his threadbare green coat, with big ugly bags on the floor beside him and books and papers strewn about the table, without having bought anything. Marvin was a TV celebrity. He couldn’t risk his reputation and have people think he associated with tramps and reprobates.

“Ah, Marvin,” the middle aged man greeted him, looking up at Marvin briefly as he walked up to the table. “Nice to see a familiar face.”

Marvin merely grunted in reply and sat down opposite. He looked around. He noticed a couple with a young child and one or two lonely businessmen enjoying a hot beverage on their way to work. The air smelled of coffee. There were clinks of teaspoons and coffee cups and those noises that coffee machines make from behind the counter.

He looked back at his friend Lawrence. He wished he could say the same about being pleased to see a familiar face. He sighed deeply and decided to at least be civil. “So what brings you back to Bedford?” He asked. “I would’ve thought you’d have plenty to occupy you in amongst the hustle and bustle of London.”

“Oh, you know, travel and studies as usual,” Lawrence explained. “I’m always here, there and everywhere to be honest. So many strange stories and interesting leads to chase up. Which is what brings me here…”

Marvin could barely stomach listening to his tall tales. Witches and ghosts, fairies and ley lines. It was all nonsense of course. But he could hardly comment on that in public. He was a TV astrologer, a professional charlatan. Still, showbiz was showbiz and crazy was crazy. To think he used to believe in all that guff for real! UFOs and conspiracy theories, it was a culture of left wing insanity he was happy to have left behind. What he did was different. He was a performer who made a comfortable sane life for himself off the profits.

It wasn’t that he didn’t feel a little ashamed of his negative attitude towards his old friend. He didn’t wish Lawrence any harm and certainly didn’t want to outright reject him or be rude towards him. But the less time he had to spend in his presence then the better! He had long since left that world behind him and didn’t want to return anytime soon.

“So that’s why I’m here,” Lawrence finished. “To read up on some history in the library, check out some of the local newspapers over the past few decades, and poke my nose around to find out what is really going on in the church, the hospital and the gay bar.”

“People will say anything,” Marvin responded without thinking. “I’ve been to that gay bar almost every weekend for sixteen years. There’s no ghost there. It’s just a load of lesbian hysteria.”

Lawrence chuckled to himself. “Oh yeah,” he said, “I was forgetting you were one of them.”

Marvin felt almost furious. How dare he? Have you looked in a mirror, he thought. But he reminded himself again to at least be polite.

“So have you got yourself somewhere to stay?” He asked, praying silently that the man would say yes.

“I’m staying at a bed and breakfast, yes.” Lawrence answered. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to impose on your fancy lifestyle.” He chuckled to himself again. “You’ve done well for yourself, I hear. On the telly and everything!”

“Well, you know,” Marvin replied, looking anxiously around the coffee shop and out of the window to make sure nobody he knew could see him. “Some of us choose to move up in the world and make a success of our talents and interests.”

“You were always a gifted psychic,” Lawrence continued rambling, “always interested in ghosts and star signs. It’s nice to see you make something of it all. Must be nice to be a high flyer and still be interested in the occult. Most of us are still viewed as loonies.”

You are a loony, Marvin thought. I’m a performer, nothing more. Occult indeed! He’ll be using the word ‘paranormal’ next.

“Well,” he interjected, desperate to end this pointless meeting as soon as possible. “It’s great to know you’re alright and to catch up on old times. So good luck on your investigations and I’ll see you around. Keep in touch, yeah,” he added without even meaning it.

Lawrence seemed vaguely disappointed as Marvin got up to leave. “Oh, alright then,” he responded. “You must be very busy. Sorry to trouble you.”

Marvin turned round and shut his eyes tightly for a moment. That hurt. It made him feel guilty. But the moment didn’t last long. As he walked out of the shop, he turned briefly before reaching the door. Mad Lawrence was already engrossed in his books and papers, without paying Marvin any mind at all.

It was a relief. There was nothing to feel guilty about. Lawrence was happy with his own company and didn’t even seem especially bothered by Marvin’s hasty departure.

“Hospital, church, club…” Lawrence muttered to himself, drawing lines with a pencil on a map of the town. “There must be some kind of pattern to it… A shape or a ley line, but I can’t see it yet…”

Marvin shook his head to himself as he turned and walked out the door. Mad as a March hare, that Lawrence, utterly bonkers!

by the way, I’m only posting the first 8 chapters on this blog. If you want to read the rest then buy The Psychic Investigation and Study Team on Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com

#fiction novel PIST supernatural fantasy lgbt

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