Dragonfly of Venus

by Susan Ferrier MacKay

  A brilliant thought occurred to Natasha as she examined the doctored photo of her wedding. She could write a book. She’d had his dick in her many times hadn’t she? She’d sucked him off hadn’t she? She could tell all. People would be hugely interested to read how Declan Thomas fucked her. It could be turned into a Hollywood movie. Who would play her? Maybe one of those Kardashian chicks. Natasha let her thoughts drift to stardom and money. They would soon be coming her way. She would be world famous, as famous as Declan Thomas.

  Janine, the guard on duty, interrupted Natasha’s reverie. Janine had become her special friend during her time inside. Natasha didn’t mind in the least licking Jeanine’s pussy in return for a special strap-on dildo so Natasha could have some fun. Natasha had fucked several of the girls and was particularly fond of her present roommate; a Scottish girl from Glasgow called ‘Mouse’.

  Mouse, whose real name was Barbara Fellen, was serving time for forgery. Her specialty was fake passports. Natasha grilled her on how to go about getting one. Natasha had no need of a fake passport but it might come in handy someday. Natasha liked options. She liked keeping hers open.

  “Khomeini. Visitor,” bellowed Janine.

  Natasha sighed. Doubtless, it would be her father. As long as he brought along trash magazines, or ‘real news’ as inmates called gossip fodder, she put up with him. What she couldn’t stand was him getting emotional, which he invariably did.

  Janine led Natasha down a pink corridor into a lounge with a sagging couch and some tables and chairs where, once a week, inmates were permitted to see family and friends.

  Khaleed Khomeini stood up when his daughter arrived giving her a peck on the cheek before handing over a stack of tabloids. He was a thin, nervous man, bent now with age and what he called ‘the shame’ his daughter had brought to him.

  “Hi Pops.”

  Khaleed winced.

  “Please do not call me by that unfamiliar name. I am your father and you should address me as such. Pops makes me sound like I am a bowl of cheap North American cereal.”

  “Yes, father,” mumbled Natasha.

  “What are your plans?” asked Khaleed.

  “Plans?”

  “You are getting out of prison in a couple of months. You must do something.”

  Natasha shrugged.

  “I don’t know. Get a job in a bar.”

  “Please daughter. You are so much better than that. Why do you not return to school and learn to do something useful. You know I will gladly pay for such a thing.”

  Natasha had to admit her father, rich from supplying car manufacturers with fabric for interiors, was generous. She yawned.

  “Yeah, maybe.”

  Khaleed’s eyes lit up.

  “But first…” said Natasha pressing her advantage.

  “Yes, anything,” said Khaleed.

  “I need a little vacation when I get out.”

  “Why do you need a vacation?” demanded Khaleed. “You have been on a vacation for the past four years.”

  Natasha looked around.

  “ Yeah, some vacation spot,” she said. “Real scenic.”

  “And whose fault is that?” said Khaleed frustrated.

  “Mine, yeah I know,” sighed Natasha.

  “You and your stupid obsession over that damn singer.”

  “He’s dead. Did you know that?”

  “I do not follow such things,” said Khaleed. “But if he is dead then maybe it is a good thing.”

  Natasha’s eyes flashed. “How can you say that? He was everything to me.”

  “He was a boy, with a boy’s pursuit of music.”

  “I’m going to keep him alive,” said Natasha. “I’m going to write a book about how much he loved me.”

  Khaleed Khomeini gave up. He knew it was useless to argue with his headstrong daughter.

  Back in her cell, Natasha flipped though pages of the tabloids looking for any references to her. The second page of one of them first startled then enraged her. The headline said “Grieving Mother.” The photo showed Elizabeth wearing a scarf and dark glasses, with her children in a stroller.

  How dare that bitch claim all the sorrow for herself, thought Natasha. If only she had gotten to spend more time with Declan those brats could’ve been hers. She and Declan would have moved somewhere sunny, not somewhere remote where she could be away from the prying lens of photographers, all clamouring to take her photo. She thought about disguises. A blonde wig maybe so she could go out in public undetected, although occasionally she might let it slip, might let one or two photographers take her picture. The headlines loomed in Natasha’s mind.

  "Declan Thomas reunites with glamorous first love.”

  Shit. Shit. Shit. That wasn’t gonna happen. He was dead. The headlines rearranged themselves to Natasha’s satisfaction.

  “Glamorous, sexy true love of Declan Thomas reveals all in blockbuster book.”

  Yes, that was much better.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  During weeks that accumulated like leaden bricks after Declan’s death, Elizabeth took long, lonely walks in the hills. She had done the same after her father Jack died. One day she even climbed to the peak of Arkle Mountain, a hike that took all day. From the top she could see Handa, a tiny speck in the distance. Why, oh why, she asked herself. Why did he have to die so young?

  Wind at the top of the mountain peak whistled fiercely around her ears, whipping her hair around her face. “Declan, oh Declan,” she cried. “Where are you? Why have you left me?”

  A solitary sheep bleated in the distance.

  Elizabeth thought she heard Declan’s voice whispering her name. She told herself it was purely wishful thinking. A few drops of rain splattered her face. It had been almost two months since her life had shattered. It was time to go back. She hugged her raincoat to her. Time to go back. The words resonated. This place, once a source of comfort to her was now mired in the darkness of grief. It was time to go back and leave her sadness behind. She would close up the cottage, maybe even sell it. She no longer found solace in the rolling surf she could see from her porch. She hated the sea now. If it hadn’t been for Effie, the north Atlantic might have claimed her as well.

  Shortly after the crash, while Elizabeth grappled with devastation, she and Effie had gone walking on the white sands of Oldeshoremore. In her overpowering grief, it suddenly made perfect sense to Elizabeth that she could join Declan. He was in the sea somewhere wasn’t he? He was surely waiting for her. She dashed into the water, splashing and falling.

  “No, Elizabeth” cried Effie, running after her. The tide was coming in. A big wave caught first Elizabeth, then Effie, tossing them around like pieces of kelp.

  “Think of your children,” screamed Effie grabbing for her. “Think of Jack and Camille.”

  At that moment, the names meant nothing to Elizabeth. She knew only that something was pulling her backwards, drawing her out into the vastness of the ocean. She felt that if she surrendered, everything would be all right again.

  “Elizabeth,” screamed Effie. “Come back. I’m not a good swim...”

  Thoughts tumbled around in Elizabeth’s head like clothes in a dryer. As Effie disappeared underwater an instinct in Elizabeth kicked in. She dove forward and swam to the point she’d last seen Effie. Reaching down, she grabbed Effie by the collar of her shirt and heaved her towards the land. The timing was perfect as a huge breaker picked Effie up and hurled her towards the shore. Elizabeth followed with a strong crawl. Finally, Effie was in two feet of water. Lurching backwards, she made it to her feet.

  “Christ Effie, I’m sorry,” gasped Elizabeth. “I don’t know what came over me.”

  “Grief,” panted Effie, “that and a killer wave. For fuck’s sake Elizabeth, what the fuck were you thinking?”

  Arm in arm, the two friends staggered to the shoreline and collapsed onto the sand.

  Elizabeth began to bawl.

  “I could’ve lost you as well Effie.”

&n
bsp; Effie placed her arm around Elizabeth.

  “It’ll take more than some fucking ocean to do me in,” she said.

  “What a tragedy,” sobbed Elizabeth. “Just think how awful it could have been.”

  “’Could have’ doesn’t count,” said Effie firmly. “It was a moment of madness is all. No harm done.”

  “My children. How could I not think of them?” cried Elizabeth.

  “You’re thinking of them now,” said Effie. “That’s the main thing.”

  “I can’t believe he’s gone Effie. I simply can’t believe it. I still feel like he’s going to turn up.”

  “Well,” said Effie, “maybe it’s best if you tell yourself he’s just gone away for a while and that he’s coming back. If that helps you through each day then what’s the harm?”

  That night Elizabeth dreamed of Declan for the first time in weeks. His perfect features and eyes as vivid as cornflowers were right beside her. She dreamed she caressed the halo of dark curls that framed his head and nestled appealingly at the nape of his neck. She kissed him in her dreams. She felt his strong arms around her. She awoke to his tight embrace only to find herself tangled in sheets, her pillow soaked in tears.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  From a seagull’s perspective, high above land, the white patch on the beach of Handa Island could’ve been sand, or a large white fish, or a tarpaulin. It was in fact, a naked man lying on his side with seaweed tangled in his hair and a long gash down one leg. The man’s legs remained half in the water, lifted gently up and down by harmless waves. Sand, reflecting in the morning sunlight, glittered here and there on his body. His eyes were closed as if he was either sleeping, or dead. The man was not dead. The man was Declan Thomas, or at least a semblance of him.

  After a few minutes of lying motionless, Declan began to cough, spitting up seawater. He groaned and rolled onto his back exposing his full nakedness. It was a sight neither Callum McNamara nor his wife expected to see, nor a sight for their eighteen-year-old daughter Fionnaugh, who recognized the strange figure as being a man seconds before her parents. She gasped. Callum, who’d been preoccupied with the latch on a lobster trap, looked in the same direction as his daughter. He flung up an arm to shield his innocent daughter’s eyes from the manliness in front of them.

  “Go on now. Quick. Back to the house. And bring a blanket,” barked Callum in Gaelic.

  Fionnaugh lifted her long skirt and ran, light as a gazelle, back up the rocky pathway from which she’d come. Callum continued his heavy tread towards the beach as his wife made the sign of the cross and began to pray. He stood for a few seconds contemplating this new offering from the sea then covered Declan’s lower region with his jacket. He turned Declan onto his side and thumped him on the back with meaty fists. Declan started coughing again and expelled more seawater.

  “Aye, you’ll live,” grunted Callum.

  The first sound to pierce Declan’s consciousness was a high wild shrieking, like the cries of a hungry seabird. His eyesight, blurred at first, focused on the pale face of an older woman, gazing down at him with an intensity made peculiar by the fact that one of her pale blue eyes looked in a different direction than its twin. Her hair, streaked with grey, was pulled back beneath a bonnet into a thick braid. She seemed enveloped in a misty softness. The woman was wailing and crying. She fell to her knees, cradling Declan’s head in her lap and rocking back and forth.

  “Johnny, Johnny. Yerv come back ta me,” she yowled.

  Callum grunted. This wasn’t his long-dead son Johnny but if his poor addled wife wanted to believe it, he wasn’t going to stop her. He allowed her to continue wailing until Fionnaugh returned.

  “Alright Moira,” said Callum sternly to his wife, “lets get tha lad up to tha house. Fionnaugh, give me tha blanket.”

  Fionnaugh, transfixed by the helpless man on the beach, darted forward, handing her father a thick sheep’s wool blanket. The image of the man’s nakedness was burned in her mind. She would like to have seen it again but her father had the man covered, rolling the blanket around him and tucking it in so it appeared he was wearing a long skirt.

  Callum put his jacket back on and hoisted the limp figure up, draping one of the man’s arms over his burly shoulders. His wife supported the man on his other side. Even though she was a tiny woman, she was strong.

  “It’s a miracle,” she kept saying. “Tha sea has sent him back to me. Ma poor wee Johnny.”

  Callum turned to his daughter.

  “Fionnaugh. Don’t stand there gawping. Go on up to tha house and get some water boiling. Make tea. And heat some porridge. Hurry girl.”

  Fionnaugh darted away to do her father’s bidding. Her heart was pounding with excitement. A stranger had arrived on their shore, and not just any stranger but an extremely handsome one. She now had her first glimpse of a naked male. She clung to the memory of the pale shaft emerging from the mass of dark hair between his legs. The sight of it stirred something within her and caused a tingling feeling between her legs. She knew her mother believed this was her brother who’d been drowned. She knew better. The stranger might have been sent as a gift from the sea, but she had a feeling this gift was meant for her alone.

  Declan had the sensation of being pulled or dragged uphill. When he opened his eyes, the landscape appeared enveloped in mist so he closed them again. Within minutes, he was in front of a blazing hearth. Soothing warmth surrounded him and began seeping into his frozen bones. A cup containing a hot sweet liquid was pressed to his mouth. He drank a few sips, feeling sugar rush through his veins. He heard voices, a man’s sonorous tones overlaid by the high chatter of females. They didn’t make sense. Nothing made sense. Fatigue carried him away.

  Declan woke once to see the pale face of a young girl staring at him. Her eyes were large, of the palest china blue; her lips a perfectly formed rosebud of pink. The hair around her oval face sprung out in a fuzzy halo of strawberry curls. She reached out a hand and stroked his face. She said something he couldn’t understand. He closed his eyes and returned to the deep well of sleep.

  It could’ve been an hour, or a day, or a week that Declan slept. He couldn’t tell. His stomach finally woke him, roused by the smell of cooking. He stretched out, alarmed to feel a sharp stab in his leg. Pushing blankets away he saw his leg had been carefully bandaged. He had no idea who bandaged it, where he was, or even who he was. What happened? How did he get here? He looked around the room for clues. Once again, a mist seemed to hover around the periphery of his vision. He rubbed his eyes until the mist disappeared and everything came into sharp focus.

  The room Declan was in was narrow with thick stone walls. It contained a single iron bed and an old-fashioned washstand. Above the washstand hung a cracked mirror, and beside that a calendar. The words representing months were in a language that was indecipherable but the format clearly indicated a way to mark the passing of time. Declan peered at the top of the yellowed piece of paper. The year was 1848. Declan blinked and rubbed his eyes again. The numerals didn’t change. Had he been tossed backwards through time? No, it was surely some kind of mistake.

  In one corner of the room, a straight back wooden chair held men’s clothing folded into a neat pile; two pairs of pants and shirts made of thick rough material. Declan walked gingerly around, aware his leg was throbbing. He parted curtains that held the room in restful darkness and took in his surroundings. Outside, fine rain was drizzling onto a bleak landscape of rolling grass. Sheep bleated in the distance.

  The washbasin had been filled with water. Declan checked it with his hand. It was still tepid. Beside the washbasin was a comb that appeared to be made from bone, a shaving brush, some oily soap and a straight razor. He splashed water on his face and looked in the mirror. A scruffy beard covered the reflected face. The eyes that stared back were violet blue, fringed by black lashes and topped with two dark slashes of eyebrows. Was this his face? Apparently it was but he didn’t recognize it. He glanced again at the calendar. Someon
e had marked off days with an X. If he was interpreting it correctly, today was May 18, 1848, surely an error but then again, maybe not. If he didn’t recognize himself in a mirror, perhaps he was incapable of knowing which century he was in as well.

  Declan rubbed oily soap over his jaw and attempted to scrape the straight razor upwards but immediately nicked himself. The tiny cut soon clotted but Declan didn’t want to risk further bloodshed. He decided to leave his jaw unshaven. His hair was extremely tangled and matted in clumps. After several tries to run the comb through it he gave up but not before extracting several pieces of seaweed and a tiny fragment of shell. He pulled on a pair of man’s pants, puzzled to find they ended just below his knees. Although they were a little loose around the waist they fit. Next, he tried on the shirt. It appeared to be made for him. On the floor, he found a pair of handmade sheepskin slippers. Again, a perfect fit.

  With his stomach gurgling in protest over its emptiness, Declan opened the door of his room into a mud-floored kitchen/living area containing a large, fire-filled iron grate and a plain wooden table with four chairs. Above the grate, suspended from a chimney flue, hung a large iron cauldron. A tiny woman was busy stirring something in the pot. She turned when she heard him come in. Flinging down her ladle she rushed to him, wrapping her arms around him and burying her face in his midriff.

  “Ach, Johnny, Johnny,” she kept repeating. She pulled back and gazed at him, both eyes watery but one looking in another direction. Babbling away in a language he couldn’t understand, she pulled out a chair indicating for him to sit. She placed a cup of milk in front of him, watching in satisfaction as Declan downed the creamy contents in three gulps. “Ith lan do bhidh,” she said putting a bowl of porridge on the table along with a loaf of homemade bread and a jam made from wild berries. She nodded approval as Declan ate the entire loaf. He’d never been as hungry in his whole life and this meal was the best he’d ever tasted.