by Peter Spokes
“She may only be fifteen but she’s always been mature for her age…” I said, wincing as I realised too late that it wasn’t the most pacifying comment I could make.
Helen said nothing for a while before; “She’s going to need to control it.”
“Of course,” I said, “but she’s at that age where boys will notice her and want to… get to know her. It’s really not her fault – you of all people should understand that,” I said trying to placate her a little.
“But she needs to understand the difference between her desires and her… Needs,” Helen said, taking a large gulp from her glass.
“She’s new to this and too young to differentiate,” I said. “She’s clearly starting to see boys she … wants… It’s natural.”
“If she’s old enough to perform the act, then she is old enough to understand the repercussions and consequences… She could get into so much trouble… and so could we!” Helen continued – a worried look still on her face.
Then she looked over at me and smiled.
“I envy you. You have no idea what she is going through. Leave this to me. I have a better… perspective on this… as I’m sure you’ll agree – than you do.”
I felt a little chagrined as I perceived a sudden relegation to my responsibility and duty; she was my daughter too, after all.
But Helen was right and so I tried a different tack.
“Do you remember your first?” I asked smiling. “I really doubt you were fully aware of your actions.”
She laughed. “Of course; you always remember your first…!”
“Yes… and? Was it so very different…?” I said.
“Well, for a start, I was nineteen, but I still wish my parents had prepared me for it. It was quite a shock…”
She thought for a moment. “I thought I was so grown up; his name was Joey…Joey Dawson.
He was so… ‘yummy’,” she said smiling more so.
I too smiled. “And how did your parents react?”
“They were happy that I was getting what I wanted.”
I was a bit surprised considering my own rather conservative upbringing.
“Seems a bit base,” I replied.
“You are such a prude,” she said laughing. “But isn’t that what it’s all about? A basic insatiable need that needs satisfying?”
“I guess so… but now we’re talking about our little girl,” I said.
Helen looked down for a moment. “Yes. We need to have that talk with her before we have another … incident… and now she’s got the taste… there will be others…”
“This was her first…” I said. “Do you think she understood the magnitude of what she was doing? And how do you think she’ll feel about her second?”
“She’ll be okay. Once the hormones kick in – again – she’ll realise that the lack of control is normal.”
I was silent. I was certain that one day in the future we would look back and laugh at our current concerns; after all, parents have that uncomfortable period when they need to extend or remove the leash on their offspring so that they may explore and taste the world.
But it was such a dangerous place and keeping your offspring safe from the hostile world seemed such a challenge.
Scene 2: A Bad Experience
Just then, Helen suddenly looked up and then over at the stairs. I turned my head to see our daughter sitting beside the bannister rail.
She stood up and started down the stairs and over to her favourite armchair where she curled up.
She was still clearly distressed by the evening’s events.
“Grace; you need to sleep. You’ll feel better in the morning,” I said.
“I’m so sorry… I don’t know what happened…” she started. “I saw this boy and…”
“It’s okay… it’s okay… you really don’t need to explain…” Helen said softly.
“I do… I want to… I was so scared… I didn’t expect it… to happen…”
“You’re a sensitive thing,” I said sitting on the arm of her chair and stroking her head and neck.
She grasped my hand.
“I… I was walking along the edge of the woods,” she started, staring between Helen and myself. “… Along that old trail, and all was dark when I saw… him coming along the path towards me.
He looked so handsome and strong and he… smiled at me; I smiled back… and suddenly I could smell him and hear his heart beating. Then, all of a sudden… as we got closer…”
“That’s when it happened…?” I said.
She looked up at me and nodded…
I looked over at Helen.
“I don’t know what came over me but… but I suddenly…”
“Wanted him so badly?” Helen said quietly.
She looked up. “Yes. I couldn’t help it… I became a raging animal… literally!”
Helen and I exchanged glances again.
Grace continued, “Within moments… he was… lying… in the mud and my teeth were… tearing at his throat… and I couldn’t drink the blood fast enough… I was so very thirsty…”
I saw her mouth contort in anguish.
“You did nothing wrong,” I said gently. “It is quite natural…”
“I couldn’t stop myself! There was blood everywhere… and I wanted more…!”
“Did anyone see you?” I asked gently.
“No… no… we were alone… and once I had finished… I dragged his body further into the woods and began chewing the flesh from his bones. I didn’t think I would be strong enough to move him, but it was… easy.”
“Yes, it would be,” Helen whispered.
Grace looked up. “I didn’t even use my arms; I dragged him with my… my teeth… but what happens when someone finds it… him?”
“Don’t worry about it; your father has taken care of that,” Helen said reassuringly and patted her arm.
I nodded. “The body won’t be found.”
Scene 3: Growing Up
Helen and I stared at our daughter for a while before I offered gently, “None of this is your fault, Grace. Lycanthropy has always been part of your mother’s line… but not mine and so we were not really sure which way you would… go.”
I left it then to Helen to explain to Grace the apparent curse or blessing – I accepted that I was never going to get my head around the whole ‘full moon’ thing.
I listened as she talked of the ways of the wolf and the sublime feeling of being alive but with an insatiable appetite that needs satisfying.
Though I was a little remote from the conversation, I was so proud of Grace.
Our little girl was growing up.
Echoes of Chronus
Scene 1: Heart Attack
I looked up – surprised at how soon I had reached the door to my father’s house. I could barely remember the journey back from the hospital.
I slowly entered the house and returned to the room where my father and I had earlier discussed our latest sojourn to the north coast of Cornwall, once he had regained his strength from a particularly unpleasant bout of flu.
I yawned. It was now 2.30 am and the house seemed dark and empty as I sat down and looked across at the chair in which he had sat only – how long had it been? – five hours ago. A lot had happened in those hours. My mind was filled with flashing blue lights, sirens and green-coated paramedics, rushing to and fro between the ambulance and my father’s stricken body.
Naturally I had accompanied him to the hospital and after much insufferable waiting, and a myriad of tests, I was assured – and reassured – that he was comfortable.
I was told that, as far as heart attacks go, this was a fairly mild one. It was thought that the flu had weakened him considerably and when they had asked what he had been doing, I answered, honestly, that he had been relaxin
g in his chair while flicking idly through a newspaper as we discussed our next holiday.
I still felt somewhat dazed that hours earlier he had been sitting, peacefully in that chair chatting and reading. As I have stated, he was perusing a newspaper but I remembered that after he turned a page, he had suddenly taken a sharp intake of breath; I had looked up to see him staring, quite fixedly, at something.
Then he was gasping for air.
“Was there anything in the newspaper that might have alarmed him?” the doctor had said.
“I really don’t know,” I had answered unhelpfully.
I walked over to the newspaper, still lying in a heap beside the chair. Unfortunately, in my haste to help my father I had thrown it to one side where it lay somewhat crumpled, making identifying the part that may have been pertinent to my father’s sudden reaction difficult.
As I flicked through the paper I saw an article relating to a comet that had passed near to Earth several days ago; a picture showed it trailing across the sky. The article explained the recent visit of TO-421114; a bright ball of ice that it was thought last visited our solar system in 1963.
I looked up for a moment; a memory of one evening many years ago, while I had been looking around in the loft, I had found a telescope but it was broken having lost its lens. I figured that my father had held some interest in astronomy, but when asked about it, he had said nothing and walked away. I never mentioned it again. I had wondered if he was upset because the device was broken.
I returned to the newspaper and began turning pages. There was a picture displaying a street in a Berkshire town – my father once lived in Berkshire. Several labourers stood beside a large hole that had been dug in order to replace the pipes in an ancient sewage system. Apparently, several skeletons had been found. This story caught my attention until I saw at the end of the article that the skeletons were over one hundred years old. There was expected to be some delay while archaeologists from the British Museum and safety experts considered it. Much space appeared devoted to pictures with the aforementioned experts gazing, with some gravitas, into the hole.
I dismissed the article from my mind and turned to the next page.
My eyes were drawn to a picture of a young girl displaying black make-up on her lips and around her eyes. She also had what appeared to be a ring pierced through her lower lip. I guessed she belonged to that fraternity known as ‘Goths’.
I read the article associated with it entitled ‘Mystery Surrounds Chapel Death’. Apparently, the girl had had a lucky escape from a violent step-father; after having been quite physically abusive to her for several years, she had understandably run away. Unfortunately, he had found her hiding in some chapel but when the resident vicar had answered her frantic screams, the girl was found hiding behind the pulpit unharmed though quite hysterical while her step-father’s body lay nearby apparently having suffered a severe impact trauma to the side of his head.
When capable to be interviewed she had made mention of a strange man in the chapel. He had appeared pleasant and courteous but then the step-father had appeared and the stranger intervened. She said that if he hadn’t she was certain that her step-father would have killed her. What made her feel he was ‘strange’ was his apparent disappearance before her eyes.
The report indicated that as no murder weapon was found, the girl could not be considered a suspect despite a reasonable motive and concluded that her step-father had been murdered by a person or persons unknown.
Good thing too; deserved what he got, I thought.
Again, I dismissed the article; I was certain my father had seen something suddenly, rather than the progressive nature of perusing an article.
On the next page, I saw some indication that the utility companies were increasing their prices again; bad for all, especially those who couldn’t afford it, but unlikely – I felt – to cause a cardiac arrest.
Another article indicated yet another political initiative to make the country a better place. There were the worn-out soundbites while the opposition parties spoke of the calamitous disaster that awaited England should the Chancellor’s white paper become law.
I had no time for politicians but nothing malicious or malevolent seemed in evidence. There was a large picture of the Home Secretary announcing his plans in a grandiose manner, while his colleagues clapped and otherwise fawned about him.
After several more minutes of disappointing scrutiny, I determined that there was little, as far as I could see, that deserved the reaction it got.
Perhaps I was completely mistaken as to the cause.
I looked again at the newspaper hoping something might jump out at me; nothing did, but I looked again at the comet… last seen 23rd April 1963, I read.
That would be four years before I was born but I remembered how fastidious my father was with his diaries, up until about fifteen years ago that was, when he retired from the world. Father had kept diaries until 1995.
I rose and headed for the loft.
Scene 2: Diaries
Once in the loft, among cobweb-covered boxes and cases, I found the old wooden trunk, aged and encapsulated in a thick layer of dust. I recovered the old telescope I had seen some forty or so years ago. It had never been repaired – still cracked and missing its lens.
Carefully I put it to one side and rifled through the trunk more so. Eventually I found the diary for April 1963 and perused only to find that the page of the 23rd and subsequent ones removed, or ripped out – and with some vigour judging from the unevenly torn edges close to the spine.
Now that was intriguing.
I started to look through previous months and found mention of a greatly anticipated visit to a hill above Daymer Bay in north Cornwall, where it inferred – with some excitement – that my father had hoped to see ‘Chronus’. But unfortunately, there was no mention as to who ‘Chronus’ was. I was aware that he was some kind of Greek god – of time – I thought.
I fired up the iPad and sure enough I found that Chronus was indeed a Greek god but otherwise of no interest until I appended the date too. The officially designated name for ‘Chronus’ was, TO-421114.
The comet.
Despite my best endeavours, I could find no more insight or information and found myself at an impasse.
Then about two weeks later I had a most rewarding visit.
It was initiated by a letter from a Reverend Alex Trelawney.
The correspondence was addressed to my father indicating a strong desire to speak to him – curiously – about an article in a recent newspaper. I had opened it because of the postmark indication ‘Daymer Bay, Cornwall’. I wrote a letter of invite explaining my father’s very recent incapacitation and my relationship. I then waited with more than a little anticipation.
On the day and at the prescribed time, there was a knock at the door and on opening it – with some surprise – I shook the firm hand proffered and invited into my drawing room a jeans-and-T-shirt-attired lady in her early forties. She smiled, I felt, more from my look of surprise than courtesy.
Shaking off my initial mistaken assumption that ‘Alex’ was a man, I offered her some tea and sat down entering into some talk regarding my father’s most recent ailment before – fired up with not a little expectation – I offered, “There was something in the recent edition?”
“Indeed,” she said, “though I baulk somewhat at where to begin.”
I sat back and said nothing giving her time to collect her thoughts.
She stood to remove a folded piece of paper from a rear pocket and unfolded it. She looked at it briefly. “You may have seen this,” she said before passing it to me and returning to her chair.
I fully expected to see a picture of the comet but looked down at the picture of the girl with the black make-up and the ring through her lip.
I looked up enquiringly.
“I’m
the reverend that found her… and the body of her step-father.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, “that must have been quite awful… but what has she to do with my father?”
She paused looking down and then ignoring my question…
“She… the young girl… was quite traumatised,” she continued. “Naturally I was pretty scared myself as I suspected the murderer – or rescuer – may still be close. I called the police but they found nothing except one thing… It was something… very old.”
I was waiting for her to tell me what it was when she changed direction.
“My father,” she started, “was a vicar at the same chapel in north Cornwall.”
“Daymer Bay?” I asked.
“Yes. He was there some forty years.”
“My father often visited Cornwall,” I offered, “and Daymer Bay in particular as it apparently afforded him excellent celestial observation; he still has an old telescope upstairs though it’s broken. I can’t imagine why he kept it.”
Alex held my gaze overlong before continuing.
“When my father died, about thirteen years ago, I spent some time reading his diaries and there was one particular entry – very old – which intrigued me. He referred to a young girl who, sounding from his description, may have been a ‘Goth’, but the entry was in 1963, about twenty years before the Goth guise appeared. I once asked him about it, and he said simply, ‘One day it will be clear’ which, of course, meant nothing to me.
I have that diary with me. Would you mind if I read you some of it?”
“Certainly,” I said looking for some rationale in this conversation.
She removed an old leatherbound tome from her rucksack and opened it where a paper marker had been placed.
“Okay, here goes.”
She began to read her father’s words from some fifty years ago…
Scene 3: The Father’s Diary
18 November 1963
It is 2.30 am and I am so very weary, but I need to note this down before tiredness and repeated revisiting and surmising of this incident robs me of its accuracy.