What Else Can Happen In A Second? #amwriting

'I'm just coming' he yelled. They were late, and Vee was getting agitated. She had been pacing the floor for 15 minutes. 'We're going to miss the train' she warned. It was 17.23 and the train was in 10 minutes and they needed to leave now. no. They needed to leave 5 minutes ago. But that's just how it was, how it had always been. He had teethed late, walked late, talked late, and he had been continuing in the same vein for the last sixteen and a half years.

Vee had grown accustomed over the years, and usually built in extra time, told him that they need to be somewhere half an hour sooner than they did, but the invite had come as a surprise and they had only just agreed to go last night. The opening night of a West End play wasn't to be sniffed at - not when you were mates with the leading actor and had been promised box seats and an invite to the after show party. 'Hurry up!' she pleaded, leaning round the hallway door to make sure he heard this time, her call echoing off the smooth wooden floorboards and polished bannister. 'Ok mum', dismissing her fuss, knowing she always made them arrive half an hour early to everything. 'Down in a sec'.

             

How could she have known he would be so true to his words. A sudden thundering, thumping roar filled the house, followed by silence. What the hell was that? 'You ok?'

Nothing.             

'Robbie?' Her stomach lurched as she rounded the corner back in to the hallway, her purple slingbacks skidding on the polished floor. A rag doll with dull grey eyes and a mop of brown curls was lying folded inelegantly at the foot of the stairs, limbs in the wrong order and an air of confusion around usually laughing lips. Its neck looked strange, like a slinky stuck mid spring. So out of place on this solid, rugby playing frame.

'robbie', she whispered, frightened to startle him. She knew, even before she got to him, she knew, but checked anyway. No pulse. her baby boy had no pulse. She crumpled, the floor rising up to meet her. What had just happened? And what was that noise?

She fumbled in her pocket for her phone, dimly aware of hitting the emergency call button. When the answer came 'emergency, which service', she realised that the noise had been her raw scream as her heart tried to climb up and out of her mouth. 'ambulance' she muttered.

'My son is dead'.

****

Almost 17 years ago, she had found this child left on her door step. There was no note, no clue as to who the child was or where he had come from. The poor bundle was freezing cold, and in desperate need of a clean nappy. She had fallen in love as soon as she had picked him up, and whilst she had distracted herself gathering essentials, feeding and changing him, she knew that this could only end badly.

She had waited, nervously for days, hours, weeks for someone to come and claim him, but as the months wore on, there was no not knock on the door. No missing person information in the papers, nothing on the news about a stolen or missing baby.

She had the skills and resources to create the documentation to make him officially hers as far as the authorities here were concerned. And as time had passed, she knew that against her better judgement, she could never give him up. She knew it was selfish of her. Knew that she was putting the boy’s life in danger, but in all of her years, she had never felt an aching in her soul like the one she felt at the thought of not being able to see these beautiful grey eyes staring out at the world like he knew everything.

He had grown so quickly. It seemed that in a blink he had transformed from a chunky little pudding with flailing arms and uncoordinated legs, to a strong, brawny teenager, complete with breaking voice until it evened out at a beautiful woodwind tone, strong and commanding, reminding her strangely of her own father’s so long ago. She had watched in awe as he developed into a real person. There had been the outbreaks of acne across his soft face and back. He had tried to take control, hitting the gym and bulking out, getting out in the sun as often as he could and guzzling water as though it was going out of fashion. She had spent a small fortune in acne creams for him during those tough few years, but since his facial hair had started to make an appearance, his skin cleared up as if by magic as soon as he started actually washing every day.

She remembered with a smile the embarrassing conversation about why his sheets and PJs were wet. She had caught him creeping around the kitchen early one morning, with a bundle of laundry tightly knotted in his arms, struggling to work out where the detergent went. He had always done his share of chores around the house; there was no way a son of hers would be a pampered layabout, but the washing machine seemed to have permanently confused him. Poor Rob, he was terrified he had wet the bed. As much as he was relieved to find that was not the case, he was still mortified to be having ‘the conversation’ with his mother at 7am. She had made them tea and toast, told him that they could talk any time he wanted to, and then left the subject.

She had told them they could talk any time. But not any more. Her baby, who was not her baby, had been taken anyway.

She knew that there was nothing more to be done here. That the life she had constructed so carefully to make sure Robbie had a normal upbringing, was over. She stood, finding the floor was solid under her feet once more although her heart weighed heavier than the universe, and made her way around the house, undoing the traces of her, erasing her existence. She put a few small trinkets in the pocket of her long tawny leather coat; Robbie’s last birthday card to her, emblazoned with ‘Happy 40^th Birthday To The Best Mum In The World’. If only he had known how far off he was. She would never be able to tell him now.

Digging through the pile of papers in her bedside cabinet, she gathered up a small photo of him as a baby, and his most recent ‘night out’ photo noting that he still had the same unruly brown curls, even now as his body lay broken. She turned, made her way carefully back down the stairs, stopping to look at her angel one final time, before walking back along the hallway. She picked up a small satin bag that had been gathering dust for longer than she cared to think on top of the coat rack, opened the heavy oak door and stepped out into the street. She left the door open for the paramedics, she knew they would take care of the body, that they would do all the things that needed to be done with his mortal remains to meet the requirements of the world she had been inhabiting when she had been ‘Robbie’s Mum’. As she marched down the street she could hear the sound of sirens heading towards the house.

She kept walking, not looking back, remembering who she had been before, becoming ‘Violet’ once more. She knew who was responsible for this, she had smelt their mark in the tiny patch of oil on the stair, had found their grimy prints on the otherwise immaculate balustrade. She had been dormant for far too long, she had grown soft and allowed them to get too close. And now, oh now they would pay. She would have blood.

Plant Restoration 101 #amwriting

'Relax, let your mind be open to the world around you. Find the root, breath it in, feel the pulse'. Instructor Lain was gently encouraging the class, helping them to find the Channel that belonged to the sad looking Winterberry tree on the low clay table in the middle of the room. 

      Olwyn had seen the droop of it as she had trailed through the mounds of pillows and low padded benches used to help students achieve the meditative state required to communicate with plants. She had found her usual spot towards the back of the room, and quickly settled into a comfortable position, long limbs stretched and fingertips softly skimming the floor.

      Having started a year late, and arrived three months into the current term, she still felt like she was playing catch up, but her entry test had shown her natural talent in Plant Whispering to be strong enough that she could go straight in to the age-appropriate year group. Olwyn fervently wished that she had been allowed to sit the first year.  She worried constantly that her fellow class mates either thought she was a know-it-all for missing the foundation level theory work that they had all been required to plough through - or that she was a dimwit for not knowing half of the basics of Whispering and couldn't remember the Names needed to address each plant when seeking an audience with them.

      Shaking the thought clear, Olwyn's long dark ponytail sent out creepers across the cushion below her as she concentrated, relaxing into position, letting the tension drain out of her muscles and into the plush fabric. She let her breathing slow, her eyes drooping, peering out through her dark lashes to see the world in between the light and dark. She could see them now, just on the edge of her vision, like tendrils reaching across the room to find a new place to root. These were the Spirit Channels of the plants in the room. Here was the Aemane, with its velvety black branches and lurid purple tips, its spirit was winding high and proud, tickling the tops of the other students' heads, ready to cure any headaches or nausea. 

      Pale-leaved and putrid, the deadly Sliyebore was there too, treacling low across the ground, slug-like, creeping over feet. Olwyn noticed distractedly that it seemed to be pooling around one of her class mates, bubbling, molten, spitting and made a mental note to gently remind the girl that Sliyebore was a well-known abortive.

      Once again, trying to focus on the task at hand, Olwyn found the dimmed Spirit of the Winterberry. It looked wheezy, rasping, stretched too thin. She was supposed to make a grand announcement of herself, bestowing honours and platitudes on the plant for receiving her. She couldn't remember the words. She couldn't understand why the Instructors insisted on such formality. She had never bothered with any of it at home, and her Whispers had usually been heard. 

      'Um, hi, my name is Olwyn. You look really poorly. I'd like to help you, if you will allow my presence?' Her voice, a thought carried as a Whisper along the Channel, found its mark. The exhausted plant confirmed it was dying. There was a parasite borrowed deep into one of its roots, starving it of water and nutrients. Olwyn promised to help her Instructor to find the parasite if the Winterberry could permit her entry and show her where the bug was lodged. 

      Acceptance. Permission. 

      Olwyn inhaled slowly and deeply, filling her body with the Spirit of the plant, allowing it to rest in her blood stream, to find shelter in her lungs and take strength and courage from her. Once the Spirit was calm within her, Olwyn breathed out, sending her own essence back along the path, touching the leaves, the flowers, the stem, gently embracing the plant until she was part of it. 

      She fought back the urge to panic as she once again felt the suffocating restriction she had experienced when she first entered the room. Drawing on strength from her dormant body, Olwyn reached out, sending energy and life throughout the plant, nourishing the leaves, working down past nodes, Whispering encouragement as she passed, down through the stem and into the primary root. 

      There. She could see the intruder, grown fat on the Winterberry's reserves. An ugly pulsating mess of translucent tubes and a gaping hole of a mouth, gulping down the rich nutrients as quickly as the Winterberry's lateral roots could draw them in. She felt a wave of nausea at the stench of rot surrounding the little beast.

      Gathering all of her focus now, Olwyn began working with the plant, Whispering, pulling together the fibres and sinews of the roots, bunching them, building a solid base. 
      Breath in; collect. Breath out; consolidate. Repeat. 
      A dozen breaths later and Olwyn had helped the plant to create a solid, coiled fist, and now, on the final out breath, they were ready. 'OK?' Olwyn checked. 
      Confirmation.

      As Olwyn and the plant released, the knot which they had been building was unleashed. An explosion of force expelled the parasite back out through the wall of the root, sealing the wound behind it and Olwyn was caught in a flood. Lifted violently in the rush, back up along the stem, past nodes and flowers, Olywn burst out of the terminal bud and was thrown across the room, slamming back into her own consciousness so hard her gums bled. 

      She felt as though someone had driven a hot poker through her temple. Rolling off the cushions to find the cold red tiles of the floor, she pressed her face against them, letting out a gurgled, exhausted groan. She was just aware of a 'thank you' in the air and a swarm of anxious faces hovering over her before she let the dark comfort of unconsciousness take her.

What Can Happen In A Second? # amwriting

'I'm just coming' he yelled. We were late, and I was getting agitated. I'd been pacing the floor for 15 minutes. 'We're going to miss the train' I had warned. It was 17.23 and the train was in 10 minutes and we needed to leave now. no. we needed to leave 5 minutes ago. But that's just how it was, how it had always been. He was born late, refused to come out when he was meant to, no matter how much curry I ate, and he had been continuing in the same vein for the last sixteen and a half years.

I usually built in extra time, told him that we need to be somewhere half an hour sooner than we did, but the invite had come as a surprise and we had only just agreed to go last night. The opening night of a West End play wasn't to be sniffed at - not when you were mates with the leading actor and had been promised box seats and and invite to the after show party. 'Hurry up!' I pleaded, leaning round the hallway door to make sure he heard me this time, my call echoing off the smooth wooden floorboards and polished bannister. 'Ok mum', dismissing my fuss, knowing I always made us arrive half an hour early to everything. 'Down in a sec'.

How could I have known he would be so true to his words. A sudden thundering, thumping roar filled the house, followed by silence. What the hell was that? 'You ok?'

Nothing.

'Robbie?' A wave of dread roared through me as I rounded the corner, back in to the hallway. A rag doll with my beautiful boy's face on was lying crumpled at the foot of the stairs, limbs in the wrong order and a surprised look on its face. Its neck, I remember, looked strangely graceful, elongated, like a swan. So out of place on this solid, rugby playing frame.

'robbie', I whispered, frightened to startle him. I knew, even before I got to him, I knew, but I checked anyway. No pulse. My baby boy had no pulse. I crumpled, Rosie to his Jim, the floor rising up to meet me. What had just happened? And what was that noise?

I fumbled in my pocket for my phone, dimly aware of hitting the emergency call button. When the answer came 'emergency, which service', I realised that the noise had been my raw scream as my heart tried to climb up and out of my mouth. 'ambulance' I muttered.

'My son is dead'.