Lifting a Woolen Veil

I think of Lifting the Veil as part of a wedding ritual in cultures where marriages are arranged and in theory the groom would not ever have seen the bride’s face until the veil-lifting. The superstition of bad luck if the groom sees the bride on their wedding day before the ceremony may come from this.

That said, I don’t currently have anything further to say about the wedding aspect. I could see some future story line developing, but the paranormal or ghostly interpretation of lifting the veil as some of you have done seems much more intriguing. I was tempted to turn to the only ghost story I’ve ever written, but the atmosphere of that one just doesn’t fit. A ghost that maliciously manifests when a dog digs bits of its long-buried body out of the wall of a collapsed dugout house from pioneer days seems too, well, gritty to have anything to do with veils. A different interpretation could deal with the solving of mysteries, but I haven’t done much of that sort of thing, either, although the body in the wall does involve a mystery to be solved. The heroine, who has herself escaped from a contemporary illegal multi-wife commune in Utah, eventually figures out that the ghost is that of the long-past pursuer of two runaway sister-wives passing as teenage boys who came this way many years ago, passed a winter in the dugout, then escaped for good when the earth caved in on their former captor. As I said, more grit than veil.

But another, more mundane interpretation could involve trying to deceive someone, “pulling the wool over their eyes,” and being discovered. Never mind that veils tend to be more diaphanous than most wool. So I’ll resort to that sort of thing, with an excerpt from the same story I quoted last time, when a Mongol General appointed by the invading Khan to be governor of an Armenian province encounters the Lady who already governs it by birthright.
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From “A Falcon in Flight” in Hot Highlanders and Wild Warriors, edited by Delilah Devlin.

This Mongol was less ugly than expected, Ardzvik thought. Perhaps even handsome if one became accustomed to his shaven head, bold, high cheekbones, and tilted eyes beneath eyebrows with the graceful swoop of a hawk’s wing. Muscular, as well, which would please Leyli, and a fine rider, though Leyli’s interest in riding did not always involve horses.
Ardzvik sensed the shift in Leyli’s mood. One form of tension had yielded to quite another. “So, sweet sister,” she murmured, “are you still of a mind to slay this Governor should you get the chance?” She would not permit Leyli to do any such thing, of course, bringing the fury of Batu Khan’s forces down upon them, as Leyli knew quite well.
“Yes, I will kill him if I can! For the sake of poor Mihran! But…not, I think, right away.” Leyli allowed her milk-white mare to fidget under her, enough to draw the Mongol’s attention away from Father Kristopor’s diplomatic speech of welcome. The man had already surveyed the mare with all the admiration due her, and Leyli too, though less overtly. Now, as the girl peered flirtatiously through lowered eyelashes and fiddled in feigned nervousness with her long golden hair, it seemed that he could scarcely wrench his gaze away.
Ardzvik’s own high-bred bay mount had been assessed favorably as well, though she herself elicited a puzzled frown. Just as she had intended. Despite Father Kristopor’s disapproval, she was dressed soberly in garb so simple that she might have been mistaken for someone of much lower rank, in contrast to Leyli’s azure robes gleaming with gold brocade. All the easier to assess his reaction to her half-sister’s charms before Ardzvik had cause to care. Not that such a thing was remotely possible.
She had not much cared that “poor Mihran,” a minor prince of Georgia sent officially to court her, had lost his heart and whatever virginity he might have had to Leyli instead. Ardzvik was sorry for his death during the fall of Georgia, but not on a personal level. Better she should never care over-much for any man.
Father Kristopor closed his speech with an offer of the hospitality of the castle as lodging for the Darugha and his men. The interpreter did his part, and the Mongol said a few words in response. The priest signaled for Ardzvik and Leyli and their retinue to advance. They rode forward out of the shadow of the ancient stone church at a stately pace.
This encounter had been staged in the town’s center as a diplomatic compromise. The ruling family need not go as supplicants to the Darugha’s great golden tent, nor he with his men as conquerors to the gates of their castle. The Lady of Aragatsotn was a vassal, not a slave.
The interpreter, a handsome young man with Persian features, spoke toward the space between Ardzvik’s dark head and Leyli’s fair one. Good. Father Kristopor had obeyed her order to be deliberately vague as to which was the ruler and which was not. “His Eminence Yul Darugha thanks the Lady of Aragatsotn for her offer of the hospitality of her castle. However, it is his custom to sleep only within his personal tent.”
Ardzvik felt the gaze of Yul Darugha sweep over her, linger on her horse, then return to her face. She met his keen eyes, saw that he had not been deceived after all, lifted her chin proudly, and spoke not in Armenian but in the basic Turkic tongue most often used between tradesmen in the various countries of the lower Caucasus. “If Yul Darugha pleases, we would offer a feast in his honor tonight, to be held in the gardens of the castle.” It was well known by now that the nomadic Mongols were ill at ease confined within rigid walls.
With no pause for instructions the interpreter began to decline this invitation, too, as expected—the Governor had not been known to dine with any of such noble families as remained--but a rich, deep voice startled them all.
“Yul Darugha will be pleased to accept.”
That voice penetrated all the way into Ardzvik’s bones. For a moment she did not comprehend the words, though they were spoken in the same tongue she had used. So the interpreter had been merely a formality! With an effort she inclined her head briefly. “We shall be honored by his presence, and that of his men.” She looked up to see a hint of amusement on the Governor’s sun-browned face. Without another word, to her disappointment—why did she wish so to hear that voice again? To feel it?—he turned his dun horse and moved away toward the camp outside the town with his two dozen soldiers following.
“Father Kristopor said the man would never accept the invitation!” Leyli trotted at her side as they turned toward the road to Aragatsotn Castle.
“Yes, he did.” The priest had looked more pleased than surprised. Ardzvik would have words with him later. “So now there is much to be done.”
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(And a bit later)
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 “Take me to see your horses,” he said abruptly. Ardzvik heard movement at the table they had left, along with Leyli’s ever-resilient voice raised in laughter, and understood his request. She led him quickly to a gate that gave onto a path leading downhill to a cluster of stables and a fenced field. A dozen horses grazed there, while others, including those of the visiting Mongols, could be seen on a plateau slightly lower on the mountainside.
Leyli’s white mare came up to the gate at once, snuffling hopefully for treats. Yul Darugha ran a hand along her neck until she moved petulantly away since nothing edible was forthcoming. “A pretty creature,” he said, “like her mistress.” He looked to where Ardzvik’s blood bay advanced and retreated, wishing to come to his mistress, displeased by the stranger’s presence. “But yours, Lady Ardzvik, is the nobler beast by far. A touch of the Arab for grace and beauty.” She nodded assent. “I knew at once,” he went on, “that the rider of such a mount must be the true ruler here.”
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Yes, I admit it, this story is from one of those books with a naked male torso on the cover, so if I’ve ever given an impression of being entirely concerned with quite a different genre, I guess I’ve lifted that veil. But just briefly. Probably. That’s the only time I’ve ventured into quite that territory. So far.
 

A Bridge to the Other Side

by Jean Roberta

I’ve come to realize that I am old enough to be the grandmother of most of my students. (Or to use a word that’s widely understood here in Saskatchewan, their kokum: Cree word for grandmother.)

The generation before mine is mostly gone. If my mother were still alive, she would be 100 years old on October 28, 2018.

I remember reading somewhere that the settler culture of New Zealand is largely British (like the settler culture of other English-speaking countries), but the land itself is profoundly different from Britain: there’s nothing south of it except a huge expanse of ocean, and Antarctica.

I can relate. I’m past 65, but I still go to a university to teach every weekday, as though I were still a generation younger. In reality, there is not much of an older generation left, and not much future career ahead of me. I’m looking at retirement (probably sooner than later), followed by a flow of unscheduled time which will end with the pristine chill of death.

Many of the people who were important to me in the past (including writers and rock stars as well as people I actually knew) have passed on. I feel as if there is an invisible nation beyond the veil, and there are times when I’d like to visit them there.

I haven’t had any uncanny experiences lately, but I don’t doubt the presence of the unseen. For one thing, the animals in my house (three cats, two dogs) sometimes react as though they were seeing, hearing, smelling something that most humans can’t.

I’m still fond of a Young Adult ghost story of mine which was published on-line several years ago in Glitterwolf (LGBT magazine), edited by Matt Cresswell of the UK. I would like the story to appear in public again, but it’s hard to place because so little of my writing is suitable for a YA audience that I have to send it to venues that are new to me, and vice versa. In this case, I assume I am reaching out to people who have never heard of me, and might not approve of me if they did.

The teenage narrator of my story, “A Bridge to the Other Side,” dreams about her late grandmother, and then she discovers that ghosts reach out to her once they know she can see and hear them. It’s no coincidence that one of these unhappy spirits was a girl who committed suicide after being raped in the girls’ lavatory, which she now haunts. Of course, no one believed her when she was alive, just as no one is likely to believe the living girl who wants to comfort her.

And then there are the hungry ghosts of past and present wars!

Here is the opening scene:

The tall woman in the lavender suit looked so alive that at first I didn’t recognize her. She moved with confidence, and didn’t seem to carry any weight on her shoulders. Her hair was ivory-blonde with silver highlights, and it glowed like a halo. “Under your bureau, Ellie,” she told me.
She looked like a high school principal, or a businesswoman. Her bright blue eyes wouldn’t let me look away. Why was she in my bedroom?

She kept looking at me, and pointed to the floor.

Freaky. My Grandma, Mary Ellen Cloud, had come back to earth to tell me to clean up my room – or else what? Reform school?

I was so upset that I fought my way out of sleep, as though coming up for air. As soon as I opened my eyes in my own room, I saw that Grandma Cloud wasn’t there.

Somehow I understood what she had told me in my dream. My lost earring was under my bureau, and if I found it, I could wear it to the school dance.

When Mom had handed me Grandma’s pearl necklace and earrings in their long wooden case, she had said, “Don’t lose these.” And then an earring went missing while I was planning what to wear to the dance with Tommy. I searched my room like a detective investigating a crime scene, with no results. I didn’t see any point in telling my parents, since they would probably take away what was left, and tell me I wasn’t responsible enough to own valuable jewelry.
I jumped out of bed and grabbed a metal clothes hanger from my closet. Then I crouched down on the floor, and used the hanger to sweep the space under my bureau. I could have cried when the earring showed up in a ball of dust, trailing a dirty white gym sock. Grandma knew where it was all along. She was watching over me.

“Thank you,” I whispered. I’m so glad you’re on my side, Grandma, I thought.

She didn’t warn me about the dance, though. Apparently I had to find out some things for myself.

It was the spring of 1965. Big hair, empire waists and Queen Anne heels were in, and I couldn’t imagine how they could ever go out of style. My parents didn’t force me to dress like a square because they thought my interest in sewing was a sign of self-reliance. Even still, my taste made them as uncomfortable as the rock songs I listened to on the radio.

I had sewn myself a dress that was meant to stop traffic. It was a lightning-flash of sapphire-blue satin that showed off the curves of my breasts, then flowed from the high waist, finished with a bow, to the tops of my new black pumps. My hair was a rich brown mass of cotton candy, shellacked with hairspray, and my eyes looked huge and dark against my pale skin and eraser-pink lipstick. Grandma’s pearls were the finishing touch.

My reflection in the mirror reminded me of the latest fashion spread in Teen Queen magazine. I hoped my boyfriend, Tommy Atkins, would be too dazzled by my beauty to notice anyone else, but not too dazzled to see how much more I was than a face and a body.

It was a lot to expect from a Connecticut boy. I wondered if I would have to move to Greenwich Village, New York City, after graduation to find intelligent friends and a man with enough soul to appreciate everything I had inside.

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I’m not sure if this story can still be accessed in Glitterwolf (Issue 6, July 26, 2014). If it’s nowhere to be found, and if you would like to read the rest of this story, just send me an email request, and I will send you the story as a Word doc (or copied-and-pasted into an email, if you prefer).

Stars in the Sky, Ghosts in the Root Cellar

Sacchi Green

I’m not a “sensitive” by any means when it comes to uncanny matters, ghosts, psychics, things that go bump in the night. I’m pretty good, in fact, at rationalizing those bumps. (Uh-oh, I forgot to bring the bird feeders in. Is that a bear? Nope, the feeders are okay. I’ll bring them in now.) I don’t want be aware of unworldly things; it’s hard enough to understand the things that can be explained by scientific studies. (And to cope with nocturnal bears, who do generally drop by when I’m away for a few days and leave the feeders out.)

Astrology, for instance, drives me nuts. It’s possible, I suppose, that the month you were born in has some bearing on your personality and even future life—was it winter and you were cold as a newborn, or kept indoors during that formative part of your life? What kinds of food were available to your nursing mother in that season? But how can the regular, measurable, predictable orbits of the planets affect you on a day to day basis? Do people into astrology have any idea what “Mercury in Retrograde” means? It means that when the planet Mercury’s orbit takes it between earth and the sun, it appears to be going in one direction in our sky, but when its orbit takes to the other side of the sun from us, it appears to be going in the other direction, thus “retrograde.” How can…well, never mind. If something can be explained in scientific terms, it’s no longer uncanny, and if it’s truly uncanny, it doesn’t need to be explained.

Sorry for the rant. At least I refrained from adding “Bats in the Belfry” to my title for this post. There are plenty of more interesting kinds of supernatural phenomena than astrology, which may not even count as supernatural to most folks. And even though I don’t have any desire to experience any of them personally, from time to time my imagination gets to work, and I write stories with anything from demons trapped in gargoyles (does fantasy count as uncanny?) to ghosts in your otherwise pretty much ordinary cellar.

Since Jean Roberta mentioned her excellent ghost story appearing in the  Haunted Hearths anthology, I thought I’d dare to share a bit of mine, too, one of those prosaic ghosts-in-the-cellar types with some history thrown in. (It was recently reprinted in Haunting Muses, edited by Doreen Perrine.)

Here are a couple of spoilers, since they’re not explicitly revealed until later in the story and you won’t see them:
1. Emmaline had run away long ago from a hidden polygamy compound in Utah, and now she’s made a life for herself with Sigri, a horse rancher in Montana.
2. There was an old story in the area about two young brothers, staying in the dugout (now the root cellar) on their way to Canada, who had got out okay and moved along when most of the place caved in.
3. Emmaline found two cut-off rings in the box with the faded coils of hair, and had her own ideas about who those “brothers” were and who might have been pursuing them.

Spirit Horse Ranch
Sacchi Green

Someone was behind her.
Emmaline, deep in the root cellar, hadn’t heard Sigri’s truck pull in or Chinook bark a welcome, but the sense of a presence was unmistakable. It had to be Sigri, or the dog would’ve sounded a warning. Sigri could sneak up on grazing elk, when the wind was right; even if Emmaline hadn’t been hammering at shelves for her preserves, she might have missed any sounds. She’d been humming, too, immersed in the joy of working among provisions of her own raising. Not that she wasn’t always, on some level, listening for Sigri every bit as intently as the dog did.
 Sigri would sometimes press up against Emmaline from the rear with no warning, nuzzle her neck, and reach around for further fondling. If she was in the mood, why not go along with it? Emmaline lowered the hammer and moved back a step, as though surveying her handiwork. Her backside tingled in anticipation.
A touch on her hair made her jump.
“You’re back early,” she said. “Didn’t figure you’d get here from Bozeman so... Ouch!” Fingers tightened on her long, thick braid, and icy-cold knuckles dug into the nape of her neck. Somebody pulled, hard.
 “Hey!” Emmaline tried to turn. The hidden tormentor jerked her head back viciously and yanked again. Tears burned her eyes and panic pounded in her veins.
It wasn’t Sigri.
 Sigri wouldn’t do that. She knew enough about Emmaline’s past, and the things that triggered memories. And no one else who knew would dare, or care enough, to search her out after twenty years--if he was even still alive.
Terror snapped into sudden rage. Emmaline wasn’t fifteen and vulnerable any more. She kicked back sharply at ankle-height, let out a yell worthy of an old-time Blackfeet war party, and swung the hammer at what should be a thigh--or, better yet, more vulnerable parts.
Her foot didn’t connect with anything. Neither did the hammer. But her yell brought Chinook scrambling down the stairs from the kitchen in a frenzy of barks and growls. Could the cellar, crowded with sacks of winter-keeping vegetables and shelves of canning jars, hold Emmaline, the intruder, and an enraged German Shepherd all at the same time?
Emmaline wrenched sideways to free herself. Resistance ceased so abruptly that she spun right around, her russet braid flipping over one shoulder. A gust of cold air rushed past; she staggered, nearly fell, and grabbed at Chinook’s shoulder for balance.
Nobody was there.
A bulb dangling from a cord hooked to the ceiling lit the space well enough. None of the sacks and crates looked disturbed. Nobody could have got out past the dog, even though her growls had subsided.
“C’mon, Chinook, upstairs.” Emmaline couldn’t keep her voice steady. The chill where her neck had been touched crawled all the way down her back. What if he wasn’t alive--but had come for her anyway? No! She had to get out of there, get her thoughts under control.
She moved toward the steps, overwhelmed by a desperate need for Sigri--and just as glad Sigri wasn’t there to witness her weakness.
“Chinook, come!” The dog’s tail wagged to show she’d heard, but she kept sniffing among the crates. Just doing her job, searching for whatever had made her mistress yell like a damn fool. But when she clambered onto a heap of potato sacks and starting nosing at the packed earth wall, it was too much.
“Drat you, Chinook, come on!” The dog kept poking at the wall. Small chunks of dirt had dribbled down, a few feet to the left of the new shelves. The hammering must have jarred them loose. A few bits of old sticks or roots showed in the roughened earth, but there wasn’t a hole, so far as she could tell without going closer, which she wasn’t about to do. Nothing big enough to let a mouse through, much less a rat.  A rat?
She bolted upward, not looking to see if the dog followed. Her scalp still stung from the tugs. No rat could have been that strong!
Better that, though, than anything else occurring to her. She could deal with vermin. Still…a great filthy rat clinging to her head? She scrabbled at her braided hair until it hung loose around her shoulders, shaking it so hard her brains seemed to slosh like flapjack batter. Her heart pounded, anger mixing with fear. She tried hard to let the anger win out.
A bark and a high-pitched whine came up from the root cellar. Emmaline went to the top of the steps.  “Get your furry butt up here,” she yelled, beginning to lower the trapdoor. Chinook, not wanting to be shut below, left off whatever she was doing and bounded up into the kitchen.
“If you haven’t caught ‘em yet, you won’t, not without tearing up my spuds and onions!” The scolding was mostly to keep her own voice steady. “Wait for Sigri to get home!”
At the sound of that name, the dog padded hopefully to the screen door and looked out at the empty, dusty road connecting the ranch to the rest of the world. For all her devotion to Emmaline, Chinook looked to Sigri as her one true goddess.
No argument there, Emmaline thought. To see Sigri riding against the backdrop of the mountains, lithe, strong, the herd of horses running with her for the pure joy of it, any passing stranger might think Montana was as close to heaven as earth could get. At night, in ways no passerby could imagine, Emmaline knew for sure she’d found her own personal paradise.    
But what was she going to tell Sigri? That she’d freaked out in the root cellar, thought about ghosts, when it might be just rats? Even in the familiar normalcy of the kitchen, she couldn’t really believe that. Whatever she decided, it would go better after supper, and there wouldn’t be any supper if she didn’t get on with it.
Chicken and dumplings had been her plan, with leftovers from the hen she’d roasted Sunday. But she’d forgotten to bring carrots and onions up from the cellar. Forgotten? Well, not exactly, but nothing was going to get her down into that hole again just yet.
That hole? Now anger did win out. She’d been so proud of the root cellar, clearing out generations of trash, building shelves and bins, reinforcing the support posts and steps with Sigri’s help. It was older than the ranch house itself, part of a pioneer dugout home carved into the hillside. Most of it had caved in well over a hundred years ago, but when Sigri’s great-great-grandfather had built his house of red cedar logs the kitchen had overlapped what was left of the hole just enough for the trapdoor and stairs to connect with it. Back then it had been used as a root cellar, but not in recent years.
Emmaline had found things in the rubble that could have been there since before the cave-in. Once she’d dug out a flat tin box, barely protruding from the wall, and found inside two long, faded coils of hair, one blonde, one reddish. Maybe two girls sick with the fever had needed to have their hair cut when it got too tangled, as was common in the old days. In an odd way it had given her a sense of connection to those long-ago settlers. She might not belong here in any conventional way—she knew the townsfolk preferred to think of her as Sigri’s housekeeper and business manager, nothing closer—but she did belong to the tradition of growing and harvesting and tending loved ones.
Which included making supper. Question was, could Emmaline let herself be scared out of her own root cellar by…well, once she knew for sure what it was, maybe she wouldn’t be so scared.
For now, there was plenty left of the big kettle of chili Sigri cooked once a week. Emmaline could whip up a batch of cornbread and pull some greens from the autumn garden. Sigri wouldn’t object, having pretty much lived on nothing else in the years she’d ranched here alone.
A tensing of the dog’s back, a perking of ears, brought Emmaline to the screen door. Dust puffed in the distance, where the road was no more than a crease in grasslands tinted gold by the afternoon light. Beyond, blue mountains streaked with early snow rose in jagged ranges; the Absarokee and Beartooth to the south, the Crazies to the west. To Emmaline they were guardians, shielding her against where she’d come from, who she’d had to be; but even their grandeur dimmed behind the glint of sunlight on the approaching truck.
Chinook’s whines rose to a frantic pitch. It didn’t take the dog’s quivering rump, ready to break out into a fit of wagging, to tell Emmaline that the truck was Sigri’s. She knew, as surely as the dog, and she understood the impulse to race to meet the loved one, but Chinook, for all her size, was barely out of puppyhood and still needed her training reinforced. Her job, her sacred charge, was to stay close to Emmaline every minute.  
Sigri had swapped the stud service of her Appaloosa stallion for the pick of a neighbor’s litter of pups. “Folks around here are pretty much decent, mind-their-own-business types, whatever their beliefs,” she’d said, “but punks can sprout up anywhere, even Montana. A good dog can make ‘em think twice about trying to get at…well, at a woman out here alone.”
No need to spell it out. It wasn’t just being a woman alone. What had happened down in Laramie to that boy Matthew Shepard was on both their minds. Sigri, when she’d lived alone, hadn’t worried; nearly everybody within fifty miles was related to her, or owned horses she’d trained. She was one of their own. Emmaline, for all her farm-girl background, wasn’t.
The red truck was close enough now for her to make out the familiar lines. Where the road dipped down to ford the tree-lined creek, green-gold leaves hid it for a moment; this was when Emmaline would generally head out to open the gate in the stock fence. Right now she wasn’t sure her legs would take her that far without some wobbling Sigri was sure to notice.
“Stay!” She pressed her hand down hard on Chinook’s wriggling shoulders. Sigri reached the gate, got out to open it herself, looked searchingly up at the house, and got back in. Emmaline waited until the truck stopped between the barn and the house and then, finally, let Chinook out.
Sigri stood, stretched her rangy body after the bumpy ride, pushed back her Stetson until straw-pale cropped hair showed above her tanned forehead, and looked again toward the house. Glimpsing Emmaline inside the doorway, she flashed a boyish grin that would never grow old, no matter how many lines time and weather etched on her face.
The dog pranced around her legs in frantic welcome. Weanling fillies along the paddock fence whickered in greeting. Emmaline, aching to be there too, watched as each animal got its moment of affection. When Sigri finally hauled sacks of groceries out of the truck and strode toward the house, Emmaline barely had time to tie on her apron, pour flour and corn meal into a bowl, and get enough on herself to look like she’d been in the middle of mixing.
The screen door swung open and shut. As soon as the bags and a banded bundle of mail were safely on the kitchen table, and the Stetson tossed onto its hook, Emmaline proceeded to wipe her hands on the blue-checked dishtowel and rush to grab a big hug.
Sigri’d noticed something, though. “You okay, babe?” She stroked the loose tangle of hair Emmaline had forgotten to tidy. Fear came surging back.  
With her arms around Sigri’s lean body and her head nestled against a firm shoulder, Emmaline managed to say, “Sure I’m okay. How’d it go in Bozeman?”
“Not too bad.” Sigri tried to get a look at Emmaline’s face. “I dropped off your baked goods at the café. Claire wrote a check for last week and this week too, so we’re all square there. And Rogers at the bank seemed pretty sure we can get an extension on the loan. He knows I’m owed enough by the horse trek outfitters to cover it.”
Emmaline burrowed a little closer, then tilted her head back for a kiss. Chinook, firmly trained not to interrupt such proceedings, lay down with her head between her paws, and then, impatient, went to nose around the edges of the trapdoor.
Emmaline became vaguely aware of the rattle of some small object being pushed around the floor behind her. Sigri, looking past her shoulder, broke the clinch. “What’s that dratted dog got? Chicken bone?”
“Not from my kitchen…” Emmaline stopped. Chinook was offering her prize to Sigri. Held tenderly, in jaws trained to pick up eggs without breaking them, was a four-inch sticklike object. Not, they both knew, a stick. Bone, but not chicken bone. Chickens don’t have fingers.

Not Flesh and Blood

by Jean Roberta

Like Giselle, I live with a sweetie who seems more sensitive than I am on several levels. Maybe it’s because she grew up in a Catholic and indigenous culture in which children are encouraged to believe in the presence of guardian angels, saints, spirits, demons and ghosts. I kept an open mind at the beginning of our relationship, but by now, I’ve seen things that I’m sure the skeptics in my life would sneer at, but I know what I saw.

Some time in the 1980s, when we lived in a large, rented house, we were watching TV in the TV room with a built-in sofa. I even remember the drama on the screen: The Burning Bed, starring Farah Fawcett-Majors as an abused wife who finally sets fire to a bed with her husband in it, not knowing how else to stop the abuse.

Apparently someone else was watching with us. We heard crackling, and noticed that the wicker peacock chair near the window was moving exactly as though someone were sitting in it. A breeze would not have moved it that way.

My eyes were pulled away from the screen. “Do you see that?” I asked Mirtha.

“There’s someone in the chair,” she said calmly.

Later, she told me she thought it was her father, who had died earlier in Chile. My parents were both still alive, and I had no strong feeling about who it was. I was shaken up, and I never saw any other uncanny thing in that house. Maybe whoever it was decided not to come back because my reaction wasn’t welcoming.

In 2009, my 90-year-old mother passed away. We were living in our current house by then, and paying a mortgage instead of rent. A few weeks after my mother’s death, we had several helium balloons in our dining room, left over from a birthday. One of them detached from the weight holding it down, and began floating toward the staircase. Again, there was no breeze to explain the movement. The balloon floated serenely up the stairs as we followed it, and drifted into our bedroom, where it hovered over our bed. That sent chills down my spine, and I moved it into the guest bedroom. Eventually, the helium leaked out, and it sagged to the floor. Mirtha thinks my mother was in the house, and her playful side was attracted to the balloons, so she used one to show us she was still around. I dunno. If it was my mom, I wish she had left a clearer sign.

In most ghost stories, the person contacted by the ghost questions his/her sanity. In our generally skeptical age, writers of ghost stories often provide a plausible alternative reading of the situation: the character who thinks he/she sees a ghost is drunk or high, or in the grip of some extreme emotion. And after all, it's fiction, so readers can believe whatever they want.

I created a somewhat overwrought narrator in my lesbian ghost story, “Authentic.”* She is a single woman from a big city in eastern Canada who has moved to the prairies to accept a job as historical consultant for the running of Government House (an actual place), home of the first Lieutenant-Governor (local representative of the British monarchy) of Saskatchewan when it became a province in 1905, now a museum where guides dressed as servants of the Edwardian Age conduct tours and serve tea. No one has actually lived in the house for years, and a sketchy neighbourhood of pawn shops and rundown houses has grown up around it.

Matt, the single woman in my story, has been taken aback at how hard it is to meet other single lesbians in the capital city of Saskatchewan. In her loneliness, and with much spare time on her hands, she chats with someone named “Ravenheart” on-line. Matt invites the mysterious stranger to meet her in physical space:

"When will you meet me?"

"Already met."

"In RL, girlfriend." Real Life. I hardly know what that is any more. She knew how easily Ravenheart could disappear completely if Matt pushed her too hard, but Matt wanted to know how much of what she had said was true. Last week, Ravenheart had sent her a link to a blurry photo of a young woman with large, questioning eyes and long pale hair tied with a ribbon behind her neck. The shading made it look like something from the archives - probably a photo of Ravenheart's great-grandmother.

"Whats real 2 u?"

"Face 2 face. Both bodies in same room."

"R u inviting me?"

"Duh. My place or yours?"

Matt waited several minutes for an answer before sensing that Ravenheart was not going to give one. Angry with herself for childishly trusting a joker in cyberspace, Matt logged out, then checked her work-related emails. Having to delete fifty government memos which had nothing to do with her made her feel invisible. By the time she finished, she was shaking. She had never felt so alone before, and she was tempted to burst into hysterical sobs. She was terrified of losing her grip.

However, Matt doesn’t have long to wait. As she munches a sandwich in the kitchen, she hears someone playing the piano, and rushes into the room to find a small, blonde woman in evening dress. In fact, she is dressed exactly like Diana MacDonald Ferrier, wife of the first Lieutenant-Governor, when she sat for a portrait in oils. The intruder is playing a song composed by Mrs. Ferrier (music-lover and feminist)+ before 1910.

The plot thickens.

----------

*This story was published in Haunted Hearths and Sapphic Shades: Lesbian Ghost Stories, edited by Catherine Lundoff (Lethe Press, 2008).

+This character was based loosely on Henriette Forget, actual wife of the first Lieutenant-governor of Sask, who was quite a social activist for her time, as well as Dame Ethel Smythe, member of the Women's Social and Political Union (UK), who wrote "The March of the Women" in 1911. According to legend, she handed sheets of the song to supporters through the bars of the prison where she was held.
-----------

A True Ghost Story (I should know. I was there.)

by Giselle Renarde

I'm a sucker for a good ghost story. Or a bad one. I'm really not picky.

After I'd booked the inn Sweet and I stayed at during the momentous anniversary trip I told you about a couple weeks ago, I noticed a page on their website: Haunted Hotel. They'd posted clips from a time when their inn had been featured on some ghostie show.

I love a good ghostie show. Or a bad one! I love any ghostie show.  I love shows where people talk about their haunting experiences. I love shows where true ghost stories are reenacted. I don't even care if it's all fake. I'm totally willing to suspend disbelief in exchange for that frisson I get when I'm scared of the unknown.

I like experiencing fear vicariously, through other people's ghostly experiences.

Does that mean I want to see a ghost myself?

NOPE.

I can't imagine coming face to face with the supernatural.  My #1 fear about buying a house (not that I could ever afford one) is that it might be haunted, and then what would I do? Move back into a high-rise built in the 70s, probably.  No ghosts here.

My girlfriend has seen things.  She works in theatre, and every theatre is haunted. Well, maybe not, but one of the ones where she used to do summerstock work had a reputation for ghostly happenings.  It was featured twice on a ghost hunting show.

While my girlfriend worked there, she often heard noises or saw strange movements when she was alone in the building. One time it was just her and her assistant in the theatre.  They both witnessed a shadowy shape moving across the stage. They turned to each other simultaneously and asked, "Did you see that?"  A question that pretty much answers itself.

But here's the one I've been thinking about lately: we were alone in the theatre one night after a performance. She'd locked every door. The cast, crew, volunteers, patrons--everyone had left.  This was early in our relationship and we couldn't keep our hands to ourselves.  We were at the back of the theatre, touching each other in our bathing suit areas, when suddenly she pulled away.

She told me we had to go.

I asked why. Things were just getting interesting, and we had the whole place to ourselves.

Or maybe we didn't.

Over my shoulder, she'd seen an apparition of some sort.  There was a shape moving onstage, same thing she'd seen with her assistant during a different production.  She felt uncomfortable in the space.  She wanted to leave.

But here's the thing: all I noticed was Sweet's reaction.  I didn't feel any change in the atmosphere.  I didn't sense any ghost.  I didn't feel anything.

Lately it's really started sinking in that she's so much more sensitive than I am.  When we have a big argument, it bothers her for weeks, sometimes months.  I flip on the TV and I'm over it.  She feels things so much more deeply than I do.  I know how much I love her, but I'm starting to think I can't even imagine how much she loves me.  Maybe I don't have access to that kind of bigness of heart feelings.  I'm too closed off.

I wonder if "sensitives" (in the paranormal sense--people who can sense spirits) are also more emotionally sensitive than jerks like me. Assuming for a second that there was an actual paranormal manifestation taking place right behind me, was I oblivious to it because I'm so insensitive? Could Sweet see it because she has heightened sensitivities, emotional and spiritual?

Or was she just unlucky enough to have been facing in the right direction?

Giselle Renarde is an award-winning queer Canadian writer. Nominated Toronto’s Best Author in NOW Magazine’s 2015 Readers’ Choice Awards, her fiction has appeared in well over 100 short story anthologies, including prestigious collections like Best Lesbian Romance, Best Women’s Erotica, and the Lambda Award-winning collection Take Me There, edited by Tristan Taormino. Giselle's juicy novels include Anonymous, Cherry, Seven Kisses, and The Other Side of Ruth.

Giselle Renarde
Canada just got hotter!
http://donutsdesires.blogspot.com

Valley of Stories

By Lisabet Sarai

Near the center of Massachusetts, the huge, butterfly-shaped Quabbin Reservoir practically divides the state in two. Constructed in the nineteen thirties to satisfy the thirst of the Boston metropolitan area, Quabbin figuratively divided the state as well, pitting the rural inhabitants of the Swift River Valley against the city dwellers in the state capitol. Four towns--Dana, Enfield, Greenwich and Prescott--were drowned by Quabbin's advancing waters. The houses of their inhabitants were dismantled and relocated on higher ground. Bodies were exhumed from their graves and reburied elsewhere. Forests were leveled in order to reduce the amount of degrading biological material that would pollute the reservoir. The land that had belonged to Dana and its unfortunate fellows was allocated to neighboring towns. Communities which had prospered in the valley since the seventeen hundreds ceased to exist.

Needless to say, the Swift River Valley is haunted. Even if you don't know the history, you can't escape the sense of mystery as you drive the winding length of Route 202, which hugs the west end of the reservoir. The evergreens that were planted to protect the watershed have grown tall now, shadowing the road. The woods around the man-made lake are home to bears, bald eagles, wildcats and perhaps stranger, more secret beings. On the eastern shore, overgrown dirt lanes meander through the village of Petersham, sending tentative fingers toward the still water.

Ghosts of the dispossessed inhabitants from the flooded towns still seem to hover in the area. They're joined by older creatures from the earlier times when the Algonkian natives fished in the Swift River, grew their corn along the banks, and worshiped the spirits of the forest.

My M/M erotic romance Necessary Madness is partially set in the Quabbin Valley. As I've commented previously on this blog, I almost always have a specific location in mind when I sit down to write a story. Necessary Madness is a M/M paranormal novel that revolves around various psychic powers--precognition, telepathy and the like. I used to live near Quabbin, and had friends in Petersham. It seemed like a natural place for the home of a consulting witch who helps individuals with psi talents to understand and control their abilities.

Here’s a scene from the book, in which one of the heroes ventures out into the ominous Quabbin Valley dusk, where he encounters a fascinating and dangerous stranger.

*****

The afternoon was clear but cold. There’d be frost tonight. Kyle could tell by sniffing the air. He swung out the driveway and turned left, heading back up Quail Hollow Lane towards the village centre.

He strode along the gravel road, snug in his warm clothing, humming a Christmas song. His breath hung in white clouds in front of his face. He reached Main Street—Route 32—and considered turning around. The shadows were getting longer by the minute, though a few rays of sunlight still slanted through gaps in the trees. Moving felt so good, though—his lessons with Elspeth involved long hours of virtual immobility. He kept going, driven by restless energy, past the Congregational and the Baptist churches, the shuttered country store and the white-shingled houses clustered around the village green.

His eyes adapted to the dimness as dusk approached. He didn’t realise how late it had become until he heard the bell in one of the churches behind him chime five.

Damn! Elspeth will have my hide. Kyle wheeled around and began to retrace his steps at a faster pace.

The two-lane road was lonely and mostly empty. A pickup truck clattered by, laden with metal scrap, then vanished into the gloom. It was much colder now that the sun had disappeared completely. Kyle hurried along, his shoulders hunched and his hands in his pockets.

An engine roared behind him. A low-slung sports car raced up and screeched to a halt on the opposite side of the road. “Want a ride?” called the driver out the window. “It’s a cold night.”

“I’m not going far,” Kyle answered. The voice was young, urban, cultured. Not one of the local farmers. “Just down the road, maybe a mile.”

“Me, too. Why don’t you get in? It’s not a good idea to be out here on the highway after dark.”

Kyle crossed and pulled open the passenger door of the sleek vehicle. “Are you sure it’s no trouble?”

“No trouble at all. Just tell me where you want me to let you off.”

“Thanks.” Kyle settled into the bucket seat. “Cool car.” He caressed the leather dashboard.

“It is, isn’t it?” the driver laughed. “My latest toy.” The dim light made it difficult for Kyle to make out the man’s features. He seemed to be no more than a few years older than Kyle, with a slender build and fair hair. “I’m Stefan, by the way.”

He offered his right hand to Kyle, steering with his left. The man’s skin was warm and dry. He wore some sort of cologne, a slightly bitter scent that reminded Kyle of fresh mown grass. “Kyle. Pleased to meet you.”

The car sped along the pavement, hugging the curves. “Likewise. You’re not local, are you?”

“No,” Kyle laughed. “I’m—um—visiting someone. She lives on Quail Hollow Lane.”

“Elspeth Holmes?”

“Yes, that’s right. Do you know her?”

“I’m headed to her house right now. She’s an old friend of my family.”

“What a coincidence,” Kyle commented. “Hey, here’s her street!” Stefan swerved onto the narrow lane just in time.

“I haven’t seen her in a while.” The rough surface forced Stefan to slow down. Kyle breathed a sigh of relief.

“She didn’t say anything about expecting guests.”

“I wanted to surprise her.” Kyle could feel Stefan smiling at him in the darkness. He felt suddenly, uncomfortably warm. “And how do you know her?”

“Friend of a friend. She’s helping me with some—research. About the town, its history, that sort of thing.” Stefan made Kyle a bit wary. In any case, Kyle knew that he shouldn’t reveal anything about Elspeth’s business as a psychic consultant. If Stefan really was what he claimed, he might already know—but Kyle wasn’t about to tell him.

Stefan chuckled. “Elspeth is a font of wisdom. Her family has been in Petersham for generations—since colonial times, or so I’ve heard. So you’re a student?”

“Um—yeah, right. Elspeth’s quite amazing. She’s helping a lot with my project. She’s a fabulous cook, too.” Stefan turned into Elspeth’s driveway and cut the motor. Kyle relaxed slightly. “I’m sure she’ll want you to stay for dinner.”

“That would be great. I’m looking forward to seeing her. And that will give you and me a chance to get acquainted.”

Something about Stefan’s voice bothered Kyle. He just couldn’t get his mind around it, though. Whenever he tried to focus, he felt vaguely confused. Maybe it was the after-effects of his last session with Elspeth.

Elspeth waited on the porch, coat-less, a frown twisting her normally placid features. “Kyle! Where have you been? I was worried…”

“I’m fine, just fine. I walked a bit farther than I’d planned, that’s all. But then this gentleman came by and gave me a ride…”

Stefan stepped out of the shadows. “Hello, Elspeth. It’s been a long time.”

“Sam!” Elspeth’s face remained serene, but Kyle heard shock in her voice.

“I’m called Stefan now. Stefan Aries.”

I'm not the only individual to feel that the Swift River Valley is full of supernatural stories. The movie version of Stephen King's Dreamcatcher features the reservoir as a prominent plot element. The cult horror author H.P. Lovecraft explicitly set his now-classic tale "The Color Out of Space" in the valley before its flooding. A variety of other authors and singers have been touched by the mystery that seems to permeate the place.

Years ago, during a serious summer drought, my husband and I went hiking in the woods around Quabbin. The level of the reservoir was at a historic low. As we followed our way down the hill from the Prescott Peninsula, we found ourselves on what had clearly been a road. Tumbled stone walls marked its boundaries. The tracks worn by cart wheels were still visible. In a normal summer, the road would have been submerged, but now it wound for a quarter of a mile, down to the reservoir's edge. Then it disappeared into the gray water.

We stopped to contemplate this fragment of history, revealed by the vagaries of climate. The air had the sultry weight of a New England August. The silence was complete--no birds, no cicadas, not a breath of wind. We both felt their presence--the souls of the folk who had last used this road almost a century ago.

I wasn't writing then, at least not for publication. Even so, I knew there were stories here to be told. Now that I've ventured into the valley with Necessary Madness, I expect that I'll be returning to explore more of these tales. I hope that the inhabitants won't mind sharing them.

Magic in the Real World by Giselle Renarde

When I started writing my dark romance Seven Kisses, I didn't anticipate the novel would turn into magical realism. I also didn't realize it would turn into an erotic adaptation of Beauty and the Beast or thinly-veiled Archer fan fiction, but that's a story for another day.

I'd conceptualized Seven Kisses as REAL realism, but before long I knew the book NEEDED a touch of magic. That magical element was required to offset the horror and the fear.

Gabrielle*, my protagonist, spends a good part of the novel drugged and strapped to a hospital bed against her will. After everything she goes through, she deserves an experience far more magical than mere escape--something more magical even than love.

I think I need that, too, even though my life is filled to the brim with love and it's nowhere near horrific. I think I need magic, and I think I need fear.

Last week I watched a free preview channel called Crime and Investigation. Mainly, it was three billion episodes of Law and Order, which was fine by me. I went with it. But then a different show came on: My Haunted House. And it scared the bejeezus out of me.

Okay, it was two in the morning and I was alone in the apartment, so maybe I was predisposed via setting to being wildly afraid of something that was only mildly scary. But maybe not.  The stories were terribly terrifying.

My Haunted House turned me into the kid I used to be.  When I was younger, I loved all things paranormal. Ghosts topped that list. Today, in erotic romance, "paranormal" seems to be code for vampires and werewolves, which kinda sucks because vampires and werewolves have never appealed to me.

I can get on board with vampires if I really want to (blood has a certain appeal), but I find werewolves puzzling.  If you want to write about them, it seems like you have to be really attuned to the trend. I've written one werewolf ebook. It's a twentieth century historical called The Beast In Me (named after this song). I really quite like my werewolf historical, but I don't think it ever saw a review over 3 stars. So that was the first and last werewolf book for me.

Back to ghosts.  I like ghosts. I like witches.  I like creepy, unexplainable things. I like telepathy. I like telekinesis. I like demonic possession.

So why don't I write more of it?

Hmm... I'm not really sure. Maybe I'll put that on the resolutions list for 2015.

In the meantime, a lot of people have asked where they can buy Seven Kisses (and get their magic on!), so here are links to for Amazon, Amazon UK, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes. It's available a bunch of other places too, as an ebook and in print.


*Within the first few paragraphs, I was having so much trouble typing "Gabrielle" that I had to transcribe the name as "ghgh" and then do a general search-and-replace. The name tripped up my fingers. Not just that, but it's too close to mine. Either I'd type "Giselle" or I'd type Gabrighsle (yeah, it trips up my fingers THAT much!). Then when I started watching Archer, the name started coming out as "Lana" and that's when I knew I'd fallen deep into fanfic mode, but like I said: a story for another day.

The Haunted Library

by Jean Roberta

Sitting in the room my spouse & I call “the library,” where our computer is surrounded by bookshelves, I see a hodge-podge of books, loosely organized into different categories so we can find them. (This doesn’t always work – read on.)

In what I think of as the spooky/spiritual section on the highest shelf to my left, I see a very thick paperback. The title on the spine is Ghosts: True Encounters with the World Beyond by Hans Holzer. This book is packed with stories and photos from the files of one of the world’s foremost ghosthunters, and it threatens to suck me in again. The last time I read it, I had to stop before reaching the end so I could keep up with my day job.

Next to this is The Complete Prophesies of Nostradamus, several books on modern witchcraft, including three by Starhawk (one bought directly from her when she came to my town on tour), The Tibetan Book of the Dead (a gift from one of my stepsons), a hardcover Bible (originally bought for my six-year-old daughter, in which she drew a picture of a smiling man with a beard, named “God”) and a small, hardcover English translation of The Koran. Strangely enough, this last book is the only one in this section that I inherited from my parents after their deaths in 2009. They were agnostics who never showed a great interest in religion in any form. However, they probably thought (as I do) that as academics, they needed to have some knowledge of the holy books of the world’s major religions.

This library is very eclectic because many of the books were given to me, inherited, or they belonged to my spouse before we joined households. In some sense, it is full of ghosts that constantly threaten to pull me away from more pressing concerns.

After my parents passed away, I let my two sisters take the bulk of their books, since I already had enough of my own. Several of our mother’s books of literary criticism are now neatly arranged on the shelves in my office at the university. A few of our father’s books on political theory are still in the home library, including two by John Raulston Saul: Voltaire’s Bastards and The Unconscious Civilization. I think my father enjoyed Saul’s skeptical look at the long-term political effects of Enlightenment idealism.

I can still hear a conversation I had with my dad when he was still an Economics professor and I was still reeling from four hard months as a student English teacher in a local high school. “Has it ever occurred to you,” I asked him, “that the idea of universal education is a well-intended 18th-century plan that has never worked as it was intended to?”

“Exactly!” he replied with delight.

“But before you propose to tear down the public school system,” I said, “I’d like to know what you would put in its place.” He just laughed.

One of the books I inherited from my father is one that Spouse and I gave to him for Christmas in 2000. It’s An Illustrated History of the Royal Navy by John Winton, in association with the Royal Naval Museum in Portsmouth, England. It’s a big coffee-table book full of full-colour paintings, engravings and photos of ships of the British Empire and the men who sailed them. I knew my dad would like this. Ever since he joined the U.S. Navy as a young man in the Second World War, he loved boats of all kinds.

In the fiction section, I have a well-preserved hardcover copy of War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy, published in 1942 with detailed maps of battle zones and a foreword by eminent critic Clifton Fadiman, who points out the parallels between the Napoleonic wars of the early nineteenth century and the “current European conflict.” I inherited this book from a woman I never knew: a locally-famous hairdresser who had recently passed away, and whose family invited people she knew (including a male hairdresser friend of mine) to browse her shelves and take whatever they wanted. A grown son of the deceased woman assured me that I was welcome to take whatever was left, since the family had already made their choices.

Among Spouse’s books are several about John Lennon and Che Guevara, the two heroes of her youth, and a biography of Lenin. Her oldest books are in Spanish, and these include material on leftist political theory and alternative Christianity (for lack of a clearer term), e.g. a history of the Rosicrucians and Dan Brown-esque investigations of the history of the Catholic Church. The Spanish-language section has its own shelf.

At one time, I had a collection of books by J.R. Tolkien, including The Hobbit and all three volumes of The Lord of the Rings, including one unauthorized book that was sold openly in a bookstore in small-town Idaho. (No one seems to remember any more that in the 1960s, an American publisher brought out a pirated edition, and Tolkien sued.) When I looked for The Hobbit to skim through it before going to the second-installment movie (The Desolation of Smaug), I couldn’t find it. This isn’t surprising. It could have left my house with my grown daughter or either of my grown stepsons. If so, I won’t demand it back. I’ll just have to buy a replacement copy before the third-installment movie comes out.

Of course, there is an erotic section in my library. It’s on two bottom shelves which can be camouflaged by other objects if necessary. That section deserves a post unto itself, but I'm coming to the end of this one.

A lot of memories are in this room.

------------

A Medium Shares Her Experience

By Margaret West (Guest Blogger)

Thank you so much for inviting me here today to talk about the paranormal. As well as being an author of Paranormal Romance novels, I’m also a working medium and have been teaching Psychic development and Angel therapy for over twenty five years. First, let me explain what the word ‘paranormal’ means. It’s an item, event or vision which is unsolved by science or cannot be explained by it.

So let me start off by speaking about orbs.

Spiritual orbs found on digital film have created a new wave of paranormal research across the world. The topic of orbs has been explored and debunked for years. Skeptics believe orbs are dust particles caught on camera or faults occurring from digital photography technology- especially when using a flash. But how can they explain away orbs seen by the naked eye? I have seen them myself, so I feel qualified to say that they do exist. So what exactly are they?

Orbs are the human soul or life force of those that once inhabited a physical body here on earth. They are pure spiritual energy - usually the first stage of manifestation (spirit people appearing). They appear to the eye, to have a mind of their own and move in a deliberate manner. Blown up on the computer they are quite beautiful, with harmonious hues of rainbow colours. Some well formed orbs will even show features within them.

So why do spirit people appear as orbs? To conserve their energy. When you shed your physical overcoat you are made up of pure energy. It’s very hard for them to show themselves as they looked in life. That’s why you should appreciate them when they do appear.

Let me explain the difference between Ghosts and Spirits, as there seems to be a lot of confusion. Ghosts haunt, while spirits are interactive. Ghosts manifest from residual energy. You can't interact with them because it would be like trying to speak to an actor in a movie you’re watching. What you see is like an etheric play. An event in a person’s life that was so traumatic they leave behind a blueprint of it, which replays over again. This is why people say they see a specific ghost every night at a house, castle etc. It just stares out of the window, walks down a hallway and so on and so forth. But it doesn’t say anything to the person viewing it. That's because Ghosts can't see/hear/feel you. You’re not part of their event.

Spirits are people who have gone to the other side of life. BUT, I must stress, just because they have crossed over, it doesn't make them suddenly become all-knowing super-heroes. Their personality doesn't change just because they've died. If they helped you in life with good advice, they will still do that spirit side. If they always steered you wrong, they will continue to do that from the other side. In my experience, spirit people come back with messages for their loved ones because they might be able to help, give comfort, release that person from their debilitating grief, or tell them 'I'm all right'.

So many people ask me, is my mum, dad, etc. happy, okay, free from pain? Of course they are. Once a person leaves the confines of physical life, they leave behind illness, disfigurement or impairment. They are whole again. Which reminds me of a story Colin Fry once told. He had a son from the spirit world who came to speak to his mother and father. Whilst they understood the message, they didn't recognize the handsome, upright man who gave the message. Colin told the spirit man, "They don't know you." The man said, "They will know me like this." His image changed to that of a man with severe Downs syndrome. The parents suddenly realized their son was more than all right. His spirit was whole again.

When people lose a limb, many say they can still feel it. I believe this is because the spirit is still whole. What they feel is their spiritual self. People from all walks of life come to me. But they all leave with the same thought. Death is NOT the end. It's the beginning of a wondrous journey.

But I will leave you with this thought. Hold your loved ones close to your heart. Tell them you love them every day. Don't wait until it's too late and you have to come to someone like me to relay the message.

BIO

Born in England, Margaret moved to the Kent countryside five years ago to get away from the busy life in London. She is married with two grown up children. She is a working medium, based in a London Spiritualist church and when not writing her novels, works as an Angel Therapist, Crystal Therapist, Parapsychologist and Psychic Development tutor.

She’s been writing over 20 years in various fields: academic modules, novels, short stories, magazine columns and Blue Mountain sympathy card range. Her main love is writing paranormal romance, incorporating her spiritual experiences into her books.

If you want to learn more about me and my paranormal life, visit me here. http://magsx.blogspot.com/

For information about my writing:

www.margaretwest.net

http://margaret-paranormalromanceauthor.blogspot.com/

http://magsx.blogspot.com/

One Night at Grandma's

By Jenna Byrnes


When I was a child, we'd travel regularly to visit my grandparents who lived two hours away in an old farmhouse. My older brother, whose main goal in life was to torment me, liked to tell me spooky stories about the farmhouse. These invariably kept me from a good night's sleep. But no story came close to what he and I witnessed firsthand, one night at grandma's.

Our family history contained a sad and scary (to parents everywhere) tale about my uncle who died as a small child. The house, built by my great-grandfather (or maybe two greats in there, can't remember) had a long flight of stairs leading to the bedrooms on the upper floor. One Christmas morning, my uncle, who must have been three years old at the time, found a shiny, red tricycle under the tree. He pestered and pestered for someone to take him outside to try out the trike, but his parents and older siblings were busy opening their holiday gifts. The way the story goes, no one noticed little Jimmy missing until he hollered and got their attention. There he was, at the top of the stairs, sitting on his tricycle. How he dragged it up there, to this day, no one knows. Just as his folks dashed to the staircase, Jimmy shoved off to take the bumpy ride of his life. He finally fell off the trike about two-thirds of the way down, snapping his neck in the process. He died instantly, and was buried three days later in a family plot on the back edge of the farm.

Fast forward thirty years or so. My grandmother made the best homemade candy by melting big Hershey bars and adding nuts and marshmallows, or sometimes a simple layer of peanut butter between two chunks of chocolate. My brother and I could never get enough of the stuff-because mom would cut us off after a couple pieces. But after the grown-ups were in bed, the candy was left unattended. We'd sneak out to the enclosed porch just off the living room, where grandma kept her table of treats, and indulge in some late night chocolaty goodness.

One night, after we were sure the elders were asleep, my brother and I slipped out of our makeshift beds on the laundry room floor, and tripped out to visit the candy. Just as we rounded the corner to the living room, we heard a noise at the top of the stairs. We froze, fearful it was mom--or worse yet, dad--catching us in the candy-thieving act. Hugging the wall, neither of us scarcely dared to take a breath. When we saw who was on the stairs, the air couldn't whoosh from my lungs fast enough. A small boy, on a shiny red tricycle, hurtling down the stairs at an amazing speed. Only this time, he didn't fall off the trike. He rode it all the way to the landing and raced past my brother and I. His face was a mask of victorious triumph. We turned our heads to follow him and see where he'd end up, but the boy and trike vanished as they reached the stone fireplace.

I'm lucky I only wet my pants that night. My brother didn't say a word, just helped me clean up the puddle with some paper towels and we both hurried back to our beds. I changed into clean pajamas and crawled into my sleeping bag, which I scooted a little closer to my sister. She might have wondered why, but she never asked.

It took my brother and I years before we could talk about that night. Both of us remembered it the same way, and we never talked about it again. We didn't sneak out for candy after that, either. And when grandma and grandpa sold the farm and moved into town, I wasn't unhappy. That place literally scared the piss outta me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The one thing I forgot to tell you about this story is that none of it is true. Okay, my dad was Jimmy, he did live in a farmhouse when he was a kid, and he did ride his trike down the staircase (he survived, thankfully, or I wouldn't be here to tell the tale.) Oh, and my grandma did make the greatest chocolate candy, but grandma was a softie and I got all I wanted. (Weight Watchers thanks her.) The only other part of the story that's true? I would have peed my pants if anything like that ever happened to me.

'Now That's Scary' was a great topic choice for Halloween week, but I had not one freaking thing to contribute. Nothing very scary has ever happened to me, thank heavens. So I decided to make something up. I'm a writer after all. And this being my last post for Oh Get a Grip, I wanted to leave with a bang instead of a whimper. *grin*

I've enjoyed blogging here these past months, and meeting a lot of new people. Time constraints and other obligations are bogging me down, so I'm going to bow out. Devon Rhodes, another erotic romance author from Total E-Bound, will begin blogging here next week. I look forward to reading her take on the new topics, and I'll see the rest of you around the web. Thanks for the great run, and Happy Halloween!!!


~ Jenna

Things That Go Bump

By Lisabet Sarai

The costume worked its magic. I was astonished at how regal I looked, and how desirable. The bodice pinched my waist to tiny dimensions, and forced my breasts upwards. The square-cut neckline drew attention to my swelling flesh, barely hiding my nipples. In fact, they were not hidden at all. Though I'd lined the top with muslin as the pattern specified, the tight nubs were clearly visible through several layers of fabric.

I cradled my breasts and used my thumbs to trace circles around those sensitive buds. With each cycle, the spring of tension in my cunt wound tighter. A light flick of my thumbnail sent electricity down my spine and triggered spasms of pleasure. I worried briefly that the juices trickling out of my cunt would spoil the satin. But after all, what did it matter? There was no one to see me tonight, no one to please but myself.

"You certainly do look sexy. Like something right out of de Sade."

"What? Who...?" I whirled around in confusion, my heart slamming against my ribs. The voice had been close, right next to my ear. Yet the room was empty, unchanged. The same rippling walls, the same thread-bare carpet, the same rusty stains on the ceiling. The rumpled bed where I'd had my tantrum. The almost-empty glass on the dresser.

Ah, the liquor. I must be more drunk than I thought. I turned back to the mirror, searching my face for signs of intoxication, and yelped as something, someone, pinched my nipples.

"Hey! That hurts." Indignation overwhelmed fear.

"It does, at first. But afterward, it changes, doesn't it? Afterward, it feels quite delicious." I stared at my image, mouth hanging stupidly open, as invisible hands caressed my tits. Strong hands, gentle hands, hands that seemed to know exactly how to make me shiver with delight. "That's what most people don't understand about pain. It's the gateway to the most exquisite pleasure."

The voice was a melodious baritone, rich, deep, hypnotic. "You fear the pain, but that's foolish. You must surrender to the pain. Let it move through you. Let it wash away your doubts and your inhibitions. Let it open you to ecstasy."

Firm, unseen lips nibbled at my neck. A warm, wet tongue traced the curve from below my ear to my exposed shoulder, then down to the hollow at my throat. With each touch, extravagant new species of pleasure bloomed in my sex. I closed my eyes and let my head fall back, savoring the delicate caresses and the amazing sensations that they triggered in my cunt.

Then suddenly, something sharp pierced the rounded flesh of my shoulder. I screamed, surprise heightening the agony that gripped me, and tore myself away from the grasp of the unseen intruder.

My reflection made me gasp in horror and wonder. Droplets of blood oozed from several wounds on my shoulder, wounds arranged in the distinctive semi-circular shape of a bite.

I felt an arm around my waist, pulling me backwards against the unmistakable bulk of a male body. I struggled against his seemingly supernatural strength.

"Let me go!" There were fingers at my back, unlacing and loosening the bodice, working their way into my top.

"Is that really what you want?" A hand snaked into the opening I had left in the voluminous skirts -- a slight modification I had made to the pattern. After all, what was the point of wearing a sexy costume if it made you inaccessible?

Cool fingertips wandered up the inside of my thigh, smearing the damp of my secretions into my bare skin. My clit ached in anticipation. A fresh flow of lubrication made my thighs damper still. "I think that you actually want something else." He found his way into my folds and began massaging the swollen bud at my center.

I moaned and arched backward, my body taking over while my mind whirled in confusion and disbelief.

"Who -- what -- are you?" He slid two fingers deep into my sopping cunt, making me writhe.

"Does it matter?" Now his thumb beat rapidly against my clit, while his fingers stroked my depths. His other hand pumped my tit in the same rhythm. I felt the first shimmers of orgasm, far away like heat lightning on the prairie horizon.

"I am who I am, and I know what you want. What you need." He captured one swollen nipple and squeezed, waking echoes of his previous assault. I yelped and twisted, trying to get away but succeeding only in impaling myself more completely on the hand in my cunt. "Let yourself go, Rebecca," he murmured close to my ear. Lost in a fog of arousal and terror, I hardly wondered that he should know my name.

From Rendezvous

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I've written my share of paranormal stories: ghosts, vampires, shape shifters. My creatures are rarely very frightening, though. You'd think that being accosted by an invisible presence in a seedy motel room in the middle of nowhere would be scary as hell, but my character Rebecca is a lot like me—she is more fascinated by the supernatural then terrified. Not to mention aroused.

Magic, even black magic, doesn't scare me. I grew up believing in powers beyond the material world and in some sense I still do (more on this next week). Discovering that the dead walk the earth or that eternal blood drinkers actually exist would give me a thrill. Okay, I'll admit that I've never actually met a ghost or a vampire. My real world reaction might be different than my hypothetical, literary response. I wouldn't bet on that, however. My sense of wonder might well overcome my natural fear.

The things that scare me are far more mundane. Domestic violence. Terrorism. Cancer. Our world is rife with horrors. There's no need to look to the next.

Even when I create a cruel, amoral monster, there's excitement mixed in with the fright. Here's a brief passage from “Fourth World”, my vampire tale that was just released as part of D.L.King's anthology The Sweetest Kiss.

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Mai lays a finger on his lips. “Don’t come yet, little boy. I want you to last a long, long time.” Her finger meanders down over his chin, tracing the line of his throat, down between his erect nipples. As it travels, she increases the pressure. I can see the indentation of her sharp fingernail. By the time she reaches his solar plexus, a red trail follows the finger’s progress. Very slowly, she slices through the skin of his belly, centimeter by centimeter, watching his face. He seems to be in ecstasy.

Blood wells up from the cut. She gathers some with her fingers, licks it off, her eyes closed as if she’s savoring the taste. “Lovely,” she murmurs. “Truly delicious.”

She rocks back and forth on his cock, wringing choked groans from Jeremy’s throat. “Magnificent,” she sighs. Her dagger-like nails open a wound across his right breast. This one is deeper, and bleeds more. Mai bends to lap hungrily at the red fountain. At the same time she pumps him with her pussy, writhing on top of him.

The more blood she drinks, the more excited she becomes. Her nails flash across Jeremy’s torso, carving bloody furrows into his fair skin. Her mouth sucks the ruddy fluid that trickles from a gash near his collarbone. She licks up the gore that pools in his navel. All the while she is bouncing on his obviously still hard cock, moaning and twisting, grinding her pelvis against him.

Then she stops suddenly, breathing hard, her alabaster breasts damp with sweat. “But I should save something for poor Harry, shouldn’t I? You can come, though, little one.” She arches back, and Jeremy yells, again and again. She is milking him, pulling the come from his body. At the same time, she slashes her lethal nails across his throat.

She rises from his twitching body, bends and laps at his bleeding throat. He is still alive. The wound is not that deep. His penis jerks and shudders as she drinks, still hard. Still aroused by her irresistible allure.

“That’s enough for you, for now. I don’t want to use you up all at once.” She turns to me, her black eyes gleaming. “Now, Harry, what about you?” She kneels between my spread thighs. “Are you ready for some fun?”

I should scream. I should fight her. I should too frightened to be aroused. My cock should be limp with terror like the rest of me.

I’m hard as granite.

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Scary? Just enough to turn me on. That's why I love Halloween—a celebration of the dark side where fear acts as an aphrodisiac.