6
Barbara
I left the
restaurant, walking out onto the pavement, feeling exposed and vulnerable –
like I was wearing a gaudy revealing outfit that would be horribly embarrassing
if I was seen in it.
But it
wasn’t an outfit; it was someone else’s body! I had actually become an entirely
different person! As far as all the passersby could tell, I was this young
nineteen year old: Lorraine Parker.
No one was
looking at me strangely. No one saw this as a magical transformation. If there
had been one – and there had – then it was over now. This was really me.
A man in his
thirties walked by, eyes dropping to my chest and legs, my midriff, briefly on
my face, then he was gone. Now that
was weird. I hadn’t been ‘checked out’ so blatantly since... ever really. That
was why I’d fantasised about being a girl like this: because I’d missed out on
that entire segment of life. It felt... nice.
While I was
standing there thinking about it, I got leers from two other men, one of them
quite dark skinned and tasty. It was actually kind of nice.
I started
walking through the milling crowds, just feeling what it was like to be young
again but in this new and exciting way: to be checked out by man after man,
feeling more confident and sexy by the minute. I wondered what it would be like
to be with one of them, to kiss them and feel them take me in their arms, enjoying
the fantasy.
What if I
went in a bar and got some guy to buy me some drinks? What if I went clubbing
and found some tasty young gigolo to...
To fuck me?
“God.”
I slipped
off the main thoroughfare and cupped my face in my hands. I stayed like that
for a minute, just trying to digest all this then swept them back up and
through my hair, linking my fingers finally behind my neck.
I was this
girl, Lorraine. I had really become her. It was exciting but it was also
entirely terrifying. The tension in my upper back was creeping tighter around
my shoulders and arms. I didn’t like it. I didn’t like it at all.
In the alley
was the entrance to a seedy-looking hotel called Brits Abroad. An Asian man and
woman emerged and I had to step out of the way. As I did so I saw the name of
the establishment and got another jolt in my stomach of tension cramps. I
fumbled for the key from the little pink handbag, holding it up; matching the
tag to the words there.
It was a key
for a room in that hotel: this squalid dump with peeling paint and overflowing
dustbins.
It was too
real. It wasn’t just a fantasy or a game. It was entirely real and it was wrong
and I hated it. I just wanted to be back in my own body – safe with Charles –
back in my own room at my own hotel. I didn’t want to be young again. I just
wanted to be me!
And as the
panic overcame me, as tears came down my cheeks, the darkness intensified in
the alley, dyeing everything a dimming hazy gold. I span, looking desperately
about me, all the more horrified, gripping the sides of my face as the gloom
swelled further, closing in on me; swallowing me.
I cried for
help from the passersby on the street but no one reacted, the noise from my
throat muted by the gloom. I strained, screaming, reaching out for them, trying
to stagger that way, but I fell forward onto my knees as the darkness snapped
over me, blacking out my vision, muffling every physical sensation apart from
the concrete under my hands and knees which quivered as though the very earth
were quaking.
Then in a
burst of restored illumination it was gone.
I was on my
hands and knees in the alley outside the Brits Abroad, trying to catch my
breath. And I was myself again. My arms were chubby again, my breasts
pendulous, my stomach round and soft. I touched the glasses on my face, the
straight dark hair, my fringe. It was all back and I tilted upright, sitting
back on my heels, smiling out of relief, the tears still running down my
cheeks.
“Thank God,”
I said. “Oh thank God.”
I climbed up
with difficulty and shambled to the mouth of the alley, squinting into the
bright shop lights, seeing all the oblivious people. Back in the alley the
gloom had departed completely.
But I could
still feel it. It was near. I could feel it like a warm chill on the backs of
my arms and behind my knees. Something unnatural.
I touched
myself all over, so relieved that it was over, but disappointed too that I
wasn’t slim and young again. There were so many carefree girls on the street. I
watched them walking and laughing, holding hands with their men... and I
wondered...
I wondered
if I hadn’t just made a terrible mistake. If I hadn’t just wasted a unique
opportunity.
A faint
tingling played across my back, running down to my waist. Whatever had done it
was still around, still coaxing me, telling me it wasn’t too late, but I shook
my head to clear it.
I didn’t
want that. It wasn’t worth it.
I didn’t
want to be young again if it meant I’d have to be poor.
7
Barbara
The Brits
Abroad Hotel was a dive but I had absolutely no doubt that it was cheap.
There had
been a time, years ago, when travelling abroad was the exclusive right of the
wealthy, but with the days of cheap flats and LastMinute.com anyone now had the
potential to explore the world. As long as the world they explored was filled
with alcohol, swimming pools, party drugs and gaudy souvenirs. This was the
kind of establishment that catered for that lower end of the market, a place to
flop after a hard night’s drinking and dancing; no frills.
I fingered
the ends of my hair, wondering if I should go inside. The reception desk was
unmanned. Behind it on the wall was pinned a faded Union Jack. On the side wall
was a big poster of two grinning football hooligans, their faces painted red
and white with the English flag, thumbs up. The bright red lettering said
“LET’S GET PISSED!!!!”
That said it
all really.
But I had to
know, so I pushed back the door and went in.
There was a
bell on the counter. I rang it and waited. Three laughing young men piled down
the stairs, singing some kind of overloud anthem, voices full of mirth and
inebriation. I tried not to look at their bare chests and muscular stomachs,
painfully aware of how out of place I looked. A sweating overweight Greek came
to the reception desk and murmured something unintelligible, flashing his eyes.
I cleared my
throat tersely. “Good evening. I’m sorry to bother you. My... niece is going to
be staying here and I was wondering if she’d checked in yet. Her name is
Lorraine. Lorraine Parker.” I smiled, feeling transparently fraudulent.
Nevertheless,
the man checked his book, shaking his head no.
“Lorraine
Parker,” I repeated. “Are you sure?”
“No Lorraine
Parker. No.” He shook his head again, even more violently.
I stepped
back, turned, remembered my manners and looked back to say “Thank you,” then
left the building, my mind casting about, trying to make sense of all this.
But there
were no answers.
Only more
questions.
8
Barbara
I wandered
back toward mine and Charles’s hotel, my mind so detached from my surroundings
that I barely avoided knocking into people. I must have looked a real sight:
the matronly woman in the glasses walking in a daze.
The odd
feeling was still with me. I could feel it crawling on my skin in the darker
recesses, gathering there, waiting, stroking at my thoughts, nudging at me,
keeping me drowsy. It was faintly disturbing, but also comforting; warming;
slightly electric, almost erotic.
Whatever it
was, it hadn’t finished with me. But that didn’t fill me with fear. For some
reason it made me... content; secure.
It felt like
it could make me happier, that a simpler life was in reach, that all I had to
do was wish for it and that life could be mine.
My thoughts
were sluggish, dropping from one concept to another only slowly, trying to
understand this thing, contain it within a framework of rules. But it eluded
that, contradicting any sense I’d ever known, making me feel as though there
was no reasoning it or understanding it; that this thing that was happening now
to me was unique. A unique relationship between me and... whatever it was.
I kept
thinking about Lorraine Parker; about the ID resolving itself from the gloom;
about the hotel key; about the dazed look on the hotel proprietor’s face when I
said that name.
He hadn’t known
her. She wasn’t a guest there. But she’d had the key. I’d had the key.
The only
thing that came close to making sense to me was that when I had become Lorraine
I had been a guest there. If I’d asked him then he would have known me. When I
changed back she ceased to exist.
But none of
this made sense, not in any real way. This kind of thing didn’t happen.
I stopped at
the side of the road, only belatedly realising I was at the hotel already.
Did this
mean that I could change into that body again whenever I wanted?
I felt a
sudden longing to and the street darkened slightly but I gripped the sides of
my face, forcing myself to put it out of my mind.
Yes. It
meant I could still invoke it. Still change. Just by thinking it.
I had to get
back inside. I had to discuss this with Charles. It was too big to keep to
myself.
Checking for
traffic I hurried across the street and in through the front doors to the lobby
then I made my way to the lifts.
9
Barbara
Charles was
fast asleep when I got back to the penthouse... which was disappointing.
I sighed
over-loudly, hoping he’d wake up then slipped into the en-suite bathroom when
he didn’t. The sight of my usual reflection was slightly jarring after looking
at myself as that girl. I didn’t like seeing my ordinary features and turned
away... then looked again: at my round face, my thick specs, my double chin, me
pear shaped body and thick thighs, my round arms.
The bathroom
was beautiful, really high quality; the best that money could buy. But was it
that great, really? Was it worth being old for? Or overweight? Was it worth
having bad eyesight to keep hold of it? Were any of these trappings worth it?
Was the mansion back home?
I could
still remember how the taut skin on my arms and thighs had felt. I closed my
eyes, remembering, the sides of my mouth turning up, and the room darkened, the
gloom closing in on me, just nudging me a little further in those thoughts.
I remembered
the hard mouth I’d had, the heavier brow. I imagined what it would be like to
be a teenager again, to not worry about what people thought about me, to be
free to act without doubt or guilt. To just do whatever I wanted. Be with whomever
I wanted.
The chills
started on the backs of my calves and pattered up my legs around my buttocks
and into my back. I put my hands to my stomach but it was already slimming
beneath my fingers and my turned-up mouth became an actual smile and then a
grin.
I wanted to
open my eyes to the darkness but I was afraid to break the spell, lose the fantasy,
let that fantasy become real. All I could think about was being that girl
again; being young again. It was everything I wanted. Every other care I had
was subsumed by that, consumed in the darkness what was closing around me.
I stretched
my arms out to the sides, my head dropping back as the preternatural wind
caught my hair: letting it do its work; letting it change me, turning me into
Lorraine again, wiping away all trace of the frumpy middle-aged woman I’d been.
The power
twirled around me, reshaping my limbs, stripping the unwanted meat from my
bones, recasting my face.
And then in
a flicker and a flash of restored light it was over and I was gasping, reaching
for the edge of the sink to keep me from falling, trying to catch my breath as
I stared once more into the reflection of the nineteen year old hellion in the
mirror.
Lorraine
Parker.
The new me.
loving it -john
ReplyDeleteGreat! I'm enjoying exploring the Golden Gloom mythos. I have several new ideas for stories based around it and around the mysteries of Barton.
DeleteEmma