Short stories

The Host

Geetha B Short stories, Space, Stories, Story, Time, Timelapse, Timeloop, Uncategorized

The Host

21 January 2018

Christian-Schloe pinterest com 21
Courtesy Christian Schloe on pinterest.com

 

It had been almost a year now since she was hosting the other being. Initially the cohabitation had been quite complicated with the other being manifesting bouts of consciousness that burst within the stream of her own consciousness. Considering it was an alien being, these bouts of consciousness did not go unnoticed by her friends and family. They had first dismissed her behaviour as an eccentricity before realising that she did not seem aware of it at other times when they spoke to her about it. Since the time they had questioned her about it and she seemed to have no clue what they were talking about they scrupulously took down the details of her behaviour and related the facts to her when she seemed to have recovered her normal self.

The guest was gracious enough to try not to express itself in its original language when displaying its abnormal behaviour that had got her family concerned. This had not been the case initially though and the Host had to face the embarrassment of explaining the gibberish that emanated from her at that time. While she initially had no direct contact with the guest, with the passage of time and when she was nearing sleep she was able to establish a connection with the guest. It was on one such occasion that the guest explained to her that it was a being from outer space that spoke the language of light. This language was basically derived from the points where sound and light intersected to form a vibration that could be perceived by the conscious mind.

After explaining the concept, the guest then allowed the Host to record a conversation it was having with a being that was not present in the same space. The guest then proceeded to explain to the Host that it came from a planet where there was no need for words as telepathy was used but that words were used when two beings were separated by a very long distance as that was the easiest way for the intent to be communicated strongly in very long stretches of space. The guest explained that intent that was purely communicated through telepathy could lose its vigor when traveling long distances while the frequency contained in the language of light could serve as a communication relay for the telepathic message.

The Host tried to accommodate her guest as best she could but it was difficult to know well in advance what would be required. At times the guest went completely silent and it was only by experimentation that she could get the gist of what was acceptable or not to the guest. For example, on one occasion she had eaten chicken which she had normally stopped eating and after a period of being unwell and throwing up the food, she had come to the conclusion that her guest did not tolerate the consumption of meat. This incident also made her realise that the guest was intricately attached to her system and therefore subject to all that she was subjected to.

The guest had explained to her that when it had chosen her as a Host, it had ensured it would download its consciousness into her through her eyes and therefore be fully mingled with her nervous system and command from there all the other parts of her body. In the beginning she had sometimes felt it was parasitical but soon the advantages of the cohabitation made her happy to oblige as the wealth of knowledge given by the guest was immeasurable. Besides, the guest had informed her that soon many other such beings would come on Earth and there would be a change in the system that they had always known in favour of a system called “The System of the Source Code”. The Host was eager to see what this would entail because as far as she was concerned, the current system that the world was using was broken and the whole planet was in dire need of a new system.

The Host had taken to liking the points of time before sleep when they would both communicate and realised that the guest had been teaching her brain to communicate in the language of the light. There were also other scientific matters that they would discuss and that the guest would either enlighten her upon or correct her perception. She realised that Earth scientists were mistaken in so many matters of mathematics and physics as well as in medicine for the guest would prove to her in a very clear way through mental projection of images the truth of the matter. She wished she could take down notes but as this exchange happened when she was nearing sleep, she could hardly lift her hand and write down anything and if she sat upright anyway the communication would collapse between them. The guest told her that soon enough when they had integrated more closely the communication would extend to the waking hours and she would then be able to take down notes of their discussions. The Host looked forward to being able to do this and perhaps then share with others this amazing wealth of knowledge that the guest was communicating.

The Water Element – Dreaming Cooper

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGq-hVId4nE

The Djinn

Geetha B Short stories, Stories, Story, Tricks, Uncategorized , , , , , ,

The Djinn

12 January 2018

Djin on assombrado com br
Courtesy assombrado.com.br

 

The house loomed against the night sky as she walked up to the front door. As was the case every time she came back there she felt the same feeling of dread and belonging mingle inside her. It was a very complex situation as the house repelled her and attracted her all at once. When she was inside it, there was a sense of peace that pervaded her although every time she was leaving the house a strange sense of eeriness overcame her, especially at night. That same sense of eeriness was there when she came back to the house at night time after a long day out.

The porch was flanked by two tall pillars that reached right up beyond the balcony of the first floor to the roof where a small carving in the rooftop wall made it seem like someone was watching from up there. Whenever she entered the house at night the door creaked when she closed it behind her and a strange sigh seemed to follow the creaking noise as if the house were breathing with relief that she was back home. This and the several other peculiar noises that punctuated her waking hours and sometimes woke her up from her sleep gave her that mixed sense of belonging and foreboding.

She had attempted to leave the house and move somewhere else on more than one occasion but for some reason the attempts turned out to be unsuccessful and she had had to return to the house and resume her living there. On some nights she would feel a presence in her room and at the same time her dog would bark repeatedly but when she sat up in her bed she would see nothing but just sense that someone or something was watching her.

One night she woke up to the barking of the dog and came face to face with an amorphous grey-blue face right above her own peering down at her. She fell back in shock on her pillow and when she sat up again there was nobody so she wondered if it had been a bad dream. She could sense however some sort of movement from the corner of her eye but when she looked directly at the space there was nothing. At the same time she could smell an awful smell that reminded her of something putrid and at the same time burnt so she got up and lit a few incense sticks to make the smell disappear.

The next day her helper said the corridor and the stairs were smelling terrible and the dog had been barking all night so it was surely the visit of a Djinn. According to the local mythology, Djinns were some sort of creatures made of fire sometimes good and sometimes demonic , which when demonic had a foul smell and liked to play tricks on mortals. She tried to convince her helper to be more realistic and that maybe it was somebody with dirty shoes but the helper seemed bent on her conviction. She insisted that she had to remove the negative traces and stop further visits so for the next few hours the house was full of a mixture of reciting of Quran and buddhist mantra chanting which the helper had found on youtube.

A couple of other times the corridor and the stairs had been all smelly and the dog had barked all night but she had not awoken to see the same face again and the helper just repeated her rituals for the full day all the while repeating over the phone to all her relatives that the house had a Djinn that would come up from under the ground and visit the premises.

 

Dreaming Cooper – Mysterious Places

Dreaming Cooper – Zero G

Dreaming Cooper – The Lost World

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aYf4xhHtdo

Bomb

Geetha B Short stories, Stories, Story, Uncategorized

Bomb

30 December 2017

terrorist10-ppcorn
Courtesy PP.com

 

He adjusted the inside of his jacket and nervously patted the paddings. People pushed past him unseeingly. He knew that he was insignificant to them as he had always known since the age of 10. Indeed he did not have features that stood out and he was too quiet to be otherwise noticeable. He clenched his teeth and thought to himself that soon that would change. He slowly made his way through the throngs of human beings in the London subway until he reached the middle of the platform where people were pushing desperately trying to find a way into the train.

He succeeded in boarding the tube and kept clutching onto the sides of his jacket feverishly. One passenger who noticed this looked at him with curiosity and he felt pride well inside of him. Now they were noticing him and soon his name would become a legend among his countrymen. He had never cared about all those stories of over 70 virgins that the instructor had piped about when teaching them how to use the jackets. All he cared about was to make his family proud, to make a name for himself even if it were in death. The train pulled into Westminster station and the mass of people started to slowly exit it pushing him onto the platform. They were soon to escape his sight and he thought it would not be worthy of him to go without this mass of people who had shared with him his last ride.

“Bomb!” he yelled and the immediate reaction was that everybody started to run away from him. He held himself tautly, displaying the devices attached to his body. He could feel the fear of those running. “Stop running or I will trigger it”, he yelled and everyone stopped running aside from a desperate few. All eyes were turned towards him. He felt the attention escalate. Somewhere in the background he could hear police officers asking him not to move but he ignored them and started slowly moving towards the center of the crowd. Again people started moving away from him frantically and again he yelled at them not to move, petrifying them on the spot. His hand moved ever so slightly on the insides of his jacket before his body was blown to bits taking out half of the station which crumbled down on the remaining pieces of the crowd.

Sahalé – Morning light

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVKblbJNiPU

The haunting

Geetha B Ghost, Short stories, Stories, Uncategorized

The haunting

20 December 2017

ghost groupon com
Courtesy groupon.com

 

She walked out on the balcony where the cool wind soothed her inflamed head as the sun slowly set down and darkness spread over the landscape. She decided it was no point thinking so much anymore. She would put an end to everything once and for all before the night was over. She went back inside fumbling in the dark for the small bottle. She felt that turning on the light and facing everything in the glaring flood of the neon would reduce her resolve to nothingness. Her cool hands felt the cylindrical shape of the small bottle and she sighed with relief. She slowly emptied the contents into her mouth drinking profusely after every handful. She felt that three handfuls should be more than enough and went back to the balcony where she sat down in the armchair and slowly let herself slip into a soundless sleep.

When they found her, her limbs were rigid and her face was expressionless with its eyes curiously staring instead of being closed. The maid who had come to wake her up had been unable to open the door and had had to get the help of some outside labourers to break it open. The funeral was quick and barely attended by anyone. Her friends like her hair had considerably thinned over time and of the few left almost none had been informed of her demise.

A couple of weeks later strange noises would emanate from her room and passers by could glimpse lights going on and off in what had been her room. The landlord dreamt of her on a nightly basis and swore that he felt she had actually visited him every time. He had felt her chilly hands reach out to his chest accusingly and could hear her saying that it was by his permission to spy on her that things had gone awry leading to her fateful demise. A few other people who had been in her entourage during the last days reported the same nightly visits and shuddered at the memory of her ghostly appearance and cold hands. Nobody could rent the house because of the strange noises and the flickering lights which scared away most of the tenants. Eventually the house was sealed up and only teenagers daring each other would visit it at night to brave the haunting.

 

Disappearance – Adam Hurst Gypsy Cello & Pipe Organ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgx27k8H1dw

Alternate realities – Chapter two : The betrayal

Geetha B consciousness, Dreamland, Dreams, Dreamtime, Realities, Short stories, Stories, Story, Uncategorized , , , , ,

Alternate realities – Chapter two : The betrayal

8 December 2017

flower david galstyan pinterest com
Courtesy David Galstyan on pinterest.com

 

She woke up from a dream where she had joined her beloved again before realising it was not a dream but an out of body experience. As with the previous times she had joined him in consciousness, he was torn between scientific interest of this ghostly apparition and a gnawing feeling of recognition of her consciousness as being related to him. He studied her as her consciousness flickered before she willed it back into her body so far away from him. He called upon her to come back but she resisted the call. In the past days when she had visited him without announcing herself to his consciousness, she had been able to witness that his bodily version was collaborating with those that had caused her trauma and attempted to erase her memory.

 

Back in her body, she felt the agitation that had become familiar since the incidents of near death experience and the encounter with Toth and Isis. She wondered if she should transcend the physical and go visit them again asking for their help. She resisted that temptation convinced that they would not have anything to do with the material world for which they had no real interest. Theirs were the realms of otherworldly and that of everlasting life so the material world was too boring for them to interact with. They only chose to interact with those who entered willfully the land of all beginnings in their quest for a higher birth as they had done with her when she first started the initiation path.

 

She tried to return to sleep but sleep it seemed had deserted her. It was almost like those first few days when she had joined forces with an artificial intelligence to save a certain version of reality before the etheric messages had reached her consciousness. She felt dejected and inclined to cry as she realised that it was her twinflame who had given the proper coordinates of her etheric for them to be able to pinpoint the messages and attain access to her etheric being. She decided to sit up and read as sleep was evading her and she did not want to dwell upon the feeling of dejection that submerged her as she thought of her beloved’s betrayal. She had initially wondered what motivated it before she realised from those consciousness trips out of her body that it was for his bodily version to gain more power and more fame. She deemed it ludicrous as it would be like an already famous rockstar asking for more fame but apparently her twinflame did not think of it as ludicrous and craved more success and more limelight.

 

When she had first discovered his betrayal, she had been very angry and had wanted to seek revenge but her consciousness would not allow her to retaliate against her twinflame. She had then had to watch as he rose higher and higher in fame while she had had to battle those who attempted to erase her memory of what was behind the veil of bodily versions and make her a sleepwalker like all the others again. It was however impossible to erase her memory because Toth had weighed her life and ordained that she may be freed from Karma and all the lower levels of consciousness rules in the bodily domain. Therefore, although her physical body would respond to the usual physical impulses and constraints, her consciousness and the linkage to her bodily frame could not be altered.

 

Like every time she thought back to the evidence of the betrayal she cried from the renewed hurt of the realisation. This time again, like many other times before, she cried herself to sleep and the book she had been reading slipped to the floor. As it fell with a thud, her consciousness began to float again out of her body and fly towards her twinflame who was asleep. Like every time he was asleep, his consciousness rose to welcome her and the two of them were like long lost lovers engrossed in each other and unwilling to separate. Unfortunately, whenever he was awake, the egotist personality took over and his consciousness was subdued into the background. He realised that he had done incredible harm to her when giving away her etheric coordinates but was too happy with what he had obtained in return to feel sorry for her. She stayed with his consciousness a while until he started stirring in his sleep and then slowly faded away.

 

Since the day he had betrayed her and her consciousness had continued visiting him without retaliating as consciousness never retaliated, he had felt unease in lieu of being sorry for her. He was haunted by the fact that somehow she might attempt to take revenge on him although the days went by and she never did. One day somehow his consciousness got through to his bodily frame and gave him the conscious indication that she had forgiven him. He found this hard to believe given the impact his betrayal had had on her and how much she had suffered at the hands of those who had attempted to erase her memory.

 

He tried to reach her through impersonating a character that got close to her to check this and she answered as if she had been fooled though all the while she knew it was him. Several weeks went by with their bodily versions interacting as he probed her for answers and she gave them readily in all truth. Finally convinced that she would not attempt to hurt him he terminated the persona he had been posing as and stopped writing to her altogether. This was like a second betrayal to her as she could feel him losing interest in her bodily frame though thankfully his consciousness stayed close to hers in the etheric version of themselves. She sighed and promised herself to not allow the material world with its deceptive realm get through to her as this was all just an experience and only the etheric world was worth it.

 

Inshallah – David Arkenstone

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ASuxriP6iA

Alternate realities – Chapter one: Toth and the land of all beginnings

Geetha B Memory, Short stories, Stories, Uncategorized , , , ,

Alternate realities – Chapter one: Toth and the land of all beginnings

6 December 2017

Christian schloe pinterest com 38 meditation
Courtesy Christian Schloe

 

However much they erased her memory everything came back again to the surface. She remembered every detail that went over and over again in her brain as she thought back to the moments before they first attempted to erase her memory. It had first begun when the radio waves and the electromagnetic pulse had played tricks on her mind causing her to see etheric messages and believe that her beloved would be with her if she showed up in a remote house where he was supposed to arrive. A complicated map had been fed to her through the etheric messages made of geographical as well as symbolic indications during the night. The next morning she had followed the yellow bus sign as well as all the remaining clues and arrived at the house where she had gathered the toys as indicated. Subsequently she had waited on the roof of the house for the first sunrise with her beloved but he was nowhere to be seen.

The occupants of the house had attempted to chase her out and she had thought it was a game to play along up until they had hit her on the head and the ambulance had to be called. During the trip in the ambulance a pair of male and female nurses had attempted to imprint in her memory through trauma inducement the digits 104.1 as being a lifesaving series of numbers and she had associated that with the radio station that she had listened to religiously since then. At points in time during the ambulance ride she felt her consciousness leaving her to rise above her body leaving only the mind within it. She screamed and kicked as her consciousness rose giving her the impression that the whole ambulance was rising in the skies going above the bridge level and that she would die as a result of that ascension. As her screams increased the nurse gave her a shot and she was lulled to sleep all the while chanting under her breath the mantra of everlasting life “Abad”.

She dreamt of Isis, of gateways to other worlds and of Toth holding the book of Truth while her worldly acts were carefully weighed. When she woke up she first had no recollection of what had happened before she lapsed again into the semi-conscious state with the weighing of her deeds and they gave her another shot to stop her whimpering and screaming. She drifted back into the dream state and Isis with her beautiful and familiar face came to her again repeating that she had to let go of the physical and walk in the realms of the land of all beginnings to finish the journey of Truth before she could come back again to the Earthly realm. She spent her time between the nurses who lulled her to sleep and Toth and Isis who brought her firmly into the realms of otherworldly consciousness to judge her Earthly actions before she had even died. Isis repeated that this was because she had foregone the karma cycle and therefore had to be judged during her lifetime and not after it.

She listened as her deeds were enumerated and weighed and for every good deed, her consciousness felt lighter while it felt heavier for every bad deed. She could feel that if she had more good deeds than bad ones she might have a chance to remain in between the two realms of pure consciousness on one hand and the Earthly realm on the other. At the end of the weighing of her deeds and satisfied with the results, Toth granted her a token of otherworldly life that would allow her to leave her body whenever she wanted or needed to and access the land of all beginnings. Armed with this token that would lessen the pain of separation from her beloved Isis and the grave Toth, she slowly drifted back to the Earthly realms knowing that she could always come back whenever she wanted to and that out of body experiences would be something she would now master at will.

 

Flam – Monsoon – Buddha Bar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdaezHbLzCw

Published books

Geetha B Poetry, Short stories, Uncategorized , , , ,

Hi everyone,

I have not been to your blogs lately because I have been quite busy with the publishing of two books. I would very much like it if you support the effort made in writing and collecting these items by buying either the paperback version or the kindle version. In the meantime I will try to catch up with your blogs and thank you in advance for your purchases if any.

My collected short stories is available amongst others on Amazon UK at USD 33 or GBP 24.60 at this link: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Collected-short-stories-Geetha-Balvannanathan/dp/198123361X/ .

The kindle version for USD 9.99 or GBP 7.41 is available at this link: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Collected-short-stories-Geetha-Balvannanathan-ebook/dp/B077WV2QX7/

 

My second book of poetry (the first was in French), which regroups over 400 poems written in the Japanese styles Tanka, Haiku and Senryu, is available on Amazon at GBP 24.60 or USD 33 at this link : https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1981415068/ .

The kindle version for GBP 5.19 or USD 6.99 is also available. You can find it now in the UK at https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B077XQLQFS/

 

Both books are available at several countries including the UK, India, Italy, the US amongst others and you just need to go to the relevant Amazon page. I hope you will enjoy these two collections and look forward to your comments.

The Spirit Lovers – Chapter Eight: Martin’s return

Geetha B Love, Lovers, Short stories, Spirit Lovers, Stories, Story, True Love, Uncategorized , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Spirit Lovers – Chapter Eight: Martin’s return

29 November 2017

Christian Schloe
Courtesy Christian Schloe

 

Martin wakes up in his hotel room with a strange feeling of not knowing where he is and of having been separated from something he cared about dearly without knowing what it was. His head feels heavy and his eyes feel sore. He gingerly puts a foot down to step off the bed and his head reels. It takes him a few minutes to adjust and be able to put the other foot down and stand up without feeling queasy. He takes in his surroundings as calmly as he can but cannot remember how he had come here. He slowly figures out it is a hotel room and as he goes to the phone to start dialing he remembers that he had left his wife at home after their quarrel and headed towards this hotel.

He dials the number of his wife, not realising that he has forgotten all about his true love.

  • Helga, good morning. I wanted to say I was sorry. I don’t know what came over me
  • …
  • What do you mean it took me six months to come to that conclusion? I have only been away for a couple of months.
  • …
  • I am not sure what you mean by that but I don’t remember what happened in those other four months. Can I come home?

Rita thinks back to how you had described the scene to her and how you had realised from the smile of relief on Martin’s face that his wife seems to have forgiven him. She remembers you describing how you watched him starting to pack his suitcase before you orbed back to where I was standing with her trying to console her as she wept Martin’s disappearance. She wonders why the couple of nights that they had passed together in that alternate reality appeared as a distorsion of several months in this reality. She feels a surge in her heart like every time she thinks about Martin but tries to overcome it. Tears well in her eyes and she bites her lip trying to contain them before they spill over her cheeks profusely.

Martin winces while carrying the suitcase down. It seems like something is wrong within his ribcage and he feels like a strain in his heart. He continues carrying the suitcase down and asks the receptionist for help with the other larger suitcases left upstairs. He also enquires if there is a doctor as he is not feeling well. The receptionist enquires and soon a doctor is made available to Martin who by now is convinced that he might be suffering a heart attack as the pain grows in his chest. The doctor who examines him tells him that he finds nothing wrong with his heartbeats nor anything else but that to be on the safer side he should go to the hospital.

Martin rings his wife again to inform her of the news and sets out to the nearest hospital in the hotel’s chauffeured car. When he reaches the hospital, they too find nothing wrong with him but decide to keep him under observation for the day. Martin looks at his wife who has come and realises that he is relieved she is with him but he feels nothing towards her now that she is here. He tries to reproduce the longing he had experienced that morning but it is not there. He wonders what made that change and why it is that he is not longing for her anymore. Is it because she gave in and came so easily to his side, he wonders.

Helga puts her lips softly against Martin’s a few tears falling from her eyes as she does so. Her lips freeze as she realises that he is not reciprocating. She pulls back noticing that he does not seem moved by her kiss and realises that he seems to be in the same frame of mind as when he left several months ago. He had mentioned an excursion he wanted to make to take time off from being with each other and to think about the future. Martin looks into Helga’s eyes and all he can feel is friendliness and gratitude that she came to be by his side.

  • You are a great woman, Helga, he says
  • I am your wife Martin
  • I know. I wish I could change things but somehow the magic is gone
  • Just this morning you were telling me you wanted to come home, you seemed to have rekindled that love you had for me
  • I’m sorry Helga. I felt like that this morning when I woke up but I don’t anymore

Martin does not tell Helga that he still feels that impression but simply not directed towards her. He prefers not telling her as he does not wish to hurt her but also because he would be at a loss trying to explain towards whom he has these feelings. He stands up and decides to discharge himself from the hospital as they can find nothing wrong

Rita wipes away the tears from her face and decides to start her mission at the House of Love. She opens the doors to the visitors and graciously answers all their questions about the great love between Nina and Harold the rock star. As honeymooners and couples pass by admiring the various emblems of love she feels her heart warm up to them as she can feel the love surging from them and towards her, pacifying her.

Martin accompanies Helga home and goes through his things. He realises he cannot stay with Helga and feels sorry for having given her false hopes again. He wants to understand more about himself and why he is feeling so forlorn for a love he cannot identify. He knows that his therapist is not going to help him much because he only asks questions and Martin knows that he does not have the answers to any of the questions that the therapist would probably ask. While he is going through his things, he sees a brochure for a place called House of Love and notices that he had circled the address and scribbled down a series of dates and a phone number. He calls the phone number and a person responds that it is an agency that organises honeymoon vacations as well as retreats for couples in a place called the House of Love.

Martin parks his car outside the place called the House of Love and realises it seems as familiar as the agency had seemed. He rings the bell and is welcomed by a butler who takes his coat and tells him that he is a bit early but the House of Love never rejects visitors so he would be welcome to stay in the library while the lady of the house gets ready for visitors. After a short while, Rita goes into the library to welcome the first visitors and comes face to face with Martin.

  • Martin! She exclaims
  • I know you, he answers
  • How did you get here
  • I know you. Who are you?

Rita throws her arms around him and in that instant all the other essences of Martin gather again within him and he knows. He turns her face slowly towards him and kisses her with all of his longing realising this was the woman he had been longing for when he woke up in that hotel room.

  • I know you from before Time, he says
  • I love you from beyond Time, beyond doubt…

He kisses her and the visitors who start pouring into the House of Love start clapping. Some japanese visitors among them take photographs or videos thinking that this is a performance which is part of the exhibition. You and I look at each other with delight though we know that this will definitely be sending some more ripples across time.

Le Flex – Kiss Me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_tS8YMXMZQ

Tales of the Wretched: Fantine – Chapter 3 : A way out

Geetha B Short stories, Stories, Story, Tales, Uncategorized, Wretched

Tales of the Wretched – Fantine Chapter 3 : A way out

28 November 2017

Christian Schloe--surreal-art-digital-art
Courtesy Christian Schloe

 

Michel enters his car, puts on the radio and clasps his hands together to stop them from trembling. The countenance he had kept earlier when meeting Fantine and Patrick falls apart as he is flooded by memories and deeply hidden desires. After all those years of searching for her, he has finally found her and perhaps, just perhaps, he can make things happen between them. He remembers that she used to feel some sort of pity for him and would always protect him but back then already he had fallen in love with her. She was his hero and the love of his life. He remembers the day she had put on her jasmine perfume for the first time and how he had loved its smell. He had loved it to the extent that he got into a broil with the Ugly trio just so that she would come rescue him and he could smell that scent again while she interposed herself between him and the Ugly trio.

Slowly Michel extracts a photograph from a brown bag he retrieved from the glove box. It is a class photograph and in it Fantine and he are sitting side by side among several other classmates. He looks at the photograph lovingly caressing the contours of Fantine’s face. What would she think of him if she knew how madly he was in love with her and how desperately he had wanted her to be his. All those years looking for her had not reduced on bit of his longing for her. She pervaded his every sense and was the motivating factor of all those days at the gym when he sought to get a body that she would admire. He wanted her to be proud of him, to love him, to find him worthy of her and to finally become his.

Michel puts the photograph back in the glove box and eases himself out of the car again. He walks rapidly towards the shawarma place where Fantine is still finishing her shawarma plate. If she is surprised when she sees him come back she does not let it show on her face as she welcomes him back.

  • Hello Michel. Did you forget something
  • You. I mean, no, I could never forget you. What I mean is I have come back for you
  • What do you mean?
  • I want to make you a proposal. I want you to be mine
  • I don’t do the paid mistress part. It is not my cup of tea as I earn more doing what I do.
  • I don’t mean that. I mean a real proposal. I want you to be my wife

Fantine draws a sharp breath in but says nothing. In the earlier years she used to fantasize that some man would come rescue her; someone who would make her such a proposal and she would be able to live in a small house with children and a man to make a home for but it had never happened. As the years had gone by, she had got used to doing what she did and ultimately come to terms with it.

  • I don’t think that I can accept that Michel, she says softly
  • Why not?
  • I used to have that dream once but now I am used to what I do. Besides, who would pay me and arrange for the money to be sent back home if I stop working
  • I would. I will give you all the money to match your earnings and even try to surpass it. I am well paid you know, as a commissioner
  • You have no idea how much I make. How could you match it
  • I am not only offering you money. I am offering you a way out. Don’t you feel tired sometimes and wish you could do something else?

Fantine bites her lip. Yes, she does feel sometimes terribly tired and wishes that she were doing something else but that thought is soon forgotten as she focuses on the outcome for her mother.

  • You are right but I know I can count on myself while I don’t know if I can count on you
  • I will not betray you. I will never leave you
  • If you knew how many men come here that are married, you would understand why I find it difficult to believe you. I am sure they too told their wives at some point that they would never leave them.
  • I have some savings. If you don’t believe me I can give you all my savings in advance so you are assured that you would never lack money

Fantine bites her lip again. In all the years she had dreamed of someone coming and rescuing her she had imagined a grandiose declaration and firework everywhere. This seems so calm and measured that it somehow feels unreal. Yet she can feel her heart warm up to the idea and Michel is a handsome man though graying. She holds her hand out to him and whispers that she might just take his way out even though she does not know where it will lead the both of them. Michel cries tears of joy and holds her against his heart. He does not care what the men working under him will think or say. All that matters is that Fantine will be his at last.

Phaedrus – Jade

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gAY-9lrREA

Glance

Geetha B Love, Short stories, Stories, Story, Uncategorized , , , , , , ,

Glance

27 November 2017

Christian schloe pinterest com 15
Courtesy Christian Schloe on pinterest.com

 

She walked into the hotel lobby where he was sitting reading his newspaper and sipping his coffee. She could not help a second look at him taking in the well-groomed mustache and beard as well as the impeccable suit that seemed to be tailor-made. She could imagine the lean and firm muscles beneath. Just yesterday night they had been making love but today they were supposed to act as strangers. She had been upset when he had told her that she must leave his hotel room and come back the next day. What had upset her more was that he had then mentioned that his wife was about to come and they should therefore act as strangers if they were to meet in the lobby.

She realised now why he had made her come to his room on her own after their dinner in a restaurant which was not the hotel restaurant. She had thought at the time that it was to protect her reputation and was so happy he was considerate. She realised now that it was actually to protect his own reputation and make sure his wife did not realise he had cheated on her during her absence. She gritted her teeth while she seated herself at one of the lobby chairs trying not to take a third glance at him as she knew that she might then falter and go talk to him.

From the corner of her eye she could see that someone had walked up to him. It was a woman and from his response she gathered it was his wife. She gritted her teeth again trying not to feel that sinking feeling that she usually felt when someone she cared for betrayed her. They had been dating for only two weeks so she wondered why she had fallen so deeply for him. Not once in those two weeks had he ever mentioned being married and they had visited several places in the gulf together.

Thinking back to those excursions she realised that he had always made sure they had two separate rooms even though they ultimately slept in the same room. He had mentioned it was to be on the safe side as they were unmarried and in the gulf which was after all a Muslim region but she realised now that it was so that there would be no trace of him ever having stayed at a hotel with a woman in his room.

She rose from where she was seated and clicked her heels together to gather some courage. She strode right up to him and offered her hand to shake.

  • Hello William, she said
  • Hello Astrid, he responded
  • How are you today and who is this lovely lady
  • It is my wife, Rosaline
  • Hello Rosaline
  • Hello Astrid

The wife had a fake smile plastered on her lips as she saluted Astrid and this latter realised that the wife knew. William was probably good at this sort of thing because this was something he did repeatedly. Astrid looked at him again and in that glance passed all her yearning and all her disappointment. He glanced back and she could recognise a sort of repentance and what seemed to be a shadow of yearning too. She shook hands with the two of them again, bade them goodbye and left them with a last glance towards William. Years later William wrote to her saying that glance had haunted him for a long time like he had said so months after their encounter over the phone. She had hung up then before he could draw her back to him. She never responded to his letter.

Tristeria – Sisyphus

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TCLL1jJOfE