Tyrant spell issue six by Alexandra Lesley

Tyrant Spell

Issue Six Late Lammas & Autumn Equinox

EDITORâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S PAGE TYRANT SPELL ! ! Hi! Welcome to the sixth edition of Tyrant Spell. ! ! There has been a reprieve! Tyrant Spell will continue, but will be shorter for a while. ! The theme story celebrates the festival of the Goddess Pomona, and is about recognising true love and the importance of teamwork. ! Saviatona episode four and the third part of the serialised novel, THE BOY WITH THE SNOWSTORM will be in the next edition. Clio part five appears in this edition, but the conclusion to the story will now appear in the Hallowmas issue, which will see Tyrant Spell come full circle. ! ! Please like, or comment about the magazine on Issuu, or email me. ! ! Poems, articles and stories, artwork and photos are still welcome as long as they reflect a theme or the general tone of Tyrant Spell. All previous Issues will continue to be available on issuu.com.This time, I would like to have reader contributions regarding The Devil. Stories, poems, artwork or non-fiction on this topic. ! The deadline for contributions for the Hallowmas edition is October 6th. Just email. The address is on the back cover. Contributions should be in the form of attachments and all will be considered for publication and all emails answered. All suitable submissions received after this date will be held over for a future issue. ! ! Alix

INTRODUCTION TO THE THEMES OF ISSUE SIX Lammas, the festival of first fruits, the disseminating Moon, the festival of Pomona, Roman Goddess of Fruit, and Autumn Equinox. ! Lammas is when the return begins. Did you feel it as the full moon in all her glory came and slipped away leaving a sense of bereavement, heralding the harvest, but also Equinox, equal day and equal night again. ! Persephone returns to the underworld, and her mother Demeter mourns, the earth begins to cool, the winds of change to blow as we move towards the stillness of winter and its dormancy, until Spring Equinox, when her reunion with her mother is spectacular! ! The theme story Dark Fruit pays homage to Pomona, Goddess of Fruit. Her festival is celebrated each year on August 13th. ! It also reflects the blessings of Lammas and links Pomona’s story to that of Persephone travelling through the underworld, but finding love in her new role. Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away; Lengthen night and shorten day; Every leaf speaks bliss to me Fluttering from the autumn tree. I shall smile when wreaths of snow Blossom where the rose should grow; I shall sing when night’s decay Ushers in a drearier day. ..A.. A.. ! ! !

! !

! ! 4

Emily Jane Brontë

Contents Editor’s Page!!

Introduction to this issue’s themes!

Contents!

Serial The One and Only, part six !

Dark Fruit! !

Serial Clio, part five! ! ! Mystery Poet !

! !!

IN THE HIDDEN HEART

91 92

Contacts on the back cover

Serial, THE ONE AND ONLY, part six Resume of Parts One,Two, Three, Four & Five: Daisy bumps into someone she canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t see in the woods and wakes up feeling and behaving reckless and ruthless. She asks her cousin Charlotte to go to The Bridge, the club where Daisyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s boyfriend Kieron plays with his band, Lonely Little Bleeding Hearts. They are regular performers there. At the club, Charlotte meets Ed, the quiet but gorgeous looking boy who serves the non alcoholic drinks that The Bridge sells to its teenage patrons. Daisy sings with the band as their guest vocalist and is really very good. She also seduces the keyboard player Declan, even though she loves Kieron and knows that her friend Cheryl fancies Declan. 6

Charlotte sees Daisy kissing Declan and is disturbed by her cousin’s behaviour and by the evil look that she glimpses for a moment in her eyes. Daisy has no intention of going to America with Declan. Cheryl finds out about Daisy and Declan seeing one another behind everyone’s backs and doesn’t tell Kieron, but falls out with Daisy. Meanwhile Charlotte is watching her cousin and is spooked by her increasingly reckless behaviour. On a sixth form trip to Kelvingrove Art Gallery in Glasgow, where Daisy has arranged to meet the band who are doing a gig in the city, something terrible happens. Will, the band’s drummer, who has always lusted after Daisy, is overcome by a fit of jealousy, somehow 7

precipitated into a fury by Daisy, or something to do with Daisy... And tragedy occurs when Will rips a medieval sword from its case, which transforms from a rusting relic into the shining lethal weapon that it once was. Will then uses the sword against a defenseless Declan. He is eaten up with guilt and remorse after Declan bleeds to death, there on the gallery floor. Although he was jealous of the attention Daisy was paying Declan and despite his being very hot tempered, he canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t believe that he has done what he has done. Was he really responsible?

Daisy convinces the police that Declan took the sword from the case and that it was he himself, who, while larking about with it, sliced his own arm off. She goes to the doctor because she is becoming convinced that she is going mad. She feels guilty about Declanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s death and not just because he and Will were fighting over her. Somehow, she knows that she is responsible, even though Will wielded the sword, it was she who killed Declan with it. Daisy canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t stop herself being unkind or rude or cruel and one night she sees a strange boy/girl in the bathroom, who disappears, but then she sees

his eyes looking at her from her own face, reflected in the mirror! Charlotte would like Daisy to confide in her, but knows that she won’t. She is suspicious that Daisy and Will are not telling the truth about what happened to Declan, but daren’t think about what the alternatives to their story might be. Ed, the boy who works at The Bridge, joins the band after kieron hears how good a musician he is and asks him to play with them. Then, in the middle of the night, Charlotte sees Daisy floating in the air, outside her bedroom window. In the morning she goes to the graveyard. Unable to face Declan’s funeral on the following 10

day, she takes a wreath to his elder sisterâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s grave, where he is also to be interred and sees Will sitting nearby. Charlotte hides and hears Will talking to Declan, telling him that he is sorry for killing him. Now Charlotte knows his secret! Martin is introduced into the story. He lives alone in a bedsit and is lonely too. At night he goes to clubs and strangers are his friends. He hides behind a disguise, wears a mask, which he creates with make up, white and black and red! He has a recurring nightmare in which he sees a severed head and a girl with very blue eyes. He doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t know who she is.

Another girl, someone he has met in one of the clubs, he also sees at the cafe where she works, but she doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t recognize him without his mask. No one knows him. Only the authorities know his name. Meanwhile Charlotte is enjoying a new notoriety, as Daisyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s friend and as the almost girlfriend of a member of the band. She is, however, still concerned about Daisy, who, Charlotte observes, is growing thin and tired looking. She sees a strange vision of a snake inside Daisy. It seems like a part of Daisy crying out for help, but Daisy sees her looking and smiles in a

smug way, as though she doesn’t care and there is nothing that Charlotte can do anyway. Daisy is still playing cat and mouse with Will. He is being driven crazy. He wants Daisy so much, needs her, as she is the only one who knows what really happened to Declan and shares the secret with him - so he believes, not knowing that Charlotte overheard his ‘confession’ in the graveyard. Will wants Daisy to make it all better, knowing that, somehow, she is responsible for what happened to Declan, not he. Besides which, he is and always has been, besotted with her. Daisy has asked Will to meet him at her school. She has a key to the shed, used as a green 13

room by the cast members of Oliver, which is being staged at the school with Daisy in the role of Nancy. Will feels that Daisy is going to allow him to usurp Kieronâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s place in her life, anytime now, so blinded is he by his passion for Daisy that he is prepared to be her slave - or partner in crime...

THE ONE AND ONLY A tale of possession Daisy i waited for Will, after the others had all gone home and thought about Kerry. She kept upstaging me. She can sing. Sheâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s not as good as me, but she can dance better and the dance teacher, our choreographer, Miss Winters, was giving her all the best steps, even a ballet sequence with Daniel or Del, the twins sharing the role of Oliver. The thing is, i knew why Kerry was Miss Winters favourite really and it had nothing to do with her being a good dancer and everything to do with the cute boy that she made as the Artful Dodger! 15

Oh, they thought no one knew, but i had noticed when Kerry started smiling at Miss Winters in a different way, not just pleased to be given so much attention, to be given the ballet with Oliver, although she was well pleased about that, smirked about it all rehearsals, the week before. I thought Miss Winters was a bit pervy, flirting with Kerry, but Kerry was flirting right back and she had blushed like crazy when Miss Winters danced Oliver’s steps with her that night, to show Del how to do it. There they were arm in arm, thought it should’ve been obvious to everyone what was going on, but it didn’t seem to be, so...

Will I went running. I went to the gym and did weight training, when it was raining hard and I couldn’t run by the canal, and I boxed, knocked a guy who usually beats me spark out and then I rammed a Supermarket window at Kingcross on my Yamaha, for the hell - I didn’t take anything. I can afford groceries, but I got no relief, not until Friday night when I kissed Daisy and she asked me to meet her outside the school gates. “Hi,” I smiled. Daisy looked great. Pumped up. Excited. In the shed at the back of the school, it was all fitted out as a dressing room, with mirrors

and counters and seats for the actors. As dressing rooms go, it was pretty cool, I guess. “Got the paint?” was what she said, not Hi Will, straight to the point, well, once that part was over with and we’d written

KERRY SMITH AND DIANA WINTERS XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

all over the mirrors and the walls, I was just glad to be alone with Daisy. We both got a rush from trashing the place a bit, then Daisy sat on a counter and opened her coat. She had a short school skirt on and bare legs and ankle boots. She looked so hot. I walked over to her and just stepped into her arms and kissed her and she was hot for me! Her hands were all over me and pulling me in. I pulled away and kicked my boots off and got rid of my jeans as well. She watched and smiled and hitched her skirt up. I went to her and she leapt off the counter and legged it. I ran after her and then remembered I was half naked. I put my jeans and boots back on

and I saw a stick of red lipstick or something on the counter and I wrote on the mirror DAISY DID THIS DAISY DAISY DAISY - then I smeared it off again with my fist, smashed it into the glass and left. I went over to see Tatum. I fell in through the door as she opened it, I was in such a hurry. “Shh,” she said with her finger to her lips, “Billy’s asleep, just got him off again. Wet. Hi babe, ok? No, I can see you’re not.” Tatum made me forget about Daisy. Tatum was everything to me that Daisy wouldn’t be. Afterwards, I lay next to her in bed and listened to her quiet breathing as she slept and to Billy’s over in his cot

and wondered about every damned thing. Why I wanted Daisy and not Tatum; whether Billy was mine; where my sister was? Where had she gone after we were separated and Rosy had been adopted? Was she even called Rosy anymore? And - how and why had I ended up murdering my friend Declan? Tatum woke up and smiled at me sleepily at around dawn. I knew I had to tell her what had happened. I knew that she would forgive me and I needed to be forgiven. I took a deep breath and sat up. Tatum sat up too. I faced her. “Tattie, I’ve got something I want to tell you,” I paused...

Daisy “Dad, someone was hanging around the school when I left tonight and followed me I think. I had to run to get away from them.” Dad looked at me with concern. I continued, “Yeah, I’ve been followed before. Once someone followed me through the woods, but I didn’t tell you. This was last year. Do you think, maybe, I’ve been wanting to ask, but I was afraid you’d say no, do you think I could have a car? Just a small one? I did pass my test last year after the lessons Mum paid for. I’m sure I’d feel safer.”

I could see that he was thinking about it. I added the last card to the stack. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Dani was attacked last year, but she kept it secret.â&#x20AC;? I watched the cards fall, like Alice.

Alexandra Lesley

To be continued.

DARK FRUIT A blur of pink and white hovered in front of her eyes and brushed her nose, tiny fingers scratched gently against her face. They were spiky twigs of the Hawthorn pricking as its blossoms caressed her. The petals tickled her lips and nose and she raised her hand and brushed them away, while loving their touch. She narrowed her eyes as the sun broke through the branches and shone on her face and as reluctant as she might have been to leave a comfortable bed on a Sunday morning, she got up off the grass. Her dress was damp and she shivered a little now as the breeze had fingers as well and placed them cold against her neck, ran them through her hair and patted at her through her thin dress. She retrieved her jacket, which had been her pillow on the wet grass and tugged it on, the fleece lining dragging on clammy skin as she pushed her arms into the sleeves. The May blossom is later every spring thought the keeper as he too appreciated the stunning white flowers on the numerous Hawthorns in the park and he unlocked the gate and made his way to his shed, 25

rubbing his hands together, as at this hour there was chill, despite it being June. No such thing as blazing June anymore he mused, as he filled his kettle from the tap in the wall and went back to the shed. “Here you are Strahan, hot, and sweet as your self old man,” he said, loud enough to wake the sleeper, but not to startle him. He placed the mug on the ground below the bench in reach of the old tramp’s hand where it already trembled a few inches above the soil. A second mug was in his hand. He looked round for the girl. Sometimes she wasn’t near. Then he saw her emerging from the shelter of the dazzling Hawthorns on the park’s Northern boundary and gestured with the mug, slopping milky tea onto the path, extra milk in hers, extra milk, because she might need it. She came towards them and he thought, not for the first time, What a beauty and again, not for the first time, under lock and key she’d have been if she were mine, under lock and key but he said nothing of this, and smiled as she reached the path 26

and Strahan sat up, bleary, but as dazzled as he was himself. “Here she is Barry, Creirwy, herself, or is it it Cerridwen, the mother, watch out or she’ll steal your soul, ah, but she’s a darlin.’ Good mornin’ Cherry.” She smiled. The two old men basked in the glow of the light from the young girl, with her amber eyes, and amber hair and pale amber freckled skin, she seemed like a human embodiment of the early morning sunshine to them. Someone younger than them, only a little older than the girl, had also been enraptured by her and he was partly responsible for her being here with them and not waiting out her time at the home, before going off to university in the autumn. She had not been happy at the home, however, except when her great grandmother came to see her, which she did regularly. They would wander about the garden and Great Grandma would make Cherry laugh like a maniac, with her tales of her own ‘mis-spent youth’ as she 27

called it, in the early part of the previous century, when she had been a flapper. “A Flapper! A flapper, my dear, you young girls don’t know how to live, these days!” “What was a flapper, Great Grandma?” “A flapper was a young woman who lived for the day, but mostly for the nights! Then she danced and she flirted and went about with whomever she liked. She wore her hair short and in a bob and had her dress above her knees and wore pearls. She wore feathers in her hair and she knew how to fly!” Great Grandma went off into peals of laughter and they both laughed until they couldn’t breath. “Before that time”, Great Grandma had confided “I had been very shy,” she said, “and mistrustful of boys and men.” Now she saw that they were human like herself and not the strange animals she had once assumed that they were. “I met a boy,” Grandma had said one day, “and I loved him so, William was his name, William Jardine. He wanted to marry me, but he was poor and a commoner from Glasgow and my father was a 28

Laird and we stayed in the countryside in a grand house on an estate not far from Edinburgh. My father said he would disown me if I married William, but I married him and I gave William a baby boy, your Granddad, also named William, Billy to his friends.” “I don’t remember him very well. I was only little when he died. Mum told me about him,” Cherry said and confided, “I wish she hadn’t died too.” Cherry’s mother, Billy’s daughter, Billie, had been a singer and had acquired a recording contract and made a record before she got married and became pregnant with Cherry. Jonno, her husband, John McKendrick, manager of a rugby team hadn’t wanted her to carry on singing then and she gave way to him. “Dad used to bring men, rugby players back to the house, to drink with him. I had a lock put on my bedroom door and hid myself away, because they came on to me and Dad took no notice.” Cherry’s dad died on one of these occasions; went to bed and never woke up.

“His blood was probably ninety percent whisky by then, Cherry and I don’t think he meant to hurt you. He loved your mother and you, but he was weak,” Grandma had said, shaking her head. “I was fifteen and they wouldn’t let me stay in the house and made me come here. Why wouldn’t they let me live with you?” “Ah, they didn’t have my address sweetheart, but I came to see you as soon as I could, didn’t I? I’m afraid I can’t have you to live with me, you see, it’s against the rules.” From this remark, Cherry deduced that Great Grandma, must live in a home too. “Why didn’t I know you before?” she had asked. “Well, your father didn’t have the right environment for me to be able to visit you, and -’’ she seemed to drift away, but Cherry knew that her dad wouldn’t have thought to take her to see her Great Grandma. She wondered why her mother never had. But then when Cherry was only seven and her mother had been thinking of taking up her singing career again, she had got cancer and had slipped out

of Cherry’s life quite quickly. She had been only thirty two. “You know, not all men are like your dad, or like mine,” Great Grandma had said, “your dad was like his dad before him and he would have done anything for your mother. He encouraged her when she wanted to become a singer and when she was successful, he was as pleased for her as she was herself and proud of her achievement. I don’t think he wanted her to marry your dad, but he knew that he was your mother’s choice and so it had to be. He was worried when your dad turned to drink, though; he told me,” she had shaken her head sadly, “just before he died.” “You must have been so sad at losing your son, Grandma,” Cherry had patted Great Grandma’s cold hand. Great Grandma had shaken herself, as though to shake off her sadness and had told Cherry, “He was old, Cherry and ill,” then she had said, “I knew him all his life, but he knows me better now. Where he is, everyone knows all that there is to know

about their dear ones, if they choose to know. He watches over you Cherry, and Billie does as well.” Suddenly, Great Grandma was comforting Cherry, for her words were comforting, Cherry realized, even if she wasn’t sure whether they were true and how could Great Grandma be sure? Pomona had looked into her great granddaughter’s eyes and saw all her thoughts in those expressive amber irises and more besides as her pupils suddenly widened, sparkled, as the sun went down on the home and the garden grew colder still in the late autumn air, that day, sparkled with a light of their own, and she had cried out and took Great Grandma’s hands, even colder now, “I’m nearly eighteen and when I leave here Great Grandma, we can live together and I can get a job and we can watch over one another!” “Yes, I’d like that, but don’t you think, you should study first, Cherry, go to college or even to university?” “But I don’t know what to study. I don’t know what I want to do.”

“You will, Cherry, you will; soon you’ll know just what to do. By next summer you’ll have it all clear and laid out before you, don’t worry. I never had the opportunity to study like girls can today, to have a career, but you will.” “You had Great Granddad and Granddad didn’t you though, Great Grandma?” “I did and your Great Granddad was like a strong tree that I could shelter in. From the top most branches of that tree I could see a rosy future and he never let me down. A wonderful husband he was to me and a wonderful father to our son. I was so lucky!” Great Grandma’s eyes had then shone. “You will be lucky too Cherry, you’ll see. You’ll leave all the unhappy times behind you.” When Great Grandma had gone that day, Cherry tried to remember her words and to believe them when the other teenagers at the home sneered at her and called her Cherry fruitcake. She went upstairs to the room she shared with Fat Sam. She had been singing to herself again, a habit she had inherited from her mother and they laughed at her. Somehow her face didn’t fit. She was pretty, 33

but she was quiet and somehow different from the others and they despised her for it - despised her. Even Fat Sam, a fellow victim, wasn’t her friend and called her by her nickname. “Oh, hello Fruitcake,” she had said as Cherry closed the door on the jeers of the others and Sam, who had been lying on her bed, listening to the ipod she had stolen, had turned over and faced away from Cherry. It was Halloween and all the teenagers at the home were going trick or treating, accompanied by members of staff. Cherry had been persuaded to go along by her house-mother Dawn and the boys had all been standing at the gate with the house-fathers waiting for the girls who had taken longer to get ready. Witches and vampires poured from the front door and Cherry after them, who had also been persuaded to wear a mask, or rather, a half-mask, like a cat’s face with holes for her eyes, leaving her nose and mouth free below its glittery fox coloured contours, that somehow fit her perfectly.

So much so that when Carmelo saw her appear from behind the other girls he saw a cat who had turned into a half girl, half cat, with long golden hair and a long blue coat that didn’t hide the fact that she was slim and walked with a cat like grace. He had dawdled at the gate, waiting for Jay who had been his best friend at the home before he left to go to live with foster parents four years earlier. Jay came out, last as usual, wearing a skeleton suit on his gangly six feet and sloping down the path. He grinned at Carmelo, brushing past Cherry as though she were not even there, as the others had and punching Carmelo on the shoulder, greeted him with his voice that was as gawky as his body. “Great you came mate,” he had said, slinging his arm around the other boy’s shoulders and sweeping him into a hug, “Trick or treating!” he had whooped and pulled Carmelo down the road after the others who were disappearing around the corner. Carmelo had glanced back as the cat girl had slowly followed, looking as timid as a cat can. 35

Jay, who was another misfit, who yet seemed to fit right in, protected by the staff and the other kids alike said loudly then, so that the cat girl must have heard. “Never mind her, that’s just old fruitcake, batty as a bat, crazy as a cat,” he had cackled, but not unkindly, just repeating what others had called Cherry. He was not malicious; however, some of the other teenagers definitely were. Carmelo, had shaken his head at his friend and pushed his head, told him off. “Its rude to call people names mate. You don’t like it - can it it Jay, ok?” Cherry had followed the others, feeling pretty miserable, and found herself tagging along after some of them who had given the house-parents the slip in the dark streets, during a momentary diversion when another group of teenagers, boys and girls, tried to start something by setting off a banger just behind the kids from the home and one of the girls had begun screaming hysterically. This took the house-parents attention and the rear 36

guard didn’t notice some of the boys and a few of the girls as well, sloping off. Cherry had gone with them to get away from the others and Carmelo and Jay were among them. She had followed three or four of them up a long driveway to a large detached house, where an old man told them to clear off after they had repeatedly rung the doorbell dozens of times. “Trick, trick!” the boys had yelled, although Carmelo hadn’t joined in. He was eighteen and mature for his age besides. That was when it had happened, first the boys had thrown eggs at the old man and the windows of his house and then stampeded down the driveway and Cherry had turned and ran and as they sped by and around her she had stood on a stone and turned her ankle and fell, putting her hands out to break her fall, but before her hands could be grazed by the gravelly path, she had been caught and pulled upright by two strong hands. Once she was standing, the hands had let

go, but a very soft and concerned boy’s voice had spoken behind her. “Are yeh all right? The idiots nearly mowed you down.” Cherry had then turned to face Carmelo. She had seen a tall boy with dark blonde hair, showing in curls on his forehead beneath a blue beanie hat. His hair was a little darker than her own, but it was his eyes, even in the lamp-light, warm, mirroring the concern, that she had heard in his voice, that had taken her attention. “I’m fine thank you,” she had said and shy, unused to talking with the others, had turned to go down the path and as she did so had stumbled when her ankle failed to hold her and pain shot through it. A hand had been immediately under her elbow and Carmelo had spoken to her again with the same concerned tone. “I must help you,” he had said sincerely, “Do yeh think yeh can walk on it?” Cherry had put her weight on her foot again and this time the pain wasn’t as bad. 38

“I think I’ve sprained it, but I think I can walk on it,” she had turned to Carmelo, “Thank you, I’ll be all right now,” she had said selfconscious still and had tried again to walk, but had to hobble, wincing a little with each step. Carmelo had caught her arm again. “I think I’ll have to help you, that is if yeh don’t mind?” Cherry had looked at the boy. He had smiled and she had found herself smiling back and leaning on his arm they had moved off. The door of the house behind them had slammed and they had turned to see a face peering at them through the window in the top half. It had seemed to smile, though the textured surface of the glass made it difficult to tell, before the light had gone off and the face of the old man had disappeared. Cherry and Carmelo walked off down the street back towards the home and Carmelo had introduced himself and Cherry had taken off her mask and told him her name and Carmelo had

thought how much nicer that was than fruitcake and how pretty she was, even prettier without the mask hiding her beautiful eyes. He had told her that the mask was like those made in Northern Italy, in Venice, where he came from, or rather where his parents had lived, but they had been killed in a car accident, when he was only seven, soon after they had come to Scotland, where his father had come to manage a small art gallery. He had been looked after by his grandmother, but she had died and so he had been taken into care when he had been eleven and had spent three years at the home and had also been to stay with two sets of foster parents until he had gone to live with the people he now called Mum and Dad. He had been with them for four years. In fact, they had recently applied to adopt him, because, they had told him, he felt like their own son and that was how he felt too. Cherry had told him about herself, and especially about her great grandmother. â&#x20AC;&#x153;She sounds cool,â&#x20AC;? Carmelo had said. 40

When they had reached the home and gone in. Cherry had called out to the receptionist who was in her office and they had glimpsed her through the open door, sitting with her eyes closed, listening to an MP3 player through headphones, singing to the music and oblivious to their entrance. In the TV room, the house-mother left in charge had been sitting dozing in front of the t.v. with a glass of something in her hand, that looked about to spill, so they had crept past. Cherry, feeling unexpectedly bold and not wanting Carmelo to leave had said, “Help me upstairs to my room,” and added, “I- I have photos of my mother when she was on stage, if - if you’d like to see them,” she had stammered, shy again. She had been struck at once by his eyes, in the hall light she had been able to see that they were not brown as she had expected them to be, but hazel, with hints of blue and green amid brown.

In the bedroom she had sat on her chair. Fat Sam’s had been piled high with clothes, but Carmelo had knelt to examine her ankle. It was swollen, she had noticed. “But, I think you will live,” he had said and laughed and she had found herself laughing with him in the way that she only laughed with Great Grandma. She had taken off her coat and Carmelo had thrown off his beanie. They had to sit together on Cherry’s bed while Carmelo and she had looked at the photos and Cherry had asked him if he was at university. “No, I’m over in Edinburgh. I, I work there,” he had said, not wanting to tell her that he was an apprentice gardener at The Royal Botanic Gardens, in case she didn’t think that was cool. She had looked up from the photo album then and caught a slightly evasive expression in the up till now very frank eyes and felt unsettled. She had moved away, but Carmelo had caught her arm and suddenly she had done what she had felt like doing since she had looked into his eyes

for the first time. She had kissed him, gently, shyly. Carmelo, eagerly had kissed her back and all at once the joy of being close to someone her own age, her dancing hormones, and the fact that he was obviously attracted to her too, had gone to her head and she stood up suddenly. Carmelo had looked startled, had started to say sorry, but she had caught his hand, explaining as she pulled him to the door that she shared the room with another girl and didn’t want to have this moment spoilt by the arrival of Fat Sam. “You don’t have to go yet, do you?” she had asked him, sounding she had suddenly thought to herself pathetic, but Carmelo hadn’t noticed, just assured her that he didn’t need to be home yet and she had limped up another flight of stairs still towing him along and taking a small key from her pocket with a flourish had said, “I’m in charge of the washing this week and I have the key to the laundry room.” Inside the small room were a large airing cupboard, a washer, a drier and a spare single 43

mattress leaning against the wall. Leaving the light off they had still been able to see with the glow of the street lamp outside and dragging the mattress onto the floor to sit on, they kissed again and again and Carmelo shrugged off his jacket. Cherry took the lead and soon it was impossible for either of them to stop and suddenly their clothes had been in the way. Carmelo had undone his belt and Cherry, unafraid, though nervous, had pulled off her top, tugged open the cupboard near them and taken two duvets from the cupboard, then had begun to take off her own jeans. Carmelo had stripped quickly and when they were both naked they had crawled inside the duvets, shy until they were cocooned in the bedding. It had been wonderful, the most wonderful thing that had happened to her since she had come to stay there, the only wonderful thing that had happened to her since she had been at the home! 44

Carmelo had matched her passion, but with a gentleness that meant that she was not hurt. Even the slightest touch of his skin against hers had set her own alight it seemed, like sunburn without pain and his breath was so sweet and his mouth like the flesh of the juiciest fruit. Then his touch between her legs had made her gasp with intense pleasure and when he had taken his fingers away, replaced them with a firm, vibrant and more substantial part of his flesh and had slid into her, she had felt as though she would faint, it was so good! And after a long time and something that felt like going to heaven and back, they had known, when it had seemed only moments had passed, that they could go on and on and so they had, until noises downstairs had told them that the others were back and they had lain quietly together then, hot and sleepy and yet Cherry had felt more awake than she had ever felt before.

They had slept then and woken when the house was quiet and kissed again and then dressed and stealthily gone downstairs, both starving, to the dining room. There had been voices coming from the kitchen and Cherry had recognized them as belonging to the house-mother who had been asleep in front of the t.v. and one of the housefathers, though she hadn’t been able to hear what they were saying. Carmelo had noticed a single fruit in a dish on a sideboard and had scooped it up. “Let’s take this into the vestibule!” Cherry had followed Carmelo into the vestibule, where they had sat on the telephone seat there. “How are we going to eat that?” asked Cherry, looking at the hard and seemingly impregnable fruit. It was hardly like eating an apple or even an orange, which could be peeled. “Here’s how,” Carmelo had accompanied his words by taking a knife from a sheath on his belt that Cherry had not noticed earlier. She was 46

surprised now that Carmelo carried a knife. He hadnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t seemed the kind of boy who would carry one. Carmelo had used his pruning knife, one of the tools of his trade, to slice the pomegranate in two and then he had pierced one of the glistening cherry coloured seeds with the tip and brandished in front of Cherry. Gingerly, she had leaned forward and taken it in her lips. It was sweet and almost spicy, but there had been nowhere to dispose of the little hard pip within its juicy casing. Carmelo had held out his hand and halfsmiling half grimacing, Cherry had spat the pip into his palm. Carmelo had pierced one for himself, but this was all taking too long. Cherry had a badge on her sweatshirt, a blackbird and she removed this now and used the pin. Some of the pips they spat into a handkerchief from a box next to the telephone and some they had spat at one another and when the fruit had been emptied of all of its tiny sparkling rubies, Carmelo had said half seriously. 47

“Now we have eaten a pomegranate together we’re as good as married yeh know,” then he had quipped as Cherry had looked quickly up at him, all seriously, “well, engaged at any rate.” He then had leaned towards her and they had kissed and Cherry had spoken without thinking. “I love you,” she had whispered, so softly that Carmelo had wondered if he had really heard the words and without thinking he had answered straightaway “I love you, Cherry.” Before he had slipped out, Carmelo had asked Cherry for her mobile number. Cherry had told him that she didn’t own a phone at all, so Carmelo had written his own number on a scrap of paper and given it to Cherry. On the next day disaster had struck. Cherry’s house mother had asked another girl, a younger girl called Lucy, who at least was not one of the older girls who bullied and taunted Cherry, to assist her and the two girls had chatted while they loaded the machine. 48

Later, however, when Cherry had unloaded the machine, she had pulled out her own jeans, the jeans she had put on last night before Carmelo had left, the jeans that had a scrap of paper in the pocket with Carmelo’s number on. On the day after the afternoon of this discovery, Great Grandma had arrived and she had seemed distracted and Cherry wondered if what she had done had somehow showed in her face and whether Great Grandma had disapproved. After all she was old and from a more repressed age, despite her having been a flapper. She had probably not slept with her husband until after they were married, Cherry thought. When she didn’t come on the following day, Cherry had been concerned, but on that night, she had awoken momentarily, feeling reassured and had fallen asleep feeling sure that Great Grandma would come to see her in the morning. She hadn’t turned up then, however, nor on the next day. 49

Cherry had begun to wonder if she had truly been offended or, Suppose she‘s ill, she had thought, then, has something happened to her? She shuddered when she imagined the worst and on the next day she had gone to look for her. Cherry had visited several homes, but she was not a resident in a care home nearby. Cherry then had rung the local council. None of the most local care homes had heard of her, nor any in Edinburgh. Cherry persuaded Jay, after bribing him with chocolate, to tell her Carmelo’s address. He didn’t have a phone number or, like Cherry, a phone of his own either. That evening she had gone to Carmelo’s house, a large house in the West End of the city. At the gate of a long driveway, she had almost turned away, but had plucked up her courage after shivering in the cold winter wind for half an hour and had opened the gate, followed the winding drive and climbed the steps in front of a wide front door and had rung the bell.

An old woman had answered the door and peered suspiciously at Cherry from behind a chain, with the door open only a crack. “Yes, what do you want?” she had asked. “May I speak with Carmelo?” she had timidly replied. “He isn’t here just now, he’s in Edinburgh, which you would know if you were one of his friends. Good Evening.” the old woman had said and had shut the door firmly, before Cherry could say anything further. She had wandered slowly back to the home and found that Fat Sam was out and she had their room to herself. She had sat sadly on the edge of her bed where she had sat with Carmelo, only a few evenings before and sighed. Then she had begun to cry. The soft sound had been heard, however, by a member of staff walking by on the landing and she had peered through the almost closed door at Cherry. What she saw, in the lamplight shining in from outside in the street, into the otherwise 51

dark room, were Cherry and a young woman in old fashioned clothing sitting together on Cherry’s bed. The older girl’s arm had been around Cherry’s shoulder, but even as she had wondered who the strange girl might be, she had seemed to fade before her eyes and merge into Cherry’s own dark figure, sobbing still and now obviously quite alone. Kahleen knew that she was drinking too much and had shaken her head, firmly believing that she had now begun to hallucinate. She would heed her colleague Jim’s advice and seek professional help, before she got any worse, she had resolved. Cherry had felt abandoned and when her aunt, Jonno’s sister had invited her to stay with her for Christmas she had gone, especially as her aunt lived in Edinburgh. She had hoped as she walked around the German Market or in the shops that she might bump into Carmelo and that he would be pleased to see her, but it hadn’t happened. When she had got back to the home she had found herself wandering about the garden in any weather, talking to Great Grandma, half-convinced 52

that she would somehow hear her, even though she wasn’t there with her as before. The others had called her more names and would have nothing to do with her and Cherry had grown more and more hopeless. Then she had started to feel bloated all the time and dizzy in the mornings. She had felt very hungry and would eat her breakfast voraciously and then long for lunch. Jam and cheese sandwiches were delicious to her or honey and bacon! The other girls in particular were convinced that she was crazy when they had seen her eating her toothpaste - “and it wasn’t even strawberry flavour,” said Lucy, mystified. Then Cherry had discovered that she couldn’t zip up her jeans without a struggle and on the same day the older sister of one of the other girls had come to see her, bringing her toddler and with a very pregnant belly and as Cherry gasped as the pain of heartburn attacked her again and she watched the two of them, the three of them, really, waving

goodbye to Morag, the realization that she herself was pregnant had hit her. The garden had been full of daffodils by then and spring was definitely on its way and the nights were a little warmer, the dark Scottish winter relinquishing its hold as Cherry had pondered on what would happen if they found out that she was pregnant. The test she had bought had confirmed this. Probably, because she was in care herself and had no means of supporting herself, let alone a baby, the baby would be taken from her and she might even be encouraged to have it adopted, Cherry had thought. Cherry had rung her aunt, who was the most scatter-brained person Cherry knew and Cherry didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t know at that time whether to be glad that her aunt was like that or whether she wished that she was the sort of person who would have taken Cherry in, given them both a home. She had told her aunt that she was going to stay with an old friend of her motherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s for a while, so when her house-mother had, 54

predictably ring her aunt she had been told by an adult of Cherry’s whereabouts, so she thought. Cherry’s aunt had even elaborated on Cherry’s story, with an inherent sense of secrecy and a need to withhold the truth from the authorities. Cherry was by then eighteen, and although legally still in care, of an age to leave the home, so no one had gone looking for her. She had taken an old back pack that had been left in the laundry room and one of the lighter duvets from the cupboard, one she and Carmelo had snuggled into she was sure, for it had a blue label, and all the others were white and she remembered it. Packing as many of her clothes and shoes into the ruck-sack, and other things she might need and her old photo-album, and Carmelo’s blue beanie, which he had left in her room all those months before, she had crept away from the home one morning before it had even grown light. 55

She had caught a bus to the other side of the city and wandered into a park that had just opened its gates as the early morning sun brightened the spring flowers and the grass. Needing to use the loo, which she had to a lot more by then, she had found the park toilets and on the path approaching them had seen a long silver key. It had turned out to be a key to the disabled toilet, that someone had dropped and when she had let herself in, Cherry had discovered that it was big enough to shelter in at night and another discovery, that of a mattress dumped over the park railings, obviously recently because it had been bone dry, had ensured that Cherry had a bed. Behind a store for gardening equipment Cherry had spied some large green sacks just delivered for park use and had used these to cover the mattress where she had hidden it against the wall at the back of the toilet block. Until recently Cherry had used the mattress every night and then it had been detected by one of the council gardeners and taken away as rubbish. Fortunately, it was now warm enough to 56

sleep outside under the Hawthorns or the fruit trees and so Cherry did. Her friends, Barry and old Strahan looked at her this morning as though she were an angel who had just appeared to them and she asked them both, jokily, “Do I have two wings or a halo this morning?” “Ah, no, sure aren’t yeh your own sweet beautiful self Cherry,” said Strahan. The park keeper, Barry, had discovered Cherry early on in her new home in the park and had gone on from initially being a little hostile to become like an adoptive uncle to her, especially after Strahan, often a resident there himself had intervened. It was Strahan who had seen Cherry come out of the disabled toilet one morning in late March with her mattress, when she had been there for a week and had watched her stash it behind the toilets. He had seen her wander then around the park, marvelling at the new plants coming up and especially at the buds on the trees, singing and taking such an obvious delight in her surroundings and when Barry had later found Cherry taking some more sacks to protect her mattress and a teabag and some biscuits, 57

he had said as the keeper had threatened Cherry with the police, “Ah, look around yeh man, Have yeh ever seen these sheds so tidy?” Barry had looked about him, still crossly and said “No, I have not, what about it?” “Do yeh think the fairies have done it?” “No, the junior gardeners,” Barry snapped. Strahan had raised his eyebrows. “I tidied up a bit to pay for what I took,” Cherry had said, “I’m sorry, I have to find a job, but when I do I’ll pay you for the food and the sacks, I promise.” Barry had looked at Cherry’s earnest expression and had not doubted her sincerity. Now all three of them were firm friends. Cherry had recently noticed that her namesake fruit was beginning to appear and other fruits as well that the park grew in a small orchard area and a fruit and vegetable garden, sometimes staffed by volunteers and student gardeners. Strawberries were also ripening and this area was kept locked, except when work was being done, however, it didn’t keep out the birds. Cherry had 58

freed several blackbirds from the netting already this year. As she was tending the beds, late that afternoon, a boy walked up to her and stood watching. “Do yeh work here?” he asked. Cherry looked up to see a dark haired boy, wearing a peaked cap. He had blue eyes and a lightly freckled face. He also had a nice smile. “Sort of,” she replied. She smiled, but then went back to her work. Strahan had warned her about the drug addicts and the perv’s, as he called them, who haunted the park, especially in the early evening before the gates were locked, sometimes dossing down in the park as Cherry and he himself did. “Josh,” the boy said and held out his hand. Cherry took it and the boy’s handshake was firm. “Actually,” he confessed, “I’ve seen yeh around.”

Cherry decided that she liked the boy, who was about her own age. “I’m Cherry.” Josh offered to help Cherry in the fruit garden and the other gardeners and volunteers seemed to like him too. Barry and even Strahan liked him and he began after that to come to the park often. As summer wore on Cherry’s pregnancy was obvious to all and her well being of most concern to Strahan and Barry and Josh. Cherry had taken to leaving the park on regular afternoons by herself and her friends believed she was attending check ups at the local clinic. “Scans and stuff,” said Barry who wasn’t married, but knew a little, after all his sister had three children and grandchildren as well. “I’ll go to stay with my aunt soon, before the baby is due,” she told Strahan and Barry, but confided in Josh that she had no intention of this.

“Come to the squat, Cherry, I’ll look after you,” Josh entreated. But Cherry had heard from Josh himself about the others at the squat and she didn’t want to go there. They were the sort of people - and Cherry didn’t judge them, but was sorry for them - the ones that Strahan had warned her to keep away from, some of them. Cherry was worried. Once or twice, pains that were a little bit like her period was on its way had made her feel quite ill, but she had bought a book with the small wage she received from Barry and realized that these were her body practicing for the birth of her baby, but she was becoming scared. She began to wonder if she aught to go to her aunt’s after all, but thinking about her aunt’s character and her probable attitude, she changed her mind. She knew that Aunt Kate wouldn’t want her, or the baby. She knew that Kate would panic and inform the home. She thought about going with Josh to the squat. They had mattresses there. Her own mattress

had been found by the gardeners some time ago and had been taken away. Sleeping out was never a worry to her. She was always warm. If it was chilly, she had her duvet and the disabled toilet was still her refuge when it was wet. One morning she sat under the Cherry trees and cupped her hands around her tummy. There were shiny cherries above her and one on the ground at her foot. She looked at its delicate ripe skin, split and spilling juice. She thought about the babyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s skin, so fragile too and her thoughts of the baby became mixed up with memories of Carmelo, of his skin. She still thought about him and about that one wonderful night. How easily she had rushed into something so short and sweet, but with such long-lasting and bitter tasting consequences. She had trusted him, trusted her own feelings. She couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t trust them now, nor anyone else either. Josh was sweet and so genuinely worried about her, but he had no home, nor work either. He had been abused and had run away from his own father and mother. 62

She knew that he was gentle himself, but she couldn’t bring herself to trust him entirely. As she sat under the tree, she came to a final decision. It was a painful one, but she had thought of nothing else now for weeks and she still believed this was the right decision. So when the pains came one late afternoon, later than she had expected them, and she knew they were the real thing; it was as if the baby had been waiting until she was ready herself and knew what to do, she told no one and soon Barry went home. Strahan had gone to visit his son in Ireland. She hadn’t realized he had a son, but he picked up letters from him at a local post office and now the son was in trouble and Strahan, who couldn’t look after himself, but, Cherry realized that of course he could and did, despite his vagrant lifestyle, was going to help his son. “I’ll be back soon Colleen,” he had said, “you don’t need to go to your aunt’s yet do yeh?” And Cherry had lied and said that she was sure that the birth was weeks off. Strahan had been obviously worried about his son. 63

Cherry wandered about the park as the pains began to come closer together, contractions, thats what they were called. She wished that she had asked Josh to stay with her, but she had sent him away, without telling him that the pains had begun, before they began in earnest to trouble her, besides, he had found evening work in a cafe where no questions were asked and he would be sacked if he didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t go, she knew. Very late, after darkness had come, Cherry locked herself into the disabled toilet, where she felt safer. She had light, though it was dim and water to drink and hot water to wash herself with and the baby, when it came and she spread her duvet on the floor and paced about her small room in between the contractions, which were coming closer and closer now and suddenly a flood of water cascaded from Cherry. She had read about this and had thought it might happen, but it was still scary. She stood, panting and sweating in the hot August night, until she had calmed down. At last she dared to do what she had been afraid to do so far and felt between her legs. 64

She could feel the babyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s head! Another searing pain engulfed her body and this time Cherry, bracing her self against the wall with her hands, began to push. Soon, as the pains had intensified and there was now hardly any space between them, she had got onto all fours on the duvet and gritting her teeth at the pain for as long as she could, at last with a scream that was more a hiss because her energy was focussed on pushing, the babyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s head appeared, the pain momentarily stopped and Cherry could feel the tiny face of her child! The pain gripped her again and with an almighty push the baby girl landed in her waiting hands and she guided her onto the duvet. There was silence. Cherry bent over the tiny person below her and put her fist to her own mouth, a huge wave of fear, of tsunami like proportions washed over and then the baby sneezed and began to cry. Cherry, shakily, relief now flowing through her, laughing and crying herself, picked up the 65

baby and sat with her back to the wall with the little thing at her breast. The baby stopped crying as she cradled her, and Cherry found herself gazing into deep blue eyes that seemed to be looking into her own, and she had the strangest feeling that it was not for the first time, though of course it was. Then Cherry took and unwrapped the pruning knife she had scalded earlier for this purpose and cut the umbilical cord. Now the child was a separate human being from herself. Suddenly there was more pain, but only a little and Cherry knew what it was as she laid the baby down, wrapping her in the duvet, where it was still dry and she delivered the placenta, the babyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s former home within her body, in just a few minutes, compared to the labour. She put it into one of the green sacks and cleaned up as much as she could, flushing paper away in the toilet. When the baby and she were clean, finally Cherry dropped onto the floor with the baby in her 66

arms and undid her blouse and fed her tiny daughter. All the while the baby looked up at her with her blue stare. So intently did she keep up her steady gaze into Cherryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s eyes, with her own never straying away and while she fell in love with her Cherry was thinking at the back of her mind, how strange it was that the baby should focus so unwaveringly. She dressed the baby in one of the newborn nappys, which she had bought and the tiny white baby gro. In the apple orchard, as the sky began to grow pink in the east, though it was not yet dawn, Cherry put the baby into one of the baskets, which were being used for the first crop. It was August 13th, her babyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s birthday and she loved her so much that she almost ached with the way it felt, which was why what she did next would have seemed strange to anyone observing her, if there had been anyone watching.

She caught an early morning bus and travelled across Glasgow and got off near the place that she had chosen a few weeks earlier. It was a very smart health centre on the edge of a residential area with large houses and gardens. Cherry crept up the drive in the dawn sunshine, hoping that she would not be seen. The drive was tree lined so she thought it was unlikely. She went up to the front door, knowing that it would be more than three hours before the place opened. Cherry put the basket holding the baby on the step, she kissed her little face and stroked her cheek and then unable to bear the childâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s frank gaze, she looked away. Almost, it seemed to Cherry now, though she felt that this was her imagination, the baby was questioning her. She left her there - with no note. At the tube station she got on the train for Edinburgh and sat in the almost empty carriage and thought about the baby. She hoped, as she longed to get off the train and go back, that the baby would have a happy life 68

and that she would find loving parents who would give her everything she could possibly want or need. She knew babies were sought after for adoption, by childless couples. She thought about Carmelo too and what he also had lost, but it had not been meant to be. He had never looked for her or even rung her at the home and now their child would begin her life without either of them. Eventually, she fell asleep, exhausted and just over an hour later was woken by the sounds of the Edinburgh underground and she left the train. She had someone to visit. She knew where the place was and found the right bus, one that took her almost to the gates. It took her longer to find the right grave, but Great Grandma had told her where to look and she recognized the large and fairly ornamental marble headstone, as Great Grandma had described it. Her mother had been buried here, interred in the family plot that her great great grandfather had arranged all those years ago. 69

Her father was not here. He had been cremated and Cherry’s aunt had scattered his ashes on his favourite rugby pitch. Cherry had not attended her mother’s funeral. Jonno had wanted to spare her from the ordeal of seeing her mother lowered into the grave and she hadn’t even known where her mother was buried, had believed that she had been cremated perhaps, until Great Grandma had told her of the family plot here, not very far away from her own parents and grandparents even grander one. Cherry walked up to see the names engraved on the white marble. Her eyes flew to her mother’s name first and then to the others, her grandfather, her great grandfather Pomona, Pomona, Great Grandma, oh, Great Grandma! Great Grandma was buried here too, but not recently. The first name on the stone was hers.

Pomona Jardine, nee Blackwood-Coutts,

Beloved

wife and mother, b. 1907 d. 1933 Great Grandma had died when her son, Cherryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s grandfather, had been born, in 1933! So she had never known her son, was the first thought that entered Cherryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s mind, followed by the realization that she had been visited for for over two years - by a ghost! Great Granddad too, had lived a long life and had never remarried and brought up her granddad alone, Cherry now also realized and then Granddad had to bring up his little daughter alone. Cherry thought about what Great Grandma had said about how they had cared for their children and was suddenly sure that she was wrong. She felt ashamed. She had just abandoned her baby! With tears streaming down her cheeks she ran from the graveyard and back to the tube station, where she composed herself a little more,

but hurried onto the platform for the train back to Glasgow. Oh why wouldn’t it come? On the hour long journey back Cherry was agitated, but she began to realize an even more amazing thing about her baby. Oh, Great Grandma, Pomona. She closed her eyes and prayed. Please be still there my little one, please be all right and, Oh, God, don’t let them take her away from me! When Cherry reached the health centre, she was so tired that her legs felt like iron bars as she ran up the drive, but adrenalin and some other strength, more powerful, still kept her running. She stopped when she had almost reached the door and the paved patio in front of it had no basket and no baby on it. Oh, where is she? “Where are you, my baby, my baby?” Cherry said aloud now and sobbing, she began to bang on the door of the health centre, for she had seen 72

someone moving about inside, though it was still half an hour off the time that the centre opened to its patients. Someone was moving towards the door now and Cherry waited, gasping and shaking, for them to reach it. As the person reached the glass doors and turned the key, Cherry at first didn’t believe her eyes, for it was Carmelo! How could it be? He opened the door. “Cherry, Cherry its you!” Cherry fell into Carmelo’s arms. “Carmelo, oh, I left my baby here. Is she here?” Carmelo supported Cherry to a chair in the waiting room. “Your baby? Sit down. Oh Cherry where have you been? You look terrible, I mean, you look wonderful. I thought I’d never find you again. Oh, where did you go?” “My baby?” Carmelo pulled himself together. 73

“Yes, she’s here. She’s with my mother.” Cherry leapt to her feet. “Oh, where, where?” she looked wildly about her. “I’ll take you,” Carmelo said and tender arms were about Cherry and Carmelo’s eyes met Cherry’s and behind the consternation she saw the same concern for her that she had seen once before in his eyes. “Mum,” Carmelo called out, then, “Mum its Cherry, I mean, its the baby’s mother.” A woman came out from a door at the side of the reception desk. “Oh, thank goodness,” she said. She led Cherry and Carmelo into a room behind the reception, where on a table, was the apple basket. Cherry ran to it. Her daughter looked up at her, her eyes serene, but earnest and held out her arms and Cherry gathered her up and sat down on a chair next to the table because she had to, because now her legs felt about to give way. 74

Carmelo’s adoptive mother was the practice manager and Carmelo had come along with his mother that morning, while he was still on holiday from his apprenticeship at the botanic gardens, before he went off into the city for the day, but Cherry was still bemused, knowing nothing of these facts. She was almost on the verge of passing out and Carmelo’s mother could see this and while she wondered at her son’s obvious concern for this girl who she had never seen before and realized that he knew her, there were more important matters to attend to. Jane Gillespie asked Cherry some medical questions and then she told her that when one of the doctors came she would examine her and then she should go home and rest. “Where do you live Cherry? Do your family know about the baby? Does the baby’s father know about her?”

Cherry found herself telling the truth to Carmelo’s mother, except who the father of her baby was. “I think we had better leave these two alone for a while, Carmelo, until Doctor Fraser has seen them, Oh, here she is now.” Jane looked up as a car pulled up in one of the spaces reserved for the doctors, immediately outside. While Cherry and the baby saw the doctor, Jane Gillespie grilled her adopted son about the girl that he couldn’t stop grinning at and who smiled shyly, all the time, now that she was reunited with her baby, at him. And - her baby, the baby that Carmelo kept stealing surreptitious fascinated and eager glances at, though the truth was beginning to dawn on her, even before Carmelo told her, hanging his head one moment and then looking at her with a fierce expression in his warm latin eyes. He made the truth, which dismayed, if it didn’t shock her, sound romantic and he finished with a note of unmistakable pride in his voice. 76

“I, I think the baby is mine, Mum.” Consequently, when the doctor had finished with the two of them, and while Cherry waited outside in the corridor, with the baby, Jane did some explaining as well. Then she escorted the girl back to rest room at the back of the building, where Carmelo was waiting and made herself leave them alone together, for a while at any rate. Carmelo is nineteen. It is his mess. He must sort it out. Carmelo sat on a chair while Cherry lay with the baby on a bed against the wall under the window with the sun glinting on her hair, which still dazzled him.Cherry listened as Carmelo told her he had rung to speak to her at the home at Christmas and was told that she was away. “I thought you didn’t want to see me again when you didn’t ring me.” Cherry explained what had happened to the piece of paper and Carmelo looked relieved, then sad.

“I came to the home at Easter, hoping to see you and Jay told me you had gone, left for good he thought.” By now he was holding Cherry’s hand and still looking quickly now and again at the baby. Cherry told him all about her life in the park and he told her about his work and Cherry asked if there were courses available in orchard management and Carmelo said that there were. “It’s what I want to do, one day,” she looked at the baby, “when I can.” “Jay and the other boys at the home told me you were mad, but I saw straight away that you were special, special to me, Cherry, that we were the same,” Carmelo said and there were tears in his eyes, “I’m sorry you had to go through all this,” he gestured at the baby, “alone.” Then he gulped visibly and said, “The baby, she’s mine, isn’t she?” Cherry nodded and held her out to him even as he reached for her and suddenly they were all three huddled together and crying, even the baby, at last, but then they were almost squashing her. Carmelo sat by the bed holding his little daughter then, who stopped crying and regarded him 78

with an expression of something like wonder on her face, he thought and realized that his own face must look the same way to her. “My so called mates told me how you would wander about the garden, talking to yourself, that you were crazy,” he told Cherry. “Then you forgot all about me,” Cherry whispered. Carmelo freed one of his hands and reached for hers, “I did not, I came to look for yeh.” “When did they tell you about me talking to myself?” “I told you at Halloween. Jay told me and then some of the others told me to leave you alone, unless I fancied having a laugh, unless you were willing to have a laugh with me,” he saw Cherry’s look of horror, “I told you, I knew you were special. I knew you were the girl for me,” his eyes told her once more that he was speaking the truth, “They said you wouldn’t have anything to do with any of them, so I was blown away when yeh liked me, when, we,” he looked at the baby now, “we made her, we made her together,” he laughed and Cherry did too. “We did didn’t we? She’s special too, Carmelo, she-”

“May I come in?” Jane asked, peering around the door, noticing that Carmelo was now cradling the baby in his arms. The girl, Cherry, was glowing and Jane suddenly felt a rush of love for her son and for the girl too, They look so right together, she thought. Later that day she asked them what they were going to call the baby. Cherry looked at Carmelo who had looked at her straightaway and said, “I thought we might call her after my mother, my birth mother?” Cherry’s breath stopped in her throat and she couldn’t speak, for she knew what her daughter’s name should be, in a way, what it already was. “If you like the name?” Carmelo looked at Cherry and then at the baby, who was lying between them on Jane’s sofa, “Pomona,” he breathed. Cherry sighed and Pomona looked up at them both, her blue eyes twinkling, perhaps she would have another lucky life this time, maybe even luckier than the last one! Alexandra Lesley 80

CLIO Resume of Parts One to Four: Callum is going nowhere, well, he始s going home on the bus from his dead end job one summer night, when he misses his stop and has to get off in a dark lane to walk back. He meets a girl, singing and dawdling in the lane, a very strange - but drop-dead gorgeous - girl. "

Much to his surprise and absolute rapture, she seduces

him! She agrees to see him again too! "

When he gets home and sees his face in the bathroom

mirror, all his spots have gone! "

It is Saturday and he decides to go into town. At the bus

stop he meets a girl he sees every morning, but has never had the balls to speak to. Today he introduces himself! "

The girl is called Clio. On the way into town they get on

like a school that始s been the target of an arsonist. Clio tells Callum, who used to be in a band, about the choir that she is in and suggests that he joins. Callum agrees to go to the next rehearsal, but when he sees that his spots have all come back, he doesn始t go. "

Instead, on the next day, he gets off the bus on his way

home from work, in the spot where he met the strange girl two nights previously and she is there again.

When she sees that his spots have returned, she somehow

knows that he has met Clio and is as cross as a box of frogs about it. "

Like a pet lamb, Callum follows her up the track that leads

onto the moor. "

After the inevitable and enjoyable, Callum asks the girlʼs

name, feeling that they now know one another well enough to disclose intimate details such as names! ʻSheʼ, says the girl, ʻyou may call me She.ʼ Callum thinks that ʻSheʼ doesnʼt want to tell him her name. He asks her out on ʻErʼ a proper date, but She refuses, saying that she is happy to see him just there in the lane and that she is there most nights. "

On the way home Callum thinks about Clio and feels guilty

for not turning up at the choir practice. "

His spots disappear and reappear and when he sees Clio on

the bus on Monday morning he is embarrassed, but Clio challenges him about missing the practice and somehow when he has explained that his spots make him embarrassed, suddenly Clio is friendly again and tells him that what she noticed about him was his smile. There is an extra choir practice, and Callum finishes work earlier that night and finds that his feet take him to the community centre and when he has sung for the choir mistress, suddenly he is asked to sing a duet with Clio at the choirʼs next gig. The Elemental Voices is a rock choir and theyʼre good and Callum is chuffed! Better still he sits with Clio on the bus ride home and

every morning and is really looking forward to the choir practice on Saturday. "

On Friday night, as he is riding home on the bus, Callum

looks to see if She is at the bottom of the track, hoping that she isnʼt! He is horrified when he sees as the bus passes the bottom of the track, a large black dog attacking She and hears her screaming as she tries to protect herself. He yells at the driver who stops the bus and Callum flies back along the lane and up the track, like the gallant idiot that he is! "

When Callum had got into the lane, however, the dog

turned away from She and attacked him instead! "

“...we were only playing!” She had said.

And once more Callum rolled over to have his tummy

tickled, kind of, if you know what I mean. "

The summer rolled on and apart from Clio somehow

intuitively realizing that Callumʼs disappearing and reappearing spots had something to do with another girl, it was amazing, as they were growing closer to one another more and more each day it seemed. "

To add to their general feeling of being high on life, Clio

and Callum were the rising stars in the choir. "

Autumn was looming and Clio was going to attend a short

course at a music college and they were going to apply for university the following year for courses in music and after that form a band - together!

Callum did his best to avoid going anywhere near the track

near where She lived, but one night, near his home, hearing She singing Clio and his song, Callum turns in the lane off which She lives and she is there in the lane and tries to seduce him again. "

Despite feeling like a candle wick engulfed by a laser beam,

Callum resists She始s efforts to persuade him to follow her up the track and what that will inevitably lead to and runs on up the lane, past the track and down Clio始s drive. "

Clio invites him in through her bedroom window. Her Dad is

asleep and Callum discovers that Clio is every bit as good at seduction as She is. "

With Clio, however, love making is different and Callum

realizes that he is in love with Clio and that, amazingly, Clio is in love with him! "

Callum then discovers that Clio has another talent that he

thought belonged to She, when they see that his spots have disappeared! "

Then they find out that the choir is going to be on TV the

following summer! Everything in life is like birthday and Christmas rolled into one! "

Then! Clio goes off to college and tells Callum in a moment

of madness to hang out with whoever he likes while she is away. "

Callum is confused by her attitude.Then suddenly Clio

hasn始t called and doesn始t answer his texts. On the next night Callum has a drink, falls asleep on the bus home and asks the driver to put him off at the bottom of the track, where She is of course waiting. 85

This time Callumʼs heart is absent and he is wracked with a

grief like Niagara Falls in full spate! He is gutted by his betrayal, despite what Clio had said to him before she went to college, he feels that he has been untrue to their love. "

Clio has her own demons to deal with, however, having

slept with a boy from college, which is why she hasnʼt been in touch. "

At half term, which coincides with Halloween, Clio comes

home and she and Callum make up. "

Then Callum confesses that he has agreed to go to dinner

with She and meet her family and Clio realizes that somehow she herself is to blame that Callum has seen She again and agreed to this, so doesnʼt go ballistic as he had thought that she might. "

On the day of the dinner, however, Clio tells her dad all

about it. "

Sean then realizes the truth about Sheʼs identity, that she is

one of the Sidhe, who are faerie people, who live in the hills. "

He tells Clio the truth about herself as well, that her own

mother was one of the Sidhe, that she isnʼt dead as he had maintained, but had left Clio with him as a baby back at home in Ireland and gone back to her people, who had wanted to harm or use Clio for their own ends. "

Sean realizes that the Sidhe is trying to lure Callum into her

world from whence he may never return and urges Clio to follow him as soon as possible, which she does. "

When Clio catches up with them on the hillside, She throws

a dagger at Clio, who screams as the blade reaches her heart! 86

" CLIO Part Five: The dagger had stopped its flight and was suspended in front of Clio始s heart, the tip just making an imprint in the fabric of her coat. She had screamed, but not in pain, with fear, mingled with rage and now abruptly and seemingly of its own volition, the dagger flipped around and with frightening speed flew back at the Sidhe, but only to stop in mid air before it reached her and fall harmlessly at her feet. Callum saw her amazement. "

Equally fast she retrieved it and flew at Clio with the dagger in

her grasp, before Callum could even move. To his own amazement, Clio rushed to meet her and then they stopped only about a foot apart from one another, seething and heaving and then as he ran towards them, something even more amazing happened. "

The Sidhe glared at Clio at first and Clio glared back. She

struggled to move. How had Clio frozen her to the spot? It was practically impossible that a human being could wield such power. She stared at Clio, into her eyes. No. Yes. Yes. OH! And the world was suddenly a warm place once more and her heart felt like a glowing coal, a feeling she had never thought to feel again, and she knew as well, the girl, she knew. "

Clio did know. A great surge of feeling had passed between them

seconds after they had looked each other in the eyes. The moment of recognition had been at the same time for her as for - suddenly they 87

were clasped tightly together, clinging like mother and daughter reunited, which of course is what they were! "

Callum caught up to them just as they flung

themselves at one another and at first thought that they were wrestling, then he stood there even more amazed as Clio sobbed on Sheʼs shoulder and more amazed, when he saw tears running down Sheʼs face as well! "

She held Clioʼs face in her small hands and brushed

away her tears with her fingers in a gesture so tender that Callum felt as though he shouldnʼt be there.Though slighter and a little shorter than Clio she seemed and looked older Callum thought now, but this didnʼt explain the way that they were behaving toward one another. Perhaps She was sorry for attacking Clio, but wow, was she sorry. Suddenly Clio and then She as well seemed to remember him. They both looked at him. She looked at Clio. "

“Your boy,” she said and Clio smiled and nodded and

was still crying. “ I have so much I want to tell you,” she hesitated, “Clio, I like that name. Will you stay a while to talk with me now, to let me talk?” she asked. Clio nodded again and turned to Callum. "

“Callum, go home and tell Dad where I am and tell

him, tell him, Iʼll be home in a while and that Iʼll be safe with my, my mother - my,” she broke off seeing the look of astonishment beginning to break out on Callumʼs face, “my motherʼs people,” she amended, but Callum was beginning 88

to guess the truth as he looked from one to the other of the two girls smiling at him through their tear filled eyes and realized, not for the first time, how alike they were. Although one was as dark haired as the other was fair, they had the same glittering green eyes and delicate fairy like faces, though Clioʼs mouth was not so wide, nor her nose so turned up as Sheʼs, but still, they looked like family. "

They hugged one another. Callum blushing a lovely

shade of pomegranate and still looking from one to another in wonder, and then looking back at them, as they began walking up the hill together, ran down the path, until reaching the trees and the lane, they disappeared from his view and he from theirs. "

When he got to Clioʼs house, he discovered that his

mother was there. Two concerned faces turned to him as he rushed in to through the back door and then from the hall into the kitchen. Sean and Ellie were sitting together at the table and both stood up and rushed to him. "

“Callum, is everything all right?” Ellie said, pulling him

into the room to sit at the table, but before he could, Sean, looking paler than his usual ruddy self, grasped Callum by the arm. "

“Clio, where is she? Is she safe?”

“Yeah Sean, sheʼs fine, Sheʼs, sheʼs with her mother.”

Seanʼs face was such a mixture of amazement, followed

by relief, wonder and finally concern again. "

Callum realized that Sean was afraid for Clio, although he

couldnʼt guess why. "

“Itʼs ok, itʼs cool, theyʼre just talking,” he said quickly, then.

“Where are they?” Sean asked.

“On the moors above the river, on the way up one of the

hills. I donʼt know its name, but -” Callum was interrupted by Sean grabbing first his coat and hurtling towards the door, then turning back to grab Callum. "

“Take me there!” he yelled and pushed Callum out through

the door. "

Alerted to danger, Ellie, without her coat, chased after

them both. !

Lavinia Hinde

The final part of Clio is now in the next issue.

" " !

In dungeons dark I cannot sing In sorrow’s thrall ‘tis hard to smile: What bird can soar with broken wing? What heart can bleed and joy the while?

There will be a poem from this poet in every issue of Tyrant Spell. There is a prize for guessing the identity of the poet, but if you know please donʼt tell anyone but the editor. The first person who guesses correctly will receive a book of poems by the mystery poet. 91

IN THE HIDDEN HEART

Hidden in the heart of things A secret sings Like the wren in the hawthorn, hidden, with folded wings

On the bed, in the day, she wakes. An invitation of her body makes, Yet a demon lies behind her eyes that may not hesitate To slake its taste for blood upon the hovering ďŹ ngers That would her breast caress 92

At night, she burns. With prey in sight. The inscrutable face of the huntress she turns On my pillow, at rest, her most candid gaze. Then her tongue with rough tenderness kisses my face. She purrs. She stirs, Cradled in my thighs she sleeps at last, Whimpers sighs. In the hidden heart of things, like the butterďŹ&#x201A;y in its chrysalis, The secret ďŹ&#x201A;exes its wings. Behind the door to the secret garden Mystery...

Alexandra Lesley

To contribute to Tyrant Spell please email the editor first at ruby.brooklyn@btinternet.com