Château Noisy (or Miranda) follow up

   A few weeks ago I published the story 'Château Noisy (or Miranda), her personal feelings'.

   A story not only close to my heart but also to a large amount of dedicated Urbexers (Urban Explorers). I received emotional feedbacks and viewed ever since, more photo's on Instagram in which Noisy is remembered.

   One of these Urbexers, my Instagram friend Sean, has a wonderful collection of photo's of this former beautiful Belgium Castle and he asked me if he could read my story in a YouTube production with his photo's.
I loved the idea from the first moment on. I am a frequent visitor of Sean's YouTube Channel and was also very, very curious how the story would be read out loud by a pure Brit.

   Every writer knows that the words he/she writes, also sound in his/her head. You write the intonation, the accents at the right place, etc. Never before have I heard one of my own stories read by someone and Sean is definitely the one I trusted to do it.

When he sent me the try-out two weeks ago, I was deeply touched. The whole (film, music and reading) was beautiful and complete. I even had a few tiny tears in my eyes (could also be my age of course ;-).

   On a serious note, I viewed his production a few times before he told me he deleted it again until it was ready for the definite upload. And this is today: Saturday December 16, 2017.

The link:Château Miranda Noisy Castle, THE STORY

   Please visit Sean's YouTube Channel, subscribe, like and leave comments. I am so proud of what he established! Can I adopt you as my grandson Sean?

   Sean also has an Instagram account: 'sean_explore' and 'exploressean'

Dear loyal, lovely readers have a wonderful and peaceful Christmas!

Helen

The Two Evils (short story)

    “Yes Mary, same cut and curls as last time!!” and whispering to her neighbour: “I have never seen such a stupid cow like Mary. My last visit was a week ago! You should think she remembered that do you?” And louder: “Yes Mary, you are a good girl, hurry hurry, we want our tea first!”

   With 'we' she meant her neighbour Dorothy and herself, Annabelle. The two ladies met each other at the hairdressers about 30 years ago and became 'weekly' friends. Although they had so much in common, they never met privately. If you ask yourself why they only met once a week I can tell you it is because they had more to gossip about.
   They crawled through life like a crab through the sea and gathered with their sharp claws every messy detail about people. And if there wasn't anything, they made it up. Outside the hairdressers they went to Bingo nights, dance clubs, women gatherings, shopping malls, you name it. They were everywhere but never together.
   Both were single, not voluntarily. Both had been married. Annabelle's marriage only lasted for two years before her husband disappeared with only leaving a note and the address of a solicitor. It turned out he met a young girl that did not have a tongue as sharp as that of Annabelle who was of course furious! She never stopped talking about her divorce and guess who she blamed...... you do not have to be a genius to know the answer, do you?

   Dorothy's husband Andrew was a very different story. He was a timid man who did not say much (well, how could he always being overruled...). Some called him shy, some called him humble. What ever he was, he definitely could not be competitive with his wife and almost everybody felt sorry for him. Men asked him for a night out in the Pub but noticed that this was horror for the poor man. He constantly looked at his watch and disappeared when others became more talkative after a few beers. And one day Andrew stopped going out, no one remembers if he just did not go any more or that the other men stopped asking.

   Actually, no one saw him outdoors after he lost his job. The redundancy is still remembered in the village because Dorothy who was afraid she could not afford the hairdresser (thus the evil gossiping) any more, cycled to Andrew's employer and started a row no one had ever seen or heard off before.
   It did not help, the boss was not impressed and it took him only 5 minutes to get Dorothy back on her bicycle. Neither was he afraid that the woman's sharp tongue was going to do his business harm. But here he was wrong, he forgot about Annabelle; the two together díd harm to his company and within 4 years he moved else where, leaving more people unemployed. But by then Andrew was resting in his grave at the local cemetery for already 3 years.
   People say he just faded away. His energy and spirit extinguished like a flame who ran out of oxygen. Everybody knew who consumed the oxygen but did not dare to say it straight in her face, afraid what was going to happen next.

   Another thing the villagers never talked about (in public, let alone near Dorothy and Annabelle) was the amount of money Dorothy spent on the hairdresser and cloths. Andrew had a very modest job in alignment with his character so where all the money came form remained a question for ever. Even Annabelle did not know which caused a minor disturbance in their relationship for a while. But because there was no one else in the village with the same skills of curling a tongue around other people's misery, they restored their friendship and booked their weekly visit for a hairdo.
   The owner of the barbershop, Jean, soon found out that the ladies were very willing to pay for a session of a few hours. She also noticed that other clients avoided her shop when the 'Two Evils' as they were called, were present. She came up with a marvellous solution: the shop closed on Thursday afternoon for 'ordinary' people as she told the two ladies. She convinced them that this was their exclusive afternoon, including a high tea. The ladies truly believed they were that exclusive and looked down on everybody who's hair was done on a different day.
   Jean told a different story to her other clients who of course, knew that this version was the right one. They were all afraid of the pair of sharp tongues and it was a local relief not to be in the shop together with them. And this way the barbershop flourished as never before.

   “Mary, what on earth have you done to the sandwiches!”, the loud voice caused Mary very negative goose bumps and almost in tears she apologized and ran to Jean who put her arms around poor Mary, promising her she was going to take care of it. Patiently she listened to the complaints and said it was never going to happen again. It did not matter if she apologized or not, soon the whole village was going to know about a bad service, carelessly sliced bread and dry scones.

   Jean returned to her desk to check the upcoming appointments with clients she liked, careful not to smile seeing a name of someone who was dear to her; the Two Evils never took their eyes of her and made up a story with every move of a muscle in Jean's face. In the meantime she tried to filter the loud gossip from the wishes of the two who now shouted at each other to outvote the noise of the hair dryers, neatly fitted next to each other at the wall.
   Jean learned not to be angry hearing all the lies about the nice people. She learned, yes indeed, to feel sorry for these two wicked souls that had nothing else to do in life. How on earth can you thrive on other peoples misery. Or worse: how can you make up stories if there isn't anything to talk about.... What went wrong in the heads of the Two Evils when they were young?
   Jean could simply not believe they were born like this. Of course, every one in the village was familiar with a small portion of gossip, like in every other village or street. But she could not remember meeting people who were so horrible.
   Neither did she remember who invented the expression 'curling your tongue around other people's misery' but it explained exactly what happened in the mouth of her two gossiping clients. If you managed to look at them without being seen, you literary saw their tongues curling, tasting, black stinking saliva almost dripping from their mouth. You could hear them chewing the gossip, chewing to squeeze every drop out of the stories until it was ready to be spit out; a moment Jean hated.

   Thinking this she noticed that she indeed started to hate the Two Evils. It shocked her, she had always been very down to earth; hate and anger were never part of her character. Is this what the 'exclusive afternoons' did to her? Grew the hate so strong that the other five and a half days with the nice clients were not enough to balance her feelings? Or was it the dream she had last night that caused a furious hate? The dream in which the Two Evils were silenced for ever?

   Jean's eyes moved from the list with the appointments to the hairdresser tools, in particularly the long narrow scissors with the extremely sharp point at the end. She tasted her own blood again when she accidentally stabbed her finger a few weeks ago. It was the first time in years she cut herself with her own tools.

Photo: @rurex_images (Instagram)

And the taste of blood... And her dream of last night.... And the loud – far too loud – voices under the hair dryers........

   Well, my dear readers, the barbershop has been abandoned a long time ago. After what happened nobody wanted to buy the building, let alone continuing the hairdresser activities.

No one in the village expected what happened that Thursday afternoon, honestly, no one! But it did happen. Please let it be a warning to all of you: never step into the shoes of the Two Evils.

   And before I forget, please do not enter the decaying shop. The building is soaked with evil gossip which drips from the walls, cracking the floors beyond repair.


Word of thanks: the photo of @rurex_images (Instagram) inspired me to write this story and I was given permission to use the photo as an illustration for which I am very grateful. Thank you!

Links: please visit the beautiful Instagram account of @rurex_images

Note: the story is pure fiction! A figment of my imagination! 

Helen 

The Gate (short story)

-4-

1977

    She loved early Spring; the night frost changed the countryside into a beautiful landscape. The soft green colours in the trees and in the fields, were miraculously transformed in soft white tones.

   Elenydd was very happy to have a day off instead of sitting behind her desk in the office that had not changed much since her grandfather Arnall Mealon Rhydderc arrived in the village to become Crickcelyn's very first solicitor. At the time Arnall was a very young man who married the beautiful and elegant girl Bronwyn, daughter of the local doctor Merrick. It was a happy marriage and Elenydd, only child, had a very happy childhood.

Because she never studied law and did not have a brother (there was no successor), the practice was sold to the solicitor that started his career with her grandfather and he was more than happy to offer her a job; she knew everyone in the village and was an excellent secretary.

   The past few weeks she went through all the old records and long closed cases disappeared to the large attic of the practice. Not a job she looked forward to when she started; all these files gathered so much dust over the years. Of course she did not read them all but there were a few that brought a smile to her face because she remembered the people and their history. The job was almost done, still a few to go and one of them was a file she found almost hidden in the back of the filing cabinet. It was sealed and the only information written on it was '1946/CHRCJ'. A bit odd as all other files had far more information and were easy accessible. The initials CHRCJ rang a bell with Elenydd but she told herself to think it over when the job was done. She put the file in a safe place to look at it another day, her instinct told her not put it away in the attic.

   While she walked down the hill she thought about this file and the written initials. She could not remember anyone who's name fitted to it but why was it so familiar? And why didn't she ask her parents? If it was indeed about one of the old villagers, her mother was the one to answer her questions but a little voice in her head told her not to bring up the subject. And Elenydd, gifted with the famous Celtic intuition, was determined to investigate on her own.

   When she left for her long walk, fully packed with sandwiches and a Thermos flask with tea, she did not have a destination in mind and was more or less surprised she stood on top of the hill that looked down on the Vale of Garhowy. She loved the beautiful view and particularly in this time of the year.

Elenydd sat down on a flat stone, got her Thermos and a cup and drank her tea; her hands folded round the warm cup. Little clouds bristled from the hot liquid and disappeared in the cold air. Apart from the calling sheep in the valley and an occasional pheasant, it was quiet. There was no wind and the sun tried to gain strength. It was going to be a perfect day and she felt very happy. “Who needed a husband to be happy?” she thought with a smile?

    She knew that she was a very pretty looking girl and the bachelors in the village competed for her attention. Of course there were a few she liked more than others but she never fell in love and managed very well to stay single at the age of only 22. “Many years to go before I marry some one. If I ever do”. In this modern world in 1977, people also lived together instead of being officially married. Not that it was a common thing in the village, on the contrary, but it was more and more accepted thanks to flower power era.

   Elenydd did not think of herself as being emancipated, modern yes, but still very feminine and enjoying being treated like a woman. She was brought up with men keeping the door open for women or not sitting down before their wife or host sat down and call her old fashioned, she valued these manners. At the same time she felt too young to step into any relationship and first wanted to travel. Her secretary job was not something she wanted to do for the rest of her life but it made it possible to save money for a long trip; Elenydd wanted to see more of the world.

   She took a handful of brown last year's bracken to dry her tea cup which she put in her bag, together with the Thermos.

Time to continue her walk. Once more she looked down on the valley and decided to go where her feet took her.

There were not many people about, only a local sheep farmer who greeted her by raising his cap. For the locals she was still the granddaughter of the old solicitor, nothing would change this.

    In the distance she noticed a bowed figure that slowly walked her way and she smiled. She recognized one of the best clients of the local Pub, an old farmer who was also one of the best gossipers in the village. Some one once said “Old Ed loves to curl his tongue around other people's gossip”.

    But Elenydd liked the man, he indeed thought he knew everything about everybody, feeling the need to exchange all this knowledge with everyone who showed interest – these were seldom people from the village – but he was not a bad man. He was very lonely after his wife died a long time ago; he never remarried. Instead he spent all his free time in the Pub where he met Elgar and they became almost a local attraction. Together they loved to play little mind games with visitors, examining them as if they were not there. And nothing the Landlord could do about it. Not that he wanted, Elgar and Old Ed were good drinkers and always paid their bills. No one dared to ask where the money came from, Old Ed protected his private life as fiercely as he talked about that of others!

   “Morning geneth, day off?” asked Old Ed. 

“Yes Ed, the weather is too good to spend a day in a dusty office!” the 'geneth' replied, used to never called by her name by Ed who agreed that it was a perfect day for a walk.

Instead of walking up hill, Old Ed stood still and looked if he wanted to ask something. Elenydd waited and nodded to encourage him. She was curious what he wanted because he knew she did not want to listen to gossips.

    The old farmer pushed his cap a little backwards, wriggled his old crooked fingers underneath it and scratched his head while his watery eyes glared at Elenydd: “Does the geneth knows about the visitor?” And when she looked puzzled, he continued: “The bachgen from Australia, that country where they sent all the thieves and murderers who never spoke proper English. They still don't.”

    Elenydd told Old Ed she did not know about a visitor from Australia. When did he arrive and did he stay at the Inn? Old Ed smiled, happy he knew something before Elenydd did and said: “ I am not going to tell, the geneth has to find out herself. But I'll tell you, the bachgen is mighty interesting!” He pushed his cap in the right place, nodded and walked off.

   She watched him going up hill and wondered why the Australian visitor was so special that Old Ed got exited. She shrugged her shoulders and followed the path to the valley and was not very surprised her feet took her to The Hall. But she was surprised about the strange feeling she had approaching the long lane and gate. She did not feel alone. She stood still and looked around but there was no one else and no sounds apart from the birds.
It was not a frightening feeling and she did not feel watched. She could simply not explain why she was almost drawn to The Hall, as if it opened its arms, calling her.

    It was a long time ago she was here. The Hall was often talked about but no one in the village knew what happened to its owners and why it was never sold. And the ones that still might know, like her mother, grandparents and Old Ed, were very skilled in avoiding answers to questions about The Hall!

    It never bothered Elenydd, every village had it's secrets; she never knew the owners. Of course she never understood why no one bought The Hall. It was decaying but not yet beyond the point that it could not be restored any more. Actually it was in a much better state than you expected after being abandoned for so long. As if he house did not want to give up, as if it was still waiting for the former owners to return.

   This was an interesting thought. Does a house have a soul? She thought about it walking the lane. “If walls could talk”.... And stories about ghosts, spirits that were left, that could not escape? Wales, Scotland and England were famous for their ghost stories so some of these must be true.

Was there a ghost in The Hall? Was this the reason no one lived there? No.... if there was one, she should know. Ghost stories were not something to hide.

But what if someone had been murdered in the house? And for what reason? Was the village protecting the murderer because the victim was a ruthless Lord, hated by one person too many?

   She shook her head telling herself not to think this way, there was no reason to do so. “Be brave, you walked here many times in the past and nothing happened!”

True, she never had strange feelings walking here but why today? It was a silent voice that called her to The Hall, that forced her to go there.

    She hesitated when she found the gate pushed open and this happened very recently, she could tell because of the vegetation.

Photo: @riposta7 (Instagram)

Carefully she passed the gate, walked halfway the lane and stopped. First she looked around, then looked to the roof, her eyes scanning the windows. There was one window that needed her attention, at least that is how it felt. She could not take her eyes off the filthy glass. Suddenly she knew there was some one upstairs, some one she needed to call.

    Although she did not know a name and did not know why this was happening to her, her heart called out for that other heart in the attic. And she was not surprised seeing a hand cleaning the window before the face of a man appeared. A face she had never seen before yet so very familiar.

Word of thanks: the photo of @riposta7 on Instagram inspired me to write this story and I was given permission to use the photo as an illustration for which I am very grateful. Thank you Mariusz!

Link: please visit the beautiful Instagram account of @riposta7

Note: this is the 4^th story of 5 that are connected. The Story is pure fiction! A figment of my imagination!

Helen

Wind of Seasons (short story)

The edge of the cliff. A dangerous place to be, she knew that, was born here.

   But an indefinable feeling that made her body tremble, drove her from the cottage to this edge of her world. She was so much a child of the beautiful Northern Irish landscape where the many shades of green competed  with the grey and blue colours of the sky. Where the wind waved the grass or tortured the scarce trees that bravely survived the storms with bowed backs like old men.

   She was born in a heavy storm in April and named Aibreann. Her paternal grandmother predicted a strong and determined will, always prepared to fight storms in her life and even looking for them.
Aibreann did not disappoint her grandmother with whom she had a close relationship. Both women had a wild almost earthly edge to their character. Both inherited the free will and combativeness from the Vikings that once ruled Northern Ireland. Add a little blood from the Cromwell's soldiers and a generation of brave women was born. 

   Strong women needed strong men at their side; it wasn't an easy task for the parents to find the right one. Most men were easily either discouraged or too impressed and Aibreann was very seldom impressed by the men who dared to try to approach her.
Her mother shook her head and believed her daughter was never going to marry. Her father laughed and said that the man who could handle his daughter was out there somewhere to turn up when Aibreann was ready for it.

   Watching the wild sea beneath her, Aibreann smiled. Yes, she was 24 and yes, there was a man - Lorcan - she liked but her heart still belonged to the seasons and not to him although she admired his tenacity. The first man that seemed not too impressed with that wild side of her. Still....
   She straightened her back even more, raised her head, her chin pointing forwards, her eyes wide open. She opened her arms and welcomed the wind that gained in strength, trying to subject her to his power.
Aibreann did not give in and laughed, the wind swirled her laugh over the fields towards a man on his horse.

   The man sat high on his tall dark brown horse, his left hand on his knee; the wind blew the manes round his right hand that loosely held the bridles.  He looked at the woman at the edge of the cliff and could not take his eyes of her, feeling a sensation of which he thought he lost it long ago.
   To an ordinary spectator it might have looked if she was going to jump but he knew that she stood their to embrace the wind. She was too far away to hear her laughing still the sound resonated in his chest. Man and horse did not move and stood like a statue in the middle of the green field defined by large ferns that obeyed the law of Autumn by fading into yellow and brown.

   At the same moment the man guided his horse to the cliff, Aibreann knew someone was watching her. She turned around and the wind blew her hair forwards; her hands held her hair back to watch the magnificent combination of strength and solidarity of the man and his horse.

   She was alone but not afraid. Her chin still up, she waited; her eyes fixed on the man's face until she could see his eyes grey as the smoke from the chimneys.
   She raised her hand and laid it on the nostrils of the beautiful horse who nodded a few times to approve with her touch. She did not look at the horse, she looked at the man who's emotions were clearly visible in his eyes; the grey turned from bright to dark but he did not blink.
   She lost track of time, the world around her stood still. The wind got hold of her heart and blood, raced through her body and she knew that the man felt the same. She knew she found her equal and she knew she needed to fight for him; he was the main storm in her life and nothing that followed later in life would cause similar sensations.

~

   Aibreann smiled and thought she was indeed an old sentimental fool. A forgotten tear dripped on the letter in her hand. One of the many the man wrote to her. Letters in which he told her about the storm in his heart the moment he saw her. That incredible sensation that raced through his blood. The recognition of equal souls; creations of the wind.
   Their secret relationship was not meant to last, they both knew that, but until it ended it was fiercely, unruly. Their passion grew with the Autumn winds, raw and reckless. The rain washed the tears they did not want to cry, their time together was too short.
   The storm inside her held on for months after he left but then came the day she calmed down and accepted the proposal of  Lorcan.

   Poor Lorcan who was good to her, who loved her and kissed the ground she was walking on. She was loyal to him, never betrayed him with another man but also never told him about the letters of her wild and passionate lover from long ago. A lover she never met again but who's letters she received though never replied to, until the announcement of his death 60 years later, long after Lorcan passed away.

   After she read the final letter from the stranger that told her about the death of her friend ("we found your address in his agenda"), she walked to the cliff but instead of looking at the sea, she looked in the opposite direction, the wind in her back, searching for the contours of man and horse but they were gone. 

Photo: @beautifully_derelict_ni (Instagram)

   All what was left was a case full of letters, carefully preserved in the attic and never to be read twice or found by anyone. Until now after she towed the case downstairs. Sitting in her chair in front if the peat fire, she opened them one by one before she laid them back in the case.   She read for days and days, forgot to eat, forgot to drink. The peat fire stopped burning but she did not feel the cold; she felt the heat of the fire that burned with the same flame in two bodies, enkindled by the storm.

   Aibreann too died long ago but the heritage of her character and the unlimited love for the seasons once united in the only man on earth that understood her, still remains. Exposed in her little home in front of a cold hearth until the elements destroy what is left of the abandoned cottage, allowing the storm to blow the written memories towards the wild sea.

 

Word of thanks: the photo of @beautifully_derelict_ni (Instagram) inspired me to write this story and I was given permission to use the photo as an illustration for which I am very grateful. Thank you Jules!!

 
Link: please visit the beautiful Instagram account of Jules

Note: the story is pure fiction! A figment of my imagination. 

Helen 

The Stethoscope (short story)

   Once upon a time…

Do not all fairy tales begin with this phrase? I don’t know if I tell you a fairy tale, it is up to you to decide.

   Once upon a time I left the Fine Medical Instruments Workshop as a stethoscope. Although we were not a very rare breed there were fewer doctors those days than in the modern medical world of today.
I was fortunate to be bought by a very young doctor who just finished his medical study at the university. I did not know of course what the expectations of my duties were and this way we were able to grow together.

   I still remember the very first patient, it scared me to death. I was held against the chest of a man covered in thick black bushy hair and I was pushed in between it. I made a strange sound which worried the doctor who took me out of his ears, shook me and held me again to the heart of his patient. This time I was prepared and the doctor could listen to the heart which wasn't well even without my extra noise.

Fortunately the diagnosis was correct and the patient recovered with the right medication.

   My doctor was a very shy and humble man and started a practice in a small village in Devon.

He could have become a rich doctor in a city but preferred the village with hard working people who could not always afford tot pay their bills. But he did not mind. Curing diseases and comforting was his main goal.

   At first the villagers did not trust the new doctor but they did not have a choice; the former doctor died of old age, still doing his work.

The practice was old but apart from a new stethoscope, everything was still useful , including all the pots, bottles, ointments and liquids with their typical smell which I learned to love.

It did not take long before the new doctor was accepted and appreciated.

   He got used to the sturdy people and their beautiful but often very difficult to understand accent. We both learned to love it.

We also learned about the characters of the patients who came in various sorts and sizes. Let me name a few:

   The Librarian, a tall and very skinny spinster with a long and thin nose with on top a pince-nez, in my opinion held in place by a thick hair. I could not think of any other reason why she did not remove the hair... Through the glasses of her pince-nez she looked at the doctor as if he was a strange book from her library, wondering who put it there without her permission. My doctor always felt uncomfortable with her and we both dreaded the moment he had to listen to her lungs; she always suffered from some sort of cold. The skin of her back (and probably everywhere else) was extremely wrinkly and needed to be pushed aside to allow me to come as close as possible to her lungs. And what a relief if my job was done!

   The teacher, he was a very sad person; unattractive, always in a gloomy mood, never smiling, walking with a bowed back and never looking anyone in the eyes. Of course he was not married and lived in a small room in the house of his landlady.

He did not have any control over the children of the very fist classes and these children, often from very large families, took advantage of his humourless character. Without doubt the teacher was very unhappy. That is why he often visited the doctor feeling unwell and depressed.

   I thought that he had special feelings for my also unmarried doctor, in those days a criminal offence. His eyes were always fixed on the doctor's hands and he blushed very quickly. But my doctor showed no interest and the teacher left even more gloomy than he arrived. Poor man.

   He could have lived a better life because the daughter of one of the sheep farmers, and I never understood why but the doctor said that women are never to understand, was very much in love with the teacher and took great effort to attract his attention but to no avail.

And she was so disappointed the day he did not arrive at school and his landlady found him and his scarce luggage gone.

   The midwife.... oh did I like her! She was big, round, cheerful and had a bosom like a side table! A perfect place to hold the babies she delivered. But she also loved to embrace the doctor who got smothered in this voluptuous amount of female flesh and warm heartedness.

   Her voice was deep and loud. She was never interested in other peoples opinion about her, she was who she was and was a very good midwife too! Not at all jealous if the doctor delivered a baby. “I can't do th'm all on my own!” is what she said. With very difficult births, she worked side by side with the doctor and hugged everybody in the room when a new born villager started to scream at his very tired but happy mother.

   She spread a smell of babies and cakes, the latter she often took to the practice and they were delicious according my doctor. Although he never admitted, he was extremely fond of this lovely lady that cycled in fast speed from one baby to the other, waving and smiling at at least two generations she delivered.

   All these people have long been gone, like my doctor and many other villagers.
The young ones moved to the cities for jobs with less long hours and better payments. The elderly stayed here until they passed away. The new villagers who moved from the cities to the countryside, brought there own cars and preferred their own specialists in town.

   Soon there were no patients left for my doctor and he died as poor as a church mouse but without regrets. He lived his full life as he always attended to do and I admired him for that.

Photo: @__ephemeral_6090 (Instagram)

Because there was no other doctor needed in the village and no one knew of any next of kin, the practice was never sold and nothing ever changed.

   I still hang at the wall with the stethoscope of the doctor before mine.

The pots and bottles are still here but the smell of dust and decay overtook the smell of ointments and liquids. Silence overtook the sound of all different Devonshire voices, the typical accent is never to be heard again.

   We are a forgotten era in a new modern world.

Word of thanks:  the photo of @__ephemeral_6090 (Instagram) inspired me to write this story and I was given persmission to use the photo as an illustration for which I am very gratefull. Thank you!!

Note: the story is pure fiction! A figment of my imagination!

Helen 

Seònaid (short story)

   She sat on a stone at the bank of the River Wharfe in Langstrothdale, her arms folded around the long skirt that covered her legs, and looked at her own reflection deformed by the fast flowing water.

Her flaming red hair, the same colour as the leaves of the very few trees on the hills that surrounded her, moved softly in the wind.
   

   It was an exceptional warm day for Autumn and the sheep, only recently separated from their lambs, walked up and down the hills calling for their absent offspring.

Their wool was still stacked in the barns but would soon be transported to the wool factories. A long journey for her husband and the other farmers and hopefully the job was done before the rain started to poor down from what was now a perfectly blue sky.
   

   Seònaid, a Scottish lass who married the Yorkshire sheep farmer Mathe, moved here from the rough Highland Glens to the hills of Langstrothdale. Both families were not happy with the two young people falling in love with each other! Although there were no great wars anymore, the Seumasachas (Jacobitism) was still busy to restore Roman Catholic - leaded by England and Ireland – to the throne of the heirs of the Kings. And the Scots were wild people!

   But the young couple was not interested in the endless discussions about Seumasachas, they were very much in love with eachother and hoped to raise a family in their own little kingdom Cowside Farm, built by the grandparents of Mathe who’s family belonged to the more wealthy sheep farmers.
   

   The view from Cowside Farm was breath taking on a sunny day like today. For the best view she had to leave the house that was built with only a very few small windows viewing the river at the cold side of the house. The front was up hill with the vegetable garden and the beautiful flowers that passed their best time in late September. Although there was enough work to do for her, she could not resist a walk down hill, watching the water following the bends in the river with high speed, curling around the boulders and falling down the flat stones. When the water level was low, you could cross the river jumping from one stone to another but there had been much rain and she needed the wooden bridge to cross.

She did not so, she felt comfortable and at ease where she was, listening to the sound of the sheep, the lark in the bright sky, the pheasants and the many crows gathering in the large trees surrounding and sheltering the farmhouse.
   

   Seònaid smiled when she thought of her parents who she had to leave to follow her heart and Mathe. It was not an easy decision but she hoped to visit them next year. If there were no fights between the English and the Scots! Their war history goes back many centuries and she would not be surprised if they continued the following centuries! But she did not want to think of wars, only about nice things and happiness. Like her pregnancy, Mathe would be thrilled tonight!

There was so much to be thankful for!
   

   It was time to return to the farm and she climbed the steep hill. Close to the farm she could smell the bread she was baking and she hurried the last few yards, afraid she stayed away too long.

She ran through the corridor to the kitchen at her left and opened the large range with the ovens for bread, cakes and food. And during the cold season it kept the house, together with the large fire in the room at the other side of the corridor, comfortably warm. The thick walls kept the warmth inside during the winter and the warm sun outside. 
   

   The next few hours she worked hard to get tea ready for Mathe and afterwards she cuddled up next to him on the sofa in the cosy room with the beautiful fresco decoration and proverb, painted by her father in law who was more an artist than a sheep farmer. Being retired he made beautiful paintings for customers in the surrounding area and villages.

  While she looked at the paintings she wondered if she was going to tell Mathe the great news now or tonight in bed, in the intimacy of their bedroom and she lay her hands on her belly which soon was going to show the growth of their very first child.       

   
   This was now all a very long time ago. Their life passed by and that of many generations after them and the world changed.

Not for the better Seònaid thought when she observed the female visitor of her long abandoned farmhouse which she never left after she died at the very old age of 83. Not many people got that old in those days!

   There were still wars, she remembered the first World War in which two descendants of her, strong young men, died. She could feel the loss and the grief of their mother and wanted to comfort her but could not reach her. Only a very few people felt her presence although they could not always explain it.

These very few people were her own blood and therefore she immediately knew if a visitor of the derelict farm was one of her descendants like the woman who now entered the house.

   She could feel the atmosphere changing when the woman stood in the corridor, looking around. She saw a sign of recognition in her eyes, if she had been here before. She spoke softly, only to her self but Seònaid could hear her clearly: “I must have been here before but a very, very long time ago. I know the kitchen is at my left hand and the room with the decorated wall at my right. Straight forward is the diary and ‘cold’ storage room and the stairs to the next floor. But I have not been here before, how come I feel at home in an unknown farmhouse I enter for the very first time in my life??”

    

   First the woman entered the kitchen and looked at the rusty Yorkshire Range which went cold long ago and smelled bread and food and not dust and damp but this was impossible! Instead of food, there were generations of twigs of crows nests, pushed down the chimney for decades.

Seònaid watched her walking around the kitchen table made of sanded pine and smiled, did the woman realise there was no table?

The woman went to the right side of the hearth and looked if she was looking for the salt and herbs which were stored there in the past.

Photo: Helen Varras

Then she turned around and walked through the corridor to the room and looked surprised, even disappointed, as if she hated the idea of the chalk paint covering the once so beautiful fresco and proverb. She shook her head and turned to the hearth which was blocked in to fit a ‘modern’ heater.

   Seònaid understood the disapproval but there was nothing she could do when a new generation modernised the farmhouse. She learned to ‘live’ with it. The expression made her smile again.

   The woman wanted to go upstairs but Seònaid warned her softly, the wood was rotten, so were the floors. The woman turned around and instead walked to the stone bench in front of the windows where she sat down, her head resting against the wooden shutters, closing her eyes. Sunbeams danced around her.

Seònaid watched the woman listening to the sounds of the house. Not the usual sounds of the flutter of the wings of insects or cracking floors but the sound of the people who lived here long ago.

The sound of the voices and laughter of Mathe, their daughter and 3 sons, their many grandchildren and herself. The sound of ancestors.

   For the very firs time in almost a century, Seònaid felt happy and in harmony with the visitor from abroad to which she had passed on her love for the Dales.

 ~

 Seònaid is fiction, a figment of my imagination. However, the visitor and Cowside Farm are not!

The visitor entered the farmhouse for the very first time in 1978, very determined to restore it to its former glory but lacked of necessary finances.
Instead The Landmark Trust restored it and did justice to the dignity of this beautiful and very old and rare survivor of maybe even the 17^th century. And of course to the approval of Seònaid!!

Cowside Farm is available for holiday bookings. Please visit the link for more information about prices and availability and for details about and photo’s of the restoration: The Landmark Trust/Cowside farm

Last but not least my word of thanks to Amy Taylor of The Landmark Trust.

Helen

The End (short story)

   "Ah bellisisma mio... when you are young you don't think about the end!
Life is endless, the end is for Vecchi, old people. The people of whom you think are antiquato, not living in the reality of today. Who are of no use to the world, who cost a lot of money because they do not work anymore. Useless Vecchi, uh?
But you are so wrong, you make an errore!! Did you ever think we were young too? Can you immiginare that we were bambini? With little hands and feet, large brown eyes and theehtless little mouths, depending on the amara and care of our parents? Bambini that were taught to eat and walk?
   For you it is not so long ago bellissima. You only think it is a long time ago because you have been living your life in a very fast ritmo, as if your life would be over soon. So typical for the young people. You are rushing through life and act at the age of fifteen if you have seen the whole world. If you know it all, if there are no sorprese left for you anymore. You are telling us that we need to shut up!
Do you know the espressione inglese "The youth is waisted on the young"?

   Mie scuse bellissima, I know I am a bit harsh on you and I should not because I have been young too. And I too thought that I was wiser than my parents, let alone my grandparents! In fact my grandparents were wiser than my parents! And of course my parents were wiser than I was but I did not understand.
  It is good that you do not think about tomorrow or next year. You need to be young and energico. Your youth is one big rehearsal for your adult life. Aaaahhh.... discovering the little secrets of amare: to kiss and make love. Yes, I am smiling when I think of that time. There were so many hidden corners in the barns of the vineyards that surrounded the little villagio! Noi Italiani have warm blood uh? And the sole is always shining!
And the girls were so very bella! When we were picking the grapes under the warm sole we could not always resist kissing one of the beautiful girls and we promised to see each other again where the adults could not see us. We did not think of our parents as people who did the same when they were young and who knew all the nooks and crannies! You will be surprised to hear that I was caught with Fabia, but too late! She was pregnant already as we found out not long after.
   Are you shocked bellissima? Did you not know that in my villagio half the population was fathered this way? Well, here you are bellissima, you think you know it all but this is still a sorpresa!!

   Today in this modern world it is not a shame anymore, you do not even marry. But I had to marry Fabia and it turned out to be a very good marriage. We got 9 children, il pastore told us that we need to have as many as possible children as good catolici. And we obeyed but also often prayed for money to raise all these children. That is why our youngest Leopoldo moved away from the villagio. He did not understand the rules of the church.

   Aaahh bellissima..... Leopoldo..... he was quite a character! He did it all his own way. He walked days and days to start a new life in a city! But he too grew wiser and one day he returned to start his own business in the villagio in these beautiful hills of Tuscany. It sounds if the villagio was large enough for a new business but that was not the fact. He came back just after Severino, the owner of the Funeral Services, died. Yes, he was not immortal either!
   Leopoldo did not talk about his life in the city, we always thought he must have left a big segreto behind. But he must have had a good income because he paid the widow of Severino a good sum of money.
But the poor donna who was as old and lifeless as the customers of her late husband, did not know what to do with so much money. We still don't know who inherited it or where she spent it on. One of the segreti of the villagio. Maybe you will find it one day??

   Leopoldo was a gentile undertaker who never married. Angry tongues said he was still married but left his wife in the city. Others said he murdered his wife and was now an undertaker to punish himself for what he had done. But the truth was never revealed.

   Leopoldo was not the only one that left the villagio, many others left too but never returned to live here again. The villagers grew too old to work in the vineyards and there was no one to buy the yards from them.
Our villagio became a forgotten corner where Vecchi looked after each other.
And all these Vecchi, once young and beautiful, returned to their babyhood: they were teethless again, walking was very difficult and tripping over was normal, like being toddlers. Some lost their speech and muttered and drooled like bambini. Again they lost control over their muscles and needed large nappies.
   You see bellissima, slow down your pace, you will be back where you started even before you realise you lived a life.

   It was after the last but one old villager died, that Leopoldo left the villagio again. Indeed was Leopoldo the last survivor of generations of persone, he left without a trace. And I could not follow him because I was bound to the cemetery together with everybody else that was buried here.

   We watched him parking his beautiful old coaches which served us all followed by famiglia and amici.
Once we walked behind them ourselves and all were carried here in the same black coaches with the carved ornaments on top, the pillars with the gold painted crowns, the large wheels that rolled through the dust, the coachman sitting at his high place, guiding the black cavalli to the church for the last farewell.

Photo: @glory.of.disrepair (Instagram)

   Leopoldo did not look back. He crossed the cemetery, stood still for a moment as if he wanted to say addio to us. We saw his lips moving but did not hear words. Then he walked away, we could not stop him and returned to our graves after he was only a tiny black spot, disappearing behind a long forgotten vineyard.

   It is here where my story for you ends, bellissima. "



Word of thanks: the photo of @glory.of.disrepair (Instagram) inspired me to write this story and I was given permission to use the photo as an illustration for which I am very grateful. Thank you Mathias!

Link: please visit the beautiful Instagram account of @glory.of.disrepair

Note: the story is pure fiction! A figment of my imagination!

Helen

The Last Call (short story)

   His arms tightly pressed against his stomach to ease the pain of hunger, he sat on a chair and balanced his body back and forth. The cracking noise of the old chair was the only sound in the basement. There was no light and no fresh air.
The man who was not taller than a 6 year old child, did not understand what was going on. His tears formed irregular grey stripes on his stale cheeks but he did not wipe them off.

   He could not remember how long he was sitting there, he lost touch with time and reality. And there was not only silence in the basement but the whole house was dabbled in stillness. He did not speak. Father and son never spoke to each other. The father did not know what to say to what he called 'the creature that was called his son'. The father could not bare the sight of the child with the enormous head on a body with short legs and arms, drooling like a baby and not able to say clear words.
But the father never took the effort to teach his son words, he never had the patience his wife had  but she died of a broken heart when the boy was 3 years old.

   The man could not remember his mother any more. Although, sometimes, listening to the quiet sound of little rat feet rummaging the straw of his mattress in the basement or the moving curtains whispering in the wind blowing through the broken windows in the kitchen upstairs, he thought he heard her sweet voice, calling him by a name he could not repeat.
The basement was so familiar, he spent so many hours here after his father locked him up when there were voices at the door. His father felt ashamed and no one knew about the child who now became a man.
The last visitor was a while ago but he did not know how many days. And ever since there was this complete silence.

   The hunger forced him to leave the basement and not without great fear, he climbed the concrete stairs, pushed the shutter in the floor open and entered the kitchen; the only place he knew. All other doors in the house were locked and knowing this, he did not even think of opening them.
He made a strange noise when he finally realized he was all on his own. He did not see his father or any other person. It confused him but it did not bother him too much. He looked around and found the phone off the hook. He never understood where this black machine was for but he remembered his father occasionally talking to it and than placing the horn back. He also remembered his father turning the disk with all the holes and he wondered why. He climbed the chair in front of the desk and imitated his father by placing the horn back, lifting it again and turning the disk. While he held the horn against his ear, he heard the voice of a woman who said "Hello?". The voice sounded familiar and he wanted to say something but his untrained vocal cords only produced a raw sound. Than the woman hang up.
He was devastated and wanted to hear her again. He dialled and dialled. Sometimes he heard a man's voice which frightened him, sometimes a woman and sometimes a buzzing sound. Every time he heard a gentle voice he tried to say that one and only word from the past that slowly drifted to his conscious: "Mo.... Mo...."

Photo: 'soul_mining'

   Eager to hear that soft voice again, he did not give up and only stopped when he needed something to drink. When there was no water left any more, he managed to open the bottles, again imitating is father. He placed all bottles on the desk and drank when thirsty. After each drink he felt warm inside and it eased the hunger. Than the day came that there were no voices any more. Ad no buzzing sounds; the phone kept quiet which terrified the man tremendously. He tried to repair the wire with pieces of string he found in various drawers but silence remained. He kept on drinking and dialling until he panicked.
The passed sound of all voices he had heard, all buzzing sounds, swirled around in his head like leaves in an Autumn storm. He grabbed his head and ran around in circles, trying to hide for the cacophony of sounds that drove him mad. It was than when he remembered the shutter that lead to the stairs to the basement. The basement where he was put when there were voices in the house. He used all his energy to lift the shutter, the hinges made a squeaking sound. He finally managed to put his foot on the stair and still panicking he tried to move his short legs downstairs. He lost grip and fell; his body spinning round like a doll made of fluffy cloths. It was only seconds before the shutter fell back in place and only seconds before his head touched the ground with a sickening cracking sound that he finally shouted: "Mommy!!!!!"

   "Hello??" He listened to the soft feminine voice. "Hello? Anybody home?". But he could not answer any more. His body long ago mingled with the dust of the basement floor and nobody would ever recognize him. Still he tried to call and call.
The girl who entered the abandoned house could swear that some one answered her hello and when she repeated it, she heard it again at the same time the curtains moved in the wind that blew through the broken windows in the kitchen.

Helen

Word of thanks: the photo of @soul_mining (Instagram) inspired me to write this story and I was given permission to use the photo as an illustration for which I am very grateful. Thank you Dan!

Link: please visit the beautiful Instagram account of @soul_mining

Note: the story is pure fiction!A figment of my imagination!