The Beasts: A Winter Tale

[CharmedFan28]

That was some great writing! Pamela's story is always very interesting, especially her hearing a version of little red riding hood. I look forward to more in a few days and I hope you are having a nice night!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Oh, I am having a very nice night, and it was a very nice day. I am just sitting here soaking my winter feet, and glad you are enjoying Pamela and all the things she's learning.

 

[ChrisGibson]

CHAPTER SIX

THE BOOK

CONTINUED




It was early afternoon when Kris Strauss woke up, and he felt more refreshed than he could remember. He could always tell how late it was and he thought, with a mix of amazement and disgust that he could not believe he’d waken up so late. He was still in his clothes, for when he had come home, he had not really thought he would sleep. He had left a little night light on, now drowned out by the grey light of the sun. When he rolled over, his elbow hit something hard and it took him a while to realize it was a book, a little while longer to realize it was The Book of Pamela Strauss.
Kris frowned and then ran his hand over it, but he didn’t open the book. He ran a hand through his hair and yawning, got up and went out of his room, down the hall, down the stairs, to Marabeth’s room. But she wasn’t there, and so he left the book there and went down the back stairs to the kitchen where his grandmother and his mother were sitting up with his sister and Joyce.
“At last the sleeping beauty arises,” Joyce said.
“I don’t know how beautiful I feel,” Kris said. “Is there still coffee.”
“If you make it,” his grandmother said. “It’s past twelve o clock.”
“I couldn’t sleep last night,” Kris yawned while he went through the high cupboards, pulling down coffee filters and coffee. He remembered how, after she’d turned thirteen, Marabeth had always kept a coffee pot in her room so that she didn’t have to see people until she had faced the day with a cup in her. It seemed like such a good idea right now.
“Mara,” Kris began and then stopped himself.
“Yeah?”
“Nothing,” he said. “I’ll ask you later.”
“Alright,” she said, her voice strange, but containing a note that said she had some inkling of what he was about to say.
“It’s really about time for me to go home,” Joyce said. “I need to see what my place looks like again.”
“I actually do too,” Marabeth said. “I can come back tonight,” she told Natalie and her mother, “but I want to see the place I pay rent on, at least for a moment.”
Joyce said, “We can leave in a minute.”
“No,” Kris said before Marabeth could answer.
“I mean, I’ll drop her off.”
He added, “I need to run some errands. Let me just finish this cup of coffee.”

“Why did you leave me that book?”
“Where did you go and not come back from till six in the morning?”
“Now you’re dissuading.”
“Six-forty-five, in fact.”
“You were waiting up for me.”
“No, I was awake. I was just going back to sleep. I kept reading, then putting the book down, and then pacing around, and then reading, and then walking around the house. You know, it’s a well built house, you don’t really hear floorboards squeaking and all that. It’s a nice place to be insomniac. Thought about Dad a lot. Thought about this Eve Moreland. Went back to reading. And then heard you tip up the stairs.”
“So are you going to tell me why you left me the book?” Kris turned on Birmingham, ignoring Marabeth’s question.
“I knew you wanted to know about it. I thought that reading it would let you know what I know.”
“Did you finish it?”
“Oh, God no! It’s hardly begun. But… Good Lord, the beginning’s enough.”
Kris didn’t speak right away and then he said, “Mara, I don’t want to read it.”
Marabeth turned to him, and he looked at her a moment, taking his eyes off the road.
“I’m sorry. I know it makes me a coward, but I don’t want to read it. I mean, I feel like whatever it is, it will make me crazy, the craziness that I take pills for, the craziness that, to be frankly honest, I felt last night. I feel it today. It’s like a shark on the other end of a shatterproof glass tank I live with every day. I know it won’t break through. It can’t. But I feel it. And, I know that’s nuts, but—”
“Don’t worry about it,” Marabeth said, “Really, I’m serious. I’ve read enough of this book. I understand.”
“Maybe you should tell Joyce about it.”
“Joyce?”
“She’s your best friend.”
“It’s a book that says that Pamela and Friederich were werewolves. It’s—”
“Mara, if you really trust her—”
“Of course I do—”
“And you really need to share it, then let Joyce read it. You can tell me everything,” Kris told her. “I just…. I can’t read it.”
Marabeth nodded.
“I’m sorry.”
“No, Baby Brother, you don’t ever have to be sorry. At least not for that.”




Marabeth took a long shower in her own shower. When she had awaken this morning, her mind had played that evil trick on her. First feeling the bed, and then looking around it at the room, she had taken a while to remember she was not in her apartment, but in the house on Dimler Street where she had grown up. And then it all came back. Her father, missing so long, was officially dead. His satchel had been returned to her, worse for wear but bearing several documents, one of them the large bound journal which read The Book of Pamela Strauss.’ And, slowly, as she had come into consciousness, she had remembered everything Pamela had written.
Well, now, back in her apartment, she had to wash herself free of it, be back in her place with the white walls and the low ceiling, the balcony doors that looked out onto bleak day after Christmas Birmingham Street. Here, hung up on a white wall, was the wicker sun that had survived college and marriage and divorce. In her housecoat she stood there feeling odd, feeling tired, feeling very discontent. When she felt like this she had to stop and take stock, and now she did. She did not take her eyes from the door until the sunlit white door became greyish blue with the passing of the day, and at last she said, “I thought I would feel freer. I thought away from the house, and from the family, I would feel free of all that business. But I don’t ”
She really only felt like this was no time to be alone, like she didn’t understand the world at all anymore, and she didn’t feel entirely safe.
“Paint,” she said, rising slowly, and stripping her housecoat. It was so warm that, after she drew the curtains on the white and grey world, she could walk around in this house naked, and she needed her paints more than she needed shorts and a tee shirt.
“Paint it out.”
Something in her wanted to go back home, but she had spent a long time fighting not to go home, to get out of Germantown, and she didn’t want to run back to her family just now.
“Besides,” she said, as she went to her supply closet, “sometimes you have to get through things on your own. At least for a little bit. Stare them down.”
Nevertheless, when Joy called her and asked her what she was doing, and Marabeth answered, “Painting,” and Joy said, “Mind if I come over?” Marabeth was only too glad to say, “Get over here, now.”

Marabeth greeted Joy with a cigarette and said, “I need you to keep an open mind.”
“I’m not even going to ask you about what,” Joyce said. “Then she said, “Fuck it, you need to keep an open mind too.”
“About what?”
“I slept with Peter.”
“Peter who—? What the fuck?”
“Yes.”
“Oh,” Marabeth blinked, then, handing over the lighter she said, “Well, you are a grown ass woman and he is a grown man, so…” she shrugged.
“And what do you need me to keep an open mind about?”
Marabeth brushed Joyce over to her desk which was before the wall with the window cut into it that divided the living room from the kitchen.
“The journal.”
“I need you to read this. At least up to where I bookmarked it.”
“Okay,” Joyce nodded warily. “Do I need a drink?”
“Wine’s in the fridge. Get me a glass too?”
“Sure thing, and why do I need to keep an open mind?”
“Because according to that book,” Marabeth said, “I might be a werewolf. And so might Peter by the way.”


“I wondered if you’d ever get here,” Jim said when Peter came into the house.
His cousin shrugged. He was in jeans and a pullover, and his hair was a bit of a mess today.
“I had some things to do. Remember, I had work.”
“Wasn’t work like one conference call?”
“I had a couple of consultations too. And had to take the kids to Desiree.”
“I never did like her,” Jim reflected.
“Well,” Peter said, going to the refrigerator as he kissed Natalie on the cheek, “now, neither do I.”
“Yes, and Peter dropped Joyce off too,” Natalie said as she headed out of the kitchen and back to the front of the house. “That was very nice “
Jim raised an eyebrow.
“Yes, that was very nice.”
Peter looked after his great aunt, his eyebrows hooded, and then he sat down at the round kitchen table, legs splayed, and opened a bottle of Gatorade.
“What’s this about you brought Joyce home?”
“As you remember, she took me home because I was…”
“Feeling absolutely no pain.”
“Right,” Peter said, flicking his cousin on the head. “Well, she stayed over last night, and then I brought her back here this morning.”
Jim thought about asking more questions, but simply said, “I hope she likes our family. She’s gotten far more of us than most people ever do.”
Peter shrugged. “I think she fits in.”
Kris was coming down the back stairs and he said, “Hey, Pete, Jim. Have you seen Mom and Grandma?”
“In the front,” Peter jerked his thumb.
Kris nodded and went out of the kitchen and up the hall.
“I was about to say I wonder what’s getting him, but that’s dumb of me,” Peter said.
“It’s like I keep forgetting Uncle Nate’s gone, and then I remember it all over again.”
“I had a dream that Nate was teaching me touch football,” Peter said. “You remember, Nate was like the tallest best looking guy in the family. He was the glamorous one. And he was always so patient with me. My dad wouldn’t teach me anything. But Nate always had time.”
“Is that why you always have time for Kris and me?”
“Uh,” Peter looked startled. “Yeah. I guess. You and Kris together sort of make up a Nate. He’s got Nate’s height and color and you’ve got the wavy hair and the looks.”
“I’ve got the gayness too. Nate didn’t have that.”
“That is… so far from anything I was talking about it. He had the touch with the ladies. You’ve got the touch with everyone. I called this morning, and a voice that wasn’t yours picked up.”
“Oh, yeah,” Jim said. “Ryan.”
“Ryan,” Peter nudged him under the table.
“Yeah,” Jim shrugged, suddenly shy. “He’s a nice guy.”
“Is he nice enough to bring him home and let the Strausses and Kellers get a look at him?”
“Actually he’s so nice that’s never ever going to happen. And anyway, it’s not serious. I mean, it’s a serious friendship, but… It’s not like a romance.”
Kris came back into the kitchen and Peter said, “Are you going to hang out with us for a little bit?”
Kris shook his head, “I can’t.” He lifted his phone. “I gave my number to that Detective McCord. He said they’re ready for us to take Dad’s remains.”
“And do what?” Peter looked horrified.
“Mr. Steigler is coming to take him so… we can have a funeral.”
“I hadn’t even thought about it,” Peter said. “I mean… we will have to have a… But… why are you going?”
They heard a jingling of keys and then Natalie Keller came into the kitchen. She was in her purple overcoat, her white hair wrapped by a scarf, and Rebecca, in her red coat, her red hair uncovered, followed.
“We’re on our way to the morgue,” Natalie said, stalwartly.
“But why?” Jim demanded.
“Because I have to see him,” Natalie said. “I could not live with myself if I didn’t see him before we decided what to do. I just can’t leave it in Steigler and Steigler’s hands. He was my son.”
“Then we’re going,” Jim said, standing up, and Peter did too.
“No,” Natalie said. “you’re not. And it’s bad enough Rebecca’s coming.”
“I’m not letting you do this alone.”
“But it will be just us,” Natalie said. “Us and only us. Not even you,” she said to Kris.
Kris looked worried and strange, and even though Jim had not quite forgiven Kris, he reached out and took his cousin’s hand, and though Kris did not look at him, Kris gripped his hand tight.
“Alright,” Kris said, after breathing deeply. “But I’m driving.”
“Alright,” Natalie said. “You’re driving.”


MORE TOMORROW

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a great portion! I am completely understanding of why Kris does not want to read Pamela's Journal. It would be a lot for anyone let alone someone who could be affected by its contents. This story is going along well and I am enjoying it! Excellent writing and I look forward to more tomorrow!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Yes, i'm glad you can understand where Kris is at even if Marabeth cannot.I enjoy posting this story and am glad you are still enjoying it this time around. I wonder if Marabeth can read the book because she is the least effected by it, or at least, the one who will not be negatively effected.

 

[ChrisGibson]

CHAPTER SIX: THE BOOK, CONTINUED

Joyce looked on the painting, mesmerized.
“I love your work,” she said, “I always have. But this…”
“Is far too crazy.”
“No,” Joyce said. “It should be terrifying, but it’s also marvelous. It might be one of my favorites.”
“I used to have dreams of being eaten,” Marabeth said, “dreams of being eaten alive, and now I wonder if this isn’t part of it.”
She stopped painting. What was left of the background was an almost luminous golden red, but most of it was taken up by a whirling darkness that resolved itself into a great wolf, and its teeth were jagged and its mouth longer than any real wolf. It devoured a girl all in red, her red cloak still hanging from her mouth. The girl’s face was round and beige and pale, and it remained unconsumed along with hands hanging limply from the wolf’s jaws, and the girl was not fighting, rather she seemed in ecstasy.
“It’s Pamela’s Red Riding Hood,” Joyce said.
“Or rather Hagano’s,” Marabeth said. “And Hagano is the man I dreamed of, the blond man of my dreams looking at me from the snow. I know it was him. And Red Riding Hood… She wants to be devoured. She must be devoured.”
“In the book,” Joyce said, “Hagano said that people added the woodman because they didn’t understand the story.”
“And I didn’t understand it either,” Marabeth said. “But now,” as she continued to add darkness to the wolf’s pelt, “I think I do. The Grandmother became the wolf, and in the end, because she was of the blood, Red Riding Hood did too. She was not consumed by a monster that was separate from her. The monster was her nature.”
“Grandmother, what big teeth you have,” Joyce said. “Then… the Grandmother really was the wolf?”
“Yes,” Marabeth said. “And so was Riding Hood. She was sent to become the wolf, sent by her mother, who was possibly the wolf already. It is… an initiation. I am sure of it. It’s really the only thing I am sure of.”
The phone rang, and Marabeth went to get it while Joyce continued staring at the painting, at the slit almond eyes like shards of glass that belonged to the wolf, at the face of the blissful girl hanging from his mouth. Beyond her, Marabeth talked on the phone. When she was off, Marabeth said, “That was Kris, he said he was on his way to get me. Grandmother went down to the police department to… look at Dad’s remains.”
“What?”
“She said she had to. They were being taken to the funeral home. She wanted to escort them. Mom went too. She fainted.”
“Call Kris and tell him not to come,” Joyce said, “I’m taking you.’
“Thanks for that,” Marabeth said.
“Don’t thank me,” Joyce said, “I don’t really feel like being left alone tonight.”
“Bring the book,” Marabeth said.
“Of course.”


As soon as she came into the house, Marabeth felt the need to put the book in her old room and keep it from everyone else. There was an air of trouble in the house. Of course there was, and she didn’t want to add to it. She was surprised coming out of her room, to see Jim coming down the hall.
“I thought I heard you come in,” he said.
“Yeah,” Marabeth answered.
“We’re all in the kitchen.”
“How much is all?”
“Peter, Kris. Myron is here too. Grandma. Aunt Becca’s lying down.”
“Jim, what all happened?’
“The police said that they were bringing Uncle Nate to the funeral home, no that the Steiglers were coming for him. And Grandma said she had to go and see him before anyone else did.”
Marabeth looked doubtful and Jim said, “I know.”
“Your mom and Kris went with her. But Kris didn’t go in to see Uncle Nate. Grandma did, and then your mom did, because she felt she needed to be with Grandma, and maybe she thought she had to because she was married to Nate. That was a terrible idea. Someone should have stopped her. They had to bring her out of the room. They said she just whimpered and passed out. Grandma just stood there.”
“But…” Marabeth began. “But,” she started again, and then she simply said, “But what’s left? What can be left?”
“It turns out a lot can be left,” Jim said. “But it just doesn’t look like a person anymore. Not really. Grandma said she had seen all of her children after they died, and she had to see Uncle Nate.”
“Well, where is she?”
“In her room. Just kind of sitting there.”
“I’m going to go see Mom,” Marabeth said.
She thought she should go check on Joyce too.
“She’ll be fine,” Jim said, “But yeah, I’ll go down there and see.”
Jim went down the back stair and Marabeth down the front to avoid the kitchen. She went though the living room, and down to her mother’s room. Her door was open, and she could hear her family in the kitchen.
Marabeth walked in and was surprised by the largeness of the room. She’d always imagined the back rooms of the house to be small, but now she saw that wasn’t so. Rebecca Strauss was not on the bed, but sitting in an easy chair under the window, her crossed feet spread out in front of her.
Marabeth sat at her mother’s dressing table, pulled out her cigarette roller and her bag of tobacco.
“Mom, you shouldn’t have done that,” was all she said. “He’s been gone so long.”
“I looked for a trace of him,” Rebecca said. “I tried to look into what they showed me, and I looked for a trace of him, and in just a second I saw it, the him in what was left. That’s when I passed out. It was like suddenly what was in front of me transformed and I could see your father in it, and that was too much.”
Rebecca shook her head.
“Now, I can’t remember much of anything. I can see your father’s face, but it’s Nate when he was young and handsome. And I can vaguely remember, like a nightmare more than anything, the morgue, and standing there next to Natalie, and she… She didn’t do anything. She just stood there and looked. All I can think is, curse you, you old bitch for making me do something I never would have done. Not that I had to do it, but when she did, I felt like I had to.”
“No one else did.”
Marabeth handed her mother a cigarette and Rebecca said, “I don’t smoke these. Filthy things.”
But when Marabeth lit it, Rebecca took a drag, and then Marabeth set to rolling her own.
“You shouldn’t either,” her mother told her.
“Shouldn’t what?”
“See your father’s body.’
“All right, Mom,” Marabeth said, thinking how that had never been an option.
“I’m going to see the others,” she told her.
“I’ll be back.”
Her mother nodded, and Marabeth went down the hall. Her cousins were drinking and Marabeth said, “I don’t want us all to turn into alcoholics.”
“We were talking about the funeral,” Kris said.
“You know, I hadn’t really thought about it,” Marabeth said. “I guess we should have it as soon as possible.”
“There’s no rush,” Myron said.
“Of course there’s a rush.” Marabeth said. “He’s been dead for half a year.”
“We were going to talk it over with the Steiglers tomorrow,” Kris said.
“I don’t understand what there is to talk about,” Marabeth poured herself a drink. “The police department has done its part. The Steiglers do cremations, right?”
“We can’t cremate our dad!” Kris said, suddenly looking very desperate. “We need to have a Catholic funeral.”
“When did you ever care about a Catholic anything?” Marabeth said. “And besides, Catholics get cremated. It’s not 1955.”
“Grandma would want a coffin.”
“Grandma went into a morgue and saw a bloated dead body and made Mom almost pass it out. Enough is enough. Call the Steiglers and arrange for the cremation. I don’t know why it wasn’t done tonight.”
“He was our dad!” Kris pounded his fist on the table.
“He was our dad! Not a fucking piece of meat, Mara. Not trash to be burnt up because it doesn’t look nice anymore. He was our dad. He deserves… what we have, the full funeral, not just some jar with ashes, and…”
Marabeth stood there silent, and Myron touched Kris on the back, and looked at Marabeth and then lowered his eyes.
She did not speak immediately. It was a while before she replied.
“I am not trying to burn him up and get rid of him like trash,” Marabeth said. “But I am trying to get him into the ground and move on. He is dead.”
“He’s our—” Kris began again.
“You can keep on saying he’s our father till Jesus comes back, and he’ll still be dead,” Marabeth said. “He’s been dead for a long time. He’s been laying out half buried, exposed to the elements, and I don’t have to pop my head into a morgue to wonder what that looks like. But to go through the… farce of embalming what’s left of him and… whatever the Steiglers do, just so Grandma can see a casket funeral…” Marabeth shook her head. “I’m not doing it. And you can bang your fist on tables and shout all you want.”
“You’re a bitch,” Kris said suddenly.
“Kris!” Peter said while Joyce, not reaching out to touch Marabeth, just looked at her.
“You’ve always been a bitch. You’re cold. That’s why Pamela gave you that book, because she knew you were like her.”
Marabeth took a huge breath, “Well,” she said, “when all my brother is capable of doing is banging tables, insulting his relatives and sneaking out to fuck whoever it is you were fucking, and Grandma is dragging Mom into morgues to stare at bloated corpses, someone has got to be.”
Kris opened his mouth.
“Shut the fuck up,” she said. “Don’t say another goddamned word. You’re too weak to do the one thing I’ve asked of you today, and all you want to do is call me a bitch and apparently talk shit to Jim who, guess what, is the only brother you have. Well, guess what, Kris? We all are going through something. Everything’s not about you. But you sit here and be sad, and you sit here and be angry, Baby Brother, and I will go and arrange things in a suitable way so that Grandma can have her casket or…whatever.”


MORE SATURDAY NIGHT

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a great portion! I don't like to see Marabeth and Kris fight and while I can see both sides, I know they are probably fighting because of their grief. This death has affected the whole family more then I remembered after seeing the body. I understand though, a death is a lot for anyone to handle. Excellent writing and I look forward to more soon!

 

[ChrisGibson]

That is very insightful and I don't know that I can add a thing to what you just said. It's all grief talking pretty much tonight.

 

[ChrisGibson]

Rage and weariness surrender to love and the search for truth as we wrap up part one of our story....


THE BOOK OF PAMELA STRAUSS

I was sixteen then. It never occurred to me to tell Friederich that I possessed the power of the Wolf, and I never asked him if he could only turn at the time of the full moon. I didn’t know him to do it any other time, though. But, and I had to remember this fact, my mother had been a wolf. And he had come for my birth. Had he waited for a full moon to change? Had I been born on one?
Friederich was like my husband now, but Hagano was my lover. We ran through the hills and we ran with the wolves. They let us come and go as we pleased, and I began to understand the wolf mind, which is different from a human mind, but not less, I do not think, and when we parted from them, either in wolf form or with human bodies, Hagano and I shared ourselves.
One night, I came home and Friederich demanded, “Where have you been?”
This was unlike him, and I said, “It’s none of your affair.”
He shook me by the wrist and then said, “Gather all you can, we must go.”
I was about to ask why when I saw a hand sprawled out in the next room and a puddle of blood surrounding it.
“Georg,” he said. “Georg said he had seen me as the Wolf. He said he saw you as the Wolf as well.”
There was the question in Friederich’s eyes which I decided I had no time to answer.
“So you killed him?”
“What else could I do?”
I could not answer this, but I said, “I am going down the hill to Frau Inga’s.”
“What can she do?”
“I’m about to find out.”


Frau Inga was succinct.
“You must flee.”
“Again?”
“You have never fled, my Pamela.”
“But Father has. Will we have to flee every time he does something?”
“Next time he does something, if there is a next time, you must put him down.
“But you are young and you should not spend your whole life under these mountains.”
“We could go to Wurzburg.”
“The world is not what it was,” Frau Inga said, “and these days I have dreams of blood. Blood and water drowning the land. I see fires in the sky. You must leave this land. This continent. Every day, outside of this village, great powers jostle for war. I have seen it. Soon this land and all lands will be covered in smoke. If you flee, flee to America. Never come back here. I have a little money, and I have directions. Take these envelopes. My daughter, the one who breastfed you, has gone to a place called Ohio. She is wed to a man called Keller. Find them. Find the Kellers. Our blood is strong, wolfling. it is the blood of witches. Bind ours to yours.”












The anger and weariness died in Marabeth’s heart, replaced by a realization that was hot and cold all at once.
“Frau Inga. The witch who bound Friederich. We are descended from her. Everyone in this house.”



WE COULD HAVE BURIED Georg and hid him away in the dirt, but there would have been questions. We could have moved the next town over, or even to Wurzburg, but by then the police went from place to place, and crimes were not as easily hidden. Besides, Frau Inga had told me of her terrible vision. And so we left in the early morning, in a wagon with all we had, making our way to Wurzburg, then from Wurzburg to Munich, from Munich to Frankfort and then to Cologne, each time my becoming more and more surprised at the size of the world, for I had never known even Germany to be so huge. At last we reached the port of Hamburg, and from that city we touched the sea. Looking back on that city, with its tall Gothic houses on the port, was the last time I saw Germany, but Germany meant nothing to me. The last time I saw the green trees and hills of Bavaria was the last time I saw home. Everything else was foreign land, and so I turned my back on the old port city, and looked forward to the sea, and to America.



Marabeth looked up and saw her brother standing in the doorway.
“Don’t say a fucking word to me, I’m not in the mood for it.”
Her room was filled with smoke, and she crushed out the last cigarette, and then downed a swig of the bourbon she’d taken from the library.
“I don’t feel like your shit, and I’m tired of your moods. Oh, by the way, I’ve handled everything with Steigler and Steigler. At eleven o’ clock in the fucking night. There’s going to be using a nice oak coffin and no embalming. There will be…. They said something about rendering or refrigeration, and I said I really didn’t need to know anything else. Now, if you don’t have anything else to say…”
“I’m sorry,” Kris said, “and I also talked to Jim. I‘m—you’re right, Mara. And I do need to read that book, and I will, and I brought you someone.”
“You brought me someone?” Marabeth sat up.
A man entered the room. He was Black and a little shorter than Kris, and Marabeth thought, Why are you bring some Black guy into this bullshit? Don’t they have enough to deal with? And then she thought, God, I look a mess.
“This is my mentor, Dr. Uriah Dunne,” Kris said.
“Oh…” Marabeth climbed off the bed, pushing her hair out of her face and getting past what she looked like and what she must smell like.
“You were going to write to my cousin, Eve,” he said.
“Yes,” Marabeth said. “Eve Moreland? Should I?”
“Perhaps,” Uriah said, “but not by yourself. And, anyway, she is not the real power in our family. If you are going to talk to anyone, you must talk to her grandfather, Augustus. Or better yet my nephew, Lewis Dunharrow.”


END OF CHAPTER SIX AND END OF PART ONE

MORE TOMORROW

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was an interesting portion. Pamela's diary continues to be fascinating and I look forward to reading more of it. I am glad Kris introduced Marabeth to his mentor Uriah. Great writing and I look forward to the start of part 2 tomorrow!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Pamela is always a revelation. I'm glad you had fun reading and hope you had a great night. Much more to follow.

 

[ChrisGibson]

P A R T
T W O

ZAUBER



S E V E N

L U S T​

I love those who do not know how to live for today

-Friedrich Nietzsche


Marabeth and Kris Strauss sat across from Uriah and he was the first to speak and the only one not smoking as they sipped tea before the closed fireplace, Marabeth looking up at the great portrait of Pamela.
“What is the thing you want to know the most?”
Marabeth glanced at Kris, and he said nothing and then she said, “I want to know if we’re werewolves.”
When Uriah said nothing, Kris finally said, “I want to know if the pills I take are because of it. I want to know if I have some kind of depression, or if it’s something more.”
“That can be easily discerned,” Uriah told him.
Kris waited for him to explain.
“Go out there to your cousins. Ask every man in the family if he takes the pills you take.”
“That is one way,” Kris said cautiously.
“Well, if not that, then there is another way.”
“Which is?
“Simply don’t take the pills.”
“What?” Marabeth exclaimed.
“If you think your father knew, if many people know, they’ve got to have other means to subdue you when you change should there be no medication. In this house, somewhere, is the means to subdue you. If this is true. And it is true.”
“How do you know?” Kris asked.
“I know,” Uriah said.
“But,” Kris said, “whatever there is in this house or wherever that could control me… I wouldn’t know where it was.”
“Someone would.”
“Dad’s dead.”
“He couldn’t be the only one. “
“Great-Grandfather only had one son,” Marabeth said. “My grandfather had two sons, but they’re both dead. The only men, and it seems to only affect the men, are Kris, Jim, Peter, Myron…”
“And any of your other cousins. Any of Friederich’s grandsons as well as his great-grandsons. If this is true,” Uriah said, “then surely it wouldn’t have only been Nathan who knew. That would be too dangerous.”
“Then you think someone else knows.”
“Marabeth, I think several someones know. Your mother must know. Your grandmother. The only reason you don’t know is because the knowledge just came to you, and you don’t dare to ask them.”
“But… Cousin Robert?” Marabeth said. “Myron.”
“No,” Kris said. “Myron doesn’t really know anything. I mean, I love him ,but he doesn’t really know anything.”
“They always said Pamela controlled things, and even though she didn’t like Aunt Maris, she trusted her sons. That’s why she sent them to law school. Granger knew everything that went on in this family. He was the executer of Pamela’s will. He handled all the legal business. He must have been in cahoots with them.”
“Shit!” Kris suddenly exclaimed, almost dropping his cigarette.
“What?” Marabeth began, and then she stopped.
Uriah looked at them both, and Marabeth said, “But… he couldn’t. He’s just. He just runs the law firm. He just handles…”
“All the family business, just like his dad did,” Kris said. “He just… runs every- thing.”
Marabeth had put her cigarette down.
“Peter knows.”


.

“It’s so cold out here,” Joyce said.
“You didn’t have to come,” Peter told her. His breath was white, and it seemed to Joyce that it might actually freeze on the night.
“I didn’t mean that to be an ass,” he said. “You really could have stayed in.”
“I wanted to hang out with you,” she said. “You don’t… wear a hat or anything.”
His ears were red, and so was his nose as he smiled down on her and they walked down the street, his hands jammed in his pockets.
“This is a beautiful church,” Joyce said. “If it wasn’t almost below zero, I’d want to look at it some more.”
“Oh, I could look at it all night,” Peter’s breath was white. “Saint Ursula’s is beautiful, don’t get me wrong. But I love Saint Agatha’s.”
“It’s a little closer to you,” Joy said. “Why didn’t your family go here?”
“Because Ursula was the German church. Saint Agatha’s was the Black church. It was built for the Black community around the time my family came to America. Or rather, they built it themselves. They decided it had to be better and more beautiful than any other church in the neighborhood, and it was. If you could see this in daylight, the red brick, it’s really pink brick, and the white cement arcades inside! I love this church. I used to be an altar boy here. Sometimes, when I just need to get quiet, I still come here, even talk to Father Johnson. I don’t know if I’m still religious, but sometimes it’s nice to talk to a priest.”
“So, your whole family went to Saint Ursula, but you went here?”
“Well, that’s not totally true. Aunt Natalie went here after her husband died. She used to bring Nate and Byron. She only goes to Saint Ursula’s on Christmas, and Marabeth and Kris went to both. But we all grew up later. And I think we felt weird so we came here.”
Joyce didn’t say she was confused over this last statement, but Peter said, “I’m a little older than Kris and Marabeth. I… I used to feel like I didn’t fit in. The other kids were kind of assholes to me, and the Black kids and the Mexicans... they sort of took me in, and so I would come to Saint Agatha’s. The Neils, the family that lives across the street from the Big House, I was friends with their son Osgood. Osgood would bring me with him to church, and so this place sort of became a home to me. See, right there, that’s the school. I ended up going there in fourth grade. My parents were… I think scared is the right word. I was one of five white kids.”
“How was it?”
“It made me glad,” Peter said. “To tell you the truth, I doubt Black people feel the same way when the situation’s reversed, but I liked it. I got so used to it. I felt super weird when we finally went to Central Catholic.”
A car drove down Demming, but otherwise the night was silent. Moments later, Peter motioned for Joyce to make way as another man, pale as Peter, walked down the sidewalk, hands jammed in his pockets. He muttered a hello, and Peter nodded, and they kept walking, they back toward Dimler Street, he in the direction of the tall buildings of downtown.
“It clears my head, you know,” Peter said, “to be out in the night. Especially on a night like this. And, sometimes, when things would get rough, when it was too much for my mind, it was good to get outside. We think it’s so cold out here, but that guy, who knows? We’re going back to the house. Who knows how long he’s walking?”
“Maybe he’s going home like us.”
“Maybe,” Peter said, “but he looked sort of homeless. It’s just downtown and bridges and old buildings and church porches to sleep under. On a night like this. Sorry, I think about stuff like that some time.”
Joyce hooked her arm in his, then said, “That was forward of me.”
“I don’t mind you being forward,” Peter said. “Maybe if more forward women showed up I wouldn’t be this weird gloomy person I am.”
“I don’t think you’re gloomy. I think you’re right.”
Joyce was jostled as Peter suddenly stopped in the middle of the street, looking up.
“It’s so small and white. Smaller than a dime,” Peter said.
“The moon,” Joyce said, realizing that was needless. It was almost burning white in the dark blue, and Peter said, “Sometimes I look up at it and I could just .. never look away. Never feel the cold.”
Suddenly Peter broke off from her, boy like in his car coat, and howled.
He laughed.
“Makes me feel like a wolf. What are you staring at?” He grinned at Joyce.
Joyce scrambled for words, not a lie, but any words, because she didn’t quite know what to say.
“You’re a rare man, Peter Keller.”
“Not that rare,” he differed.
Then he said, “My kids are still gone tonight? Would you want to come back with me. Tonight? Or would that be too soon?”
“You’re not into games, are you?”
“Games are for kids. I like having you around. I liked you staying with me.”
“I like staying with you too. If Marabeth doesn’t think I’m too much of a tart, then yes, I’ll come back with you.”
Peter shrugged, “Marabeth can think whatever she wants. I like being with you Joy, McNamara.”



They stayed up talking a while, Kris mostly keeping silence between Marabeth and Uriah, and of course Kris had not read the book and knew very little of what Uriah knew. Uriah had only told him that there was much more in the world than people liked to admit, and often left it at that.
“You have to understand, I did not seek Kris out, but when I first met him, when he first described his depressions and his youth I decided I’d better keep an eye on him. I had some inkling as to what he was.”
“Then you know about… werewolves,” Marabeth had said.
“I know about Strausses,” Uriah said. “Your Aunt Pamela knew my Uncle Augustus. He spoke of her, and so I knew that there was a family in Ohio, where I lived, that could shapeshift.”
“That’s a very nice way of putting it,” Kris cut in.
“I had forgotten much of what I learned, and only begun to put two and two together after I had known Kris awhile. But he had not told me and so I did not know if he knew and was keeping it to himself or… what I felt like, that it was not mine to tell. But I felt like he had to come to Chicago to see other things.”
“Like Eve Moreland.”
“Yes, like the witches of my family.”
“And are you a witch?” Marabeth asked.
“No,” Uriah said. “Not really.”
“Then I might not really be a—”
“You are,” Uriah said. “I don’t know how it works in your family. Apparently all of the men must take tablets or they turn. Apparently the gene or trait or gift or—”
“Curse,” Kris said
“Or whatever it is,” Uriah said, “is quiet in the women. Pamela had it, but she was taught it. Friederich changed but only when he wished to. The trait doesn’t seem to have any consistency.”
“But then I haven’t finished reading the book.”
“That’s right,” Uriah said.
“And we also haven’t spoken to Peter.”
After they had talked a little more Kris said he would take Uriah home and Marabeth said she would go upstairs to bed.
“Are you staying here?” Kris asked.
“I think I’d better,” Marabeth said, yawning.
The house was beginning to feel like home again, and she could hear Jim down the hall snoring in his old room. She went through the ritual of showering, washing her hair, brushing her teeth and climbing into bed. She glanced at the journal and then looked away from it. Time for that tomorrow.

MORE ON TUESDAY

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was an intriguing portion! More and more is coming out about what parts of the family know about "the curse" as Kris calls it. Great writing and I look forward to more in a few days! I hope you are having a nice Sunday.

 

[ChrisGibson]

It certainly does seem as if Marabeth and Kris and even Jim have been kept in the dark about something that's sort of an open secret. Right now it is just "the curse" to Kris, and we're not exactly sure what Peter knows. but soon, much will be revealed. I'm having an interesting night which is going to be more interesting still and will talk to you soon.

 

[ChrisGibson]

EVEN THOUGH THE BEASTS WAS SCHEDULED FOR TUESDAY, AS OFTEN HAPPENS, PLANS HAD TO CHANGE AND SO HERE IS TONIGHT'S PORTION

In her dreams a man was kissing her, and that wasn’t strange. She was, after all, divorced and terminally unfucked. She even knew she was dreaming, but she wanted to put that away. The more he undressed her, ran his hands over her, the more she knew it wasn’t real, knew that the moment before you knew it wasn’t real was when you woke up pissed off and frustrated. She willed the dream to stay. She undressed the man. He was long and tall and he was muscled. His body was like a furry blond pelt. His eyes blue. He kissed her hungrily and she knew, but did not push it from her mind, that this was Hagano, her Aunt Pamela’s lover, the man from her dreams. She opened her thighs for him and she felt his kiss on her breasts, on her shoulders, back up again. But now as she awoke she knew it was only a dream, that she was Marabeth Strauss, divorced, almost forty and in her mother’s house. But…
He was still making love to her. Her eyes opened wide and she saw, beneath the blankets, between her thighs, the figure of a man moving, and the blanket was up as if over his shoulders. She pulled away almost screaming, as the blanket collapsed, and she was alone, but still felt the heat of Hagano’s body on her, still felt him in the covers, still felt his touch, still felt wet between her thighs, sat up in the night terrified to find her gown down, and her nipples wet with his kisses.
She was discombobulated and so it took a moment to hear the buzzing, to know the buzzing was her phone and then to find said phone even though it was on the nightstand beside the bed where she always left it.
She picked it up and answered, which she never did this late and said, “Joyce?”
“I’m sorry,” the man’s voice on the other end of the phone said, “I didn’t expect anyone to pick up. I was leaving a message. I don’t know if you’ll remember me, but this is Detective McCord.”
How would she forget the man who had brought her dead father back to her?
“Yes, Detective. I remember you.”
“There were other effects of your father, still at the station. I was leaving the message so you could get them.”
“Oh… thank you. I… I could get them tomorrow.”
She felt awake and said, “I could get them tonight, actually.”
“I didn’t think you’d be up,” the detective said. “I can bring them to you. I get off of work in forty-five minutes. Unless that’s too late.”
“Forty-five minutes or an hour would be great,” Marabeth said.



She was a slut. Jenean had no problem admitting this to herself. She wasn’t a slut every night. Being a slut was just an approach to life. Being a slut, Jenean thought, was to not be shy about what you wanted, to simply admit that you wanted a thing and then to go out and get it. Being a slut was when you felt like less than a wonderful woman, when you were feeling very much like a tired waitress, to realize a man was staring you down and stare right back at him. She knew that dark haired guy had wanted her, and while she was deciding if she liked him or not, if he was good looking or not, she was pretty sure she’d have him. She wasn’t quite sure where, but the more she talked to him, the more he made little jokes and she looked at his rumpled hair, the more she decided that she would definitely have sex with him.
It had happened rough and wild and desperate in the backseat of her car. She squeezed her thighs around him as he fucked her and she loved how a man, no matter how dignified he looked, gave up all his dignity in fucking. He had seemed very dignified. Not a business man, too rumbled, probably a college professor. He had been very together, But now he needed it the way she did. He needed to be in her as much as she needed him inside, and he had been so large and thrust so hard he’d bruised her.
Having sex in the backseat of her car in an I Hop parking lot didn’t bother her. She’d fucked and been fucked in far stranger places. Once, in Chicago, she had let her then boyfriend fuck her on the hood of a car, and she didn’t feel like less of a person. She felt a little more free than girls she knew, not stuck on her reputation.
She brought him home. Now, that was a little stranger. Not that she didn’t have sex in her home, but often she felt no need for a man after she’d finished with him. This one she had wanted to come home. Even though the sex had been rough, there was something else to it that she couldn’t explain. She wanted to be with him again. She wanted him in her shower and she loved the love they had made.
But in the very grey morning, while Jenean Morrison lay looking over Kris, tracing the fine hair up and down his slender naked body, a naked body curled like a little child, his mouth open against the pillow, his eyes closed while he smiled gently, she was seized by a strange feeling.
Jenean always followed her feelings. She knew if you thought too much about them you’d be embarrassed, and she didn’t have time to be embarrassed. She climbed out of bed, thinking about putting on her housecoat, and then shrugged that idea off. She went through Kris’s trousers and pulled out his wallet. There was the credit card. There was the driver’s license. An Amazon card. A Wallington college ID. Aha, this would do.
She took the ID and placed the wallet back in Kris’s trousers, and then she slipped the ID into her bureau and placed it under the Bible her father had given her when he had found Jesus, which she had never read and told herself she never planned to.



“Well, you’ve got to tell him,” she told herself as she stood outside of I-Hop, hugging her shoulders and smoking a cigarette. As she watched the cars drive down Southdale, she knew she wasn’t out here because she needed to smoke so badly. She needed to think.
“That’s the whole reason you took it. You’ve got to give it to him.”
Jenean took one last drag, and then tossed her cigarette out into the parking lot.
“Well, fuck it,” she said.
She took out her phone quickly and dialed the number on the card.
The phone rang for longer than she thought it should and she was about to hang up when a dense, sleepy voice said, “Hello?”
“Uh, hello… Ahhh... Is this Kris Strauss?”
“This is.”
Now she felt stupid.
“You wouldn’t know me. Not my voice. I mean. We met the other night. On Christmas. You stayed the night.”
“Oh,” Kris said.
Before she could read what that O meant or make him think she was crazy, she said, “Your ID fell out of your wallet, and I thought you should have it back. It says….” She pretended to squint over it, “Willmington College.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Uh… you do want it?”
“Yeah. Yes, Yes I do.”
Some men were so afraid of sex they ran away as soon as the condom came off. She’d wondered if he might be like that, not even care about the ID, hang up and block her number.
“I get off in about an hour. You could come tonight, or you could come tomorrow. Or,” she stated again, “you could come tonight.”
“I’ll come in about an hour and a half.”
“Do you remember where I live?”
“Yes,” Kris said, “I do.


“I really like having sex with you,” Joyce said.
Peter laughed out loud.
“No, I do,” Joyce said. “You’re… very good at this.”
“I feel like I should roll my hand and say, ‘Thank you m’lady’ in a British accent.”
Now Joyce laughed and she said, “I just… I’m a forthright person.”
“You sure in the fuck are.”
Peter turned over in bed and said, “You wanna cigarette or what?”
“I do,” Joyce said,
“I don’t smoke in front of other people, but I feel like…”
He stopped, shrugging, “I just feel like we know each other. Does that make sense?”
As he passed her a cigarette Joyce said, “Yes. Considering that we keep on getting into bed.”
“Say,” Peter said as he leaned forward and lit her cigarette, “Do you want to go on a date? Cause I feel like we’re seeing each other, and the whole third date sex thing is out of the way.”
“Do you know,” Joyce said, “if we do that, then we will actually reverse the order.”
Peter smiled stupidly and pushed his hair out of his eyes.
“I’m just not going to say anything right now.”
“Any why is that?”
“Because I’m turning into one of those guys who says the wrong thing. Starts talking about you meeting the kids and us going on vacations and… all that.”
Peter waved it off as he flicked his cigarette in the ashtray he’d put in the bed between them.
“Well, then let’s just forget you said anything about that.”
“I’m serious,” Peter said. “Let’s forget what I said and just enjoy each other. Mind if I get morose for a moment?”
“I feel like you’re ose enough.”
Peter frowned at her.
“That was a terrible joke.”
“What? Oh… more… ose. Wow, that was bad.”
“Don’t I know it? And sorry I interrupted you with an awful joke.”
“It’s just good to meet someone,” Peter said.
“You get divorced and suddenly you’re either undesirable or you’re thinking the next woman you meet has to be the mother of your children. But just… fuck all that… to meet someone. To meet you. Whatever the fuck this is, I like it.
“And now,” Peter said.
“And now what?”
“And now what are the thoughts in your head?” Peter said in his best German accent. “What are you trying not to say, trying to keep out of your mind?”
“That is… You’re an interesting man, Peter Keller.”
“I’m an alright guy,” Peter amended.
“No,” Joyce said. “No man ever laid next to me and asked me what was on my mind?”
“Well, you’ve been dating a bunch of assholes, then.” and Peter added, “M’lady.”
“I could tell you my bills are on my mind, and they are. I could tell you I wonder if I look fatter lying on my back, and that’s true too. There’s a lot of shit on my mind, but the reporter in me is curious.”
“About?”
“You?”
Peter grinned at her childishly and said, “I’m on your mind?”
“Well, Pamela Strauss is on my mind.”
“Oh,” Peter almost frowned. “I haven’t thought about her in years.”
“Or at least in a night.” Joyce turned over. “Marabeth got her journal.”
“Yes,” Peter said, his tone changing a little, though Joyce couldn’t quite say how.
“Aren’t you curious about it?”
“Not especially.”
And then Joyce said, “Marabeth had me read it. Well, some of it.”
“She did?”
Peter was saying small phrases, but he was changing with each phrase and Joyce wondered if she was afraid, but realized she wasn’t. She trusted him.
“She thinks she’s a werewolf,” Joyce said quickly. “She… I thought I shouldn’t say anything. Thought maybe I shouldn’t bring it up to you, but I’ve been thinking about that since you asked me to come walking with you. Since, really since I’ve met you.”
“Marabeth is your friend.”
“She’s my best friend.”
“Right,” Peter said, turning to lie on his back. “You wouldn’t just… tell your best friend’s crazy business. Not even to her cousin you’d just started sleeping with. Especially,” Peter amended, “not to her cousin you just started sleeping with. Not for the hell of it. Not unless you thought there was a possibility that it was true.”
Peter turned slowly to her, his blue eyes were tilted. He was looking, suddenly, wolfish, “not unless you were looking for confirmation.”
“Well,” Joyce said, “when you put it that way… I wish you’d stop looking at me that way.”
“Joyce,” Peter sighed, lying on his back again, “I’ve never gone to bed with a woman who asked me if I was a werewolf. This is kind of a first time discussion.”
“I get it,” Joyce said, “and I feel nuts discussing it, as nuts as I felt terrified a moment before and—”
“And I’ve never had to think about seriously answering,” Peter continued.
“Well, why would you? I mean—”
“And I hate liars, and I hate lying, so I’ll just tell you straight up, yes. Yes, I am.”
Joyce dropped the bed sheet before her breasts.
“What the fuck?”



THE BEASTS WILL RETURN ON WEDNESDAY

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a well done portion! I had forgotten about Kris and Jenean and Marabeth and the detective. Looks like Joyce has had a nasty shock with the werewolf business. Great writing and I look forward to more soon!

 

[ChrisGibson]

I don't think you could possibly not have a nasty shock if you had just finished having sex with someone who tells you point blank that he's a werewolf. Joyce was not expecting that all, and Peter is just not willing to tell lies.

 

[ChrisGibson]

Tonight, a double portion of The Beasts...

THE CONCLUSION OF CHAPTER SEVEN: LUST

“I stole your ID,” Jenean said when they both lay on the floor of her apartment, naked and looking up at the ceiling. “I’m crazy that way. I didn’t take your credit card, but I wanted some excuse to get a hold of you again.”
Kris’s eyes searched the ceiling for words.
“That is…”
“The most fucked up thing you’ve ever heard.”
“No,” Kris waved that away with his index finger. “It is definitely not the most fucked up thing I’ve ever heard. It’s actually kind of a compliment. Truth is, usually women tend to not want to see me more than a few times.”
“Well, we’ve made it to two, so is a few three? That means one more time before I hate you.”
“Well,” Kris turned over on his side, “we better make the most of tonight, then.”
“You know,” Jenean said, pushing the curtain of ash blond hair out of her eyes, “it really doesn’t matter that much when you think of the number of men I’ve hated that I seemed to not mind having sex with. And I totally shouldn’t have said that because it makes me sound like a huge slut.”
“I don’t think I’m in a position to talk,” Kris said. “What’s more, I don’t think it really matters.”
“That’s very renaissance of you.”
“Is it?” Kris said. “I feel like since we just had sex in the backseat of your car on Christmas in an I-Hop parkinlg lot, any other feeling would be hypocritical.”
“What were you doing in I-Hop?” Jenean said, “On Christmas night?”
Kris instantly thought of lying, but then he said, “I had just learned my Dad was dead.”
“Oh, shit.”
“I mean, he went missing half a year ago, so we assumed.”
“But still.”
“Yeah,” Kris said. “But now it’s certain, and then tonight we went to get him, his remains and…. It’s just kind of fucked up, but… fuck it, I don’t want to talk about this!”
He stretched out on the floor.
“I get it. Sorry.”
“No,” Kris said, “You don’t have anything to apologize for. We’re having a good time, and I like having a good time, and tomorrow morning I’m going to go back to all that. All that family stuff. But for tonight… This.”
“Well, my pussy hurts so we need to come up with a different kind of fun for a bit.”
“Fuck!” Kris laughed. “Well, then. Howabout you tell me about yourself.”
“That is as much fun as your story,” Jenean said. “The men in my family are weird and crazy and disappear. They have serious depression.”
“Sounds like the men in my family. Except for the disappearing thing.”
“My dad left when I was about five. My mom could never make ends meet. We were always being evicted, and getting our lights turned off. She turned into a total slut. She married my stepfather who molested me. Uh… there are a lot of real nuggets in my adolescence. It would make some interesting books. Maybe not books you’d want to read, but, still. I left home when I was seventeen, and went in search of my father.”
“Did you find him?”
“Yes.”
“And was that a good thing?”
“Not entirely. But that’s a whole set of stories too. Ends in me narrowly escaping a gang rape in Vegas and making my way back across the country On The Road style, except for the boring white male self pity of Jack Kerouac.”
Kris said, “I always did think that was kind of a whiney book.”
“I fucking hate it, and I’m pretty sure Kerouac was homosexual.”
“Some people say bisexual.”
“Bisexual is what you say when you don’t want to admit you’re gay. The only people who are bisexual are vampires and those assholes don’t exist.”
When she said this a look passed over Kris’s face, and suddenly he thought of being in the chamber underneath the church in Chicago, of the moment when Lawrence, that vampire, had stood beside him and Eve Moreland had handed Kris the letter and then Laurie had handed her the bag and the human head had fallen out of it.
“At least,” Jenean amended, “they’d better not be real.”
“I’m glad I met you, Jenean,” Kris said.
“Why, cause my life is more fucked up than yours?”
“No,” Kris said, “because you’re strong, and when I listen to you I think, well hell, maybe I can be strong too. Maybe.”


Jim Strauss blinked and realized he was in a dark room in Ohio, which should not have been strange except he had thought he was somewhere else, in a house full of light. He was lying in bed with his lover, and this was not Ryan. He was a handsome man about the same size as him, young, tender. Jim felt tender to him even though he had no idea who he was, even though he was clearly a figment of his imagination. He had a beautiful rounded face, trimmed by the thinnest of beards and he looked quiet and full of peace. This man had lain in the bed beside him, on his back, mouth open and palms up, breathing softly. Seth had known him before. They had lain in this bed together. They had stood on a lake before and he had said to him, or the other way around, “I’ve known you forever.”
The other man said, “I used to not understand my dreams. They used to terrify me but they don’t anymore.”
Jim almost knew his name and every time he was about to say it, the name disappeared.

But now Jim was here, and alone, and the house was chilly the way it got this time before the furnace came back on early in the morning. There was a vague light down the hall, and Jim climbed out of bed, put on his shirt, smoothed his hair out of his face and went into the hallway to see Marabeth’s door half open. When he went to tap on her door, he pushed it open a little. She was not there. He left the room and went downstairs. The light was on in the kitchen and Jim walked through the house and down the hall toward where Marabeth was sitting up with… the Detective from the other night?
“Is this a party?” he asked.
“It could be,” Marabeth said.
“Can I get you guys something?”
Marabeth shook her head.
“I’m good on tea,” she said.
Then she said, “I couldn’t sleep, and lucky for me—or unlucky—Detective McCord had a pair of father’s cuff links to bring over.”
The long tall redheaded man with the broad face nodded.
“Thank you for that,” Jim nodded to him. Then he said to his cousin, “What kept you up? Uncle Nate?”
“No,” Marabeth shook her head.
“You should tell him,” the detective said.
Jim looked at this man. Why would he know anything? What had she told him?”
“It’s the journal,” Marabeth said.
“You can’t read too much of what Pamela Strauss said,” Jim said, “At least, not from what I know of her.”
“You should read the book,” Marabeth said.
“When?” said Jim, closing the microwave and turning it on.
“Now.”
“But…” Jim began, “what about you?’
“I can’t read it all,” Marabeth shook her head. “In fact, truthfully, I can’t read any of it. Not now. It’s becoming too real.”
Jim raised an eyebrow and looked at her.
“I can’t explain it,” she said. “Not now. But… ”
“Okay,” Jim nodded. “I’ll read it. Where is it?’
“On my bed.”
Jim nodded again. “I’ve been having strange dreams too. I’ll take it to my room and read it with my tea. See if it gets me to sleep.”
“Yeah,” Marabeth shook her head, “I don’t think it’ll do that.”

























When Jim left, Marabeth said, “Detective—”
“Call me Jason.”
“Well, alright. Jason, I really should probably be getting to bed too.”
“You sure?” Jason said.
“Well, I mean, I guess I’m a cunt,” Marabeth realized. “Having you come over in the middle of the night and then here I am sort of like saying, see you, and you’re a guest in my home, Well, my family’s home.”
“No, No,” Jason McCord stood up, smoothing out his trousers.. “I just mean you seemed pretty shaken.”
“I was pretty shaken.” Marabeth had not said anything about the dream of Hagano or Hagano making love to her. She had not said anything about waking up and… no, best not to think about that now.
“I could sit up with you for a little while,” he said.
“That’s good. I mean, I shouldn’t ask you to do that, but—”
“But I would like to.”
“And I would like you to.”
“We can go to the parlor. Or to the library.”
“I’d like to see the library,” Jason said.
“You know,” Marabeth said as they entered the library and Jason closed the door, “A few days ago I would have never imagined any of this. I mean, how could you? And yet, right now it all seems like it makes perfect sense, like, of course this shit is true. What to do with it all, I don’t know, though.”
“I feel like we’re talking about more than finding your missing father,” Jason said.
“We may be.”
They sat down on either side of the fireplace. She wondered how bad she looked at this time of night. He was the kind of man who, like her cousins, was in trousers, shirt and tie even this late. It went well with his sort of longish red hair.
“I know how you feel, though.” Jason McCord said. “Maybe. I mean, that’s the way I felt about my family. I always heard things, but when I knew… certain things, it made sense. Everything just made more sense. Even if I wasn’t really part of it.”
“Do you wish you were?”
“Not really,” Jason said. “Do you?”
“I think I am,” Marabeth said after an uncertain moment. “I think I am only I don’t know how. Which I guess is better than…” not knowing how to control something that just happens to me.
Jason tilted his head, and then he said, “Well... if you are able to figure out whatever it is you need to, do you think you will?”
“Yes,” Marabeth said more quickly than she’d meant to. “My Aunt Pamela did, and if I can do it the way she did, I definitely will.”
Then she said, “But why am I so afraid?”
And then she said, “Fuck it!”
“What?” Jason almost laughed.
“I… my aunt’s book is making me feel strange.”
“What kind of strange?”
“What I didn’t say…”
But still, she could not say it, and she simply said, “I haven’t had sex n a year. I vowed I would never let that happen to me. It’s making me strange.”
“That isn’t right,” Jason said. “You’re a beautiful woman.”
“I…” Marabeth began, and then she laughed.
“I don’t even have the energy to deny it.”
“And sexy.”
“You’re not so bad yourself.”
“No,” Jason admitted, laughing, “I don’t suppose I am.”
His shirt fit him. She could see the outlines of a fit body through it, and his trousers fit well. She had to stop herself from looking at the bulge between his legs.
What’s wrong with me?
The lust rose in her. Her mouth watered as she felt herself getting wet.
Neither one of them said anything, and there was simply the staccato ticking of the clock above them, the portrait of Friederich looking to Pamela over their heads.
“Do you think I’m some kind of slut?” Marabeth said.
“What?” Jason said, almost sleepily.
“Women never know how to ask for what they want.”
“That’s a… this conversation has…” everything Jason started to say he seemed too sleepy to say. It didn’t seem quite honest.
“What do you want, Marabeth?”
“You have to not judge me.”
“No.”
She could still feel the ghostly lands of Hagano on her body, his knee pressing her thighs open, his body, heavy, pushing between her legs. She slid down to her knees, and unzipped Jason’s trousers.
“Goddamn,” he said.
His dick popped up, thick and darker than the rest of him, and she took it in her mouth, down, down to the back of her throat, almost gagging, rising up, taking it it in again while his hands gripped the sides of the chair. She pulled down his Jockeys and worked at his trousers.
“Do you want to fuck me?” she demanded.
“I want to fuck you,” Jason’s voice was thick as he climbed out of the chair and put her down on the floor, opening her thighs so she wrapped her legs around him.
As he pushed himself inside of her, and felt Marabeth’s hands gripping his ass, Jason growled, “I wanna fuck you so bad right now.”

MORE TOMORROW

 

[CharmedFan28]

Great to get back to this story and thanks for the double portion! Looks like Kris and Marabeth are having some fun. Pamela's journal seems to be affecting the family more then they thought it would. Excellent writing and I look forward to more tomorrow!

 

[ChrisGibson]

What's happening with Marabeth and the Detective will soon be fleshed out as I realize, the first go around it was not. A lot is happening tonight.