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| Image in the public domain |
My lover and I have a caravan and are looking for somewhere to park it for the night. We’re intending to have a lot of sex. We want somewhere that’s far away from other people so that we can have some peace and quiet, but we know that we mustn’t go back to any of the places we have already been. The problem is that there is a perfect spot, isolated and by the sea, that we’ve already visited. We can see it on the map which is also a real-life view of the location: it’s night-time, and the lights on the sea wall are burning yellow.
The solution is of course to make the caravan invisible. That way we’ll be able to go back and no one will know. There’s an invisible log, or rather a long heavy beam of rough wood, that will make the caravan invisible too if we bring it inside. Between us we manhandle the heavy beam through the caravan door in the dark. As we do this we are both visible and invisible at the same time: in visible form we are demons, with black shiny scarified skin and large bat-like ears.
I look into the lit windows of the caravan, which is now a train carriage. I can see the strange, wizened-baby face of the stranger. I have seen this person in the caravan before; it’s all rather mysterious. Once I’m inside the train carriage I realise that it’s my old schoolfriend G. I haven’t seen him for so many years, and I loved him so truly … I rush to embrace him, but as I pull back from the embrace I see that it’s a woman. “You’re not G!” I exclaim, rather dismayed. “But it is,” she says, and sits on my lap on the carriage seat. She’s dressed entirely in orange and yellow, wearing an orange-and-yellow striped tank-top like the one I had as a small child.
As she sits on my lap the two of us gaze together along the length of the carriage. Music starts playing: it’s the Carpenters, singing: Here you come again / Just when I’ve begun to get myself together / You waltz right in the door / Just like you’ve done before / And wrap my heart ’round your little finger … With a sudden realisation I exclaim to the woman on my lap: “You’re doing this!”
The people in the cave of orange crystals are transmitting readings from the crystals onto the small device I am holding, which is about the size and shape of a Kindle. They’re having to do so manually, and I’m surprised and impressed that they’ve manage to overcome the technical sabotage they’ve suffered. The coordinates they are transmitting will allow us to detect the vampires. I see a vision of the crystals, all yellow and orange, with golden light pouring through the cracks. The cave is so beautiful, and the people so brave.
Merl Fluin 