Chapter 5: The Red Mist

"Tanya, Tanya, oh please, please Tanya, wake up my love please!" It was Lucy's voice.

It must have been raining as I could feel it on my face. Drops of wet salty rain dropped on my face. Tears? Yes that was it, tears not rain. Someone was crying.

"Oh God forgive me! Tanya, PLEASE WAKE UP!!" What did she want?

The sharp pain of the slap, cut though my reverie and I woke with a start. "OUCH!! Fuck off. What was that for?" I said shocked.

Lucy stood beside my bed naked. Her face was contorted with misery and pain, she was weeping in a way I had never seen before. Instinctively I got to my feet and reached for her, whatever or whoever had hurt her would need to answer to me. She backed off and I saw her twisting from the hip. Her hand came from my left side over my shoulder. This time she meant it, the slap sent me spiralling backwards and if it had not been for the bed I would have gone to the floor. My head spun with the force of the blow and the side of my head hurt, she had caught me on the side of the head above the ear. She fell on my back as I lay face down on the bed.

"You fucking stupid bitch, what the fucking hell do you think you are doing." She was sitting astride me, shaking me. "I never ever want to see you again, do you hear me, we are finished, I hate you!"

She slid from my back and off the bed onto the floor weeping uncontrollably, between the sobs she swore at me. "You fucking idiot, you stupid, stupid fucking whore bag cow, don't ever come near me again, I love you, I hate you. OH FUCK YOU." She curled into a ball and cried. She was curled up on her knees her back arched and I could see the sobs being wrought from deep inside her.

I slid from the bed to her side and put my hand on her back. "Lucy, my dearest Lucy what on earth have I done.? You know I would not hurt you for the world. The last I remember we were so happy! What happened.?"

"Your asking me what happened? I should be asking you, you animal. You frightened me so. I have never seen you like that before and I never will again, because we are finished, do you hear me? Finished." She meant every word, that I knew.

"Lucy, oh Lucy my love, it is something I cant control, please listen to me, please" I told her about it all. Even Roy. She sat on the floor and listened, watching me closely as I tried to explain the red mist and the effect that stretching my cunt had upon me.

She rose and started to dress. I opened my drawer and selected a short pleated mini skirt and sweatshirt, she had a mini kilt and sweatshirt. When we had dressed I put my hand out to her but she knocked it away. I was afraid she was going to do it, to finish it with me and the fear made me cry softly. She started down the stairs but stopped three steps down and looked back. I sat on the end of the bed and looked at her tear streaked face, I pleaded silently for her to change her mind, she looked down the stairs and then back at me. Then she turned and walked back. My heart leapt and as she entered the room I stood and waited.

"Hit me again if you want, scratch my eyes out if you want, stick a knife in me and cut my heart out Lucy but please don't walk out on me, please" I closed my eyes unable to stand the pain of seeing her turn away again.

"Sit down and shut up," she said. I opened my eyes and she stood before me, still angry and hurt. I sat on the bed and she sat at my side. "How much do you remember? What point do you remember up to?"

"We had been having fun with that big thing, you had my legs under your armpits and you were fucking me with it, or trying too. I felt the end stretching me and it hurt like hell, I tried to say stop, but the red mist came and it stopped hurting! No, that's not true, it still hurt, but I loved it. Then came the thick blanket and that was it, I was waking up" I shrugged my shoulders.

"I bent you double to get maximum spread, I was looking at how it was stretching you and I asked you to promise to tell me to stop if I hurt you." I nodded yes, I remembered that. "Then you just opened up and swallowed the damn thing, it went in so far and so fast it scared the wits out of me. I tried to pull it out but you grabbed hold of my wrist and would not let go." She showed me the back of her hand, I saw the imprints of my nails. "Then you started screaming and shouting. We both swear Tanya, and it was not the words, it was the animal that was saying them, it was not you. It was not the girl I have loved all my life. It was as if you had been taken over by something, a different person. I don't love that person Tanya, I don't know her and I don't like her. If I ever see her again I shall never come back. Do you understand?"

"Yes Lucy, I understand. But please, please don't go, please"

"Do you remember my cousin Alan?"

"Um, yes, I think so, he died didn't he?" It had been years ago and I hardly knew him.

"When he was 12. I was only 6 and can hardly remember it. He started having fits, he changed, got very angry and moody. They took him into hospital and gave him some treatment but he died. He had a tumour. A brain tumour. I don't want you dying on me, not like that. If you promise me, I mean promise me that you and I will go together to see Dr Thomas on Monday evening then I will stay. OK?"

I nodded. We fell into each others arms and wept together till we fell asleep.

I woke suddenly and sat upright, beside me Lucy was also awake and sitting up.

"What the fuck was that?" We asked the same question of each other.

From downstairs had come a massive crash followed by the most awful wailing sound. I crept to the top of the stairs and Lucy followed me. A low moaning could be heard, it seemed to be coming from the kitchen, Lucy made to start down the stairs but I held her back. I pulled her to my bedroom and from behind the door produced my hockey sticks. We had one each. I lead the way step by step down the stairs.

"Are we Hammer Horror or The Bells of St Trinians?" Lucy giggled

There was a foul odour about the house, evil, thick and bitter sweet. We reached the bottom of the stairs and I could see one of the cupboards in the kitchen was open and the ironing board and mop on the floor. As I peered round the door I caught sight of it. I leapt back and bumped into Lucy. I put my finger to my lip, signalled my intention, she nodded her understanding. I counted on my fingers, 1,2,3 and we both charged screaming into the kitchen holding our hockey sticks high. The sight that met our eyes was the most dreadful I had seen in my life. It was like a long pink maggot, it shimmered in the sunlight that fell through the kitchen window. At one end, the end nearest us was a mass of writhing brown snake like tentacles, from below these dull red eyes glowed menacingly. Two spindly arms equipped with talon like claws were clawing at the kitchen work top as the creature from hell raised itself onto what appeared to be two leg less feet protruding from the far end. With a hideous wail the creature launched itself at us, reaching for us with its outstretched claws, then tripped over the ironing board and fell flat on its face.

"Oooooohhhhh please someone help me" said Christine's voice.

"What the fuck is that?" I asked

"If I am not mistaken its the Grandpapa of all hangovers my dear," said Lucy.

We sat her on one of the stools and she leaned over the sink. The kettle was put on boil and black coffee made. Half an hour and five mugs of strong black coffee and she started to surface. She had had the presence of mind to find the bucket in the kitchen cupboard and had used it to vomit in. She had slept on the sofa and crawled on hands and knees from lounge to kitchen but was unable to stand upright at the sink. I took the bucket into the garden and rinsed it with the outside tap, tipping it down the open gully. Lucy and I had been swopping glances and we sat beside her, she looked so pathetic you would need a heart of stone not to offer some sort of help.

"Your both so lucky, you don't know how lucky you are. You have your family, your friends, each other. Do you know what I would give for just one true friend?" We looked at each other and shrugged, she was not far wrong.

"You have Roy" Lucy ventured.

"Oh no! You don't understand. He was just using me to pass his 'A' levels. Maths is my thing you see. Its OK. I don't mind, the situation is clear enough and scatty as I may be I was never under any elusion that it was otherwise. No! Now we have finished the exams he will dump me and go off with one of the pretty girls. I would have given anything for... just once... you know what I mean." We looked at each other, yes we knew, "but that is my fate. To be alone!"

"Your not really on your own though are you? I mean you have... your family?" I was struggling. She never talked about her family.

She smiled a little and sat upright. "Family? No! I have no family. Not as you would recognize a family. Mother and Father live separate lives. She is a Lawyer; he is a Surgeon. Both at the top, so they say. She lives in London, he is in the US. Got three children over there with a nurse he would marry, but she will not divorce him. I get a Christmas card and a photo, but we will never meet, my half sisters and half brother that is. My brother Brian has finished his... well, call it training, and is in the army. He comes to visit sometimes. Other than that it is just me and Mrs Whitelaw the housekeeper. Brian and I were packed off to boarding schools as soon as we were old enough, but I kept running away. Five years ago they gave up, and said I should live in the house at Baker Crescent. Elsie, that's Mrs Whitelaw, arranged for me to attend school and here we all are! I thought if I was a normal child things would change but they did not. I hated the children at boarding school; stuck up snobs, but you all think that of me. To you I am the same as they are to me! I am too different; talk like a prat; got a plum in my mouth, they say behind my back. I dress like the village idiot, lets face it I am the 'OWL'"

Lucy's face had been changing all the while Chris had been talking, she and I valued our families above all else, except maybe our friendship. She certainly looked different in my eyes all of a sudden. I glanced at Lucy and shrugged. She took hold of a lump of Chris's hair and scowled at it.

"Who did this?"

"My friends last night, I was a little drunk at the time, what have they done?" Chris asked.

"The same 'friends' did your make up did they?" She asked

"Yes, I have not seen myself in a mirror, what's it like?"

"Think 'Little Shop of Horrors' " I advised.

"Right," said Lucy, leaping up from her stool. "The Bastards have done it now, this is war. Chris! Shower!"

We almost carried Chris upstairs and deposited her in the bathroom. Lucy went into Alex's room and emerged with the giant dildo we had used earlier. She said nothing, but disappeared down stairs. A while later I heard the lid of the trash bin close. She came back and sat beside me, we sat on the end of my bed and waited.

She opened the door and crept in looking awful. She had a hangover from last night and had been crying. She was about to be dumped by my brother, I did feel sorry for her as he had used her to help him pass his 'A' level mathematics, and was now going to just carry on as he had before. Fucking anything that moved. She had her hair wrapped in a towel and one of the beach sheets that mum had replaced all the bath towels with wrapping her from armpit to floor. I asked if she felt any better and she said she did.

"Earlier this morning, before I was fully awake, I heard you two..." She fluffed at the air with her hands. "I was not being nosey but I could not help but hear you." Lucy blushed and I giggled, "It sounded so beautiful and loving, something I have never had. Never will have. I love Roy with all my heart and when he says goodbye that will be my one chance gone. I do not fool myself, I do not want you to try and convince me it is anything but the truth, I am plain ugly." She smiled a watery smile at us. "Best bet is a blind man; that's what they say behind my back, I've heard them."

"Maybe its a case of the book and the cover" I offered

"Sorry?" she looked puzzled.

"The gift and the wrapping" I shrugged and looked at Lucy for help.

"I don't see what you mean" Floundered Chris

"Let's peel your onion" said Lucy "See how many layers we need to remove before we get to the you inside"

Chris had sat on the end of the bed and I stood with my back to the door, Lucy was on the bed behind Chris. Lucy removed the towel that held Chris's hair and it fell down over her head.

"Shake your head," Lucy ordered and Chris complied. "Shit, what did they do? Put a bucket over your head and cut round the bottom.

Her hair was the same length all round, shoulder length. She looked up at me, like an Old English Sheepdog. I bent down to eye level and peered at her through the curtain of damp hair.

"Um, are you in there Chris? You look like you could do with a decent cut."

She shrugged. "What's the point?" Her head was down and I could feel her despair.

"The point is" I lifted her chin as I spoke "Do you want Roy or not?"

"If it was only the one time I would be happy"

Lucy parted her hair with her fingers from behind, I put my head on one side, "Your not so bad as you make yourself look. Lucy, can you help?"

Lucy was feeling her hair and running it through her fingers, "Get the box," she smiled and winked.

Fay, Lucys Mum, was a hairdresser. Years ago she had put together a box of tools so that Mum could save money by cutting the families hair. Over the years Mum had got very good, but she was not a patch on Lucy. Fay said it was in Lucy blood, I don't know, she just had the knack. She cut mine and all her families and if anyone could do something with Chris's mop it was her.

When we moved, just after Alex was born, every thing went into boxes and they were marked with tape and thick pen as to the contents. The box Lucy referred to was the box the tool kit had been moved in and it still had the tape with 'Barbers tools' on it. It took a minute to get it from the kitchen and by the time I returned she and Chris were in the bathroom; Chris sat on the chair from my room. The bathroom floor was covered in vinyl and it was easier to clean up hair clippings.

Lucy held her face in her hands and tipped her head to one side and then the other, she took the long comb from the box and combed Chris' hair back, then forward, then over to one side, then the other. She took a deep breath and without a word set about the transformation. She snipped and clipped, she picked up the hair expertly between two fingers and judged the length and cut. It took no more than ten minutes and then she was standing back admiring her handy work. To her credit, not once did Chris question what we were doing to her.

"Shake your head" Lucy ordered. Chris obeyed shaking it vigorously.

"Carmen" Lucy put her hand out, and took from me the powerful little hairdryer, I had already plugged in, choosing the right extension for the job.

Five minutes and she sighed "Shake again."

The hair flew in all directions as Chris played her part. It settled back perfectly in place.

"That will do" said Lucy, with a small show of well deserved pride. "What do you think?"

Chris stood before the mirror in the bathroom and stared at herself. "Oh my goodness!" She whispered, "Oh my!" She shook her head and the hair fell back perfectly in place. "Oh Lucy you clever, clever little devil" she shouted and planted a kiss on Lucy's lips with a huge and exaggerated "MMMAAAHHH" sound.

"Now lets see the rest of you" I said, whipping the towel off from behind.