Ephemera & Tales

A short Christmas ghost story, written in response to a challenge at Just_Writing

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It was bitter cold this year. The snow that brought the city to a halt earlier in the week, which made the solstice celebrations glitter and shine in the darkness, has gone. The iron grey that was left had Col cold to the bone, and it wasn't surprising that everyone else who had a warm cosy place to be chose to be there instead. It left the Christmas woods deserted. Just him, and the drip of water slowly rolling together on a leaf, the sharp rustle as a bird took wing. Col thrust his hands deeper into his poachers pockets, and hunched his shoulders, trying to shield his heart from the cutting wind. ( Read more... )

for samcdermott65, who's resolution was Lose 20 lbs. Curb the wine consumption or eliminate it all together. Eat healthier.

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Mark stretched out, languorous and heavy-limbed, coming so gradually awake that he wasn't sure if he was still dreaming. They'd collapsed together in the recovery coma of le petite mort, so the gas lights were still casting their gilded glow over the scene: Mark's dark wooden floors strewn with discarded garments, his own leg, thrown over the side of the mahogany framed day-bed, the muscle-shaded back of the beautiful young man who was sprawling across Mark's lap.

Oh yes, the New Year was off to a sterling start! ( Read more... )

I've been thinking about the turn of the year, and this came along : a little snippet of an epilogue for my centaurs.

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The solstice night had come quickly. ( Read more... )

for cicirossi - mist, train, loyal

The whole school had been caught up in excitement about Christmas and the upcoming break for what felt like forever. At least now he was in the upper school he didn't have so share a dorm with eleven Christmas-enthused whispering teenagers. Just one, very determined, fellow student, who's absence was most of the reason Christian wasn't looking forward to the three weeks holiday. Lucian was – Lucian had won his heart, spun dreams between them, accepted Christian's adulation, and taught him un-thought-of pleasures, all in the brief weeks since he had joined the student body.

Lucian was currently on the train winding its way across the mist-soaked moors, back towards Sheffield and then London and his family and his other life. Christian was alone in their room, writing formal letters to distant cousins and looking forward to Christmas spent with the Head and his prim un-welcoming wife not at all.
Lucian had spoken of parties, of dinners and theatre and dancing till after midnight every night for a week. Of débutantes and elegant dresses and silk stocking and silkier skin above them. He'd spoken of these things, eyes dancing and a smirk pulling at his kiss-swollen lips, and when Christian had gone silent, looked away, Lucian had caught his hand and promised, expansive and ebullient, punctuated by kisses and touches that made Christian gasp, that of course he would be loyal, faithful, true to what they had found. That the girls were for show, the parties expected as much as anticipated, and that his heart would stay within the four bare walls of their room, wherever his body may roam.

This one comes in between this entry and this one over at runeden.

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He wasn't sure how it had happened, but his parents were playing host to his dad's whole extended family this Thanksgiving. He knew that suggesting he might go over to Ru's would get him a lecture about putting friends before family, but with the crush for sleeping space it had seemed like quite the gentlemanly thing to do to offer to spend the night back at the Halls. His mom had looked like she was about to object, 'till his gram cut in to agree.

"The winter weather isn't settled in yet" she argued "so there's no reason at all why his father couldn't run Trent down, and then pick him up again tomorrow before breakfast, now is there Madeleine? That way the girls can share in his room, and I'll get a proper night's sleep without them all in with me, bickering over the blankets."

He'd seen his mom take on school boards and ballet teachers and competition judges and sales clerks in Macey's, but never her mother in law. So now he was here, with the building practically echoing with emptiness, curled up and cosy with a stack of books, listening to the lonely wind battering against the windows and enjoying the space.

So cold tonight. I couldn't sleep, so I took my bike out for a bit of a run - went up round the common and back through the park, and half three on a Sunday night there's no one around, just frost and mist and street lights. I was beautiful out on the common - so quiet, you could almost forget that you were in London, and only my bike lights to cut the mist. Just as I was coming back up from Park Drive we got the first few flakes of snow. Touch wood that it's going to settle - I think it will - there was enough frost to lay the foundations for it. ( Read more... )