I stared into the drawer for what seemed like hours as I struggled with the existential question that threatened to undo my entire mental defences. What underwear to wear.
The plain knickers were all in the wash basket and I was left with a choice of feminine lace and bows or a thong.
I gave in and chose the former, feeling yet another small, fragile, part of my oh so vulnerable masculinity fall away.
Some part of me, deep down, knew it was pathetic. But it had been ingrained in me for a lot of bloody years, about what a man was. While I was more than willing to admit that some of those ingrained ideas were fucking stupid, once I'd learned a bit more about the real world, they were hard to shake off.
Dressing quickly, I realised that the only two reasonably conservative dresses had been worn, which left me with something tight, low cut and short enough my ass would be hanging out. Or a skirt.
Which meant when I descended the stairs, I wore a flared pink skirt, white fitted blouse that clung a little too much across the chest for my liking, and a pair of black tights that itched like hell. My hair, no matter how much I brushed it, still insisted on falling into my eyes, so I'd pulled it back with one of those stupid little clips I'd found on the dresser.
The final insult?
White trainers with glitter on the sides.
I looked like a walking advert for 'trying too hard to look cute,' and the worst part was… it worked.
My day was not off to a great start.
Anna was waiting at the table in the kitchen, mug of herbal tea in her hand. She smiled a greeting as she chatted amiably with Nicole.
"Where's… ah… dad?" I asked.
"Clearing leaves in the garden," Nicole answered, looking up. "Are you planning on going out again?"
"Fraid so."
"Well, don't push yourself too much. You're still not well, I can tell."
How? I would have asked but I was afraid that the answer would be that I wasn't acting like 'myself' and so I just smiled and made some polite small talk while Anna finished her drink and then made our escape.
"You feeling better this morning?" she asked, and I grunted.
"Not really."
"Kevin still not messaged, huh?"
"That's not…" I stopped in my tracks, fists clenched by my side and shaking as I shook my head vehemently. "I am not upset about that."
"Course not, hon." She laughed and I threw my head back, groaning, before I stomped off after her.
Alan stopped his raking of the leaves long enough to wave, which I returned with a grimace beneath Anna's amused smile, and climbed into the car with her.
"So," she said. "Last night I had an idea."
"Oh?"
"Yeah, lot of time to think when I was driving home."
"Go on then. What is it?"
She just grinned and started the engine. You're gonna love this."
Anna explained the plan as we drove and while I was hesitant to agree, I realised that we didn't have much else to go on. So, as risky as it sounded, it was the best option we had.
I mean, what's the worst that could happen?
It seemed that as soon as we hit Harehills, I felt it, that deep oppression pushing against my psyche. An almost palpable pressure against my skull like the feeling you sometimes got when the weather changed, and a storm approached.
Can't say I was a fan of it.
Anna felt it too. Her smile had faded and worry lines showed around her eyes as she chewed her lip. I smoothed my skirt over my legs anxiously and wondered again if the plan was worth trying.
Then we arrived at the cemetery, and I knew that the chance to back out had passed.
We were committed.
Beckett Street Cemetery had closed to interments in 2001, though it remained open to visitors. Which was good, since that meant we were less likely to be seen as there were few people about early on a Sunday morning.
It covered ten acres and seemed overrun with trees that provided shade for visitors as they walked the long winding paths amongst the gravestones. It was still care for, the grass cut, and weeds removed, but there was still an eerie emptiness to the place, a feeling of abandonment.
I wondered idly how many ghosts lingered in this place as I paced along the path, past moss-covered gravestones that hadn't been visited in decades. Those interred, having died almost a century before.
"Oldest part of the cemetery," Anna said. "Less likely to be noticed here."
"Sure, whatever."
I glanced at my phone, brow furrowing and stuffed it back into my purse in irritation. I resolved not to check it again.
Would be his fault if I missed his message.
If he ever sent one.
With a sigh, I leant back against a gravestone and folded my arms as I watched Anna unpack the items she'd brought with her in a backpack.
Simple things. The sort I would have expected a witch to have. Thick waxy looking candles, long stems of dried plants, small off-white bits of bone that I really hoped came from an animal that died of natural causes, and a big leather-bound book.
"Cool," I murmured, and she grinned back at me.
"Grans," she said by way of explanation. "Her mum's before her, and Her's before that."
"Lot of history." I grinned back at her. "No male witches then? Bit sexist, innit."
"There are male witches," she said primly, turning her nose up at me. "Just not in my family."
"Why's that?"
"Long line of girls."
"Fair enough."
It was clearly a sore subject, and I dropped it before I annoyed her too much. A bit of banter was always nice to have, but I didn't want to go too far and hurt her feelings.
Something that I'd have not considered when I was in my own body.
"Let's get this moving," I said.
Anna poured a fine white powder in a circle and set the candle in the centre. She'd chosen a spot behind one of the gravestones, shielded from the light breeze. She had no lighter or matches though, so I wasn't sure that would even matter.
The bones were scattered around the candle in a pattern that I suspected made sense to her, and she held the dried sprig in her right hand, as she knelt before the circle. Her eyes closed and she murmured soft words that landed on the edge of hearing, no matter how I strained to hear.
With a final word, she waved the plant over the candle, and I blinked as it flared to life, sputtering with a soft, purple flame.
"Very cool," I murmured.
"Come," Anna said, pointing imperiously at the other side of the circle. "Quickly."
I did as instructed, wincing as my tights absorbed the morning dew that lay on the grass. Then, hands on my knees, I settled back and waited.
More chanting as she waved the plant in a circle above the flame. I wrinkled my nose as I caught the soft scent of copper, which made no sense at all.
Anna caught my eye and nodded. I did as she'd instructed earlier, and held my right hand out palm down, over the flame. The dried plant was waved over, then around my hand and finally it was placed against my palm.
"Okay." She was breathless, her chest rising and falling as though she'd run a marathon. "Are you ready?"
"As I'll ever be."
"Then close your hand."
"That simple, huh?"
She smiled, and I took a deep breath. Then closed my hand around the plant.
The world spun as everything shifted, like an image splitting in two, I saw double, and I gasped. "Holy crap."
"Can you see it?" her voice echoed from a distance, and I nodded absently looking around, hand still gripping the dried plant.
My palm began to itch.
"Hurry," she gasped.
Light filled the world. A million different colours and hues shifting and changing wherever I looked. It danced amongst the blades of grass, and threaded through the naked branches of the trees, hanging like gossamer spiders' webs in a rainbow array of colour and patterns that dizzied the mind.
I twisted my neck, straining to see, to take it all in.
Then I saw it.
A black shadow in the distance.
"I see it," I said, licking my lips, suddenly nervous.
"Focus," Anna cried, "Find the source."
Easy for her to say.
I squinted my eyes at the patch of darkness and then I was moving, though I could still feel the damp earth beneath my knees. The cold breeze on my skin, and the growing heat in my hand as the itching sensation crept up my wrist, intolerable, aching to be scratched.
But I had to resist as I rode a wave of light, dancing from strand to strand with my mind. Skipping past the multi-colours of families in their homes. The golden hues of the dogs being walked, by a splotch of purple and brown.
Silvery flickers swooped and dived as birds sang emerald, green songs that hung in the air, and beneath it all, a patch of darkness.
Berkeley Steet, I recognised it. One of the side streets.
The pain in my hand was becoming intolerable. The itch up to my elbow. I surreptitiously pressed my elbow to my side, trying to stop the itch but it only made it worse, as it spread across my ribs.
"Fuck," I said, whimpering.
"Hurry," Anna repeated. "Please, hon. Hurry."
The darkness covered a large area, growing and spreading like a fungus. Everything it touched, darkened, the light losing its lustre as splotches of shadow spread through them. The closer to the centre, the less colour there remained, just shadows and darkness, warring with one another, a constant battle full of violent rage.
"Chloe!" Anna insisted. "Please!"
My hand was cramping, fingers bending back unnaturally away from the plant. The itch was at my shoulder, a creeping pain sinking deeper into my skin the further it went. The need to scratch, to tear at my skin with my nails was all consuming.
Sweat ran down my cheek, my blouse sticking to my back as my body trembled.
There!
The centre of the darkness.
A patch of black so great that it absorbed all colours.
I knew it. Could feel it.
A demon.
Then I felt its eyes on me, and I screamed, hand opening and dried plant bursting into flame that consumed it in an instant.
As I fell back, Anna swept her arm across the circle, breaking it and scattering the components.
"It saw me!" I cried, shaking.
Anna crawled across the grass, visibly shaken, skin of her face pale as she pulled me close, stroking my back and rocking me like a child.
"It's okay," she cooed. "I broke the spell. It can't track us."
But it could.
I could feel it, a dark presence on the edge of my vision. Searching.
"It knows we're looking for it," I breathed, voice trembling. "It'll tell the others."
"We need to go," she agreed. "To be safe."
She hurriedly gathered the spell components and stuffed them into her backpack before we left, trotting along the path and away from the site of the spell. My fingers ached as though they'd been bent backwards, pulled out of their sockets and then reset.
The itch that filled my arm was fading, but it took every ounce of willpower I had not to scratch it.
"We need to go now," I said, as we reached the car.
She threw the backpack into the back seat and arched a brow. "Where?"
"Berkeley Grove." I licked dry lips and shook my hand, before rubbing the fingers, trying to ease the ache. "It's in a house in Berkeley Grove."
"We find it," she said. "We take it alive."
"You think we can do that?"
"If you want answers," she said, grimacing. "We're gonna have to."
I shivered, the feeling of being watched growing with each passing moment. I could feel it's questing mind, searching for the one that dared to spy on it.
"It'll be waiting," I muttered, climbing into the car. "We could use help."
I reached for my purse and pulled out my phone. No messages. I didn't have a choice though. I thumbed through the contacts and clicked dial on a number.
It rang seven times before a voice, groggy with sleep, answered. "What?"
"Kevin," I said. "I need your help."