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humbly-a-doppelganger · 3 months

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The Stolen Child: Chapter 3 - Through the looking glass

Next -> 4

2 <- previous

Index

Timeless was a chaos.

All across the establishment, people screamed and cried and called for help. A few brave voices—Atalanta and her friend Daas included—did their best to calm the rest down, yet their efforts proved fruitless.

Cal’s whole attention was trained on Diana, who spasmed with such a strength that Cal couldn’t hold on to her any longer. Diana toppled to the floor, her knees and palms to the wooden tiles, and Cal watched in stupefied horror as her appearance mutated.

Diana’s dark skin turned onyx, the type of black that sucked out all light, and the veins running down her arms bulged up, acquiring a purple tone.

“Hey, Cal,” came Oliver’s voice “Don’t look at her, okay?”

Cal stepped back to her best friend, who enveloped her in his protective arms.

“She’s screaming,” she barely felt like she was speaking; her eyes were fixed on Diana, as she screamed and failed to resist whatever force had possessed her “Is this her secret?”

“She’ll be fine,” replied Oliver.

Cal ripped her eyes off Diana, about to demand how the fuck was she supposed not to worry. But Oliver wasn’t even looking at Diana. Instead, his eyes were fixed on the newcomer.

A child? thought Cal.

The stranger’s back faced them, and they couldn’t have possibly been more than seven. The kid wore an old-fashioned dress full of ruffles and lace and was slowly approaching a girl a few years Cal’s elder.

Terror twisted the girl’s face. A fast shadow curled around her neck. Cal blinked, and the girl’s neck was replaced with a fountain of blood.

Her head had been bitten off her shoulders. And it rolled its way to Cal.

“Martina!” a boy behind them cried.

The stranger turned around. Cal froze. Where the eyes and mouth of a little girl should have been, several aquamarine tentacles slithered out.

“What—what is—” Cal stammered.

“A sentinel gone rogue,” Oliver trembled “Please, Cal, don’t look.”

“You killed Martina!” cried the boy “Sentinels are supposed to protect us!”

The little girl didn’t deign to respond. Lightning-fast, she got in front of the boy, who tried to escape, but it was too late for that. Her tentacles shot out and ripped his head clean off his neck. The boy’s head joined his friend’s beside Cal and Oliver.

“Don’t look,” Oliver nudged Cal’s face to his shoulder “Come on, Cal.”

“Oliver—”

“Atalanta studies at Emtikax. Daas is in the army. Please, Cal, don’t look.”

“No!”

Oliver had been whispering, but Cal didn’t control her voice.

The little girl whipped to them. Her tentacles vibrated. In recognition? A sick gut feeling intimated that, at the very least, she recognised something in Cal.

The little girl opened her jaws. Hid behind the tentacles were rows stacked upon rows of spike-teeth.

She made to take a step forward, but an onyx hand stopped her.

Diana loomed behind the little girl, her former panic overpowered by an alien calmness. Reflected on her countenance was something other than Diana.

The white of her eyes had turned the same shade of black as her skin and her iris the same purple as her veins.

Diana’s hand closed around the girl’s neck, fingers pressing against her windpipe. With a strength she’d never before displayed, she lifted the little girl off the ground. The little girl thrashed, kicked and roared otherworldly screams, but Diana’s hold didn’t budge.

All staring at them, the little girl’s tentacles went limp. Diana finally released her, falling to the ground herself along with her victim.

“She’s a host,” Oliver’s voice was tinged with wonder and incredulousness. Gone was his fear “Atalanta, Diana’s a host.”

Atalanta was staring at the two forms on the floor. In her hands, she held an embellished machete, like she’d been planning on taking on the little girl.

“That’s not how hosts behave,” Atalanta muttered, kneeling beside Diana. She beckoned Oliver over “Come here.”

Oliver obliged, unwrapping his arms from Cal. “She’ll be fine,” he concluded after pressing two fingers to Diana’s temple “But that girl and boy—”

“Daas will take care of them. And he’ll tell the Boule what has happened, too. You didn’t know Diana was a host?”

“I’ve never even seen her with an imlium.”

Atalanta contemplated him for a moment. “We’ll take them to Mirror.”

Oliver nodded. “Right,” and he picked Diana up bridal style “Do you think you can find a blanket? She’s shivering.”

Cal spoke before Atalanta could reply.

“What the fuck?” she stumbled back “What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What—”

“Coraline,” Atalanta seemed surprised, as if she’d just remembered that Cal was there.

Diana had turned into a monster at the same time as a tentacled little girl had started aggressively murdering people, killed said girl, and passed out. And now Atalanta and Oliver were talking about it as if they were discussing the bloody weather.

It had to be a dream. But Cal didn’t dream.

“What the fuck did just happen?”

“Cal, just let us explain,” Oliver approached her, his hands raised in a placating fashion.

“Nope. You’re not going to do any explaining,” Cal said. She staggered back a few more steps “I’m out.”

But when she tried to do so, a girl materialised out of thin air and attempted to barricade the exit.

“Humans can’t—”

Before Cal could think about it, she Split. With her invisible body, she pushed the girl off her visible body. A murmur ran through Timeless. Cal thought she heard the word ‘doppelgänger’.

Double-walker.

“Oliver, stop her,” Atalanta ordered.

“Atalanta, I don’t think that’s how we should proceed.”

Anxiety shone through Oliver’s tone.

“Oliver.”

“Fine.”

Suddenly, movement became impossible. Cal tried to push past the invisible chains shackling her to the ground, but her body simply refused to respond.

“Oliver! What are you doing?!” she cried.

The last thing she heard was Oliver’s apology.

Cal had forgotten what sleeping felt like.

Her invisible body didn’t function like her visible one. It didn’t need rest, for once, nor nourishment of any kind. At first, it had been terrifying. Six-year-old Cal had repeatedly tried to sleep to no avail, for she would inadvertently Split. Her desperation had reached a point where, one night, she’d snuck into her parents’s bedroom to see if they were like her.

Eventually, she’d come to appreciate her uniqueness. She’d challenged herself to test her ability. First, she’d read and played video games, learning how to walk on nimble feet so as to avoid getting caught. She’d honed her hearing. On her fifteenth birthday, Cal decided that her house was too small for her nights and started venturing outside. Now London bowed to her authority, though no one knew her; the stars welcomed her as their sister-in-arms.

However, the Split had its drawbacks. When she finally got to sleep, a decade later, waking up made her feel as if her bones were stuffed with lead, and the mere thought of moving was torturous.

I’m never sleeping again, declared Cal to herself. She was about to yawn, when she realised she wasn’t alone.

There were two more people in the bedroom—it had to be a bedroom, because Cal was laying on a mattress—, conversing quietly. One of the voices belonged to a woman that sounded oddly familiar, but Cal couldn’t pinpoint why exactly. The other voice, though. That Cal knew.

Atalanta.

That bitch, she thought. She mentally took back the statement about Atalanta probably not being a murderer.

Fearing what would happen were she to move, Cal stayed still, eyes closed. She tried to eavesdrop on their conversation, although such a feat soon proved to be impossible. The language Atalanta and her companion were speaking was evocative of German, which Cal was proficient in, but upon further inspection, the words were wholly foreign. Alien.

Cal could only guess that the woman had dismissed Atalanta when a series of syllables underlined with steel were pronounced and, subsequently, a door clicked shut. Cal heard shoes tap-tap-tapping closer. She tensed.

The mattress sunk lower with the woman’s weight.

“I could sense you awakening, so there’s no need to pretend you’re asleep,” said the woman in a perfect rendition of the Queen’s English “Won’t you look at me, Coraline? I promise I don’t bite.”

Cal cracked an eye open, squinting at the sudden light.

“Well, good morning, Sleeping Beauty,” amusement tinged the woman’s voice.

Cal lunged for the woman, but she stood no chance against her. The woman closed claw-strong hands around Cal’s wrist, efficiently immobilising her, and laughed with mirth. “That’s no way to meet your aunt. Didn’t Dahlia teach you any manners?”

“The fuck—” for the first time, Cal looked at the woman, eyes widening.

She saw her mother.

The woman shared Dahlia Everitt’s chestnut-coloured hair, her deep-brown eyes, her sharp jawline, and even the pointed nose she’d passed on to her daughter. The woman was Dahlia Everitt, but she couldn’t be: her slicked-down hair reached just above her shoulder while Cal’s mother’s brushed her hips, their voices were different and—more importantly—Mum was a bundle of nerves there where the woman had the disposition of a cat; laidback in a manner that bordered laziness.

“I hope I’m not that ugly,” said the woman, her face a mask of amusement.

Cal stared at her. “Who are you?”

“I’m Leora Everitt-Melton,” she replied, standing up. She wore an old-fashioned, brown sack suit “I’m your mother’s sister. That would make me your aunt.”

“Bollocks,” Cal snapped “My mother doesn’t have siblings.”

Leora quirked an eyebrow at her. “I’m afraid you’re wrong.”

“She would’ve told me.”

“Is that so?” Leora’s face darkened, overcome by a sadness which planted a seed of doubt in Cal’s belly “Pray tell me, do you know who your grandparents are? Either on Dahlia’s or Matthias’s side? Or do you not have those, too?”

Cal’s doubt grew roots. She didn’t need to ask to know why Leora knew her father’s name. The truth was, Mum and Dad had never told her of the rest of her family.

“What’s going on?” now, Cal’s voice rose barely above a whisper. A faint tremor coursed up and down her arms at the implications Leora’s existence entailed.

Leora sighed. That sadness shifted to softness, and she retook her place on the mattress, elbows digging into her knees. “Dahlia has a twin sister and that is me. Our parents are Eugenia, former Mayor of the Mirror UK, and Isidore Everitt. Matthias has an older brother who is the current Doppelgänger Gatekeeper. His name is Claude Mochizuki. Your paternal grandparents are Ophelia and Arthur Beardsley.”

Reality swung off its hinges. Nausea crawled up Cal’s throat, burning everything in its wake. And a second afterwards, she found herself bent over the bed while Leora’s—her aunt’s—hand rubbed her back. Her touch dwarfed Cal’s physical upset, but that was ephimerous in comparison to her mental turmoil.

Fragments of questions swirled in her mind and she was able to piece none but one: the easiest one.

Matthias has an older brother who is the current Doppelgänger Gatekeeper.

Back in Timeless, people had called Cal a doppelgänger.

Did that mean she wasn’t alone?

“Is your mother still dramatic?” Aunt Leora asked, her mood imbued with fake lightness.

“She is,” to her surprise, Cal realised the knot at her throat had eased.

“And does your father still call her ‘princess’?”

Cal nodded.

Aunt Leora kneeled down before her. Her smile was different from Mum’s, yet it shushed the noise in Cal’s head. “Don’t get angry with them. They can’t blame their amnesia.”

Before Cal could ask what she meant, there was a knock on the door. “That must be Atalanta,” Leora announced “Come in!”

Atalanta carried a bundle of clothes, though Cal hardly paid them any attention.

“What are you wearing?” she blurted out.

Rationally, Cal knew she should’ve accused Atalanta of kidnapping her as soon as she crossed the threshold. However, Atalanta’s appearance begged to be met with anything other than reason. She was dressed in a floor-length, cinched white and bright purple gown. A myriad of ribbons, trims and ruffles had been sewn down the sides of the skirt. It all was a tad too much.

Atalanta turned to her, with that condescending look Cal found so annoying. Her hair had been curled and put up in a bun atop her head, with only a few very long streaks loose.

“It’s a natural form era ballgown. They were popular between the late 1870s and early 1880s,” said Atalanta coldly, as if blaming Cal for not knowing Victorian fashion “Not all of us prefer jeans and oversized t-shirts.”

Cal was about to reply that people were more likely to wear jeans and t-shirts than her absurd dress, but Aunt Leora spoke first.

“Coraline, you’ve been asleep for a couple days,” she said “We didn’t change you out of your uniform because Oliver said you wouldn’t appreciate it. Nevertheless, now that you’re awake, it needs to be washed. In the meantime, Atalanta will lend you some of her clothes.”

Cal stopped paying attention at Oliver’s name. She saw red. If she was in this whole stupidity of a situation it was partly because of him.

She looked Aunt Leora straight in the eye. “Where is Oliver? I need to talk to him,” she demanded.

Aunt Leora quirked an eyebrow at her. “The Whitaker boy will be brought to you once you’ve had a bath and changed into Atalanta’s clothes.”

“I need to—” before Cal could finish her protest, Aunt Leora clapped her hands together.

“Well, that settles the matter,” she took the bundle of clothes off Atalanta’s arms and deposited it on the mattress “The bathroom is past that door. Please, leave the clothes somewhere visible so the servants won’t have trouble finding them,” then, she turned to Atalanta “Let’s go, Bunny.”

The nickname seemed to embarrass Atalanta, but she obliged nonetheless. Wordlessly, she left the room without a glance back, skirts swishing as she made her way out. Aunt Leora wasn’t as fast: she walked to the door in a slow gait, only to stop at the doorway. From that vantage point, she contemplated Cal with an indecipherable expression.

“I hope we can get along, Coraline. Losing your mother was—” she stopped herself “Anyways, I think you’ll be staying here for a while. After all, we’re closer to Aboveground London than Mirror Tokyo is.”

And just like that, Aunt Leora left.

Cal collapsed on the bed. “What the fuck is going on?” she whispered to the ceiling.

Minutes in blank stupor had to pass before her mind processed everything. Oddly enough, the fact that Diana had become a monstrous thing to beat a monster in child’s clothing was now far less shocking than her newfound family. And she didn’t even want to broach the notion that Oliver was in on this madness.

The back of her eyes burnt. She felt as though a higher power had ripped a blindfold off her face and the ensuing light—it was too much to take in, so Cal padded to the bathroom in hopes that a shower would offer some solace.

From the threshold, she tossed her dirty uniform onto the bed. Then, she dunked Atalanta’s clothes on the sink. The bathroom was the most old-fashioned thing Cal had ever stepped foot in—she was sure it dated back to the same year as Atalanta’s gown—which made Cal worry that there wouldn’t be running water; that she would have to manually dump water into the massive bathtub instead.

Thankfully, her fears didn’t come true.

The water came out scalding, just what Cal needed to grow accustomed to the light. Now she knew she was standing at a crossroads. She could tread two paths: one of anger—because Oliver had lied to her and he should’ve informed her of her otherworldly heritage—another of excitement because Cal wasn’t alone. There were words to describe what she was, people like her, family members like her, and she couldn’t wait to know them. But still she didn’t know what path to take.

One or another. Anger or excitement.

The shower did little to help her decide. Cal sighed as she stepped out the tub, and she sighed more as she changed into Atalanta’s clothes. Her only comfort was that these belonged to the last decade, albeit were a snug fit.

By the time she returned to the bedroom, her uniform was gone. A chill ran down her spine.

“Who even has servants today?” she wondered, infinitely more worried about not having heard them. Aunt Leora certainly dressed like someone who hired staff.

Much like the bathroom, the bedroom’s decor was too old for the 21st century. The walls were covered in a white-and-blue, flower-patterned wallpaper; the bed she had been sleeping on was a gigantic wooden canopy bed—with heavy, opaque draperies. At the bed’s left, a couple of armchairs and a sofa surrounded a round coffee table, while on the right stood a simple wooden desk. Beside the desk was a vanity table, its wood carved in the shape of thorns and roses.

Cal reached for a door somewhat concealed by the wallpaper, thinking that the servants might have used it to access the room. But the only thing beyond the door was the empty space of a walk-in closet. After making sure there were no hidden handles or the likes, she stepped out the closet and went to the vanity.

She inspected herself. Atalanta had lent her a pair of grey pyjama bottoms and a t-shirt of a half-faded anime bloke. Cal spent the better part of a quarter of an hour trying to discern who he was, but eventually gave up in favour of venturing beyond the bedroom’s threshold. She wanted to speak to Aunt Leora.

Outside, Cal found herself in as old-fashioned a hallway as the room she’d exited. This time, the wallpaper was bottle green and rows of portraits were nailed to the walls. All of the people displayed on them were vastly different, both in appearance and in looks. Golden plaques were affixed to the space underneath each portrait.

Cal approached the nearest one and saw that its plaque read: ‘Wonsook Cho, Conductor Leader (1842)’. The Korean woman in the painting couldn’t have been older than twenty-five, and she wore a white hanfu. Next to her was a middle-aged man; ‘Sergeyvich Vasnev Iosif, Conductor Leader (1605)’ read his plaque. A hyperrealistic drawing of a Native American couple was introduced as ‘Dibe and Tahoma Hickman, Puppeteer Leaders (1977)’.

Not all pictures were as cold as the portraits. Cal saw stills of a much younger Atalanta smiling widely for the camera, her front teeth missing. A picture of baby Atalanta being held by Leora as a black-haired woman beheld them with fondness etched across her features. Leora and said woman touching foreheads, a soft smile on their faces and their lips a breath away. Atalanta a few years back cradling a massive, white rabbit. Atalanta ice-skating with two black-haired siblings. Atalanta standing beside a diverse group of people—one of them being a very attractive East Asian boy.

Atalanta. Atalanta. Atalanta. It suddenly struck Cal that she was very possibly in her house, and that Aunt Leora and that other woman must be her mothers.

Which would mean that Atalanta and Cal were cousins.

“That was Leora and I’s wedding. Almost twenty years ago.”

Startled, Cal whipped around.

The black-haired woman nodded at the drawing Cal had been staring at, of her and Aunt Leora. “I’m Cal,” was the only thing Cal managed to choke out.

“Linette. Pleasure to meet you,” the woman’s voice was strikingly similar to Atalanta’s; which was to say, bloody indifferent “I apologise for not having welcomed you sooner. I had pressing matters to attend to,” and she extended her hand.

Cal shook it and properly studied her. Linette—Aunt Linette?—wore a suit the same shade as her hair, which was gathered in a braid so long it reached her waist. Her bright blue eyes contrasted with death-pale skin.

“Aunt Leo—I mean, your wife told me Oliver was coming.”

Linette gave the barest hint of a smile. “Please, call her Aunt Leora. And me, Aunt Linette. We’ll both appreciate it.”

“Sure,” Cal coughed awkwardly “And, er, Oliver?”

“I sent our coachman a few minutes ago. He’ll be fetched in no time. You can wait in your bedroom.”

And just like that, Aunt Linette turned around and left.

#writeblr #female writers #original writing #writers on tumblr #writerscommunity #writing #queer writers #writing community #original character #oc #ocs #spilled ink #spilled thoughts #spilled writing #the kinship chronicles #the stolen child #tkc

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humbly-a-doppelganger · 3 months

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I've battled with that sentiment as well since I get little to pretty much no readers. I'm used to it and I don't care a bit about it, but posting and editing on AO3 takes time since I have to manually justify the texts + add cursive where cursive is due. It's tough lol

That being said, I do find great comfort in knowing that my original stories are stored somewhere. I'd have lost my first story had I not posted it on AO3 lol so I'm still going to post what I write there (and somewhere else in case AO3 goes crazy). Besides, there might be a small number of people who read what I write, but there's people nonetheless and I'd hate to follow a story that won't ever update even though the writer has heaps of content ready + I want to own one of the longest fics on AO3...

They say you should make art for yourself, but the folks writing long-form fic on AO3 where the last reader comment was thirty-five chapters ago and they're still updating every week like clockwork are putting that into practice in ways I can only dream of.

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humbly-a-doppelganger · 3 months

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The Stolen Child: Chapter 2 - The haunting dead

Next -> 3

1 <- previous

Index

When Diana first laid eyes on the girl leaning against her high school’s gate, she had to stop dead in her tracks, somewhat overwhelmed by her beauty.

Atalanta was gorgeous.

Her hair was the colour of just-fallen snow, her eyes were purple and her skin the palest canvas Diana had ever beheld. Subconsciously, Diana was happy it was raining, because she feared that Atalanta would get sun poisoned otherwise. Diana had already seen a lot of white, non-albino people suffer a similar fate. Her father liked to call it the British curse. Although Atalanta didn’t necessarily look British; rather, she had certain facial features that reminded Diana of the Mediterranean peers at her former school.

Atalanta must’ve been around Diana’s height, 1’66—perhaps a bit shorter—, but her lean complexion, ramrod straight posture and innate confidence spun the illusion of impossible height. It was striking, as was every other detail that made her up.

“Hey,” greeted Oliver before walking over to Atalanta and drawing her in for a quick peck on the lips.

The two made an odd couple. Oliver dressed marginally better than Cal, and he exclusively bought plain clothing. Atalanta, on the other hand, evidently paid painstaking attention to her wardrobe. That much was discernible from her well-ironed, baby blue vintage dress and the intricate braided bun she’d gathered her hair up in.

“Hello, Oliver,” Atalanta stepped back from her boyfriend and switched her attention over to Diana “You must be Diana Zubairu,” she said as she extended her hand for Diana to shake.

Her voice didn’t denote any emotion whatsoever.

“Coraline,” she acknowledged Cal with a curt nod.

The tension between them could be cut with a knife. Just as Cal had said earlier, Atalanta’s eyes set on her with an odd intensity: as if on the lookout for secrets hiding underneath her skin.

Her piercing gaze reminded Diana of John.

Stop it. Don’t even think about him. You left Coxwold for a reason, she chided herself.

“Hi,” replied Cal, looking like she was trying very hard not to cringe.

Seemingly sensing his best friend’s discomfort, Oliver slung his arm around Atalanta’s shoulders and motioned for her to lead the way to the café.

On their way there, Atalanta and Oliver were completely enthralled in each other; they walked hand in hand and talked in hushed whispers, though the latter would glance at Cal from time to time. Diana could tell he tried to be subtle with little success.

Meanwhile, Cal and Diana walked at the rear in silence. In fact, they hadn’t talked more than what was strictly necessary since lunch break. Diana supposed her reaction to Cal implying that she had a secret was to blame. But she couldn’t have helped herself.

Rationally, she knew it was impossible for Cal to be like her, and she wouldn’t want to wish that kind of torture upon her worst enemy, not that she had one. And yet Diana wondered. What would it be like not to be alone?

Cal nudged her on the arm. “Hey,” she cleared her throat awkwardly “You know, we don’t have to talk about what happened during lunch.”

Diana felt herself wind tight. Cal hastily continued “I mean, sure, I would love to lend a friendly ear and everything. But that’s a 100% your call. I have secrets, too,” at that, Cal shot a quick glance at Atalanta “And it’s not like I’m comfortable disclosing them, either.”

“Not even Oliver knows?” Diana asked against her better judgement.

Cal shook her head. “Not even Oliver knows.”

If she hadn’t told her best friend, maybe Cal was like Diana. For the past eight years, her curse was something Diana had taught herself to conceal, especially from her loved ones. Did Cal have siblings? Or did another type of ghost haunt her?

Diana pondered over Cal’s words, studying them from all angles in hopes of finding anything that encouraged her to take the leap. To tell Cal about John. And then she thought: wasn’t what she knew about her friend already enough? Cal had been great right from the start; her careless nature had somewhat eased Diana’s constant anxiety, and she hadn’t minded that she was both black and a lesbian. That was more than Diana could say for many of the friends she could’ve made, had her skin been paler and her sexuality conventional. Mr. and Mrs. Everitt had welcomed her with open arms. Last night, the latter had even gone as far as to cook Diana’s favourite Nigerian dishes to make sure she felt like home, and she and her husband had befriended Mum and Baba in order to reassure them that Diana would be fine.

Diana could see the abyss. The impulse to tell Cal the truth raged war with the paralysing imperative to retain her darkest nooks under lock and key. Diana valued their friendship more than she thought she would, so she took a deep breath and settled for a middle ground.

She walked to the edge, her toes curling around air, but didn’t take the leap just yet.

“I hope one day we’ll both be able to confide in each other,” Diana smiled.

Cal returned her smile. She would have responded, had a loud thump not startled them. They looked forward and saw that Oliver had tripped over a crack. He’d cushioned the fall with his knees, and now the front of his trousers was wet with dirt and rainwater.

“Stupid,” said Cal with a snort “Oliver, mate!” she went to join him and Atalanta, who heaved him to his feet.

Diana observed them, smiling still. She was about to join them, but then her eye caught a familiar silhouette.

He stood a few metres away, staring straight at her with the same unreadable countenance.

John.

John followed them the rest of the trip to the café, and once they reached its facade, he followed them inside. Never taking his eyes off Diana.

Luckily, Diana had long taught herself how to pretend like he wasn’t there. Still, his presence unnerved her. John belonged in Coxwold, her former school and even her travels to Abuja, but not London.

Or so she’d thought.

“This is Timeless,” announced Atalanta in her even voice “There’s a table over there we could use,” then, without even a glance at her companions, she walked to it, Oliver right in tow.

The café had looked ordinary from the outside, but the inside told a completely different story. The walls were dark green, and covered in paintings ranging from children’s drawings to a replica of the Mona Lisa; from the ceiling hung both gas chandeliers and the latest ceiling lamps. Following the non-aesthetic aesthetic the café had going on, no tables and chairs matched. Timeless looked like a juxtaposition of differing puzzle pieces that, somehow, made for a lovely landscape.

“What a place,” came Cal’s voice from behind.

Doing her best to ignore John propped against their table, Diana grabbed Cal’s wrist and dragged her to Atalanta and Oliver.

The dozen or so patrons there were openly staring at them. A few even mustered up enough courage to approach Atalanta to ask who they were.

“Oliver’s friends: Coraline Everitt and Diana Zubairu,” she would always respond.

Some would express shock at hearing Cal’s name, others would shoot her a nasty glare, but none pressed further. The only exception was an Indian man in his mid-twenties.

He’d barked out a laugh and offered them his hand. “Pleased to meet you two. I’m Daas Kapil,” then he’d ruffled Atalanta’s hair “Young Atalanta better be treating you nicely.”

“Of course I am, Daas,” Atalanta had replied with the barest hint of a smile.

After he’d left, Cal whispered to Diana. “That’s the nicest I’ve ever seen her.”

Having overheard her, Oliver replied that if Cal had put effort into getting to know Atalanta, she wouldn’t be so surprised. After that, they’d gone back to studying.

Three hours in, they were still glued to their textbooks. All but Cal, that is: she’d only leafed through their history book, half-assed a couple maths exercises, and then moved on to playing Candy Crush. Diana wished she could chastise her friend, but there was no point in forcing her to study more than she needed.

Diana took a sip of her spicy hot chocolate. Cal’s intellectual advantage aside, the afternoon was progressing smoothly. Diana completed the assignments her physics and Spanish teachers had sent as homework, and was on her way to finishing her part of a history group project.

Atalanta was a superb study partner. Not only was she quiet—which wasn’t surprising—but she also helped Oliver and Diana with their maths homework, as she was some sort of prodigy on that front. Diana had asked her what high school she attended, at what Atalanta, not looking up from her iPad, replied, “A boarding school. You wouldn’t know it.”

“I went to a boarding school, too. Maybe I know yours.”

From what little she could see of her screen, Atalanta was reading something in Mandarin. Diana’s previous school had had extracurricular lessons on that language, so chances were she and Atalanta were former schoolmates.

But Atalanta shook her head. “No.”

“I’m going to dream of Parmenides tonight,” yawned Oliver, slinging his arm around Atalanta “Someone remind me why we decided to make this group project on him.”

“Because you chose to and we trusted you,” commented Cal, grinning. One of her feet was propped up against Oliver’s knee, not that Atalanta seemed to care.

“I only chose it because I thought your mother would help us,” he protested. To Atalanta, he said “Dahlia loves philosophy.”

“Don’t remind me,” Cal sighed “You should hear her talking about Plato.”

“I’m sure she made your part of the project.”

“She didn’t.”

“Liar.”

“You lie.”

“Danger is near.”

Diana started violently, jumping to her feet. Shaking, she slowly pivoted on her heels to fully face John: he stood beside her, closer than ever before.

John hadn’t changed since the last time she braved a true look at him. He still had the appearance of a ten year old black boy. His hair remained shaved close to his scalp, neither had he changed out of his white tank top and tattered jeans.

He looked exactly like he had on the day of his murder.

“What?” she asked, her voice trembling.

“Diana, are you okay?” Cal’s concerned voice sounded more distant than it actually was, and from the corner of her eye, Diana could glimpse Atalanta and Oliver staring at her with clear alarm on their faces. The former stood up, slowly. She fished something out of her pockets, and Diana thought she saw a blade glinting against the oil lamp light above.

“Danger is near.”

John tried to take hold of Diana, but she quickly drew back against Cal, who wrapped her arms around her, confused. The people around them had started noticing them.

Before any of Diana’s friends could say anything, a new customer came into the café.

“There’s no time,” pleaded John.

He lunged for Diana, catching her wrist. Shocked, Diana saw their skins melt together.

“A host,” whispered Oliver.

Diana screamed as the world around her pummelled into pitch darkness.

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humbly-a-doppelganger · 3 months

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I’d forgotten how much I loved writing my necro(platonic)philiac lesbian from the Victorian era odneiendjnwisnd

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humbly-a-doppelganger · 3 months

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a very important message

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humbly-a-doppelganger · 3 months

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The Stolen Child: Chapter 1 - Oh, the cleverness of me!

Next -> 2

Prologue <- previous

Index

February of 2020

Cal likened herself to a star.

James Matthew Barrie, Peter Pan’s father, had once described them as forever barred from partaking in the nighttime celebrations they oversaw, helplessly perched atop the depth-tinted firmament as they were. ‘It was a punishment put on them for something they did so long ago that no star now knows what it was,’ Barrie had written.

But he’d been wrong in assuming them burdened by their fate.

For there were benefits to their solitude.

The first thing Cal saw when she turned her bedroom lights on, was Diana’s left foot hovering dangerously close to her mouth. With a sigh, she rolled out of the way and headed for the bathroom.

“Diana, wake up or else we’ll be late for school!” she yelled from the sink all the while unscrewing the cap of her toothpaste.

“We woke up twenty seconds ago,” replied the sleepy voice of her friend. A yawn, then “How come you’re so energetic?”

“I’m aces at mornings.”

Grinning wickedly, Cal heard Diana’s soft paddles coming into the bathroom. “I don’t know about you being great, but your energy during the morning sure borders a superpower. Pass me the toothpaste, please,” Diana added as she came into the bathroom, toothbrush in hand “I thought you went to sleep at ten. Yesterday we stayed up until well past two in the morning.”

“Please, Diana, that was nothing. When Oliver stays over, we don’t get a lick of sleep,” Cal wiggled her brows suggestively.

At that, Diana lightly shoved Cal, causing her to stumble and spill most of the toothpaste all over the bathroom floor.

“Oh, fuck,” barely able to restrain her laughter, Cal glanced sideways, to Diana. Her friend was laughing hysterically as she made a poor attempt at cleaning the mess they’d made.

A part of Cal was glad that things weren’t going awkwardly between her and Diana. It was the first time they were alone without Oliver. Him and Diana were supposed to have stayed over at Cal’s place, but he’d given them a rain check at the last minute because his girlfriend—some bizarre girl named Atalanta who Cal hadn’t seen more than twice in the entirety of their six-month relationship—had ‘decided they should go to a party one of her friends was hosting, because he was supposed to be dating her, Oliver, and not your childhood best friend’.

So, Cal had been left alone with Diana.

Don’t get her wrong, her and Diana were good friends, it’s just that they didn’t have much in common: Cal was obsessed with video games, Diana wouldn’t be caught dead playing one; where Cal couldn’t stop gushing about her most recent literary infatuation, Diana would sigh upon seeing some pretty actress. Come to think of it, they didn’t even look like they mingled in the same social circles. Cal was really lazy and laid-back, and her wardrobe stood as proof of that fact—oversized t-shirts, comfy pants, sneakers and no dress or skirt on sight—while Diana kept her appearance in check with soft jumpers, cute skirts and dresses and basically neat, girly clothes.

Although obviously, that wasn’t discernible today; both would be wearing their private school uniforms: a blue blazer over a white shirt and a blue-and-black checked skirt.

“I think that the dedication you pour into your hair is a superpower,” Cal told Diana after they’d calmed down from the toothpaste fiasco.

Diana had a beautiful, huge afro, but it seemed tough to maintain. Cal had seen the array of products Diana used and felt slightly self-conscious of the sole shampoo bottle she lathered hers with.

“Cal, you only brush your hair to free it of knots,” said Diana while folding her purple bonnet “Every other aspect of haircare beyond that seems like dedication to you, but it’s really not. You could do with some styling,” and she regarded Cal’s slightly messy red hair in mock disgust.

Cal shrugged. “I’ve been meaning to cut it shoulder-length,” without her realising so, her red hair had grown up to the middle of her back “Shorter hair is always easier to brush.”

Cal saw Diana open her mouth, no doubt to say that she couldn’t believe her, when Cal’s mother cut her off before she could even start speaking.

“Coraline Edelweiss Everitt, come upstairs now! Breakfast is ready and if you don’t hurry up, you’ll be late for school!”

“Coming Mum!” Cal yelled back.

“Your middle name’s ‘Edelweiss’?” Diana inquired.

“Told you my mum was a floriography nerd.”

They gathered their things as fast as they could, and then climbed their way upstairs. Diana tried to convince Cal that they should clean her bedroom—Cal slept in her house’s spacious basement, which in the span of four years had got progressively filled with video game posters, a PS4 and a myriad of books—but Cal reassured her that she would clean up after school.

“Finally, Diana dear, how much syrup do you want on your pancakes?” asked Cal’s mother when they arrived at the kitchen. After quickly glancing at the pair, she added “And CC, you could have brushed you hair a tad more. It’s all over the place. Really, you could take some advice from Diana, couldn’t she, Matthias?”

“Of course, princess,” Cal’s father answered mid-yawn from the sitting room.

Cal sighed and grabbed a plate full of pancakes. Dahlia Everitt had even more energy than her daughter during the morning, enough to wake up at 5 a.m. for a run around the neighbourhood despite having gone to sleep past midnight. By the time Dad rolled out of bed, she’d come back home, showered and was halfway through finishing breakfast. Mum was a mystery Cal doubted she’d ever decipher, because she seemingly drew her energy out of thin air.

Unlike Cal, who was all rise and shine-y because she hadn’t slept in ten years. Not in the way the rest of her family slept, anyways.

“Who is the spare plate for?” asked Diana, confused after seeing Cal’s mother deposit a third plate of pancakes—these filled with caramel syrup to the brim—on the kitchen aisle.

“Oliver,” at seeing Diana’s confused look, Cal explained “He always comes when Mum makes pancakes, no matter what he was doing the previous day.”

As if on cue, the front door opened.

“Where are my pancakes? I’m famished,” announced a cheerful voice, making his way to the kitchen.

Cal had been called stupid by the girls in her class a few times for not making a move on Oliver, and even though the mere thought of being attracted to him in any way repulsed her, she couldn’t but agree with them when it came to his appearance.

Oliver was, objectively, very good looking: he was tall and his face was oddly charming. He also had a more ‘edgy’ touch to him (which, according to Haley Brooks was ‘oh, so gorgeous’), what with his electric blue hair and monochromatic ensemble—all of which contrasted perfectly with his light olive complexion. However, Cal couldn’t for the life of her see a potential boyfriend in Oliver.

They had known each other since they were five. Cal had been his friend when he was still an awkward, brown-haired, thirteen-year old lad with braces and cartoonishly-gigantic glasses (he now wore contacts). She had been the first person he came out to as bisexual—in the dead of night, during a beach outing two years ago—, and she had been subjected to his super-intense trivia phase.

“Get out of my house, you traitor,” Cal replied jokingly.

“Good morning, Oliver. Your breakfast,” said Diana, sliding the third plate of pancakes before him.

“Thanks, Diana, you’re godsend,” announced Oliver as he wolfed down the pancakes “By the way, have you girls studied for today’s biology exam? I had to stay up until 2 a.m. doing my revisions.”

“I studied just fine, I guess,” replied Cal. She placed her plate in the dishwasher and slid her phone out her pocket, tapping on the Candy Crush app “Biology’s easy,” then she playfully added “Though I doubt that girlfriend of yours was glad when you told her you wanted to leave her friend’s party to study the mitochondria.”

Oliver grimaced. “She didn’t mind, you know? Atalanta’s really nice.”

Last year, he’d had another entanglement—a skater bloke from South Africa—and he hadn’t even bothered to introduce him to Cal. Instead, Oliver had limited himself to explaining how they’d met and other such stuff, but Atalanta was different. Cal sometimes had the impression that her best mate was more interested in forcing the two to get along than in dating his girlfriend.

“You know how much I detest biology. If I pass, it’ll be a miracle,” said Diana hastily, trying to veer the conversation back to its original topic.

Cal smiled at her thankfully, and sprang up from her chair.

“Well, let’s get going.”

Cal had always enjoyed high school. There was a certain hilarity to breaking every rule in the book and still not facing any consequences whatsoever, because who could venture to think she skipped class when they saw her sitting behind her desk? Who would know she got the higher grades among her peers because she cheated on every single exam?

That day was a rainy, stormy day, as it often was in London. Mr. Kamal’s, their biology teacher’s, entrance was announced by the rumbling of thunder and, beside Cal, Oliver started at the ominous sound. Diana was on the desk in front of his, but she paid the thunder no attention. Her brow was pressed against her intertwined hands and her lips moved in silent prayer. Mr. and Mrs. Zubairu weren’t religious, but Diana’s grandmother Mercy was a devout Christian and she’d instilled in her granddaughter the idea that if she prayed before sitting an exam, God would look out for her.

Wordlessly, Mr. Kamal raised a hairy hand and closed it into a fist. The whole room quieted. Wordlessly once again, Mr. Kamal approached the student sitting at the left corner of the first row. He smiled at Cal upon reaching her desk, and she grinned back.

“Think you’ll best Mr. Whitaker this time?” Mr. Kamal asked her.

“For sure,” Cal lied seamlessly.

An aspiring doctor, Oliver loved biology and Cal, a professional liar, couldn’t compete with him. At best, she could copy off his exam, which was something she’d promised herself she’d never do.

Right after Mr. Kamal moved on to the next student, Cal Split.

A copy of herself ripped out of her body, though she was the sole person able to see it. Silently, her invisible body walked over to Samuel Villalobos’s desk—in biology, he was second only to Oliver—and with those invisible eyes, her original body spied Samuel’s answers. She made sure to paraphrase them; changing a couple verbs, switching the structure of some sentences and modifying other sentences that had been literally translated from Spanish to English to their British counterparts.

Cal discovered the Split when she was around five. Since then, she’d debated whether she should tell Oliver or her parents about it, but she’d watched too many sci-fi movies to be comfortable being open about an ability that could land her in a lab. Besides, she’d spent a good portion of her life ashamed of the Split, and by the time she’d come to terms with it, she’d got too used to its secrecy.

Only once had she been close to disclosing the Split, on the night Oliver came out to her. It had seemed like the perfect moment: he’d been vulnerable and she’d wanted to be vulnerable with him. But then she’d realised that Oliver might think she was joking, or—worse—making fun of him.

“I hate biology. I completely, utterly, unashamedly despise it,” swore Diana. She had started complaining the moment the exam had ended, and now that it was lunch break, she was back to complaining. “Why should we learn about cells? I don’t care about ostroclasts”

“Osteoclasts,” corrected Oliver. He was laying on the ground with his head on Cal’s lap, who sat against a big oak tree in the middle of the school’s backyard.

“Nor additive tissue.”

“Adipose tissue.”

“And I definitely couldn’t care less about the process of the mitosis.”

“You actually said that right,” commented Oliver.

With an overdramatic sigh, Diana plopped down next to Cal, who patted her on the shoulder. “Don’t worry too much. It’s not like an architect needs to have a great understanding of the human body.”

“Yep, as long as you don’t end up with a ‘happy mistake’ you’ll be fine,” added Oliver with air quotations.

At that, Cal shoved him off her lap with a snort.

“As if,” replied Diana, the beginnings of a smile dancing on her lips “I guess I’m lucky I’m a lesbian, then.”

“Yep, you’re—” Oliver was suddenly cut off by his phone going off. The ringtone was a song about vegetables by a Japanese children’s group—Cal had found the song a few months ago and set it as Oliver’s ringtone just for the kicks of it. Confused, he picked up the phone, announced it was Atalanta, and excused himself.

“Damn, that girlfriend of his must be head over heels in love,” commented Cal as she watched Oliver bore holes into the ground a few paces away.

“Are you jealous of her?” asked Diana in an excessively tactful tone.

Cal diverted her attention to Diana, her eyebrows raised. “Are you insinuating I fancy Oliver? Because I can assure you I don’t.”

“Then? What is it?”

“Atalanta gives me the creeps, not in an ‘I’m-secretly-a-murderer’ way, mind you. But she looks at me like she’s expecting me to do something strange,” she then added quietly, to herself “As if she knew something about me no one else did.”

Upon hearing those last words, Diana quickly looked at her. She was staring at Cal unnervingly, those black eyes of hers pinning her down. Diana’s whole demeanour changed, became something agitated. And... was she scared?

“Coraline—” before Diana could say anything else, Oliver ran up to them.

“Hey, I’m back,” he sat crosslegged on the ground, oblivious to the tense atmosphere that had settled over the girls “So, Atalanta said she’ll be waiting for us after school. She knows this nice café and proposed that we studied there today.”

“Mate, I’m pretty sure that’s a date. Friends aren’t supposed to go with you on a date,” Cal tried to act like nothing was up, although her mind was caught elsewhere, working out the reason behind Diana’s reaction.

She can’t be hiding something important, can she? she thought.

Diana hadn’t revealed much about her life beyond the very basics. Her family had moved from a tiny village near York only four months ago. She was Nigerian but her father hadn’t taught her Yoruba; she strangely enjoyed British food but was crazy over everything spicy. She was a lesbian, obsessed with romance books and a hopeless romantic. She was a pretty black girl who was incredibly shy and polite. She was prone to rambling in the presence of other pretty girls or just about anyone who questioned her anything.

Oliver had made fast friends with her on her second day of school, and expeditiously introduced her to Cal a couple hours afterwards. The rest was history. Diana had seemed rather normal.

Seemed.

“Cal, are you listening to me?” surprised, Cal noticed that Oliver had been talking for a while. She tried to stop thinking about Diana, who was looking down at her hands and frowning, as though on the verge of tears.

“My bad. What were you saying?”

With a sigh, Oliver repeated himself, “Atalanta wants to spend time with the two of you. You’re my friends and she doesn’t want to be alienated from that part of my life. So you’ll be coming to the café with us.”

Cal concealed her disbelief; shut down an impending wave of discomfort.

“Whatever,” she replied.

It seemed that that afternoon she’d both have to pretend to study and that she enjoyed Atalanta’s presence.

Bloody lovely.

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