Hubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble             by : Jennifer Jane Pope

 

Prologue and WARNING!

I’m actually writing this bit AFTER finishing the story, which started out to be a long short story, became a very long short story and eventually grew to become very nearly a novelette and might well have become a full novel, if I hadn’t managed to find a very powerful old spell to keep it under control in the end.

You see, that’s the trouble with magic stories - and magic in general - you start diddling and you never know what’s going to come (or who!) and then the magic starts leaking and the characters start taking over and before you know it, it’s not your story any more, it’s theirs. But then, I suppose, that’s the whole point anyway - it’s their story, so all I’ve done is written it down and given it to you.

What you do with it is your business, but make sure you keep it in a safe place. magic is very unpredicable and has now learned the trick of travelling electronically, so it can get from continent to continent in the time it takes to depress the "Send" button. And sometimes, in the case of very strong magic, it knows how to press that button when you’re not looking.

So ... yes, there is a TG theme to this story and yes, there’s sex in it, but the magic decreed that it doesn’t start appearing until quite a way into the thing. On the way, there’s whimsy, comedy, puns, irony and a really nice dinner in a riverside pub. There’s also a very good clue as to why Joanna Lumley doesn’t seem to get any older and why police witnesses all give different descriptions of suspects, but you’ll see all that for yourself.

Apologies to any of you who are vertically challenged, named Nigel, or went to public school - or all three. I’m not sexist, racist, size-ist, or snobbish and I’m certainly no purist. I totally divorce myself from some of the statements made by characters in the following four parts - they in no way reflect my own opinions, but, in the name of freedom of the press, I’ve published them unedited here.

So, if you find yourself offended or insulted - you should get out more.

Or do I mean "in"?

Happy diddling, girls.

Enjoy.

[And if you haven’t realised, from reading thus far, what sort of a lunatic witch you’re dealing with here, then may I say you deserve everything that’s coming in the next twenty something thousand words or so!]

 

Part One - Hubble

Believe in magic? Witches and elves and goblins and stuff like that, I mean. No? Okay, then close the page and go away. I don’t blame you, ’cause I was the same not so long ago. But, unlike you, I was converted - in more ways than one.

Still here?

Oh, so you do believe? Or is it just that you fancy reading what you think is just a harmless fairy story? A word to the wise - some fairies are not harmless and they don’t usually look like fairies, either, which is a bit sneaky. I mean, fairies are supposed to have wings, aren’t they and sweet, angelic little faces.

Well, one out of two ain’t that bad and you can’t say I haven’t tried to warn you. So, here goes. Twice upon a time ...

I say twice, because I went back for a second date, but then who wouldn’t? Imelda wasn’t just the prettiest girl I’d ever met, there was something really - well, different about her, though just how different I had no way of knowing when we first met. If I had, I’d never have gone back. I may be a bit adventurous, but I’m not plain daft.

Imelda - she said her other name was Green - bumped her car into my rear wing outside the supermarket one Sunday afternoon. Oh yes, fairies do drive cars, mainly because flying about in broad daylight draws unnecessary attention to them and besides, the weekly shop is a bit heavy, even for an immortal. Some laws of physics, like gravity, can only be suspended up to a point, you see.

But I digress, as ever. Bump. Not BUMP! Just b-ump, very gently.

‘I’m so very sorry,’ she said, as I got out of the car again. I just hoped she was insured, otherwise these were going to be four of the most expensive toilet rolls I’d ever bought. I walked around and surveyed the damage. Except that there didn’t seem to be any. I made a funny face and peered closer.

No, nothing. Not a scratch, not a blemish; the dark blue paintwork shone from its recent waxing with all the virginal beauty of something that’s very virginal - and beautiful. Which was the immediate impression I got when I looked at Imelda properly, so that I immediately dismissed my disbelief that even a little b-ump could leave behind not the slightest trace.

Now, I’m going to digress again, because there’s something else you should know about fairies. Normally, they’re a bit hard to be seen, when they don’t want to be. Seen properly, I mean. You can’t really get anything clear from a full on "butcher’s", you have to sort of look sideways, almost squinting really, which few people ever bother to do, because it makes you look an even bigger pratt and besides, other people then start looking at you and, if any of them are wearing dark blue uniforms, you’s got trouble.

So, most people would have trouble giving a decent description of any fairy they happened to bump into - or be bumped into by - unless that fairy chose differently and Imelda did. After a few seconds of not really noticing her and concentrating on my mechanical pride and joy’s potential suffering, I suddenly found myself looking into ...

... well, heaven, if you must know. I don’t know how else to describe the feeling.

‘I really am so sorry,’ she repeated, bending over to look where I had just finished looking and suddenly giving me something much more interesting to look at. ‘Any damage done?’

‘Doesn’t seem to be,’ I managed to say. Actually, there was a great chance that I was going to do myself some damage here. ‘Are you all right?’ I said, remembering my manners and struggling to get my gaze back up to her face. Not that it was really much of a struggle. It was a beautiful face.

‘I’m fine,’ she smiled. Oh, keep steady, knees! ‘And my car’s not marked either.’

‘We’re both lucky, then,’ I said. Great conversationalist at times like this, me. ‘Um, would you like to sit down for a bit - for a minute or so, I mean? Just in case, you know? delayed shock?’ I offered, hopefully.

‘I think I’d like a cup of coffee,’ she said. ‘Maybe, if we park up again, I could buy you one in the cafe over there? It seems the least I can do.’ Oh, my soaring heart!

‘Er, yes,’ I replied, ‘but I should buy you one. Manners and all that.’

Five minutes later we were sitting opposite each other, separated only by a small, round table, on top of which was a gaily chequered, red and white plastic table cloth. Really high class, eh? Imelda introduced herself.

‘Are you from around here?’ I asked, after the peaky looking waitress had taken our order.

‘Here abouts,’ Imelda said. ‘I live just outside of town, actually.’ I looked at her hair. Did I mention it was golden? Had it been that colour when I first saw her? Probably. Maybe. I’d have been certain then, but I’ve since learned never to take anything for granted.

‘What do you do for a living, Simon?’

‘I’m a painter,’ I said. Her eyes sparkled like the proverbial.

‘Portraits?’

‘Houses,’ I said. ‘And shops, and garages and fences.’

‘Oh, a decorator?’ She didn’t seem disappointed.

‘Well, I splash a bit of paint about,’ I quipped, ‘but nothing to get emulsional about.’

She laughed at my joke and it was like hearing the lost cord. How did they ever know it was lost, until someone found it?

‘What about you?’ I prompted. ‘Job, I mean.’

‘Ah, well, it’s sort of hard to explain,’ she said, her lips twitching mischievously. ‘I sort of look after woodlands, give Mother Nature a hand, now and then, if you know what I mean?’

‘Conservation?’ I asked. The twitch grew more noticable.

‘Oh yes, we conserve all manner of things,’ she said. ‘Especially traditions.’

‘What about dating?’ This was a bit forward, especially for me. I didn’t know what had got into me.

‘Well, that’s traditional,’ she laughed. I felt myself starting to blush.

‘No, I meant - ‘ I hesitated. ‘I mean,’ I corrected myself, ‘is there, you know, anyone special at the moment?’

‘Plenty,’ she said, agreeably. My heart started to sink. ‘Three sort of aunts, ste-aunts, I suppose you’d call them, or foster aunts, then there are lots of cousins.’ Buoyancy returned to the old pump. ‘But,’ she said, ‘if you mean is there a special male in my life, then no, not at the moment.’ Afloat again! Hurrah! ‘Why,’ she grinned, ‘were you thinking of asking me out?’

‘Well, er, yes,’ I admitted. ‘Yes, as a matter of fact, I was.’

‘Go on.’

‘Eh?’ She giggled, very, very prettily.

‘Go on, then,’ she said. ‘Ask me out?’ Was she just winding me up. I took a deep breath.

‘Imelda,’ I began, ‘would you like to go out somewhere this evening?’ Oh ye gods, her face was so pretty.

‘How about this afternoon?’ she suggested. I furrowed my brow slightly.

‘Oh, you’re busy this evening, then?’ She shook her head, golden cascades and glinting sunlight.

‘Nope,’ she said, ‘but I haven’t got anything to do this afternoon, either and it seems a shame to waste such nice weather. It’s very mild for the end of October and I’m assuming you’re not working today.’

‘Oh?’

‘Unless you paint houses in designer jeans and what looks like quite an expensive shirt from where I’m sitting.’

‘No, overalls,’ I said. ‘I mean, no, I’m not working this afternoon. Don’t often do Sundays, not unless someone’s prepared to pay for the privilege.’

‘Quite right, too!’ she stated, firmly and half an hour later we were in my car, hers left safely in the supermarket car park, tootling merrily out of town towards a nice little pub I knew by the river. I couldn’t believe my luck.

I suppose, actually, I’m not that bad looking. I’m quite tall, pretty fit and have blonde hair - not golden like Imelda’s, more a slightly grubby straw colour. I also have blue eyes and an even set of teeth and I’d never had any complaints from females before. However, I’d also never had a female sitting beside me who came within a mile and a half of Imelda. As I keep saying, she’s something quite special - only how special I didn’t know at the time, of course.

She didn’t - doesn’t - drink alcohol. I can take it or leave it and besides, I was driving, so we settled for coca colas and sat at an outside table, right alongside the river bank itself, and watched the shadows lengthen in the late autumn sunshine. We talked about - well, all sorts of things, but curiously, afterwards I couldn’t really remember what they were. I think the topic was mainly me, because I do remember she kept asking me about family and stuff.

My family hails from the north, except they don’t hail at all, because they’re all still up there and I’m down here, in the south. Never was one for all those Dark Satanic Mills, even if most of them have now either gone, or been transformed into museums with little gift shops where you can buy pocket sized models of whatever erection Brunel or somebody other had two hundred years or so ago. Not my cup of tea and besides, it’s warmer down here on the south coast.

The pub had a very nice restaurant attached to it and the beams inside were all real, so I suggested dinner when it finally began to grow dark. Imelda did not need any persuasion at all and her dark green dress and golden hair seemed just so perfect in the shimmering candlelight. I remember wondering, vaguely, how come she had been out shopping in such a formal dress in the middle of the day and why it was I hadn’t noticed just how elegant and formal it was earlier, but it was no great deal, so I concentrated on more important things.

She had green eyes, did I tell you that? Not just that sort of hazely green that goes amber in some lights, but really green. I mean really, really green, like two deep pools.

‘You really are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met,’ I said, over the starter, which was - hell, I can’t remember that now.

‘You should meet more people, then,’ she quipped, but I could see the compliment was well received.

‘I think I’ve just met as many people as I ever want to meet,’ I said. Sounds daft, maybe, but that’s how I felt. She laughed.

‘Really?’ she said. ‘That’s a shame, ‘cause I was going to invite you to a party tomorrow night and you can’t go to a party without meeting people, can you?’

‘Tomorrow?’ I echoed. ‘Monday?’

‘Hallowe’en,’ she reminded me, ‘but I suppose you’ve already got loads of invites to parties.’

‘Well, no,’ I confessed. ‘I hadn’t actually given it much thought.’ Besides, Hallowe’en parties are always fancy dress and then you get those where half the men start dressing up as witch queens and perfectly pretty girls splatter all sorts of stuff on their faces to make themselves look like hideous old crones. After a few beers, it can get hard to tell who you’re chatting up - and vice-versa.

‘Is it fancy dress?’ I don’t know why I asked. I’d have gone to a nudist party, so long as Imelda was there with me. She shook her head.

‘You come exactly as you want,’ she said. Now, if you were cynical, you could construe that as a rude pun, but I don’t think it was, even though I did - about three hours later, in the big double bed in the front bedroom of my first floor flat above Giggs and Mellows, camping equipment retailers.

Did I ask her back there? Well, I must have done, I suppose, or so I thought back then. Hindsight is an exact science, practised by the majority. And did I make the first move towards the bedroom? Answer as above. Ditto.

Whatever, however, it was the most incredible night of my life. Golden hair, deep green eyes, lightly tanned legs and breasts, soft lips - this is starting to sound like one of those periodic women’s romance things, so I’ll draw a veil and just say it was fantastic and, if I hadn’t been in love with Imelda before we went to bed, I certainly was by the time we woke up next morning. If she’d asked me to walk through fire for her, I’d have done it and chucked more fuel on it on the way through.

Hallowe’en Night. Well, to be more accurate, late afternoon and Imelda collected me in her car, me having driven her to the car park to collect it around eleven thirty that morning. Four hours and a bit later, she was back for me.

Work? Oh, don’t be silly, I was in no fit state. Apart from being tired, I was so hyped up I couldn’t have cut in a straight line to save my life, so I went around to the job I was working on, gave them some story about hurting my back, accompanied by suitably understated grunts and gasps and returned to soak in a deep bath for an hour and then stretch out for a nap.

So, just after three thrity and we’re back off to the countryside again, only in a slightly different direction and heading for the largest area of woodland for thirty miles around. If you go down to the woods today ... tee-tum-titty-tum-ti-tum.

With the clocks having gone back only a week before, it was starting to get dark much earlier and the sudden mist, as we turned off the main road, didn’t help much. Imelda, however, seemed to know her way blindfold, which was a good thing, because that’s how I felt, with the dipped headlights coming back off a wall of grey-green.

‘This is spooky,’ I said, grinning in an effort to hide the terror that was growing with every dark tree silhouette that flashed past on either side.

‘Very appropriate, then,’ she smiled.

‘Very,’ I said. ‘Next thing you know, there’ll be witches flying about.’

‘Well,’ she grinned, ‘you never can tell.’ Except, of course, she could. But how was I supposed to know that? Then.

Then there was no mist and it was surprisingly light among the trees; light enough to see that we had run out of proper road and were travelling along a flat mud track - surprisingly flat, as mud tracks go - towards what appeared to be a gingerbread cottage. of course, it wasn’t made of gingerbread, but I’d have liked to give a few colour coordination lessons to whoever last painted it.

Nevertheless, as Imelda parked and we got out of the car, I still felt a bit like Hansel and Gretel - well, Hansel, anyway.

‘Who lives here?’ I asked. ‘You?’ Imelda turned and laughed, shaking her head.

‘Goodness, no. Could you imagine me living in a place painted these colours?’

‘Does look like someone used up all the spare cans of paint in Dorset,’ I agreed, hoping my little joke wouldn’t cause offence. It didn’t.

‘It’s my aunt Polly,’ Imelda said. ‘She’s pretty much colour blind, but she won’t admit it.’

‘One of the aunts you told me about yesterday?’

‘S’right, except she’s not a real aunt.’

‘A foster aunt,’ you said, I reminded her.

‘Well, my godsmother, actually.’ I missed out that little plural "s", but then, I bet you’d have done the same, if it had been you. Imelda walked up to the door, knocked once on the big iron knocker and pushed the orange and pink rectangle open.

‘Pol!’ She looked back over her shoulder at me. ‘She’s a bit deaf, too,’ she said.

‘Only she won’t admit to that, either?’ I suggested. ‘Won’t consider a hearing aid?’

‘Won’t hear of it,’ Imelda said and we both giggled.

‘I bloody well heard that, you cheeky little sprite!’ The old lady appeared, framed in the doorway, as if by magic, which, as I subsequently learned, was probably how she did it. All that was missing was a puff of greenish smoke, but then, as I said at the beginning of this, not everything we’re taught about fairies and witches and stuff is that accurate.

‘Pol, meet Simon,’ Imelda said, quite unphased by Aunt Polly’s sudden materialisation and kissing the old dear on the face. I say "old dear" because, well, that’s how she looked. She was shortish, plumpish, with tidy grey hair, neatly pinned in a bun and wore a floral dress of mainly pink and green and a bright blue designer tracksuit top, which hung open, lossely, being about two sizes too large for her.

Aunt Polly looked towards me, wrinkling her nose and screwing up her eyes. Not just colour blind, I surmised. She stared at me for several seconds and then her wrinkled features broke into a really warm smile of welcome. A very nice old dear, I thought.

‘Come inside then, Simon,’ she said, waving her arm and stepping back. ‘Bet you could do with something to warm your cockles, eh?’

‘Tea,’ I agreed. ‘Unless you have coffee. I don’t want to put you to any trouble.’ She laughed, a quite ear shattering cackle, coming from such a sweet and homely looking person.

‘Bugger tea and coffee!’ she exclaimed. ‘Have something proper inside you.’ And with that, she made towards the mahogany drinks cabinet that dominated one corner of what was a surprisingly large front room. So large, in fact, that it almost seemed to be larger than the outside dimensions of the entire cottage. Impossible, of course, but then the Tardis theory in Doctor Who had come from somewhere, only I never made the connection right then.

I expect you’re expecting me to tell you how she gave me this pewter goblet, in which was a thick, home made potion, smelling oddly of unidentified herbs and that I drank it out of politeness and then ...

No such thing. Aunt Polly had five star brandy in that cabinet and several bottles of it, the sort of stuff you can’t get outside of France for under thirty something quid a bottle.

‘Hennessy Cognac?’ I ventured, taking a cautious sip. She chuckled.

‘Well done that man,’ she said. ‘And what do we mix with Hennessy Cognac?’

‘Another Hennessy Cognac?’ She held out the bottle and I had passed the first test.

‘And bloody nothing else,’ she sniggered, topping my glass to the very brim. ‘Get your entrails the right side of that, my boy!’ I raised my glass again, this time in salutation and thanks.

‘You bin shaggin’ our little Immie, so I hear!’ The new voice was high pitched, slightly cracked, obviously old and could have peeled wallpaper from a distance of three rooms. A fine spray of cognac hit the air. What a waste. When I stopped coughing and the tears cleared from my eyes, I focussed on the new arrival.

About Polly’s age, but much, much thinner, with beakish nose, half moon glasses, stick insect limbs, the lower ones of which protruded from beneath the hem of a black skirt much too high to be decent on a female of that age, and with hair the colour to match that skirt.

‘This is Aunt Holly,’ Imelda introduced the old lady, completely unmoved.

‘Er, hello,’ I said, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, drying it on my trousers and then offering it. ‘Sorry about that, but you startled me.’

‘Shoulda thought about that before you started diddling in our Immie’s drawers,’ the old crone cackled, but she took my hand and shook it with a surprisingly firm grip and action.

‘Auntie!’ Imelda’s tone was warning. ‘I keep telling you, I’m not a baby any more. Besides, if we hadn’t - well, you know what I mean.’

‘Not a baby!’ Aunt Holly’s tone was scornful. ‘Not a bloody day over fifty.’

‘Fifty one, actually,’ Imelda said. I stared at her, hardly able to believe my ears, or else assuming she was just joking, but there was something about the expression that now occupied those beautiful features that told me instantly that neither was the case. She nodded, looking half apologetic, at least.

‘Fuckin’ hell!’ The words were out of my mouth before I could stop myself. Aunt Holly cackled again.

‘They probably do, young man,’ she wheezed, ‘but that’s getting off the point, ain’t it?’

‘I think Simon looks as if he could do with sitting down,’ Aunt Polly suggested, a note of concern in her voice. I allowed her to lead me to a big, sloppy looking armchair and sank gratefully into it. I sipped at what remained of my brandy and looked at Imogen.

‘You’re not really fifty one, are you?’ I almost pleaded. Again a nod.

‘Fifty two in December, actually,’ she said. ‘I can see it matters to you.’

‘Well, um, I mean ...’

‘Well, it would dear, wouldn’t it?’ Aunt Polly held out the brandy bottle again and my glass was drawn to it, as if by some magnetic field. ‘I can see the poor lad’s in love with you and probably already thinking of spending years together. He looks the type. Sensitive.’

‘A painter,’ Imelda said.

‘Houses,’ I mumbled.

‘Could do with you around this place,’ Holly snapped, still sounding as prickly as her name suggested.

‘Is Aunt Polly right?’ Imelda asked. I nodded.

‘Near enough,’ I admitted, gulping more nectar. ‘I mean, it’s probably a bit early and I’m probably taking too much on myself and now you tell me ... oh well, maybe I can learn to live with it.’

‘Maybe you won’t have to.’ Yet another new voice and I turned my head towards the door and the speaker. Another female, this time looking about the age Imelda had just told me she really was and dressed as if she had just come from the boardroom. Tailored black skirt and jacket, black silk blouse, sheet black stockings and black stiletto heeled court shoes that could have pierced flesh at either end.

‘Hello, Aunt Dolly,’ Imelda said, moving across and reaching up to plant a kiss on the cheek of the woman’s perfectly made up face. Did I mention that Aunt Dolly was very tall? Even without the added five inches of her footwear, she would have given me a fair run and I’m not short by anyone’s standards. Well, unless you count basketball players, naturally.

‘Aunt Dolly, this is Simon,’ Imelda introduced us. Aunt Dolly held out a hand and I saw that she was wearing skin tight gloves, also in black. Apart from her face, the only thing about her that wasn’t black was her hair, which was a rich, luxuriant auburn.

‘I can see that, sweetie,’ she said. Her voice was quite deep and perfectly modulated and she moved with an elegance that was sort of oiled, only in the nicest possible way, if you follow. ‘A pleasure to meet you, Simon. I’ve heard so much about you.’

‘You have?’ I took her hand as if afraid of soiling those gloves and my voice emerged as a squeak. She nodded, smiling an expansive, carmine beauty salon sort of smile, which revealed teeth of a whiteness that dazzled. By thingy, she was no spring chicken, but she was one hell of an attractive woman. Talking of which, as I sank back into my armchair, my poor old grey cells at last began to find each other and start holding hands. A few neural connections later:

‘Imogen, how can you be fifty odd and look twentyish?’ I asked. And no, I hadn’t guessed the bloody answer, ‘cause I hadn’t had ten percent of the clues I’ve given you, so no smart remarks, right! Imogen cast a quick look around the assembled aunts and then gave a sort of half shrug, half something else.

‘Because I’m a fairy,’ she replied, simply. I nodded.

‘Of course,’ I said, peering down into my glass, which had somehow been refilled again, without my noticing it, ‘that would do it, every time!’ I gulped more courage and Aunt Polly and bottle began to move in again.

‘A fairy, eh?’ I said, after a short pause for recollection. Glug-glug went the brandy bottle, bloody hell, said a little voice, somewhere deep inside my head. ‘No, I don’t think so. I think this is some sort of hidden camera stunt.’

‘Whaddideesay!’ Aunt Holly’s hooked nose swivelled in my direction, her hawk eyes glittering accusingly. Aunt Dolly intervened with a smoothness that told its own story.

‘He said "stunt", Holly,’ she said, speaking very slowly and I realised that Aunt Holly, whilst her sight was better than her first sister’s, was probably a bit deaf. She relaxed, visibly, muttering something about no young whipper snapper being able to get away with calling her ... and there the muttering merged into a blur.

‘It’s no stunt,’ Imogen said. ‘I really am. Look!’

I did and suddenly she wasn’t quite there. By which I mean, she was there, but the edges were somehow sort of not exactly blurred, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on -

‘Hey!’ I exclaimed, staring back into my glass, accusingly. ‘What’s going on here?’

And suddenly, Imogen was back, clear, distinct and as beautiful as ever.

‘See?’ she said. She smiled when I looked back to the glass a second time. ‘You’re not that drunk,’ she said and did the damned act all over again.

‘Okay! Okay!’ I cried. ‘I’m impressed.’ She shimmered back into focus much more slowly this time, as if to demonstrate her complete control. ‘How’d you do that?’ I gasped. That smile again.

‘It’s a fairy thing,’ she said. ‘It’s so we can go places and do things and afterwards, if you asked for witnesses, no one would ever be able to quite describe us.’

‘No one?’

‘Only people we want to,’ she said, assuredly.

‘Like me?’

‘Yes, like you.’

‘But why me?’

‘Why me?’ she countered. I looked at her sort of sideways, as the expression goes.

‘Well, I’ve fallen in love with you,’ I said, quite candidly. She nodded.

‘Well then, there’s your answer.’ It took a few seconds for the penny to start rolling and then it dropped. Per-link! I gasped.

‘You mean you’ve fallen in love with me, too!’

‘Of course,’ she said, quite serious now. ‘I didn’t have a choice.’

‘I don’t understand,’ I said, genuinely bemused. Like I said, I’m not that bad looking, but she was -

A fairy. ‘A fairy does with a human what we did last night,’ she said, with utter candour, ‘and she falls in love automatically.’

‘Oh,’ I said, not sure whether to be flattered or otherwise by this latest revelation.

‘Actually,’ she said, ‘I think I was sort of starting to anyway. I’ve been watching you for a few weeks now, you and a couple of other possibles, but it was you I chose.’

‘I never saw you,’ I said and then realised why that was. She smiled, as if she’d heard that second coin drop after the first.

‘Exactly,’ she said, ‘because I didn’t want you to. Well, you did, but of course you never really noticed me.’

‘Until the car park,’ I said. ‘After you’d judged my reaction to the prang, what there was of it?’

‘Right.’

‘And there was no damage, not even a scratch,’ I said, beginning to catch on at last.

‘Because there wasn’t actually any contact.’

‘More fairy magic?’ I guessed. She nodded again and now I smiled.

‘Ain’t young love bleedin’ touchin’?’ Holly cackled, cutting in. ‘And here’s me sittin here parched, Poll. Got a guiness in the fridge?’

‘Only Murphy’s,’ Aunt Polly apologised. ‘Delivery boy was off sick today and you drank the last of it last night. I phoned the off licence and they promised to get a van over before eight.’

‘Hang on a minute,’ I said. ‘If Imelda is a fairy, what does that make you three? Not fairies, surely?’

‘We’re her godsmothers, sweetie,’ Aunt Dolly purred. ‘Hasn’t she told you yet?’

‘So you’re not fairies?’ I persisted.

‘E’s quick,’ Holly rattled, ‘but not that quick. We’re witches, you stpid boy, or can’t you tell that?’

‘Well - ‘ I hesitated, looking at Polly and Holly, but then my gaze turned to Dolly. That wide, sexy grin again.

‘Me too, sweetie,’ she said, quite affably.

‘And you ride broomsticks?’ Okay, so maybe I was taking the piss, but this was all starting to get out of hand. Dolly laughed and it was very much a bedroom laugh, or would have been, had the circumstances been different.

‘I prefer my Porche, darling,’ she said. ‘Much less drafty. Besides, those hazel twigs snag stockings far too easily.’

‘Isn’t there a spell that could prevent that?’ Well, in for a penny, in for a pound, but Dolly didn’t seem to pick up on my sarcasm.

‘Yes, as I said, a spell in my Porche,’ she said and then I saw, from the glint in her eye, that I’d gone about as far down that road as she was going to tolerate. Beautiful, sexy, perfectly groomed and very well mannered, Aunt Dolly, I realised, was probably the one to watch out for here.

‘Okay,’ I said, sitting back deep within the relative protection of the big armchair. ‘So Imelda is a fairy and you three are witches. Supposing I buy that, then would someone like to fill me in as to what this is all about?’

‘Warlocks,’ said Aunt Polly.

‘Eh?’ croaked Aunt Holly, accusingly.

‘Warlocks, you deaf old bat,’ Polly said, speaking much louder. Aunt Holly raised her eyebrows.

‘Pardon me for bloody breathing,’ she snapped, ‘let alone asking a civil question.’

‘Warlocks?’ I asked, pronouncing the word very carefully, all the while with an eye on Aunt Holly. Then I saw the glimmer of a smile, only for the merest of fractions of a second and I realised that maybe she wasn’t quite as deaf as she was making out. Mischievous old trout, but I suddenly found myself warming to her.

‘They want to shag Immie,’ she said, bluntly.

‘What?’

‘You know, bonkety-bonk, rumpy-pumpy, hide Mr Toad in the bloody hole.’

‘You mean have sex with her?’ Aunt Holly gave me a resigned look.

‘That’s what shagging usually involves, ain’t it!’ she cried. ‘@Cept its not just sex, not like you and her did it.’

‘How do you know - ‘ I began, but Aunt Dolly intervened.

‘Because you are very obviously in love with little Imelda and she with you,’ she said. ‘What the warlocks have in mind for Immie is a sort of saturnalia.’

‘Gang bang, in your language,’ Holly cut in, with just a shade too much relish.

‘And when’s this gang - I mean, when’s this saturnalia thingie supposed to take place?’ I asked, but I think I already knew the answer to that one. A slow starter, granted, but I was starting to catch up fast. Given I could accept that young and beautiful Imelda was really a fifty-something fairy and that her three godsmothers, including the impossibly elegant Dolly, were all witches, I could work out what day it was, especially as I already had a calandar.

‘Tonight,’ Imelda said and suddenly began to cry.

* * *

 

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