The Limbo of Luxury

I LEFT THE film studio to travel and get serious about my own film projects. I had big aspirations at that time, but they waned as the next year passed and I found myself no closer to getting a film on the screen.

Between losing faith in film production and commencing work on my first successful novel, I was forced to earn a living. And, as so many starving artists do, I got a job in retail sales.

I’d worked in a record store before; in fact, I’d worked for this same retail music chain before. I met many an aspiring artist among the staff and it got to be that my first question to anyone I’d not worked with before was, ‘So what do you really do?’

When I asked Claire this question, she gave me an exhausted look and mumbled, ‘I’m an actress,’ She stood there in anticipation of my next question being, ‘So what have you been in?’.

‘I sympathise,’ I replied. ‘I’m a writer.’

At that moment we recognised in each other a kindred spirit who had dreams and a life beyond the walls of retail sales.

Working with Claire made working in a record store bearable and when Mandy (the body builder) came to work with us, my paying job even became fun for a while.

Despite the great people and times we had, it killed my soul to know that whilst I was working full time for someone else, my own dreams were fading and I was turning into a moody, depressed person. I was beginning to be sucked into company politics and I hated that I was expected to give a damn about sales figures. There was this amazing story forming in my head, which I did not have the time to write and this frustrated me all the more.

Claire took a stand for her art before I did; she found herself an agent and headed off to the US to see if she couldn’t get serious about her craft and make some connections. Not that Claire wasn’t acting one hundred percent of the time, anyway. When asked to actually use her own voice and personality for a moment, it was not unknown for Claire to find herself at a loss.

I took holidays to try and deal with the fact that work was going to be even more depressing with Claire gone, and that in three years I hadn’t touched my film project or written anything new.

The amazing tale that had been brewing in my mind for many years finally got a look in. Those holidays I found my passion for storytelling once again. Still, I had decided not to waste the idea on a film script. This time, I would write a short story. That short story became The Ancient Future Trilogy, which eventually spawned a second trilogy, The Celestial Triad.

When I returned to work having written five amazing chapters of my first book, I was told that Mandy had resigned from her casual position at the store. She was going to design her own label of gym wear and was off to the US, with Claire, to buy fabric and scope the latest trends. I resigned my full-time position on the spot, and applied for her casual job. This was one of the most vital decisions of my career — I still had money coming in, but I had a whole lot more time to work on my writing and a whole lot less responsibility to the company. The career prospects really started looking up after that and I got happy and healthy in mind, body and spirit.

Claire returned from the US and found work in commercials, TV and theatre. She took acting classes and became a damned fine clapper loader on the side — for extra cash. She acted in a couple of short independent films the year before last, the first of which won Tropfest 2000, and the second was featured in the ‘best of the rest’ at the same festival. Next thing Claire knew, she’d been accepted to attend an acting school in New York.

Two days short of getting on the plane, Claire was diagnosed with cancer and was informed that she immediately faced six months of chemotherapy if she wished to live.

I have yet to mention Claire’s extraordinary beauty, of which she has always been annoyingly unaware. The next six months really tested this woman’s opinion of herself, and her beliefs, but never did she question her goal. Her ambition never suffered one iota for her illness. In fact, every second week (when therapy was not causing her to throw her guts up), Claire was still working on any production that she could work her treatments around.

Fortunately, the acting school in New York was kind enough to hold Claire’s position until the following year. The star herself got through the therapy and her cancer has gone into remission. A year to the day after Claire learnt of her illness, she climbed on a plane and flew off to New York. She returned to us, after the course, a completely changed woman, full of positivity and hope. She has just returned to the US to speak with a producer about a feature film.

Claire appreciates her own beauty and knows her power now, knowledge that is bound to be useful where Claire is headed.

Miss Claire-Bear McFlair inspired the character of Rhiannon in
Masters of Reality
, and the character of Zoe in the forthcoming
Book of Dreams
.

I had started writing ‘In the Limbo of Luxury’ even before Claire influenced the storyline and the tale became dedicated to her.

I dreamt up the story right in the middle of penning the second book of The Celestial Triad — being the fifth book of an ongoing series, the writing was heavy going. Every time I wrote a sentence I had to consider the text of the four epic books that had gone before it. For a brief, insane moment, writing seemed to be a chore and I didn’t know what to do about it.

Claire was staying over on the weekend I was having this crisis. I didn’t have writer’s block, I had something worse. I was bored with writing and although I was enjoying the story that was unfolding, it was just too hard. So much research was involved, so much history had to be considered. I craved a new tale, one that was entirely spontaneous and unexpected.

‘Write something just for the hell of it,’ Claire said, encouraging me to blow off my paying text and have a little fun.

I don’t normally like to concentrate on writing more than one tale at the one time, but ‘In the Limbo of Luxury’ taught me what a grave mistake that had been. This tale popped out in a couple of weeks and the book that I was contracted to write also fell out into my computer with more ease and joy than it had heretofore. I finished
Tablet of Destinies
well within deadline. Now I am twice as productive and if I were not, this book would not be here.

During the short time it took to pen this tale, Claire’s illness came to light.

From the moment I’d conceived of this tale I knew that it was to have a surprise ending. All my readers have come to expect a happy-ever-after tale, but this time my heroine was going to self-destruct and betray herself in the end.

Claire’s illness changed everything. She knew I was writing a story for her and I knew I could not run with the plot as it stood. So, my beautiful ghostly tragedy became a fight to save my character from the destructive path she’d set herself upon … and the plot did thicken!

IT WAS THE COLD that woke her. An icy film prevented her eyelids from opening and only with a concerted effort did they part to a squint.

The sun was up and its light reflected off the surrounding thick, white blanket with blinding intensity. The windscreen was shattered and snow from the rockface she’d careered into had cascaded down on to the smashed bonnet of her vehicle. The build-up of ice had piled in through the void in the shattered glass and was tumbling into her lap. Fortunately, the rockface had held firm on impact — she could have had worse than ice piled in her lap.

‘Oh Christ … I’m alive,’ Riane mumbled, as flashes of the accident replayed themselves with disturbing clarity.

It had been her fault. She shouldn’t have had those drinks with lunch, or at the least she could have considered staying the night at the little hotel, instead of pushing on into the highlands as evening fell, and in such dreadful weather. Listening to the locals tell ghost stories, time had got away with her. Intent on sticking to her holiday schedule, Riane wanted to make it to the coast this night and that meant braving the winding highland road.

‘Young women go missing on that road at night,’ the barman had told her, straight-faced and sombre.

‘And have done since before this village even existed.’ The local historian added his two cents’ worth. ‘Some bodies have been found in pieces at the base of mountain cliffs, or frozen stiff at ruins and sacred sites … others have never been found at all.’

‘And men have never gone missing, I suppose?’ Riane had scoffed at their obvious attempt to frighten her into taking a room for the night. When all the old blokes at the bar shook their heads in unison, perplexed by the mystery, Riane had been forced to restrain her laughter.

‘There are ghosts a-plenty wandering about out there and the mist plays tricks in the dark.’ The barman took a final stab at a night’s rental, and although his claim had, admittedly, sent a shiver up Riane’s spine, she had decided to press on. The old men had been more creepy than any old road at night, in her opinion.

If she had not allowed herself to be so drawn into their yarn spinning, she probably wouldn’t have imagined herself into this mess. Riane had been fiddling around trying to light a cigarette, when she’d glanced up to see the oncoming headlights. She’d swerved and got into this dire predicament to avoid hitting the oncoming car, which had swerved off into the rockface on the other side of the road and burst into flames.

‘What friggin’ car?’ she cursed, pushing down on the handle of her door, and with a great shove, it creaked open.

There was no debris on the other side of the road. Had she imagined the whole thing? Or had she crossed paths with one of the local ghosts?

Riane did her best not to panic when her legs wouldn’t move of their own accord. There was the hope that they were only numb from the blanket of snow that covered them. Using both her hands, she moved her legs one at a time by lifting them around into position. Her woollen gloves were soaked through and movement of her frozen limbs sent waves of pins and needles through the disturbed body parts. When her legs emerged from their burial free of mutilations, Riane was most relieved. Using the car as leverage, she pulled herself up to a standing position and was doubly pleased to discover that her spine hadn’t been damaged either, just chilled.

‘Yahoo!’ She jumped into the air to be sure everything was functioning correctly and was heartened to discover she was A-okay. ‘Dry clothes,’ she stammered aloud, in the hope of defrosting her face and stopping her teeth from chattering.

Her suitcase was in the undamaged boot of the car. The hatch door provided shelter from the falling snow while Riane stripped off her wet attire and pulled on as many layers as she could find and still move. The sandshoes she used while driving were replaced by her dry hiking boots and several pairs of woollen socks, which did wonders for defrosting her frozen feet and ankles; adding a woollen scarf, balaclava, beanie and dry leather gloves, Riane felt herself ready to go find some help.

These roads were not well used in the heart of the cold season. In fact, Riane hadn’t passed a single vehicle since she’d left the village yesterday before sunset. This made her encounter with the phantom car doubly strange, now that she was sober enough to consider it. In the split-second view she’d had of the vehicle, it had appeared to be some sort of vintage sports car.

‘Now who would take an old sports car out on these roads at this time of year?’ She found it hard to believe her own recollection.

According to her informants, everyone in these parts would be well dug in for winter, and if they weren’t going to find her, then Riane thought she’d best go and find them.

The contents of her bag had been scattered in the crash and then covered in snow, but Riane managed to dig out her purse, her passport, her cigarettes and lighter. She gave up hunting for her mobile phone and returned her frozen fingers to the warmth of her glove. ‘Damn thing’s probably dead or out of range anyway,’ she justified, managing to control her growing anxiety at not being able to locate her lifeline to civilisation. ‘If I just stick to the road, I’m bound to get where I’m going.’ She persuaded herself to ignore the ghost stories of the locals, which were replaying over and over in her mind as she set off on her trek.

Walking along the highland road was pleasant enough whilst the sun shone in the sky, and the views were spectacular.

Great mountains of white rose and fell all around her for as far as the eye could see. Riane could have been the one person alive on earth, for not a hint of civilisation intruded on the landscape — even the road could only be defined by the piles of snow that lined each side of it.

In the afternoon, storm clouds gathered, and the wind whipped up with an icy vengeance to make the journey more challenging. Neither a car nor another being had been spied all day, and there had been no sign to say that she was nearing the coast.

‘I should have stayed with the car … dug out my phone …’ She stammered out the words through her chattering teeth. ‘What the hell was I thinking!’ she screamed, hoping her anger might warm her and speed up her freezing limbs.

Thankfully, the open moorland of the high mountains had given way to a forest-lined road and the trees served to give her some shelter from the brewing storm. The day was fast becoming as dark as night; when night did descend it would be as black as pitch. Suddenly it wasn’t so hard to imagine how all those young women had gone missing — with no light to see by, Riane felt she could easily lose the road and wander off a cliff. If she stood still, she’d freeze to death!

‘Some great options you’ve left yourself. If someone doesn’t come along before nightfall, you’re stuffed!’ Riane forced herself to walk faster, although her legs were becoming less and less responsive. Her tears warmed her face momentarily before the wind chill factor froze them to ice. ‘I’m not ready to die yet,’ she mumbled. ‘I haven’t fathomed the meaning of life … or found true love, or figured out what the hell I’m supposed to be doing with my life! So what was it all for, if I never discover these things?’ She spoke aloud as if reasoning with God — whom she’d not contacted in many a year. ‘I’m a
good
person,’ she appealed, not sounding quite as positive about the statement as she would have liked. ‘Okay, so I’m a bit self-centred,’ she admitted. ‘And I’ve slept around a bit … so what? Can I help it that you gave me a weakness for tall, dark, foreign men?’

If the truth be known it was this weakness that had ultimately landed Riane in this predicament, because the reason she was so eager to stick to her holiday schedule was that, if she did, she would cross paths with a charming love interest that she’d met back in Edinburgh. Geoff was a tour guide and in two days time they could be reunited for a romantic highland interlude; or at least that’s how he’d described it.

‘No dirty weekend is worth this,’ she puffed, sickened by her own desire to be desired. ‘Goddamn it all!’ she hollered as she came to a standstill, for she could barely see the road in front of her any more — the sun was setting. ‘How many times do I have to have this same pathetic talk with myself … I do not need a man in my life to be complete!’ Riane ventured to pull her hand out of her glove for just long enough to retrieve a cigarette from her packet and light it. Sucking back the smoke and icy air through the woollen balaclava that almost covered her mouth was not as pleasing as expected.
So, this is it … my last meaningful experience,
she thought. ‘Don’t listen to me God, I’m full of shit … what I wouldn’t give for a hot bath, a good man and a bottle of port.’ Her request inspired a groan of delight as she pictured the scenario in her mind, although the warmth of her vision was but a haunting and fleeting tease to her in this grim reality. As she dragged on the cigarette again, Riane noted what appeared to be a parting in the trees across the way. ‘Is that a road, or a driveway even?’ Riane’s heart began beating madly in her chest as she scampered over to investigate. The daylight was nearly gone and the sky had begun rumbling.

There was most definitely a road cut through the trees.
It has to lead somewhere
, she reasoned in her mind, as her mouth was nearly frozen shut.
What if it leads to a lookout?
she cautioned herself. But the truth was, she just didn’t care any more. Rescue or death; whichever brought relief from the cold would be welcome.

Darkness descended and Riane whimpered quietly as she shuffled along the snow-covered track in the forest. Fortunately, the snow piled along each side of the clearway let her know when she was heading off course.

‘I think I’m headed the right way to becoming another ghost story in these parts.’ She attempted to amuse herself, but she was getting beyond hope, and was literally freezing to death. Her bleary eyes caught sight of a flicker of light, which quickly vanished again into darkness. ‘What was that?’ She moved back to check and found her eyes had not deceived her.

There was a light in the distance. The road she was following must not have been entirely straight, and thus the forest had blocked her view of the light source. ‘Oh, God, please make that light be coming from any form of shelter.’ Riane sped up her shuffle, hoping she wouldn’t die before she reached the only beacon in the harsh, black landscape.

Around a bend in the road, Riane was relieved of the worry of falling off a cliff, for lit up before her was a manor fit for a queen. ‘Oh, thank you, God,’ she cried when she found the gate unlocked.

‘Must be somebody home.’ She encouraged herself to keep going, although her legs were beginning to fail her. Next thing Riane knew, she was face down in the snow. ‘Get up!’ she cried. The rest was blissful and her body longed to take its repose. She raised her head to find the front door was within her sight. ‘
Come on
,’ she whimpered, when her body would not respond to her command and the wild winds whipped over her, covering her with icy flakes. ‘Fuck this,’ she hollered in the face of death and managed to roll on to her back. ‘I will not die here.’ Riane rolled on to all fours and staggered upright. ‘All right,’ she clapped her hands once to acknowledge her efforts, and then stumbled on all fours up the manor stairs. ‘I made it,’ she mumbled. She clung to the large doorknocker, exhausted from the effort. Her head was spinning as she began pounding the knocker against the solid timber doors, her enthusiasm waning after a couple of minutes.

She turned and leaned against the barrier, admiring how pretty the snow looked dancing around the gas lanterns that lit the pathway to the house. Riane didn’t notice that she’d slid to a seat on the ground and was only vaguely aware when the door opened and she dropped completely to the ground with a thud.

‘Good heavens … are you lost, girl?’ a blurry figure asked.

He was male, she could tell from the voice, which was rich with a Scottish accent. But Riane’s eyes would not focus; they wanted to sleep. ‘Save me,’ she appealed, as her mind seized control of her suffering and she blanked out.

Out through the windshield the night is dark and the falling snow looks like sparkling stars during a jump into hyper-space as the flakes lit by the headlights speed toward the vehicle.

Her hand rummages through her bag; she glances aside only for a moment.

Then, returning her eyes to the icy roadway, the headlights of the oncoming car blind her.

Both cars swerve violently and headlights illuminate the rockface for a second before impact.

After the deafening jolt, many minutes pass before the windscreen shatters.

A woman, as pale as the snow around her and dressed in a tattered wedding gown, is perched on the bonnet, peering inside at Riane. Her dark hair and hollow eyes command attention. ‘Men are deceivers,’ she hisses. ‘Cursed is the woman who trusts her heart to a man’s safekeeping.’

‘Huh!’ Riane woke with a start to find herself submerged in a warm tub and still dressed in her innermost layer of clothes. Her opulent surroundings were like something out of a fairytale. She’d never imagined a bath, or a bathroom, so grand or beautiful as the one she currently occupied.

‘Rest easy now.’

A hand touched one of her arms and she followed it up to discover a tall, dark-haired man, who was smiling broadly at her. ‘My name is Marcus MacCloud. It was my doorstep you stumbled upon and I have your welfare safe in hand.’

He was young and handsome, with the fresh, intelligent face of a member of the gentry. He was attired in warm, casual clothes of good quality, that were not too dressy, not too flash.

Riane smiled, amused that her greatest wish had been granted. She had the bath and a gorgeous man. ‘Now all I need is a glass of port,’ she joked to herself, half-delirious and believing she must have died and gone to heaven.

‘We have everything here.’ Marcus placed a port glass in her hand and filled it. ‘Go on. It will warm you on the inside.’ He encouraged Riane to drink, but all she could manage was to giggle hysterically.