At One with Soil
by Paul McAvoy

Sometimes you have to really believe in something to see it to be real; to scrape away that lining between what we all know to be real and what we might believe is real. What we see is what most of us believe, but underneath, there is so much more, some of it good, and some of it bad. Take the case of Peter Penny, flower lover, breaker of hearts, rogue. Shallow, but likeable. Adored by the opposite sex and admired by his fellow man. Now, the case of Peter Penny is something you have to hear, just so you can know for yourself just how easy it is to move from what you know, to what you can imagine, to see that there is a lot more to life than you realised, if you care to have the fortune (or in the case of Peter Penny misfortune) to go look there.

I believe, I truly believe – I will never doubt what I saw with my own eyes. So, what happened to Peter Penny, do you ask? Well, in short, he went for the wrong lady, and I mean the wrong lady.

Peter Penny collected women like some people collect stamps; he hunted them down like a hunter hunts game, just so that he could say that he had had her. Three things have to have happened for Peter Penny to have succeeded in having a particular female. He had to successfully woo her, have sex with her and have her want him back when he walked out on her; and that was what he always did, walk out, too young to get serious or even to care.

He left a trail of broken hearts and made a note of the women he’d had in a diary, just as a train-spotter makes a note in a logbook of the trains he has seen. Then, the catch over, the catch held, he moved onto the next one.

One might say he was addicted to woman, psychologists might even assume he was a frustrated homosexual. Peter Penny knew only one thing: he did what he did because he enjoyed it, and because he could afford to.

He had few problems with attracting women and having women, usually did not have to try too hard. Most fell for him instantly. But the harder the chase, the better it was. The harder to get the woman, the more of a challenge it became. Things usually turned out the way he wanted them until he met one woman. And that woman was Claudette Kirk.

When Peter came to see me he was a wreck. As his GP, I had known the twenty-five year old computer whiz kid since he was small, and had seen him grow into a confident man who had few problems with making friends or meeting girls. When I saw him that January morning he was like the shell of his former self. His hair was greasy, his clothes dirty and there were dark rings under his eyes.

He sat in front of my desk, stuttering his words, nervous-looking, playing with his fingers and shooting glances all around him, as though he had enemies capable of appearing through the very walls to get at him.

‘What’s wrong?’ I asked, in my normal, doctor-patient concern. My first thought had been that he was on drugs or something, but as we began to speak I soon realised I was wrong. Of course, I did not believe him.

‘I want you to make them stop,’ he told me. He coughed and closed a hand over his mouth. He moved the clenched hand away from his face and opened it. On the palm of his hand was a bright red rose. ‘God, Doctor Ramsey, make them stop!’

‘Make what stop?’

He sighed. ‘I ought to start at the beginning.’ He began to remove the petals from the rose. He shot a glance over his shoulder, then looked back at me. I told him to continue, that I was listening. What followed was an account of his experience with Claudette Kirk.

He met most of his women in nightclubs, spotted them dancing away in tight fitting clothing and plotted how he would pick them up. He met Claudette, however, in a library. When he saw her knew he wanted her. She was in the computer section, browsing. She wore a black outfit and her long brown hair was tied up at the back. Inevitably, he was instantly drawn to her.

He got talking to her, found out she was a student, and eighteen years old. He also found out –around the time she told him to just leave her alone, please – that she was not interested him in the slightest.

She left the library and Peter was quite amazed. This was going to prove to be a challenge, but he would have her. Of that he was certain. He would not stop until he did.

The next day he waited outside the college she was studying at and waited for her. She came outside alone.

‘Hi,’ he said and she looked at him as though he was something bad she had stood in.

‘Oh, it’s you.’

‘Peter Penny,’ he said. ‘I don’t think I told you yesterday. What’s your name?’

‘Why should I tell you?’ she asked him, those dark eyes almost boring into him. ‘Why do you think I would even want to tell you?’

‘Because it’s a custom. I say my name, you say yours.’

‘Will you leave me alone if I tell you?’ she asked him and he nodded. ‘Okay, it’s Claudette Kirk. And I am French, before you ask. But I am not related to James T., either.’

He tried to woo her more, but to no avail and she jumped onto a bus. He noted the bus and looked in the phone book, finding out where she lived. The next day he waited outside her house in the morning when she left for college. She grimaced when she saw him. ‘Peter Penny, turning up once more like a bad penny, as you say in England.’

‘Can I take you out for dinner?’ he asked. ‘I know this Italian place.’

‘I hate Italian.’

‘Indian, then?’ he asked, hurrying down the road after him. She stopped at the bus stop.

‘Gives me indigestion. Sorry, Peter Penny. I am not interested.’

‘I will keep sending you flowers until you say yes,’ he told her.

‘Whatever,’ she said and jumped on a bus.

Peter did as he promised and for a week he sent her a dozen red roses each day. On the seventh day she phoned. ‘Okay, if I go out with you, will you stop sending me damn flowers?’

‘I will,’ he smiled.

They ate Chinese that evening. And it went much better than he had though it would do, even though his ego normally outweighed his fears ten-fold. They had a lot in common and he could see she was falling for him. At the end of the evening, she said, ‘Do you know, Peter, I am glad I agreed to have dinner with you. I have enjoyed myself.’

‘Then would you like to go out for a drink at the weekend?’

‘I would do,’ she nodded.

Peter grinned. He knew he had her.

So, the inevitable happened. They had sex the following weekend and he left her flat in the small hours, knowing he would not return. She called him the next day and he said he though they should cool things off for a while, that things had been happening too fast. It was his standard line.

‘You’re chucking me?’ she asked him. ‘Peter, are you actually chucking me, after all you went through to get me?’

‘I wouldn’t say I was chucking you, I just want to cool things off for a while.’

‘God, you are even too much of a coward to say it straight. Peter, don’t do this, I love you!’

‘I’m sorry, Claudette. It’s over.’

There was laughter at the other end of the line – sharp, mad laughter and Peter suddenly realised that this was one woman he could not and should not treat this way. But the damage had been done. ‘Then, Peter Penny, you shall pay for this. I did not want you to mess with me, but you did. Hope you like the flowers. I will expect your call in a few days. But you have hurt me so badly and my kind don’t like that. We find it very hard to forgive. So don’t expect me to stop what I am going to do.’

The line went dead.

Peter Penny turned to face me, having been looking down at the floor while he told me what Claudette had said to him. ‘The next day, the flowers started coming. The first one came in the morning whilst I was having a shave. Suddenly I felt a lump in my throat, I coughed and there it was, a white rose.’ He grimaced. ‘I have been coughing up roses ever since, and that is for about a week. At first it was one every three or four hours, now they are coming one every fifteen minutes.’

I watched him cough and place a hand over his mouth. In the palm of his hand was a small yellow rose. ‘Can I see that?’ I asked and he handed it to me. I placed it in a tissue and put it on my desk. I wondered for the first time, was Peter Penny winding me up? But if so, why? Was this some Beadle or Candid Camera type of set up?

‘I know what you are thinking,’ Peter said. ‘But what I am telling you is true, not a lie or a joke. I called Claudette, just as she said I would call her about the flowers. She told me it was my punishment and that it was what I deserved. I asked her to make it stop, that I would do anything. She just laughed. She said it would be over sooner than I think.’ He exhaled. ‘Help me Doctor Ramsey? Can you stop it from happening?’

‘I don’t know,’ I told him. ‘I don’t really know.’

He sighed. ‘I did not think so. Do you think this is some sort of spell she put on me.’

‘I just don’t know what to think,’ I answered.

Suddenly, Peter leapt up from his chair and held onto his stomach tightly. He let out a gasp of air and sent his body forward, still gripping his stomach. Then he sent his hands to his mouth as his body lurched backwards. He coughed up another flower. This, also a rose, was white and the size of a small child’s fist.

He looked at it and threw it on to the floor. ‘I’m cursed, Doctor.’ He moaned, something gurgling in his throat. ‘She’s cursed me, and I am going to die!’

‘Peter…’ I began, trying to reason with him, but then Peter held onto his stomach again and another rose shot out of his mouth and across the room. The red flower hit the wall behind me and fell to the floor. ‘Jesus,’ I muttered.

Then Peter was out of the room, leaving the door wide open behind him. I followed quickly. Peter rushed through the waiting room, and I followed, ignoring the strange and frightened stares of the patients. He pushed through the door, nearly knocking an old gentleman off balance. I followed, apologising to the old man. Peter hurried down the street, coughing up flowers as he did so. Roses, mostly, and some carnations, all colours.

I do not know what I thought at that moment, but my sheer instinct as a doctor, wanting to help the sick, spurred me on. I did not have a clue what I was going to do when I reached him, if my forty-five year old body would reach him. I knew was that I had to try to reach him. He was patient, he needed me.

So I followed.

I ran down the street, turned left, the cold winter air beating at my face. We turned onto the main road and Peter crossed over without looking. I tried to do the same, but the horn of a car kept me back on the kerb. I checked for more traffic, and followed once more.

Peter turned into the gates of Lowfield Park and I saw him hurry across the deserted bowling green towards the opposite side. I followed, standing on flowers as I progressed, stamping on roses and carnations he had incredibly spewed out of his mouth.

Then I saw him fall to the floor and turned onto his back on an area of grass between a tall oak and a fledgling elm. I hurried towards him, but about four metres away, I stopped.

I watched.

What I saw will be with me until the day I die. I still wonder if it was all my imagination, even though deep down I know what I saw happened. First came the roses, shooting from out of his body like fireworks, followed by a trail of blood, leaping into the sky and falling to the ground around him. Then he began to quiver and shake on the floor, calling out. There was a short respite, then more roses shot from out of his body, soaring into the sky and smashing against the ground. Very soon, the area of grass around him was covered in roses of reds, whites and yellows. This was mingled with patches of dark red blood. Some of the flowers were dotted with blood, too.

Then Peter Penny began to change. His body seemed to grow a deeper shade. The roses ceased shooting from him and he twisted over onto his side, then onto his back, calling out in pain. He looked over at me, his eyes showing me a glimpse of the utter agony he was feeling. Pain I could only imagine. I could only watch, rooted to the spot. I was powerless to aid my patient, and it felt bad. God, it felt bad.

Peter turned his head and looked up at the sky, then his skin was instantly turned to a coal black colour. He closed his eyes, let out a sigh and then…then he melted into nothingness. Quickly, without warning.

Peter Penny melted into the ground, right into the soil. I blinked several times and looked at the spot where he had laid. Then I walked over, looking down at the soil incredulously. He had become one with the soil and now he was no more. I could not believe what I had just seen. I looked around and saw that the park was deserted, that the only evidence of what had happened were the roses on the floor, and they seemed to be disappearing, too.

I walked back to the surgery wondering what the hell to do next. What could I do? I could not really call the police, they would think I was addicted to one of the drugs I prescribed, or just plain crazy. They might suspect I had murdered him, and might question me as to the whereabouts of the body. There was no evidence of what had happened, no remains of Peter’s body.

I was at a loss, but I did not stop believing in what my own eyes saw.

The next day I went in search of Claudette. I found her living in a the downstairs flat on Primrose Hill Street. She answered the door with a curious stare. ‘Claudette?’ I asked, and she nodded. ‘I need to talk to you.’

‘I am leaving the country,’ she told me, ‘very soon.’

‘It’s about Peter Penny,’ I told her. ‘I have to know…um…certain things. If you could give me a moment of your time. I promise that everything we say to each other will remain between us.’ She nodded blankly, then asked me who I was. ‘Peter’s doctor. I saw him die.’

‘I see,’ she said. ‘Come in then, I have half an hour before I must leave.’

I followed her into her flat. Three suitcases were by the door, packed, along with a hold all and a handbag. The furniture was covered in sheets, but she cleared the sheet off the sofa and sat down, gesturing me to join her. ‘What do you need to know?’ she asked me.

‘Who you are…what you are.’

‘I am person. Just like you.’

‘I saw what happened to Peter. The flowers, the curse you put on him.’

‘How do you know it was me.’

‘Because he told me it was.’

She nodded. ‘Long ago, in the Russian hills, my kindred roamed free, and alone until we were discovered and treated as evil. Some of us fled the country, starting new lives in new places. We have been mistaken for vampires in Transylvania, for werewolves in Scotland, for Witches in America. But we are just people, people who use their heads.’

I looked at her. She was very beautiful and desirable. It was obvious what Peter had seen in her, it was not the beauty I saw, but the person she was, the image she was slowly unravelling to me.

‘It would take me forever to tell you everything,’ she continued. ‘And we do not have forever. It will take you forever to find another like me, too. But I feel I want to tell you some of it: I did not want Peter to die, you see, but my head did. He upset me, and my hatred transgressed, became a form. Die, choke on flowers, die. Turn into soil! That is what my head screamed, and I let it. I used my head and he was doomed. I am sorry, but it has happened.’

‘Then you killed him. And you ought to be punished for it.’

‘You going to call the police. Tell them everything I did. Were is the proof? In the dark ages I might have been tried for being a witch, but not today, they will laugh in your face.’ She looked at me almost pityingly. Then she stood up. ‘Now, I really ought to be going. Don’t try to stop me, or interfere, you know what happened to Peter Penny. This is the last you will see me, or hear of me.’

I watched her get up and leave the room. Outside, as if by magic, there was a taxi, waiting for her and her bags. I watched the taxi drive away, then I walked slowly to the park, where I had seen Peter Penny die and fall into the soil.

It happened three years ago, and I have never heard of such a happening again. What was she, from some race of telekinetic people who used their heads to make things happen? Possibly, I do not know. I have read much on the subject, exhausted the local library of its books on the occult: my own front room has become a library Van Helsing would be proud of. My marriage has suffered because of it.

Every week I pay a pilgrimage to the park where Peter died and yesterday I visited it once again. I saw something that prompted me to write this down for the first time. To catalogue the events, as I don’t know what will happen now, not after what I saw. I feel scared; to be honest, and a little bit excited, too.

For three years I have watched a fledgling tree develop from the ground where Peter died, now it is four foot high. Yesterday I saw buds appearing on the leaves.

Small white buds.

Hundreds of them, normal in every aspect, except for one thing.

Each one had a small round head with face, eyes, everything.

Each bud was an exact replica of Peter Penny’s head. Fixed in a scream. A permanent, grotesque scream…

©2003 Paul McAvoy