Our second evening was almost as good, spent in the Forth, just up Pink Lane from our hotel, because we had a visitor. We had just given our food order at the bar when Maz squealed, LC looking terrified for a few seconds as Ish calmed her, before turning to offer a hand to our new arrival after he had released Maz from his hug and finished wiping his eyes.

“Neil. Be welcome, mate. Be so bloody welcome! Carolyn?”

She started, almost as if slapped.

“Ish?”

Chapter 10

As they were driving to Birmingham, where the girls wanted to visit the Bullring, Wendy asked them if they had enjoyed the party.

“It was fabulous, Mum. So many friends and so much cake. I don’t think I could face another slice.”

“Well, there is some left over, which Malcolm will probably have out as dessert tonight. Did you know that the label was going to be there?”

Back at their hotel, the four of them gathered in Melissa’s room.

“Mom? Did you know about Jack being a Lord before you came back here from your tour?” asked Zane.

LC simply looked confused, but it was our son’s turn to help, Ish calling out, “When I was very little, I had a stuffed rabbit”

“What’s a rabbit?”

Moments like that cut me, for each was a reminder of how much of our child’s life had been stolen by those bastards, along with that of my wife. Ish was still on point, though.

“It’s a little animal, Carolyn. We’ll show you some real ones, but mine was a toy, like your bear, for cuddling. Another name for a rabbits is ‘Bunny,’ and because I was very little, I called mine Bunbun”

“Have you still got it?”

“Ooh, how about these?” Sarah asked as she picked up a box of expensive-looking chocolate covered shortbread biscuits. “You did say that one of the new Angels is Scottish, didn’t you?”

“Yeah, but she’s not moved to London yet,” Nikki replied, before giggling, taking the box from her wife and placing it in the already-bulging trolley. “Both Alice AND Charlotte love these though, hehe!”

“And being models, they’ll probably only be allowed to eat a maximum of two each,” Sarah teased.

I found myself looking into my own beer glass, worried about confessing the truth. It’s been fifteen years, for fuck’s sake! What can he do to me? “I reacted to you like any other fourteen-year-old-girl would. I get why that freaked you out.”

Threads of Truth

A Transgender Coming of Age Romance

From the Harmony Aspirant Universe

Chapter 5: Sanctuary Secrets

By Ariel Montine Strickland

How will Kiki and Julian connect over the sanctuary project? Can Kiki cope with the news she receives from her mother?

Copyright 2025 by Ariel Montine Strickland.
All Rights Reserved.

Chapter 9

When Willow and the conductor followed the orchestra after the tuning, she saw that the place was as packed as it had been on the two previous nights. For her, it was sit and repeat; for the audience it was all new and wonderful. There was good applause with each item, and her passage back to the Yamaha was much easier without all the cables.

The next story I'm going to share with you guys concerns a certain cabin. Now, before I go on, I should say older cabins, those being the first ones built by the first campers were all named after characters from Disney's classic animated movie “Bambi”. One of the first cabins that was completed was named after the main character, the adorable young fawn Bambie. It is also rumored to be the most haunted and the most active with paranormal activity.