The Birth of a New Story

I am beginning a new story though I have two other stories [books] still on the go. The story began to emerge in my head a few days ago while sitting on the back deck enjoying some green tea. It was a warmish and sunny time which allowed me to be au naturel. Unlike other story ideas that pop into my head and then disappear, this ideas stayed, something that told me it was for real. Yes, it will be naturist fiction, speculative fiction that is better classified as magical realism.

The morning sun had crested the horizon creating long shadows, a reminder that even in the light, the world of shadows continued to exist. The early morning in France was the same as early morning in Canada. His life in Canada was no more. He had left it all – his family, his friends, his career, and the place he had made his home. It was the hardest part of being immortal, not a god in any sense of the word. He was just a man who somehow had been cursed with longevity that seemed to be endless. It forced him to abandon one lifetime for a different one, in a different place every twenty-five years or so. Otherwise, the truth of his curse would be betrayed to those around him as they aged, and he didn’t. The morning shadows always seem to bring these semi-bitter thoughts to mind. It was as if he was Sisyphus getting ready to roll an impossible boulder up another endless hill, the same task repeated day after day, year after year, decade after decade, and century after century.

Everyone he had known in Canada, believed he had died in a car crash in Paris, six months ago. His faked death allowed him to leave everyone with an ending they needed. If he had simply disappeared, there wouldn’t have been closure for those he left behind. Death was something they knew and accepted as part of life. His supposed death also allowed him to begin another new life, one for which he had been preparing for the past ten years. It was all about creating a new identity that would survive the usual scrutiny by others. It had begun using social media and the power of Internet.

He had bought himself a private dwelling in the suburbs of Amiens sixty-five years ago, a second house in Aix-en-Provence forty years ago, a third house in a town not far from Santiago de Compostela in Spain fifteen years ago. He had thought it would make for a good change to have a second place in Spain, somewhere in the south east near Malaga and perhaps a place in Florence, Italy.

He had been preparing for this change of identity for a few years, making quick trips back to Amiens to have a presence there with a paper trail. It was the usual, having a bank account, paying utility bills, having a Facebook account and Twitter account with his identity as a French author. On those trips, he made sure to be seen and remembered in the neighbourhood. It helped that money wasn’t an issue.

Sighing, he pulled the keyboard closer, needing to get back to work. He was now an author and he had stories to tell. Like Hermes and Mercury, he was a messenger at best and his messages would now be coded into novels. His task for as far back as he could remember, has always been to be the go-between for most mortals and the world of spirit.

He was a healer of the soul, and in today’s world, that was shifting from simply being a mental-health practitioner. People wanted more than hour sessions in a comfortable chair in a pleasing room. They wanted sound bites, they wanted digital books that they could listen to in between the multitude of activities with which they filled their lives. They wanted anything and everything that they called New Age, a strange thing if one only thought about it. This New Age was nothing more than repackaged beliefs from centuries in the past.

Back in Canada, he had been a counsellor, a therapist who walked with those who came to him, broken. Here in France, he would now be a creator of media with print, audio and visual elements. It was an appealing way to live. After all, this was all his own idea. He had done this before, a few lifetimes ago. Back in Canada, he had a family. Now, he was lonely.

Oh, it wouldn’t stay that way too long. There was always someone who would again appear, some new person to love. He missed being in a relationship with someone he loved. He missed his children, grandchildren, and he missed being a husband. But he didn’t miss the excruciating pain of out-living all of them. It was better for them that he appeared to age and die like everyone else. And that, in turn, made it better for him.

In the past, he had made the mistake of staying too long in relationship. He had grown too comfortable. However, when his children at that time became older in body, he was denounced as a witch. He was in Spain at the time. He had to flee before the fires of the Inquisition became a threat. Though he was immortal, he did suffer pain. There were a lot of lessons learned over the centuries. There were a lot of stories to tell.

He looked once more at the keyboard in front of him. It was time to begin telling his story.