Magic by Audrey Niffenegger

Author:Audrey Niffenegger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy
Publisher: Rebellion Publishing Ltd

THE PROCESS WAS old and not without its risks. It had been passed down among the womenfolk from one generation to another. Martitia told her to sit back and relax, but Sasha was nervous, and in the back of her mind there was a suspicion that she had made the wrong decision in coming here.

“If it helps, you can think of this as an ancient homeopathic remedy,” said Martitia, sterilising a needle in spirit. “I need your blood and urine, just tiny amounts of each.” Inserting the needle in the crook of Sasha’s arm, she withdrew a small amount and emptied it into a plastic beaker, to which she added something pungent from a white paper packet, and a brown liquid. The combining process took just a few minutes. When she had finished, she asked the girl to remove her jeans and pants.

Martitia sang softly to herself as she donned a pair of plastic gloves with practised ease. It sounded like a folk tune, dirge-like and vaguely annoying, the sort of thing old people hummed as they pottered around their flats. “Now, I have to feel inside you, just as far as your unborn baby’s head. It won’t hurt, but you may feel some discomfort.”

“Are you sure that–”

“You mustn’t worry about anything. Why don’t you just lay your head back on that cushion and close your eyes for a few minutes? I need to put some lubricant on, and it will feel cold. Try to think of something nice. Think of a time before all this happened, when you didn’t have anything to worry about.”

Sasha tried to relax but she could feel the chill, slippery wetness, the alien hand between her thighs. She thought of her mother, and of Riley singing on the player in her bedroom when she was ten. She thought of innocence and the sheer simple pleasure of not knowing. There was a brown stain on the ceiling, beer or a burst pipe. Martitia was humming again. The sound seemed to pass through her, washing away her apprehensions.

“There, how are you feeling?”

She awoke with a start. Martitia had removed her gloves and was washing her hands in the bathroom basin next door. Sasha raised herself and pulled up her pants, still a little sticky. “All right, I think.”

“Well done. That’s all for today.”

“What do you mean?”

“There are two more treatments, exactly the same as the first. It has to be done over three days.”

“You didn’t mention–”

“Well, I didn’t want to alarm you.” Martitia came back into the room, drying her hands. “Just come back at the same time, and now that you know the procedure I imagine we’ll be through in about twenty minutes.” She went to the desk and wrote out her number. “Here you are, hang onto this. Call me if you need to move the appointment slightly, but it’s important that you try to make it roughly the same time each day.”

“What happens at the end?”

“At first, nothing. You won’t feel any different. Then

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