Mandy and the Mothers

My sister spirit Mandy and I, live together in a small, white apartment on an avenue lined with trees. Her mother comes over to visit and freaks out at all the esoteric literature on our bookshelves. We try to explain ourselves, beliefs and interests as best as we can but she still leaves in a huff of fear and anger.

Next my own mother comes over to visit and she too freaks out at all the esoteric literature on our bookshelves. Once again we try to explain ourselves, our beliefs and our interests, but she too is visibly upset, hurt and disappointed.

She reaches over to pick up a book from the shelf. The cover art is of a cherubim baby boy, with wisps of brunette curls, big, deep, sparkling eyes, the fattest cheeks and a tiny, rosebud mouth. He is facing to the left so we can only see his side profile, and he is floating in midair.

Starting just above his ribcage is the stem of an apple which ends just below his ribcage, almost aligned with his navel, where it then blossoms outward into a full, ripe, luscious, blood red apple covering his entire oblique, from just before the navel all the way across his right side to the beginning of his back.

The apple ends at the top of his upper thigh, from the outside of his pubic to the start of his behind. This apple however is neither the image of an apple before the cherubim baby boy, nor is it even a tattoo of an apple on his skin. It seems to come from within his body; the skin around it is filled with veins as if his body were straining to emanate it. It can be best described as a birthmark of some kind.

Behind the cherubim baby boy is a full grown man with an identical birthmark on the exact same place as the baby. Again the skin around it is filled with veins as if his body were straining to emanate the mark. Taking the book from my mother I place it back on the shelf, telling her it was just a romance novel. The Dreaming shifts …