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Livy and Me
– a suspense novel
by Flove

“I’m going to need expensive Italian real estate, big, expensive Italian real estate.”

He had not known love or loss until he risked losing his brave basket ball player Livvy.

His contented life is shattered when he learns that the lazy Dead Kennedys plan to bankrupt Livvy and he knows he has to stop them or his heart will die.

At 40, the Exercise Mat Salesman from Belgium is both delightful and friendly. But will it be enough to protect Livvy?

He goes to a Basket ball tournament in Hawaii where he acquires some expensive Italian real estate and Scooters. It finally seems that he will be able to stop the Dead Kennedys that wish to bankrupt Livvy.

However, when Livvy calls, begging him to come home, he is forced to decide what is more important: stopping the lazy Dead Kennedys that bankrupting each other, or preserving his relationship with his basket ball player?

Flove delivers a brave and poignant story that explores the love between a Exercise Mat Salesman and his basket ball player.

“Never have there been more chilling villains than lazy Dead Kennedys that bankrupt each other.”
– The Daily Tale
“Are we seriously supposed to find a delightful and friendly Exercise Mat Salesman from Belgium heroic?”

The early morning sea mist was evaporating as Fanella strolled around the village picking up dog shit. She reminded herself to fully appreciate the damp coolness, before the scorching summer sun enveloped them in a bone warming blanket, and then reminded herself to appreciate the bone warming effects of the full sun later. As she retraced her steps she noted how differently everything looked on a return journey, how piles of dog shit had escaped her notice while going one way, but were obvious on the way back. It reminded her of something she’d read recently in one of the books that Lisa insisted she read to improve her English ~ A Field Guide To Getting Lost . Hah! Had there been a cruel irony in that choice of book? Fanella had felt lost ever since she arrived in 2020. But according to the book, getting lost wasn’t a bad thing, not at all.

To be lost is to be fully present, and to be fully present is to be capable of being in uncertainty and mystery.

Fanella sighed. All sounds very philosophical, but I’m still stuck in the wrong time zone.
Another passage from the book popped into her head:

We treat desire as a problem to be solved, address what desire is for and focus on that something and how to acquire it rather than on the nature and the sensation of desire, though often it is the desire between us and the object of desire that fills the space in between with the blue of longing.

Fanella gazed up at the sky ~ the blue of longing was taking over, as the white wisps of clouds dispersed.

The people thrown into other cultures go through something of the anguish of the butterfly, whose body must disintegrate and reform more than once in its life cycle…. how often the early stages of change or cure may mimic deterioration. Cut a chrysalis open, and you will find a rotting caterpillar. What you will never find is that mythical creature, half caterpillar, half butterfly….No, the process of transformation consists almost entirely of decay.

Charming, Fanella thought, just bloody charming. Rotting soup of change, that just about sums it up. No wonder I wake up every morning with my bones feeling like mush.

“Tuna wars!” Jack said as the alarm clock bleeped. “Tuna wars?” asked Lisa, but got no response; Jack was still asleep.
There had been an impromptu gathering the previous evening, various friends had unexpectedly called round, some bringing their holiday visitors with them and they had sat drinking beer and wine on the patio until well after midnight. Lisa started clearing away the ashtrays and bottles, noticing the racket the sparrows were making ~ they seemed unusually agitated this morning, darting between the overgrown foliage flapping and shrieking. When Lisa had finished clearing up the debris, she kept looking around, wondering what was missing or out of place. Something didn’t seem right. What was it, what was missing?
The tile! That strange convoluted tile shaped rock that she’d found on the beach was gone!

The dogs barking woke Lisa up; at first she assumed she had woken up disorientated and disgruntled because of that, but then she recalled all the screaming, no, more like bellowing, she’d been doing in her dream. Intense passionate bellowing howls, like an expulsion of pained frustrated energy, of outrage. Frustratingly, she recalled no details. There had been a similar dream the previous Easter when she was sick ~ the same kind of howls, and she had felt much better afterwards, but she wasn’t sick now ~ in fact, she had been feeling better than she had in a long time.
Sipping her tea and still feeling cranky at being woken up, Lisa recalled the strange phone call she’d received the night before, and had a feeling it might be an element of her dream. One of her neighbours from just outside the village phoned, Clarissa. Clarissa was a young widow; since her elderly husband had died some months ago, and she had lived alone with her eight dogs. There had been nobody to ensure she took the medication she needed for her condition, which had resulted in a series of challenging episodes, alarming the locals. A few weeks ago, one of Juan’s sheep had been talking to her and wouldn’t stop, so she killed it in the lane outside her house. The sheep kept talking to her, so she cut it’s head off (a gruesome struggle by all accounts, although thankfully Lisa hadn’t witnessed it herself). The severed sheeps head continued to talk to the troubled Clarissa, so she kept the head on her verandah. That was the last thing that Lisa had heard when she received the unexpected phone call.
Clarissa was polite and friendly on the phone, inviting Lisa and Jack over for drinks ~ insisting really with an edge of desperation in her voice. Lisa declined the invitition, and omitted to mention that Jack was out playing poker. If it had not been for the sheep incident, Lisa might have responded differently, but her sense of responsibility to her own animals made her cautious. Then, to her horror, Clarissa offered to come round and feed Lisa’s dogs.
As soon as the long and insistent phone call ended, Lisa gathered all the dogs up into the gated top patio; a little later she was gratified to hear a noisy game of football going on in the street outside. Had she over reacted? Should she have had more compassion for the distressed young woman? Lisa lit another cigarette, feeling confused. She had only met Clarissa once, many years ago, and had no idea why she had called her, or where she got her phone number from. She knew of her because of the convoluted connecting links between them ~ Clarissa’s husband had been her own friends father. And she had heard about the various incidents since he had died from other neighbours.
Lisa had the unsettling feeling that she had refused a call for help. On the other hand, she felt that she had responded to the call for help in merely speaking to Clarissa on the phone. Lisa had been kindly towards her, although not encouraging of any physical contact.
Lisa sighed. She felt a stronger connection to Clarissa now, but was unsure what it would entail.

“You’re better off without him, really” Adeline said. “Igor would never have settled down with the likes of you, Mirabelle”
“What do you mean, the likes of me?” Mirabelle responded, wiping her eyes and sniffing.
“You’re far too bossy for a man like that” replied Adeline tartly, pulling no punches.
“But he needed someone like me to keep him in line! He goes off the rails quicker than a greased mermaid, always looking for trouble!”
“Well, it’s too late now, he’s gone, and if trouble is what he’s after, then trouble he’ll find. Now, blow your nose and stop sniveling. Come on,” Adeline gave Mirabelle a quick hug. “It’s time for your driving lesson.”
Mirabelle cheered up at that, she was enjoying the driving lessons. It was something she could excel at without worrying too much about languages and attempting to communicate vague rambling thoughts.

With years of intense Happiness training, and being herself a certified Happiness Coach™ in Rainbow Unified Bliss®, Lisa was reasonably adept at dispelling the occasional bouts of frustration that the six time travelers were experiencing while familiarizing themselves with the new time frame. Learning the new languages, both the local Spanish and the common language of the village tribe, English, was of paramount importance, and Mirabelle in particular was having difficulties. A basic vocabulary was easy enough, but when it came to grammar, Mirabelle was hopeless. Thus her communications were of a very basic and rudimentary nature, and she often felt unable to express her feelings, or her thoughtful observations on the many nuances, similarities and differences and overlaps of the current time and 18th century France. Not only was she obliged to learn two new languages, but was also learning to read and write. Often it seemed like all work and no play, too much pressure to perform, to learn, to do well at her studies, and yet play breaks were always frustrated in some manner because of her difficulties in communicating clearly. The fact that the others were progressing better with the languages made her feel alone, adrift in a sea of her own unexpressed thoughts.
Adeline had a more relaxed approach to the language difficulties, less inclined to struggle with it and more likely to chatter endlessly to Boris instead, and ask him to translate when she needed some help. She had discovered an interest, and some considerable talent, in the art room, experimenting with the paints and materials, and spent many happy hours engrossed in her paintings and playful collages of mundane (but to her, bizarre) objects. She was like a magpie, collecting items that caught her eye. The bright colours and smoothness of plastic appealed to her, especially when transformed in shape by one of those odd little plastic fire making gadgets. Sunglasses were another favourite, especially the different shades of lens. It was not unusual to hear one of the villagers complaining that the lids to the tupperware containers were missing, or all the bottle tops had been removed, to find they had all been glued together, with the flyswatter, a few odd flipflop beach shoes and the mirror lenses out of someones shades. But the villagers were on the whole amused, generously indulgent, and good naturedley rolled their eyes at her creative curiosity.
Boris was practical and capable, and true to form, was learning rapidly. He had no particular desire to express vague rambling thoughts (indeed, he was not a vague and rambling man by nature) and turned his attention to more practical matters. When he wasn’t chatting to Adeline, he was watching Jack tinkering inside car engines, or playing with Pierre’s camera and had quickly learned how to upload and play with the images on the computer. Often in the evenings Adeline would sit beside him and watch drowsily as the images changed in front of her eyes on the screen.
Ivan and Igor were learning what they needed to learn while doing it ~ tending the goats and chickens, working outside on the land, or helping with various building projects. They had taken to the local bars like ducks to water, and spent the evenings downing copious amounts of beer and wine with the locals, all of them babbling and shouting incoherently, but seeming to understand each other in the camaraderie of inebriation.

Mirabelle and Adeline sat in the morning sun on the verandah, appreciatively nibbling the perfectly formed sliced toasted bread and marmalade.
Almost six months had passed since they’d been found on the beach, confused and soaked, babbling incoherently. An early morning beach walker had found them (she had wondered if she was dreaming or hallucinating), and had attempted to engage them in conversation. A rudimentary smattering of French acquired during a grape picking sojourn in France many years ago helped. Much of what the bizarrely clad group said was incomprehensible, but it was clear that they were lost and hungry, so Lisa invited them back home with her. They were reluctant to get into the car, fearing a trap, and when she started the engine, they panicked and scrambled to get back out until Boris calmed them down and suggested they had better trust this stranger because frankly, what were their options? She seemed kind and helpful, even if she was shockingly under dressed with her legs exposed for all to see, and had an invisible and very noisy horse pulling her carriage.
Lisa lived in a relatively new community of creative and forward thinking individuals who were in the process of renovating an abandoned village in the orange groves. They called the village the Trading Post, a name that was a loose play on words on the social media platform where they had first become acquainted and traded and shared posts. They were a diverse assortment of people from all over the world, united with the common goal of experimenting with a new type of anarchist culture, a novel creative and expansive playful approach that was becoming increasingly popular.
Pierre and Étienne’s knowledge of French had come to the rescue upon the first arrival of the group, as they unraveled their strange tale. After much confusing conversation and translations for the rest of the occupants of the village, it became clear that the group were time travelers, although somewhat accidental and clearly unprepared.
While the travelers rested after an unfamiliar but welcome meal, the villagers discussed the situation with much interest and curiosity. It was decided that they would keep the news of the travelers a secret for the time being, and gradually assist them with learning about their new timeframe, current customs and the local languages.

Although there were many dolphins in the Bay of Biscay, there were none close enough to the drowning balloon travelers to help ~ not without teleporting. Six pink dolphins from the rivers of the Amazon jungle were the first to respond to Pseu’s call. The shapeshifting time traveling pink dolphins home base timeframe as it were, was the beginning of the 21st century ~ in this particular incident, 2020 to be precise. They were regular visitors to Maria del Mar’s home base time location in the Alboran Sea, between the Pillars of Hercules, and thus, they were familiar with the ghost of Belen and her affiliation with Maria del Mar.

So this is 2222, thought Sadie, relaxing back in the warm sand. Not bad so far! I wonder where we are. Further along the beach she could hear the sound of laughter and bickering as the boys and Sanso practised their moves for the upcoming show—the details of which were still under wraps. Linda Paul, now she had sobered up, seemed to have forgotten her strange request for Sadie to take on a drag queen identity. ”Thank Flove!” Sanso, however, with unexpected enthusiasm had taken on the non de plume “Miss Titters” and insisted that he was going to join the 3 divas on stage for their closing number.

“Miss Titters! A bit childish,” Sadie rolled her eyes, then noticing that it did not feel good to be judgemental, chastised herself. That didn’t feel good either so she chastised herself for chastising herself. Fortunately at that moment a Juicy Lemon came through on her e-zapper interrupting her rampage of chastisement with perfect synchronicity.

Oh just release that little bird

Irina perched on the edge of her antique Rocchetti sofa—a beautiful piece of furniture over 200 years old, made from faux fur and crafted in the shape of a cartoon bull—and looked critically at the hologram of her mermaid outfit rotating in the centre of the room.

“What do you think, Mr R?”

”It is an exquisite piece of design engineering, Ma’am. The organ you see in the chest cavity can operate as a lung or a gill enabling you breathe as a human or to extract oxygen from the water. The circulatory system has been engineered to withstand different water pressures. The skeletal system is light and pliable and designed for speed and agility under the water. The eyes have been designed to ensure you will be able to correctly focus both above and under water. The intricate design of the ears means that you will be able to hear as a human above water or use sonar communication under water.”

”Yes, yes, most interesting, Mr R. But do you think my bum looks fat in that tail?”

”Not at all, Ma’am. Your figure is beautifully proportioned and the tail only accentuates your womanly curves.”

”I think that shade of pink is much better. What do you think, Mr R?”

”The carmine pink suits the undertones of your skin most favourably, ma’am. It is preferable to the cerise pink you chose earlier. Although that was an excellent choice too, of course”.

”Wonderful! Print it out then, Mr R. And print out your Octopus suit at the same time. I feel an unusual emotion which may even be excitement. Hawaii, here we come”

Whale time travel reached an unprecedented level of popularity in the 2020s. Whales were quicker to learn the skills needed than their human counterparts, less constrained by belief constructs and generally more relaxed and fun loving, less hidebound with responsibilities and worries. There were accidents of course ~ some accidentally teleported onto land, as in the case of the many “beached” cetaceans, humans mistakenly assuming that their swimming techniques had been faulty. Another common misconception was that whales spotted in waters that they normally did not frequent had been swimming off course, for reasons unknown but generally assumed to be because of pollution, radiation or underwater sonic disturbances related to the military. It was true that sometimes these factors were a motivating aspect, but primarily whales teleported and time traveled for the sheer fun of it. Time traveling back to times and places where whaling ships dominated the oceans was considered to be a sport for the dare devils and thrill seekers; time travelling to the future for those more interested in a relaxing holiday. Some whales had a particular interest in archeology ~ shipwrecks and underwater cities and so on, but the dates of arrival had to be timed correctly, as underwater cities were not always under water and a miscalculation could result in a stranding on land in the middle of a town square or atop a pyramid. Many an ancient legend of monstrous other worldly beings had arisen from such a faux pas.
Whale teleport practice portals had sprung up all over the seas in response to the increasing demand from young up and coming whales eager to try their fins at the new pursuit. Most of them were static, and related to land mass locations, such as the waters between the Pillars of Hercules at the western mouth of the Mediterranean, or the area offshore from the Hercules Tower on the Galician coast. In fact, the whales surrounding the shores of Spain had been at the forefront of the explorations, and these two portals were well established.

Irina buzzed for her robot, Mr R. All the elite class had robots. Most nowadays were barely distinguishable from humans. However, Irina fancied herself to be someone who did things a bit differently. The design of Mr R was fashioned on the robots from classic twentieth century literature: his “head” a glass bubble sensor unit with moving antennae, his trunk-section a rotating cylinder with controls on the front, extending bellow arms that ended with mechanical claws and bellow legs with tread tractor units. He was able to move with deceptive speed and agility. Personality-wise Mr R was programmed to be the epitome of deference and tact.

“Did you have a pleasant time with Mr Sanso?” inquired Mr R politely. “I believe you have a spot of cucumber on your face. Allow me to remove that for you.” He did this with a deftness belying his dangerous looking extremities. “And how else can I serve you this morning?”

“Thank you, Mr R. Mr Sanso proved to be inscrutable as always. Please provide scanning assistance. Target 2121 Time travel mission 2222.”

“Delighted to oblige, Ma’am!”

Irina scanned the brains of the time travellers. The 3 drag queens were hypnotically sensitive and should be easy enough to manipulate. The girl, Sadie, was more problematic. Her motivation was happiness and her purity of intention meant that she would be difficult to manipulate successfully. Sanso, she knew already, was a law unto himself.

Irina felt a stab of fear as she thought of the 22nd of February 2222. (Fear was an unusual emotion for Irina—in fact all strong emotion was unusual—and it took her a moment to identify it.) All the 2’s in alignment. If the time travellers were successful in retrieving the crystal and decoding the information before that date, what would that fateful morning look like? Would Irina herself even exist? Doubtful.

Life was pretty good for Irina. In 2222 the Elite were free to pursue their goals—without the confines of the ethical and economic considerations of the old days. They were not confined to human bodies either; they could be robotic, animal or some other more exotic design or mythological creature. It really just depended on how the mood took them. Irina, with the expert assistance of Mr R, was planning in meticulous detail a mermaid-like body, complete with gills and a tail, so that she could travel to an underwater location for her next vacation.

It wasn’t like that for everybody though. And this “progress” had not come about without a huge impact on the environment. There were large pockets of people scattered throughout the world who had eschewed the new technology, instead choosing the way of Love.

“Looooooooove!” Irina rolled her eyes and Mr R chuckled politely on cue.

If Irina had her way they would dispose of the time travellers the moment they arrived. Or better yet, send a team back to 2121 and dispose of them there. Management had forbidden this route, not for any ethical reasons—there were few moral guidelines nowadays—but out of caution. The vote had been close. Apparently there were some documents from the early channellers foretelling disastrous consequences if the time travellers were unable to return to their century. Management had decreed instead that the time travellers must be diverted from their goal.

The crystal itself was closely guarded by the whales until the so called Chosen Ones arrived with the key.

The medical team was easily identifiable with their tomato suits. Since the smell was gone, and certainly the toxic gas which was responsible for the loss of consciousness of the work teams, people were gradually regaining consciousness. Nobody had been harmed, which was quite a relief, it would be easier that way as there was no need to contact the families. Still all those involved would have to submit to regular check-ups in the following weeks.

Linda Paul was overseeing the operation. The silver stripes of her suit were sparkling in the sunset. She had put on her Darco Barbane meringue wig as soon as she had gotten rid of Boba Fett’s mask, positioned at the right place to have a silver lining appear around her sculptural silhouette. Much better, she thought as the cleaning team was gone.

Still, something was bothering him, they spent millions on supposedly hight tech solutions and backups to make the time sewer secure and have a robust way to time travel; they had haute-couture exosuits and gas masks to be able to intervene in dire situations, but all it really required was an old sucker truck —who could come up with such a design ? — to unclog the sewer in less than five minutes. The next board meeting would be stormy. She would request a thorough investigation. First the Russians, then the network cancellation and now this clogging. Something was not straight, and not in the good way.

The next morning, Linda Paul consulted her mailbox. Seventy three messages. She had a nervous laugh. ‘Incredible’, she thought as she sifted through the mails. More and more incompetence, that was all there was in the mails. The maintenance team had been unable to unclog the time sewers. They were writing mails after mails to show that they were working. Linda Paul felt an urge to answer back ‘Stop writing mail and work!’ But instead she remembered the Love and Shine training she went with Sadie last month. “Breath in, deeply, blink three times slowly, and exhale”, she said inwardly. Already she felt better.

They didn’t have much time, which was a bit of a paradox considering that they had a time sewer at their disposal, but the more it stayed clogged, the more difficult it would be to find the precise way out.

She put on her blue and silver work suit. It really fitted her. Doubled with artificial mouse fur, very warm and good for qi circulation. She had silvery stripes added to make it more queen-like. She chose her platform boots carefully, she didn’t want to get too muddy nor stay stuck in the time muck.

The time sewer central hub was not at the bar. This was merely one of the numerous available entry points. It was hidden in the calanques near Aubagne. She had to drive her Subaru SUV to go there. Which was not an easy task with platform boots. When she arrived on site, she realized the work team was not there. She squinted her eyes. That was suspicious. Who was sending the mails if nobody was doing anything ?

She went to the hub and almost puked before she could get close enough to see what was inside. The smell was terrible, all the scum of the ages seemed to have disgorged here. She found a gas mask, which fit perfectly once she had gotten rid of her Darco Barbane meringue wig. She saw her face in the side mirror of a truck. She looked a bit like Bobba Fet. She pushed away the irritation to have to go to such length with her pride to have the work done.

It was much better with the mask, she realized. So it was a small price to pay to the drag-style. When she arrived to the hub, it looked worse than she had imagined. The edge of the sewer hub was covered in white moss, which seemed to be pulsating slowly. She thanked her Love and Shine training once again, it helped her keep her smile on as she went on. What she saw next alarmed her. A few people were lying there, unconscious. Yet, some of them were wearing masks. Not a good idea to go further.

She’d always been proud of her quick wit. It had helped her a lot when guys were mocking her wigs at school. Now she needed it for another kind of life threatening situation. She looked around, trucks, barracks, more people on the floor, a ginger cat licking its balls… she laughed nervously. Strange that the cat didn’t seem affected. She noted that somewhere in her mind, she might need it later. Then she saw exactly what she needed. The dildo truck. She never remembered the real name, but it sure looked like a giant dildo in the front of a truck. She didn’t know what was its real use of course, but years of gauging the size of men’s attributes allowed her to see that it fitted perfectly the sewer hub.

“Hard on, ladies”, she thought as she climbed in the front seat, saying a silent prayer to all the Queens of all ages. She started the truck and began to move. She had the weirdest impression to understand what it mean to think with your dick. She stopped the truck, facing the sewer hole with her dildo. She noticed a small red button on the dashboard, it had a tag on it which read “lubricant”. She pushed it several times and nothing happened. Go to hell, she thought.
Then the queen revved up the truck. “Love and Shine, biiiitches”, she said as a mantra, and let it all go.

The mind has a tendency to forget unpleasant things. All she could remember was that she had to get in and out several times. And that nasty suction noise. But in the end, she could clean wash the white moss with the water jet incorporated in the truck. She turned the sewer back on and threw the gas mask in the hole to check it. As good as new, and the smell was gone too. Her incredible memory allowed her to register that the cat as well was gone.