Figgis 2: Sister Midnight

Part two of the supernatural satire thing.... (and yes, a song title this time)

Sister Midnight

She looked down at him, this angel of the night. Figgis grinned, showing all of his teeth. His tongue lolled out of the side of his mouth. He hoped he looked cute, but got the feeling he looked dopey. Not the sort of intelligent, man about town currently trapped in a dog’s body impression he hoped to give, but rather the look of a dog who tended to walk into doorways and be startled by its own shadow. He shut his mouth.

“My name is Theresa,” she said to him. “I don’t suppose you can tell me yours?”

“’iggish" Figgis managed. He was definitely getting better at this canine speech lark, even if he sounded like Scooby Doo under the influence of either a heavy cold or too many scooby-snacks. Maybe both.

“Iggish?” Theresa shrugged. She spread her wings wide, the leathery appendages spun four feet either side of her. She flapped them a couple of times them folded them neatly back into her spine. “Look at the state of me! They said I’d be able to transform at will, and I’d be able to fly.” Conspiratorially she added, “it was the flying, I always fancied flying. They never mentioned anything about none of your clothes fitting over them.”

Figgis cocked his head in a sympathetic fashion. Nobody had mentioned anything about being a dog either, but as Theresa bent to scratch him behind the ear, and her ill-fitting clothes sagged forwards, he guessed he could see a few advantages.

Theresa blushed. “Ah, sorry about that.” She adjusted her clothing, much to Figgis’s disappointment, and leant on the side of the building. “I keep hoping it will reopen. I’ve been here all day. I went home last night and my parents were horrified.” She slid down the side of the building, put her head in her hands and began to cry.

Figgis curled up at the side of her, licked the tears from her hands. Theresa pulled him to her chest and hugged him, obviously forgetting that beneath the fur lurked one extremely manly man. And also, now one very aroused man.

“You do realise that’s not a dog, don’t you?”

This new voice startled both Figgis and Theresa, who pushed him away. Figgis slunk away to a more respectable distance and threw himself to the floor. The voice belonged to a very short woman. There was something very different about her. It took Figgis a few minutes to realise he could see straight through her.

“I knew i should have gone somewhere reputable,” the woman said. “Bloody shysters. That’s me, incorporeal for the rest of my natural. Or unnatural. Whatever.” She sniffed. “Cheer up duck, your parents will forgive you eventually, at least you’ve got a house to go back to.”

Theresa looked up. “What did you ask for?”

“Immortality. So they made me a ghost. Ha ha, joke of the century, couldn’t see that coming,” she sniffed again. “Much like me, I suppose.”

“And now you can’t go home?”

“Been booted out. Apparently I don’t count as a tenant any more, seeing as I don’t have a body.”

The strange ghost launched into a tuneless rendition of ‘ain’t got nobody’.

Figgis looked from one woman to the other, both of them homeless. One of them weeping and the other seemingly deranged. he made a decision. He may be a dog, but he could still be a gentleman.

“Woof,” he said, and jerked his head in the international sign for ‘come this way’. It seemed easier than trying to communicate Scooby-style.

“Does Lassie want us to follow him? Is Timmy stuck in a well?” The ghost asked, and giggled.

Figgis chose to ignore that particular jibe. He trotted a few paces down the street, then looked back. Theresa had gotten to her feet and was following him. It did cross his mind that it may be a little unwise to take two strange women home with him, but at least one of them would be able to feed him. He drew the line at dog food though. Just as long as they understood that.