Short Stories

Livvy shot up from her bed in the dead of the night, dripping with sweat, her boyfriend, Chris, by her side. It was two am, and these nightmares had been plaguing her at this time like clockwork for the last ten days or so. Chris attempted to comfort his girlfriend, but she was in such a state of unrest, gasping for breath and clutching her chest. It was awful to witness; he reached for his mobile phone, concerned that he might need to call 999 this time, but Livvy’s breath began to steady, and she seemed to be slowly coming around.

 

     Chris took a deep sigh of relief. He turned the bedside light on and noted that the little pile of Victorian coins that Livvy had recently found whilst metal detecting had once again been knocked off the table. He wished she’d put them somewhere for safekeeping.

     'Chris, I–I’ve had it again, that same …' she shuddered. 'That same horrible, horrible dream…' she whimpered, clearly very much affected by the night terror. Chris stroked her earthy coloured hair affectionately in an attempt to soothe her.

     'I’m worried about you. You must see the doctor again. Hopefully, the blood tests will come back soon.'

     'Yeah, but why do I keep having this dream, Chris?'

     'I don’t know…'

    'They are always so real. It’s dark, there’s rain, I hear the bray of a horse, and then – suddenly, I can’t breathe, I’m spinning around and around and –'

     'And then you wake, like this, unable to breathe. I can see how terrified you are. There must be something bothering you – what’s going on, Liv?'

     'I really don’t know, but I’m getting a really strong feeling that I need to go back to that farm…'

 

***

 

Ten days earlier, Livvy was up at the break of dawn. She’d got all her metal detecting equipment ready, including her find pouch, pin pointer, spade, gloves, and, of course, her beloved detector itself. All detectorists wore camo. She had never worked out exactly why, but it was a thing. Livvy packed everything in the car and was really looking forward to a day out on the field with the Somerset History Finders’ Metal Detecting association. The weather forecast predicted a dry day with little chance of a shower, although the ground was saturated with previous rainfall, which was the best condition for treasure hunting.

     After the usual briefing (where the organiser explained what fields they had access to, and predictably reminded everyone to fill their holes properly), they were off. The swarm of detectorists soon disbanded over the one-hundred-and-fifty-acre permission. Soon they were appropriately scattered over the fields. Although detectorists were social when they wanted to be, once out detecting, as a general rule, they were solitary creatures. She’d catch up with her close friend Mickey after lunch. Her first signal produced a beautiful high-pitched tone, but it was accompanied by the dreaded ‘iron grunt’. I’m not digging that, she thought to herself. She continued to swing until her coil glided over another target, and this one sounded so sweet. She passed the coil over it quickly. It was repeatable and steady, showing a solid number thirty on the display. This was definitely a target she must recover. Livvy pushed the spade in to the ground, making a three-sided shape that she could just flick open like a little trap door. Kneeling, she then inserted the handheld pin pointer into the hole, and it beeped straight away. Nice! Using the small trowel which was attached to Livvy’s belt, she carefully excavated the earth.

     There was an edge! It looked round, too. Livvy, with her gloves on, carefully retrieved the item. She sighed. It was just a squashed bottle top, like the type one might have found on the top of an old-fashioned milk bottle. She popped it in her scrap bag and went on her merry way. The morning continued in quite the same manner, scrap after scrap, the occasional small pewter button, and a lucky (?) horseshoe.

     True to the forecast, the weather had held up. Livvy was just about to give up and find a tree stump to stop and eat her chicken tikka sandwich, when she came across an irresistible signal. Again, repeatable, and solid, there was no doubt about it – she was digging it! Once again, down on her knees, and plastered in thick sticky mud, she put the pin pointer in the hole and moved it around, but just couldn’t pick up the signal. She reached for the detector and swung it over the hole and, as clear as crystal, the original signal was produced. This is a deep one, mused Livvy as she continued to dig deeper. After a short time, Livvy’s pin pointer started to bleep…

     A wave of nausea swept over her for a second, and then as she overturned the next spadeful of earth, what she saw literally took her breath away! There in the clod was not one, not two, but at least five or six coins! Not any old coins either. She was sure that they were silver. Excitedly, she retrieved them and on closer inspection; she confirmed they were Victorian. In fact, the spill comprised of two half crowns, a couple of twopence, a threepence, among a few copper pennies that had certainly seen better days. But the milled silvers were painstakingly beautiful! Although not a particularly old discovery, Livvy was delighted – the Victorian era was a period that she was very much interested in, and her mother, Rosie, had beautifully documented information and photographs from her side of the family in scrapbooks that were a joy to look through.

     Livvy was categorically buzzing with her find, it was a real treasure to her. Her heart started beating quickly as she imagined who had dropped the coins and, under what circumstances, they had been lost. Out of nowhere, she felt an enormous thrust upon her as though she had been punched in the stomach, and then proceeded to struggle for breath. She’d had childhood asthma before, so put it down to that, coupled with the adrenaline rush from the find, but when it didn’t pass quickly, she felt somewhat concerned. The shortness of breath was quite frightening, and the waves of nausea didn’t ease off either. Livvy looked around the field, and to her dismay, couldn’t see any of her fellow detectorists anywhere. Typical, she thought. At that moment, the skies turned dark, and an unusual sepia ambience filled the air and space around her.

     Livvy reached for her mobile phone from one of the many pockets in her various pouches strapped around her waist, leg, and back. She attempted to ring Mickey, but the signal was non-existent. (Mobile network was sketchy at the best of times in these remote locations). Where were all the other detectorists? She asked herself once more, but when the heavens suddenly opened, she quickly dropped the Victorian coins into her finds box and made a dash for the hard standing in the farmyard, realising that thankfully the feeling of anxiety and shortness of breath had passed.

     With pure elation, Livvy reached her car, opened the driver’s side, and collapsed in the seat, leaving the door ajar. She leaned her head back, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. Where did that weather come from? She pondered. The nose of Livvy’s car was facing the entrance to the field, and she was startled when Mickey (who was completely dry) playfully knocked on the bonnet.  

     'Mickey!' she let out a yelp. 'You scared me! Where have you been? I couldn’t see you anywhere. I couldn’t see anyone!'

    'I could ask you the same thing!” he said. Looking at how soaking wet she was, he enquired. 'Where have you been? Did you fall in the river or something?'

     Livvy looked up into the sky. It was bright and clear, and there were no puddles on the ground. She looked into the field where she saw dozens of detectorists still out on the pasture. Shaking her head, she grabbed onto Mickey’s hand a little too tightly and gasped. 'What’s going on?'

​

* * *

​

Livvy and Chris sat at the kitchen table. They had just received a call from the doctors following Livvy’s blood tests.

     'You’ve got to listen to the professionals, Liv. Your blood tests are all normal. This has all got to be down to stress… you need to take things easy from now on… and that means no more detecting…'

     'But –'

     'But nothing. You need to go back to bed. And I, sadly, must go to work, but promise me, you’ll rest today?'

     'Yes, ok,” Livvy obediently nodded, but she had no intention of doing so. What Livvy hadn’t explicitly explained to Chris was that she had been getting the overwhelming urge to go back to the spot where she found the Victorian coins ten days ago, and it had been getting so strong that she could no longer pretend it wasn’t there. Chris kissed her on the head and closed the front door behind him.

     Livvy rang Mickey right away.

     'Mickey, I need your help. I need to get back on that field. Do you have the contact details for the farmer?'

     'Yes, I know William and Mary pretty well, and it was my club dig. Let’s go together. I’ll pick you up in an hour.'

 

The pair pulled up to the farmyard, and the smell of the countryside wafted up their noses. It was another dry day, but time wasn’t on their side, and they were hoping the landowners would let them back on site. Before they got out of Mickey’s jeep, he looked at Livvy and asked. 'What are you expecting to get out of this?'

     'I don’t know, Mickey, but some things telling me there’s more in that hole to be found…'

     They walked gingerly over to the farmhouse and tapped on the door. After a few moments, a grey-haired lady wearing a pinny, covered in flour, opened the solid oak door. 'Oh, hello, Mickey, oh you’ve popped in at a rather perfect time, it’s ‘baking day’ Come on in!' she beamed.

     Livvy and Mickey found themselves being treated to tea, complemented with freshly baked scones and jam, and it really was rather delicious, especially as neither had eaten any breakfast that morning.

     'So, Mary – Livvy and I were at the metal detecting event a few weeks ago, and Livvy found a number of Victorian coins, but we think there might be more there… are you happy for us to go and have a further look today?'

     Mary stuffed half a scone into her mouth. Nodding, she gestured with her hand towards the fields. 'Yes, yes, for you, anytime, but be careful out there. She’s been quite active out there recently…'

     'What?' chimed Mickey and Livvy in unison.

     'Oh, our resident ghost, my dear. Charlotte,' she said, without battering an eyelid as if it were quite normal. 'Hmmmm, these are rather a nice batch, aren’t they…' Mary smacked her lips together in approval.

     'Mary, a ghost?' gulped Livvy.

     'Oh yes, dear, rumour has it the poor soul came to a rather grizzly end, out on the south field.' She nodded again, and Livvy and Mickey weren’t sure if it was because of her statement or further appreciation for the scones. 'Yes, there used to be a bridle way down there…'

      'She’s right, I looked up the field on an old maps website, Livvy,' concurred Mickey.

      'So, you don’t seem too perturbed about this…erm ‘ghost’, Mary?' pried Livvy, with a panic-stricken look on her face.

     'Well, dear, when she wants to be heard, she really wants to be heard, just be careful out there, I didn’t want you to have any nasty surprises… although, by the looks of it – am I right in saying you’ve already had an encounter?'

      'Well, not exactly….' murmured Livvy.

     'Rumour has it, someone murdered the poor soul out there, back in the early 1900s. Young women who have been on the farm have sometimes ‘felt’ it…'

     'Felt it?' asked Livvy with trepidation, reflecting on the strange things she had felt since her first visit to the South field.

   'Yes, like the air’s being sucked out of them, like they’re being starved of oxygen… rumour has it Charlotte was strangled… by her own jealous husband…'

     Livvy was dumbfounded. She polished off the scone and slurped down the tea. Mickey did the same, except it was his second scone. 'Well, I think we better get out there and have a look. Thank you, Mary.' she said.

 

Livvy easily located the spot where she had found the coins. She swung her detector over the area and the signal was stronger than ever, despite last time having retrieved all the metal she could find. Mickey did the shovelling, while Livvy used the pin pointer.

     'Dig deeper, Mickey!' she commanded. Livvy was in a trance, she was wild. Every time they shovelled out the earth, the pin pointer screamed stronger than ever before, but there was no metal to be found. Livvy turned white. The peculiar feeling was coming over her again, and this time she could hear the haunting sound of a galloping horse, getting louder and louder, closer and closer.

      'Deeper, Mickey! Dig deeper!' she screamed with urgency as the skies turned dark and the rain began to fall. Nausea swept over Livvy with a force stronger than ever before. She collapsed in a heap by the side of the hole, depleted of all energy.

Mickey leant to her side. 'Liv! Liv, you ok?'

     'Yes, I’ll be ok, but you need to – dig – dig…'

     'Yes, I know, dig deeper!'

 

The horse brayed. It was a ghostly bray that seemed to echo through the two dimensions with determination and a distinct degree of pain.

     'Did you hear that, Mickey?'

     He looked at Livvy. 'No, but do you see that?' he said, pointing down into the very bottom of the hole (which was by now a good four feet deep). Livvy crawled to the edge of the crater, barely being able to drag her own body weight. She peered down, and as she did, she found she could finally breathe again. She let out a huge gasp, followed by another, and another, until her eyes were able to focus on what Mickey was trying to show her.

     'Bones…' she gulped.

​

* * *

 

From that day on, Livvy never experienced the shortness of breath again. Whilst she took a short break from metal detecting, it was not long before she was back out in the field, and her next find was a Victoria gold sovereign. She had found it so easily, and she couldn’t help but wonder whether Charlotte had led her to it. Perhaps it had been a way to thank Livvy for uncovering her remains. Chris never did find out that Livvy hadn’t rested up that day and took the credit that his sound advice had indeed been critical to her recovery. They continued to be a very happy couple and got engaged the following year. Livvy often handled the Victorian coins she had found, and although she never experienced anything harmful, from time to time she knew Charlotte was up to no good when the coins mysteriously turned up in random places, like on her knee when she was in the bathroom or under her pillow when she woke in the morning. Charlotte also had a confusing habit of taking out the scrapbooks from the bookshelves and leaving them open on random pages. It was a bit of a nuisance until one day certain photographs were forcefully ripped out from their decorative mounts, and Livvy felt certain it wasn’t just typical ‘Charlotte Tomfoolery.’

     Livvy studied the photographs and then she realised that in each of them, the same young lady appeared among those caught in the picture. Livvy truly did have a connection with Charlotte, and it wasn’t just random after all, and Livvy realised it had been her fate all along to discover Charlotte’s final resting place. What’s more, she now had a face, and you know what? Charlotte had such an uncanny resemblance to Livvy; she was undoubtedly a relation. Livvy framed the best of the photos and displayed it in pride of place on the mantelpiece. From that day on, her love of history and her ability to connect with the paranormal only grew stronger, which made her metal detecting experiences certainly a lot more interesting that your average detectorist – as she was to find out not everyone was as willing to hand over their lost treasures as her dear Charlotte was that day in a field in Somerset, but that’s a whole other story altogether!