Crystal Bella Read online

  CRYSTAL BELLA

  Marty Christopher

  All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Copy right © 2014 Marty Christopher

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form by any means, without prior permission in writing of the publisher.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1- Ethan Dreams

  Chapter 2- The Edge Of Booker

  Chapter 3- A River Queen

  Chapter 4- Ethan Christie The Child

  Chapter 5- Attractions Of Law

  Chapter 6- The Face Behind The Dream

  Chapter 7- A Copper In The Mix

  Chapter 8- Knickers And A Gun

  Chapter 9- The Ether

  Chapter 10- House Of Hearts

  Chapter 11- Heaven And Hell

  Chapter 12- The One

  Chapter 13- The Husband

  Chapter 14- Back To The Ether

  Chapter 15- Death

  Chapter 16- Life Without Her

  Chapter 17- One Day In Booker

  Chapter 18 – Seven Heaven

  Epilogue

  PROLOGUE

  The sea spray lifted into particles that entailed ancient symbol’s that formed into mist, flying above the water’s edge.

  A wave crashed against the rocks and a flock of birds danced into the sky igniting color to the scenery that had formed long ago, but was now touching this moment with all the depth of beauty that ran through her, delivered by her maker.

  The universe knew what was happening and unfolded her beauty for the change of one beautiful soul, and there was Ethan, 200 feet above looking down on this serene picture.

  He was in the air, time was frozen and Ethan had no choices left.

  This should be the only time one will feel this feeling. The moment when you realize you cannot escape death, that it will consume you in a few seconds. Would death be sweet like wine? From the view ahead, it all looked poetic like it was meant to be and the Gods would catch Ethan’s fall.

  In this frozen moment with the ultimate view in Ethan’s eyes there is a depth of knowing within him. Humans call it déjà vu. Ethan has been here before, and has travelled this exact moment. This feeling of death is also in his DNA as he has died before. But how do you understand or explain that in one second of seeing what can only be your death, unless a miracle occurs.

  ~~~~

  This place will be returned to, like Ethan we will come back again and face what we think is our first time.

  ~ CHAPTER ONE ~

  ETHAN DREAMS

  Ethan Christie pulled the curtain with his black nail polished fingers, his rings clinked into each other imbuing a sound that sparked the memory of an edge cliff on crystal waters, sipping beers, night matched by a rare blue moon.

  They were the days of a summer gone by. The full circle had come around again and here was spring, sparking memories, showing light, pouring sun into the eyes of Ethan.

  The light was bright, Ethan was still tired and wanted to sleep some more but as he pulled the curtain the light came through the other end, and straight into his eyes. He pulled the curtain back but it still followed him. The light was following Ethan. Again it followed his eyes; the light would not leave him. It triggered the memory of his dream from his night just gone.

  He was walking in the dream and the light was shining out of him. It radiated out and he was able to flow as the light and be like the wind. It made him feel god-like. He then became the light and he could see everything so clearly, moving through space and being transparent. Then he shape shifted back into himself, but the light still shined out of him. He came to an arc like door, it had flowers imbedded in it and he had to walk through. There was someone waiting for him on the other side. She was so sacred and special to him, that’s all he knew, but he couldn’t see her. He realized the light that had been building up within him, had to get to this level, it had to burn this bright to get through this door. The light had to match the light that came out of this door. It had to be equal. Someone above said, “walk through the door, Ethan.”

  He took one step and the light ignited him and just as he was about to see who the person was on the other side, he took a sharp intake of breath and he awakened. He woke up excited from the feeling because he could feel who was on the other side of the door. Whoever she was, the feeling that she radiated made Ethan yearn to see her. He knew she was a woman, she was so special to him, he knew her, but had forgotten her somehow. He could feel her, she was so close.

  ~~~~

  This morning felt fresh on this spring day of 1989. The energy was often at its most heightened state at this time, early in the morning. Ethan Christie knew it, but he often still slept in. He knew his organs would get nourished and rested at certain times of the night and that he should go to bed earlier and wake up at first sunlight. Ethan knew a lot, he was an old soul, but there was a part of him that never wanted to go to sleep at night and never wanted to get up in the morning. He wanted to stay up forever, but once he was in a deep sleep, he liked to remain there also.

  It was time to get up today, he knew it, but the peace he felt longed him to stay in that cozy bed of his. As a teenager he sometimes used to set his alarm for 6am and say to his girlfriend at the time, 2am on the phone.

  “Lucky for you, you can sleep in tomorrow. I’ve got a new regime, a new start. I have to be up at 6 am tomorrow and every morning after that.”

  Ethan meant it, he really did, until 6am came and he would turn off his alarm in his sleep, without any memory of doing it. He would awake, and nervously look at his alarm, wondering why he felt so fresh for 6am with little sleep. It’s too good to be true, surely? Then he would see the time, 10am and think to himself, man, slept in by four hours. This happened a lot. Ethan could do incredible things but trying to get up early was very difficult for him. The smell of lunch was often his alarm to get up from his mom making toasted sandwiches. The smell could wake him up and it also had the ability to get him out of bed.

  He had to get up for college today. He went to Booker University and had a more civil time to get up of 9am. The birds chirped outside, the sun shined through the gaps in the curtain and Ethan knew he had to get up.

  30 minutes later he was out of bed. He meditated every day, usually first thing in the morning, but today he just couldn’t do it, he knew he should, kind of, but fun beckoned. He was torn for a moment between meditation and fun. I’ll have both. He was running a little late and he knew he could pick up the meditation later at night. He drew the curtain open to see the freshness of the morning. There were small droplets of water on the garden and the trees looked more green than normal.

  Ethan lived with his mom, Elisabeth Christie, (Ethan had taken his mom’s name) just the two of them in the suburb of Sea Cliff, which was just on the edge of San Francisco inner town. It was highly peaceful. It had a feeling as if you were a long way from it all. It was leafy and quiet and they lived right on the water’s edge.

  Ethan always slept in his boxers, as a ritual he usually got out of bed, jumped onto his knees and asked his beautiful heart to lead the way.

  Ethan knew his heart would never let him down, he trusted it, he trusted the universe and he loved his mom with everything he had. At 23 he was just happy to wake up with the sounds of birds, a lovely room and the most adorable mom he could ever wish for.

  Elisabeth sat in the lounge. It was 9.33am as she looked at her watch. She liked that time, all these 3’s seemed to tell her something, it seemed like a kind sign. She got signs all the
time and she often got the feeling or knowing of something without being able to explain it in words. She probably could explain it in words but she could get a deeper understanding by the feeling.

  Ethan would be up soon. The love for him had always remained so strong. She loved and adored him as a child and it just enhanced and evolved. She adored him even before he turned up. She was positive she could sense him before he arrived, before she was pregnant, so much so she always had conversations to her little Ethan. And when he did turn up at 11.11am she loved him beyond this world, a karmic tie, an ethereal thread. She felt like her twin had arrived but still within that motherly, protective manner. She loved him like no other. All she ever wanted from Ethan was for him to be with his pure heart. She loved him unconditionally, she didn’t care what he did, but as much as she didn’t care, she knew he was so special and could do incredible things.

  Ethan walked into the lounge where Elisabeth sat. It was usually around this time that Ethan came in. He had showered, thrown on some grungy type of clothes and was ready for the day.

  “Hey mom.”

  “Hey Ethan,” she said with her normal glow.

  Something buzzed in him today. It was the time of year, spring and those exciting years of feeling so free. He loved his home and waking up and seeing his mom had always made him feel so blessed. He had gelled his hair up more than normal today, he felt alive and had to express it. He felt abundant and creative and had to edge that up, make himself look more messy. He didn’t want to look too clean and nice. Ethan always had to match his appearance with his feelings.

  Ethan walked past his mom to the kitchen. It was an open plan house so the kitchen and the lounge were all visible to each other. Ethan poured a juice. He looked at his mom, there in the lounge with a long shirt on, bare legs, curled up on the sofa. For that brief moment he sensed how beautiful she looked and how blessed he was. That beauty was passed down to Ethan, in genes, in blood, by soul and 23 years of unconditional love.

  “I do like your hair, Ethan though it is getting to the point where you can just get up and it’s done, no more gel,” Elisabeth said from the lounge.

  “Yep…thanks, mom you might be right, that’s where it’s evolving to,” Ethan said walking into the lounge smiling, juice in hand. “I don’t know if it would suit you though.”

  “I could pull it off if I was a boy. I’d much rather be a feminine woman though.”

  “I understand. If I was a woman I’d like to look like you.”

  “You would not.”

  “I would, mom. I would dress like you too.”

  “Really? Messy hair, long shirt, look like you have just been scrubbing the floors?”

  “I actually like that look,” then he added, “on the odd occasion, not walking the streets like that though.”

  She smiled.

  “Do you have class this morning?”

  “I do, I’ll be off soon, I have to pick up Christian on the way, then drop in for a coffee before class.”

  “What cafe are you going to?” Elisabeth knew most likely it would be Edgeoholic where he often went and where his ex girlfriend worked.

  “Yeah Edgeoholic.”

  “Will Natasha be there?”

  “She will be she works today. I know her hours pretty well. She still looks gorgeous. In a way I don’t like seeing her, but it’s our hang out spot so I don’t really want to change. But when I see her it does charge me with emotion. It’s the beauty, the love, caring about her once and her volatile self. It’s just a mix of....all that.”

  Ethan sat down on the armrest of the sofa where Elisabeth was. Elisabeth was listening, she knew he was highly sensitive, a beautiful rare quality in a male. She knew females were attracted to it, some though were fearful of it also, not used to it.

  “I understand,” she said, “you’re right she has something special, almost pristine, but there is a darkness within her... and I don’t mean that in a tough way, like something in her past has made her, kind of wild. But I can see why you liked her so much, she is captivating.”

  “It’s true, mom and when you fall into that and become one romantically it is just so hard to..” he lip-synched ‘Fucken’...“disconnect.”

  “I know, it’s part of life, Ethan you have to go through these experiences. Find out what you do want and what you don’t want.”

  “Yeah so true. It’s just having that special someone, Natasha, her beauty, her gorgeous self mixed into a realm of potent crap sometimes, and you can’t separate it and a part of you is almost okay to accept it and say, so be it. I‘ll have the shit with the love...and hope she sorts herself out.”

  Ethan finished, pondered, his mom didn’t say anything in the brief moment of a gap in the conversation so Ethan continued.

  “When we were together, I went around to her house to break up with her after she was being a total madam and I thought enough. I think she knew I was turning up to break up with her. It was like she was nearly testing me to see how much I could handle. So I rocked up to her house, she had straightened her hair, made herself look really good. I looked her in the eye, ready to break up with her and I just couldn’t. I was like how the fuck am I going to be able to break up with her when she is this beautiful. And she knows it, that power that she can have.”

  Elisabeth just listened. Ethan was always so expressive, waving his hands around, using gestures. A girl he dated briefly once said he talked like a poet. Older people especially corporate types had often thought there was something wrong with him. His expressive, passionate ways had appeared outright odd to them and with his dress sense, dark clothes, different designs, black nail polish, smudged eyeliner, he was nearly a freak to some. But Ethan had never adjusted to the judgment. He knew in his heart he had it right. They thought he was weird, but from his eyes the older types who judged him, they were like the walking dead. To Ethan they seemed so removed from the tastes of the real world, that was the spirit, love and joy mixed in this human culture that Ethan often rebelled against, which was the conservatism, money, greed, ignorance. He knew it was there but tried his hardest to remain detached to it.

  “Anyway time for class.”

  He got up and they walked together to the front door.

  “You’ll be okay, with time it does heal.” Elisabeth said.

  “Yeah, I thought I was all sweet, then I have a dream about her or see her and it all comes back. Over sensitive huh?”

  “You’re just a sweet, sensitive male.” Elisabeth said, giggling. “You’re just being honest to how you feel.”

  “A clean slate, that’s what I want, no baggage just the free spirit in me roaming doing what I want.”

  “Be true to your heart and do what you will.”

  “I like that.”

  “A clean slate, a sweet heart, some good looks from your mom, what more do you need?”

  “I know, I’m blessed, good genes, thanks, mom.”

  Then Elisabeth lightly commented about Ethan’s ripped jeans.

  “Next time I see those jeans in the wash, they will be sewn up.”

  “Don’t,” Ethan said almost childishly.

  “You look lovely,” Elisabeth said as she pulled his shirt and moved a piece of his hair. “it’s just like when you were 11.” Ethan laughed.

  “Where’s my packed lunch?”

  “There are some raisins and some fruit on the bench if you want those?” Ethan nearly laughed, she almost seemed serious.

  “Very tempting, I’ll be cool, love you.”

  Ethan gave her a hug and they said bye to each other.

  ~ CHAPTER TWO ~

  THE EDGE OF BOOKER

  Ethan jumped into his car, a convertible Porsche. He loved it and felt free in it. It looked flasher than what it was, an old version, with high mileage.

  His mom had helped him with the cash. Ethan rarely held onto any job for too long, usually complaining about the boredom of it. He was a true free spirit and some of his employers couldn’t handle his
personality. He hated to be confined or controlled. The controlling nature of humans was his dislike and having a bit of money kept him free. He knew what it was like to have to scrimp and save and he didn’t like it. He didn’t like the lack of options and the control that could be exerted from others when you didn’t have money. Sometimes you just needed time to do what you like. He had lived without it and now with it and he was highly appreciative of having abundance.