Shoulder Conversations
A/N:
Kisses to my spouse Hatti, who invented the shoulder-devil in fanfic ten years ago. I still love your xfiles story (and you).:)
Helen cowered behind a rock and regarded her left shoe with irritation. Who would have thought a simple shoe lace could be such an essential thing. You simply couldn't run fast enough with an open shoe. She had tried to replace it with some sort of liana but with all the running she had' to do every day it had soon frayed too.
It seemed she needed to go back into her own time and get a new synthetic shoe lace.
Helen sighed.
Perhaps a visit to Nick was in order too. There was still the possibility that he would let her into his bed this time. No man could go on that long without sex. Otherwise there was still Stephen. He could be annoying with his gullibility but surely he was still a good sport in the sack. And she'd been successful at seducing him before.
Besides they were so much fun to mess up.
For instance she could...*POP*
Helen jumped as something hopped onto her right shoulder. She quickly wiped the thing away. But the next moment it landed on her left shoulder and muttered "Heh, that wasn't nice."
Shocked Helen peered at the little thing. It looked rather like like a miniature version of herself with red furry skin, little black horns and a remarkably long tail.
'Great! Now she'd started to hallucinate as well. 8 years with only dinosaurs as company could do that to a human being.'
"I'm here to help you. Just listen to me and then I can buzz off again."
"Why should I?" Helen asked annoyed. She didn't like receiving orders, not even from someone who looked like herself.
The little shoulder-devil got comfortable on her shoulder and folded his arms behind his head.
"Why should you do this?" it screeched. "I can't believe it. Here you are, alone, sitting morosely on a rock having no fun at all. And you're asking me why you should listen to me? You really have to spend more time with people instead of watching dinosaurs eating grass. You need a life. I wanna help you get one."
After his big speech the little redskin exhaled and started to polish one of his hornes until it shone again.
Helen mulled over this words.
The insane thing was that the little creature was right.
She was bored and needed a change. But she had managed that on her own in the past, dhadn't she?
Well, it couldn't hurt to listen to what the little furhead had up its sleeve.
"All right, so shout."
"Let's see. You could lead some T. rex to Street on Friday afternoon. That will give your husband a nice workout."
Helen shook her head. "I want to nettle him, not kill him!"
"Then how about something like the action with the dodos?" the devil said. Then in a lower voice it added, "I liked the parasite killing people."
"Too boring. Watching people chasing dumb cursorial birds is no fun at all. Can't you come up with something better? I thought you were here to help me."
The shoulder-devil dwelt on her words for a minute.
"You could tell Nick some details about your affair with Stephen," the red furry creature suggested. "That will tick him off. Perhaps he'll go mad and beat Stephen up."
Helen considered that and finally grinned. "Sounds good. Go on. What's next?"
*POP*
The next moment a little thing, also looking like herself, with a white nightgown on and a harp in its hands arrived on Helen's other shoulder and pleaded,
"Don't do this. They are nice men and Nick is still your husband. You cannot hurt someone you love."
"Pah! The other side. As always too late! Love! Bullshit! That's just something that people made up to sell more flowers and chocolate. Don't listen to him," Helen's -devil shouted.
"That's not true. People have sung about love and written poems and tales about it for centuries."
"They just wanted sex and were to afraid to say it straight out."
Helen watched amazed, as the dispute on her shoulders continued, turning her head from one side to the other.
"But without real feelings sex isn't half so good," the angel argued.
The devil-creature remained silent. It didn't seem to be able to come up with a counter-argument at the moment.
"By the way, that's my side. You're forever turning up on the right side. So now you are quite wrong," the angel railed.
"This time I'm on the left. So get over it." The little devil grinned sardonically and stuck its tongue out.
"But the left side is mine," the shoulder-angel wailed. "That's not fair."
"Life isn't fair. Ask Helen. If life was fair she would be sitting on a tropical island with a drink in her hand and her husband kissing her feet. And look what she's got instead. A broken shoe and some ugly dinosaurs."
Helen had had enough. "Stop 're here for me. So stop wrangling and help me."
Both shoulder occupants peered at Helen.
"She's really bad tempered today," the angel remarked.
"Hardly surprising, if you'd gone for 8 years without sex you'd be grumpy too."
The angel was shocked. "But she's married. Men love sex. So why hasn't she had some?"
"Her husband doesn't want her anymore. He's gone all gooey eyes for this Jenny now. I know it from a safe resource. My poker evening with Lester-devil... " Helen-devil whispered.
Helen-angel whispered back, "Last I heard Nick boy wanted this Claudia girl."
"Pah, typical of your side. Never up to date. Claudia girl disappeared and this Jenny girl replaced her. That was good work from Helen and us." Helen-devil grinned, pleased. "Theoretically they are the same. She looks like Claudia girl, she talks like her, but her shoulder-devil has much more success than before.
Jenny-devil told me Jenny girl can lying through her teeth without problems and she does it often."
Helen-angel pondered this. "Perhaps she's what he needs right now. Better than the one he married."
"Hey, you're talking about our client. It's your problem when she's following more of my advice than yours. Shows your bad work," Helen-devil said, nastily.
Helen felt a big headache starting.
"I can still hear you. Gossiping behind my back. A nice help you are," she said, sarcastically.
The shoulder occupants looked at each other and shrugged.
"And for the record Nick still loves me, he does. And Stephen too. Both men will love me forever." Proudly, Helen threw her head back.
*POP*
A little devil who looked like Stephen appeared beside the other one and cried,
"Hell, stop pining. Just screw your professor. After this bitch of a wife he will love it."
"Hey!" Helen-devil gave him a kick.
"Oops, wrong shoulder," Stephen-devil called. With a *POP* he vanished again.
Helen-devil and Helen-angel only just managed to remove themselves to a safe place before Helen fainted.
With a loud *POP* she hit the ground.