Communication issues

Sarah woke up with such a start that she fell over backwards off the stool on which she had been precariously perched resulting in a painful crash on the floor and a hilarious slap stick comedy moment if anyone had actually been watching at the time (for which she was certainly thankful that there wasn't). She cursed everything she could think of silently under her breath and rubbed the numbness from her cheek which had been placed there by the kiss of the cold marble imitated kitchen counter surface. The jelly, spoon and camera were still there, showing that neither Janice nor Sophie had risen in the time that her mind had lapsed once again into the abyss that was sleep.

Too much had happened in her life recently to keep up with; she really didn't want her very sanity in question at the moment, couldn't her life be calm and stress free? Checking the camera photos again she was certain, it wasn't all a bad dream, this was happening again. No matter how much she wanted it to go away, it wasn't; she was just going to have to face it head on. The sound of groaning and clumsy movement from overhead brought Sarah out of her pit of self-pity and forced her to focus on the days tasks. Janice and Sophie were awake.


Two hours later Janice, Sophie and Sarah had sank into the tan leather sofa in front of a chick flick coming to the final scene. Sarah had tried to pay attention to it but the dream kept echoing around her mind over and over, it was the sort of dream which made you scared to go to sleep for fear what might happen next time. It hadn't been scary, just plain weird and a little too close to what had been going on in her head recently for comfort, she couldn't remember the man's face but she could state a 90% certainty on who it was.

Unconsciously a sigh escaped Sarah's lips causing the two women who looked a little worse for wear to glance at her with curiosity on their faces. No questions needed to be voiced, Janice was worried that the sigh was over Sam and Sophie being the hopeless romantic hoped it was over the guy she had met last night. Ironically combine the two and you weren't far from the truth.

After a lapse of silence which had gone on for more than the recommended time for not being uncomfortable stated, Janice sighed herself and asked:

"Please, tell me after everything we went through last night and this morning that you are not thinking about the colossal prick we bitched about for at least a solid hour last night."

"Alternatively tell us about the guy you DID meet last night! Don't lie, I distinctly remember a blonde haired man buying us, but more specifically YOU lots of drinks." Sophie piped in with her round eyes and widening at the prospect of blossoming love. Was it any wonder that this woman was still single?

"Why do I not remember this?" Janice asked with a little more ferocity than was probably intended causing Sophie to back away from her.

"You don't remember? He challenged you to a shot run! Remember, the blonde guy in black leather with deep pockets and an amazing ability to pack away alcohol. Really cocky and stubborn, doesn't like to lose."

Janice's face was transformed as memory and realisation coincided to create a vivid picture of the man they had indeed met last night. "Oh yeah! He gave you his number! You are going to call him right? You have to!"

"Why do I have to? I don't even know if I like him that much." An entirely true statement.

Janice made several exasperated hand gestures towards Sarah as she battled the frustration and wish to shout at their seemingly inept friend.

"Fine! I'll ring him." Before Sarah could even wonder whether Janice had meant what she said, Janice had swiped the phone from the table and was running upstairs. Sarah set off to follow her but was rugby tackled by Sophie who was surprisingly strong for her petite structure coupled with her hung-over state. Or Sarah could just be more hung over than originally thought. Janice called from the top of the stairs "Sophie, I need the number!" Using what seemed to be inhuman strength Sophie manoeuvred herself so that she had pinned out Sarah's arm and forced her jumper sleeve off to reveal the number.

She then shouted each number in turn with difficulty as she battled Sarah, attempting to keep the number on her arm visible.

Eventually the full number was obtained and Janice dialled the phone quickly placing it to her ear praying for it to ring and not to go to answer phone. As the sound of dialling clicked in Janice realised with a shock that it was Sarah who needed to answer the phone and with a burst of adrenaline ran down the stairs and threw the phone into the hands of Sarah who Sophie had just released from the wrestling position. Unusual to form Sarah caught the projectile and pressed it to her ear just in time for the dial tone to cut off signalling an answer.

Sarah gave Janice and Sophie a look of pure poison and murmured "I am going to fucking kill both of you!" To which she got innocent smiles in reply.

"Hello? Is anyone there?"

Shit. "Hi, Jareth, it's Sarah, you know, from the bar last night..." She could feel her gut sink lower in her body, as if it was on a one track course straight to her feet.

"Sarah! How are you? I hope you've recovered from last night's venture."

"Uh, yeah, yeah I am thanks, how about you?"

"Yes, I am perfectly rejuvenated thank you." An uncomfortable silence descended like a shroud over both of them, suffocating any chance of a redeeming comment.

Janice and Sophie wrote something down on a piece of paper and showed it to her, and for lack of anything better to say Sarah read it out loud.

"Do you want to go out at some point this week?"

"That sounds like an immensely profitable way to spend time, I would love to. Do you have a specific venue in mind?" The gears in Sarah's mind started turning quickly. A public place was required; you could still have an incredibly private conversation within a public place. No alcohol as well. Definitely no alcohol.

"Would you like to meet at the park just down from the tooth and claw?" The place had come to her on the spur of the moment, but the more she thought about it the more it made sense.

"Perfect, shall we say Wednesday lunchtime?"

"Uhhh...yeah, sure, sounds good to me, meet by the memorial tree?"

"Excellent, see you Wednesday, goodbye." Sarah was left listening to blank dial tone while staring blankly at Janice and Sophie in disbelief. Could it really be blind luck that the lunchtime he had chosen was the only one in which she had time to do anything? However that thought was erased as Janice and Sophie took two sheepish steps back misinterpreting Sarah's blank face as incomprehensible anger towards them. Ironically the gesture reminded Sarah of the playful anger she was meant to be showing and she was only too happy to oblige.

"I swear neither of you will leave this house without something hurting!"

Sarah dived towards the both of them from her position but Janice and Sophie were already running into the hall way. Sophie ran for the kitchen where as Janice bounded up the stairs merrily singing "Sarah and Jareth sitting in a tree, K, I, S, S, I, N, G!" The choice was easy. Janice first.

Five minutes earlier...

Jareth analysed the black pebble like object in his hand with a mixture of wonder and bewilderment. Apparently this device allowed you to contact people all over the human world, and quite by accident the Fae had discovered that they worked across the worlds as well when a Fae had stolen a human child who had had a mobile phone in their pocket at the time. The afore mentioned Fae thought it was an exploding device of some description when the child's parents had tried to ring them.

Human technology really was amazing; the only problem was that he did not have any idea as to how to use it. He had gone in to a human store to buy one and had come out with the strangest looking contraption he had ever seen, it didn't even have a "keypad" as the salesman had put it, who, consequently, seemed to have a heart attack when he realised Jareth hadn't even known what one of those was. The salesman had also said something about it being a "touch screen" which had meant absolutely nothing to Jareth and quite frankly he had stopped listening at that point, all he wanted was a phone, was that too much to ask?

He had managed to leave the human store with a piece of technology which had probably cost too much for what it was and was too confusing even to contemplate giving a try for the time being. He had memorised the number he needed to give Sarah and figured out how to put a number into his phone…and that was it.

Now he was faced with the dilemma of the phone "locking" itself and he had no idea how to "unlock" it considering there wasn't a padlock or key in sight. These thing were meant to be simple and quite frankly they were anything but, it was a miracle that the humans had figured out how to use them. Every time he pressed the screen it lit up and said "slide to unlock" but he couldn't slide it open, no matter how many times he tried it he just couldn't do it.

Not that he had a guarantee that Sarah would call him, it was possible that she wouldn't go for the bait, not that it mattered; he had a multitude of back-up plans if this one failed. However, he just got a feeling that this one was the most likely to work whether she remembered him or not, she was always too curious for her own good.

The echoing sound of a shutting door alerted Jareth to the fact that he was no longer alone in the room, and sure enough before his very eyes he saw a tiny goblin hand appear over the top of the table and sneak its way towards the black pebble.

Quietly Jareth struck like a cobra, grabbing the young goblins wrist and wrenching the trembling creature up to his eye level, oh how he loved to be intimidating. "What in the name of stars do you think you are doing? Sneaking in to a Royal chamber without permission, trying to steal from the property of the king himself! You have a vast amount of audacity." To his surprise however, the goblin wasn't trembling with fear, but rather trying to stifle it's laughter by shaking and pressing its entire fist into its mouth. A look of confusion washed over Jareth's face before being replaced instantaneously by realisation and surprise. Turning to face the table his suspicions where confirmed as he saw a goblin running towards the door with the phone in hand. They had actually concocted some form of a plan…and he had fallen for it! Growling with anger Jareth through the goblin in his hand across the chamber and started chanting a magic spell which he directed towards the thief in question. The goblin was frozen in space giving Jareth all the time he needed to calmly approach the goblin and take the phone from its hand which, to his amazement the goblin had managed to unlock. Releasing the spell Jareth grabbed the squirming goblin and maliciously asked "How did you unlock it?"

The goblin refused to meet his eyes, instead it focussed on the floor below its feet and sheepishly muttered "Black thing said slide to unlock, that's what we did."

"And how long did it take you to come up with such a plan?"

"Three days." The goblin said looking directly at him with a wide eyed grin. Clearly it was very proud of itself for it.

Sighing Jareth began to think of a way he could punish the goblin, because he had to admit, he was impressed that a goblin had even managed to devise such a scheme. This was clearly one of the brighter ones in his kingdom. However, his thoughts were interrupted as the phone started buzzing and shaking with weird sounds protruding from all ends, it was as if it had been hit by the twitch spell. Reading the screen bright letters flashed "Incoming Call, Sarah Mobile." Staring at the machine in astonishment and horror Jareth resembled a deer in headlights, he hadn't expected her to call him this soon! "How do I answer it?" Jareth asked the goblin in his grasp with a sense of urgency he didn't know it was capable of in his voice. Blankly the goblin stared at him and a place on the screen which said 'Answer.'

"Simples." The goblin said with a smile. Letting the goblin go Jareth hesitantly pressed the device to his ear. "Hello? Is anyone there?"


Toby had learnt how to use skype as soon as he had discovered that he could talk to Sarah face to face using it while she was on another continent. Sarah had always felt very close to Toby and he had cried for days when he had been dutifully informed by his mother that Sarah was going away for a very long time and that he wouldn't be able to see her every week. As a result to cease the tears Sarah had agreed that while she was in England she would talk to Toby for an hour every Sunday between 11am and 12pm which made it very early morning in America (Toby didn't seem to believe in sleep during daylight hours). Sarah was exhausted but desperately needed to talk to Toby, as much for the promise sake as for the whole Labyrinth situation.

He was already online when she signed in and started a conversation with numerous questions in rapid fire as 10 year olds are known to do. "Hey Sarah! How are you? This past week has been sooooo much fun, we went on a field trip to the zoo and I got to pet a lion!"

"You touched a lion?" Sarah asked sceptically.

"No…not exactly, but I was the bravest one there and I got very close!"

Sarah couldn't help but smile. "I'm sure you were."

"And then we saw the hugest eagle in the world! And Miss Hoober said that we could have one as a pet if we got a licence and I really want one! But mum says I can't, can you talk to her for me? Pleeeeeeeeeease?" At this announcement Toby used his puppy dog eyes, which he had spent a lot of time perfecting over the years and a look most natural mothers would melt at, unfortunately for Toby, Sarah and his mother had become immune to it.

"Sorry Tobe, if mom said no then there's no way I'm ever going to be able to persuade her."

Toby's downcast look did however pull on one of her heartstrings and so she quickly changed the subject to the aim of the evening.

"Toby, do you remember a while ago you told me you were having dreams?"

At this Toby's demeanour completely changed and he tilted his eyes away from the screen. "Mommy says I'm not allowed to talk about them, she doesn't like them."

"Well I'm not mommy, so it's ok to talk about them hun." With this sentence Sarah used her reassuring smile and Toby seemed a little more encouraged to talk about them.

"There's always the tall blonde man there with the scary smile, and lots of little monsters running round, you're there too." Sarah didn't even know what she was aiming for or meant to be asking, she hadn't even thought this far ahead. She could have smacked herself for the lack of thought put into it.

"Toby, are they dreams, or…are they memories?" She was scared to even ask the question, but she needed to know.

"I dunno Sarah, it's not just that mummy doesn't like me talking about…"

Sarah shifted forward a little bit in her seat; she had never heard her mum say anything about this. "What is it Toby, I promise I won't get mad."

"I see monsters other people don't see. I see humans in the street who sparkle like diamonds and have green skin. They're mean and steal people, I'm scared of them Sarah."


Sorry this is taking so long to get up and running again, experiencing some technical issues which will hopefully be resolved soon, please enjoy in the mean time!