short story – Page 2 – A. L. Lester

Nell Iris Guest Post: It Rained All Night

Thank you so much, dear Ally, for allowing me back into your space to talk about my newest release It Rained All Night. (You are most welcome, Nell!)

This story features a trope I usually don’t write: class differences. I’ve written about it exactly once before, but that was in one of my rare fantasy stories, and it felt more natural in that situation. It Rained All Night is a contemporary story, and it doesn’t come naturally to me in this context. I’m aware that class differences are a real thing—both IRL and in books—but the poor MC meets billionaire MC isn’t something I read a lot, which means I don’t write it either.

But Henrik, the narrator in It Rained All Night, told me he was filthy rich, and I had to listen to his voice. He started as a regular gazillionaire (hah!) with a private plane at his disposal, but in the final edit, after I got my manuscript back from betas, he morphed into something more. He turned out to be nobility.

Sweden is a kingdom and has had noble, titled families for hundreds and hundreds of years, but in 1902 the last person became ennobled, and the nobility lost their official privileges, such as tax exemptions on July 1^st, 2003. They still enjoy some informal social privileges, and in 2022 there are still 657 noble families in Sweden.

And Henrik is one of them. His family still garners lots of attention from the press, and they’re very rich, not just from inherited money, but also from hard work. They’re always in the public eye, something Henrik doesn’t like, something that has kept him from trying to find a significant other because he doesn’t want to subject someone to a life of public scrutiny.

Then he meets Mikko, a regular middle-class, yoga-loving guy, and his life changes completely…

It Rained All Night

Can a chance meeting in the rain change someone’s life?

Meeting someone who can make him stop going is an eye-opener for Henrik. The man, Mikko, is his complete opposite, a steady rock in the wild rainstorm that is Henrik’s life, but the connection between them is both unexpected and instantaneous. Their encounter only lasts a few minutes, but before they part, they exchange phone numbers.

They live far away from each other, but soon they text and call daily, until Mikko is Henrik’s dearest friend and most trusted person. But a late-night question on the phone has Henrik re-evaluating his feelings. It’s impossible to love someone you’ve only met in person once…right?

Is the connection Henrik and Mikko forged long distance enough to sustain them when they meet again? And will their love be strong enough to give them the happily ever after they deserve?

M/M Contemporary / 7673 words

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Can a chance meeting in the rain change someone's life? It Rained All Night by Nell Iris.

Excerpt

It’s late when I finally get home. I tear off my white bowtie as soon as the door closes behind me and toss it on the entryway table. The peacock-y tailcoat suffers the same fate, and as I march through the apartment to my bedroom, I remove the cufflinks and the studs from my suffocating shirt, flip open the button on my pants, toss them on the bed after shimmying out of them, and by the time I reach the shower, I’m naked. I quash the guilt about throwing my fanciest clothes around like I was a teenager in a snit, but I’ll take care of them in a moment. I need to wash off the day first.
I turn the water to red-hot and step under the spray. I hate weddings. At least grand formal affairs that are mostly for show and less about celebrating love—the ones attracting the press like flies to a rotting corpse—the kind my family likes to put on. It’s not that I doubt that my cousin Emma loves her now-husband, but a white-tie wedding? Yes, we’re a rich, titled family, but we’re not the royal fucking family.
The warm water beats down on my tense muscles as I scrub off the ostentation of the evening, and I feel a little better after drying off. I pull on some soft sweats, take care of my fancy suit, then slip out onto the balcony. It’s chilly; spring has just sprung, and the rain-heavy air doesn’t help with the temperature. Raindrops are splattering against the glass roof, and the scent…the scent is intoxicating. It’s earthy and fresh, it’s washing away the old and dead to make way for the new and the budding.
I take a picture of the rivulets on the roof and send it to Mikko without a message. It’s late—a glimpse at the time tells me it’s close to one in the morning—and he’s probably already sleeping. He’s an early riser and never misses his yoga practice at five-thirty, so I don’t expect a reply. Instead, I sit on one of the chairs, dragging the other one closer so I can rest my feet on the seat, before reclining the back and closing my eyes, exhaling all the frantic energy of the day.
If I ever get married, it’s going to be a small affair. Just him and me and the witnesses needed to make it legal. No napkins printed in gold with our names, no long-winded speeches, no band playing, no press photographers. Just him and me and the I do’s and a light drizzling rain in a remote place where no one can find us…
I sigh. If I ever get married. I need a man for that, and I won’t find a man if I’m not looking, and I’m not looking because…
A gust of wind sprays me with chilly raindrops. I shiver but don’t go inside. Instead, I sink deeper into the chair and let the steady dripping on the roof soothe me.
I’m not looking because of Mikko.
I don’t know when it happened. When my feelings for Mikko veered from being friendly to something else. Something more. Something deep.
We stayed in contact after the yoga retreat; even though we’d exchanged phone numbers, I didn’t expect much, but he’s an avid texter and kept me updated about his long train ride back home after we parted. He was funny and thoughtful, and it didn’t take long until texting him daily was a regular part of my routine. Until I started expecting “good morning” messages with a picture attached of him contorted in one of the harder, fancier yoga poses. Until I started needing to chat with him for a few moments at the end of the day to unwind. Until he was the one I wanted to confide in, until he was the one I started to turn to when something important was going on.
Until he was the one I fell—
I push away the thought before I can complete it. It’s not possible to fall in love with someone you’ve only met once. It’s not.
Still, as I sink deeper into the chair, as the pitter-patter of rain against the roof chases away the stress of the day, I allow myself a second to acknowledge that I’m fooling myself with those kinds of thoughts.
But then my phone buzzes with an incoming call, I know it can only be one person. Only Mikko would call me at this hour.
“What are you doing up this late?” I ask as a greeting, as the tense set of my shoulders bleed away, leaving me relaxed for the first time all day.
“I was waiting for you to report back from the wedding of the century.” His voice is hoarse, sleepy, but happy.

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About Nell

Nell Iris is a romantic at heart who believes everyone deserves a happy ending. She’s a bonafide bookworm (learned to read long before she started school), wouldn’t dream of going anywhere without something to read (not even the ladies room), loves music (and singing along at the top of her voice but she’s no Celine Dion), and is a real Star Trek nerd (Make it so). She loves words, bullet journals, poetry, wine, coffee-flavored kisses, and fika (a Swedish cultural thing involving coffee and pastry!)

Nell believes passionately in equality for all regardless of race, gender or sexuality, and wants to make the world a better, less hateful, place.

Nell is a bisexual Swedish woman married to the love of her life, a proud mama of a grown daughter, and is approaching 50 faster than she’d like. She lives in the south of Sweden where she spends her days thinking up stories about people falling in love. After dreaming about being a writer for most of her life, she finally was in a place where she could pursue her dream and released her first book in 2017.

Nell Iris writes gay romance, prefers sweet over angsty, short over long, and quirky characters over alpha males.

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Surfacing Again: Otters and anthropomorphism

Morning everyone! Surfacing Again is 99c for the whole of this week and I thought I’d share a bit about otters. This is largely an exercise in basking in cuteness for five hundred words, so please do excuse me.

close up shot of otters — Photo by Silvia Heider on Pexels.com

As you know if you’ve met any of my Celtic myth retellings, they are all based on some sort of legend from the westward Celtic fringe of the British Isles. I began by making them Celtic (hence the name, doh!), but I’ve expanded a bit for the sake of a good story and St Cuthbert was actually knocking round Northumbria in the very early middle ages, during the seventh century. His church was part of the Celtic tradition, but he wasn’t a Celt. I made an exception for him because I was so taken by the otter story. (The whole Celtic church versus the Roman church is a whole other post, so we’ll go with this oversimplification because it’s a niche interest 😊)

So. Cuthbert was an extremely austere chap, who used to go and stand in the sea to pray. When he got out, a pair of otters would come out of the sea too, and dry him off. We know this because a creepy stalker-monk spied on him and later told St Bede, who wrote it in his Life of St Cuthbert.

This is…not usual otter behaviour.

cute wild otter swimming in lake — Photo by David Selbert on Pexels.com

Here in the UK we don’t have sea otters. We just have otters, some of whom prefer to hang out on the coast. I like to think of them as water-cats, or maybe water-dogs, because they are so active and playful. They are the European otter, members of the Mustelid family which also includes stoats, weasels and mink. They’re all pretty fearsome creatures with an exciting set of teeth that you don’t want predating in your chicken house.

They are also exceedingly rare in the UK at this point, although I believe they are less rare than they used to be. My sister (to whom Surfacing Again is dedicated) is our local point of contact for one of the otter protection organisations and she does counting and watching. This seems to mostly involve dangerously hanging over bridges and wading through unpleasantly deep streams to change the cards in her wildlife cameras and then watching the footage and logging what she sees. She also counts up footprints and spraint that she finds. Because they are so endangered, people aren’t encouraged to deliberately go and search for them.

I think we have this anthropomorphic idea in our heads about some wild creatures that doesn’t serve us well, simply because they are so charming. Otters fall into this category I guess.

They eat mostly fish, but will also eat birds, mammals and frogs if they’re hungry. Because they’re inquisitive they will interact with humans occasionally in the way they do in Surfacing Again…coming up to see what’s going on. But like all wild animals they aren’t tame and we shouldn’t see them like that. Having said that I loved Gavin Maxwell’s Ring of Bright Water when I read it in my teens. In my opinion it’s the ultimate otter book. Maxwell lived with a house full of otters on the west coast of Scotland—he was a naturalist who travelled widely in the interwar and post WW2 years and brought his first otter back from Iraq . It was a different time and these days you have to have a licence to keep a wild animal as a pet.

In my story I tried to balance my desire for Mustelid cuteness with my feeling that otters are wild creatures who should be respected. I hope I’ve done that.

Surfacing Again

Melinda is staying on Lindisfarne for a Christmas break with her old friend when an unexpected argument leaves her alone for the holiday.

It’s the first Christmas since her mother died and the island’s peace and wild tranquillity bring balm to her wounded heart. Two chance meetings, first with a pair of wary otters and then with cafe-owner Rowan, bring her genuine joy.

Will her tentative relationship with Rowan survive the end of her holiday and the turning of the year?

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otters drinking water from river — Photo by Kieren Ridley on Pexels.com

Release Day! Out of Focus

Ta-da! Today is the release day for Out of Focus and here’s a bit about it!

Enemies to lovers, a broken wrist, hurt-comfort and pining. A short contemporary gay romance set in a little Welsh theatre.

Out of Focus. Gay romance, Welsh theatre, hurt-comfort, enemies-to-lovers.

It’s the first of a new series, although it’s not actually a series because that would imply they are going to be in order. Instead I’m going to have a collection of different novellas about different people in the same small town, with the focus being the Theatre Fach or Little Theatre.

Welcome to the fictional town of Llanbaroc, on the north Welsh coast between the sea and the mountains! There’s a decent tourist trade, but there’s also a very close-knit local community, including resident hoteliers, the theatre/community centre, the hospital, the college, the hospital and the donkey sanctuary. There’s a livestock and produce market every Saturday and it’s a centre for the surrounding farming community.

Alex and Luke are well-liked employees of the theatre and have lots of roots in the town—Luke more-so than Alex, because he’s been there longer. I hope you like them as much as I do!

Out of Focus

Alex has never quite believed he’s good enough. Not as a person and not as a lighting technician. He hates that however hard he tries he can’t get his boss, Luke, to like him. In the two years he’s been in the job it’s become a Thing with him and he’s got a huge crush on the man. He needs to move on for his own sanity and his career and he’s just about to accept a job at a bigger theatre when one of the volunteers he’s bedded and dumped pushes him off a ladder.

Luke likes Alex a lot and has done since the day he walked through the door of Theatre Fawr two years ago. He doesn’t date his staff though, or do casual—and Alex is the epitome of casual. So Luke keeps his distance despite Alex’s constant flirting.

Will Alex’s injury give Alex and Luke the push they need to open up to each other? Or will Luke’s inadvertent discovery that Alex has a secret job offer push them further apart?

A 17,500 word short story in the new Theatr Fach universe.

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Read a snippet!

Luke was furious. Bloody furious. His theatre. His crew. Alex.
He’d got back after a leisurely look round a potential new supplier of scissor-lifts and harnesses followed by a pub lunch with the business owner to find the theatre in uproar. Alex had tipped over on the zargees…which was bloody ironic given it was the approaching new height restrictions about using ladders to rig that had sent Luke on his errand.
He’d gone straight to the hospital and found Alex about to check himself out against the doctor’s advice. Bloody Alex, as well.
Alex had been a thorn in his side since he’d started in post two years ago. It was a tiny theatre and the chief technician was responsible for anything with a plug on it as well as showing the film programme and doing the lighting and sound for shows. They’d done a panel interview and Luke, a couple of members of the board and Lacey the theatre manager had seen half a dozen people. Alex had come out head and shoulders above the rest.
He’d walked in on his first proper day on the job and looked at Luke from underneath his ridiculously long eyelashes and smiled and said something perfectly professional that Luke hadn’t heard, because he was gone. Gone, gone, gone. His heart had given a big thump, he’d flushed from his chest to his hairline and he’d taken an actual physical step back because otherwise he’d have done something stupid.
Everyone on the circuit knew about Alex Tilsom by reputation. Not his professional reputation, although that was solid. His unprofessional reputation, as Luke privately thought of it.
It was a small industry.
Luke had seen whole companies explode because people fell into bed with each other and the detonation when they fell out of bed again meant they couldn’t work together. He’d been at Theatr Fach for a long time now and although there were no actual rules against it, his personal tenet was to keep his professional relationships professional.
So he let Alex’s good natured flirting roll over him, he didn’t respond like he wanted to and he never, ever commented or ribbed him like the others did about his latest conquest. It was worse because strictly speaking he was Alex’s boss. He tried very hard not to be the older creep who letched on his staff.
Newsflash. In this case he did not always succeed.
It made him feel uncomfortable and itchy inside his own skin. Alex was a funny guy. He worked hard, he was good at his job. He charmed passing crew and volunteers into bed and out again with no drama before or after. He’d be gone in two or three years…he was the sort of person who saw Theatr Fach as a stepping stone to something bigger and more challenging.
All Luke had to do was hold on to that thought and not smile back.
He’d thoroughly fucked that up in the last twenty-four hours, hadn’t he? It was his job to go and see what was going on at the hospital. And he supposed he could argue it was his job to stay with Alex overnight if no-one else could, if the stupid arse wouldn't stay in hospital like he should have.
It wasn’t his job to mostly fail to sleep in the armchair in the corner of the man’s bedroom and creepily watch over him all night. Or was it? Was that on the right side of the line? Fuck it, who knew any more.

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Nell Iris: Santa in Sweden

Today I have a post from my friend Nell Iris for you–and I need to apologise to both Nell and you, because it should have gone up yesterday and I forgot. Nell Iris, everyone…with The Santa Emergency.

Merry Christmas to everyone who celebrates, and happy random day in December for everyone else. A huge thanks to Ally who’s always so kind and generous and invites me when I have a new book to talk about.❤️ And I do have a new book to talk about: The Santa Emergency. It’s out today, and it’s perfect if you wanna buy yourself a little gift. And speaking of gifts, I’m here to talk about the Swedish Santa, and I’m kicking it off with a poem.

Midwinter’s nightly frost is hard,
Brightly the stars are beaming;
Fast asleep is the lonely yard,
All, at midnight, are dreaming.
Clear is the moon, and the snow-drifts shine,
Glistening white, on fir and pine,
Covers on rooflets making.
None but the Tomte is waking.
Poem by Swedish poet Viktor Rydberg, originally published in 1881, translated to English

Traditionally, the Swedish Santa, or tomten, wasn’t a jolly fella with a white beard who gave kids presents at Christmas. No, he was short and old and dressed in plain wadmal, gray clothing. He was the protector of the farms, he was rumored to be ill-tempered, and a sure way of angering him was to disrespect the farm or mistreat the animals. He was offended by rudeness and didn’t like changes, so it was important to follow traditions. When angered, his retributions ranged from small pranks all the way to maiming and killing the animals he was protecting.

But at the end of the 19^th century, the image of tomten changed, thanks to the poem above, and the illustration that accompanied it. Swedish painter, artist and illustrator, Jenny Nyström got the assignment to illustrate the poem, and it led to a long and successful career. She’s often referred to as the mother of Santa in Sweden, and with pictures like these it’s not difficult to understand why.

These days, our Swedish Santa looks a lot like jolly old Santa Claus, but there are a few differences:

• Tomten lives in a nearby forest, not at the North Pole,
• he has a family,
• he doesn’t come down the chimney at night, but knocks on the front door,
• he delivers presents directly to the children on Christmas Eve before the children go to bed, just like the yule goat did;
• before he hands over presents he asks, Finns det några snälla barn här? (Are there any good children here?),
• he normally walks with his sack, but if he rides in a sleigh it is drawn by reindeer across the snow – they don’t fly,
• he likes a bowl of porridge, not a mince pie and a glass of sherry

(list borrowed from here)

Since we’re all grown-ups, we know Santa isn’t real, but since the presents are hand delivered in Sweden, we need someone to play Santa for us, wearing masks like these. When I was a kid, my beloved uncle always went to the store to “buy a newspaper” every time Santa arrived. When my daughter was little, her uncle went to visit his friend who lived next door to “say hi” and sadly it collided with Santa’s appearance every year. One year, the last year she believed in Santa, she confided to us before Christmas that she was pretty sure that Santa wasn’t real, that it was in fact her uncle. And since we were mean and devious parents, we asked someone else to be Santa that year, and our daughter was very confused. 😁

Kristian in The Santa Emergency was tasked last minute to host his family’s Christmas celebrations, and he pulled it together nicely. With one tiny little problem: he forgot to ask someone to come play Santa. So when it’s less than an hour before Santa is supposed to knock on his door, he rushes over to his new neighbor with a plea. I have a Santa emergency and I desperately need your help.

The Santa Emergency

I have a Santa emergency and I desperately need your help.

Sigge isn’t exactly a grinch when it comes to Christmas, but he’s not a fan of the holiday either. So when his new neighbor Kristian shows up in a panic, begging him to help by donning a Santa suit, Sigge’s gut reaction is to say no. But Kristian is cute and funny, rendering Sigge powerless against his heartfelt plea—especially after a promise of spending more time together—so he agrees.

The instant connection deepens as they share mulled wine and conversation as easy as breathing. But is it just holiday magic swirling in the air, or is it something real? Something that will last into the new year and beyond?

M/M Contemporary / 13 816 words

Buy The Santa Emergency: JMS Books :: Amazon :: Books2Read

About Nell

Nell believes passionately in equality for all regardless of race, gender or sexuality, and wants to make the world a better, less hateful, place.

Nell Iris writes gay romance, prefers sweet over angsty, short over long, and quirky characters over alpha males.

Find Nell on social media:

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Excerpt from The Santa Emergency

“My mom broke her leg two weeks ago. We always do Christmas at her house, and she wanted us to this year, too, despite her injury. But she’s not the kind of person to sit idly by and let other people do all the work, especially since she doesn’t let anyone into her kitchen. She’d insist on business as usual, and she’d exhaust herself and risk re-injuring her leg. So my sister came up with the idea of Christmas at my house since I’m the only one in the family besides Mom living in a house and not an apartment.” He rolls his eyes. “Because Santa would surely strike us down with a mighty hammer if we celebrated Christmas in an apartment, right? I know I’m mixing my metaphors, but I’m trying to say that I’m sure the world wouldn’t end. I love my sister to death, but she has the weirdest ideas.”

He speaks with his whole body; he gestures with his hands and his face is lively and animated, and I can easily read every emotion as he experiences them, even after only being in his presence for a few minutes. All that makes him even more irresistible. In a society where everything is about hiding the truth behind a pretty surface, meeting someone open is refreshing.

“Anyway,” he says, “that gave me two whole weeks to unpack my stuff and plan a party. Dammit, Sigge, I’m a copywriter, not a party planner!”

Holy crap. He’s paraphrasing Star Trek, too? Is he perfect?

“But I did all right. The food, the decorations, everything is perfect. Or you know…everything except that I forgot to convince someone to come play Santa. When my sister found out, she lectured me in her scariest hissing voice until I was overcome with the urge to run away from my own house. She said I must not love my nieces and nephews since I forgot about a Santa. Her blame game is on point.” He grimaces.

“I’d say.”

“It’s Christmas Eve, and Santa always comes after Donald Duck is over. I can’t believe I forgot. The kids reach meltdown level if someone needs to go to the bathroom after the TV is turned off, so I have exactly—” he looks at his watch and gasps “—thirty-five minutes until my sister declares me the worst uncle ever. You must help me. Pretty please with sugar on top.”

His eyes are wide and pleading, his eyebrows slumping sadly, and I swear I can detect a hint of a tremble in his lower lip. I reach out and ease the cup out of his hands and pour more mulled wine into it before handing it back to him. “Drink this.”

He nods and tosses it back like it’s a shot, and I hope he doesn’t choke on the almonds or burns his tongue. “Thank you,” he says, then slumps back on the couch, the corners of his mouth drawn down, his lower lip pouting a little.

“What do you need from me?” I ask.

“I need you to be Santa.”

I blink. I really should’ve seen that one coming, but I didn’t. “Huh?”

“I need a Santa or the kiddos will be heartbroken. You’re my only hope.”

“I can’t be your only hope. What if I hadn’t been at home?”

“I would have been seriously fucked. Everyone I know is knee-deep in their own celebrations. I could probably convince my best friend Anton to do it because he’s too nice for his own good, but he’s a new dad and I don’t want to tear him away from his baby girl on her first Christmas.”

“I don’t even know how to be Santa.”

“Of course, you do. Everyone knows how to be Santa. All you have to do is be jolly, say ho-ho-ho, and ask if there are any good children in the house. Then you give presents to the kids whether they say yes or no. But if my sister says she deserves a gift, don’t believe her. She doesn’t. Not after the lecture she gave me.”

Of course, I know how a Santa behaves. In theory. There was no Santa when I was a kid, rarely any presents, so all encounters I’ve had with him come from TV and movies. I know it’s not like he’s asking me to do an in-depth interpretation of a complex character, but my instinct is to say no. I have little experience with kids, I’m awkward around people, and I don’t do Christmas.

“Oh.” He sits up straight. “Are you…religious? I mean…did I offend your religious beliefs with my request? If so, I’m sorry; I didn’t think before barging into your home. I mean, you haven’t decorated, and—”

“Kristian, please.”

He snaps his mouth shut and looks at me with his eyes full of concern.

“I’m not religious. That’s not why I’m hesitating.” It’s because you’re cute and I don’t want to look like a fool in front of you, my brain adds, but luckily I’m able to stop the words from spilling out of my mouth.

“Whew.” He relaxes his stiff posture “I don’t want to get off on the wrong foot with my new neighbors. And you’re really cute.” His eyes widen and he sucks his lips into his mouth as though he’s trying to stuff back the words from whence they came.

Cute? He thinks I’m cute? No one’s ever called me cute before. Scary or intimidating, yes. Even hot. But not cute. “Thank you,” I say, unable to fight a smile taking over my face.

“Thank you?”

“Yes. I’m…uh…flattered you think so.” Flattered is an understatement, but I don’t want to tell him about the tickle in my belly caused by his words.

“Flattered?”

I nod.

“Okay.” He looks at me from under fluttering eyelashes, a content smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

“Okay.”

A quick glance at his chunky watch snaps his focus back to where it belongs. “So…Santa?”

Buy The Santa Emergency: JMS Books :: Amazon :: Books2Read

Surfacing Again: Otters

Surfacing Again came about because I essentially decided I wanted to write a story with otters, for no other reason than otters; so I went looking for myths I might be able to adapt. There are quite a few otter-myths in the UK—I liked the Otter Kings of Scotland very much and might see if I can write something longer about them at some point. But I was also very drawn to St Cuthbert and his helpful otters on the Holy Island of Lindisfarne.

As I wrote in my previous post, Lindisfarne is a small island off the North East coast of Northumbria in England, and the first, wooden, monastery was built there by monks from Iona (in Scotland) under St Aidan in 635AD. St Cuthbert was the Bishop of Lindisfarne from 685AD until he died in 687AD, but he seems to have been ubiquitous to the area for a couple of decades before that. Bede wrote a ‘Life of St Cuthbert’ in the early years of the eighth century and that’s where the otters come in.

“…[St Cuthbert] went down to the sea, which flows beneath, and going into it, until the water reached his neck and arms, spent the night in praising God. When the dawn of day approached, he came out of the water, and, falling on his knees, began to pray again. Whilst he was doing this, two quadrupeds, called otters, came up from the sea, and, lying down before him on the sand, breathed upon his feet, and wiped them with their hair after which, having received his blessing, they returned to their native element.”

It all sounds extremely unlikely, as Lin comments in Surfacing Again…however, it also sounds extremely charming and I couldn’t not use it.

The UK’s species of otter is Lutra Lutra, the Eurasian otter. We don’t have sea-otters, we just have some colonies of otters that like to hang out by the sea. They’re part of the mustelid family, which also includes stoats, weasels, polecats, ferrets and mink…they’re essentially enormous aquatic weasels.

They live in family groups and stay with their parents until they’re fourteen or fifteen months old. Population is gradually increasing again in the UK where they have been very sparse in the last few decades due to river pollution. You can read more about them and their habitats at the UK Wild Otter Trust and there’s a bit more about Coastal Otters in Scotland on the Forestry and Land Scotland website.

Here are some Asiatic Short-Clawed otters from New Zealand, making their characteristic chirping noise:

Surfacing Again: A short contemporary lesbian romance

Melinda is staying on Lindisfarne for a Christmas break with her old friend when an unexpected argument leaves her alone for the holiday.

Will her tentative relationship with Rowan survive the end of her holiday and the turning of the year?

A short sapphic Christmas story. With otters.

BUY SURFACING AGAIN

And finally, you may have realised my title is taken from the Seamus Heaney poem The Otter.