Teenage Banshee

Sinead slammed the front door and ran upstairs to her bedroom. Her mother raised her eyes as the bedroom door slammed too.In her room, Sinead sat on the bed, rocking herself slowly backwards and forwards. Her long dark hair hung over her face. The dark eye makeup was smudged from the flow of tears she had been wiping hurriedly away on the run home.Her mother tentatively knocked on the door.“Go away!”She listened until she heard the footsteps disappear back down the stairs. She stood up and looked in the mirror. Her eyes stared back at her, dark and piercing like two sunken dark holes in her pale skin.‘How the fuck could this have happened again?’ Monday morning, as she walked into school, she could hear the whispers. It wasn’t surprising, she reflected. I mean, how many seventeen or eighteen-year-old boys drop dead just like that? She stood at her locker, slowly unloading her bag. She glanced up, seeing the girls looking at her, pretending not to, ducking behind their locker doors or sneaking shy glances at her.She closed her locker door and trudged off to the art rooms. She felt she was becoming a social pariah already. The rumour mill was working overtime. She almost laughed as two younger pupils saw her and ran into each other in their attempt to get out of her way.The art room was almost deserted. Her fellow goth, Deirdre, was busy sketching a rabbit skull but looked up and smiled supportively as Sinead slid onto the stool beside her.“Are you OK?” she whispered, almost apologetically. “I’ve been hearing some crazy stories all morning.”Sinead shook her head slowly. “No,” she croaked, scared to say any more in case she broke down.Deirdre reached over and stroked her hand. “Shall we do a runner, find somewhere quiet and you can talk about it?”Sinead nodded and the two girls picked up their bags and slipped away.They sat on the stone cairn overlooking the town. The ruins of the ancestral home of the O’Donnells were visible on the hill opposite. Deirdre pulled a packet of Marlboro lights from her bag and together they inhaled the acrid cigarette smoke and lay back on the rocks, letting the sun warm their faces. There was definitely something to be bonus veren siteler said for bunking a day off school.It was only after the cigarette butts had been discarded, flicked into the damp grass that Deirdre broached the subject again.“So, is it true… about, you know, about Sean?”Sinead nodded. “Yep, it’s true. I killed him.”“Don’t talk daft. I heard it was a heart attack or drugs or something.”“Yeah, cos people our age drop dead of heart attacks or whatever all the time.”“Did you know he was ill?”“No, he wasn’t sick. Everything was fine.”Sinead felt herself going red as she recounted the events of Saturday night.  “We’d gone to the cinema, then, as he was walking me home. We’d slipped behind the old bakery and well, one thing led to another. He’d my knickers off and I was up against the wall. My legs were wrapped around his waist. He was pounding me for all I was worth and fuck it was good. I arched my back, threw my head back and screamed as I orgasmed. The next thing I know, he is lying there, dead.”Deirdre stared at her, open-mouthed. “And then?”“And then, I panicked. I pulled my knickers back up and phoned for an ambulance. They were asking about drugs and all sorts.”Deirdre wrapped her arms around her friend and held her tight.“Sean never took drugs, and neither do I.” She wiped her eyes with the back of her sleeve. “Not that anyone believes me.”Deirdre didn’t know what to say. She had heard the rumours. The town was full of them. The rumour mill had lurched into action almost as soon as the sirens rang out and the blue flashing lights were seen.“I wish I’d thought to zip him up before the ambulance crew got there. Everyone knows now that we were having sex.”She paused, staring into the far distance.“They’re calling me the Black Widow, aren’t they?”Deirdre laughed. “Yeah, I’m afraid so. I think that’s quite cool actually.”Sinead smiled the faintest hint of a lip curl and lit another cigarette.“I’m never going to get another boyfriend.”She blew a long plume of smoke out of her lungs before continuing.“Once might be seen as a tragic accident, but I’m afraid having two men drop down dead in front of you is more bedava bahis than just coincidence.”Deirdre sat up. “What? You never told me that before?”Sinead thought back to last summer. She was back staying with her Granny for a few weeks. She’d met one of the farm hands helping out with the hay making. He was tanned and broad shouldered, what comes from spending all day throwing hay bales onto the trailer, Sinead thought.Well she’d managed to accidentally bump into him after hanging round the hay byre all afternoon and she’d ended up having a roll in the hay. He was the first man who had fucked her properly. The couple of times before that had been disappointing. She’d lost her virginity to a boy who’d cum almost as soon as he’d pushed it inside her. All she could remember of that was the pain and hurt and embarrassment. The second time hadn’t been much better. It was less painful but almost as short lived. This time in the hay was different. “But anyway,” Sinead concluded. “The same thing happened as with Sean. I remember screaming as I orgasmed and the next thing I remember is him lying dead.”Deirdre stared at her, the cigarette smouldering in her hand as she listened, unable to move.“I ran back to the farmhouse and told my Granny. She just told me these things happen and not to worry. The next day I heard everyone saying that he had died of a heart attack.”Deirdre couldn’t think of anything to say so took her time savouring the cigarette smoke and slowly blowing it out as she looked out over the town below.“That’s seriously mental,” she finally decided was the most appropriate line she could come up with.Sinead snorted. “Yeah, it is.” She looked around at the darkening sky and decided it was time to go home.As soon as Sinead opened the front door, she could sense immediately that there was a weird atmosphere in the house. She stuck her head into the living room and saw her mum and her Auntie Mary deep in conversation on the sofa. They both looked up to greet her. Auntie Mary looked pleased to see her but her mum had a strained expression on her face.“I hear you had a bit of a shock over the weekend, Sinead.”Her aunt stepped deneme bonus closer and ran her fingers through Sinead’s dyed black hair. She guided Sinead to sit down on the sofa between her and her mum. The two older women held Sinead’s hands and her aunt smiled reassuringly at her. Sinead looked from one to the other, confused by what was going on and a little scared. She laughed nervously.“We need to tell you a wee bit of family history, Sinead.” Her aunt had a far away look in her eyes. Sinead sat dumbfounded as the story unfolded. She felt herself starting to tune out while her aunt wittered on about faery stock and family tradition. How there was one in every generation who had the gift. For a moment, Sinead thought she was talking about Buffy the Vampire Slayer until, suddenly Sinead sat bolt upright and shrieked “I’m a what?”‘How the fuck can I be a banshee?’ She thought, but, suddenly, it all made sense. “We are the banshees for the O’Donnell clan.” Her aunt told her. “When one of them is going to die, you will give a haunting mournful cry then a loud wailing scream. It’s not like a normal scream. This one comes from deep inside and when they hear it, the person will die.”“But Sean wasn’t an O’Donnell? ” Sinead questioned, confused.“Well there is one teensy little side effect. While an ordinary scream won’t kill anyone. The scream you get when you orgasm has the same effect.She turned and looked at her mother.“So are you a banshee too?”Her mother nodded, almost imperceptibly. “Why didn’t you tell me or warn me?”Sinead stood up and began to pace the room. She glared at her mother who lowered her eyes. “We didn’t want to tell you in case you weren’t one. If you’d only told us what had really happened last summer. We’d have known then. Your Granny was always one for her secrets. As it was, it was only after we heard that you had screamed at Sean and he dropped down dead that we knew.”“Is Daddy a banshee?”“No, of course not. A man can’t be a banshee.”“So how come Daddy didn’t die when you and him had sex?”“Your father never made me scream,” her mother sneered grudgingly.There didn’t seem to be much to say to that. Sinead looked imploringly at her Aunt who just shrugged.Sinead threw up her arms in desperation.“I need some air.”Grabbing her jacket, she headed off to Deirdre’s house. This would take some explaining.Sinead sat in Deirdre’s room. Posters of Robert Smith and The Cure hung on the walls.