Beauty

Thanks again to Gabi for her editing and support.

Beauty can be a curse. Curses can be a lesson. Sometimes the mask people show us is a mirror to show us how we see them.

Cautions for death and violence, because this is a fairy tale.

Beauty

Once there was a handsome prince. You wouldn’t find his kingdom on any map, his father was a captain of industry whose factories dominated in a hundred countries. Stefan was the heir apparent to all the vast wealth and power his father had amassed through the years. When his father died, Stefan shed few tears, his father had always been too busy running his kingdom to spend time with Stefan.

Stefan knew his limitations; he got bored easily, he was too young and no one would take him seriously as a businessman. So, he signed over the running of his assets to his father’s most trusted advisors and ensured that he was set up with lines of credit that were better than money and taxed at a much lower rate. For the first year of this new phase of existence, he was relatively circumspect; he bought a large house in the country and recruited a cook, a butler and a maid, but he did not throw extravagant parties or squander his wealth in ridiculous ways.

At the end of the first year, he reviewed his assets and found that the amount of new capital he had accrued exceeded his outgoings by two orders of magnitude. He began to understand that his wealth could not be spent in his lifetime, so he set out to ensure that he had the best time imaginable. He was not really sociable, he despised people. He bedded dozens of women, sometimes several in one night, including ‘celebrities’ who were more forgettable than the ‘exotic dancers’ his advisors found for him. He set up a movie production company just to lure young actresses to him and he delighted in tarnishing their dreams. He tried all the many drugs and stimulants available to him, but he found them all boring and tedious, too much trouble for the limited pleasure that they afforded him.

His chief delight came from manipulating the young and vulnerable. Giving them what they asked for but at a dreadful cost. He would use his lawyers to craft contracts with draconian clauses that were just, barely, still legal. He would extract promises and favours from hopeful men and women and record the details so that they could be used to coerce future compliance.

In short, he became a corrupter and defiler of a generation of young hopeful actors and performers, both men and women.

But, what makes our story something more than the normal humdrum tale of LA excess is that Stefan’s mother, Helana, had links to the Fairy world. She wasn’t a fairy herself, but her cousin's mother had slept with a fairy and so, when Stefan had been christened, shortly before Helana had died, she had asked her distant relative Daphne to be a godmother.

Daphne didn’t really understand what Christianity was about, but over the course of Stefan’s life she had read about godmothers and gained an understanding of what was expected of her. So, on his 25th birthday she came to visit Stefan, in disguise, to find out how her blessing had affected his life.

She was pleasantly surprised when she arrived at his house without an invitation and was shown in to a party in full swing.

She was not as appalled by the lewd behaviour of some of the guests as she might have been, fairy’s have very broad minds when it comes to such things, the prospect of a fairy lifespan unleavened by a little spice of naughtiness would be very tedious. But Daphne drew the line at cruelty and bullying, and she rapidly realised that Stefan hadn’t just crossed a line he had invented new lines just to destroy those too.

She slipped unseen through the party, sampling a glass of wine here and snaffling a vol-au-vent there as she assessed the situation. After a while she came to stand in front of Stefan.

“Who let this ugly hag in here!?” Stefan demanded.

“Stefan, I am your fairy godmother!” Daphne announced “I gave you the gift of wealth, but I am horrified to see how you have chosen to use it! I am here to teach you a lesson!”

“Hey, Tony!” Stefan shouted over to his security chief “Get this dingbat out of here!”

Daphne snapped her fingers and time stood still for everyone present. Stefan’s eyes went wide.

“What the hell!?” he demanded angrily.

“Let me think…” Daphne mused, “I don’t want to just punish you, I want you to have the chance to learn a lesson and redeem yourself. But, I warn you, the change has to come from you, I don’t have the patience to stick around and educate you…”

Stefan scoffed.

“Hmm, you clearly don’t respect women…” Daphne said “So… I will transform you into a beautiful young woman. You can keep your wealth, it was a gift and I don’t take back anything I give you, but it won’t do you any good! For the main lesson… everyone around you will be transformed to reflect the way you relate to them. Most of your guests…” she looked around the room “will look like furniture to you”, several footstools and console tables appeared and people disappeared. “Many of the women, that you have monstrous intentions for, will become monsters, good luck corrupting them!”, several beautiful women turned into horrific monsters with dripping ichor and tentacles, one young man turned into a horrific werewolf-like creature with an enormous mouth full of huge teeth, “and you…”, she pointed at Tony, who turned into a shark and started thrashing around, desperately trying to get to the swimming pool.

Stefan disappeared in a puff of pink smoke and glitter and a fragile looking ingenue with huge blue eyes and wavy blonde hair appeared. She was wearing a simple blue cocktail dress where the blue was so bright it glowed, which emphasised her eyes. She wobbled in her heels and looked around angrily. Her anger subsided as she realised that there was no one who could come to her rescue and several monsters that looked as though they would cheerfully eat a small woman who made too much noise.

“Oh my god! What have you done?!” Stefan whimpered to Daphne.

“Alright!” Daphne said, looking around with satisfaction, “That looks suitably dark for me! True love’s kiss breaks the spell, of course… good luck! Toodles!”

Daphne waved her hands and disappeared.

Stefan looked around at the monsters.

They looked at her.

The frozen time effect ended and chaos erupted. Various objects fell over, trays crashed to the floor and the creatures started to move.

Stefan fled for the door, the rapid movement of the brightly coloured dress around her body attracted the attention of every moving creature left. They all went for her.

It was only the fact that they got in each other’s way that saved Stefan, she sprinted through the door as the claws of the werewolf closed on the space she had just vacated and snagged on her dress. It shredded like tissue paper and she made it through the door in her black lacy underwear and bright blue rags. All hell let loose behind her as she sprinted for the garage and the various creatures started fighting each other to get through the door. The werewolf made it through first and in a few moments it had caught the girl. A clawed paw smashed through her fleeing back and shredded the flesh, as Stefan choked on the blood from her ruined lungs the wolf’s jaws closed on her neck and ripped her throat out…

-+-+-

Stefan came back to consciousness as if waking from a peaceful sleep. A voice rang in her ears after a moment.

“Ah, ah, ah! You don’t get off that easily, you will always be beautiful, there is no escape!” Daphne’s voice said.

Stefan looked down, there wasn’t a mark on her pale flesh, her fingernails looked freshly painted and she smelled faintly of floral perfume. But her dress hung in tatters and the strap of her bra was slashed through. She was scared and humiliated.

She looked around, the werewolf had gone. In the distance she could see some of her guests were starting to leave the party, they had returned to human form.

Maybe someone had slipped some LSD into her drink? Stefan thought. She made her way warily back to the party. When she got within one-hundred metres of the people, strange things started to happen; several of the waitresses turned into occasional tables. Two of the female guests turned into nightmares from the tales of Cthulhu, with too many eyes and tentacles. They turned towards her and gave chase.

Stefan stood in panicked horror as they quickly crossed the space towards her and they grabbed her with their tentacles and ripped her in two between them…

Stefan awoke a short time later. She could see people leaving the party still and she retreated to a safe distance to let them leave. Her clothes were beyond saving, so she squatted, naked, behind the bins and hugged herself to try and keep warm.

Once the people had dispersed she cautiously made her way into her home. A few occasional tables popped into existence as she made her way into the house.

Stefan saw Tony trying to get out of the pool just before he transformed back into a shark. The shark looked a bit like a cartoon shark, with a smile full of teeth and ridiculously little arms and legs.

“Hey! Beautiful! How about giving me a hand to get out!?” Tony the shark called out.

Stefan was surprised that the shark could talk. She mused that she had always seen Tony as more like a real human being than the monster he pretended to be, so it made sense that he would be a hybrid person/shark, based on the curse that the Fairy had explained to her.

“You won’t try to eat me, will you?” Stefan asked as she came closer.

“Ah! You caught me! I was going to try and eat you!” Tony admitted with a shrug.

“But it’s me, Stefan!” Stefan said, “You wouldn’t eat me, surely!?”

“Stefan? But you are so… bella!” Tony said.

“Ah! It was that stupid Fairy! She put a curse on me!” Stefan said.

“So, I’m only a shark because I’m with you?” Tony asked.

“Yes!” Stefan said.

“OK, fine - I won’t try and eat you then… who can I eat?” Tony said.

“Well, everyone else is turned into furniture or monsters” Stefan admitted.

“What kind of curse is that?” Tony asked.

“The Fairy said that I would see people how I treated them…so, staff turn into furniture, the ones we try to corrupt become monsters…” Stefan said.

“Aiiee, don’t call no lawyers, then!” Tony joked, his growling bubbling laugh was deeply disturbing.

“How could they turn into anything more horrible?” Stefan joked, her laugh was a trill of pure joy.

“So… not to complain… but why are you a naked ragazza, eh?” Tony asked.

“Oh, the girl thing is part of the curse, to teach me a lesson… the naked thing is…” Stefan burst into tears as she recalled being ripped to shreds…

“No! No, no, don’t cry, bella regazza!” Tony called out.

“Oh Tony, the monsters, they KILLED me! It was horrible! And every time, I come back like this, there’s no escaping the curse!” Stefan cried.

“Stefan, mia bella, don’t cry! We will find a way to fix this!” Tony growled.

“I’m not Stefan any more!” Stefan said, bitterly, “I’m just a pretty girl! A what did you call me? ‘Bella’!”

“Bella ragazza” Tony said, as softly as a ten foot long half-human shark could. “Not just a girl, my pretty. An indestructible girl!”

“I still die! I still feel pain! I just can’t ever escape!” Stefan sobbed, “I’m just a pretty, pretty chew toy for monsters!”

“Mia bella” Tony said.

“I’m NOT your Bella!” Stefan said hotly.

“Ha! Well you ain’t my Stefan, either!” Tony said, “Bella is a good name for you, pretty one. You can’t go round looking like that and calling yourself Stefan!”. Tony’s arms shrank as he lost his temper and he became more shark-like. Stefan relented.

“No! Tony! Come back! I’ll be your Bella! Just… don’t leave me all alone!” Bella said “I’ve got no one but the furniture to talk to apart from you! Maybe if I treat you more like a person and less like a killing machine you can get out of the pool and walk around?”

As Bella cried, Tony became more humanoid. Eventually he regained enough of his human shape to be able to climb out of the pool and put a pseudo-arm around Bella.

“Oh, Tony!” Bella sobbed in his arm, ignoring the welts raised on her flesh by the shark skin he was covered in.

After a while Tony said, “Go and put some clothes on now, Bella.”

She went off to the bedroom to find some clothes.

Bella was disturbed to find that the girl that Stefan had left tied to the bed had turned into a lifelike inflatable sex doll. Presumably she had changed back to human while Bella was outside but she had been unable to free herself. As Bella hurried to free her bonds she became more human-like without becoming fully alive, it was horrifying and heart-breaking to see her unable to talk because of her ridiculous round hole of a mouth as she struggled to tell Bella to free her and attempted to help untie the knots with inflated paddle shaped hands. Once she was untied she tried to head for the door, but her inflated legs wouldn’t support her weight properly and she was struggling to walk.

“Who’s there?” a voice called out.

Bella recognised it as Sophie, Stefan’s maid, but she couldn’t see her anywhere. As Bella looked for her, she realised that the wicker clothes basket was talking, the lid opening and closing like a mouth.

“Hang on, Sophie… let me just get this…” Bella watched with horror as the sudden realisation that she couldn’t remember the name of the girl tied to the bed caused her transformation to abruptly become more extreme as she became wholly a comical inflated sex-doll.

“Young lady” Bella continued sadly “dressed and out of the house.” The doll regained some of her natural hair texture as Bella draped a dressing gown around her. Bella grabbed a gown for herself and began to carry the doll downstairs.

“Just a moment, young lady! Where do you think you are going with Master Stefan’s property?” said the wash basket as it hopped along behind them.

“Property!” said Bella “This is a human being! Show a little compassion! How would you like it if…” Bella trailed off, she had been about to say ‘treated you like an object’ but she realised that was exactly what Stefan had been doing, to the girl, to Sophie, to the staff. That was the lesson that the Fairy had been trying to teach him.

She got the doll to the door and left her propped against the wall, just outside. Bella went back to Sophie.

Sophie had obviously changed back into a woman and made her way downstairs as the washing basket was at the bottom of the stairs when Bella went back inside. A lot of the other furniture had moved closer to the door while Bella’s back had been turned.
Bella sighed to herself and turned to Tony.

“Tony, explain to everyone what’s going on, will you? I’m going to hang out in the barn so that people will change back to themselves and they can get their shit and leave…” Bella said.

“Boss, I don’t know wtf is going on!” Tony said.

“Me either,” Bella said, “but they need a chance to get away…”

Bella wrapped the dressing gown around her and shuffled off, dejectedly, to the barn outside. She climbed to the loft space and watched from a distance as all the staff fled. Many of them were carrying things. Bella saw two men carrying a TV. It looked like a cross between a disaster movie, a riot and a looting. She thought about wandering over and having the two men turn back into coffee tables, but either that would make them drop and smash the TV or, knowing her current state of mind, they would turn into vicious dogs and turn on her. Bella really couldn’t face being torn to shreds and killed again today.

Bella rang Tony, not sure if his phone would have survived the multiple transformations. Tony picked up promptly.

“Boss?” he said.

“Who’s there with you?” Bella asked.

“Sophie, Mr Page and Dan” Tony replied. That was the maid, the butler and the cook that Stefan had originally employed a few years ago, before Tony came into his life and things started getting darker.

“OK, Tony - put me on speakerphone, please…” Bella said.

She explained, to them all, what had happened with the fairy godmother, how she had been transformed, how everyone around her had changed, how she had been brutally killed and how she kept coming back.

The four staff members said how this was impossible, how they would back Stefan, now Bella, and how they were sure that a solution could be found.

The five of them talked for a long time, Tony did most of the talking but the others chimed in from time to time. They drew up an action plan:

Bella would become, from necessity, a recluse. She had money and servants to take care of her, but it was easier on her and those around her if most of her interactions were done remotely.
Tony would arrange for Stefan’s funds to be made available to Bella. Tony didn’t know how but he would arrange for the best lawyers and fixers that money could buy and get it done. Stefan’s lawyers were used to dealing with Tony and it shouldn’t be too difficult to do it. Stefan had funds in numbered offshore accounts who did not care who you were if you had the access codes, but that wasn’t going to be necessary, Tony was sure.
Mr Page would arrange for gardeners and contractors, as required, to give Bella notice and space to ensure no issues would arise.
Tony would hunt for a specialist investigator who could advise how to lift the curse. No one knew who the hell would have that kind of knowledge (0800-BUSTAFAE, Dan suggested, it was the first Bella ever realised that the cook had a sense of humour). But, they had the internet, so there was bound to be more than one nutjob that would take their money and, who knows, maybe it would lead to something. It beat sitting around looking for inner enlightenment. Bella was self-aware enough to know that her disdain for staff was deep-rooted and the prospects of anyone falling in love with her were… well, difficult to figure out. Yes, she was beautiful now but… her personality was still the same, she still liked women, she wouldn’t be swooning over some stud any time soon, despite the way she looked. How true could love be if her body was the opposite of true?
Bella would be giving everyone a 20% pay rise and 20 days paid time off in an attempt to treat them like human beings, in the hope that they would retain their arms and legs when she came back in the house. Tony said it as a joke, but Bella ran with the idea. The isolation she had felt, man-handling a sex doll past a talking laundry basket, had made a lasting impression. She would be making a very real effort to be seeing all 4 of them as people first and furniture never.

-0-0-

Bella’s life quickly settled into a new and more boring schedule. She did nothing, saw no one and went nowhere.

It was boring, but safe. She had all the material comforts but company. She was bored, lonely and occasionally, grouchy. During her first period she was exceptionally grouchy, even allowing for the sudden hormone changes.

She took to playing online video games, as an outlet for some way to have social interaction. She learned not to put ‘Bella’ or any other girls name in her profile or user name as the constant influx of ‘dick pics’ and death threats was off-putting. Even talking on the headset got her grief. She tried to pretend she was an 8-year-old boy as it got her more respect and less creepy creepy comments from other gamers.

Even other ‘girl gamers’ seemed to despise her.

But it was still better than talking with a laundry basket.

Mr Page appeared as a robot, and it didn’t seem to make any difference to the calm efficiency with which he organised Bella’s life around her. Dan waddled around the kitchen like a small old-fashioned cooker with legs. He couldn’t actually cook anything in himself unless he was plugged in, which thankfully Bella never actually saw him do. She wasn’t sure how a humanoid cooker actually worked without electrocuting himself and she was freaked out by the thought of which bit of him transformed into the power lead.

After the first few months, Tony had worked his way through three different investigators, who had taken Bella’s money but not come up with anything useful.

-0-0-

Bella was playing one of her favourite MMO games when there was a commotion downstairs. She put the controller down and went to investigate. Tony, in his shark form, was trying to distract a monster that was trying to get to the stairs. Tony saw Bella on the landing and yelled out “No! Bella! RUN!”

The monster looked up and saw Bella and ran towards her. Tony tried to head her off and got swatted to one side.
Bella cried out “Tony!” and ran to help him.

The monster tore through her like a chainsaw through a burger.

Bella’s final thought as her head skidded to a halt at the other end of the room from her eviscerated torso was “OUCH!”

-+-+-

When Bella woke again there was a clatter as Sophie dropped the mop she had been using as she popped back into being a laundry basket with arms.

Tony came lumbering up and said “Boss? Are you ok? That was quite a hit you took. Thanks for distracting her from me, but… that looked like it really hurt!”

Bella chuckled ruefully.

“Yeah, having your head ripped off is not exactly relaxing, but I can bounce back from it, I’m not sure you guys can,” she said.

“Do you want to see it again?” Tony asked.

“You’re kidding! You have that on camera? Eww!” said Bella.

“Yeah, I beefed up the security, there’s cameras all over the house just in case more freaky shit happens. You might want to see this, see what happens after she kills you…” Tony said.

“She? That tower of teeth and fur was a she?” Bella said in disbelief.

“Yeah, and you know her…” Tony said.

Bella followed Tony to his office where he had a video cued and ready to play.

The video showed a young woman knock on the door and get let in by Sophie. Bella gasped as she recognised one of the actresses with a contract with her production company. Tony came and told her to leave. The woman refused and started moving to the back of the house, Tony moved after her to stop her but the two of them started to transform as they moved closer to where Bella was upstairs. Bella winced as she saw herself torn apart, but she had to admit it looked very brave, and not a little stupid, for a small woman to not back down from something that looked like an evil were-bear. The monster took a mouthful from the bloody corpse and then started vomiting as it transformed back into a blood-soaked woman. The woman kept vomiting until she was on the floor sobbing and dry heaving. Then she screamed and ran from the house, screaming as she went.

“What the hell?” Bella said.

“She dropped this…” Tony said and handed over a brown envelope. Bella tore it open, it had a plain white card, on the card was written in simple calligraphy ‘Surprise!’.

“I chased after her after you… you know… She was having hysterics, she had no idea what was going to happen. Someone had paid her a thousand Euros to hand-deliver that envelope to you and she was instructed not to take ‘No!’ for an answer!” Tony said.

“That’s horrible!” Bella cried “Who would do such a thing?”

Tony shrugged; “Maybe your little fairy friend thought you needed another lesson?” he said.

-+-+-

Things went back to normal for a few days, then the visitors started to come. There were three more that first week. They were all oblivious to what would happen when they got near Bella. They had all been given instructions on how to circumvent Tony’s measures to keep them out. One got in through the garden gate while Bella was in the pool in a bikini. Bella awoke naked in a heap in the bushes nearby, the pool was a deep red colour.
One was waiting in the bushes as Bella cycled around the house’s gardens for exercise. Tony’s video of that attack showed the monster bursting into existence as soon as Bella got close.

“You have cameras in the grounds around the house, as well?” Bella asked, surprised at Tony’s thoroughness.

“I don’t have full coverage, but cameras are cheap and freaky shit is happening,” Tony told her

The last one crept into Bella's room at night while she was asleep. The ghastly rattle of chitinous claws on the tiles were the first alert she had before a foot long black stinger on the tail of an eight foot long scorpion based monster disembowelled her.

Bella was horrified to find that Tony had infra-red cameras in her bedroom.

“Have you been spying on me!” she asked Tony.

Tony looked a little shifty as he replied “No boss! I only review the tapes if there is an incident!”

“I think that you better give me a map of just exactly where all these cameras are!” Bella said fiercely.

Tony meekly handed over a map and Bella studied, then she spent the rest of the day checking that the map and the cameras she could see matched up.

That evening, she called Tony up to ask him if there was any way that she could tell whether the camera was active in her bedroom.

“No boss, it all just goes to tape. It’s not like I’m going to watch you get ready for bed or anything!” Tony assured her.

When Tony left her room, Bella quickly stuffed pillows in the bed and followed him downstairs, avoiding him and the cameras that she knew about. She waited outside his office door, tucked out of sight behind a cupboard until she heard a low moan coming from the office. She crept closer to the door and peered through the keyhole. The bastard was pleasuring himself while watching videos of Bella being torn to shreds!

“You bastard!” she screamed at him “You bloodthirsty monster!”

As she screamed he became less human-like and more shark-like. Bella went to punch him on the nose and found that she was dealing with a ten foot long great white shark. Tony was thrashing around desperately now. Bella wasn’t sure if he was trying to eat her or just keen to get back to the pool. She watched him from a distance, unwilling to let the murderous fish out of her sight. After a while, the shark stopped thrashing and lay there, still. Bella was numb and kept watching the dead shark until she fell into an exhausted sleep.

-+-+-

The next day Bella asked Mr Page to arrange for the police to come and retrieve Tony's body. None of them were to touch anything. Bella would stay in the barn while the police investigated and no one would mention her. The story would be that Stefan was on an extended trip and there were just the four people living there. They assumed that there would be an autopsy, Tony was dead with no obvious cause, but they agreed that it was unlikely anyone would figure out what really happened.

Which led to Mr Page asking what did really happen. Bella tried to explain as best she could. She was so upset by the whole thing, especially the betrayal. Mr Page and Dan did not shed any tears for Tony. They knew he was a brutal man. Sophie cried so hard she got all the washing inside herself damp. Mr Page, despite his appearance as a robot, was worried about how this was affecting Bella. He suggested that she see a therapist or a psychiatrist.

"The moment I start talking about what is the real cause of my problems they will want to lock me up and throw away the key!" Bella said.

"Not if they visit you here and experience the transformation for themselves!" Mr Page argued.

"What if they turn into something horrible and kill me?" Bella asked.

Mr Page hesitated.

"The only people, other than Tony, who became monsters were people you and Tony treated monstrously," he said. "Why would you intend to behave that way to someone who was trying to help you?"

"Well, everyone else turns into inanimate objects!" Bella objected "How is talking to a pot-plant going to help me?!"

"Some conversations I've had with pot-plants have been more productive than this conversation we are having now!" Mr Page quipped.

“Alright!” Bella sighed in defeat.

-+-+-

Mr Page made the arrangements, via a legal company that Stefan had on retainer. Tony’s disappearance had left Bella’s legal status up in the air, somewhat, as he had been dealing with the necessary paperwork to give Bella access to Stefan’s assets. Tony had been trying to get Bella recognised as his ward and Stefan’s heir. Bella shivered when she realised how close she had become to being Tony’s golden goose, tortured for his jollies and kept under his control while she appeared to be under-aged. The lawyer that Mr Page found found a number of anomalies in the paperwork and was happy to switch Bella to be in control of the assets, even without Stefan being declared dead, as she was merely added to the beneficiaries of Stefan’s trust. Stefan hadn’t dealt with ‘real’ money in the way that normal people thought of it for years. Everything he had was borrowed from a bank or financial institute against promises on the funds of his trust. Bella sort of understood it as she was the one who set it up, but it was following the advice of some financial wizards who were a lot smarter about such things than she was.

Mr Page found a psychiatrist and the legal company drafted a contract that would leave her destitute if she ever spoke to another soul about events at the house. Then they arranged for her to visit for an extended period of ‘not less than 2 months’.

Bella had been building an image of the psychiatrist as some sort of inquisitor or confession-demanding devil. Not consciously, but she was terrified of what she would have to reveal and how she would be judged.

When the psychiatrist arrived and was taken to meet her patient Bella saw that she had turned into a goat-headed creature in a judge’s robes with red skin, cloven hooves with stocky furry legs and bat wings. The creature was very obviously male and the sudden change was causing the psychiatrist some problems.

“What is the meaning of this?!” the creature roared “Oh my!…Was that… me? I don’t know what came over… Oh SHIT! Is this real?”

The creature noticed Mr Page had turned into a robot.

“I’m terribly sorry,” he explained “I couldn’t think of any way to adequately prepare you other than letting you experience the transformation for yourself.”

“Why are you a relatively benign robot and I am this HORRIBLE creature?” the psychiatrist wailed.

“That is partly due to the nature of the curse and partly due to the psychiatry of your patient” Mr Page explained.

“Are you, my patient?” the creature asked.

“No, Bella, may I introduce Dr Jones, the therapist” Mr Page said.

Bella stepped forward nervously, the creature was very intimidating, and held out a hand.

“Dr. Jones, I am so sorry for the inconvenience. I’ve been struggling to deal with this problem…” Bella said.

“INCONVENIENCE?!” Dr Jones roared “Do you have ANY idea…”

Dr Jones stopped when she saw the young woman cowering in front of her. Her demeanour softened.

“Well… “ she said, “I suppose that explains the nature of the job more and why it pays so well…”

“The changes are temporary,” Bella assured the doctor, “and you don’t need to worry if you have an urge to kill me, I just come back again.”

“What the hell? Kill you? I have no desire to KILL you,” Dr Jones roared.

“Oh” she said in a softer voice, “Yes, I see… You… You’ve been killed by other doctors?”

“Oh no! You are the first therapist I’ve seen. I’ve been trying to live as a recluse. Some old… associates came and they turned into monsters and killed me…” Bella said.

“Is there somewhere we can go to talk?” Dr Jones said.

“Oh, don’t mind me, I’m just part of the furniture…” Mr Page said.

“Just like me!” Sophie said. She had been keeping quiet up until this point.

“Oh, my word! A talking laundry basket” Dr Jones said.

“Ah, that’s Sophie, my maid.” Bella explained, “She has developed an odd sense of humour to cope with all this!”

“I am a bit of a pushover” Sophie said, “I should be thankful Bella doesn’t see me as a doormat!”

“So… all of this transformation comes from your imagination?” Dr Jones asked.

“Not consciously!” Bella said, “I never think of my Starlets as monsters or my staff as furniture, that crazy Fairy bitch twisted everything as some kind of sick joke!”

“Fairy?” Dr Jones asked.

Bella recounted the entire story, Sophie and Mr Page chipped in with their point of view. Sophie was nearly hysterical when she described how horrible it was when Bella was killed in front of her the first time. Bella was quite moved by how much empathy the laundry basket showed. Suddenly a pair of shapely legs popped out between the feet and the base of the basket.

“Oh!” Sophie cried, “I have legs!”

Bella giggled and a dress appeared over the basket.

“Does this sort of thing happen a lot?” Dr Jones asked.

“It comes and goes,” Mr Page said.

“It’s a very visual training method that the Fairy implemented” Dr Jones said.

“Tony was the one that Bella saw as the most human” Sophie said.

“What happened to Tony?” Dr Jones asked.

“I saw him for the killer he was!” Bella said softly as she started to weep.

Mr Page explained, “Bella found that Tony was arranging for her to be brutally killed purely for his amusement, he went from being a shark-like human to a great white shark in his office. Sharks don’t live long out of water!”

“The Fairy changed him into a shark first, but he was near a swimming pool. He became more human-like when I came back. I’ve relied, or I did rely, on Tony to ‘fix’ things for me…” Bella said.

“Tony was your confidant and pied piper” Sophie said, with a little bitterness in her voice “Stefan used to be a sweet enough guy, if a bit spoiled, before Tony came along. Tony turned Stefan’s fooling around with people into something darker!”

“Fooling around?” Dr Jones asked.

As she asked, a pair of horns popped out of her forehead and her hooves started glowing red.

“Er…” Bella said, noticing the changes but not knowing what to make of them. “Tony and I… we would give people opportunities… in films and the like… But, here’s the thing… Tony convinced me that we needed ‘leverage’ to make sure that they kept doing what we needed them for… I know, it sounds bad….”

“It sounds like blackmail and coercion. Maybe you should be the one that looks like a monster!” Dr Jones said hotly.

“Trust me, the fairy knew what she was doing when she did things this way round. There’s no way I’m going to influence anyone, looking like this! And now, when any of these people are near me… they turn into horror film creatures and rip me to shreds. The fairy thought death was too good for me, so I get to be the never-ending chew-toy of any number of monsters!” Bella said, tears coming to her eyes.

“Are there any starlets that you didn’t screw over?” Dr Jones asked.

“It wasn’t just the actresses,” Sophie interjected, “it was cute boys, too!”

Bella hung her head in shame.

“The first actress for my production company, before Tony arrived, she’s called Janet Weiss. I got her the first big break she had and I’ve never done anything other than look out for her. Mostly because she was a big moneymaker for my company” Bella said.

“Could we try and meet her, under controlled circumstances?” Dr Jones asked.

-+-+-

The meeting went better than expected. Dr Jones stayed out of sight. Janet Weiss shimmered when she got within range of Bella’s curse, she became more beautiful and kind of larger than life. Bella was clearly star-struck, she stammered and struggled to find the right thing to say. Bella explained that Stefan and Tony were gone and that she now ran the production company.

Janet was clearly disappointed but she also seemed a little relieved. Bella asked her what she felt about the changes.

“To be honest,” Janet said “I am a little relieved that Tony is out of the picture. He always gave me the creeps!”

“Oh, me too!” Bella agreed wholeheartedly “He had the eyes of a serial killer!”

“I wouldn’t go that far!” Janet said with a wry chuckle “But he did give off a creepy vibe.”

Bella leaned in and whispered “I caught him watching ‘snuff’ porn, shortly before he died…”

“Oh my god!” Janet said, clearly shocked “Tony is dead?”

“Oh, yes…sorry, I thought you knew?” Bella said.

“Well, you said that you were taking over but… How did he die?” Janet asked.

“We’re not sure, he was found dead in his office without a mark on him…” Bella said. She was uncomfortable talking about Tony’s death, especially as she was so star-struck with Janet. She almost felt like she should be worshipping her.

“Oh, I see,” Janet said, “and Stefan?...”

“Oh! No, Stefan is still alive, he’s travelling. I’m not sure where he is at the moment, you know Stefan!” Bella said.

“Not as well as I would have liked…” Janet said with an enigmatic smile.

“Oh” Bella said as realisation dawned “Oh! You mean… you, with him?!”

“Sadly not…” Janet said.

“Ha ha!” Bella laughed “I know he never would have seen that coming, he always thought that you were too good for him!”

“Really? I was never convinced that he would be interested in me, at least, not the way I was interested in him…” Janet said.

“Yes, it’s probably for the best that neither of you became…” Bella searched for the right word, “entangled.”

Bella paused for a moment and then went on “To tell the truth, Stefan has had some personal issues, he has treated many of the stars that worked with the production company in appalling ways. I think much of the initial influence came from Tony. I don’t know how much of it was Stefan. I have a lot of work to sort out the mess he left things in… That was why I wanted to meet you, Janet. You are the first and last time he treated one of his stars right, I think. I want to make sure that we treat all our stars as well as we treated you. Stefan isn’t around to clear up his mess, it seems to have fallen to me. Do you have any pointers?”

“Hmm. Don’t treat people as if they are fools. Don’t try to take advantage of them. Don’t expect something for nothing and don’t try to coerce vulnerable people!” Janet said.

“I don’t, I haven’t and I will not” Bella said, feeling as if she had just received a telling off. As Bella, she didn’t feel she deserved it, as Stefan, she knew she deserved that and much more. Her cheeks burned with shame and hurt pride.

“I don’t know how a pretty young thing like you got control of a production company from two powerful men, but I can’t imagine it was your experience and business acumen!” Janet said.

“No, it was luck and connections, I guess. I just happened to be here at a time when the company needed someone to make decisions and fix the mess that Stefan and Tony left behind!” Bella said. She was aware that, as of yet, she hadn’t exactly fixed any problems and her ‘chat’ with Janet seemed to have gone off the script. At least Janet wasn’t trying to eat her!
But, she was trying, dammit!

“So, you will just give me whatever I ask for because you require my good will?” Janet said.

“Did I say that?” Bella turned to look to her entourage, and then remembered that she didn’t have any, for the obvious reasons, “I’m pretty sure I didn’t say that. I would have cheerfully risked being eaten by sharks and monsters rather than being subject to Tony’s bullshit, so I have no intention of rolling over like a puppy for the chance of a good word from you. But… in the interests of learning from my predecessors’ mistakes, I don’t want anything other than mutual respect between us” Bella said.

“Oh, I like you!” Janet said “You, my dear, are a breath of fresh air in our industry. Get some projects together and let me look them over and we’ll see what we can do. I think we can give some of your stable the opportunities that they’ve needed for too long, this could be really good!”

-+-+-

The two of them had chatted on for hours until Janet had noticed the time and excused herself. Bella had never realised, when she was Stefan, how much power and influence he had had for good and ill with the production company. She wasn’t even sure who had been managing the day-to-day running while she was out of action. She would ask Mr Page what he knew of the production company.

Bella called Dr Jones and explained what had happened and what her plans were for the future. Bella was bubbling with excitement and filled with hope for what was to come.

“Ms Weiss didn’t eat you?” Dr Jones asked.

“No, it was the strangest thing, she was just like herself only more so,” Bella tried to explain. “I’ve always put her on a pedestal, admired her from afar. I think my curse just turned her into the goddess I’ve always perceived her to be.”

“Better than the devil, I suppose” Dr Jones said ruefully.

“I’m… well, I’m truly sorry about that. I know how disorientating such a transformation can be, that affects the core of who you are and how people perceive you. I hope you realise that it’s not anything to do with my feelings for you personally. It’s a combination of the curse and my subconscious feelings about the role that you fulfil in my life.” Bella said.

“As a torturer?” Dr Jones asked.

“As someone to hold me to account for my sins,” Bella said in a small voice “which are many.”

“Bella,” Dr Jones said “I don’t think that you are that person anymore. All I see is a beautiful young woman who is trying to take on responsibility for the things that have been done by others. Since I have known you, you have never treated people in the way that you are being punished for. I think it’s important that you humanise the people around you, and yourself, as much as possible. So… I would like you to call me Helen, please.”

“Thank you… Helen” Bella said “But I have all the memories and I carry all the responsibility for the things that Stefan said and did. I’m sure Tony made things worse and we will have a journey trying to find where that rabbit hole takes us but I was Stefan and Stefan was an asshole. I’m trying to make the inside match the pretty outside you and others see now.”

-+-+-

Over the months that followed, Helen and Bella saw more of each other and Helen became more and more involved in Bella’s life.

Bella listened to Helen and got to know Mr Page as ‘Ben’. She kept pictures of Sophie, Ben, Dan and Helen in their human guises on her desk as she worked. She noticed that the curse seemed to be lifting in bits and pieces; as Bella became a nicer person the people around her became more human. Maybe, she wouldn’t need some mythical true love’s kiss? Maybe the secret lay in her own heart?

It was still risky meeting new people in the flesh, so much of her business was done via Google Hangouts or on the phone. Helen found that she was acting as Bella’s proxy more and more. She was happy to spend the time on Bella’s projects, thanks to Bella’s generosity she no longer had to worry about money. But, more than that, Bella’s enthusiasm for the new projects she envisaged was infectious and Helen found herself carried along.

Bella had worked with Janet and a trio of writers that Janet had recommended to draft out a fantasy universe of epic scope; starting before the dawn of history with ancient alien elves helping men survive against the ice age and an ancient adversary, culminating in a peaceful galaxy of co-operating civilizations setting out on a grand adventure to explore new galaxies and new universes through the past, present and future. The first story to be filmed and to set the corner-stone of this universe that everything else would hang on would be set in the present day, starring Janet and would show the events triggered when a long-buried artefact from the age of heroes is uncovered and begins changing our hero to prepare her for the struggles to come.

-+-+-

Bella and Janet were thrashing out what these troubles would be, and Helen was joining in as referee. The conversation had to be via a conference call, despite the fact that Helen was only in the office in the barn complex that Bella had had built for her. It would be difficult to explain to Janet what was going on as Helen transformed into a devil. Even though the devil was no longer masculine. As Bella had got to know Helen and spent more time talking to her and seeing her online she could no longer picture her as a man. Helen now transformed into a succubus with disturbingly sharp teeth in her inviting smile.

Bella was finding it increasingly hard to keep her intentions to Helen pure, despite the risks of the curse turning Helen into a literal man-eater, well, young woman eater, anyway.
Only the fact that both Helen and Bella had mutual respect for one another kept their relationship from triggering the worst aspects of the curse.

When the call had ended and Janet had dropped the line, Helen asked Bella if she would like to go for a swim.

“Sure!” said Bella “I’ll meet you out there. I’ll see if Sophie wants to come too.”

Bella went looking for Sophie and found her downstairs. She didn’t want to come because it would make her wicker soggy.

Bella was dejected that she couldn't figure out a way to return Sophie to normal. She met Ben on the way to meet Helen at the pool and she asked him if the private detective ever found anything.

"You know, I haven't heard from him in a while. I'll follow up and see… What would you like to do if he doesn't have any information?" Ben asked.

"Let him keep looking. It's not as though I can't afford it. Who knows, maybe he will find a clue. The fairy said 'True Love's kiss' but who knows what qualifies for 'True Love'. I hope it doesn't mean I have to offer myself to a peer of the realm or other such anachronistic foolishness. And I also won't be kissing any frogs!" Bella said firmly.

Bella made her way to the pool and met Helen. The two women splashed around in the pool together then lay in the sun on the loungers near the pool.

They chatted about the film script, plans for the rest of the summer and the fact that the curse had turned Helen’s one piece lycra swimsuit into a black leather studded bikini of scandalous proportions.

As they were chatting there was a commotion from the other side of the fence.

"Where are you, Stefan! You miserable pile of festering excrement! We had a deal, you bitch!" a woman's voice was yelling.

"Oh shit!" Bella said as the colour drained from her face "It's Bianca!"

"Another one of your starlets?" Helen asked.

"Oh yes, she's got more cause than most to be upset with Stefan!" Bella said. Bella found it easier to speak of Stefan in the third person now as his life had so little to do with her life.

"What can she do? She's on the other side of a secure barrier?" Helen said

"Oh shit, you had to go and say it…" Bella said "It's a curse for heaven's sake, and it thrives on irony! Quick, you run to the barn and I'll go to the house. If she 'Hulks Out' I'll throw myself on her claws, that way she won't hurt any of you."

"I don't want to leave you…" Helen said.

"Trust me." Bella interrupted her "We will both be safer once she has mauled me and gone. I've done this before."

Helen nodded reluctantly and hurried to gather her things and head to the barn.

At that moment there was a sudden shrill scream that dropped three octaves and became a roar. Something massive smashed into the boundary wall. Helen yelped in surprise and fear. She started to head for the barn but the monster that had been Bianca smashed through the wall faster than anyone could have expected. She looked like a mini Godzilla or a very large velociraptor. She saw Bella and started moving towards her. Helen’s natural instinct, despite their conversation of moments before, was to protect the smaller woman. She stopped running away and started to head back towards Bella.

"Helen! NO!" Bella shouted, waving her arms to attract Bianca.

The monster saw Helen start to challenge her and moved to intercept her. Helen realised her mistake and tried to evade the monster but fleeing only raised a predator's instinct in the creature, it pounced on the red-skinned woman and prepared to disembowel her with a clawed paw. Bella screamed as if she was damned and launched herself between the claws and Helen. The claws got stuck in her body and the monster shook a limb to free the paw. Bella sailed through the loungers they had been sitting on moments before with a clatter, her broken body sprawled in a grotesque parody of how she and Helen had been relaxing minutes ago.

Helen whimpered to see the ferocity with which Bella had been flung. The noise alerted the monster and it turned to look at her.

Bella hung on to consciousness by a miracle and realised the peril Helen was in. She couldn't force her broken body to move so she screamed with all the might and desperation she could summon.

The monster turned to her, casually walked over and began gnawing on her.

Eventually the screams stopped.

The monster shook itself and began to shrink. It vomited several large bloody chunks and then fled, turning into a green-faced and terrified young woman as Bianca fled the scene.

Helen couldn't figure out quite what happened, but shortly after, Bella ran across to her. She didn't have a mark on her body. This was particularly apparent as she was naked. The bikini she had been wearing hadn't survived the attack and Bella didn't pause to find an alternative covering before running to check on Helen.

"Oh my God! Oh my God!" Bella wailed with tears in her eyes "Please be alright!"

Helen chuckled ruefully.

"I'll have bruises tomorrow" she croaked.

Bella sobbed as she cradled Helen in her arms.

Helen hugged her back and kissed her. She had intended only to kiss her cheek, but Bella moved as she leaned in and they kissed each other on the mouth.

They each froze, aware that a line had been crossed.

Helen smiled at Bella, her canines showing. Bella smiled at Helen and they set to kissing each other passionately.

A short while later they both came up for air.

"Huh!" Bella said in surprise " Your skin isn't Red anymore!"

"No one's perfect" Helen said as she reached to pull Bella close again.

A few minutes later Sophie came out in a bathing costume.

"The curse is gone!" she said cheerfully "So I thought I'd swim for a… "

"Oh!" Sophie said as she saw a naked Bella snogging the face off Helen.

"Maybe I should just… give you a bit of privacy? Yes? That would probably be best…" Sophie said as she headed back to the house.

Bella and Helen never noticed.