This is a four-part story set in the Transition period between the Old and the New Earth – the time we’re just about to move into.

Viewed from outside, and at a distance, the marriage of Conrad and Claire seemed to be made in Heaven. Or Hollywood, at least. He was a handsome, high-earning, brainy and benevolent man, and she was a lovely, sweet-natured, cheerful and creative home-maker. So far, so good.

But on the inside, things looked a bit different, as they generally do.

Claire had a lifestyle that most women would envy, but she felt a disparity in power between herself and Conrad – not that he meant to exert power over her, but that nevertheless he had the upper hand.

And he had a strange quirk of behaviour which mortified her, and which only emerged in the company of women: he would home in on the subject they were most familiar with and knew more about than he did, and tell them all about it. So he would lecture cardiologists on heart disease, Egyptologists on pyramids, mathematicians on the Fibonacci Sequence, and so on. And once he started there was no stopping him.

Why did he do it? How could an intelligent man be so stupid? Claire could see the exasperation in the eyes of his victims, so why couldn’t he?

The outcome was that any intelligent woman who swung into Claire’s orbit – and showed promise of becoming a friend – swung straight back out again, and never came back.

Claire knew she should be more assertive and address this issue with Conrad. There was no point in getting angry about something if you didn’t communicate how you felt and try to sort it out. But she didn’t like to raise it in the full heat of her irritation in case she came across as petulant and out of control. And by the time she’d calmed down it seemed too late. And well, basically, she wimped out.

***

Claire would agonise about her marriage on a fairly regular basis. She always went through exactly the same process and came to exactly the same conclusions, so you might wonder why she bothered to keep doing it, but that’s people for you.

It went like this:

Why do you stay in this marriage? Would you still be there if Conrad wasn’t so well-off?

Of course not – I’d have left him years ago.

So what does that make you – some sort of gold-digger?

Not exactly. I don’t care about the money itself. It’s the freedom it gives me – the freedom not to have to work, and to spend my days pursuing the things I love and the things that interest me.

But why should you be able to do that when the vast majority of people can’t?

I know. It doesn’t seem fair. But what can I do about it?

You could leave Conrad and get a job. In solidarity with the rest of the human race.

Are you kidding? The idea terrifies me. I have no marketable skills. I’d never survive out there.

But you could at least leave him, couldn’t you? Get a divorce. Wouldn’t that be more honest? With the settlement you’d still be pretty well off.

But then I’d have to drag us both through all that trauma. And I’d hurt him. I don’t want to hurt him. He’s a nice man. I like him. Love him, even. It’s just that he drives me absolutely bonkers.

***

For the last decade or so, Claire had been on a spiritual path, and learning to follow the guidance of her Inner Voice. And she’d recently woken up to what was really going on in the world, the immense changes that were coming, and her own calling to be a Lightworker.

She’d tried to discuss these matters with Conrad, but he always took control of the conversation and steered it towards his own knowledge and understanding, which was all of the material world. She didn’t know how to stop this from happening. He was too strong for her. Too intellectual. Too full of facts and opinions. She didn’t think he meant to overpower her in this way, but it seemed he couldn’t help himself – he didn’t know any other way of behaving.

So she gave up trying to reach him, and instead focussed on her own inner development, and on making her contribution to the transformation of the world by meditating, working with crystals, sending love, praying for peace, and practising Ho’ Oponopono.

Then Marion came into their lives and turned them upside down. Or right way up, depending on how you look at it.

***

Marion was a Librarian and an Activist – an indifferent Librarian, but a passionate Activist, with a permanent sense of outrage at all the injustices and stupidities in the world.

Over the years, she’d fought for women’s rights, gay rights, animal rights, the starving, the homeless and the refugees. She’d fought against the bomb, the wars, animal testing, factory farming, fracking, deep sea oil drilling and the TPPA. She wrote, she organised, she marched, she spoke. She was loved, admired, feared, vilified and repeatedly arrested. She was brave. She was indomitable. She was a shining light. She was a pain in the neck.

***

Claire met her at a meeting about the Extinction of Species. Her simple presentation of the facts made a great impression on Claire, and she went up afterwards to thank her. She liked her immediately, with her freckled face, rumpled hair, sense of humour and huge vitality. She was everything that Claire wasn’t.

Later, she looked Marion up on the Internet. She was awed by her achievements, and felt even more guilty than usual about her privileged lifestyle. She’d had twenty years of not even having to work, and what had she achieved, in comparison to this woman? ‘Your spiritual work,’ said her Inner Voice. She knew that this was true – at least, in recent years. She also knew that different people had different kinds of contribution to make. But she still felt guilty.

Her Inner Voice started prompting her to get in touch with Marion. ‘She won’t be interested in me,’ she protested, but it was insistent, so eventually she gave in, found Marion’s contact details on the internet, and invited her out to lunch. To her surprise, she said yes. Over lunch Claire told Marion all about her privileged lifestyle, while bracing herself for the pain of disapproval and rejection. Which didn’t come. Instead Marion gave her a lopsided smile and said, ‘Well, Claire, we all have to make our way in this wicked world as best we can, don’t we?’

From that moment on, they were friends. Mismatched friends, you might say, but their differences were stimulating for them both. Marion educated Claire about the state of the world, and Claire educated Marion about the spiritual side of life and the coming changes. They were surprised to find quite a bit of overlap – especially concerning the Global Elite.

***

Claire and Conrad threw a dinner party, and Marion was one of the guests. All went well till the cheese course, when Conrad, with the inevitability of a heat-seeking missile, chose to lecture her on the Extinction of Species.

‘What people don’t realise,’ he told her, ‘is just how rapidly species are disappearing. In fact, we’re in the middle of the biggest mass extinction since the dinosaurs were wiped out sixty-five million years ago. At the current rate, fifty percent of all the species on the Earth will be extinct by the end of the century. And it’s the human race that…’

But that’s as far as he got. Marion broke into his flow as follows:

‘What is it about me, Conrad, that makes you assume I don’t already know all this? It wouldn’t be because I’m a woman, would it? I do hope not, because if so, you and I are not going to be friends. And I like your wife very much, so that would be a pity. Sorry, Claire.’

Silence fell upon the dinner party. Conrad was at a loss for a reply, while Claire was amazed to see him stopped in his tracks – the first time she’d ever seen it done. But the other guests were squirming with embarrassment, so she cunningly introduced the subject of their children, knowing that parents can talk about their children under any circumstances without even having to engage their brains. So the black hole in the conversation was quickly smoothed over.

Later, in bed, Conrad said, ‘I seem to have offended your friend. I didn’t mean to, you know.’

‘Of course you didn’t, darling. You never do.’

‘What do you mean, “I never do”?’

‘Well, you do have a habit of lecturing women on the subjects that they know more about than you do.’

‘Do I?’

‘Yes, you do.’

‘So why don’t they say so?’

‘Darling, it’s very difficult to get a word in edgeways once you get going, and most people are too polite to just barge in while you’re speaking. So they wait for a gap. But it’s no good waiting till the end of one of your sentences, because you’ve learned how to take a breath in the middle of them like the TV presenters do, so there isn’t a break between one sentence and the next.’

‘Really?’

‘Really.’

‘Is that what I do?’

‘Yes darling, that’s what you do.’

‘Well I’m jiggered… But your friend didn’t have any trouble interrupting.’

‘No. But I think she’s a special case…’

***

One evening Marion came to supper, and lost no time in getting down to the nitty-gritty.

‘So what’s your job, Conrad? What do you do to earn a crust? At a guess I’d say not refuse collection or social work.’

‘Oddly enough, it is social work of a kind, Marion. I’m a lawyer.’

‘Ah! A lawyer in the guise of social worker. So you work in Criminal Law, do you? – representing the downtrodden and the disadvantaged? Somehow I doubt it.’

‘I certainly represent those who’ve been unfairly treated.’

‘Such as Monsanto and Goldman Sachs, I suppose?’

‘Monsanto has been one of our clients, certainly…’

‘I knew it! My God, Conrad, that’s scraping the bottom of the barrel! Do you know what they’ve done? You must do!’

‘Be careful what you say, Marion. I’ve got a photographic memory, and I’m not afraid to use it.’

But Marion was undaunted, and launched into an account of how Monsanto had brought starvation to third world countries, and toxins into food and the environment.

‘I’m afraid this is all hearsay, and you haven’t a scrap of evidence to back it up.’

‘But this isn’t a court of law, Conrad. The evidence exists, and believe you me, it will be brought to bear. The world is changing. People are waking up to what is really going on. They are standing together and saying ‘No!’ And Disclosure is just around the corner.’

‘What disclosure?’

‘Disclosure with a capital “D,” Conrad.’

‘I have no idea what you’re talking about, Marion.’

‘Well, Claire knows. Haven’t you discussed it with him, Claire?’

‘Well, I tried.’

‘What do you mean, “You tried?”’ said Conrad.

‘Darling, I did try to discuss it with you, but I gave up because you weren’t listening to me.’

‘Well, I don’t remember any of this,’ said Conrad.

‘So what happened to the photographic memory?’ said Marion. ‘Do you switch it off and on depending on who’s talking?’

***

Later, in bed, Conrad said, ‘Alright then, tell me. Spill the beans.’

‘About what, darling?’

‘About Disclosure with a capital “D”. What was all that about?’

‘Do you really want to know?’

‘I really want to know.’

‘Okay… Well, you know the people they call Conspiracy Theorists?’

‘Not personally, thank God. But I know who you mean.’

‘Well, they’re right. And Disclosure…’

‘They’re right? What, all of them?’ said Conrad, laughing.

‘A lot of them. And Disclosure…’

‘But they all say different things!’

‘Conrad! Hear me out. You asked me, and now I’m telling you. I’m not clever like you. I don’t remember all the details like you do. But what I do know is that there is a massive conspiracy – or a whole raft of massive conspiracies all linked together – and Disclosure with a capital “D” is when the truth will come out. And all the evidence. All at once.’

Part 2 soon

© Sue J Davis 2015