Title: The Hungry Butterfly
Author: Eule Grey
Publisher: NineStar Press
Release Date: 10/01/2024
Heat Level: 2 - Fade to Black Sex
Pairing: Female/Female
Length: 18500
Genre: Horror, contemporary, thriller, body horror, bisexual, British, suspense
Description
Downtrodden charity worker Brenda can’t believe her luck when she gets a new job on a medical trial. It’s a dream position with a generous wage—almost too good to be believable. Life has never been better…
Until Brenda discovers some concerning facts about the company facilitating the trial. Why is FixMe so impatient for results? She keeps telling her manager you can’t change lives overnight, but Thomas doesn’t listen.
She should have noted the red flags.
Fortunately, Brenda isn’t ultimately responsible for the trial’s ethics. Who’s going to care if she forges signatures? One or three teeny-weeny fibs don’t matter.
She should have called the police.
Bells ring when Brenda starts ‘forgetting’ things. Where did she leave her case notes, and why can’t she remember writing them? Then Brenda’s customers disappear, but it’s too late for regrets.
She should have run.
It’s a constant struggle to remember what truly matters. Brenda doesn’t mean to lie or cheat, not at the start. What begins as a second chance at adulting ends with a trail of body bags and a broken butterfly.
She shouldn’t have done it.
Excerpt
The Hungry Butterfly
Eule Grey © 2024 All Rights Reserved
Brenda
Thomas almost smiled.
“We need evidence, Bren. It’s not enough to say you’ve made a difference. We know you have, of course. We are behind you, supporting you all the way. Certainly. But the funders—You understand. What FixMe need, FixMe get! Ha, ha, ha.”
Brenda’s stomach created a series of sounds and sensations similar to an operative building site. She became breathy and lightheaded and felt under attack. When she tried to speak, all that came out was air. “Off. Oof.”
A spray of spit landed on Thomas. He removed his glasses with a Dickensian grimace.
“How many cases have you got? I trust you’ve brought the notes?”
Notes? Cases? Brenda turned a snort into a cough. She’d known on the first day the job would be a pile of crap.
FixMe, a newly established charity, worked with people stuck in a cycle of crime. The job description boasted a worthy ethos and decent pay. The cold realities of the work had proved less attractive—no training or support, no induction, no structures or pathways, no risk assessments or colleagues.
All Brenda had been offered as support was a tiny office in a storage facility. Thomas was based far away at an undisclosed location. Once a week, Brenda received an email with a list of names to contact and a reminder that she was doing an extraordinary job.
Since starting the job, she’d trailed the streets, visiting crack dens and prisons. Got nowhere. She’d made hundreds of desperate phone calls to the police and cried in the storage facility toilets. Increasingly, she’d return home by one o’clock and chain-smoke in bed.
“Fourteen cases,” she lied. “Two more sign-ups this week.” She’d meant to say four, which would’ve been an exaggeration since she had no cases. No cases. Zero. A big, fat nothing.
Thomas pointed one long finger; hand poised in mid-air. “Fourteen?” His fingernails were brown as if he’d been scratching at graveyards.
Brenda nodded and then couldn’t stop. Her head went up and down like one of those car toys attached to the dashboard, trapped by motion and movement. Stuck forever.
“You’ll need to up your load to fifty by the end of March.” Thomas licked his lips. “At least. A hundred would be even better, wouldn’t it? Hmm?”
Brenda’s voice hit the unpleasant notes of a shriek. “Fifty?”
“You sound surprised, Brenda. Fifty. Yes. If we want to get paid. And we all want money, don’t we?” Thomas tapped the desk with his FixMe pen, decorated with pretty butterflies. “Payment by results. It’s the deal. Hasta la vista, baby.”
Brenda’s resolve not to argue snapped. The words tumbled out. “But it’s not possible. It’s not! We’re talking about people with numerous barriers who’re entrenched in harmful behaviours. Most of them have mental health issues. There’re no easy fixes. It’s hard enough getting hold of them in the first place. They leave custody and disappear. I have no way of finding them.”
Under the table, Brenda’s hands found each other. Her bottom lip wobbled. “I’m struggling. I can’t do it.”
Thomas sighed. He tapped his pen on the desk every few seconds.
To Brenda, the noise of the pen was a frantic heartbeat and the background music of a cult horror film. Tap, tap, tappety tap.
Thomas tapped aggressively.
“Have you sought referrals from statutory services? Police and Probation. Social Services. Et cetera.” His head began wobbling like Brenda’s. “I presume so because you assured me it was the case last time we spoke. Hmm?”
Had she? Brenda tried to think back, to be professional and robust, efficient and resourceful, and all she’d promised at the interview. Effective? She’d been drinking too much and not sleeping, and anyway, her memory wasn’t what it used to be.
“I. Yes.” It was all she could manage.
Thomas shifted some butterfly-patterned papers. When he spoke, it reminded Brenda of a film about interrogations.
“Last supervision. The fourteenth of the month. Two p.m. You reported the project as going well with no issues. We’ve had ten supervisions altogether. It’s been gratifying having such a dedicated and positive employee.” He smiled nastily.
Brenda suddenly needed the toilet.
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Meet the Author
Eule Grey has settled, for now, in the north UK. She’s worked in education, justice, youth work, and even tried her hand at butter-spreading in a sandwich factory. Sadly, she wasn’t much good at any of them!
She writes novels, novellas, poetry, and a messy combination of all three. Nothing about Eule is tidy but she rocks a boogie on a Saturday night!
For now, Eule is she/her or they/them. Eule has not yet arrived at a pronoun that feels right.
Free use image from Open Clipart Vectors
Ornery Owl's Review
Rating: Five out of Five Stars
This thought-provoking novella addresses medical ethics being skirted in favor of prestige and profits. The story is only appropriate for readers 18+ because of the adult subject matter, including discussions of addiction and criminal behavior and depictions of sexual activity between adults.
The book will appeal to readers who are interested in the subjects of addiction, the causes of homelessness, trauma, and overprescription of pharmaceuticals rather than addressing the root causes of these issues. It is not a light read, and some readers may find the story's use of body horror and sexual situations with dubious consent. Brenda is an unreliable narrator, but I fully believe that her sleazy boss, Thomas, is more than capable of slipping his prospective "partners" a roofie.
Using powerful metaphors, The Hungry Butterfly addresses the need to get to the root cause of addiction and maladaptive coping mechanisms in patients with complex PTSD issues. Many homeless individuals struggle with their mental health. Having to live on the street certainly doesn't improve their plight.
A for-profit medical system does not care about treating people with serious mental health issues. They certainly don't care about the homeless population, which is comprised solely of people who can't pay for their services. The approach with these people is to drug 'em up and put 'em back on the street. To claim that this tactic is ineffective is a massive understatement.
Great stories inspire serious thought. The following are some of my thoughts on addiction, trauma, and the medical community's proclivities for treating the chart rather than the patient.
Addiction and trauma are still misunderstood areas of psychological treatment, even in the twenty-first century. The tendency to throw pharmaceuticals at every mental health issue, often without providing counseling services in conjunction with said pharmaceutical treatment, has improved somewhat.
As someone who went through most of my life believing I was fatally flawed, I have sought psychological support in understanding why I am the way I am for decades. In the 80s and 90s, the standard protocol involved prescribing psych medications, mostly SSRIs. For me, the cure is worse than the problem when it comes to psych meds. I can't take them. SSRIs make me manic and psychotic, and sedatives such as benzodiazepines tend to have paradoxical effects.
I have bad reactions to most prescription painkillers as well, although if IV morphine were readily available, I would be addicted to it. This tells me that I would probably have developed an addiction to drugs such as cocaine and heroin had those been available to me at the point in time when I was willing to try them.
There is a tendency for psych medications to cause weight gain. However, there is such a powerful bias against larger bodies that the patients who do gain weight while taking these meds are treated with disdain. I often express my belief that a Health At Every Size approach is far more effective than a weight-normative approach. Shame is a poor motivator. Treat the patient, not the chart.
In my own case, I have found techniques such as art therapy to be far more effective in managing my anxiety and depression than taking pills that prompt anxiety spikes, hallucinations, nightmares, and even straight-up mania and psychosis. While there is no one-size-fits-all approach to mental health issues, an attitude of compassion and a willingness to listen are imperative in every case.
Many mental health practitioners aim to create compliant patients rather than help those who are suffering find happiness. In defense of the practitioners, this is what they are trained to do, and often, they don't have the proper tools at their disposal to accomplish much else. This approach must change before real healing can begin.
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