Note to Self (85) Faucets

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Exchanging ideas with a fellow tweep yesterday, who wondered what she could blog about, and she added “it needs to be about my childhood”, I asked myself: could I write a post about my childhood?

I tend to let words take control and I talk about my current life, my stressful every day routine and my dream of writing, but who really knows anything about my childhood? Not many, if nobody.

This kingergarten memory immediately resurfaced. Could it be a good idea to write about this? Why not? I’m sure people will think it’s actually very cute.

Alright. Let’s take a leap of faith and go for it. Ready? 1… 2… 3…!

I was maybe 4 years old. My hair held above my head looked like a little black palmetto tree. I don’t know why people thought I was Asian for some strange reason, but they always called me Chinese because of this peculiar hairdo. Alright. Small town folks with small ideas, I guess. I had a darker skin complexion, mostly because I played outside a lot so I was tanned, on the contrary of today, where I’ve turned almost… how shall I describe it? See-through?

I always loved jewelry and accessories. The more the better. I downgraded a bit since I have to look “serious” now, but at the prime of my early toddler years, I was literrally covered from head to toe. Pink plastic jewelry was by far my favorite. Matching earrings, necklace, ring, bracelets… Fushia outbrighted everybody else in the room and I couldn’t feel more proud of it. Mama was in the house!! And she brought it on.

That day we had the official school photographer scheduled to come and take the annual class picture. No individual portraits at the time, just a simple group shot. Extremely self-conscious of my glorious appearance, I wanted to make sure that I indeed looked phenomenal, so I took a little bathroom break to check myself out and reclip what could have possibly moved out of place during my previous activities.

The girls’ and boys’ pottie rooms were located very close to each other. It’s actually weird when I think of it now. They were at the end of a small hallway, the boys’ straight ahead, the girls’ on the right. There was a wall on the left, or maybe a closet. I can’t exactly remember. I also recall that there was no door to push or pull to enter. Well, in France, we usually never place doors at the entrance of bathrooms because we think the stall doors are enough already. At least, that’s what I grew up with in every school I attended. Which means that for men’s bathrooms, you have a clear view of the urinals at all times.

I walked toward the girls’ room, facing the boys’ room. All the urinals against the wall, I inadvertently peeked. And what I saw really confused me.

As I returned to the classroom, I didn’t pay more attention to my intriguing discovery and posed like a little star for the picture. Once the day was over, and I left to go home, I ran to my mum and asked her the 1 million dollar question.

“How was school?” she asked.

“Well mummy, I saw something weird today.”

“What was that?”

“I saw boys pee.”

“Ok.”

“And they don’t pee like girls.”

“No?”

“No. I sit down when I pee. They stand up.”

“Ok…”

“And they open little faucets. Pee faucets.”

My mum started laughing. I looked at her, totally serious.

“Why don’t I have a pee faucet too??” I asked. A look of incredulity on my 4 year old face, I stared at her in complete disbelief. What was so funny about what I just said?

Later, I had to retell the story to my dad, who literally died laughing.

So that was it. A faucet. When you think about it, I had made a great observation. And I knew since then that I had an irresistible sense of humor. These things can’t be explained by logic. A child’s innocence is by far the most beautiful thing in the world.

I still smile when I think about it. Priceless.

Note to Self (84) To my far away kingdom

New York City, Note to SelfWrite a comment

She walks hastily, brushing past people like a lightning bolt. She doesn’t care about the rest of the world. All she wants is to get out of this mess. The crowd makes her sick. She can’t take their smell. Their eyes quickly wander on her face, staring for a few seconds before disappearing into the anonimity of the subway car, and she forces herself to reject their blank looks. She ignores them, thinking they’re dead bodies standing for the sake of filling up an otherwise empty vessel. She abhorres the noise around her. Her thoughts immediately drift once she finds a comfortable spot with enough space not to feel claustrophobic.

She pictures herself very far from this hell, living in a farm, with two kids and a nice man to be her husband, maybe a dog or two, many cats, and horses. She gets rid of the make up and the blow dry, the suit and the expensive Cartier watch, the Chloe bag and the Tory Burch shoes, the Kate Spade earrings and the Louis Vuitton necklace. She virtually cleanses all the superficiality off her skin, and aims at remaining the simple country girl she grew up as. She remembers her feet in the mud, her head full of ideas, her dishevelled hair playing with the wind, and her bitten fingernails virgin to manicures. She runs with rubber boots through the fields in dirty sweat pants, her shirt torn at the sleeve, and her eyes lost on the horizon while she sings a melody of her own composition.

“Let me be free, from this world of oppression, let me find my voice in the silence of my reason, I want to dream, I want to fly, I want to love and never die…”

She makes it up on the spot, letting words flow out of her mouth like blossoming flowers. Nothing stops her. She feels invincible at the top of her hill, overlooking her kingdom of cows, corn, trees and daisies.

With a ballpoint blue pen, its cap bearing her teeth marks, she writes poetry on a notepad covered in redacted portions that create a maze of criss-crossed lines, words entangled to form an illegible mass of obliterated thoughts. She suddenly draws a smile at the bottom of one page. She loves it here. Her cat by her side, she’s a queen among the nothingness.

It all had to go. She grew up to be serious. A lawyer, to say the least, is dead serious. She’d have been a doctor had it not occurred that she couldn’t stand the sight of blood.

Life took a different turn once she left the countryside. She went to law school. She stopped reading novels to replace them with law books. She became a law book worm. She drank the filthy words, and they infected her like a disease. There was no room for her imagination to flourish anymore. That part of her had officially died.

She grins. The guy across from her gives a weird look. Yeah, she didn’t lose her mind. Yet. She will eventually, if she stays here.

The train slows down to a stop. Grand Central Terminal 42nd street, hub for all possible traffic mixing tourists, homeless people, preachers, models, business men, nurses, teachers, school kids, babies, strollers, nanies, elderly, teenagers in love, and perverts, to name a few…

She exits, and rushes for the turnstiles. At the bottom of the stairs, she feels somebody passing next to her, almost forcing her to step down. She looks to her side, and sees this guy. He must be seventy. He looks really old.

He hands her something.

“Miss… It fell from your pocket.”

She stares at him. She has no pockets. She wants to ignore him, but she hates to be rude. She usually manages so well not to talk to people on her way to work. Why must today be the exception?

“Thank you.” she quickly utters and grabs the piece of paper. She has to leave. No time to waste.

She goes up the stairs, runs through the doors, reaches the street, hails a cab, opens the cab door, lands on the backseat. The paper stays in her hand.

She distractingly opens the folded piece. Something’s scribbled on it.

A phone number. And these exact words.

“Gene – Evening’s best.”

She glances outside and rips it in a million confetti.

Back to her drifting mood, she thinks of the fields again. The dirt, the mud and the air, free from exhaust pipe gas and eight million people’s stench. She imagines the sky and animal shapes on clouds. Any direction she looks at, she sees grass.

She needs to get out. Anywhere far from this urban jungle. Fast.

Guest Post (5) Dennis Sheehan

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Happy Monday everyone!

Today I welcome a guest on the Manicheans, Dennis Sheehan. Dennis has quickly become a very good tweep of mine. He’s a true New Yorker, but has lived in China and Russia for over twenty years, and his book “Purchased Power” is on my to read list.

Without further ado, I present to you his post. Enjoy!

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A Creature of the Night, an essay by Dennis Sheehan

 

I remember fondly the dark, smoke filled places where I spent much of my time. The acrid smell of stale beer and booze emanating from the old wooden floors is still in my nostrils. I remember the feeling of sliding up onto a slightly sticky bar stool, thinking comfort when my elbows hit that long wooden plank called the bar.

As many of the others in such places, it was my escape. The darkness and loud bass beat of the music was a stark contrast to the fluorescent light and subdued whispers of the office. I could be anything I wished here, my conversations were casual, my stories were always accepted with a pleasant smile; I could be me and my relationships here were dispensable.

I could enjoy my life as I wished, if I was not getting a good reception from my new group of friends I could simply move on to the next joint and find a group more suitable.

Over time I realized that my life was there, in the night, in these wonderful places with wonderful people. I didn’t dream all day about it but in the dark recesses of my mind I knew the days were only to fill in time until I could be me.

In the beginning, the only downside I found was the realization that it was a little more difficult to get out of bed in the morning, and that slightly nauseous feeling would go away by noon. This was a small price to pay for the excitement of the night.

I waited each day in anticipation of who I was going to meet that evening, where I would go, I would dream about the adventures I would encounter. I was successful at work, it really didn’t interfere, and that feeling of anticipation got me through those boring afternoons where tedium had replaced productivity.

I shared the night with like minds, those seeking happiness through social interaction. My relationships were perfect, every encounter a study in conversation, love, sex and joy, although they very rarely lasted more than that night. It was like I was living through an exquisite glimpse of time with people who were doing the same.

We lived in the illusion of happiness in these small, dark and loud venues of love and personal relationships, which had been somehow strategically placed throughout every city.

Once I had gained acceptance into this wonderful environment of frivolity, I knew I had the world where I wanted it. When then out of the blue, it started to become more difficult to get up in the morning, the realization hit me that I was losing it. I no longer felt slightly nauseous, I wretched each day before work, but it still was a small price to pay for the key to happiness.

This problem became more serious when I started to become drunk earlier in the evening. That was quickly solved by one of my friends, a bartender. He had given me a small vile of white powder with instructions to snort it. This miraculous powder solved so many of my current problems. I never appeared drunk, I was wittier and the best, I no longer required sleep. Lacking the need for sleep, I now had more time for conversation, love and sex. As I remember it the sex was great, although my partners generally left before I found out how they enjoyed it.

My life was back on track, my career was going well and my nights were fantastic. There were, however, some problems along the journey into happiness.

I recall an incident where I had a business meeting in San Francisco. I received the tickets the morning I was supposed to leave. It was a fact that I had 6 hours to get to the airport and that was not enough time to get anything accomplished at work, so I went to a favorite watering hole and constructively spent the time with friends. I remember waking up on the plane as it landed, not in San Francisco but in Tokyo.

I called the clients, and I rescheduled. Now I had 2 days in Tokyo and thought it might be nice to check out Japanese nightlife. My memories are only that I do not like Karaoke and the entertainment was about ten times more expensive then New York.

It had to be more than a year from my visit to Tokyo when I realized one day that there had to be more to life than clouds of euphoria interrupting the stark realities of the day.

I wondered how adventurous it would be to take those realities head on without the buffer of the comforts of the night. Difficult at first, I started to realize a very important reality.

Happiness comes from within. It is hard to find sometime but once found it is sublime.

Note to Self (83) I should say thank you

Note to SelfWrite a comment

I haven’t really blogged in a long time.

A few days are a long time. I needed to take a break to reflect on the journey I’ve made, and how far I’ve come. I exited the gates of hell, and now where am I?

I can’t define the place where I live as heaven. It feels temporary. A safe harbor to shelter me until I’ll find a better spot to move on to. I like the idea of change, because it keeps me from stalling. Life’s supposed to be a succession of different stops until the final destination: death. So I enjoy it while I can. I sometimes wonder where to go next, impatient to leave the state of monotony I’ve reached. I dislike the routine I forced myself to accept, and I ask: what’s normality in a world where everything’s exceptional?

I’ve always been too quick, and I never took the time to appreciate the opportunity given to me.

So let me pause and look around, to make sure I didn’t miss anything important.

A few months ago, I started a new chapter in my existence. I shyly opened the book, and turned to a blank page, because I couldn’t stick with the past anymore. I left everything behind, and I closed the door. It tortured me to feel a part of me dying, but I had to go through that experience to grow stronger. I hated myself for a while. I searched for answers, trying to understand the changes that occurred inside me.

I thought I had become somebody else.

A hand grabbed me, and pulled me to the other side. I didn’t fret. I let this happen to me, and I observed everything.

I witnessed this young woman seeking the truth in a swamp of lies. She was distraught, and very sad. She cried a lot, harmed herself, and begged for salvation.

Nothing seemed to change.

She escaped by drinking, and losing herself in the arms of her friends, wanting to forget the hurt she felt from the love she thought she had.

This young woman promised to give so much to those around her. Yet, nobody listened.

They all ignored, pushing her to a corner where she secluded herself to cry some more. The unbearable pain lingered and waited to consume her completely, until she became almost insane.

The answers that she looked for never came. She drowned in a pool created by her own sorrow. When she had to breathe again, she almost forgot how to push her head from under the water.

I whispered a few words and looked into my eyes, reminding myself of all the dreams I had.

I couldn’t give up so soon. It wouldn’t be fair to anyone.

So I left. I packed my bags and I swallowed my pride. There was so much I wanted to say.

I remained silent.

I started the journey not knowing where to go, only trusting my instincts. I kept moving forward, toward the light, the heavy weight of pain slowly disappearing off my shoulders.

I didn’t hope for things to improve.

I worked to transform my life, and I wrote. I faced many obstacles along the way, including horrible traumas that happened because I was too vulnerable to react intelligently. The drinking had to stop so I could finally look at myself and see who hid behind the wall of tears.

I had stayed exactly the same.

Despite all the hurt that an evil force threw into my face, I stood up and I fought. It would have been easy to surrender to hatred.

I resisted.

Yes, I know pain. Yes, I know misery. These exits showed up many times on my highway. Did I take them? Yes, I did. Did I follow them? No. I turned around and I drove back to the main road until I found a better way out.

I never believed in God when I was a child. I had no incentive to. I also didn’t understand what God would bring me that I didn’t already have.

Well… now I understand.

The journey’s supposed to be difficult. I want no redemption, nor forgiveness for the sins I committed. They’re part of the adult I grew up to be.

What I want is a time for prayer.

I’d like to thank all the souls that guided me toward a better life. Family, friends, strangers who gave me their support.

I look forward to sharing more with you since it’s the minimum I can do. It didn’t take much for me to realize that I had come to an important stop along the road. When I glanced around, I saw all of you welcoming me with open arms.

It felt great. Almost like heaven.

I know that love’s stronger than pain. I know that a smile can defeat a heartache. I know that we’ll all meet again, maybe here, maybe in another world very far away.

This is only the beginning of a wonderful adventure, and I’m ready for this.

Guest Post (4) Peter Labrow

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Welcome!! I’m thrilled to have a great guest on the Manicheans today. I started following Peter while I still learned how to use Twitter. Always searching for the perfect horror story, I decided to purchase his novel, entitled “The Well”, which blew my mind and which I strongly recommend to everyone. He knows it by now – I’m a dedicated fan of his work, and I take advantage of my power by putting an immense amount of pressure on his shoulders.

Follow him: @labrow.

It’s truly an honor for me to present to you his post.

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The reality of research

Johanna asked me to write a guest blog. “No problem,” said I. “What about?” “About anything,” she said.

Quite honestly, asking a writer to write about ‘anything’ is like asking evolution to come up with the definitive life form. This explains the delay of several weeks between being asked and submitting the blog itself.

So, I’ve decided to write about New York, where Johanna lives – and (importantly) I don’t. But, in the context of writing. (See what I did there?)

So, I’ve visited New York once, a stay of just under a week. I did the usual things – strolled through Central Park, took the ferry to Ellis Island, walked across Brooklyn Bridge as the sun went down – you get the picture.

I loved it. New York is massive, energetic, vibrant – and yet still has a feeling of real community to it. I was struck by several things – all of which I’m sure are not ‘universally true’ but are a long way from the picture I’d built up in my mind of New York.

One of the days of my visit was the day of the Puerto Rican Day Parade. It’s a big deal – around a million extra people descend on NYC. Since the City has a population of around 8 million, an extra million is still a massive deal. What amazed and impressed me was how the police handled this. In the UK, if that percentage of people marched through central London, we’d see the police on horseback, carrying riot shields. The interplay between the New York police and crowd was social, chatty and respectful. In the UK, the police segregate themselves from the ‘public’ and don’t encourage interaction – there’s often an atmosphere of fear, not respect. I’m simplifying – and I’m sure UK politicians and police would be horrified at what I’m saying and defend the police’s relationship with the public. They’re wrong. They have their heads in the sand. They place the blame for rioting totally with the public and don’t accept that donning battle armour contributes to ill feeling.

Another example. Walking through Central Park on Sunday morning, it was a pleasure to see lone people, wandering into the park with baseball bats and mitts – to be invited to play a game with someone they don’t know. In the UK, we think of Central Park as a place of muggings and rapes. I know this still happens – I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be in there at night, but then again I wouldn’t do that in the UK either. (I’d argue that wandering into a park for a game with strangers is a type of social interaction that we’ve all-but lost in the UK.)

As a tourist, I often was unsure of my way. More than once I was approached by someone offering to help. I can tell you from experience, that this doesn’t happen much in London.

Sure, there are sides to New York I didn’t see – it has a massive drugs problem, like pretty much any major city. I didn’t see where the prostitutes hung out – and a million other things that make a city what it is.

But I was surprised many times, assumptions were undone and a new understanding began to fall into place. I could honestly see why people love the place – and feel that it holds most of what they need.

As a writer, this fascinates me. We all write from experience – but lots of our experience is just plain wrong. It’s developed from what we’ve seen on television, watched in films, read in books and seen on the news. If we base our writing on second- or third-hand experiences, we perpetuate myths, draw unreal worlds, exaggerate issues or deny facts.

If you want to write vividly about watching the sunrise from the top of a mountain, how much greater will the resonance of your words be if you’ve been there, living it? If you write the experience based on photographs, will you genuinely catch every aspect of it? The cold discomfort of the night? The clawing, clagging, clinging of the morning mist? The meagre warmth as black gives way to colour? The smells in the air changing? The sounds of the day beginning to rise?

Imagine describing making love, if you’re still a virgin. You know lots, could probably make a good stab at it – but how much would you miss?

How two-dimensional would a scene in New York be if it featured a mugging in Central Park? It may not be a mistake – but how much richer would it be to feature a Sunday morning ball game, being helped by a stranger and chatting to a cop?

If I’d set even one scene of a book in New York, all of that scene would be based on assumptions. Here’s another example – on a recent trip to Rome, I was flummoxed by the simple process of buying and using a railway ticket. In Rome, you have to validate a ticket before use, in a machine on the platform. This is a separate and unrelated activity to buying one – and, once validated, you have seventy minutes to use the ticket. And tickets are mostly sold in tobacconists. So, I write the simple phrase: “I bought a railway ticket and got on the train” and I’m wrong. In this case, not wildly wrong in a way that could affect the plot, but wrong nonetheless.

I wrote about research recently on my own blog – about how it always, always enriches what you write. You don’t need to become an expert – although more experience always helps. If I were to write about someone living in New York, it would make sense if the character had just arrived, rather than being a long-term resident. Otherwise, I’d miss so much. If I wanted to describe a deeper experience, I’d probably have to talk to those who live there – it’s not likely that I could get under the skin of a place in a few weeks or even months.

As writers, we do what we can – research has to be efficient, otherwise the book would never get written. But the research needs to be there – you can’t really visit New York via Wikipedia.

Peter Labrow is the author of the 4-/5-star rated horror novel, The Well, which is available in print and on Kindle from Amazon.

Note to Self (82) Living the dream

Note to Self, WritingWrite a comment

I woke up this morning, my head still in a fog from the night before. I forced myself to walk to the bathroom, take a shower, brush my teeth, comb my hair and put on clothes, the routine kicking in while my muse yelled at me in the background.

I jumped on the bus, checked my emails, tweeted a few words, then caught the subway, my thoughts in a place where my body wasn’t. I peeked at faces who commuted with me, and I saw the same expression everywhere: unhappiness, frustration, robotic moves against human nature and a lack of drive that’d cause the entire world to collapse if something bad suddenly happened.

I didn’t even reach my thirties yet, I got married and now I’m dealing with a divorce. No kids, good income, one nice 1 bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, loving friends, family too far away, and two cats to keep me company. To any outsider, I’m living the dream. The single girl in New York City who can do anything she wants! She’s free! Look at her! Envious eyes stab me in the back while I pace to the office. My phone in one hand, my Ipod in the other, I represent the cliche that you watch in movies. The busy corporate lawyer who never stops breathing because her life sounds so exciting.

But another reality hides behind the curtain. I wear a disguise so I can pay the bills at the end of each month. If I lose my job, I’m homeless. I don’t even have enough savings to sustain for more than 2 weeks. My parents don’t live here. My friends can’t keep me forever on their couches. My cats need me so they can be fed. I became the slave of a lifestyle I abhorre.

I get up every morning, and I want to write, because this is my dream. Yet so many people also dream of writing. And singing. And dancing. And acting. And playing baseball like Derek Jeter. How many succeed? A handful.

This would be a good enough reason to stop fighting for it. Many would advise me to just continue with my boring life, because I live comfortably. I can afford to go on vacation, and buy nice stuff. Deep inside, however, I don’t care about vacation and nice stuff. I need a roof over my head so I can feel safe, and food in my mouth so I can survive, but the rest doesn’t matter to me. I only want one thing.

I remember being 11. When a teacher asked me what I’d like to do when I grew up, I simply responded: writer.

I’ll maybe never reach the stars, but I’ll follow the Moon, because this is the only reason that keeps me going every day. I probably aspire to become much more than I’ll ever be, so what? The routine is what’s killing me. Not my crazy dreams.

Guest Post (3) Matthew C. Wood

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After a few days of silence, I welcome Matthew on the Manicheans once again!!! I think it won’t be the last time we’ll see his talent on this page.

Please follow him on Twitter @Matthew_C_Wood and read his wonderful blog: SunStoppedShining

Without further ado, Ladies and Gentlemen, Matthew C. Wood!!

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Stealth Writer

            “I am the scribe who writes in the night! I am the one who finds people a fright, I am…The Stealth Writer!”

            Imagine a funky 1990’s Saturday Morning Cartoon theme here.

            He sat in the artificial glow of his bedroom light, surrounded by towers of poorly organised notes and pictures of his family. Nestled in the centre of his apparent chaos was a Laptop Computer, which our hero was currently using to listen to music, hold conversations on Twitter and write a guest post for a good buddy of his all that the same time. He liked to think multi-tasking was a talent of his.

            But what this guy thought he could do – and what he really could do late at night – were two totally different things.

            Only tonight was no ordinary night. For starters, he had yet to touch a can of Beer.

            A conversation had brought about the spark of inspiration in our hero’s creative mind, one which was destined to be brought to life on Office 2007’s idea of paper. Sleep would not come until it had.

            Hours passed without notice with nought but the constant clicking of fingers furiously tapping at a keyboard. Everything, even the looming spectre of work early in the morning, was forgotten in the moment.

            Soon the clock struck midnight. Dramatic as it sounded – not to mention cliched – he made his finishing touches on the bell’s final toll. A great masterpiece was now ready to go out into the world, surely to become the next great literary achievement of our time.

            “Hang on a minute,” Our hero muttered at the dark world beyond his bedroom window, “Nobody told me this would have to be read by…people…”

            How often have you completed a written work and been almost petrified by nervousness when you put it out for the world to see? I’ll be honest – I get that way every single time I post up an Episode of The Day the Sun Stopped Shining or, more powerfully, when I let someone have a look at my Work in Progress Novel, The Fallen.

            No word of a lie – I’m terrified of hearing that age-old phrase, ‘Don’t give up the day job.’

            So how do we overcome those nerves and avoid becoming a Stealth Writer, unseen and unheard by a much louder world?

            For me, it’s as simple as checking, double checking, triple and then quadruple checking my work before tightly closing my eyes and hitting ‘send’. Seriously. I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen my work get sent anywhere. But I’m serious about becoming a Professional Author one day, so if it has the effect of making people see what I do – I’ll keep blindly hitting that ‘send’ button until Doomsday.

            Because the hard truth is a Stealth Writer may evade the world’s radar, but misses the whole point of the mission. We need to be seen and heard, even if that means getting the occasional verbal missile shot at us now and again. That’s if we want anyone but good old Mommy to read our work.

            For most of us already Tweeting and platform building away on the Interwebs, this is not much of an issue. So let this message be one for the emerging scribblers out there, who have yet to reveal themselves.

            Don’t be a Stealth Writer. In this author at least, there is a kind eye willing to read.

Note to Self (81) Sweet angels

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I like angels. They seem sweet, and kind. I can’t even imagine them being mean. Yet, I met lots of angels who turned into devils very quickly… and it surprised me.

I was just a little girl, believing in the good human nature, when my ideas got suddenly shattered with a big pounding of the fist on my innocent face. Whose body did the fist belong to? My best friend.

I had many best friends growing up. They changed every week. I remember writing them letters talking about how awesome it felt to have them in my life. One week later, they would disdainfully throw the letter at my feet, announcing our official breakup and forever preventing us from sharing candy again, thus preserving me from childhood diseases such as the chickenpox until I turned 11.

Those were odd times indeed. I didn’t really suffer. I picked friends like I fell in love. Every day I had another crush. Yet, it hurt me to lose the followers I gathered around me as if fate asked me to keep searching for more, until I’d find the right ones who would truly stick by me for longer than one week.

I think it took me over twenty years to locate these wonderful individuals. And I’m happy it lasted that long, because I appreciate it greatly now.

These words are to you, my sweet angels, because you are real angels. You can’t lie and play tricks on me, and you tell me the truth when you send me tons of twitter love every Wednesday and Friday! I like when you say that you like me, even if we’ve never met before. You’ve seen everything there was to see, you know. My words always reflect my soul.

Of course, writers tend to exaggerate a bit when they start romanticizing things like that. I guess I should add: take everything with a grain of salt? But I don’t want you to doubt my words; I mean everything I write. My soul never lies.

You support my dream, make me laugh and cry (some of you are really good at making me emotional) and mostly, you see me for who I am, the writer, the wild spirit that fears no hatred with a heart ready to take over the world. You’re the ones who keep me at it. Every day of the week, every month of the year, I write these words thinking of you. Whether I feel happy or completely down, you always know what to say to make me smile. You’re amazing guys. You really are the angels I looked for and expected since I was a little girl.

I’d be nothing without art, and my art would be nothing without you. Thank you.

Guest Post (2) Simon Tall

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Hello everyone!

Today has been a very productive day, and I’ll tell you why: not only did I get to post a very interesting story in a genre never attempted by me before (probably for the last time too) – erotica – but I’m also publishing a guest post. Well, I call my work super soft erotica, because I could honestly not write something too graphic. I could describe to you a whole murder scene, but a sex scene – off limits. Anyway, I have the pleasure to introduce you to a wonderful tweep, Simon Tall, aka @simonpoore. Please follow this guy because his writing truly rocks my socks off, even if I wear no socks right now.

Our yesterday conversation led us to discuss shoes – high heel shoes – and how a girl can become the biggest source of attraction just by wearing the right pair of shoes… This became a story. On my end, a temptress who lives just for sex. On Simon’s end, a fantasy that turned into harsh reality.

Please enjoy this amazing read. I present to you: The Girl Called Christmas.

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“The Girl called Christmas”

The Tuesday before Christmas…

Trevor woke with a start. It was dark and his head was throbbing, like the blood in his skull was trying to escape, pounding against the pillow. He took a few deep breaths and rolled over onto his back. The red numbers on his clock said 2:15. Two fifteen AM. Through a small gap in the curtain he could see that snow was still falling, tiny flakes melting on the glass. He began to lift his head but thought better of it. The dark room seemed to spin and he still felt drunk. He lay back and sighed, spreading his body. His arm fell over the side of the bed and his hand hit something on the floor. His fingers gripped it; a shoe. His fingers traced it’s shape, a woman’s shoe. He lifted it to the dim red light coming from the numerals of the digital clock. A leopard print shoe with a very high stiletto heel. A puzzled crease appeared across his brow as he stared at the shoe in the dim light. How did that get there?

Looking around he could see the bathroom light glowing from under the door. Suddenly it opened with a soft click. Startled, he lifted his head again to see and he caught a glimpse of the curves of a female figure in silhouetted in the light. She doused the light and padded across the carpet in the dark.

Trevor just lay there confused, the shoe still in his hand, unable to see her properly in the dark.

“I see you are awake,” she said, her voice husky, seductive, like gravel mixed with honey, “would you like me put those on for you again?”

She reached the bed and took the shoe from his hand. Leaning down she cupped his cheek in her hand, her soft hair falling on his face. He see the curve of her naked breast and could almost taste her scent, sweet and coy, with the merest hint of sex.

Before he could speak she pressed a long delicate finger on his lips, “don’t say a word, just lie back and enjoy…again.” He couldn’t see her face but sensed from her voice that she was probably smiling.

She walked to the far side of the bed, in the dark he could see her hour glass shape as she seemed to be dressing. His mouth was dry and he rubbed his face, but he could feel the deep stirrings of anticipation.

His eyes watched her shape, desperate to see this girl. He had no idea who she was or how she came to be in his apartment. For once though he thanked his lucky stars. Drinking several too many whisky sours on a Tuesday night had actually been a good idea.

She returned to stand by his side of the bed. He could smell her again. She leant down and turned on the lamp on the bedside table, adjusting its angle poise head. Light streamed downwards and Trevor blinked in its brightness. He looked down at her shoes. Perfect stockinged feet inside them.

“You know you can touch them,” she said. He reached over the edge of the bed and placed his hand on her foot, feeling the shoe and silky stocking on her foot. He was breathless now and his hand was shaking.

“I know you like to look…and touch…” she said. He let his hand glide up her leg, feeling the seam of the glossy stocking at the back of her calf, fingers tracing its arc. His eyes followed his hand, staring in lust at her legs. Fingers lingering on her thigh he looked up at her body slowly, taking in the black silk and lace clinging to her curves, encasing her breasts. Her face was in darkness above the cone of light from the lamp.

“Let me see your face?” he whispered.

“Tut tut,” she said, “you know the rules.”

Without saying anything further she pulled back the bedcovers and switched of the light. His hands caressing her as she straddled him in the dark, and he surrendered himself to pure anonymous, sensuous pleasure.

And so it had begun. Every Tuesday night she appeared, somehow in his apartment, and they followed a routine of pleasure like no other he had ever experienced. The first Tuesday he tried retracing his steps, drinking in the same bars, but he couldn’t tell if she was there or not having not seen her face. She appeared that night anyway, waking him with her skilful fingers. Again he didn’t see her face. The next week he stayed home and and tried to stay awake, but just as he was dozing off she appeared from the bathroom and into the darkness of his room. He couldn’t tell how she got in. He tried to ask her questions but she remained coy and mysterious, preferring to concentrate on their mutual pleasure. Sometimes she would talk; erotic whispers and compliments. Sometimes she silently pleasured him and herself in the most sensuous and imaginative ways he had known. Always the shoes; every encounter began with the delicious leopard print stilettos coupled with the most amazing lingerie. Her stockings seemed like gossamer under his rough fingertips. Sometimes corsets or basques of all designs, sometimes a simple bra of finest silk. She was like his fantasies all come true; all he had ever dreamed for in a woman, and, for Trevor, it was like Christmas came every Tuesday.

And always, she hid her face in the dark…

Soon he accepted the delicious routine of it. His days were spent anticipating their next encounter and he smiled often, daydreaming of who she might be. His imaginings of her began to fill his waking hours. Love? Could he be in love with her? Without seeing her face? She was his true life fantasy girl, could he spoil it all by demanding to know who she was, what she really looked like?

The next Tuesday she appeared again like clockwork. He lay in the dark waiting. This time she came through the door to the hallway. Moonlight streamed from the open curtain and she crossed its beam. Her face was covered by her hair, she was dressed in a tight fitting little black dress, a simple string of pearls at her neck. She clutched her bag as if she were going to a fancy dinner party at an embassy. On her feet as always were the shoes, perhaps incongruous and slutty compared to the demure but sexy dress.

“Hello,” she said softly, sitting on the edge of the bed, her hand slipping slowly under the bed covers to caress him. Trevor placed his hand on her thigh.

“I was going to give you a name, like ‘Christmas’ or something,” he said smiling, “because being with you is like Christmas.”

“How nice,” she purred.

“But I guess that’s a bit silly,” he said pausing.

She continued to touch him slowly in the silence. His breathing quicken for a moment. He slid his fingers under her dress, caressing her stocking tops and the soft milky skin above.

“Why do you always wear those shoes?” he asked.

“Because these are my sex shoes, my ‘fuck me’ shoes. And of course I know you love them so,” she replied.

“You are wonderful,” he sighed, reaching up to touch her face. His fingers pressed her cheek and suddenly she froze. The skin of her face was soft and smooth but something was wrong. He realised as his fingers traced along her face that they had never kissed. Somehow during all of their delicious love making she had engineered every movement, controlled it so that he never touched her face.

He sat bolt upright in the bed, something was very wrong. He moved his hand further along her face, he could feel no lips, no contours, no eyes! Jumping quickly out of the bed he ran to the wall and slapped on the light switch. And there she sat, the girl called Christmas in all her glory. Her body was perfection itself but she simply had no face, her perfect blonde hair framed an empty picture. No features; simply smooth flat skin.

“What the fuck..” said Trevor, naked back against wall in panic, “what the fuck are you?”

A small lipless mouth appeared through the skin at the bottom of her faceless face as she began to speak softly and calmly. “Maybe I am your ‘dream’ come true,” she said, “maybe I am everything you ever wanted from a relationship. Or maybe…just maybe…you should be much more careful what you wish for next Christmas…”

With that she rose demurely and crossed the carpet, hips swaying seductively. Trevor slumped down the wall, his eyes fixed on her blank face. He sat on the floor and watched her perfect shape slip through the door.

 

The Tuesday before Christmas…one year later…

Trevor sat alone at the bar, nursing a cola, picking nuts from a bowl and staring into space.

“Hello,” said a female voice, breaking his reverie. He turned to see a girl climbing onto the bar stool next to him. She was pretty but prim, ordinary in a check shirt and jeans, straggly brown hair up in a bun.

“You know what,” she said, “I fancy a whisky sour, it’s been a rough day…join me?”

Trevor found himself looking into her eyes, “Well,” he said smiling, “I haven’t had one of those in quite a long time, don’t mind if I do…I’m Trevor…

Note to Self (80) Heels

Note to Self, Short StoryWrite a comment

Black patent leather, 4 1/2 inch stiletto heels. It seems impossible for her walk, yet she strides along as if she was bare foot.

Her long black dress gives a peek of her legs, the fabric softly brushing against her skin as she takes up the stairs. The slit on the side of her left thigh suddenly reveals a captivating tattoo of a naked pinup. She looks straight ahead, her head held high, her shoulders pushed down and her back arched in the most sensual manner. Her eyes stay focused on the elevator before her. The closer she gets, the more impatient she becomes.

The garment she chose to wear tonight perfectly compliments her figure. She never felt so beautiful. Her long dark hair drips down her neck, hiding another small tattoo of a butterfly behind her right ear. Her fingers suddenly go to her lips, and she realizes that she forgot to apply lipstick. She searches the content of her little purse and finds the precious color. The bright red contrasts magically with the porcelain white of her skin. She checks herself one last time in the pocket mirror before pushing down the handle of the door, and enters the room.

It’s dark inside. All she can see are the shadows created by the furniture, but she knows where to go. It’s not her first time coming here. She directly moves toward the bedroom where she notices a shape lying on top of the bed covers. He has been waiting for her like this every Friday for the past 6 months. Same hotel on the West Side, room 903. She doesn’t know much about him, except that he’s married. He told her he loved her many times, but she never fell for it. All she cares about is the hot depraved sex. No strings attached.

“How are you baby?” She knows how much he wants her. His voice cannot hide the desire he feels for her.

She doesn’t respond immediately. Instead, she grabs his face with one hand while slightly choking him with the other, and slowly kisses him on the mouth. His breath stops for a second as she holds on tight to his throat, putting more pressure on each side, forcing him to completely surrender to her.

When she finally releases her grip, he gasps for air. She lets him recover while she moves away from the bed, her heels carrying her like a princess ready to become a queen. Nothing’s stopping her when she turns around and whispers: “Do you love me?”

“Yes, oh how much I do… Come to me…” he replies back.

His words make her giggle. She adores the power she has over him. She tilts her head, her hair falling down her chest and her arm.

“I want to see you.” She turns on the light.

She likes to watch him be so helpless, naked and tied onto the frame by his wrists and his ankles. All the things she could do to him if she had a twisted mind. She laughs. That would be quite a spectacle indeed.

She approaches and climbs on top of him, pulling up her dress to her waist. The diamonds dangling from her belly button ring shine with the light of the bedside table lamp.

“I like to tease you.” she murmurs, before kissing him again. Her right hand grabs onto one of his arms and plays with the fabric of the cuffs, slowly loosening up the knot as she gently bites his lip.

“I want to play.” she smirks at him and gradually moves up his chest until she sits on his face. He battles with his tongue through her sheer black panties, his hand struggling to free itself while she pulls away every time he gets too close.

When she knows he’s about to gain control back, she crawls back down, her hair brushing his chest, and her relentless kisses drown him to a new state of ecstasy. He can’t get enough of her mouth, as transported to a new dimension.

“Time for me to teach you a lesson.” she smiles while running one of her hands all the way down, and he moans. She takes advantage of the situation to tease him some more, until she feels he can’t take it any further.

She positions herself on top of him again, the fabric of her panties rubbing against his skin, and releases one of his hands. Overwhelmed with the sudden freedom he was awarded, he immediately unzips her dress.

The silk falls and forms a black puddle on the floor. He glances at the pinup tattoo, an inferno burning in his eyes. His fingers race up and down her back, then stops at the edge of her bra.

It quickly lands next to the dress. He kisses her more, feeling her hips pressing hard against him. She works toward untying his other hand.

Her small sheer panties ultimately meet their fate at the bottom of the bed, and soon her body rises as he grabs onto her stiletto heels, the passion completely consuming them. They become one and forget all about the outside world for several hours.

When dawn comes, she gives him one last chance at love during their final embrace.

“Until next Friday…” One kiss and she waves goodbye.

Black patent leather, 4 1/2 inch stiletto heels. The object of all her affection, and her secret of seduction.

As she glides away to hail a cab, she remembers the day where she saw them luring her behind the window of this very chic boutique down in SoHo. She allowed herself to splurge, thinking that it might be a bad idea… Obviously it wasn’t. She became a fearless temptress ever since she started wearing them, simply because they gave her the confidence to feel sexy again.

CFMS – Come F*** Me Shoes. The sales assistant assured her that they’d never let her down. And to this day, they didn’t.