Signore L was a bottle of Limoncello, a Latin liquor whose proof could weaken, cloud and confuse the most steadfast of minds with swirls of tropic temptation. He stood next to Miss Peach, a curvaceous flask of juices pressed from the malum persicum fruit, pure and wholesome, the kind of drink that might be served at Sunday school picnics. That's why they had chosen her - she knew - for the children to drink at the party. But L thought differently. He wanted her. He wanted her with the cool deliberation legend to citric intoxicants.

"Dear Signori," he spoke urbanely to her, breaking the silence, "please forgive my intrusion upon your thoughts, but who knows how long we might stand here."

"It's quite all right, sir" she answered, surprised that a bottle of alcohol could be so polite. "I was only dreaming about my Alabama orchard and the tree that sprouted me," she continued, her voice as sweet and tempting as apple pie.

"I would love to show you my home in the Sicilian Plains where the sun shines us to a sizzle as it rambles lazily across the sky."

"Thank you so much, sir."

"Please don't call me sir, call me L," he interjected, "When that Mediterranean sun rolls onto you, you want to burst with juices, but you don't. You become richer and suppler and dizzy for lips to drink you."

"I've never felt a sun like that," she told him, wishing privately that she had, but unsettled by the idea of being drunk.

"And the quick relief of the gentle rains as they light upon your lemon skin. They fall mainly in the plains, you know," he elocuted. "Let me describe the feeling..." L continued his poetic reveries and Miss Peach listened. For days and nights on end they stood in each other's proximity on the shelf of the kitchen pantry, Signore L "working" on Miss Peach the entire time. But New Year's Eve was approaching and there was not much time left before they would be carted off to the party. Signore L made his move. "Miss Peach," he whispered, "May I sip you?"

"Oh no!" Miss Peach responded with genuine shock. His suggestion did not seem decent to her, "That would break my seal! I've never been opened before."

"But surely you won't keep your vitamins to yourself!" he shot back, "and you need my vitality. Have you seen your 'use by' date? Without my alcohol you'll spoil in a week, two at the most. Flecks of mold will begin to float in you, and then they will pour you away, down the sink."

"I still say no!" she answered indignantly. "The children could never drink me if I said yes to you."

And so their conversation ended. Miss Peach spoke no more to him, nor did she react when he spoke to her. But in her nectar fermented the fear that she might somehow say yes to his debonair decadence after all. L ceased talking but eyed her constantly while cocktail fantasies inflamed his fifty proof mind. He drooled luridly to himself: "If only I could get my mouth onto hers for a moment, and give her a sip of myself. Her resistance would be diluted. She would be mine then, to the very last drop."

New Year's Eve came. They were taken from the shelf and placed on the drink tray together. Miss Peach saw then that she was not intended for any children. There were no children at all at the party. She was an ingredient, nothing more - to infuse the various liquors surrounding her: whiskeys, ryes, bourbons and gins. Some of the bottles began a raucous chorus:

99 bottles of peach on the wall
99 bottles of peach
Take one down, pass it around
98 bottles of peach on the wall...

She became frightened, a fear which stirred her straight to Signore L, the only bottle she knew. "L! Hold me close. Please," she whispered to him - at least he came from a citrus fruit, as she herself was born of a fruit. "Oh, splash me, spill me, spike me!" she clamored anxiously to L to drown out the breaths of hard vodka crowding against her, brushing her most sodomously. She sweated with the chill of the nearby ice.

L tapped her lightly, responding with all his charm, "Come with me, and we shall be as one, as only two liquids can." Together they wobbled to the edge of the tray, off the bar and away into the bedroom. Unseen. Unnoticed. She nuzzled up to L on the bed as he gazed into her translucency. He spoke gentle words to her, "Oh my god Miss Peach, how lovely you are - like a young girl's breast." Then he was on her. "This will only hurt a little," he said, "I'm going to unscrew you," And with a nimble twist of the neck, she was open, her top removed. He repelled his top instantly, shooting it into a corner of the room. Then they clinked together, glass upon glass, and poured themselves into each other.

"Oh Signore L!" Miss Peach let out, half blind with passion as Signore L slurped. "What are you doing to me?" She felt as dizzy and breathless as a lone girl at spin the bottle. As his alcohol swirled into her pureness she began to tingle and tremble and savor the feeling. "Happy New Year" she gushed at him, then tumbled from the bed to join the vodka bottles.

Story #385

(This photo was donated by dear, sweet, irresistible Roachz whose Limoncello Parties are legend in Japan.)

Postscript: This is the second story to a photo donated by Roachz. The first story (with a juicy picture of Roachz herself that will make your mouth water) is here.


A Safe and Happy New Year to One and All!

In the night after Christmas the loaded sleigh sped away and dissolved into a sudden cloud of glistening snowflakes. Then, silently, it began to exist again, pressing distinct traces into the snow, on the Eve of the Yuletide holiday.

The sleigh's occupant knew the village well, from memory. He crept in and out of each house like a shadow, leaving presents that would later cause a minor sensation, as no one could say how they had been put there or who was responsible. But all were immensely astonished at the insightful selection, as if the giver had known exactly what the person might need later, even before that person had thought of it.

Since McPhearson had discovered the principle of time travel, he kept it a secret, using it only to satisfy his sense of generosity among the people of the village he loved, that special place of his childhood. There were so many Christmases to chose from, and he darted from one to the next, pausing only to replenish the pile of presents on his sleigh.

He made his final stop at an unlit cabin. The mean hermit who lived there had always chased the children from his yard. He was feared and avoided by all. McPhearson knocked. "I am the spirit of Christmas past," he called in response to the frightened stir. The hermit slowly opened the door to stare into his own face.

Story #384

The previous Christmas stories: #118 and #323

Here's wishing all of you a great Christmas and all the best for the New Year!

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Story #370 somehow got lost in the shuffle, but I've finally posted it.

Imagine an ancient goddess whose name is not recorded in the mythologies of pre-civilization. Imagine also that this is with good cause. The goddess is so horrific that a single prayer to her would cause reality along with all life, time and memory to cease. She is the goddess, not of infinity, but its opposite which holds in a space smaller than a pinpoint the end of all existence. She lived before the nothingness that preceded creation. As human awareness arose from the moor of scents and images, words for this goddess were never created. What is not uttered cannot be invocated. The antithesis of a mother's life-giving force is a metaphor that begins a vague grasp of the essence that is this goddess. But it is dangerous to think further.

Through the ages this anti-goddess remained unsung, unworshipped, and unembraced while her brothers and sisters enjoyed prayers, unerring devotion and the homage of sacrifices. She lived in seclusion in a realm removed from the other gods and goddesses, who themselves were wont to mold her image out of one of their thoughts. But divine beings cannot live in such isolation - they thrive on the love and especially the fear felt by their subjects. Thus it became necessary for the goddess to visit humankind in her most miniscule form.

"Worship me," an elemental particle whispered in the ear of the woman who in her life had mothered a child.

The woman answered with the emotion of surprise - she wondered at the origin of the voice.

"Follow me," it continued it's bodiless whisper.

She sealed her eyes against the light of day, and followed the sound within herself.

"Closer," the voice repeated, and she moved in closer, focusing her sharp gaze on the origin, only to see it recede into the distance before her. She neared, it tumbled away, ever deeper, drawing her after it. She felt as if she were running downwards, in a mad vertical dash leaving behind all that she knew. She ran and ran and soon blackness loomed before her.

"Embrace me!" the field of darkness commanded - and she did. It was then that she comprehended the loss, all would become nothing. Her child was gone, her past, her future, all that she had loved. She gasped, and brought her hand to her face in a physical extension of the anguish. There were no words that could express the primal feeling of the smothering of every thought.

"It's a take!" a voice interceded. It was the director, and he gazed in wonderment at the actress. "That was incredible! For one moment I actually believed. How you capture these emotions so convincingly will always be a mystery to me."

Story #383
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Speaking of theatre, here is an earlier Indeterminacy theatre story from a year and a half ago: #239

Each night in the extended instant that separates the conscious hours from the time of sleep she is visible to me. I lay in my bed. My thoughts fade into oblivion as the grip of wakefulness relaxes. Then she flows in as if the glass bowl of reality had suddenly become a sieve. I open my eyes and see not the world of colors I breath and walk through, but the outline of her figure, violet iridescence glowing in the realm where the shadows of dreams are cast. Then we stand before each other in the onyx blackness containing us.

"I've found you again," I say to her, and see that her eyes are bound by a thick cloth. Only the lower portion of her face remains uncovered. I marvel at the artistry of her lines - her chin, her lips, and the unblemished surface of her neck, the way it invites as she tilts her head slightly sideways. I had never noticed this constellation before.

"How may I be of service?" she answers as she always does, though the relationship is clear. It is I who stand in subservience to her.

"I wish for a vision of unrequited love, the random terror of malevolent beings pursuing me into a cavernous haven which becomes a ship sinking in arctic seas. Then, as I swim, a fearful plummet into an endless depth. And this time - intensity, it must be brutally intense."

"It shall be as brutal as you are honest with yourself. It is truly what you wish?" her lips form the words as I look at her again. I try to summate her entire physical being by combining the glimpses afforded me in the past. Sometimes it is only her shoulder that is unveiled, sometimes a breast. This time her lips are emphasized. The next visit I may see only her eyes.

"I know it will be terrifying," I tell her,"but the anguish might bring me to realize what I must do. Perhaps when I am awake, I will understand the message I cannot receive in unobscured form."

"Indeed," she comments, "it is subtle, but then, that is how it should be. If the message were open and direct, all our realms might implode..." She approaches, her arms outstretched, palms extended, not to embrace but to transfer the images into me, the images I will dream, the message that my life screams for metamorphosis. She places her hands on my forehead, and my awareness of the realm dims and is extinguished. Immediately my nightmare begins.

Story #382

Thank you to all who contributed their own story inspirations! You may see more of the mysterious blindfolded girl at Samara's Photoblog.