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Monday, December 22, 2014

What A Christmas, Carol!

The snow tumbled from the sky like a curtain in big, wet flakes that glittered in the porch light and added layer after layer to the smooth, edgeless blanket that tried to swallow the world. From time to time, trees capitulated under the weight and threw their branches to the ground with a final, resonating gun shot, or faltered altogether with a cannon blast. The startled jerks and hammering heartbeat were the only things that broke Carol’s miserable monotony while she stared out of the blurred window into the white-gray nothingness and watched through red-rimmed eyes as the snow climbed above the window sill.

Her mood was just like the snow - gray, heavy and cold. It should have been the best Christmas ever. Now she sat there, alone, the ambers of the fire in the hearth behind her dead, and wrapped her blanket tighter around herself, unable to dispel the chill from her heart.

Going to be a day late. Missed flight. Driving up there by myself. ” Was that the message you wrote your fiancĂ©e when you needed to tell her that you’d be late for your first real, romantic holiday together -- for the long-awaited, cozy Christmas week in a remote mountain cabin? Of course it wasn’t.

How he could not have expected her to call him after that, she had no clue. Or perhaps he had, subconsciously. Perhaps this had been his way to tell her that sorry, it just didn’t work for him. The giggling, female voice that had answered her on his fixed phone had been like a punch into her face and guts. But when she had asked for Fernando and Miss Giggles had called out for loverboy, she had felt her heart freeze and shatter, piece by piece, with agonizing pain.

“Don’t bother coming.” It had been a single wave of wounded rage that had kept her voice steady enough to say the words -- before the tsunami of misery following in its wake tore apart her world. She had hung up the phone, and there had been nothing. No frantic call back. No message begging her to talk. Just silence, a broken heart and tears streaming in rivers down her face.

* * * *

The snow was halfway up the windows. Candles flickered and made the room look far warmer than it felt. Carol’s stomach grumbled, but she couldn’t find the energy to get up. A knock sounded.

She should go to the door. But there couldn’t be anybody outside, not on Christmas Eve with the snow already four feet high and still falling. Her fantasy was playing games; loneliness was no doubt making her imagine things.

Another series of knocks broke the silence, loud, insistent. She turned her head around and looked at the door. “Wha…” Her voice was inaudible, raw from crying.

The knocking turned into a pounding. “Hello?” a muffled male voice asked from outside. “Is there anybody inside? Hello?”

* * * *

A deep trench, almost a canyon, wound its way through the snow, and the older couple standing in front of Carol’s door, clad in thick down jackets and with their cheeks reddened by the exertion in the cold, looked relieved. They were both breathing hard and leaning on their snow shovels.

Carol vaguely remembered their faces. “Hello,” she finally managed to stammer, and even as she spoke, the names came back to her. “Mr. and Mrs. Preston.” The tumbling snowflakes gave the scene a blurry appearance.

“June. Please call me June, and he’s Edgar. We’re neighbors, after all. You’re Carol, aren’t you?” The woman smiled brightly, and her breath came out in puffs of mist. A few blond curls clung wetly to her forehead under the jacket’s hood.

“I’m… yes. I remember you. Dad fixed your car once.”

The man, Edgar, chuckled. “That he did. I’d been trying to get it running for a whole day. Took him all of five minutes.” He looked her up and down. “We saw your car and the smoke from the chimney, but then the smoke stopped, though your car’s still up the lane. Are you okay? Are you here alone?”

“I… yes.” It was hard for Carol not to start crying again. “My fiancĂ© was supposed to come too.”

“Oh.” June gave her a look of sympathy. “They closed the roads a few hours ago.”

“I don’t care!” Carol’s breath hitched. “I’m sorry,” she hastily added. “It’s just that…” She looked at the single wooden step in front of her that the snow already tried to claim once again.

“You had a falling out.” It wasn’t a question.

“How…?”

“Your eyes are red and puffy. We saw you crying through the window.”

As if the mere mentioning of the word had open a valve, fresh tears streaked down Carol’s cheeks. She hated that she couldn’t hold it together, but the frozen fingers of loneliness crushed her heart once again.

“Oh my!”

The wooden shaft of the shovel clanked on the cobbles, and then arms wrapped around her and pulled her into a tight hug. A scent of female perfume and sweat filled her nostrils. Sobs shook her, but a soothing hand travelled up and down her back.

“Nobody should be alone for Christmas. You’re coming with us.” June’s tone left no room for discussion. “But first, we’ll go inside and close the door. You have to be freezing in just your pajama, girl!”

“I… oh…” Flustered, Carol extricated herself from the embrace and took a step backwards. “I’m sorry, you have to be freezing yourself. Come in.”

Edgar had already leaned the shovels against the porch railing, and the two of them quickly stepped out of their boots and onto the lush carpet. Once the door shut behind them, Carol nervously looked around, for the first time in days noticing that the living room was quite a mess. “Sorry, I didn’t have much energy for tidying up.”

“And that’s understandable.” June stood next to her, one hand on Carol’s shoulder. “Why don’t you pack your things and jump into some warmer clothes, and we’ll head over. It’s rather cold here.”

“I had blankets.” Carol’s defense fell short against the twinkle in her older neighbor’s eye.

“Oh my god!” Edgar exclaimed far too loud. “Is that an original?” He crossed the room with a few long steps and crouched down in front of the wooden statue Carol’s mother and father had quarreled about so often.

“Not really. But it’s been made at the end of the nineteenth century.” She felt her cheeks grow hot, watching Edgar admire the lewd ebony statue. “Mom always argued that it was indecent, but Dad insisted on having it out in the open. I never got around to stowing it away.”

“And I’m glad.” Edgar’s voice was nothing more than a deep whisper. “She’s beautiful.” He ran a finger down the horned, wooden goddess, over her full, naked breasts and between her lewdly splayed legs.

As her neighbor’s finger caressed the statue in such a loving, almost sexual way, Carol became aware of her own state of being under-dressed. “I… I should really put something on. I haven’t unpacked much. I’ll be just a minute.”

The tightening of June’s fingers around her shoulder stopped her. “You don’t need to hurry.” She winked. “If there are two things that can keep my Edgar happy and occupied, it’s Egyptian history and naked women.”

Carol’s blush intensified, and she quickly headed to her bedroom.

* * * *

“...and this will be your room.”

“It’s lovely.” It was, really. Unlike the rest of the Preston’s cabin, which was all sheepskins and wood, the small room towards the back had two red-bricked walls and a four-poster bed with intricate ornaments and airy, transparent veils. “It’s like a princess’ quarters in a castle.”

June chuckled. “That might be because Edgar modelled it for his princess.”

“You have a daughter?”

“Yes, her name’s Amy. She has to be about your age. It’s a pity you never met. She’s twenty-three.”

Carol bit her lip while she stowed away her clothes in the dark wooden wardrobe, wondering if she should ask the question. But she was curious now. “She’s not coming here for Christmas?”

“Not this year. She lives with her husband in Australia. They visit us over the holidays every other year though.”

* * * *

They had spent the night in front of the fireplace, wrapped in thick woolen blankets, eating home-made cookies, sipping hot punch and sharing stories of past times at the cabins. Whenever June and Edgar had shared a particularly funny moment, they had sent each other loving smiles and winks, and the small touches that accompanied those always sent small stabs through Carol’s heart. But the laughter over -- in hindsight -- hilarious mishaps had more than weighed up these reminders of her loneliness, and when Carol had made her tipsy way to bed, she had felt relaxed for what had felt like the first time in ages.

She awoke to a soft bumping sound and had to blink a few times to realize where she was. The soft, bluish moonlight reflected on the snow and tinged the room in a mysterious glow. Something creaked, and more bumping followed, soft thuds.

Suddenly wide awake, Carol extricated herself from the blanket and slipped into the felt shoes. They were really ugly, but they were soft and warm. She tip-toed into the hallway to get herself a glass of water, but with each step, the thumping sound got louder.

When she was about to pass the Preston’s bedroom, she noticed the door slightly ajar and couldn’t stop herself from taking a peek. She almost gasped aloud and put a hand across her mouth.

Both were naked. June was on all fours in the middle of the huge bed, with her eyes closed and her head thrown back in ecstatic bliss. Behind her, Edgar knelt with his hands around her hips and pushed her slowly back and forth. She couldn’t see his groin, but there was no doubt what Carol was witnessing.

She had never considered herself a voyeur. But these two bodies, in all their slightly pudgy imperfection, were beautiful in the moonlight. June’s big breasts dangled rhythmically in the shape of long, perfect, round cones tipped with dark, long nipples, and gasps and grunts accompanied their dance of love. The looks of passion on their faces were breathtakingly beautiful.

Moisture coated Carol’s fingers and a moan almost escaped her lips. A guilty blush spread over her cheeks when she realized where her hand had strayed. She shouldn’t be doing this! But the rhythm sped up, the creaking and thumping intensifying just like the moans and grunts did.

“Oh god yes, baby, yes, give it to me! God, this feels so good! Harder!” June’s moaned encouragement was shaken by pleasured hitches in her breath.

“I love you!” Edgar grunted in reply, pushing himself hard into her and drawing a moan of delight.

Carol’s own fingers danced between her thighs, delved into the wetness.

Continue reading the full story at Lushstories...

Tuesday, December 02, 2014

The World Is Made Of Small Things

This is an article I wrote for the Writing Tips and Advice section of the lushstories.com forums.

Small things and characters

Some stories have characters that feel three-dimensional from the start, and you get instantly pulled inside by them. Others (and often our own) aren't written that much different, but the characters just aren't that compelling. There's description for these characters in both kinds of stories, but some just don't work.

Often, I've found, this is due to the smallest things - seen from a plot perspective, even completely unimportant ones. In an age where we're overwhelmed with visual impressions and tv characters, it's sometimes hard to build a unique picture of a person in our minds from the descriptions of body features and clothing alone.

There's a solution though. Sprinkle in little eye catchers. Stick a band-aid on your roguish male character's shoulder. Put the bobby pins in your female character's hair in unevenly. Take your main character out of the house wearing mismatched socks. Have the buckle on their leather purse be cracked or a letter from the word on their print t-shirt be missing. Something unimportant in the scope of the story, but something you'd immediately notice if you were there in real life.

Small things and the world around

What works for characters, also works for the world in which they live. Don't just let your main character "walk up the drive" when he gets home after a boring taxi ride you've already had to describe. Let him sigh when he looks at the grey fence post that's askew. Let her smile when she looks at the ugly Halloween pumpkin the neighbor's kids have gifted her. Let the windows be dusty, even though they were cleaned just a week ago. Put an empty soda can in the drink holder in the car or let a crumpled paper roll back and forth on the floor of the subway.

Why does that even work?

There are a few reasons why this does work, and it's not high science.

First, it's unexpected, and thus it prevents a story from getting boring. We've all probably read tens, if not hundreds of breakfast scenes, and we know how these go. If we need to write one of these and it doesn't suddenly turn into debauchery or an argument, we've got to keep the readers on their toes. What we do by adding small things like a wrinkled cereal pack or a smiley sticker on the toaster is laying false trails, but small enough ones so the reader doesn't get annoyed.

Then, there's familiarity. Small imperfections tell the reader this doesn't happen in a perfect glamour world, and other little details tell them that our world doesn't start and end with the story. It gives a sense of reality. If we're lucky, the reader might even recognize some of the small things and say, hey, that's just like at home, or just like someone I know. We humans are suckers for familiarity, so let's not disappoint our readers.

How to come up with the small things

The answer is simple: start watching. Just look with this in mind when you walk down the corridor to your office and encounter a colleague. Do they just walk down and nothing else? Often, yes, but not always. You'll find that one may hold a fork in his hand and wiggle it right before lunch. Another one is carrying a cup of water that is filled to the brim and tip-toes in an attempt not to spill it. When you walk home from work, look at each house that you pass and ask yourself what small imperfections you can see at the first glance. When you visit family, do the same in the kitchen, or living room, or garden (better don't tell them, though, unless you don't like them and don't mind being barred from visiting for a while).

It doesn't take long until you find more and more of these small things - it's not that you didn't notice them before, but once you look out for them, you'll be able to remember them when you need a little spice for your story.

A First Time For A Cheat

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