Back from Turkey Day
Nov. 28th, 2004 10:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
miss_ytOtherwise, it was quite nice. I finished most of my thesis proposal and all of a short story I have been writing (linked to this post), saw The Incredibles, got The Confusion (for those who don't know, the second book in Neal Stephenson's The Baroque Cycle), and beat a really hard level in Star Wars Episode I Podracer. Grandma and Grandpa also gave me a check that will get me the Firefly DVD series and the rest of Ruse in single issues: I don't think the last two trade paperbacks are coming out any time soon, so I will get the rest of the series bit by bit from online vendors and the local comic book store.
Now, ladies and gentlemen, for your perusal: my short story "Bottles." Any constructive criticism and grammar nit-picking is welcome, since I intend to submit this to the college literary magazine so it has to be good.
Bottles
To make a long story short, a nasty divorce put me off men and on the bottle, and though I’ve gotten off the bottle as far as the usual sense of the metaphor is concerned, I tend to think that I haven’t gotten off it so much as changed my relationship with it. I collect colored glass bottles from recycling bins or from litter on the street, or I get them as donations from friends who know my habits. I also have an arrangement with some local liquor stores (not the ones I used to patronize – I’ve moved since then), who deliver empty bottles to my house in exchange for a modest fee. This is how I get fancy bottles of sculpted or colored glass.
As a rule, I will only accept empty bottles as donations. If I happen to find one with something in it, no matter what it is, I empty it into the nearest drain. Full bottles are dangerous; they cause unhealthy thoughts. I do not keep glass bottles in the house.
Empty bottles are fascinating. They inspire me. The bottles I collect go to the big, cluttered shed in my backyard, where I cut them up with a glasscutter or a special rotating saw. Sometimes I just smash them, but not so much now as I used to. Then, with the careful application of cutting and engraving tools, a polisher, drills, and sometimes a glassblower’s torch, I shape them for use in a piece of art.
At first I made simple mobiles and mosaics. Those became more elaborate, and at some point I started making mosaic bowls, plates, cups. Three years ago I started making little glass buildings and landscapes. For some reason I can’t fathom, people are willing to pay considerable sums of money for my pieces. Not that I mind, of course. Far from it.
I have another rule, too: I won’t touch a bottle I can’t bring myself to destroy. I made this rule because I thought that keeping a bottle would set a precedent for further weakness. Now I have another reason for not keeping bottles – but it only makes sense if you know the whole story.
I found it at a yard sale. The old lady on the corner had died and her daughter was selling off all the things she had no use or liking for. Most of the merchandise consisted of antiques – not the “valuable” sort of antiques, but antiques of the “old artistic miscellany” kind. Pots, paintings, little decorated boxes, porcelain sculptures of animals, that sort of thing.
The bottle – a flask, actually – was nestled in a cluster of teapots I had been examining. It was made of slightly tarnished bronze, six inches high, a bit less than two across, rounded corners and sides with just a slight outward curve. Very ornate, too. The stopper was shaped like a many-petalled flower; the surface of the bottle itself was covered every inch over with masterfully crafted bas-relief patterns of the scale one usually sees on fine jewelry.
At first glance, it seemed to me, the intricate patterns formed animals, plants, people…but when I looked too closely the shapes I thought I had seen melted away into abstraction. There was only one possible thing such a flask could contain – if it contained anything – and that would be some very precious liquor.
The bottle was maddeningly beautiful, and fascinated me in a way I can’t even begin to explain. I picked it up even as my mind was articulating the notion that the flask was trouble. It was surprisingly heavy for its size, even taking into account that it was made of bronze. I held it to my ear and shook it, but heard no sloshing or rattling inside. I held it at arm’s length, watching as the sunlight hit it and flowed like molten gold in the crevices of its carved surface. For a span of heartbeats I stood there, staring at it, my better judgment telling me to put it down while my insubordinate hands refused to do so.
Back when I used to drink, I carried out the process of choosing and buying a bottle of something or other on autopilot. I would sit somewhere in the back of my head, aware but unable – or, at least, very unwilling – to stop myself. Buying this bottle was kind of like that. I recognized the sensation as my consciousness surrendered control of my motor functions to impulses that I thought I had defeated years ago. That set off all sorts of alarms, which I ignored.
I brought the bottle to the table where the woman running the yard sale had her cash box and notepad with a list of items sold. She was only half-invested in the transaction, and casually overcharged me for the bottle. My eagerness to possess it kept me from haggling for a more reasonable price, and I passed her the money she requested as if the cash were burning my hands. Then I headed home, cradling my prize under my arm. I walked briskly until I turned a sharp bend in the road that took me out of sight of the yard sale, and I ran the rest of the way.
If I’d had even the slightest notion of cutting up the bottle for art material when I first got it (and I could have cut it up, since I had the proper equipment in my shed), that notion was gone by the time I got home. I didn’t even think about taking the bottle to the shed. Instead I took it into the house with me, searching for a good place to put it.
Unable to decide whether to put the flask in the living room, the front hall or my bedroom, I wandered into the kitchen, turning my problematic new possession over and over in my hands. The bottle seemed Oriental or Middle Eastern – I’m not an expert on any kind of art but my own, so I couldn’t say for sure which. There wasn’t any engraving on the bottom to indicate where it had been made, or by whom. That indicated to me that it was a real piece of art, not a trinket for tourists or some faux-Eastern piece of junk made by a Western manufacturer. I ceased flipping it over and began to trace the petals of the flower-shaped stopper with my index finger. What kind of flower was it?
“You’re just a little bundle of mysteries, aren’t you?” I muttered, tapping on the stopper. A lotus, I guessed. I had a couple of friends who knew about these things and might be able to say for certain: I decided to show them the bottle at the earliest opportunity.
My curiosity, however, could not wait that long. Finding one avenue of investigation blocked, it started pushing me down another one – one that was unlikely to be profitable, but would at least allow me the satisfaction of having done everything I could to learn about the bronze flask on my own.
I wanted to know what was inside the bottle.
True, I’d heard nothing when I’d shaken the bottle; that didn’t necessarily mean the bottle was empty. I had simply taken that for granted. The unusual heaviness of the bottle led me to think that perhaps there was something inside after all – it was simply something that did not make a noise when the bottle was shaken. I couldn’t imagine what that something might be, but it was certainly possible. Even if the bottle was empty, there might be something interesting engraved on the bottom of the stopper. If my search proved fruitless, at least I’d know for sure that there had been nothing worth finding.
I curled my fingers around the flower-shaped stopper and gave it a tug. The stopper refused to come free. I pulled again, making a sustained effort this time. It didn’t even budge. Frustrated, I examined the seam where the stopper met the neck of the bottle. Perhaps it had been closed so long that it was rusted shut. This obstacle only made me more eager to get the bottle open.
A spray of WD-40 on the problem area didn’t help matters. The stopper, which still wouldn’t come free, was now slick and harder to hold, even after I rubbed off the excess. Holding the flask over the kitchen sink, I used my pocketknife to loosen up whatever was holding the stopper to the bottle. I worked the knife around the seam between them and extracted about a thimbleful of green-gray rust.
The moment of truth was still a little while in coming: I had to ease it out bit by tiny bit. It came free suddenly. I gave a “Ha!” of triumph and peered into the bottle. I felt even more elated when I saw that the bottle wasn’t empty – there was some shimmering, sparkling gray substance inside. Was it mercury? No, mercury shimmers, but it doesn’t sparkle.
I had just begun puzzling over the substance when it exploded out of the bottle at me.
The cold, shimmering gray smoke filled my vision. My behind hit the tiled kitchen floor before I was even aware that I’d been knocked off-balance. I heaved myself up into a sitting position as the smoke retreated from me. Shards of rainbow color twinkled and danced across its mercury-silver surface.
At that time I noticed that the bronze flask in my hand had become very warm, almost hot, to the touch. I knew that bottle was trouble.
I watched as the cloud of smoke expanded, without dissipating, and stretched itself out vertically, becoming a column at my feet. The column began to mold itself into a new shape: certain parts of it began to change in color or opacity. At some point it stopped being a cloud of smoke and became a blurry humanoid figure.
As it cleared up, the figure revealed itself to be a tall man with polished-silver skin – skin that should have, but didn’t, reflect images of its surroundings. The man was lanky and sharp-featured, with a neat black moustache and pointy goatee. His clothing consisted of sky-blue pantaloons and tunic, embroidered with silver, and a dark blue turban and sash. His feet were bare; his arms were folded menacingly. Both hands and feet were equipped with sharp black nails. The man frowned down at me, his catlike yellow eyes glinting as he looked me over.
No, he wasn’t a man – he was a genie. Or maybe a demon, but a genie made more sense. If anything about the whole situation made sense.
“Mortal,” the genie boomed, “thou hast freed me from my prison.” At the time I didn’t think it odd that the genie spoke English, and not Arabic or some related language: although I’m not sure that he was speaking English, either. Whatever it was, I understood him perfectly, and somehow he comprehended me as well.
I blinked at him, bewildered. “Um…you mean the bottle?” I asked.
The genie nodded. “I was sealed therein by a great sorcerer when I refused to submit to his will,” he began. “During the first hundred years of my captivity, I swore that I would make the man who freed me rich beyond his wildest dreams. But when those hundred years passed and I was still imprisoned, I made a different oath, that I would make the man who freed me king of all the Earth.”
I’d read a lot of stories in my time, so I thought I knew where the genie’s monologue was going – and I hoped very much that I was wrong.
“That century passed, and still I was imprisoned,” the genie continued. “During the next hundred years I swore that I would always be there in spirit for the man who freed me, and I would grant him three requests each day. When that century passed, and still I was imprisoned, I was so angered by my captivity that I swore I would slay the man who let me out of the bottle, and the only mercy I would show would be to let him choose the manner of his death.”
Damn. I was right. Fortunately I found the whole thing so bizarre that the strong possibility of imminent death inspired only a strong sense of unease, rather than paralyzing terror. “I’m not a man,” I said, pushing myself off the floor and getting to my feet. I’m all for gender equality in most situations, but this was a bit different.
“I meant ‘man’ as in ‘person,’” the genie replied, glowering down at me from what I estimated to be his six-foot-five height. “And thou canst not convince me that thou’rt not a person.” Okay, so I couldn’t call him on a technicality.
I tried a different tack. “That’s not terribly grateful, you know,” I said, “killing me when I let you out of there. I’m sure nobody would mind if you decided not to keep your oath – I certainly wouldn’t tell anyone.”
This only seemed to annoy the genie. “I do not care what thou or any other thinks of my oath. It is mine to keep or break as I wish, and I am keeping it. Thou canst not convince me to do otherwise. Now choose the manner of thy death, and be done with it. Delay too long, and I shall choose for thee.”
I considered trying to trick him back into the bottle, as the fisherman in the Arabian Nights had done in a similar situation, but decided against it. While this genie certainly had a one-track mind, I didn’t think he was stupid enough to fall for it. He would probably take it as an insult to his intelligence and kill me in some particularly unpleasant fashion.
Well, I wasn’t going to let him do that. “Old age,” I said. “That’s how I want to die.”
The genie’s fierce expression transformed into one of wide-eyed bewilderment: he blinked at me several times. “But…you can’t…that’s not…” His voice, I noticed, had lost its earlier boom.
“You said I could choose,” I reminded him.
The genie stared at me for a few more seconds. Then, with a heavy sigh, he slumped to the floor, where he sat hunched over with his legs crossed and his chin in his hands. “I get tricked into a bottle for twelve centuries,” he muttered to himself, “and what happens when I come out? Tricked again!”
“Wait, I thought you said a sorcerer sealed you in there because you wouldn’t serve him,” I said.
The genie pouted. “Yes, but he did it by a trick. I told him that I could do anything and he bet I couldn’t fit in that little bottle,” he said, jerking his head in the general direction of my left hand, with which I was holding the bronze flask. Good thing I didn’t try to use that old ruse on him.
“I must be the most pathetic excuse for a genie that ever existed,” he sobbed, putting his face in his hands.
Great. Now I had a depressed genie sitting in the middle of my kitchen floor. I didn’t think it was much of an improvement over having a homicidal genie standing in pretty much the same place.
The oddest thing about it all – and this is, you understand, saying a lot – is that I felt sorry for him. I remembered the times when I’d called myself a pathetic excuse for a human being at least once a day, usually when I woke up feeling the effects of some ill-conceived attempt to drown my sorrows the previous night. But while I sympathized somewhat with the genie, I had no idea how I could comfort him. This was more than just sympathy; on the practical side of things, getting him out of his funk was the only way I could think of to make him leave.
Looking down at the bronze flask in my hand, I saw that the engravings on its surface no longer resembled twisting coils, just very stylized vines. I replaced the lotus-flower stopper in the mouth of the bottle and inspected the bottle. It looked quite unremarkable. I don’t know what I’d seen in it in the first place.
But it gave me an inspiration…
I edged cautiously towards the genie and tapped him on the shoulder. He looked up at me, surprised. “Come with me,” I said, turning around and beckoning for him to follow. As an afterthought, I added, “You should probably turn invisible or something, since we have to cross the backyard.”
At first the genie was fascinated by the equipment I had in the shed; he’d never seen anything like it before. In spite of that, once I showed him how to use all the machines and let him try himself, he operated them as if he’d been doing it for years. Though the bronze bottle was harder to cut than my usual glass ones, in the end it couldn’t stand up to the diamond-edged rotating saw. After I made the initial slices, the genie continued on his own. He didn’t try to use his powers, or mention doing so. I think he realized that magic would have defeated the purpose of it all.
It had been early afternoon when I first took the genie to the shed, and I had lost track of time. Now it was an hour after sunset. The genie seemed to have the hang of things, and I trusted him not to make a mess of the place – not any more of a mess than it usually was, anyway. I left him there cutting up the bronze bottle and told him he could use the glass bottles too, if he wanted.
The genie didn’t need to eat or sleep. He stayed working in the shed for three straight days and nights. If I stood by the back door and listened carefully I could often hear the whine of the saw or the dull roar of the blowtorch coming from my little workshop.
I stayed in the house, because I didn’t want the neighbors to realize that it wasn’t me in the shed. I would spend hours standing at the back door, listening, wondering what the genie was doing, but I never disturbed him.
On the morning of the fourth day, when there was only silence from the shed and I was going crazy from restlessness and curiosity, I finally went out to the shed. There was no answer when I knocked on the door, so I just opened it.
The genie was gone. The shed was neater than it had been in years. Everything was squared away and swept clean. In the center of the floor was a small, square box – it used to be a plain wooden box that I’d found and never gotten around to using. Now it was transformed, covered with a carefully patterned mosaic of colored glass and pieces of the bronze bottle, which the genie had flattened with the judicious application of heat from the blowtorch.
Fixed in the center of the lid, gleaming like liquid gold in the sunlight coming through the window, was a blooming bronze lotus flower.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-11-29 06:34 pm (UTC)There were a few things that didn't quite work, but I think they would be pretty easy for you to fix.
1- Something about your early descriptions of her art don't feel quite right. The wording is much more focused on the materials and tools than on the final product, whereas in my art I'm so focused on the final product that the tools and materials are only important because they involve me in the process that gets me there. Then, with the careful application of cutting and engraving tools, a polisher, drills, and sometimes a glassblower’s torch, I shape them for use in a piece of art. It's too methodical for art, and it's too distant from the process, to feel authentic.
2- I do not keep glass bottles in the house. This sentance is in the wrong place. It started me thinking 'typo', which distracted me until I got to the bit about the shed.
3- Now I have another reason for not keeping bottles – but it only makes sense if you know the whole story. I really don't like this transition, although I must admit I have no rational reason for it.
4- I'd like to see a bit more of the genie learning the tools in the shed. It's an important part that I think begs for dialogue.
5- What, exactly, is the point of the lotus flower? Your main character seems satisfied with the return of the design at the end of the story, and I assume it has some sort of meaning, but it doesn't make sense to me.
I'd be happy to look over a revised version for grammatical errors, if you should need a beta. In any case, best of luck to you. I think it deserves to be published. :)
no subject
Date: 2004-11-30 02:20 am (UTC)Check out the revised version in my next post.