Amorous Goods: the Red Leather Boots

Prologue:

A lifelong collector of goods and objects from far and wide has passed and left the entire collection and the business built around them to the only remaining relative, a niece on a career path of her own. Vikki has taken on the task of administering the estate and liquidating the business and collection. However, she has come to find out that many of the goods have been cursed or enchanted with amorous powers that affect those who encounter them. These are the stories of some of those encounters with objects found at Amorous Goods.

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Karen woke up slowly. Her head was a little stuffy, and she thought she had probably drunk one too many strawberry margaritas the previous night. Granted, it had been both Halloween and her fortieth birthday, but still, she felt like she had maybe stepped over a line. She was a respectable person, a history teacher in the local primary school, and it wouldn't do for her to get too carried away.

She stretched and yawned. Her bed was soft and the scent of the laundry softener was floral and familiar. Her body felt stiff, but strangely relaxed at the same time. Had she danced a lot last night? She and Janet had agreed to go to that roadside bar, with line dancing, to celebrate. It was a little too wild for them, because there was that motorcycle gang that occasionally took over the place, but it was the best place to dance around their sleepy little town. Surely one could let go a little for one's fortieth birthday, right?

Maybe she was so sore because she'd worn new shoes. Janet had given her the most beautiful pair of gold embroidered red leather boots for her birthday. She had said she'd bought them at the new shop at Main Street, and they were the only pair, and they were so pretty she would've wanted them for herself, but they were too small for her. Karen had rolled her eyes, and thanked her for being at least the second person she ever thought about. She had put the shoes on, right there at the table at Fred's, deciding to give them a go at the dance floor straight away. Their heels looked just right for it. Funny, she couldn't remember how it had been to actually dance with them.

Her hand touched something. She mapped it with her fingers, and couldn't make sense of it, so she opened her eyes and lifted it up for examination.

It was a leather bag of some sort. She twisted it in her hands. It wasn't a bag, because there weren't any handles to carry it with. There were three holes on one side, positioned to form a triangle, and a short zipper on the other side. She creased her brow. She had never seen this item before, and seeing that she lived alone she had no idea how it could have ended up in her bed.

Karen put it back on the bed and sat up, still yawning. Thank God it was Sunday, and she didn't have to work today. She loved teaching, but the kids could be a handful at times, especially around festivities like Halloween. She was well aware she wasn't a poster girl of authority, and that she constantly struggled to maintain the control of the classroom. She had been a teacher for almost twenty years, and if she had hoped things would improve when she got older, she had been wrong. She sighed, and searched for her fluffy slippers to go to the shower.

She looked at herself in the bathroom mirror and wondered. Maybe she was coming up with a flu or something? She had dark shadows under her eyes, and her face looked pasty and lifeless. Then again, she wasn't a figure of female beauty in the best of days. She was barely five feet tall, and her width was only slightly less than her height. Sometimes she daydreamed of the tall, handsome cowboys that used to go line dancing at Fred's, but she would've looked ridiculous paired with any of them. Not to mention the bikers. Her stomach fluttered at the thought of their wild beards and leather riding gear. No, she shouldn't even think like that, that was too wild for sure.

After the shower she dressed. She put on a dress with a paisley print, one of her favorites, with a fluffy angora cardigan. She wasn't going anywhere today, but she had precious little to dress up to, so she often wore her favorite dresses at home. At work she always dressed more conservatively and discreetly. This was not a sexy outfit per se, but she still didn't consider it conservative enough for work.

Her phone rang, and she picked it up.

"Hi, Janet!"

"Karen! I've been calling over and over! Oh my God, are you alright?"

Janet sounded breathless and horrified, and also something Karen couldn't interpret despite having known her for thirty-eight years. She creased her brow again.

"What are you talking about? I was just waking up, surely you haven't called before? I do have my phone switched on."

She glanced at her cell, and to her amazement, the little green picture of a phone had a number of 27 next to it. 27 missed calls! How was that possible, when she just woke up, and had her phone with her the whole time? She checked to see if the mute switch was on, but it wasn't.

Karen lifted the phone back to her ear. She could hear Janet's agitated blabbering long before she could make out the words.

"Calm down, Janet," she said. "You're not making any sense. Why are you so worked up?"

"And how can you be so calm!" Janet yelled so hard that Karen had to move the phone away from her ear.

"Calm DOWN, Janet," Karen said more sternly. "I don't know what you're on about. I will hang up on you, if you keep yelling like that. You're gonna damage my hearing if you keep it up."

Janet huffed and puffed. "Are you home?" she asked finally. "I'm coming over there. Don't leave."

"Okay, geez," Karen said and rolled her eyes. "Weren't you coming over anyway? I thought we agreed on a movie and pizza today."

Janet drew a deep breath. "Karen. It is Wednesday. Just stay put. I'm coming over."

Janet hung up, and Karen looked at the phone quizzically. This must be some sort of a practical joke, although Janet wasn't one to joke. She was practically the polar opposite of anything humorous. Karen was no prankster herself, but Janet was even stiffer.

The date at the locked screen on her phone said "Wednesday, 4th of November". Karen stared at it. How could Janet have switched the date? This was the most elaborate practical joke she had ever done, for sure.

Karen walked downstairs, stepping over the creaky spots in the wooden stairs with practiced ease. She loved this house, but it was surely old. She considered renovating it at times, but it just seemed so difficult that she kept putting it off. Occasionally, she entertained a daydream or two of the hunky handyman that would come to do it, but that was the furthest she had got to doing anything about it.

She stepped halfway down the stairs, dumbstruck. What on heaven and earth had happened here? There were glasses and plates around the tables and even floor, empty bottles, half eaten pizzas, some sort of clothes sprinkled around the room, and for some reason, feathers. There were black and orange feathers scattered around the room. Her eyes fixed on stains on her beige canvas sofa. Was that blood?

She scouted the downstairs slowly, with growing apprehension. It looked like someone had had the party of a century in her house! Who, and by what right, and why, and how was it even possible when she had been sleeping upstairs?

She got outside just when Janet half walked, half jogged towards her from the direction of her house. Karen stood on the porch, and looked around her yard, with her mouth hanging open.

There were a multitude of bottles and feathers across the lawn as well, and remains of what looked suspiciously like bonfires. Carved pumpkins lined the stairs and the driveway, and the carvings were elaborate and not . . . family friendly. There was a wooden post of some sorts, with some weird looking leather straps hanging from the metal rings attached to it at varying heights. Her ornamental bushes were trampled, and there were gaps in the hedge. It looked like someone had run through it.

Janet approached her carefully. "Karen," she said. "Thank God you're okay. Do you remember anything?"

"Anything about what?" Karen said, and turned her attention to her friend. "What has happened here? I'm telling you, this isn't funny."

"Come on, we'll take your car," Janet said. "I better show you. We'll start at Fred's."

Karen looked at her incredulously, but walked over to her car. Janet prompted her for the keys and climbed to the driver's seat, and Karen shrugged and took the shotgun. For some reason, there were three motorcycles parked behind her garage. She could see them now that Janet backed away from the driveway. Just as Janet swerved away, Karen thought she could see someone sitting up at the far corner of her yard. It almost looked like the leader of the motorcycle gang, the one with the scraggiest beard. Surely it couldn't be? And why did he have no clothes on?

Janet kept her eyes on the road. "Do you remember anything?" she asked again. "Anything at all?"

"You keep asking that," Karen said, annoyed. "About what? Did I drink too much and embarrass myself?"

"You're not going to believe it," Janet said. "You are NOT going to believe it."

Karen was annoyed. Janet was making no sense, and this was getting too drawn out to be funny. They parked outside Fred's and went inside. The bar looked even crummier than normally, it looked like half the wooden chairs were somehow battered, and there were more dents in the walls than Karen remembered. Was this place always so shoddy in the broad daylight?

The bartender paled at the sight of them, and motioned towards the back door. Janet nodded, and took Karen by the arm. They went through the saloon doors labeled "personnel only", and Karen was too outraged to object. This was certainly an elaborate prank.

There was a small office with security camera screens. Janet sat her down in a chair in front of it.

"I've organized the tapes with Fred," she said. "Look, this is where it starts."

From the grainy footage Karen could see herself, and Janet, in the table they had shared. Their strawberry margaritas and wing baskets were on the table. Janet was handing her the gift, she opened it, and admired the shoes. They had the conversation about the boots. She rolled her eyes at Janet, and put them on, trying them for size.

Karen didn't remember what happened next, and she had trouble believing her eyes. She was standing up to try out the new shoes. She stood up, and somehow it looked like she kept standing taller and taller. Her whole posture looked different. She rotated her arms starting with her shoulders, opening her chest, and her posture stayed that way. She wasn't hunched and apologetic like she normally was. How was it possible that her hair looked longer? And did she really put that much makeup on? It was difficult to tell from the footage, but it looked like her lips were darker, and the makeup around her eyes was more pronounced than just a minute before.

Wait, now there was something in her hand. Where did it come from? Something long . . . like a rope? No, this was rigid . . . a whip?

Karen looked at herself, looking around the place with royal dignity, and felt her jaw fall. In the footage, she strode across the floor, and when she left the first camera Janet scurried behind her, apparently trying to say something to her. The footage flicked, and the angle changed to the bar, this must be some sort of a cut and paste edit of footage from multiple cameras.

She stood at the bar, still the whip at hand. How was it possible that she now had a leather mini skirt on? And her blouse looked tighter. It was still her, as plump and short as ever, but her hair looked longer, and like there were some sort of stripes in it. She said something to the bartender, and when he didn't react fast enough, she struck the counter with the whip. Hard. Bartender hurried away, and she turned to look straight at the camera. Karen yelped, and jerked back, and then watched in mute horror as her image smiled lewdly at the camera and winked. It was undoubtedly her, but simultaneously it wasn't. It was someone wearing her face. As obnoxious as it was, she had to admit that whoever - or whatever - it was, it wore her body better than she did herself.

Janet pushed a few buttons at the keyboard. "This is an hour later, when the bikers arrived."

The gang walked in as if they owned the place, like they always did. The crowd on the dance floor shied away from them, except for Karen, who was standing in the middle with her whip. A pair of curved, pointy horns had appeared on her head, resembling the ones the kids wore attached to hair bands while trick-or-treating, although hers looked more realistic. Her legs were spread wide, and she tapped her thigh with the whip, her other hand stretched as she was summoning the bikers with a slow curl of her index finger. They approached her, and surrounded her, so that her shorter figure was almost obscured by muscular male bodies clad in black leather. There was no sound in the footage. After a few seconds, a ripple went through the bikers and they kneeled around her. The leader went first, and everyone, to the last man, followed suit.

"They called you mistress," Janet said, with horror and awe in her voice. "And this is two hours later."

Karen was seen sitting on a chair like a throne. It was elevated, because four bulky bikers were holding it up, kneeling around her with devoted looks on their bearded faces. Their muscles bulged with the strain. She sat sideways in the chair, and now her blouse was missing altogether. It looked like her bra was of the same black leather as her miniskirt, and studded with silver spikes. She flexed her feet, and stroked the red leather boots with the whip.

"This is you leaving the bar," Janet said, again with a push of a button. Inside the bar it looked like a hurricane was breaking loose, with the bikers thrashing the place as they retreated. From the footage taken from the direction of the door, Karen could be seen, moving with feline grace, donning a full-length leather jacket that matched her outfit. She looked straight to the camera, and winked once again. Behind her were three bikers on their hands and knees, and Karen wasn't sure, but it looked like some sort of a leash extended from each of their necks to her hand.

"What the hell," Karen asked, with wide eyes, and looked at Janet. Janet stumbled to get her phone out.

"I followed you to your house," she said. "Here's a rehash of videos I recorded from behind the fence. This went on for the entirety of Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, for all I can tell."

There were four massive bonfires at her lawn. She sat on a chair, much like the throne at the bar, and there seemed to be black and orange feather boas around her neck. Around him were the three bikers, sitting on their haunches and looking at her lovingly. Like . . . she searched for a word . . . like lovesick puppies. They were naked now, and with sick fascination she looked at their rigid cocks, all pointing straight up. She had their leashes in her hand, and now they had collars around their necks. Everyone around them was drinking something.

In the next clip, she was whipping a naked man, who was tied to the pole she had seen in her yard. It was from so far away the picture quality was awful, but maybe it was for the best. She seemed to be enjoying herself, and by the look of the man's erection, so was he.

"Didn't somebody call the police?" Karen asked, stunned. "I mean . . . that's just obscene."

"Funny you should ask," said Janet, sounding like it wasn't funny at all.

In the next clip there were two police officers. Both were bent over and tied to the pole by their arms. Both were taken from behind by naked men clad only with some kind of a leather strip harnesses. They moved in perfect synch, and the light from the bonfires glimmered on their slick dicks. Their faces couldn't be seen, because on their heads they wore leather hoods, with holes only for their eyes and mouth. With a sick, sinking feeling, Karen recognized the mystery item she had found from her bed earlier.

"I think that covers it," Janet said, and put her phone away. "The police stopped coming after that. I kept trying to call you, but I didn't dare come any closer than that. You were sometimes inside the house, but at night you were always outside, with the bonfires."

"And now it's Wednesday?" Karen asked. She was thoroughly shaken, but she couldn't deny her eyes.

"And now it's Wednesday," Janet confirmed. "And in two hours there's an emergency board meeting at the school. Dennis is driving for your immediate dismissal, on the bases of disorderly conduit."

Karen snorted. Dennis was the principle, a repugnant man whose picture should be in the dictionary to denote "sleazy", as Janet often said. He had long tried to get his niece to teach history in Karen's place, but so far he had had no luck convincing the board to let her go, when her teaching was impeccable.

"Of course he is," she snarled. "So what do we do?"

"Well, we have time for lunch before that," Janet said. "Maybe we can think of something."

They went back outside. The bartender very carefully didn't acknowledge them. Janet got into the driver's seat again, and as Karen walked around the car to her side she spotted something at the backseat. Something red, glimmering with gold.

"That's the shop I got the boots from," Janet pointed as they drove by. Karen looked, turning her head and craning her neck.

"Amorous Goods" was printed in slanted golden letters above the dusky window. The window reflected the sunlight, so that she couldn't see any details.

"Actually, we could go to that Italian place next to it, right?" Janet said and put on a signal to park beside the road. "Maybe we can ask about the boots, after we've eaten."

"Or maybe we should do that before eating," said Karen. She stepped outside, and stormed towards the shop, leaving Janet to lock the car and jog after her.

A small brass bell above the door chimed when Karen stepped inside. She let her gaze glide over glass cabinets filled with various objects. It didn't look like there were two of any kind. There was jewelry, clothes, miscellaneous items, even candy. She wondered how Janet had ever happened to come in here.

A woman appeared from behind a green curtain leading to the back room.

"Hi there, I'm Vikki," she said. "What can I do for you?"

Janet entered the store behind Karen, and Vikki's face lit up. "Yes, I was hoping you would come back," she said. "You came by Friday, didn't you? You bought a pair of leather boots?"

"Yes," Janet said, approaching the counter. Karen stepped to stand beside her. "About the boots."

"Oh, you see, that was my mistake," said Vikki. "I was in a bit of a hurry, and didn't realize they were only part of a set. I shouldn't have let you buy them without this."

She lifted a red cowboy hat on the counter. The brim had the same golden embroidery as the boots.

"There was a note attached. It said this would 'help you keep your head on straight'," Vikki said, handing the hat to Janet. "I hope it fits."

"Oh, okay," Janet said, sounding uncertain. Karen could see that she had prepared to complain, but now she was folding, like she always did. Janet was the worst dissatisfied customer in the history of dissatisfied customers. She usually failed to even not use the same service again, no matter how badly she was treated.

"Yes, thank you," Karen said briskly and took the hat. "Now if you'll excuse us, we have to get going, if we're to eat lunch before a meeting."

She took Janet by the arm, and pulled her outside.

"But I thought you wanted to return the boots?" Janet asked.

"Not just yet," Karen said. "I've got an idea."