Autograph
By de Vere
From de Vere's upcoming collection of short stories,
LET: Tales of Love, Eros and Taboo
. Some are true stories, some are fiction. Some are aspirational. You decide which are which.
The names have been changed to protect the naughty.
Writers live to write.
The act of crafting words to be printed on paper for people to read in bedrooms, on airplanes, on a sweaty recliner on some tropical beach, that is what we do. But simply writing a book—no matter how good, how captivating, how salacious—that does not put a book into a reader's hands. This mercantile task requires marketing, a chore authors loathe. I certainly did, early in my career. The book signings, the interviews, the travel to small towns only large enough for a bookstore where the locals considered an author reading from his book to be quality entertainment. That is the universally-hated bane of an author's existence.
That changed, though. Certainly in a way not anticipated.
Following a moderately-successful series of crime stories and historical novels, the idea for a sexually-charged crime story came to me in a moment of true inspiration. I ruminated for months about how it might be possible to craft a whodunit where the body of the victim is discovered, but that victim is still alive. Suddenly it came to me nearly fully-formed.
That is how my novel
Inside Pandora's Box
came to be, and soon a different type of audience came out to hear me speak or sign their copy at book fairs or Barnes & Noble. Less gray-haired, less male. This book reached women, touching something deep inside, and my personal appearance audiences soon morphed into mothers of school-age children, lonely divorcees, those who had nursed spring-break hangovers
Inside Pandora's Box
while in college.
Women less interested in how the mysterious body came to rest inside the eponymous box, instead, the tales of forbidden love, the tragic romance that drove the crime fascinated them. Strangely, that is the part I enjoyed writing most, a love they felt steaming from the pages. Fewer people asked about the crime. All they cared about was about the lovers. Even the most taboo aspects of the entwined love stories spellbound these women.
This prospect never occurred to me while writing. What I had hoped would not overly offend—what I call the
ick-factor—
instead aroused something deep and dark in women living desperately unfulfilled suburban lives, an unsuspected demographic who devoured that book and each one that followed. And I discovered another benefit to writing, one not financial.
The first one I bedded was a slender, fortyish brunette with crystal blue eyes named Margaret. During an early version of my bookstore presentation before a crowd of perhaps thirty, she asked, "When you are writing your love scenes, are you thinking of women in your life, or are they purely imaginary?"
"If it is possible for a man to conjure a realistic woman purely from his imagination, I have not met him. Mine are rarely based upon one woman, typically a combination of two or three living, breathing women. Old girlfriends, ex-wives," the crowd laughed, imagining which traits of my villainous characters those exes inspired, "friends. Between marriages, I surrounded myself with a group of interesting women, though not romantically."
"Although from time to time some interest arose. I enjoy the company of women, but in that season of my life, I needed the connection, not the sex. Several made their way into one of my characters in one way or another. I guess you can say my characters are literary brides of Frankenstein. Which, I suppose, explains a lot."
Margaret and I sipped coffees at a little coffee shop down the block, knowing neither really wanted coffee. The first of her children were not expected home from school until four, her husband much later, so we spent the rest of the morning and much of the afternoon in a hotel.
From the way she appreciated the time with my face buried between her legs, I suspect years had passed since she last experienced kisses there. Nor had she swallowed her husband's seed since before her first child was born—that much she told me, lying in bed while I played with one erect nipple after she sucked mine down as if drinking the most delicious vanilla milkshake from a straw.
I know a gold mine when I see one. I developed a sixth sense in picking them out the moment they arrived, before they had chosen a seat the stores set aside for presentations. Tall, thin blondes resembling Cheyenne, the book's seductive mystery woman. Busty, well-dressed housewives wishing they had the balls of Priscilla, the main character's bitchy wife. Once a gorgeous Latina showed up wearing nursing scrubs, exactly as another of my characters.
Needless to say, it pleased me to no end when she told me she had just completed a twelve-hour shift at the hospital nearby.
"The worst part," she explained, "is I can never sleep during the day, and no one's around to spend my days with."
Of course, that afternoon I kept Yasmin company, taking turns sharing ideas about how the main male character in the book would have entertained himself with the Latina nurse character. She took the role-playing all the way, and I had no objection. She even dug a traditional nurse's dress from her closet, changing into it the moment we arrived at her apartment, which I insisted she wear as she straddled me and took me inside of her.
Eventually, though, the thick polyester fabric keeping my hands from the flesh of her breasts grew tiresome. And those B-cups felt incredible in my hands and to my lips. But the memory of her olive skin against the pure white of that nurse's dress, long, dark hair falling over the shoulders as she moved her hips slowly up and down is the one that often returs to me at night.
Their questions gave themselves away. The woman who asked whether it is necessary to have a threesome in order to write about one. The women who delved into the taboo love stories. When they ask about the characters as real people or, better yet, as myself, those were the ones who slipped me a piece of paper with a phone number while I signed their books.
One girl was nothing like that.
Her red hair shone like a beacon sitting in a relatively large crowd at a bookstore in Athens, Georgia. She also stood out due to her age. College students rarely attend book signings even in these college towns, making her unique among the lovely women in their thirties and forties in the crowd.
Although she asked no questions, she hung on every word, sky-blue eyes following my every move. Disarmingly disguised by a bookish appearance, a nerdy look cultivated by large, black-frame glasses which, if intended to minimize her beauty, achieved quite the opposite effect. She noticed how frequently my eyes drifted back to her, although for quite a different reason than the brunette in front whose carefully-selected blouse distracted me with an awesome display of cleavage.
Sherry was her name. A real estate agent, from the card she slipped to me with her cell number circled. A tight little butt, too, noticeable when she walked away from the autograph table with a flirty, personal message inscribed inside.
I had begun imagining an afternoon with Sherry showing me homes in the area, hopping onto a granite counter top to ask,
See anything you like
?
"Hi. My name's Virginia. I so love your books. I've read all of them."
"Thank you, Virginia. Beautiful name. Which is your favorite?"
"This one." The nerdy redhead slipped a well-worn paperback in front of me to autograph. "I don't have to buy one today for you to sign, do I?"
"Of course not. I'll sign anything for a fan, although," I glanced back at those eyes framed in black plastic, slightly distorted by lens glass, "I did not expect people your age to read this. If I had, I might have spared a few details."
Indignantly, she asked, "How old do you think I am?"
The most-feared question a woman can ask. Typically I guess low, careful of the fragile, middle-aged egos of women I wished to entertain after an event, but it is just as tricky with younger women. Her face had some maturity, but the diffident expression of a teenager, loose clothing over an impossibly thin body that made her modest breasts seem large. So I guessed a year or two higher than I really believed. "A junior in high school?"
Her eyes narrowed and her face reddened. "Off by four years. A junior in college." Defensively producing a UGA ID card bearing her photo which she slid back too quickly for me to see her entire birthdate, just the year indicating she was either nineteen or twenty.
"Sorry. Someday you will be thrilled when people underestimate your age, but that's likely a few years off yet. Remember me when you are forty and someone asks for your ID when buying a bottle of wine." I slid her book back, which she read while the woman behind her placed a brand-new copy of that same book down for me to sign.
"
A book's characters only age if the author allows them to. Thank you for your dedication, and may my future works continue to bring you enjoyment
." she read aloud. "Can I ask you a favor?"
Still embarrassed for humiliating a college student by calling her a high-school girl, while signing the next woman's book, I answered, "Ask away!"
"I am studying to be a writer, too. English Lit. I've never had a chance to meet an author. Well, besides one professor, but he writes boring shit. Not like your books. Yours make me
feel
, you know?"
"Thank you, but I have to see someone this afternoon."
"I can buy you lunch. I have so many questions, about your inspiration, how you make readers care about your characters."
Something about the way she asked made it impossible to say no. I pitied the helpless frat boys at the university, although she had yet to harness her powers. That would come with time. Besides, there would still be plenty of time during the afternoon for the lovely realtor to show me the master bedrooms of a few houses. "You drive a hard bargain, Virginia. Pick a restaurant, but I well remember my student days. My treat. Can you get good Thai nearby?"
Indeed, Athens offered several Thai restaurants we passed as she drove her silver Miata with me tailing close as I could in my less-nimble car. The place she chose was a bit pricey for a college budget, so I suspected she took advantage of my offer. After the excellent satay, I did not care.
After I ordered green curry, Virginia asked the waitress which of their curries is their hottest. Told it is the red one, she ordered, "Than I will have that."
"Make mine the same." To her quizzical expression, I replied, "You only live once, right?"
She asked insightful questions, the kind expected from a student who chose to major in English Lit. for reasons other than a career teaching high school English, as she explained her mother was. Why I chose certain situations in my books, the themes, symbolism I assumed went unnoticed by readers drawn more by the salacious aspects of the novels. Finally, after the scorching curries arrived, I asked what aspect of my novels appealed to her most.
