Just for fun

I had to do a creative writing exercise for my language arts class. I was surprised when I started doing my assignment because it seemed like the ideas just flowed. I became so "programmed" to think in certain ways at my old PR job or to regurgitate material from textbooks for class that I kind of lost my creative juices. I seriously had a hard time even coming up something to write in a birthday card that was meaningful...it was very, very strange. I guess because business creative is far from creating characters and stories. In business you are given your subject and then you think about your angles and press releases. Free writing is so much harder because you have to create everything yourself.

Anyhow, I wrote a cute little story that I thought I'd share.

Love Potion?

I was so stupid to think I could order love potion online that actually worked. What was I thinking? Three payments of $19.95 was supposed to reward me with the kind of love affair “you only see in movies such as Ghost, Romeo and Juliet, and Titanic.” I completely fell for the worse infomercial that had ever been on late night cable TV. My love life had really been in the gutter, and I had been trying to catch the eye of the bank teller who cashed my check every Friday. He looked just like Johnny Depp and smelled like a mixture of sandlewood and crisp mountain air in the winter. The problem was, he never knew I existed. He never looked up from his desk after he called “next” to the person waiting for a bank transaction. Why did I torture myself? I used to make up excuses to stay in line, which got time consuming and ridiculous. I was late for work twice because I kept taking fake urgent work calls just so I could have him deposit my check. Love potion seemed to make sense, or at least make him look up. I hoped.

The third Wednesday in March the package arrived at my doorstep. My precious vial of what I thought was going to help award me the man of my dreams was packaged in a plain brown box. The label was handwritten and looked as if the person who wrote it certainly had been receiving the AARP magazine for quite some time. The clear packaging tape was sloppily holding the flaps of the box together which made the tape easy to pull off the box. I loathe trying to open packages taped up like Fort Knox, and having my package show up easy to open seemed like foreshadowing that things would work out in my favor.

I stood in my tiny white kitchen, took a deep breath and slowly pulled the tape off the top of my package. White packing peanuts fell promptly onto my counter and I had to keep swatting Betty, my black Persian cat, away from eating them. After fishing around for a few seconds in the sea of Styrofoam I placed my fingers around the smooth glass vial. The vial was blue and shimmered in the light reflecting beautiful rainbow colors. I could see the liquid inside was thick and tar-like. The sound of Betty’s playful meows broke my concentration on the vial and I looked in the box to see if there were instructions. From the box I pulled a sheet of roughly torn notebook paper that had written on it “Drink after breakfast. See the person you want. Prick your finger to draw blood and then touch his/her top right hand with the finger that is bleeding. Be sure to do exactly this or you’ll be sorry. No refunds.” Seemed easy enough, kind of gross, but I thought I could manage it.

Getting through the rest of Wednesday and Thursday seemed to be an eternity. Friday morning came and I woke up smiling. Anticipation and excitement filled my body. I felt warm and giddy. My shower was long and hot with all the at-home spa treatments I could squeeze into an hour. I pulled my hair up and slid into my hippest pair of Lucky blue jeans and Jimmy Choo heels. I felt like a million bucks, and I looked like it too. Looking in the mirror at myself after a nice swipe of red lipstick, I wondered why he never paid attention to me, or any other girl for that matter. Well, not anymore. Hopefully this potion would work and he’d be mine!

I skipped down the hall from my bedroom to the kitchen, kissed Betty and then carefully placed the vial in my purse. Heading to work I hummed a little tune my mom used to sing to me when I was young and let out a little giggle because I couldn’t wait to cash my check. 11:00 AM came quickly that morning. I snatched my check from the boss and ran to the bank. I pricked my finger, got in line. There he was in all of his glory. I started to shake. How on earth was I going to pull this off? But, no way was I going to have second thoughts.

I waited in line, he called my name, I slipped him my check and looked down at my hand to be sure my finger was still bleeding. Calmly I raised my finger as he handed my check back to me and swiped his LEFT hand. Oh no! Oh No! I was scared to see what on earth was going to happen. The note said I would be sorry if I didn’t follow the directions exactly.

I don’t need to tell you what happens to a woman who goes into a bank with a bloody finger and tries to grab a teller.

But, while my new accommodations are cold and I don’t really like the bars I stare at everyday, the good news is: there is this guard. He is so adorable. Looks just like Johnny Depp and smells like a mixture of sandlewood and crisp mountain air in the winter. And, for just three payments of $19.95 I could make him fall in love with me and maybe get out of this rat trap…