Category: Short Stories

I have an imp that I keep in a Grand Marnier liquor bottle. The bottle is stopped with a cork and sealed with red wax. I keep the bottle on the dresser in my bedroom. Sometimes, when I’m having sex, I hear the little imp jumping up and down in the bottle. I hear muffled shouts when I orgasm and I hope the imp enjoyed it as much as me. My partners have never commented on the bottle or on any sounds so I don’t think any of them have paid much attention to my bottled imp.

A Grand Marnier bottle was once given to me by Professor E. J. Herbert, professor of literature and ancient religion. Professor EJ (we all called him EJ) taught a course called Magic and Myth in European Literature. As a witch who has lived for centuries, I decided to take EJ’s course to find out how much people know, whether it’s true or based upon some fanciful idea of what might have been.

On the first day of class, EJ placed a Grand Marnier liquor bottle, a paper bag with the top scrunched shut, and a rectangular box on a table in the front of the room. He said that at the end of class he wanted us to tell him what was inside each of the containers. Whoever got it right could take one of the containers home.

Then EJ proceeded to lecture on Tolstoy’s The Imp and the Crust for over an hour. I had no idea that anyone could talk about a short story for over an hour and I stopped paying attention after the first ten minutes.

At the end of class, EJ went around the room asking each student what was in the containers on the table. No one got it right.

EJ came to me and I said, “orange liquor, some recently picked ears of corn, and a loaf of just baked sourdough bread.”

EJ congratulated me and because no one had gotten even one thing right, he gave all three items to me. The other students bolted from the room as I stayed behind to collect my prizes.

“How did you know?” EJ asked.

“I could smell the corn and the bread,” I said. “And the liquor was just a good guess. You know, liquor bottle, filled with liquor.” It was a lie, of course. I knew what was in the containers because I could see through them.

“Well, how about I pick up a couple of steaks and we take all this stuff back to my apartment for dinner?” EJ asked.

That was transparent, I thought. The items didn’t have anything to do with the lecture. I wondered how often he had used this ploy to hit on a college girl.

I looked him over. He was over forty, but I’d never been one to worry about age differences. Looks and the spark of sexual excitement were far more important to me. His brown hair fell in soft curls over his ears. I liked that. These days so many men were shaving their heads and going macho bald. It was refreshing to see a man commit to having unruly hair. He smiled, showing his perfect white teeth. His eyes were blue. I went to his apartment for dinner.

We opened the Grand Marnier after dinner and sipped it in front of his big screen TV. It was tuned to a classical music channel and colored lights waved and flashed to the rhythm of Vivaldi. We had sex on a Persian rug on the floor.

We saw each other frequently after that, always at his apartment. Dinner was always a piece of red meat, grilled just enough to heat it through but still leave it bloody and two fresh vegetables, steamed, whatever was in season. Snifters of Grand Marnier followed dinner. Sex followed snifters.

EJ fell in love with me. I didn’t want a husband and broke up with him. He was jealous when I dated other men. He became a pest. He followed me on dates. It became tiresome. I thought briefly about leaving school, about going to another country or another century. But I discarded the idea. I liked it here. I liked being a college student at an American university. I liked the freedom to drink and smoke pot and have sex with random people. I wasn’t ready to give it up.

I bought a bottle of Grand Marnier and invited EJ over. It was during the Christmas break and neither of us had anywhere to be. We ate blood rare steaks and drank Grand Marnier and fucked like bunnies, uninterrupted. When the Grand Marnier ran out, I cast a shrinking spell on EJ and stuffed him into the empty bottle. I cursed him with immortality and then sealed the bottle.

All that racket he makes when I’m having sex thrills me. I see him jumping up and down in the bottle screaming, “Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! You should only have sex with me!” Maybe I’ll let him out one day and do it with him again. But for now, I’m enjoying the parade of casual lovers coming through my bedroom and the frenzy of the imp inside the Grand Marnier bottle.

George died a horrible death. Cancerous nodules riddled his body. They lodged in his lungs, in his throat, and on his bones. The pain was excruciating. Eloise, unable to bear the weight of his agony, pumped him full of morphine until his breathing slowed and stopped altogether.

Eloise called hospice. The nurse came and confirmed that George was dead. They called the undertaker who came in due course and, finally, it was over. The nurse stayed long enough to offer Eloise the remaining anti-anxiety medications that had once been George’s. He was doped up enough so that the fear of dying became remote, a hazy notion through a drug-induced fog. Eloise thanked the nurse and waved her off.

When the house was once again quiet, Eloise went out into the backyard. There, in the full light of the moon, she smoked a cigarette and wondered what she should do now. For months she had done nothing but take care of George. Now what?

From the bushes at the side of the house came a small squeak. The squeak repeated several times, at length penetrating Eloise’s consciousness enough she recognized the sound as a meow. She went to the bush to investigate. Stooping down, she saw a small kitten hiding among the twigs and leaves. The small creature meowed again and turned its big round eyes up to her.

Eloise snuffed out her cigarette in the dirt and reached into the bushes and picked up the kitten. She held it up to her breast and lowered her face to its head. The kitten purred. Precious little thing, she thought. Then something  crawled from the cat to her throat. Fleas! “Hell,” Eloise cursed. She held the cat out away from her body and looked at it. Its hind legs dangled. Its head seemed to wobble. “You have fleas!” she accused.

In the house, she ran warm water in the kitchen sink, added mild dish soap, and then dunked the little creature. The kitten struggled, but Eloise was the larger animal and she prevailed. She thoroughly washed the kitten, dried it, and combed it with a fine-toothed comb that caught all the remaining fleas and eggs in its teeth. The little kitten was flea free at last.

In the days that followed, Eloise planned the funeral, called the relatives, and played host to people who came to visit her. It seemed like everyone wanted to drop by the house to offer their condolences. Where were you, Eloise wondered silently, when I was struggling to care for my dying husband? But she never asked them that. Instead, she smiled and thanked them for coming. Then cursed them as they drove away.

She was angry about everything. Angry that her young husband had died of cancer. Angry that he died before they had children. Angry that it left her with a mountain of medical bills she could never hope to pay off.

The stream of visitors dwindled to no one. For days on end it was only Eloise and the little kitten in the house. Eloise let the television run on the Nickelodeon channel around the clock, the volume turned low so that the television never bothered her. She couldn’t quite make out the dialogue that was being spoken, but the sound of canned laughter always came through, tinny and false. She rarely watched the television. Instead, she puttered around the house, packing this and that. Labeling boxes for storage, give to Goodwill, or take to dump. Canned laughter cutting through the air. Every time she heard it, every time it reached past her wall of grief and caught her heart, she scoffed. Life is so very, very funny.

When she wasn’t packing, she wandered from room to room, touching a table here, opening and closing a cabinet there. Mindless movements inspired by a muddled mind.

Through all the packing and the wandering, the little kitten stayed with her. Most of the time the cat sat on her shoulder, often wrapping itself around her neck. The little creature purred and purred. It slept on her pillow at night. It sat beside her plate when she ate. Eloise hadn’t gone to the store for cat food, so the kitten ate what she ate. Tuna salad for lunch, cheerios with milk for breakfast, and unidentifiable frozen entrees for dinner. Eventually, Eloise knew, she would have to go to the store. Eventually, she would have to rejoin society. Eventually.

When there was nothing left of George’s things to pack, Eloise took to her bed. The little kitten slept with her. They slept for days. Once the kitten left and came back dragging a cellophane of saltine crackers and dropped them by her face. Eloise nibbled on a cracker and rubbed behind the kitten’s ears.

And then one day she got up. She took a shower, washed her hair, and put on jeans and a tee shirt. She had worn nothing but a grimy sweat suit for days on end. It felt good to shower and dress. Outside, the sun was shining. She sat in the Adirondack chair that George had made in his wood shop and raised her face to the sky.

It wasn’t until later that night she realized the little kitten was gone. She searched the house. Then she searched the yard. No little kitten. She tore out the bush where she had found the kitten. No kitten.

In time she got on with her life; without George, without the kitten.