Amorous Goods: Thyme in a Bottle

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.

The late September rain began to fall in large, soaking drops from the deep green clouds above, making dark splatters on the sidewalk. Alfred held his coat close and dodged into a recessed doorway in an attempt to seek refuge from the approaching deluge.

He was frustrated at being caught by the storm, blaming his manager when he was pulled him into one of those never-ending meetings that occur late Friday afternoon. He had seen the warnings on his phone and had hoped to leave early, but alas, his afternoon destiny declared that would not be the case.

It was well past his normal quitting time, with the meeting was going nowhere at full steam, when the power in the building went out. The office plunged into darkness, pierced only by the beams from the emergency lights and those few computers that had a backup battery. With no light to work by, the meeting was reluctantly postponed until Monday. Alfred made his way back to his desk, and collected his things, before heading for the elevators. As he passed the door to the emergency stairwell, he dawned on him that no power meant no elevators. Coming to an abrupt stop, he turned and entered the stairwell through the door to his right. The air inside was hot and stuffy and by the time he had traveled down six of the twenty-two flights to the ground level, he was soaked with perspiration. The constant round and round of the stairs added to his discomfort, making him slightly dizzy. Reaching the ground floor ten minutes later, he pushed open the door to the street, hoping for some cool, dry air.

Walking to the subway station, he watched the storm clouds continue to build and gather strength above him. As he stepped into the station, he could feel the wind pick up and the temperature drop as the warm and cold fronts collided.

Descending to the platform, he pulled out his phone while waiting for his train to arrive. His digital companion informed him that its battery was low and that he had five downloaded voice messages awaiting his review. Since he was underground he knew could not make calls or send text messages, but he could listen to his voice mail on the ride home. The first message was a tirade from his wife Candice on his lack of consideration for her planned dinnertime, his failure as a husband, and another accusation about an affair he was having with one of his co-workers. The second and third messages were similar to the first, but he could tell Candice was drinking by the increase in her slurred speech. During the fourth rant, the phone's battery exhausted its last electron, and the phone lapsed into silence. Now completely cut off from the world of constant contact, Alfred sighed and began steeling himself for the unpleasant reception waiting for him at home. As the train arrived at the station, Alfred slid his phone into his pants pocket and boarded the car in front of him.

Reaching his station stop twenty minutes later, Alfred exited the train and climbed out of the underground to the densely clouded day. The storm was still forming at his current location, but he was anxious as he started his half-mile trek home. It would have been more convenient for him to drive his car, but Candice insisted that he walk, since he spent most of his day sitting, getting little in the way of exercise. Every day, he trekked to the station unless it was actively raining or snowing when he left in the morning. A forecast of afternoon precipitation was not sufficient enough to allow him to drive, if the morning was clear. In the first few weeks he discovered the most efficient route from his house to the station, and had taken that same route every day since.

So here he was, standing in an alcove waiting for the storm to blow past. Glancing across the street, he noticed the twenty-four hour diner with its bright neon lights, beckoning him to brave the rain for a cup of coffee and a warm place to sit. As he continued to stare at the diner, a confused look passed over his face; he knew this area intimately and he could not remember there being a doorway in the spot where he currently stood. In fact, during a recent outing at the diner with his wife, he remembered commenting on the graffiti covering the solid brick wall of the building across the street. That solid wall was now pierced by the entranceway where he currently stood.

The lights of the diner slowly began to dim and blur as the rain increased in intensity until it was falling in torrents. Trapped and with nothing else to do, Alfred explored the nook around him for some clues to its origin.

The brickwork at the edge and sides of the opening looked old and well established. In fact, in some ways, the brick looked to be older than that of the wall outside. The floor was not concrete like the grey, soaked pavement, but was covered by an elaborate spiral mosaic of dry black and white tiles. Turning around, he found a stout wooden door, not painted but stained a deep red mahogany color and polished to a lustrous gleam. On the left side of the door, a brass escutcheon plate had an oval shaped, crystal doorknob extending outward, and a cavity for an ancient skeleton key. At eye level a small shiny brass plaque proclaiming the store's name, "Amorous Goods". What a strange name, he thought to himself. "Why it almost sounded like, but no, the city zoning council would never allow a sex shop in this neighborhood," he thought to himself.

Alfred was contemplating other possible meanings of the store's name, when a sudden flash of lightning, followed by a rolling wave of thunder, and a cold blast of wind drove the rain into the alcove. Without thinking, Alfred opened the door, stepped inside, shutting the door behind him.

The shop was narrow, dark and musty; his first impression of its interior was brown. Not a soothing earth-tone brown, but the dark, foreboding brown of soil recently dug to make a grave. A trio of bare Edison bulbs hung from the ceiling, their dim filament's golden glow barely illuminating the floor. At the back of the store was a long, glass counter; its interior contents obscured by a layer of dust and dirt. A young lady sat on a stool behind the counter near its left side. On top of the counter, an archaic cash register claimed the far left corner like a mercantile sentinel of times past. Against the rear wall behind the counter, a series of five shelves had been mounted, each filled with an assortment of bottles in various shapes and sizes. A thick, black steam pipe rose from the depths, piercing the center of each shelf on its way upwards to the gloom that enveloped the rafters high above him. As his eyes followed the pipe up, he noticed that there were some musical instruments, a couple of stuffed dolls, an old gas station sign and a skeleton hanging from wires that were nearly invisible in the shadows. Looking around, he saw that the sidewalls were made from exposed, dark red brick on the top and covered by an indistinct but dark wainscoting on the bottom. Down the middle of the store, an aisle of sorts presented a crooked path from the door to the counter.

On the left side of the path, two tables were piled high with a haphazard array of leather bound books. Between the tables was an oversize grandfather clock, which for some reason seemed to be missing its pendulum. A large speaker enclosure, labeled Mach 1 in large letters, acted as a buffer between the furthest table and the glass counter.

On the right side of the path, three round racks of assorted clothing were being separated by a large Victorian dollhouse painted pink, a waist high console radio from a bygone era and, between the counter and the last rack was a table with a Radio Shack TRS-80, model 100 and a vintage electric fan (of the finger slicer design).

Walking down the aisle, Alfred stopped to look at the books on the table, but their age and condition did not excite him enough to actually examine them closely. When he was halfway into the store, the accumulated dust and dirt obscuring the contents of the counter yielded, and he was able to make out the eclectic set of items contained within. He was able to identify a coil of rope, a long knife, a lava lamp, a pipe wrench, a short piece of metal pipe, a pair of red taper candles, a blackened candlestick, a gun and an Aladdin style oil lamp.

As he stood there gazing into the counter from a slight distance away, the young lady looked up and said, "Can I help you?"

Looking up, slightly startled, Alfred said, "It was pouring down rain outside, so I stepped in to get out of the storm. I hope you don't mind."

"That's fine," the lady said in a brisk voice that implied a total disinterest bordering on dislike for customers or company, "but I will be closing soon. If you have any questions, please ask. The books and garments are imports from overseas and are half off their marked price. I haven't a clue about the items in the case, but the other items scattered about have price tags on them. If you see something that really interests you however, I'm sure we can come to a satisfactory arrangement."

Just as she finished speaking, there was a sudden feeling in the air; a type of tingling that makes your hair stand on end. Then a blast of lightning struck the building causing the lights to blink out. In the complete darkness, Alfred could just see faint electrical sparks traveling up and down the steam pipe, almost as if they were searching for something. After a moment, the sparks formed a ring around the pipe, right at the level of the middle shelf, causing a bottle near the pipe to be flung off onto the floor below. The bottle rattled as it impacted the tile floor, but gave no indication that it had broken. Their work done, the mysterious sparks vanished, and the lights began to glow again, like frightened children peaking out from under their blankets.

The young lady stared, wide eyed, at the fallen bottle, picked it up then exclaimed, "Of all the things that have happened in this store, that had to be the strangest. Mind you, I don't really believe in omens, but I think this might be one. That bottle was meant for you."

"Oh, no," Alfred replied, waving his hands in a dismissive gesture, "I didn't intend to buy anything and besides, I short on cash and I really need to get home." With that, Alfred started turning to leave.

The young lady thought for a moment then said, "When I was younger, my grandfather would bring me here and show me the wonders he had collected. He once told me that every item in the store had a destiny to fulfill, and that it sometimes took a strange occurrence to connect an object to its intended owner. When he died, he left me this store in his will along with instructions to make sure each item ends up in its intended home. Go with your gut, he told me and you can never go wrong."

She examined the bottle for a moment then placed it on the glass counter top. It was about the size and shape of a liquor miniature, made from dense brown glass, and seemed to have something inside. A small cork stopper sealed the top, and melted wax covered the cork to help ensure the contents stayed secured. An old, yellowed, folded piece of paper wrapped around the waist of the bottle contained a single elegant handwritten word: Thyme.

"Why you are destined to own a small bottle of spice I don't know," she said, "but I can tell you that each item belongs to someone, and I'm sure this item belongs to you."

Alfred approached the counter, and picked up the bottle, which felt warm in his hand. As he started to put back down, she pleaded, "No, please, keep it. If nothing else, you can use it to spice up an egg omelet."

Alfred smiled at that, and put the bottle in the outer pocket of his coat.

"I guess I better see if the storm has abated. My wife was already angry enough at my being late and I best not upset her further." Alfred sighed.

"Well good luck to you. I hope everything works out the way you want," the young lady replied.

Alfred headed back to the entrance but stopped just before opening the door. Turning back he looked toward the counter and saw that the young lady had opened the register and was counting the change. Knowing that this was a task not compatible with interruptions, Alfred decided that he could not procrastinate any longer, so he opened the door and left the store.

Upon stepping outside, he saw that the rain had stopped; in fact the sidewalk and street were bone dry and the sun was shining brightly. Striding out into the sunshine, Alfred continued his walk home; unaware that the alcove he had just exited was morphing back into a solid brick wall.

During the remainder of his walk home, Alfred's thoughts were not of the strange store and the occurrences of the past few minutes, but of his wife Candice. They had married some 30 years ago, he was an upcoming accountant in his mid-twenties, and she, all of twenty-one years old, worked in the mailroom delivering packages through out the office. She was tidy, efficient, and quite a flirt in those days. In fact it was her flirting gave him the courage to ask her out. After three dates, their relationship bloomed to one full of passion, and less than a year after that first date, he proposed to her. With his fiscal planning, they were able to afford many of the good things in life and soon talk of having children became the subject du jour. Her drive to have children made her do wild and crazy things in order to encourage frequent and repeated intercourse.

He fondly remembered the night they planned to have a romantic dinner out followed by an evening of making love. She was dressed to the nines in a slinky black dress, with spaghetti straps, low cut in front, backless, and slit up the side almost to her waist. It clung to her modest figure like a coat of paint, highlighting the swell of her ass and the soft curves of her breasts. As they drove to the restaurant, she commented that the weather was turning very cold, but she didn't want to wear her coat because the ones she owned made her look matronly. Looking over, he noticed the two sharp points of her large, plump nipples pushing against the thin fabric of her dress.

On a whim, and since they did not have a timed reservation, he made a short detour to a nearby boutique that sold furs. They shopped for about an hour, as she tried on coat after coat. The full-length fur she selected was deep silver; she couldn't stop stroking it all the way to the restaurant. Reluctantly giving up her new fur at the coat-check, she made sure to put the claim ticket in her clutch before taking Albert's hand. At the table, she slid into the booth first, patting the seat next to her as an invitation for him to sit beside her. Once he was settled in, she commented that this was much cozier than sitting across from each other, and tonight was going to be all about cozy.

They exchanged kisses, shared wine, and an occasional touch. When she first placed her right hand on his pant-covered cock, he jumped, so she released his cock, and took hold of his left hand. Pulling his hand under the table, she slid it up between her spread legs until it rested on her bare pussy. She whispered to him that wearing panties with this dress was out of the question since the lines would show as clearly as a hard cock. He remembered her giggling when she said, "Besides, the look on your face was priceless".

They continued eating, their hands gently stroked, teasing and edging each other. Between the wine and his caressing touch, she was very flushed and extremely horny by the time the meal ended; he was as hard as an iron pipe and there was a spot on his pants from his leaking pre-cum. They agreed to skip dessert, so he called for the check while she excused herself to "touch up her makeup". As she walked away from him, she swayed her ass with exaggerated prominence. She stopped briefly at the Maître De desk before disappearing down a hallway to the restrooms.

The check paid, he waited at the table for her to return. When she did, she was wearing her fur coat and carrying a medium size paper bag. He asked about the bag, figuring she had ordered some dessert to go, but she sidestepped the question, took his hand and led him from the restaurant. Once in the car, he started the engine but before he could shift into gear, she briefly opened her coat, revealing her naked body. With the light from the parking lot illuminating her glistening skin, she reached into his lap, unzipped his pants and fished out his rapidly hardening cock. Bending over, she told him to drive carefully before placing her head in his lap and filling her mouth with his cock.

Needless to say, he had a difficult time concentrating on the road as she gently sucked and licked him. He even drove through a stop sign, causing him to swear loudly, and her to giggle; a sensation that almost put him over the edge. When they arrived home, she sat up in her seat, put her hands in her still naked lap and waited. As he started to put his cock away she stopped him, telling him to be a gentleman and get the door for her. So he stepped out of the car and walked around to her door with his six-inch cock pointing the way. He was only slightly startled when he opened the door to find her stroking her pussy. As he offered his hand to help her, she slid two fingers deep inside herself before placing that hand into his. Being a courteous gentleman, he had to kiss and lick her fingers clean. Once out of the car, she slipped off the coat, threw it over her shoulder and walked slowly to the front door. Needless to say, their lovemaking session that night surpassed all prior encounters except, maybe their honeymoon night. It wasn't the only time she went naked under that coat, but it was the most memorable.

Years passed and no children arrived. They went to a doctor, took the fertility tests, and discovered that there was a problem with her uterus. His little swimmers were having a great time, but polyps were preventing the eggs from attaching. Gradually, she became despondent and depressed as their sex life slowed to a trickle, then stopped altogether. Alfred suggested they see a marriage counselor, but that just made her angry and even more withdrawn.

Looking up, Alfred realized that his daydreaming had distracted him quite thoroughly and he was now standing at his front door. Where those particular memories had come from, he wasn't sure, but he knew that it would not reoccur anytime in the near future.

Walking inside, he noticed an open bottle of whisky and an empty glass on the living room table. Candice came staggering in from the kitchen wearing an old dingy housecoat and a pair of ragged, fuzzy bedroom slippers.

"Why didn't you call? My dinner is ruined! You fucking, ungrateful ass! I spend all day cooking and washing your putrid clothes and you don't even have the courtesy to let me know you will be late. Are you still screwing around with that bimbo from work? I'll bet you are, you bastard," she screamed before flopping down on the couch to cry and pour another drink from the half empty bottle.

Alfred kept silent because he knew whatever he said would be twisted and turned against him as her fury built. Hanging his coat on the coat rack by the door, he dejectedly walked up the stairs to get changed.