Friday's Whims of the Time Traveler 31.1: May 9th, 2010
"Caramel Kisses" is an unfinished novel I began to write back in 2009 and stopped working on in 2010. The two main characters - Adriana Maguire Reynard and Emma Burking - would ultimately be revised for my later completed novella, "The Liffey Is Half-Asleep," in 2011. Several elements of "Liffey" can be found in their original forms in "Caramel Kisses," such as the characters' names, the haiku scene, and Adriana's penchant for writing.
Because of its influence on my later writing, I figured that this story, though incomplete, was worth sharing.
Caramel Kisses: Chapter Seventeen
by Belinda Roddie
“They want to bring it to the Orpheum,” announced Hudd as he swooped me into a hug that lifted me off my feet and overlooked his tiny stature.
“Really?” I gasped, as he set me down and my feet shook noticeably on the plush carpet. I was worried my ankles would give out; I felt completely disjointed from the whole experience.
“You’re damn right, really,” replied Hudd, and he laughed and did a crazy little dance across the floor. He left scuffs on the carpet as he zipped about like a train off its rails. “Two producers talked to me after the show about it. And they want me to direct it again. And if they really like it, they’ll take it to New York!”
“That’s incredible,” I managed to say.
“I know, right?” Hudd cried, and he hugged me again, squeezing my arms and shoulders against my sides and tightening my lungs like ropes. “And it’s all thanks to you, my fine writing friend! All thanks to you!”
I obligatorily blushed at the extraordinarily elevating compliment, but I let the feeling subside as Hudd led me past the lobby to a dining set-up in one of the adjacent rooms. We had rented a floor of a fancy hotel to celebrate the play, deciding to dance if it went well and drink if it went badly. Now Hudd was proclaiming both were necessary, as he beckoned over two hotel workers with ice buckets of champagne and skipped over to the many tables set up around the corner of the room. The musicians he had hired out of his own pocket were prepared with the usual jazz standards that I couldn’t help loving. The saxophonist, a squat white man with blond hair like he was wearing a straw hat, saw me and gave me a thumbs up because he had watched the play with his wife.
I returned the gesture and turned to find Emma flinging herself into my arms for the fourth time since the curtain call. She had had to back off as several audience members shook my hand and showered me with the usual compliments and mentions of being personally affected, sprinkled like a chocolate drizzle over a cake. It had all tasted unbearably sweet and I had been happy to follow a gleeful Hudd backstage where he jumped around and bobbed his brown head at each actor, some of them looking like they were about to cry from all the shock of the reception.
“Let me guess…you told me so?” I prompted her, and she laughed and shook her head because she had said that line twice already and that it’d get too tiring on me if she reiterated it. She stroked my cheeks with the palms of her hands and left a soft texture on my skin.
“I’m just happy for my little prince,” she said, smiling.
I couldn’t help laughing at that. “Little Prince?” I asked. “What am I, a creation of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry?” And when Emma gave me an odd look I put on a high falsetto and demonstrated. “Now draw me a sheep, miss!”
She got it then. “You’re helpless,” she teased, pinching my arm as if to get back at me for the night before. “You are absolutely helpless.”
I shrugged. “Not much I can do about it,” I said coyly.
“Good. Stay that way.”
The cast of the show had already crowded into the room, all dressed casually as they had rushed over here from signing autographs. Some crew members were there as well, though I wasn’t surprised that others weren’t, either racing home thanking the heavens that it was over or enjoying the rest of the theater festival. But I couldn’t focus on any other play but my own now. Not by a long shot. I was happy to be away from the stage, breathing in the atmosphere of accomplishment and praise and just the plain old satisfaction of it all.
Hudd poured Emma and me two glasses of champagne and we toasted to everything we thought of. Emma toasted to England, to her father, and of course to me, my complimentary love. Hudd toasted to theater and to his native land in India and to the gods themselves for his undeserved karma. I toasted, at last, to San Francisco, to my cynical family, to the love of the theater and love of writing and love itself, and I caused a scene by kissing Emma loudly on the lips as Hudd laughed and raised an eyebrow at the whole presentation.
The band started playing and some of the actors and guests, the latter having scampered over from either the show or from their little houses on Hudd’s request, scattered themselves around the bigger spaces separating the tables and kicked up their heels in a typical classic dance. I smiled at the fact that we were actually dancing, and not rubbing on each other, though some of the younger actors seemed displeased that we had a band and not some DJ with sunglasses and dark stubble putting an iPod on shuffle. I was a bit overwhelmed and subsequently too mentally worn out from the performance to be dancing just yet, so I asked Hudd to take Emma out on the floor while I had some crab to eat and some ice water to drink.
Hudd grinned. “Don’t worry, I’ll bring her right back to you when we’re done,” he said. He bowed to Emma and took her hand as she grinned and nodded approvingly. “Shall we, Miss Burking?”
There was no denying that Emma liked Hudd and his antics, and she certainly loved dancing with him. She didn’t have to tell me for me to figure it out. But as I sat by the table and was sporadically visited by the occasional guest to give me the standard congratulations and comments, I couldn’t help but notice her eyes locked on me as she whirled by laughing with the man whose forehead barely was at the same level as her eyes. It was not an anxious look, nor an angry or frustrated one; she wasn’t upset that I had handed her off to a man while I lazily lounged and put my feet up. It was simply a look of resolve, of expectation. She was pretty much telling me, “You’re next,” each time she spun by, her shoes squeaking and kicking at the long hems of her jeans as Hudd dipped her in a 1950s-style dance move.
I retrieved a paper napkin from the rigidly organized buffet and set it beside my plate, where the empty shells of crab legs lay barren from my ravaging of their interior. Reaching into Emma’s purse, which had been propped on the chair beside me for safekeeping, I pulled out a pen and clicked it to life. I had felt empty without my usual writing utensil being tucked away in the folds of my breast pocket, and now was as good of a time as any to let the words hop about, to see if they could regain some footing after their latest storytelling escapade.
Last time was haikus. This time, I resorted to sonnets. Shakespeare would have been so proud of me.
She sweeps the floor with tiny feet that light
Up reflections scattered across the glass
Of twenty windows, colors that are caught
Between the eyes of every dancer passing
And in each pane, a pang of heart, and I
Can’t help but wonder if it’s somewhat pain
But pain is not and pain is naught, for this
Is what I’ve always wanted. Here, again,
Is that sweeping movement, she raises brows,
And raises eyes to catch the colors, too,
Like everyone else in this lively room
Dancing with the rush of jazzy tunes
And while I can’t yet dance and take my part,
She sweeps the floor and dances with my heart
Sadly, it was the best I could write. The others were less cliché and sappy, but they were lacking in structure, lacking in rhythm. Still, I was satisfied, satisfied with the fact that I still had an energy to me even if the battery needed to be charged. I would be running on full again soon, and I must have openly smiled at that, for Hudd finished a final dance with Emma and led her to me like a father leading a bride down an aisle.
“She’s yours, madam,” he said, and he passed off a fleeting wink at me as he disappeared into the throngs of people.
Whether or not Hudd was getting more champagne or socializing, I was happy with his gesture. He understood this connection; after all, he may have been Indian, but he was a citizen of San Francisco through and through. I stood up to reach Emma’s eye level and grinned as the band seemed to notice us and decided to taunt us by starting up a slower jazz instrumental. A ballad lingering in the night air.
Emma’s fingers felt delicate in my hand, like I was clasping porcelain and she was a doll for me to smile at. But as we blended into the scattered huddles of dancers and the heat swelled around us like fog, I noticed that while she felt fragile her pulse was strong. Quick, too, competing with mine as they pounded out their rapid-fire percussion against the lethargic tempo of the band. We pressed against each other, shoulder to shoulder, breast to breast, my elbow stiff as I raised her forearm in a clumsy waltz stance. She giggled and blushed and I breathed in deeply and smelled the fresh fabric of her sweater, the light perfume and make-up she had worn for the special occasion. I wanted to bury my face into her auburn hairand kiss the ringlets, but I had to focus as we began to sway to the rhythm, hips shimmying as we swept the space clean with our shoes.
This was the night, and what a beautiful night, and I called it Bella Noche. Everything was filling up a figurative glass, wine overflowing from the brim. I felt as if I could dance my entire life, balanced on the bar of success and love and never losing my coordination. I was drinking from that spilling glass and sucking in the sweetness and tasting the droplets on my tongue, thinking by God, this had to be better than the blood of Christ himself. And I knew it was sacrilegious to say it, but I didn’t care, because if this was happiness, than happiness was the most blasphemous act of all.
As I twirled Emma around, her back arched against my chest like we were posing for the camera, I already was planning another way to defy God. And while I contemplated in my choreography, I saw the auburn tresses turn to threads of gold in the overhead lights, as Emma turned to face me and her eyes held that same sweet warmth like chocolate caramel that I had loved since the very beginning. Oh, did I hardly deserve her. Did I hardly deserve to be in her presence.
The music ended with a lingering drawl and we all stopped to clap as Hudd loudly popped the cork off of another champagne bottle, and we all watched it zip like a rocket straight into the air. As it fell, I extended a hand and caught it deftly between my fingers. The cast and crew and guests whistled and cheered at this strange show of apparent talent, and I extended the trophy to Emma, who looked at me oddly as I offered it.
“A souvenir,” I said. “For being so good to me.”
That was all it took, for she snatched it from my hand then and the witnesses standing close to us laughed. I drew Emma to my chest, the sleeves of my jacket bunching around her shoulders and her cascades of auburn hair as I breathed in the autumn and the theater and the romance, all bundled into one gift just for me.
And soon, I told myself, the resolute words jabbing at my psyche; I would return the favor by giving Emma the greatest gift of all.
Because of its influence on my later writing, I figured that this story, though incomplete, was worth sharing.
Caramel Kisses: Chapter Seventeen
by Belinda Roddie
“They want to bring it to the Orpheum,” announced Hudd as he swooped me into a hug that lifted me off my feet and overlooked his tiny stature.
“Really?” I gasped, as he set me down and my feet shook noticeably on the plush carpet. I was worried my ankles would give out; I felt completely disjointed from the whole experience.
“You’re damn right, really,” replied Hudd, and he laughed and did a crazy little dance across the floor. He left scuffs on the carpet as he zipped about like a train off its rails. “Two producers talked to me after the show about it. And they want me to direct it again. And if they really like it, they’ll take it to New York!”
“That’s incredible,” I managed to say.
“I know, right?” Hudd cried, and he hugged me again, squeezing my arms and shoulders against my sides and tightening my lungs like ropes. “And it’s all thanks to you, my fine writing friend! All thanks to you!”
I obligatorily blushed at the extraordinarily elevating compliment, but I let the feeling subside as Hudd led me past the lobby to a dining set-up in one of the adjacent rooms. We had rented a floor of a fancy hotel to celebrate the play, deciding to dance if it went well and drink if it went badly. Now Hudd was proclaiming both were necessary, as he beckoned over two hotel workers with ice buckets of champagne and skipped over to the many tables set up around the corner of the room. The musicians he had hired out of his own pocket were prepared with the usual jazz standards that I couldn’t help loving. The saxophonist, a squat white man with blond hair like he was wearing a straw hat, saw me and gave me a thumbs up because he had watched the play with his wife.
I returned the gesture and turned to find Emma flinging herself into my arms for the fourth time since the curtain call. She had had to back off as several audience members shook my hand and showered me with the usual compliments and mentions of being personally affected, sprinkled like a chocolate drizzle over a cake. It had all tasted unbearably sweet and I had been happy to follow a gleeful Hudd backstage where he jumped around and bobbed his brown head at each actor, some of them looking like they were about to cry from all the shock of the reception.
“Let me guess…you told me so?” I prompted her, and she laughed and shook her head because she had said that line twice already and that it’d get too tiring on me if she reiterated it. She stroked my cheeks with the palms of her hands and left a soft texture on my skin.
“I’m just happy for my little prince,” she said, smiling.
I couldn’t help laughing at that. “Little Prince?” I asked. “What am I, a creation of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry?” And when Emma gave me an odd look I put on a high falsetto and demonstrated. “Now draw me a sheep, miss!”
She got it then. “You’re helpless,” she teased, pinching my arm as if to get back at me for the night before. “You are absolutely helpless.”
I shrugged. “Not much I can do about it,” I said coyly.
“Good. Stay that way.”
The cast of the show had already crowded into the room, all dressed casually as they had rushed over here from signing autographs. Some crew members were there as well, though I wasn’t surprised that others weren’t, either racing home thanking the heavens that it was over or enjoying the rest of the theater festival. But I couldn’t focus on any other play but my own now. Not by a long shot. I was happy to be away from the stage, breathing in the atmosphere of accomplishment and praise and just the plain old satisfaction of it all.
Hudd poured Emma and me two glasses of champagne and we toasted to everything we thought of. Emma toasted to England, to her father, and of course to me, my complimentary love. Hudd toasted to theater and to his native land in India and to the gods themselves for his undeserved karma. I toasted, at last, to San Francisco, to my cynical family, to the love of the theater and love of writing and love itself, and I caused a scene by kissing Emma loudly on the lips as Hudd laughed and raised an eyebrow at the whole presentation.
The band started playing and some of the actors and guests, the latter having scampered over from either the show or from their little houses on Hudd’s request, scattered themselves around the bigger spaces separating the tables and kicked up their heels in a typical classic dance. I smiled at the fact that we were actually dancing, and not rubbing on each other, though some of the younger actors seemed displeased that we had a band and not some DJ with sunglasses and dark stubble putting an iPod on shuffle. I was a bit overwhelmed and subsequently too mentally worn out from the performance to be dancing just yet, so I asked Hudd to take Emma out on the floor while I had some crab to eat and some ice water to drink.
Hudd grinned. “Don’t worry, I’ll bring her right back to you when we’re done,” he said. He bowed to Emma and took her hand as she grinned and nodded approvingly. “Shall we, Miss Burking?”
There was no denying that Emma liked Hudd and his antics, and she certainly loved dancing with him. She didn’t have to tell me for me to figure it out. But as I sat by the table and was sporadically visited by the occasional guest to give me the standard congratulations and comments, I couldn’t help but notice her eyes locked on me as she whirled by laughing with the man whose forehead barely was at the same level as her eyes. It was not an anxious look, nor an angry or frustrated one; she wasn’t upset that I had handed her off to a man while I lazily lounged and put my feet up. It was simply a look of resolve, of expectation. She was pretty much telling me, “You’re next,” each time she spun by, her shoes squeaking and kicking at the long hems of her jeans as Hudd dipped her in a 1950s-style dance move.
I retrieved a paper napkin from the rigidly organized buffet and set it beside my plate, where the empty shells of crab legs lay barren from my ravaging of their interior. Reaching into Emma’s purse, which had been propped on the chair beside me for safekeeping, I pulled out a pen and clicked it to life. I had felt empty without my usual writing utensil being tucked away in the folds of my breast pocket, and now was as good of a time as any to let the words hop about, to see if they could regain some footing after their latest storytelling escapade.
Last time was haikus. This time, I resorted to sonnets. Shakespeare would have been so proud of me.
She sweeps the floor with tiny feet that light
Up reflections scattered across the glass
Of twenty windows, colors that are caught
Between the eyes of every dancer passing
And in each pane, a pang of heart, and I
Can’t help but wonder if it’s somewhat pain
But pain is not and pain is naught, for this
Is what I’ve always wanted. Here, again,
Is that sweeping movement, she raises brows,
And raises eyes to catch the colors, too,
Like everyone else in this lively room
Dancing with the rush of jazzy tunes
And while I can’t yet dance and take my part,
She sweeps the floor and dances with my heart
Sadly, it was the best I could write. The others were less cliché and sappy, but they were lacking in structure, lacking in rhythm. Still, I was satisfied, satisfied with the fact that I still had an energy to me even if the battery needed to be charged. I would be running on full again soon, and I must have openly smiled at that, for Hudd finished a final dance with Emma and led her to me like a father leading a bride down an aisle.
“She’s yours, madam,” he said, and he passed off a fleeting wink at me as he disappeared into the throngs of people.
Whether or not Hudd was getting more champagne or socializing, I was happy with his gesture. He understood this connection; after all, he may have been Indian, but he was a citizen of San Francisco through and through. I stood up to reach Emma’s eye level and grinned as the band seemed to notice us and decided to taunt us by starting up a slower jazz instrumental. A ballad lingering in the night air.
Emma’s fingers felt delicate in my hand, like I was clasping porcelain and she was a doll for me to smile at. But as we blended into the scattered huddles of dancers and the heat swelled around us like fog, I noticed that while she felt fragile her pulse was strong. Quick, too, competing with mine as they pounded out their rapid-fire percussion against the lethargic tempo of the band. We pressed against each other, shoulder to shoulder, breast to breast, my elbow stiff as I raised her forearm in a clumsy waltz stance. She giggled and blushed and I breathed in deeply and smelled the fresh fabric of her sweater, the light perfume and make-up she had worn for the special occasion. I wanted to bury my face into her auburn hairand kiss the ringlets, but I had to focus as we began to sway to the rhythm, hips shimmying as we swept the space clean with our shoes.
This was the night, and what a beautiful night, and I called it Bella Noche. Everything was filling up a figurative glass, wine overflowing from the brim. I felt as if I could dance my entire life, balanced on the bar of success and love and never losing my coordination. I was drinking from that spilling glass and sucking in the sweetness and tasting the droplets on my tongue, thinking by God, this had to be better than the blood of Christ himself. And I knew it was sacrilegious to say it, but I didn’t care, because if this was happiness, than happiness was the most blasphemous act of all.
As I twirled Emma around, her back arched against my chest like we were posing for the camera, I already was planning another way to defy God. And while I contemplated in my choreography, I saw the auburn tresses turn to threads of gold in the overhead lights, as Emma turned to face me and her eyes held that same sweet warmth like chocolate caramel that I had loved since the very beginning. Oh, did I hardly deserve her. Did I hardly deserve to be in her presence.
The music ended with a lingering drawl and we all stopped to clap as Hudd loudly popped the cork off of another champagne bottle, and we all watched it zip like a rocket straight into the air. As it fell, I extended a hand and caught it deftly between my fingers. The cast and crew and guests whistled and cheered at this strange show of apparent talent, and I extended the trophy to Emma, who looked at me oddly as I offered it.
“A souvenir,” I said. “For being so good to me.”
That was all it took, for she snatched it from my hand then and the witnesses standing close to us laughed. I drew Emma to my chest, the sleeves of my jacket bunching around her shoulders and her cascades of auburn hair as I breathed in the autumn and the theater and the romance, all bundled into one gift just for me.
And soon, I told myself, the resolute words jabbing at my psyche; I would return the favor by giving Emma the greatest gift of all.
The work you see here has not been edited nor altered since May 9th, 2010.
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