And I'm stumped.
Oct. 10th, 2007 02:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kippurbirdAnother piece from my writing group.
I have no idea what to make of this one...
It's called Goggles for Lulu
Chapter One: A Cheeky Ewan
The first truly interesting thing Lumina Untpshaw witnessed in the village of Cloff-Prunkshire was a man jumping over a church. Before that, she’d been so overcome with boredom that her knees had gone numb.
The day she and her husband arrived in the village, a garden party was held to welcome them. Of all the garden-infested villages in Dorset, Cloff-Prunkshire had the loveliest gardens, and every resident of Cloff-Prunkshire agreed that the retired Admiral and equally retired Mrs. Haupt-Finchley kept Cloff-Prunkshire’s loveliest garden. They invited only the loveliest people to their lovely garden parties.
Naturally, Lumina (known to her friends and husband as Lulu) should have been rather flattered to attend a party there at all, and all the more so that the Haupt-Finchleys hosted the event to honor her husband, Trevlin Untpshaw, recently appointed vicar of Cloff-Prunkshire. Any good woman would have been thrilled at the warm reception from the scions of the village. Lulu, it cannot be avoided, was not a good woman as much as a slightly wicked woman in a lovely garden.
“How ever, Father Untpshaw, did you manage to secure so pretty a wife?” Mrs. Haupt-Finchley had asked upon meeting the couple. Throughout the afternoon, Trevlin Untpshaw was complimented on his very pretty wife no fewer than four hundred seventy times. Lulu simply smiled and suppressed a homicidal yawn each time, while the vicar credited God for providing the match.
The canapés had been delectable and tea just right and the sky wore an Alma-Tadema blue, dotted now and again with clouds so uniform in whiteness and puff that one could imagine cherubim holding shining brass trumpets to their supernaturally plump backsides, flatulating perfect balls of holy steam for the amusement of the locals.
But none of this, celestial or gustatory, moved Lulu in the least.
Lulu counted Trevlin among the dim spots of the Anglican faith, scarcely given to passion, empathy or inspiration unless rugby or Our Lord Jesus were involved. But even he noted her sour mood. “Something amiss, my dear?” he whispered.
She could never have told him the truth, that she would far rather have eaten sharpened chamberpots than sit amongst the daffodils, motionless as a dead carp, while limp-minded gentry complimented the new vicar on “his very pretty wife” over and over.
Oh, she was very pretty, no question. She possessed the combination of aquiline bone structure, fiery red hair and eyes of Celtic green that novelists often fancy. Her flawless porcelain skin could have inspired ancient Greeks to fight wars for the privilege of eating fresh fruit off it. But Colonel Haupt-Finchley’s guests paid her magnificence no more mind than they might a platter of small, triangular sandwiches. It would have been a fine thing had anyone at the party taken notice of her cleavage, at least. She’d come to expect that. Her breasts were stellar; she could have keep Saville Row quite busy mending the many trousers ruined by sudden masculine response to her décolletage. Sadly, she saw no evidence at the garden party that her profile had raised as much as an eyebrow, let alone trousers.
Lulu could never convey such thoughts, so she told her husband instead that of course the party was a lovely sort of lovely garden party, but she would rather return home presently, as she suffered from fleabites.
“Fleas?” Trevlin said, his chinless face rearing back in surprise, wiggling a little in the aftermath of so sudden a movement. “What, fleas? Here in this lovely garden?”
“I meant it metaphorically,” she answered.
He scratched his head. “Is there such a thing as a metaphoric flea?”
“Never mind the flea, Trevlin,” she said quietly. “I mean to say my monthly visitor has arrived.”
“But we’ve only been here a day,” her husband said, sharp as a boiled glove.
“My womanly friend?” Lulu went on. “The curse. Red tide in the Channel. No? The mating call of the vampire?” In the end, she had to pull him close by the earlobe and tell him in no uncertain terms what issued and whence, and in what volume.
As she spoke, Trevlin’s mouth worked fishlike, before his entire face turned pale and boneless and his body shambled off automatically in search of fortifying brandy. For the hour that followed, he could scarcely look at her, knowing now what horrors lurked in her petticoats.
Not long after, drunk, he pointed to his wife, exclaiming, "There are mysteries which men can only guess at, which age by age they may solve only in part!" after which he fell in a swoon and landed right-ear-foremost in an otherwise splendid custard.
"My apologies," said Lulu, turning to Mrs Haupt-Finchley, "for my husband's misuse of the dessert."
"Quite all right, my dear," her hostess said. "Why, I recall a bishop who, when given too much sherry, treated a figgy pudding like an choir boy."
What do you think of it?
I have no idea what to make of this one...
It's called Goggles for Lulu
Chapter One: A Cheeky Ewan
The first truly interesting thing Lumina Untpshaw witnessed in the village of Cloff-Prunkshire was a man jumping over a church. Before that, she’d been so overcome with boredom that her knees had gone numb.
The day she and her husband arrived in the village, a garden party was held to welcome them. Of all the garden-infested villages in Dorset, Cloff-Prunkshire had the loveliest gardens, and every resident of Cloff-Prunkshire agreed that the retired Admiral and equally retired Mrs. Haupt-Finchley kept Cloff-Prunkshire’s loveliest garden. They invited only the loveliest people to their lovely garden parties.
Naturally, Lumina (known to her friends and husband as Lulu) should have been rather flattered to attend a party there at all, and all the more so that the Haupt-Finchleys hosted the event to honor her husband, Trevlin Untpshaw, recently appointed vicar of Cloff-Prunkshire. Any good woman would have been thrilled at the warm reception from the scions of the village. Lulu, it cannot be avoided, was not a good woman as much as a slightly wicked woman in a lovely garden.
“How ever, Father Untpshaw, did you manage to secure so pretty a wife?” Mrs. Haupt-Finchley had asked upon meeting the couple. Throughout the afternoon, Trevlin Untpshaw was complimented on his very pretty wife no fewer than four hundred seventy times. Lulu simply smiled and suppressed a homicidal yawn each time, while the vicar credited God for providing the match.
The canapés had been delectable and tea just right and the sky wore an Alma-Tadema blue, dotted now and again with clouds so uniform in whiteness and puff that one could imagine cherubim holding shining brass trumpets to their supernaturally plump backsides, flatulating perfect balls of holy steam for the amusement of the locals.
But none of this, celestial or gustatory, moved Lulu in the least.
Lulu counted Trevlin among the dim spots of the Anglican faith, scarcely given to passion, empathy or inspiration unless rugby or Our Lord Jesus were involved. But even he noted her sour mood. “Something amiss, my dear?” he whispered.
She could never have told him the truth, that she would far rather have eaten sharpened chamberpots than sit amongst the daffodils, motionless as a dead carp, while limp-minded gentry complimented the new vicar on “his very pretty wife” over and over.
Oh, she was very pretty, no question. She possessed the combination of aquiline bone structure, fiery red hair and eyes of Celtic green that novelists often fancy. Her flawless porcelain skin could have inspired ancient Greeks to fight wars for the privilege of eating fresh fruit off it. But Colonel Haupt-Finchley’s guests paid her magnificence no more mind than they might a platter of small, triangular sandwiches. It would have been a fine thing had anyone at the party taken notice of her cleavage, at least. She’d come to expect that. Her breasts were stellar; she could have keep Saville Row quite busy mending the many trousers ruined by sudden masculine response to her décolletage. Sadly, she saw no evidence at the garden party that her profile had raised as much as an eyebrow, let alone trousers.
Lulu could never convey such thoughts, so she told her husband instead that of course the party was a lovely sort of lovely garden party, but she would rather return home presently, as she suffered from fleabites.
“Fleas?” Trevlin said, his chinless face rearing back in surprise, wiggling a little in the aftermath of so sudden a movement. “What, fleas? Here in this lovely garden?”
“I meant it metaphorically,” she answered.
He scratched his head. “Is there such a thing as a metaphoric flea?”
“Never mind the flea, Trevlin,” she said quietly. “I mean to say my monthly visitor has arrived.”
“But we’ve only been here a day,” her husband said, sharp as a boiled glove.
“My womanly friend?” Lulu went on. “The curse. Red tide in the Channel. No? The mating call of the vampire?” In the end, she had to pull him close by the earlobe and tell him in no uncertain terms what issued and whence, and in what volume.
As she spoke, Trevlin’s mouth worked fishlike, before his entire face turned pale and boneless and his body shambled off automatically in search of fortifying brandy. For the hour that followed, he could scarcely look at her, knowing now what horrors lurked in her petticoats.
Not long after, drunk, he pointed to his wife, exclaiming, "There are mysteries which men can only guess at, which age by age they may solve only in part!" after which he fell in a swoon and landed right-ear-foremost in an otherwise splendid custard.
"My apologies," said Lulu, turning to Mrs Haupt-Finchley, "for my husband's misuse of the dessert."
"Quite all right, my dear," her hostess said. "Why, I recall a bishop who, when given too much sherry, treated a figgy pudding like an choir boy."
What do you think of it?
