Mister Doe's Fiction

What's New (4/14/11)

2011-04-14T13:40:00.000-04:00

This blog is no longer being updated. All new posts are now at Misterdoe.com.

(6/18/09 update))
Posted a new story, Floating Wig. Still working on the blog transfer. Well, no, really, I haven't been working on it, but it's still in progress :-\

(4/16/09 update)
After some repeated hints from a fellow writer I've posted the long-missing Do Not Fondle the Merchandise story. I had taken it down for a rewrite but got stalled early in the process. I'm not that happy with it (and it's still not finished) but others wanted to see it again, so here it is, for now.

(12/23/08 update)
I've started copying story links from my old Geocities site. I used to surf for stories all the time, and post the URLs for interesting stuff that I found. I don't do it as often anymore, but I'm finding that many of those old links are still active. Soon I'm gonna check with the authors for their permission to post the stories here, in case the original sites go down...

(8/1/08 update)
I finally added a new page to chapter 3 of Plane Crash.

Also, Blogger's automated spam blockers made a mistake and decided that this blog was a spam blog, and blocked my access to it for most of the day (8/1/08). I had expected to be unable to get back into it for most of the weekend, so I'm glad that at least the human checkers (the only ones they should be using, in my opinion) was quick about checking out the blog for him- or herself and correcting the needless error. But this only gives me more inspiration to get going with my plans to get my content hosted on my own space.

I may host these blogs offsite, or I may just start fresh somewhere else, but I definitely need to get my stuff away from where some mindless software program can block my access to content that isn't doing any harm to anyone.

Someone made a comment, when I told them by email about this problem, that this is just what's wrong with companies that grow to "evil-empire size." He has a good point. I'd really like to talk or at least email someone to find out just what it was about this blog that the bots decided was spamlike, so I won't have that problem again. But, of course, trying to find the person who checked out my blog would be like searching for a needle in a haystack and actually expecting to find it, let alone someone who could actually explain how the software goes about detecting a suspected spamblog.

For the most part I haven't really had a problem with Google, but this unnerves me a bit. I was actually planning to start a business using Blogger blogs, as I've seen promoted all over the web, but if this is what I'd have to look forward to, then it definitely won't be hosted on Blogspot, if I go the Blogger route at all. I already have bots telling me that my emails are blocked more often than I like, but I can't have them getting in the way of making money...

(3/21/08 update)
Finished repaginating chapters 2 and 3 of Plane Crash to make them easier to read (shorter pages). Fixed all links to the story.

(3/20/08 update)
Posted part of chapter 3 and started repaginating Place Crash chapters 2 and 3 to make them easier to follow; took the whole story offline until the adjustments are finished.

(3/19/08) update)
Just a quick note to let readers (both of them) know that I haven't abandoned this blog. I've just been working piecemeal...

(11/26/07 update)
Repaginated chapter one of Plane Crash. Chapter 2 repagination coming soon...

(9/20/07 update)
Reposted my last few DeviantArt posts.
(6/5/07 update)
Posted a brand new story snippet, Snippet: Middle of Nowhere. Actually I may wind up not adding much more to this one.

(5/22/07 update)
Finished posting category indexes of the stories. Actually, having both category listing AND labels is probably overkill, but at least that makes it that much easier for visitors to find the stories they're looking for...

(5/21/07 update)
Just added an account of a dream, Invisible Woman at Work, that I first posted at DeviantArt almost two months ago.

(5/18/07 update)
I've finally started adding labels, at the suggestion of a fellow writer and manipper. I had started writing index pages for the various story themes, and realized that labels would just work better, even if they do require editing every single story to add the appropriate labels. The labels are still a work-in-progress, however.

(5/17/07 update)
Posted a new story idea, Snatched During a Test Drive, that might wind up being used as part of another story already in the works.

(4/17/07 update)
Posted some story ideas that for some reason were posted only as drafts; explained some terms that new readers might not quite understand; and posted a link to a FAQ on Paul Cwick's Invisible Woman Story Archive.

(4/14/07 update)
Repaginated Watergun and added a bit to the Fembot Walk snippet, which is now posted but not quite finished yet. Also, I've finally started posting some invisible girl pictures here.

(4/12/07 update)
Repaginated An Ordinary Bus Ride, so it wouldn't be such a long read in one shot. Eventually I'll be doing this with all my posted stories, as well as posting new ones in the future so that no single story requires scrolling down more than twice.

(3/21/07 update)
Repaginated Full Service.
(1/27/07 updage)
Added a repost of Full Service, a story I first posted to my John Doe's Writings Yahoo Group back in 2001.
(12/29/06 update)
Here's a video that's similar in approach to what I had in mind when I wrote An Ordinary Bus Ride, an only slightly embellished transcript to a vividly remembered (day)dream: http://www.dailymotion.com/visited/search/invisible/video/x2sg3_cartonhommeinvisible
Of course, he disappears from the bottom up, where the trapped-between-dimensions woman, if that's what she was, would have disappeared into the box from the top down. But, hopefully, you get the general idea.

(12/12/06 update)
Sometime ago Chaz Hill posted a vignette in response to someone asking if any of the writers had ever had a male character become invisible along with the requisite invisible woman. I've reposted it here.

I've also added a correctly edited version of the conversation mentioned earlier about the presence of "real" invisible women in the groups, or whether any group members know any other "real" invisible women.

Table of Contents

2011-04-12T00:24:00.000-04:00

Thank you for visiting this blog but all content has been moved to its own server at http://misterdoe.com. Since then the posts at this site have attracted an inordinate amount of SPAM so I've deleted them.

Follow this link to the new site: Misterdoe's Fiction

Heroes

2007-05-22T13:14:00.000-04:00

I haven't posted much beyond stories, story ideas from myself and others, and an occasional essay or two, but I have to post about last night's Heroes finale. After so much buildup, I have to say that, although I enjoyed the show, I was a bit disappointed by how it turned out. I'm glad that Nathan realized that there had to be another way for things to turn out, other than standing by while his brother goes nuclear and takes out half of New York City (thanks to the bug Claire kept putting in his ear about how family is supposed to be). But I have to admit that I was expecting a cataclysm that would directly affect all the characters, as well as all the city itself, since that's where the story played itself out.

Also, having Nathan whisk Peter out into space before he blows up leaves a question that will have to wait until next season, if ever, to be answered: do the Petrellis survive? Apparently there will be a mini-season showing just how certain characters came to be mutants, in particular but that's examining the past. What happens now?

Now that Linderman and Thompson have apparently been removed from the picture, is The Company finished? Are the surviving mutants safe now?

Last night's episode had an inexplicable cameo by Charles DeVeaux, who was supposed to be dead. Had Peter traveled back in time to find out something he needed to know about himself, or is Charles really dead?

If he's not, then what about the other characters who have been killed off? I was especially disappointed by how quickly Charlie, the waitress at the Burnt Toast Diner in Midland, was dispatched. Will she be back? What about Isaac Mendez? Matt Parkman? Eden McCain? Ted Sprague? Simone DeVeaux? And, most of all, Sylar? There was a scene last night where some kind of insect was seen crawling up out of a manhole where Sylar's blood had run into the sewer after Hiro had run him through with a sword. Anyone who saw the end of Species II knows this could have simply transferred Sylar's capabilities to... someone or something else. Maybe this was the boogeyman worse than Sylar that little human GPS Molly Shannon alluded to last night?

I guess we'll have to wait until September for these answers, since the summer series fills in blanks about the past, rather than advancing the story, but I can't help feeling a little let down...

Table of Contents

Idea: Snatched During a Test Drive

2007-05-16T16:25:00.000-04:00

This one is more in the invisible tickle-monster pocket: I go to a car dealership and find myself drawn to an extra-large SUV, something I'd ordinarily not pay any attention to -- horrible gas mileage, horrible to park, etc. The salesman hands me the keys for a test drive, but I get only a half-block away from the lot before lengths of rope slide out from under the front seats and tie my hands and feet together. All this time the truck is driving itself, since my hands are being kept off the wheel. Once we enter the highway, I'm blindfolded, so I don't know where we are when the SUV stops and I'm transferred to another vehicle. (The dealership people are, of course, surprised when an anonymous call comes in telling them where their "stolen" SUV is. All of them, that is, except one...)

The new vehicle takes me to a huge secluded compound way out in the middle of nowhere, where I am well taken care of, with my captors secure in the knowledge that if I try to escape, I might be nabbed for "stealing" that SUV. During my "stay" I'm played with by objects come to life, invisible hands (and other parts), and at least one invisible shapeshifter...

Dreams, Snippets, and Story Ideas

Table of Contents

Snippet: Fembot Walk

2007-05-16T14:57:00.001-04:00

EDIT: only slightly changed from the original post

One day at work, my phone rang. My job is mostly dealing with paperwork, so the phone doesn't ring very often, and it's almost always either a personal call or a wrong number.

I answered. Before I could say anything, the voice on the other end spoke. "Hi, Bryan," said the unmistakable voice of Marla, my invisible housemate. She doesn't call me often at work, so naturally I wondered if something was wrong.

"Nothing's wrong," she said. "I just wanted you to know I have a surprise for you when you get home. It's something I've been working on for awhile now."

"Should I try to guess what it is?" I said, getting a mental picture of a delivery man ringing the doorbell and being greeted by a disembodied voice when the door opened.

"You can try," she said with a giggle, "but it's something that probably never even occurred to you. I doubt very much you'd get it right."

And she was right. I spent the rest of the workday trying to figure out what kind of surprise she had waiting for me. She'd already surprised me with clothing purchases, making the clothes move around as if an invisible woman were in them. And, just because she could, she bought the clothes in different sizes, approximating a variety of figures when making them move. And she did this for little old me, to whom she owed nothing. Go figure...

As I pulled up to the house I noticed nothing about the place that looked any different, at least from the outside. She could easily repaint the whole house, though she'd have to do that at nighttime to avoid having the neighbors seeing paint cans and paintbrushes moving around by themselves.

I walked up to the front door and still didn't see anything out of the ordinary until I got right up to the door. The mailbox opened, and a sleep mask came floating out of it as Marla's voice said, "I want you to feel the surprise before you see it." The mask slipped itself up over my eyes as the strap went around my head. The door creaked as it opened and Marla ushered me inside.

"Feel it?" I said. "Why?"

"Increases the surprise," she said. "Like I told you earlier, you'd never guess -- and I wanna see your face when you can feel what it is but can't see it." Each of my hands was gently grasped by a soft feminine hand and held out in front of me, even while I could feel a warm body against my back, arms clasped around my midsection, and a head resting on my right shoulder.

I idly began wiggling my fingers, not knowing what to expect, when...

I felt something. It felt like... skin.

I gasped, thinking right off the bat that Marla was playing some kind of game with me and lured some woman into playing along, but I didn't say anything. Or did Marla get me a woman? I thought, smiling. But there wouldn't be any need for that -- she might not have a default physical form but she can approximate one quite nicely when needed, even if it is invisible.

I was ready to pull my hands away as soon as I realized what I was touching, but since Marla had actually guided my hands there I figured there was no need to back off, at least not yet.

The skin was warm and yielding, just like human skin, but I had no reason to expect or even want such a "present" with Marla in my life. But I continued my masked discovery. My hands came in contact with a woman's midriff before the hands guiding me brought my hands upward to where they felt two large round masses, warm and firm in a way that said they were totally natural and that the body they belonged to was probably young. I felt around for nipples; when I found them I began flicking my thumbs against them, and of course they began hardening to my touch...

"Uh, Marla?" I said. "Care to explain?" The subject had never exactly come up before, but I would hardly have expected her to be OK with the idea of me feeling up some woman, and here she was leading me to said woman.

"No, not really," she said. "I'll just let you see for yourself." As she said this, I felt the mask strap pull away from my head, then the mask came off... and it was indeed a woman standing there in front of me, a very attractive and very naked smiling woman with my hands on her breasts...

Kind of.

She wasn't breathing. In fact, only now that I could actually see her did I realize that the whole time my hands were "examining" there hadn't been any movement in time with breathing. Nor had there been any flinching, any gasps of pleasure, or for that matter signs of displeasure, telling me that all was not quite as meets the... fingertips.

She broke me out of my ruminations by asking, "You like?" She meaning Marla, not the apparent young woman I was, um, handling.

"Um, well, she's quite a looker," I started, "but I'm pretty sure by now that she's not human."

"Does she look like someone you'd be proud to have by your side at, say, a restaurant or a movie or something?"

"Um, sure, but why would you ask something like that? You're not leaving, are you?"

Unseen lips pecked me on the cheek, and the invisible arms around me gave me a squeeze, even as the chin resting on my shoulder stayed in place. "No, hon, I'm not going anywhere. Well, I'm not leaving, in any case, but I figured that once I got myself something for people to actually see then maybe we could actually go somewhere without you always having to be visibly alone." After a couple of beats she added, with a slight bit of irritation, "Maybe then people will stop trying to fix you up with their friend-of-a-friends."

"Got yourself something, you said," I said, noting again that the "something" was not moving or responding much to my still-roaming hands. "So, this is some kind of doll or robot or something?"

"You could say that," Marla said. "Some people in really high places owed me some big favors, and so I called them on it and voilá! I had them use top-of-the-line materials, so that no one looking on, or feeling on like you're doing" -- she punctuated that with a giggle and a squeeze from the unseen arms around me -- "would catch on that she's not actually human. I'm still working on all the little cues you all give off without thinking."

"OK, but if we're gonna be going out, then I guess that means we need to do some shopping?"

"Already taken care of," she said again. "You never noticed those boxes in the basement? Those are clothes for the 'bot. Once I had chosen measurements, I went down to a few stores and tried on some items to be sure I knew what sizes I'd need. Then, I used one of those new cash card accounts I got us and bought some things online."

"No, I never noticed any boxes," I said. "What did you get?"

Right then, a procession of cardboard boxes began floating into the room from the kitchen. "I figured you'd ask, so I put them where I could easily get them while we were talking." The fembot, still smiling, took about two steps back as my hands were released from Marla's unseen grasp. The closest box opened and a dark pink short-sleeved top and a midlength denim skirt floated out and began drawing closer to the fembot.

The bot held its arms out as the top slid up one, then the other arm and then began buttoning up by itself.

"You should have had the bot button the top," I told Marla. "The finger movements would give you practice at one of those little things you were just talking about. And no underwear?"

"Well, it's just a fembot, and only partially functional at that. I'll be managing all its movements but only what's needed to pass for human. It won't have to duplicate any, uh, biological functions, so no underwear would really be necessary." As she said this, the bot was stepping into the floating skirt, which then pulled itself up the bot's legs and zipped itself up.

"True," I said, "but if you want it to be seen, don't you want people to see you're doing what they think you're 'supposed' to be doing? Or do you want to put on a show?"

"Maybe I do want to put on a show," she said, with another giggle-and-squeeze. "After all, I know you're not all that worried about all those niceties that everybody expects but no one wants to follow through with. And after I went and got you a 'woman' to be seen with, don't you want people to see that she's happy with you?"

"I suppose," I said, after a pause. I motioned for the bot to turn around, then realized what I had just done, drawing a full-on laugh from Marla.

"It was just force of habit," I said in a feeble attempt at a defense. The bot turned slowly to the side, then turned its back, leaning forward, thrusting its left hip to the side and giving a come-hither look over its left shoulder. In spite of myself, I immediately gave an involuntary visual cue of liking what I saw.

Marla laughed out loud again, and at the same time had the bot's grin grow into a toothy smile. But before I could make any comment about how natural the transition to a smile had looked, my pants began unzipping.

"Hey!" I said, reaching down to zip myself up again. But as soon as my hands started moving, each of my wrists was grabbed by a hand, while my pants then began pulling down. Once they were out of the way, the waistband of my drawers pulled out and an unseen hand began to play with me.

But she wasn't finished showing me what she could do with the bot. She had the bot fix its gaze downward, as if intrigued by the visual evidence of an unseen hand in my drawers; it (the bot, not the unseen hand!) drew itself up straight, turned around to face me, and walked closer, all the time with its apparent gaze never leaving my crotch. We really don't need any more details of the next few minutes, but let's just say that Marla had a better command of the finer details of human movement than she had let on.

But she still had a lot of work to do.

She'd shown me plenty of times that she was able to make clothes move as if there were someone in them, and was even able to create resistance against the fabric if you pressed against it. But actual human movement, what goes on under the clothes, is a whole lot more detailed.

For that she had to go and do some field research...

"And I have a feeling you know just how to go about that research," I said, when she mentioned field research. She'd told me about some of her escapades in her former way of life, and what she sometimes got into when she needed to take a break -- snagging herself a guy or sometimes a girl and taking them to a hideout somewhere, and playing with them. Her idea of "play" often included tickling, and for some of the less eager participants she'd had to, as she put it, "put them in an invisible suit" to get them to do what she wanted.

"An invisible suit?" I said, when she was explaining this to me.

"Yeah -- think of a jello mold, only this jello is alive and the mold is animated as well."

She had supposed she could probably do the same without actually taking over the, uh, subject. "I just have to find a woman the same size as the bot," she said, "and mimic how she moves."

"Somehow I hve the feeling that you didn't go through the trouble of having this thing made without already having a potential model or two in mind," I said. "I'd even be willing to bet the bot looks like someone you're acquainted with."

"And I wouldn't take that bet 'cause you're right," Marla said. "There's a woman here in town that... well, let's just say I've been watching her for a long time." I was surprised by the wistful tone to her voice, like she had some kind of crush on this woman or something. But she was still speaking...

"She's gorgeous," Marla continued, "and she has the most beautiful laugh -- I'd love to make her scream my name at the top of her lungs."

"Make her scream your name?!" I repeated. "You wanna seduce this woman?!"

"No, no, I don't want to seduce her." Marla had told me earlier that, strictly speaking, she's not actually female -- which makes sense with her not being physical -- but she likes interacting with us "meatbags" as a female, for whatever reason. "I just want to ... play with her body. Take her to the limit of what she can handle, then push her ever so slightly past that mark. I just want to hear her voice over and over, deliriously screaming out my name, while I find all her spots and push all her buttons."

I took all that in, and something occurred to me that I wasn't sure she was prepared to hear. But I had to ask...

"Did it ever occur to you that what you want to do to her might be considered unfair?" I asked.

"Unfair?" she repeated. "Unfair how?"

"Simple. You're not physical. You mimic a physical form during our... bedroom gymnastics but you said yourself that you don't feel it physically the way I do, yet you enjoy the fact that I enjoy it. So it's give and take for us. What you want to do with this woman, though, is all take for you. She may give you enjoyment by her reaction, but she has no choice in the matter, and she can't reciprocate. You're not giving anything to her, and she's not taking anything from you. How can she get to you that matches the way you want to get to her?"

She was silent for a few seconds. I began to wonder if maybe I had said the wrong thing. She was powerful, after all, and those with power generally don't like to be reminded about anything that goes contrary to what they want to do.

I was just about to start backpedaling when she finally spoke. "I suppose you would have a point if I had chosen someone at random. As it happens, I didn't just follow this woman around for a few minutes to get a few movements down pat. I followed her off and on for a few days, and guess what?"

I thought that was just a kind of verbal comma, until I realized she was waiting for an answer. I didn't have any idea what she was leading up to, so I shrugged and said I didn't know.

"She's really ticklish," Marla said, "and it turns out she has a few tickle buddies -- she's a natural for what I want to do with her."

"And just what did you want to do to her, anyway?"

With an exasperated sigh, she replied, "I said do with, not do to -- I'd make sure there was something for her hands to do also. But since you want to know..."

Before I knew it, her unseen hands had made short work of stripping me down to my underwear and pinning me to the carpet, at least four hands holding down each arm and each leg, along with a hand pressing down on each shoulder. I reflexively tried to tug free of the restraining hands, and she put just enough pressure on each limb to keep me from getting free without actually weighing down on me.

It seemed to me that I had been in that position for a long time, with nothing being done but holding me down. "Is this all you're gonna do?" I asked, like a fool. "Just hold me down like this? I would have thought 'playing with someone's body' meant more than this."

"Oh, it does," she said. "I just want to establish that you won't get free until I want you to." With that, I saw something stirring across the room.

Over by the fireplace there was a pair of old vases, one on each side, with half a dozen peacock feathers in each as decoration. When Marla first entered my life arrived she declared that the house needed decoration, and I guess that's where the vases and feathers came in -- I hadn't really paid them that much attention. A feather rose from one of them and began floating over towards me.

Once it was directly over me, it turned itself upside down so that the tip of its stem was pointing up in the air, and it lowered itself and very lightly dragged itself up my right leg. That old dependable involuntary visible response kicked in again, and I don't mean goosebumps.

"I see you like that," Marla commented. "I thought you would." With that, all of the feathers made their way over to me, stopping a few inches away. I'd expected them to lay into me as soon as they got there, but first...

My outstretched arms were brought together above my head, after which my t-shirt removed itself without any of the restraining hands on my arms or shoulders moving -- only someone like Marla could do that. Then one of the feathers approached and slowly began dragging its tip up and down my torso. In no more than five seconds all of the feathers were busy dragging themselves back and forth on my arms, legs, or chest, making me a twitching, guffawing mess; one was even dragging itself across my face! And just like when my shirt was removed, the feathers seemed to move through the restraining hands; the hands moved not one inch to accomodate the feathers, and I kid you not, I could actually feel both feather and hand when one approached where the other was.

Then she added another only-Marla touch. My back was flush against the carpet, but there were fingertips raking my back, and others rubbing at my sides.

Finally she spoke. "You realize that she has parts that you don't have. Prominent parts that are really sensitive and fun to play with." She paused, then continued, "But then, you have sensitive and fun parts that she doesn't have..."

TO BE CONTINUED... maybe

Explanation of Terms

2007-04-17T01:33:00.000-04:00

In this blog, and on other sites the blog links to, you'll find the abbreviations TFI, PFI, and FFI. These relate to different "types" of invisible women. They all stem from the faux-French term "Femmes Invisible," or invisible women. The term is, in fact, almost French; all that would be needed is an "s" on the end of "invisible," but the term's originator, Mike B from Dennard Summers' Femmes-Invisible mailing list, didn't want to go all-out French. As for the other abbreviations, which all stem from the original FI:

TFI - This stands for Total Femme Invisible, or a woman whose invisibility affects only herself, not her clothing. Often, even makeup is excluded, since this is not part of her body. Such a woman is then required to strip totally in order to be completely invisible. (See Kitty Carroll from The Invisible Woman (1940), Sandy Martinson from The Invisible Woman (1983), and to an extent Sue Storm Richards from Fantastic Four, since any clothing other than her specially-formulated uniform does not disappear with her.)
PFI - This stands for Partial Femme Invisible, or a woman who disappears in parts. Generally found in fiction more often than in movies.
FFI - This is Fading Femme Invisible. This woman's clothing disappears along with her, normally as a result of either psi-based invisibility or a cheap moviemaker's not-so-special effects department (almost any cheaply made so-called scifi or fantasy flick). This is also what happens with Sue Storm Richards when she wears her uniform.

Then there are hybrids and/or those who don't really go in any of those categories. For instance, Paulette, an invisible character in many of my stories, is "naturally" invisible but otherwise human. So her clothes won't automatically disappear when she puts them on. Yet, if she wants to, she can make them disappear, along with anything in direct contact with her skin. This is also true of Sue, a central character in the episodic stories found on the American Invisible Inc. website.

A more complete FAQ about the invisible girls found here and elsewhere can be found here.

Back to Dreams, Snippets, and Story Ideas

Table of Contents

Dreams, Snippets, and Story Ideas

2007-04-16T00:19:00.001-04:00

(plain text without links represents a work in progress -- the link will be provided when the post is finished)

Snippet: Middle of Nowhere

Dream: Invisible Woman at Work

Idea: Snatched During a Test Drive

Explanation of terms: TFI, PFI, FFI

Dream: Runaway Van

Dream: Talking Car

Dream: Invisible Dreamgirl In My Lap

Snippet: Fembot Walk (still more to add)

Snippet: Marla at Home

Conversation About a (Yet-Unwritten) Story Idea

Mitch Stevens Takes Over the World!

Conversation: Any "real" invisible women in the groups?

Conversation: Man (Becomes) Invisible With the Woman?

Ideas: Becoming, Unbecoming, and Stuck

Idea: LNC-Bot

Idea: The Fembot Who WAS Me

Idea: Sideshow PFI

Table of Contents

As always, this blog is always under construction, more in content than in format, so check back often for new posts!

LNC-bot

2007-04-14T02:41:00.000-04:00

I came up with this one some time ago, after watching the movie Earthquake in New York on television.

I was just watching gorgeous Lisa Nicole Carson in that Earthquake in New York movie, and I got another story idea.

This story is set in a 1999 United States in which the Cold War has not yet ended (maybe Russia has become the new Soviet Union; it's still just an idea). Anyway, the KGB is hard at work replacing American entertainment figures with lookalikes (clones or androids, haven't decided which) that have been engineered with the ability to turn invisible.

The Lisa Nicole Carson lookalike escapes her handlers in Moscow, turns invisible and escapes to New York, where she tries to blend in as much as possible (well, as much as such a gorgeous woman can -- as you might have guessed from this and the Dream story, I have a serious LNC fixation).

Once the KGB discovers the escape, they spread the rumor that Lisa Nicole Carson is a KGB spy, hoping to flush their Lisa out of hiding.

Meanwhile, in New York, she runs into a seriously starstruck young man who fawns over her, providing many opportunities for her to flash that dazzling smile. The young man works in the intelligence community, but he cannot accept that his dreamgirl is a KGB spy.

At some point she reveals who she really is and the young man helps her foil the Russian plot to take over the US entertainment industry.

I'm still mulling this one over, but I had to put it out here for you all to see.

Back to Dreams, Snippets, and Story Ideas

Back to Table of Contents

An Ordinary Bus Ride: Page 5

2007-04-12T23:59:00.000-04:00

As the elevator door closed, I saw this building had one of those weird floor "numbering" systems I'd seen in a few places. They were actually lettered. The button for floor "C", presumably the third floor, was pressed.

When we got there, again, someone was waiting for the elevator as we got off. Just like the man downstairs, she spoke to me and to the box. I noticed that neither of them had said a name, hadn't even pretended to try to remember one, just "Hello." So, maybe everybody in this building had some kind of mysterious secret...?

I followed the box to apartment to apartment C0, silently noting the irony that apartment "see zero" would be occupied by someone who can't be seen. The two keys that had been floating above the box ever since the first key had been used now went to work, each unlocking its proper lock, after which the door swung open. Both keys pulled out of the door and dropped onto a table just inside, as the box and I entered the apartment. The box disappeared down a hallway while the door swung closed and locked itself behind me. I even saw the chain lock apply itself with no visible help, by which point my... "hostess?"... had, uh, disappeared behind closed doors.

Momentarily the closed door (not the front door, the one the box had ducked behind) opened, and jeans similar to the ones modeled in the store emerged, topped by a rather tightly-filled knit sweater, with matching knit gloves at the ends of its sleeves. Again, no sign of the box which had seemed so integral a few moments earlier. But that thought fled my mind as I took in the sight of these well-filled clothes walking towards me.

The clothes stepped towards a kitchen, where a cabinet opened and a glass floated out. The outfit grabbed the glass from the air, then cocked it towards me, which I took to be an offer of something to drink.

"Um, sure. What do you have?" I replied, wondering what empty clothes needed with something to drink. Or an apartment, for that matter.

The clothes turned towards the refrigerator but it opened without any apparent move by the outfit to open it. A couple of things slid around on the top shelf, and I saw a few different fruit juices, along with lemonade, ice water, ginger ale, and even beer. I decided on cranberry juice, watching as the jar floated out, filled the glass still being held by my oufit-hostess (or hostess-outfit), and returned to the fridge. Just before the fridge door closed itself, I noticed all kinds of food in there, and again I wondered why empty clothes needed a refrigerator... or food.

"Thank you," I said, as the outfit handed me the glass of juice, and led the way to the living room couch. It gestured for me to sit first, so I did, expecting it to sit next to me. I sipped my juice, noticing that the clothes hadn't moved. When I leaned towards the table to put my glass down, a coaster from a stack on the other end of the table floated towards me. I waited for it to stop, then put my glass down. The outfit was apparently waiting for me to lose the glass, because once I did, it sat right in my lap. Actually, it sat sideways in my lap; as soon as it did, its shoes unstrapped themselves and floated down to the floor, as the outfit wrapped its sleeves around my neck. I put my left arm around its back, while my right arm busied itself with getting more familiar with this sweater. That led to the gloves leaving their places at the end of the sweater's sleeves to caress and massage my shoulders, while the sweater actually pressed the ends of its empty armholes against my face, as if to emphasize that there was no body in it.

And that's where the story ends. Like I said at the beginning, I don't know if this really happened or not. If it was a dream, I can't say for sure that I was asleep at the time, and if it really happened, I can't say for sure that it happened to me.

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An Ordinary Bus Ride: Page 4

2007-04-12T23:58:00.000-04:00

I guess the clothes, or their unseen wearer, decided my lean didn't bring me close enough, because the whole outfit leaned a little towards me, until the front of the tube top was pressing against my chest. And yes, there was just the right amount of resistance when the top pressed against me, even though there were no actual breasts to be seen. Just because I could, I actually reached down into the tube top and began stroking the inside surface of the fullest part of its left breast. The outfit began to wiggle a bit in response.

"You like that?" I asked aloud, without meaning to. "Well, I like it too. Too bad there isn't just a little bit more of you. I mean, more to you."

The jeans cocked one leg behind them, as if to back away, but made no immediate move to get away from my rubbing fingers. But finally it did, backing away a few steps until, again, it was just beyond arms-length. Then, the jeans and tube top just collapsed, like their supports had been removed. But neither of them hit the floor; instead, the now limp tube top came to rest on top of the box I had been standing on just a little earlier. Then the shoes' ankle straps again undid themselves and the pantyhose lifted their legs into the air, letting the jeans slide free, then fold themselves in midair and place themselves atop the box. Meanwhile the pantyhose continued to hover there in the air momentarily, almost in a sitting position, while the box floated next to it holding the jeans and tube top. Then, finally, the hosiery stepped out of the air and back into the shoes, which again strapped themselves to the pantyhosed ankles.

I should point out that in all this time, not much else was going on in the store, but the apparent lone employee on hand, sitting behind the register the whole time, paid little or no attention to what I thought were strange goings-on. Neither did she pay much attention when a box-with-legs approached the cash register, piled with clothing to buy. She watched placidly as each item floated up off the box and onto the counter, then she rang it up and put it into a bag. Once everything was rung up, lo and behold! a credit card floated up from under the box to pay for the purchases. I tried to get a peek at the name on the card, but the cardholder (there's a quick way out of what to call her/it) cleverly positioned the card so that I could see nothing but its underside even as the card passed practically in front of my face. I honestly can't tell you why I didn't just reach out and grab it...

Once the cashier had processed the card, she put the charge slip, a pen, and the charge card on the counter. Now, the register area was on a small platform about a foot above the store's floor level, meaning the pen and charge slip rested about eighteen inches above the top of the floating box. But, hey, if you don't have a solid form, what is eighteen inches, right? The pen floated upright and signed the charge slip, but it was one of those unreadable scribbled signatures I call wannabe-autographs. It must have matched the card, though, because the cashier checked it and then handed over the card, a copy of the charge slip, and the bag with my new "friend's" purchases. The bag floated up off the counter, then down towards the box, then disappeared underneath it, setting my mind abuzz again. I could see earlier that the box appeared to be just a prop. Yet, again, the pantyhose disappeared inside it at a level improbable (apparently not impossible) to the eye, and now charge cards were first appearing from its underside and then disappearing inside it along with shopping bags full of clothes.

Again I was left shaking my head and deciding not to try to figure out what was going on, since I had plenty of clues that were absolutely no help in figuring anything out...

The door swung open in front of the box-with-legs, the same way it had when we entered, and stayed open until I had cleared it, although the box was by this point a few steps ahead of me. I continued to follow it, not having to worry about being discreet like I had tried to do earlier. We walked around the next corner, where the box approached the first door, which again swung open in front of it and stayed open until I had entered, even though the box was still a few steps ahead of me. As it approached a locked door inside, three keys floated out from its underside; two floated just above the box, while the third unlocked the door and let us in, and again the door stayed open until I had come through a few steps behind the box. The key pulled itself from the lock and returned to where it had come from, under/inside the box, as it waited by a bank of elevators.

When one arrived, a sharply-dressed man exited. When he came out, he was actually looking straight down at the box as he said hello to it, and another to me, then went on his way, leaving me to wonder if the residents of this building were... missing something, or was it me that was missing something. Remembering both the bus driver, the bus passengers, and the cashier back at the store, I figured it must have been me...

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An Ordinary Bus Ride: Page 3

2007-04-12T23:57:00.000-04:00

"I don't know what-- I don't know how you do this, but you are strong," I said. Apparently my new friend had decided to show me just how strong, because right then the floating box floated to a position next to the jeans that had been beneath it, and lowered almost to the floor, as if inviting me to step aboard. *Am I gonna be sorry for this?* I thought, but for whatever reason I actually stepped onto the box. It didn't sag in the least, but held my weight just as solidly as the floor had just moments before. Then, it rose to its previous position a foot above the level of the jeans' waistband. I yelped, after which the box rose even further, until my head was brushing against the ceiling! Though I tried not to look directly down, since I was standing on a "platform" not much larger than my footprints, I did see when I glanced downward that something was tumbling about in the air just above the jeans. I couldn't dwell on it at the moment, though, worried as I was that I might fall or be thrown from my floating perch.

"OK," I said, in a wavering voice. "I shouldn't have leaned on you, and I don't know why I thought I had to see how strong you are, but could you please put me back down now?!" The box complied, slowly lowering me back to the level it was at when I stepped aboard. By this time there was something new floating above the jeans -- a tube top. A very nicely filled tube top, at that, ending about six inches above the jeans.

I already knew there was no body inside these clothes, but my hands wouldn't stay away. This time I found myself rubbing the bottom of the tube top, which caused the whole outfit to begin swaying back and forth, obviously enjoying the feeling.

"Sorry for stepping on your box just then," I started, before it hit me -- the box was no longer part of the picture, at least not at the moment. Apparently it had dropped to the floor directly below where I had stepped off it. I stared at the box, wondering if it had actually been part of this... entity from the get-go or was it just a prop, like the clothes. I picked it up and turned it over, not knowing what to expect its underside to look like.

It looked like the underside of a cardboard box. No circuits, no visual hints of a portal of any kind. Nothing out of the ordinary. I even reached towards it, expecting my hand to somehow disappear inside it. Instead, my fingertips thudded solidly against it like it was no more than the slit-off underside of a cardboard box it appeared to be.

I tried to shake the conflicting thoughts from my head and finish what I had started to say.

"Better," I said, having resumed dragging my fingertips back and forth along the fabric of the tube top, "but I still wouldn't mind a bit more. And maybe whatever's gonna happen next can happen somewhere private?"

Apparently it wasn't ready for me to stop what I was doing at that particular moment. And, to tell the truth, neither was I. I mean, what are you supposed to do when a pair of jeans with a tube top floating above, clothes you know have no one in them, walks up right next to you and just stands there? As I continued rubbing the tube top's bottom hem, I leaned a bit closer and did something I know I wouldn't have been able to do if there had been an actual invisible woman wearing these clothes: I looked down inside them.

Not like staring down a blouse as in looking at cleavage. That would have been some trick, looking into an invisible woman's cleavage... No, I leaned over enough so that if there had been someone inside the clothes, we would have bumped heads. Then, I looked down. I could see the bottom of the bulge where the unseen breasts were pushing the tube top outward, but from the inside. I could see the inside of the jeans' waistband, the seam where the two leg openings separate (something you'd NEVER see on a visible woman, even if she were wearing transparent clothing), the empty shoes below the jeans' equally empty leg openings. Very odd. But a good kind of odd...

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An Ordinary Bus Ride: Page 2

2007-04-12T23:56:00.000-04:00

Thinking about old TV shows almost made me walk into a parking meter from not watching where I or my subject was going. The box creature walked about a block in the direction the bus was going, then rounded a corner. I ran to avoid losing it, but didn't want to be too obvious about following. But when I rounded the corner, it was just standing there, as if it were waiting for me to catch up. For half a second I thought about the possibility that this was a setup, that I was walking into a trap, but I ignored that and continued following the box, which had stopped in front of a clothing store. As it stopped and its legs turned direction slightly, the door swung open but slowly, as if being pushed rather than opening automatically.

I followed, not noticing until after I was inside that it was a women's clothing store. But I was determined to find out what was what regarding this box creature, so I stayed and watched as it began its version of shopping. It would stop by a rack, where a hanger holding an outfit would float off the rack and hang there in space between the rack and the box creature, sometimes appearing to be manipulated by unseen hands. After a few moments the floating hanger would be lowered onto the top (bottom?) of the box in such a way that the clothing it held would be loosely folded atop the box rather than piled up. Once a few items were stacked way, the box made its way towards the dressing rooms.

I wondered silently why it was bothering with a dressing room, since whatever entity was behind all this movement was invisible anyway. Apparently that thought did not occur only to me, because the box stopped right outside the dressing rooms, did a quick about face, then turned and walked back towards me, stopping a little more than arms-length away.

The outfit's shoes unstrapped themselves from the hosed-but-transparent ankles, after which the hosed legs stepped out of them. The pantyhose then made slight movements as if unseen hands were adjusting them a bit, smoothing out here and tugging there, after which went to put on a pair of jeans. The hanger holding the jeans floated up off the box as the jeans unclipped themselves from the hanger, which was tossed aside as the jeans positioned themselves to be stepped into. There was nothing visible lowering the jeans to where the hosed legs could step into them, but they hung there just the same as if unseen hands were holding them as the legs stepped into them. Then they pulled themselves up the pantyhosed legs, zipped themselves up, and fastened the crotch button. I hadn't realized it at the moment, but apparently when the jeans floated off the box to be "put on," the box itself rose a bit into the air, because once the jeans were fastened onto the unseen and intangible figure underneath, it floated at least a foot above the waistband of the jeans.

With the same reckless boldness that had earlier led me to stroke the legs on the bus after another rider had apparently been slashed for the same thing, I reached out for what I was sure was an unseen midriff between the jeans' waistband and the box. But my hand made contact with nothing but air; it was just like it looked, jeans and pantyhose that held their shape but without something solid inside to give them that shape.

"I hope you don't mind," I said, just before I reached down just a bit to rub the inside of the waistband. There was no apparent response to my spontaneous action, not that I had expected any, or had any idea what to expect.

Another idea, just as silly, popped into my head. The situation I was finding myself in had removed whatever filter would normally have stopped me from acting on just such a silly impulse -- I propped my elbows on the still-floating box and leaned on it with almost all my weight. There was absolutely no give, though I had just felt that there was nothing solid holding it in place.

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An Ordinary Bus Ride

2007-04-12T23:55:00.000-04:00

To blatantly rip off a much better known writer, "This may have really happened; I'm not sure. But I do know that if it did in fact happen, it didn't happen to me."

The way I remember it, I was riding in the last seat on a public bus and this passenger got on. It was, I kid you not, a cardboard box with two legs sticking out of the bottom, wearing slightly transparent white hose. You know how sometimes in grocery stores or the neighborhood mom-and-pop store, they will slit a box in half to use it as a display tray for the merchandise inside? Well, this "passenger" was one of those boxes, but it was walking around with its own full-sized woman's legs. As I stared, it strutted to the bench seat across the back of the bus, turned around, and sat.

I spent the whole time the box-with-legs was seated next to me staring at it/them and trying to figure out how such a thing could be possible. The box was obviously not deep enough for a full-sized woman to be walking under it, and yet there were these legs sticking out of it. There didn't appear to be a visible top to the hosiery sticking out of the box, so I guess it was pantyhose rather than stockings. But, was the box some kind of portal to another dimension? Maybe a woman somehow got stuck in the middle of transferring from one to the other? Or something...

I also noticed, to my surprise, that not only was the hosiery itself translucent, but apparently so were the legs inside them. I couldn't really see through the hose that well, but the image I saw through the hosiery was definitely that of the seat under it. So this box-thing was walking, not with its own legs, but its own hosiery with no legs in them?

While I sat there and tried to figure this out, another male passenger who had been sitting and staring at these very shapely legs like they were something to eat reached out to feel the legs. I guess he figured that if there was no upper body, there was no one to protest or react. It was a much bolder action that I would have taken; in the face of weirdness, I will usually sit and mind my own business, if I can help it. Sometimes I can't...

The guy who reached out for the stockings sticking out of the box? Well, for him that decision was an unfortunate miscalculation, because as soon as his fingers made contact with the apparently empty hosiery, his hand was slashed by something neither of us could see. The poor fool yelled and pulled his hand back. I didn't see any visible sign that he had been cut, but from his yell I have to guess he was in some kind of pain. He got up and marched in disgust to an empty seat closer to the front of the bus.

Even though I saw what had just happened to my fellow passenger, for some reason I felt bold enough to reach for the legs myself, thinking that the box or whatever it is must be able to see, since it turned around right in front of an empty seat and sat down. It must have seen the expression on the guy's face and didn't like it. I was curious, but not, um, hungry, at least not like him. I finally did reach out and stroke the stockings, causing them to twitch and to shift their position a bit, but without doing anything to me or causing anything to happen to me.

I rang for my stop about ten blocks after the guy who'd been slashed got off, and noticed immediately that the box-thing uncrossed its "legs" and stood up as if to get off also. I'd had someplace definite to go -- that's why I was on the bus -- but when I saw this mystery creature stand and prepare to get off the bus, all thoughts of what I had been about to do just left me, as I decided to follow this creature and see what it (or "she?") was up to.

When the bus stopped, I stepped aside and gestured for the box creature to get off first, mostly out of curiosity so I could watch from behind. And, sure enough, as the box-creature descended the steps, the movement of its hosed legs told me that they had to be attached to something "inside" the box, though that was visually impossible. Again I began thinking that the box was some kind of portal, with the rest of the woman on the other side of it. Made me think of an episode of the original Twilight Zone, where a little girl fell out of bed and phased through the wall into some other dimension, leaving her family to figure out how to get her back before the invisible hole in the wall closed up, which it did as soon as her father leaned through it and pulled his daughter back.

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Sideshow PFI

2007-04-07T14:03:00.000-04:00

Idea suggested long ago by Paul Ingerson...

A permenent PFI leads a fairly normal life keeping her invisible parts covered. But how would she tell any potential boyfriend? She'll need to know if he'll be attracted or revolted. Can she trust him to keep it secret?

This might tie in with the "Freak Show" idea I posted last year? The PFI tells her boyfriend. He's turned off, but he doesn't betray her. However someone else - a rival girlfriend for the boy? - is spying on them, and she does tell the travelling freak show.

The PFI's captured and taken with the show to another town. She escapes, returns home and confronts the boyfriend, who she believes betrayed her. She finally believes his innocence when he hides her from the freak show goons looking for her. (He's been missing her all this time, and believed she'd run away because of him.)

Together, the two of them work out who betrayed her and get their revenge.

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The Fembot Who WAS Me

2007-04-07T13:42:00.000-04:00

I don't have a working title in mind for this one. It's also a first-person story, so the description uses plenty of "I" and "me" but it's not supposed to be "me," Bryan. Though that will probably be the character's name...

An inventor/researcher friend with unconventional methods of researching and of financing, builds a prototype "biodroid," as he calls it, using some "borrowed" military technology. And some nonstandard funding sources as well.

In time the military brass that was overseeing the project turns against him, but he sees it coming and by the time they come to lean on him, he has basically removed himself from the project. A friend of a friend of a friend convinces me to let him stash in my basement ("just for the weekend, I promise") what he insists on referring to as a "body," until the heat lets up some.

I keep going to check on this woman-thing, not quite believing that it is what it's supposed to be, some kind of super-high-tech mix of biology and electronics, hoping that they do indeed come and get it before the weekend is out.

Monday comes, but my friend and his friends don't. Tuesday and Wednesday pass with no news. On Thursday, my friend's name hits the TV news in connection with an executive of a military contractor who disappeared over the weekend with hundreds of thousands of dollars. The story mentions that "the government fears the unauthorized use of military technology to build machinery that may fall into the wrong hands" and that the government's search for the executive, my friend, and the "military technology."

I get worried, and drunk, and go to check this woman-thing again and brood over it. I start to panic, and somehow I spill beer over the "machine." I pull this thing from its hiding place by its hands to find somewhere else to stash it... to find myself looking up into my own eyes.

By some kind of exchange that I don't understand, I have somehow been transferred into this female android body. But if I'm in the android, who's in *my* body?

You guessed it... somehow I got "doubled," or copied, but the perspective of the story then shifts to the fembot. What happens next...

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Ideas:Becoming, Unbecoming, and Stuck

2007-03-23T17:15:00.000-04:00

Becoming: I wake up one day to find that I've turned into an exact copy of Esther Baxter, and invisible hands are (physically!) guiding my actions

Unbecoming: While staring intently at pics of Esther Baxter in some magazine, somehow I get sucked into the mag. But, since it's something that's already happened, and thus I'm "not supposed to be there" (because I wasn't there), I'm turned invisible and intangible. But still able to direct objects and make my presence felt...

Stuck:

I find that I'm seeing the world from EB's perspective, as if I had been turned into her, but she's still firmly in control. As if I've become imprisoned in her mind or something.
After a period of time where I've been impersonating EB in a lookalike bodysuit, it comes to life and assumes her persona, suggesting that either the suit *was* EB all along, or else EB has temporarily *become* the suit and is aware of the impersonation.

Dreams, Snippets, and Story Ideas

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Emma-terial

2007-01-24T17:26:00.000-05:00

Traveler visits bed and breakfast recommended by friends, and find out its entire "staff" now consists of one immaterial woman(?), who has taken a liking to him.

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Meeting Odalys Garcia

2005-04-15T13:21:00.000-04:00

I had a rough day at work today. Kind of like the start of my first Dream story: the work just kept piling higher and higher, making it look like I wasn't doing anything, even though I was hard at work all day.

Anyway, I needed a break, so I walked into a conference room adjacent to my desk, closed the door behind me, and stared out the window at the ever-moving crowd of people coming, going, talking, doing whatever it is people do who aren't sentenced to work where I do.

While I was lost in thought, I felt hands and arms sliding below my arms and around my midsection, though I hadn't heard anyone enter the room. Then a chin rested on my right shoulder. I looked down and didn't see any arms or hands down around my waist, but I could feel them. I placed one hand on my stomach just above my belt buckle, but there were unseen hands clasped together there. Whoever it was that was hugging me responded by holding her body against me and moaning softly.

*So I'm not imagining it, then,* I thought. I then reached around behind me with my right hand, and right behind my thigh I felt fabric, though I didn't see anyone or anything back there. The unseen hugger chuckled. I then did the same with my left hand, and the hugger said, "That tickles!"

Right away I noticed a slight Spanish accent, though the voice didn't seem to be the least bit familiar.

"Who are you?" I asked, amazed at just how calmly I was reacting to being hugged by an invisible... something.

"You mean, you can't guess?" she said playfully. It didn't sound like Val. The accent sounded authentic, and Val didn't have much of an accent.

"No, I have no idea. Please tell me, who are you?"

"I hear you've been wanting to meet me for a long time, so I thought I'd give you your chance," she said.

My mind started racing. Who had I been wanting to meet for a long time that would have a Spanish accent? More importantly, how could she have found this out, whoever she was?

After I didn't answer right away, she said,
"Think television. Or should I say, 'Piense en television?'"

Wheels started turning. I do spend an inordinate amount of time watching Spanish television, wishing I'd spent a little more time using the Spanish I had learned in school.

"Are you Sofia? From A Que..., A Que... something, you know, that show on Univision?" I said, meaning Sofia Vergara, from A Que No Te Atreves,' one of the shows on Univision, a Spanish television network.

"No, I'm not Sofia," she said. "But you're pretty warm. Very warm, in fact."

Then it hit me. I knew that voice. I knew that figure (not from holding it, of course, but from... well, that would be a long story). It could only be...

"Odalys?"

"That's me!" she said. I could tell from her voice she was smiling.

Odalys Garcia! Miss Lente Loco herself! I was actually in the company of a woman I considered to be television royalty. If there had been anyway to foresee this day, I would have made such plans... But something wasn't right, somehow. "But... how did you become invisible?" I said. "And why, for that matter? And how did you know I wanted ot meet you? And where to find me?"

"Sooo many questions!" she said. "Val told me you'd have a lot of questions."

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

"VAL told you?" I repeated. "You mean, Val did this?"

Before she could answer, there was a knock on the conference room door. "Are you busy in there? We need the room," Katie Arrington, a supervisor from down the hall, said through the door.

"Um, um, OK, I'll be out soon," I said to her. Then I gently pulled free from Odalys' embrace, turned to where I thought she was standing and said, "We're going to have to let them use the room."

No answer. Not a peep. Not even breathing.

I started wracking my brain. I know I'd wanted to meet this woman ever since I first saw her show years earlier, but not so much I'd imagine her like this, at my job. And yet, if she was real, how could she be invisible? And how could she be there one second and gone the next, without using the door?

I started slowly "sweeping" the room, swinging my arms around very slowly as I moved about the room ve-e-e-ry quietly and listening for sounds of breathing. Ms. Arrington must have opened the door while I was facing away from it, because when I turned back she and four of the workers from her unit were staring at me like I had just landed from outer space.

"Is something... wrong?" Ms. Arrington said, in that tone usually reserved for speaking to the very young or the very stupid.

"Um, no, everything's OK," I said. "I was just, uh... look, it's been a long day, and I was just kind of bugging out, I guess. Nothing serious. Sorry to hold you all up."

Ms. Arrington laughed. "No problem, John," she said. "We all know how it can get around here. Believe me, we've all had days as bad, if not worse." Then they all filed into the room and closed the door.

I sat at my desk and went back to work. Then I heard something creak near my desk. "Is that you, Odalys?" I said.

A voice whispered in my ear, "Come over into the staircase."

So I got up and walked over to the staircase. When the door closed behind me, an unseen hand took my right hand and led me up the stairs to the landing just inside the door to the roof.

"Are you really Odalys?" I said.

The voice giggled and said, "Why would I be pretending to be if I weren't?"

"Well," I started, "Val knows how much I really want to meet Odalys, and she'd probably get a kick out of pretending. Though I don't know how she'd manage the figure."

"You think I'm Val, huh? Well, tell me if Val can do this," she said, as she became visible. She was Odalys, alright, in all her fine smiling Cuban glory. That megawatt smile (and multimegawatt figure) could make a blind man have to shade his eyes. She was wearing a shimmering red v-neck minidress and matching red stockings, making the most of that awesome figure. It's no wonder her show is so popular, even with people who don't understand a word of Spanish.

"Just how did you manage to do that, anyway?" I said.

"What? You mean, this?" she said casually, as she disappeared again.

"Um, yeah, that," I said. "You make it sound like it's nothing."

"It is nothing, to me," she said. "Remember a couple of years ago, when I used to appear and disappear at random on the show?"

"Yeah, I remember," I said. "I thought you were going to drive your co-host crazy."

"Raymond did take a while to get used to it," she agreed.

"You make it sound like it wasn't just a camera trick," I said.

"It wasn't. I've been doing this as long as I can remember. Before you ask, it's not magic, it's genetic, so I can't teach you how to do it. I'm not sure how it's done myself, exactly. I just do it."

"What about your clothes?" I said.

"Oh, is that bothering you?" she said. Right then her red dress reappeared. Even invisible, it was plain that the figure inside the dress was mind-boggling, and mind-boggling was just what her unseen figure was doing to me.

"Odalys," I said, "please tell me: why would an awesome-looking woman like you want to be invisible?"

"Because I can do it," she said. "I can go without having to worry about how my hair looks, do my clothes match, is my makeup right, whatever. It doesn't matter if you're invisible."

"Now, you didn't answer the rest of my questions, but I guess the answers are obvious. Val must have told you where I work. But how did you get in?"

"Raymond," she said. "He parked, got out of the car, went over to the passenger door and opened it for me, and then when we got to the front of the building he did the same. He's downstairs in the Health Department office right now; he knows someone down there. When I'm ready to leave, I'll need you to call him and tell him I'm ready, because I have to be invisible when I leave. He'll stand inside the front doors until I let him know I'm there, and then I can get some stuff from his car."

In the building I work in there are many who can watch Univision and understand what's being said, so I can imagine why she'd prefer to be invisible when she leaves. But something isn't adding up.

"But, Odalys," I start, "why are you getting things out of Raymond's car, if you're gonna be invisible? You can't go walking around like that."

Her face became visible again, smiling away. "Oh -- I forgot to tell you," she said, " Val told me that you wanted to have the whole world see me with you, so I'm taking you out to dinner."

"Val told you that?" I began to realize I'd have to reconsider whatever bad thoughts I'd had about Val recently. After all, if she'd arrange a complete surprise like this...

I noticed that Odalys had a strange look on her face, and she was looking at me. It didn't take more than a few seconds to figure out what the issue was. But she asked anyway...

"Is Val, like, your girlfriend or something? She seemed like she really wanted me to agree to go out with you, and yet it seemed like she was very attached in a way that goes beyond friendship, know what I mean?"

"Yeah, I know what you mean. It's a complicated story, believe me. Maybe I'll tell you about it later." Looking at my watch, I realized that it was 5:00. Time to go home.

I gathered my things and left, arm-in-invisible-arm with Odalys as we walked down the stairs to avoid any awkward situations on the elevator. She told me on the way down the stairs that once she rode in an apartment building elevator while invisible and an obviously very drunk man entered. He bumped into her, then reached out and touched what turned out to be an uncovered bit of cleavage. He perked up, feeling around to see what else was there. She couldn't go anywhere, and she boarded on the 20th floor, so it was a long ride down.

When she left that elevator, the man was writhing in pain on the floor, the victim of an invisible knee to the groin. I asked her what he did. She just grunted and said, "Use your imagination."

We got to the ground floor, and Raymond was there by the front doors, looking around for some kind of cue to Odalys' presence.

"Aren't you Raymond Arrieta?" I asked, trying (not very well) to play dumb.

"Um, yes, I am," he said, looking distracted (I suppose I would be, too, if I was the one waiting for a woman like Odalys).

"What brings you to the Social Services building? You have a good job," I said jokingly.

He chuckled and said, "I'm, uh, waiting for a friend. The friend is supposed to be meeting me here, but I'm not sure if, um..." He looked at me like he wanted to ask me to leave, or was hoping that I would. He was understandably nervous. Who wants to be seen talking to someone who doesn't seem to be there?

While Raymond fidgeted, a voice whispered in his ear, just loud enough for me to hear, "Relax, Raymond, he's the one I came here to get."

He flinched and started looking around, then caught himself and chuckled sheepishly. The three of us then went out to Raymond's car. I told them that I should probably go get my car and bring it around to where Raymond was parked. Odalys said that if the car was in a parking structure, it was better that we walk to my car, with me carrying her stuff (of course).

We walkeed to my car, with me carrying Odalys' bag slung over my shoulder. When we got there, she asked whether I'd prefer that she be visible or invisible in the car.

Hmmm. What a choice. Do I have her become visible, and chance creating accidents when people (all men, I'm sure) look over and see the goddess in the car they're passing (I'm no speed demon, and my car is a 12-year-old Hyundai)? Or do I have her stay invisible, and keep all the distraction to myself?

"Tell you what," I said. "It's starting to get dark. How about if you make just your clothes visible? I'll stay in the right lane so there are no accidents. The Bronx River Parkway is tricky enough without all those drivers looking over and seeing you."

She laughed. We talked all the way home, occasionally getting a second or even third look from some of the other drivers as they passed. Rather, second and third looks from passengers in the cars that passed us.

When we got to Mount Vernon, she was once again invisible, which means when we got out of the car, I had to carry her bag again. "I bet you do that just to get out of carrying things, don't you?" I asked.

She laughed again. It was amazing that such a beautiful woman could have such an easy laugh and agreeable attitude. Not at all what I was used to.

When we got inside, I asked her what kind of dinner she had in mind. "Nothing fancy," she said. "I was thinking maybe Dallas BBQ's. Val tells me that's one of your favorites."

*Boy,* I thought. *Val's taken care of everything.* I began to wonder if she wasn't really up to something, if this wasn't some kind of elaborate prank.

I went into the bathroom to take my shower. Various thoughts invaded my head as I shed my clothes, not all of them unwelcome, involving Odalys and the shower. I opened the bathroom door just a crack and said, "Odalys--"

She cut me off. "No-no-no. I thought you might want to ask me something about that shower, and Val saw it coming too. She made it clear that I'm only supposed to be taking you out to dinner. She was not at all vague about what could happen to me if I was to 'take liberties,' as she put it. Something about calling Paulette. Who's that, anyway, if Val is your girlfriend?"

*Val REALLY thought of everything,* I corrected. "I'll explain later," I said, and reclosed the bathroom door.
As I started to wash, a familiar voice said, "Here, let me do that," after which the washcloth removed itself from my grip.

I started reaching out for Val, until I realized that even in the shower, I couldn't see her. I mean, the water should have been bouncing off her body, making it plain to see where she was. But it wasn't.

"That IS you, isn't it, Val?" I asked tentatively.

"No, it's not me, John. Your washcloth is washing you all by itself," she said in a voice dripping with sarcasm.

"But how... that means the water is just passing right through you, and that's not possible... is it?"

"Don't ask me," she said. "Whatever happens or doesn't happen is because of YOUR bag of tricks. You must have been fantasizing again."

"Yeah, I was," I said. "Does she know you're here?"

"No. She thinks I left her alone with you for the evening. You won't tell her any different, will you?"

"She must think you're here or something, because she turned down an invitation to join me in the shower," I said.

"That wasn't an invite," Val said. "You just wanted to see what the answer would be, right?"

"No, I really was--" I started, before something she'd just said about fantasizing hit me. "Wait just a second. You said that the water passed through you because I was fantasizing about it. Please tell me that Odalys in there is not just some kind of trick I'm somehow playing on myself. Or one that YOU'RE playing on me."

She didn't answer for a while, as she continued dutifully washing me. Not lingering on any particular area, which I don't suppose I should have expected her to. I repeated my question just as she had finished me.

She spoke her answer slowly and deliberately, as if she was afraid of saying the wrong word, or maybe that she might leave something out. "Odalys is not like me. You didn't invent, or concoct, or whatever word you want to use -- you didn't produce her, like you did me. She really exists. So you should stop worrying and just go out and have yourself a good time, OK?"

"You didn't answer my question, Val," I said. "I know Odalys really exists. What I want to know is, is that beautiful creature in the other room really Odalys Garcia, or some fantasy trick that one of us is playing on me?"

She answered me with another question. "'One of us'?" she repeated. "John, do you think it's really possible to trick yourself, and do it so well that you wouldn't even know? Do you REALLY think you can do that?"

I realized right away that she skipped right over whether or not she was personally responsible for tricking me, if indeed I was being tricked, but I chose to overlook that and just answer her question. "Val," I started, "you know as well as I do that somehow I can make myself believe just about anything--"

She cut me off. "Fine. If you want to believe that a figment of your imagination or some trick up my sleeve is about to take you out to dinner, then go ahead. If you want to believe that she's real, that's fine too. Either way, just go, and have a good time, OK? Can you do that?"

I decided that being treated to dinner by such a gorgeous creature wouldn't be the worst thing that ever happened to me, even if I didn't know who or what she really was. Just as I grabbed the doorknob to open the door, Val said, "And John? Not a word about this conversation, OK?"

"Alright, Val. I'll play your little game."

I walked into the bedroom with the towel draped around my waist. Odalys' voice, coming from the empty space in front of my open closet door, said, "You won't very well be able to get dressed with that around you, will you?"

"You're in here? I thought you'd be waiting in the living room while I got myself ready," I said.

"Part of the deal I made with Val was that I get to pick out your clothes and dress you," her voice said.

"You're going to *dress* me?"

"Yeah, and I'm sure Val is checking up on us. I heard you in there talking, and I'm sure you weren't talking to yourself, were you?"

I didn't answer. I just did some quick figuring and came to the conclusion that Val was testing me for something, or else I was just plain losing my mind. But if my own imagination was testing me, I couldn't let myself fail; and if I was going crazy, then I was going to enjoy every minute of it, at least as long as Odalys seemed to be part of it.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" Odalys' voice said. "You're gonna have to drop that towel sometime, you know."

So I did. A low whistle sounded from the emptiness in my room. "Very nice, John. Too bad Val is spying on us; I have to keep my word."

My underwear drawer opened and a t-shirt and pair of "boxer brief" underpants floated up out of it. "Here, put these on," the voice said. I did, after which I heard the sound of feet aagainst my rug crossing the room, going back to the closet.

My olive-green double-breasted suit floated out of the closet on its suit hanger. "Odalys," I protested, "you're not seriously dressing me up just for Dallas BBQ, are you? That's a jeans-and-sneakers kind of place."

"Are you sure you don't want to wear a suit? Put it on, at least, OK? I want to see how it looks on you."

The hanger deposited itself on a hook inside the closet door, and then the jacket unbuttoned itself. The pants, hanging inside the jacket slid from the hanger, and positioned themselves for me to step into them. I did, after which they pulled themselves up, zipped themselves, and one of my dress belts tucked itself into the belt loops and fastened itself.

Next a hanging white dress shirt floated from the closet, removing itself from the hanger and positioning itself for me to put it on. I slid an arm into a sleeve, after which the other sleeve slid up the other arm, and the shirt buttoned itself.

My favorite tie that matches that suit, a gold one with green and royal blue designs on it (it looks better than it sounds), slid from my tie rack, looped itself around my collar, and began to tie itself.

"Wait a minute," I said. "Could you do me a favor and let me stand in front of the mirror while you tie this for me?"

"Sure, but why?" she asked.

"Well, I have no trouble tying a tie, but I have to stay away from mirrors. I get all crossed up. Plus, this will be my first time seeing a tie tie itself."

She laughed and led me over to the mirror I have propped up on top of the radiator (it was originally right inside the bedroom door, but at the time the dresser was there. The bed is there now, and if what usually happened when the mirror was there were to continue happening, I would have a VERY rude awakening one morning, finding the mirror face down on top of me. So the mirror rests on the radiator). It was a very compelling sight, watching the tie loop around itself like that.

Finally the jacket pulled itself on and buttoned itself. Then my socks and shoes were placed on my feet, and I got yet another show watching my shoes tie themselves.

When the outfit was complete, I heard the unseen feet take a couple of steps back. "Very nice," Odalys' voice said. "Are you sure you don't want to go somewhere else, instead of Dallas? It would be a shame to not wear that suit." As she spoke, unseen hands turned me around, presumably so she could see the suit from other angles.

"Well," I said, "I really wanted to go to Dallas, but we don't *have* to dress casual, if you really want to dress up. I suppose you're all set, so I guess we're about ready to go."

"No, I'm not all set," Odalys' voice said. "I still have to get dressed."

"But what about that dress you wore earlier today?"

"You want me to wear the dress I've been wearing *all day?*" she said.

Women. They can look just perfect, and still they want to change. I was about to insist that the dress she was wearing would be just fine (once it reappeared), when I realized that she might have planned to treat *me* to a show.

"Of course," I said. "Now I understand. You had a suit in mind all along, that's why you brought that bag along with you, right? You have another dress in there?"

"I have a few things in there, actually," she said. "What I was actually going to wear depended on what you wore."

"So now you get to wear something nice."

"I would have done that anyway, John," she said. Right then that red dress appeared again. It was almost a shame, knowing that she wasn't going to wear it. But if she did, there would be no show.

The dress (I forgot to mention this earlier) had sheer mesh sleeves, enhancing the invisible effect. The empty sleeves reached behind the dress and I could hear the sound of a zipper coming undone.

"I could have done that for you, you know," I told her.

"Yeah, I bet you could," she agreed, "but I don't want to be tempted to go back on my word to Val. 'No funny stuff,' that's what she said."

*Again with this agreement with Val,* I thought. All three theories still ran neck-and-neck in my mind (Val playing a trick, Odalys is real, I'm going crazy). Every time something happened to advance one idea, something else would happen to short up another possibility.

The dress' empty sleeves reached up until the end of its sleeves were about level with its shoulders; then the dress' shoulders slid from an unseen form underneath. In seconds the dress had completely removed itself from the unseen form shaping it, leaving only a floating red bra, red panties, and red stockings to give any hint of a person where the dress had been.

"Sure you don't need a hand with any of that?" I said, only trying to be helpful.

"You would like that, wouldn't you?" she said playfully (at least she *sounded* playful). "I'd love to let you, but there's no telling what Val might have up her sleeve... You never did tell me. Is she your girlfriend, or what?"

Talk about timing. I don't think Odalys could have chosen a more awkward (for me) time to ask me that question, when only her underwear gave me any visible hint as to her presence. Here I was fantasizing about that floating underwear, and here *she* was asking me about another... "female person."

I decided that, awkward or no, it was the moment of truth. I had no idea how she would reat, but it was going to come out at some time, so why not?

"Odalys," I started, "Val is... a figment of my imagination."

Immediately she became visible. I guess the time I'd spent with Val had made me immune to what might be called a "normal" reaction to having someone turn invisible (or visible) right in front of my eyes. Because though it didn't bother me in the least to have those glorious undies floating in front of me, when she became visible, my eyes almost popped out of my head. I started hyperventilating and fell backwards. Fortunately, I was standing in front of my bed at the time.

"No way," she replied. "She can't be. She called me on the phone and everything."

"Odalys... please... blank out again, would you?"

She gasped. "I thought you *wanted* to see me!"

"I do, but Val got me so crossed up that I'm more used to invisibility."

"Invisibility?" she repeated, looking at me warily. "Am I supposed to believe that this Val of yours is invisible?"

"She is, Odalys, and right this minute I wish you were too, at least until you get dressed," I said.

She sighed. "OK," she said, finally. "I don't get it, but if it makes you more comfortable, I'll wait until I get dressed. I wasn't planning to stay this way anyway, but if it makes you feel better..."

She vanished again. "So you've never actually... been in her presence?" I said.

"No, I haven't, and I don't believe this business about her being invisible, either," she said. "Prove it to me."

There was a knock at my bedroom door. We both turned to look, and were met by the sight of a mint-green tankdress clinging to an invisible figure. "How's this for proof?" said a voice from above the dress.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Again Odalys became visible, and visibly shaken. "Ay! Ay! It's a... it's a..." Odalys started, before she passed out.

"Nice going, Val," I said. "Shouldn't every date start by making the one who's paying pass out?"

"Oh, calm down," Val shot back, helping me get Odalys to the bed in my guest room. "You could have waited until after dinner to tell her, couldn't you?"

Two things came to mind: One, that Val was probably not playing a trick on me, and two, that I have to work on my timing. I started feeling guilty that this gorgeous woman, a TV star who was going to take *me* to dinner, was now out cold. I might even have to pay for her dinner to quiet my guilty conscience.

My Original Stories -- Table of Contents

Some story ideas from another group

2005-04-10T13:23:00.000-04:00

The Glove Box: Engineering student builds basically useless contraption called a "glove box." A booth, something like an old-fashioned telephone booth, with walls of latex sheeting with electical wires running through the walls. An AI unit powering the box can form "gloves" that extend from the walls, which can be programmed to do a variety of tasks.
A female janitor notices the box one evening as she is cleaning the facility housing it. She steps inside just as a bug in the AI program causes it to go into operation. The gloves wave around inside and find someone there, and then...

The Leg Model: A half-asleep night worker, just coming home from work, hears footsteps outside his first-floor window as he's getting ready for bed. He looks outside to see what looks like the bottom half of a woman walking by. He follows this walking skirt withs legs and learns "her" story.

The Dentist Office: Smoke begins to gather around a dental hygienist while she is at work. Soon another hygienist takes her place in the office while she tends to her problem. The patient she was working on is an amateur detective, and decides to investigate.

Bugs: A man hears about an especially realistic VR girl program and pirates a copy of it. He then has to deal with the program's bugs after he installs the program in his house.

Blinded Date: A man's blind date is a member of a private women's club that requires all male guests to be blindfolded for the evening. When he finally is able to see (after a few slipups) he finds out that his date is...

A Suit Becoming Her: A woman asks a stranger for aspirin for her headache. He gives her something else, and soon loses control of herself but remains conscious. Then...

A Day in the Life: A interview with the female star of the Levi's Invisible Couple commercial.

Phantom Wife: A man falsely claims to be married in order to obtain credit and has his hacker friend create a Social Security account in his "wife's" name. The man knows nothing about hacker "ethics," though...

Obsessed: A man becomes obsessed with two women he sees dancing on Soul Train. He uses his connections to get backstage, and then...

Sweet Chocolate: (Any attempt to describe this one beforehand would be absurd)

By Any Other Name: Clones of Heidi Klum, Tyra Banks, and Laetitia Casta try to live normal lives and succeed until the media catches up with them.

A Lotta Nerve: A man is injected with nanites as part of an experimental medical treatment. The scientist overseeing the experiment, though, forgot about the *other* program he was running when he was programming the nanites...

Instantly Rich: Franchise operator Mike Davis has quietly become one of the richest people in the world. When the Food Workers' Union is unable to organize his workers, the FWU hires a private eye to find out what's going on. His findings are...

Never in a Million Years: A female and invisible figment of a writer's imagination comes to life one Saturday afternoon and offers critiques of some of his writing.