Shoe Repair

CHAPTER ONE

I had often watched the bustle in front of the low wooden door of the shoe repair shop across the side street from my small third-floor interior design office, but I’d never been tempted to stop in. I’m a shopper, not a fixer. I own dozens of pairs of shoes. Probably more than thirty. Okay, more than fifty. But I only wear each of them a couple of times, that way they never wear out. I get a chuckle out of the streams of women pouring in and out of the shoe repair shop. Some of them are familiar faces, and there are a few I could swear were there twice a week. I can’t imagine what kind of a clod could possibly go through shoes that fast.

But here it was, the fifteenth of March, with the Springfield Museum opening that was going to launch my already successful design business, CHT (that’s me, Catherine Hanrahan Thomas), into the stratosphere only two days away, and I was sitting at my desk with my lavender Spanish leather stiletto in two pieces. The Spanish Stilettos. The ones James had bought for me on our Mediterranean jaunt three years ago, that he’d been bugging me to wear ever since, probably more so that he could show off the absurdly extravagant purchase he’d made for his girlfriend (me) than that he remotely gave a hoot’s twiddle about shoes.

“I can not believe this heel came off,” I said to Janis, my secretary, for the fourth time. “It’s a bad sign. An omen.”

“Ides of March,” Janis said solemnly, nodding her double chin. “Go shopping, Cat. Get a new pair.”

“I can’t!” I wailed.

“I know, I know. It’s cold, wet, and icy out there, you already took off your snow tires, you don’t want to drive to La Gallery in the rain, you’ve got twenty seven last minute details to attend to, and your annual exam to deal with tomorrow morning, not to mention the salon, waxing tomorrow afternoon, updo on Friday before the show. So how can I help you, boss?”

“That’s not the worst of it! Even if I did go shopping, I’d never find another pair like this in a million years. They were custom made for me in Barcelona. And they perfectly match the lilac chiffon. Which, by sheer coincidence with a little help on my part, perfectly matches the lobby of the museum.”

“And your eyes. Don’t forget your eyes.”
“My eyes are green.”

“That’s what I mean. Green and purple. Perfect.”

I sighed. It was a good thing Janis was the secretary, and I was the designer. Purple didn’t match my eyes, what was she blind? But it did complement them, in a way. Made them deeper, more emerald, less olive.

Purple looked lousy on Janis. She had grey eyes and dyed her hair a dark, shiny, almost blue black that did nothing for her complexion at her age. And she wasn’t exactly fat, but she did sit at a desk chair all day, which tended to fill out those little matching polyester pant suits. Don’t get me wrong, I like Janis. And one of the things I like about her is that people walking into the office look right past her like she isn’t there. Not that she’s ever going to get a guy like that, but hey, I don’t pay her to get guys on my time.

We sat in silence for several minutes. Janis knew when not to rush me. “I’ll see if the guy can repair them,” I said finally.

“What guy?”

“The shoe guy. You know, right across the street.”

“What shoe guy?”

She was blind. “Little wooden door? That weird little dark building? Women going in and out all the time?”

She shrugged. “Never noticed. Want me to take them over for you?”

I clutched the shoes to my chest in mock horror. “These babies? No, they don’t go anywhere without me. I’ll drop them off when I’m done here.”

I went over the party plan for the museum again, and then one more time. James’ guy had the limo ordered, dinner at Reisengaard’s afterward, most of the press had replied to the invites, the florist had finally secured the right shade of orchids. The design work was flawless, kind of 1920's gentleman’s club meets The Grotto, in shades of mauve and grey: fake stone arches, towering columns, rounded low chairs. And me, of course, making my entrance. In lilac chiffon and those to-die-for purple Spanish heels. With James beside me, impossibly handsome and even more impossibly rich. If he were a bit, well, dull, then what of it. We looked good together. The magazines loved our beautiful faces. His company liked being in the news, and he liked his picture next to a tall blonde like me. That about covered it.

I sighed and looked at my watch. There was nothing more to do. I was simply wearing out the papers on my desk looking at them, nothing was changing. I slipped my shoes into their box, snapped my purse shut and called out a goodbye to Janis.

A group of five women came bursting out of the dark shoe repair door as I reached for it. They ducked their heads to clear the doorframe one after another, lost in laughing with one another, their faces flushed in the cold wet late winter air. Their laughter died away as they saw me standing there. I’m sure they felt intimidated by my fashionista presence, my short beige tweed skirt and long legs that looked good even in their little flats that let a slice of toe cleavage hang out. So what if that meant my toes were getting soggy, not to mention frozen, in the late winter sidewalk slush. I looked hot.

“So, um, is this guy any good?” I asked, nodding my head through the door.

“Oh, is he ever,” sighed the youngest, just stepping out onto the sidewalk. One of the other women elbowed her hard and they erupted in laughter, swirled around me and walked on down the sidewalk humming and chatting and cooing amongst themselves.

“Well, then,” I said to myself. “Fine.” I pushed open the low wooden door and blinked against the dark silence and the wood-smoke filled air. Once through the doorway I could stand upright, but not by much. Nor was there much room to move amidst the stacks of leather, shoe forms, cobblers benches, racks of hammers, and shelves and shelves and shelves covered with shoes. Stacks of them, boots and pumps and loafers and even a few worn pairs of sneakers. Next to the counter, oddly out of place, hung a single small rack of shoelaces in shiny plastic packages.

“Hello?” I called tentatively. “Anybody here?”

“Anybody here, anybody here,” came a loud mocking voice with a touch of gritty brogue. “Next she’ll be saying, ooo, I didn’t see you there.” The voice emanated from behind the dusty countertop. I peered over it, and spied the top of a man’s head. A short man, hardly clearing the counter, with bushy hair nearly the same color as his absurdly comical red cap, a clean-shaven face, a shirt that was once white tucked into olive trousers held up by a huge black belt in a square brass buckle. On his feet were square-toed black boots that oddly reminded me of Santa Claus. I bit my tongue to refrain from saying ‘I didn’t see you there.’

“I’d like these shoes repaired,” I said, handing them over. “And I’m in a bit of rush. Need them by the seventeenth”

“Of course you do. Why else would you be here.” He threw the box onto a shelf behind him which was already precarious piled with slipping, jumbled pairs of shoes. I winced.

“Aren’t you going to look at them?”

“Bah!” He grimaced. “Purple. Spanish. Heel. What’s there to look at.”

“I need them. The seventeenth,” I tried again. “An event. A very, very important event. They have to match.”

“I’ve got lots of shoes in back.”

“Yes, but, see, I need these shoes, these are special shoes...”

“Special shoes? I’ll show you special shoes. Special shoes are in the back.” He stepped out from behind the counter in a rolling shuffle, raising his arm in what might have been a gesture of invitations. He was an ugly little gargoyle of a man, the top of his head barely brushing my hipbone. My irritation was rising, but I was curious. What would special shoes look like to a... a creature like this who had just so casually dismissed my prize pair, a pair that sold for probably twice what this guy made in a year?

“You wanna come in the back?” His voice was curt, insistent.

I nodded. He crossed his arms.

“You gotta say it,” he said.

“Say what?”

He raised his eyebrows, pushed his lips together in exaggerated disbelief at my stupidity, and circled his fingers in my direction, like he was pulling the words out of me.

I had no clue. And I was losing patience with this irritating gnome. “You mean, say I want to come in the back?”

He nodded and pretended to applaud.

“Fine then. I want to come in the back.”

The heavy door swung closed behind us, and I found myself in a cottage living room, a fire burning brightly in a field stone fireplace, shelves no less jumbled than those in the shop room, but here the jumble was not piles of cracking, mouldering old shoes, but a wild assortment of household crockery, paintings in bent frames, clocks reading random times, and boxes of every size.

I gasped as my eyes adjusted to the gloom. Every few feet among the piles of junk, there was a cleared, clean circle, and within each circle stood a pair of shoes. Such shoes as I have never seen, or heard of, or read about. Pumps and wedges, high heels and flats, the sheer craftsmanship of them glowing, the buttery leather and shining beads and buckles longing to be touched. I stroked a pair of raspberry slip-ons with plum beading topped with a tiny purple rosebud. The flower burst open under my fingertips and I jumped, then laughed and reached for the next pair. Black patent reflecting like chrome; matte navy textured like fine wool crepe.

“Shoes,” I mumbled. “Look at these shoes. Oh, they are gorgeous. Oooo, these, yes.”

I bent to pick up a pair of gleaming teal and silver pumps with long upturned toes, and felt a sudden hard pinch under my skirt. I shrieked and straightened. I turned around, but the gnome shuffled around behind me, keeping between my legs. I swatted at his shoulders. “Get off of me you pervert,” I ordered.

His hideous little face suddenly popped out from between my knees, looking up at me with gleaming, beady eyes. “You want your shoes fixed?”

I started to nod.

His face vanished in a flash and I could feel tugging at my Donna Karan nylons. I punched at the hands that were squirming around under my skirt, tried to find his legs to kick at but it was like trying to swat a yellow jacket on steroids.

“Oww,” he muttered as I connected with something that felt like his skull. His horrendous face popped out again like a sick jack-in-the-box, red and angry. “You want your shoes fixed,” he asked again. “If you want your shoes fixed, you gotta come in the back.”

“I’m in the back, you sick little prick.”

“You gotta come in the back,” he said, sticking out an impossibly long tongue and taking a big swipe at the air, leering as if I could possibly miss his obscene meaning.

“You’re kidding me.”

“And this,” he said, turning around and leaning backwards through my legs, holding on to my left thigh and fumbling with his big brass belt buckle with his right hand, “this is no little prick.”

His trousers fell the foot and a half to the floor and a bat-like penis, nearly as tall as the gnome himself, sprang out like a flag pole, thick and red and waving its mushroom-like head in the firelight. I stared in fixed, fascinated horror.

“No little prick,” he chanted. “Never been sick. No little prick. Just a nice big dick. Go on, give it a squeeze.”

I had never seen such a thing in my life, not even on Reilly, the friend of a friend who spent a night pounding away at me one college weekend, with a dong so long I wound up at the doctor’s office with bruised kidneys. Not even on a dog. Or a horse. It was bizarre. And sculptural. And so very, very big. I couldn’t help it. I reached out my right hand and squeezed its tip to see if it was real. Warmth oozed from it and up through my fingers like liquid gold. It spread up my arms and through my breasts and straight down through my pussy in a wave of want. I wanted, and wanted, and wanted. I wanted shoes. And that enormous dick. And shoes.

“Yep,” I heard him say from under my skirt. “Hee hee. Genuine article.” He yanked my pantyhose and panties over my hips and they rolled to my ankles in one swift motion.

My eyes remained riveted to the tip of that impossibly magnificent shaft. My fingers squeezed the head again, and one perfectly round gleaming pearl rose from the dark oval eye in its tip and swelled, rounder and rounder like a filling balloon. I was vaguely aware of him pushing my hose towards my feet, and I lifted first one foot and then the other cooperatively. I gave his cock a little pinch, and the pearly bead, grown to the size of a ping pong ball, rose into the air and drifted away like a soap bubble. I opened my mouth in wonder, watched it float towards the ceiling, then looked back at his cock and began to squeeze out another one.

“Well, put them on,” he demanded.

“What?”

His face darted out again, utterly disgusted at my profound ignorance. “The shoes, the green ones. In your hand. You want them. Put them on.”

“Oh, yes,” I shuffled the teal pumps in my hands. They were awesome works of art; I’ve never seen their equal, or their design, anywhere in the world. Not a seam to be seen, not a visible stitch in the flawless, glove-soft leather. Even the bottom of their soles were dyed in a swirling pattern of knotwork design. I bent to slip first one, then the other, onto my cool bare feet, shifting the tip of his cock from one hand to the other as I did so, not bearing to let go.

“They fit perfectly,” I exclaimed, and even as I said it I could feel the shoes reaching out, enveloping my skin, a warm, pushing, glittering sensation that slid up my legs like cashmere. Who knew shoes could do that?

“Of course,” he said, sighing as he straightened up between my legs, shoved my skirt up to my waist, and pressed outward on my inner thighs with his palms. “All my shoes fit.”

His lips, now precisely at the height of my crotch, dove roughly into my smooth, bare vulva and his tongue unfurled inside me, a squirming thrusting wet mass molding itself into every corner of my cunt at once. My body, wrapped in the kitty-soft, swirling aura of those shoes surrendered of its own accord, pressing down into his face only to feel that awful little nose, hard as a thumb, pushing up against the back wall of my pussy, pressing against my ass. My knees turned to putty.

His massive caricature of an erection had, if possible, swollen even larger and was shuddering in mid-air. I grabbed it with both hands to steady myself and felt his tongue stiffen inside me at my touch. He made greedy little grunting noises while my legs began to tremble, my entire body filled with the sensational pulsing of his tongue, my hands moving in unison on his shaft, one above the other.

I felt the tensing in my hips, the tingling in my pussy lips that told me I was about to come. I rocked my hips back and forth and he let go of my right thigh, moved his stubby hand between my legs and found my clit with the tip of his thumb. He gave it a little tickle like he was ringing a jingle bell and I exploded, my cunt and thighs and ass closing and opening with such force that I thought I would suck him right up inside me. His shaft compressed in my hand and then zoomed out to its full length, shooting a cloud of bubbles from its tip that drifted off in rainbows across the room, popping into slimy trails as they hit the dusty beams of the ceiling.

His tongue collapsed back into his mouth and his cock collapsed back towards his body like folding drinking cups. He quickly slid the fingers of his left hand into my dripping, still pulsing slit, once, twice, and again, then stepped out and buckled up his pants.

“Shoes off,” he said as I emerged from my daze.

I looked down at the beauties encasing my bare feet. “No, I need to buy these shoes.”

He shook his head. “You’re here for shoe repair. Spanish.” He snorted his disdain. “What do they know. You came in back, you get what you wanted. Shoe repair.”

“But now I want to buy these.”

“So, you come in, you want to buy these, you come in back, and you’ll get what you wanted.”

“So tomorrow when I come in, I can buy these.”

“No. Tomorrow you come in, you’ll want to pick up those ridiculous purple things you call shoes.”

“Ridiculous? Those were extremely expensive, and custom made.”

He shrugged and frowned. “Whatever. You’ll want to pick those up tomorrow.”

“How much will that be?

“You wanna find out the price, you’ll come in back. But don’t think you’re gonna come in here wanting the know the price and wanting to buy on the same day. You get one thing, and one thing only. And you got to come in back to get it.” I heard the bells on his front shop door jingle, and he scuffled out of the room. “Shoes off,” he called back over his shoulder.

I sat on the low stool by his fireplace, suddenly exhausted. The fire’s warmth sank into my cool skin. I stretched my legs out in the firelight and admired the pumps, and my legs in the pumps. The brought out every curve, every line, the pale pink of my skin. I reached to take them off, then hesitated.

The door swung open and his disgusting little head popped into the room. “Shoes off!” he demanded. “I’ve got customers.”

Customers. Of course. It all made sense now. All those women getting shoes repaired twice a week. Leaving with insipid smiles on their faces. What a racket he was running . But of course, here I was, too. Just like them. I sighed and slipped the teal stilettos off my feet, setting them together just where I’d found them on the floor. I wrestled with my underwear and pantyhose and stuck my feet back into my work flats. They felt big and stiff and cheap, though they were designer Italian, and too new to have stretched out already. My legs moved like lead, clumping across the floor like an elephant.

The shop windows were low and dirty, but the light still dazzled my eyes after the glow of firelight in the back room. Two women stood at the counter, perhaps a mother and daughter. They had the same brown-gold hair and wore blue coats in a similar style. The older one was holding out a pair of penny loafers with a flopping sole.

“You want that fixed?” the little man asked with a lascivious smile. Their dazed grins told me they’d been here before. I headed straight to the front door without saying a word.

CHAPTER TWO

I awoke and stretched luxuriously, a warm, languid smile on my face. I flung back the drapes and stood naked in front of the huge glass window over looking the gardens, the low back wall, and down the hill over the rooftops of the factories and low industrial parks of West Springfield. Beyond them the thick brown waters of the wide Arlon river flowed, reflecting a nearly white and heavily raining sky. The office towers of downtown Springfield on the far bank were lost in morning mist and fog.

I peered into the low drifting clouds engulfing the landscape, sliding my hands over my hips and stomach. I felt a twinge below my navel, a little tugging sensation. That prick better not have given me something, I thought with a sudden instant of panic. Then my body relaxed. No, he didn’t give me anything. Just the best, not to mention most unexpected, tongue fuck of my life. I’d probably just come so hard that I pulled a muscle or something. Muscles that had been somewhat irritatingly in a state of disuse lately.

Now that I’d been reminded of that fact, I needed to do a little exercising. I leaned my left hand against the cool glass window and slid my right hand down over the runway of blonde fuzz that ended in the neat red button. I parted my vulva and slid my middle finger deep into my slick puss, and withdrew it to rub wet circles around my clit.

That tongue, I thought. That huge hot wet tongue. I wanted to just take it home with me, that and that fantastical cock. What would it be like to ride that thing? I groaned at the thought of it. I lifted my hand from the glass and leaned forward from the waist, my chest now pressed against the cold window. I brought the cool fingers of my left hand to my cunt and stretched the skin apart hard, so my clit stood up like a miniature dick itself. I dipped my right middle finger into my slit again, now swelling hungrily. I want to squeeze that big dick again, I thought. I want it. I moved my fingers faster, slipping from their patient circling motion to a straight back and forth jilling jerkoff rub. Oh, how I wanted it. I wanted to lick it and rub it and ride that thing. I wanted to mount that gross little troll. I wanted it. I wanted those shoes. Oh, those god damned shoes. I wanted to be fucking in those heavenly, buttery, slit-licking, ass rocking shoes.

“Put them on me,” I whispered aloud. “Put them on me.” I could feel it coming, feel the muscles in my thighs going into paralysis, my ass aching with the memory of that hard little nose butting up against it. “Give... me... those... fucking... shoes,” I moaned, and my body let go, pulsing into the smell of shoe leather and peat smoke and dusty wood beams.

As I stood leaning against the window licking my fingers, Esmerelda appeared in the doorway with my morning coffee on a tray. She was used to me wandering around the house naked. In fact, it was Esmerelda with her big round South American ass who convinced me to get a Brazilian wax for the first time a couple years back. I guess she got disgusted at seeing me wandering around with all the brush between my thighs. She said it would drive the men wild, but James’ only reaction was that he couldn’t wait to tell the guys in the boardroom about this. But I liked it, the way I felt all smooth and silky.

She sat the tray down on my dressing table, crossed her arms and tilted her head, looking at me with those piercing, black eyes. “Something wrong with you this morning?”

I shook my head. “You know, I want to do something different. Can you get me a cup of tea?”

“Tea? Oh my.” Esmerelda wagged her finger at me. “Your smiling. You don’t want your coffee. Don’t you go tellin’ me nothin’s wrong.”

I felt like dancing. I spun through the room, arms flung out into the air, then collapsed on the bed. “It’s spring. The sun is shining. The birds are singing. I don’t always have coffee. I mean, sometimes, I have, I don’t know, cappuccino or something.”

“It’s raining. The birds are still in Mexico. Cappuccino is still coffee.”

“Just bring me tea, will you. What time is it.”

“Eight thirty.”

“Shit!” I sprang off the bed, my reverie hitting a brick wall. I began throwing clothes out into the room, scrambling for my charcoal silk trousers and navy cardigan set. “I need to be at the doctor’s office in forty-five minutes and I’ve got a stop to make first. Go start the Jag for me, will you?”

“If you got an errand that needs running, I can do it for you this afternoon.”

“Thanks, but no. I got to pick up my shoes from the repair guy.”

“Repair guy? You?”

“Yeah, those purple shoes, you know, the ones James had made for me. God damned heel broke. So much for quality.”

“Where’d you take ‘em,” she asked in a suddenly suspicious tone of voice.

“Guy across from my office,” I said warily.

“Little guy? Red hair?”

I narrowed my eyes. “What do you know about it?”

“Just something Colleen told me.”

Colleen was my other maid, straight off the boat. “And what was that.”

Esmerelda waived her hand. “That he’s a leprechaun, or some crazy shit like that. Look out he don’t go stealing you away underground, lock you in his trunks of gold. You gotta watch hiring these soft-minded chicky babes, like to drive me loco with their stories.”

“Like you don’t scare the shit out of her with your voodoo and blood-sucking goat tales. I’m late, go warm up the car, will you? Please?”

“Now why should I have to let the Jag warm up,” Esmerelda called as she retreated down the hallway. “The sun is shining. Spring is here. Crazy blonde woman.”

If the cops weren’t ticketing, which they almost never were this time of morning, I’d just make it across the river and through the city to Doctor Stein’s office in time for my appointment. But I needed those shoes, and I wasn’t going to wait. I negotiated the off ramp on the other side of the bridge and slid the nose of the gold Jaguar XKE down the block alongside my office building, rolling to a stop in front of the little wooden door of the shoe repair shop.

I locked the Jag even though I was only walking ten feet away. Glancing at my watch, I raced to the door and yanked at the cast iron latch handle. It didn’t budge. I tried again; it was locked tight. I lifted my hand to knock, when a faint voice, somewhat like a distant scream, rose up from inside the shop. I froze, then put my ear to the door to listen.

“I said tell us where it is, you little creep.” The voice was deep, yet it was hard to tell if it was a man or a woman. It sounded almost more like an animal, gutteral, inhuman. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck begin to rise. Yes, it sounded evil.

There was squeaking in response. I leaned my head to the left, easing one eye past the casement of the low, diamond-paned window. The glass was filthy, and the diffuse morning light made it impossible to see in. I leaned up to the glass and cupped my hands around my face. There, in jet black silhouettes against the flickering firelight of the room, were two large shapes, the size of large men but swathed in formless cloaks with hoods pulled over their heads. As I watched, the two shapes leaned apart, and there, between them, unmistakably, stretched the ugly little shoemaker, splayed out spread eagle in mid-air. He shrieked, a high-pitched, desperate wail.

“I haven’t... got... it...” he gasped.

“We caught you fair and square,” one shape intoned. “You know the rules. What’s ours is ours.”

“You didn’t... ayiieeee...” His protest was cut short by another hard stretch. “Catch me. You caught my father.”

“And you inherited his debt.”

“You’re not entitled.. arghhhhh, stop it, please... Not entitled to what I made after that... stop it, oh please stop.”

The two shapes suddenly released the little man and he fell on his head with a clatter, collapsing into soft sobs. The shapes started to move, and I backed away from the window, turned to run towards the car. I slid in the slush on the unshoveled sidewalk, regained my footing, and fumbled for my keys.

The wooden door burst open and the two shapes swelled out onto the sidewalk. I caught glimpses of their square jaws, could sense more than see their muscled forms beneath their black robes. They moved towards me silently and swiftly.

“Come on, come on,” I said frantically to the car keys. My car alarm went off as the two men, if that’s what they were, brushed past the hood.

“I smell you,” one said.

I tried to scream, my voice locked in my throat. There, the key was in the lock. It was turning. I pressed the button on the door handle.

“I smell you, golden girl,” the other hissed.

I threw myself inside the car, slamming the door shut as they reached for me. One yelped and brought his hand to his mouth, cursing. So they were human, after all. Just nasty. My fear gave way to rage. The motor of the Jag sprang to life and I slammed the accelerator down. The rear tires spun, showering the men with ice and stones. They backed away, arms lifted over their faces. In my rear view mirror, I saw them turn their backs on the shop and walk away, then break into a run.

“Yes!” I shouted, flooded with relief. If they’d gone back into the shop, I don’t know what I would have done. The leprechaun’s fate was hardly my business. But he did still have those shoes, my shoes, the buttery green leather pumps with silver beads, and if he wound up in the hospital who knows when I’d get such a luscious tongue-cumming again. No, wait a minute, those weren’t mine. The purple pumps, the ones chucked onto his shelf. That’s what he had.

“Run you bastards,” I yelled, pumping my fist into the air. It was only then I realized that I was in my stocking feet, the respectable loafers I’d worn for my doctor’s visit left back on the sidewalk in my hasty retreat.

I arrived at the medical center two minutes late, and rudely but intentionally threw the Jag into a reserved handicapped parking spot. The way I was shaking now that the adrenaline was wearing off, and with nothing but socks on my feet to wade across the icy wet parking lot, just this once I deserved to be as much of a jerk as all the other people who parked in handicapped parking spaces without the proper sticker. I grimaced, shoved my feet into the ice-cream textured coating on the pavement, and slogged to the lobby. I made it into the elevator alone, an icy chill spreading up my legs. My silk pants were soaked to the knees. My hair was dripping. I could feel rivulets of mascara wending their way down my cheeks. I felt like a complete ass.

The elevator opened directly into Doctor Stein’s office lobby. The receptionist looked up smiling, then her smile froze into a momentary look of incredulousness and she wrestled with what to say.

“Catherine Thomas? Here for an annual?”

I nodded.

“Perfect, we’re just a little behind this morning. Let me send you right in. Darcy?” She gestured to a stout nurse practitioner wearing pink scrubs, then pulled her arm and whispered to her. Both sets of their eyes glanced in my direction.

“I’m fine,” I snapped, before they had a chance to ask.

They exchanged a wary look and then Darcy flashed a forced smile at me. “This way Catherine. Room 2. Just go ahead and put on the johnny, opening in back, you can hang your clothes up over there. Doc will be right in. Can I, uh, get you anything while you’re waiting?”

I shook my head and frowned. I just wanted a few minutes alone. The door clicked shut behind her and I shimmied out of my wet gear and into the soft, worn johnny. I hopped up on the table and shivered. Goosebumps rose along my thighs. I rubbed my hands up and down on them briskly, warming the flesh. The muzak coming over the loudspeakers began to filter in to my ears, along with footsteps outside the door, hushed voices coming from down the hall.

The florescent light overhead had a buzz to it. The walls were ivory, with peach and blue stencils near the ceiling in some pattern vaguely reminiscent of a quilt. It did nothing to warm the room, but how could it. If one of these medical centers would hire me, I’d turn the whole design concept around. Put the exam rooms in a semi-circle, so that women on the tables would know that there was a whole circle of women just outside her door in the same position. Paint the walls dark gold and raspberry. When your legs are in the stirrups, you don’t want that cold clinical feel, even if it is supposed to convey that you are in a sterile, professional environment. Dr. Pozzi, the famous Parisian gynecologist who invented the two-handed, inside-outside exam, had the right idea, examining women in their own boudoirs, where they were already accustomed to spreading their legs. Rich velvet pillows, tasseled drapes, now that would be reassuring.

Doctor Stein strode into the room with her best professional game face on, but I could tell she’d been told that I wandered in drenched and shoeless. “Catherine,” she said. “Did you have some trouble getting in today?”

“Sorry I’m late,” I said. “I lost my shoes running through the slush on the sidewalk and didn’t even realize until I was halfway here. I must look a sight.”

Her expression began to warm. I guess it sounded plausible. “You look tired, though. Getting enough sleep?”

Sleep, yes, plenty. Just exhausted from having the shit scared out of me by two evil dudes in black capes that were shaking down my shoemaker. “Just jitters I guess,” I said aloud. “Big museum opening tomorrow, my showcase design project.”

Doc seemed satisfied. “Okay then, you know the drill. Feet up here, scootch down to the end of the table.”

I dreaded this. The cold metal, the awkward exposure. The strange feeling that they talked about me afterwards, laughingly saying God, for a chick that looks like a supermodel she’s got one gnarly little cunt. I stared at the ceiling, counting dots in the tiles. That’s another thing I’d do if I designed a doctor’s office. Something to look at on the ceiling.

“Any pain, skin irritation when you get waxed? Any pain during sex? On urination? You’ll feel a little pressure now...” Doc kept up a steady stream of questions as she worked, probably to make me feel at ease. It didn’t work. It was annoying. I wondered whether I could think of her hands as sexy as they poked and prodded me. I tried. That didn’t work either.

I suddenly realized she’d fallen silent. Then she sighed. Oh, god, I panicked. That little gnome. He did give me something. Cancer, or some disease, or I’m pregnant with some monster. Stop it, I grabbed hold of my racing thoughts. None of the above would show up in less than twenty-four hours anyway.

The Doc rolled back in her chair, and gestured for me to put my knees down and sit up. I found her sitting, staring at her gloved hands. Finally she looked at me.

“Catherine,” she said. “I realize that different people engage in very different personal activities, and that’s fine. It is not, I assure you, for me to be judgmental in these matters. But as your physician I must advise you that, from a health standpoint, leaving objects inside the vaginal cavity like this can lead to a variety of problems. Irritation, infection, lesions.”

“Objects?” I stared at her in utter confusion.

She held out her clenched, gloved fist, then unfurled her fingers. There, in the palm of her hand, sat three shining gold coins.

“That son of a bitch,” I said vehemently. “He really is a leprechaun.”

Doc backed away a foot, closed her hand back over the coins. “Excuse me?”

“The shoemaker,” I said, words sputtering out in my agitation. I stabbed the air with my hand to show his height. “The, the little guy, that ugly little shoe repair man, with his huge tongue and those shoes, you have never seen shoes like this.”

The Doc’s face was frozen in an attempt at professional blankness. I could see the gears racing behind her eyes. “This, this leprechaun as you call him, is that someone who is your sexual partner?”

“Bah! Partner. I never met the guy until yesterday. But yeah, I had, well he had, he’s got this dick see, sorry, this penis...” I gestured with my hands again, trying to convey the massive size of it.

“Catherine, I’m not understanding this. Are you describing a man you had sex with yesterday?”

“Yes, yes exactly, the shoe repair guy, and then this morning, I was there but there were these two evil dudes that were attacking him, and they chased me but I sprayed them and that’s when my shoes fell off...”

“Catherine, Catherine, slow down. I want to make sure I hear you. You had a sexual encounter with the man in the shoe repair store yesterday, and are you saying that he put these gold coins inside of you?”

“Well, it would have to be wouldn’t it? And leprechauns have pots of gold, that’s what those guys were looking for. Now it makes sense.”

“Catherine, do you live alone? Anyone else at home, parents, partner, roommate?”

“All by myself. And my personal assistant Esmerelda. And the housekeeper, Colleen, she’s the one who knew he was a leprechaun.”

“I see a Janis down here as your emergency contact person. Who’s that?”

“My secretary. At my design firm, CHT.”

“Anyone nearby who is closer to you? Boyfriend, girlfriend, sister?”

I shook my head. James sprang to mind a few seconds later, but the Doctor was already rising from her chair.

“Can you excuse me for a minute?” she asked sweetly. “I’ll be right back. Are you warm enough?”

I nodded. As she pulled the door firmly shut behind her, I noticed that she’d left the coins on the corner of the counter. I hopped down from the table and picked them up. They were surprisingly heavy, bigger around than a quarter, thicker than an old British pound coin. I turned them over and over in my hands. A four-leaf clover was embossed on one side, surrounded by a wreath of leaves. On the other, a harp, the main support of which looked like one of those carvings of big-busted women at the prow of a ship, surrounded by a ring of fine-lined knots.

“Gold,” I whispered to myself. “Real leprechaun gold. Magic gold.” And that fiesty little sex troll had thought he’d secret it away safe in my cunny. Be careful he doesn’t lock you in his trunks of gold, Esmerelda had warned. Hah. Looks like he was locking his trunks of gold in me. There’s got to be more where this came from, I thought. And if that walking dick wanted me to help him hide it, he was going to have to give me those shoes. Those Shoes. The Shoes. The green ones. They were mine. I wanted them.

There was a polite, rapid knock at the door and Doc re-entered the room with a soft-faced Asian man in tow. “Catherine, I’d like you to meet Doctor Lee. Doctor Lee is a psychologist who works in another office in this building. We’re associated with the same hospital.”

“I’m here for an annual,” I said, confused. “I don’t need a shrink.”

“I would be remiss in my duties if I let you out of here without assuring myself that you are not undergoing a difficult time. I’ll be frank with you, some of the things that you were saying to me simply don’t make sense to me. And I will tell you that I called Janis, and she told me that you were going through a fairly stressful time this week, with pressures at work and so on. She said you have not been completely yourself over the last twenty-four hours, and that concerns me. So what I’m asking you to do is simply talk to Doctor Lee, let him ask you a few simple questions, then we can all get on with our day with a mutual level of understanding as to where we are. Is that okay?”

“Look, as long as this is not going to take a lot of time...”

“I assure you, Ms. Thomas,” Lee said in silken tones. “I can be very efficient. Now let me see, what do you have there in your hand.” I dropped the coins one by one into his outstretched hand as Doc slipped out the door.

I waited until the door snapped shut, then stood and whispered in Lee’s ear. “That’s what Doc found tucked up inside my pussy. You want me to show you how?”

Lee turned red, and as he sat down in Doc’s chair and pulled a small notebook and a pen from his suitcoat pocket, I could see the bulge already growing in the crotch of his pants. He crossed his legs and looked at me expectantly. I reached up and untied the johnny behind my neck, and let it drop to the floor.

“I think I ought to tell you the whole story,” I said.

“Oh yes,” he agreed, his right hand settling lightly over his craning erection. “Start at the beginning.”

CHAPTER THREE
MARCH 16th
Janis looked at me strangely. It’s true, I don’t usually wander in to work this late. Or sit with my bare feet propped up on the desk.
“It’s more the mooning around that has me worried,” she said. “Day before a big opening like this, I’d expect you to be in manic phase.”
“I know Janis, it’s just...”
“Yes?”
“I’m thinking about those shoes.”
“He said he’ll get them done, didn’t he? I’ve been asking around. People think the guy’s the best shoe repairman they’ve ever seen. Don’t worry, Cat, the whole purple thing is going to work, you’ll look stunning as usual. No, more stunning than usual.”
I shot her a withering look. “Purple? You think I’d be caught dead in those purple shoes? I’m talking about the green ones.”
Janis raised her eyebrows. “I’m missing something here.”
“The shoe repair dude. He doesn’t just fix shoes. He makes them. Custom-made shoes.”
“But Cat,” Janis said, her voice getting firm and parental. “Those purple shoes were custom made for you, and not by some guy in some broken down little shoe repair shop in Springfield. They were made in Spain at one of the master houses. Most women would kill to have a pair half as nice as those.”
I sighed loudly then pressed my lips together. There was no point in trying to explain. They weren’t just shoes. They were... they were what exactly? My mind raced back through the way they made me feel; fitting like a glove, supple, warm, like hands wrapping around my legs and stroking my body with every flex of my ankle. I could feel their power washing over me, spiraling like a cloud of silver moon dust, each speck holding a promise of some childhood dream, some wicked fantasy. I closed my eyes and raised my arms up over my head, surrendering to the magic of the shoes.
Janis cleared her throat. My arms dropped and I opened my eyes suddenly, blinking against the harsh, cold florescent light.
“Look, Cat,” she said. “I’m worried about you. Your doctor called me yesterday, asking some pretty weird questions for a gynecologist. I can only assume you had some conversation that made her concerned. And now, you’re moping around here. And if you could have just seen the look on your face. You’re scaring me.”
I grabbed my handbag (a green croc kelly, the ‘it’ bag of the year, but it would look tattered next to those shoes) and stood abruptly . “Janis, you’re right. I’m in a lousy frame of mind. I’m going out for a walk, clear my head, and I’ll be back, no more than an hour. Go over the details on the opening while I’m gone, will you? Flowers, limo, media...”
“Already done.”
“Do it again.”
Out the front door of the building I turned right, compelling myself to walk down the sidewalk instead of bolting across the street to the small wooden door and those shoes. Janis might be watching me from a window. I walked two blocks, took another right, then waited for what seemed an eternity before dashing back out and across the pavement, keeping my head down and slinking instead of my usual brisk stride.
As I reached the side of the low, dark building, its front door burst open. I ducked behind the corner and peered out as the two bad guys backed out, hoods thrown back, fingers jabbing back in the direction of the leprechaun. In the light of day, I could see they weren’t demons, but a couple of young toughs wearing capes that looked like something out of a comic book.
“Tomorrow’s the day,” the dark-haired one said. “You know what I mean, you little freak? Give it up or your teeth will be coming out your toes.”
The door closed behind them and they headed up the sidewalk away from me. “Not that his teeth and toes are that far apart to begin with,” the fair-haired on said, snickering.
“I can’t believe he’s trying to dodge out on his duty like this,” the other replied. We caught him fair and square. It’s perfectly clear, in every book of tales that’s ever been published, you catch the leprechaun, you get his gold. Wait a minute, do you smell that?”
“Smell what?”
“Gold! Do you smell it?” He stopped, turned around, piercing black eyes darting in my direction. I pulled back against the side of the building, my heart pounding in my ears.
“For Pete’s sake, Jack, quit it with the smelling gold crap. You can’t smell gold. Last time you pulled that you nearly got us run over, remember?”
Jack stood still, sniffing the air, and took a step in my direction, and another.
“Jack, come on,” his companion insisted. “We’re going to be late for work.”
Reluctantly, Jack turned. “Don’t worry, Mike, one more day and we’ll never have to stock bookshelves again.”
“If only.”
I waited until Jack and Mike were out of sight, then crept into the shop. It was as dark and dusty as before. As my eyes adjusted, I heard him sniffling in the corner.
“I know you’re there,” I said, trying not to feel sorry for him.
“I know you’re there, I know you’re there,” he mimicked. “Where else should I be? I’m the shoe repairman. Where else should I be?” He leapt suddenly up onto the counter. I gasped and gave a little jump backwards. His left eye sported an impressive shiner. “Come for those purple rags, eh? Haven’t got ‘em. Not ‘till tomorrow.”
“I’ve come for the green shoes,” I said.
“Then you’ll have to...”
“Come in back, yes, I know.” I was already headed for the back door ahead of him, my hips swinging dramatically in anticipation. He was snuffling at the back of my silk trousers before the door even closed behind us.
I whirled around on him, thrusting out my palm, in which sat the three gold coins. “What do you say about this, shoemaker? Or should I say,” I jabbed the coins at him, “leprechaun?”
His face blanched at the sight of the coins, then he winced and raised his hand to his sore eye. “Leprechaun, leprechaun, oh the little people, so you think you know something, do you?”
“That’s not much of an explanation for why you’re hiding your gold in me. And in every other woman who walks in that door, eh? I know what you’re up to. Those guys are after your gold. They say they caught you fair and square and you owe them.”
“Bah,” he spat venomously. “They didn’t catch me, they caught my father. And he was poor. A poor leprechaun, can you imagine. Died in his sleep last year. They caught him just before that, when he was but an tiny, frail waif of a thing.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t...”
“Point is, I owe them nothing.”
“So you’re hiding all your gold in your customers?”
He raised his one good eyebrow. “All my gold? All my gold? I’d need the entire Miss America pagaent ten times over to hide all my gold. Trunks of gold. Rooms of gold. But they won’t have it, not a single piece. I hide it here, hide it there,” his fingers darted out and grabbed my crotch, “little here, little there, at least some is safe from their greedy hands. Greedy, greedy, greedy.”
“What makes you think it’s safe with your customers? Don’t they find it and spend it?” His fingers were warm, and working in circles through the cool silk crepe of my pants.
“Find it? Find it? Never found it, not one, not until you. I never leave it long. Take it back, move it around.”
He tugged at the button on my waistband. From the corner of my eye, I spied the green shoes sitting right where I’d left them by the hearth. Those shoes, I needed those shoes. I could feel their glow spreading from across the room, calling to me. My zipper slid down and my trousers fell in a silken soft cloud at my feet. I stepped out of them, staring at the shoes, while the leprechaun stroked at the edges of my panties.
“You’re in and out of those women that often? Naughty boy, you are. Have you heard of a bank?”
He laughed. “In and out, in and out. You think I hide my money in every little cunny? No no no. In purses and soles and inside their coat pockets. They always come back, I see to that. Happy happy, every one. Go on, put them on.”
I turned and stooped to pick up the green shoes, as he slid my panties down my thighs. I slid my left foot into the waiting butter-soft leather, and then the right, as his tongue parted me from behind, stroking through my vulva and up and around my ass in long wet swipes. I sighed and bent over, the beauty of the shoes running up my legs like vines of joy and pleasure.
“These shoes,” I murmured. These shoes. In them, I was voluptuous, soft, wild, womanly. In these shoes, I was desire itself. And something more. What was it?
“Ummm,” he growled, reaching forward and guiding my hands down to the top of a low cobblers’ bench.
“I want these shoes,” I said.
He pushed my arms forward, then pressed against the back of my knees. My legs buckled, and I found myself splayed spread eagle over the bench. The leprechaun spread my ass cheeks with his hands and sucking hungrily at my cunt, his lips and tongue playing me with such intense tenderness that I could not keep track of the licks, strokes, and taps; it all blended with the swirling waves rippling up from the shoes into one whirlwind that filled me like a burbling spring of pleasure.
“You can hide your gold in me,” I said between gasps. “You can hide your gold in my cunt if you let me have these shoes.”
“Twenty pieces,” he said, muffled in my bare puss. He stood and pushed my legs further apart with his thighs, and I heard his heavy belt buckle hit the floor. “Twenty pieces,” he repeated, his left thumb circling my anus, then pushing in with short tugs, to the nail, then the knuckle. I moaned and pressed back against him as he buried his thumb in my ass.
Then I felt the tip of that magnificent cock against my clit. He circled it around my clit, dipping it into my wet, waiting slit, then circling again, awaiting my answer.
I could barely focus on what he was asking. “Twenty pieces, that’s a lot,” I managed to say.
“St. Patrick’s day’s coming, can’t lose a coin, not a single coin,” he said. “Lose one, lose them all.”
“Give it to me,” I begged.
He pulled back and I lifted my hips in desperate anticipation of that extraordinary shaft piercing me. Instead, I felt the rough shove of a cold hard roll slide into my pussy, and the leprechaun zipped up his pants and slapped me on the rump. “Done,” he said.
I spun around and sat up, confused, craving. “Done?” I asked. “What do you mean, done?”
“Done. Done means done. You got what you wanted.” He pointed to my feet. The silver threads and beads in their swirls of leaves gleamed over the forest leather. The shoes were mine. But the shoes and the little man had me on fire with desire.
“I can’t leave like this.”
He crossed his arms and gestured with a flick of his eyes towards the door.
Now I was getting angry. Shunted out the door like some two-bit one-minute stand. “You can’t just, I mean...”
“You get one thing,” he reminded me. “You got those shoes.”
“Ah, but I have your gold. You better watch how you treat me.”
“Oh, you’ll be back,” he said knowingly. “Not to worry, you’ll be back.”
At home, alone in my four-poster bed, I slid my fingers inside. My fingertips hit cool, smooth metal. I gripped it between my second and third fingers and tugged. The ridged roll of coins slid out of me right to the end. Then they stopped. I pulled, but they would come no farther.
Nervous, I wrapped my fist around the roll and pulled. It refused to budge. I sat up a little, and could see the thick shaft of solid gold poised between my thighs. It looked heavy, but felt strangely weightless. I let go, and it hung there, poised at an erect angle. I wondered, then reached my left hand over the bed and touched the shoes. I hadn’t been able to bear the idea of putting them as far away as the closet. Not taking my eyes off the roll of coins, held together between the lips of my cunt like a dildo with a mind of its own, I slipped on one shoe, then the other.
The power of the shoes engulfed me instantaneously, and I spread my legs wide and threw myself back on the pillows. The gold coins warmed and swelled like throbbing flesh, pulsating within me. The roll began to shimmer and vibrate, then slowly, it slid into me, one ridge coin edge at a time. Oh, he knew just what I needed, that loathesome little man. I’d have to thank him for this. No wonder he knew I’d be back.
By the time the gold slid into me the third time, my orgasm swelled and burst from the curve of my spine to the arches of my feet. When the pulsing stopped, the roll of coins fell still and silent, hidden motionless inside of me, and I fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.





CHAPTER FOUR
MARCH 17th
I sat in my bedroom chair, head in hands, feeling ill. I could hear James in the bathroom, brushing his teeth. It was a loud, scraping, grating sound, and it made me want to throw up. I had hoped he might just drop me at the door and go home, but here he was in my bedroom. It was only 10:30, and what was supposed to be the crowning night of my life was an unmitigated disaster.
I’d worn the shoes. The Shoes. How could I not wear the shoes? And Janis said that purple and green went together, the dress and my eyes; why not the lilac chiffon dress and the green and silver shoes, too?
James was livid from the second he saw me. “If a man pays the price of a car for a pair of shoes, he’s entitled to see the woman wear them,” he said.
“Entitled, entitled,” I answered mockingly. “You get one thing. You got me. Don’t be greedy. Greedy greedy.”
He looked at me oddly. “You’re acting strange,” he said disapprovingly.
“Strange? Strange? Yes,” I said, “A strange little honey.” With gold in my cunny, I added silently.
“Are you drunk?”
“Drunk! Drunk! I’m drunk with these shoes! It’s St. Patrick’s day, James, lighten up.”
“We’re not celebrating St. Patrick’s day. We’re celebrating the museum opening. You better focus.” It was less a friendly suggestion than an order.
“I don’t like your tone.”
He frowned coldly. “It’s my limo. I’ll speak in it as I wish.”
I turned and looked out the window, biting my lower lip. But I couldn’t stay sour for long. The shoes were like fingers dancing all over my skin, and anytime I shifted my hips, the gold inside me shivered. I wondered if anyone besides me could hear it’s tinkling, teasing jingle.
Whether they could hear it or not, no one at the museum was in the mood to be pleased. From the minute we walked through the door, the wall of their whispers hit me like a wall treatment, their whispered criticism, harsh voices, and downcast eyes encasing the room like the fake-stone gray paint I had foolishly thought would provide an appropriate backdrop to the city’s finest artwork.
“Cheap,” I heard. “Insubstantial. Too thin.” Were they talking about me or my work? Like the blade of a double-pointed knife, the same words worked to slice on both sides of the equation. “Too uptown. Too cold.” Their disapproval sank to the pit of my stomach, blanketed my pleasure in stinking wet horror, like a wool blanket left in a leaky basement and forgotten. Even the magic of The Shoes could not hold up to the tidal wave of negativity; the vines of warm desire retreated down my legs, leaving sad little twinges and gentle tingles cowering along my calves and ankles. My face grew hot with tears. I called for whiskey.
I saw their sneers, those stone-hearted society women. “Those shoes,” they said, their voices a perilous blend of envy, awe, and hatred. Did they not recognize quality? Did they have no appreciation for beauty? They were right about my walls, about my colors, my upholstery – but would they really criticize The Shoes? They’d gone too far.
“Custom made,” I slurred back at them bitterly. “Right here in Springfield. By a shoemaker with the most incredible cock you’ve ever seen.” The museum director was left fanning his wife to revive her from her shock as James dragged me away and out of the building, arriving at the restaurant an hour early for our dinner reservation.
James ordered porterhouse steak and sat smiling and nodding his head for the benefit of any media or clients who might be around while I picked silently at a green salad, my left hand wrapped around the heel of my right shoe crossed unladylike over my knee. Half way through his steak he stood and guided me back to the limo with a steel grip on my right elbow.
James cleared his throat, and I looked up to find him standing in front of me in his pajama bottoms, puffing out his chiseled torso with its six-pack abs and gym-built shoulders smooth under a tangle of black hair. His square jaw line smelled of fresh aftershave. His lips were set, his dark eyes hard.
“I’ve had a lousy evening,” he said, holding his hand out to me. “You’re going to make it up to me.”
“Lousy evening,” I said, standing obediently and moving towards the bed. I kicked off the shoes before I sat down. “Lousy evening, as if I haven’t had one as well. Why don’t you make it up to me.”
“Hey, it was your show,” he said, pushing me back and kneeling over me. “I just paid for it.”
“Paid for it? What am I...” I began, but he had pushed the waist of his pajama pants down and was pressing the tip of his half-flaccid cock against my lips.
“If you’re good you’ll get yours later,” he said bluntly.
Good? I thought as I felt the short thick shaft harden in my mouth. How is this good? I pictured the leprechaun’s cock-of-legends, it’s gleaming shaft, the glistening spray of bubbles spurting from its tip. I started to laugh, and looked up to see James’ model-perfect form rising above me. He looked down and frowned.
“Just suck it, baby doll, and spare the chatter. Yeah, like that.”
Minutes later, I drank his thin salty cum. He flopped onto his back and began to snore. I sat up and stared at him, his sculpted arm thrown up across the pillow like he was posing for the cover of some romance novel. For all the symmetry of his outward physique, I was disgusted by the sight of him. I heard the words of the critics at the museum echoing in my head: cheap; insubstantial; cold.
Suddenly I knew what they meant, not only about my museum designs, but also about James. I’d been looking only at the surfaces, and missed the deeper matter. Like thinking of that leprechaun as ugly, when he bathed me – body and soles – in pleasure that I had never ever dreamed of before. How could I have thought that magic could hold up against the illusions of wallpaper, upholstery, and aftershave? And if those goons had their way, that magic could be vanishing right this minute... I leapt up, hastily pulling on a pair of jeans, a tshirt, and The Shoes.
“Get up,” I prodded James. He gave a snort and rolled onto his side.
“Get up,” I said again. “Go home.”
He sat up, confused. “What’s the problem?”
“Just go home, James. I need to be by myself.”
“You are definitely acting strange. Janis says...”
“What Janis says is none of your business. I want you out of here.”
He stumbled standing on one foot, pulling on his trousers. “Fine. I’m gone. But you’ll pay for this.”
I rolled my hips slightly and felt the gold coins wake slightly inside me. “Pay for this? Pay for this?” I laughed. “Yes, yes. This and much more. But not from you, pretty boy.”
“Are you high?” He was serious.
“High? High!” I crowed, then stopped and pointed hard. Yes, I was high. High on joy and desire for that warm, wonderful, powerful magic of the shoes. And their maker. “I said out!”
He smoothed his clothes and slipped into tasseled Italian loafers, then squared his shoulders, attempting to reassert his alpha male presence over the room. “I want to be certain that you know, if I walk out that door...”
“Walk out!” I cried. “Walk out! Out the door! Come back no more!” I followed behind him, mocking and prodding. “Out, out!” My bedroom door clicked quietly behind him. “You lousy fuck,” I muttered under my breath to his retreating footsteps.
I glanced anxiously across the room, focused on the glowing red digits on my bedside table. Eleven oh eight. Eleven oh nine. If I hurried, I would make it.
*****
Warm yellow light gleamed across the wet pavement, scattering from the windows of the shoe repair shop like paths of gold under the silver moon which broke through cloud races whipped by the late winter wind running high on a wild sky. Something in the night and in those traces of light felt like it called me home; yet I knew that no placed domestic scene awaited me beyond that gnarled wooden door. I took a deep breath, steeling myself for whatever I might find inside, wishing up to the moon that there was still time. As I clenched the iron latch in my fingers, I could hear their voices looming inside.
The leprechaun was sitting up on the counter, his head hung low, his shaggy red hair covering all but the tip of his bulbous nose. Jack and Mike stood on either side of him, hands clenched on his shaking arms and knees.
“Only twenty-eight minutes left, you freak,” Jack sneered. “You don’t give up your gold in twenty-eight minutes, you know what happens. Poof, you’re gone, and as soon as we find it, it’s all ours, every drop.”
There was a grunt in response, that dissolved into a moan and a choking sob.
“Be reasonable,” Mike implored. “We’re not asking for much. Only what’s owed us. Only what’s our due. Whatever your father owned when we caught him, that’s ours. Give it to us and we’ll be on our way. Otherwise you’re going to lose everything.”
“I’ve got it, boys,” I said in what I hoped was a sultry voice, propping myself in the doorframe like a 1940's pin-up girl. “I’ve got your gold. You want it?” I waved one sparkling coin in the air, just enough to catch the moonlight.
Their greedy little eyes lit up with gold lust and they dropped the leprechaun, who scurried swiftly behind the counter and vanished in the piles of torn leather and discarded shoes. I held up my hand to stop Jack and Mike’s advance.
“I said, do you want it?”
They nodded. “Oh baby, give it to me,” Jack nearly shouted.
“You want the gold, you gotta come in back,” I said.
They looked at each other, too caught up in their money hunger to wonder.
“You gotta say it,” I said, crossing my arms.
“Say what?” Mike asked half-heartedly.
“Say you want to come in back,” I replied, my tone making it obvious that he was a moron for asking.
“We want to come in back,” the boys said together, and scrambled after me to the rear door of the shop.
I swaggered by them, grabbing their hands as I passed and pressing them to my hips. “C’mon boys,” I said. “We’re gonna go play some hide and seek.”
“Just give us the gold,” Jack said, but his voice quavered a bit. The Shoes had warmed up, their magic roaring up my thighs, wrapping around my waist and streaming from the tips of my breasts in nearly visible cords of light. I ran their hands down my buttocks and over my thighs and heard the change in their breathing, felt their heartbeats quicken under my fingers.
“Oh, you’ll get your gold,” I murmured into Jack’s ear. I rolled a gold coin over my fingers, wondering where I’d learned to do that. Their eyes followed it’s every turn. I popped it down the front of my shirt. “There’s more where that came from, lads. But you’ll have to look for it.”
They turned to face me, fingers scrambling to tug my tshirt over my head. They fell on my bare breasts with hunger and confusion, their lust for gold competing now with the hard-ons straining at the crotches of their jeans. “Oh yes boys,” I whispered huskily, unzipping their flies, “that’s right, you look for what you want. Take your time.”
Their thin young cocks tumbled out into my hands and they gasped as one as I began to stroke them. “Oh yes,” I repeated. “That’s what you want, isn’t it? Tell me, tell me what you want. Come on, Mike, tell me.”
His blue eyes were glazed over with pure unabashed teenage desire. “Yes, yes,” he croaked. “Rub it, I want it.”
I glanced warily at Jack, who was not yet fully giving up on the gold hunt. He wavered, breathing faster, but fingers still pawing at me. I turned back to Mike; get the easy one out of the way, I figured. “Tell me, Mike. You don’t want that cold metal, do you. You want warm flesh, you want my hot hands on your cock, don’t you?” I kissed him hard. “What about my mouth, Mike? Tell me that you want it.”
“I want your mouth on me,” he blurted.
“Tell me where.”
“I want your mouth on my cock.”
“You want it more than anything, don’t you? You don’t need anything else right now. Tell me. Tell me that you release everything else you wanted, and I’ll go down on you right now.” I licked his throat, ran my tongue up and over his ear, raising my breasts to his face.
“Yes, yes,” he said. “I release it. Do it to me, do it now.”
I shoved him away from me as hard as I could, the dazed look on his young face barely registering as he fell into the burly arms of a red-headed stranger. The tall, iron-shouldered man who locked Mike in a vise grip looked strangely familiar, and he smiled reassuringly as he clasped his hand over Mike’s mouth and lifted him into the air. The handsome stranger gestured with his eyes towards Jack, whose mouth was now latched to my left nipple even as his fingers struggled with prodding my ass, still seeking the disappearing gold.
As the door to the shop opened and the stranger dragged Mike out into the street, I turned my full attention to Jack. “Ooo, Jack,” I crooned. “You know what I can give you.”
“Give it to me,” he muttered. “Give me the gold.”
“Gold? Oh, plenty of time for gold,” I said, glancing at my watch. It was two minutes to midnight. I had to move fast. “Mike already got his gold. Now it’s your turn.”
“Wha....” he glanced around, noticing for the first time Mike’s absence. I pulled his face back to my chest.
“He got his gold because he came for me, Jackie boy. Now I’m all yours. Just lay back here, Jack, and let me give it to you.” I pushed him gently backwards. His calves found the edge of the cobblers bench and he sat down, reaching behind him with one hand to steady himself. “That’s right, Jack,” I said encouragingly. “Lay on back now. Put your hands up and relax, let me do it to you.” I pushed up his tshirt and ran my tongue down his flat stomach to the button on his jeans, then wrapped both hands around his cock and squeezed in a rolling motion.
He moaned and lifted his arms over his head, and I smiled. I had him now. Behind me, I heard the door to the shop open again, and out of the corner of my eye I saw the red-haired stranger slip into the room, waiting quietly. “Just tell me that you want it, Jack,” I said quickly, before he noticed the intrusion. “Tell me you want my mouth.”
“Oh, I want it,” he said. I frowned. Not good enough. He had to say what he wanted. He had to wish for it. You got what you wished for here in the back room – but only one thing. He had to say he released his prior wish for the gold, and wanted my mouth instead, and I had only one minute left to get him there.
I covered his body with mine and rocked my hips against him, then kissed him full on the mouth, prodding my tongue between his lips. “Tell me, Jack. Tell me that you want my mouth. Tell me right now.”
“I want,” he muttered under my lips. “I want your mouth.”
Halfway there. Thirty seconds.
“Tell me that you want it right now. That you don’t want anything else right now. Tell me that I’m what you want, Jack, that I’m all that you want.”
“I want it now,” he moaned. I caught my breath and waited. “You’re all I want,” he said.
“Hah!” I leapt off him and the red-haired man sprang im, lifted him off the bench, and raced out the door with him. I heard the front door slam as Jack hit the street. The red haired man re-emerged, face split in a mighty grin.
“You did it, lass,” he cried, lifting me off my feet and whirling me around. “You saved me, and you saved my gold, every last piece.” He sat me down, his face turning somber. “But why’d you do it? Why’d you come back for me? I thought you had your big night tonight, and after all, you got the shoes.”
“Big night, big night,” I muttered. “Didn’t turn out right. Besides, what good are the shoes without the shoemaker?”
He kissed me, his strong arms wrapping around me, and my hands ran over the sculpted beauty of his back muscles, down to the narrow turn of his hips, his hard thighs pressing against me. I felt the warm power of the shoes wrapping us in a cocoon of bliss. Our hands scrambled at each others clothes as we tumbled into a nest of sheepskin and blankets nestled on the floor before the glowing peat fire. At last we lay naked. I pulled back and drank him in from head to toe. His beauty was awesome and powerful, each line, each curve, his shoulders, his ribs, the flat plane of his stomach, the cone of red hair descending to the erect pillar launching straight and smooth between the tree-trunks of his thighs. I pressed my lips together and sighed.
He arched his eyebrows in question.
“You’re gorgeous,” I said.
“But?” he prodded.
I shook my head. “But this isn’t really you. And besides, I don’t even know your name.”
“It’s Sean,” he said. “And isn’t this what you want? A manly form to reflect your foxy figure? Someone to look good with you?”
“I did,” I admitted. “You’re right. That’s all I thought about. But I’ve learned something about appearances recently.”
“Careful what you wish for, Cat,” he said, smiling. “You know you only get one thing at a time back here.”
“Yeah, I know,” I said. “But I’m sure. I want you, Sean, the real you.”
In a flash of glitter and gold dust, the leprechaun was back, in all his ugly, magical, beautiful glory. “Tee hee, tee hee!” he crowed, “It’s really me!” He unfurled his long tongue and dove between my thighs. I shouted with joy and spread my legs sky high, The Shoes shining above us both.