By all means!

Okay, I had ice cream instead. And a pain killer, for my back. This could be totally purple and cliched, and I wouldn't know since sugar rush + opiates = dumb happy Amy.

"Cheap Red Wine"

He's easy and sweet, always available when she needs something to fill her up. Some days the hollowness is a jarring echo, like a penny inside an empty can, and she needs something to drown out the noise of her loneliness.

One phone call is all it takes. He's always home, probably bent over his books or his computer, not that she cares. He gets the job done, that's the point. A little conversation, a drink, and then the dizzy rush of his mouth and his hands on her skin. She could drink him all night, like cheap red wine.

Thanks for helping me procrastinate on my schoolwork, Erin.

"Cheap Red Wine"

“We can bring wine for ourselves this weekend.”

“No, we’re at the liquor store now. Just tell us what you like.”

“Are you sure? We really don’t mind.”

Realizing it’s useless, I give her the names of two reasonably priced, widely available brands of wine.

The next night, at dinner, we are served red wine from an oversized bottle.

“Sorry, they didn’t have the wines that you mentioned. I hope this is ok.”

We say, “Oh, it’s fine.”

We think to ourselves, next time we’ll bring our own wine, because my family can’t seem to resist buying cheap, red wine.

Heh, what timing. I was reminded of this just the other day. It's a funny memory, sorta, in hindsight. It's how I learned I can't handle alcohol.

More than a sip but less than a gulp, it lights a small fire in my belly, and I feel the warmth spread outward until it reaches my spine--where it pauses, gathers itself back together, and climbs steadily upward. In less than a minute it has licked its way past my neck and crept into my skull, where it crouches on top of my brain and starts to pound, pound, pound, until I can't see straight, can't think straight, can't do anything but pray for the pain to end, and promise myself I'll never, never, never do this again....

drabble

I've had the good stuff, and I can see what the fuss is about. Complex flavors that take the taste of food up to a whole new level.

But what I want is the cheap red stuff I learned to love in college. A couple of bucks a bottle, companion of dorm pizza and heartbreaks.

Twent years later, I buy another bottle of Riunite Lambrusco, exemplar of my youth. I expect it to be vinegary, bitter--the kind of rotgut people are referring to when they sneer about cheap wine.

At the first sip I'm young again, learning about love and lust and the fear of a blank future. I lean back and savor the uncomplex sweetness.

dcp, are you sure it's the alcohol? My DH has red wine problems because of the nitrates--they trigger migraines.

We've found something local called, "Our Daily Red," which is young and must be drunk young because it has no preservatives. Sody pop for grownups.

Ooh, drabble:

Chianti, the rough, cheap stuff for pizza nights and spaghetti suppers, when three or four couples got together and pooled their meagre resources. The empty basket-wrapped bottle set on the red-checked kitchen tablecloth to hold candles scrounged from anywhere, different colors, all lending their molten substance to the multicolored volcano cascading in layers down the bottle's sides, till the bottle itself was completely hidden.

A masterpiece, seven years in the making and probably seven pounds in heft, slipped and fell to the sidewalk, shattered, colored wax flying apart like shrapnel, though the wax and the basket kept the bottle intact.

ETA: And where's my head? Yay, Jilli! And sorry about the wait. Can you think of it more as antici--pa.tion?

A little bit long, but, hey, the muse spoke and I listened.

She kept the bottle under the passenger seat of the Seat, a cellophane-wrapped stack of plastic cups next to it. The tiny bodega tucked between a disco and a pasteleria along Avenida San Fernando smelled sour and musty, the cask-filled nook with its sticky counters and floors was easily overlooked by the touristas gawking at the white-sided buildings. Hard to tell it was 10:30 in the evening, the sky was still so blue without even of hint of dusk around the edges.

She carried the empty bottle in with her, eschewing the plastic bags with twist ties handed out for free with the wine; the odd form of packaging sat uneasy with her. All the wine was cheap, homemade, red and slightly bitter. She could fool herself that the liter she stopped for everday and put in her bottle made her better than the street beggars who snatched their fifty pesetas from sun-struck American/British/German hands, then took the wine home in plastic bags. The bottle had cost her an extra fifty pesetas the first time she'd gone in to buy wine and that made all the difference between her and them.

Warm summer evenings in Eminescu’s city, pouring local wine from big plastic bottles into chipped glasses while the purple shadows lengthen all around us. Romania in 1993: a world where a bride and groom fresh from the church with cheeks glowing and veil a-flutter will queue for an hour to achieve the glamour of a Big Mac from the newly-opened McDonalds; a world where one in three people worked for the Secret Police; a world of poetry and bureaucracy and wild dogs roaming the streets; a world of imported soap operas, glittering dreams, back-breakingly hard work and cheap red wine.

Beverly, it's possible, perhaps even probable, that was the real cause, but I hope I described the experience vividly enough to explain why I've never tried to find out.

Of course she's looking forward to your propposal, Jilli, but I'm glad she had the presence of mind to say so. I hope the three weeks fly by.

i'll have to ponder the drabble.