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Subject: {ASSM} AnnD"Through The Looking Glass Darkly"(1/3)
Date: Wed, 9 Aug 2000 11:10:05 -0400
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Through The Looking Glass Darkly
by Ann Douglas
(ann_douglas@hotmail.com)
Thanks once again to Mordmorgan who helps
find and correct my grammatical errors. Any
that are left are my fault not his.
This story contains magic and other unusual
elements. You have been warned.
Part One
"I have a delivery here for Dr. Harrison
Jones," the man in the dark brown uniform said as
he stood on the steps of the modest suburban
home.
"I'll take it," the tall, slim eighteen-year-old
who had answered the door said.
"Are you Doctor Jones? the overweight
deliveryman, with the name Bob on his shirt, said
with a smirk.
At five eight and a hundred and twelve
pounds, the light brown haired women could
hardly have been mistaken for a Harrison Jones.
Especially when the small bikini she was wearing
barely contained her 34C-24-34 inch body.
"No, I'm his daughter, Lara," she said,
unimpressed with his attempt at humor. "I'll sign
for it."
"Are you eighteen or older, young lady,"
the now annoying, middle aged man asked,
sticking to his company's rules to the letter.
"Yes I am, do you need to see my driver's
license?" Lara said, thinking it was too hot a day
to put up with a jerk that thought for some reason
that he should be on the next Comic Relief.
"Cause if you do, then you are going to have to
come back later. As you can obviously see, I
don't have it on me."
"No, that won't be necessary," the man
responded, deciding he had gotten as good a look
at her breasts as he was going to get. If he stayed
at this stop much longer, Bob thought, he was
going to have a hard on by the time he made his
next delivery. "Please sign here, number
twenty-three."
Lara practically grabbed the clipboard out
of his hands and scribbled her name on the last
empty line. In the mood she was in right now, he
would've gotten the clipboard back between his
legs if she could've read his mind.
"Well you have a good day, Ma'am," the
deliveryman said as he waited on the steps long
enough to get a good a look at Lara's ass when
she turned around to open the door. "You stay
cool."
"Asshole!" Lara said softly as she carried
the small package into the air conditioned house,
closing the door behind her.
"God, what an ass on that one," Bob
thought as he climbed back into his truck, "even
better than her tits."
As he pulled away from the curb, he
realized that he was going to be sporting an
erection on his next stop, like it or not.
"Who was at the door?" the young man
asked as he stepped in from the back yard. Like
Lara, he was wearing only a swimsuit.
Only an inch taller, the darker haired teen
bore enough of a resemblance to Lara for them to
be twins. Which was exactly what they were.
Douglas Jones shared his sister's deep brown eyes
and had a body that was just as well developed.
"A package for Dad," Lara said as she
read the label on the small parcel. It's from
Professor Lyons in Cairo."
"Let's see what it is," Doug eagerly
suggested, taking the package from his sister's
hand and shaking it."
"No way, Doug," Lara said as she pulled
the package back. "The last time you opened one
of Dad's packages it would up in a hundred
pieces. That bowl had survived five hundred
years in a tomb, but not five minutes with you.
Whatever this is, it can wait until the end of the
month when Mom and Dad get back from Central
America."
"Come on, one little accident, it could've
happened to anyone," Doug said, trying to
maintain a look of innocence about him. "It
probably wouldn't happen again in ..."
"Five hundred years?" Lara chimed in.
"Exactly," he smiled.
"Well that's how long you'd have to wait
before I trust you with another of Dad's artifacts,"
Lara said as she put the small package in the china
closet and locked it. "And I mean that!" she
warned.
"Probably just some ancient good luck
charm," Doug laughed as he held on to the towel
around his neck with both hands and walked
away, thinking that his sister could be such a bitch
at times.
The sibling's father, Dr. Harrison Jones,
was a world renowned leader in the field of
Archaeology. For the last month, he and his wife
were away on a dig in Central America, leaving
his children to enjoy, as they put it, the comforts
of civilizations rather than roughing it along the
equator.
In years past, Doctor and Mrs. Illyana
Jones had made arrangements for Housekeepers
and Nanny's when they were away. Once their
children came of age, however, they trusted them
to handle things in their absence. What they really
should've arranged for, as anyone who knew Lara
and Doug Jones could have told them, was an
armed referee.
To say that Doug and Lara didn't get along
would be to say that the Titanic was a minor
boating accident. The two had been at each
other's throats since before the onset of puberty.
An event which, according to Lara, was still an
ongoing process in her brother's case. Doug, on
the other hand, believed his sister had been born
an old lady, never wanting to have any real fun.
Lara Jones had been the valedictorian of
her high school, and come the Fall was going to
be entering the Pre-Med program at Harvard
University. That much sought after combination
of beauty and brains, she was as committed to
maintaining a sound body as she was a sound
mind.
Douglas Arthur Jones on the other hand,
was almost the archetypical jock and party animal.
Tall, dark and handsome as the old saying went,
the former high school baseball and football star
considered himself the Fate's gift to women. It
was a belief that had been steadily endorsed by a
steady stream of young and in a few cases, not so
young, women who found their way to his bed.
Both of them stood to inherit a quite
considerable trust fund from their Grandfather on
their twenty-first birthday. In Doug's case, he saw
no reason to pass his time until then as anything
more than one non-stop party.
"Hey, Doug my man, come on back to the
party," a similarly garbed blond teen called from
the patio door.
"Hey, wherever I am, that's were the party
is, Harry" Doug said in reply.
"Well you may be the party, but the girls
are still out by the pool," Harry shot back.
"Okay, I'll be right out," Doug finally
relented.
"How bout you, Lara baby?" he asked,
turning his attention to the brunette. "I'm saving
you a lawn chair next to mine."
Harry Willis was Doug's best friend and
Lara's worse nightmare. With a personality she
considered almost as obnoxious as her brother's, it
had been Harry's stated goal in life to share Lara's
bed. In Lara's mind, he had a better chance of
sharing Julia Roberts'.
It wasn't that Harry was a bad looking
guy. In fact, quite the opposite was true. It was
just that, like her brother, the former Swim Team
Captain was more interested in girls who did their
thinking with open legs or mouths than those who
might be able to express an intelligent opinion.
"I'll pass, Harry," Lara said, suppressing
her anger at already having her quiet day by the
pool ruined by the arrival of Doug's friends. It
was that anger that had been vented at the
deliveryman. "I'm going up to change, then I have
a few errands to run."
"I'd be glad to help," Harry quickly
offered.
"No thanks," Lara declined just as quick.
Moving up the stairs to her room on the
second floor, Lara was all too aware of Harry's
eyes following her. As far as his eyes were
concerned, she might as well have been walking
around naked.
Intent on avoiding Harry's eyes, Lara
totally ignored her brother's. If she had taken note
of his gaze, she would've seen that it was centered
on the package she had just locked away.
The errands took Lara the rest of the
afternoon. None of them were particularly urgent,
but she couldn't deal with all of Doug's moronic
friends. Thankfully, by the time she came home,
they had gone off in search of other amusements.
"A few more months and I'm out of here,"
Lara thought as she exited the air-conditioned
comfort of her mother's car and headed for the
house. "Then I'm never coming back except to
visit Mom and Dad."
Despite her academic success, Lara had
only a few good memories of her years at Robert
Kennedy High School. Moderately popular, she'd
had a few boyfriends and despite her brother's
belief, hadn't been a virgin since her seventeenth
birthday. Before that, she had also engaged with
the sexual experimentations that most girls her age
dabbled in. Not seeing anyone now, she really
wasn't planning any brief summer romances.
Stepping into the house, a comforting
coolness engulfed her skin. That was something
she wouldn't miss when she moved to the
northeast next fall, the almost total absence of a
cool season.
Lara was on the way to the kitchen to fix a
nice cool drink when she noticed something that
quickly brought her blood to a boil faster than the
blistering heat outside. The door to the china
closet was open and she could see the discarded
wrappings that had covered this afternoon's
delivery resting on the dining room table. The
artifact, and Doug, were no where to be seen.
"Damn that brother of mine," Lara
thought as she picked up the folded letter that had
been enclosed with the package and discarded
unread by him.
Not for the first time since her parents
left, Lara regretted her promise to them to stay
home for the summer and keep an eye on things
for them. Harrison Jones had a deep hope that his
only son would eventually grow up and find his
place in life. Unless his place was as a beach bum,
Lara couldn't ever imagine that happening.
Unable to do anything about it until Doug
showed up, except worry , Lara fixed her drink
and sat down in a recliner to read the long letter
from Professor Lyons. Included in the ten-page
letter was an explanation of the legend behind the
find and some translations of the engravings on it.
"Where have you been?" Lara yelled at
her brother as he finally came home two hours
after dark.
"Jeez, you sound more like my mother
than my sister," Doug said as he stepped into the
living room, "and since you're only ten minutes
older than me, I don't think you really qualify."
"Funny, real funny. I wouldn't trade places
with Mom for all the money in the world," Lara
said. "Not with you as a son."
"Chill out, Sis," Doug said, trying to calm
her down. "Here's your precious trinket, still in
one piece."
"Where did you take it?" Lara asked as she
picked it up from where Doug has tossed it onto
the table.
"Betty wanted to see it so I brought it over
to her house," Doug said. "She gets off on the
idea that something like that might be hundreds of
years old."
Betty Braddock was the closest thing
Doug had to a steady girlfriend. A girl who was
so sexually charged that he wanted to sleep with
her more than a few times, yet still intellectually
challenged enough not to complain too loudly
about the other girls who passed in and out of his
life.
"And I suppose that she got you off for
bringing it over," Lara said sarcastically.
"Well she might have," he replied, "if her
mother hadn't come home early."
"No doubt," Lara said as she examined
the artifact for damage.
It was an amulet, she remembered from
the notes she had read, a rather common polished
stone surrounded by the ancient symbols for male
and female. What the Professor had found so
fascinating was that for such an unimpressive
ornament, it had been found in a box of gold and
silver.
"Hey, I said I brought it back in one
piece," said Doug as he watched Lara go over the
rarity with a fine tooth comb.
"I'm just making sure," Lara answered.
"And for your information, it's thousands of years
old, not hundreds."
"Really, are you sure?" her brother asked,
thinking how much more impressed Betty would
be if he could tell her that.
"If you bothered to read the letter that
came with it, you'd already know."
"All right, Miss I'm smarter than everyone
else," Doug commented as he stepped next to his
sister to look at the artifact in a new light.
"What's this thing supposed to be?"
"Well it's Egyptian," Lara said.
"It came from Cairo, that's a big surprise."
Lara ignored his sarcasm and went on.
"According to the translations that
Professor Lyons and his people made, it's some
kind of talisman used in a royal marriage
ceremony."
"A marriage ceremony?" Doug repeated,
actually interested because whatever he learned
from Lara might get extra points from Betty.
"Somehow, it was supposed to make the
bride and groom more compatible by letting each
see the world through the other's eyes," Lara
said, recounting the letter. "Or that's at least what
they could make out of the translation. They were
hoping Dad would go over it as well."
"How's it supposed to work?" Doug
asked.
"Like you're really interested?" she said.
"Hey, I actually am," her brother said in
his most sincere tone.
"Somehow, I doubt that," Lara said, then
remembered her mother's many requests for the
two of them to find common ground. "Well, first
of all, you needed a full moon."
"Like tonight," Doug interrupted,
remembering watching the full moon rise on his
way home.
"Then the couple would hold it in both
their hands and concentrate on seeing life through
the other's eyes. According to the legend, they
would see the world and each other from their
mate's perspective."
"Wild," Doug laughed. "Let's try it."
"What?" a shocked Lara asked.
"Let's take it out under the full moon and
see what happens," Doug said.
"You're serious," Lara said.
"Hey it'll be good for a laugh," Doug
insisted. "Aren't you the one always saying that I
should see the world through your eyes for once.
That I'd be surprised at how much sense it would
make."
"Say I go along with your little joke," a
hesitant Lara said. "What do I get out of this?"
"What do you want?" Doug asked.
"A weekend without all of your friends
hanging around the house, especially Harry."
Lara said.
Remembering that he, Harry and the guys
were planning to a long drive down the coast this
weekend anyway, Doug quickly agreed.
"Okay, let's get it over with so you can
have your little laugh," Lara said as they walked
out by the pool.
They stood in the open, the light of the
moon reflecting in the polished stone. Each
placed their hands on part of the amulet.
"So now what do we do?" Doug asked.
"There was a prayer to the Egyptian gods
for what they think translated as wisdom and
understanding," Lara said, feeling more than a
little ridiculous about this whole thing.
"Did he include it in his letter?" Doug
asked, thinking this was going to get him at least a
special roll in the sack with Betty.
"We have a deal, right?" Lara said, "I get
the house to myself for the whole weekend."
"Yes, that's the deal," Doug promised.
Lara looked at her brother's eyes, brown
orbs so like her own. Whatever other problems
they had with each other, they never went back on
an actual promise.
Taking a deep breath, Lara repeated the
prayer, invoking the names of long forgotten
deities. A calm quiet filled the air as she spoke,
and it seemed as if the warm evening air suddenly
turned cold.
Doug listened intently, remembering the
words. Like Lara, he had a phenomenal memory,
when he chose to use it. They reached the end of
the simple ceremony as Lara invoked a final plea
to the ancient Moon Goddess.
No sooner had the last words passed from
her lips when Lara felt the world in front of her
explode in a white light. She felt her legs give
way beneath her, then a feeling of weightlessness.
Then a total blackness as her mind went blank.
Lara's first thought as consciousness
slowly returned to her was that the house had
somehow exploded. Every part of her hurt that
badly. Then as her eyes focused, she considered
the idea that this was one of Doug's practical
jokes. She lifted her head off the patio to which
she had been thrown and saw the impossible.
Stretched out on the concrete a dozen feet away,
was her own body.
"I'm still asleep," she told herself, thinking
this had to be a dream.
Reaching into the pool only inches away,
she splashed water on to her face. The nightmare
grew even worse as the water showed a reflection
not her own. Yet one that but for a tiny change in
her mother's womb might have been hers.
"This is impossible," Lara said as she
looked down and further saw her brother's body in
place of her own. "Things like this can't happen."
(missing parts may be found at)
Ann Douglas Web Page
http://www.asstr-mirror.org/files/Authors/Ann_Douglas/www/
ASSTR Donation Page
http://www.asstr-mirror.org/donations.html
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