Emerald Christina's “UP-Rice-Ink"
A tale through the lens of the blurry vinegar of metaphysical time
In memory of Emerald Christina. Mighty woman.
In the absence of evidence, she declared that Mr. Uggi's final words were, “Poetry is on the dance floor, and fiction wants to dance.”
In reality, Mr. Uggi’s final words were far less poetic. He had asked his wife to put rice on the floor to fill a hole. It was the same hole that eventually caused him to trip and fall to his death, after his wife neglected his request for a day and a quarter.
Despite this, Mr. Uggi was becoming a posthumous writer in the eyes of local authorities, even though he had never written anything.
The week after his death, the local paper printed the story in the curiosities section: "Mr. Uggi was an unpublished writer." After reading the news, his fresh widow, Emerald Christina, found herself deep into revisiting her private journals, hoping to fill in the blanks on her late partner's bibliography and possibly achieving nationwide literary recognition under a masculine pseudonym.
"Tonight, The Black Ink Widow reveals everything. Every detail from her long-standing con act. She’s in 44 Minutes: For Forgiveness."
- “So, you fatherless daughter of a sin, what made you deliver that line that launched your career?”
- “I was high as a kite. I sucked rice every day back then. But the muse—or the fuse, you know, whatever defines the moment of inspiration—it happened. Somehow, it happened!”
- “You made a ton of money off it."
- “Yay!”
- “What about the people you scammed? You’re rich filthy, just like your stories.”
- “We-we-w-ell—- Scam? I mean, huuuh, I wrote all of it. I created something that influenced positive change in society. Where’s the damage?”
- “Peasant erotica?Tiny flaccid penises floating in dark alleys aiming for lost sheep ports of redemption? Is that positive change? What the heck? You’re sick in the head, Emerald Christina.”
- “Come on, give me a break! I did what you would have done if you were in my shoes.”
- “To really pen a penis and a vagina in love, an erotic dance of pleasure. Do you know how it’s done? To drop a line and deliver it aligned? Silver or gold? Fine! Your fancy jewelry has you accomplished, huh?”
- “What the fuck is this place? I was told I was in for a treat. This is unhealthy! I need to talk to my agent before proceeding.”
- “This is Hell In 44 minutes, ma’am, live for you and me.”
- “Who are you?”
- “The Devil. A fan. A punisher. My job, my pleasure. Whatever!”
- “I’m agnostic. Do you have a joystick? I mean… what?”
- “Hahahahaha, huh!!!”
- “Well, if you don’t mind, I’d appreciate a glass of wine. And a cigarette”
- “We don’t drink wine down here, Christina. We drink blood. Cigarette smoking is dangerous, hazard for your health.”
- “God would light it up himself and pour wine into my mouth.”
- “Alright, alright, you got me there. You’re good at delivering one-liners! Killers, hahaha! You-you-you-you!! You should write this shit down!”
Daydreaming was another of her pastimes. When she awoke from the underworld-uptown reverie, she said to herself, “I should definitely write that shit down, and rewrite all my journals in that out of time, trash-talk style I have invented.” That style of hers was about to make her dead lover notorious, and in doing so, she was about to launch herself into a transformative literary career filled with fat royalties. She envisioned upgrading her lifestyle to that of monarchs living by the Seine River. “Come on! That’s what I’m talking about,” she exclaimed, spitting rice, lying on the floor covered with vulgar journals.
Her prose—sexy, lucid, introspective, revolutionary—was poised to become the hidden rupture of feminism in the dark ages of equal rights. She fantasized about men kneeling to her, licking her southern lips as if they were golden bricks of holy nectar. And she planned to use her late husband’s name, the same name that had made her so unhappy, to accomplish her literary conquest.
"Dancing in the moonlight, I was sending sand to the times! Alright!" Yes, she liked to sing and dance, following the inner rhyme of her impromptu attempts at self-liberation. She was kind to beggars when she was out, heavy with thoughts of the riches her writing might bring. “Harvest season is in my mind. You and I in the field, naked, physically gossiping while we stab ourselves with pleasure in the fields of hard labor.”
Under the masculine disguise of her pen name, her work blossomed in bookstores. Her hidden ink of vulgar stanzas and replicas of imaginative feminine sermons of irony and sexy fantasies with scandalous heroines and timid crows, all flourished in the name of a dead man! “Extra, extra! Mr. Uggi’s novel has arrived, it’s hot, hot, hot! Your next read,” clamored the fussing boys on the street corners.
She did things she wasn't proud of to fulfill her purpose, but the only thing she regretted was telling her housewife friend where all the ink came from. Her friend, a slave to her own master, just wanted a kitchen full of rice. She loved to suck on it, and was too hooked on the craft to stay home and be bored. Consequently, she told her husband. “How did you tell him!!! Him? Of all the cocks in the barn?” complained Emerald Christina. He was a remarkable drunk who loved to spout off when he had lost his face at the tavern. One night when he was feeling especially tell-tale, the Duke of Fuckington - or someone equally privileged - dropped by to pick up a message from one of his unceremonious mistresses.
The following section is from Emerald Christina's autobiography “UP-Rice-InK”.
Inside the cathedral, under the statue of a saint, the Duke of Fuckington was telling me about his idea of making me a legal witch. I asked him how he knew I was the cunt who wrote with a dead penis. He said, “You look like a bitch I wouldn't dare fuck with,” and I knew he was right. But I offered him a deal. “If you say shit, I'll fuck you big time.” The Duke tried to cool my threat with a posh smile. I said, “I'm Emerald Christina, I don't give a shit how many teeth you have” At the same time I grabbed him by the neck and stabbed him with my crucifix. Christ abruptly got between his skin and his life cried red. I knew when I saw his tears that he knew he was in a tough spot. “Le-le-lelet's make a de-de-d-eal! Let's make a d-de-deal!” he stammered.
The rest of this story remains undisclosed, as I wish to remain a distant witness and entertain the mystique of Emerald Christina through the blurred vinegar lens of metaphysical time.