Prologue

 

"My name is Dale Daley, I'm twenty-six and I'm an alcoholic."

I recite the ritual beginning and launch into my catalogue of woes, even though I know damn well this court-ordered program is not for me. Despite what the judge thinks, I don't need it to keep me off the sauce. I've been burned so badly by drinking I have absolutely no urge to start up again now that I've been dry for six months. Plus there are other things about Alcoholics Anonymous that frankly offend me.

To start with, the thinly concealed religiosity of it all annoys me.

I don't believe in God, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, or any other 'higher power' for that matter, and I resent the assumption that I need to in order to stay clean. Furthermore I have very little in common with most of my fellow sufferers here. They strike me as a bunch of whiny, self-pitying wrecks that are too thoroughly broken by life to ever truly get their act together no matter how many imaginary friends they have. And the ones who have been straightened out by AA are now smarmy, self-righteous prigs who could use a good punch in the face. There are only two related reasons (other than the fact that I've been mandated this by the court) that I keep coming back here every Thursday evening.

One is that I truly want to better myself by addressing a character flaw that has long held me back and that contributed to my drinking getting out of control. I lack self-discipline and seriously need to develop some. I also suffer from a woeful lack of assertiveness. Though I'm of average height and build at five-nine and a hundred and seventy pounds, am well-proportioned and reasonably good-looking with brown eyes and hair and a carefully trimmed goatee, I've suffered from an inferiority complex and resulting timidity all my life. I've only had one real lover (now gone for good) and am desperate for some female companionship. Naturally this brings me to my other reason for being here.

Her name is Kimiko Katsumi, Kim for short, and she's just as lovely as her name, which I looked up after becoming infatuated with her. Apparently Kimiko is Japanese for 'empress', or 'noble child' while her last name means 'victorious beauty'. Believe me, the appellation is apt. The lady has an almost regal bearing, and seems to have tons of everything I lack. Kim is strong-willed, supremely self-confident, and clearly comfortably well-off at the age of thirty. She's a volunteer here who helps to keep order among us unruly addicts, which she is always able to do with no more than a menacing look or a sharp word. This ease of authority seems equally a function of her imperious attitude and spectacular sex appeal.

Though thoroughly American, Kim has an exotic mix of genes - Japanese and Swedish I'm told - which have combined in stunning fashion. Though she's elegantly slender and over six feet tall Kim's breasts are nevertheless almost shockingly full, and beautifully upswept even without the help of a bra - which I've never seen her wearing. Her skin is a flawless creamy white while her silken hair is purest midnight black, at least until the light hits it right. Then it shimmers with an almost ultraviolet iridescence.

Parted down the center, this falls thick and perfectly straight all the way to the bottom of her buttocks. A glorious banner that beguiles the eye trying to follow that quicksilver sheen, it is quintessentially Japanese. Other evidence of her Asian heritage can be seen in her enormous tilted-almond eyes, which are a brilliant green with an obvious epicanthic fold. Her other facial features are similarly strong and yet fey, angular but exquisite: a high forehead and cheekbones, pointy nose and chin with a narrowing jaw and small mouth. Her ears are also small and almost lobe-less, giving her a fox-like look that is so compelling it's almost impossible to tear your gaze from. Again and again my eyes seek her out as I give my testimonial. And always she's staring calmly back at me, the slightest of vague smiles playing about her lips.

This is a marked contrast to her usual look of coolly aloof detachment.

Surely she's noticed my puppy-like infatuation with her. Yet rather than respond with indifference, contempt or even antagonism there's this sense of amused indulgence. It makes my face flush, my heart pound, and causes me to stumble through the same humiliating speech I've already made a dozen times before.

"I've been a heavy drinker since sixteen, but in the past year my drinking - drinking cost me everything. I had to quit my job before being fired, and I haven't found another one.

"My savings went to pay a lawyer and fine after my second...second DWI. That also cost me my license, and I had to sell my car anyway. I'm now living off unemployment until it runs out. Then I don't know what I'm going to do. My girlfriend - I mean my fiancé - she left me, taking the ring I gave her and moving out, to where I don't know - somewhere across the country probably as far away from me as she can get.

"I had to move out of the nice apartment we shared in the suburbs. Now I'm living in a crappy little studio not far from here. Anyway I... I quit drinking on my own over six months ago. I have no urge to start up again. I'm only here because the court ordered me to be. And... well, I have some personal issues I want to sort out and I can't afford a shrink. I'm trying to develop some discipline and self-confidence, assertiveness."

Maybe it's a trick of the light. But as I sit down I swear I notice the same gleam of appreciation in Kim's huge green eyes that I've noticed before at this mention of my shortcomings. Her smile is certainly wider in any event. But then I'm distracted from this enticing mystery by the need to defend myself (for what feels like the hundredth time) from the combined censure of the group.

How dare I suggest AA wasn't an absolute necessity for me! No one who suffered from such a terrible disease could ever get over their absolute compulsion to drink on their own and in only six months! I was obviously in deep denial, and only by accepting wholeheartedly the loving support of the group and God-as-I-perceived-him could I ever possibly overcome my demons and start on the road to recovery.

As always, it seems to me that the vehemence of these attacks demonstrates more about the shortcomings of this particular group than about any flaws in my own makeup. Twice Kim has to speak up and rein in the eye-popping, spittle-spraying tirades of people who simply can't countenance my refusal to accept that I'm fundamentally damaged and desperately need their help. This intercession on my behalf makes everything worth it despite the terrible emotional toll standing up for myself takes on me.

This is my true therapy: doggedly forcing myself to overcome my timidity and assert myself in the face of universal condemnation. I don't know if I could ever do this without the occasional reward of having the lovely Kim briefly if obliquely on my side. And even more treasured are the faint smiles of amusement and even encouragement she gives me.

I only have five more of these mandatory weekly meetings to get through before the sentence set by the judge is up. As much as I despise them, I'm tempted to keep attending if only to keep offending these people, curing my lack of self-confidence, and earning these faint signals of approval from this victoriously beautiful empress. And after all, if I stop coming, when will I ever see her again? I'm more addicted to the sight of Kimiko Katsumi than I ever was to booze.

Musing on this after the group finally gives up on me and moves on to someone else, I suddenly come up with a solution as simple in its ordinariness as it is nearly unthinkable in its temerity. Why don't I just ask her for a date?

The very thought makes me tremble with trepidation.

I've never approached any woman nearly as beautiful and desirable - to say nothing of intimidating. Kim is older, taller, far richer and more attractive than I am, and her arrogant self-assurance could eviscerate my own tentative timidity at a stroke. The effort required even to speak to her would far outstrip that of merely standing up to a group of people I despise. But ah, the potential reward is so commensurately greater as well! Right away I determine to go through with it. This will be a huge step for me, whether it ends in success or disgrace.

The rest of the meeting passes in an agony of suspense and second thoughts. Somehow I make it through with my determination intact however. Then as the group disperses I summon more courage than I ever dreamed I possessed and approach my destiny.

Step One

 

"Can I talk to you for a minute, Kim?"

"Miss Katsumi!"

"Of course. I'm sorry, Miss Katsumi."

She straightens up from unplugging the coffeemaker. With her high-heeled shoes (black like her tight skirt and the stockings encasing those incredibly long and slender legs) she looms over me by more than half a foot. Folding her similarly long and slender arms under her breasts (these are molded beautifully by the ruffled white blouse she wears, the big dark nipples clearly visible through the thin silk) she leans against the table and favors me with that thinly expectant ghost of a smile. Her striated irises seem to have every tint of green in them: emerald, hunter, and the leaves of high summer. Scintillant with amusement they both daunt and encourage me. Like the swift way she corrected me on the formal use of her name and the familiar manner she addresses me herself, this contradiction seems to egg me on and yet warn of the consequences of continuing at the same time.

"Well, what is it Dale?"

A quick glance around reassures me that no one remains within earshot. I'm all aquiver inside. I can't believe I'm doing this. This is the nearest I've ever been to her, and up close Miss Katsumi's aura of intimidating allure is overpowering. My mouth is so dry I'm afraid nothing will come out of it but a desiccated croak. But somehow I force my voice into use.

"I wanted to thank you for interceding for me tonight, and for all the times you've done so in the past. It's not easy to have everyone ganging up on you and screaming in your face, particularly for someone like me. If I didn't have you at least obliquely on my side once in a while I could never get through it. Of course I know it's just your job. But I wanted you to know that I appreciate it all the same."

I pause to let her respond. She merely continues to regard me with Oriental inscrutability leavened the tiniest bit with private amusement. Then she arches one elegantly thin eyebrow.

"Is that all?"

"Well...well, er no actually."

Suddenly I'm stammering and fidgeting like a schoolboy before his teacher, shifting from foot to foot and wanting to ask if I can have an extra day to finish some assignment. Come to the crunch at last I'm suffering under an avalanche of embarrassment and painfully acute anxiety. I want nothing more than to flee into the night and never see this victorious beauty again except in endless regretful musings about what might have been. Somehow I find it within me to take the plunge though. Either my tentative new assertiveness will be rewarded spectacularly or dealt an almost fatal setback. One or the other - it couldn't possibly be both, right?

"You see... the thing is... well, I only have to be here for another five weeks. And I kind of doubt I'll be coming back after that. And that would be a shame."

"Not because I need these meetings, you understand," I hasten to add. "Just because, well, you're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. I've... oh damn it! I've kind of fallen in love with you. Would you like to go out for a cup of coffee or something?"

My heart is pounding like mad. Still Miss Katsumi tortures me with suspense for a few minutes, calmly regarding me with that barest hint of cool amusement. At last she effortlessly devastates me.

"I don't think that would be a good idea. Haven't you had enough caffeine already? You're trembling where you stand."

"I'm...I'm sorry!" I stammer, preparing to scuttle ignominiously off. But she stops me with the touch of a hand on my arm. This physical contact - the first ever between us - causes my shattered heart to lurch alarmingly. Then at a stroke she both mends it and causes it to swell and start racing more dangerously than ever.