Who needs a traffic light when you have equipment like that to stop traffic? Lust: if you have to die, what a way to go, eh?

This is the fourth entry in Katie’s competition involving the Seven Deadly Sins, or as we Buddhists prefer to call them: the seven human hindrances. Check out this link to find out all about it.

The basic scoop is that anyone can enter a 0-600 word submission about the sin/hindrance/flavor Katie selects.  A panel of judges will narrow down the submissions to their top five; then Katie will post them for the general blogging community to vote. Anyone can join in on the fun, kind of like contributing to a PAC, entering a triathlon, or being one of the lucky people who have seen Elvis since he “died.”  Just be careful. From what I’ve heard, once you dip your toe into any of these tempting waters, you’re likely to get sucked down a drain you may not want to be swirling around in. I’m just saying… Of course, if you have writer’s block, this kind of thing may be just what you’ve been looking for. Consider it my gift to you: Writer’s Draino for your Writer’s Block (or Clog).

Talk about a great writing prompt…It has it all: drama, suspense, emotional turmoil, drainage issues, sexism, ridiculosity. Sometimes I surprise myself with what I find for you.

The fourth of the sins/hindrances is Lust. Here’s my submission for you to read. If you’re expecting some Fifty Shades of Grey smutty hoopla, then you should just go back to reading your naughty trilogy in the privacy of your Methodist Women’s Reading and Knitting Group. My essay is more boring… tame…cerebral than soft core porn. This essay uses the lyrics of a song preformed by Elvis Presley. To see him perform the song in his oo-la-la youth, click here.

In the immortal and eloquent words of Piglet: “Oh My. Oh, mm…mm…my, my, my!”

I Want You, I Need You, I Love You

The occasional static and crackles caused by obsessive listening was no match for Elvis’ satin voice. She played the record again, swaying her shapely hips to the music and mouthing the words as she watched herself in her full-length mirror. She knew the words as well as she knew her reflection. Both felt as hollow as a grave before the casket was lowered into it.

Hold me close, hold me tight.
Make me thrill with delight.
Let me know where I stand from the start.
I want you, I need you, I love you
With all my heart.

How many times had men fantasized about her while listening to this song?

She made a career out of making men want the seductive woman they saw when she put on her mask. And she was the best in the business. Desire is what she sold and men bought it up with reckless abandon—men who never knew her, only her act. Nameless men offered her just about anything she wanted from them in exchange for a chance at devouring her body. All she wanted was their undying love and an unbreakable promise never to leave her alone. But they weren’t able to offer her those things, even in for a chance to fondle her breasts and feel her shapely legs wrapped around their torsos.           

Ev’ry time that you’re near
All my cares disappear.
Darling, you’re all that I’m living for.
I want you, I need you, I love you
More and more.

“I want you, I need you, I love you.” Elvis crooned. She felt that way about a man once. He was really just a boy and it was so long ago that it hardly counted as this lifetime. But she ached for him with something inside so strong that she knew she would love that man to death…or she would die trying.

I thought I could live without romance
Before you came to me.
But now I know that
I will go on loving you eternally.

But he didn’t give her the chance to give her life to him. He up and left while she was still young and innocent. So she made herself into a woman no other man would ever up and leave. Not and live to tell about it.

Won’t you please be my own?
Never leave me alone
‘Cause I die ev’ry time we’re apart.
I want you, I need you, I love you
With all my heart.

 “Yes, Elvis. I know how that feels,” she said to her reflection, which was the most real thing about her anymore. “But no matter how much you beg and plead, they always leave you alone, don’t they? It’s best to leave before you get there, don’t you think?”

She zipped up her dress and adjusted her ample breasts to make sure the cleavage looked just risqué enough for the crowd she wanted, needed, loved to please.

The doorbell rang. She appraised her reflection from glamorous head to spike-heeled toe. Blowing herself a kiss over her shoulder, she grabbed her purse and headed toward the door.

On the dressing table were two empty champagne bottles and one glass smothered in lipstick kisses.

Elvis was silent now. The needle on the stereo was stuck, so she exited to the faint sound of kerrrr-chrrr…kerrrr-chrrr…kerrrr-chrrr...

*****
In case you missed my first submission on Gluttony, click here. To find my second submission (on Envy), click here. My third essay on Sloth is here. I only suggest this because I’m treating these entries as a series involving the same character, so you will see her struggle with each human hindrance.

Go to Katie’s blog to read other awesome Lust submissions. (Go ahead, your significant other will thank you. Well, then again, maybe not…)

I ask again, friends and readers, who is this woman so obviously hindered, so perfectly flawed in her humanity? I’ll tell you at the end of the series.

The suspense is killing me. Is finger biting one of the deadly sins? I hope not, because I’m a gonner if it is.