Blood Moon

“The pub was busy the night I met Olivier. I don’t remember much about my life before, but I remember that night very clearly as it was the day my life changed forever. I do know that. I do know there was a before but the details and memories are all lost to me now. But I do know there was a before. Like everything was in black and white before, but now I was seeing in technicolor.

I was sitting at a table in a corner, grading papers. I think I taught at a university, statistics maybe. This… ‘man’ was different. He was beautiful, sure, but that wasn’t the only thing that drew me to him. It’s something inexplicable. Joie de vivre. Je ne sais quoi. He had an aura about him. It was as if he glowed, in part because his skin was such a beautiful, buttery brown that it looked almost golden. He walked toward the bar with an unfazed alacrity, turning countless gay and straight heads alike. I couldn’t keep my eyes off of him. Then, I remember this so clearly because it aroused and terrified me in equal measure, he turned his head and looked so deliberately into my eyes. From far away I could see they were clearly lighter, it took him getting much closer to see that they were hazel.

He asked if he could sit with me. I said yes. He wooed me. His voice was like a siren’s song. He was charming and funny and charismatic. He was smart and devilishly handsome. Devilishly. I recall he had rather prominent canines, no more than the worst you’ve probably seen, but enough for me to take pause.

Before I knew it, I was following him back to his place. I remembered being scared at first when I saw him driving so far out of town. Where we were wasn’t anyone’s home. It was an old motel, you know the little cracker jack single story ones…? I would have thought it was condemned but for the giant neon sign that said they had no vacancies. He already had a room. He said he was staying there for the week.

He parked an odd distance away. In hindsight, there were so many red flags and I saw them, I was cognizant of them, but I observed them with absolute and profound apathy. I felt so heady and light, as if being pulled by some indescribable force, almost like a dream but I knew I was awake.

I still attest that I followed him of my own volition, by the way. Don’t get me wrong, at no point did he force me or coerce me or drug me, although he no doubt had some kind of psychic hold on me. I was in such a heightened state of arousal and I knew he was the source, so I followed him. At the time, I thought I was in love. I was in a sense, because my desire for him was such that it wouldn’t have mattered if I was following him through the gates of hell, but I was going with him no matter what. So I followed him. I followed him down a dark and dusty clay road. It was a tawny red color.

I was somehow not concerned to see so many of the rooms of the motel were abandoned, doors ripped off hinges and debris all around. Only one room in the whole joint looked inhabited or even inhabitable. And through those thrown open windows, it strangely didn’t look like a hotel room, it looked like a room…a room I couldn’t recall from my childhood. A bedroom. My own from when I was eleven and painted the whole thing purple. ‘Scuse me, lavender.

I strangely didn’t get that prickly feeling that I was in danger. Seeing my childhood home in this way inspired no unsettling feelings. Instead, I felt like I was home. I followed him into the room, sat on the bed. It was astounding. A perfect replica, down to my N*Sync poster.

He sat on the bed beside me.

His fingers grazed my knee and then caressed my thighs so gently, it felt like rose pedals. The sensation was electric. The feel of his lips on my neck, on my chest, on my breasts…it nearly took my breath away. It was so soft and gentle and sweetly intimate. His fingers, drifted, casually up my thigh, inching my skirt up, slowly higher and higher.

I asked him to stop. He asked me why. I wanted to warn him that I was on my period. He appeared surprisingly enthusiastic about that.

He moved my knee to sit between my legs. He pushed my skirt all the way up and removed my panties. They were period panties. I never used tampons or pads. I liked to free bleed.

He looked at my vagina, wet with blood and longing. Then he did something no one had ever done to me before. I let him eat me. I was self-conscious at first but then when he started—it was unlike anything I had ever experienced. It was pure, unadulterated ecstasy. It was a pleasure unlike I had ever known. Later I would discover that there is a kind of temporary neurotoxin that simultaneously calms you and floods your pleasure center with dopamine, causing you to experience euphoria on a God-like level. I believe it is the closest thing I will ever get to Heaven.

Damn. Just thinking about it now makes me ache for that feeling again. Which is how he knew he had me. He had given me a taste of something I could now no longer live without. I would never be satisfied until I had it. Had it all. Had it all the time. I NEEDED it. This is how, when he asked me if I wanted to feel that way all the time, I said yes. He asked what I would do to have that level of pleasure all the time? Would I trust him? Would I follow him? Would I be willing for others to join in our play?

I said yes to all of it, whatever he wanted. Forever.

He opened the slatted accordion doors of my childhood closet. There, under clothes I hadn’t seen since middle school (my size and everything, even though I distinctly remember donating them to Goodwill once I got to high school), under the rack of shoes and bags filled with hats and scarves, was a latched door in the floor that I had never noticed before. I wondered if there was a latched door of my actual childhood home or if this was the only deviation that split the two realities. I’ll never know. That home was sold decades ago and I don’t have any pictures.

Regardless, Olivier lifted up the door, revealing a set of stairs that led into complete darkness. He stepped in, turned around and held out his hand for mine. I took it and followed him blindly without hesitation. I was endlessly fascinated, intrigued, everything piquing my senses and arousing an infernal desire.

We descended for a long time. Long enough that the room was just a memory. I relied on my heightened sense of sound and feeling to continue further into this seemingly never-ending pit of darkness, his hand continuing to guide me. I was not scared until about a half hour into our descent when the inescapable blackness became unnerving. That’s something they don’t tell you, when you’re accustomed to the light, people can go mad from complete and utter blackness. When there is no difference whether your eyes are open or shut,  the darkness that surrounds you can get into a person’s head and create disturbing and terrifying images. At least that was my experience.

Olivier didn’t answer my questions when I asked, but I knew he was there. His hand was still in mine, I could hear his steps and his breathing. We continued downward for what seemed like an eternity until suddenly it stopped. I heard his feet and then mine on what felt like sand. Then, as if by a miraculous gust of wind, fires erupted into being in the torches that otherwise lit this dank, dark hallway. I was perplexed to find I was completely alone. My hand was affixed to nothing. I turned upward to look up the steps to see if I could see the room now that the space was lit, but to my amazement, the stairs were gone as well.

There was no other option but for me to go forward now, down the hallway that still had seemingly no ending. As I walked the path, more torches would alight the path. The hall went from a dirt tunnel, to a slightly larger space with dripping stalagmites and  stalactites, to a glittering salt mine. I continued walking until I saw a door and beside it stood Olivier. I turned to look behind me, confused and saw only the torches going out one by one.

‘Are you ready?’ He asked and, although I was more nervous than a girl on prom night, something deep within me wanted and knew I was ready for whatever was to come next.

He opened the door and inside was a large, sparkling room sculpted in salt. There were doors etched into the walls of this great room and there was a hole carved out of the ceiling that revealed a reddish full moon. The rest of the room was lit by those same torches that had led my path here. In the center of the room were four cloaked figures with a gynecological table in front of them.

Olivier led me to the table to sit. Each of them in turn explained what was about to happen. It was the same deal they cut on every blood moon. They were going to take turns feasting on me, and after I’d had the ultimate pleasure, I could either choose to forget everything and wake up in my bed as if I had just had a rough night of drinking and go back to my life as usual…Or, I could become one of them. They told me I didn’t have to choose then, but whenever I chose, it could not be undone.

They surrounded me and I merely watched as they stripped me down, guided me down onto the table, and gently helped me get arranged in my stirrups. They did some kind of chanting as they stood around me. They did just as they said. They took turns feasting on me. Even the women. Especially the women. While the one was eating me, the rest were petting me all over, stroking me, sucking on my breasts and neck and ears, all heightening my pleasure beyond anything I could even comprehend. I don’t even know if I was in fact cumming. If I was, it was one extended orgasm unlike anything I had ever experienced. It went on for hours like that, I didn’t even realize I bled that much.

When they stopped, I was out of breath. It was almost too abrupt, to snatch that infinite pleasure from me. They asked me the question again, if I wanted to return to my normal life or stay there forever with them, as one of them. I never wanted to leave this place, leave them. I felt inextricably bound to these people…no, not people. Vampires.

All five of them led me to a new room, one of the many rooms off to the side of this central room. Fire exploded into the torches revealing a singular, massive bed, clearly meant to accommodate many. The bed was a thick, rich, regal red with numerous pillows. Each of the cloaked figures disrobed, revealing lithe, beautiful bodies. They climbed onto the bed. One man was a shade or two darker than Olivier, the other was much lighter with brunette hair. One of the females was Pilipino I think, almond shaped eyes and raven colored hair. The other had the sweet porcelain face of a doll, auburn hair and brilliant jade green eyes. They were five of the most effervescent, inescapably gorgeous individuals I had ever seen, and they were each beckoning for me to join them.

I came to my knees on the bed, amongst these ethereal specimens. I was enveloped by hands caressing every inch of my body, mouths kissing me and licking me everywhere, as one of my arms became outstretched and I felt a puncture at my wrist. Any discomfort lasted only a moment, but then I felt that that same visceral, immaculate, almost dreamlike pleasure. It went on and on as they felt and licked and sucked my body. They bathed in my blood. I could see it smeared on body parts and faces. They sucked between my legs some more. They kept sucking on my wrist.

Amidst this ocean of pleasure and pain, my life in the sun flashed before my eyes. I felt this shock run through me. There was split second darkness, the same blackness that had been so unnerving to me before. And, not knowing how much time had elapsed in this state, my eyes flashed open.

I was reborn.

But the pleasure didn’t end. My senses were so much more attuned to everything. I could hear the small sounds of animals scurrying above us, coming from the mouth of that hole in the ceiling. I could feel every touch across every hair of my body. More kissing. More caresses. I looked at my wrist and saw no puncture wounds. My period had ceased. I was new. I was whole. I was now one of them.

I was guided on top of Olivier. I mounted him. I felt my walls seizing his member as I slid up and down, steadily harder and deeper, the sensation almost robbing my breath from the gratification. Their hands and lips all over me, sucking my breasts, holding my cheeks apart as I rode his perfect appendage. I felt myself cumming so hard that I saw a blinding white light behind my eyes. The only light I’ll ever know again. Fortunately I knew where to find it.

They guided me off him when our time was done. I was too weak from cumming that hard, a dopamine overload. The Pilipino girl was on the bed. She motioned for me to come to her now. I kissed her supple lips, brushed her hair away from her face. I kissed behind her ear, then her chest, then I kissed each nipple and watched them grow hard in response. I kissed her stomach and felt her arch her back. Her sharp teeth flashed as she moaned and hissed like a cat. I felt my own teeth with my tongue and realized for the first time, my canines were more prominent. I kissed her hips and then her inner thigh and then I buried my face between her legs. She was sweet. I wanted to see if I was capable now of providing the same level of ultimate satisfaction as I had experienced. While I was lapping and sucking at her, they continued to pet me…us. All of us. I felt myself being entered from behind as I continued with the Pilipino girl. I made her cum until she let out a banshee scream and somehow I knew this meant she had reached that euphoric climax. Did I emit a similar sound when I came?

The man behind continued to thrust deep into me, hitting my G-spot as  I sat up to kiss whoever it was. It was the brunette. The girls sat up to suck my tits and kiss me and finger the bud between my legs as he entered me over and over. Harder. God yes! I tried to stay present through the euphoria as they bit softly into my neck and chest, enough so that I heard the same banshee cry escape my own lips.

We writhed in that bed for hours like a bucket of eels, taking turns satisfying each other. I didn’t know when the day started or when night began but I guess I’ll never know again. I don’t know when I fell asleep but when I awoke, everyone was as  intertwined as they were in the act but every one of them had their arms crossed over their chest.

What had I done?

I went out of that room, into the vast space that connected every other room. The glare of a pale waning moon lit the way. I found my clothes, found the door I had come through, went back down the hall, now feeling my way through the darkness and relying on those bat-like senses to climb back to the top of the stairs that appeared at the end of the tunnel.

Without the need for illusion, I was not surprised to emerge from a trap door into a completely dilapidated and desolate place. Wind came through the broken window shuffling the leaves along the floor. There was no furniture, no pictures on the wall.

I walked through the open door and looked around to see the motel, same as before except for the room that trap door was in. I walked back down the dirt path that was now no longer red but I couldn’t find the car. When I looked behind me, there was no path or motel. I walked down the street, back towards town. I tried hitchhiking but in the early morning hours, there was no hitch to hike. It was probably ten miles before I came across civilization again.

I finally reached my apartment, with a surprising amount of energy remaining. I took a shower but when I came out, I could no longer see my reflection in the mirror. I noticed more changes, like no matter how much I filed my nails or teeth, they’d always grow back to their same elongated, sharpened form. My sense of smell and my appetites were also different…voracious…primal…simple. I had one desire and one desire only now, to devour any human that crossed my path. I could smell the blood pulsing through their veins. I could smell when women were bleeding, that same metallic smell as when I had mine. This time it was intoxicating. I began feasting on anyone and everyone. Whoever I could get my hands on.

I creep into rooms while people are sleeping. I take countless women home from bars. With every meal, I’ve become stronger, more powerful. I am now something to be feared. I am the thing that goes bump in the night, here to bringing you both pleasure and pain, fear and unparalleled satiety in equal measure.

So”, I say to the woman, hypnotized, just now breathing normally after whimpering and crying from cumming harder than she had ever cum before. I knew that face of complete and total submission. I had seen it so many times before. I feasted on her as I was feasted on so many blood moons ago. “I’ll give the same deal as the others gave me…which do you choose?”

X

“Too High” by Lil Dicky was booming over the radio. It was already too loud for comfort at the start of the night but by now—5 shots of Patron, 3 Jack & Cokes, a bump and two spliffs later—at about 12:43 AM, the sound was painfully pounding in Xander’s head. The lights were starting to swirl but not in a good way like off a disco ball the way it had been all evening, but drunkenly distorted.

He liked it this way. He moved through his own house with dazed alacrity. Greeting whoever corralled him into conversation. Cracking a joke! For sure there are jokes to be made. He had enough quips locked and loaded about his own name. (Pronounced Zander but his friends called him X.)

And yes, I said his own house, but really his parents bought him this 3 bed, 2 bath townhouse. The amount his parents’ charged his roommates covered the mortgage, plus enough for him to live on.

From the outside, he was a typical frat boy. His parents had money, or at least they were smart with the extra they had, putting a certain amount into investments that allowed them to live comfortably. He was classically handsome with dark chestnut brown hair, a chiseled jawline, pouty lips and thick effeminate eyelashes shielding eyes that were a mystifying blue-hazel. He was tall and his body reflected his daily gym efforts. This is what everyone saw, what many chose to see, but that’s not who he was. Or not ALL he was at least.

D & D was the sport he chose in high school. He loved manga more than anime. He solved the Rubik’s Cube he kept in his backpack in between classes and while sipping a pint alone in old, unpopular bars.  He was socially awkward more often than not, but he could turn it on like a switch.

Since his junior year of high school, he started restoring old computers, laptops and even phones for nearby women’s shelters. What made him a douchebag was when he occasionally used this info to woo chicks. But he knew it. He was a strategic asshole. As most men are.

He knew what he was. He was a mask. He was something different than what everyone else saw. Like Superman he hid in plain sight. He leaned into this persona of effortlessly handsome, exceedingly confident, an irresistibly charming ladies’ man, because he knew the real him was a buffoon. Very few people got to know the real him. This was intentional, a way of being true to himself while still playing the role everyone just assumed he was playing.

Because he was never fully able to be one without the other, he had dualling voices in his head all the time writing jokes, pondering, debating. Not real voices, obviously. Not the kind you have to be hospitalized and medicated to silence! Heavens no! These voices were just a means of his brain to work shit out.

He spent most of his nights in bars and clubs, trying to find his voice in stand-up comedy. He had no interest in his “chosen” major (accounting—like his dad before him), but he was excited to be headlining for a few big names in the coming weeks. He addressed the incongruousness of his look in his act. Making fun of this sometimes suffocating persona he had fashioned for himself was where he felt most at home anymore.

No one wanted to hear that he was lonely…or sad…or smart…or more complex than his quizzically blue eyes. He worked this angle with oh so many girls. Unfortunately for him, the wrong kind. The cheap pretty kind. Fun for a little while but not built to last.

He kept ambling his high drunken ass through the crowd of primarily strangers in his home. He took an abandoned bottle of Modelo from the foyer table and drained it on his way out the door for good measure. He put it neatly beside his front door to pick up later. He held the door open for a group of more people with more booze to try to fit into his crowded house.

“X!!” They yelled jovially.

“Heeyyyy,” his locked and loaded greeting for all the people who recognized him that he didn’t know who the fuck they were.

The throb of a Childish Gambino song was still audible and palpable across the street. They would probably call the cops but who knows. This was a half-filled-out new development community. Most of the houses were still vacant.

He saw someone in the distance on one of the swings on the otherwise deserted playground. No families had moved in yet. He never saw any kids playing. It made him curious.

A solitary street lamp outlined the figure. He kept walking towards this human mass as if drawn by an indescribable force.

It was a girl—sorry a woman—because she was so much more poised and held herself with such an air of sophistication. She was delicately thin. She had a dense mane of blue hair with dark roots that was shaved on the right side and swept over to the left. She wore a simple black dress with an oversized black denim jacket with different Oni (Japanese tribal masks) on the sleeve.

There was a light chill in the air, enough to see that she wasn’t wearing a bra. Or probably any underwear, he thought. She was one of those sleek, cat-like alternative chicks that were usually not cute enough to endure whatever rant about women’s rights for a chance that she might be crazy wild in the sack. He saw himself as an ally. Why did he feel like he was always being attacked? It’s not like he chose to be born a male…or white.

His loins told him there was something different about this one. She made A-cups look sexy. She was no pseudo-intellectual. She was the real deal and she exuded her sexuality with an almost bored, languid confidence that said she genuinely did not give a fuck what anyone thought.

He liked that. A lot.

She had innumerable earrings dangling from her right ear, some long enough to graze her shoulder. She was hunched over on the swing, reading. When she looked up, her big doe eyes arrested him. For a second, those eyes stole his breath. He tried to regain composure.

“Hu—,” his words caught in his throat. He coughed to clear it. “Sorry,” he stumbled, “Is anyone sitting here?”

She looked around, a grin forming around the corners of her mouth. “Umm…no. You’re fine. You can sit.”

Her voice was thick, dense, deep—so much deeper than a typical woman’s. X found this wildly attractive. It was buttery…silken…just like her pale freckled flesh. Her jewelry, her hair, everything dripped, dangled and teased the eyes in the style of bohemian gothic.

He sat next to her and offered his hand, “Hi, I’m—”

“Yeah, I know who you are.”

“Oh.” She didn’t look like the type to know who he was.

“Yeah, actually, I’ve seen you at the Laugh Attic. Quite a few times actually.”

Xander scrunched up his face.

“What?” she asked.

“I would have fucking noticed you,” he said dramatically.

She giggled. “Yeah um…the hair…it’s not usually this bright a cerulean—”

This bitch out here using words like cerulean AND she has seen my standup. Fuck, he thought. I am for sure out of my depths with this one.

“I died it fresh for the party.”

He looked around comically, “My party?”

“Haha yeah. I hope you don’t mind, I got invited by a…well whatever we are…”

“Uh oh, sounds like this is the type of convo that needs a drink!” He whipped out a flask and offered it to her first.

“No thank you, I’m driving.”

I’m not letting you get away. He had been working on his external vs. internal monologue. On account of how rapey that immediate thought sounded, he felt fortunate to have that one censored. He couldn’t help but think, I want to go wherever you go.

She seemed willing to talk, at least. She lightly folded the corner of her book, In Cold Blood, and stowed it in her backpack which featured Godzilla fighting Mothra. She didn’t seem like the kind to do anything she didn’t want to do just to save someone’s feelings.

He pulled out a joint, lit it, hit it and then offered this as well. This time she shrugged and took the peace offering. She held it in her lungs for an inconceivably long time before releasing.

“Squad Goals” by PROF came on next.

“Nice. ‘I got guns, hoes, money, dro, cars, boats, you should know!’” she quoted.  “I love this song.”

He looked at her, puzzled. It did not go unmissed.

“What? I don’t look like someone who’d know this song?”

“Sorry—”

“And coming from the comic who’s sick of being judged…? And for their fucking good looks no less…” She rolled her eyes, taking another big rip and then passing it back. Their exhalation of smoke mingled in the night air.

“Oh damn, you have seen me.”

“You’re surprised?”

“No…I just…I don’t invite any of my friends or anything. It’s kind of something I’m doing on my own and I kind of like to keep the two worlds sep— Never mind…I…oh God, please tell me you weren’t there…”

“About three weeks ago when you bombed extraordinarily? No. Whatever do you mean?” She said with a sly grin. She was sexy and she knew it. She was going to be a problem.

“Fuck. I was hoping to not see anybody who saw it—”

“I mean, you brought it up.”

“I mean…it was embarrassing in the moment. Lord, I was sweating so much! I felt like the biggest fucking loser but…I learned so much from it and it’s almost like I needed that experience. I mean I look at it like a badge of honor now, like an achievement because I needed to bomb to know that feeling and improve and all that…”

“Absolutely.”

He laughed a little nervously. Why was he nervous? “Sorry…thank you.”

“Ha! For what?”

“I mean for coming to the shows and stuff.”

“I wasn’t going to see you or anything.”

“I know.” Was he sweating? Jesus this bitch was terrifying. Don’t call her a bitch. No I meant it in the general sense. I know what you meant, stop being a cocksucker.

“You know you’re a lot less confident in person. And you seem a lot less like a douchebag.”

“I’m a fucking mess,” he conceded.

“Aren’t we all?”

“Ha! I guess I’m just not used to…real conversation, I guess, is what I was thinking.”

“No. I don’t imagine you would. You’re so pretty, I forgot what we were talking about.”

Was he actually blushing?

A long pause fell over them but not between them.

“You say ‘I mean’ and ‘like’ a lot.”

“Like in my act or right now?”

“Either, I guess. I didn’t really mean that as a critique, more of a incase-you-haven’t-noticed thing.”

“I hadn’t—”

“But it’s good you know? It could be like your catch phrase. I meeeeaaannn…”

He laughed. He hated comics with catch phrases. He thought they were hokey. But the way she said things, although intense, she also had this buoyant, animated way of talking that made her naturally funny. She had timing and candor.

“You have gotten better since then, by the way. I’ve seen you twice since then.”

“Thank you.” Pause. “So…”

“So…?” she mimicked, playfully.

“So…who are you here with?”

She let out a belabored sigh. “I came with my lover/boyfriend/ex-boyfriend thing and a few of our friends—” For a split second his heart sank. She’s still saying “our friends”. Easy man, chill.

“But…I guess he found someone more interesting tonight. Some chick with big tits. Honestly—”

“Big tits…ew.”

“Dick.”

“For what it’s worth, yours are very nice.”

She looked down, “It is what it is. They may not be a full handful but they could for sure cut glass.”

“Haha! Well…Fuck him!”

“I meeeeaaaannnn…” she teased with a glint in her eye. “Not anymore.”

This was going well, he thought. He noticed the body language of the two of them slowly but surely leaning closer into the other.

“You’re actually pretty easy to talk to,” she admitted, coyly.

“I was just thinking the same thing.”

“I’m Corinne,” she said, passing back the roach for a final time and offering her hand.

“Oh I’m sorry!” He shook her hand and it lingered there before sliding away. “My friends call me X, by the way.”

“Sometimes my friends call me Corey.”

“Nice.”

“So what are you doing out here?” she asked. A valid question.

“I…I’m not even sure. I think I came out here for some fresh air, I guess.”

“Hm. It takes a lot of energy to maintain a lie, huh?” But she didn’t say this as a roast, she said it with sincerity. Poignant. Knowing. He was exhausted and somehow she saw into him enough to see that.

This took the words from him. Maybe this Imposter Syndrome thing he felt all the time was more common than he knew. He was transfixed by her. He had never met someone quite like her. Her look, her mannerisms, how easy it was to talk to her. He wasn’t able to talk to anyone like this, not even his friends, for sure not his parents, and definitely never a girl…chick…sorry, woman. Everything in him was begging, screaming for more. He was already on the hook. He wanted to know more about her. Everything. He wanted to know her. Like really know her. Biblically. Shut up, you scumbag. But also yes. He had a desire for her that was carnal, indescribable.

They watched the party’s last death rattle from across the street before it slowly died out as they continued to talk. At one point, he felt like he was interrogating her, but then she wasn’t trying to leave. She answered his questions with an inviting coolness, often followed by an enigmatic grin. She had a sexual power and she wielded it without mercy. Her lips…her thick lips and, God, that cute little part in her front teeth. It was characteristic. It was sexy. She even has one of those piercings! Smiley. What? That’s what it’s called. Whatever, I’m with it. She laughed at his jokes. She got all his references, even the obscure ones…she was like his fucking dream girl! Like everything he had no clue that he even knew he wanted!

“What?”

It wasn’t until she asked this that he realized he was just watching her as if hypnotized.

“Sorry.”

“No, seriously, what?”

“You’re so unexpected…I’ve never felt so seen. I mean… (he rolled his eyes when she giggled at this) Maybe too seen… You’re a powerful witch.” Then, as if on cue, the street lamp went out. “See what I mean?!”

She laughed heartily at that. God, my new mission in life is to get you to laugh like that every time.

“I swear I had nothing to do with that!” She snorted.

“I meeean…” More laughs. “Are you sure?"

He wished he could see her face right now. I bet she’s laughing so hard now that she’s flushed. I bet she gets flushed when she cums too. His dick flinched at this thought and suddenly he felt like he had to know.

As her laughter died, she shuddered involuntarily. It was getting to be that witching hour when the world is at its coldest.

“Fuck. I wish I had something to give you—a sweater or something.”

“That’s sweet but I’m fine.”

“I could literally give you the shirt off my back…?” He went so far with the gesture as to begin unbuttoning.

“No! Really haha I’m good. Thank you, though.”

There was a small pause. Fuck it. Big Air. I’m going for it. “We could cuddle?”

“Uh…”

Maybe he didn’t have this as in-the-bag as he thought. “You know for warmth or whatever…?” He added.

It was the tiniest things about him like those slight flashes of insecurity that endeared X to Corey. He had no idea the urges that were writhing in her loins like a cluster of crazed eels. She stood in front of him and he rose to meet her.

Standing toe-to-toe, she was a head shorter than him.

Suddenly, he felt as though he could not be more awkward. “Is it okay if I uh—"

“Shut up, loser. Get in here.”

She wrapped her arms around him and pressed her face against his chest. She didn’t wear a lot of makeup. He wouldn’t have to wash it off him or have to do laundry to try to get the sparkles out. He liked that a lot. Bonus points for being naturally pretty.

“What about the guy?” X asked, testing the waters of the situation.

“What guy?”

“The guy and all your friends…that was gonna—or that you were going to drive home?”

“Eh. They can figure it out.”

Her hands hung at his pants line. His arms were wrapped around her shoulders.

“God I feel like such a cliché.”

“What do you mean?” Because he could not see anything about her that was cliché, blasé, just okay or any other way.

“I meeeaann…” She joked. “How many times has this story played out? You probably have two, three chicks just naked in bed waiting for you right now.”

“Probably,” he said as a joke.

“Man…” She started to pull away so he drew her in closer.

He rested his chin lightly on top of her head, enveloping his arms around her. Her hair smelled like lavender and vanilla.

“I know what I look like but I’m not a playboy. I’ve only been with a handful of girls and they were girlfriends. Really, I’m not that guy. I feel like you already know that.”

Her small hands crept so stealthily beneath his shirt, he didn’t notice it while it was happening. He just felt two hands like icicles on his back.

She looked up at him, those arresting, big doe eyes. He rubbed her back. His hands fell at her hips. She was willing him to kiss her with her eyes. One hand came to her face as he pressed his lips against hers, the other one grabbed her right butt cheek. She wrapped a leg around his midsection. He lifted her leg up and hoisted her up like a doll. He held her ass with one hand, his free hand stroking her face.

She kissed him as if she wanted to devour him. She tasted sweet. When their lips parted again, he kissed her clavicle, he sucked at her neck. He felt the blood rush to his cock and press against his jeans.

“Mmmm—bite me,” she commanded softly, raking her hands through his hair. He bit her gently. “Mmm harder.”

He did as he was told and knew when he’d done it right when she gasped and moaned with pleasure.

“Wait! I have an idea,” she said mischievously.

He let her down. She ran over to the swing set again and threw it around the top several times, looking over at Xander to match his height. She crept up onto the swing and then motioned for him to come closer with one seductive finger.

Did she do what I think she just did?

“You don’t have anything do you?” she asked as he came nearer.

“What?”

“When was the last time you were tested?”

“Oh, two weeks ago,” which was the truth. “Clean. You?”

“Clean.”

He stood there, a little taken aback at how reckless and cautious she was at the same time. She found his zipper and slowly unzipped him, staring into his eyes. He looked around to see if anyone was around or watching. There was nothing. She pulled his underwear down, never breaking eye contact. She pulled her panties down, adjusting herself in the seat. So she was wearing panties.

She pulled up her skirt to reveal her well-manicured pussy. He didn’t know why but seeing that she wasn’t bald down there like so many of the girls he’d been with made him painfully hard.

He cupped her small breasts in his hands and felt her body. He put two fingers inside of her and felt how wet she was for him. He played her until she was moaning, begging to be entered.

When he took his fingers out, she intercepted them and stuck them in her mouth, sucking her juices off his fingers. This filled him with a greed for her. Ferocity took over. He bit her neck and shoulder like an animal as he entered her.

“Oh god!” she said, “Oh god!”

He used the swing to bring her down on his cock. He tried getting deeper with every swing. She breathed in through her teeth.

“Oh god that feels so good!”

“God, your pussy is so tight, baby. Fuck you feel amazing!”

She threw her head back in ecstasy. He pulled the top of her dress down to reveal her smallish tits and sucked on her nipples. His tongue played over the rings in each nipple.

She made soft noises of pleasure followed by sharp noises with each hard thrust. She was melting into his arms. She was cumming and gushing all over him. He felt her juices dripping on to his balls and down his leg.

“Oh yes! Fuuuuck! Oh goddam it yes!”

“I’m gonna cum!” Xander warned. She wrapped her legs around him, tight. Feeling this, he came hard deep inside her. She convulsed as she felt the giant vein on his cock ripple inside her.

“Oh shit.”

“It’s okay,” she said breathily, the side of her face pressed against his. “I’m on the pill.”

It still didn’t make him feel better but Jesus Christ she felt so good, and he wasn’t sure why her wrapping herself around him more as he was about to cum made him cum harder than he ever had before. She was electric.

He kissed her again. She picked her panties out of the mulch and shoved them in her jacket pocket. She adjusted her skirt as he pulled up his pants and underwear.

“Actually, I have to pee,” he said, realizing.

“Me too!”

She scampered into the grass and squatted. He aimed his stream at a pole. Marking his territory. She emerged from the darkness, and checked her phone.

“Oh shit. It’s almost 4:30…want to get breakfast?”

“Ha! Yeah, actually. Your place or mine?” he asked, flinging her Godzilla backpack over his shoulder.

“I meant at like a Denny’s or something.”

“Denny’s is shit! I’ll make you a real omelet.”

“A real one, huh?” she asked, walking backwards towards his place.

“Yeah,” he said, catching her hand and lacing his fingers in hers.

“Okay.” She smiled at the gesture.

Neither of them were sure what they were doing. He became more awkward and oddly chivalrous when he brought her back to his place. They split an omelet and drank the rest of the orange juice that was in the fridge. They went up to his room. She shut the door behind him. They fucked two more times and then slept till noon.

When she left for work, he asked for her number. He gave his. He asked her to come to his show on

Wednesday night. She said yes but then she didn’t respond to his texts.

In the green room before his show, he looked at all the faces in the crowd. He didn’t see her.

He got up on stage, less sure of himself than ever. But then, after he told his first joke…that laugh. He looked in the crowd, the light of the stage blinding him. There she stood, at the bar in the back of the venue. She raised her bottle to cheers him. All of a sudden, he felt like he was on top of the world.

She smiled in spite of herself. He smiled back.  

The Fever

His slacks were stained and tattered at the hem but he knew no one at the truck stop in Blythe would care. He shuffled into work with the weight of his 47 years on his knotted shoulders. If he were smarter, he would have been preoccupied with the prevalent disappointments of his middle aged life. But he wasn’t. He was content with getting up at the same time every morning, eating the same breakfast of instant oatmeal and toast, driving five miles to his thankless job at the station where he’d stand behind the register, staring into the abyss and spitting his chew behind his boss’s back so he wouldn’t see. You weren’t supposed to dip at work.

He looked out the window by chance. He tried not to stare for too long outside. The swiftness with which the sun would rise and set in the span of a work day gave him an inexplicable feeling he didn’t like. But, there was a woman there. She emerged from a red jeep with bikes attached and a lot of gear in the back. A man stepped out from the driver’s side and began to pump gas. He said something to her that made her smile while she stretched. Her shirt slid up as she reached from side to side, revealing a taught tan stomach above her faded jeans.

He wondered what the man was to her, whether they were brother and sister, or boyfriend/girlfriend, or husband and wife, and in the time it took for him to even question it, she was coming through the door. She caught his eye and smiled before heading toward one of the aisles. He couldn’t stop watching her. She been touched with the tar brush, he thought. But he couldn’t stop looking at her.

She had long straight hair that trailed down her back. She could have been Indian or Mexican. She had prominent cheekbones and dark sun-kissed skin but her eyes were hazel; and she was tall. Hell! She came to near about his height at 5’10. But these simple observations weren’t what drew his eyes, no.

It was her lips. He imagined looking down at her as she sucked his cock. She had beautiful full lips, the kind that know what they’re doing, and he could see her licking them before sliding them over his rock hard dick. And he’d give it to her. He felt himself stiffen in his pants at the thought of filling her mouth, the thought of her tongue tracing his head and she’d tug on his balls a little the way he liked.

He saw her head bobbing faster and faster and running his hands through her hair and pulling it the way he liked. Her mouth, so warm, and the way she’s sucking him off is so good. He liked the feel of her gagging, it felt so good he got goosebumps and started to feel that familiar tingle. He looks down at her as she looks up at him and then he tugs her head back a little and fills her mouth. She gags so hard tears start falling from her eyes and as he feels himself cumming, he’s so deep in her that he feels her swallowing and it’s so intense, it sends shivers down his spine.

He spits.

She’s picking out peanuts and jerky. He wasn't even a thought to her.

He leans against the counter to feel the pressure on his throbbing member. Something about a girl like that had a way of bringing out the teenage boy in him. How old was she anyway? 22? 23?

He was old enough to be her father. That didn’t repulse him in the least. He cursed the lucky bastard who got to spank her when she was naughty. I bet she still likes a good spankin’, he thought. Those pants were so tight they showed everything. She had a plump perfect little brown ass. It was round but it was tight and those pants were so low, he wondered where her vagina even began.  He watched as she turned the corner to grab a soda wondering if she had any underwear on and what it would look like if she did. It would have to be one of them thongs, for sure, ‘cause there weren’t no lines.

He unbuttons her pants and scooches them down over that fat ass. They’re lace and red, the kind that were made to be removed by teeth by an alpha male and he was happy to oblige. They were also the kind you didn’t have to remove at all, you could just pull them to one side while you slip your dick inside. And aw yeah he could imagine his dick in that sweet little pussy. I bet it’s so warm and tight and I’d get her so wet, it would just slide right up in.

There’s that moment when you stick your rod in a woman for the first time. He’s got her lubed up and ready to go, she’s so hot, she’s begging for it. There’s a small gasp that women do. He likes that little sound, so delicate and relieved. He’s fulfilling her as he’s filling her. That sound is as if he’s finally satisfying the unsatisfiable need for him to be inside her. He hadn’t felt that sensation in probably a decade.

He spits.

He adjusts himself, the pressure in his pants a nuisance now as he has no way to deal with it. He could take a long bathroom break. He was known for those anyway.

She puts cream in a cup of coffee and stirs. Yeah, I’d like to put cream in her coffee. I’d stir you all night. One leg on his shoulder. He could almost feel her tight pussy clenching in ecstasy. She knows how to move just right, she looks like she can keep the rhythm, allowing him to plunge deeper and deeper into her. People think I’m slow but I’m not as dumb as they think, I’d have her cumming harder than she’s ever cum before. I bet that chocolate cunt tastes sweet—

Her brother sets the door chime off. He goes to grab his own coffee. He kisses her neck and she shrugs him off. Maybe not her brother. He follows her to the counter, smacking her on the ass, as he walks behind. They unfold their bounty onto the counter.

“How much do I owe you, buddy?” her boyfriend asks.

He spits.

He rings each item with fresh resentment, his hard-on gone, with no resolve to rub one out later, and he’s just a man again with stained trousers and the same old chew. He watches as they banter back to the jeep with full arms and drive off to destinations and excitement unknown.

He spits.