Work Text:
“You’re probably wondering how all this started…”
She actually said the cliche out loud. Even lit and started a cigarette; taking a long slow pull followed by a pregnant pause full of smoke laden lungs before exhaling in one big push out and away from herself…as if by doing so she could as easily distance herself from her actions. At the end of the cigarette, a vibrant ruby stain clung like a needy lover after each press of the filtered butt against her lips. Her makeup, so perfect earlier that night, was stained now by tears and cracked by her periodic sobbing that would eventually break into unstable laughter.
“I guess…” pause for cigarette inhale and exhale, “I mean…” pause for cigarette inhale and exhale, “Well, if I’m going to say it out loud the easiest way to put it is…” she paused again for another inhale from the cigarette before pushing herself off of the counter she’d been sitting on, fingers curling around the already bloody handle of the cleaver that she’d been sitting next to, smoke trailing out of her nostrils like a demon from my father’s constantly referenced Hell.
“I guess I’m just one of those kinds of lesbians.” a coquettish giggle was the only noise she made as she smirked and raised the cleaver above her head…above my head…oh god…!
BLOOD.
Blood…everywhere, coating the demon who stood above me wreathed in smoke and steeped in gore. All that blood… the blood of…my mind filled with static at the realization that it was the blood of myself and the others. Joseph, Beth, Martin…it hurt to think about them too much and so instead my thoughts instead focused into hatred and blame on the woman in front of me.
The woman who, pausing for a moment to fix her hair in the reflection of the gleaming steel of the cleaver, swung the heavy cleaver down…
Down, and she was giggling still in that coy and flirtatious way when we met, and down…
Down and I’m screaming and her laugh mingles and our voices are piercing each other to be heard over one another, as violent as the scene around us and down…
Down through the air and then the solid and abrupt stop on the table next to me. Next to my arm and so much gushing blood.
The pain reached my brain at the same time as the realization that the table she hit with the cleaver is in fact the table that is next to meohmygodthetablewhereI’mon…wheremyARMisfuckohfuckoh, where is my…my aaaaaaarrr...I’m back…the numbing sucking feeling of falling unconscious that ends back...back in the memory of when I met her, that fucking bitch from…
***
“...work invited me out to dinner? I mean, isn’t it a little bit weird?”
Beth just would not shut up about her newest romantic interest as they entered the bar and only paused to order a drink. Carol knew it wasn’t going to go anywhere, but also knew there wasn’t anything else to do except let Beth go until she was done. What was more pressing on Carol’s mind was having to wonder what sleaze would convince Joseph and Martin to go along with Beth’s plans...again. There was a limit to what even those horny idiots were willing to do for a promise of a threesome or, at the very least, seeing two girls make out.
Carol sighed internally as Beth continued rambling. Carol’s mom would describe Beth as one of those people having a ‘mighty peculiar but good heart’. Carol was beginning to wonder if perhaps she needed to talk with Beth, but just never had the time or even interest in such a difficult conversation with someone who really didn’t see a problem with her actions. Deep down, Carol knew the real truth was rather simple. Beth just made risky/dangerous decisions because Beth’s parents can and will always bail her out of any real trouble.
Which is why they find themselves here. A dive bar they are becoming regulars at most nights of the week, pre-gaming liquor before going over to visit Joseph and Martin and who will have them drink a lot of cheap beer together. Joseph and Martin were friends of Beth’s that Carol knew from the office vaguely. Carol worked in the back office while Beth, Joseph, and Martin worked in advertising together. Carol and Beth met in college and been best friends ever since, but Joseph and Martin joining their group had led to a very…uncomfortable dynamic.
Beth realized that sex could be exchanged for favors from the boys, as well as free things. Which meant Carol found herself roped (sometimes literally) into sexual trysts in exchange for what Beth wanted. Carol didn’t complain, mostly because deep down she wished it could have just been her and Beth sometimes…most times, really.
Carol shook her head at the thought…the mind that wanders down silly little rabbit holes, doesn’t it? She was a good straight girl and loved being used by two men. She didn’t find it degrading or spend most of her alone time crying in bed over it. She repeated the silent prayers her father and pastor had beaten into her time and again, the pain a dull cut that barely registered anymore.
‘No sirree…’ she thought as she ordered a Tokyo Tea at the bar. Thoughts of the boys potentially having a real fun night planned was already leaving Carol already feeling like she needed to shower.
‘Might as well start disinfecting my insides…’ Carol took another long sip from her drink after grabbing it off the bar, and then walked quietly along with Beth over to a small booth. Carol slid into the booth and made herself comfortable, ‘It’s likely we’ll be having more than one drink here…’
Once it was clear that Beth was only pausing to take a sip from her own drink, Carol began to scan the room and people watch. They had gone to their usual place along the way to the bus stop they needed to take, but it was unusually quiet for a weekend night. Only a few people standing at the bar, with sparse couples/friend groups sitting at various tables and booths.
Carol’s eye was immediately caught by a pair of women standing over at the pool table. One of the two wasn’t that unusual to see: black work boots, ripped up jeans, and a red and black flannel over a t-shirt that clung to her like a second skin. Carol giggled as she noticed the t-shirt under the flannel said ‘Come Visit Santa Carla Boardwalk!’ in kitschy 80s Lost Boys font. Her make-up was rather expertly done; subtle in ways that made it look like she wasn’t wearing much make-up but it complimented her style. Topping it off was bright red hair feathered out in a way that made her look like some lumberjack Farah Fawcett.
Carol quickly changed that from ‘lumberjack’ to ‘flannel lesbian’ when Carol saw her gently touch the arm of the other woman playing pool with her after making a shot. Carol knew deep in her innermost heart what sapphic flirting in public looked like. The gentle play of touch with the appearance of not touching was a dance that caused her heart to ache in a way she hadn’t thought of since…before her father found out.
She heard a song play that she hadn’t thought about since high school deep inside of her, she could almost hear it playing…WAIT. She was jarred out of her thoughts as she realized the song really was playing in the bar. She glanced over to the jukebox and saw Flannel Lesbian walking back over to the other woman at the pool table.
The other woman…looked extremely out of place. She was dressed like a pin-up model, the dress a striking red satin gown with matching bright red heels that added almost a good two inches to her height. Long, black hair fell in dark ringlets over bare shoulders and cascaded into generous cleavage. On her left breast was a tattoo of a broken heart bleeding and a single bright red rose tattoo was on her right breast. Dark red lipstick and deep black eye shadow juxtaposed against a pale face; her eyes glittered as they unexpectedly met Carol’s.
Carol’s blushed deeply as her breath caught then she looked over to Beth, who had a look of annoyance.
“Hey, Lezzie Carrie…you there?” Beth took a finishing sip of her drink then stood up with an icy glare. “Fuck, you’re such a fucking weirdo, I swear. I’m getting a refill.”
“I told you…” Carol started to yell but as Beth continued walking away she just muttered into her drink, “I told you to not call me that. I’m not a…”
“A lezzie?” a strange voice interrupted her. She choked on her drink to see Flannel Lesbian standing at the table above her; grinning like a Cheshire Cat. Sitting herself down at the table with a wry chuckle. “Hey, it’s fine. I get it, friends are…”
“Look, I’m sure you mean well but I’m not a lesbian. I’m not.” Carol interrupted Flannel Lesbian abruptly, saying the words by rote now and meaning it just as much now as she did when her mother, father, and pastor made her pray it again and again back in high school. “It’s a really poor taste inside joke, but she doesn’t mean offense or anything.” Flannel Lesbian laughed at that and smirked again in a way Carol was already finding endearing.
“Yeah, the completely straight girl thing of staring like you want to fuck me or my girlfriend over there on the pool table.” She slowly lifted the Rolling Rock that she had been holding over the side of the table by the neck and took a sip; smirking and chuckling the whole time. Carol blushed again and tried to play it off as outrage, while her heart fluttered in her chest.
“Well, my friend will be back soon with her drink, so you might want to move.” Carol smiled pleasantly and gestured for Flannel Lesbian to stand up. The infuriating woman instead just angled her head towards the bar, forcing Carol to turn and see that Beth was somehow having a hard time getting another drink. Unusual for Beth, to be honest, but it wasn’t that busy…Ohhhhh, it suddenly clicked when Carol saw a guy come out of the bathroom, join his friends at the bar, and Beth instantly started to chat him up. No help there…
“What about your girlfriend?” Carol glanced over to the pool table and was surprised to see the glamorous vamp was chatting with several men and women. Carol felt a shiver as she realized that despite having a conversation across the room, the woman was still staring directly at her every time she looked. It was clear it wasn’t constant but yet it felt like she was reading Carol’s mind to know when to look. Flannel Lesbian grinned and leaned over the table, one finger brushing the air next to Carol’s hand holding her drink on the table. Almost touching, but not.
“Oh, don’t worry about Elise. I guess you could say were a bit...open. But I saw you and thought…well, you look like a girl that I’d like to flirt with after putting a song on the jukebox for her.” Carol blushed and felt butterflies in her stomach as she pulled her drink up to her lips…her hand up and away from Flannel Lesbian’s. She locked eyes with the alluring woman sitting opposite and, after a faint pause, sipped her drink and asked a quiet question around the rim of her glass.
“But how did you know to put on this song?”
“What? Iris by Goo Goo Dolls? Cause it’s a fun reference to a Nic Cage and Meg Ryan romance movie adapta…”
“Yeah, yeah...but also the song that was playing the only time I ever kissed a girl?” Carol put her glass back down, the ice clinking gently as it settled. She settled the glass back in the same place without looking and Carol held her breath as she realized her finger touched the other’s as she did.
Neither moved and the moment melted into forever…and then Flannel Lesbian winked and got up from the table and the contact was broken.
“Maybe I read your mind, Carol.” she winked, “I’d love to stay and flirt more but a girl’s gotta do some work. Pleasure meeting you, my name is Max.” with that she walked away, blowing a kiss across the bar to Elise on her way out the door. Carol was flustered but before she could compose herself suddenly Beth was back with two fresh drinks and several men in tow and seating herself where Max had been a moment ago.
“Oh my gawd, Carol, was she bothering you?” Beth looked like a cat with the canary, clearly debating if she should make some stupid comment in front of the guys.
“No, she…well, a little yeah. Weirdo lesbians, you know? But you seemed preoccupied so I had to entertain myself. Besides, haven’t you seen her girlfriend over there?” Carol said with a slight nod towards the now alone Elise who was smoking a cigarette and playing pool.
“I knew it! Gawd, I cannot staaand how you seem to always attract such…” Beth paused. And Carol could tell Beth wanted to say a slur of some kind but finally settled on, “colorful people.” Beth’s humor had the guys laughing pretty hard and pretty forced. Carol just rolled her eyes as she took her replacement drink and let Beth entertain her new adoring fans.
At the pool table, Carol’s attention was caught as Elise grabbed her fur coat and small hand bag to leave. Instead of leaving though, she slowly walked towards their table. Carol felt an unexplainable feeling of fear…a reflexive ancient response of what it must have felt like to be a small mammal at the watering hole as a significantly larger and sharper toothed predator sidled next to you to drink.
Whatever Elise’s intention, she was stopped midway by a very drunk man who decided now was the time to shoot his shot. Elise laughed in his face, loud and brash, and Carol simply tucked the feeling away as the natural panic she felt anytime a lesbian talked to her in public.
“Darling, I despise men. Especially drunk men who dare to speak to me.” Elise’s tone was mocking, her accent heavily French. She paused to adjust her hair then moved past him. Carol winced, having been there many times herself. She wasn’t at all surprised as the man moved to block her path and plead that Elise really should give him a chance.
“Besides, why don’t you let a real man show you what you’ve been missing.” he was slurring out as he tried to put a hand on the small of her back. Carol hated when men did that, and clearly Elise didn’t like it any more then Carol.
“Silly boy, my girlfriend’s cock is very large and pleasurable. I highly doubt your little…thing…would be worth my time.” Elise laughed and tried to slide away from the man’s grip.
“Hey, fuck you, dyke!” the man yelled as he pulled Elise closer in; his hands grabbing at her...violent and possessive. Elise barely noticed his efforts and just practically swooned into his arms. Her words as she spoke though did not match the warm and willing response her body was giving, but the drunk guy clearly didn’t notice. Carol did.
“My but you are very unpleasant. And I hate when men touch me, especially when I’ve told them not to.” suddenly the Elise locked eyes with Carol and winked, “Besides…I need to make a small addendum to my dinner plans. It looks like one of the dessert items is suddenly off the menu tonight. Come, let’s go take a walk. I have places to be and I’m hungry.” and with that she was guiding him to the door and again Carol thought it odd that no one else seemed to have noticed any of what just happened. Odd that Elise was practically speaking to Carol at the end and no one at all noticed that. Beth’s confused voice seemed to indicate that everyone else was finding Carol’s reaction much more concerning.
“Carol? Carol? Are you okay?” Are you…”
***
“...okay?” Max’s voice breaks me out of what felt like someone else’s memories as a sadistic voice cooed out in a sing song mockery of Beth’s own cries earlier, “Carol? Are you okay, Carol?” another laugh and pause for another drag on her cigarette.
“Sorry, you where kind of somewhere else for a minute and I needed you back here. You wanted to know why, after all. Oh shit…” Max was fumbling...reaching… Things were getting blacker and softer…muted almost…
“Yeah, little too much bleeding out sweetie, you’re going to go unconscious again. Well, we’ll continue the story after you wake up. We’ve got all night…”
***
“...after all and I don’t see any reason to go home because you thought you saw a creepy lady at the bar.” Beth was still not listening to Carol as they walked the last few blocks over to the boys apartment. Carol had wanted to immediately get out of the bar after that weird interaction with Elise and the drunk asshole. Beth had agreed it was weird, but insisted that Joe and Martin had promised something really fun tonight. They’d gotten on the bus and gotten off at their usual stop, and now were walking the last several blocks on foot along the well-lit sidewalk at night.
“I mean, for what it’s worth, I think it’s worth saying that this!” Beth spun and gestured around them at the brightly lit block of apartments, condos, and open windows with people partying. “THIS? Is not exactly a dangerous place to be.” Carol was about to say something when they both saw at the same time that down one of the alleys that functioned as parking for one of the apartment buildings was that woman from the bar, Elise.
It looked like she was making out pretty heavily with the man from the bar. Carol quietly wanted to keep walking but of course Beth stopped to watch. Whether Elise realized it or not, she slid to her knees in the dirt and oil of the alley in her satin dress and unzipped the man’s jeans, pulling his admittedly fairly impressively sized cock out of his pants. Elise licked along the shaft of it, then lightly kissed the tip.
She took his length in one fluid motion, her soft lips hitting the base of his shaft and he was moaning loudly and his head rocked back in ecstasy at the sensation. Carol grabbed at Beth to keep moving and again Elise suddenly and intensely locked eyes with Carol. With a lascivious grin, she slid her lips up along the man’s cock, pausing at the tip as she kissed it again so gently before deep throating him again and he was screaming now in pleasure and what sounded like sudden clima...
Oh.
Oh no, not climax at all Carol realized as blood spurted all over the asphalt and Elise’s exposed chest and face as she smiled. She then swallowed his severed cock with a light burp and a laugh.
“Oh, I love a good facial…” she said before latching her mouth back onto the dying man’s bleeding wound and drinking greedily from it before he slumped limply against the alley wall and onto the ground. Elise stood up from her knees and gently brushed off some stray gravel and pebbles.
“Bigots just really do taste better, you know?”
Carol and Beth immediately backed away from Elise, an unsettling dread settled on them. The taller woman smiled at both then casually lit a cigarette between two perfectly manicured, blood soaked nails. She took a luxurious drag from it, flicked the barely smoked cigarette away, and sighed with a bored look at the two girls frozen in fear before her.
“It really is more fun, more... delicious if you run, sweetlings.” Neither needed to be told twice, immediately running down the street in the direction of their friends apartment and safety from whoever...whatever that lady was. Her husky laughter, languid and cruel, filled the night air as she sank into shadow and out of sight.
It didn’t take them long to arrive at the doorway of Joseph and Martin. They frantically pounded on the door and rang the bell, the door swiftly opened to reveal a pleasantly lit living room and the silhouette of Joseph with a confused look on his face. He began to ask for an explanation, but neither gave him time. Once shoved past Joseph and inside, Carol was thought to close the door behind them while Beth just fell sobbing to the floor of the living room. Carol was trying to explain to Joseph, but Beth was babbling incoherently to a perplexed Martin. Martin, who had jumped up from his seat on the couch.
His seat on the couch was next to a woman Beth clearly didn’t recognize. Carol glanced over and then couldn’t stop laughing when she noticed that the stranger on the couch was none other than Flannel Lesbian.
Martin, not understanding, grabbed Beth and took her to the couch while Joseph helped Carol up from the ground and whispered to her, “Sorry, yeah, I tried to call you guys before you left…Martin brought some chick from the bus over tonight. I think her name is Maxine? I think she said she goes by Max.”
Carol nodded curtly and looked over at Max. “Funny that…we met ourselves a stranger as well on the way from the bar. Though she was much…more intimidating.” the boys raised their eyebrows at that, but it was clear they were a little too buzzed already to notice. Beth was chugging a bottle of beer herself, her face a mess of sweat and make-up. Carol mentally laughed that it was the first time Beth looked like that upon arrival at Joe and Martin’s. Carol tried to look at Max without staring so when Joseph held out a beer, she reflexively took it, while pulling Joseph close enough to whisper, still keeping her back against the now closed front door.
“Who is this Max chick then?” she asked while Joseph began explaining. It was hard to pay attention though because just as she asked she realized that Max was staring directly at her. She made eye contact with Carol and slowly a wide smile spread across her otherwise still face. The smile was devoid of warmth or joy. It was the smile of a predator looking at prey and realizing it was a small and trapped fluttering thing. And at any moment she could just…
***
SNAP.
Another bone cracked as Elise fed on…what had her name been? Max always had a hard time remembering their names. Oh, at first that had been guilt and…well, some way to preserve what she laughably had thought was sanity at the time. But now? They all just blur together after a point. And it had been…at least twenty years now by her count. Jesus, I’m getting old. Well, except for the whole vampire thing, she thought with a barely stable giggle.
A wide splash of blood appeared on the wall and Max rolled her eyes in annoyance and hurriedly put out her cigarette in the severed hand on of the woman she’d been butchering and stormed into the blood soaked living room with exasperation in her voice.
“Elise, come on man, I’ve got to clean that shit up…Oh there you go all growling like a demon at me! I’ve got enough to do prepping and putting your leftovers in tupperware!”
Tupperware? Tupper…where? Where…
***
“Wherever did you meet…Max, was it?” Beth was being her usual oblivious self. The danger seemed past, so she was quick to lean back on social niceties. Something she prided herself on, after all. Max turned her eyes from Carol and gave Beth the same cold, sharp smile.
“Funny you should ask, Carol just asked me that herself.” Joseph gave a patronizing chuckle as he spoke. The others braced themselves for one of Joseph’s long-winded explanations, but Max cut him off.
“I tricked them into thinking they were gonna fuck me.” was the much blunter and direct response, clearly one that neither Joseph or Martin had expected. Max rolled her eyes then stood up from the couch in a languid motion that hinted at a dancer's grace. She was suddenly moving towards Carol…no, Carol realized at the last second, not herself but towards the door!
Carol tried to lung to stop her but wasn’t fast enough to keep Max’s hand from settling on the door knob first. Carol and Max locked eyes and, for a moment, Carol realizes just how truly fucked they are. Max’s eyes and expression betrayed an utterly alien mind, devoid of warmth or empathy towards any of the people in the room besides herself. Sheer amusement replaced it though as Carol realized that Max’s hand should be warmer…a person’s hand should be warmer, but it was as cold as whatever motivated the…
Oh my, now that they were closer Carol realized just how much more thick and tall Max was from herself. Max smiled her wolf’s smile and turned the knob. Carol did her best to try to stop her but Max easily used her own size and momentum to slam the door wide open.
“Elise, my mistress, you are free to enter, my lo…” was about as far as she got before Joseph ran up and tackled Max off both the door and Carol. Carol slammed the door shut again, breathing heavily as she watched in silent terror as Max and Joseph wrestled to get on top of each other. Joseph was an athletic man, Carol knew he played on the company softball team and was one of the better players. And yet as they writhed together on the floor, legs entwined like violent lovers, it was clear Max was toying with him.
He still managed to flip her onto her back and get on top of her, straddling her legs while his hands slithered for her throat. He had a sadistic grin to his face that Carol admitted disturbed her more than the openly turned on reaction that Max had to being choked. She smiled lewdly and let out a sexual moan as Joseph’s grip tightened. Martin was laughing and encouraging Joseph to do worse while Beth opened her mouth to say something but just gave a desperate whisper for Joseph to stop.
He didn’t.
Max’s eyes rolled back in her head and her hips bucked, throwing Joseph over her head. He landed with a loud thud on the carpeted floor, groaning in shocked rage and pain as Max lazily got up onto her feet again, not even breathing heavily. Joseph got up slower, scanning the room for any sign of a weapon or tool to use to help fight against a seemingly superhumanly strong woman.
Max gave a grin as both of their eyes landed on the baseball bat handle sticking out of a sports duffel by the doorway. She grinned and mouthed at him “Do it…” as she moved away from the bag. Carol let out a low moan of fear as Joseph lunged towards the bag and pulled the baseball bat out of the bag, gripping the tape wrapped handle with practiced ease.
Max stood back with her arms wide and smiled wide. “You’re gonna want to make it count, buddy. I’m pretty resilient…”
Joseph stepped forward, swinging the bat at her midsection. Max lunged to the side, the bat swinging through bare air. Joseph spun into the swing, used his inertia to swing back and hit one of her legs out from under her. She easily hopped over it, laughing and mocking the whole time.
He faked a swing to her shoulder, but then changed the angle to aim for her head. With the sound like a home-run hit, Max leaned into his swing with a smile, and the baseball bat connected with Max’s neck, snapping it like a twig. It reminded Carol of the wet snapping sound of wet twigs in the woods. With her back against the door, Carol’s chest heaved with sobbing gasps for air, trying to get enough in her to say something coherent.
She finally managed to scream out Joseph’s name but her eyes were unable to look away from the corpse at her feet. Max’s head sat at a forty-five degree angle at the neck, her spinal bones protruding obscenely against her pale dead flesh.
Joseph let the bat fall from his hands with a loud clatter on the tiled entryway floor. He clutched his head in his hands and stammered out, “I…I didn’t mean to swing that hard, I wasn’t…wasn’t trying to kill her…”
Beth wouldn’t stop screaming, Carol was starting to worry that if Beth kept screaming then she would start screaming hysterically as well. Martin was frozen in shock, neither screaming or calm, his face a rictus of uncontrolled terror at the sight of a dead body. Beth just would not stop screaming but before Carol could yell at her to shut up, someone else said it for her.
“Jesus Christ shut her up!” was specifically what Max yelled before everyone started screaming hysterically along with Beth. Max stood up from the ground, grabbed her dangling head with her hands after searching a bit, and then snapped her head back on straight with a slight grunting noise of discomfort.
“Oh God, now you're all gonna scream? Jesus, I'd let Elise kill you all first before I got up but your friend is really shrill.” Max lit up a cigarette and effortlessly kicked the bat out of Joseph's reach with a cruel laugh. “Nice try, but looks like you just couldn't seal the deal, bro.”
Carol was frozen, she couldn't understand what was happening or how. Joseph stepped between Max and the others, holding up his fists.
“I don't know what the fuck is going on, but fuck off, bitch.” his usual bravado was on full display but this…this was something his machismo couldn’t rescue them from. They were already all dead. With the realization of this, Carol was only able to let out a mewling, crying sort of sound.
“You weren't so quick to ask me to leave earlier. You and Martin were practically begging me for a threesome real quick before the girls got here. Now you're just being rude to a gal.”
Joseph lunged at Max, swinging his fist into a punch that dropped guys twice his size. Max's torso twisted unnaturally fast to the side as she gave Joseph a playful slap on his ass and a kiss on his cheek. His face darkened in embarrassment at the sound of Martin letting out a high pitched and uncontrolled laugh. It even got Beth to stop screaming for a moment, like a tea kettle that’s finally been left to boil too long and is empty.
“Finally!” Max let out a sigh of relief. “Surprised…” again her words were cut off by Joseph hitting her in the back of the head. She fell to a knee with a grunt, but didn’t fall completely over this time.
“Owwww!” She said, getting up and rubbing the back of her head. “Owww!”
Carol could see that Joseph was about to lose his temper. Max was taunting them, sarcastic and cold. The mockery reached a head, and Joseph ran his mouth off as he swung his fists.
“Fuck you, you trap tranny whore! We paid for your time and you had to…”
A lot happened the moment the slurs left his mouth.
Max’s smile fell; Joseph had found a way to hurt the woman more then knocking her head almost off her body.
The door slammed open and, with a loud crack, the lights went out then flickered weakly back on.
The reason Joseph fell silent was instantly visible in the dim renewed light; he no longer had a throat, a bloody gash gushing blood was all that was left of his throat and lower jaw.
Elise, beautiful and terrifying in her flawless make-up, jewelry, and dress, now stood between Joseph and Max, a hand lazily extended out, stained in blood and gore. Joseph's tongue was held between two perfectly manicured nails that had sharpened into vicious talons.
“Oooohhhhh, cat got your tongue, you naughty boy. Shouldn't have said such a vile thing.”
It’s amazing how slow and yet how fast things can happen.
In the moment? In the actual fifteen or twenty minutes preceding when Max let Elise into the house…those moments in Carol’s flickering and fading memory seemed to stretch an almost sort of lifetime. Yet in the hours following Elise entering the house and they all began to be…to be…well, that time seems to just have been a blip in time. A mere few second since she saw Joseph’s throat get ripped right out of his body.
How could Max already be in Carol’s arms, kissing her while sticking the syringe into her neck. Carol felt everything getting so so numb and she was falling…falling out of Max’s strong and (careful) controlling arms and onto the floor, her eyes stuck open as her mind screamed. Her throat was frozen in a gurgle of inarticulate confusion and terror.
Finally her eyelid fell, uncontrollably flicking across her ocular membrane and released just as fast and despite all desperate efforts to keep her eyes shut, they blinked open again in time to see Max suddenly next to Beth, holding a sharp looking razor blade…you know, the kind you saw Sweeney Todd using in that ridiculous musical…but it was real and wet ribbons of blood shot out from Beth’s stupid, vapid, vain throat. Wet, bubbling screams tried to well up, but she was gasping in more blood than air so none of it mattered as her corpse finally stopped receiving the last reflexive muscle spasms that made up Bethany, her best friend since college.
Carol sobbed internally while numb tears streamed from her staring eyes as Elise suddenly was at Beth’s side. Elise looked at Max and smiled, gently caressing the other woman’s face before kissing her gently on the forehead, leaving a bloody kiss mark, like Carol used to do when Beth and her were girls and practicing make up together and oh god…
“Good pet. Though I would have preferred to drink her fresh, she was the loudest and most annoying.” Elise spoke with a weird cadence devoid of accent, yet almost remarkable in her lack of accent. There was something French, but also Irish to her voice, but Carol didn’t really care, she just wanted to go home and wake up and it was all a nightmare.
“Now,” Elise was straddling Beth and reaching down between her dead best friend’s legs to undo the already ridiculously skimpy underwear. “I will take some pleasure in feeding on this butterfly. Especially in front of your new…” Elise glanced at Carol and winked lasciviously at the paralyzed woman, “companion for the night. A good choice. A good treat for my Dog.”
At the term ‘dog’, Max dropped to her knees at Elise’s feet; gazing up at her with adoration and obedience. Her eyes glowed with a feral light, and Carol saw Max’s nose and mouth crack and reform into a wolfish muzzle, her teeth sharpened almost to fangs but still as wide as a persons. Her ears got pointed and the hair on Max’s forearms grew coarser and darker.
‘All that and the bitch’s make up is still flawless. Even her hair…is perfect.’ Carol helplessly thought as she felt her mind starting to fracture away from what most people comfortably consider sanity. Max winked at her and Carol was suddenly thankful that whatever froze her muscles didn’t allow her to blush in response.
Elise held out the hand with Joseph’s still bleeding tongue over Max’s face; a few drops of blood spattering over Max’s eagerly upturned face. Elise brought the tongue down in a sweeping motion, rubbing it lewdly between Beth’s thighs and against Beth’s bare and very dead crotch. She then brought it back up and held it up over Max’s eager face.
“You did earn this one, so it’s yours. But there is another player on the board and…I…think…he’s…a…runner…” she slowly enunciated each word before dropping the obscene remnants of her two dead friends into Max’s open mouth. As Max greedily devoured her treat, Elise snapped her fingers and Max stood up from her knees with a languid motion. If she could have, Carol would have gasped in shock to see the other already bigger woman standing almost a foot taller now.
“Fetch, Dog.”
Max gave Carol one more wink, then tugged at the visibly hard bulge at the crotch of her tight jeans before skipping out of the room and singing out, “Burning the ground, I break from the crowd… I’m on the hunt I’m after you. I smell like I sound, I’m lost and I’m found and I’m…HUUUUUUUUUuuuuUUUUNGRY LIKE THE WOOOOOoooooOOOOOLLLLLLFFFFF” she howled into the dark house after Martin. Martin, the asshole who had run immediately out of the room the second that Joseph was killed.
As Elise began to feed on Beth, Carol tried to close her eyes. She didn’t want to see…she didn’t want to seeeeeeee…
SHE DIDN’T WANT TO SEEEEEEEEEEE
DIDN’T WANT
SHE DIDN’T WANT
WANT TO SEEE
‘What did you see Carol, what did you see through those eyes of yours, my love my darling new friend. Maybe I keep you? Maybe you can by a helper? Give me a hand? You already gave me two of yours, why not more? Forever?’
Carol didn’t know where that came from, but it was better than seeing Elise finger fuck the corpse of her dead best friend while drinking all the blood from her. Better then remembering or realizing just how much Elise enjoyed it and better then trying to figure out which pleasured Elise more; her own ghoulish acts or Carol’s unwilling witnessing of them all?
It was a blessing when she found herself able to close her eyes, and she closed them and didn’t think or listen to the sounds of diabolic pleasure coming from Elise.
I kept my eyes closed and wished that maybe…maybe if I just opened my eyes it would have been some nightmare between blinks and opening my eyes would reveal the room right as it should be and not covered in blood…my own blood. I didn’t need to worry about that because it was all a dream and maybe this time if I opened my eyes I wouldn’t see the gore and viscera pooling beneath her body.
I let out a helpless sob, as I fail and open my eyes, much like I had every minute for the last hour, and saw instead that the dream was normalcy and reality was the abattoir. I see the tourniquet on the stump of my arm, and can’t stop sobbing over and over, getting louder now as panic sets in. I became deathly silent thought the moment I realize I’m not alone anymore.
Max entered the room with a wild grin and sighed. Rubbing some gore off of her hand on a dish towel, she lit up another cigarette.
“Oh, you’re awake! I’m really glad, I was worried I hadn’t tied you off fast enough.” Max walked across the kitchen to where a stack of coolers were that contained various tupperware of…oh...oh god…
”Oh, yeah…I mean, Elise is a big gal, but even she can’t eat all four of you in one go.” Max said with a chuckle as she saw the horror on my face. She laughed uncontrollably a moment before muttering in a hushed voice, “I bet she could at that…though she’d feel like shit after and be an absolute baby about it.”
Max pulled out a cleaver and slammed a leg down on the countertop, about eye level with where I was lying on the kitchen table. As she began butchering my own leg in front of me, Max began to talk and I couldn’t do anything but listen to the sound of her voice with any pauses filled with a disturbing wet slurping, chewing sound that came from the other room.
***
The Incredibly True and Awesome Story of Max
A Narration
I met Elise about few decades ago. I was born in the 70s, if you can dig it. My mom dipped out and left me in rural southern California. I grew up in the desert near the ocean and saw a lot of weirdness just growing up in the city of Angels herself.
My father remarried when I was a kid and we moved to Beverly Hills. My step mother was…well, I would say she's a bitch but that's too kind. She hated me, and hated my effeminate mannerisms.
She threatened to out me as a fag once when i was a teen, but i laughed in her face and screamed i was a transsexual diva not some faggot.
My father didn't see the humor in my response either. I'll never forget what they did to me next…
***
Max paused and absent mindedly touched a blood soaked hand to her long, beautiful hair.
***
I woke up one night and my dad's friend was pinning me to the bed. He had me in a choke hold and no matter how hard I struggled… I was a teen and he was a man.
My dad came in with a set of electric razors and turned them on with an ominous snap.
“I…indulged your effeminate bullshit cause it reminded me of your mother. But this…this is too far and I'm putting a stop to this. Starting with with fagotty hair style. You ain't no hippy, and your step-mother says you ain't no fag.
Well, I say you ain't no woman, so you are getting a proper man's hair cut.”
I tried to break free, but my dad's friend slugged me in the temple. Things went dark and blurry... I woke up to the sound of a razor and my hair…my beautiful hair was…
He had buzzed it… completely off. Had barely left any stubble. He whipped me with his belt and swore if I wore it long ever again he'd ship me off to the marines and let them deal with me.
I often think I should have killed them all that night. I like to pretend I waited and then snuck into the kitchen when they were asleep, grabbed a kitchen knife, and stabbed them like Micheal Meyers. Or grabbed my dad's gun and just shot them all. I’d like to to say all kinds of things, but I was just a scared child who knew that home wasn’t safe and never would be again.
I ran. I was 11. I lived on the streets and mostly disappeared from the Hills and down into the valley. I sold myself; many times. Lots of different ways for a teen in Hollywood to make a buck in the 80s, let me tell you. A blur of guys I blew for enough cash for bus fare to get to other guys who wanted to fuck me for enough cash to get someplace to stay for a night or possibly longer.
One client, a church pastor of all people, offered to put me up in an apartment in exchange for discretion and exclusivity. I was 16 by this point and the AIDS genocide by Reagan was at its height. Queer civilian friends and “co-workers” were dropping dead from what at first they’d been calling Gay Cancer, which then became GRID, and finally became AIDS.
It took them four deadly years of “research” to whittle down the causes of AIDS. Cases began when I was like 11 which was…oh fuck, 1981. It started in LA, ya know? Us and San Francisco, and let me tell you…in the beginning there was just fear. Fear over anything queer…that’s what it boiled down to.
By the next year, only five hundred people had died from this strange disease with a lot of unknowables but one thing...well, one thing was knowable. It seemed to be degenerates who practiced the disgusting practice of sodomy, also known as homosexuals, also known as fags, or faggots if you were fancier, queers, homos, fairies, fruits, queens, poofs, sissies…gay men, if you will. Or at least those with some connection to gay men.
Do you ever even think about the faceless number of people who died of AIDS that no one ever gave a fuck about? I will whisper to myself the names of my friends who were murdered every night until the day I die. We all didn’t know what was going on at the time. I…made the choices I made with Elise in part because…yeah, she saved me from dying in the gutter. But really, deep down…well, immortality means I can memorialize my friends who died in the streets of LA that no one ever will know. I’ll etch their names on a fucking rock before the heat death of the universe if I have to, but any new universe that comes next will at least know their names better then the names of the butchers who killed them all or the patronizing celebrities who deigned to touch us.
So I was 16 and terrified and I say yes to this friendly pastor who smiles real wide when he sees me in my dresses or lingerie. Smiled real wide the whole time...until he had me trapped and then it was all about “converting me back to the Lord”. He did a lot of things at first that bothered me but again I was safe and off the streets so I could handle wearing boy clothes when he came by and take the beatings he doled out if he caught me wearing my girl clothes when he would come by for surprise visits.
It wasn’t until he went too far that I snapped.
HE CUT MY HAIR.
Fucker.
Pig fucker.
So I gutted him; like I should have with my father. I stabbed him over and over and over until I couldn’t see his stupid, smiling face anymore. His wife came by to check on him when he hadn’t come home; screaming when she found me covered in stale, dried blood and wearing my girl clothes with the knife still sticking out of his face.
The church didn’t really know what to do with me. There was too much evidence of the Pastor leaving holy water in my back door to have the cops believe that I wasn’t a victim of some sort here. Not that it would have mattered, but I managed to get off with simply being bathed and set free to the streets with a wadded and stained ten dollar bill and a pair of jeans, a boys t-shirt, and an oversized men’s hoodie.
Something in that moment broke me. I admit that a therapist likely would say something broke inside me long before that, but at that time for me I felt the sanity snapping in a way that couldn’t be recovered. I’d killed someone and gotten away with it. The greater implications didn’t really make sense to young 16 year old me. I was too scared to resume street sex work, and puberty was making it harder and harder to ignore that there was no amount of anal violations that would magically forstall time. It was an easy decision to give up and just die.
I didn’t die though. Life clung to me like a lover who stays too long; you can feel your love for them slipping away the longer they stick with you. Depression is a bitch, as they say. So, depressed and cold, huddled in an alley eating trash is when my Mistress found me.
I was wearing clothes I’d found at a food pantry and eating whatever garbage I’d managed to scrounge out of the alley trash can. You’d honestly be amazed at what people in LA throw out. Elise, to me…well, she was a goddess.
Wearing fishnets and black platform boots that buckled up to her calves, she looked down on me. Her skirt was scandalously short, with bright pink panties easily viewable from where I sat on the ground. She was wearing a tight fitting black t-shirt with a denim vest over it. The vest was adorned with a variety of band patches as well as patches that said a variety of things from “Eat The Rich” to “Peg All Assholes”. Her face was pale, almost porcelain white, which went well with her trad goth make-up. Black lipstick, black eye liner with dramatic wings behind round, red-tinted sunglasses. Her hair was wild and clearly styled to be unkempt, reminding me of Robert Smith.
“Well, a pretty little girl like you doesn't deserve to eat trash. She deserves to eat royalty.”
I felt grubby and much too much a man to even say anything. I kept silent knowing that my voice would give me away and she wouldn’t want to speak to me any further. She just looked at me and extended a leather gloved hand to me.
“Come with me, and we’ll eat the rich together.”
...Well… talk about romancing a girl.
She turned me that night and I welcomed the choice. I finally didn’t have to take anyone’s bullshit anymore and Carol, let me tell you. The rich? The rich really are delicious.
Between now and then, well, Elise and I have just been wreaking havoc for a decade or so now. Leaving a string of untraceable murders all over the place. You’d be amazed at how many people can die and no one really picks up on the pattern. Or those that do pick up on it are rarely listened to.
Speaking of, you might be wondering why I tied you to this table and took your hand. And leg. If I’m being honest, and... well... at this point in our relationship I see little point in dishonesty. Truth be told, it is extremely boring to do put leftovers away alone. I used to listen to music but then I lost my ipod and haven’t really had the time to buy a replacement. This was my way of asking you to lend me a hand. Get it?
So you’re basically my ipod replacement. That’s not true or fair, you mean much more to me then an ipod ever did. But hey, enough about me, what about you Carol? Oh, no no no, don’t try to talk, you aren’t really strong enough for that yet. I’m just in your mind, so why don’t you just think about it?
‘Like this?’ I think as Max narrated her words and actions to me. There was a moment of dissonance and then they were synced and I began to think about my own past…
The Depressingly Real Life Story of Carol
By Carol
I was born in a suburban neighborhood…my mom and dad were alright. I mean…they loved me. I know they do because they told me that all my life while beating me and slut shaming me. It’s not my fault a teacher groped me in junior high, but they made sure I knew it was my fault. Really.
According to my dad “good christian girls don’t tempt nice godly men”. He didn’t like it when I told him that I had no interest in men so I wasn’t trying to tempt them. He beat me pretty regularly after that if he caught a hint of queerness.
I tried to date men but I…well, I just never clicked with anyone. I guess… since you mentioned honesty Max… I didn’t try all that hard. I have never felt safe with any men in the room since I was a kid and the pastor at my church tried to have a talk with me about “godliness and purity”. A talk I told my parents about, who refused to believe me and insisted I misunderstood.
Men are predators…in my experience. They are like sharks. Big, dumb, brainless sharks. 90% of the time? Oh, they are just floating in the ocean of male privilege they exist in, unaware and blissfully ignorant of the fact that of course you don’t have any fears, you are an apex predator in a hunting ground your grandfathers built for you to play in.
And just in a snap, they go from big fleshy floating blob to teeth and bones and blood and groping and serration and penetration and blood and screaming and pain and so so much pain…
Honestly? I hated Beth. I hated Jonathan. And I hated Martin. I hate all my friends, but they’re the only ones I get. So I listen...listened to Beth’s bullshit. I turned a blind ear and eye to Jonathan’s slurs and transphobic insults. And I let Martin fuck me whenever he got too drunk and Beth had ditched me for some random drunk asshole.
But I never felt I belonged. I never felt safe. I never felt…alive. So if you’ve kept me alive to just hang out and be entertainment…fucking kill me now so I can at least be done with this. Cause to me, you’re just another shark. A different kind, a womanly kind…but still a shark.
***
Max looked up from her work, her eyes meeting Carol’s gaze and holding it. Carol’s breath held in her throat as she saw genuine emotion in Max’s eyes, and not for the first time that night.
“Fuck me…well... you’re right.” she sniffled a little and wiped a tear from her eye. “When you’re right, you are right, and Carol…you are right. This was unfair of me.” she paused for a moment and seemed lost in thought for a moment.
“See, you were meant to be part of the meal originally, but then...well, we met in the bar. And I liked you Carol. I knew in the bar that I wanted to offer you more...I wanted more with you.” Carol was starting to feel faint again when Max spoke again, barely a whisper. “I’m sorry I called you an ipod...that was...a lie I needed to tell myself because I didn’t really dare think you were…” the beautiful ghoul paused another time and I’m having such a hard time hearing her alluring whispered words...
“What if I offered you the chance to be a shark yourself, Carol? No, no… more than a shark. A goddess with me and Elise. You don’t have to suffer men groping you…suffer the faceless, incessant, greedy hands that grasp while you just try to ride the bus. No longer hide who you love? What if you could be free to join me and Elise? I’m sorry about the hand…a few drops of Elise’s blood and you’ll be right as rain.”
I blink, slowly, my mind swimming with the sight of Max holding my severed hand with a yearning that I knew only too well myself. Max smiled and giggled coquettishly at my hesitance. I mean... there’s a million good reasons to say no, but... I can’t deny some very good reasons to say ye…say what exactly?
Yes? Say yes to a lifetime-no, more than a lifetime…an eternity of blood and carnage? Max was smiling at me in a maddeningly attractive way…a way that promised safety but staining my soul with the blood of inno…
Well…
Hold on now. It wouldn’t exactly be the blood of the innocent. And since everyone is being honest with each other tonight, I have to admit I don’t really believe in God, at least…not the way that it was presented by my families version of christianity, at least.
Max stepped closer and cradled my tear and blood stained cheek with her hand. It was so cold, so cold, and yet, I can’t deny it, also so soft and tender. I lean my blood streaked cheek against the cold firmness of Max’s palm, and it feels so good on my feverish face. With unnatural poise and grace, Max vaulted up onto the table, straddling my waist. I bite my lower lip, feeling myself getting wet at just how hard I felt Max’s girl cock getting, even through her jeans.
Max’s face fills my vision, and I feel faint. My vision blurs; stars exploding within the dark galaxies I saw within Max’s eyes. Bright...red (blood) stained lips moving forward and pausing right before touching my own willing and slightly parted mouth. I could barely move but wasn’t able to stop my bodies weak attempts to grind my hips against Max’s…imperceptible likely to most but Max pressed her legs down on my thighs, stilling my attempts.
“Shhhhh…there will be time for that later, love. But first…you must drink and then you can choose to be with me and we can be together…forever…” Max’s voice was my last tether to consciousness, I can feel the fetid heat of Max’s carnivore breath on my face and it felt good. All of it felt good…from Max’s turgid member pressed against my belly to the idea of finally showing men that they don’t get to just float blindly in privilege forever to Max’s lips tenderly kissing my neck...all of it was good.
Blood/Pain/Penetration…oh God how those sensations had always been connected to self loathing or disgust for so many years, and now…now it was a blissful feeling that I hoped would never end. Max’s cold strength draining all of me. Soon, there was almost no blood in me and Max is on fire on top of me. Max shifts and her cock presses throbbing into me and I’m wetter and a moment closer to orgasm as Max sits up over me.
Max winks and slides one of her long, sharp finger nails across her wrist and blood began to seep from the wound. I giggled to notice that it didn’t flow or gush…it was like a gel almost; so dark and thick. Max slowly extends her wrist... I’m ready, eagerly opening my mouth to greedily drink Max’s blood.
Max let out a gasp of pleasure as she started grinding herself against me as well. I suck for a good moment; letting out a loud popping gasp as my lips separate from Max’s wrist, my lungs still insisting on air being necessary. Max grinned and carelessly rips her shirt off. Her breasts stood large and firm on her chest, a small patch of downy hair nestled in her cleavage.
There were a lot of tattoos over Max’s torso and arms, and two very clear implant surgery scars as well, but I only watched with breathless excitement as Max leaned back to cut a small incision below her right nipple. I’m straining to get as far off the table as the restraints allow but I couldn’t get even close to Max. My still weak strength forces my body to limply slump back onto the table, whimpering in desperate desire while Max grinned, leaning over me and I feel little drops falling on my face.
My lips eagerly latch onto Max’s breast, and she let out a cry now of pleasure...now of pain...back and forth between the sensations as I suckled like a newborn babe. Max held my head against her chest and I’m moaning as the sensations grows and blooms within both of us… I can feel us feeling together somehow... I let out a whimpering moan of climax, and she finally let’s me go. My limp form falls against the table; I lie whimpering and twitching in orgasm as Max presses herself against me.
“Carol, love…do you accept my gift? Will you join me in an undead eternity of killing those who deserve it? Hunting the strong and breaking their will? Will you be mine forever?”
\In that moment, the steady tether of Max’s voice finally started to fray and snap and in a sudden burst with the last of my energy I’m screaming into the void and darkness a whisper that barely reaches Max’s waiting ear right next to my barely moving lips.
“ Yes… just promise me … we hunt and kill our dads next... ”