Black Thoughts

Black thoughts.

I walked in, walked over to him, and bent my back and brushed his cheek with the back of my hand. His eyes rolled to and fro for an instant but the lids stayed closed, and I wondered if he was only feigning unconsciousness. His one demonstrated talent, after all. I bent down closer, kneeled, leaned down and licked the blood crusted above his mouth. And indeed at this he inhaled sharply and his eyes opened wide, bottomless blue and the pupils huge with terror, which decontextualized looks so much like desire.

Missus MacCready, her eyes did not widen, at the end. She was wet enough, comfortable to slip into, and that muscle which has no masculine counterpart clenched tight around me once twice thrice just before I came, and her little mouth even sighed, but her eyes were never wide. Her pupils stayed pinpricks all through, and all through it her body lay splay-limbed and limp as a dirty forgotten old doll, through all that and after, as I rose, and took my knife, and cut her throat.

Very different flavour, the female. Not for everyone.

Not entirely unlike his, in which there was by this time no trace left of the taste of brave soldier. I licked my lips. And then his.

He made a terrified animal sound and tried to turn his face away from me but I had my hand tight in his hair, which felt like wool, carded but unspun, and with it I held his head where it was. Held him down, pushed his manacled wrists up over his head out of the way and pressed my chest down on his, pressed his back against the floor, and looked into his eyes, bottomless blue, and wide black, and I smiled as I swallowed his blood.

He took shallow rapid breaths, as I swung my leg over, and I raised my body up off him a bit, slid my hand between us, slid my fingers along his collarbone, shoulder to centre and down the open throat of his shirt. I let the heel of my hand rest on his chest moving up and down rapid and shallow. Not much fat, but more meat on his fine china bones than one might think.

He closed his eyes.

I kissed him.

Covered his mouth with mine, warm, wet, beard like starched lace, and his breathing gradually slowed. My tongue slid across and then between his parted teeth, and touched the roof of his mouth, and my crotch ground against him, and he was warm, and his breathing deepened, but still it took me almost by surprise to feel his erection next to mine, under. I smiled. "Never was all that certain you had one," I said. He didn't answer, and his eyes stayed closed.

I'd let go of his hair at some point, but I grabbed it again, and jerked his head up, and his blue glass eyes snapped open.

What are you doing?

I just wanted to know how they worked, the eyes.

Put her down, Christie had cried, so I'd dropped the doll.

"Answer me," I said.

"Yes, I'm a man," he muttered. "Disappointed?"

I let his head fall, and it hit the floor with a solid sound.

Christie reached down and picked the doll up. If you've broken her, I swear, she hissed, and then she coughed, and then she coughed.

Boyd kept his eyes open, avoiding mine, as I moved my hand down his chest, slowly, unfastened buttons, over his empty belly and under the waistband of his trousers. I wrapped my fingers around the empirical proof of his masculinity, and kissed him again. His gaze remained fixed somewhere off to the side.

If you've broken her, I swear, I shall tell Mother.

Christie, calm yourself, I'd said, and taken her hand in mine and rested the doll in the crook of her other arm, and she coughed, clutched it close and coughed, and coughed. Christie, calm yourself.

She ran her thin fingers through the doll's woolen hair. And after that, I'll tell Father.

I wrapped my hand around, and squeezed, tight, up and down, and he started to kiss me back.

That's not funny, I told Christie. Hand too tight around hers. She grimaced, coughed, coughed blood on my face which was bent in close to hers. That isn't funny, I said. Licked my lips, tasted blood. She kept coughing.

Boyd moaned. His tongue pushed in between my parted teeth, and he lifted his manacled wrists up over my head with a rattle of chains, got his arms around my shoulders, cautious and awkward.

No, it's not, she agreed, when she had enough breath. Her eyes were brown, Christie's, like mine, and the pupils huge. It's not funny at all, she said, and coughed, more blood. And I licked my lips. Tasted black thoughts. Her fragile fingers ran down the pillow next to her. Plucked at it, as though she'd lift it if she could.

But I will, she said, I swear I will. She smiled. Her eyes were brown, like mine, and wide as anything.

His arms were tighter around me now, tense fingertips kneading between my shoulderblades, and he was thrusting enthusiastically into my hand, with as much excitement as I'd ever seen in his mountain lake eyes. Thinking, maybe, the same thing as Missus MacCready maybe thought: fuck him and he will feed me. Or, at least, he won't be able to bring himself to eat me. Not me. Fuck him. Kiss, thrust.

I loosened my grip abruptly, withdrew my hand from his trousers. He stopped moving, then, although his arms were still wrapped around my neck.

Silk and lace pillowcase spattered with blood, heavy goose-down inside. Well, not heavy for me: I was at that time still healthy and fit. Fortunate, for Christie was surprisingly strong, at the end. Her nails drew blood.

His eyes met mine. "Are you finished?" he asked, somewhat breathless. And still hard, as was I, despite distracting thoughts. I shrugged my shoulders and he let me go, put his hands above his head, still looking at me. I backhanded him, which drew more blood, to replace what I'd licked away. And his pupils, if it were possible, widened further, in the brief moment before he sighed and closed his eyes again.

She was surprisingly strong, but not impossibly, my dear Christie. Probably it only seemed like an hour I had to hold the pillow in place while she clawed at me, and then two hours more after she'd stopped, just to be sure.

I looked up, out the window. White sky. Boyd breathed slowly, shallow, silent, through his mouth.

No, it couldn't have been very long at all, because Mother never came, not until long afterwards. Not until she heard me screaming, smashing the doll.

Boyd stayed still. When I glanced down as I moved off I saw water running from the corners of his closed eyes.

Smashed that doll all to hell, its little brittle head, smashed it all to fuck, and its dead blue glass eyes rolled away, and then Mother came in, and I never did find them.

Never did find out how they worked.