The Monster

Snap. Click. Why'd I have that on me instead of a pencil? Wooden and pointy. Our friend the pencil. The SATs gave me way too much credit, I think.

"I mean, am I really so horrible?" the monster asks. And tears a sweet bland brick of Pez from my witch's throat, and washes it down like a pill with a mouthful of vodka or gin or whatever it is he has.

I don't trust myself to talk and not scream so I shake my head, no, no, course not. His face is human at the moment and he could walk, or, well, stagger, amongst us. My face is hot from crying. No, no, you're not horrible at all. I shake my head. Wipe my nose on my sleeve.

"Now, for example, you," the monster replies. "Anyone can see where you'd want to practice a love spell or two. But me?" Click. Snap.

I take a deep breath and think calm. Green. Blue. Think of cool blue water.

The monster stands up. Puts my witch in the pocket of his coat. "Get started," he says.

Breathe deep. And, hey, look. A river runs under us. I can feel the water flowing. Cool. Well, more likely it's a sewer, but the fact remains.

I clear my throat. "Well, actually what I was doing was a, an anti-love spell." I say. "The ingredients are almost the same, almost, but, um—"

"That's stupid," he says. "Why'd you want to—" Then his eyes flick over and down in the direction of Xander. "Oh." He frowns.

"The ingredients are almost entirely exactly the same," I say.

He takes another long pull on his bottle, and stays resolutely off-track. "You're telling me you'd rather fuck that, that—that—than—"

"Oz. His name's Oz. My boyfriend's name is Oz." That's what you're supposed to do in this sort of situation, right? Talk, use names, make it more real. "And, no, no, I wouldn't. Hence the spell. Anyhow, as I was saying, about the ingredients."

"Slut," he says. Although in a relatively calm conversational tone. He's way in my personal space in front, and the tire-fire-scented bed behind.

This vampire-hostage sort of situation. Right. It's in every half-decent introductory psychology textbook.

I look at him. Meet his eye. Deep breath. Confident. Top dog. "Listen," I say. My brain hasn't written me the rest of the sentence yet, but I'll bet it's going to be good. Really good. Be the ticket to me and Xander getting out of here alive.

I should write that book. It could be the first one in Giles' library to have a nice bright cheery non-rotting-leather cover. And full-colour illustrations. I really should.

He takes another drink. Bubbles rising up like in a hamster's water bottle. "Listen what, slut?" he demands.

"I'm not a slut. Do I look like a slut? I don't think so."

Oh, thanks a lot, brain.

He smashes the bottle on a bedpost, and I say, "What I mean," and then just like that I'm on my back on the bed, and he's sitting on my stomach. Perched lightly. Most of his weight on his knees, which are clamped tight around me. And my arms are pinned down by his legs, and his eyes are yellow, suddenly. And he's smiling down at me, and his teeth are sharp.

And he's sliding an even sharper shard of glass from the bottle down the side of my face. Pressing lightly. It doesn't hurt. Atom-thin edge slicing skin-cells in half. The little capillaries. I can't breathe. "When I'm done," he says. "You won't have to worry about all the boys looking at you like that." And he slides the shard all the way down to the place where the face meets the neck and I just want to scream at the top of my lungs. But that might wake Xander up, and the monster would kill him.

Then the monster leans forward and licks up the line that he's drawn. Wet raw beef-tongue feel, butcher-shop liquor-store accident smell. And he says, "Ah."

And then, "Ah, fuck," as the glass slices into his palm, and he sits up straight again and throws it across the room. Past where Xander is still lying, lying still, maybe dead. I almost hope dead. I hate it when things die slowly. Orphaned, abandoned, wounded things.

"Fuck, fuck," the monster continues, and licks his palm, and I take advantage of this distraction to heave myself up as hard as I can, and twist, and at least try to get my arms free.

He moves his hand down away from his mouth, and he's grinning again, or still, but the man-mask is back in place now. "Be patient," he says. And the bloody hand and the other one push my sweater and T-shirt and bra up to almost my neck, and then he lets my arms free, and pulls all of it inside-out and over my head so I'm blind for a second and off me, quick and clean.

With my arms free I go for his eyes, his throat, but he dodges and blocks and says, "play nice," like a kindergarten teacher in hell, and then he gets all the way off of me, and starts pulling my pants down.

After he's done that he shrugs off his coat, and pulls off his shirt, and peels off his T-shirt. And under all that he's, seriously, like something I've only seen in those awful gay porn magazines that Cordelia smuggled in to me in the hospital for a laugh when I was—when I was sick—and Xander was down in the cafeteria, and we were laughing, me and Cordelia. Cordelia and I, I mean. No doubt the demerol made it seem extra hilarious. Me and Cordelia laughing at those ridiculous bodies, those disembodied bodies, perfect past perfection and into a sort of ugliness. This perfectly ugly body, and now he lays it down on me. And it feels smooth and cold, his body, like the belly of a frog in formaldehyde.

"Skin on skin," he hisses, and kisses me, smooth and cold, everything smooth and cold. His skin on my skin, his tongue in my mouth, his hand on, his finger in, the wet dry wet cold between my legs. Making little circles, pressing hard, back and forth, sliding down to where the bone ends, like the edge of a cliff, and his fingers fall off it, fall in and out again over and over.

I wonder if he's drunk enough maybe not to notice when he's finished if I use a spell of sleep, and/or give unto me a pointy piece of wood, instead of love. And if he did notice, would he break Xander's fingers while I watched, the way, the way Angel, in and out over and over, and/or put his eyes out, with, you know, with, God, it's always so noisy in here.

"Come on, witch," he says. "Pretend I'm your boyfriend over there." He nods toward Xander. And I wonder if he read my mind somehow, or my face, and the idea makes me feel sick to my stomach, makes me want to curl up in a tight little ball. He grins. "No? The other one then."

And I don't know why it matters to him, but on the other hand he's not slicing my face off with glass, so we're on the right track, so, think, well, Oz asking me to touch it in the van in front of our house after the movies, with the extra-greasy popcorn that he paid for, and I did, but I wanted more, but there needed to be at least a month of pills before we could, and they make me feel funny, and even then a condom.

Not very Romeo and Juliet.

I wonder if Xander and Cordelia. Probably. I wonder. On top with her stupid big breasts hanging down in his face and her scary sharp nails.

"There you go," says the monster, moves faster, rubs harder, and, Romeo and Juliet and Cordelia and Xander and breasts and erections and estrogen and demerol and fingers digging into, well, I guess, the G-spot, as it's generally known, although a lot of people seem to think that it doesn't exist, in which case it's probably something else I feel, like a river in my belly, like sparks in my head. Maybe something psychological.

"Fucking slut," the monster whispers in my ear, as my muscles squeeze and loosen and squeeze tight around his fingers.

And you know when it's over, even though it's not like it would be if you were a boy. The only way you know is that you don't want to do it anymore. I mean you do because you, you, you, you love him, but it's not like smelling food when you're really really hungry, not like waiting for that next shot of demerol.

He sits up straight on his knees again and his face is still human, his eyes fixed on nothing, and he's sort of weaving way up there like a drunken snake.

"I guess I should get started on that spell now," I say. Worth a shot. "I think maybe I could jury-rig something—."

"Shut the fuck up," he says. And his fingers are on his belt buckle. Opening up his belt buckle. Not the button of his jeans though or the zipper.

"Do, do you, should, should—" I reach up to undo it for him. Full of desire to get this over with before Xander wakes up. Unless he's already dead.

The monster slaps my hands away. Slithers his belt out through the beltloops of his stiff sticky jeans. "You ever been beat with a belt?" he asks, in a how 'bout this heat sort of tone. I shake my head, cover my face with my hands, and I want to scream. And yet when it does come, crack, hard hot flat snap to the back of my hand, I don't. Don't wake up Xander. I don't scream, I just gasp. He hits me again. "Think I could break your bones just with this?" he asks.

Which bones? Hammer, anvil, stirrup, sure, if they were laid out on a table. Where they are right now it might be harder. Collarbone, probably, it's basically built to be broken. Femur, on the other hand, I doubt it, but I, but I don't, but. "I don't know," I say. Through the barred window made of my fingers. The wall of my palms.

"Rhetorical question actually," he says. But, or and, he doesn't hit me again, yet.

Kneecap, shoulderblade, knucklebone, skull.

"Put your hands down."

Tibia, fibia, jaw.

"I said." Hands wrap around my wristbones, and pull my palms and fingers away from my face. "Put them down."

And he's dropped the belt. Opened his fly. Pushed his pants down a couple of inches.

Of course I look. It doesn't matter. Morbid curiosity. It's no bigger than Oz's. And definitely not up to the size of the guys in Cordelia's magazines.

I wonder if vampires spread diseases the way mosquitos do.

He slides his hands up the insides of my thighs, then under them, raises them up, spreads them wide. I don't fight. Quaint honour. Sure. Get some perspective.

He gets on top. Gets in between. His face close to mine, so I look at him. Return his steady stare. Meet his dead drunk blue Barbie-blank eyes. But inside, I'm at the dentist. Too much candy. That's what happens. Rubber dams, and rubber gloves, and inevitably there's pain, a wet red intimate kind of pain, but it's okay. You have to remember to breathe, but aside from that, it's all okay. The needle's in, and that means I'll be numb and happy soon.

He kisses me, meaty mint topical anaesthetic cool, and arranges my legs around his waist, and starts to move, and the broken bedsprings scream. Sing along, dance beat, get-it-done get-it-o-ver-with. Stops kissing. Keeps moving. There's a spring digging into my spine. I wonder if my tetanus shot is up to date. Tetanus, tetanus, up to date. Kisses me under the ear. Dance beat. Steel frame beneath the spring. Concrete beneath the steel. Dirt and worms and bugs and rocks and roots below the concrete, and the river running underneath it all. Flooding faster. Needles needles needles needles needles in my neck.

I thrash, kick, twist, until I grind his rhythm to a halt.

He lifts his head. Eyes blue. Mouth lipstick-bright. Frowns down at me. "You do know I'm going to kill you. Now or later." Then he hiccups. I wonder if breathing into a paper bag works if you don't have to breathe. The image almost subverts the dread.

"I can't very well do your spell if I'm dead," I say.

"Don't worry," he tells me. "You won't be dead for long."

"Well, well, when I'm all evil, maybe I won't do it, anyhow, just to be mean."

"After," he says. "After. After the spell." Then he closes his eyes and starts moving again.

And then there's a moan, a groan, and it isn't me, and it's not the monster either. Oh Xander, oh God, you're alive, be quiet, lie still, lie still, lie still.

But the rusty springs keep screaming, even though I'm not.

"Willow?"

He freezes inside me.

"Will, are you, what—"

He pulls himself out.

"Oh God," Xander says.

The monster grins, sharp. "Hold that thought, love," he tells me. Rolls off. "Soup's on."

I claw at his hair, hook my legs around his, trying to hold him back, just a second, let Xander run. Run. But he just sits there, with his chin and one arm on the bed. Just sits there and stares at the monster.

And the monster shakes free of me easily, and lunges quick smooth as the sewer river running under us.

And I scream.

Except, I don't.

When a mother lifts a car off her baby or whatever, I had always imagined it would be really hard, you know? Even with adrenalin, it would still be like the hardest thing you've ever done and then some.

But this is easy.

This is like unclenching my fist and letting some weight I'd been carrying fall, from the top of a tall building. All I have to do is let go. Gravity does the rest. Shatters the pavement miles below.

The monster launches himself across the burnt bedspread, half-naked and smeared with my blood, and his murder-mask on.

This is easy. Like opening a water main, and letting what's in get out. The vastness and speed of it cracking the pavement above. Cracking the thin shell of distance and time and reason and all the insulating unmagic that keeps the green riot of life all around us imprisoned in seed and slow growth.

Holding up. Holding back. Holding in the scream.

Step up onto the railing and over.

The monster's hand in Xander's hair. Teeth at his throat, the main, the vein there.

This is so easy.

I just let go.

Both of them turn, momentarily distracted mid-murder, at the sound of glass smashing as branches break through the high window above us. Through every window. At the sight of brick falling as twigs worm their way into cracks in the mortar then thicken and blossom and bloom.

"What the fuck," says the monster. And then one root thrusts up through the concrete and up through the bedsprings and up through his heart, and his body turns to dust, and the dust rains down on Xander and I. I mean me and Xander. Dust and mortar and little bits of brick. Easy as hurricane, lightning, tsunami. Easy as Hiroshima.

The roots rock the bed, and branches bend it, but none of it touches us. And Xander says oh god will what's happening. And then Xander is holding me. My bare chest pressed against his dusty, bloody shirt. And Xander is holding me tight, while mad vines tear the walls of the factory down.

Oh god will are you, are, are you, Xander says. And he looks, looks away, looks again. There's blood between my legs, and dried on the side of my face where he cut me with glass, not yet dried on my neck where he bit me. There's blood streaming out of my nose. Blood film fog in my eyes.

Now the growing is slowing. Leaves shiver, shaking off magic, sobering up, and plaster and flower petals pitter-patter down all around us like snow. Which I've never seen. No snow for Sunnydale. It still gets chilly, though. Specially with the walls all gone.

So I free myself from Xander's grasp, and look around for my clothes. See first the black coat, the red shirt, the T-shirt an old indeterminate shade. And the belt. No pants, though. I sent his pants to hell.

I laugh.

And Xander says oh god will god willow oh god.

But it's like he's at the bottom of a well, or like he's on a train and it's rolling away.

I find my underpants and jeans and shoes all lumped up near my feet, and put them on. Hope the blood's stopped by now, hope it won't seep through like an unexpected period.

I stand up. Do the button. My legs are kind of weak, but my head's so light that it holds the rest of me up.

I find bra and T-shirt and sweater all together on the used-to-be-floor, all inside-out and woven through with roots. Sewn to the earth.

So I put on the coat instead. Put my hand in the pocket, and my witch is there. I smile. Far away Xander stares.

"Skin on skin," I explain, and start climbing a vine. Hold my hand out to him. Quickly. The river is rising.

We should get you to a hospital will, Xander shouts. But the sound of his voice is so faint from the bottom of that deep deep well, from the window of that long-departed train.

I smile down upon him. "I'm fine," I say.

And, you know what? It's funny.

I am.