Chapter 15 Madison
Madison
So the question is… why?
Lick-the-Bean Peter
Is your grandmother all right? I wanted to text you last night because I was worried, but I didn’t want to bother you.
I almost texted him last night too, while I was waiting anxiously for an EKG analysis. All the doctor said on the phone was that Abuela had been sent to the hospital wing, complaining of chest pain. Several hours of tests later… turns out bad gas can feel a lot like a heart attack.
Scanning Peter’s kind message again, I shove down the irritation and resistance to sharing personal information—that’s what dating is, after all—and type something so honest it feels vulnerable, because I don’t want him to think that I ran out on our date for something unimportant.
And I never explained to Peter how important Abuela is to me.
There was a medical emergency. She’s okay now. Sorry again for leaving, but she’s my only family.
Don’t apologize. I’m glad you got it sorted.
When I check my face, I realize the grin is huge and dopey. Dios, is this what infatuation feels like? How is he so fucking perfect?
Thanks for asking about her. And for caring.
Briefly, I hesitate before typing out my next message. I want to choose the right words.
I can’t wait to see him again. It’s like a physical pull—a need so strong it’s all I can think about.
Between somehow engineering the best date—a private arcade?
All the games, none of the screaming children?
Are you kidding me?—another mind-bending and completely scorching kiss, and then dropping to his knees and eating me out in the middle of it all, I’m definitely a goner for this guy.
All morning I’ve been grinning like a fool whenever I remember that moment of confusion when I felt him convulsing between my legs.
I’m so tickled that he enjoyed eating my pussy so much that he came, I don’t even care that I didn’t.
And the wincing humiliation on his face when he admitted it just about made me swoon—not because he was embarrassed that he came in his pants, but because he was embarrassed that he came when he was trying to make me come.
That tells me he’s no selfish lover; Peter is the kind of guy who genuinely cares if you get off.
Okay, not apologizing, but I’d like to make it up to you.
Heart racing, I press send, and my stomach flops over.
Cálmate, Madison. You’re not being hunted for sport.
But this is scary! Liking someone is scary. The possibility that this could work is scary.
Caring about what someone thinks sucks balls.
I always find a reason to write someone off.
Most people don’t like me after they really get to know me, and that’s fine—I’m a prickly bitch—so I prefer to be able to examine someone from arm’s length and find the flaws that reassure me it’ll never work.
The rejection hurts less that way. It takes all the pressure off if I know we’re doomed from the start and just having fun until things fizzle out.
It’s not like that this time. I’m not dreading looking at my phone when he texts; my heart races when I see his name on my screen.
I’m not looking for excuses to bail on a date; I’m planning how to ask him on another.
I’m not anticipating lulls in the conversation; I’m trying to save and remember things so I can tell him stories to make him laugh.
It’s… uncomfortable. In a thoroughly exciting way, yes, but it’s making me second-guess myself because he’s still a stranger and I don’t know exactly where I stand.
I know he wants me—that’s fairly fucking obvious—but does he like me?
I think he does, but there’s still that little voice of doubt that tries to convince me that running off in the middle of an amazing date that he went to such lengths to plan for me is sure to piss him off.
I heft the paper bag of groceries under my arm and lock the car before I head inside.
My phone buzzes, and my heart plummets into my stomach with nerves, but it’s not Peter.
It’s one of the IRCs I’m on—not SpyderMan’s.
I haven’t even talked to him since we got into that little spat.
It’s been days, which is weird for us, now that I think about it.
But I guess I’ve been riding the high of the excitement with Peter and I haven’t given SpyderMan much thought.
Guilt is just a twinge, because it’s drowned out by relief. Maybe it’ll be easier to get over SpyderMan than I thought.
NoBody: We need to talk. In person. Text me when you get this.
I roll my eyes. For a tough guy with questionable morals, he’s pretty dramatic.
He probably has another job for me or is having a hard time with the data I sent him.
Not really my problem, and I don’t feel like doing him any favors at the moment.
Luckily, I have enough in the bank that I can squeak by for a few months until I get bored.
So, I ignore the message and silence the IRC.
I’m trying to get the key into the lock on my front door without looking when the wind blows my hair over my shoulder into my face. I glance over at the front entrance, then roll my eyes preemptively.
It’s Todd, looking more irate than usual and—I note with a cheerful kind of curiosity—like someone kicked his ass.
He’s got a giant purple bruise stretching across the front of his neck, and he seems sort of…
beaten. Like, he usually holds his head high and postures when he walks, but now he’s slouching and subdued, almost as if he took a blow to the ego as well as the throat.
Dios, I hope that’s what happened. Just because I would never do it myself doesn’t stop me from wishing someone else would. It’d be a long time coming for someone who doesn’t think before he speaks but likes to run his mouth.
“You know, they really recommend you start slow with the auto-erotic asphyxiation,” I muse, lips twitching as I try to straight-face this one. “It’s dangerous. You could hurt yourself.”
He limps slowly past me, giving me the stink eye. I can’t see why he’d be limping from here, so it feels… performative. Especially after he says in a hoarse voice, “You’ll be hearing from my lawyer.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “You mean your dad?”
“Yeah,” he shoots back, oblivious to the implied insult. Of course, his dad is a lawyer.
I chuckle, unperturbed but curious. “Why, is he hot? You looking for a new stepmom? Careful, young man, or I’ll send you to bed without supper.” I wag my finger.
He scoffs, infusing the sound with as much disgust as he’s physically able, then wincing and grabbing his Adam’s apple like it hurt.
“You think you can hide behind your big, scary boyfriend? He can’t just go around assaulting people for no fucking reason.
I hope he’s got deep pockets, because they think my larynx is going to need surgery. ”
“My what?” I repeat, stuck a few sentences behind.
“Don’t play dumb, you fucking bitch. It’s all on video,” he hisses, pointing to the security cameras in the corners of the hallway’s ceiling.
“Management doesn’t pay for those to work, Todd,” I inform him with a small laugh. “It’s security theater, meant to deter people just by having them there, like that Guard on Duty sign—have you ever seen a security guard here?”
He blanches and turns his accusatory stare to the cameras. “W-well… Uh… I’ve got a witness, too. Proof.”
“Of,” I prompt, waving my hand in a get to it motion.
“Your boyfriend, threatening and attacking me.”
I open my mouth, then snap it shut. Clearly, Todd suffered some brain damage and is confused.
It’s really not nice to kick someone when they’re down.
“Right. Well, good luck with the lawsuit. I’ll be sure to tell my boyfriend to watch who he throat-punches next time.
I don’t think your brain can really afford to be cut off from oxygen again. ” I turn the key and slip inside.
“We’re gonna have his ass deported,” Todd growls after me.
“You do that,” I chuckle, making a mental note to check the camera feeds I just told him didn’t work. Well, I was tricky with my words—I didn’t say they don’t work; I implied it by saying that our building doesn’t pay for them.
Management may not care about the cameras, but after Mrs. Louis upstairs got mugged on her way in one day, and burst into tears at her mailbox telling me that the leasing company essentially told her to buck up, I do.
I couldn’t stand the look on her face—like she was afraid to leave the house.
Even after I explained that I’ve been personally paying for and monitoring them ever since, she still insists on using an old-school camera with an actual dinosaur VHS tape recorder to capture the street view “just in case.” I humored her.
What can I say? I’m a prickly bitch, but I do have a heart. And she takes care of my cat for me on the rare occasions when I go away.
If someone assaulted Todd… I kinda want to see that. Then pop some popcorn, pull it up on my TV and watch it over and over. Maybe in slow-mo with a theatric sports-announcer type voiceover.
I put away my groceries, feed Some Bills, and head into my bedroom.
Wearing an anticipatory smile, I sit at my computer and pull up the historical feed from the hallway camera.
The service I use saves 30 days of footage before it overwrites itself, so I should be able to find the scene I want—but I’m not sitting here and manually running through it.
I write a quick program to scan for Todd’s face, then isolate and highlight all of his comings and goings for the last few days.
Once the program is done, I’ve got a few condensed minutes of the most boring short film ever: There and Back Again and Again, Todd’s Hallway Journeys. But it’s missing something.