Abel
We’ve just walked inside the motel room when I reach for her wrist and pull her back to me. There’s something in her eyes when I look at her.
They study my face and they flinch.
Fear .
I’m delivering it and she’s giving it right fucking back.
And I ask the question I’ve been wanting to ask since I realized what the fuck she’s truly capable of. “Will I ever be enough for you?”
Silence.
Her mouth opens and closes. And then she’s grabbing me and pulling me to her.
Her kiss feels angry, but I know better. She wants to feel control. But she won’t get any of that shit from me when it comes to this. When we touch, I’m in charge.
Her jeans are tight, making it hard to yank them off, but I succeed after sitting on the bed and slowly pulling them down her smooth legs.
Her pussy peeks at me from under her panties and I press my face against it, inhaling the musky scent before running my teeth softly against the fabric. “Answer me,” I say as my fingers curl, beckoning against her sensitive, wet flesh through her damp panties.
A gasp and a weak answer. “Yes.”
I shake my head, hands palming her ass and propelling her into my face so I can scrape once, twice, three more times.
“Yes,” she cries out.
Her eyes are closed when I reach down and yank her panties in my fisted grip, up so the fabric catches her pussy between the seams. I sink to my knees as she trembles and my eyes line up with the puffy lips that beg to be tasted. I put my mouth on her and she jerks a little. I press my tongue into the cotton and I can already taste her. I let an exhale loose and she squeezes her thighs together, pressing into my face.
I lean back and look at her. “Do you love how I make you feel, espinita ? Is there any feeling better than this?”
She doesn’t answer but it doesn’t matter as I shove her body away and back, so she falls on the bed. The moment she hits the mattress, I push her panties to the side and slide my tongue along her wet slit.
Fuck words.
Fuck words the way I’m about to fuck her.
Hard and without a second thought.
Fuck anything that isn’t happening in this room with both of us doing whatever feels good.
Mierda.
I push a finger inside her, hissing at how wet she is, and her back arches.
“,” she cries out.
That’s me, I think to myself as my tongue flutters over her clit. That’s me making you feel like nothing else matters in this fucked up world.
“You gonna come, baby?” I ask, sliding my hand under her shirt and bra. When I pinch her nipple, her body shakes.
I put my mouth right back on her center, licking and gripping her thighs to keep her legs spread, dying to get her close enough to taste every drop.
“Mmm,” I hum against her, just as she starts to convulse, her body pushing away. I know it’s too much, but I keep going.
I own this moment.
I own her gorgeous fucking body.
But I could never own her . I could never count on her as long as she insisted on being this fucked up person. And I should’ve banked on it because she never promised me she’d ever change.
My dumbass just heard what I wanted to. I let my vision cloud my sight.
Como un tonto.
She sits up and reaches for me, but I back away, out of her arm span.
Unreadable eyes try to assess me, but I look away.
I run my hand over my mouth and sit back on the chair in the corner of the room, not watching as I hear her sit up and adjust herself. From the corner of my eye, I see her reach for her jeans and place them on her lap.
“For a moment, you forgot what you were in love with,” she says, her voice quaking. “You were just…in love.”
“I’m always in love. With you,” I tell her with a shake of my head. “I love you so fucking much. But fuck, Rose, you force me to do shit, to be someone I’m not.”
There’s this quiet consumption, a passing, a digestion of what I’ve said.
And then there’s a truth.
“I don’t know that I can change,” she finally confesses.
Or a version of it anyway.
I hear what the fuck she won’t say. I hear it and I want to scream at her.
No soy estúpido.
Just because I don’t speak the way she does or wasn’t brought up in a big ass fancy house, doesn’t mean I can’t hear that she won’t change.
“We need to leave,” I finally tell her.
There’s a slight shake of her head and then, “I’m not finished here yet.”
I’m too tired to be exasperated.
“I can’t stay here. If we get caught, I don’t think I could forgive you, Rose.” Not any more than I could forgive myself.
“In order for you to forgive me, I’d have to ask for forgiveness. But I’m not sorry, . Not in the slightest.”
I stand and shove the chair back, so it hits the wall. “This is fucking bullshit,” I say as I grab the keycards and walk out, slamming the door behind me.
I run down the steps so fast I nearly trip trying to get the hell away from the wreck inside that room.
What else is left for us?
Will I go back?
Will she even be there if I do?
Once I reach the parking lot, I keep walking. I must walk about half a mile before I get to a gas station. And then I just sit on the bench, watching my breath hit the cold air, watching as it gets darker and darker outside.
The questions that insist on throwing themselves at me, they need to be answered. I can’t fucking live with myself if this is all there is. If this is all my future will look like.
Running, hiding, killing.
So I reach in my pocket and pull out my phone.
I scroll down to the number I called before and my thumb hovers over the green button that’ll connect me to this condescending asshole.
Don’t .
I try to talk myself out of making this call but what the hell else is there for me? I think back to that motel room, to the blood on that girl’s hands as she cried at the movie theater, to the cop with the hole in his fucking head.
The scent of tobacco fills my nostrils and I wave it away.
“You knew better than to get tangled up with that blanquita , .”
I ignore her, the rasp of her voice, the way it irritates the fuck out of me. And just so I don’t have to speak to her, I press the green button.
Every time I try to call this fucking guy, my hands shake. It rings once, twice and by the third ring, I’m nearly ready to hang up.
“Dr. Brown.”
That’s all this asshole says. Nothing else. I start to think this was a mistake when he speaks again.
“Rose?”
I press my eyes shut and tap the back of my head against the wall behind the bench. “No. It’s .” I can hear a low buzz of static but that’s it.
“Are you with Rose?”
I take a deep breath. I can still smell the tobacco. “Why haven’t you called the cops?” Why is he playing with us like this? Why are we getting away with this shit?
“Because I knew when you realized she wasn’t capable of giving you the life you wanted, you’d contact me.” He clears his throat and lowers his voice as if to share a secret. “Neither of you deserves to be here but…my hands are tied.”
“No. I don’t want her to go back there,” I tell him and my voice sounds fucking shaky and I hate it. “You hear me? She’s not going back.”
“Do you have a better idea, ?”
He still sounds like a condescending prick but he’s all I’ve got right now.
“She never took her medication,” I say. “Maybe if she does?—”
“You think I don’t know that? The fact that she never even tried to stay on her medication is a testament to her unwillingness to change. Stop listening to her pretty words and her pretty face and pay attention. You’re a smart kid, . You know better than this!”
I’d never heard Dr. Brown raise his voice before.
“If she goes back, she’ll kill herself,” I whisper. He needs to know how serious this is. “That’s why I got us outta there. She said if she wasn’t out by her birthday, she’d?—”
“And you fell for her.”
“It isn’t like that. She loves?—”
“Let me ask you this, Mr. Cartagena. How many people has she attacked since you got her out?” He pauses. “Don’t tell me if she’s killed anyone because I’ll have to contact the authorities. They’ll shut me down. My reputation will be ruined because I chose curiosity over the wellbeing of others. In fact, don’t tell me anything. Just think of the answer to that in your head. She loves you, but she’s willing to jeopardize your newfound freedom. She loves you, but I bet if you asked her to stop, she’d tell you she can’t. Or won’t because there’ll always be someone. But don’t you see? Her list is never-ending. There is no light at the end of the tunnel. With her, you’re in perpetual darkness. Are you prepared to live that way for the rest of your life? Because at some point, this will all catch up to you.”
You think that when you hear your fears confirmed, it won’t be as bad because you already kinda fucking knew. You think that because you had your suspicions, there would be no way hearing that what you were thinking was true would kill you.
But Dr. Brown is doing more than telling me the truth. He’s changing my goddamn future. If I looked five years toward the future, I pictured me and Rose somewhere safe and unbothered and maybe married. Now, I just see me on my knees, cleaning the blood of her latest victim.
“Estupido, escucha a tu doctor,” mami whispers.
No. I’m done listening.
“Shut the fuck up,” I yell. “Both of you.”
Dr. Brown sighs on the other end of the phone. “Still hearing your mother?”
“You don’t have all the answers, Doc,” I yell. “You can’t even keep your patients from being raped by your fucking nurses. How’d you manage to cover that up?”
I didn’t call for this shit. I don’t need a therapy session. I don’t need to be reminded that the person sitting next to me is all in my head.
I need a cigarette and I need Rose.
I need to feel a little less fucked up.
He doesn’t say anything and I’m wondering who the fuck this man is, who can make the calls he makes, or apparently hide two murders and two escapees from the authorities.
“Tell me how to fix her and I will,” I tell him, prepared to make a deal with the devil.
But the devil has other plans.
“Take her somewhere she can be more of an asset than a liability.
Before he can say anything else, he disconnects the call. I’m staring at the phone before I decide to get up and head inside the gas station.
“Marlboro Reds,” I tell the man behind the counter as I reach for a baby blue lighter. The same color as her eyes.
He doesn’t say anything as he reaches for a pack.
I’m dropping cash on the counter when I notice the television in the corner. The dead girl from the movies. Her face is on the screen before cutting to Rose, who’s too blurry to make out with her short blonde hair covering most of her face. I’m so glad that she cut it on her own, having the foresight to know it would take time for people to connect that vague image to her. Beside the image is a number and a message urging anyone who knows anything to call in and report it.
I’m seeing dead people everywhere.
Without a second thought, I step out and light up, relishing in the smoke as it fills my lungs. I’d stopped because I couldn’t find money for food, let alone this shit habit.
A few kids are outside playing on skateboards. I hear them cursing and bullshitting and I remember a time when that was my life, coming home late from hanging out with my friends. Or making out with some chick who’d let me get to third base.
I notice their things in a pile beside one of the pumps. There’s an iPhone sitting on top of a backpack.
I may not be a murderer but I’m still a criminal.
I tuck the iPhone into my jacket pocket and head back to the motel. Before I make it there, I light another cigarette and take my time, scrolling through the phone. Who has one of these things without a passcode? What a stupid kid.
I scroll through their music library and I am surprised. Good taste .
Some music I don’t know, but Radiohead comes up and I listen to Creep on speaker the rest of the way back.
When I reach the steps leading up to our motel room, I crush the cigarette under my heel and stow the iPhone in my jacket.
I’m not sure what I expect to see when I open the door, but it isn’t Rose with her head tucked against her knees, still no pants on.
I miss the mass of long blonde hair, but I still reach for the shortened strands, unable to keep my hands to myself.
“Why don’t you hate me?” she asks, not moving.
“I couldn’t if I tried.”
She turns her face toward me and those baby blues open me right up.
And I’m reminded of the first lie I ever told Rose.