Chapter 9
CHAPTER
NINE
The vibration, the swaying—it's not something I've felt in a year, but instantly it's familiar. Have I parked my car at the station in the suburbs and now I’m headed into the city? Am I headed home? Worse… am I headed to the airport? I find I have no idea.
Across from me, an elderly man sits with his head propped against the railing, snoring. With each click of the tracks, his balding head shakes, making the wispy hairs on his head sway in time.
How long has he been here? How long has he slept, the rocking a paltry replacement for a mother’s arms?
He doesn't even wake when the train screeches to a halt.
The force of it sends me careening until I catch myself with a hand.
Across from me, the old man sleeps on, seemingly oblivious to the train around him.
How nice it must be, so entrenched in a dream that you don't want to leave.
That's certainly not my experience.
It's obviously his, because as I stand to leave, the corner of his mouth hitches in a smile.
The doors open, and I walk to stand before them.
It's dark outside, and I squint to see through the murk.
Frigid and cloying, the outside comes in to meet me.
A thick black fog rolls in and fills the inside of the train car.
It creeps over my skin, freezing every inch it touches, making me hiss.
The stinging chill freezes me in place, even though my brain is screaming at me to run.
My heart is racing so fast that I feel dizzy, and sweat bursts from my pores only to freeze atop my skin.
It doesn’t take long before I’m encased in a thin sheet of ice, trapping me further than even my own nerves.
Still, the fog swarms in, hungry for every inch of space.
When I'm surrounded, the thick black miasma tightens, constricting and choking me. Somehow I can feel that I am an obstacle, like the fog is thinking and feeling. It’s pressing its thoughts and intents into my brain, and I know.
I see it as it sees me, and it’s horrifying.
I am not an enemy.
It bears me no ill will.
It thinks almost nothing of me.
I am a pebble in its shoe.
A speck of dust.
Insignificant, bothersome and easily dealt with.
It squeezes harder, the casing of ice shattering and transforming it into shards that slice into my skin with their biting cold.
Every place where one breaks the skin, I can feel the warmth of my blood as it trickles out.
It almost makes me grateful for the pain, because in each spot, there’s a tiny war being fought for the temperature of that scrap of skin.
The pain and the warmth bolster me so that I can move the tiniest bit. At first, I’m just shaking, shivering from the cold, but it’s more movement than I’ve been able to accomplish for seconds… minutes… hours?
As I tremble, I warm, my movements correspondingly larger, more erratic.
When I feel strong enough, warm enough, I plant my feet and jump, launching myself from the train car.
The top of my body breaks free, though fog sucks at my legs, so that I fall forward onto my face.
I scrabble at the ground, clinging to twigs and snow, attempting to find purchase.
Rocks scrape at my hands, and now that I am free of the dark, I can see that I am spreading my blood over the snow with every move.
Then, in the dim moonlight, I spot it—a tree branch curving up and out of the snow, just a bump, but it’s something stable that might allow me to free myself.
The bark bites into my already raw hands, but it only serves to tell me that it is solid.
That this is something that I can depend upon.
Unsurprisingly, my noodle arms struggle to move me—my bottom half has always been where I carry most of my weight—but I reach into the depths of my being and find the strength only available in life-or-death situations.
Because there is no doubt in my mind that if I let the fog suck me back, I will die.
I scream, a deep, guttural thing torn from the very depths of my being to propel me forward. I flail my legs, kicking to free them.
Inch by inch, I drag my body further away from the subway and the fog, reclaiming my sanity and self in one fell swoop. When the last sucking tendril releases my foot, I tuck my legs up, away from the train.
“Please stand clear of the closing doors,” Frank Oglesby, forever the voice of the T in my head, intones, and the doors slam shut so quickly I’d have lost a leg.
As soon as they are closed, the T barrels off into the night, the loudness of its clacking on the rails emphasized by the eerie quiet of the forest once it’s gone.
My breath pants out of me, disturbing the silence. I shiver. I don’t know if I am just still freezing or if I’m in shock, but my body responds the same either way. I hang my head, still lying atop the snow now red with my blood and brown from the dirt I’ve managed to scrabble up.
For long moments, I hear nothing but myself. It isn’t to last, though, because with a dread that permeates to my bones, I know—the second I hear the twig snap—that I am not alone.
The forest reveals nothing in the night. Every tree casts a shadow that could hide any manner of dangers. A bear, the rare cougar, a rabid raccoon, or worst of all, an angry bull moose.
No, not worst of all.
Worst of all is humans.
Ignoring the stinging cuts all over my body, I push onto my hands and knees so I can stand. Once upright, I pause, listening.
Another twig snaps, and I whip my head in that direction, squinting into the night in an attempt to spot what hunts me.
I shuffle away from the sound. I’m already turning to run when I hear it, so deep it's almost imperceptible.
A laugh.
I gasp, turning and willing my exhausted body to grant me this one further thing. Get me out of here. Get me to safety.
As I run, trees whip my naked body, leaving welts that I cannot acknowledge.
Wait, naked?
Glancing briefly down, I can see that I am, in fact, naked.
Damn it.
The fog must have shattered my clothing along with the ice.
Thankfully, my feet are numb from the cold, so I don’t feel the poking of twigs or the bite of the snow.
Unfortunately, though, it also means I am much clumsier than I would be otherwise.
Instead of shifting when I encounter a rock, I stumble.
Narrow miss after narrow miss drives me forward, though I know it’s only a matter of time until I’m flat on my face with my hunter at my back.
He laughs again, closer this time, and his voice, one I know so well, calls out into the night. “Running from me now, Princess?”
It’s not just any hunter behind me, it’s my nightmare.
In perhaps the most unhinged thought I’ve ever had, I almost stop and wait for him.
Luckily, sane Ada is driving this body, and I continue running.
He might have gotten me off once, but I have a much longer history that tells me that letting him catch me is dangerous.
Behind me, his footsteps are slow and steady, as if he’s in no rush, but still, they grow nearer and nearer.
“Oh, Princess, running from me is a dangerous choice. Who knows what I’ll do to you once I catch you?”
A year of nightmares is apparently nothing in the face of one orgasm, because the second he mentions doing anything to me, my blood starts to buzz in my veins. Warm tension settles between my legs, and with each pump that propels me forward, I can feel the slickness dripping out of me.
“Fuuuuuck,” he groans, so much closer than I’d thought. “You’re such a little slut for me. I can smell you from here.”
I pump my arms, willing my legs faster. I can hear the want in his voice, the strained quality that tells me he’s likely as rock hard as I am wet.
I’m not going to make it easy for him.
If he wants me, he’s going to have to catch me.
I throw my head back, laughing into the night. Adrenaline pumps through me, though I’m still unsure if I am scared or aroused, though the answer is likely both.
Maybe he’ll hurt me when he catches me, but in my bones, I know that is nothing new. It's the possibility that he won’t that really drives me forward. That maybe tonight, like last night, he’ll call me a good girl and let me come.
“Do you know what running does to me, Princess? What it does to monsters?” he growls out the last word, leaving no question that it’s true. “If only you’d stayed, perhaps you could have been my good girl…”
Disappointment makes me stumble, but I press on.
“But only bratty little sluts run from their monster.”
Part of me wants to stop and give him a piece of my mind, because if he didn’t want me to run, maybe he shouldn’t be fucking scaring me. Then again, that would only prove him right. It’s peak brat behavior.
“Lucky for you—” He’s close enough that his exhale caresses my ear. “I like punishing you."
Steel arms wrap around my middle and lift me from the ground.
I scream, thrashing my legs. I don’t know what kind of punishment he’s going to exact now that he’s got me, but there’s no way I’ll make it easy for him.
My feet impact his shins as he takes us to the ground, flipping me so that I’m on my back. He hovers over me, boxing me in.
His hand wraps around my neck. I still, submitting in the wake of his gentle threat.
Up close, I can see that he’s still wearing the mask, though I still have no idea which of the red openings are for his eyes. His tongue, darting from his mouth to lick his lips, is a bright, bloody red.
“You’re even dressed like a little slut,” he observes, taking in my naked form. Squeezing my neck once, he moves his hand to toy with my nipple.
Each movement of his thumb shoots straight to my clit, and I press up into him, begging for more, for friction, for whatever he’ll give me.
“Please,” I whimper.
“Princess.” He tsks. “Is that all you can say? I think you can do better.” The moonlight flashes off his fangs as he smiles. “Tell me what you want.”
“You! Anything! Please!” I gasp, because no matter how I move my hips, he skirts away from where I need him most.
“I don’t know that you deserve me, Princess…
you ran from your monster.” He leans down, and I think he’s going to kiss me, but instead he sucks my bottom lip into his mouth and gently, surgically, pierces the inside of my lip with his fangs.
The iron-y tang of my blood floods my mouth, far too much for such a small prick.
He soothes the pain away with a swipe of his tongue and kisses me, the swirl of my blood dancing between us.
He kisses me breathless, senseless, consuming every shred of dignity and shame I have until I’m a writhing mess beneath him.
Breaking our kiss, he pulls back and wipes my blood from his bottom lip.
“If you want me, you’re going to have to show me.
” To emphasize his words, he bucks his hips so that I can just feel the tantalizing brush of his pants ghost over my pussy.
“Show me, Princess, how bad you want your scary monster to fuck you.”
All at once, he isn’t moving away from me.
I don’t need to chase sensation, because the hard bar of his cock has settled between my thighs.
I keen out my relief, grinding up into him.
I could cry at how good he feels. The soft texture of his pants provides little resistance, especially once it’s smeared with my wetness.
He lowers his head and licks up the side of my neck, growling in my ear, “What a desperate little slut you are for me.”
His hips meet my every move, rocking into me until I can hardly think. My head spins and my pussy tingles. With every thrust, I clamp down on nothing, achingly aware of how empty I am.
“Please,” I gasp.
“Words, Princess. You should know by now,” he says, sucking on my neck.
How does he expect me to speak when he’s driving every coherent thought from my mind?
“I need—” I gasp.
“What was that?” He pulls back and smiles down at me, smug. “I didn’t quite catch that.”
“I need your cock! Please!” It’s almost a scream, and I can hear my words echo through the forest.
His smile twists into something menacing. “No.” Leaning on his elbow, he leaves my breasts and circles my neck once more, using his thumb to tip my head to the side.
“No, bratty little sluts don’t get fucked. They have to ride my dick and show me what a little monster whore they are.” Grabbing my leg, he wraps it around his waist so that I have even better access to his hardness.
The next words he speaks against my neck, right where my shoulder meets the mask. “Be my little whore, Ada, and maybe next time I’ll give you what you want.”
With that, he bites down on my shoulder, flooding me with pain and pleasure.
I tense, my orgasm shattering me. I can do nothing but ride the wave and press my clit into the length I wish was filling me.
Screams echo through the forest. My own.
I don’t have a name I can call out, so it’s just all vowels and moans.
My shoulder aches in the most luscious way, like a well-fucked pussy.
“Good girl.”
As my orgasm subsides, I blink, staring up at him, or rather, at his mask. With a hesitant hand, I reach up. I want to know what he looks like, but the second I touch it, he’s ripped from me, and I wake.
Alone.
I’m gasping in the darkness, and the panic of yesterday seeps in. Suddenly I’m remembering how alone I am, how confused, and how none of that was real.
Reality asserts itself with painful speed. The bins of decorations, my fears, it all combines to a crushing realization that I may not, in fact, be getting out of bed today.
“I am safe. I am in my home. I am safe.” I whisper into the dim morning light. Perhaps it’s a desperate attempt to make it true, but instead it only reminds me of the worst truth of all.
My home no longer feels safe.