Hard Byte

by Misha Bell

  “So, I have a magic effect I wanted to try out on you,” Gia says as we walk into a ritzy department store.

  Great universe. Shopping wasn’t bad enough; now I have to deal with this too? As children, our siblings and I sat through our share of Gia’s beginner magic, with me getting the brunt of it. If I had a dollar for every card I’ve picked in my life, I’d own this whole store.

  “It’s a good one,” Gia says, no doubt picking up on my hesitation. “And short.”

  Short? I guess not all is lost. “Go ahead.”

  “Can I help you?” says a snooty-looking saleswoman before Gia can continue.

  “She needs a new outfit,” Gia says, nodding my way.

  The lady looks me up and down with a look that seems to say, “Boy, do we have our work cut out for us.”

  “Before we shop, maybe you can participate in a little experiment my sister and I were just about to undertake,” Gia says, her stage persona in full force.

  The lady looks at her suspiciously, but that doesn’t deter my twin in the slightest.

  “When I say so,” Gia says, “you will think of a two-digit odd number. A number so odd, in fact, that both digits are odd. Okay?”

  The lady’s nod is more reluctant than my own, but not by much. I also wonder if Gia is blind to the irony of asking us to think of an odd number while acting so odd?

  Unless that’s part of the trick?

  “I have one in mind,” I say, since I know how to handle my twin better than the salesperson does.

  “I do too,” the lady says with all the enthusiasm of someone who’s entered The Twilight Zone.

  With a flash of fire and smoke, a notepad and a pen appear in my sister’s hand.

  Wow. Gia has gotten much better since the last time she showed me stuff. I have no clue how she just did that.

  The saleswoman clutches her chest, no doubt worried the fire alarms are about to blare.

  Gia writes something on the pad. “I’ve just committed myself.”

  I’m glad to hear that. She’s certainly acting like someone who needs to be committed.

  She thrusts the pad into the hands of the stunned saleswoman. “On the count of three, you will say your numbers out loud.”

  She counts to three.

  “37,” I say at the same time as the helper lady says the exact same thing.

  Double wow.

  “Check the pad,” Gia says.

  Yep. On the pad is 37.

  Not only did I and a perfect stranger think of the same number, but Gia also knew what it would be ahead of time.

  How? She could’ve guessed I’d say 37—it’s a permutable prime because you can make 73 out of it, which is also prime, and I like that sort of thing. Then again, nothing stopped me from choosing 13. It’s a twin prime to 11 because they are two apart, and it fits her “both numbers odd” criteria.

  The real question is, why did this lady say the same thing? And how did Gia know she would?

  “Is it subliminal messaging?” the lady asks.

  Rookie mistake. Gia will never admit how she did what she did—not even to someone with identical DNA.

  My twin smiles with an air of mystery. “Can you keep a secret?”

  The lady nods.

  “So can I,” Gia says triumphantly.

  If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard this joke, I’d also own this store.

  The lady rubs her temples. “I have a headache. Did you do that?”

  “No, but put your hand out.” Gia waves her gloved hands over the lady’s extended palm and a white pill appears there.

  The lady stares at the pill.

  “It’s Tylenol,” my sister says.

  “Thanks,” the lady says but doesn’t put it into her mouth—and I can’t blame her in the slightest. “Are you ready to shop now?”

  Gia says we are, and before I can argue to the contrary, I find myself shepherded into a fitting room with a strappy black cocktail dress designed for a femme fatale in a James Bond film.

  Taking off my clothes and bra, I shimmy into the dress and look in the mirror. “I don’t like it.”

  “Who cares?” Gia asks. “Come out so I can see.”

  I step out of the fitting room.

  The helper lady nods approvingly, and Gia examines me like a butcher about to make a prime cut.

  “Too conservative,” she concludes, making it sound like a bad thing.

  “I’ll get something else,” the lady says, scurrying away.

  I look back into the mirror, then at my twin. “My problem was the opposite. It doesn’t look proper.”

  She rolls her eyes, walks into the fitting room, and gingerly lifts up my perfectly functional beige bra with her gloved hands. “Is this your idea of proper?”

  I shrug.

  “I assume you have granny panties to match this atrocity?” she asks.

  I put my hands on my hips. “Oh, pish posh. Who cares about my underwear? No one is going to see it.”

  She snorts. “Not with that attitude he won’t.”

  I flush, the thought of the Devil seeing me in any underwear making me uncomfortably warm inside.

  “How about you grab a dress you like?” my sister says, suddenly sounding conciliatory. “I’ll go find some normal underwear for you.”

  Leaving her to it, I locate something appropriate.

  By the time I return, she’s waiting for me, hiding something behind her back. “That is something a sadist would ask her bridesmaids to wear,” she says, wrinkling her nose at my choice.

  Ignoring her, I go into the fitting room and try the dress on.

  Outside, I hear her saying something to the salesperson, but I can’t make it out.

  The dress looks okay, I think. Reminds me of what I wanted to wear to the prom before my siblings talked me out of it.

  “I think this is it,” I say.

  “Show us,” my sister says imperiously.

  I come out.

  The salesperson’s eyes widen, and she struggles to keep a professional expression. On her end, my sister just laughs in my face, like a maniac. “This might work as a Halloween outfit,” she says when she catches her breath. “You can be Cinderella… before she got the ball makeover.”

  I huff indignantly. “This isn’t a maid outfit.”

  “Go back and take it off,” Gia says. “We’ll hand you things to try.”

  I return to the changing room and strip.

  “Start with this.” Gia tosses in two lacy atrocities. “You’re not going in granny panties.”

  I hold the items between my thumb and index finger, far away from my body in case they bite. “This is stupid. I’m not here for new underwear.”

  “Just try it,” she says.

  To shut her up, I put on her selections.

  The so-called panties make me understand why they call these “butt floss,” and the bra pushes my boobs just a few inches shy of my chin.

  “What do you think?” Gia asks.

  “I look like a French courtesan circa the Middle Ages.”

  “Which is good, right?” she asks.

  I readjust my squished boobs. “It’s not proper, but I don’t care as much because it will be invisible.”

  “Great.” She tosses in a dress. “Even if no one sees the new undies, you’ll feel sexy wearing them.”

  Does feeling sexy have a lot in common with feeling scratchy? Maybe. Knowing men, they just might find it hot if they saw you readjusting your knickers.

  With a sigh, I put on her chosen dress and gape at all the exposed skin. “This will not do.”

  “Show me,” Gia says.

  I shake my head. “A streetwalker would hesitate to wear this.”

  Gia knocks on the door. “Come out.”

  “No.”

  “You’ll have to, eventually.”

  No, I won’t. I’m just going to change back into—

  Wait.

  Where are my clothes?

  “I hid them all,�
�� Gia says before I can ask. “If you want to come out of there dressed, you’ll have to do it in that dress.”

  With a growl, I step out of the dressing booth.

  The salesperson and Gia exchange knowing glances.

  “You look hot, sis,” Gia says, and the lady nods enthusiastically.

  I look in a mirror again and frown. “My cervix is showing.”

  Ignoring me, Gia asks the salesperson for a pair of high heels.

  “You’re wasting your time,” I say when the lady is gone. “I’m not wearing this.”

  “You are,” Gia says.

  “Am not.”

  In déjà vu, we go back and forth until we get to:

  “Yuh-huh.”

  “Nuh-uh.”

  “You forgot something important,” Gia says.

  My stomach turns cold at the wicked expression on her face. Surely, she’s not going to—

  “Yeah, that’s right, you owe me one,” she says, confirming my fears.

  “But—”

  “I’m calling in my favor,” Gia says ceremonially. “I want you to look hot for your date. That means this dress, professional makeup, this lingerie, high heels of my choosing, and last but not least, a Brazilian wax.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  If her magic career never takes off, Gia can always give law a shot. No matter how hard I try to argue that heels plus lingerie plus dress plus makeup plus wax is five favors, she expertly contends that “looking hot” is just one.

  Handing me a shoebox, she makes a summation of her case. “Teaching you lock picking required talking, gesturing, breathing, and much more, but I didn’t consider those subparts separate favors. You should be grateful I’m using up my favor for something as selfless as making you look good for your date.”

  “Yeah, you’re a saint,” I say and open the box. “These are fuck-me pumps.”

  “Show us.”

  With a sigh, I clickety-clack out of the fitting room and twirl for my tormentors.

  “Perfect,” Gia says. “Now let’s pay and go get you made up.”

  The makeup artist is so slow with her task she makes a slug seem zippy by comparison.

  When it’s done, I look like a proper strumpet, with a touch of trollop thrown in—which, of course, means Gia loves it.

  After this metaphorical torture is over, we sprint across the street to a salon where a much more literal torture of hot wax awaits.

  “The aesthetician will be right with you,” says a smiling older woman.

  I do a little research on my phone, then look up. “Is she licensed?”

  I don’t ask for the gender—if it’s a man, I’m going to revolt.

  “Of course,” the lady says, smile faltering.

  “When was the last time she got her physical?” I ask.

  “Ah, there she is,” the now-frowning lady says and gestures at who I presume is the aesthetician.

  Tall and broad-shouldered, the woman looks more like a wrestler than a beautician, but hey, at least she should pass any physical with flying colors.

  “Good luck,” Gia whispers to me. Louder, she says, “She wants a Brazilian.”

  “No problem,” the aesthetician booms in a masculine voice with a thick Russian accent.

  Great. The last thing I need is an accent that reminds me of the Devil.

  As she leads me to the torture room, I ask her all the standard questions I’d ask my surgeon, like if she drank the night before (no), and if she got enough sleep (yes).

  “Do not be twitchy,” she booms after my fifth question in that vein. “I take good care of you.”

  I know she wants to be reassuring, but it actually comes off menacing.

  “In here,” she says.

  I step into a sterile-looking room with a big table in the middle.

  “Strip,” the aesthetician orders.

  Fighting the urge to whimper, “Yes, mistress,” I take my clothes off and follow directions until I end up on my back, legs spread, ready for further indignities.

  “Nice bush,” the mistress says, looking over my pubes approvingly. “Make job easier.”

  “Thanks?” I mutter. Who knew never trimming myself down there would come in handy?

  Muscles flexing, the mistress treats the area with cleaning products and who knows what else while I lie there and remind myself that this is a licensed professional, and that I’ve survived a gynecologist’s office with my sanity mostly intact.

  When she applies the first batch of hot wax, I realize my teeth are clenched so tightly I just might need a dentist’s visit after this—and wouldn’t that put a shit cherry on top of this crap cake.

  “Relax,” the mistress growls after she attaches the first strip to my skin a few inches below my navel.

  Relax? That is what all the doctors say before they do something—

  Aargh! The sound emitting from my mouth is as shrill and desperate as that of the proverbial stuck pig would be in this situation—though if anyone waxes pigs before sticking them, PETA should get on it, posthaste.

  The door opens and the receptionist lady rushes in, along with Gia and a couple of women I haven’t seen.

  “Are you okay?” my twin asks.

  I redden. Could this be any worse? I guess they could’ve brought some random men with them. Or my dad. Or the Devil himself.

  “She okay,” my mistress tells them. “First time always hard.”

  “No, I’m not okay,” I gasp. Giving my twin a narrowed-eye stare, I grit out, “I’ll get you for this.”

  “Oh, you’ll thank me once it’s all over and you feel like a sex goddess,” Gia says and herds all the spectators out of the room.

  “Not bloody likely,” I yell, but by then the door is closed.

  “No worry. I make it better,” the mistress says and applies another strip.

  How?

  She rips. I yelp in pain—but not as loudly.

  She bends her head until it’s inches away from my crotch and blows gently on the booboo.

  Oh, this is what she meant?

  Hmm. It does feel better—but at the same time, I really don’t feel comfortable with how close her lips are to my clit, or the sensations my clit experiences from that airflow.

  “Ready?” she asks.

  I nod, resigned.

  She rips again, then blows on the smarting flesh.

  To stay sane, I count the number of rips and think of England.

  After I survive a few more rounds, my tormentor says, “Now more sensitive area. Take a deep breath.”

  Wait a bloody sec—

  Aargh! The pain is so intense I inadvertently squeeze my legs shut, no doubt giving the mistress a flashback to her wrestling career.

  “Now look what you do,” she says when my legs come apart again. “You glue your vagine shut.”

  She’s right, and the process to undo the damage is probably the most humiliating thing I’ve ever experienced—including everything that’s just preceded it.

  “Try again?” the mistress asks when my mistake is finally undone.

  I take in a deep breath. “Do it.”

  She does.

  I yelp in pain and swear vengeance on Gia—but my legs stay apart this time.

  My yelp is less loud the next round, and even less the one after that. I wonder if I’ll reach subspace—a state of mind I read about in the context of BDSM. As the process continues, the subspace never materializes, so I desperately count the rips as I mentally draft a letter to whoever puts together the United Nations Convention against Torture—they clearly missed a technique.

  After a century of pain, the aesthetician stops.

  Dare I have hope? Is it finally over?

  “Get on all fours,” she orders.

  I furrow my eyebrows. “Pardon me?”

  “Doggy style,” she says with a deadpan expression. “I finish Brazilian.”

  Oh, well. In for a penny of indignities, in for a pound of humiliation. I get into the required position,
and hot wax is smeared around my bumhole for my troubles.

  Can this get any worse?

  Yep, sure can.

  Though the pain of the rip is less severe, her subsequent blowing on the spot is as close as I’ve ever come to someone blowing smoke up my butt—sans the smoke.

  On rip sixteen, she says she’s done.

  Sixteen? Not a prime. It’s going to drive me mad.

  No.

  Must let go.

  Can’t.

  Bugger. Am I really going to do this now?

  Seems like I am.

  Looking over my shoulder as I would at a lover mounting me, I ask, “Can you do one more strip?”

  She stares at me like the hair she’s just waxed has sprouted from my eyeballs. “Why?”

  “Please?” I sound like I’m begging, which no doubt cements her “kinkiest client ever” impression of me for good. “I’ll give you an extra tip.”

  With a slow headshake that clearly means “the shit I do to make money”, she applies a little bit more wax to my bumhole, then rips—but without blowing this time.

  That’s fair. I guess now she thinks things have gotten weird.

  Whatever. I got my seventeen rips, so I can leave.

  In hindsight, counting wasn’t the best idea.

  I swiftly dress and pay, then walk out of the place while pointedly ignoring Gia’s attempts to chat me up.

  “Let me buy you lunch,” Gia says after a few minutes of silent treatment. “You seem hangry.”

  She must feel very guilty indeed if she’s willing to part with cash—her magic career doesn’t pay all that well.

  Let’s see if I can call her bluff. “How about Nemo and Chips?” I ask, picking a restaurant near my place that I order from on the days I feel particularly thin and/or nostalgic for the UK. A place I happen to know she hates.

  “That fish and chips shop?” Gia asks with an eye roll.

  “At least it’s clean enough for you,” I say. “A-rating all the way.”

  She scoffs. “Yeah, like no one’s ever gotten food poisoning from fish. But sure, why not? Brits are famous for their delicious cuisine.”

  Despite the grumbling, she hails a cab and takes us there—a sign of just how guilty she must feel after my banshee shrieks.

  When we get a table at the place, I sip my tea and she guzzles her bottled water while giving me unsolicited advice for my upcoming “date”—advice I studiously ignore.