Periphery

by Lynne Jamneck

  They looked up at the first sound of the guitar. I had crawled over to where Glory lay, and slid the Walker from her hands to cradle it in my lap. I had no pick and just used my fingernails to strike a chord, the first of a descending series starting up on the neck and working my way down until it felt right. From there, I fell naturally into a minor key riff, alternating the strum with finger picking.

  I could almost hear the parts that would go along with it, a cello, with a deep, rich bowed voice, and hand drums, a doumbek maybe. I kept playing. There were no words. I didn’t know what to tell them, what I wanted to say about her or me or my life. I just kept playing.

  But eventually the song came to a close, as it cycled down and my energy flagged. When I finished, I saw they were both crying. I laid the guitar aside and went to them, and hugged them.

  Exactly how that turned into me kissing Calla, I’m not sure. Her mouth was hot in mine, her cheeks wet and scarlet. Her breath came fast and hard. My hands traveled down her sides, over her hips. I felt her weight shift, as she reached out to Basil. Then she was kissing her, too, and in the back of my head I tried to pause. I had done many wild sexual things since leaving my quiet life on the moon. Some of them had been with Glory, some not. But I did not know what Basil had under her jeans and to some part of me that mattered.

  The Spark did not much care for my squeamishness. The pang of fear I felt transmuted into thrill, and then my attention went back to Calla and I felt desire flare. I pulled her toward me, Basil trailing along like the caboose, onto the smooth, hospital-cornered bed. I began peeling off the clothes she had just put on. Basil took her other side, and very shortly Calla was naked there on the coverlet between us. Basil and I exchanged a look, then each of us took a nipple in our mouths and Calla gasped. In perfect harmony, we each slid a hand up the inside of her legs, teasing her. Then Basil’s fingers cupped over her mons, her labia, and then spread, opening her for me. I used the tip of my index finger to skim the cream from the edge of her vaginal opening, spreading it liberally around her clit. She moaned. I continued to move gently, my touch light, until she ground her hips upward toward my hand. But she could not move much, as Basil and I kept sucking her nipples, and I lifted my hand away from her.

  She whimpered and Basil chuckled low in her throat in response. I played with her lightly until she bucked again and this time I let her impale herself on my fingers, my index and middle fingers curving into her, my thumb extended over Basil’s hand and then sliding between her fingers to where her clit swelled. One of her hands clutched at Basil’s jeans and I gave her a little nod. I had her cunt to myself then, and I took the opportunity to position myself there, my cheeks between her thighs. But as I licked her with long strokes, at first softly but then with urgent energy as her voice rose to a wail, I had one eye fixed on Basil. Under the jeans she had plain white briefs, with a noticeable bulge. My stomach tightened. Then she slipped those off, too, and I almost laughed with my tongue plastered in Calla’s cunt. Basil’s protuberance was a technocock of some sort, form fitted and wired to her nervous system, rising rapidly in response to the arousal signals her brain was sending. The skin was imbedded not only with millions of nanosensors, but with accompanying lightglow effects. Right now the base was a deep red but the tip was glowing white like an iron left in the fire.

  Calla tugged at Basil’s brightly colored cock then and silenced herself as she pulled the slender machine into her mouth.

  Baz gasped and steadied herself on the bed with one hand as Calla’s tongue worked. It felt to me like I was licking her, too, as if somehow, through Calla, Basil’s cock and my tongue were connecting. “Kee-rist…” she breathed, the only one of the three of us whose mouth was not busy, and yet she could barely speak. “Wow…it’s…”

  Calla paused to grin up at her. “Is it as good as they say?”

  Basil nodded, then must have read the questions in my eyes. “It’s new. She…paid for it.” And that was all she could say as Calla’s mouth went back to work. It made sense now, the way she kept expecting Glory to invite her to bed. I felt Calla’s clit spasm under my tongue and knew she was close to coming. I increased my pressure and she came while Basil thrust into her mouth, into the fleshy side of her cheek where I saw it bulge. Then I closed my eyes and concentrated on making her come once more, two fingers spiraling in and out of her while my mouth drew her clit in and I clicked my tongue on it. She rewarded me quickly, wailing again as Basil popped free.

  I sat up and Calla looked at me, pleadingly, both of them did, and it was easy to see she wanted more of the technocock. Basil and she giggled a bit as we swapped positions, and I shifted around until Calla was sitting up, her back against my chest like two kids on a gravity toboggan. I reached around with my hands to brush her nipples and she arched just as Basil thrust in. Soon she had established a rhythm, and I let the waves of sensation come through her body and into my own cunt. I had tucked my head next to hers and she could turn her head to kiss me on the lips. I closed my eyes and kissed her and rode the wave of Basil’s backbeat for a while. Then she broke away and kissed her, too.

  I was startled out of my reverie then by Baz’s lips on mine, her tongue searching urgently for something in my mouth. The Spark flared up to meet her hungrily. And then somehow she was climbing past Calla, and the two of them together climbed onto me. Calla lay along one side, kissing my neck and stroking me from breast to the top of my bush, while Basil crushed the erect technocock into the crook of my hip with her body.

  “Luna,” she whispered, her throat tightened by desire. “Luna.” I quivered under her, the echo of the shivering fit I’d had before starting again. I knew if I paused too long… I knew I didn’t want to pause too long. Glory and I had played with dildos, the low-tech kind, from time to time—she liked sticking things into my cunt as a way to prove she was in charge—but never anything like this and not in a long time. I crooked one knee up and there was the tool, now glowing blue and green and casting an undersea look on Basil’s face, bumping up against the flesh between my legs. It had looked so slim before as she had pumped Calla’s mouth, but now I wondered if it would hurt when she put it in. I clutched at her sweaty back with one arm, the one that wasn’t trapped by Calla, craving it and fearing it all at the same time, which only stoked the Spark hotter. Calla’s free hand then, it had to be, reached between my legs and opened me wide, and Basil thrust upward through the slippery juices, then she adjusted her angle and sank into me.

  I cried out, not from physical pain but from the sudden memory of the shape of Glory’s hand stuffed into me. Basil’s technocock was nothing like that, conveniently shaped for pleasure but not the rock heart that her fist had been.

  Calla moved then, letting Basil push my knees up, and straddled my face. I licked at her between gasps as she dug her fingers between our bodies to get at my clit. She soon had the loose skin of my labia and bush stretched up taut toward my belly with one hand while the other jabbed in double time over the hard nub. Basil’s thrusts mashed her hand even harder into me and I thrashed my head from side to side. “Harder,” I said through clenched teeth. My body wanted violence, needed it to break through the tense wall of pain that separated me from them. The wall that Glory’s death had erected.

  No, I realized. The wall that Glory and I had built bit by bit over the last few years. Basil and Calla obliged, fucking me and frigging me as hard as they could, until I felt the edge of her finger claw over my clit. “Yes!” She crooked her finger more and I bucked hard against her, Basil now the one along for the ride. The orgasm seemed to radiate along my skin as well as through my insides, doubling back and cresting for a second time as they continued their motions until I went limp.

  I was amazed that Basil had not come, but what did I know about how the technology worked? Maybe she had a way to turn it down. She pulled out of me, the tool glistening wet and now throbbing a deep purple, and Calla nearly leapt upon it. Baz obliged, falling onto her back and letting Calla sea
t herself with the cock deep inside. She moaned and fell forward for a moment, then sat up erect. Now I could again circle her with my arms and get my fingers onto her clit and nipples.

  I don’t know how long it was before she succeeded in making Basil come. All sense of time had long since fled. The three of us were just in a groove, where she would peak, then I would, using my own fingers when I had to, until eventually she arched and cried out and gripped her by the hips for two last thrusts that set Basil finally into a spasm, while I thrust my own fingers into my empty vagina, trying to remember what Glory’s calluses had felt like.

  The two of them were then on me again quickly, Calla burying her face in my muff while Basil hugged me from behind. Then, as Calla drew another orgasm out of me, as I beat my palms on the coverlet, I shouted “Enough, enough!”

  They fell away from me as the sensation ebbed. There weren’t many cases, but there were a few, where people were fucked to death. The Spark can burn out a host, too. It was time to get it back under control.

  I think it was some time later that I began to speak. I’m not sure if I blacked out or not, but when I came to, they were still there. The three of us were lying on top of the bed and I had no way of knowing if we’d been there for a minute or an hour. “We’re going to play tonight,” I said.

  “What?” Basil sat up at the sound of my voice and rubbed her eyes.

  “We’re going to play tonight. A tribute concert for her. Just like we did here. Improvisational, cooperative.” Not like anything we’d done before. As I described it to them, I could see the idea catching fire, the memory of the song I had played stirring faintly. “And there’s something else I have to tell you.” And I told them, about the Spark, about Saffron, about Glory, Rose and Nura, and all I knew. “I’m sorry,” I said as I finished. “I should have told you before. For some it becomes a curse.” I looked at Glory, still lying in state on the low table. “But it is a gift, too.”

  In response, they came and kissed me, both together. I already had the sound in my head of the music we could make together.

  *

  CT: The inspiration for “The Spark” came to me many years ago, over a decade ago, in fact. It was one of those idea stories, where the concept of “what if all those classic rock and roll deaths were related?” just sort of hit me. I don’t remember if I was watching MTV at the time or what. Why I took that idea and married it together with a rock band on a space station, I don’t know, that’s just the way my brain works. I wrote about half the story then and just didn’t know where it was going. I tried to take it in a non-erotic direction for a while and it simply did not work. Then as soon as I gave in to the erotic impulse, the sex pretty much wrote itself.

  Sideways

  (Excerpt from forthcoming novel, Compostable)

  By Sharon Wachsler

  I’m bringing Coleman in from the backyard when the phone rings. I toss the slobber-covered ball into Coleman’s crate and hit “pickup” on the kitchen counter. Serena’s face pops into view. The clock shows it’s only 2:30. Why’s she calling mid-afternoon? She always checks in at the end of her day, on her way home. I see the car’s red vinyl interior and the road slipping away behind her in the rear window, so I know she’s driving, but this definitely isn’t her usual “Honey, I’m almost home” call. Her face is splotchy. One of her cheeks is smeared with mascara.

  “…stole my cameras!… All my equipment!” Her voice is a high-pitched, raspy whisper. “…the Rev leering…perfect shot! And what am I gonna…”

  I can’t understand a fucking thing. The TV’s on too loud. “Hold on, honey! Hold on!” I shout.

  I’ve been feeding mindlessly on the primary results all day. It’s all pseudo-news—pureed and strained of any real content until it’s the informative equivalent of wood pulp. I’m zombified as hell. As I search for the remote, I feel a wave of relief that I can turn my attention to something other than the goddamn election. A trickle of guilt follows in its path—my first response to my lover seeking help in a crisis is relief? Even the boredom and anxiety that the primaries inspire can’t justify that. The only thing I’ve gleaned is that somebody stole Rena’s equipment—her passion, our livelihood, and our best chance at finding a chink in the armor of the CFR/Green party. I shiver.

  Serena is still gasping incoherently when, next to my half-eaten breakfast omelet, I finally find the TV remote and click “off.” The glimmering eyes and teeth of CFR/Green winner Reverend Edward Barns disappear from the screen.

  “What would you have done?” Rena is hyperventilating, which explains why I couldn’t hear her and why she sounds so unlike her usual klaxon self. I’ve gotta take charge.

  “Honey, please, pull over. Just pull the car over onto the shoulder. We’ll talk when you can get the words out. I’m not going anywhere.” Oh, how true this last bit is.

  “Oh-oh-kay-ay, oh-oh-kay-ay,” she gasps.

  “Take a few deep breaths, sweetie. In and out, in and out.” I’m using my mellow, ultra-cool tone with her—the tone that, when we’re fighting, she hates, but when I’m fucking her, she loves. It’s my “I’m in control here, so relax” vibe. Right now it seems to be working. The cars behind her slip out of sight as she eases into the breakdown lane.

  “That’s good, babe. We don’t need you splattered all over the highway just because some light-fingered asshole fucked up—” I almost say “your career” but instead slip into neutral and end with, “your, uh, day.”

  “It’s not just my day, Sis! This is serious shit. I mean, you know better than anyone.” She snuffles and runs a pale hand across her nose.

  “I know. I know,” I soothe. “Just turn off the engine.”

  She does so, grumbling, “Yeah, yeah,” and slumps against the seat, eyes closed. Then she looks up at me in the screen and bursts into tears.

  “I can’t—I can’t believe it!” Serena cries, rocking in and out of view. “I was right there. Right there, Sis, like, ten feet from the guy. With my zooms and overheads in place I could see every pubic hair, hear every whisper. He had the other guy’s dick in his hand—just about to open his mouth—he was even kneeling, for Chrissake. It was perfect, the CFR candidate about to suck off this—, this—” her voice slows and she purses her mouth. “Actually, hon, I don’t know who the blond schlong was. I’m gonna be googling all night. Boyfriend? Pool boy? Intern? For all I know the wife likes to watch.”

  “So, what actually happened?” I am tapping my fingers on my armrest, keeping it cool. Serena is not big on getting right to the point.

  “Oh yeah. So the light’s perfect, zooms, hovers, audio—I’m filling a chip and ready with more—when this asshole comes out of nowhere and grabs my bag off my shoulder and tries to run off with it!” Serena gropes around the passenger seat for a bag of mini candy bars. She tears each little wrapper open and eats them one right after the other, chewing savagely. “He musta thought it was my purse or some shit. Any bozo could tell there’s hundreds of thousands of dollars of cams and peripherals doing their thing, but he probably thought I was just some star-fucker trying to get in to see Mr. Next Elected and that’s why I’m crouching in the bushes. Who knows? Anyway, he grabs, I’ve got the strap around me, and I’m pulling back so I end up on the ground, rolling, if you can believe it—” She shakes her head ruefully, “Must be some great pics of me on that chip—in the grass, kicking. Ha.” She tries to gurgle out a laugh, but sobs instead. “I didn’t want to pull too hard because I still had an analog around my neck and I didn’t want to wreck that, too. But my strap broke and he ran. I was just in shock. I kept thinking, ‘How am I gonna get it back?’ I totally forgot why I was there. I was such a wuss, Sis.”

  Rena presses her palms into her eyes, her slim arms shaking. I notice patches of green grass and brown mud stains on her cream silk shirt. “If I’d just acted like the professional I’m supposed to be I woulda let go of the strap and just shot what I had with the antique cam and the hell with the rest! But by the time I
realize I’ve still got the analog and the better part of a roll, Barns or his ‘friend,’” Rena sneers the last word, caramel showing on her front teeth, “musta heard something because they decided to shut the drapes.”

  “Was everything…?” I start, but Serena cuts me off.

  “Yeah. All my cams and the chips I shot earlier, peripherals, slide-pods—all of it but the vintage cam—oh, and its tripod. That was in the car. I like to have the analog stuff along in case a story comes up where that grainy, old-timey look gives it an edge. Why didn’t I let him take the fucking bag, you know? If I’d shot the dinosaur instead I’d have made enough to replace it all three times over! Ow!” she yelps, jumping in her seat. “Fuckin’ Christ on a shit-wheel. I bit my goddamn cheek. Sis, I’m bleeding. Look.” She holds up her shutter finger, smeared with chocolate and caramel and blood.

  “Hon, I am so sorry. This really, really sucks,” I croon. “But can’t you go back? Borrow some equipment? You know this can’t be the first time. I mean, shit—Ted Barns, fellatin’ for Christ. Your career, yeah, but also, the election. No way Christians for Fiscal Responsibility’s gonna get anyone else in shape to run by November, Green coalition or not.”

  “I know, I know,” Rena groans, running her clawlike nails—now sucked clean—through her black hair. “Do you think I haven’t thought of that? Do I need your extra pressure right now?” she glares. “I’m in just as deep with NDY as you are. I’ve got just as much riding on nixing ERTD as you.”

  No, I think, you don’t. You’re not a “compostable.” It’s not you they want to “return to the Earth.” Not that I’d want her to be in my position; the idea gives me goose bumps. With the new powers afforded the Environmental and Medical Hygiene Agency and its “Medical Detention Act,” it certainly doesn’t take much these days for someone to get reclassified from “productive and normal” into potential compostable. Still, sometimes I think she believes we’re on the same page when actually she’s about two chapters back.