HOPE . . . because that's all there ever is.

by James Crow

  ‘I can’t wait to cream on it, hon.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Your beard.’

  ‘Cream?’

  She snuggles into him, takes his hand and presses it against a tit. ‘My creamy cum, when I ride your face, Petey. When you eat my pussy, yeah?’

  The penny drops and the dick in Pete’s pants wakes up. ‘Oh. Aye. Right.’

  ‘Give it a squeeze then?’

  Pete thinks she means his dick, but her hand is on his, on her tit, encouraging him to give it a squeeze.

  ‘I’m a squirter, you know,’ she says, then flinches when Pete squeezes her tit hard.

  He looks at her blankly.

  ‘A squirter, hon. You never seen a girl squirt?’

  Pete hasn’t a clue what she’s on about. ‘No.’

  ‘Did you ever even fuck a girl?’

  In his mind, Pete sees the butterfly folding around his cock, remembers the way it sucked him in. ‘Just the one,’ he says.

  She taps a fat finger off his nose. ‘I guess I’m gonna have to teach you a few things.’

  Pete smiles at this. ‘Aye. You will be mine.’ Those words again. They sound good, they bring a feeling of . . . satisfaction. ‘Mine,’ Pete says the word slowly. Saliva fills his mouth. He swallows it down and licks his lips.

  ‘I’m all yours, babe.’ Her lips touch to his, her fat tongue pushes into his mouth.

  Despite the cheesy taste, Pete kisses Sasha back and wonders if she has the meat to make another butterfly. Her hands are in his hair; his hands find her knotted pigtails. He takes one in each hand, tugs her head back. She yelps and there’s a sparkle in her piggy eyes.

  ‘You want to undress me and touch me all over, Pete. I can tell. I can hear your mouth watering.’

  Funnily enough, Pete hears it too. He swallows it down, gives her pigtails another jerk.

  Her eyes light up. She reaches for his crotch, squeezes. ‘You like tugging on my tails, Petey? I’d like to tug yours. You know, since that day I . . . that day I . . . milked you, I knew there was more to come, knew you’d love a bit of Sasha kink. I’ll do anything, Pete. Tell me what you want to do to me, babe. Go on, tell me.’

  Through his jeans her touch feels good. Pete’s beginning to believe she hasn’t seen the laptop. The greedy fucker went straight to the fridge to feed her fat fucking face. He needs to get her down to cabin 1. Pete smiles at the fat fuck.

  She strokes his cheek with her chubby fingers. ‘Tell me, Petey, what floats your boat?’

  Pete thinks of building cabins, laying pipes, constructing a spring-fed water system, ploughing new pathways with the digger.

  ‘Pete? I like a bit of pain, that’s what floats my little man in a boat. How ’bout you?’

  Pete pulls on her pigtails again, her head tilts back and she grimaces. He can see the hairs up her nose. He lets go, moves his hands to her fat neck. The bitch shudders and groans when he squeezes. He lets go, runs his hands down the front of her tee and she shudders again.

  ‘God you make me hot,’ she says. Panting now, she runs a hand up his jacket front. ‘Ever tried a golden shower, hon? I can piss for England. Or I can sit on your fist, elbow-deep, that’s a neat trick.’

  Her words aren’t really making sense. In his mind Pete sees her feet in the scoops, her legs spread wide, and Himself fucking her hard with His Greatness, a fuck so Supreme that He’ll split the cunt in two. ‘I just want to fuck you.’

  Her fat pink tongue rolls across her lips. ‘I’m game. Got any booze?’

  ‘Aye, shitloads.’

  Pete explains he has the perfect fuck-place, with a perfect bed, and all the booze she could want, oh, and nuts – lots of those fuckers.

  ‘I love nuts,’ she says. Of course she fucking does. She puts on the fur coat, hooks her spotty bag over an arm and holds out a chubby hand. ‘What are we waiting for, fuck-buddy?’

  2

  Ali was slaking her thirst at the sink when she heard George cry out. She refilled the tumbler and hurried to the bedroom. George was red, not just with blood on his face and down his neck and shoulders, but red with sweat, and probably rage. His pale eyes seemed to bulge from their sockets, as though the bang to the head had jolted them out of place. She threw the water in his face. George spluttered and spat. He tugged at the binds on his wrists and did the same with those at his ankles. ‘What did you do, Ali? What the fuck did you do?’

  She kneed onto the bed and straddled him once again. She rubbed her crotch back and forth over his. ‘I kept you, Georgie. Kept you from wherever it is you go.’

  ‘Kept me?’

  ‘Yes. You’re mine now. Mine.’

  ‘Untie me, Ali. My head hurts like a bastard.’

  A lump the size of an orange had grown behind his mashed ear. ‘You took a fall. That’s all. You’ll be fine.’

  He tugged at his binds again. ‘I didn’t fall. You fucking whacked me. Untie me now, Ali or so help me God I’ll–’

  She laughed and pressed her crotch against his flaccid cock. ‘Fuck me. Come on, love your wife like the devoted husband you are. Do your fucking duty.’

  He bucked, trying to unbalance her. ‘Where’s Bethany?’

  She ran her hands up his stomach and scratched at his nipples.

  ‘Where the hell’s Bethany?’ he bucked again.

  She slapped him, caught him full on his good ear. He screamed like a girl and spat a lump of blackened blood to his chest. ‘Georgie Porgie pudding and pie, leaves his girl and makes her cry. We need to make sweet love, Georgie Porgie.’

  He was breathing heavy now. ‘Untie me and I’ll fuck you.’

  ‘I’d rather we made love, George, but I guess that’s not your style.’ She straightened up and lifted her dress above her stomach. ‘Would you look at that, would you look at what you do to me.’

  His bulging eyes glared at her scarred flesh.

  ‘You bring me nothing but pain, Georgie. Nothing but shitty black miserable pain. And you don’t give a flying fuck, do you?’

  ‘Please, Ali. Please untie me. Please.’

  ‘Whine, whine, whine, whine, whine. Why? So you can piss off with your bitches and rob another fucking bank?’

  ‘I won’t go anywhere, I promise, I just want . . .’

  ‘What does diddums want? To love his wife? To respect his wife?’

  ‘I want to hold you, Ali. To make it all better. Please untie me. We’ll be okay.’

  She let the dress fall back over the scars. ‘Tell me what you really do when you disappear for days on end, and I might let you live.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You heard. I might let you live, Georgie Porgie.’

  He tugged at his binds again. Blood dribbled from his nose. ‘You know what I do, Ali, for Christ’s sake.’

  ‘For Christ’s sake? How about for my sake? For Beth’s sake? We don’t even come into it anymore, George. We don’t exist to you, and I’ve had enough!’

  ‘You’re wrong about that. You and Beth, you’re all that matters. Where is she?’

  Ali peeled the dress off over her head. ‘Every time I cut myself, I do it for you. Every time the itches come, they come because of you.’ She cupped her breasts. ‘I left these untouched – for you. Convince me you’re not a lying cheating bastard and I might leave them that way.’

  He stared at her, his right eye twitching. ‘You’re fucking mad. You’ve fucking flipped. Where the hell’s Bethany?’

  She reached to the bedside table for the razorblade, touched it against the flesh of her right breast, just above the nipple, then rocked the blade and the pain turned to joy and ran sweetly free. George glared as her blood ran over her nipple and dripped to his stomach.

  ‘Please stop this, Ali. Let me help. I’ll put things right. I really promise. I’ll do anything you want. Anything.’

  ‘You really promise? Do you realise how pathetic you sound?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Ali, sorry if I’ve hurt you. Please. I’ll do anything.’
r />   ‘Will you be mine?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘All mine? Just li’l old me?’

  ‘I will, Ali, now please, untie me, and we’ll sort this out.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘Ali, my head, it fucking hurts.’ His right eye twitched again, then went still. The eyeball seemed to look down, then stay there. ‘Can’t focus,’ he said.

  The lump behind his ear seemed to have grown a bit. But no matter. She waved the razorblade at his good eye. ‘I said, I don’t fucking believe you!’

  ‘I promise, Ali. Whatever it takes.’ He coughed and a clot of blood rolled down his chin.

  ‘Whatever it takes? YOU? All YOU do is give me fucking itches.’ She pressed the blade into her left breast and the itches scurried free.

  ‘Stop it, please, Ali. Stop this madness.’

  ‘Now you’re boring me. Fancy that.’ Another cut to the right breast, another to the left, another, another, another. To Ali there was no blood, only tiny spiders with scratching legs, pushing through the slits in her flesh and falling onto George in a trail of sweet release. She sighed and cut again, and again. Oh, the fucking joy!

  George’s scream for help brought her back. She dropped the blade onto his chest and slapped him. She felt under the pillow, found the knickers and scarf she’d hidden there, stuffed the knickers into his mouth and circled his head three times with the scarf before tying it tight over his mouth. George was grunting, bucking, seething. She leaned forward and hung her dripping breasts over his face and watched him squirm.

  ‘I’d hoped we’d make love, husband. But as per fucking usual you’re a bit tied up.’ She rubbed her bloodied breasts in his face. ‘This feeling, Georgie, of beautiful release, of the darkness leaving your body – your soul . . . you need to know what it feels like. I can give you that, my husband.’

  George was shaking his head, snorting bloody snot.

  ‘Sometimes, when the pain’s real bad, when you want to curl up and die and never take another breath, and you make that cut, and it’s deeper than before, it’s like an orgasm, Georgie . . . better than that, a heaven-sent orgasm.’ She sat back down on his crotch and stared off into space. This was her day, her time, nothing else mattered. Not even Bethany? Beth would be better off without her. She was sure of that. She picked up the razorblade from his chest. ‘This is the end, Georgie Porgie.’

  George’s chest heaved. He was crying.

  3

  When Elizabeth hugs her, Beth hugs her back with meaning. When Elizabeth plants a kiss on her lips, Beth kisses right back with added pressure, despite the sour-peach taste. When Elizabeth takes her hands, Beth squeezes her fingers and giggles. Her forced giggle sounds real. It is real, she thinks, before the wood spirit catches that thought.

  ‘I think you’re ready, Bethy,’ Elizabeth says over the sobbing of the younger Elizabeth crosslegged on the floor.

  ‘You do?’ Beth smiles high, tries to push the smile into her eyes, but it’s hard to keep her eyebrows up and not look at the butterfly lady on the wall.

  ‘Yes, Bethy, I truly do.’

  ‘Ready for what?’

  Elizabeth clasps her hands to her heart. ‘Oh, Bethy. Master is going to be so happy with me. And with you, too. This is a special day.’

  ‘It is?’

  Elizabeth nods excitedly. ‘I’ve a special memory. Really special. And I’m going to share it with you.’

  ‘Cooly-dooly!’ Beth says, eager to leave this memory, she offers up her hands. The wood spirit squeals with delight as she takes them. With her heart thudding, Beth puts herself on high alert.

  The butterfly wings on the wall behind the wood spirit’s head shimmer, fade then reappear. The sobs of the crosslegged child seem to stutter before starting up again. They haven’t yet left this awful room.

  Elizabeth is looking at her with questioning eyes. ‘Your heartbeat is unnaturally loud. Are you sick?’

  That’s one of those funny words. You can be ill sick. You can puke sick. And you can be sick of something, like being inside the wood spirit’s head. ‘I’m a little nervous, that’s all.’

  ‘Why would you be nervous? You should be grateful and eager to please, not nervous.’

  Beth hears Martin’s voice in her mind, stage fright. ‘I think I might . . . I think I might be stage frightened.’ No sooner are the words out than she realises playacting goes hand in hand with frightened stages. She pushes a silly laugh from her mouth and shakes the wood spirit’s hands, ‘I’m scared because I don’t want to mess things up for you. That’s all it is.’ Eyebrows high, she gives her best enthusiastic grin. ‘Can we?’

  The wood spirit grins back, the butterfly wings on the wall flutter away and the sobbing child stops sobbing.

  Grey walls thud heavily into place. Sunlight spears in through one small window illuminating a scene that makes Beth gasp.

  Master is sitting in a rocking chair by the fire with a book on his lap. Behind him stands Elizabeth. She looks exactly like she does now and she’s braiding Master’s hair. Both of them are naked.

  ‘Watch, Bethy. I’m braiding his hair one last time. Note how much care must be taken with each loop, each perfectly formed to sit well and relax in the best pattern. Not a hair out of place. Not a hair.’

  The naked Elizabeth picks up small scissors. She moves to Master’s side and snips at his beard.

  ‘Thirty-three snips,’ the wood spirit says. ‘No more, no less.’

  The naked Elizabeth massages Master’s shoulders and Master moans his pleasure.

  Beth averts her eyes as Master makes to stand. The rocker creaks. Beth fleetingly wonders how long she’s got to make her escape, and just how she’ll make it.

  ‘This is so . . . cooly-dooly,’ the wood spirit says with a giggle.

  ‘Cooly-dooly,’ Beth giggles back.

  Master and Elizabeth leave the room. The wood spirit pulls Beth along by the hand. The walls and tiled floor of the hallway are rainbowed from the stained-glass flowers above. They step through the front doors into sunlight and a nippy air. Master and Elizabeth stand hand in hand on dewy grass, embracing the chill, breathing it in.

  ‘Beautiful,’ the wood spirit says. ‘Can you feel it, Bethy?’

  ‘Yes,’ Beth says, although she can only feel the cold and it’s making her shiver.

  They follow the naked pair to the copse, where the pit’s handle is shiny and new, sparrows dance around them, and giant mushrooms spot the grass like upturned bowls. Master opens the hatch and crouches before it, Elizabeth at his shoulder. They both close their eyes and inhale deeply.

  Beth catches a nasty smell and blows it back out.

  ‘The rich soup of life, Bethy. We are each a part, each a fragment, each a tiny cogwheel in the ever-narrowing focus.’

  Master closes the hatch, stands tall and pulls Elizabeth to him; they embrace and Beth can feel their happiness. They follow the naked pair through the trees, accompanied by many sparrows; there’s even one on Elizabeth’s bare shoulder, its claws pricking red dots on her skin. They stop just before the yard and stare intently at rotting flowers and shrivelled heather.

  ‘Flowers are always more beautiful in death, don’t you think?’ the wood spirit says.

  Strangely, Beth agrees. ‘I do, I so do.’

  They enter the house through a side door and walk along a stone passage and through another door where steps lead down.

  Where now? Beth thinks.

  ‘To one of my favourite rooms,’ the wood spirit replies.

  As they descend the steps into darkness where the air smells fishy, Beth glimpses a face in the shadows – a woman, and there’s a big black dog by her side. In a blink the face has gone, but it’s a face she won’t forget: a smiling woman with short white hair. She had lots of teeth.

  4

  ‘That was fun.’ Carol stroked Bob’s hair.

  His head on her chest, Bob nodded.

  ‘Emotional, too, Bobby. Fantasies are good for t
he soul you know. We should do it more often.’ She ruffled his hair. ‘Takes two to tango.’ She laughed at that. ‘Thank you, Bobby. It was wonderful. You were wonderful. I’m sore, but it’s a nice sore.’ She sighed. ‘I didn’t mean to hit you. It’s just, I don’t know, I guess –’

  ‘Sorry, Caro. You made me think of Beth, and –’

  ‘I know. It’s okay.’

  Bob looked up at his Caro. ‘With Bethy, you know, there’s nothing to be jealous about, she’s –’

  Carol laughed. ‘Jealous? Is that what you think? Bob she’s a fucking kid and you drool over her.’

  ‘Drool?’

  ‘I’ve seen you. Seen the way you look at her.’

  ‘I look at Beth like she’s my own daughter – our daughter. I wouldn’t dream of – of anything else.’

  ‘Jealous,’ she said glumly then laughed again. ‘You pillock. I want another fuck.’ She pushed his head to her breasts, giving him a faceful of sequins. He nibbled at an erect nipple and Caro moaned.

  ‘Bobby?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘I’ve a fantasy, some role play. You up for it?’

  ‘Fair’s fair. Who would you like to screw?’

  After a few moments: ‘The halfwit.’

  ‘Peter?’

  ‘I think he’s a virgin.’

  ‘I don’t think he’s a halfwit.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘No. I think he’s gay.’

  ‘So what if he is, it’s only a fantasy, Bobby.’

  ‘You want to screw Peter the gay virgin? He’d be shit.’

  ‘Yes, but it wouldn’t be him, it would be you, wouldn’t it. You just have to act like him. I could make him scream,’ she added.

  ‘Not sure I could act like a halfwit.’

  ‘Yes, you could. I’d let the halfwit take me from behind. He’d come too quick and I’d get angry with him.’

  ‘Spank him?’

  ‘No, I’d slap the dumbfuck, make him cry, make him beg for my body.’

  ‘I don’t mind begging for your body. I like that idea.’

  ‘I’ve an even better idea.’ Fingers grasped his hair. ‘Bite me.’

  ‘Bite?’

  ‘My tit. Bite it, suck me a love bite. A big one. Draw me a picture and make it hurt. Come on, Bobby I’m horny as fucking hell.’