“I am,” admitted Sandy in a rush her eyes all for me, which made Leda roll her own. She hadn’t changed. She was exactly the same as she’d been on the first day I had met her.
Ramona merely batted her eyes at me, saying, “I’d never turn down anything you were cooking up, Effy…”
I chuckled at the sexual innuendo and motioned for them to come inside.
Now, here I was, before the stove, spatula in hand with Sandy at my side – spatula in hers - helping me cook the eggs, bacon and ham, potatoes O’Brien and pancakes. We were toasting bread also, talking the whole time. Leda sat at the breakfast bar across from us, listening to our conversation, every now and again adding to it, her mood lightening as time passed. Ramona and Katie had moved to the dining room just passed the bar and Leda.
I glanced over at them from time to time. I could tell they were in a deep discussion, and I could pretty much divine what was their topic of choice – me. I was never a true master of extrapolation, but it was still easy to see they were engrossed over what was certain to be a very detailed retelling of the first-time fuck between Katie and me.
I felt my mouth twist to one side, wondering what they were saying. Were they comparing or making notes? Were they jealous or angry, or were they curious or interested? What did they think of me? Was I good in their eyes? I mean, I always figured I was a fairly decent screw, because I went out of my way to make sure my partner got off just as much as I did. I sort of prided myself on that, but still… us guys we never know, you know… especially with all of those chicks who claim they fake it most of the time. I was really hoping that neither of them had faked it. I wanted to be good enough to make their toes curl for real. What man wouldn’t want this for his girl, right? I mean, I was a little concerned. And why were their heads so close together? Why were they speaking in such low tones, their lips moving a mile a minute? Why?
“…like to cook, Estefan?” asked Sandy, breaking my concentration.
“What?” I asked, missing what she had said.
She smiled and shook her head ever so slightly, a small movement in fact, nearly imperceptible. “I asked you if you liked to cook.”
“Ah, sorry, my mind was elsewhere,” I replied, rolling my eyes up in my head and made myself look like a loon or something like that.
She huffed happily through her teeth.
When I stopped, I added: “Yes, I do actually. I like to see the pleased looks on people’s faces when they eat something I cooked particularly well. It makes me feel good to know that they enjoyed something that I created.”
“That’s kinda cool when you put it like that.” Sandy’s orbs sparkled as the concept settled into her mind.
I breathed a laugh. I grabbed the handle of the largest skillet and began to turn over the potatoes chunks intermixed with onions, bell peppers and a good dusting of seasoning. At my side Sandy, flipped an egg, and then tossed a look back toward Leda. “You’re an over easy kind of girl, right?”
“Yes ma’am,” she answered with a nod. “So, Estefan, you cook for all of your girlfriends?” she inquired a few moments later. Her left arm resting across her mid-section, she cupped the elbow of her other, supporting it. She placed her hand beneath her chin and tapped her fingers across her cheek.
She was being overly speculative as if she were fishing for something deeper, possibly more personal. Thus, I was careful. “Not just my girlfriends, Leda, I cook for my family members too, even for my extended family at barbecues and such.”
The tapping slowed. “But, the girls, they like it, don’t they?”
“I guess… unless I mess something up along the way. No one likes jacked-up food.” I shrugged and turned to face her more directly. “Why do you ask?”
She truly smiled, for the first time today, it reached all the way up to her dark eyes. I was amazed at difference. She was actually very pretty when she let her guard down and tossed aside the whole “I’m a bitch” attitude, but the tapping continued unabated. “I think you use this, your domestic side, to get them all worked up over you.” Her laugh was like water over smooth rocks, tumbling and rolling as it spewed forth.
Sandy giggled.
I shrugged anew. “Once again, if it comes out like crap, I don’t think anyone would be all worked up over me.”
“Yeah, but your good at cooking, so you don’t ‘mess’ up very often I bet. In a sense, it works just about every time. Am I right?” she continued to laugh with her chin jutting out before her.
“I don’t know…,” was about all I could say to that.
“It does, I mean look at what it’s doing to Sandy. She’s about half-way decided whether or not she should jump your bones, and I don’t think it matters all that much that you’re taken,” said the dark haired girl, pointing at her friend.
What a bitch! I thought as I watched Sandy’s expression melt into complete ignominy.
“Leda!!!” she exclaimed, getting both Katie’s and Ramona’s attention.
“What?” replied Leda with fake incense. “You know you’ve always liked the guy. It’s just that Ramona got dibs, so you’ve laid low. Right? Come one, girl, admit it.”
“God, Leda, you can be such a hag when you really want to be. Is that why you came with us today, so that you could try and make a fool out of me in front of everyone?!?” Sandy stomped her foot, spun about and placed the spatula on the countertop next to the stove. She stalked off toward the TV Room without another word.
Ramona went from the dining table after Sandy, scowling at Leda as she passed her. “That was fucked up,” was all she said. Then, she was out of the room too.
Leda placed her hands to either side of her, palms up, silently asking what she had done wrong. Her eyes fell back on me. “She does like you. I wasn’t like I was lying or anything, or putting anything out of context, for that matter.”
Sandy likes me? After all this time, she still likes me? How come I hadn’t seen this before?
“It was sort of mean, though,” piped in Katie as she walked pass the breakfast bar and made her way to me. She actually picked up the spatula Sandy had been using and began to help. Whoa, Katie must be really sick in the head to actually be helping!!! Better call an ambulance, and fast!
Leda tilted her head toward the doorway her friend had stormed through. “Yeah, maybe… I just couldn’t take the way she was mooning over your cousin, all girlie and cute. It was disgusting.”
“Why, not everyone is as cold and shut off as you,” I blurted out before I knew what I was saying.
Leda’s usual glower returned in an instant.
I could feel Katie’s gaze on my cheek, red hot and searing.
I didn’t care, what Leda had done was cruel.
“You’re an idiot, Estefan,” she began with a level tone, but her eyes were twin shards of glowing coal. “You’re so caught up in pussy, you can’t even think straight.”
“And you’re so far up your boyfriend’s ass, you’re as fucking blind as bitch in heat,” I countered almost upon the heels of the last syllable she had spoken. My proverbial dander was on the rise.
Where the fuck was this shit coming from? I am never able to be this direct and on the fly.
Beside me, Katie rested a hand upon my forearm – softly, but firm. She was telling me without speaking, I was walking a very fine line.
“Oh god, I don’t know what any of them see in you, you god damned man-whore!” yelled Leda before she scooted off the stool. She walked through the dining room and out the far door toward the front of the house.
I watched her go, not really sure what to feel. I know what I had said smacked of the truth. Maybe my delivery of it had been a little harsh. Maybe I could have tempered it better or tried a more delicate approach, but thoughts of that nature vanished in the next second when Sandy walked through the door. Her face was splotched with red, and her eyes bloodshot from crying. Ramona was a half-step behind her, using both of her hands, clutched at Sandy’s elbows, to urge the girl forwar
d. Sandy looked hesitant and wary.
Fuck you, Leda! You deserved it!
An awkward silence befell us all, only the sounds of the cooking food reaching our ears, which sprung me from my stupor and I began to attend to the food, so nothing burnt.
“Effy, I am sorry about Leda,” apologized my girlfriend as I removed the eggs Sandy had been cooking and deftly plopped it on a nearby plate. “You know she can be unpredictably difficult at times.”
“I’m not the one that needs to be apologized to. Sandy is the one who deserves it,” I responded, looking at the group of girls in general. But my sight settled upon the light brown hues comprising Sandy’s hair and eyes, her delicate v-shaped chin and the overarching “tiny” features of her face.
Man, I was totally surrounded by fucking HOT chicks that day!
[He almost ejects from the program, but realizes his mistake, calms down, and the memory stream continues.]
“You, Ok?” I asked her, my voice much more quiet than before.
She merely nodded. Her eyes were big as a deer’s in the headlights of an oncoming truck. She had no idea what to do next.
“Hey Katie,” began Ramona, which sort of startled me, because it was the last thing I would have expected her to say, “Let’s go finish our talk.” Her eyes met mine and a half-smile etched one side of her mouth.
I was about to think, you darned girls are going to talk about me again, aren’t you?, when something more subtle registered in her cast of her orbs. This wasn’t about their conversation they’d been carrying on earlier. This was something else.
Katie glanced from Ramona to me a few times, her brow bunched in question. She seemed to slowly understand something – something that completely eluded me. She handed the spatula back to Sandy, who took it reluctantly. “Ok, let’s continue,” was all she said and walked out of the kitchen with Ramona toward the TV room, or so I assumed.
Sandy hardly moved, holding the cooking utensil before her like it was some sort of burning brand. I peered at her stupidly, because I had no clue what had just happened. I was forced to turn back to the stove to attend to the food yet again.
“You have the coolest girlfriend ever, Estefan,” said Sandy mouse-like and faint.
“How do you figure?” I asked without looking at her, concentrating on not spilling the potatoes all over the top of the range.
“Because…,” was all she said, sounding so much like a third grader.
I stopped what I was doing to gaze at her.
She appeared on the verge of tears again.
I didn’t say anything, thinking it inappropriate to speak at the time. Why was she so close to losing it, though? I raised my eyebrows, urging her to continue.
“Because she told me to tell the truth and I am like so amazed she would even say something like - .” she was answering me… when…
…From the front of the house - we both heard a gasp. A second later, a series of ferocious gaging sounds and then a solid Thump! as if something large had hit the floor.
We shared a surprised look, then came more gurgling rasps and a strangled call for help. It hit me!
Leda was sick! What had happened to Katie and me was now happening to her!
I quickly turned off the burners of the stove and grabbed Sandy’s hand. “Come on! Leda is sick!” I commanded, dragging her in my wake.
She came like an automaton, but all of that changed when we reached Leda and saw her lying on her side, on the floor, puke flowing from her mouth like a river.
Sandy screamed, “Leda!!!” She shook free from my grasp and went to the aid of her longtime friend.
That was when Katie and Ramona came bounding through the house.
Whatever this sickness was, it was spreading, and doing so at an alarming rate.
~~~~~~~~~~~~♦~~~~~~~~~~~~
~ Chapter 29 ~
(Summer – 2018)
Demonstration
I stood and watched her from the other side of the bed. Sandy was sitting next to her. Both Ramona and Katie had taken up posts at the foot of the bed. We were all in the Loft, concern plain upon our faces over the girl lying before us. Katie was supposed to be using this bed, but had yet to sleep in it. Leda had beaten her to it. She lay propped up by a number of pillows. Her eyes closed, her upper body swathed in towels, under which she wore only her bra. Her black t-shirt had so much vomit on it; we had to get her out of it. It positively reeked.
Of course, I hadn’t seen any of the disrobing. The moment they had ascertained her t-shirt was a definite casualty, the others had ushered me out of the foyer where we’d found lying in her own chunks. I had gone back into the kitchen to put the food in various plastic containers, stacking it all quite neatly in the microwave, so we could eat it later. It was a few minutes after when Ramona had come into the kitchen and asked me to carry Leda up to the Loft. By the time I’d laid eyes upon the sick girl, she was thoroughly wrapped in the towels from the downstairs bathroom.
She was small in stature, so picking her up and walking her up the two flights of stairs to the third floor was easy enough. She had even - rather listlessly - put her arms around my neck and rested her head upon my chest, moaning with stomach cramps that were all too familiar. I had placed her upon the heretofore unused bed. Ramona and Sandy had piled the pillows behind her to prop her up. Katie had come from the bathroom with a damp wash cloth and handed it to Sandy.
“Here this seemed to help me when I got it a few hours ago,” Katie had said. I recalled I had used the very same piece of fabric on Katie when I was putting her back together after she had spewed all over the bathtub.
Sandy had taken it and began to wipe down the face of her recalcitrant friend.
“W-what the h-h-hell happened…?” A pause, a swallow, “Oh god, my throat feels like shit,” commented Leda, breaking my train of thought.
“She needs to drink something,” I concluded.
Katie trotted back into the bathroom without a word.
Leda peered up at Sandy, her face bunched with the aches still coursing through her. There was an undertone of worry, carried mostly in her eyes. “What’s going on?”
Katie came back from the bathroom with a glass full of water, edging around me, her hand extending the cup toward the supine teenager. “I think,” began my cousin, once Leda had taken the water from her and took a tentative sip,” you just experienced what Effy and I did a few hours ago.”
“…And what is that?” inquired Sandy from the other side of the bed, her body half turned at the waist, so she could face Katie more squarely.
“It feels like nothing more than an acute bout of nausea at first, but, within seconds, overwhelms you. Before you can really understand what’s going on you’re barfing your guts out, so violently you almost can’t stand - ,” I supplied, but Leda cut in.
“I couldn’t even do that. I was on my ass in seconds, it came up so quickly.”
“Babe, you make it sound like there is more to it,” nudged Ramona, knowing me well enough to know I hadn’t finished my explanation of the sickness.
I shrugged, trying to find some clear way to convey the changes I felt within the first hour of being sick. I let my eyes drift toward Katie who had been there, and had… “I feel different than I did before I got sick,” I tried, though I was fairly certain, I had fallen short of outlining it properly. It was difficult to conceptualize; speaking about it was even harder.
“How?” Now Sandy’s face bunched in question.
“I can…how do you say…?” I was lost for the correct words.
“There is something he can do now, something he couldn’t do before he was sick,” interjected Katie, before I could finish my thought. “Or maybe he could, but not with the incredible strength he can do so now.” She smiled unevenly, knowing she hadn’t made much sense to the others.
Everyone in the Loft went silent, unmoving, except for their heads, which all swiveled toward me.
I ginned crookedly, though I didn’t feel a
n inkling of humor within. I felt like an ameba under a microscope with so many sets of female eyes staring in my direction.
The silence stretched.
Leda took another deep drink of water and cleared her throat, which seemed to spring the question each of them had boiling near the varied surfaces of their brains. Out of some feminine pecking order that I couldn’t discern, it was left to Ramona to ask.
“What can you do, Estefan?”
I winced, abashed. “I’m not entirely sure; because the experience for me is dramatically different for those around me. I can’t say with any real degree of certainty what it is I do exactly. I only know the result.”
Both Sandy and Ramona moved to speak, but Katie beat them both to the punch. “It will be very difficult for Estefan to explain it properly, because it’s not just an obscure sort of ability. It is… well, it’s sort of personal – very personal, in fact.”
Ramona tilted her head. Her natural instincts already giving her an idea of where the conversation was headed, but it was Leda – of all people – who asked: “What do you mean - personal.”
Katie internalized her embarrassment and glanced my way, then let her gaze linger, her lips twisting with reluctance. “It’s sexual…,” she murmured just loud enough for all of us to hear.
Though my vision was locked on Katie, but I could feel Ramona’s eyes burning into the side of my face. Sandy and Leda shared an awkward look. Both of them seemed unsure of how to interpret what my cousin had just stated, especially the context, which – being female – they began to extrapolate instantaneously. She was, after all, my cousin and they both knew what the implications were behind her words.
“What… or how do you know it is sexual?” asked Ramona of Katie, crossing her arms under her breasts, though she didn’t seem angry or even annoyed, merely intensely curious.
Yeah, I know she was walking along a knife’s edge, but she was, otherwise, holding it together.
Katie shuffled her feet, so she was facing my girlfriend, a thoughtful sort of cast to her face. “Believe me, it is…,” she trailed off, and then seemed to realize there were others in the room as well. “I mean, it felt that way. It was very strong, very powerful and we’re related, and even then, the pull was pretty incredible.”
Shadow Seed 1: The Misbegotten Page 36