by Kate Messick
No god is a true god if it does not punish one for over-indulgence.
Sandy Yuhi
I wake up to a pounding at my front door. My eyes feel gritty and my mouth is beyond dry and tastes foul. The sounds of cooking are coming from my kitchen, it sounds like an army camp, each bang and chop shooting into my skull. I rub my eyes as a figure walks across my little studio to open the door.
“Who the fuck are you?” I hear Amorino’s voice bark.
“A friend. Who the fuck are you?” Is that Joe’s voice? I rub my eyes one more time, the world focusing a little more. I’m wearing a wrinkly shirt that doesn’t belong to me and my undergarments from the day before. My head pounds like there is an army of miners chipping away at it and my stomach gurgles with pain as I slowly stand.
“I am her boss. Sandy didn’t show up for work this morning, and we’re having an issue on site,” Amorino explains.
“She might be in this afternoon.” The anger leaves Joe’s voice, replaced with a polite tone. “She had a rough night. Do you want to leave the problem with me? And I can have her call you when she’s up?”
“Who are you again?” Amorino asks.
“I’ll be in this afternoon,” I raise my voice slightly. I can hear the croak in it. “I’m extremely hungover. Give me a few hours to unscramble my brain.”
“Coffee, in two,” Amorino demands.
I battle my hangover and make it to my front door. Joe opens it just enough that I can peek around his muscled form. Almost like a bodyguard. “Not interested,” I respond. “Joe, shut the door, please.”
“Wait,” Amorino says. “Are you safe?” He eyes Joe’s bulk.
I just start laughing. The laughter hurts my head. I stop and try to rub my brain. “Oww.” I wave to Amorino as Joe shuts the door the rest of the way.
Joe locks the deadbolt and turns to me. His military fatigues, riding low on his hips, and are wrinkled like he slept in them. His chest is only covered by a thin white undershirt. I knew he was built, but damn. Curly black chest hair rests on sculpted muscle, and a defined six pack melts into his low pant line. His face is rough with more than a day’s growth on his chin. He looks sexy as hell.
“Am I wearing your shirt?” I ask.
“You puked on yours,” he replies.
I feel heat rise to my cheeks. I don’t remember much of last night, but I remember a hand holding my hair as I worshiped the porcelain god, and a soft voice telling me it would all be ok. Did I talk to him about why I drank till I couldn’t think?
“I need a shower,” I say.
“Yeah, you do,” he agrees.
“Can you leave my apartment while I’m in the shower and we pretend this never happened?”
“Nope,” he answers with the shake of his head. “I already called in and took the day off.”
I don’t have an answer for that. I take a few aspirin and down a liter of water before stepping into the shower. The aspirin and water stay down for about two minutes before they are both donated to the porcelain god. I scrub everything there is to scrub, including my teeth. But when I emerge, wrapped in a towel, Joe is filling two of the pickle jars I use as cups with liquids out of a blender. Two more aspirin are waiting next to them.
“I made you my famous hangover cure,” he winks.
“I don’t own a blender,” I respond. “And I don’t know if I can keep anything down.”
“One step at a time,” Joe says. “One step at a time.”
“I’m sure whatever they need can wait until Monday,” Joe insists.
We pull up to the two pods that make up the headquarters of Amorino’s construction site. Joe drives a red Volkswagen Jetta. The interior is cream leather and very fancy. The engine doesn’t whine like my car, and I feel very out of place. Joe has his own shirt back on and I have on clean work attire. My head still throbs too much to touch my hair, and it falls limply around my shoulders.
“Devon sent me a text,” I say. “It really is work.”
“What else would it be?” Joe asks. I scowl at the seat of his car, unwilling to come to terms with myself, much less out loud to someone I just met a few weeks ago. I fucked up. God, I fucked up. And here Joe is, inserting himself into my life and making everything worse.
I don’t want to admit that I was loath to leave my apartment. After not being able to keep down the first half of his magical hangover cure, Joe and I sat on my bed and watched dumb reruns on my laptop. I woke, curled up in his arms. The rhythmic beating of his heart part of the reason I was able to fall asleep. I hate it that I want the feeling of strong arms around me. I hate men in general right now. Fuck. He’s married? Since when?
“I don’t even know why you’re going to work,” Joe presses. His takes his hand off his steering wheel and hooks the hair that is covering my face behind my ear. “I just spent the entire morning with you and I still don’t know a thing about you. I can get you whatever you need.” His voice is overly gentle, and a piece of me wants to lean into his shoulder. But it will just lead to hurt. I steel my heart.
“I do site inspection,” I say instead. “If they find something that isn’t right, I have to clear it before they can continue work. You really should just ask.” Before Joe can say anything more, I jump out of his car. Well, trip out of it, holding my head. “I can get a taxi …”
“Shut up and call me when you get off,” Joe demands. “I will come pick you up and we can go get your car.”
I slam his car door. Overbearing ass. He inserted himself into my life and is now bossing me around like a small child. I’m angry enough. I don’t need him adding to it. I give him the finger as he drives away. Childish, I know. But it feels good.
I stomp into Devon’s pod. The door bounces exactly like Amorino’s. I have timed this. Amorino is on his scheduled inspection.
“Devon,” I say when I see him seated at his desk.
He looks up, concern written on his wrinkled face. Unlike my work clothing that just get some mud on the bottoms from inspections, his are covered in stains, dirt, and years of hard work. “Did you get your oven turned off?”
I blink a few times before remembering the excuse I used to leave yesterday. “I did.”
“Is it going to stay off?” Devon asks.
I look at Devon. His green eyes are bright. “Did you know?”
Devon is quiet for a moment. “I had no idea that the oven was on,” he finally says. “But I know the man who built it, and sometimes when he’s building more than one at a time, it causes problems.”
“I would like some company on my site inspections from now on,” I say. “And I’m moving my desk into your pod.”
The locked doors, sex everywhere, but not at either one of our homes. I thought it was exciting and adventurous. It never once occurred to me that he wasn’t free to enjoy our adult activities. Amorino was just very thoroughly covering his tracks.
I’m beyond relieved when Devon pulls me into work and gives my mind something to focus on. I think of what Joe said earlier this morning and repeat it to myself. One step at a time.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Reality, Conor O'Neill's Pub
To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong.
— Joseph Chilton Pearce
Sandy Yuhi
“I had no idea our pub served lunch,” Dillon says.
We have both slid into the same booth we have used a few times now. It looks different during the day. The wood gleams with more red. I notice the plethora of black and white pictures of Ireland on the wall. Maybe I notice them too much, avoiding my problems again.
“How are you feeling?” Dillon asks me.
I wrinkle my nose and focus. Joe had said Dillon was at the Dark Pony too. “Much better. Thank you for showing up to help me. I’m sorry you had to see me like that.” I really am. Dillon makes me want to be a better person.
“It’s ok, like we have been talking about in our emails, experiences build character,” Dillon answe
rs. “I don’t want to admit it, but it was good that Joe showed up. I didn’t exactly know what to do to help you.”
“I don’t think anything would have really helped me,” I answer ruefully.
We both scan the menu and order.
“I don’t think drinking excessively is a good idea though,” Dillon says tentatively.
Although I agree with him, getting black-out drunk kept away my panic attack, and even if I’m still a little hungover two days later, emotionally, I feel more in control if still hurt. I don’t want to talk about it, but I let Dillon tell me more about his alcoholic uncle that ordered the hooker for him. I sprinkle in a few facts burned into my brain about the topic; it seems to calm him down. I have been slowly realizing that Dillon is really worried about me.
“I’m going to be ok,” I tell him. I squeeze his hand that’s resting on the table and Dillon flips it over and intertwines our fingers. “Experiences build character, right?” I repeat his earlier words.
He chuckles as our food arrives, releasing our hands. Dillon and I have talked about that for Nozomi’s back story a lot. Would I be a different Sandy now if I hadn’t found out about Amorino’s wife? Would I have grown up faster if Dad hadn’t died? Did I grow up faster because he did die? I feel like maybe when he died, I buried my head in the ground. Now, I see the world through a dirt-covered lens, always expecting the worst. Afraid of new things. And maybe that dirt isn’t what I want to see anymore. I need to stop making the same mistakes. My dad would be sad, I suddenly realize. He would want me to be loving everything and living life, as he did.
“If you need to talk about something,” Dillon’s words cut through my thoughts. “I’m here for you.”
“Do you think people can grow as adults?” I ask suddenly.
“It’s harder to change as you get older,” Dillon answers slowly. “But I would hope everyone is growing all the time. Are you ok, Sandy?”
I eat mechanically, my little world on its head. I want to open up to Dillon, I want to twine our fingers together again. A piece of me feels like talking to someone would make everything better. Dillon makes me want to trust. But I just can’t bring myself to do it.
“I’m fine,” I respond, my habit of avoiding my own personal life too ingrained.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Campaign, Poogses’ Country Estate, Room Five
The main means of fixed transportation between supernatural cities is magical doors. Unlike portals, they can go anywhere or nowhere. They can lead to the unimaginable or the mundane. Only under extreme circumstances should one ever enter without a guide.
Ruby (Lynda’s character)
As I cross the threshold of door number five, I find that we have stepped into what looks like a hospital. Greenish-white walls meet a slick, white tiled floor. We’re looking down a hall-way. Lamps are evenly spaced every few feet, hanging from the ceiling. Dark green doors, just as symmetrically spaced, seemed to go on forever.
“There isn’t much for me to scout,” Nozomi whispers.
I look behind us and our entry point has vanished, just like in room four. I hear the howl of a wolf in the distance. More than a wolf, it’s a werewolf. A lycanthrope. One of my unwanted brethren.
“This might be my room,” I whisper. Trixy, next to me, hesitates, but doesn’t answer. Even our whispers bounce around these walls, departing our mouths to be heard over and over again as they explore the hard surfaces.
“Short, concise communication.” Trixy clips her words as she speaks. The echoes still take them, but they bounce less.
“Door on left first,” Nozomi says, and before we can talk about it she opens it.
“So, we’re not checking for traps or looking at the door? Just going in?” Steven asks passive-aggressively.
I take a sip of wine. I don’t understand why D&D brings out the worst in my husband’s personality, but it does.
“What do we see?” Sandy asks Joe, as if Steven hadn’t spoken.
Sandy looks so tired. I don’t know her well. But no one should look that tired. What I find even more interesting is that Joe and Dillon both look overly worried about her. She’s struggling to meet Joe’s eye tonight and she pulled up early with Dillon in her car, obviously giving him a ride. I pull my attention back to the game as Joe describes the room.
Made of the same walls and floor as the hallway, It’s impossibly round. Seated in the center is a woman, her arms in a straitjacket. She rocks back and forth, her voice devoid of emotion as she rhymes:
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall,
All the King’s Horses and all the King’s men
Couldn’t put Humpty together again.
My skin crawls when she looks up at us. Her eyes are orange like our witches. I look over and see the witch in Goliath’s arms smiling, her eyes still closed. Her body is as still as death. The woman in the straitjacket opens her mouth, her jaw cracks as her head leans back. Her mouth opens impossibly wide as a scroll appears in her throat. Nozomi moves forward fearlessly and picks it up.
“I’m searching the room,” Trixy declares as she walks further in.
“Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.” Nozomi starts to read the scroll. “It’s just the rhyme again.” She passes the note around.
Trixy finds nothing else in the room, and we move onto the next. When Nozomi opens this door, the sharp smell of blood fills my nose, and we all slip and slide on what was a white floor, now covered with layers of thick cooling blood.
I feel Trixy gagging next to me. So much blood. It takes me a moment to realize that there are little channels in the walls, and blood is actually moving through them, collecting on the floor.
“What is this?” Goliath demands. No echoes happen here, the acoustics muted by the thick red layers.
“Is it human blood?” Strider asks quietly.
My senses have been so assaulted by the sheer enormity of it that I can’t tell. Nozomi might know, but she’s staying quiet, or is just as overwhelmed as me; It’s hard to tell.
“We need to search,” Strider says. He’s doing the best with the blood.
“Nozomi,” he says. “Search with me.”
“Gladly.” Nozomi reaches out a hand, steadying her frayed nerves with Strider’s confidence.
In our own time, each of us acclimates as much as possible and joins in. I move toward the middle of the room and slip. A scream catches in my throat as my hands and pants are coated in blood. “I don’t like this,” I pant. I try to pick myself up but slip again. Why am I slipping? Since being bitten, my balance has been impeccable.
“The floor isn’t flat!” I announce triumphantly. “I figured something out.”
“Great job, sweetie,” Steven says.
“Does Ruby also yell that?” Joe asks. “Remember, we want to stay in character as much as possible.”
“No, she doesn’t say that,” Steven answers for me.
“I quietly state my observation,” I add, giving Steven a frigid glare for answering for me.
It appears that the floor slopes down until it comes to a divot, two feet in diameter and we are guessing about 3 feet deep. Despite its depth, no one noticed before because the volume of blood made the floor look like a swimming pool.
“Nozomi, you have been so brave. You jump in.” Trixy’s voice is persuasive.
“That didn’t work out so well for her in room number four. Why don’t you jump, Trixy?” Strider quickly shoots back.
“Found a tongue today, have we?” Trixy laughs evilly.
Before Trixy or Strider can continue their argument, Nozomi jumps – or more so slides into the blood-filled divot. Nothing happens for a moment, and then suddenly, a resounding wet thud booms through the room and her body sinks up to her chest in the dark crimson liquid. The lights in the room dim. The hum of gears and moving parts rumble behind the plinks of a music box playing a creepy, toneless melody.
“I can f
eel the blood dripping down around me,” Nozomi says. She moves a bit. “But It’s not fast. I feel like we opened up a valve or a sieve.”
Body parts, I think to myself. My worst fear is losing control of my werewolf and waking up amongst the half-eaten organs of my innocent victims. I squeeze my eyes shut. Nozomi is fished out and she cleans off as best she can, her skirts caked with quickly drying blood. There seems to be nothing else for us in this room and we move on.
“Couldn’t put Humpty together again?” Strider asks per the final line of the rhyme.
“But what would have happened if they had?” Nozomi asks.
The two share a look and open the door to the next room.
I hold my breath and keep to the back, not wanting to see but not being able to stop myself. This room is shaped like an oval. Green and yellow acid drops from the ceiling. It doesn’t melt the soft, sticky, pink floor, but it burns if it touches us.
“I can’t hear music or moving parts,” Goliath points out. There are no echoes in this room either.
“Look for things out of place,” I say.
“What in this room is in place?” Nozomi asks.
“I think we’re in a stomach,” I answer. I can feel my arms start to shake.
There is silence for a moment.
Nozomi takes out a blood-crusted dagger and pokes the wall with it.
“Is this your fear, love?” Trixy asks.
I turn to the succubus and nod. Her eyes are understanding. I wrap my hands around myself to control my terror. Body parts: this is my fear.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Reality/Campaign, Joe’s House
Although it would seem like each D&D game is limited by the imagination of its Dungeon Master, in fact the opposite is true. The best games are guided by the DM but shaped by the players. Their input and choices spark creativity and emotion, truly evolving the game into its own universe.