Everything was going to be ok. I sagged in relief. Sandy could take down the training circle, I’d give everyone big hugs, and then I was hitting the sack.
“I can see you,” I told Sandy. “I can really see you. Oh, this is so nice.”
“Good.” Sandy looked relieved. I’m sure this was hard on her too. “Are you ready for me to take down the circle?”
I nodded and she went to the wall and touched the rune.
The circle collapsed, the walls vanished, and the darkness pounced.
I saw red glowing eyes as the room filled with rolling smoke. It wrapped around me, hoisted me into the air, and I slammed against the ceiling.
I heard Annabeth scream as it reversed course and I slammed against the floor.
John jumped on me to hold me down, and my newly healed bones did some hollering of their own.
The smoky ropes tried to haul me around some more, but with John holding on I wasn’t as easy to move.
The ropes morphed into something man shaped, with two pits of darkness where his eyes should be. His arms ended in sledgehammers and he began beating on John, trying to get him to move.
John just turtled over the top of me and held on. I could feel the vibrations of the hammers through his body.
Sandy cast a spell, but it went right through him and exploded the furniture behind.
Annabeth cast something and the room was filled with a deep bass tone. The effect was so powerful I could feel it in my teeth.
The smoke lost cohesion and the man thing staggered around the room. Then the spell ran out and the smoke man reformed. He rushed Annabeth and knocked her across the room. She hit the wall and stayed down.
He reformed in Sandy’s direction and rushed her next. She dove to the side, rolled to her feet, and kept going. Sandy was obviously no stranger to battle. Instead of casting more spells, though, she began banging on the walls and yelling “Help us” at the top of her voice.
The smoke man chased her, and he was quick. Really quick. It helped that he didn’t have to step around anything. His smoky form just flowed over any obstacles.
When he caught Sandy, his smoky form enveloped her for a moment and she dropped to the ground.
John surged to his feet with a roar and grabbed the coffee table. I thought he was going to throw it at the Smoke Man, which wouldn’t have done smoky any harm. Instead he started waving it like a large fan, trying to create a wind that would blow the smoke away.
Coffee tables are heavy, but John was waving it like it was made of paper. I knew John was strong but this was insane.
His idea sort of worked. Smoke Man tried to close with him more than once but the coffee table kept destroying his cohesion. So, it ended up being a stalemate. John couldn’t harm smoky and he couldn’t harm John.
The stalemate didn’t last for long. Part of the smoke split off and came for me. John was too busy defending himself to help and the evil was coming fast.
My instinct was to run and that is exactly what I did. I ran around that room screaming like a girl with her hair on fire.
I dodged furniture, including John’s wild coffee table swings, jumped over the kitchen counter, slid along the floor, and did whatever it took to be somewhere the smoke was not.
The problem for me was the same as it had been for Sandy. The smoke flowed over obstacles, cornered like a race car, and just never slowed down. The living room and kitchen were a pretty good size for an apartment, but it wasn’t anywhere near big enough for me to get away and hide.
It had already been a long day for me and I wasn’t in top shape anyway. Fear kept me moving, but soon it wasn’t enough and the smoke caught me.
It collected around my head like a fishbowl, and sucked all the oxygen away from me. Suddenly I couldn’t breathe. I gaped like a fish out of water. No amount of hand waving or rolling would get it away from me long enough to get a breath.
Sandy was awake again and she was pounding on the floor and screaming “Help me” along with a few other choice profanities.
I had no idea who she was talking to. Did she think a little magic man was going to pop out of the floor or something?
Then I felt him. Thing One. The author of my Death Experience. He was outlined in smoke sitting cross legged on the floor by my head. His elbows rested on his knees. His hands clasped together. He looked at me in a calm detached manner.
I felt fear. Not the normal scaredy-cat fear, I’m talking the freeze you in place, can’t look away, body starts to shake, kind of fear. The kind of fear that leaves you with wet pants and puke on the floor.
I heard a crash as a bed landed in the middle of the room. Under normal circumstances I’m sure I would have been surprised, but my ability to process this situation was already overloaded.
A cute guy with tousled sleepy hair sat bolt upright in bed and looked around wildly.
Dark spots filled my vision and the last thing I saw was a smoky Thing One, his eyes flashing red, looking at me. Then the lack of air took its toll on me and I blacked out.
08 Snuggle
Sleepy snuggles are the best. I liked his arm around me. It felt like half of a long hug. His warm chest and body curved around mine. We were spooning and I was the inner spoon.
I put my hand on top of his and pulled him in even closer. I could feel his breath on my neck. I was mostly asleep and didn’t want to wake up.
This moment of calm—this moment of peace—was what I needed. I wanted to stay here for a long time.
The next part, when we woke up a bit more, was usually not a lot of fun. Sometimes my hookup would politely try to figure out how to get me out of the house. All the while I was trying to figure out how to get breakfast before I hit the road. The hard light of morning usually put a big ugly stamp on the guy I’d gone home with. Club lighting hid a lot of sins.
My usual rule is good lighting added ten years and took away two points from their hot index. The old saying about going to bed at two with a ten and waking up at ten with a two was often true. I know that sounds a bit harsh but I’m sure they felt that way about me too.
I’d been in this situation a lot. Dad kicked me out of the house for being homo. Well, he really kicked me out for burning the house down but being a guy lover didn’t help.
I hadn’t been homeless exactly. I’d just been permanently residentially challenged. I had enough good looks to get picked up by someone so I wasn’t living on the streets. Morning time brought out the hustle to get some food and maybe some cash.
It wasn’t much of a living but it got me through until I started learning poker. There were a few guys that actually enjoyed my company enough to let me hang around for a while. I’d been living with Ben for a few weeks when he had a poker night with the guys. I was fascinated. Once I learned the rules, I started to see the patterns in the cards. I won that night and every night afterward. I read Dan Harrington’s Texas Hold’em poker formula, all three books, in two days. I was hooked.
I played the legal tournaments and then graduated to the high-stakes backrooms. I won too much too fast and thought it would be best to relocate for a while. Ben was starting to get restless too, so I cooked him dinner, gave him a long sweaty night to remember me by, and left.
After that I’d had just enough money to have my own place without having to trick all the time. It takes money to make money so I had to be really careful with what I spent and how I played. It wasn’t a glamorous life, but it could be once I got good enough to go to Vegas. That’s where the real money started. If I could win there, the final destination was Monte Carlo, where the ultra rich played. I could win a million in a few nights if I was lucky.
For a while I just breathed, enjoying the dream of success and the warm man behind me. I cracked one eye open. The last light of the day filtered through the blinds and lit up my bedroom with a rosy glow. There wasn’t much to light up, just the old dresser and the white walls. I didn’t have much here. The dresser looked beat up, but it had been cheap and the d
rawers slid easily. We were lying on a mattress on the floor, no official bed. It was super comfortable and that was all that mattered to me. So what if it was lying on the floor?
Why was the sun setting? I must be really out of sync. I usually wake up in the afternoon. I closed my eye and pushed the thought away.
Why was I in my bedroom? I didn’t like bringing anyone back here. This was my space, and simple as it was, I didn’t like sharing it. I must have been really drunk, although I didn’t remember having anything to drink. Poker and alcohol don’t mix. Well, they do, but only if you like to lose. It only takes one sloppy “all in” to end up slinking away with nothing.
I pushed that thought away too. Focus on the snuggle.
I trailed my fingers over his hand and up his arm. He felt strong. I liked that. He must have been more awake than I thought as he took his hand to do some touching of his own. He began rubbing my chest and then trailed his fingers down my side. I loved that. It made me feel long, lean, sexy.
He nuzzled the back of my neck. I couldn’t help it. I let out a sigh and arched my back. It felt that good. Things were heating up fast. I could feel myself responding. What was his name again? I couldn’t remember.
I rolled over to do some exploring of my own. I kept my eyes closed. I wasn’t ready to face reality yet. I would let my hands create the image.
And what an image it was! I was feeling smooth skin, defined muscles, and broad shoulders. I slid my hands down to his ass. What an engine! Wow!
He was back to kissing my neck again. It sent shivers down my back. I moaned. Something more than his hands reached for me and pushed against my aura.
It wrapped around me and started to tingle. It teased me trying to find a way in. His mouth and hands were keeping me occupied. I was thinking with my little head and it was quite happy with how things were going. Then the power squeezed, and I felt an anger that wasn’t my own wake up inside.
The cold power of the grave pushed back.
He flew out of my bed and slammed against the wall. His head bounced off the drywall, hard enough to leave a dent. As he fell to the floor I jumped out of bed and scrambled to the other side of the room.
What the hell!?
I flicked on the light and looked around for a weapon.
Nothing.
Note to self: get some weapons. The dresser was the only thing in the room other than the bed. I’m sure John could have picked it up and swung it around like a claymore but I’m nowhere near his size.
Lover boy was much closer to the bedroom door than I was. I could make a dash for it but I’m sure he would get me.
Speaking of lover boy, I got my first good look at him, and paused in awe. Nutty brown skin, shaggy dark hair, and everything rippled as he got off the floor. Not in the ‘I spend all my time in the gym’ kind of way, more like a panther flexing. He had abs for days, broad shoulders, and chocolate brown eyes that would make you believe when he said he loved you.
“Wait! Stop!” I felt a push of something but it slid off me. He held up a placating hand. “Just give me a minute.”
He shook his head and blinked his eyes hard. I’m sure the smack against the wall must have scrambled his brains.
I took that moment to notice his light blue underwear, which he filled out very nicely. Wait, did he have underwear on before? It seemed like he didn’t. I remember touching his ass and it was bare at the time.
“I know this is a bit sudden for you but did you have to throw me into a wall?” He grimaced and shook his head a bit more.
He looked upset. Not hugely upset, more like annoyed. Maybe he got thrown into walls all the time. Now I was thinking about it, how had I done that? It takes a lot of force to throw someone. I don’t think I could have even done that physically. I might have knocked him over, but not actually thrown him. My magic was just small time, like lifting a penny… wasn’t it?
I started to stutter out a reply when I felt the touch again. It was a light poke, like it was trying to get inside me. I waved my arm and batted it away.
“What are you doing?” I demanded.
“What do you mean?” He sounded defensive.
“I felt you do something,” I said. “You tried to get inside me somehow. Stop it.”
He sighed. “I’m trying to speed up the process.”
“What process?”
“Having sex.”
“Do what??” I can be pretty direct sometimes, but not that direct.
“You know. Doing the nasty, knocking boots.” He gave me a sexy smile.
“I got that part,” I said sarcastically.
“Heels to Jesus. Taking the hot dog bus to taco town.”
“I got the picture.”
“Bumpin ugly, naked wrestling, the horizontal mambo.”
By this point he was making some very suggestive hip gyrations. Part of me was tantalized. Part of me was pissed.
“I got it,” I shouted. The pissed part of me was winning. “Where do you get off showing up here with your perfect body in my bed just thinking I’m going to roll over for you.”
I was gesturing wildly. Although part of me was hearing what I was saying and, actually, he probably did expect to show up and shag just about anyone. I just wish I knew how I’d met him. Where had he come from? How had he ended up here?
“Easy there, Mary,” he said. “I was just having a bit of fun. Trying to lighten the situation and all. You probably don’t remember me but I saved your life the other night.”
What was he talking about?
“You know. The Smoke. Trashing Sandy’s apartment. Trying to kill everyone including you. Ring a bell?”
It all hit me. I remembered everything. I also remembered him. He was the guy in the bed that suddenly appeared in the living room.
“Ahhh. All coming back to you is it? I stopped the smoke last time but I’m not sure when it will be back again. It’s better if we hit the sack now and then you’ll be right as rain.”
“So I’m supposed to have sex with you and then I’ll be alright?” I asked.
“Yep.” He beamed at me like that explained everything.
It explained nothing. Was this ‘have sex with a handsome stranger for your health’ day? A shag a day keeps the doctor away? Like eating an apple only more fun? I still wasn’t clear how this was even supposed to help.
“You’ve got riders. I’ve seen it before. It’s like having a ghost inside, only in your case it’s a poltergeist. They live in your spirit and hijack your magic.”
Say what?
“I’ve never seen anyone have more than two before, but they are all churning and seething inside of you.”
I remembered the sheer malevolence of the darkness. Stalking me. Oh yes, they were mad as hell.
“So what are you? Some sort of Exorcist?”
“Sort of. I absorb emotions. I get power from giving and receiving emotional energy. Makes me the greatest therapist in the world.” He said that last part rather smugly.
I’m sure he was, although most therapists didn’t run around naked and screw their patients. Or maybe they did and they were just more discreet about it. I’ve never been to a therapist before.
“A rider’s construct is nothing but emotion. Once I absorb that, it will unravel and fade away. Anyway, I have a life far away from Louisville, Kentucky and I’d like to get back to it. The House just dumped me here to solve your problem. Once you’re fixed, I can go back home. So be a good boy and do what the doctor orders.”
“I thought you were a therapist?” I said.
“Whatever,” he said as he walked toward me. Damn, he did look fine! He moved like a dancer. A poem in motion.
This guy was all business, and obviously in a hurry to get home. I guess I didn’t blame him. I wouldn’t appreciate waking up in someone else’s house and having to fix their problem.
“I’m not a prude or anything,” I said as he moved into my personal space. He ran his hand over my chest. I could feel the heat coming off
of him. “I like a good wrestle in the sack as much as the next guy, and you are certainly attractive enough, it’s just the whole thing seems rather… cold, calculating.”
I was struggling to keep my big brain doing the thinking.
“I’m sure it does. That’s because it is. Well, maybe not cold and calculating. More like clinical. This is fast therapy. You’ll enjoy yourself. I’ll enjoy myself. You’ll be rid of your death wish and I’ll be home.”
“Did you say Death Wish?” This was a whole new level of scary. What was going on?
“Yep.” He nodded. “That’s what these remnants do. They destroy their host. They get their vengeance.”
Oh crap.
“You’ve actually got four of them. Three of them are pretty low grade and kind of muddled, but one of them is strong. Really strong. He’s almost got an entire personality in there.”
I was pretty sure I knew who that one was. I was scared. Thing One, the Death Experience guy was a monster in real life and now he was living in me.
“Sandy told me your story. I’m assuming they were the four guys that tried to kill you.”
I just nodded. I felt like the room was closing in on me.
I couldn’t breathe.
“Hey! Take it easy.” He touched my arm and then gently pulled me into a hug. “I’m here. It’s going to be ok.”
It felt nice to be hugged. In the middle of freaking out I noticed he smelled nice.
“We just need to have sex for several hours and this will all work its way out.”
“For real!?” I laughed in disbelief and pulled away. “You tell me I’m going to die and then you hit on me?”
“I have an ability,” he said, giving me my space. “I can consume negative energy. I can see it, sense it, and pull it out of people. In your case it is going to save your life. That’s why the House brought me here.”
I held up a hand and he stopped talking. I needed to process this for a moment. I was remembering everything from last night: the feeling of the grave, the powerful smoky figure throwing people around and then choking me. It was no joke. I had thought I was going to die. I still wasn’t sure how I’d been saved. If this guy was telling the truth then he had probably stopped it.
Misfit Mage Page 9