Naked or Dead

by Murphy, A. E.

  “Nonya.”

  They look amongst themselves, confused, waiting to see if anybody knows what I said.

  “Nonya?” Nok’s lips twitch.

  “Yep. Nonya business.”

  His friends laugh as I saunter past, one of them makes a comment about what a great ass I have. I give it a bit of extra sway until I’m out of the door. Gunning for one person in particular.

  “Barbie,” I say, making my voice high and welcoming.

  “Hi, Lilith,” she replies, making her voice equally as high and welcoming. Her eyes move to my swollen temple as students move around us at her locker.

  Tish is looking at her phone, disinterested in this exchange.

  “How are you? I heard you got into it with Nokosi?” Barbie winces when she sees the yellowing bruise. “What happened?”

  “Can I talk to you?” I whisper, swallowing dramatically as my eyes fill with tears. “I just… I need to vent.”

  She places her hand over her heart. “Oh wow, of course.”

  When she clicks her fingers at Tish, the girl looks up at last and smiles. “Hey, Lilith.”

  “Hey, Tish.”

  “We’ll be back.” Barbie links her arm through mine. “I’m so glad you came to me. I know exactly how you’re feeling.”

  “I know.” We enter the girls’ bathroom around the next corner, only unlinking arms to get through the door. It smells like peaches. Even the bathrooms in this place are fucking insanely clean.

  “Talk to me,” she instructs and moves to the mirror to check her purple lipstick. I have to admit the girl chooses a great lip color.

  “I should never have gone with him,” I mutter, shaking my head as though I’m the stupid one. “He told me you’re a liar and that you came on to him.”

  With a dramatic roll of my eyes I move to stand beside her and we look at each other in the mirror. She’s soft and pretty in a way I’m not. I’m gritty and real, and I have a dead silence to my eyes that creeps people out. Barbie is way more dangerous than me because people don’t expect evil from her. Whereas that shit emanates from me like a fever.

  “What a dick,” she grumbles, but her eyes flicker to the left.

  “He’s so charming.” Now I’m the liar. “He gave me this spiel about how I’m different and blah blah…” We both laugh, a gentle lilt in the empty bathroom. It bounces around the cubicles and lingers for a moment with our shared smiles. “Said you attacked him in his car.”

  “Of course he said that. I’m a black belt. If I’d attacked him, he’d know about it.” She’s lying again.

  Or maybe I’m wishful thinking so I don’t get my ass kicked?

  Nah. She’s definitely lying.

  But about what? Being a black belt or about everything she said about him?

  “I heard he tossed you around in the back of his truck?”

  “Kind of,” I place my bag on the water-splattered counter between the sinks. “Have you seen my face? I’m hideous.”

  “Want me to kick him in his dick for you?”

  I shake my head, letting her brown eyes hold mine when I turn and rest back against the counter. Taking a casual nonthreatening stance. “Nah. I want you to tell me the truth.”

  She blanches, pulling her head in so her chin touches her neck. “The truth?”

  “About what happened that night with Nok.”

  “I told you what happened. You’ve witnessed firsthand his aggression; you know it’s true.”

  I hum thoughtfully. “Yeah. Maybe you’re right.”

  “Of course I am.”

  “But you’re not though. Are you?”

  Her lips part. She’s offended and gasping and spluttering for something to say. I love that I’ve trapped her.

  My fingers tap against the counter side, curling over the soft, curved edge. It’s cold like my soul. “You wanted him, and he turned you down, didn’t he?”

  Her jaw hits the floor. “Are you kidding me? How dare you?”

  “I dare do a lot of things.”

  The bathroom door opens and a girl I don’t recognized steps inside.

  “Pick another bathroom,” I bark and her eyes round with surprise. She slowly backs away and I turn back to a panicked-looking Barbie.

  “Why are you doing this? Why are you picking a fight?”

  “Meh…” I shrug my shoulders. “Boredom probably.”

  Her brown eyes narrow. “Boredom? Or is it because you like Nok?”

  “Mixture of both I guess.”

  I bring up my booted foot and kick her in the stomach before she even knows what’s happening. The trick to winning a fight is to always have the element of surprise. Fuck that “don’t hit first” bullshit. If you know they’re gunning for you, get your scope on them first and do not fucking hesitate.

  She heaves and drops onto her hands and knees, looking about ready to vomit. “Thought you were a black belt?”

  She wheezes, unable to talk or do much of anything really.

  Saliva drips from her lips to the floor. I hit her really hard. I wonder if I broke a rib.

  “Tell the truth,” I demand, putting my phone on the counter.

  “I am,” she rasps, her voice a fraction of the tone that it was before.

  I grab her hair and yank her up onto her knees.

  “Stop,” she begs, and a thrill courses through me.

  I love this feeling. I love this power.

  Dragging her to the middle stall, ignoring her shrieks, I kick it open and show her the toilet. She very quickly goes quiet.

  “I’m gonna dunk you and I don’t think it’s been flushed yet.” I peek over the basin and sure enough, there’s an oily sheen of yellow resting on the water surface.

  I kick up the toilet seat, but it clatters back down, so I do it again but slowly this time, with more patience. “Last chance. Tell the truth.”

  “Somebody is going to come in here and stop you.”

  “I wouldn’t count on it.” Her hands claw at my wrist, her nails dig into the skin drawing blood, so I step on the back of her ankle until she screams in pain and sheathes her claws. And then I force her face into the toilet, stopping only an inch from the water. It is so much easier to manipulate a person’s body when you’re pressing against one of their most painful places. Her forehead is against the basin. So gross. “Tell the fucking truth!”

  “I am!”

  I step on her ankle harder and push her face closer, so close the tip of her nose is also touching the basin. My hand in her hair is starting to ache but the thrill of this torture overrides that feeling. She sobs uncontrollably.

  “Please.”

  “If you want it to stop, tell the truth!”

  “OKAY! Okay…” I allow her some slack by bringing her head out a bit. “I lied. Okay? I was embarrassed and my dad was about to ground me so hard. I panicked.”

  “And you came on to him?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you showed up at his house?”

  She nods.

  “FUCKING SAY IT!”

  “YES!” she shrieks when I thrust her back into the toilet. “Yes, I showed up at his house.”

  My hands are shaking. I feel so fucking alive right now. Does that make me a sick person? Do I care?

  Fuck no.

  I pull my switchblade from the inside of my boot and raise her head so she can see it. I don’t unleash the blade, I just need her to see it and know that it’s there.

  “Little miss black belt bullshitter. When you leave this bathroom, you’re going to apologize to Nok. You’re going to start telling the truth about what you did to clear his name.” I whisper the last part for added effect and so the voice recorder doesn’t catch it. “This right here is child’s play in comparison to some of the shit I’ve done. Do you understand?”

  “Please,” she begs, sobbing. “It’s over for him now. It’s done. I’ll be persecuted.”

  “You mean like he was and is?”

  “Hardly, he got to stay i
n school.”

  This bitch. “Are you fucking deluded? You almost ruined his life!”

  “I know. I’m sorry. But admitting it won’t change anything.”

  I release the blade, unable to control my shaking rage, and she shrieks with panic and fright. I can feel her trembling, worse than jelly in an earthquake. If I wasn’t holding her up, she’d be a puddle on the tiled floor beneath my feet where she fucking belongs.

  “For every word you say to argue from this point, I’ll carve a line into your neck. Do you understand?”

  She nods, pressing her lips together as her breath comes out in staggered gasps.

  “You’re going to tell the truth, aren’t you?”

  “Yes,” she sniffles, her breathing uncontrollable now.

  I put my booted foot on the toilet rim and tuck the knife away. “Good girl. Let’s keep this between you and me, huh? Your word against mine after all and I’m the one with nothing to lose when I creep into your room at night and cut your face from ear to ear.”

  “You’re a psycho,” she whimpers.

  “At least I’m an honest psycho. I don’t just ruin people’s lives because they rejected me.” I throw her face-first into the side of the stall, leaving her dazed and crying. Then I wash my hands at the sink, put my phone away and zip up my bag. “Good talk, Barbie. We should do this more often.”

  I exit with a skip in my step and adrenaline pulsing through my veins.

  That felt so good.

  I hang back, hiding out, waiting to see what Barbie does. She exits the bathroom with puffy eyes, messed-up blonde hair, and slumped shoulders. I expect her to go straight to Principal Cooper, but she veers in the direction of the cafeteria. She hesitates at the doors and Tish follows hot on her heels, asking her what’s wrong. But when she turns to look at Tish, she spies me, and there’s genuine fear in her eyes.

  It almost makes me orgasm. Fuck me. That’s amazing. I love it. I live for this.

  I keep close watch as I enter through the other doors and sit back with Loki while she actually approaches Nok who tensed the second he saw her coming his way.

  His arms fold across his chest as she speaks, and I shush Loki while I concentrate.

  Barbie breaks down and starts sobbing but all Nok’s friends are glaring at her. One of them says something to her that makes her cry harder.

  And then Nok, who looks perplexed by the entire thing, looks up and finds me.

  I smirk at him and lean back on my chair just as Barbie runs away crying, leaving Tish to stare after her with a gaping mouth.

  I see Tish look at Nok and mouth something that looks like an apology, before she moves to a group of girls looking pasty faced and horrified.

  Nok strides towards me, his boys behind him. He stops at my toes as I lean back casually against the table edge. He sees my arm, sees the bloody half-moon grooves in my wrist and gently touches them with the tip of his fingers.

  “What’s going on?” Loki asks quietly.

  Nok, with his sparkling acorn eyes on me, grabs the front of my black T-shirt that says in bright yellow letters,

  “If I don’t say it with my lips, you’ll see it in my eyes.”

  I got changed just in case I got blood on my school shirt. I’ll change again before class.

  He yanks me from the bench, and everybody stills. It was an aggressive move to an outsider. It was a pleasant one to me.

  His lips descend, crushing mine in a powerful display that hushes the entire room. He yanks on my hair, deepening the kiss with his tongue, and holds my body to his with a hand on my back.

  Fuck.

  That was hot.

  But it was also never supposed to happen.

  People cheer, a chorus of claps and wolf whistles.

  He pulls back, breathless and panting. Then he turns and walks away with his friends, smiling and talking about things I can’t hear.

  “You’re with him now?” Loki asks.

  I let out a laugh. “He wishes.”

  “So what was that?”

  “The start of a dangerous game, Loki,” I answer, sitting back down and watching Nok exit the cafeteria. “The start of a really dangerous fucking game.”

  “You’re crazy. You know that?”

  I grin at him. “You really have no idea.”

  Willow and I spend a rare evening in with Mom. Though despite the fact she’s here, she’s not actually here. She’s on her phone texting while we watch one of the Avengers movies. It’s still nice getting to chill like this. It’s such a rare thing for us all.

  That coupled with the fact Willow is in good health tonight.

  “You keep looking at your phone,” Willow whispers, frowning at me from her end of the couch. “Expecting a call?”

  I shake my head, glancing at my sickly mirror image. “Not really. I’m just…”

  “You like him?”

  I shake my head. “No. Not at all.”

  “Mm-hmm.” She doesn’t believe me, of course she doesn’t. “Do you like him so much that you don’t want to go through with it?”

  “Hell no. I’m never wrong about this. You know I’m not.”

  She glances at Mom and whispers even lower, “What are we going to do if you are?”

  I shrug and place my phone facedown on the arm of the chair. “Find someone else?”

  She laughs sardonically. “We leave in three weeks.”

  “I’ve got this.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “I do.”

  “If you’re so sure, then say the word.”

  I stand and stuff my phone into my pocket. “I’m not saying shit.”

  “I’m dying, Lilith.”

  I look at her frail form and resist the urge to sob. “I know.”

  “You’re wasting time on him that could be spent with me.”

  “I know.” I sit back down and curl into her side. “I know.”

  “Then stop this nonsense. Let me take care of you for once.” Her cheek rests against my hair.

  I shake my head slightly. “Let me be sure. Okay? I have a couple of weeks left. If I haven’t figured it out by then…”

  “Okay. Deal. But be home more. I need you.”

  She’s right. I haven’t been there for her at all since we moved in. I bet she’s been feeling lonely and neglected. “I’ll do better.”

  “You’re the best already. Just fit in more time for me.”

  I look at Mom who is now smiling at us, a vacant, tired expression on her face. She gets like this when she misses Dad.

  I sigh heavily. “What are we going to do about her?”

  “Nothing. Just hope she gets laid and finds love again.”

  We share a smile and then we abandon our mom to go and paint our toenails upstairs. I need to invest in more nail polish. Neon pink is my sister’s color. Not mine. But I ran out of my crimson red the last use.

  “I’ve been chatting with locals in the school forum,” Willow admits. “There are a lot of good people here.”

  “It’s not all bad.”

  “They’re terrified that they’re going to be next on the School Sigil Searer’s list.” She’s obsessed with watching the news these days so it’s unsurprising she’s getting local gossip.

  I tense. “You know I saw a man in the woods yesterday.”

  “Oh?” Her eyes light up with excitement. “Was he naked?”

  Laughing, I shake my head. “No, he was just staring at me, standing there. He had a similar body shape to Dad. It was beyond weird.”

  “Sounds it. What were you doing in the woods?”

  I shrug and smile sheepishly. “Bonding with Nok.”

  “By yourself? Are you fucking insane?”

  “I have to get him alone.”

  “What if he hurt you?”

  I grit my teeth. I know she’s concerned for me, but she doesn’t have to be. I can look after myself. I don’t know what it is about people suggesting I’m weak that has my hackles rising. I know that’s not
what she meant. It’s just a deep-down feeling I can’t shake.

  I’m not weak. I’m strong and willful and fearless.

  I need everyone to believe that.

  “I’ve got this,” I reply firmly. “Trust me.”

  “I do. I just don’t trust your judgement. It’s been sketchy in the past.” She shuts down, her eyes lose their vibrance and her lips lose their sweet smile.

  “We should get you out of the house,” I insist, tugging on her hand. “While you’re feeling good.”

  “What about Mom?”

  “She doesn’t want to be here, Willow,” I implore, sighing at the end. “You know it. I know it. It’s too fucking painful for her.”

  “I know.” She pouts and I help her stand. “Why don’t we go for a walk or something?”

  “Let’s do it.”

  We head downstairs and Mom is arguing on the phone with somebody. We both roll our eyes towards each other and slip out the back.

  As we cut through the yard, our neighbor’s head pops over the high fence. White hair and blue eyes and a friendly smile.

  He smiles at us and Willow greets him with a wave which he returns. “Good afternoon, Mr. Miller.”

  “Good afternoon, Willow.” He returns to his duties and I take my sister’s hand.

  “Let’s go riding?” I ask, moving to the small garage where my bike is hiding.

  She wets her lips, looking nervous. “I don’t know.”

  “I’ll go slow. We’ll be able to go further together.”

  After a brief hesitation she nods. It’s been a long time since I got her on the bike. She used to ride her own all the time but that ended when she got sick and her arms just don’t have the strength in them to guide the bike anymore.

  “This is going to be fucking awesome.”

  “I can’t do it,” I growl, feeling frustrated when another fish gets away from me. “Can’t I like stab it or something? This is boring.”

  Nok blinks at me slowly. “You mean like spear fishing?”

  I nod. “Duh. Isn’t that something your people do?”

  “Not anymore but once, I guess. We’d need spears.”

  “Or just really sharp sticks with a kind of hook on the end.”