Chapter 15
681 Words
80
STARTLING STORIES
Chick had shed his parka and boots and deposited his gloves and card key on her nightstand. His lanky body sprawled over the double bed she unofficially shared with Stu. Chick watched her intently.
“You sexy thing,” she said as she ap-proached the bed. “Vape a little c******s first?”
Chick liked to chillax after a day of pop-ping Adderall like Pez. His grin returned. Then he squinted, staring at her eyes. “Red as tail-lights. Somebody got a head start.”
“Plenty left.” Mac raised the vape, then paused, giving Chick a contemplative look. Slowly, she said, “I’m in the mood for some wet work.”
He frowned in concentration. Then his mouth opened in astonishment and a trem-bling vulnerability. The rumors were true. He favored a very specific practice.
“Oh, Mac,” he said finally. “You don’t have to—”
She laughed. “Your blood.”
“Please,” Chick whispered tremulously.
“‘Please, boss,’“ she said. “What’s the safe word?”
He laughed, low in the throat. “How about ‘alien,’ boss?”
“Shuck your shirt, grab iron, and don’t let go until I tell you.”
Chick sat up and peeled off his pocket tee, revealing a scrawny torso and alabaster flesh. No tattoos were visible, but a few faint, straight scars crisscrossed his front and back. Stretching out, he grabbed the cross-bars at the head and foot of the bed.
Taking the remote from her nightstand, Mac turned on the wallscreen, then activated the stored entertainment—a British reboot of Babylon Berlin so violent, one critic had labeled it Babylon Bonnie and Clyde. She hadn’t gotten far into the new season—Stu found the show disturbing—but it helped Mac unwind after a 16-18 hour day.
She raised the volume. Her inner and outer walls sandwiched insulation, and her container stood at the edge of the camp, but the containers were close together. Her “eve-
ning” with Chick might get noisy.
She raised her pen and took several puffs, but didn’t give Chick a hit, however much he begged. Then she pulled a straight razor out of her nightstand. As she unfolded the blade from the handle, Chick whimpered.
Theatrically, Mac polished the heavy blade on Stu’s suede strap. Stu loved a close shave and adored lathering up old-school with soap and brush, and he kept his toilet-ries in her container. To avoid rust, he stored his razor with its strap in her bedside drawer. He’d taught her how to care for the blade, and she enjoyed the comforting weight of the “cut-throat razor” in her hand and the sight of the edge starting to shine. When she got back to civilization, she was getting her own open razor for shaving her pits and legs.
She smiled at Chick, and he spoke hoarse-ly. “You are cruel, boss.”
“Want a hit?”
“Please—”
“Keep still,” she said, “and I’ll think about sharing.”
He lay very still. She puffed, then re-turned her vape to the little plate with the image of the Tokyo Skytree, which she’d picked up during her three years in Japan. Despite the swampy subtropical summers, she’d enjoyed her duty posting at Torii Sta-tion.
When the edge shone like a mirror, she turned to Chick. His gaze jumped to the blade. He smiled as if Mac were presenting him with the Oscar.
She ran the edge of the blade very light-ly across Chick’s chest. A fine red line ap-peared, vivid against the milk-white skin. Chick bit his lower lip, but looked pleased when blood began to gather between his nearly nonexistent pecs.
Mac cleaned the blade and folded it into the scales, then dropped the razor in the breast pocket of her wave-patterned men’s aloha shirt. Ignoring his pleading look, she raised her pen and enjoyed a toke. She showed the device to Chick.
“Your turn,” she told him.
- Writer
