Green Light

by Jescie Hall

My body is functioning purely off of illegal substances and a history of trauma.

This life holds the promise of heaven for those naive enough not to realize we were subjected to hell long ago.

He is, however, exactly what I would guess a guy in this business would look like—rough around the edges, a few screws loose, assumptions of a massive cock beneath those fitted pants. All the crazy ones have the best dicks. It’s science.

Viagra. Changing lives since 1998.

When you really love people, you deal with their dirt and let it become you.

“The point of this story is that I had a lisp for a while.” “That’s the point of this story?”

“It’s her, isn't it?” he asks with an exasperated tone, piecing it together. “Who is she to you?”

“Everything I once was,” I finally admit, pushing my palms roughly into the door to leave.

“They weren’t lying when they said you were a cold, lifeless bitch.” She leans back against the counter near the door, still blocking me. “Who’s they, Lana? Your sad, sagging tits?”

I quickly text Markie. Money Shot: You wouldn’t believe the ass on my new ride. Ass so tight it might even turn Markie straight.

“But what if—” “I don't give a fuck if the heavens open up on us and God strikes his way into the middle of the bonfire and everyone dies. This party is happening.”

Fucker wouldn’t even get stabbed for his girl? Figures. Spineless prick.

“Bury me, Venom. Bury me so deep I can breathe again.”

“Fuck, you’re mine, Monty. You’re mine. Always going to be.” “Shane,” I breathe. “No one touches you but me,” he mutters before he licks the length of me again. “Never again. Do you understand? I’ll kill everyone.”

“You need the green light?” I mutter, my chest touching his with every inhale. His lip pulls into a half grin before the pained expression returns. “It's yours. It’s always been yours,”

“Don’t play games with a guy like me. I’ll fuck you right here on this bike in the middle of the intersection.

“But I’m fucking insane, and jealousy would have had me slitting my friend’s throat. I used to hope for the opportunity to see someone touch you, catch you in the act with your little fake boyfriend just so I could fuck you over his warm, dead body. I’ve imagined your tight little ass wrapped around my dick while staring into Wesley’s dead, dried-out eyes.”

“I’d grown tired of this path,” he sighs, talking so casually. “Sanity is so monotonous…tiresome, unimaginative.” He drops onto his haunches before me. “Tragic.”

The one who fostered my trauma and matched it with his own. The one that stole a part of me I didn’t know I owned. The one who proved me wrong. Not all men take.

All this time, she had held Gabriella’s secrets in order to maintain her image to the public, not wanting to further desecrate her memory.

“What happened to you?” “It doesn’t matter. I’m alive. You’re alive.”

“Markie Mark and Money Shot. Years. This whole time, it was…you.”

“That’s how you knew I was auditioning for the casting call. I told Markie I was looking for quick cash…she sent me to…you sent…Vince. That’s how I found Vince.” Where it all began.

“How could you…keep…” she mutters, lost for words. “How could you keep this up for so long? We…she—” “I needed access to you, Monty,” I interrupt. “I didn’t know why you left me. I just needed you in whatever capacity I could get you.”

Awareness pummels me into the ground as an avalanche of memories bulldoze me. My father fell for her lies. Left our family with the hopes of pursuing a dreamt-up illusion of a relationship and future with the online vixen that was vEm0mX. She was the reason for it all, inadvertently saving me from continued agony and abuse by luring him with false promises. Her demented obsession rivals my own. Fuck, I’m insane to find this so attractive. “You really loved me, didn’t you?”

“You saved me. The keychain that Markie—you gave me. It was the only thing I had. He would’ve killed me. He brought weapons. He had a bag full of—” A wet gurgling sound interrupts us, and I stand again, lifting Montana and pulling her behind me. Alek’s body seizes on the floor, his chest continuously trying to expand as the blood slowly drains from his punctured neck. He’s still alive. Just barely, but he’s holding on. I look back at Montana, and she peers back at me. She didn’t want me to shoot Alek the way I’d intended when I stormed in here. Possibly to protect me? To keep my hands clean as she suggested? But by the way her eyes darken as her gaze lingers on him, I can tell it wasn’t just for my sake. It was more than that. She was hoping for the possibility of violence. Awaiting her orders, I look longingly into those dark amber eyes, watching as they ignite with a newfound rage. “Shane?” she calls out, her fiery stare never tearing away from his crumpled, bleeding body. “Be a doll and fetch me that bag.”

I visualize Alek’s arms and legs strapped to the wooden chair with his own cables as the rich notes vibrate from the wooden instrument into my body. The nails from his nail gun, puncturing through his bones as his throat shrilled in horror, holding him upright in the chair. With every pluck of the rapid pizzicato, I visualize the gaping holes where his eyes and tongue used to be, enthralled by the destruction of his once handsome features.

We dance together to the warm, thrilling tone as I get flashbacks of split flesh and the words Killer of Gabby Marxon engraved on a dead man’s chest. The song comes to a triumphant end, my last note finalizing with the richest sounding vibrato, my pulse in tune, heart beating simply for her.

I play through the finale, my note lasting far beyond the others. Breathless and coated in another man’s blood, I stand, staring out into the bright light of the abyss. It is the duty of the living to maintain justice for the dead, no matter how they chose to live their life.

A warm sensation encompasses me because I know he’s there. Shane’s out there, covered in the same blood of retribution, gazing right back at me.

With my every flaw and imperfection, there is a man who embraces my darkness, fosters it as his own, and craves the madness of my twisted mind as chaotically as I do his. A man who walks that same line of depravity as me, flirting with the edge of corruption, our moral compass adjusting toward the justice we see fit. For the first time, I know that the depth of me is reachable by the only one who dug into my dirt and made it his own. I’m entirely exposed, and finally seen by the only one who’s ever mattered.

Word on the street was she started getting mailed letters and naked photos from some fling of his that he apparently met in the romance section at the library. Writing cursive like a woman is so hard.

Wesley Hopkins was expelled from college after a woman filed a rape charge against him. Luckily, the event was filmed, and his word wasn’t shit against the damning evidence. He was ostracized from his family after the circulating video leaked to news sources all over the country. Karmic law says you never fuck with the dogs.

I definitely wore her out last night. Hanging gagged from the ceiling for hours while getting defiled with silicone cocks appears to have taken its toll.

sPideRrr6: Eat a dick, you choleric cocksucker. Straightening in my chair, I stare at it in awe. Reading, then re-reading it. That insult. I’ve heard it before. No fucking way.

There on the couch, she sits, the game still up on the screen and the controller still in her hand. She bites her bottom lip, withholding her smile as she cocks a brow. “What?” she says nonchalantly. “You’re sPiderRrr6?” I shout frantically. She shrugs, grinning menacingly before peering at her neon green cat-like nails. “I needed a new hobby since departing from the orchestra. And busting my man’s ass in his favorite game is proving to be such a delight.” I stalk toward her, licking my teeth as I tip my head, forever astonished by her intelligence and ability to navigate and rule whichever world she chooses. Cam girl and gamer girl? I’m a goner. Deceased. Dead. Rotting.