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I’ve been in an abysmal mood for the last week or so, and I didn’t feel like writing. On top of it, this Friday I came back home from work at eleven at night only to wake up at six for my solitary Saturday shift, that involved handling the computer issues of strung out nurses and doctors who’ve dealt with this crisis for far too long. At one point of that last shift I considered giving up and pretending I wasn’t present for the remaining hours. I need a break myself. Fortunately, this weekend I’ve played some more of GTA V in VR, I’ve emptied my balls, and I’ve managed to push out the rest of the thirtieth part of this strange novel that for whatever reason I need to write. Hooray.

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A herd of goats bleats around a fire as their hooves dance against the ground. Nearby, on a log by the fire, sits an ancient woman with long, gray hair and a white beard. She’s staring at the dancing goats with rapt attention, with cloudy eyes that gleam like those of a child.

The bleating muffles an approaching chorus of women that scream in pain and anguish. They are dragging their sons and daughters by the hand towards the herd of livestock. The goats cease their cavorting to face the weeping women, who kneel down and beg for their children to be killed. The women repeat that they can’t bring themselves to do it.

In a blink, the herd transforms into a single man who wears a bloodstained apron. His face is a patchwork of scars, one eye is blackened, his lips have been cut off. As the man plods towards the women, he takes a cleaver from his apron’s pocket.

My mind feels foggy. It takes me a few seconds to register the sky blue ceiling and its three hemispherical lamps arranged in a triangle. They are glowing.

My whole body begs for me to close my eyes again and let my head sink back into the pillow, but I groan and push the bedclothes away. I scoot to the edge of the bed. When I look up, I catch a glimpse of my naked reflection in the mirrored wardrobe, so I lower my gaze to my lap. I rest my elbows on my knees, rub my eyes and yawn loudly.

A background noise like oil sizzling in a pan quietens my deep breaths. I wish that my first sight after waking up, filling my field of vision, had been Jacqueline’s caring expression, but at least her scent has taken over every pore in my body, and her taste has coated the insides of my cheeks and my throat.

Before I’ve had time to acclimate myself to having woken up in someone else’s bedroom, the footsteps of the owner come down the hallway. My heart jumps. I straighten my back. Jacqueline has leaned against the jamb of the doorway, crossing her bare feet. Her punch pink robe, the only garment that prevented her warm skin from fusing to mine throughout the night, has slipped open at the neck, revealing her milky skin and the curves of her breasts. Thick locks of hair frame her beautiful face, with its delicate features and her cobalt blue eyes.

“I’ve made us a tasty breakfast. I prefer to eat after I’ve taken a shower, but you already washed that skinny body of yours last night, and I don’t want you to wait around until I come out of the shower. So go ahead and fill your tummy.”

I smile shyly as I take in the sight of her standing there with her head cocked slightly. The memory of our frantic fucking remains fresh in my mind.

Jacqueline’s gaze slides over the convex curves of my abdomen, then lower to my exposed slit. I hold my breath and swallow hard. She’s staring like I’m a leg of serrano ham on display and she’s aching to cut into me and gobble me up.

“I-I should probably put something on to walk around your home,” I say as the skin between my legs tingles.

Jacqueline licks the tip of her left canine tooth.

“I’d prefer if you showed me your bare butt at all times, but you have a right to your modesty, I suppose. Your bra, panties and socks must be lying around somewhere.”

Why is my stomach filling up with dread, as if I were about to endure a lengthy trial? I look over my shoulder. Jacqueline has raised the roller blinds, but the outside world remains dark and gloomy, both because we’ve woken up before the sunrise and because bulky clouds have covered the sky. The background din comes from millions of raindrops hitting every available surface.

“It hasn’t stopped raining?!” I blurt out.

“It has only rained for a couple of days, though.”

In about twenty minutes I’ll get dressed, travel to work and try to drown my intrusive thoughts for hours so I can focus on programming through the tasks that my dickheaded boss piled up on me. Once the workday ends, I’ll either stay to work overtime or just return home, where I’ll laze around, masturbate and go to sleep. I hope that at least I’ll dream about having sex with Jacqueline in a variety of positions.

In the vision, my hunched self, who sits at her workstation and types away at the dirty keyboard, wears one of my usual hoodies and loose fit trousers, but those remain in my apartment. I gasp.

“I can’t go to work wearing the dress I bought for our date!”

Jacqueline broadens a smile.

“Of course you can, sweetie, and your loveliness will liven up that aseptic workplace of ours. But I don’t want to see you shivering again, so I’ll lend you a pair of my tights.”

Although I was about to complain, Jacqueline pulls back her satin robe as she undoes the belt. She slips off the garment, unveiling her balloony breasts and pert nipples, as well as the trimmed pubes that top her slit, then she dangles the robe over her right arm. The sight of her nakedness causes me to suck in a sharp breath and squeeze my thighs together.

“Go on, Leire,” Jacqueline coos. “Surely you want to take advantage of the breakfast I prepared so lovingly, don’t you?”

My mind races, trying to come up with a witty way to respond. I don’t have any witty way to respond, only horniness. She smirks, then heads into the bathroom. Her breasts bounce heavily with each step she takes.

When I recover from my daze, I already hear the shower water splashing against Jacqueline’s skin behind the closed door. I try to shake off the drowsiness that clings to my bones, then I search around for my underwear. My panties somehow ended up under the computer desk. I lift them to my nose and give them a sniff. They smell of stale arousal, but to be fair, that wouldn’t have been enough for me to pick some fresh panties back at my apartment.

I stagger into the hallway wearing only my bra and panties, then I follow the aroma of freshly brewed coffee and honeyed pancakes that wafts from the kitchen. My stomach growls.

I hadn’t given the kitchen any thought, but I wouldn’t have expected it to be this narrow. The fridge, the counter and the oven cover the wall to my right. Most of the surfaces are graphite grey, so polished that they reflect the ceiling light’s glare like a swimming pool. Only a person at a time could stand sideways between the counter and the square dining table, that has two chairs pushed under it. A row of cupboards are hung close enough above them that I could easily bang my head by mistake.

I guess that Jacqueline had to pay premium for this apartment due to its quiet neighborhood as well as that wraparound balcony, which the storm has prevented me from exploring. At least those cherry red cushions on the dining chairs look like they’d support my ass competently.

More importantly, the table is set with three plates, one of which is stacked with pancakes, and a nearby, steaming coffee pot contains an ink-colored liquid. Although Jacqueline has poured honey on the pancakes, she has also lined up next to them butter as well as bottles of chocolate and strawberry syrup.

My brain buzzes as I plop down in the chair that faces the balcony door. Lightning flashes through the clouds. The rain sounds like it’s coming from far away, but I feel the cold that penetrates the glass.

I serve myself three pancakes and a cup of steaming coffee. Once the taste of the first sweet, spongy morsel of pancake hits my palate, I shiver and my vision blurs. A pang of hunger, as well as some inexplicable shame, flares in my stomach, then two thick, warm tears run down my cheeks. I wish I could sit here for hours to savour stack after stack of my angel’s pancakes.

The raindrops are hitting the balcony tiles in little taps as I sip my cup of bitter coffee. The coolness of the air feels good on my bare skin.

I recall some videos of lab monkeys who were allowed to venture out of their captors’ workplace into a meadow full of wildflowers. Haggard and wary, they dared to look up at the strange fireball that hangs in the sky. One by one the monkeys started wandering around, taking in the sights and smells. Some sat down and ate the grass. After a while they likely hurried back to the building, where they watched videos on their computers or had sex with each other in the comfort of their cages. I try to picture the same scene with a human, but when I close my eyes, the image I see is of a naked, obese man who’s being forced to masturbate in front of an audience.

“I don’t understand,” I mumble, then I sip the last dregs from my coffee cup.

How many men, and likely women, has Jacqueline seduced into a night of delight? Possibly thousands. Maybe even tens of thousands. I’m sure she’s made millions from all the horny people she took for a walk in her meadow of desire. She nearly fucked me into a coma.

Why was I selected to experience that taste of heaven? My head throbs from the thought of my infinitesimal place in the universe, so miniscule that it could fit on a postage stamp. As it concerns a broken beast like myself, Jacqueline might as well have gifted me the world’s most decadent cake, which I would eat until I died of diabetes.

I’m about to get hurt, I can tell. But maybe I’m ready for the pain.

I wipe the wetness from my cheeks. I don’t know why I’m crying, but it can’t be for anything more important than the food in front of me.

When I return to Jacqueline’s bedroom, I realize that she has left the bathroom door open. She’s standing in front of the sink, leaning in towards the mirror and offering me a full view of her backside. She has tied her raven black hair in a loose ponytail, and it smells of jasmine. A light scent of soap emanates from the naked, warm skin of Jacqueline’s toned arms, shapely back, plump ass, and long legs. The muscles that work under her skin shift with her movements.

My heart is pounding. I want to lick Jacqueline’s nape. I want to run my hands all over her body, to feel how firm and smooth it is. I doubt she would mind.

My gaze’s wandering ends at the reflection of those free-hanging breasts, that stand out with their weight and gravity. Once Jacqueline finishes painting her lips, she smirks through the mirror at my dumbfounded expression.

“The pancakes didn’t fill you up enough, huh? Then let’s take advantage of the few minutes we have left.”

Her breasts sway as she turns around. I’m rooted to the spot while Jacqueline struts up to me, and then past me, brushing my shoulder along the way, to sit down on the edge of the bed. A few stray drops of water drip off her chest onto her thighs and the sheets.

She stares up at me through her eyelashes as she reaches to spread her labia apart, exposing the glistening flesh within.

“Come here and eat up mommy’s pussy, honey.”

A wave of warmth washes over me. My gaze is glued to the pink promise of her lips as I shuffle towards my beloved. I kneel at her feet. The dark, slippery interior of her womanhood beckons me. I want to crawl inside it and go to sleep.

Jacqueline grabs my head and pushes it against her cunt. My nose is buried in a forest of scented hair. My tongue probes the warm, creamy depths of her sex.

“Suck on mommy’s clit,” Jacqueline whispers as her hands grip my scalp and dig into my skull. “Make mommy feel good. Make me cum all over your face.”

When I regain my senses, Jacqueline is petting my hair. I’ve grabbed her ass cheeks and I’m pulling her towards me while I lap at her engorged clit like a cat licking her bowl clean. Sweet, sour, bitter, and salty all coexist in this woman. I lick her even while the juices drip from my chin. Then there is nothing but the hot, humid taste of her nectar as it floods my mouth, my throat, my lungs.

Jacqueline’s breath comes out in short, ragged gasps.

“You are such a good little slut,” she utters in a voice between a purr and a growl. “Famished from morning to night.”

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The last throes of the orgasm leave me dazed and drained in a pool of euphoria. I slump from Jacqueline’s lap onto the mattress like a rag doll. Once my eyes snap open, I stare vacantly at the ceiling as I catch my breath.

Jacqueline’s face looms over mine. She climbs onto me and pins me down, squeezing her boobs against my punier breasts. Our bodies are slippery with sweat, and the heat that her skin radiates causes goosebumps to erupt all over my limbs.

She draws her head back. Her brow furrows as she observes me with concern. Only when I follow her gaze I feel the warm tears running across the heated skin of my temples.

“What’s wrong, baby?” Jacqueline asks, her voice gentle and soothing like a lullaby. “Is something troubling you?”

The cacophony of the downpour and the heavy wind that pushes against the window remind me of the harsh reality here at the orphanage of this planet, and of the bleak future that awaits us all. Jacqueline massages my neck as she awaits my answer. The corners of my mouth turn upwards.

“I always cry during sex. It doesn’t mean anything special.”

Jacqueline smiles back, deepening her dimples. She holds my head and tilts it to lick my tears delicately, even off the tips of my eyelashes. She runs the pads of her thumbs over the contours of my cheeks to wipe away the remaining moisture. A deep sigh escapes from within my chest.

Jacqueline seeks my tongue with hers. We make out under the shroud of her raven black hair, that has gotten plastered to the sides of my face. My heart races while she laps at my organ as if she were feeding at a stream where she’d discovered a nest of tasty fish eggs waiting to hatch.

We roll around in the bed like beasts wrestling in slow motion. Jacqueline’s thighs grip at my waist tight as she fondles my naked, skinny body greedily.

I’m floating above myself. The flesh of my arms and legs and chest is made of paper mache painted gold with glitter. Molten metal flows through my veins.

* * *

My consciousness emerges for air from the churning sea of my impulses. I’m lying on my back. Outside, the wind howls as it rushes past the balcony, and the rain continues to pelt the earth like millions of bullets fired into the ground. I hear it hitting metallic roofs and gushing down gutters.

I’m befuddled as if I just woke up from an operation. As I prop myself on my elbows, I realize that the tap is running in the adjoined bathroom, behind its closed door. Less than a minute later, Jacqueline comes out wearing a punch pink satin robe, tied in front and embellished with lace trim on the sleeves and hem.

I blink away my daze. As Jacqueline approaches the bed, the fabric of her robe shimmers in the light from the nightstand lamp, close to candlelight. Her raven black hair falls loosely around her shoulders, and glistens in silky waves. Her gaze is intense, but her smile suggests she’s about to break out in giggles at some private joke.

“Your turn, sweetie. You can use the other bathroom if you want more privacy.”

She’s standing close enough to make my heart race. I find myself unable to stare straight at her confident beauty.

“M-my turn for what?”

“For starters, to wash your face. Otherwise all that sticky residue will stink in a short while. But you can grab a new toothbrush from any of the bathrooms, and also pee and shit if necessary. You know, the whole routine of getting ready to go to bed and sleep soundly without worrying about your dreams haunting you.”

My gaze wanders over to the two fleshy pillows that Jacqueline’s robe has covered, but I catch myself and rub my eyelids.

“Did I pass out? Did I actually die?”

“Still alive, as far as I can tell.”

“I didn’t vomit nor empty my bowels while my subconscious was in charge, did I…?”

Jacqueline holds my gaze with sympathy.

“The sheets seemed clean enough to me, just moist with our sweat and naughtier fluids. You are still out of it, but so am I.”

I scoot closer to the edge of the bed until I sit upright, placing my bare feet on the cool hardwood floor. Jacqueline sits beside me. She smells of soap, fresh deodorant and mint. She wraps an arm around my shoulders and leans in to plant a lingering kiss on my temple, which sends a thrill through me.

I lower my gaze to my calves. Am I embarrassed because I remain naked, because I’m in the presence of the only human being who has touched me intimately in years, or because I want to beg for Jacqueline to let me suck on her tits again?

I lick my dry lips and speak hoarsely.

“It feels as if we just fucked each other to death.”

Jacqueline raises her eyebrows and nods in agreeance.

“I thought I had gotten used to any kind of sex, but… I guess not.” She lifts my face with her thumb, forcing me to look into her cobalt blues. “Anyway, maybe you need to eat? Should we whip up dinner?”

The mere thought exhausts me. Cooking takes too much time and energy when compared with simply licking off someone’s pussy.

“No, I’m drowsy. So, am I going to spend the whole night with you…?”

Jacqueline chuckles.

“Of course you are staying,” she purrs. “I’m going to keep that frail body of yours in my warm bed.”

I avert my gaze because I’m too tired to risk getting horny, but I find myself staring at the black lenses of the mounted cameras.

“Won’t it be a waste to record us sleeping for like eight hours?”

“Thank you for reminding me, but I already turned them off. I also secured the videos. Of the little I’ve checked, you’ll have lots of fun playing them when we are away from each other.”

I realize that the ring lights have been switched off, I guess back when I lay unconscious. I forget quickly about the video evidence of tonight’s debauchery, because I imagine myself cuddling against Jacqueline’s tits under the comforter for as long as we want. Wait, tomorrow is Monday!

“Oh shit, we still have to go to work,” I mutter.

Now that Jacqueline and I have fucked, the world outside of this bedroom should have been reduced to a black void. Inside of our private shelter, we’d lie around naked while our bodies consumed themselves until we starved to death. We’d end up like two mummified corpses locked in an embrace, straight out of a Beksiński painting. But reality intrudes upon my fantasies and forces itself on my senses with a sharp reminder that I need to stick my tongue in someone’s asshole five days a week to survive.

Jacqueline pats my bare thigh.

“Baby, it hurts my heart when you look that miserable! I understand, though. Why would we need to resume the routine of wasting half a day at work to earn a salary, after we have experienced such a bliss? But we sit next to each other at the office, so we will spend very little time apart.”

I sigh deeply.

“I just want to stop working for that prick. Is that too much to ask?”

I regret how bitter my voice sounded. Jacqueline runs her fingers along my jawline, then she presses her lips against mine gently as if to assuage my worries.

“Don’t suffer for stuff you can’t change at the moment. What you should do is get up and show mommy your ass as you walk to the bathroom.”

I swallow, then clear my throat.

“Okay, let’s try that.”

I jump to my feet, but I wobble slightly like drunk. While I shuffle out of the bedroom, my ass cheeks burn as if I were warming them by a fireplace.

I enter the bathroom at the end of the hallway and close the door. I make the mistake of staring at my naked reflection in the sink mirror. I look haggard and gaunt, with my skin hanging loosely over my bones and muscles like tattered rags. My eyes are sunken in dark circles; added to the bags under them, I resemble a raccoon.

I shut my eyes and concentrate on breathing deeply. I feel my ribs poking through my skin, but the self-imposed darkness allows me to better smell the lingering traces of pheromones and similar erotic scents, echoes from a distant shoreline where some women washed ashore naked in a wave, their hair clotted with blood and chunks of flesh, perhaps dead or injured in a shipwreck or drowned in the rough sea during a storm.

As silently as I can, I push a tiny turd out through my asshole. I clean the puckered hole with toilet water in case Jacqueline decides to stick her tongue in there. I rip open a pack of toothbrushes, then I brush my teeth. I take a shower mainly to clear my head, but also to wash off the grime and sweat.

When I return to the bedroom, Jacqueline is lying in bed waiting for me, concealed up to her head beneath the comforter. Her raven black hair is splayed on the pillow in a wild mess. She pulls away the bedclothes to reveal her punch pink satin robe, inviting me to snuggle with her.

My pussy stirs. I want to bury my face between those large, meaty tits, which fill the robe’s ample chest compartment. I shiver, then I recall that I’m standing naked.

“S-should I put something on?”

“No way,” Jacqueline answers as she leers at me seductively. “The only way you are ever getting into my bed is naked, girlie.”

I climb into the empty space next to my beloved, and as soon as I nuzzle up to her warm body, she covers my nakedness with the bedding. Jacqueline must have reached for a hidden light switch, because the night envelops us. We sink our heads in the pillow, with our noses a few centimeters away from each other. Jacqueline strokes the skin along my collarbone as if caressing a cat’s fur, while she breathes deeply and stares at me lovingly.

“Your luminous beauty shines brighter than anything else in this dark world,” I blurt out, overwhelmed by her tender touch.

Jacqueline squints and laughs softly as her shoulders tremble. When she catches her breath, she grins playfully.

“Baby, you’ve already gotten me in bed.”

“Back at that Irish pub you told me to speak freely, so that’s what I’ve been doing. I’m telling the truth, too. You could make a stone feel like a living creature.”

“Ah, what a nice compliment!”

Jacqueline hugs me and covers my face in wet smooches. My nipples rub against the silky fabric of her robe, which causes me to squirm as a wave of pleasure courses through me.

I close my eyes and snuggle against my beloved. Hints of her musk waft about like incense. Beat by beat, my heart slows down until it matches Jacqueline’s rhythm.

How did an awkward, unhinged creature like me, who couldn’t shake off her hallucinations even during masturbation, end up having guzzled an angel’s vaginal secretions? In retrospect, I should have expected Spike’s stink to pollute the sanctity of Jacqueline’s bedroom, for that horse-shaped fiend to spectate tonight’s holy lovemaking. But why would my rotten brain rely on imaginary beings anymore, when the most perfect woman has welcomed me into her domain?

“It seems I have outgrown my need for horses,” I say proudly.

Jacqueline raises her eyebrows, then smirks.

“I haven’t got the faintest clue about what you mean, but I can tell that’s a good thing. I’m glad, baby.”

She rolls onto her back and lifts the bedclothes to create a void.

“Come here. Give mommy a big hug.”

I hurry to crawl on top of Jacqueline’s supine self. Once her fleshy tits get squashed together with mine, she nuzzles her face into my neck, she drapes her shapely legs around mine, and she wraps her arms around my back. A deep sigh escapes from my lungs. Jacqueline slides her cheek over mine and kisses each of my eyelids with a lingering, moist touch that makes me melt.

“As I thought, our broken pieces fit together,” she purrs.

I blush furiously while a warmth spreads in my chest. I can barely push words through my tightened throat.

“You go on like that, Jacqueline, and I’ll fall in love with you.”

Her tongue flickers delicately as she licks the contour of my left ear.

“I’d love for someone to worship me,” she whispers. “But you gotta be careful with what you say while we are cuddling in bed. I might end up wanting to ravage you and make you plead and beg until I cum deep inside you. Do you understand?”

“A-an odd threat coming from you, but I can’t deny its effect.”

Jacqueline smiles wickedly at me, then shen cups the back of my head to lower my lips onto hers. As soon as she sticks out her tongue, I suck it into my mouth and savor her taste.

The canvas of my mind has been painted with Jacqueline’s scent and her gentle touches and the warmth of her breasts and her cobalt blue eyes and the way she holds my gaze. I feel it to my core: whatever doubt I retained about giving myself away to this woman has vanished. I need to belong to her, now and forever. If she wants to kiss or lick or tickle or stroke or fondle or pinch or nibble or ride or spank or maul or torture or strangle, I want to as well. I adore the taste of her juices and want to feel more of them, a whole flood, running down my gullet to satiate the hunger that lurks below my consciousness. I might also want some of her fingers sliding in and out of my asshole.

We have rolled onto our side, facing each other. Jacqueline retracts her tongue with a smacking sound, then she brushes away a lock of hair from my face. She yawns and shifts slightly, making my body rock as she nestles closer to me.

“Mommy needs to catch some Z’s, particularly after such a good fuck,” she says mellifluously. “I’m guessing you also sleep on your left side, so turn around. You welcome the notion of spending the whole night with my tits pressed against your back, right?”

I roll onto my left side, facing the closed door to the balcony.

“Absolutely. Please keep me in contact with your tits at all times.”

Jacqueline giggles. After she slides her left arm under my neck, she wraps her right arm around my torso and lowers that hand to pat my defenseless abdomen, which causes a shiver to run down my spine. Jacqueline pulls my body against her voluptuous self so her tits fit snugly against my back, my ass rests against her crotch, and the back of my thighs merges with the front of hers.

She’s breathing on my nape and inhaling deeply. Her soft hair brushes over my shoulder and chest with every gentle movement she makes. I nestle in Jacqueline’s arms as I hope that the warmth she radiates soaks me.

My eyelids get heavy, my eyes grow moist. The tension in my body dissipates, leaving behind an overwhelming sense of well-being. Jacqueline will keep me safe and loved. She’ll never allow anyone to treat her girl like a monster. I can live happily ever after in her embrace.

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Note from the author: Thus concludes the unexpectedly long sequence in which Jacqueline and Leire frick, which might be related to the rest of the plot. How will our delusional, mostly unhinged protagonist adapt to her new reality as the adopted daughter of someone eager to screw her own daughter? Stay tuned and all that (assuming anyone reads this garbage).

These weeks have been tough at the office. As if the usual issues of working as a computer technician in a hospital that handles a couple hundred of covid cases weren’t enough, I fucked up my lower back relocating PCs, and I also suffered through two major migraines. I’ve yet to recover fully from the latest.

Migraine headaches are some of the scariest experiences I endure on a regular basis; I’m someone who relies entirely on the doors I can open through my mental abilities, so losing half of my vision as well as most of my ability to understand anything for a few hours makes me fear that one of these days the effects will become permanent as in a stroke. I swear I’m getting a bit dumber with each attack. I still remain disoriented from the migraine I suffered two days ago at about nine at night, shortly before my shift ended.

I’m going to be busy for a couple of days; I ordered a new processor, motherboard, RAM, cooler, etc. to upgrade my PC, and I’d rather make sure I get through the annoyance of putting essentially a new PC together before I focus on anything else.

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Jacqueline squeezes my right ass cheek through my dress, digging into the flesh with her nails. I wince, and my pussy quivers. She pushes me gently until we stand between the cameras that face the mirrors at the head of the bed, with its flamingo pink comforter and matching pillowcases. Two puffy toss pillows of faux fur are propped against the regular pillows, and their colors, baby blue and turquoise, make me wonder from which alien creatures they were skinned.

“Take off your shoes, push them under the bed, and sit down,” Jacqueline orders me huskily. “The cameras need to start recording. Quite anticlimactic, isn’t it?”

When my ass sinks into the plush comforter, my mind floods with images of me lying under the bedding while Jacqueline smothers me against her breasts. The pair of cameras are glaring at me through the rings of light like cyclopean, robotic police officers interrogating me for messing up their futuristic dystopia.

I feel drugged. I blink repeatedly to snap out of it, and I realize that Jacqueline has stooped behind one of the cameras. Her raven black locks frame the lense and its ribbed focus knob as she twists the machine on the tripod. The way her tits hang makes my neck shiver. I lick my already wet lips as I hope that her nipples, that bulge in the reinforced cups, slip out. I’ve become a kitten who is searching for anything to suckle on, except that I’m three steps away from the most appetizing breasts on Earth.

Ah, I’m supposed to take off my shoes. I fear that I might collapse onto the hardwood floor, so I bend over carefully to remove my left sneaker. To take off the other, I dig in with my freed toe. The rainwater must have seeped into my shoes, because my socks are moist. I peel them off. I smell them, but as I grimace, Jacqueline grabs the socks and tosses them aside.

She pulls me up then turns me around so I face the mirrors at the head of the bed, where her silky negligee glimmers in the soft radiance of the mounted ring lights. My beloved looms behind me, several centimeters taller, as I shyly hold my own reflected gaze. Dressed in my high-waist, tiered dress with a square neckline and puffed sleeves, I look like a teen, or a worn out thirty-year-old woman cosplaying as a teen, who went out for a stroll on a Sunday only to be lured into a house of sin where she’s about to be defiled. A surge of tingles in my tummy threatens to flow down to my crotch.

Jacqueline slides her hand under my hair. As she combs it, she strokes my scalp with gentle motions. I shiver. My neck loosens, my gaze unfocuses. The fingers of Jacqueline’s right hand rest on my chin, then she tilts my head to examine the self-inflicted wounds on my neck closely.

“Poor thing, stabbing yourself with a fork,” she coos.

“How do you know I used a fork?” I ask, surprised. “I don’t recall telling you.”

“What other implement of that size has four prongs?”

“Ah, you are so intelligent,” I say dreamily.

Jacqueline chuckles. Her breath stirs my hair.

“And you, baby doll, should aim better when you attempt to impale your food.”

“No, I intended to kill myself painfully.”

Jacqueline’s fingers, that were caressing the skin around my puncture wounds, freeze. She wraps an arm snugly under my chin.

“Yes, I know.”

After she plants a soft kiss on my wounds, she licks them up and down, coating them with her warm saliva. I squirm as a heat rises in my loins. Jacqueline wraps herself around my torso, pressing her breasts into my back and nuzzling her nose against the side of my neck. Her nipples poke me through her negligee. In the mirror, my beloved resembles a wild beast that longs to sink its fangs into its prey.

“You know you are safe with me, right?” she whispers. “You don’t need to worry about anything.”

Her hands brush lightly over the undersides of my breasts, then she pinches my erect nipples through my dress and bra. After she plays with my nubs for a few seconds, Jacqueline takes a step back. She unbuttons my dress near my nape, grabs the sides of my garment and pulls it upwards, exposing my panties.

“C’mon, lift your arms and shimmy,” she orders me with a wicked smile.

I raise my hands and wiggle my butt. The front of the dress glides over my closed eyes like a veil. When I open them, I find myself staring at two wads of armpit hair like clumps of daddy long legs. I lower my arms reflexively.

“F-fuck, I forgot to shave my armpits!” I blurt out.

I blush deeply and I avert my gaze from my panicked reflection, but Jacqueline laughs. She traces a pattern across my back with her fingertips, leaving a trail of goosebumps in her wake.

“It’s just a bit of hair, sweetie. No need to look so ashamed of yourself. But look at this…”

Her red nails dig gently at the valleys between my prominent ribs.

“You are so skinny, Leire. Your diet must be atrocious. No wonder you seem woozy half of the time! You need someone to take care of you, don’t you? And who better than me?”

Jacqueline closes her eyes and buries ner nose in my hair as she wraps her arms around my torso, squeezing me against the cushions of her breasts.

“Yes, skinny and pale like a lost little girl,” she whispers.

My breath hitches as Jacqueline’s warm saliva dribbles down my neck. She’s a freak. My eyes water, but I blink repeatedly to clear the tears away. I’ve never felt so relieved. Another freak could take me as I am. Another freak could even love me.

She unclasps my bra and pulls it off as if she were undressing a doll. My breasts fall free. Jacqueline purrs as she kneads my chest with both hands, and she pulls lightly at my nipples with her thumbs and index fingers as if testing their firmness. I whimper and tremble with pleasure.

“I love your boobs,” Jacqueline says.

“Not as much as I love yours,” I reply hoarsely. “But yeah, mine are pretty cool.”

“Oh? I was sure you would have grown to dislike them somehow.”

“I could never dislike breasts, even my own. They are my only good trait. My oddly big, pleasantly-shaped breasts. If only I had the confidence to parade them around like you do with your titanic tits, I bet my life would have fared better. But I also wouldn’t have ended up here…”

“So what do you see when you face the rest of yourself, Leire?” Jacqueline asks seriously.

I glance at my skinny body in the mirror.

“I see a walking corpse. Everyone can tell how crazy I am just by gazing into my sunken eyes.”

Jacqueline’s breath tickles my neck. I hear how hard her heart beats.

“Such disdain for yourself… I want to put more meat in your bones, for sure. But first, let me show you how you look like to me.”

Her wet mouth closes around my neck while she circles my areolas with her index fingers like a blind person reading the bumps. She runs her palms over my breasts as her hands travel downwards, then her fingers trace over my sunken abdomen down to my navel, where she presses a thumb into my belly button. A wave of hot tingles travels through my pelvis.

The painted nail of her middle finger tugs lightly at the waistband of my panties. Jacqueline cocks her head playfully and licks her lips at me in the mirror.

“Your pussy has soaked through. It’s aching for someone to eat it out, isn’t it? And maybe fingerfuck it too?”

I nod silently, but I swallow hard and try to steady myself, because I’m getting light-headed.

Jacqueline massages my mound firmly through the thin material, spreading my folds. She grinds her palm against my throbbing clit.

A thousand tiny sparks of heat ignite within my body. My legs quiver uncontrollably, and are folding inward as if about to crumple under my weight.

My beloved wraps her left arm under my chin while with her right hand she slides a finger inside my panties. She drags it down the length of my slit teasingly, making my sensitive flesh shudder. She starts rubbing my clit with circular motions. My pussy throbs and twitches, and I’m writhing about as her tongue wets the ridges and grooves of my left ear.

Jacqueline slides the finger out until her hand leaves my panties. I’m trembling and panting. When she ceases to hold me, I nearly collapse onto my knees.

She brings the index and middle fingers of her right hand to my lips. I smell my pungent musk.

“Open your mouth, sweetie,” she orders. “Taste what is happening to you.”

In the mirror, Jacqueline’s cheeks are flushed with arousal. As she slides her fingers into my mouth, I imagine her forcing them down my esophagus, pushing her entire hand into my stomach. She’d plunge her fingers into my bowels, where her sharp nails would sink into the walls of my intestines and rip them open. Those bloodied fingers would rummage through the viscera to grasp at my ovaries, until they found their target. She would yank at them and drag my reproductive organs out of their natural habitat so that they could be inspected, analyzed, manipulated, while my gaping vagina poured the contents of my body in thick strands of magma.

I suck my slick, salty juices off Jacqueline’s fingers, making slurping sounds. She hums with pleasure. Once I’ve finished cleaning her fingers thoroughly, she takes them out of my mouth and lowers them to my waist. Both of her index fingers tug at my underwear as Jacqueline squats, sliding the panties along the curve of my ass. They drop onto the hardwood floor, and I step out of them.

“Now you are going to be a good girl and lie on your back,” Jacqueline orders me, “sinking that pretty head of yours in a pillow.”

I crawl onto the mattress, exposing my asshole to her lust. I position the baby blue, fluffy pillow so I can lie down in perpendicular to Jacqueline. I roll onto my back and let half of my head sink into the toss pillow as if I were to take a nap against the belly of a fat sheep.

Jacqueline’s bust protrudes from the bottom of my vision as she gazes at my naked flesh. I’m a piece of artwork, or an animal sacrifice presented before a goddess.

“D-do you want me to spread my legs?” I ask weakly.

She narrows her eyes at me and brandishes a hungry smile.

“No, stay like a corpse in its coffin.”

I nod.

“A suitable pose.”

Jacqueline climbs onto the mattress and straddles my waist. A light sheen of sweat shimmers on her forehead and cleavage. Her cobalt blues have gone glassy with lust. She looks down at me as she smiles with smug satisfaction while her raven black hair falls across her face, obscuring it with shadows. The midnight black negligee hides her crotch, that’s breathing warmth onto my navel.

My thighs are quivering with nervous energy. My mind is a blank slate except for one word repeated endlessly: fuck.

Jacqueline scoots closer to my brain. Although I try to hold her gaze, the heavy globes of her breasts cover my vision as if I stepped under a fleshy awning. I’m captivated by the enticing fragrance of Jacqueline’s cuntal secretions.

She straddles my face, and I find myself staring at her pink, swollen pussy lips. Her vagina radiates an oven-like heat against my skin, while its nectar oozes out like wax dripping off a candle onto my mouth with wet squelches, coating my lips, teeth and chin. At the top of her slit, the hood has drawn back over the throbbing clitoris, a gargoyle perched above a fountain that spews a warm, thick, gooey, sour and intoxicating liquid.

Jacqueline presses the velvet cushions of her thighs against my ears, sealing the holes, deafening me, protecting me from the maddening din of the outside world. As she lowers her pussy onto my mouth, its silky folds surround the edges of my vision like the canopy of heaven.

I stick out my tongue and taste her warm, slippery labia. It stretches apart inviting my organ to crawl inside and loll around within the confines of her saturated vaginal walls. Her pubic hairs brush against my nose and cheeks. As I wrap her throbbing clit with my lips, I slurp greedily at her wetness, intending to draw out all her fluids.

Jacqueline is balanced precariously on her knees while she rides a steady rhythm. Her muffled voice breaks as she says, “My poor baby girl, you must have been starving.”

I consider opening up about my dietary habits, but my tongue is busy. My hands are kneading at Jacqueline’s muscly ass cheeks as if to mold dough into rolls, then flatten them and cook them with hot oil until they get crispy brown.

Her thighs are trembling, and to support herself she leans with both hands against the mirrors propped up behind the pillows. Her clit has become hard as a diamond point. Her moans grow louder, her hips start to rock faster, and she’s panting with excitement. She’s reaching the heights of her climax.

Jacqueline shudders and spasms as she empties her juices into my eager mouth. She cries out hoarsely, trying to suppress the volume. I swallow her salty fluid as it spills down my throat. It’s mixed with a hint of copper and a trace of bitter chocolate.

She grinds to a stop at my lips. The muscles in her thighs tense and release as she comes down from her high. She lifts herself off my face, dampening my hair with her juices. She slides to my side, then she leans upon one elbow to look at me. Her face has flushed red, her cobalt blue eyes glisten, and a pearly drop of wetness clings on her lower lip. Her breasts heave heavily, about to slip from the cups of her negligee, as she tries to regain control of her breath.

Jacqueline takes a long, shuddering sigh. She leans dreamily over my face, then she thrusts her tongue into my mouth, invading me. She sucks on my organ, drawing it deeper into her warm cavern, that must be flooding with the taste of her own pussy. When she pulls away to catch her breath, she licks her lips clean and shoots me a satisfied glance.

“You are a natural slut, sweetie.”

My chest swells. What is that? Pride?

“I’ve always known I was depraved. But thank you for the compliment, Jacqueline.”

She kneels on the mattress. Her tits wobble heavily as she arranges the pillows so she can lean back against them. I become aware of a pattering on the window of the balcony, and of the background din of a downpour. It’s been raining the whole day, hasn’t it?

Something about Jacqueline’s pose reminds me of how my mother used to sit in the bathtub in the middle of winter because she was cold, until the day when we found her frozen stiff; the water had gone ice cold overnight. Icicles hung from the taps like stalactites from a subterranean cavern. We didn’t find any signs of foul play, or of a struggle; my mother had never struggled in life. She had never experienced what it meant to be afraid of death, because she had already been dead.

Jacqueline says my name as she lifts her breasts to entice me.

“You’ve more than earned these, don’t you think?” she whispers seductively. “You’ve been eyeing them for months at work, and now they’ll be yours.”

She crosses her arms to grab the sides of her negligee, and before I realize it she has pulled the garment off her torso. Her breasts spill out heavy and pendulous. I gawk in awe as my mouth floods with saliva. My gaze is glued to the taut, creamy skin, with bluish venules visible beneath it, of each large, pillowy orb of flesh. Jacqueline pushes her tits together, which emphasizes her pink areolas and nipples hardened to pointed nubs, like bullets ready to be fired into my brain.

I’ve turned into a dog who’s been offered the most appetizing treat of its servile existence. I worship breasts. I live for breasts. They are the center of everything that moves and breathes in this universe.

Jacqueline takes my right hand from my thigh and lays it gently on one of her tits. When I recover from the shock, I knead at the doughy globe, making it jiggle. I stroke at its base to test the weight of the flesh, to feel it resting on my palm. I run the tips of my fingers over her creased areola, and I lick my lips at the nipple that invites me to feast at its juicy depths.

“I’ve… never seen anything this beautiful,” I mumble.

My beloved grabs the turquoise toss pillow and places it on her lap, covering her crotch. She flattens the faux fur, then pats the pillow invitingly as she offers me a sultry smile.

“Come, my girl. Lie down sideways.”

As I crawl into Jacqueline’s lap, I’m breathing heavily, inhaling her strong and arousing scent, fresh sweat mixed with a whiff of musky perfume. A string of drool falls from my chin onto her stomach. I’m about to wipe it with my hand when Jacqueline cups the back of my head and pulls me into the fragrant valley of her cleavage. Her tits almost engulf my face. An intense heat radiates from the mounds of fat and firm flesh and silky skin.

Her heart beats like a drum inside her chest. I press her soft orbs tightly to my cheeks with both hands while I lick the salty sweat of her cleavage. I’m panting, as I can barely pass air through my nose due to her enormous tits.

“So cozy, aren’t they?” Jacqueline asks sweetly. “Like a blanket on a winter night.”

The ends of Jacqueline’s locks brush against my face like silken feathers as I nuzzle my way to her left breast. My tongue slithers over her erect nub, and my beloved squirms with pleasure.

“Let’s see you suckle on it properly, baby girl,” she whispers, breathless. “Don’t just smear your precious saliva on it.”

I press my lips tightly around the teat, latching onto the smooth flesh. When I suck deeply at the hard tip, Jacqueline lets out a low moan. Her taste makes my eyes water. I’ve been deprived for so many years of what sustains human beings alive.

Warmth suffuses all of my muscles, making me weak. A flood of calm acceptance envelops me. Although I’m a worthless piece of shit and an embarrassment to humanity, right now I can be grateful.

“You look so relaxed, Leire,” Jacqueline coos as she strokes at the crown of my head. “Like a baby about to fall asleep. But not just any baby, my very own.”

Her throat makes small noises that vibrate through her chest.

“I wish I could fill that sunken tummy of yours with my milk,” she whispers dreamily. “You’d drink up as many liters as you needed until nothing in you remained empty. I would love if I did little else in life than run my fingers over your scalp as you suckled on my breasts.”

Jacqueline’s fingers comb my pubic hair, then she teases me by running them along my inner thigh.

“Why would a little sweetheart like you hate herself, huh? Don’t worry, mommy will take good care of her girl and make her feel like she deserves.”

She slides a long finger down the crease of my pussy. I whimper softly. I’m so wet that my inner folds are oozing juice like a leaking tap.

“Look at me, Leire,” Jacqueline whispers hungrily. “I want to look into your pretty eyes while I feed you.”

I tilt my face upwards. In the blur of her face, her cobalt blues burn brightly.

I fall down a well of endless time while Jacqueline’s loving fingers stroke my clit. My whole body quivers and twitches with pleasure. An orgasm builds up within me, threatening to explode, until my eyes roll back and my vision whitens as I come in a giant wave of ecstasy.

Finally, a good death.

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Jacqueline’s Audi ascends along a one lane, winding road bordered by three meters tall hedges and a fence topped with spikes. The apartment buildings we pass by have three floors, are built on raised platforms, and were designed by architects who were allowed to flaunt their creativity. Between the clusters of houses like secret villages in isolated wooded valleys, the night and the downpour conceal our surroundings, but even during the daytime, the view would have been reduced to grassy slopes and palisades of straggly trees.

I could mistake the dark grey cloud cover of this evening for the murky fog in my own mindscape. Raindrops are pattering against the windshield, but the wipers drone on as they swish back and forth. The candy red taillights of the few cars ahead of us glisten in the wet road like vertical columns of luminous smoke, while random reflections glow white against the blackness as if to illuminate some unknown dimension.

I can see my own reflection in the milky glow, but I can’t bear to face my own eyes. I recall my own name and I can come up with my own thoughts, but my eyes might be blank, or they might have become black as coal. Maybe I’m already dead. The world is so strange to me. I’ve become a blind person trying to comprehend what she can only sense with her fingertips. All I can feel is a longing as if something was pulling at my heart, a hook embedded deep within it and tugging at a thread buried at its center.

Jacqueline’s raven black hair flows freely in her profile view as she focuses on the road to drive smoothly. I wish I knew how to carve her effigy in marble so I could place it on my nightstand. What kind of woman charms and enthralls someone who for many years has struggled to retain her sanity, and can barely function due to a relentless horniness and self-hatred?

Nobody knows that I dared to invite Jacqueline out on a date. Nobody would have expected it either. She could be guiding me to an isolated house. Inside, I would follow her meekly into a dark cellar where I’d allow her to chain me up naked to a wooden beam. I would become Jacqueline’s secret pet, to play with and ravage whenever she remembered I existed. My mistress would return to work and feign ignorance about my disappearance. Our boss would get pissed because I quit without notice and every call went unanswered, but soon enough he’d hire a stable programmer who wouldn’t varnish her office chair with her cunt juices. In a few weeks, everyone but my captor would forget that I was born, although I would remain down in the silent, velvety blackness of that cellar, and hopefully I’d never see the outside world again.

“It’s alright if you can’t wait,” Jacqueline says, “but I intended to fire you up from zero if necessary once we reached my home.”

I swallow to clear my throat, and I taste remnants of Jacqueline’s saliva. My heart beats rapidly, my breath is ragged.

“W-what do you mean?”

She glances at me and gifts me a patient smile.

“Even if I were blind, I smell your arousal. You are soaking with it. But I couldn’t mistake how you are playing with yourself.”

I realize that I have lifted the skirt of my dress, slid my right hand under my panties, and I’m lazily rubbing my clit. I’m a slave to the need that burns through my body like an electric fire.

“My consciousness has shrunk and is bobbing in a heated, churning sea of impulses, I’m afraid,” I say in a threadbare voice.

“You are a sensual creature and you are craving a big, sloppy fuckfest with a woman that you are free to love as much as you love her breasts.”

“Still… I shouldn’t stain your upholstery.”

I sigh and retract my sticky fingers although my clit keeps throbbing. I slump in my seat.

“Don’t let my masturbatory habits distract you,” I mutter. “I’d hate for us to die in a fiery wreck before I reach your bed.”

“And you endured that horrible scare with your car, too…” Jacqueline says regretfully. “Yeah, I’ll drive safely, don’t worry about it.”

The passing, snow white headlights illuminate Jacqueline’s motherly features, and also bring out some raindrops that cling to the windshield, producing a halo like frenzied fireflies around the passing cars. My coworker is driving by the kind of apartment buildings that prosperous professionals pick to distance themselves from the rabble.

Dazed, it takes me a moment to realize that Jacqueline is maneuvering to park in front of a four stories tall, bone-colored apartment building. Water runs down the sides of the building in tiny waterfalls, reflecting the light from the street lamps. She kills the engine, and I shake my head to snap out of my trance.

“Take the umbrellas, sweetie,” Jacqueline orders me as she unlatches her seat belt.

Once we expose ourselves to the cold of this evening and to the breezes that spray us with rainwater, I cover Jacqueline with her umbrella. I follow her down a narrow path between low walls to the front door of the building. We hide from the elements in the entrance hall while a thunder crashes resoundingly.

Jacqueline grabs her umbrella from my hand, closes it and shakes it. She sighs.

“We finally got home! Stormy evenings like these are meant to be enjoyed under the comforter, preferably beside a warm lover.”

A glimpse of my gawking expression in the mirrors that cover the wall convinces me to close my mouth.

“Are you fucking kidding me, Jacqueline?”

She draws her head back, then giggles.

“What’s with that outburst?”

“No way you live here.”

“Oh, but I do. I didn’t steal someone’s key, as much as I want to impress you.” She kisses me on the cheek, entwines her fingers in mine and tugs on my arm towards the dim flight of stairs. “Your legs remain strong enough to walk up two floors, yes?”

When I stagger a few steps into Jacqueline’s apartment, she locks the door behind me. She stores her umbrella in its stand then prompts me to slide mine beside it. She helps me peel off my thick corduroy jacket. As she hangs it on a coat rack, I’m drawn to the living room, the first open space on the left. I press the switch on the wall, and the living room gets bathed in warm white light. The corner velvet sofa, that faces a widescreen television instead of a pile of board games, could seat five people comfortably. A carpet under the rosewood coffee table is made of animal skin, possibly human.

I shuffle to the balcony door. Even on this evening, dark as the sludge in the bottom of a coffee cup, I make out the silhouette of Mount Igueldo. Between its slopes and some nearby buildings, a bowl-like concavity contains part of the Cantabrian Sea up to the horizon line. The wind is howling outside while a drizzle hits the windowpanes.

I clear my throat.

“You are like rich or something, Jacqueline. How can you afford such luxury with the wages of a clerical worker at our shitty office? Do you deal drugs on the side?”

“Sort of,” she answers coyly from behind me.

When I turn around, Jacqueline is standing next to the sofa and wearing the attire she chose for our date inside the cozy pub: a crimson, lace dress with sheer sleeves that cover her arms, and a choker neckline that pushes her breasts together like twin mountains of ice cream. Her skirt has bunched up enough that it reveals how her thighs bulge a bit over the welt of her black stockings. Those cobalt blue eyes are peeking at me through her thick eyelashes.

I’m an ungainly beast compared to this vision. I force myself to hold Jacqueline’s gaze instead of ogling her tits.

“Huh? What kind of drugs?”

As I wonder whether my coworker might be one of those women who snort cocaine while riding horses bareback, she walks up to me, cups the back of my head and devours my mouth. I close my eyes. Jacqueline envelops me in an embrace, and her scent fills my nostrils. My mind gets foggy, my skin flush with heat. I moan into her mouth as her lips suck at mine and her fingers dig into my hips, then she slides her hands under the skirt of my dress to fondle my ass firmly. Rivulets of drool are dribbling down our chins.

I hold onto Jacqueline. Right now she’s my sole reason for living.

Once we break apart, we rest our sweaty foreheads against each other and catch our breaths.

“Do you need to go to the bathroom, baby?” Jacqueline whispers as she rubs my shoulders.

I nod weakly.

“I need to pee, yeah.”

“It’s the door at the end of a hallway. I’ll use my bedroom’s bathroom.”

Jacqueline pulls away from my grasp, but she shoots me a smoldering look before she sways down the narrow hallway ahead of me. She enters a room on the left and closes the door behind her.

Inside the bathroom, that contains a toilet, a sink and a curved shower enclosure, I lean against the white ceramic sink with both hands as I stare at my reddened face in the mirror. My eyes are glassy and I’m gazing into infinity with a slack expression. My body is burning with desire, my panties feel damp.

“What the fuck,” I blurt out. “What the fuck, what the fuck.”

I wash my face with cold water. I pee. I flush a couple of times to cup fresh water and clean my pussy thoroughly.

Jacqueline must have been waiting to hear me close the bathroom door; when I step onto the hardwood floor of the hallway, she summons me from the bedroom in a lilting voice. I swallow, then venture into her domain.

She has donned a midnight black, babydoll negligee that emphasizes her delicious curves and exposes half of her skin to my lust-drunk eyes. Her breasts overflow the reinforced lace cups, creating a shadowed space between the center gore and the meaty undersides of her tits, in which I yearn to stuff my face. Beneath the wavy, sheer lace hem of her negligee, her pale ivory legs are toned, their skin elastic.

I’m stunned. As the rain splashes on the porcelain tiles of the balcony behind Jacqueline, she waits for me to regain my senses. A sentence forms in my mind: that’s not the body of a forty-four-year-old woman. I’m witnessing the benefits of unrotten genes, good luck, regular exercise and inordinate injections of semen. The holy grail to deter aging.

I’m about to slide into a dejected mood, but I catch myself. Jacqueline has led me to her nest to fuck me, so she has already accepted this worthless beast enough.

“What do you think of my choice of attire, Leire?” Jacqueline asks playfully.

“That my heart might explode.”

She holds her hands behind her nape, which lifts the silken balloons of her breasts, then she sashays towards me while her mammaries bounce and jiggle. I’m about to drool, so I tighten my lips to contain my saliva. Had I ever felt this ravenous? I’m overcome with the urge to feed on flesh and blood and sex and cum and death and the world itself.

“You are as candid as a kid gaping at a chocolate pie, Leire,” Jacqueline says with a smirk. “You wouldn’t be able to hide how you feel.”

“Yeah… Your tits are a French national treasure.”

She giggles.

“I’ve lived in this country for most of my life, you know.”

“Well, they become a national treasure of whatever country adopts you.”

Jacqueline’s gaze is igniting my brain, so I look away. I notice two cameras mounted on tripods. They are placed strategically at both sides of the foot of the bed, and their black lenses are peering through ring lights that radiate a soft glow. My coworker has separated the king size bed from a wall enough to prop up two full-length mirrors behind the pillows, and a mirrored wardrobe offers a profile view of the whole mattress. Two snaking cables coming out of the cameras connect to a hub placed on a desk next to a desktop computer, whose monitor is showing a video editing program.

“You asked me how I could afford such an apartment with my salary,” Jacqueline says. “There are plenty of economic opportunities for a woman blessed with this body and who knows how to set up a home recording studio.”

“You are a cam girl?” I ask, awed.

“Let’s say I have a whole network of girls making me plenty of money.”

“Huh?”

My mind is reeling as Jacqueline approaches me, and my pussy throbs hoping that she will assault my mouth again.

“I’m going to record what I will do to you,” she states. “You are fine with it, right?”

“T-to sell it online?” I ask in a trembling voice.

Her pupils are lit with a gentle fire.

“Not this one. I intend to treasure our lovemaking session forever.”

I recall the moment back in our office when a floating screen showed a live feed of me as I abused my genitals, although when I turned around, nobody was standing behind me. My facial muscles freeze. Was Jacqueline the one who pointed a camera at my workstation? Is that why she remained unruffled after I opened up about my masturbatory habits?

Should I be angry that my coworker, whose breasts I’ve wanted to suck on for months, has been spying on me? I drop that line of thought, because I’m getting wetter. Without my knowledge or consent, Jacqueline was interested in me enough to set up hidden cameras at the office to record me rubbing my clit. She must have fantasized about fucking me, and now she has seduced me, brought me to her apartment, and intends to ravage my body and swallow my soul. I’ve never felt so desired and horny.

“S-sure, record me all you want,” I say, breathless. “But give me a copy of the video afterwards. I look forward to playing it at home whenever I’m missing you.”

Jacqueline’s nostrils flare. She bites her lower lip and loosens her shoulders. As she walks by me towards the wardrobe, she reaches out to caress my jawline and neck with her fingers. She slides the door open, which reveals two dozen Seagate external hard drives stacked like ingots.

After she closes the wardrobe, Jacqueline turns around with an impish grin.

“Figuring out how to send you several gigabytes of video files would be a huge bother, but I’ll gladly lend you the external drive so you can copy the files yourself. You’ll have to give it back, though!”

From now on, even in the darkness of my dreary bedroom back in Irún, after another meaningless workday I’ll be able to lie in bed and masturbate as I play the video of us fucking. I’m so thankful that I fear I might burst into tears. I’m standing in front of a creature of unearthly perfection.

“Whatever you want, Jacqueline,” I say obediently.

My beloved blushes. She bats her eyelashes and cocks her head as she widens her mouth in a smirk.

“I’ve brought you to my home and my bedroom, and now you offer me to do whatever I please with you, huh?”

A few minutes of relief from this life filled with anxiety and stress and worry and loneliness and self-loathing and despair may save me, or at least make me believe that one day I might be.

“Anything.”

Jacqueline exhales a pleased sound.

“But words are cheap, aren’t they? So you’ll have to prove how much you’ve lusted after me.”

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A drop of sweat trickles along my temple as I admire Jacqueline’s raven black hair, so smooth and lustrous, that cascades past her slender neck. She notices my wandering gaze and smiles, pleased with herself.

Jacqueline lifts the brass medallion that hangs from my necklace and holds it against her palm. She traces with her thumb the engraved letters.

“Mon coeur,” Jacqueline reads as her eyes twinkle. “You are laying it thick, huh?”

Her lips part slowly in a mischievous smile that makes my neck tremble. I imagine myself gripping my coworker’s head and pushing my tongue into her mouth. As I stammer an answer, a breeze chills my face, upper chest and bare legs. On the lower level of the pub, a man is holding the front door open while he shakes the water off his umbrella, so the storm is blowing gusts into the pub, spraying the floorboards with rainwater. A nearby patron must have gestured for the newcomer to save them from the cold, because the guy nods apologetically and closes the front door behind him.

Jacqueline lowers my medallion so it rests on my skin again.

“I-I just intended to convey that nowadays my heart is full of French,” I say.

She chuckles. Her right hand caresses my cheek, and as she runs those fingers through my hair, she leans closer. Her lips brush the ridges of my right ear. Jacqueline whispers huskily in French, and her sensual tone along with her warm breath burble down my earhole to fill the hollow space inside my skull. None of the individual words penetrate through the dense cloud of longing that has engulfed me, but goosebumps rise along my arms, I shudder warmly, and my pussy quivers as if a thousand bugs were trying to escape from my nether regions.

My pulse races wildly. I swallow to quench the dryness in my throat.

“I have no clue what you’ve said, but it made me tingle in the right places.”

Jacqueline’s warm fingers stroke the skin of my left hand upwards, towards the top of my forearm, but midway through she turns my arm. She traces the veins slowly, as if checking the pulse. She has scooted so close that her face almost fills my vision. Her breath, that breaks against my lips, smells like fruit punch. Those cobalt blue pools are staring straight into my eyes, and although I can feel her boring into my pupils, it’s calming me down.

“When did you fall for me, Leire?” Jacqueline asks softly.

My cheeks burn.

“I think I was always attracted to you. When you were near, I felt all tingly, but I found that uncomfortable because I needed to suppress my attraction to you. Your eyes are mesmerizing when they sparkle like that, and you have such amazing breasts and hips and ass. However, when you found me crying in the bathroom and you held me in your arms, I knew it in my bones.”

“You knew what, baby?” Jacqueline asks as if she wished for me to state it clearly.

I sigh.

“As long as you were with me, I was home.”

Jacqueline’s eyelids twitch, her nostrils flare. Distant thunder crackles over Red Hot Chili Peppers’ ‘Scar Tissue’. One of the bartenders must love this band. My coworker entwines her fingers with mine, and the heat of her hand radiates against my palm. Our bare knees touch.

She looks over the banister towards the bar counter, as if reminiscing.

“When I first met you, my impressions were negative. You had a strange smell, you laughed weirdly, you stole glances at my breasts. You seemed intelligent, but your thoughts were so convoluted and disjointed that I could barely comprehend half of what you said. I could tell you were mentally unstable, so I wasn’t too eager to deal with you.”

Jacqueline considers me a foul-smelling freak, and my laugh is annoying. I avoid blinking in case my eyes moisten.

“I hope there’s some upside to all that, because you are destroying me here.”

A smile flickers on Jacqueline’s lips.

“You’re scary sometimes, and even now there’s still a bit of danger lurking about you. But over time I found myself wishing to spend more time with you and hoping to learn more about your life. I wanted us to hang out in our free time, but I had no clue how you would react to such overtures from a coworker.”

“I don’t know either how I would have reacted. Over the years, I’ve ended up regretting many of my reactions. For most of my life I’ve been scared of getting involved with anyone else, and thought of love as a disease that could be cured by a pill or a hysterectomy. Being intimate means taking a risk, and… m-my mind dislikes risks since I lost my twin brother to cancer last year. But maybe that’s a habit that can be changed.”

Jacqueline’s seductive pout widens into a full smile that displays the whole upper row of teeth, deepens her dimples, lifts and tightens her cheekbones, wrinkles the bridge of her nose, and narrows her eyes.

“Jacqueline, when you smile like that, I feel like smiling too,” I say as I catch my breath and hold my stomach to keep my guts from erupting and splattering onto the floorboards. “It’s devastating.”

“I’ll smile like that more often, then,” she answers with an amused expression, but her cheeks are pinkish. “You referred to me once as a sexy mommy. Do you recall that?”

I have barely recovered from Jacqueline’s dazzling grin. I said what, and when?

“I-I couldn’t possibly keep up with every word that bubbles up from my subconscious and ends up sliding down my tongue.”

“I thought so, that you had let it slip out. But those are the best, aren’t they? And the thought of becoming your sexy mommy… made me all warm inside.”

I’m woozy with longing. I wish I dared to lean in and suck on her tongue, to lose my mind in a makeout session that would tune out all rational thinking, along with this horrid world. Maybe she will allow it if I ask nicely enough. For now, sweat is oozing out of my pores and likely staining my dress and the wooden seat beneath my butt.

Jacqueline stares at me intensely. I’m sure she can read my brainwaves.

“What do you think we should do tonight?” she whispers.

My mind gets crowded with short clips of our naked bodies entwined as we roll around on a boundless bed. I struggle to speak, but Jacqueline insists.

“Do you want us to fuck tonight, Leire?”

Blood thrums in my ears.

“Yes. Very much so.”

“Then come closer,” Jacqueline orders me huskily.

My heart hammers against my ribcage, and the blood it pumps out feels thick and heavy. My skin is warm and wet from perspiration. Jacqueline’s cobalt blues grow as I lean in. I close my eyes as I press my lips against hers. Her warm breath enters my mouth, the beat of her heart pulses through her silky lips.

When I draw my head back, Jacqueline narrows her eyes, and her nostrils flare as she inhales deeply.

“What are you, a teenager?”

I force myself to hold her gaze, although I feel small as a mouse. I shrug helplessly.

“I might as well be one.”

Jacqueline wets her lips. Her eyes are alight with desire.

“Kiss me again, girl,” she says. “Now like you want it.”

Her voice, honey dripping off a spoon, soothes and hypnotizes me, although I can barely see or hear anymore with how my blood is thumping in my ears and how the insides of my skull burn. As I lean in slowly towards my beloved, Jacqueline cups the back of my head, pulls me in and slides her tongue into my mouth. Her warm saliva has a tangy, fruity flavor. She keeps her cobalt blue eyes ajar, gazing deep into mine, as her tongue swirls slowly around my eager organ, exploring it with delicate movements of its agile tip. Her deep breaths warm my upper lip while our noses brush against each other. We are locked together in a dark room without any source of light or sound except for our lips and tongues touching one another.

Jacqueline strokes my nape tracing the skin with her nails, digging in as if to mark me as her possession. While her breasts squish into mine, her erect nipples, solid like round pebbles, poke at the fabric of my dress. A dizzying heat is building between my thighs. I’m containing myself from grabbing and fondling Jacqueline’s tits, although it feels as if they are pulling my hands towards them.

When we break apart, a strand of saliva connects our lips together like an umbilical cord. The crimson lipstick of her lower lip is smeared. It reminds me of the blood spatter from when I gunned down a man and buried him in a shallow grave.

Jacqueline licks the drool that was dribbling down a corner of my mouth, then she turns my head and nibbles delicately at my throat, tickling my nerve endings. I feel delirious, dazed by pleasure, as she runs her hands along my sides. I repeat to myself that I shouldn’t moan in public.

While Jacqueline’s wet, velvety tongue licks my earlobe, which sends shivers down my spine, whatever part of my brain is acting as a sentinel forces me to regain the sense of our surroundings. The group of college-age people that occupied the nearby table have quieted down, and their stares are burning the back of my head.

Jacqueline whispers into my earhole.

“I’ve parked my Audi nearby. Let’s go.”

I nod weakly. I’ve become too stunned and horny to speak. When we get up from the stools, I try awkwardly to fix my hair and the neckline of my dress.

Jacqueline looks me over. She wets her thumb and wipes some smudge off my chin, then another off my neck. I swallow. My coworker was turning around, but I wet my own thumb and I clean her lipstick smear from around her mouth. She grins.

Jacqueline tosses me my thick corduroy jacket. We hold each other’s gaze as I put on my jacket and she buttons up her designer coat. I grab both our umbrellas, one in each hand. We descend the stairs to the main level of the pub, then we march to the entrance.

When Jacqueline pushes the door open, a cold breeze blows on me, splashing my face with raindrops. The row of streetlights of the nearby square are pouring ovals of silvery light on the pooled water, that seems to be sizzling under the downpour. Most of the windows of the white building that hides the view of the beach shine blurrily. The air smells of saltwater and damp pavement and mud.

“Shit, it’s raining even harder now,” I say weakly.

Jacqueline takes her umbrella from my hand, then opens it with a flourish. She holds her right arm around my waist as she covers us both with the canopy. We step out from under the balcony of the first floor.

She leans in to lick my ear, then she speaks softly into it.

“You know where it won’t rain? In my house, under my comforter. I will keep you warm, too. So let’s hurry to my car.”

Jacqueline half-drags me up the narrow street, past parked cars, as I struggle to keep up with her pace. A streak of lightning illuminates the night, and thunder rumbles. With every step, our shoes splash on the tiny current that flows down the pavement. I’m sinking in a reverie, numb from horniness and confusion. The wind whips up a gust that lifts my skirt and flings icy needles at my bare legs.

I spot Jacqueline’s fog grey Audi A4 Avant.

“Hold the umbrella, sweetie,” she orders me.

“Huh? Alright…”

After I take over the duty of protecting us from the downpour, from a pocket of her coat she pulls out the car’s key fob. When she presses the button, a row of lights bring out the raindrops that roll down over the headlights. Jacqueline opens the passenger side door for me to climb in first. I barely realize that I’m sinking in the seat and that I’ve closed my door when Jacqueline sits down and closes hers. She takes the wet umbrellas and places them on the floor behind her seat. The rain is hammering on the roof and windows.

When Jacqueline turns towards me, her gaze melts my bones and transforms me into a trembling wreck of a human being. She scoots closer, wraps her right arm around my shoulders tightly and pulls me in. Her hot tongue burrows into my mouth like a raven’s beak seeking worms beneath rotting bark. She runs her free hand over my exposed thigh. Both our breaths become ragged and heavy. I close my eyes and let her ravish me.

When Jacqueline withdraws her tongue, I attempt to follow it, but she rests her forehead on mine.

“I’m going to do such nasty stuff to you,” she utters hungrily.

I swallow Jacqueline’s saliva. My labored breathing suggests I’ve just run down the street.

“Yeah. Flay my skin, amputate my limbs, gouge my eyes out.”

Jacqueline kisses the tip of my nose, then she slides back behind the steering wheel. The dashboard has lighted up with blue and yellow lines and curves, and the touch screen has switched on. As she revs up the engine, she closes her left hand around the wheel and shoots me a caring glance.

“Baby, I’ll only procure you pain of the sexual nature. Hopefully in time you won’t want any other kind.”

• Previous part (24)
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I swirl the coffee around in my mouth as I struggle to gather my words. The glass panels of the front door have darkened, but the rain keeps drumming on the windows. The tinny speakers over the counter are playing a melancholic guitar riff dampened by the murmur of conversations, which makes the song sound like someone is practicing in a lonely corner.

Jacqueline takes a sip of her mimosa. As her tongue glides across her plump lower lip, I dare to speak.

“These days my dream job is to die in a traffic accident. My corpse will rot in a ditch until someone finds my decomposing remains and wonders why my clothes are torn and my face is swollen. Through my driver’s license they’ll learn my name and address. Once they find my family, they’ll call them and tell them what a terrible person they raised. The insurance company will send my parents a letter stating that the damages were deemed unrepairable because the body is so badly mangled that nothing remains of my breasts or my vagina.”

Jacqueline tilts her head and narrows her eyes at me, but when she smacks her lips, another flood of words runs off my tongue.

“When I was three years old, my mother evicted my alcoholic father. He refused to accept defeat, so he broke into his former home and kidnapped both me and my infant sister. Then my father drunk-drove us off a cliff into a lake. My sister was rescued, but I drowned to death. With every rising swell of water, my hair and clothes floated around my waterlogged corpse from which my soul had escaped. My eyes were closed tightly shut, my hands crossed over my chest, my mouth frozen open, and bubbles of blood were stuck at the tip of my protruding tongue. But somehow I ended up uploading my unbodied consciousness into the mainframe of a machine, that now contains my mind and memories. I’ve become ones and zeroes as part of this giant network of ghosts trapped in machines. There’s no one to talk to other than a robotic nurse and a sadistic programmer who intends to involve me in his VR porn scenarios. As for my father, well, no one knows where my father is, but everyone assumes that he’s rotting away somewhere with nothing but worms crawling around in his skull for company.”

Jacqueline runs her fingers through the length of her raven black hair, as if to calm herself down from the storm of emotion she must be feeling at the prospect of becoming insane like myself.

“I thought your father was supposed to be in the car with you and your baby sister,” she says quietly. “Whatever disaster totalled your car, as you put it, must have done a number on you, sweetie. But I’m glad you are opening up about it. You need a shoulder for your troubles and comfort for your fears, right?”

My heart beats faster with guilt and self-reproach. I swallow my bitter bile and vomit-like thoughts back inside my gut.

Jacqueline’s hand rests on mine and holds it. When she lets go, she smiles at me with those piercing cobalt blue eyes of hers.

“Leire, have you ever been with anyone? Like with a guy in a romantic sense?”

This whole time, Jacqueline believed I was a virgin?! I must dispel this notion immediately.

“Of course I’ve been in relationships before! For example, my latest ex is in prison after he was found guilty of having sex with my corpse during a night of heavy drinking.”

Jacqueline chuckles as she traces the rim of her glass with her index finger.

“I can see how that would put you off relationships for a while.”

I rub my eyes. My heart is beating fast. I fear that I’m widening the chasm between us. Maybe Jacqueline has ceased to appreciate my presence, my stories or even my existence anymore.

“W-what, do I seem as if I have never dated anyone?” I ask cautiously.

“You always gave me the impression that people make you uncomfortable,” Jacqueline says with concern as she rests her cheek on her hand, “that you deal with human beings because you don’t have a choice, and you hope to be left alone soon. You can’t keep up with the world and its changes; you can only watch everything from afar like a bird that sits on a window sill. You prefer computers because they aren’t attached to you emotionally, and won’t judge you for anything you might say or do wrong, right? Such a personality sounds unsuitable for romance. Why are you here tonight, sweetie, instead of sitting at home and thinking about how much you want to be free from the world’s expectations and demands?”

My cheeks burn. Is Jacqueline, in her saintly patience, trying to make me realize the mistake of having invited her out on a date? I drink my latte as a thunderclap rattles the windows of the pub. The dim light bulbs flicker.

“I dated a few guys, long ago,” I mutter, then I clear my throat. “And I learned from those experiences what I would learn from placing my hand on a hot stove: I ended up burned badly and with an awful smell permeating my flesh. Also, that when I close my hand around a man’s hard penis, the sensation can trigger a fire alarm because erections can heat up and cook a woman’s soft tissue. In any case, it took two more tries for stupid old me to learn my lesson. I doubt I’m built for human relationships.”

What the hell am I saying?! Am I not trying to date Jacqueline?! Maybe my own subconscious has realized that I have embarked on a suicidal quest and is urging me to relent.

Jacqueline offers me a lovely smile. And those cobalt blues of hers from up close make me want to weep, throw my arms around her slender neck and bury my face in her raven black hair to beg for forgiveness.

“Sweetie, I get why you feel like that about romantic relationships,” she says.

“You do?!”

How would she, when she likely gets fucked by four or five guys every week?

Jacqueline’s gaze darts around. She shifts her weight in the stool and lifts the slice of orange from the rim of her glass. She tears off the juice vesicles with her teeth, then she leaves the rind on the table. Her eyes light up suddenly, and she shoots me a mischievous glance as she swallows.

“Besides, who needs to deal face to face with people when you can always play with yourself on the phone, isn’t that right?”

I did call Jacqueline yesterday while I was diddling myself on my bed. I guess I deserve the many references to that choice she’ll be throwing at me from now on. I sigh heavily.

“To be honest, I sometimes fear that I will vanish from existence due to a stroke caused by excessive masturbation.”

We’re silent for long seconds as the rain pours down outside. A gloomy feeling has descended upon us, threatening to engulf me. I’ll have to slog my way back home in that downpour. I wish the owners of this pub would let me sleep in a corner.

“I… masturbate so much because I need to feel good at least for a few seconds, and I’m too lazy to figure out which of the drugs out there would suit my needs best. Also, I’ve sought solace in self-pleasure whenever I faced a dreadful problem or I was drowning in anxiety, and I become increasingly anxious from the moment I leave my apartment, so…”

“I get it, sweetie. Taking care of yourself feels great.”

“I-it’s this garbage job of ours and the stress and monotony it inflicts on our lives. My waking hours are spent staring at computer screens. Even when I refuse to work overtime, I waste my free time between exhaustion and worry about the tasks I’ve yet to finish, because tomorrow looms over us like a monster waiting to devour us. When I look in the mirror after playing with my clit, I see nothing but darkness. I’m an aging spider caught in its own webby tangles.”

Jacqueline pats me lightly on the back of my dress. I’m used to wearing hoodies over T-shirts, so her touch lingers on my skin.

“As far as I’m concerned, you are a tiny little baby. You are talking to a forty-four-year-old lady, remember? I always hoped that someone would have invented a way to remain young forever. But no matter what I can do, I will grow old and die eventually.”

I clutch my glass as I straighten my back. I’m tasting my coworker’s bitterness for the first time, and it feels like home.

“Let me tell you, Jacqueline: you can easily pass for thirty.”

Jacqueline snorts, then sips her mimosa.

“You’re right. I can pass for much younger if I want to. But my mind remains that of an old, single lady who has spent years on self discovery to find happiness through romance, gaining painful lessons along the way.”

“Oh no, I won’t let you call yourself single when you get fucked by ten men every week. You’ve likely made love to half of Spain’s population without getting bored with their body types and tastes. So that’s an insult to those of us who have to diddle ourselves in odd places while a horse stares at us.”

Jacqueline laughs softly, her shoulders tremble. It warms my heart. Before I figure out how to cause such an exquisite sound again, she twirls one end of her raven black hair between her fingers as she addresses me.

“What’s with you and horses? But Leire, I’ve wanted to tell you for a while, because it pains me to see you miserable: life is beautiful and worth living if you don’t think hard about anything. Regardless of your capacity for happiness, just let yourself enjoy what you love.”

Jacqueline relies on clichés, like the majority of the flesh and bone robots that populate this world. I need her to be unique, so maybe I let myself be deceived by yet another delusion. My hand trembles as I reach for my glass, which I’m tempted to empty out, as the latte has gotten cold.

“I’m alive, so like most people I’ve heard the notion that one should stop thinking and just be happy,” I say hoarsely. “Is that truly applicable to anyone? My brain thinks by itself constantly. I snap out of a daydream I didn’t choose to fall into, only to realize I was supposed to pay attention to the pavement and the traffic lights, or to the code I have to program, or even to the road as I’m driving. Such daydreams, or waking nightmares, often force me to confront everything that has gone wrong in my life.”

Someone’s footsteps approach me from behind, which startles me. A college-age girl with long blond hair passes by our table. She eyes us with curiosity, then disappears behind the brick pillar. I had forgotten that a mixed group has occupied the nearby table, which robs Jacqueline and I of our privacy.

“We can try to believe that happiness will be possible for us,” Jacqueline says carefully.

“I guess I’d rather be miserable in truth that happy in deceit.”

“If we can’t convince ourselves, at least we can hope that someone will help us along the path that leads to happiness.”

Why am I getting annoyed? This lovely woman whose attention and embrace I crave is trying to improve my mood, yet I feel like shooting her down with a thousand barbed words. I rub my eyes and take a deep breath.

“So you’ve been feeling bad because you had to deal with my miserable self at the office. Jacqueline… I appreciate that you were looking out for me although you felt like you couldn’t approach me. I guess I scare off most people.”

When I dare to lift my gaze at Jacqueline’s face, she gifts me a sad little smile. I’m tempted to brush one of her locks behind her ear, but I don’t deserve to initiate contact with anyone.

“Also… I doubt I’ll ever forget how you held me in the bathroom when I broke down and wanted to die.” I shiver, then I look down into my glass. “But if you expect me to ever be happy, you might as well wish upon a star for it to land in my lap. Another shooting star, a shining silver fragment, already pierced my eye back when I was a baby, punching a tiny hole that turned everything murky and miserable.”

We remain silent. Jacqueline tilts her glass to drink her mimosa, and when she sets the glass down, her gaze is unfocused. I would have never expected Jacqueline to look deflated. I want to scoot closer and nuzzle up to her. I can only properly connect with people when they become so depressed that they wish they hadn’t been born. If I have to drag them down to that level, then so be it.

“Life sucks ass for everyone except robots and psychopaths,” I say in a thin voice that sounds as hollow as my head has become, “and merely looking around whenever you leave the safety of your home will tell you that soon enough this society will come crashing down into dust, along with many others. We’re forced to engage in a barbarian struggle for survival in a hostile world filled with hungry monsters that wait at our doorsteps to gobble us all up, and we’re not special in any way other than living brief lives filled with suffering, sickness and death.”

I picture a future when Jacqueline wanders around a desolate landscape, trying desperately to keep herself sane while a crazed lunatic rants at her from a distance. Maybe once a robot has eaten the last horse whole, there won’t be a thing left in this world but a few people with broken brains wandering about aimlessly until they finally starve to death, like lost children abandoned by a cruel parent in the wilderness.

The college-age blonde from earlier emerges from behind the pillar, which startles me. I avert my gaze. Her blurry legs pass us by as she trails the smell of soap. She must have done something nasty to her vagina to have cleaned herself so thoroughly.

I wipe the sweat from my brow. I riled myself up with my speech, so I continue.

“But I already ceased to care about this world long ago, when I faced that I should have never been born in it. Also, we are ruled by machines that control our minds through technology so complex it’s impossible for us to comprehend. What scares me these days is that my mental faculties may fail me and I’ll get trapped inside my own mind for the rest of my life. I refuse to imagine the monster I’ll become once I lose the ability to distinguish between reality and fantasy. Unfortunately… Let’s say that nowadays I feel close to crossing that red line.”

Jacqueline has furrowed her brow as she studies my expression.

“What do you mean, Leire?”

My heartbeat echoes loud throughout my skull. I gulp nervously. Why did I bring it up? Do I believe that Jacqueline would understand, or at least comfort me?

“I… might be losing my mind. That’s the clearest way I can put it. Some vital part of my brain must have gotten scrambled. Also, I lied to you, about my car I mean, when I suggested that I had an accident. I nearly killed myself in it. Before I could realize it, I was veering into oncoming traffic. I guess… I truly wanted to die. I even convinced myself that my old Renault Laguna was driving itself! This must be the onset of some kind of dementia, or one of those diseases of the brain that nobody wants to learn about unless they affect a family member or themselves.”

Jacqueline’s eyelids quiver. She grabs my left hand, squeezes it gently and keeps holding it. My heart flutters.

“Don’t worry,” she says soothingly. “When you told me about your accident, I feared you may have done it on purpose. I’m glad that you stopped yourself. You must want to live at least that much. But look at the bright side: I’ll get to drive you around from now on.”

The sparkle in Jacqueline’s eyes advertises how much she has grown to care for me. I hang my head low to avert my gaze as she rubs my left palm with her thumb. What have I done for someone like her to care for a rotten bitch like me?

“Whenever I look back to figure out where I went wrong, it feels as if I was broken from the beginning. Every day is a struggle to achieve what comes easily for others. And why struggle at all? You can’t expect a broken thing to ever stand straight, can you? I’ve done little else than stumble along as I hold the broken pieces of myself, which constantly threaten to slip my grip. And let me tell you, I’m fucking sick of holding everything together.”

Jacqueline’s fingers caress my knuckles, but she remains silent like a mother allowing her child’s tantrum to subside. I take a deep breath and exhale slowly as I try to calm my racing pulse.

“I feel like we understand each other much more, Jacqueline,” I say gratefully. “Below that gorgeous, seductive facade of yours, you are a barren middle-aged woman with a few remaining years of romance to squeeze out of life.”

Once I finish that sentence, my blood freezes as if my heart was pumping icy water. Jacqueline’s hand is closed around mine, but has become inert. A sepulchral silence buries us as I listen for any change in Jacqueline’s breathing, until she smacks her lips.

“I’ve always wanted a family,” she says hoarsely.

The hurt in her voice must have cracked some dam behind my eyes, because they fill with tears that drip on my right palm as I lift it to cover my eyes. Jacqueline drapes her arm around my neck and pulls me closer. She rests her chin on my scalp.

“C’mon, there’s no need to cry about that,” she whispers gently.

My ragged breaths inhale Jacqueline’s perfume mixed with the musky aroma of the sweat between her breasts. The tears roll from the corners of my eyes and dribble onto my bare knees.

“I knew those words would hurt you,” I mumble. “That’s why they came out of my mouth. I’m suffering all the time, so I need others to suffer as well. I’m a rotting, diseased rat who should be stomped on and thrown into a landfill. I have nothing good to offer to this miserable world.”

Jacqueline swivels on her stool towards me and she embraces me properly, burying my face in her warm neck, squeezing her tits against my shoulder blades, as she wraps her arms around my torso. Her hair brushes my skin with a light caress as it settles on my shoulders. The shock paralyzes me until a relief builds up in my depths. The pressure I had been containing escapes through my mouth like air leaving an untied balloon, and my heartbeat slows down until it matches Jacqueline’s rhythm.

She slides a hand under my hair to stroke my nape. I hug her back. I feel the intricate texture of her lace dress on my fingertips, as well as the cold chain of its zipper running up her spine.

“What I’m about to tell you,” Jacqueline whispers near my left ear, “I haven’t shared with another human being in a long time. Back when I was eighteen, I believed I was in love with a much older, married man. He took my virginity and treated me like a treasure. In just a couple of months, he got me pregnant. Even at my young age, all I wanted was a big family and to be a good mom, so I intended to give birth to this baby. You can figure out how that man reacted to my decision, right? He convinced me that we should wait a year or two, that he’d figure out how to divorce his wife without getting fleeced. I wanted to keep that man as well, and he’d resent our child if I went ahead with the pregnancy, so I opted for an abortion. I never recovered from my decision, in more ways than one. Something precious had died inside me, although I didn’t want it to die. I was a wreck. Back at my parents’, for a few days I did little else than lie in bed and cry. I felt ill, but why wouldn’t I? I could have created something beautiful. I was actually sick, though, in physical pain. A foul smell was coming out of me. When I went to the doctor, it was too late. I had developed an infection that spread to my ovaries. They treated me for a couple of weeks, but the tests revealed that my tubes were… scarred. I was one of those unlucky cases in which the damage makes you infertile. I have forgotten the weeks that followed, but I think that I cracked. For years I couldn’t care about anything. When I thought about spending my whole life unable to make my one dream come true, I needed to scream and break anything. My parents gave up on me, and I don’t blame them. From then on I figured that if I wouldn’t get out of life what I had always yearned for, I would have as much fun as I could. If anyone got too clingy, I moved on to someone else. After all, what was the point of settling down with someone if I would never have a family of my own?”

I’m stumped. The muscles around my heart have tightened painfully. I feel a person inside the warm frame that’s holding me in her arms, as if her consciousness was kicking through the bones and flesh.

When Jacqueline pulls away from the embrace, I want to complain until she locks her arms behind my back again. The sadness that lingers in Jacqueline’s eyes reminds me of an abandoned house on a winter’s day.

“You… always seemed like you were enjoying yourself,” I mumble.

She rests her forehead on mine as she sighs deeply, warming my lips with her breath.

“Oh, it’s been a rollercoaster. But I’ve always needed something else.”

• Previous part (23)
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I haven’t fully recovered yet from the Moderna booster shot, but at least I don’t have a fever anymore. I spent the day after the jab with temperatures close to 39ºC. The following day they averaged about 37.5ºC. Besides the inevitable decline of my cognitive abilities during the fever, I experienced muscle pain, a troubling, pulsating headache at the base of my skull, and maybe worst of all, I developed something of a bronchitis, for which I’m still taking asthma medication. Still, it seems I’ll have to continue this life of mine.

Anyway, I had been working on this scene for days, and frankly I wanted to put it out there and move on. I’m not entirely content with the result, but it achieves all it was meant to.

---

Jacqueline and I walk arm in arm under her umbrella along the puddle-infested pavement, as we head towards my coworker’s chosen pub. Raindrops are pelting the umbrellas and plunking against car roofs; only the occasional motorbike’s engine sounds over the white noise of the downpour. Rivulets run across the street and into gutters where they turn white with froth. With each inhalation, watery air enters my lungs. Jacqueline and I remain silent as if we had agreed to wait until we reached a shelter.

We pass the courthouse, and after we hurry to cross a short zebra crossing, we continue along a leaf-littered pavement lined with nude trees. The umbrellas of the strangers that pass us, as well as ours, sway and dance in response to the gusts of wind. Rainwater falls from the ends of the fabric in curtains while cold raindrops hit my bare legs like tiny daggers, as if the water was trying to push through to enter my bloodstream and feed on my living tissue.

By this point of human civilization, when most things are airtight and insulated from nature to prevent damage to buildings or our vulnerable lives, stormy weather should have been forbidden by law, yet it continues to make everything on earth quiver and shiver and whimper in terror at the sight of the freakish beast known as rain. However, being so close to Jacqueline’s warmth has given me goosebumps on top of those the cold provided. With every breath I take, her scent invades me. It’s musky with an undertone of rose petals and honeysuckle. This also causes a slight but noticeable warming of my genitals.

My mind drifts to daydreams in which I’m lying in a stroller with the canopy down. I’ve never quite known which way to go, but with Jacqueline driving me around, I don’t have to worry.

Jacqueline slows down as we reach the end of the canyon made of wheat brown apartment buildings. Beyond a small square with a garden enclosed by a green and yellow, knee-high hedge, a daisy white building, that likely contains one or two hotels, hides the view of the La Concha beach. The air is damp with the smell of the ocean, a touch of seaweed mixed with brine.

“That’s our pub,” Jacqueline says.

She tugs on my arm so we won’t miss the green light. The shopfront of the pub is wooden and painted charcoal black, which clashes with the building it’s embedded into. The fake, gilded signs written in English evoke decades long past. Must be an Irish pub.

Jacqueline closes her umbrella as I pull the pub’s door open. In the interior, thick wooden beams run across the ceiling, the dimmed bulbs highlight a few cobwebs, the pillars are made of mortared bricks that remind me of an old factory, sets of stairs lead to raised platforms where they’ve set up a few tables, and wooden banisters have divided up areas like a row of tables next to the windows, or the mezzanine. A musty aroma permeates the room as if mildew had grown in the wood paneling. The room is also filled with the low murmur of conversations, mixed with soft rock music that comes out from a tinny sound system hanging above the bar counter.

The brass umbrella stand is stuffed full, so we walk further ahead while the floorboards creak beneath our footsteps and our umbrellas leave a trail of rainwater. Groups of men or couples sit at worn out wooden tables with scarred surfaces, furniture likely made with love, at least of money.

“Let’s see if my favorite tables are free,” Jacqueline says cheerfully.

She walks ahead, but as she disappears past a pillar, the sole of my right sneaker slips on wet wood, and I stumble backwards onto my ass with a loud thud. I suck in my breath and hold it as my ass cheeks complain.

A guy sitting at a nearby table is eyeing my crotch while he nurses his beer mug. What the fuck is he looking at? Ah, my legs are spread as if I were about to give birth, and I’m wearing a damn dress, so I’m flashing my panties. I bang my knees closed, mortified. However, the guy had already averted his gaze to stare into his beer. He had a chance to ogle my barely covered vagina, but he rejects it? Am I that disgusting? What has my life become that some pervert wouldn’t even bother checking out my privates for more than a second?

I try to stand up quickly, but Jacqueline approaches me and stoops to help me up.

“You okay?” she asks.

“I mean, besides the embarrassment.”

“Don’t worry. We can sit at one of my favorite tables, so we’ll be fine.”

As I hurry up beside Jacqueline, I avoid glancing back at the fiend who had gotten an eyeful of my likely wet panties. We walk up a short flight of stairs. Jacqueline guides me to a high-top, round table next to a decorative barrel and a pillar that hides us from the rest of the pub except for the bar counter, the bartenders and a nearby table occupied by a mixed group in their early twenties.

We lean our umbrellas against the banister. As I drag a tall stool to our table, Jacqueline unbuttons her designer coat and takes it off, revealing a crimson, lace dress with long, sheer sleeves and a choker neckline that pushes her large breasts together. The skirt of her dress ends mid-thigh, but black, opaque stockings hug the rest of her shapely legs. Her dress is tight enough to display the curves of her stomach and her wide hips.

I swallow.

“Holy fuck.”

Jacqueline laughs softly. She helps me take off my thick corduroy jacket, and we drape my jacket and her coat over the barrel.

“A bit overdressed for this place,” Jacqueline says mellifluously, “but you had waited for a good while to see more of me. Oh, and look at that, your nipples are poking right through your bra and dress as if taunting me. As I thought, you have surprisingly big boobs for someone so skinny. It’s a shame that you choose to hide them with hoodies and sweaters.”

I’m dizzy and speechless as a flush of warmth spreads throughout my midsection. The next thing I know, I’m perched on my stool, and Jacqueline has dragged hers close enough that her thighs almost touch mine. But I’m disappointed that she hasn’t taken me in her arms and filled my mouth with her tongue. A part of her must be afraid of becoming too involved with a creature like myself.

Jacqueline brushes a lock of my hair behind my ear as her cobalt blue eyes lock into mine, causing goosebumps to erupt all over my body. I can’t look away, although my face is burning up.

“You are much cuter when you blush like that,” she whispers.

I discern the webs of striations in her irises, that encircle the black holes of her pupils. That gaze captivates and possesses anyone who meets it, and the longer she stares with hunger into the eyes of a victim, the more they lose themselves, becoming so engrossed in lusting over Jacqueline’s presence that they forget the corpses strewn about the ruins of this society. It may also lead to madness and eventually death for those unlucky souls unable to fight back.

“So, what do you want to drink, sweetie?” she asks.

“W-well, just travelling to Donostia has worn me out, so I need a coffee.”

“Alright. What kind?”

“A latte would be fine, but I should be the one…”

Jacqueline shushes me up. She stands up, then steps gracefully past the brick pillar.

My coworker has taken the lead in this gathering. She’s turned into a predator that’ll try to drag her prey into her cave. I can’t wait for her to turn me inside out and devour every morsel of my flesh.

Jacqueline reappears once she reaches the bar counter. A female bartender, who is wearing a white T-shirt tucked into black trousers, approaches my coworker and greets her as if they know each other. Jacqueline nods towards the backbar, where the rows of liquor bottles glisten in the dim light.

From this angle, her dress delineates her firm ass cheeks. I need to knead that ass and stuff my nose up her asshole. She must work out, while in my spare time I barely retain enough energies to trudge up to my sofa and pass out. I avert my gaze partly because I fear getting so horny that I’ll become incoherent.

Two of the young guys sitting at the nearby table, and facing the bartenders, crane their necks to check out Jacqueline. One of the girls, who looks like a college student, looks over her shoulder to figure out what has titillated her pals. These girls may be much younger, but they ain’t Jacqueline.

My coworker is taller, stronger, healthier, more beautiful than me. She has the passion and drive to succeed in life. Jacqueline surpasses me in every parameter, except programming. I’m quite sure that she can’t program for shit, so I have that going for me. What am I doing, though? Would it be possible for a woman like Jacqueline to fall for someone aged by stress and who lacks any charm, a creature with no redeemable qualities other than having a job with a decent paycheck, the occasional urge for self-abuse, a fetish of collecting unplayed board games, and a penchant for masturbating to elude her despair? How did I dare to invite Jacqueline out on a date? I’m a cockroach that skitters about in this world of towering humans.

I rest my elbows on the table and hang my head low. The rain is beating on the windows, which muffles the murmur of conversations and the clinking of glass. I close my eyes and listen to Red Hot Chili Peppers’ ‘Californication’, that’s playing on the speakers. A song that never got old, and that makes me nostalgic for a youth I never had.

When someone’s footsteps approach me from the nearby pillar, I open my eyes and find myself staring at Jacqueline’s ample thighs. Her legs appear taut and muscular underneath her black stockings. I straighten my back. My coworker’s cobalt blue eyes sparkle with mirth, her teeth gleam white, her lips are full and red, her neck slender and smooth.

Jacqueline places my latte, served in a glass, in front of me. A fork-length away, she places her glass, which is filled with a yellow liquid. They stuck a slice of orange on the rim.

“What the hell is that?” I ask hoarsely.

Jacqueline chuckles as she climbs onto her stool.

“A mimosa.”

“Sorry, I don’t know shit about drinks.”

She smacks her lips, then rubs my nape with her warm hand.

“What’s got you down, baby doll? I wish I knew what’s going on in that head of yours.”

If Jacqueline knew, she would regret it and never look my way again. I wish I didn’t know about the monster that dwells within the confines of my skull.

“I wonder… why an exquisite creature like you, with all your charms, wastes her time working at our shitty office surrounded by miserable people, or at least one miserable person and that happy-go-lucky intern of ours. Shouldn’t you be out there conquering the world instead, maybe starring in movies?”

Jacqueline caresses firmly, but slowly, the muscles in the back of my neck. My heartbeat accelerates as my chest rises and falls with deep breaths.

“Oh, you just think so because you are seeing me through your adoring eyes, sweetie,” she says in a sultry voice.

I dare to hold her patient gaze for a second before I focus again on the cracks in the wooden table. I sip my latte, then wipe my lips with the back of my hand.

“I don’t know. Our job feels like having settled for a boring, dead-end life with no meaning other than being employed.”

Jacqueline takes my chin and turns my head towards her. That beautiful face framed by raven black locks fills my vision. Her sapphire earrings contain a polygonal, distorted version of my own visage.

“Leire, you know you can relax.” Her voice is low and husky, with hints of that French accent that reminds of wine in an old oak barrel. “Back when I drove you to the train station, we spoke without issues, didn’t we? We had no problems getting along, no awkward silences or anything like that. Right?”

I can’t remember anything about our conversation during that ride, just that my heart beat fast and that I wanted her to drive me to her home and take care of me until morning. Now I wish I could press my lips against hers and taste her warm saliva, at least to forget for a while about my life and this shitty world.

“S-sure,” I whisper, “but these are different circumstances.”

“Because you have invited me out on a date?”

Jacqueline fixes her lips in a reassuring smile. Is she testing me to clarify my intentions? A woman who only sees another as a potential intimate friend wouldn’t invite her on a date. Maybe I have mistaken why Jacqueline agreed to meet me today, and I’m about to be shot down with the harsh truth of how reality works.

“Yes,” I say.

She touches the tip of my nose playfully.

“You’ve already been brave enough. Now we will open up about the inner workings of our minds and hearts so that a budding romance can blossom between us. Surely you can say whatever happens to pop into your brain.”

A shiver runs down my spine. I shift my weight in the stool.

“You have no idea the kind of ruination you’ve invoked.”

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---

Thick raindrops keep racing each other on the windowpanes, forming tiny rivers that run down the glass surface and reflect the living room lights with kaleidoscopic patterns. Beyond the window, the visual noise caused by slanted lines of rain blurs the facade of the opposite apartment building, although grey shapes appear briefly every now and then; possibly pigeons looking for shelter from the driving wind. I picture them getting struck by lightning, which would cause my window to crackle as if filled with static electricity, making the glass vibrate with white sparks of energy. The wings of those birds would catch fire, and then, unable to escape from the electrical discharges zapping their bodies, they would die screaming even before they shattered some bones by crashing into trees.

Any other day, I would have welcomed the patter of rain hitting my window, as well as the distant thunderclaps, but in a couple of hours I must abandon the safety of my dry apartment and venture through the drenched cold of the outside world so I can meet my French queen. I have paced my apartment frantically for the last thirty minutes, as my stomach acid breaks down whatever remains of the spaghetti, but the weather remains indifferent to my plight. Or maybe it’s punishing me for daring to pursue Jacqueline as my lover.

I plonk down on the sofa and I wipe my eyes with my palms. Where is that stupid horse hiding? That abomination had scarred himself mentally by interrupting me at work as I masturbated, but when I need someone to calm me down, he’s nowhere to be found. I can’t rely on anybody but myself. Although I’ve always known it, every time I relive the same realization, it takes a chunk out of my sanity.

I need to empty my mind until it becomes an open vacuum waiting for a spark to kindle and set off an explosion that wipes everything out, me included. It’s better to spend one’s life in loneliness rather than embrace love blindly and end up crushed and mutilated beyond recognition, like a piece of candy broken between somebody’s teeth.

Jacqueline must be standing by her window. I picture her sighing as she caresses her large breasts and twiddles her nipples. The deluge has procured the excuse my coworker needed to cancel our date, but she’s reluctant to call me in case she has to hear me stabbing myself on the other end of the line. I should contact her instead, and bow out gracefully from this mess.

I blow my nose quickly as I wait for the call to connect.

“I’d figured you would call,” Jacqueline says warmly into my ear.

“Yeah, I…” I clear my throat. “I guess you want to cancel.”

The rain sounds like thousands of water drops bouncing off metal foil. Jacqueline sighs.

“Is that how little you want us to meet, that regular old rain should cancel the opportunity?”

My heart pounds fast. I sit upright and wave my hand at the emptiness above my coffee table.

“No, not at all! Rain is wonderful! But I feared you would want to.”

Jacqueline laughs lightly. I picture her twisting a lock of hair around her finger and tilting her head to stare at herself in a full-length mirror. She’s wearing nothing but stockings, panties, a garter belt, a bra, and lace gloves that reach up to her elbows. Her body radiates warmth. I need her to wrap her arms around me and hold on tightly for the rest of my life, so I won’t feel again the coldness of even a single raindrop splashing against me. If only we could be together tonight, inside, on a bed or floor with a blanket spread over us, away from all dangers and monsters. Otherwise there’s no point in continuing with this charade of being alive.

“You have a low estimation of your ability to adapt and overcome, as usual,” Jacqueline teases gently as if she was talking to a toddler, which makes me wet all by itself. This must be a trivial topic for everybody except me. “Leire, just make sure you don’t drown on your way to the Buen Pastor cathedral. We’ll see each other in a few hours.”

“At s-six o’clock, right?”

“Still six o’clock,” she says melodiously.

“I’m looking forward to it.”

“I can tell, sweetie.”

Jacqueline hangs up. I slump on the cushions and listen to the pelting rain as my heart settles down.

After I take a deep breath, I close my eyes and fill the theatre of my mind with Jacqueline’s tits. Her hands knead them, and with each upward motion she caresses her flesh buttons to expand those soft globes. I suckle gently on one of her hard nipples as she squirms and lets out throaty hums. I feel the heat rising from her breast, I inhale the musky scent of her sweat. Jacqueline observes me from above with pleading eyes as her mouth quivers. I take her nipple deeper within my mouth and massage it with a firm suction as my tongue swirls about its length, savoring every curve while my lips slide across the silken skin. When I pull back from her breast, a drop of honey seeps from its puckered center as if following my tongue. Once I’m done with her breasts, I lap up Jacqueline’s pussy with my snake-shaped tongue until she cums blissfully.

* * *

The cold air rushes to my lungs as I exit the Amara Euskotren station along with a throng of travellers, some of whom are holding briefcases or bags, or have glued their cell phones to their ears. I’m held up in a jam behind a wall of people who are either opening their umbrellas or huddling under the awning. Those who dared to continue on their way are rushing over the zebra crossing, although they can’t avoid stepping on puddles. Heavy clouds hang overhead like bloated balloons made of lead and filled up by hundreds upon thousands of gallons of water droplets.

I shudder. I chose to wear my thick corduroy jacket over the dress I bought yesterday, and by the time I realized that the combination looks silly, I had to hurry to the train station. My bare legs, that I went through the trouble of shaving for Jacqueline’s sake, are wet and covered with goosebumps. I want to rub my thighs together to warm up, because even my pussy has gone numb.

Once the mass of bodies has thinned down, I cross the zebra crossing as I hide my shame behind the inner canopy of my umbrella, but I realize that the downpour was muffling some chanting along with irate shouts. A crowd has packed the adjoined Easo square. Half of the people are facing the train station as they awkwardly hold banners along with their umbrellas. The banners feature the portraits, many upscaled to pixelation, some mugshots, of men that belong to a mixture of races. These demonstrators demand justice, and for some people, presumably the men featured on the banners, to be brought back. The other half of the crowd is counterdemonstrating. As I walk by the low wall that delimits the square, a big guy who looks like a construction worker makes a bullhorn with his hands and shouts angrily, “Good fucking riddance to those rotten bums and thieves!” The rain has plastered his wet hair across his forehead as the thick raindrops keep slapping him upside his face.

I follow other pedestrians, nearly bumping into their umbrellas with mine, to bypass two police vans parked on the pavement. Pairs of Ertzaintza officers, covered as best they could with black raincoats that hang loosely down their backs, stand around like they’d rather pull out their fingernails than stand out here in the rain to handle this mob.

As I trudge towards the nearby Buen Pastor plaza, I only peek out from under my umbrella to make sure I’m heading the right way. Millions of raindrops strike randomly against stone, metal and glass like tiny artillery shells fired by angry angels trying to find out where heaven hides. I must be walking awkwardly as if I feared pissing myself. My legs have gone numb, but thankfully I brought tissues, because I keep sniffling.

When I spot the tortilla brown, palatial public library, I cut through the smooth pavement of the plaza. Some trees obscure the view of the cathedral, a gothic marvel of architecture from likely centuries ago, and that looms over the nearby buildings. Those spiky spires look like they’d hurt if I shoved them up my ass.

A couple of minutes later I’m standing on the raised platform where the cathedral was built, and that overlooks three square gardens marred by slippery patches, where pools of mud have accumulated thickly like sludge oozing from somebody’s rectum after a rough bowel movement. More importantly, the platform overlooks the nearby street from which Jacqueline should appear in about ten minutes.

I only feel giddy and tingly for a minute, until the wet cold wins out. I’m clenching my teeth and shivering. My anxiety is building up like rainwater in a glass placed on the pavement, and my hands tremble as if I were possessed by the restless souls of the recently deceased. My thoughts are stuck in the mud of my mind like worms that can’t find their way out.

As I scan the view hoping that any of the umbrellas that bob through the plaza hides Jacqueline’s face, a few of the passersby glance up at my solitary self, instead of to ogle my bare, pale, soaked legs, to wonder what kind of moron would wait for someone under this barrage of falling water. I avoid their gazes; any quick peek informs them of the hideousness that lurks inside me, a beast so malformed and unsightly that it would frighten even street-tough orphans.

My hair is matted, has fallen out at random, or is congealed with the blood of others; my face is too thin because I survive on a diet of spoiled roadkill; my eyes are sunk deep into their sockets; blood oozes out from fissures and cankers in my rotting gums; my teeth point inward and to the sides due to terrible genes, are clogged with bits and pieces of my dead friends and relatives, and whenever I eat I need to keep my gnashers from rattling loose from their sockets; my mouth is dripping with spittle, drool and vomit. Also, due to excessive use of my vibrator, the edges of my mouth have become permanently numb, which hinders my ability to smile properly, and those I force come out creepy.

I snap out of a trance, because a luminous figure is strolling towards me between the rows of elm trees. She tilts back her umbrella, which is black with a white and tiger orange butterfly motif, to reveal a red smile that would make most women put aside their love of cock for a while. Jacqueline walks with her back straight and her shoulders squared. Her raven black locks are bouncing with her rhythmic strides, while a long red scarf hangs loosely off the shoulder of her designer coat, trailing its crimson hem along her body and emphasizing her tall figure. Her long, stockinged legs lead to the box pleated skirt of her coat, that barely conceals her curvy hips. She attracts the attention of a couple of passersby’s like a lodestone sucking in the ferrous metals around it.

I can’t tell if I’m shivering or shuddering with lust as Jacqueline ascends the steps to my level. Earrings of gleaming sapphires dangle at her ears. As she greets me with a wider smile, her dimples deepen, and the skin at the corners of her cobalt blue eyes creases as she squints like a cat.

I want to tear off Jacqueline’s clothes and shove my tongue deep inside her pussy until she begs for mercy.

I shake my head slightly to wake the fuck up and pretend to be sane enough, but I’ve barely stammered a greeting when Jacqueline steps closer, places her free arm around my shoulders and presses her warm cheek against mine. Although the contact lasts two seconds at best, it sets my face on fire and makes me achingly aware of how hungry I am for Jacqueline’s blood and meaty innards. I swallow deeply a breath filled with longing and despair.

“I didn’t recognize you for a moment,” Jacqueline says.

“Huh? Ah, you wondered why a wet homeless woman was staring at you.”

I fear that Jacqueline will confirm my suspicion, but she closes her eyes and lifts her free hand to her mouth as she chuckles.

“I meant the dress, idiot. You bought it so you could wear it for me, didn’t you?”

“Y-yes. It’s not like I would wear this of my own volition. I mean, I usually wear hoodies and stuff.”

Jacqueline checks me out brazenly from head to sneakers and back again. I gulp. She seemed about to point something out when she blinks twice and leans in to inspect my neck.

“Are those perforation wounds?”

I clench my teeth. I had forgotten about the consequences of that time I thrust a fork into my flesh to see if anything lived there. Just how long do wounds take to heal?!

“I might have done something nasty to myself,” I admit sheepishly as I avoid Jacqueline’s concerned gaze, but I’m eager to change the topic. “What about you, though? Both of your chosen mascara and lipstick are bolder than usual, and I’ve never seen you wear this expensive, comfy-looking coat. Did you want to look that good for me?”

Jacqueline lifts the left side of her upper lip in a flirtatious smirk. She steps back, and as she holds up her umbrella elegantly, she twirls like a schoolgirl. White noise rushes to my crotch. I press my thighs together, mostly because I can’t shove my hand down there now.

“You know it,” Jacqueline says. “Anyway, let’s get going, shall we? Aren’t your poor legs wet enough?”

As she strokes my cheek, worry creeps into her blue eyes.

“Sweetie, you are shivering. It’s too cold to bare your legs like that!”

“Y-you’ll have to warm me up then, won’t you,” I whisper hoarsely.

Jacqueline’s eyes widen and narrow rapidly, then she giggles. She pushes the bottom spring of my umbrella and slides it closed as she covers my head with her own umbrella. She nods towards the nearby street.

“Grab my arm. This pub I like is dark and warm, so it will suit us well.”

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I’ve endured through a hellish week at work that involved me visiting numerous medical departments and befriending their nurses enough so they would cooperate with what I was tasked to do. It was one of those weeks in which I remember that although I can act well enough, my nature doesn’t tolerate having to deal with so many human beings and the nonsense they impose upon me. I wish I worked at a remote lighthouse.

In any case, that meant that I wrote far less than other weeks, although I have rearranged my notes, and added some more, for my ongoing novel ‘We’re Fucked’. I have accumulated about nine thousand words of unimplemented notes, so that means I still have at the very least about 27000 words left to write of this story. I have already figured out its remaining major plot points, including the ending, so I should have little issue getting there, assuming I can find the time and mental energy to do so.

---

A dead face stares back at me in the bathroom mirror. It glistens with stale sweat that emphasizes the rouge pink eye bags, and that has drenched the tresses glued to the forehead, where a lifetime of stress has carved wrinkles that stretch from one side to the other. Those wide eyes, vulnerable and defenseless as a cow’s, and yet burning with an obsidian black gleam of madness, speak silently of a hunger for sustenance beyond mere calories, for something nourishing that doesn’t come packaged with a label and a barcode, a craving born of desperation because everything valuable has been stripped from existence, and what remains is a hollow, hungry soul with nothing but despair to feed upon, that waits endlessly for death although it finds herself forced to struggle as a humanlike construct.

Soon enough, the hair will turn patchy and wispy, the skin will start rotting, the eyes and nose and ears and lips and genitals will fall prey to decay. The extensive loss of tissue will cause the circulation to collapse, the blood vessels to rupture and hemorrhage and empty out into puddles. But those dead eyes will remain wide open, unblinking and unmoving, the jaw hanging slack, the threadbare facial muscles locked into an expression of mindless stupor.

I scream. I consider screaming again when I admit to myself that dead people are rarely covered in stale sweat, particularly those corpses that look as if they’ve been lying in a ditch for a couple of days, nor could the dead imitate my nervous movements so minutely. The mirror reflects the ghastly creature that I’ve become, the same that somehow believes herself worthy enough of meeting a French queen.

I hadn’t bothered to pick up my panties after I got up from my bed and shuffled to the bathroom, so now that I’ve stepped back in disgust, the mirror shows me a pair of slim legs covered in downy hair, and a wiry patch of pubic hair sprinkled with vaginal juices and even tangled in tufts that I’ve twisted absentmindedly. My hands are wrinkled claws with sagging veins and yellow nails sporting dirty spots of accumulated shit and urine, the fingers bent backwards and resembling mantis appendages. My eyes stare from behind their blinds because of all the grime caked upon them, mud gathered beneath the lashes, the irises coated in dirt, the pupils reflecting my own demented thoughts. There’s nowhere to flee, not from my home in this rotting corpse.

I imagine myself daring to stand proud, with my feet wide apart and naked from the waist down, to offer Jacqueline a proper display of my feminine charms, but she doubles over and vomits.

I’m about to hyperventilate, so I fill the sink with frigid water then I dunk my face in it. I let the cold liquid seep into my brain as a stream of bubbles rolls up each of my cheeks. I don’t want to be a disgusting, pathetic excuse for an insect anymore, a living being that squirms helplessly inside the belly of a vivisected carcass while a parasitic worm gnaws on my skull and another parasitic parasite crawls into my ass and takes residence within my rectum’s dark recesses. I want to prove to her majesty how amazing I am by displaying various degrees of affection for her person, including my gratitude towards having received royal patronage to fuck her as much as I please.

I snap my head back and fill my lungs with air. As the foam on the surface of the water fades away into thin strands of bubbles, the liquid turns murky with organic waste matter drained out from a sewage system built by worms with tiny little worm intestines. The fetid pool reveals my past reflection staring back at me: that of my mother.

Although I have calmed down, I feel filthy, so I step into the shower to rinse off all the crap on me, as well as all the dirt lodged deep within my pores. I turn on the water to a scalding temperature to help loosen the debris. The spray feels like the blast of heated jets hitting the body of a bikini clad creature riding atop a horseman, and I wish that I could wrap my arms around the coarse coat of his neck while the two of us race across hills or prairies or desert plains or snowbound mountain tops, galloping at full speed as the wind blows my wet tresses around my face like some wild woman of the forest that rides the back of a unicorn whose hooves churn the ground like a raging storm. The animals seek shelter from our racing approach; we’re dangerous beasts driven mad by lust for blood, that kill without remorse because we’ve been starved of pleasure for far too long.

While the water rinses off my limbs like an overflowing waterfall washing down the mountain slopes and carrying soil, stones, sticks and leaves, along with dead bodies, I marvel at its powerful suction force. That’s what this shower invention does to a body immersed under its spray: it sucks away the dead weight weighing on its bones until the true form emerges from the shower like an amphibian freed from its chrysalis.

After I have dried myself off, I’m returning naked to the bedroom when my stomach grumbles. This unusually turbulent hunger justifies how woozy I’ve felt for the last few hours. I’m forgetting how swallowing nourishing food feels like, which would improve anyone’s life despite the horrors that lurk beyond these walls. Still, I don’t want to go through the bother of trying to whip up a meal out of the expired contents of my fridge, so I look up online if there’s any nearby Chinese restaurant willing to deliver me some food.

At a quarter past two I’m in the kitchen and sitting in front of two tupperware-type containers filled with either beef in oyster sauce or noodle stir fry, and both smell like they would provide nutrients. The long, greasy strips of beef are tough and stale as if this restaurant cooked the food a few hours ago and just reheated it, but I’m desperate enough to risk poisoning so I can nourish my dying brain. I may have been tempted to bite a chunk out of a rat. How could I complain about the food quality, anyway, when I’m tasting juicy flesh that oozes with fat and is seasoned with salt, oil and herbs?

I’ve emptied both containers. I lean back on my chair and I sigh heavily. Now that I’ve fulfilled my duty as an apex predator, I have to focus on how I can make myself presentable enough that tomorrow afternoon won’t end with Jacqueline running away in tears. No way my French queen will see me naked during our first date unless she really wants to watch someone undress, but suddenly the probability that I might pull down my trousers in front of her has increased from zero percent, so just walking alongside the woman I desire while my trousers hide my hairy legs and wild bush will pump up my anxiety tenfold.

I open my wardrobe forcefully, which causes my collection of hoodies, sweaters and T-shirts to sway in their hangers. Years ago, in my distant youth when I considered myself dateable, or at least that some men would want to fuck me, the few that dared to hold my hand, kiss me, fondle my ass, fumble with my bra, lick my pussy or shove their cock into my vagina, also lived with their parents, so they tolerated my imperfections. Few cared about how often I wore hoodies once they got to slide their hands under them to grab my tits. But I have already hit thirty. Everyone that interacts with me assumes that I’m an adult instead of a teenager whose body grew old.

Jacqueline always shows up at the office with what I would consider business attire, but she rocks it so well that anyone that works with her will eventually develop a fetish for secretaries. If I dared to meet her tomorrow dressed in one of my old sweaters and carrot pants, and not wearing makeup, I would witness Jacqueline’s face twisting in a grimace. She would grant me a pity hug, and an hour later she would find some excuse to leave. Once I shuffled back to the station, I would throw myself in front of the train, so I wouldn’t have to suffer the flashbacks that would harken me back to that moment when Jacqueline realized she should have never agreed to a date with me.

At about four o’clock I leave my apartment and I walk down the stairs to the street level. The sky is overcast with chunky clouds that are gliding by fast, carrying dirty water along with trash and human remains. Those cloud butts have darkened to spruce blue, the cloud equivalent of blood pooling at the lowest points of a corpse. The cold breeze, which makes me huddle under my coat, smells like rain mixed with rotten cabbage. I should have grabbed my umbrella, because I may end up getting caught in a storm, but I don’t want to bother walking back into my apartment building.

As I march with my head down towards the Mendibil mall, the breath thickening in my throat and the pressure in my chest remind me of why my routine has been pared down to trekking to work and then returning straight home. All streets leading from my apartment building lead nowhere good, and all roads point toward death. This city is like a sewer drain clogged by shit from every angle, a fetid hole with rotting excrement staining all available ground.

I have reached the closest square, which contains a playground with only a plastic tower and swing, a coffee shop and a few business, one of them the hairdressing salon that I frequent whenever I need to get rid of my excess hair, the one that grows in my head. The sight of the working-class apartments that surround me, their rows of windows like empty eye sockets, along with the cars driving by along the narrow road and the random humans with whom I share the pavement, make me feel as if I’m venturing into safari country. Emaciated dogs pace at the roadside begging at passersby, gross men walk around with bloated bellies as they drag their guts through mud, starving rats feast on the carcasses left on gutters, the dead bodies of drug addicts hang from lampposts, and all the residents who can fill their bellies with fresh food instead of roadkill appear ready for war as they glare threateningly at everyone who crosses paths with them. Those who remain sane, or who have gone crazy enough to see clearly, prefer to hide within their fortified compounds, because the monsters come knocking after dark. But I have to admit that, while there are several dozen species sharing our planet with the vermin known as humankind, none can match the strength of these jerks in performing miracles of manual labor with their small minds.

Everybody talks so loud, and the car engines cause such a racket, that I wish I could turn off my hearing at will. I walk enough zebra crossings to reach the more populous Fuenterrabía street, with its rows of decades-old businesses in front of which meanders a hodgepodge of people that the French police regularly push back into this border town’s boundaries for failing to show residency papers. I anticipate the next time I’ll find myself followed by strange men who speak in unintelligible languages and snicker towards me, as if they were planning to ambush me in an alley, rape me while screaming insults because I dared be female, strangle me and throw my corpse in the river. There isn’t much difference between this place and a wildlife reserve, except that predators roam free while prey hides within cages. Most humans are too busy looking at their phones and talking about trivial nonsense to realize what kind of disaster is happening around them, so at least they can continue feeding upon one another until everybody dies. I wish I could just run back to my cave, sit in front of a fire and hide from the rest of this species except for the very few of its members that I like, and whose name starts with a J.

There must be another world out there beyond this squalid reality: a bright place full of wonder where dreams happen without a hitch and people show affection through hugs and cunnilingus, so everyone smiles at each other and share kind words like ‘bonjour‘; a land with fewer buildings but plenty of trees growing wild and unkempt, where the air smells like roses instead of sewage mixed with garbage and piss; a peaceful realm where one can always find a partner to play board games, and it doesn’t matter if you spend hours gazing at videos of naked women with large breasts.

I suddenly remember that I went out because I intended to buy clothes, razors, shaving cream and lotion, so I force myself to check out the storefronts that I usually hurry up past. A clothing store, its window plastered with sale signs because the aging owner may retire or die soon, sells inexpensive underwear and shirts that are likely stained with vomit, dirt and cum. In another storefront, headless, armless mannequins display the kind of dresses that a New Age lady would wear on a stroll through the countryside. I’m still thinking about underwear. I might buy some silky red panties with lace edges that look like tongues licking naughty places.

Once I walk through the bridge that spans the railroad tracks, I head down the Colón promenade, past the outside tables of coffee shops and restaurants. I’m bothering to observe the storefronts, so I discover clothing stores that I could swear didn’t exist until now. However, none of the styles suit me. What would suit me, though? I wear hoodies and sweaters because they are comfortable and they conceal my decaying body. If my usual clothes speak to people, they tell them to look elsewhere. But I need Jacqueline to look at me, to focus on me, to find in my inadequate self someone to like. I swallow the taste of vomit that rises from deep within my stomach. A deformed, castrated, horse-shaped delusion had taken the habit of stalking me recently, and yet now I can tell that I’ve lost my mind, because I have convinced myself that I have the slightest chance to be accepted as a human being.

Past a panhandler, a homeless guy sleeping on a bench, a row of phone shops, and one of those shady stores that buy whatever gold you bring, no questions asked, I freeze next to a storefront in which elegant mannequins, oriented to gaze blankly in different directions, are bedecked with sun, apron or babydoll dresses, fern green or rose red, with floral or polka dot patterns. An array of sparkling jewels hang from silvery chains. I approach the glass. As the breeze chills my face and makes me sniffle, I bow my head slowly until my forehead rests on the cold glass. My vision is blurring while an uncomfortable warmth spreads in my chest. A few tears roll down my cheeks, but I don’t bother wiping them although I hear the footsteps of many pedestrians as they walk by me. They keep their distance because they can smell in me the rotting flesh that has long since been drained dry by parasites and maggots crawling inside, feeding off my decay. The few passersby brave enough to sneak glances at my tears must be wondering why I have chosen to remain in this world.

I dry my eyes and cheeks on the sleeve of my coat. I sigh deeply. When I walk into the store, a bell above the front door chimes. The room smells of incense and potpourri. An old bimbo with white hair looks up from behind the counter, and as she notices my expression, that of somebody trying desperately to preserve her sanity, her face transforms from placid to bewildered.

“Please,” I beg in a thin voice, “help me dress myself as if I deserved to be loved.”

***

At half past five I’m standing at the entrance of the Mendibil mall as I hold on to two bags, one from the clothing store and another one from the cosmetic store. I feel drained and ashamed like I used to after each therapy session, and I’m spacing out as my mind attempts to hide in daydreams. I need to be home, in the darkness of my bedroom, where I would curl up under my sheets and cry myself to sleep. But I have already walked all the way here, so I’ll push myself a bit further.

Adults also buy enough groceries to cook proper meals. Some even buy enough to last them days, or a week. Although I have to squint against the fluorescent lights shining overhead, and the presence of many wandering humans is making my skin crawl, I stand on the descending elevator that leads to the depths of this mall, where they built a BM supermarket. The bumblebee yellow they used for their signs hurts my eyes, as well as my sense of harmony.

As I stagger through the aisles, I only glance as necessary at the assault of items on display that threaten to overwhelm my mind. I fill my hand basket with wheat bread, skinless chicken, turkey breasts, pasta, rice, eggs, Frosted Flakes cereal, milk, and a few cans of tuna. When I realize that I have gathered as many groceries as I’m willing to bother checking out today, I take a deep breath of relief, but I find myself staring down a narrow aisle lined with tall, packed shelves of canned goods. Once again, the same silhouette of a man materializes at the end of the aisle, facing straight ahead menacingly. Armed with a black hammer, the man sprints from buyer to buyer as he strikes them in the head with the deadly implement. Although the buyers continue browsing the groceries, their souls slip out of their frames and collapse on the floor, and from under them spread puddles of black blood.

When I open my eyes again, the murderous silhouette has disappeared, although I’m still surrounded by wandering monsters. My hand that holds the basket trembles, so I change the weight to my other hand. It’s been years since I learned that a guy that the news only identified as mentally ill rampaged through these aisles and cracked some skulls open, which killed a few of his victims. I had come to buy groceries just a few days before the assault happened. Ever since, an echo of that nonsense plays out again in these aisles so I can witness it once more. I prefer my kind of mentally ill, those people who’d rather stick forks into their own necks, and who daydream about jumping off a window for relief. I’m better off staying home and watching porn until the demons stop invading and devouring my thoughts.

***

By the time I hurry up the stairs to my apartment and I close the door behind me, I’m sweating, my muscles are tense, my hands and feet are tingling. I place my groceries on the kitchen table, and then I shuffle to my bedroom and I take out the folded clothes I bought. I drape the dress over the wrinkled sheets. I take out the brass medallion necklace and I lower it so it rests on the delicate fabric. I chose a high-waist, tiered dress with a square neckline, puffed sleeves and a floral pattern that from a distance looks like green noise. I pick up the necklace by the brass medallion, and I run the fingertip of my thumb over the words engraved on the metal: ‘mon coeur‘.

I’d never wear such a daring dress of my own volition, but I had also never attempted to pursue a woman that I have no chance of seducing. Or any woman, for that matter. I guess that tomorrow I’ll cosplay as a regular girl who is getting too old and who hasn’t been loved in a long time. In reality, I’ve felt ancient ever since I was born, and nobody has ever shown me what love is supposed to feel like.

I’m frying an egg and the remaining slices of serrano ham on a pan when a pitter-patter distracts me. Night has fallen, and those threatening clouds are peeing on my window, as well as on the entire city. I avoid staring at the rain falling outside; sometimes my imagination makes me see snakes crawling around naked underneath the wet night skies. After this afternoon’s adventure, I have to steel myself to sit on a crowded train to Donostia, and huddle under my umbrella as I march to the Buen Pastor plaza, where I will wait in the cold and rain for my beloved to arrive, if she shows up at all.

I go to sleep at ten, partly because I’m exhausted and I was dozing off, but my brain won’t shut up. I move away my sheets and blanket, I pull my pajama trousers and panties down, and I soak the index and middle fingers of my right hand with a coat of saliva. Nothing has ever calmed down my frenzied thoughts like abusing my clit, as if I was trying to claw through this rotting body of mine in search of salvation, until I come violently, panting while drooling copious amounts of saliva onto the pillow. And I need all the relief I’m able to muster so I can distract myself from the disaster I’m heading towards.

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At midday, I pull down my pajama trousers, lie down on my wrinkled sheets and wet my fingers with saliva to combat my despair, which worsens when exposed to bright light and sounds of life and civilization, and that by now it feels like a spreading rot from a necrotic limb. I close my eyes and take a deep breath. With my damp fingers, I stroke myself gently around my clit as I paint a portrait of Jacqueline on the dark canvas of my mind. Those cobalt blue irises acknowledge me from her narrowed eyes. She brandishes a pink smile that deepens her dimples, displays the slight gap between her lateral incisors and her canines, tightens the skin around her prominent chin, and wrinkles the bridge of her nose. I yearn to induce thousands of such smiles, if only because they may lead to Jacqueline wanting to embrace me and keep me pressed against her motherly breasts.

My vagina has discharged enough gooey lubrication, and I spread it over my labia. My body temperature is rising rapidly, my heart is jumping on my chest, I’m breathing faster, and I feel the warm flow of blood rallying round to enlarge my clit, that I keep massaging with circular movements while I gaze into the void.

Ever since Jacqueline wrapped me in her arms and convinced me that a home awaits me in this world, I’ve hoped to strengthen the lingering echo that my bones have preserved, but I can’t synthetize at will how safe and loved that Frenchie made me feel. Such inability might be a built-in defense mechanism; if I could spark that feeling the same way I can make myself cum, I likely would never leave my bed. In any case, I ache to touch Jacqueline’s warm skin again. As long as she remains close by, she will ease away the darkness that threatens to swallow whole the hopeless human wreck that I’ve become.

As I caress myself, I reach towards the nightstand to grab my phone, but I nearly push the vibrator to the floor, which would have made me stop abusing my genitals to pick it up if I end up requiring its services. I thumb the phone’s screen until I pull up the entry for Jacqueline on the contacts list. I would only have to press the green button and wait a few seconds for her mellifluous voice to flow down my ear hole. I’m assuming that she’d like to hear from me, but… why wouldn’t she? While I’m fondling my genitals, Jacqueline goes as far as staring at me so intimately and whispering consoling words that echo throughout the theatre of my mind, just so she can help bring me to a climax. Surely she’ll welcome my call.

While I hold the phone to my left ear and wait for the call to connect, I close my eyes and I stare at Jacqueline’s rosy, moist lips as they part, inviting me to dive headfirst into her darkened, warm pool of saliva.

“Hey, Leire,” says the voice on the other end. “So nice to hear from you.”

I hesitate to answer. That voice belonged to a much younger woman. I picture a college student with twinkling eyes and who holds against her chest the unjustifiably expensive textbooks she was forced to buy. Did Jacqueline give me a wrong number originally, maybe to avoid a confrontation? That doesn’t make sense, because we sent a few messages back and forth, and this young voice has called me by my name. Whatever. I guess we all sound different over the phone. I suspect that if I heard my voice back, I’d sound like a madwoman who should be locked in an attic.

I ease the abuse upon my throbbing clit so I can speak without panting.

“I think you told me,” I mumble, then I swallow to clear my voice, “unless I have made it up, that you’d be there for me, that I could rely on you.”

Jacqueline remains silent. I make out a faint conversation in the background. I press on.

“M-maybe you just blurted that out because seeing me cry made your maternal instincts kick in, but if you were serious, I’d… I’d like for us to meet and hang out, if that’s fine with you.”

After a silence long enough to make me want to kill myself, Jacqueline smacks her lips, but a man’s voice approaches her. Jacqueline muffles the mic. When she uncovers it, I understand the words ‘from the office’. A door closes.

A cold feeling spreads in my chest, and my heart would have sunk to my feet if I wasn’t lying on my back. I have interrupted Jacqueline either before or after one of her tennis players fucked her. Now, even receiving a call from her relatives would have annoyed her. Why did I ever think that such a divine woman would want to bother interacting with a loser like me, especially one with such terrible social skills and a taste for masochism?

“You are this naughty, huh?” Jacqueline’s giggly voice first disarms me, then it seeps down my ear canal like honey dripping from between her warm thighs.

“W-what do you mean?” I croak. My throat is dry, and my body is taut as the wires of a harp.

“You are lying in bed and touching yourself, aren’t you, sweetie?”

I shudder from head to toe, but I must have developed an alien hand syndrome, because listening to Jacqueline’s voice has convinced my right hand to polish my clit harder while the available fingers dig deeper into my cunt’s fleshy folds. I feel that if I were to look over my shoulder, instead of staring at my headboard, I would hold Jacqueline’s mischievous gaze.

I gasp at a sudden realization.

“Were you the one filming me all along?” I ask, flabbergasted.

Jacqueline chuckles.

“Filming you? Strange of you to say that. But no, I haven’t filmed you so far. What I meant was, don’t you understand who you are talking to?” she asks in her melodious French accent. “I recognize that labored breathing and the tiny breaks in your voice, which you distort with the effort to avoid gargling your saliva.”

Sweat beads on my forehead and temples, my clit throbs against my soaked fingers, the muscles around my vaginal opening contract violently. Jacqueline is lying beside me. Her moist lips are brushing my left ear as her honeyed voice reverberates in the concha.

“W-what kind of depraved fiend would call a coworker while she masturbates?” I ask in a panic. “No way I–“

As I scramble for any excuse, I picture myself dressed in a hoodie and running leggings as I fly through my city’s moldering streets, trying perhaps to escape the demons that haunt my thoughts and memories, but even that healthy version of myself would stop to make a call. Besides, any excuse that involves exercising feels more demeaning that the truth.

I suck in a deep breath to quell my growing terror.

“Alright, I’m masturbating. B-but that’s unrelated to my sudden urge to call you!”

Once the words I chose hastily escape my mouth, I clench my teeth and hold my breath. The blood is pulsing sluggishly inside my head.

I was about to apologize when a muffled giggle makes me imagine Jacqueline covering her mouth with her hand as her shoulders tremble.

“You want us to get together, huh? Alright, it’ll be fun. Today I’m a bit busy, but how about tomorrow afternoon, around six?”

I want to cheer and scream with joy, but I fear that Jacqueline will find my enthusiasm repulsive, so I clear my throat. Am I truly going to hang out with Jacqueline, just the two of us? The thought alone keeps my sanity intact.

“That sounds great. I have nothing going on.”

“Can we meet in Donostia? I’d rather not visit Irún if I can avoid it.”

“Of course. I want to spend as little time in this cesspit as possible!”

“Great.” I can picture her smile by how it distorts her voice. “Let’s meet in front of the Buen Pastor cathedral. From there we’ll walk to this pub I like. How about that?”

“I wish I was there already,” I say hoarsely, but there’s a slight tremor in my hands, and tears are starting to stream down my temples at the notion of being close to her again.

“Don’t play with yourself too hard, huh?” Jacqueline suggests, then hangs up.

My heart is trying to dig its way out of my chest, and it wouldn’t surprise me if the next moment a torrent of hot vomit came spewing forth from my esophagus. The air remains still, permeated with my musky, sweaty scent. My stomach calms down as my wet fingers continue to stroke my aching clit.

Did Jacqueline agree to a date, or does she just want to spend some free time with a coworker that amuses her? Maybe she feared that if she rebuffed me, I would have leaped from the nearest window to my demise. I may have. But who cares? Tomorrow at six in the afternoon I’ll stand in front of the Buen Pastor cathedral and gaze upon my goddess. Maybe she wants to cum all over my face while making sure I keep gazing directly into her sparkling eyes until they burn my soul, leaving permanent scarring with their luminous blue hue.

I would have never dared to call Jacqueline and propose that we meet if my pleasure-induced delirium hadn’t convinced me. I only have masturbation to thank for the few blessings in my life.

Sorry, Jacqueline, but this warrants a more diligent self-diddling. As I knead my breasts with a needy intensity, I reach towards my nightstand with my left arm and close that hand around the sticky plastic of my vibrator. I turn it on, then I ram it into my pussy. The plastic shaft vibrates wildly as its buzzing song reverberates throughout my body like a swarm of bees trapped in a jar and banging violently against the glass enclosure, trying desperately to fly unfettered to pollinate flowers and plants and shrubs and trees so they may bloom and flourish in abundance, becoming a source of sustenance for any creature too lazy to suck nectar directly from flowers, slurping sweet dew off blooming rose petals with the tongues of hummingbirds. Sorry, birdies, but my fantasy doesn’t include the need to feed you with my fluids. Sorry sweet insects of the forest that I’ll only explode in an orgasm if your tiny mandibles dig deep into my clit’s hooded entrance so my blood starts pumping rapidly through my throbbing cunt and lubricating your hungry mouths.

My body twitches as waves of bliss radiate from between my spread thighs and up my spine. I’m panting like an excited dog, drooling profusely and emitting moans of relief mixed with animalistic noises. My eyes roll back, my mouth gapes open. As the spasms in my loins continue to shake my frame, a warm gush flows from my vagina, leaving a damp stain on the sheets and the air with a sickening odor of discharge, a stink of putrefaction mixed with excrement, as if my entire nether half had voided itself and marred my home’s decor with its vile output. I am a disgusting mess and will remain as such until my body can rid itself of the revolting stench that suffocates every one of its cells.