Llena del alma mía

Bazoniuth comes back to me in a dream. Doesn’t possess me, that much I’m sure of, because there’s a Taoist mirror hanging over the bed that wards away her kind. I’ve got enough awareness in the liminal half-world to recognize that I’m dreaming, but not enough to dream lucidly.

“Hello, Ronnie,” Bazoniuth says, wearing Karen’s body again. She goes out of her way to twirl around and show me the tattoo on Karen’s back that’s supposed to prevent her from ever being possessed again. “Been a while, hasn’t it?”

“Get out of her,” I hiss. My heart pounds against my chest as my hands ball into fists at my sides.

“I don’t know if you’ll like seeing the real me,” Bazoniuth replies, her tone nonchalant as Karen’s face splits into a ghoulish grin. “I’m not this pretty, you know.”

I’m rooted to the spot. I’d fight her, but that’s still Karen’s body, and the very thought of hurting her makes my stomach twist. Besides, what would punching Bazoniuth do? Only an exorcism had finally cast her out, and I don’t know jack shit about performing one.

“Get out of her,” I repeat, my voice a low growl.

“All right,” Bazoniuth says, sighing and turning Karen’s beautiful, silky voice into something clammy and moist that sends goosebumps of disgust up my arms. But Bazoniuth doesn’t burst out of Karen’s body like during the exorcism. Instead, she oozes out of Karen. Turns her skin translucent and saggy, reveals the whole of Karen’s eyeballs as the flesh sloughs off her eye sockets. Tears along her stretch marks, seeps liquefying fat yellow-slick over her limbs, which distort like quavering Jell-O. Pulls her inside-out until all my beautiful Karen is anymore is a mass of meat. I’m too shocked to register the scene. All I glimpse is tendon tethering bloody chunks to bone before Bazoniuth rises and reveals her true form.

I don’t know what I expected Bazoniuth to look like. In my naïveté, I figured demons were four-limbed, horned and winged things with pointy tails. But Bazoniuth is none of that. She’s a pebble-skinned mass, cysts like salmon roe spotting her body. Blood, thick and near-black, sloughs off her in coagulated lumps along with bits of membrane. She towers over me, stretching into the endless night sky—the roof is gone, and I’m levitating to hang in the air like the sickle moon. As she grows, she bulges, becoming ridged as her flesh sprouts ragged edges like rotting kelp. She splits open down the middle, all squick and slick sounds as her gaping maw writhes open, thick with the scent of offal and death.

“What the fuck,” I say. “What the fuck.”

“Don’t like what you see?” Bazoniuth says, voice a gurgle bubbling up from a poisoned well deep in the abyss of her. “You’ve been inside me, you know.”

“Not you,” I say, my chest tightening with the shortness of my breaths. “Not like this.”

“You’re all ugly like this on the inside,” Bazoniuth says, sympathetically. “It’s just that you’re usually neatly contained. But I like how disgusting humans are. I fashioned my body out of human parts, after all.”

One by one, the cysts all over her bruised violet-red body burst. Green-white fluid seeps from the hollows left behind in her flesh as the lumpy masses levitate alongside me like mutated stars. God. I think I’m about to choke swallowing my tongue with how hard I want to throw up.

“Ronnie,” Bazoniuth says gently. “They’re just eggs. Karen’s full of them.”

Each of them splits open to reveal a big-eyed, curled thing that could be a chicken, could be a shrimp, could be a fucking elephant for all I know. They’re all alien at that size.

“You came from one, too.”

To my horror, my arm reaches out of its own will to pluck one of the fetuses from the sky. I can feel the faintest hint of a heartbeat as I hold it in my palms. As Bazoniuth swallows me into her maw, the fetus melts into rivulets of old, dead blood that stain my hands black.

---

Sweat plasters my hair to my forehead and my shirt to my chest when I wake up. Karen’s already left for the day, but Jesse’s still snoring softly under the covers beside me. The way our shifts are staggered leaves us with little time together. Karen works first shift doing data entry for an office recovering documents lost during the quake. Jesse drives third shift doing a mix of delivery and rideshare. Meanwhile, I’ve been taking contractor projects here and there. Barely made it through the triple-digit heat of summer, but the work is more manageable now that the weather’s cooled down.

The hands-on construction work keeps my mind off the all-too-many thoughts I have. The shelters I’ve been helping to build are done, so I’ve got a breather, a couple days to rest at home. I’m not sure if it’ll do me any good, though. When I’m on site, I do so much physical labor that by the time I get home, falling asleep out of sheer exhaustion is easy. But when I have free time and nothing to do but sit around and “rest,” every thought comes flooding back in to displace the momentary peace, including weird-ass dreams that I can barely recall now that I’m awake, but that have still left an emotional stain on me.

Still, it’s nice to be able to wake up late to Jesse beside me. His face is turned toward me, eyes closed and tranquil as his chest rises and falls. I push the last wisps of the dream out of my mind as I turn all my attention to him. His hair’s ruffled against the pillow, his beard this side of scruffy. I feel the smile on my face before I’m aware of it. Our triforce with Karen has been good—beyond what I ever thought was possible. It seems hard to believe now that it took us that long to become one, but then I remember how much shame seized me back then and continues to seize me now. Jesse’s sleeping face forth brings a surge of fondness in my chest that flutters against my ribs like a bird in a cage. As if to unlatch the door, I press a soft kiss to Jesse’s forehead. I hold him there for a moment, savoring the chance to show him some affection without being self-conscious about it.

“Mmm.” Jesse opens his eyes. “Good morning to you, too.”

I blush. Sometimes I forget how light of a sleeper Jesse is. I’d expected Karen to be the light sleeper for some reason, but she’s the one who can sleep through an earthquake without turning over. But even if you sneak out of bed like a ninja at 4 am for a piss, Jesse bitches at you to stop being so loud.

“Morning,” I reply. He cups my face in his hands and brings me down for a kiss. He’s got a bit of morning breath and I’m sure I do too, but it’s not enough to bother me, not when his mouth is so sweet, his kisses so soft they make my heart stop, waiting for his next breath so I might breathe too.

“I love kissing you,” I murmur as we part. He captures my lips in another kiss.

“Yeah?” he says, biting my lower lip just enough to get a whine out of me. “That’s good, ’cause I love kissing you, too.”

“Fuck,” I say in between another kiss. His sleepy face is one of the most gorgeous sights I’ve seen—something about the tenderness of his expression, like he knows he can be safe to be half-awake around me, gives him a glow like nothing else does. I deepen the kiss, nudging against him to find his cock already hard. Whether from making out or because it’s morning wood, I can’t tell. The blood’s already rushing to my own dick. I love morning sex.

Jesse’s grinding his hips subtly, like he’s trying to wear the edge off a spike of want. I grab his cock, my grip firm, getting a contented sigh from him.

“God,” I say, then laugh. “You get me going so goddamn quick.”

“I know,” Jesse replies, grinding now against my palm, his hips moving slowly as the blush on my cheeks deepens and lightning finds its way down my spine. His eyes have gone half-lidded with desire, his lips full and spit-slicked. Gorgeous motherfucker. A fierce possessiveness washes over me, knowing that, in this moment, he’s only mine. Don’t get me wrong, sex with all three of us is great, but there’s something different about just being with one person at a time, whether Jesse or Karen.

“Keep being a slut and I’ll fuck you like one,” I murmur against Jesse’s ear as he continues to rock against my hand. I relish the sight of goosebumps prickling Jesse’s shoulders as his breath hitches.

“Yeah? I’d like to see you try.”

I chuckle as my tougher side begins to surface, my face taking on a mask of dominance the same way his begins to reveal submission. We slip into the space where humiliation becomes a thrill, both for him and for me—him so he can stop being strong for just a second, me so the voices crowding my head have some kind of release.

“I don’t have to ‘try,’” I say, getting up on my knees and stripping the case off my pillow. I tug down my boxers and let my cock spring free. “I will.”

I haul him up by the collar of his soft, worn shirt. He gives me a defiant look, though I know from the wicked glint that it’s all for play.

“You know you want me to, anyway,” I say, smirking as lust begins to outshine defiance in his gaze. “You love it when I fuck you.”

My cock bobs as it gets even harder. It’s difficult to believe that the words are actually true. Going from crushing on my best friend for, what, twenty-five years, to finding out he’s into me that way, too, and having it all actually work out? In the middle of a long apocalypse? I wouldn’t believe it if Jesse weren’t in front of me now, looking at my dick.

“It’s true,” he admits, then smirks back. “So get to it.”

“Órale pendejo, don’t be rude,” I reply, whipping the pillowcase around the back of his neck and jerking him toward me. “I’m gonna fuck you at my pace.”

Which turns out to not be all that slow. He wastes no time getting my dick wet, and soon I’m fucking his throat as I keep a tight grip on the pillowcase. I hold back with Karen, but I can be rougher with Jesse, and he can take more of me in his mouth. Even as he chokes around my cock, he recovers quickly, then goes right back at it. Soon I’ve let go of my hold on the pillowcase to pull in a fistful of Jesse’s thick, dark brown hair each hand. He groans appreciatively, the sound buzzing through me.

“Fuck,” I say. I yank him away, then shove him down onto the bed. He’s splayed out on his back, his grin bright with spit and pre-cum, but all that pride disappears as I pop open a bottle of lube and work a couple fingers into him. His ego thaws, gives way to a wildfire of passion and release. I’ve had partners who were enthusiastic, but Jesse takes that to a whole new level. Yet it never seems like too much. It’s just enough to light that blaze under my skin, the way he rides my hand like it’s the best damn thing he’s had inside him.

“Look at you,” I murmur, choking him with my free hand, fingers pressed against the blood vessels to either side of his throat. His eyes flutter shut as he rides me more desperately, as if putting more into it will get me to release him. I laugh. “First thing in the morning, but you’re still ready to take me.”

I choke him a moment longer until he taps my arm. I let go of his neck, then slap him across the cheek. The first time he’d asked me to, I’d been uncomfortable with it—I’d never hit any of my partners in any way. But knowing just how strong Jesse is, how he’s never lost a fistfight as long as I’ve been around him, knowing that he could kick my ass yet is literally turning the other cheek… I get it now, why he’s into impact play. Even if I’m the top, the physical sensation of impact does something for me, too: the way his body shakes with the force of my blow, the way my hand leaves a mark on him—sometimes the thrill that courses through me as I have him whimpering and squirming under me scares me. Like there’s a part of me that could really hurt someone, if I didn’t hold back.

But I guess holding back is what makes me who I am.

Jesse’s chest heaves as he takes quick, deep breaths, his left cheek burning red with proof of my touch. All that defiance and attitude from earlier has melted away completely to reveal a rawer side of him. He runs a hand up my thigh and reaches for my cock. I swat his hand away, withdrawing my fingers long enough for him to whine before I plunge them back into him.

“Let me make you feel good too,” he breathes. My heart skips a beat. I swear my fondness for him at that moment, entirely at my mercy, his face a wrecked mess, his breathing ragged, like he’s about to drown—the feeling threatens to engulf me whole. So I nod and say a soft all right, let him wrap his fingers around me, then redouble my efforts, getting his hole soft and slack for me as I do my best not to let the pleasure of him stroking me cloud my efforts.

I don’t linger on the foreplay. I nudge him so he’s on his side and spoon up behind him, sucking bruising kisses into his neck as he gasps. I keep one arm around his throat, one hooked under his shoulder as I guide my cock into him. I give him a second to compose himself as I press my hips against him. I release his shoulder for just long enough to squeeze the full swell of his ass and leave my fingerprints on him. As soon as he starts grinding impatiently against me, I hook my arm around his waist and thrust into him, long, languid strokes that have him squirming to be fucked harder.

“Espérame, amor,” I murmur, grinning. He struggles to look back at me and only manages to turn his head partway, glancing over with a cock-drunk expression. I let go of his neck and spit in the palm of my hand. I wrap my slick hand around his cock, keep him right at the edge with my fleeting touches as his wrecked moans fill the room.

“If you don’t hurry up, I’m going to flip you over and ride you myself,” Jesse says as he pushes back onto me, squeezing my cock tight until I choke out a soft fuck. “Your cock is mine.”

He might be bottoming for me—the very thought makes my head tingle, never mind all the other sensations shooting through my body—but I’m not sure who’s the submissive right now. I’m slipping out of domspace as physical sensation supersedes it, a blur of prickling heat spreading over my skin. I pull out of him, watching as his hole gapes for just a moment before closing, then thrust into him again, balls-deep. I’m not sure if pulling out and fucking him again at such a slow pace is going to stop me from coming, though. If anything, Jesse buries his face in his pillow so he can moan louder as he pushes his hips back against me. I doubt I’ll last much longer, so I welcome his next words.

“I want you to come all over me,” Jesse says between gasps.

“Yeah?” I say, leaning in to kiss his back as I pick up my pace, our thighs slapping together as his filthy cries reach a fever pitch. I pull out, get to my knees, and shove him so he’s lying flat on his back. He looks up at me, eyes soft with love. It’s that look that undoes me, and I can’t help the noises I make as I come in spurts all over him. My cum clings to his chest hair; a stray drop slicks his chin. As I squeeze out the last drops, I bring my hand up to my mouth, suck off the cum there on the web between my thumb and index finger like it’s a shot of tequila. I grin at the blush on his cheeks.

“Fuck, Ronnie,” he breathes, but I’m not done with him yet. With cum still glossing my palm, I close my hand around his cock. I keep his foreskin pulled back like he likes, grip him tight as I reach a rhythm that has him squeezing his eyes shut, his lips parted.

“That’s it,” I say, warmth and pride surging through me to my fingertips. With my other hand, I choke him again, relishing as he struggles and opens his eyes to look up at me with a tender, vulnerable expression, one with an edge of awe to it. I don’t know exactly what he’s feeling, but I can sense myself mirroring it as my grin widens.

“Angelito,” I say, reaching up to press a kiss to his forehead again. As my palm glides over the crest of his cock, he cries out and comes, his mixing with mine to pool in the dip of his solar plexus. I give him a moment to catch his breath as my own heart rate begins to come down. I pepper sweet kisses on his cheeks as I release him and sit back, finally letting our bodies be apart.

“You better make me breakfast after this,” Jesse says, grinning, satisfied, as the sunlight catches on the mess all over his chest. “I deserve it.”

“All right, brat. Chorizo and eggs?”

“Perfect.”

Jesse and I get ourselves cleaned up. My dick still tingles with pleasure, even as I’m standing by the stove, stirring the chorizo and scrambled eggs in the pan. As I take in the changing textures of the ingredients, the nightmare slowly resurfaces in my mind.

Eggs. Suddenly, the scrambled yolks no longer seem as appetizing. The chorizo feels a bit too meaty, too much bits and pieces of discarded flesh, nauseating me even as the fragrant smells make my mouth water. Just my mind fucking with me, I tell myself as I divert my focus from my thoughts to the gnaw of hunger in my gut.

I’m usually ravenous after a good fuck like that, but when I set both plates down on the table and start picking at mine with a fork, I still don’t have much of an appetite. Jesse wolfs down his—“fucking delicious, chavo”—but soon, he’s noticed my expression.

“What’s up?” he says, then chuckles. “I thought you were feeling pretty damn good.”

I hesitate. There’s a hive of emotions in my chest that I haven’t sorted out. I’m not sure I’m ready to express any of it, but I figure I can at least give Jesse a hint, even if I don’t want to talk about everything.

“Had a nightmare,” I say, pushing around a wobbly bit of scrambled eggs. I make them perfect, but they’re still not looking delicious yet, and they only get less appetizing as they get cold. “About… about Bazoniuth. She was in Karen’s body again, until she wasn’t.”

“That’s all over now,” Jesse says.

“Is it?” I pick up a forkful of chorizo, then set it back down again. “I know Bazoniuth’s gone for real, but…”

I hesitate. I guess there’s no use talking around the heart of the nightmare. And if there’s anyone else who would truly understand what I’m feeling, it would be Jesse.

“Bazoniuth was… Karen’s womb,” I say, as if it were a confession. “But all fucked up. Fucked up eggs. Fucked up fetuses. Blood everywhere, black and old.”

Jesse’s quiet for longer than I expect him to be. I wonder if he’s disgusted, but there’s no trace of that in his expression. He looks contemplative as he finishes the last of his breakfast and sets down his fork.

“You stressed out about becoming a dad?” Jesse says.

Of course. Trust him to cut right through the bullshit and stab me right in the heart with deadly accuracy.

“That’s gotta be it,” I reply. I manage to have a bite of chorizo. “I… I don’t think I’m good with kids. And like—miracle of life, I know, but just the idea of having something growing in you… I mean, I guess I’ll never know what that feels like.”

“Me neither,” Jesse says. “I don’t think Karen would mind if you asked her about it, though.”

I hesitate. It seems like such an intimate topic to broach—yet who other than Karen and Jesse do I have such an intimate relationship with?

“In fact, I bet she’d be happy to tell you all the gross details,” Jesse adds. “Besides… you think I’m any better with kids?”

“You can at least humor them,” I say glumly as I begin to actually eat my breakfast. “I just feel like I’m going to say something wrong and it’s going to scar the kid for life. Or I’m going to take my eye off them for one second, and they’ll, I don’t know, stick a fork in the outlet or something. What if I can’t handle changing diapers? What if I mess something up and the kid hates me for life?”

Jesse laughs. I’m about to cuss him out for it, but the objective part of me tells me it’s not a mocking laugh.

“Kids are resilient,” he says. “I mean, we’re still alive.”

In the span of a few seconds, I remember every time we skateboarded down steep hills and skinned our knees until we could nearly see bone, every time we held each other’s heads under in a swimming pool, every dumbass thing we did that absolutely stuns me to look back on as an adult. That gets a smile out of me, until I remember the less childish stuff—being left home alone constantly, moving around a lot, picking fights, punching the shit out of people.

“In any case,” Jesse adds, “why think of it so negatively? That’s shit everyone goes through. But you could be that amazing dad who makes sure his kid grows up self-confident and happy. You’re sensitive and thoughtful. You might not be the best parent, but there’s no way you’ll be a bad one.”

“I guess.”

A couple moments pass as I eat more of the scrambled eggs and chorizo. I can usually finish my plate, but two thirds is good enough for today. As I set down my fork, Jesse reaches across the table and puts a hand over mine, startling me with the fondness of the touch. The smile he gives me has an edge of sadness to it, but also bitterness and resentment as he speaks.

“Not everyone has to grow up the way we did.”

---

I dream of Bazoniuth again. Only this time, it’s my belly that’s rounded. I accept it as I accept all dream logic: I’m pregnant. So be it.

I splay my fingers out over the taut skin. It’s translucent, almost. There’s movement inside. A strange and unfamiliar warmth glows in my chest as I feel a kick—then sublimates into horror as the thing inside me keeps kicking, distorting my skin, revealing the outlines of limbs that aren’t human: first, something bumpy as if the suckers on a tentacle are trying to paw through; then, a multi-jointed, more rigid thing that reminds me of a crab leg. Or, I realize with horror as the limb tears through my skin, a massive insect, bristly joints hooking on my flesh and fat.

“You’re cursed, Ronnie,” Bazoniuth says as the terrible chimera emerges from my womb, spilling blood everywhere. “You don’t deserve a happy ending.”

“Get out of me.”

“This is what you are inside,” Bazoniuth says, snapping her jaws at me. “Horrible and disgusting. This is all you’d ever be able to pass on. Your brokenness.”

“No,” I choke out as bile rises in my throat. “No. I’m not broken. I’m just human.”

“You can be both, you know,” Bazoniuth says, her vertebrae crunching as she pulls the rest of herself out of my womb, leaving a bloody gash across my abdomen. She grins. “You can’t take care of yourself. You’ll let anyone walk all over you if it’ll get you even a bit of attention. Do you really think you can protect anyone? Nurture anyone?”

She draws herself up to her full height. Impossibly tall. There’s no way she could’ve fit in me, but dream logic doesn’t acknowledge that. Instead, as fluid bursts from her unfolding joints, I’m frozen in place, only one thought replaying in my head: That’s me. That’s what’s inside me. That’s what will come out into the world.

Bazoniuth leers down at me.

“You’re pathetic, Ronnie. Look at you.”

A twisted limb, slimy like mackerel and stinking of rot, curls around my cock. I hadn’t even been aware that I still had one, but now that my belly is flat, I can see the blood running from the wound across my abdomen to wash over my cock, making it run red even as it hardens. The shame in me wells up as Bazoniuth’s limb slithers along my cock, eliciting wave after wave of pleasure as she pulses her hold on me.

“You miss me.”

As my vision goes white and I come, I think, It’s true.

---

I realize as soon as I wake up that it had been a wet dream. Can’t even take a nap without Bazoniuth haunting me. My skin prickles. I’ve had non-sexual wet dreams and sex dreams that didn’t have me waking up to boxers full of cum, but the part of my brain that operates on shame still draws a connection between the nightmare and the cum sticking to my inner thighs.

You miss me.

I close my eyes and recall the times Bazoniuth was in Karen’s body. Her brusqueness. Her coldness. The way her words had cut as if her tongue were a blade; the way the sting had brought me pleasure, too: You’re right. The way everything had felt like guilt, and somehow, that had made it all the hotter. The way, fucked up as it may be, I long for her cruelty all the more when Jesse and Karen show me love.

I don’t know what that says about me.

I drown myself in a shower to cleanse myself of the shame still sticking to my skin. I turn up the water as hot as it goes and clench my jaw as I draw my shoulder blades together and withstand the scalding pain, my eyes shut tight until my breaths escape as long hisses. Once I can’t bear it any longer, I yank the handle over to freezing. The water rains on my reddened back. My eyes burn with the desire to cry, but no tears well up.

The sensory shock pulls me out of my shame. I turn the handle to a reasonable temperature and finally allow myself to take an actual shower. I shake myself off like a cat to rid myself of the rest of my goosebumps. My skin is flushed all over. I think about the blood vessels and capillaries underneath, dilating to accommodate the pressure of my pounding heart, releasing heat from the core of me into the air.

At least all my blood is on the inside now.

I scrub myself all over and get to my cock last. A hint of shame surfaces as if for a breath, but I shove it back down as I let the water cascade over me and wash away any last trace of cum. I pull back my foreskin. The water hits the head of my cock just right and makes my breath hitch in my throat. I’m still tender from coming in my sleep. I think of those paintings of demons sitting on people’s chests as they sleep, except the demon on my chest is Bazoniuth wearing Karen’s body, spreading her legs, showing me her flushed, wet cunt…

You miss me.

Fuck. I lean against the wall, enveloping myself in the warm steam as I look down, my fingers wrapped around my already hard cock.

All the blood on the inside.

I shouldn’t be having the thoughts I’m having. Shouldn’t be jacking off to them. Shouldn’t indulge the fucked up parts of me.

Before me and Jesse and Karen were a thing, I only saw Karen as a hot Asian girl. One who I wanted to fuck and see how much of what people say is true and how much is complete bullshit, as if she were a bingo square. Was she the pure and innocent type? Or the wild slut? Or any combination of the two—pure by day, a slut by night; a slut by day, virginal at night, all mine for the taking? Every fantasy got me going. I wouldn’t admit it, but the fact that she was Asian, all sweet and cute as she worshipped me, would inevitably be what pushed me over the edge to coming.

I wouldn’t say I have yellow fever, but I guess that isn’t my call to make. Besides, every girl I’d dated before Karen—all two of them—were Mexican. Still, the shame in me strengthens when I ask myself, Is this what conquistadors felt? What colonizers felt? What slavers felt, seeing people as prizes to collect, as they stripped them of their souls? I know that the desire in my eyes when I look at Karen now is entirely different than the hungry stare I’d had before, seeing her as if she were something to devour, consume, and use.

There’s a kind of anonymity to that, though, where we can keep our hearts closed off and pretend to be objects. Bazoniuth gave me that. A way to fuck Karen without really fucking her and showing her any of the real me. She’d be nothing more than a gorgeous sex doll, not a person I need to connect to, whose expectations I’d have to live up to.

Sex can be quick, but love takes a while for me to grow into. And now I’m hopelessly in love not only with Jesse, but also Karen. For the person she’s shown herself to be. Quick-witted but also incredibly ditzy; stronger than anyone I know, but still fragile and vulnerable, even if she withdraws and does her best to hide it when she’s falling apart. A person with hopes and dreams, fears and triggers, traumas and blessings. A person who can love me so much it overwhelms me.

It fucks me up that I do miss Bazoniuth. That when I’m shown this kind of love, all I want to do is run away with how unworthy I feel and wish for a time when I was just a body and not a person. It fucks me up that, as I begin to stroke myself with fervor, I still get myself off sometimes to memories of fucking Karen when she wasn’t Karen, even if she’d ended up being the one who’d had the idea and wanted it. There’s some kind of tangled argument about morals and ethics and consent in my mind, but, as I think about Bazoniuth tearing an orgasm out of me even as she tells me how worthless I am, all those thoughts fade away as I come in spurts on the shower tile, the force of it making my legs go weak.

I’m breathing hard, as if I’ve just gone on a run. My mind is buzzing too much with the comedown for me to think clearly. For the rest of the shower, my mind is blissfully blank.

It remains blank as I towel myself off and change into a fresh outfit. First thing I do as soon as I’m dressed is go out onto the balcony to smoke a bowl. The evening is cool and crisp; a full moon shines bright as I flick the lighter and take my first hit. Bud’s the only substance I’ve ever really connected with, maybe because it forces me to breathe deep and slows everything in my head down. I’ve tried cigarettes before, but they speed everything up and made me feel worse. Meanwhile, alcohol tastes gross and makes me feel like a rag doll. So bud’s my one vice.

If you ignore the sexual ones, I mean.

I’m leaning against the railing, facing out toward an ugly parking lot with cracked asphalt. I’d fallen asleep after Jesse left for a delivery job. It’s not often that I’m at home alone. The evening breeze carries away silvery ashes from the bowl as I take another hit. Just as I begin to prickle with loneliness, I hear the glass door slide open behind me.

It takes just one footstep for me to know it’s Karen. Then, her floral perfume wafts over, confirming her presence.

And only hers.

“Hey,” she says, smiling as she rests her elbows on the railing. I turn to look at her, hoping my thoughts aren’t written on my face. The orange of the streetlamps and the soft white of the moonlight play across the planes of her face and shimmer across her curly hair. God, she’s so fucking gorgeous. Not just because of her features or her body, but because I can now see her soul shining through.

“Hey,” I say, leaning in to give her a gentle kiss. She seems to want to deepen it, but I pull away under the pretense of setting down the bong. I know it’s not possible, but I feel like lingering on Karen’s touch will only transfer more of what’s on my mind to her, like some kind of telepathic osmosis.

I look out at the parking lot. My hands still feel sticky. It’s just the mental feeling of being unclean, I remind myself.

Karen elbows me in the ribs.

“Hey,” she says, in a warm but concerned tone. “What’s up?”

I don’t know how I’d even begin to put all the feelings and thoughts racing through me into words. The more I try to think about it, the more I feel disembodied, like my mind’s leaving my flesh and observing things from afar.

The bud definitely doesn’t help with the dissociative feeling.

Karen doesn’t pressure me to talk before I’m ready, and I’m grateful for that. I take in a deep breath as I gather my words.

“I miss Bazoniuth,” I say, before cowardice stops my tongue.

I expect Karen to cuss me out. Or be angry. Or ask, “How could you? How dare you?”

Instead, she gives me a long look, her expression unreadable.

“Why?” she asks. It’s not an accusation or a demand for answers. Just a genuine question—making it all the harder to answer.

“I don’t… I don’t know,” I say, even as my mind provides me with a dozen reasons. I push those voices aside as I ask, “Do you ever… miss her?”

Karen looks out, but at the moon rather than the parking lot. A few expressions flit over her face before she finally settles on a wry smile.

“I’ve never told Jesse. He’s not the person to talk to about this,” she says. “The truth is… I enjoyed it, in a way. Being possessed by Bazoniuth. I could take the backseat and hide from the world for a moment. She could say things I would never say. Do what I wouldn’t do. But now I remember the feeling of being so unrestrained—the wicked and terrible pleasure cruelty brought me.”

Her smile loses its wry edge, then fades from her face entirely.

“And I have to hold myself back,” she finishes.

I don’t say anything, but, as I flash back to how much I love choking Jesse and fucking him rough, I think I know exactly what she means.

“I’ve been having nightmares about Bazoniuth,” I say. “Weird, twisted nightmares. Jesse says it’s ’cause I’m scared of becoming a dad. They’re all like… pregnancy stuff. But bloody.”

“Pregnancy stuff is usually bloody,” Karen says, nodding. I roll my eyes and elbow her.

“I mean like, really bloody. Nasty bloody.”

“Right. Like all pregnancy.”

I sigh. She’s right, though—it’s not the blood and gore and nasty shit that left me with an emotional hangover upon waking. Hesitantly, I let my gaze linger on Karen’s belly. She’s not quite showing yet, but she will be soon.

“What does it feel like…” I say, then let the momentum carry me through the rest of my sentence: “…to have something inside you? Something alive?”

Karen’s silent for longer than I expect. I begin to wonder if I’ve offended her. When she speaks, her words are slow, as if she’s picking shards of pottery to put together.

“Overwhelming, most of all,” she begins. “Pregnancy… it’s never been something I’ve been excited about. And it became even less exciting after I miscarried.”

My gaze snaps from her belly to her face. She senses my surprise and looks over to meet my eyes.

“I was nineteen,” she says. “It wasn’t old enough to even be called a baby. By the time the gore started to come out of me, the father was already my ex. Yeah, I’m not fond of him.” She goes quiet, then adds, as if speaking to herself, “I went through all that alone.”

I don’t know what to say. I’m so sorry seems incredibly fake. All I feel I can do is hold her hand. Her trembling fingers intertwine with mine.

“Being possessed by Bazoniuth felt like that,” she continues. “Going around day by day, leaking blood and the tissue of what was supposed to be a human being, except when you’re possessed, it’s your soul, your emotions that are leaking out, and no one knows it’s happening. No one but the part of you that’s screaming even as you’re trying to be strong.”

Then, she smiles, surprising me with how fond it looks even as grief infuses it.

“Sex with you was the one thing I could really consent to when Bazoniuth was in control. Even sex with Jesse didn’t feel quite right because of how she was pitting us against each other. Luckily, she liked fucking you more.”

That sends a complicated pulse through me. Sort of embarrassed to admit that it ends, as many things do, with blood rushing to my dick. Thank God Karen doesn’t seem to pick up on that, at least.

“I’m older and better at coping now, though,” Karen says, straightening up. “This time, being pregnant feels like proof that my body’s more than just a host to something else. Like maybe I can actually nourish something.”

She pauses.

“What do you miss about Bazoniuth?”

My breath catches in my throat. I’m not sure I’m ready to talk about everything running through my mind yet. I chew my lip. The high that had started as a buzz in my head has settled into my bones and flesh, loosening my emotions and tongue. Karen’s vulnerability encourages my own to emerge. Once I finally speak, the words come easily.

“I miss not being myself for a moment,” I confess. “I miss being treated like a toy. I miss Bazoniuth telling me what I know is true, which is: I’m worthless.”

“Oh, Ronnie,” Karen says. Her tone and the way she says my name reminds me eerily of how it had rolled off her tongue when Bazoniuth had said the same. But she’s not mocking me. I expect her to tell me that I shouldn’t think that way, that I should have self-esteem and self-confidence and whatever other “self-” things I don’t even know about.

But Karen surprises me.

“You don’t need Bazoniuth for that,” she says, grinning. I stare as she adds, “I can show you what it feels like to have something inside you.”

“Oh my God. Karen Wenyu Chiang.”

“Eh?” she says, pointing finger guns at me.

“You’re lucky you’re so hot,” I say, pulling her in for a kiss. I start out soft and sweet, then squeeze her ass and press her up against the rail as I deepen the kiss.

Her energy’s different this time, though. The air shifts as she exudes more dominance, flows more into her body. She cups the back of my head and caresses me, threads my hair through her fingers—then yanks me away from her. Even though she’s a good half head shorter than me, I’m the one who’s left feeling small as she leers at me.

“You’re the lucky one, scum,” she hisses.

It’s embarrassing how fast that gets me going. It’s like she flipped a switch I didn’t even know I had. Immediately, I feel a release of energy as I decide not to push back, then another release as I submit to her gaze. For a moment, I have a double-vision of Bazoniuth superimposed on Karen, even if they’d both been in the same body. But Karen anchors me in the present with her fierce gaze. For once, I ignore shame completely, ignore the questions about whether I’m turned on because of Karen or Bazoniuth or both, and let myself simply be.

“Let’s take this inside,” Karen says. An overwhelming need to please Karen rises in me as I oblige her wordlessly, watching for her next move, listening for her next command. She shuts the curtains with a single snap, then goes to the bedroom and returns with a towel and the floral-print box that she keeps all her sex toys in. She tosses the towel onto the couch and sets the box down on the coffee table.

“Do you want to bottom for me tonight, Ronnie?” she says, clearly relishing the shiver that runs through me. My mouth goes dry as my palms begin to sweat.

“Yes,” I breathe, before I can overthink my answer.

“Yes, Daddy,” Karen says, correcting me.

“Yes, Daddy,” I say. A spike of arousal pulses through me.

“That makes me happy,” she says, smirking. It’s not like her body language is shy to begin with, but, embodying this role, Karen is stunningly intimidating. She puts a hand on my shoulder, as if to draw me in, then shoves me. I stumble back onto the couch.

“I’ll fuck you on the bed when I think you deserve it,” Karen says, taking a bottle of lube out from the box before closing it again, making sure that I can’t peek at what I know is inside: her cock.

“Yes, Daddy,” I say, already feeling the blush rising in my cheeks.

“Take off your clothes and lie on your back.”

I strip off every item of clothing as if I’m trying to go for an undressing speed run, very aware of how hard my cock is. Karen doesn’t let me forget it, either—she gives my cock a disdainful look as she spits on it. I take in a sharp breath, expecting her to touch it, but she shakes a finger at me.

“Your cock won’t get any attention until you prove you’re at least a little useful,” Karen says. My face flushes with humiliation, but my cock bobs with interest, betraying my emotions once again.

“I will,” I say, then add, as if compelled to, “Anything for you, Daddy.”

“Oh?” She bites her lip—a gesture of genuine arousal that breaks through her mask, sending a thrill through me. “I like hearing that.”

She walks a circle around the couch, legs long, thighs thick. She stops beside the coffee table and wrinkles her nose. I remember just as her gaze falls on them that I’d left the bowl and spoon I’d used in the morning there.

Karen hates that. I open my mouth to apologize, but she cuts me off.

“I’ve told you a million times to put your dirty dishes in the sink, bitch,” she says, savoring the words and the way my lips part upon hearing the word “bitch.” “Let’s make it so you don’t forget next time.”

She picks up the spoon. The rounded, weighted end of the steel handle glints. My instinct to question things melts away as I give her all my attention, rapt. I don’t need to worry about what’s going to happen next—I’m not the one running the scene.

Still, I’m not expecting it when she pumps lube on the cold handle of the spoon and touches it to my asshole. I resist the urge to pull away.

“Have you ever played with your ass?” she says, maintaining eye contact with me as she teases my hole. Even just that much gets my breaths coming out ragged.

“Not really,” I confess between gasps. It’s taking all I have to hold myself still.

“Never been fucked in the ass?”

I blush. It sounds so crude, the way Karen’s saying it.

“No,” I say. I’d never really thought of bottoming before. It’s been a vague possibility on my radar, but nothing I ever pursued.

“Lovely,” Karen says, looking at me as if I were a new toy. My scalp tingles. “I’ll be sure to make your first time memorable,” she continues as she presses a kiss to my hipbone.

She teases me a little longer, enough to get me whining and lifting my hips for her.

“You’ll take anything in you, huh?” Karen says, her lip curled back as she looks down at me. With my guard finally lowered, I nod vigorously, my hair falling into my face.

“Yes, Daddy.”

“Filthy slut,” she murmurs, but the pride still shows through in her expression as she watches me, taking in my reaction as she pushes the rounded metal into me. I let out a soft aah. The sensation sends a deep thrumming through me. There’s pain, a delicious kind that gets my cock hard, and an unfamiliar pleasure that has my head spinning.

“Fuck,” I whisper.

“That’s it,” Karen says, pressing down on the handle, opening me a little more. I gasp and squeeze down reflexively. Karen presses a kiss to my inner thigh.

“Relax,” she says, gentle, the dom energy receding for a moment. I nod, my breaths short and quick. I remind myself not to let myself get overwhelmed. I take a proper breath, then another, deeper one. The pain and discomfort retreat as pleasure radiates through me to take their place.

“More,” I say, surprising myself, then add as I remember my manners, “Please, Daddy.”

“So desperate to be fucked?” Karen says, loving every word. “I would’ve had my cock buried in you a lot earlier if I’d known you enjoy it this much.”

Everything in my world has drilled down to just me and Karen. Nothing in my mind but euphoria. All I can think about is how I want more of her.

Karen pops open the lube and gets her hand slick and shining. I watch with anticipation as she tugs out the spoon and sets it with a clatter back into the dirty bowl. As she holds my gaze, she pushes one finger into me, then another.

“Oh my God,” I say, my head falling back. I can’t even begin to vocalize any of what I’m feeling. She spreads her fingers inside me, dragging out a whine that embarrasses me with how weak and pathetic it sounds. The humiliation of it makes my cock harder.

“Can I…” I say, whimpering as she touches her fingers back together, then spreads them vertically rather than horizontally. I run a hand down my chest but stop just short of my cock, letting my hand rest under my navel. I’m blushing so hard it feels like my whole face is ten degrees hotter than the rest of me. I bite my lip, hoping that my gaze communicates what I’m asking for.

“Can you what?” Karen says, reaching her other hand to close two fingers around the base of my cock. “You want to touch yourself?”

“Y-yes, Daddy,” I say, panting as she plays with my ass, gets it pliant the way I’ve done with Jesse.

“If it’ll help get you gaping open for me,” she says, nodding with permission as she goes harder, fingers me rougher.

When I first close my hand around my cock, slide my foreskin up over my head, get it wet and shining with pre-cum, my vision nearly whites out with the combination of sensations, the two points resonating with the same bright pleasure. As my hand flies over my cock, Karen works another finger in.

“Oh Ronnie, I can already tell that there’s nothing you like more than being fucked in the ass,” Karen says, grinning, her dom persona once more coming to the forefront. She presses in a fourth finger. I arch my back, crying out as that drives me down further on her. The pain of being stretched open has already fully receded, leaving me in a haze of pleasure that nearly has me sobbing as she crooks her fingers to press up against my prostate. I rut against her shamelessly.

“I think you’re ready for my cock,” Karen says, pleased. She withdraws her fingers, making me whimper with how empty I feel. She wipes off her hands on the towel and goes over to open the toy box. I swear just the sound of the metal clinking gets me thrumming with desire. Her cock juts from the harness as she buckles it on. It’s more slender than Jesse’s and a little longer. The thought of having both their cocks in me flits across my mind, turning me on to the point where it’s painful that it’s not happening.

She drizzles lube on her cock generously. She gives me a brusque nod as she waves her hand nonchalantly, gesturing for me to get on all fours. I do so. She settles onto her knees behind me, hands on my hips as she nudges my hole with the head of her cock.

“Breathe,” she says, then presses her cock into me. Even though I’m warmed up, the feeling of a whole cock in me, hard and ungiving, filling me and shaping me around it, overwhelming as it breaches into me… I remember her words and inhale deeply as my eyes fall closed.

“Fuck,” I breathe. My vision blurs for a moment as I open my eyes. “It’s so intense.”

“I know you can take it,” Karen says sweetly. “You’ve gotten this far.”

“I can. I can take it, Daddy,” I say, gasping as she pushes another inch in me, spreading me what feels like obscenely wide.

“Good,” she says. She leans down to press a kiss to my back. Her cock angles down as she does, jostling me, making me whine. Karen rocks slowly, in and out, the drag of it so fucking delicious that whatever shred of dignity I have left goes up in smoke as I moan, unrestrained, the sound of it buzzing through my chest.

“Sweet, sweet Ronnie,” she says, drizzling more lube onto my ass as she picks up her pace. “My little cockslut. I would’ve never known it was your first time.”

I’m helpless as she fucks me, every stroke longer than the last, until her hips kiss mine with each thrust and I take every last inch of her. I try to lower myself onto my forearms, but Karen yanks me up by my hair. I can’t do anything but let my moans ring out. I barely recognize my own voice, but the way it shudders through my chest, runs free out my throat, feels as much like bliss as having Karen’s cock inside me.

“Fuck,” I say, my eyes rolling back as she hits a spot inside me that makes even more intense pleasure burst through me. There’s not a single inch of my skin not drenched in sweat. I buck my hips against her, trying to chase that ecstasy, find that spot again for myself. My cock is achingly full and waiting for attention.

“I love having you like this,” Karen says, her tone sadistic. “What a pretty little fuckdoll. Pity Jesse’s not here to fuck you too and fill you with his cum.”

“Please can I touch myself, Daddy?” I ask. Just her words have me feeling like I’m on the edge of coming with all the images playing through my mind, to say nothing of the pleasure coursing so hard through me it makes my toes curl.

“You’ve been good. Go ahead.”

She releases her hold on me. I fall to my palms, then lower myself into kitty position, face in the couch cushion. I touch a finger to my slit and find myself plenty wet. I swirl the pre-cum around the head of my cock. As Karen fucks me, I sync my rhythm to match hers, my hand pumping hard as I bite the cushion to muffle my moans.

“You look so innocent on the outside, Ronnie,” she says. I twist so I can catch a glimpse of her. God, she’s so fucking hot, her lips parted and shining, her warm brown skin flushed, her curly hair bouncing over her shoulders as she fucks me. I can barely believe this is actually happening, and whenever I remember this is real life, I get more turned on, going past whatever I’d thought was my limit before.

“Who would’ve known you’d be so nasty?” she says, grinning as she relishes whatever look is on my face as another bright thunderstorm of pleasure breaks through me. “I’m so happy to show you how much of a slut you are, baby. Say ‘thank you.’”

“Thank you, Daddy,” I say, loving how it makes me feel like I’m beneath her, and not just literally.

“Mmm. You’re welcome, bitch,” she says, voice wicked and lazy. She pulls out of me, flips me onto my back, and spits in my mouth, fast and disdainful. Then, she chokes me with one hand, her slender fingers pressed on either side, pushing me over the edge as my hand finds my cock again.

I can’t even say a warning before I’m coming in quick spurts over my chest and stomach, my eyes squeezed shut, my head spinning so hard I feel like I’m about to pass out. Karen releases my neck. The rush of air and her cock still buried deep in me send a deeper kind of pleasure resonating all through me, one that can’t be compared to ejaculating. Drunk with orgasm, I sigh contentedly as she thrusts into me a couple last times, each drag and the kiss of the cold air on my messy cock sparking through me. Karen falls still, letting me catch my breath for a moment before she withdraws from me. She unbuckles the strap and sets it aside on the towel.

Several minutes pass as we catch our breaths. Gradually, I come back to my regular headspace. I expect thoughts and voices to rush back in, but the exertion has left me blissfully blank, nothing but the afterglow filling me.

“Was it good?” Karen says as she sits beside me and cradles my head in her hands. She kisses my forehead, then my cheek.

“Yeah,” I reply. I take a second to breathe and compose myself. Then, I smile up at her. Sheepish with how soft I’m feeling, I say, “I love you.”

“I love you too,” she says. She presses her forehead to mine, her hair cascading down to curtain us. “I love… being able to be with you, now, just you and me, the way we really are.”

I tilt up to kiss her.

“Me too.”

---

The next time I dream, Bazoniuth isn’t in it. Instead, I see myself from the outside: tall-ish, my body the type of solid that comes from work and not the gym. My hands are callused and square. My fade has gone shaggy; the wavy hair on top has grown wild.

I stand in an endless expanse of white.

If I look closely, I can see the faded scars on my arms.

The third-person point of view is uncanny. At the same time, it feels comfortable, like putting on an old hoodie. This is how I’ve always viewed myself. As a silent observer, not a participant.

I blink.

Eyes have sprouted all over my body. As if the gaze I always feel on myself has manifested itself literally. The eyeballs are of all different sizes, all different colors, the lashes blond on some, brown on others. They roll back, revealing red capillaries; their pupils widen and contract, each a hole into me. Like whiteheads, the eyes swell to obscure my body, until I’m a blastocyst more void than not.

I blink.

The eyes are gone. It’s as if they were never there—I look the same as I did the moment before, slouching like Karen always tells me not to. From this point of view, my body seems opaque. When I’m not inhabiting it, when I see it from an objective stance, I see not a man whose shame is branded all over his face, nor the terrible monster that is what I think of myself—even more monstrous than Bazoniuth—but just some guy who masks his anxiety pretty damn well.

My body turns to face me.

I’m not sure what “me” is at the moment, but my body is staring right at it. The expression on my body’s face goes from blank to a slow, downturned drip of agony, as if it were a clock in Dalí’s “Persistence of Memories.” It clenches its hands into fists, bares its wrists at me. The scars, so old they’ve faded into the same tapestry of brown as the rest of my skin, begin to redden, then split open again as my body keeps its expression frozen in an anguished, voiceless sob. Blood, thick and black, oozes out of my veins. The wounds sputter. More blood, rich red this time, chases the black and flows down my arms, down my wrists, a waterfall that lands nowhere.

Instead of being fearful, I simply take in my body’s pain. I touch invisible fingers to my body’s wrists, until I begin to fill with my body’s blood and the outlines of my hands become visible. They’re the same hands I’ve always had, but skinless, fleshless, nothing but dream logic containing the blood sloshing through me, as if I were a decanter.

My body shrivels as it empties into me. Flesh sloughs away from eye sockets; fingers deflate into gloves. My body crumples like a discarded sweater.

I blink. I am once again inside myself, gleaming with blood, bubbling with life. When I look down, it’s from a first-person point of view. I take in the currents rushing through my wrists, teeming with oxygen. I press my palm against my chest, right over my heart, where I feel it thumping back against me, deep in a crimson sea.

---

The thing is, I never expected to make a home during an apocalypse. Movies make apocalypses sound like the world ends all at once—even if sometimes “the world” only means the USA. I expected infrastructure to be completely knocked out. For the utter collapse of society, as preppers and conspiracy theorists would have us believe.

Instead, the apocalypse ends up being a patchwork thing. With the epicenter just under Northridge, much of the San Fernando Valley remains an absolute clusterfuck. The San Gabriel Valley is hit-or-miss—very little structural damage, but a shitton of demons and other beings. The San Bernardino Valley carries on as if nothing has happened, though there’s definitely demon activity that’s spread there, like the sprawl that characterizes all of New Angeles’s history. Meanwhile, Orange County’s had far less activity from Hell. The biggest demon they’ve got is the very human Ku Klux Klan brazenly making its presence known again, especially to Chinese and Jewish people—anyone whose rituals they can call strange and tie to demons. Jesse and I used to go down to Santa Ana for the best menudo, but now that the Klan’s back in town? Nah, fuck that.

I feel guilty sometimes that life is as good as it is for me right now. Even though I tell myself that an apocalypse doesn’t change the fact that everyone should have family there for them. I guess it’s just finally sunk in that yeah, the three of us are a family. Jesse and Karen know my soul far deeper than any of my blood family. I used to long to be part of a huge, extended Mexican family with massive gatherings for any event that could be celebrated, but I’ve come to realize that me and crowds just don’t get along. Turns out “family” isn’t something you can measure in numbers, anyway. Even so, there’ll soon be four of us. Jesse’s been beaming with pride and excitement, and Karen carries on acting stoic, but I catch her smiling with her hand on her belly when she thinks no one’s watching.

Me, I’m still scared shitless of becoming a dad. I have to leave the apartment and go for walks around the block when the anxiety starts to crush in on me. I’m sure Jesse and Karen have sensed my agitation. It’s gotten to that point where I end up shutting my mouth because I’m feeling too overwhelmed to even begin talking about what’s eating away at me. But bottling it all up only ends with me feeling like my mouth’s crawling with buzzing hornets.

I’m avoiding my feelings tonight by having an Alien movie marathon. It seems like a safe choice—surely far future science fiction has nothing to do with the present day—until I remember that it’s basically a movie about a momma alien protecting her babies. I stop the movie before I see any chestbursting. God. I feel as if my blood is on fire with all the energy racing through me. I put my head between my knees for a moment, then sit up again and tip my head back to look at the ceiling. I clasp my hands together, but soon I’m fiddling with them, cracking my knuckles or otherwise being restless.

Gotta keep my hands occupied.

Don’t want them releasing any blood.

I shake my head sharply. You’re past that now, I tell myself, even as I feel my every heartbeat thudding through my veins. The years have hidden the scars on my arms, but the impulse to break skin and bleed when emotions course through me is still deeply there.

My fingers twist together, longing for a blade. I shake my head sharply again and go into the bathroom, where I run the water as cold as I can get it and dunk my head under the tap. The shock of the water has me gasping, like I’ve just jumped into a frigid pool. My ears stop ringing, filled instead with the white noise of cascading water as my vision clears and an eerie sense of calm washes over me.

As I’m toweling off my hair and stepping out of the bathroom, I run into Jesse. It’s the rare night all three of us have off together.

“Hey, cabrón,” Jesse says, grinning.

“Hola, pendejo,” I reply.

“What’ve you been up to out here all alone?” Jesse says, peering first into the bathroom, then into the living room. “Alien? Without me?” He shakes his head. “How could you?”

“Me?” I say, feigning indignation as I quickly steer the conversation away from Alien and all the existential dread it’s causing me. “What about you? You and Karen up to no good without me?”

“Maybe,” Jesse says, voice dipping. With a wicked grin, he cups my cheek and kisses me, his breath hot and welcome. As I slide my tongue over his lips and take in the scent of him, I realize he tastes of Karen too, sweet and wet.

“Can’t believe you didn’t invite me,” I say, biting his lip just enough to be punishing as I grab his ass roughly.

“Why do you think I came out here?” Jesse replies. Instead of submitting to me, he looks up at me, sneering, his gaze a challenge that makes me forget about anything but him and being the focus of his attention. I’m vaguely aware that, a moment ago, I was feeling some major anxiety, but now it seems to have faded to background radiation levels as Jesse leads me down another road that can be an outlet for my energy.

“Why?”

Jesse shakes his head, tsking disapprovingly.

“You think I’m going to let Karen have your ass all to herself?” Jesse says, his eyes roving over me in a way that leaves me feeling naked. “You’ve been holding out on me.”

My breath hitches.

“I swear I haven’t,” I say, heart pounding as Jesse looks down at me. God, how can he do that when he’s the one who’s three inches shorter? Any sense I have left is rapidly oozing out of my ears along with my melting brain. “I’ve been wanting you to fuck me so bad.”

Oh, fuck. Guess those last words really left my mouth. Jesse’s cheeks flush as he grins devilishly.

“Me too,” he says. He presses me up against the wall. As his breath grazes my neck, I tremble, every inch of my skin waiting for his touch. He chuckles, the sound of it dark, stirring something in my stomach. Instead of kissing me, though, he grabs my arm and leads me toward the bedroom. “C’mon.”

Karen’s lounging on the bed in a sports bra and boy shorts, her legs parted to let me see that she’s got her packer on today. I used to think wearing a packer would be like having a dildo in your pants, but Karen had rolled her eyes and set me straight on that one by showing me the one she wears. The silicone is surprisingly realistic, even more so when concealed by underwear.

“What’re you looking at?” Karen says, cocking an eyebrow.

I blush.

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit,” Karen says, grinning as she shifts her weight so that her bulge stands out more. My mouth goes dry as my eyes flit up to meet hers. “You want Daddy to fuck you?”

“Wait your turn,” Jesse says to Karen. She pouts. Seeing them fight over me, even if it’s just play fighting, gets my head spinning with a sense of importance I’ve never really felt before. As Karen continues to give him puppy dog eyes, Jesse relents. “Well, we do need to get Ronnie warmed up first…”

Karen nods enthusiastically.

“That’s right. Come here, baby,” she says, patting a spot on the bed beside her. I obey wordlessly. She leans over and gives me a kiss, but pulls back just as I try to deepen it. “Take everything off.”

I tug off my Misfits shirt, my pajama pants, my boxers, my socks, then sit down on the edge of the bed. I’m on display as Karen smiles appreciatively and Jesse grins, both of them still clothed, leaving me feeling exposed. I’m not hard yet, but Karen sees to that quickly when she gets off the bed to kneel before me. She closes one hand around my cock, uses the other to push my thighs apart. Even though she’s the one beneath me right now, I know I’m the one feeling more vulnerable. Just a couple light strokes of her hand get me wet and heated, have my breaths coming out ragged.

“I know you’ve been feeling tense, Ronnie,” Karen says sweetly as she circles the ridge of my cock. “You’re not as good at hiding your feelings as you think you are.”

“I-I’m not?” I say, my voice quavering, punctuated with half-gasps. Karen laughs.

“Nope,” she says. She dips her thumb into the pre-cum leaking out of me, slicks the head of my cock with it, drags a long gasp out of me. “You gotta learn how to deal with your feelings before you’re cornered, baby. ”

She lingers on my frenulum, gets pleasure racing white-hot through me as she teases me.

“If this is dealing with my feelings,” I say, “then I wanna do it all the time.”

“It’s one way to deal with your feelings,” Karen says. “One of many ways.”

She pauses to look up at me. Holding eye contact feels unbearable, but Karen’s focus compels me not to look away.

“So here’s what’s gonna happen: me and Jesse are gonna love on you, hard, ’cause you deserve it, and ’cause I know it’ll get a lot of that energy out of you. And then we’re all gonna sit down later, maybe order a pizza, and properly talk about feelings and all that gay shit.”

God, she literally has me by the balls. But I welcome it: her attention, her focus; Jesse’s support as he looks on. I nod.

“Okay. Fine. But can we finish this first?”

“Sure, baby,” Karen says sweetly, as if she weren’t just crucifying me with her gaze a second ago. She runs her tongue along the underside of my cock, kisses the tip, her lips plush and pillowy as she takes more of me into her mouth.

Jesse hums in appreciation. I look up to see him leaning against the wall, his fly undone. He tugs down the waistband of his boxers, revealing his cock. He takes it in one hand, eyes dark and glittering as he watches Karen going down on me.

“Hot as fuck.”

His eyes flit down to admire the boy shorts riding up Karen’s ass as she gets more into the blowjob. She spits on my cock, gets me messy and wet, takes me into her throat while somehow making me feel like I’m the one who’s submitting. I moan helplessly as I clutch at the sheets. I squeeze my eyes shut and see stars when I open them again. Breath hitching, I look down at Karen, who’s come up for air, her face shining with spit.

“Oh God, please don’t stop,” I whine.

“Sorry,” Karen says as she gets up. She climbs back onto the bed. As she kneels behind me, she tugs a pillowcase free and uses it to tie my hands behind my back. “You’re not in charge right now.”

She nips my neck, sucks a bruising kiss into my shoulder. She tugs me down and manhandles me until I’ve got my cheek pressed against the bare pillow, my hands at the small of my back, my ass in the air, my cock leaking pre-cum onto the sheets. I know that I do have control still, that I can call everything off by saying “basta,” but the illusion of being helpless turns me on more than I want to admit. I finally surrender. Even just fully accepting that I’m submitting brings me release. My heartbeat seems to slow as everything comes into more focus. Tension melts out of me as I wait for Karen or Jesse to speak.

The bed shifts as Karen gets up and Jesse takes her place. Even though I can’t see her, the clinking lets me know that she’s putting on her harness. Jesse smacks my ass, taking my attention off Karen. Even though he’s holding back, my skin still tingles with the blow.

“Qué bonito,” Jesse says. He touches fingers slick with lube to my hole. I can’t help but whine, the sensation still new to me. Jesse chuckles. I glance back, able to catch only a sliver of his grin. “You are a little impatient slut, aren’t you?”

“I told you,” Karen says, coming back into view. She’s swapped her sports bra for a quarter-cup bra and her packer for her strap-on. She’s put on some lipstick, too, wine-red to match the blush deepening all over her. She grins as Jesse teases me more, gets me burying my face into the pillow as little sounds escape me. He slips one finger, then another into me, stretches me gently, gets me past the initial sting. He withdraws his fingers, touches the head of his cock to me, but then he runs the length against my slick hole rather putting it in me.

“God, please just fuck me already,” I plead. Jesse laughs.

“You don’t want me to go all slow and gentle?” he says.

“Not today,” I say. “Just fucking wreck me. I need it.”

I catch Jesse murmuring fuck under his breath, the words hot with want. He touches his cock to me again, presses in. I suck in a deep breath, willing myself to relax. Soon, I’m thrumming with sensation, my blood bubbling with every tiny movement as Jesse keeps a steady level of pressure on me.

“Oh my fucking God,” I choke out as Jesse inches into me, sparking pain and pleasure alike. “I’m going to lose my mind.”

“Yeah, that’s the plan,” Jesse says, humor in his voice. “Fucking your brains out, I mean.”

“Please.”

It doesn’t take long for the discomfort of the initial stretch to subside. Jesse fucks me in a few long, slow strokes that have me keening before he withdraws again, leaving me cursing and tingling. I’m about to whine for Jesse to keep going when he puts his fingers in me, three this time, and has me gasping as I cant my hips toward him, trying desperately to fuck him myself if he won’t keep up the pace.

“Damn,” Karen says admiringly as Jesse crooks his fingers and hits me in the prostate, making me shudder as my toes curl. Then, she snaps her fingers, getting an idea. “Hang on.”

She opens a drawer and pulls out an eye mask. Smiling mischievously, she leans over me, presses a kiss to my forehead, then slips the mask on over me. The panic lasts only a fraction of a second before I let my eyes flutter shut and sink myself into the darkness. Sounds and sensations amplify. Smells, too: Jesse’s musk, almost floral with its bright, sweet scent; Karen’s wetness, tart like citrus.

Jesse starts fingering me again, this time in earnest. The sensation explodes over me. Against the nothingness, my mind sparks colors. I’m gasping, driving my hips back as Jesse murmurs that’s it, baby. I feel deliciously open as Jesse stretches me wider until I’m a mess begging for his cock. When he finally puts it in me, I get only a few slow thrusts before he starts fucking me hard.

“Oh my God,” I gasp as Jesse pounds me. I’m sure there’s a wet spot under me now with how much pre-cum I’m dripping. Pinned under Jesse, my hands behind my back, my legs spread, blindfolded as he fucks me open, not knowing what Karen’s up to… “I’m going to lose my fucking mind,” I say, unable to string together any other words. With the blindfold on, I forget about the bounds of my body, the way any of it looks. I become just a conduit, open and channeling pleasure, merging with Jesse as he lights more fires in me with every drag.

“Mmm.” Jesse puts more weight into his thrusts. I’d never expected myself to be loud during sex, but the pleasure tears whimpers and cries out of me, has me sounding more like a schoolgirl than a grown-ass man, sparking far more arousal in me than I’d like to admit.

Jesse puts an arm around my hips, pulls me closer to him. He bottoms out in me, making me sob with the sensation of having him in me, having him being a part of me. I press my hips back against him, willing him to fuck me deeper. He surprises me by hauling me upright, driving me further onto his cock. My weight shifts onto my knees. With my hands tied behind my back, I have no choice but to thrust my chest out, my shoulders pulled open.

Right as I find my balance, the bed sinks before me, signaling Karen’s presence. I turn to her, even if I can’t see her. Jesse’s thrusts are long and slow now, keeping me right on the edge of coming. Karen nudges something against my lips. As I part them to let her in, I realize it’s her cock. Another burst of arousal colors the darkness. Karen takes her time fucking my mouth. I hope she can still sense the worship in my eyes as I relax and let her facefuck me, her cock thrusting into my throat. I suppress the urge to gag and instead channel the fight into fucking harder against Jesse, taking more of Karen, opening myself until I’m just a hole for them to fuck.

“Fuck,” Jesse breathes. His thighs slap against mine, driving his cock harder against my prostate as I gag on Karen’s cock. “I’m gonna come.”

The instant Karen’s cock is out of my mouth, I turn back to Jesse, still unseeing.

“Please,” I say, pushing back onto him as I let whatever words out of me. “Come inside me. Fill me up, make me drip. I need it.”

Jesse comes with a choked moan, throatier and hotter than any sound I’ve heard him make before. For a fleeting second, with my guard down, I entertain the fantasy where it’s possible for him to knock me up. In an instant, my mind flashes through a thousand memories that don’t exist. Flashes to the image of me in the dream, looking down at my pregnant belly. But this time, it’s not Bazoniuth kicking. It’s a baby, a normal, human baby, mine and Jesse’s and Karen’s, its soul a warm ember within me. Another flash. A knife in my hand, losing all its power as I look at the belly past my wrist and realize that hurting myself has always hurt others.

“Okay,” I say, breathing fast as I blink away tears. “Basta. Basta.”

Jesse stops immediately as Karen takes off the blindfold. The light is overwhelming. I blink. Jesse withdraws from me, though he continues to hold me gently, his touch grounding me as my eyes dart all around the room.

“Are you okay?” Karen says, all trace of her dom energy gone, replaced by concern as she looks into my eyes.

“Yeah. I just—”

I take a deep breath. Jesse unties my wrists. I loosen up my shoulders and scrub my hands over my face. When I look down, I see my belly, flat, empty. Horror rushes through me, only to subside when I imagine the warm ember. As I focus on the image in my mind’s eye, calm myself with the soul I feel within me, the realization dawns on me so quickly that I burst into laughter, the sound of it almost feral.

“I… I don’t think I… want to be a dad,” I say, then add quickly, before Karen and Jesse can get the wrong idea, “I think—I think I want to be a mom.”

The room is dead silent for several moments. Just as the anxiety within me begins to rev up again, Karen nods, a haggard look on her face.

“Gender feelings, eh?” she says. “Welcome to the club. Always knew you were an egg.”

“A what?” I say, bewildered.

“Maybe it’s time to order that pizza,” Jesse says, grabbing his phone from the nightstand.

“No pineapple,” I say reflexively. Karen rolls her eyes.

“As if I’d ever forget,” she and Jesse say together.

That gets me smiling. Once Jesse puts through the pizza order, he’s back by my side, sitting to the left of me as Karen sits to the right.

“Thanks,” I say to both of them. I’m not sure for what, not yet.

“Of course,” Jesse says.

“Anything for you,” Karen adds, her smile soft and sweet.

They both lean in to kiss me. As our lips meet and I breathe the air they breathe, I feel their souls washing over me as mine washes over theirs.

© 2020 by December Seas