The Velvet Garrote

AND THEN THERE WAS BLACKNESS :: P .H. Madore

2006-03-15T13:11:00.000-08:00

One

Shadows cackled on the wall of the cell and I huddled the best I could in my bunk and blankets as I awoke in prison, in some abyss, wrong as it seemed even to me; fearful, confused.

My second thought was of hell, a place dark and quiet with an occasional flickering television.

I stood, stalked around the cell--pacing, gasping, thinking, mumbling, speaking, weeping, crying, standing, sitting, trying, brooding, whimpering, lavishly flashing, teeth-gnashing, hammering, stammering, shivering, giving ground to shadows, breathing, dying, frying, freezing, lying to myself, sighing, timing, and setting and casting and catching and forgetting. For all this I had one realization: the cell was strange to me, entirely so, and I had no use for it.

Two

I crept when they let me out. Thought I was doing my best to blend into the scenery and not draw unwanted attention. I did well at it, at least that was my impression of my own actions.

The same time, I was ready to kill a motherfucker because I wanted some answers, and I would do whatever it took to get them.

Three

I decided on a motel as I came outside it in a cheap taxi, the kind that is actually a van on its last legs. I put my two bags on the bed of the room; slammed the door and made it to the cab before it left me, and soon came to a bar.

There was a woman there who bought me a drink and had the favor returned. Eventually I kissed her and tousled her blonde hair. She came back to the motel with me.

Four

I wasn't sure of anything.

I had flagrant and detailed memories far prior to waking up in prison. But there was a serious black hole as to the time I spent getting there. I remembered getting thrown out of my house, staunchly walking away. That hadn't been good as things absolutely never are.

I remembered losing my job and roaming the streets.

I remembered an ether trip--and then there was blackness. That must have been it, but even that I couldn't be sure of.

Five

I trudged on; into a park even as the snow fell the next day.

I looked at a playground nearby, walked a hundred, a thousand leagues or more. In that moment I dealt with the greatest of regrets. A wife and kids in the toilet, ether swirling around the rims, loss of memories and lost minds. Moreover, I took all of it in stride...

Six

I struck my way through a gray morning atmosphere some days later, walking up the street, and eventually I decided to flag down a sympathetic cabbie --though I had no money.

Once he found me, I for some reason felt more sure of things. It seemed that in the gray of the week or month or however long it had been the cabbie was a suitable guide. Like a sheperd finding a lost member of his flock.

Before getting in, I stood and looked across an ocean of rubies and diamonds and this compelled me to tell the cabbie to wait. He did, and the aforementioned ocean did glimmer at the two of us--and I took pity on the cabbie as it changed him as a man, and I wished suddenly that I could go through like changes--knowing all the while, of course, that to change a man like me, a man so lost and foolish and clueless, was simply not possible.

I took good stock of my surroundings and told the cabbie to drive. He asked where and I reminded him, or at least that's what I thought I was doing, that it didn't matter. I had every intention of paying him, but it didn't work out as the continual non-reality of my empty pockets surfaced and re-surfaced, and I was thrown out somewhere downtown.

Seven

I started smoking, chain-smoking, as a habit suddenly when I saw a cigarette machine weeks later. I wanted to use the machine. As I lighted a cigarette, smoked it, purchased another and smoked it, a line from Kerouac's On The Road occurred to me; something about "only the mad" being for him; and I was as comforted then, nictoine buzzing my brain, as I was when I had first read it. And the lively feeling was bright and spastic and gave me the urge to jog somewhere, anywhere, to roam and never strive for the so-called stability of bourgeois existence again. Kerouac's words and cigarette smoke clung to me like mud from a swamp might.

I went back to the motel where I was still staying. I don't remember how I kept paying for it, or even if they ever charged me. I don't actually remember if it was even a motel.

Eight

Hours later, I found myself sitting atop the table in the room's kitchenette, writing on a tablet. It felt as if I had come awake again, like the time in prison, and I didn't know what or why I was writing.

But it felt good. Extremely good.

Nine

I've lived the sort of life where many times I have been forced to see myself simply as the protagonist in some great, unheard-of, worthless, unpublished, half-baked novel.

A short one, I see now as lights flash outside and the corpse of the woman from the bar comes to light, but a worthwhile one nevertheless.

BIO: P. H. Madore has never been to prison that you can prove. He HAS been published in a bunch of places recently, including insolent rudder, Yankee Pot Roast, the Lampshade, and more. Bother him at http://phmadore.net

GODDESS DANCING :: Theresa Cecilia Garcia

2006-03-07T12:52:00.001-08:00

In the middle of NYC, abstract letters were dancing on red brick walls, white starched, among rainbow-colored laundry on thin beams of line held firmly in place with wooden clips, waving with the warm breeze.

My body jogs repeatedly about the perimeter of the neighborhood for hours at a time and I run as far and as fast as I can. Sometimes it seems like I'm going to fall off the edge of my world into a pool of deep thought, drowning, until someone walks by and finds the remains of my body, blood spurting viciously from all orifices. Stream lining through my fingers, down my legs and I scream a silent scream and I smile and hide behind it. Hurt yourself on the outside, kill yourself on the inside.

He told me he loved me. That he would never do anything to hurt me. But down came the rain and the darkness swallowed the sun's rays and I reincarnated.

Have you ever looked into someone's eyes and seen death? It's a strange death because life has not killed the soul nor has love. It's the death of a silent wound. Unrevealing yet immense and as you stare into those eyes the feeling of pain estranged from the world but in our midst miraculous, inviolable like a flower unfolding, exquisite martyrdom holds your gaze.

In a split second of fury and inattention, a horrendous inhuman roar exploded through my head and I was taken back. "I have to ask, are you wet? Because I'm getting hard just looking at you." Forced smile, "What?" Uncomfortable, "No, not at all." "Hmmmmmmm not wet yet? Can I help?" His facade of civility snapped as he lashed out and jerked me by the hair so hard all I could see was stars. I screamed and fought, bit into his hand and drew blood as he dragged my head toward him, his hot breath on my face. "Don't be so puritanical and do not call for there's nobody here. Do not shout, do not ask or beg for there is nobody, there is nobody."

Vomiting on the edge of the sidewalk. Release me. Midnight. Two ambulances silently flashing their lights. One on the left the other on the right. My legs were vibrating. I'm stagnate, standing at the red light and both ambulances pass through it with ease. And I don't know who I am.

BIO: Theresa Cecilia Garcia is a free spirit and a former elementary school teacher turned writer. She is an active member of www.zoetrope.com and has been published in numerous ezines.

AND COUNTING :: Mark Budman

2006-03-06T11:02:00.000-08:00

100 seconds. All your life you dream of free flight, but the weight in
your chest holds you down.

80 seconds. A flight attendant finally falls. You don't know how she
managed to remain standing for so long with her hands tied behind her
back. Her skirt rides up; her thighs are skinny. Blood flows down her
chin from the deep cut on her cheek. You want to pray, but you forgot
the words. You want to cry, but you have no tears. You want to be tiny,
like a fly. Or maybe big, like a fire-breathing monster.

60 seconds. The plane rattles. The pilot is an amateur, after all. The
overhead compartments spill canvas bags and crocodile briefcases. A man
across the aisle clutches his chest. A boy behind you says, "Mommy,
mommy what does Allah mean?"

40 seconds. A woman next to you screams. She can't help it. You feel the
air sucked out of your ears.

20 seconds. You hug her and whisper, "Don't cry, angel. We are
immortal." She sobs on your shoulder.

0 seconds. The weight is gone. You are reaching for the sun; you no
longer need to blink. Finally, you are in free flight.

BIO: Mark Budman is the Editor/Publisher of Vestal Review, a flash fiction magazine.
All stories 500 words or shorter. If you don't have time to read them, then fine literature is in trouble
http://www.vestalreview.net
Mirror: http://webdelsol.com/Vestal_Review/
Guidelines available on the Web site
Featured on Web Del Sol
Featured on NPR: http://www.wskg.org/OffThepage/2004-11-16-budman-offthepage.htm
Editor of Web Del Sol Interviews: http://webdelsol.com/f-literarydialogues.htm

"And Counting" was first published by LitPot: http://www.inkpots.net.

WHITE LINE FEVER :: Cami Park

2006-03-03T07:37:00.000-08:00

Tell me your story.

The night is long. The road unspools before you like dark ribbon. There is no hurry. There is time to say all that needs to be said and do all that needs to be done.

Tell me your story.

I'm here with you, but you don't know it. You feel me like a discordant lullaby, as distant and persistent as the wax paper moon stuck to your windshield. I'm not going anywhere. I won't go anywhere.

Tell me your story. Sing it. Whisper it. Shout it.

It doesn't have to be perfect. I crave the imperfect. Tell me what's buried there under the refuse-- the booze, the pills, the condoms, and all the other souvenirs of the misbegotten piled against a truth so ugly it's beautiful, but it hurts, it fucking hurts so much.

Tell me. Make it hurt.

I want to crawl into your junk heap soul, burrow like a maggot through the vomit, rotten TV guides and bad checks. When I get to the core of you, I will feed, nourish myself on what ruined you, what made you fit for this world and unfit for me and my night. I will never leave you.

Drive.

BIO: Cami Park's work can be found in publications such as Smokelong Quarterly, Outsider Ink, No Tell Motel, Opium Magazine, Forklift, Ohio, and Ghoti Magazine.

THE BEAST :: Wayne H. W Wolfson

2006-03-01T08:54:00.000-08:00

I'm low.

Ah, fuck. Nothing new, but it is like a lump in my chest. It is the beast. When he wakes, he bangs around to let me know he is still there.

The hurt, the hello.

I would like to let him out, at least at night. No. That is a mistake, to say "to let" or "I would like". He calls the shots.

I shouldn't complain though. It is only through our pain that we can sometimes be reminded that we are alive.

Berlin suits me.

With shorter hair my hat is now ill fitting.

The bar where I opened the letter. You are pregnant and the bartender, the other one, Sandra, still ignores me.

There is no sign, no name. It suits me.

Did I write you congratulations or did I get right to the meat of the matter?

No name suits me. Call me Berlin.

Well, in any case, congratulations. Did I tell you about Marlene Dietrich? It's not really her, I just call her that. Every one is eventually re-christened by me.

We talk. Out of boredom we fucked.

It started with a song.

We were at opposite ends of the bar. No one else was around. Music was playing. Radio crackling like the rebellion of a dying fire.

She just stared at me, not in the blatantly hostile way I sometimes encountered though. With the right song and another drink one of us is going to spill out, I had thought.
Risking exile, I went behind the bar and changed the station. I wanted a soundtrack that goes with a movie about a man trying to forget.

I am such a liar.

I wanted something to prod me into action.

She had a good twenty years on me. Which was good, it meant we wouldn't have to spend the whole night sitting at the bar, small talk, playing coy.

Still, I didn't mind a little bit of chat.

Marlene lived above a cobbler who closed too early and she hadn't seen in years.

We had some more drinks.

I didn't know her and could be completely honest. It was refreshing. She returned the favor. For Marlene there is nothing more, all tomorrows lie dead in the street

I was in the middle of finding out how much ink a year without you translated into.

All tomorrows lie dead in the street, but even in death rituals and habits must remain.

She wouldn't mind listening to the Blue Note she saw poking out of the top of my bag. She pointed with her chin.

"Mmm... die gut musik".

Her elevator had pretty brass grillwork on the small door which was tarnished to a Degas green.

She brushed her teeth. I sat on the end of the bed. She kept the light on, I liked that.

Her stockings clung tightly to her legs and I watched her try to roll them down slowly without losing any of the eroticism.

We had forgotten to put the record on. I had been careful not to put my bag near any heater though.

She pointed to one meaty thigh on which the inside a blurred tattoo of a phonograph could be seen.

"Die gut musik".

BIO: Wayne is a California-based author. More information on his works can be found at his site Terrible Beauty at www.waynewolfson.com.

THE GROWING CAVE :: Lise Jacoby

2006-02-28T13:00:00.000-08:00

Boris placed his hand on her back, assuring her it was okay to enter the cave. She felt him reach up and run his hands along the stone wall. She jumped as she heard a click.

“What was that?” she asked.

Another click.

“Hmm?” he said.

Another click and the cave filled with warm light.

Boris motioned for her to sit on one of two large rocks that were positioned in the center of the low-ceilinged cave.

She did as she was told.

His voice came through the familiar sludge of his throat, though this time, the growl was gone. She listened closely and thought she heard tenderness.

“I want to say I’m sorry,” he shut his eyes, seeming to squeeze back tears. She could not and she started to cry. A slight trickle at first, but the fear and the shock at seeing her dad in such a vulnerable place turned to heaving sobs in fractions of a second.

“Please don’t cry, Tam. I’m trying to say I love you.”

She barely heard him.

“Listen to me. Listen.”

She tried really hard to stop crying.

“Tam, you are almost a woman. Are you listening, Tamella? You are twelve years old and almost a woman now. I’m trying to say that I’m sorry and that I love you. I want you to be a woman now. I am an old man, Tamella, and I can’t be responsible for a young woman.”

Tam blinked, squinting at Boris. She could barely hear him. He was whispering and not making any sense.

He cleared his throat and continued. “It is time, Tamella. Time for you to grow up. Are you listening?”

She nodded.

“I can’t take care of you anymore and you need to learn how to rely on yourself. I am going to leave you here, Tam. I am going to leave you here in this cave. There are two ways out. One is through the front entrance, where we came in. Are you listening?”

Tam was dizzy, her ears ringing. Her mouth was dry. She coughed and dry-heaved, missing what Boris was saying.

“…through the back all the way to the house. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” she lied. Her voice like glass in the quiet cave.

Boris nodded and got up. He leaned over and gently wiped her face.

“I trust that you will find your way home,” he smiled. “That’s my big girl.”

Tam was frozen. Her tears were gone. She struggled to hear what he was saying. She saw him moving, saw his hand reach out for her shoulder, watched his lips move. But she couldn’t comprehend what he was saying.

And then he was gone.

And she was alone. And in the dark. There was light earlier, she was sure of it. But no more. The light was gone and her father was gone and she was alone in the dark. But she didn’t cry. She just sat.

She was a woman now. That’s what he’d said. She was a woman and she could take care of herself. She could take care of herself on a rock, in a cave, in the dark, in the middle of the night on her twelfth birthday. She could take care of herself, because Boris trusted her. And he loved her. He even said so.

She got up off the rock and started to walk towards the entrance. Her shoes began to stick in the mud on the floor. She stretched out her arms, feeling for the wall. All she felt was cool air. She concentrated on the slurping of her feet and tried not to panic.

She walked and walked and never found the opening. Never touched a wall. She turned around to find the rock. She walked straight back the way she’d come, but couldn’t find the rock either. She twirled in the middle of the cave, desperate to find the way out.

Even though it was dark, she closed her eyes. She took off her shoes and felt the mud squish between her toes. She held her arms straight out. Leaned her head back. And begin to spin.

She spun and spun and didn’t quit until she fell in the mud, landing in a clump. She rolled onto her back and extended her arms and legs like the Vitruvian Man. She closed her eyes and concentrated.

She jumped up and ran as fast as she could, certain she’d found the way out. She held her arms straight out to the sides and ran in the mud. She felt the coolness of stone on her left hand and realized she’d found a wall. A wall! She’d find her way out for sure.

She clung to the wall and continued to run. Her breathing was short and shallow. Her heart beat wildly. Her lungs burned, as did the muscles in her legs. She ran blind in the dark, listening to the mud under her feet and her father’s words looping through her head.

You’re a woman now. You’re a woman. I love you. I am sorry.

She was so dizzy and couldn’t catch her breath. She needed to stop, to rest. How long had she been running? It was a small cave. She’d seen it when she came in. She’d been running for hours, she was sure of it. Running lost, thirsty, cramping. But not scared.

She was almost a woman.

She didn’t even realize she was on the ground when she fell. Her brain was swimming. Her leg felt hot, she reached down and it was wet. She was covered in wet. Mud she guessed. But her leg hurt. And now she was a woman. Boris trusted her. She was his big girl.

She closed her eyes and saw her dead mother’s face. She was smiling and she wore a bright red rose tucked over her left ear. She pulled out the flower and handed it to Tam. Tam took it and held it close to her nose, inhaling deeply, trying to pull her mother’s soul in through her nostrils.

“Tamella. My daughter. My love,” her mother said. The words tickled as they coursed through her ears.

Her mother scooped her up and carried her in her arms. “Let’s go home.”

Tam flew with her mother through the cave, turning left and then right, Tam clinging to her mother’s chest, savoring the smell of fresh roses.

Her mother carried her straight up to her room and laid her down on the bed. She pulled the covers up over Tam and smoothed down her hair.

Tam started to talk, but her mother shushed her, placing a bony finger to Tam’s lips.

“Not yet. Come find me tomorrow night,” she said and was gone.

FLAMES :: Peter Ciantini

2006-02-24T11:24:00.000-08:00

I watched you burn and I couldn't do a thing.

It started with the drapes. Or the 'curtains' as my mother would say. I thought I could put it out and I tried but it got too big, too fast, and it took over everything. I watched the couch burn like it was made of plastic. I watched the table and our books go up in flames. It was hot and humid and smoky and it looked so bad and so awful. I got scared. I ran out into the garage, but then I remembered that you would have tried to save me. I know you would. So I went back in.

I ran up the stairs. I ran through fire for you, just like some dumb country song. But it was too late. When I got to your room and looked through the smoke your bed was in flames. I wonder if you screamed and I didn't hear you. Oh, God. The black shape of you on the bed. And the melting of everything. Your hand lying perfectly still like nothing had happened. And your face.

Your face is what keeps me up at night.

FAMILY-TIED AS EVER :: Henry Chalise

2006-02-23T11:52:00.000-08:00

For T. C. R.

You know I'd cry a million tears
and think a thousand thoughts
and die a hundred times
for you.

You know my heart's rotten
because you won't die
because cars can crash and kill you
because I'll never know &
because I wasn't there
so you won't be forgotten.

And we died on that icy hardtop together
family-tied as ever
I went with you though my heart
refused & refuses to stop
you know it pumps of spite.

And I said,
words never counted
yet no longer do.

And you stood to say,
“cunts cocksuckahs mothahfuckahs & whoahs
--bitches--
lookit these bastahds galoah!”

And I said,
words never counted
yet no longer do.

So did I wonder:
why wander
oh mind of mine?
not focus & stabilize,
realize things can be fine?
doesn't it lead to points unworthy
and dreams unlikely?
don't things lose sense
can't you just stop and like me?

And at that junction
yesterday or wasn't it last year
things began to make sense
yeah after she left
after you left too
I took to taking life
in the present-most tense.

You know into the unknown
I'm forever headed
because when my beard grows
it'll be gray
and when the wind blows
I think of you
every last undeserved day.

And you stopped to say,
man I'm joining the marines
man this girl, she's all mine
man I'm loyal to you, to my family
man this life, it's all mine
man I'm great, to be admired
man this doesn't need saying, it's true
that's why I never did.

So did I wonder,
am forever wondering:
why the fuck
did death take
you in my stead?

BIO: Henry Chalise is lampshadian-in-chief and editor of The Lampshade. His credits include DISPATCH and [insert presitigious print magazine here].

SHE SCREAMS IN THREES :: Seth Harding

2006-02-22T15:03:00.000-08:00

It wasn’t love that made her still. It wasn’t lust or fantasy or even the delicious feeling of being controlled. It was defeat. The first time the whip stung her back she screamed. Not in pleasure like he thought, but in shame.

Theresa had grown up with privileges that most southern black girls in those days didn’t have. She grew up with real luxuries: a first-class education, a nice house and a car on her sixteenth birthday, family vacations. But most of all, opportunity. She’d had a shot at an Ivy League university but she’d given it up for Jeffrey’s smile and his promise to take her places her dreams never could. Things were pretty good before the baby. Actually, they were really good. People always said that babies changed your life. That was true. Even if they are never born they leave long, thick scars.

When Jeffrey took her to her first party she was nervous, not that she didn’t know what to expect. They’d watched bondage videos and she felt prepared. They played with handcuffs and blindfolds at home. Jeffrey liked to lead her around with a leash. It turned her on to see him so in control. The sex wasn’t what she enjoyed about it, unless she was masturbating. It was more about watching him shine in his element. It was the only way she’d found to make him happy.

She wasn’t prepared however. Not even close. She watched him turn from being her sexy master into a maniac. He hit her harder than ever before and even ignored her when she used the safe word. He bent her over a stool near the kitchen and put on her collar. He pulled it too tight and as he was closing the buckle she coughed.

“Claudia,” she squeaked. Claudia was what she’d wanted to name their baby, but she never told Jeffrey that. She said Claudia felt ‘safe’ because she was her favorite childhood friend.

Jeffrey grinned but didn’t loosen the collar. Instead he pulled her hair and grit his teeth.

She choked back a tear. “Claudia. Please, Jeff.”

He licked his lips and pointed her face toward the writhing couple next to them.

“Watch them,” he said.

* * *
The night Jeffrey Wayne was born was the happiest night of Edith’s young life. She had a son. A real son that cried and squeezed her finger and nobody could take him away from her. And nobody could make him not love her. Nobody.

Never mind that it was the forties and a teenaged unwed mother couldn’t make it very far. Never mind that she couldn’t tell anyone who the real father was. “Some boy from school,” they all whispered. But they were wrong. There were only three people in the world that knew the truth and they weren’t telling.

Edith knew Jeffrey wasn’t quite right very soon after she brought him home. There was something strange in his eyes, something cold and strong. Something knowing. He scared her. He was only days old and he definitely knew more than she did. He mocked her with his tongue. He’d puke whenever she did something he didn’t agree with. He hated her. She could feel it. He shouldn’t have been born. He knew why, somehow, and he’d never ever forgive her for it.

When he nursed, he’d bite her nipples till she bled, even without teeth. He’d cry as loud as he could all night long so that her mother would come in and give her a beating for keeping everybody awake with her awful mothering. Jeffrey was only three months old, but when she’d cry she’d look over at him and catch him smiling.

She knew that God was punishing her for letting her father touch her like that. And not just for letting him touch her, but for wanting him to. She also knew it wasn’t normal, the things he wanted to do. She’d been with lots of boys before and they never wanted to do what her father did. They never tied her up or put tape over her mouth. They also never made her come. She knew God hated her for everything she’d done and he’d sent her Jeffrey to make her suffer. She tried to scream in silence, but Jeffrey always knew.

* * *She watched them through the veil of skin and blood, breathing by osmosis, feeding through the long cord that connected her to the big balloon. She listened to the sounds outside. The woman cooed to her, sang her songs and called her Claudia. She liked that. The man was not as soothing. He was loud and scared her. When he yelled, Claudia kicked at him. The woman would say, “Stop it. You are scaring the baby”. Claudia wondered what a baby was.

Whenever they’d talk about the doctor or the appointment, the woman would cry and Claudia could feel her whole body shake.

The man would say, “We don’t have a choice.”
The woman would say, “Why can’t we keep it?”
The man would say, “Because we don’t want it.”

The last thing Claudia remembered was hearing the woman crying and another woman telling her, “Shush, shush. Everything will be okay.” Claudia liked hearing the calm woman’s voice; liked hearing that everything would be okay.

Claudia closed her eyes and screamed as she went through the long tunnel, prepared to open them on the other side.

BIO: Seth Harding is a writer living with a wife and three girls in Washington State. He doesn't know much, but he knows he's tired of the rain.

WATCHING MYSELF BLEED :: Sonia Rapertly

2006-02-22T14:57:00.000-08:00

When I was a kid I used to fall down on purpose to see my knees bleed or my skin tear. I would sit and stare at the skin, all white and numb then the blood would come sometimes in drips, sometimes in spots, sometimes it would gush out depending on how hard I’d hit the sidewalk. Slamming my knees into the pavement so I’d have to pick out the pebbles and the dirt. When the scabs came, I’d pick them off too and bleed again.

So it didn’t seem so bad that when Grandpa's friend took me out to the shed in the back yard when I was eight. That made me bleed too but he didn’t care. He took a fish out of the pond Grandpa had made in the backyard and he layed it on the grass and made me watch it flop around and fight for air and die. Then he threw it back in the water and told me to never tell. He didn’t know I liked it.

Later when we went in the shed he made me do things to him and then he’d always bend me over. We went into the shed for years. If he saw me out back, on the swings, he’d need to borrow something suddenly from Grandpa and he’d come over. I used to want him to come over. I’d swing on the swing set real high with no panties on. He didn’t know I killed all the fish in grandpa’s pond one afternoon with my bare hands. I’d killed their puppy too. Holding his neck nice and tight, watching him struggle and kick just like I did out in the shed.

My grandma caught me once lifting up my shirt in the front window. She caught me masturbating to my uncle’s playboy magazine once in the basement. She caught me taking a shower with my Uncle.

I didn’t go back to Grandma’s after that.

I couldn’t go to Grandma’s anymore so I’d ride my bike by his house and his wife was sick and in a wheelchair so we’d go to his basement and I’d crawl through the window, making sure I scraped my thigh on the sharp metal edge as I’d squeeze through. Then I could watch myself bleed while he came. After a while he couldn't even get hard anymore but I liked being high and he liked watching me.

My mother got re-married and he liked my ass, too.

I’ve been to the hospital thirteen times, some guys like making a girl bleed. They don’t know how much practice I’ve had though. They can never hurt me as much as I can hurt myself.

Even after all the men who fuck me and fuck me and fuck me inside and out and torn up and ripped and tattered and bleeding always bleeding, I’m still here.

BIO: Sonia Rapertly is 23 and from Couer d'Alene, Idaho. She is currently attending the University of Iowa. She also bartends, has no tattoos and owns two goldfish named Bob and Bob. This works well as she can't tell them apart anyway.