Jeremiah Quick

by SM Johnson

  "Why are you so agreeable all of a sudden?" she asked, as her hands were freed and he removed first the belt and then the wrist cuffs. "It was only an hour ago that you took away my hands so I couldn't touch you at all."

  "Because you're willing to do for me something no one else in this universe would be willing to do." His gaze was steady.

  "Yeah," she said back. "Because I'm insane."

  "If you love me," he said, his voice softer even than the brush of his lips against her cheek, "please kill me. I can't bear to be here without him."

  Pretty wanted to scream at him. What about me? Why wouldn't he even try to let her love him all better?

  "Pre-ordained," he whispered. "This is your legacy. The power to love, the willingness to kill. Good medicine."

  No, it wasn't good medicine, and would never be. It was just that she understood about regret now, and how she regretted more the things she didn't do than any of the things she did. She'd already promised him. That part was done. And if she fit nowhere else, she fit here with him, these past weeks, perfectly.

  They were a perfect complement of light and dark, beauty and terror, life and death, happiness and sadness.

  Polar opposites.

  It didn't matter. She would love him always.

  Silence grew, and it was the comfortable kind, not the silent screaming fuck-you kind, and it was good.

  This, then, is when she made her approach.

  First, hands on his shoulders, kneading hard, like a massage. He crossed his arms over his chest, protecting himself. After a minute or so Pretty relaxed her fingers, changing the massage to soft petting. He sighed and dropped his arms, a little more open.

  As she let her hands explore his skin, she thought about all of this.

  Could killing him really be good medicine, in this or any universe?

  She didn't believe in one God, so it wasn't that. She'd given up that belief years ago, long before she could ever articulate about belief systems, agnosticism, atheism – when she was still a small child counting hats in church, already aware that whatever 'faith' was, she didn't have it. There was no God to stop her.

  Jail – or prison, even, should be considered. No matter that Jeremiah was asking her to love him enough – enough to do this thing – no matter that she heard Jamie's voice, plain as day, "I made a mistake," and knew in her heart that he was real and he meant it, and that Jeremiah meant it when he said he couldn't live another minute without Jamie. This was all true. But she could still be guilty. She could still be arrested for murder. Hell, it was more likely than not, wasn't it, what with the advances of forensic science and all. But oddly enough, that all seemed so far away, so distant from this present moment, that she couldn't wrap her head around worrying about it.

  Moral implications, then? Her husband. Would she tell him what she'd done? Could she?

  He was the only one who'd ever accepted her as she was, and continued to love her, day in and day out, through all of her changes, for almost twenty years. But could he love her after this?

  She had no idea.

  Silly, isn't it? She should know him well enough to decide, but found herself wavering between one or the other. He was an honorable man. Straight-forward, no games. Simple in a lot of ways, emotionally, but sometimes still surprised her with emotional reactions to unexpected things. But this she know – he would definitely have an emotional reaction to his wife having had raunchy, bloody, unprotected sex with Jeremiah Quick. Yeah, no matter how loving, how forgiving, he wasn't going to be okay with that.

  What if he left her?

  She couldn't think of it. Too terrifying, too alone.

  She tried to push it out of her head and kept petting Jeremiah and half-smiling at his antics with the red pen.

  "Earth to Sunshine," he said, and she startled to better attention. "I think a knife. My knife, into the heart, would be the most… well, I'm not sure 'pleasurable' is the word I want. Fitting, maybe."

  Pretty shrugged. "If that's what you want."

  "You won't mind the blood?" he asked.

  She shook her head. "My sacrificial virgin days are long behind me, aren't they? Blood is wet, and messy, but other than that, just a fluid."

  He grinned. "That's my girl." Proud. Pleased. He'd done this to her, and he was glad. That same perverse pleasure he got upon finding out she'd mourned him when she'd thought him gone.

  Now he really would be, and her mourning period would be all too real. Somehow she suspected that pleased him, too.

  Her fingertips found their way across his bare stomach, and his muscles rippled a reaction. She wasn't sure if he was tensing and flinching away from her touch, or if he was reacting in a more positive way. And the more she thought about it, the worse she felt about coercing him into accepting this.

  "You don't have to tolerate this," she told him. "I'm sorry. It's not fair of me." She started to pull her hand away from his skin, but he grabbed it and trapped her fingers against his flesh.

  "I'm not… used… to being touched. At least not nicely, not without Jamie."

  Pretty tugged, trying to free her hand. "That's what I mean, about not being fair. You don't even like girls."

  "I like you, Sunshine. It's okay to want to touch me. It feels like a compliment – like love and care and home."

  Truth? She adored his almost-too-thin body, his long slender bones and smooth skin, so she took him at his word. She skimmed both hands up his ribcage, almost hearing xylophonic notes in her head, the low, deep vibrating wooden ones. And then she noticed – he was making that noise, the rumbling coming from his chest, his throat, that it wasn't inside her head at all. He was humming scales as she explored him.

  She started to giggle, and his eyes opened, all clear and guileless the way they could be sometimes. "This would feel so much less wrong if we were in the woods," she said.

  He smiled at her, then, and it made his face look young and beautiful, and maybe for the first time ever in her sight, the smile did seem to reach his eyes. They crinkled at the corners – she'd never noticed that before – and he said, "The woods aren't any good for this," and he looked at her for a beat too long, then unzipped his pants and pushed them off.

  However would she… could she… do what he wanted her to do? How could she, ever, be the one to make him gone?

  He was naked, now, and her eyes traveled the length of his body. He was hard. Her eyes flew back to his, and he was grinning, showing the white shine of his teeth. He laughed out loud. "Like what you see, Sunshine Girl?" She knew what he meant, but ignored it, and just nodded.

  She wasn't going to wax poetic. Not about his prick, at any rate. But then she found herself talking anyway, saying, "You're beautiful. Perfect."

  "Oh, I'm a far cry from perfect, baby doll. I can be the meanest of the mean."

  She nodded at that. "I know."

  And she had the scars to prove it, didn't she? He'd taken her out of her life. Yeah, not exactly against her will, admittedly, but still without her having a clue what he wanted.

  Though maybe at the time his intentions were as vague as her own motivation. Maybe they fell into this thing together without intent at all. That happened to people all the time. It was possible. Anything, at this point, was possible.

  "So look. Touch. Do what you do," he said, and his voice was teasing, but the expression on his face utterly serious.

  So she did.

  She touched him gently, reverently, letting her fingertips explore the planes and contours of his body, dipping into each hollow between each rib, feeling him, learning him, hoping he could feel how much she loved him. Do you feel it Jeremiah? Do you want me to stop?

  He sighed beneath her hands.

  She almost asked the question out loud, but the sigh was him settling, relaxing. Accepting.

  The bones of his wrists and ankles jutted out like hard bolts, and she thought of the creation of Frankenstein – monster on the outside, mass of confused mush and pain on the inside, driven to s
eek love, to find understanding, needing to know how the hell this happened.

  Jeremiah, needing Jamie.

  Jamie, needing absolution.

  His shin bone was the flat of a knife blade, hard and angled under her fingers, traceable beneath his skin, seemingly not attached to anything else, never mind tendons and ligaments.

  He vibrated beneath her hands, humming some tune, and she found herself humming along. Love me to death or leave me alone… It was something from his playlist.

  His hip bones were hard shells, curving inward, and she pressed her thumbs into their inner curve, hard enough that he grunted and shifted, and his cock, upright and ready, bumped her hand.

  Her worship was the right technique.

  And as she lowered her head to his cock, he trembled, more than the song, more than his chest vibrating.

  Her tongue liked his taste, and darted out in quick licks to gather each seeping drop, though she didn't take it into herself, but pushed it along his shaft.

  His hands found her hair, wrapped around the braid, alternately pushing her away and pulling her in, controlling the pace.

  That was fine. She wouldn't reject him, not ever, and certainly not like this.

  Her fingers bit harder into his hips, holding onto him, the Jeremiah Quick chorus running through her head again, but after a few minutes she pulled away, and he didn't fight it. She wasn't ready for this to be over.

  She crawled up his body, pushed his torso down until he lay back, and laid herself right out on top of him, like lovers, ignoring the stickiness of her wounds.

  He felt perfect beneath her, like he belonged there, like they'd done this a hundred times.

  Except this one time would have to last forever. There was sadness in that – there was – but there was also an intense gratefulness to be allowed this moment at all.

  Pretty framed his face between her hands, looking into his clear eyes, then leaned down to speak quietly against his ear. "I love you, you know. I always have and I always will."

  She licked her lips, slowly, with tongue pointed and sharp, then clicked her teeth together at the same moment she dug her fingernails into his sides. She watched his pupils dilate.

  His arms came around her then, and he held her in a grip that felt fierce in its constriction, squeezing the air from her lungs and making her gasp and then squirm.

  She kept her fingernails tight against his flesh and dragged them from his back to his front. He groaned and bucked up against her, his cock pressing into her belly, still leaking.

  She smiled into his dilated eyes. "You like it when it hurts."

  He blinked, not smiling. "Sometimes."

  She pressed her mouth gently against his, not really kissing, and kept it there, digging her nails in harder. She felt him shudder, and then, without warning, he bit her, hard enough to make her squeal, and a flutter spun out of control in her stomach. Her thighs squeezed his hips, and her nipples went tight.

  "You like it, too," he said, and she sighed against his mouth, unable to voice a denial.

  "Fucker," She finally said, and, "I'm really going to miss you."

  Chapter 44

  She.

  She gentles me with her hands.

  The same as she used to gentle me with chocolate,

  In small pieces and careful increments.

  She doesn't laugh or giggle – none of those shy things –

  Or sigh and huff.

  She's never told me to eat more,

  never exclaimed over me or declared me too thin.

  But she lets her fingers walk over my skin, hesitating here and

  there as if my bones are fallen branches.

  She whispers my name.

  I whisper hers back to her, but inside my head.

  Every touch says, "I love you."

  Every press, "I'll miss you."

  It's hello and goodbye, in the same breath.

  I feel bad about that

  but I can't change my mind.

  She.

  She is mine, yes.

  But we're only meant to collide for these brief times

  No more.

  I cannot be swayed.

  Jamie's calling.

  If she loves me that much.

  Only if.

  Chapter 45

  He inhaled a breath, then put his hands to her hips, shifting her up and back, so he could press himself into her; held her in place for a brief but violent fucking. After a minute or so he slid his hands all the way up her back until he grasped the end of her braid, and he pulled it, yanking her head back, hard, but now fucking her very slowly, very gently, until she thought she would go mad. And he murmured, so softly that she almost didn't hear, "You'll be all right. You've got sunshine on your side."

  And then she cried.

  And because it was him, she jerked her hair loose from his hand and dipped her head so he could eat her tears – that was his role. Hers was to submit, his to take.

  He licked at her eyes and she discovered she didn't hate it anymore – she expected it. It would probably be weird until the end of never to not have him around to do this. It was a piercing vulnerability.

  How would she cry when no one wanted her tears?

  They showered together, after, and while they'd been very, very serious before, now they giggled and teased like lovers, or like friends who'd known each other for years and years.

  No shyness.

  No awkward silence.

  Pretty washed Jeremiah's hair, marveling at the long black fall of it, letting it slide through her fingertips like warm water. He had to bend his knees so she could lather it properly, so she could reach the top of his head to massage his scalp.

  This made him grin. "I'm about to start scratching my ear with my foot," he said with a laugh. "Just call me old dog Quick."

  Pretty laughed, too, and couldn't help but give him a wet slippery hug.

  Too soon, though, and they were dry, staring at each other with solemn expressions, his eyes lidded and content. Pretty thought hers must be filled with fear and dread.

  Jeremiah put on makeup, white face, then black and red and smudges of gray, and so intricate and careful that when he was done he looked like someone else. His lips were deep burgundy, black-lined and rich. He drew two perfect tears beneath his left eye and one beneath his right, and along the curve of each cheek he carefully drew feathered fans in dark red that mirrored eyelashes, and brushed over, but didn't obscure, the painted tears.

  "Are you sure this is what you want?" Pretty asked, watching him.

  "One of the three to be the death of me," he said, in a sing-song voice, the corners of his mouth quirking up.

  "I'll be the death of you," Pretty said. "Isn't that my line?"

  "Yes. You'll be the death of me. It's my line, too."

  But nothing could bring back the levity of earlier. Pretty supposed dying was like that.

  He told her one very important thing – he didn't have HIV. Jamie'd been dead for over a year, and Jeremiah had tested twice, hoping for a death sentence, but by some unfortunate miracle, he was clean.

  For Pretty, this was a huge relief, an uncoiling of something tight and terrified that had lived inside her since he'd told her the story of Jamie.

  And then it was time. There was no getting around it, nothing else that needed doing first. They had reached the moment. The climax.

  "Do you want chocolate?" she asked, in some lame attempt at a stall.

  He shook his head. "No. But… we have to go to the dungeon. I want it to happen there. It needs to happen there."

  They dressed in the house and undressed again in the garage. Somewhere in between, he handed her a black-bladed knife, and its sharp silver edge gleamed in the half light.

  And then he told her what kind of preparations he'd made, what she'd have to do, after.

  She tried to listen, but started crying. He pulled her to him and… what else? Stole her tears.

  Because that's what he did. That's
what he always did.

  He leapt onto the mattress, and it squeaked beneath him, skin on vinyl. "You should tie me down."

  She supposed he was right. "It will probably hurt more than you expect, " she said. "Maybe we should have a code word for if you change your mind."

  "Code word," he said, making quotation marks in the air with his fingers. "That will be enough. But I won't change my mind."

  He directed her to the restraints, and she closed them around his wrists and ankles, looped the ends around the bedframe, buckled them in place. Tugged them. He twisted and pulled at them, but was secure.

  "Are you sure?" she asked again, and her knees were wobbling and she felt her mind almost separate itself from her body. This could not be undone. This could never be fixed.

  "Yes. But… music. Please."

  His iPhone was already docked. He told her to find Beautiful Thing, by Romantic Torture. "Put it on repeat. It has to be that one. Loud."

  Pretty started the song. Turned up the volume until it was almost unbearable. He mouthed 'thank you' and lip-synced the words, or maybe he was singing them, too soft for her to hear, and he stared at Jamie's scrap of fabric, which almost seemed to be moving in time with the music. Surely it was Jamie's song…

  Pretty climbed on top of him, straddling his hips with her thighs. She played the flat of the blade along one hip, lifted herself to tease it against his scrotum, black metal, gleaming silver edge.

  Now his gaze shifted back and forth, her, the fabric scrap hanging from the rafters, her again. When she ran the blade edge carefully and slowly up his torso, she felt his cock nudge against her.

  A sense of power like nothing she'd ever felt flowed into her, like water, like magick, like she had control of every living thing in the universe.

  She didn't, of course. Only this one living being.

  "Fuck him while you do it."

  She almost jumped, the voice was right next to her ear, easily heard despite the music.

  She settled a little on her haunches, enough for Jeremiah's cock to find her opening, and he thrust his hips up, eyes closed, mouth tight, and slid into her.