A Final Valentine

"What's the matter with you? Why can't you keep food down?"

"They don't know," I signed. "But, for some reason, for about the last ten years, every time I eat, I try to throw it back up. The only thing that I've found that will stop it is sucking back a clove cigar."

"You smoke those way more than you eat," she signed after a moment.

"They also help with nerve pain which I have a lot of. If I didn't smoke as much of these as I do, I wouldn't be able to do even as much as I do."

"Pain fades after a while."

"Talk to me again in forty or fifty years, kid, when all of the pain you thought went away drops by to talk about old times."

Angela, if that really was her name, winced. "Ow."

I was torn between wanting her to eat more and my newfound suspicions eating away at my resolve to help her even as much as I had. So, I let her throw away our styrofoam cups and wash the spoons and each of us went to our separate rooms.

I didn't mean to doze off.

--Interlude the Fourth--

Angela, my Angela, or at least her ghost or my hallucination or whatever the fuck she was, was standing in front of me looking as she had when we'd first met, except for her leg was undamaged, with her hands clasped at her waist.

I folded my arms across my chest and waited for my straight line.

The usual background, the lake we would sit beside or swim in, the flat green meadows we would run through, the forested mountain trails we would hike together before taking a break to fuck under a tree on the side of the trail, were all gone. We were standing, facing each other on a flat surface of white with a sky that was also white. White as far as the eye could see with the only splashes of color her red hair and my black leather duster and hat. She was even wearing some kind of gown or ankle-length toga that was white. Angela, the real Angela, had never worn white in her life other than one of my dress shirts or t-shirts.

"She's probably not lying, you know."

"Thus speaks the lie!" I snapped back. "You're a lie. This place is a lie. The words you speak are just lies I am telling myself. You aren't here. You couldn't be speaking to me. Every word I lie to myself that you are speaking is just my own brain fucking with me."

"Is it?" Angela asked as she stepped closer. "Is it really, Aaron? Tell me, then. When did you get to be such an expert in the psychological ramifications of sexual abuse? When did you learn about 'Stockholm Syndrome'?"

"I listened when you talked," I said, petulantly. "When you were alive to talk. You probably talked about it then, and I just sort of remembered."

"Fair enough," Angela said. "I'll let you have that one. So, tell me, Aaron. How would I know that the whole reason Rebekah fought to seduce you for three months was that I was filling her ears with tales of how hard you would pound my pussy until I came at least three or four times before you would let yourself?"

"What are you talking about?" I found myself swept up despite myself. "Beka didn't try to seduce me for three months. Wouldn't have at all except you let her stay with us for three days."

"Oh, please, Aaron! She offered you brownies on Valentine's and chocolate covered strawberries during her Spring Break. She was so wet just thinking about the stories I told her, she needed a towel to sit on for when she soaked through her underwear and pants! I had to tell her to come out of the shower in her towel and ask you if you minded if she borrowed your razor to shave her pussy. That you would either ignore or just not respond to anything short of that. How would she have known to do that if I hadn't coached her?

"How would I know that she found and married a guy who looks and acts a whole lot like you?" Angela asked. "You don't know that. Or that she has two sons and a daughter that has grown into the very image of her mother. How would I know Kim gave up her dream of modeling and works behind the scenes doing make-up and also married a guy a lot like you? You don't know that either."

"And I still don't!" I snapped. "You are a hallucination. You are a dream. My brain is just making shit up there is no way I could prove or disprove because I'm trying to hold onto as much of the wife I loved, that I still love, as I can while simultaneously trying to convince myself that she could forgive me when I can't even forgive myself!"

Both of us regarded each other in silence as the echoes of my shout faded away.

"Alright, Aaron," Angela said after an interminable time. "Try this, then. It is cold. And it's going to get colder. Angela, the Angela with you now, is going to die before morning if you don't wake up and do something to keep it from happening. If you are the man I love, then you will at least try."

--Day Five--

A basic meteorological function is that clouds during the day stop heat from the sunlight reaching the ground. During the night cycle, those same clouds stop heat from leaving the ground level, trapping it. When clouds are around during the day but clear off during the night, the temperature can shoot down to unbearably cold. I knew that. But, it didn't seem pertinent since we were, after all, inside a structure a little more sturdy than a tent with a gas heater blazing merrily away.

I fought my way out of a frozen stygian hell only to find the darkness was a figment of my sleep, but the cold wasn't.

Startled at the amount of light behind the heavy drapes over my head, I pulled them aside to feel a blast of cold and see the pale full moon dancing merrily with the ice crystals on the ground.

I frowned as I shivered and considered the last words of my hallucination of the woman I had loved and lost. It was probably bullshit. Just my subconscious getting involved as my body tried to get word to me what it was feeling. The kid, Angela was probably just fine.

Still, it might be good to at least check on her.

My traitorous dog was lying atop the form under the pile of covers I'd given her and gave me two tail thumps before starting to whine.

Certain I was being ridiculous, I shook the lump of covers. When she didn't respond, I shook her harder. When she still didn't respond, I ripped aside the covers to check on her.

Angela's skin was icy to the touch. It was much colder in the room than where I was sleeping. Her pulse was there, if low and slow, and she was breathing. But, her eyelids didn't so much as flicker.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck! Fucking fuckity fuck!

I guess there must be some truth to those stories about women who throw cars off their children because I lifted that child in my arms and carried her to my bed and didn't stumble once. After peeling her clothes off, I came back long enough to get the covers I'd set up for her and took them back to spread over the bed before losing my shorts crawling in beside her.

Bitty had already claimed the far side and we sandwiched the girl between our larger and heavier bodies. I ignored as best I could the flares of pain as her skin touched mine and woke rampaging nerves to sing of their disapproval.

Eventually, she warmed and her pulse and breathing regulated. I kept a silent vigil alone as Bitty started snoring on the other side of her, confident that I was on the case.

When Angela awoke pressed against me, she moved just a bit and then froze, her breath catching. I took that as my cue to give her some room and rolled away to light the candle I'd set on my desk.

Large brown eyes peeped at me from beneath the hummock built of covers about where my chest had been.

"Are you all right?" I signed.

"What happened? Why am I here in your bed?"

"It was too cold. Hypothermia."

"I remember feeling cold," her fingers signed. "Had trouble getting to sleep. Couldn't stop shaking. Then, finally, I wasn't cold anymore. Now, I'm cold again."

"When you stopped feeling cold was when it got bad. That you feel cold now is good. It is cold." Lord, that was the truth. I could see my breath pluming in the air by the candlelight. "Hot shower might help."

I'd given her enough of my body heat, I was a little chilled myself. Enough that when she agreed a hot shower would be welcome, I not only helped her in but climbed in with her.

"What are you doing?"

"We both need to get our body temperature back up," I signed. "Then, we need to get back under the covers as quickly as possible, before we lose too much, to trap it under there with us."

Unlike her, I had pulled the shower curtain closed behind me. In the dim light of the candle on the counter coming over the shower rod, we were little more than shadowy silhouettes to each other. Which was probably just as well since I was actually in the shower with her. Both of us naked as the day we were born. With hot water running over our bodies and the cold gradually being steamed out of us.

I didn't offer to wash her back or any other part of her. Nor did she reach out to me. Each of us just turned periodically, soaking in the heat and steam.

Once I deemed we were as warm as we were going to get, I shut off the water and bit back a scream as the temperature dropped like a boulder since Bitty objected vehemently to the bathroom door being closed. I hustled the kid, Angela, through drying off and back into the bedroom under the covers.

"Wait," she signed as I made to climb in beside her. "My dog and my rose."

Of all the damn...

Feeling more than a little put upon, I hustled as quickly as I could into the room which resembled a walk-in freezer more than a library and snagged both off the table to carry back to her.

And it was Angela's rose, damn it! My Angela. Not this Angela.

"My book?" She signed by the light of the LED as I blew out the candle and climbed in beside her.

"Fuck off! It's cold. If you want it, you go get it."

Angela, the child Angela, sighed a huff reminiscent of Bitty when I tried to fool her with a can of Mighty Dog in place of her 9 Lives. But, she didn't climb out of the bed to go get her book either.

"I'm bored," she signed after maybe five minutes.

Oh, dear God.

"Then go back to sleep," I signed. "It's too cold to get up and look for something to do. We'll get up when it warms up."

I laid there and listened to the distant hiss of the gas furnace under our breathing and Bitty's until that damn rose-light dipped down to point towards our feet. Or more accurately, my crotch.

"Stop that," I signed once I had pulled the light back the direction of our faces.

"It's so small," she signed. "I thought you would be much bigger."

It wasn't worth pointing out it was cold. The truth was, I was a grower, not a shower. Even when it was warm, my tube of flesh didn't expand much more than it was now except when I was aroused. My balls didn't hang as tight to my body. But, that was about it.

"Seriously," she signed. "Your balls are bigger than your dick."

"Well, at least my nipples aren't about to put someone's eye out."

"It's cold!"

"Ditto."

Another three minutes or so passed as she shifted restlessly.

"I'm bored."

Oh, fucking fuckity fuck.

"Then turn off the damn light and try to go back to sleep," I signed.

She did turn off the light. She did not, however, even try to go to sleep.

Darkness hadn't swaddled us buried beneath those covers for a full five minutes before I felt her shifting. At first, I thought she was just working that dog in her hand, flipping it over and over as she had a tendency to do.

Then the motion picked up speed and got more frenetic as I heard the telltale wet sucking sounds of a pussy being finger fucked.

Oh, fucking hell.

I tried to ignore it. But, my cock was really interested in what I was hearing. And smelling as the rich sea scent of her arousal wafted up to be trapped beneath the covers we were burrowed under.

Suddenly, that rose lit up causing me to wince and blink away spots from my eyes.

When I could see once more that damn light was pointing right at my cock. Which was fully aroused and thrumming in time with my pulse.

She was sitting up, letting in cold air to do it, and her mouth was sagging open.

"Do you mind?" I signed once I'd snagged the rose away from her.

"Holy shit! It grew!"

"Yeah, it does that."

"No, I mean, holy shit, did it grow!"

I was more or less used to it. Every girl I had been with had been shocked by the difference when they had first seen it. I wasn't porn star length by any stretch. But, when something expands from one inch to just over seven in length, and from no bigger around than my thumb to a healthy three-inch diameter, it made an impression. Or seemed to at any rate.

"Yes," my fingers snapped. "Like I said, it does that. Forget it. It's not important."

Rather than forget about it, her hand reached out and touched it, sending me flying out from under the covers and off the side of the bed.

I was furious. I lit the candle, finally, after fumbling the lighter three times. Once I had yanked my shorts on, I turned on her.

"It's so hard," she signed at me once my attention was returned.

"I said forget it!"

"No," she interrupted. "You don't understand. I've never felt one so hard. I've seen bigger. But, they were sort of spongy even when they were as hard as they got. Yours is like a piece of bone or something, it's so hard. Can I see it again?"

"No, you can not see it again! I did not give you permission to touch me there!"

"But, I like you."

"I don't care! Just because you like me, doesn't mean you get to touch me without my permission!"

"It never stopped anyone from touching me anytime they wanted to."

"And that was wrong! Just like you touching me was wrong! Did you like it the first time someone touched you when you didn't want them to?"

"No," she signed after a thoughtful pause. "No. I cried the first time."

"And yet, you did that to me and think it's okay?"

"But, you like me. I didn't like him. But, you like me. That's what it means when a dick gets hard. That the guy likes me. Just like my pussy getting wet means I like him."

Bitty raised her head and growled, looking at the far wall. I held up my hand to stop Angela from signing at me and motioned for quiet as I watched Bitty.

Bitty raised to her feet and turned her butt to Angela and me with her head lowered and growled again. Angela looked at Bitty, clued in that something was happening when Bitty brushed her with her butt as she turned.

"What?" Angela asked aloud in that voice of hers that was just off tune from seeming right.

"Wait," I signed at her. "Not sure. Trying to listen."

Then I heard it. The muted shouts of an argument next door breaking into full swing. Fucking assholes. Like anyone wanted to hear their domestic shit.

I was considering heading into the front room to pound on the wall at them when the first gunshot went off.

Fuck! The stupid motherfuckers were shooting!

I grabbed Angela on my way to the floor, yanking her off the bed on top of me and slapped my other hand against my thigh to get Bitty's attention. As she was trained to do when I made that sound from out of her sight, Bitty moved to check my next command and I gave her "heel."

One of the stupid ass motherfuckers in what was turning into the God damn OK corral in the front apartment brought out something beginning in a .4 or possibly .5 as a fucking bullet hole appeared in the wall above us. To get so far, the fucking bullet would have had to breach the wall between their front room and mine, then breach two more walls since there was a pair of closets between the front room and bedroom. And I wasn't placing any bets the damn thing had stopped in the wall above us or the one on the other side of their electrical room and storage either. Granted, the walls in that place weren't much thicker than a good quality canvas tent, but still...

Rage stripped away the years, injuries, and silent enemy of illness as my hand closed over the handle of the machete I kept under my side of the bed. Red rimmed my vision as I bear crawled at a lope holding that machete between my teeth out of the bedroom and through the front room around into the kitchen with Bitty hot on my heels.

I was going to fuck these motherfuckers up. I was going to chop their fucking heads off and put them on spikes out in front of the God damned place as a warning to the rest of the motherfucking gangbanging drugged-out stupid punk-ass wannabes that this is what fucking happens if you whip out your penis substitute and start popping shots at me and mine.

I didn't snag my walking staff as I passed it on my way outside. I didn't need it. My fury propped me up as I slogged the few paces through the snow at my thighs to their kitchen door and rammed it with my knee.

The doors the apartment owner had hung were metal. The frames the dumbass had hung them in weren't.

Rotted wood splintered as the metal door boomed back against the wall while I dropped to a crouch with my shoulders pressed against the wall beside it and my ass against the top of the snow.

There were no more gunshots. They had stopped sometime during my rush. I counted to three Mississippi and then glanced around the doorjamb before pulling back with Bitty quivering in anticipation.

I'd seen a body in the doorway from the kitchen to the front room with a gun just out of its hand.

I surged up and in, with my bare back against the cold metal door. I wasn't worried about the corpse on the floor anymore. When half their head is gone, they typically don't reach for the gun just past their fingertips.

"You motherfuckers almost shot my dog!" I roared from where I was crouched. "What did I fucking tell you I was going to do?!"

No voices or gunfire answered.

Emboldened, I stood up and made my way further inside. I considered scooping up the firearm, a 9mm from the quick glance, alongside the outstretched fingers of the corpse. But, something told me not to and I gave Bitty an absent "stay" command where she was crouched at the spot I'd left by the door.

Their front room was like a scene out of Doom. Blood, entrails, and grey matter splashed around seven bodies in addition to the one in the kitchen. My five Rasta motherfucking neighbors and three "friends" or whatever the hell they were wouldn't be giving me or anyone else any more shit.

I noted more bullet holes in the three walls other than the one we shared, as well as the stacks of cash and drugs on the table. As well as one corpse propped up on the couch that didn't quite realize it was dead just yet.

"Help me," the woman whispered, lifting her hand towards me.

I ignored her and backed out of the room, careful not to step in the congealing pool from the corpse in the kitchen on my way out the door.

The fun was over. Nothing was left but the clean-up.

While I'd once been much better at the mayhem end of the stick, I had had enough training on the clean-up side to hum a few bars and fake the rest.

I shut Bitty back inside after exchanging my machete for my staff and headed back out and around the building to check the outer walls by the light of the rising sun.

There were no new bullet holes on the outside of the kitchen wall or the driveway side. Which made sense since the main Rasta son of a bitch with the bullet wound drilled through his throat on the couch next to the woman who was even then probably cooling had been the one with the gold plated BFG.

There were, however, holes in the east-facing outer wall.

Fuck.

A family with two little crumb snatchers lived in the front half of the next duplex over.

I slogged through the snow and banged on the door to check on them. It took a minute or two for the man of the house to open the door with a baseball bat in his hand. His mouth dropped open when he saw me.

"Lord, what are you doing out in this mess, Mr. Aaron? Didn't you hear them gunshots?"