Am I Awake?

Apparently Kelvin had built two places of sanctuary from the creature using some sort of carved runes. One such place was his own bedroom, the markings in the door frame serving to seal it from those not invited in. The other was the deck of the boat.

There was a dire warning that the only safe way to use her (for apparently it was a 'she') was to restrict oneself to one or two dreams per week and no more. Apparently any more and she would become strong enough to start to escape from a dream-only form and at that point you would have serious problems. If she ever immortalised in the flesh then the only thing one could do would be to run and stay away until she weakened back to being just bones and dreams. It was for this reason that it was really important to keep on asking oneself, 'Am I awake?', and to panic away if the answer was ever 'yes'.

Kelvin went on to detail that he believed she could control the local weather and the meaner creatures and that she was much more strong in the dark hours. He went on to say that for this reason, he was never in the house over winter, only in the summer when the daylight was strongest.

I put down the book for a few minutes. It was all a bit too much. For sure, had it not been for the funny dreams over the last few nights, I would have put this down to one final, utterly nuts Kelvin joke. I did wonder if he had even somehow set me up subconsciously.

Just then I heard Debbie make a noise and I went back upstairs to see her.

She was lying white and naked on top of the duvet, black hair splayed out over the white pillows. She writhed seductively as I went in, eyes still closed.

As I bent down to stroke her forehead and work out if she was properly awake, she pulled me down onto her. She held and my head firmly between her breasts and rasped, "Kiss me."

So I did, and I felt myself instantly get hard in my jeans.

"Harder", she moaned.

I continued kissing her deeply as I traced a line down her belly to her pussy and then climbed on to the bed between her legs. She wrapped her things around the back of my neck and pulled me hard into her wetness, bridging her hips up. I tried to lick her deeply as she begged for more and more. I wrapped my arms around her bum and pulled her hard into my face as she gyrated up and down against my chin. She seemed both frantic and frustrated.

She begged me to go harder and harder and I did try. Then she pushed me back,

"No, please, like last night, bite me."

So I did, gently as first, trapping a small piece of her outer lips between my front teeth and gently nibbling while swirling my tongue above her clit.

She pulled me hard against her with her legs and arms and seemed to get more and more worked up and annoyed.

"Please, like last night", she begged.

She giggled and prised open my mouth wide with her fingers and then forced her open pussy in, trapping her clit just behind my front teeth.

"For fuck's sake, put your tongue inside and bite me hard," she commanded.

I did a little bit but really I was scared to hurt her. It was her that generated force against my teeth by pulling me in with her legs and arms.

Then she writhed back, and with a frustrated little scream pushed me off. As I lifted up, in the morning light I saw two half moons of little cuts not far from where my teeth had been. They were scabbed over and much deeper than I could have made. I simply didn't have the teeth for it, especially around the eye teeth, top and bottom, which had left deep red welts.

I ran my finger over the raised bumps and asked her what had done it. She giggled a silvery laugh back down at me and said,

"last night silly, it was just wonderful."

With that she pushed me back off and rolled back under the covers to go back to sleep.

I was left hard and wondering what to do. Her pretty bum and pussy still poked out from under the covers even though her top half had rolled back underneath. I ran my hand over her thigh and looped down over her soft pussy.

From under the pillow she yelled,

"You want to fuck? Then get some teeth and come back later."

That was it, I left with a raging boner and a lot of confusion and went back down to re-read bits of Kelvin's mad book. I could hear Debbie cackling to herself as I descended back down the stairs.

It was early afternoon before I saw Debbie again. She looked tired and bedraggled as she came into the kitchen wearing some jogging pants and an old t-shirt of mine that I guess she had pulled out of a drawer.

She didn't want anything to eat but it was clear that the coffee was welcome. I guessed she was working through the same hangover that I was just about done with myself. What did seem to excite her was the idea of dinner later on, we both settled on the idea that we would have a steak and fries night-in, with the idea that we might put a bit more colour back in her cheeks.

As she sat down with the coffee, I slid Kelvin's book over to her. I really still didn't know what to make of it. It all seemed pretty far fetched to me so I just let her leaf through it without offering comment.

It certainly did hold Debbie's attention for a little while. She also giggled at it and agreed with me that Kelvin had probably just set us up with the joke of the century. On the other hand, she did look a bit wistful and made the point a few times that she had had a really good night. No seriously, REALLY good. I didn't ask her about the marks on her body. I knew that she must have seen them and it just didn't seem like a good time.

What did occur to us was that if Kelvin was to be believed then there aught to be a little pile of bones somewhere in the basement. We laughed with each other, wondering what he might have set up for us down there. For sure it took another strong coffee each before we were ready to try the code-locked door and have a look.

Predictably, it was the same code as for the house and the car. The door from the pantry that opened to the flight of stairs leading down to the cellar opened easily. The lights flicked on brightly. It was clearly all recently fitted out but Kelvin hadn't put any furnishings down there. I had very much expected an old yellowed bulb swinging over a dusty pile of earth and my own weight in sprayed-on cobwebs but that couldn't have been further from the truth.

The polished cedar stairs led down to a largely empty room with a clean slate floor. The only thing in the room was what looked like a solid laminated wood counter top in the far corner with a brightly decorated blanket draped over part of it. As we approached the table top, Debbie and I fell silent. True to what we had read in Kelvin's book, there did appear to be a pile of dusty old bones there, piled up in a slightly haphazard way but topped off with what was clearly a human-like skull.

I found it completely impossible to look away from the skull. The empty eye sockets stared back up at me. I didn't find it immediately scary, more just completely bizarre. One notable feature of the skull was its teeth. The rest of the bones looked old and faded but it appeared to have not just a full set of teeth but a really terrifying full set of healthy teeth. Each tooth was slightly serrated and angular and the canines were slightly elongated and recurved into perfect pearl fangs. It all seemed unreal to me and at that point I was sure that Kelvin had played us perfectly.

I said so to Debbie but she remained silent, just standing next to me and staring at the skull. She seemed quite entranced as she stepped forward and ran her fingers along the sharp edges of the teeth. I saw that her other hand was gently brushing down the front of her jogging pants, just caressing herself with a cupped hand.

"This is what I was talking about", she started. "You know, I have met these before."

I knew she was correct, they were the same terrifying teeth that I too had seen in my dream of the beautiful neighbour. I kept it to myself but I could feel my shirt getting damp with sweat.

I was glad when Debbie and I were back up into the kitchen, the basement light was off and the code door was closed. Somehow normality and sanity seemed to creep back in.

"I think this might all be a massive joke Debbie", I said but without full conviction. "Above all Kelvin was a joker. Hang on, are we even sure he's definitely dead?", I half-smiled up at her.

She reminded me that she had a pack of papers and that in fact one of those papers was his death certificate.

Quite reasonably, she seemed distracted and happily ushered me out to the car to go and fetch the shopping for the dinner later. She excused herself from the trip saying that she wanted a shower and a bit of time to think about what she had just seen.

I have to admit that I was more than happy to take the excuse to march out of the house and jump in the car.

Despite it being more late afternoon than evening, the night had already drawn in and it was a dark and rainy drive. Town was busier than I had expected and I ended up having to park in the lot of the supermarket rather than on the street next to the wine shop as I had been hoping. I loaded up with a couple of steaks and a bunch of other sundries to go with them. We were going to have prawn cocktail to start with and a small mountain of fries to go with the meat. I got us a frozen Black Forest Gateau and some squirty cream for desert. Either a bit of a dated meal or an absolute classic depending on how you look at it. I got a happy little frisson as I imagined what I might do with the squirty cream and Debbie afterwards.

After dropping the food in the passenger seat of the car, I locked up again and walked down the street to the wine merchants. Fifteen minutes happy browsing later and I struggled back down the street with a full case of mixed wine and a few bottles of bubbly for good measure.

The drive back to the house was easy going and quite pleasant in the now softly falling rain. I was able to listen to the end of a podcast on The Ancient Romans I had been working through and enjoying.

I pulled up by the kitchen door at the side of the house rather than putting the car straight into the garage. It made it easier to move the stuff into the kitchen in a few trips. I was glad for the bright white movement sensing security lights which showed my way as I did.

Once i had loaded up the refrigerator, I shouted for Debbie. Getting no response, I assumed she was still in the shower or had maybe even drawn a bath so I poured a couple of glasses of champagne and went up to find her.

Upstairs was still dark, nobody had switched the lights on yet. I did a tour of the two bathrooms that she might have been in, shouting her name but to no response. I put my head around the door to the Red Room and called out to her but that too was dark and there was no answer.

I carried my two glasses back down to the kitchen, all the while calling out for Debbie but still there was no sign of her. I wondered if she had perhaps gone out for a walk but it would have been a weird choice. By then it was pitch-black outside and the rain, although it had eased off a little, was certainly still coming down.

I sat for a moment at the counter and sipped from my glass, trying to decide what, if anything, I could do next.

Then I noticed through opening to the pantry that the door to the cellar was slightly ajar and a faint light from the basement crept up through it. I was sure that I had shut the door and turned off the light earlier.

I put the glass down, strode across the kitchen and went down onto the cellar steps, calling out Debbie's name as I went.

She didn't answer me but as I got halfway down the stairs, I could see and hear what was going on.

Debbie appeared to be lost in her own world. She had mounted the table with the bones on it and was gently gyrating over the open mouth of the skull. Her skirt was bunched up around her waist and she had dropped her knickers in the middle of the floor. I was part shocked, part turned on and part appalled as I got closer to see that she was forcing her soft, trimmed pussy deep into the sharp open jaws on the table. I could see the lower jaw line replete with serrated teeth pressing against the front of her mound and it was clear that the upper teeth must all be hidden between her legs and digging into the back of her pussy and her bum. Debbie seemed oblivious to my presence, she was staring down hard at the bones beneath her. I could see that there was blood on the bottom fangs and smeared a little over Debbie's front.

I shouted her name and she seemed to come-to. She gasped as she did. Then she laughed a silvery laugh, tilting her head back as she raised herself up and off the bones. She stepped down from the table and brushed her skirt back down around her knees. Then she smiled and kissed me on the cheek as she passed me to pick up her knickers. She uttered a "that was wonderful" and then sighed, seemingly still slightly on a different plane. Then she patted me on the shoulder and told me she was going to go up and find a bath. All completely nonchalant, as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

As she climbed the stairs, I turned back to look at the blood soaked skull. As i did, it was as if the bones were completely porous and dehydrated. The blood seemed to just soak into the teeth and jaw until it was again just a grinning white skull. There was, however, something new about it now. The bones no longer looked old and dusty, they looked polished and glistening, marble-like. I turned back up the stairs and turned the light off as I went. I'm not quite sure why I did it but as I locked the door, I changed the code, simply appending a digit at the end. I double checked that the door was locked and then went back over to the counter to down my glass of champagne in one go.

———

(9)

It took me a while that evening to steady my nerves and build up to seeing Debbie again so I busied myself with dinner preparation in the kitchen while Debbie took a bath upstairs. Eventually, after much prevarication, I got to the point where there was simply no more to be done on the food prep. I realised that I was in serious danger of finishing the first bottle of champagne on my own so I plopped another one into the ice bucket to cool. I poured Debbie a fresh glass to take up to her in the bath.

She was already out and sitting at a vanity mirror in one of the spare rooms drying and brushing out her long black hair. The scent of the bath and soap pervaded the room. She appreciated the glass of wine and said she would be down soon. Normality seemed to have resumed and she didn't mention what had occurred earlier. As I padded back downstairs, I happened to glance through the open door to the Red Room.

All was as it should be in the darkness however one aspect did catch my attention and that was that the light in my neighbours house was on. I simply couldn't help myself so I crept across the room, leaving the lights off and peered out over the dark rain-swept garden. The curtains were open and the room was illuminated but I couldn't see any sign of her. I paused for a moment and studied the house but nothing was going on so I returned to the stairwell to carry on downstairs.

As I entered the kitchen, I saw that the lawn just outside the kitchen was illuminated by the security light. There was nothing unusual in that, all sorts of small animals, or even just plants swaying in the wind were constantly setting it off. What froze me in my tracks, however, was what appeared to be the silhouette of a woman standing stock still in a long dark cloak. She was perhaps twenty feet from the window and was deadly stationary despite the maelstrom that surrounded her. The hood of her cloak was pulled up and was generous enough that I couldn't make out any of her face which remained shadowed in darkness. Then the security light timer must have expired and the harsh white flood light was extinguished. The garden fell back into darkness and I was unable to see anything.

Breathing quickly I strode quickly over to the big flat French doors that separate the kitchen from the flag stone terrace that adjoins the lawn. I peered hard out into the darkness but I couldn't see anything. I pushed my face up against the glass but still nothing save the beating rain on the other side of the pane. There was no way that I knew of to turn on the security light without going outside and moving about under the sensor. I thought about it, running my hand over the white plastic door handle as I did so, but fear got the better of me. I told myself that if it was not for the weather then I would go out and work out if anyone was out there but I knew that I was lying. Idly, I moved my hand away from the door handle and over my chest, I could still feel my heart pounding as I turned back towards the counter.

Then a figure slammed against the outside of the glass door. I fell backwards down on the floor in terror. By the kitchen light, I could see her, all at once in her nudity, both awesome and terrifying.

The woman's mouth was open unreasonably wide as she pressed her face up against the glass. It was all sharp teeth and elongated fangs. Dark black eyes, with a hint of luminescent green bored in at me and long, black wet hair was plastered around her face.

Her cloak was open at the front and her body was pressed hard against the glass. I followed the snake tattoo which ran all the way down between her breasts and naturally drew the eye to her hairless olive skinned pussy which was where the head ended. Each of the snake's lips tattooed onto the woman's outer pussy lips. Entrance into her open pussy was the same as entrance into the snake's open mouth.

The terror of the predator at-hand chilled me down to my core. Some deep primal survival instinct kicked in telling me to get away at all costs. At the same time I could feel my dick hard in the front of my slacks.

Then she was gone. Just nothing there, emptiness where she had been. It took me a few moments to get up off the floor and regain some composure. Again, I couldn't help but second guess the fragility of my own mind. She had simply been there, terrifying me on to the ground one moment and then gone the next. I chided myself for having drunk so much wine so quickly and settled myself down on one of the big wooden chairs around the kitchen table.

———

(10)

I was still sitting there when Debbie came down, looking all pink and refreshed, positively flouncing into the kitchen. She stopped when she saw me, telling me that I was completely white and that I looked as if I had seen a ghost.

The truth was that I did not know what I had just seen. I told her all about it, we had been through too much already for me to not to.

There was not really much to be done apart from to turn on some music loud and cook the steaks. I let them rest while we had our starters. I had to force the food down as my stomach was still doing somersaults, figuratively speaking. The only welcome tonic was another few glasses of champagne followed by a heavy red which served well to quiet my racing mind.

Debbie for her part seemed completely unfazed. She unlatched the door and walked briskly outside into the rain, illuminating the empty garden as she went. There was of course nothing out of the ordinary. I guess it had already been a weird enough weekend that she was now just rolling with whatever turned up. For my part, I was already thinking that I would probably catch the flight back to Boston with her the next afternoon, just to avoid being in the house alone with, well whatever it was.

Debbie happily ate the starters but she was really ready for her rare steak. There was something in her that gasped slightly as she bit into it. Her eyes closed for a moment and her white cheeks flushed deep pink as she savoured the first few mouthfuls. We carried on chatting but no longer light bubbly conversation, more deep, slow moving and serious. There was something in her eyes that just for a moment glinted with a deep sparkle and just for a moment, I thought that I saw a glint of a sharp tooth as she bit a chip in half across the table from me. But it was all just for a moment, as soon as I glanced back it was gone.