Anvil

Editor's note: this story contains scenes of rough, reluctant, dubiously consensual, or non-consensual sex.

Author's Notes:

Anvil is a walk down a path strictly forbidden by 'polite' society.

Incest.

Few taboos are more reviled, and those who succumb to the trap of its feverish desires, face being judged and damned by those who uncover their 'sin'. Shunning is the smallest consequence of being exposed.

The story revolves around two damaged souls who suffered through the absence of love when it was needed most, then were betrayed in the most horrifying ways by those entrusted to nurture and cherish them.

There are some dark subjects and moments in this story, but again, at its heart, it's a story of the healing power of love. Perhaps it's a love few can accept, at least not without intense guilt.

Consider yourself... cautioned.

All characters engaging in sexual relationships or activities are 18 years old or older.

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Anvil

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Chapter 1

Do popcorn ceilings lead to madness?

It was a hell of a thought to wake to every morning, Cassandra mused to herself as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes.

She desperately wished someone would scrape the crap from her apartment ceilings.

As she was living in a cheap rental apartment, no such renovations would happen anytime soon.

Her alarm had gone off only a minute or two ago, so she wasn't late, but she had to get up and get started on her day.

Cassandra worked as a teller at a bank, and she needed the paycheck. That was a truth she had to accept. It was also true that the bank manager was a misogynistic bastard with an overinflated ego.

Another truth she was dealing with was that she was bored with the job, as it barely scraped the surface of her capabilities, though it paid the bills. Barely.

When she finished her night school college courses, she'd be able to get a better job, but for now, she had to get up!

With a quiet groan, she slid her legs out from under the covers and tossed the covers back. She pushed herself up to a seated position and paused to let the throbbing in her head settle down. She'd gone out drinking the night before with some of the girls from night school. She didn't really fit into their clique, but she had no other friends to go out drinking with. She was relatively new in town, after all.

Heaving herself onto her feet, she staggered from her bedroom to the bathroom in the hall. Her small one-bedroom apartment also had one washroom. She listened, but Andre was still asleep. She'd be okay to take her shower now.

She closed the door and tugged off her sleep shirt. Looking down, she realized she wasn't wearing her panties.

Damn. Did she hook up with one of those idiotic college boys again?

She paused, and the evening before came back to her. Retaining her memories meant she hadn't indulged too far past her limit. Dancing... she recalled there'd been dancing, and she did do a little bumping and grinding, but that was it for sexual activity.

She sighed. It was becoming her thing. Sexual frustration, even when she hooked up with someone. None of them gave her satisfaction. Frigid bitch, the last prime specimen called her.

It wasn't like she didn't want to enjoy sex with a sexy man. Something seemed to block her from reaching her release.

She could definitely achieve an orgasm if she masturbated with her dildo, so it didn't seem to be a physical issue.

Cassandra critically examined the woman in the mirror, and the first thing she saw was that nose! It had a dorsal hump that made her feel like it dominated her face! She often swept her long straight blonde hair forward to cover one eye and her nose. Her attention moved to her eyes, which again seemed a little oversized for her face. They did have a sleepy bedroom quality that made the boys ignore her nose, so she didn't hate her eyes. They were pale blue with a darker ring around the outside of her irises. Yes, she didn't hate them.

Her mouth was wide, but her lips weren't thin, so it balanced out. Baring her teeth, she examined them in the mirror. She lucked out with how straight they were, as her father had several crooked ones.

A sudden flash of rage shot through her, and she gripped the countertop to keep her balance. She knew better than to think of the monster.

Stepping into the shower, she ran the water and quickly washed her pale-yellow hair, which hung down to mid-back. Scrubbing her pale skin, she assumed she must have gotten her coloring from her mother as well. Not that she had any memories of her.

She shook her head and climbed out of the tub to dry herself off. Wrapping the towel around her, she wished it was a beach towel as it barely fit around her thick body. She wasn't fat per se, just extra cushioned... in select places. Her breasts, hips, and ass were just more generously cushioned and made her delightfully curvy. She'd caught Andre staring more than once. She squirmed at the thought.

As well as being a little thick, she was fairly tall at five-foot-nine. She was two inches taller than Andre.

After she brushed her teeth and hair, she listened at the door but heard nothing. She stepped out and looked down the hall toward the living room. Still nothing, so she quickly went into her bedroom and closed the door.

She didn't spend too much time on her makeup, as it had to be understated in a business environment. Just some eyeliner, mascara, and lipstick, but not a bold color.

Panties, bra, nylons, slip, grey stretchy pencil skirt, and cream blouse went on, and she looked like a bank teller. She pulled on the grey jacket for her outfit and picked up her shoes, as she wouldn't put them on until she got to the bank.

Leaving her bedroom, she padded down the hall and slipped into the tiny kitchen to unplug her cell. It went into the purse she'd left on the counter. She looked in the fridge and smiled as there was the brown bag lunch Andre made for her the night before. It would be a cheese-lettuce-and-tomato sandwich, but the tomatoes would be in a separate plastic sandwich bag to keep the bread from becoming soggy. Mayo and black pepper to her taste. There'd be a pudding cup, a plastic spoon, and napkins in the bag, too. She took the bag from the fridge and added it to her carryall sack with her work shoes and paperback.

Before she left the kitchen, she peered around the corner to smile at her sleeping brother.

Andre slept on the sofa bed in the living room and kept his clothes in an old dresser, which doubled as the TV stand.

She paused as she saw he'd kicked his blankets down to the bottom of the bed. Her eyes were trapped by the sight of his hard muscles. He only wore running shorts to bed, so his body was on display.

Where she was blonde and fair-skinned, Andre was dark. His hair was jet black, straight, and long. It reached his lower back, and currently, it was flowing across his pillow and face. His skin had an olive complexion and was stretched tight over his well-defined musculature. Where she was cushioned all over, he had no fat to hide the contour of each and every hard muscle. They seemed like slabs of polished stone.

No, his body was more like cast steel, as he'd endured the endless hammer blows life sent his way. His childhood hadn't been gentle, but neither had hers been. They'd both been through the crucible and emerged damaged in their own ways but not broken.

Cassandra shook these dark thoughts from her mind and allowed her eyes the guilty pleasure of admiring the beautiful man before her.

Other than his luxurious hair, there seemed to be no softness to him at all, from the strong jawline seen through the curtain of hair down to his--her eyes were trapped by the tenting of his shorts.

When she realized she was staring, she pulled herself back into the kitchen and grabbed her purse, carry bag, and keys.

Face burning, she slipped her runners on at the door and stepped out into the hall to lock the door. She thumped it closed a little harder than she'd intended and hoped she hadn't woken Andre.

"Damn! That's a fine bubble butt!"

Jolting slightly at the sudden voice from across the hall, she turned to glare at her neighbor, once more feeling the stab of regret for sleeping with the man in a moment of weakness.

"Piss off, TJ," she said to the tall Tobagonian who was leering at her as he leaned against his doorjamb.

"Aww, don't be like that first thing in the morning," he said with a sly chuckle. "You know we had a good time."

She gave him a weary look. "I was too drunk to remember, and that seems like a tender mercy right now." Her eyes dropped to see he was stroking the front of his jeans. There was a bulge there, but for a moment, her mind drew her back to the memory of her brother's tented running shorts. That... seemed more substantial. She yanked her mind from the memory and saw TJ's leer had grown. She turned and flipped him the bird as she walked toward the stairs. Hearing his chuckle sent a shiver up her spine. How could she have been so stupid? He was a drug dealer! Granted, she hadn't known that at the time. She just knew that he was an orderly at the hospital.

Leaving the building, she hustled to get to the bus stop just before it arrived. She got a seat next to the window and glanced up at her apartment window as the bus passed. A stab of guilt passed through her with a chaser of tingles as her mind took her back to an image of Andre's body.

She looked straight ahead as she cursed her uncontrollable sex drive. There had to be boundaries!

Chapter 2

The thump of the front door pulled Andre from the depths of sleep and a really hot dream. He stretched and enjoyed the tingles going through his body. He opened his eyes, and they immediately began tracing the thin cracks in the cheap plaster above as he thought of how Cassandra hated it. He sighed.

He looked down and saw he'd kicked the sheets off. He also noticed he was at full mast and poking straight up.

SHIT!

He looked to the door, and a jolt of guilt and fear shot through him. Did she see?

Andre desperately didn't want to offend Cassandra. When she took him in two years ago, he'd been in a horrible place in his life, and she'd saved him. He owed her so much, and he needed her! When she let him live with her in her small apartment, he immediately worked on making himself useful to her.

He cleaned the apartment, made the meals, did their laundry, and shopped for their groceries. These were skills his last stepmother had trained him to do.

His mind tried to shy away from memories of Gloria. While she'd been his third mother, she'd had the largest impact on his life.

To discipline his errant thoughts, he got up and made the bed before folding it back into its sofa configuration. Cushions back in place and throw pillows positioned and fluffed, he grabbed a pair of fresh underwear from his bureau and walked down the hall to the bathroom.

Tugging his sleep shorts off, he saw he was still partially erect, and his mind went back to the dream he'd been having before waking. He felt a familiar throb, and his cock began rising once more. He stepped into the shower and tried ignoring it as he washed his hair and body, but it wouldn't be denied.

He took himself in hand and stroked slowly as he allowed his mind to return to the guilty images of Cassandra in a tight t-shirt and her yoga pants. His hands ached to touch those delicious curves. He braced himself against the wall as his hand moved faster and faster until he groaned and felt the release explode through his senses.

As he panted, his guilt came crashing down on him for thinking of his sister in that way.

He couldn't explain why she affected him like she did. All he could do was try to keep these feelings to himself and show his appreciation of her in every way he could.

He stepped from the shower, dried off, and tugged on his underwear. Then he cleaned and tidied the bathroom until it sparkled.

Andre walked back to the living room and got dressed for school. He pulled a black, long-sleeved t-shirt from his drawer and put it on, lifting his hair free of the shirt. Then he tugged on some black sport-socks and his baggy black jeans. Home was the only place where he didn't keep his body hidden. His bulky black hoodie on the hook by the door would go over the tight t-shirt.

Moving to the kitchen, he made himself a slice of peanut butter toast and wolfed it down. He unplugged his cell and checked it for messages. There was one call from his boss, Travis, asking him if he could work the Saturday shift in two days. It was a typical last-minute request from him, but he called the man to leave a message accepting the shift as the money was welcome.

He worked part-time in the stock room of a big-box electronics store and was doing his best to become indispensable to his boss. He'd assisted the man in reorganizing the inventory to make it easier to find, easier to collect with heavier items on the lower shelves, and the most popular items in the easiest to access bins they called their trending area. Whenever a new shipment was scheduled to arrive, Travis made sure he called Andre in to restock the back shelves. Sometimes, Andre would do closing to midnight shifts to fill the gaps in the store shelves. He was fast, meticulous, and efficient.

His employer didn't know that Andre had compulsions that drove him to organize and arrange things in precise ways, and he didn't spend his work hours socializing because he couldn't. Relating to people was something Andre struggled with, so he did the work and went home.

He stuffed his cell in a pocket and his keys in the other before heading back to the bathroom to brush his teeth.

Once ready, he grabbed his hoodie, slipped it on, slung his school backpack over his shoulder, and put on his black work boots. He left the apartment and locked it up. His earbuds were pulled from the sweater's pocket, connected to his cell, and popped into his ears before he began walking. His music was a mix of Heavy, Gothic, Thrash, Death, and Black Metal. He found it helped calm his mind, keeping it occupied and distracted from the zillions of other inputs pouring in. With the beat of Metallica's Creeping Death providing the soundtrack, he left the building and walked to school.

The sun warmed his face as he went, and the breeze carried the smell of exhaust, cooking, flowers, and less appealing odors. A young boy ran across the street ahead, a car revved its engine behind, sunlight flashed off the chrome rims of a bicycle passing by, and birds chirped. These and dozens of other sensory inputs vied for Andre's immediate attention.

When he was much younger, this torrent of information would overwhelm him, and he'd hide in the basement. It was on such a day that Cassandra saved him for the first time. He felt the pressure building and cried when he discovered his father had locked the basement door. Cassandra feared her father would punish him for his bawling, so she dragged him behind the big chair in the corner of the living room, wrapped her arms around him, and held him tight against her body. His ear was pressed against her chest, and he could hear her heart beating fast and loud. Andre focused his attention on this wonderful sound, and soon the rest faded into the background. He could catch his breath again, and his mind calmed.

From that day onward, he would seek Cassandra when the torrent was too much. If she wasn't there, he would sit in front of a radio and listen to music, concentrating on the sound. He discovered stronger music was easier for him to focus on. Gradually, he learned to focus on selected external stimuli, such as someone speaking to him, even while music was playing in his ears. He reaped the rewards of higher grades in school by honing this mental discipline of tight focus and combining it with his keen intelligence and absolute recall.

He'd be a little early today, but he'd use the time to read in the library. He'd already read all his course material and completed all the textbook lessons. His eidetic memory wouldn't let him forget something once he reviewed it.

The only classes he had difficulty with were those where the material required subjective interpretations, like this year's Art course and last year's English class.

Since he came to live with Cassandra, she'd been helping him create responses the English and Art class teachers would respond positively to. She'd look up the teachers online and build a profile on them to identify their values. Then she'd review his course material and give him some bullet points he could use in class if called upon. He was learning to game the system thanks to his sister.

With his baggy black clothes, his hood pulled up between classes, and the earphone cable leading from his inner pocket and hidden by his hair, people tended to ignore him so he could move through them without having to interact with any of them. He found people stuck to their own cliques, and that suited him fine.

He didn't join clubs, after-school activities, or play sports. He did his best to slide through unnoticed.

His teachers noticed him, though. With mostly perfect grades, aside from the problematic Art class, he was on track for a scholarship. The other students would cast looks at him if the teachers made a point of identifying he'd got another perfect grade. He did his best to ignore them in return.

The library only had a few people in it at this hour, so he found an empty table and prepared to spend a half-hour reading.

He'd just settled in when he saw someone stop behind the chair on the other side of his table. He tried to ignore them, but he heard them say something to him. He plucked the earbuds out and glanced up. He froze when he saw it was his art teacher.

Ms. Rubio was a lovely Hispanic woman in her early thirties. He assumed she was a very talented artist, as he'd seen books in her class that had paintings of hers in them. She was carrying another art book and was smiling at him, so he looked away.

"Mr. Marin? May I speak with you for a moment?" she asked gently.

He glanced at her again, then down at the table as he nodded. He had no justification for sending her away.

"I was approached by the vice-principal, who was reviewing student grades for this semester and brought to my attention that you have been doing exceptionally well in all your classes except for mine. He was wondering if there was a problem. I wasn't aware that my course was your only challenge." She looked at him for a response.

Andre thought quickly. He knew his grade wasn't spectacular in her class, but with Cassandra's help, he was getting a B minus to C plus on tests and assignments. That seemed good enough to pass. "I thought I was doing okay in your class," he admitted.

She showed him a little frown and tilted her head down to get him to look at her again, briefly. "I'm afraid your last assignment received a failing grade. You seemed to be confused about the theme of the paintings, and your answers didn't seem to match the questions. This has made me go back to review your previous assessments, and I found a startling pattern. You seem to give me pre-defined answers to my questions and the same answers in the same order. I have to admit, I missed it when I graded the assignments. They looked like answers, but now I see they weren't genuine."

Andre glanced at her as a cold sweat began to form on his back. "I-I wasn't cheating--"

"I don't mean to imply you were." She opened the large art book and flipped the pages to stop at a page showing Edvard Munch's The Scream. "What do you think of this painting?" she asked as she watched him intently.