Brick, Mortar, and Bruises

Between the handshakes and farewells, Raduz kept glancing through the bus window at Anni. Regret and longing wrestled inside him as he felt her slipping from him for good. He had raped her. He had used her. He had beaten her and fucked with her mind over and over and yet she had trusted him with all that she was. She'd seen his scars, the beaten dog that hid underneath his clothes. She'd seen, but she'd still chosen to see the man in him, not the dog.

Nevertheless, Raduz still kept on waiting for a sign that Anni's apparent distress over losing him was nothing more than an act. He had paid a high price for trusting a woman's feelings once and he'd be damned to let it happen again.

"Liars," he thought as he watched the bus drive off. "Liars and whores all of them."

Had she ever really cared for him or had she just been playing a part to evoke his pity and save herself a full year of harrowing sexual slavery? How could Raduz be sure of anything? He knew better than anyone what vicious, twisted creatures women were.

"Yes," he admitted to himself, he did see the signs; Anni's love had been written all over her being, in every word, look and touch. But still, how could he believe it? How could he trust her? He knew it for sure that if she betrayed him he'd beat her to death with his own hands. Did he have the right to gamble for happiness with her life? Did she even realize how dangerous a man he was for a little girl like her to desire?

His past made him want to play it safe, yet still he couldn't help feeling Anni's pain in his own heart. He felt her feel, so he knew that what she felt had to be real.

He returned inside and sat at his desk. He picked up some papers and stared at them without seeing them. The thought of the next group of volunteers arriving in a few weeks, the thought of the next wretchedly weeping slip of a girl beneath him, made him curl his lip in disgust. Knowing what it felt like to be given, Raduz did not want to go back to taking. He didn't want to watch some random girl sniffle and cry -- he wanted to hear Anni moan; and then watch her thrash wildly in pain and shriek in agony when he would put her back into her place.

She had suffered and bled for him and still she had loved him. Twisted and broken as he was, she had accepted and wanted him for who he was. And he had started to love her too; first as a mere object of vicious obsession but later -- after the night she had held and touched him -- as something much more than that.

Maybe there still was a chance that he could be the man he wanted to be instead of a hollow ruin. Maybe he wasn't broken beyond repair. Maybe he still was capable of companionship and trust, maybe even love. He thought of the night he had melted in her small hands, her touches, whispers and caresses, the fire within, the way her touch and her presence relaxed him. Her plump little body was as soft and warm as her soul was gentle. If he was ever to find peace this was it. And he, idiot, had sent her away. He'd let go of the only person ever to want him. He kicked the chair from under him, felt his keys in his pocket, and started running towards his car.

Anni and the rest of the crew were already inside the terminal and did not see Raduz's dusty car pulling up in the airport parking lot. Anni's legs were shaking as she approached the gate. It was so hard just to keep upright and choke down all the tears and sobs. She couldn't take much more of this. She needed to curl up in a black hole somewhere to cry it all out. But that wasn't a choice now. Not for 20 more hours at least.

There was a line before her and in her head she shrieked "Move!" at the other passengers. Even the imagined voice in her head sounded broken and shrill. She couldn't bear standing there, waiting, and suffering the physical, wrenching pain of a broken, broken heart. Every second of waiting tortured her, so if she had to leave she wanted to get it over with and be on her way.

A woman in the airline's uniform worked the line quickly and the gate loomed only a few yards away. She had to stiffen the muscles in her neck to prevent herself from looking back. He would not be there and it would only make it hurt more to remind herself that he, the heartless bastard, had not cared enough to come and see her off. She thought of her apartment, of her family, her friends, her studies and all of it felt faded and unreal. Raduz had been a blazing storm of wildfire, which, when it suddenly burned out and died in the ash, left her with nothing. Nothing but loss. The unbearable, unceasing agony of loss.

With him she had learned how twisted her emotions were and how dirty love was. And then, later, how nothing was really twisted at all and how truly glorious love was.

She remembered the day he had had her come into his office every half an hour to wipe off her flooding juices and rub in more cold cream to burn her clit, asshole, nipples and pussy to make her sore and swollen for the agonizing rape that would follow at night. Her shocked cunt had tried to flush out the irritants but he had applied more and more, fucking the gel inside her with his fingers, coating her vulva, her vagina, her rectum, her clit, asshole and nipples, until her only thoughts were fire and pain.

She remembered, and she wanted it back, because that pain, Raduz's intense, passionate pain, was so much better than the pain she was in without it, the aching and longing and emptiness that had gnawed her flesh and bones all the years He had been no more than a fantasy and a dream.

All she wished for now was unconsciousness so she wouldn't have to think or feel. Having finally found Him, how could she bear to live after losing him? After having been sent away by him, unwanted. What was the point of anything now that the world held no meaning and offered no joy.

She clenched and unclenched her fists, trying to focus on the tiny movement. Stretch. Clench. Stretch. Clench. Stretch. Don't think. Don't look back. Don't feel. Just stretch and clench. Stretch and clench. In mid-movement a hand closed around her wrist from behind, but she didn't jump. She recognized Raduz's touch instantly and it filled her with ease. It was instinctive to her now, whenever he touched her she knew she needed only to obey, to follow his lead, and he would take care of the rest.

In silence, without a word, without even looking over his shoulder at her, Raduz picked up her bag and lead her away from the gate and past their confused, ogling colleagues, through the huge terminal, out into the cold late autumn sun and through the parking lot to his car, pulling Anni with him. He smelled of cigarettes though he'd said he'd given up smoking years ago. The smell was comforting and familiar, the same scent that had surrounded her as a little girl in the arms of her father. It filtered into her flesh and made it hum.

"All will be well," it sang.

He opened the passenger side door, gently pushed her in and closed the door after her. Anni sat there, absolutely dazzled, not yet fully realizing what had happened and where she was. She watched as Raduz placed her bag in the trunk, walked around the car and stood there, his hand on the latch, a minute, another, third. Anni stared at him even though she could only see a stretch of his torso on the other side of the window. He turned, lit up a cigarette, smoked half of it, swore and tossed the pack on the ground. The numbness in her body was changing, turning into the prickling of a thousand pins, into a burn of a thousand flames. She stared through the driver side window at his familiar shape in his familiar clothes: the jeans, the flannel shirt, the tan colour of his faded suede jacket. His breathing was shallow, his body tense, his movements nervous little shuffles. When he finally opened the door and sat down, Anni stared stiffly out the front window, unable to move, too nervous to look at him.

Raduz took the rucksack from her hands and threw it on the back seat. His hand rested for a moment on hers and started sliding up her arm. When it passed her shoulder to rest in her neck, she closed her eyes and let out an instinctive, involuntary moan. His grip coaxed her to turn her head and slowly she looked at him. He pressed his left palm against her cheek, thumb stroking her lips, and she rubbed her face against it, telling him without words how much she had missed him. The smell of tobacco on his palm flooded her with emotion, and, feeling the tears finally burst out, Anni buried her face into his chest and hugged him fiercely.

He let her cry, stroked her hair and whispered hoarsely, "I wanted to let you go, to be free of you. But you are a little witch, aren't you? You're under my skin and in my head and—"

He stopped, not ready to say more, and after a while added, "Stay. Be mine. Only mine."

Sniffling in his arms, Anni wept and laughed at the same time, momentarily unable to accept the great happiness that was offered her.

"And," Raduz continued, his voice grave and his arms squeezing her tighter to make her understand he'd never been more serious, "never leave me or I will go mad."

With a new-found certainty Anni looked up and caressed his face, committing to memory every detail, every line, blemish and groove. Now that she finally saw -- truly saw -- His face for the first time, she wanted to remember it forever so that He would never be vague or faceless in her mind again.

"Say you want me. Say you need me," he pressed when she still didn't speak.

"I do want you," Anni replied, smiling. "More than anything."

"Well, in that case," Raduz teased her with a predatory smile, "we have two full weeks of solitude until the next batch of volunteers arrive."

He nuzzled her neck, causing her to yip and giggle in excitement. Then he suddenly grabbed her harshly by the hair.

"Do you have any idea of the things I can do to you in two weeks? You're going to scream, my little dove. Oh yes. You're going to scream for me until your throat is swollen and too hoarse for you to even speak. And then I'm going to tie you down on my desk and fuck it until you beg, until it's as raw and bloody as your every other hole. Actually, dove, we might not even make it back into the camp before I shove my entire fist into your randy little cunt and fuck you with it until you pass out from screaming."

Hearing his threats a girl might have regretted not getting on the plane, a girl might have been scared. But the two had finally found their match in each other and by the time Raduz pulled over to empty his balls into her and realize his threat, Anni's pussy was already dripping juice and twitching eagerly in expectation.