Gianna laughs when I stand face-to-face with her, pushing forward despite the resistance of her body in front of me. She doesn’t separate into pieces to allow me to pass; she isn’t hollow. Instead, her mouth curves into a wicked grin as I try to push through her.
“You want to be inside meso bad, don’t you, Krowe?”
I don’t miss the inuendo.
“So bad you’ll do anything. So bad you’ll resort to dirty tricks. Well, I have a few tricks up my sleeve, too.”
This time, when I shove against her, I gothroughher… I sink past the flesh and bones that are no longer there, and I cease to exist.
I become her, and I become nothing.
My body disappears, and when I try to look at myself, lifting my arms and spreading my fingers, I see nothing.
Iamnothing.
The world around us has disappeared and all there is is darkness, stillness. It’s not the comfortable kind, but the kind where you know something lies just before you, watching, stalking, hunting…
“Gianna!”
I can’t even hear my own call for her. I don’t know if I did call for her, or if I just thought about doing it.
“Are you scared?”
I can’t open my mouth to say yes, and it’s not my pride that stops me from admitting it. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to burn to death. I don’t want to be left in the dark.
"You don't have to worry about that when you're with me."
Gianna?
"Trust me, Scarecrow, you're gonna be popular tonight."
It’s not just fear. Whatever this is, it goes beyond something as simple as fear. This is… terror. This is a poison seeping into my veins, leeching into my bones, a rapid overtaking of everything in me.
“Just try and have fun tonight, okay?”
There’s nothing fun about the pain stabbing through me. It reaches in through every inch of me, twisting, burning, eating, corroding.
Gianna!
“Let go and it'll all be fine.”
I can’t let go, though. I’m holding too tight to whatever is left of my life.
“Gianna!”
"Hear that, Jackson? She's got a name. Gianna.”
White-hot fire pokers seem to lance every part of my body; the body I no longer see. I feel it, though. I feel it, and I wish I didn’t. It’s excruciating. I can feel myself shaking, trembling despite the heat and the sweat dripping down me.
“Maybe you oughtta scream it as you cum."
“Gianna!”
"Fuck, Giannnnnnaaaaa!"
All at once, the pain ceases, I can breathe, and I’m me again… just in time to watch as Gianna’s friend drums his fingers down my mom’s chest, slowly tapping as he dips between her cleavage.
I feel sick, and just the thought of seeing my mom’s tits makes me want to vomit. But the touch isn’t sexual, it turns out. Instead, he traces a path down the center and then veers left, tapping through her clothing in a rhythm like a heartbeat. It’s fast, scared.
