Are We Human?

Nathan Gargano's disgusting slurps echoed throughout the house. It roared out through the open windows into the street; it blew down the doors, set off car alarms, knocked the neighborhood kids off their bicycles. The horrible, death-rattle gurgling was the only thing staving off the impending interrogation that dangled above the room, and he prolonged it as long as possible. He funneled the lukewarm coffee into his gullet and let the swallows bulge his unshaved skin out in rolling waves. He was forcing Drew to wait, reveling in how much it irritated him to be left stewing in the spotlight of the kitchen. Lady Sparrow was not the only sadist in Drew's life.

Eventually, Nathan placed his mug off to the side of the table and asked his first question.

"So, Terry, how was your night last night?"

Terry Rubin stood at the stove and scraped at the eggs in his copper pan.

"I had a lovely time," he replied from over his shoulder, keeping the majority of his focus on his developing breakfast. "I was out at Margot, Beth, and Fatima's house drinking beer and playing Mario Kart."

"Did you sleep well?" Nathan followed.

"Yes I did! I had a wonderful, restful night of sleep in my comfortable bed."

He slid the final product onto a slice of wheat toast and brought his plate to the kitchen table. The chair legs screeched against the tile floor as Terry took his seat between the two roommates. Drew winced at the unpleasant sound, one of many currently in the kitchen.

"And what about you, Nathan? How did you spend your night?" Terry asked in return through a mouthful of eggs.

"Well now that you mention it, Terry, it just so happens that I too was playing Mario Kart and drinking beers with Margot, Beth, and Fatima," he described pleasantly.

"And where did you sleep last night?"

"Why, I slept in my own cozy bed, in my own cozy house."

"Well, that sounds positively splendid, Nathan."

"Oh it was, Terry. Yes, there truly is no greater joy in life than the warm embrace of one's own bed."

"It really feels like home, doesn't it Nathan?"

"It really does, Terry, it really does."

The pair shared shit-eating smiles at each other, habitual ball breakers in their latest routine. Drew sat grimacing as they turned their grins on him with predatory slowness.

"And what about you, Drew?" Nathan finally began. "Were you drinking beers and playing Mario Kart with Margot, Beth, and Fatima?"

"I don't recall seeing him there," Terry answered for him.

"Now that you mention it, Terry, I don't recall that either."

"Can we please just skip to the punchline already?" Drew interrupted loudly.

"You seem awfully impatient. Is there somewhere you have to be?"

"Someone you have to meet?"

"Yeah, I need to have a long chat with my real estate agent."

"Aww, you're moving in with her already?" Terry mocked. "Like a couple of lesbians, you are."

"Why am I even on trial for this?" Drew argued. "Am I seriously being shamed by you two, of all people? As if you never-"

"It's the bruises," Nathan reminded him flatly.

Drew's hands went instinctively to his neck. The fighting spirit had intoxicated him into believing he possessed some sort of phantom strength; then he remembered the marks she had left on him. He hadn't been much of a fighter when she smothered his desperate cries beneath her hand and tore at the blood vessels in his neck. How could he even pretend to be tough when he wore his white flag tied tight around his throat? Drew was built to surrender, to serve in the presence of true strength. Lady Sparrow would've loved to watch him squirm in his seat over what she did to him.

"When you vanish all weekend and come back looking like a Dennis Rader case, it tends to draw out the concern of your peers," Terry explained.

The mystery of the missing Drew intrigued his roommates, but their concern, if genuine, was only a minor facet of it; the ultimate goal was dirt. The strange sequence of events carried the potential for a fantastic story, one that the boys could go back to again and again for a laugh at his expense. This was par for the course; the three of them practically ran a gossip magazine out of their house on Dendro Avenue, exposing and mocking each other's most bizarre, embarrassing, and often intoxicated experiences. Any and all stories were probed for their juiciest, most salacious details to become fodder for the next edition. All three of them could tell - although only one knew for sure - that the next big scoop was sitting anxiously at the kitchen table.

"I got drunk Friday and wandered off with a girl," Drew defended in vague truths. "I saw her again last night, and I stayed over till the morning."

"Well, that answers all of my questions, except for, ya know, all of them," Nathan criticized.

"You guys have questions? I thought all you had were jokes."

"We can't make good jokes without all the details," Terry explained again. "How about we start with her name?"

Her name is Abby Heyman, but Drew knows her as Lady Sparrow. She's his mistress. She owns this little slut, and he does whatever she says. With a single word, she can have him on his knees; with another, his mouth is pressing against her, lips pursing and working for her. She teases him, torments him, degrades him, and the sick freak just adores it. He begs her to treat him like a pathetic, powerless toy for her to entertain herself with. Lady Sparrow treats him so right. She knows exactly what her darling needs.

Drew ignored the voice in his head.

"Her name is Abby. Abby Heyman."

"Never heard of her," Terry stated.

"Is she in a sorority? Fatima might know her," Nathan suggested.

"She doesn't strike me as a sorority girl. She's too... "

Independent. Powerful. Domineering. Seductive. Persuasive. Sadistic. Marvelous. Perfect.

"It just doesn't seem like her style," he finished.

"Then what is her style?" Terry asked.

Break unwitting boys down into sex slaves. Demean them while they worship you. Laugh as they writhe like agonized maggots at your feet. Claw your way into their minds and keep them up at night in cold sweats as their trembling lips mouth your name silently into the cold, lonely darkness. Haunt their closed eyes. Rule their worlds.

"She's cool. Is cool a style? She's just really cool."

"Seems like you two really got to know each other this past weekend," Nathan replied.

"I'm assuming you'd do better at telling us what she looks like, then?" Terry requested.

Hair like the night sky, skin like the moon that sails through it. Her thin lips curl upward for your misery and scowl for your disobedience. Her hazel eyes will cut you and stab you and make you bleed for her. Her long fingers extend into sharp talons to tear the flesh from the playthings that displease her. Her limbs are solid, her body strong. Her round ass beckons for devotion. The sight of her makes you cum.

"She's cute. She wears glasses."

"Wow, you are totally useless," Nathan criticized.

Drew picked at the hem of his shirt.

"I'm not good at describing people. She's white, she has short dark hair. I don't know."

"Well, hopefully we won't need a police sketch of her anytime soon."

"Kinda looks like we might," Terry mentioned.

"Are we done?" Drew asked, irritated.

"I still wanna know how she managed to do that to your neck," Nathan said, with Terry nodding on in support.

Drew watched it in his mind, as he had many times before. She held him down to the bed. He thrashed and thrashed but couldn't stop her. His vessels snapped in droves as she bit him, pinched and sucked on his skin. First he screamed; then he moaned. His hard cock ground against the comforter. He gave in. He was hers. He wanted her to mark him.

That was the truth.

"You know how girls get when they drink."

Buried truth rots in the gut; what is does in the light is even more toxic.

"I knew it was happening, but I was too drunk to care."

"And now you suffer the consequences."

Yeah.

"Yeah."

"I hope it was worth it."

Dear God, it was worth it. He loved it he couldn't stop thinking about it he wanted more he wanted to be back squirming under his mistress feeling the blood pool in his neck he wanted to be her slave he wanted the bruises and the shame of being such a fucked up depraved whore please Lady Sparrow please more more more.

"I guess so."

"So when's the next date? Or whatever you two call it," Terry inquired.

Days. Maddening days dragged on in years and decades. Drew slugged his way through Monday classes, eyes downcast, ignoring the subtle glances and bold stares that his peers cast on him. At night he sat in bed and twiddled his thumbs, waiting for her to reach out to her antsy pet. Tossing. Turning. Shifting. Dreaming.

Daydreams. Tuesday he began to see her. He would close his eyes during lectures and then she would be there, standing at the head of an empty classroom. Clack clack clack. Heels on linoleum. Clack clack clack. She leaned over his desk and dared him to stare down her blouse, watching him through the thick-rimmed glasses that dangled at the tip of her nose.

"Are you dozing off in my class, Mr. Lawson?" she asked him.

"No ma'am," he replied.

"For some reason, I don't feel like I have your full attention," she told him.

"You have it, ma'am. You have all of it," he replied.

She slipped the end of her ruler under his chin and raised him from his seat.

"I expect thoroughness in work from all my students. I would thus fail you as a teacher if I did not exemplify the importance of taking the extra step to ensure that lessons taught and lessons learned are made to stick in the mind."

She slid the end of it down his chest, bisecting the cadaver, till she reached the buckle of his belt.

"This is unfortunate business, but the necessity of it cannot be ignored."

Drew dropped his pants and underwear to his ankles and bent over the desk. His fingers clenched around the edge. She brushed the wooden ruler up and down his exposed backside. Deep breaths. It's for your own good.

"One."

Lady Sparrow cut the air and cracked a firework against his skin. His first cry was strong, fueled by the shock of a brand new pain. She had never had to resort to such barbaric measures before, but he had pushed her to the limit now. What else could be done with Drew the delinquent ne'er-do-well?

"Two."

Familiarity with the sensation didn't save him. He couldn't prepare himself for the second blow; it opened a fresh wound atop the previous one, the ashes of which were still smoldering.

"Three."

Drew lurched forward and kicked a pointed foot up in the air. He would be on the floor right now were it not for the desk beneath him. He held onto it tightly, the roaming driftwood in this expanse of tumultuous sea. His knees were quaking, ready to fold under his dead weight.

"Four."

Rosy welts rose like blooming roses. Lady Sparrow warmed her hand on their radiation, brushing the back of her fingers on his red skin. Drew recoiled more from her delicate touch than he did from the vicious, disciplinary blows.

"Don't pull away from me."

Drew quivered as he flattened his feet against the floor and made himself vulnerable to her. He kept his butt outstretched for his teacher to inspect, biting his lip to hold back the whimpers and cries as her nails trailed faintly against his burning skin.

"If you try to escape me, that means you aren't learning."

"I am learning, ma'am, I've learned so much!" he replied.

"Five."

His desperation came out dust in his mouth. There it went, rolling unhindered down his cheek: the only tear anyone would ever shed for Drew Lawson. Sympathy for The Devil, none for Her bitch.

"Six."

The marks on his neck were nothing compared to the damage she was doing now. He would have the lesson written in scars across his backside, that much was certain. This ruler would brand her presence in his mind; he would feel her sting forever.

"Tell me what your lesson is."

"Attention," he breathed heavily. "Pay attention."

"Pay attention to whom?"

"To you, ma'am."

She slapped her ruler on the wood beside his left hand. He jumped away, then trembled into a slow return to her desired position.

"Your teacher, boy. You will pay attention to your teacher. I am your superior, the keeper of your mind and the benefactor of your wisdom."

She pressed herself against his back, pushing her hips stiffly into his searing skin. Drew slouched down in fear, but there was nowhere for him to go. She dipped down further and further until she had him crushed against the wood of the desk. The side of her head brushed against his face, and he filled her ear with the pained mewls she so longed for.

"You will respect me," she informed him. "I will make you respect me."

Drew opened his eyes. The world - the unfortunate real one - fell into place around him. The monotonous pain it offered him only served to deepen his need for the vivid pain of Lady Sparrow's touch. He felt helpless, trapped in the immovable time. Lady Sparrow had a tendency to hurt him when she was around, but when he was apart from her, that's when she really began to kill him.

Debate. He sat in front of his phone on Wednesday night, an empty message tapping its foot impatiently on the screen. Each time it dimmed from his indecisiveness, he struck it with his thumb to keep it awake. He had to say something. Obsession had festered in the three days without her word; hour after hour, he would hold his phone in his hand and wait for her to shake it to life.

He felt forgotten. More than forgotten; Drew felt discarded. Lady Sparrow had taken what she wanted, but now the boy was more trouble than he was worth. He could hardly blame her for it. All he did was provoke and annoy her anyway. Pestering her for attention now would only push her even further away.

No, that couldn't be true. The last time they spoke, Abby had told him to stay in touch. She wouldn't have said that just to be polite; when she gave orders, she meant them. Drew was meant to reach out.

But when was he supposed to reach out? Would it bother her if he tried to take up more of her time so soon after the last meeting? What if she expected him to stay in touch later in the week? Would he seem desperate if he contacted her only three days after they last spoke?

Well, he was desperate. They both knew that Drew was a prisoner to the world that Lady Sparrow had opened to him. The sensations she inflicted on him, and the way she forced them deep into his veins to worm her way into the fabric of his soul, had unearthed a hole inside of him. He didn't notice the empty space until she had filled it with lust and fear; now, the space had been shaped into a throne for her to lounge in as she ruled him from within. Her absence made him hollow, just the way she would have wanted. Lady Sparrow didn't want him to wait. She wanted desperation to consume him.

"I can't stop thinking about you."

For the next 24 minutes, Drew berated himself for not opening with "hello." He sounded like a lunatic! Wasn't he weird enough without being so aggressively forward with his sick fantasies? How could he be so inept, so socially incompetent that he couldn't keep his perversions to himself for just one single moment?

His phone shook.

"I'm sure I'll find that flattering until you start elaborating on what you're actually thinking about me," Abby wrote.

It occurred to Drew that he had been holding his breath since she left him on Sunday. In his next breath, he tasted every molecule of oxygen that flooded his lungs, and warm blood pumped through him once more.

"Do you want me to elaborate? Or should I keep it to myself?"

"If you're thinking naughty thoughts about me, I have a right to know what you're making me do."

Drew shifted in his seat as he sorted through the many, many naughty thoughts he had constructed in his free time.

"Not all of them are naughty," he defended sheepishly.

"Then tell me about the ones that are, idiot. Either you'll distract me from my work, or you'll give me a reason to beat your ass."

Drew flopped down onto his bed and searched for a story that would appease her. He scrubbed through the scenes and clips that spanned the spectrum of his desires, before selecting the one that kept his toes in a permanent curl.

"I was daydreaming in class... and you were my professor."

"Oh God, it's one of these, is it? Alright, my little 'pupil,' what was Professor Lady Sparrow doing?"

"You made me bend over the desk... and take my pants and underwear off..."

"Why do you keep using ellipses? Do you think it's cute? Or sexy?"

"I'm nervous to tell you what I was thinking."

"If you can't tell me what you were thinking, then don't think it. Now you have to tell me."

"You had a ruler in your hand, and you used it to spank me."

"Ha! You were fantasizing about getting spanked? Normal people would've thought about fucking me for a better grade. I guess you're just incapable of that."

The amusement came through clearly in her words. Drew rocked his hips side to side as her spell fell upon him once more.

"I couldn't help it, Lady Sparrow. You would count off every time you hit me, and you scolded me when I flinched at your touch."

"Well you deserve a scolding for trying to keep my hands off of what's mine. What did I say to you?"

He heard the hiss of it in his ear again. He could almost feel its heat roaring into his skull.

"You told me to respect my superior, the keeper of my mind and benefactor of my wisdom."

"You made me say that?! You're so fucking lame. No wonder you're not a Dom."

Drew let out a gasp, and a shiver wiggled through his body. All she had to do was write a few words, and she could force his body to respond.

"I'm sorry, I thought it sounded teacher-like. I don't know how you say the things you do. What would you have said, Lady Sparrow?"

After thinking for a bit, she decided, "I have a few ideas, but I'll save it for when we start roleplaying. This fantasy is too adorable for me to not enact with you."

"You would do that?"

"When you earn it, of course. I wanna see the stupid look on your face when you realize I can make your wildest dreams come true," she mocked dryly.

In the past three days, Drew's imagination had gone out of control with scenarios and acts that he had never considered before. Although he thought about them incessantly, he had done so under the assumption that these dreams were unrealistic. He should have known that Lady Sparrow had the power to bring them to life. There was nowhere that she couldn't go, nothing beyond her reach. She could bend reality to her will, provided Drew made it worth her while.

"Can I see you soon?" he asked abruptly.

"Hmmmmm..." she began. "It may be difficult this week. I still have things left to do."

Then, she added, "remind me again how badly you want to see me."

"I need you, Lady Sparrow." he pleaded. "It hurts me to be away from you, it drives me insane. Please, I'd do anything you want just for one more minute with you."

Drew placed his hand over his bulging desperation and caressed its aches while his mistress mulled it over.

"Come over tomorrow around 5. Nothing long term, but after remembering how much I miss hearing my pet grovel for me, I think a break would be good for me. Besides, I've had a shit week so far, and someone has to answer for that. Is that acceptable?"

"Yes Lady Sparrow! I'll be there. Thank you for making time for me."

"Of course, my sweet."

She signed off with a kissy face. Drew wished she would stay to continue her lackadaisical flexing of ownership, but the success of the conversation was too precious for him to risk. His daydreams had amused Abby instead of annoying her, and she had been pleased enough to make room for him in her busy life. Soon, she would reward the courage it took for him to contact her, as well as the patience that the next twenty hours would demand. Things had gone too smoothly for him to get greedy for her attention. Drew gushed with pride; he could've given himself a pat on the back. He patted his front instead, the reels in his mind still spinning through the fantastic tales of Lady Sparrow.