The Pet Chronicles

There is a periwinkle bulb at the top of a post over the emergency phones, put up to save girls about to be gang-raped by marauding frat boys. Through tears, it splits into four spikes, like a compass rose, and hangs gently in the sky, outside the filmy dorm window. The blue light snags the belly of each tear that she squeezes out: they fall in a steady procession, down, off one side of the bunk bed, and into the tangle of her clothing. Blouse, socks, jeans, still as a castoff skin. Smelling of smoke.

Des watches the light and thinks of Magi coming across the desert for—did they know what?—something wonderful. Their hearts thumping a bit more with each dune, which in the moonlight look like frozen waves. And they were on a wave, big and about to crush everything below it. They follow the light and eventually stumble upon... well it turns out to be the marquee on the new desert casino. Goddamn it, Balthazar, this is the third time this has happened. Last time I follow you after magic lights. No, wait a minute, Melchior, maybe the child's

inside

the casino! Help me out here, Gaspar. But Gaspar's already disappeared into the building with the gold he brought as a gift—he has a gambling problem, you see. Melchior curses and hands off his camel to the valet before running after him.

She is laughing desperately, one of those great laughs through tears that inevitably involves mucus. Of course, this is when Sarah comes walking in.

"What's so funny?"

"Couldn't explain it if I tried."

"Try."

Des just shakes her head.

Sarah doesn't bother with the light. In the moonlight there's a shining line that marks the side of her body, and the rest of her is very dark as she undresses. Though in the day time she's as white as a C major scale on a piano. Stars appear far away in her eyes. Like a statue carved from ebony coming to life, like a river in the night, she moves, pulling pieces off her outfit. Des's eyes catch on her navel, her belly smooth as the flat of knife.

"Do you believe in God?" Des asks.

"Yes. But you know that, you've seen the tattoo," Sarah says. She stands tall and proud, even in her underwear. Perhaps because she's in her underwear. "Do you?"

"No, not for a long time."

"He'll find you. But... until then..." She slips into the bottom bunk with Des, and presses their bodies together. Their breasts nudge gently and the softness is too much—Des turns away, feels her roommate's arms slide around her tummy and lock. Everyone's trying to stake their claim this evening.

"What does God think about what you did tonight?"

"Well, seeing as I'm young and stupid and was a little drunk and obviously taken advantage of buy an older man—"

"And his wife."

"Yes. I'm betting God's willing to overlook what I've done so far. But wait until he sees what I do next..." Her hands probe down into Des, brushing pubic outskirts and holding their advance.

"You're not taking me seriously."

"Did you want me to?" She's kissing her shoulders patiently, deliberately, making each quiver of her lips count for something.

"Yes."

"I don't think I can do that, Dezzie." She laughs but otherwise is still.

They lie there for a few moments. Some yelling comes by from outside—the kind of rapid volume modulation that indicates a history of Jäger shots. Des thinks of the Gestapo again.

"I didn't say you had to stop," Des finally says when the voices are gone, and Sarah growls as she bites down on shoulder flesh, gnawing a bit of muscle.

"So, did you have fun?" Sarah asks.

"I don't know."

"That means yes!"

Des laughs, finally, and Sarah moves her hands down between her thighs, spreading them apart like a surgical instrument. She's going to start sopping soon. "Tell me a story," Des says.

"What about?" Sarah's moved on to the back of her ear. The tiny crenellations in her lower incisors are rumbling back and forth along it.

"Tell me what you did tonight."

"How about you tell me what you did tonight? Bill McMurty? Seriously? He usually just talks all night or stands outside and smokes."

Des sucks breath in—this could be for any number of reasons. "Who told you?"

"Des, come on, it's a party made up of wives and girlfriends—if gossip traveled any faster it would disprove relativity."

Des smiles a bit—she feels she can, because Sarah can't see her face. "Ok," Des says, "I'll tell you, but you tell me first."

"Must we? I was so enjoying you trying to induce my Catholic guilt."

Des's legs squeeze closed and strangle one of Sarah's hands. The free one goes up her side like a spider and burrows into an armpit; Des erupts in giggles.

"Behave," Sarah says, "or I'll tickle you all night."

"Ok!" Des is panting for breath.

"Promise?"

"Promise!"

"Are you going to kiss me?"

"Yes! Just stop! Seriously! I can't... breathe!" The moment Sarah's hand stops twitching their mouths lock like opposed magnets. Slugs hump like their tongues move. Sarah kisses like a man—never doubting herself, never doubting she's in charge, never taking no. She takes the kiss like property, explores Des's mouth, bathes her gums, spreads the wet all around. And still so soft, such a sweet taste—the wax of her lipstick, the salt of her spit, all coming together in a taste like a bit of potpourri.

Des's eyes widen and gaze up—it is precisely the same look she gave Bill McMurty while secured around him earlier. "So... tell me," she says.

"Fine. Gosh, so needy," Sarah says. "Where were we?"

"Your friend was referring to my bubble butt and my general fuckability."

"Ha. Danny's quite the poet, isn't he?"

"He's like Gertrude Stein and Robert Frost had a baby. And it had Down's Syndrome."

"Be good or so help me God I'll spank your ass pink, Desdemona Jimenez."

"'Hispanic bubble butts' start brown. You can't pink brown. That'd be like uncooking a steak."

"Speaking of pink."

"Now you behave."

"So I believe Danny had me over a shoulder..."

"And I was slowly receding away from you, alone on the dance floor, left to the mercy of all those wicked people."

"Sorry, babe. A pet's got to do..."

Sarah had been small until she turned seven—then her body started growing in earnest. She quickly distended all her hand me downs and exploded a series of sneakers. Thus started five years of banishment to the back of the school picture. She doesn't know the niceties of human development, but has figured out it goes something like this: bones grow. Much later, muscles and nerves follow. Thus she spent her early years trying to control her own limbs like a puppeteer wielding a tangled marionette, stumbling around the playground, desperately trying not to trip while running the bases in kickball (and failing -- Mark Costner, who was an idiot, used to yell "Timber!") and otherwise acting like a midget on stilts.

By the time she had turned twelve her classmates had finally caught up to her, and she had gotten used to managing her proportions, even enjoying them. Then she went to bed the night of her thirteenth birthday, finally content with her earthly lot, and woke up the next day a foot taller, now six feet and two inches. Everything had to be relearned, this time dealing with the added complications of mounds of fat that had materialized on various awkward perches around her frame—perhaps nature's way of cushioning her during the next phase of falls.

Mark Costner, who was still an idiot but by this time was an idiot who could score pot, asked her to the junior prom, and spent each dance with his nose wedged in her cleavage. She didn't date much—that and her predilection for sports (she did eventually learn to control those wild extremities)—led most people (notably her Grandmother, who couldn't keep such inferences to herself) to suspect Sapphism. Of course it had nothing to do with that—she just couldn't take short men seriously, and most men, from her standpoint, were short. Perhaps they all reminded her of Mark on the dance floor, rooting through her breasts like he smelled truffles.

Which makes the fact that a man six inches shorter than her currently has her over his shoulder like a bag of wheat somewhat hard to understand.

"Danny, put me down!"

"Hush up, girl. Tell me about that friend of yours."

But therein lies the answer. Dan Newcastle's not just another below average height male—he's a below average height male who will pick up a girl and throw her over a shoulder. He's a below average height male who's deaf to the protests of his captive. A below average height male, an above average man. Same amount of testosterone, more concentrated.

Sarah realizes that everyone at the party is now staring at the two of them, laughing. Not wanting to draw more attention she quiets up. This is also fine with Danny. He takes her resolutely up the grand staircase, pausing for an excruciating few minutes to greet and talk with some folks—Sarah can't see, as her ass is the only part of her facing the conversation, but she can hear their smiles. Again he pauses, now to grab a handful of appetizers, then does an about face to let Sarah pick from the waiter's tray. She takes her time picking one out, a mushroom cap stuffed with something, then pats Danny's butt. "Ok, onward slave."

"Oh, you are going to get it," he says, not picking up speed at all as they enter a winding hallway with red carpet, marked here and there with an antique mirror, priceless paintings and—bizarrely—a signed poster of

Rocky IV

. Emily McMurtry's concession to her husband, hidden as far away from the spots company are likely to visit as possible.

"We'll see," Sarah says. But of course she has no say in the matter, or Danny wouldn't be Danny. He'd be Mark Costner, trying to get her drunk on prom night (and failing -- he had passed out before she had even gotten tipsy).

The first door is the wrong door: a trio of folks are inside, naked on the bed, watching porn and seemingly trying to mime the positions. Danny doesn't say anything so Sarah squeals out a quick apology as he turns and continues down the hall. The second door is locked—Danny knocks on it and yells for Sue but no one opens. So he moves on.

"Hey you," Sue says, lighting up when they finally find her. She's on the bed reading a magazine. "I recognize that dress."

"Thank you!" Sarah says. "Danny didn't even say anything!" She's been unceremoniously dumped on the mattress next to her lover. Her other lover wastes no time in pulling off his tux jacket and loosening his tie.

"I noticed," he says. "I just didn't see the need to mention it since it's coming off immediately."

"It most certainly is not," Sue says. "We paid for it, we should enjoy it."

"Well, we may be able to leave it on... depends how far it'll hike up in the back." He's gotten off his shirt now, pumped up his impressive brambly chest. Sarah once told him he should shave it all off, show off his pecs—jokingly—and he of course refused.

"Not far," Sue says, touching Sarah's body for the first time. The static spark is, by this point, to be expected. "Look how tight it is. Then again, look how short it is. Don't need to move it very far... as long as there's nothing... in the way."

Her hand's been moving this whole time and now slides in between Sarah's legs, though her eyes stay on Sarah's. Sarah lies submissively—something about them both being with her, acting together: there's no point in resisting. She feels her panties gently tugged, Sue's finger sliding between the elastic and her skin, lingering longer than necessary and then withdrawing.

She throws the panties to her husband, who snaps them out of the air and studies them.

"Wet," he says.

"Of course," Sue says.

Sarah does something she never does, except here, with them. Blushes.

"So cute," Sue whispers, her finger now tracing a line in Sarah's neck. After her finger's done she follows its trail with her tongue. Sarah had forgotten to inhale and now sucks in a gust of air, sending her bosom upwards.

"So," Sarah says, "I actually brought a friend today. My roommate from college!"

"Shhh," Sue says, pressing a finger to her lips. She retrieves the panties from her husband and gingerly pushes them into Sarah's mouth. A few bits of fluff are left out and she takes her time pushing them all in, fold by fold. "No more talking."

Sue stays close the whole time, keeps her eyes on her prey. Sarah loves her face, the magical angles of it, the contrast between the plumpness of her lips and the severity of her cheeks. Her body hovers above as her fingers enter. Sarah can only make feminine squeaks and mumbles, sounds that are ambiguous between torture and ecstasy. At first she can only hear her heartbeat, sounding with wet thuds like a hand slapping a lump of gelatin.

Sue's patient, her fingers at first spending as much time in her as out of her, now dipping into the honey pot, now smearing it along her thickening lips, mapping her moist topography contour line by contour line, digit by digit. Her thumb may brush idly against her clit. Occasionally her fingers will clench inside in a come hither gesture, pulling right against a bundle of nerves and sending Sarah's head backwards. This increases by gradation. Recess is taken to concentrate on and expose and pinch the clitoris, then apologetically massage it. Repeat as needed.

By the end the only sound is her fingers flailing against Sarah's boundaries, the copious wetness of it all unmistakable: it brings an utterly wonderful guilt with it, to have someone be able to make her pour out of herself like this. Her hips don't ask for her permission to buck, but there they go. In the end, orgasm thrumming against her ears and her thighs clenching tight like a wilting flower, she feels lost, powerless, as if Sue had lifted and ripped something out of her—something she could do without. A compass that never worked. A gun with a busted hammer.

"Good girl," Sue says, her eyes finally leaving as she kisses her neck.

"Gggrrmm," Sarah says.

When Dan enters her, she sees a color without a name.

Des has started to pant.

"You ok, Dezzie?" Sarah asks.

"I think so," she says. It's the darkness. A fantasy is always easier to picture in the darkness. The faces, the bodies, it all just projects better on black.

"Do you want me to stop?"

"The story or the...?"

"Either one."

Des whispers no, though so quietly she knows Sarah's going to ask her to repeat it. She does. Des does, and Sarah kisses the middle of her back.

"Good girl," she says. Sarah's left hand is cupping a breast, rubbing her nipple between fingers. Her right hand's trapped inside Des's panties. Both are moving in different rhythms—Des thinks of the old game where people try to pat their heads while rubbing their belly—or is it the other way around?

The last half of the story has come in a menacing whisper: Sarah's lips are an inch away from Des's ear, and occasionally pause to take a nip out of it. For some ridiculous reason, they're still under the bedspread and this overpopulated subterranean world beneath it has taken on rainforest humidity. Yet neither one of them think to throw it off.

Sarah's stopped. She's waiting. She needs to be invited—like a vampire at the front door.

"And did you ever get the dress off?" Des prods, and the whole machine starts back up.

"Oh no," Sarah says in her ear, "Not even when he began to fuck me, after my cum was just dripping out of my pussy." The crude words are special touches just for Des, because Sarah thinks she likes them. It's possible she does. "God, it was so wet, Des. Wetter than you are now. He had a hand on each of my thighs, digging his fingers into them and pulling me close—half of it was him thrusting in, the other half was him pulling me to him. And each hump, our bodies met in the middle with a loud slap.

"The whole time Sue's copping a feel, kneading my breasts. Over the fabric, so it's almost provocative, like something that could be done in public. Danny pounds away like an animal and Sue sometimes just watches him in amazement, smiling. When tears come out of my eyes, she smears them away with her fingertips and tells him to fuck my little cunt harder. Tells him to make me really cry.

"I love how Danny looks when he fucks me. His mouth opens and he breathes low and fast and I think, were it not for the ejaculation, he could do this all night. Sometimes he bends close and starts going like a jackrabbit, and sometimes he almost reclines, takes a bit of a breather and makes up for it with these incredibly long strokes, barreling into me until his crotch is kissing mine and I'm amazed to think how deep he is in me.

"Eventually Sue pulls the panties out of my mouth and by then I've lost the ability to control my voice. I just scream and scream and scream and finally Danny's fucking me so fast I think this is it—he's going to kill me, he's going to fuck me to death—and then I can feel him blow inside me. He pushes himself into the hilt and just lets it out, pump by pump."

"You let... him cum... in you?"

"You want to get free dresses, you have to pay your dues."

"Oh God..." Des moans aloud and bites her lower lip. Sarah has two fingers in her, and it's almost too much, curling faster and faster, sliding up and down like something automatic.

"And then he pulled me closer to him, brought my face right up to his cock and slid it in my mouth, and I sucked out every drop, his body shivering as I did it, Sue stroking my hair and telling me what a... good girl... I was..."

Des's spine arches as she screams.

In the black and white of early morning, Des knows Sarah's awake.

"We've never done that before," Des says.

"I know."

"I wouldn't have let you before."

"I know."

"It's something about those parties, isn't it? Opens a person?"

"I think so."

"Do you know what it is?"

"I can't put the words to it. It's like light. And then you see it, and then sometimes, the non-pet life, the vanilla world, begins to seem like a really boring dream. A pale imitation. That's the danger, you know. You'll get addicted."

"You never warned me about that."

"I'm warning you now."

A few moments go by. A car sounds outside—probably a janitor coming into work.

"Sarah? When we were at the mansion, I could hear you screaming through the walls."

Sarah laughs a little, then says: "Des? When we kissed earlier, I could taste Bill's cock on your tongue."

It's impossible to see without the light, but nevertheless, at that moment Des's brown cheeks turn a definite pink.