"From Childhood's Hour" Chapter 5
Chapter 5
Even at 2 in the morning, Nevada is freaking hot.
I learned that many times over during quite a few summers, a lesson that I'm learning once again, trudging home in the wicked heat. The city is still active, and lights are still on everywhere. It smells like smoke, sex, and drugs. The same as it always has.
My apartment door is locked, but that doesn't really matter, as I know exactly how to hit the door just above the lock with my fist to get it to pop right open.
I make sure to be quiet when I walk in, so as not to disturb my mother, who will be asleep by now. Of course, Evan isn't. He's sitting on the couch with the TV on some stupid local channel, since we don't have cable. He found the thing sitting outside somewhere, and brought it home. I hooked it up, and, even though I'm not a huge fan of television, it can make a good distraction.
“Hello, Evan,” I greet. He's moved into my apartment now. It wasn't a distinct decision or even a day really, he just started staying over longer, and longer, until he eventually just stopped leaving.
“Hey, Spencie,” he says happily. “Come 'ere!” I walk over, and start to sit on the couch next to him, but he pulls me down on his lap instead. I squeal, and I blush when Evan laughs at me because of it.
“Not funny,” I grump, only because I know he's in a good mood, and will laugh with me.
“Is too, pumpkin. You're just so adorable. Like a kitten!”
“I'm a kitten?!” I ask, outraged.
“An annoyed kitten.”
“Hmph.”
He laughs, and playfully nibbles my ear. He whispers, “You know what I'm in the mood for, kitten?”, and grinds his already hard cock against my ass, like I couldn't feel it when I first sat down.
“The same thing you're always in the mood for?” I say instead with a teasing grin.
“Damn straight, kitten.”
I turn, and face him, straddling his lap. I learned my lesson about fighting the sex, and would much rather have it on my terms than his. I grind against his groin, and grin wickedly at him, before undoing his pants, and pulling out his cock. I work it with my hands for awhile, before stripping, and stretching myself for him. Then, I ride him into a blissful completion.
“Damn, kitten,” he tells me, and I grimace, because, really, the kitten thing is getting old. “I love it when you take control like that. Fuckin' hot.”
“I know,” I tell him cockily, wearing a little smirk.
“Come here,” he says, pushing me down on the couch, and laying on top of me. We spend the rest of the night having nice, gentle sex. I fall asleep curled up in his arms. It's moments like these that I can spend with him that make me want to actually stay with him. I love him when he's like this, enough that I can forgive everything else. Because, that's how love works, right? You learn to forgive the things you don't like, and relish the things you love.
* * *
I wake up the next afternoon still curled up on the couch with Evan. He's already awake, playing with strands of my hair.
“Mmmm,” I groan, stretching.
“Hi, sleepy-head,” he says.
“Urghh,” is the most intelligible thing I can manage. He laughs at me, and sits up, so I do, too.
We sit there for a moment, before I decide to take a quick shower. Of course, Evan decides to join me, too, and that shower becomes a lot less quick than I had initially planned.
When I get out, Evan picks out my clothes for the day, and I wordlessly put them on.
“Come on, kitten,” he tells me when I'm finished, and leads me out of the apartment, and to our corner.
The day goes as most do, with Evan, Ethan, and I all standing on the same corner we always do. I stand in the middle while Evan, and Ethan do their best to glare each other to death. No one speaks a word, with the exception of Evan pulling me over towards himself to whisper dirty things in my ear, and grope me a bit. \
We're each called into cars a few times, but more often just led around back to an alley. You'd swear more people came to Vegas because of the prostitution as opposed to the gambling.
At one point, once dusk hit, Evan gets in the car with a man Ethan, and I know to be one of his regulars. He'll be gone for a good thirty minutes, and I always feel myself relax when this happens.
Ethan, and I are silent for half that time when Ethan inevitably brings up my relationship with Evan.
“Spencer, why do you stay with that guy?” he asks.
“Not this again! Ethan, I've told you-”
“And still don't understand! The guy's an ass. He beats you, Spencer. He fucking rapes you!”
“He doesn't rape me!” I yell back.
“He doesn't? Than what do call having to have sex with a guy you don't like and don't want to have sex with, because you know he'll beat you if you don't?”,
“Really?” I say scathingly, latching onto my last defense mechanism: anger. “You're talking to me about having to have sex when I don't want to? Last I checked, we were both standing on street corner selling our asses for money.”
“Yes,” he said. “For. Money. You get nothing out of your relationship with Evan.”
“I get protection,” I tell him. “Besides, he loves me.”
“Ever heard of Stockholm Syndrome?”
“I do not have Stockholm!” I yell loudly enough for people walking across the street to turn, and stare at us.
“You deserve better than him, kid,” he tells me.
“Whatever.”
“I'm serious!” he says. “Has he ever kissed you in a way that makes you feel special. At all?”
“What?”
“Has he ever kissed you? Like this,” Ethan says, and I should know, I really should know that knows the time to get away. Instead, I stand stock still while his lips meet mine. Eventually, when I pull myself out of my shock, I start kissing back even though my brain is screaming at me to push him away.
We part as a car calls Ethan away, and he leaves, which is probably for the better, but I can't help but feel saddened, and empty with him gone.
Then, suddenly, I find myself pushed against the alley wall. My head jerks back, and I feel it bounce off the brick, and I reorient myself just to see Evan's angry, twisted face above my own.
“You fucking slut!” he yells. “Couldn't wait for me to leave before you climb all over someone else! Fuck, Spencer, I knew you were a whore by profession, but not by nature. Is your mommy even all that sick? I bet you do this cause you like it, don't you, not because you're mom needs support-”
“Shut up!” I yell. “Shut up!” Bringing my mom in was just too much.
“What did you say to me you little whore?!”
“I told you to shut the fuck up! You don't know shit!”
He brings back his fist, and hits me right in the face then grabs me by the collar, and leads me into some completely deserted alley. No one could hear me, and if, by chance, they did, they'd ignore it. I feel myself slip into panic, and have to control my breathing.
“St-stop!” I yell! “Stop! Please, Evan, I'm sorry!”
“Too late for that,” he says, his face splitting into a grin crueler than I've ever seen it before. He pulls out a switch-blade, and I start struggling even harder in Evan's grip.
He holds it against my throat, getting ready to kill me, but I kick him where it counts, and run off, looking for something that could possibly help me, moving on adrenaline, and fear more than anything.
Evan catches up with me all too quickly, and tackles me to the ground. He pulls out the blade, and I catch his arms before he can get it to my body, and try to buck him off of me.
“Not gonna work, Spencie,” he says with an evil glint in his eyes. I feel an even stronger spike of fear, and start struggling even harder. I manage to twist his wrist enough to get him drop the blade.
I scramble out from him, and grab the knife before he can. He might be stronger, but I can mover faster.
He jumps on top of me yet again, grabbing the upper position, but before he can use it to his advantage, I take the knife, and stab him with it, blindly striking out with my hands.
I close my eyes when I strike, instinctively not wanting to see the act of violence carried out by my hands, so I feel surprise at the amount of blood pooling onto me, and the strange gurgling sound Evan made before he fell on top of me. Motionless.
With a sound of disgust, and terror I flip him over onto his back next to me to see what happened. I'd hit him square in the neck. He was dead. He was dead almost the second the knife was removed.
“Oh, god,” I say to myself. “Oh my god.”
I turn over, and throw up for a long time. Long enough that I'm surprised I even had that much on my stomach.
“I killed him. I killed a man. I took a man's life.”
Soon, though, the guilt changes relief.
“It's over. It's over.” I find myself laughing like a madman. “It's really really over.”
Epilogue
Even at 2 in the morning, Nevada is freaking hot.
I learned that many times over during quite a few summers, a lesson that I'm learning once again, trudging home in the wicked heat. The city is still active, and lights are still on everywhere. It smells like smoke, sex, and drugs. The same as it always has.
My apartment door is locked, but that doesn't really matter, as I know exactly how to hit the door just above the lock with my fist to get it to pop right open.
I make sure to be quiet when I walk in, so as not to disturb my mother, who will be asleep by now. Of course, Evan isn't. He's sitting on the couch with the TV on some stupid local channel, since we don't have cable. He found the thing sitting outside somewhere, and brought it home. I hooked it up, and, even though I'm not a huge fan of television, it can make a good distraction.
“Hello, Evan,” I greet. He's moved into my apartment now. It wasn't a distinct decision or even a day really, he just started staying over longer, and longer, until he eventually just stopped leaving.
“Hey, Spencie,” he says happily. “Come 'ere!” I walk over, and start to sit on the couch next to him, but he pulls me down on his lap instead. I squeal, and I blush when Evan laughs at me because of it.
“Not funny,” I grump, only because I know he's in a good mood, and will laugh with me.
“Is too, pumpkin. You're just so adorable. Like a kitten!”
“I'm a kitten?!” I ask, outraged.
“An annoyed kitten.”
“Hmph.”
He laughs, and playfully nibbles my ear. He whispers, “You know what I'm in the mood for, kitten?”, and grinds his already hard cock against my ass, like I couldn't feel it when I first sat down.
“The same thing you're always in the mood for?” I say instead with a teasing grin.
“Damn straight, kitten.”
I turn, and face him, straddling his lap. I learned my lesson about fighting the sex, and would much rather have it on my terms than his. I grind against his groin, and grin wickedly at him, before undoing his pants, and pulling out his cock. I work it with my hands for awhile, before stripping, and stretching myself for him. Then, I ride him into a blissful completion.
“Damn, kitten,” he tells me, and I grimace, because, really, the kitten thing is getting old. “I love it when you take control like that. Fuckin' hot.”
“I know,” I tell him cockily, wearing a little smirk.
“Come here,” he says, pushing me down on the couch, and laying on top of me. We spend the rest of the night having nice, gentle sex. I fall asleep curled up in his arms. It's moments like these that I can spend with him that make me want to actually stay with him. I love him when he's like this, enough that I can forgive everything else. Because, that's how love works, right? You learn to forgive the things you don't like, and relish the things you love.
* * *
I wake up the next afternoon still curled up on the couch with Evan. He's already awake, playing with strands of my hair.
“Mmmm,” I groan, stretching.
“Hi, sleepy-head,” he says.
“Urghh,” is the most intelligible thing I can manage. He laughs at me, and sits up, so I do, too.
We sit there for a moment, before I decide to take a quick shower. Of course, Evan decides to join me, too, and that shower becomes a lot less quick than I had initially planned.
When I get out, Evan picks out my clothes for the day, and I wordlessly put them on.
“Come on, kitten,” he tells me when I'm finished, and leads me out of the apartment, and to our corner.
The day goes as most do, with Evan, Ethan, and I all standing on the same corner we always do. I stand in the middle while Evan, and Ethan do their best to glare each other to death. No one speaks a word, with the exception of Evan pulling me over towards himself to whisper dirty things in my ear, and grope me a bit. \
We're each called into cars a few times, but more often just led around back to an alley. You'd swear more people came to Vegas because of the prostitution as opposed to the gambling.
At one point, once dusk hit, Evan gets in the car with a man Ethan, and I know to be one of his regulars. He'll be gone for a good thirty minutes, and I always feel myself relax when this happens.
Ethan, and I are silent for half that time when Ethan inevitably brings up my relationship with Evan.
“Spencer, why do you stay with that guy?” he asks.
“Not this again! Ethan, I've told you-”
“And still don't understand! The guy's an ass. He beats you, Spencer. He fucking rapes you!”
“He doesn't rape me!” I yell back.
“He doesn't? Than what do call having to have sex with a guy you don't like and don't want to have sex with, because you know he'll beat you if you don't?”,
“Really?” I say scathingly, latching onto my last defense mechanism: anger. “You're talking to me about having to have sex when I don't want to? Last I checked, we were both standing on street corner selling our asses for money.”
“Yes,” he said. “For. Money. You get nothing out of your relationship with Evan.”
“I get protection,” I tell him. “Besides, he loves me.”
“Ever heard of Stockholm Syndrome?”
“I do not have Stockholm!” I yell loudly enough for people walking across the street to turn, and stare at us.
“You deserve better than him, kid,” he tells me.
“Whatever.”
“I'm serious!” he says. “Has he ever kissed you in a way that makes you feel special. At all?”
“What?”
“Has he ever kissed you? Like this,” Ethan says, and I should know, I really should know that knows the time to get away. Instead, I stand stock still while his lips meet mine. Eventually, when I pull myself out of my shock, I start kissing back even though my brain is screaming at me to push him away.
We part as a car calls Ethan away, and he leaves, which is probably for the better, but I can't help but feel saddened, and empty with him gone.
Then, suddenly, I find myself pushed against the alley wall. My head jerks back, and I feel it bounce off the brick, and I reorient myself just to see Evan's angry, twisted face above my own.
“You fucking slut!” he yells. “Couldn't wait for me to leave before you climb all over someone else! Fuck, Spencer, I knew you were a whore by profession, but not by nature. Is your mommy even all that sick? I bet you do this cause you like it, don't you, not because you're mom needs support-”
“Shut up!” I yell. “Shut up!” Bringing my mom in was just too much.
“What did you say to me you little whore?!”
“I told you to shut the fuck up! You don't know shit!”
He brings back his fist, and hits me right in the face then grabs me by the collar, and leads me into some completely deserted alley. No one could hear me, and if, by chance, they did, they'd ignore it. I feel myself slip into panic, and have to control my breathing.
“St-stop!” I yell! “Stop! Please, Evan, I'm sorry!”
“Too late for that,” he says, his face splitting into a grin crueler than I've ever seen it before. He pulls out a switch-blade, and I start struggling even harder in Evan's grip.
He holds it against my throat, getting ready to kill me, but I kick him where it counts, and run off, looking for something that could possibly help me, moving on adrenaline, and fear more than anything.
Evan catches up with me all too quickly, and tackles me to the ground. He pulls out the blade, and I catch his arms before he can get it to my body, and try to buck him off of me.
“Not gonna work, Spencie,” he says with an evil glint in his eyes. I feel an even stronger spike of fear, and start struggling even harder. I manage to twist his wrist enough to get him drop the blade.
I scramble out from him, and grab the knife before he can. He might be stronger, but I can mover faster.
He jumps on top of me yet again, grabbing the upper position, but before he can use it to his advantage, I take the knife, and stab him with it, blindly striking out with my hands.
I close my eyes when I strike, instinctively not wanting to see the act of violence carried out by my hands, so I feel surprise at the amount of blood pooling onto me, and the strange gurgling sound Evan made before he fell on top of me. Motionless.
With a sound of disgust, and terror I flip him over onto his back next to me to see what happened. I'd hit him square in the neck. He was dead. He was dead almost the second the knife was removed.
“Oh, god,” I say to myself. “Oh my god.”
I turn over, and throw up for a long time. Long enough that I'm surprised I even had that much on my stomach.
“I killed him. I killed a man. I took a man's life.”
Soon, though, the guilt changes relief.
“It's over. It's over.” I find myself laughing like a madman. “It's really really over.”
Epilogue