Hurt Flower
Realized I haven't posted here in a while, figured I would throw in some recent content. The things that come of vodka on cold winter's nights:
I met her at a New Year’s Eve party, 1999. A big crowd of us were all holed up at my Russian friend’s three story house, high on booze and pot and the impending apocalypse. He was a transplant, my friend, came over on the first wave of Glasnost back in the eighties, but he was all about the American experience now, so we had guns and canned goods and vodka and readiness. None of us really thought it was the end but you could feel a vibe in the air, a sort of desperation, the kind all of mankind or womankind or whateverkind must experience at the thought of extinction.
I guess that’s why I was so attracted to her when I first saw her across that smokey room. She had a way about her, a way of finality, a certain heaviness. Like a lead weight on a rubber sheet, she sort of slanted reality toward herself when she entered. Some IT guy was lecturing me about something, old programming languages or DARPANET protocols or something. I saw her and everything else faded. Color drained out of everyone around her and she moved in a field of blooming hues. She was tall, curvy but lean, dressed mostly in black and a big leather jacket. Long hard legs in knee high black boots. Didn’t walk so much as stalk across the room.
Her eyes were blue, madness blue, and they caught mine. Something inside me snarled a warning, and I ignored it.
She cut through the crowd and was on me instantly. My friend was pushed aside as she backed me against the wall. I braced myself and she grabbed a handful of my shirt and gave me the hard glare.
"So just who the fuck are you?" she asked. There was an accent there, one I couldn’t place. Must be a friend of the Russian, I thought.
Now I’m no lightweight, no amateur to the dance, no greenhorn to the rodeo, so to speak, so I smiled with a curled lip and answered, “I’m that asshole you heard about.”
And she bit the fuck out of me. I gasped a bit in surprise, it was hard enough to almost break the skin. I got a handful of her hair, pulled her roughly off and reversed her into the wall, caught an elbow in the ribs for my trouble. She laughed, arched back, grinding her ass against me. I sank teeth into her neck, just enough to make an impression without leaving a bruise. She growled at me, hand reaching out to turn a nearby doorknob which, luckily, was a hallway into the back of the house. We staggered and struggled down it to a tiny closet at the end and there finally, cramped and sweating, did our best to destroy one another at the stroke of midnight.
It was mad, nasty, crazy sex. The kind of stuff people write magazine columns about, or I guess internet forums these days. She was all muscle and teeth one minute and then all soft curves and softer kisses the next.
When she came the first time, she screamed in my ear and punched me right in the face. Around her second or third orgasm I had my first, and I swear to you, I thought I was going to die, that my heart would explode or that the oxygen in the cramped closet would run out or that maybe, if we were lucky, the end of the fucking world had really happened right here and this was the last thing either of us would experience. But I didn’t die, and she was still going and I would just be damned if I was the first one to quit this so I kept it up. I had never come that hard or that often, and never since.
This went on for hours, a couple of times someone would knock on the door and ask if we were okay and we would both shout at them to fuck off and leave us alone. We punched and bit and pulled and slapped and fucked until we were bruised and blooded and finally, spent and wasted on each other, we curled up together in a ball among the old coats and afghans, not moving but still connected, and she asked me my name and I told her. When I voiced the same question, she answered with something that I thought, because of her accent, was “Barbara Yargar” and that she just missed on the ‘r’ sounds.
I was wrong about that, but I didn’t find out until much later.
When I woke up the next morning she was gone, but in the pocket of my jacket I found a flower, looked like a daisy. I staggered out of the tiny closet to the bathroom to survey the damage. Goddamn but she did a number on me, teeth marks all over, scratch marks crisscrossed my back, yellow and blue bruises on my arms and thighs. Battered but still alive, I tried to clean up a bit before limping downstairs. My friend the Russian was picking up beer cans and bottles and assayed me with a grin.
"Look who is the mister man now?" he said and laughed, "You look like shit my friend, I heard you had a wild time of it last night."
"Yeah," I managed, wincing, "I hope that wasn’t some relative of yours. She left me a flower, look."
"That’s a chamomile, national flower of Russia." he looked puzzled, "My family is in New York or Russia these days, who was this girl?"
I explained to him about the strange girl and her accent and he asked her name, which I told him.
"That doesn’t sound Russian." he said with concern, "Are you saying it right?"
"Well," I said, "I thought she was saying it with an accent so I added the ‘r’ sound, because, well I don’t know
why, I was drunk and it made sense. I guess she really pronounced it this way."
And I said it the way she had said, originally.
His face went pale, then red. “Are you fucking with me, my friend?”
"Hey, what? No, no, man, she pronounced it that way."
He walked over to me, an inch away from my face. “You are telling me she said this was her name? She said this to you?”
"Uh, yeah. What’s wrong?"
"You are telling me this? You are not bullshitting me?" his voice grew louder.
I shook my head no.
He was screaming at me now, shaking with fury, or maybe fear, “You are telling me you fucked Baba Yaga in my house last night! The Grandmother of Witches? Yes? This is where you get the bruises? The bites? She marked you?”
I took a step back, palms up defensively, “Calm down man, if she was a relative I didn’t know.”
"GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY HOUSE!"
And so I got out. I had to look it up on the internet to figure out why he got so angry and I still don’t think I understand it all. I heard he moved a month or so later. I never saw the girl again and I suppose, if you believe such things, I’m lucky.
But sometimes I hear her laugh in the wind.
And of course, I get an erection.
I met her at a New Year’s Eve party, 1999. A big crowd of us were all holed up at my Russian friend’s three story house, high on booze and pot and the impending apocalypse. He was a transplant, my friend, came over on the first wave of Glasnost back in the eighties, but he was all about the American experience now, so we had guns and canned goods and vodka and readiness. None of us really thought it was the end but you could feel a vibe in the air, a sort of desperation, the kind all of mankind or womankind or whateverkind must experience at the thought of extinction.
I guess that’s why I was so attracted to her when I first saw her across that smokey room. She had a way about her, a way of finality, a certain heaviness. Like a lead weight on a rubber sheet, she sort of slanted reality toward herself when she entered. Some IT guy was lecturing me about something, old programming languages or DARPANET protocols or something. I saw her and everything else faded. Color drained out of everyone around her and she moved in a field of blooming hues. She was tall, curvy but lean, dressed mostly in black and a big leather jacket. Long hard legs in knee high black boots. Didn’t walk so much as stalk across the room.
Her eyes were blue, madness blue, and they caught mine. Something inside me snarled a warning, and I ignored it.
She cut through the crowd and was on me instantly. My friend was pushed aside as she backed me against the wall. I braced myself and she grabbed a handful of my shirt and gave me the hard glare.
"So just who the fuck are you?" she asked. There was an accent there, one I couldn’t place. Must be a friend of the Russian, I thought.
Now I’m no lightweight, no amateur to the dance, no greenhorn to the rodeo, so to speak, so I smiled with a curled lip and answered, “I’m that asshole you heard about.”
And she bit the fuck out of me. I gasped a bit in surprise, it was hard enough to almost break the skin. I got a handful of her hair, pulled her roughly off and reversed her into the wall, caught an elbow in the ribs for my trouble. She laughed, arched back, grinding her ass against me. I sank teeth into her neck, just enough to make an impression without leaving a bruise. She growled at me, hand reaching out to turn a nearby doorknob which, luckily, was a hallway into the back of the house. We staggered and struggled down it to a tiny closet at the end and there finally, cramped and sweating, did our best to destroy one another at the stroke of midnight.
It was mad, nasty, crazy sex. The kind of stuff people write magazine columns about, or I guess internet forums these days. She was all muscle and teeth one minute and then all soft curves and softer kisses the next.
When she came the first time, she screamed in my ear and punched me right in the face. Around her second or third orgasm I had my first, and I swear to you, I thought I was going to die, that my heart would explode or that the oxygen in the cramped closet would run out or that maybe, if we were lucky, the end of the fucking world had really happened right here and this was the last thing either of us would experience. But I didn’t die, and she was still going and I would just be damned if I was the first one to quit this so I kept it up. I had never come that hard or that often, and never since.
This went on for hours, a couple of times someone would knock on the door and ask if we were okay and we would both shout at them to fuck off and leave us alone. We punched and bit and pulled and slapped and fucked until we were bruised and blooded and finally, spent and wasted on each other, we curled up together in a ball among the old coats and afghans, not moving but still connected, and she asked me my name and I told her. When I voiced the same question, she answered with something that I thought, because of her accent, was “Barbara Yargar” and that she just missed on the ‘r’ sounds.
I was wrong about that, but I didn’t find out until much later.
When I woke up the next morning she was gone, but in the pocket of my jacket I found a flower, looked like a daisy. I staggered out of the tiny closet to the bathroom to survey the damage. Goddamn but she did a number on me, teeth marks all over, scratch marks crisscrossed my back, yellow and blue bruises on my arms and thighs. Battered but still alive, I tried to clean up a bit before limping downstairs. My friend the Russian was picking up beer cans and bottles and assayed me with a grin.
"Look who is the mister man now?" he said and laughed, "You look like shit my friend, I heard you had a wild time of it last night."
"Yeah," I managed, wincing, "I hope that wasn’t some relative of yours. She left me a flower, look."
"That’s a chamomile, national flower of Russia." he looked puzzled, "My family is in New York or Russia these days, who was this girl?"
I explained to him about the strange girl and her accent and he asked her name, which I told him.
"That doesn’t sound Russian." he said with concern, "Are you saying it right?"
"Well," I said, "I thought she was saying it with an accent so I added the ‘r’ sound, because, well I don’t know
why, I was drunk and it made sense. I guess she really pronounced it this way."
And I said it the way she had said, originally.
His face went pale, then red. “Are you fucking with me, my friend?”
"Hey, what? No, no, man, she pronounced it that way."
He walked over to me, an inch away from my face. “You are telling me she said this was her name? She said this to you?”
"Uh, yeah. What’s wrong?"
"You are telling me this? You are not bullshitting me?" his voice grew louder.
I shook my head no.
He was screaming at me now, shaking with fury, or maybe fear, “You are telling me you fucked Baba Yaga in my house last night! The Grandmother of Witches? Yes? This is where you get the bruises? The bites? She marked you?”
I took a step back, palms up defensively, “Calm down man, if she was a relative I didn’t know.”
"GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY HOUSE!"
And so I got out. I had to look it up on the internet to figure out why he got so angry and I still don’t think I understand it all. I heard he moved a month or so later. I never saw the girl again and I suppose, if you believe such things, I’m lucky.
But sometimes I hear her laugh in the wind.
And of course, I get an erection.