Madness Read online

  He’s asking for sex!

  Panicking, I take a breath as I think of everything I’ve been through. I cannot escape the past, nor can I run from the future. All I can do is live the moment—Here. Present. Now.—in the forest with a hunky (but awkward) man with twitching ears, a deadly timepiece, and nice bulging...eyes! Wait...no, wrong fairytale. Nice bulging pecs! Yes, pecs!

  Shit! I don’t do this. I don’t know how.

  “Yes,” I whisper drooling. “I trust you, Whit, I do.”

  “Lift your skirt.”

  Coming out of my brief crotch-focused trance, I hastily scoot away and gulp. “... What?”

  “Lift your skirt,” he repeats with a lascivious command. I dust my hands off and do as I’m told. I don’t question as I pull the fabric up over my knees. His fingers brush over my legs. “Roll over on all fours.”

  “With the skirt up?” my voice cracks.

  “Ye—ssss!” He arrogantly smirks. “Show me.”

  I’m humiliated by my innocence as the twigs and leaves poke into my palms. I won’t be enough for this man or any man for that matter. I’ve been locked away and trapped inside my head while people my age were racking up real time experiences.

  And now, I’m stuck, unable to make up for the lost time and only able to attract bizarre fellows. Maddy was right. I’ll never find a suitable companion.

  He eases closer. Every move he makes causes my wide-eyed inspection and assessment. I’m jumpy, full of anxiety, and need those pills I refused to take for so long. He tilts his head, and I scoot a few inches away. He lifts an eyebrow as he raises his hand, and I bite my lip. I don’t know what he is doing, but I wish he would stop with the intimidation tactics. It’s daunting.

  My body turns from a fiery heat to complete mush under his direction. I don’t understand this lust. Creeping slow, he meticulously cups his hand around my ass cheek. He doesn’t move, allowing me to adjust to the feel of his palm, but I want more. I shift my hips back with an invitation.

  “Why are we doing this, Whit?”

  “Shh, Ellison…shh!” He takes a good minute rubbing my ass cheek. Tipping his head back, he shuts his eyes tight and stutters, “Such a sweet, sweet girl in white panties.” His erection must be massive now, and I agonize over my inability to meet his demands.

  He pops the lace against my thigh, shocking my thoughts back to trusting his lead, and I shiver at what comes next. “Are you going to hurt me?”

  “No, Lys,” he replies, slowly easing his fingers under the fabric. “I’m going to make you better. I’m going to make you all better. All you have to do is agree.”

  My mouth opens as wide as my jaw will allow. “… Agree?”

  “Yes, I need your consent to proceed,” he informs with a tantalizing growl. His enjoyment of his perverse actions is obvious, and I hate to admit that I am turned on as well. “I am, after all, a kind man…a good man…a gentle man.”

  His words caress my skin, drawing up waves of a delirious craving. I think he may be getting fresh with me as I spot the lantern and consider my options. I cannot lose my V-card because I’m caught up in his syllables or...the size of his massive fucking ears.

  I’m torn between the struggles of my mind and the grasp he holds on my heart. My eyes dart from side to side as I whisper, “Are you going to mount me from behind?”

  “I cannot tell you what I’m going to do or that would ruin the surprise,” he says, slithering his words with a wicked grin. “Your consent, Ellison, I need your consent.”

  I stare at the flicker of the flame. If he weren’t tempting my senses with such impeccable regard, I’d throw the lantern in his face and watch his ears go ablaze.

  No, no…I mustn’t kill the rabbit.

  He hasn’t done me any harm. Besides, I like the way his soothing voice ripples through my spirit. He sequesters my demons and calms my inner monster. All he wants is a shelter for his rigid cock, and spreading my legs is the least I can do to thank him for his efforts.

  What would it hurt for me to indulge in his desire?

  Taking a deep breath, I lower my head and prepare for his initial thrust. He’ll probably do it as soon as I whimper an affirmative peep. He’s a kinky one, this Whitman Dare. I never imagined screwing on the forest floor, but now that we’re here...and he’s packing those trousers so supreme.

  “Yes!” I scream out, freeing my repressed needs. “Yes!”

  Locking the tip of his finger into the waistband, he tugs my panties down. I lick my lips and grip my fingers into the debris. I fight for purchase as I await his soul-devouring penetration, but his heavy hand impacts my bottom, and I tumble, spiraling into a dark invisible hole.

  “Don’t get lost on your way down!”

  And I’m falling...falling...falling fast.

  “This is more than I agreed to!” I stammer out, spinning round and round in the intestines of the earth. “You lied to me!”

  “I didn’t!” His shout echoes throughout the winding labyrinth. “I never promised you a thing!”

  Shit.

  I should have read the fine print.

  “How will I ever find someone to love me now?”

  “They’re all going to love you, Ellison!”

  “Lys!” I fiercely correct as Whitman skitters past. “Oh! I’m sorry I didn’t mean to yell in your face. But my name is Lys! And how can they love me when they don’t even like me!”

  “Stop listening to the voices in your head, Ellison!” He taps my noggin and grins. “Follow your heart!” He checks the hands of timepiece once again. “And now I must be going. I’m going to be late!”

  He hastily flies down, turbocharging to his…demise. “Wait!”

  “I can’t wait! I’m going to be late!”

  Down. Down. Down I go.

  Pirouetting like an insane ballerina, I bump into a bookcase, disturbing the relics and awakening their memories. They fall into a cannon type thing with a rectangular barrel and fire off one by one.

  The blast lifts the words from their parchment, and they flutter through the air amidst the covers, spines, and the decimated bits of paper. The ticker-tape parade spins in the vortex of my making.

  An AIN’T lands in my hair and smiles before spinning the dark tresses into a horrid mess as silver keys ping with high notes against the vowels and golden locks thunder with a low bass roll on the consonants. I twirl in the harmony, out of control.

  Mirrors of glass shatter my image as I grieve the sorrowful past of my father’s lost words. Photographs of my youth drip with crimson red, and the sharp fragments shred my pretty periwinkle dress.

  “He was lost, but you’re found!” An owl declares, sweeping to a burly tree, as I leave the tenebrous hollow behind. The past is gone as I hit what I think to be the midway point. My sense of navigation is all asunder. Latitudes and longitudes of the depressing sadness for which I have succumbed to for years are gone in an instant.

  “No!” Terrorized by the unknown, I scream, “I don’t want to find anything but home!”

  “You can’t go home, Lys.”

  Finally, someone calls me by my name.

  “But why?” I ask, drifting by. “There must be an elevator out of this mess!”

  “We’ve destroyed the map of who you once were.”

  I imagine the aesthetically burned edges igniting into flames. “But how will I know who I am?”

  The wise owl winks. “You’ll grow.”

  If there is no gloom, then I will be forced to bloom.

  I don’t understand what is happening, but I know—I am changing. I slip from the pitch-black into a blinding bright white light. I cannot close my eyes because the wafts of lifting fog and gray clouds are too heavenly. Perhaps, I’ve died and gone to heaven.

  Do you honestly believe you can repent for your crimes?

  You’re heinous! A monster!

  Down. Down. Down I go.

  “Stop it!” I bark to the dialogue scattering in my brain. “I can! I can do anythi
ng!”

  Colorful lights strobe in the strange passage as disco music blares. A hive of bees buzz around my body. I note each one marked with a letter. “Are you the spelling bees?”

  “No,” one says with a flamboyant flap of his wings. “We’re the Glam Squad Stingers here to make you over.”

  Slightly distracted by their splendid appearance, I scan their neon hair colors in orange, pink, blue, and green. “You’d look like highlighters if you had a yellow.”

  “That’s what you’re here for!”

  “I don’t want to be yellow,” I contend as they zip around. “I want to be beautiful.”

  Their amount of excess stirs the girl inside of my soul. I’ve never embraced my gender—because when have I had the opportunity? But with their queer celebration and joy, I’ve never been happier to own my curves.

  To the squad, being a girl is the greatest gift ever. Though I have no idea how to capture the essence of their feminine zest, I quietly agree to try. My girly girl is something special to them, and maybe I’ve just been blind in my captivity.

  The blue-haired bee excitedly declares, “Honey, you got a rack worth all the envy in the world!”

  Unsure of their fanfare, I blush and allow it to happen. The alternative is fighting a hive of raging divas, who sparkle brighter than the stars in a blackened sky, and I won’t win. I settle down and prepare to sprinkle glitter with every step.

  Maybe I did too many drugs from Dick’s sack. I’ve overdosed, and this is all a fantastical trip into the whimsical recesses of my cortex. I’ve fried my synapses like an overcooked egg with crispy edges and yolk sizzling in the pan.

  The merry bees whiz around with tubes of shimmering makeup, lush lotions, and clouds of perfume. I’m being transformed in the bowels of hitting rock bottom by a gang of wannabe queens, and I cannot fathom why as I sneeze and query, “Why are you doing me up so?”

  “Because, girl, you must always have your face on!”

  Half the squad strips off my tattered dress, hoisting my boobs within a binding white corset, and wedging a tight pair of boy shorts on my derriere. I feel the fastening of the garters, and the brush of blush hit my cheeks as my hair goes up…up…up in rhinestone clips.

  After tossing a sheer sapphire dress over my body, they splash loads of sparkling jewelry on my person and lace up my white boots. The bees spray everything down in the sensual aroma again. I sneeze, and my eyes water.

  “Right!” I sarcastically agree and sneeze again. “Because even a grim corpse like me needs a little spit-shine for the party of the macabre.”

  The bee with pink hair scolds, “You must stop sneezing before you ruin your mascara! We didn’t do all this work for you to go goth to the party!”

  “You’re so on fleek!” the orange-haired one gushes. “The boys are going to love you!”

  With her green shaved-up, punk-do, one says, “She must save the kingdom of The Darkland so they can love Ellison!”

  “My name is Lys!” I argue with fighting words. “And what kingdom of The Darkland? I’m no soldier! I can’t even save myself!”

  Under their breath, they giggle as I rapidly soar to another level of this hell.

  “Have fun!” one yells as I slide away, unable to stop. “Choose wisely!”

  With my hair coifed and my lips glossed, I expect to glide any moment into a coffin. I wonder if Maddy will come to my funeral. Probably not. She’d be too obsessed with the numerical evaluation, the financial obligation, and the bottom line. Better to stay away than run the risk of having to pay for the Glam Squad Stingers.

  Good looks don’t come cheap.

  Down. Down. Down I go.

  A saxophone oozes with smooth jazz as I delight in my becoming. Low red lights and black walls ignite the cold heart in my chest, just like Whitman Dare. I wanted to fuck him, but now I am here and not there. And he is down below, and I am up above. Maybe when I land, I will straddle over his shaft and impale myself to death.

  “What a monumental hookup!” I muse, blushing at the thought. “Oh, he twisted me up so!”

  “Where at?” a midnight blue butterfly inquires. “Did he arouse your flesh and quench your thirst with his kiss?”

  A yellow swallowtail asks, “Did he peak your nipples and soak your slit, Lys?”

  “You’re asking way too much of me. I don’t have those kinds of feelings,” I reply as a pair of handcuffs and cuffs circle round.

  “Oh, but you do!” the monarch says with a giggle as they gossip amongst themselves.

  “Those things are of my past!”

  “Wrong!” The blue butterfly bats her long lashes. “These things are waiting for you!”

  I gasp at the ball gags and zip-ties and chains and crops. Tubes of lube zoom through the hole at lightning speed. Fitting, really…well. Flustered, I inquire, “Where am I going?”

  “You must save their future, Lys!”

  “With all this?” I wrinkle my nose at the whips slithering past. “I can’t! I want to go back!”

  “You wait and see. The fates won’t let you leave.”

  Down. Down. Down I fall.

  The end of the tunnel makes a thudding noise as I enter the exit. I’m deposited into a lovely room and gracefully float onto my knees. Looking around the mirrored room, I wonder who I pissed off.

  Maybe I shouldn’t have swallowed all of Dick’s magical wonder…or did I?

  Wait, I remember. Where is that sexy hare?

  “Whit? Whitman? Mr. Dare… I’ve arrived!”

  Oh, indeed, Lys, you have.

  3

  Pick the D!ck

  I cautiously stand and notice my reflection. I look nothing like the girl I was a bit…hours…months…years ago. I have no idea how long I’ve been in the waterslide ride, minus the water. I don’t even know if they have water in this place, but if they don’t, I won’t last long. I fear someone will find my corpse, dried and withered, and be unable to recognize me.

  The same could be said of the living.

  The entire room is mirrored. The ceiling and floors reflect my image. Only one door exists, and it’s no bigger than a small mailbox. “How am I supposed to get through there?”

  I lower onto my belly and peer at the splendid gardens awaiting just past the opening. Sticking my hand through the hole, I see nothing but my arm as it fills the view. “Shit!”

  In frustration, I stomp around in a brief tantrum. “Someone let me out of here! I must get home! I have to go to prison! I’m a very dangerous girl!” I yell, thinking all the screaming in the world is pointless, so I try a whisper.

  Tiny hole? Tiny voice?

  “Someone, please remove me from this nightmare. Wake me up already! I promise to be good! I’m just a young woman. I can’t survive alone…”

  I slump to my knees and consider crying my eyes out, but I hear the bees reminder—“We didn’t do all this work for you to go goth to the party!” I fall into a hysterical bout of laughter. There won’t be any party on this day or any day because I can’t get out of this mirrored room and away from seeing who I am.

  “... Shit, really?”

  I’ve had about enough of this psychoanalytic jargon. I’m not the girl in the mirror. I am a killer, and I’ve enjoyed it. No amount of lash extensions and lace will change the facts.

  I’m homicidal.

  I’ve learned to deal with going off on a moment’s notice, but others may see it differently, particularly if they’re the focus of my rampage.

  I note an absurd looking eight-legged table. I approach it with caution, not wanting to tango with a waist-high arachnid.

  On the tabletop (the spider’s carapace), a minuscule bottle on a cord waits. I ease closer and hastily swipe the bottle before dashing to the other side of the room, which makes no sense, really. If The Spider wants to attack, then she can zip across the floor and strike. I have nowhere to run as everywhere I look, I see what I’ve become.

  Keeping one eye on the table, I scrupulously inspect th
e bottle. In absurdly small font, I read the words, “Drink Me, Bitch.”

  How in the world did someone manage to get all those letters on this tiny bottle? Even more important, should I follow the instructions?

  I tilt my head to and fro as I note The Spider opening an eye. Oh, no. I move my back to the wall, but all I’ve done is manage to pin myself in place for her fangs. Assuming she has fangs...assuming she is a she...but it really may be a he. Oh, this world is so bizarre for all I know she, he, or they may have a gleaming white smile.

  With a high-pitched voice reminiscent of my mother, she advises, “You should drink it.” I huff as she rolls her many eyes. “They need your assistance.”

  Feeling marginally safe, I whine, “Why does everyone keep saying they need my assistance?”

  “You are the Ellison.”

  I don’t bother to correct her as the pearly whites I imagined are two enormous, sharp fangs. “Say your name!” she scolds. “Say it loud!”

  I shuffle my feet tucked inside of the boots. If they weren’t white, I’d love them. Although the bees pointed out that I didn’t need to exemplify my darker side, I looked damn good in black. I was emo. And goth. And demented. And slightly deranged if I’m being frank.

  Dr. Witter-Ratrow diagnosed my sick self with every mental illness imaginable. For which, I would need to gulp pills for the rest of my life to be classified as marginally normal, but maybe the creepy-crawly has a point. I open and close my mouth half a dozen times, but nothing comes out.

  “Do it, now,” she warns, tapping her toes…or the foot of the table.

  “Ellison Alicia Kingsley,” I meekly reply.

  She blinks and scoffs, “Again!”

  Understanding how badly I wish to remain puncture-free, I loudly say, “My name is Ellison.”

  “Now, remember it!” she declares, closing her eyes.

  I open the bottle and take a whiff. The overwhelming smell of watermelon hits my nose. I sniff again. Or is that peanut butter? Or corn chips?