Double-Crossed

Chuck has asked us to write something filthy, dirty and downright disgusting... well, I've done that in all kinds of ways - I hope.  I know for one thing:  I didn't hold back on this one.  I normally do a little.

Enjoy.

Damian had set up the cameras around the room, as asked by Frederick while his flatmate was out on his date with Cindy.  He had to make sure these cameras weren’t able to be seen by anyone; but Frederick told him where to set them up, so he could pick them out when he wanted to.

Damian hated this idea.

He liked Cindy.

She was cool, innocent in just the right ways and very pretty.

This got her all the wrong attention from the wrong guys.

Sighing he picked up his tablet and lined up the signal to all of them, so they’d switch on at the same time and left the flat leaving on a few lamps around the living room to give off the right light for adjustment.  He went to the flat three doors down – an empty one – to do the recording to stay out of the way for the night. 

A few hours passed and he had ordered pizza, had gone out and bought a six pack or so of beer and Frederick came home on the fourth beer.  He put down his beer, wiped his hands on the legs of his jeans and put on his headphones as the show began:

‘Isn’t Damian home?’ Cindy’s slight form walked into view from across the room on the living room camera.

“Damn she’s gorgeous.” Damian whispered to himself, “Why didn’t I ask her out?”

‘Nah, he’s out for the night.’ Frederick’s voice warbled a little.  Damian quickly fixed that with a few taps of the keyboard.  The next camera switched on and the kitchen one brought them up a lot closer, ‘Wanna a coffee?’

“She drinks tea you moron.” Damian said.

‘I’ll have a tea.’ She said walking to the lounge where the camera above the tv on the bookcase switched on. It was hidden between a couple of books and not easily noticed. Cindy sat down, putting her bag on the floor, ‘That was a great meal.’

‘Yeah, I never knew there was an African restaurant here in our small town.’ Frederick remarked finishing in the kitchen. He brought over the two mugs – one of tea, one of coffee – into the living room and joined Cindy on the lounge.  After sitting beside her, Frederick almost had no clue what to do with her… it was as though Damian was going to have to phone him and walk him through how to make a move on her; but then, he look at her and smiled, the edge of his hand touching hers.

You could almost feel the electricity in the air snap between them.

Damian’s heart dropped. 

Cindy liked Frederick.  This is how it always went with women; they liked his friend more than they liked him.  Damian was nice, but Frederick was the charmer; even though he was the dickhead.

He kept a watch on the two in the darkness of the empty flat as they started making out, taking each other’s clothes off, nuzzling, kissing, fumbling… enjoying and…

Damian watched on as Frederick peeled her clothes off piece by piece and had Cindy on the lounge.  Her eyes closed, back arched, arms around his flatmate… when that should have been him doing that to her.  Then, as though this was a porno film, he watched on as they became more and more sweaty and her cries of pleasure filled the air, filled his ears… making him sweaty, making him hard, making him want her so much that he hated himself for doing what he was doing now.

But for some reason, he couldn’t stop himself from watching it, pulling on his pants as his hard-on made everything uncomfortable in every way, becoming sensitive as hell as he tried not to touch himself… and yet couldn’t help himself as he watched.

“This is disgusting…” he muttered knowing if he gave in to playing with himself now, it would mean he’d be the pervert.  Damian tried to ignore his dick and concentrated on … other things, but couldn't. As the two on the screen got busy, he unzipped his jeans, shoved his hand down his pants and jerked off in time with her cries.
He sat back as he felt a sweat break out all over his body.  He shuddered and he climaxed everywhere. Damn, what a mess.  Damian stood awkwardly, and walked off to find something to clean up his mess, ashamed he had let himself get so much pleasure out of something he shouldn't have. 

By the time he looked back at the screen, the two were gone.  He flipped from camera to camera and couldn’t see them anywhere around the living room, kitchen or hall of the flat.  He wondered where they had disappeared to, until Frederick walked into view wearing a towel around his waist.

They had showered together.

She came out soon after with wet hair and grabbed her clothes to get dress, but Frederick was ready to go again.

“Oh, jeez, not again…” Damian sighed taking the headphones off and closing the laptop, getting up from the table.  He pulled at the crotch of his pants again, “I can’t do this.”

He spotted her in the huge library at the university looking very tired.  Cindy was trying to concentrate on her studies when Damian walked to her side, “Hi.”

She looked up and he could see the dark rings under her eyes, “Hey, Damian. How was your weekend?”

He nodded, “Good… you look stuffed… you okay?”

Yawning, she offered him a seat next to her, “I didn’t sleep very well over the weekend.”

“Neither did Frederick.” He said.

“He and I went out… but…” she hesitated, “I… oh I can’t tell you, you’re his friend.”

He looked at her, “Did he hurt you?”

“No… just… I went out to dinner with him and, I think he put something in my tea.” She said looking at her notes blankly, “I woke up in your flat but have no idea how I got there.”

“Oh… I have to tell you something about the weekend.” He said, “You might hate me for it, but I can’t tell you here.”

Cindy pulled the headphones off as she closed the laptop quickly, “I can’t believe you did that!”

He looked to his hands, “Neither can I.”

“Did you watch?”

“A little… but I stopped… I didn’t want to do this.  And I don’t like what he does to girls.” He said, “Did you notice that you never went into his room?”

“Yeah.”

“There’s a reason for that.” Damian said, “And I can show you.” He put out his hand hoping she’d take it, hoping she wouldn’t think he’d be a shit, and he was grateful when she took it, “You have to trust me when I tell you that I never wanted to do any of this to you.”

“Okay.”

They arrived at Damian’s flat and heard noises through the door of Frederick with another girl.  So, instead of going inside, he motioned her down the hall to the empty flat where he was situated, let himself in, turned on the lights and walked to the table.

Closing the door, Cindy checked her phone where she had missed a call from Frederick.  Her thumb brushed the screen as she watched Damian turn on his tablet and have a look at what the cameras were recording.  Sure enough, he had another girl on the lounge in much the same way as he had screwed Cindy, “Oh my god.  He’s just gone onto the next chick.”

“Yeah.” He said turning it off and sitting down, “I’m really sorry.  This should never have happened to you.”

“You truly feel terrible, don’t you?” she touched his hand.

“It’s because I … oh, shit… I really like you, and Frederick just took you away from me.” Damian looked at her hand as he turned his hand around, rubbing her fingers with his thumb, “I really want to be with you Cindy.”

She covered their hands with her left hand, “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

He shrugged, “Dunno.”

Frederick was sitting on the lounge, watching the goings-on between Cindy and Damian on his laptop.  Bette was making coffee for them both as he smiled at the result of his set-up.

“Did it work?” she asked.

“Yep… they’re talking – at long fucking last!” he said, “I’ve been trying to get him to talk to her for so long.”

She placed the coffee mug next to his laptop on the coffee table, as he drew the long usb cord and plugged it into the large flat-screen television, “Now, to watch the fun and games before putting it all onto YouTube.”

“Hey he didn’t do that to you.”

Sipping from his cup, he smirked, “No, but he’s gutless.”

Bette put her mug down, “And you’re just a dick.” She grabbed her things and turned to leave when she heard a click at the door and looked over her shoulder.

Frederick had pulled a gun from somewhere, “You try to leave, and I’ll kill you.”

“Still think you’re a dick.” She put down her bags and rejoined him on the lounge.

Damian and Cindy sat at the table smiling and talking.  He looked over all the equipment sitting around he had brought with him and sighed, “I know you think this is creepy.  But if I was Frederick, I would make something up with another chick… another film… run it on a loop, make it look like something it’s not and double cross me.”

Doubt fleeted across Cindy’s face, “Really?”

“Yeah… really.” He stood, holding her close, whispering in her ear, “Don’t say anything, just pack up, and we’ll go out somewhere.”

She looked into his eyes, smiling, knowing that ‘somewhere’ meant that they were going to bust Frederick at his own game.  She liked where this was going, Damian was exciting… more exciting than Frederick had told her he was.

They sat outside the building in his car as the police busted into Frederick’s flat.  He had worked on pornographic website to make it loop around and hooked it into the cameras in the flat a few doors down from where he lived the night Frederick had him working on the cameras in their place. 

It had taken him all night, but he did it.

Damian had also packed his car with his belongings as well, so the police only caught Frederick, and not a thing on him. 

The police found Frederick with the laptop hooked up to the television, with the film he had ‘taped’ from a few flats down uploading to YouTube while he was sitting on his lounge naked with a chick (who turned out to be a prostitute who was working for Damian and so she spilled the beans immediately to the cops).   The cops let her go, charged Frederick and searched the flat saying they had been tipped off by Damian.

“That little fuck!  He’s so gutless!  He’s so shy!” Frederick screamed.

One of the cops turned to him, “If he’s so gutless and shy, how did he get one over on you so big you didn’t even know it was happening under your nose?”

Haunted

She first woke me at 2am.  I had just moved in the week before and she wasn’t happy with me living here – in her home – as I was yet another intruder she felt she had to get rid of.  However, to her, this was going to be another routine thing to do.

“What the hell!” I sat up in bed and turned on the bedside lamp, turned back but she was gone, “Who the hell was that?”

I didn’t sleep again that night – well not much anyway.  

I had to figure out who was living in my home with me.

The Perverted Leprechaun

Chuck has us chuggin' drinks and cocktails this time.  He put up a link to a site which has recipes to these great drinks - 10 to a page - and I found this fine little ditty.  Enjoy.

I’m in prison because of him.

My hatred for that little man is beyond anything I can say, but I don’t trust him as far as I can throw him; that is if he stood still long enough!  And to think, I trusted myself to be lined up with him through a dating service – a reputable one too!

I’ll start at the beginning – a good place to start.

Fergus was his name.  I knew it was Irish – I mean, just listen to it roll off your tongue!  By the sound of his voice on the phone I kinda knew he was short, but then he told me how tall he was and it confirmed it:  I was going on a date with a little person (no not a midget – that’s not politically correct; and besides, it’s impolite to call them that now). 

Besides, I wasn’t going to turn him down all because of his height.  He was charming, sweet and made me laugh.  And isn’t that part of the experience of dating, that spark?

Well, from the moment we met, I knew something was up with him.  One moment he wasn’t there and the next, he was sitting at the table in the middle of a story I hadn’t heard the beginning of. 

I thought I had zoned out at some point.  But I hadn’t.

I thought something had happened and he popped something in my drink, but he hadn’t – well, not to my knowledge.

Then, Fergus would laugh and touch my hand and I’d laugh too.  It was as though I was charmed by him, as though his touch was something of hypnotism and I couldn’t help myself.

Now I think of it, I don’t actually remember accepting our first date.  I just remember showing up to the café and sitting down at the table.  I checked my phone and its calendar and – sure enough – our date was written in there. 

I just wish I knew how that came to be – how I came to be here in prison so quick.

I hadn’t known him a week and I landed here with charges that nobody wants on their records: murder.

The problem was that nobody believed it wasn’t me; not even my lawyer.  He just gave me a pitiful look and that pinched expression which told me that he’d do what he could… sure… bullshit.

The truth was that Fergus was gone the moment the trigger was pulled and my ex-husband hit the floor of his house.

How we got to be there was a complete mystery to me too; and perverted in every way:  we broke in while Tim was having a shower.  Uh, yeah, that really sounds like that’ll hold up in court that we were invited in… but Fergus told me to tell the cops that.

Which – for some reason – I did while they were cuffing me and telling me my rights, which were to shut up and wait until I got a lawyer.  Of course I didn’t… I kept on blathering on that I was invited in and Fergus was there.

Well, he was… he stood over there in the corner keeping his mouth shut the whole time they were walking around me taking in evidence that I was the one who cooked up this whole thing and killed my ex-husband on my own.

My lawyer sat there while I was handcuffed to the table watching me carefully.  Fergus sat by my side urging me to go on and answer the man… but when I looked back at the lawyer he asked me the dumbest question: “What are you looking at over there?”

I glanced back to Fergus and he was gone!

It was then I realised something was dreadfully wrong and I turned to him, “Okay, I have been on a dating service and Fergus and I were lined up to date.  Look in my handbag and you’ll find a business card for the place.”

The guy wrote it down nodding, “Okay, dating service.”

I told him all about our first date and how everything seemed strange, right up until all this stuff about my ex-husband happened, “Please look into it.”

You know something?  Nothing ever came of the business card. 

I never heard from my lawyer again.  Actually I was given a new one.

I wondered what happened to my last one.

So, this brings me to here… sitting in my prison cell. 

Fergus is gone.  I haven’t seen that little perverted shit anywhere since the lawyer and I talked last.  Looking at my hands, I wonder how long it’ll take until they find out what’s going on.  I hear another inmate being brought in. 

She keeps on talking: “It’s not my fault… it’s the leprechaun… his name is Fergus!  I’m telling you, he disappeared when you guys arrested me.  Please… he was the one who shot my ex-boyfriend.”

“Listen, we’ve heard it all before, a dozen times from you crazy broads.” The screw snapped as he shoved her into the cell with me, “It’s not going to float.”

As the door slammed shut, she cried out through the small window, “He’s left me here to rot! He’s a perverted little shit!”

Looking up at her as she crumbled to the floor, I realise something and smile, “So, you know Fergus too?  What did that perverted leprechaun do to you?” 

The Abstraction of Heaven and Earth

Chuck's prompt was late this time around.  However, not a disappointment.  He gave us a list of sentences and asked us to pick on and put it into a flash fiction of 1,000 words then post it... my sentence is: 'Abstraction is often one floor above you'.

I couldn’t believe it. 

I had made it here without detection.

Heaven that is…

I had made it beyond those famous gates, through the quad into the famous time-keeper’s rooms without anyone knowing I was here.

Okay.  I’ll tell you why I’m so stunned.  I’m not dead.  I haven’t left the mortal coil.  I’m still connected to Earth – and they know it! – and I’m here to search out somebody.

The clock ticked to my left.  And there was a huge, empty, cavernous hall with a massive pipe organ to my right.  It was immense to see this hall, absolutely stunning architecture – I loved it!  This place reminded me of the York Minster, but with no pews and less people.

My feet are cold.

Looking down, I find my shoes had been removed and I can’t find my Doc Martens.  It’s raining outside – storming in fact.  It’s amazing to see it rain in Heaven… it’s nothing like it is on Earth.  Golden sunshine glimmers through the glittering rain outside as it taps gently against the glass of the tiny room I’m standing in.

The clock has stopped ticking.

Its long trendles, beaded with diamonds and sapphires and opals stilled.  Its hands have stopped at 12:15.  I’m not sure if it’s day or night… but something doesn’t seem right as I approach the clock in its glass case.

I shouldn’t be here.  I know this now.  I know what I wanted to know where my friend was… but I don’t think this was the place to come to find out.

“You know, Bethany, you most certainly are in the wrong place.” His voice whispered at my shoulder, “Well, you’re not needed here yet.”

I turned and saw him, in his robes, knowing it was something of a dream, “I’m sorry.  I just want to know where my friend is.”

“She’s fine.  But she’s not here.” He said, “Helene may be very sick, but she’s fighting to stay home.”

I looked to my feet, “You call this place home.”

A friendly smile grows on his face, “Yes… but I mean Earth.  And you’re in the wrong place.  You’re not supposed to be here.  I don’t know who gave you clearance to be in the Time-Keeper’s Quarters, but I should send you back where you belong now.” He reached out to touch my shoulder.

“Wait!” I stepped back, “My shoes… where are my shoes?”

Looking to my feet, he blinked, “Why they’re on your feet, of course.”

I looked to my feet again, to find them back on and tied up.  How they got to be there without my help was beyond me; but I was happy to have, um, found them.  Shrugging, I looked up at him, “Okay, send me back home.”

I woke up to my alarm.

It was 6am. 

Picking it up, I turned it off and put it down on the bedside table then curled up on my side wondering just what the heck happened.  Was it a dream?  Did that just happen?

Damn, it felt so darned real!

“Abstraction is often one floor above you.” Came a whisper over my shoulder of his voice.

Turning over, I flipped the covers off me and sat up, ready to confront whoever had snuck into my house the night before to watch me sleep… to share my bed without my permission… to… to…

…there was nobody there!

My day went on.  I did my usual things of breakfast, going out and shopping and visiting my folks.  Nothing out of the ordinary happened for most of the day. 

Not until I needed to go to my doctors and get a check up on a few old skin complaints.  I approached the building and looked up the first floor where I saw my friend, who I was so worried about sitting by the window reading a magazine. 

She turned the page, spotted me and disappeared from view as she rose from the chair.

My heart sunk.  She didn’t want me to see her.

Bursting into tears on the footpath, I didn’t know what to do.  I really wanted to see my friend, but if she didn’t want to see me, what could I do?

“Bethany?” Helene’s voice was by my side, “Hey, what’s wrong?”

Looking up to her, I sniffed, wiping the heels of my hands over my cheeks, “Helene? I have been looking for you everywhere.”

“I know.  Mum told me.  She told me that she’s been telling you lies to keep me safe.  But she didn’t need to.” Her arm was around me in a minute, “I’m going okay.  I’ve had my liver transplant… now it’s just about getting better.”

“I wish I had known you were better.”

“Who told you to find me here?”

“Nobody, I have an appointment with my skin specialist here.” I said, “We happen to have them in the same building.”

Helene smiled, “Come on, let’s go in.  We can chat until your appointment is done, and we’ll have a cup of coffee or tea afterwards.”

“Oh… that does sound great.” We walked in through the doors and up to the first floor where we both waited in the same waiting room together chatting and catching up with everything over the last two years (yeah, we’re friends who can do that).  Then, the doctor came out, calling my name.

I stood and turned to him, freezing on the spot when I saw his face, “You.”

“Of course me, I’m your doctor.” He smiled that wonderful friendly smile, “Come on, Bethany.”

I followed him to his office and he offered me a chair as he closed the door, “Now, how are you feeling today?”

“It’s you… from, you know…” I pointed up towards the ceiling.

Putting down my file, he clasped his hands on top of it, “Yes it’s me and like I told you…”

“But this isn’t abstraction.”

“You found your friend when you least expected to, didn’t you?”

The first quarter of this piece was written fresh from a weird-ass dream I had this morning.  Right up until the alarm went off at 6am was my dream... verbatim.  It was amazing, brilliant and still very much clear in my mind even now.