Jeremiah Quick (15 page)

It came again, a definite thud, not
frightening, not exactly painful.

She counted to two on her fingers, then
waited a beat… and then… three. This one definitely hard enough for
her to catch her breath. And… four – but no, it didn't come. Wait,
wait. She was already anticipating his rhythm – because it was what
she'd come to expect – fast or slow, there was always a discernible
rhythm.

But… nothing. And then he was touching her
hand, curling her fingers into her palm, stretching his neck to
kiss her fist, holding it enclosed in his hand for a minute,
shaking his head, a slow deliberate
No
.

She tried to follow his silent message. It
was obvious he didn't want her to count. Because… this wasn't
punishment?

Oh! Why did he make it so difficult? If he'd
just
talk,
she could bear it
.
She could bear
anything, if he would only explain.

When he resumed the flogging there was a
rhythm, all right – and nothing Pretty would have been able to
count on her fingers. The tails fell and thudded, one lash after
another, and she reacted not at all at first, but later – and she
had no idea how much later – with struggles and wiggles and
flinging her head back and forth, trying to hard not to make noise,
but her back was unbearably hot, some kind of mush and burning, and
what she didn't identify as pain with the first few blows, and
maybe not even the first quarter of an hour – now she knew was the
worst torture she'd ever been subjected to.

And she knew how to make it stop.

She heaved, and cried out, and stopped
fighting the burning in her eyes and let them fill with the tears
he wanted.

And then the flogger was on the floor and
Jeremiah was facing her from the other side of the wood, blocking
her from seeing herself in the mirror, leaning in and lapping at
her face.

In the silence, Pretty could almost hear him
thinking, coaxing,
Yes… cry for me. You know I love it
.

Hands patting her hair, lifting it from her
neck, blowing cool breath into the sweaty mess, and then he was
walking around her again, too close, until he was directly behind
her. Pretty watched him in the mirror as he took one last step and
leaned, pressing a hundred tiny spikes into her sensitized flesh,
hard enough that not only did she absolutely groan out loud… she
writhed and moaned and
came
- the unexpected orgasm tearing
through her, shuddering her limbs, arching her spine as much as
possible while strapped to the frame, hips frantically thrusting
into the space beneath the crossbeams where there was nothing to
thrust against.

Just. From. That.

The press of his armor.

Ahh, Jeremiah
, she thought,
we're
both fucked, aren't we?

And he… he took his silence and left. Yet
again.

Without even giving her a taste of
chocolate.

Jeremiah was in complete control of their
relationship, always. Pretty was open, friendly, talkative. Too
much so, perhaps, for he tended to ignore her when she was at her
most chatty, when she was talking just for the sake of talk, to
fill in the silence. Or he'd find a way to shut her down. Once, she
complained to him about the fainting girl. How, the moment anyone
had something they were excited to tell the group, the fainting
girl collapsed into a boneless heap on the floor, face slack,
eyelids fluttering, interrupting the conversation, pulling all the
attention to herself.

Pretty thought it was suspect that the
fainting girl never got hurt. And because Jeremiah hated bullshit,
she thought she'd have his sympathy. So when she paused to elicit
some response from him about the gossipy complaint, she was
startled to find frown lines marking his forehead, and one of his
colder expressions directed at her. "It's her reality, not yours.
Maybe she doesn’t know any other way to ask for attention."

What? He was going to take her side? But
that girl drove Pretty crazy…

"Be a better friend," he suggested. "Listen
and be kind."

Huh.

That shut her up for the rest of the lunch
period, quietly pouting and feeling very uncool. Which was as
ridiculous as anything – Jeremiah was the opposite of cool – and
yet… somehow his opinion of Pretty mattered, and it bothered her
that he thought she was being unkind.

Still. The next time the girl fainted,
Pretty found herself rushing toward her instead of standing back
rolling eyes at the ceiling, and then made herself be quiet, more
available to listen.

Jeremiah never gossiped. Not even when Chill
shaved his eyebrows, and everyone seemed to think it was
exceptionally weird, and it made Pretty self-conscious of her own
eyebrows, so light blonde they were almost invisible.

"But why did he do it?" she asked
Jeremiah.

"Ask him."

That made her squirm. "I don't want to ask
him. I want you to tell me."

"Listen, Precious. I don't talk about you to
other people. And I won't talk about Chill to you. If you have a
question about his fucking eyebrows,
ask him
. It's not hard.
You open your mouth and let words come out. It's not like you have
any trouble with that any other time."

She didn't know how to explain it – how
sometimes it was her very shyness that made her chatter, that
silence felt heavy and non-productive. If she was silent, and
Jeremiah didn't talk, they weren't interacting, and therefore
Pretty wasn't learning more about him.

Again, ridiculous, because she only ever
learned what he was good and ready to share.

She didn't know his favorite food, his
secret fear, his hope for the future. She could name a band or two
he liked, but didn't know if they were his favorites. She knew he
liked black, and British flags, and safety pins. And spikes.

The next morning Jeremiah gave her a hard
nudge in Chill's direction, and a very long, steady look.

She rolled her eyes, and he answered with a
quick jerk of his chin, again indicating Chill.

All right, all right. Loud and clear.
Asshole
.

She ambled toward Chill, hating to interact
with him, really, because he was… well. She was going to say
weirder than Jeremiah, but that wasn't true. Chill was differently
weird, obviously enmeshed in the same sub-culture, but somehow…
less appealing. He came across as less bright – to the point that
knowing his IQ was genius level made him almost like an idiot
savant. And she felt shitty just thinking that.

"Hey, Chill," she said, letting her shoulder
bump against his in greeting. She didn't know why he was out here
all the time – he didn't even smoke. But that was unfair, too. She
knew that he went where Jeremiah went.

"Good morn-ing, Sun Shine," he said,
enunciating each syllable, making both morning and sunshine into
two words, and looking directly into her eyes. He was one of the
shorter guys around, only a couple inches taller than Pretty.

"Can I ask you something that might be
personal?"

He shrugged, but his pupils flared for just
a second, and his expression was open, so she took the chance. "Why
did you shave your eyebrows off? Everybody's wondering."

"Interesting," he said, in the same concise
tone. "Not one person has asked."

"I'm asking," she said, and offered a tiny
smile.

His facial expression didn't change, but his
eyes seemed maybe a little warmer. "My cat died."

She nodded and smiled, pretending that this
made perfect sense, but of course, it made no sense at all.

"He found me seven years ago, and he never
left. I will mourn him until the next cat finds me."

It was the most words she'd ever heard him
say in one stretch.

She gave up trying to understand and decided
to just be kind, which came naturally to her. "I'm sorry about your
cat," she said. "That sucks."

He nodded, and then turned slightly away,
breaking eye contact with her to glare toward the red line, where
one of the asshole wanna-be jock stars was leaning into Jeremiah's
space, saying something heated.

Pretty caught the word 'faggot' and the word
'freak,' and then she was there, sliding in between them, the back
of her winter coat scraping against the studs of Jeremiah's leather
jacket. "What's your problem? Jesus, don't you have any friends out
here?"

This made the jock asshole laugh, and she
felt Jeremiah's breath hot against her ear as he said quietly, "Not
helping."

"There's no help for a permanent asshole,"
she answered, talking to both of them. "But hey, Nick, you know
Melinda?" Pretty gestured across the pavement at the fainting girl.
"Over there, reddish hair, pixie face? That girl thinks you're
totally mint. Go talk to her."

It was like tossing a coin past a crow, or a
peanut near a squirrel. Nick the wanna-be jock held up two middle
fingers as he backed away, then turned and made sure he tucked them
away before sauntering through Pretty's friend group and saying
something that made Melinda blush and smile.

The bell for first period would ring in
three minutes at the most.

She didn't even turn to look at Jeremiah.
She knew she would be less than pleased.

"What the hell were you doing?" he asked,
his voice rougher than gravel, which she took to mean either he was
pissed
, or he was trying not to cry.

She had no idea. She still didn't look at
him. "I
like
you. I hate when they're assholes."

"There will always be assholes. I don't want
you to do that, ever. I don't need you to stand up for me."

"But you don't do anything, you just take
it. And you… you could slay them with words, easy. If you wanted
to." Because he slayed her with his words, all the time. And then
she was the one crying.

His whole voice, hell, his whole body, when
she turned to see him walking backward, was one long, lean sneer.
"They're not worth either my time or my energy. And I'm a pacifist.
If you don't know what that means, look it up."

The bell rang.

Bastard
, she hissed to herself, but
he must have heard because the sneer grew even more well-defined,
and he flicked his fingers at her, then toward the entrance to the
school. "See you soon, Precious."

She knew what a pacifist was, but when she
got to third period English she looked it up anyway, unsurprised to
read
a person opposed to war or violence of any kind
.

Oh so lovely and idealistic, but Pretty was
still pissed off. She hated that Jeremiah stood still and let the
assholes hit, shove, and humiliate him. She guessed she wasn't a
pacifist. She believed in standing up for yourself. She suspected
Jeremiah would say that by being passive, he was standing up for
something bigger than himself. But the truth was, it made him look
like a coward, helpless, and she hate hate hated that. He wasn't
helpless, he was brilliant. And if he chose to look odd, well, what
of it? The world didn't need more and more and more of the same,
did it? Different was interesting. Fascinating, and Pretty didn't
understand why more people didn't get that – why they were so
terribly afraid of
different
.

Because humans are pack animals. Everyone
wants to fit in, we all want to belong
, her brain answered,
very, very quietly.

And she never would, not for a long, long
time.

Not with Jeremiah; not with Drew or Laughing
Girl. Not at school or work or her parents' house.

She would build her own reality, her own
little place of fitting in. And she would find belonging. And
twenty years later, she'd let Jeremiah Quick lead her away from it.
And for what? To fuck? To finish something they'd started eons
ago?

Chapter 15

H
e stayed away for
a long time.

Long enough for the inevitable to happen –
the bladder twinge, and much, much worse – a twisting rolling cramp
deep in her gut that she fought, oh, with everything she had, but
to no avail.

She cried, then, in anticipation of the
humiliation of his return, and couldn't bear it, couldn't bear any
of this.

He would take all of her away, and then
what?

On a deeper level, she knew exactly what;
there would be nothing left. Of either of them

The click of the door startled her to
attention, horrified all over again.

She was a mess, all aching arms and
trembling limbs and stink.

The first thing he did was come around the X
frame and look into her face. The makeup was smudged, almost worn
away, and his eyes were initially kind, thumbs brushing her cheeks
as he kissed her mouth sweetly, ignoring the fact that her legs
were a mess of urine and shit. Some deep interior part of her
rolled over, offering soft underbelly, trusting his kindness. But
then, as if he felt the salty trails of tears beneath the pads of
his thumbs, his kindness faded, and eyes turned cold, detached.

He said, "You cried without me. Pity. I'm
disappointed in you."

Hearing his voice after what felt like days
was an overwhelming gift, but the words, themselves, crushed
her.

She would have collapsed without the bonds,
curled up on the floor as far into herself as she could go, arms
wrapped over her head to hide her face, so strong was her sense of
shame.

But of course she could do none of that,
only hang helplessly and endure.

"So, so disappointed, Pretty."

That brought another wave of shame, that he,
who rarely addressed her by name, would call her pretty when she
was this much of a mess.

It felt like a betrayal, and she felt
little, and helpless, and tears slipped from her eyes like an
apology.

He kissed them away, his lips against her
cheek the gentlest touch. And then he smiled into her eyes. "A
peace offering. Rather brilliant of you. Are you tired of being
silent?"