Don't Tell (Alexandra1405 & Mathim)

[MoldaviteGreen]

“I really don’t think that this is a good idea….”

“Don’t be such a pussy, Tom. It’s his birthday, he’ll fucking love it. You don’t have to do anything other than be there, alright? I never said that we would be sharing.”

“I’m not being a pussy, I’m just being logical. He won’t be expecting this.”

“Good.”

For most, this night was like any other. The city had quietened from its loud roar of flowing traffic, to the dull whisper of midnight breeze catching stray litter along the sidewalk. Silver orb of the moon hung low against the backdrop of brewing storm, the clouds rolling in from the eastern seaboard bringing with them the promise of pelting rain and the claps of thunder. This was a city that was rumoured to never sleep, and finding those that preferred to live during the window of dusk and dawn was no difficult feat. All it took was a glance down a narrow alleyway, a peek into a seemingly abandoned parking lot, and a venture into a downtown club that still pulsed with heavy bass. The nightlife was the pride for some of the people who called this city home, the kind that would draw young people across the state borders simply to get a taste. Narcotics were pushed across tables to settle deals. Black market trinkets shared with potential bed-mates. Dirty money exchanged between equally dirty hands out the back of clubs under the cover of long shadows. With nightlife came crime, and with crime came trouble. Yet, trouble didn’t follow all nefarious activities, as one may think; especially when it was two broad-shouldered young men promising a large sum of money for a night of fun.

Their conditions were simple—anything goes. There’d be a safe word, of course, should things become far too intense, but if it were used the sum of money would be cut in half and it would have barely been worth her time. Their goal, it seemed, was to surprise a member of their tight-knitted brotherhood for his birthday, while humiliating her in turn. They were specific in their requirements, in their desire for her dress, and she was left with no other option but to accept. There could be no negotiating when men had something solidified in their mind, when they were desperately certain that an idea needed to be one thing and one thing only. Stubborn creatures, she had come to realise during her time stalking the night, but often dumb-witted enough that their own determination allowed her to rob them blind in the end.

She was a good choice, they’d decided upon spotting her as she’d leaned across the nightclub bar with the curve of her ass mostly on show. Their friend had particular tastes, the kind that left them searching for nights on end to find a girl who met that strict criteria. Finding her was like hitting the jackpot, their excitement barely containable. Yet now, as they lingered outside an abandoned warehouse amongst the shadows, doubts had began to nestle inside the mind of just one. Thomas had never truly believed that this was a great idea; purchasing a stripper for a night as a birthday present, and he’d agreed even less when Max had lured the girl into giving up her body for the entire six hour night to do with as they please. Max may not have been explicit, in his usual round-about way, but there had been mutual, silent understanding that had passed between the jock and the redhead when the deal had been struck by a firm shake of hands. A stripper, she may have been, but a prostitute she was now.

Weight shifted from foot to foot, Thomas keeping olive hands tucked deeply inside his thick coat that was barely enough to stave off the chill. Howling wind caught a lock of dark, dishevelled hair to toss it into equally dark eyes before he quickly brushed it aside. “What if she changes her mind and doesn’t come?”

A groan escaped the blonde standing beside him, cream fingers plucking burning cigarette from between lips as Max released smoky breath into chilled night air with a roll of his eyes. “That’s exactly why I gave her some of the money upfront, so she would have to come in order to claim the rest.” Wide-palm slapped Thomas roughly on the shoulder, enough to make the young man stagger a step before self-righting as Max grinned wolfishly. “Unlike you, I know exactly how to do business with women of the night. They’re greedy fucking things. Give them a taste of the money, and they’ll be desperate enough to follow through. Never pay them upfront. They’ll send you to the cleaners, otherwise.” Another drag was stolen from the cigarette, the tip flaring bright amber as smoke was drawn deep into lungs, Max running a hand through neat blonde hair. He said nothing more as he held out the roll of paper to his friend, a silent suggestion that Thomas take a hit and relax a little.

Despite the assurance from Max that all would be well and that all had been handled, Thomas still felt on edge as he began to pace a short length of the sidewalk; clearly on edge as his mind wandered. “What if the boys take him to the wrong place?”

Max pinned him with a harsh glare. “How many abandoned warehouses do you know of that’s covered with graffiti and a blue set of tits?” After a shrug from Thomas, the blonde smirked darkly. “Exactly. They’ll be here, it won’t be long. She better fucking arrive before—“

“Before what, exactly?”

Neither of the young men had been paying keen attention to their surroundings, despite how either one bragged about being able to hear someone approaching from a mile away. Their senses had been dulled by the chilled bite of the wind, and they’d become distracted in their bickering. In their failure to recognise the sound of heels across cement sidewalk and to notice the linger of a petite presence against the corner of the building while cast in shadow, it had given her ample opportunity to assess them from close range. One seemed anxious, almost fearful, as if he’d realised that this was possibly their worst idea. The other, the one that she had struck the deal with, remained as cocky as ever. So, it wasn’t just a ruse, then, she thought to herself as lean-toned arms came to cross beneath heavy bust. Cloaked in the gloom of the shadow, she remained shrouded in the darkness as both men turned in place to pin her with a stare.

“Ah,” Max nodded, tossing his cigarette onto the sidewalk to crush it beneath his boot, grinding it into the pavement. “You’re a little late than expected, but better than never.” Rubbing a knuckle against the underside of his nose, the tip chilled from the harsh wind, he pulled his bomber jacket a little tighter about his broad frame as he moved towards her. Warm hand was anything from friendly as he caught her by the elbow, tugging her away from the cement wall and towards the steps leading inwards. Her beauty was lost on him, the young woman having been branded with a label that decreased her appeal tenfold instantly. “You need to get ready, they’ll be coming soon and you haven’t left yourself much time.” Elbow was tossed aside as Max pushed her into the foyer, the concrete underfoot cracked and lopsided. “Get moving.”

She chose to say nothing, biting harshly at the inside of her cheek until it bled copper over her tongue. Saying something now would only aggravate the prick, and so she stole back her arm, tossed fiery curls over the narrow of her shoulder, and cut a path along the decrepit foyer to the metal staircase. “I’m assuming that you have some idea as to where you’d like this to be carried out?” Her siren-song voice was as cold as it was cruel as it carried over her shoulder to the two young men lingering by the entrance. “Or shall I just pick a room myself?”

“Down here is perfectly fine,” Max called, his own voice bitter, carried on the echo of the abandoned building as he closed the rickety doors behind them to seal out the wind. “Try and make yourself tight, sweetheart. Our buddy doesn’t appreciate loose cunts.” The snicker that followed went ignored by the young woman who disappeared into a room off to the side. It did, however, earn a hard punch from Thomas who glared at his friend darkly. “What?” Max shrugged, chuckling deeply to himself. “She’s probably fucked dozens of guys. You honestly think that her snatch is still tight? You’re dreaming.”

“We paid her for a show, not for her to fuck him,” Thomas grumbled sourly, moving towards the back of the warehouse. They didn’t have long before the others arrived, and if they wanted this to run smoothly, they needed to get to work. His footfalls were heavy, not waiting for Max who was still laughing darkly to himself.

“By ‘we’, I hope you mean me. Secondly, I paid her for a show and for him to do whatever the fuck he wants with her. Whether that’s for her to suck him off, or to be spit-roasted, I don’t care; but I’m getting what I paid for.” Max trailed after his friend as they made their way into the back of the abandoned warehouse. It was the perfect scene, he realised. The rest of their friends would arrive with birthday boy in tow, push through the doors to be greeted with a single black chair opposite a tall ice-cream cake. The grin upon his face was almost as sadistic as it was wicked as he dragged the chair into the centre of the space until it was positioned perfectly beneath one of the few light bulbs that swung from wiring. The rest of them would need good lighting to be able to enjoy the show, after all, even if the birthday boy didn’t want to share the goods. “I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to see the look on his face.”

Up the stairs in a small glass-windowed room that once belonged to the warehouse foreman, the young woman lingered before the grimy pane of glass, staring absentmindedly at her dull reflection. It had always amused her that she remained nameless to the men she stripped for, simply labelled “the redhead” and never anything more. Men chose nicknames based on features; that was what she had learned when she’d fled the small country town in the search of something more worthwhile. It could be “big tits” one night, and “baby-doll” the next. Men were shallow creatures, and as much as she hated to admit it, she’d crafted something from her talent at being able to manipulate them. They barely noticed, at the end of a night, when a wallet went missing or when a wad of cash took a walk when distracted by toned body and heavy bust.

How long had it been since her name had been uttered in disappointment or detest? How long had it been since it was cried in genuine euphoria or heartfelt pain? Weeks. Months. Two years. For so long she had gone nameless, where it sounded almost foreign to herself when she whispered it. Eris. It meant so much more than the goddess of chaos and discord, a rather fitting name for a young woman who tended to buck the system. Eris, to her family, meant a young woman who packed only the essentials before fleeing in the middle of a summer night never to be heard from again. Eris, to her friends, meant the bizarre young woman who was too keen on causing as much trouble as possible. Eris, to the local police, meant another attempt at making a charge but being unable to find the perfect criteria to write the papers. Eris, to her high school, meant a budding young woman who had great aspirations until one critical incident that had been scratched from all records. In the two years since that one fateful night, her name had lost its meaning to no one but herself. Who even was she?

“Who even am I?”

Dull eyes blinked back at her, her own reflection muddied by the dirt that clung to the window that overlooked the warehouse floor where the two young men began to ready what seemed to be her working space. Her features had lost the fullness of life, the colour of her skin the same shade of warm cream but seemingly lacklustre. Eris appeared exactly as the same as she had when she’d fled the home in the middle of suburbia in the middle of the night; albeit a little rougher around the edges. Bronze freckles still decorated round cheekbones. Her lips still peaked sharply in the cupid bow and their familiar shade of deep-rose that glistened now as pink tongue swept across their tiers. Doe-eyes were their stunning shade of brilliant blue; the colour of bright sapphires that shone with allure of the Mediterranean ocean. Red hair was pulled back and bunched together atop her head, out of the way and out of her face, though wisps of copper fell to frame the heart of her face. The dark kohl about her eyes was new, giving her appearance an edge that she lacked two years ago that warned most against messing with her. The shell of her right ear was pierced several times over with delicate golden studs that glistened beneath the flickering, amber-hue light. Her once usual blue jeans had been traded for those stained black, rips over her knees. Everything about Eris now appeared dark and rough; a soul that had become wayward.

It didn’t take her long to strip down from her warm layers that had staved off the chill of the night on her journey to the abandoned warehouse, the pile on the desk growing in size. Soon, she stood before the window, cream hands brushing absentmindedly at the curve of her waist as fingers moved to adjust the strap at the narrow of her shoulder; its own slope freckled with bronze. Her outfit was simple enough, despite the seemingly complex straps that ran over the crest of her chest. Sheer black stockings reached from beneath suede straps of heels to the milky flesh of her thighs, stopping only to be clasped by the suspenders that sat snug just beneath her hips. Pin was pulled from the pile of red hair, releasing and allowing the copper curls to tumble to the narrow of her waist where a black, corset-like belt sat snugly. They’d been specific in their requests, and Eris had gone to the effort to ensure that she met all specifications; including the bunny-eared black mask that shielded most of her features save from the red lips she painted as she leaned towards the glass as she traced lipstick over plump tiers.

With a smirk at her reflection that was as wicked as it was dark, Eris tilted her chin skyward just an inch with reaffirmed confidence. “We’ll see what their buddy appreciates soon enough.”

Downstairs, Max and Thomas had returned to bickering. Would it be too comical for her to come out from the cake? Would it take away from the fact that they were presenting him with a stripper? Thomas, of course, was concerned with the sterility of the cake after it would have had a stripper turned prostitute within it. Max, however, couldn’t have cared less and was simply concerned about creating as much shock factor as possible. They stood together with their backs to the metal staircase, arms crossed over broad chests as they contemplated their next decision. How would they present the birthday boy with his present?

“The cake is a bit much, don’t you think?” Eris called to them from the stairwell, flicking a lock of fiery hair over her shoulder as her heels clicked softly over broken concrete as she stalked towards them. “It’s almost comical. Stereotypical. Boring, even. Not that I would have expected anything more creative from you, that is.” Her grin was wicked as she paced about them, dipping a finger into the ice-cream frosting before bringing it towards red-painted lips to slip within the warmth of her mouth. Bright eyes pinned Max with a look akin to a glare. “I’m not getting inside this ridiculous thing until I know they’ll be here in five minutes.”

Phone pinged, immediately snatching Thomas’s attention as he did his best to avoid looking at the stripper. “Funny you’d say that because they’re here….”

 

[Mathim]

Chris Bowman, if one didn't know anything about his home life, would have said he had it pretty damn good. Athletic and talented, but also studious and intelligent, as well as artistic and creative, he was an enormously well-rounded student. He got all sorts of positive attention from his teachers and had friends belonging to every major clique in the school. Him staying over at friends' houses five days a week was considered normal for him, and nobody ever questioned why he was so eager not to ever be at home with his family, it was just assumed that there was more to offer for him to be in the company of his peers, even on school nights. He would always just give the eye-rolling shrug if the topic of his family came up, making them seem like boring lame-o's that weren't even worth the wasting of breath.

The yearbook would have no dearth of pictures of him in what was (at the time) considered his prime, though even he didn't surmise just how much higher he would soar once he graduated. In the meantime, however, he was a valued member of the basketball team and received athletic scholarships that on their own would have gotten him comfortably through the years of college coming up. His dark red hair was already perfect for someone playing sports and needing it out of the way, trimmed very short on the sides and leaving an otherwise wide mohawk that seemed naturally inclined to slick itself back and somehow stay that way even when sweaty and following his active body. He was already 6'2" as well which was a real edge when most of the team didn't quite hit 6 feet even, though he lamented still not being able to dunk. He was very good-natured about it when some of the African-American members of the team razzed him about that and that made him even more popular for being able to take a joke. Him being freckle-free unlike his sister didn't hurt either, though he did express a liking for girls who had them.

Academically, he was a 4.0 student all four years of high school. He was just seemingly naturally gifted, but that didn't mean he put no effort into studying. He even tutored his friends and classmates, simplifying and breaking down the lessons into more digestible bits, which always got them asking why the teachers didn't simply present the material in that way, and giving the student body the perception that Chris knew more about the subjects than the teachers did. His SAT scores being the highest not only in his school but in the entire school district, could have gotten him into just about any school he wanted. His friends had been hoping he would stay local or at least be close enough for a day's drive so they could still party on the weekends after graduation but Chris harbored a dark secret, that he had no intention of remaining anywhere near the place of his birth and where his parents lived and was going to be gone from there at the soonest opportunity. It was a dick move, especially from their golden boy, but that was because he only chose to show them that side of himself and obscure the shadow looming over him.

Chris had a great deal of unresolved anger issues, and while it was somewhat known that he had a little sister, it never came up in conversation and so it was assumed that she was still in elementary or middle school. Ever since she departed from their home and had vanished off the face of the earth, he lost the ability to pretend that everything was okay at home and so found a way to never be home and substitute friends and peers for his family environment. He had no grudges against any of them nor any reason to involve them with his dirty laundry and so it was far easier to plaster on a forced smile and accept a dare to chug a beer in one breath to impress them and distract entirely from what he was feeling inside. He knew better than to entirely sabotage his future by getting into any risk behaviors that were too outlandish, only ever eating edibles with marijuana rather than smoking it. It never seemed to affect his academics, somehow.

His art teachers would have been fooled by his style into believing there was, strangely, not enough wrong with him to channel some raw emotion into his work, whether that was drawing, painting, music or filmmaking and theater production. He hid his pain so well, unwilling to let it show and allow his facade to collapse prematurely. Sport was his only real outlet but football was too primitive for his taste and might have let him get carried away with his aggression. So he just took to having his basketball entourage egg him on while he wailed on a punching bag in the gym and engaged in some minor wrestling practice, claiming it was to round out his mixture of upper body and lower body activity. Flipping someone over, throwing them over his shoulder and slamming them on the floor, was quite a nice aggression alleviation method. He didn't care about pushing them out of the circle, and lost more often than not, though he didn't care, he always had an audience and he knew they liked seeing him toy with the other guy and then let them win out of a sense of charitable pity, as he had no desire to be on that actual wrestling team and wanted them to be able to pursue it if they did.

Relationship-wise, he had to be very careful about. Sex as an outlet was also vital to him being able to carry on without breaking down or letting slip that anything was less than perfect. Bringing a girl home to the parents was utterly out of the question. That could go maybe a month before it became too awkward not to have done and pretend it wasn't. He had waited til 16 to start dating and lost his virginity the summer before Junior year to a girl that, he was ashamed to admit, had the same name as his mother. He kept that little detail to himself, avoiding family at all costs, and while he wished it could last longer, it wasn't going to be worth what would happen down the line and he started feigning having a lot of flaws that she wouldn't be able to overlook and so she was the one to suggest they break it off. They were tame enough defects in his performance as a boyfriend that no rumors would be able to get much traction if she told her friends, and it was an amicable enough split that no one would think there was no reason to try and score him on the rebound. He did wait at least two months in between relationships to try another one, just to let things really settle down.

Having things down to an exact science like that, and not getting on anyone's bad side, there was little motivation for anyone jealous of him to try and bring him down. He already knew how to roll with the punches and deal with embarrassment, embracing it if anyone managed to find a good means of trying to make fun of him. He was always the one they would dunk the cooler of Gatorade on after a particularly vigorous and victorious game and he would pretend to wash his hair with it before heading to the showers. He would always dress up as something unflattering and self-deprecating on Halloween. Whatever kept the attention on him and not his home life was fair game for him, no matter how uncomfortable it would be for anyone else in the same situation.

Then at last, graduation. He could have graduated early, of course, but he wanted to be a legal adult before he began emancipating himself from his family and forging ahead with his new life. He had given up hope of ever finding his sister, and wanted to be away from any place she might have drifted to or met her end in. Too many reminders of his failure as a brother lingering in their hometown. He was on the first flight out of there with three bags full of clothing and everything else that belonged to him, bound for the dormitories at his college of choice and a fresh start, where nobody knew him and he could be selective about his social group, and do activities that he wanted to. Why couldn't high school have been more like that?

He joined a fraternity that fit his tastes and made lifelong friends out of them for how much he contributed and helped them. They won numerous competitions for best fraternity thanks to him, their academics improved under his tutelage and a few of them even got girlfriends just because of the attention being associated with him garnered. They didn't last long, naturally, but that wasn't really the point, or so they claimed. Chris himself didn't manage to have any long-term relationships either, lasting only marginally longer than the ones in high school. While it wasn't an uncomfortable subject anymore, his being able to admit to having a broken family life was somewhat off-putting when it came to revealing how he dealt with it, which is to say, not really dealing with it at all.

That was when he decided not to take any more psychology majors, who were acutely aware of how unhealthy that kind of behavior and mentality were, and his refusal to seek help or counseling even to this day was a bad sign. He wasn't comfortable hearing that sort of thing. Hadn't cutting his ties with his parents been enough? Was there still something intrinsically wrong that needed resolving? Never looking back seemed like the prudent move and now that he was rooted in his new surroundings, 'running away' seemed like an inappropriate metaphor. But that blind spot in his mind prevented him from acknowledging that just because one was staying in one place didn't mean they weren't still running away from what they had left behind.

He had been on something of a dry spell recently, having given up sports and not having the same level of popularity he enjoyed (or pretended to enjoy) in high school. Taking more classes than most responsible students would dare ate into his free time and while he was still performing capably, it was rather stressful. Now that finals were over, however, things were looking to be more relaxed for a few months. That was when his frat brothers decided to reward him for all he'd done for them and give him a reward for his diligence in academics that brought their cumulative scores up vicariously if only through leading by example. They hadn't seen him so much as hold hands with a girl in months and knew he had to be aching for a release, and not only that, but a guaranteed one with no chance of rejection, as well as one with no holds barred that he could use in any way he wanted.

That was where Max came up with his idea. It coincided with Chris' birthday anyway, which always made Spring semester finals something they looked forward to instead of dreading. Their parties were legendary, and while it wasn't often, Chris had engaged in some of their group sex events where it didn't necessarily involve more than two people coupling with one another, it was done in a setting where everyone saw everyone else naked as they fornicated in the same room. Chris didn't have any excuse to be gun-shy about having his 'yeah, I could do amateur porn if I wanted' endowment engorged and getting worked on in front of his frat bros, but without the atmosphere being appropriate or him being able to mentally prepare himself, it would have been more uncomfortable than Max may have realized. Still, the others, even timid Thomas, agreed that Chris deserved to release a semester's worth of pent-up cum inside a woman who couldn't say 'no'.

While Max and Thomas procured the mystery lady's services, Greg and Sam took Chris with them to obtain all their party supplies, claiming it was going to be a more intimate event, with just them and not a bigger party with lots of guests as they were more accustomed to. The amount of booze and snacks, as well as the weed that Sam had managed to score, seemed contrary to this idea but Chris said nothing, knowing better than to be a buzzkill to these, the best friends he'd ever had. Besides, they were doing it for his sake more than anything, and he was grateful that they didn't just treat him like a meal ticket or someone to be used for what he could bring them and discarded when he stopped paying off to their benefit.

Arriving at the warehouse in Greg's SUV, Chris was suddenly aware that they weren't just making one last stop before going back to the frat house, this was intended to be a surprise for him. "You got me!" he admitted, his intelligent analytical senses having failed to tip him off sooner that there was no reason for them to be going to this out-of-the-way place before heading back. "It better be something really special to be worth coming out here to the ass-crack of nowhere." he joked. He followed them as they carried in a twelve-pack on one arm and a plastic bag of munchies in the other, leading him inside to whatever they had planned for him. There was certainly enough in the way of supplies for a good dozen or so more guests, and the place was big enough for even more than that, so he really had no idea what they might have had in store once the door opened.

It was emptier than he imagined, more space than necessary for anything that wasn't going to involve blacklights and glow-in-the-dark rings adorning bodies. Raves weren't really his thing, though, so he knew it wasn't going to be anything like that. "Where my homeboys at?" he cupped his hands around his mouth to let it echo around the large empty interior, then lowering them and laughing. Those guys, they really cared. He knew it was going to be fun, whatever it was, so he wasn't worried. Even on the off-chance that it wasn't, he would just drink til it didn't matter.

"Sit yo' ass down in that chair, birthday boy." Max came out and pointed to the black seat reserved for Chris. "We're already running late and your present is getting impatient." he teased, almost giving away the real surprise prematurely, though it didn't automatically infer that his present was a person, or even something alive, it could have been a figure of speech. The latter was what Chris assumed, as he never would have imagined them hiring an actual prostitute for something like this. A stripper? Maybe. Okay, well, yes, definitely a stripper. But not in a place like that. So what, other than a stripper, did they have planned for this venue?