III.  The Honey and The Ivory

I knew I was on the right track with the girlishness when after our tenth session, 
Saffie did something I would have found annoying in any other circumstance.  
She woke me up Wednesday morning not with the chicken and matzo soup one 
of the neighbors had sent over, but with a long draught of wordless mind syrup 
that bordered on sensual.  Girls are supposed to care or whatever, right?  I sat 
up in bed to find her, pointing to the steaming bowl on my nightstand.  Smiling... 
this sick little nurse grin.  

Perfect.  Getting there.  I blew her some pink cupcake thanks to see how she'd 
react.  Girls, pink cupcakes... you know! But she didn't seem to get it at first so I 
sent it again.

And felt her shields drop like the pit of my stomach.  She had it... the stupid brat! 
She had my bell jar now besides my worthless childhood! And I hadn't even 
noticed either! Christ...

::Why are you *still* mad at me? I don't understand.::

It was just one shock after another with her.  Her using the other way, one that 
can't be put into words.  There were no words, would never be, not even our 
names.  But I knew better than if there had been, and Saffie, she did too.  ::No, 
I'm mad at myself, and it just feels like you since you're my sister.  You know I 
like messin' with your head.:: 

::Like last night?:: Put off through and through.

::Like every night.:: Can't lie mind to mind.

She threw me a total blank, patted my knee, got up and left.  But before her riot 
gear snapped back into place, I caught the beginning swirls of formless 
contemplation starting to leak from her.  

Oh yeah, and I'm gonna call it riot gear on her.  They may be my shields, or I've 
always felt like they were mine, but they just fit her so well, and they come off in 
pieces.  So many nights have gone by that I'm the only one she tries the flavors 
of.  Yeah, she can filter, has been able to since those long, lazy days in our 
apartment in Chicago where she hardly ever tried to push me away.  But back at 
the start.  The morning with the matzo soup, I sat there making mush of it and 
wondering... how come? I mean, she doesn't want me there obviously, and yet I 
get into her every week! No one thinks it's fun to have their thoughts screwed 
with!

"I can hear you in there! You're not eating." Called from our living room.  I heard 
the curtains fly back with a loud grinding sound and sunlight burst under my door 
as they wobbled back and forth from the force of that little girl.

"But I'm seriously considering it! Be happy."

"I am." I may not be the best analyzing voices, but this had the tone you'd expect 
with a shrug.  

Guess that answered an awful lot.  So what was the point in being pissed off, I 
mean- I kinda like matzo soup.  We'd gotten the apartment all white and fully 
mod furnished.  I didn't have anywhere to be.  

So I ate.

***   

Summer'd come by then, and let's just say we lived that summer like two 
ethereal beings, Saffie and I, once she was Saffie.  She never wanted to eat 
much either, heat or not.  I sure didn't.  I finally found myself free to play 
Belladonna whenever I wanted, and for some reason, it never struck anyone as 
too loud.  No, they thought mice lived beside them. We could hear through the 
walls, every sight bounced back, sweeter than sound.  We had nowhere to go 
and no shortage of ideas.  I mean, if we'd gotten there in the middle of October, I 
still wouldn't have considered sending her to school.  After all, a telepath who can 
read can also breeze through City of Glass by Paul Auster in one day and get it 
on the first try. What's the point?  But we weren't in New York so it didn't matter.

Not much did.  But I still didn't trust her to be on her own.  Can you imagine the 
fits the neighbors would have had? Not like we were all chummy with them or 
anything.  Soup by the gallon from the one, bills from the landlady, not a peep 
from the rest.  That's what you get for trying to look normal by picking out a 
normal apartment in the middle of a normal neighborhood.  Yeah, the people in 
that building? Beyond boring.  

One morning, the Jewish mother was doing her wash at the coin laundry, 
worrying after *her* mother, and Saffie, with a mental tap as light as spun sugar, 
sent me over to them.

"They're dears, both of them."

"I know," her high-school bride companion replied, "But funny.  They haven't 
even got a TV! Yet they've paid for their place furnished."

"Honey, my mother never owned a TV in her life."

"But they're so young! And they sure don't talk.  Makes me wonder.  If, you 
know."  Nudge nudge, wink wink.  This used to be unspeakable, what I'm 
thinking, but now it's on the evening news.  True too, or was.  I can't remember 
and that's the whole point.

"You're too suspicious of the world."  Tell her grandma!

"Can't be too suspicious of the world," I coolly suggested, sidling past with my 
damp jeans in tow.

My sister chimed in sweet as wine, "It's scary."

So the two of them looked at us and giggled, and we talked about nothing 
besides socks with lace before I sent them away.  Fucked the bride that week 
too, because she was there and her husband double parked me one day.  
(Because someone I lived with was hungry for a little angst.)  She never told him, 
I never saw her socially again.  She hung herself a couple of days before we 
moved out and her mind went out so quick- what an anticlimax.

But we did go out, Saffie and I.  And I'd always make sure I had her fixed up all 
prim and spicy sugar before we'd leave, me thanking someone or something 
she'd skipped over the interests of a child.  No playgrounds for her.  No toy 
stores, no pony rides.  She didn't want friends her own age and neither did I.  
And what is it with little girls and ponies anyway? Or other little girls? Lesson 
one- it's possible to have a feminine child who doesn't go for these things.  A little 
Cassandra.  Or at least what they started thinking about her down at the coffee 
shops where we used to go.  Not for the coffee, that was pretty damn awful, but 
this was all back before Starbucks took over the world and sold intellectualism in 
little vacuum sealed bags, so there were lots of great tasty, sick people full of 
weed and agnosticism at most of the cappuccino shops.  Not that we stuck to 
those...

And I missed hearing somewhat intelligent banter.  Used to college I suppose.  

I go for a good argument now and again, not over who'd do the laundry (Saffie...) 
but anything people get rods up their asses about.  Abortion, rights for those 
people, string theory.  So I'd go down there, or even just to the park in the 
evening - the little girl's favorite, Ruby's, hell! You look close enough, you might 
fall over intellectualism in your grocery store. Point- we'd find someone to bitch 
with and bitch my heart out as the Devil's advocate, feeling whomever it was get 
madder and more desperate.  What do you have to prove to me? Nothing, but 
you're scrumptious when you try.  And there were people who used to wait for 
us.

But as for the Cassandra thing? After all, don't see too many six year olds who'll 
sit through a discussion on whether or not masochists are mentally ill and NOT 
come in with a stupid kiddie rationale about something.  She's so quiet when she 
sips the minds of others, Saffie.  

But the best part was at the end.  Maybe they couldn't ever know the sort of 
ideas she would bounce to me, skipping sensations of places to take them with 
my words, but there was one thing she always did.  

"Sorry.  It was nice to see you though."  Every single time we left.  And that would 
leave them speechless and ready for whenever we showed up again.

***

Not that I didn't do the occasional little tests with her. I bought her a mirror.  She 
loved it, vain little creature that she was.  Sadly enough, I did too since, well, she 
gets that from me.  But it took me awhile to get back to preening my puckish 
youth.  You got looks? You got a mirror? Use 'em.  Oh, and we did.  I don't know 
how many hours I spent petting my face with one hand and Saffie's with the 
other.  We became each other's excuses.  

::Am I prettier or are you? I wonder.::

It was about that time I started putting henna on my hair, so it went from dusty 
honey to martian red, and all too fast.  Used to wash it with these little cakes of 
scarlet soap they sold at health food stores and of course don't make any more, 
and then wash it again when Saffie pointed out I'd missed a spot.  She got pickier 
about how I looked than I did half the time, and with a gigantic mirror to mess 
around with, it was just, why not? Why not anything?  I offered to let her have a 
little of it one night.  "You'd look like you were mine then."

"But I already know," she protested with a whine.  "And b'sides.  You like my hair 
the color it is.  You think saffron looks expensive on me, more than pearls."

"So I do."

"Then why'd you ask if I wanted any?"

"Same reason I did naughty things with the neighbor lady.  I could.  It's not what 
you can do..."

"It's what you can get away with?"

So I lied, and the next day I did take her to the toy store.  Once.  Just to see what 
she'd do.  Answer? Grand nothing, except complain.  And make the one clerk fall 
into the arms of a woman who was already suing him for harassing her, because 
she was a clerk at a toy store and she had no money.

Always, always things like this.  Everywhere in the world.  Every day.  They are 
the world, when you see it like a telepath can.

Wet words and all this.  Here I am praising a child for her hatred of toys and I 
ended up with one myself.  My dolly.  And she seemed so real to me.

***

We had one serious heat wave, like a fever in the cloudless sky, and I'd be 
damned if I'd bother getting out of bed in the middle of that.  Saffie felt pretty 
much the same way, so we spent quite a few days lounging around in our 
underwear.  One afternoon, between being bored and being asleep, I kinda, for 
no reason, noticed her nipples were pinker than mine, so I reached over and 
pinched them for revenge.  My arm just stayed there while I sifted through her 
thoughts.  The lady next door found us just like that, only Saffie'd nodded off.

"C'mon," I said to her, "You seriously think I'd want to do that?"

"Actually," all whispery "It never crossed my mind.  You look so cute together."

At least it won't cross your mind anymore... liar.  But I fell asleep too.  After 
remembering to lock our door.

"Schu-baby?"

"Ah?"

"She's a lot yummier than the boring people at the toystore."

I cracked one eye open only to find it was hopeless.  The sun had gone down 
and we were both blind save for the reflected headlights that breached the mini-
blinds now and again.  "So that's why you weren't happy."

Happy or not, she didn't tell me to move.

***

No point in putting it off any longer.  It is THE question of the day.  How DO two 
hopelessly romantic-era-rich-boy telepaths support themselves? 

They don't.

Other people support them.  Now, admittedly, at first, I did resort to using an 
imaginary down payment and references on the landlady, but discrepancies like 
that tend to catch up with you after awhile.  And frankly, we had enough trouble 
making ourselves eat, especially considering neither of us cooked.  At all.

Neither of us can stand TV dinners.

Or canned soup.

After awhile the taste gets kinda endearing in a perverse way, but cottage 
cheese isn't so bad.  Except when there's a lot of it, every morning for breakfast.  
And then I'd drag Saffie out of bed (sometimes the other way around), carry her 
down to Ruby's Diner at the local mall and order whatever looked good.  Thought 
tastes, food tastes, telepaths have problems with both I hear.  We got picky, but 
not picky enough to mind the kitschy 1950's memorabilia everywhere, or the 
occasional smart-aleck waitress.  And besides, they had chocolate cokes.  Try 
ordering one of those anywhere else.  

And picky people cost a lot of money.  I digress, but this is where you have to 
take care of these problems.  Cash flow difficulties.   So, Friday nights I had my 
other appointment, and yes, it involved the not always so tactful ministrations of 
my mind in someone else's.  Sound too sexy for you? Hehe, sex sells! I'd coax 
Saffie into bed early, lock her in and well, go sell myself.

Not like that.  I mean... the image of me.  The lovely boy, dressed up well, but 
not too well.  Hanging around in bars just looking so cute, and so innocent, and 
soooooo willing to flirt with anyone else who was soooooo lonely.  I'm not totally 
reliant on my mental tongues.  But, with them I managed to convince plenty of 
people that I was deserving of the contents of their purses and their wallets (and 
once the lacing of HIS corset) and make them forget all about it, and their 
troubles, if I was in a good mood.  A few good words, a wave of the magic wand 
and they'd go home drunk figuring they'd just forgotten the night before 
somewhere between one shot of scotch and the next.  I could do three or four on 
a good night, no sweat.  Just picture her asleep at home while I roamed the 
streets, only to fade back into the white of dawn and our apartment, the nowhere 
limbo of our lives I perfected with my eccentric little occupation.

Ok, ready?

I never went to the same bar twice... no real reason.  I coulda gotten away with it 
and all, but this was a job and jobs get boring after awhile.  A couple of Fridays 
later, I gave myself a walking tour of the better half of the city, getting higher and 
higher as far as the lights and the couture were concerned, not to mention the 
noses... anyway, I tried some back alley I'd passed a few times before.  The end 
of it? A little silver glitter kinda place called Sweet Sorrow, and judging from the 
smoke of thoughts drifting from it, aptly named. 

Hey, what the hell- old-fashioned joints have their charm, their bartenders in 
penguin get-ups, their live jazz bands, their loyal, rich clientele.  And, as it turned 
out, imported raspberry beer.  I ordered myself a bottle and grabbed a seat at the 
bar.  I guess the music, languorous and dripping brassy stuff with nowhere to go; 
that pretty well cooled me out inside until I felt like I had nowhere to be myself.  
But then again, a pretty boy in a rush? Now that's suspicious.  I'd say I looked 
fine.

Halfway through my beer, I finally took a look around that evening's hors-
d'oeuvres.  Old dame, her dog had just died.  Too easy.  Retired navy captain.  
Short on cash.  Too drunk even for me.  Another little usurer, but a girl.  Not 
threat for me and going for the bartender.  Stupid.  Recent divorcee with three 
kids... no way! 

/Damnit, I shoulda kept walking./ That was just the first little ironic case of the 
night.  No big deal, I just started considering putting up with the divorcee just 
because I was there, and I'd gotten more stubborn than ever since Saffie 
happened.  I figured I could go about thirty minutes and then have my little ways 
with her. 

In the meantime, the door flashed in the half-light.  Normally, I mean, hey, people 
walk in and outta bars all the time.  Big deal.  But I had a look anyway, see if I 
could once again do any better.  Mind first, as always.  Hello!   This guy, all caf‚ 
latt‚ smooth.  Heady as cheap perfume and walking like he knew it too.  As for 
what happened next behind my little amber bottle from France... what can I say? 
Even telepaths can be suckers for blue eyes. 

I stared. 

Not too much older than me, white Armani suit fitted so well the average person 
couldn't ever picture him in anything else, even though the way he moved, yeah, 
he woulda looked just fine in less -short, neat black hair, but not too neat, like 
he'd left the few stray strands that way on purpose, and these two ice blue eyes 
blinking slow and luscious behind gold rimmed glasses. 

Oh, did I mention I'm actually queer? Ah... whoops.  And this guy reminded me 
why. 

So, naturally, I shrugged inside and turned my false attention back to the rows of 
glassy candles behind the bartender.  Tapped the divorcee's fancy to let her 
know I was there.  I'll say you look twenty lady, if you come over here.  Make you 
feel good before you wake up without yourself tomorrow morning.  C'mon, I don't 
bite.  I'm just winking at you because I can take my sister to dinner on your 
money. 

But then from the guy in the ice cream suit, I got this little incidental thread of 
what I'll have to call recognition.  Not "I know you", not "I've seen you before".  
Real thin and mellow, nothing more, but right at me.  How weird.  I had no *clue* 
who he was.  He knew that.  He knew... 

Didn't stop him from taking the stool right next to mine.  Smack in between me 
and the generous potential contributor to my bank account. 

"Champagne, please." Voice as dry as dry and clear as sherry, just to go with 
this little bar scene,  "Anything that's not American." 

Hmm... good taste or not, he'd have to pay for being gorgeous and loaded with 
cash and stupid.  Oh, not to mention around me.  Let's not forget that! 

"Champagne," I remarked, "What's the occasion?" Another sip of my drink and I 
turned to face him to find him looking my way like I'd always been there.  Or he 
had.  One of the two. 

"You don't need a special occasion to drink champagne.  Those are for century 
old bourbon and wines made by monks." 

"Spoiled, aren't we?"

"Yes, very," His glass appeared then, and he took this impossibly long sip from it.  
"But you are too, I suspect." 

Another as I tried to take a taste of the thoughts below his surface- that fluxing, 
freezing metallic control that just had me still like cold water.  /Ice indeed, do you 
know your eyes do justice to your mind? You can't be yanking me... you snobby 
bastard! I'll take you for every dime!/ 

"No," he finally finished.  "I know.  Let's not play games, shall we?" 

"Geez, I try to start a friendly conversation and this is what I get?" I rolled my 
eyes at him, and he took his chance to snap them up with his.  Not that I minded.  

"Everything except what's in my wallet." 

Clank.  My bottle hit the table a little hard.  At least I didn't gulp.  It's not often 
someone says something that I don't expect, and I never, ever like it.  Before I 
even got done with my I-am-not-amused glare... 

"So, it is you.  I was expecting so.  You're a telepath, or am I mistaken?"  That's 
when he finally did it.  He tossed me a darling, little smile, an airy shrug and... 

"You're precognitive." I spoke what I'd found at last beneath his blazing diamond 
sheath, just to shake the feeling I only knew so much because he wanted me to. 

Damn it all to fucking hell. 

"Yes, maybe a little.  No hard feelings now.  I don't care if you don't.  Oh, and that 
little single soccer mom you were prowling after? She's about to get rather pissed 
and drop her drink." 

The music lulled a moment just to let the twinkle of the falling snifter have center 
stage with its discordant breaking heart and that of its owner before the floor. 

I snickered into the last swig of my drink.  A totally comfortable laugh, not a 
nervous one.  That woulda been just dumb.  Letting go was dumb enough 
already.  Just what is it that's so fun about the unknown? Even to me... I mean... 
the fear, the novelty.  Sure...  "I'd say I don't care one bit." I tossed the bottle 
down to the edge of the counter and leaned across it myself.  "Want me to do the 
Humphrey Bogart line or will you?" 

"Go ahead." 

"My pleasure.  So, what's a nice precognitive like you doing in a place like this?" 

"Looking for you, of course." 

Another laugh on my part, not like we'd gotten cozy or anything but... what was I 
supposed to do? "Ok, ok! So you- and you can see the future -you just come 
waltzing in here one jolly little evening knowing you're fated to run into me or 
whatever and that I'm after your money but you show up, right here, in that seat, 
anyway? I'm flattered but spoken for." 

He drained his glass and pushed it aside, dipping his finger in the wet ring it had 
left behind, turning so his whole body faced me while I still hung slumped over 
the counter, looking bored and young as I could.  "I don't know everything.  I'm 
sure you understand the sensation, even with your gifts." 

I snorted. 

"If you have a better word, I'd like to hear it.  Anyway, it's not important, and I 
doubt that to you, the fact I see neither everything nor the inevitable is either.  My 
visions are fragments of what could be, and sometimes they bring me tidings of 
things I simply do not understand.  Things that make me curious, but they don't 
come to me as often.  The world has become dull in its old age.  I hate them, I 
need them." 

"Your life is a fucking bore without them?" 

"I was going to say 'bloody' but yes.  Then again, I did come here to let you hurt 
me." A cold little flash passed the oceans of those eyes while mine... mine just 
glinted all over I'm sure.  He reached into his jacket and took out this engraved 
silver cigarette case.  "Besides being a clairvoyant, I'm also a famous chain-
smoker.  Care to join me? They're clove." 

"Sure, why not?" I hadn't had a good smoke in ages. 

He flicked two cigarettes out and set them both to his lips.  I marveled at this 
sloppy show, especially since he'd done it just like that with one hand still in the 
fading puddle of the long gone flute while the other clasped the lighter.  He lost 
himself as soon as they were both lit and I got a little lick of his sanguine rapture.  
Nicotine junkie all around.  Almost kissed the first one goodbye before he handed 
it over.  No thanks from me, I just blew my first drag back over to him. 

"Gold-digger thinks you're hot," I offered with a smirk. "But her uncle died of lung 
cancer so now you're lost to her forever." 

"Picky bitch.  I assure you, she'll be leaving shortly since she can hear us, and 
we do sound rather mad.  Oh, and she'll make a fool of herself." He paused to 
lap at his filter and blow himself a little smoke ring.  Heh, I'd never seen anyone 
do that before. 

"So it goes." Uttered into empty bottle for the fate of his artful smoke, but I gave 
up on it in the end for another draught from my clove. 

"Vonnegut fan?" 

"Reading bores me most of the time.  But I know enough about him to have a 
decent conversation.  Why, you like him?" 

Another smoke ring.  "Why not? I can say I feel like I am him some days, or like 
Malachi Constant when the party is over.  I didn't figure *you* would go for him." 

"Well, Slaughterhouse Five is so homey it scares me." 

"You're brutal." Another contemplative puff.  "No, I'm not a literary man though.  
I'm a musician." 

"Let me guess, classical piano, nothing written less than one-hundred years 
ago?" I could have figured that out *without* being able to chance his mind now 
and again.  He was just the type. 

"You get ahead of yourself.  I'm clearly at the disadvantage here, but you must 
enjoy that.  Knowing pieces of me." 

I sent him a feather of just how much, unwrapped and strawberry slush for him.  
Eyes closed, and I cursed him for it, as he pondered. 

"I may know what you are," spoken dreamily to the walls and fading in with the 
saxophone as it wept, drowning out the maudlins who had never even noticed 
us.  "But what about you? Your name? Do you like the same things as me? You 
seem like you're not talking enough, but I don't blame you." 

I didn't answer.  Just scowled as I felt the loafer pressed dirty up my ankle.  I 
could have drowned the both of us in the ire that bubbled up in me watching him 
just so casually flip that cigarette against the ash tray.  I felt like a piece of sheet 
music.  He didn't look any different than when he'd sat down. 

"Schuldich," My voice creeping with anger.  More at myself, I don't like being 
toyed with either and by now I'd gotten sick of it all over again. 

"It's a nickname, I hope? I'd love to hear how you got it sometime, Schuldich." His 
German was flawless, incidentally.  "And decide for myself if it suits you." His 
care got tossed aside then, and he had a talent for even that 'cause I heard it 
clanking louder than the ashes he tossed away. 

He leaned over right there in the middle of Sweet Sorrow and laid one on me. 

The gold-digger slammed her Tom Collins down and tried to get up, but she 
walked into a table and spilled something. 

"Seducer," I muttered to his lips. 

His eyes still rapturously closed, he said to me.  "Perhaps."  This true or not, he 
dropped his shields and that was it. 

"You came here to pick me up." 

"I did.  And I'll let you clean out my wallet if you come along." 

With a more than descent huff, I pulled away and crossed my arms.  "Hey, I may 
be a thief and a candy boy, but I'm not a whore." 

He took a moment to straighten his glasses, and stare at me chilly and yet 
somehow dumbfounded.  My own mouth curled with this one little trace of victory.  
"I never said you were." 

A quick smack of my own knees before I threw up my hands.  "But hey, you're 
the precognitive, you should already know my answer." 

So, basically, we went back to his place (and what a place!) and before we even 
got through the damn entry way, he started ripping my clothes off and marking 
me up all over my neck and chest- not just hickeys, I mean serious bites.  Then 
he dragged me upstairs and threw me on his black velvet bed that was more of a 
stage than anything else.  He was a pianist after all, and a voyeur in the highest 
sense who had me frig myself with a hairbrush handle until my hand cramped up.  
The coup de gras: *he* sucked *me* off. 

Then kicked me out with three thousand dollars in my pocket and a note he 
wanted me back next week.  So, basically, there I was, staggering down Fourth 
and Main (like I could walk after that) with a wad of cash in my hand (and the 
hairbrush in my back pocket) feeling guilty about doing kinky shit for money.  
Well, except for the guilty part.  I mean, basically, I'd gotten paid for doing 
something I would have gladly paid someone else for.  Pretty cool huh? 

Saffie and I went to the diner for lunch every day that week. 

***
::You've got a boyfriend!:: 

::Ch'! I have not!:: I snapped back as I tossed my hair down over the back of my 
head and started brushing the back of it out too.  Oops, thought about doing 
myself with the brush.  Saffie didn't seem to notice but I simpered at her anyway.  
::I have a guy I'm going to see because it's easier than bar-hopping... c'mon!:: 

::I know that, I'm just teasing you.:: Snap! There went her riot gear and Snap! 
She tapped me forward so I bumped my head on the sink. 

"HEY! Ow..." 

Giggles, like I expected less.  From my awkward position I rocked back and 
flopped down on the floor beside her, doing my best to radiate displeasure only 
to get deluged by her mocking marmalade.  ::You make sure you behave 
yourself now.:: 

::I'm the older one here! That's my line.:: 

::Oh! But can you take the irony of it? I'm young enough to be your daughter...:: 

::What a sick mind you have.:: 

::And I have to play your mother.  So what else could I be but your sister? It all 
works out.:: 

::Your logic would be lost on anyone else.::  But I can't say I wasn't intrigued by 
such a nonsensical self-proposition, or that she didn't know, or that she hadn't 
pulled the whole thing just to surprise men.  ::Don't wait up for me.:: I pondered 
her disastrous syllogism all the way to the house of my music friend.  

I could only hope he wouldn't mind if I came through the maw of his mahogany 
doors WITHOUT a hard on.  Frankly, thinking about existential crap was never 
the most arousing activity I engaged in.   As it was, I didn't exactly go through the 
gate, since he'd left the doors behind it propped wide open.  Talk about an 
invitation- just to thwart it anyway, I jumped the fence.  Ended up in a heap of 
wineberry bushes, which I'd mistaken for... well, something else in the flickering 
dimness of the old-fashioned lamp posts that raced up and down the cul-de-sac 
where he lived.  Lying in the thorns, I took a little look around, figuring I might as 
well make ruining myself worth it and actually check his mailbox for a name.

Which would have been well and good if he'd HAD a mailbox.  I couldn't help but 
wonder if there had been one up before tonight, and he'd gotten rid of it just to 
taunt me.  

Now that kinda got me goin'.

I dusted the thorns off me for the most part, snacked on a few of the berries I 
hadn't crushed, only to come across a recently pinned scrap of paper, which 
clearly read "forbidden fruit", followed by a lopsided smiley face.  

I picked a handful and munched on them all the way up the white, white throat of 
his house, where I stood for awhile, thinking /Hey, THAT'S the rug I fell on last 
week?/ It was just so clean, so red- the white was just so white... I left one berry 
on the edge of that rug, one on the preternaturally empty table beside the foot of 
the steps and one on the edge of the frame for Michelangelo's Lybian Sybil.  Just 
my little contribution to the decor. [2]

He didn't draw me to the living room.  No, shields up once again.  Not that I 
needed anything that obvious from him after finding a stack of towels, a bottle of 
baby oil, a robe and a disposable enema waiting on one of the fainting couches 
in one of his parlors. 

But then again, he'd probably foreseen my spill weeks beforehand and not even 
bothered to unlock his damn gate, which I could see from the gallery window of 
the bathroom, looking like a row of dainty pikes and bodies along the road.  
Gallery windows in the bathroom, never a good sign... Squeaky clean and just 
barely oiled, I proceeded to his bedroom.  

"Guten abend, Schuldich," the voice, but no trail of smoke with it.  No hot, naked 
precognitive in the bed.  Instead I found him sitting on the floor on the far side of 
the room, leaning on that black velvet stage of his.  Beckoning too.  I think I'd had 
the robe he'd left me on for a total of thirty seconds before I dropped it in the hall 
and shut the door behind me.  But I didn't say anything, just slid across the bed 
and jumped down beside him, let him fondle my mouth for awhile.  And I do 
mean with his hand.  Guess you had to be there to understand, but having 
someone do that with their fingers rather than their mouth...nice to get away with 
something like that and not have any excuses.  I told him so.  And speaking 
without my mouth...

He just smiled and looked all wicked.  He was naked except for his glasses.  "So 
you think I don't have any pretenses."

"I didn't say that."

"Correction, you didn't *say* anything.  So don't know.  Let me explain.  I would 
like to show you something I show all my lovers, and none of them but you."

"Oooooh, riddles," I teased, then slipped into sucking his index finger and the 
sapphire ring he had on it.  

"Feisty little thing, aren't you?" The "we'll see about that," implied.  He never took 
his eyes from me, even as he reached over and pulled the cord for the curtains.  I 
looked out, ready to smirk at whatever view I'd be presented, like I didn't care 
one way or the other.  Unfortunately, I did care, since I found myself staring back 
at his eyes. 

At least, their reflection. 

You know me and mirrors.  That and he was the one smirking.  I just stared at 
myself, at every curve of me blotting him out as I slunk forwards on my hands 
and knees, reached up and wrung a few strands of my bangs.  It just felt a little 
strange, seeing myself in that plate of skyscraper shell WITH him (we were both 
pretty pale, but we clashed otherwise- me with my familiar tints and he all 
celestial black and blue against that snow white skin), so I just looked at me and 
that seemed to be what he wanted.  At first.  I felt his hands come up and catch 
me around the waist. 

"No, no.  Come sit on my lap." 

I did.  But he held me away with one palm so I didn't end up with his dick in me- 
just kinda cradled with my ass between his thighs as he reached one arm around 
me, nibbling at the traces from last week's bites. Leaning back against him, I 
knocked my lips against his cheek as if that'd coax it outta him- what he wanted, 
since he wouldn't come out and say, or let me say it for him.  He swung my legs 
over his and bit my ear as he whispered into it, "I can't have you being 
embarrassed about yourself, now.  Telepath or not.  Tell me." A long lick that ran 
the length of my collar bone.  "You like to look at yourself in the mirror, hmm? But 
have you ever really seen yourself?"

No more little assurances, no more appurtenances of words.  He just cupped my 
balls and everything with one hand and pushed my butt out from under me so I 
was staring straight at my rosebud.  That explained the glasses then- he wanted 
to wash me with his gaze.

Did *not* however explain why I got so wide-eyed myself.  OK, so maybe it did.  I 
mean it was just weird seeing him rub me up down there like he was rubbing the 
wrinkles outta the front of his shirt.  Either way, he had me stiff and dripping 
before he even did more than tease me a little with this damn connoisseur look 
on his face; that same complacent stare from the bar.   I could feel him getting off 
on it too, way off.  Either that or my squirming.  I don't know how he expected me 
to be still, especially after he got the jar of raspberry gel from the nightstand and 
started smoothing me open until I wasn't just looking at me; I was looking IN me.  
Something kinda entrancing about that- turning myself on.  I'd never seen such a 
warm, silky-looking little ass and this was mine with someone else's fingers 
prying it open.  God, he had these long, bony fingers... 

One of which he finally stuck in me to the last digit so I could watch myself slurp 
him up.  I remembered my hands were free and wretched his chin around so I 
could jam my tongue down his throat as payback.  

We both smiled then, since we'd found each other's eyes in the mirror.  Kissed 
outside our mouths because, oh man, did that ever look sexy.  He tried to pull 
away but reached around and held him.  Just vanity.  I had such a cute tongue, 
cute armpits, cute, neglected nipples.

But then it was back to him and he picked me up so he could ease me down on 
his cock in slow motion.  I got to see every inch of him as he pushed it in.  That 
wasn't so cute.

Did I scream though? No, he did.  Drooped over my shoulder.  I laughed alone, 
just so he could feel me shaking around him.  As he hung there pressed against 
my neck I finally told him.  "HEY! You've just committed a felony.  I'm only 
seventeen."

"Oh damn," he panted, dragging me up just to slide me down again, "Not another 
one." And then he frenched me.

We stayed like that for awhile, him pressing me this way and that, flicking his hips 
against mine, moaning heavy against me.  I had another small revenge, I just 
watched him, us doing it.  In and out and in and deep and out and in and shallow 
and just like that, don't you know it's great? He did and he splayed me out on my 
side after awhile, crouched over me with one of my legs slung over his shoulder 
as he pounded into me .  He'd laid me out so I could still see, see myself jerking 
with his thrusts as much as he was, rubbing him against my insides.  I can't claim 
I was quiet myself.  

Or totally still after I ended up on the floor under him.  Just for a little joke, I 
figured I'd try, well this one little thing I'd worked a few times,  Sometimes if I got 
somebody in bed with me who enjoyed it as much as I did, I'd kinda tickle them a 
little on the inside, work my way into their head and look at my naked body 
through their eyes.  From the surface and the depths peer out, feel what they felt 
like doing me or getting done by me.  And this would be like, if I did it right... it'd 
feel like I was fucking myself. It'd rip me open some place in my mind where I 
could screw myself, feel their pleasure, as pleasure in me, as pleasure in them, 
reflected into each other like a box of mirrors.  

Yes, mirrors again.

Yes, it felt REALLY good, thank you.  

If I did it right, which having whoever it was pass out halfway through probably 
doesn't count as right.  Editorial cough.  As I clenched myself closed around him, 
I only just grazed his mind, skidded over his half-cocked shields.  I mean I had no 
intention of him fainting before I got off.  A scream bloomed in my mouth and 
silver rose oil through ever muscle in my body.   

The scream because he'd froze. 

"What did you do?" he demanded and tried to catch his breath at the same time.

"This?" I tightened myself up again.  

He groaned, but shook his head.  His glasses fell off and landed on my stomach.  
He swatted them away, and I thought I heard them break.  "No, the other thing."

A tiny pat against his lust-wet nerves.

All I got was a deep sigh but his blind eyes fell closed... almost like they did 
when he had a cigarette.  I don't know which got me more, that he was so near-
sighted he couldn't even focus on me or that I found myself asking him straight 
out- ::How can you feel that? You're not a telepath.::

His shields fell in on themselves.  "I don't care, just do it."

"You'll faint."

"I DON'T CARE ABOUT THAT EITHER SCHULDICH! JUST FUCK ME!"

Well, that's not a request I ever ignore.

There's candy in thoughts and then there's pure honey eaten off a cute, horny 
little boy.  And this guy, who wouldn't even tell me his name before he got me up 
the ass, had some that I wanna call the honey.  But if memories are written down 
as stories, than stories betray him and even the notions of candy.  These would 
have been the dark ambrosia somewhere even if earth had never been.  Imagine 
if the rings around Saturn turned to sweets, how rich and rare and fleeting they 
would be here.

And if they made me write all that flowery nonsense shit - I mean hey, what do 
you want? 

He didn't faint.  Just got really exhausted and curled up on top of me after he was 
done.  We'd come about the same time.  Happens with most telepaths even if 
they're not latched onto their bedmate's mind.  Never understood why anyone 
would find it charming.  The clock downstairs struck one.  I yawned.  "You done? 
'cause I really gotta go."

He purred between his little sighs.  "Mmm... no.  You stay here awhile.  Stay 
here with me in you.  Stay the night."

Irritated, I blushed and snorted a little, "Oh c'mon."

"Just a little while."

"Alright, Bradley."

Bradley Crawford who fell asleep on top of me.  The lights went out, don't ask me 
how.  But after my doze I woke up in the dark, filled with the scent of his sweat 
working through all that imported cologne.  I dropped him on the floor when I got 
up.  I took another shower and dripped all the way down to the couch where I'd 
left my clothes, put them on, felt the roll of money digging into me.  Servants I 
supposed and limped down the stairs to that white, white foyer where the Sybil 
let me pass without a second thought.  There was a taxi waiting outside and a 
line of overlapping shadows thrown by the chandelier.  Something on the landing. 
The darkest one looked like him but I didn't turn over my shoulder to check.  I just 
went home.  The last thing I remember before I fell asleep in earnest?

"Saffie, can I sleep in your bed?"

***   

Three thousand dollars, no note and god! I was in serious pain again.

"I really don't want to know," Saffie sighed.

I just glared at her and started flicking my hundred dollar bills across the floor.  
She watched me.  Funny, I'd been way too hot right after I crawled in bed with 
her.  Now I could hardly feel the difference.  There's a practical application for the 
laws of thermodynamics.  We had the windows wide open- the curtains and the 
glass, both of us, just whiling Saturday morning away in bed and sunshine, 
watching the drapes ripple out of time with the car horns below.   If it wouldn't 
have been for how sore I was, I almost coulda sworn I'd spent my whole life like 
this with nothing to do but watch the lake-spiced air tear up anything light 
enough.

Funny how the ends of one-night stands always get you just like that.

Even if it was a two-night stand.

"We should go do the laundry, unless you've got an excuse."

"I can't even sit UP, what makes you think I can carry a load of wash 
downstairs?"

"I STILL don't want to know."

Someone knocked on the door.  We sighed.  They knocked again.  She 
answered whoever it was wearing the top of my pajamas, signed for me too from 
the sound of it.  But then again, riot gear on duty, and she hadn't let anything slip.  
I closed my eyes and stretched against the pillow.  No use in wondering now.

Next thing I knew something light and scratchy fell all over me, and something 
iridescent clear met my ears.  "Schu-baby! Open your eyes." Tickled to death, 
that's what she sounded like! What the...

I did and found myself lying in a puddle of dead roses.  Not hung and dried, 
dead.  Some were rotted, some were burnt, some were sun bleached, some 
were frozen, some were poisoned with grey spots, some had been soaked and 
turned black, red or not before someone got their hands on them.

And I had a pretty good idea who.  "Hey, they send notes with these things, kid."

Just one hand popped out from behind her back, and I raised an eyebrow to her.  

"You've got somethin' else back there.  Lemme see."

She had a blue and white lithograph box all forties looking, mostly because no 
one takes such tacky umbrellas to the beach anymore.  With a wink she flipped 
the lid open revealing a casket worth of saltwater taffy.  ALL teaberry and 
addressed on the inside of the lid to, "La Petite Soeur".    She had one stick out 
and ravished before I even had a chance to ask for a taste that wasn't 
secondhand.  Which I got anyway while I unwrapped the note.  It was in an 
envelope of cellophane so old it had gone amber.  Before it turned to dust all 
over my roses.

[Schuldich,

The other little afrits told me your address, but not why you insist on being so 
despicable as to leave me alone in a cold bedroom.  That I learned for myself.  
Visions again.  Report me to the mental health authority of your choice.  I'm not 
in the mood to hold it against you, so I shan't bring it up next time I see you.

This va-comme-je-te-pousse behavior of ours is becoming a nuisance.  I suggest 
we meet somewhere to discuss other arrangements.  I already know you've 
picked a place, and a time.  Please call to confirm anyway or I will look the rude 
one.

Bradley Crawford

P.S.- Bring the gamine if you like.]

Someone threw a honking fit outside.  Some blond chick flouncing around with 
her shirt undone.  

"You've got a boyfriend!"

"Correction," I gave her a little swat to the side of her cheek, then snatched her 
chin up in my hand.  "WE'VE got a boyfriend.  What do you think we should do 
with him, hmm?"

Two very, very wicked little grins.  "Wednesday.  Wednesday is a good day to 
meet people because nothing ever happens on Wednesdays."

"But we have to take him out- can't bring him back to our apartment now can we?  
That's the whole art of negotiating, making the other party feel comfortable so 
you can get what you want.  What we want is beside the point... in the meantime, 
where could we take him? Someplace that looks neutral but, hehehe, we'd still 
be at home in?"

We both certainly knew the answer to that, but I wonder if the reader does?

***

We asked him to meet us at noon, so Saffie and I showed up at Ruby's around 
11:50 and "cajoled" the waitress into giving us a table easily seen from the 
outside window.  Not up next to the window - that looks too eager.  Either way, I 
don't think anyone in line before us believed the place took reservations.  Just 
the same. 

Just like it was any other day, we ordered a pair of chocolate cokes from the 
usual "I'm-such-a-stereotypical-waitress-I-make-myself-sick." Not that I'm into 
omens or that shit but she only had on half the usual make-up and I took it as a 
good sign.  

"Hey you two! Haven't seen you allllll week and I was gettin' worried."

"Good morning, Gloria!" The old bag thought it was "just adorable" if I let my 
sister do the talking.  "Sorry we made you worry."

"That's Ok, sweetie."

"We're having company today."

"Wow! Isn't that exciting! Well, I'll be right back with your drinks."

::Exciting, eh?:: I mused, absently creasing the corner of my napkin all funny.

::I wouldn't call it that myself, but if it makes her happy.:: She who'd already 
flashed us the backs of her sun-wrinkled legs... too old to be wearing that 
uniform.  Far too old.

We waited.  Just to set the scene in the mean time.  The sun was shining, but it 
was kinda on the cool side for summer. I had Saffie in a white dress with peonies 
embroidered on the front so she was shining.  I had overdone the perfume and 
didn't care so I was smirking, happened to have on my black wind-breaker.  The 
planes running forever on their little looping track around the ceiling had taken a 
break so the fans could run for a change without nailing them.  We got the 
manager to turn them on anyway and other than that amused ourselves with 
some incorporeal appetizers.   

Twelve.  The door jingled and there he was.  He checked the paper in his hand.  
He looked kinda like a self-righteous Mormon actress who'd just been asked to 
do a nude scene in the middle of a park.    

But that's the nice thing about clairvoyants.  They really DON'T see everything.

Even if the nauseated little angle of his upper lip was sexy.

We popped out hands in the air like the good little suburban kids we weren't, big, 
sunny smiles all over us.  After all, with the feeling of any sense of personal 
decency he'd had about me smashing all over his suede shoes, it was all we 
could do not to laugh.   

But he, in the meantime, nodded to us, straightened his lapels, and took the 
obligatory ritual walk through the poorly parked strollers, fallen canes and rows of 
nubile servers checking him out, all of which he sidestepped with a prissy all-
business determination, coming to our table with only his glasses to re-arrange.  
Which he did, and they flashed as if they were as irked as he was.  

"Hey Brad!"

"Schuldich." A curt little nod, and he swept shiny red faux leather the seat with his 
handkerchief before gingerly taking a seat. 

Our waitress, on the way to another table, overheard and hated him from then on 
because she thought he'd said, "shut up", though that was apropos to nothing at 
the time.   

"Brad, this is my sister, Saffie." I gave the usual little wave between them.  Her 
eyes had already perched on him, but he'd only just found her.  She had one 
finger on her mouth in uncertainty, like she was nibbling it, even though she 
wasn't.  

He leaned down, scooped the little fingers up with all of his long, fair ones and 
finally kissed her hand.  

You should have heard her giggle.

"Pleased to meet you, Miss Marlow."

"Je vous en prie."

"Vous parlez francais?"

"Oui, mais si les tourists, je suis certain!"

"Nonsense." He looked back over to me, his eyes almost flickering curiosity at 
me.

"I taught her," I explained.

That being enough for him, he paused to drink in his surroundings a bit more, as 
if hoping they'd changed or he had hallucinated them all.  I guess you could say 
he choked on all that cherry red and white.  And when he had so many other nice 
cherries around! Like the cherry in the chocolate coke my sister was sipping at, 
my tight cherry ass.  I would have taken the time to remind him of that, but he 
had his shields up like any prudent negotiator.

Bastard.  

I opened my jacket as he seriously considered groping the jolly cheesecake girl 
on the menu cover so he looked at me instead of her.

You see, I did contribute to the arts; not as reparations for repeatedly dissing the 
art teacher, but Public Broadcasting Services won't send you one of those nifty 
black T-shirts with the logo on unless you're willing to be one of those "viewers 
like someone else".

Best fifty bucks I ever wasted. [3]

Brad adjusted his glasses AGAIN (a new pair I noticed, hehe) rather than field 
my saucy grin and said to Saffie, who'd been admiring his ring (also new, blue 
topaz this time), "Darling, do you know if they serve anything here that hasn't 
been fried in the grease of a hundred dead Mexicans?"

"Well, the clam chowder, but that has bacon in it."

"Oh..."

Just like a puppet show gone wrong, our waitress took this opportunity to park 
herself beside us and in the way of at least five other people trying and failing to 
walk past.  "Actually, we're out of clam chowder today, but can I get you 
something to drink while you make up your mind?"

"Perrier, and a glass to put it in.  No ice."

She scratched this down, thinking the whole time how it was just gross how 
people would drink stuff that had bubbles in it and WASN'T sweet.  Since after 
all, that was where bubbles first came about, right? Mineral water was soda for 
snotty people, at least in whatever part of lala land she'd been raised in.  "Can I 
suggest the fish tacos, they're real good!"

"Well," he pointed out with a sigh, "You already have."

I chimed into the ensuing silence of mutual ire.  "And another chocolate coke for 
me.  Two cherries, please."

"Gotcha! I'll be right back with those."

Mumbling about kids these days, she left.  Not that Brad was a kid to even her.  I 
smacked her on the ass when she went by.  Hey, the customer is always right.  

Brad considered hauling me into the Men's room to wash whatever parts of me 
he could fit in the sink.  "So... I take it you two come here often?"

"We eat here every week," Saffie told him.

"I see, and how long has THIS been going on?"

We both shrugged, and I answered just the same, "We don't remember.  But 
she's right, ya know."  A little jerk of my head towards the counter where our 
slap-not-so-happy waitress had gone to skulk for the time being.  "The fish tacos 
ARE pretty good."

"I didn't eat tacos when the meaning of the word was pristine, and I'm not about 
to start now." Saying so with a conceited huff in his shoulders, he reached over, 
took a menu, grimaced, dropped it on the table in front of him, flicked the covers 
apart with his little finger, wiped his hands on the napkin and then my knee, and 
finally glanced down on the plastic pictures with his hands folded before him as if 
he was going over a battle plan.  I guess in his mind, he was and all.

"OI!" in my very worst British accent.  "Ladies present!"

Again to my sister with not a shred of attention to me, "Did you understand what I 
said, miss?"

"Not at all."

::Liar.:: Since she happened to be sitting on the same side of the booth as me, I 
poked her with my knee and got away with it without another look from Brad.

::Yes'm, the kettle is very black.:: Her returning shove was all in my head, a 
swishing vertigo fish tank feeling.

And it got a push of mine right back, damnit! ::I have never told a lie, and you 
know it.::

::But you have the most amazing power to censor the truth!::

::Not the same thing.::

::See?::

That went on for awhile, back and forth and back and forth, until Brad got the 
once in a lifetime opportunity to wonder just how in the hell a skinny six year old 
managed to push me off my seat and into the aisle, let alone a skinny six year 
old who hadn't moved an inch. I got to be stepped on by some free range four 
year old whose mother yelled- "Honey! It's not nice to walk on people!" as if 
telling him was gonna do any good at that point.  I told her as much by arranging 
for her to suddenly unfasten her own belt, loose her shoes and get walked all 
over by the brat on the way out.  Only then did you-know-who so much as crack 
a smile.

"What are you two babbling about?" he demanded, just as the waitress got back 
with our drinks, coming up on silent booth of course and getting the first of many 
What-the-fucks for the day.  I picked myself up like nothing was the least bit 
suspicious about my lying in the middle of the floor, and he didn't even bother to 
check his glasses for spots before he started washing them off.

Anxious to leave, the waitress piped up after a minute watching the straws in our 
drinks do loop-de-loops in the breeze from the fans- "So, what can I get you 
gentlemen and the little lady?"

One ever unabashed (and shameless!) Saffie went first.  "I would like a beach 
burger made with turkey and a half order of fries." She was even still pouring all 
over the menu like some socialite.  

::Trying to impress someone are we?::

::Nah, but it's nice hearing that she thinks it's cute that I can read such HUGE, 
polysyllabic words.::

::She thinks you're cute? UGH! I'll never forgive her!::

"And for you?"

"Ditto."

So all three of us turned for the final act of the night, the grand conclusion to 
Shakespeare's only play less appreciated than Titus Andronicus- the one about 
the guy stuck in a restaurant he doesn't like, trying desperately to find something 
he'll actually be able to eat just for the sake of being in a restaurant.  Never mind 
how he got there, that's the most amusing subplot of them all! What a comedy! 
Hidden behind the menu, he comes to face the evil estrogen power of server! 
Only one order will placate the beast? What is it? He only has one chance!

"Very well.  One order of... ugh... fish tacos."

So the monster, so soothed, summarized what she'd heard so far and traipsed 
back to her lair.  

I started to clap, but he stopped pouring his Perrier, grabbed my hands without 
looking and faced Saffie.  "Pardon me, but I'm very hungry." So he tied me up 
with his fingers and pulled me over for a kiss that was lazy and messy and tasted 
like a few packs of cloves.  Not to mention went on long enough for a couple of 
straight people on the other side of the room to throw down their checks and 
storm out without paying.  

/You and your sister aren't the only ones here who know how to make a scene 
you know./

I threw my extra cherry in his glass and it left a streak of crimson brown through 
the mineral water.  

Saffie just giggled at the whole mess- me and him and everyone and the way 
Brad rolled his eyes but drank anyway at last, sucking on the cherry but never 
taking it into his mouth.  Talk about a tease.  He almost started to smirk when yet 
another kid at yet another table started to bawl.  Instead he ended up with his 
head in his hands.

"Ah, Saffie? Schuldich? Would one of you two...?"

My sister filled the brat's head with dreams of shiny things and cream cakes.  
And the next brat.  And the next.  And the one after that.  Suddenly, it'd all gone 
as dead in there as a Brad-esque caf‚ in there.  

"So, while we're waiting and everything..." At last! My revenge! Small and with 
ranch dressing! I toed off my shoes and shifted down in my seat so that I had 
enough room to reach over and run my instep over his calves.  "I know you didn't 
come in here to talk about chocolate coke."

Cue a slurp on the little girl's part here.

Which he didn't mind, the sigh had been for something else.  He was running out 
of something else's by then and so naturally he had us both at full attention trying 
to guess his brand new momentary grievance. "You're quite right, as always.  
And yet... this, Schuldich.  This whorehouse of so-called cuisine.  It is enough of 
a reason I need to stop meeting you like this.  You have defined most of the 
problem the very day we meet to amend it." 

"Oh? And how do you propose to do that? You pick the place from now on? 
'cause I can live with that.  Just don't expect great things from me in the caviar 
eating department."

"Me either!" my sister chimed in.

Then came one of those moments regular people have all the time- you know, 
the one's where you'd trade a body part or five to know what the other person is 
thinking.  Just imagine what it was like for me! I wasn't used to it damnit! And 
neither was Saf but she took it better, the brat.  Anyway, Brad looked downright 
offended for a second.  And not all second handed the way people get when you 
insult the band they followed around for most of their lost years, or in this case... 
caviar but really, fish eggs are gross! Who would go near them to begin with? But 
it wasn't like that... after awhile he just caught me straight in the eye like he didn't 
want to, woulda rather been calm somewhere else and shouting something at 
me.  Dare I say, "hurt"?

::You're gonna get it.::

::I usually do.::

But he shook his head and called me the fool with a purse of his lips.  "No, I want 
you to come live with me.  You and your sister."

We both blew bubbles in our drinks just then.

Taking this as a cue to disseminate his master plan, Brad began his lecture on 
the future as he'd envisioned it.  Much more fascinating than philosophy.  At least 
regular philosophy.  Kinda felt like he was sending us on some errand, except for 
the way he kept casting that deep, deep gaze around.  "Yes, but not here.  I'm 
planning to move.  What's more, I won't insult you two by keeping either or both 
of you.  You'd have to find some form of employment.  It would be rather 
unseemly if anyone I knew caught Schuldich prancing around in a bar making off 
with wallets that don't belong to him.  Yes, I am aware of the fact this is an ironic 
request considering how we met; you needn't point that out.  As for the 
Mademoiselle, I'll pay to send you to private school, any one you like, though 
there's an especially lovely one I had in mind.  With regards to spatial 
arrangements, you'll each have your own rooms.  They'll be yours, and only 
yours and I shall have no say there.  However, if Schuldich would consent to pay 
for half of the house, it would be half his, though not to clean.  We'll have maids 
for that." A pause to take a sip of his Perrier.  "There, that's my question.  Do you 
want that? Doesn't it at least sound more amusing that sticking yourselves up in 
the fifth floor of that... complex you live in now, and might be living in for years to 
come otherwise?"

All the while he'd been going on, he'd crept his hand across the table, Saffie 
glancing down on it now and then, kinda like the way you watch a hermit crab 
someone else is playing with to make sure it doesn't end up angry in your lap.  
Funny how he'd always meet her eyes when she was looking for his, or mine he 
had trouble keeping his off of.  Or my fingers he pressed away from my glass so 
he could smooth the cold condensation on them into his own.  He sat there 
petting me then, all coercive and chilly.  

And got one thing from Saffie. ::Later.::

::Sure, maybe.::

"You're trying to steal us away," I laughed.  "How Keatsian!"

He parried this with a heavy, little grin.  "Oh? And am I going to be answered with 
a lot of luscious and ambivalent language about rose buds and seduction verses 
spirituality?" My sister clapped here, and he tipped his head in thanks. "Because 
you are luscious and ambivalent."

I sighed, "OK, maybe I'll buy the luscious, but I know what I want, just not where.  
One of those things happens to be NOT working or sending your precious Miss 
Marlow off to school.  You know enough about the romantics to see neither of us 
are old enough to give up tryin' to be some ourselves." 

I got a squeeze here.  "Not that kind of school.  A good one for... not gifted as 
you'd both usually be taken for... the other kind.  And only little girls, the very 
prettiest." His free fingers grazed the wisps of her bangs.  "Because beauty is 
power.  Has your brother taught you that?"

"Often."

"Good! Then all he needs to know yet is that he won't be taking a regular 
position, you might be inclined to call it.  He would be going to work with me.  As 
my equal.  And in a cloak and dagger world which could surely entertain him for 
some stretch of time.  Especially since I've my own aspirations there."

"You're also an aesthetician.  You want us because we're pretty." Couldn't have 
pulled that one off without a poker face.

"Oh yes! Beauty, money, power and all the delicious thoughts you can savor.  I'm 
not ashamed I go for those sort of things."

"How about vagueness?"

"Ah, now that is my gift to you.  Come with me and I'll take it back just to give you 
something better.  But I would never..."  Here he took my wrist and lifted it from 
the table as he oh-so dreamily ran his fingers over my veins, trying to read them 
with the pads of his hand.  "... be so fool as to try to harm you.  Do I lie? Are you 
afraid?" Asking himself, or so he might have seemed to someone else.

A pinhole appeared and beckoned from his shields.  I dove for it- the sense of 
kinda-truth. That was all I found, Saffie seeped in a little deeper for the last 
droplet of frozen nectar, came up lapping her lips in the real world.

She and I agreed on one thing.  "This is too much.  Give us a couple of days."

My sister here again, "Then maybe we'll follow you blindly into the woods after 
the Cattleya and the nightingale."

Of all things, this was what made him smile.  "Oh? Do you know much about 
Cattleyas? Because if you don't, I think you will.  If you come with me."

That was how we discovered he didn't know what we were going to tell him.  So 
beauty was power.  Two comely things against one.

So after that he sighed at us one more time and gave up for the time being.  We 
talked about why existentialism sucks and why maybe it wasn't so bad Vonnegut 
hadn't killed himself just yet.  We talked about dancing and the occult as it didn't 
pertain to dancing.  He talked about my playing in Saffie's hair and his playing in 
his own.  I tried to tell him to grow it long, and he made Saffie look away while I 
swallowed his tongue.  Then there was something about art that didn't go well 
with living room furniture.  And this was before we got our food.  Needless to say, 
the waitress left it, told us to enjoy and ran off before she had time to wonder just 
who Arthur Rackham was [4]. 

Then it was all card tricks with our thoughts and smacking our lips as loud as we 
could while we licked off our fingers between french fries.

As for those fish tacos Brad had almost managed to convince himself he 
WOULDN'T have to see: "Hey! You're not grimacing very much!"

He shot me a look with his mouth full in the most unflattering way.  "I awakened 
rather late this morning and didn't have time for breakfast.  I didn't want to be 
rude and not eat with you, so I've had nothing since last night."

"I think you like them," Saffie giggled, batting her eyes at him with all the 
sweetness of someone who wasn't trying to give him a hard time.

And he didn't fight it, just sighed one more time and seeing no reason he should 
have anything close to manners around two ketchup faced guttersnipes, propped 
his elbow on the table, his head in his hand as he groused in munching silence.  
"I think you're awfully sure of yourself."

"Pomme frit?"

"Why not?"  His fingers folded up under his chin and he leaned into it like a little 
baby-kiss, me getting to see him literally eating out of my sister's hand.  "Call this 
charming Schuldich, and you will wear that burger of yours."

"MY GOD! You CAN talk with your mouth full."

"And so can you, much better than I, it seems!  I wonder if that's a good thing or 
a bad thing?  No matter.  Might I trouble you for another, Mademoiselle? I don't 
think I've made enough of a scene to equal that of your brother yet."

"Speaking of scenes," I began with a no-reason yawn.  "I think I'm going to go 
make one in the men's room.  Back whenever.  You two try to resist turning 
anyone into toads."

"I would expect no less from you!" he called after me as I went down the aisle 
shaking my ass back and forth for everyone to see whether they wanted to or 
not.  

Nobody already in the fire-engine red bathroom paid any attention to me after I 
waltzed in, so I did what I usually did whenever I go to take a piss; I whistled as 
loud as I could and simpered everybody who went past, winked at the one the 
opposite end and acted like everybody did it.  Yeah, but they never wink back, 
even if they want to, most guys.  Yes, just shake themselves and book it without 
washing their hands.  Still got all hot and bothered.  Or nicely disgusted.  
Bothered, disgusted.  Oh how was I supposed to choose in such a short time.  
The one I was playin' eye footsie coughed and went back to his wife before I got 
done, and I just stuck myself in his thoughts to be the subject of this sexy dream 
and that fantasy played out alone in some other washroom wherever the hell he 
worked.  And that was enough for then.  Poor guy got so distracted he walked 
into someone on the way out.  Someone who clacked his tongue as he took up 
the spot empty spot beside me.

"You did that, didn't you?" Brad sighed as he messed with his zipper.

"You bet." Got no answer for my answer so I whistled again for awhile, stopping 
in the middle of the crescendo.  "What? Like it bothers you?"

"No, not really.  I was waiting for you to try something along those lines, and a 
public restroom was not what I had in mind.  Not that what I have in mind and 
what you have in mind would have anything to do with each other."

"You like it?" Done or not, I hung around and watched him just for the shock 
value it'd have on any other saps who came in.  Two guys at the urinals actually 
looking straight at each other.  Heh, not in a million years.

"Yes, I do actually. Jealousy... always strikes me as amusing."

That made me laugh, and him too, just enough to make the walls sound all tinny.  
"So you gonna french the next guy comes outta one of those stalls to see me 
turn green?"

So that's more or less how I ended up pinned to one of the empty walls, fly 
undone, arms pinned over my head and Crawford's bare crotch twitching up 
against mine with these reaaaaaal little nudges- just enough to tease.  He just 
held me there for a minute, smirking his self-indulgent little smirk and trying to 
make me squirm against him.   I hissed a little, and he dragged my head to one 
side so he could lick the inside of one of my cheeks.  "Well, no." He admitted it 
just as the guys from one of the stalls decided to flee now or never.  Kitchen 
worker too.  So much for "all staff must wash hands before returning to work".  "I 
was hoping to make them jealous of myself.  After all, I've got you to grind my 
hips against and they don't... or did you have something else in mind? 
Entertaining me with your lack of self-control? A cheap waitress old enough to be 
your mother! Really Schuldich!"

I just pursed my lips and lunged for his mouth before giving in one way or the 
other, "So we're back to that.  I think you're the one who's gotten all envious." Bit 
him along the jaw there.  "Let go of my hands, and I'll grab your ass too!"

The door opened and closed, but nobody went in or out.  Brad didn't care one 
fucking bit whether someone had decided NOT to watch our little peep show.

It was my ass that got grabbed then, and my neck all spitty as he started tasting 
it.

"Oh fine! Be that way."

"I think I will, thank you."

Once he'd decided to take his tongue out of my mouth, I just shook my head at 
him- "You know I can't block.  Saffie can hear everything you're doing to me."

It was good I looked up at him when I did, or I wouldn't have gotten to see his 
saucer-wide bewildered eyes, kinda those one time things after all.  I got 
dropped.  He washed his hands, stuffed his half-hard dick back in his pants, 
straightened his tie, smoothed his hair and went back into the restaurant like 
nothing at all was the matter.  Aside from the fact he had me on his heels and all.  

My sister sat utterly complacent among our half eaten lunches, swirling her coke 
round and round and round and watching this old het couple with a pudgy little 
toddler they were both caressing over like nobody's business.  It just wouldn't 
stop laughing.  

"Kidnappers," she said.

"Good luck to them," and Brad raised a toast.

***

[So I'm back to the velvet underground
Back to the floor that I love
To a room with some lace and paper flowers
Back to the gypsy...that I was...to the gypsy...that I was...

And it all comes down to you
Well you know that it does, well...
Lightning strikes...maybe once...maybe twice...
Oh....and it lights up the night....
And you see your gypsy.......
You see your gypsy....]

So I sang along just because I knew the words so well it was hard not to.  I could 
kinda hear Saffie now and again over the rush of evening traffic down below our 
sorry excuse for a porch.  Well, not that either of us really minded. It was barely 
big enough for the both of us- all rust and whitewash.  I guess the sun had set, 
but since the skyscrapers were in the way, it was hard to tell.  Still kinda hurt to 
look straight at the peach and boysenberry sky.  So I didn't.  Didn't really look at 
anything.  Didn't really want to.  Her hands came up and straightened my scarf 
since it was falling off.  I bopped her on the head and then grabbed her by the 
back of the shirt.  She was sitting on the railing I just leaned against.  I was outta 
cigarettes.  The Fleetwood Mac album wasn't even halfway over.

::Gonna be dark soon.::

::It's never really dark here, now is it?::

::Eh, you're right I guess.::

[She is dancing away from you now
She was just a wish
She was just....a wish
And her memory is all that is left for you now
You see your gypsy.....]

Even I won't talk over a good song.  And this was one of those songs I guess.  
But then again, never had to talk over anything with her.  Man, I love 
technicalities.

Didn't mean she couldn't poke me in my thoughts, or prod me with her sneakers 
when she gave up kicking the rail.  Thump.  Thump.  Thwack.

::Now you cut that out.::

::You too.::

I knew what she meant.  ::...So he wants us to go far away with him.  Go 
wherever with him.  Go to the ends of the earth with him and the stupid earth 
doesn't even end! Jeez! You know he can't be easy to live with.::

::He was thinking the same thing about you.::

::Goddmanit! You did get in then! I hate you.::

::I hate you too.:: And she just smiled at me, so I smiled back.

::So it's up to you.  I can't decide the way I feel now.  But I want you to make up 
your mind not by...::

"What he said or did, but by how he tasted."

"You talked over my song!"

[I still see your bright eyes...(bright eyes)...]

"You've had it on repeat for the past hour.  Plenty of time for me to figure it alllllllll 
out."

"Is that so...?"

*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*

{Note - found on the bottom of the manuscript - blue ink - handwritten - dated 
25 March 2002}

It took me only three days to find what you've finally finished scratching on 
after... six months, isn't it? No matter, as you are fonder of saying than even I 
had guessed.  

Who have you written this for? Your sister knows everything that you do.  Nagi 
cares nothing for self-indulgent romance-era prose (unless he has written it 
himself).  And frankly, if I was someone else to you, I would have been offended 
by what you've said about me.  Had I known you despised aestheticians, I never 
would have let you call me one all those years ago!

So I think I'll have my revenge right about now, mein teufel.  My bambin 
demonique with the tiger green eyes. Even if no one ever reads it, you'll always 
know I added this to your precious papers.  Just as you will always remember it 
was I who captured you and the pearly little waif you call your sister.  I believe it 
was Beagle who said something along the lines of, "I am immortal because there 
is a wild and ever lasting beast who will remember always that I captured her".  
But as that's not a book by Vonnegut, I don't imagine you'll care if I look up the 
exact quote.  I have outdone whoever it was uttered those words. [splash of 
purple ink here] I have not only kept you, but I have come close enough to touch 
that red hair of yours without fear of losing my hand.  I would never expect you to 
settle down, as they say.  But it is an honor nonetheless...

[Another splash of purple ink, followed by a few lines of very small writing.]  
Mommy Fortuna in The Last Unicorn.  Bradley, you naughty boy! Writing on my 
Schu-baby's things.  

[More blue ink -in the same hand as the earlier note]

I am only expressing my sentiments as a fan.  Which reminds me- if you get the 
chance, do see if you can cajole Aubrey into going back to work.  It seems to me 
he has only written half the story.  I don't imagine Nagi is thrilled about being left 
out.  As for Farfarello, if there was a god, I assume not even he would know.  Or 
care.

Though, it's very telling, what you care to write about.

*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*

End Schu-baby
Next Time: Schu-baby Second

*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*


[2] With apologies to Sandra Cisneros for stealing her bit.

[3] Please allow me to explain Schu's dreadful pun.  His shirt says "PBS" as in 
the network though he's obviously trying to communicate "PBS" as in "Pushy 
bottom society".

[4] He paints faerie pictures if you were curious. 


***This fic is most fondly dedicated to Ms. Rachel C., for without what ignorant 
so-called criticisms that did spill from her lips, I would never have been so 
dumbfounded by the depths of stupidity humanity might fall into, and thusly put-
off enough to finish this fic.  I hope you are having a lovely time writing potboilers, 
dearie. ^_^***