Rowan Gant - Perfect Trust Part 13

"Get a grip, will'ya? Those red shoes don't go with that skirt. The black ones you moron, the BLACK ones!" Her voice seems directed at someone unseen by me.

"I don't think he can hear me. h.e.l.l, I can't even hear me. What do you think, Rowan? Can he hear me?"

"Who?" I ask aloud. "Tell me WHO can't hear you."

"What's that?" Ben's voice s.h.i.+fts past me in a discordant echo.

Oh G.o.d, what is happening?

Where am I?

Absolute terror burns its way into my chest.

I can see only a silhouette in the dim light. I can't make out any features.

An explosion of brightness sears my eyes.

I'm blind.

I try to scream, but it catches in my throat and rests therefor me to choke on.

I can feel the burn of tears welling in my eyes.

An angry voice exclaims, "f.u.c.k! Not again! STOP IT! Your makeup is running!"

"I don't care. It serves you right you weirdo. Oh, no way. Are you blind?

That lipstick is way too dark. Look at me you idiot." Debbie Schaeffer's voice vibrates inside my head as she admonishes some unseen figure.

She turns her attention back to me for a moment. "Can you believe this guy, Rowan?"

Before I can even begin to answer she is yelling at him again.

"Go ahead, make me look like a circus clown you dips.h.i.+t!"

Her voice bounces around inside my skull, trying on my psyche for size. From one moment to the next, I am she and she is me. We are one and the same. We are neither and separate. We phase in and out of one another like playing cards shuffled into a deck.

She stands at my shoulder.

She faces me.

She steps into me.

She steps out of me.

She runs to the brink of a distant unseen abyss and casts deprecating observations into its depths.

The darkness enveloping me bleeds black, then suddenly s.h.i.+fts to blue grey.

Then blackness again.

She jumps in and out of my head as if trying to find the most comfortable spot to reside.

I try not to fight the process, but wonder if the pain is truly worth what I may eventually discover from her-if anything at all.

She settles in behind my eyes and the landscape becomes a muted haze. I am beginning to see the faint outlines of what she sees in vivid color.

Together, we watch with growing interest as the shadow moves about.

Who are you ?

Why are you touching me ?

No! Please, no?!

Oh G.o.d, please don't!

A violent thrust from nowhere purges Debbie Schaeffer from me. The suddenness of it all is even more painful than her careless entries and exits had been.The scene changes point of view and I see a young woman clad in a party dress.

She is draped limply in a chair. Her face is a palette of colors, painted haphazardly on delicate features.

Visceral, primal thoughts race through my head.

Electrically charged s.e.xual desire wells within me. coursing throughout my body with an animalistic pa.s.sion.

The feeling is unnatural and foreign.

The intensity of the desire I am feeling frightens me, but I cannot back away from it.

In the real world I am disgusted by something dark that permeates the arousal.

In the real world I begin to feel physically sickened by the perversity that is woven within the shroud of l.u.s.t.

Between the worlds I am engaged by it and craving more.

Oh Jesus! She is just so gorgeous!

She's so close! So close!

d.a.m.n! She's almost perfect!

Muted darkness.

Explosive blinding light.

Muted darkness.

Explosive blinding light.

Muted darkness.

Jesus... So close.

My desire is stiffening, and I can't wait any longer.

I must fulfill the need.

Quench the fire.

On this side of reality I deny the urge to take myself in hand. In the darkness between, I am unable to resist.

"Dammit, Rowan! Don't let him do that to you!" Debbie's voice sc.r.a.pes past my ears with anger charged static.

Panting...

Heart racing...Quickening...

She's so close...

She's the closest yet...

If only she was really her...

So close...

Quickening...

Faster...

Again, Debbie's voice punches inward and wrestles me away, evicting the sudden perversion from its warm and comfortable place in my head. For all the disconcerting imagery she brings with her, I am thankful for the rescue. Her voice is frenzied and caustic-aimed at me, him, whomever. She slips into the three-piece suit of my Id, ego, and superego taking absolutely no care. The intensity of her emotion painfully strains the seams of the garment that is I.

"Look at me s.h.i.+thead. I must look like a two-year old who got into mommy's makeup. Are you blind or are you just stupid? How in the h.e.l.l can that be getting you off?"

She slips out without warning and stands before me. I feel the hard sting of her palm against my cheek. "Don't you ever do that again.' It's GROSS!

You're supposed to be HELPING me, Rowan!"

Her voice calms, and she studies me carefully.

"Okay. That's better. So, now that you're back, you want to tell me what is up with this guy, Rowan?"

Again, she flits away before I can answer. I am left standing in the cold darkness.

I hear her distant tenor echo in the abyss.

"Hey, you! Perv boy! Are you listening to me?"

She returns as quickly as she left, making my stomach churn as she turns my neural pathways into an amus.e.m.e.nt park ride.

Her momentary occupation of my conscious ends as she is bludgeoned from behind and thrown forcibly into the cold.

My hand is warm and wet...

Panting.

Heart still racing.I'm spent... for now.

I tug at my zipper.

She's so beautiful.

She's so very close.

If only she really was her.

Then...

Then she would be perfect.

I tap directly into the solid grounding Felicity is forcing upon me and fight to expand my 'self outward. My growing consciousness forces the vile invader from within me. But it isn't enough. I'm outnumbered and each time I chase one of them away, another comes from behind to occupy the s.p.a.ce. I struggle to follow the tennis match going on between the hemispheres of my brain.

For one brief instant, calm ensues and I find myself face to face with a pet.i.te blonde.