Hi Everyone!! Glad to see that a select number of members on here liked my last story, you know who you are.
This next one is a little different. It's not as long. I'm taking a new approach. I'd like to know what you all think, honestly. I'd really appreciate the feedback, more bad feedback than good, because I can't learn anything new from just getting praised for my accomplishments. Thank you all in advance for taking the time to read this one.
I couldn’t quite grasp it then. The proceedings meant very little to me. I didn’t know him like she did. In fact, to that day and the ones that followed, I don’t recall ever seeing her more vulnerable. Of course, at the time, I didn’t care. It was hot, my armpits were sweaty, and the frills on my dress were being so uncooperative. Minutes stretched to hours as I fidgeted in my seat. To subdue an itch mounting along the arch of my foot I took to stomping the ground. I was immediately reprimanded.
It was a year to the day before those proceedings finally started to garner some significance. She looked vulnerable again, yet through fought back tears, she told me the story that led to the marble stone we were commemorating. It was also the day she brought home little Charlie Cameron.
I wasn’t there to see it, but oh does she have a way to tell a story. She could have been a great writer.
Looking back on it with a more mature mentality I concur, it was a shameless act. In the end though, she was happy to have a new addition.
And while it took some getting used to, I soon saw him as she did.
She spoke about him for days on end to pretty much anyone who had an ear; how he, “understood” and how there was this, “unspoken connection”. I felt it too. Words were beyond him, still we couldn’t help but notice how his eyes, those green and blue, beady little things, never seemed left in awestruck wonder; as if everything he surveyed, he’d seen before, in another time and another place.
He slumbered like a corpse. On nights when God was angry, nights that saw me seek comforts beyond my own bed, he’d barely twitch. I’d walked in on him sleeping a handful of times.
In the year of 97 mom sent us off to camp. Cabins made up of wood, netted with wired screen windows made for an interesting change to the city life. No electricity meant going back to simpler times but by my accounts, it was okay. I’d grown to appreciate simplicity. It was affordable.
One morning, while most of us were still sleeping, waiting for that dreaded trumpet to rouse us from whatever lucid dreams our unconscious could conjure, feelings of a more natural order awoke me. Ants in my pants. No, not literal ants, but it’s what we’d been conditioned to say by our councilors to avoid any notion of the literal stigma, particularly since the older kids would sometimes catch wind, and tickle it out of us for their amusement. I would have asked my councilor to escort me to the toilet accept she wasn’t there. By the looks of her bed, she’d slipped off into the night with Tommy. Ever so often I’d hear him sneak into the room while she read us off into slumber. And although this time the sandman caught me a little early into the chapter, I reckon he’d whisked her away again.
Dew covered leaves sent a cold chill through my naked soles as I stepped lightly towards “piss rock”. The boulder sat on a ledge making it the perfect place to pop a squat. I just might have, except for something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye. It was Charlie.
He was whispering some random gibberish into the nothing. I’d told him to leave his friends at home, that they’d bring him nothing but bullies here. I suppose he didn’t see the harm in it, given the hour.
With every step I took towards him, a scowl on my face sat ready to reprimand. I just might have, but then something stopped me dead in my tracks. Before Charlie, suspended between his hands, was a skipping stone. He seemed very concentrated on it, as if nothing outside of him or the stone existed. Then I heard him whisper something, something that sent the stone whirling through the trees of the dense forest surrounding us. I didn’t need to use “piss rock” anymore.
I wasn’t sure whether to go dry off or call out to him as I watched him wander a bit further into the woods. It was a selfish thing to do, but I figured myself fast enough. I was wrong.
A manhunt ensued, but the boy known as Charlie Cameron was never see again. Looking back, I can imagine why he’d ran. If there was fear presiding in me over what he could do… Well, who knows if fear was even a part of his physiological makeup.
My mother became vulnerable again. At first, I sympathized; after all the feeling was mutual. But I healed faster, and my sympathies turned to pity. My focus turned to school, and with blinders on I buried her sorrows.
I eventually graduated with honors. My grades even helped me earn a scholarship to the University of Texas, where I studied criminal justice. It didn’t become a passion till reruns of an old 90’s T.V show started resurfacing through syndication. I wanted to chase little green men with a gun and badge. Then cancer got in the way.
After only two years of schooling mom was diagnosed with a low-grade malignancy, and I abandoned my studies to stay by her side. She didn’t want me to, but it was the most affordable option.
I took up a job as a loss prevention supervisor at the department store where she used to work. The money helped supplement whatever social security and Medicare couldn’t. On more than one occasion, I’d find myself walking past the display of car seats and strollers, reminded of her story.
It killed her slowly, the cancer. By the time she passed, I’d lost more than just her. It’s a selfish thing to say, but I’d lost three years of my life. In my absence, my scholarship had been revoked. I was alone and in a heap of debt after the funeral. It’s funny how family tends to dissipate when times get tough, mine anyway. So, I did what I assume most anyone would… I… settled.
I had just enough college credits and within twenty-one weeks I was deputized; an officer of the law. Fate had succumbed me to this dirt brown uniform; a fitting physical parallel of my life.
The first time I put it on was the first time I’d ever associated with the word, “vanity”. The vest made me look fat. The color was unflattering, redundant I know, but some points I just feel like hammering in. The pants, baggy, left my legs these shapeless uniform stumps. I settled on a half shave to get my strawberry locks to a more manageable length.
I was met with plenty a face upon my arrival to the department. Among them was officer Brian Threadbare, one of the department’s “grandfathers”. Uniform aside, he could have passed for an off-season Santa Clause the way his gut bumped into things. His seemingly endless supply of Coca-Cola, at times, made me wonder if he didn’t have stock in the beverage. One was never too out of reach from his stubby fingers which effectively earned him the moniker, “coke head” around the office.
Most days were spent keeping to the speed limit; surveying the streets for petty traffic violations, and occasionally answering a call or two from residents regarding minor domestic disputes. Nothing unimaginable, but nothing worth an episode of COPS. About a hundred donuts and ten gallons of coffee into my employment a briefing was had. It was the standard affair. A rundown of assignments went addressed to corresponding officers. Brian and I were given a “scrap” an apt name for a petty detail.
“Threadbare, you’re familiar. Fill her in, have a look at the particulars. Make a house call, etcetera, etcetera,” Our superior took his leave, slamming his hand against the podium as if it were a judge’s gavel, and we all disbursed.
“So, like what’s this? Another, like, deadbeat assignment or what?” I questioned.
“You youngsters and that word…” he grumbled.
“I’m sorry.”
“… and no. There are no such things as deadbeat assignments,” he huffed.
I mouthed the words with over-exaggerated animation. He’d hammered that line into my brain the first couple of weeks, “Ugh, I know, but what did ol’ pasty face mean, “familiar”?”
“Miss Highmers, late 70’s, suffers a bit upstairs,” Threadbare alluded to his forehead which made me scoff, “she’s a repeat customer if you catch my drift, says someone’s been frequenting her house, stealing,”
“Anything concrete?”
“Not so much as a fingerprint, never any forced entry.”
“Family?”
“They furnish the place, wouldn’t exactly make sense.”
“If she’s not all there, she must require attention.”
“Well, yes, but we’ve questioned her provider on two occasions, and her alibis checked out, we’re barking up the wrong tree.”
“And I suppose, given her mental state, a facial composite…”
“Well actually, there is one on file, but with her memory on shaky ground we may be grasping at straws.”
I was given a copy, which for some reason I chose to open alone. The hairs on my neck sat up as I unfolded and flattened out the creases. It seemed that despite her flaw, Miss Highmers had laid out a pretty vivid detailing of her intruder. And unless someone else had a similar set of beady eyes, I was looking at one Charlie Cameron. He’d aged. If everything on the rendering was as accurate as his eyes, he’d grown a strand of white hair down his right side. Protocol would have seen me excuse myself of any further involvement. Instead I folded up the sketch, and returned it to Threadbare.
The visit was nothing short of routine, with Threadbare doing the talking, and me wandering about the room looking for anything significant. She mumbled on aimlessly; going off on tangents barely relative. It was easy to see why she’d been targeted. Precious antiquities adorned just about every shelf and corner of her living room. And while the visit got us nowhere closer to Charlie, it wasn’t a total loss. For, as long as she could retain it, this feeling of comfort, we could walk away with our heads held just a little higher.
Threadbare explained that the department didn’t have the manpower to surveil the premises, so I took it upon myself to do a little surveilling of my own, hoping that just maybe, lightning would strike again.
Silence always evoked a string of thoughts and memories, and there was no shortage of either as I sat alone on this particular night, staking out the house. I wondered what I would say, what he would say. I wondered what circumstances had led him down this path. Could he still levitate things with his hands? And if that potential had evolved, would he use it against me out of fear, or spite, or anger? My mind was a string of questions.
I considered calling it a night as I looked to my phone. The lights to Miss Highmers’s house had dimmed a long while ago, and so too had mine begun to dim as I reclined in the seat of my Jeep. Then a loud screech, I reckoned a hundred yards down, knocked the cobwebs off my head.
It didn’t make sense that he’d be driving so reckless at this time of night, on this suburban street no less. But there he was. It had to be him. It was dark, but it had to be him. In a frantic effort to recover my phone which had inconveniently slipped between the seat and the center console I missed his entrance.
“Brother or not, you’re coming with me,” I said under my breath.
So what if it was a corny twist on an old 80’s one liner?
It was an unnerving sensation knowing I was about to go in unaided. The trepidations alone had my heart pulsating faster than it ever had, and that’s saying something considering I fancy myself a sprinter. Of course I took all the necessary precautions by strapping on my vest and arming myself. My badge I wore on a chain around my neck, just like they do in the movies.
I was back in the woods again, stepping on dew covered leaves as I approached the house with caution. The nerves which had at once began in my heart, seemed to have trickled down into my hand as I continuously grazed my holster, outlining its edges with my fingertips. The door was ajar, but I was expecting that. What I hadn’t expected was the crowbar leant up against the staggered panels of the house.
“Forced entry?” I pondered quietly.
I treaded cautiously over the hardwood floor of the house, as cautiously as I had done that one fateful morning in the woods, careful not to stir any loose or creaky boards. It didn’t take long to find him. My ear led me.
He was so immersed in his work he hadn’t noticed I’d crept up behind him. The rendering of his hair had proved that there was in fact some steel grey strands of hair atop his head.
I said his name with nothing but a quiet conviction that he’d recognize my voice even after all these years, “Charlie,” My voice cracked.
He spun around, startled I would imagine.
“Oh shit!” He blurted, putting up his hands.
“It’s been a while,” I said, keeping my gun hand ready.
“Too long.” He nodded, “What’s with the costume? It’s not Halloween.”
I scowled, “Oh it’s real.”
His smile faded as he glanced around at his handiwork, “Well then, looks like you caught me at a bad time.”
“Looks that way,” I uttered softly.
“Wait, don’t you all come in twos?” He inquired.
“Outside,” I said softly.
“You never really were good at lying,” He shook his head, “You gonna take that hand off your pistol there?” He said with a shaky voice.
“It calms my nerves,” I said, gliding my thumb down the polymer frame.
“Fair,” he nodded.
“Why?” I asked.
It was a vague question, one that he could have taken a number of ways and a number of directions. I suspected he’d address the issue at hand. I suspected.
“I don’t know really. Something, or someone rather, how do I explain this…” he began to pace, “they called to me out there.”
I scrunched my face, “What are you on about?”
“Mom knew. She didn’t never know the day or the hour, but she knew,” he stared at the ground, “How is she?”
“She passed,” I said quickly.
“I’m sorry. How did she go?”
“What’s it to you, runaway?”
He frowned, “It wasn’t up to me.”
“She mourned a long time.”
“Unfortunately, things didn’t work out, which would explain why you’re here,” he said, motioning his hands over his loot bag.
“You’re in a pickle Charlie, as a long-lost sister, I sympathize, but as an officer of the law, you’ve crossed a line that I’m sworn to uphold.”
A lump formed in my throat as I watched him grimace.
“Charlie please; you’ll only make things worse by not cooperating. I can help you, but we have to do this my way,” I pleaded.
I kept a steady hand on the grip of my gun as his beady eyes locked with mine.
“What are you going to do with that?” He asked in a low tone.
I’d hoped it wouldn’t come to that. But the gleam off a stainless-steel knife sent my instincts into action. They called it fight or flight back at the academy. His hands were clumsy, and I was quicker off the draw.
“Don’t move Charlie.”
“Aww, don’t you trust me… Maddy?” he pouted.
With piercing eyes, I relieved, in hazy spurts, the slow six-foot descend, “How do you know that name?” I whispered intimately.
Charlie, keeping the knife betwixt his fingers, let a chuckle escape from behind his devious grin.
“How?” I asked urgently.
“Mother,” he said softly.
I gritted my teeth, and snarled, “Liar! That name died with him.”
He grew frustrated, frozen in this standoff, and raised the knife to just above his belly.
I cocked the hammer to my service pistol and cried out commandingly, “Drop the knife!”
“And risk stabbing myself in the foot? No thanks,” he quipped.
“Agh! Just… put it down.”
I kept the gun tucked onto my chest. Any recoil with an extended arm would hurt like hell, maybe even snap a bone, then what good would I be?
“Yes officer,” he said dipping low to gracefully unite the knife with the hardwood.
“Hands behind your back,” I said, motioning him to turn around, “I’d hoped not to have to use these, but you leave me no choice.”
Keeping my gun firmly gripped and affixed on his spine I reached behind me. I slid my hand along the small of my back from hip to hip and back again.
“What’s the matter officer? Looking for these?”
It seemed the biggest question of the night was floating right in front of me, embedded in my matte black handcuffs dizzyingly twirling before my eyes.
I should have made for the door right then and there, but I was headstrong, and the badge weighed heavy on my heart, “Charlie give them back!”
He turned and snickered, “You sound just like a sandbox school girl unwillingly forced into a game of monkey in the middle.”
Indeed I did, but I indulged in his antics anyway, stubbornly scrambling about fixated on snatching the cuffs out of the air. It was downright humiliating, or so I thought at the time.
“Go on, catch them! Oh, so close!” He teased.
“This is ridiculous!” I said flustered.
I abandoned the restraints hovering around my head, and aimed my pistol right down his chest, “Come quietly, or there will be trouble.”
“Really Maddy? Robocop? Was it me, or did mom always favor the right cheek when she’d put you over her knee for watching that shit? Why she never got rid of that tape is beyond me, then again it was his favorite.”
“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” I said, gripping the gun till its jagged edges etched into my hand.
Suddenly there was a challenging tug vying for my weapon. For all the grip I had and for all the will I possessed to keep the gun in my hands, his will was stronger. I watched, helplessly, as the gun was pried from my hands. Then he pointed it directly between my eyes; my own pistol, suspended against me.
Had my body been any stiffer, a paramedic would have been within their rights to pronounce me D.O.A, dead on arrival. Or perhaps my body was just practicing for what seemed inevitable.
“You don’t deserve to die. You’re just doing your job.”
I watched as my harbinger of death went from being pointed at me to being stripped down to its simplest components till it was nothing more than a heap of useless parts scattered at my feet.
“But…” He cleared his throat.
Looking back on it now it seems foolish of me to have attributed my deathly motionless body to anything other than his supernatural abilities. But at the time fear was a more comprehensive conclusion, even after what I’d just witnessed.
“I cannot allow your actions to subside without some swift retribution on my behalf.”
My courage decayed as a simple hand gesture on his behalf elevated my body several inches above the hardwood, trapping me in a state of paralysis.
“Wh-what… are you… d-doing to mee?!”
My vest was the first thing to go. It frayed from every stitch until it was little more than a worthless pile of fabrics endlessly knotted in a spool on the ground; my pants and shirt suffering similar fates. My intimates were spared. I suppose the “brother” in him had no desires to see me naked. Or perhaps, given his seemingly endless knowledge of the Bryson family lineage, he’d already seen me naked in another time and another place, overly displeased with my assets. Neither offered me much solace knowing that whatever shred of dignity I still had, tethered between his intentions and two scanty pink articles of clothing.
He looked at me once over, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead, “Oh Maddy, looks like you’re the one in a pickle now.”
“Stop calling me that!” I blurted.
“You act as if you’re in a position to dictate anything, let alone how I address you.”
His words rang true, and sent a spine tingling tremor up my back, “MISS HIGHMERS!!”
“Ha! That old bat wouldn’t hear a freight train barreling through here without her hearing aids,” He said with a witty grin, “You’re shit out of luck.”
I was forced to reach for the sky as my arms succumbed to his telekinetic abilities, and there they remained as he slowly and softly began stroking the insides of my biceps.
“Whaaa-ha-at… are you doing-gee-hee-hee?!”
“I seem to recall a certain little someone, having a certain little secret, which evolved into a certain little fear of a particular set of hands,” He pondered aloud.
“Oh shit!” I winced.
I’ll never fully comprehend the value God finds in making us ticklish. Anatomist suggest it’s a primitive defense mechanism designed to warn us about impending danger. I just viewed it as one of nature’s substantial flaws, and rightfully so given how excruciatingly torturous it was to have fingers lightly dancing about your armpits.
“I’ll take it, from your less than charismatic facial expressions, you haven’t lost your touch,” He quipped.
I would have replied with a snarky remark had I not been so concentrated on stifling my laughter. Then again, with my thoughts growing abundantly clouded amidst the involuntary emotions, I doubt I would have come up with anything noteworthy.
“Tickling you say? A bit childish, I’ll admit. More of an innocent pastime under the right circumstances. But for you…”
Somehow he knew as he let his hands dig a little deeper into my ghastly white hollows with tiny pinches that ascended and descended at random.
“YEA-AH-HA-HA! CH-CHARLIEEE-HEE-HEE!”
So much for not giving him the satisfaction, I thought to myself as with every burst of laughter my resolve crumbled under the power of his frivolous fingers.
As fast as the titillations had come pouring in, so too did they make a swift exit as his hands withdrew from my body; time enough to regain my composure and reconnect with the fear momentarily turned asunder by fabricated fits of merriment.
“Oh Maddy, why the quiver? Of all the painful alternatives, you should be thankful you’re getting off so easily.”
I unwillingly held my tongue.
“Oh come now, don’t be such a recluse. It’s not polite you know,” He egged.
I bit my lip, and let my eyes wander about my surroundings, not that I could reach for anything, but even a microsecond to take my mind off things was welcome time.
“Rude,” he said reuniting his hands with my elbows.
As his fingers trickled down my arms triggering a host of sensations, I managed a though between the snickers and snorts. For all his motivations, he had a point. I may not have been embracing of the adolescent mischief, but no serious physical harm was befalling my body, and for that I was grateful.
“WHAA-HA-HA-AAAH! JEE-HEE-HEE-ASUS-SA-HA-HA!”
“Must you say that name?” He hissed over my laugh.
Had I my bearings, I may have caught his unwittingly subtle hint. Then again for those of us who’ve had the unfortunate privilege, I think it’s safe to say our I.Q points take something of a decline amidst the madness.
I just had to wear the satin bra. Granted that morning when I’d picked it out over a slew of others I hadn’t anticipated I’d be in this jam, but oh how that material made use of my nerve endings. As sensitive as they already were, it seemed their sensitivity only increased under the magic of that slippery material.
His hands were quick to pick up on my fashion faux pa, eliciting belly laughs that jiggled my supple flesh. And here’s the kicker, he was barely touching me at all.
“BWAAA-HA-HA-HA! WHAA-HA-HA-HAT THE FAACK-KA-HA-HA!”
Simple circular motions and I’d whip my head. A spontaneous pinch, and my face would scrunch. I was like a marionette, each of his volatile strokes, a tug on my strings.
A few beads of sweat trickled down his temple as he began an excavation on my ribs that would have rivaled even the most money grubbing oil tycoon. Except my precious resource… well, you already know what that is.
“OH GEEE-HEE-HEEZE! SON OF A BEE-HEE-HEEATCH! CHARLIEEE-HEE-HEE!”
The veins in his hands were out in force as he spread his fingers along my ribs, feeling me up one squeeze at a time. He rode that fine line between tickle and pain exceptionally well. The calculated firmness of his grip never once inflicted any trauma; as if he’d been trained in the art of pressure, where to apply it and where not to. But human beings can be fickle individuals; not a one equal to the other. Yet he knew my ins and outs possibly better than anyone, myself included.
“WHOA-AH-HA-HA! NOT THE RIBS! NOT THE FUCKIN’ RIBS-SA-HA-HA!”
“Is that any kind of language for an upstanding officer? Who’s uniform and badge are a symbol, a shining light to the…”
“FOR FUCK’S SAAAKE-KA-HA-HA! STOP YOU FUCKER!”
Through a squint I watched his head cock back, disapproval written all over face.
“Excuse me?” He said playfully.
His temple throbbed as he wicked away more sweat. I took three heavy breaths hoping that somewhere in between them I could conjure up some form of reputable apology.
“You want to run that by me again?” He said, unfastening the top button to his shirt.
“I’m sorry, it’s ticklish… I mean I’m ticklish… I am… you know… I… I…”
The words tumbled around in my brain incoherently like wet laundry set to permanent press. I was a hopeless mess, unraveling just as fast as my uniform had only moments ago.
Injury to insult ensued as he mimicked my folly, babbling alongside me as I struggled to string together a sentence. Then his fingertips nestled into my tender hollows obliterating the notion with spontaneous spider like hand gestures.
“WHOO-HOO-HOO! WHA-HA-HEEEE! AGH-HA-HA!”
With ample amounts of fervor he drilled into my armpits, rippling my flesh. My breasts jiggled, rubbing against the cups of my bra till my nipples were these tiny erect beads aroused off erotic frictions.
“You’re blushing,” He declared.
“CHARILEE-HEE-HEE PLEE-HUS-SA-HA-HA! I’LL LET YOU GOO-HO-HO!”
“Oh, you’ll let me go?” He chuckled.
In retrospect it really was just a shot in the dark, my little comment; a cry of desperation. The balance of power had shifted exponentially since I’d walked in armed and dangerous. Then again I suppose it could be argued there really never was a balance of power; that my vest, and my weapon, and my badge were merely illusions that had built me up to believe I had some sort of chance against my opposition.
“YAASSS! I’LL LET YOU GO! I WON’T TELL ANYONE!”
Look at me, reduced to this, pleading.
“Is that so?” He smirked.
He kneeled at my belly, watching it inflate and deflate as I strived to replenish lost vitality through precious sips of air.
“You’ll have to forgive me, my suspicions. After all, you seemed quite adamant about taking me in,” He said placing his hand along my side where my pistol used to sit.
His hand didn’t stay stagnant long as after a cherished gulp of air he squeezed my love handles. Somehow, I managed to ball my fists, an involuntary response I’d been deprived of since my paralysis. Though much to my dismay, digging my nails into the meat of my palms did nothing to subdue the intense titillations coursing through the rest of my body.
“WHOAH-HO-HO! WHA-HA-HEE-HEE-HEE! CHARLIEEEE C’MON PLEEE-HEE-HEEASE!”
I may have been bawling incessantly, carrying on like a psychiatric patient in need of a sedative, but my eyes could not have been mistaken. Beyond my tear stricken pupils I noticed, there was something different about Charlie. Not that he was sweating profusely, I was with him in that respect. In fact, I don’t recall a time outside of my fitness gram where sweat had accumulated in such volumes between my butt cheeks. No, not the sweat, but his hair. More of his hair was turning grey.
“CH-CH-CHARLIEE-HEE-HEE! YOOOUR… H-HAAAIR-RA-HA-HA!”
His gyrating thumbs pressed deep into my core, kneading that quarter inch of stubborn belly fat layered above my abs. In any other circumstance vanity and self-consciousness would have preoccupied my psyche, but this wasn’t an ordinary circumstance as more pressing issues mastered my domain.
“An unfortunate side effect,” He grimaced.
And though I wanted to know more, a boisterous bashing of my belly derailed my train of thought, forcing my reply to be anything but cognitive.
“OH-HO-HO! AWWAH-HA-HA! HU-HA-HA-HA!”
He probed my belly-button.
“Now there’s a tender spot if I recall,” He said through bloodshot eyes.
I turned my head away, a futile attempt to dissociate from the proceedings. A hazy, somewhat glared reflection off the picture window caught my eye. The image was little more than a funhouse distortion of my predicament, only I was in pigtails, finger paints were nail polish, and The Count was on Sesame Street sporting the number eight in his hands. I could almost smell the freshly baked cookies being set down with a glass of cold milk.
“WHAA-HA-HAAT THE FUCK-KA-HA-HA!”
I blinked and the image was gone. I could see myself as I was again, hopelessly stretched out in nothing but my boots and intimates. My boots.
Had he read my mind? Nothing was beyond plausible at this point as Charlie abandoned my soft midsection and forced my legs up into the air till my black leather boots sat adjacent to his chest.
“You didn’t think I’d be neglecting these pretty little things did you?” He wheezed.
The only response I could muster were widened eyes as I watched him effortlessly pluck away at my laces. I pressed my toes against my insoles, anything to momentarily stifle his efforts. I think I spared myself five seconds, but for my insubordination…
Veil thin nylon anklets served as my last defense as I heard my boots crash to the ground. My feet were on display, and I could tell by the twinkle in Charlie’s eye he was fully invested in the view.
“Phew! Someone forgot their Odor Eaters today,” He teased.
“Well, you could, you know, just put them back on,” I bantered back.
“Someone’s coming alive,” He smirked.
“That’s an un-under sss statement ta-ha!”
How rude of him not to allow me my two cents. Then again, who was I to be filing grievances as his fingers took to an effortless escapade across the gentle curves of my feet.
“RAAAH-HA-HA! OH THIS SUUUCKS-SA-HA-HA!”
Figure eights abound dizzyingly scribbled upon each sole, these intricate little patterns in constant fluidity from his fingers to my body. Waves of sensation, overwhelming, ensnared within my meaty size sevens.
“Oh Maddy, you’re huffing and puffing,” He teased.
I nodded accordingly, smiling from ear to ear as his fingers danced in emphatic fashion along my arches; back and forth, and back again, like a giant paintbrush set to an awkward pace devoid of rhythmic pattern. And then at once he snagged my socks.
“I never figured you for pink,” He said slipping them off my feet.
“Charlie… please… I can’t… Char-LEEEE…”
With a single finger he tantalized my naked left sole.
“Ch-Charlie no… nu-nu-NO-HO-HO… That’s-sss-SEE-HEE-HEE… enough…”
A careless… little… finger.
“Oh sh-sheeet-TEE-HEE-HEE… OH WHYYY-YAH-HA-HA!”
My face must have been a twisted contortion of hysteria because it was enough to make Charlie indulge in a laugh at my expense.
“Oh come now sister, I’m barely even touching you.”
It didn’t matter. Wave after wave of subsequent erratic prickling coursed up my calves off this one finger alternating between my feet. And though my body longed to move, it begged to move, every fiber of my being crying to be unbridled, his telekinetic resolve was too much for my physical strength to overcome.
He stepped back and gritted his teeth.
“I can feel you.”
It took me a moment to recompose, catch my breath, and process exactly what he meant. I was left with a quizzical look upon my face as he fanned my toes with one quick wave of his hand. It hadn’t meant much to me that Miss Highmers was an avid collector of native American antiquities till Charlie plucked a feather off a tribal headdress.
“How convenient,” He said resting it between my toes, “it’s as if someone wrote them in just so I could have something to delight these cute little marshmallows.”
I huffed, blowing a rouge lock of hair off my face, “Indeed.”
It was a stiff little son of a bitch twirling between my toes ever so lightly.
“HO-WHA-HA-HA! OH THAT’S THE WOOORSSST-STEE-HEE-HEE! I CAN’T MOOO-WHOO-WHOOVE-VA-HA-HA!”
He rolled his eyes and shrugged away my desperate cries, the feather’s quill, one with balls of my feet. He scribbled merrily, in endless circles before abandoning my feet for a more supple region of my body. This scrunched position left my midsection a protruding life preserver of excess fatty tissue that he seemed more than happy to plunge his fingers into.
It about goes without saying at this point that I went berserk; balling tight my hands and whipping my head as he pierced through my layers to get to my abs. Nestled deep his hands kneaded my flesh with jubilant pokes and gyrating thumb thrusts.
“NOO-HO-HO! WHAA-HA-HA! CHARLIEEE-HEE-HEE PLEE-HEE-HEEASE!”
“You should have left well enough alone, but you just had to play hero,” He shook his head.
“IT’S MY JOB-BA-HA-HA! PLEE-HEE-HEEASE! BROTH-TH-THER-RA-HA-HA!”
Another bead of sweat slipped down my backside to be collected between my creases as I reflexively clenched my butt amidst the endless exuberance flowing through his fingers rippling my belly. And I was about gasped out of laughter when he stopped, suddenly.
Heavy breathing followed. Through tear stricken eyes I watched him tremble. I could feel his hold, failing.
“I think… I have one more trick up my sleeve,” He said, fatigued.
“Charlie, that’s enough!” I said through precious sips of air, “You… you have to let me go! It’s hurting you!”
“Oh you’d like that,” He said placing a hand on my forehead.
“There’s… just one more thing… needs to be done,” He said closing his eyes.
Much of what happened after that, I don’t remember. In fact if I were to have testified, it likely would have been inadmissible given how uncorroborated my memory was of the proceedings following his tender touch atop my forehead.
I was stirred by a faint tapping on my window, my Jeep window; a late-night passerby looking on as I faintly roused my head off the steering wheel. I feared the worst as he cupped his hands and peered in; but that’s when I felt it, my uniform. I was completely clothed from head to toe.
“Sorry, I must have dozed off,” I said through the glass.
Instinctively I ran my hand across my chest and produced my badge, clanking it against the window.
He threw up his hands and backed away slowly, mumbling something indistinct before skating away.
I reached for my hip, where sure as shit my pistol was, locked in its holster, fully functional, not a bullet removed. My vest was laid carelessly across the backseat, where I’d initially tossed it, carelessly.
I looked to my phone; no missed calls, nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing except, the hour. I stared at it until the minute turned, trying to convince myself it was an error, some kind of glitch, and that I’d be calling Sprint to resolve the issue at the start of the next business day. Then I looked to the Jeep’s dash for confirmation of a truth I held to be self-evident.
This next one is a little different. It's not as long. I'm taking a new approach. I'd like to know what you all think, honestly. I'd really appreciate the feedback, more bad feedback than good, because I can't learn anything new from just getting praised for my accomplishments. Thank you all in advance for taking the time to read this one.
Maddy
I couldn’t quite grasp it then. The proceedings meant very little to me. I didn’t know him like she did. In fact, to that day and the ones that followed, I don’t recall ever seeing her more vulnerable. Of course, at the time, I didn’t care. It was hot, my armpits were sweaty, and the frills on my dress were being so uncooperative. Minutes stretched to hours as I fidgeted in my seat. To subdue an itch mounting along the arch of my foot I took to stomping the ground. I was immediately reprimanded.
It was a year to the day before those proceedings finally started to garner some significance. She looked vulnerable again, yet through fought back tears, she told me the story that led to the marble stone we were commemorating. It was also the day she brought home little Charlie Cameron.
I wasn’t there to see it, but oh does she have a way to tell a story. She could have been a great writer.
Looking back on it with a more mature mentality I concur, it was a shameless act. In the end though, she was happy to have a new addition.
And while it took some getting used to, I soon saw him as she did.
She spoke about him for days on end to pretty much anyone who had an ear; how he, “understood” and how there was this, “unspoken connection”. I felt it too. Words were beyond him, still we couldn’t help but notice how his eyes, those green and blue, beady little things, never seemed left in awestruck wonder; as if everything he surveyed, he’d seen before, in another time and another place.
He slumbered like a corpse. On nights when God was angry, nights that saw me seek comforts beyond my own bed, he’d barely twitch. I’d walked in on him sleeping a handful of times.
In the year of 97 mom sent us off to camp. Cabins made up of wood, netted with wired screen windows made for an interesting change to the city life. No electricity meant going back to simpler times but by my accounts, it was okay. I’d grown to appreciate simplicity. It was affordable.
One morning, while most of us were still sleeping, waiting for that dreaded trumpet to rouse us from whatever lucid dreams our unconscious could conjure, feelings of a more natural order awoke me. Ants in my pants. No, not literal ants, but it’s what we’d been conditioned to say by our councilors to avoid any notion of the literal stigma, particularly since the older kids would sometimes catch wind, and tickle it out of us for their amusement. I would have asked my councilor to escort me to the toilet accept she wasn’t there. By the looks of her bed, she’d slipped off into the night with Tommy. Ever so often I’d hear him sneak into the room while she read us off into slumber. And although this time the sandman caught me a little early into the chapter, I reckon he’d whisked her away again.
Dew covered leaves sent a cold chill through my naked soles as I stepped lightly towards “piss rock”. The boulder sat on a ledge making it the perfect place to pop a squat. I just might have, except for something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye. It was Charlie.
He was whispering some random gibberish into the nothing. I’d told him to leave his friends at home, that they’d bring him nothing but bullies here. I suppose he didn’t see the harm in it, given the hour.
With every step I took towards him, a scowl on my face sat ready to reprimand. I just might have, but then something stopped me dead in my tracks. Before Charlie, suspended between his hands, was a skipping stone. He seemed very concentrated on it, as if nothing outside of him or the stone existed. Then I heard him whisper something, something that sent the stone whirling through the trees of the dense forest surrounding us. I didn’t need to use “piss rock” anymore.
I wasn’t sure whether to go dry off or call out to him as I watched him wander a bit further into the woods. It was a selfish thing to do, but I figured myself fast enough. I was wrong.
A manhunt ensued, but the boy known as Charlie Cameron was never see again. Looking back, I can imagine why he’d ran. If there was fear presiding in me over what he could do… Well, who knows if fear was even a part of his physiological makeup.
My mother became vulnerable again. At first, I sympathized; after all the feeling was mutual. But I healed faster, and my sympathies turned to pity. My focus turned to school, and with blinders on I buried her sorrows.
I eventually graduated with honors. My grades even helped me earn a scholarship to the University of Texas, where I studied criminal justice. It didn’t become a passion till reruns of an old 90’s T.V show started resurfacing through syndication. I wanted to chase little green men with a gun and badge. Then cancer got in the way.
After only two years of schooling mom was diagnosed with a low-grade malignancy, and I abandoned my studies to stay by her side. She didn’t want me to, but it was the most affordable option.
I took up a job as a loss prevention supervisor at the department store where she used to work. The money helped supplement whatever social security and Medicare couldn’t. On more than one occasion, I’d find myself walking past the display of car seats and strollers, reminded of her story.
It killed her slowly, the cancer. By the time she passed, I’d lost more than just her. It’s a selfish thing to say, but I’d lost three years of my life. In my absence, my scholarship had been revoked. I was alone and in a heap of debt after the funeral. It’s funny how family tends to dissipate when times get tough, mine anyway. So, I did what I assume most anyone would… I… settled.
I had just enough college credits and within twenty-one weeks I was deputized; an officer of the law. Fate had succumbed me to this dirt brown uniform; a fitting physical parallel of my life.
The first time I put it on was the first time I’d ever associated with the word, “vanity”. The vest made me look fat. The color was unflattering, redundant I know, but some points I just feel like hammering in. The pants, baggy, left my legs these shapeless uniform stumps. I settled on a half shave to get my strawberry locks to a more manageable length.
I was met with plenty a face upon my arrival to the department. Among them was officer Brian Threadbare, one of the department’s “grandfathers”. Uniform aside, he could have passed for an off-season Santa Clause the way his gut bumped into things. His seemingly endless supply of Coca-Cola, at times, made me wonder if he didn’t have stock in the beverage. One was never too out of reach from his stubby fingers which effectively earned him the moniker, “coke head” around the office.
Most days were spent keeping to the speed limit; surveying the streets for petty traffic violations, and occasionally answering a call or two from residents regarding minor domestic disputes. Nothing unimaginable, but nothing worth an episode of COPS. About a hundred donuts and ten gallons of coffee into my employment a briefing was had. It was the standard affair. A rundown of assignments went addressed to corresponding officers. Brian and I were given a “scrap” an apt name for a petty detail.
“Threadbare, you’re familiar. Fill her in, have a look at the particulars. Make a house call, etcetera, etcetera,” Our superior took his leave, slamming his hand against the podium as if it were a judge’s gavel, and we all disbursed.
“So, like what’s this? Another, like, deadbeat assignment or what?” I questioned.
“You youngsters and that word…” he grumbled.
“I’m sorry.”
“… and no. There are no such things as deadbeat assignments,” he huffed.
I mouthed the words with over-exaggerated animation. He’d hammered that line into my brain the first couple of weeks, “Ugh, I know, but what did ol’ pasty face mean, “familiar”?”
“Miss Highmers, late 70’s, suffers a bit upstairs,” Threadbare alluded to his forehead which made me scoff, “she’s a repeat customer if you catch my drift, says someone’s been frequenting her house, stealing,”
“Anything concrete?”
“Not so much as a fingerprint, never any forced entry.”
“Family?”
“They furnish the place, wouldn’t exactly make sense.”
“If she’s not all there, she must require attention.”
“Well, yes, but we’ve questioned her provider on two occasions, and her alibis checked out, we’re barking up the wrong tree.”
“And I suppose, given her mental state, a facial composite…”
“Well actually, there is one on file, but with her memory on shaky ground we may be grasping at straws.”
I was given a copy, which for some reason I chose to open alone. The hairs on my neck sat up as I unfolded and flattened out the creases. It seemed that despite her flaw, Miss Highmers had laid out a pretty vivid detailing of her intruder. And unless someone else had a similar set of beady eyes, I was looking at one Charlie Cameron. He’d aged. If everything on the rendering was as accurate as his eyes, he’d grown a strand of white hair down his right side. Protocol would have seen me excuse myself of any further involvement. Instead I folded up the sketch, and returned it to Threadbare.
The visit was nothing short of routine, with Threadbare doing the talking, and me wandering about the room looking for anything significant. She mumbled on aimlessly; going off on tangents barely relative. It was easy to see why she’d been targeted. Precious antiquities adorned just about every shelf and corner of her living room. And while the visit got us nowhere closer to Charlie, it wasn’t a total loss. For, as long as she could retain it, this feeling of comfort, we could walk away with our heads held just a little higher.
Threadbare explained that the department didn’t have the manpower to surveil the premises, so I took it upon myself to do a little surveilling of my own, hoping that just maybe, lightning would strike again.
Silence always evoked a string of thoughts and memories, and there was no shortage of either as I sat alone on this particular night, staking out the house. I wondered what I would say, what he would say. I wondered what circumstances had led him down this path. Could he still levitate things with his hands? And if that potential had evolved, would he use it against me out of fear, or spite, or anger? My mind was a string of questions.
I considered calling it a night as I looked to my phone. The lights to Miss Highmers’s house had dimmed a long while ago, and so too had mine begun to dim as I reclined in the seat of my Jeep. Then a loud screech, I reckoned a hundred yards down, knocked the cobwebs off my head.
It didn’t make sense that he’d be driving so reckless at this time of night, on this suburban street no less. But there he was. It had to be him. It was dark, but it had to be him. In a frantic effort to recover my phone which had inconveniently slipped between the seat and the center console I missed his entrance.
“Brother or not, you’re coming with me,” I said under my breath.
So what if it was a corny twist on an old 80’s one liner?
It was an unnerving sensation knowing I was about to go in unaided. The trepidations alone had my heart pulsating faster than it ever had, and that’s saying something considering I fancy myself a sprinter. Of course I took all the necessary precautions by strapping on my vest and arming myself. My badge I wore on a chain around my neck, just like they do in the movies.
I was back in the woods again, stepping on dew covered leaves as I approached the house with caution. The nerves which had at once began in my heart, seemed to have trickled down into my hand as I continuously grazed my holster, outlining its edges with my fingertips. The door was ajar, but I was expecting that. What I hadn’t expected was the crowbar leant up against the staggered panels of the house.
“Forced entry?” I pondered quietly.
I treaded cautiously over the hardwood floor of the house, as cautiously as I had done that one fateful morning in the woods, careful not to stir any loose or creaky boards. It didn’t take long to find him. My ear led me.
He was so immersed in his work he hadn’t noticed I’d crept up behind him. The rendering of his hair had proved that there was in fact some steel grey strands of hair atop his head.
I said his name with nothing but a quiet conviction that he’d recognize my voice even after all these years, “Charlie,” My voice cracked.
He spun around, startled I would imagine.
“Oh shit!” He blurted, putting up his hands.
“It’s been a while,” I said, keeping my gun hand ready.
“Too long.” He nodded, “What’s with the costume? It’s not Halloween.”
I scowled, “Oh it’s real.”
His smile faded as he glanced around at his handiwork, “Well then, looks like you caught me at a bad time.”
“Looks that way,” I uttered softly.
“Wait, don’t you all come in twos?” He inquired.
“Outside,” I said softly.
“You never really were good at lying,” He shook his head, “You gonna take that hand off your pistol there?” He said with a shaky voice.
“It calms my nerves,” I said, gliding my thumb down the polymer frame.
“Fair,” he nodded.
“Why?” I asked.
It was a vague question, one that he could have taken a number of ways and a number of directions. I suspected he’d address the issue at hand. I suspected.
“I don’t know really. Something, or someone rather, how do I explain this…” he began to pace, “they called to me out there.”
I scrunched my face, “What are you on about?”
“Mom knew. She didn’t never know the day or the hour, but she knew,” he stared at the ground, “How is she?”
“She passed,” I said quickly.
“I’m sorry. How did she go?”
“What’s it to you, runaway?”
He frowned, “It wasn’t up to me.”
“She mourned a long time.”
“Unfortunately, things didn’t work out, which would explain why you’re here,” he said, motioning his hands over his loot bag.
“You’re in a pickle Charlie, as a long-lost sister, I sympathize, but as an officer of the law, you’ve crossed a line that I’m sworn to uphold.”
A lump formed in my throat as I watched him grimace.
“Charlie please; you’ll only make things worse by not cooperating. I can help you, but we have to do this my way,” I pleaded.
I kept a steady hand on the grip of my gun as his beady eyes locked with mine.
“What are you going to do with that?” He asked in a low tone.
I’d hoped it wouldn’t come to that. But the gleam off a stainless-steel knife sent my instincts into action. They called it fight or flight back at the academy. His hands were clumsy, and I was quicker off the draw.
“Don’t move Charlie.”
“Aww, don’t you trust me… Maddy?” he pouted.
With piercing eyes, I relieved, in hazy spurts, the slow six-foot descend, “How do you know that name?” I whispered intimately.
Charlie, keeping the knife betwixt his fingers, let a chuckle escape from behind his devious grin.
“How?” I asked urgently.
“Mother,” he said softly.
I gritted my teeth, and snarled, “Liar! That name died with him.”
He grew frustrated, frozen in this standoff, and raised the knife to just above his belly.
I cocked the hammer to my service pistol and cried out commandingly, “Drop the knife!”
“And risk stabbing myself in the foot? No thanks,” he quipped.
“Agh! Just… put it down.”
I kept the gun tucked onto my chest. Any recoil with an extended arm would hurt like hell, maybe even snap a bone, then what good would I be?
“Yes officer,” he said dipping low to gracefully unite the knife with the hardwood.
“Hands behind your back,” I said, motioning him to turn around, “I’d hoped not to have to use these, but you leave me no choice.”
Keeping my gun firmly gripped and affixed on his spine I reached behind me. I slid my hand along the small of my back from hip to hip and back again.
“What’s the matter officer? Looking for these?”
It seemed the biggest question of the night was floating right in front of me, embedded in my matte black handcuffs dizzyingly twirling before my eyes.
I should have made for the door right then and there, but I was headstrong, and the badge weighed heavy on my heart, “Charlie give them back!”
He turned and snickered, “You sound just like a sandbox school girl unwillingly forced into a game of monkey in the middle.”
Indeed I did, but I indulged in his antics anyway, stubbornly scrambling about fixated on snatching the cuffs out of the air. It was downright humiliating, or so I thought at the time.
“Go on, catch them! Oh, so close!” He teased.
“This is ridiculous!” I said flustered.
I abandoned the restraints hovering around my head, and aimed my pistol right down his chest, “Come quietly, or there will be trouble.”
“Really Maddy? Robocop? Was it me, or did mom always favor the right cheek when she’d put you over her knee for watching that shit? Why she never got rid of that tape is beyond me, then again it was his favorite.”
“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” I said, gripping the gun till its jagged edges etched into my hand.
Suddenly there was a challenging tug vying for my weapon. For all the grip I had and for all the will I possessed to keep the gun in my hands, his will was stronger. I watched, helplessly, as the gun was pried from my hands. Then he pointed it directly between my eyes; my own pistol, suspended against me.
Had my body been any stiffer, a paramedic would have been within their rights to pronounce me D.O.A, dead on arrival. Or perhaps my body was just practicing for what seemed inevitable.
“You don’t deserve to die. You’re just doing your job.”
I watched as my harbinger of death went from being pointed at me to being stripped down to its simplest components till it was nothing more than a heap of useless parts scattered at my feet.
“But…” He cleared his throat.
Looking back on it now it seems foolish of me to have attributed my deathly motionless body to anything other than his supernatural abilities. But at the time fear was a more comprehensive conclusion, even after what I’d just witnessed.
“I cannot allow your actions to subside without some swift retribution on my behalf.”
My courage decayed as a simple hand gesture on his behalf elevated my body several inches above the hardwood, trapping me in a state of paralysis.
“Wh-what… are you… d-doing to mee?!”
My vest was the first thing to go. It frayed from every stitch until it was little more than a worthless pile of fabrics endlessly knotted in a spool on the ground; my pants and shirt suffering similar fates. My intimates were spared. I suppose the “brother” in him had no desires to see me naked. Or perhaps, given his seemingly endless knowledge of the Bryson family lineage, he’d already seen me naked in another time and another place, overly displeased with my assets. Neither offered me much solace knowing that whatever shred of dignity I still had, tethered between his intentions and two scanty pink articles of clothing.
He looked at me once over, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead, “Oh Maddy, looks like you’re the one in a pickle now.”
“Stop calling me that!” I blurted.
“You act as if you’re in a position to dictate anything, let alone how I address you.”
His words rang true, and sent a spine tingling tremor up my back, “MISS HIGHMERS!!”
“Ha! That old bat wouldn’t hear a freight train barreling through here without her hearing aids,” He said with a witty grin, “You’re shit out of luck.”
I was forced to reach for the sky as my arms succumbed to his telekinetic abilities, and there they remained as he slowly and softly began stroking the insides of my biceps.
“Whaaa-ha-at… are you doing-gee-hee-hee?!”
“I seem to recall a certain little someone, having a certain little secret, which evolved into a certain little fear of a particular set of hands,” He pondered aloud.
“Oh shit!” I winced.
I’ll never fully comprehend the value God finds in making us ticklish. Anatomist suggest it’s a primitive defense mechanism designed to warn us about impending danger. I just viewed it as one of nature’s substantial flaws, and rightfully so given how excruciatingly torturous it was to have fingers lightly dancing about your armpits.
“I’ll take it, from your less than charismatic facial expressions, you haven’t lost your touch,” He quipped.
I would have replied with a snarky remark had I not been so concentrated on stifling my laughter. Then again, with my thoughts growing abundantly clouded amidst the involuntary emotions, I doubt I would have come up with anything noteworthy.
“Tickling you say? A bit childish, I’ll admit. More of an innocent pastime under the right circumstances. But for you…”
Somehow he knew as he let his hands dig a little deeper into my ghastly white hollows with tiny pinches that ascended and descended at random.
“YEA-AH-HA-HA! CH-CHARLIEEE-HEE-HEE!”
So much for not giving him the satisfaction, I thought to myself as with every burst of laughter my resolve crumbled under the power of his frivolous fingers.
As fast as the titillations had come pouring in, so too did they make a swift exit as his hands withdrew from my body; time enough to regain my composure and reconnect with the fear momentarily turned asunder by fabricated fits of merriment.
“Oh Maddy, why the quiver? Of all the painful alternatives, you should be thankful you’re getting off so easily.”
I unwillingly held my tongue.
“Oh come now, don’t be such a recluse. It’s not polite you know,” He egged.
I bit my lip, and let my eyes wander about my surroundings, not that I could reach for anything, but even a microsecond to take my mind off things was welcome time.
“Rude,” he said reuniting his hands with my elbows.
As his fingers trickled down my arms triggering a host of sensations, I managed a though between the snickers and snorts. For all his motivations, he had a point. I may not have been embracing of the adolescent mischief, but no serious physical harm was befalling my body, and for that I was grateful.
“WHAA-HA-HA-AAAH! JEE-HEE-HEE-ASUS-SA-HA-HA!”
“Must you say that name?” He hissed over my laugh.
Had I my bearings, I may have caught his unwittingly subtle hint. Then again for those of us who’ve had the unfortunate privilege, I think it’s safe to say our I.Q points take something of a decline amidst the madness.
I just had to wear the satin bra. Granted that morning when I’d picked it out over a slew of others I hadn’t anticipated I’d be in this jam, but oh how that material made use of my nerve endings. As sensitive as they already were, it seemed their sensitivity only increased under the magic of that slippery material.
His hands were quick to pick up on my fashion faux pa, eliciting belly laughs that jiggled my supple flesh. And here’s the kicker, he was barely touching me at all.
“BWAAA-HA-HA-HA! WHAA-HA-HA-HAT THE FAACK-KA-HA-HA!”
Simple circular motions and I’d whip my head. A spontaneous pinch, and my face would scrunch. I was like a marionette, each of his volatile strokes, a tug on my strings.
A few beads of sweat trickled down his temple as he began an excavation on my ribs that would have rivaled even the most money grubbing oil tycoon. Except my precious resource… well, you already know what that is.
“OH GEEE-HEE-HEEZE! SON OF A BEE-HEE-HEEATCH! CHARLIEEE-HEE-HEE!”
The veins in his hands were out in force as he spread his fingers along my ribs, feeling me up one squeeze at a time. He rode that fine line between tickle and pain exceptionally well. The calculated firmness of his grip never once inflicted any trauma; as if he’d been trained in the art of pressure, where to apply it and where not to. But human beings can be fickle individuals; not a one equal to the other. Yet he knew my ins and outs possibly better than anyone, myself included.
“WHOA-AH-HA-HA! NOT THE RIBS! NOT THE FUCKIN’ RIBS-SA-HA-HA!”
“Is that any kind of language for an upstanding officer? Who’s uniform and badge are a symbol, a shining light to the…”
“FOR FUCK’S SAAAKE-KA-HA-HA! STOP YOU FUCKER!”
Through a squint I watched his head cock back, disapproval written all over face.
“Excuse me?” He said playfully.
His temple throbbed as he wicked away more sweat. I took three heavy breaths hoping that somewhere in between them I could conjure up some form of reputable apology.
“You want to run that by me again?” He said, unfastening the top button to his shirt.
“I’m sorry, it’s ticklish… I mean I’m ticklish… I am… you know… I… I…”
The words tumbled around in my brain incoherently like wet laundry set to permanent press. I was a hopeless mess, unraveling just as fast as my uniform had only moments ago.
Injury to insult ensued as he mimicked my folly, babbling alongside me as I struggled to string together a sentence. Then his fingertips nestled into my tender hollows obliterating the notion with spontaneous spider like hand gestures.
“WHOO-HOO-HOO! WHA-HA-HEEEE! AGH-HA-HA!”
With ample amounts of fervor he drilled into my armpits, rippling my flesh. My breasts jiggled, rubbing against the cups of my bra till my nipples were these tiny erect beads aroused off erotic frictions.
“You’re blushing,” He declared.
“CHARILEE-HEE-HEE PLEE-HUS-SA-HA-HA! I’LL LET YOU GOO-HO-HO!”
“Oh, you’ll let me go?” He chuckled.
In retrospect it really was just a shot in the dark, my little comment; a cry of desperation. The balance of power had shifted exponentially since I’d walked in armed and dangerous. Then again I suppose it could be argued there really never was a balance of power; that my vest, and my weapon, and my badge were merely illusions that had built me up to believe I had some sort of chance against my opposition.
“YAASSS! I’LL LET YOU GO! I WON’T TELL ANYONE!”
Look at me, reduced to this, pleading.
“Is that so?” He smirked.
He kneeled at my belly, watching it inflate and deflate as I strived to replenish lost vitality through precious sips of air.
“You’ll have to forgive me, my suspicions. After all, you seemed quite adamant about taking me in,” He said placing his hand along my side where my pistol used to sit.
His hand didn’t stay stagnant long as after a cherished gulp of air he squeezed my love handles. Somehow, I managed to ball my fists, an involuntary response I’d been deprived of since my paralysis. Though much to my dismay, digging my nails into the meat of my palms did nothing to subdue the intense titillations coursing through the rest of my body.
“WHOAH-HO-HO! WHA-HA-HEE-HEE-HEE! CHARLIEEEE C’MON PLEEE-HEE-HEEASE!”
I may have been bawling incessantly, carrying on like a psychiatric patient in need of a sedative, but my eyes could not have been mistaken. Beyond my tear stricken pupils I noticed, there was something different about Charlie. Not that he was sweating profusely, I was with him in that respect. In fact, I don’t recall a time outside of my fitness gram where sweat had accumulated in such volumes between my butt cheeks. No, not the sweat, but his hair. More of his hair was turning grey.
“CH-CH-CHARLIEE-HEE-HEE! YOOOUR… H-HAAAIR-RA-HA-HA!”
His gyrating thumbs pressed deep into my core, kneading that quarter inch of stubborn belly fat layered above my abs. In any other circumstance vanity and self-consciousness would have preoccupied my psyche, but this wasn’t an ordinary circumstance as more pressing issues mastered my domain.
“An unfortunate side effect,” He grimaced.
And though I wanted to know more, a boisterous bashing of my belly derailed my train of thought, forcing my reply to be anything but cognitive.
“OH-HO-HO! AWWAH-HA-HA! HU-HA-HA-HA!”
He probed my belly-button.
“Now there’s a tender spot if I recall,” He said through bloodshot eyes.
I turned my head away, a futile attempt to dissociate from the proceedings. A hazy, somewhat glared reflection off the picture window caught my eye. The image was little more than a funhouse distortion of my predicament, only I was in pigtails, finger paints were nail polish, and The Count was on Sesame Street sporting the number eight in his hands. I could almost smell the freshly baked cookies being set down with a glass of cold milk.
“WHAA-HA-HAAT THE FUCK-KA-HA-HA!”
I blinked and the image was gone. I could see myself as I was again, hopelessly stretched out in nothing but my boots and intimates. My boots.
Had he read my mind? Nothing was beyond plausible at this point as Charlie abandoned my soft midsection and forced my legs up into the air till my black leather boots sat adjacent to his chest.
“You didn’t think I’d be neglecting these pretty little things did you?” He wheezed.
The only response I could muster were widened eyes as I watched him effortlessly pluck away at my laces. I pressed my toes against my insoles, anything to momentarily stifle his efforts. I think I spared myself five seconds, but for my insubordination…
Veil thin nylon anklets served as my last defense as I heard my boots crash to the ground. My feet were on display, and I could tell by the twinkle in Charlie’s eye he was fully invested in the view.
“Phew! Someone forgot their Odor Eaters today,” He teased.
“Well, you could, you know, just put them back on,” I bantered back.
“Someone’s coming alive,” He smirked.
“That’s an un-under sss statement ta-ha!”
How rude of him not to allow me my two cents. Then again, who was I to be filing grievances as his fingers took to an effortless escapade across the gentle curves of my feet.
“RAAAH-HA-HA! OH THIS SUUUCKS-SA-HA-HA!”
Figure eights abound dizzyingly scribbled upon each sole, these intricate little patterns in constant fluidity from his fingers to my body. Waves of sensation, overwhelming, ensnared within my meaty size sevens.
“Oh Maddy, you’re huffing and puffing,” He teased.
I nodded accordingly, smiling from ear to ear as his fingers danced in emphatic fashion along my arches; back and forth, and back again, like a giant paintbrush set to an awkward pace devoid of rhythmic pattern. And then at once he snagged my socks.
“I never figured you for pink,” He said slipping them off my feet.
“Charlie… please… I can’t… Char-LEEEE…”
With a single finger he tantalized my naked left sole.
“Ch-Charlie no… nu-nu-NO-HO-HO… That’s-sss-SEE-HEE-HEE… enough…”
A careless… little… finger.
“Oh sh-sheeet-TEE-HEE-HEE… OH WHYYY-YAH-HA-HA!”
My face must have been a twisted contortion of hysteria because it was enough to make Charlie indulge in a laugh at my expense.
“Oh come now sister, I’m barely even touching you.”
It didn’t matter. Wave after wave of subsequent erratic prickling coursed up my calves off this one finger alternating between my feet. And though my body longed to move, it begged to move, every fiber of my being crying to be unbridled, his telekinetic resolve was too much for my physical strength to overcome.
He stepped back and gritted his teeth.
“I can feel you.”
It took me a moment to recompose, catch my breath, and process exactly what he meant. I was left with a quizzical look upon my face as he fanned my toes with one quick wave of his hand. It hadn’t meant much to me that Miss Highmers was an avid collector of native American antiquities till Charlie plucked a feather off a tribal headdress.
“How convenient,” He said resting it between my toes, “it’s as if someone wrote them in just so I could have something to delight these cute little marshmallows.”
I huffed, blowing a rouge lock of hair off my face, “Indeed.”
It was a stiff little son of a bitch twirling between my toes ever so lightly.
“HO-WHA-HA-HA! OH THAT’S THE WOOORSSST-STEE-HEE-HEE! I CAN’T MOOO-WHOO-WHOOVE-VA-HA-HA!”
He rolled his eyes and shrugged away my desperate cries, the feather’s quill, one with balls of my feet. He scribbled merrily, in endless circles before abandoning my feet for a more supple region of my body. This scrunched position left my midsection a protruding life preserver of excess fatty tissue that he seemed more than happy to plunge his fingers into.
It about goes without saying at this point that I went berserk; balling tight my hands and whipping my head as he pierced through my layers to get to my abs. Nestled deep his hands kneaded my flesh with jubilant pokes and gyrating thumb thrusts.
“NOO-HO-HO! WHAA-HA-HA! CHARLIEEE-HEE-HEE PLEE-HEE-HEEASE!”
“You should have left well enough alone, but you just had to play hero,” He shook his head.
“IT’S MY JOB-BA-HA-HA! PLEE-HEE-HEEASE! BROTH-TH-THER-RA-HA-HA!”
Another bead of sweat slipped down my backside to be collected between my creases as I reflexively clenched my butt amidst the endless exuberance flowing through his fingers rippling my belly. And I was about gasped out of laughter when he stopped, suddenly.
Heavy breathing followed. Through tear stricken eyes I watched him tremble. I could feel his hold, failing.
“I think… I have one more trick up my sleeve,” He said, fatigued.
“Charlie, that’s enough!” I said through precious sips of air, “You… you have to let me go! It’s hurting you!”
“Oh you’d like that,” He said placing a hand on my forehead.
“There’s… just one more thing… needs to be done,” He said closing his eyes.
Much of what happened after that, I don’t remember. In fact if I were to have testified, it likely would have been inadmissible given how uncorroborated my memory was of the proceedings following his tender touch atop my forehead.
I was stirred by a faint tapping on my window, my Jeep window; a late-night passerby looking on as I faintly roused my head off the steering wheel. I feared the worst as he cupped his hands and peered in; but that’s when I felt it, my uniform. I was completely clothed from head to toe.
“Sorry, I must have dozed off,” I said through the glass.
Instinctively I ran my hand across my chest and produced my badge, clanking it against the window.
He threw up his hands and backed away slowly, mumbling something indistinct before skating away.
I reached for my hip, where sure as shit my pistol was, locked in its holster, fully functional, not a bullet removed. My vest was laid carelessly across the backseat, where I’d initially tossed it, carelessly.
I looked to my phone; no missed calls, nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing except, the hour. I stared at it until the minute turned, trying to convince myself it was an error, some kind of glitch, and that I’d be calling Sprint to resolve the issue at the start of the next business day. Then I looked to the Jeep’s dash for confirmation of a truth I held to be self-evident.
