Destiny by Ella Burch
Wren, a timid woman, comes alive when she meets Destiny, whose morbid hobby fascinates her.
Jurisprudence hates a violent woman, and so do I.
So, when a violent woman struck me with balled fists and caged me in the pink press of girlhood, I crawled in culture's basement, invisible to all but the tangled spider webs.
That is, until I emerged a violent woman in my own right, blood caked under uneven fingernails and curling tongue. I blame Destiny.
When Destiny popped up behind the formica counter, all blonde hair and lavender perfume and spray tanned knuckles, her brightness swallowed my judgments whole, regurgitating them into some cupcake shaped pastel thing.
"What can I do you for, doll?"
She is a sketch of southern life, the most realistic drawing of a Florida summer I have ever seen. "Hi, yeah, just a pack of RAWs. And this." I place a neon green lighter on the counter, the kind with a long stem.
"No problem," Destiny hands me the pack of papers. I turn them on their side, examining the label.
"Oh, you heard about that smugglin' stuff goin' on? Don't worry baby, these are 100% USA." She taps her long nails on the screen, ringing up my purchases with first-rate fluency.
"That'll be $8.90, doll. You got rewards with us?" she asks. I shake my head, holding my card against the reader until "Approved" flashes across the screen.
"Thanks, have a good day!" I say.
"You too, baby, enjoy."
I go bounding into the sticky August heat, half-smiling at the first woman to call me 'baby' in years.
The open freezer fills my nose with cool air, the parcels' parchment crinkling between my fingers. I rifle through the meat, weighing each package in an open palm. Tonight is lighter than usual, my hunger subsumed in the humid air. As I unwrap the tongue, I score its surface with my sharpest knife, puncturing it with a fork in even rows. Under the blade, its rounded form is lost to even strips, each sizzling with fatty delicacy in the stainless steel pan.
As it cooks, I roll a joint between two fingers, sticking my lip to the paper end before sparking a small flame. Pinching each strip of tongue between fried flour shells, I plate my tacos with a wedge of lime, letting the meat dissolve and simmer between pointed teeth. I allow myself to imagine the taste of blood, its rusted flavor. I chew slowly.
With half-opened eyes and a mouthful of tongue, I flip my phone, taking in my image in the inverted lens. These were the moments I most easily saw my beauty, the moments when my ravenous mouth was full, eyes relaxed, mind twisting the shapes and colors of my dingy apartment into a cinematic scene. As my nails tap the chrome salt shaker, my knee bouncing under the table, cilantro sings against my tongue, prickling against the tart lime, deepening the decadence of the well-seasoned meat.
In morning light, the kitchen's rich scents fade into a waft of oily musk, the heat and salt of the evening seeping into the vibrating walls. As I pull my wiry hair into a taut knot, my toes wiggle into their captivity, straining against the patent leather of my matronly pumps.
7am is an unpleasant time to look oneself in the eye, but a flash of lipstick and a brush of mascara are unwritten appendices to my employment contract. And, of course, perfect teeth. No one wants to schedule their next cleaning with a dim-toothed, unsightly receptionist, and Dr. Heller all but branded my bright smile into the dress code. I measure my half-hour commute with twenty-eight billboards as landmarks, personal injury lawyers and chicken restaurants screaming into view nearly one per minute. The highway swallows my morning, tucking me into a side street in front of Middleview Dentistry, complete with a vinyl window dressing of an anthropomorphized tooth mascot.
The morning rush of patients passes by nine, each fresh-mouthed forty-something ostensibly sitting behind steelcase desks in plastic chairs, running their tongues across the gritty residue of an imperfect final rinse. When 11am arrives, so does Destiny.
It takes her a moment to recognize me, to place my face among her hundreds of customers. I check her in behind the desk, watching her eyes linger across my face once, twice. The waiting room is empty. When she hands me her completed slip, the light of recognition finally flashes behind her clumpy lashes.
"Oh hey, you came in yesterday, right? It's a real small world, huh?"
"Haha, yeah, I figured you might not remember. I mean, it all blurs together when you see so many people every day."
"Naw, you've got a nice face, real pretty smile. Well, I guess you've gotta," Destiny gestures to the walls, the end-to-end posters of perfectly smiling faces.
"It's all part of the job. Destiny, right? That's a nice name."
"Yeah, had real hippy dippy parents, named me after some singer in the sixties. I never liked it much, got picked on for havin' a stripper name. What's your name again?"
"Wren. My parents were a little snooty. Never got much heat for it except the whole bird thing, but that's not so bad." Destiny giggles, and I imagine her picturing me as a little bird, my brown hair morphing into spiky feathers.
"Yeah, not compared to bein' a stripper. But hey, strippers are makin' a comeback. There's a new movie comin' out, some horror business, about, like, a stripper serial killer or somethin'. I think I'm gon' try to see it sometime."
"Oh, yeah, I saw an ad for that a couple days ago. I love thrillers, horror, all that stuff," I trail off.
"Hey, you know, maybe we could go together. If that's not weird, I mean. Figure, I'm new 'round here and you seem real nice."
"Yeah, that would be great. How about Thursday, after work. Your shop closes at 8, right? I could just meet you there."
"Sounds good, yeah, that works just fine," she smiles into her words.
"Destiny?" She stands to meet the scrub-clad hygienist.
I mark it in my calendar: movie date? Wednesday and Thursday pass like sand through loose fingers, the minutes ticking past my glazed eyes. Each patient is greeted by my lilted voice and paper-thin smile, unaware of how their faces morph into a blur of suburban monotony. I think of Destiny often. I debate picking up a bouquet after work, settling instead on a pastry, something lemony and crisp. With a parchment-wrapped package in hand, I approach Godzilla Smokes, complete with neon signage and teenaged loiterers. When I pop through the door at 7:56, the tinkle of the bell swings Destiny's head toward me, her gummy smile bursting through rosy glossed lips. I place the lemon bar on the counter, leaning my elbows against its cool surface. She raises her eyebrows, tugging at the purple ribbon to reveal the powdered morsel.
"Aw, doll, you shouldn't have!" Before I can respond, her mouth is full of tart cream.
"It was no big deal, the shop is on the way from work, plus, I go there all the time." I feel my ears flushing crimson, grateful for my untied hair. She silently offers me a bite, her fingers inches from my mouth. As I lean in to take it, I meet her gaze.
The walk to the theater is brief, a ten minute stroll peppered with amiable small talk; stories of difficult customers, a recounting of workplace lunches, flippant recommendations of passing cafes. Destiny crumples the empty parchment wrapper into her purse, slinging it over her left shoulder and keeping me close to her right. When we order our tickets, she touches my back for a moment before leaning over to grab them. Destiny insists on paying for snacks, and I watch as she plucks a carton of Whoppers from the shelf. I watch as she pours the Whoppers into the popcorn, tousling the kernels to disperse the melting chocolates.
"What are you doing? They're all gonna melt!"
"What, you never had Whopcorn?" she smirks. I crush the sweetened kernels between my teeth.
"Yeah, okay, that's really something."
"There you go," she almost whispers as she gazes back up at my widened eyes, winking as the lights fade down to welcome the booming reel of advertisements lighting the screen.
When the lights come up, Destiny and I sit frozen for a moment too long before our giggles become belly laughs, snorting and croaking like teenagers sharing their first joint.
"That... fucking sucked," Destiny breaks through her laughter.
"Oh my god that fucking sucked. Holy shit. That's two hours we'll never get back, and for what? And oh my god the dubbing? Ashley Simpson puts that lip syncing to shame."
As we walk out of the chilly theater, Destiny's arm bumps against mine, her pinky brushing the back of my hand. I take the hint, pulling her into the nearest dive bar, unwilling to let this evening pass so soon. I order us lemon drops. We down them, and two more, chatting at a corner table. The crowd is thin, a Thursday evening of washed-up retirees and barely-legal college boys perched on cracked vinyl. A Cranberries song comes on, and our eyes glimmer.
"I love this song!" I say.
"Me too, let's dance, doll." I'm just tipsy enough to be pulled out of my seat, the liquor warming my throat with a confession I blurt too soon.
"I really like you, you know." My heart sinks as I hear the words hit the air, their weight clouding the space between our swaying bodies. Destiny's smile nearly tears her lips and she leans forward, planting a sticky kiss on my cheek. I take the opportunity to bring her lips to mine, holding the back of her neck and letting my fingers weave into her hair. And I'm in so deep/ you know I'm such a fool for you/ you've got me wrapped around your finger/ do you have to let it linger?
As the song ends, Destiny pulls me by the hand, leaving a twenty at our table and swooping through the creaky front door. We walk in silence for a moment, the heavy evening air thick with dew and anticipation.
"My place is right around the corner," she says. I nod, giving silent permission. I try to picture her apartment. I imagine beaded curtains, incense and candles. There's a bottle of merlot on the counter, an old yellowing fridge. She has two cats, and they pass through the periphery like specters of agility, spectating our intoxication. When she leads me up the stairs, the place warps my imagined vision, with perfect gray walls and black leather sofas, every surface metallic or marble. The contemporary finishes wrap her in a different kind of light, each straight edge tensing my tongue with another question. When she pulls out a chilled bottle of gin, I allow one to slip through.
"So, this is it, I guess." She gestures around the room with her eyes, feigning modesty.
"Oh, this is it? Shut up, it's huge! I didn't expect you to be the American Psycho type. It's all very lawyer-y and shiny," I reply.
"What, just 'cause my parents were hippies don't mean I can't indulge in the finer things. Plus," she bites her lower lip, "rent stabilized."
I smile and roll my eyes, miming a stab into my chest.
"Ugh, some people just have it all." She hands me a purplish cocktail, garnished with some kind of herbal sprig. She clinks her glass against mine, pulling a tightly rolled joint from a drawer. Destiny leans over the counter, placing it between my lips, flicking a heavy chrome lighter. The warmth in my throat travels down to my lungs, and I hold the smoke in my chest for a moment before letting it escape through the right corner of my lips, aiming the cloud away from her face. When I pass it back, Destiny inhales for ten seconds, the end of the joint crackling into embers, a clump of ash falling onto the counter. Her smoke cloud blurs my vision, and I watch her hazy features through its mist.
With our minds foggy and warm, we sit inches apart on her stiff black couch, a red knit blanket strewn across our knees. She tells me stories of weekends spent movie-hopping with her dad, their 10am tickets a portal to eight Saturday showings.
"We'd be there all damn day, refillin' our popcorn and watchin' anything, even shit we saw before, even shit we hated. We had money problems, but he never let me know about it. We just watched our movies and had waffles for dinner and I was a real happy kid, for the most part," she says.
"What about your mom?"
"Yeah, well, she wasn't really around. Sometimes she'd try and pop back up and give us some bullshit about how she changed, then she'd be gone again with nothin' but a note on the fridge. It happens all the time, I guess, she just wasn't a mom, she couldn't make herself one."
"Yeah, I don't think mine was really a mom either. Sometimes I wished she would leave, just so it would stop." I feel the warmth in my chest as I speak, the words tumbling too quickly from my lips. I want to tell her everything, every slap, every harsh word, every hole through the wall by my head. Destiny is a balm to it all, her raspy voice and her shiny apartment, the way my name sounds between her teeth. I catch myself staring at her freckled nose as she speaks, letting the words swirl up into the hazy air.
"Wren?"
"Sorry, what?"
"Nothin', I was just sayin' she sounds like a bitch. You know, fuck moms." She slurs the sentences, 'moms' sounding heavy on her tongue. We toast to the sentiment, to the women who left us reaching for something. I place a hand on her thigh and pretend to forget my mother, pretend to be seeking something else in Destiny's warmth. When we fall into her smooth sheets, our bodies slosh together like schoolgirls. Her name feels better moaned, her hair twisted in shaking fingers. The moments that follow are quiet and close, breath mingling in the sound of her ceiling fan. I lie on her bronzed chest, hand stretched across her waist.
"Hey, I wanna show you somethin'. I think you're gonna like it." Her voice is uncharacteristically soft. She leads me to a hallway closet, flicking the cool light on with her middle finger, glancing back at me with widened eyes. The fluorescents beam down onto rows of jars, each framing suspended flesh. There are organs floating in clear alcohol, sinew and fascia and toothy tumors. I hesitate, feeling her eyes scanning my reaction. A small smile spreads across my lips, my fingers reaching for a jar containing a shrunken heart, ostensibly an animal's. A warmth spreads through my chest as I picture my crowded freezer, Destiny's grip on my heart tightening too quick.
"These are -"
"Wet specimens, wow, they're cool," I say, dazed. Her face relaxes with relief, her arm wrapping around my waist as I gaze into the wobbling jar. I fold a creep of fear between my brows, mimicking a normal reaction to a gory collection. She lifts the back of my hair to kiss my neck, reaching past me for a suspended liver.
"Yeah, I look around for roadkill and keep whatever's intact. Most people don't really fuck with it." I control my face, maintaining apprehensive eyes. How did I find this girl?
"Yeah, well, most people suck. It's just... different. What do you do with the bones?" She pulls a bin out from the bottom shelf, revealing a tangled mess of chains and bones and metal.
"I make jewelry, it makes a killing on Etsy." Her face is still sheepish, waiting for my body to stiffen in the bluish light.
"Sick..." I pull a necklace out of the bin, adorned with pointed teeth. I can't hide the adoration in my gaze as I look back at Destiny, her smile widening as she wraps the chain around my neck. The gratitude in her gaze leaves her chest naked, previous judgments clouding her pride. She clips it in the back, pushing a strand of hair behind my ear.
"It's yours now," she says. I take a moment to bask in my luck, to revel in the rows of flesh and guts. For a moment, I'm less alone.
This perfect night leads to countless others, dinners and lazy mornings and earmarked dresser drawers. When Destiny sees my apartment, it becomes routine to default to hers, keeping my secrets just that. I read the stack of books on her bedside table; I wrap her finger in a bandage when she misses the stalk of celery; I kiss her in the shower from head to foot, folding her skin beneath my fingers to know she's real, alive; I sit on the counter as she slices open a dead racoon, watching as she precisely cleaves each plump organ from the carcass. We fall into a rhythm. When she asks about my mother, I tell her almost everything, more than anyone else. Her fingers swipe at my tears, her lips graze my spine. I start to trust her, to think about her differently. Like maybe I can let everything else go, but her.
When Calvin arrives, something changes, a blip on the radar, more to her story. I find Destiny leaning across the smoke shop counter, hand on his tattooed arm one Wednesday evening. The cold Mountain Dew in my bag almost slips as I hand it to her, my gaze fixed on his ruddy face.
"Babe! Hey, this is Calvin, he's an old friend," her voice bends. She wouldn't normally be so vague. My old friend from high school? My college lab partner? A childhood neighbor? No, 'old friend' means they had sex, and it's more than she wants to explain. His eyes tell me as much. He seems surprised to see me kiss her, marking my territory like a pathetic beagle. He extends his hand.
"Hi, nice to meet you...?"
"Wren, hi, I'm the girlfriend."
When they leave to have a catch-up dinner, I crawl to my apartment, downing a bottle of wine within the hour. The walls feel closer than they once did, the counter sticky, the bathroom smelly and cramped. My feet don't glide across the floors anymore, my body endlessly readjusting into the orange couch. I crack open the freezer for the first time in weeks.
When I place a slab wobbling meat on the plastic cutting board, I butcher sloppily, the knife feeling foreign in my hand. I steady the meat with my left hand, slowing each cut to perfect the lines. I lick one finger, then another, taking a single raw bite before reaching for the jar of fat above the stove.
As I grind the meat between my teeth, I feel Destiny's voice quiet in my mind.
When she arrives at my office in the morning armed with bagel sandwiches, I kiss her quickly, waiting as she divulges the details of her dinner with Calvin. Between bites, she sets the scene.
"It was nice, you know? He's back in town for a bit, travelin' with guys in his cycling group. They're callin' it the Tour de Florida," she says.
"Funny."
"Yeah, I mean, we haven't seen each other in ages, so it's nice hangin' out. I still don't got all that many friends around here," she glances up at me.
"Are you gonna tell me how you really know each other?"
"Woah, jealous much? Yeah, I guess we were fuck buddies back in Mississippi, but that was like ten years ago. You don't gotta worry, babe, I'm all yours," she slides her hand up my arm as she speaks.
"Besides, we were never really together. He's dumb as a damn brick."
Calvin starts showing up everywhere. Popping onto her phone with questions about local restaurants, stopping into her store for weed and conversation, coming by the apartment to drop off soup when she cancels their lunch with a cold. When he looks at me, it plucks at my rage, his faded tattoos and receding hairline mocking my illogical fears.
I return to my apartment more, have more meals alone. I think more carefully about my words, reluctant to show uninhibited devotion. The asterisks on my declarations of love wear on her, and start to sting her skin. Destiny fills more jars each week, slicing her animals and buying gallons of isopropyl alcohol, sinking her fingers into lukewarm flesh.
When Calvin leaves town, I relax, sitting back at the apex, but Destiny's collecting only escalates. I perch on the counter, feet swinging as I watch her prepare a stray cat's stomach for preservation.
"Tell me how you found this one, babe?" I ask. She glances at me with stern eyes, her long-faded tan leaving her cheeks gray.
"Yeah, uh, I was drivin' home from work last night and saw this little guy all fucked up in the road, so I went and got 'im," she gestures at the carcass. I nod, keeping my eyes wide and bright, begging her to mirror me, if just for a moment.
"That's cool." I pause, the space between our bodies bloated with silence.
"You know I love you, right?" I want to scream it. I love you!
"Yeah, babe, love you," she replies. Love you. I hop down from the counter and retreat to our bed, curling my knees up to my stomach as I scroll my camera roll up to June. I stare at our first selfies together, when we were nervous to touch. Our naked shoulders on a bright morning, faces puffed with sleep and sex and laughter. My grandpa outfit on a long hike, Destiny crouched over a fawn corpse, her cheeks pink with sun. Forty minutes pass before she comes to check on me, silently kissing my forehead and sliding into bed beside me.
"You good, baby?"
"Yeah, of course, what do you wanna watch?"
That night, I dream of my mother, her twisted features scraping into view. She's silent, standing in a corner. As I move toward her, my steps are small, inches at a time, then millimeters. I hear a child. Mommy! There's a toddler on the floor, complete with sticky fingers and a shock of red hair. As her cries grow louder, her voice deepens. When I look back at my mother, there is blood pooled around her ankles. Then the girl claws forward, sliding through the blood. When I jolt awake, Destiny isn't beside me.
As I prepare for bed one evening, I slather her skin with cream, inviting her into cool sheets.
"I think I'm gonna go out lookin', there's always more at night," she says.
"Baby, it's so late. I wanna go to bed with you, come on."
"Babe, just tonight, okay? I have a good feelin'."
"Okay, fine, but kiss me when you get back, alright? Don't just leave me asleep, I wanna know you're here," I ask.
"Alright, doll." She kisses me goodbye and tucks me into bed, pulling the comforter to my chin before flicking off the lamp.
I toss and turn for a while, trying to manually slow my breathing, pulling my arms against my chest. When thirty minutes turns into an hour, I decide to make myself some tea, to wait up until Destiny comes home. I need to talk to her. As I wait for the kettle to whistle, I linger by the window, wondering if I might catch a glimpse of Destiny walking by. The lamp at the end of the street flickers, and I see a figure shift below the window. The light reflects off Destiny's bright tresses, her body hunched into a wide squat. It looks like she's injured, maybe vomiting, and I rush to turn the stove off and shove my feet into slippers. The elevator ride feels endless, the light blinking as I pass through the two lower units in the narrow building. When I finally rush through the back door and into the yellowed grass, I see Destiny.
"Destiny? What the fuck?" Her eyes are frozen, wide and vacuous, a rabbit lying limp in her bloody hands. Its center is torn, flesh bleeding and ripping through the middle, intestines spilling from one side.
She drops the carcass into the grass, turning her body to face mine. I squat beside her, leaning toward her dripping face. As I lick the blood from her teeth, I feel her grip tighten into my hair, my nose sliding against her tear-slicked skin. The kiss deepens until her tongue plunges down my throat. Her eyes are empty but crazed, absent of even the smallest tenderness left between our skin. When Destiny's fingernails dig into my scalp, I wrench my neck back, fear and blood and love swirling between my teeth. She doesn't speak, wrestling a groan from her throat before gripping my head more firmly, tears dripping down her cheeks. My words are muffled, her mouth still pressing into mine.
"Destiny. Destiny, please!"
I curl my toes, steeling myself to her apathy, her rage, her newly foreign face. The next moments pass as they often do, fleeting and colorful. There's nothing quite like watching crimson muddle smooth cream. With my body in the lead, I fall down into it, the taste of blood. I can't tell if my eyes are open, each flashing moment warming my throat, settling my racing heart. Then, everything quiets. The crickets and cicadas blend into the breeze, my breathing barely disturbing the dusky calm.
I scramble for a plan, some way to move forward, some way to run from this, again. I tear holes in her clothes, grabbing a sharp rock from the grass. I sink my teeth into her flesh, ripping her face, her arms, her abdomen. I slice her skin with the rock, remembering photos of maulings. I've seen bobcats do this kind of damage.
I walk along the building's edge, unraveling a length of a hanging hose. As I rinse the blood from my skin, I watch it run into the grass, tinting the blades for a moment before sinking into the soil. When I am clean and left with only a bra, boxers, and slippers, I bury the rest in a nearby dumpster, thanking some kind of god for the phone in my pocket. I take a grocery bag from the dumpster, plopping the rabbit inside and covering it with newspapers. I tie the bag, letting it swing by my side as I leave.
I walk a few darkened residential blocks before ordering a car. As I sit in the Uber to my apartment, I feign sloppy drunkenness, a ride of shame. I keep the crinkled bag between my feet, thankful for the silent driver. I curl and uncurl my toes, hair wet and sticky with sweat, tears, crusted blood. My breathing is uneven, my mind flooded with flashes of Destiny's warm eyes. Her face kissed by the morning sun, then torn and oozing. Her fingers grazing my freckled cheek, then caked with fur and flesh. Her body curled onto mine, heavy with sleep, rhythmic and calm. Her still corpse, strewn across browning grass.
I tip thirty percent and walk up the dusty steps to my door, plucking a spare key from behind the nearby fire extinguisher. When I enter, I get to work, butchering the rabbit and finding its kidneys intact. I fill a jar with isopropyl alcohol, rubbing the organs clean under running water before easing them into the solution. When the jar is sealed, I pull the stove from its space in the kitchen, prying the loose board from the wall behind it. I place Destiny's jar on a small shelf, beside a silver fountain pen, a pair of coke bottle glasses, and a stack of notes. I pull the notes from the shelf, peeling them up from the sticky edge. Baby girl, I'll be back soon. Don't forget how much I love you.
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So, when a violent woman struck me with balled fists and caged me in the pink press of girlhood, I crawled in culture's basement, invisible to all but the tangled spider webs.
That is, until I emerged a violent woman in my own right, blood caked under uneven fingernails and curling tongue. I blame Destiny.
When Destiny popped up behind the formica counter, all blonde hair and lavender perfume and spray tanned knuckles, her brightness swallowed my judgments whole, regurgitating them into some cupcake shaped pastel thing.
"What can I do you for, doll?"
She is a sketch of southern life, the most realistic drawing of a Florida summer I have ever seen. "Hi, yeah, just a pack of RAWs. And this." I place a neon green lighter on the counter, the kind with a long stem.
"No problem," Destiny hands me the pack of papers. I turn them on their side, examining the label.
"Oh, you heard about that smugglin' stuff goin' on? Don't worry baby, these are 100% USA." She taps her long nails on the screen, ringing up my purchases with first-rate fluency.
"That'll be $8.90, doll. You got rewards with us?" she asks. I shake my head, holding my card against the reader until "Approved" flashes across the screen.
"Thanks, have a good day!" I say.
"You too, baby, enjoy."
I go bounding into the sticky August heat, half-smiling at the first woman to call me 'baby' in years.
The open freezer fills my nose with cool air, the parcels' parchment crinkling between my fingers. I rifle through the meat, weighing each package in an open palm. Tonight is lighter than usual, my hunger subsumed in the humid air. As I unwrap the tongue, I score its surface with my sharpest knife, puncturing it with a fork in even rows. Under the blade, its rounded form is lost to even strips, each sizzling with fatty delicacy in the stainless steel pan.
As it cooks, I roll a joint between two fingers, sticking my lip to the paper end before sparking a small flame. Pinching each strip of tongue between fried flour shells, I plate my tacos with a wedge of lime, letting the meat dissolve and simmer between pointed teeth. I allow myself to imagine the taste of blood, its rusted flavor. I chew slowly.
With half-opened eyes and a mouthful of tongue, I flip my phone, taking in my image in the inverted lens. These were the moments I most easily saw my beauty, the moments when my ravenous mouth was full, eyes relaxed, mind twisting the shapes and colors of my dingy apartment into a cinematic scene. As my nails tap the chrome salt shaker, my knee bouncing under the table, cilantro sings against my tongue, prickling against the tart lime, deepening the decadence of the well-seasoned meat.
In morning light, the kitchen's rich scents fade into a waft of oily musk, the heat and salt of the evening seeping into the vibrating walls. As I pull my wiry hair into a taut knot, my toes wiggle into their captivity, straining against the patent leather of my matronly pumps.
7am is an unpleasant time to look oneself in the eye, but a flash of lipstick and a brush of mascara are unwritten appendices to my employment contract. And, of course, perfect teeth. No one wants to schedule their next cleaning with a dim-toothed, unsightly receptionist, and Dr. Heller all but branded my bright smile into the dress code. I measure my half-hour commute with twenty-eight billboards as landmarks, personal injury lawyers and chicken restaurants screaming into view nearly one per minute. The highway swallows my morning, tucking me into a side street in front of Middleview Dentistry, complete with a vinyl window dressing of an anthropomorphized tooth mascot.
The morning rush of patients passes by nine, each fresh-mouthed forty-something ostensibly sitting behind steelcase desks in plastic chairs, running their tongues across the gritty residue of an imperfect final rinse. When 11am arrives, so does Destiny.
It takes her a moment to recognize me, to place my face among her hundreds of customers. I check her in behind the desk, watching her eyes linger across my face once, twice. The waiting room is empty. When she hands me her completed slip, the light of recognition finally flashes behind her clumpy lashes.
"Oh hey, you came in yesterday, right? It's a real small world, huh?"
"Haha, yeah, I figured you might not remember. I mean, it all blurs together when you see so many people every day."
"Naw, you've got a nice face, real pretty smile. Well, I guess you've gotta," Destiny gestures to the walls, the end-to-end posters of perfectly smiling faces.
"It's all part of the job. Destiny, right? That's a nice name."
"Yeah, had real hippy dippy parents, named me after some singer in the sixties. I never liked it much, got picked on for havin' a stripper name. What's your name again?"
"Wren. My parents were a little snooty. Never got much heat for it except the whole bird thing, but that's not so bad." Destiny giggles, and I imagine her picturing me as a little bird, my brown hair morphing into spiky feathers.
"Yeah, not compared to bein' a stripper. But hey, strippers are makin' a comeback. There's a new movie comin' out, some horror business, about, like, a stripper serial killer or somethin'. I think I'm gon' try to see it sometime."
"Oh, yeah, I saw an ad for that a couple days ago. I love thrillers, horror, all that stuff," I trail off.
"Hey, you know, maybe we could go together. If that's not weird, I mean. Figure, I'm new 'round here and you seem real nice."
"Yeah, that would be great. How about Thursday, after work. Your shop closes at 8, right? I could just meet you there."
"Sounds good, yeah, that works just fine," she smiles into her words.
"Destiny?" She stands to meet the scrub-clad hygienist.
I mark it in my calendar: movie date? Wednesday and Thursday pass like sand through loose fingers, the minutes ticking past my glazed eyes. Each patient is greeted by my lilted voice and paper-thin smile, unaware of how their faces morph into a blur of suburban monotony. I think of Destiny often. I debate picking up a bouquet after work, settling instead on a pastry, something lemony and crisp. With a parchment-wrapped package in hand, I approach Godzilla Smokes, complete with neon signage and teenaged loiterers. When I pop through the door at 7:56, the tinkle of the bell swings Destiny's head toward me, her gummy smile bursting through rosy glossed lips. I place the lemon bar on the counter, leaning my elbows against its cool surface. She raises her eyebrows, tugging at the purple ribbon to reveal the powdered morsel.
"Aw, doll, you shouldn't have!" Before I can respond, her mouth is full of tart cream.
"It was no big deal, the shop is on the way from work, plus, I go there all the time." I feel my ears flushing crimson, grateful for my untied hair. She silently offers me a bite, her fingers inches from my mouth. As I lean in to take it, I meet her gaze.
The walk to the theater is brief, a ten minute stroll peppered with amiable small talk; stories of difficult customers, a recounting of workplace lunches, flippant recommendations of passing cafes. Destiny crumples the empty parchment wrapper into her purse, slinging it over her left shoulder and keeping me close to her right. When we order our tickets, she touches my back for a moment before leaning over to grab them. Destiny insists on paying for snacks, and I watch as she plucks a carton of Whoppers from the shelf. I watch as she pours the Whoppers into the popcorn, tousling the kernels to disperse the melting chocolates.
"What are you doing? They're all gonna melt!"
"What, you never had Whopcorn?" she smirks. I crush the sweetened kernels between my teeth.
"Yeah, okay, that's really something."
"There you go," she almost whispers as she gazes back up at my widened eyes, winking as the lights fade down to welcome the booming reel of advertisements lighting the screen.
When the lights come up, Destiny and I sit frozen for a moment too long before our giggles become belly laughs, snorting and croaking like teenagers sharing their first joint.
"That... fucking sucked," Destiny breaks through her laughter.
"Oh my god that fucking sucked. Holy shit. That's two hours we'll never get back, and for what? And oh my god the dubbing? Ashley Simpson puts that lip syncing to shame."
As we walk out of the chilly theater, Destiny's arm bumps against mine, her pinky brushing the back of my hand. I take the hint, pulling her into the nearest dive bar, unwilling to let this evening pass so soon. I order us lemon drops. We down them, and two more, chatting at a corner table. The crowd is thin, a Thursday evening of washed-up retirees and barely-legal college boys perched on cracked vinyl. A Cranberries song comes on, and our eyes glimmer.
"I love this song!" I say.
"Me too, let's dance, doll." I'm just tipsy enough to be pulled out of my seat, the liquor warming my throat with a confession I blurt too soon.
"I really like you, you know." My heart sinks as I hear the words hit the air, their weight clouding the space between our swaying bodies. Destiny's smile nearly tears her lips and she leans forward, planting a sticky kiss on my cheek. I take the opportunity to bring her lips to mine, holding the back of her neck and letting my fingers weave into her hair. And I'm in so deep/ you know I'm such a fool for you/ you've got me wrapped around your finger/ do you have to let it linger?
As the song ends, Destiny pulls me by the hand, leaving a twenty at our table and swooping through the creaky front door. We walk in silence for a moment, the heavy evening air thick with dew and anticipation.
"My place is right around the corner," she says. I nod, giving silent permission. I try to picture her apartment. I imagine beaded curtains, incense and candles. There's a bottle of merlot on the counter, an old yellowing fridge. She has two cats, and they pass through the periphery like specters of agility, spectating our intoxication. When she leads me up the stairs, the place warps my imagined vision, with perfect gray walls and black leather sofas, every surface metallic or marble. The contemporary finishes wrap her in a different kind of light, each straight edge tensing my tongue with another question. When she pulls out a chilled bottle of gin, I allow one to slip through.
"So, this is it, I guess." She gestures around the room with her eyes, feigning modesty.
"Oh, this is it? Shut up, it's huge! I didn't expect you to be the American Psycho type. It's all very lawyer-y and shiny," I reply.
"What, just 'cause my parents were hippies don't mean I can't indulge in the finer things. Plus," she bites her lower lip, "rent stabilized."
I smile and roll my eyes, miming a stab into my chest.
"Ugh, some people just have it all." She hands me a purplish cocktail, garnished with some kind of herbal sprig. She clinks her glass against mine, pulling a tightly rolled joint from a drawer. Destiny leans over the counter, placing it between my lips, flicking a heavy chrome lighter. The warmth in my throat travels down to my lungs, and I hold the smoke in my chest for a moment before letting it escape through the right corner of my lips, aiming the cloud away from her face. When I pass it back, Destiny inhales for ten seconds, the end of the joint crackling into embers, a clump of ash falling onto the counter. Her smoke cloud blurs my vision, and I watch her hazy features through its mist.
With our minds foggy and warm, we sit inches apart on her stiff black couch, a red knit blanket strewn across our knees. She tells me stories of weekends spent movie-hopping with her dad, their 10am tickets a portal to eight Saturday showings.
"We'd be there all damn day, refillin' our popcorn and watchin' anything, even shit we saw before, even shit we hated. We had money problems, but he never let me know about it. We just watched our movies and had waffles for dinner and I was a real happy kid, for the most part," she says.
"What about your mom?"
"Yeah, well, she wasn't really around. Sometimes she'd try and pop back up and give us some bullshit about how she changed, then she'd be gone again with nothin' but a note on the fridge. It happens all the time, I guess, she just wasn't a mom, she couldn't make herself one."
"Yeah, I don't think mine was really a mom either. Sometimes I wished she would leave, just so it would stop." I feel the warmth in my chest as I speak, the words tumbling too quickly from my lips. I want to tell her everything, every slap, every harsh word, every hole through the wall by my head. Destiny is a balm to it all, her raspy voice and her shiny apartment, the way my name sounds between her teeth. I catch myself staring at her freckled nose as she speaks, letting the words swirl up into the hazy air.
"Wren?"
"Sorry, what?"
"Nothin', I was just sayin' she sounds like a bitch. You know, fuck moms." She slurs the sentences, 'moms' sounding heavy on her tongue. We toast to the sentiment, to the women who left us reaching for something. I place a hand on her thigh and pretend to forget my mother, pretend to be seeking something else in Destiny's warmth. When we fall into her smooth sheets, our bodies slosh together like schoolgirls. Her name feels better moaned, her hair twisted in shaking fingers. The moments that follow are quiet and close, breath mingling in the sound of her ceiling fan. I lie on her bronzed chest, hand stretched across her waist.
"Hey, I wanna show you somethin'. I think you're gonna like it." Her voice is uncharacteristically soft. She leads me to a hallway closet, flicking the cool light on with her middle finger, glancing back at me with widened eyes. The fluorescents beam down onto rows of jars, each framing suspended flesh. There are organs floating in clear alcohol, sinew and fascia and toothy tumors. I hesitate, feeling her eyes scanning my reaction. A small smile spreads across my lips, my fingers reaching for a jar containing a shrunken heart, ostensibly an animal's. A warmth spreads through my chest as I picture my crowded freezer, Destiny's grip on my heart tightening too quick.
"These are -"
"Wet specimens, wow, they're cool," I say, dazed. Her face relaxes with relief, her arm wrapping around my waist as I gaze into the wobbling jar. I fold a creep of fear between my brows, mimicking a normal reaction to a gory collection. She lifts the back of my hair to kiss my neck, reaching past me for a suspended liver.
"Yeah, I look around for roadkill and keep whatever's intact. Most people don't really fuck with it." I control my face, maintaining apprehensive eyes. How did I find this girl?
"Yeah, well, most people suck. It's just... different. What do you do with the bones?" She pulls a bin out from the bottom shelf, revealing a tangled mess of chains and bones and metal.
"I make jewelry, it makes a killing on Etsy." Her face is still sheepish, waiting for my body to stiffen in the bluish light.
"Sick..." I pull a necklace out of the bin, adorned with pointed teeth. I can't hide the adoration in my gaze as I look back at Destiny, her smile widening as she wraps the chain around my neck. The gratitude in her gaze leaves her chest naked, previous judgments clouding her pride. She clips it in the back, pushing a strand of hair behind my ear.
"It's yours now," she says. I take a moment to bask in my luck, to revel in the rows of flesh and guts. For a moment, I'm less alone.
This perfect night leads to countless others, dinners and lazy mornings and earmarked dresser drawers. When Destiny sees my apartment, it becomes routine to default to hers, keeping my secrets just that. I read the stack of books on her bedside table; I wrap her finger in a bandage when she misses the stalk of celery; I kiss her in the shower from head to foot, folding her skin beneath my fingers to know she's real, alive; I sit on the counter as she slices open a dead racoon, watching as she precisely cleaves each plump organ from the carcass. We fall into a rhythm. When she asks about my mother, I tell her almost everything, more than anyone else. Her fingers swipe at my tears, her lips graze my spine. I start to trust her, to think about her differently. Like maybe I can let everything else go, but her.
When Calvin arrives, something changes, a blip on the radar, more to her story. I find Destiny leaning across the smoke shop counter, hand on his tattooed arm one Wednesday evening. The cold Mountain Dew in my bag almost slips as I hand it to her, my gaze fixed on his ruddy face.
"Babe! Hey, this is Calvin, he's an old friend," her voice bends. She wouldn't normally be so vague. My old friend from high school? My college lab partner? A childhood neighbor? No, 'old friend' means they had sex, and it's more than she wants to explain. His eyes tell me as much. He seems surprised to see me kiss her, marking my territory like a pathetic beagle. He extends his hand.
"Hi, nice to meet you...?"
"Wren, hi, I'm the girlfriend."
When they leave to have a catch-up dinner, I crawl to my apartment, downing a bottle of wine within the hour. The walls feel closer than they once did, the counter sticky, the bathroom smelly and cramped. My feet don't glide across the floors anymore, my body endlessly readjusting into the orange couch. I crack open the freezer for the first time in weeks.
When I place a slab wobbling meat on the plastic cutting board, I butcher sloppily, the knife feeling foreign in my hand. I steady the meat with my left hand, slowing each cut to perfect the lines. I lick one finger, then another, taking a single raw bite before reaching for the jar of fat above the stove.
As I grind the meat between my teeth, I feel Destiny's voice quiet in my mind.
When she arrives at my office in the morning armed with bagel sandwiches, I kiss her quickly, waiting as she divulges the details of her dinner with Calvin. Between bites, she sets the scene.
"It was nice, you know? He's back in town for a bit, travelin' with guys in his cycling group. They're callin' it the Tour de Florida," she says.
"Funny."
"Yeah, I mean, we haven't seen each other in ages, so it's nice hangin' out. I still don't got all that many friends around here," she glances up at me.
"Are you gonna tell me how you really know each other?"
"Woah, jealous much? Yeah, I guess we were fuck buddies back in Mississippi, but that was like ten years ago. You don't gotta worry, babe, I'm all yours," she slides her hand up my arm as she speaks.
"Besides, we were never really together. He's dumb as a damn brick."
Calvin starts showing up everywhere. Popping onto her phone with questions about local restaurants, stopping into her store for weed and conversation, coming by the apartment to drop off soup when she cancels their lunch with a cold. When he looks at me, it plucks at my rage, his faded tattoos and receding hairline mocking my illogical fears.
I return to my apartment more, have more meals alone. I think more carefully about my words, reluctant to show uninhibited devotion. The asterisks on my declarations of love wear on her, and start to sting her skin. Destiny fills more jars each week, slicing her animals and buying gallons of isopropyl alcohol, sinking her fingers into lukewarm flesh.
When Calvin leaves town, I relax, sitting back at the apex, but Destiny's collecting only escalates. I perch on the counter, feet swinging as I watch her prepare a stray cat's stomach for preservation.
"Tell me how you found this one, babe?" I ask. She glances at me with stern eyes, her long-faded tan leaving her cheeks gray.
"Yeah, uh, I was drivin' home from work last night and saw this little guy all fucked up in the road, so I went and got 'im," she gestures at the carcass. I nod, keeping my eyes wide and bright, begging her to mirror me, if just for a moment.
"That's cool." I pause, the space between our bodies bloated with silence.
"You know I love you, right?" I want to scream it. I love you!
"Yeah, babe, love you," she replies. Love you. I hop down from the counter and retreat to our bed, curling my knees up to my stomach as I scroll my camera roll up to June. I stare at our first selfies together, when we were nervous to touch. Our naked shoulders on a bright morning, faces puffed with sleep and sex and laughter. My grandpa outfit on a long hike, Destiny crouched over a fawn corpse, her cheeks pink with sun. Forty minutes pass before she comes to check on me, silently kissing my forehead and sliding into bed beside me.
"You good, baby?"
"Yeah, of course, what do you wanna watch?"
That night, I dream of my mother, her twisted features scraping into view. She's silent, standing in a corner. As I move toward her, my steps are small, inches at a time, then millimeters. I hear a child. Mommy! There's a toddler on the floor, complete with sticky fingers and a shock of red hair. As her cries grow louder, her voice deepens. When I look back at my mother, there is blood pooled around her ankles. Then the girl claws forward, sliding through the blood. When I jolt awake, Destiny isn't beside me.
As I prepare for bed one evening, I slather her skin with cream, inviting her into cool sheets.
"I think I'm gonna go out lookin', there's always more at night," she says.
"Baby, it's so late. I wanna go to bed with you, come on."
"Babe, just tonight, okay? I have a good feelin'."
"Okay, fine, but kiss me when you get back, alright? Don't just leave me asleep, I wanna know you're here," I ask.
"Alright, doll." She kisses me goodbye and tucks me into bed, pulling the comforter to my chin before flicking off the lamp.
I toss and turn for a while, trying to manually slow my breathing, pulling my arms against my chest. When thirty minutes turns into an hour, I decide to make myself some tea, to wait up until Destiny comes home. I need to talk to her. As I wait for the kettle to whistle, I linger by the window, wondering if I might catch a glimpse of Destiny walking by. The lamp at the end of the street flickers, and I see a figure shift below the window. The light reflects off Destiny's bright tresses, her body hunched into a wide squat. It looks like she's injured, maybe vomiting, and I rush to turn the stove off and shove my feet into slippers. The elevator ride feels endless, the light blinking as I pass through the two lower units in the narrow building. When I finally rush through the back door and into the yellowed grass, I see Destiny.
"Destiny? What the fuck?" Her eyes are frozen, wide and vacuous, a rabbit lying limp in her bloody hands. Its center is torn, flesh bleeding and ripping through the middle, intestines spilling from one side.
She drops the carcass into the grass, turning her body to face mine. I squat beside her, leaning toward her dripping face. As I lick the blood from her teeth, I feel her grip tighten into my hair, my nose sliding against her tear-slicked skin. The kiss deepens until her tongue plunges down my throat. Her eyes are empty but crazed, absent of even the smallest tenderness left between our skin. When Destiny's fingernails dig into my scalp, I wrench my neck back, fear and blood and love swirling between my teeth. She doesn't speak, wrestling a groan from her throat before gripping my head more firmly, tears dripping down her cheeks. My words are muffled, her mouth still pressing into mine.
"Destiny. Destiny, please!"
I curl my toes, steeling myself to her apathy, her rage, her newly foreign face. The next moments pass as they often do, fleeting and colorful. There's nothing quite like watching crimson muddle smooth cream. With my body in the lead, I fall down into it, the taste of blood. I can't tell if my eyes are open, each flashing moment warming my throat, settling my racing heart. Then, everything quiets. The crickets and cicadas blend into the breeze, my breathing barely disturbing the dusky calm.
I scramble for a plan, some way to move forward, some way to run from this, again. I tear holes in her clothes, grabbing a sharp rock from the grass. I sink my teeth into her flesh, ripping her face, her arms, her abdomen. I slice her skin with the rock, remembering photos of maulings. I've seen bobcats do this kind of damage.
I walk along the building's edge, unraveling a length of a hanging hose. As I rinse the blood from my skin, I watch it run into the grass, tinting the blades for a moment before sinking into the soil. When I am clean and left with only a bra, boxers, and slippers, I bury the rest in a nearby dumpster, thanking some kind of god for the phone in my pocket. I take a grocery bag from the dumpster, plopping the rabbit inside and covering it with newspapers. I tie the bag, letting it swing by my side as I leave.
I walk a few darkened residential blocks before ordering a car. As I sit in the Uber to my apartment, I feign sloppy drunkenness, a ride of shame. I keep the crinkled bag between my feet, thankful for the silent driver. I curl and uncurl my toes, hair wet and sticky with sweat, tears, crusted blood. My breathing is uneven, my mind flooded with flashes of Destiny's warm eyes. Her face kissed by the morning sun, then torn and oozing. Her fingers grazing my freckled cheek, then caked with fur and flesh. Her body curled onto mine, heavy with sleep, rhythmic and calm. Her still corpse, strewn across browning grass.
I tip thirty percent and walk up the dusty steps to my door, plucking a spare key from behind the nearby fire extinguisher. When I enter, I get to work, butchering the rabbit and finding its kidneys intact. I fill a jar with isopropyl alcohol, rubbing the organs clean under running water before easing them into the solution. When the jar is sealed, I pull the stove from its space in the kitchen, prying the loose board from the wall behind it. I place Destiny's jar on a small shelf, beside a silver fountain pen, a pair of coke bottle glasses, and a stack of notes. I pull the notes from the shelf, peeling them up from the sticky edge. Baby girl, I'll be back soon. Don't forget how much I love you.
from FICTION on the WEB short stories https://ift.tt/NobCQBU
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