Hero Worship

1The Impossible GirlThe steady slap of polished wood against bare skin left Billy unusually dissatisfied. He increased the pace: thwack, thwack, thwack. Momentarily the flesh tensed before settling again into softness. Knees and hands remained rigidly planted on the bed, and a toss of long blonde hair indicated he should continue. Under the action of the paddle, a vivid red splotch had bloomed, the same color as the high-heeled shoes that protruded over the end of the bed. The mark became angrier each second and grew slightly as the skin swelled. Billy peered at it closely, his nose almost touching the shapely bottom. He could have sworn it was taking on the shape of a country he recognized. France, maybe? No, not square enough for that. Spain? He moved back and slapped the oddly shaped swelling once again, with a little more pressure this time, discovery just another paddle away. A triangular extension burst onto the skin and extended the square downward. Africa! That’s it! Not a country—a whole bloody continent! It made him sort of proud. The last slap also elicited a slight “ahh!” from the woman straddled on his slickly wrapped bed. The black silk sheets were a recent purchase made from boredom and a brief desire to adopt a Hugh Hefner persona. They’d proved to be a disappointment. No one had told him silk was so damn slippery and already caused one unfortunate bunny to shoot across the bed and land in a twisted heap on the floor. In addition, when he got into the bed on his own, which was becoming more frequent of late, they were icy-cold on his skin. Uninviting. He probably wouldn’t keep them, the sheets or the blonde. She seemed preoccupied. Despite his attention returning to her backside, images of her manicuring her nails or considering a grocery list kept flashing through his head. The few sighs that emanated didn’t seem to come from pleasure, either. They were too similar, the same weak inflection every time. He came to the conclusion he must bore her, too. That smarted a little. The idea that those who’d recently occupied his bed didn’t remember him with the same level of affection they used to, disturbed him. The last few months had really put a crimp in his performance and, truth be told, left a cramp in his thigh muscles. Thwack! With one last energetic slap which took the bottom quite by surprise, he said, “Time to bugger off, love.” The look he got back was one of gratitude. She is bored. Bloody hell! Without waiting for the girl to get up from the bed, Billy pulled on his designer underwear and the shirt he’d removed earlier, and made his way into the living area of his East London Docklands flat. As usual, it was pristine. The three black leather sofas sat solidly in the middle of the floor arranged around a geometric patterned black and white rug. Their flat square arms delivered a safe resting place for the bottles of the European lager he favored, but not an ounce of comfort for an occupant. The bricks in the walls provided a rare splash of color. Original to the eighteen forties when the building operated as a tea warehouse, they were a little crumbly around the edges, but still maintained their chalky red hue. The walls reached high to open rafters and were decorated with an assortment of oversized photographs depicting stick-thin models standing in awkward poses against dramatic backdrops of industrial machinery or views over rock escarpments. Still-life studies of female footwear also adorned the space: six-inch red stilettos vied for room against more steampunk-inspired thigh-highs. Only one photograph, of well-used rough workman’s boots, provided a change of mood. But even these were back-lit and placed attractively, one leaning its heel against a low satin-covered box, and the other resting at a sideways angle against its companion. A regiment of desktop computers of varying age and quality covered the large desk in the far left corner of the room. Behind them stood a wall of similarly neatly arranged routers, screens, and hard drives that gave the impression of the electronics shelf in a thrift store. Billy loved old technology. Color coded wires were everywhere, hanging from every device like limp spaghetti. After retrieving a beer from the fridge in the kitchen, Billy pried the metal top from the bottle with an opener styled as Dracula’s open mouth. It released with a pop and he took a quick swig, then studied the gadget. The vampire grimaced at him, its flat central teeth providing just enough space to grip a bottle top tightly while the two sharp canine fangs served little function. He smiled. He’d received the opener as a gift and a lecture had accompanied it: Of course, vampires don’t actually use their fangs for anything but a show of aggression, and only very mature ones have them, anyway. He’d learned a lot that day—the day his best friend, a haughty and often impossible half-vampire girl, had chosen to teach him about the supernatural world. When he’d dropped that same girl at a South London psychiatric unit four months ago, those conversations had stopped. The first twelve weeks had passed in a haze of daily visits, each one taking the same format: the repeated telling of the events that had brought her there, mindless board games, and tales of his latest plaything to make her smile. When he wasn’t there, he’d heard from the orderlies she would curl up in a tight ball in the corner of the room for hours at a time, her eyes squeezed shut. At night, they said, she lay stiffly on the bed, arms by her sides, staring up at the white expanse of hospital ceiling. A study in stillness. It pained him to think of her that way. After one hundred and fifty years, her life had come crashing down, and Billy had finally admitted to himself there was nothing he could do to make it better. He didn’t know what was worse, his inability to help or the guilt he felt for doing nothing. Recently, he’d spent more time away, desperately needing normality again. Party people, long runs, and highly paid technomancy contracts, all provided the distraction he needed. Though the guilt had yet to lessen. The sound of high heels clipping sharply over his polished wood floor brought him up short. He winced and without looking up said, “Shoes!” “I know!” He felt her eye-roll. The footsteps paused by the front door, and the offending heels clattered to the floor. He looked up. The woman was now clothed in a deep brown wrap-around dress that tied at the waist and ended just below her knee, not a hint of cleavage. A strangely sedate outfit for her chosen lifestyle. She pulled on low wedge-heeled canvas sandals, kissed the air vaguely in his direction, and was gone. Billy’s shoulders sagged in relief. Even his heartbeat steadied. He pulled the kitchen drawer open to return the bottle opener, but hovered instead, his fingers running over the sharp little teeth. Dracula’s wide staring eyes looked back at him. The girl had copied that expression exactly when she’d given it to him, her whole body rocking with laughter. The sound of that laugh never changed, so natural, so… sweet. She would have laughed even harder at him for using that word. The alarm from the Mac cut through his contemplation. Someone was calling on the video link. He dropped the bottle opener into the cutlery drawer with a clatter, and headed toward his desk hoping for good news.