Hurt Me Daddy, for I Have Blogged

3. Jenae plopped herself down onto the curb as the world blurred in front of her eyes, rubbing the palms of her hands against the upper back of her head. “Al! Al! I thinkI dranktmuch.” “Probably. We had to cut you off. Just take a seat and take some big, deep breaths, ok? And next fucking time, JJ, no drinking contests with these guys. I’m gonna bring you a bottle of water.” Shots were Jenae’s vice. She was not a big social drinker but when someone offered the challenge, especially a man, she was ready to step up to the plate. Now she hovered just in front of sleepy blackout. One of the PickupPals, Chris, staggered out of the pub. “I gaveyoumnumber, right?,” he slurred. Jenae frowned. She barely knew what was going on, but she frowned. “Have I…have we talked?” At this point the fact that blackout had happened became a little clearer. “Chris. I complimented your necklace,” he said, gently fingering the stone. At least he hadn’t touched her hair but at this p...

2. Jenae knew that she’d had a brother who had been taken and grew up in the system, but that was all she had known. She’d lived a relatively easy life in the suburbs with her aunt and uncle, who were already very proper older folks at the time. Uncle Reggie had tried to raise her on British TV, though Aunt Agnes made fun of him for it and would walk around the house doing the accents. Reggie and Agnes were actually distant cousins of her biological parents, but Jenae knew little else about them. In the dim corners of memory, Jenae would recall scenes at home. Her brother was there, too, yet they were both tiny. Things seemed normal, like the home life with two parents and siblings that most of the people at school had talked about later. Little trouble at home, no abnormal fighting, though sometimes it seemed like her mother would disappear. Other times her father would. One day Jenae remembered a big blackout, she and her brother crying, the police arriving, and then not much else....

1. Jenae plopped down on the couch after a long day and flipped on the TV. She wanted to try to forget the text she’d gotten about three hours earlier. Allison wandered into the living room. “Hey there. How was work?” Jenae could sense that Al needed some girl time, but frankly, she wasn’t in the mood. “Uh. You know. The guys are always ok. Except for Tad, that fucking bro. I mean at least I don’t work with the cavemen most chicks at game stores get stuck with. Luckily they’re not all fat white basement-dwellers. But you know, Tad finally had the balls to approach me today about being their booth babe at ComicsGalore, because he saw me wear the costume that one time when BloodFountain 7 came out. I, of course, told him he was nuts.” “Damn straight. Those fuckers finally pulled that, huh. Well, at least they’d waited until you’d been there two years.” “Like, aren’t guys supposed to get all weirdly comfortable with you during that time and not look at you like that anym...

It was a full-on stupid hour to be at Danny's Diner on a Tuesday. "So...who are we looking for?" said Dalene. "And how the fuck are we out here before midnight." "Just you wait." countered Gabe. "I'm not nearly high enough to be doing this at this hour." "Too bad. No time to deal. You're good doing our work when you're sober anyway. Don't be an addict." Dalene eyerolled. "Trust me. He's going to walk in at any moment." "I trust you. Ok. Ok. I mean at least I can vape in here." "That's gross. I'm pretty sure that will still kill you." "Wow, since when were you Captain Judgmental about this shit?" The man walked in. “Gabe, I want to order a burger. Or at least a shake. It’s way too early for this.” Gabe flipped his shades on and sidled gently up to his subject. The man began to speak immediately. “They did it again....

Yana collapsed on her bed, a weight free from her shoulders. She felt emptied. Voided. Didn’t want drink or drug now. The camper was so utterly quiet. She was sadder at all the hard work they had put into the sister act to get here, only to lose it all.  “But that’s life,” she heard Aunt Lala say. Work so hard only so lose it. That was the life they had chosen, anyway. In the empty trailer, she wished for arms to hold her. No men fucking her, no cold-ass Jorge. She wanted Lala or Uncle. Maybe Mom or Dad. She knew Mara was gone, and they would never hug or sleep close again. Yana wondered at the abyss that Mara might’ve seen in her last moments. Was she free? Was she sad? No way to know. Was it Godless? Did she see the Virgin’s face, maybe? Drained, Yana finally met the shore of dreams. ** It was 4am. Jorge stumbled, with a small flashlight, finally finding the small, raised mound. The moon was a sliver, and it was too dark to see whether there was any blood nearby. He hadn...

The Tree of Evil is the habit, the compulsion, the auto-default, that which we were born with. It is that which tells us to sin against our higher self and our betterment. At the heart of it we have failure and pain. This is the Tiphareth, spelled backwards. Are we on our heads here? And thus my baptism began, my light into the shadow. My head was submerged, and upon it I saw red snakes; petrified ribbons of victory. No drug strong enough for me. And then the priest stated: “Do you renounce your will and all that made sense to it?” And then he gave me a taste of the opium as communion, and it smelled like chemicals. It was the gateway to other lives, other things. But my habit was the compulsion I was born with, the chemicals throughout my meridians. My hands trembled and I felt nausea. It was so easy to be stuck but so difficult to say no. Time had stymied me into wanting the same thing, day in, day out. Somewhere I heard an echo of a suicidal man’s song. I was a victim and t...

She had never visiting a Living inside a passageway. The health centers were located inside the underground passageways so that people from either side of the fence could get to them. The Masters and Collectors had one wing, and everyone else took the other. The other wing was hermetically sealed. But this was not just any visit to a Living. It was to the sealed side of the Center. She would need to wear a bubble suit, by mandate. Visits by Harvesters or any Infs were rarely permitted. They divested her of any tools. Incredibly thorough search, body scan and questionnaire. The fee was less for her, since she had her own fully functional Engine of Joy. --- He sat upright in bed. One of the many who had a gas mask welded on surgically around puberty; nebulizer over that. Their engines pulsed in time. It was frightening. She decided to speak to him in an ancient text called Binary. "Elder. Please excuse and forgive me. You must know why I was told to be watchful over you. F...