You think you can go from the gutter to Bel-Air without stepping on and over a few people, Jenson Brooksby? Think again, fucker, because you tried that shit with me and you thought you got away with it, but you didn’t. Not anymore.
My fingertips rip off part of the bushes and I crush the leaves in my grip, pulverizing them to a fine powder before I drop what’s left of the vegetation to the ground, my eyes never wavering, still locked on their window.
I’m less than twenty seconds from seeing her up close and personal and my cock is as hard as a fucking rock. Taking in a deep breath I blow it out slowly before pulling the two lifelike dolls I bought and dressed in kid’s skeleton outfits just for this occasion. I take the hand of each one and flip the switch on the back. Mechanically they begin to walk, just like children, as we move toward the house.
It’s creepy as fuck but it’s what I need to pull this off. But the only thing I want to pull off now is my own matching skeleton outfit, the fabric tenting like crazy as the polyester and elastane does little to hide my need for the girl I’m here to take.
Slowly and carefully I guide my two little USB-charged accomplices to the front door, raise my shaking arm, and press on the bell next to the fake cornstalk fall decorations, fake spiderwebs, and plastic Jack-o’-lanterns. Nothing fake about what I’m here to do to that fake piece of shit that pretended to be my friend all those years until it was more convenient to throw me under the bus and then use his considerable resources to try and keep me there.
“Coming,” a woman’s voice calls out, sounding like angels taking flight.
My angel. But get ready, girl. It’s Halloween and the devil’s out tonight.
For you. And you have no idea what’s coming.
2
Juniper
“I’ll get it!” Mom yells, rushing toward the door in the costume she had hand-made by one of Hollywood’s top designers along with makeup applied by the guy who the last three Academy Award winning actresses rely exclusively upon.
I try to catch up with her but as I do, my stepfather comes out of nowhere, stepping in front of me and walking me backward until I have no more room to go, first my shoulder blades find the wall, and then the rest of my back presses against it like a pancake.
“Have I told you how much I like your costume?” he asks, running two fingers across my collarbone as I immediately taste bile and try to keep down the candy corn I’ve been binging on all night.
“About five times. Thank you,” I say, trying to duck under and around him but he sidesteps and keeps me cornered.
“You know how much your mother and I like having you at home. I don’t understand why you insist on living by yourself in some cramped studio apartment closer to U.S.C. when you could be sleeping in any of the dozen bedrooms we have here.Anyof them,” he says, a devilish grin overtaking his face.
My stepfather’s been trying this game since my mom married him three years ago. He even asked me where I stood in regards to ‘ménages’, his words, not mine, when he not so shyly suggested a threesome on the day he married my mom.
Classy.
I’ve told my mom on multiple occasions, but she tells me to just ignore him, in line with her own behavior. To block him out of my mind like she does when she visits her private pilates teacher for half the afternoon, or goes and sees the dentist for a routine cleaning that runs three hours, or her tennis lesson that always seems to run long and winds up with her returning home without a single drop of sweat on her. Sometimes she even forgets to take her racquet and plays it off like it’s nothing. Because she’s playing my stepfather for his money, just like he’s using her for a shot at me it seems.
Technically it qualifies as a symbiotic relationship, which is a bit ironic considering how parasitic they both seem.
Unfortunately, Jenson doesn’t seem to take the very obvious hints that I’m not interested in anything he has to offer, preferring to work my butt off to pay my own way through college, along with a mountain of student loans that I got because I applied for them before he and my mom got married. Had I waited, his income would have made me unable to get any such help.
But I don’t rely on him for anything, to the point I even eat before I come over to visit my mom. I don’t want as much as an ice cube from this excuse for a man, even though he wants something so near and dear to me, so precious, I can only share this one-time gift with one man for as long as I live. My v-card.
He’s dying to be the first as if he knows I’m that inexperienced, as if my mom might have told him. I’ve never told her anything about my love life other than I’m too focused on making my own way in the film world without relying on Jenson’s connections. The casting couch is real, and not just for actresses. And I’m not about to go down that path. Ever. Eww.
Heck, I didn’t even want to come over tonight for Halloween, but close to U.S.C. is a bit of a sketchy area of town, and Halloween is just an excuse for more violence than we already have in L.A. At least I know I’ll be safer over here, and it’s a perfect excuse to get dressed up for my favorite day of the year and hand out candy to kids, which I adore. All the little kids that came by in their costumes are so, so cute, but it’s getting late and we haven’t had a single trick-or-treater for a solid half an hour.
Probably time to shut it down after this, or at least lock myself in one of the rooms here, out of reach of mom’s very handsy second husband who treats Halloween more as a photo op to show how he’s ‘involved in the community’ despite being the most money-grubbing ‘me first’ person I have ever met in my life. He’d tear down a kid’s park if it meant he could add an extra fifty cents to his already nine-figure bank account.
At least with so many trick-or-treaters coming and going tonight I always know there are going to be extra eyes by the door, which is why I stay close, ready to hand out candy and keep Jenson’s clammy, soft hands off me.
I’ve been winning that battle all night, until now.
Now I just want to be alone, picking at a big bowl of Orville Redenbacher while watchingFriday The 13thon repeat on my laptop, knowing the scary parts are coming because I’ve binge watched Jason, the hockey mask-wearing murderer, every Halloween…yet I still spill popcorn everywhere when he comes out of nowhere, stalking somebody and then destroying them in ways so violent I have nightmares for weeks.
But the only nightmare right now is my stepfather, and he’s so bad one of these days I might just have to schedule a visit with one of the world-famous psychiatrists that work in this town, keeping Tinsel Town glittering despite the dark undercurrent.
How much better it would be to be snuggled up under a blanket, protected from the crisp nip of the fall air, watching slasher flicks than being here? I question my decision immediately, just like I question my mom’s decision to be with this pervy sex hound, despite the financial perks. Nobody’s worth the money if you don’t love them, right?
Or maybe I really am naive, like Jenson insinuates. “You know how the top actresses got ahead? Got to where they are today?” He winks and makes a clicking sound with his tongue in his mouth, his eyes lasciviously looking me up and down.