You Win The Game

Ethan sidled up next to me, put his lips near my ear, and whispered, “Binklebop.”

He’s weird like that, he has a tendency to make up his own words and languages, and refuses to tell me their meanings.

Ethan works along with me in Hot Topic, we both are cashiers, we both have gages, we both have colored hair, we both love black clothing. He’s adorable in his mindset. Sometimes he’ll create a game that we’ll play all throughout the day and I won’t even realize it till he tells me if I won or he won, and what the prize is. Because I rarely know of these games, the prizes are easy - buy the winner a piece of candy, one free movie pass, etc. He’s kooky and wonderful.

At almost closing time, a man comes in. The man is rather large and foreboding with multiple piercings and dark eyes, but it’s nothing neither of us have seen before. The man comes in and looks around for a few moments before buying a Blood on the Dance Floor t-shirt from Ethan and is on his way. While they were making small chat however, I thought I saw a strange look pass over the man’s face. It wasn’t until later that I realized it was kind of a lusty-smoldering gaze. He had been lusting after Ethan! Not that I blame him, Ethan is one of those guys anyone on a slightly darker side of the force might love. Strong jaw, dark and deep set green eyes with dark brown/purple hair that was usually in a fohawk. It doesn’t hurt that he’s tall and strong, the kind of strong that lies in lean muscles, not giant and bulging. That can be disgusting sometimes. Very good to look at overall, with a wonderful personality to go with, I can never figure out why he’s single.

We close up soon after the man leaves and head towards the back entrance and to our car, we’re roommates so he just drives both of us to work. If we have separate shifts I can take my car, but I much prefer his over mine, he’s got cool little tags everywhere and it’s warm and comfortable.

He starts the car, and we hit the road. “I won the game tonight,” he informs me with a smile, “A gay guy hit on me and not you! Hehe!”

I laugh, “How could I have won if it was for gay men, gay guys don’t hit on girls you booger.” I stick my tongue out at him.

“I admit, it was a very one-sided game today,” and in a stereotypical gay man voice, “But I was under the impression that you could turn a gay man,” he coughs, “Straight.” Changing his voice to an overly macho, deep tone.

“Well I’m sorry to disappoint, what is your prize good sir?” I mock playfully.

“Tonight, we’re going to a party, and I get to see you chug a beer.” He says with glee.

I groan, I hate beer. It has a horrible aftertaste, and middle taste, and beginning taste. But he won the game, and he always follows through on these things for me, so I oblige. “Alright, alright, but just one, then I’m going back to my own delicious concoction.” Mainly vodka, malibu, and orange juice. “Where’s the party tonight?” We usually go to parties a couple times a month, and they’re almost never in the same place.

“Some guy named Alex, Matt texted me the address. We’ll go home for a few minutes to change and stuff then head over. It’s only twenty minutes from our place walking, so no sleeping over.” He points his finger to me with a disapproving wag. I have a tendency to fall asleep at other people’s parties and wind up passed out in some corner where no one can find me till I wake up in the morning. No one bothers me, so I don’t care.

We pull up to our place and go up the two flights of stairs it takes to get there. I go in my room and take a quick shower and dress in some dark jeans and a tight red and black v-neck striped top that accents my breasts well. It doesn’t hurt to show them off sometimes. I apply my makeup and head out of my room.

BANG BANG BANG. His door shakes as I rather strongly bang upon his door. “Come on slowpoke! You don’t want all the hot chicks to be taken do you?”

“Yeah yeah yeah, I’m comin, keep your panties on.” I plop on the couch and flip on the tv, and decide to watch the old episode of Invader Zim that comes on. It’s the one where some aliens try to take earth to be used for fuel and Zim gets all pissy because it was charted as HIS planet, yada yada yada.

I still wind up waiting another 10 minutes before he comes out of his room. Swear, that boy takes twice as long as I do.

I take a whiff of him and he already smells like a party. “Go spray some axe dude, you reek.” He rolls his bright eyes and sprays himself with some deodorant. I take another whiff, “Much better,” I thrust out the crook of my arm for him to wind his through, “Let us take our leave good sir.”
“Positively madame.” He says imitating my upright tone and smiles as he leads me out the door.

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We arrive at the party and see it’s got a pretty decent atmosphere already. Ethan and I enter through the door and mingle with a few of our friends before splitting for a little bit. Him to talk to his guy friends and me to talk to my girl friends. The music booms through the house and I see Ethan out of the corner of my eye laughing hard, he’s so cute sometimes. He holds up a finger and excuses himself to his friends out of my view. I turn back to mine as one makes a funny joke. I laugh a little excessively, and almost spill my drink.

I see Ethan out of the corner of my eye again with two red solo cups heading my way. Dammit, I forgot.

“Time to chug Mo,” he hands me my cup. My friends start to cheer me on a little, “Mor-gan! Mor-gan!”. I tip back my drink and my head and chug my beer thinking to myself, ‘God, this tastes awful. Whatever, anything for Ethan’. I finish my beer and let out a very unladylike belch, thrusting my fist in the air in success. Ethan and a couple friends slap me on the back, congratulating me, and accidently incite a couple burps.

I make my way to the kitchen, leaving them all behind to make my own delicious drink. A hand slaps my ass and I turn around and slaps the face that did it before continuing to the kitchen to make my drink. That shit usually happens to me at parties and I try not to make a big deal out of it, I don’t usually get much trouble after the first time it happens as my hand print can usually last on their face all night.

I’m pouring my drink and looking for the orange juice when someone comes up behind me and taps me on the shoulder. I turn around to see a gorgeous man. Tall, styled dirty-blonde hair, gray eyes, built of lean muscle a bit like Ethan, only more pronounced. His eyes had a bit of an effect on me and I got mesmerized for a second before I noticed his full lips starting to move and I snapped myself back to reality.

“Can I help you find something?” he spoke, his voice was deep and luxurious.

“Uhmm” Shit, my brain needs to work now, come on brain, work dammit. “Uhh, yeah, do you know where some orange juice is? Ya know, for my drink?” Crap, I sound so stupid, of course it’s for my drink he knows that he can see that. So stupid.

He grins a lopsided grin that makes me melt a little. He reaches up over my head and leans into me a little, and I subconsciously lean into him too. Pulling back he hands me the orange juice and lets his hand linger on mine for a few extra moments. “I’m Alex, what’s your name?”

“I’m Morgan, or Mo, or whatever, whatever you wanna call me is just fine.” I internally facepalm. “So is this your place? It’s soooo nice.” I’m pretty sure I sound like an idiot but my mouth won’t shut up. To busy myself I pour the orange juice into my drink.

He slides in a little closer and puts his hand on the small of my back, “It’s nice to meet you Morgan, and yes this is my place. Well, my parents place. Summer house kind of thing. I’m just here killing time till school starts up again.”

His touch makes me tingle a little bit, I play with his shirt a bit to have something to do. I feel his abs beneath before playing with the bottom of his shirt and stare at it while I laugh, “Well good for you, I’m stuck here 365 days a year. Aren’t you lucky.”

“How so?” He inquires, tipping my head up to look at him. I try to put my head back down but he keeps his hand under my chin making me look into his eyes. “You know why I think I’m lucky?”

I shake my head, my brain not working with his body pressed up against mine and his hands on my hips. “I’m lucky,” he whispers, bringing his lips closer to me, “because I get to do this,” he plants his lips on mine and passionately starts to kiss me but pulls away after just a few seconds, “with the most beautiful girl here.” I know it’s a line, but I don’t really care, all I care about is getting his perfect lips back on mine. He runs his hand to the back of my head and grips my neck firmly but gently. I tilt back my head and breath deeply as I put my hands on his muscular back and pull him close to me.

His strong hands pull me in tight. The hand not holding my neck slips down into my back pants pocket while we continue and I start to lose my breath. He pulls back to bite and kiss at my neck. I was on my fire, and from what was poking into my thigh so was he. A slight moan escaped my lips.

“Would you like to go to my room?” His eyes bored into mine with meaning.

Apparently the look in my eyes said what my lips couldn’t as he held my hand. Unfortunately the route to his room took us close to where everyone else was and I saw Ethan. The look on his face as he noticed me with Alex, it wrenched my heart. He looked so hurt, so betrayed. With a blink of the eye he was gone and I was in a low-lit room with a sexy gorgeous boy that almost made me forget about Ethan entirely. Almost. He closed the door shut and soon I was being devoured in passionate kisses and heated groping. I tried to get into it but, Ethan’s face lingered and I just couldn’t. I had wound up on Alex’s lap somehow with his shirt off and him pulling mine off.

I put my hands on his hot chest pushing him away. He misunderstood and fell back pulling me against him.

“No, no that’s not what I meant. I can’t do this I’m sorry.” I moved to rise back up but he pulled me against him and rolled over, so he was on top of me. A nervous laugh bubbled out of me as I asked, “What are you doing?”

He looked me in the eyes, and I could see a hard look in them, a look like he knew exactly what he was doing. “You can do this, and you will do this.” His voice was hard and it scared me.

“I don’t want to, let me up, this isn’t funny.” My voice was small, just above a whisper, “Let me go, I’ll scream.” I threatened. My threat sounded so pathetic that he just laughed.

My eyes watered, and I opened my mouth to scream. Before it could pass my lips his hand slapped my face so hard I cried out in pain. I start to struggle beneath him but I couldn’t move, he was so heavy. He took my wrists and held them above my head with just one hand while he used the other to unbutton and remove my pants, then his. I felt him against my thigh, he’s not that big, but I could tell that that’s not what will hurt me anyways. He started to poke against me on top of my panties and didn’t move them out of the way, yet.

“My, my, these are soaking aren’t they. I think someone’s enjoying herself, isn’t she?” his voice is dangerous, and there’s a glint I didn’t see before, malice.

“It’s not from this that I’m wet, it’s from before, it’s not fair.”

“Hmm, that’s not what I think. I think you like pain, you get off on it don’t you?” I felt him pull my underwear out of the way as I struggled harder, but he plunged himself into me. It hurt, god it hurt. I screamed and screamed as he thrust harder and harder.

“Stopppp! Stop! I don’t! Stop!” His fist connected with my head and my vision went dark around the edges. My body went numb and my head rolled back unable to support itself. I shut my eyes to the world as he clawed my breasts and brought on a new kind of pain. He bit them hard and I knew I’m going to have bruises, if not cuts.

The music thumps through the walls, I recognize the song. It’s one me and Ethan always sang together in the car. My fuzzy brain put together the lyrics and I hummed along, Ethan always sang, I couldn’t sing, so he always sung and it was beautiful. Alex punched me again, “Stop that bitch, stop fucking singing. I want you to fucking SCREAM.” He dragged his nails down my side and I could feel the deep gashes, and blood dripping down my side.

Screams exploded from me, giving Alex what he wanted. I wanted to stop, my throat was already sore from before, but I couldn’t stop them. I heard the door bang open and Alex’s weight lifted from me. I hear the sound of flesh being pounded, and not mine. I cracked my eyes, and saw Ethan. I smiled when I saw him, before the world went dark, and I no longer heard or saw anything.

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The sheets surrounding me were warm, as was the body that held me close. I snuggled in closer and felt my skin stretch and twist, causing a small cry to escape my lips. I remembered what happened, and I began to cry.

“Shh, shh, it’s okay, I’m here, I’m here.” a soft voice assured me and gripped me tighter. For a second while the sheet covers my face I think it’s Alex so I struggled to get away. My body went into self-defense mode ignoring the pain it felt when I moved to kick and push at my attacker.

The voice just gripped me tighter and pulled the sheet away. It’s not Alex, it’s Ethan. I bury face in his chest and wail. He held me close and tells me, “You’ll be okay, I’m here for you, I love you Mo, I love you.” His voice is soft, and made me feel better. He said it over and over until I stopped making noise. I feel his lips on my forehead, “I’m so sorry,” he whispered sadly. “I thought you had chosen me over him. When I saw you go in that room with him, I was heartbroken. I needed you, I’ve always needed you. But I never thought you needed me, so I left you alone. I should have been there for you. I’m so sorry, forgive me. Please, forgive me. I love you so much, and I’m not letting you go again.”

I say nothing, I just look into his eyes and see what he says is true. I stare at him for a moment longer before leaning in, and placing my lips softly on his. A spot on my lip doesn’t feel right, like it’s missing. I reached up with my hand to feel it. They’re sore and partly scabbed. I explored the rest of my face lightly. My right cheek is bruised, I have a cut across my nose, and two black eyes. My tender skin told me to stop touching it.

“Alex confessed to everything that happened, everything to up before I came in and beat the shit out of him.They’re putting him in jail, you’ll be safe.”

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Over the next several weeks I got healthier. After the first few days I could move without too much pain, in the next two I could walk. I also discovered the extent of my injuries. I had lacerations across my ribs on both sides, bruises from head to toe, broken nose, black eyes, my left ulna was broken, as was my right pinky finger, and vaginal bruising. I hurt down there for awhile, and everywhere else too I might add.

Ethan took care of me every step of the way. He watched as my bruises gradually faded away, my nose got fixed, my wounds healed. Every once in awhile I would kiss him, or he would kiss me, but he always pulled away within a few seconds. We never moved further than kissing for at least 3 months.

My first week back at work, I got a couple more stares than usual. I didn’t have much physical evidence anymore of what happened, but word got around from the people at.. his.. party. I couldn’t bring myself to say his name after the first week of my waking up.

At the end of my first month back we clambered into the car a bit quickly since it was cold out. We drove back to the apartment in silence, only the radio playing. At the moment that he was about to turn off the car, our song came on. The same one that made me think of him and forget what was happening to me. I looked at him, and he looked at me. He looked worried, but all I could do was smile and start humming along. A moment later, he started to sing. In all the months I’d been getting better, I hadn’t heard him sing once. It made me light up with joy.

When the song ended, he reached over to me and held my hand. “You win.”

“How’d I win?” I was confused, he hadn’t been playing any games since the party, I had thought he stopped them all together.

“You win, because you persevered. You win, because you are beautiful. You win, because you are brave and smart.” He took a deep breath, “But I win, because when you woke up, you didn’t reject me like I thought you would, you accepted me. I love you so much, and I never want you to be hurt ever again, and I want to be the one to make sure that that NO ONE can ever take you away and cause you that much pain in any lifetime.” He leaned over and kissed me, longer than any previous time. He placed his hands softly on my cheeks.

He ended the kiss a millennia later, and reached into the front compartment of the car. Out he pulled a small case. “This was my mothers, but now, if you want it, it’s yours.” The case opened, and in sat a beautiful ring. It wasn’t made of diamond, it was an emerald, the exact same shade as his beautiful, sparkling eyes.

I had tears running down my face as he asked, with his eyes watering, “Will you love me, and be loved by me, for the rest of our lives?”

I grabbed his head and kissed him passionately, lovingly, with all my heart in that one kiss.He laughed a twinkling, knowing laugh, “I’ll take that as a yes?” He smiled and placed the ring on my finger, it fit perfectly.

We went upstairs and made love for the first time. It was the sweetest, tenderest love I’d ever felt, and the best I’d ever had.

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We married outdoors a year and two months later. I wore a black and purple wedding dress, because it was my wedding day, and no one could say shit. We both dyed our hair the same purple as the dress had. I said it looked better on him, he said it looked better on me. We were married for another 69 years, had our up and downs but in the end, I died first and waited up in heaven for him for only about 30 seconds. We took one last look down at ourselves in our bed, holding each other in our arms with our foreheads touching.

The first thing you can do when you arrive in heaven is look at your last thoughts, I looked at his, and he looked at mine and we smiled. “You won the game, but I love you no matter what.”