The Hell You Are

THE HELL YOU ARE

by Averil Dean

Photograph by Aneta Bartos

Sofia wakes me with a start. She throws my arm aside and slides away, dropping her legs over the side of the bed. I prop myself on my elbows and squint around the room in the low orange light. A sunbeam flares through a hole in the curtain and projects a tiny yellow star on the far wall. The alarm clock reads 5:10.

She pulls her duffel bag from the closet and starts tossing her clothes inside, stomping them down. Her dark hair is tangled and rough and the ends keep getting caught at the insides of her elbows. In her tank top and a pair of my boxers, she looks like a defiant teenager.

“What are you doing?” My eyes are gritty from lack of sleep. I rub at them with my thumb and fingertips.

“Leaving,” she says. Her eyes are ringed, smutty. Huge and wounded in her young face. They drop to the phone number written on the back of my hand.

I laugh a little, out of relief, since that number’s nothing at all. But we’re on the far side of a rough night and my throat is hoarse from yelling. Sofia hears my laughter as a taunt. Her head snaps around. She tightens and springs for me, flat-out, the way a cat will launch at her prey. I’m on my knees in time to ward her off with a forearm, catch her by the elbows and pivot in place to fling her down to the bed. And all at once we’re right back where we left off three hours ago when we fell asleep out of sheer exhaustion. Sofia’s eyes fill with furious tears and she arches up, long narrow throat drawn tight around a frustrated scream. She draws back and spits in my face.

That’s the way it is with Sofia. She does nothing halfway.

“Calm down,” I tell her. I wipe my face with a corner of the sheet.

As I said, it’s been a rough night. Most of the time, Sofia’s hauntingly quiet. The inside of her left arm is crisscrossed with thin white scars that need no explanation – not that one is forthcoming in any case. Sometimes when we’re on the couch watching TV she’ll let me trace those scars with my fingertips. Most of the time she wears long sleeves.

Everyone thinks Sofia’s so fragile. She’s tiny and slender, a hundred pounds soaking wet. But she owns every inch of herself. She’s a dancer – a real dancer, I mean. A trained ballerina. I never knew what that meant before Sofia. I never knew what it was to completely inhabit your own body. To drive it without mercy. To grind your toes literally into the ground.

The first time I saw her, Sofia was rehearsing alone in one room of a massive dance studio owned by the city ballet. I kept passing that door, carrying armfuls of flooring material from my truck, and with the last load in my arms I simply stood there and watched. She was doing the same sequence over and over and she must have been frustrated because her eyes shone with angry tears. But my god, she was beautiful. Light, shimmering, suspended in the air like a butterfly, with no perceptible impact when she touched down on that worn wooden floor. I watched through the glass door until she finished, and when she took off her ballet shoes and revealed her bloody toes, an unexpected lump formed in my throat.

When I close my eyes and imagine Sofia, I always see her just like that. One leg folded, one outstretched. And her ugly feet, bleeding, the first time our eyes met.

There are other pictures in my mind, other memories of Sofia’s pain. Images of her arms bound so tightly that her shoulder blades are almost touching when I take her from behind. Or tied to the bedpost, eyes closed while I walk around the bed and tell her the many ways she’s about to get fucked. This is the only way she’ll let me go down on her, so when I’ve got her in that compromising position I always take full advantage. I bury my face in that sweet forbidden dampness and dip my tongue inside her, seeking, slipping in her heat, scraping her with my chin until I’ve got her leaping into my mouth. Then, finally, I’ll hear the crystalline sound of her voice, calling my name, begging me to fuck her and make it hurt. She withholds this encouragement the way other women withhold intercourse.

I think Sofia likes me to hurt her the same way she enjoys a really deep stretch or a long run up a steep hill. She says I make her feel like a dancer.

We were at a carnival the night I asked her to marry me. Halfway up the ferris wheel with a pink stuffed dog between us that I’d won her at the ball toss. It wasn’t a spur of the moment proposal, though, I had a ring. And, taking no chances, I threw down for a really good one – a classic, fiery solitaire. Sofia kissed me with one hand curved around my stubbled jaw and said yes, she’d marry me because she thought I’d always be able to get the better of her.

She showed me what she meant right away. Sofia loves to fight and hates to win. I can see the disdain in those steady gray eyes if she ever thinks she’s hurt me. And she does, sometimes. Still, she called it right those six years ago; I always do get the better of her.

Later, that night I proposed, I paid the carny to lock up his dogs and let us back into the deserted fairgrounds. Sofia ran past the twirling lights to the funhouse and through the maze of mirrors, where she darted and dove and still could not escape. Her reflection was trapped there, bounding back on itself, back to me. When I pushed her into a corner, she dug the pocket knife from my jeans and told me breathlessly to open it, to hold it at her throat. The blade gleamed against her pale skin, flashing under the strobe-lights, there again and gone. This was a test for me, to see what I was capable of putting her through, and it was understood that if I wanted Sofia she was mine for the taking.

My hand was steady when I put the tip of the blade under her chin and wrapped her dark hair around my fist. Her breath was shallow, trembling. I slipped the blade through her shirt and tore upward, pushing the fabric aside, scraping the blunt edge against her skin. She stopped breathing altogether when I dipped the knife between her breasts and cut through her bra. Slowly, I pricked the lacy trim with the tip of the blade and drew it back. Her upturned nipples crinkled under the smooth cold metal. She was frozen, eyes on me and over my shoulder where our reflections surrounded us, wavering in the old mirrors, with smeary opaque patches where the shine had worn away. With my knife at her neck, she took off her clothes and opened her mouth.

Her tongue danced around the head of my dick, then she took me right down to the back of her throat. Our elusive reflection seemed surreal, disembodied in the strange light, but Sofia’s lips around my cock anchored me to her. I called her filthy names, made sure she could see the knife flashing in my fist. My other hand twirled her ponytail higher and tighter until I was fucking her mouth like I had no manners at all. She began to struggle and gag but I was slow about backing away.

I pulled her up by the ponytail and steadied her with one hand at the nape of her neck. With my thumb I pulled her hair free and lifted a strand to my nose. She was trembling, glistening with heat, her lips parted. Steam rose in translucent silver ribbons from her body. And in every narrow mirror was a slice of my Sofia.

She guided the tip of the knife to the center of her chest, just below the crescent of her sternum, and I twisted a tiny drop of blood from her core. I licked the blade clean and dropped to my knees, pulling Sofia down with me, straddled over my lap with only a scrap of black lace underwear between us. I wrapped the strap around one finger and pulled it taut, letting the fabric bite her, working it like a guitar string while she hissed through her teeth and opened herself wide and bared her neck to me. I nipped at her tender skin and slid my fingers under her panties, into that damp, heated darkness at the seam of her body. Her clit was simmering in its own juices, thrumming under the pad of my circling thumb. And the scent of her – that mysterious, vanilla warmth – was driving me out of my mind. My dick raged at her entrance while I told her what I was going to do, how many ways I was going to fuck her that night and every night thereafter. When I cut through the straps and tore her panties away, Sofia came hard, with a ragged cry of pure surrender.

“Oh good girl,” I said, surprised.

I dropped the knife and plunged my cock inside her, into a deep pool of liquid bliss. She rocketed up in my arms, but I braced her hips and drove her downward again and again. A low moan rolled in her throat as her beautiful body followed mine, eyes closed, ass pliant but firm under my splayed fingers. I latched onto her breast, dragged at her hair, drove her over the edge one more time before I surrendered myself, clamping her in place while I battered at the wall inside her and exploded with the force of a grenade.

We were married six weeks later. I couldn’t wait any longer than that for Sofia to take my name.

She’s never been easy. For hours at a time she’ll sit by the window and stare into distance as though we’re on a ship and she’s watching the mainland roll by. This usually precedes a disappearance of a few hours or a few days, until I’m absolutely fucking mindless with worry. When I ask her where she’s been, she’ll raise her eyebrows and accept my brutality and put me through the whole thing again in a few months’ time. I’ve tried several times to follow her. Once, she went to the beach and sat there the entire night, looking at the water while I crouched in the tufted dunes with a pack of Marlboros and a faulty lighter. At dawn she danced along the creamy surf, scattering the gulls, and when she left I followed her back home.

After six years I haven’t begun to figure her out.

At the moment she’s gone quiet and still. She’s coiled. Waiting. Last night’s unfinished fight is hanging in the air and I can see that there’s more to come, but for now I leave her with a warning look and shamble off to the bathroom to relieve myself. My head’s not quite right, so I brush my teeth and splash some water on my face. When I leave the bathroom, Sofia is dressed and headed out the door with her duffel bag. I follow her to the living room.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m leaving,” she says, reaching for the door.

“No you’re not.” I grab her duffel bag and drag it backward with her at the other end. She’s got one of the straps and leans back, almost sitting, but it’s like playing tug-o’-war with a child. The bag is mine. She gives up and lunges at me one more time. I drop the bag and roll my eyes, bringing her on with both hands, fingers fluttering at the ceiling.

Sofia draws back and punches me. The blow lands on my chin and slams my teeth together, chattering around my tongue. I taste blood in my mouth and see it suffuse the yellow morning haze with pulsating red. My ears roar with the sound of my heartbeat. There must be something unpleasant in my eyes when I draw myself to my full height and set my feet, because Sofia’s face is transformed in an instant. Her eyes go wide with fear. She turns on her heel and makes for the hallway and the kitchen door beyond.

I’m on her in three strides with one hand around her elbow and the other in her hair. I spin her around, hook her slender neck and force her against the wall. Her throat moves convulsively under my hand and she won’t raise her eyes to me. I slap her, once.

Now she’s listening when I tell her that phone number is nothing. She strokes my chest to placate me and tries to sidle away. But I am tired of being left and I tell her she’s not going anywhere. Her mouth is open when I kiss her, inhale her, bite her lower lip. Her breath comes in small startled gasps.

“Take off your clothes,” I tell her. And I’m not leaving room for debate. My hand is still around her throat and that phone number in blue is like a collar under her chin. She fumbles with her jeans but I refuse to help or let her bend down; I won’t let a breath leave her body without getting my share. The blood on my tongue is smeared over hers and she knows it pisses me off.

When Sofia has struggled out of her jeans, I divide her with a knee and reach between her legs. Sweet Jesus, she’s wet. My fingers slide inside her, two and then three, and I draw them up the center of her body and gloss her lip, inserting her desire with the tips of my fingers into our kiss. Her arms curl defensively over her chest and I curse at her, carry her wrists to the wall overhead, let her feel how defenseless she is. I drag the back of my thumb over her clit and she flinches, delicate wrists twisting under the palm of my hand. Desire sinks like a heavy, hot stone through my body. I pull off Sofia’s tank top, hiss filthy words against her cheek, fill my mouth and the palm of my hand with her bare breast. My dick is a steel pipe between us and Sofia shivers against my lips.

I turn her around and press her against the wall, still with one hand around her wrists. Her ass is so smooth, perfect and round and crowned by those feminine twin indentations and a tattoo of my name. I smack that ass and the sound cracks with satisfying immediacy in the silent hallway. Sofia jumps but doesn’t make a sound, so I spank her, harder, again and again with everything I have, until my palm is burning and my shoulder is cramped and exhausted. Sofia breaks at last, lets a small sob leak from the back of her throat. We’re sleek with sweat. The hair clings in swirling tendrils to her forehead and the back of her neck. She looks beautiful. More fuckable than any woman I’ve ever seen. Her ass is red, welted, but she offers it to me on the tips of her toes.

I kick her feet apart and sink my cock inside her. She’s impaled on me, and I lift her up and put her down right where I want her. She moans as her feet leave the ground, and the thrill of conquest lights a crackling fuse at the base of my spine.

“That’s fucking right,” I tell her. She slides along the wallpaper, cheek pressed to the wall. She’s a hot fist around me. I reach between her legs, slipping, circling, and now Sofia can’t be still. I snarl against her ear. Call her mine and make her say how much she wants this. It’s not my role to tell her how good she feels, but fuck, she does, holy fuck she does, and I want to come inside her right now and just fucking tear her apart. My jaw aches with the effort of restraint. Her hair sticks to my chest and our bodies clap together like we’re making our own applause.

Sofia is weeping around me. Warm tears slide over my fingers and the inside of her thigh. I cup a hand around each knee and spread her wide, backing up a step, leaving her to cling to the slippery wall with no help from me. Her body is splayed open, submissive and abandoned and unbelievably erotic. A high-pitched whimper lodges at the back of her throat. I crank my hips and watch the long, narrow muscles in her back quiver and bunch as she bows backward, writhing, begging me not to stop. I smack her ass and tell her to come. Right fucking now.

Her head falls forward and her body relaxes for just a moment, and then she does come, crying and pleading in flowing Italian that needs no translation. She’s liquid, oozing fire, pulsing around me, and I’m in hot pursuit. My fist is full of her hair and my cock is driving her, drilling her into the wall. I’m throbbing, aching, exploding inside her and her cunt is swallowing me whole and still there is no way to get close enough to Sofia. My climax is monstrous, desperate, broken and needy, and when she comes again I think I hear her laughing.

My arms tremble when I lower her to the ground. She puddles at my feet and runs one small hand around my calf like a young child who will sleep wherever she falls. I pick her up, cradle her against my chest, and carry her back to bed.

“I’m leaving,” she says with one leg over my hips and her tousled head on my shoulder.

“The hell you are.”

Copyright 2011 Averil Dean