Petite Morte

Petite Morte


Her body swayed to the soft music. She ran her hands over her dark hair and the strap of her negligee slid down her shoulder, revealing an enticing view to the audience, all of which were mesmerized by her sensual dance. The lights played across her milky skin, making it seem all the paler against the thin, black material. He had seen the show a thousand times but it still took Ash a heavy effort to tear his gaze away and sweep it across the crowd to search for trouble makers. Ashley Frost had worked at Petite Morte for nearly five years and never yet had a girl been touched on his watch. It was a point of pride with him.

Across the room Mirabel Lackley, the owner of Petite Morte, was leaning casually against the polished black bar. Mira liked black. She showed her enjoyment of the color with a thoroughly monochromatic color scheme. Instead of appearing morbid, as Ash would have thought, it gave off a kind of casual elegance that seemed slightly out of place on the otherwise dingy little street of businesses that Petite Morte sat on. Mira herself was dressed in her usual graceful manner in a simple black dress that fell nearly to her ankles. The plunging neckline let all those around her know that, though she had never graced the black stage herself, she could put on a truly delightful show. Her dark hair was pulled back from her face and twisted into an elegant knot at the back of her head. A small smile played at the edges of her mouth and her nearly black eyes shone with a kind of secret amusement.

A man close to the stage made a sudden movement, as though unable to help the urge to touch the girl that danced before him. Ash stepped forward, stretching his full six foot two frame so that his black t-shirt strained against his muscular chest. He settled his pale gray eyes on the wiry figure and shook his head, sweeping a lock of black hair from his forehead. The man licked his lips and hastily snatched back his hand before dropping his gaze. Ash relaxed and threw a warning glance over his shoulder as he turned and waded through the sea of bodies.

Mickey, an eager kid nearly as large as Ash, stepped out of nowhere and flashed his usual grin.

“You got a visitor,” he said, nearly shouting over the music and murmur of the crowd.

Ash glanced around and saw Payne Miller sitting at the bar, staring into his beer and looking monumentally uncomfortable.

“Watch these guys,” Ash said. “I’ll be back.”

Mickey gave a one-fingered salute and melted into the crowd as swiftly and silently as he had appeared. Ash contemplated his friend’s slumping posture before making his way to the bar.

Payne was an old-school biker according to the legends that surrounded Fulton Street. You could almost see it in his leathery face and the way his body had deteriorated, sinking from muscle to seed. But, whatever he once was, he had become an old man, thirsty for friendship in his life, yet too suspicious to let anyone get too close. He owned a little tattoo parlor on the end of the strip that attracted just enough clientele to keep him in ink and supplies. Ash was one of the few that frequented the shop and had struck a steady friendship with the older man. But Payne could turn odd at times, an occurrence that Ash laid off on the drugs he had surely experimented with in his youth.

“What’s up, Payne?” He asked, leaning a hip against the bar.

Payne took a long swallow of his beer before answering. “Your ex was by the shop today,” he said, finally.

Ash’s body tensed immediately. “What did she want?”

“A tattoo, she said,” Payne replied. “I think she just wanted a look at Annette. I was in the back when she came, finishing up Spider’s tat.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing,” Payne replied. “She said she wanted Annette to give her a tattoo and I told her to get out. You’re the only one that ever asks for Annette. She makes most people uneasy.”

“She okay?”

“I think so,” Payne said, his voice going a little gruff. “How can you tell with that one? Always sad, hardly ever talks. I don’t think Carrie got many digs in before I threw her out. I just thought you should know what she was up to.”

Ash nodded. “I appreciate it.”

Payne nodded back, finished his beer and tossed a few bills on the bar. “I gotta get back.”

“Take care Payne,” Ash said. “And Payne?”

The other man was nearly to the door when he turned, in an almost resigned fashion. He didn’t quite meet Ash’s eyes, but signaled to let him know that he was listening.

“Thanks for looking out for her, man.”

Payne sucked in some air and let it puff out his cheeks before blowing it back out. “I was looking out for her a hell of a lot longer than you were, son. She’s like my family, but she can’t be what you want her to be.”

Ash raised his eyes, looking at a spot somewhere over the other man‘s shoulders. It was an old argument between them. “I think that’s for her to decide,” he replied.

Payne stared up at the ceiling for a moment, as though he wanted to say more. Finally, he nodded, turned and stepped out the door, leaving Ash to stare after him. A loud ruckus behind him signaled to Ash that Mickey, ever earnest in his pursuit of making a name for himself as a bouncer, was handling some incident with more zeal than he was sure the patron could handle. Mira gave him a flash of white teeth as he turned, hurrying across the floor to step in before bones were broken. The ensuing mayhem drove all else from Ash’s mind for a long while, but when Petite Morte closed it’s doors for the night, none of the girls had yet been touched.

There were two apartments above Petite Morte, one that Mira lived in and the other she let Ash stay in, free of charge, ever since his marriage had fallen apart. His wife had left him for his best friend. It had been a hard shock for him, but not so heart-wrenching as it should have been.

Carrie was one of the most beautiful women he had ever met, and one of the most selfish. At one time he had believed the golden cascade of her hair, only slightly darker than the pale gold of her skin, was worth a stroll through hell, that the curve of her generous lips in that smile she reserved just for him was worth a duel with the devil. That was before he realized that she was the devil.

It had been difficult, coming to terms with the failure of his marriage and his friendship all in one fell swoop. But it hadn’t been long after that he had gone into Payne’s shop and found Annette, looking as lost as he felt, sitting behind the counter. Ever since, Annette had been working on his back, determined to make the reaper tattoo he wanted an incomparable masterpiece.

Over the next three months, he went in a few times each week, listening to the almost unnaturally loud buzz of the tattoo gun and watching her calm, melancholy face in the mirror on the wall. Payne was right; she did make others uneasy. But he could not deny the quiet joy she filled him with. He wanted to keep her safe, and make her happy. He wanted to strip her pale body bare and make her cry out in the night. He wanted to have a life with her. But first he had to get rid of Carrie, to truly and completely erase her from his life.

He unlocked the door to the apartment and walked inside, pausing only to drop his things in the chair by the door before walking to the phone. He didn’t worry about waking anybody up, though it was nearly two. He had absolutely no consideration for the couple on the other end of the line. They had both, in his opinion, lost all rights to his consideration.

Carrie answered on the first ring, her voice clear, if strained, as though she had been sitting by the phone waiting for the call.

“What the hell were you doing at Payne’s Tats today?” He asked without preamble.

Carrie hesitated before answering, as though uncertain of what answer would piss him off least. Ash wondered idly if Sammy were sitting near her, if that was the cause of her hesitation. Would he be jealous if he knew that she had been on a quest to harass her ex’s new girlfriend? Screw him.

“We need to talk,” she said finally.

“So talk.”

“Can I come over?” She asked.

“No,” Ash said, in a hard, flat voice. “Say what you need to say.”

“I’ll be there in a few minutes,” she said, then the line went dead in his hand. Ash wasted a few minutes cursing before hanging up the phone. He thought about redialing the number, but dismissed the idea, knowing she would already be gone. He wondered where she would tell Sammy she was going.

Barely ten minutes had passed before a sharp rap sounded on his door. He opened it to find not just Carrie, but Sammy as well, standing in the landing outside of his apartment.

Carrie looked beautifully mutinous, Sammy looked just plain pissed.

“What the fuck?” Ash said, stepping back as Carrie pushed her way past him.

“That’s what I’d like to know,” Sammy said, following on her heels.

Ash shut the door and turned to look at the couple as they each tried to glare the other down, Carrie all in shades of pale gold, even down to the dress she was wearing. Sammy complimented her nicely with his pale blonde hair and bright blue eyes. He was nearly as tall as Ash, though not quite as muscular, and nearly as good-looking in the face.

“I don’t know what the hell’s wrong with you and I don’t care,” Ash said, glaring at them. “Take your spat somewhere else.”

Carrie turned from Sammy’s glare and winced at the distain on Ash’s face. “You can’t mean that.”

“I can’t mean that? What the hell are you talking about? You left me for my best friend. We’ll be divorced in less than two weeks.” Ash shook his head. “Get the hell out of my apartment. And stay the hell out of my life.”

“Why?” She asked. “Because of that sad little girl at the tattoo parlor? You can’t be serious. Look, I made a mistake. I miss you. I want you to come home.”

Ash stared at her with cold anger and disbelief. “Get out. Now.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head, tossing the rich mane of gold over her shoulder. “We can work things out. I know we can.”

“No,” Ash said. “We can’t. I don’t love you, I’m not sure I ever did.”

“You don’t mean that,” Carrie said, her face paling slightly.

“Yeah, I do,” Ash said. “I don’t even hate you anymore.”

“You don’t?” Carrie asked, taking a step forward. “I’m so glad. If you don’t hate me, we can work through this.”

“No,” Ash said. “I don’t hate you. I don’t love you. I don’t feel anything for you.”

Carrie froze, color rushing back into her face bright and dark. Her eyes flashed, but she straightened her back and walked toward the door as though to leave. At the last minute she turned and lunged at Ash, taking him off guard. Her face contorted in rage as she raked her nails over his face, going for his eyes. Ash snatched at her, but not before she left a nasty scratch down his face. He tried to restrain her, but she had become a wild thing in his arms, lashing out with nails, teeth and kicking at him with her spike-heeled shoes.

“Sammy, control your woman!” Ash yelled, then grunted with pain as she managed to connect a knee to his groin.

Sammy, who had watched the scene unfold with a sullen expression, seemed to shake himself loose at this and rushed to help manage the thrashing woman. After a long time of struggling, they pinned her bucking body to the couch and she sagged, panting, under their weight.

“I’m going to the bathroom to clean up.” Ash said, wiping at his stinging face. “When I get out I want both of you gone, or I’m calling the cops.”

With that, he left his former friend to handle his former wife and limped down the short hallway to the bathroom. The glare of the overhead light revealed a deep, jagged scratch on his face, and several shallow ones on his neck and arms. By the looks of his ribs, he knew that he would be bruised the following day. He began cleaning the scratches and cursed Carrie with colorful epithets.

A banging on the wall in the living room caused him to pause, and for a moment he was tempted to aide Sammy in the fight that had obviously broken out in his absence, but then thought better of it. Sammy had made his bed. Let him lie in it. She was his problem now.

He took his time doctoring his wounds, waiting until the commotion had quieted before finally taking a deep breath and walking slowly back to the living room. Sammy sat on the floor by the couch, his face void of expression. Carrie lay on the couch where they had deposited her, completely still, her eyes open and glassy. Ash blinked and edged closer.

A pillow lay on the floor next to Sammy’s still hand. Some of Carrie’s lipstick was smeared across the pale fabric. A cold suspicion that had laid curled in Ash’s chest from the moment the noise had stopped began to spread out like a breath of frost to the top of his head and the tips of his fingers.

“What did you do, Sam?” He asked, his voice hoarse with horror. “What the fuck did you do?”

“She didn’t want me,” Sam said, in a dead kind of voice. “She never wanted me. She just wanted to make you jealous.”

“What the fuck did you do?” Ash knelt next to Carrie’s still form, reached out a hand and touched her face. No spark of life came into her eyes. No breath whispered through her perfect, still lips. Ash snatched his hand back and turned to Sam. “She’s dead, Sammy. You fucking killed her.”

When Sammy didn’t react, Ash thrust his fingers into his hair, as though if he could just move the thick blackness of it, he would be able to think.

“We have to call the cops,” he said, finally. He strode across the room, not looking at his friend until Sammy’s body crashed into his, as though he had appeared out of nowhere, pressing something against Ash’s throat. He could feel the cold, hard bluntness of it and knew it was a gun. It seemed Sammy had come here with a plan. Ash looked into the eyes that he once knew so well and understood beyond a shadow of a doubt that Sammy had come to kill him.

Rage and regret chased themselves across Sammy’s blue eyes before cold, hard resignation settled there, and Ash knew he was dead. In one last, desperate attempt for survival, he thrust all of his strength against the barrel of the gun, just as Sammy squeezed the trigger.

The explosion was deafening. Warm, wet crimson sprayed across Ash’s face, and heavy, thick things settled in his hair. The world was a white haze of nothingness when he opened his eyes. Then his vision cleared and he had a moment to be amazed that he still had eyes to open, before he sat up and saw the thing laying on the floor by him. It was Sammy’s body, but where the head should have been, was a deceptively clean, white, hollow shell. His brain didn’t want to accept what his eyes were telling him, but he became aware, all the same, that he was staring at the inside of Sammy’s skull.

“My, my,” Mira’s voice purred from the open doorway. “You’re in quite the pickle.”

She had been his boss for nearly five years. He didn’t at all dislike her. Yet, there was something about Mira, an otherness, that made him uneasy in her company. She stood in his doorway dispassionately eyeing the broken corpse on the floor, and the bloody clumps that had once made up it’s head. It unnerved him to see such cold nothingness in her dark eyes, as though she were standing in line at a Starbucks, waiting to be served.

“We need to call the cops,” Ash said, more to fill the silence than to inform. Of course they would call the cops. That’s what you did when your best friend killed his lover in your home, then accidentally killed himself. You called the cops when there were dead people cluttering up your living room. It was common sense.

“And tell them what, exactly?” Mira asked. “Your estranged wife and her lover appeared in your doorway, and killed each other? That they attacked you and now they’re dead, through no fault of your own? Think about it, my dear. That sounds far-fetched.”

“I didn’t kill them,” Ash said, in a shaky voice. “I swear to God.”

“Swear to whomever you wish, it won’t change what the police will do.”

“What do you suggest then? That I hide the bodies? Maybe load them up in my car and bury them somewhere?”

“Don’t be silly,” Mira said, mildly. “If they disappeared like that, you’d still get the blame.”

“Maybe you have a magic wand up your sleeve to take care of all of this for me then,” Ash said. There was an edge of humor to his voice that had nothing to do with joking. He knew dimly that it would be very bad to give in to the laughter that was trying to boil up out of his stomach. That if he gave in to it, he wouldn’t stop laughing. He took a deep breath to try to calm himself, but the taste of blood that dribbled into his mouth made him choke.

“I don’t need a magic wand,” she said, stepping into the room and shutting the door behind her. She walked over to where Ash sat on the floor, carefully stepping over the lumps of head that littered the area around him, and squatted down to look into his eyes. “Have you ever wondered about the dancers, Ash? How pale they are. How quiet and well-behaved they are? How they never miss work or complain about their personal lives?”

Ash swallowed his gorge and tried to focus on Mira’s whispered questions. “The dancers?”

Mira stared deep into Ash’s pale gray gaze and nodded. Her darkly pale skin glistened as though wet, though Ash knew that if he reached out and touched that perfect face, it would feel soft and dry beneath his fingers.

“What are you?” He asked, his voice faint and faltering.

“I am your redemption, Ash,” Mira’s whispered voice seemed to echo around him. The darkness in her eyes enveloped him, wrapped him in a silken nothingness from the inside out. He ceased to feel the cooling blood that dried on his skin and in his hair. The hysteria that had threatened to explode from his core, and shatter his sanity, ebbed. The only thing in the world at that moment was Mira and her dark eyes.

“I can make this go away and keep your secret. But, I must have something in return.”

“What do you want?” Ash asked. The tranquility inside him squelched the spark of alarm her words had ignited. At that moment, he knew, he would deny her nothing, even his very soul, if she asked for it.

“Your wife,” Mira said, her words the barest whisper of breath against his cheek.

“She’s dead,” Ash replied. Even as he said it, he knew that was the reason that Mira wanted her. Not despite the fact that Carrie was dead, but because of it.

Mira smiled. “Yes. And she is lovely. She will be the crown jewel of Petite Morte. Did you know that’s French for little death, what they call an orgasm?”

Ash shook his head and Mira smiled wider, showing white, even teeth. “They will feed on the cooling flesh of the other. I have no use for one that cannot pass for alive. I had to cut loose one that had been stabbed several months ago. The marks on her back were too obvious, but Carrie will be perfect.”

“What you’re saying,” Ash said, trying to feel the horror inside that he knew he should. Trying to feel the disbelief that would confirm that he was speaking to a crazy person. “Is that they’re dead. All the girls that dance for you, they’re all corpses.”

“It is a peculiar gift I have,” Mira replied, her face still inches from Ash’s. Her voice still that soft, silken whisper. “I tried to open a brothel once, but sex is too close to feeding for them. They ate all of the customers. Such things can’t help but draw attention and it’s best if we stay out of direct vision, just at the edges of the peripheral.”

“I don’t understand,” Ash said, trying to make himself feel revulsion or horror. Something. But his mind still seemed to be wrapped in silken unconcern.

“Think about it, Ash,” Mira whispered. “All you have to do is say yes. Say yes and all this will be erased, leaving nothing behind but the memory. All that woman did for you in life was cause problems and heartache. In death she could destroy you. It’s much better if you give her to me. If the other disappears, that’s one thing, it’s so very easy to spread a rumor about how they broke up and he ran off somewhere far away, to mend his broken heart. It wouldn’t even be so far-fetched, considering that he had already alienated his best friend. After a time, people won’t even wonder about him anymore. All you have to do is say yes.”

He wanted to deny that this could destroy him, but he couldn’t. Mira was quite right about that. The scratches Carrie left on him would make him look even more guilty. It would certainly appear to the police that the two bodies in his apartment were the result of the jilted husband, finally extracting his revenge. The way Sammy and Carrie had screwed him provided him with a motive. It was too much to hope by any stretch of the imagination that he would be found not guilty in a trial. The victims were in his apartment, he was present at the time, he had motive, there was evidence that he struggled with his dead wife. He would be lucky to get life in prison.

Ash cast about in his mind, looking for an excuse to say no. It would have been easy if he couldn’t do it, if there were people in Carrie’s life that might notice if she suddenly changed overnight. But there was no one. Her only living relation was miles away, and even more distant emotionally. She flitted into and out of friendships, never making any closer ties than it took to have an occasional lunch and shopping spree. Carrie had been very self-absorbed and the sad fact of the matter was the only person left that had given half a shit about her anymore was the headless corpse only feet away from Ash. Without any obstacles to stand in his way, the temptation to say yes was overwhelming.

But he would, of course, say no. He had to say no. To do otherwise was to forfeit his soul. He knew that. It was an undeniable fact that Mira’s plan was beyond perverse; it was absolute evil. He couldn’t be a part of that. If he did, he would save his life, yes, but he would lose his soul. What kind of choice was that?

But, even as he opened his mouth to deny her request, a shimmering image of Annette swam before his vision. An image of her finally granting him access to her body, and her heart. Her sad eyes filled with tears of joy for once, as he proposed to her. Her body shrouded in a white as they prepared to exchange vows. Her radiant smile as she held their first child. All of the things that were possible to him, to them both, if he just said yes.

His gaze flicked to the couch, to Carrie’s lifeless form. She was dead. What made her her, wasn’t there anymore. It wouldn’t cause her any pain, not even discomfort, to grant Mira her wish. He didn’t ask her to come to his home. He sure as hell didn’t expect Sammy to kill her. He closed his mouth, looked Mira dead in the eye, and nodded his acquiesce.

“Go and clean yourself up, Ash,” Mira said, smiling serenely. “Don’t worry, everything will be fine. Just don’t come out of the bathroom for a long while. You don’t want to see them feed.”

Mira stood in a graceful, almost boneless movement, and helped Ash to his feet. She shooed him off to the bathroom and shut the door behind him, leaving him to bathe. He did so, scrubbing away the blood and bone and thicker, softer things that stuck to his skin and hair, still holding onto that blissful unconcern. Only when he emerged from the bathroom to find the dancers from the bar below gathered on the floor around where Sammy’s body lay, and heard the wet sounds of bloody meat smacking on blunt, human teeth, teeth that were never meant to eat in such a manner, did he feel the calm begin to slip away.

“To bed with you,” Mira said, materializing from a shadow on the far side of the room. “When you wake, there will be nothing left of the mess.”

She ushered him toward his bedroom, where he glanced back to catch a glimpse of what used to be Carrie, her face smeared with blood, her eyes empty and doll-like. Then he turned willingly to his room, shutting the door behind him and snapping the lock in place. These were things that he didn’t want to know. He fell into bed and shut his eyes, willing his dreams to wander to Annette. But, even when they did, her eyes were empty and her mouth was smeared with blood.

The next day and in the days following, Ash’s mind seemed at war. His memory wanted to rewrite itself. Every trace of violence had been erased from his apartment. But he still knew when he looked at Carrie, watched her dance in that hypnotizing, sensual sway on the black stage, that she was dead. That they were all dead. Horror rose in him every time he thought about it. But when the court date came, he still divorced a corpse. He still stood guard among the throng of admirers that crowded around the black stage, now with the certain knowledge that he was protecting, not the girls, but the crowd. He still lived in the apartment above Petite Morte. And he still went to Payne’s tats to let Annette work on his tattoo.

Then, one fine day, Annette finished her masterpiece. The buzzing stopped abruptly, a startlingly cold, wet cloth wiped at the long since numb skin of his back, and she straightened. He stood and looked at the finished product in the mirror, and his breath froze in his chest. The reaper rose up on his back, scythe raised in a white-knuckled fist, shadows of dead souls crowding around the dark-caped figure. The face hidden in the shadow of the hood showed just enough for him to realize that it wasn’t a skull head at all, but the visage of a woman. Her dark beauty was just visible enough for him to understand that she was supposed to be anonymous, but to him she was the image of Mira.

He shivered and turned to Annette, taking her into his arms. She tensed there for a moment before letting an expression of hot, intense hunger seep into her eyes. She molded her soft, pale body to his and used one hand to guide his lips to hers. Ash felt his body react immediately before she pulled back. She kept that hungry stare on him as she reached behind him and locked the door. Then she stepped back and slipped the thin straps of her dress over her shoulders, letting it fall to the floor to pool around her feet.

Ash drank in her nakedness, gripped by such intense lust that he ceased to think. He reached for her and she came to him willingly, wrapping herself in his arms, twining her own around his neck. His hands roamed down her lower back and over the gentle swell of her hips, just missing the angry, jagged and open wounds that marred the creamy perfection between her shoulder blades.

In the front of the shop, Payne Miller closed his eyes and turned the sign in the window to “Sorry, we’re closed,” with shaking fingers and settled back in his chair to wait. He had warned Ash, time and time again, but there was no helping him now. She was like his family, after all.

The End