Sex Death And Other Strange Ideas Ch 04

Sex, Death, and Other Strange Ideas is a steamy supernatural romance novel with multiple chapters. Contains language and situations (utterly) inappropriate for those under 18.

(Chapter 1)

https://www.literotica.com/s/sex-death-and-other-strange-ideas

(Chapter 2)

https://www.literotica.com/s/sex-death-and-other-strange-ideas-ch-02

(Chapter 3)

https://www.literotica.com/s/sex-death-and-other-strange-ideas-ch-03

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CHAPTER 4

Jo had no idea how long she'd been sitting bolt upright sucking air in ragged gasps. It didn't occur to check her watch, but gray morning sunlight was creeping in the window and the fire had burned down to embers. She'd fallen asleep in her clothes, but it was due to the constant anxiety of the previous day, not the minor amount of alcohol she'd imbibed to relax. And yet her head throbbed, her mouth was dry as a desert, and she was so damn shaky and nauseous that it sure

felt

like a hangover.

And great God in a bottle, what was with those

dreams

? Jo had always been a vivid dreamer, every once in a while growing close to true lucidity. So when she had nightmares, they tended to be pretty fucking nightmarish. But what had held her in its merciless claws until the gray light of dawn came to liberate her was more than any mere nightmare she could ever recall. Jo even knew the technique of waking herself up when she needed to, but none of the usual tricks had worked. Her sleeping mind couldn't pull off the required reality check. It was all too fucking

real

. She had been helpless as a newborn afloat on an ocean of...

...blood...

Although her system was craving caffeine, Jo moved over to the couch instead of heading straight for the kitchen. Her gleaming, top of the line laptop adorned with numerous Star Trek stickers sat on the antique coffee table, and Jo opened it up. There were about twenty unread email notices, but she ignored them and went straight for her "Documents" folder, opening the file titled "AGDDD". The document came up with "Another God Damn Dream Diary" written in bold across the top of the first page, and Jo scrolled to the bottom to enter the current date.

'

Blood

'. Jo typed the first word and stalled. That was unusual too, her dream journals were sorted by year and held increasing detail as they went along, marking her journey as she matured and learned the tricks of the hobby. There was probably enough material in here for a book series, a couple of movie tie-ins, and a TV spinoff. Being at a loss for words to describe her dreams was as out of character as her inability to wake herself up from them.

'Blood. An ocean of it.'

Jo finally typed. '

But not just blood, there was tissue in it. Sometimes entire body parts, but mostly ragged bits that could be anything. It smelled rotten. It wasn't a quiet ocean, there was a storm. The clouds were red and the sun was black.'

She was typing as fast as she could, getting as many specifics as possible before her waking mind discarded them. Mark up one more thing as unusual, because Jo remembered most of her dreams with crystal clarity and could take her time to elaborate.

'I drowned a hundred times, but I couldn't die. I knew it was a dream, but I didn't know it well enough to wake up. At one point a gross clot caught in my nose and mouth and I suffocated. Another time I choked to death on a finger, or maybe a toe. I never went anywhere and my soul never left my body. I just kept fighting the storm, but I was drowning over and over and over again.'

"Shit," Jo muttered. She was losing it fast. Her mind was flooded with horrific images, but like the tempest she was making a feeble attempt to describe, everything was so chaotic it was hard to grab onto anything solid. Wait, 'grab onto anything solid...'

'I found a face. HIS face. The dude I saw in the mirror. It was all fucked up, but I knew it was him. I felt it before I saw it and thought I had grabbed hold of a wet rag. I pulled it out of the muck, and it was draped over my hand so he was staring straight at me. His face had been peeled off his head, but he still had his eyes.'

A shiver ran down Jo's spine. Of the whole turbulent and rapidly fading mess in her head, those eyes stood out sharp as life. The unearthly light of the black sun had turned them the color of molten gold, and though they stared out from a bodiless, blood-drenched scrap of a face, they were as intense and penetrating as she remembered them in the mirror.

Damn.

There was

so

much more to tell, but it was fading fast. Jo knew she was losing vital details, but her fingers stalled over the keyboard and refused to move. Come on, come on, there had been

more

. It had all been so clear, from the salty burning in her eyes as she fought to see, to the foul metallic taste of the human sludge she had drowned in countless times. From the way the fearsome red clouds had roiled overhead to the nauseating touch of unidentifiable shreds of flesh against her naked body.

And there had been something

else.

Something very important that had already vanished into the mists with no hope of recovery. Jo concentrated as hard as she could, typed a few words, then decided she was making them up rather than remembering them and deleted them with a muttered profanity.

It was no good, it was gone. Jo never lied in her dream diary, and if she didn't remember something clearly enough, she didn't write it down. She grunted in exasperation with her fingers poised over the keyboard ready to hammer down the first coherent image that came to mind. All that remained with any clarity however was those goddamn

eyes

, staring up from her hand as if intending to devour her whole. Jo sighed and typed the last few words she knew to be an accurate recollection, then got up from the couch and wandered toward the kitchen where her morning ritual awaited.

The words she had typed were a single line, a fragment of a sentence rather than a proper one. They floated alone at the bottom of the page, otherwise filled with dates and lengthy descriptions of her nighttime fantasies. Jo's final entry was more fragmented than usual, but the last line summed up what had made the dream so curious as well as terrifying. It regarded the disembodied face draped over her hand.

'He was still alive.'

#####

Alex leaned against the wall amusing himself by making funny faces at Jean-Luc, who had decided the man was now worth ignoring. You had never been ignored until you were ignored by a cat. Alex put his thumbs in his ears and waggled his fingers, stuck out his tongue, rudely grabbed his crotch, and shot the blowjob hand signal for good measure. The animal kept his distance, sitting calmly on the far side of the great hall and lazily gazing around at everything but Alex. Alex knew his antics to catch Jean-Luc's attention were silly, but he felt the need to lighten up after the night they had spent.

God, those measly three or four hours had passed like an eon. Jo had thrashed and tossed in the grip of her nightmare, occasionally crying out in a gurgling voice like someone trying to yell through a mouthful of soup. Alex had drawn close to her in an attempt to comfort, and once reached out to touch her hair, but that only made things worse, and they didn't get better again after he withdrew. He even tried shouting Jo's name in a vain hope of waking her up, knowing full well what a futile effort that was. Alex had never felt so miserably helpless in his life. He hadn't wanted to leave the room on her, so he'd finally resorted to sitting in the chair furthest away with his legs drawn up, and watching the poor woman suffer until she woke herself up some countless hours later.

Alex read what Jo wrote on her laptop, and the words '

the dude I saw in the mirror'

stood out as if in large bold print. Jo hadn't described him in her journal entry, but there was no one else Alex could think of that she could be talking about. So far he had been able to write off her behavior around him as a mere oddity, but here contained in the space of a few words was proof in the so-called black and white. Somehow, Alex had no idea how, Jo could perceive him. She knew he was here. The ramifications of this development didn't just bewilder, they evaded him completely. It was simply too far outside Alex's understanding of how all this crazy shit worked.

And so, Alex had watched from a distance as Jo went about her morning routines. She seemed to shake off the nightmare quickly, and after her first cup of coffee was chatting with Jean-Luc about how nice the weather was. Alex glanced outside and saw it was indeed shaping up to be a gorgeous spring morning. Rather than intruding on Jo as she bathed and dressed, Alex loitered downstairs in the great hall messing with the cat.

Eventually Jo appeared at the top of the stairs, redressed in loose jeans with her hair tied up in a stylish ponytail. Alex didn't get the full joke on her T-shirt, but he snickered anyway. It was an image of a half bald and dark-skinned alien with a bumpy ridge running up the middle of his forehead. The caption below read "Klingons: Ribbed For Her Pleasure".

"Hi Jo," Alex greeted her as she descended the stairs toward him. His first instinct was to step away, but he decided at the last moment to stay where he was and see how close she got to him. "You look like you're feeling better."

"Hey baby," Jo said to Jean-Luc, passing by Alex and showing no sign that anything was the slightest bit awry. "Guess what? You're going outside today! You've finally got a yard to play in you spoiled little brat." She stroked the cat who arched his back appreciatively, and then Jo went to the front doors. Opening the left one as far as it would go, she propped it open so the morning sunlight could stream in. "There you go, Jean-Luc," she invited him. "It's all yours, just be careful. Unless they got rid of them, there are a lot of fucking rats and raccoons around here."

"No, they never got rid of them," Alex said. "They brought in an exterminator a while ago to try and get this place uninfested, but I've been seeing evidence of them in the attic again. You're going to need some traps at least."

Jo stepped out onto the covered front porch, leaving the door open so the house could breathe and the cat could come and go as he wished. She stuck her hands in her back pockets and deeply inhaled the morning air. "Yep!" she said as if very satisfied about something. "Still smells like motor oil and dead fish. Gotta love this town."

Alex chuckled as he stepped through the doorway to join her. He intentionally stood closer than normal, but Jo didn't even shudder. "I doubt the Sound has gotten any less polluted since you left," he said. "When the wind blows in from the docks it can get pretty nasty."

"At least we're not in Tacoma," Jo said, wrinkling her nose and unconsciously continuing their conversation. "That town really stinks." She descended the four wide steps from the porch to the front pathway. It branched throughout the property, one way trailing along the edge of the house and the other running down to the driveway turnaround. Jo selected the right-hand path and strolled along at an easy pace, taking in her surroundings.

"When you need the lawns taken care of, you've got to stick with Rick," Alex said by way of small talk. "He's self-employed and getting pretty long in the tooth, but he sure knows how to take care of this place. He's been here almost as long as I have."

"

Petunias?

" Jo grumbled as she passed one of the large stone planters. "Aw, come on, we can do better than that. Note to self: Find something else for that spot. Shit, I should have brought a notebook."

"Have I told you how nice it is that you're a talker, Jo?" Alex inquired with a smile. "You even have a pretty voice. Forgive me if I'm being forward, but I'm glad you're here. I'd like it if you stayed for a while. I'm really sorry about last night, I

hope

that dream didn't come from me somehow." On an impulse, Alex tilted his head and tried to catch Jo's eyes, but she looked past him without so much as a blink and knelt to inhale the fragrance of a patch of dahlias.

"You're nice there, you guys can stay," Jo said, addressing the flowers directly. Alex had noticed her tendency to anthropomorphize things and found it interesting. It was one more small piece in the grand puzzle that was Jo. So many elements about her seemed as if they should be in conflict, but they all fit neatly within her to form a most intriguing whole.

Alex didn't know Jo well enough yet to be certain which parts were closest to her true self. The highborn young lady who held onto enough of her roots to leave her a taste for the finer things, or the ferocious and sultry woman who had done a striptease in her kitchen just to spite her already-departed mother? Was she the courageous defender stalking her house with a gun, not knowing who she was looking for, but more than ready to blast them to kingdom come? Or was Jo more what she was presenting now, skipping from planter to planter, dressed in whatever had been closest at hand, so eager was she to get outside and smell the pretty flowers? There was so much to this stunning woman that even if it weren't for her strange sensitivity, Alex would happily spend a lifetime unraveling her mysteries.

"Just wait until you see the backyard," Alex said, keeping in step as Jo strolled along the path. "You could put in a swimming pool if you wanted and still have plenty of lawn left over. One guy was going to do that, but he moved out before he did more than mark the outline. Because, you know, reasons." Alex shrugged good-naturedly and continued their walk as Jo voiced her approval of this or that, or noted how the place could be improved and repaired.

They paused in the side yard so Jo could admire a lovely water fountain, adorned with a life size statue of a half-clothed young woman. She had gathered a bit of mold but was still a beauty, a winding wrap covering her nether regions and a sculpted fall of roses concealing one breast.

"You're pretty," Jo said to the art piece. "I wonder who you are?" She glanced around the base of the fountain but found no identifier.

"I think she was one of the Cairnwoods," Alex said, still playing tour guide. "There used to be a plaque, but it was too rusty to read. If she

was

part of that family, my guess is that she was adopted. She's the only one of them that doesn't look inbred for four generations."

"Ick!" Jo declared as she dabbled her fingers in the stagnant water and they came back green. She wiped them on her jeans with disgust. "Clean you up, get you working, plant some flowers, add some fish... Maybe even have a nice side patio put in. This could be an awesome spot. It's a shame you're stuck out here where nobody can see you." Jo wandered around the structure a couple more times to admire the fine details, then she and Alex continued their stroll through the grounds. Behind them, unnoticed by either party, a large bubble rose and burst in the opaque water of the fountain, and then all was still again.

Alex was enjoying himself greatly. He had been here long enough to learn quite a bit of trivia about the place, and his companion was interested enough in the house and grounds that sharing his knowledge was fun. Of course, Jo never responded directly to him, but after the events of the last couple of days (had it

really

been that short of a time?), her lack of awareness was reassuring. Alex did find himself rather wishing he could hold her hand though.

They made their way around the corner of the huge house to find the pathway split three ways. One way led to the covered veranda, big enough to host a party by itself, and the outside door that granted access to the living room. "Hot tub," Jo said firmly, pointing to a likely spot off to the side. The middle path wandered across the landscaped back yard, and there was indeed enough room to put in a pool if one were to move a few of the ornamental trees dotted about. The central focus was the old-fashioned and elaborate gazebo, the stone walkways surrounding it in an artful style. Like everything else around here, the decorations ranged from antique to modern and several looked like incomplete projects, as if Cairnwood had been inhabited too many times by people with short attention spans. Which it had.

Alex smiled and nodded politely to his companion, offering to accompany her down the middle path. It branched yet again, the pathways being mazelike by themselves, and suddenly Jo gave a happy squeak and clasped both hands over her mouth. She hopped up and down clapping like a schoolgirl, and then jogged down the leftmost route.

"Shit, Jo!" Alex called after her. He took half a step forward and stalled. "Hey Jo, not that way. Come on, let's check out the gazebo or the courtyard or something. That place is a dump anyway, there's nothing in there. It should be taken out." His calls went unheard, and Jo's ponytail bounced as she skipped toward the glass corner of the structure that was her destination.

Jo was heading for that goddamn greenhouse.

#####

Even in her excitement, Jo noticed the odd fact that this corner of the property seemed untended. The neatly trimmed lawn gave way to trees, which in turn gave way to dead trees and thick underbrush. The path was overgrown, and weeds had been allowed to poke up through the cracks. Several low-hanging branches had to be navigated, their remaining leaves still wet from the recent showers. The sunlight didn't seem to reach this area clearly enough to dry anything. It was notably strange, simply due to the beauty of the structure that lurked back here, hidden in plain sight.

The pictures Penelope sent hadn't come close to capturing the majesty of the greenhouse. It was built in the old-world style with a cathedral roof, tall and wide enough that Jo could grow trees in it if she wanted to. It was so large that it could be a house by itself, every wall composed of vaulted windows and paned glass, separated by baroque, cast iron supports. Jo pushed through the damp overgrowth so she could press her face up to the mildewed window, cupping her hands to cut the glare and get a better look inside.

It baffled Jo that something like this could go abandoned for so long. Were people

crazy

? She had seen aborted attempts at modernizing and beautifying the old house everywhere she looked, but this amazing greenhouse appeared to have stood here forgotten since God was a kid. The interior was a clutter of fallen shelves and broken planters with no trace of anything alive save for the weeds that poked up through the holes in the decayed floor.

Jo followed the ornate glass wall until she found the entrance, an iron-wrought door that almost blended in with the windows on either side. It was slightly ajar, but Jo had to lean on it to get it open far enough to squeeze through, the hinges screaming in protest. "God," she muttered aloud. "This is a fucking

tragedy

!"

A few panes of the triple thick glass were broken here and there, and the iron supports bore a lot of rust, but otherwise the structure itself was in fair shape. But whether it was the passage of time, vandalizing kids, or poltergeist activity, the interior had been decimated. Wreckage was strewn everywhere, forcing Jo to pick her way through as she explored. The only sign anything was

ever

alive here was a few withered petals near a broken flowerpot that had yet to turn to dust. The floor bowed under Jo's weight, the wood feeling squishy, and she grimaced at the image of what might have taken up residence underneath. One of the few traditionally 'girly' things about Jo was that she wasn't a big fan of creepy crawlies.