"$3.19 a gallon?" Lori scrutinized the price of gas as she pulled into the station. She sighed, annoyed at the price – and more annoyed that there was a car in front of her, waiting in line for the pump. She tapped her fingers against the steering wheel, turned the music up a little higher and waited.
The sun was beginning to set. It was almost six and all she wanted to go was get home, shower and curl up in bed. This was not how she thought she'd feel, even on a Thursday night, at at the young age of 26 – but as it turned out, working a grown up job made you... well, tired. All the time. But tomorrow was Friday and then she could go out to the club with her girlfriends and pretend she was still in college and daddy was still paying the bills.
The car at the pump pulled away and the car in front of Lori pulled up – but for what felt like forever, no one got out to pump gas. Getting frustrated, Lori honked her horn and was met, a few moments later, with the middle finger out of the window. She looked around and noticed another spot open. Well, sort of – there was another car dilly-dallying instead of pulling in. Lori jerked her car forward, flipping returning the finger to the other car and pulled into the new spot.
As she got out and swiped her card, the red truck she'd cut off honked his horn. Snottily, she waved him off and proceeded to pump gas. A man got out of the truck and approached her, his face neutral, his demeanor polite.
"Um. Excuse me, but I was waiting in line," he said tentatively.
"Yeah, so was I. I saw an open spot and I took it. You were busy texting or wacking off or whatever," Lori claimed. She was not going to feel bad for some little dweeb who couldn't stick up for himself anyway. When he didn't respond or move, she glanced over at him. He was quite tall, probably nearing 6" – much bigger than her 5"2' height. His muscles were well-defined and, she thought, if he didn't seem like such a pussy, his radiating blue eyes and dark hair might even make him a hottie. But as of right now, with him staring at her in such a pathetic, imploring way, he was just getting annoying to her. "Look, why don't you be a good little boy, go sit in your car and wait? I will be done in just a second." When he didn't move, she waved a hand at him dismissively and turned away.
After a few more seconds, she heard his footsteps moving away from her. She rolled her eyes, finished pumping her gas – a full tank, just to annoy him like he'd annoyed her, even though she couldn't really afford it – and then got back into her car, waving snarkily at him as she pulled away.
After a few blocks, she glanced behind her. She could swear that was the same car from the gas station. What was he doing? She shook her head as if to shake the thoughts from her head, turned up her radio and sang loudly to drown out any thoughts.
When she turned onto her street a few minutes later, the red truck turned with her. By this time, her heart started to pound. She took her phone out and dialed 911 – and as she pulled into her house, she poised her finger over the dial button if he tried to come with her. But he didn't – the red truck kept going. She watched as the tail lights faded down the street and the car turned on the next block.
Lori closed her eyes and took a deep breath. False alarm. Maybe, she thought honestly to herself, this was her conscience considering karma. But karma didn't exist, that was silly. Finally, she tucked her phone away and gathered her things. She unlocked her front door and turned on every light in the house. Most of the time, she liked living alone – but this was one time when she wished she didn't. Lori stripped her work clothes off and threw them into the laundry hamper, which was overflowing. Saturday was laundry day. She scurried, naked, to the shower.
Lori turned some light music and slipped into the shower, turning the heat up to high. After that, she washed and conditioned her long dark curls, the thick hair cascading down to her ass almost. She soaped up and cleaned her creamy, curvy body of 140lbs, including her soft C-sized breasts. She shaved all her shaveable parts and then just relaxed in the heat and steam of the shower.
Finally, after what was probably almost an hour, she turned the water off and wrapped herself in her fluffy lavender towel. She went into her bedroom and turned the music off. She was exhausted. Still, she went into her nightly ritual of drying her hair and lotioning her body to keep the skin soft. She pulled on a long t-shirt that went halfway down her thighs. She didn't wear panties to bed because she loved the feeling of being "free" at night.
Lori crawled into her gigantic king-sized bed, yawning as she did so, and turned the TV on. Infomercials – fun. She considered momentarily masturbating or even calling Chad, her boyfriend, but to her horror, made the decision that she was too tired.
She snuggled down in the bed and turned the light off. She laid there in the dark, watching an infomercial about an all in one blender – state of the art, one of a kind, the ad said – and as the images flickered in front of her face, her eyes slowly slid closed. She fell into a peaceful sleep.
Lori woke up with a start. The room was utterly dark. The TV was off – perhaps she'd turned it off. She glanced over at her alarm clock – 2:27am. Why had she woken? The house was silent and she was tired. She wanted to go back to sleep. And yet...her nerves were on end. She listened hard but heard nothing. She glanced around the deep blackness of her room but there was no movement.
She sighed deeply, realizing she was just spooked from earlier. She made a silent vow not to provoke strangers in the future and forced herself to close her eyes.
And then she heard it. A slight movement, here in her bedroom, and the intake of a soft breath. Her eyes flew open and her heart started to pound. She was frozen, but slowly turned her head to the side. Her eyes were adjusting to the dark and she was trying desperately to locate her cell phone. But damn – she couldn't see enough yet.
There it was again. A movement, the telltale stirring of motionless air, a deep breath. And this time, she heard the sound of fabric moving. She couldn't help it, her eyes sought out the noise. Now she saw it. Now she saw the darker outline of a man against the darkness. And he was close. He was maybe a foot away from her. She felt a scream welling up inside of her but nothing came out. She couldn't even breath, she just held her breath.
He came closer. She made her move fast, lurching herself in the opposite direction, knowing that she knew her house better in the dark than he did. She could escape him and get help. But then, she screamed – because as she lurched herself away from him, he grabbed a handful of those thick dark curls and yanked her back.
He slammed his hand down over her mouth, so hard that tears welled up in her eyes and her mouth throbbed. It worked.. it both silenced her and subdued her. One thing was for sure: she was a pussy when it came to pain. And fuck, that hurt. He held his hand against her mouth just hard enough that she couldn't move.