Nightingale

It was four o'clock in the morning, and Pearl's head was throbbing. She stared at herself in the mirror with a morbid fascination, expressionless and nude. It was worse than she had expected; her wrists were still red raw from rope burns, and a small scab had formed on her right wrist where the rope had finally caused her skin to give way. Her ankles were similarly afflicted, and there were bruises on her neck, shoulders and arms from thrashing against, and being dropped onto, the table in the corner of the club. As bruised and battered as she was, she felt a lingering contentment and peace, and her youth, perfect proportions and proud posture lent her an air of beauty that belied the beating she had taken.

At length, she swung her hair from side to side, letting the blonde curls bounce as they customarily did, and smiled at herself. She turned and twisted her body so she could see the reflection of her butt, one side at a time; it, like her wrists, was bright red, and a multiplicity of bright red hand marks and a shining swathe of belt marks were visible. She looked at each tortured cheek with an adoring fondness, as though it were a beautiful piece of jewellery. After lingering several moments longer, she turned and made her way from her bedroom to the adjoining passage.

Still drunk, she wobbled out toward the bathroom. One of her favourite pieces of art, hanging on the wall, caught her eye. It was of a golden-haired woman, sitting in a chair, combing her hair and looking at herself in a handheld mirror. She wore a light, skin-coloured dress, loosely draped around an otherwise nude body. Below the picture, the caption read as follows:

"A vision of perfection... Isaiah, Rossetti, Browning"

She managed a weak smile at the picture as she shuffled past and entered the bathroom. Stepping into the shower, she slipped, smashing the soap dish, and left a shallow slit on the hitherto unbroken skin on her left wrist. Blood oozed forth from the wound; she picked herself back up with difficulty and bandaged the wrist before stepping back into the steaming shower. As she stepped under the stream, the wrist oozed blood through the bandage and onto the floor of the shower, and splattered onto the shower curtain, and the grazed skin on her other wrist shone out bright pink into her eyes, dazzled by the bright heat lamps in the bathroom. She washed herself as best she could, ignoring the plaintive whining of her body, dried herself and rebandaged both wrists. She was stronger than this, she told herself, and she was not about to let one night's enjoyment interfere with that of the next day.

Stepping back into her bedroom, she noticed that dawn was breaking. She remembered that Warwick was visiting late morning, and breathed a sigh of relief that she would sleep at least a few hours. Nevertheless, presentation was important. She put on a pure white padded bra that covered her already ample breasts adequately, a long-sleeved tight white top, and a white cardigan over the top, thick white panties and jeans that were slightly too long for her. This, she thought, should cover the problem areas. With that, she slumped onto her bed and fell asleep within seconds, without so much as pulling up the covers or turning off a single blaring light.

***

"Pearl, sweetie?" came the voice, echoing through Pearl's slumber and calling her back to consciousness. She roused and moved with some effort, carefully concealing the pain she was still in and smiling sweetly at Warwick.

Warwick was a short but stocky man, only slightly taller than Pearl, but nevertheless perhaps twice the size. He had a square-shaped face with a carefully crafted kind smile and unusually intense green eyes that, had he not worn glasses, have appeared to be the result of mischievous contact lenses. If it were not for his rather prim manner and insistence on "morality", Pearl would have been attracted to him. He seemed, to Pearl, to self-consciously attempt to make up for his manner and tendency to preach by being effusively affectionate and sweet, and keeping his mop of light brown hair carefully brushed. He wore an immaculately ironed beige dress shirt and a pair of rather unremarkable looking grey suit pants. On the surface, Pearl mirrored his affections back at him, a facade he was rather eager to uncritically accept.

"What time is it?"

"It's nearly midday, bub. What were you doing last night?"

"Oh, I was reading," she lied, with a perfect pokerface. She pointed at a volume of "The Little Prince" she had carefully left sitting next to her on the bed.

"Want me to read some more to you?"

"No, no, it's okay baby," said Pearl, smiling her slightly strained, wantonly insipid smile back at him.

Pearl's body was beginning to recover from the previous night due to the extra sleep she had unintentionally obtained, but was still somewhat sore and took some extra coaxing to move from its comfortable position. She played the delicate flower facade well, slowly picking herself up and delicately putting her feet on the floor, one at a time; the ease with which she was able to do this, however, reassured her of her strength to carry out the day's plans.

"Want me to get you some breakfast?", she asked him. This was a courtesy she always extended.

"It's okay, really," replied Warwick. "I ate before I came here."

"I can't let you go without proper breakfast though. My breakfast," she said, looking downcast, and pouted at him.

"Okay, okay. Breakfast it is."

Pearl shuffled out to the kitchen. The whitewashed walls, mirroring the bright sunlight from the kitchen's large curtainless window, dazzled her eyes as she steadfastly maintained her sweet pretense. Smiling, she poured out two bowls of cornflakes. In one bowl, she poured full-cream milk, the carton of which had been opened and marked with a line in red permanent marker across the top; into the other, she poured skim milk, from an otherwise unmarked pink carton, for her. She handed the full-cream version to Warwick with a coy little smile.

"You don't have to do this, you know," he said, looking genuinely abashed. "It's a bit late for it, anyway."

"No, no. I insist. I know you like it," she replied, knowing it was not just he who liked it.

They sat at the bench eating while she attempted to carefully construct a convincing story of what she had done the previous night. Meanwhile, the thoughts of what had actually happened, and her immediate plans, caused the warmth and wetness between her legs to build and her skin to tingle. Her flash of goosebumps was, however, deftly hidden by the clever disguise she had wrapped herself in earlier in the morning. Although she did not always have such an excuse to cover herself, she always dressed this way for Warwick. It made him feel more at ease, and that was important if her plan was to succeed.

"So tell me baby," said Pearl, beginning to smile less coyly, "how are you feeling?"

"Oh, I'm okay. A little sleepy, actually," he said, moving his hand to the back of his neck, his eyelids starting to involuntarily lower themselves.

Pearl put down her empty cereal bowl on the counter and moved over to him. "You sure you're okay there? Do you wanna lie down for a bit?" It was at that point that she noticed a bulge in his trousers and grinned. "Are you feeling a bit turned on sweetie?", she asked, slowly running her fingertips down his chest, eventually reaching the bulge and stroking gently.

"Uhh, I umm.. why does-"

"Shhhh," she said, pressing the index finger of her other hand across his mouth. He stopped talking in an instant, looking bewildered and befuddled. She gradually stroked the growing bulge in his trousers faster, until it strained painfully against them. The intense involuntary reaction was intoxicating to her with the same power, if not the same derangement of her thoughts, as the tequila that had now almost departed her body. Pearl was powerfully swept away in the moment and felt her fervor and hunger grow with every sensual stroke she gave.

She removed her finger from his lips and said to him, as his eyelids began to fall further, "I think you want to ... let's just say ... make love ... to me." She giggled girlishly and just a little wickedly, having imposed her most mocking tones on the two words "make love". This, she had actually tried, once, but as she described it to Ruby, "it was so frustrating, like trying to scratch an itch with a feather duster when there's a fingernail right behind it. He had the fucking fingernail; he just wouldn't *use* it properly." She had, therefore, devised a better plan, by which she could put Warwick to proper use.

"I really don't feel... very comfortable..." he said, beginning to slur his words together and lean backwards. Pearl caught him with unexpected deftness and strength, wrapped her arm around him just under his shoulders, and dragged him sliding across the floorboards back into her bedroom; even battered and bruised, Pearl was easily the stronger of the two, at least Warwick was in no condition to offer any resistance. With some effort, she carefully lay his half-conscious form down on the bed, her sweet smile turning to a truly sinful grin.

"It's okay. Pearlie's here and will take care of you, sweetie," she said, still grinning at him from ear to ear. He was barely conscious and murmured something unintelligible. This was her cue; she flipped the clip on his belt and pulled the belt from his trousers with a flourish, then yanked the trousers and his briefs down to his knees. His cock sprang out at her as she had anticipated, already hard. She stroked it playfully, squeezing on the upstroke, feeling it easily become engorged under her fingers, and let out a chuckle as she fluidly stripped herself of panties and jeans, leaving only the bandages on her ankles, a little ragged from the morning's restless slumber. Her pussy felt wet already at the thrill of what she was about to do, but still, she took some time to seduce herself, letting her fingertips slide over her inner thighs. She let out a little gasp as her fingertips finally made their way to her now very wet opening.

Pearl continued to stroke Warwick's cock for a moment longer; incoherent moans escaped his mouth, but no speech. His head wriggled from side to side a little, as if an artefact of a dream, but the rest of his body was still. She paused a moment to admire him in this state; he really was quite good looking, now that he was asleep, she thought. His hair had become touseled and untidy through being dragged to the bed; his cock was easily thick and hard enough to be a thing of pure pleasure for her. Free of his usual self-restraint, he was exactly the man she wanted him to be.

Finally, smiling wickedly and feeling bolts of excitement and arousal pulsing through her, Pearl picked herself up and squatted directly over his cock, then lowered herself carefully down onto it, moaning as she felt its engorged form submerging inside her pussy. She began to ride it, rhythmically, slowly at first. While Warwick had, for all intents and purposes, lost consciousness, Pearl did not want to risk shocking him awake, in case he became aware of what she was doing. She was practised at this and had never woken him before, but was taking no chances.

Gradually, Pearl picked up her pace, letting out some soft moans as she rode his cock harder and faster. He let out a few more incoherent noises, which might have been a moan, part of a sentence, or perhaps anything else, but his body was continuing to respond to the mixture of her and the chemicals that had been added to his milk; he was beginning to move in time with her, so she paused, turned away from him, leaned backwards and began to ride him with considerable force, an achievement from her battered body. After several minutes more, she felt her climax building and decided to let it play out; she deserved one for the effort, she thought. Her breathing quickened and as she slammed her body down on his, she felt her muscles spasming and let out a long, shameless moan. Her bleary-eyed victim moaned a little along with her.

Pausing for a moment, she returned to her task, turning once again to him and fixing Warwick's face with a fiendish grin. She began to ride him again in quick, forceful strokes. As she pulled upwards, she clenched her pussy around his cock. She wanted to feel him come hard inside her. She leaned forward and wiggled her butt on the upstroke, clenching around the head of his cock, and alternated with long strokes down on him. Soon she felt him pulsing, and responded in kind by fucking him with all her might. Finally she felt the first burst of come shoot inside her, then the next and the next, and laughed manically, slamming her body down on him harder and harder until she had squeezed the last drop from him.

As she felt his reserves deplete and finally run dry, his cock still painfully pulsing, Pearl picked herself up from Warwick. As she rose from the bed, she picked up her copy of "The Little Prince" and threw it at his still shuddering, sleeping, defeated form, cackling at him. Even drugged, he still wasn't half as much fun as Chase, she figured, but this would keep her feeling calm, at least for a while.

"How's that, mister old rich cunt? Feeling better now?" She paused for a moment, then continued. "You couldn't keep a dandelion happy, but this little venus flytrap can kick your arse right back to hell." She tried not to ponder too deeply about which of them would be going to hell for this; it should be Warwick, she thought; after all, he had tempted her into wanting him. She had only extracted from him what he was too awkward to give freely and willingly. His cock was slowly losing its hardness, but the rest of his body was unmoved. She picked up a towel from next to the bed and wiped him off, then replaced his briefs and jeans perfectly in position. She smiled proudly as she inspected her handiwork; but for a slight wet patch seeping through his jeans, he looked more or less the same. Her work here was done, and her restlessness had abated, if only a little.

Pearl turned and inspected the incoming messages on her phone, ignoring Warwick for the moment; it would be a while before he regained consciousness, and she needed a way of filling in time, she reasoned. The most prominent icon on the phone's homepage was Snapchat, with 52 new messages. She chuckled to herself and beamed; the tempting messages she had left for all the boys the night before had had their intended effect. Of the 52, most would be revealing. "All, of the sexy pecks and dick pics," she said complacently to herself. "All fucking mine ... yes," she whispered triumphantly.

Warwick's expression, a feature Pearl had conscientiously ignored, began to betray slight signs of awareness; mainly, it showed confusion, but as he twitched uneasily from side to side, flashes of grief and pain began to seep their way through the fog behind his glazed eyes. As his emotions seeped to the surface, a single tear welled up through his right eye, slipping out and dropping silently and unseen onto the sheets below. At this point, another thought occurred to Pearl, which, she realised, was far more important than Snapchat.

"Wanna pay my bills now?", she asked the unconscious form in a mock-girlish voice. "I thought so." She dug her hand into his front pocket and retrieved his wallet, picking out several $50 banknotes and a credit card for herself.

"Did you lose your credit card baby? Awwww," she mocked, making her best exaggerated duckface at him. She paused, then chuckled again, and sauntered out of the room. She would, of course, replace the credit card, but both her use of it and the missing bills infallibly went unnoticed.

When he awoke, Warwick remembered nothing of his experience. He always noticed that he felt unusually relaxed but moderately nauseated and disorientated, and wondered why he always felt sleepy when he visited Pearl. The first few moments of consciousness were a strange, dizzying sensation, and were always coupled with a feeling of emptiness and soreness of everything between his legs. He looked directly at, and felt the truth deep beneath the threshold of consciousness, buried somewhere in the place where his subdued senses lurked while Pearl worked her wiles on him. However, he failed to drag to the surface the vision of Pearl's acts that all the time was staring him in the face with its lustful, predatory gaze, expressed as it was through her quaint self-presentation.

Occasionally, he dreamt about Pearl, always dressed as she was for him in her white cardigan, but in the dream, her legs had been replaced by a dozen tentacles. The tentacles would hold him helpless and rip the limbs from his body; Pearl would smile sweetly at him and whisper something unintelligible in his ear. Awakening from his dreams of Pearl felt similar to awakening with Pearl; the same sense of dizziness and disorientation would return. The association of Pearl and Pearl's apartment with a mixture of soreness and relaxation held a peculiar fascination for him. He could not understand why falling asleep at a friend's apartment would cause this, nor could he understand the peculiar mixture of captivation and dread that went with it. At a loss, he attributed it to his former attraction and initial encounter that he had never dared to attempt again.

Indeed, the idea that he always "fell asleep" at Pearl's apartment was an embarrassment; his friends, like him, were socially conservative, and "sleeping" in a woman's apartment would immediately have garnered interpretations that, as far as he was concerned, were incorrect. This had the fortuitous result, for Pearl, that Warwick kept any feelings, thoughts and his confusion about what was happening carefully and conscientiously to himself.

***

It was Sunday afternoon. The sun shone brightly through the wide open window, and the breeze rustled its way soothingly through Pearl's bedroom. Pearl meandered around, holding her mobile phone to her ear. She was wearing a tight, low-cut blue top, through which the form of her breasts was clearly visible, and black leggings, through which she sported a rather obvious camel toe.

Ruby's musical voice, incredulous, pealed down the phone line into her ear. "So you fucked the boy in his sleep? Again? Doesn't he suspect anything?"

"He seemed a bit weird afterwards, but like, I think he just figures he was sick and I was the nice little girl that looked after him," Pearl replied, smiling with mock-innocence, an expression Ruby effortlessly imagined. It was at this point that Ruby had to consciously remember that not only was Pearl of age, but also a year older than her.

"But like, always at your place? Always the milk? She's gonna pick you up on that, sister."

Pearl laughed. "Okay, you've been seducing too many computer nerd boys who still live with their parents. Anyway, how am I going to dissolve all this stuff in someone else's milk? Or worse still, into a beer? I think the boy would, like, notice if his beer fizzed up like a berocca."

"You've really thought about this a lot, haven't you?", mused Ruby, sounding somewhat perplexed. The question was rhetorical. "You're coming out clubbing next week, right?

"Wouldn't miss it for the world."

"Ah ha! We'll do all of it again."

"All of the boys," giggled Pearl.

"Or maybe just the ones we want," was Ruby's reply.

"Yeah, yeah." Pearl's phone made a number of bell-like noises.

"Are you getting more nudie boy pics again?", asked Ruby, the amusement evident in her voice. Without waiting for confirmation, she continued, "and have you blocked fucking fat boy already?"

"Yeah, I finally blocked him, but now he's all pissed off with me," said Pearl, sounding a little pained. "I think he, like, wanted to fuck me. Gorilla boy wanted to fuck me too and now he's all, yeah, butthurt."