F4: Life in Suspension

Not that he cared. He got what he wanted.

They all do. They all get what they want, and I get what I want. The money, the feeling of being so sexy someone will pay me for it, and the fun of controlling their every pleasure.

My name is Alexus Mano Leia. And I'm a sex addict.

* * * *

"Hello, my sexy little shark," purred a voice in my ear when I answered the phone half-awake, half-asleep. I smiled to hear it.

"Hello, my beautiful angel." I told Gabriel, as I rolled onto my side. "Where are you?"

"L.A.X," she told me,shifting the phone.

I could have guessed, hearing the noise behind her. I could just envision her running in her impossibly high heels, her body encased in sprayed on Lycra, the color of the sky. Every eyeball in the whole place following her ass, while she dragged a piece of luggage the size of a Volkswagen behind her.

"Are you coming here?" I asked, hopefully. She told me that she might think of doing the Hawaii thing, if money got tight enough. We were both pretty flush at the moment so I hadn't expected this. "Are there money issues?"

"No, and no. I'm catching a midnight flight to Houston. Got a call from a client I used to know in Atlanta. You know and love him... and his pretty wife." I heard Gabriel's heels tapping the floor tiles.

"Mitchel and Susan? Oh! My! God! I wish I was there! Tell them I said hello no... tell them I said Aloha." I sat up in the bed and pulled my feet in under me. "It's not fair."

"Oh, don't pout. I'll talk them into having us both back, just as soon as you get home. How is the money flowing?" she asked as naughty as he could say it.

I grabbed one of my pillows and pulled it to my chest. My breasts rested on top of it to help support their weight.

"With a distinctively Asian flavor." I rocked a little and wiped a tear from my eye. Just the sound of her voice. "I wish you were here."

There was a pause then a sigh so soft I almost didn't catch it.

"Don't get all maudlin my little shark. We'll see each other soon. Give me a second." I just held the phone while she talked to the ticket agent. "You still there?"

"Yeah."

"Look, I'm going to have to let you go, Hun. We're about to board, and they are giving me the evil eye." I felt the tears start to flow then. She must have heard. "Alexus... have you been taking too much of your Spiro? You are all but PMSing."

"No! I'm taking my normal, 'piss-yourself-to-death' dose. I just miss you," I told her softly, hugging the pillow to me.

I heard a soft chuckle then, far more manly than she normally will make, then her more feminine laugh.

"Are you missing me, or is your ass just missing my cock?" she asked, all low and sexy.

"Both."

"Well, good for you. They are both easily taken care of. I'll be seeing you in about two weeks. I'm going to get enough money from Mitchel and Sharon to let me catch up on everything we owe and still have enough to buy me a plane ticket out to there. I'm not going to work though. My tired tits are taking a vacation, girl!"

"Not even with me?" I asked teasingly.

"Oh, shut the fuck up. Look, I got to go. Love you..."

The phone clicked dead before I could reply. I'm not sure I could have spoken anyway. In all our years together she had never said that to me. My heart broke like a dam and the tears that began to gush out my eyes were like the water over the dam breaking. Two other "ladies", Julia and Silvia, that lived here with me came to see what all the crying was about.

I hugged them so hard they protested, then I dragged them into the bed, squealing like a teenager, as I started a tickle war.

* * * *

The bathroom in the terminal at Houston, Texas is like almost every airport ladies room I have been in. It was cold, like the air conditioner was set to run only in this room. It smelled of cleaners, those tended to vary from city to city but here it was stinky pine.

Looking in the mirror, my eyes are like shiny jewels in a sea of black mascara. I'm making myself not think. I must not think. I must not think.

"Are you okay?" I heard behind me.

When I turned around, and she got a better look at me, her expression changed.

"You do know this is a women's restroom?" Her tone was acidic bile being spewed out with every verb, every noun, every god-forsaken syllable. My eyes, within their bird's nest of black, took in the look of disgust on her face as she looked me over. "YOU need to get out of here! Decent 'women' are trying to use this restroom and can't, till a pervert like you leaves."

I needed comfort. I needed a shoulder to cry on. I needed at least a wet napkin so I could fix my face. And what I got was her. This saggy-titty, pouch-bellied, granny-flapped, excuse for a human being.

"Get fucked, you cunt," I told her.

As I walked past her and out the door, I heard her say something to the lady that passed me on her way in.

"All these sick weirdos need to get dragged behind trucks, like that pervert in up in Baytown. Imagine the nerve of him coming in here to pee like he's a real woman!"

I was crying so hard that security came and took me out the concourse. After a lot of questioning, I was placed in a cab by a man that seemed to understand. He told the driver where I needed to go.

The driver didn't want to take me.

I tossed the guy a hundred dollar bill over the front seat to make him shut up. When he looked back and saw the folded wad I had on me, he became my dearest friend. I finally told him to shut up and just drive after about five miles of him trying to comfort me.

The long cab ride was not what I needed. What I needed was my Gabriel.. My poor... my poor Gabriel. I had seen the news headlines while half awake. Then, when they had fully sunk into my grief besotted brain, I threw the TV out the front door, while screaming his name at the heavens to make them give him back.

I wanted to do that now. To drive to the middle of no where and lift my head to the sky and howl out my pain. It didn't feel human to hurt this bad... but then, given what humans had done to my lover... my love... my beloved Gabriel. I didn't want to be human anymore.

They were sick, diseased creatures that all needed to die. Those monsters that had chained his lovely ankles together and hooked him... Oh god, Gabriel.

Hugging my self, I dug my fingernails into my arms till I bled, trying to feel, in some small way, the pain he must have endured. I leaned my head against the cold glass window and looked out at the approaching light of the gas refineries that is most of Baytown.

* * * *

The room was cold. It smelled of antiseptic, which I thought was funny. No one that was staying there could catch a cold, and anyone that was coming to visit them was like me. Dead inside already.

The room was cold.

So was he.

They had kept me waiting for four hours before they let me see him, and only then decided to because they wanted someone to identify the body. The had said that because I wasn't immediate family or married to him by California law, I had no legal right to view him.

At first they hadn't wanted to even let me be into the hospital where his body was being kept.

So I picked up a ballpoint pen from the front desk and stabbed my left hand hard enough to drive the tip out my palm.

That didn't go over well. But it got me in the doors.

Finally, the detective in charge of the case showed up and paved the road to where I was standing now. The morgue.

Gabriel would have laughed... if he hadn't been dead.

The Human Meat Locker he had always jokingly called the place. The next-to-the-last stop on the dead man train. For a time my lover had gone through a Gothic phase. Morbid had been the normal for him. That he was stretched out on a gurney, a big "Y" cut across that lovely chest, would have been a hysterical joke to his twisted mind.

But he was dead, and I didn't find it funny.

No.

Not funny at all.

As I took in what had been done to him, I dropped to my knees next to the gurney, and tried to scream denial of the destruction of his beauty. But my throat was too raw for sound. My heart too broken to beat, my mind useless for anything but painful memories.

"Mr. Kyle?"

I tried to speak but couldn't.

"Mr...Ky..."

"DO I LOOK LIKE A MR. TO YOU?" I screamed at him, with a throat on fire. "DO I?"

* * * *

I couldn't go back to L.A. The apartment had always been in his name, but there was nothing of me there that I would miss, and what I would miss of him wasn't there either.

The wad of cash in my pocket got me a hotel room, a bottle of gin, and enough packs of over-the-counter sleeping pills to do the job I intended.

Why not?

I mean who would miss me?

My Mom? She had disowned me the moment I came out.

My Dad? He was an 'Ice' smoking junkie, more drunk than alive, who had spat on me when I introduced myself to him.

My Granna? She was... well, she was with Gabriel. Probably teaching him to make her potato salad. He hated potato salad, but for her he would have made it and even acted like he was enjoying it. She had that way with people.

The list of other people I knew was nothing but a who's who of hookers and johns. But then who was I to be judging anyone? What was I if not a whore living day to day just sucking and fucking? Who was I but another lost soul on Charon's boat?

How I had earned the coins for my trip would stand against me in the next life, no doubt. Not that I cared. Let me be a whore then as well. So long as I had my Gabriel there to show me how to suck cock... How to make a John cum in moments and have him believe it was his fault.

How to put my makeup on, how to dress, how to walk, how to talk, how to do every god damn thing that I should have learned to do from someone who would tell me they loved me more than once in the decade and a half I had known them. Slept with them.

Loved them.

I was broken. Just finish it already. Be there with him. Granna will fuss, no doubt, but I could always make her smile. That sweet smile, with her front teeth gap and twenty dozen wrinkles.

BethAnn?

The pills were in my hand. The bottle was at my lips. Why did the thought of my second cousin suddenly give me pause? We hadn't spoken in a few years. Unlike most of my family she hadn't turned away from me but at the same time she was shunned if she talked to me too much.

BethAnn...

I let the pills fall onto the cheep hotel comforter that I had intended to be my death shroud. Picking up the phone I dialed out and got an operator.

"Macon, Georgia please. A Mrs. BethAnn Tomas."

I took a huge drink of gin as I waited. Then another.

* * * *

My head leaned against the glass, I watched the cold lights of New Orleans slide past in the dark. They were soon lost in the distance behind me. Lost in that dark past I was running from. I shifted my vision till I was looking at my reflection in the glass.

I looked like hell, even to my own eyes, but I was at least me again. Alexus. The mental me that I had been since that first night in Atlanta when Gabr... when I had gotten into a car to go perform sex for money.

How many times have I sat in a bar somewhere, so late at night it's tomorrow, listening to my fellow 'sisters of the street' talking about their first trick. How bad it had been, how much that had anguished over it. Then the guilt afterwords. Then how, like the coke addicts most of them were, they had returned to it again. And of course again.

The lure of that easy money is like the lure of the fame that drives a runaway to the lights of L.A. You have needs so simple and basic at the start. Nothing more complicated than maybe enough to eat and a warm bed. The simple human needs of any of us. But then the money comes in, and you find that those are too simple. You want the next thing, and the next. The twenty thousand dollar car seems out of reach, and then you realize you could pay for it in cash, if you worked three weeks doing the shit no one else wants to do.

But, then you have memories that wake you screaming. If you're lucky you have you someone to cling to there in the dark. Someone to wipe away the tears and hold you till the shaking stops. If not?

A warm "John" with a hard cock, a bottle of champagne, enough coke to kill a rockstar, any of those will take the place of a friend in the dark. Not as good as, but then what in this world is.

Family?

For those like us, the streets have to be our homes and the twisted relationships of pimps and whores, our bothers and sisters. Like every family. It's dysfunctional but damn to hell anyone outside that crosses that line. That's what it felt like I had done when I called BethAnn. Crossed the line and reached beyond the accepted bounds of my place in life.

I was Alexus. Streetwalker, escort,TS, goddess... whore.

Who the fuck was I to be calling decent people and asking for something like help?

"Hi there," came a voice into my darkness.

He was clean cut. College-boy looking. Nice clothes, but not too nice. I could tell he had money, but not the type that would have let him fly.

Or maybe he just liked trains. Or was scared to fly.

"Can I join you?" he asked, with a smile.

Part of me wanted to send him away. He looked too young to be wanting to play the game he had in mind. But then... how old was I when I got into that car that night? Probably younger than he.

"Please, I would like that." I told him softly as I moved my purse. He slid in next to me and met my eyes with a gaze I knew well. Male lust. He was bathed in it, from the top of his dark hair to those nice, shiny shoes. This young man wanted me. He wanted me to take him to places that he would remember for the rest of his life. I might remember him tomorrow.

Just as likely, I might not.

"I'm Albert."

Of course you are.

"Nice to meet you, Albert. I'm Alexus. Enjoying the train ride?" I asked.

"Oh yes. I love trains. Takes me back to when I was a kid, playing with my train set." His smile was all innocence.

Reaching over, I placed my hand on his knee.

"I had one of those." I lied.

There had never been money for those kinds of toys. Santa would get my letter ever year asking for things like that but he would always forget to pack it on his sleigh. Maybe next year. Maybe next year. Maybe...

Albert, looked at my hand on his leg, and his smile turned into a grin.

How easily played they are. Like any game there are rules, moves within moves. All you have to do is make a move out of the normal play, and the fact that you are eager for sex flashes straight to their brains. Just that simple bit of flirting and he was hooked. Not landed yet, but hooked. Now to set it.

"You know I don't really feel like beating around the bush tonight." I told him running my hand a bit further up his leg. "I'm the type of girl that likes to be the center of attention at the party. Do you like to be that? When you party?" His breathing tightened. Good, he had watched 'Hookers at the Point.' I hate having to explain. "Would you like to maybe go to a party? With me?"

My hand rubbed across a hard bulge. It wasn't the one I cared about of course. He was most likely sitting on that one, but this was was nice enough.

"Yeah." He breathed, nervously. "I would like that a lot."

I looked up.

"I managed to get me one of the sleepers. There is plenty of room up there. Why don't you come... up there with me and we'll talk about it some more?" I let my hand rest on the bulge. I thought he was going to choke to death trying to speak, so I just took his hand and stood up. "Come with me."

I led him though the train and up to the second level to where my sleeping car was. Meant for two people, I had left the top bunk folded up against the ceiling, but I had the bottom one pulled out. The... would you call them stewardesses on a train?... had been in and turned down the sheets. I felt the man behind me wanting to hurry, so I slowed down. I leaned back against his chest as he closed the door behind us.

"You do understand that I'm not free, yes?" I asked softly. "But I am well worth the price."

"Money's not a problem. I have cash on me. You just name a figure." His voice was husky, laced with lust and desire. Desire for me. His hand came around my waist and slid down to cup my mound. He stopped, then his hand moved as if searching.. "I thought.... I mean... you're a guy right? I wasn't wrong about that was I?"

I turned in his arms and looked up in his suddenly wide eyes.

"Well, if I'm not... you have just insulted me right?" I placed a finger on his lips, silencing him. "I'll be everything you want me to be. A guy, a girl, a woman, a man, a virgin or a slut. You just tell me what you want me to be."

"My first," he said softly.

I stopped cold. Now it was my heart that tripped over a step.

"Tranny that is. I mean I've had girls... and a guy, but never..." He started to stumble over his words. "Well... a... you know."

Laughing at him, I sank down onto the bed pulling him down with me, by his hands. His body, hard with youth and probably sports, came to rest between my open legs. His khaki slacks rubbed against the inside of my thighs then the hard bulge pushed up against me. I slid my hands down his back and under the tan cloth to clutch his tight ass in both palms.

"Albert." I said his name like a lover would, all soft and hot next to his ear. "I'm a woman with needs. Can you see to my needs?"

Sitting up, he looked down at me as I unbuttoned my top and let my bra show. The nearly see-through fabric did nothing to hide the inky darkness of my nipples. Nor did it hide the outline of my barbell piercings.

With a frantic haste he began to shed his shirt, then standing up, his pants. I didn't let the smile show when the designer underwear appeared. It dropped to the floor just as fast as a pair of tighty whites would have. His cock was hard and twitching with the need to cum.

I pulled my breasts free, and taking hold of the metal bar, gave it a twist that made the nipple ache. When I looked down, I could see that he was not wanting to touch himself. He was already close to cumming just from the whole forbidden fruit that I am. I decided to have pity on him. After all I was to be his first... well you know.

Sitting up, I reached over into my purse and pulled out a condom. I could open these blind folded with both hands tied behind me. Don't ask me how I know that, just go with the fact it is so. I popped it into my mouth, enjoying the peppermint taste for a second as I aligned it, then grabbing his hips, pushed it down the length of his cock without touching him.

As I slid my way down the slick length of latex, my mouth went cold from the flavoring. I looked up to see his eyes wide. I smiled in modest pride.

Moving quickly I rolled over to my belly. When I looked back at him, his eyes were on my ass. I peeled the thong down to my knees, taking the gaff with it at the same time. Lifting up a little, I let my cock fall forward, out the way, and then settled back. I gave my ass a wiggle. Nuzzling the pillow, I moaned.

"Don't keep me waiting, Albert. I need it." Looking back at him, I faked innocent. "Please be gentle, though."

I let my teeth take a bit of the pillow case between them, as I looked back at him.

His weight hit me, pushing me into the mattress pad, even as I felt his cock trying to slip between my cheeks. He reached between us and more of his weight came down on me as he fumbled around trying to find the dark rose. Then he was there and with a cry from him, his cock began to enter.

I winced at the slight pain, even as I pushed to open myself, to let him deeper. I knew, as I felt him slide in, that I should have used some lube besides spit, but even as I thought that I was glad I hadn't. I needed this pain. I needed it to make me hurt, to try and find a way to match the hurt I was feeling.