Lillian trudged the swamp land, searching for Bozo; it was her personal name for one the alligators that seemed to enjoy a good joke. He liked to disappear just when it was time to feed or harvest…seemed to find that very funny when no-one could find him. But she was on to him now – she knew his MO. He usually swam downstream to lounge out near the neighbour’s ramshackle dwelling. She’d never actually made it to the house so she hadn’t met them. They probably weren’t a bunch of rednecks since they hadn’t shot Bozo yet. It would serve him right if they did though.
She heard a rustling up ahead. It was different than the constantly moving underbrush beneath her feet or the chittering and twittering of birds and whatever else in the trees. She stopped to listen, wondering if she should just turn right around and head back. But she was a curious person by nature so instead she crept forward, peering cautiously through the trees. There was a clearing up ahead and she caught sight of a ladder against a tree. She relaxed figuring that if whatever it was had to climb ladders to get up a tree then how dangerous could it be? She walked forward to see who it was and what they were doing. It wasn’t like these were fruit trees that could be picked. She inclined her head to see better through the thick leafy branches and jumped as she heard the sound of a branch shifting under great strain. A pair of legs appeared in her line of sight, dangling and shaking wildly as if the owner had no control over them. Or else as if they were looking for purchase and failing to find it.
Lillian ran forward to see a young man with a rope around his neck, slowly choking as he hung off the tree. She ran forward trying to catch hold of his legs and pull him upwards. She almost didn’t manage it but the branch he chose to hang himself off of was slowly bending under his weight. It would break soon enough and who knew what might happen to him then. She grabbed hold of his legs and put them on her shoulder so he had something to anchor himself with.
“Come on now lad, yer can do this. Take the bloody rope off of yor neck!”, she yelled up to him standing on tiptoe so he had enough leverage. She’d never thanked God for her height before but she did now. She could feel his weight pressing down on her shoulder which meant he wasn’t still choking slowly to death on his rope. The desperate sounds he’d been making before had also stopped.
“Okay then, right, yer good, is it? Come on now, right, take the rope off”, she encouraged. She could hear sounds as if one rough surface was being rubbed off another. His weight on her shoulders was suddenly gone and she looked up quickly to see that he’d gotten the rope off his neck and was holding tight to it with his hands. He swayed a bit and then jumped down onto the ground, next to her.
“Awrigh’?” she asked extending her hand to touch him gently on the shoulder. He looked up at her breathing hard.
“I guess I am…for now”, he said.
“Wot’s yor name?” she asked inclining her head at him.
He looked down at his feet as if thinking if she was authorised to have that information. He shrugged and then said, “It's Roy. Roy Lestrange”, he said still watching the ground.
“Oi Roy, yer can’t be more than nineteen years old. Wotcher finkin' tryin' ter kill yorself?” she asked bending down to stare into his face. He stared at her, mouth open, eyes on her lips like he could decipher what she’d said just by watching them.
“Excuse me what?” he asked.
“Why. Are. You. Trying. To. Kill. Yourself?” she enunciated clearly.
Roy shrugged, “I thought I’d save myself the trouble of wasting away”, he said to his shoes.
“Excuse me wot?” It was Lillian’s turn to ask, “Are yer sick or sumfink?”
Roy just continued to watch his feet and say nothing.
“Oi wotever it is, it can’t be worf killin' yorself over! Are yer in a bit of pain?” she asked. Roy smirked and shook his head.
“Then wot, then, eh? Doctor gave yer six monfs ter live or sumfink?” she persisted sitting next to him on the forest floor.
Roy sighed, “They don’t even have the decency to do that. I mean obviously they can’t…it's different for everyone. But…I think I’d feel better if I knew how long I had, you know? At least I’d know”, he wailed looking up at the sky. The pimples on his face stood out redly; Lillian figured that it wasn’t that long since he left adolescence behind…if indeed he wasn’t still one.
“So yer decided ter do Deaff a favour and do 'is dirty work for 'im ?” she asked not without compassion.
“Its going to happen anyway so…”, Roy shrugged.
“Boy I know nuffink is certain but deaff and taxes but wot yer 'ave ter realise is that we’re all on a deaff sentence. We’re all gonna die. So just because yer know 'ow yer might go, right, doesn’t mean yer should just give over on life!” she said throwing her hands in the air in agitation.
Roy sat with his hands on his knees, head hanging between his legs. He opened his mouth, breathed in and then closed it again. He turned his head to look at Lillian and then back down to the grass, “It's not so much the dying I don’t think. It’s the process. The slow, painful, undignified wasting away that’s waiting for me. The shame and humili-“, he stopped talking really abruptly.
Lillian sat patiently waiting for him to continue; his breath began to hitch and he was hiccupping, moisture falling from his face to the hard ground beneath. Lillian put her hand on his shoulder, rubbing slowly.
“I’m right sorry Roy. Cor blimey guv, I wish I could make this better for yer.”
Roy laughed bitterly, “Yeah, that’s exactly what my mother said. She’s been sooo understanding.”
“And that makes yer mad ?”
Roy covered his face with his hands, leaning back on the tree that had almost been the instrument of his death, “I just…I’m so ashamed”, he whispered, “I don’t even know how to look at her and she just keeps giving me these understanding, compassionate looks. Its like a knife in my heart every time.”
Lillian didn’t know what to say…just continued to rub his shoulders soothingly.
“I can’t talk to anyone about this”, Roy said softly.
Lillian glanced at him, “Yer can rabbit and pork ter me, init? Oi Roy, 'ave a look at me ”, she said putting her fingers on his chin and turning him to face her, “Yer can talk ter me. Anytime yer need to. I’m 'ere.”
It’s the low hum of the television that woke her, that and the crackle as static filled the room. The movie they’d been watching was long finished. Lillian blinked against the darkness, disorientated, and tried to stretch out her cramped limbs, the small couch in her room not really built for her height. Especially when she had to share.
Phil’s arm was warm and heavy across her midriff, his leg a possessive weight across her thigh. Hot puffs of air breathed into the back of her neck in a regular, sleep-filled rhythm. Lillian thought about moving, but didn’t want to wake Phil. He looked like he needed the rest for one thing; for another she was enjoying having him pressed all up close to her, unaware.
Lillian moved just a fraction, and felt Phil’s protest. It was grunted into the back of her neck. Phil’s arm tightened around her waist, pulling Lillian back against his hard stomach.
That wasn’t the only thing that was hard. Lillian felt like she really should move, but every time she tried Phil tightened his grip until Lillian could scarcely breathe without Phil protesting. Lillian found that she was wet; a standard reaction to having a hard dick pressed against her. Or so she told herself.
Phil bent his leg, and groaned aloud in his sleep when his cock made contact with Lillian’s ass. Lillian forgot to breathe, just for a second, and then Phil shifted his weight, pushed up against Lillian’s ass and groaned louder.
Lillian waited. Holding still, as Phil’s hips rolled away only to grind forward again, finds a rhythm and keeping to it. He nosed his way through Lillian’s hair, mouth open, and breath hot against the shell of her ear. Phil’s breathing sped up, as his dick rutted up against Lillian’s ass, and for a second, just a second, despite her best efforts to remain still, Lillian pushed back, adding to the friction.
“Yeah, just like that,” Phil slurred in his sleep. His hand sliding down to cup Lillian’s silk covered breasts, squeezing just a touch, enough to make Lillian want more. Lillian tried again, pushed back a fraction, gasped when Phil cupped her harder. He flicked at her nipple, making it hard as he shunted them both forward.
Lillian huffed out a frustrated moan. It was awkward and she couldn’t get the angle right, needed more, more friction, more movement. She reached down to unzip her jeans, shocked when Phil slid his hand into the space provided, pushed cotton aside to expose bare skin, fingers curling into her centre to rub at her sensitive wet nub.
“Jesus,” Lillian hissed quietly so as not to wake Phil. She wasn’t sure how he would take the fact that he was basically fucking her in his sleep. It might be embarrassing; he might never come near her again. Her brain was screaming at her to move away, when Phil tightened the grip he had on Lillian and stroked inward, exploring her responsive flesh with dedication, fingernail dragging against her slit.
Lillian rocked back against Phil, feeling the harsh brush of three-day stubble as Phil nuzzled in against her neck, breathing hot and heavy against Lil’s skin. She pushed, slow and steady, into the warm cradle of Phil’s practised fingers.
She kept to Phil’s rhythm, rocking back, when Phil eased away, forward, tilting her hips slightly to get a better angle as she pushed down onto his fingers, biting the inside of her cheek to prevent the moan that threatened.
Phil was not so restrained, moaning loudly, when Lillian finally got the angle right and pushing back harder than before, grinding down into her lap. Phil rewards Lillian with a sharp twist of his wrist on every stroke, tightening his fist as he works it up, all the way to the epicentre of Lillian’s heat.
It’s so quiet, Lillian was sure she could hear her own heartbeat, felt it thump erratically in her chest, and just when she thinks, she can’t take it any longer, needs faster, harder, more; Phil picked up the pace, attuned to her needs even in sleep.
Lillian hissed out a breath, as Phil stroked her, shorter and faster, thumb ghosting over the head of Lillian’s nub on every down stroke. Lillian was a hair’s breadth from coming, spilling herself all over Phil’s hand, as he pushed up, hard against her ass and groans, long and loud. The sound of his pleasure, the heat of it breathed out against her cheek was more than she could take. She didn’t think she could be any more turned on, but somehow she is with every pleasure-filled moan that slips past Phil’s lips.
She wanted to praise, encourage, tell Phil how good it felt. She didn’t dare make a sound though as the slow heat built and caught fire. Her body jerked in Phil’s hand, and again causing him to stroke her faster until all she could feel was heat and movement and the desperate need to come. She almost whimpered, probably did as her body jerked again. Phil squeezed tight as she came, pulsing warm wet liquid over his hand.
Lillian held her breath and waited. She waited as Phil’s breathing returned to normal, finding a slower, steadier rhythm. Until Phil moved his hand, pulled it free of Lillian’s pants, and only then did she breathe. She sucked in a breath as reality slammed in. As the wetness about her legs cooled to leave her sticky and wet. She thought she should probably move, but didn’t know how to disentangle herself from Phil without waking him. She took another breath, worrying her bottom lip with her teeth.
“Damn it Lil, either piss or get off the pot,” Phil mumbled, shifting back a touch and moving his leg from her thigh.
Lillian blinked, but didn’t say a word as she climbed off the couch and made her way to the bathroom. She switched on the light, avoided looking at herself in the mirror as she shrugged free of her clothes, and rinsed the flannel under the hot faucet before cleaning herself off. She could hear Phil moving about in the next room, and waited until it was quiet again before switching off the light and opening the bathroom door.
“I saved a life today”, she ventured to say to him. He was lying in his bed, on his side, back to Lillian, the sheet pulled up to his waist.
He turned around to face her, “Oh yeah?” he asked eyebrow and voice raised with interest.
“Yeah I met this boy in the woods, about to off himself. Literally talked him down off of a tree”, she said. She took a step forward, and another until she was standing beside the bed, didn’t over think it, just climbed in. Her back was to Phil, one hand beneath the pillow as she took a deep breath, and settled.
Phil was silent, still for a moment, and then he shifted, turned over, threw one arm over Lillian’s midriff, warm and heavy as he pulled her in, and huffed out a breath.
“That is amazing”, he said into the flesh of her neck.
“Yeah, it really was”, she agreed with a smug smile as her eyes drifted closed.
They slept.
Mya knocked softly on the classroom door. She poked her head in the door and waited for Mrs Argent to notice her. She was sitting at her desk, eyes on a piece of paper on her desk as a student stood beside her, body language radiating anger.
“You can’t go on like this Leo; scraping by is not acceptable. You’re better than this”, Mrs Argent was saying, staring earnestly at Leo who was nodding his head. His eyes darted from the window to the teacher’s table. He seemed not at all interested in her words.
“I’m sorry”, he said.
“I don’t want platitudes”, Mrs Argent snapped, face red and eyes narrowed, “I want action.”
Leo actually looked at her like he was seeing her at last.
“I’m doing the best I can”, he said.
“Do you need help Leo? Ask me for help and I’ll give it to you”, she said.
‘I need help’ Mya thought with a mental lift of her hand, ‘Ask me if I need help.’
Mrs Argent turned at last to look at her, “Mya”, she said brightly, “Come in.”
Mya stepped in the room slowly, wondering if it might not have been better to come back another time. Mrs Argent pointed at her eyes on Dean, “You see her?”, she said to Leo who darted Mya a glance filled with resentment, “She comes from an extremely disadvantaged background but she does her best; she tries.” She said. Mya bristled a bit at the ‘extremely disadvantaged background’ and to his credit, Leo quirked his forehead and smiled slightly in a way that said he got it. She said nothing though, just leaned on the wall and let Mrs Argent finish.
“Mya do you know this young man?” Mrs Argent demanded. Mya looked up at him; seeing as he was said to be responsible for the remarkably good run the basketball team was having…she couldn’t exactly say she didn’t know who he was.
“I know of him”, she said.
“He’s in your year you know that?” Mrs. Argent said as if she was pushing for something. Mya shrugged.
“I’m mostly in AP classes anyway”, She said and then blushed. That implied that there was definitely no way that Leo could be taking any advanced classes. Mya thanked the gods that she was too dark for them to see her blush, “Not to put down your academic abilities or anything”, she said quickly.
He did that smile again, just a small uplift like he was just too cool for a full stretch of the lips, saying he got what you were sayin; but it just wasn’t that serious.
“Oh this young man is bright enough to be in any AP class if he applied himself but he’s barely scraping by”, Mrs. Argent complained. Leo didn’t look too moved, Mya was at a loss for something to say.
“Mrs. Argent”, she said straightening up and choosing to ignore the whole ‘Leo’ thing, “I wanted to show you my application letter if you have the time”, she said. That actually got her eye contact from Leo; he seemed surprised at her words.
“Oh yes Mya dear I remember; why don’t you leave it on my desk and I’ll read it and get back to you?” she said.
“Uh huh”, Mya said hesitantly, “I’ll just go make a copy.” She glanced at Mrs. Argent’s table which is chock full of papers and shit. She’s not risking losing her only copy of the letter in that avalanche; it was hard enough to write the first time.
“Good call”, Mrs. Argent said. Mya disappeared out the door, headed to the office to use the copy machine. When she came back, Leo was gone and Mrs. Argent had calmed down.
“I’ll get back to you with feedback on this”, she promised, “And if you see that Devereaux boy in the corridors, giving him a good nudge for me”, she smiled wistfully at Mya as she said it and Mya tried to respond with a smile; but she couldn’t care less about the Leo kid. She only wanted her letter polished up and that was it.