Disclaimer/Author's Note: If you recognize it, I don't own it. This is an old little story I wrote a while ago (2013, I think?) and then took down. And since I'm in one of those moods to dig out old stories and clean them up, I decided to revise this and repost it. So here's a little slice of Beni's backstory.
Sightless
She couldn't see him, but she knew he was thin.
Skinny arms, narrow shoulders. A series of bony ridges that must be his ribs. When he climbed onto the mattress, it barely made a creak.
And when he put his hands on her, she barely made a sound.
She knew she was no prize herself. Her reflection was a mystery, but she imagined she must be hollow-eyed and sharp-boned. No better than this underfed man who took her greedily, almost impatiently, as if he feared she would vanish before he could be satisfied.
His clothing scratched her. Rough and full of holes. She didn't know the color of his eyes or the shade of his hair, but she could tell he smoked cigarettes, hadn't shaved in a few days, and didn't use soap when he last bathed—if he ever bathed at all. He rolled away from her with a little sigh, making the mattress creak just slightly as he settled his pitiful weight beside her. While she caught her breath, staring at the ceiling with sightless eyes.
"You're not as good as they say you are," he said.
He had an unpleasant whine of a voice. Probably an ugly face to match, since the ugly ones always loved coming to her door. At least that was what the other girls said.
"Who says I'm supposed to be good?" she asked.
"Your pimp, for starters," he whined at her. "The only blind prostitute on this side of Budapest, he says. Like you're so special. I could have paid less for a better time."
"Why didn't you?"
He let out a derisive little snort. "I've already had half the whores on this block, that's why."
And half their diseases, if luck was against her that night.
"There's an awful lot of whores on this block," she said. "Couldn't find a nice neighborhood girl who would take a second look at you?"
"Nice girls are boring."
His voice sounded whinier than ever, as if all the nice girls in the world had personally wounded him. She figured he must be ugly. Only an ugly man would say such a thing.
Only an ugly man would sleep with a prostitute who couldn't see him.
He sat up and fumbled in his pockets—or at least she hoped they were his pockets—and relaxed when he found whatever he was seeking. She heard the strike of a match and caught the unmistakable reek of cigarette smoke. It had become obvious to her over the years; the difference between cigarettes and cigars. She imagined her companion with a slim white cigarette as thin as himself, taking a drag as greedily as he seemed to take everything else.
"What do you do for a living?" she asked, as the smoke drifted past her.
His tone was instantly suspicious. "Why do you ask?"
"I want to know how you can afford all those whores you were bragging about. What do you do?"
"I steal things."
She couldn't tell if he was joking. "Like what?"
"Anything. Sometimes I trick people out of their money."
"And how do you do that?"
He snickered into his cigarette. "It's not hard. The world is crawling with idiots."
Maybe he thought she was an idiot, because she sold herself for a living and couldn't even see if her customers cheated her. She wondered if he paid her the wrong amount on purpose, taking advantage of her lack of sight. Frustrated, she rolled onto her side, facing his direction, and wished she could look at his face. Just for a clue of what went on in his head.
"I could tell the police you're a thief and a con artist," she told him. "Aren't you afraid I'll rat on you?"
"Afraid?" he scoffed. "You can't even describe my face to the police."
She wanted to throttle him, but it was useless. Everything was useless. She turned her eyes back to the ceiling, blinking up at nothing, and listened to him take another drag.
"Does your family know you lie, steal, and spend your nights with whores?"
"I have no family," he said, the sad whine creeping back into his voice. "My mother died years ago. I don't know who my father is."
"Not even his name?"
He snickered again, but this time it sounded uglier than before. "He could have been anyone. My mother was a whore, like you, until her pimp threw her out of his house for getting knocked up. After that she worked in a factory, but she fucked the landlord when she couldn't pay the rent."
"How do you know that?"
"We only had one room. I was in the apartment whenever he came to fuck her. He always threw his shoe at me when he wanted me to leave."
She knew she shouldn't feel sympathy for him, but somehow she did. Easy to feel pity for a man she couldn't see, even if he had that grating whine, and he didn't seem like the type who was too proud to turn pity away. A man like him probably ate sympathy like it was candy. She reached out to touch him, then thought better of it, remembering his bony arms and cold, greedy hands, and instead murmured, "I'm sorry."
"So am I," he said sorrowfully.
He put out the cigarette. She felt his weight leave the bed as he swung his legs over the side and rose to his feet.
She waited in silence, listening for his footsteps across the floorboards, and was relieved when no suspicious sounds reached her ears. The door slammed shut, signaling his departure, and she remained on her back. Thinking of the poor ugly bastard making his way onto the dark streets of Budapest.
Next time he came to her, she would have to ask him his name.