Not Enough Time, Not Enough Experience.
It had been a year since the incident, the incident that involved a castle on the outskirts of a small town in Ohio. When sexualities were questioned and cherries were forcefully popped.
But even after that experience, Brad and Janet Majors were perfectly normal. Brad had started a small car dealership that brought in some serious bacon, and Janet was a pretty damn good housewife.
Except until they had a surprise visit from two all-too familiar faces in the middle of the night.
It was early May, the voices were clearly heard before the knock at the door,
"This seems creepy."
"Shut up, I see her."
Janet unlocked the door, looking through the peephole, she couldn't make them out exactly, she could hear that they were two young women, around 20-24, one of the voices was high-pitched, the kind of voice that was funny for two hours before it got old, and a quieter one, gently accented and subtly intoxicating,
Janet opened the door...
Janet found herself running up the stairs to the room she and Brad shared, he was still asleep.
"Brad, Brad, wake up, you'll never believe who's at the door!"
"The Easter Bunny?" he moaned facetiously, "Janet, who the hell would be at the door at this ungodly hour?"
"No. No, just come downstairs." Brad hauled ass out of bed and followed Janet down the stairs to the living room, Brad was completely unprepared for what he saw.
"Magenta and Columbia? What're you doing here?" Brad questioned at the two women sitting on the plastic-covered living room couch, Columbia's hair was longer and Magenta had lost weight, Janet was beaming.
"We just thought we'd drop by, we were in the area, and, well, I guess that explains it." said Columbia,
"So, are the two of you a couple or something?" Brad questioned, rubbing his eyes, still pissed at Janet.
"Oh no, we're both single. And you two?"
"Oh, we had a spring wedding..." said Janet, smiling,
"That's nice." Magenta said quietly, "Do you mind if I use your shower for a few minutes?"
"Of course not, you can use the one in the master bedroom, upstairs, third door on the right."
"Thank you."
As soon as Magenta was upstairs, Columbia began to spill it, "Okay, you should know something, Magenta and I were never in the area. The reason we're here is... Magenta's sick."
"She looks fine..." said Janet,
"No, I mean... Well, 3 weeks ago, she kept blacking out, I didn't know what was causing it, we went to a hospital, and it turns out she has two years. Magenta's terminal."
Janet's breath caught, "I'm so sorry!"
"It's okay, but, she doesn't know, so, please don't bring it up."
"What does she have?"
"It's an illness limited to Transylvanians, because of genetics, it's rare, which makes it incurable. She's the only one in her family to have it, and I'm all she has in terms of people who can effectively take care of her, so if it's okay, can we stay here?"
"Of course." Janet whispered, "Columbia, I'm so sorry..."
"I brought her here because I wanted her to be able to see y'all while she still can, next year will become a downward spiral, the last few months are always the hardest. I'd really appreciate if the two of you could be with us during that period of time."
Janet nodded. "Yes, yes, Columbia." Janet started to sob, "I'm so so sorry."
"The only other option was to take her to Transsexual, they're farther ahead medically, the disease would still be incurable, but they'd be able to prescribe better painkillers and maybe even give her longer to live."
"How did we not notice..." Janet sobbed,
"You did, she's lost a lot of weight, she's pale, I mean more than usual, and the debilitation will become more apparent over the next few hours."
"Columbia, if you don't mind my asking, what are the last few months going to be like?"
"She'll be semi-lucid for the most part, she won't be comatose but the disease becomes more painful as it progresses. And it screws up her immune system, she'll get sick a lot. Even now..."
"Oh, that's awful, Brad, darling, be a dear and take Magenta and Columbia's bags upstairs to the guest room." Brad stood up passively, picked up the two suitcases and dragged them up the stairs.
... Magenta was standing in the hall wrapped in a towel. Naked. Brad stopped when he saw her, she turned around,
"Oh God, I'm sorry, I really shouldn't be streaking in your home."
"That's fine." Brad noticed what she was staring at. The wide window that overlooked the back of the house. The view was astounding, most of Denton was visible, and luckily for Magenta, 'most of Denton' couldn't see her.
"Your house is beautiful."
"Oh, uh, thanks." There was a long pause, Brad glanced nervously around the hallway and Magenta cast her focus at the carpet, her hair fell into her face, "So, uh, the guest room is just down this hall."
Brad began to proceed down the hall, Magenta followed, Brad set the bags on the bed and Magenta sat next to them, Brad began to wonder how this woman, this beautiful young woman, with her flyaway red curls and butterfly-flight of a shy smile, could possibly be dying by degrees. "I should go." Brad covered,
"I should get dressed." Magenta said quietly, standing up, slowly, almost weakly, a subtle reminder that this wasn't an average conversation.
Brad half-ran downstairs and hid in the basement until Janet made dinner.
Brad snuck into the guest room that night, Magenta was sleeping in the bed in the middle of the room, Columbia was lying on the floor on an air mattress. Brad touched Magenta's hair, it was possibly the softest thing he'd ever touched in his life. He stared at her for all of two minutes until she opened her eyes,
"I sincerely hope you weren't feeling me up."
"Oh, no, no I wasn't, I just- I just-"
"You should leave."
"I have a question first."
"Get it over with."
"How do you feel?"
"About what?"
"No, like, physically..."
Magenta sat up higher in bed and crossed her arms vindictively.
"She told you?"
"Look, I'm so sorry-"
"Sorry for what? Columbia thinks I'm really pissed about being single, but it's not a problem, really."
"Oh, right. That's it."
"Please leave."
"Okay... Okay, yeah, alright."
Magenta lay back down and Brad ran away down the hall.
...
Columbia woke up before anyone else the next morning, she minced around the guest room for a few hours, trying to clear her head. On one hand was Magenta, incredibly sick and not going to make it, and on the other hand, herself. Ever since arriving in Denton, she'd been overcome with an odd desire, a yearning that she hadn't felt since middle school. She couldn't label it, but it was there. Stroking Magenta's long curls one last time, Columbia went downstairs to make breakfast.
...
Voices drifted upstairs to the master bedroom when Brad was on the verge of waking up,
"Columbia, this is delicious!"
"Well, there is a secret ingredient."
"Love?"
"Lard!" Brad heard Janet gagging. He stood up and started to get dressed, finally walking down the hall, Magenta was wearing a white dress and no apparent panties. Standing in the sunrise and staring blankly.
"Your planet doesn't have sunrises, does it?" Brad inquired softly, Magenta leapt back,
"Oh, no, we don't." she smiled a little bit, "It's almost always dark there. The lightest it gets is, like, a weird lavender color..."
Brad smiled and inhaled deeply, he was unprepared for the smell of some kind of perfume. The scent was weird, in a good way, almost vanilla-y, warm, definitely, so warm it made Brad's stomach churn in an odd, horny way, and it was RADIATING from her. Brad tried to look cool and leaned on one of his hands against the glass wall, before he knew it there was a loud shattering noise, Magenta was screaming and his hand was warm and dripping.
...
"Brad, you need to go to the emergency room." Magenta capitulated, holding Brad's hand in a blue towel that was quickly becoming red,
"I'm okay, it's fine."
"Shut up, we need to go before you pass out."
"It's just a cut."
"You have glass shards sticking in your hand! YOU LOOK LIKE A FUCKIN' PIN-CUSHION!"
"Magenta, look, I'm okay."
"Okay? You might need a blood transfusion! Okay my ass..."
"You don't drive, how are we supposed to get to a hospital?"
"I don't know... CALL A DAMN AMBULANCE!"
"I highly doubt we need to call an ambulance because I have a cut."
"Clearly you've never been to where I'm from."
"I can honestly say no to that one."
Columbia found Janet in the backyard with a cigarette behind her ear. The smell of burnt hair was pervasive. Janet looked up and smirked,
"I know this looks bad, but I can explain-"
"Oh, that's fine. I'm not opposed to others smoking, Magenta does it all the time."
Janet was silent, "Is there anything that Brad and I can do to help? You know, when it starts to get bad..."
Columbia smiled, "We'll get to that when the time comes."
Columbia sat down next to Janet as the sun beat down. The moment was interrupted when Brad and Magenta ran outside with Brad's hand spraying blood across the porch.