They belong to Marvel. I ain't making a cent. Yada Yada Yada.
Many thanks to my bud grrl4vic, aka Danielle cause she inspires me and keeps me honest. Sorta.
All Of My Life
The setting sun poured gold light through the window, bathing the bed and girl in it's ephemeral glow. She watched it cover her and the rumpled bedding, enveloping her in it's warmth. She snuggled the comforter, not yet ready to leave the security it offered. The sheets pungent smell, the scent of sex and sweat and lust invigorated her, and she breathed deeply.
She wanted to remember this smell forever.
Having come to a decision, Birdy still had to drag herself from their bed. She looked wistfully at the one sure place in the 10,000 square foot prison where she had always been happy. Where she and Vic had always been happy. Never any argument there. The bed was their sanctuary. The passion and tenderness and playfulness that lived there immune to the bitterness and cruelty of their life outside the four-poster.
Birdy sighed and looked away with effort. She wrapped a light- as-gossamer robe around her and walked down the curved staircase to the gourmet kitchen. Taking a bottle of water from the refrigerator, she drank the crystalline fluid thirstily. She picked up a piece of her stationary and a pen, and walked back to the foyer. She wrote quickly, and folded the marbled parchment. For a moment she hesitated, then smiling slightly to herself, she held the missive against her heart. With a graceful hand, she trailed the paper down her chest, over the curve of her breasts, across the gentle slope of her stomach, and down between her thighs. She raised her hand and floated the paper under her nose like the cork of a fine wine. She lightly inhaled the scent even she could smell. The combined scent of last night's lovemaking. Birdy placed the note next to the huge vase of flowers on the table. Vic would be sure to find it.
She climbed the staircase and walked to the bathroom. She lit the scented candles as she ran her bath. When all aglow, the assorted candles lit the room like a church vestibule. Turning off the light, she paused to view herself in the mirror. Even in the soft candlelight she could see the bruising on her cheek and temple. She was not sad. She barely felt the injuries now. Unpredictable violence was a way of life with Victor Creed. As long as she lived with him, this was to be expected.
She climbed into her bath, the hot water a baptism for her mood and resolve. She relaxed into the water and closed her eyes, wondering what fortune had brought her to this life. She had been in his mind often enough. She had seen his twisted psyche firsthand. So why did it surprise her still when he lashed out at her? When his volatile moods erupted in vicious cruelty? Was it that they usually followed - or preceded- a particularly sweet period of harmony?
What did it matter? This was her life. She couldn't leave him. He would find her no matter where she went..she knew that. And the truth was, she wouldn't be able to stay away from him. For despite the sadness that flowed through her when he was cruel, there was no other man for her. The memories of other men were pale ghosts alongside the full-bodied, larger than life Victor Creed. He had dazzled her when she met him. He still did.
She used the lavender soap and washed herself gently but thoroughly. She used her razor, and lay back to luxuriate in the peace of the warm water. She closed her eyes, dreaming of a warm night in Tuscany, and slowly drifted to sleep.
Victor Creed strode through the front door like a victorious general. It was shaping up to be a helluva week. He had just finished recognizance for a very lucrative contract. Birdy had given him the fuck of a lifetime the night before. Life was good for him..but death was even better. He smiled at his own lame joke.
He could smell the scented candles in Birdy's bath, and knew that was always an invitation. Birdy was apparently over the row they'd had two days before. He didn't even remember what had set him off. Perhaps it had been that mouth of hers. He had never met a woman as fearless as Birdy. She'd go toe to toe with him, even when the outcome was assured. He had to admit, he admired that in the girl. And the sex? Christ! She fucked him so hard even he was dry-mouthed and weak-kneed. He hadn't been able to quit touching her, so wrapped up in the sensations they had created. The memory was making him hard. He whistled low to hinself.
His keen eye for detail delayed his ascent. Seeing the small card nearly hidden by flowers on the marble table, he walked over and retrieved it. The aroma of the card brought a smile to his lips. So what if the claw-footed bathtub was too small for the both of them? He would manage the dimensions. Who said he wasn't a man who could compromise?
He opened the note and read
Victor
There will never be another man for me.
Creed smiled at that
I cannot live without you
or with you
B
He suddenly felt as if a steel hand, burning cold, had gripped his guts and twisted. For a moment he did not breathe, or see, or feel. His eyes turned toward the stairs and he was moving..clearing the flight in a second...running down the hall..and into the bedroom. The bathroom door was shut. When did she EVER shut a door on him? He did not slow down or check the lock. He rolled his shoulder and hit the barrier full speed. The door screamed as it tore from the frame, wood shards flying.. The hinges groaned as they separated.
She was asleep.
Creed slowly walked to the bath. He gripped the edge of the tub and lowered himself to his knees. He looked at her with the dispassionate eyes of an assassin, cocking his head slightly as his eyes moved the length of her body.
He exhaled.
The candles were nearly done, but a few still burned and cast a shimmering gold light on the crimson water. He trailed his hand through the pool and rested it on her chest.
The water was ice cold.
She was colder.
His fury exploded then with a roar that shook the room. His huge arm swept the shelves, and the candles and glass bottles shattered around him. His claws tore the pedestal basin from its perch. Turning back to the tub, he again dropped to his knees. He growled as he surged forward, grabbing the uncomplaining girl roughly and pulling her to the floor. Her white skin rivaled the tile.
A strangled cry escaped him as he pinned the girls limp arms to the hard floor. Creed hovered over her in an eerie imitation of love-making, but there was no ardor here. He growled softly, his face inches from hers. He spoke through clenched teeth.
"DID I SAY YOU COULD LEAVE!!?"
He pushed away from her, sitting back on the floor. The room was deafeningly quiet. He heard only his own breathing and the sound of the blood rushing in his veins. He got to his feet, and bending down, picked up the girl with an embrace as gentle as any lover. He carried her over the debris and into the bedroom. He placed her on the white linens on the bed.
He watched her for a long time, pondering her death. Had he not often told her that she would never get away from him? That he would follow her, find her, anywhere?
Not this time.
Creed smiled to himself. He nodded slightly in salute to the girls success in proving him wrong. It was a helluva way to win an argument. A sure as hell one shot deal. Nevertheless,
She had bested him.
Had he been capable of grief, he would have mourned her. But grief and regret had always been alien to him. He did feel a need to provide a ritual of somekind. He could not leave her here.
Victor Creed had seen more corpses than many undertakers. But where it was their task to give the dead a peaceful countenance, a decorated, shellaced look of bliss, Creed has always seen only the horrified face of death. The shocked, suffering faces at the moment their lives left them. He was unfamiliar with graceful send offs.
He watched Birdy for a little while longer, finally chastising himself for his inaction. He wrapped her securely in the white satin sheet, hesitating briefly before covering her face. He carried her downstairs and across the threshold, following the stone path to the back property. He grabbed a tool and ripped something from her spice garden as he passed, and moved into the woods.
He buried her under an oak tree,. the oldest by far of any in the wood. Before he pulled the blanket of dirt over her, he tucked the lavender into the folds of the sheet. He didn't know why. He covered her and stood at the mound for a few moments. He felt nothing.
Returning to the house, he built a roaring fire, leaving all the lights off. He sat in his oversize wingback in front of the fire and opened the first bottle of Glenlivit. The amber scotch went down easy, and he downed the bottle in seconds. He barely felt it. No matter. He had a dozen bottles of scotch and a cord of wood and he planned to use it all.
He stayed in the bedroom all day..And the sun rose and set twice more. Creed did not eat or bathe or speak a word. He had no hunger, and his smell did not offend him. Under the dirt and the blood and the sweat, there was a faint scent of a pretty, blond girl. And he wasn't ready to lose it yet.
He was, after all, a visceral creature. And where others rekindled memory from photos or words, it was a scent that could bring a reality jarring back into his consciousness. He waited a little longer.
On the third day, after relieving himself in his bathroom, he glanced in the mirror over the sink. He flipped on the lightswitch. He laughed at the dirty, pathetic mutant that looked back..
"Creed, you look like shit"
He laughed at his weakness. There were plenty of women in the world. What was one dead girl in the scheme of things? That's probably just what he needed. A change of scene. A little female company. A good fuck.
He was a flurry of action then. He pulled the linens from their bed, as well as her lingerie from the chest. He moved to Birdys rooms and gathered all of her belongings. He dragged the lot downstairs and to the back lawn where he poured the last bottle of scotch over the the entire proof of her existence. Striking a match, he lit a cigar that was clenched between his teeth, and tossed the small light onto the pyre. He watched it burn until it was ash.
He showered for an hour. Longer. The scalding water burning his skin, washing away the last scent of her. He dryed off and slipped on some khakis. Barechested, he stood at the basin shaving, and allowed hinself to think, without anger, of his dead assistant.
'Good for you Birdy" he said aloud. "You had some balls in the end, didn'tcha?"
She had always been a conniving little minx he remembered. Always using her PSI powers to get back at him. Always tricking him.
Tricking him.
Creed dropped the razor in the water.
She was alive.
He did not bother with a shirt or shoes. He didn't feel the cooler beginnings of fall as he roared into the woods. He had only one thought. She was alive. Whoever, whatever he had buried wasn't Birdy. She had mind-locked him and left him. And when he found her there'd be hell to pay.
He had no shovel. And the dim light was no guide. But he found the grave by the scent of fresh earth. He used his hands and claws to dig, furiously scraping layer after layer of dirt aside. All the while laughing to himself at the girl who had gotten one over on him. He finally saw the satin shroud peeking through the earth. He stopped. Wordlessly, he used his foreclaw to rip down the sheet from head to toe.
The grey shell that had been Birdy lay peacefully before him, beyond his fury now.
He lauighed loudly, maniacally. Any humans in hearing distance would have been compelled by that sound to cover their children and lock their doors. But this was an isolated area. And from here, his property opened into a national forest all the way to Canada.
He covered Birdy again. He pulled the dirt back on her, shaking his head at his own insanity. He reburied her, or whatever had been her. This was nothing. A body. Birdy was gone.
Creed brushed off his hands. He would go somewhere. One of his other houses. He would take a contract in an exotic place, spend a few weeks there.
He looked in the direction of his mansion. His sharp eyes could make out the shadow of the home. He started to walk towards it. Suddenly the wind gusted, and he shuddered. The mansion's cold stone suddenly oppressive to him. He could not go there now. The walls would be too tight. The ceiling would press down on him. It was a mausoleum.
He glanced back at the woods, and he was drawn to it. He could go north. Just go and move and not think. He would eat when hungry, sleep when tired, and kill when he needed too.
And if regret or sorrow invaded his thoughts he would push harder and further until there was no thought at all..just survival. Just...the moment.
He glanced once more at the gray stone in the distance, and turned away. He walked, then ran towards the darkness of the beckoning woods.