Lori slipped her fingers into her hair and tugged in a gesture bespeaking madness. Before her, Lincoln sat in his chair, his body from the chest down covered in thick white foam and his face twisted into the most excruciating expression she had ever seen, his teeth clenched and his neck veins standing out. The flesh of his neck and chin was singled and blistered, reminding Lori (sickeningly) of gooey cheese pizza. The foam was beginning to drip away from his legs, and what she saw made her feel faint: A black, crispy, charred mass seeping blood, pus, and other fluids she couldn't name. Tears filled her eyes and she looked at Lemy. He stood there watching her with wide, retard eyes. Rage filled her. "GO AWAY!"
She turned back to Lincoln, her trembling hands fluttering to her mouth. Oh my God, what do I do? What do I do? Despite being almost thirty-nine, she had never been in an emergency life-or-death situation, and she froze, her muscles rigid and her mind blanking. When the light snapped on, she whipped her head around, and saw Lola, Lynn, and Lana. "What…?" Lynn started, but stopped when she saw Lincoln. She looked at Lori, her eyes widening slightly. "What the fuck happened?"
"L-L-Lemy," Lori said. She was suddenly cold. "He did this."
Lynn turned to him, and he paled. "You dumb bastard," she said, and slapped him so hard in the back of the head that he was driven to his knees, "you could have burned us up."
In his chair, Lincoln flopped his head back. "It hurts so fucking bad!" he screamed, his voice cracking. He thrashed, and began to topple forward; Lori jumped out of the way with a squeak, and he fell face first into the carpet with an agonized wail. Lori dropped to her knees. She was shaking all over now. "C-Call an ambulance," she said, and turned her tearful eyes up to Lynn.
Lynn's face was cold and hard. "No, fuck him."
Lana, standing next to her older sister, glared down at Lincoln's prone form, her brow knitted and her lips scrunched in disgust.
Lori reeled. "Y-You can't be serious. He might-he might...!"
"Let him die," Lynn said cruelly.
She couldn't believe what she was hearing. Lincoln was literally on the floor half-dead and they..they didn't even care!
Except for Lola; she brushed between Lynn and Lana, then knelt on Lincoln's other side. Lori's hope turned to horror when she younger girl reached into Lincoln's back pocket, slipped his wallet out, and then removed a stack of bills. She counted, grinned, and got to her feet. "There, do whatever you want with him. I have a breakfast date tomorrow." She shoved the money into the pocket of her nightgown and started toward the stairs just as Luan appeared. She came forward and started to speak, but saw Lincoln and stopped, her eyes widening and her hands flying to her mouth.
Lori was fighting for breath now. She had the eeriest feeling that while may have gone to sleep in Royal Woods, she woke up in the twilight zone. Lincoln trembled and wept bitterly, like the little boy he was once. "Please," Lori begged.
For a moment, Lana sneered down at him. "We can't afford anymore medical bills," she said coldly, "I'm with Lynn."
"We can't afford funeral bills either!" Lori sobbed.
Blowing a raspberry, Lynn waved a dismissive hand. "Just cremate him. He's already halfway there."
"You're fucking crazy!" Lori shrieked.
Lincoln moaned. "Take me to a hospital," he muttered.
Lynn bent at the waist, her eyes blazing with fury. "You don't deserve a hospital, bitch!"
Lori turned to Luan for help. The younger woman's face was ashen and her moist eyes were large with horror. "Please," Lori sobbed, "call an ambulance." Luan's eyes darted from her to Lincoln and back again as though she couldn't understand simple English.
"If you wanna save this sack of shit, fine," Lana said, "but no ambulances. If they see what happened, CPS will get involved and take Lemy away...they'll take all the kids away. I'm not losing my daughter over this piece of fucking scum." She glanced at Lemy, her eyes narrowing to predatory slits. "Or his firebug son."
Next to her, Lynn crossed her arms. "Why do you even care? What's he ever done for you...besides that bruise on your face?"
Lori's fingers instinctively crept to the ugly purple mark spreading across the side of her head from her hairline and across her cheek; it stung under her touch, and she remembered Lincoln clutching her face and threatening to put Loan - their daughter, his daughter - on the street. A ghostly trace of anger flitted across her chest, but evaporated at the sound of his soft weeping. A very large part of her hated his guts, hated the way he treated her, but a small yet very vocal part still loved him...as both a brother and more. The others didn't understand; she was seven when he was born, and she keenly remembered holding him in her arms, his big brown eyes staring up at her with love and wonder; she remembered feeding him and playing with him and giggling with him when he did something silly. She remembered the chipped tooth boy who, long ago, would do anything for his sisters, even if it meant hurting himself or sacrificing his time. He wasn't always a piece of shit woman beater - he was once the most beautiful person she had ever known, and despite her cross thoughts and words, she spent much of the past fifteen years hoping and praying there there was still a little bit of that boy left inside, and that maybe, just maybe, under the right circumstances, he would grow like a tree in a fire scorched forest, getting bigger and bigger until he was back and they could all be happy again.
"P-P-Please help me, Luan," she trembled, "please."
Luan blinked and a look of uncertainty flickered across her face, then she came resolutely forward. Together, they got Lincoln to his feet and slipped their shoulders under either one of his arms. He screamed in pain. "Tell them he was drunk and trying to barbeque," Lynn said. She snatched Lemy by the arm and dragged him to his feet. "You're lucky I love my daughter or your ass would be in the nuthouse along with your loony sister." She lead him up the stairs as Lori and Luan struggled Lincoln out the door.
"You're a real fucking moron," Lynn told her nephew as they started up the stairs. Liena, Lacy, and Lizy scattered like cockroaches when you turn on the kitchen light; Lynn looked mad, and none of them wanted to incur her wrath. "You ever do that again, I swear to God I'll cut your nuts off and make you eat them." At his door, she grabbed him by the back of his shirt and shoved him in as hard as she could; his feet tangled and he fell with a pathetic retard cry. "Come out again tonight and die." She slammed the door so hard the impact resounded through the house like a gunshot.
When Luna got back from wherever she was, she was going to beat the shit out of her; no, really, she was going to smash her stupid nose in and knock her rotting junkie teeth down her fucking throat. It was her fault for not taking care of her pyro son and her skitzo daughter. She -
"M-Mom?" Lacy asked. Her door was open a crack and her fear filled face stared out.
"Not now," Lynn spat and threw up her hand, "fuck off and go to sleep or something."
The door slammed, shutting off the sound of Lacy's sobbing.
Shaking her head, Lynn went down the stairs. Sometimes these people were more fucking trouble than they were worth.
When the hallway was empty, a door creaked open and a blonde head poked out like a rabbit from its burrow. And like a rabbit, her nose twitched and she sniffed the air; the faint smell of her father's burned flesh drifted into her nostrils and made her eyes roll back into her head. Ummm, I love the smell of vengeance in the evening...smells like victory. A smug smile flickered across her pink lips and she turned her gaze to the door at the end of the hall; a crack of light shone beneath. So Lemy wasn't going to go to juvie. Hm. In that case…
She withdrew back into her room and closed the door. Lizy was sitting in the middle of her bed, a model of the Titanic in her lap; she stared down at it in dejection. Tonight Leia nearly exhausted her supply of pirate jokes, only stopping when Lizy was sobbing too loudly to hear. Welp. There was always tomorrow.
Presently, Leia went to her vanity and studied herself in the mirror, twisting this way and that, her hands on her hips. She wore a simple pink nightgown with a tiny pink ribbon on the chest; the hem stopped short of her knees by a good six inches, revealing pale, creamy flesh. Her long blonde hair was down and spilled over her shoulders like the rays of the morning sun. She wiped all of her makeup off, though. She frowned. That will not do. She didn't care about Lemy's experience so in that regard, she could be frumpy and ugly just as long as she got off, but feeling beautiful was a key component of sex for her...which is why she couldn't really get off from having her pussy eaten. She wanted to see the love and adoration in his eyes, she wanted to feel his gaze ghosting over her bare skin, she wanted to be the only thing that mattered in that moment, to be his world entirely. She was what should matter most, and seeing in his face that she was made her cum so hard it hurt.
She sat, reached for her lipgloss, and applied some, dividing her attention between her own beautiful reflection...and Lizy's ugly one. She had those big, sad puppy dog eyes on again. Well...puppy dog eye. Arr.
Done, Leia applied a touch of blue eye shadow, then picked up her brush and ran it through her hair. She began to hum a tune she heard in an old movie, and Lizy lifted her head, her one eye brimming with tears and misery. Satisfied that she recognized it, Leia began to sing in a low, musial voice:
"Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me
We pillage, plunder, we rifle and loot
Drink up, me 'hearties, yo ho."
Lizy hung her head and squeezed her eye closed; Leia smiled when she saw a single tear streak down the little girl's loved making that little bitch cry.
"Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for Lizy
She's a stupid, smelly bitch with one eye
And she needs to die."
The little girl broke down and wept bitterly, hugging the Titanic model to her chest as though it were a life ring and she was drowning. "Please stop teasing me," she hitched, her voice cracking, "I can't take anymore."
Leia laughed richly. "Oh, boo-hoo-hoo. Pwease stop teasing me, I can't take anymore."
Lizy cried harder.
Satisfied (for now) Leia continued brushing her hair, stopping only when it was beautiful and silky smooth. Should she put on nail polish too? She lifted the backs of her hands and checked. Hmmm, she could, but the echoes of Daddy's screams still rang in her ears, and the heavenly scent of his roasted flesh lingered in her nostrils, and with each passing moment she was getting more and more turned on: Her throbbing nipples poked through the fabric of her nightgown, and the insides of her thighs were slick with her excitement. She slipped her hand between her legs, and her heat washed against it in sickening waves.
Alright, she was pretty enough.
Pushing away from the vanity, she got up and turned, her gaze instantly going to Lizy: She clutched that stupid toy to her chest and rocked violently back and forth, her face white and drawn like that of a corpse. What a weirdo! "You're a fucking freak, you know that?" she asked.
Lizy didn't respond.
"Your mom should have aborted you."
Back and forth, back and forth. "You're like One-Eyed Willy from The Goonies, only uglier. No boy will ever want to have sex with you. Not even Lemy."
Rock. Stare. Stare. Stare.
Rage bubbled in Leia's chest. Lizy was so fucking pathetic she just wanted to march over there and strangle her; the thought of crushing her sister's warm, pulsing throat, and of watching her life drain from her one good eye made her heart race and her pussy ache. "The only thing you'll ever have inside of you is that stupid ship."
God, not being fucked sounded like a fate worse than death.
And Lizy deserved it. She was rocking even faster now, her eye big and empty. She looked like she was one insult away from imploding on herself. Good. Leia put her hands on her hips, bent slightly at the waist, and sneered. "No one will ever love you." She snorted. "Not that anyone does now."
Lizy's eye began to leak, but her expression remained unchanged. Leia blew a raspberry. What a pitiful waste of fucking life. You know how Leia knew there was no God? If there was, Lizy would have wounded up a wad of bloody toilet paper floating in the commode.
Whatever; she was really horny, and messing with Lizy would have to wait. "I'll deal with you later," she said disgustedly, and left the room, her bare feet padding on the carpet. Behind her, Lizy's eye blinked, and in it was something hard, something fiery.
Something like hatred.
Lori sat nervously in a waiting room off a tile-floored hall, her arms crossed over her thin frame and her fingers unconsciously rubbing circles in her pallid flesh. Her eyes were bloodshot, her hair was messy, and her lips were a tight white line across her wan face. Next to her, Luan clutched her purse and stared straight ahead. She was vigorously chewing her bottom lip, something she only did when she was nervous. A wall-mounted TV played unwatched, a rerun of Three's Company: John Ritter wore shorts so tight his bulge was clearly visible, while Don Knotts wore orange pants and an orange shirt with a funky seventies print. Lori glanced up at the screen, then away when the audience laughed at something John Ritter said.
It was almost like they were laughing at her.
At Lincoln.
She took a deep, shivery breath and looked around. Was it just her or were the walls getting closer? The air was heavier than it should be, harder to breathe, the smell of disinfectant turning her already nauseous stomach. There was something else under it, something sickly sweet that she knew, but didn't want to name: The odor of Lincoln's charred flesh.
Bile rose in her throat, and she swallowed it down. She remembered picking bits of blackened skin off of her shirt in the bathroom, and a sob escaped her trembling lips. Her hand went to her forehead and she fought to keep herself from breaking down, winning, but just barely.
She picked her phone out of her lap, swiped her thumb across the screen, and checked to see if Luna had texted her back.
Of course, she hadn't. The funny thing was, the word READ sat under Lori's text like a flashing neon narc. Your son set Lincoln on fire. We're at hospital. Luna saw...she just didn't give a fuck, she was having a grand old time shooting up and sucking Chunk's dick, why would she let her kids, or Lincoln, or anything else intrude?
Deep in her heart, she still wanted to love Lincoln, but she did not want to love Luna; of all her sisters, Luna was literally the most selfish, uncaring, and...well, no, that title belonged to Lola now. Her brother, the father of her daughter, was lying practically dead at her feet, and all she could think of was raiding his wallet. Oh, oh, actually it was Lynn. Let him die. Her brother, Lacy's father...how can you be so callous?
Tears filled her eyes, and she wiped them away with the heel of her palm. She picked her phone up, swiped, and checked even though it hadn't buzzed or chimed. Nope. No Luna. READ stared mockingly back at her. I see but I don't care; I see but I don't care; I see but I don't care.
No one cared. No one cared about Lincoln or the kids of each other or anything but themselves. Once upon a time, they did - they were a happy, loving family and they always tried to do the right thing, even if they didn't always succeed. No one's perfect, especially when you're a kid. They fought, they bickered, and sometimes they even took advantage of each other, but they never did it with malicious forethought, and when they realized what they'd done, they did something about it. Now? Ha! Now everything was so screwed up that none of them gave a single flying fuck that Lincoln was set on fire.
He wasn't perfect - he was a real prick sometimes - but he was still their brother, he was still their kids' Dad, they still made love to him...didn't any of that count to them? How can you feel so coldly for someone you've been with? Someone whose body, whose spirit, was meshed with your own? Even if he's like Lincoln, how could you?
Something was wrong with them. All of them. Herself included. The kids, the house, the fucking street. She said once that she was in hell...she was right, this was hell, a twisted, perverted version of the family she once knew, the life she once knew.
And it all started with her and Lincoln.
It was their fault.
They tempted their sisters like the serpent tempted Eve in the Garden, and now they were being punished. Lori didn't believe in God, but she was suddenly so certain of this that a vise of claustrophobia closed around her chest. It would never end; no matter what they did, no matter where they went, the mark of Cain was upon them, and how can you hide from the wrath of a vengeful God? You can't, he'll find you and smite you into the ground.
In that moment, she felt so helpless that all she could do was hug herself and squeeze her eyes closed. Their fault. All their fault.
She didn't mean for this to happen, though. She wanted her family to come closer together - she wanted her sisters to share in her heady, heart pounding, butterflies-in-the-stomach giddy, happy, love. She didn't want them to all get pregnant and miss out on their dreams, she didn't want Lincoln to be a father for the first time at fucking twelve. She was sorry; if she could go back in time, she'd stop herself from doing what she did, she'd stop all of this from happening. Lynn could go play ball somewhere, Leni could go to design school, Luna could go play music or what the fuck ever...no one would get pregnant, no one would give up their dreams, and no one would grow so bitter and miserable that they could honestly want their little brother dead.
And their little brother wouldn't hit them.
"You think he's going to be okay?" Luan asked without turning; she faced dead ahead, her hands wringing the straps of her purse and her eyes haunted with the vision of Lincoln's charred lower half.
Lori sighed. "I don't know," she said honestly. The fire burned Lincoln from his feet to his stomach so badly that his skin was falling off in wet globs and staining the backseat; he left black skin flakes everywhere, and as they carried him into the emergency room, he dripped blood and pus on the ground the way Hansel and Gretel dropped breadcrumbs. His face was the color of milk, he was hardly conscious, and his labored breathing had a rattling quality that froze Lori's heart. She didn't know...but if she was honest...he probably wouldn't...he was so hurt he was sobbing.
Tears burst from Lori's eyes and she pressed one hand against her face. Luan frowned deeply and glanced at her hands.
Like Lori, there was a small part of her that still cared for Lincoln...not as strongly as her oldest sister, but enough that seeing him hurt so badly, and see her other sisters' unfeeling reaction, disturbed her. Many times over the years, she wished death and dismemberment on Lincoln, but to actually see him in such agony, half of his body reduced to char...she shivered and blinked back tears of her own. Lori was bent at the waist, her face buried in her hands and her shoulders shaking. Luan hesitantly reached out her hand and laid it on her sister's back.
That's how Lincoln's doctor found them fifteen minutes later. A slight black man with a thick mustache named Crawford (the man was named Crawford, not the the mustache), he wore a white lab coat two sizes two big, a tight pair of Chinos, and a rumpled green and white plaid shirt. Lori and Luan both looked up when he came in. He offered them a curt nod and sat in the empty seat next to Lori, turning so that he faced her.
"Is he o-okay?" Lori asked, her voice faint and watery. There was a hopeful note, like the sun peeking tentatively through a storm cloud.
Dr. Crawford nodded slowly. "He'll most likely live," he started haltingly, "beyond that, we really aren't sure. Your brother sustained sixth degree burns to almost thirty percent of his body, and fourth degree burns to another fifteen. He's lucky to be alive."
Lori blinked in confusion. "Sixth degree?" She thought burns only went up to third degree.
Dr. Crawford nodded again. "Sixth degree burns are the most severe. Let me put it this way: People are like onions. They have layers. Fire burns away those layers, starting with the epidermis. The more intense the fire, the deeper it goes. Sixth degree means that the fire...the fire burned bone. Lincoln's legs were the most badly affected area, and we were forced to amputate them."
Lori's hand flew to her mouth and a strangled sob escaped her lips. Beside her, Luan went entirely white.
"He's not out of the woods just yet," Dr. Crawford said, "and...from here, it's going to be a long, arduous road to recovery. And things, I'm afraid, won't be the same at the end of it all."
No, Lori figured, they wouldn't be. Just when you think things can't possibly get any worse, they do.
They always fucking do.
Leia slipped into her brother's room and softly closed the door behind her. He was curled up on his side and facing the wall, golden lamplight falling across the bed and casting him in muted warmth. He glanced at her, then turned pointedly away, scooting closer to the wall like a dog on the arrival of a cruel and hated master. Leia's lips peeled back from her teeth in a hateful sneer. What the fuck was that about? He acted like she kicked him or something rather than giving him the best sex of his life. Ungrateful little 'tard.
A rush of anger came over her, but she pushed it away. "Hi," she said, trying to sound sexy but sounding strained and annoyed instead.
Lemy curled up tighter, his knees touching his chin.
"What the fuck is your problem?" she snapped.
He grunted in defiance.
She started to stalk forward, intent on clawing his eyes out and turning him into Lizy-with-a-dick, but she stopped herself and took a deep breath. Serenity now. "What is wrong?" she asked.
"Got Lemy in trouble," he said sullenly.
Leia made a small, dismissive noise in the back of her throat. Was that all? You got grounded...for the night...how is that 'trouble'? If she was aunt Lynn, she would have pulled his pants down and beat his bare ass with a belt until he looked like a Mississippi slave. That aunt Lynn only yelled at him and put him in his room revealed what a weak, limp-wristed, pathetic pushover she was. He set a man on fire! (Well, she set a man on fire, but still). If you can't muster up enough indignation to give him an asswhipping over that, you're pitiful.
Not that Leia didn't know that already. All the grown ups here were pitiful.
Putting that aside for now, she crossed her arms. "I'm sorry," she said, unable to keep the snotty insincerity out of her voice. Usually she wouldn't say those two awful, bullshit words, but she was horny and getting her pussy fucked was all she cared about right now. "I didn't know you'd get in trouble."
Lemy didn't reply for a moment. "Go 'way. Lemy mad."
Leia's face fell. Oh? She pushed herself away from the door and crawled onto the bed, Lemy glared at her but didn't do anything as she walked across the bed on her knees because he was a little bitch. She swung one leg over and shifted onto the side of his leg, the rough fabric of his jeans rubbing her soft folds and making her breath catch. Lemy stared at the wall with a shitty little expression on his face, his brow knitted and his lips tight. She had half a mind to punch him.
Instead, she whipped out the secret weapon of evil bitches everywhere (and yes, she was evil, thank you very much). She grabbed Lemy by the chin, turned his face to hers, and leaned in until their noses were almost touching. "Fuck me or I'll tell everyone you raped me."
He stared at her with the blank expression of a retarded pyro who could barely comprehend how to put his shoes on. Leia drew an angry breath. "Have sex with me or you'll really get in trouble," she clarified.
His eyes widened with fear, and Leia grinned smugly. Got'cha.
"Are you going to have sex with me, or am I going to get you in trouble?"
"S-S-Sex," he stammered.
"Good." She pushed herself up and pulled the nightgown over her head, tossing it aside. She rolled off of Lemy and onto her back, where she spread her legs and planted her heels into the mattress. Lemy sat up and pulled his pants down, his movements slow and robotic. When he was naked from the waist down, he positioned himself between her legs. His penis was hard despite him not wanting to, boo-hoo. He didn't' immediately enter her, though; he looked down at her with that dumb face of his. She flashed and shot out her arm, raking her nails across his cheek. He cried out. "Don't just look at me, shit-for-brains, fuck me."
With a mixture of blood and tears running down his face, Lemy thrusted into his little sister, and she gasped at the sensation of him filling her. She stared him in the eyes the entire time, her arousal rising as his tears came faster, mixing with his blood and dripping onto her fevered flesh. For her, sex was about feeling beautiful and desired, but she discovered something as her sobbing, bloodied brother reluctantly rutted into her: It was just as hot when your partner was unwilling and you wielded all the power. Holding their life in the palm of your hand, making them do what you wanted them to do, seeing the terror and shame in their eyes. Her eyes narrowed to slits as her orgasm hit her, and she fisted the blankets, her hips bucking up and her teeth clamping her bottom lip.
Lemy didn't finish, but that wasn't important. She shoved him off and he curled up next to her on the bed, his body starting to tremble and his dick rapidly deflating, its purpose served. Leia snuggled deeper into the bed, her body quivery and pleasantly warm in the afterglow of her climax. She giggled and turned her head to her brother. He was shaking and crying silently. "That was really good, Lemy...I never thought a fucking retard like you could fuck so well. Hm. Guess I'm not always right." She got up, snatched her nightgown from the floor, and slipped it on. She turned, and Lemy was still crying like a pussy. She rolled her eyes. "God, you make me sick. If it wasn't for your dick, I'd set you on fire."
He quaked like the almost-useless pile of jelly he was. Leia blew a disgusted pfft and left the room. That was really fun - would it be as fun if she did it to one of her sisters? It wouldn't be entirely the same, but as long as the feeling of godlike power came over her, what did it matter? She'd have to see if Lyra or Liena had a dildo or something she could use.
And she knew just the one eyed freak to use it on.