"Brigitte Snaps Back"
Chapter Six
"They All Do It the Same"
Ginger's burial site is easy to find. Sam explains to Brigitte on the way that he buried her somewhere that would easy to find after, just in case the knife to the heart thing didn't quite take. He remembers where he parked before going into the woods clearly: he's left a mark on a tree, a jagged letter G etched into the trunk. Brigitte is glad there weren't any cops around when he buried Ginger (how many times do you have to remember it's not her?) – it'd be hard to explain the blood and gore covering him from head to toe.
Then again, Pam would probably say she did it because he was looking at her wrong.
(you're both my babies)
Brigitte shrugs it off. Pam is a sore spot now. Years of wondering if she had deserved the ire she and Ginger had piled on her, as if to see how much she could take, frustrated by her obvious obliviousness and wondering if there was more to all that... to finally find that there was.
(one more thing you took from me, Ginge, one more thing I can't replace now)
"Brigitte, hey."
Brigitte blinks and suddenly, Sam exists.
"What's wrong? Look, we can just go back, do this another day."
Brigitte shakes her head.
"You sure?"
"Yes." Brigitte says, "I have to see it for myself."
"Alright." He shrugs, "I'm just the guide."
(he's a paranoid drug addict who wants to be the hero)
Sam leads, Brigitte follows.
The digging takes it out of her. The ground is damp, sucking moisture from the air, and it's easy to dig, but every time the shovel sinks in and more earth is extracted from the closed wound, Brigitte feels her heart beating faster and faster. Her head is a movie theater, and it's playing a psychotic mashup of every single werewolf film she's seen, and the common thread binding them: the death of the monster. Every time the monster dies, the corpse reverts to its human form, to who the monster used to be.
Sam is unusually quiet and his silence isn't helping.
In her mind's eye, she sees Ginger lying there, half-buried in the earth, worms slithering across her pale skin, naked, pale, cold, dead but still her, still her sister, still the Ginger she used to play dying games with, still the Ginger she wanted to die with.
(you give up now, you leave me here alone, I would never do that to you)
(but you didn't give up, you gave in, and all I have left now is him)
"This should be it." Sam says, "Nearly four feet. Shallow grave."
Brigitte glares at him through her hair.
"Sorry." He says. He puts down his shovel and gets down into the open wound in the Earth. He starts to dig with hands. Brigitte stabs her shovel into the ground and leans on it. She lets him do the work. Isn't that how it goes, anyway?
Gradually, Sam uncovers the corpse. Brigitte's heart is a war drum, sounding the alarms, hailing the arrival of consequences. She almost can't even look at the grave, but she knows she has to, so she does.
All she sees is the lycanthrope. All she sees is what the rotting slab of meat used to be.
All Brigitte sees is death, you know, that thing she was once so excited about.
Brigitte returns to the van. She gets in and sits there. She spots his pack of 3 Aces on the dash, next to a red Bic lighter. She lights one up. She smokes three, back-to-back. It feels like inhaling less than air. As she smokes the third one down, Sam emerges from the trees, dragging two shovels behind him. He goes around the van and puts them in the back with the other tools.
Sam slips in next to her and closes the door. She's halfway through her third cigarette. He lights one up himself.
"You did everything you could." He says, "And I do mean everything. Somebody else would've gone down the Remington road long before you didn't give up."
Brigitte doesn't say anything.
"This isn't a pep talk, just so you know."
"Noticed that."
"So... what now?"
(how should I know? why does everyone expect me to know everything?)
"Can you take me home?" Brigitte asks meekly.
"Sure." Sam says and starts the van.
The road is silent. They move through the anonymous background decoration of Bailey Downs, now quiet as a graveyard. Brigitte can practically hear the sound of silence.
Sam parks and follows Brigitte into the greenhouse. Without breaking stride, she heads to the living room, and he tails. She sits down, takes out the pack, but can't find the lighter and ends up checking every pocket. Sam has it. He lights her cigarette, and then his own, and sits next to her.
Silence ensues for a few minutes.
"So." He says, "What now?"
"We play the waiting game." Brigitte says, "The investigation means school's out, so nothing for me."
"Nothing for me, either. Not unless someone needs gardening done."
(without the greenthumb, I'd be a total waste of space)
"...Sam?"
"Yeah?"
"Can I stay here?"
"Yeah, sure."
"Where can I sleep?"
"Well, there's only one bed, and I know from experience that it's not a very good idea to try and sleep on that couch. And from what I can tell, my bed can handle both of us... so, one choice, really."
He looks to see her glare, but can't judge it to be anything.
"I'll behave." He says.
"Thanks..." she replies.
Brigitte slips in next to him and he gives her a generous amount of space on his bed. She curls up in a ball and remembers the nights when mind-fucking nightmares woke her up and she snuck into her parents' bed. She remembers thinking that, whatever shapeless monstrosities were there to plague her sleep, her mother's stubbornness would be enough to kill them all in one fell swoop.
Brigitte waits for Sam to fall asleep. Then she cries.
The waiting game quickly gives way to routine on the second day and they develop a talent for navigating around each other, as well as into each other. Brigitte likes it. She hides her little smiles behind her thin fingers and her hair. Sam's not sure. He doesn't do a good job of hiding it.
The third day is vague, indistinct. For Brigitte, it takes place between waking up and going to bed, both to the tune of Sam's breathing. For Sam, it takes place between the burning in his throat from the last sip of rye and the last cigarette, and the burning in his throat from the last sip of rye and the last cigarette.
The fourth day is when Brigitte wakes up to the heavy, sharp smell of 3 Aces in Sam's hair, mixing with the semi-clean scent of the pillowcase and the faint whiff of rye whiskey, and finds herself liking it. Finds herself sporting what she thinks may be a genuine smile. Finds the pain of Ginger's absence less – it's still there (sisters, we're forever) but it feels lighter, somehow. She feels a warmth in her stomach and worries that she's coming down with something. When she listens to him breathe, she understands. He's alive. He's alive and with her, and she's alive, too.
The fifth day is when Sam, upon returning from the very strange job of trimming someone's bonsai with what he thought was a pair of nail scissors, finds Brigitte in the living room, curled up on the couch, asleep. He's surprised at how sudden the urge to just grab her, slam her to the floor and fuck her brains out is. He drowns it out in half a bottle, four cigarettes, and a shuffle. He returns later to fulfill his other need – to throw a blanket over her and hope not to disturb her sleep. Perhaps, he thinks, it's because when she's asleep, she curls up in a ball, tucks her hands under her chin and breathes softly and so she looks vulnerable. Like she'd break if he touched her. So he doesn't.
The sixth day is silent. They don't speak. Each one is preternaturally aware of the other.
And on the seventh day, everything changes.
Sam steps into the greenhouse, still trying to shake the week's end off, and finds Brigitte occupying her usual station: on the couch, with a book in her hand. He doesn't quite understand what she gets out of reading up on botany, especially anything about poisonous plants, but she's taken that up, and it's her way to deal, he knows.
"Hey." He says.
She looks up from her book with those gorgeous green eyes...
(why? why would you do a thing like that?)
"Hey." She says, "What's up?"
"A job here, a job there. People are still too preoccupied with the whole murder investigation thing."
"Can I help?"
(you don't have try this alone)
"No."
Brigitte hangs her head. That does it for him. He bends down and kisses the top of her head. She tenses up under his lips. He withdraws with the last of his strength and finds her looking at him. Sam wants to say something as they look at each other and silence lingers, to say anything. He's fully prepared to spout bullshit about a completely random thing, to create conversation, to put words in between himself and her... between themselves and themselves.
Brigitte leans towards him, her tongue tied up behind her teeth. Her fingers find his coat, grab the collar and curl up.
Brigitte smashes her lips against his, and control, such as it is, disappears into thin air. She props herself up to her knees as Sam shifts his shoulders and discards his coat. Brigitte's fingertips find the small gaps between his shirt's buttons as one of his hands finds the back of her neck, moves up and grab a handful of her hair, keeping her in place.
She pulls the fabric apart, sending buttons flying everywhere.
Her lips part, and their tongues dance as she rips his shirt open, her strength surprising even herself. But this need that's burning in her, this absolute, urgent, desperate fucking need for the sensation gives her the right of action.
The way he pulls her head back, slides down and with a surprisingly restrained bite, kneads her flesh between teeth, tells her that he has the right of action also.
She shivers with delight, her head starting to swim, submerged in delight, and a stray thought asks: was this how Ginger felt?
Sam takes a moment to rush his way through her top – she lifts her arms and he pulls out her sweater, long-sleeve and most of her bra all at once. She corrects him as he fumbles with his belt. Brigitte takes that moment to remove her skirt, and her panties, by which time Sam is down to his underwear.
She almost leaps out at him, and he grabs her as she licks his neck. He loses his balance and they to the ground. The impact shakes her.
Brigitte stops for a moment, just a moment... before giving in.
(they all do it the same)
Her hand trails across him, and meets his just around his cock. He's on the verge of losing himself, she knows, because he is as hard as he has ever been, and she is dripping with the force of her need.
Brigitte drives her hips down, sinking onto him, sinking him in deep, feeling him drive into her, in turn – it's then that a moan escapes her lips and she finds his shoulders. She lifts her hips up, and drives them down again. She remembers in that moment her utter contempt for this baser instinct, for this cog in the breeder's machine.
They all do it the same, in the end, and so will they, she feels, as his hands lower her onto him and his teeth find that soft spot between her shoulders and neck.
Sam holds her firmly in place, a fistful of her hair constantly in between his fingers, his other hand securing her hips in place as he pounds her, slamming himself again and again and again into her with all of the ferocity his body can muster. It's merciless, basic, ugly and desperate, but teeth clenched, her screaming in his ears and her teeth breaking skin on his neck, her fingernails drawing blood, he gives into his drive, and drives her along.
"Shit..." Brigitte exhales through clenched teeth, "I f-fu-fh-fucking hate y-you... sh-shit..."
Sam screams wordlessly, by pushing her beyond what he can't even feel, that even he isn't capable of and driving her over the edge.
Inside, he's screaming.
(good. hate me. fucking hate me. that's what I get)
Brigitte can feel her body shaking, warmth, beauty and bliss spreading from his point of entry and across her entire body. She clenches on him, grinding, catching him and with small thrusts, invites him along – he stiffens up under her, Brigitte doesn't release, and he comes, holding onto her.
A necessary end to it all comes in the form of hard breaths strung up in a row, and the sense of the world, that had all but disappeared in the rush, returns.
The world recedes, the world closes in, recede, repeat, until Sam finds himself lying on the floor, deflated now and almost too tired to move, a mess... a fucking mess...
Brigitte reels herself in, barely scraping out the parts of her and finds that everything got confused. She's all tangled up, tired and shaking still, a perfect mess.
In the brief respite from the maddening rush of it all, shame crawls back in.
Brigitte looks at the marks on Sam's body, left by her nails and teeth. Small red spots, some of which are actually bleeding a little. Her scalp hurts from where he pulled her hair, she's aching all over... and there's something drying on her inner thighs... the moment freezes and her awareness of what just happened expands and expands and expands until it takes over completely.
Brigitte slowly rises, to her knees first and then, as he tries to squirm out from under her, to her feet. Once she finds her balance, runs out of the room and leaves him there.
Sam looks on after her as she abandons him, then and there. He's still barely coming to, and he becomes aware that he still has his boots on, and his pants are around his ankles. He sits up, reaches down, and pulls his pants up.
There, with them unbuttoned and his belt undone, he listens to the hum of the room, briefly interrupted by the sound of the bathroom door slamming home and asks himself just what the fuck that was.