Okay, Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk. I know, I know, I don't own it. No need to get possessive.
Here's the part you've all been waiting for, you dirty-minded people, you ;)
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CHAPTER 11: My Empire of Dirt
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"I hurt myself today to see if I still feel. I focus on the pain, the only thing that's real. The needle tears a hole; that old familiar sting. Try to kill it all away, but I remember everything…"
-Johnny Cash, 'Hurt'
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Resting against the door that she'd firmly shut behind her, Violet took a deep breath, attempting to steady herself before she gave in to her trembling knees and fallen into a heap on the floor.
She'd almost gone too far this time.
With all of the burning resentment that had begun to fill her over the past year, her outlet for all of that unresolved emotional need and pain being left unsoothed and neglected had been close to being… dare she say it? Dare she admit it to herself?
She did.
It wasn't enough anymore.
Standing under the unflattering bathroom lights in front of a mirror as she watched herself tear her own skin open over and over and overandoverandoverandoverandover… it wasn't enough. She no longer awaited the cool slide of the metal over her wrist and under her skin with a sick sort of anticipation anymore. She wasn't hypnotized as fat, red droplets of blood dripped lazily onto the cold white ceramic of the sink any longer.
It wasn't enough to just have a reminder of the control that she so wished she could believe that she still had over her life.
It wasn't a reminder; it hadn't been since she'd moved into this god-forsaken house. It was a lie.
There was no such thing as control in Murder House. There was only indulgence and excess of the most taboo sort, tinged with a shade of ever-present mourning for the many that had died in this place yet never stayed dead.
Fingering the bandages she'd carefully wrapped around her arm, wincing as she did in a show of surrender, Violet pushed herself away from the bathroom door, stumbling back to her room as she wasn't steady on her feet yet.
The rush of terror at the acknowledgement of her loss of control came similarly to the tide of adrenaline brought on by a roller coaster ride or a near brush with death. And so very near it had been.
She'd spent a good thirty minutes after her initial slew of placing self-inflicted injuries in a neat pattern along her inner forearm staring almost longingly at the blade, contemplating with utmost seriousness the idea of running it along her delicate pale throat. So delicate. It would be all too easy to stand there, under the harsh lights in front of the mirror that no longer helped her remember what it felt like to have some small measure of freedom, watching as her neck would weep deep red in a gush of finality.
But in the end, she'd deliberately put down the sharp piece of metal with a shaking hand, silent tears flowing from her wide, brown eyes while she ducked under the sink and retrieved the first-aid kit.
Violet finally made it into her room, flopping down on her bed and throwing her uninjured arm over her eyes. The action made it feel as if all of the tension deeply seated in her small frame was slowly leached away by the comfort and familiarity of her own bed. In that small moment, she felt as if she was once again blissfully unaware again.
It didn't last long.
Sensing the return of the heavy burden she once again had to shoulder, she got to her feet, throwing open her closet and searching for something that would conceal the extra bulk of the ace bandage she sported on her left wrist.
Tate had promised her something special. It wouldn't do for him to worry. It would ruin the only night of the year that he could step foot off of this cursed property.
Maybe this had been old native burial land or something else straight out of a second-rate horror film, she mused to herself. Maybe that was the reason for all of the resentment and anger that filled these walls.
She'd barely finished pulling on her cardigan when she heard a quiet 'ping' on her window. And another.
Seriously? As if we didn't have enough of the horror movie stereotypes, you had to go for the whole 'forbidden romance' shtick as well?
Romeo, Romeo, where for art thou Romeo?
Geezus, talk about cliché.
Violet made her way over, peering down and seeing Tate, just as she'd expected. Popping her head out, he grinned, motioning downwards.
Smiling despite herself, she made her way down the stairs, allowing herself to collapse into his awaiting arms.
"It's been weird here", she pushed out, avoiding placing pressure on her arm. "My parents rushed off to the hospital, and I heard police sirens outside."
"Well, I don't know about the hospital, but the police do tend to hang around here on Halloween", he replied, looking her in the eyes. "A lot of asshole kids in the neighbourhood. A lot of old people who like to complain too."
Bringing up his right hand, he revealed the darkened rose clutched in it. "I know you don't like normal things, so I painted it black."
Right out of a Rolling Stones song, she thought to herself, a slow smile worming its way onto her face despite her previously terrible mood. "Thanks. You're the first boy to ever give me a flower."
She could almost feel the pride at that statement rolling off of him in waves.
"Come on, I have something to show you", Tate said, grabbing her hand in his own and pulling her away.
She let him.
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Violet knew that she probably shouldn't have left the alarm on when she picked up her cellphone and her mother demanded to know where she'd went.
She was only half paying attention as she watched Tate prance around like a child, laughing as if this was his first time at the beach. She grinned as she pressed a kiss onto her cheek and vaguely promised Vivien that yes, she was safe, and yes, she was having fun.
She hung up, giggling as he kissed her neck this time, pausing as he asked who had called. She answered and he responded with another kiss, this time to her lips, tipping them back in his eagerness.
She didn't resist as Tate began to kiss her more aggressively, even craning her neck so that she could feel more of his lips, more of him.
They were only a few feet away from the bonfire he'd built, a testament to the days when his mother had forced him to attend scouts, he'd recalled wryly, dousing balled-up newspaper with the bottle of Jim Beam he'd brought along as fuel for the flames. The tide continued to roll in, spraying the both of them lightly despite the heat of the flames separating them from the water.
They pulled apart from each other, taking a few much-needed breaths- her out of necessity, him out of habit.
He rolled onto his side, his fingers playing with her hair as she reached into her pocket, retrieving her lighter and cigarette case. She shook one out with a practiced hand, placing it loosely between her lips and lighting the tip. Taking a few drags, she passed it off to him, watching his lips intently as they pulled smoke.
Tate pulled himself up, wrapping an arm around her and pulling her to the same position, keeping her close to his side.
"You know", he began, pausing to take another pull from the rig before giving it back to her. "I used to come here."
Violet knew exactly what he meant by that. When he was still alive.
"When the world closed in and got so small that I couldn't breathe…" he continued, his eyes fixed dead ahead on the crashing waves. "And I'd look out at the ocean… and I'd think, 'Yo, douchebag. High school counts for jack shit.'"
The bitterness in his words tore at her, yet she remained silent and immobile, waiting for him to exhaust his anger.
"Kurt Cobain, Quentin Tarantino, Brando, DeNiro, Pacino…" he turned to look at her. "All high school dropouts."
It was when Tate smiled that she knew that everything was going to be okay. It didn't matter that he was dead. It didn't matter that her parents were selfish and oblivious to their own shortcomings. It didn't matter that she no longer had control.
"I hated high school", he admitted. "So I'd come here and look out at this vast, limitless expanse. And it's like, 'that's your life, man; you can do anything, you could be anything.'"
He wanted to say so much more. He wanted to remind her that this part of her life wouldn't last forever and that it was all bullshit. He wanted her to realize just how messed up he was, just to see if she'd stay. He wanted her to know that he was a monster, but he didn't want to have to tell her what she should already know.
It was then that Violet kissed him.
Time seemed to freeze as Violet pressed her lips to Tate's. She savoured the taste of whiskey, smoke and spearmint as his tongue danced with hers. For a ghost, he was surprisingly warm and his body settled comfortably close.
She felt so alive- she could almost feel the revulsion most would at knowing that she was kissing a dead man, but she couldn't bring herself to care. Tate was REAL, and that was all that mattered. In her mind, this was right. Now was right.
Violet ran her fingers through his hair, grasping and tangling at messy blond curls.
It was beautifully violent. Teeth nipping and tearing at frenzied lips. His hands running all over, everywhere at once.
She tugged. Hard.
Suddenly, Tate groaned and pushed her back, his own body following with hers as she fell back onto the sand. He surrounded her even more in his heat and the smell of him.
This wasn't some fairy tale romance.
Violet knew deep down inside that their relationship would be tragic. She knew it from the very first time she laid eyes on him.
They weren't Romeo and Juliet; one horny on the rebound and the other so young and VIRGIN that it hurt. No, they would last. They would outlast their tragedy and ram through the glass roof of the future until there was nothing left for them to run on.
It didn't matter if they were one part unstable and two parts desperate. They. Were. Perfect.
For each other.
In that moment, it didn't matter if Caspar the Friendly Ghost and Janis Joplin were playing tonsil hockey. It didn't matter if Manson and Addams danced tongues.
Because they were free to exist and do whatever the hell they pleased.
So of course they weren't gentle with each other.
They were like savages, trying oh so desperately to get what they wanted. The only difference was that they knew that the other wanted the exact same thing.
They were rough.
"Oh god", Violet murmured, sighing as Tate continued to kiss and bite his way down the side of her neck. His hand was traveling up her shirt at an alarming rate, and there was only one thing she could think to say.
"Oh god."
She knew she shouldn't.
How this was five billion types of wrong. This was necrophilia in a less literal way. But even then, it was too clear that this was not right. But it still felt so good.
Violet pulled harder on his hair, letting a quiet moan escape when his fingers reached the underwire of her bra. They pushed their way up, up, up until his hand was firmly under the cursed thing she wore only because she didn't want saggy tits. He pinched and pulled at her nipples, rolling them between his thumb and forefinger.
This felt so much better than when she did it.
She let his hair go, one hand scrambling to pull his shirt off and the other reaching for his neck. She kept his lips planted on hers all while she attempted stripping him. Not her brightest idea.
His sweater caught on their chins and he let loose a groan of disappointment before he moved away to shuck his shirt in record time.
And then he was back, running his hands along her thighs.
The heat that had risen from her toes reached her head, causing the feeling of clothing on her skin to become so much more uncomfortable than nudity. She frantically twisted away from her cardigan and began to tear at her shirt, gasping as Tate's fingers dug into her lower back.
Violet finally managed to free herself from the constricting confines of her top, left in nothing but her skirt and her bra. It didn't matter that her bandage was exposed. Both of them were far too distracted to notice.
Tate's eyes devoured her almost bare form like a starving man would a good meal. That's how he looked- starved of intimacy.
It was too late to turn back. Both of them knew, and it scared each of them for different reasons. Her because of his nature, the thing that had caused her to doubt her feelings, as well as the loss of the last dregs of her innocence. Him because of the emotional commitment that such an act would demand from him, and the fear of what he was capable of. But even so, they pressed on, her arms reaching up and wrapping around his neck to pull his mouth back to hers.
They collided yet again; two falling stars set on a path to mutual destruction.
Her fingers traced patterns on his bare abdomen while the hand he didn't have on her breast was sliding towards her hip.
Tiny moans escaped her lips when they weren't touching his own.
Tate's rough fingers continued downwards, pushing down her skirt and skimming over her panties.
Violet's nails raked down his back, her hands grasping at his shoulders and forcing her pelvis closer to his.
This was better than either of them could have imagined, sick fantasies fuelled by teenage hormones in the dead of night when no one could hear their heavy breathing. In, out. In, out.
"Tate", Violet gasped when she realized that his fingers were only teasing, brushing against her most private place only to retreat, dancing along the inside of her thigh. But he only kept his touches lighter than air and barely there while he spoke in a husky voice, "Beg for it."
She knew all too well that this moment was inevitable. The moment in which he took control and she just let him, going along with his every whim. And that was all okay now. So long as he finally fucking touched her properly.
"Please, Tate", she pleaded, moaning a little. "Please do it."
"Do what?" His question demanded an answer and was spoken in a rough whisper as he leaned his head down to lick at her nipple.
"Please, touch me. Fuck me. Make love to me." His hand ventured closer.
"Which one? Which one do you want me to do?"
He began to suck at the pale skin of her breast, biting and tonguing the spot where he intended to leave his mark.
"All of them, Tate. Do all of them to me."
It was as if she had opened up the floodgates on a dam ready to burst.
Tate made short work of her skirt and nearly ripped off her bra, pulling off his own pants. All of it took less than five seconds.
Now, they each possessed exactly one article of clothing remaining on their bodies. It was only a matter of time before they disappeared too.
His index, so long compared to her own small fingers, teased at the place where no other person had been before. He could feel how slick she was and let loose a low groan of anticipation as he softly ran his finger over her folds. It was as if his touch was flint, simple contact producing sparks. And she was the blazing bonfire, lit by him and him alone.
"Christ, Tate", she moaned, her hand sliding down from his shoulder, tracing the tight muscles of his abdomen and then following the fine line of hair down his belly button. She paused at the waistband of his boxers, running her nails just under the elastic only to remain stationary.
All the while, Tate was still taunting her with the smallest shreds of pleasure. He refused to continue on properly, only sliding a single finger along her slit, keeping far away from her clit and entrance.
Violet whimpered, rolling her hips in a desperate attempt to receive relief from the fire burning in her stomach and between her thighs. She could feel her juices dripping along his finger as he traced circles along her lower lips. His smirk was sinfully beautiful enough to draw more wanton sounds from her as he stroked at her core.
He held everything in her in the palm of his hand, and here he was, toying with her. It wasn't enough. He needed more.
Of her touch. Of her scent. Of her submission.
Of her surrender.
"Please, Tate, please", Violet pleaded, five seconds away from reaching down and finishing the job by herself. She was far too turned on to stop now.
"I'm begging you."
That was all he needed.
He applied the barest of pressures upon the slick little nub that brought her so much pleasure. As she writhed against his hand, Tate took the opportunity to slide a single long finger inside of her.
It felt more like relief than anything else.
And then he started to move his hand.
There weren't words to describe it. There just weren't.
All of that inoutinoutinout and the flick of his wrist and-
Her mind went blank as he curled the finger within her, smirking as he slid another in to keep it company.
Something in Violet's mind snapped, much like a rubber band.
She'd had more than enough of her half-hearted and fearful attempts at making him feel something even remotely close to her own level of sensation in that moment.
Her fingers, which had been flirting with the waistband of his jeans, shifted to fumble clumsily with his belt buckle.
'I swear, I will go back in time and murder whoever came up with the idea for the belt before they made it', she grumbled to herself.
This pulled a chuckle through the haze of hormone-fuelled need in Tate's mind.
His focus sharpened and he began twisting the fingers within her with a calculated intensity.
Violet all but squealed, finally succeeding in tearing his belt open, now busying herself with the button of his jeans. All of the dexterity had fled her fingers the moment his had entered her. Tate himself was growing impatient with her clumsy fumblings, and would have taken over and stripped his pants off on his own, but then he remembered with a smug smirk that his hands were otherwise occupied. In fact, they were currently responsible for her lack of motor skills.
He allowed himself a short moment of rather strong pride before he returned his attention to the task at hand.
They were so immersed in each other; drowning in the shallow pool of their emotions.
They were at least honest enough to admit that to themselves. They'd known each other for barely two months, and maintained their secrets safely locked away and guarded fiercely from the other. There was no true depth to their relationship. It was barely even a relationship at that.
But they were driven by the hormones floating about in their systems, urging them to participate in the act of copulation. This wasn't some declaration of love or the cementing of their commitment to each other as it was for normal people.
No, this was the product of a dead guy who hadn't gotten any in seventeen years and the depressed sixteen year-old outcast who had never gone past second base.
But it was right for them, right in that moment.
All of their attention focussed on a specific task- her on getting those goddamned pants off while trying not to succumb to pleasure and him on providing said pleasure.
Of course, there was the voice in the back of Tate's head hissing 'don't do it, psycho, you twisted fuck'. Violet's own reminded her of the fact that, a) she wasn't on any form of birth control/didn't have a rubber and b) HE WAS FREAKING DEAD.
They went ignored and overlooked in favour of the promise of sex.
In fact, something-someone might have also gone unnoticed if not for the loud throat clearing they seemed to be engaging in.
"Ahem, ahem."
Dolores Umbridge had nothing on this guy.
Swearing even more offensively than Constance on a bender, Tate looked over to the source of the offending noise. "What?"
At the sight of the person before him, all of the frustration and annoyance he'd placed into that word drained away, as did all of the blood in his face.
Before him, arms crossed and face resembling that of the victim of a wildcat mauling, stood Larry Harvey.
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Yes, I know, I didn't go through with the whole thing, but there is a very, very good reason for that. This scene was also very important to the plot, as it instigates a major event later on.
There WILL be a full M scene later, so don't fret.
(I am also so excited for Coven that I just can't express with words- gaaaaaah xD)
Readers: Love ya, don't know what I'd do without you.
Favorites/Alerts: Love you guys so, so much. Almost as much as I love chocolate. And that's saying something.
Reviews:
jandjsalmon: I hope I've made the M scene something with a bit of substance :) The darker bits will in fact be a product of this particular scene, and I hope that you enjoyed it :D
vixenXfreezepop: Happy (really, really) belated birthday :D Tate's hate of what he is is only just beginning, because trust me, shit will go down, and soon. And it's no problem, I'm just happy that you enjoyed the last chapter so much.
So, I hope that you all like this chapter and hopefully I will in fact update before my semester ends xP
Peace out,
Merida