Let's Count Down

There was no hand crawling towards me, holding my shoulder with its long black slimy rigid fingers tugging me back to where my mental hell had lived. No, it was much more sweeter. There was only darkness. Not a frightening darkness, just darkness. Silence. Then I woke up, with blurry rheumy eyes as I rubbed them off and rub it on my pants. Then I realized.

Two years ago, I had lost my virginity. Not to a person I ever loved. I was drunken on booze. She forcefully wanted to fuck me. And then I did. It wasn't pleasurable. But that dream had become fulfilled, and another dream among that. Finally, there was a girl on my bed laying, looking at me with her eyes. Well, this was the first time the girl that I had slept with was ever actually happy. The unknown girl lost from my memories wanted me to get out of the house.

This was the second time that a person has been on my bed. Not the fucking, but just the sleeping. A beautiful woman.

Monika.

"Darling," Monika interrupted me of cocking my head up. "Go back to sleep."

"Why are you here?"

"Well, I wanted to sleep with you, of course."

"On the second day that we met."

"Well, this isn't the second day that we met. It was many, many weeks. Game-wise."

"Real second day, like after the computer decided to shit you out of it."

"Oh," Monika stopped.

"Actually, why did you want to sleep with me? Give me a detailed excuse."

"Darling, I felt that I really needed to be with you, alone together. I really wanted to, but I keep restraining myself. Then, I only slept for two hours at the wake of the day," Monika looked down. "I'm fucking kidding, the mattress was uncomfortable. It's fucking solid, for fuck's sake!"

"Sorry," I apologized.

"It's also because of you too. Mostly your comfortable bed. Let's call it a 50/50."

"I'm getting up," I sat up and put my feet on the floor. Shit spun around everywhere, like I took some crack. Well, I'm just imagining that that's what's happening when you take some crack, I don't know. Never took drugs.

"I'm also getting up too," Monika stood up and crept beside me putting her elbow on my shoulder.

"You look like you're drunk," I walked with Monika, drunken in the morning rays cascading down from the windows.

Groggy and limping, I walked to the bathroom. I grabbed the toothbrush and dabbed on an unimpressive line of advanced whitening toothpaste and start brushing. Monika's lips part, as she was about to talk.

"Darling, I kind of woke up in the middle of the night," she stated.

"Huh?" I slur with the brush in my mouth.

"My breath was whack, so," Monika paused. "I brushed my teeth."

"With your toothbrush," she delivered the final blow.

I spit out the toothpaste and the brush out of my mouth.

"WHAT?!"

"Sorry."

"What kind of fucking sicko are you?"

"I'm not sick, so you'll be fine."

"Where's the mouthwash?!" I panic and swish the mouthwash in my mouth and spit it out rapidly at the sink. I take another swig, spitting it out almost immediately after I swirled it swiftly in the 'oral crevices'.

"We'll need to the essential hygienic items," she reminded.

"Just call it shit that you need to be clean..." I blinked again, rubbing the rheum of my eyes and washing my face aggressively.

"TP, soap, shampoo, toothbrushes, toothpaste..." I listed the basics. Y'know, the basics.

"Sanitary napkins," she chimed in.

"The hell is that?"

"Pantiliners. The pussy's gonna paint the town red."

"Fuck! Are you bleeding?"

"For fuck's sake, you can just call it a period," she rolled her eyes.

"Well that fucking attitude's like you're having one now."

"We also need feminine deodorants, powders, soaps and wipes. And probably a douche."

"Well you have one right here," I joked. "No seriously, what the fuck is a douche?"

"A douche, I learned in Sex Ed-"

"Wait, Sex Ed?"

"It's a fucking water spout that cleans inside ya' candy store."

"Oh fuck, candy store." I blushed.

"Come on, prove you're not a pussy anymore, y'know. You're living with four legally aged women. And thank fucking God you're not thirty years old, cause I was gonna think that you're going to rape us senselessly."

"Girl, what?"

"Guys!" Yuri ran to the bathroom. "Uh... there's some bad news?"

"What is it?" I asked.

"Sayori's having her period."

"FUCKING HELL-"

This was a very important lesson. And I'm glad that I was single before this catastrophic shit.

A sickly crimson blood stain blotched the bedsheets. And it went to the mattress.

"Well, fuck."

"Uh... can I get your underwear?" Sayori asked.

"Sure," I facepalmed. "Don't stick a wet tissue up your..."

"I won't put it up my pussy. Got it," Sayori ran with her hand clutched on her... nether region.

"Well she was brave to say that." Natsuki scoffed.

"Yes... Sayori, hasn't cursed... I think so." I tried to track back in the horrific events of the literature club. Heh. It's all erased. The stabbing and the noose-crafting should stay there locked in a multi-layered vault.

"I'm drinking coffee,"

"Now we have to buy a new mattress, and a new bedsheet," I reminded myself.

"Darling, your bank's perked up again," Monika reminded.

"How much?"

"Thousand dollars."

"Whoa," I paused. "Thanks-"

"Save it. After all, the money was just for you to spend it on us." Monika sat on the couch in a sultry position looking at me deeply.

"Well, that's fucking sad," I inched to the couch, relaxing whilst looking at her. "I also forgot that rent's due tomorrow, and I barely even saved money." I look at her with some guilt on her face. Only some guilt.

"Awh," she inched towards me. "Fuck you."

"Well, you are the cunning linguist," I continued to play the summoned game. The insult game. "The one who insulted me also loved me dearly, and got her panties twisted so soaking wet, as she squirmed and spiraled down to insanity as she plans to kill off the three other characters in the game."

"Well I'm the one who spiraled down to insanity and not just become a failure of a man with a lowly job."

"And I am the one who would've done some shit and not just lash out their anger into killing and go HAL 9000 on the characters."

"What could've you done, Jeremy?"

"Masturbated, probably."

"And I'm not the one who would be disgusting."

"And also I'm not the kind of person that would think about fucking the only man in their house."

"Well, I'm clearly not," Monika blushed.

"Really?"

"How in the hell do you know that?"

"Well, I smelt cum in the bathroom in the morning. The pungent smell of it. And there's some traces on you. And I felt, when I was in the borderline of awake and asleep, you pretended to ride me as I was suddenly erect in the morning," I smirked, remembering an uncomfortable time when her hot breath collided with my cold frigid skin.

Monika's face tensed with beet red. "How... goddamnit." She paused. "Why..."

"I'm not fucking you," I stood up, looking at her with a devilish smirk. "I have human decency. And I'm not the one who would be disgusting."

"Jeremy-"

"That's what you said, right?"

I went away with a grin.

This was a day. My proof of Monika masturbating to me and the fact that Sayori's having her period makes me want to kill the four bitches. And I'll be charged of murdering sweet innocents. My chance of fucking them has turned to impossible to unlikely. Plausible, yet unlikely. Well, Monika did pretend to ride me in the morning, so that's that. Maybe she is just a horny bitch.

She's turning a bit sultry... Maybe it's just a flirting technique after talking to so many walls in her hell. The game.

Sayori turned up with layers of my underwear with fading stains of blood under her pink open laced dress that she wore to sleep. Weirdly The rest of the girls still wore their outfits from the night. It's very comfortable, apparently. Satin and wool. Apparently the night was cold. Maybe it's the bad insulation. Monika still looks hot with the dress.

I think she wore heels in her sleep.

I looked to her feet.

She did.

"Guys, we need to go," I stepped to the door, opening the car with the remote-thingy. Yeah, it's a pretty decent car. No key required. A backup key is provided.

They stepped behind me and walked down the stairs to ground level, running down to my seat. Suddenly, in a blink of an eye, they were right there behind me. Monika at the front.

"That was quick."

They equipped their seatbelts before I could remind them. Well, damn, they learnt shit. I wore my seatbelt, and revved the car in reverse, coming out from the driveway like a mother's vagina bringing a baby out to the world, which is a fucking horrible metaphor. I'm sorry you had to image that in your head... so goddamn sorry. Like I said, this story's narration is like a hybrid of improvisation and scripted.

Wait, did I just say, equip their seatbelts? Sorry... I think the author's going to delete that.

(A/N: I'm not.)

Eagles played through the radio, not the song, whatever song you're thinking about that is also coincidentally named 'Eagles', the band 'Eagles' played through the radio. Wasn't Hotel California, thank God, because it's like November Rain, a new instrumental part stabs you in the back when you thought the song was over. It was something else. Was just slight twinklings of guitar, heavy bass and prevalent drums. The lyrics sounded like the main singer, whoever the fuck he is, was talking about a hooker that looks like a MILF. Or coincidentally was. Talking 'bout her boots. Apparently boots was hot. Judging by the song's instrumentation, it sounded like a hot ass prostitute walked into the saloon, because a harmonica solo just played. The imagination of humans are magical.

Natsuki, fazed by the song's general sensual and a bit sexual undertones had a face that screamed 'what the fuck is this shit, is a sex scene is about to happen'. Kind of like how I watch Game of Thrones with a friend you're trying to impress. Then you stand up and excuse to go for the bathroom. You're leaning on a prayer to find the friend uncomfortable, friend crossing his legs because of a very visible boner or the most unlikely, your friend jacking off to Daenerys getting on with swoony Snow.

Wait... Snow's parents are two different houses, Stark and Targaryen. Daenerys has full Targaryen blood so... shit, Daenerys is his aunt.

Well, never before incest was hot. That happened multiple times.

Okay, back to the real world. Well a world in paper, and you have to paint it with your mind, so technically this world you portray, I ask Natsuki what was wrong.

"The lyrics," she replied back. "They're questionable."

"What she's saying that it's rapey," Sayori chimed back, rephrasing her into a much much worse interpretation of 'questionable.' Well, you must, and I do, respectively, get her reason of rapey lyrics. "Sounds like the main bitch in a brothel came in."

"Very colorful interpretations, Sayori," Monika replied back.

"Is that the period kicking in?" Yuri questioned Sayori. "Like the ketchup in the bun is starting to summon?"

"I'm gonna think, since the pussy is quite the bloody down there, you're going to have to make more violent tendencies and bitchy lashes to us, aren't you?" Natsuki asked Sayori.

"Bitch, please, we're collectively all going to be bleeding down making a pink cunt to a crimson hell." Sayori laughed drunkenly.

"Sayori, that's some surprising language!" Monika scolded her, with a tone like a very 'civilized' mother, the air quotes around civilized obviously put there because the tone of the mother is very scolding but then after some chugs of the grape, obviously white wine, she sounds like a pirate who's about to publicly fuck a giant teddy-bear, hearing his child speak a distinct curse word from like the 1880s. Perhaps like 'toot' or 'jolly bandwagoners'.

"Girl, you cursed in front of Jeremy's goddamn face!" Sayori claimed.

Monika looked at me in disdain as I side-eyed her surreptitiously putting the car on autopilot for a bit.

"Sorry about that," she apologized and put her eyes in the road back again.

"And you and I both know that you like saying the fucks and the shits," Sayori preached again. "I'm guessing that you'd eventually get dirty with each other like him fucking you on the wall as you cling onto his arms digging your nails in and screaming his name so smooth yet so rough three inches away from his ear-"

"Sayori!" I screamed out, ending her rampageous assaults. "You're getting too far."

Silence.

"Huh," I talked to myself. "No backlashes at me. Perhaps I had taught you a lesson after all."

"Sorry," Sayori bashfully apologized.

Monika rolled her eyes. "For fucking God's sake-"

"You too, bitch beside me," I side-eyed her again, autopilot on.

"Well, that's nice, little shit."

"Fuck you!"

"That's even more insulting!"

"And isn't that what you said to me earlier?" I gave Sayori a little snicker.

"Sorry," I apologized at the end.

"Was that argument just to spite me?"

"Yes," I snickered, eyes on the road again, cruising.

"Well, fuck you. And this time for real."

"Oh, that's sweet."

"I'm kidding."

"I know."

Silence.

"This song is boring," Monika, telepathically, went through the radio. Because why would she do it manually? "I'll find something-there it is."

Away from the rapey lyrics, Heart of Glass was playing. Apparently, the radio likes the oldies. Why? Perhaps it's only just one way to relive time. Just listening that music was less weird than consuming Crystal Pepsi, having Dunkaroos for snack, Hi-C Ecto Cooler for tea, and pretending the World Trade Center was booming and alive. The last one was a bit dark. Well, the booming part was true at that cold and bleak September day. For each second when the plane collided. That's even worse, let's move on from that.

"This is better than rapey-town," Sayori exclaimed.

"Whatever," I coarsely uttered.

"She sounds like she's half a bottle of beer," Yuri complained.

"But it is catchy," Natsuki chimed in.

"We all know it's an okay song," Monika settled the debate down.

"At least it isn't giving me memories of university promenade," I commented, with slight memories slipping back in. It faded pretty quickly. It had no association with the incident.

"University promenade?" Monika queried.

"Yes..." I sighed. "I will not tell you about it."

"Why not?" Yuri asked.

"I said... I said so. It gives me hell."

"Hell?" Monika reiterated.

"Don't... mention anything about it. When around me, you never talk about the promenade."

"Why not?" Natsuki annoyingly questioned. For God's sake, I was sick of it.

"I repeat, when around me, you never talk about it."

Silence. Thank God.

A PaknSAVE is a store that caters low prices. And it isn't just unbranded things, it actually sells branded things. While at other stores cheap wine costs eighteen bucks, you can get it at nine. Because they like alcoholics. I'm kidding. But we're going to Countdown, which is another store. Like the Whole Foods of NZ stores.

We went to the not-so-crowded proudly green store bearing the logo and COUNTDOWN. The logo looked like a tomato, but the tomato's body was like a oval W with the tomato's leaf at the top. It was also green. Green, red and white, the main schtick of the supermarket.

I stepped in. The blood-stained male underwear that Sayori was wearing under her lacy dress she wore to sleep was barely visible. But if you see the Calvin Klein logo and grey color, the looks will be given. I covered her at the front with Monika at the back, slightly skewed to the right so she can see. Courtesy.

"This is... a big building," Sayori stated the obvious.

"Don't sound like an alien. People will give you looks."

"Well, we've been to the Sky Tower, so that's thrown out in the contest of size. I know fruits and vegetables and shit like that," she cursed. "Don't treat me like an idiot, Jeremy."

"Sorry," I apologized.

I grabbed a trolley, ahem-shopping cart-from the entrance and just waltzed in to the produce section. "Buy something. Buy vegetables and shit you want to eat," I inched closer to the bell peppers, as I grabbed them, for dinner tonight. It was 11:PM, and we're trying to be as fast as we can before our stomachs very audible grumble and we starve to death, ending up eating just a tiny morsel of a 3-pack Ferrero Rocher.

Monika and Sayori grabbed strawberries, while Yuri waltzed to grab some grapes, while Natsuki grabbed bananas. Weirdly. I don't know if she's going to do some questionable things. Questionable material. I guess tsunderes kind of look hot eating bananas. And I'm guessing she likes those. Dunno.

We waltz, with the girls following suit. I suggested for them to buy something and go willy-nilly in the store, but they didn't give a shit. Passing by the dairy, Yuri and Monika grabbed some yogurt, in two different flavors. Strawberry for Monika and Kiwi for Yuri. That was nice. I'm betting it'll taste rancid and shit.

Kansas has turned upside down.

"Well, fuck me gently with a chainsaw," Monika cursed under her breath. "Here comes Mother Teresa."

"Was that a Heathers reference?" I mutter, before waving at Claire de-fucking-Lune, and we didn't hear that name for a long time. I wish you and I had never fucking did.

"Hi, Claire," I nervously smile and wince.

"Well, darn, you're the one introducing first. Didn't really expect you here," she toyed with her hair. "And look, there's Monika," she stared right in Monika's eyes.

"Yes, that's her."

"I'm guessing these unfamiliar three are the rest of your friends," she applied with air quotes. "Acquaintances, I may call them."

"Basically people I need to live with, but it's fine. Like little children."

"Well, fuck, you are the cunning linguist," Natsuki looked at me like a mother offended by his son saying 'darn' in church.

"Natsuki!" Yuri shut her up.

"Well, damn, you curse very harshly when you look like a prepubescent kid," Claire confidently stared at Natsuki. "Sorry, darling, what's your name?"

"Natsuki," she replied.

"That sounds Japanese, is that right?" Claire queried. "My friend's also Japanese. He's right there wondering in the aisles."

"Claire," a male Japanese voice emanated behind her. The man with the voice was young and was probably in the early 20s. Some acne covered his face. He was pretty beige and was like a normal Japanese male living in a small apartment. He had a Samsung phone clutched on his hand and a Countdown portable basket on the other filled with noodles.

Claire turned around, eyeing the basket he was holding.

"Noodles, again? We just bought noodles at the bloody Japanese shop!"

"Sorry, Claire," he sympathetically apologized. "I like mixing my noodles."

Claire sighed. "That's fine."

"Claire," I pointed out, "You don't treat that guy like your bitch."

"Whatever," Claire rolled her eyes jokingly at me.

"Who's this girl?" Yuri asked kindly.

"Claire de-Lune," I quietly introduce her as I tune out the argument between her and the Japanese fellow. She turned around as I continue talking. "She's a huge-"

"Fashionista?" She interrupted.

"I have never heard of that word," I commented.

"Well, I can be an example."

"Whoa," the Japanese fellow's eyes dazzled. "You look like... anime?"

"Ani-what?"

"It's Japanese animation," I informed her.

"Oh," Claire sighed. "Like Tom and Jerry?"

"For fuck's sake," I muttered.

"We look like anime?" Monika asked.

The Japanese man clutched his phone, with the camera app in reverse. Monika's face was on the screen, and he slowly dragged it to the other girls, giving a full view of their faces. "You realize that, right?" The man asked once again. "You're... you look the same as anime girls."

"Oh, come on, do I have to learn the lingo and the slang of a depressed man in their early 20s?" Claire rolled her eyes.

"Stay out of this shit."

"You fucktard, you little women-excluding bitch, how dare you exclude me!"

"You don't know what we're talking about."

"Excuse me, I can be capable of knowing things."

"If I was a doctor, imagine, and I was in a conversation circle with you in it and another doctor, and said doctor and I talk about our horrible surgery experience, me detailing my patient's severe bullet wound dead center in the pancreas, when you ask something and I say to stay out of it, stay the fuck out of it, because you're not a doctor. You're a Gucci-bag hoarding bitch, who isn't a doctor."

"Whatever," she rolled her eyes once again, and turned around, walking away like a kid who 'takes action in bullying' sort of shit.

"Waltz out, fucking Emma Watson." Might I add that Emma Watson is a feminist and women's rights activist. I tuned her out and never watched the Harry Potter movies again. She is hot, might I admit.

"My God," the Japanese man scoffed.

"Anyway..."

"You do have great points, actually."

"What do you think of her?"

"A little annoying."

"She did not leave a good first impression," Sayori commented.

"She's even angrier than Sayori on her period," Natsuki chimed in.

"You piece of-" Sayori stopped, mid-sentence, aback by Natsuki. She stopped on her tracks. "Actually, thank you. She is a bleeding bitch down there."

Monika laughed.

"A bleeding bitch indeed that bitch is," Yuri started to snicker.

"Bleeding... bitch?" The Japanese guy stuttered slightly.

"Holy fuck, he said it!" Monika started to chuckle more. "Oh, bless you. You don't know what that means, right?"

"I don't know..." The man replied.

I fiddled with my phone and typed Claire de'Lune's name in Japanese. "This is what it means," I clicked the sound icon.

*cue bitch in Japanese*

"Oh my god." The man's face glowed with just red.

Goddamn priceless.