Her Fragrance (Part Two)

© 2013 David Jasmin-Green

Callum worked until about six thirty when his aching muscles told him he had had enough, and he reckoned the job was just over half complete. He folded over the plastic sheeting on the stairs to provide a not particularly safe passage, there was no point in clearing up the mess because it was going to be as bad again tomorrow. He put his clothes straight into the washing machine and took a shower, vigorously scrubbing the dust from his hair and body, then he placed a ready meal that had been thawing on the draining board into the microwave and buttered some bread.

When he had eaten he watched a documentary and then a film, neither of which he could get into because the self-replicating cast of Sonia's face kept invading his thoughts. Several times he half climbed the stairs and checked where the cast and its near replica had been, and every time he saw nothing untoward, just a perfectly ordinary bare section of wall ready for priming with PVA and papering.

Around nine he took a walk to the Off Licence at the end of the road for a six pack of Stella, partially to quench the mighty thirst the dust had given him but mostly to calm his nerves. Callum wasn't a big drinker, but if he didn't satisfy his craving he would drink endless cups of tea and coffee, which would probably keep him up half the night. It was snowing pretty heavily, something the Met office hadn't forecast, and he thanked God that he hadn't got to get up for work in the morning. Halfway through his fourth can he decided that he'd had enough, he was shattered. That was shortly before eleven. He spoke to his mother on the phone for twenty minutes or so, something he did every day without fail, and then he carefully climbed the stairs and went to bed.

Callum slept like a baby until some intangible something roused him from his slumbers. He was lying on his back, and as soon as he opened his eyes he glanced at the alarm clock, which he deliberately hadn't set. It was three thirty three. Strange, he thought, Sonia had gone through a period of waking in the night when she first moved in, and she claimed it was invariably three thirty three precisely..... He could hear the melting snow dripping off the guttering, it sounded like it was thawing fast, which was a good thing. And he could hear something else, an odd crackling noise that he couldn't place, and it was coming from the hallway beyond the open bedroom door. He turned on the bedside lamp, slipped on his boxers and a t shirt and went to investigate.

It was maybe ten feet from the master bedroom to the end of the upper hall where the light switch was, and as he traversed that infinite stretch of semi-darkness he could hear a noise, a noise like someone crumpling stiff paper. His mind had already mapped out a rough sketch of what he was likely to see, but when he flicked the switch and the stairs were flooded with light he was still shocked.

The first thing he saw was Sonia's face rendered in plaster, but it wasn't only her face. Her head and neck, her arms and part of her upper torso were clear of the wall, her naked breasts were jigging up and down violently as if someone was back-scuttling her and she was flailing around with a pained grimace on her face as if she was stuck in quicksand, as if she was fighting something, something that was trying to hold her back, a covetous enemy with a monstrous grip. “Callum!” she cried. “Please help me!” This time Sonia's voice wasn't in his head, he could hear it clearly, only it didn't sound quite right. Almost, but not quite.

“You're not Sonia,” he replied, not entirely confident of the statement.

“Don't be such a twat!” she said - towards the end of their relationship 'twat' had been her favourite label for him. “If I'm not Sonia then who the hell am I?”

“I don't know,” he said, “and do you know what? I don't want to know.” He picked up the broom that was sitting in the corner of the hall, decided that it wasn't even nearly hefty enough and scampered back to the bedroom for the pickaxe handle that he kept under the bed in case he had uninvited nocturnal guests. “I keep this at hand in case I have human intruders,” he said, more to himself than the thing struggling to pull itself out of the wall, “but I have a feeling that it'll deal with the likes of you just as efficiently.”

“Callum, don't – you don't know what you're doing!” the Sonia thing said as Callum started to descend the stairs.

“I know exactly what I'm doing,” he replied. “You're not Sonia, you can't be. If you were Sonia and you really wanted me back you'd call me or knock on the door like a normal person – no normal person would grow from the fucking brickwork and demand to be loved. No, you're something else, something far more dangerous than my cheating, cock loving ex, and whatever you are I want you out of my house.”

The wall around the flailing something popped and crackled as it tried to heave its entirety out of the crumbling surface, out of whatever reality lay beyond and into this one. Callum aimed for the back of its head, but the body twisted at an impossible angle and it caught the stout length of ash in its small but surprisingly powerful hands.

“Thanks, Callum,” the Sonia thing said, smiling up at him, its voice dropping several octaves. “That's just what I need, a helping hand, a bit of leverage to get me out of the fucking sewer I'm trapped in – you have no idea what it's like here!” The thing gritted its teeth and pulled on the pickaxe handle that Callum was still holding with all its might. It ground upwards through solid masonry and heaved with tremendous effort, and all of a sudden it fell on top of him in a shower of dust and plaster. “Success!” it screamed. “I'm out now, twatty, and it's time to stop pretending. I'm free, and you're all fucking mine!”

Callum and his small yet unbelievably heavy and powerful adversary bounced and rolled down the stairs as one, and when they came to a halt at the bottom the monster was on top and Callum was winded. “I've got you now, twatty,” the thing growled, its grossly contorted face inches from his. “Can you not feel me fleshing out as I feed on your delicious terror? Can you not see the difference in me already? I haven't tasted a drop of your blood or feasted on a single morsel of your succulent flesh yet, but I feel strong and alive and free.”

The things eyes rolled in their sockets, and though they still looked dry they had pale blue corneas just like Sonia's eyes. It made a grab for Callum's neck, and he could feel a trace of warmth surging through its powdery fingers. Letting go of the pickaxe handle was a big mistake, though, and Callum brought it up with all of his might, hitting the creature under the chin. It leaned backwards, stunned, and he managed to buck it off him and scramble to his knees.

The Sonia thing was too quick, and in a flash it was upon him once more, wrapping its arms and legs around him, its mouth opening impossibly wide in an ear to ear grin. Strings of saliva hung from its wicked pointed teeth, and its hot breath was too fetid to bear. That awful mouth closed on Callum's face, he could feel an enormous pressure on his cheekbones and jaws as the monster's huge masseter muscles began to grind bone and flesh to a bloody pulp. “No!” he cried, desperately scratching at his aggressor's eyes, and the thing silently said 'Yes, yes, YES'.

*************************

Callum woke with a start, a cold sweat seeping out of his sodden scalp. “Thank fuck!” he grunted. “It was just a bloody nightmare.....” There was a pressure on his lower body, though, and something warm was curled up down there. He had an erection, and small hands were expertly manoeuvring it. He felt something that he hadn't felt in a long time, the feeling of his dry, blood engorged glans slipping into a wet, hot mouth. 'Shit,' he thought. 'How much did I drink last night? Did I really stop at four cans, or did I neck the lot and then reach for the Jack Daniels to drown my sorrows? Did I go down the pub afterwards and pick up some cheap strumpet?'

He reached out and flicked on the bedside lamp, the dim light revealing a sizeable lump beneath the duvet. When he threw the bedding back Sonia was greedily sucking on his cock, a flesh and blood Sonia, not her plaster counterfeit, or so he thought. One of her hands massaged his balls and she looked up at her lover, managing a smile with her mouth deliciously full before slowly retracting her head, and his aching tool slid out with a loud, wet pop and slapped down on his belly. “Hi, twatty,” she said in the not quite Sonia voice. “I'm home.....”