Whenever my phone went off at some ungodly hour, it was safe to assume that it was Leo. 

We never made plans ahead of time. I rarely made any attempt to establish contact with him first. Mostly because he was difficult, if not impossible to peg down. He had a strange habit of losing (or deliberately ditching) his phone and acquiring a new number to disappear whenever it suited him. It suited him often. But he was the only one who ever thought it appropriate to call me in the middle of the night after weeks, if not months of radio silence.

On the rare occasions I mentioned him to my friends, I referred to him simply as the Vampire. Because I was not entirely convinced that he wasn’t one. There are many other stories to support these theories, but the point I’m making right now is that I never heard from Leo when the sun was up. When I did hear from him, he would reach out to me well after dark on a school night and even later on the weekends. 

This may sound like a classic booty call situation between casual friends with benefits, but it was always much more complicated than that. At least, I believed as much at the time. 

I was only 21. I’d never touched anything harder than alcohol. But Leo taught me what it was like to be so high that I believed anything was possible. Consequently, he also introduced me to the uncomfortable haze of the comedown, and the gut-wrenching pain of a hangover that feels like it might just last forever. Our relationship was a series of acid-dreamlike epiphanies and crashing breakdowns. In the spaces between our encounters, I swung violently between feeling that I was madly in love; that I only truly lived when I was with him; that he breathed life into me in ways no one else could... and that he might just be the key to my undoing. I even found a sort of pleasure in that destruction.

I never considered myself prone to addiction until I started to put into words the ways I felt when I was with Leo.

Every snapshot of our time together reads like a pivotal moment, a tired streak of the moment that everything changed. But now that I've had some time to reflect, one moment in particular stands out above the rest as a major TSN Turning Point. 

It was late, but not too late. It might have been a Saturday night, but I can’t be sure now. I was working as a server at the time, so weekends didn’t have the same weight as they do to people who work a Monday to Friday gig. I’d just finished up my shift for the night and was on my way home when I got a call from an unknown number. I didn’t answer because I was driving. The phone had barely fallen silent when the caller sent a follow-up text message. I couldn’t wait until I got home—I succumbed to the urge to check the message when I pulled up to the next red light.

hello, dear.

My stomach did a somersault. There was no doubt in my mind as to whom this mysterious number belonged.

I hadn’t heard from him in almost three months. Leo explained in the messages that followed that he had misplaced his phone (of course) and that he was back in town again for a bit. If his stories were to be believed, it impressed me that he always managed to remember my number.

He asked me what I was up to. I told him that I wasn’t doing anything and asked him what kind of trouble he was getting into that night.

Through his string of sparse messages, I inferred that he was at a party. He invited me to the house where he had ended up. In spite of myself, I accepted the invitation. 

My nerves struck up when I pulled into the driveway of a strange house in an area of town I had never been. The houses weren’t brand new, but they still gave you the impression that their owners were wealthy and had been for a while. I had no idea who was going to be inside that house. Leo and I had no mutual friends. There was almost no chance I’d recognize a single face besides his. If his face was even there still. I couldn’t even be sure of that because I hadn’t received any word from him since I left my place. Plenty of time for him to disappear again.

I took my key out of the ignition and sat in the silence of the night. My pulse thumped louder and harder the longer I sat there. I focused on the quiet plinking that echoed inside the hood as the motor cooled and it seemed to soothe any unease, allowing the adrenaline to fully override my system. I decided to go inside. 

Typical Me would have knocked quietly on the door and wait to be invited in. That night, I walked into the house with unbridled confidence. 

But there was no one there to greet me. The house was silent, the front room dim and empty. So, I began my exploration of some stranger’s home, searching for any sign of Leo.

The bathroom door down the hall was closed, though a strip of light glowed out from the bottom edge. The shower was running. I heard the faint suggestion of music coming from outside. I deduced that the party must have been going on in the backyard.

I heard a phone vibrate down the hall when I texted Leo to confirm I was at the right place. I followed the buzz past the bathroom to an unlit bedroom at the end of the hall. With the exception of the shadowy furniture, the room was empty. 

Just as I turned back to find some way outside, the bathroom door opened, releasing the hot whispering breath of the shower out towards me. Despite the cigarette grit polluting his vocal chords, his voice was unmistakable. 

“There you are.”

Already feeling the effects of being near him, I smiled at the familiar silhouette in the door. “Here I am.”

“Come,” he said and took me by the hand. He pulled me into the bathroom and I was overcome with the same kind of conviction I felt when I left my car. Before the door could latch shut, I launched into a kiss that had been waiting—always desperately waiting—for months to happen. 

If nothing else, Leo had taught me to practice patience. Because as long as I left the invitation open, he would come and go as he pleased; if I wanted to see him, I had no choice but to wait for him. He always dictated when, where, and how we would come together. 

But that night was different. 

He may have instigated but I felt like I was the one making the decisions. That I was taking something rather than simply waiting to be taken. It was a strange, unfamiliar feeling. But after I got past the itch of that new fabric, it felt… good. I didn't ask for his touch, I demanded it.

We whipped ourselves up into such a frenzy of lips and hands that my hair got caught in the barbell in his left ear. We paused, laughing softly together as I let him untangle me from the stubborn metallic grip. We locked eyes in that gentle moment. It might have been the only time he was fully present with me that night but it was enough.

Once freed, Leo took my face in both hands and pulled me back into his mouth, urging me to take more. It was as if the whiskey that had been fuelling him all night had intoxicated me too. So much so that my knees went weak. He sensed my body waver and dragged his hands down my torso. Cupping under the flesh of my ass, he hoisted me up off my feet. I wrapped my legs around his lithe, slender body. Though he didn’t have to go far to perch me safely upon the counter, his unassuming strength always impressed me. 

He kissed down my neck, pinching the skin between his teeth a little more every time until he found the thick flesh of my shoulder. I loved them, and he knew it, but you couldn’t get away with calling them love bites. He never drew blood but he often came close. My thighs clenched tighter into his sides with every indulgent nip.

I tore my shirt off, inviting him to continue his ardent rampage down my body. He clamped his lips down into the cupped flesh of my breasts. I wrenched down on my bra to bare my nipples to him. Each in their turn, he sucked them in with a force that knocked the wind from my lungs. I did my best to stay quiet. I was grateful for the shower’s attempts to help keep me muffled.

The steam was rising all around us, wetting the air with a feminine power. With his hands flanking the dips of my waist, he pressed his forehead to my womb. Reverent. My ass kissed the cool marble bowl of the sink beneath me. I felt every ounce a water goddess perched on her polished throne, looking down on a most faithful devotee.

He kissed the flesh between my navel and the waistband of my jeans just once and ripped the button open. I planted my feet on the counter’s ledge on either side of him and lifted my hips, allowing him to pull my pants right off of me.

I was still rather self-conscious of my pussy then. At least, until then. But that night in a stranger's fully lit bathroom with this terrifyingly beautiful man literally ripping away the layers of my insecurity to get down on his knees and worship me without expectation? Suffice it to say that I wasn’t worried about much of anything anymore. I had never felt so confident in the natural beauty of my own vessel. I had never felt so powerful in a space that my vulnerability usually occupied.

Leo let out an audible gasp when I leaned back and spread my knees wide; his gaze then penetrated me harder than his cock ever could.

He bit a trail of purple pebbles into my inner thigh as he made his way down. But where his teeth with harsh, his tongue was soft and doting. He unfolded me without haste, licking up and down every bit of my surface before digging deeper. Once satisfied with his survey of the land, he teased my swollen lips apart and drank from my source. The wetness that had been building since I arrived spilled over his tongue and melted into his mouth. He moaned approvingly into me. 

Eventually, he did recoup his unique intensity. And despite his affinity for symmetry and form, I could not pinpoint a rhythm or pattern to his movements. His tongue was a pink blur of chaotic evil between my legs. I’d never been so quick to rise with him.

My hands and feet were planted into whatever solid surface they could find. Leo continued his greedy lapping, licking, sucking, and fucking. All spit and slick and need. The need to give and the need to receive. His tongue was everywhere I wanted it to be. We barely knew each other, but he knew me so well.

I threaded my fingers through in his fine, dark hair. If I pulled too hard, he gave me no indication. I didn't care. I was about to come. I was about to say so when he shoved two fingers up into me. They slid in without any difficulty and after a few torturously slow thrusts, they worked their way up to match the quick, forceful flick of his tongue. 

My back arched involuntarily and I leaned back, pushing and grinding my pussy into his mouth. At the same time, my hips shook, trying to rise away from his onslaught. But Leo dragged me right back down, holding me in place. No escape. 

The pressure of his dutiful push against my pull was deliciously tense and everything I needed. My head banged into the foggy mirror. Not hard enough to break it, of course; that would have been too poetic. Channeling the force of his fangs, I bit down on my own lip just as hard as if it had been him as I coated his chin with my release.

My teeth were chattering so hard that my vision blurred over and my foot slipped out from under me on the marble ledge. I nearly fell off the counter but Leo caught me and held me there while I steadied my breath. Coming down from a mind-numbing orgasm can be a dangerous task without a spotter. I wrapped my arms around his neck, my legs around his belly, and melted into him. I breathed in remnants of his morning shower and memories of past bliss from his hair. I liked the way he hooked his chin on my shoulder and pressed his cheek to my ear. If I listened closely, I could almost hear the erratic frequency of his unspoken thoughts.

When we finally pulled apart, I reached down between his legs, implying that I intended to return the favor. But he grabbed my hands and held them between us.

“There’s no way I’ll get hard enough for either of us to enjoy that tonight,” he said with a soft chuckle, followed by a crooked smile.

Though I was confused, I smiled back. “You must have known that before you invited me over.”

“I did.”

His grin tugged even little wider when he saw that I had figured out that this had been his plan all along. 

“I’m going to shower now. I’ll see you soon.”

I smelled the heady echoes of my orgasm all over him, mingling with the whiskey and nicotine when he kissed me on the cheek. Then he climbed into the shower and disappeared into the mist.

I wiped a space in the condensation on the mirror to get a better idea of what my face was doing before going back out into the world. I was beaded with steam, but that wasn’t the reason my face was so flush. I could just barely make out the fierce grin painted on my face through the fog. I mussed my hair into place and shrugged at my indiscernible reflection. Leo was humming a complex melody from behind the blurred glass when I walked out into the much cooler hallway and closed the door behind me.

Three people I’ve never met—and have never seen since—were sitting on the couch in the front room when I emerged. I’m sure they had an idea of went down, judging by my appearance and the fact that Leo was then showering. But I didn’t even have a flicker of embarrassment. I wore my damp, disheveled hair and dreamy orgasmic glow like a stamp of pride.

“Hey, du—” The blonde boy in the middle stopped mid-greeting when he realized I wasn’t Leo. “Oh. Sorry, I thought you were someone else. Who are you?” 

“I was just here to see Leo,” I said, already at the front door slipping on my shoes. 

“Oh.” The lack of intrigue in his tone felt forced as if he was trying to convince himself that he already knew who I was. “Right.”

“Well, have a good night.”

I walked out and closed the door to cut any further pleasantries short. But I sat in my car in the driveway for a while. My wide smile shifted to a contemplative frown and back again as I stewed in how I felt versus what I thought. 

Was this strange power I felt real? Or simply a product of Leo's carefully executed power plays? 

Did he plan it this way to show me what was already there? 

Does it even matter? 

Despite the testimonials from past minds who swore by the enlightenment achieved with hallucinogenic aids, forcing the logic of our world on an altered reality (in the heat of the high, no less) will only take you down a deeper hole. 

I'll think about this later, I told myself. Right now, I just want to feel.

I nodded this silent acknowledgment to myself and started the engine. I turned on my music much louder than was acceptable for such a late hour in a quiet, respectable residential area. My tires squeaked a bit when I peeled out of the driveway. I deliberately took the longer route home via the freeway because I wanted to feel more of the warm summer wind on my fresh bruises and replay the way the steam kissed my skin while Leo gave me a taste of something that I’d been ignoring for too long. 

Driving above the speed limit down the empty, early morning roads, I floated on my high, the one that always followed my encounters with Leo, when coming down felt impossible, and the tug of the current just didn’t seem so bad. 

The wave washed over me and the darkness drifted away.

comma chameleon. word witch. smut queen.