23 - Changes

"Relationships can be so difficult," Asenath said, as she rose and took a step to take up another candle. "What do you do when the fire goes out? How do you rekindle a relationship that has gone cold? I once heard a story of a husband who would do almost anything for his wife...whether she wanted it or not. I call this story...

CHANGES

Mira Beckinworth coughed in the other room. A nasty, phlegmy cough. John Beckinworth and his wife had come out west in the hopes it would help her tuberculosis, but all it did was stretch out the dying into a long, lonely succession of sleepless nights on separate beds. Their marriage in St. Louis three years ago had been a torrent of passion; young and in love, they had little money but all the time in the world.

Then she lost the baby. And the next had miscarried. The wet cough had settled in her lungs, and she grew pale and frigid where once she had been warm and playful.

"I don't know, Doc," John said once to Doctor Grumman. "I can't blame her for not feeling up to it, but a man has needs. I just wish...well, I wish it could be like the old times. When we were first married, and she was hot to do anything, day or night. Some of the things we got up to, back then..."

John gave a chuckle, remembering better days. When her cunt was so tight she would pull the cap off a bottle of beer, and she had shown him how the French girls kissed and how women in prison made their own fun with broom handles, even during their periods. They had tried that a few times too. Mira had split her clitoris falling on a fence rail when she was younger, and ever since then she needed it a bit rough.

"Well," Doctor Grumman said, cradling an empty whiskey glass in one meaty hand. "I might have something."

That caught John's attention. He tipped the whiskey bottle over to refill the old man's glass. "Really? No foolin'?"

Grumman nodded. "I was talking to Doc Ito over on the west side once—professional consultation. You know he's learned in traditional Chinese medicine. Japan to China and then to California, ended up here. He's got some queer ideas what you can do with herbs and powders and whatnot. I was having trouble with a horse that couldn't get in the mood when the stud came along. So he gave me a script, and I went to the medicine-seller they got over there, and he filled it. Little packet of powder, mix it with water. Three times a day. Well, that horse was randier than anything I've ever seen. Damn near wore that stud out!"

John considered that. "My wife's not a horse, doc."

Grumman sipped his whiskey. "Good point. Better only give it to her twice a day."

It took half a bottle of whiskey, but John got the faded script from Grumman's wallet. On the west side of town, the little dealer in herbs and medicines looked over the bit of paper, and considered it solemnly. John watched him measure out bits of deer baculum and various powders, several different herbs, and what looked like small dried organs. At last, he reached for a small urn on a top shelf, and taking it out, emptied the little bit of white powder onto the scale. It was all that was left.

All this was very carefully ground up with pestle and mortar, sieved through a fine sieve, and the bits left over pounded again.

The packet of powder cost John Beckinworth three dollars. But he was ****.

Mira's "night cap" was a sugar cube dissolved in a few tablespoons of laudanum, mixed with water. She swore it helped her breathe easier through the night. John dropped a pinch of the powder in, and it dissolved easily. She was sitting up in bed, beautiful but frail by candlelight, her dark hair grown long past her shoulders. He watched her drink it down, and wondered how long he should wait.

As he washed the glass, she put out the candle. John could hear her breathing in the dark as he undressed. They hadn't slept in the same bed together for months, the heat of another body too much for her. Just the thought of that soft body against his made John hard. His palms itched as he pulled back the sheet—anticipated a row as he insisted on his marital rights—but to his surprise she turned towards him in the dark, and Mira's arms drew him down into her.

John had never felt his wife's cunt wetter than that night. The inside of her seemed to be boiling. It was more than a man pent up so long could stand, and within moments he exploded. If she felt it, she didn't stop. Her ragged breathing, her sweating body rubbed against him with a **** need that matched his own. John could feel her sweat through her shift, and thanked God that his prick remained hard enough for her, even though he had shot his wad.

Until at last she gave a little cry, and kissed his neck.

The next morning, he put another pinch in her morning coffee. As he was shaving, he saw her crawl across the floor, and pull down his boxers. For the first time in months, her pouty lips slipped over his pecker and she sucked him off like the French girls did. A treat that had cemented his love for her on their third date, so long ago. Nor did she blanch or expectorate when the familiar tingle ran through his turgid prick, balls tensing as he stabbed his cok into her throat and emptied himself into her mouth. She swallowed it like a fish swallows a worm.

Then it was back to bed for the day.

Pinch by pinch. Every one seemed to bring the old flame back to Mira. Yet an odd thing happened that troubled John. The more his wife regained some of her former ways, the less of her he saw. The blinds and curtains on the window in her room was always drawn, the candles were never lit anymore. Every time he went into the room, he could hear her wet breathing, but he could never see her. She never went to the bathroom save for wrapped head to toe in a blanket, often crawling on all fours. The atmosphere in the room began to grow oppressive, a reek of sex and illness, and every time John touched Mira beneath the covers her skin was slick and sticky with sweat.

And yet...his cock ached. He had spent more times in his wife in the last week than in the last year. When the powder took effect, she was insatiable, eager, ****. John would feel her wet lips play at his nipples, her hands wander around to his ass—he had never asked where she had learned that trick, but the sensation of a finger squirming up his butthole when she sucked hard on his pecker sent such a sensation through John he thought he could see Heaven and touch the hem of God's cloak.

At last, the powder ran out. John carried her nightcap into the room as usual, but something felt different. He couldn't hear Mira's breathing. No rasp. No wet sucking sound. A gurgle in the pipes caught his attention, and he fumbled for a match.

On the bed, where Mira should be, was a large black stain. The sheets had all been fouled, and the blanket and clothes cast aside. A trail of liquid ran from the bed to the bathroom, and as the match burned down, John quickly struck another and ran into the bathroom.

Something slumped in the tub, wet and black. He stared at it in horror. The smell was overwhelming. The reek of sex, as though he had jammed his head into his wife's bloomers. A part of it rose and reached for his pants, where his cock strained. Small white things fell through the gelatinous flesh and clattered on the tile floor.

Fingerbones.

They saw less and less of John Beckinworth in Dagon's Hollow over the next few months, and Mira Beckinworth not at all. Most imagined her illness had entered its final stage, and by the pale skin and wracking cough John had developed, they imagined he wouldn't be far behind her. At last, they saw neither of them again. The house stood empty, and it was some time before anyone dared go inside, for fear of disease. When someone did, he found it utterly empty of human life—save for the mingled bones of two human skeletons in the bathtub.

Asenath gave a sad smile, and blew out the candle.