Restraint

When I turned to look, the man in black was already disappearing into the shadows that my spotlight-blinded eyes couldn’t pierce.

More importantly, the girl behind me hung there, no longer balancing on the tips of her toes, perhaps hoping that the pressure on the wrist restraints would stop the rivulets of blood that were rapidly trickling down toward her armpits. Judging by the rhythmic nature of the crimson streams leaking from the long gashes on her forearms, it wouldn’t matter.

As much as anything, I wish that I could say that I saved that girl. I wish that I could say that I called in the cavalry and Maria, David, MJ, Badger, Carter, and fifty Mexican National Guard soldiers swarmed the building.

But I didn’t.

Though her blood smelled so strongly that I could taste its sweet coppery flavor, I had consumed my fill from the peacock woman and I tamped down the audible rumble of my stomach as it rest, crushed somewhere unnatural by my too-tight dress.

I gulped again and again as I stood there, unable to save the girl and utterly unwilling to hurt her further, in defiance of my salivary glands’ manifest enthusiasm.

She died there, a minute or two or ten later.

I turned and glared at the audience defiantly as they released the chains and carried the girl’s corpse offstage.