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Max knows she shouldn’t be snooping in Billy’s room. It’s risky and stupid, and she knows what will happen if he finds out, can already see the bruises blooming on her pale skin if she gets caught….
(Her forearms still hurt from their last fight, when he’d grabbed her and shaken her like a ragdoll, all because she’d had the nerve to tell him to “Go to hell!”, refusing to explain why she was home so late after school.)
It’s dirty in here, she thinks. And it smells just like him. Of cigarettes and sweat and that weird muskiness that she can only describe as something gross, something nearly animal, something crude and macho.
(It makes her think of heat and skin, of forbidden touches, of what guys do all alone in the middle of the night.)
Her heartbeat skitters as she digs through his messy bed, feeling under his pillows and trying not to think about that stuff, trying to block out the images of what her stepbrother might look like splayed out in the dark—his muscles bunching together like when he’s lifting weights, his heavy-lidded gaze distant, vacant, unfocused, mouth twisting into something like pain (something raw, something slack-jawed) . . . or what he might sound like—those heavy grunts he makes when he’s exerting himself, that satisfied sigh when he’s done, the creak of his mattress’ bedsprings as he drops his dumbbells on it with a soft groan….
“Gross,” she whispers to herself, shaking her head as she feels around for the skateboard wheel he’s stolen.
She doesn’t know for sure that he’s taken it, but she doesn’t need to be sure, seeing as he’s always damaging her belongings whenever he feels like it, whenever he feels slighted, whenever she so much as breathes wrong . . . which is pretty much constantly….
(“You know what happens when you lie to me,” he loves to tell her, and apparently not answering his stalkerish questions is somehow also a mistruth.)
Acidic resentment bubbles in her stomach as she rummages through his dresser, feeling around his socks and boxers, fingering the rough denim of his jeans and the corded cotton of his wife-beater shirts. Nothing interesting here, she realizes, except his mangy, oil-stained clothes (although somehow it feels weird to touch them, knowing that they’ve been on him, like she’s doing something wrong, fondling his private things), so she squats down to feel under his dresser.
Her fingers meet with a slick, papery feeling. Magazines. She pulls one out, only halfway surprised to see a naked woman on the cover. This is much worse than touching his clothes, she knows, realizing that she has no excuse for snooping on him this much, understanding that she should shove the ‘nudie-mag’ (as all the boys at school jokingly call them) back under the narrow gap of his dresser, the space between carpeted floor and hardwood.
But there’s something about the way the model looks that sets off a little alarm bell in her mind. (It kind of looks like her, if she were a handful of years older, if her breasts and hips were to fully grow in.)
That’s stupid, she tells herself, and more than a little paranoid—but she’s not able to put it back where it belongs, fascinated that Billy has obviously ‘read’ this one a lot; the cover is smudged with oily fingerprints, the glossy paper crinkled, the thin spine worn.
Maybe he’s read them all a lot though.
It gives her a squirmy feeling to think about what he does as he reads them, but she just has to be sure. Carefully she pulls the next one free, and then the next one, tugging them through the slit, and staring in bewilderment as each cover shows a petite red-head. The uncomfortable pit grows inside her. It’s not even the same girl—but many different young models who all look alike—each one freckled and demure, with porcelain skin and big eyes, fiery red hair cascading down their backs as they pout or preen…
“So what . . . he has a type,” Max murmurs to herself, trying to calm the jagged thumping in her chest, the sudden wooziness that makes her head want to sway.
Just because these girls kind of look like her, doesn’t actually mean anything. They’re all obviously adults, for one. They’re all paid models, for two. And, lastly, they’re all completely unrelated to him . . . so what does it matter if they all have red hair? It doesn’t mean he’s ever looked at her that way. Right?
Billy might be a violent asshole sometimes, but he’s never actually touched her—never actually made her fear anything but getting roughed up or verbally abused . . . which is pretty much the same treatment he gets from her stepfather, just a shitstorm trickling down, of Billy’s blood and sweat and tears staining her ‘privileged existence’, because he still thinks that she’s the one to blame for being forced to move to Indiana, still thinks it’s all her and her mom’s fault that his old life and California are nothing but a distant memory….
(But that’s not true, she knows, because he was an aggressive bully there, too, getting kicked out of school after school….)
Still, the pit in her gut doesn’t go away as she flips through the magazines, her breath hitching as she imagines Billy thumbing through the pages, a cigarette dangling from his lips, his blue eyes squinting in that particular, investigative way he does sometimes—like when he’s hounding her for her secrets.
(He’d never stuck his hand down his pants when he did that, though, she reasons, biting her lip as she eyes the glistening nether regions of a girl who looks too much like Max for comfort, spread eagle, showing off all that God gave her and even more, a zoomed in picture showing internal pinkness, another after that showing the once gaped hole stuffed with something plasticky and purple….)
Max doesn’t know exactly what she’s looking at—other than it’s something like sex, but somehow even more filthy—or why it shifts the fluttering unease into something different, something warm that tingles in her lower abdomen and makes her overly aware of the space between her legs.
She’s never put anything up inside her before, never even thought it was a possibility (because good girls don’t touch down there), although sometimes late at night she hugs a pillow close to her, imagines kissing a boy, rocking against her mattress with slow, measured precision, feeling guilty as brief rushes of pleasure ribbon through her. Really, she’s only had a taste of whatever the hell is happening in these magazines—but she can’t help but be fascinated and horrified all at once, wondering how often Billy looks at the small stack of smut-rags that she’s laid out before her, wondering if she should be concerned that he might sometimes think of her, but also realizing that it could just be a coincidence, and she could just be overly anxious….
The slam of his door makes her shriek. Her face jerks up to find him towering over her. One of his clawlike hands is pressed so hard into the closed door that she can see his fingertips going unnaturally white, and the low drawl of his voice makes her skin crawl, “What’re you doing in here, Maxine?”
His eyes look too intense, too blue. The same look he gets when he’s beyond angry with her, when she’s pushed him too far, lied too many times.
“I’m not—I’m just,” she stammers, her hands scooping the magazines into a sloppy pile, shoving them awkwardly towards the too narrow gap underneath his dresser. The top ones crinkle loudly. “You—you stole my skateboard wheel,” she whispers shakily, cringing as he stoops down low and bats her hands away.
“You’re ruining them,” he snarls.
“Sorry!” She scoots away, her face going beet red as Billy feeds them back into his hiding spot, knowing that she’s beyond fucked, that he’s really going to give it to her now, his broad shoulders bunched together and a tense, blank, scowl on his face.
Will her mom believe that she fell down and broke her own hands? Or maybe it will be her face? Billy’s always threatening that he could make it look like an accident—that he could really hurt her if he wanted to—that skateboards are dangerous and that if he busted her up some that she better never tell anybody about it, that she better pretend it was all her fault.
“You get a good look?”
She doesn’t register his question at first, her panicked imagination running wild with all the parts of her that might snap under the force of his long fingers.
“What?”
“My porn. Why were you going through it?”
He turns his face fully to hers, his eyebrow quirking. He almost doesn’t look mad. Max knows that it’s probably a weird trick, a mind-game he’s playing, and she hates that she doesn’t have a good answer to give him, other than a flimsy, “I don’t know.”
He doesn’t get up from the awkward squat he’s holding, the muscles in his legs apparent and bulky in his jeans. His tone drops an octave, going husky and low, “You curious or something?”
“I—” Max starts, the blush on her cheeks trailing down her throat, going red-hot and blotchy down her pale chest.
What answer does he want? This situation is so embarrassing that she’s willing to say whatever—willing to take the beating she deserves for trespassing—willing to kiss ass and apologize, even, when her usual smart mouth can’t seem to do anything but curse and talk back at him.
“Yeah,” she admits, looking down at the shaggy, orange carpet (it’s almost the same color as her hair); there’s no good excuse to give him for going through his magazines, and they both know it; there’s no way a skateboard wheel would be hiding amongst the pages, she should have moved on long before now.
“That’s normal,” Billy murmurs, shock going through her as he reaches out and grips her bare knee; her shorts suddenly feel too short as his large hand completely encases it. His touch nearly burns. “You’re at about that age.”
“Billy,” she squeaks.
She tries to draw her leg away as his thumb swirls over her kneecap, but he doesn’t relent, gripping her so firmly that she can’t move away.
(The sensation is too intimate, too alien, too predatory . . . even for him.)
“I could show you a thing or two. You could earn that skateboard wheel back—”
“No!”
“Or I could kick your ass for being in here,” he hisses, his blunt nails digging into the peach-flesh of her skin.
She yelps as hot tears spring to her eyes, her hands flying out to grip his strong forearm, adrenaline rushing through her as his tendons flex under her touch.
I’m sorry, she wants to babble, I didn’t mean to—but it all sounds so stupid and pathetic in her mind that she doesn’t bother saying it. Her wide eyes lock onto his overly intent ones. Her breath comes out in a huff as he softens his grip, smoothing the hurt with a gentle caress.
“You’re wondering why they all look like you, huh?” he asks, smiling darkly at her. “Gotta admit it, Red, but I’ve been curious about you, too….”
She makes a noise, it sounds kind of like “Oh…” and kind of terrified and breathy, but that only makes his smile grow wider, the sharp points of his teeth catching her eye.
He looks like a wolf, she thinks, or a shark (something that will chew her up and swallow her whole)—but he also suddenly looks too human, too masculine, too real. Not some monster in the dark, or even the villain from some fairytale, but just a man, the defined ridge of his jaw standing out, his lanky, muscular build both frightening and intriguing. Billy’s not ugly, by any means, and she’s always known that he gets around, that he’s a sexual being, but none of that ever involved her, none of that ever mattered before this very moment in time—other than the awkward half thoughts she’d stomped down. Now it seems to matter very much, the smell of him and his room, his overly warm touch, heightens her alertness, her senses….
“I won’t make it hurt,” he tells her, pushing his hand up-up-up, his fingers pushing under the leg of her shorts, hot skin burning against her thigh.
Max doesn’t say a word, doesn’t dare move or speak as an otherworldly feeling of unreality sets in. Make what hurt? She knows but doesn’t know (or maybe she just refuses to imagine). She can barely concentrate on his soft explanation, “I can make you feel good. I can show you what it’s like . . . Relax, Max, I know what I’m doing.”
This can’t be happening, she thinks blindly.
When he leans in and kisses her, she’s so shocked that she doesn’t resist. The stubble of his facial hair tickles her skin, but the hot pull of his mouth, of his tongue gliding against hers, makes her choke on her fear. He tastes of salty-sweetness, of cigarette smoke, laced with a sharp, alcohol-like bitterness. He smells of spicy, cheap cologne, of forbidden musk. It floods her senses, sets her head reeling, makes her lightheaded like she might faint.
“You ever done this before?” he teases, his hand pushing further up, his thumb swiping over the crotch of her white panties. “You ever touched yourself—here?”
He grins again as she shakes her head, kissing her before she can pull away, before she can answer.
“It’s fun to break in virgins,” he tells her, “You’re all so shy, at first—until I show you how it’s done….”
“Billy,” she squeaks then, just as his thumb finds a spot that sends shivers straight up to her brain, her legs clamping together.
“Shh, don’t fight it.”
“I don’t want—”
“You think you’re too good for me?” he snaps, using his free hand to push back open her legs. “You’re the one invading my room. You’re the one acting like a little slut, making sure that I’d find you going through my porn. Stop acting like a filthy tease, because you’re the one to blame for this….”
It physically hurts that she can’t deny all of it. She shouldn’t have gone into his room. She shouldn’t have been snooping. She definitely shouldn’t have been looking at his private magazines.
“I’m sorry,” is all she can say, guilt and arousal coursing through her as his thumb swirls and swirls, pressing just right against the spot between her legs that makes her tremble. Her head starts to feel too fuzzy, too incoherent as she mouths pathetic apologies over and over again, stiffening as his fingers toy with the crotch of her panties, moving it aside to skim across her slit.
“You’re getting wet for me,” he whispers, leaning in so that his face is nearly pressing against hers. Their breath becomes one, his smoky muskiness combined with her sharp, fearful exhalations. “You want this.”
“No….” It’s so soft that she thinks he might not have heard it, if his body didn’t tense up, if his fingers didn’t suddenly press into her harder.
“Don’t piss me off.” One of his fingers slides right up inside her, making her squirm as the rigid, hot flesh invades her tight, virgin tunnel.
It burns for a moment. Stretching her out, making her completely aware of the depth inside her. She can hear the soft squelch of wetness as he pushes further in, moaning in horror, crying out as he hits a spot inside her that makes her legs flail out.
“Feels good, huh?” he murmurs, sounding entirely too smug as he nudges the spot again and again, nearly making her mind go blank. “All girls are whores. They just need someone to show them….”
“I’m not a whore,” she tries to groan out, but his finger keeps pressing right into that spot, keeps making her unable to speak-think-fight, keeps making her lower body spasm and her toes clench and curl.
“Not yet,” he breathes.
Everything’s so deliriously wet. The easy slide of his finger inside her (first one, then two), his wet-hot breath ghosting her face, the pull of his coaxing mouth trailing up and down her throat.
If he were unattractive, she could hate this, and that makes her feel pathetic, makes her feel cold. It shouldn’t matter that any girl in Hawkins practically begs for this treatment—practically throws themselves at her stepbrother. He’s gross and crude and slutty. But he’s hot, she recognizes distantly, hating that she’s even seen that distant light in her own mother’s eyes (when Susan walks in on him lifting, her startled, “Oh, Billy—I didn’t mean to interrupt…”, sometimes sounding a bit too high and breathless for Max’s liking).
Max wonders how her mom would even take it if she told on him, if she’d be doubted, because wasn’t her mom always coming up with excuses for Billy’s treatment of her anyhow? And wasn’t Max somehow asking for everything she got?
(‘Why were you in his room, anyway?’ She can practically hear her bewildered mother ask her. ‘You should know better than that….’)
“I can feel that you’re about to cum,” he whispers, his mouth hot against her ear. “You’re twitching all around me.”
She’s not quite sure what he means. Other than the fluttery feeling that keeps intensifying each time he moves inside her, each time that he presses his thumb down on the bud of nerves between her legs, his fingers wiggling against the spot that shoots stars straight into her eyes.
There’s a disconnect between her brain and body, the new feeling of being penetrated somehow intoxicating, somehow the best-thing-ever even though it’s the worst-thing-ever, because her stepbrother is the one doing it. Delicious tingles go all through her, just like the ones she feels when she secretly humps her pillow, but intensified by a zillion.
“Wait—I’m going to—” she stammers, not knowing exactly what’s going to happen, because it feels like she might wet herself, it feels like she might explode into a million pieces; it feels like she’s being pushed into insanity, the pleasurable pressure building and building until she doesn’t know who-or-what-she-is-anymore.
Something like breaking apart happens all at once. Her body seizes up, muscles contracting, a breathy cry escaping her as she suddenly understands the meaning of the word ‘cum’. It’s intense and sharp and horribly wonderful. His fingers feel so full and thick inside her, her insides clenching around him, trying to suck him deeper in.
“That’s it, that’s my girl,” he tells her breathlessly, almost like he’s the one being impaled by her, almost like he’s the one being tortured so exquisitely.
She barely has time to register that it’s over as he draws away, waves of something-like-bliss still washing over her, but he’s rising up and dragging her to her feet, her knees like water as he shoves her towards his bed, pushing her face first into his rumpled sheets.
“My turn,” he tells her, “You owe me now….”
There’s a moment of panic as she feels her shorts being unbuttoned and ripped down, her panties hobbling around her thin thighs. The clink of his belt buckle opening makes her try to stand, but everything’s happening so fast that she doesn’t manage, squealing as something blunt and too-warm nudges against her tender, wet opening.
“Billy, stop,” she bites out, but it’s too late, because he’s already sliding in, pain buckling through her as she lurches forward, her hands grasping for anything, anything to ground her, finding only blankets to hold. “It hurts!”
“Shh, no it doesn't,” he argues, his words strained, his usual vitriol shadowed by something else, something almost desperate. “Fuck, Max—you’re so tight….”
If she thought his fingers stretched her out, it’s nothing compared to this. It feels like being split in two, her legs trembling as he sinks deeper and deeper, the width of him tunnelling her out, poking too far in. She squeals as he hits something deep inside her. Something solid. And then he draws back, only to thrust hard, hitting that same wall again.
“Billy, it hurts!”
“Shut up,” he hisses, pushing on her shoulder blades as she squirms. “Just shut up for a goddamned minute….”
She thinks she hears him grunt, “I’m almost done”, but can’t register anything over her own ragged breaths, can’t think about anything else but the swollen feeling inside her, the strange throbbing of their parts intertwined.
It seems like it goes on for an eternity, the weight of him pushing up against her, of him pushing up inside her, but it’s only a minute or two before his body slumps over hers, his thick arms caging her, one hand gripping the back of her neck and the other clutching her hip as his low groan reaches her ears. A liquid-heat begins to pool inside her, the invasion of his flesh twitching rhythmically, and she knows it’s over—over now for real—over in the way it was finished for her, when his fingers brought her to the same release that he’s feeling now. He rocks against her slightly for a moment more, then stills, cursing.
She expects him to taunt her. Expects him to tell her that she got-what-she-deserved. (“See, you’re nothing but a whore now, huh? My whore.”) But he doesn’t say anything as he slips free, doesn’t sigh in satisfaction the way he does when he’s finished lifting his weights. The wet sound of his flesh leaving hers imprints on her mind, instead. Something awful trickles out of her, splashes down the backs of her bare legs. She’s not sure if it’s blood or what. She doesn’t want to know.
She thinks he strips off his shirt. Thinks he uses it to wipe at her, dab her mostly dry. She cringes as he does it, but doesn’t say a damned thing, trying not to cry. He doesn’t deserve her tears, she tells herself, doesn’t deserve to know how traumatized she is. It’s the worst thing he’s ever done to her—but she doesn’t want him to know it, doesn’t want anyone to know it, wants to forget it ever happened, wants to never think of it again.
She’s not sure who pulls her shorts back up, or if they do it together, but somehow she’s clothed again, standing shakily and stumbling towards the closed door of his room. Her mom should be home soon, she knows, and she wants to be far away from Billy’s bed when the front door opens, wants to be far away from this when she’s expected to help with dinner.
“You come in here again, shitbird, and I’ll expect you’re ready for round two,” Billy tells her as she fumbles with his doorknob. “I’ll leave the skateboard wheel on your bed.”
She doesn’t look back at him. Doesn’t answer. She doesn’t give a flying fuck about her skateboard anymore, and she’s not going to willingly step foot into his room ever again.