kara was still stuck in limbo, still in stasis, still waking alone. it was her own fault, though. she would stake her bets on the shadowy ones then mope when they disappeared. real flesh and blood men tripped over her smoldering eyes all the time but she bowed them out, dissed them almost politely, then checked her phone to see if he'd called.
who was he? he was a composite disaster of a man, a classic-line player and state-of-the-art flirt with no particular i.d. he had rich dark hair or a shaved and balding pate. he was ovalish or long, compact or overdrawn, huge to hold or like a hard wire. he was afraid of nothing and everything, afraid of the night and of the darkness between kara's thighs, afraid of being a man and far too gone to keep the little boy game rolling along another moment. he was beautiful and full of lust, hot kisses raining down as he turned her and held her and whispered her name. he was that perfect 3 a.m. lover who left her in the morning with a vapid kiss after timeless hours of passion that never lasted past dawn. he was all of them, the whole dark aspect of their sex warped into one creation, then split into figures for her collective pleasure. or so kara had thought.
she took a puff of her smoke, and considered her state. it should have been easy. they were the same breed, weren't they? sensuous and twisted, licking the darkness for its salt and champagne flavor, using innocents as props, accessorizing with others' emotions. that they all agreed on. and she had bet on them with lust, that by sleeping her way through this roiling sea of dissipate characters she'd find her one true dark mate. her shadow soul. or at least finally discover the secret to conquering the whole charade.
but that hadn't happened and this couldn't go on. this was supposed to be her game, her play, and what she was dealing with now was the desperate, voracious, uncontrollable hunger of men and their repulsive daytime ennui. every late night contact left her a little more skinless, as if each of her bad-boy lovers were stripping her of a fine layer of self to feed on. It had to stop. she pulled again long and hard on her smoke, held it in for an extra beat, closed her eyes, then let it go. from the depth of her exhale it hit her: she snapped to attention, looked quickly over her shoulder, and took one last drag. she had to take action. now. this was going to have to be a long con, and her game had just begun.
© Madia (Maria Alva Roff) 2005
