Sins Immortal

Short story for the "What A Character" contest. Falling victim to one of the 7 deadly sins

2000 Words

Chris stood at his makeshift workbench, electric anticipation crackling down his spine as the swinging Edison bulb slowly ticked above his head like a pendulum. Another rivulet of sweat gathered above his eyebrows, and he could feel his pulse hammering away beneath the goosepimpled skin on his neck. He mopped at his brow with the sleeve of his flannel before it dripped into his eyes.

Two unfinished wooden planks lay side-by-side in front of him, held aloft on either side by the rickety metal sawhorses that came with this god-forsaken house. The evidence of multiple basement floods swam all around him, the most obvious being the choking smell of mildew that threatened to take up permanent residence in his lungs. But at this moment, it barely registered to his senses. All he could smell right now was her. Her sweat. Her adrenaline. Her fear. But the sweetest smell of all?

Her hope.

He hadn’t anticipated that when he had lain awake, fantasizing about this moment night after night over the past several months. It was so much sweeter than he ever could have imagined. He savored it as he hovered his hand over the litany of tools laid out methodically on the table in front of him. He chuckled quietly at the way his hand shook with excitement.

Easy tiger, he thought to himself. Wouldn’t want to prematurely blow our load now, would we?

He took a couple of deep breaths to still himself, and slowly, deliberately, picked up the needlenose pliers. He turned around to face her, a wicked grin spreading across his cupid’s bow lips as he took in her visage anew. His eyes pawed at her, his breath catching in his throat as he was temporarily stunned by the sight of her. Her eyes, the green of a poison dart frog, gleamed up at him, rimmed by carbon black lashes brimming over with tears.

“God, you really are delicious,” he said, stepping closer to kneel in front of her. His jeans tightened uncomfortably around his knees, but he barely noticed. He reached out to gently caress her jaw with his free hand, frowning slightly as she turned her face away from him, breathing more frantically. He grabbed her chin and forced her face back towards him, and she let out a muffled sob. An erotic jolt ran through him as his fingers brushed against the moisture saturating the torn strip of t-shirt he’d used as a gag. He leaned in closer, dropping one knee to the cement basement floor as he inhaled deeply from her neck up to her mouth, relishing the eddy of scents he found there. Her tears and saliva mixing so sensually with her sweat made him shudder.

She started crying again, further plastering her crow-black hair to her cheeks, which annoyed him. He tsked and used the pliers to push the hair from one side of her face. She tried to flinch away from the cold metal, but the rusty pylon she was tied against was restricting her movement. Her black leather bomber jacket bunched awkwardly around her breasts where the rope criss-crossed her sweat stained white t-shirt.

“Aw Liz, such a pretty girl… But you’re so ugly when you cry,” he crooned, his lips downturned in a mockery of disappointment. “You don’t want me to see you this way, do you? No, I’m sure you don’t. Let’s clean you up, yeah?” He ran his thumb slowly over her jaw, then put it into his mouth, running his tongue lithely over it to cover it in saliva. His eyelids fluttered as his eyes rolled up into his head at the taste of her. He then used that thumb to wipe the smudged makeup from beneath her charcoal stained eyes. Her lip curled in rage and disgust as she maintained direct eye contact with him, revealing a glimpse of her perfectly white teeth clenched tightly over the gag.

“Fuck,” he said breathlessly. “I didn’t think I’d like you angry, but that’s really doing something for me… I wonder what else might make you angry,” he said, reaching the pliers up towards her silver hoop nose ring. She cringed away from him, squinting one eye in anticipation of the pain.

And then the strangest thing happened… Her eyes flattened, glancing behind him, and he paused. There it is again, he thought, sniffing the air. That hope… And possibly several moments too late, he was suddenly curious.

“Who do you think is coming for you, sweet little Lizzy?”

“That would be me, asshole,” said a voice from behind him. The blood drained from his face as he stood, and his head swam as he spun to confront the intruder. Cold sweat formed above his navel as he faced a shadowy woman clad in solid black moto-cross leathers, blood red lips, and strawberry-moon eyes to match. The smell of her…gods it was intoxicating.

“Who…the hell are you?” he sputtered, barely able to string words together in any kind of coherent order. She let out a throaty, sultry laugh. It was somehow reminiscent of a strip of silk submerged in an ice cold, crystal clear stream, and it brought him to his knees. He thoughtlessly dropped the pliers to the ground beside him.

“You’ve been kneeling at my shrine for years, darling,” she purred as she bent down to hold his face between her red ochre hands . “Have you forgotten my name so easily?”

“Oh you greedy, show-stealing bitch,” a disgusted voice bellowed from behind him. His head jerked around, pulling free from her grasp, and he blanched as he saw Liz standing behind him. She was inexplicably free of her bindings, ropes and gag alike. And she looked pissed. Her black stiletto nails gleamed in the still-swinging orange light as she flicked open a black metal lighter, struck it, and lit the cigarette now dangling from her black painted lips.

When did she freshen up her lipstick? he thought to himself in a haze. Before he had a chance to ask, however, she bent down to place a hand gently behind his head, another on his chin, and gingerly snapped his neck.

“Envy, don’t!” Lust hissed as she reached toward him belatedly, his limp form slumping to the floor. Liz laughed in satisfaction as she bent over him. “Oh COME ON, he was clearly MINE,” Lust growled. Liz leaned over him and inhaled sharply, a bright green mist snaking out from his mouth and slithering into her nostrils. Her eyes flared a bright neon green as she breathed it in with a sly satisfaction.

“Tell it to the green mist, sister,” she said as she stood, slowly rolling her shoulders, head tilting back as she soaked in the man’s essence. It had been so long since she’d had a decent meal.

“UGH,” Lust huffed. “You can’t keep doing this! I’ve been working him for months now, and you think you can just swoop in, play the simpering victim, and steal him away? He was drowning in Lust and you know it. He was mine.”

“Listen. He chose me. I wasn’t even trying, pinky swear.” Liz shook off her reverie and took a drag on her cigarette as its dulled cherry glow threatened to go out. “I was minding my own business in my territory, enjoying a quick snack in the casino, indulging some cocky schmuck when he approached me. He was determined to steal me away!” She pulled her round black shades from her jacket pocket and slid them onto her face. “What kind of vessel would I be if I left a meal like that on the table?” She smirked as smoke curled up through her lips, tinged green and swirling as she blew it into a cloud above her head. Lust’s top lip cinched up into a snarl.

“You think you’ll keep getting away with this just because you’re father's new favorite pet, but the rest of us won’t stand for it. You’ll learn how things work soon enough,” Lust spat. She pushed past Liz and made for the rickety wooden stairs that led up to the main floor of the house.

“Yeah, whatever. I never asked to be here,” Liz said, inspecting her cuticles. Lust stopped on the stairs and turned around to face her.

“Oh grow up. You’re a vessel. You literally had to ask for this or you wouldn’t be here.”

“Well it’s not like I had much of a choice.”

Lust laughed ironically. “I mean, you could have just died like the rest of the humans do, have done, y’know, for eternity? But your selfish ass probably never thought of that.” She turned and stomped the rest of the way up the stairs, vanishing over the rectangular horizon of the upper doorway.

“It’s literally all I think about,” Liz said to the now empty room. She heard the corpse slowly drag itself up from the floor behind her, and she absently turned to look at it.

“So, how pissed was she?” the corpse asked with a smirk, crossing its arms and thrusting a hip out to one side.

“You know you could just use a phone, like a normal person.” Liz looked around for her combat boots. She had somehow managed to kick them off during the “struggle”, and they had ended up somewhere off in the shadows. Ah, there, she thought as she grabbed them and strode over to the staircase, sitting down to put them on. The corpse’s oil black eyes rolled in annoyance.

“Yeah, but…effort,” it said. Liz finished lacing up her boots and sat for a moment, staring at the ground.

“Very,” she said.

“Huh?” the corpse replied as it absently started patting its own pockets. It pulled out a leather wallet from a back pocket and opened it to find several hundred dollar bills. “Oh nice!”

“Pissed. She was very pissed.” Liz stood up and snatched the wad of cash out of its hands.

“Skank!” it said, but it made no move to try and snatch the money back. Liz put the cash in her jacket pocket and started walking up the stairs, preparing to look through the rest of the house for anything valuable. “Why do you keep doing it,” the corpse called after her, quickly moving to catch up to her on the stairs. “For someone who’s destined to only have 6 friends for the rest of her life, if you can call it a life, you sure do like to make enemies.”

“I don’t-…” Liz sighed. “I’m not trying to piss anyone off, Sloth. It just keeps happening. Honestly, this time it wasn’t even on purpose. I didn’t even know what he was about when he first approached me. I legit thought he was mine. He was dripping with envy, practically radiating an emerald fucking cloud.” She found the bedroom and knelt on the floor to check beneath the bed for a safe. “He was honestly pretty charming, the way he drew my attention away from the GQ prick at the bar. Funny, too.”

Nothing. She sighed as she got up and walked to the closet to check there. “Anyway, by the time I figured out he was probably Lust’s, I was already being knocked out with chloroform and tied up in his basement. How is this my fault?”

“You could have escaped,” Sloth said as she fell backwards onto the bed, idly playing with the switchblade she swiped from the dresser.

“Yeah, and then he’d have been Wrath’s, and I’m definitely not trying to piss her off…”

“Again,” they both said in unison, immediately bursting into laughter. When the laughs died off, Liz stood up and walked over to lay down on the bed next to Sloth.

“Can I tell you a secret?”

“As long as it’s a short one, I’m due for a nap.”

“I wanted to see what it felt like to die.”

“Sister, we’ve all been there,” Sloth responded, reaching over to lace her fingers through Liz’s.