Chapter 4: The Phony
The neighbor—Mark, maybe? Mike?—sweated onto her skin, his movements rhythmic, predictable. Puck stared past his shoulder at the water stain on her ceiling, shaped vaguely like Australia. His breath hitched, a wet sound against her neck. Cheap beer and stale pizza. Not Ronnie’s scent. Ronnie smelled like laundered cotton and faint, clean sweat. Like quiet focus.
His hand slid down her side, clumsy. "Yeah," he grunted. "You like that?" His fingers brushed her throat, feather-light, hesitant.
Puck flinched. "Harder." Her voice was flat. Distant. She needed the pressure. The surrender. The crunch of control.
He chuckled, a nervous puff of air. "Whoa, easy there, tiger." His grip didn’t change.
Frustration coiled, hot and sharp, behind her ribs. It tangled with the lingering shame from the car, the phantom feel of charcoal grit under her nails. This wasn't working. This bland, panting man with his timid hands couldn't touch the fire inside her. Couldn't pin it down. Couldn't own it like Ronnie could. Would.
"Choke me," she hissed, arching her back, forcing his hand tighter against her throat. Her own pulse hammered against his palm. "Do it."
He recoiled like she'd bitten him, pulling his hand away as if burned. His eyes went wide, startled, a little afraid. "Jesus, Puck! What the hell?"
The dam broke. The careful persona, the cool designer, shattered. Pure, feral irritation surged. She shoved him off her, hard. He stumbled back, naked and blinking, bewildered.
"Ronnie would fucking choke me!" The words ripped out of her, raw and vicious. "He wouldn't wimp out like some scared little boy! Get out!"
Mark-Mike gaped, his mouth opening and closing like a fish. "Who the hell is Ronnie?"
"OUT!" she screamed, pointing a shaking finger towards the door cluttered with coats and discarded boots. The sheer, irrational fury in her voice, the absolute certainty behind the name ‘Ronnie’, scared even her. But it scared him more. He scrambled for his jeans, muttering curses, tripping over a discarded art book. The door slammed behind him, shaking a framed print of a snarling punk band on the wall.
Silence crashed down, thick and suffocating, broken only by Puck's ragged breathing. The incense she’d lit earlier – sandalwood, Ronnie’s phantom scent from their brush in the break room – suddenly felt cloying. Cheap. Australia mocked her from the ceiling. The apartment, usually her sanctuary, felt alien, charged with the bitter residue of failed escape.
She stumbled across the room, naked, skin buzzing with unsatisfied energy, kicking a pile of sketchbooks. One slid open. Her breath hitched.
There it was. The lunchtime sketch. The one she’d slammed shut on Ronnie’s bewildered face. Ronnie’s name, carved into the paper over and over with brutal charcoal strokes. R-O-N-N-I-E. The letters were thick, dark, almost violent, filling the page edge-to-edge. And in the margins, smaller, rougher, but undeniably him: the curve of his jaw, the neat part in his brown hair, the startled kindness in his eyes she’d captured even in her frenzy.
A low moan escaped her. Shame warred with an overwhelming, aching need. She hadn’t just written his name. She’d summoned him.
Puck sank to the worn rug beside the sketchbook. Not Mark-Mike. Never again. This. This was what she needed. What she craved. Her trembling hand reached out, not for the dildo she kept in the bedside drawer, but for the sketch itself. She traced the rough charcoal line of Ronnie’s jaw with her fingertip. Then, slowly, deliberately, she brought the paper to her lips.
The kiss was soft at first, hesitant. The paper tasted of dust and graphite, dry and slightly gritty. She closed her eyes. Imagined the warmth of his skin, the slight stubble catching against her mouth. Her tongue darted out, tracing the bold capital ‘R’. The charcoal dissolved slightly, bitter on her tongue, mingling with the salt of her own skin.
A shiver ripped through her.Yes. This.
She stretched out on the rug, the sketch held reverently in one hand. Her other hand slid down her stomach, fingers finding the slick heat between her legs with none of the earlier fury, only desperate, focused need. Her eyes stayed locked on the rough drawing of Ron’s face as she pushed two fingers inside herself.
"Ronnie," she whispered, a broken sound against the paper. She kissed the sketch again, harder this time, leaving a damp smudge on his charcoal cheekbone. Her hips lifted, rocking against her own hand, finding a slow, deep rhythm. The friction built, not frantic like in the car, but purposeful. Worshipful.
She licked the dark line of his hair, the taste of charcoal sharp and real. Her fingers curled, pressing deep inside. "Made for me," she breathed, the words vibrating against the paper pressed to her lips. "You are. You just don't know it yet." The fantasy bloomed: Ronnie above her, his kind eyes darkening with possession, his hand firm on her throat, his body pressing her down into the rug amidst the clutter of her life. Not hesitant. Not gentle. Hers.
The climax rolled through her, a deep, shuddering wave that made her spine arch and her fingers clench around the sketch, crumpling the corner slightly. She moaned into the paper, a long, low sound that echoed in the quiet apartment, her body trembling as the aftershocks pulsed through her. Wetness soaked the rug beneath her hips.
Slowly, bonelessly, she slumped back. The sketch of Ron’s face was damp, smudged from her lips and tongue, stained with her saliva. She held it close to her chest, breathing heavily, staring up at the water-stained ceiling. Australia was still there. But the frantic energy, the desperate need to expel him through someone else... it was gone. Replaced by a terrifying, absolute certainty that settled into her bones like lead.
She brought the crumpled, damp paper to her lips once more, whispering the only truth left in the incense-heavy silence: "Mine." The word hung in the air, a vow etched in charcoal and spit.