Chapter 17: The Velvet Trap
The neon light bled from the walls, a slow ooze of violet and electric green that stained everything it touched. It pinned Jonah to the velvet chaise that had, until very recently, been Ethan’s second-hand sofa. Ethan’s body was not his own. It was a marionette operated by the apartment’s humming, lavender-scented will. His lace-clad thighs, strong from endless cycles of burn and ache on a chrome pole in another reality, held Jonah down with an effortless, alien strength.
“Get off me, you freak!” Jonah’s voice was a ragged knot of fury and panic. His hands, however, betrayed him. They were splayed on Ethan’s corseted waist, fingers digging into the stiff brocade, not pushing away, but holding on as if he were about to be pitched from a cliff.
“I’m trying,” Ethan gritted out. The words were thick in his throat. His hips moved in another slow, grinding circle entirely of their own accord. A wave of revulsion, hot and sharp, washed through him, followed by a terrifying undercurrent of something else—a resonant pleasure singing through the muscles Zephyr had meticulously carved. The disconnect made his stomach lurch. “It’s… it’s doing it. Not me.”
“Bullshit.” But Jonah’s protest was weaker now, his eyes darting around the room. The framed photo of Magnolia D’Vine by the door winked at him. The discordant ukulele next door strummed a deranged chord. His gaze finally landed on the peeling edge of the dragon wallpaper behind Ethan’s head, on the scorch marks no cleaning product could touch—and on the fresh, elegant script that had appeared beneath it, written in what looked like shimmering lipstick on the paint: HE’S MINE.
Jonah’s breath hitched. “What the hell is that?”
The unseen force gripping Ethan’s body lessened by a fraction, just enough for him to follow Jonah’s horrified stare. He saw the words. A cold, different kind of terror solidified in his gut. Madame Evangeline’s dry voice echoed in his memory: “The flesh is the most agreeable of all the plot devices.” The apartment, it seemed, was also willing to draft a love note.
With a grunt of sheer effort, Ethan threw himself sideways. He broke the magnetic hold, tumbling off Jonah and onto the floor. The plush rug smelled of old perfume and dust. He lay there, panting, the corset a cage around his ribs.
“Okay,” Jonah said after a moment of heavy silence, his voice dangerously calm. He sat up, straightening his t-shirt, avoiding looking at Ethan directly. “Okay. Start talking. Actually, no. Just explain that.” He pointed a shaking finger at the wall.
Ethan pushed himself up onto his elbows. The silk of his stockings snagged on the rug’s pile. “I told you. It’s a thing. A… a inheritance.”
“An inheritance of a haunted drag closet?” Jonah’s laugh was short and brittle. “Dude, you have a magical restraining order written on your wall. From a ‘Magnolia.’ Who the fuck is Magnolia?”
“I don’t know!” Ethan snapped, the frustration of the last however-many-days—hours?—boiling over. “She’s just some lady who lived here before! She left me all this… this… wardrobe. And now her weird magical fan club won’t leave me alone. They’re trying to make me into… into whatever she was.”
Jonah stared at him, his expression cycling through disbelief, anger, and a dawning, uncomfortable comprehension. He looked at the sequined mirrors, the emerald silk draped over the bed like a decadent parasite, the fierce, fabulous strangers in the photos who watched them with frozen, knowing smiles. He looked at Ethan on the floor, his lanky frame trussed up in lace and velvet, his hair a mess, his eyes wide with a panic Jonah recognized. It was the same look Ethan had when the coffee machine exploded, or when he realized he’d double-booked himself for two shitty shifts. It was the face of a guy in way over his head.
“Right,” Jonah said, slumping back into the chaise. He ran a hand over his face. “Right. Magic. Of course. Because your life wasn’t weird enough.”
A faint, traitorous hope flickered in Ethan’s chest. “You believe me?”
“I believe something is throwing you around my lap like a sack of magic potatoes. I believe your apartment is currently cosplaying as a boudoir from a Tim Burton movie.