I can’t remember what the Creditor said as he wiped the cocaine dust from above his lip line. The swirls of alcohol made my legs feel like lead and my eyes like buckets of molten lava, but even in the drunken stupor cast upon me after several bottles of cheap Prosecco, I could see the Creditor’s sharp nose and eyebrows staring back at me. He was a tall man, not very healthy looking—like a blown Walmart bag—and when he knocked on my door late in the evening, the only thing I hoped he came with was a promise of sex and hate—I shouldn’t say that—that holy stuff never stuck to me despite my mother’s ardent hope—but instead, he offered me three little bricks of cocaine in one of those miniature plastic bags and a letter of eviction.

          Apparently, I put my house as collateral three-sum years ago, and it finally crawled out the bank’s ass and into my awaiting, broke arms. That’s not the problem, though. I have little issue with losing everything that I decide to offer up like a generous-fucking-begger, but my only vice, only stipulation, is that good-looking men should be the bearer of bad news.

          The Creditor was none of this, so you’d imagine my grief.

          It doesn’t matter, though. Because I brought the bastard in—in my own god-contracted home—offered him one of the bottles of Prosecco I stole from the gas station and proceeded to do line after line with said bastard and a used Starbucks gift card.

          I never really liked cocaine when I was younger. The practice was odd—crushing up the pills and snorting them up your nose like a dog sniffing out a bird—but the taste was good. My dealer Flowers was always kind enough to get the limey-smelling pills and even go so far as to bring me a few tablets in a little tin when my mother died in a bathtub with red dribbling from her wrist—what a Christian!—so I always held the drug quite tenderly to my heart.

          But here in the sad, murky basement with flowery red candles, the air was thick oil, and the promise of sex was drippy and malignant.

          But the Creditor was fine enough. 

          “So…you’re a…loan shark…” Cocaine made me slurpy and soupy. I never had much self-control.

          The Creditor sunk deeper into my stained, yellow couch and thought for a moment.

          “Sort of,” he said. “I like it when I visit poor people. Makes me feel better about my poorness.”

          “Do I make you feel better then? Less…poor?” I think I asked. The wall started twirling around me in lazy spins. “I hope I do…”

          The Creditor looked at me with rotten eyes—you know when fruit starts molding?—and tilted his head. “Well, I like to think it’s a compromise.”

          I saw his dripping lust before he noticed. Idiot. “...You must enjoy compromises then.”

          “Oh, sure I do,” The Creditor said before digging into his pocket. He pulled out another little bag filled with striped pills. “But I’m in a giving mood. Want one?”

          Through the cocaine haze, my throat did a weird little flip-flop, but I swallowed back the saliva soaking the back of my throat. “Sure. Three.”

          The walls bled a stripped, lime green and yellow, and I saw shadows swirling behind my eye sockets, but nonetheless, the Creditor nodded, tapped the bag, and three little pills rolled onto the coffee table. Slowly, like my blood was made of honey, I leaned forward and scooped the pills into my hand.

          The first was big and pale blue, the second one was small, round, and gray, and the third one was a copy of the first one, only much more delicate—even in my hand, I saw the little powdery flakes breaking off.

          I giggled and raised the first one up to the candlelight. “What…is…it…” I asked. “They...look like…stars.”

          I didn’t pay attention to his answer, and took the first pill, popped it in my mouth, and crunched down.

          Acid exploded in my mouth. Oil oozed up and down my spine, and I think I gasped, but I then felt lips crashing on mine.

          “Let it go,” The Creditor shouted—whispered?—into my ear. When did he get there? 

          “It’ll be alright.”

          It wasn’t fucking alright––it was unbearable. Like ice in my lungs, hacking with every breath. I lunged across the Creditor and grabbed the Prosecco. Chugging it, I felt sweat permeate my brown, and I felt the Creditor right next to me, urging me on.

          Then, it passed.

          I breathed heavily and felt the sweat sticking to my back. “What…the...hell?”

          I unfurled my hands and saw the two pills left—well, the one—the other one was bitter, blue chalk on my hands. I looked at the Creditor and saw his tense, nervous expression.

          “Again,” he said, and I choked—the Prosecco churning in my stomach.

          The Creditor looked weird. His hair was neater, shinier. Suddenly, he wasn’t a plastic bag caught on barbed wire, but rather—a man. I hesitated, and he nodded once and put his arm over the back of my seat.

          I didn’t hesitate to take the second pill.

          Acid stained my mouth, I felt my nose burning to bits of charred flesh, and my lips crashed into the Creditor’s mouth. Fumbling, I fiddled with his suit and let his mouth trail up my neck in slow, heavy trails.

          Oh God, I couldn’t breathe.

          The Creditor tugged on my shirt—I let him. Looking up, I stared at the ceiling as my eyes melted out from my skull. As my body disintegrated underneath the Creditor’s heavy body, I smiled at the stars.

Lilee is a young writer living in the southwest who enjoys screenwriting, writing short stories, and testing out new forms of writing. While battling school, she does her best to find time to work on writing collections and go for morning jogs––maybe even squeeze in a little relaxation. But life is fast, and Lilee does her best to keep on going.