We billed out at 2am. Glen had to take a different route with another girl while I had to walk around the virtually vacant areas with Purple Eyeshadow. She was introduced to me a while ago, I just couldn’t gather a staggering effort to recall her name.

I found it enjoyable though, how the only way we could stimulate a conversation is how she could recall films from the most prominent actors and their overly romanticized roles while I had the pleasure of watching her struggle with names. I couldn’t even digress how nauseated I was when the only way she could remember Psycho was how Anne Heche tried to imitate stark fear while being stabbed in the shower in 1998.

I couldn’t even comprehend the standards of pretty. Does it count that Isabella Rossellini became seemingly more fascinating in a David Lynch film? Or how I‘d rather watch Kirsten Dunst thrice looking demented and worn-down in Melancholia rather than to marathon three of Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man films? No, Sin isn’t pretty. She is the melancholic specter of a delicate Ophelia Hughes would spew out on a panel at 19. Frail and desolate, the utter perversion to what typical individuals imply. Like I said, I had no definite sense of pretty.

Purple Eyeshadow here however, could pass for that genuine eye candy at the side of the field when you lost a game. She may be deceiving you, leading you on too much, gagging your senses on how someone as mediocre as you deserves to lay a hand on the flushed white limbs of a glorious prom queen. At least you walk out of her house or out of a hotel room grinning ear to ear.

Anyway, in those minutes of slow-paced tottering I kissed her, or eventually she leaned forward and I took it as an invitation. And it led to some graceless, drunken waltz of stumbling off to the corner of the street, continuing to kiss her the way I would deliberately wield a blissful groan from her throat. I heard her giggle, and our kisses went deeper as I pressed against her, my fingers beneath her jaw to tilt her face upward. I had to count possibilities. She could push me away, blame the reckless concession to the excessive amount of alcohol she chugged, hurl out some inapt accusations of being encroached in her feeble state, burst into tears and reflect on an ex. She didn’t. Her arms clung and her flaccid waist yielded, then her hands wrapped around my wrist and led my hand down her breast. Score.

There was a swift and forceful tug at the back of my collar, tearing me away, flailing and staggering. I resounded a punitive “What the fuck?!” before being knocked down by a headbutt. I thought it was a sudden thunderclap. I abruptly saw light before my back struck the wall. Then I slid down, a wilted marionette without strings.

From that passive moment I heard Purple Eyeshadow’s screams, piercing and abysmal and slowly fading, the scraping sound of being dragged to the ground, that’s all I could perceive with my senses drowning out.

Then the forceful groping on my collar again, with a snarl spitting in my ear. “Get up!”

I saw Sin’s flaring eyes, her face inches from me as I was pulled to my feet. I stumbled up, managed to stand while Sin continuously hauled me on the streets like an iron-fisted high school brawl mediator, halting to the corner where she could easily hail a cab.

Sin conveniently eyed a shabby red taxi, flagged it down with an arm swaying impatiently in the air as the taxi took a hesitant swerve before slowing down to a halt. She marched down to pry the door open without a word and tossed me in like a rucksack, slammed the door shut and marched to the other side.

Inside, she sat in the furthest corner with her arms folded, her eyes fixed to the view at the window.

I slouched, tilted my head back while the cab sped off. My brows furrowed. That’s the only time I felt the deep cut at the corner of my brow while something damp and lukewarm tricked down my eye. I wiped it, then eyed the back of my hand.

“I’m bleeding.” I said impassively.

Sin sat unwavering, “You deserve it.”

I hunched, tugged up the sleeve of my hoodie and smothered it all over my brow. “Where’s the girl?”

“Dead.” Sin snapped.

I scowled. “You killed her?”

Sin’s eyes rolled. “Do you remember her name?”

I gave no reply and turned my head away.

Sin gave a resounding shrug, one I could hear from the crotchety snort and the slump of her shoulders. It felt like fingers snapping close to my ear.