Chapter One: It's Just Drinks (With Our Evil Ex-Girlfriend)

Living with Booker was it's own little string of silly, sweet, annoying, and occasional maddening moments...

No one needed telepathy to understand Vanessa. As far as people went, she had a transparent streak. She was honest-- sometimes brutally so. She hypothesized that all the points she put into "lying and deception" were preoccupied keeping the two major secrets of her identity.

When Vanessa wanted something, she found it best to lean into her transparency. It was going to be clear she was angling for something, especially when Booker was the person she wanted something from. Rather than trying and failing with subtlety, she was going to just go all out with brown-nosing and see where that got her.

By the time Booker got home from work, the table was already set. She had made herself a humble salad with avocado, but his side of the table was notably different. Nessa had sucked up her moral quandries long enough to prepare a steak, with a side of baked potato. She had not been a vegetarian all her life, so she was not inept with cooking meat. Rarely, that could come in handy. She even went out of her way to buy his favorite beer. No cutting corners!

She was looking for a favor, which was always more challenging since it put Booker in a position of power in any upcoming negotiations. Unless she had something he needed, she was at his mercy. This would be even more of a challenge, because the favor she needed was something he would disapprove of. She was a big girl who did not have to run her life choices by her brother, but she acknowledged how easily he could ruin her plans as her roommate. The wisest choice was too appeal to him and hope he could give her a break.

Lofty goals.

When the door opened, presenting Booker, fresh off a long day at the library, Nessa greeted him enthusiastically. "Hello, brother of mine! How was your day? Don't worry about dinner, it's all taken care of. Just take a load off and relax!"

Who needed subtlety, anyway?

Booker LOVED the library. He deeply and truly did. However there were just some days where he didn’t love it as much. The problem today concerned with the rolling out of a new LMS (Library Management System) that turned out to be an absolute piece of garbage. Libraries use a lot of computers now as it helps to keep track of materials, to check out items, and to store information about patrons. It makes processes a whole lot easier than it used to back in the ages where libraries were manned solely by monks who had to travel acres of stone steps just to get a single roll of parchment.

However, not all programs were created equal. Booker didn’t advocate for the change in system, that was from upper management. They were trying to cut corners, trying to get rid of the old system that was more expensive for something that was considered top of the line and brand spanking new. Well, it was certainly spanking their butts today.

Beta testing seemed promising. It did everything it said it would. But once the first day of official use came out, absolutely everything went wrong. Patron files were lost, books couldn’t be found, it was a veritable nightmare and it was one that somewhat soured the librarian’s usually sunny disposition. He shuffled to his front door, somewhat defeated, his usually nice shirt was disheveled from running around, his bowtie was askew, and even one of his nice shoes was squeaking obnoxiously.

Booker B. Bookman was not having a good day.

But he was home. He would make it up to himself. The latest patch for Watchover was out and he was excited to play the new character, Adam Archive. He would be on his living room Gamestation, all night, running through the arena and blasting away at people, imagining them as the developers of this hellish program he just finished dealing with. Nessa would be home, but she would either be engrossed in working or setting up plans to go out. Booker was just looking forward to being home.

Turning his key and stepping in through the front door, he sighed and breathed in the sweet scent of his home. It smelled like comic books, like video games, like steak,….wait…what was that last one? He tilted his head, curiously, as he turned to survey the surroundings suspiciously. Shuffling deeper into the apartment, he pulled the Velcro strap of his bag open, releasing the weight from his back. He never came home to the smell of cooking steak. His sister was a vegetarian and rarely, if ever, cooked meat. So why did he smell it?

Oooh, maybe that Turkish meat vendor guy was outside the building again! Odd…considering that he didn’t see hi--

>> "Hello, brother of mine! How was your day? Don't worry about dinner, it's all taken care of. Just take a load off and relax!"

He jumped at the sudden appearance of his sister. She ran on with a stream of words that barely made any sense to him. She cooked dinner? She knew how to cook, of course, but she so rarely had it waiting for him that it took Booker a second to realize that she was serious. On top of that, she was waaaaaay too chipper. Nessa knew how to be happy, of course, but her words were usually coated with snark, not…peppiness. Ugh. What was going on?

”Kay...?” he said suspiciously. ”…the hell got into you?”

Vanessa’s barrage of niceties and kindness had the exact effect on Booker she expected, eliciting confusion and suspicion. Necessary evils. He knew something was up, and she was going to give up the ghost and ask her favor almost immediately. She just had to pacify his suspicion with delicious food scents first, to remind him that she could be a giving, thoughtful sister when properly incentivized.

Before she started to speak again, Vanessa was already moving past him so she could nudge him from behind toward the table. ”Nothing’s gotten into me. I just thought you could use a good meal after a long day of work. It’s important to treat ourselves after we work our asses off, and we, as siblings, should be encouraging one another to take that time to treat ourselves.” Once again, the lack of subtlety could win awards.

Once Booker was in range of his well-seasoned, cooked to his preference steak, Vanessa’s words became more drawn out, like she was trying to make her request sound like the logical conclusion of her point. ”For instance… it would be very cool and noble for a certain brother to perhaps make plans out of the house Saturday night.”

The next line was noticeably faster in pace because there was a subtext of guilt to her request. ”So his sister can maybe have a few drinks and catch up with an old friend.”

It would be nice if he said yes without further cajoling. He could eat his steak and slather his potato with sour cream and chives and put no thought into questioning who Vanessa was planning on bringing over the house. It was a pipe dream and was not going to happen, but the thought itself was pleasant.

Instead, Vanessa took her seat in front of her salad and the potato she had prepared for herself. She took a sip of one of her grapefruit beers and braced herself for what might come next.

Come on, pipe dream!

Booker was indeed suspicious. Something was off about all this. He loved his sister but he also knew his sister. When she was this generous then something was up. However he was both so confused by her sudden behavior, distracted by the scent of delectable food, and irritated after a long day that he didn’t have all of his mental capacities. Therefore, he had to ask, da faq was wrong with her? Normally this would open him up to some extreme firm sass throw in his face but rather than do that, she did the complete opposite – she continued to be pleasant.

>> ”Nothing’s gotten into me. I just thought you could use a good meal after a long day of work. It’s important to treat ourselves after we work our asses off, and we, as siblings, should be encouraging one another to take that time to treat ourselves.”

”Since when?”

He didn’t really notice that she had managed to slip behind him like some shadow. By the time he did, it was too late and he was already being steered towards the savory scented meal that had been laid out for him on the table top. He still had trouble wrapping his mind around the fact that she had actually cooked him a steak. But, dammit, it just kept smelling more and more amazing as he was pushed closer to it.

It was like a captain being steered towards jagged rocks via siren songs, Booker could sense some kind of impending doom but weariness, frustration, and hunger were blinding him to most of the obvious facts. Some peeked through, such as how sweet Nessa was being, almost overtly so.

Booker was unceremoniously plopped down into his seat. Blinking in confusion, he lifted his head to look at his sister again, but every time he tried his gaze was pulled back down to the (almost) perfectly cooked steak in front of him. The baked potato looked amazing as well, all his favorites toppings set aside in little containers just for him, in the exact right amounts. And, lastly. His favorite beer, Wulver, by the Thirsty Dog Brewing Company! He thought he was out and lamented how much he wanted one but lacked the will to go to the store.

”Wooooow…” he smiled almost happily as he looked over the spread that was laid out before him. His suspicion started to dwindle, just a little bit, but the fact that he didn’t have to cook dinner, his favorite meal was prepared, and his favorite drink was at hand, what more could he ask for?!

However it didn’t take long to lower the boom…

>> ”For instance… it would be very cool and noble for a certain brother to perhaps make plans out of the house Saturday night. So his sister can maybe have a few drinks and catch up with an old friend.”

Booker was just about to pick up his fork and sample the hot, steamy innards of the potato when he stopped. His eyes narrowed and rationale thought finally started to win out over hunger pangs. His gaze followed Nessa as she turned and took her seat across from him, sitting before her own elegantly made salad. His head tilted, her kept watching her for several moments as he quietly set down the silverware he had picked up, tented his fingers in front of him and rested his head upon his hands. She had his undivided attention now.

Eyebrow up, expression neutral, Booker stared at Nessa for the longest time before he finally cleared his throat, sat back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. His brilliant mind was already working backwards, pulling up what he knew of his sister and her habits, all of which was aided by his eidetic memory, a veritable lock-box of information.

It was several seconds before he finally did speak, and when he did, well…

”Who is it, Nessa?” He knew her too well. This was a multi-level excursion on his private time. She was trying to come at him by being purposefully over-the-top and hammy which hopes just knocking him off guard. But to send him out of the house…for an old friend. No, there was something waaaaay too fishy about that. Unlike her, he didn’t steal her conquests, so if she wanted him out of the house, it wasn’t just for privacy sake…it was for embarrassment? Fear of what he’d think? Why should she ca….his eyes widened. He stared, hard, at her. ”Nessa,” he demanded. ”Who?”

Silence. Silence was bad. Booker was processing, and he was watching her vigilantly. Vanessa was doing her best to keep her expression neutral, but Booker’s own neutral look was unnerving. He crossed his arms, and she watched nervously, waiting for him to break the lingering, painful silence in the room.

>> ”Who is it, Nessa?”

Sweet lord, how she missed the silence. Now that the inevitable question was asked, it was on Vanessa to decide the best way to broach her request. Best was a subjective term, because she knew the “best” option compared to all her other options still left much to be desired. She was hesitating, and the longer she gave Booker to think, the more likely he would assume the worst. The way his eyes widened and his tone of voice changed the second time he asked just showed he had reached that point in his process.

Unfortunately, if he had gone to the worst-case scenario, it was likely he had reached the right assumption. ”So…” she began, trying to piece something reasonable together out of the words she had rehearsed before his arrival. All those words, and indeed, all the words in her vocabulary, were doing an excellent job avoiding her. The words she did find, she started stringing into a drawn out, run-on sentence. ”She messaged me a while ago, and I just kind of left it’s just been the odd message here and there, checking in, and then she casually mentioned she was coming back to town for the weekend and that we should have a drink and catch up, and all the stuff was a really long time ago, if you remember, and we’re legitimate adults now, so I don’t see the harm in catching up with Spencer.”

Her own eyes were wide when the name left her lips, and she watched Booker’s face like a hawk, sure she would find a reaction. What she would not give to negate his Adapted field for just sixty seconds so she could see all the many warning bells would be going off in his head at the mention of Spencer Robertson.

He knew it. Booker KNEW that something was up. The moments where Nessa was actually nice to him, without an ulterior motive were rare to the point that when she was, it was clearly a ploy of some kind! Okay, so maybe that wasn’t fair of him. He really didn’t have any right to judge his sister so harshly. She was nice to him, all the time, but not like this. This was overly done. This wasn’t genuine. This was Nessa trying to be overtly nice as a means to signal that she wanted something from him but was willing to play the part of an overly generous sibling to make it so.  

She wanted him to make the connections because she knew that he would figure it out…to some extent. At the end of the day, it was just how the Bookmans operated. They danced this little dance of theirs until, in the end, they laughed it off, one owing the other a minor favor, at most. Favors were the currency of the household. But this…this was different.  

Nessa was being waaaaay too nice. Which was waaaaaay too suspicious of her. She wanted him out of the house but that was rarely a problem. Some teasing would go on, outrageous favors would be demanded, but all-in-all, they were two grown adult sharing the same space. It wasn’t an unreasonable request and they both understood that.  

But something was wrong. Her timidness and overt niceness startled the man and that could only lead him to the conclusion that she was seeing something she shouldn’t be seeing. Someone that maybe he wouldn’t approve of? But, really, Booker wasn’t one to judge so why should she be afraid that he wouldn’t approve of th…His eyes widened.  

No, no, no, no, no, no…! 

>> ”So…”She messaged me a while ago, and I just kind of left it’s just been the odd message here and there, checking in, and then she casually mentioned she was coming back to town for the weekend and that we should have a drink and catch up, and all the stuff was a really long time ago, if you remember, and we’re legitimate adults now, so I don’t see the harm in catching up with Spencer.” 

Booker listened attentively, his face betraying the look of shock and abhorrent surprise as he knew what was coming. Every word she said just continued to hammer the nail harder and harder into the running theory that he was already formulating. When she reached the end of her litany of word vomit, he cringed, hard, as he heard the one name he didn’t want to ever hear again – Spencer Robertson.  

Spencer was probably the worst mistake that Booker had ever made in his life. She had was hot steaming sexpot of a woman that had immediately managed to ensnare his sense. Everything she did was with purpose, and that purpose was solely to find a mate and devour them until there was nothing left but a husk. Oh she was all peaches and ice cream when you first started to talk to her. Compliments, flirtations that you weren’t sure were flirtations. It was only when you were pulled in too close that she finally made her more. 

Oh the earthy pleasures that woman indulged in. The levels of nirvana that she could make you feel. But Heaven swiftly turns into Hell the longer you spend with her. It starts as small things, a suggestion here, an action against your better judgement there. Then you find yourself doing things you didn’t think were possible, that you would ever allow yourself to do with another human being. It’s by that time that you are waaay too late to escape from her machinations and you start desperately looking for any way out.  

Madness. Spencer Robertson was madness incarnate. And the fact that her name had passed from Nessa Bookman’s lips only made it all the more terrifying.  

Firmly, and without giving an inch, Booker shook his head. ”No.” He said. ”You…have no idea what you’re getting into.” This was his “Big-Brother-Listen-To-Me-Now” Booker voice. It didn’t occur to him that his sister might be offended by his tone. Right now he was only protecting his little sister. ”You cancel. Right now.” 

It was… a strong reaction, to say the least. Booker’s opinions on Spencer were well-documented. Years later, she still came up occasionally after a night of drinking. It was word-association; for some people, when they thought ate strawberry ice cream, it drummed up a strong memory associated with the frozen treat. When drunk Booker heard something about “evil” or “mayhem,” his mind was good at drawing parallels to Spencer.

Vanessa did not appreciate the patronizing tone her brother was taking with her. She did not know better, did she? He could be unintentionally pompous; she was sure it came from being “brilliant.” He was not the only one who had dated Spencer, and not the only one who suffered the consequences. Yes, he had the fact that Spencer was laying down the flirtatious groundwork with Nessa before she broke up with Booker. She would be shocked if that did not come up in the upcoming argument.

”Booker, I’m not an idiot. I haven’t just forgotten who Spencer was. I very much remember being handcuffed to a bench at the police station.” It had been fortunate that she had been busted by a gruff mutant cop who had better things to do than deal with a girl who was busted for trespassing and lewd public acts. It was the one time Spencer almost got Vanessa arrested, but there were close calls. Something about Spencer made it impossible to say no, which led to boundaries pushed, alcohol consumed, and at least one unexpected overnight trip to Canada.

Years had passed! Nessa had time to gain perspective. Spencer was selfish, and she was a liar. She was unfaithful to Booker, and she was unfaithful to Nessa in the end. ”It’s been ages, and we’re adults. I get who she is, and I know better now. I’m a big girl, Booker,” she reminded her brother. ”Maybe I just think it’s time to stop being petty. Exes can be civil, even when one of them is Spencer Robertson.” She had to show she was confident; Booker was so used to protecting her, but sometimes, it was unnecessary. She had to make her own choices.

Spencer Robertson. Ugh! How that name just crept up his spine like a spider. Each spindly leg piercing his skin like a needle, crawling up and up in an attempting to crawl into his cranium and seep into his brain. The woman’s name was the epitome of horror, to him, and woman it belonged to was even worse. You know those wraith-like things in the Barry Cotter series? She was like that – only she sucked the reason, happiness, and joy out of your $#*%! instead of your face.  

There was something about the woman. Something that made almost irresistible. With a bat of an eyelash and a purr from her lips, she could disarm the most stubborn of individuals. What made matters worse was that she played both fields, seduced both men and women, and therefore literally the entire span of genders was her Smörgåsbord – and boy did she love to pig out.  

Booker remembered Spencer only in snippets of nightmares. Oh the things that she could make him feel, the lengths that he would go to in order to please her, but there was always a hefty price to pay. He recalled that she was always frustrated with him for some unknown reason. While he would oblige her, it seemed like with him it would take far more coaxing than she was used to. It seemed that she was accustomed to having people wrapped around her taloned fingers, even called him her “Most-Stubborn-Boy”. It wasn’t his favorite nickname.  

Almost arrested a couple of times for public indecency and a few other acts (the person he stole the chinchilla she wanted dropped the charges once Booker agreed to return to animal and pay $200 for mental distress), it all came to a head one brisk morning. Unknown to him how, Booker had woken up in a field in upstate New York, nude except for a Arachnid Man mask sitting on his groin and his left wrist handcuffed to a nude mannequin. If ever there was a walk of shame, this was it. Plus, it didn’t help him getting a ride home with the word “LITERA**” written in sharpie upon his forehead.  

It was a long day.  

Spencer, thankfully, was done with him by that point. When he was ready to see her again, he walked in a firm voice that he was going to end the relationship. It was then she broke the news that she was bored, found him boring, and moved on. Took a bit of the fire from his sails but at least he was done with that psycho…that is until much later one that he caught Nessa in his bed with her. Ugh! From then on the woman’s name was banned from the house.  

Until now… 

>> ”Booker, I’m not an idiot. I haven’t just forgotten who Spencer was. I very much remember being handcuffed to a bench at the police station.”  

He rolled his eyes at that. Nessa was clearly not thinking straight. He knew the long con that Spencer played all too well. It seemed innocent enough, just a minor infraction or two in the name of impulsive youth, but that was how Spencer operated. In exchange for some of the best intimate times that would follow you to your grave, she managed to creep until your skin and start tainting your very soul. The fact that she was going to be in the city again, and even in this apartment, just made him want to retch. There was no way he was going to allow his sister to go through that.  

>> ”It’s been ages, and we’re adults. I get who she is, and I know better now. I’m a big girl, Booker…Maybe I just think it’s time to stop being petty. Exes can be civil, even when one of them is Spencer Robertson.” 

Silence for a moment as he watched. Then, as if startled away he blinked at her. ”…Hmm? What was that? I couldn’t hear over the sound of your good sense leaving your body.” He shook his head. Elbows on the table, hands clasped in a very adult-like manner, Booker gave Nessa the protective big brother look. ”Nessa, right now, every square inch of my body is trying to keep from running off, packing everything we own, and hightailing it to Canada. I’m not just saying this to you because Spencer is a perverted-psychotic-hell-succubus, but I’m saying it because I love you. Please, pleeeeease don’t do this.” He implored. ”You had a couple nights with her. I dated her. I know how she operates and the last thing I want to do is to have to bail you out of the jail because she convinced you it was a good idea to spray paint your ***s on top of the nearest water tower.” 

Not that that happened to anyone he know. His face uncharacteristically serious, he sighed and locked gazes with Nessa again.  

”So please. If my advice means anything to you, listen to me now…and not your libido.” Spencer was a tough pass for Nessa, Booker was well aware of that. Mocha colored skin, a body with curves in all the right places, and an overt wiliness to be sexual explorative; it was everything any one could really want. But it was just all candy coating, candy coating for evil. ”Cancel with her. I’m begging you.” 

All Vanessa’s reasoning fell flat on Booker’s ears. It was hard to blame him when she knew what Spencer was like back when they were still in college. He was not trying to be selfish; as he pointed out, the selfish choice would have been to flee the country. Booker was genuinely looking out for her, and his good-intentions were enough to stifle her frustration at how patronizing the whole encounter felt.

Particularly when Booker was working with partial information. When he mentioned Nessa’s “nights” with their ex, she winced, realizing an inherent problem that got lost in the shuffle. Booker was focused on his schoolwork, and Vanessa was busting her ass working, so it was easy to forget a necessary conversation neither of them was going to want.

Booker was begging her to cancel the plans, but Vanessa was already sighing and resting one hand atop the other. ”So. We’ve never really talked about the Spencer stuff because… well, you know.” It was not a great moment in their sibling relationship when Booker caught the girls in his bed. She was originally visiting the campus to see her brother, but when Vanessa and Spencer crossed paths, there was no resisting the pull between them. She genuinely did not realize which room she had stumbled into until Booker made his presence known.

”In the interest of full disclosure… that night in your dorm room was… kinda not the last time I was with Spencer,” she admitted, forcing the words out slowly, like each one was trying to hide in her throat. ”We may have been… you know… together for like two months.” Yes, the right thing to do would have been to break up with Spencer that day. It was not the first compromising position the bombshell put her in, but it should have been the last.

Therein lied the problem. ”I planned on calling it off, but… it was hard. When I was around her, it was hard to remember the totally logical reasons to end things.”

Suddenly, Booker’s advice hit her, and it was like her ears were finally unclogged enough to hear it. Her eyes widened. ”Oh my God, this is a terrible idea.” What was she even thinking? Drinks at her place with Spencer? That was like inviting the fox into the henhouse!

Except she had already made plans, and Vanessa felt weak backing out of them now. She did believe there was some safe middle-ground worth finding with Spencer. Rebecca made mistakes, and Vanessa was working to forgive those (slowly,) and it had been years. ”What about a compromise? I meet her for coffee out in public. Plenty of witnesses, no alcoholic influence, and no proximity to a bed.”

She looked at Booker, determined. She was a responsible adult, after all! Her teenage childishness was behind her! ”I can handle this, Booker.”

This was bad. This was so, SOOO bad. He couldn’t stand the idea of Nessa seeing his ex-girlfriend. Spencer was such an unsuspecting monster that people so rarely saw her as one. She was all bubblegum sweet wrapped around a volcanic sexpot, the kind of woman that college students absolutely adored and prayed for. But once she sunk her talons into you, it was already too late. The second she was interested in you for more than a single night, you better pray your affairs were in order because she could very well convince you to throw yourself out of a window in her name. The woman was a demon and she was stalking his world again.  

Though he was thankful that her eyes were not set upon him, he was understandably upset that she was now locked onto his sister. Ugh! He still remembered so clearly finding the two of them in his dorm room and it damn near scarred him for life. Just…the positions…UGH! He felt a shiver run up his spine. Sometimes having an eidetic memory was absolutely the worst.  

However, apparently he was in for a bigger bombshell than just the fact that Spencer Robertson was rearing her ugly head again… 

>> ”So. We’ve never really talked about the Spencer stuff because… well, you know…In the interest of full disclosure… that night in your dorm room was… kinda not the last time I was with Spencer…We may have been… you know… together for like two months.” 

”WHAT?!” he suddenly asked in a voice that was a few pitches hire than his own actually voice. The surprise was clear on his face.   

Booker, had not idea. He had accepted the fact that Spencer and Nessa had a few flings but once the woman moved on, if figured that was it. He hadn’t seen his sister much in that time but both of them were crazy busy and they weren’t exactly living together like they were now. However, he had never expected that Spencer and Nessa had been together for as long as Nessa was saying. He tried to think back, looking for clues, hints to this betrayal, but the woman’s mocking, laughing voice rolled around in his head with so resonance that he couldn’t think straight.  

The siren returned.  

>>”I planned on calling it off, but… it was hard. When I was around her, it was hard to remember the totally logical reasons to end things.” 

Nessa was in a rush to explain, stating that she had been planning to call things off with Spencer but being around her just seemed to have a hypnotic appeal. The second she said this, Booker crossed his arms over his chest, leaned back in his chair, and gave her his full attention. While Booker was extremely intelligent, he knew his sister was too. Even as she explained, the man quietly counted down in the back of his mind, waiting for her to put the pieces together. He would guess in three…two…one…. 

>> ”Oh my God, this is a terrible idea.” 

”…ya think…” he said with a tinge of faux-disbelief in his voice. He shook his head. ”Nessa…” he started to say, but was cut off by his sister’s need to compromise. 

>> ”What about a compromise? I meet her for coffee out in public. Plenty of witnesses, no alcoholic influence, and no proximity to a bed.”  

It was a bad idea. Booker was already shaking his head “No” but she kept on talking, kept on trying to explain how the situation would work. He loved her very much but he didn’t want to see her get hurt by this succubus. However, there was one thing he knew about his sister was that she had to make her own mistakes. He could put his foot down, he could tie her up and leave her in some dark little basement, but in the end she would just resent him and it would only add more fuel to the fire that she would do whatever it was she wanted to do.  

He sighed.  

>> ”I can handle this, Booker.” 

He still shook his head, but not in disagreement towards her, but more because of the situation. He would honestly put a steak through Spencer’s heart if he had any inkling that she even had one. So, with a grumble, he picked up his utensils and cut off a piece of the steak. The only comment he would make about Nessa’s compromise was…”This is such a bad, bad idea…” 

If Booker was not a fan of Spencer being his kid sister’s former fling, he was viscerally bothered by the realization that she was an actual ex-girlfriend. Vanessa did not consider what she was doing as “going behind her brother’s back.” It was a busy period in their lives, and Booker did not warrant a say in her love life. She was in the last years of being a teenager, when anyone was quick to defend their decisions with the shield of adulthood.

Except the decisions she made with Spencer were troublesome. She would think of a bad idea, bat her long eyelashes, pout with her pillowy lips, and Vanessa would find herself going along with anything her girlfriend wanted. Looking back, it seemed bizarre, but in the moment, it was hardly like her arm was being twisted. Spencer just… made her want to live dangerously?

Booker may have had a point, even if he chose to be a smug *sshat in the way he acknowledged her revelation. Vanessa was willing to concede her original plan, but she was a big girl. She was a mind reader! (She was a mind reader back then, but she would ignore that condition.) If she caught any troubling intentions in Spencer’s head, she could bail. It was like having a built-in storm-warning!

The tense silence hung in the air, but eventually Booker broke it with a heavy sigh. It was the sigh of broken resolve. Success! He did not say he was okay with the compromise, but his final warning was clearly one of resignation. She could take that.

Vanessa hopped from her chair and wrapped her arms around Booker, planting a kiss on his cheek for good measure. ”There’s the begrudging consent I was looking for! Thanks, Book!” She returned to her seat and picked at her salad, but she was already texting Spencer to amend their plans. The change was surprisingly well-accepted, and Vanessa felt confident that they could handle coffee as adults who once dated without it getting weird.

---

Vanessa groaned, feeling a pounding in her head, accompanied by a consistent ringing. Her body felt loose, but there was a sore spot on her stomach. She was still wrapped in sweat-dampened sheets and, of course, Spencer.

If mind reading was Vanessa’s storm warning, she blatantly heard the sirens and ignored calls for evacuation. It genuinely started with coffee. Coffee went so well, Vanessa was sure they could manage a drink to cap off the night. The drink became three drinks, which became a trip to the tattoo parlor. Right, the tattoo parlor for the fresh belly-button piercing Nessa now sported. From there, drinks continued until Nessa lost count.

And now she was greeted by the dark haired vixen responsible for her headache (and more pleasant after-effects.) Spencer was already on her feet in all her vivacious glory, grabbing a towel from the hook on Vanessa’s door. ”Oh good, you’re up. I’m guessing the bathroom is down the hall? Maybe I’ll see you there?” God, the idea sounded so appealing in that sweet Texan accent, even with her pounding headache.

”Mmm, maybe,” she groaned, still trying to stop the room from spinning. ”Down the hall to the right.”

Spencer blew her a kiss and slipped out of the room, and Vanessa’s head started slowly clearing up. Booker was absolutely right; she was not prepared for Hurricane Spencer, and…

Oh, ****, right. Booker.

Booker was not going to stick around for this sh**storm. While he firmly believed that his sister was a grown up and that there was nothing he could do to really dissuade her, a minor part of him had sincerely hoped that she would keep her word. However, Booker knew too much about Spencer and too much about his sister to really think that this was going to go over well. As a precaution Booker made arrangements to sleep over at a friend’s house; Nessa was only a little offended by the lack of faith he seemed to display in her. However his actions weren’t out of lack of faith for her but total faith in the type of manipulative psychopath that Spencer was.

His night had gone rather well. Up gaming most of the night with his buddy, plotting some great ideas for a new video on Pixel Rainbow. Over all, it was a pretty good night; except for those few, quiet moments when Booker was sitting in the dark, or laying on couch, peering up at the darkened ceiling. He was worried for his sister. Every now and again he would check his phone, fearful that she would send him a picture of her mugshot or get her one phonecall from a jail cell. Thankfully, none of those events came.

And yet, his sleep was rather fitful. Whenever he began to drift, to fall into the tender lands of sleep, he would become started by the sound of a sweet, stinging laughter in the distant shadows. It wasn’t a good feeling but he had hoped it was little more than his imagination. This thought followed him until, finally, he had fallen asleep.

Now, standing in front of his apartment door, Booker had checked his phone again to see that there were still not messages of detainment or pleads for bail money. Maybe Nessa had finally proven him wrong. Maybe she actually was a mature, grounded individual who could make decisions for herself. As he unlocked the door, a small smile of relief pulled on his lips as she stepped back into the apartment. Yes, his sister was finally a grown up and responsible individual. Maybe he would make her her favorite waffles as an apology for disbelieving her.

"Yeah..." he nodded hopefully, speaking low and full of relief to himself. Seeing that everything was still in the apartment and not a pawn shop was indeed refreshing. "...waffles sound good."

”Fancy meeting you here, sugar.”

That accent. That sweet, Texan accent. As his eyes drifted over to the hall, he noted that Spencer was actually there, in his home, draped in a towel – only a towel. She gave him her most flirtatious of smiles before she turned and sauntered into the bathroom. Soon after the sounds of a shower could be heard cascading from within.

This was a place of evil now.

Still shaking the haze from seeing the demonic princess of bad decisions in his home, Booker barely noticed the sound of rushing feet, a door being pulled open, and the sudden appearance of his sister’s head in her doorway. The two caught one another’s gaze. She had started to say something, maybe something apologetic, he didn’t know; Booker couldn’t hear her. Instead the man merely turned back around, opened the door, and quietly closed it behind him, making sure to lock it.

He loved his sister. He was going to miss her. But she belonged to Spencer now. So, one sibling short, Booker turned down the hall and headed back out. He could grab breakfast somewhere out on the town now. And if he should so happen to walk into traffic on the way there, well, it was still better than being in the same room as Spencer Robertson.

Vanessa was stumbling her way out of bed, trying to gather herself. The night before was intense, and maybe even fun, but it was a terrible decision. It was specifically the terrible decision her brother warned her about before she dismissed it. She was so confident she had matured enough to resist Spencer’s advances, and she could not have been more wrong. Did she even think about saying no? Not that she could recall. Booker was right; Spencer should be classified as a Stage One Dangerous Substance.

>> ”Fancy meeting you here, sugar.”

Right! Stumbling! Vanessa got to her feet, still feeling her knees wobble from… recent activities. There was no time to dig around for a second towel, so she could only poke her head and an obviously unclothed shoulder through her doorway to survey the scene.

Spencer was already sashaying her way into the bathroom, (and God, was it fun to watch her sashay,) leaving her poor brother standing in sight of the hallway.

Their eyes met, and Booker seemed shell-shocked. This was the one thing he did not want to return home to, and she could see the urge to escape in his eyes without the need for mind reading. Vanessa had a rare moment of lucidity where she realized how in over her head she was. Booker was right, and as much as she hated to admit it, she could use his help getting out of her situation.

She meekly mouthed the words, ”Help me,” but it was too late. Booker turned and walked back through the door, vacating the apartment and freeing himself from the toxic sex cloud Vanessa let in. She tried to follow, forgetting her unclothed state, but there was no chance for her now.

Spencer opened the bathroom door, looking at Vanessa like a snack she had a craving for. ”Everything okay, baby? I was waiting,” she purred, loosening the towel around her body until it fell to the floor.

She… well… a shower did sound refreshing. ”L-lead the way.”

Spencer Robertson was only in town for the weekend before returning to Texas, so Vanessa would only be under her mysterious thrall until her flight Sunday morning. (Nessa would, of course, offer to drive her to the airport.) Vanessa would call Booker that afternoon to assure him a dozen times that Spencer was gone and she was not complicit in some trap to lure him into her clutches.

Until then, Vanessa was a compliant, whimpering victim, suffering the consequences of not listening to her brother’s experience.

Chapter Two: Something Wicked This Way Dreams

The darkness encroached from all around. Darkness that was choking, wheezing, crawling with unseen things that no mortal man would dare seek out. The scary thing about the dark was never the color or the absent of light, it is always about the unknown. About not seeing what was just the in peripheral, stalking you, hunting you like an animal. That was what made something like sleep so scary. Behind the blackness of your closed eyes, horrors and terrors which you cannot understand stalk the shadows, ready to leap out just when you are at your most vulnerable.

After all, when you’re sleeping, who is there to help you?

For Booker B. Bookman, the man had had dreams before. Usually they were nice little romps through a fantasy world where he could fly and fight evil, or he was on an epic space journey with a furry friend at his side. But every once in a while, Booker’s sweet dreams turned from a fantasy into something quite monstrous.

These weren’t ordinary nightmares. These were terrors born from real trauma that reared its ugly head every now and again when the librarian didn’t expect them. It was in these dreams that the shadows took the form of not some monster, but rather someone whom he intimately knew, from back in his college days. The young man with the solid body and a head for perfection. Booker had admired Jamal since they had met, and it only continued when they dated. Now, however, the young man who had lost his life because he couldn’t control what he was, had become a scarecrow in the fields of his mindscape.

A reminder that at a time when many were dead or injured, Booker walked away from it all completely unharmed.

It started with screaming. With the feeling of guilt. Voices screamed and shouted in a fiery panic. Then the explosion shot outward, like an ever expanding field, a bubble that slowly consuming everything within its path. Debris flew, bodies were broken before being swept off their feet, and in the epicenter of all of it was the young man, Jamal, who stared so heatedly at Booker. In the midst of all the carnage, all the destruction, Booker himself stood, unfazed, terror swirling about him, choking him, freezing him in place. Worst of all, the thing that saved him, the thing that made him special, it didn’t work here.

The fire broke through. Shrapnel flew towards him. And the last thing that Booker saw were those angry, demonic eyes glaring at him with all the fires of hell.

---

Booker awoke with a start. A silent one. He shot upward, sitting and looking around his room in a confused panic as he tried to fight off a hazy sleep and the desperate need to be awake. His heart felt las if it would pound its way out of his chest, the racing drowning him for a moment where for the briefest seconds he figured that this was it, that he would die from a heart attack rather than just sheer panic. But as the seconds passed, as the cold sweat dripped down his forehead, Booker slowly came the realization that this wouldn’t be his end. He was alive – but it did little for panic that was still settling in his chest.

Despite the fact that he knew the majority of what he saw was a dream, a vivid one at that, Booker could still hear them. He began to cut out reality from fantasy, and those tidbits that were definitely memories shined through loud and clear – and he didn’t like it. Booker tried to lie back in bed but those thoughts onto continued to grow more and more desperate for his attention. The darkness, the silence, it was a veritable breeding ground for those horrible things that he didn’t want to remember.

A glance at the clock would show 3:00 A.M. illuminated in neon red lettering. He sighed, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed, sitting still and resting his elbows on his knees. Running his hand through his hair, he knew that he wouldn’t be getting back to sleep any time soon. Hell, just closing his eyes he could feel Jamal’s angry glare and hear the shouts of those people who died that night. The worst was the thunder, the crashing, the cacophony of the explosion as it ripped through the frat house. That sound, well, it was just the most unholy of all.

Feeling another wave of anxiety attempt to wash over him, Booker finally got up. Dressed in just a plain, forest green tank top and his boxer shorts, the man started to pace. Walking helped, usually, but right now he knew that he needed to do more than just pace. As he opened his door, Booker stepped out into the darkened interior of the apartment, looking around with shaky breath. His eyes settled on the kitchen, he made for it.

---

He had to keep moving. He wasn’t sure how much time had passed but Booker had to keep moving. After he had turned on the light, the man had begun sweep (the kitchen was dirty). However he soon noticed that he needed to sweep sparingly or he was going to run out of floor to actually sweep. Therefore, his attention turned again, this time to the fridge. He could clean out the fridge. That train of thought didn’t last, though, as only a few minutes into taking out old things, he noticed that the milk was going to expire in a day or two. There wasn’t much left and he didn’t want to waste it, but what was he to do?

Ten minutes later found Booker mixing dough for chocolate chip cookies with a large, wooden spoon. The kitchen was essentially in disarray now, half cleaning projects here and there, a batch of cookies being ready to toss into the oven as he finished mixing a second helping. It was working, though, deep down, somewhere he knew that it was working. He was thoroughly distracted…but how long would it last?

Vanessa had her faults, but she generally saw herself as a competent person with strengths and talents others would envy. Her talent for remaining oblivious to the clock as it ticked into the first hours of morning was not one of her most enviable traits. She was constantly working on forming some semblance of a normal sleep schedule, but she was easily sidetracked by ViewTube videos, (which she could technically qualify as work research,) and video games, (which she could file under “work training.”)

The latter was responsible for her latest sleep aversion. Vanessa had settled into bed at the reasonable hour of eleven with the intention of playing an hour of the recent Flame Icon game to wind down from her day. She should have known better, as she kept moving to new encounters, compelled to maximize affection systems between her characters to pair the ones she wanted to see married. (For the benefit of team synergy and definitely not petty shipping reasons.)

When Vanessa played games at night, she always popped in ear buds to prevent her bad habits from affecting Booker. He worked an actual day-job that began early in the morning, as opposed to Vanessa’s late-morning start times. She liked hearing her games, particularly when they had notably good music, so she could be dead to the world for hours.

It was… well, she did not want to look at the clock, but she knew it was too late. She could feel it in her heavy eyes. She pulled the earbuds out of her ears, hearing the subtle ambiance of her room and the city outside for the first time in what felt like forever. She was going to pay for her bad decision making in the morning, she realized as she turned off the lamp on her nightstand.

With her room darkened completely, Vanessa noticed for the first time that a light was peeking through the space between her door and the floor. Had she left the lights on? Vanessa was conscious of her energy bills, so she normally did what she could to turn off lights when she was not in a room.

Vanessa tossed on a long t-shirt so she did not walk into her kitchen topless. It was a wise decision, as she found her brother standing there. ”Book?” she mumbled, rubbing her eyes.

She looked around, and suddenly she realized what was happening. The kitchen looked like someone was reading half of each article in a housekeeping magazine. Booker was keeping occupied, but looking at him mixing cookie dough, it was clear he was barely there. This was not the first time she had seen this behavior since he moved in. It was always a sign that he had one of “the nightmares.”

”Hey Book…” she said softly as she approached, not wanting to shake him too quickly from his stupor. ”Rough night?” There was a sincerity to her expression; she hated seeing her brother go through this.