Death: The High Cost of Living *Anthologies*

Ben was sitting at a computer in an internet cafe at two in the morning, virtually alone, save for the snoozing register jocky behind him. He was here, studying for a big test, as well as writing a research paper in a separate window when another head ache crept through his skull. He leaned back and pinched the bridge of his nose before rummaging through his heavy back pack for the bottle of pills he kept with him at all times.

Taking three of the pills, cause he'd found that two wouldn't even touch the pain, he followed them with a gulp of his cooling cup of toffee flavored coffee. He then proceeded to stare at the paper he'd been typing up on the computer screen. It all seemed like a fuzzy mess as he set his head down upon his upwardly pointing thumbs and folded his hands, seemingly in prayer, as he closed his eyes against the pain. "God please... Make this pain go away..." He whispered, fighting the need to vomit.

He was in such pain that he didn't notice when a rather pale 'goth' chick entered the cafe and quietly took a seat at the computer right next to him. He was still muttering for relief when she did.

Death

She was watching him, quietly, the tiniest hint of a smile on her lips. Although her skin was incredibly pale, her hair, her cloths, even her fingernail polish and her eyeliner (down to the Egyptian-looking flourish of makeup around her right eye) were as black as the ink between the stars. Only the silver ankh she wore on a thin chain around her neck gave her outfit any shine or sparkle. She was watching Ben, and to a casual observer, one might think she was checking him out, a gothy college student up in the wee hours of the night, on the prowl for some companionship.

Her interest in Ben went far beyond the physical, though. She was about to become the most important girl in his life.

She watched as he choked down a few mouthfuls of coffee and then begged for the pain to end.

"If the coffee's that bad, maybe you should think about putting more sugar into it? Or maybe switching to some nice tea or something?" she said in a conversational, almost playful tone. And as she spoke to him, the pain in Ben's head seemed to lessen just the tiniest amount... but that could have been the pills kicking in...

"What?" Ben croaked as he drew his hands away from his face and lifted his head slightly, peeking over the crook of his arm at the girl sitting next to him. "Oh... No... Its one of those... Cappocino's... Full of sugar." He replied, lifting his head as he felt his nausia fade away. His head still hurt, making it hard to think. "M'sorry if I disturbed you..." Ben added as he started staring at her. She was really rather pretty, in a dark sort of way.

He caught himself wondering if she were a vampire or something, come to drain his life away, and turn him into her dashing, eternally young companion. "Benicula... Heh..." He muttered under his breath as he turned back toward the computer monitor glowing brightly, lighting his face. The play on his name reminded him of a silly book he read when he was alot younger, about a bunny that would drain the fluids out of various vegetables.

Death

"Nope; didn't bother me at all, Ben," she said as she slid into the other chair at the table where Ben was sitting. She reached over and picked up his drink and raised it to her lips... yet didn't drink. She only sniffed at it, then winced as she put it back down.

"I should say there's plenty of sugar in there. That much'll rot the teeth right out of your mouth, you know." She glanced at his screen, but from her angle she couldn't quite make out what he was working on.

"So... you must have a pretty important test or something looming if you're out in the middle of the night like this. Anything I can do to help?"

She smiled again as she ducked her head to peer at his downturned eyes, trying to catch his gaze away with her own.

Ben glanced over as the girl took and sniffed at his luke warm drink and had to crack a smile when she winced away. "Well... I do brush my teeth... So..." He said with a shrug, not realizing that his headache was slowly going away, little by little.

"Yeah, I have a test about the human brain, and I'm writing a paper connecting chemical imbalances with certain behavior..." Ben looked up and fell silent as he noticed the girl tilting her head. "I um... I forgot what I was saying..." He admited as he blushed a little. He wasn't very good with women, especially pretty ones.

Death

"You were talking about your test. About the human brain. Bad luck for you, I suppose! The human brain's the complicated one." She smiled. "Really, it's a pretty resilient organ, but it's also one that, when something doesn't work quite right, really causes a whole host of problems. Chemical imbalances or worse."

Ben had worse. She knew. That was why she was here, after all, but she was pretty sure he didn't know how much worse. These were always the hard ones; the people who still had so much to do but not enough time to do it. Especially when they had no idea how little time was left.

"So what comes first. Test or paper? Because you aren't doing yourself any favors staying up all night if you can put the paper off, don'cha think? Wouldn't it be better to go out and do something fun? Or heck... maybe just even catch a few hours of sleep so you don't go into your test completely wrecked?"

"Oh right... The test... The test is on monday... The paper isn't due till wednesday, but I like to be ahead of things, you know? Say, sounds like you know a little bit about Neurology yourself, I wouldn't have guessed that... I mean... You, well you really don't seem..." Ben realized he was digging himself a hole, so he just trailed off. "Hmm... Maybe you're right... What would you suggest I do?" Ben asked, not sure why this girl was showing such an interest in him, but liking it none the less.

Death

She seized on what he'd brought up, refusing to let it pass. "I don't really seem like what, Ben?" she said, smiling at him impishly. "Like the type of girl who'd be interested in science? Well, you'd be wrong there. Science is what it's all about. You should know that." She stood up, then crooked her finger at him, inviting him to follow her out of the cafe.

"It's late, and there's not THAT much to do, unless you know where to look. Come with me, Ben. I have to show you something."

"I... I'm sorry, I didn't mean... Yeah, I know, you're right." Ben was stumbling over his words as the girl stood up. "Come with you? Where are we going?" He asked, growing a little leary as he saved his paper to his flash drive before pulling it out and pocketing it. "I mean... I'm not really much into partying... But... Okay... What do you want to show me?" He asked, finding himself already following her out of the cafe, dispite his meager protesting. Why did girls always get him into such a mental jumble like this, he wondered, his head ache seemingly gone for the moment.

Death

"Don't worry, Ben," she said with a cryptic smile. "I'm not all that into partying either. Follow me." She left the internet cafe and stepped out onto the street. Despite the fact that it was the middle of the night, it was still busy; lights flashed everywhere and cars raced back and forth. She looked around, almost as if she were frustrated by all the noise and chaos, then noticed the fire escape running up the side of the building; the internet cafe was in the basement of one of the city's countless towering buildings, and the structure rose almost twenty stories into the sky above. Moving quickly, she leapt up to grab the lower edge of the fire escape and without seeming to strain at all, she pulled herself up onto the lowest level of the steel frame. She lowered the ladder down to Ben, then began clambering the stairs toward the roof. "Come on!" she called out to him. "If we hurry, we won't miss it!"

Dispite the fact that he'd been living in this town for the past three years Ben just couldn't seem to get used to all the noise. It always set him on edge, so when he noticed that the girl he was following seemed frustrated with it as well, he smiled a little to himself, wondering if she came from a sleepy little town like he had.

It occured to him just then that he didn't even know her name, but before he could ask, she'd leapt up and dragged down a near by fire escape ladder and was already climbing the stairs, lithely, like a cat. He watched her with a sense of admiration until she snapped him out of it by calling down to him, saying that if they didn't hurry, they'd miss something...

Miss what, he wondered as he started up the ricketty old ladder. "W-wait up... I'm comming!" He called back as he got to the first little landing above the ladder. "Wait for me." He whispered under his breath, looking up to see her on the landing just above him, looking down sort of impatiently, but in a teasing sort of way. He rushed up the steps to meet her with a quiet laugh.

Death

She looked down and smiled as she saw he was catching up, then sprinted ahead, clambering up the row after row of steps, keeping a steady pace all the way to the top. She wasn't even winded when she reached the roof, and the sound of the city, so loud and distracting before, was now pleasantly distant atop the twenty-story building. Even the buzzing sound of an air conditioner vent was more soothing than annoying. She held out her arms and threw back her head, looking up into the starry night sky as she spun slowly, then looked out over the edge of the building at the city.

The view was magnificent; a panorama of lights showing the route of freeways and roads and the rise of buildings. She heard the sound of Ben clambering up onto the roof, his breathing heavy from the exertion, and skipped to the far side of the roof where the view overlooked the river and the rest of the city on the far shore.

"Come on over, Ben. It's about to start."

She was smiling as the sudden blackout, an event she'd known was coming, known in the same way she knew so many things. An overloaded circuit at a key substation had blown, and it would be hours before it was fixed. Until then, the were at ground zero of a sixteen block blackout. The sound of the air conditioner faded, and for a moment, the night was silent until it began to be filled with the distant cries of frustration. Beyond their island of darkness, the rest of the city blazed on through the night, but here in the heart of the blackout, it felt sheltered and surreal. She turned to face Ben, her keen eyes sparkling, almost glowing silver in the darkness, picking out his expression with an ease that human eyes could never accomplish.

"Huhn... Huhn... Whats starting?" Ben asked, trying to catch his breath as he came over to the far side of the roof, where the girl was standing. As if on cue, block after block of the city blacked out. The silence that followed was so absolute that it brought tears to Bens eyes. What a strange reaction, he thought as he felt a tear roll down his cheek, not understanding why it had affected him so.

He realized then that this girl apparently knew this black out was going to happen, and also that he did not even know her name. Looking over at her while he wiped the tear from his cheek, he asked her nervously. "Who... Who are you?"

Death

She closed her eyes and breathed in deep, taking in the scent of humanity. The mix of car exhaust and sweat and hope and fear was never the same; each spot had its own strange mix. She exhaled through her mouth, then clambered up onto the edge of the short stone rim that surrounded the building, balancing with ease atop the narrow edge as she looked out over the city. She didn't look back at Ben when she spoke.

"You mean you haven't recognized me yet, Ben?" she asked. "I suppose that's okay, although you'll need to recognize me soon, I suspect. In the meantime, though, how about this? Who would you like me to be?"

Something was vaguely familiar about the way in which this girl took her time in replying, taking a deep breath before she climbed up onto the ledge of the building. She was calm and fearless as she looked out over the city. And though Ben found himself reaching out to draw her back from the edge, his voice shaky with nervousness as he said. "H-hey, c'mon, don't do that, you're scaring me..." He couldn't help but feel an ache in his heart, wishing he had the nerve to climb up beside her.

"Recognize you? What, are you famous or something?" He wasn't being snarky, he genuinely thought that she might be famous, but that he was so out of the loop that he simply didn't recognize her. Then she asked him who he would like her to be, and something clicked, or at least he thought it did. "...Like you to be? Wait... You're not like a... I mean... I do like you and all, but... If you need me to pay, or something... Maybe I should go..." Ben was really starting to feel stupid and disillusioned, he'd really thought that this girl was interested in him.

Death

"Don't go," she said, then held out her hand. "Take my hand. Come on up. Don't worry, I won't let you fall." She felt his hand close over hers, but her grip was stronger than his. With a gentle tug, she helped him clamber up onto the ledge, and as long as she held his hand, his sense of balance would seem strong and true.

"There," she said as she looked from him back out over the city. "That's much better."

For a few moments, she simply stood there, looking out over the city. "As for me, well I suppose you could call me famous. Although not in a way that most people realize, I guess. I'm not a prostitute though, so you don't have to worry about me lightening your wallet." She shot a quick glance and a smile to him to assure him that she'd taken no offense at his response, then gave his hand a quick little squeeze.

"Although I do find it interesting... maybe even a little flattering that that's what first came to your mind when I asked you what you'd like me to be. Prostitution gets a bad rap these days. It wasn't always like that. Once upon a time, prostitutes were important religious figures. Priestesses, even. Sometimes, I think modern religion's sort of lost its way."

A few more minutes passed, then she spoke again, looking out over the city and not at him. "You're a good looking guy, though, Ben. You shouldn't need to pay for sex if you want it."

Ben turned and looked at the girls hand, feeling a deep seated sense of trust in her, although he had no idea where it came from. He came back and took her hand as she hoisted him up onto the ledge with her. Normally, he would have peed his pants, looking down at how high up they were, but while he held her hand, he felt safe.

He looked up at her with a look of wonder in his eyes as she glanced at him. When she looked out over the city again, he looked too in awe of it. He was speechless, it was like she was showing him the world. She started talking again, her voice soft and friendly as she mentioned her fame again. Maybe she was a writer, he thought. She told him that she wasn't a prostitute and squeezed his hand, causing him to look embarassedly at his feet and blush over his incorrect assumption. "I'm sorry..." He muttered as she continued on.

Ben did a double take when the girl mentioned that protitution was a religious matter. The concept surprised him, and he thought that maybe he had been born a few thousand years too late. He blinked a couple of times, nodding as she said she thought modern religion had lost its way. "Yeah, yeah, I agree, too many TV evangelists."

Another few minutes passed before the girl spoke again, and what she said choked him up inside. He looked over at her, his eyes filling with tears, his lips parted, an almost haunted look on his face. "Who... Who are you really?" He asked, his voice shaking.

Death

"I'm a friend, Ben," she said, her voice soft and compassionate. "Isn't that what you need right now?"

She reached over and took the hand she was holding in both hands, then leaving him perched on the edge of the building, she stepped off behind him and took his other hand in her own, holding both of them as she stood behind him, her head coming up to the small of his back. She guided his hands down to his sides, then leaned in and pressed the side of her head against his right hip, her small but perky breasts brushing against the backs of his legs. Her left hand released his, then slid around to the front of his pants and found him hard, straining from inside against the front of his pants.

"Think anyone's watching us?" she said playfully.

Ben nodded, trying to swallow back on his emotions. Whatever else this girl might be, he felt, he knew she was his friend. By now, as she moved around behind him, Ben was looking out over a sea of flickering lights, most likely from candles and flashlights, anything that would light up the pitch darkness below them. Ben found he wasn't thinking of her as a girl or a stranger any more, but a woman, so close, and so warm.

It was cliche, but his knees were week as she circled her arms aorund him, bringing them up to caress the erection he was sporting for her. "Its too dark for them to see, I think..." Ben answered almost breathlessly, turning to face her as he got down from the ledge by sitting on the edge of it and extending his legs to meet the ground in front of her.

He looked her in the eyes, his own showing need as he reached out to caress her cheek. "I'm... I'm a virgin..." He admited, biting his lower lip against another flood of emotion.

Death

Her eyebrows arched at his confession.

"Well!" she said as she stepped back to appraise him anew. "That is surprising. At least, here in what you like to call the 'civilized world,' at least. To be honest, it's kind of refreshing to hear that, Ben." She smiled, setting him at ease again with her easy friendliness and to assure him she wasn't teasing him. She had, of course, known he was a virgin. She knew a lot of things about Ben, but this particular quality, combined with certain other dark shadows lurking unseen in his near future, were what drew her to him tonight.

"So, virgin by choice? Or virgin just because of the way things have worked out for you? Are you saving it for marriage, or just waiting for the right girl to come along and sweep you off your feet?"

Ben looked up feeling very self conscious as the girl took a step back, giving him a look of surprise. He blinked and sniffled a little as she said it was refreashing to hear that he was... A virgin. Her smile drew a nervous laugh from him as he felt the snot and tears of his held back emotions building up.

He sniffled again and formed a smile as he shrugged. "It's just never happened, I guess I havn't really gone out of my way for it... Its like... Like how you mentioned that women... Er... How sex was a sort of worship? All the pretty girls always seem so shallow, or mean to me... You know? And it makes it hard for me to, you know, give myself to them? Does that make any sense?" Ben asked as he blinked out a single tear.

Death

"It makes perfect sense, Ben," she said. And then, without any preamble, she lifted her black shirt over her head and cast it aside. The silver ankh on the chain around her neck swung down between her pale breasts, the nipples large and hard. Her flesh, now that everything above her waist was visible, looked even more pale, lit by the moonlight.

"Would you be willing to give your virginity to me, Ben?" she asked.

Ben exhaled slowly as sunk to his knees and looked up at the woman before him. Sniffling with a look of almost religious awe in his eyes, Ben nodded. "Yes, please?" He whispered as he clasped his hands in front him before reaching out to touch the subtle curve of her bare stomach. He leaned so that his mouth touched her skin, just below her navel. With a soft whine of need, he parted his lips and tasted her skin with his tongue as he moved his hands to lovingly caress her hips.

Death

She reached down and ran her fingers across his head, through his hair. Her hands slid down to his shirt, and as she took hold of it, he reflexively raised his arms to allow her to pull it up and over his head; she tossed it aside as well to land atop her own discarded clothing.

"Well then," she said, as she enjoyed the tiny kisses he was planting on her belly. "You'd better finish the job I started and get us out of these pants."

With a calm he did not know he could posess in the middle of something so erotic as this scene, Ben undid the woman's tight leather pants and began working them down over her hips, along with her black silk panties, while she swayed every to slightly to help him shed them from her body. He looked up into her eyes with longing, parting his lips in a sigh of awe at her perfection as the trim nest of her pubic hair was revealed.

Bowing his head as her pants fell to rest about her ankles, Ben gently lifted her feet, one after the other, free of jeans and panties both. He added them to the growing pile of cloths with a quick glance before returning his attention back to her body. He ran his finger tips over the dark silky curls that crowned the lips of her pussy. "I want to taste you..." He breathed softly, leaning in to put his mouth upon her bare sex.