Short Story: 'So This is What it Feels Like.'

This short story was written over fifteen years ago for a competition organised by a company called 'Drinksafetech' which provided kits so you could tell if your drink had been spiked. There was a bit of controversy, as far as I remember, from other competition entrants, as my story hints at rape and violence. It also seems to recommend revenge -- although what that might ultimately be is up to the reader.

I don't know if I would write a story like this today but that is only because, as they say, a river is never the same twice. People change, grow, adapt. Writers are no different -- they carry their current baggage about and drop pieces of it on the page. Their writing is a product of self AND the age they live in. All of which to say that although I would never thought of adding trigger warnings fifteen years ago, I'm telling you about them now so you are forewarned.

That doesn't mean to say, I don't like the story. I think it has a good structure. Motivation and action is all clear, yet the ending allows the reader to imagine their own scenarios.

The story...

So this is what it feels like.

     His legs buckle and he sits down. Gravity pins his head back onto the vinyl of the booth. Taking a deep breath doesn’t stop the room spinning upwards. Drinkers at the bar are hurtling to the top of his vision. With effort he brings them back down. They hurtle. He closes his eyes.

     “You okay?”

     The voice is soft. A girl. He daren’t open his eyes. Taking care not to move too suddenly, he gives a small nod. The foam in the couch beneath him breathes and the PVC squeaks as she sits down and briefly places a warm hand over his.

     The gesture shocks him. He would flinch, if he could, as though from a slap; but his body remains unresponsive, inert. Her touch angers him, although somewhere in the half-light of his being he recognises that this gentleness is what he craves. Sometimes, late at night, bed ruffled and damp from his exertions, he feels he would give all he owns for a light touch, a tender kiss, his hair smoothed from his brow.

     A long time ago, he subverted this need for affection into a longing for sex. He’d spend a week’s wage buying drinks, flirting with girls who’d cackle out into the black night. Sometimes he got what he wanted, but it never seemed enough. The girls slipped away from him, no matter how many phone calls he made and texts he wrote, no matter how many visits he made to their flats. The whole thing was too much effort. There had to be an easier way.

     There was. When he was sitting on the train, some men got on at the Hythe and he’d overheard them talking about what they’d done the night before. Seemed like everybody was doing it. There were the occasional disadvantages, of course: the odd stretched muscle from trying to move a dead weight; funny looks from the taxi driver, that kind of thing, but nothing that would put him off doing it again, and again.

     Until tonight. Sweat is beading on his face. Something has gone wrong. But what?  The roofies are still in his pocket, so he hasn’t taken one by mistake. This time, someone has spiked his drink.

     He smells the girl’s freshly washed hair as she leans close and whispers, “Open your eyes.” He does and shuts them again quickly. Her image burns onto his retina. One of his girls. He’d taken a photo of her, trussed up and naked. She’d never know. Where was the harm?

     “Remember me?” she asks. The anger in her voice is controlled. “It’s my turn now.”

     So this is what it feels like.