One Way Or Another

I was pacing around my room. I couldn’t seem to still, so this was my only option. Well, this or go pace in the living room and my roommates would most likely love this job. Therefore being where they could hear and beg me to take it did not sound like a good idea.

“I told you before, I’m not interested.” I said trying to stay sounding polite.
“If it’s a question of money Ms. Shimshi my boss is offering a healthy sum.” The woman continued on still sounding way too chipper.
“It’s not about the money, it’s about what you’re asking me to do.”
“It is just a book.” She said flatly yet some how maintaining her cheery tone.
“Then hire a librarian, I’m not qualified.” I said hanging up before she could say anything else. It didn’t matter someone else would call again.
I curled up on my bed still holding my phone, half hoping it would ring. I was trying to will it to ring. Not that I had anyone is mind to talk to really I just wanted to talk.
Instead I grabbed my trusty laptop and decided to do a little research. Twenty minutes later I had all the tastiest bits of information. Which still left me completely puzzled. I had no media buzz, no television show, so how did he know I existed?

The man looking to hire me was a tech mogul. He not only programmed some of my favorite software, he was also behind some of the biggest sites on the web today. So, why would he want me? The answer was clear, he was very New Age, his business practices of using tarot readers has been laughed at by nearly every other CEO. Got to love old money, if it’s not our way it’s silly. One look at his net worth had to show he was doing something right.

Still, the whole proposal smacked of Hilter wanting to and ultimately trying to win World War Two with the Occult. Jared Barnes wanted me an unglamorous college going medium and all purposes aside slacker to find him the Necronomicon. Part of me wanted to be snarky and send him Simon’s Neronomicon but, my mother raised me with manners.

Why me?

I’m Lux Shimshi and I’m a lightning rod for the paranormal and while it’s interesting, sometimes I wish I’d just been ordinary. See, I’m a mermaid, who’s also a medium, and lately very popular. I’m 22 years old and going to college, working most nights at Coffin Candy’s a strip club as a DJ. When I’m not doing that I’m usually on a ghost hunt with ORACLE my roommate’s paranormal group.

It wasn’t me specifically Barnes wanted, he probably knew my father’s passion was that book. The last fully Japanese Merman Toru Shimshi, leader of the biggest Merfaction died looking for that book.

I was my father’s daughter.

Part of me wanted to call Daniel, my twin, but it was late and knowing him he had 3 or 5 house guests. Best not to wake them, I’d call in the morning. Something told me the icky feeling wouldn’t go away anytime soon.

Curling up into a ball tighter, I knew exactly what I needed, and where to get it. Soon I was relaxed and I slipped into a crack. Upside, I was left standing in front of a bar. Instinctively I knew he’d be here. I followed them through the crush of people making my way to the back corner table. Where he sat in his usual unshaven dirty but just enough to be sexy. I still catch myself wondering how he managed to pull it off.
I slipped into the booth across from him.
“Hello.” He said softly not yet looking up from his paper.
“Hey Jack.” I said softly smiling.
“I’m not going to help you find it, so don’t bother asking.”
“Can’t a friend just drop in to say hello?”
“Not the kind of friend you are and the kind of dropping in you do. That’s my final answer. You don’t want anything to do with this. Just let it go and walk away,” he said as he pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, shifting them around a little.
“You just don’t understand.” I started to say, but stopped, seeing him glare at me.
“I don’t understand? Girl, you’re looking for what is, in your world, reputed to be the source and cause of a great deal of the world’s suffering. Not only that, but you’re going to take it back, through the divide, into a world that it was never meant to exist for real in under any stretch of the imagination. You’re going to do all of this, and you still have the stones to say I don’t understand that you feel you have something to prove for this little bit of insanity, yeah, I guess I don’t understand then,” he said, fidgeting with his lighter.
His ability to make a person feel only a few inches tall never ceased to amaze me as I stared at him, trying to regain my composure. Something shook deep in my core as he started again.
“What I do understand, however, is the burning need to find something you know you better damn well leave alone. That’s normal in our line of work. Hell, I’d be even more worried if you hadn’t taken the job.” He lit a cigarette.
“I haven’t taken it…yet.” I said stammering. I felt myself flicker. See in Jack’s world I was not corporeal. I was like a ghost, with out that icky being dead part.
“Yes, you have. I can see it in those beautiful translucent eyes of yours,.”
“Charmer but, no I haven’t.”
He only smiled as he took a long drag on his cigarette, the smoke trailing upwards. “Right. Anyways, I’ll see what I can find. I know some people who know some people who get their jollies over rare, human-leather bound tomes that could bring around the destruction of all life as we know it,” he said with a smirk, blowing a stream of smoke through me.
He liked reminding me why we’d never go for dinner and a movie. He was a bastard but I loved him. Part of me still held out hope I’d find a better opening to Hollow Earth. As I sat there, he stood up and rifled through his wallet.
“Got change for a twenty,” he asked with a smirk before dropping a couple bills onto the table. “Come on. I gotta see a man about a horse.”
“A man…about a, what?” I asked, following a little behind. Not only was he a scruffy bastard who felt he knew more than everyone else, he was a scruffy bastard who felt he knew more than anyone else that seemed desperate to confuse the living hell out of a girl.
“It’s a saying. You have them on your side too, don’t you?” His grin was starting to wear thin on my nerves.
“Yeah, but…”
“Alright then,” he cut me off as we turned down one of the alleys for a moment before he stopped and flicked his cigarette away. “This should be about good.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m a little tired of this intangibility thing,” he said, shrugging a little bit before pulling a flask out of his pocket and handing it to me. The contents smelled like someone distilled a sewage treatment plant and packed it into a hunk of tin.
I resisted my gag reflex, “What is this?”
“Just a little something I whipped up for your next visit. Though, I wasn’t expecting you to drop by so soon. Did you miss me that much?”
“Maybe a little, but you know this is just business, Jack. That’s all,” I said with a dismissive smirk. The whole intangibility thing started to rear its ugly head again.
“Yeah. I know, you just keep forgetting about things. It’s okay. You’re not all here. Yet. Drink this.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“I am. Now, do you want my help or not?”
He had me in a bind at that. There was a lot that he could do in his world that I couldn’t do in mine. Even if his noxious brew had any effect it would probably help find that cursed book. That, and he was kind of cute in that bossy sort of way. I decided to throw caution to the wind and focused myself. Reaching things past the divide was hard enough, but actually ingesting something, especially something as foul smelling as the thing Jack was handing me, that was a different story altogether.
Slowly, my hand started to take on a more solid form and I grasped the flask, tossing it back quickly so I wouldn’t lose my tangibility or my nerve in the same fell swoop. A wave of nausea rushed over me and I fell back against the wall of the alley. I felt dizzy, so I steadied myself with the wall.
“You son of a bitch,” I said, gasping between breaths. “That was awful.”
“Right. Awful, but look,” he said as he pointed at my hand against the wall. I hadn’t even noticed prior, the rough texture of the brick against my skin.
I was solid. The snarky bastard was right.
“How? I mean, why? What?”
“Eloquent as always Lux. Unfortunately, we don’t have that much time. It only lasts a couple hours at best and the ingredients are a bit sparse,” he said with a smirk, pressing me back up against the wall.
“Shouldn’t we go look for the book?” I asked, blushing at the closeness of his body. He had a smell that I couldn’t shake, it was like nature and tobacco.
His hand slid around and cupped my ass. “I’ve got a friend looking into it. Don’t worry,” he said before starting to kiss my neck, his hips pressed against mine.
I gasped, clutching him towards me, leaning up to kiss him deeply. I had wanted to do that for as long as I could remember, but all I could think of was someone walking down the alley. “What if someone sees us?”
“Nobody will see us.”
“More…magic?” I asked, swallowing a mouthful of air as he started to caress my breasts.
“No,” he grinned as he answered, his fingers pulling at my clothes quickly. “Nobody really comes down this alley. It has a reputation.”
“How romantic,” I said, gasping.
“It’s not like we’ll get to do this often,” he said, his voice husky as he pushed me back up against the wall. We were like wild animals digging our fingers like claws against each other trying to move bits of clothing to expose each other and take advantage of the time we could have together. I fumbled with his zipper for a moment before he pinned my hand back against the wall to do the deed himself.
I bit my lip watching, my heart pounded, my panties were soaking. Jack always had that effect on me. It was really such a shame we did not live on the same plane of existence. Jack pulled back his pants off his hips, his cock was absolutely rigid and thick just how I liked it. Of course that might be because I’d lost my astral virginity to him. My physical virginity was lost just a few months ago. To a guy I met that night. Bad, I know. Worse, he was vying to be my boyfriend.

Here. Now. I forgot all of my normal life and just wanted to be Jack’s fucktoy. He knew it too. He grinned as he pressed the thick, swollen tip of his shaft against my hungry pussy.

He slid into me and it was fast and sudden, better than all the other times. It was like going from mono to stereo. I could measure the difference but, all I could do was moan and wrap my legs around him.
“Luxie, you are such a naughty girl.” Jack whispered in my ear before thrusting up inside me again.
My answer came in the form of a well placed bite on Jackʻs shoulder. He tasted faintly of Cinnamon above the taste of skin. I moaned licking along his flesh.
“Keep that up, I will put you on your knees.” He said with a growl. “Then I might never get to finish fucking your pussy.
Pulled back with a needy moan pushing my hips out driving him deep inside me. My thoughts raced, I wanted him inside my mouth, I wanted him doggie style. My deepest erotic daydreams were flooding every thought. Jackʻs cock pumped in and out of me. My brainʻs pleasure center was on overload.
“Fuck me.” I said throwing myself against the brick wall scraping my back.
“What do you think Iʻm doing? I ainʻt whistling Dixie”
Great, he could be snarky and make me orgasm. My thighs started to twitch and shake. I squeezed him harder and my hips jerked me into his chest.
Jack reached down and slapped my ass, and I moaned as my orgasm finally broke leaving me panting and grasping at Jack like a flood survivor.
He just groaned and fucked me harder fighting my pussy until he finally couldnʻt stop. His nails dug in my ass, prompting a miniature orgasmic aftershock.
“Damn it Lux, I do love you.”
“I know Jack.” I whispered against his lips I could not resist it. So, I kissed him. His mouth tasted of cigarette smoke, and I didnʻt care. I needed him.

We held each other breathlessly for a moment before he pulled out of me. My legs were wobbly from a combination of the brutal fucking and being shunted into tangibility. He smiled at me a little as I fumbled with my clothes, trying to tidy myself up the best I could. After a cursory sweep of the alley to make sure we hadnʻt forgotten anything, we were on our way while the solidifying potion was still working.

Waking up after being with Jack always left me drained, but pleasantly so. He talked me into it. He knew exactly how to do it too: appeal to my curiosity. Itʻs why I hated him. He could talk me into walking on water.
As my luck would have it, my cell rang. Half-heartedly stifling a yawn I answered gruffly, “Hello?”
“Ah, the elusive Lux Shimshi,” said an overly seductive voice. Kind of like a Siren or bill collector.
“And who are you?” I asked, my voice in an automatic purr.
“Jared Barnes,” he said almost like a declaration. The shock of the name that I wasnʻt expecting to be on the other end of the phone so early in the morning bolted me upright.
“How fortuitous,” I said.