Providence Girls: A Sapphic Horror Romance by Morgan Dante

Author:Morgan Dante [Dante, Morgan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-09-04T16:00:00+00:00

One night, the world was dark except for candlelight. Rain drummed against the roof.

I’ve done nothing with my life. I didn’t love; I don’t love. Because if I’m at a distance, I can learn and prosper without fear of pain. We learn by doing, by seeing the results, as messy as they are.

The stars don’t foretell anything. They mock us.

We slept, and when I awoke, it was no longer raining, and the sun was out. I slept again, and before long, it was the afternoon.

On my back, I asked you, “Would you judge me if I told you I’ve been promiscuous in the past?” It mustn’t make any sense to anyone but me. All I wanted was to assert my body was mine. I was the one who chose my lovers, chose what happened to me. When I visited the two brothers in the house closest to me, it was me who told them to take off their dungarees. Don’t I live? Yes. Badly, I know, but I live.

And if you and I were to be together? Me, with what I’ll become? I can only recall the books in Father’s study. The ones he told me never to open. The ones I sometimes stole and kept in bed as I fingered myself, those musty texts with lovingly detailed illustrations of erotic conjoinings between faceless, thin-limbed human women and tentacled cosmic entities with jellyfish heads and barbed penises. I suppose, in the end, they were more interesting than the old Victorian magazines he had with a penchant for spankings and incest.

“No,” you said, on your back beside me. Our elbows brushed together. “Can’t see a reason to. There are really bad things.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“People hurting others ’cause they can. That, I can’t stand.” Like that, you closed the topic on whether I should be judged. Oh, Vin, this bastard world has never deserved you. I must’ve looked ill because you rolled over and asked, “Do you need a hot cloth? Or some ointment?” My dormant gills were inflamed again.

I said, “That peppermint salve works well.” You went and retrieved some. I wanted to tell you I could apply it, that you didn’t need to worry about it, but truth be told, I always enjoy having your fingers on me. In me.

“I think we should try something,” you said, tapping your chin.

“Yeah?”

“Do you think you’ll feel better in water?”

I shake my head, sitting up on the pillow. A pang in my neck, but otherwise I don’t feel so terrible. “Barely in freshwater.”

“What about saltwater?” you asked.

“It’s worth a try, I think. I feel better today.”

You sucked in your bottom lip and worried it with your teeth. “Yes, I’d like to go out. I never used to—on today.”

“Today? What’s today?” I asked you.

“This is my birthday,” you said. Flatly, as if it were nothing,

“Oh, how old are you?” I shook my head. “Sorry, that was impolite.”

“Thirty-seven.”

I blinked. “I never would’ve guessed.” You smiled at that. Perhaps you thought I was being polite. “No, really.

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