Wolf With the Red Roses, The

(ROUGH DRAFT)

The Wolf with the Red Rose

By Michael Pallante

Graffiti painted by unskilled hands clung to weathered walls as he stepped by what he hoped wasn't blood on the sidewalk. He looked around at an unfamiliar city and paused to get his bearings- he'd found the liquor store but at the expense of his equilibrium and struggled to pinpoint southwest. A man whose jacket matched the refuse in the street exited a Chinese restaurant and dumped a small plastic rose from a thin glass tube with hands that shook with desperate anticipation. Somewhere over the Philadelphia skyline towered the peak of a green suspension bridge. The scent of burnt hair and antifreeze drifted from a nearby alley and Trent looked for a street sign. Eighth and Snyder. He cursed himself for traveling so far North and doubled back past the liquor store. The passing of the previous decade's fashion hadn't phased him nearly as much as the razor sharp wind slicing through his flannel coat.

The paper bag cradled like a child in his arms had soaked through and frosted over in the December chill. Several glass bottles clinked together with each step and he got the distinct impression he stood out in this neighborhood and that perhaps that was an unfortunate lot.

A muzzled Rottweiler led a couple down Snyder toward him as a burly man, ill dressed for the weather, shoved past him from behind. The man in a windbreaker who couldn't seem to sit still stopped the couple with the dog and they both assumed defensive postures as the dog licked his hand. Trent kept walking until the three were in earshot.

“Beautiful dog!” exclaimed the frenzied stranger to the couple, “Guess you need him down this block eh?”

The two agreed hesitantly.

“A lot of guys with guns around here. They'd probably rob you. Its good to have a dog. Does she bite?” He continued.

“Only when I tell her.” replied the man holding the leash.

“Bet the niggers hate her.” Said the jittery intruder.

Trent sighed and began to understand exactly where he was and headed towards the lights from the bridge which glowed like a halo over South Philadelphia's jagged rooftops. He lowered his head into the wind, like bracing for a wave, as he walked South down Seventh Street. Strange street signs with questionably pronounceable names fading from the green paint passed over head and a starless night loomed oppressively behind them. A triangular intersection rose in his path, brimming with light and activity. Gated walls of a thrift store mirrored the steel windows of an obviously out of commission deli. Mounds of loose trash were mounted behind the deli and strange arms of metal and splintered wood rose from them as if grasping for one more piece of this world before they were sucked to the hell beneath them. Trent believed fully that this intersection could suck you to hell. Hopelessness and doom pervaded every eye on the street that looked at him funny. Yellowed planks of teeth snapped at him from a homeless man's mouth, braying strange commands in a gruff tone. Trent simply said “no” and looked up to a street sign with a familiar word, “Wolf.”

A girl wrapped in thrift store posh eyed him from behind a pay phone with the words “Kill Whitey” scrawled in cursive on its side and Trent remembered the nature of wolves. They prayed on the weakest member of a pack. The sick. The infirm. The lame.

“Need a date slim?” She cracked.

Trying not to make eye contact he crossed to the other side of the street only to find the rest of the pack had huddled, their dozen eyes fixed on him. All at once they shouted to him, their individual utterances clambering into a howling cacophony as a dozen eyes glowed in the moonlight of a starless night. All except one who slouched against the remnants of the Deli, hiding her face against raised metal gates. Hugging the Old English to his tightening chest Trent pushed through the pack, eager to get to the house and forget the journey. The girls lost interested and scattered, all at once disappearing into the cracks and shadows of the intersection. Except one, who stood perfectly still, hiding behind a green winter coat. Curious as it was, Trent didn't look and didn't want to look. Until reflex got the better of him. Fight or flight imposed itself, and when a small rough sound echoed from behind he turned to see its origin. He turned to see her coughing and immediately stopped.

An icy wind tussled her hair and through howling cold he heard himself say, “You?”

While time and occupation had eroded her face the girl's voice had been spared. With a familiar deadpan she answered, stepping from the grim bed of shadows into the cold moonlight. Though her green coat was thick and practical, naked legs dangled beneath it- stretching to the ground where they were anchored by thin stiletto pumps which raised her four inches from the broken cement. Bare toes packed to a fine point seemed pale blue under wine red nail polish. Brown hair dyed black pulled into two pointed tails framed an empty face, withered by years of use and the effort of forced smiles for lonely men. Under a quivering and weathered jaw was a thick black choker over which crept bruises in the shape of fingers- a gift from the last man she approached.

Like Lot's wife he gazed at the devastation of that which he'd known and if only for a moment stood as a pillar, transfixed. She moved toward him, a wraith of memory, her long painted nails swimming from beneath the edges of her coat and pressing softly at his throat. The red plastic claws making dimples in his skin as ragged chewed lips met his cheek and whispered a simple warning.

“Trent. Keep walking wherever you're going. Don't you dare look back. If you do I'll simply point to you and yell 'it was him' and you'll wish I hadn't. Understand?” She said as cold as the wind.

“Um. Yeah.” he replied and turned his back, striding away, eyes forward. Brimstone could have rained down from heaven upon the plain and people of the city behind- but he would not look. Beer clanked in his arms to the rhythm of his shivers as he closed the distance between him and the safety of the house swiftly.

Numb fingers traced over her bruised neck, the thick blackening marks dwarfing her tiny digits as she remembered the start of her evening. She woke past dinner time from a late night. A late but worthwhile night. She woke with a cocksure type of glee- the comfort of having enough for the day. Fingering a bag full of Oxycotton she laughed at herself for her late start last night. A Narcotics Anonymous meeting had ended briefly when she realized the dismal irony that addiction and recovery both function on the same premise: one day at a time. Musing on that phrase she'd gone out and worked the street with a singular purpose: Enough opiates for one day.

Two oblong blue pills turned to dust under the weight of a Campbell's soup in her living room and she looked to the empty room at the end of the hall, a room she hadn't seen the inside of in four years, shouting, “ Breakfast of champions!” to the shut door.

2.5 oz Gin. 1.5 oz Vermouth. 320 Milligrams of opiates. Olive.

Dusting the errant flakes from the label of her can she shouted to the door at the end of the hall, empty but not unoccupied, “Being good in business is the most fascinating kind of art!” She laughed between sips, “Get it?”

Cascades of warmth without heat pulsed through every limb. Consuming waves of TV static washed over her and she sank into the comfort. For the first few minutes everything feels right and tomorrow is as irrelevant as yesterday or right now for that matter. You see spots if its strong enough. The wetness between your legs tingles but you're too comfortable to bother satisfying any transient needs. Existence is enough and you revel in the simplicity of that.

The body is easy to fool but the brain still knows from reality.

She sings to herself as she changes for work, “What good is sitting alone in your room?”

Her panties decorate the couch and a silver backless dress hugs her pale flesh.

“Come here the music play...”

Her long flat hair is pulled back into two youthful ponytails and tossed over her shoulder.

“Life is a cabaret old chum...”

Invisible straps lock over her toes and she stumbles to stand on four in stilettos

“Come join the cabaret...”

Throwing on a green winter coat she's out the door, leaving an empty glass and unwashed clothes to greet her when she returns. She wore her numbness like a shell and the unforgiving elements went unnoticed except for the sensation of wind passing like silk between her naked legs. A wry smile played on blue lips as she passed a shell of a church recalling the broken old woman who greeted her at the meeting last night.

“Yo'git drugs so y'don' feelit when them' take'y'home, right lil' angel?” She said, her gums barren and mouth full of tar.

“No. I let them take me home so I can get drugs.” She'd answered with an unremitting confidence that shrunk the toothless old bag back to her chair.

She was swimming in 320 milligrams of the same “Fuck you” arrogance as 7th and Wolf came into sight. A girlfriend was blowing off a shaggy haired man-boy wearing a T-Shirt and a wicked grin. He started toward her with a ruthless strut and before she could even spit a word out he offered a price and lead her down Wolf. His body was a pale gnarled Oak and his voice carried the weight of lead as she road her neon buzz behind him. He found a darkened place not quite out of sight and directed her with his hands. The fuzzy image of weeping scabs on his forearms trailed in front of her vision as he grew taller before her becoming a looming golem in frozen moonlight.

He was bubble gum in her mouth, limp and rubbery as the condom he'd paid her to keep wrapped in her purse.

She looked up at the Oak, his lean figure silhouetted by a clear Winter's sky, with a look of pity. Customer service consisted of servicing customers and any polite consideration or flattery came at an extra charge. Working him with numb fingers she parted wet lips with venomous dirty talk, assaulting him with the filth only a paid for woman can say without shame. Insincere and meaningless strings of the obscene. She looked up and met his eyes, narrow and unkind. With a sputtering glottial stop his blackened fingers pinched the flesh of her cheeks over her teeth and she couldn't bite down without tearing through the flesh of her mouth. An iron grip closed around her throat, and she felt the nubs of each digit pressed against the esophagus. He rang her neck like a sponge and among the spots she saw him finally grow thick and mean between the legs. The splintering pressure on her throat turned to desperate burning as the minutes passed. Vomit rose from her gut, spilling over her lips and onto her shit. Tears froze to her cheek. At the brink of suffocation and despair she heard him finish with a shrill whine. She collapsed to the pavement blind and gasping with wet breaths. She felt his hand on the back of her head and dirty fingers pry her scummy lips apart and the bitter taste of two hundred dollar bills stuffed between them.

She was punished for the look of pity and left with bile on her lips and blood on her tongue.

A wad of blood, puke and semen spilled from her mouth as he walked off with a fuck you arrogance only chemical highs can bring.

Daria dried her eyes on the the sleeve of her green coat and dug a handful of moist towelettes from her purse. She cleaned off her mouth and shirt as best she could but the stench of vomit and wet stain still froze to her chest. She made her way back to the corner.

A new batch of girls, all familiar to her, huddled on the sidewalks. When her aching and strained cough caught their attention, and the magenta bruises on her neck their interest, was surrounded by the barking scratching herd. Each one trying to sound more concerned and outraged than the last. A horrible chorus of sycophantic narcissism personified by self indulgent whores basking in Daria's violence. They found her ordeal significant if not by intrinsic meaning or consequence then by the simple fact that something had happened. Daria knew their lives were provincial routines. Most of them were uneducated or in intellectual drug comas. Now, more than ever, she felt as much an outcast as she'd been in high school. Now, more than ever, she saw the difference between herself and the babbling crowd in so much as she was indifferent to the bruises on her throat save for the fact that swallowing would be difficult for several days. She thanked them each for their concern as cell phones flashed and pimps, mamas, friends and muscle were called. The urge to spear them with her thought that her ordeal was being co opted not avenged was replaced with the rationalization that this was, if anything, cause to snort an ocy.

One girl, not as droll as the rabble, guided her to the side, across the street from the pay phone which read “White Power” and helped her crush 800 milligrams on the deli's window ledge. Daria knew she'd likely finger a pill or two for herself in the process, but appreciated the kindness all the same. She clutched her winter coat about her, starting to feel the cold, and snorted four inches of off white powder through her unclogged nostril. The wave is instant. Equilibrium becomes option and up becomes a variable in the process of navigation. Its best to stay in one place.

The hoard forgot the drama as a tall man in a dark coat stomped down the street looking very much the tourist. Cradled in his arms were bottles of malt liquor.

His eyes, narrow and sweet, fixed on her.

And he said, “You.”

His host's lock proved as idiosyncratic as any other stranger's. Even with the key it felt unnatural and subversive. The two hundred and forty milliliters of malt liquor squashed against his chest made the endeavor all the more troublesome, yet a few awkward motions and truncated expletives later the door fell open just as his own back home. He passed through the threshold into the standard build Philadelphia duplex. The wind trap lead almost directly to a set of stairs pressed against the left wall which ascended to immediate darkness. He'd been told the working bathroom was there. To the right was a modestly spacious living room which his gracious host had converted into an extended entertainment center. Against the right wall were the remnants of a couch on which rested four men in their mid twenties looking at him with tenuous satisfaction.

“Get lost out there?” asked the host, strolling in from the kitchen.

“Uh. Yeah.” Trent replied and set his bags down with a clink that made the rest of the house guests nervous.

Pulling a bottle of Old English for himself and wiping the frosted sweat from the label Trent seated himself in the far corner and indulged. With the sudden but subtle effects of malt liquor taking root Trent's thoughts meandered easily to the “what ifs” and “I should haves” that his right mind had ignored. In the mounting stupor of alcohol fuzzy guilt crystallized and his rationalizations crumbled under the weight of clarity. His mind weaved through the logic line by line, each feeling less honest than the last.

“She asked me to leave. I was respecting her wishes.”

“She didn't want me to see her like that any more than I wanted to see it.”

“Everyone makes their own choices.”

“Its not my problem.”

“I don't even care.”

As thick amber seas dwindled to foamy shores a last sickening thought slipped past his defenses.

“Jane wouldn't want this.”

Shards of noise tumbled like waves nearby and pulled Trent from his reflections. He scanned the room for broken glass and found all eyes pointing his way. Looking down he saw the glinting edges of what was once his bottle in a pool of foam.

A lulled apology went unheard as his friends and host approached with the look of concern across their faces. Before he could even process the situation long time friends and a man he'd met only that morning were patting him on the back and asking questions. They suggested water, sleep, deep breaths and it wasn't until he was handed a tissue that he realized his eyes were wet and the taste of salt had touched his lips.

Motioning them back he simply said, “ I just need some air.” And headed outside without keys or coat.

He tore through the streets in just a long black shirt and jeans, retracing the route he took from 7^th and Wolf. His breath billowed like smoke before him, crystallizing in the air. Pumping furiously in the frigid urban tundra his legs cramped up and each step wrenched through his body- but drunken bravery and unanswered questions drove him blindly on. The air in his lungs was frozen and each breath was swallowing glass. The dry gasps which could be heard from blocks away weren't enough to keep oxygen flowing to his muscles and they began to burn and suffocate with use. Philadelphia's frozen kiss made every sensation numb and acute at once.

Wind blew tears into his eyes and he almost missed her blurred silhouette stepping awkwardly down the convenience store steps. Quickening his pace with a singular purpose he passed a tall dark man leaning against the “Kill Whitey” pay phone.

The figure made himself known by stepping into Trent's path and barking in a husky tone, “Gottuh dollah stretch? I tryin' t'git somethin'a'eat.”

Trent waved him away with a dull retort, “If I had any money I wouldn't be here, man.”

With a crack the world went red. Then black.

He woke on his back to Daria's black hair brushing over his neck, keenly aware of a thick liquid warmth draining over his mouth. Instinct brought his hand to his nose and pain sent it reeling away.

“Stop that, Trent.” She said in her familiar tone.

The unyielding sting of blunt force trauma in the cold fought the pressure behind the eyes that a strike to the nose leaves behind. He opened his lips to answer her and hot coppery liquid splashed his tongue.

Sputtering blood as she lifted him up against the pay phone Trent managed to cough, “Daria?”

“Very good. Now tilt your head back... stay still. Here, hold this against your nose, its going to sting.” She replied passively.

“O'tay....” he managed, holding ice wrapped in a wet nap to his swollen bloodied nose.

Daria squatted next to him, avoiding putting her bare legs near the dried brown patterns of blood Trent had left on what remained of the pavement.

“What happin'd?” he asked, staring skyward.

“Jim took a swing at you. Apparently you mouthed off and-”

“Jim?” Trent interrupted.

“Just a drunk from the neighborhood. Said you said you didn't have any money. Looks like you weren't lying.” She answered, placing an empty wallet against his chest.

Pawing blindly with his free hand for the wallet Trent answered, “I'm dizzy.”

“Hit the ground pretty hard. You probably have a concussion-” She paused, catching his breath and continued on with a disappointed tone, “You been drinking?”

He tried to lower his head to meet her eyes but she scolded, “I said don't move. Just rest a little bit. I'll get you inside in a bit. Does it hurt?”

Trent gave a slight nod.

“I've got some aspirin in my purse.” She replied, digging through her bag for a moment before placing a pill in his free palm, “Take this. You'll feel better.”

He obeyed, watching the moon pass behind the clouds as he downed the pill and swallowed it dry.

“Better get you up.” She remarked dryly, steadying him as he stood, head still pointed to the gray Philadelphia skyline.

“Thanks.” he said as she linked her arm his and lead him down the sidewalk.

They had barely rounded the northeast corner of 7^th and Wolf when Trent said, “That wasn't aspirin was it.”

Daria shook her head and answered plainly, “No. Keep looking up.”

She led him, arms locked at the elbow, like a blood stained prom date through the streets of Philadelphia. Neither spoke for blocks until they passed a strip club on Oregon Avenue.

“Friend of mine got shot there 'bout two years ago.” Daria commented.

“Mm?” Trent replied.

“Yeah. She was a dancer, not so much a working girl. But she did private shows in the Bubble room. One of her regulars took her back there. Did that every week. Cept that time he shot her in the head before killing himself.”

Trent mumbled acknowledgement.

“Yeah. They didn't even close the club down. Emergency response came tearing through. All the girls were told to say it was a 'heart attack' in the Bubble room. Most of the customers thought it was pretty funny. Some old geezer overstimulated by a lap dance. But no- they paid the EMT's to hold the body back there until the club closed. Just laying there dead waiting for everyone to leave.”

“Hmm.” Trent replied.

“Yeah.” Daria said.

They continued on in silence and by the time they reached the Oregon Diner Trent's nose had stopped bleeding. He finally lowered his head and looked at Daria in the light of the diner's neon logo. She had square black rimmed glasses and she'd taken her hair down and fallen into the familiar silhouette he'd come to know when she was just sixteen. She hadn't changed it two years later when, sitting on his bed, packed to leave for college in Philadelphia, she'd said she loved him. The next morning her long brown hair had blown across a Mona Lisa smile as she left with his sister Jane for Pennsylvania.

His thoughts meandered comfortably as they stared through glassy eyes at each other. A dull smirk on both of their faces and the undulating wavering of limbs marked them as sharing an opiate dance.

“Uh. Lets go inside.” She said after what could have been long minutes of drinking him in.

“OK.” he answered with light laughter as she escorted him through the doors.

The rubbernecked looks they received on the way to their booth eluded Trent, but Daria felt a burning in her cheeks. A smoldering ember of embarrassment.

“Just came in from the cold.” She reminded herself as they were seated, shaking the feeling off and setting her glasses on the table.

She waved their server off with one hand, rubbing the bridge of her nose with the other. Somewhere in the blank chasm between them the familiarity of an old face was swallowed by the surreal juxtaposition of context it represented. They studied each other, each trying to make room for the other in their lives.

“Its weird seeing you.” Trent finally said with his wry honesty.

“Its weird being me.” Daria answered in dry humor.

Neither laughed. Daria looked down at her hands placed primly on her place mat. One hand cupped the knuckles of the other and formed an arrow pointing to the John across from her, extended just far enough that she had to lean forward and expose her bust line. The awkward hunch of her teen years had blossomed into an obtuse arching of the back, her hips so far back they had no place to go but forward to whatever this John snuck under the table. Her head shot up as she eyed the bruised by familiar face across from her. It was Trent.

Slumping back into her seat, Daria remarked coldly, “What the fuck are you ding in Philadelphia Trent.”

“Gig.” he said in a voice as small as his syntax.

Daria looked away, wishing somehow the answer would have been longer. The inevitable was looming just behind both of their eyes. She wanted to put it off as long as possible- until never if she could. Truth flickered between them in the glint of stolen looks.

Trent started, “I'd thought you left the city. We lost track of you after the funeral.”

Her eyes, bereft of pity, locked on his, “ What would you know about the funeral? You weren't even there. None of you were.”

“Well I...” he started.

“I had to bury her alone. No one else came.”

“I'm sorry.” he answered.

“You're are sorry. You're a sorry son of a bitch. I waited for you for hours... “

Trent shrank in his seat.

Daria's voice cut through him with a quiet rage as she continued without raising her voice, “ I should have known. After everything- if you were the type of brother who would have buried his sown sister she wouldn't be in a pine box now. What's left of her. And if you were the kind of friend who'd be there...”

Daria's rage momentarily softened to tears which her voice fought through with progressively manufactured hate, “...Who'd be there when I needed you. When I needed to tell you.”

Trent winced, a bad son's voice weak as it responded, “ Is that how... I mean why you're... why you...”

Anger hadn't betrayed Daria's calm facade, but five year's loneliness did, her fists pounding the table in a clang of silverware and condiments, “ You have no fucking idea!” she screamed with horse exasperation.

He sat before her looking childlike and dumb and worse still innocent. For all his jaded post 90's angst he was still innocent. He hadn't felt the hole Jane left in her life. She thought, “You never laid a flower on her grave. You didn't stand in the rain saying goodbye without a shoulder to cry on. You didn't...” and a sick truth struck, “... You didn't see her die.”

The truth that had flickered between them now burned white. There was a burning in her face that had nothing to do with the chemical cocktail swimming in her veins. The clarity of her intent, blinding in its brilliance, washed everything between them away. Even Trent was a silhouette in its luminescence. She wanted to hurt him- for all the hurt she'd endured in the years since Jane took her heart to the grave. The knowledge she was going to do it warmed her freezing toes. The satisfaction she felt knowing she could destroy Trent in two sentences sent a tingle through the warm mess between her legs.

“Trent baby.” She said, her voice beyond its normal register. He was a trick.

“Mm?” He answered clueless.

“D'yous know how Jane died?” She continued, a fake South Philly accent dangling from her pouty lips, her knee bouncing so her chest jiggled before him.

“Cancer.” He answered darkly.

“Un-unn.” She waved a finger seductively, like a dancer motioning for the audience to keep their hands to themselves.

Trent's black wet eyes met hers for the first time with sincerity.

“You should have visited her.”

“What do you mean... you called and said she had cancer.”

“You should have buried her.”

“I couldn't.”

“You should have-”

The older man in him came out and he scolded, “Don't fuck around Daria. What are you talking about?”

Daria leaned to him, putting a hand on his and speaking with sarcastic comfort, “Oh baby, I know this'll be hard for you to hear. But your wittle sissy never had cancer.” She shook her head melodramatically, melodically commenting, “No. I'm afraid she was a victim of the streets.” Placing both hands on Trent's cheeks she forced him to meet her face dead on, her voice falling back to a dry tone, “She died of organ failure while on a morphine drip. Complications from AIDS.”

She watched for his reaction. The triumph of her will. She waited for the payoff.

The drunk man pushing 30 she'd once fancied. The cute older brother of her best friend- her street sister, withered. Blood drained, even from the bruises surrounding his swollen nose, until a dwarfish wraith sat crumpled before her.

No satisfaction came. She'd said in rage what she'd wanted to share in confidence. Where catharsis could have been only regret festered.

Swallowed by the darkness of a heartless city she folded on herself and offered a pitiful, “I'm sorry... “

“I didn't know.” he answer in a broken chirp.

She continued in the monotone of her youth, “ She died with me. In a charity hospice. We couldn't afford the drugs she needed- only the drugs that...” It had all seemed the only way at the time.

“See Trent. We got into it. Bad.”

“What happened.” He stated, broken.

Daria took a breath and continued in unbroken tones, “ She was alone, when we were kids. I mean I was there for her- but I couldn't be enough. Your parents, well you know the story there. And you were there for a while but then you started touring. And she was alone. So she went out. Got a boyfriend. Mph. You know how that ended.” Daria paused, remembering the night she'd spent in bed with Jane's boyfriend, wondering if she could taste Jane when she swallowed him.

“She stopped talking to me. And ran. That summer she spent at the art colony. When she came back she had secrets. One day I came to the house- two boys were leaving as I walked in. And Jane...” Daria took a deep breath, “ She was in the corner of her room when I walked in. Huddled in the floor with a brush and a canvas. It was like watching an animal. Pawing at the canvas with no paint and showing me her work every few minutes. I sat there for an hour. Every time she looked up it was like I'd just walked into the room. She spent the next six months trying to get me to drop acid with her. She finally got her way one day.”

Lowering her head in her palm, “It was a Friday. She answered the door in a bath robe. A purple one.” Daria's unbroken tone quickened, as though she were racing to the end, to get it over with, “ And kissed me. She had kiwi flavored lip gloss. It was fire- my lips tingled and between the kiwi and the tickling on my tongue it was like champagne. When she pulled back from me I saw a sinister smile. That twisted. And twisted. And stretched. And spun. I put my fingers to my tongue- she'd slipped a tab into my mouth.”

Trent listened with quiet remorse.

“After that I did it again. And again. The fact that we got through senior year still baffles me. When we came to college in Philly...” She gestured around her, “Things changed though. You'd do coke so you could stay up and drop acid. Then you'd just do coke. Then someone cuts it with dust. Then you crash. Then you feel like shit. Then someone suggests you snort some heroin to feel better. And you realize no amount of speed or cilocybin is ever going to feel that good- that perfect.”

She shook her head again, “I'm scared of needles- but Jane had no fear. None at all.”

Daria continued. How a blow job for a bag from your dealer soon turns into a fuck. And the more you do the more he wants to fuck you. And if you're fucking for two you have to take it in the ass. And how Jane made them take turns. And how when their dealer got shot their arrangement died with him. And so you go to the streets. You have a job and go to class but your apartment and food cost as much as the opiates that make work and school bearable.

“...Jane never stole from me. But we lost all our friends at school. No one wanted to be around us. She was into the shit bad. Me? I could take it or leave it, but I got high with her, yeah. She was a junkie. I was too, but I was addicted to the money. Even if I spent it all getting Jane high. I paid for the apartment and groceries. I could afford it- she shot all her money up.”

“When she got sick, we were both so fucked up, we should have taken all the money I made and taken her to doctors. To free clinics. You can get the drugs cheap- but she'd given up. She just wanted to get high. And she didn't care who she infected. We were so fucked up, we figured we were doing something good- spreading it to the maggot dicked scum that fucked us. The guys cheating on their wives, we never though of the wives, we figured the best thing we could do was spread it. Give it to other junkies- they deserved it for being junkies after all. I don't know if we were afraid or just really that fucked up inside. But when Jane was too weak to work I'd go out. Bring her clean needles. Make sure she ate. Got her pot so she wouldn't puke when she did.”

Daria was mechanical, past crying, “It took six months from when we got the test. I'd come home and find her on the bed, naked in a puddle of shit. Or on the floor trying to find the strength to get to the bathroom to throw up. I couldn't take care of her, couldn't even get food down her throat. I remember calling the cab to take us to the hospice. Two of them refused to take us. Her eyes were milky pink and blank. She'd stopped eating, though I doubt she could have processed any food if she did. Reckon her pancreas had shut down. Her bones were showing through her skin except for her stomach. This bulging pot belly stuck from under he t-shirt. Hadn't been able to bath her. The sores in her arm were infected. Knees were bloody from falling down the stairs. Finally a cab took us downtown... it was only days after that. They put her in a room that was there for people to die in. I was the only person in there not dying. I stayed with her for two nights. And woke up one morning to a beautiful corpse.”

A thick South Philly accent cut in with indifferent brutality, “Can I take your order?”

Trent and Daria found themselves in the shadow of a fat woman with a notepad.

“A tea. To go.” Daria replied blandly.

After an obscene remark, they were alone again.

“I should have been there.” Trent said again.

“I wanted you to be. For me.” Daria said, “I really needed you when she died. You were the only other person I think ever cared about her. I wanted....”

Embarrassment stole her voice.

“An out?” Trent offered.

Daria nodded morbidly.

“I should have been a better brother and friend.”

Pale hands lifted black frames to watery eyes. Dyed black hair framed a pitiful face which, from behind lenses, gave a pleading look.

“Is it too late to be your friend.”

“Or more.” Daria said as an angry Philadelphian dropped a scalding hot cup with a string peaking from beneath its top in front of her.

Ignoring the server Daria continued, “I'm sorry for what I said before. Can I make it up to you?”

Under the impatient stare of a the waitress Trent replied, “ How?”

“Show you her room. I haven't touched it. There's some things she wanted you to have.... Get to know the girl your sister was when she died?”

Trent nodded, sniffing loudly through a swollen nose.

Daria placed a single wadded bill in the server's palm and left the tea as she led Trent from the Oregon Diner.

A cheerful and genuine, “Have a nice evening kids! Come back any time.” chased after them as the ogreish waitress exampled a fifty dollar bill in the light.

Trent walked through the multicolored scrawled doors into a blackened hallway. Immediately the sensation of a wall of warmth swept over his body- chilled from the short walk to the apartment. Through an oppressive warmth he forged toward a sliver of light under a door which opened into a niche of cleanliness in the clutter of Philadelphia. Daria brushed passed him and lay her coat on the couch.

“Take your jacket off and stay a while.” She said, half mocking the colloquialism.

“Uh. Sure.” He replied, placing his thick winter coat over hers. Already the heat of the room was forcing a layer of sweat to build under the seasonal jacket he'd worn.

“Its this way.” Daria motioned.

The clicking of Daria's pumps on the ground drew his attention and his eyes followed the six inch heels into a flatteringly shaped pair of legs which carried an hourglass shape topped with dyed black hair. Flashing a glance over her shoulder Trent saw a glimmer like life in her eyes.

“Coming?” she purred.

When she stopped at a closed door, Trent bumped into her.

“Uh, sorry. Still a little messed up.” he excused himself.

“Its OK.” Daria said briefly and pushed the door open, flicking a switch and washing the room in the quivering light of a dying bulb.

Trent stepped into a spartan room and looked around. His hands brushing over every objected in the room, trying to make contact with the woman his sister became when she left home. He skimmed pictures of Jane and Daria, flipped through school notebooks, riffled through cups full of pens and stared blankly at canvas hung on walls with imagery altogether alien to him.

“What did Janey want me to have?” he asked in awe.

Warm lips touched his neck and a silvery voice whispered, “Me.”

Gentile kisses melted into soul sucking as they tumbled to Jane's bed. Sweet apologies and professions of “always” and flirtations with fate degraded into hair pulling and profanity. Lulled musical moans fractured into rough animal grunts.

Daria's skirt around her ankles and Trent unzipping as she cradled him between her knees she put a hand to his chest and amid the humid panting whispered, “You deserve the ignorance of bliss that I still wish I had. Do as I say not as I do.”

“What?” he said, burrowing inside her.

She squealed and whispered,”I can't give what I can't take.”

Mourning washed over them. Naked and dehydrated, Trent woke to a Philadelphia sun- chemicals in the sky burning a toxic winter rainbow. Daria lay next to him, cool and supple, clinging to his chest. Silently he slipped out of bed and made way for the bathroom.

Crisp water failed to wash the hangover away- but he drank heartily from the faucet, muscles quaking. A pounding headache insist he look for aspirin in the medicine cabinet. He pulled back the mirror with a piercing squeak, winced, and eyed its contents.

Grabbing several bottles he read their contents with blurry eyes, “Invirase, efavirenz, lamivudine, zidovudin....”

He blinked himself into focus and checked the date of the prescription.

Dropping the bottles to the floor Trent rushed clambered back to Jane's room- throwing the door open as his heart beat in his throat.

Stumbling to Jane's desk he found a framed picture he'd skimmed the night before. Drunk and confused before, he finally took in what' he'd seen. A cold sweat beaded d own his chest.

The picture, in a hand made mirror frame, showed Jane and Daria at a restaurant, their mouths locked in a kiss like the one's he'd shared with Daria last night.

Lifting the frame into the light he saw a smirking girl with dyed black hair in the silvery reflection.

“Daria....”

He spun around to see her naked form resting on one arm, looking up at him with a cold smile.

“Do you have Aids.” he said.

“No Trent, baby. We do.”