I felt the urges for at least an hour after we got home.  Bell rubbed my back and held her neck to my lips.  Her dress fell off her shoulder and long white legs spasmed through her fishnets.  It was over in minutes.

            We had met Judy and Christopher at a local club, The Blue Tsunami, and drained it of Hot Damn and Flaming Sambuka.  It began with Bell’s roommate, Mesha,  lifting her shirt.  She had new dread locks, purple and green, and was shaking them out for everyone to see.  It was her look of the week.  The real surprise was coming though,  she lifted her camo tank-top exposing a series of  welts just beneath her bare chest; her new tribal carvings.  They snaked around her breasts and came together in an arrow just below her belly chain.  Judy nudged me and pointed her out.  There was a group of college students gathered around her and instantly I knew Bell would want to join in.  I turned and tried to drag her away with me.  After all, this was nothing new.  Judy and I had seen this type of ritualized scarring before.  Bell held taut.  She looked at me and nodded, a thin curl to her lip.  It was all she could talk about on the way back to my apartment.

After Mesha’s display I felt the urges.  Bell complied.  She laid her head in my lap and I padded fresh gauze on her swollen neck.  The bite was healing, but not as fast as I had hoped.  She still felt the need to wear a black choker whenever she went out.  That would pass in time.  The bite would heal and she’d be better than ever.  I was zoned, thinking of that future, when Bell nudged me.    

            She looked up from my lap, “Mesha paid a couple bills to get that done.”

            “Mesha’s an idiot,” I said laying back a bit.  “She abuses herself for nothing.”