Nighthawk: A Superhero Story (closed for Siobhancan99)

[Halcyon638]

“Is this it?” Austin said teasingly as he pressed her against the door. “You want it right here?” He pulled her in for a firm kiss while grabbing her ass through her jeans. A few seconds later, he tugged his shorts down quickly. Even not quite fully erect, his large dick was impressive. As Monica undid the button and zipper of her jeans, the athlete kissed her neck and then her ear, breathing warmly. He yanked her pants off her hips, taking a moment to admire her panties and touch one of her breasts through her shirt.

With a smile, he pulled her underwear down to her ankles and waited for her to step out of them. He locked eyes with her and put both big hands on her hips, his cock now as swollen as ever.

 

[siobhancan99]

Reaching down she stroked his fat shaft, feeling the hardness of it, the way it barely fit in her hand. She swallowed as she thought about the way it barely fit in her, comfortably, and how it would feel to be impaled on it and held against the wall. She let go of it, fumbling at the nearby drawer to get out a condom. she set it out, then leaned in and kissed along his chest as her hand stroked his engorged shaft. She brushed her thumb against the crown of his cock, feeling it hot and heavy in her hand. "you should put that thing on and fuck me against the wall. You know, since you have practice here in a minute." she ran her fingers down, cupping his balls, teasing them with the pads of her fingers as they brushed along the sensitive scrotum.

 

[Halcyon638]

Austin stroked a lock of Monica’s golden hair and kissed her again, their tongues sliding together as his weight pushed her back against the wall. He pulled the condom over his bulging dick and effortlessly lifted her off the ground, his fingers burrowing into her hips. The athlete pressed in against her and grasping her with one arm, began adjusting his erection to line up perfectly with her waiting slit.

Austin took her hips with both hands again and slowly lowered her. Monica felt the solid head of his dick starting to part her pussy lips and then in what felt like a split second later, she was on top of his thick shaft, feeling it penetrate her so deeply a gasp escaped her lips. “Yeah, that’s it. Wrap those legs around me,” he instructed her, biting her neck a bit.

The athlete made his first pair of thrusts, powerful, quick, almost desperate motions. “Oh, fuck.” His third and subsequent thrusts were slower, more measured, as he seemingly tried to find his rhythm. Austin’s right hand squeezed onto her left hip while his other hand was placed on her shoulder. His motions began to pick up speed.

 

[siobhancan99]

Monica wrapped her arms and legs around him, grunting as he entered her. "Fuck" She had to adjust to the feeling of him inside her, as he was big. maybe a touch too big really. Suddenly she was full of him. She bit his shoulder, keeping herself wrapped around him, feeling him pin her against the wall. She wasn't going to be able to cum with the paucity of foreplay, but that didn't mean the sex wasn't good. That being lifted and handled like this wasn't hot as hell. She squeezed him, careful to not grip him too hard. She dug her short nails into his back as he took her, moaning out her pleasure that was as much psychological as physical. That feeling of being handled, lifted and tossed around it was hot. It was something she hadn't really expected to want or need but there it was and it was amazing. She kissed his chest, curling just a bit to get the angle she wanted as he thrust into her, taking her rough and fast "mmmm fuck yeah."

 

[Halcyon638]

“Ahh fuck, you feel so good,” Austin said as he drove his big cock into her with increasing frequency. He let out a groan with nearly every movement of his shaft and head. He looked down into Monica’s eyes, locking gazes with her as he stopped for a moment, just letting his hard-on linger inside her. Catching his breath, he slowly slid it down, then penetrated her again with the same deliberate pace. Before long, he had begun to build up speed once more, gripping both of her hips now with his strong hands as he pounded away.

 

[siobhancan99]

Moaning, she moved with him as best she could in his firm grip, supported by his strong hands and pinned by his muscular frame against the wall. Her hips rocked, taking him deep with his movements, feeling the way he stretched her, filled her so completely "god damn Austin. God damn don't stop" She dug her fingers into his back, whispering in his ear as he fucked her, pounded her good and hard "yeah that's it Austin. Just like that. Just like that." Her body taking him over and over again, at once uncomfortable and loving every second of being filled by his raging erection. "Don't stop. Don't stop."

 

[Halcyon638]

Austin’s breathing sped up as his dick repeatedly filled Monica’s pussy. Her shoulders were pressed hard against the wall as the upperclassmen moved inside her. “Fuuuck,” he groaned. “Gonna cum. Gonna fucking cum inside you.” The muscles on his tattooed arms bulged as he held her hips tightly.

“FUCK!” he cried. His words devolved into a chain of groans and moans as she felt him unload inside his condom. His big cock kept pumping her for a bit afterward as he worked out the last of his seed. Finally, she could feel his body slacken and he slipped out of her. “Fuck, Mon,” he said, a grin spreading across his handsome face, still holding her, though less tightly. “You felt so good, babe.” He kissed her lips softly now, stroking the side of her face affectionately, then gently lowered her to her feet.

Leaning down, he picked up her panties and kissed the inside of her toned left thigh. “Once you get cleaned up, let me at least drive you back home. If I’m going to get torn a new one for being 5 minutes late, might as well make it 25.”

 

[siobhancan99]

Monica kissed him back then slipped into the bathroom. She inhaled and exhaled "what the fuck Mon" She shook her head and rolled her eyes at herself, then got herself together. She headed back out, then let Austin drive her to the store near her apartment, which was faster for him to get to the arena anyway. She bought a chicken, noodles, stock, fresh parsely, broccoli and some cooking wine. Heading home she mixed up the stock, wine, some ground mustard and the parsley, then brushed it all over the chicken before sliding the chicken into an oven. She worked diligently but once she stopped she felt the rise of self recrimination and just enough self loathing to add a particularly piquant quality to it. She got in the shower and sighed, scrubbing herself more for the need to perform an activity than anything else. "What the hell have you become?" She wondered aloud.

When Gabi got home, she was working on school in part because she had the vigil later and in part to just not think about her situation. "Hola, Bella" she gave a little smile and waved as Gabi headed in to shower. As her roommate did that she had a thought. If Paige was alive, whoever had her had to be keeping her somewhere. She pulled up her list of potential suspects, and did a deed search with the county to see if they owned property anywhere. She'd have to do the surrounding counties as well, and might have to look to see if any of them had land where they grew up. Still, for now she could focus on finding existing properties. As Gabi came out of the shower, she shot an email off to Townes, asking where and when to meet.

 

[Halcyon638]

Townes sent back an email a few minutes later. He offered to meet her for the pre-record discussion for a cup of coffee on campus around 1:30, after Monica’s writing class but before her first work-study shift started at 3:00. “Let me know if that works for you or we can figure something else out. We can work out the actual record time there as well. Look forward to chatting with you. Alex.”

Monica’s searching revealed that two of the people on her initial suspect list did own property in either the suburbs of Prospect City or a nearby town. Dr. Townes owned a modest house in the suburbs, the 30-something father and personal trainer, Jason Giovanni, owned a house about an hour away from the city.

Checking her encrypted email, she realized she’d received updates from Hadley’s father just an hour or two after he’d left for the police station. “Hi. I hope you are having a better weekend than I am and not actually reading this until Monday. I found some information about the Ines Rivera disappearance for you. It’s some disturbing stuff. I am trying to also collate the files on all 3 disappearances to see if I can identify any commonalities as no one else has made much of an effort to put them together, especially since Rivera doesn’t fit the profile in some ways (ethnicity) though does in others (young, worked in service/retail industry, pretty, etc.).”

Monica perused the information regarding Ines’s disappearance. She was last seen at a subway station in Gilliam Heights (on security camera) around 10:15 PM on March 14th. Some of her coworkers at a bar called The Barnburner noted that guy in his thirties of average height and with short, dark hair often asked about her and tipped her big. There were rumors, based on the amounts of cash he carried and a vaguely Eastern European accent that he was a member of the Russian mob, but not further information was given, and he had never showed signs of being violent or even antisocial.

Streaming under the name UrGirlElisa, Ines had on 2 occasions about 5 months before her disappearance repeated harassment to the streaming company Thumnail. Someone kept harassing her using multiple accounts in ways that were disturbing enough to get her to report it. The account names were “Orpheus12” and “Father_Midnight.”

Monica scrolled through the log of the anonymous user’s comments. It seemed to have started as semi-creepy but not remarkable “flirting” between Orpheus12 and Ines.

UrGirlElisa: So how did you stumble across me if you don’t like video games?

Orpheus12: I didn’t stumble. This is just the simplest way.

UrGirlElisa: For what?

Orpheus12: To watch you.

UrGirlElisa: Lol, getting a little serial killer-y. Seriously.

Orpheus12: You probably don’t remember me but I remember you. Isn’t that the curse and gift of beauty? You haunt a thousand men’s memories but forget a hundred thousand desperate faces.

UrGirlElisa: Um, yeah. You are 2 seconds from getting blocked.

Orpheus12: Ines is a pretty name, isn’t it? “Pure.” “Virginal.” Are you ashamed of contradicting your name, “Elisa?”


On another thread, Ines/ “Elisa” had started a chat with “Father_Midnight” in which she hinted she’d be starting an OnlyFans page in a few months.

Father_Midnight: What is OnlyFans?

UrGirlElisa: Just a site where you can see a little more of me.

Father_Midnight: I’ve seen you nude before. What else can you show me?

UrGirlElisa: Lol, in your dreams, papi

Father_Midnight: I drew every line of your body and committed them all to memory that very night. Truthfully, I find it somewhat tragic that your beauty is in thrall to commerce rather than serving art. Why the whore and not the muse?

UrGirlElisa: Fuck, it’s you again. Fucker. Go jerk off to the Mona Lisa and kill yourself, okay?


The police report also included information about an attempt to trace the IP. The latter conversation which took place between 8:30 and 9:30 PM was traced to a building on Prospect U’s campus—a computer lab that was locked up for the night and used by up to 60 different faculty members in addition to the students who accessed it during the day. Among the list of faculty members were some familiar names—among them, Melanie, Alex Townes, the fiction writer/professor Mateo Leonard, her engineering professor, Cameron Finley, and her physics professor, Quon Hu.

Detective Knapp had sent her a follow-up email. “I hope there’s something helpful in here. From what I can tell in reading between the lines of what’s in these reports, the fact that the IP was traced to campus hasn’t been made public. I’d say there’s a good chance the university tried to keep that one quiet.”

Monica heard a knock at her door. Following Monica’s invitation, Gabi stepped in. “Hey. How’d it go with…Austin?” she said tentatively. “Was he…are you guys still…?”

 

[siobhancan99]

Father and 12 seemed to be a theme, and the aggressive stalkerish shit seemed to link the accounts as well, so... probably the same person. The email being sent from somewhere Townes had access to also made sense. Melanie too. She couldn't discount the possibility that Melanie was some kind of psychopath, but from what she remembered it was rare in women and almost never violent. Plus the messages were just so male. So masculine and coarse. They also reinforced a sort of Madonna/whore dichotomy thing that seemed uniquely male. Melanie was probably not pathological in her sexuality. Quon Hu was out as well. That left Cameron and Alex... and weirdly Mateo. Some of the gross comments had a certain poetry to them, or ... at least the pretention of poetry. That spoke still more to Townes or Leonard, as Mateo was actually published. Still it wouldn't hurt to peruse his work from around the time of the kidnappings again to see if the phrases came out of his books. He wasn't so big a celebrity that it was likely a coincidence if so. Townes not owning a second piece of property was concerning, as it meant that Paige might be being held (or worse buried) on the property somewhere which upped her risk. Suburbanites called the cops when strange masked women snuck around their good clean homes, and Townes himself would be home unless he was at work.

She emailed and said yes to Townes. The campus coffee place used disposable to-go cups for everything. She could snag the cup and get it off to Knapp for DNA comparison, if she was smart about it. She could also head out in the sliver tonight to Giovani's property. See how isolated it was, and if there were any other structures or if the basement windows were blocked off or anything that might suggest that he had a creepy rape dungeon. If he wasn't home too she could maybe get some hair from a brush or something for DNA comparison. Looked like a busy night after the vigil. A busy week really. She'd love to have an answer before hiking though she knew that solving a crime the police worked on in the span of a few days was... optimistic.

When Gabi poked her head in she sighed and buried her face in her hands "I'm so gross. Ugh I don't even know what the fuck is wrong with me" she sighed and looked over to her roommate "So like...yeah I mean, there's gotta be something between 'I'm your boyfriend' and 'I'm the village bike and everyone gets to ride me' and well... whatever I had with Austin it wasn't in that middle ground I don't think. Fuck he's.... so beautiful. and ... he can lift me up and toss me around and its SO HOT but... that's clearly a gift he feels like he needs to share with the whole wide world. I didn't really come away with the impression that he was just hooking up opportunistically when I wasn't around, which... I'd have been fine with but... I think he's cultivating a few of these relationships and that's gross. How fucking much sex does a man need?"

 

[Halcyon638]

A quick search pulled up 2 published works by Mateo Leonard, the recently published Sidewalk to Heaven from May and from 2016, another collection of short stories entitled The First to Know which Monica vaguely recalled seeing on Melanie’s office shelf. A digital copy of the newer book was available online for $12, but the older collection seemed to be unavailable digitally.

“Mon,” Gabi said sympathetically, wandering behind her and placing her delicate hands on her friend’s shoulders. “There is nothing wrong with you. There is something wrong with him if he doesn’t appreciate how amazing you are. I’m sorry, carino. I feel bad because…I kinda talked him up at the gym and encouraged this whole thing. Not to let him off the hook, but…maybe I pushed you when you weren’t ready? I don’t—”

There was a knock at the door. “Shaun’s here.” She checked her phone. “We were going to grab a bite to eat but we can totally hang out here or I can ask if we can postpone it. You let me know, mi vida.” If Monica hoped to make it to Founder’s Square with a few minutes to spare, she would need to hop on a bus from campus in 20 minutes or so.

 

[siobhancan99]

Monica sighed "thanks. And I stress cooked and there's a whole Sunday dinner so... feel free to eat it. Or put it in the fridge. Or throw it out. Whatever. I'm fixing myself a plate real quick and then heading to the vigil to meet Professor Howe." She turned and cupped Gabi's face "Gabi... you... have always been my rock. You've never done anything to hurt me and I can't imagine that you ever would. For 12 years its been you and me against the world." She leaned in and kissed her roommate's forehead "So don't you ever lay this bullshit at your feet. You're amazing and I'm never going to think otherwise."


She let her roomate go and made herself a plate of food. "seriously help yourselves. Or don't It will keep and you and I can eat it the next few days" She piled food on her plate and basically inhaled it while making a few moments of small talk with Gabi and Shaun. Whether they ate or not, she went into the other room and changed into a long skirt and a sweater, stuff her mother had left behind. It had a real bohemian look and feel to it and right now she wanted something to ground her and make her feel closer to the girl she was growing up than the girl who beat up guys in the middle of the night and fucked beautiful man-whores. She left herself without makeup. This was a vigil not a date. She threw some things in her bag, including the lockpick gun and the sliver remote as she'd be making her way out to the trainer dude's house assuming she had time after the thing.

 

[Halcyon638]

Gabi smiled. “Thank you! Shaun and I will definitely tear into that food. I kinda have to save up a bit since I shelled out all that money on clothes last week.”

Downtown, there was quite the turnout for the event, both an affirmation of people’s need to celebrate their loved ones but also a sobering reminder of the city’s epidemic of violence. It took a little while for Monica to finally come across Melanie. She was dressed professionally as usual, this time in black pants and a white button-down shirt. Despite the gravity of the gathering, a slight smile appeared on the older woman’s lips. “Hello,” she said. “I’m glad you came out tonight. Did it take you long to get here from campus?”

As they made their way with the crowd that was assembling around one central spot on which were placed microphone stands, Melanie asked, “How has your week been?”

Soon, speakers were beginning to take the stage. The first was a woman named Jennifer Davidson, the organizer of the event. She had lost her 10-year-old son to gun violence. She thanked everyone that had come out and instructed them to light their candles, which Melanie and Monica did in unison with the other attendants. “This is a reminder, not only that our loved ones—those who were taken from us—are not forgotten. But you are not forgotten. Each and everyone of you who still feels these wounds, you are not alone. We are here for each other and we can lean on and depend on one another. This is what strength looks like.”

At one point, Monica noticed Daunte Ellis, the candidate for District Attorney she’d seen speaking mostly favorably of the vigilante on television. He was dressed neatly in suit and tie and stood among the crowd, simply observing. Next, an aging clergyman named Pastor Lucas Maxwell took the stage. He shared the accounts of helping several of his parishioners grieve their losses, each gut-wrenching in its own way. “I want to thank y’all for coming out tonight. If any of y’all are so inclined, this is just a reminder that our brothers and sisters over in Gilliam Heights are going to be out there again next Saturday protesting the Lehman Yards project which our mayor and city council just opposed over the strenuous objections of nearly every resident. Please call the council and the mayor’s office and let them know this greedy cash grab won’t stand.”

Jennifer Davidson now opened the floor to anyone who wished to speak. Among them was Ariana Ramirez, the fiancée of Eric Ramirez, whose killer Monica had apprehended. She told her story, fighting back tears at many points as the notes she held shook in her trembling hands. “In many ways, I consider myself lucky. Many of the dreams we had for our future came true: a beautiful baby boy. Careers that gave us meaning and made us feel connected to our communities. Just this spring, we hiked Arches National Park.” Wiping her eyes, she added, “But so many more of our dreams have been shattered.” At the end of the speech, Ramirez said, “If I could say a word to her, I would thank the masked woman for bringing my family and I justice. And some sense of closure. Yet we shouldn’t have to rely on her to keep us safe and put away those who would hurt us. We need our politicians and leaders of every kind to take responsibility for ending this violence and the conditions that create it: corruption, poverty, neglect. All of us have a part to play in ensuring a better future.”

 

[siobhancan99]

Monica made a "so-so" gesture to Melanie, figuring they could talk after. At the mention of this Lehman yards project, she decided to look into it a little more. If there were greedy developers involved there might be some sort of pressure to push locals out. She might have to step up patrols in that area, catch some of these guys in the act. It was definitely worth pursuing as her next project in addition to finding Paige Howe. She looked over to Melanie, wondering if she'd be happy or not. She assumed she would be, but two years is a long time. Maybe time enough to make peace. When people started talking about their experiences though, she found that six months was decidedly not enough time to make peace. She did, as she always did, attempt to tamp everything down and keep a lid on it, but she couldn't. Confronted with all these reflections of the profound sadness she had bottled up inside, she broke and started to cry. She wiped her tears away at first but finding they wouldn't stop she let them come. In typical Centauri fashion, she didn't want anyone to see, and she maintained that illusion for herself by refusing to look around.

There was a lessening, at least, of the tension inside her when she heard that she'd had some role in giving some closure to the Ramirez family. That was an affirmation that she needed. She had long told herself she was doing this to give others the peace she would never have, and hearing that wasn't exactly enough to make her feel triumphant, but it was enough to pull her back from wallowing, from concentrating on the life that she lost the night Tom died. These people were right. Their loved ones leaving left a much bigger hole than you'd contemplate. It permeated every aspect of existence. It was a weight that she would never free herself from. At least she had something to keep her afloat though, if barely. If she wanted that to keep being true though she had to push herself. She had to find the next person to help. First Paige and these people at Lehman Yards. Maybe she'd call pastor Maxwell's office to get information on the project and the community's thoughts on it.

As she stood contemplating all this, thoughts in a whirl with her personal drama and her own feelings of bereavement she finally looked over and leaned in "thanks for coming with me. It's easier not to collapse when you're standing with someone."

 

[Halcyon638]

“I know the feeling,” Melanie said. “I’m glad I could be here with you.” She handed Monica a tissue. “Consider it returning the favor.”

A cool autumn breeze blew through, extinguishing some of the candles. Some of the remaining participants noticed and relit the candles in defiance of the weather. “It was beautiful,” Melanie said as they moved away from the main grouping of people. “What the first speaker said…reminding us that we’re not alone in our pain even though it often feels that way. That…spoke to me.”

Monica received a text. Opening it, she saw it was from Austin. “I’m glad we were able to talk today. Would you still maybe like to grab a cup of coffee before class tomorrow?”

“Are you hungry at all?” Melanie asked. “There’s a little diner not far from here. I didn’t have much for dinner.”

 

[siobhancan99]

Monica offered a thin smile. She was wrung the fuck out, emotionally, but it was better than going back to sulk in her room or blubber on Gabi's shoulder. "I can drown my harsh self recriminations in a shake or something while you eat. I made a full sunday dinner before I came here, but you know... there's nothing like a good strawberry shake with real whipped cream. Or coffee shake." They made their way to the diner and, as luck would have it, shakes were on the menu. She ordered one and sat waiting on Melanie, then handed the menus back after the redhead ordered. While she sat with Melanie she texted "Have to study for an engineering test. Maybe wednesday." She didn't want to just ghost the guy. I mean he was who he was, a sweet dorky guy who lucked into being super hot and was compulsively sexual in these his prime years. It was like being mad at the sun for shining. That didn't mean she couldn't address her own behavior and limit some of her exposure to him. She sighed and pushed the phone away, then sipped at her water while she waited on her shake "So how are you doing?" Talking about Mel was easier than talking about herself, so she figured it was best to just start there and see where things went.

 

[Halcyon638]

Melanie ordered a hot turkey sandwich. “I’m doing…pretty well this week,” Melanie said, her tone lifting as if she’d just realized it herself. “There are ups and downs but it was mostly an ‘up’ week. I just had a proposal accepted for a conference being held at the University of Reading in England this spring, which was…very exciting, but now I have to actually write out the full paper I proposed, which is…something else. I got outside a good deal, though it was mostly getting the yard cleaned up. There are still so many leaves lying around. Caught up with an old friend from grad school who I hadn’t spoken with in years. And now…this,” she said. “I tend to get the ‘Sunday blues’ this time of night, so it’s nice to be out doing something rather than waiting for the weekend to end, you know? And you?”

The waitress brought Monica’s milkshake. “There you go, hon,” the matronly woman said. “Your sandwich will be just a few.” A few tables down, Monica glimpsed a table of three rough-looking 20-something guys stealing glances in her and Melanie’s directions.

As Monica started in on the milkshake, Melanie smiled. “How is it?”

 

[siobhancan99]

"it's good. nice and thick" She took a sip of her milkshake "I'm glad you're having a better weekend than I am". She gave the rundown on the Austin situation, how 'not that serious' had been interpreted wildly differently. "Like, I was prepared for the occasional act of opportunity, and you know uh... well um." She shifted a little "I mean I... am sort of figuring out how to navigate this bisexuality thing. So you know. Having it not be us locked into some sort of committed relationship was good. I didn't really anticipate that he'd be looking around for ass every minute that I wasn't around though. And really I'm not mad at him. I mean he is who he is and he never lied to me really. I can still find it all sort of tawdry and disgusting at the same time though. You know? So... mostly I just feel mad at myself for engaging in it at all."

She brushed her hair back from her face "But you know like... I'm not really ready to give up Tom even though uh." She looked down at her hands "Even though he's gone. He's gone but... I mean... How much could I have loved him if I was just running into the next relationship and looking to replace him?"

 

[Halcyon638]

Melanie took a forkful of her gravy-covered sandwich. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I was only…halfheartedly pursuing men at your age, but it seems like college guys—college boys—haven’t changed much since my day. It’s a little sad that we’ve actually moved forward a little bit in some ways, but some men still treat sex like one of their stupid competitions. You shouldn’t beat yourself up over it, Monica. Even if he was open about not wanting something without labels he should have been explicit upfront that he intended to screw around on the side. But I’m guessing he thought that would hurt his chances of landing you in bed.”

The older woman’s tone revealed some actual anger at Monica’s predicament. She twirled a french fry in some gravy and then ate it. The men at the table were laughing and talking in hushed tones. One of them, a heavily pierced guy, cast a lascivious look in Monica’s direction, then said something to make his friends laugh.

Melanie listened to Monica as she spoke about Tom. “Everyone grieves at their own pace. In their own way." The men in the other booth got up and left, but not before leering at both women on the way out. "The fact that you were with a man six—seven?—months after Tom passed doesn’t say anything about how deeply you’re grieving him or how much you love him. Sometimes we just need that…intimacy. Someone to touch us, make us feel wanted…desired. Sometimes it’s hard to think of anything else.”

 

[siobhancan99]

Monica appeared to ignore the men as they commented and leered. The pro in her though looked out at the street as they left, trying to ascertain whether they had indeed vacated the area and by what route. Just in case there was going to be some kind of trouble she wanted to be fully cognizant of the potential for it. She might not be able to avoid it but it was best to not be prepared. She sighed a little, inside, about the thought. Was her new pursuit going to doom her to seeing ambushes around every corner? She wondered if soldiers or cops had the same sort of routines when they were out and about. She frowned at the thought then realized she was doing it and hoped Mel thought it was about the conversation.

She nodded to Melanie and took a big sip of her milkshake, reaching out to touch Mel's arm in a gesture of empathy for a moment. "Yeah. I mean that's part of it right? Like... you don't want to cut yourself off. Like you still need love and affection. So there's this struggle between the part of you that needs that and wants to be normal with the part of you that is you know, still afraid of being hurt or also like... holding on to that amazing thing that you had before." She leaned back in the booth and sighed "It sucks that this all has to be so fucking complicated." She ran her hand through her blond locks, pushing them back from her face "Oh. Um, sometime this week can I borrow your book Mateo wrote? I can get the newer one online but I can't get the older one."

 

[Halcyon638]

When the 20-somethings left the diner, they seemed to head off to the left of the diner, opposite the direction from which Melanie and Monica had walked.

Melanie glanced in the men’s direction momentarily, but then turned her attentions back to Monica. “Sometimes I think we make it more complicated than it needs to be,” she observed. A moment after Monica touched her arm, the professor put her warm hand on Monica’s for a few seconds.

“Of course,” Melanie said. “He’ll be happy to know he’s got a new fan. You can come by my office any day to pick it up.”

Both women finished their food, and when the check came, Melanie said with a smile, “I’ve got it. I’m not paying for tuition.” After the check had been paid and a tip had been left, the redhead stated, “You’re not getting back on a bus at this hour of night. Let me drive you. I insist.”

As they exited the diner, Monica spotted the trio of guys hanging out on the sidewalk about 50 feet away, two of them smoking and the other clasping a bottle. “Evenin’, ladies,” one of them said. Melanie didn’t look, continuing to walk back toward her car. “It’s my friend here’s birthday tonight. You wanna come to a little party?”

“Come on,” Melanie said, putting a forearm around Monica’s lower back as she walked a bit faster now. Monica heard the men’s footsteps slowly coming closer.

 

[siobhancan99]

Monica increased her pace as they moved towards the corner. She aimed to match the men's pace to keep the distance between them, but neither she nor Melanie had good footwear on for a run. Part of her badly wanted to turn around, but she had to preserve her identity and this would at the very least make Mel suspect if nobody else. "When we get to the car, I want you to hurry up and get in, even if they're close" she said, trying to use a firm tone so there'd be no argument. "Hopefully as we don't respond they'll get bored and peel off." She figured there was a chance of that at least. For now, she just listened to see if they were gaining on the duo. If they were, there might have to be a new plan.

 

[Halcyon638]

The men’s footsteps slapped the dry concrete a little faster now. “Hey, blondie,” one of the men sneered, “you want to blow out my candles?”

Melanie spun around, livid. “Leave her the fuck alone.”

“Ooh, I like this one. A fiery redhead and a MILF, too,” one man, a short but muscular bearded and tattooed man said. “Maybe it’s my birthday, too.” A distance of about 40 feet separated the two women from the three men now. They were perhaps just 60 feet away from the professor’s car.

 

[siobhancan99]

Monica groaned softly. On one level the sort of masculine show of chivalry was you know, flattering and a little hot in a way that would have been demeaning if it had been a man that had done it, on the other they needed to be moving towards the car if they didn't want to get cornered by four guys. Monica didn't think she was necessarily a match for four men, and Melanie would be a hamper not a help. She tried to steer Melanie towards the car "thank you for that but the sooner we are in the car the sooner we can get out of here Mel. Come on don't give them the satisfaction. Lets just go. Unless you've got a gun in your bag 2 girls on 4 guys well... we don't come out of that matchup well. Come on." She needed to just clear that distance though, it was probably not possible to do it she had to at least try to get Mel to get in the car. "Please Mel. Please."

 

[Halcyon638]

Melanie turned and lowered her head, then sped up her pace again. “Aww, don’t be that way,” the man who had just called to her added.

One of the men added another comment that Monica couldn’t quite make out, and a few laughs broke out. The voices receded in the distance as the trio wandered away. When the two women reached the car, Melanie put her hands on the top of the vehicle and gripped it as if she were holding onto debris following a shipwreck. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have…I was just so angry,” she said, trembling, though with rage or anxiety, Monica couldn’t tell.

The older woman clicked the button on her key fob and unlocked her car, then climbed in. “You okay?” she asked.