Heads Will Roll: Chapter One - Welcome to Hell
“It was her bestfriend disguised as her killer - a traumatic betrayal that she’ll carry even in her grave.” Two high school students, sophomores engaged in intimate relations, stare at the girl’s laptop, gaping at the ending of the story they have binged for the last week. Lola opens her mouth, the promptly closes it, like a fish, really. Raúl blinks endlessly, shuts his eyes, then slowly opens them.
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
“That’s it? Nah - shit, bruh, that can’t be it-”
“Damn, son, I don’t fuck with these cliffhangers, moe, the fuck is going on-”
“Ay, yo, hol’ up a minute, I gotta take this.” A twenty-something-year-old woman stands from the bed, cutting her eyes at Raúl, who opens his mouth to complain. She doesn’t need to speak and tell him to shut up; her glare does all the talking. Briskly leaving the dorm room, heels clicking with each, poised step, she answers the phone the moment the door is closed and she feels alone enough to speak freely. ”¿Hola? Carlos, ¿qué quieres? Estoy en medio de una misión con Lola y Raúl y ahora no es un buen momento.” She huffs, running her freshly manicured nails through wavy, chocolate, stress-prone locks. Not this. Not now. “Ya te dije esto. Ya no trabajo en esos trabajos. Encuentra alguna otra puta perra. Estoy tratando de armar mi mierda. ¿Lo entiendes?”
“Angela? You alright?” Fuck. She whips her head around to find Lola standing in the hall, gentle hand resting against the doorframe. Her lips are pressed into a thin line, concern branded across her face. Angela resists the urge to cringe, to lash out, to break down; she promised herself that her little sister would never see her like this - never again. But Carlos is there, in her ear, like Mephistopheles, tempting her patience, tempting her emotions, tempting her-
Angela needs the money. Lola needs the money. This is the only way to get her through this expensive-ass, cash-thirsty boarding school. This is the only way to keep her from going back home.
”¿Asi que? ¿Ha cambiado de opinión?” Carlos almost sounds smug. Angela clenches her fist tighter around her phone, acrylics scratching at the screen. But, to her sister - her darling, innocent sister who is far too good for her own sake - she forces a smile and giggles, waving her hand in such a carefree manner that Lola grins right back at her.
“I’m fine, Lo. Just some bullshit from work. Don’t worry about it, sweetheart.”
“Good, because Rafa wants to talk about the fic. Could you believe that ending!” Lola throws her hands up, the most eloquent way to get her words out, still at a loss. “I mean, what the fuck man! I wasted a whole week, I coulda been doing that project for Lang-”
”‘Project?’” Angela quirks an eyebrow at Lola, who falters, swallowing thickly. She barks out an over-exaggerated laugh that is born from her diaphram and booms forth from her mouth. Though her defense mechanisms were more incriminating than helpful, Angela knows her sister well enough to know that the sudden guffaw is just a highly awkward don’t worry about it. “Lo, I’ve gotta go.”
The laughter dies down a little more rapid than Angela would have liked, and she grimaces at the crestfallen look on her sister’s face; at the way her back and shoulders collectively slump, defeated.
“Right. Well, you are working and everything now. These calls come with the territory, I guess. Shoulda peeped that...” Angela wants to pull her sister into a hug, wants to tell her that it’s alright, wants to scream and shout at her that what she’s doing is for her and that she needs to grow the hell up.
Angela, instead, like a good big sister, just leans forward, kisses Lola’s forehead, and takes a step backwards. “I’ll see you later,” she promises, and she means it.
When Lola looks back up, Angela’s already so far down the hall that she didn’t get the chance to sneak a peek at caller ID on the screen.
Thing is, it’s Carlos’s birthday and Angela has always thought that he acts like a child on “his day.” Typically, he hates it when people deny him what he wants, but his bitchiness only worsens when said people are supposed to be celebrating “him.” Cue Angela, his favorite person, his bread and butter, the candles on his cake that he’s just dying to blow out - here she is, on her knees, the entirety of Carlos’s length down her throat while he’s on the phone with Sanchez. Fucking Sanchez - the gutless bastard probably planned this call knowing what poor little Angela would be doing at the same time.
“Well I told Ramirez to bring his boys down to the Gold Bug tonight at around... 1700? 1800?” Carlos runs a hand through Angela’s hair (a hand that she almost leans into) before harshly fisting it, making her gag violently when he pulls her off of him. “Angel, what time did I say my meeting would be?”
“1800,” she spits out, wiping the taste of salt out of her mouth. Carlos merely chuckles and pats her cheek twice, but it feels more like he’s slapping her. Angela scowls up and him, but proceeds to lean in and finish off what she’s started, much to her generous tormentor’s pleasure.
“Yeah, Sanchez, 1800. I know, she is a good girl, isn’t she? Maybe if things go smoothly tonight with Ramirez’s people, I’ll let you have the night with-- HER!” Carlos’s eyes widen like saucers, pupils totally blown at a particularly hard suck accompanied with grazed teeth on Angela’s end. He stares down at her like she’s the most terrifying thing he’s ever encountered and Angela, smug, cuts her eyes up to his, smirking even though her mouth is full. She can hear Sanchez’s raspy, tobacco-smothered voice on the opposite line, asking if Carlos is alright, so the man does the most noble thing he can in this situation. “I’ll call you back. Urgent business came up.”
Carlos cuts the call in the midst of Sanchez’s rushed spluttering about payment finalizing, tosses his phone to the dark sheets doning his king sized mattress, firmly graps both sides of Angela’s head and proceeds to piston her until he’s spilling into her mouth. It doesn’t take long - she had been teasing him for the duration of his conversation with Sanchez. Angela pulls off of him violently, repulsed by the sudden stream bitter warmth shot onto her tongue and spits into a floor-side wastebin.
“What? Don’t act like you didn’t ask for that,” Carlos drawls, now zipping up his slacks accordingly and tucking in his shirt. He then snorts at the wrecked glare he receives from the woman curled up on his rug. “Spitting after oral sex is a sin, if you didn’t know that.”
“Boohoo, I’m going to burn in Hell. What’s new?”
“Aw,” Carlos swoons, crouching down to her height and ruffling her hair like one would a dog, “that’s so cute. You’re an adorable person, you know that?”
“Fuck you.”
“Later,” he promises, smiling fondly at the aggravation on her face when he says that. “I need to finish getting dressed though. I still have business to attend to this evening.”
“Why does it have to be during my shift,” she hisses, swatting his hand from her hair and turning so that she could open one of the small drawers in the oakwood desk, fishing out a pack of Camels. She keeps digging her hand through the drawer for another minute, something Carlos observes with light interest before she angrily slams it closed. “And where the hell is the lighter?”
“Lost it,” Carlos shrugs.
“Liar.”
“If you ask nicely, I’ll set it on fire.”
“That is one of the corniest things I have ever heard come out of your mouth.”
“That wasn’t an innuendo.” Then, deviously, he smirks and says, “say please.”
“Fuck. Off.” Carlos sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose, frustration building in his stomach. For such an entertaining woman, she can be such a headache... He slides to a sit beside her, slinging an arm around her shoulders (it’s obvious that the action makes her feel uncomfortable when she tries to hide her grimace.)
“I decided to hold the talk during your shift,” he begins slowly, “because Sanchez has been overstepping his grounds. He needs to learn his place and know what does and does not belong to him.”
“I’m not your’s.”
“That stain on your arm says different.” So Angela shuts up, because he’s right, and that fills Carlos with pride for making his favorite person bend to him so effortlessly. “Although,” he sings, sending shivers racing down Angela’s spine, “I could always let it slide. He’s been a great subordinate for the last few months and I like to reward good behavior.” At that, his voice drops a few octaves and it’s when Carlos uses that tone that Angela is brought back to two years ago when it was just the two of them and he was her only chance at survival. Angela never wants to repeat those days.
“Please.” Carlos produces a small, red lighter from his pants pocket and hands it to her. Angela is eager to pull a cigarette from the box in her hand and set the tip aflame, bringing the cancer-stick to her lips. The smoke curls in her mouth in such a pleasing way that the taste of the man sitting beside her is drowned out; Angela sighs, content to the point where she hardly cringes at Carlos placing his own cig between his teeth, leaning over to her and pressing their tips together, igniting it.
“See? That wasn’t so hard,” Carlos snickers, quieter than usual. Angela’s unaccustomed to him being this gentle with her. She’s afraid that he’ll flip on her without warning and do something dreadful. He derives pleasure from her pain, after all. Then again... “I’m not going to try anything, if that’s what you’re thinking so hard about.”
“You know that’s exactly what I’m thinking about,” she deadpans, taking another, weighty drag. “Why not?”
In any other story, this would be where the villian admits to having feelings for the heroine, hoping that she joins him by his side and that they be equals married by minds, souls and hearts. “Eh, the suit’s too expensive to get blood and cum on.” This isn’t that kind of story apparently, Angela thinks with distaste. Carlos laughs at her irritation then kisses her forhead. “What? Don’t tell me you want me to hurt you.”
“I hate you.”
“I know.” He’s grinning at her like she’s some kind of joke and she wants nothing more than to dig her cigarette butt into the side of his neck and leave a blistering, ashy mark for the whole world to see. “You know what I’ve been thinking, Angel?”
“Amuse me.”
“If this deal goes well, let’s get married.” Now it’s Angela’s turn to laugh. Carlos looks genuinely confused. “What? We can fuck for a lifetime! Plus we’re so good for each other. We balance each other out, we finish each other’s sentences, we both want to see Sanchez get hit by a bus--”
“You must be delusional if you think I’d ever be your wife, you fucking psycho.”
“Oh, please, save the bedroom talk to after my meeting, sweetheart. I’ll make sure you eat your words, among other things.” Angela doesn’t say a word after that. Carlos rolls his eyes and stands up, finishing off what’s left of his cigarette as he does so then trashing it. Opening another drawer to his desk, he pulls out a small, scarlet-colored box and tosses it into Angela’s lap. “At least give it some consideration before I force you into it. You know that I don’t take no for an answer already, so why not get into the mindset of being a housewife. You’d never have to work again.” Carlos is now buttoning up a dark, black blazer with gold accents, having already shouldered it on and adjusted his cuff links. Angela just sits on the floor, too stunned to move, watching him wrap up his dress.
“You’re leaving so soon?” She asks, unsure as to where the question came from because since when does she care about what he does? “My shift doesn’t start for another hour.”
“Then you best start getting ready then. Shower’s free for your use,” he replies, nodding over at the attached bath on another side of the huge master bedroom of Carlos’s estate that costs more money than Angela can even dream of having. “And you already know that I have an extra uniform in the closet.”
“Yeah...” Angela swallows thickly. “In the back on the right.”
“Good girl.” Carlos adjusts his tie clip on last time in the mirror and Angela becomes hyperaware that it’s the white gold one she got him for his last birthday. She feels embarassed, then prideful, then... guilty. Did she forget everything he’s done to her? All of the suffering and depression she’s endured because of him? Why when he all of a sudden throws marraige in her face does she feel so vulnerable? “Angela,” he calls and her head shoots up in attention, like a bitch would to her master; his eyes are hard and his mouth is stiff. There are very few times where Carlos is capable of looking so serious and those times are only when he’s so quietly angry that he wants to rip someone’s head clean off their neck with his bare hands. “You know better than everyone that I don’t mistreat my belongings. If you’d just submit to me, you’d understand.” His voice is low, as if there are people all around them, watching them, so Angela matches his volume.
“Then why do you hurt me?”
“Because you have yet to realize that you are eternally mine.”
Angela stares at him for several, anxious moments, not moving. Finally, she releases the breath she had no idea she was holding when she nods in two, steady movements.
“I’ll... I’ll think about it,” she whispers. Carlos smiles at her and shakes his head, pocketing his hands.
“Cute,” he mutters, then raises his voice to its normal level. “That’s all I need.” Her gaze falls back down to her lap at the tiny box resting there. Her hands are trembling when they try to open it; the lid clamps closed once - twice, until she can see the object inside in all its glory.
Seated upright in a pillow of red is a rose gold engagement ring, real diamonds encrusting the band. At the ring’s center: a huge, glittering rock that nearly blinds Angela at first glance, held high by a cage the band encloses about its sides. It’s so magneficent that Angela wants to throw up. When she whips her head back up to demand why Carlos would leave such a priceless work of art to her, he’s gone. It takes everything in Angela’s power to keep from shattering it.
©SelfTitled, 2018
Art by: SelfTitled
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