Candy Ramherst

It was just another godforsaken night, Candy told herself as she stepped from the studio into the back alley once again for today’s walk home. Ouch. She exclaimed as she tripped on the step. Her teeth gritted, I always miss that step. She shook her head at herself. Calm down, she tried to convince herself. But she had been trying to convince herself of that all night. Now she was done for the night, but the tremor in her hand still had not ceased. She had tried to convince herself earlier in the day that all Mickey had given her was some Ibuprofen, maybe he thought she had a headache. She knew better though. The girls had been stressed lately, and those chalky pills couldn’t really pass for over-the-counter pain meds-that is, unless you were trying to convince yourself that you weren’t really in that much trouble.
“Screw him,” she muttered aloud, her Jersey accent pouncing on the words as they escaped her lips. She tried not to curse, her mother had always taught her not to, and now it was the only dignity she had left to preserve. The tremor worsened just a bit with the effort. She bent over, and emptied the contents of her stomach onto the street-corner in front of Derrione’s. She was overwhelmed with the post-sickness lightheaded sensation. Her head seemed to weigh more than her whole body on one side. Her hand caught at the brick wall next to her and she leaned her weight into it.
“Oh God,” the words gushed from her, “Damn this…” Her breath caught, a series of short coughs wrenched forth from her gut. Finally, she pulled herself up for a deep breath of polluted air. Her breaths following that one were shallow, shaking through her lungs, but she reached her trembling hands deep into her trench coat’s lined pocket for a cigarette. As she pulled her hand forward, and retrieved the lighter she had barely remembered to stuff in her purse, she walked forward just a bit to the street lamp. Refusing to turn around, the tired worker could still sense the smoke and debauchery of her workplace.
It was the leading disreputable bar in San Magdala. One of the only places left with “dancers,” and gambling, it was run by Mickey Tonson. Mickey looked any old mob boss, but his specialty was in picture taking, and avoiding take over by the cops. His bartenders and managers looked after the rest. Candy let forth an overwhelmed sigh as the work of the day flashed through her mind. She couldn’t bear the thought of what she did herself, so all she saw was Mickey and his demands, barking and harassing her forward. That’s when her agent had spotted tears in her eyes. He took her to the back and slapped her, hoping to ‘bring some sense into her,” then he had shoved the pills into her hands and she had finished the day’s work. She closed her eyes in anguish and flame glittered forth from her zippo only to mingle with the tobacco and nicotine waiting in her clutch.
She stared forward into the closed businesses all around her. The industrial revolution had sure been aimed right for this place. Concrete masses were piled all around her, lit only occasionally where night workers kept their early morning vigil. Above that was a pitch-black void, punctuated only by the front of clouds that almost completely hid the moon.
Another long drag of the cigarette. For a moment she was back at home, clinging to her mother’s leg. It was an odd sight. Her mother had looked and dressed like a 50’s Leave it to Beaver mom, except for the overdose of crimson lipstick and blue eyeshadow, highlighted by the smoking cigarette that nearly always protruded from her mouth. She remembered her mother dragging her leg forward to the table as she set the day’s burnt casserole onto the table, nearly burning herself and jumping back with a premature, “Ouch,” still holding a hot mat in one hand and shaking the other(which just so happened to be gloved. She shook her head relieving herself of the memory, it was too long ago, not worth thinking about now. The cigarette was gone, already? It seemed like they just disappeared lately. Most of her paycheck went to buying cigarettes, ever since she stopped riding the bus that is. That was a bad thing about working in performance. All the perverts knew her name, and not just her name, but all the wrong ways to talk to her. And so, she was sentenced to the long walk home. It didn’t fix it all, but the few drunks out this late at night were easier to deal with than the night-crowd in the Amway system.
Her black heels clicked on the sidewalk.

“Tick, tock, make it hot, DJ…”

Oh, I hate that song.

She shook her head, wishing it wouldn’t be stuck in her head…again. Casualty of the job, she grimaced, how could she NOT memorize every grimy popular song out there, she listened to them all day, every day. Hmm, she lived their ideal dream, too. Well, she might as well have brushed her teeth with Jack in the morning, but the parties weren’t all they were cracked up to be.
Her stomach surged and she strained to hear the silence again, the clacking of her heels, the breath of the wind around her shoulders. Her ears ringing from the days exertion was enough sound for her tonight. She stuffed her hands further into her pockets and tightened her lips against the cold, gritting her teeth to maintain some sort of balance.

A chilled drop of icy rain steeled itself against her cheek.

“Not now…” she muttered in disapproval. 3 miles left to go and the sky had decided to empty on her. The void had filled itself with grey masses quickly enough after she had gazed upon it outside the club. Now it was threatening her trek home. She tightened a scarf around her neck and scrunched her shoulder up nearer to her neck. This was just in time. Minutes later the torrents were let loose. It started slow enough, but the rain emerged into a downpour before she had weaved through one more block. The icy shots to her forehead seemed to refresh her a bit, but her nauseated stomach rejected the chattering teeth and tension from her conservation of warmth.
She gagged again, leaving what was left in her stomach on the side of another road. The world seemed to spin before her again. She took a turn, not sure if it was in the right direction, but desperate to keep moving. Vaguely aware of a couple of hobos outside a movie theatre, she sped up her step,
“Hey, little lady,” their shouts barely pierced her inner moanings, “I could show you somewhere to sleep tonight.”
She gagged again, choking to hold back angry cries as she did so. And her steps forward doubled. One of them took another step towards her, but seeing her ghastly pale face he was taken aback, and before he could say anything else she was gone.
Turning a corner, she caught herself against a wall for just a moment. The rain had died down just a bit, but she had somehow ended up in a part of town she knew better than to spend much time in. It was, if anything could be, worse than the industrial area around her studio. Here there were shacks that held drug dealers, the broken homes of drunks who worked what little jobs they could to feed their families, and who knew what else. She hadn’t taken the time to look before today. Here clothed in night, she couldn’t really see the fearful places she had been steered away from, but she could sense a friction in the air that sent chills up her spine. She redoubled her steps, scarcely daring to turn around to relieve that feeling that someone was watching her. She nearly collapsed as she neared the end of the block, catching herself on the edge of the stop sign and trembling as she nearly retched yet again. That sign became her closest friend in the world as she clung to it to make the world stop spinning.

She felt a slight, almost tender, touch at her side. She turned toward it only to gasp in horror.

A man stood by her. He was over 6 foot and possessed a strength that simply radiated forth from him. She took no more time to observe him but turned and ran as fast as her tormented body would allow. She began to limp as one high heel pulled at the muscles in her leg. She tore it off as she continued to run, but in this endeavor she collapsed on the ground.

Her knee hit the concrete first, making a splitting sound as it did. She crumpled to the ground in pain, and a sob choked forth from her. She had turned the corner right before she fell and from all she could tell, it seemed the man was gone.

It seemed centuries that she stayed curled there in the fetal position, covered by a blanket of icy rain, shivering. Tears begun to stream down her face as she attempted to stand. Each attempt ended in her collapsed again, until she realized the futility of her efforts and gave in to a hopeless offering of herself to the night.

She cursed the day as she lay there trying not to think of the death that would probably take her, and just when she thought nothing could get any worse, she sensed a figure’s approach. Her shivering body refused to move as she tensed, hearing each steps approach nearer and nearer. The steps quickened, and suddenly, she felt a gentle hand on her cheek.

She shied away. It was a touch she had never felt before, but flashes of her work lit her brain with the fear that desired to cry out from her.

“Shhh,” he lilted. His hand caressed her fallen head, and he stroked her air away from her face. He pushed his hand forward in front of her face, and she allowed it to be wrapped in the welcoming of his human touch. Her tears wet the palm of his hands and he soothed them away as they came.

Her eyes closed as he lifted her into his arms and she felt the warmth that had never approached her roughened skin. “Shhhh,” he said again, ”Everything’s allright” and her head dropped into his shoulder.

And from then on “everything” was.