I open my eyes and turn on my side. The bouquets still sat under my desk, ready to be given to their special person. Their smell covered the room, bathing it with a gentle fragrance of rose and lilac. Only if a gentle breeze could force its way inside, then it’ll truly become beautiful.

I crane my neck to look out the window. I move the curtains and see the night’s still fresh and morning still has time before its rebirth. Then why did I wake up?

“Mmn.”

A sudden moan in the hallway drew my attention. It sounded almost like Harmony, but she should be in bed by now. Then again, the moans were growing louder. What if she hurt herself going to the bathroom or something? I couldn’t just ignore her if that’s what it turned out to be.

I get out of bed and approach the doorway. I was about to enter the hallway until the moans stopped out of nowhere. 

“Fuck me.” 

Okay, now my interest has peaked. I slow down and peek my head into the hallway, hoping to find the glorious view that the voice promised. And indeed, the image was accurate to the moans and words. 

Harmony sat in front of the bathroom door, pleasuring herself. It was hard to see what exactly was happening, but a few things were fairly obvious at first glance.

She’s completely naked, first of all. Shirt? Tossed to the side. Skirt? Burned in the trash. Panties? Thrown to the fiery depths of hell where they belong. She wore her birthday suit proudly, not caring about the risk of being seen. If I was a betting man, then I’d say the threat turned her on even more.

She stared toward the ceiling, eyes closed, showering in the pleasure her fingers drowned her with. With every pinched nipple, she cried out for more pleasure. With every slight graze on her g-spot, she begged for something harder to poke her.

The sound of her pleasure juices splattering against the floor as she dragged them out forcibly with her fingers echoes down the hallway. The only thing louder was the moans that escaped her lips. 

The last time I fingered a woman was in my sophomore year of highschool, so I’m not the most recently active, but even I knew that the amount of liquid coming out of her pussy was terrifyingly too much. How much water did she drink to not get dehydrated after the first minute of this?

Was it because she’s a succubus? Maybe, but even still, her reproductive system seemed to work more on porn game logic than actual sense. 

“Harder. Ram it in harder.” 

She opened her eyes and her head just so happened to swivel in my general direction. It also just so happened that I was too enraptured by the scene to make the right decision and retreat to my room. It also just so happened that we caught each other’s eyes.

In anime, if a girl is caught doing something lewd, then no matter who’s fault it is, the main character must get slapped. She breaks into the bathroom while he’s taking a piss? Call him a pervert, then slap. She changes in his room, knowing that he’s almost home. Second verse, same as the first. 

I was curious as to how this scenario would play out in real life. Would I get slapped like every anime said would happen? Will she just scream and run away? Some other third option that I can’t think of? The choices are virtually endless.

I didn’t expect what happened next.

In a flash, she just wasn’t there. Instead, I stared into her eyes as my back lay flat against the floor. It all happened in the blink of an eye. She tossed me to the ground so hard that my headache sprung back up again, only this time much more ferocious than before. 

The only thing I could do was scream as I felt something wet trickle down the back of my neck. The erection I had vanished in an instant once the pain took over completely. The only thing that was left were those eyes and her voice.

“Fuck me.” Harmony whispered over and over again.

I looked into her eyes as my consciousness began fading. I could feel a hand over my pants, about to pull them down. Before that could happen, with the last blink of my eye before I lost consciousness, Harmony panicked like the end of the world just happened.

“Ty? What happened. I’m sorry! I’m so so-”

The world faded to black.

***

I open my eyes and turn on my side. The bouquets still sat under my desk, ready to be given to their special person. Their smell covered my room, bathing it with a gentle fragrance of rose and lilac. Only if a gentle breeze could force its way inside, then it’ll truly become beautiful. 

I crane my neck to look out the window. I move the curtains and see the birth of a new sun as the mirage of the moon lingers in the background of daylight. I didn’t want to climb out of bed, but I promised Harmony that I would walk her to work today. 

“I’m going to regret this, aren’t I?” 

I don’t even think I could count that as a question. It’s almost like an inevitability at this point. Still, I climb out of bed, toss my blanket to the ground, and prepare the first sarcastic joke of the month.

So what’ll it be today, brain? If she looks tired, I could say something along the lines of: Have you ever heard of coffee? It gets you worked up, and steaming. No, I could do better. What about: Did you stay up too late last night getting a good workout? Better, but maybe I could work with it a bit more.

Sadly, before I could, I had already made it to the living room. I’ll have to use the beta version of my sarcasm this time. It’s not all too bad, however. Even in beta version, it’s still somewhat acceptable. 

Harmony was already in the living room, sitting in a chair and drinking a steaming hot cup of coffee. I walk to her with a smile and wave, about to deliver my amazing brain abilities to come up with sexual innuendos. 

“Hey Harm-”

I freeze before the delivery. I just couldn’t bring myself to do it after I stood in front of her. Bags dragged her eyes down, her hands shook with the ferocity of a full clothes dryer, and that wasn’t even the worst of it.

Her skin is an awful gray that reminded me of a corpse that was on the final brink of decomposing before its skin split open for maggots and bugs to climb their way inside. That’s exaggerating it way too much, but I don’t know how else to describe it. I wasn’t looking at a person. I was staring at a walking and breathing corpse.

“Harmony?” I reach out to touch her shoulder.

“Don’t touch me!” She screamed as loud as she could.

I back away as quickly as possible, nearly losing my balance in the process. My heart skipped several beats, then began pounding so fast and hard I could feel it in my ears. I was worried that she would hit me from the intensity of her yell, but she refused to move from her seat.

“Is everything alright?” I ask so quietly I doubt she even heard me to begin with. 

She said absolutely nothing. The air was so thick it could be cut with a knife, and my brain was so empty that I could only think of cliche lines to say. There was only one question going through my brain. How am I going to fix this?

Yesterday she was smiling, and even though she nearly fell over, she looked perfectly fine. Then there’s this version, and she looks like death opened the door years ago. 

“Harmony.” 

There’s only one thing I can do. Throw all my sexual innuendos to the side to start off with. They can be used later, and it gives me more time to think of better ones. Next, I smiled as brightly as I could. My smile can conquer even the most broken of hearts if I care enough, and this is one of those times.

“Harmony, I want to tell you a joke. Can you stomach that?” She didn’t answer. “I’ll take your silence as a yes.” I cough into my hand. “Why did the chicken cross the road?” I lean my head in and wait for an answer that I know will never come. “It’s where KFC is.”

It was awful, but something that a comedian should never do when trying to cheer up an obviously depressed person is to tell their best punchlines. That’ll show that they’re trying too hard and not trying to relate to them on their level. Start with the cringy stuff first, then work their way up.

“So that didn’t make you laugh? That’s too bad cause I got this amazing bird for you.” I raise my middle finger and pretend to pet it like a dog. “If only you can laugh, then you can have this amazing pet to play with.”

Movement at four-o’clock. Her eyes looked in my general direction. This really isn’t my best material. Who knew actually trying to be funny ended up with me falling behind in the funny. But she was beginning to react, so I couldn’t fail now. 

“Harmony, I want to ask you something, and I want you to answer honestly.” She’s looking at me now. If she’s looking, then she’s listening. With a dumb smile plastered on my lips, I went in for the kill. “Are you okay?”

She looked up, but refused to look me in the eye. “Do you remember what happened last night?”

I shook my head. “What happened last night? If something happened last night, and I don’t remember, then doesn’t that mean we should move past it?”

I could see her chest rising and falling as her breathing grew more and more steady. “It’s important to me.”

“But if it’s hurting you so much, then why do you want me to forget?” I could see herself losing focus. “If you want me to forget, I will, cause I don’t want to hurt you. If you want to talk about it, I’ll sit here while you rant about your feelings.”

Tears fell from her eyes and slid down her gray cheeks. With a deep breath, she brought the coffee mug to her lips and chugged the last of the coffee. When she lowered it, I could see a smile form from the ashes of her despair.

“Are you sure that you want to hear me rant?” Harmony asked.

“I’ve already heard you spill your heart out about Loving Gates, so if I can survive that, I can survive this.”

A chuckle left her mouth. “This is nothing on the same level as my love for that show. It’s much, much worse.” She took another deep breath. “But I need to tell you this, for your own sake, as well as my own.”

“I lied to you about cubbi gaining energy from eating human food. At most, it just makes us want to use the bathroom, but we get no energy from it. Without sex, we get hungrier and hungrier. Or in human terms, we get hornier and hornier. The longer we go without feeding, the more our minds break down, and we snap”

“I want you to imagine how that’s like for a second. Our source of food is the bodily fluids of the opposite gender. When a cubbi is hungry, they'll find a way to eat, no matter how destructive they get. I can’t count the amount of bruises I’ve had on my body after a feeding. I also can’t count the amount of bruises I gave to others.”

“That’s just with other cubbi as well. Imagine what would happen if a cubbi, with strength that far surpasses humans and their minds are on the breaking point due to the lack of food, imagine what would happen to that human afterword.”

She didn’t say anything. I guess she actually wanted me to answer that question. However, I had nothing to say to her. What could I say exactly? I’m fine with my body being tossed and beaten like a puppet to satisfy someone else’s hunger and horny? That doesn’t sound like a good time for anyone, not even the most hardcore masochist out there would think it’s okay.

When I didn’t say anything, she continued. “If they don’t die somehow, then they’ll leave with so many injuries, it’d be like they would be better off dead. That’s what almost happened last night. My mind shattered, and my body needy, I nearly raped and killed you.” Tears welled up in her eyes once again. “I don’t want that to happen. You’re the first and only friend I’ve had since I was born into the cursed world.”

What is the definition of a curse? It is a supernatural power that harms something or someone. In the various media I’ve read throughout my twenty-four years on this earth, succubi were depicted as either sex goddesses that got off on the pleasure of sex, or demons that killed any man that they could seduce, the pure embodiment of the evils of lust.

But here, a real life succubus sat in front of me, tears in her eyes saying how her very existence pains her. From some unknown means, or possibly some fucked up God, decided that these people should perish for just being born as themselves. It was a tragedy as old as time. The act of being born is what causes the most pain a person can have.

And I couldn’t accept that reality. Life weaves narratives in tragedies, and both the stories I’ve written were tragic to replicate that reality. And people ate that shit up like breakfast, finding some sort of catharsis at other people’s suffering beside their own. I’ve always wanted the narrative to be something else completely. Rather than a tragedy, I want the world to create comedies.

Let people laugh as the funny man makes a reference to a show he likes, then proceeds to harm himself in making that reference. Let innuendos fly like the wind as people shouted them on the streets and car windows. Let the smiles of people fill the streets, children laugh as slapstick occurs regularly in the neighborhood park, and aliens come from their flying pancakes and think we’re all insane for enjoying life.

This is reality, however, and it’s never going to listen. A woman cries in front of me, despair filling her because her curse destroyed her life forever. She’s not just a succubus. She’s a living being, with thoughts, feelings, flaws. She’s not a sex object. She deserves better.

With a smile still on my face, I lunged from my seat and hugged the crap out of her. I know she didn’t want me to touch her, but she left me with no choice. I don’t like tragedies after all. Even if it kills me, I’ll make her laugh a genuine laugh for once in her life.

“You don’t have to suffer alone, you know. You don’t have to force yourself to do anything. When the time comes, I’ll protect you. No matter what happens, I’ll never hate you.”

For a second, I expected her to push me off of her. But when she wrapped her arms around me, and began crying into my shoulder, I gripped harder onto her, my smile never disappearing. It’s been vanishing a lot lately, but I’m going to make a promise to myself. I’ll never let this smile drop. During the good times, or even during the times where I want nothing except to cry, I’ll keep this smile on me.

She let go of me and we grinned like a couple of dumb idiot dingleberries at each other. Then the unexpected happened. She lunged from her seat and immediately sprang into cussing and action.

“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. I got work today!”

“Yeah, I would have told you that, but you kind of looked like my grandma in her casket.”

“Shut the fuck up and get ready. You promised me you were coming with me.”

“Yes, ma’am.” I salute her.

We both hurry along, getting coffee, then headed out for a day of excitement. After we left, the only thing left on my mind was tonight.