A Night Out

The bottle whirled round and round with the warm So Cal air causing a light whistle every time the opening caught just the right angle. Micah and Noah were practically shaking to find out which of the three girls across from us they might get lucky with. This idea to mix a curious kid’s game with a bottle of tequila came to be after leaving the Border Bar. Gabby and Francesca huddled with the third girl they only referred to as “Lady” and came back after an exchange of giggles and muttered Spanish with a look in each of their eyes that never made one of us think twice, almost like a sort of dark spell.

The bottle finally came to a halt and Gabby got who she wanted with her spin, Micah. They left the patio for one of the rooms in the Airbnb beach house we scored for the trip. Next was Noah. Before he touched the bottle, I knew for some reason he was going to get Fran and I would finally be left with the mysterious Lady. Her and the macabre tattoos that covered every bit of her arms and legs that was visible and seemed to shine in the moonlight. The bottle started to slow again with the neck pointing at Lady, until a last little turn, as if a hand snuck out from the shadow and pushed the tip towards Fran. She took Noah by the hand to join the others’ inside and said “Buenos noches senora de las sombras.” Lady smiled and stepped in front of me to come between me and the house, turning her back on the couple as they shut the door.

Her hair looked darker than the night itself, making her brown eyes almost blend into her pupils. “What did she say?” I asked, as she reached out softly to touch my arm. Her hand touching my wrist immediately made me feel as if I was out in the ocean, freezing, drowning, gasping for life in the wet darkness. Then suddenly a crack from the house of a door breaking in caused her to lift her hand, allowing me to come back to the surface and out of the darkness. Shocked and almost sick from the feeling of going from freezing alive to uncomfortably hot, I couldn’t decide what to address first. The sound from the house where my friends were assumed to be enjoying their time or if Lady’s hand had taken me far from the original safety of this patio. Perhaps the tequila we had to finish in order to play this game was taking a heavier toll than expected.

“Man that stuff was strong” I thought in my head, until I heard a man yelling “Where is she? She knows this isn’t her territory!” Then a primal scream rang out, maybe from one of the girls frightened enough to make such a sound, yet no sign of the boys. Another mans voice sternly replied to the scream. “Fine, we’ll take you down, then teach her a less..” the mans words cut off by the sound of gurgling and coughing. Then a smashing of bones and some whimpers before the first man grunted “Damn Muertes.” I snapped out of it and looked to Lady who appeared to be nervously tracing her tattoos. “Lady we need to go somewhere safe, they must be looking for the owners of this place.” I whispered, grabbing her hand to settle her. She swiftly turned her head my direction as I stopped her hand, to show her once soft and delicate face now with skin falling off to reveal two dark, deep eye sockets surrounded by bone, white as fresh snow. She proceeded to trace the long scythe tattoo on the inside of her left forearm. With each trace more skin fell to the bricks. Her midnight hair began to float and grow until fading into a shadow that took the form of a cloak wrapping around her. On her last trace as the final bit of skin fell off her arm, the very scythe tattooed on her arm appeared in front of her, levitating and almost groaning before the boney, fleshless fingers wrapped around it. Looking back at me, the snow-white skull said, “No.” “They’re here for me, the Lady of shadows, just as Francesca said.” She moved towards the house and right through the door. The man yelled and a series of flashes of lightning beamed through the windows followed by the sound of a sharp blade making contact and the pieces of flesh it met hitting the floor. An erotic laugh rang out and Lady said “Ohh you American angels, I play where I want.” Then, appearing as she was before, walked back out to the patio and handed me that bottle of hers softly saying, “lets go back to my place.” The cold wet waves of darkness crashed back over me.

I could hear water falling as I woke up on a cold floor. I could hear the water almost as much as I could hear my head splitting open from the tequila. Must have passed out in the bathroom and one of the guys got a shower going for me. “What an awful set of nightmares” I thought, struggling to stand in the bright room I couldn’t quite make out yet, hitting the glass door of the shower. “Hopefully this shower and a greasy burrito does the trick.” Fumbling for the handle I yelled “thanks guys, I’ll be done in no time.” Not finding a handle I realized it wasn’t the shower door but a wall of glass. Looking through the glass I could see myself in a mirror, terrified to see Lady holding me in her tequila bottle as if trading my soul in for the worm.