Cry Little Sister

"Dorian!"

He moaned when my pussy went tight, squeezing on him with the force of the orgasm that ripped through me and that was the sensation that definitely belonged as a whirlwind in the second circle of hell. There was no thought, nothing but the obliterated need, the thrill of reaching the end of the build and having it come to a head so that the madness made perfect sense. I held onto Dorian like a lifeline when he was always the one who pulled me back from the brink, when he always understood what he needed to do and say to make me think clearly again. He let me have him for as long as he could hold off, I think, before he ripped away from me so that I watched with a kind of dazed wonder when he stroked his cock over me instead, pumping himself until he inhaled and the hot drops fell on my abdomen.

The exhilaration made me laugh a little, so that Dorian smiled and stroked a finger down my cheek. There was a moment where I closed my eyes and nuzzled him happily, but it was when I opened my eyes that I managed to focus behind him and to see the real magic.

I sat up straight in his bed, eyes going wide at the image on his wall, where there was still smoke swirling around us from the fog machine. "Your cross!"

But Dorian was grinning his playfully mad grin. He looked behind him to see the blood that was dripping down the front of the cross and then fell on his back beside me, with a dreamy expression in his eyes. "See, now that was a scene I always liked, but I couldn't make it fit in the movie very well when it was already heavily paired with Dracula and would so obviously be stolen. Artists have to be careful about their thievery." He winked at me. "So I made it a magic trick for my little sister instead."

I burst into laughter because of course he had and I couldn't help but stand the same way I had stood for nights lately, lost to insanity, but of course, I had never truly been one of the lost. Dorian was always there and sanity was overrated anyway. I had to grin at the scene of fake, thick red liquid dripping from inside the cross, by some foresight of Dorian's, my wonderful older brother, the only one who could talk to me, and the thoughts made me laugh all the harder even if I couldn't have quite said why. There was a joke in all of it, in being afraid to show my first nudity reveal, while this was the final scene of his perfected Dracula, this madness that lay beneath my skin, that I couldn't be rid of, the affliction of the mind that ran in our blood.

I hadn't even realized I'd fallen to my knees beneath the cross until Dorian knelt behind me, and his kisses were soft on my neck. It cut off the madness at least and I turned to look at him curiously, where he studied me with an expression of tender care. "I don't know if you're capable of understanding this anymore. You got a lot worse in a short amount of time in college, but it was never jealousy I felt for you, little Lucy." I frowned when he didn't call me Mina that time. I knew who Mina was and how to act as her in the different parts of the movie as she fell farther into the gray, while Lucy was an entity that confused me, one that was so boring to consider when I'd been born in her name. Dorian patiently soothed me with a stroke of my hair, however, pulling me from the brink in his slow, methodical way. "It was just fear. I meant what I said. If you wanted to try another relationship, you could, but the thought scares me. You're not like me. You're okay... until you're not, until it snaps you, and I'm scared of how you might snap if you don't give these things outlets, like you do with acting. It's what makes you such a wonderful actress actually, baby. You need it and the thought of someone not understanding how you need it concerns me, but I meant it. I would help you try a relationship with someone like Brandon, if that's truly what you wished."

I blinked, then smiled, nuzzling him. "Of course I can't do that. You made the cross bleed already and it wouldn't be a very good magic trick if I didn't stay with big brother and his wicked seduction."

He thought about that and then grinned. "It really wouldn't, would it?"

"And sad endings are just the worst."

"The absolute worst. Do you still want to play with Mina for a while or would you like to play a different game, little sister? Is she still loud in your head or is there another character getting jealous of the attention she's been receiving?"

"I like Mina when she's broken and happy and bloodthirsty right now. Show me more magic, Dracula!"

Dorian laughed and tugged me to my feet. "Children of the night. What music they make," he quoted, teasing me, letting the misty look of romantic stories fall over his own eyes. My brother. I nuzzled him happily, thinking that it was oh, so dreamy how he could play and not play sometimes. I remembered the pain of being lucid, how I didn't want to think like that more often than not, and how he so willingly went back and forth. He was far stronger than I was in that way, strong enough to find the willpower to walk the path of sanity when the dark fairy lights of magic lay as the other option.

And then I forgot about it, staring at the bloody magic trick he'd made with the cross, thinking that I was Mina and it was so delightful that the cross should bleed at the end when I had fallen to the charms of the taboo. It made me giggle while Dorian playfully guided me through one of those hidden doors, to play some more in our happy ending.

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Her madness was tricky to learn, even then, however. Her moments of lucidity have always been so perfectly sane. The way the curse touched me was something I found a bit easier mitigate, when it was merely an odd form of thought. Sometimes, it's still hard to notice when I have one of those stray ideas. Wonderfully, as a director of the twisted and odd, I can rather easily get away with this. Happily for me, eccentric artists are a cliche and I just so happen to fit it rather well. I might get an odd look, but people let it pass.

In contrast, Lucy is... volatile at times. It took me a while to realize that if I kept a touch on the madness in myself and if I learned to speak her language, then I could bridge the gap between her and others. I could navigate her insanity, in a way, and guide it in such a way that others might not notice. I found it easier to learn how to do this if I kept myself isolated from others.

Er, actually, that's not entirely true. The frightening truth is that I enjoy isolating myself so that she has influence over me. She is such a romantic soul and there is something pure in her visions and dreams. She talks endlessly of Dracula after her first play, where she was cast as Lucy. She loses herself so totally in stories and carries them with her. She becomes afraid of the monsters at times, usually when her vision warps with the faint level of hallucination she suffers. That particular brand of delusion doesn't overly manifest in her, however, and I've discovered that if I romanticize the monsters when they scare her, she is no longer afraid. It is such an easy solution and it works every time. I weave her "happy endings" so that the monsters stay at bay and... it works.

I can keep her safe and that is something that feels like true magic. So many of our family have suffered tragic endings when the fear and terror overwhelms them. But I can speak to Lucille. What's more is how much I love to do so. It's intoxicating to lose myself in her stories. Actually, it's the only problem I've encountered so far with her, how much I do love talking with her.

Sometimes, it is oh, so hard to keep my own touch on lucidity, when the temptation to fall beneath the waters is strong being near her. My beautiful sister. I used to be horrified when I became old enough to understand what our family's curse meant for me. I no longer am. Lucille... Lucille turned it into joy.

~D. Foyle

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Lucille

The movie was award winning. I remember seeing the final scene's end and it was true that the final cut of the revealing scene was sexy and well done in its own right. But the image of Mina against the wall of the dungeon, wrapped in chains and growling, cackling madly while trying on some last level to keep to humanity, was the part that made me most uncomfortable. There was being laid bare.

And then there was the other kind of being completely laid bare. For a brief moment, I had enough presence of mind to think that I had just done the equivalent of dancing naked in a crowded street for anyone to see and wasn't it so perverse and fun that they'd never know that was what happened in front of their eyes? It gave me fits of giggles, so that Dorian lovingly guided me to one of his fantasy rooms, letting me play while he covered for my absence.

He helped me get ready for the awards night, when I had my own acting award to accept. He even chose my dress for me when he always chose well, a raven black color that fit perfectly with my hair, when that was still styled like Mina's. For a few months after I was done with filming, he had also insisted on calling me Lucille, before he went back to Lucy, although both made me frown when I couldn't remember who Lucille was. She seemed so dull.

Dorian's eyes that night were the indicator that it was the more serious kind of night. Whenever he would play with me, his eyes had this mistiness to them, a kind I liked to think of as a symptom of our family gift. They were like fairy lights and stars in his eyes, a kind of unfocused thought in the green of them. It was the kind that I always seemed to have when I looked in the mirror, the kind that looked just like me, but on a masculine face.

No, that night his eyes had the focused sharpness to them and he helped me dress, gently stroking my breasts when he did, toying with the nipples like he so casually did now. "You have to put your clothes back on, Lucy. Do you know what I mean?"

And I did. It was a joke between us after we talked about the Dracula scene, about which one was the real form of Lucille Delilah's nudity shot. I smiled, forcing myself to think through the gray, to find him on the level he needed me to be. It was painful, to be honest, and most of it was an echo of acting, of pulling on Clarice Starling where she lay in my mind and letting her logic work from my mind's palace. "Yes, Dorian."

He smiled in approval when I didn't call him my big brother, when that was something that we always kept secret, and helped me finish with my dress. "This is one of your good days, baby."

I sighed. "I really wish it wasn't though. It's not that much fun. There's no bleeding crosses or gargoyle images or spinning pictorial lights like you have in the other rooms. And we can't share mind palaces together."

He laughed. "We can always do that last one, Lucy." I frowned again. It was much easier to be a character he created for me. It made life into a game and I could always seem to tell how another person would think and mimic them when it was so damned difficult to come up with how Lucy would feel.

But I grinned when his words sank in, kissing his palm. "I would like that, please." Another thought came to me, one of those painful, lucid thoughts that haunted my days, when the night was so much more pleasant. The night hid, but the light forced me to think of things I'd rather not worry about, when it was such a revealing force. "Dorian." He paused at the sound in my voice, watching me with concern in his eyes. "What if I turn into what Mama was? What if I die from the paranoia and terror?"

His expression was soft and he stroked my hair, kissing my forehead lovingly. "You won't, Lucy. I'll keep spinning your fears into romantic dreams so that it won't be fear. I'll keep making the demons wear roses around their horns until they look too pretty to make you scream like she would. Don't you remember Auntie Elizabeth? You can write to her if you like and she's still just as happy as always. She can still only speak in quotes for the time being, but she makes them coherent enough."

That made me smile. Auntie Elizabeth truly was someone perfectly happy in life. Her husband was endlessly patient with her, too. He liked to say that his beautiful wife just spoke a bit of a strange language in comparison to what everyone was used to, but he conversed well enough with her, using the same language of quotations as she did. I leaned back against Dorian's shoulder, having vague Lucy memories finally, when Mina had been forced back for months. "I remember when we were in the stables with the horses all those years ago and we were talking about Edgar Allan Poe and Lord Byron together." I grinned. "And then we started talking about movies, too, and I told you that I wished every story could have a feel of Edgar Allan Poe, but a romantic ending in Lord Byron's style, even if he was way too sad all the time. Like if Dracula could keep Mina forever because sad endings made me so upset."

Dorian's eyes were excited when he turned me in his arms. "You do remember, at least a little, at least sometimes." I grinned that it made him so happy. "You really are just like Elizabeth, baby. It's okay. I'll keep making the demons dance for you."

I nuzzled him, comforted by that promise. The thought of being afraid of these images was the only part that truly bothered me when I was lucid enough to focus on it. "Thank you, big brother." I kissed his shoulder and then softly whispered, "You made the cross the night after that conversation."

His answer was to hold me in the softest embrace and it took him a moment before he answered. "You never remember when you start to fade on me, but it really was always you. Even when you deteriorated, you could speak to me and always gave me my ideas for the movies we've made together. You'll forget this when you find another character you like, Lucy, but I mean it. I'll take care of you. I know what it's like and I will always be there for you. You won't go the way Mama did. Besides." He touched my nose, grinning. "It seems to truly help you to get lost in the characters for the movies you make. Come on, love. Let's go together." He paused when I hesitated, staring at him for a moment of hesitance in my sanity. But he always knew how to speak to me in those moments as well. He sang more of Cry Little Sister under his breath, starting with, "My Shangri-Las," until I finally grinned and took his hand.

He led me from the hotel room, so that I had a moment to remember where we were when we weren't at home, when things ran together sometimes. But Dorian held me, keeping my hand in his.

And truly, I could deal with most anything with him by my side. He was something special. He could talk to the demons and make them dance when he wanted and he could come back when he wanted, too. He was always the mad genius of us like that and he always did hate sad endings after I brought up how awful they were to him.

Method acting. Sometimes I thought he was lying when he told everyone that's what I did. Other people always said that method acting was safe for the actor and sometimes what I did didn't feel very safe at all, if I'm being perfectly honest. It felt rather dangerous and thrilling, actually, and somehow the characters always seemed to get lost in my mind palace so that they never quite left me. Pieces of them always tried to rise to the surface and they never seemed to fully go quiet.

Dorian distracted me by making the next character when I became bored of being Lucy. Every now and again, I would look at the shelf with acting awards on it and grin with the thought that I was stripping naked in every movie, anytime I got to play a moment of mad laughter and let the demons out to play while Dorian made them dance for his movies. It was always best when I got to chant in a sing-song voice, when the rhythm just felt chaotic and wonderful.

It felt like playing for Dorian, so he could take those shadows that distorted my vision and force the awful monsters that made them to wear pretty jewels and glittery ornaments. He made them dance to happy music so that they weren't so scary at all. They became rather nice and pleasant to see, actually, and the characters in my head always seemed to agree with us once Dorian got done fixing them with their stories.

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I suppose, to summarize, I wished for two things. I wanted her to stay happy and to be as healthy as she could manage with her condition. Maybe she would have been fine with someone else, but there was a selfish part of me that enjoyed her too much and wanted to keep her to myself.

At any rate, it wasn't a sad ending, at least not to my mind, not when she curled up against my side every night, her madness like a wild creature, with its teeth filed to harmless edges and its claws carefully removed so that she merely purred in contentment. Not when she happily shared her mind palace with me and talked about how she was taking my hand to guide me and show me all the rooms where the characters stayed. "They won't ever quite leave," she said on a particularly bad day. "I think they're like little witch's familiars, Dorian, and maybe they can't leave at all. Maybe they shared too much of themselves with me and they have to stay close forever."

I kept her hidden as best I could during these moments and carefully spoke with her. Eventually, she would find her way back to something more socially acceptable, not that it was a problem to keep her hidden. I quickly learned that she was highly attached to me and that she enjoyed me for my stories, as strange as they were. I have her to thank for the strokes of genius I am praised for, which is a fact I find very enjoyable.

Every moment of brilliance that is most praised for being seductive in horror came to being from Lucy's most deteriorated moments. It's the thing that gives me hope in the end. She is mad and I know that I am touched with that affliction as well, to some degree, although mine is far more manageable.

But perhaps the nature of humanity is that some form of madness lies within all of us, when escape is something we all strive for at times. Perhaps madness is the most extreme form of escape or escape gone awry, for those with the terrible hallucinations. I don't know. I know that it is medically measurable in people like my sister. I know that it could be medicated, especially in extreme cases like hers. But if she remains happy and harmless in my arms and in my care, then I cannot quite bring myself to subject her to those medications when I have seen their effects on others. They are not often kind and my sister is a vital, energetic person, filled with life and energy. I cannot bring myself to dull that if I can manage to avoid it and so far, it seems safe to avoid it.

Life is dark enough without dulling the life in it. Perhaps I am as crazy as she is because to me that would be the truly miserable ending, to take her, even on her bad days, and to dull the green of her eyes. She is an enigmatic creature at times, but she often gives me perspectives that seem quite wonderful. For instance, well...

I truly despise a sad ending now.

~D. Foyle