Sasha Green and the International Porn conspiracy
Running late and running, Mark hustled through the oncoming traffic and was welcomed with an abundance of horns. Alicia stood above by the door wearing the red coat she described in her email. The stairs added extra displeasure to his journey and sweat gathered in circles that descended down to his netherworlds. Finally there, an avalanche of words poured out of Mark.
“Alicia, Sorry I’m late. The schedule for the bus was all wrong this morning and then when they finally came…Alicia, It’s Mark. I can’t believe we are finally meeting!”
The sweat had cooled but settled into pockets of Mark’s flesh as they sat down together. The coffee shop was old and romantic. It resembled a Moroccan café and was assembled like a restaurant that years ago could have been filled with femme fatales and hardened private eyes. Mark had been here before, but never with a companion. Although he wasn’t aware, this place had seen an abundance of awkward and awful internet dates. The waitresses had become proficient in silently and sometimes not so silently judging others.
“So you’re from Connecticut, right Alicia?” Mark deliberately said her name feeling that his knowledge of it had put him significantly ahead of the curve.
“Yeah, from just outside Hartford.”
“I love Mystic. It is like a postcard from New England.” Mark responded.
“Really? My grandmother has lived in that area for years.”
Mark felt comfortable now. He explained the menu to Alicia and listed some of the better options, while making sure he was extra polite to their wait staff. He cracked a few jokes and made her smile. She seemed to becoming more comfortable with him, which pleased Mark. She was more affable and pleasant than he had expected.
One of the waitresses approached the table. “Are you Mark? There is a call for you.”
“For me? That’s weird. Excuse me Alicia, I didn’t even know anyone knew I was here.”
As Mark made his way to the phone, he felt important. This phantom phone call couldn’t have come at a better moment.
“Hello?” Mark said.
“Mark Fisher?”
“This is?”
“The International Porn Conspiracy. I’m Sasha Green.”
“The what? I’m sorry, the what conspiracy?”
“This is the IPC. International Porn Conspiracy. There is a bus line behind the coffee shop. I need you to get on the 57 bus and take it to Longwood. My associates will be waiting to take you into hiding. Mark, they’re coming for you.”
“Is this a joke? Because I’m not laughing!”
“Listen pervert, I’m not fucking around. When you see the man with the trimmed mustache and the anchor tattoo, no one will be laughing. You better run. Tell Alicia I said hi!” Click.
Mark’s heart was pounding. Who were these people? The man with the anchor tattoo? Obviously, one of his friends was winding him up for laughs. He made his way back upstairs to Alicia.
When Mark returned to the table, Alicia was texting on her phone. Maybe she had asked her friends to make the phone call as a joke? It wouldn’t surprise him. Online dating was a bad idea. He always had bad luck with women. Putting away the phone, Alicia looked up as Mark sat down again and smiled at him. Her teeth glistened white between her lips and her eyes peered into his insides. No, most likely she was just texting the details of their date to one of her friends. On the other end of the café, a customer working on his laptop rolled up his sleeves revealing the edge of a tattoo.
“Alicia, what kind of tattoo do you think that is over there?”
“I don’t know. Why?”
“No reason. The guy just looks a little bit like a seaman. Strange for him to be in here. We’re so far from the ocean.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Nothing. Are you done with your coffee?”
“Almost.”
“Let’s go for a walk. I mean, would you like to go for a walk?”
“Sure, just let me finish.”
Mark almost knocked over a grandmother walking past him as he hurried up. “I’ll go get the bill. My treat!”
Mark journeyed with Alicia through a maze of crosswalks and changing streets; he had grown quieter and was rattled by the phone call. He would have to discuss this in his therapy. He had to stop thinking he didn’t deserve a normal life with normal relationships. Warm winds gusted around them as they progressed, blowing them back and forth with each step. If he just kept talking, he could manage the whirlwinds and hellfires that were raging within him.
Talking just about you on a date was a big turnoff. Women love to be shown that you are interested. Don’t look at the breasts, he told himself. Don’t look at the breasts. Alicia’s breasts were freckled and filled the front part of her dress. Don’t! He didn’t look at the breasts and launched an onslaught of questions.
“Do you like the people you work with?”
“Do you want to go back to school?”
“How did your parents meet?”
“Do you want kids?”
“Would you ever want to settle down?”
He was content that he had outrun, whoever was trying to make a fool of him. The International Porn Conspiracy indeed? He had to admit it was a pretty clever joke though. There was a park bench just past Broadway that Mark would often eat his lunch on. Typically alone, he would read his paper here and eat his lunch in silence. He often sat here and watched the young urban mothers walking by with their children. Occassionally, he would wonder what kind of men were there husbands. Mark motioned towards the bench and Alicia joined him.
“Have you met anyone else from this site?” Mark asked.
“A few people. I’m just scared ill meet a real weido. I don’t date people off the internet much. How about you?”
“Me either. I’m not really much of a dater. ”
A homeless woman dressed in layers of rags and carrying a garbage bag smiled at Mark from the other bench. “This poor woman,” Alicia said. “I wonder if she is a drug addict.”
Using his own personal knowledge, Mark guessed “she probably has mental health issues.” The poor woman was talking and laughing to herself
Crap, he made eye contact. Great, she is coming over here. Alicia and Mark looked up at the disoriented woman now looming over them with a crooked face smile.
“Hi.” Mark said unsure if he had any change. He looked anyway for her.
“I’m really sorry I don’t have any cash. Maybe we can buy you some food?” Alicia responded.
“I want it. Give it to me.” the haunted woman shrieked.
“I’m trying to find some. Just a second.” Mark was rummaging through both of his pockets desperately to find change admist the candy wrappers and debit card transactions. Turning to Alicia for assistance Mark asked her if she definetly didn’t have any change.
“Not that. I want your balls, if you have any.” The withered succubus of a human being leaned in and breath death on Mark’s pants. “Want to party?”
“Jesus, no. Go away Mark” yelled.
Ignoring Mark’s “no,” the homeless woman’s hands girated around the center of Mark’s legs and were shaking from the excitement of lust and the withdrawals from medication.
“Get the fuck away form me,” Mark yelled. “Come on Alicia.”
The lusty vagabond wasn’t done though and as Mark and Alicia tried to relocate, she began to beat Mark with her trash bag. Coffee cups, newspaper, and fast food waste splattered all over Mark and his date’s clothes, as she shrieked in pain at both of them.
“He’s gotta tattoo and he’s going to fuck you. Balls, balls, balls. Your girlfriends got more balls than you.”
Was she talking about the man with the anchor tattoo? Who would involve this crackpot in on their joke. Mark was flustered. Was there something wrong with him?
“Come on Mark. She’s crazy.” Alicia said as they fled through the park back on to the thoroughfair. They approached Raven Books, a used bookseller that Mark had frequented. During his intense questioning earlier, Alicia had stated her third-favorite author ever was Flaubert because of his “complex human relationships.”
“Listen Alicia, I know this date has been a nightmare, but let’s just hang out a little longer. I mean how could it get worst? Look this is one of my favorite bookstores. Want to check it out?”
As Alicia wandered aimlessly through the aisles of books, Mark had an idea. There had to be a copy of Sentimental Education somewhere in the store. Mark tried to traverse the “H” in the author’s alphabet, but his path was blocked by a man in a tan trench coat. The obstruction wore oversized pants that were adorned in unnecessary pockets – each pants pocket from foot to thigh was crammed and bulging out. The man in the trench coat appeared to notice that he was spotted. Pretending to read a hardbound copy of The Inferno, his eyes followed Mark from the discount section to the classics and over to the generalized fiction bookshelves. Mark noticed Alicia was elevated on a bookcase ladder and was leaning in for a distant book.
“She’s got a great ass, doesn’t she?” The strange man said without moving his mouth.
“Excuse me?” Mark snapped.
The strange man smiled and continued reading Dante, ignoring Mark. “No, not like that. We need to talk telepathically. The walls have ears and possibly surveillance equipment. Plus there are agents everywhere: VDI, CIA, UTI, and the IPC. Are you going to try it with her?”
Confused, lost, worried, and very curious, Mark tried to play along. He sat down and focused himself and thought, “Try what?”
“Your new technique of course! The one Interpol leaked to the Vatican which started this whole mess with the Porn Conspiracy- the brave new position that will change human sexuality and pornography consumption forever and set us free from bland penetrative intercourse! I really do admire you, sir!”
Mark was confused. He didn’t know anything about a new technique. Does masturbation even have techniques? There must be some mistake. Why was the universe so intent on ruining his date with Alicia?
As his mind raced frantically, it was invaded again by the man in the trench coat. “Don’t worry I’m a material plane virgin. I wouldn’t ever steal your technique. But there are others that seek to exploit your genius. Fuck, they’ve found us!” The man with the trench coat threw his copy of Inferno frantically at Mark and scuttled like a crab around a stack of paperbacks dropping dildos from his bulging pockets. In a strange melodious voice, he tried to explain himself to a confused hipster working at the counter. “Those sex toys aren’t mine.”
Mark couldn’t take it anymore. The telepathy, the phone call, the mind reading, and now this large man in the trench coat collapsing in front of him. Mark snapped. He had longed for death for a long time now, but he wouldn’t allow the conspiracy to hurt Alicia. She had a life ahead of her. She would meet someone else and fall in love. She would soon forget she had ever gone on a horrible blind date with MaFish85. He found Alicia, grabbed her hard by the hand, and led her toward the exit. He looked at Alicia terrified beside him. “Trust me, we have to leave. This is for you. I know you love Flaubert.”
They fled together to the Longwood area. Perhaps it wasn’t too late, perhaps Sasha would be there. He would just explain to her, he had no technique and was actually pretty bad in bed. He had seen all of Sasha’s movies and would recognize her immediately. As he dragged Alicia, through the crowds and city streets, people would stop and stare, convincing Mark that the conspiracy was moving in for their final strike. Mark scanned the horizon waiting for reality to crack open at any moment. Agents of porn, SWAT soldiers, and disembodied sex organs loomed behind every corner, but when would they strike? At times Alicia would try to pry her hands free from Mark, but at others she looked resigned to her fate as his prisoner. Should he leave her behind? He just didn’t want to be alone when they came for him. What would they do? “Fuck. He’s here!” Mark yelled. The man with the mustache and tattoo anchor was in front of them blocking their way.
“Why don’t you let her go man? You’re hurting her.”
A crowd had descended around them, probably all agents of the conspiracy. Mark was trapped.
“She’s scared. Just let her go.”
Panic and terror were in Alicia’s eyes. Recognizing that there would probably not be a goodnight kiss or even a second date, Mark dropped Alicia and fled into the streets through flashing blue lights and a dark angel choir of horns. A car skidded and knocked Mark to the ground. Darkness. Death. It was over. Would anyone mourn him? Maybe Paul and Matthews from his support group.
When Mark awoke he was in a padded room. The melodious voice of the trenchcoat man rung in his head, “Wake up. Wake up. You’re home.”
From the halls, he could hear teeth gnashing and souls suffering throughout the unit. Looking around him, Mark saw what looked like a boiler room converted into a psychiatric ward. The heat was immense. He must be near the furnace.
“Can I come in?”
Where am I? Mark wondered.
The door opened and a doctor in a white lab coat stepped in. Beside her was a woman about the same build and look of Alicia, but slightly younger. Her face looked blank and her eyes glistened emptiness.
“Sasha Green?” Mark stammered.
“It was a good thing we got there when we did. We were able to extract you before the agents moved in. How are you feeling?”
“My head- it’s so foggy.”
“We had to enter the cortex to disseminate the technique to the populace. Sorry about the headache, but you hid it deep in your subconscious. You should have seen the sensation it created on the web! You’ve got production credits of course. You are quite the celebrity know. There is fan mail, which the nurse will bring you later. We just need more. More tits! More cocks! More of your brilliant sexual fantasies!
“I’m sorry more what?” Mark said hands holding his aching head.
“More positions. We start production this week. Any ideas?”
“Is Alicia okay?” Mark said looking at the tall slim girl beside Sasha. She could be Alicia’s younger sister, Mark thought. The girl returned his stare with silence. Droplets of saliva formed around her mouth and rolled down her chin. “Who is that?”
“She’s for you. It’s our gift. See what you can come up to on her. Alicia had to go home. But we figured she would be a better and younger substitute anyway. Don’t worry we took care of her brain.” Sasha turned to the girl beside her. “Stay. Stay. God, she is dumb, but see what you can do with her. We expect great things from you.”
Saved and Abandoned
“I love you.”
Deirdre turned toward where she imagined him to be. Worried the other sisters would hear her, she whispered, “When will I see you?”
“When you pass through the heavens, I’ll be there waiting for you, my love. Soon my love, soon my love.”
Delicate sensations of pleasure swirled around Deirdre’s body. Though she couldn’t see her lover, she experienced his warm touches and gentle brushes against her body as miracles from the Lord. Beams of light crept through the windows and up onto the outer reaches of her bed. It was almost morning. Soon she would be in her habit, meeting with the Mother Superior, but not yet. She rested her eyes and drifted off to sleep in the sensual hands of Christ, her Lord and lover.
Deirdre made the sign of the cross. “Forgive me, Father Peter, for I have sinned.” Father Peter ‘s hands were soft and wrinkled with age. It soothed her to watch him walk through the parish doing his sacred and daily work; he moved slowly in his robe with a gentle air. She trusted him, even though her Lord and lover had told her never to confide in him. She wanted to entrust him with her secrets. He would be so surprised. Who ever would have suspected lowly little Deirdre? From the other side of the confessional Father Peter peered through at Deirdre. “How long has it been since your last confession, child?”
Deirdre explained she was suffering from guilt. Was it always wrong to want? She wanted to experience motherhood. She wanted to belong to a man, but she never would. She could never confess to the father, with his frail hands and good heart, the sensations that came to her at night. As Father Peter comforted Deirdre’s, she watched the sunbeams stream into the confessional twisting and turning slowly in air.
She wanted to know if he had once felt like she felt:
“Father, how were you as a boy? Did you have these feelings?”
The kind father explained to Deirdre, “You have made a great sacrifice to the Lord, my child. Pray to him to take away the burdens of the body.” But Deirdre wasn’t listening.. She was lost in the strands of light dancing around her like lovers at a ball. A great warmth rested against her and she was far from the convent.
Deirdre left the confessional genuflecting in front of the tabernacle. A celestial wind stirred between her legs as Jesus drew near.
“Follow me; Deirdre, I will bring rain to your drought. You have love. And I…I will harvest it.”
Deirdre hurried back to her room, rushing to bring the Lord up the long stairs to where they could be alone again. Once again in her unadorned room and on her sparse bed, she waited and listened for him. What special message did he have for her now? She tried to feel him but there was nothing. In the confessional, he was as alive and real as Father Peter. She closed her eyes and felt herself leaving the burdensome demands of her flesh. Free from her body, she twisted and turned in the room. Heaven was all around her. She was in and out of dreams again. She felt someone next to her in bed. Her Lord had not abandoned her.
A talkative girl with loud red hair, Bridget was Deirdre’s best friend at the convent. She had come from County Mayo on the far side of Ireland. She was forced into the calling like many, but she took it with humor and a good bit of disdain. As Deirdre cut the potatos for supper, Bridget talked significant nonsense about her hopes and dreams for a man.
“Don’t you ever wonder about love though? Sure, you and me are not like the rest of those old goats around here.”
“I think about love.”
Sometimes during the day, Deirdre could sense her Lord and lover around, listening to her and carressing her. He was there now. She grew quiet and listened to his voice in the air. “Tonight my love,” he whispered. Deirdre felt fear and wonder. Would it be a sin with the Lord?
“Deirdre! Deirdre! I lost you in your thoughts,” Bridget interrupted loudmouth that she was. “Were you away dreaming of a bouquet of roses?”
“I was thinking about something wrong.”
The Lord stayed with her, “No one must know about us.”
” You may as well get yourself to Father Peter and confess what you
were thinking.”
“Sometimes I wonder. Is it really a sin?” With the Lord present, Deirdre drifted off inside of herself to the far side of her soul. Deep behind a wall, where she had hid her dreams for her life, the Lord lingered there watching and waiting. Deridre would give herself to her savior tonight. How could she not comply? She felt herself being pulled closer to his heavenly spirit. Stars from the sky fell like raindrops into the convent, as cherubs and seraphs descended from above. Angels were around them- a heavenly choir singing of their love. “You are beloved amongst all. For you are chosen to bear the heavenly spirit,” they intoned in harmony. Like a cosmic convergance, his form was drawing closer to hers. What would happen tonight? Deirdre and the Lord embraced as Bridget added parsley to the soup.
Deirdre awoke with a start. She wasn’t with Bridget, she was in bed. She didn’t remember walking back upstairs. What had happened? She remembered the Lord. There was knocking coming from behind the door. It had been the knocking that pulled Bridget back into herself and away from the freedom of sleep. How she wished she could just sleep forever, but the knocking continued. One of the other sisters was calling her, “Deirdre, the Mother Superior needs to see you.”
The Mother Superior had called Deirdre into her office to lecture her on her behavior. Deirdre hated to be around this woman. Years ago, when Deirdre’s mother was passing, Mother Superior had come to the house to take Deirdre away. She had one look at the tiny girl of 16 with her tangled hair and poor education and stated she would “do her best with this one.” Her body was hunched and falling then and was hunched and falling now. Gravity had been pulling her down to the grave. Hair sprouted like wild funeral flowers out of the clefts in her chin. Time had made her bitter and mean. Deirdre could see life’s cruelness on each of her wrinkles and moles.
“You were sleeping during the morning mass.”
The Mother Superior’s breath was foul and pungent. She wondered when the mother had first come to the monastary. Deirdre imagined the old woman always haunting the halls, but surely she was young once too. Deirdre could see a young Mother Superior spending time with Father Peter, himself a young man, praying and planning for the church. Could she have loved him? Her body had been thirsty for love all those years ago, but had been dried out by the desert sun.
“I’m glad your mother is not here to see you. God rest her soul.”
Deirdre turned away in disgust. The Lord had no need for this weathered old bag, smelling of death and disease. He had chosen Deirdre of all women. He had told her she was beautiful. The Lord was with her now. He slid between her legs and gently tickled her thighs. Soft kisses gently crawled across the soft skin of her stomach going slowly down and down, until….
“Yes…yes, I will try harder.” She wouldn’t end up like the tyrant across from her. He had once promised her children. Maybe tonight, when they were together…the sons of the Son of God!
Mother Superior ranted, unaware that Deirdre was inside of herself again. There was no one else in the world. All around the convent, bodies were rotting from the inside out. Not Deirdre though. Not tonight. She would be a mother tonight. But not to the zombies of death around her. She would give birth to a new world. It was a world Deirdre only knew from her dreams.
The Mother Superior had stopped talking now. She had noticed Deirdre’s absence from their dialogue. The young nun was deep within herself again.
“You’re dismissed. But keep your mind here in this convent. Jesus needs you here. ”
After her bath, Deirdre ignored her habit. She pulled out the dress she had worn on the day she arrived. It was long and plain, but it was the best she had. Her blouse she left unbuttoned. She lit candles around her bed. As she closed her eyes, she prayed for his arrival, while she began to touch and massage her breasts gently.
Nervousness and curiousity made her excitement intensify. Her hands went lower and lower. The Lord was inside of her mind and was moving them for her. The hands of a ghost spread her legs wider and wider. With each moment, new sensations exploded in her body. As the Lord entered her, his warm breath fell on her neck like crashing waves. She was gasping in pleasure and she couldn’t breathe. Her head was submerged beneathe a sea of sensations from the Lord. Her body was now being dragged with the currants father and farther from the docks. Would she ever return? Oh the esctacy! Heaven and Earth joined for a minute. When she was done, she felt he loved her and she loved him. She wished she could see him, but knew she wouldn’t be able to. She couldn’t even smell him. There was a smell in the air, but it was just the sweet smell of her body. She rolled over and began to dream.
She was in childhood home. Was she a child? Her mother was there, and they were waiting for her father to return home from work. He would be home any minute. Deirdre knew she was dreaming, but she felt whole.
Someone was in the front of the cottage. She could hear them approaching the door. It was her father! He was home from the fields for dinner. She waited anxiously, but no one came in.
Deirdre awoke hours later with a great pressure on her chest. Only partially awake, she couldn’t see past the darkness. Darkness was everywhere. There was a darker shade on her and she could feel it forcing itself into her. What had happened to the Lord? She tried to move but couldn’t. The shadows were tearing at her body. They weren’t gentle. They didn’t acknowledge her. They just took and took. Their laughing echoed through the halls of the rectory. She tried to pray but no words came out of her mouth. The Lord was gone, and she knew he wouldn’t come back.
The demons were laughing. They mocked her and called her a whore. They said they would rape her with Jesus’s cock.
In her terror, she called for her mother, but wasn’t able to speak. Deirdre tried to mouth the words,
“Please, Mammy. Please.”
But her mother was dead ten years. This is why she had come to this convent- alone and orphaned. When the pain became to much to bear, she blacked out and returned to the world of nightmares.
She was in her cottage again, as she remembered it before she left. Food rotted on the sink. Newpapers were strewn on the floor, yellowed and filthy. Their dog was wet and starving. He whimpered to himself for his lot in life. Her mother was as she remembered her, with her unwashed clothes and tangled hair. Physically ill and talking to ghosts from her past, she waited for Deirdre’s father to return. He wasn’t coming back.
When she awoke, she was running through the woods screaming in terror. Was she still dreaming? Her clothes and face were torn. She knew they were following her because she could hear them- horrible children with demonic faces. They were gaining on her, so she ran and fell and continued to run and fall. She would never stop because she knew they wouldn’t stop. She had birthed them and they wouldn’t leave her. Their horrible laughter echoed through the night. When she couldn’t run anymore, she began to crawl. Almost naked now, she was blinded by blood and tears. She couldn’t see anymore, but could still hear her children around her. They would feast on her flesh. Why had Jesus abandoned her?
The Mother Superior would find her naked and bloody in the morning. She was covered in blood and screaming about her children.
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