CONFIRMED BACHELOR

BY MADAMLUNA

"Ahh, thanks, pals, you're really too kind," I crowed, reaching out a bony hand to scoop the pile of chips into my lap. The other players at the table reclined with the most sublime looks of disgust I've ever seen, and I don't blame 'em--it's not every day that a ghoul makes the trek into the blown-out wreck of Atlantic City's Tropicana Hotel, and it's even rarer that they clean out the wallets of those ivory tower assholes that live there.

"Hey, Judy," I called out, leaning over the back of the chair and popping a cigarette between my ragged lips. "Change some of these out, will ya? You know, for 500-cap ones? Otherwise I'll need a big burlap sack--"

"Mister," the cute casino bunny said with a huff, "you've already got all the 500-cap chips."

"You don't say. Well, you've got two lovely mitts right there," I said, lifting up a heaping handful. "Mind helping me carry these over to the counter?"

By the time I changed them out, I had a potato sack of close to fifteen thousand caps. It was hard enough to scrounge and save even a fraction of that in the wasteland, and I was fantasizing about what to spend it on when Judy, ever the opportunist, tapped me on the shoulder. "You're gonna have to get rid of some of that before you leave. You don't wanna carry all that around, do you?" she said, with infinite hope in her voice. "Maybe you wanna spend some of it on drinks, huh? Or maybe, you know..."

She bit her lip, batted her eyelids and nodded towards the VIP room with a cute little toss of her head. "What a sweetheart," I chuckled, "and so open-minded, to get it on with a ghoul like me. No, thanks. But..."

I took one tall, thin stack of chips and balanced it on her palm like a game of Jenga. "Thanks for the help, Jude!" I slung my sack over my shoulder, wheeled around, laughed and gave her a playful smack on the ass. As I walked out, I could hear a clink-clink-clatter of caps falling to the ground, and Judy hissing "aw, shit!"

She was right, though. 300, 400 caps at a time is nothing, but 15,000 is a real pain in the ass. You can't run, you can hardly walk, and forget about sneaking or spying. Even after getting a new gun, some ammo, a stylish coat and my first meal in weeks that wasn't just Radroach meat, I still had 10,000 left and it was driving me crazy.

I had to spend it on something, and my eyes wandered over to a little hole-in-the-wall spa tucked behind a dead palm tree. Now there was an idea. Get a nice long massage, work out those kinks in my back, maybe work off some other kinks, too...be funny to see the look on their face when I ask them how much it'd be to 'full service' a ghoul.

The spa was actually relatively clean, which was a nice surprise. There was an older guy behind the counter, with kind of a craggy face and a doctors' coat, and frankly, he looked way too dignified for the kind of dive this probably was.

"So you're the high-roller who cleaned out all our caps," he chuckled. It made that bag I carried feel even heavier, and I shifted on my feet uncomfortably. "You've got a real haul there, sir."

"Yeah? I wanna get rid of some of it." I rested the bag on the counter with a slushy clink. "How much for an hour?"

"600 caps."

"Not bad. So, uh..." I gestured vaguely. "Who's workin'?"

"Well, we have a few ladies here. There's Lucy over there--" The man jerked a thumb over at one of the tables, where a dark-haired, dark-eyed girl was rubbing the shoulders of a stocky, broad-shouldered woman. She had a handsome face, and only looked up for a moment when I glanced over to her. "--but she's busy. Now, Melinda's on her break, but she'll be back soon, if you care to wait..."

I peeled my lips back from my teeth in a grin. "I don't."

"Ex...cuse me?"

I could see Lucy's eyes flash out of the corner of my eye, and even the lady she was massaging glanced over her shoulder. "Hey, I'm just saying," I said quickly. "Why don't you do it? You work here, don't you? You know your stuff?"

"I...yes, I do." He laughed, thank God, and the tension loosened up. The last thing I needed was his dark-haired guard dog sticking a knife into my back. "It's just been a while since I've had anyone ask. Come on back here," he said, and turned to lead me into a separate room.

It was in way worse shape. The walls were falling apart, and the fluorescent lights flickered in a way that made the whole room look sickly. There were some old boxes of food and some stimpaks piled high on a table, and I saw an IV full of Rad-Away gathering dust in the corner. "Sorry about that," he said. "I keep meaning to get this place cleaned."

"Once you get those last thousand caps, right?" I replied, pulling off my clothes and my guns and hanging them loosely over the back of a chair. "Well, if you really know your stuff, I'll give you a great big tip. You'll be able to deck this place out so nice, it'll be like the bombs never fell."

"You're too kind." As I laid down on my stomach, I could hear him starting to wash up behind me. It felt amazing to lie down in anything resembling a bed, and I let out a long sigh as I started to relax. "So, any problem areas? Anything giving you trouble?"

"Yeah, my back and my shoulders," I murmured, my eyes drifting closed. "It's all that time hunched over tables and shit. Really bad for my spine, you know?"

"Ah." The water stopped, and I could hear his shoes clacking against the tiles as he paced around the table. "Well, I can do something about that, I think."

I could hear his hesitation. I could practically see his hands hovering over my shoulder blades, wondering if ghoul flesh was safe to touch or if it'd flake apart like old paper under his fingers. "What are you waiting for?" I murmured. "My back's not gonna bite."

That did it. He leaned his weight forward onto me, sinking his mitts into my skin and pressing the heels of his hands right where the neck meets the shoulders. He squeezed a long, low groan out of me with that first push, and christ, it was like I hadn't relaxed in months.

He moved his hands in tight circles at first, moving down and then outwards to my shoulders, squeezing them with a long, slow motion before moving back in. "You must be a fucking pro," I breathed, and he laughed. "No, I mean it. And you're not even wearing gloves."

"Should I be?"

"Hah!" I let out a sharp laugh. "Funny guy! A smoothskin like you who...oohh..." The masseuse pressed down into my back and I arched up, cracking deliciously under his touch. Fucking amazing. "...who doesn't get the shakes over touchin' a zombie?"

"You think you're the first one to walk in here?" I could hear him chuckle, low and confident, close to my head. "I heard you were arrogant, but not that arrogant." He pressed his hands down harder and I flinched, hissing out a groan from between my teeth. "My, you bruise up easy, don't you?"

He made his way down my back like a trapper through a jungle, navigating the landscape of scars and bones. He talked to me, he asked me questions--he taunted me, even, digging his thumbs into the hollows between my ribs to make me jump. "You're tough," he laughed, and I let out a long, hoarse sound as he grabbed my waist and pressed down hard. "All muscle and bone!"

I tried to tell him off, but with the way I was shaking, I could barely manage a groan into the pillow. This wasn't anything like the ginger touches I got from every other shithole "spa" in the wasteland, where the girls thought I was either going to eat them alive or fall apart at the seams. This was deep and biting and I could feel it all the way down in my stomach, heading between my legs.

I held up a shaking hand and pushed myself up, my cock jerking against the cushions. "H-hold up a second. You'd better be offering some 'extra services,' here--" I felt a squeeze around my dick and my arms buckled, sending me slumping back down to the table. "F-fuck!"

"I do," the masseuse replied, his thumb and forefinger holding me tight. "But let's talk about that after I finish taking care of the rest of you. Now, are you going to stop squirming?"

"You know, you're a real prick--" He gave a slow, firm tug on my cock and I dug my nails in hard, practically ripping the cushions. "Okay! Okay, yes! Fine!"

"That's good." He pulled back and went down my legs, squeezing them and working all the knots out of my muscles. I tried my damnedest not to flinch or shift when his hands dipped down between my thighs, but I must have anyway, because he let out another low chuckle that made me burn.

He paused when he got down to my ankles. "You've got a few sores down here," he remarked. "A lot of raw skin. You want me to patch that up for you?"

"Can you?"

"I have some bandages."

"Yeah, sure, go for it--Jesus Christ!" My leg jerked up as he gripped my ankle tight, digging his fingers into a ring of red skin rubbed raw from my boots. I felt a sharp sting on it that must have been peroxide or something, and my voice kicked up into another octave altogether. "Holy fuck, you fucking sadist!"

"I guess the secret's out!" and he let out this obnoxious laugh like he wasn't a goddamn quack torturing me on his massage table. "Now listen, high-roller, you're getting the best care in the wasteland..."

He finished wrapping up my right ankle, and I bit down hard on the pillow as I felt the sting work its way through the skin on my left one. "...and I'm betting you're not going to up and leave as long as you've got that hard-on making a mess all over my table, are you?"

Mother fucker. I could feel my cock pulse when he brought that up, jerking hopefully against the plastic.

"Those legs of yours should heal up in...well, for a ghoul, it'll be three or four weeks. Expose it to some radiation, maybe...that should do you good. Keep the dressings fresh. Now..." He pressed against my hips and I flipped over for him, my cock pressing up tight against my stomach. "What do you want me to do about this?"

"Anything," I said quickly. "Gimme a handjob. Jerk me off. Please?"

"Are you sure you want my hands on you?" he laughed, sinking down between my legs and wrapping his thumb and forefinger around it again. His mouth was only an inch or two away and I let out a groan, twitching hard. He had a good point.

"Okay, then, a blowjob. You'll do that, right? I'll pay good money--"

"Are you sure you want my teeth on you?"

"Quit fucking with me!" I brought a leg up and wrapped it around his head, forcing his mouth up against my cock, and started to grind myself against his lips. He opened his mouth and as I pushed up, I felt his teeth rake down the side of my cock. "Ahahh, finally..."

I reached down to grab his hair. He'd been really pushy before, yanking me around and taunting me, but now he let me tilt back his head and slip my dick into his mouth without a word. "Not so mouthy now, huh?" I said. "You get off on being used like this?"

He nodded and started to bob his head up and down, running his tongue over the skin of my cock. I let out a groan and really started to go at him, fucking his mouth with hard, deep strokes, pushing up against the back of his throat. "Fuck, fuck," I hissed, twisting my fingers hard in his hair. "Christ, do it..."

He made some sound underneath me and I felt him give way, letting me sink in deeper, and his muscles started moving like he was swallowing around me--

"O-oh fuck!" I nearly doubled over as I came into his mouth. It felt like he kept me hard in there, pulling on me with his lips and tongue, and it made me so shaky that I slumped right back onto the goddamn table while he milked me dry. The whole blowjob had probably only taken a couple minutes, but it felt like I laid there for an hour, just letting him work me over.

I could hear him murmuring something, but who knows what it was. It was something about the caps, and I just waved it away, sure, sure, you know what, just take whatever you want from that big sack over there, pal, you deserve it.

He pulled me up, eventually. "So maybe this is a little forward of me," he asked, and I would have burst out laughing if I weren't so exhausted, "but I'm feeling a little flushed. Would you like a drink?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'd love one. Probably not as much as you would, though, right?" I managed a weak snicker, and downed the glass of whatever he gave me. It was something brown and thin and really, really strong, and I could feel it burn in my stomach as it made its way down. "Hey, not bad. What do you call it?"

"Just a cocktail." He laughed and leaned over on his shoulder across the table, and I grinned down at him. "I had some whiskey sitting around, a little gin, you know how it is."

"Oh yeah, I love whiskey. Gin ain't bad, either." I gave him a loopy grin, even as something started to pound on the side of my skull. "Gotta say, though--no offense, but you're a way better masseuse than a bartender. Whatever this is, it's kinda giving me a headache."

"Ah, well, you can't win 'em all," he said, giving me a smile that made me wanna melt. "I guess the RadAway's not agreeing with you, huh?"

"I...what?"

"I think it was somewhere around when I was sucking you off," he mused, sipping on his drink while I went from melting to freezing. "I was definitely getting a fever. Definite onset of rad-poisoning, in my expert opinion."

"Wait a second, did you just slip me some RadAway?" I stammered, looking from my glass to the IV to the masseuse's smug, smug face. "D-did you just fucking--" I tried to say, my stomach wrenching to the side. "--p-poison--"

I could see him walk over to the chair, where all my clothes and my guns and my money sat in a pile. "Get away from that," I slurred, reaching out for him. I leaned over and almost pitched onto the floor, and my hand shook as it brushed against what might have been his shoulder. "Thass my stuff...you ssson of a bitch!"

"Ah, that does it," I heard him say in some far-off voice. A blur in a white coat picked up another blur full of bottle caps. "I feel so much better already..."




CHERCHEZ LA FEMME

BY ANNA ANTHROPY