Logan walked, his senses leading him unerringly to the seedy side of town, his mind roiling with self-hatred and despair. Fuck it, fuck it, fuck it, he repeated to himself, but somehow he was unable to reach the state of numb detachment the words promised. He found a store that sold both Jack Daniels and condoms, and snarled as the pimply cashier flashed him a knowing smirk.
He found a motel, one of the dank holes he was used to, and got a room. Then he followed the twin scents of vomit and human misery to the source, a dismal squalid bar on a dismal squalid side street. The beaten-down bartender made the mistake of meeting his eyes for just a moment, and whatever he saw there made him serve up Logan’s beer in a hurry and not say a word as he alternated pulls from the bottle of whiskey with gulps of beer.
Logan eyed the bar’s inhabitants, looking for an easy fuck or a hard fight. This was exactly what he was used to. This was where he belonged. So why was the pressure in his chest so tight he felt like he couldn’t breathe? He took another long pull on the whiskey bottle.
He smelled her coming, a combination of carelessly washed body, acrid hairspray, and arousal. As she got closer he smelled the increase in both her excitement and fear, and knew she was exactly what he was looking for. She wanted someone who would hurt her, and he sure as fuck wanted to hurt someone right now. Still, he had trouble making his body turn around to even look at her.
“Lookin’ for company?” she asked archly. He took in the blowsy form -- brassy hair, too much flesh in too little clothes, lines of age and hard-living under the thick makeup. Exactly what he was looking for. He slammed money down on the bar, grabbing her elbow roughly and pulling her out the back door, feeling with disgust the excited hum of her blood as he manhandled her.
Another alley, another easy fuck, he’d been here a hundred times or more, and yet still it felt like this attempt to slide back into his former life was a smothering weight on his body instead of a sweet relief. Fuck it he tried to tell himself again, closing his throat tight against her smell, pushing her up against the wall, pressing his body against hers and yanking her leg up around his waist. “Ooh, baby,” she said, and he pressed a rough hand to her face, turning it towards the wall so he wouldn’t have to look at it, taking another pull from the bottle in his other hand.
Distantly he felt her hands under his shirts, pushing them up. The front of his shirt covered his face for just a moment, but it was enough. Suddenly the clean sweet scent of Marie filled his head, her voice ringing in his head as another woman’s hands traveled over his chest. /”I want to touch you, Logan. Let me.”/
He pushed away from the woman with a roar, turning his back on her, swallowing down the bile that rose up in the back of his throat.
“Hey -- c’mon, do me baby,” she whined, reaching a hand out for his shoulder, as he shuddered and shrugged it off. “C’mon, you bastard!” she said, angry now, and without turning around he popped his claws. “Fuck -- get away from me, you freak!” and now she was cowering away, scurrying back towards the bar.
Logan started walking again, the bottle falling from his nerveless hand and shattering on the alley floor. Almost against his will, he lifted the front of his shirt to his face, smelling Marie again, thinking of her arms wrapped around him, her cheek pressed close against him. earthraincomfortMarie.
Suddenly the pressure was too much -- the tightness in his chest, the roaring in his head. He had never cried in his memory, but somehow he knew that lump of bitterness that stung the back of his throat was tears. He stopped, leaning both palms up against the rough brick of the alley wall, breathing in shallow pants. He bashed his head into the wall, once, and then again, cursing the healing that caused the pain to fade too soon.
He didn’t remember exactly how he found his way back to the motel, before he knew it he was fumbling open the metal door to his room, slamming it behind him. He turned around and punched it as hard as he could, closing his eyes and welcoming the pain as the skin split over the metal on his bones.
“Careful, sugar, you’re gonna lose your security deposit.”
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Okay, I promise I'm not trying to be an update whore with this very short chapter. I had planned for this and the next to be all one, but for some odd psychological reason I want to separate this out from what will hopefully be the Rogan deliciousness to follow. In other words, it bothered me to have this skank in the same chapter with Marie. ;-) Happy angsty new year!