The warm desperation of his breath gripped at the skin on her neck when he spoke. “You’re such a bad girl,” he said as he rolled her toward him. Aria’s arms fiercely folded over the top of her breasts in self-preservation, her closed hands pressed together, covering her lips. It only encouraged him further.

“Why do you want to seduce me?” he asked. “Are you lookin’ for a spanking?”

He lifted his body on top of hers, unaware of the crushing strain of his weight. She squirmed and fought to breathe. She struggled out from underneath him, which made him laugh. “Don’t you tease me now,” he said. He caught her hair and smelled it. His hand traced the length of the inside of her thigh. He began to jerk off with his other hand, his breath sucking in and out in sporadic spurts of exertion.

Aria was incapacitated by the bankruptcy of his heart. She surrendered to the simultaneous feeling of pain and pleasure as his fingers crept between her legs. She was only half there. Drowning in his perverted domination, she took the only exit that was available to her.

She looked over at the snow globe that was sitting on the desk adjacent to the bed. She was inside it, the silence and refuge of the secluded world it contained, the fake snow and sparkles falling on her face all she could feel, all she could let herself feel. Aria might be unable to escape the moment with her body, but she could leave her body behind and escape with her mind. It took her a moment after he had cum before she could let herself drift back, waiting for him to leave before grabbing tissues to clean herself with and drifting into a haunted sleep.

The next day, Aria rifled around in the various toolboxes of the garage, leaving lids open and tools scattered until she found the blade of an X-Acto knife, a deranged craving pulsing in the marrow of her bones. Like poison, despair trickled through her veins. She needed to be relieved of it. In a focused frenzy, she found a roll of duct tape and paper towels and carried them to the upstairs bathroom, and closed the door. Stripping down to her jeans and bra, she climbed into the bathtub, where she crouched and proceeded to let the blade speak against her skin. She shook as she drew the blade across both forearms, repetitively making diagonal cuts in both directions. Her skin yielded to the blade. Blood welled up out of the cuts and dripped over the side of her arms to splatter against the floor of the bathtub.