Author's note: So, uh, this whole thing took me like, 1 week to write, so if there are errors and an inconsistency in voice (which I know there is) please forgive me. My writing style has changed a lot from The Sloth Monologues if you were one of the few that read it (and the even fewer that liked it), so please take that in account if you find Sloth too not angsty or too much of an ass hole. I'll be posting the rest in like … five day intervals? That sound good? Ok.

Peace and love,

J. Dac

It's a rare and shining moment when you meet a broad who can dance, especially if she's equipped with brains. A girl who can bend like putty every time you sway her body—a girl who can merge into your hip like her pelvis belongs on yours—a girl who can tiptoe her tiny feet across the dance floor like a tightrope walker and still stay around for a chat and cigarettes afterwards—that girl's a jewel.

Like all great things, those kind of girls never come in pairs. You never find a diamond so exquisite twice in your life, especially sequentially, and that kind of a woman's no different. You could sift through the muddy streams of women with the most intricate filter and never strike gold twice—but a gold rush is started by only a smattering of gold bouncing through a tin. Likewise, many after me reached for her caramel elbow and tried to waltz her away by the waist; but she always comes twirling back to me after a momentary tango, refreshed and ready for more.

She has a name, you know. "Space Faerie"'s pretty generic, don't you think? I mean, you don't go around calling Fyora "Queen Faerie" or Jhudora "Bitch Faerie," do you? Hoshiya. That's her name, but we all called her Hoshi.

My name is Frank. That's the only real name I have—a given name. A "Christian" name, if you will. Faeries don't have surnames, and I followed that tradition up until adolescence.

That's when I got sucked into this little band called "Kasey and the Sloths." I was the keyboardist. It was actually an insult to my years of feverishly seeking the proper funny bone on the ivories to tickle, and it paid like shit, but it was something to do between work, the lab and ridicule by dark faeries. I wasn't Kasey—Kasey was an obnoxious moron that insisted on wearing her hair in a feathered eighties style and screaming into the microphone with no concept of pitch. I was one of the Sloths—God knows how we got that title, because Kasey's variable tempo forced us to play like Seabiscuit with a cattle prod at his ass.

Anyway, I liked the name, so I took it. Frank Sloth. An ugly, monosyllabic name, but it kind of worked for me.

See, I've never been what you'd call 'attractive,' especially by faerie standards. Faeries expect their population to be nothing less than supermodels—glowing skin, perfectly primped wings, hair styled at the peak of fashion. Thanks to this, most faeries wind up being female, but as procreation generally requires two genders, they have a small flock of males. Males tend to be rather popular amongst the community with their impeccable pectorals, throbbing biceps and Fabio-good-looks, along with the fact that there's about a 100:1 female to male ratio.

I'm a male, but you'll never see me on the cover of any tawdy paperbacks courageously holding a half-naked maiden in my arms, especially not nowadays. Back then, I was passable among human standards, except for maybe the green hair and red irises. My body frame was fairly lanky, but my skin was anemic enough to register as faerie; my ridiculously pointy ears also gave it away. Thanks to my lack of muscles, I was always freezing in the paper-thin atmosphere of Faerieland, so more often than not I was condemned to a life wrapped in suffocating sweaters and scarves. I also had to wear rather thick glasses that detracted from my status as 'studmuffin.' Red eyes are a recessive trait among faeries, and as such those that have them generally have ocular ailments.

Physically, I was about as runty as they came. My wings were nothing to write home about; they were threadbare and torn, and a lemon-lime color at best. Being an orphan since my birth didn't help either. Gruel doesn't do much to build up muscles, and the heavy beatings administered by bigger, older orphans (usually future butches) helped to give my eyes that classic, intellectual 'sunken in' appearance. This was only aided by the fact I took refuge in libraries and museums alike, idly cramming in information while relying on the shield of shelves to hide from bullies.

This story isn't about me, though. This story's about Hoshi. Hoshi, my muse. You wouldn't think scientists would have muses, but that inspiration isn't reserved for just literary hotshots. Science relies on creativity just as much as intelligence, and that art sparked from her.

She floated into my life on the dance floor at a wedding, her hips tracing perfect curves in the air. It was a marriage of one of my bandmates—I was still in The Sloths at the time, much to my financial chagrin. Paulia, my bandmate, was to marry the lucky and ungrateful Weryra, the biggest gnomer I met in my life. Of course, I've never minded gnomers, as long as I can bum some off of them—but marrying one of them was out of the question. I warned Paul about her terrible choice in a bride, but she brushed it off with that half-assed excuse of "but I love her, Frank."

Besides, what was an unmarketable faerie like me doing giving relationship advice?

Hoshi was a friend of Wery, which at first set off ambulance alarms in my mind, warning me 'hands-off.' The fact that at every interim of music she would pause at a table and finger a white substance from a cloth bag to her nose was also worrisome. Yet there's something hypnotic about the waves and trembles of a woman's curves that are irresistible. Yes, Hoshi wasn't just a faerie—she was a bonafide woman.

It was during a fast song that I made my move. The beatbox drums were set to a level that made it nearly undanceable, weeding out those with no real intention to throw down. My limbs were a mess of unmovable spaghetti in moments, and I was preparing to quit when my eyes lit on Hoshi.

There she was, in the midst of the remaining dancers, beating her feet against the floor in perfect rhythm. It seemed impossible for a body to move that fast—her arms in a looping frenzy and her wings a dash of blue against her back—but there she was, a medicine woman entranced in the beat. Her hair was long then, but still freckled with stars, and with each progressive beat a strand of hair strayed away from the flock until every strand stayed on end, her body a channel for unexplained electricity. While her companions began to drop like flies about her, she continued her insane intensity, seeming to grow even faster. She lived in a world where speed was a matter of choice, and with an internal magic she achieved light speed at will.

Without my noticing, she had been stripped of followers, and suddenly it was only her and me on the dance floor. I had ceased dancing a while ago, but now she approached me, her crimson eyes alight with the enchantment of an age of shamans. There was no chance I would dance back at her, let alone challenge her to a dance-off, so I slowly backed off, hoping to make it off the dance floor in one piece. But she was having none of that. She seemed to come at me from all sides, trapping me into one little square of the dance floor, breathing in all of my oxygen. I shrank back into myself, but she would not allow my escape—I was her captive, and she my master.

The music came to an abrupt halt suddenly, and there was utter silence among the drunken masses. Hoshi had materialized back to one entity and was completely still, a statue leaning towards my face. I was bent backwards, eyes wide and locked with hers, scarlet reflecting scarlet.

"Hi," I managed to squeak, sounding prepubescent at best. "This is where you get out of my face."

Her face stayed stagnant for a moment, then split into a smirk. "Frank, is it?"

"Yeah. Yours?"

"Hoshi."

She pulled away from me, breaking the magnetism that had formulated in a matter of minutes. The party returned to normal, rousing voices lighting the night with slurs and happy screams, but I remained changed. As the dance floor filled up and spilled over like a head of beer, Hoshi retreated without a word from her stance, taking shelter in a table in the back. I followed her like a disciple, intrigued.

"How did you know my name?" I asked, taking a plastic lawn chair next to her. She was already fingering that white powder into her nose, shaking her head after every inhalation.

"You're kind of the butt of most faerie jokes." She paused, looking at me for a hurtful reaction. I declined her the privilege. "Sorry. It's just the truth. You shred the keyboards, though." I had played earlier for the benefit of the crowd. "Coke?" She scooped up a fingerful of the powder and held it out for me. I waved it away. She shrugged and took it herself, more than willingly.

"You're quite a dancer, you know."

"I suppose," she dismissed, pulling her hair back with her hands. Fully revealed, her face was gorgeously exotic, toasted brown yet rosy, made bright by her spitfire eyes. She tied her luxurious velvet hair back in a sloppy ponytail, shaking out the bangs into her face. "You looked kind of scared out there." She itched her nostril. "Do I intimidate you?"

"Not really."

"Oh." She sounded a shade dejected.

"Where you from, Hoshi?"

She pointed upwards, through the gazebo roof and to the black expanse veiled by clouds above us. "There."

"The sky?"

"Nope. Space."

"How the hell do you breathe up there?"

"I don't." She took another a noseful of coke. "I only use the lungs down here."

"So you're kind of like an amphibian."

"Sort of. Except I'm not slimy." With wide eyes, she looked up at me with absolute innocence. "Am I?"

Though she was doused in a layer of glistening sweat, I doubted it. "I don't know. I'm a scientist, though. So you're gonna have to let me inspect you if you want to know." I reached forward, as if to relieve her of the light weight, red-and-black dress she wore. She reeled back immediately, clutching at the bosom as it had no straps.

"Perv," she accused, her eyes flashing. I laughed at her gullibility.

"I'm kidding, sweetheart. Jeez, that crack makes you highstrung, huh?"

"It's coke."

"Right." I paused. "Listen, am I the only one who thinks this wedding is boring?"

"If I died, then yes."

"What would you say to leaving?"

"I'd consider it."

"You've got five seconds. Ok? Five …"

"Hold on."

"… Four …"

"Ok, let's go."

"I knew you'd come around."

"You're lucky you're cute."

My heart blossomed as we stood up at that comment. Never before had such an adjective been laid upon my person—and the first time it was uttered paved a path towards impulsive affairs. There was no need for bouquet or garter-catching—the moon swollen with romance in the sky was proof enough. From that moment on, I walked the rocky road of love.

We didn't fuck the first night. God knows, I would've loved that—half of the purpose of why I had asked her away was so we could fuck. But she was far more guarded than that, my beauty from the stars. She wouldn't even let me lay my lips on her even as we balanced on our bodies on the rickety structure of my bed. We talked on a variety of subjects; despite her affinity for that dusty drug, she was well-versed in a number of topics.

I explained to her what being a 'scientist' meant, a term she was only vaguely acquainted with, typical of most faeries. There was only one institution in Faerieland that was equipped for scientific, rather than magical, teachings, and it had been situated in a rather shady area of Faerieland to discourage inhabitants from pursuing hard facts. Called The Faerie Institution of Technology, possessing a staff of barely over two dozen and classes that could be counted on the fingers, it certainly wasn't a shining beacon of faerie civilization. Yet with all the zeal I could muster, I stressed the importance of its discoveries and research to Hoshi as she listened on, her eyes seeming to absorb the information far more than her ears.

"So wait. Explain this to me again. You're a doctor, yet you don't know medicine magic?"

"No. I'm not a medical doctor either, as in surgery and pill or needle medications." She gave me a blank look at this comment, her understanding cut short. I sighed, and immediately dove into a thorough lecture on healing methods outside of the magical realm.

She just seemed to be grasping it when she suddenly collapsed on my lap, as if a vacuum had spontaneously deflated her. Her hair spilled out on either side of my thighs, like solidified water peppered with the reflection of the night. "No more tonight, Frank," she complained, her thick lashes shielding those eyes so like mine. "You're getting boring."

"Do you want me to walk you home?"

"No, I think I'll just sleep here."

"But I don't have a—"

"Shhh, Frank, I'm trying to sleep here."

Her delicate fingers curled up underneath her cheek, and she gave a light sigh, already drifting away on my lap. It was all I could do to control the beast looming beneath her head from giving her a pointy wakeup call. Much to my loins dismay, trying to retreat from under her only caused her to stir and moan uncomfortably, urging me to stay still. Already I was a slave to her whim, and fell still as if paralyzed whenever she requested. Ultimately, I was forced to read the nonsense book I leave on my bedstand for insomniac reading (something about channeling your magic for karma), and muster all the willpower in my body to control the peak that threatened to swell beneath her head.

When morning came and the sun slowly nudged her awake, I squeaked something about having to pee and dashed out from underneath her head. Racing to the bathroom, I then tended my own head to a quick stroke-and-squirt until all the tension building from the long night oozed down the toilet bowl in a swirl of sticky white.

Re-entering the bedroom, I was privileged with the sight of her sprawled on the bed, languishing like a goddess. Her smooth skin contrasted sharply with the rough covers pulled firmly across my mattress, all that I could afford on my paltry salary. Head tipped over the side of the bed, her hair made a waterfall onto the ground, spreading out into a deep blue pool at the bottom of my bed. As I made my entrance, her eyes opened halfway and formed an upside-down smile.

"Feel better now?"

The sarcastic tone in her voice implied her knowledge of my stroke session. Blushing the color of my eyes, I cleared my throat loudly.

"Are you hungry?"

"Starved," she commented, sitting up in bed. She inspected the knit purse she carried with her, now significantly emptier. A wave of sorrow spread across her face that threatened to shatter my heart, brittle and vulnerable as it had become. She turned her head over to me, chin settling on her shoulder. "You wouldn't happen to have any … ?"

"No. Maybe some weed, but not that." She sighed heavily, and scooped up a smaller amount of coke than she had shoveled up her nose prior.

After giving a firm snort, she spun around on the bed, throwing her legs off the other side. Her elegant toes just barely brushed the top of the gnarled carpet. Such a fragile beauty seemed unnatural in the basal practicality of my room; her form demanded elegance, screamed for silk wrapped around her shoulders and trailing down her calves. She sent a shiver in my heart that made my budget want to spill out for her, lavishing her with the highest fineries Faerieland offered. Perhaps her mere exoticness intrigued and aroused me—I can't tell.

"Do you want me to make you some breakfast or something?"

"Not until you wash your hands," she snorted. That familiar flush found its way to my face. Her sardonic expression quickly turned to amusement—not sarcastic, but genuine. "You're blushing." Her comment only served to further rogue my face. Her purpose satisfied, she hopped from my bed smoothly, as if each movement flowed through water. With an alien grace, she moved up to me and then past me, pulling her hand softly against my hip as she went. As she walked away, she kept her eyes on me, offering a mysterious smile. "Make me some pancakes, Frank."

I did, but she didn't eat them. Instead she smoked her way through a pack of Luckies in a half an hour and I was left with frozen meals for a week. As she plowed through a pack and I tentatively picked at a pancake (a most loathsome meal—I prefer meat in my breakfast), we talked casually without commitment.

Through our conversation, I slowly began to uncover her nature, seen through the veil of a nebula until then. She had not gone home last night because she had none. She was a free-loader. Up until now, she had mooched room and board off of Wery—but once Wery admitted her engagement to Hoshi, Wery gradually began elbowing her out of the house. It came first with Hoshi's lamps on the curb—then her clocks, posters, and CDs—then her coke and futon. From what I could gather, those essential items still sat lonely in front of Wery's house, unattended and possibly garbage-picked. I offered to help her move her things—not volunteering my house as a final destination—but she declined the offer with a flick of an ash.

We sat in quiet for a moment as I sipped my third cup of coffee. The final cigarette from the chain dangling from her lips, Hoshi raised an eyebrow in my direction. "You drink that stuff black?"

"What other way is there to drink it?"

"With sugar and cream. You know. The normal way."

"And ruin my coffee? I think not."

"So you like that stuff bitter as hell?"

"I look at it like this—if you're brewing coffee, you're brewing something that's 'bitter as hell' anyway. That's what you bargained for. Why try and mask what you get by cream and sugar?"

She moved her head to the right but kept her eyes resting on me, taking a thoughtful and final drag from her cigarette. Still looking at me, she mashed the butt into my table. "You're a strange one, Frank."

"You can afford to be strange when you look like I do."

"Don't start a pity party now."

"I wasn't planning on it." I tipped my head back for the last dredges of my coffee and got up, placing the cup in the sink. I turned on the tap and began cleaning it out with a crud-infested sponge. "You can stay here today if you want, but I'll be gone all day. I have work."

"Where do you work?" she inquired from across the room. She was already up and inspecting the pictures on the wall, flicking away the dust with the back of her fingers.

"Record store. Nothing special, though we've probably got every LP imaginable."

"LP? Like, vinyl? Isn't that dead?"

"Not if we have anything to say about it," I smirked, putting the cup in the drying rack.

"Didn't you say you were a scientist? Or a doctor or something?"

"Yeah, but that doesn't pay the bills. I'll probably be at the lab tonight, though."

Before I knew what was happening, she was behind me, practically on her knees with excitement.

"You absolutely have to let me come!"

"No can do," I said, shaking my head. I walked nonchalantly to my bedroom, shutting and locking the door behind me for privacy. Such a concept eluded Hoshi. I could barely get my shirt off before she came bursting through the door, a puff of magic succeeding her. A vague annoyance flittered through my mind—I had ordered those locks magic-proof—before I could react to her nearly tackling me to the ground in her zeal.

"You have to take me!" she insisted again.

I grasped to the bed for support, pulling myself to my feet. She clung to my ankles, desperate, and giving me the most pathetic and heart-wrenching look ever made. My resolve to stay silent and solid melted behind me, but I couldn't satisfy her demands so easily.

"Look, it's not so easy. We work with dangerous chemicals, and we can't have innocents just wandering around. What if you accidentally broke something? Not only would they be pissed and it all be on my ass, what if it burned you? What if you got hurt? They have some terrible brews in there … I've seen them do—"

She cut me off as women do so masterfully—she launched herself onto my torso, spreading me backwards onto the bed, and pressed her mouth down against mine, my cheeks held captive by her palms. It was the kiss of the innocent, the inexperienced—closed mouth yet demanding, her lips laced with ulterior motives. Her scent filled my nose, of my cheap cigarettes, coke and something sweeter yet cold—the scent of the farthest reaches of space, a musk that couldn't be bottled.

She held me in that position, hands useless and mouth sealed, for what seemed like hours; stupid and shocked, I held my breath, nearly asphyxiated by my first kiss with her. That seemed to be how our relationship always progressed.

Breathless, she released me, panting heavily and lustily. I stared at her, stunned and immobile. Without intention, my hand floated to her cheek, cupping it curiously. She grasped it hungrily, pressing her lips against my fingers. With her eyes focused solely on me, she uttered a plea to the cracks of my fingers. "Please?"

How to resist a presence like hers? It was impossible. Feigning distaste, I pushed her off of me, but complied to her demands with a mask of reluctance. As soon as I bowed to her whims, she skipped out of the room lightly, leaving me to change as well as agonize alone over the sincerity of her kiss.