SEXty-nine nights of a Girl

Shattered strings

The mirror reflected her figure in the dim light, an image she often hated. Lila adjusted her silk dress, the dark crimson fabric clinging to her curves. Her smoky eyeshadow was smudged, a consequence of tears she wouldn't dare admit to shedding. The scent of cheap wine and desperation lingered in her apartment, mixing with her overpriced perfume.

They always left. Every. Single. One.

It didn't matter if she played coy, laughed at their jokes, or whispered their names like prayers in the dark. Lila was the kind of woman men desired until they didn't. They never said why. A slow fade, a quiet ghosting that haunted her far more than any words could. The worst part? She let them.

She met Erik on a night when she had sworn she was done. No more chasing, no more wondering what was wrong with her. She promised herself she'd close her heart like a vault. Then there he was, dark and magnetic, his eyes so penetrating they seemed to read the secrets she guarded even from herself.

"Drinking alone?" he asked, leaning against the bar like he owned the room.

"Sometimes that's the best company," she replied, her voice coated with defiance.

Erik laughed, the sound deep and low, curling around her like smoke. "Mind if I join you, then?"

For the first time in months, Lila felt seen—not as an object, not as a fleeting thrill, but as something alive, something dangerous. His touch, when it came, was a whisper against her skin, electrifying.

They spiraled into a kind of madness together. Erik had a way of making her feel like the only person in the world, yet every moment with him felt like it could shatter at any second. The sex was volcanic, leaving her breathless and aching, a physical embodiment of her emotional hunger. He worshiped her body like a man starved, yet there was a darkness in his eyes, a void she couldn't place.

"Promise me," she whispered one night, her voice raw as she clung to him in the afterglow. "Promise you won't leave."

He kissed her forehead, murmuring something that sounded like an agreement, but it wasn't. Not really. Lila knew promises were just words. She had heard them before, from lips now gone silent.

But Erik stayed longer than the others. He lingered, drawing her deeper into his world. He had a taste for the macabre, a fascination with life's underbelly that mirrored her own hidden darkness. Together, they danced on the edge of the abyss, their connection both intoxicating and suffocating. She didn't care. She'd rather drown in him than live in the barren emptiness the others had left behind.

Then, one morning, she woke to an empty bed.

It wasn't like the others. Erik didn't vanish quietly. He left a note, scrawled in messy handwriting on her nightstand.

"You wanted too much. I can't give you what you need."

The words burned into her skull. The air around her seemed to freeze, suffocating her as she clutched the note to her chest. Too much. What did that even mean? How could she be too much when every man had taken everything from her?

Days turned to weeks. She searched for him obsessively, driven by a gnawing ache she couldn't silence. She called, texted, begged for answers. Nothing. Erik had done what they all did—disappeared.

But this time, something inside her snapped.

She found him one night in a bar not unlike the one where they met. He was with another woman, laughing, his hand resting on her thigh like he had once done with Lila. The sight twisted something inside her. She didn't feel hurt. She felt...hungry.

Later, when the woman left and Erik walked out alone, she followed him. The alley was dark, the air thick with the scent of rain-soaked asphalt. Erik didn't notice her until she was inches away.