The purple line on the television screen gave the people in the movie a Technicolor moustache across their lips and sometimes across their foreheads. The magnified noses twisted, creating a blurry eye that ended into an enlarged lip. Not the perfect display of a director’s vision or the way an actor would want to see his face across a screen. The jiggling and jagging made a buzzing noise above the words that were clearer than the screen. Sasha was too lazy to get up and even lazier to get up and find the lost remote control.

Sometimes the lines made Sasha laugh, as she lazed curled up on the couch. Eleven o’clock at night was the time for blackened, simple rest with no time for silliness like finding a lost remote control or seeing anything in this world as so important that it cannot be laughed at when it has a purple line across its face. Sasha knew this. The warmer she got the sooner she would float across the room to finish the night’s rest in bed.

She was idle, very unusual for a girl who worked nights. She knew the Canteen would be bubbling right now. Bubbling with the hands, the eyes and the silly words used in ways to convince her that she owed them a few hours of her time. Sasha was not there on purpose. She knew she was not going to follow the old flagstone alley leading to her headquarters of easy money, and lost people. Sasha had chosen a new life – from now on.

That was why Sasha could lay across the couch and laugh at the purple lines. This was a new Sasha. She had not seen a stranger in her home since Charles C. Bloomington and the two weeks between him and her suited her to the point of just lazing the time away on the couch before bed. This was a completely new Sasha.

Under a blanket of triumph and long weeks of a new outlook, what could make the night even better, she thought, chocolate, no, some coco, no, maybe just a little tea with…. Then, Sasha clearly heard the sounds of a wandering homeless sailor lost from his ship or the two light blows to the door from a burglar who stopped by after heisting many colored jewels. Old or new, forgotten and vaulted it did not matter; someone was knocking on Sasha’s door.

This was the old Sasha. Answering a door at midnight as if the day had just begun and the typing pool was gearing up for another long haul, her old cavernous life was decrepit and caused her harm, pain and the occasional STD. She did not want that old life back or to answer it, and at this point, the purple line was turning aquamarine, she could not call up the energy to respond. Then the knock came again and something about the sound aroused Sasha’s curiosity. Silently she slid across the hardwood floor not wanting to be found out. At the peephole Sasha lips gasped, her eyes lit, a spacious smile echoed across her face and through the door, as she heard a quiet voice say, “Sasha? Are you there?

Sasha put her hand over her mouth to muffle the slight noise from her lips – it was Ian. She leaned her back against the door to take a second breath before letting Ian in. Sasha had always liked Ian above all the other clients and, although, she had not seen him as a boyfriend and he had treated her like a paid professional – she loved Ian. Ian flew across nations and skydived, he owned a company, was Jewish and shy. She loved everything about Ian, mostly his slight body and bold black eyes above the most unaware, deadly smile. He was suave in his use of words and grand in his walk that said he had somewhere he needed to be.

Ian had taken Sasha to a business Christmas party as his date one year. He stood out amongst his colleagues, definitely; Sasha knew he would be the best-looking lawyer in the room. Some of the gossipy secretaries said they thought he was gay, and Sasha wondered why a man so handsome was not married. Later that night after champagne and head swirling dancing that made her feel like a princess, Ian grinded Sasha and grabbed her neck until she gasped for air. The sweat coming down his forehead was evil in the way it caused his black brows to spike. Ian liked her under him where he could see the pain or occasional wince on her face. Sasha hated the sexual side of Ian, even though she orgasmed with him in spite of her attempts at muffling her love for his malicious slaps.

Dancing with her, Ian’s eyes glowed a sweet boy smile, but when above her a sexual animal came out and it hungered to penetrate her deeper. Sasha held on to the loosened bed sheets for letting go meant she would lose her sanity. Why Sasha had liked Ian above the rest may not have been obvious to anyone, but her. Deep down inside Ian was sweet and maybe a little gay in his unconscious inclinations, but during even the most hideously humiliating moments of sex with Ian, he always found a second, perhaps one in transition or one unaware to her, to kiss her lovingly. He would pull her hair to one side where he could find her lips and gently caress them. Sasha always thought he was apologizing in advance for what he was about to do next, as he ran his fingertips over her outreaching lips as she begged for him to continue the light tickling motions he calmly laid across her lips before indulging in Sasha’s body again. Sasha did like Ian, a lot.

Sasha knew the click, the destructive cycle, the turn of the dead bolt would lay claim to her old vast and spiteful way of life, and then she turned it with a hard clap that echoed in her heart. She opened the door to Ian. The only soldier, cat burglar, capable of changing Sasha; Sasha knew this well.