Free Coin-Operated Machines by Alan Spencer

understand if he decided to renege on his decision to have this talk with Brandy.
    If you can't do this, what makes you think you can save Angel?
    That convinced him to knock again, this time speaking up, "Are you in there, Brandy?  Hannah said you wanted us to have a talk."
    He waited a full ten seconds.  It was enough time for the wind to calm and dissipate.  He barely heard through the door, " It's open ."
    Brock edged open the door.  Once he had one foot inside, he was seized by the wrist and yanked forward into the apartment. The door slammed closed behind him. He landed on his hands and knees, thrown so hard.  He was confused, afraid somebody else was in the apartment besides Brandy.  Before he knew what had happened, he was seeing stars.  A lamp had been smashed over the back of his head.  The porcelain pieces rained down his face and back.  Before he could blink the stars out of his eyes, Brock was lifted back up by the collar of his shirt, hoisted by a strong force.  A left hook later, his jaw clocked, the motion of flesh, an arm, a fist, a pivoting fighter, it all blurred into senseless motion. 
    Brock was a helpless idiot in the face of the pummeling of a lifetime.  He wasn't prepared for the swift upper cut to the stomach that hurled him up against the wall, his back absorbing the pain, the contents of his stomach threatening to lurch up his esophagus and out of his mouth.  He did his best to beg for mercy when a red Puma shoe attached to a foot struck home between his legs, forcing back down the words.  The spike of nausea creeping up his belly, he melted onto the ground, wincing, wheezing, and moaning softly to bemoan the pain in his balls.  He was closer to vomiting now with the sensation of his balls being crushed repeating in dizzying pangs.  He squeezed his eyes shut and tears crept free. 
    After five minutes of being spread out on the carpet, the agony of his balls reduced itself to a low broil.  Gaining his sense of sight back, Brock studied the room anticipating a new attack.  He spotted Brandy standing above him.  She wore an ass-kicking outfit, one with much flexibility, namely a pair of sweatpants, sports bra, and her black hair styled into a ponytail.  Her expression was one exempt of apology, of a woman who had taken martial arts classes after being raped and facing off with her previous aggressor.  Her menacing face challenged him to get up, to take her on, to fight back and give her a new reason to kick his ass some more.
    Her voice was gravel.  "Get up, you asshole.  Are you going to take it?  You going to take it from me, you fucking washed up asshole?"
    Brock leaned his back up against the wall.  He could've charged at her, barreled into her chest, but that wasn't who he was.  He wished no harm upon her despite the fact a warm bullet of blood was crawling down his face.  There was an open gash at his scalp. 
    Brock was still afraid to say the wrong thing.
    "You can't have my sister, you dickhead."  She spat in his direction.  "They say once a junkie, always a junkie.  That won't be my sister because she won't be with you.  You'll stay a junkie, and Hannah will find some rich, kind, big dicked man to live happily ever after with.  She'll forget about you in good time.  Maybe no time at all."
    Still furious, nostrils flaring, lips sneering so hard he could see a centimeter line of her teeth, Brandy bent over him, slapping him hard on the face, then yanking back his hair.  "Don't you want a shot at me?  You're not going to fight me?  You a pussy?  You a chicken shit?  Tell me what you are, because you're certainly not a man."
    Brock did his best to absorb the pain of her blows.  "I don't want to fight."
    He was socked in the gut twice. 
    "You've apologized a lot in your life, Brock, but do you ever mean it?   Am I supposed to be impressed that you've cleaned up?  Because I'm not.  You have a bad day, and instantly, you're back in rehab or stealing from