Chapter 11 -- Camille's Revelation

Well you walk into a restaurant,
Strung out from the road,
You can feel the eyes upon you
As your shaking off the cold.
You pretend it doesn't bother you,
But you just want to explode.

--Turn the Page (Bob Seger)

Camille seemed nervous when she picked me up. "We're going to Lake Shore Point," she said.

I grinned. "You've always wanted to get into my pants," I said.

Instead of laughing, Camille groaned.

I now knew that something serious was up. "What's wrong, Cammy?"

"It's about your so-called Lucky Tickets. It will not be easy telling you these things."

Looking at Camille, I could see that she was serious. Gone was her carefree manner that I came to know and even expect of her over the last few months. "What's wrong?" I asked.

"Jim, I know I have a reputation as a slut, but this is really going to be difficult for me. Those tickets almost completely destroyed my sister's life, and they almost destroyed my own. I don't want the same thing to happen to you or Kristen."

I looked at Camille, and I saw the start of tears in her eyes. "Why are you telling me this now?"

"I... I couldn't at first," Camille said. "Actually, that's not entirely true. I was... afraid. I was afraid of what would happen to me."

"What do you mean?" I asked. "What will happen to you?"

Camille pulled into the parking lot at Lake Shore Point. She turned off the ignition and looked at me. "Debbie... my sister... used to have them. She was a nice girl, and I loved her. Those tickets turned her into a monster. She knew that I knew about them, but she made it so that I couldn't talk to anybody else about them."

"You are talking to me about them," I pointed out.

"Yes," Camille admitted. "Debbie no longer has the tickets. A lot of her wishes about me no longer have any effect. Some of them, like her wish that I could only talk to her about the tickets, are now bound to you... I can only talk to you about them right now. There are other wishes that now have me bound to you but they aren't as effective since you aren't aware of them."

A ghastly thought occurred to me. "Wait a minute! If I get rid of the tickets, Kristen will be addicted to the person that finds them next?"

Camille shook her head. "I don't know. I'm not a hundred percent sure how they work, but the last I heard, Debbie is still living with a girl she enslaved in New York."

This was confusing, but I needed more information. "How do you know so much about these tickets?"

"When Debbie first found them, she played 'Make a wish' with me, and granted me some wishes. My hair color turned from dark brown to light brown--I'm actually a blonde now! Debbie wished for my hair to look like Kristen's."

I was always struck the similarity between Kristen's and Camille's hair. This intrigued me, especially since the rest of Camille's family all had dark brown hair.

Camille continued, "Another wish was that I would be smarter, and I went from being an average student to one of the top students in my class. That wish still seems to be in effect--or, at least I have gotten used to being smarter, or whatever."

I nodded. "I was surprised to hear that you were in the Honor Society."

Camille gave me a look. "You think that just because I'm a blonde and a cheerleader that I'm a mindless twat with big boobs and no brains?"

I was a bit put off by that remark. "By your own admission," I said, "you aren't really a natural blonde."

Camille gave me a withering look. "You'd never be able to prove it," she spat. "You've seen me naked!"

The two of us sat silently. I was a bit put off. This was the first time that Camille actually got angry at me.

"Camille," I finally said. "I didn't mean..."

"Actually, Jim," Camille said, her look at me softening. "You probably could turn me back to a brunette. I'm not sure how I'd feel about it. I wasn't thinking..."

"Neither was I. What I meant to say before was that I was just surprised when I heard that you were in the National Honor Society. Patty says you might be class valedictorian. I always thought you seemed to be just like everybody else."

Camille looked at me, and the anger that I saw before disappeared after a few moments. "I'm sorry, Jim. I get sensitive about that, especially knowing that my intelligence is a bit... well, fake. Anyway, Debbie even made a wish about you. We were babysitting you, and giving you a bath. Debbie invited me into the bathroom and we were playing a bit with you."

This was very curious. I never recalled this happening. "No, you didn't," I said adamantly.

"When I got blonde hair, my hair color started to change almost immediately. Debbie saw that and said that if the wishes really work, she'd like to see you with a bigger penis. And your little thing got bigger."

"This did not happen!" I said. I would have remembered somebody playing that kind of sex game with me.

"It did happen. You were, what? Nine or ten years old at the time? When we finished playing, Debbie gave you a ticket and told you to forget what happened."

For some reason, I felt violated. I was about to say something when I realized that I did the exact same thing with Patrice and Merry--I took advantage of them and them made them to forget what happened. I was starting to get a feeling that some wishes that I made that I thought were harmless may not have been so harmless after all.

Camille nodded. "It's a hard thing to find out, Jim, and I'm sorry. We were just kids and playing around... harmless fun."

Something nagged at me. "So, Cammy... am I... really... bigger?"

"You know I've seen a lot of guys," Camile answered. "I've seen a couple that were bigger than yours, but you are pretty large for somebody in your grade. I don't think you may be in any competition with Tiny Jonas, but you're definitely in the top ten percentile in the school."

This embarrassed me a bit, so I decided to get off that particular subject. "What happened after that?"

Camille said, "Debbie and I played with the tickets for a few days, and then Debbie did something--she never told me what--and she got scared. She hid the tickets, vowing never to use them again."

I nodded, having made a similar vow after I found out what I did to Kristen, but that vow didn't last very long.

Camille saw my reaction. "She actually forgot about them for a few weeks until one day, they were with her again. The difference this time was that it was as if they completely took her over. She became a different person, very controlling and very spiteful. She seduced some of her friends, her teachers, and when I noticed her behavior, she... she..." Camille broke down and cried.

Camille was leaning towards me, and I pulled her head onto my shoulders, offering her comfort. After a few minutes, Camille said, "Debbie turned me into a slave. She forced me to fuck her friends... and not just boys! I... I couldn't disobey her, or anybody else when she told me to fuck somebody. Eventually she got bored with this town and moved away. My mother has no idea where she is, and I think Debbie made her not care, because my mother's lack of interest in Debbie is totally out of character for her. Anyway, I recently discovered that she's living in New York."

I didn't know what to say to all this. First, other people knew about the tickets. Second, I myself was once a victim of them... in the same way that I victimized Merry and Patrice. Third, Debbie's turned her sister Camille into some sort of sexual slave. This was all very heady stuff.

Suddenly, I felt warm lips caress mine as Camille kissed me. Instinctively, I opened my mouth and her tongue coaxed mine into hers. I could taste the salt from Camille's crying in her mouth. Closing my eyes, I kissed her back for a few moments before I came to my senses.

I pushed myself away from Camille's embrace. "No, Camille!" I said, my breath ragged.

"I'm... I'm sorry," Camille said. "It's just that... oh... I'm fucking everything up!"

Camille was completely disheveled. I didn't realize that she wore mascara until now, when I saw it streaking from her eyes. "What's wrong, Camille?"

"Jim," Camille finally said. "It's not just good enough to get rid of the tickets." Camille's words were coming out fast, as if she were running in a race to get them out. "Somebody else will find them, and the whole thing will start all over again. People will be hurt... people will be destroyed by them. We need to destroy them before that happens!"

I could understand what Camille was saying, but I wasn't sure if I truly agreed with her. There was indeed something magical about those tickets. There was absolutely no way that these things could possibly exist; in order to believe in them, you needed to allow for supernatural things--like the auras that Kristen's brother said he saw. I wasn't sure that I was ready to believe in that hocus-pocus.

There was an indisputable fact that the tickets existed. I could not deny their existence. Not only did they exist, but they worked. I saw many instances where people would do things that they would not normally do under the influence of the tickets. So, if these tickets existed, then somebody or something needed to have created them.

Camille also said that the tickets I gave her didn't work on her. Why would that be the case? Didn't she say that her own sister used them on her? Didn't they work on Camille when I took her and her two friends to Kneely Park for a mutual masturbation event?

"Camille, you said that the tickets I gave you didn't work on you. I remember using one on you that day in the lingerie shop."

"I noticed your tickets right away, and since I felt guilty over what Debbie and I did to you some years back, I played along and wanted to see what you'd do. After all, I was already known as a slut, and I could probably distract you from taking too much advantage of Wendy or Patty. Your use of the tickets seemed quite tame. That is, until I saw what you did to Kristen."

Kristen again! I felt my heart grow heavy as Camille reminded how I utterly humiliated Kristen because of some mistaken notion that she was responsible for Patrice treating me like shit. I did so in front of Camille and her two friends Patty and Wendy. I hung my head in shame over that unfriendly memory.

"None of us really liked Kristen," Camille admitted. "We actually helped you shanghai her. I had my own reasons; Lynette was my friend, but she would ignore me if Kristen or Dale wanted to do something. Anyway, I didn't know what you did to Kristen until the next day. To your credit, when you found out what you did, you immediately tried to make it right. That was totally unlike Debbie, who probably would have laughed and ordered Kristen never to see her again, making her unable to ever find happiness."

I was astonished at Camille's revelation.

Camille continued. "You, on the other hand, saw the insidiousness of the tickets. I wish I told you then about the tickets and how strong they were, but I was afraid. I was drawn to you--I still am! Worse, Patty and Wendy were also there and I couldn't say anything in front of them. I just sat there and played along, as if I were just as in awe of you as the other girls were. It's as much my fault as it is your own. I knew what could happen and I never warned you."

"I never really made it right, Cammy," I said sourly. "Kristen is still addicted to my... my sperm."

Camille nodded seriously and said, "You couldn't fix that?"

I sighed. "I tried. I found out that no ticket can undo the influence of another ticket completely. She still has that addiction, but she can now manage it."

Camille thought a bit. "I never really became familiar with how they worked. How did you find that out?"

I smiled a bit. "If I give a ticket to somebody, I can ask that person how they work. I found that out when I first gave one to Merry..." I stopped, not wanting to admit what I did to my step-sister.

"Your sister?" Camille asked.

I sighed. I knew that I already went this far, and Camille seemed the only person that I could talk to about this. "Yeah. I didn't know what the tickets were for, and she asked me for one. She got the first one, and when she told me I was given a wish, I thought she was playing a game. It didn't take me too long to realize that the tickets were for real."

Camille thought seriously. "Is she still under their influence?"

"No," I said. "It was just that one time. I then used them on Patrice and then on a girl I met at the park. You, Patty, and Wendy were next, and then Kristen..."

"You didn't actually enslave anybody?" Camille asked.

"I almost did it to Kristen, but Patty helped me with that. It turns out that deep down Kristen really loves me. I'm not exactly sure why she chose me--every time I bring it up, she changes the subject. I do know that her love wasn't something I that actually wished, though. The only thing I really wanted at first was her forgiveness. It took a while, but eventually I found out that I really love her as well."

"Jim, think!" Camille said. "Are you sure you haven't enslaved Kristen? Could you have done so without knowing it?"

I wondered if I should tell Camille about that game of "Master/Slave" we played the previous night. That was just sexual play, right? The tickets weren't involved at all.

"I really don't think so," I said. Camille's questions, however, made me start to doubt myself. "I gave her wishes with expirations... like, she had to do whatever I said that day at Wendy's house. But that wish had an expiration."

Camille said, "I remember, although I don't remember you giving her a ticket. You gave it to her before you left the mall parking lot, right? I remember you telling her to do things, and she just did them, but I don't remember you making her an addict."

"I told her that quietly," I said. "I wanted Patty to find out about that later."

"Patty?"

"Yeah," I said, remembering the event vividly now. "I told her she needed to schedule her sessions with me through Patty."

"Fuck!" Camille said quite loudly. "Do you mean to tell me that Kristen actually schedules her dates with you through Patty?"

"Um..." I said. "Actually, no! Only that once, when she called Wendy's house looking for Patty."

"So that wish expired, but her addiction is still there. Is that right?"

Camille was right. There was something different between those two "wishes." And those two "wishes" happened with the same ticket! I didn't put any expiration on Kristen having to schedule through Patty, but she doesn't seem to be under that command anymore. "You're right."

"How is she managing her addiction?" Camille asked.

"Um, well... you know..."

"I mean, she just spent a week in Europe, didn't she?"

"Yeah," I said. "I helped her manage that by giving her the same addiction to chocolate covered peanuts. She can hold off the one addiction with the other."

"Oh," Camille thought for a moment. "That was a brilliant idea!"

I sighed.

Something occurred to me. "You said you used to be your sister's slave. How come you aren't any more?"

Camille dropped her eyes. "I woke up one day, and I knew that I was no longer under that spell. I'm not sure, but later that day, I saw the tickets, so I surmised that my sister no longer owned the tickets."

"You said she's still living with one of her slaves," I pointed out.

Camille furrowed her brow. "Hmmm, that needs thinking."

Neither Camille nor I spoke for a few moments. There was a lot of information to digest.

Did those tickets actually turn Camille's sister Debbie into a monster like Camille described? Would that happen to me? I thought back to my initial experiments with the tickets, and how I used them for revenge with Patrice and Kristen, and realized that this was an ugly part of me that I never wanted to see again.

On the other hand, I saw the good things that came about from the tickets. My relationship with Kristen, and my friendships with Patty, Sherry, and even Camille were good examples of what the tickets could do. I now had many friends, and I was more confident in myself.

From somewhere deep in my brain, a troubling question arose. If my friendships with these girls were due to the tickets, was it the case that I couldn't have friends of my own without them? It was a subject that made me feel a bit uneasy, so I buried that thought quickly.

I looked up to see Camille looking strangely at me. "Jim, did you hear me?"

"What?" I asked, having been immersed in my own thoughts.

"I said that you need to destroy those tickets," Camille said.

I couldn't accept that. "The tickets can't be as bad as you describe."

Camille's eyes widened. "They are insidious, Jim! They will make you a monster, just like my sister. She was a nice person, just like you. She thought she was strong, but they took control of her."

"Why did you wait so long to tell me?" I asked.

"I... I can't say," Camille said, looking extremely frustrated.

Looking into the cheerleader's eyes, I knew that she was truly scared. "Let's say that I believe you," I said. "I throw them in the garbage and they're gone. Apparently, somebody will find them again. I still don't know how they got on the street corner where I live. You said that your sister lives in New York City!"

"Yes," Camille explained. "Debbie must have finally found a way out from their power. It must have been last summer, because that's when I knew that I was no longer her slave. Soon afterward, I saw them on the ground. They were sitting there on the sidewalk where I was walking. I saw them and I knew exactly what they were. I immediately turned the other way, and ran to get away from them. I was worried about who would find them, but I knew that I would be damned if it would be me."

"Somebody must have found them," I pointed out. "They weren't on the road when I found them."

Camille shook her head. "No. I'm not sure how they work, but I saw them a few other times since that first time on the road. It was always somewhere where I was walking. After the first couple of times, they actually seemed to call to me, and I felt a part of me drawn to them, but then I would remember how horrible they were. I made sure to always avoid them no matter what. I never saw anybody else pick them up. One day, they stopped appearing to me. I would guess that's when you found them, because it was a few nights later when I saw you with them."

I didn't know what to say. Camille knew the danger that these tickets posed and wisely avoided them. She was indeed a very intelligent person in that respect.

"Jim, those tickets are evil!" Camille cried. "I told Debbie to get rid of them. She laughed at me, and then she turned ugly, telling me that I was jealous about the tickets and she... she turned me into her slave. She made me fuck people and then made me forget who I did. Do you know that I still have dreams about that? Who could I tell? Debbie prevented me from telling anybody about the tickets. Even if I could, what would I do? Go to a doctor? A priest? The police?"

The twelfth grader was starting to get hysterical. "Camille, please calm down."

Immediately, Camille took a few deep breaths and got her emotions under control. I was quite amazed at how quickly Camille was able to do that. "Jim," Camille said in a more even tone. "Those tickets are evil, and even with the best of intentions, they may destroy you."

"Can you tell me how to get rid of the tickets?" I asked.

"No," Camille said evenly.

"Why not?"

"I don't know how," Camille answered. "When I saw the tickets on the road, I tried to locate my sister. I finally found a credit statement that was accidentally sent to our house that showed her address in New York, so I got her number and called her. I found that I couldn't even mention the tickets to her... it was frustrating! She seemed embarrassed to be talking with me and the conversation was very short."

"Maybe we should visit her and ask her. I'm under no spell to keep from talking about the tickets."

"Jim, it's not enough to get rid of the tickets. They must be destroyed so nobody ever finds them again!"

In a way, I could understand Camille's hatred of the tickets. After all, if what she told me was true, they really messed up her life, although her life seemed to be on a better track now. I still thought that I could be careful with them. I knew that I didn't want to turn into a monster like Camille described her sister, but something inside me told me that I shouldn't get rid of the tickets, either--at least, not yet.

I nodded and thought about this. Camille watched me, seeing the effect that her words had on me. "I need to think about this," I finally said. "If you think that they need to be destroyed, then why didn't you pick them up and destroy them yourself?"

Camille hesitated. "I was... I was afraid, Jim. I admit it. Those things scared the hell out of me when I saw them. And when I saw you with them, I felt a bit better, even if I felt a bit guilty when we used them on you. I couldn't say anything with Patty and Wendy around, so I just played along with you and pretended that I was under their influence. I know for a fact that I was only pretending that day."

On that day, it didn't appear to me that Camille was pretending. It occurred to me that Camille might be lying to me about the tickets. "You don't think the tickets work on you?" I asked.

"They didn't seem to work in the lingerie shop. Why are you asking?"

"What if I give you a ticket now? Let me ask you to... oh... do something you wouldn't normally do. If you do it, the tickets work. If you don't, then you are immune to their effects."

I could see Camille think about my suggestion. I felt that I needed to do this, mostly because if the tickets didn't work on Camille, then there might be other people who will be immune to their effects. Trying to hand a ticket to somebody who was immune could prove to be embarrassing.

"Jim, I trust you, but I'm terribly afraid of those tickets," Camille finally said. "I was a bit relieved when I found out that you now owned the tickets, and all you made us do was get naked and masturbate. I got a bit scared after seeing what you did to Kristen, but to your credit, you tried to make it better. You are a nice person, Jim. I'm going to trust you, but if you betray my trust, then I will never consider you a friend ever again. Do you understand? You could force me to be your friend with a ticket, and it might appear that way. You might get my body, but you'll never get my soul! That's one thing that Debbie never got from me!"

I contemplated what Camille said. I nodded in agreement, and then opened my attach case, and ripped off a ticket. "Here, Camille, have a ticket."

Camille automatically grabbed it and then said, "It's weird. It's as if I cannot help but take the ticket!"