Sunny Meadows Care Facility always smelled the same. It didn’t matter if it was two in the afternoon or two in the morning. It smelled of industrial strength Pine-Sol and boiled cabbage. Underneath that was the faint, lingering scent of urine that no amount of scrubbing could ever fully erase.

This was my life for the summer.

I was 16 and entering my senior year of high school. Most of my friends were heading to the beach or taking trips to Europe on their parents’ dime. I was here. I needed volunteer service on my resume when I started to apply to colleges and Sunny Meadows was close to home and had immediate availability. They called me a “Care Assistant.” It was a fancy title for a grunt. I changed sheets. I fed oatmeal to men who had forgotten their own names. I mopped floors.

It was not glamorous work.

I punched my card at the time clock. 10:55 PM. I was working the overnight shift. The “Graveyard Shift” the other nurses called it. It was usually quiet. The residents were sedated or sleeping. It was just the hum of the dehumidifiers and the occasional beep of a monitor.

I walked down the hallway toward the staff locker room. The fluorescent lights were dimmed for the night. The linoleum floors shone with a fresh coat of wax. My sneakers squeaked as I walked.

I hated the job most days. It was boring. It was gross. But there was something about the place at night that felt different. It felt private. It felt like a secret world that only a few of us knew about.

I pushed open the door to the women’s locker room. It was empty. The day shift had already cleared out and the other night staff were already on the floor.

I went to my locker and spun the dial. My locker was a narrow metal box that smelled like rust. I opened it and pulled out my uniform.

I stripped off my jeans and tank top and stood there in my underwear.

I took a moment to admire myself in one of the full length mirrors.

I had lived in this body my whole life but sometimes it still surprised me. I had hit a growth spurt late and things had settled in places I did not expect. I was five foot three and weighed exactly one hundred and ten pounds on the scale. I was petite. Small boned.

But I wasn’t a stick.

I turned to the side. My tits filled out my bra cups. I was a 34C. They were firm and sat high on my chest. Boys seem to like them. My stomach was flat. I kept it that way with running. I ran three miles every morning before the heat got too bad.

My panties were basic white cotton. “Good girl” panties my mom would say.

I looked innocent. That was what everyone told me. I had blonde hair that fell to my shoulders and big blue eyes. I looked like the kind of girl who baked cookies and went to church on Sundays.

I did neither of those things.

I looked at my reflection and touched my stomach. My skin was pale. Unmarked. I looked soft. I looked like fresh dough waiting to be baked.

I grabbed my scrub top. It was baby blue. It was supposed to be calming. I pulled it over my head. It was a size small but it was still baggy on me. It hid my waist. It hid the curve of my ass. But if I moved the right way the fabric pulled tight across my chest.

I liked that. I knew the old men liked it too. I caught them staring sometimes. Mr. Maradora in 304 always asked me to adjust his pillows when I leaned over him. I knew what he was doing. He was looking down my shirt.

I told myself it was gross. I told myself I should be offended.

But I wasn’t.

If I was being honest I liked the attention. It made me feel something in this dead boring place. It made my nipples hard. Like now. Just thinking about Mr. Maradora’s eyes on my cleavage made me shift my weight.

I felt a little throb between my legs.

I should stop thinking like that. I was a professional. Sort of.

The locker room door banged open.

I jumped and turned around, clutching my scrub pants to my chest.

It was Roxy.

I had only seen Roxy a few times in passing. She worked the late shift exclusively. She was a legend around here. The nurses whispered about her. They said she was trouble. They said she had been fired from the hospital across town for “fraternizing.”

Roxy did not look like a nurse.

She was tall. Five foot nine at least. She had jet black hair that was shaved on one side and hung long on the other. She walked with a swagger that took up the whole room. She didn’t squeak when she walked. She stomped in heavy combat boots that she somehow got away with wearing instead of sneakers.

She stopped in the middle of the room and looked at me.

“You’re the new girl,” she said. It wasn’t a question.

Her voice was low. Rasping. Like she smoked a pack a day. She probably did. I could smell the faint scent of menthols and heavy perfume clinging to her.

“I’m Jane,” I said. My voice sounded thin in the tiled room.

“Jane,” she repeated. She made it sound like an insult. “Plain Jane.”

She walked over to the locker next to mine. She didn’t give me any space. She stood right next to me. She was so close I could feel the heat coming off her body.

She started stripping.

She didn’t turn away. She didn’t hide. She unzipped her leather jacket and threw it on the bench. Underneath she was wearing a tight black tank top.

My eyes went to her arms. They were covered in ink. Sleeves of intricate, dark patterns. Skulls. Roses. Vines that wrapped around her muscles.

Then she pulled the tank top off.

I stopped breathing.

Roxy wasn’t wearing a bra.

She was tatted everywhere. A flock of black butterflies rose up her neck from her collarbone. Script writing curved around her ribs.

But that wasn’t what I was staring at.

Her tits were heavy. They were bigger than mine. Full and round with dark aureoles. And right through the center of each nipple was a silver barbell.

They glinted under the fluorescent lights.

I couldn’t look away. I had never seen nipple piercings in real life. Only in pictures on the internet that I looked at late at night. They looked painful. They looked savage.

They looked hot.

Roxy didn’t rush. She tossed her shirt into the locker. She stretched her arms over her head. Her tits lifted. The silver rings caught the light.

I realized my mouth was open. I snapped it shut.

I turned back to my locker, my face burning. I fumbled with my scrub pants. I tried to step into them but I tripped over the leg. I stumbled.

Roxy laughed. It was a dirty sound.

“Easy there, fresh meat,” she said.

I managed to get my pants on. I tied the drawstring tight. Too tight. I needed to feel secured.

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

“Don’t be sorry,” Roxy said. “You were enjoying the view.”

I looked at her. She was leaning against the lockers now. She was still topless. She had one thumb hooked in the waistband of her black panties.

“I wasn’t,” I lied.

“You’re a bad liar, Jane,” she said. “I saw your eyes. You were trying to figure out how they felt.”

She flicked one of the silver bars with her fingernail.

I flinched. I felt a jolt shoot straight to my clit. “Did that hurt?” I asked. The words came out before I could stop them.

“When I got them done?” Roxy smiled. “Yeah. It hurt like a bitch. I screamed.”

She stepped closer.

“But now?” She lowered her voice. “Now they make everything sensitive. My shirt rubs against them all shift. Keeps me on edge. Keeps me wet.”

I swallowed hard. I shouldn’t be hearing this. This was workplace harassment. This was inappropriate.

But I didn’t move away.

“Why do you work here?” I asked. “You don’t look like...”

“Like a nurse?” Roxy finished for me. “Because I like taking care of people, Jane. Just like you.”

She finally reached into her locker and pulled out a scrub top. It was dark blue. The senior nursing staff wore dark blue. She pulled it on. It was tight. I could clearly see the outline of the piercings through the fabric.

She didn’t put on a bra.

“These men are lonely,” Roxy said. She was checking her makeup in the mirror. She wore heavy black eyeliner. “They spend all day rotting in bed. No one touches them. No one looks at them. They need care.”

She turned around and faced me. She looked me up and down.

She looked at my scuffed sneakers. My baggy scrubs. My bare face.

“You look like a virgin,” she stated.

I stood up straighter. “I’ve had a boyfriend,” I defended myself. “We’ve done it twice.”

That was technically true but both times he came in like a minute and I was left to finish myself off after he went home.

“A boyfriend,” she scoffed. “Some pimply kid who doesn’t know where the clit was. That doesn’t count.”

She stepped into my space again. She boxed me in against the locker door. She was taller than me. She smelled of smoke and sex.

“I bet you’re tight,” she whispered.

My heart started to race. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me,” Roxy said. “Tight and wet. You walk like it.”

She looked at my crotch. Then she looked back at my eyes. Her eyes were dark. Almost black.

“Tell me something, Jane,” she said.

She reached out. Her hand came up to my face. I thought she was going to hit me. Instead she ran her finger down the side of my neck. Her nail was sharp. It dragged against my skin.

I shivered.

“Have you ever fucked a girl?”

The question hung in the air. It was heavy. Thick.

I should push her away. I should report her to the head nurse. I should run.

But I didn’t. I stood there, pinned by her gaze. My nipples were rubbing against the cotton of my bra. My pussy was damp. I could feel the moisture collecting in the cotton crotch of my panties.

“No,” I whispered.

Roxy smirked. She leaned in close. Her lips were inches from my ear. I could feel the heat of her breath.

“That’s a shame,” she murmured. “You look like you taste like vanilla frosting.”

She pulled back. She winked at me. It wasn’t friendly. It was a promise.

“We’ll have to fix that,” she said.

She slammed her locker shut. The sound echoed off the tile.

“Come on, fresh meat,” she said, walking toward the door. She had that sway. Her hips moved in a rhythm that was distinct. Purposeful. Like she was walking to music only she could hear.

“Mr. Horsham needs turning in 302,” she threw over her shoulder. “Try to keep up.”

She walked out.

I stood there in the empty locker room. My hand went to my neck where she had touched me. My glowing skin felt hot.

I looked in the mirror again.

I looked the same. Blonde hair. Blue eyes. Innocent.

But I didn’t feel innocent.

I looked at my reflection and saw the flush in my cheeks. I saw the way my chest was rising and falling.

I knew it was wrong. She was dangerous. I knew I should stay away from her.

But down below, where it mattered, my body had made a different decision.

I was soaking wet.

I took a deep breath. I smoothed down my scrub top and fixed my ponytail.

I opened the door and followed her down the hall.

Two weeks had passed since that night in the locker room. Two weeks of changing bedpans, mopping up spilled apple juice, and ignoring the way my heart pounded every time Roxy walked into a room.

She hadn’t brought it up again. In fact she ignored me most of the time. She would breeze past me in the hallway, her hips swaying with that heavy, deliberate rhythm, and not even look at me.

But I looked at her.

I watched her constantly. I watched how the muscles in her arms flexed under her tattoos when she lifted a patient. I watched how she bit her lip when she was concentrating on a chart. I watched the way the senior doctors looked at her. They looked at her with a mix of disdain and hunger. They hated her attitude but they stared at her ass when she walked away.

Just like I did.

It was a Tuesday. The ward was quiet. It was 2:00 AM. The silence in a care home is heavy. It presses down on you. It is the sound of fifty people waiting to die.

I was doing my rounds. I had to check the vitals in the B wing.

Room 204 belonged to Mr. Maradora. He was seventy-eight and a mean old bastard. He had been a foreman at the steel mill and he treated the nurses like lazy workers on his line. He threw his food. He yelled if his pillow wasn’t fluffed exactly right. He called me “Blondie” and told me I was useless pretty much every night.

I dreaded his room. I usually saved it for last.

I walked down the hallway. The floor wax squeaked under my shoes. I held my clipboard to my chest like a shield.

I got to the room. The door was cracked open about an inch.

That was strange. Mr. Maradora liked his door shut. He said the light from the hallway kept him awake.

I stopped and strained my ears. I expected to hear him snoring. He had sleep apnea and usually sounded like a chainsaw.

But I didn’t hear snoring.

I heard a wet, rhythmic sound. Slap. Slurp. Slap.

It sounded like someone eating a peach with their mouth open. It was wet and sloppy.

Then I heard a groan. It was low and guttural.

“Oh god. Yes. There.”

It was Mr. Maradora. But he didn’t sound angry. He sounded weak. Desperate.

My first thought was a medical emergency. Maybe he was choking. Maybe he was having a seizure.

I stepped forward to push the door open. My hand touched the wood.

“Take it deep,” Mr. Maradora groaned. “Suck it.”

I froze. My hand hovered over the door.

I should have turned around and walked back to the nurse’s station and put on my headphones. I knew exactly what was happening. I wasn’t stupid.

But I didn’t walk away.

My heart kicked against my ribs. My mouth went dry.

I pushed the door open just another inch. Just enough to see in.

The room was dim. The only light came from the bathroom door which was slightly ajar, casting a wedge of yellow light across the bed.

Mr. Maradora was lying on his back. His hospital gown was pulled up to his chest. His legs were pale and thin. His knees were knobby and covered in white hair.

But between his legs, he was hard.

His cock was thick. It stuck straight up, red and angry looking against his pale skin.

And Roxy was bobbing up and down on it.

She was on her knees on the bed between his legs. Her dark hair was pulled back in a messy bun, exposing the shaved side of her head and the tattoos climbing her neck.