"Thank you!" she cried, a malice hidden behind her sparkling eyes and beaming grin. It was not the bus driver that had bothered her, a docile elderly man with a penchant for friendliness, but the stresses of the day coalescing into a contorted ball of hatred and villainy. The public take their toll on the gentle soul, and SludgeSlut's soul had taken a battering. Bunched fists and pursed lips can only dam a wave so strong, and soon the tides turn violent.

With a bump and a crash, SludgeSlut entered the apartment, sawing the keys into the lock with a ferocity exemplary of a redhead so characteristically fiery. A fire that burned like a vortex, dragging in the atmosphere around her, and if you didn't believe in air feeling tense, well, the slam of the beaten, oak door would make you swear gospel. As she turned and looked at the mirror hanging just eschew of eyeline within the precipice of the entryway, she noticed a familiar, yet amorphous shape on her t-shirt. The black and red stripes of a menacing persuasion were ill-fit to hide the haunting that the ghost of a tubular yoghurt leaves on the clothing of ditsy women, a ghost inextricable by mortal means, or, at the very least, irremovable by tender hands and fluoridated tap water. It was not the embarrassment of splattering herself surrounded by her peers, nor the indignity of serving customers with an auspicious white stain on her cleavage that bothered her. She could move through humiliation as she had done before, and would be doing throughout her life. Rather, she thought back to a day, years prior, starting at her new job and resting to eat one of the now infamous tubular yoghurts on her lunch break. The day she had met the man now known as SludgeStud.

With a faint sound of suction and the creaking of hinges, the staff room door glided open like a figure skater on ice, revealing a silhouette she would come to recognise, towering over her yet not imposing on her or her space. Not yet. Within moments, they locked eyes, a look that could be shared for eternity and still leave you wanting. Unfortunately, this moment was interrupted with SludgeSlut barely managing a sweet chirp of "Hello!" before her pouch figuratively and literally exploding.

"Hello!" beamed a low but gentle voice, rousing SludgeSlut from her daydream. A familiar face was leaning around the far doorway like a bozo doll reeling from a hidden impact.
"Hey baby, how was work?" SludgeStud said, pulling his woman back into reality.
"Awful! I'm so stressed, it's been non-stop! I haven't sat down al-, "she began to cry out, venting her frustrations like a train vents steam, before her train was stopped dead in it's tracks by the waft of a sweet, chemically smell emanating from the direction of her partner-in-slime.

Her rigid frown slowly twisted as she flipped through her records, searching for the identity of the odour affronting her. On reflection, SludgeStud was usually on the sofa when she returned from work, as predictable as an attention-driven puppy, but today was different. He was speaking to her from the bathroom, and he was being awfully suspicious. She could feel herself reaching boiling point, about to demand he tell her what he was up to, before her eyes drifted towards the plasterboard cover from which he was avoiding her fire, noticing a discernibly bright, pink smear. Before she could ask, SludgeStud swung his hands into view, coated in layers and layers of thick, gloopy, fluorescent pink gunge.

"I like your work outfit, I'm glad you happened to wear that today," SludgeStud interjected, parrying her suspicions with ease. She stood before him in the red and black striped t-shirt, with the addition of a certain splotch, jean shorts with all of the belt loops visibly broken, a pair of formerly black tights, besmirched with the dirt and dust of the workplace, with special attention paid to the knees, and black and white high-topped Converses. She wouldn't let him best her so easily.

"Have you been mixing-" was as far as she got, but like a gunslinger at high noon, her man fired back with, "Have you done something different to your hair? I like it, but I always like your hair. You have gorgeous hair!"
He was deflecting, and she didn't like it. With the flick of a wrist, her tiny Pusheen backpack went skittering across the living room, crumpling in the corner like a visage of feline dread, and she was gaining on his position.

Like an Olympic rower, SludgeStud began backpedalling, but a storm approached that threatened to sink his canoe. Quick as a bolt of lightning, she had a hand on his chest, pushing him into the doorway behind him, his hands raised despite his lack of being detained, dripping 4-inch blobs of goo onto the hallway carpet.

"I thought you might be having a stressful day, so I thought maybe we could shoot this evening?" he choked into her ear, savouring the flavour of every word in his mouth.

SludgeSlut's face assumed the visage of a 1990's inflatable girlfriend, mouth agape with shock. Locked in a moment that felt like a lifetime, she slowly eased her left to see a PVC piping frame above her usual spot in the bathtub, with a generous container perched above it, visibly filled three quarters of the way with some form of ominous, pink sludge. On the opposite side of the bathroom stood a tripod three quarters the height of her partner. Next to that, a familiar bucket containing a helping of the pink sludge, although roughly three quarters mixed.
"Now you can get changed if you want, but I'd prefer if you didn't." SludgeStud barked, looking at her sternly with his arms crossed, coating both of his armpits with a decent slopping of sludge.

SludgeSlut wanted to argue, wanted to be able to make a fuss, as was her nature, but in her heart, she knew the cure for the blues was often

muckier than she could ever expect. Or perhaps this only applied to her. Regardless, she felt the pull of the substance and had enough experience under her belt to know not to rebel. With this, she sighed, a wave of relief coming over her, replacing her animosity with anticipation, and took a seat, cross-legged, under the devious mechanism that had been built for her. Tenderly, SludgeStud danced his fingertips across her chest, over her shoulders, and up to her cheeks, a warmth filling her like the burn that comes with drinking spirits. He circled the end of his pointer finger on her palm before handing her a cord, visibly attached to the DIY disaster, both perching over her like flock of vultures, waiting to dismantle her.

"Now do you want to pull it, or should I?"