Dream Sequence Knows What’s Real

 

                                                            by

 

                                                Steven       Grogan

 

 

Disclaimer: This story is part reality, part dream. There could be a long exposition here about what brought this story into being or I could even be boring enough to tell which parts are dream and which parts are reality. However, I have judged that this kind of interjection would be an insult to the audience’s intelligence. I leave it to the reader’s judgment to decide which is which.

 

            From the very beginning moments of my life I knew what my purpose was. Clarity hit me the second that one important cell pierced the shell of her egg. She gave herself to him that night... desired his hands caressing her breasts, wanted his flesh to be hers, longed to have his mouth fastened to hers. I would be raised to believe that a woman offering herself in this intimate way to a man was a special occasion, that not just anyone should be allowed to see a woman’s tender loving side...but so many of my peers (and people even younger than I am) would not feel this way. They had hollow caves where their hearts should be. Lacking any sense of love drove them to share with whoever was around. Some would use excuses...like constant horniness, alcohol, or drugs...but I was not blinded to the truth. Mine was a generation of misfits incapable of loving themselves or anyone else, more prone to loneliness and alienation than even the Beats. Yet I was unique in this sea of misery because I embraced my loneliness. My problem proved to be its own solution.

            At any rate I am getting ahead of myself. I’d like to start this tale right from the beginning. Yes, the very second one of my father’s sperm cells cracked the egg’s defenses. In that instant I was finally made. As I lay there hovering in the womb, my head entertained all sorts of visions. None of them meant much to me then, nor do they hold any significance now. While nutrition reached me through the umbilical cord I came to realize my life had already reached a clear decision on what kind of role I was to adopt when I left the womb. The underdog, the loser, the one who has bad luck or no luck at all...this was going to be my role. Someone or something had already chosen for me. Into the fluid of the life-giving sac I screamed inquiries and profanities of all sorts, lashing out with my feet when the lack of answers frustrated me.

Months passed. My development was the same as any other embryo. However, despite the physical similarities I had already gained a realization that I would be different. There would be no one quite like me.

            It was this sense of uniqueness that made me dread leaving the womb. I had no way of knowing anything for sure, but I had a feeling that individuality was not a highly-praised quality in the world I was going to enter. Somehow I just knew it. The cost of being myself would be an unspoken but clearly felt distance between myself and every other person that surrounded me, a wall that I did not want or put there on my own. There would never be any proximity between myself and someone else, and any situation that arose in which I thought there was would be false. No matter how real someone’s love might feel, I could not allow myself to believe it. I had to train my eyes to see through the illusions of other people.

Nine months of thinking in my wet cave were forgotten when I felt movement. Muscles contracting in agony. In minutes I was born. Screaming already.

            I did not take my time growing up. Later in my life my mother would always say I was a quiet baby. Even as a toddler I never displayed the normal gaiety and outspokenness of a life that age. It has always been more pleasing to me to withdraw into myself...to be closed off from everyone. And why not? Whenever I tried opening up to them they would respond by withdrawing from me. Why not do the same?

            Right from the start my suspicions about the life that was in store for me were proven true. None of my classmates would talk to me even though they were constantly gabbing with one another. During playtime I sat alone and entertained myself. I was forced to develop a complex imagination that would fill the gap left by the children that should have been playing with me. My teacher told mother I was a good, well-behaved little boy. She felt sad because I was always alone. At first this bothered me as well. Why was I the only one with whom the children refused to play? What made me so different? All I could ask was why, but I felt no shock when I got no answer.

            As time passed, I stayed mostly in my room and had no real friends. There were those who would offer fake friendship for a while, asking if they could maybe borrow some change or if they could have some of my lunch when they had me in their confidence and knew I would say yes. They knew I believed them to be my friends. Like a true fool I never followed the guideline I gave myself when I was just a single cell lingering in the womb. I did not keep my mind alert enough to realize they were fooling me. Well, maybe I slacked off because I wanted to think they liked me. I wanted it to be true that someone could like me or call me their friend.

            Junior high school hit me with the impression that my peers would never give me the acceptance I desired. I did not mind not having friends and being alone all the time, yet I wanted them to accept me so that I could find friends among them if I ever wished to do so. No chance. There was an individual residing in this body of mine, a spirit that wanted to rebel and fight against all the things that other people wanted me to believe, because I realized as I grew up that I was expected to meet certain preconceived notions about who and what I was supposed to be. Yes, I was an American middle-class male so therefore I was expected to be a good church-going Catholic boy going promptly every Sunday and, being a teenager who had just hit puberty, I was also supposed to use that new burst of testosterone to play sports. However, the surge hit my  brain instead of my muscles. Rather than tearing across the football field or the racetrack I found my mind running through alternate worlds of a vast collection of literature. Early in my reading career I was unbiased. No book was safe from my all-consuming mind. Whether it was true crime, science fiction, poetry, basement-bargain schlockly horror, or good old-fashioned Western canon classics, I would read it. Time spent reading was time not spent exercising. This caused me to gain weight, another piece of lumber which my peers could throw on the fire to fuel their contempt for me.

            No matter how quiet I was in school or how hard I tried to stay out of their way, their anger  was drawn to me as if it had nowhere else to go. I would find myself suddenly assaulted by their verbal abuse. Sometimes I could have sworn the situation would lead to a fist fight. I had no idea how to fight. If such a melee had taken place then I would have to suffer the humiliation of being beaten for all to see, so before it could happen I started to study the martial arts. This began with judo after I finished my junior year in high school. (Once again I am shifting time out of sequence like a Tarantino film.) During this abuse I would imagine lashing out violently, breaking my assailant’s nose or jaw...yet in reality I merely sat there, hoping the episode would end soon and usually crying when I got home. My mother came across me one time while a crying session was drawing to a close.

            “ What’s wrong, honey?” she asked.

            “ Somebody was picking on me at school,” I said in a whiny teenage voice.

            “ Well, what did you do?” mother further inquired.

            “ I  didn’t do anything! I was just sitting there reading a book before class, and they started making fun of me!” I explained.

            Mother laughed after this discourse. With a dismissive wave of her hand she said,

“ Oh, honey, don’t be silly. You must have done something to make them pick on you.”

            Once again I tried explaining to her that I did  not do anything  to be an instigator, but she became cross with me and said she did not want to hear another word of it. This was so shocking to me that I went numb. My crying stopped immediately. Not even my mother was able to show me any sympathy. Here was not just family but one of the people who had actually given me life can you imagine, and no soothing words were coming forth from her. Mommy would not kiss the mental boo-boo and make it better. She had been given the chance and violently refused, telling me not to waste my time with my whining. Was this how my entire family would act toward me? As I grew older and spent holidays with my relatives, the answer to this inquiry became a clear and painful yes. With every year that passed I could feel them pulling further and further away from me. Never in my wildest nightmares could I have seen this coming. Nobody else would be my friend, but family would always be there...right? Before  birth I knew I would be a loner but I never thought I would be an orphan as well.

            My overweight problem was not too severe, but it was enough for my peers to make fun of me. Daydreams of violence continued and grew more extreme in nature, but they were just fantasies that helped me vent my  anger at my cowardice. I never thought of making them real. One day out of curiosity and boredom I rented a horror movie. Like I said my violent fantasies were vehicles of release. However, watching the graphic violence getting played out on the screen saved me even more dramatically from the tension in my mind. After watching the movie I felt healthier. So I rented more horror movies...and more...and more. Just like with reading I was indiscriminate when watching these films...whether they were high-quality big-budget studio horror films or cheap little quickies that four bowling buddies threw together over a weekend. No matter how much of a mess the movie was, I loved them all. Eventually I locked on to Fangoria magazine and learned more about what I was watching. Certain names quickly became familiar to me. Among them were David Cronenberg, John Carpenter, Stephen King (of course), Clive Barker, and Tom Savini. Through Fangoria I was able to discover the editors’ and contributors’ favorite classic and modern horror films. Consuming  their favorites helped me outline my own boundaries to define what I considered a good quality horror movie. Horror buff, video geek, fright fan...all these terms and more could be applied to me (and still can to this day). Soon I had consumed a tremendous amount of horror films, averaging approximately two each day. When I became more picky about what I watched this rate slowed down. Despite all the time I spent watching movies, my grades did not slip. As long as I am in a positive state of mind I will do exceptional in my schoolwork and it made me happy to watch these horror movies...pleased me to think about them after I was done, admiring the camerawork and the plot, the special effects and what (if anything) the movie meant. Of course I watched my share of exploitational fluff, movies whose details evaporated from my mind as soon as I hit the rewind button on my remote, but it was all good clean fun...a lot cleaner than some of the fun my peers were having. A few of them had already started their sex and drug escapades. At that age I took no interest in such things. Where was the sense inn getting so drunk that you could hardly stand up, could not remember anything, and were destined to feel like shit the next day? And sex! Out of all the information my parents gave me, the only sentence from them that I ever regarded as  words of wisdom had to do with sex. They said to me, “ Sex should happen only between two people who love each other.”

            This did not imply marriage. My parents were not opposed to premarital sex. As long as two people loved each other, sex was morally justifiable. Copulation without love was animalistic behavior. Animals fuck to continue their species. We are supposed to be better than animals. Later in life my stance on drinking and getting drunk would shift, but my thoughts on sex and love would never change. I made  a vow to never fuck a girl unless she loved me and I loved her. Of course that is not to say I kept this vow, but I   want it to be known that I did make it.

            Horror movie afternoons carried me into high school. My pessism had  reached its apex by the time I got there. Every day I thought about committing suicide. Aside from that, I hated my peers  as much as I hated myself. The jock and cheerleader clique especially pissed me off. They were an airheaded lot, foolishly preoccupied with physical perfection and superficial beauty...so concerned with fashion they were too blind to see how shallow they were. Even the people who were against the norm, those with whom I could most readily identify (the punks, the artsy freaks, the role-playing kids), had ideals which I could not understand or accept. Punks were too anarchistic. Art students were always dropping acid or smoking weed or doing even harder drugs. Although role-playing kids were more like me because they favored using their imaginations over vegetating in front of the television or sweating up a storm on the basketball court, they were social misfits without redemption. Perhaps I did belong with them. That was how it seemed at first. However, it was soon made clear to me that the world’s reaction to their awkwardness had injured their social skills. Now they refused to open up to people. They kept their distance because they were scared. For  months I hung out with them and still could not confide in them or call any one of them a  true friend.

            Freshman and sophomore years were quite uneventful. No girls ever looked my way twice unless they found me  so repulsive that they had to study this gross  deformity that is my face. My peers assumed I was gay, which was odd. How could I help that no females desired my intimate companionship? At night, however, when I masturbated I had them all in my bed. They sucked my cock, I licked their clits, I fucked their hot snatches, and then with some patience and a lot of lubricant I fucked them all in the ass...

even getting the more reluctant ones to let me take that path...and the sensations were so good from this that I propelled hot semen into their bowels...but in reality I was only drenching my own stomach with come. Around this time my loneliness was becoming unbearable. All I wanted was a girlfriend but none wanted me. My poetic skills were also developing at this time. During sophomore year I read T.S. Eliot’s “ The Wasteland” and William S. Burroughs’s Naked Lunch. These differing  styles forced me to realize what I had been missing. Actually, the first book to really make me change my mind about what literature was and what it could achieve was The Stranger by Albert Camus. Soon I was writing in a form that seemed to be a combination of all the works I had read, yet also possessed a voice of its own. The next step in my development would be to break away so that my voice and mine alone inhabited the words I wrote down.

            Junior year of high school. Still nothing doing. No friends, no girlfriend, no one in whom I could confide, still a misfit...still an outsider watching horror movies and mastur-

bating my life away. Teachers, hailed by my parents as the ultimate sources of wisdom, proved to be more centers of frustration. There were no exceptions. Everywhere I looked I saw that I  was alone. Verbal confrontations still pursued me. I knew if I were to stand up to my assailants that a fist fight would be sure to follow. Having never been in a fight I was unsure how I would handle myself. Surely the only result of a fist fight would be my physical humiliation. I had been badgering my mom for years to let me learn a martial art. Finally she relented. In the summer of 1993 I started to learn judo. Early June inserted me into a new environment: a place where respect was the first word on everyone’s tongue...except the head sensei’s. He seemed to be a laid-back man when I first met him. Gradually his behavior chipped away at this  facade. Sensei was arrogant, mocking other styles while promoting judo, and he also revealed himself to be a sexist pig as well as extremely  impatient. Perhaps the most humorous of these faults was his tendency to ridicule other styles, claiming they did not work and that only judo was street effective. And why is that? Why did his boasting strike me as being so hilarious? Because the judo he taught...the techniques I wanted so badly to perfect...would work in only one place: a judo tournament. Instead of a martial art, what I was learning was actually a martial sport.

            After a while I was so dissatisfied that I left judo, but not before earning a yellow belt. This was no great achievement because yellow is only one step above beginning white, but I was proud of myself...finally proud. My senior year of high school saw my literary skills put to use quite often. In class I wrote more poetry than notes. By this time I had read Ulysses by James Joyce and Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon, so I was trying to emulate what they had done. I was also reading up on martial arts now, and Bruce Lee’s writings (as well as articles on him) were my main focal point. Soon I learned that Bruce’s only teacher was an old Chinese fellow named Yip Man, who taught a fighting system which focused more on speed than power. That system was called wing chun kung fu. There was a wing chun school in Albany, but I was unable to find it. Instead I wound up joining a combination taichi/kung fu school. This also proved to be a letdown because what the guy taught was not kung fu and could not ever be street effective. What this school offered its students was something called wushu, a flashy and acrobatic “ fighting” style which can be used in combat only if you want to diffuse the situation by making your opponents laugh. By June of 1994 I had left that place.

            October 1994. I was attending college, SUNY at Albany to be exact. There was a Korean girl I had met. She was friendly enough despite occasional mental distance, but this did not bother me as much because I expected nothing different from her. People had been keeping their distance from me all my life, so I was used to it Although she claimed she had a boyfriend back home, it was apparent  with each conversation we  had that she was starting to like me. Finally, I thought, a human being is drawing close to me! She was lowering her guard for me! And I did not have to fake anything with her. Like Allen Ginsberg, I  had never been afraid to bare my soul to people...and yet this very admirable act of not hiding the self behind false beliefs and conformity was exactly what drove people away from me. But she was not pushing me away, at least not yet.

            In October I located the wing chun school. I attended a class and fell in love with the style right away. The style was close-range (punching and elbow distance) yet also had  methods it could use to handle long-range attacks. It  was not a strength-oriented style which was good because I am not that strong. Bruce Lee wrote many essays in which he said a martial artist should flow like water when he moves. Watching the smooth transition from attack to attack in wing chun let me know where Bruce had obtained this idea. Wing chun’s moments were brutally effective yet also quite beautiful. Another bonus was the number of forms: only three empty hand and three others (wooden dummy, pole, and butterfly swords). One brief discussion with my mom later, I had joined the class. This was finally the martial arts school at which I would remain. Off and on I had to drop out and come back to it weeks or months later due to time and money constraints, but I never lost my love for it...practicing whenever I had the chance, the only drawback being I could only practice the forms and shadowboxing. But it was better than not practicing at all.

            Because of Bruce Lee and the martial arts, I found myself reading more material from the East. Philosophical books like the Tao Te Ching and the Analects soon filled my library. My interest in China stemmed further than its martial arts. During the early years of my infatuation I absorbed China’s poetry, philosophy, and painting. Learning China’s history was a shocking wake-up call for me. How could a country be so hideous and so beautiful at the same time? This is a question I still cannot answer.

            Having lived in a household where religion was not very strong, these new philosophies I was ingesting were reshaping my mind. I definitely had an interesting mix of thoughts filling my head. Earlier in life, as I said, I had read The Stranger as well as very little bit of Being and Nothingness by Jean-Paul Sartre. Although I could not understand everything Sartre wrote, I knew I identified with what I could comprehend. Existentialist, Taoist, and even some Buddhist thought all sought for a way to combine into a new hybrid ideology in my mind. Another idea swirling through my beliefs  was the infamous religious figure of Jesus. Truthfully I never believed he turned water into wine or brought the dead back to life but I did believe there was a historical Jesus, and his message of universal love always intrigued me.

            Love, as we all know, is a strong emotion. And you have to be a very strong person in order to handle it. Or else it will tear you apart. Hatred is the polar opposite emotion but presents the same kind of scenario. If you cannot handle your hatred, there will be some nasty results that may not affect only you. It might spill out and hurt other people. Just look at Hitler. He and his followers were bitter men who did not know what to do with the anger that raged inside them. And look what happened.

            My interest in China pushed me to take several classes that dealt with Chinese

subjects once I reached college. Hardly any of my classmates were white, which showed me that I was pretty much alone in my curiosity. Being in proximity to Asian classmates meant the only females I got to know (and therefore wanted to date) were Asian girls which was a phenomenon that came about coincidentally. But some of my peers did not  see it that way. Soon a stereotype was placed on me. Suddenly people crowned me as one of those white guys who wanted to date only Asian women. People poked fun at me quite a bit about this. Years passed, and among most of my peers that image dissolved...but not before I dated this Korean girl whom I mentioned earlier.

            Surely this was a sign of hope, right? A girl...another human being...lowering their defenses so they could be close to me. Remember my rule to never believe such a situation was real? Well, once again it was momentarily forgotten...because I liked her, and I wanted this to be real...but this illusion did not last very long. We got in some silly argument one night and she stormed away mad. I tried calling her one night to heal the wound. She hung up on me. Writing her letters was also fruitless; she probably just threw them out.

            What had I done to drive her away for good? Was it really my fault or was she just a crazy over-reacting pain in the ass? It turned out later, after a great deal of analysis of the argument we had, that the latter was true but I had no way of knowing at the time it all went down. I could have sworn it was my fault. Every night I fell asleep dreaming of her. My chest felt hollow...like I had no heart. And it was true. I did not have my own heart...she did. Despite what happened it was still with her.

            When summertime came around again, my heart majestically returned to me. Once again I felt like a complete human being. Relationships looked like a decent idea again. In my sophomore year I wound up dating a half-Chinese half-Irish girl. For a while we really loved each other, so much in fact that we actually made love. She was my first, and I hers. All those lonely days and nights spent wondering what sex was like were finally answered. nothing spectacular, but that was probably because she was no good in bed at all. Please do not get me wrong, I am not trying to say I was great either. How could I have been? It was only my first time! But any woman should be able to make a guy reach orgasm; we get there in two minutes, but with her I very rarely came.

            This was my sophomore year of college. Not only  did I lose my virginity that year but I also met my best friend for life. He never knew it but he was like a big brother to me. His name was Jeff. Second semester he moved into my suite because the other guy had gone to Denmark for a study abroad program. One afternoon Jeff and I just sat down in the suiteroom and talked forever. It turned out he was from the Utica area. Another upstate New Yorker like me! That was a bonus because I was having such a hard time making friends among those Long Island and New York City kids. Jeff would turn out to be a true friend, and he would help me struggle through numerous ordeals.

            Jeff was there when this Chinese-Irish girl fell out of love with me. I drove her away because I was a jealous fool. She had gotten to do so many things that I had desired to do but could not because of money: travel around the world, go to concerts pretty much every other night, live in Manhattan, and numerous other details. I let my jealousy consume me. It burned so strong that the flames leapt off my fingertips when I reached out to touch her. She pulled away from the burn. Could anyone blame her?

            But then she kept going back and forth. She would dump me then get back with me, only to act distant...as if she were not my girlfriend. Then I would get dumped again. A week later she would come back again. My heart was torn to shreds because she kept bouncing me around like this...like I was an emotional yo-yo. As the second semester of my junior year came around she made it final that we were finished. Every night I fell asleep thinking of her. Once again there was that hollow sensation in my chest. Instead of calming down, I let my jealousy rage on. By the end of the year she did not even want to be friends with me anymore. But by that time I did not give a shit anymore. Eventually I came to the realization that as a person she was worthless...an arrogant know-it-all bitch who thought everything in the world started and ended with her. Arrogance is about as boring as the attitude all those Goth punk freaks have...that life is boring and pointless and blah blah blah and there is no point to love either so fuck whoever you can, pay no attention if you say to someone “ I’m your boyfriend/girlfriend” because relationships are meaningless. All this bullshit strikes me as dull dull dull.

            I still kept in touch with Jeff of course. We sort of lost touch over the summer but when my junior year started I ran into him and got his phone number. At that time he was living at a downtown apartment. During the second half of my junior year he gave me a phone number for a chatline/dating service called Quest. But even before that I had met someone through a service like that...met her in a chat room on the Internet. She lived in Arizona, and we hooked up. Her name was Mary, and she called me on that very first night we chatted. We talked. Without thinking ahead I decided to visit her on my spring break. My first time flying. Only drawback...she was fat...so goddamn repulsively fat. And annoying too. This girl lived all the way across the fucking country and expected me to be faithful to her. Sorry, slobs who live nowhere near my hometown do not inspire me to be a good little boy, not when I could be potentially scoring with a hot piece of ass from SUNY. Not only were there those two flaws but she was also starving for attention and was  damn selfish about getting it all from me. Even though Mary knew my finals were coming up she would still call me and say we had to talk about something and blah blah blah. When I tried to tell her I had responsibilities and had to go, she would start laying a guilt trip on me.

            “ Fine, go then. You’ve got responsibilities,” she would say in a sarcastic tone.

            Oh man I just wanted to reach through the phone and smack her.

            She asked  me why I never let her talk to me about religion. I told her because I was sick of religious freaks trying to push their beliefs on me. And I made her cry. But I did not, could not care. The fat cow kept saying oh we never talk you don’t know one dream I have not one dream. Well, you know what? I DON’T CARE EITHER!

            Anyway, as I was saying, Jeff gave the phone number for Quest. I called the

chatline to see what it was like. It was free for ladies. guys had to buy blocks of time via credit card. At first I resisted, content to just browse the system and hear the advertise-

ments people made for themselves. There were four ad categories, and each category had a sub-category for different age groups. Eventually I  bought myself a two hour block of time. Also I made myself an ad. These days I do not remember much from the early group of women who left me messages. none of them talk to me now. Some of them were not even old enough to be using the system (which means they were under eighteen). Others already had children or were pregnant. In other words, the early women were not all that appealing.

            The big break (and addiction to the line) came when I actually went on the chat line instead of just browsing the ads. Soon I was talking to local singles. This was so much better than an Internet chat room because not only could I hear their voices but I also knew they lived close to me. Some of them wanted my number. One woman, a Puerto Rican named Yvonne, gave me her phone number. We had phone sex and, a couple nights later, I visited her to make our conversation  real through our flesh. I fingered her ass with three digits but never got to do anal intercourse. A week later she just tossed me away. Out of nowhere this decision came, and I was not allowed a say in it. No explanation, no good bye, nothing....just a statement that I was not to call her anymore. Which hurt because I kind of liked her.

            From Quest I met two fifteen year olds, one from Troy and one from Rensselaer. There were three other girls Jeff and I met in Rensselaer, all of them very attractive, but it was no go...nothing happened. Later I met a fat disgusting housewife and her daughter. Jeff and I met a woman who wanted to have sex with two men to celebrate her thirtieth birthday; the experience was not satisfying for me. Tina from Latham did not like me, but Tina from Troy still calls every now and then. There was the repulsive Georgette whose sight was so obnoxious that I ran for the hills when I saw her. Heather from Cohoes claimed she was hot when all she really had were nice legs and ass. Jen from Menands

pretended to like me then never called again. Keisha was a cute black girl from Rennse-

laer but her mom was home, a real shame because I have never been with a black girl and really wanted to try her out. Cassandra actually became a girlfriend despite her obesity. She was the first to let me  fuck her in the ass. I was so desperate, so down on myself, and so convinced that I could get no better that I had to take her. Soon however her jealousy got on my nerves and I ditched the fat cow. Good fucking riddance too. One time all a girl did was say hello to me and Cassandra flipped out, going on a tirade like,

“ Oh I see you’ve got another girlfriend now!” and getting all mad just because another woman talked to me. Believe me, all you fat ladies of the world, when you are that huge you have got to struggle not to be annoying because you have no right. You are already

repulsive on the outside. Do you have to drive everyone away by having a shitty personality? Anyway I cut her loose, kicked her out of my life. Amelia was hot---a stripper---and therefore out of my league. Opal was nice but would not be honest and just tell me she did not want to date me. Instead she had to pretend things kept coming up. While Joanna and I were seeing each other (but were not boyfriend and girlfriend), I fucked Bobbie Jean...everywhere; she loved me in her ass the best. Coincidentally her ass was the best-looking part of her but her stomach fat nearly made me vomit. After our fuck I never called her again. Christine let Jeff, another Utica-area boy named Derek, and I take turns fucking her. Since I was the host, I let them go first. When it came to be my turn I once again fucked all three holes. Tiffany and Barb were okay for a while but soon got on my nerves. As days passed I lost interest in Tiffany (another huge on) and gained it in Terry who was supposedly not fat.

            The one. The one I was come to feel was meant for me. The one who heard of me through Joanna. The one for whom I felt such strong emotion that I severed my ties with Joanna and Tiffany. The one who said she loved me and that we belonged together. The  one who said she wanted to marry me someday. The one who told lies out her ass. The one who wanted me to take her anal virginity although I have reason to suspect I was not

really the first to do it to her. The one who said she was bisexual. The one who said she liked to be slapped and pushed around. The one who said she lived in Chicago but it was all a lie. The one who brought joy only to burn my house of happiness to the ground. The one the one the last one who I would let pull my heart out. The one the one the first one to experience any backlash from breaking me.

            Terry knew Joanna through a friend of a friend kind of arrangement, and the latter told the former what a great guy I was which inspired Terry to leave a message in my mailbox on Quest. She said I sounded interesting and she hoped to hear back from me. I gave her my SUNY number. Joanna got pissed and tried to say I was cheating just because I went to meet Tiffany in person, something that happened shortly after I gave my number to Terry...or maybe it was shortly before, I cannot quite remember. Then Joanna tried saying some bullshit about how she checked Terry’s mailbox and that I said to Terry I was single and all that. First of all shut your slutty little mouth, second of all I was single. That is what the little seventeen year old whore never understood. Maybe she can understand it now:

            We were not together, we only dated. Remember how I never returned your calls and never talked to you much even when you got a hold of me? That was because I was too much of a coward to say I had no interest in you. So I was hoping you would get the hint but clearly you did not. By the time you fucked Bob you were not my girlfriend...not in my mind anyway. And that was some very amusing info to hear...there you are accusing me of cheating just because I fucking MET someone in person, and you let some other guy fuck you. Well, I hear he has a big cock so I hope it fucking hurt. Oh yeah it is also interesting that you called ME disgusting when you found out I slept with Terry. What is more repulsive...a guy breaking up with a girl and then hooking up with said girl’s friend, or being a seventeen year old like Joanna and having slept with about thirty guys, as well as a few girls, and even engaging in a few threesomes?

            Well, I will let the reader judge that one for themselves. Goddammit, why does

my life have to be filled with annoying people? A little skank ho’ like that is gonna sit there and tell me I  am the repulsive one? Sorry, I think not. It was not long before I told her not to call me ever again. Not much longer after that Terry called me. Our first conversation was not very long. Also I sensed she did not act all that interested in me. The second time she called, however, Terry seemed nuts about me. Right from the start I was cautious about her. Our first conversation’s date was December 13, 1997. There are two reasons why I remember this date exactly: (1) Jeff and Derek had come down for one last weekend before Fall ‘97 semester ended; (2) I canceled meeting Terry on Tuesday December 16 because I had a paper due on the eighteenth.

            Although I was supposed to still be with Tiffany, I continued talking with Terry. She had phone sex with me during which she fingered her anus to reach orgasm. Terry told me she wanted me to be the first boy to fuck her in the ass. I told her the pleasure would be all mine. We kept in touch. I felt like I was only dating Tiffany, not actually with her exclusively. There was no boyfriend-girlfriend tie between us as far as I was concerned, so I did not consider it to be cheating when Terry and I had our first date and I had yet to tell Tiffany it was over.

            December 28, 1997. The first Sunday  after Christmas, Terry and I went to see a movie. I Know What You Did Last Summer, which many people were saying was just a poor Scream knockoff but I felt the film stood on its own two feet quite nicely. Terry gave me a hug when she saw me. She was kind of pretty, I thought. At the car I got her door for her as a gentleman should. When we got to the movie theater Terry bought me everything: my ticket, the candy, the soda. It was a thrill to have a girl that was actually thin like me so much. A thrill that could not last. Right from the start I sensed there was something wrong with the picture, but that was all my intuition told me. There was no telling what exactly what askew.

            At first I kept my physical distance. I was afraid because  I thought Terry and Joanna were conspiring to get revenge on me for what happened between Joanna and

I. But Terry kissed me first. She held me first. When the movie scared her, Terry pulled my arms toward her, directing them around her body to hold her when she got nervous. My left arm was misguided. Instead of going around her, my hand got caught on her breast. Neither one of us minded leaving it there. Our tongues explored our mouths more than our eyes explored the screen (although I really wanted to watch the movie because Sarah Michelle Gellar was in it). Terry was so warm. Holding her was like holding the sun. No boy in the world could not love that.

            The movie ended around quarter to nine. Terry and I went out to my car. She leaned across the seat and kissed me, pushing her tongue roughly into my mouth.  I returned the gesture happily. When I pushed my arms around her, I could actually touch my hands behind her back...could even reach far enough to touch the opposite elbow. No one can understand the relief I felt. Finally, a skinny girl was with me. Physically the best girl I had been with was Christine from Middleburg, but aside from a bit of tummy Terry was perfect. And anyway physical matters made no difference here. It was her personal-

ity to which I was attracted. My hand slipped inside her jeans to feel her firm ass.

            She loved my attention. We had been discussing her ass and all that I would do to it for weeks. Now I cupped her asscheeks in my hands. The movie crowd was still filtering out and walking by us. Their presence did not disturb us. I licked one of my fingers while Terry kissed my neck. Very gently I pressed my finger into her ass. Terry gasped. At first I thought I had hurt her. When she responded by kissing me harder I knew she was enjoying it.

            This was what I had always wanted...to be a lover, not a fighter. Despite my wishes I had been forced into confrontations all my life. Finally I was loving someone. I was loving her.  My beauty queen. That was what I christened her...that night of all nights which saw more passion flow through my heart than all the nights spent with my other girlfriends put together.

            Passion. Passion for her, for Terry. Passion for the heart that pulsed behind her

ribs, the brain that hummed inside her skull. Passion for the hands and lips that greedily explored my body. Passion for the lips between her legs that became increasingly saturated as I kissed and touched her. Passion burning and urging me to rip off her clothes right there and slam my cock in and out of her lovely shaved pussy...the pussy of a thousand  years, pussy of a young woman dying to find herself, pussy of falling stars and crumbling planets, pussy meant to belong to my cock and trembling in its longing to be branded by me...just desiring beyond all belief to feel me enter her...to spill my warm fluid into her and douse the fire in her loins.

            We took a break from making out. It was only nine o’clock. She was on winter break, so Terry did not have to be home until eleven. At this point my beauty queen was only seventeen, soon to turn eighteen. Despite her age she was still in high school and condemned to the torture of having to simultaneously complete her junior and senior year. At least that was the story she gave me. There was also another story from her about the time when she had a drum set and was in a band. Another tale (which I never really believed) was that she worked at a nursing home and earned $500 a week. All I could think when Terry said that was: okay, whatever. One final tale (which she told me back when I had no reason to believe Terry would lie to me) was that there was a time back in the mid- to late-’80s when she lived in Chicago. Wait a minute...let me start a new paragraph for this one...this deserves it...it is quite a whopper of a lie...but, like I said, at the time there was no reason not to believe it.

            Terry told me she used to live in Chicago. The time frame was the mid- to late-

‘80s as I have already said. Imagine the year 1988 if you will. Many people do not know how significant this year was. However, a Smashing Pumpkins fanatic like myself remembers that 1988 was the year when two unknown young men (Billy Corgan and James Iha) played a small and somewhat unsuccessful set in a club called the Cabaret Metro. Back then Billy played bass, James played guitar, and they used a drum machine. What Terry claimed was that she saw them play for the first time and talked to them once their set ended. Of course the tall tale would not be complete if she did not say she got the autographs of both Pumpkins. And she did say that. (Later in our relationship she also said she sucked face with Marilyn Manson and that it was even on the evening news. Yeah, okay...like your overprotective parents would not have flipped out and grounded you for the rest of your life!)

            When I mentioned this story to my SUNY roommate Theo, he told me to ask her to bring the autograph to see when I met her. But what would that prove? First of all I have no way of knowing what Billy Corgan’s handwriting would look like, so there would be a question right off the bat of whether or not the letters were shaped the way he would write them. Second there would be the question of how old the signed article really was. How could she prove that it was really from the 1988 show and not sometime later? Right from the start I was teetering on the edge of trusting her or not. Perhaps if I have decided not to trust her, my life would not have taken the horrible path that it has traveled.

            Travel. My mind has known more cities, countries, worlds, and galaxies than my body will ever see. This journey has been  quite a lonely one. Why did it have to be that way? Please tell me why I have to feel distanced from everyone just because I happen to be a writer? No, let me tell you why. It is because Americans still support this silly, stupid romantic notion that a person can be a writer or poet (or both) only if that person is possessed by genius. William Blake and T.S. Eliot were two poets who believed they were geniuses. America needs badly to be  affected by the Dada spirit that anyone can write a poem because this notion of the poet genius is driving me crazy. That is another stereotype that upsets me: the crazy poet, a.k.a. the mad genius, or the poet who writes from some intense suffering which they experience. John Berryman led a fucked up life on purpose so he could have material for his poems. Poetic genius my ass! If he were intelligent then he would not have done the things he did!

            Terry and I went back to my place because we had two hours left together and

I did not know what else to do. It was approximately 9:30 by the time we got there. She and I went to my room where our kissing and fondling resumed. Then my queen had to use the bathroom. I stretched out on my bed and waited for her return. The light was on. When she came back Terry shut the door tightly. Before I knew it the light went out and she jumped on top of me. Now Terry was kissing and dryhumping me, grinding her sweet cunt into me while her tongue ravaged my throat.

            “ I’m coming,” she moaned. “ I’m coming.”

            “ You’re so perfect,” I said,” so beautiful.”

            “ No I’m not...I’m no good, no good at all.”

            This kind of talk upset me. I asked her to stand up. She did. We were making out again. I was undressing her as we kissed. Soon we were both naked from the waist up. My hands eagerly explored her body.

            “ You see? Look at your body,” I whispered in her ear. “ This body is gorgeous, you are gorgeous.”

            She opened her pants and grabbed at my cock to stroke it. I returned the favor by rubbing her clit. Her baggy pants easily fell away from her body. Once again my fingers returned to the task of massaging her still-soaked pussy. So beautiful. Every part of her. Perfect. Mind’s eye could no longer see any other woman daring to be with me like this. There was no doubt in my mind that I could enjoy waking up to see her face every morning.

            Now Terry moved over to the bed. I stood behind her, my hardon touching her thigh while I kissed the base of her neck. Then Terry bent over. Very gently I entered her from behind, slowly gaining speed until I was  fucking her hard. She wanted me to finger her ass while I fucked her. So I did and I accidentally hurt her, and Terry begged for me to stop all sexual activity. Upset at myself for hurting her I swiftly pulled out my softening cock...shrinking because I could not be hard with pleasure when I brought such pain to visit her flesh. We got dressed. The time was approximately quarter after ten...

almost time to go. Dwelling in the twitches of Terry’s face were indications that worry was holding her mind captive.

            “ What’s wrong? “ I asked, rubbing my hand up and down her back while delivering a swift kiss to her cheek.

            “ I’m worried I won’t make it home on time.” she said.

            Apparently her mother was more protective than I thought.

            “ Don’t worry,” I said,” because if we leave now you’ll be home with twenty minutes to spare.” Her worry seemed to dissolve and she kissed me. We went to her house. On the porch I gave her a cosmic good night kiss. Refusal to move registered in my  lips...not wanting to release her mouth.

            But the magic had to be shattered.

            When I got back to my apartment I opened my top dresser drawer. (Yes, my apartment...not my dorm room...because I had moved off-campus for the last semester of my SUNY career.) I studied the gun which I had carefully placed beneath several pairs of socks. I bought it when I had moved into my apartment with my friends because the neighborhood in which we lived was a bad one. As if that was not bad enough, the lock on our front door broke. Every time we went out the front door had to be left wide open. My slothful roommates were taking their time replacing it and I had no job so therefore no money to get us a  new one. Actually it should have been the landlord’s job to get it replaced. Apparently one of my friends did indeed mention it to the landlord. Seeing as how the lock was still not fixed, I assumed they were ditching their responsibilities.

            At night I always went out to practice my marksmanship; the night I met Terry was no different. There were some woods by my mom’s house, which was less than ten minutes from my apartment. I was born and raised in Troy. Originally I had hoped to move to a place in Albany, but my friends got a place still in our hometown and I had to make a fast decision. Initially I was unsure what to do. Then I figured I ought to hop on the chance to move out so I could finally experience what it was like to live on my own,

and later on I could get a place in Albany if the opportunity came. Until then I would still dwell in my place of birth. Jeff and I wanted a place in Albany because we wanted to keep going to the bars which all the SUNY students frequented. He was trying to get a job down in Albany but it was tough. Those plans did not ever advance.

            Target practice at night. I thought it was better to do it then instead of during the daytime  because there was no one else around, and also because my theory was that if I could a bull’s-eye in the dark then I would probably be an even better shot in the light. Sometimes I would have to run away from my practice because neighbors, hearing the shots, would call the cops. (These woods were not as secluded from civilization as I would have liked them to be.) Everything about Troy is a joke, including the police, because even a schmuck like myself was able to escape. They never caught me when I went out shooting. Not once.

            In my dreams I was once again having every woman I wanted . I dreamed of a young woman who used to sit in front of me in an English class I had taken at SUNY, her hair dangling from her scalp like strands of sunlight...containing a light all its own. At the end of the dream my crowning sexual achievement was Terry. The most beautiful lady with which I had ever been. Best piece of ass. Neurosis please let my body go and let my mind be unleashed from your grasp because I need no worries now, nothing to shame or stain or rearrange my brain into alien shapes that confuse me into paranoia, and from this paranoia I proceed straight into doubt, not stopping to think and just heading there, heading on a path which oblivion has marked eternally as its own.

            These were the days of perfection, the days of a wonderful love that I could see lasting forever. Jeff mocked me in typical Jeff fashion. He said Terry and I would not last long. My friend, knowing my recent history with Joanna and Tiffany, predicted I would become bored with Terry very quickly. No way, I told him, this could be the girl. Ah you always say that, Jeff replied.

            Little did he know how right he was. Terry and I would indeed come to an abrupt end, but no one...not even the almighty psychic Jeff...could have predicted the exact way in which this relationship came to its conclusion.

            I have always been the typical angry young man. But with Terry the rage had at last subsided. It was not entirely gone, mind you, but it was a time when I felt at peace with myself. She made life beautiful again at a time when it looked all dull and gray and incredibly hopeless.

            A few days later Terry and I were finally at my place again. We had been hanging out almost every day since that night we met. On New Year’s Eve she had wanted me to be with her but I had already made plans to be with Jeff, plans which I did not think would come true but they did, and I finally made my trek up to Utica; after all those times he had come to see me it was now my turn to make the lonely journey. She was saddened by my absence because New Year’s was also her birthday, but what was I supposed to do? Let down my best friend of two years for a girl I had known for two weeks? Friends are supposed to be forever. Relationships come and go. I elected to go to Jeff’s house. Although I felt bad, my decision to go actually worked in my favor. At the time I did not realize it, but I was playing hard to get. It was quite unintentional, and it also made Terry pursue me even more passionately. Unfortunately, when I became conscious of the fact that she liked me, my hard-to-get behavior vanished without my approval. Once it was gone I could not get it back. This caused irreparable damage to the intensity of Terry’s feelings toward me.

            To be adored, to experience another human being expressing physical and emotional affection toward me, to know there is no wall between my  soul and another’s, to feel how freely the emotions flow from me to that other person, to have the message scratched into the very core of my heart and mind that I am the only one she loves and the only one with whom she wants to be and the only  one she wants to make love to her and the only one whose sole company she prefers to anyone else...that is all I want which

is not really a whole hell of a lot, the only desire filtering through my thoughts that is actually worthy of my time, the only one I want to be real...the only one I always pursue and the only one I am constantly denied. My purpose in life is to fulfill this dream before I die. Leave it to me to have a dream that I cannot realize without the help of another human being! And just at a time when the amount of horrible people in the world is at an all-time high! These days you cannot trust anyone. You could be acquainted with a person for years and think you know them inside and out, but then out of nowhere they betray you  the first chance they get...especially if that betrayal allows them a chance to better their lives financially or otherwise. Liars are everywhere and everyone. Back in the

day I used to automatically give people my trust and hope they did not do anything to prove they did not deserve it. Now people have to earn my trust first. Jeff taught me to be skeptical with new people and information they give me...taught me to question them to death and then some before I believed what they told me. He gave me a form of interrogation not unlike that used by the police who drill a suspect repeatedly, hoping their story will change and give them the clue they need to either convict the suspect or to pursue further investigation.

            As I was saying, Terry and I were finally alone in my bedroom again. It all started out so innocently. Just the two of us on my bed watching a movie. She on her left side on my bed, myself in a similar position and close behind her and my right arm across her stomach, my left arm who knows where...I cannot remember. Her right hand covered mine like paper covers rock. Terry rubbed our hands back and forth across her belly. I watched her face watching the movie and realized in her features true beauty...true love. At least that was what I saw there at that moment. And I wanted desperately to believe it was not all going to fade and that it was not an illusion and that in future mornings when the sun rose to make the sky bleed a pink hue across its morning flesh I would see her face feel her figure lying beside me. There was no reason for me to doubt this  would all come true. My lips caressed the soft, warm flesh at the base of her neck while these thoughts raced through the movie screen of my mind. Words were so dangerous to use yet I whispered them to her anyway, depositing them in her ear like a flooding river dropping minerals into the soil on its banks.

            “ I love you, Terry,” I said while my heart pounded out in a rhythm that spelled out a mating call to which she responded.

            Terry turned her head so her lips could get a hold of mine. “ I love you, too,” she said. Her voice was full of the fire and strength it takes to weigh the air down with such words. Once again, where was my reason to doubt all this?

            Her body soon followed her head in turning toward me. She turned into a full embrace all while her lips kept careful track of mine, making sure to hold on during the transition. And lying there in her arms I knew, I knew who I was and every place I had been, knew what I had thought of myself when I was a pure angel hovering in my mother’s womb and knew it was wrong, knew all those afternoons spent sleeping did not matter, knew that all those neighborhood baseball and basketball games I missed did not matter, knew that the melody of my soul was shining, knew that I could live up to the declaration I had made, that I was the best person she had or ever would have as a boy-

friend, knew I made my mistakes but the honesty I so desperately valiantly promote helps to  soften the blow of my errors, knew and knew for sure at that moment that Terry and I would love each other, knew that the rivers of my heart were there for you to swim Terry only you I swear it the devotion was all for you.

            So what was I to do other than cut my ties with all the other women that wanted me (yes it does sound strange to hear me myself being Steve Grogan saying women wanted me), of which there were two, they being Tiffany and Joanna, two women who already had children and therefore were in a situation to which I did not want to attach myself. There was basically no trouble involved in cutting Joanna out of my life. Nobody would have a problem telling her to fuck off. With Tiffany there was some difficulty because I had no reason to end it. She was doing nothing wrong...but there was her kid and the fact that  she was on welfare and the fact that she always did things that common sense should have let her think hey maybe this would upset Steve and yep you got it she went ahead and did those things anyway...things like calling me Saturday morning at five a.m. when she knew she knew she KNEW  I had been  out until three the night before, things like allowing her psychotic friend Barb to get a hold of the phone number at my apartment so she could prank me all times of day and night, things like not disciplining her son properly so that she would always have to bring him along when she and I went out (because no one else would tolerate the little brat enough to watch him for a few hours) and sometimes he would come back to my place with us and the little snot NEVER KNEW HOW TO KEEP HIS HANDS OFF THINGS and he was always breaking things, one time even breaking a glass that did not belong to me and caused hell to be raised between myself and one of my roommates. Once I reconsidered all these flaws it was easy to tell Tiffany our relationship was finished. Of course that does not mean she gave up. For the next few weeks she kept calling me. Twice she showed up at my apart-

ment unannounced and uninvited. One time Terry was upstairs with me; the other time Tiffany was retarded enough to bring Barb with her. Great, just what I fuckin’ needed...

that psychotic bitch knowing where I lived. As if I did not already feel like my life was hell! Barb started prank-calling my apartment. This was the most unbearable part of the whole ordeal because all my roommates were pissed at me. Against my will I had to get back in touch with Tiffany because at this point I did not know who the prankster really was. Thanks to Tiffany I had the information that Barb was the caller and also that the nutcase had said to Tiffany, “ Steve better watch his back. I’m gonna have someone slash his tires.”

            “ Well, Tiffany, I thank you for leading that bitch right to my front door. What the hell were you thinking when you brought her along that day? First of all, you showing up uninvited was bad enough, but then the second time you also brought fuckin’ Barb with you! Just what the fuck were you thinking?! No, hold on...don’t say a word, because I

already know the answer...you weren’t thinking at all!!” All this I unleashed in one furious breath with no interruptions no pauses no breaks no  place where Tiffany could get a foothold and stop my raging.

            And what was her big, heart-stopping, dramatic response?

            “ Well, I’m sorry I brought her to your apartment...but I did it and it’s done... What do you want me to do?”

            “ That is all you have to say for yourself?” She was silent. I laughed. “ Well then, why don’t you at least tell me why you brought Barb over?”

            I had to ask this question because even though I had been home when the two of them came over that day, my roommates covered for me and said I was not there. When Tiffany asked how my car was there and I was not, my roommate Wayne said my mom had picked me up early that morning because we had to go do something together. So I had to pretend that I had really been out that day and that my roommates had told me her and some girl they did not recognize had stopped by for me.

            Tiffany’s response to my inquiry was, “ Well I needed to talk to you and Barb had something to say to you too.”

            Anger was the only emotion vibrating throughout my soul once I was given that explanation. “ Goddammit, I don’t care if Barb had to tell me the meaning of life! I don’t have anything to say to her or you! I said you and I are over, finished, through! What part of that don’t you understand?! Now that psychotic bitch knows where I live!”

            Once again all she could say was that she was sorry and what was done was done  and what did I want her to do she could not undo her past actions. I wanted to smash the phone, wanted to slam my head against a wall, wanted to shake the hell out of the fatass until she realized what a pain in the ass she was.

            “ What do I want you to do? How about I want you to start using a little more common fucking sense, eh? I want you to stop doing things that you know...that you know...will piss me off, goddammit! I mean, you do so many inconsiderate things and then get surprised when I get pissed at you...which leads me to believe  that in your mind you never even think that your actions might make me angry!” I paused only because I had not caught a sufficient amount of air before starting my speech.

            She apologized again. I  wanted to tell her to just shut the fuck up and enjoy her miserable life without me because that was the last call I was going to make to her. Tiff reminded me that a long time ago she had warned me that giving Barb my phone number would bring me nothing but trouble. So I countered with the logic that if she had not given or allowed Barb to get a hold of my apartment phone number, this whole episode would have ended when I moved out of my mom’s house because I know my mom gives my number out only to those people who I tell her are approved. If she is unsure if a person is okay in my book, then she does not give them my phone number. Thanks to Tiffany, Barb would never be out of my life unless I moved again.

            But I could not move again. For me to move would be to say Barb had scared me and I bent over to the desires of my fear. As a decent human being I should be able to live where I want without these kind of hassles. Something should be done to make this nonsense stop. There is no reason why I should have to put my life all out of whack for a psychopath like Barb. How was I supposed to conduct my life normally if this harass-

ment continued? Could I even say I had a normal life? Would I ever be allowed to feel comfortable in my new home?

            Actually I was surprised Terry could feel comfortable with me at all that second day at my place. Now that I think about it, I do not think that was the time Tiffany had shown up like the stalker she was. (Sorry about the mix-up of details there...my memory must be slipping, which is quite unusual because I can usually recall these kinds of things with ease.) That second day with me was the day, believe it or not, that our passion for one another hit its highest level. Not a good sign, you say, if a relationship hits its peak that quickly. Believe me when I say that I agree with you one hundred per cent. I had no way of knowing we would head downhill from there.           

            Her lips and body were so firmly in my grasp, manipulated by the pleasure I was giving its owner. However, for all the enjoyment she felt, I had none of my own. I did not even care because I am not the kind of man who comes to orgasm  quickly. When I get a girl in bed I enjoy taking a long time. Sometimes I never even reach orgasm and the lovemaking ends when we are both too tired to continue.  The sensation of her in my room already had made me erect, but having her in my arms had my cock straining to get out of its prison. All in good time, my friend. Soon her upper torso was bare  to my roaming hands, and mine to hers. So open to accept something to fill them, my hands went to her breasts. My lips kissed their way down her body kissing her belly source of her shame fingers wrapping her body so warm and tight firm ass and legs so wonderfully devoid of excess cellulose a landscape of beauty to me.

            She upon her back, legs spread, my tongue exploring her pussy and mixing my saliva with her juices. Meanwhile I had put my hands to work releasing my cock from its denim trap. After licking her to orgasm and completely removing my jeans, I wiped my mouth dry and kissed Terry. Then we switched positions in every sense of the phrase. Now I was on my back, now Terry was putting her tongue to use giving my cock a good old-fashioned tongue lashing. Although it was not the best I had ever received, she was not terrible. Moments later Terry was climbing up my body. A kiss occurred between us while she took hold of my cock to guide it into her as she lowered her pussy down to me. My flesh tingled all over my body as my cock sank into her slippery cunt. Slowly she let herself accept my entire length and then began moving up and down. To avoid feeling like a lazy boring partner I took hold of her hips and thrust up into her, timing myself with her movements or else I might accidentally slip out (which happened a few times  anyway). With one hand I reached between us to massage her clit while my other hand reached back to squeeze her ass. I was nervous to do anything more than that because I remembered having hurt her the last time.

            However, I figured it would be better for us to get back into the swing of things,

so without further ado I stuck the middle finger of the ass-grabbing hand into my mouth and got it all good and slick with saliva. At first I just rubbed it up and down the crack of her ass, briefly passing over the virgin passage. Gradually I found my nerve and pushed my fingertip into her. She did not seem to mind it so my finger’s adventure continued some more. Soon my entire digit had slid up her ass. Terry had not made one complaint during the whole process. On the contrary, she was gasping for more. The action of my cock, my finger on her clit, and the other finger in her ass sent her rocketing into a series of orgasms that poured over her like rain.

            Like Henry Hill said in the gangster movie Goodfellas, it was a glorious time. A time when the tightest, sweetest, and hottest pussy in the world was holding my cock. Its owner was happy to accept my flesh as a visitor. Find absolutely no comfort in misery again, my son! Here is a young woman whose flesh, mind, and soul all ache and sweat and groan and strain for you! And you alone! No more crying in the dark or pursuing shadows that your mind created! On top of your prick there is a physical reality to smash all your dreams, to help them crash into the waking world. Love is riding your cock of youth and honesty.

            Love is asking you to fuck her in the ass. There is nothing too disgusting or too unusual when I am with her. She could even ask me to lick her ass and it would not make me feel sick. Every act with her is an act of lovemaking. Even though I am about to have anal intercourse with you Terry it will still be making love with you.

            Brutal honesty, total honesty. No other way to go really, not for me anyway. I cannot help it...cannot help showing who or what I am when I speak or when I write or when I play guitar or when my body relaxes into sleep. The act of revealing myself. If I think of a sentence that embarrasses me then I immediately write it on the page. This is what I am doing here...what I am doing right now as my pen speaks and you read what-

ever it is that wanders through my head, marches down my arm, spreading into my fingers, and jettisoning out of the pen. You read me, my friends, as I recount the day when Terry climbed off my cock and told me to stand up. She stood up with me and, as always, we shared a brief kiss before moving on to other things.

            “ Get on your hands and knees,” I said.

            And she did as I asked. There was her wonderfully firm ass hovering before me. I squirted some lubricant out on my right hand and rubbed it generously across her asshole. Meanwhile I was insider her pussy again because I did not want to go limp while I was waiting until she was sufficiently lubricated. Finally I thought she was ready.

            Terry was a bit taller than me so it was very difficult to find a way to maneuver myself into her. I pushed and kept slipping down into her pussy or up so that my cock was just resting in the crack of her ass. After a while I got the idea to put my left leg up on the bed. For whatever reason (for I am not sure myself) that did the trick. Now I had that extra inch to give my cock access to her ass.

            Slowly I pushed into her. This, for those of you who did not know it, was the first time I was really ever with a girl who did not weigh a ton, so therefore it was also the first time I was able to see what happened as I entered. Her asshole blossomed slightly, just enough to let me in. Terry was quiet as the penetration began. No sounds indicating pain or pleasure passed her lips. Without any sign to tell how she felt I did not know how I should proceed...or if I should continue at all. I decided to press on, moving myself in deeper so that the entire head of my cock went into her.

            Still nothing from her. I said, “ Let me know if I should go in anymore, honey. You’ve got to tell me when to push more in. I don’t want to hurt you.”

            “ Keep going,” she said. I inserted a bit of my shaft into her, not much past the head. “ Keep going.” More in, maybe halfway to completion. “ Go on.” Some more...

almost done now. “ Go.”

            All the way in now. There I stood and there she knelt...well, crouched...on the

bed...my cock fully embedded in her ass and no movement or sounds passing between us.

Just the unification of flesh to communicate.

            “ How’s that?” I asked with concern.

            “ It hurts,” she said.

            While pulling out I said, “ Geez, Terry, why didn’t you say something? I told you I did not want to hurt you and then you let me go ahead and do it. Why did you tell me to keep going if it was hurting you?”

            “ I don’t know...I like pain...just didn’t realize how much I could take before it wasn’t pleasurable anymore,” she said. “ Wait a minute, you...we’re not gonna give up today, not yet. Let’s try it like this.”

            She lied down on her right side facing the wall facing away from me where I stood astonished mouth agape at my surprise that she wanted to try it again. I got behind her on the bed. My right arm slid around her to grab her breasts. Kissing her neck helped to get her horny so I started that activity. Meanwhile down below my left hand steadied my  cock to guide it into her ass. Gently again gently as  I always am I pressed into her. But most of you never knew this gentleness. Most of you never even gave me the time of day. This time her hole opened more readily to accept me. Something about this position made it easier for her, and she could take it at a faster rate, as if she had been practicing anal sex for months. But I was her first (or so I was told but with a lying whore like Terry I could not be sure, but what I mean as I always do is that at the time I had no reason to believe this was a lie). Terry told me to keep going...told me that it felt really good. Soon I was all the way inside again...the only thing absent was  the pain.

            “ Oh God,” she moaned,” that feels so good.”

            “ Are you sure?” I asked. “ It doesn’t hurt at all?”

            “ No,” she  said.” Now fuck me.”

            Carefully...slowly...yes, one could even say gently...I started to pump my cock in and out of her ass. As soon as I began, Terry was groaning. She was short of breath. It

was incredible to experience first-hand how much anal sex turned her on once it did not hurt. The tightness of her pussy had been wonderful, but the grip of her until-now virgin ass on my flesh was even more mind-blowing.

            I thought of fucking her the way I think of target practice. Getting my cock into her was just like aiming my gun. Fucking her was like testing the wind and generally just getting ready to pull the trigger. Firing a shot would mean not only my orgasm but hers as well. That day I got off two rounds because Terry screamed (and rather quickly) that she was going  to come. Immediately I set about playing with her clit while continuing to fuck her in the ass.

            “ Oh God...oh God...I’m coming, I’m coming!” Terry howled.

            My whole body was on fire. I thought of how turned on she was and how turned on it made me feel...this hot girl not only wanting me but letting me be the first to fuck her in the ass...this act now a reality as we lay on the bed side by side. Someday I would be a legend...a rock and roll legend, a filmmaking legend, a literary legend...and I wanted this beauty to be there to share the glory of fame with me. All these thoughts caused the fever in every limb to suddenly surge right into my cock, flooding every nerve end to the breaking point and I was orgasming, releasing a tremendous amount of semen into the condom. It seemed my ejaculation would never cease. My muscles kept spasming even when the last squirt had emptied into the rubber. Feeling my come as it made the condom expand sent Terry into another orgasm. Despite the fact that I was spent beyond belief my cock refused to soften. Maybe it was because I was still inserted in the environment of her anus. At least that was my theory, so I tried pulling out.

            Terry protested. “ I want to feel you shrink inside me.”

            What was I to do, deny the lady her request? There was no choice. I had to please the young woman and let my penis remain inside her. It took quite a while for me to soften. Until then we remained there in each other’s arms, the sweat of my chest and stomach mingling with the sweat of her back. Thanks to the outpouring of the two of us the sheets had become drenched. My lips were at her neck and jawline. She was smiling and giggling. The world was perfect and we were perfect. We were beautiful. For a moment I believed love could be true. That moment was suspended in time. Eventually I was too soft to remain inside her. Terry sighed as I slipped out of her.

            “ Mm, even that felt good,” Terry said. She turned to face me and pulled me into an embrace again. “ I’m glad you were my first.”

            “ I love you, Terry.”

            “ I love you too,” she said while kissing my cheek.” We were meant to be together.”

            At the time she said it I could believe it. I wanted it to be real. Never before  had I given two shits if a relationship crashed and burned. This was the only one I ever wanted to work. And work for a while it did indeed as we cruised the highways and backstreets of love. Who can give me a hip hop bebop jazzy snazzy beat to which I can write my happy snappy prose. Alone, no sir not for ages because I had Terry to hold my hand...

had Terry to hold me...had Terry to kiss me in the movie theater when we should have been paying attention.

            We saw each other every day while our vacations lasted. Hers was much shorter than mine. Afternoons of loving, Terry on top and going wild, even asking me to put my cock in her ass if you can believe that one. Wild desires that I could not comprehend or approve of. She was suicidal. Low self-esteem. As an extension of this she was very submissive  in bed (which explains her requesting me to sodomize her, the most submissive act in which a woman can engage). Terry liked to be pushed around and told what to do, liked to have her hair pulled and get smacked around a bit. Bondage, whips, pain...all kinds of weird shit turned her on, but we never covered that ground. All she did was tell me about them. To be honest I did not like hearing about her sexual past. Yet she never seemed to hear me asking her to please stop  talking about it. The girl was a space cadet. Sometimes Terry just did not get it...meaning she had no clue what was going on

or what life was all about or what it meant to be a decent person. Have you ever met anyone who had no clue what they were doing? Despite all her faults I still wanted it to work. Even though she was clinically diagnosed as having depression (which caused her emotions to go on and off like a light switch), I wanted to be strong and tough it out with her...wanted to be there for her.

            I could have been, goddammit I could have been strong enough, but she had to fuck it up, had to deny, had to lie, had to wear a mask and put on an act that I blindly accepted as the truth. This is all knowledge which you the audience shall know. Imagine if you will a typical Sunday on which Terry and I were hanging out. She got into my car and said we had to talk...said we had to be friends until June...said her mom and dad told her she could not date anyone...said I could date other people if I wanted to but she was going to stay single and concentrate on her schoolwork...said it was her parents’ idea because she was failing almost every class...said she would wait for me...

            WAIT FOR ME!!!      

            “ I want a compromise now,” I said. “ If I have to keep my hands to myself and wait until June, then I want to ask that this ‘ just friends’ deal goes into effect at midnight tonight. What I mean is we’ll stay boyfriend-girlfriend until then...the rest of today.”

            “ All right,” she said.

            I wanted this because I was so damn horny for her that day. All I wanted was to be with her one more time. June would be a long wait until I could make love to her again. As the day turned out I was to be denied my one last wish. She would not even really make out with me. Ever since the passing of our first week together, her physical show of affection had almost completely disappeared. One time I had the nerve to confront her about that.

            “ Why is it you were all over me at first? What changed?” I asked.

            “ Nothing. That’s just the way it always happens with me. My old boyfriend Chas used to complain about that all the time.”

            “ Well, can you blame him? It’s not normal for affection to drop so fast if everything still is the same between us, as you insist it is. I really don’t understand you sometimes,” I countered.

            But she pulled a childish trick and just started to hum some tune I did not know, pretending she did not hear me. Go ahead and fake it, you bitch. You may have had me fooled at first, but the blindfold is gone now and forever. I know what kind of a person you are.

            That Sunday, our last day as boyfriend and girlfriend, we saw a movie. I forget what it was although I think it might have been Starship Troopers. There was a love element in it  which frustrated me because on the screen these two people were getting what they wanted: each other’s intimate company. What the hell was I getting? An eternal wait until June, a chance to sit beside the one I desired and say she was a friend when I wanted to say she was so much more. We shared one long kiss during the movie. Under any other circumstance it would have been wonderful. But the knowledge of our relationship’s termination was the most frequent thought in my head. The kiss might as well have not happened because it meant nothing.

            Jeff  was coming from Bridgewater that day because there was a band coming to Albany (Marcy Playground) and he wanted to see them. They had recently released a single (“ Sex and Candy”) which became quite a hit on the local radio stations. Because of that fact, Terry and I called it a day kind of early. No stops back at my place, no parking in vacant lots to have one more heavy make-out session, no promises of not dating or having sex with anyone else until we got back together in June. She would not even go the show with me because she did not like the band. So all I could do was drop her off then go back home to wait for Jeff to arrive.

            First I stopped at a sports store on my way. I had been longing to buy a holster for my pistol, a product which I found easily once I  got there. Also that day I bought a switchblade. My skills with my gun transferred surprisingly well to knife-throwing, but I was far from perfect so I kept working at it all day, hitting a target I hung in my mom’s basement. Sometimes I moved the target so I could throw the knife at different angles and distances. As you can imagine my space was quite limited, but it was better to get some kind of practice rather than none at all.

            I thought of Terry all while I practiced with the blade. Why were things between us suddenly falling apart? The more I thought about it, the more angry I became. Rather than seeing the target I started to see Terry’s face. That was when I knew it was time to take down the target and call it a day. Not a good idea to keep going when you are seeing the knife sink into your girlfriend’s eye. Upstairs in my old room I decided to create a leather wrist holster for my blade. The holster could be covered by a long-sleeve shirt and thus conceal the weapon. To see how well it worked I held my hands behind my head and took out the blade. After some practice I was able to take it out so smoothly that not even I could see my hands moving when I studied myself in the mirror.

            The next day, Monday, was a day which for whatever reason Terry had off from school. She called me and asked me if I wanted to hang out. There I stood in my kitchen all geared up and ready to go out for some target practice. I was so stunned that she was actually asking me to hang out that before I knew it I was saying yes. Did this mean she still liked me? Terry said head on over and a second later I heard the dial tone. Quickly I grabbed my coat, keys, watch, and wallet. In the car I realized all my target practice gear was still on, but I decided to just head on out for Terry’s. It would take too long to get it all off anyway.

            Twenty-five minutes later (standard travel time from Troy to Guilderland) Terry was sitting beside me. She said we were going to go hang out with her old friends Bob and Joel. Bob was a  familiar name to me. He had known that basket case Joanna. In fact Bob was the one Joanna had   fucked while she was supposed to be with me. There were no hard feelings though because I did not miss Joanna one bit. Joel was a guy whose name I had heard a few times from Terry. Recently kicked out of his house for reasons

which were never made clear to me, Joel was now living with Bob and his family. Terry said she had been friends with Joel for years and loved him like a brother. My intuition told me this was not good to be hanging out with Joel. However, I did not want to seem like a control freak and say no we were not going to hang out with them.

            “ Joel’s bisexual,” she said,” and for some reason he wants me to give him a makeover.”

            “ A what? You mean...”

            “ He wants me to put make-up on him,” Terry said through laughter.

            I shrugged. After all who was I to judge him. Not much longer after the trip started, we reached Bob’s house. His parents were home, his girlfriend was over, and he was drunk. What kind of parent lets their underage child get drunk and then laugh at it like it was a joke? Bob’s girlfriend Robin was a horror show...a jealous control freak like Cassandra. Joel seemed okay enough. (Please, I ask my audience to remember that statement so they can appreciate the bitter irony of it later.) While Terry reminisced with Bob and Joel (whom she had not seen for years) I tried to get comfortable on the couch. The house was boiling and I wanted so badly to open my jacket, but my gun and blade would have been exposed. So I had to sit there and suffer. Eventually Terry asked Joel to go upstairs with her so she could put the make-up on him. Bob tried to follow. Robin grabbed hold of him.

            “ Let them be alone,” she said.

            Excuse me? Let them be alone? What the fuck did she mean by that? I headed upstairs. The bathroom was right there at the top of the stairs. Down a short corridor to my right there were two rooms. First came the parents’ room, then Bob’s. Joel and Terry were both in there.

            “ What’s the matter? Don’t you trust me?” Terry asked.

            The answer to that question was of course not you stupid bitch. But I did not give that answer. So much for honesty. Quickly I looked around the room. Spotting Bob’s

guitar gave me my way out,  so I used my enthusiasm for the instrument as the reason why I was there. As I sat down the two of them got up. They left the room. Bob and Robin came upstairs. I went out into the hall. Terry said she was going to give his make-

over in the bathroom.

            “ Nobody can see it until we’re done,” Terry said.

            With that she closed the bathroom door. What the fuck is going on here? That was all I could think. As Bob and Robin headed into their bedroom for typical relationship hijinks, I went down the hall and stood right outside the bathroom. Bob was being loud so I stormed back down the hall.

            “ Could you shut your fuckin’ drunk ass up for a minute!” I growled at him.

            My anger must have taken him by surprise. He apologized. I closed his bedroom door before heading back down the hall. Then I stood outside that room again...and listened...listened as I have never in my life listened to anything or anyone, wanting to know just what was going on in there. Was it all as innocent as Terry implied? Soon my answer would come...I knew it.

            I heard something only a moment later...a noise, casually drifting through the door...nonchalantly  making its way to my ears as if it were of no great importance...but that sound was a nightmare come true. It was a cigarette still lit and cast into dry grass. That disturbance in the air started a brushfire that nothing could prevent.

            Did I hear

                        correctly or did I

            just                   think                 I

            heard                kissing     noises?

            Fingers delicately unzipped my jacket. No reason to panic but still I was heating up with the fire that burned in my chest. Probably just a friendly kiss on the cheek which she gave Joel once...then again...then again...then again...then again...

            then I knew they were no longer kissing noises when Joel moaned.

            All the following happened in such lightning motion. I whipped off my jacket and tossed it into a shadow-filled corner of the hall. Before I knew it the gun was in my hand and my foot delivered a mighty blow to the door. The feeble lock gave way beneath the brunt off my assault. Beyond that threshold my worst fears were true.

            Terry screamed in pain as the door flew open. It must have hit her on her left side because now she was sprawled across the floor on her right side. (Why had she been so close to the door, you may ask? Well, in order to kneel in front of the toilet she had to be beside the door, because that was where the toilet was...right there just inside the door- way and to the left. And why  was she kneeling in front of the toilet? Soon, my friends, you will know the answer.) Yes, she had been kneeling right beside the door. Then I noticed the toilet was there and seated upon it...as if he  was the King of Shit...was my good buddy Joel! His sweatpants were pulled down past his knees, exposing his cock. Suddenly it all snapped into place and I was aware of every little detail that confronted my eyes in that tiny bathroom. The wet noises that sounded like kisses...Terry kneeling so close to the door that she must have been in front of him...Joel’s cock exposed and hard and glistening wet with saliva...

            She had been giving him a blowjob,

            after all her promises

            and excuses

            and complaints that I did not trust her,

this day had come                     fragmented

fractured, like my ego... humiliated again by a woman...a woman do you understand?!,

            broken like my spirit...thinking

            not only thinking but believing that this girl was the one, that this was the real deal and this relationship could last a long time...it had all turned out to be a lie

            and she a whore...a filthy, lying whore who did not realize

            this is not how it can be...

            this is not another time when I am the loser

            not another chance for me to be made a fool of by an immature cunt.

            All the humiliation I had suffered at the hands  of women...

well it was time to give some payback.

            Without thinking I raised the gun. No thought, only pure emotion. I pulled the trigger, sending the sex drive from Joel...and the bathroom was showered with his blood and shredded genitalia. The blast echoed in the tiny room and mingled with Terry’s scream. Joel struggled to make some kind of noise as he toppled to the ground. Shouts were coming from other rooms in the house. Now Joel was on the floor groping for me. My eyes connected with Terry’s, and I grinned...a foolish Steve grin. Oh, too bad there are no visuals and you cannot see the classic maniac smile I gave her.

            “ Try sucking his cock now, bitch!” I wailed the madness clearly in me.

            I heard someone coming toward me from behind. Thinking Terry might get up and attack me if I turned my back, I blew away her left kneecap and just hoped that the shock would not kill her (and thinking if it did oh well). The sound of her bone splinter and break was thoroughly satisfying.

            It will echo in my heart forever.

            As I turned around I saw drunken bob (apparently sobered up a bit by the sound of the gunshots) running at me, holding his guitar upside down like a baseball bat. Quite a comical sight. One bullet destroyed his makeshift weapon. It  was too late for him to slow down his momentum, and he crashed into me. Fortunately I was able to keep my balance and start my offensive tactics on him. My hand crushed his windpipe while the gun fit snugly into his belly. I felt my skin burn as the point-blank shot ripped his guts wide open. What a thrill to be looking in his eyes as the shot went off, to see the life in his eyes suddenly going out. Terry and Robin were shrieking, and to me it sounded like mystical chants. Scream, bitches, scream!

            Robin had been (and still was) in Bob’s doorway. He had been blocking her from

my sight. As he dropped lifeless from my hands, she was introduced into my field of vision. I took no pleasure in killing her. She just had the misfortune of being there as a witness. The bullet abused her face, dismantling in a second all that careful work which nature had taken years to create.

            For reasons I do not yet understand even to this very day, I turned back to the bathroom to check out Terry and Joel. Stupid of me really, because Bob’s mom and dad were still in the house. they could have been calling the police while I stood there like a fool. Joel had crawled toward Terry. She was cradling his head in her lap. The scene could have been a tender one if I was oblivious to the way it had come about...but I knew the history that led up to that scene...knew every second by heart. If Terry had not spoken I could have at least kept my cool. But no, she had to look into his eyes and say:

            “ I love you.”

            “ THE FUCK YOU DO!  “ I roared.

            I dragged Joel away from her. My gun went into his mouth, reminiscent of the way his cock had passed through Terry’s lips only a moment ago. There was almost orgasmic joy in watching his brain get destroyed...humiliated (like me) and splattered across the bathroom floor. Another shot rang out. It was not mine. This explosion was more powerful than my handgun. When I turned around I saw Bob’s dad at the bottom of the stairs holding a shotgun and pointing it at me.

            I stood at the top of the stairs, pistol still in hand. Bob’s mom stood behind her husband, sobbing and scared.

            “ Put the gun down,” he said.” Put your hands behind your head and come slowly down the stairs.”

            Smiling while I complied, I wondered why he had not just killed me. That would have been the more intelligent thing to do. Maybe Bob’s dad figured I was a dumb youngster and, seeing how I was stupid and unresourceful, he had me where he wanted me now. He wanted to kill me of course; I could see it in his eyes, but it was too late at this stage. His wife was talking about calling the police and seeing my ass rotting in jail,

and I could tell she was probably the one who had encouraged him to shoot above me instead of killing me. Despite the fact that I had killed her son, she still could not see her husband kill anyone. Geez, nagging wives. The court system does not send killers away anymore, honey! Thanks to your babbling “ No don’t shoot him don’t be a killer like him” you just fucked up your only chance of seeing justice done...just missed the chance of seeing your son’s murderer punished.

            Bob’s mom also mentioned a lawyer and watching me squirm at the trial. That was when the smile disappeared from my face. The reality of this new turn of events hit me. I realized being caught was not an option, so I had to act soon.

            “ That’s it, you bastard...come down here slowly,” the old prick said.

            His wife watched me with a mix of animosity and fear. She  had the receiver in her hand but had not yet dialed the police.

            The gun was trained on me until I was halfway down the stairs. Then Bob’s dad let the weapon rest across his abdomen, confident that I was captured. Perhaps that was why he screamed so loud when I made my move: the element of surprise increased the sense of pain because he had been duped into believing my act of helpless captive. He did not even see me fidgeting behind my head to get the switchblade out. A beautiful throw sent the blade straight through his right hand, pinning it so he could not pull the trigger. Mom was flustered; the phone dangled from her hand...useless, dead. They were both trying to yank the blade out while I turned to grab my gun. Two more bullets tore through the air. Dad and mom died together like all married couples should. Neither one would be alive to suffer from missing the other.

            If only my  grandma had been so fortunate. 1989 was the year my grandpa died. Ever since then grandma had been alone, sitting in her recliner as her physical and mental health slowly deteriorated. Why did it have to happen like this, all drawn out? Tell me why death could not be merciful enough to take her away so she could see grandpa again and feel young again and feel whole again and not have to be stranded home all by herself as if she were on an island while meaningless boring television images flickered before her eyes and echoed inside her mind, lost in a red haze that devoured everything and would not let her live her last few years in peace.

            In the bathroom Terry was still whimpering. Now that all the others were dead I could take my sweet time with her. Fortunately Bob’s house was out in the sticks where a person’s next-door neighbor was five miles away. The shots could not have possibly drawn anyone’s attention. Momentarily I worried that Bob’s parents had company on the way or, even if that were not so, maybe someone would show up unexpectedly. However, my fears were all put at ease while I was dragging Joel’s corpse out of the bathroom. Look what I had at my disposal. A knife, a pistol, and now a  shotgun. Anybody coming here would be totally unsuspecting. There would be no reason for them to think there was an armed psychopath in Bob’s house. Once again I possessed the element of surprise. For a change things were working in my favor.

            All the bodies went into Bob’s room. Dad gave me back my switchblade. After a bit of a struggle I also managed to wrench the shotgun out of his hands. All the while I was still worried that Terry was going to die from the pain, but when I rejoined her she was doing better than most people would. (She had more of a will to survive than I thought.) Some quick tourniquet work stopped the blood flow. Then I picked Terry up off the floor. Her destination: the bloody toilet seat.

            “ It’s drenched in your new boyfriend’s blood,” I said.

            She did not respond. I removed her glasses. It always escaped my memory...was Terry near-sighted or far-sighted? Ah well, who really gave a damn. A second later the glasses were smashed under my foot. Then I knelt down before her.

            “ So...how’s it going?” Just more crying. “ Well, so much for trying to improve the communication level in this relationship...but at least I tried.” I scratched my upper lip while continuing to address her. Now, Terry, I have a question for you. Clearly what I saw a moment  ago was Joel’s cock in your mouth...Well, actually I did not see it but it was more than obvious that oral sex was indeed what was happening before I burst in. Okay enough babbling. Here is my question. When girls give blowjobs they usually don’t just bob their heads up and down. Sometimes they hold the cock steady in front of their faces so they can lick it all over...so my question to you is, did you do that to him? Did you give his cock a tongue-lashing?” Silence from her now, not even a sob. “ Answer me, you fucking slut. Did you give his cock a tongue bath?” The air still hovered in silence between us. “ If you can’t say anything at least nod your head for yes or shake it for no. You know what nodding is, don’t you? It’s that up and down motion...similar to the way you were moving your head while giving Joel his blowjob. Now shaking, on the other hand, does not mimic a blowjob...BUT...if you stick our your tongue while you shake your head from side to side, then that little muscle produces quite a lovely effect on a boy’s pecker. So...what’s the verdict, nod or shake?”

            Slowly I received a nod. In other words she was saying yes, Steve, I ran my tongue all over his cock while my hand held it steady at its base. I smiled. All during this inquiry I had been kneeling before her...right where she had been kneeling to service Joel. Now I stood up, and when I did she made a pathetic attempt to hit me in the groin. Martial arts reflexes saved me.

            I struck her across the face. “ Don’t fucking try that again.” Now I had my blade in my hand. One click, and it was open for action. “ Stick out your tongue.”

            “ No,” she said, her voice cracking. Good, bitch. Stay scared.

            “ I said stick out your goddamn tongue.”

            Once again she refused. I grabbed her by the sides of her head and slammed her face into my rising knee. She toppled unconscious off the seat. Yes, out cold at last. To be honest I was surprised the pain from the destruction of her kneecap had not knocked her out. Terry was apparently much more of a fighter than her paranoid schizophrenic

suicidal rantings led me to believe. Being that I claim honesty as one of my main traits, I have to admit I was impressed.

            So there she lay unconscious upon the bathroom floor. And I had the urge to not do what I knew had to be done. I could have resigned, could have given in and  laid down to accept my position as underdog as loser a station in life which I finally realized was not mine after all but was in fact the place which I had let the world convince me was where I belonged, the world and other people, people like jocks and cheerleaders and teachers, people who told you one thing when the truth was something else, people like Terry who had confused me with lies and tricks that sent me spinning like a top and not letting this motion stop making its spin cease only when they knew I would be messed up enough to believe I was an underdog.

            And in that moment of clarity, when I realized Terry was the great conspiracy that was  keeping my life from reaching its full potential, I knew my plan had to be executed. Years of denial and betrayal...inability to even earn friends let alone a woman’s true love...flooded my memories all at once. The torment caused that good old red veil to fall over my eyes and, as the cliché goes, all I saw was red. I had a mission and if I ever wanted to defeat the system and prove to them and more importantly to myself that I was not the underdog then I had to complete  that mission. To a certain extent I had already proven myself. That instant when I had pulled the trigger of my gun to relieve another human being of their life was the same moment when I had said fuck you I will not even conform to your laws that say killing is wrong or any of your goddamn rules. Now that I had broken the most taboo restriction, all the others fell flat. If I felt no guilt over killing someone then I certainly would feel no guilt over stealing or running red lights. From now on the word and sensation of guilt would never occupy my brain again, would never make my conscience get to me. No more. Down with  conscience! Abolish guilt!

            I had no guilt when I took Terry’s unconscious form and propped it up against the wall, no guilt when I fished into her cock-flavored mouth and pulled out her tongue to

hold it tightly between my thumb and  pointer finger, no guilt when I kissed my blade, no guilt when I lowered the weapon to her mouth, no guilt when the metal negotiated its way through her flesh, no guilt when I saw her blood flowing over her chin, no guilt when I completely freed her tongue from her mouth and it was twitching still alive between my fingers.

            After flushing Terry’s tongue down the toilet, I went about fixing the new wound. Otherwise she would have choked on her own blood. I bound her hands and feet with some rope I found. Terry was still unconscious so I searched Bob’s house. The fridge was my focal point. Quickly I stocked up on food and beverages. Once a good inventory had been assembled I put it all out in my car.

            Halfway through the loading process I heard some fidgeting upstairs. She was coming around. I dashed upstairs because I wanted to see her face when she realized her tongue had been cut out. And I was there in time to catch a glimpse. If only I owned a camera! Just to see her pothead eyes finally widen with surprise as the truth reached her brain, and let us not  forget the pathetic primitive grunting and moaning noises she made! Terry started squirming. It was a good tourniquet, but I had no pain killer. The only sensation which her state of consciousness would let her feel was pain. Good, bitch, get to know how it feels when the tables are turned and you are the one who has to suffer, not me...not anymore...not now.

            I went into the bathroom and sat on the toilet. She looked at me and all I saw were billions of molecules that formed a hatred for me. How sweet it was to let her see the same lifeforms inhabiting my eyes. Yes, you stupid cocksucking bitch, I hate your fucking guts.

            “ You knew what I would do if you stuck out your tongue, so I had to knock you out to make you more compliant,” I said. “ But you...you have been a naughty girl, and you must be punished for your behavior.”

            A moment later I had Terry draped over my shoulder. She kicked and grunted

while I took her into the parents’ bedroom. Once in there I tossed Terry face-down on the bed. Quickly scanning the room gave my eyes the opportunity to spot a belt. While I took hold of it, I realized I should have tied Terry’s hands behind her back. What the hell had I been thinking? Now she could pull herself up on the bed. Of course she could not get far but this mobility could prove to be a nuisance. That detail would have to be covered later, though, because right now I had an ass-whuppin’ to deliver.

            She gave me a bit of difficulty when I tried to remove her jeans. But I was not going to give in anymore. Soon her slender legs and firm ass were mine to view, as well as her shaved pussy. There was no stirring in my loins when I saw her. All my lust had exploded when Joel’s cock entered her mouth. My love for life and my trust in anyone had erupted with his dick as well. Earlier I had worried about being caught. So what if I was? Who cared if they caught me now?

            That worry had been caused only by the fact that I had initially wanted to torture and kill Terry right on the spot. Now plans were changing. Why kill her, I asked myself, why not let her live? Yeah, load her in my car and drive drive drive.

            Where  should we go? An idea hatched in my head. I will not reveal what it was...

not yet anyway.

            I pinned Terry down while the belt whistled a happy tune. Her ass turned a won-

derful hue of red as the belt struck home. It was a glorious sight. Nothing could match the surprise I experienced when I found myself getting hard while I studied her whipped ass, and I almost came every time I hit her. This kind of activity has never made me horny before. Whips and chains had never turned me on, so just what the hell was going on here?

            Power, power was the force that pushed the blood through my cock and made it rock hard. Soon it got to the point where I could not take it. I got my pants down to my knees and slammed my hardon into her. She screamed.

            “ Does that hurt, you bitch?!” I bellowed.

            Of course she could not answer this or any question. I started humping her like a jackhammer. There was something warm and wet flowing over my cock and matting down my pubic hair. Almost immediately I realized it was her blood. My entry had made her bleed. With this revelation my cock spasmed. Hot semen flowed into her cunt. When I finished I collapsed on top of her.

            “ You bitch...you goddamn sexy, tongueless cunt. I just came inside you, you fuckin’ whore. You liked it, didn’t you...you nasty slut. Now I probably have AIDS or some other disease, don’t I?” I moaned. “ Well, no matter.”

            I had fucked her from behind like a dog mounting his bitch. What a coincidence that she  actually was a bitch. Before pulling out I licked her face (once again, like a dog). She still had not learned her lesson, though. Despite all the hell through which I had put Terry, it was still not enough. Terry still had not been fully humiliated...still had not learned how to be a human being. By degrading her I was hoping to let her know how I had felt when I had seen her and Joel. Then she would know how wrong and hurtful her actions had been.

            Leaving Terry on the bed momentarily, I went out to my car. For a while I just stood there. Before heading back indoors I snapped the license plates off my car and took off my bumper stickers. Then it was time to tie Terry’s hands behind her back. It was not that easy a  task to complete. She was fucked up but not out of fighting spirit. Perhaps fifteen to twenty minutes later her hands were finally bound again.

            I dragged Terry back into the bathroom and cleaned her bleeding snatch. She groaned all while I did it. After that I took her to the car. We headed back on  to the Northway. Where should we go? Then came time to reveal my great idea.

            “ I have a plan, Terry. Let’s go visit your family!” I cheered.

            Terror flooded the whore’s face because she somehow knew what I was planning to do. Joy joy oh joy oh joy of joys to see this heartless bitch finally feeling something after all those years of not giving a damn for anything! Let the pain ravage her fucking mind for eternity!

            “ You know, Terry, I have come to discover more than one unpleasant thing about you within the last hour. Not only are you a lying cunt, but you are also selfish! The only time you have shown yourself to be scared or worried is right now...in other words, when something might make life inconvenient for you. Well, dammit, I am your teacher...I am gonna teach you how to care. By acting with total disregard for the way you feel...by doing what upsets you, I will show the hell that life becomes when a boy like me loves a girl like you...in other words, a fucking cunt. I’m gonna show you that you can’t go through life doing what you want, hurting people and not giving a second thought...not feeling guilty. Now it’s fucking payback time, you slut. And I don’t care how bad it makes you feel. you shoulda thought of that before you decided you would treat me like a dick. You really thought you’d get away with it, didn’t you? Well, life is full of fucking surprises, bitch.”

            I spit in her face. She recoiled but could not avoid the saliva. Then I pulled off on to the shoulder of I-87. Terry gave me a puzzled look as if to say, what the hell are you doing now?

            “ Gotta take a piss,” I said.

            To myself I thought, why explain myself to her...I should let her wait and wonder and be scared to find out what I am going to do. So I made a mental note to never tell her my plans ahead of  time.

            I got out of the car and went around to the passenger’s door. Then I dragged Terry out and threw her on the ground, placing her on her back. Zipper went down. Cock came forth. Piss spilled all over Terry. My hand moved my penis back and forth, distributing the piss equally across her body. Terry could only moan and wriggle.

            “ Now this is a waste of good piss. At least I ain’t takin’ a dump, that’d be an even bigger waste,” I said.

            Yeah, degrade the whore! How wonderful it was to piss on her face! She could not get away...she could never get away. When I finished I loaded her back in the car and we were once again on our way. The rest of the ride was uneventful.

            We reached her house and there were no cars in the driveway, but that did not mean nobody was home. Her brothers, Andy and Alan, could have been there. The only thing the absence of a car meant was that her dad was not there. There was the possibility that her mother was home. I parked my car down the street in a shopping plaza parking lot. It was a good idea to investigate the situation first before I dragged Terry along to watch me do my work.

            A quick peek through the front door revealed nobody. However, the television was on so somebody had to be there. Carefully...quietly...I made my way inside. Someone was singing in the kitchen. It was none other than Terry’s mother. With gun in hand I went to visit her. She was standing by the sink. Her back was to me.

            “ Hello, Mrs. Barber, how are you doing today?” I said, loud and sounding quite merry.

            She jumped twice: one because my voice startled her, twice because she quickly noticed the gun in my hand which was aimed at her.

            “ Steven, what are you doing?” she asked.

            “ I have something to show you,” I said, “ but I have to go to my car and get it. Do you have anything that I could use to tie you up?” She nodded. “ Please get it for me, ma’am...and don’t play any games or I’ll kill you right now.”

            She went out on the back porch. I followed her to make sure there were no tricks she would try to play while out of my sight. Mrs. Barber came back with some rope. It was kind of weak-looking, but it would hold her steady if I tied it right. We went into the living room. Soon she was tied up and sitting in her favorite recliner. Now there was only one more question to ask.

            “ When will that big racist husband of yours be home?”

            “ Soon,” she said.

            I put the gun to her head. “ I’m not playing any fucking games with you. Soon is no kind of answer! Now tell me when.”

            In a quivering voice she said, “ Within the next half hour.”

            “ Okay. Now don’t go anywhere...I’ll be back.”

            I ran back to my car. Terry was still there of course. We drove back to her house. It was a risky thing to do, but I untied Terry’s feet so I would not have to carry her in. As it turned out, I had to carry her regardless because she was one knee short. When we got into the house I dropped Terry on the living room floor.

            “ My God, what have you done to her!” her mother screamed.

            “ What I did is nothing compared to what you have done,” I said. “ It is because of you and the shitty job you and your husband did as parents...you and your crazy over-

protective bullshit. You had the nerve to complain about her friend Shauna not having basic social skills? Shauna is like a Girl Scout compared to your daughter! I often ask myself, why does Terry act the way she does? The answer is because she had you as a fucking parent...probably the worst mother in the history of mankind! No wonder she’s a space cadet...no wonder she’s a whore! It’s all your fault!”

            My knife was out. I kicked Terry in the stomach to keep her from moving around too much. Then I got behind Terry’s mom. A handful of hair gave me the ability to pull her head back. Terry was on the floor in a way that would allow her to see what I was about to do.

            “ Say good bye to a horrible mom, bitch.”

            The blade gracefully slipped across her throat...the poetry of brutality echoed in the pulse of her veins. Arteries tore from the pressure of the razor-edged metal. Being behind dear mother left me out of the path of the arterial spray. Terry’s idiot noises of agony chimed in when the blood started squirting out of her mom’s neck.

            It did not take long for the blood to leave her completely. After that Terry and I

waited for her dad. My gun was trained on the front door. While waiting for the fat racist pig I dragged Terry over so she was lying on the floor before me. My foot on her stomach kept her whereabouts in check. As I sat there I started worrying that Alan and Andy might be coming home with their dad. They were young. Not even teenagers yet. There was no way I wanted to be a child killer. What would I do if they got home?

            I had to calm down. That question could not be answered unless that was how it went  down. The minutes closed in on me. Pain clouded my mind. What was going to happen? Who was going to come home?

            Suddenly I heard the car pulling in. My nervousness fortunately did not spread to my hand. The gun remained carefully aimed at the door. Big bad Mr. Barber came lumbering through the front door.

            “ Steve, what are you doing here?” He then noticed Terry and his wife. “ You...

what the hell...you killed...you...”

            I did not want to shoot him because this neighborhood was not like Bob’s. Next door neighbors really were next door. But he started charging at me. Rage would not let him fear the gun. He was almost upon me when I released a shot. It crashed through his skull. Death did not stop Mr. Barber’s progress toward me. There was no way for me to avoid the inevitable...no time to jump out of the way. When he collided with me his weight knocked me back. The chair rocked back and threatened to tip over. Worst of all, I had lost contact with Terry.

            With a grunt I pushed her father’s corpse away. By that time Terry had gotten up and was heading for the front door. A blur of motion placed me right beside her. I got her by the hair and that was a sufficient enough anchor to hold her still.

            “ Hey, how’s it going? Where ya headed, babe? Oh, out to fuck Joel? Damn, he’s dead...although I wouldn’t put corpse fucking past a weirdo like you. Come on, let’s go across the street to visit grandma and grandpa.”

            We headed over there; she was on my right and fussing quite a bit. In the past we

had always entered grandma’s house through the backdoor. On this day we did the same. Some guy I did not know answered the door when I knocked. He was young and good-

looking, with short black hair and light brown eyes. Too bad it was all over.

            “ Hello, who are...hey, Terry...how’s it going? And you must be Steve.”

            “ Yes, and you are?”

            “ Boz,” he said. That was his nickname anyway. I forgot his real name.

            “ So, how’s it going?” I asked.

            “ Pretty good. Come on in, grandma and grandpa are in the living room.” As he turned away he noticed Terry’s knee. Who knows why the jerk took so long to see how clearly fucked up she was.

            “ What the hell happened to you, Terry?” he said.

            “ Nothing you need to be concerned about,” I said.

            The bullet smashed his heart to bits. Terry and I entered the house. At first she did not want to step over Boz’s corpse. Grandma and grandpa had come into the kitchen, panicking and screaming. It was really getting on my nerves.

            “ Hi!” I said. “ Please, stop that screaming.”

            I knew they would not follow my order, so I took two more lives. Destroyed yet another couple. Grandma and grandpa died together. The way it should be. With a great deal of nervous trembling I dragged Terry back to the car. Her feet...yes...must tie her feet again or she might decide to kick me or step her foot on the gas...so I hurriedly tied her feet together and buckled her in...now time to move again oh God hurry or else the police will be here because I am certain somebody heard the shots and called...time to get going oh where to go now where.

            Forever. We took a ride into forever.

            Before that, however, I was thinking about the lecture I had given Terry’s mom, the one in which I mentioned Terry’s friend Shauna. That was our next stop.

            It is easy to see why Terry and Shauna were friends. They were pretty much the

same damn person. Shauna, a liar and a criminal, a sick bitch who was on probation because she bit someone and drank their blood. She even dressed like she thought she was a vampire. I was going to prove to her that she certainly was not immortal.

            Shauna was the only one home when I got there. I parked in the driveway and waited on her porch. Despite her freakish ways she was kind of pretty. She was shocked to see me.

             “ What are you doing here?” she asked with a smile.

            I returned the grin. “ Just wanted to see you, babe.”

            A brief pause. She struck a somewhat sexy pose for me. “ Like what you see?”

            “ I sure do,” I said, deciding to play along.

            Then I stood there briefly remembering. There was a day on which Terry, Shauna, and I all hung out. I did not recount it in this narrative because it had been a forgettable day. Now Shauna brought the topic of that day into our conversation while putting a hand on my shoulder. My hand went to her hip.

            “ I knew it...I could tell on that day that you liked me better than Terry.”

            “ You’re damn right,” I replied.

            Then we were in one another’s embrace. Her tongue and lips caressed mine. it could have been a beautiful moment. She and I could have had a glorious fuck. But it was not meant to be. Not in my mind anyway. Hands and mouths roaming, minds scanning all the possible combinations into which our flesh could fit. My hand against her ass made me wonder what she would look like on her hands and knees. Probably one hell of a sight. Was it such a shame? Should I take the time to fuck Shauna’s brains out? Behind her back I had fished out my switchblade. The sound of her moaning covered the sound of the blade clicking open.

            From her mouth I moved to her neck. This aroused her, as I knew it would. It arouses every girl. My tongue knew how to explore the landscape of a female neck. now I had to make my decision: should I fuck this freak and then kill her? Or was it better to just gut her and get on the move again? Well, she was fourteen, and I was feeling quite devious...but there was this constant  worry about getting caught. They could not catch me, not before I knew Terry had learned her lesson.

            “ Let’s go inside,” she said.

            We moved backwards toward her front door. I fumbled  with the knob and managed to twist it. The door opened and we stepped into the threshold. Then Shauna asked me a question that brought it all to an end...for which I am grateful. I did not want to be a child killer OR a child molester, and her question saved me from possibly turning into the latter.

            “ Hey, is that Terry in your car?”

            I sighed. “ Yeah, it is.”

            “ Let me go say hi.”

            “ No need,” I mumbled. “ Say hi to this.”

            No more hesitation no more hovering in empty moments I plunged my blade into her gut repeatedly. Sometimes it got stuck and I had to really yank hard to get the knife out of her abdomen. She made no noise when I stabbed her. The best victim is a quiet one as any murderer knows. I laid Shauna down gently just inside the front door. On my way out I wiped my fingerprints off the doorknob. Then I went back to the car.

            “ Well, Terry, time to get moving again,” I said.

            And then we were off, heading nowhere again. It was a boring journey. But that was exactly how I wanted it to be. Terry had always thought I was a dull boyfriend. At least that was the rumor I had heard. (Made me wonder of course why she even dated me in the first place, but it seems I had a car and that is why I was worth keeping around.) I wanted to keep her bored, wanted to torture her as much as I could. While we drove around the Tri-City area I would abuse her every now and then. A slap across the face, a punch in her stomach, a terrifying  sequence during which I pointed my gun at her cunt.

            This gave me an idea. I got her pants down, exposing that pussy that had taken

in so many cocks, and sank the barrel of the gun inside her. Then I fucked her with the gun. A mix of  terror and pleasure was encoded in Terry’s face. It turned me on to watch her. In case the pistol accidentally went off somehow, I decided to unload the gun. The clip went into my jacket. My activities resumed. Now she was really getting aroused. Or was it another Terry act? Knowing Terry she was faking it...just like she faked orgasms with me, just like she faked enjoying my cock inside her, just like she faked any interest in me, just like she faked caring for me. Cunt, bitch, slut, whore! Fuck you! People like you do not deserve to live! So strong was the urge to reload and blow her pussy to bits. But I could not do it. Terry had to live, had to feel the humiliation she had made me feel, which equaled spending three weeks in hell...three weeks, the time Terry and I had dated if you want to call it that.

            But I started to realize maybe I was partially to blame as well. If I had not said those three words so quickly (as I always do) I would not be in this mess. Now Joanna, who I mentioned briefly earlier...another Quest girl...the one I saw before Terry...she really loved me. She cared about me. And I threw her away for this slut. Well, there was no way Joanna would take me back now. And who could blame her. I mean there are women who love criminals, but I know she has more self-esteem than that.

            Sitting in that driver’s seat I began to see the truth. Joanna was the one I should have wanted. We had gotten along so well together. I like to be affectionate in public as well as when I am home alone with my girlfriend...and she was always cuddling with me and holding my hand and squeezing my ass (a bit embarrassing, this last one, but it was good because I knew someone was attracted to me). Why was I so blind to kick her out of my life for this whore?

            Night came. Well, evening actually. We were idling at a red light when I noticed a barber shop across the street. The owner was getting ready to close, and the neighbor-

hood in which we were situated was deserted except for the three of us...barber, whore,

and I. When the light went green I went straight ahead. I stopped at a Stewart’s down

the street to buy a can of gasoline and some matches. This purchase was made with cash. Could not have the police tracking my credit card trail now could I? Then I headed back to the barber shop.

            Barber shop.

            Barber, Terry.

            The significance could not be overlooked.

            I parked my car across the street from the barber shop. There was no traffic so it did not take long to cross. On the way I took out my switchblade. Holding it was like caressing a lover’s hand...a real lover, not an onion person like Terry...not someone who you really want to know but they hide behind layers so you start peeling away...mask after mask, act after act, only to find out they are not a person...they have no core, no center, no soul...and you keep peeling away to search for them, but the more you look the more you cry...and tears are your only reward in the end. Holding a lover’s hand. My life would never again enjoy those days. No more love for Steve. Ha! As if there were any there in the first place.

            Well, there was Joanna...but I cannot think about that. No regrets, dammit! Not now! I have work to do!

            I entered the barber shop. He took a second to notice me.

            “ Sir, I’m getting ready to close,” the barber said.

            “ That’s all right,” I replied calmly.

            “ Sir, you’ll have to leave.”

            “ Don’t worry, this will take only a minute.”

            He could not argue with the blade. I covered his mouth and quickly spun him around. At first the barber struggled. Then he felt the metal on his flesh. There was an office at the back of the shop (which I had noticed once I came in) so I walked him back into it. When we got there I slit his throat, letting my hand linger against the wound to feel the blood gush out. And goddamn did it feel good!

            Then I remembered the task at hand. Like a fool I had not brought the gasoline can in with me. No matter. It was easily obtained from the backseat of my car. In a minute I was in the shop again. I started dumping out gasoline in the office first, soaking the still-twitching corpse. After a while the stench got me high. Gasoline flowed through my veins, fueling me up and preparing me for whatever task might come my way next...

and there was a whole universe of choices out there for me.

            Less than five minutes later I was standing just outside the front door. My pockets bulged with the money I had taken from the register. There was also a safe, but I was not expert enough to crack it nor did I have time to look around for where the combination might be hidden. I had not been thorough in distributing the gas, but I had covered enough of the items in the shop to make sure it went up good and fast. The empty gasoline can rested by my foot. Matches. Where were they? A quick search revealed they were in my left hip pocket.

            I lit one, holding it inside the doorway while I picked up the gas can. Then I let it descend to the floor and tore ass across the street. A fireball erupted inside that barber shop. By the time I got to my car, smoke was already rising. There were sounds of shattering glass. Not having a care in the world, I got into my car and headed out for my next adventure.

            On the ride I asked my passenger slut, “ You know why I blew up that shop?”

            She nodded. I took a few glances at her every now and then, and I started to regret having cut out her tongue. Now it would be just like talking to myself...unless we both learned sign language. Terry would need it to speak to me, and I would need to know it to understand what she said. Fortunately I did not need it to talk back because, of course, she could still hear me.

            A few days later I bought her a book...a sign language book, using money I robbed from a Stewart’s that I knew had no security cameras. I shot both employees because they still have a security system in the form of little necklaces which all Stewart’s employees either wear or keep in a handy spot if they get robbed. Located on these necklaces are buttons which alert the cops to the crime. Neither of them were wearing the necklaces, but I took the precaution of making sure they did not press the button when I was gone.

            Out of nowhere I started talking to Terry on a subject which I had longed to discuss with her.

            “ Narcissism, Terry,” I said. “ It’s a fucking plague that is going to tear this country apart at the seams. Such are the tragedies of a democracy where people can think however they want. You know, sometimes I hate that freedom of speech and spirit of individuality. Sometimes I wish we were all the same. Democracy allows people the chance to get an attitude problem. Cunts like you for example. You think you’re so pretty and so damn attractive and so many people want you that the world must revolve around you, right? Well, guess what, bitch...” (I punched her across the face) “...you’re dead fuckin’ wrong!”

            We drove in silence. Then another rant of mine began.

            “ That’s one thing I love about China. Every girl from there that I have met feels like shit. Women born and raised in most communist countries don’t develop a high sense of self-esteem...even the ones who deserve to say hey, I’m a good person. But you’ve gotta admire communism for that reason.  At least everyone feels like crap. In America the people that should have high self-esteem are the ones that sit at home either writing about or attempting suicide...while all the whores, rapists, thieves, and killers are out having a good time, dammit! All horrible people...they all live forever. Did you hear what I just said, Terry? All the murderers!” I took a deep breath. The excitement of my revelation took me by surprise. “ Well, this is...this is one hell of a conclusion to reach, dear Terry. I...I’m going to live forever now.  It’s like...for every  person I kill, my  life absorbs the years that my victim should have had left to them...Forever, Terry...and you are going to live with me...share the future with me. I don’t mean marriage because, let’s

face it, whores like you don’t get married for two reasons...one, it’s not your style...two, you are not worth marrying in the first place! No, what I mean is you will live with me so you can experience everything that one of your fellow immortals does. You are a shitty person too, so that means we are both eternal. I hope you enjoy the show.”

            And all I could do was laugh...because I had centuries left to live, because I had a nicely-shaped (and somewhat pretty, I guess) girl by my side that I could beat and fuck and torture and humiliate whenever I wanted, because I had a car and a pistol and a switchblade and a shotgun at my disposal, because I had no more inhibitions to stop me from reaching my goals, because I had freed myself from the boundaries which Their rules had set up for me, because I was on a mad killing spree that involved killing Terry’s family and friends as well as anyone who got in my way...

            and I had found an address book in Terry’s handbag

            which listed

            all her family, all her friends

            all the cocks she had ever held or sucked or ridden

            destined to be violated by my rage

            goddammit it was a madman’s motherfucking fantasy

            and the nightmare had just begun

            right there in the confines of my car       

            while Terry and I rode

 

            on the highway to eternity...

 

 

            End.