Apocalypstick Read Free Page A

through the tall, narrow window by his front door, just like I imagined.
I must have lost track of time, because it was suddenly dark. I watched him for
a second, and then drove away.
    #
    The Holiday Inn Express near the highway wasn’t as nice as the
Marriott, but it had a bed and a clean bathroom. I cleaned my leg wounds with water
and bandaged them again. They were small, but they were puffy, and hurt a lot. I
accepted the pain as a fitting reward for my weakness and perversion.
    As I drifted to sleep, I thought about the pretty lady of the
house on Maple Drive. She seemed to love her husband, and despite the fact that
she acted like a filthy whore, he seemed to love her, too. She was probably
seducing him at that moment.
    I never got past the foyer at the open house, but I could picture
their bedroom easily enough. Their king sized bed was dressed with a pretty
comforter and pillows, and the huge bathroom had a garden tub. The air was still
steamy from the shower, and David sat on the bed, barely covered by an untied
silk robe.
    The pretty lady stalked out of the walk-in closet wearing pajamas
from Hookers-R-Us that didn’t cover anything.
    “What do you think?” she asks him, standing in the doorway with her
arms up over her head.
    “Mrs. Keaton! I think I’m going to need some extra help after
class,” David says.
    A whining noise comes from the other side of the closed bedroom
door. Shirley must know what her masters are up to, and is trying to save them
from their depravity.
    “Shirley! Stop it!” David yells. “Shelia, don’t let her in.”
    So that’s her name. Shelia.
    Sheila opens the door, and David falls back on the bed, annoyed.
Shirley spins around in a circle by the door, and runs back downstairs with a
peculiar whine.
    “She needs to go out, honey,” Shelia says. “Hurry. I promise
I’ll make it worth your while when you come back up.”
    I could practically sense Shirley’s anger at her master. Every
dog wants a good master, not a depraved pervert. I pictured what might happen
if Shirley realized her master was a bad man who wanted to hurt her.
    David opens the sliding back door. “Come on, girl. Out you go.”
But Shirley doesn’t go out. She growls at David, and lunges at him. Her teeth rip
the skin on his hand, and then she runs out the back door, across the yard, and
through a hole under the fence.
    “Dammit!” David yells, “Shirley! Get back here!”
    Shelia runs down the stairs to see what’s going on.
    “David! You’re bleeding! What happened?” Shelia cries, grabbing
a towel and wrapping it tight around his hand. She pulls the loose silk tie
from around his waist and ties the cloth in place. She is still mostly naked,
and now David’s blood is on her new pajamas.
    I woke up from my dream and sat up in bed. Even though I was
still dressed, my wicked part had a mind of its own. I pounded my fist into my
groin as hard as I could. I saw stars from the pain, and curled into a fetal
ball. I cried myself to sleep, and thankfully didn’t have any more dreams.
    #
    I woke up early the next morning, at least I hoped it was the
next morning, ate some scrambled eggs and a dry muffin at the buffet, and climbed
into the van. At around seven o’clock, I found myself back at the quarry. I
stood on the edge again, looking down, but with the sun still low on the
horizon, the pit looked like a dark, bottomless hole.
    I sat down and dangled my legs over the side. My leg burned, my
body ached, and I just wanted to go home. I closed my eyes and tried to imagine
what David and Shelia were doing, but I couldn’t concentrate.
    Forcing the pain out of my mind, I remembered the feeling of
David’s soft cashmere jacket. It took me back to the moment when I opened that
closet and saw the treasures of their normal life. It was like I was back in
the foyer.
    “No,” David’s voice says from the kitchen. “She’s not out there.
Poor girl. What could have gotten into her? She just went crazy. I