Lethal Fetish

by Jeffrey Alan Lockwood

  “Ours is a grand voyage,” Eunectes said with the dramatic intonation of Christopher Columbus or Francis Drake preparing his crew. “On the horizon is the greatest possible sexual ecstasy. Together, we will share in the climactic experience, a distant shore that every one of us has imagined.” His voice rose to a fever pitch. “We will realize our most glorious, erotic fantasy!”

  There was a long pause before he began again in a soft, diabolical tone. “Tonight is the last time we allow a new member to join our adventure. And this is also the last opportunity to turn back. Now is your chance to leave. But understand that anyone who speaks of our voyage outside of the group will wish that he was the one being featured in our grand finale. Does anybody wish to disembark?”

  There was the sound of a prolonged exhalation from behind me in the darkness, but no movement. And then silence.

  “Good. Very good,” Eunectes said with sinister satisfaction. “I will provide details of time and location as the plan comes together. But the elements are falling into place more quickly than anticipated. So expect to hear from me as soon as tomorrow.” Then his tone shifted to that of a late night talk show host, providing a warm welcome to a performing artist. “Let me introduce our new crush mistress, Courtney.”

  There was scattered applause as Eunectes disappeared into the darkness and a too-thin, too-blonde woman wearing a too-tight, too-short dress stepped onto the stage. She looked to be in her early twenties, although her breasts and hips seemed adolescent. Courtney began her patter almost shyly, but became more forceful as the men grunted their approval. She looked over the audience and said, “You’re shit to me. Nothing but weak, putrid scum.” There’s not many venues where a performer would succeed with this line, but Courtney’s Crush Theater was aberrant in so many ways.

  Courtney continued her insults while she reached into a box and pulled out a handful of cherry tomatoes which she proceeded to seductively mash under her bare feet, squirting their contents onto the newsprint. I’d never thought of tomatoes as lewd but now I’d never look at a salad in quite the same way. The men moaned their submissive encouragement as music began to fill the room with the voices of angry women and the pounding beat of heavy metal. Courtney rubbed her body in synchrony with the music. She teased and danced until the audience became restless for more of what they’d really come to see.

  With rock lyrics declaring something about being a victim, the crush mistress dropped a wriggling mass of earthworms onto a sheet. She ground them into the paper while declaring, “You’re not going anywhere. I say when you can leave—and when you can spurt.”

  Next came the crickets. Courtney plucked the hind legs from the insects, flicking them into the audience and continuing to degrade the men over the sound of the music. Calling them worthless vermin, she dropped each cricket onto a clean sheet of paper, watched it struggle, mocked its efforts to escape and pressed her heel onto the insect. For my part, I was not so much disgusted with Courtney as disheartened with humanity. But my part quickly changed.

  With Eunectes’s encouragement from the wings, Courtney invited me onto the stage. As the music throbbed, she whispered to me, “Pick one of them, pin it to the floor, and guide my foot. I’m not sure I can do this alone. I’m sorry.” She directed me to the table while she slipped on her high heels and Eunectes slipped behind a video camera on a tripod. I assumed my role was being documented to assure I was completely enmeshed in the perversion should I attempt to betray the group or its leader. This was about the only thing I fully understood of what was happening. Blackmail is rational.

  In the largest box on the table were four mangy kittens with matted fur. I selected the runt, a reject unlikely to survive in any case. Or so I reasoned. It didn’t help. I could feel its toothpick ribs under the tissue paper skin. It flailed weakly, squinting under the bright light, mewing without its littermates.

  When I was in high school, Deacon Roland taught a class on Catholic morality which seemed like a really good idea given the temptations of cars, beer, and girls—although not necessarily in that order. He told us that ethics was not about choosing between good and evil. If we were unsure of what to do when confronted with such a stark choice, then we were simply psychopaths and he couldn’t help us. Rather, moral dilemmas were about choosing lesser evils, accepting venial sins to avoid mortal sins, doing a small wrong to prevent “a horrible malignity” (I looked up this word, thinking it might entail some juicy taboo, but I was disappointed).

  I brought the tiny, doomed creature, shivering with fear, to center stage. Over the music’s throbbing drums and bruising guitars, the lead singer howled in despair and wailed a warning to “watch your step,” with the last words ominously repeated. The warning evoked a memory of when I beat a thug in an alley to extract the location of a kidnapped girl. She needed medicine—and the guy knew where she was being held. Between his ruptured spleen and some bleeding heart do-gooders, we found the kid and I lost my job as a cop. I’d told the commissioner that I could live with trading the life of a street punk for that of an innocent child—and my career. He understood.

  I knelt down and shifted my lower leg to momentarily block the view of the audience. My only excuse was a version of George Orwell’s assertion, allowing the creature to die peacefully at night because a rough man knelt ready to do violence on its behalf. Pretending to position the pathetic thing for Courtney, I delivered a sudden twist, breaking its neck.

  As the tiny creature’s spasms quickly subsided, I swung my leg out of the audience’s sightline and glanced up at Courtney. She turned her back to the audience to provide a clear view of her stiletto heel hovering above the kitten, looked down at me, and silently mouthed a thank-you. Then she launched a debasing monologue for those whose existence society wants desperately to deny, along with the vermin in their crawlspaces and basements.

  CHAPTER 33

  After the performance, there was no applause, just murmurs of approval. A musty odor had replaced the grassy sweetness and the music was reduced in volume and quality—not that heavy metal has notable artistic virtue, but it is more genuine than the insipid blend of flutes and chimes that followed. The spotlight was dimmed and the floor lamps were turned up enough so nobody stumbled over the scattered furniture on their way out. The audience exited wordlessly, evidently satisfied with the evening and on board with what Eunectes had coming next.

  Outside, Luis and the others headed toward the street. I went the opposite direction, seeking solitude in the labyrinth of warehouses. Coming around a corner, I saw in the shadows a woman doubled over, holding her gut. Not one to abandon a damsel in distress, I drew closer and the stench of vomit hit me like a warm, wet pillow. Courtney retched and then stood up, swaying like a punch-drunk fighter.

  “You alright?” I asked. She looked at me dizzily.

  “Sure, bud. Classy ladies always spew on their shoes in upscale neighborhoods.” She wiped her mouth on the back of her sleeve. “We do it to attract refined gentlemen, asshole.”

  “Hey, just asking. I’ll let you get back to your charming endeavor.” I started to head down the alleyway.

  “Hold on,” she commanded. “You’re the guy who assisted me on stage, right?” She stepped into the glare of an industrial, vapor lamp. Her face softened.

  “That’s me, the kitten killer. We made a helluva team tonight.”

  “I should be thanking you, not mouthing off. Christ, I knew what was coming, but I hadn’t done it before.” Her eyes filled with tears. “That was fucking messed up,” she whimpered.

  I never know what to say at these moments, so I tried the comforting platitude, “What’s done is done,” followed by the even less helpful cliché, “It’s all over now,” which evoked a trembling in Courtney reminiscent of the pitiful kitten.

  She gave a rasping inhalation. “I gotta figure a way out.”

  I stepped toward her and she collapsed against me, sobbing. Long, rattling breaths finally giving way to deep sighs as if she’d fallen
asleep. Courtney looked into my face with the desperation of a hostage, then dropped her eyes and wiped futilely at the mess she’d left on the front of my coat.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t even know your name and here I am blubbering away as if you should care or help. God, I must look disgusting,” she said.

  “Not at all. I’m Riley and I find women covered in puke and snot to be irresistible.” She looked at me with a mixture of uncertainty and revulsion. “I’m kidding, doll. My desires don’t go much further than silk sheets and soft music—and the only kink in my sex life can be found in my lower back the morning after a night of lovemaking that pales in comparison to whatever the hell happened on stage tonight.”

  “So, why were you there? You’re not a cop or something are you?”

  “Not a cop. Maybe an ‘or something.’”

  “Can you help me get out?” She had the desperate tone of a panicked child.

  “Slow down. I’m not sure what you’re in. Let’s go somewhere and talk.”

  Courtney clung to my arm with daughterly dependence and wobbled along beside me. After a few blocks we found a bar where a middle-aged man escorting a young woman wouldn’t draw attention. The place had crumbling brick walls, exposed ductwork, and rough wooden flooring which was either a stylistic effort to evoke an industrial ambiance or a financial move to avoid improving the decor. In any case, it was poorly lit, blessedly quiet, and sold beer, which was all we needed. Courtney went to clean up while I ordered a couple Budweisers—the least offensive of what they had on tap—and took them to a table in the back corner.

  “I should be less disgusting, now,” she said, taking a seat across from me.

  “You look fine. Lovely, even. Which makes me wonder—“

  “What’s a nice girl like me doing in a place like that?”

  “Yeah, something along those lines,” I said, sampling my beer. It was cold, which is about as much as you can say for the standard American brews.

  “I’ll give you the short version,” she said, taking a sip and leaning forward. There was nobody near us, but she was clearly anxious about being overheard. “I came to San Francisco with my younger sister. She’s sixteen. I’m twenty,” she said taking a long, defiant drink. Great, I was buying booze for an underage girl who evidently perceived me as a father figure. But given our earlier collaboration, beer seemed morally harmless.

  “We used to live in Sacramento with our mother, a junkie, and our stepfather, a fuckbag who regularly beat the shit out of us. Hooking was a way to get enough money to escape. My stepfather’s pals were into S&M, so I learned some things that paid well. Very well. So when we got here, we connected with Eunectes and he got me some lucrative gigs as a dominatrix.”

  “And your sister?”

  “Followed my mother’s example and went into the family business. She whores to make enough money to get her next fix. I love her and hate who she’s become. Not that I’m any role model. But that’s how this shitty world works.”

  “Speaking of which, why don’t the two of you start over somewhere else? You can’t do much worse than tonight, no matter what it paid,” I said, draining my beer and signaling the barkeep for another round.

  “I want to. It’s not that causing men humiliation and pain bothers me. I just imagine they’re my stepfather. They consent to it. But animals? Mice and hamsters and kittens ... ?”

  The beer arrived. I tipped the guy ten bucks and asked if we could have some privacy. He grunted and turned the chairs upside down on the table next to us. It wasn’t going to cost him any business on a Tuesday night.

  “So what’s keeping you here?”

  “A nightmare named Eunectes.”

  I took a drink and waited for her to explain.

  “Last week, he set me up with a customer. Told me it was a special arrangement that was going to pay a premium, like triple the normal charge. The deal was a choke scenario and the guy wanted it filmed. I knew what I was doing, how to bring a guy along, how to avoid damaging the windpipe. You know.” I didn’t, but I nodded. “And I also knew to wear a mask if there was going to be a videotape.” She took a long pull on her beer. “So I get into my costume and go into the room. The guy is lying on the bed and looking pretty fucked up, but what the hell, it was his party. After some preliminaries, I straddled him and started pressing on his carotids and releasing. He didn’t signal me to stop, so I kept going.

  “Eunectes was behind the camera and kept nodding to encourage me to apply pressure longer and longer. The trick wasn’t looking so good, but the payday was. On about the fifth or sixth round, he passed out. And then stopped breathing. Eunectes freaked out, yelled that I’d killed him, and told me to start mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. I took off my mask and tried to save him, but it all turned out to be a scam.”

  “So, the guy wasn’t really dead?” I’d forgotten my beer at this point, but Courtney reminded me of our refreshments by draining half her glass. I followed suit.

  “Oh, he was dead alright. But I hadn’t killed him. After Eunectes shut off the camera, he started laughing. He says, ‘Sweetie, I got you good. I have you on film killing a guy with kinky sex.’ I looked at him and started crying. And then he says, ‘But what’s not on the video is my giving him an overdose before you came in. You were just yanking his cock and pinching his arteries until the junk stopped his heart.’”

  “Nice guy, that Eunectes,” I said.

  “Yeah, he’s stroking my hair like he’s my friend or something. And in this soft voice he says, ‘Now here’s the deal. I’ll send this tape to the cops and I’ll give your baby sister a needle contaminated with AIDS for her next fix if you don’t do me one, big favor.’ Then he grabs my hair, pulls me backward, and pins me to the bed next to the dead guy.”

  “Let me guess, he invited you to be the crush mistress for his ultimate fantasy. You’re chained to the oars of his ship and rowing to the distant shore of sexual ecstasy, to borrow from your vile captain’s imagery.” Courtney dropped her head and stared at the tabletop. When she looked up, her eyes were filled with tears which she wiped away angrily.

  “If it was just me, I’d run. I’ve hidden away enough money to get to New York or Florida or somewhere the cops wouldn’t find me. I’d have to go underground for a while, but I don’t figure that the dead guy was anyone important. Eunectes just needed a corpse on film. The police will lose interest once enough bodies of whores and junkies and runaways pile up. But ...”

  “But what? Take your sister and get out.”

  “She won’t come. She thinks Eunectes is her savior. He supplies her with Johns and smack. She’s set up in this studio apartment a few blocks from here, not far from where Eunectes lives, although I don’t think anyone knows exactly where that is. Her place is a shithole but it’s the safest place she’s ever lived. If I bolt, she’s facing a death sentence, a sure, slow, miserable death from AIDS. I know that bastard will infect her to get back at me.”

  “So, by your figuring, there’s no way out.”

  “Not unless you come up with something. I shouldn’t be dumping this crap on you, but I’m so fucking scared, and I don’t know who can help. I could see in your eyes when you broke that kitten’s neck that you’re not one of them. I don’t know why you were there, but you’re my only hope.”

  “I’m gonna be honest. I’ll help you if I can, but my concern is for the kid Eunectes has lined up for his finale. I’m his only hope.”

  “That’s for real because I can’t help him,” she said, finishing her beer. “If I don’t follow through with the final crush, Eunectes will find some other chick. Unless you can do something, the dude’s going to die sooner or later.”

  “Are you sure that Eunectes is serious, that he really has some guy lined up?” I asked, putting away the rest of my beer.

  “He’s a lying, manipulative son-of-a-bitch. So it’s possible he’s just screwing with the crush freaks, seeing how far they’re willing to go. He’s all about power. He wants to be
dominated, to imagine himself utterly debased by a woman. But at the same time, he wants to have complete control over others. Redbug told me that he’s serious, but that sicko’s just creaming his pants in anticipation.”

  “So, you figure it’s going to happen?”

  “Probably. But we won’t know until it actually comes together,” she said, pushing back from the table. I caught the bartender’s eye in thanks and he nodded an appreciative reply. Back on the street, I told Courtney what I needed from her was as much advance notice as possible about the place and time of Eunectes’s crowning—or crushing—glory. I gave her my number and she paused for a moment, seemingly unsure what to do. Then she stood on tiptoe, whispered a thank-you into my ear and delivered a quick peck on my cheek. Looking a bit embarrassed, a presumably unpracticed emotion in her life, she headed up the sidewalk, the glare from the streetlights in the fog casting an angelic, or maybe hellish, glow around her.

  ~||~

  By the time I got home, I was brooding and angry. A frozen pizza and a glass of low-end Jameson were about all I wanted—along with the third act of Rigoletto. Sometimes when you’re in a funk, going deeper feels good. Or at least it feels right, as if wallowing in rottenness is more genuine that pretending the world is filled with goodness. The pizza crust was burnt around the edges and soggy in the middle, just the way the damned things are designed to cook. Along with the cheap whiskey, it became a kind of penance. Maybe not ashes and sackcloth, but something that resonated with my long-rejected Catholic roots.

  Piero Cappuccilli accompanied my dinner with his heartrending baritone. I stopped eating to savor the part when the Duke’s voice, singing a reprise of “La donna è mobile,” can be heard echoing in the streets of Mantua. In this ominous moment, Rigoletto realizes that the shrouded body he’s preparing to dump in the river—the payoff from his hired assassin—is not the corpse of the Duke who defiled his daughter. The anguish as he opens the sack to discover his own dying daughter is beyond words, which is exactly why the music of opera is necessary.