Messalina: Devourer of Men

by Zetta Brown

  The back is also completely black except for white space containing the barcode.

  There is no way anyone without a clue is going to guess what’s in between these covers. But the sheer simplicity of the cover is enough to make it stand out on any magazine rack.

  I take a deep breath, swallow my pride, and open the book.

  What I see inside is magnificent, sublime. There is no dialogue. The time for talking between Messalina and Jack Dover is past. This issue is all about action and Jared has laid it bare with cinematographic perfection.

  It starts with Messalina standing in the doorway, hands on hips, feet planted. Her tall, hourglass body fills the doorway, blocking any means for Jack to escape, even if he wanted to.

  Jack is sitting on the edge of her desk, calmly smoking a cigarette, which he flicks aside and they meet in the center of the room, each prepared for a battle.

  It’s all over from there. From that panel on, there is nothing but wild, unbridled sex presented in the most erotic, sensuous drawings I have ever seen and the color scheme changes to suggest pleasure and pain—red, purple, black, blue.

  Jared has captured some of our most intimate moments and has recreated them for the world to see in vivid detail: a Jared and Evadne “greatest hits” retrospective. The straining muscles, the yielding flesh, the sheen of perspiration on skin, it’s all here.

  And Jack and Messalina are an energetic pair. They start in the office on her desk, but their passion is so intense they move from the desk to the floor, out the door, into the hall, and beyond, but the progression is natural, seamless.

  My eyes cannot look away from the images on the pages before me; they absorb the heat Messalina and Jack produce and transfer it into my body. No one can doubt the force and power in their lovemaking. It’s like the first image I ever saw of Jared’s graphic work in the bookstore. He has conveyed the same emotion—and cranked it up.

  You can feel it when Jack plunges into Messalina or when her nails cut into his skin. Jared’s decision to use no dialogue or scripting of any kind makes the images more forceful. You don’t need bubbles with “Oh!” “Sigh!” “SLURP!” when it is all in their faces. This is body language in the extreme and the things Messalina and Jack’s bodies are saying is lewd.

  Regardless of my tutelage in porno flicks, I am struck dumb by what I see. Sure, it’s titillating, but it is also beautiful. Jared and I never videotaped our lovemaking—not to my knowledge, anyway—but as I see it playing out before me, I find it hard to believe that it all came from his memory.

  The mirrors. I remember being unnerved at the thought of all the mirrors in Jared’s bedroom but by the time we split, their presence seemed totally natural. They have served their purpose well. I take what I see on these pages before me as genuine.

  But it’s more than Jared’s memory I’m seeing. The way he has composed this issue has given me the most insight into his feelings about the time we spent in each other’s arms. The detail he puts into drawing the oral sex, the vaginal sex, the anal sex, the way Jack gropes Messalina’s flesh or grits his teeth.

  A drop of sweat falls into my eye making me gasp. It’s a perfect reaction to the next panel of me—Messalina rather—moaning out of ecstasy. He captured what I have never seen: my face during orgasm. I didn’t know how blissed out I looked. I know I felt that way, but I never realized my expression was so soft, so enraptured.

  Damn. I’m beautiful when I come!

  Of course, Messalina doesn’t have my face, but the way she moves her mouth or expresses with her eyes, I see myself. And Jack doesn’t resemble Jared, but from the way Jack talks or reacts, I can look see Jared.

  He has really outdone himself. This one sex scene is an extended game of cat and mouse. Jack and Messalina fight and change position between master and servant at least three times until the last page where they are hammering away at each other with him on top. In one panel, there’s a close-up of his eyes and, in the next, one of her eyes. Suddenly, Jack grabs her by the waist and they turn over. Messalina now straddles him between her strong, exquisite thighs.

  Finally, it happens. Silhouetted against a background that’s a firework explosion of color, Jack comes inside Messalina. The last frame is of her riding him to glory, head thrown back, hands gripping his as he holds her down by the hips.

  With amazing accuracy, Jared has captured the moment during my last night with him in Dallas. He has immortalized the one moment in my life I thought was totally private, that I thought was mine alone, because no one else in the world would place as much significance on it as I would.

  The night I went to Nirvana . . . Jared went too.

  I drop the comic onto my lap. I can’t hold it any longer. I am drenched. The chenille throws were thrown aside long ago. I’m sweating, aroused, and can feel heat and dampness between my legs. But I am also crying, trembling.

  The phone rings, startling me out of my seat. It rings again.

  Fuck, I can’t deal with anyone right now. One more ring and the answering machine does its job.

  “Hello? Eva? It’s Ana. Pick up friend-girl.” Her voice is soothing, sympathetic.

  Silence.

  “C’mon, Evie, pick up.” She’s sharper now.

  My mind races until I finally pick up the receiver.

  “I knew you’d be home.” She says.

  “I can’t talk right now.”

  “Sure you can. You just did.”

  “Ana—”

  “Evadne.” Ana’s tone is no-nonsense. She isn’t going to let me wallow in self-pity. I blow my nose.

  “What do you want?”

  “To ask you what I should think.”

  “Huh?”

  “What do you want me to think, Evadne? Is Jared a complete and utter bastard or a mother-fucking genius ? Personally, I choose the latter, but you’re my best friend and I love you and I got your back.”

  Her words remind me just why we’ve been friends for so long, but I am too drained to be in a rage. I’m not even sure what I’m raging against and sigh. “Think what you want, Ana-Marie.”

  “Well, what’s your opinion?”

  “Shocked. Mortified.”

  “But why?”

  “Because it’s me, Ana!” I can’t believe she can be so slow. “It’s us! Jared has taken our love life and exposed it to the world.”

  “Eva,” she argues, “he’s been doing that for months with the rest of the comic.”

  “That’s different.”

  “How?”

  “Because those acts between other characters can’t be traced back directly to us.”

  “But you don’t deny the experiences are genuine? You and Jared do—did—those things. Whenever someone has sex in The Life of Lucrezia , it’s really a recreation of what you and Jared have done.”

  “It’s still different, Ana.”

  “How?”

  I roll my eyes. We’re repeating ourselves. “This is personal, Ana. I feel so exposed.”

  “Why should you? There’s only six people who know the connection—and we ain’t tellin’.”

  I tell her about the possibility of my dad, nephews, Sarah, and Neil knowing.

  “Personally, Evie, I sincerely doubt your dad and nephews know. This isn’t the type of thing your dad goes for and the twins have probably progressed to stealing a peek at Shaved Snatches or Horny Whores by no
w.”

  I smile at her made-up titles.

  “And Sarah,” she adds, “she’s just bitter.”

  “And Neil?” I prompt. “He’s been trying like hell to get me in a compromising position. I can’t think why. There is some kind of frat-house game I’ve heard about, but I don’t see how I could be a target.”

  “Yes,” Ana drawls and I hear her throw something into a hot skillet and the loud sizzling that follows. “He does pose a minor problem.”

  I chuckle despite myself.

  “Seriously, Eva. You don’t sound like the same chick that emasculated Eddie Norton. Where’s your fight, girlfriend? This Neil kid can and will be eliminated.”

  This time I do bust out laughing. “Listen to you, Ana. You sound like a hood rat.”

  “Hey, I got some street in me. You do too.”

  “Ana, we’re about as street as Clare Huxtable.”

  “What- ever ,” she says in her best snotty teenager voice. “You don’t need street cred in order to scrap. And Clare Huxtable did become a partner in the law firm, remember?”

  I don’t say a word. My head is starting to ache.

  “Think about it, Evie. Neil is a little schoolboy who’s looking to be taught a lesson. You’re the professor, so teach him. You know where I am if you need me.”

  * * * *

  “M”

  She is pure sex. Messalina is a voluptuous vixen with the business acumen of Warren Buffet and the sexual appetite of the Marquis de Sade. And she’s in stores now—in the raw. So, come on.

  . . . You know you want to.

  Three days later and not only does the journalist for Redd Ink rave about the latest issue of The Life of Lucrezia , bringing up its popularity in the underground and its slow, but inevitable, crossover into the mainstream, but there are also rumors that it may be banned in some states. He goes on to list locations where people can get it.

  Like Preston’s Place in LoDo.

  I put down the magazine.

  Lucrezia is no more.

  Long live Messalina.

  Chapter nineteen

  “A woman scorned”

  Messalina: Devourer of Men issue #1 hits the streets as a serial in its own right, in a way Lucrezia never did, and I am starting to see hints of it all around me.

  The signs are subtle: a young man wearing a black button with a white, gothic “M” in the center, or a young woman wearing the same in the form of a baseball cap.

  But last week, when I saw a woman standing in line at the deli by the campus wearing a T-shirt with the “M” on front and the new catchphrase: . . . you know you want to , on the back, I thought I would drop dead.

  It’s all very clever the way Jared (by way of Trey) is marketing his latest creation and developing a type of beacon for those in the know to seek out each other. Perhaps even more disturbing is what I see in Messalina . It’s definitely a darker, more violent story line than the quaint idea of suburban bordellos in Lucrezia .

  Jared and I have been apart for a few months and the issues are still sent to my address, but I don’t need a Freudian to tell me the pages are a representation of Jared’s state of mind. When you compare the two series, Lucrezia is drawn in a style similar to the old Archie comics, whereas Messalina has a noir feel reminiscent of classic DC Comics. This is appropriate considering Messalina is turning out to be more of a detective comic than erotic fun like Lucrezia .

  But I have other things on my mind, such as my family and my future at Bellingham College.

  During my years at the college, I’ve been living under the radar. Given my untenured position, I haven’t gained the status to strike out at the establishment by making provocative statements, such as the ones I made at the debate. Since then, I’ve felt like I’ve been under surveillance by the powers that be.

  It’s lovely when you’re teaching a class and someone higher up the food chain comes in halfway through your lecture, all smiles, and takes a seat in the back as an “unnoticed” observer.

  And I consider myself lucky that, over the last few months, I’ve been called into my head of department’s office on four separate occasions to be asked how I’m doing, or if I’ve heard anything or needed to talk to someone about the Hyde case, especially since I’ve been mentor-less while on the verge of being offered tenure.

  Nevertheless, these gestures of support have done nothing but make me skeptical and rattle my nerves. I’m thinking a long vacation may be in order—away from Bellingham, away from Colorado, away from everybody.

  * * * *

  My office isn’t too big or small. It has windows and, apart from the summer months during some of the mini-courses, I have the office to myself. So when a large envelope with the word OSCAR written across it in black marker appears on my desk . . . my heart stops.

  Sitting down, I open the envelope. Several photographs and paper clippings of various sizes fall out. I don’t even have to look at them to know that I’m in a world of shit.

  I get my eyes to work and this is what I see: Jared and me kissing on his doorstep; Jared leaving my apartment building; the newspaper clipping of me, Jared, and Tony; and a clipping from the campus paper about the debate with my name highlighted along with the quotes.

  But that is nothing compared to the next series of photos of me bent over the arm of Jared’s couch with him fucking me from behind. It’s an excellent photo taken from between a gap in the curtains allowing anyone with a high-power lens on their camera to have at it. The tattoo on my hip is clearly visible, but there is something else about the photo that turns my mouth into cotton.

  Quickly, I get up to close and lock the door to my office, then I go about closing the blinds, never mind that I’m on the second floor and my office windows open out onto the quad. Whoever took these snapshots is spying from afar and an open window is all it takes.

  With the blinds closed and the clouds coming in from the west giving credence to the forecast for rain, my office is dark enough for me to turn on my grandfather’s desk lamp.

  After slipping all but one of the photos back into the envelope, I undo the latches of my briefcase and open it. Inside the last compartment, behind a half dozen student essays and articles waiting to be copied as part of my lecture notes, I find my copy of the “Sex” issue. I pull it out, open it to the page in question, and place it next to the photograph.

  The way the scene in the book is illustrated, with the background in shadow, it is easy for the casual reader to overlook the décor. I’m not a casual reader, but I definitely have not been observant. Like everyone else, I was too busy looking at the action.

  It never occurred to me when I saw it the first time, or the hundreds of times since, that it was all here in full color. On top of the bookcase in Messalina’s office sit several pieces of pottery. The shadows make it impossible to see detail, but their shapes are distinctive and they are the exact same shapes in the exact same order as the row of pottery sitting on the mantelpiece in Jared’s living room.

  Next, I notice the floor lamp in the corner of the drawing that throws a small circle of light in the comic book is the same lamp standing in the corner of Jared’s living room.

  Like the image I saw when catching my nephews with the magazine all those months ago, instead of a dentist and his patient doing it doggy-style in the
dentist’s chair, there can be no doubt that this is Jared and me—Jack and Messalina—screwing each other like it’s going out of style.

  We are the centerfold.

  “I am such a fucking moron .”

  I turn to the first page of the issue and instead of engrossing myself with the bodies before me, I analyze each and every object in every frame. The mystery photographer would not know that the bronze in Messalina’s study can be found in Jared’s hallway, or that the painting hanging in her bedroom is a miniature of Jared’s own creation located in his spare bedroom. But I do.

  And I had missed it all.

  Stupid, silly me with the advanced degree missed all the little details where the Devil lies pointing at me, mocking me.

  “God damn.” I rub my forehead, then my eyes. The birth of a migraine is starting at the base of my neck and will reach my temples within the hour. I start packing everything away and when I pick up the envelope. All the snaps fall out and scatter across my desk, including a white piece of paper.

  Pressing my lips together, I turn the slip over and read:

  Dear Evadne,

  I am sure you would like the memory card to go with your photos so I suggest you be in your office at this time tomorrow.

  My initial curiosity has now changed to survival instinct.

  * * * *

  Over the next twenty-four hours, I try to think of my battle plan only to discover I don’t have one.

  I consider calling Ana, Tony, even Trey, but decide there is very little they can do but give me a pep rally. Glynnis? No. Not because I think she’d gloat, but because she warned me several times and I ignored her.

  I could try to contact my “mentor,” Terrence Hyde, and get his opinion as to what it’s like being in the center of a sex scandal.