The Minotauress

by Edward Lee

  Then twisted for all he was worth.

  The act begot the strangest sound, like a hinge squeaking, then wood splintering:

  kreeeee-CRUNCH!

  "Eeee-YEAH!" the boy's father grunted with earnest effort, and simultaneously the wicked tool in his hands successfully yanked the left horn out of the 1,900-pound Black Angus gelding's skull.

  The steer, understandably, howled.

  The young boy looked into the hole that had been caused by this rude and cruel extraction. A gritty, wet hole in the skull now replaced the once-proud horn. Pinpoints of blood began to appear inside.

  Wow! the boy thought. A hole—in its head!

  The mammoth beast bucked in its steel gate, still howling, snot flying away in ropes. Metal clattered, hooves pounded the earth.

  "If it could get out of there, son, it'd gore us lickety-split. It'd kill every thing that moved."

  The boy peered closer at the huge trapped beast. Yeah, but it CAN'T get out! It CAN'T! Then came a fit of giggling.

  Next, the boy's father wrenched out poor beast's second horn.

  kreeee-CRUNCH!

  The steer, again, howled. Its howl trumpeted over the farm's vast expanse like a vociferation from hell...

  "There ya go."

  The two horns lay in the dust now, between the boy's high-top Keds.

  "See? That's all it takes to turn this mean-ass creature into a harmless pud. " The man set down the infernal instrument, then put his arm around his son. "And one day, boy, you'll be a horn-cranker too, just like me and my father before me... "

  CHAPTER ONE

  SEATTLE, WASHINGTON, 1999

  When it wasn't raining, the entire city of Seattle sighed in relief. Which wasn't often. No, God saw fit to tinkle liberally on this city 280 days per year. Hence the floods, the washed out roads, the houses sliding off hillsides, and the highest suicide rate of any national metropolis came as little surprise, forging a dismal inclement cement shit-house with a candyass monorail, a ripoff "Underground," and a piercingly ugly Space Needle that most residents hoped would fall over onto 5th Avenue rush hour. Tourists were in for a big surprise should they venture past the scenic "Waterfront," for then they would see what the city was really about: derelict vomit splattered on every sidewalk and buses that smelled worse than the shit-hoppers at a compost dump. Seattle was a wino-loogie-pasted rain bucket which attracted too many fish-belly-white "Goths" who thought it "chic" to live in environs bereft of sunlight, too many women with knapsacks and unshaved legs, bums, drunks, and homeless crack addicts (because showers, here, were free), and police kicked off of every major city on the West Coast (because what qualified officer would want to work here if he could get a job anywhere else in America?) Teeming rain ruled, as did people blowing off their heads due to protracted Vitamin-D deficiency and Seasonal Affect Disorder.

  In a city as fucked up as this? Who knew what other "disorders" might be percolating? Who knew what other slow-burning sicknesses were beginning to smolder in unsuspecting heads?

  Who knew?

  ««—»»

  When Dean Lohan's wife pulled up at the corner of 4th and Virginia, Dean just stood there a moment, looking at her face behind the half-opened driver's side window. Pert, classy, with penetrating indigo eyes, Daphne's beauty only seemed to evolve since their marriage three years ago. They both had jobs in the city, rode to and from work together, had lunch together every day... Well, not every day; lately Daphne was having to skip her own lunch hour for important work meetings. She worked for a national clothing distributor, was moving fast up the ranks, working hard for the marriage. She's my life, Dean thought as he stood looking at her. The image and the thought nearly brought him to tears She's my very world...

  "I'm going to Ajax's to drink beer," he said to her. "I need the car."

  Daphne, with a creased expression, rolled the window down the rest of the way. "What?"

  Dean's voice was already honing its edge of impatience. "I'm going to Ajax's to drink," he repeated. "You deaf? Get out of the car."

  Daphne's model-face froze, then went lax as she laughed. It was a joke, of course. Dean joked around all the time.

  "Think it's a joke?" he said. He yanked open the car door. Then he grabbed her, not by the collar and not by the hair, but by the face, and hauled her shrieking out of the Honda Accord.

  "What's wrong with you?" came her shrill and flabbergasted objection.

  "I'm thirsty. I need a beer."

  Daphne stood stiffly on the sidewalk, her fists at her side. "How am I going to get home?"

  Dean grabbed her—again, not by the hair but by the face—and shoved her toward the bus stop. She nearly lost her footing, nearly fell into the street.

  "Take the fuckin' bus," Dean said.

  —as the drone rang in his head, he couldn't move, he couldn't—

  "... mind taking the bus?"

  —and Dean's mind jigged, then jagged, and he snapped out of the waking dream. He was standing on the corner of 4th and Virginia, looking at his beautiful wife behind the wheel of their car.

  "Honey?" Daphne asked through the open window. "Are you all right?"

  Reality slammed back. "I'm sorry, honey," he said once he recomposed himself. "Forgot to change the air in my head today."

  Daphne seemed concerned. "You looked like you were in a trance. Are you sure you're all right?"

  "Fit as a fiddle, however fit that is," Dean tried to joke. "Seriously, how fit are fiddles? What's that you were saying?"

  Her profuse lashes blinked at him. She looked depressed. "Mr. Thron called a work meeting tonight. Quarterly inventory."

  "Bosses do that," Dean tossed it off.

  "The meeting's now. Would you mind taking the bus home?"

  "No biggie," Dean said. "I enjoy busses, actually. You might even call me a bus-loving man."

  "I knew you'd understand." She batted her big eyes again. "Kiss-kiss."

  "Ah, of course." Dean leaned over and kissed wife on the lips.

  "Love you," Daphne whispered.

  "I love you more... "

  "Do not."

  "Do too."

  Dean grinned, stepping back. He could stand there and kiss her forever, and that would be fine with him. But then she'd miss her meeting!

  "Oh, and I might be late," Daphne added, slipping the car into gear. "So don't wait up."

  The love in Dean's eyes shone like hot embers as he watched Daphne drive off. He thought nothing of the fact her office was south yet she was driving north. It didn't even register.

  Dean looked at the Metro bus stop, less than enthused about the hour-and-a-half ride back home. Hell, it's Friday night, he thought. A minute later, he was on the pay phone.

  "Ajax, it's Dean. What say we have a few beers?"

  ««—»»

  Ajax, like Dean, was not a true Seattlelite. He'd moved here from the east coast to pursue the more bountiful employment opportunities. He stuffed envelopes for a national survey corporation and was quite proud to make a living at it—not that many would call his existence a living.

  Ajax looked like Rush Limbaugh with a beard, and possessed similar political sentiments. Well, make that Rush Limbaugh with a beard who dressed like a pan-handler. He and Dean had met quite by accident, at a Fremont tavern called THE DUBLINER during the last game of the World Series. They'd been the only two cheering when the Yankees had won. Since then, both never fitting into the Seattle grunge-goth-Left Coast-shaven-headed-everyone-has-a-fucking-knapsack scene, they became fast friends.

  Ajax' surname was Jackson, and his parents had absurdly dubbed him with the first name Andrew. In his bent political persuasions, however, he regarded the seventh president of the United States as the nation's first "pinko," a closet separatist who boldly killed unarmed Indians while the rest of the Continental Army was fighting the well-trained British, and who "lucked out" at the Battle of New Orleans because his drinking habits forced subordinate officers to lead the battle. Hence, Ajax didn't l
ike his name, so he insisted he be called Ajax.

  Ajax was also a bit of a pervert.

  "Man," he said, "I'd like to pee on her back."

  Dean frowned at the table.

  With this comment, Ajax had been referring to the zombie-shuffling waitress who'd just brought them their beers. She was rack-skinny, straight black hair like a mortician wig, with unbra'd tits pushing against her black PIERCE ME! T-shirt like a couple of under-ripe peaches. Tattoos of skeleton hands crawled up her neck to strangle her, and she had something in her lower lip that looked like a shower-curtain ring.

  "Shit," Ajax appended, "that tramp's probably had more abortions than I've had beers. Bet she gargles biker piss like Listerine. Pops empty Jim Beam bottles out of her pussy for parlor tricks and has an asshole bigger than the drydock for a Nimitz-class carrier."

  Dean blanched.

  "Yeah, I'd yank that bitch's reins bigtime; she'd whinny like a horse, " Ajax went on, his eyes fogged in fantasy as he stared after the vapid barmaid. She moved like one of the cast of Cemetery Man. "I'd fist-fuck her entire large intestine, then piss on her so hard her Ozzy Osborne tattoos would wash off." Dean blocked out his friend's pornographic rant. God he's so sexist! No wonder women don't go out with him.

  Full of reeking bums eating their own boogers, bovine-faced bald lesbians, and a man with a beard and large breast implants—God Bless Seattle!—the Rte. 25 bus had brought Dean here from downtown—here being a tavern called THE WHARF which sat one street away from beautiful Lake Union, or not so beautiful when one considered the lake's history. For a hundred years, a coal-oil processing plant had dumped its petro-chemical effluence into the lake's pristine depths. Swimming was strictly prohibited, and if you ate a fish caught in Union's waters, any sequent offspring would more than likely be born with flippers. As for THE WHARF itself, it was an actual murder site: A number of years ago, a local "businessman" was shot in the head with a small-caliber weapon, evidently for running up too lofty a marker with other local "businessmen." Ajax and Dean sat at the self-same table.

  The tavern made a garbage pit look well-appointed. Some entrepreneur took a couple of double-wide trailers, smacked them together, and that was it. That was the bar. The clientele fit right in, West Coast rednecks to the max. Heavy metal blared from the juke, billiard balls clacked in the back. A giant projection TV in the corner sported Monster Truck races.

  Ajax sipped his Redhook ESB and winced. "So the wife let you out of the cage tonight, huh? Let me guess. Work meeting?"

  Dean squirted lemon juice into his Pyramid Hefeweizen. "How'd you know?"

  "Duh. What is this, like the eighth Friday night in a row she's had a work meeting?"

  Dean grinned triumph against the ceaseless implication. "No, it's the sixth, smart guy."

  "Oh, that's right. The other two work meetings were on Saturday nights. And you don't think that's odd."

  "Why should I?" Dean retorted. "She's in an odd business. Clothing distribution isn't like working at a bank, you know. Most of their invoices go out on weekends."

  "Whatever you say... "

  For as long as they'd been friends, Ajax had always intimated that Daphne might be cheating on Dean, the prospect of which Dean viewed as preposterous. We're in love! he thought. He doesn't understand true love.

  "How often do you drop wax?" Ajax asked.

  "What?"

  Ajax rolled his eyes. "How often do you fuck her? Let me guess—once every two weeks?"

  Dean was taken aback. "Well, not quite that often. Once a month or so." Actually, it was more like once every two months... but why quibble?

  Ajax laughed. "Christ, my grandparents fuck more than that."

  "Marriage isn't about sex," Dean explained. "It's about a spiritual bond, an everlasting one. It's about commitment and total faith. It's about sharing your life with someone else. It's about love, Ajax," and at that precise moment an uncharacteristic selection switched on over the juke: "All You Need Is Love," by The Beatles.

  "See that!" Dean clapped at the coincidence.

  The side of Ajax's bearded face flopped into his palm. "You're hopeless. You live your life by advice from The Beatles."

  "The Beatles were monumental," Dean defended. "The most important musical assembly in history."

  "They were a bunch of acid-head hippie pinko guru-loving junkie shit-heads—"

  Dean was long used to Ajax's rather conservative nature. Best to change the subject as quickly as possible. "We were talking about the reality of marriage, Ajax. Sex becomes faddish, much less important."

  Ajax grinned. "Faddish?"

  "Statistically, sex amongst happily married couple drops drastically after the second year."

  "Not into the toilet," Ajax said. "Shit, man. If I was married to a woman as good-looking as your wife, I wouldn't even care if she was cheating on me. But I'd sure as shit be busting my nut up her cooze twice a day. No, with her? Make that three times. I'd be hosing her down like a fuckin' fire truck."

  There was no arguing with him. He just doesn't understand, Dean realized. He's never been truly in love. Best to just leave it lie.

  But even though Ajax was a weirdo, pervert, and asshole, he was also Dean's friend. And true friends were always there when you needed them. "Look, Ajax, I've got a problem. Do you know anything about—"

  Ajax was rubbing his hands together at an image. "Yeah, I'd be dick-spanking that tramp every night. I'd be coring her asshole and dropping big peter-tracks on her back. Shit, I'd whittle my dick down to pencil-width and fuck her nose—"

  "Ajax!" Dean was disgusted. "That's my wife you're talking about!"

  "Oh, yeah. Sorry. I was just... .abstracting."

  Dean simmered. "I was asking if you knew anything about psychology."

  Ajax sipped his beer, then winced. "Does the pope have nocturnal emissions? Fuck, yes, I know about psychology. Shit, I majored in psych... before I quit college."

  "Well, see, I've been having these—"

  "Nocturnal emissions?"

  "No," Dean said.

  "So what's the problem, partner?"

  "Sometimes I think... " How could he say it? "I have these... dreams. I call them the Jig-Jags, 'cos that's how my mind feels. It's like vertigo or something; my brain jigs and jags, and then it's like I'm someone else."

  "Dreams, huh?"

  "Well, no, it doesn't happen when I'm asleep. It's more like a day dream."

  "The Jig-Jags? Sounds like lucid dreaming to me," Ajax said. "Let me guess. When this happens, you see yourself doing something you'd never do in real life."

  "Exactly!" Dean excitedly replied. "Like today, I was standing there, and I saw myself grab Daphne by the face and yank her out of the car."

  "By the face—I like it," Ajax remarked. "And if you ask me, you should've done it for real, the way the bitch treats you."

  Dean scowled.

  "It's called non-REM imagery, waking fantasy construction," Ajax went on. "Freud wrote all about it. The strictures of society repress everyone to an extent, but some people get squeezed harder."

  "What strictures?" Dean asked. "Society doesn't impose any strictures on me."

  "Don't be a dope; of course it does. Everything that's made mankind civilized can be viewed as a stricture. Progress is a stricture. Part of us, in our psyches, will always be cavemen. It's in our genetic code. Raping cavewoman pussy, eating raw meat, and shitting in the woods. Then ‘civility' comes along, and we gotta shit in shiny white bowls and wipe our asses with toilet paper. We don't eat raw meat, we eat a ‘balanced diet' consisting of the four major food groups. When our dicks get hard, we don't drag a bitch by the hair into the nearest cave and stick her; now we gotta date 'em first, hold hands in the park and buy 'em roses. Shit, we gotta take 'em out to dinner before we come in their pies. Cavemen didn't do any of that shit! When they got horny they just spit on their dicks and stuck it in, and if the bitch didn't like it, she'd get her head cracked with a rock. In a sense, the modernization of
society wages war with our true primordial selves. Get it?"

  "No," Dean said.

  "Domestication is one of those strictures, nimrod. Relationships. Pair-bonding." Ajax winked. "Marriage."

  "I don't believe it," Dean attested. "You're talking like human love is an aberration but it's not. It's part of how your primordial cavemen evolved," and then, at that precise moment, another uncharacteristic song switched on to the jukebox: "Love Me Tender" by the King.

  "See!" Dean clapped at the coincidence.

  "First The Beatles, now Elvis."

  "What's wrong with Elvis? He was the most monumental vocalist in—"

  "He was a fat drug-addicted cracker who never wrote a song in his life and died on a toilet seat."

  Dean grit his teeth at such blasphemy. "Let's stick to the point, huh?"

  "And the point is, you've got these ‘Jig-Jags,' and I'm telling you why. Non-REM Imagery Syndrome is commonly experienced by people who've undergone a drastic change in their lives. And look at you. You spent the first twenty-five years of your life growing up in a rural environment, then—BAM—you move to a big city. Three years later, you're married and you're damn near having hallucinations. Something ain't right in the gearbox, Dean. And I know what it is: your wife."