Wilde Stories 2014

by Editred by Steve Berman

  I almost left the wheel, but they were forty paces away, the beast already drinking from Olgaren’s neck. Instead, I heaved the wheel to larboard, feeling the deck surge and lift as the prow swung out. Then we slid from the crest and fell lengthways into the deep valley between waves. A wall of water slammed the hull and broke in a sweep of rushing foam across the deck. The two figures fell, and I lost them in the gloom. Searching the racing shadows, I swung the wheel back as fast as I could to help the Demeter lift her prow. Water streamed from the deck as she heaved herself clear, and at last I saw him, wrapped around the mainmast, unmoving. I strapped the wheel in place, ignoring the shouts from the fo’c’sle, and ran.

  Even after the storm, the deck was treacherous. Mud oozed from the joins between every plank. I skidded to a halt at Olgaren’s body. He was cold and white, his eyes rolled back, his teeth chattering. Blood, his own or the beast’s, smeared his jaw and darkened his lips. As I leant to touch the pulsing wound at his throat, a shadow slipped from the prow and slid along the deck towards us.

  I stooped and swung Olgaren over my shoulder. He seemed light as a child. Where could I run? Where would be safe?

  Upwards, I thought. At the top, there would be a stretch of rigging free of soil where the beast could not tread. I clutched Olgaren to me and began to climb the mainmast, lunging one-handed, upwards from rung to rung. I climbed until my limbs weakened, until I feared I must fall. When I looked down, the monster hung, scant feet below me. His eyes burned red.

  “Drop him,” he said. I heard him clearly, though the wind shrieked in the rigging all about. He grinned. “It is time for your reward.”

  I gripped Olgaren tighter and forced myself upwards, while the monster’s voice followed me into the swinging, empty sky.

  “You want me,” he said. “I shall be your master. You will have no uncertainty, no doubt. Your station will be absolute. You need never struggle to define yourself again. Leave him. Come to me.”

  Behind his eyes, the red glow grew bright. It drew me downwards, more than the weight of Olgaren on my shoulder.

  Even up this high, the ropes were black and slick. I pulled us upwards, dreading to feel the monster’s jaw clamp on my heel.

  The deck swung past under me as the Demeter heaved herself up onto the next wave. For one small moment, if we had fallen, we would have landed on the wet boards. Around that instant, the dark of the sea crashed in foam-streaked chaos.

  I reached the boom. There was no higher to climb. I could edge out along the horizontal beam, but to what end? It, too, was smeared in mud. Olgaren twisted and slipped a hand’s breadth from my shoulder. I tightened my grip and when I looked down, the monster was flying towards me, his arms outstretched, his hands crooked into claws.

  My body seized. Every muscle locked. My heart clapped once, louder than lightning—and the beast struck. He caught the boom with one hand, causing the entire mast to shudder. The boom swung out and back, whipping the monster’s cloak out behind him. He hung below, grinning at me, then in an impossible movement, pulled himself up one-handed, to stand on the narrow, wooden beam. He reached out a claw.

  Olgaren screamed. He writhed and fell. I lunged for him. My shoulders almost tore from their sockets as I caught his shirt. The sea swept beneath me, then the brief flash of the deck, then the sea again.

  “Drop him,” the beast said. “In England, you shall be my hand and I your will.” He stood, hardly swaying on the beam, so high above the deck. He was young and strong and dark, having drunk from many men. He was taller than I, and I did not know his name.

  Yearning built in my chest to be free. To be free of choice, and of duty. This beast could wrap me in his cloak and I would not feel the cold. I would not feel anything at all. Absolute submission….

  Olgaren moaned. My arms cramped with a distant pain. The beast waited, as again the deck swept beneath me. I would not feel…. The greatest rebellion—

  No, I realised. There would be no rebellion under the beast.

  Olgaren was mistaken. Absolute submission was the minimum the monster required.

  I let go of the mast. For an instant, we hung, high above the waves. The smile whipped off the face of the beast. He fell away upward as the wind built to a roar about us, foam flashed, and we plunged into the black water.

  The shock woke Olgaren, who kicked and struggled free of my arms almost immediately. A slap of salt water filled my mouth.

  When I had finished choking, the Demeter was nothing more than a receding shadow against the silver-streaked horizon. High above the deck, two glowing red eyes faded with distance. Not once did the beast look away before the wind bore the Demeter out of sight, but with her passing a heaviness left me. My limbs grew bright with motion in the chill water. I scoured the surrounding waves. At last I spotted Olgaren clutching a length of dark wood, and swam his way.

  More under the water than above, the sodden spar tipped as I grasped it. Olgaren gasped. His lips trembled. As I watched, his grip on the wood relaxed and he slipped under the surface. Once again I lunged and found his shirt. I pulled him against me and tried to hold his head above the waves. But the spar rolled, and Olgaren could not help, and my new-found strength ebbed fast.

  The gold coin banged against my thigh with every stroke of my legs. Its weight seemed to pull me down. With numb fingers I held it above the water. My payment.

  I threw it high and far and did not hear the splash.

  All night I fought the sea. When at last dawn silvered the eastern horizon, I blinked myself from a dream, to find I had let Olgaren slip. He hung in my arms, below the surface of the water, his eyes closed, unbreathing.

  I howled, pulled at him, tried to force the water from his lungs, but he had left me. I had refused the security of the beast. I had hefted responsibility onto my shoulders, only to fail before a single night had passed. I wept at Olgaren’s cold features hanging in another realm, inches from my own, and at last, I resolved to join him. The sky lightened above me. I took my last look at Olgaren’s face and found his eyes wide open, gazing at me from under the water. His grip in mine strengthened as he pulled himself from the sea. Water streamed down his skin. His eyes glowed, not red, but deepest green. He had drunk from the beast.

  He smiled when he saw me, a feral stretching of his face that chilled me more than the freezing water. The emerald glow in his eyes shone bright. “Amramoff!” He reached a hand and cupped my cheek. Only then did he recognise his state. He turned his palm to his face and his smile faded. A wave slapped sea-water into his mouth. He let it drain, uncaring. “I submitted too far,” he said. “I drank from him. Will I ever see the sun again?”

  I could not but recoil, at which his eyes cleared and the glow faded. “I will not take you,” he said. “I will not…do evil.”

  A wave lifted us. Over his shoulder I saw a strip of shoreline, black against the brightening horizon.

  “Swim, Olgaren,” I said. “Take me to shore.”

  In this state, he was stronger than I. His legs churned the sea into foam behind us. I slept, and woke to find him weeping. He had dragged me almost free of the tide, but now huddled behind, attempting to push me further up the shore.

  “It hurts me, Amramoff,” he said when he saw me awake. “I cannot leave the sea.”

  I grasped his hand and fought to pull him further, but he writhed in my grip. His hand darkened and shrivelled in mine. He howled. I had no choice but to let him go and watch as he pulled himself back into the surging waves. Separated by only ten paces, we watched each other.

  “What am I?” he asked.

  At that moment, the sun lifted a golden edge above the horizon. Before I could answer him, Olgaren sank beneath the water. He floated under the surface, his arms crossed over his chest. I could only find one answer to give his unbreathing form. You are dead, Olgaren. You are of the night. And of the sea.

  I pulled him to a tidal pool. Once assured the receding sea would neither sweep him away nor leave him high and dry, I
dragged myself up the beach and collapsed. My last thought was this: of course he could never leave the sea. Just as the monster aboard the Demeter needed its own unholy soil under its feet, Olgaren needed the water that had witnessed the passing of his life. The open sea was his grave and tomb, his consecrated realm…

  The sun warmed my bones. I awoke with fine sand pressed against my cheek, to find the day passed, the sun not far above the horizon. A desperate thirst dried my mouth and cracked my lips. I must drink soon, or die. I stood and stretched my limbs.

  The tide had returned. Olgaren floated near the shore. I had sworn to protect him. How could I do so now? Did my word still hold? Should I aid him in finding blood? The thought repelled me, all the more for having sent Petrofsky down to the beast myself. As the sun lowered and reddened, and seagulls arced overhead, I fought my conscience. I should leave him, and head inland in the hope of finding water. But if I broke my promise to protect Olgaren, who would I be? What was left of my soul? On that nameless beach of white sand and black rocks, I struggled until my mind at last fell silent. Beneath it I heard the steady voice of my heart.

  Stay, it said. He smells of nutmeg….

  I had no plan in mind when the sun slipped away and Olgaren awoke. His face had thinned and he hissed at me, waist deep in the water, before consciousness blinked back behind his slitted eyelids.

  “You did not leave me.” A wave broke across his back, but he did not fall. “I am hungry, Amramoff.”

  I nodded.

  “I do not know how to be this thing.”

  I could think of no answer to the anguish in his voice. “I must find water,” I said. “Let us walk.”

  Olgaren drifted beside me as I stumbled along the shore. The reflection of his eyes glinted green in the rock pools. No streams broke the shoreline. No lights twinkled inland. When we rounded a headland and I saw a five-mile stretch of white sand in the moonlight, I fell to my knees.

  “I can go no further.” My voice caught and cracked.

  “I shall go ahead—”

  “No, Olgaren.” I swallowed, but my throat was made of sand. “How will you bring me water? You cannot leave the sea. I am done. You must drink of me, now.”

  “No! I would never—”

  “I have failed,” I said. I felt the weight of it in my bones. “I could not save you. Drink of me and you may survive.”

  “This is not survival,” he cried. “This is not life!”

  I crawled towards the waves. Closer, I saw the hollows under his cheekbones, the skin drawn tight over the tendons in his neck.

  I rolled into the sea, gasping as the chill water soaked my clothes yet again. Olgaren stepped deeper, shaking his head. I fought to keep my chin above the water against the pull of my clothes, spending the last of my strength to reach him. I gripped his cold hands and tipped my head to one side. “Drink.”

  He lunged in a blur of movement. His hand suddenly gripped my throat. He pulled me close. “There is enough evil in this world,” he said. “I will not add more.”

  And in that instant, I knew what we had to do. “Olgaren.”

  “Do not ask me again.” He dropped his grip and turned to swim away but I grasped his arm.

  “Olgaren, I know how we can survive. I see how to make peace with what we are.” I took his face in my hands while he kept us both afloat. A wild laughter bubbled in my throat. “It only requires that I die. By your kiss.”

  He shook his head, but I pulled him closer. “Shh. I am ready. This life is over. Listen, let me explain….”

  Silence fell after I had spoken. Olgaren’s eyes widened.

  Emerald light boiled from his pupils. He licked his lips over teeth that lengthened as I watched. He pulled me closer, and his lips brushed my own, then swept past. Twin spears of pain sank into my neck. His legs twined about my thighs and we sank below the waves. A burning heat grew in my throat. I felt his tongue probing the skin. He drank from me. Waves of hot and chill pleasure rippled from his bite along every nerve in my body. My head grew light. I opened my mouth to tell him to stop, and salt water poured down my throat. I struggled then, and tore his teeth from my neck in frenzy.

  Strong arms pulled me to the surface. They held me until I ceased to cough and turned me to face an Olgaren renewed. Red flushed his cheeks. His lips were full and dark. He had stolen my strength and I could not break his skin when he held me to his neck.

  “Here,” he said, and sliced himself with a fingernail grown long and sharp.

  His blood tasted of salt, of fire, of whiskey and moonlight. It left me thrilled and sensual in the embrace of the waves. But I did not change. First, I had to die.

  “Now,” I whispered. “You know what you have to do. Do not tarry.”

  He pulled me close, while dark tears fell from his eyes. Our lips touched and again we sank beneath the water. I would like to say I did not struggle, but mortal life is determined and will not give up easily. I fought him while my weakened lungs ached for air and my thinned blood thundered in my temples. He did not let me free but watched with infinite sadness in his eyes as the last of my life fled. My vision darkened. I was for one moment a child, warm, wrapped in my mother’s arms, then something left me with a snap—and all fear ceased. I opened my mouth and let the sea enter freely. It washed through me, chill and clear. I opened my eyes. I was reborn.

  8. THE SEA

  The shadowed water glowed blue and full of promise. Something slid over my naked eyes, and the seabed came into clear focus.

  Moonlight-dappled kelp shone a rich purple. Fish glittered like gems. I pulled the blood-dark sea into my lungs and felt myself part of her. Whale song shook my bones. Icebergs calved in echoing rolls of thunder, half a world away. I heard children scream with laughter, heard men drowning, felt entire villages afloat on rafts of flowers. The vast sea contained all, and I loved her and all her loves.

  I grinned and felt my teeth grow sharp behind my lips. My muscles burned. My heart had stopped but I had never felt so alive. I turned slowly. Olgaren hung before me. His eyes glowed with worry, with fear, with love. We kissed. His cool lips sent shudders of ecstasy down my spine. His yellow hair lifted about our kiss in a halo, and the halo was gold.

  We sought the currents of the sea and sang to them and they took us to the wallowing belly of a ship, bound for Australia. Her hold ached with the moans of chained convicts. I feared we could not mount aboard, but a ship is of the sea, not of the land, and our feet stood firm upon her deck. Surely within this boat, of all vessels on the sea, would rest someone evil enough for us to kill?

  We have not killed yet.

  We are both hollow with hunger.

  And this brings me to you. I have told how I came to be here. You know I am not a good man. Now it is your time to speak. Three fates await you. You may convince us of your worth, and we may set you ashore, free to begin your life anew. We may judge you not worth the soul that animates you, and we shall drink your blood to the death. Or perhaps we shall see a kindred spirit in you. Perhaps we shall offer you our blood in return and allow you to join our crew. The result will be a world slightly better than before. We will not be a force for evil.

  I am filled with anticipation. Any one of the three endings will satisfy me. Olgaren will decide which is yours. Watch his face as you tell your story. If he smiles, even once, we will take you. I need not say how much I hope to see his smile again.

  Be sure to tell the truth. We can smell a lie.

  You may begin….

  In the Brokenness

  of Summertime

  R.W. Clinger

  Estelle mentions that I gift-wrapped a scalpel for my lover.

  The self-induced cuts—narrow, razor-sharp lines that proved infidelity, red-purple zigzags against his wrinkled and scarred wrists—would heal Cannon; that is what he often told me. Cutting was significant in his life, a means of his survival, and cutting produced by a tilted marriage was natural medicine, a means of Cannon learning to forgive himself for bet
raying our Valentine love/lust—something.

  The bandages were a logic he used to prevent his insanity. Delicate wrist-armor that he sported almost all the time, never irregularly, keeping the visual atrocity of his sexual desire for another man concealed. And then he covered the bandages with fanciful, almost queer, accessories—a navy-blue scarf, a leather band purchased near the Vista del Rio in Barcelona, a red-white-and-blue bandana—which maybe caused him to believe they had healing powers for both of our hearts, but mostly his.

  When his wounds—valley-like gashes at the bottom of both thumbs—were exposed, we were exposed. The lacerations were in view for all to see. Self-incisions because of man-with-man tenderness exposed. Raw tissue of our life together (seventeen years of marriage in Apartment J-1 on Padilla Street, next to the Allegheny River in Pittsburgh) unveiled, the bruised flesh of hardship and indecipherable pain between two men in love. Brokenness was discovered. Those cuts dissected our single unit into two cells: one of faithfulness and the other of radical sin.

  Cannon bled.

  I was delighted to watch him bleed.

  Shrink Time.

  Estelle listens. It’s her job to listen to me once a week, sometimes even twice a week. $150.00 a session. Says that I love Cannon with all my heart. Says we balance each other out. Says it’s refreshing for me to call the man a jagged little fuck. Because I hurt. Because Armageddon swooped me up in its hulking arms and gave me a bad ass squeeze. Because Cannon Marshall Dixon could not keep his seven-inch crank inside his running shorts.

  And I say to Estelle that it will never be the same between us. Things will always be and feel different. Our gay marriage/companionship/faggot union, or whatever Uncle Sam wants to label it, or not label it, no matter what, the ideal will always be sour. A skim of poison will reside on its surface for years to come, decades.

  Estelle says to take a breath. Calm down. I can overcome this challenge.

  I reply with something like: Some days I want his cock to fall off. Does that make any sense to you? Is that in your psychology textbooks? Will it ever make any sense to me?