Shudder

by Harry F. Kane

  “Can I help you find what you’re looking for?” asked the girl as she walked over to Dave. He shot her a guilty glance, “Where are the umm… the dolls?”

  “Oh, they are on the lower floor. This way.” She did not lead the way, she only pointed.

  Dave went over to the staircase and descended to the basement level. Here too was a counter, behind which sat a young woman, who was a brunette of about twenty-eight—thirty, a thin green latex collar with small round studs on her neck.

  She smiled at David, “Can I help you, Sir?”

  “Uh yeah, I’m looking for—” Dave stopped. His attention was caught by a soft, long strap-on dildo, with two thin antennae of the same material attached to its base.

  The girl followed his gaze and smiled, “Ah, I see you are intrigued by the Skull Dominator.”

  “The what?”

  “It’s a very new product, but it’s catching on. You see these?” She pointed at the two thin antennae.

  “I certainly do.”

  “They are made with anatomical precision, to fit most sizes.”

  “Most sizes of what?”

  “Nostrils, of course.”

  Dave opened his mouth, but nothing came out. The girl picked up the transparent bag, opened it carefully, took out the dildo itself, and a folded piece of paper.

  She unfolded it and on it was drawn an illustration of the dildo entering a throat, and the two thin tendrils at its base entering the nostrils, and curving downwards.

  “You see, they don’t go into your brain or something,” she smiled,” and anyway, it’s an ancient yoga tradition.”

  “What, getting tiny dildos up your nostrils?”

  “Not exactly,” said the saleswoman almost chidingly, “but they do clean their nasal cavities with ropes. The put a rope up one nostril, and pull it out of their mouths.”

  “Do they really?” Dave said and fingered one of the yielding silicone pseudopods, “but with these little dildos, don’t noses get broken or something?”

  “Not if you are a loving and responsible partner,” she gave him a stern look.

  “Of course, of course,” he tried to think of something adequate to say. “This is only for lesbians, I suppose?” He inclined his head towards the strap-on.

  “Yes, and for submissive men in a heterosexual relationship,” she said, looking him in the eye. “We also have cock-rings with added nasal dildos, so that you can feel the throat of your loved one around your penis and still give them the added overwhelming pleasure of having every possible hole filled up.”

  As she was reciting this, she held up a purple plastic cock-ring with two thin tentacles hanging from it.

  “I’m sure, no doubt.” Dave looked away.

  “Ahem,” a voice said in his left ear.

  “Yeah, yeah,” muttered Dave absently, as if to himself, while he checked out this part of the shop.

  While upstairs was the colorful and well-lit part, with candy colored dildos and sexy clothes, down here the dungeon esthetics were put to strong use. Black leather costumes hung from the ceiling in one corner, boots, corsets, and long gloves decorated angular mannequins. Whips, handcuffs, and various masks lay on the shelves. A few thick, black dildos lurked in the shadows.

  Dave looked at the girl and pinched his nose, “I’m looking for a cyber-toy for home.”

  “Oh, I must tell you, that we only have one type left but it’s on a discount.”

  “Really? Which type?”

  “The fifth-grader cyberpunk girl.”

  “With a discount you say? I’ll take it.”

  The girl walked over to the shadowy corner, unabashed by the towering artificial dongs, and pulled back a small latex curtain. Behind it were stacked a few four foot boxes.

  She maneuvered the top one to standing position and beckoned to Dave. He beetled over to her.

  From behind the transparent lid of the box a girl of a mixed race looked back at him. She was almost a Latina, almost Asiatic, and almost Caucasian.

  The designers had tried to hit as many rabbits as possible with one bullet.

  “Would you like to see the black version?” asked the sales clerk as she started working the box lid open.

  “No need, thank you. I’ll take that one. I like it.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  After paying on the lower floor and wishing the upstairs girl a good night, Dave went back out into the rain and into his BMW.

  He lingered in front of the car for some seconds, just to give the mysterious someone a good chance to realize what he had bought, put the big box on the back seat, and drove off.

  So far nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

  “How’s it looking on your side?” he asked his lapel button.

  “Still nothing, still nothing, ah,” the voice said in his ear.

  “What do you mean—ah?”

  “There’s a scooter following you, I think. Th-th-there, now I’m following the scooter.”

  Dave saw a far speck of light in his side view mirror, “Okay, I think I see it.”

  He drove for twelve minutes in the sparse late traffic. Kamikaze rain drops flung themselves at the front windows and after the resulting miniscule explosions streamed downwards—a thousand tiny, short-lived streams that blurred the lights of the nighttime city.

  Sometimes a surf of rainwater would rise for a second from under one of the wheels. The tiny headlight remained in his mirror.

  Not so mysterious now that people know that they should be on the lookout, Dave thought. A total amateur actually.

  He reached his home and parked.

  Dave got out of the driver’s seat, opened the back door, and took out the box with the toy. He thought he heard a scooter park somewhere in the shadows.

  The rain drops drummed on him, on the roof of his car, and on the box in his hands.

  Whistling like a very guilty person, Dave opened the door of the block’s foyer, and went up into his apartment via the elevator.

  Once at home, he switched on all the lights, to make it easier for an outside observer to figure out on which floor and on which side he resided.

  He then waited for five minutes, sitting at the kitchen table and looking at the box.

  This was a mid-level toy, which spoke two hundred sentences in eight languages and could play the part of an innocent victim; a dirty and willing victim; a willing virgin; a daughter; and a niece.

  He took the girl out of the box and plugged her in. It was supposed to take three hours to charge her up for a night’s session.

  He tried to read the instructions but couldn’t concentrate. He crumpled the piece of paper impatiently and stood up.

  “I’m going out now, into the direction of the twenty-four seven.”

  “Do it,” said Andy’s voice, “I’m close, watching.”

  Dave fixed the motion sensors in unobtrusive corners of the walls and walked out of his apartment, locking only the lower lock. He turned towards the shop.

  “Well?” he asked after a few yards.

  “Nothing yet. Keep walking until you turn the corner.”

  “I’m there. Anything?”

  “No, nothing. Ah, here it is.”

  “Infrared?”

  “Yeah, glowing like a human. Small, though. Just went into the block’s entrance.”

  “Okay, I’m coming over.”

  “Do it, I’m keeping watch here.”

  Dave hurried back to his bleak high-rise, raising a mist of rainwater with his shoes. His attention though, was focused entirely on the tiny screen which he held. It was now active.

  “I’m getting my motion detectors data, the perp’s at my home door.”

  “Want us to go get him?”

 
“No, let’s wait. Woop. The kitchen detectors went off, he’s in the kitchen.”

  Five minutes passed. How long does it take to dismember a toy-girl, wondered Dave. What if we miss him on his way out somehow? He stood at the corner of the building, struggling with the desire to run to his home. Then the little screen lit up again. “The front door detectors again, he’s coming out.”

  “I’m coming,” Andy said and appeared at a run almost instantaneously. He took out his gun and nodded at Dave. Dave approached the door, preparing to swing it open, but the lights inside suddenly switched on, glowing mutedly through the thick reinforced glass. Someone was already about to open the door from the inside. A shadow grew.

  Dave took a step back and Andy leveled his gun at the door.

  The door swung open.

  Mrs. Timmons trotted out with her rounded old pug shivering and snorting through its steaming runny nose.

  Her eyes fixed on Andy’s gun before he could hide it.

  “Help,” she screamed, and grabbed her precious dog with surprising alacrity, cradling it to her bosom.

  Dave waved at Andy to follow him and ran into the building. Mrs. Timmons had just blown their chance of surprise.

  Inside, he immediately heard steps—receding steps—someone was running up the stairs.

  Their prey.

  “Stop, stop or we’ll shoot,” he shouted as he jumped over three steps at a time, trying to gain on the unknown fugitive. He heard Andy right behind him.

  They ran up two floors, grinding into dust paint flakes from the unmaintained walls, squashing cigarette stubs, and crushing the incidental syringe.

  Then Dave suddenly saw a leg flash for a second at the turn of the stairs.

  They had gained—the perp was now just yards away.

  With a blood-curdling shout, he put his whole energy into one final push, turned the corner and saw a small figure at the top of the flight of stairs.

  The detective lunged with outstretched hands and felt his fingers close on fabric. Staggering, he pulled the fabric at himself, feeling it yield. In a moment the small figure was in his grasp; a whirlwind of arms and legs, kicking and scratching.

  “Let me go, let me go,” a child’s voice screamed as the detective barely held on to the struggling body. “Let me go. I hate you. Let me go.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Natalie sat in the National Patriot office, on her screen an unfinished list of newssheet editors and radio and TV hosts who might be sympathetic to the new party, and felt her heart thumping like a beat in a dance club.

  Her arms were very weak, her hands clammy and very pale, and there was a very slight tingling somewhere just behind her ears.

  She woke up powerless, sporting a headache, but forced herself to go to work. She was now in charge, she had responsibilities. She couldn’t let Mister Eberstark down. She couldn’t let Mister Blonski down.

  Kurt, a thirty-year-old junior expert in public relations, appeared by her desk. “Hi, Natalie, do you know where the files for the patriotic education act are?”

  She looked at him with unseeing eyes, “I gave them to Karen half an hour ago.”

  “Okay, thanks. You’re doing a wonderful job, Natalie.”

  “Thanks,” She turned stiffly back to her text. Can’t they see that I’m ill? she asked herself with a mounting hysteria creeping up her throat, can they really not see it?

  Acting on a sudden decision, she closed all her open files and shut down the computer.

  I’m ill. I’m very ill, she told herself and gave an involuntary belch, as if her empty organism was trying to throw up something nonexistent.

  “If anyone asks, I’m home, being ill,” Natalie said as she passed Kurt and then walked past the young man with the serious haircut and the mutant sideburns, and stumbled at the exit. She regained her balance, but was almost out of breath from the pounding of her heart.

  Nonexistent snowflakes appeared in her peripheral vision.

  Must not blackout, must not blackout, Natalie repeated to herself as she tried to remember where she was. Trying to get back home now was out of the question.

  To her left she saw an orange blur.

  The Smooth Cats Cappuccino Palace.

  Unsteadily, but not allowing herself to hold on to the building’s wall, she walked towards the orange blur. It grew bigger and now all she had to do was figure out which one of all the glass squares was the entrance.

  Someone walked out and she grabbed the door and went in.

  Warmth, the smell of coffee and of sweet down-market perfume. This was natural, since at this hour, when all honest adults were at work, the main client body of the cafe was made up of teenagers and seniors.

  Natalie saw a blurred row of people to her right. Now she would have to make an order and then move inconspicuously to a table and try to get a grip on herself. She felt that she couldn’t handle a conversation concerning what type of drink she wanted.

  Her skin felt a flash of cold. She was standing near the cold drinks. Cold drinks... She could do with one, any one.

  She took a plastic bottle at random and walked over to the counter.

  In front of her stood two elderly ladies who slowly conversed in order to reach a consensus on each purchased item.

  Impatiently, Natalie opened her bottle and took a sip. It turned out to be a tangerine-flavored tonic. It would have to do.

  The ladies stated what they wanted, paid, and scuttled off.

  Now it was her turn.

  * * * *

  Natalie shows the bottle to the person at the counter without looking at him/her and hands over a bill. With a ‘thank you’ she gets her change and turns around to find a place.

  The person at the counter asks her something, but she does not understand what it is and does not want to find out. The question is not repeated, so it must not have been anything very important.

  She finds an unoccupied plastic orange table and sits on the chair beside it. She puts her bottle on it. The bottle tips over, falls, and rolls towards the edge of the table but it does not fall. Its momentum runs out two inches before the edge.

  Natalie takes off her coat very slowly and then realizes she is almost not breathing.

  By application of considerable willpower, she takes a breath. It is in fact a very shallow breath, but it helps a lot.

  She takes another breath, which is a little deeper. The shapes around her begin to come into focus.

  She takes a third breath, which is now really deep, making her chest unlock with a muffled crack and her ribs expand.

  The ringing behind her ears is reduced to a general hum. It fits quite comfortably with the music and conversations of the Smooth Cats Cappuccino Palace, into which the unorganized background noise of a minute ago has transformed itself.

  She takes her bottle with a steadier hand now and takes another drink. Soon she would be able to walk out of here and get a cab.

  In the cafe’s toilet, she looks at her reflection. How can the face of a black girl look so pale? The apparition, with bags under its eyes and a subtle gray tinge to the lips, stares back from the mirror with desperation.

  Breaking off eye contact with herself, Natalie starts rubbing her cheeks with detached automatism, and gives them little slaps, trying to get the blood flowing again.

  * * * *

  As she entered her home, Natalie slammed the door behind her, zigzagged through the corridor, and fell into her bed without undressing.

  She lay there for half an hour, on her face, without moving even a finger. Then she rolled over to her back, rubbed her eyes, and got up.

  She undressed, letting her coat simply fall on the floor, and without taking off her boots she went to the kitchen and made herself a cup of green tea. She lighted a cigarette and sat
limp in her chair.

  She ran her free hand through her hair and listened to her heart. Its beat was much less pronounced now. It no longer felt as if each heartbeat rocked her whole frame.

  There was an apple in a plate near the window. It’s been there for two days, but she couldn’t bring herself to eat anything for a long time now, except some nuts and tiny pieces of chocolate.

  Natalie told herself that she had to eat that apple.

  Then she answered herself, that the very thought of doing that makes her insides tightened and her windpipe seize up. I will try to eat it after I wake up, she promised herself in the end.

  Ten minutes later, she was in her bed, beneath the cool sheets, naked.

  As she woke up, the dreary early morning light was already oozing through the thin drapes.

  She was awake but could not move.

  She felt figures in her room. Many, three or four of them.

  She felt a sickly sexual charge in the air and knew that this time they would do what they hadn’t done in years.

  As she felt herself violated, huge distorted hands pressing on her body, which suddenly felt miniscule and fragile, cocks which felt thick and endless entering her, Natalie tried to do her trick.

  She tried to change the situation by repeating to herself: I want this, I like this, I am in charge, they are doing this because I want them to, I want this, I like this, I am in charge, I commanded this to happen, I want them to do this...

  Part Three

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Dave looked at the pedestrians bustling to and fro, scandalously faster than the stream of cars of which he was part.

  Something was inherently faulty with the mechanics of city life, when people on foot moved faster than people in hi-tech contraptions with hundreds of horse powers slumbering unused.