by John Everson
He lay heavier on top of her and thrust, and as he pressed down on her with his chest, her mouth loosed a sudden cloud of rotten air. Tony choked in spite of trying to keep his nose closed, and thrust again, but he was making no headway (so to speak).
"Ahh shit," he declared and rolled off of her, his erection gone and his stomach suddenly nauseous.
He turned his head away and took a deep breath to clear his lungs, and then took a closer look between her legs. Maybe rigor mortis had closed her off to him? He fingered her to see how tight she truly was, and it wasn't too hard then to find the problem.
She'd been sewn shut.
Stitched up by a devil with a sense of humor, the thread matched the auburn crop of her pubic hair.
"What the..." he moaned aloud, voice breaking. "I've gotta cut her open? Shit... why would a dead girl need a chastity belt?"
Tony got off the bed and picked up his pants. He kept a pocketknife on his key chain, and while he was sure its makers never envisioned unthreading dead virgins as one of the 1,001 uses they advertised it had, he flipped open the blade.
"Use 1,002," he murmured, bringing its blade to bear on the thread between the dead girl's labial lips. "Readying dead virgins for necrophilia."
He sliced downwards, careful not to take her delicate tissues with the thread, though why he should care at this stage, he didn't know.
It was difficult at first; the stitch had been very tight and close. But one by one he sawed through the barrier threads, and grinned with satisfaction as he saw the glint of something shiny begin to leak out of the hole he'd broken. Finally, halfway down the girl's cleft, he gave a fast flick and opened the last stitches with one slice.
And froze.
That glint of shininess was oozing from her vagina now that he'd set it free, and it wasn't feminine mucous.
It was a stream of maggots.
A score of them exploded from her to land squirming and stinking on the bed. And instead of slowing, the stream increased. Dozens of the white slimy worms slipped out of her in seconds, some of them choosing to crawl up through her ruddy hair or to hug the inside of her thighs.
Tony coughed and covered his mouth with a hand, choking down vomit. In horror, he backed off and away from the bed, still holding the knife, which had one-half of a tiny squirming maggot stuck to its tip. He dropped it and his keys to the ground.
"Oh God, oh God," he cried. The clock said 11:54. "What am I gonna do?"
The stench of her now filled the room and it was everything he could do to keep from puking. But he watched the second hand spinning slowly around the clock face and shook his head.
"No you don't," he said, and again went to his pants. Contract didn't say he couldn't wear protection when he came. Just said he had to cum. And he knew there was an old condom in his wallet. You never knew when you might run into a chick who wasn't a devil-provided virgin.
Closing his eyes for a minute, he pushed the images of the maggots away and brought to mind the image of the last blonde he and the crew had gangbanged. With a frightened urgency, Tony worked himself hard enough to slip the rubber on. Then he moved to the bed and got in push-up position over the girl, trying not to let any part of his body except his cock make contact with her. He guided himself into her and thrust forward, feeling something within her squish as he moved against her virgin walls. In his head he knew what his cock was mashing, and it wasn't a hymen.
He shook the thought away, and stared at her breasts, which still looked suckable and warm, despite her condition. He pushed himself deeper inside her, and coughed when the result was an expulsion of fetid air. It would help if I could at least kiss the girl, he thought, and looked up from her tits to see a creamy yellow maggot worming its way out of the corner of her mouth.
"Ahh shit, shit, shit!" he cried and rolled away from her again, cock flaccid and breath coming in dangerous gasps. "I can't do this. I can't!"
The clock now read 11:58. He didn't know if he'd gotten deep enough inside her to make her no longer qualify as a virgin, but he hadn't consummated the deed and that was definitely part of the deal. He looked at his cock and grimaced at the yellowish scum that discolored the head of the condom. With his hand, he tried to stroke himself erect again, but if anything, it pulled deeper inside him, like a hiding tortoise head.
11:59
Still yanking his maggot-slimed penis, Tony stood at the side of the bed and looked at the virgin. The freed worms were now happily canvassing her entire body with their spasmodic up and down inchworm motions. A steady stream issued now from her lips and pooled in the cavern of her throat. Her thighs and the bed between them were alive with fly-spawn, and even the rosy tips of her nipples boasted one curious worm. Another twitched from between the toes of her right foot, and then fell with a plop to the sheets.
Tears ran from Tony's eyes, which were torn between staring in horror at the rotting girl and at the second hand of the clock, which inched from the 30 to the 40 to the 50, 55 and finally...
The door burst open and Rumpelstiltskin sauntered in, his face covered by the most profound grin Tony had ever seen. The Messenger was looking forward to becoming The Executioner.
"What's a matter, can't get it up?" the dwarf taunted. He hitched at his belt. "Need me to do the deed for ya? It won't fulfill yer end of the bargain, but hey, what's a little worm meat between friends eh?"
"She's dead," Tony said. There didn't seem to be anything else he could say.
"What's your point?" the dwarf laughed. He was giving her a gynecological examination. He looked up, still grinning and announced, "She's still a virgin."
"She's full of maggots!" Tony cried.
"You think that's bad? Wait 'til you see what the Boss has got waiting for you below."
"That's not fair," Tony pleaded. "The contract didn't say anything about them being dead."
"Yeah, well, it didn't specify nothin' about them being alive, neither," Rumpelstiltskin cackled. "And anyway, they all die pretty quick once you're done with 'em anyway."
"Die?"
"Sure," the dwarf grinned, wrinkles nearly swallowing his beaming emerald eyes into the folds of his leathery face. "Lots of 'em slit their wrists, especially after they pump out some kind of six-armed monstrosity. Others just kind of corrode away. Boss figures they're either fertile fer his kids or ought to be fertilizer for someone else's."
"His kids?" Tony frowned. "What are you talking about?"
"Talking about the Boss's seed," Rumplestiltskin said. "You carry it inside you. Been carrying it to women all over the world for years. And the Boss's seed don't plant any happiness, let me tell you! You think he's been having you sacrificing virgins just for your own fun? But you can see for yourself; Boss'll have what's left of those girls waiting for you down below."
The dwarf looked at the clock, which now said 12:03.
"How would you like to shuffle off? Something memorable, I imagine. 'S a shame when rock stars just slip away in their sleep. No headlines there. Wanna slit your wrists and write a goodbye message in your blood? Maybe OD on some choice heroin? How about drink yourself out - choke on your own vomit?"
The dwarf tapped a long gnarled finger to his lips.
"Naw, I'm getting too habitual about this, we've done all those. How about..."
Tony bolted from the room, without even slowing to pick up his pants. The dwarf followed at a more leisurely pace, pointing his finger "up" when Tony reached the stairs the groupie had fallen down. Instead of following her path, the singer's feet suddenly turned and took the stairs towards the roof.
The Messenger hopped happily up the granite steps, and a smile cracked his hide from ear to ear when, in the theater attic, Tony tried to dig his feet in but found himself unable to stop running headlong toward the giant air circulation fan.
"Yes," the dwarf said to himself. "Decapitation is a nice choice. Haven't done one of those in literally ages."
As Tony's head punched through the barrier screen to meet the sl
icing blades, The Messenger winked out to meet him on the other side. He had lots of new girls for Tony to meet.
And none of them were pretty - or virgins - anymore.
Body & Blood
The body had been in town for days. He'd thought nothing of it.
The entire town had become its faithful coven. It didn't nag him.
Normally, he wasn't a real curious guy. For him, it all started with blood. On a statue.
If this was Christ, the devil was loose in heaven.
The pictures of Jesus from Sunday school had never looked this pained. Nic Collins stood staring at the latest grotesque religious addition to his living room in disbelief. He'd just come home from April's; Mom hadn't yet returned from Tuesday night service. In front of him stood a six-foot effigy of Christ on the cross. Candles flickered at the statue's feet, throwing hellish, sinuous shadows across the tortured ceramic. He shuddered.
Blood streamed down nearly every crevice of the statue's body. A crimson rivulet ran from a gash on the right cheek, pooled on the shoulder, and then trickled down across the chest, soaking the loincloth a dark dusky red. The eyes were open, rolled back like a cow in the final throes of anthrax. This was the victim of a medieval torture chamber, not God.
The door slammed behind him.
"Nic? Nicky?"
Shit. She walked up behind him.
"Thank the Lord you're home. I hate leaving you alone this late at night, but since Saint Theophrastus has been here, Father Raphael has asked that we stay at church as long as possible."
She looked him up and down. He cringed, awaiting the unavoidable question.
"Why don't you come with me tomorrow? Bring April with you. It'd do you both good. You can't give too much time to God, you know."
"Maybe." He faked a yawn. "'Night." A quick hug and he was vaulting the stairs to safety.
"Nic?"
He stopped on the landing.
"Yeah?"
"What do you think of this gorgeous statue? Father Raphael made it for us, can you believe it!?"
"Great, Mom. 'Night"
He closed and locked the door. This was getting too weird. Mom had always gone to church regularly, but, lately, she was nuts with it. In fact, now that he thought about it, lots of people were spending an inordinate of time at St. Matthew's Church these days.
Since the remains of St. Theophrastus had been brought to town last month, it had been church, church, church. Like his own mother, April's parents had been going almost every night (something neither of the teens minded - it left them an empty house).
He stripped off his clothes, climbed under the covers, and his mind drifted back to April - wispy, shoulder-length blonde hair, electric blue eyes, breasts straining to escape a red tank top... He awoke an hour later, after a vivid dream of April with blood staining that hair, running down the sensual neck and pooling on her chest, the tank top cruelly blotched by darker shades of color. He forced himself back to sleep without the glass of milk he craved to help wash out the images; he didn't want to have to pass that statue right now.
* * *
"Going to be at church tonight, Nic?" Mr. Glover, the pharmacist, stared at him. The Trojans in Nic's hand were a flashing neon sign: Nic and April are fucking; Nic and April are fucking...
"Don't think so, Mr. Glover."
So you're going to fuck her tonight instead, huh?
"Well, we'd all like to see you there sometime, Nic. Give it a chance."
The cash register clanged open and Glover handed him his change.
"Have a nice day. And think about coming to see The Saint."
Nic ducked out of the shadowed drugstore onto the blinding white sidewalk outside. He stuffed the bag into a knapsack on the back of his 10-speed. He could feel Glover's eyes on him through the window. Suddenly the main drag of Parkville, IL, his hometown of 18 years, didn't seem friendly anymore. He shook his head. A feeling patently ridiculous. It wasn't a big secret to most people in town that he and April were a coupling couple - except maybe to their parents. So why the sudden chill?
* * *
April Tandy lived just a few blocks from St. Matt's (actually, Parkville was small enough that nobody lived more than a few blocks from it), so he had to pass it on the way to her house. He turned down Missionary Street and there it was. He coasted for a minute, then abruptly pulled onto the sidewalk.
The church was, in many ways, the heart of the town. Long dead city fathers had poured all their sweat and resources into it: St. Matt's was the largest structure in town, a three-story grey stone facade with a bell tower spire, a rectory behind the altar, and a giant meeting room beneath it all. In the summer, there were monthly fairs and picnics in the acre behind the church. In the winter, the basement was often filled with smoke, laughter, and the warm, teasing scents of potluck dinners.
Nic climbed the seven cement stairs and pulled open the giant wooden door.
He stood still in the foyer for a minute while his eyes adjusted to the gloom. The acrid taste of incense hung strong in the air.
The long, oak pews stretched out in front of him, empty and uninviting. Shafts of sunlight slanted through the blue and purple stained glass windows, windows that circled the building to recount in garish detail the final events in the life of Jesus Christ. The streams of light bloated the images, trailing them across the empty marble altar and the statue of Christ on the cross behind it. Two women knelt in the first pew; in front of them was the object of the town's current religious fervor.
Nic moved quietly down the center aisle, toward what appeared to be a glass coffin. The women didn't look up, but he heard beads snapping as they shifted rosary stones between bony, wrinkled fingers.
His resolve slipped as he got closer to the transparent box. He stopped a couple pews behind the old women, who still hadn't turned to look at him. Lying on purple velvet was a man, wrapped in white vestments, his skin bleach white - its lack of color only shown up by the thatch of white hair on his head. To all appearances, this was a robust, seventy-something man who had failed to wrinkle.
Nic was shocked. In truth, one of the reasons he had refused to accompany his mother to the church was that he didn't relish the idea of looking at the exhumed bones of a dead man. But this figure under glass was far from calcified bone fragments.
"Theophrastus was a saint from the 16th century, laid to rest in the catacombs in Rome..."
16th Century! They must have put a wax caste around the skeleton! But it didn't look like wax. He could almost see the chest rising and falling...
Nic abruptly decided April couldn't wait any longer. With a negating shake, he left the strangely silent church holding an apparently near-living saint and two near-dead old women.
* * *
It was after midnight when Nic got in - he and April had had carnal rather than spiritual recreation - and he expected a lecture. But Mom still wasn't home; the house was silent. The Parkville Chronicle hung over the side of the recliner in the living room, and candles again flickered at the feet of the bloody statue across the room. Nic flipped on the table lamp by the chair and replaced the paper with himself. He rolled his eyes at the lead story:
"MAYOR PROCLAIMS SAINT WEEK" boasted the headline.
The story urged anyone who hadn't attended one of the night services at St. Matthew's to come and pay homage to the miraculously preserved saint. At the end of the article, Nic found what he was looking for:
"Theophrastus was martyred in the sacristy of his own church in 1593 in the hamlet of Modiscar, England. While the Vatican pronounced him a saint in record time, historians have speculated that the controversial Bishop was not killed by enemies of the Church, but by the Church itself. Theophrastus's teachings threatened the hold of fear the Catholic Church had over its followers. He taught that God meant for man to revel in the joys the flesh offered, not to feel guilty for them.
"While another might have been excommunicated for such statements, Theophrastus was an undeniably popular
father, not to mention a distant cousin of the reigning pope. It would have meant worldwide embarrassment if a member of the pope's own family was declared a heretic, so the Papal See, rather than condemning or considering the teachings of Father Theophrastus, instead pretended not to notice this voice proclaiming freedom from the unnatural restraints religion placed over the flesh.
When Theophrastus was cut down by unknown assailants, Pope Clement VIII proclaimed him a martyr and spirited his body off to Rome, where he was interred beneath St. Peter's. When it was discovered during World War II that the body had amazingly resisted corruption, the Church removed the body from the catacombs and placed it on display. In 1979, apparently to inspire the thinning ranks of "The Faithful," the Vatican authorized a "world tour" of the saint's body. That tour brought St. Theophrastus to St. Matthew's in June, where he is displayed 24 hours a day.
Nic laid the newspaper down beside the chair. So the saint everyone worshipped was actually a hedonist cut down by the Church itself. If that was the case, why was the Church shipping him out as an example? Why hadn't his sainthood been stripped - St. Christopher's, he recalled from Sunday school, had been taken with less reason - and how had a town the size of Parkville gotten a shot at receiving this "saint" and keeping him for weeks? As for his obvious lack of decomposition, could he have been mummified? But how would you preserve the skin so taut, so fleshy, so... lifelike? Something just didn't make sense about this whole thing. He vowed to hit the library tomorrow. A saint with that kind of story had to figure prominently in the history books.
* * *
The Parkville Public Library is more like a home for used Harlequin Romance books, Nic thought as he bounded up its wide cement steps. But there was a small non-fiction section - begrudgingly admitted, he was sure.
Nic waved at Mrs. Fellier behind her desk, an old schoolteacher's model stacked high with books, cards, and papers. She waved back. Her mouth never slowed as she animatedly described the plot of the latest Harlequin to an eager housewife.