Victor J. Banis

by Deadly Nightshade

  After she had gotten used to it, though, and it didn’t hurt so much, it had still been just okay, until she had learned to get herself close to orgasm before he got there. Even the orgasms hadn’t been all that great. In time, she had learned that she could do better by herself or, still later, with a vibrator.

  Which told her she didn’t need a man to get her off. She never had. She’d needed something. He had said so. “I’m doing this cause I could see you needed it,” he said one time, “if it wasn’t me it would be someone else, probably the wrong someone else. I’m doing this for you, sweetheart.”

  But whatever she had needed, it wasn’t that. Once she had tried it with the vibrator, had found one in her best friend’s mother’s nightstand and stolen it, she discovered immediately that the vibrator did a better job of getting her off.

  But a vibrator couldn’t sweet talk you, couldn’t stroke your back and fondle your buttocks while it thrust in and out. Couldn’t start out soft and then stand up stiff from nothing more than the power of your magic over it, couldn’t pant just from the idea of humping you.

  So, as imperfect as they had been, she had loved his nighttime visits—until everything changed. Until she discovered she was pregnant.

  “Jesus Almighty,” he swore through clenched teeth when she told him. “How could this happen? How could you do this to me?”

  They hadn’t fucked at all that night. Afterward, she thought it might have been wiser to wait until he’d finished—only, most times, as soon as he’d shot his load and slipped out of her, he slipped out of bed, too.

  “Don’t want your Momma to come checking on us,” he’d say. He’d adjust himself in his boxers, most nights give her bottom a quick slap, or maybe pinch one of her nipples, and like that, he’d be out the door, never even looking back.

  So, she’d had to tell him first, as soon as he climbed into bed. He’d taken hold of her, she could tell he was in a hurry, he was already hard as rock, tried to push her on her back and climb on without hardly a pause

  —and she’d told him, her voice shivering, “I think I’m pregnant.”

  He had frozen crouched over her, stayed like that for the longest time and, finally, with a great, weary sigh, he rolled off of her, onto the bed beside her, not even touching her now—like she was contaminated or something. She could see, in the moonlight through the window, that his mighty erection had shriveled, it lay limp across the front of his boxers. He reached down absentmindedly and tucked it away. She was sorry to see it go. She wanted to take hold of it, make it grow, the way it did in her hand. She didn’t, though. There was nothing inviting now in his manner.

  “Maybe you’re not,” he said at last, and she said, “I’m pretty sure.”

  The next day, he brought home a sack full of pregnancy tests from the pharmacy, slipped the bag to her when Momma was in the kitchen, told her to wait till everyone was in bed before she tried them out.

  She used a half dozen different kits. The results were all the same.

  “Shit fire,” he swore when she told him. They were in bed. He’d slipped into the room same as usual, slipped into her bed, but nothing else was the same. He lay beside her again, still not touching her, and when she summoned up her courage and tried to reach inside his boxers to take hold of him, he shoved her hand away.

  “We don’t have time for that shit,” he muttered. “I got to think. You’ve got us in a real spot here, you stupid little bitch.”

  “There’s clinics,” she said. “I could go for an abortion.”

  “You’re too young,” he said in an angry whisper.

  “You could go with me?”

  “And tell them what? That I’ve been porking you steady. I don’t want to be associated with it in any way, your being knocked up, not in anybody’s mind, least they start thinking the wrong things. People have dirty minds.” He paused, and swore under his breath. “Fuck. There’s things a woman can do, you know, douches, stuff like that.”

  “I didn’t know.”

  “Well, you ought to have, you want a guy slipping it to you regular, the way you like it and all, you’re supposed to think about shit like that, it ain’t up to the man.”

  She couldn’t think what she was supposed to say to that. How could she have known anything like that?

  He was the first one, which he surely knew. The only one.

  He’d thought of that, too. “Who else you been fucking?” he asked her. “Maybe it ain’t mine.”

  “Nobody,” she said, hurt, wanting to cry, and knowing if she did he’d slip away.

  “Maybe so, maybe not.”

  “Nobody,” she said, her voice intense. “You’re the only one, I swear to God.”

  He was silent, apparently believing her. “Christ,” he said after a while. “If your Momma found out. If anybody found out. You got any idea what they’d do to me? I’d be in prison for sure. Probably dead in the first year. Those guys in there, they resent stuff like this. They’re all jealous, most likely.”

  Eventually, he found someone, a woman he knew. “She does this all the time,” he told her when she said she was scared. “Knows more about it than the doctors do, you want to know the truth.”

  She’d done as he wanted. Momma had unwittingly cooperated. Her sister, Aunt Jenny, was getting married. They’d planned to go together, the three of them and Moira’s younger sister, Brenda, the whole family. Moira had played sick, started a day ahead of time, not enough time to take her to the doctor’s, the way she had figured it out, and time enough for her to lay it on thick.

  “You go,” he said to Momma, “You take Brenda and just go on, and I’ll stay here with her, see that she’s okay. I’m not that crazy about your sister anyway, and I sure don’t like that shitass she’s marrying.”

  The Buick had barely pulled out of the driveway, Momma and Brenda on their way to Charleston, before he was urging Moira to get dressed fast, “She’s waiting for us,” he said repeatedly. “Said not to be late.”

  It had actually been far simpler than she had imagined and feared. They were home in less than three hours, and she spent the rest of the day in bed. Nothing much was said. He brought her some soup, sat on the side of the bed while she ate it. She thought maybe he was thinking about doing it. She was sore, but she’d suffer through that, if he wanted to.

  When she reached for him, though, tried to grope him through his jeans, he’d shoved her hand away again.

  “No more of that shit,” he said. “One good scare is enough.”

  That was how it had ended for them. A year and half love affair, over just like that. She tried. Sometimes she almost thought she had convinced him. She’d catch him when they were in the house alone, she’d see him looking at her with that unmistakable gleam in his eyes, the way he had looked at her in the beginning, before that first night, when he was still just thinking about it.

  She would come close to him, press herself against him, and sometimes his arms would come around her.

  Once or twice, he kissed her, and she could feel it rising up in his pants, pressing against her belly.

  Whenever she tried to take it out of his pants, though, he would shove her away before she even got the fly undone.

  “I could suck it,” she said once, and he said, “We both know what that would lead to, don’t we? It ain’t sucking you want, you wouldn’t be happy then till you had it in you, and next thing you know, I’d be sweating bullets again. Thanks, but no thanks. I’ll do without.”

  It was months before she realized he wasn’t doing without. He was slipping down to Brenda’s bedroom now instead of hers. She heard stealthy footsteps in the hall one night, and, curious, poked her head out in time to see a shadow disappear into Brenda’s room. One time, she found Brenda staring at her in a funny way, and wondered if Brenda knew. Moira had blushed and looked away. And another time, she found a used condom in the wastebasket by Brenda’s dressing table. At least now he was being careful. Looking out for Brenda. Which he hadn’t don
e for her.

  After that, she hated Brenda. She was angry with her father, and hurt, but that was nothing compared to the way she loathed her sister. She’d have given anything to hold him in her hand again, feel him growing stiff

  —at the same time, she thought she’d like to cut it off, so he couldn’t stick it anywhere else.

  Especially so he couldn’t stick it in Brenda.

  Eventually, she’d seen to it that he wasn’t sticking it to anybody, unless they did it in Hell. She’d seriously thought about sending Brenda to join him, and had decided to run away from home instead. But she still thought sometimes about going back for a visit.

  § § § § §

  Tanya parked on the side street, 17th, let herself in the gate there, strolled down to the atrium. She was actually humming as she passed the fountain, pausing to run a finger through the splashing water. She was happy. She was about to do what she had been planning for a long time.

  She had to knock twice before the door opened. She dearly hoped she’d interrupted them fucking.

  “Hello, Gayborg,” she said when he opened the door. She had the gun in her hand. “Is your sweetie here yet?”

  § § § § §

  No sign of Moira at her apartment. No wig, either. No gun.

  Tom watched as his men combed the apartment. Had they gotten it wrong? He closed his eyes, trying to remember the bar, the redhead in the gold dress. His head had been spinning from the drugs—but not at first, not when she’d approached the table, knocked over the drink, sat down beside him.

  No, he was sure of it. It had been Moira. So, where was the evidence he was looking for?

  On cue, one of the uniforms said, “There’s a gold dress in here.” He took it out of the closet. The dress shimmered on its hanger.

  Tom smiled. “That’s it,” he said. And the rest of it… maybe she was wearing the wig. And if she was wearing the wig, she probably had the gun with her too. Which must mean she was working, stalking another victim. But where…?

  He became aware that his cell phone was vibrating in his back pocket. He took it out, checked the messages, found the one from Stanley.

  Oh, shit, he thought. Stanley, going after Moira on his own? If it came right down to it, Moira could probably kick Stanley’s cute little ass. “You guys strip this place,” he said. “Look for anything that might give us DNA. Tissues, lipsticks, used glasses. Tampons.”

  “Ah, man,” the uniform searching the bathroom said.

  “Bag it,” Tom said, and ran outside.

  § § § § §

  Stanley knocked hard on the apartment door. It occurred to him suddenly that, in the movies, the cops all had their guns in hand when they did this. He reached for his gun, to take it out of his pocket, when the door opened and Gaye stood there, white as a ghost. She was in full drag, as if she were getting ready to do a show.

  Stanley thought it was odd to see her all dolled up like this, at this time of day.

  “Is Acheson…?” Stanley started to ask, and saw the woman standing off to the side. Or, not a woman, but what looked like a drag queen, with long black hair and overdone makeup.

  “Moira,” he said in a hoarse whisper.

  She smiled. Unlike Stanley’s, her gun was already out. She pointed it at him.

  “It’s Tanya,” she said. “Oh, this is working out even better than I dreamed. Do come in. We’re having a party.”

  § § § § §

  Gaye and Tanya might have been twins. Or, they were dressed alike, the same skimpy red dress, the same long black wig—only, Gaye exuded a certain glamour, if it was a bit exaggerated for daytime. Tanya looked as if she had made herself up to be a caricature of Gaye. Close enough you could see the resemblance, but, at a second look, not really alike, not really convincing.

  Acheson was taped to a kitchen chair, leaning against the far wall. His hands were behind the chair, duct tape holding his feet together, covering his mouth. Only his eyes, wide with fear, showed.

  “Over there,” Moira gestured with the gun.

  Stanley moved to stand with Gaye in front of the sofa. Stanley’s gun was on the floor, where she’d ordered him to toss it. Even if Stanley had been the heroic type, and way more athletic than he was, there was no possibility of his getting to her before she shot him. Anyway, if it ended up the two of them fighting over the gun, he wasn’t altogether certain he’d win. She looked hard and mean, and determined, and he’d never been much of a fighter.

  “So, uh, what’s the theme of our little party?” he asked, swallowing and trying to make his voice sound normal. It didn’t work.

  She laughed. “We’re going to play a game.”

  “What kind of game?”

  “It’s called, last one standing. Of course, he loses by default,” she shot a quick glance at her former husband, trussed like a Christmas turkey in his chair, “since he can’t stand up.”

  “So, how do we play?” Stanley managed a watery smile. He was thinking, Tom must have gotten his message by now. Tom knew where he was. Only, would Tom rush here? He might be busy with all kinds of raiding party things. Never having been in on one of those (and it occurred to him that if the big lummox had let him go on this one, he wouldn’t be in this fix now) he didn’t know quite what the drill was. For sure, Tom would come, but would he come in time? Because it didn’t look like there was going to be a lot of it to spare.

  “Well, since he’s just holding up the action,” she said, flicking a hand in Acheson’s direction again, “the first thing is, we get rid of him. Twinkletoes is going to shoot him.”

  “I won’t,” Gaye said. “You can’t make me.”

  She gave him a look of devastating scorn.

  “She doesn’t mean literally,” Stanley said. “She means, she’s going to shoot him. And make it look later as if you did it.”

  “Bright boy,” Moira said. “I always did figure you for the smart one. By the way, where’s the beefy one?”

  “He’s at…” Stanley started to say, and caught himself. “He’s just downstairs, parking the car. He’ll be here in another minute.”

  “And he sent you in first, to clean things up? I don’t think so.” She laughed again and as quickly grew sober. “Then, after Gaye shoots him, she’s going to shoot you. She’s the murderer you’ve been looking for all along, don’t you see? She’s the one who killed Hartman. She fits the description, doesn’t she? She looks just like those sketches. Or enough like, at least. “

  “It wasn’t me,” Gaye said. “It was you. Jake told me later, after he’d thought about it. He said it was the funniest thing, but that drag queen looked an awful lot like you.”

  Stanley suppressed a groan. Gaye Dawn had just signed her death warrant for sure. His too. There was no way they’d talk Moira out of it now.

  “So, then, Gayborg kills you, and it’ll just be me and her,” Moira said. “And I’m going to try bravely to take the gun away from her, and while we’re struggling, the gun will go off. And that will leave just me. Last one standing. Get it? I win.”

  “You can’t get away with anything that silly,” Stanley said. “It’s like an old Joan Crawford movie. The cops will get here and they’ll see you dressed in that Tanya getup and they’ll know right off what happened.”

  “Only, I won’t be in this get up. I’ll be Moira. Jake’s ex-wife. Who Gayborg hated. He set all this up to kill me and Jake both, because he realized Jake was still in love with me. But, before he did it, he confessed. All about the others.”

  “Well, since you brought it up, what about those others?” Stanley asked. “Why did you have to kill them?”

  “Because I wanted him dead.” She waved the gun in Acheson’s direction. “Him and his little faggot friend. But I knew I couldn’t just kill the two of them. I’d be number one on the hit parade, wouldn’t I? The first one they’d look at. But if I set it up first, made it look like some crazy drag queen was running around killing Johns, well, he’d be just another victim of a serial
killer.” She looked downright proud of herself.

  “But, Jesus, Moira, that’s pretty cold, isn’t it? I mean, killing all those innocent guys…”

  “Innocent?” She sneered. “As far as I’m concerned, those no such thing as an innocent man, they’re all of them animals, they do all their thinking with their dicks. And those guys I killed, well, they were hypocrites to boot, getting it on with drag queens so they could pretend they weren’t queer. They were scum. They deserved to die.”

  She was smiling again. “Only, the thing was, I found out I liked it. I mean, at first, they were just a means to an end, just part of the plan. But then, the means became the best part of it. I really got off on killing them.

  Getting them turned on, all hot and bothered, and then, before they could get their rocks off, bam. It was such a rush. I wish I’d started doing it sooner. When I was kid, even. What a way to grow up, offing a bunch of stupid dickheads…” She stopped, breathing heavily, her eyes glinting with a feverish light. She stared at Stanley as if she were seeing him for the first time.

  And now she’s going to kill me, he thought. His flesh actually seemed to shrink, to cower against his bones.

  “And now I’m going to kill you,” she said. She smiled again, broader than before.

  “It won’t work. Tom will be here any minute.”

  “Oh, please, spare me…”

  “Stanley? Are you here?” From outside. Tom’s voice.

  “The cavalry,” Stanley said, giggling despite himself. This was worse than a Joan Crawford movie.

  § § § § §

  “Stanley.” Tom dashed up the stairs shouting, gun in hand. He hit the door of Acheson’s apartment, hard.

  It exploded inward. He stopped on the threshold, barely registering the sight of Acheson gagged and bound, or Gaye Dawn cringing in the far corner. What he saw, the only thing he had eyes for, was Stanley, in the middle of the room, and Moira-Tanya with a gun at his head.

  “Drop your gun,” she said, “Or I’m going to blow your little sweetie’s brains out.”