FICTION

Arms and legs thrashing. The hammer of blood and so on. I have mistaken her breathing for my own and it seems that she pushes me along even as I push at her and I have the idea that neither of us can swim and if one us fails to push then both will drown. I am aware too that I should stop thinking, that conscious thought will surely fuck things up between us and already I am losing her and now she swims ahead and it appears that if anyone is going to drown it will be me.

    

I'm coming, says Jude.

    

And holds her breath. The orgasm is brief, nonviolent.

    

What color? I say.

    

Devastating blue, she says. The blue of Pinnochio's eyes.

    

Before or after he came to life?

    

What do you think about, Jude says, when you fuck me?

    

I close my eyes and try to think of a normal, well-adjusted response. My mind does tend to wander during sex. I have strange, inappropriate visions. I often think of Jenny, a neurotic border collie I used to have. Jenny had wings; that dog could catch a frisbee no matter how high or far I threw it. I might have entered her into competitions but she would never give the frisbee back unless I threatened her. Jenny would run from me, she would hide in a patch of tall grass and chew and suck at the frisbee in a way that was manic and eerily sexual. And she could destroy a good frisbee in five minutes.

    

Do you see whores from your past? says Jude. Your dead wife or pale pubescent girls? Waitresses with bad skin or hairless men?

    

What was the third choice? I say.

    

Jude chews at her lip. You never come anymore, she says. I try not to worry about it. I close my eyes and tell myself that you're a freak and you do too many drugs and it's not my problem.

    

But you're a liar, I say.

    

Yes, she says. I want to make you come. I want you to come for me, to come inside me. I want you to come in my face.

    

What does my come taste like?

    

Aluminum, she says.

    

The taste of fear, I say.

    

Exactly, she says.

    

I grope the walls and flip the lights. The room is a horror and my dick is soft, very soft. It just lays there, meek and fleshy against my thigh and I'm sure that a soft penis is what death looks like. Or feels like. Loose skin and a thousand wrinkles, grey and wasted.

    

I offer this comparison and Jude doesn't smile.

    

She squints at me. Your eyes are the same blue.

    

Don't look at them.

© 2000 Will Christopher Baer and Nerve.com, Inc.