 WARNING: This story contains sexually explicit material.

   It is not intended to be read by anyone under the age of 18.  This is a
work of fiction.  Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely
coincidental.  Copyright 2007.


   Title: Mike

   Author: geraldine

   Story codes: MF, nosex, sad, torture, snuff





There must be thousands upon thousands of Mikes in the world.  This is the story of one of them.  

Mike is about 40 years old.  Has receding hair. Glasses.  Tall. Has let himself go at the belly, like almost everyone does.  Such weakness.  Not unattractive. Quite average, actually, the sort that blends in.  I am not entirely sure why I choose him.  Easy marks bore me, but here he is anyway. 

He is a customer where I work.  Like so many customers, he chats me up. I am always bored and daydreaming at work. Work is recharge time for me. I only work a few blocks away from my apartment, but in the mornings I get up very early and spend two hours running through bush or cycling up giant hills. My legs are covered in small scars from various thorns and branches and crashes. I always wear shorts during my morning exercise so that I can watch myself bleed and feel the sting. I always wear pants or long skirts at work. Not a conversation I want to start with anyone. No one understands.

Mike mentions he has a boat. Just to me, while I work. And a house, up in Duncan. He drives into town every day.  I think: you should spend those two hours doing aerobic activity instead of driving back and forth to work. But I don’t say that. I nod and act impressed. He has a fancy old sports car too. He wants to take me for a drive. I am 22 years old. I giggle at all the right times and coyly avoid eye contact and play with my hair. I have been doing this for years. The job pays the bills so I can live alone. But this – this is what I live for. 

The drive gets upgraded to a drive and a sail on his boat. Friday. Apparently he is independently wealthy or something and doesn’t work. I have Friday and Saturday off. I don’t tell anyone what I am doing or where I am going.  I keep to myself, mostly. I have codes that I write on my calendar at home for the different things I do every day.

He picks me up Friday morning, in his fancy little convertible.  I have my hair up and an overnight bag with me.  He doesn’t talk much.  Wind noise is high. I am fine with that. We drive out of town, straight to his boat.  He never told me that someone else was coming with us, but I don’t mind.  I meet his friend Steve on his sailboat.  I don’t know much about boats. Steve is slight, tanned, dark hair. Greets me with a huge grin.  He doesn’t already know my name. He apparently did not realize Mike was bringing someone. This is good. 

They promise me that I don’t have to do anything because they are both expert sailors. Good. I sit at the front of the boat and let the sun wash over me.  I can hear them cracking beers and laughing. Nice boat, forty feet they tell me.  Mike yells out about how much it cost and little fussy detail stuff that I promptly forget.  I don’t care.  I am saving myself.  I doze off to the sounds of the ocean lapping up against the boat as we motor out of the marina and out into the bay.  I feel like a big cat lounging on a windowsill with the sun pouring over me like this. 

Mike comes out and hands me a beer.  Sits down next to me.  The day is very hot and still.  We have been using the motor, not the sails.  Not enough wind. It is very peaceful.  I am glad Steve is here.  Mike is afraid to make a move and have me tell him off while someone else is around to see it.  Smart man not to push his luck with me.  He talks to me a bit, about nothing.  Pointing out islands and houses and hills.  

We go all the way across the channel to an island.  Go to the pub at the marina there for a late lunch and more booze.  It is hot enough out that I know to temper my alcohol intake.  I get too punchy when I drink heavily anyway. Then we motor on back, slowly, across the beautiful ocean.  I see trees, hills, vast swaths of green, expensive homes peppering the land.   I am pretty bored.  I am not big on sitting still.  We have been joking and laughing and telling stories, but I am bored with both of them already. 

I know Mike is too drunk to drive, but I don’t care. We leave Steve at the boat and drive to Mike’s house.  The drive is almost half an hour.  We drive right through the center of Duncan and up the other side, not into the country, but into the woods.  The road gets narrower and the trees crowd out the light.  I like when it is darker like this.  The sun always makes me feel so exposed. 

We park at the end of a long dark driveway.  The trees open up and I am left staring at his house. His house is a giant sprawling white ugly thing.  I am surprised how big it is considering he lives alone.  I know his ex-wife lived here too.  They didn’t have any kids.  When he walks up to the door I hear dogs barking.  But there is something funny about the bark.  Mike just looks at me and smiles.  

“Ah, clever security system,” I say.

“Yah, you like it? It sounds like dogs!”

“Yes, yes it does.” 

“The reserve is just next door. They always try and steal from me, break in, take my stuff.  It is a real pain but I got a good deal on the house. I have a pretty expensive security system installed. Damn Indians can’t get me now.”

“Oh.” Jerk.

We go in and I immediately wander around.  Mike takes my arm to give me a grand tour.  I don’t pull away, even though the thought of him touching me is almost making me sick.  At least he’s pretty loaded.  The place is huge.  I make a mental note of where everything is.  I have a photographic memory.  We get out to the back porch and I see nothing but trees.  Big backyard, just grass, and then beyond that is trees.  

“Wow, I can’t even see any other houses from here.”

“All alone! Just the way I like it!” He goes back in and cracks two beers.  Hands one to me.  Jovial, swaggering. I notice the six foot tall speakers.  Long, skinny things. I have brought a couple of CDs in my overnight bag.  He sees me staring at the speakers and throws in a CD.  Some folksy crap.  I can’t believe that anyone would play something mellow on these monsters.  I laugh.  He thinks I am laughing with him, about what I don’t know, but he starts to laugh as well.  He is hammered. He pounds back his beer and goes for another.  I don’t know if he is normally like this or just trying to build up courage to make a move on me.  I know he will.  We both know I am planning to stay the night.  

I excuse myself to the bathroom.  I take my overnight bag.  I pack light.  One of the things in my bag is a gorgeous little push dagger I got in California a while back.  The blade is short, double-edged, with a bone handle.  It is very light.  It looks like a regular knife in its sheath, but you pop the blade up and it sits perpendicular to the handle.  That way you can wrap your fist around the handle and have the blade poke up between your fingers.  A long blade would be useless for a knife like this; you would lose power.  But a short blade like this is like an extension of my hand, another finger.  It looks a bit like I am giving the middle finger to someone, and in a small way, that is exactly what I do with it. 

I’m not going to say that I came here with specific intentions. You can’t look too far ahead - you have to observe, study, think, plan, organize.  The situation, the area.  The lay of the land, so to speak.  Absorb the surroundings. It always gives me the slightest twinge of sadness when I am this aware, so aware. It makes me sad that I cannot share what I know about the future. It is a big secret.  But I always make sure I have my small kit with me. You just never know when opportunity will knock.  And right now the pounding in my head is very, very loud. 

I look at myself in the mirror. Put on more lipstick. Powder my nose. Tousle my hair. Take a facecloth out of my bag, wet it, run it over my neck, under my breasts, scrub it over my crotch. Take one set of latex gloves out of the plastic bag at the bottom of my bag and rest them on top. I do everything with quiet precision, smooth movements, efficiency.  The same movement, a thousand times over. 

Mike yells out from the front room, “What are you doing?”  He is slurring his speech, even yelling such simple words.  I raise my sight back up into my reflection and look at the grin I have on my face.  I hear the crappy music stop and the TV get turned on.  Some movie. 

I have learned to control my breathing and calm myself. You lose control when you cannot tame the adrenaline in your system. This comes from many years of practice.  When I was a teenager there were four guys – two sets of brothers, who were best friends – who I used to hang out with all the time.  I slept with all of them on a regular basis. They were all in jail on a regular basis too, for various stupid things. By stupid, I mean, they got caught. But they all taught me things, including how not to panic.  How not to lose my control when I get excited.  They would hold me underwater in the bathtub until I would learn not to panic.  They would hold me in the dark under bedsheets, hold lit matches up against my skin.  They would go down between my legs for hours and make me breathe slow and steady, no matter what they were doing to me. Show me how to focus.  To remain in control. Of the four of them, only one is still alive. 

I feel bad about some of the things I have done. Not because of what I did, but because I think, looking back, that I could have done them better.  I am a perfectionist, an artist.  I close my eyes for a moment.  I open them and stare into my own eyes in the mirror. All the colors jump out now.  Everything has become crisp and sharp and bright. Almost like a heightened reality.  A second flows by in a minute.  Minutes become hours. This is it. 

I come out of the bathroom.  Put my bag next to the couch. Mike is on the couch, sprawled out a little, remote control in his hand.  Some war movie is on.  He looks at me and sees me smiling, and smiles back.  Sits up a little straighter. 

“Where’s your beer?  You want another one?”

I tilt my head to the side. “Got anything stronger?”  Big grin. 

He almost leaps up and walks over to his entertainment system.  Pulls out some rum.  I see a bottle of vodka and grab it.  “This is what I want,” I say.  I take a swig right out of the bottle, and then hand it to him.  This is a game to him.  He takes a big swig.  

“So, how about I put some of my music on?”  Still smiling.  He sits on the floor with the vodka in his hand and nods at me.  

Instead, I close the curtains first.  The blinds.  Giggle a little.  I see him watching me intently.  I know he doesn’t realize he is staring at me.  He is not even pretending he is drunk; he is right out of it.  It is so cute.  I unplug the phone in one swift motion as I circle back towards him.  I have already unplugged the only other phone in his house, in his bedroom.  Very simple setup in here.  He has the air conditioning on so all the windows are closed.  

“So, what did you want to do tonight? Got any friends stopping by or anything?” I walk back towards him and stop just out of his reach. Stand up straight, put my hands on my hips, and cock my hip to one side. He blinks.  Pauses. Eyes on my hips.

“Hmmm?” I cross my arms, tilt my head.  I notice how much of the vodka is gone now.  He is so nervous.  The heat, the long day, the lack of food is getting to him, and making him weaker.  I know he is dehydrated.  I can see it in his skin, the color, the tightness. The alcohol is just making it worse. He probably has some mild heat exhaustion.  A long day of watching me and not having the guts to do anything about it until he gets a bellyful of booze. Pathetic. 

“Um, what did you want to do?” Puts down the bottle.  

“Does anyone know I am here?”

“Noooo…” Slowly he shakes his head. 

“Is anyone coming over to visit?”

“Noooo…”

“So that means it is just you, and me, all night. Right?” I get down on my knees in front of him.  “Is that what you want? Just you and me all night?” Tilt my head again, smile.  I had been wearing shorts and a tank top all day.  In the bathroom I had changed into a short stretchy skirt, and had taken my bra off from under the tank top.  I can tell he noticed. I sit back on my heels and rest my hands on my thighs, fingers splayed out.  

Here comes the courage. He sits up straight again.  I lean forward onto my hands, fold my arms under me and rest my chest against the carpet.  I know exactly how my ass in this skirt looks from his perspective.  I rest my chin on my hands.  I shift a little and my ass wiggles a bit.  His eyes are firmly glued to the round curve of my ass sticking up.  He swallows hard. God, he is so drunk.  The courage is gone again.  I like when they don’t talk much.  I hate talking.  The TV next to him flickers as some battle scene plays out.  There is uncertainty in his eyes, but for the wrong reasons.  There is also a lot of hunger. I guarantee he hasn’t been laid for a while. 

I sit back up, slowly, watching his eyes follow my breasts.  “I was going to put some music on. Let me do that now.”  I reach over beside me and pull out a CD.  Crawl a couple feet over to the stereo, take the crappy music out, and put this one in.  Turn off the TV volume. Turn up the stereo volume.  “I really love this.  I think you will like it too.”  He has become so quiet.  “Do you know Nine Inch Nails? This is all remixes of this song called Closer.”  It starts pounding out of the crazy tall speakers.  Very strong steady beat.  I move a little to it, stand up, flow to it, raise my arms above my head and spin around, move my hips.  Just under the loudness of the music I hear him let out his breath, hard. I know exactly what I look like doing this.  The same movement, thousands of times, second nature.  Efficiency.  I let my head fall back and shake my hair.  He hasn’t moved. I feel his eyes touching me.

I move over to him, sitting on the floor.  His eyes get very wide as I stand above him, and lower myself down onto him to straddle him.  My skirt rides up my legs as I get on top of him.  He is sitting cross-legged and is leaning back on his hands. His belly gets in the way a bit.  I hate that. He puts his arms around me, breathing heavily on my neck.  I resist the urge to pull away.  He is boring me to tears.  He is kissing my neck, pulling me close to him and moving his hands along my back.  His hands find their way down to the curve of my ass and he grabs at me.  I think: what a drunk fat lazy fuck.  But I stay focused.

I lean back a touch and slide my tank top over my head.  My breasts jiggle in front of him and immediately his hands and mouth are all over me. I still have my top in my hand.  I whisper to him, “Give me your hands, it is more fun this way.”  I drag his arms behind him, slowly, and use the top to tie his hands behind his back.  He is making these awful grunting noises as he bites and licks at my neck and chest.  

I gently take off his glasses and slide them under the couch next to me.  I know he can still see pretty well without them.  I stand up abruptly and slide off my skirt right in front of him.  I can see his erection from here. He’s whispering oh god oh god over and over. He is not used to this. I am naked in front of him now, moving my hips just inches from his face.  I wiggle for a bit, then turn and go for my overnight bag beside the couch.  He is saying something about untying his hands, but I am not listening anymore.  I put on my gloves, get out the duct tape.  Move my hips to the pounding beat in my ears.  Make sure there is a little flap on the duct tape so I can pull it up easier. Hum a little. The gloves fit my hands perfectly, a second skin.  I put my hands behind my back, holding the duct tape and my push dagger, and walk back.  Straddle him again. He is so wasted, and saying all sorts of things that I can no longer hear. 

In one practiced motion I reach behind him and remove my top from his hands.  Throw it on the floor.  He goes to put his hands on me again, but I keep them back and tell him to hold still.  I lift his t-shirt up over his head and throw it to the side. His white skin almost blinds me.  Deftly wrap his wrists together tightly with the tape.  Use the knife to slice the tape. Rub it smooth with my hands, making sure it is good.  I take a quick look to make sure it is perfect. 

He gets a strange look in his eyes, puzzled, drunk.  I smile at him. He is rock hard against me. I love that feeling. This part is quick. Cut a piece of tape. Over the mouth. Second and third pieces, also over the mouth.  Do not block the nostrils.  I don’t look at his eyes.  He is getting scared.  I am so beyond seeing that now.  All sort of muffled noises now.  Trying to move away from me, kicking with his legs.  I just hope he doesn’t puke and choke on it before I am done. They always blow it out their nose but some always gets stuck and then I have to battle against time.  I would much rather just do things my way, in my own time. That is the whole point of this. It is all mine. 

I take one more piece and put it across his eyes. He is whipping his head around frantically now, so it takes a moment. I curse myself silently for not getting it on straight.  No cooperation whatsoever from him. I tear off another piece and make it nice and flat against his eyes. It is totally dark for him now. 

Then I get up, almost falling over with him flailing beneath me. He rolls and bucks and kicks wildly with his legs. His breath comes out in giant snorts through his nose.  He is trying to talk.  I don’t care what he has to say.  It would all be bullshit anyway. I step up onto the couch and sit down on the back of it, with my feet on the seat.  I watch for a bit. There are veins standing out on his neck.  I smell metal and my pussy.  I move a little bit to the music as I sit there watching.  I am glad I learned to just put tape over the mouth and a little to either side, instead of wrapping it right around.  If you just wrap a piece of tape all the way around, they learn to rub their jaw along the floor to make it curl up and roll up and then they can try to work it off. I hate that. Even with the tape the way it is, he can rub his mouth on the floor on the side of the couch and eventually pull up a corner and work it free if he tries really hard and is lucky.  And, of course, if I let him.  I would never leave him alone while he was conscious or alive. 

He kicks at the coffee table and knocks my beer onto the floor. He barely misses the base of one of the speakers. I am surprised he hasn’t knocked himself out yet, the way he is trashing and whipping his head around.  He still has a huge erection pushing up against his shorts.  It looks so sad now. No mind.  I have work to do. 

I tie back my hair. I know damn well he can hear me, well, he could if he stopped panicking and listened. Now it just sounds like a constant whine coming through his nose.  His jaw is trying to move. Pathetic. I get up and check the windows, make sure I cannot see anything, no lights. The night is black. I come back with my duct tape and loudly rip off a long strip.  He stops for a moment, listening, lifts his head slightly. It excites me. I get goosebumps for the first time today. I stop moving. Total silence. Then suddenly he is in a rush to get a lungful of air again, and the wheezing through his nose continues. 

I grab one foot and immediately he is kicking with every ounce of strength he has. He is about six foot three, probably pushing 250 pounds. He is bigger than me but I am so much stronger, and more disciplined. I get two wraps around one ankle, with difficulty. Bastard will not stop moving. I want to get him secured before I bring out my knives, dammit. I step back for a moment and watch him kick, with the roll of duct tape still attached to his ankle. Sad. The moment he pauses, on his side, I dive down and wrap the tape around his other ankle. I feel like a cowboy at the Calgary Stampede, roping a calf.  I have the fleeting thought that I would love to chase down a man on a horse, toss a lasso and rope him, see him whip up into the air as the rope comes taught against the horn of my saddle. Run to him, throw him on his back, and wrap his wrists and ankles tight. Then jump up with my arms above the head while the crowd roars and cheers. My face hurts from grinning.

I see that the tape is moving slightly over his lips as he tries to breathe through his mouth.  Fool.  I stand up and start dancing around, kicking up my feet.  Shades of Clockwork Orange.  Funny the thoughts that race through my head.  I am in my own space, where I do my best work.

It is painful for him to roll onto his back because his hands are tied at the base of his spine. I think he feels more desperate and vulnerable on his stomach, so he stays mostly on his side.  He is tired now, I can tell. At least he hasn’t wet himself yet.  There is some dignity in that. Not much of a challenging prize really, but at least this will sate my desire for a spell. I thoroughly enjoy watching him squirm.  I want to look inside his head and see exactly what is going on, know his thoughts, and hear the screams. Learn from it. 

Check my hair that it is pulled back tight into a proper bun.  Check my hands, gloves for holes. Put the duct tape back in my bag. I take out my other knife: a boot knife that has been sharpened so many times the blade is almost a full inch shorter that when I acquired it. The grip is tightly wrapped leather. It is part of my hand now.  I straddle his hips as he lays on his side, shaking and still breathing way too hard. 

I rest the side of the blade against his skin.  I know how cold it feels.  If he has any sense left in him he knows what this is.  I know he is listening for me to say something, to comfort him, to assure him.  I say nothing. It is as useless as speaking to a rock.  And all I hear now is the beat from the speakers moving up through the floor, into my knees and up into my crotch and through my body and it feels beautiful.  I sometimes become such a clinician and so focused that I almost forget how much I enjoy this, how it makes me feel, how it pulls the heat to me.  The fire that it brings to me. 

Blade tip under the armpit.  Press.  Drag down towards my crotch, slowly. Deep. A lot of movement from him now.  I am strong. I grip him with my thighs.  Not too much fat along the side here.  I can feel every rib.  I drag the knife again; the same place, bumping over each rib. Not too much blood yet.  So much noise now, how can he make so much noise and still breathe? He is going to pass out on me dammit.  And then he will puke and I will have to get the tape off and dig puke out of his throat so he can breathe again and I can continue.  The human body disappoints me sometimes; mostly, though, it makes me impossibly happy.

Two more cuts, long deep ones. Now I am getting into the fat of it all. Cutting perpendicular to the first one.  Down, and across. Opening a flap across the chest.  So much noise, so much movement. I still feel the hard-on pressing against my leg.  It feels good.  The human instinct to survive and procreate, even now.  I peel the skin back, cutting underneath.  Fat makes my work look sloppy, and I hate that.  I know damn well that he can smell this too.  He starts to convulse, spasm. I just hold him there.  Eventually he stops. I make sure he is breathing okay. Shallow and fast. Oh well, he is drunker and more dehydrated and damaged from the day than I had hoped.  Less of a struggle for me to work with now.  Now there is more blood, and I smile. So many smells, but this is the one I take to the most, the one that I breathe in and soak in. There is so much energy here, wasted for years, that I will take with me tonight.  The blood bursts and flows. I let out a tiny squeal of delight. 

I used to bring my anatomy book with me, but I don’t need it anymore.  I know where I am. I know what I want to do.  But first I need him to lay flat on his back, and I can’t do that with his arms tied behind his back.  And I will not cut off that duct tape; I don’t care how passed out or in shock he is.  I stand up and look for something big. I would use my heel if I had some big cowboy boots on, but I don’t have that here. I only have stupid summer sandals, useless for this.  I see a blender on his kitchen counter. Fine.

I grab the blender base and get back to my straddling position, fumble around until I get a good solid grip.  I aim carefully.  I hate missing.  I bring it down hard on the rotator cuff, dislocating his shoulder.  That brings fresh noises and a shudder from him.  I get up; roll him to his other side, and do the same thing to that shoulder. The shoulder joint is so useless.  It is not even a real joint; it is just ligaments and little muscles. There is no bone in bone, as in the hip. No socket. Now I can pull both arms above his head, no problem, and get him lying how I want, flat out.

The canvas has already been started, but I know I can work it better now. Straddle the hips, do the same thing to the other side, pulling the skin back in a huge flap.  Cut it all off.  Getting messy, lots of blood and ooze and crap.  I notice that it has wet himself now.  I didn’t notice the actual wetness against my crotch because my own pussy is so wet, but I could smell it.  I hate that smell but I always end up smelling it. Eventually I will smell shit too, and I hate that too. I would rather fill my nostrils with blood. I take a finger, dip it in, and rub it under my nose.  It doesn’t really help but it makes me feel better.  I bet I look totally silly like this but I don’t care.  I put on a second set of latex gloves, over my first set.  

After taking a moment to check its status and hearing that same shallow fast breathing, I continue. I can now see all the ribs exposed.  I don’t want to work through the belly fat further down.  It disgusts me.  When I find a lean young man with a velvet washboard stomach, I will do something different.  But for now, I am in a great position to work and explore upper torso.  I notice that I am bobbing my head to the music, and it makes me smile.  I clean up a little with my boot knife and my hands so I can actually see what I am doing. I am more a fan of bone than of organs, but the organs get in the way of the back ribs.  So I start moving things around a bit, taking care not to bump the heart too much or poke a lung.  I am also careful of puncturing the stomach or liver, anything that has gross acids and poisons in it. 

Suddenly everything spasms underneath me and sort of moves upwards, towards the head.  I realize it is choking. I rip off the tape and there is coughing, puke, blood, crap everywhere.  I shove my hand in and start scooping.  I hate this part.  But, you have to take the good with the bad.  Turn the head to the side, scoop. Ugh. I get things settled and leave the tape off.  Mouth breathing is fine now.  It is not regaining consciousness. 

I take my dagger and start jabbing at bone, cutting at it, working it.  Dry dead bone does not flex and absorb like this; it simply breaks. I am continually amazed at how bone moves. I work along the collarbone, shoulders. I love the collarbone. This one is meaty. Feel the shoulder grind itself as I push down and cut. It gives a little moan.  I am so quiet, working, bending and cutting.  I absorb myself in my work and after a while all I can hear is my steady calm breathing.  I cannot even hear music anymore, but I feel it up through my body as it shakes the floor. I am in my space, I am invincible, I am right. There is nothing here now but me.  I carve out designs, I strip off sheets of flesh. Layer the flesh to one side. I watch the red soak the carpet and spread. The blood is my favorite part: it mesmerizes me, makes me let out a little gasp of joy, brings tears to my eyes. It pours from the body as freed from a prison. I cover and paint myself with it. 

I have this knowledge in the back of my head that does not break my focus: there is no more breathing, no more heartbeat, and no more movement whatsoever.  I don’t really care. There was a shudder at some point and it was over. It is sort of sad but it happens. I am playing now. This gives me the chance to remove everything inside now, because it won’t matter.  I dig around.  I try and stack stuff, but it is all so mushy and slippery.  I just make a mess.  I make little poke holes around the neck with my push dagger. It slides in so easily, it is all like soft butter.  Everything inside is so soft. I lean down closer and start poking and dragging the blade along the back ribcage.  I explore.  I work my way along the collarbone, the neck, the dislocated shoulders again, drawing, cutting, creating, molding. Nothing matters anymore. I clean off bone. I see the red of blood and the white of bone, and it pleases me like nothing else. 

At some point I realize that the music has stopped playing.  I should have been paying better attention.  For all I know, someone could be standing behind me.  I am singing. I stop and immediately forget what I was singing about.  I am awful singer.  It explains why I save my terrible voice for these sessions.  I look at a clock on the wall, the quiet stereo, the TV still flickering images. I should just learn to hum a tune instead.  It is really late.  I totally lose track of time when I do this.  The body is already getting cold.  

I blink my eyes a couple of times and realize that I am done. Finished with this one. I shift a little and realize how cramped up my hips are. I slowly get up and hear my knees crack and pop. I look at myself and am glad I am naked. It is a mess, I am a mess. I wipe my forearm across my forehead to catch some of the sweat, and laugh because I know I just wiped more blood on my face. Now it is time for clean up and wrap up.  This is part four. Part one is the setup; part two is gaining total control, and part three is when I get to do what I want.  Part four is the inevitable clean up.  Part five is letting the memories of this wash over me in a daydream later.  I always enjoy that part, because it is all mine. 

Stand in the shower, rinse myself off, no soap, just water.  Make sure all the blood goes down the drain.  Keep my hair in a bun.  Pat myself down with a towel. Throw the towel on top of the body. I go downstairs, still naked.  Into a room full of tools and other crap.  Messy room.  I hate messes.  I find a jerry can of gasoline.  I had seen it here before.  I go back upstairs with it and get my lighter out of my bag.  I don’t smoke; I hate smokers.  Put that on the couch. Put my clothes back on.  Take my CD out of the stereo. Take a hand towel from his bathroom.  Walk around the house and wipe down every door handle, every thing I touched, the beer bottle, the stereo, the handle on the sliding glass door, fridge handle, my ass print on his toilet seat, everything.  Take out the batteries in his two fire alarms. Clinical again. My routine. Put the hand towel on the body. Pick up the jerry can. Pour gasoline all over the carpet around the body. Over the body, soak the towels. Over the couch. Can is empty. I open the liquor cabinet, gloves still on. Take out everything, open all the bottles. Pour them out all over the room, into the bathroom, out onto the deck.  So bored now; this feels like chores, but necessary.  I just want to leave. The smell of gasoline and hard liquor drifts in the air, and covers up the smell of death, and body waste, and metal. 

Sling my bag over my shoulder.  Make sure I have everything.  Double check. Open a couple of windows for better air flow.  This would be my favorite part if he was still alive, but he’s not. Now I am just covering up. I flick the lighter, watch the tiny flame dance for a moment, then feed the gasoline trail in front of me.  It races forth to the body and starts to eat it. Grows very big for a moment, then settles into a steady crackling wave.  I watch it for a moment, watch it slowly branch out around the room, up the walls.  Little hairs loosen from the tight bun on my head and wave around my face, tickling. Blood and fire.  It brings a heavy sigh from me.  I love fire, like a child. Dancing. 

I walk down the stairs and out the front door. For some reason I turn off the lights inside.  I turn on the front porch light. No stupid barking alarm goes off.  I walk out a few steps and listen intently.  I can hear fire crackling.  A wisp of smoke coming out a window, rising up against the night sky towards the moon.  Clear night.  It is cool out.  I take the hand cloth out of my bag and wipe down his car in the artificial light flooding over me. Not very much to wipe down. I had my hair tied back the entire time in here anyway.  I hate having my hair whipped around while driving down the highway. 

I finish my work on the car. I take my latex gloves off and put them into my bag. I can’t hear a thing except the crackling of fire. Feeling it ebb and flow and grow and move and eat. I stand there for some time, close to the trees edging the driveway so I can duck into the woods should anyone show up.  I can’t smell anything bad from out here. I can smell forest and the crisp night air. It smells wonderful. 

After I finally see the flames coming out of the windows, licking along the rooftop, I decide to leave. No silly Hollywood explosions, no loud noises, just steady crackling. My work here is done. I am tired, but refreshed. I feel clean. I walk up the dark driveway until I can no longer hear the fire devouring wood and flesh. I walk along the dark narrow road, and away, towards town.  After a while all I can hear is the soft rhythm of my footsteps on the road, and my own quiet humming.  It pleases me. 
