He was pretty, yes, but it was not enough.
An image of her stood perfectly in his head. It was a dream, something she had never been, but he liked the dream even more than the woman.
His bedroom was mostly bare, like the rest of the apartment. In one corner by his bed there was a computer on a stand with a printer. Over the top of the monitor there was a window that looked over the western horizon. He liked the computer by the bed because of the view through the window. He had a seventh story apartment, and there was nothing on this side of the building to obstruct the sunset. He liked to believe that watching the sun set inspired him to write. Indeed, he had started a great many short stories, and with more or less the same characters. Between the bed and the computer, he spent a great deal of time in that corner of the room. Often he was sitting with a bland expression on his face as he looked out the window, palms pressed together and wondering why it was that the people he knew hadn't yet recognized him as a genius.
The printer wasn't attached, and there was no ribbon. There had never been a ribbon.
In the opposite corner of the room, near the doorway, there was a full length mirror leaning against the wall. If there had ever been a stand for it he had never known about it; he had found the mirror in an alleyway. But it was the perfect height for him, and often, late at night, he liked to strut by it in a tight pair of jeans, or simply naked, and observe the effect.
But she obviously didn't think he was so beautiful.
A slight frown touched his face.
Any thoughts of failure that had been in the process of formation were instantly disbanded wherever they could be detected by the heavy hand of his will. If anything believed he had an immense control over the state of his mind.
How could she not think he was beautiful? Surely the bright, brown eyes and the angular bone structure - the thin sleekness of his body - were there for all the world to see! Could it be that she had been blind?
Other women fawned on him. They were drawn to the slyness of the way he moved, all careful and pretty like a feline, and the softness of his features. But most especially they were drawn to his quiet nature. He had learned at a young age that if he simply kept quiet the women would approach him.
There was most certainly a trick to attracting them. One had to appear intimately disinterested in other people. It was a trick that was in itself quite difficult to master; one certainly never looked directly at one's prey, for there was no telling when - all in an instant - she would flick her hair and shift her gaze. To be caught looking away was to move on.
But he had wonderfully strong control over his will and all the things he did; he never looked until she was offering him a drink.
He had met her in a bar. He had tried to pick her up the same way, but she hadn't gone for it. At the time he decided that she was a snob, because he really wanted her and she hadn't so much as cast a furtive glance in his direction. Later on he discovered that she had never even caught sight of him, that she was there with someone else and besides, she didn't think he was the most striking man she had ever met. She told him so. Of course, he had always thought she had been joking.
It dawned on him then that he had been nibbling at the soft flesh of his bottom lip, and stopped himself.
One might have thought that he'd have seen the marks his teeth left, or that if he did the sight of them would have disturbed him, but he was too busy eyeing the hairlessness of his chest. He was admiring the bronze hue and smoothness of his skin.
He raised his arms above his head and began to gyrate.
Moments later, eyes still fastened to the flat surface of the mirror, he was trying to recall anything queer that she had ever done.
It is true that he had fucked several different women in the year since she had left him, but it was never as satisfying. He had never come so strongly as when he had been with her.
And none of the other women were as wonderful to make love to. Not one cried out like her. Some wouldn't cry out at all. And there was the perfect face that she made as she approached orgasm, a face that was about to explode; eyes clamped tightly closed, the corners of her mouth pulled toward the nape of her neck. And all the beads of sweat that glistened in all the crevices of her skin, like tiny jewels.
He looked at himself in the mirror and was surprised to find a solitary tear making its way down the side of his nose. Angrily, he wiped it away.
And then, without so much as a grunt in warning, the demon rose up within him, leaped out of hiding into the very center of his mind - at its front - and began to shriek. The thing was vast and red like a lobster. There was a tail with an invidious looking hook at its end that swished this way and that, knocking up heavy stones. And claws that made eerie clicking sounds as they danced through the air, gouging out huge clods of his mind and throwing them into the pit of its mouth.
But worst of all were the great gaps of emptiness that were left by its devastation. Sometimes, he feared them so much that he couldn't bring himself to look at them. But even if he wasn't looking he knew that each stone that was turned and heaved - each monument or piece of earth that was uprooted - left in its place a terrible blackness, like a blemish, and sucked up sound and light and thoughts alike.
There was nothing underneathe, just emptiness, the greatest abyss that there might ever have been, and if he fell in then he knew he'd just tumble forever. And there would never be anything to stand upon again.
He ignored the demon.
Sometimes it came to him, but he knew that eventually it would tire itself out and scamper off to some hiding place, in a nook or a cranny, where it would sleep. And he'd be left to try and put all the stones back in the ground and all the monuments in their proper places.
But, of course, he could never remember exactly where everything went. There were always two or three stones that looked to be exactly the same (but they weren't), and, of course, the last stone would never fit in the last gap, and then he'd have to think his way through it all. The monuments, too, always seemed out of place when he had finished with them. And with each coming of the demon things were becoming more and more out of place, and the landscape inevitably changing, despite his best efforts against it.
When the demon was with him, it always made him nervous. In the past months it had often chanted her name. And it is quite a sickening feeling - you can imagine - to feel yourself being eaten away from the inside of your head. You can't just open it up and let the damned pest out.
Almost mechanically, then, he marched over to his stereo and put on some music, something with a hard, fast beat. He turned the volume up very loud and started thrashing about the room, throwing his head violently this way and that and strumming at the air with his fingers, and fastened all of his thoughts upon her.
At length, the demon retreated. He pranced about the room a bit more, but he felt extremely spent, like after sex, and so he stopped. He found his way back to the mirror, and when he looked upon himself this time the first thing he noticed was that there was a series of long scratches that ran down the length of his legs. Some of them had bled in places.
There was something compelling about his wounded flesh. He cocked his head and ran a hand through the soft locks of his hair that fell comfortably about his face as he studied it. Looking at himself through the mirror was like looking at a different person, and for a moment a feeling of revulsion coursed through him.
He banished it at once.
In the aftermath, as he stood surveying the damage, he couldn't help but remember that in all the days she had been with him, the demon had never come. He had been too strong them, and there had been light in the inner sanctum of his mind. He had even thought to comb the furry crevices of his soul looking for the monster, but it was not to be found. It had fled, and gone on to other places where feeding might be safer.
For some reason he felt dirty.
His attention moved from his damaged flesh to the perfection of his legs. He loved limbs, and he thought his own were very nice.
They had been in the habit of rubbing each other down with vegetable oil, and the part he had always enjoyed the most was her arms. Hers were long and slender and she liked when he touched her there.
In the weeks after she had left him there was not a doubt in his mind that she would be coming back. He had spent them trying to figure out how best to make her suffer.
Anger now, swelling up inside of him. Bitch. She had deliberately reduced him to huddling before the mirror. She had charmed him into trusting her, into revealing himself to her, and then she had broken him and walked away laughing.
He was still trying to put all the pieces of himself together. If only he could remember where they went -
His eyes desperately wandered his body, for he sought some solace in his own beauty and its satisfaction. But he felt empty. There was no warm tingling alighting underneathe his skin and spreading, as if something had spilled. Lust had momentarily deserted him. He felt a slight chill in its absence.
He felt a small swell of hatred for her crawl up the back of his throat. He swallowed it back, but the taste it left was lingering.
That whore. She was probably fucking all of Chicago right now. But he had had her before any of them. She had been tight when he was with her.
Spent loads, damaged goods. He laughed.
The laughter felt good even though it stained him, and he did not attempt to restrain it. He let it roll off his tongue because it felt good, like giving in to something that is forbidden can be. But the laughter grew in force until it had grown beyond his control. It ballooned inside of him and took his breath away, and suddenly he was afraid. Huge peals of laughter landing like boulders in his room and sounding terribly evil. There was hardly time for breathing.
And even as he looked he saw his face reddening, and it was growing bigger. And - he could see it in the mirror! - he was slouching, even though he was trying to stand straight. And wasn't that a tail thrashing about behind him, tearing up the rug, and hadn't he cut his fingernails last week?
His mouth wasn't enough for the laughter any more. It was pushing its way out of his pores, stretching him, and even as he looked on he saw horns grow out of his head.
Deep inside he shrieked as the walls rushed in on him, threatening to shut out the sun and encase him forever in darkness. He had to break the paralysis -
With all that remained of his will he lashed out and sent his fist hurtling into the surface of the mirror. There were at once a million crystalline cries of pain and the image was irrevocably shattered. Small pieces of the demon tumbled through the air, spinning, and struck the floor. The look on its face was one of astonishment.
The CD had expired. The only thing to break the silence was his heavy breathing. He was staring with eyes steeped in horror at the blackness where the mirror had broken away, panting, wanting to take a peek at himself but entirely afraid to do anything of the kind. Blood ran freely down his knuckles and dripped to the floor in a steady stream.
He didn't allow himself to think of anything for some time. He just stood staring at the mirror where his eyes would have been and got used to breathing again. His body felt limp and ethereal.
He was afraid to see now, of course. He would have to take all the mirrors down from the house. And he'd have to stop wearing his contact lenses. If the demon could get at him from outside his head, too, then certain steps had to be taken.
Perhaps, he thought to himself rather blandly, shifting the weight between his legs, I should put out my eyes.
He permitted himself to be drawn into the black surface behind the mirror, and was pleased to find comfort there.
This site and all its contents are the result of the tumultuous workings of the mind of one Adam Wasserman.