(I)
It was the last thing
Patricia needed: another steaming, piping-hot dream. . .
.
Faceless,
well-muscled men spent themselves in her one after another. When
one rolled off, another took his place, hot skin veneered in sweat
sliding across her tingling flesh. Something felt soft beneath her
bare buttocks and back—her bed?—but through the woozy slits of her
eyes she was certain she saw trees, moonlight, the woods.
Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God, she thought
as another orgasm broke. The gustlike sensation racked her, forcing
her to lock her ankles and wrists around the broad back of her
current suitor, but he shrugged away, dragging his manhood out of
her just to make way for still more unidentified men. Teeth clamped
her nipple ends and pulled; calloused hands wrung her inflamed
breasts. Patricia was going crazy in the anonymous sexual frenzy.
She was allowing herself to be used, to be squashed, humped, and
emptied into, yet through that debasement—she knew—she received
pleasures far more intense than those she was giving. Who were
these men, these roughened, lust-charged strangers? It didn’t
matter. They were but sexual animals, just as she. They were
symbols of her repression and the designs that society nowadays
demanded of successful, married “businesswomen.” It doesn’t matter, she panted to herself in the
dream. None of it matters. The only thing that
matters is me. . . .
She quaked at the
ensuing orgasms. Mouths licked greedily over her body; tongues
roved her sex. Stout fingers manipulated her clitoris with a
jeweler’s finesse, then roughly burrowed into her folds as well as
other places.
Moonlight blurred in
her eyes. The orgy seemed to be abating, but she could still see
shadows of people around her. The aftermath of her ecstasy left her
gleefully exhausted, but . . .
She felt herself
becoming aware of something. The trees around her, the woods—they
seemed pushed off at a distance. Did she hear water lapping
somewhere? She thought of a pond or a lake, and as more water
gently splashed, she thought it could mean that someone was coming
out of this body of water. Details shifted, and her vision began to
clear.
Then her heart froze
in her chest.
I know where I am now, she realized, and she might
as well have come to this conclusion inside of a
coffin.
She’d been having sex
with all those men . . . at Bowen’s Field.
She lurched upright,
screaming. She ran for the woods, thrashing into their midst. Her
scream followed her like a contrail, but when it occurred to her
that she was being followed—by some bizarre, giggling horde—the
fringes of the nightmare began to dissolve, and the next thing she
knew she was standing before the dresser mirror in the bedroom,
naked, hair disarrayed, terrified. Her bosom heaved. The badger’s
foot on the cord about her neck seemed to be vaguely alive, moving
about the valley of her breasts. In the dark mirror she saw that
she’d been finger painted with Squatter graffiti: gleaming,
slate-colored lines and squiggles inscribed about her nipples,
bracketing her navel, traveling about her thighs like crestwork on
an old house. Her face had been painted likewise—an ancient
fertility mask, a rictus of either wantonness or
horror.
The giggling tittered
behind her. Had something followed her from the nightmare into
reality? Her eyes bloomed at her horrid likeness in the mirror, and
in the reflection she could see the window, and a faceless figure
standing there.
She sat upright in
bed as if awakened by a shriek. She remained naked, the sheets
kicked off the bed. Her first instinct, though, was to look very
closely at herself.
She slid off the
mattress and walked gingerly to the dresser. Please, please, please, she thought. The badger’s
foot still dangled between her breasts, but her face and skin were
clean—no evidence of the Squatter clan’s body paint. Finally she
let out a long breath. The cicadas trilled sedately from outside.
Moonlight tinted the quiet room.
Just a nightmare, she assured herself.
She was tired of her
dreams, and tired of never feeling like herself since she’d
arrived. I need to go home soon. This place is
weirding me out.
In the dream she’d
been drenched in impassioned sweat, but now she felt equally
drenched in shame and unmitigated sin. She’d enjoyed the raving
sexual fest of the dream, which only made her feel guiltier about
Byron. I’ll bet he’s not dreaming of orgies
with a bunch of women, she thought. He’s home worrying about me, and missing
me.
Patricia didn’t do
well with guilt. . . .
The clock on the
nightstand read 3:20 A.M. Jesus . . .
Now that the terror of the dream had subsided, her head throbbed.
I’m half-drunk and half hungover at the same
time. The dark room hovered around her. Eventually the
comforting moonlight and cicada sounds turned annoying.
Then—
Creeeeeak.
Patricia snapped her
gaze toward the open window. “Who’s there?” she abruptly called
out.
A creak.
As if someone had
been standing on the wooden porch below the window. It’s probably nothing, she dismissed, yet quickly
pulled on her robe.
Someone had been
standing by the window in the dream. . . .
Yes, it was probably
nothing, but she got up nonetheless and leaned out the window. “Is
anyone there?” she asked too quietly. What if someone answered? Who
would be out here at this hour, and for what purpose?
She wouldn’t let
herself contemplate answers.
She squinted, set her
hand down on the sill to lean out further, but . . .
What is . . .
Her hand came away
wet. Something viscid.
Gross. Whatever it
was, it felt warm. Slug trails. Annoyed, she wiped her hand with a
tissue, then grabbed the flashlight and went outside.
At first she couldn’t
reckon what she was seeing in the flashlight beam: a splotch like
melted wax pooled on the sill, the overflow running down the
outside wall in a trail. It was still wet, but now she noticed
other similar trails that had long since dried.
The window, she thought.
Then, revolted, she
knew.
Like the peephole at
the Squatter’s shower. Oh, my God. The
realization bloomed in totality.
Some man was out here, masturbating. Looking at me naked
in bed . . .
Then a rustling came
from the hedges out in the yard, and she saw a figure slinking
away. It was Ernie.
He stumbled drunkenly
down the path, then through the trees, and
disappeared.