Wanted Man

Rain had warped the WANTED poster, causing the face on it to shrivel like a piece of fried bacon. Even without this distortion the sketch of the wanted man was unnerving. He had a broken nose, a scar that ran the length of his cheek, and eyes that seemed to look in all directions at once.

A woman approached with a sack of groceries in her arms. Her attire - fishnet stockings, short black skirt, blouse made of some flimsy fabric - was hardly adequate for the brisk fall day. When she saw the WANTED poster she walked over to look at it closer. Beneath the fugitive's face was a long list of crimes. The woman bit her lip. She couldn't say whether the list of crimes was complete, but the sketch itself was accurate. She knew this because the wanted man was hiding out in her house.

Five nights ago she had been startled awake by an urgent knock. Through her bedroom window she had seen a helicopter's searchlight sweeping across her lawn. She had run to the kitchen, threw open the door, saw the fugitive standing on her doorstep, and pulled him inside. She slammed the door a second before the searchlight sliced across her stoop. When the wanted man asked her why she had let him in, she said it was because he had an innocent face. Paradoxically, she added that she liked to root for the bad guy.

In the days that followed the wanted man was as quiet as a shadow. He spent most his time in the kitchen, sitting at the table and staring at the wall. He'd eat whatever food the woman put in front of him, and answered her questions with a grunt or a nod, but the kitchen wall was the only thing that seemed to really interest him. He would stare at it for hours. When his eyes were so bloodshot that he could no longer keep them open he'd stumble into the living room and collapse on the woman's couch. He spent the nights turning from side to side. In the mornings he'd awake with a shudder, as if shaking off a bad dream, and stagger back to the kitchen to continue his staring.

The woman gave the fugitive his space, and he provided her the same courtesy, with one notable exception: Whenever a loud noise broke the silence -- like a car alarm or a door slamming -- the wanted man would be overcome by a sudden fury. The first time it happened was when the woman was watching a gunfight on television with the volume turned up. In this instant and the others that followed the fugitive ceased to view the woman as his ally and saw her instead as a wily opponent. He believed that she had orchestrated his capture and was his heartless warden. He would then chase her into a corner and demand to know the secret of her true identity. These outbursts all ended the same way - with the fugitive bending his captor over a piece of furniture, most often the kitchen table, and sodomizing her with angry thrusts. The woman stared at the WANTED poster as she remembered the most recent episode. Then she blinked, hoisted the groceries higher on her chest, and continued on her way home.

Down the road, across a field, in the woman's small gray house, the wanted man was seated at the kitchen table, staring at the wall. He stared at the wall so hard it melted. On the other side was the roaring darkness of space. Stars spun in this abyss like wreckage being sucked down a whirlpool. The fugitive peered into the vortex with his eyes peeled wide.

Somewhere in the abyss lurked the Beast, dragging its tail through the ether. More often than not the Beast was sedate, but from time to time it would roar with all its might. The Beast knew when to lash out and when to lay low. It could take over the fugitive's mind in an obliterating instant, or remain silent for days, even weeks, nearly convincing him that it was gone for good. The fugitive scanned the limitless depths of space and spied the Beast's reflective skin, rainbow-colored and reptile-smooth, as it swam between planets. Its cockerel crest was a nebula; its blazing eye was a comet. As the wanted man scrutinized the chaos, the Beast's fiery eye turned to appraise him, even though he was worlds away, even though he'd done everything in his power to hide from the Beast, even though he was sick of the Beast's hunger and couldn't stand the thought of feeding it one more piece of his soul.

The fugitive shut his eyes. When he opened them the kitchen wall was intact and the cosmic maw had vanished.

Suddenly the door crashed open, causing him to jump. The woman stomped into the kitchen and put her groceries on the counter. She started to unpack the bag when what sounded like a barrage of gunfire erupted from outside.

The woman spun on her heels but the fugitive was already upon her. One of his hands clutched a fistful of her hair. The other held her throat. Before she could say anything he gave her hair a sharp tug.

"Not one peep, you hear?"

She looked at him with unblinking eyes.

"You know what I do with enemy spies like you?"

The woman nodded. She knew all too well. The wanted man took his hand off her throat and moved it down to her blouse. There was the sound of fabric tearing and of buttons hitting the floor. He cupped one of her breasts in his calloused hand and began to suck. The woman tilted her head back and sighed. The whites of her eyes sparkled through slits. Another gunshot pierced the air.

The fugitive took his mouth from her nipple. "You think you got me cornered, don't you?"

The woman nodded again, breathing heavily.

"You think that just because you're beautiful you can get away with anything? Is that it?"

"That's right."

Another gunshot rang through the kitchen. The fugitive unzipped his pants and shook them off his legs. His erect penis stuck out like a fist. He dragged the woman across the room and bent her over the kitchen table. Then he yanked up her skirt.

"Wait a second!" the woman shouted. "There's Crisco in the bag!"

The fugitive pulled back and ran across the room with his penis bobbing. He rummaged through the grocery sack, found the container of Crisco, and tore off the lid. As the woman watched over her shoulder the wanted man rubbed a dollop of shortening on the tip of his dick. Then he ran back across the room, positioned the head of his penis just so, bent his knees, and entered the woman with the speed of a man who is only guaranteed the present.

The woman grimaced as the fugitive proceeded to plow her with long hard strokes. The fugitive grunted and sank his teeth into her shoulder. The woman moaned while grinding her jaw.

This continued for a few minutes and then the gunshots that came from outside suddenly stopped. In the silence that followed the fugitive's pace began to slacken and his thrusts came with less and less verve. The woman bucked against him to keep up the friction. She even reached back, grabbed the wanted man's thigh, and tried to pull him into her. But it was a lost cause. After one final stroke the fugitive succumbed to a shudder and then slumped forward on her back. After a few heavy breaths, he pushed himself off the woman, staggered back, and sat down hard on the floor.

"What happened?" The man looked around with watery eyes. "Did I do something wrong?"

The woman's face twisted with disgust. She had been on the brink of a mind-blowing orgasm.

"Yeah, you did something wrong!"

The fugitive looked down and began to cry. It was a hushed blubbering that sounded like it came from a child. The woman looked at him with her hands on her hips. Each time pushes him closer to the edge, she thought to herself. She suspected he was only good for a few more fucks before he completely lost his mind. Look at him now, she smirked. Sobbing like a goddamn baby. Soon he'll be a vegetable and then he'll be totally worthless. That's when I'll call the cops.

The woman went to a closet, got a bathrobe, and tied it around her waist. Then she kicked open the back door, letting in a burst of bright light.

She stomped down her back steps and walked around the corner of the house. Some children were sitting on the grass beneath the kitchen window, surrounded by the shreds of exploded balloons. It looked as if they'd skinned the hide of some rainbow-colored beast.

"What happened?" the woman shouted. "You still have half a bag of balloons!"

"We're tired," the children cried. "Our lips hurt. Can we go play now?"

"No!" The woman's voice was shrill. "I paid you ten dollars to get through the whole bag. Now catch your breath and blow up the rest of those goddamn balloons! And start doing it faster! I don't want any more gaps."

The children sighed and reached for the half-empty bag. The woman stomped back inside. The slam of the kitchen door served as the first explosion.