Grimoire Diabolique

The girl stared out the windshield and stroked her chin as if pondering a puzzle. “I wonder if what’cha eat effects the taste of your come? Ya think?”

Gray’s smile of incredulity bloomed on his face. “I…don’t know. But I suppose it’s an interesting question.”

“Like, if all a guy eats bacon, does it make his come taste like bacon? Er-er-er, what if he eats lots’a candy?” Her stare beyond the glass deepened. “I wonder if it makes his come sweet.”

“Perhaps it does.” Gray could barely stifle a chuckle. This is some conversation. “You’re really great,” he finally said when he got his breath back. Now she was daintily rebuckling his slacks, tucking the shirt in, making sure the zipper’s tab was right when she pulled it up.

“There ya go…”

“Look, you know, I mean,” he began to babble, “didn’t you say said you walk this way a lot?”

“Yeah. Ever nat. Ever week-nat that is.”

“Well, see, why don’t we make a deal? I drive home this way every night too, the same time, and I was thinking that maybe I could pick you up like this and drive you home, for, you know—”

She seemed elated. “You’s’ll drive me home ever nat fer a blow job an’ gives me twennie five ta boot?”

“Yes,” Gray said. “Why not?” The quiet calculation registered: twenty-five dollars a night, five nights a week. A little over six grand a year. Piece of cake. His two ex-wives were remarried now—no more alimony. “I mean, you need the money for your baby, and I, you know, I need—”

Her hand, perhaps unconsciously, squeezed his crotch. “That’d be dandy ’cos, like, most’a the guys who give me rides ever nat, they’se only pay like five’r ten bucks an’ a lotta times they’se try to do things I never agreet to. They’se all mostly crackers, see, dirty fellas and mostly drunk. But I like you. An’ you’s say you give me twennie-five fer a blow? Ever nat?”

“Sure,” Gray said. “Every night.”

««—»»

She lived way back in the boondocks, all right. An old county utility road took them deep into the woods. The moon had risen higher; it was a half-moon, a yellow lump hovering. Gray kept taking sideglances at it, for whatever reason, but it just made him more aware of the girl. For the whole time he drove, she never took her hand off his crotch. He could feel her hand’s warmth through the material. Then she was rubbing more intently as her big dark-caramel eyes wandered over the scape of the forest. It didn’t take long before Gray was hard again.

The Corvette’s tires crunched over gravel. At the end of the road, a clearing opened, and a little two-story farmhouse sat wedged into sprawls of high weeds. Blistered once-white paint peeled back to reveal old, dull-gray wood, and there were dark shutters with slats falling out. An attic with one blank window peaked out of the structure toward its rear, some shingles missing from the small belfry-like roof. A large garage branched off one side, obviously a makeshift addition, and behind it, an expansive area surrounded by an eight-foot-high plank fence, more old unvarnished gray. Amid the weeds crawling around the house, Gray noticed orange bloated objects sitting lopsided, and then he realized what they were. Pumpkins, he thought. Well that’s damn appropriate, because this dump could pass for a Halloween house of horrors any day. Gray didn’t want to hang around. She had a kid, so she probably had a husband. And the husband must have a shotgun, to fit right in with the rest of this backwoods cliché.

He pulled up at the end of the gravel drive, stopped.

“Look,” she said, “I means, you been real nice’n generous to me, ’specially offerin’ ta pick me up ever nat, but, see, I lives here with my two brothers Jory’n Hull, but, see, they’se’re mechanics, they’se work on cars.”

“What about… I mean, aren’t you married?”

“Aw, no, I’se ain’t married!” she exclaimed as if at an absurdity. “I gotta baby, shore, but that was juss by some fella who raped me once.”

“Oh, wow,” Gray said. “I’m sorry.”

“Ain’t nothin’ ta be sorry ’bout ’cos she’s a beauter-full baby.” Her fingers, very daintily, tacked around Gray’s crotch. Things were moving down there again, the tent struggled to rise against the tension. “I’se don’t want ya ta think I’m greedy’re nothing, but, ya know, seein’s that yer hard again, I thoughts ya might wanna come in an’ give me a fuck.”

Just hearing the word—fuck—come from her mouth made Gray feel like he might come right there in his pants. His chest tightened. “But-but you said you had two brothers.”

“Yeah, I’se do, but, see, they’se ain’t here right now, won’t be home till tuh-marruh nat on account they had ta go ta Pennsylvania ta buy car parts at some big car convention. So’s you kin come in, an’ we’se won’t be disturbed. But, ya know, I’d have ta charge, like, maybe…forty?”