Free Anathema by David Greske Page A

she replied. Then she brought her hand to her face and licked her fingers.
    * * * *
    Kitty-corner across the hall, Molly sat by the window and stared at the blaze of neon caused by the carnival lights. In her mind, she was there again, in the midst of the noisy midway.
    Travis handed her a ceramic angel he'd won by tossing a softball into a milk can. “Here, this is for you,” he had said. The smile he wore was so big the corners of it rode halfway up his cheeks.
    "What is this for?” she had asked him.
    "Because you're my sister and I love you. Even if we do fight, sometimes."
    She accepted the gift and gave her brother a kiss on the top of his head. But she really hadn't heard what he'd said. Her concentration was focused on the young stud that was about to swing the sledgehammer at the Muscleman game. The way he moved, how he stood, the color of his hair, reminded her of Cruz. And because of that, she couldn't get him out of her head.
    Molly saw him almost as soon as they arrived. It was as if some great magnet had pulled her attention in his direction. He was in the beer garden, whooping it up with some of his friends. Molly knew he saw her, too. It was just like one of those romantic movies where lovers-to-be caught each other's eyes across a crowded room, or in a packed subway.
    Their paths crossed again near the cheese curd stand, and she gave him her prettiest smile. He winked at her, and she thought her heart would melt. The third time, she stood right next to him while Travis tried to win a framed photograph of some rock star by throwing darts at a balloon.
    When he turned and said, “Hello,” Molly felt an electric charge chatter through her body. His eyes were even cuter than Cruz's and his voice was like smooth chocolate over ice cream. There was something else, too, something that made her burn inside, something that made him insatiable. He looked dangerous. And Molly liked that. She liked it a lot.
    Molly ran her hand across her budding breasts. The nipples were hard and sore. She wished she was bigger, fuller. He'd like that.
    She stroked the inside of her thigh with her other hand and let it linger when she touched her crotch.
    This isn't right.
    Then another voice, one she'd never heard before, whispered, But, oh, isn't it fun!
    Yes, Molly agreed, but that still didn't make it right.
    Molly picked up the gift from Travis, ran her fingers across its features. In the face of the angel, she saw her angel.
    A smile slithered across her face as she pressed the angel against her swollen vagina.
    * * * *
    Bill sat in the beer garden, silhouetted against a glow of carnival lights. He drained the dregs of his beer, shook a Camel Red from its package, and thought about her.
    Virgin meat, said a voice inside his head. It wasn't a voice he recognized, it certainly wasn't his, but somehow he felt a strange kinship with it. Hot cherry pie!
    Bill lit his cigarette and sucked until the ember burned as hot as the fire in his loins. He pictured Molly's soft, untouched lips. He wanted to fondle her young, pure rosebud breasts and break her seal as he tasted her sex.
    Bill moaned.
    "What the fuck's wrong with you?” Denny Halloway asked. “All that moanin’ and groanin’ shit."
    Halloway was Bill's best friend. He was also a small-time crook whose specialty was boosting car stereo systems.
    "Nothin',” Bill replied. “I'm bored with this shit. Finish your beer and let's go give Jarvis a hard time."
    "Whatever.” Halloway downed the rest of his beer and belched. Then he farted.
    They left the beer garden and shuffled to the Stumble Inn. Bill's thoughts kept drifting back to...
    (Hot cherry pie)
    ...Molly, and although the voice inside him told him he'd see her again, he couldn't help but wonder when.

 
    Chapter 11
    Jarvis hustled the last drunk out the door of the Stumble Inn about ten minutes ago and turned the lights off in the tavern. Even though he'd wiped down the bar and tables with a solution of Lysol and