Free The Joy of Killing by Harry MacLean Page B

My bike was locked up in front of the drug store only a few blocks away.
    A cold blast of air swept up from the river. The train jerked back, and then slipped forward, screeching and creaking, wobbling back and forth. I looked around for the girl, but she’d gone back inside. Given up on me, I thought, which was probably just as well. In those few moments I had felt the constraints of the involvement, the pressure in her eyes. Now I could ride with the Ghost Riders across the devil’s endless sky, hook back up with the train bandits in their hideout in a distant canyon. The train began to roll a little faster, and the lights of the little town on the far edge of the river grew brighter, and I wondered how many people in the houses there were eating or watching TV or sleeping. I wondered why I still felt nothing, despite the bitter wind. I stood there until the train was over the bridge and the clickety-clack sound returned to normal. Finally, I felt the chill of the night invade my bones. I punched the button for the door. Shivering, I hunched my shoulders and pushed in, only to have the door close on its own and catch me in the chest, pinning me to the frame, half in and half out. I pushed against it, but it only jammed harder. I flung around for the button, but my frozen hands could feel nothing. Suddenly the door snapped open, and there stood the girl. She had been waiting for me. “You poor thing,” she said and wrapped me up in her arms. She held me like that, moving her arms gently up and down my back. She lifted my chin, wiped the moisture from the corner of my eyes, and kissed me. She pressed her whole body into me. She led me back to her seat and motioned for me to sit in the chair by the widow. I reached for her, but she pressed my arms down. “Trust me,” she said. I lay my head back and forced an exhale.
    Her hands slid down and undid my belt and shot the zipper down. In the midst of the struggle I had forgotten about my dick, and now I could feel nothing of it. I flexed it, but still nothing. Frozen solid. Her hand slipped beneath my underwear. Suddenly, there it was. She leaned in to kiss me, and I pulled her in until our lips were smashed together. I found her tongue and sucked until most of it was in my mouth. She pulled my dick all the way out of my pants, and I could see by the way she looked at it that what was coming wasn’t another blow job. She held it lightly, turned in her seat and shifted a thigh over me. “Jesus,” I whispered. She sat straight up, and I held my breath as my dick disappeared under her skirt.
    I could feel the heat of her. She tossed a wave of hair off her shoulder. I fought back the impulse to thrust up into her. Her hands pressed down on my shoulders. I slipped my hands under her skirt and placed them on her thighs, and allowed them to slip up to just about where her panties would be. Her look told me not a millimeter further.
    I STAND UP abruptly. The scrape of the chair on the floor is the howl of an angry banshee. I see the wooden canoe, twisting in the waves, and realize I can’t remember what happened to it, if it finally floated ashore, or somebody pulled it out. It was ours, I remember now. Our dad had bought it at the end of the previous summer, and we had hauled it here strapped on top of our station wagon. Our name was painted on the green bow in white letters. It carried two paddles and two life vests. I see a vest lying on the sand where Joseph had tossed it. Bright orange. It would have brought himback, and all this suffering would have been avoided. Just because you wanted to impress the girls. You had them anyway; they loved you for your carefree arrogance. We didn’t look for our canoe. As I said, we left the day after the reception and never came back.
    The bathroom is in the middle of the hall, next to my old room. I have only to walk down the stairs, unlock the door, and it’s a few steps on my left. I hesitate to