Sanity’s Threshold, Slivers of a Twisted Mind

“Where am I?”

I roll over in back of the station wagon, stiff from an activity I don’t remember.  The full moon lights the parking lot with a dimness that matches my confusion. My head aches with the pain of seven hangovers.

“What the hell?”

The crusty blanket beneath my head smells of vomit which permeates the interior of the sedan. I test the flavor inside my mouth. The odor must be from some other poor soul’s supper.

The evening’s activities patch together: the bar, the drinks, and the girl.

The girl. A beautiful creature with airbrushed tits and pearly-white veneers. At that moment, nothing existed except for my desire to taste her mouth. She had me before she tickled my thigh with her toe.

I followed her like a puppy dog to her nauga-wood paneled porn palace, a 69-Chevy complete with curtains on the extended rear windows. Whatever freak show she had in mind, I was game. She made me climb in the back, after that the misty remnants of my memories drift just out of reach.

It must have been the drinks. Come to think of it, they did have a kick. I drank one by the pool table and one by the juke box while her dancing finger twisted my hair. Hell, she could have slipped me anything because I certainly wasn’t thinking with my brain.

I ease my throbbing head toward the rear of the car and yank on the tailgate’s release lever. Locked. I crawl over candy wrappers and used condoms and flop onto the back seat. My surroundings disgust me, but I didn’t care earlier. Knowing I am not the first to lower myself to this squalor does little to lift my spirits.

The night air hits me, cool and clean, a hypnotic fragrance to my lungs after inhaling the wretched air inside the confined cabin. A cloud flits across the face of the moon, and the first pangs of panic worm down my spine.

Cold, clammy hands cover my eyes, and a hard body presses itself against my back. A whiff of stale alcohol and cigarettes fill my nostrils.

“Did you miss me, my love?”

The sultry voice does little to relieve my climbing sense of foreboding. I stop her hand working its way to my throat.

“What did you give me?”

“Come on, baby, don’t you remember? We’re having so much fun.” The other hand drops to my crotch and takes a no-so-gentle tug at my junk. It responds against my better judgment.

“No, I don’t remember much.” I pull away, but she holds me tight.

“Not so fast, big boy. I’m not done with you yet.”

The grip locked around my larynx restricts my next breath. “You’re hurting me.”

“Yes, but you like it, lover. You insult me. You’ll always be one of my favorites.”

The tug at my belt grows frantic, and my cock rises to the occasion, pressing against the cold steel of the sedan. My anticipation accelerates as tiny memories of our escapades work their magic. The first ray of sunlight touches the hood of her car and the pressure behind me evaporates. My breath balloons against the window in hasty pants as I wait for her to continue.

***

“Hey buddy, you can’t sleep here.” A not-so-gentle toe prods my thigh.

I rub embedded gravel from my cheek and cringe at the stench of stale grease that emanates from the dumpster that towers over me. “What the fuck?”

Joe, the owner of the tavern, scowls at me. “Had a few too many last night, eh bud? You still owe me for that last round.”

I dig into my jeans pockets for my wallet. Gone. She must have pinched it.

“She must have took my wallet. I’ll pay you, don’t worry.”

Joe rolls his eyes at the words he has probably heard a hundred times.

The station wagon is nowhere in sight. Just as well. I don’t want to get back into the jizz jalopy if I can help it. I follow Joe into the shaded recesses of his bar.

“Way you were drinking didn’t know if you’d see the light of day.”

“I’m not feeling so hot. I think I was drugged.”

A round of laughter filled the bar. “Drugged, or drunk for sure.”

“I’m just here to see if anyone found my wallet. I think the girl I was with might have stolen it.”

“Girl? You weren’t with no girl.”

“Sure I was, the red-head.”

The early morning day drinkers exchanged knowing looks.

“Must have been Ole Mabel. She’s been known to show herself just before the full moon.”

“Where can I find her?”

“You don’t, she finds you, and if you were a smart feller you’d forget about that wallet. Nothing good has ever come from Mabel.”

I stumble toward the door rubbing my face in confusion.

***

Joe polished his bar. “You think I should have told him?”

A newcomer at the end of bar piped up. “Told him what?”

“Ole Mabel been dead for over forty years.”