The Masterpiece
A. Cheshire Catt
all in one day, December 23, 2007 (perilously close to Christmas Eve)
email me: I love your feedback kierkegaard_is_cool@hotmail.com
For after all, there was nothing to be said about the goodness in his soul, there was nothing of goodness in him anyway: no valour, no honor, no shame. He had grown up as a good boy. Polite, sincere, of good intention, he was the sort of person one was proud to present to respectable society, he was cheerful and pleasant with the conversation he made with people of the variety one shakes the hands of, kisses the cheeks of. He was an artist, he was a poet, he was a bit of a scholar, an amateur with his fingers dabbling in the spectrum of word-play men of intellect can take years to grasp with any confidence at all. He was from a family of local-hero status. His father was the son of a successful agriculturalist, his mother was the daughter of an architect whose less popular buildings can still be seen in this town. Worldly and well-read, his home was complete with all the fineries inherited from generations of such people. But, for after all there was nothing to be said about any of that, this young man was just a man, prone to getting himself into all sorts of trouble; and, though he might be presented to people who are patrons of theater groups and art galleries, his mind was of the most depraved kind. The ease with each he navigated the fine line between madness and sobriety suggested a complexity and depth that will assure this young man a fine place in the greatest realms of Hell.
His name was Bradford Dupuis. Tall, thin, gallant: he dresses fashionably, with well-tailored jackets, stylish shirts, nicely-hemmed pants, shoes polished, hair tightly trimmed. He had spent his spritely years writing criticisms that ruined the careers of many an aspiring local artist. He was popular at local pubs and clubs for arriving late, selecting boys of the rosiest-cheeks, innocent kinds, naive like this, for his heartless, brutal, selfish passion. Often, after such nights, he left those kids on street corners flagging cabs at god-awful hours of the night when he refused to let them sleep with him. Those who had been in his home over the years told fantastic things about the chambers of facetious decorum, their legends grew to precede him before he even got to those places where rosy-cheeked cherubs awaited such loveless sexual slaughter.
All this before the young man reached thirty years of age and yet the young man seemed ancient. His hair had grayed after the sudden death of his parents. His face had turned to stone after the only lover he'd ever known had disappeared while pursuing a single passion in a place of absolute savagery. His hands crept upon door knobs, his shadow made blades of grass tremble, and his echo often refused to return as if his voice was freed from him, and liberated would never return. All this may have been fine, all this may have been assured: but after all it meant nothing on that night when this strange incident occured.
See, it is important to realize he did not live a solitary life. He was well-acquainted with several people of similarly devious disposition. This being an age of not exactly the most Christian persuausion, he was easily befriended online with people around the world who had far too much time on their hands, and somewhat ill-begotten luxury. He was able to collect a circle of friends within his own city that laughed in the face of the misery of others. Such was the fate of one young man several years before.
On that night, when Bradford Dupuis was just an art critic with parents living in a mansion in the suburbs, he was joined by his friends at a local theater reopened for a rarity in the performing arts, the revue of a troupe brought across the ocean to this run-down place. Where spectacular shows had been given for the amusement and titilation of children, the dimly flickering marquee invited them in for what was now a performace frought with ghosts of the most frightening kind. His friends that evening included but were not limited to, three young savantes of similar age and fashion. The son of a Russian diplomat, one Maxim Pushkin: a fiery young man with a terrific collection of guns that had played the part in some of the more gruesome events in history, his prized possession was the pistol that had done in King Gustav III of Sweden. They were joined that evening at the theater by the arrogant drunk, the heiress of an untouchable marijuana tycoon, Violet Sky, a waif of a young woman, with high-heeled boots who spoke in tongues, as if awake she dreamt of the future, the past, or some other realm in the here and now. Also in attendance was the less sinister, and often mocked, the small-time stage actor, barely liked by the art critic, one Toddery Johnson, a mimic of their fashion, a victim of circumstance. That evening, that night, they were to lose one of their friends, not to death but to normalcy. But they'd no idea how real the pain of a soul could be.
It came to pass that their arrival at the theater would be late. They would stride through the doors into the theater with a clamor and disrupt the opening refrains of the show. The darkly clad emcee, with his old-fashioned microphone squealing like a disturbed child, would look disappointingly upon these four children of the night with a sour disapproval. Whatever it was that he had explained they had sorely missed. And drunk with the wines taken during a light dinner, they laughed as an usher forced them to take uncomfortable seats near the front.
The usher was a young man, terrifyingly sullen. He lurched with a small, hand-held light at them, hushing them sternly, but they huffed and wailed, and disturbed the serious attention paid by the sparsely attending audience.
Clearing his throat, the phantom harlequin host warned the foursome, "You four will pay a grim price for your insolence: you're a nuisance to the ambience, a pestering monster in this dark place."
"Stop talking in riddles old man," Maxim was heard saying.
Toddery was worried about what price they'd have to pay and wished his friends would respect the program of the show.
"We should be careful, fates terrible and unholy fall from these high-held sceneries," Violet noted.
They took their seats and the host continued.
"This evening, my humble company will provide for its patrons a thrilling spectacle of the most frightening kind. As usual it will bring from you the most heart-wrenching emotions, but we remind you why you've come. I have travelled the world for many seasons, I have met people who were witnesses to atrocities one can not even imagine, I have taken into my ranks the people who wish to share with all the world the triumph of their evil lives, who wish to show you that evil does exist. I remind you, that you are here on this night, not to smile, not to laugh, but instead to feel the pain of these poor souls. I remind you of your own pains, or your own search for pain. I remind you that tonight you will bear witness and I hope to fulfill your most unholy of unholy desires."
There was a noise behind the dark crimson curtain that was draped upon the stage. A ruffle, an errant breeze disturbed the stillness of the curtain. The host raised an eyebrow but paid little attention to this, as if a ghost had passed but this man a ghost himself paid little attention to such an expected phenomenon.
Suddenly the curtain raised and the host pulled his microphone to the side, the thudding of the leaden base, the scrape of the wire, was dulled by the clanging of the curtain as it rose.
Standing to the side now the host raised his arm as if an extension of the curtain, "Behold the setting of a stable."
And it was a farm, it seemed, the classic stable scene. It was something that stirred in some of those more feebly-willed something of a Nativity Scene. Being that it was close to Christmas there was the sentiment that this may be a parody of the Holy Birth.
Feeding on this easy parallelism the host chuckled, "We propose to you that this humble stable was soon to be the setting of the Glorious Moment, the Holy Star will shine down upon this and summon the birth of the king of kings, the lord of lords, the sensation star of our worst religion. Soon to be, I say, because if such a stable really existed the night before Christmas the stable existed as well. And a few weeks before as well. But such a stable need not exist always as such a holy place, and we mustn't be fools for the ages and believe only good and godly things happened there."
There was the sound of weeping then, it wafted in from the side of the stage opposite that of the host. A boy was brought in then. He was clad in a flimsy cotton smock, hands bound with a rough rope that reddened his wrists. Seemingly of clean virtue, the boy was plainly unsure of himself. Perhaps the boy was drugged, but he was clearly alert and concerned and it seemed he wasn't at all. He looked pale and tired. He looked reluctant but fully aware what was happening shouldn't really be. He was brought to the center of the stage at the hands of two large guards. They were massive men, dark-skinned, of olive complexion, they wore black vests and tight pants, jeans, and black leather boots laced tight and high up the shin. Dark sunglasses hid their eyes, their emotions from the glaring light of the spotlight turned upon them now. And the boy was dashed to the floor forced to kneal and trembled trying to see an audience that he heard breathing. "Is my mommy out there?"
The audience laughed.
His mother was nowhere to be heard anyway.
"Mommy?"
But only a tragedy of laughter rose from the audience.
"This terrible scene, of this terrible play, is called: The Assumption of the Virgin."
One of the men that had led the boy out there suddenly grabbed the back of the boy's head and brought him up to the tight-clad package that buldged in his jeans. He smeared the boy's tears where the shaft of his seemingly tremendous cock waited. The other man, while the boy was distracted with that, tore the cloth garment from the boy in one violent movement and left the boy naked and pale and shaking in a sudden jerk.
"What do you want me to do?" The boy was unsure why the two men circled around him, towering over him, they were easily three or more inches over six feet tall. The two men grinned but said nothing, the script was not one of words, it was clear, it would be a pantomime of perilous discord for sure.
Suddenly one of the men removed from his jeans a cock easily eight inches long. It swayed before the boy's face. Unsure of what it is boy of his age is to do for these men of such dominant stature, the boy reached out with his tightly bound hands and took into his clutch the cock presented. The man thrust his hips at the boy and looking up at man he understood that he was to put the cock in his own mouth. Which barely fit, the other man reached down and pulled the jaw open wider and then the other man forced his cock in. The boy choked. The audience hummed with boredom. This is what they came for?
The other man, the man holding the jaw, removed then his cock, of greater size easily compared to the other, and the boy then put his lips barely upon it before he was choking upon it. The boy was suckling one, then the other, for a few turns on each before suddenly one of the men started urinating on the boy and soon after the other followed. The smell of the urine was potent, it reached the audience and cast a spell on some of them. One of the men farted and its sounded stirred an even deeper sense of debauchery in some of the members of the audience. The boy swallowed some of the piss shot at his face, the boy choked and was forced to take the surge of urine, forced to wear it all over his pale body, the dirty stench of it, the hot acidity of the shame. The rubbed his own body, he looked down but one of the men smacked his head really hard and the boy looked up, mouth agape, and was then forced to take into his mouth the lesser of the two big cocks waiting for service.
The boy gagged on one then the other then for another short interval before he was coaxed to stand and then bend over. Taking one cock in his mouth the other man placed himself behind the boy and rubbed his large member along the crack of his smooth little ass. Vulnerability was something unknown to the boy, he seemed unaware of what anguish threatened his virgin hole. The crowd reeled at this. A trickle of anticipatory applause summoned the ruthlessness lingering in the loins of the larger-cock minion. He smiled at the audience, in a theatrical aside manner, and then started the brutal thrust. The boy jumped when he sensed the penetration beginning but the strong arms of each man held him still. While his boy mouth was filled with the gigantic cock he cried and gasped and tears streamed down his face. His legs trembled, as if he could barely stand while he was being entered.
The host, through the microphone, could be heard clearing his throat: the whole audience, as if dead to life till stirred by that sound, jumped and looked at him, and then noticed that he was signalling to the stars to go down upon their knees.
The boy was laid bare upon the floor of the stage, in the filthy puddle of the early action. He cried clearly that it hurt, it hurt bad, it really scared him, he was shaking and grabbing at the denim clad legs of the man whose cock choked him more and more. Suddenly he threw up and only a little string of bile escaped. The man in his rear pushed harder and further and those close to the stage could swear upon on the throbbing skewer there was evidence of an internal wound, blood, ruby red: the glory, the gift of this art. The boy grew pale. Then slapped across the ass, the boy became alert and wailed, bawled as the men fucked him from either end. The man in his rear fucked him and grunted pulled his member out to shoot a stream of semen all over the young man's back. The boy was turned then, his arm bending and his feeble body used like this was like a toy, like a prop. The other man then forced his cock into the bleeding ass while the other man straddled his boy chest: while getting the final fuck of his boyhood the first fucker shit upon his chest, great heaping globs of filthy shit. Promptly the man fucking the now-limp body pulled out and shot stream after stream over the apparently-unconcious lad.
The curtain dropped and the audience applauded. But Bradford, always the critic, decried the violence. "Merely porn, merely smut, merely snuff: hardly a spectacle, hardly worth the innocence of a boy."
Maxim chuckled but the gurgling noise of his amusement was cut short by the whine of the microphone being turned on, by the clearing of the vampiric host's throat.
There was a whinny behind the curtain of what seemed to be a beast being controlled, followed by thunderous clamour of hooves upon the hollow wood of the stage.
"Our next offering then, the second of three acts: a parable of The Sacrifice of the Lamb. But for this we require a particular breed of innocence, a certain prescription of reluctance. For this we ask the assistance of a member in our fine audience."
But no one could be heard rising to the occasion, only a muffled worry for each person's dignity.
"If no one volunteers it can be safe to say I shall be required to throw upon you a curse."
A voice could be heard suddenly and to Toddery's horror it was that of his Judas-friend Bradford. "He's shy your graciousness, but I believe my friend here would like to offer himself to your altar." Toddery cried out that he wouldn't like to, that he shouldn't, that he couldn't, and with one final burst of shame moaned that he wouldn't.
"You're a brave fool, a dysfuntional Abraham, to offer upon us your boy."
Toddery cried out, "My friend is drunk sir, he doesn't know what he says."
"No, no, I'm sure I know what I say," Bradford jested, hoisting his friend to stand by the collar of his beige cordorouy jacket. "He is eager to please an audience, being the fine thespian he is."
"Come then, come upon the stage and bathe in the glory of this spotlight young man."
"No! I will not."
Then the host spoke with a low voice, so low the microphone trembled and the echo of his summoning stirred the shadows haunting the furthest reaches of this hall: "Come to me child."
Strangely then the three friends who brought him cheered him, and applauded and confused by his own unwillingness and yet somehow concerned for his reputation among them, he finally, seemingly of will, abandoned the safety of his seat. Assisted by the cold hand of the usher, trembling a little, he was escorted to the stage. An assuring applause could be heard.
He was brought into the bright light of the stage. He seemed pale and worried. He could not see from this vantage the worried look coming upon the face of the mad Violet Sky. He did not see the disdain expressed wordlessly by Maxim who would never have thought to offer Toddery. Nor did he see the grimace of Satanic delight that graced the face of Bradford Dupuis. The host shook the young man's hand and, away from the microphone now, was offered words of wisdom that the audience was not privy to. Whatever was whispered into his ear was a strange thing to be heard, for it soothed him uncannily, it calmed him, dulled him, somehow it even intoxicated him.
The curtain opened then upon a setting like an altar cut from red stone. A rough altar, without any particular icons, without any sort of idols to be worshipped. It seemed to convey an ancient place, like something found in forbidden forests far from this place, something far from this time. Two whispy young men moved out to the stage from either side and removed the layers of clothes Toddery had been wearing. The jacket, the shirt, the belt, and then he stepped from his pants. His shoes, his socks. He was then naked. He covered himself bashfully, though he had nothing to be ashamed of for Toddery was notorious for being well-endowed. All his possessions were removed to the side of the stage.
A third character in this play came out, a strong man like the beasts who had raped the boy in the previous scene. This man wore the same style of clothes, a black vest fastened taut about the pectoral muscles, the heaving abdominals exposed, a belly there suggesting a pirate's girth. His arms blazing with dragon tattoos that breathed fire up at his shoulders, up around his neck. Dark sunglasses hid this man's eyes, his emotions, and the audience could only assume his soul was protected by these shades as well. The man's crotch bulged with a muscle of an appendage that was comparable to those of the previous minions. The man's boots made a noise upon the floorboard that seemed unable to stir the naked young man from whatever spell he was under.
The man seemed of a soft nature at first. He caressed one of Toddery's arms from the shoulder the hand, Toddery offered his hand to the man, and the man took it. Standing behind Toddery then he stroked, just as softly as the first arm, the full length of the other arm, and at the end of his thick, callused fingers' journey down the arm, he took Toddery's other hand. A magic trick of sorts, behind Toddery's back a small fastening was performed, a faint drumroll heard, perhaps the hearts of souls previously played with echoing their torment, the man turned Toddery around to reveal his hands had been bound easily, tightly, and that there was no escape.
The man led Toddery to the altar and lay him upon his belly. It was clear then that his ass would be hoisted by the sheer angle of the altar, it would present it to some buggering beast, whatever that beast might be. The man consoled the trembling Toddery with kissed upon his lips, he then went round to his rear and, spitting there, then removed his steady shaft from its denim package and the audience moaned at the size of it. Easily this cock was over eight inches, something that seemed impossible but was true. A dagger, a machette, a sword ...
"Surely an angel will save this poor son of Abraham before he meets his fate."
Foolishly Bradford announced, "He's a great lay, he can take it!"
The host scowled in the direction of Bradford, some might say he even looked him right in the eye. But Bradford, not believing that any force beyond the theatrical was afoot, merely laughed and sat down. Maxim squirmed nervously. Violet Sky reeled like a lunatic about to be delighted. The audience held its breath, some said prayers for the boy who was taking their place.
The barrelling chest of the man at Toddery's rear was released from it black-vested retraint and the man breathed in, filling his chest, making it large and wide. Exhaling then it seemed he blew smoke from his lungs and then he weilded his cock at the man's ass there, waiting for its role in the sacrifice. Though one expected some disturbance there was none and the man was fucked then brutally by the man with cock of more than eight inches. Toddery whined and moaned and the man pulled out his cock with shit upon it. The audience laughed. Whatever spell Toddery was under did not save him from shame for he blushed and his brow furrowed with pain. The man fucked him more and more and spanked the white baubles of his ass, the sound ricocheting like bullets about the hall. Then suddenly there was a whinny, then suddenly there was a thunder of hooves. And from stage-right, from behind the man slaying Toddery, two black-winged characters led a great black horse from the wings of the stage. A blazing white star was pronounced on the foreheard of the horse, but otherwise this steed was a velvet of pitch. It's long cock, having been previously enticed to full size, was dangling between it hind legs. The horse kicked the floor, the sound was so loud a woman could be heard gasping for air, and then there was the din of her fainting and her escort could be heard reviving her. Maxim turned to see the usher leading them out.
Maxim turned to Bradford, "They don't mean to fuck him with a horse do they?"
Bradford, adjusting the throbbing member in his pants was unable to move his stare from the scene on the stage, he merely managed a muffled, "I hope so."
The altar was prepared in such a way that as the horse was led to stand over Toddery, the angles and proportions were just right for the plundering. The horse, the poor horse, seemed oblivious to its role in this game for the idle rich, but it seemed Toddery was even more uncertain till suddenly the horses front legs were fully straddling his frame. The spell seemed weakest then, and he moaned, "No, no I don't want this, it'll kill me, it's going to ruin me forever. This should be you! This should be you!" Bradford seemed oblivious to the fact that to whom Toddery was shouting this wicked curse was himself, not the audience in general, just him, just Bradford Dupuis.
The angels that had led the horse there had pet this shimmering pelt of the horse, calmed him and took the long purple shaft in their hand and steered it at Toddery's ass. There was a sheen upon this horse's cock that suggested it had been thoroughly greased beforehand.
Maxim was so nervous. He turned red in the face. He gasped. He admitted that he couldn't stand it. "Stop this madness," he yelled. Violet Sky hushed him. Bradford was wrapped up in the glory of this scene.
Suddenly, blindingly, a great scream was resounding about the whole theater, a passerby even noted a strange sound emanating from this darkened theater thought long-abandoned to rats. The horse's cock was forced into the tiny anus, forced to the point of tearing Toddery, tearing him mercilessly. The laughter of angels could be heard. The host himself was even moved to a state of hilarious appreciation of this pain. While they fucked him with the horse's cock the large-cocked man forced his cock into Toddery's mouth, muffling him that they may not alarm the neighbors, the authorities. They fucked him with this horse's cock till the horses shimmied and shook and tossed out loads of creamy horse cum into, onto Toddery's bleeding brutalized arse. And then the curtains closed and the audience applauded.
"Now that's entertainment!" Bradford exclaimed.
Maxim mumbled, "You monster."
Violet Sky was now silent, unflinched, barely moved. "Well I thought there'd have been more." She said such a thing so casually, affirming the love Bradford had for her.
The laughter of the angels could still be heard from behind the dropped curtain.
Maxim could be heard, "Where is our friend, gave us Toddery back."
The host chuckled into the microphone, "Your friend, insolent bastard, or what is left of him, can be retrieved from the stage-door."
"After the show," Bradford said.
Violet Sky laughed.
"Now, you deprived fiend."
Despite the curiosity Bradford felt, the wanting-to-know of what that third, certainly most terrific scene promised, the three of them began their departure from the bowels this theater they disturbed. As they neared the door Bradford hesitated, he listened as the host described that third scene, the final of the three.
"I ask of you one question, to set the tone for this most gruesome of life's promises: Was Christ borne upon our history only die for nothing? This third scene is the true Passion of Plays: entitled, Crucified with Thieves."
"Please!" Bradford begged.
"No more," Maxim dragged his devilish friend out onto the street as the audience nervously greeted what was surely a fatal moment in art itself.
The street was wet and there seemed to be an abundance of rubbish in the alley beside the theater. A cold wind blew and Maxim called out to his friend, "Toddery, where are you?" There was a faint stir among the rubbish.
They found him naked but for the blood stained smock that had most likely wrapped the boy they'd seen raped for the pleasure. They found Toddery shaking and blurred by this nightmare he was waking from, dark rings of tormet under his drooping eyes, painted under his drooping lids by this fateful event never to be removed. His hair would now turn startlingly white, and he would never talk sense after this night, he would never be the same: his family would lock him up in an expensive home for idle-rich's most lost of souls, none of them certain what had happened upon this night.
But one last thing of solid sense would pass through these lips of his, a curse: "Bradford Dupuis, you have lost all your chances. You will never know what love is: and just when you think you do, just when you think you are allowed to know what that monstrous host whispered in my ear, you will meet the end of your heartless days, your loveless nights."
Many years would pass. Many loveless, bone-chilling years. While Maxim and Violet Sky had been wed and lived happily, Bradford still labored with his torments and never knew what they had. His house seemed permanently a display of all his unrequired attempts to find someone to share his wealth and idleness. At first he remained a man very much the same as that which had been invited to that theater, that night in the dimly flickering past. He would entertain prostitutes, drug them and fuck them while they slept, he would fuck them raw, fill them with his, shit on them, piss on them, tie them up for days. He would fling money at the desperate and watch as they scurry like frightened little mice in his cat-paws. He would make connections to people who could provide him with sins, younger and younger, more and more, never less than what he wanted, but never more.
He lived on a street where prosperity overlooked the avenues. Companies built rows of homes and advertised them with glowing brilliance, "Raise your families, see the generations, promise yourself a wealth: a way of life." But these homes were soon abandoned, their owners finding wealth in other parts of town. It would seem the mansion at the end of this suburban street was the epicenter of a great gloom that their proximity to forbid them any goodness, any luck. So the houses were left to squalor, to hopeless refugees who got their roof for dirt cheap. Diners closed due to a lack of people willing to look upon the dark street, the lights along the street flickered, cats fought, children were to never be heard.
Burrowed deep in his catacomb he drew the curtains to what attempts the sun made to shine, he cursed his maids and threw plates at the cooks, no one was pleasing him, nothing was clean, nothing had taste. It was the worst of his life, he had reached the most decrepid of a man's being.
Still, in his dreams, he'd hear the screaming anguish of the young Toddery, but he couldn't help himself: in his dreams he was one of the dark-winged angels, massaging the gallant steed's cock till it spewed holy semen into the bloody arse of his sacrificed friend. And he'd awaken to a lonely life: summoning his connections to bring him something to help him. As quickly as it could be done, a boy would be delivered and he'd have that boy, just like the others, and when done with him would dispose of him, heartlessly, lovelessly ignoring any pleas for food, for money, for help.
Then one winter night, during a blizzard that had frozen the town solid, the connections he'd made were unable to come to his call. The maids had abandoned him. The cooks were not there to spoil his appetite. He wandered the halls of his lonesome palace at the end of his abandoned street. In other places merrier times were being had as it was perilously close to Christmas Eve. He rummaged like a starving vulture through an exhausted kitchen for something to eat, finding himself without anything of savory delight he submitted to the feast of a mere apple. Bored then he went to the library and found himself scanning through the remains of his better days, the copies of criticisms of artists his words prevented from knowing any real fame. He never rued anything, in fact his most delicious demolitions brought to his face a strange sort of smirk like the grin on a gargoyle. And suddenly, he came upon the review he wrote for a show that would be the undoing of his own career, that dynamo performance that had been awarded his accolade, in which he provided whole-hearted dares to find a floorshow that could compare: that show that had been the undoing of his friend Toddery Johnson. He never rued anything, but there was something terrible that happened upon him after the writing of this review, his editor had told him that never had such a show come to town, that the theater in which he dared suggest it had been played had been the breeding place of rats, nothing more, and abandonment of this town's entertaining past. He'd insisted he'd been there, he emphasized the triumph of what he'd seen, and listening to the terror the critic described with such elation the editor was made distinctly aware that Bradford Dupuis, the unwavering, detestable art critic was in fact mad, that all the careers he'd ruined were perhaps ruined in vain, and was moved to fire the man on the spot.
Suddenly there was a knocking upon the door. So late in this snow-driven night he shivered and wondered who it could be. It seemed in another life he had been promised a visit from his loving friends Maxim and Violet Sky, but that had been days ago now, he'd allowed himself to believe they'd moved on and weren't ever to visit him again. The knocking persisted. There was a sense of loneliness all over him, he was a statue of his former self then, frozen by the time he'd been alone in his cave, and as if this disturbance were a hand on the drapery that he was under he hesitated to believe that it could be true, that he could be saved. The knocking resounded, the ripples of it moved through the halls of the house and found him and the drapery was removed and he moved himself then to the door to answer, in a great swinging effect, expecting to find friends he only found strangers.
"Help me please," an older man said, a man that was wiry and cold and wrapped up in a stinking coat. At his side was a boy, trembling and clinging to the man's leg. "We're hungry and this blizzard has shut off the power in our home and I saw the lights were on here, you must have heat, maybe just a little something to eat."
"I don't allow strangers in my house," Bradford recited, sticking to the script he'd used a million times.
"Please, we're so cold sir, desperate. I'll give you anything once this storm has cleared."
"I don't like strangers in my house," Bradford clarified.
Suddenly the boy, whose very flesh was turning blue from the cold, looked up at him with such sweet, innocent eyes, and from his pathetic hood moaned something about being hungry, cold, wet, tired.
The boy seemed to be the key of course, and Bradford removed the barrier to his house and they entered through this portal to find it so warm, smelling good, like a home. As they stomped snow from their boots the father said, "We'll not bother you long, just till the storm stops and then we'll move on, I promise, then help will come and the power will come on and we can go home again, we'll have food to eat then." The boy looked strangely at Bradford, the boy almost smiled and Bradford melted helplessly then. The boy thanked him, removed his coat and revealed a frame that inspired thoughts of a most sinister kind.
"Your kindness will be repaid, I assure you," said the father.
"I'm sure it will, I assure you."
Suddenly Bradford became a gracious host, a disguise that he didn't wear well and it was strange for him. His movements became awkward as he attempted grace, but loneliness will do that to a person.
"Please, please, get out of those clothes. Strip right out of them, I don't want them anywhere near the furniture."
"Um, sir, please, I assure you we can be left alone in a room to change, if you have something for us to put on."
"No!" He yelled it, belched it, barked it. Then more calmly he said, "No, no, here, we'll go in here, to my drawing room and I will draw the curtains and I will give you blankets to wrap in, but I don't want you alone here. Who knows what lurks in this lonesome place."
"Daddy?"
"It's alright, it's alright, he's most kind to allow us in son."
They went into the drawing room then and found it to be almost stifling hot. A fire was burning in the hearth and a portrait hung over it, its oil paints seeming to ooze, the couple portrayed in it melting in the heat of the room. The two guests came into the room then and then when they arrived in the center of the room the command was again iterated.
But the beauty of these men became obvious once they started to disrobe and Bradford broke his first promise but being unable to look away. The father, in the first place, was not at all as weak-seeming as he'd been at the door, he had broad shoulders that were of an olive complexion, and he had muscles from what must have been a lifetime of laboring with heavy objects. His son, removing his clothes, was scrawny and effeminate, pale and barely dressed at all. As the clothes were removed they stood with their bodies exposed to the flame. The father had an enormous cock, it dangled between his legs in a flacid state. The father covered himself bashfully. He tried to not let himself blush but it seemed he was glowing from being watched by another man. The boy, noticing this awkwardness in his father stood close by and covered his own wee penis with a single fist. The boy was no older the eleven, Bradford decided, and the father, though burly, must have sired this lad at a young age.
"The mother," Bradford probed.
"She is rather preoccupied this evening."
A whore, Bradford decided.
Bradford was aflutter with this. He dared to push the bounds of his hospitality by nearing the father and pressing his breath on the father's neck as he sniffed for some remains of his intentions. The father stood there and stuck out his chest with some unconquerable pride that promised to protect his son. When they were close enough that the heat from Bradford's body was arousing the nipples of the father, the father said quietly, "Don't you dare touch my son."
"I wouldn't be so terrible sir, are you threatening me in my own house?"
"No. No." He apologized then, he went on to say that there are some vicious people in this world and that they are humbly honored they would break his rules to let them find safety in what seemed to be quite a luxury.
"Fine then," Bradford said. He leaned down and tugged on the chin of the lad and said, "Are you hungry? Shall we find you something to, um, put in your mouth?" His eyes devoured those of the boy and the boy seemed uncertain, he moved like a puppy might at the first sense of an earthquake. Bradford's hand fell along the arm of the boy and tickled him, and then poked between his apparently starved side, between his ribs, "Come, we'll find something for you to wear first."
They marched then, Bradford leading the way and the two clasped together behind. They marched up the stairs to the floor with the bedrooms and with a flick of a switch came on the lights. Bradford led them to a room that smelled of old clothing and he told them this was where his father's clothes were, where he kept the clothes he'd worn as a boy, that surely there would be something that fit them in there. He opened case after case of glamorous antiquities, fashions from several decades, styles from several ages. The child could be heard giggling as he pulled out a feather boa, and Bradford said, "Ostrich feathers, a rarity these days." The father told his son to find something quick, that he'd catch his death of cold. Without blinking an eye Bradford watched as the two of them rifled through the cases and bent to find things they'd like to wear. The father's tan legs poked through the legs of a pair of trousers, then his shoulders flared and he bloomed into a shirt, and finding a jacket then he put that on too. His son found something quite similar, like a schoolboy's uniform and looked quite smart in it. "I promise I will get rid of those awful rags you wore in here, I promise to let you keep these things. They make you look like twice the men that came in my house."
"Thank you, sir you're too kind."
But as they left the room the father led the way, then the son and as Bradford followed he let his hand lower upon the crown of the boy and ruffled hair, tickled the back of his neck. The father noticed and gave Bradford an angered glare but Bradford rejected this hostility with a kind smile. Kind? Smile? The grin of a gargoyle, more aptly.
Then to the kitchen where there was not much to eat. "I'm short in the area of cakes or deserts, but there is meat here, some fruit. My cooks, they have abandoned me."
"With this storm, what with Christmas, I'm sure you've let them be with their families."
He grumbled, "Of course, yes. Christmas."
"I'm afraid I don't know how to cook very well. You're free to fire up the stove though, I permit you to use this room as one should."
The father then went about the preparation of the meal, he prepared enough for Bradford too. It was becoming a fairly festive occasion; if one took a chance to look in one of the windows one might think all these people knew each other well, that this generosity being shared, doled out, was a generosity among kindred spirits. In the next room Bradford was amazed at the sing-song lightness of the boy as he danced around the room. Bradford found cutlery in a cupboard and service for three, and laid out it awkwardly, all the while eyeing the child as he danced around the room. He found some glasses and some wine and teased the boy with promises of some wine.
The boy was telling him things about him and his father, about how hard they'd looked for help, about how hungry they'd become. Bradford turned to put these crystal goblets on the table when suddenly the boy danced his way around the table and they collided. A strange thing happened then, for though the boy had bumped into Bradford and though the boy had jostled him while he held crystal goblets, all had seemed fine till Bradford had a wicked epiphany of sorts and dropped one of the goblets and it smashed all over the floor ... smashed into a million peices. The boy was instantly apologetic. Begging forgiveness the two of them lowered at once to retrieve the larger of the shards, the stem, the pedestal. When they grabbed at the pieces the boy pricked his fingers and a single droplet of blood slipped from his flesh. The boy whinced and Bradford, satisfied with this in a way, took into his icy talon this fleshy finger, brought into his mouth and put the whole length of it in his mouth and sucked it, blood and all, the length of it, while locking the eyes of the boy on his own. Hidden by the table and the legs of the chair Bradford felt safe then reaching out and cupping into his hand the head of the boy and mesmerized the boy allowed him to be brought closer and then kissed, and the boy's lips parted to the entrance of the blood-dappled tongue of Bradford. They pulled apart then and Bradford thought for a moment of that boy he'd seen raped, pissed on, shit on, rendered unconcious. Could it be? No.
There was a clanging of silverware then, and the father came in the room. They both stood, both looked guilty. The boy admitted, "I broke a glass Daddy, I'm so sorry."
"Oh mister, I'll repay you the cost. I hope it wasn't too valuable."
"A toy, nothing really. It wasn't worth anything that you need worry about." He look down at the floor, with his leather shoe he swept the glass under the cupboard. "Don't even worry about the mess, I'll have someone clean it up when they come in. Ahh! The feast you've made. Look at this."
After eating the meal they'd made the father and son felt bloated and pushed back their chairs. The father sat next to his son and he brought the boy closer and pet his head as the young child started to quickly fall into sleep.
While the child began to mumble about wanting to go to bed the father conducted him to lay with his head upon his lap for just a moment. "I hope you wouldn't mind if perhaps we stayed the night."
Surpassing his own expectations of himself, Bradford almost yelled, "I'd not be able to say I've lived if you didn't spend the night tonight."
Laughing at the extent of his compliment the father admitted something to his host, "You know at first I thought I recognized you, thought I knew who you were, but I'm beginning to think that I was wrong. You seem like a very nice man."
"Oh, sir, looks can be deceiving."
"I'm sure. But I -"
They locked eyes momentarily and Bradford instantly squirmed. There was a distant thundering sound outside one of the windows that distracted the both of them, a demonic sound that chilled Bradford to the bone, like that of hooves on a hollow stage floor.
As if to assure his guest, or himself, "I'm sure it's just the snow plow, they'll be working all night with this weather. Yes. The plow." He coughed uneasily. "Now, no more of this, let's find your son a bed."
In one of the rooms at the far end of the second floor, there was room that he sometimes let people sleep in. It was comedically called Maxim's room, for reasons that are not of any value to this story. Maxim's room was warm and inviting and there was much decoration that would seem inviting. There were books on the shelves, curtains on the windows, a painting on the wall by an uncle of Bradford's who'd disappeared in the Amazonian Orchid Hunting Expedition several years before Bradford's birth. The father brought the boy into the room and he lay the boy down upon the bed and he kissed the boy's head and Bradford was almost moved to tears to think of all the treasures and wealth he'd inherited from lives that were lost to this planet, but how poor he seemed in comparison to this pair.
Then leaving the door open just a bit he led his father back down the shadow-hewn hall, down the stairs, through the foyer to that room at the front of the house, the drawing room. The fire was dying there, but Bradford threw another log on it, stoked the coals, and a crackling of the wood invited them to sit for a moment. Bradford offered wine, brandy, rye. The father insisted there wasn't anything he could want. Bradford insisted that he couldn't sit without drinking something. Some conversation. Some cigarettes. Exotic ones his friend Violet Sky had purchased for him while honeymooning with Maxim in Egypt. They sat in the drawing room for hours then, till very late in the night, till nearly morning, and the more they sat the more they drank. Finally the father relented, "I don't know how to repay you for this."
"Oh, sir."
"Call me Tom."
"Tom. I think you know what I could want as repayment."
His vision was blurry with the dim light, with the drink, he shook his head, the father was disturbed by this.
"I want you to aide me in my loneliness."
"I don't know what you mean."
With that Bradford stood and moved over to the chair where the father sat, one of those claw-footed, over-stuffed leather chairs by the fire. Rubbing at the side of the man's head he brought his ruddy, bearded face in at his crotch: he resisted.
"Please sir, I'm not that sort of man."
"Ah, that's all the better."
"Hey, I mean, you must be a smart man, I could pummell you ... I could beat you senseless."
"I could call the cops sir, I could say I came home to find you'd invaded my home, put on my clothes, helped yourself to my kitchen, my wine."
He thought about this.
"I know you're tired of running, that when you came to my door you were desperate, I can see how strong you are, you are an attractive man, very attractive."
The man stood abruptly, too quickly. He nearly fell over. Bradford balanced him and caught him with a passionate kiss. The two fell to the floor then. They started to grope at each other and their hands made their way into their jackets, up under their shirts. Bradford was amazed at the ferocity of this man's loving. It seemed his lips knew what pleasure they could conjure. There was a fighting with belts. There was a tugging at pants and a great triumph was discovered in their nudity. Bradford suckled the tremendous cock and he purred upon the shaft while the man coddled Bradford's head upon it, pumped his cock into the man's throat. With eagerness and knowing that the father must be so tired of carrying around a child, he moaned and sadly pouted that he would love to take care of the father, that nothing would bother him anymore. The father's eyes were lost in drunkenness. There was a delirium in this room by the light of the fire. They were aroused and with each heave of the body the crackle of the fire seemed to threaten to burn down the house, the world, the blizzard be damned, didn't matter anymore. A feverish sweat broke across the brow of the father and Bradford gasped as he let the long cock of the man enter into his ass smoothly, like the tongue of a demon enters into a balmy night's steam striking out at the sensuality there.
Their bodies were hot by the fire and the light of the flames danced in Bradford's eyes, licking at the soul there that still heard the noises made in that long-ago night when Toddery had been forced to take the horse. Toddery's body had been pale in that spotlight and this brought passion to the loins that gripped at the father's sides, Bradford's ass squeezed the father's cock, and moved the man to cry out and let loose into Bradford the seed of his payment for this hospitality.
Subdued, like a rabid beast sated, the father moaned and seemed too quickly to succumb to a deep sleep and Bradford, rising from the exhausted body, smirked evilly and went to the settee by the window for a blanket there. He tossed it down on the man there and told him that this was not the payment he had in mind. "No, but you will give me this payment now."
The boy was so small compared to the frightful size of the bed, the room itself croaked and groaned, and a lost uncle's spirit sat helpless in the corner, bearing witness to an event that he himself had visited upon a nephew in a time long gone. A shadow crept in the room and the boy stirred from his pleasantness and called out quietly, "Daddy, is that you?"
"Yes son, it's your father."
The jacket fit him just so, the shape of him seemed right. The son allowed the man onto his bed. The son allowed rolled over to face him and the man leaned over and kissed his young mouth again. Instantly the boy knew but was afraid to cry out. "Daddy, is it really you, it's so dark I can't see."
"Hush now, be quiet."
And Bradford began his molestation without waiting for any permission the boy may have offered. He put his hot hand into the boy's trouser's and felt the wee boy-cock and squeezed it without expressing any emotion of mercy. The boy was then pressed under his full weight as the man crawled on top of him and ground his hips into the boy. The boy squirmed, uncomfortable with all this weight. "Daddy, do want to make love to me?"
"Yes, son, I do."
The boy smiled. "I love it when we do this Daddy."
Amazed by this Bradford was ravenous with lust. He stripped the clothes from the boy, tore the shirt from his shoulder, and grappled to keep the boy still while he smudged the young flesh with the rough jaw of his maturing grimace. Scraping the boy with the sharp beard of his chin. He buried his nose in the boy's armpits and smelled there a smell of adolescence. He sucked on the boy's cock and tasted the virginal issuing of a triumphant first. He removed from his own trousers the lenth of his sheathed cock and turning the boy over onto his belly in a singular movement he swiftly presented his cock to the boy's puckering, pink, rosebud ass. Spitting on himself, on the boy's whole, he told him, "Son this will hurt only a bit."
Then the boy grunted as Bradford took his toll. The boy cried out but Bradford covered his mouth and then hesitated believing he'd heard a noise. Then recovering his prowess he resumed his assault and fuck without relent for what seemed an eternity to the helpless boy. "Oh you're so hot, child, I've loved you for so long." The boy said, "No, you're not my father."
"I can be your father. Your father is gone and has left you with me, as payment for my kindness, you'll be mine now. Tell me you love me."
"No, no, he would never leave me."
As he fucked the boy he forced upon him this lie.
"He didn't want you, you were a burden to him, but with me you'll be rich and will be free."
"Stop stop, you're scaring, you're hurting me."
"Never, I want you to stay here forever boy, and you'll grow and known all the wonders I know. You'll never want for anything else, as I never want for anything. Just tell me you love me. I love you."
He flipped the boy over then and fucked him sternly, angrily, looking him in the eye. He spit in the boy's face, "Tell me child, tell me you love me."
Then leaning up to the man's ear, and wetting his lips for the telling of it the boy said something terribly true into his ear, unheard by anyone, no matter how closely they listened, unheard by anyone but himself ... and for himself these were the accomplishment of a masterpiece ...
And finally he felt his climax coming. He felt it stirring in his heart, a great thunderous clamor, a snow plow going by, a horse entering from stage-right, and Toddery in his asylum cried out madly and without relent, this was the day, the moment ... the triumph of the curse.
For as Bradford issued into the boy the seed of his payment, there was great whack upon the back of his head and a terror of pain riddling every inch of his being: and death seized the essence of life in his body. The lost uncle sighed, no longer alone in the jungle of this mansion. And the father regained his son, saved him, consoled him, applauded his performace again, that boy sure could take it. The father, clearing his vampiric throat, announced that now the third act was done, "The Show is truly over."
When finally the day came that the snow was mostly melted, and the neighborhood bathed in a glorious, prosperous sun, two visitors walked up the path to the house and knocked loudly, as one is often required to do. Maxim Pushkin and his wife, the impregnated Violet Sky, waited to be let in. No one came to the door. The pushed their way in and found the place utterly abandoned. Not a room had been touched in weeks, months, ages, a lifetime it seemed. The pictures stared out from cobwebbed walls, the ashes remained uncleaned in their cold hearths, the books unopened, unread, uncherished. Maxim, knowing the house as well as the master of it, moved about the rooms calling out the name of his estranged friend. But nothing came back, not even an echo could be stirred here. Finally, in the bedroom, that for reasons beyond this story was comically called his room, there was the disturbed bed, nothing else but a single, quaint seedy stain: ... nothing remained of the awful Bradford, but Violet Sky, always a little crazy, a little mad, she said to the lonely room where the ghosts of lost souls lingered unheard crying, "Now, that's entertainment!"