Clive Barker - Everville

Lucien had not taken her hint about sensitivity, thank God; he knew the moment he saw her face that she wasn't as blithe as she'd been. He gently inquired as to why, and she told him. He reassured her as best he could with words, but she quickly made their inadequacy plain, and he turned instead to touches, and kisses, and before long they were getting naked and he was warning her that he was no great lover and that she shouldn't expect too much.

She found his modesty disarming, and, as it turned out, unnecessary. He was no great experimenter, to be sure, but what he lacked in range he made up for in depth, which wasn't to be despised. they coupled with the kind of fervor she'd not experienced since her college days, all of twenty years before the bed squeaking under them, the headboard deepening a' groove in the wall made by those who'd loved here before.

Raul kept his silence for the first bout. She heard not a peep from him. But when, after she and Lucien had eaten a couple of slices of cold pizza, the nuzzling began again, he piped up.

He's not going to do it again.

"He can do it all night," she thought, "if he's up for it." She put her hands down between their legs, and guided him inside her. "And it looks like he is."

Christ! Raul sobbed. How can you bear this? Make him pull it out!

"Shut up," she said, staring down at her and Lucien's locked groins. At least close your eyes, Raul said.

She was far too intrigued to do that. "Look at that," she thought, raising her hips to welcome his length. "Him meeting me meeting him-"

Damn you "Like crossroads." You're raving, woman.

She looked up into Lucien's face. He had his eyes half closed and his brows knitted.

"Are you... all right?" he gasped.

"Never better," she said.

The ape continued to sob in her head, the words expelled upon Lucien's thrusts. It's like-he's stabbing-us. I can't-take any-more!

As he spoke she felt his will impinging on hers, crossing the divide they'd established at the beginning of their cotenanting. It hurt, and she let out a moan, which Lucien took for a sigh of appreciation. His embrace became tighter, his jabs more frenzied.

"Oh yes," he started to chant, "yes! yes! yes!"

No! Raul hollered, and before Tesia could demand her body back he took control of it.

Her arms, which had been languishing on the pillow, suddenly flew at Lucien, her nails raking his naked back. From out of her throat came a bestial din she'd never known she was capable of making, and as he recoiled in mute shock her legs rose behind him, hooking beneath his armpits and pulling him back. All this in such a blur of noise and motion Tesla wasn't even certain what had happened until it was over, and Lucien was sprawled on the floor beside the bed. "What the hell was that all about?" he said, finding his voice now.

Satisfied with its efforts, the monkey's hold relaxed enough for her to say, "It... it wasn't me."

"What do you mean, it wasn't you?" Lucien said.

"I swear@' she said, getting up from the bed. But he wasn't going to allow her near him again. He was up on his feet in a flash, retreating to the chair where he'd thrown his clothes.

"Wait," she said, not making any further attempt to approach him. "I can explain this."

Watching her warily he said, "I'm listening."

"I'm not alone in here," she told him, knowing as she spoke there was no easy way to say what she was about to say. "There's somebody else in my skull." Still, she thought, he should be able to understand the principle. Hadn't he been talking about being a vessel for the infinite that very morning? "His name's Raul."

He looked at her as though she were speaking in an alien language. "What are you talking about?" he said, plainly incredulous.

"I'm talking about the spirit of a man called Raul being here in my head with me. He's been here for five years. And he doesn't want us to do what we've been doing."

"Why not?"

"Well... why don't I let him speak for himself?"

What? she heard Raul say.

"Go on," she said aloud, "you've done the damage. Now explain it."

I can't. "You owe it to me, damn you!"

Lucien listened to the side of the argument he could hear with disbelief all over his face. She waited, leaving her tongue slack in her mouth.

"You snarled," she reminded Raul, "now you can damn well talk."

Before she'd finished the thought she felt her tongue start to flap and sounds emerged, crude at first, but quickly turning into syllables. Lucien watched and listened to this bizarre performance without moving a muscle. She suspected he thought he was in the presence of a lunatic, but she had no way of reassuring him until this was over.

"What she's just told you... " Raul began, Tesla's voice now in his possession, "is true. I'm the spirit of a man who... gave up my body to a great evil called Kissoon." She'd not expected him to offer Lucien a guide to body- hopping, but it ameliorated her fury somewhat to hear him do so. This was difficult territory for him to discuss, she knew. Kissoon and his persuasions were a bitter memory for them both, but how much more so for him, who had lost his very flesh to the shaman's tricks?

"She... did me a great... kindness," he went on hesitantly. "One which I will... always be thankful for." He licked her lips, back and forth a couple of times. His nervousness had made her mouth arid. "But ... this thing you do to me with men... " He shook her head, "It sickens me."

As Raul spoke, Lucien instinctively dropped his hand between his legs, covering his sex.

"I'm sure you mean to give her pleasure," Raul cautioned. "But her pleasure is my pain. Do you understand?"

Lucien said nothing.

"I want you to understand," he pressed. "I don't want you to think this is any failing on your part. It isn't. Truly it isn't."

At this juncture Lucien plucked his briefs off the floor and began to pull them on.

"I've said all I can say," Raul concluded. "I'll leave you two to-" Tesla leapt on his words before they were finished. "Lucien," she said.

"What are you doing?"

"Which of you is it now?" "It's me. Tesla." She got up from the bed, pulling the sheet around her as she did so, and squatted on the ground in front of him. He continued to dress as she spoke. "I know this is probably the strangest thing you've heard@' "You're right."

"What about Kate and Friederika?"

"I wasn't fucking with Kate. Or Friederika," he said, his voice tremulous. "Why didn't you tell me?" "I didn't think you needed to know."

"I'm making it with a guy-and you don't think I need to know?"

"Wait. Is that what this is about?" She got up from the floor, and stared down at him imperiously. "Where's your sense of adventure?"

"I guess I'm all out of it," he said, hauling on her patchwork jeans.

"You're leaving?"

"I'm leaving."

"And where will you go?"

"I don't know. I'll get a ride somewhere." "Look, at least stay the night. We don't have to do anything." She heard the desperation in her voice, and despised herself for it. What was this? One and a half fucks and suddenly she couldn't face sleeping alone? "Strike that remark," she said. "If you want to go find a ride, go find a ride. You're acting like an adolescent, but that's your problem."

With that she retired to the bathroom and showered, singing loudly enough to herself so that he knew she didn't care if he left or not.

Ten minutes later, when she emerged, he'd gone. She sat down on the edge of the bed, her skin still wet from the shower, and called Raul out from hiding.

"So... I guess it's just you and me." You're taking this better than I thought.

"If we survive the next few days," she said, "we're going to have to part. You realize that?"

I realize that.

There was a silence between them, while she wondered what it would be like living alone.