Deathbed Ch. 4

Part Fifteen

By all rights, the sun should have come up. I was sure that I had lain for hours in this bed with Deadman beside me, making love at wakeful intervals, sleeping now and then with his heavy body half atop mine as it was now.

A long time had passed since I had realized what was happening, and in that time, I believed, I had embraced my doom. I had been right about the implications of sex with this man--I had passed to another state of being, utterly transformed from what I had been, and in attaching my fate to his I had crossed a barrier that kept the world of the living separate from that of the dead. Never again, though he was undead and half demon, would I have the power to part from him.

My heart, unerringly guarded and cold, had opened to him as it never had to any man, and either I was a different person, or I had discovered who I truly was. I had entered into this state of my own free will, but in another sense I had been compelled, because it seemed that everything that had ever happened in my life had pointed me to this night, this bed, this feeling that burned within me and seemed to sear clean all the guilt and foulness of my soul. Free will and destiny intertwined nearly indistinguishably like the bodies of lovers; the night had passed in the ecstasy of existence made meaningful for the first time.

But the room was still dark. I still saw the glow of the lamp on the window that showed the blackness outside. I turned my head, my chin brushing the rider's left forearm which lay across my neck, and looked right into the tattooed eyes of a skull cradled in a wizard's hand. Just above the rider's elbow, a spectral death's-head figure crouched, its long dark hair trailing as it looked over a precipice.

I turned my head farther to the left. My cheek came up against Deadman's ear and sideburn, for his face was pressed into the pillow above my shoulder, possibly in an effort to muffle his deep, resonant snoring. His left leg lay relaxed over both of my thighs, pinning me down with its weight alone, and his loose hair was tangled with mine. Warm in my nostrils, his scent enfolded me, and I closed my eyes for a moment and kissed his arm on the bony lips of the eyed skull.

The rider muttered something in his sleep and turned his face out of the pillow towards me. When his eyes opened inches from mine, he regarded me solemnly for a minute. Strange, acid green; no trick of the light, but a constant reminder of his unhuman nature. The musky, dreaming fancies of sleep began to dissolve, but one thought remained; what was I, that I lay entwined in sensual langour with the dark angel of death?

"Evenin'," he said.

"Uh…hello." Evening? My eyebrows went up.

"You've been asleep for quite a while, girl. All day, matter of fact."

"Oh. That's why it's dark." Something sprang awake in my mind, and I tried to sit up. "The police! I've been lying here all day? They'll have--"

Deadman pulled me down again. "Ain't seen no cops today. And if I did, you wouldn't see 'em for long." I looked at him, and he smiled sideways with a click of his tongue. "Don't you worry none about them, darlin'." He leaned forward and kissed me briefly, then rolled over and sat up, swinging his feet to the floor.

"My Papa never got here?"

"Nope. Probably driving in circles and turnin' his road map inside out. Not like the locals are gonna show him the way to *this* hacienda." He chuckled.

"Um…Deadman?"

"Yeah?" he replied, pulling on a pair of jeans.

"What's your name? Your real name?"

"What?"

"Will you tell me your name?"

He looked at me in some amusement, standing and zipping his fly. "What for…*Irene*?"

"Well…I mean, we've been doing, um, rather intimate things--"

"Don't like fucking a guy when you don't know his name? You ain't generally so particular, darlin'. Least not from what I've been hearin'."

With that shot he opened the bathroom door and went in, leaving me bewildered. I thought I knew how he felt about me; he had expressed it over and over with every touch on my skin, every look in his strange eyes. Did he doubt how I felt about him, or how I could feel about any man? I had to admit he had reason to do so--I began to doubt it myself.

So unfamiliar a feeling, so novel and terrible. I confided and did strange things during sex--might that incredible emotion have been only a queer impostor? It still lingered as a burn in my breast, but perhaps I had imagined it into being.

I had never outright told a man I wanted him or that I loved him. I teased, I glanced, I provoked, and I let myself be taken, but never gave anything back. I liked to pretend I was being forced, because then I expressed nothing of my own desires. I only took a man's desire, played with it, and threw it back in his face.

Could I really have changed so much in one night? Had I really given Deadman my heart and soul? Did I have a heart and soul to give? In this small, shabby bedroom, the events of the night seemed like a dream. I was no authority on emotional attachment, having used physical connection as a substitute for it my entire life. Perhaps Deadman's face and touch had expressed nothing more than his carnal desires.

I sat up and looked for my clothes. They weren't on the floor, but they had been washed and lay folded on a chair at the side of the bed. Knowing that Stephanie had unwillingly done the work, I felt a pang while dressing.

She hadn't asked for her fate. She'd been an ordinary farm girl once, and her brand-new husband had gone into a ditch and taken her and her whole family with him. What had she thought in the last moments of her life? Had she panicked or prayed? Had she felt pain? And what had she thought when her ruined body had been reconstituted and she and all the people she loved most had stood lost and wondering at the side of the road, waiting for the reason for their continued existence to arrive?

When had it sunk in that this was all there was?

Never to have a child while she longed for one, embracing her husband night after sterile night; all the potential life in a young woman's body cut off at the source. No wonder she had soured like curdled milk. It wasn't right that they should linger here neither alive nor truly dead, taking out their pain on each other, but what could be done about it? How could they fight the forces of Hell, and did they even want to?

Hearing a splash of water in the bathroom I rose and walked to the open door. Deadman was shaving his throat and cheeks with an old-fashioned straight razor, the strop hanging down next to the sink. He raised his brows at me for a moment when he saw me in the mirror and wiped soap from the blade. "Yeah?" he said, drawing the blade along his skin.

"You have to shave?"

"Yep. And eat, and take a crap. Might as well be alive, hey?" He grinned at me.

"Why were you made that way when you were raised from the dead? Um…Aitch told me how it happened. The race."

"Aitch," he said, expression darkening, "has got a big damn mouth. And a wandering eye, you may have noticed."

"Yes."

"And he's such a sweet-talkin', good-lookin' son of a bitch." He wiped his gleaming blade again and gave it a few strokes on the strop. "He was a hired hand on this place after he got out've the Marines, just no-account scum on a dollar a day, and he got the boss's daughter tumbled out behind the barn, and took her off and married her quick before she could think it over. In a week even Daddy was singin' his praises."

He inspected the edge of the blade. "He's got himself a lot more practice with that kinda thing under his belt in fifty years, I'll tell ya, an' you shoved him off you like he was a dead skunk. Didn't quite see it that way at the time, but I guess that's what you did."

I smiled a little into the mirror over his shoulder; he was almost apologizing for saying that I wasn't particular. And asking a question at the same time. "I could see what he wanted the moment he came into the barn. He took me by surprise, though, because he'd been…helpful. Up until that moment. Will you tell me why you're so human? Why do you feel pain and have emotions? When you're the Undertaker? The Hellrider?"

His face disappeared under a towel as he wiped off all the soap. "Why?"

"Because I want to know."

Deadman swirled his shaving brush in the mug and applied a new coat of soap around his goatee; apparently his beard was dense or he was taking special care with the task. "You want to know what makes me tick, hey? Last night I was a 'disgustin' hoodlum' or some such, and you even put a couple bullets through me."

"But--"

"And then you fucked me like nothin' I've ever had, darlin'." He looked as if he was trying to cover his expression with the soap. "Nothin' I ever dreamed about. And it got me wonderin' why, at least in the cold light of day. I went and sat by the crick a spell while you were sleepin', and I thought it over, and I couldn't see any reason why that would be so. Why a lady like you would just turn to fire under my hands."

The blade scraped down his throat. "I saw that house of yours when I went to look for your husband. I went through all the rooms searching for him, and I saw that fancy carpet, and the windows, and the furniture, and all the clothes and geegaws you had in the bedroom."

He flung soap and bristles off the end of the razor. "I've seen every kind of place where people live, naturally. I've seen palaces. But this was the place you lived, so I kind of paid attention. That was a fine house, and it cost plenty of money. I gather he got his money dishonest, and he sure was a waste of valuable space and drinkin' water. But you married the man for his money anyhow."

"I was sorry for it."

"You cheated on the guy." He tested the smoothness of his jawline with a finger drawn through the soap. "You said the vows, and you broke 'em. Killed him dead to top it off. And then you came to these parts and looked at me the way you did, like, 'c'mon there, you big dumbass, get yer hands on me right smart or you'll be regrettin' it the rest of your days', which in my case is a hell of a long time. I guess I don't regret it, because I'll remember last night for that same hell of a long time. But, dammit, woman--"

He finished shaving and scrubbed off all the remnants of soap. "When that Papa of yours comes to get you, or when I let you persuade me to take you into town to call him, I'm gonna regret that I ever had a feeling bone in my body. Why I had to find a woman like you, of all people, at this time of all times…"

He broke off and resumed in a harder voice, splashing his face from the sink with both hands and with his head lowered so that I could not see his expression in the mirror. "Reckon Aitch blabbed about how I'm bound to find a faithful woman if I'm ever to be free. I've longed for that, because I want to be released. I want to lie down and never open my eyes again. She would have brought me rest, I guess. But I don't suppose she'd ever have brought me a night like that, Irene." He dried his face and turned to look at me; the burn in my breast had become a full conflagration, and I had no way to hide the glow from him.

Deadman slowly shook his head. "You're a coy, fickle bitch. You ain't quite sure what you want, or you'd rather you were made to take what you want without ever having to say you want it. You've killed and you've lied and you're the opposite of true. But I wouldn't have passed up that one night for all the faithfulness in the world. I guess I'm a goddamn fool, but that's the gospel truth." Tossing down the towel, he brushed past me into the bedroom and rummaged in his motorcycle saddlebags, which were lying on the floor near the bed.

"Deadman," I said through blurring eyes. "I won't forget it either. I know I'm not the kind of woman you were looking for. I wasn't looking for you either. But for some reason we did find each other, and I…I think I was meant to be here."

"Don't be crazy," he said, pulling a black T-shirt over his head. "Yer pop will get here or we'll go find him. I'll give you a lift into town after dinner. You'll go on home tonight one way or another."

"Don't…don't you want me to stay?"

"What the hell for? This joint? You don't like it any here, girl, and don't go telling me different."

"Not the place, no. Of course not," I said with a slightly teary laugh. "The food's bad and the people aren't friendly. Or too friendly. But that's got nothing to do with *you*. It's *you* I was meant to be with. Don't you understand…what I mean?"

The rider pulled his hair out of the neckline of the shirt and looked skeptically at me; obviously the thought had never yet crossed his mind and was having a tough time making it from one side of his brain to another. "You sound like you need a little food in ya, girl. Come on downstairs." He put an arm around my waist and urged me along.

I sighed through a smile. Of course this sounded strange to him--it sounded strange to me. I could not come right out and say the words--*'I want you…I need you…I'm yours and somehow I always have been…'* And so all I could do was show him in any way I could. "All right."

Going downstairs with him, I noticed that the bloodstains from the previous night had been scrubbed away, though not entirely. The bullet holes were still there, ragged and dark around the edges. The rider noticed my furtive examination of the wall and laughed. "I ain't holdin' a grudge, darlin'. How about you?"

"Me?"

"Yeah, you." He stopped and let go of me at the base of the stairs. "As I recall, you told me to knock it off, and I didn't do that. That's why you used the gun, right?"

"Well…I was afraid the police would catch up with me if I stayed much longer. Obviously I shouldn't have worried--"

"That wasn't the only reason you shot me, darlin'. You figure I done you wrong?" I hesitated in answering and he bent down to look in my face, putting a hand on the wall. "Tell me, Irene. I thought you wanted it and I was right, but I guess that ain't the same as sayin' yes. Did I do you wrong?"

"You…said you know I wanted you." I looked up at him; his expression was stern and serious. I wondered why this meant anything to him--it hadn't the night before.

"Sure I do, but like I say, that ain't the whole story. If a judge was to ask you in a court of law, official like, what would you say? I was kinda forward and I didn't quit when you said to stop. Or suppose you were tellin' someone--one of yer girlfriends, say? Would you tell her I treated you bad?"

I couldn't imagine discussing him with any woman I knew. "I'd never accuse you of a *crime* for taking me last night."

"All right, I'll take that as a no." He nodded gravely, apparently satisfied, then smiled with his mouth closed and leaned forward to kiss me; again a brief, dry contact, but I put my hands around his neck and opened my lips against his.

Deadman took a deep breath through his nose and let me stroke his tongue with mine. His arms went around me and our bodies began to fit together as we stood at the foot of the stairs. I combed my fingers into his long hair, cupping his face in my palms and humming softly into his mouth. The rider's hands slid down my back and curled around my buttocks, lifting me to tiptoes and massaging in slow circles.

His lips were warm and wet, his mustache tickled under my nose, and he let out a soft groan, hips rotating into mine. Through his jeans I could feel his penis hardening against my stomach and pressing a groove into my flesh. I put an arm around his waist--it didn't reach all the way around--and placed the heel of the other hand against his groin. Under his clothing, the firm ridge of his erection shifted into my palm.

I began to curve my fingers around it and Deadman stood back with a gasp, removing my hand and adjusting himself through his jeans. "Whoa there, girl. If you want anything to eat before morning, you better slow down."

Part Sixteen

I laughed in my throat and brushed my hair back over my shoulder. Deadman rolled his eyes and blew out his cheeks, then followed me into the kitchen. No one was there, but he didn't seem inclined to call anyone to do the work.

"Caught me some fish while I was sittin' by the crick, Irene," he said. "They're outside the door." I opened the door and looked; four fair-size trout were swimming slowly in circles, nosing the sides of a five-gallon bucket. The place was quiet and I noticed that the Firebird wasn't in the driveway.

Finding a chopping block, I put it in the galvanized sink and fetched a large knife. Deadman watched as I hooked a trout with a finger through the gills and held it on the board while it flopped and struggled.

WHACK! I stunned it with the handle of the knife and quickly slit its belly. Its body still quivered slightly as I gutted it and rinsed the blood from the cavity, but I knew it hadn't felt pain. I put it on a plate and reached for the next one.

"You do that pretty good," remarked Deadman.

"I grew up in the country," I said. "I don't like fish, but I know how to clean them." WHACK! The next fish gave up its life.

"Sorry, but I thought they might be better than canned meat."

"I hear that Spam's popular in the South Seas."

"Yeah?" Deadman opened a cupboard and got out a bag of cornmeal. "Why?"

"Well, the islanders liked to eat each other before the missionaries got there. Cannibals. And apparently when the Marines came through during the war and hired the natives to help build airstrips and so on, they paid them in food and Spam was the most popular item. It reminded them of human flesh--pork is the closest thing to it--so they still eat it for old time's sake." WHACK! "Or so I hear."

Obviously something had truly changed between us; the conversation wasn't precisely casual but compared with that of the night before it was amazingly easy. He seemed to accept that I looked on him very differently now, though perhaps he didn't trust it very far. I wasn't sure if I did either.

"No shit," said Deadman, laughing. "I always kind of liked Spam, even in the Army." He put a pan on the stove and turned on a burner, striking a match to light the gas. The flame sputtered and burned yellow. "Christ. There ain't much pressure left in the damn tank…"

"They were messing with it last night. The valves. Maybe Aitch turned the pressure down too far."

"Ahh…they probably fucked it all up." He fiddled with the knob for a moment and got a blue flame. "OK. That'll cook fish." Reaching for the gutted ones, he salted them and rolled them in cornmeal. I killed and cleaned the last one and handed it to him. He fried all four in hot shortening and turned them out on a pair of plates, their dead eyes bulging white under the yellow-brown coating. "There we go. You gonna be OK with this for dinner?"

They actually smelled decent, since they were so fresh, and I nodded. "That's fine." Deadman took three fish and I took one, and with a few slices of bread we sat down to eat.

I tried a small bite and to my surprise it tasted good; hot and tender and not very fishy. He knew his fish cookery, obviously. He cut each of his in half with a fork, speared and ate them bones and all; I scraped the crisp skin and flesh off the ribs and avoided the head and fins. The rider chuckled at my fastidiousness and got up to fetch a bottle and glass.

"You want a drink?" It was a fresh bottle of rye whiskey, and he broke the seal and poured himself a stiff slug.

"A little. With some water in it." He chuckled again and got out another glass to make me a drink. I took it from him and sipped it while he threw the liquor to the back of his throat, let out a rasping breath and poured himself another. "You don't seem to get drunk very easily."

"Nope. I can't be poisoned, so it takes some doin'." The rider grinned at me over the rim of his glass. "Ain't impossible."