Collector’s Edition DVD

AUTHOR’S NOTE:  The following long story (10,000+ is NOT a short story) contains adult language and graphic sex.  If you are under the age of 18 PLEASE LEAVE NOW!

Collector’s Edition DVD

            Josh Ramsey walked into his apartment.  He grimaced at the mess in the living room not because it needed cleaned but because it reminded him yesterday was his last day off.  He’d have to work another forty hours at Burger World before he could relax.  The smell of dirty clothes and his work uniforms reeking of French fry and hamburger grease welcomed him home like an irate wife.  He shuffled inside, closed the door behind him and tossed his book bag on the floor. 
The satchel contained his latest soiled work outfit, grease smeared shoes and an all too familiar white sack from BW.  Dinner was courtesy of his job.  He could see the flashing red-blue-red light of the neon sign from the street coming through the window.  It bathed the combination living/dining/bedroom with harsh illumination.  The sounds of cars and trucks with all their honking, revving and speeding down the street weren’t well muffled by the window or the heavy curtains.  Josh kicked off his shoes and headed to the bathroom.  Once inside he shut the door to the only separate room in the flat.  Peeling off his clothes (which due to their trip in the backpack carried a faint odor of fast food) he saw his reflection.

            Josh was tall and skinny.  At twenty-five he was still plagued by acne eruptions.  They dotted his face and neck like the boils on a troll’s ass.  Violent red in color mingled amid the scraggily and thin beard from not shaving for two days.  His nose was too long and his average brown eyes perched at the apex of it too close.  He looked like a bird.  His thin chest, narrow hips and oversized feet and hands completed his stork-like appearance.  Standing in his underwear he wondered what bet his parents’ lost with God to produce such a misfit.

            I should be depressed about my life but…, he thought.

            In his mailbox he’d discovered a reason to smile.

            Although he worked a minimum wage slave job, lived in a bad side of town in a shitty apartment there was one thing he still had.  To most it wouldn’t be worth mentioning.  Some would recoil in disgust from it while yet others would find it hilarious.  However his secret was safe.  Nobody knew his hidden passion, the reason he kept on going.  Like a man struggling through the burning desert towards a distant oasis Josh stumbled on through his life.  Onward to his goal—the bright light in the constellation of his life.

            Stacy Starr.

            He had run across her during a late night web browsing session.  Sitting naked in front of a computer he’d bought at a pawn shop he was looking for some excellent wanking material.  By sheer accident he stumbled across her site.  He could still recall the hot flash of lust which had torn through his chest making his breath catch in his throat.  His fingers trembled on the mouse. The picture of Stacy on her homepage had her right side facing the camera.  Her body turned slightly exposing both tits which peeked over the red satin sheet she was holding.  On the screen the white arrow shivered across the porn actress’ angelic face, heavy breasts and perfect ass.  Her golden hair hung in loose curls around her features.  Josh was quick to click her photos link and wasn’t disappointed.  Stacy alone, Stacy with another woman, Stacy with a man and Stacy with multiple partners the snapshots went on and on.  But unlike the others in the images none of them compared to the angel with the devil’s grin. 

            Stacy Starr—the brightest star in Josh’s life.

            He’d joined her fan club, bought her videos and paid good money to become a VIP member of her website.  He dug up every interview, read her biography and even purchased tickets to see her live and in person at a men’s club.  To see her, only fifty feet away dancing, strutting and smiling caused Josh to nearly black out from ecstasy.  He knew every curve, swell and arch of her body memorized over countless masturbation sessions.  But now he could smell her perfume, hear her voice live and watch her interact with the crowd.  She teased men wealthy enough to pay to come up on stage.  Josh cursed his meager savings and low wages.  Stacy was funny, charming and had a wonderful delivery when it came to dirty jokes.  Her two hours on stage seemed both long and yet short.  It left him wanting.  It left everyone in the men’s club wanting but not getting.  The perfect show.  The washed out strippers who normally worked there appeared to be faded plastic flowers compared to Stacy’s bountiful bouquet. 

            I’d hoped to get closer to her—but there were too many others in the way, he said with an inner grumble.

            He’d been rebuked by her manager a greasy man with too many chins and not enough brain cells to realize Josh was his client’s biggest fan.  He’d asked for five hundred up front just to attend a meet-and-greet with the adult film star.  Josh worked at Burger World and five bills were more than he could afford.  He’d walked out of the club depressed and angry.  It didn’t stop him from keying Mr. Moneybag’s Cadillac just out of spite.

            But last week there was an email in his inbox.  Stacy had a “special” gift for all her loyal VIP fans.  It was a limited edition, only-available-for-a-short-time collector’s DVD.  The price—a mere fifty bucks.  Without batting an eyelash Josh dropped the cash on it.  Now stashed in a zippered compartment of his backpack was the manila envelope with a return address fromHollywood,California.  When he pulled it out of the mailbox, saw the address and felt the DVD case inside he almost fainted.  His vision swam in lusty red waves when he spied the lipstick kiss on the cover next to his name and address.  Had Stacy’s lips really touched the envelope?  Was it another woman working in some sweatshop or had that angelic mouth made real contact near the printed words “Josh Ramesy,2023 Division Street, Apt. # 12,Chicago,IL60622”?

            He didn’t care.

            Josh started the shower which was quick to steam up the tiny room.  Letting the burning liquid roll down his body and ease away the tension of the day he imagined Stacy kissing the envelope over and over in his mind.

****

            Dinner was eaten in a hurried rush.  Sitting in front of him, still unopened was the goddess’ mailed surprise.  He toyed with it, spinning it around only after wiping his hands in a furious fashion to avoid leaving greasy fingerprints.  The anticipation of what could be on the DVD took precedence in his mind.  He tried to imagine what he’d find.  Stacy was bold as she was beautiful.  Scenes of past performances played out in his head like a looped video on the Internet. 

            “But she said it was special—for her biggest fans only,” he said past a mouthful of Super Deluxe Mega-Burger (hold the onions please). 

            He tossed the limp cold fries away and downed the rest of his Coke.  His eyes never left the DVD envelope.  Josh stood up and saw his devastated apartment.

            “No, this simply won’t do,” he said aloud while rubbing the stubble on his chin.

            He spent the next two hours cleaning up his place.  Tossing out trash, moping up the small landing strip of linoleum in the kitchen and even running the vacuum cleaner.  The last bit of tiding up left a burning smell lingering in the apartment.

            “Stacy deserves better,” he muttered.

            He opened the window after pushing past the heavy curtains.  The cool night air rushed in like a robber but then swept out after finding nothing to steal.  The scent remained.  Shutting the window and drawing the drapes he went into the bathroom.

            “I know I put those scented candles Wendy got me here somewhere,” Josh spoke out loud.

            The memory of the evergreen tapers and their obnoxious emerald hue made him scoff at the giver.  Wendy Marshall was fat, pimply and definitely NOT Stacy-like.  His co-worker’s hair was a badly dyed black, her blubbery lips seemed to constantly be wet and her pudgy hands were always near her mouth.  Needless to say Josh wasn’t shocked at the condition of her nails.  They were chewed to the ends of her fingers.  Wendy liked him.  Josh liked her as far away as possible.  Wendy gave him gifts (like the candles) and Josh gave her the cold shoulder.  Wendy told him about how she just bought some expensive lingerie, Josh cringed at the thought of her wearing it.  Co-workers laughed behind his back so Josh asked the manager to only schedule him from open (five in the morning) until two hours after lunch.  This limited his time working with Wendy to two hours (she went to cosmetic school from six untilnoon).

            “Ah, ha!’ he exclaimed when he found the candles in the back of the cupboard under the sink.

            Running into the living/dining/bedroom he rummaged through his junk drawer until he found an old lighter.  It was out of fluid.  Taking a risk he managed to light the candles on the gas stove only slightly burning his fingers.  Sucking on the singed digits he placed the powerful smelling candles around the room.  One on the television set, another on shelves next to his favorite paperbacks, yet another on the nightstand beside his bed and the last on the battered coffee table in front of the couch. 

            “Perfect!” he said with a satisfied chuckle.

            Going back to the bed (sitting in the back right corner of the room) he opened the nightstand’s only drawer and pulled out a bottle of personal lubricant and a pair of old dish towels.  He set them on the coffee table, checked the curtains for privacy and snatched the envelope (with the lipstick kiss) off the dining table.

            “There’s something missing.”

            He went to his dresser and found a pair of mock silk pajama bottoms.  Stripping off his clothes he jammed one foot in and then the other.  Josh tugged it up to his skinny waist, cinched the drawstrings and ran his hands down the soft material.  Satisfied all was as it should be he retired to the couch.

            “I wanna be careful with this,” he told himself.

            He ripped in delicate fashion the sealed edge of the manila package.  Tipping it over the DVD case slid out with a whisper and into the palm of his hand.  The cover made him swallow hard and dry.

            Stacy.  Naked.  Horny.  Smiling.

            Not just that but another lipstick kiss had been planted on the cover and—gasp—his name had been written on it.  Josh felt his eyeballs bulge out as he read the words.

            “Too Josh, all my love—Stacy” it said in flowing feminine script.

            Stacy began to shake as Josh’s hands trembled like a bowl of Jell-O in an earthquake.  He licked his lips.  Meanwhile in the fake silk confines of his pajama bottoms his thin cock began to stir like some awakened garden snake. 

            He opened it up, his fingers quivering with excitement he almost broke the case in two.  Inside was the silver disc itself.  Stacy’s face and name dominated it.  He frowned.  There wasn’t a lipstick kiss here like he hoped for. 

            “No matter, it’s all good,” he said consoling himself.  “The DVD is the important thing.”

            He stood up and walked over to the electronic video machine.  Jabbing the power button he waited for it to stick out its wide tongue to receive the ambrosia circular delight he held.  Placing it with exaggerated care he pushed the tray and ran back to the couch.  Josh picked up the TV and DVD controllers and waited.

            The blue screen seemed to mock him.  He began to worry the DVD was blank and he’d been ripped off.  As his anger rose (and cock fell) the monitor flickered from blue to the main menu.  He read the words in hot pink which were to the left of Stacy’s gorgeous face. 

            Welcome!       

Play.

Jump to a Scene.

            Extras.

            More Videos.

            Fan club Info.

            “So much to see, but what should I start with?” he said to the empty apartment.

            He wanted to get right to the action.  The hot desire thundering through his veins didn’t want one more moment of suspense. 

            “I’ve got time,” he told it, picking and selecting the Welcome option.

            The screen dissolved into tiny digital dots and sizzled back into focus with Stacy, the Sex Goddess herself, sitting on a wicker lounge chair next to a in-ground pool of blue water.  She was wearing a white and pink silk kimono and nothing else.  Josh could see her pussy exposed just enough by the hiked hem of her attire.  Before he could visually devour her long legs, angelic face and sensuous nether lips she spoke.

            “Well hello there, baby,” she said her voice husking with lust. “I’d like to welcome you to the never-before-seen, extra-special DVD for all my true and devoted fans.  Since I went on tour and met some of you I decided you deserved something unique.  I wish I could’ve met all of you—but I’m only one girl after all.  But I just wanted you to know I love each and every one of you—and I dream nightly about you.  This video is a collector’s edition so be gentle with it—and me.  Also I’d like to announce a new feature on my website.  It’s called “Sexy Talk with Stacy”.  You will be able to email me directly—and I’ll come back to you as soon as I can.”

            Oh shit!  Oh shit, I’ll be able to email her? Josh screamed in his head.

            “But for right now let’s spend some time alone together,” she continued, beginning to stroke her left breast through the silk.  “I’m sure we’ll have a really good time.  Ta-ta for now!”

            The images faded and returned to the main menu.  Josh found himself gasping for air. 

            He clicked Play, snagged the bottle of lube and tugged his semi-soft cock out of the fly of his pajamas.  Greasing up his palm he watched with a burning intent as the video kicked off with Stacy talking to him, calling him baby and stroking the pussy he’d pay anything to touch just once.

****

            “Hey mister, how about my change?” the angry man said.

            Josh blinked his eyes and stared at the customer.  Apologizing in a muted tone he scooped out seventy-two cents in change and handed to the business suit wearing man.  The guy snatched his order off the counter, grumbled something about Josh being a mental case and strode away.  The Tuesday lunch crowd had thinned out and nobody stepped up to the register he was standing in front of.

            Josh yawned so wide his jaw popped.

            He’d been up almost all night, pulling his pud while watching Stacy Starr perform dozens of self-pleasuring acts upon herself.  She spoke to him like the DVD was made specifically for him.  His crotch was sore.  When he finally went to bed he woke up with a stiff and sticky right hand and an aching cock.  He’d waddled into the shower and even the coolest setting of the meager deluge of water made him cry out in pain.  Between the lack of sleep, the soreness of his privates and the lunch hour rush he still carried the burned in images of Stacy’s hot antics.

            Josh looked at the clock.  It was one-thirty and he was due for a break.  Catching the manager’s attention he motioned for Cheryl Hanes to come over.

            “It’s my break,” he said trying not to yawn again.

            “Go ahead, I’ll cover for you,” she said, “and for God’s sake drink some coffee—you look dead tired.  You only got a half hour left on your shift but I’m afraid you’re going to fall down and hurt yourself.”

            “Thanks.”

            Josh poured himself some coffee.  Hot and black it steamed up smelling strong and slightly burnt.  Carrying it with limited caution (spilling enough on the back of his hand to nearly cause him to swear out loud) he departed.  He made his way around the stack of milkshake machines, the heated bin and the soda dispensers.  Stumbling past the fryers he avoided the grill worker’s attempt at conversation.  He pushed past the door and into the break room.

            Wendy was there waiting for him. 

            Her round, fat face broke into a smile and she seemed to perk up like some dog seeing its master come home after a long day at work.  He sat down and she leaned towards him.  This caused her big boobs (the only feature she had which caused a minor interest for her in him) to squash on the small table.

            Just great.  I’m dead on my feet and now I have to deal with her, Josh thought.

            “Hiya Josh!” she said in a too cheerful chirp.  “What’s going on?  You look really tired.”

            “Couldn’t sleep last night.  Apartment was too hot.  Air conditioner is broke,” he lied.

            “Oh you poor thing!  My dad works on things like that.  How ‘bout you bring it over to my house and let him look at it?”

            “Not today—I don’t think I have the energy for it.”

            “So did you hear the news?”

            “What’s that,” he said, sipping the burnt liquid and grimacing.

            “The Uptown Theater is having a special showing of the original Star Wars film this Saturday.  Not that crappy Episode One either—the first one with Mark Hamel, Carrie Fisher and Harrison Ford.”

            He perked up when the news awoke his inner geek.

            “Is it the re-release?” he asked, his voice rising.

            “Nope!  The very original original.  Do ya wanna go with me?  I could buy the tickets tomorrow on my way to work,” Wendy said.

            He smiled and immediately regretted it.  Due to his tired status he realized he’d fallen into one of her obviously laid traps.  She knew he was a big Star Wars geek.

            “I think I gotta work Saturday,” he said hoping she’d get the hint.

            “Oh come on!  You work days… the movie doesn’t start untilseven o’clockin the evening and you have the next day off.  What do ya say?  It’ll be my treat.”

            Fuckity-fuck-fuck! he swore to himself.  I’m too exhausted to come up with another lie.  I’ll just agree to it and then pretend to get sick—yeah, yeah that’s the ticket.

            “Sure I’ll go,” he said over the rim of his coffee.

            “You will?  Oh wow that’s fantastic!  I just know we’ll have a good time.  Maybe we can stop for donuts and go back to your apartment to talk about the movies in general.  I’m a big fan…”
            And a big assed woman too…

            “… and I know it’d be great to talk about something other than work,” she finished saying.

            “Give me your cell number in case I can’t find you at the theater,” he said.

            “Oh wow!  Sure let me go get a pen and paper from the manager’s desk!”

            She departed with all the grace and quietness of a buffalo stampede.  Josh hung his head and wished for a do-over.  But he knew he was fucked. 

            Maybe I should just tell her I’m not interested—wait I’ve told her she just isn’t getting the message, he thought.  Oh Christ, if the rest of the crew here find out I’m in for a world of snide comments and fatty-and-skinny jokes.  Oh well…

****

            It was Thursday night and his cock had healed.  Promising himself he’d take it easy Josh decided to only watch his favorite part of Stacy’s video.  Using the remote he picked the Jump to a Scene feature and highlighted the “Stacy in bed” image.  Lubing up his hand, tugging out his cock (still a bit tender) he waited for it to start.

            “Ooh yeah…,” Stacy said in a drawn out sigh. “I thought you’d never get here baby.  I’m so worked up—so horny for you.  But you can only watch.  In fact why don’t you take out that big, hard cock of yours and start jerking off?  You can watch me stroke my hot, wet pussy while I get off watching you play with yourself.”

            “Anything you want, Stacy,” he said in response.

            She began pulling apart her wet labia and exposing the inner pink petals of her cunt. She dipped a finger into it and ran it up in a slow caress.  She moaned loud and long as she did so.

            “Ooh yes… that feels so good,” she drawled.  “I love to touch myself and have you watch, baby.  I bet you’d like to fuck me—wouldn’t you?  Well that’s too bad because I want to tease you until you come.  I wanna see your hot jizz squirt out of your cock.  Oh yeah… look at how deep I can put my two fingers into my pussy.  Do you like that?”

            He did.

            “Does it make you horny seeing me stroke my cunt?”

            It did.

            “Oooh yeah but it’s not enough… just not enough to make me come.”

            Josh had to concur.

            She reached behind the pillow and pulled out a realistic pink dildo.  She licked the tip.  Stacy put the head in her mouth and sucked it long and hard.  The fake prick made a popping sound when she pulled it out between her tight pursed lips.

            Stacy giggled… Josh groaned.

            “I’m gonna fuck myself with this… are you still hard?  Oh yeah, I can see you’re nice and hard.  Here it goes… ooh it’s a bit too big… ahh, there it goes.”

            The head of the dildo was sinking into her cleft.  Stacy’s fingers began to rub her clit, she shut her eyes and wiggled her hips.  Her thighs shivered.

            “Oh so deep… so good… I wonder if I can take more?  Would you like to see me try, baby?” she asked.

            “Yes… shove it all in, Stacy,” Josh answered his fist picking up speed across his erect shaft.

            The ten inch long phallus of realistic latex eased into her.  She spread her legs wider and the camera zoomed in for a closer look.  The screen was taken up by Stacy’s cunt filled with fake meat and her fingers (red painted) circled her swollen bud in tight, slow circles.  The camera pulled back and Stacy’s other hand was squeezing her left tit.  Her mouth parted in a pre-orgasmic O of pleasure.

            “I’m going to stick my ass in your face—just to give you a different view,” she moaned.

            Stacy pulled the dildo out of her pussy, took her digits off her clit and spun around.  She got on her hands and knees, dipping down so her heavy breast dangled between her legs and framed her red snatch.   She spread her legs and pushed the fleshy invade back into the heated slit between her thighs.  Stacy looked at him over her shoulder. Her face was red and she was panting in hot desire.

            “Oh yes… tell me how naughty I am,” she said begging in hot need.

            “You’re an angel in heat,” Josh answered in a ragged voice.

            “I’m… I-I’m going to come.”   

            “Me t-too.”

            “C-come with me baby.”

            “Yes I will.  You’re so fucking hot—I love you, Stacy!”

“Isn’t this… fantastic?  I want to feel you come on me…”

“I wish you were here with your mouth on my cock!”

“Coat my tits with your jizz… make me your bitch forever! Oh yes… I can’t hold back…”

“You’re mine!  Forever and ever!”

            She stuffed and unstuffed the fake cock into herself.  Josh could hear (due to the volume being turned up near maximum) the sloshing sound of her cunt being plunged into recklessly.  His hand blurred across his cock, Stacy began to whimper in stuttering orgasmic noises.  She rolled over, reared up and wedged her feet underneath the arching top bar of the brass bed’s headboard.  She was totally exposed, splayed out in a vulnerable position while she drove the dildo into herself.  Stacy began screaming in soft high tones.  Her thighs shook, her face contorted in an animalistic delight as she drove the fake meat into herself.

            “I-I’m coming!  Oh fuck yeah… I’m coming for you, baby.  Come with me… please spray your jizz all over my cunt and hands!”

            Josh moaned loud and felt his balls squeeze tight and his cock begin to pulse.  The squishy sounds of his lubed hand gliding across his iron-hard shaft mimicked Stacy’s wet delving of her pussy.

            Then the screen froze. 

Stacy’s face was stopped at the very edge of her climax.  The image flickered briefly a few times but didn’t continue.  Josh’s hand stopped at the apex of his next stroke.  He waited for a second for it to continue while he ignored the need to orgasm.  But the image only remained frozen.  He started to swear.

“Goddamned cheap-assed DVD!” he said his anger rising.

He picked up the remote and pressed pause and then play.  Nothing moved.  He tried fast forwarding, it didn’t work.  Rewind was equally a failure and even pressing the main menu button didn’t do shit.  He screamed in frustration and threw the remote across the room where it struck the wall.  The back lid came off and batteries spilled out and rolled like terrified cockroaches under his bed.  He started to go soft.

“You fucking bitch!” he yelled at the naked woman on the TV.  “You cheap, rotten cunt!  I’m so pissed… I’m going to demand a fucking refund!”

He picked up the DVD case and flung it into the kitchen.  It hit the wall above the refrigerator and slide down behind it joining a few other items which had become lost there too.  Prancing around in fury, his cock still dangling out of his fly Josh swore up a blue streak.  He turned to kick the screen, his anger climbing to heights not yet discovered by any space vehicle.

Stacy began to move.

He flinched and fell back on the couch.  Watching in utter amazement another Stacy began pulling away from the stilled image and pressing her hands against the screen.  Josh looked on in fascinated horror as the glass began to bulge out.  He heard a tittering squeak of terror and realized he was making that noise.  Stacy-But-Not-Stacy pushed her hands, palm first thought the screen.  They were quickly followed by her arms, her face and her upper body.  Her huge rack melting outward to dangle almost to the floor. 

“No, no, no!” he wailed.  “G-go the fuck back where you came from… I’m sorry I was mad… please don’t h-hurt me.”

Stacy-Yet-Not-Stacy fell out of the TV and onto the threadbare carpet.  On the monitor the other Stacy was still frozen with her hand between her legs and her feet on the headboard.  The other Stacy stood up in a slow manner.  Her body flickered like a static laced TV transmission.  He could hear the hiss and snap just like you would during a bad storm. 

Then she looked at him and smiled.

He heard a squeal bubble past his lips.  His arms went over the back of the couch as his heels dug into the carpet.  He tried but failed to gain any purchase to escape.

“Hello,” Stacy-Out-of-the-TV said in a pop-snap-crackle voice.

“W-who… what are you?” Josh said in a mealy mouthed tone.

“I’m Stacy… Stacy Starr.  And you are Josh, right?”

“You can’t be… you c-came out of the TV.  How did you know my name?”

“Yes I know your name.  The DVD was made just for you and now you called me.”

“It was?  I did?”

“I heard you say you’d be mine for ever and ever.  Ah, that poor nice cock as gone all limp on you.  I bet I know how to bring him back to life.”

“N-no stay away…”

She walked through the coffee table.  Not on it or around it by passed through the center like it didn’t exist.  Josh saw it and froze.  Her legs made a crackling sound as it passed through the pressed wood of the table.  Stacy-Out-of-the-Boob-Tube knelt at his feet.  She started reaching for his forgotten and greasy shaft.

“Ooh this is a nice cock you have,” she said purring like a kitten.

Josh sobbed out like a terrified child lost in a grocery store and separated from his mother.

She grabbed his meat.

It felt solid but not solid.  There was an electric-like tingle where his flesh met hers.  She began to stroke him, he began to watch.  Nature took its course despite the unnatural events and he rose back to hardness in her static-filled fist. 

“Oh… f-fuck!” he said in a loud voice as she pushed his cock into her mouth.

It was like being encircled by some wet, electric sex toy.  He could feel every millimeter of her gripping lips, exploring tongue and deep throat.  She sucked and sucked.  He whined and gasped.  His hands fell to his sides and curled into white knuckled fists.  Stacy-Not-Stacy took his meat all the way to the base and he could tell there was room for more.  Slurping, licking and sucking the woman out of the television brought him to the point of orgasm.

Then she stopped.

He whimpered in wordless tones. She sat back on her heels and glorious ass and grinned like a sex fiend.  She climbed into his lap.  Slow and unhurried she mounted him.  His eyes rolled back in his head when his shaft sank into her buzzing almost electric pussy.  Josh opened his eyes to see her offering up her left tit.  He grabbed it and covered her nipple with his mouth.  He sucked it while she fucked him.  His lips and tongue tingled like he’d eaten spicy hot salsa.  Her smooth legs and supple thighs rubbed against his as she rode him without hurry. 

Up and down.

In and out.

Suck and fuck.

His balls swelled, Stacy began to cry out and toss her head wildly from side to side.  She came—hard.  One moment she was a steady piston rising and falling on his shaft and the next she was like a wild animal.  Bucking up and down in a furious attempt to drive his meat up into her body like some fleshy spike.  Her tits swung out of his hands.  They slapped at his face while she began to babble in lusty incoherence.

“Fuck yeah!” she wailed. “This is… better… better than… doing it to myself… oh yes… oh baby drive it into me… fuck me like an animal…”

“Huh, huh…ahhh!” he managed to reply.

“So hard… so good… fuck yeah!”

She screamed.  Her head fell back and she arched towards the coffee table making her breast thrust out erotically.  Stacy-Not-Stacy rode him until she was reduced to quivering rises and shivering falling upon his still unsatisfied shaft.  He started to say he hadn’t finished when she hopped off his lap and stuck her ass into his face.  She presented the puckered opening like it was a special present.  Without a word she sat down on his wet cock.  He sank into her snug, tight bottom until her creamy rear squashed against his trembling thighs.

“Oh… yeah…,” Stacy moaned.  “So deep in my butt… feels good…”

Josh couldn’t speak.  It was like having a Tesla coil wrapped firmly around your junk.  She began to squeeze her ass cheeks and pump her rear up and down on his meat.  He saw her grab her tits and toss her head back.  Her long golden hair hung down to the top of her bottom.

“Fuck me… fuck my ass, Josh!” she said in a tone like a horny angel.

He pumped his hips the best he could but she wasn’t leaving him room to maneuver.

“Come in my ass… do it!  Squirt you jizz into me… give me a sperm enema!”

He didn’t have time to reply and suddenly he was ejaculating so hard he felt lightheaded and dizzy.  Shot after shot was deposited into the snug realm of her ass.  She screamed along with him.  Her ass bounced off his thighs until he began to beg in blubbering tones for her to cease and desist.

“N-no more… please Stacy, no more,” he said with a gasp.

She rose from his lap like a ghost from its tomb.  Something wet glittered between her perfect thighs and she leaned down and kissed him on the forehead.

“You were fantastic,” Stacy said.

“You too…,” he mumbled.

“I have to go.”

“Where?”

“Back into the DVD.”

“Stay?”

“I can’t not without payment.”

“How much?  I’ll give you everything in my bank account.”

“I need flesh…flesh and blood to remain on this plane of existence.”

“W-what?”

“I’d only need it once… would you do that for me?  I’d stay with you forever, just like you want me too.   I just need flesh and blood.  You could provide it for me.”

“I-I don’t know…”

“Think about fucking me every night.  No holds barred, nothing off limits and any taboos you’d like to explore.”

“That’d be nice…”

“I just need flesh and blood.  Surely there’s someone you know that nobody would miss.”

“Yes.”

“They need to be naked and aroused.”

“Naked and aroused…”

“Remember it’s important to have the DVD running.  It doesn’t have to be playing but it must be on as well as the TV.”

She kissed him on the mouth leaving a static charged sensation on his lips.  He watched her sink into the TV screen, remerge with the Stacy on the bed and then the DVD started up again.  Stacy shoving the cock into her pussy one final time and climaxing in a shriek of ultimate pleasure.  Her voice still echoed siren-like in his mind.  Josh closed his eyes and listened.

I need flesh… flesh and blood to remain… Surely there’s somebody you know that nobody would miss…

****

 

He woke up to the alarm clock’s warning, the DVD still running and the unmistakable smell of hot pussy in the apartment.  He thought about the price and by the time he was dressed and ready to go to work he had the details all worked out.

****

            Saturday night at the Uptown Theater and Josh was trying to keep his nerve.  It wasn’t because he was meeting Wendy Two-Tons-of-Fun but what would occur later on.  Did he have the courage to permit murder in his apartment?  Would the cops trace her back and slap the cuffs on him?  Was it worth it?  Was the price of having Stacy Starr (or this facsimile of her) all to himself?  He tried not to bolt.  But his lust for the porn star kept him rooted to the spot he was standing on.

            “Josh!  Hey Josh, I’m over here!” his date called out.

            She pushed her way through the crowd like an out of control tractor trailer going through a used car lot.  She was holding two tickets in her pudgy grip.  Wendy stopped just short of hugging him.  She was wearing a dress that fit her well and complemented her ample curves and bust.  The makeup she’d applied accented her beauty, a prettiness he didn’t notice before.  But she was no Stacy Starr.

            “Are you excited?” his co-worker asked.

            “You have no idea,” he said keeping his voice steady but just barely.

            “Let’s go!  I wanna stop and get some popcorn and drinks.”

            “Okay.”

            Then she grabbed his hand and yanked him into the cinema pushing people out of her way like they didn’t exist.

****

            The Donut Hole was empty.  With the exception of Josh and Wendy (who was babbling on and on about the movie) they had the place to themselves.

            “Oh and wow!  I still get goose bumps when the Death Star explodes and the rebels win the battle,” she said in a rambling voice.

            “Glazed or with icing and sprinkles?” the bored woman behind the counter asked.

            “Ah, both please,” Josh replied.

            “A dozen?”

“And then when they get their medals… like wow I get so stoked!” Wendy continued.

“Yes a dozen please,” Josh answered the cashier.

He thought about it for a second.  The passion she talked about the Lucas film made him remember his inner geek.  She wasn’t ugly, just a bit overweight.  During the movie he was surprised to see how much they had in common.  She easily grasped the subtle nuances of the film, the character development and many other things he’d long to discuss with someone.  Now he was thinking it was a bit of a shame about Wendy’s fate tonight.

“So what do ya wanna do now?” his date asked.

I’m not sure but I guess I have to go through with it, he thought.

“We’ll go back to my place… you know, to discuss the movie,” he said instead.

“Really?  Oh wow… I wasn’t sure if… oh never mind me I’m still excited about the film.”

He took the box of donuts and paid the unamused clerk.  Wendy stuffed her chubby arm through his elbow and pulled him towards the door.  In his mind Josh decided the faster this hyperactive tub of blubber died the better off he’d feel.

****

            He opened the door and Wendy breezed past him like a charging rhino.  She started an endless series of comments about how nice his place was (he’d been keeping it clean for Stacy), how good it smelled (the candles still cloyingly clung to the drapes) and admiring the view (the neon sign flashing “Tony’s Bar and Grille).  When she saw the bed out in the wide open she turned and gave him a sly grin.

            Oh Jesus, I forgot the part about getting her naked and excited, he thought in a cold rush.  But she’s worth it… Stacy is worth it… isn’t she?

            “Want a donut?” he asked closing the door.

            She followed him like a faithful mutt.  He set the box on the table when she hugged him from behind.  Wendy started talking in fast, halting words.

            “Ever since the first time I met you I knew somehow we were destined to be together,” she began.  “Everyone makes fun of you at work but I defend you because they can’t see the real you.  I see tenderness, compassion and a strength of character most guys don’t have. J-Josh I’ve l-loved you from afar for too long.  Tonight I’m going to show you how much.”

            W-what the fuck? he thought.

            “Now you know how I feel about you,” she said.  “I can’t believe we’re alone together… finally alone at last.”

            “I can’t believe it either,” he replied.

            “I’ve wanted you so bad… I can’t fall asleep without dreaming about you.  This is the start of all sorts of new dreams.  Don’t you think so?”

            He nodded his head and tried not to say it would be more like nightmares instead.

            She nuzzled his neck, he wanted to run.  Not to flee from her but because why she was here.  The terror welled up inside of him and icy fingers began to caress his heart.  He started to say they needed to leave—to go someplace else and talk about this.

            Wendy reached down and caressed his crotch, he forgot about the danger.

            “I want to try something,” she said, her voice thick with desire.  “I’ve been fantasizing about this for ages.”

            She spun him around and kissed him.  Her tongue invaded his mouth and he found himself responding.  He could feel her breath, taste the popcorn on her tongue and hear her soft moans of excitement.  Something bumped against his backside.  It was the box of donuts.  Her hands reached down and undid his belt.  She greedily kissed him while she undid the button on his jeans.  He gasped when his zipper was tugged down.

            Wendy’s hand was now on his cock.

            He always imagined his penis would retreat into the safety of his abdomen, going internal to escape her fat clutches. But instead his shaft actually rose in her tender grip.  She pushed her heavy bosom into his chest a silent plea for him to touch her.  Confused he was barely aware he was squeezing her large ass with both  hands.  She groaned in his mouth.

            Her mouth departed his and she winked at him.  There was a rustling behind him and then she produced a glazed donut and licked her lips.  She slid it over his cock now jutting out of his jeans.  She leaned forward and Josh hoped she could tell the difference between the pastry and his organ.  Wendy began to alternate between eating the donut and sucking his cock.

            She wasn’t bad at it.

            Her mouth was wet and talented.  Her tongue, coated with sticky glaze slid across his shaft.  He reached out, perhaps it was instinct to grip the sides of her head.  She was pulling at her blouse while she ate donut and sucked cock.  The white shirt came off exposing breasts barely contained in an obviously made-to-order bra.  He watched in amazement as she reached back without looking and undid the back.  Wendy’s boobs (double Ds if not bigger) spilled out.  Josh gawked at her huge nipples and his cock twitched in response.  She giggled around his shaft.

            Holy fuck… she’s got one hell of a rack! He mused in a dreamy fashion.

            Wendy ate the rest of the donut and pulled her face away from his crotch.  She scooped up a massive tit in each hand and began to jack his cock off between her meaty globes.  Josh nearly came right there.  Soft, warm and firm Wendy’s boobs milked him.  She caught the tip of his cock (which peeked out only for a nanosecond) and sucked it.  He had to close his eyes from the erotic scene.

            All this time you’ve been shoving her aside but this girl’s got some serious skills, he thought.  She’s honest, loving and is totally into me. 

            She pulled his shaft out of her cleavage and looked up at him.

            “I’m going to rock your word, Josh,” she said tears of joy in the corners of her eyes.  “I’ve waited so long to be with you.  I-I know I’m a big girl—but big girls need love too.  And I’m a bit of a freak.  I-I haven’t been with many guys but I try things on my own.”

            “R-really?” he asked.

            “Sure.  I usually use my dildo on myself and pretend it’s you.  It’s, I mean you’ve been in my mouth, my p-pussy and even my ass.  Now I get to feel it for real.”

            “I don’t know what to say…”

            However his heart was beginning to speak to him.  It spoke of ignoring a real woman, with real honest feelings for an electronic fantasy or images on the computer screen.  Suddenly he knew how stupid he had been acting.  Sure she didn’t have a figure like a porn star but her open and honest love for him transcended her physical appearance.  He opened his mouth to speak but she cut him off before he could.

            “Don’t say anything.  If this is just one night I don’t want you to spoil it.  Don’t lie and tell me you love me, just make love to me,” Wendy said slowly.  “If tomorrow comes and it doesn’t work out then at least we’ll both have nice memories of this night.”

            “Wendy I should tell you something…

            “Hush now… no more words.”

            She stood up and took off the rest of her clothes.  Standing in just her panties Josh realized Wendy wasn’t that big.  Oh she had heavy thighs, a bit of a gut and chubby shoulders but she was proportionate.  He found his eyes being drawn to the thick patch of curly hair framing her cleft.  She helped him get undressed.  Then she kissed him.

            He found himself kissing her back with real, honest passion.

            He pushed her onto the table, she spread her legs.  Josh buried his face between her trembling thighs and began spreading the thick folds of her labia.  Her pussy was open, wet and ready.  He tasted her—she was delicious. 

            “O-oh God,” Wendy said in a halting voice.  “I-I’ve never let… Oh. My. God!”

            Josh jammed his tongue into her snatch licking and lapping at her salty-sweet goodness.  He brought up his hand and began fingering her swollen clit.  Wendy’s legs wobbled on either side of his face.  Looking up past her tummy he saw her fondling her own breasts.  She crushed her nipples between her quivering fingers while he dined at her Y. 

            “Oh yes… oh my… I-I’m going to…,” she said in a sobbing, happy voice.

            He dove into her sweltering snatch and licked her like a wild man.  It only took another minute or so before she went into wild convulsions.

            “I’m c-coming!” she squealed her body shaking so hard the table began creaking.

            Her thighs closed around his head.

            “Oh… fuck… oh yes, Josh you’re making me c-come so hard!” she wailed.

            The juices he was lapping up became thicker, like womanly honey.  He didn’t stop until she was pleading with him to let her catch her breath.  Standing up he saw Wendy’s face was scarlet from ecstasy, her nipples (the size of a midget’s fist) standing out like tiny fingers.  He licked and bit each one until she moaned for him to stop.  He loved the sound of her voice.  Josh loved the taste of her.

            He realized he loved her.

            Josh pulled her towards the couch and bent her over it.  Her large ass quivered as she spread her legs.  Looking over her shoulder she wore an expression of fear and excitement.  He touched the tip of his cock to her soaked and spread pussy.  He managed to push in an inch or two before she started speaking.

            “Oh fuck!” she screamed.  “It’s so t-tender… so sensitive!  Oh yes… deeper.  Josh push it in all the w-way!”

            He mashed his hips against her plump ass sinking all of his length into her.  She began pounding her fists against the couch’s cushions and shrieking like a wild woman.   Her butt wiggled and ground against his loins.  The hot smell of her excitement filtered up into his nose and drove him to madness.  He had a rude idea.  He stuck his right thumb into his mouth and coated it with spit.

            She said she was up for anything, Josh thought.

He sank it slow and steady into her puckered anus.

“O-oh God!” she gasped.

“Like that?” he asked.

“I-I don’t know… yes, yes I love it!  Stuff you finger up my ass.”

He did as he was told.  Alternating he plunged cock, withdrew and shoved his finger in while Wendy cried out in pure delight from the double penetration.  He fucked her for what seemed like an hour.  Each thrust made her moan.  Her second orgasm of the night made the couch scoot across the carpet and his ears ring from her blissful screams.  He pumped once, she sobbed for him to stop.  He thumbed her butt and she moaned with pleasure.  Again Wendy looked over her shoulder, her face hot scarlet with unsated lust.

Then she said something unexpected.

“I-I want it… want it in my b-butt,” she said admitting to a nasty, taboo desire.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“Y-your cock… in my ass.”

He pulled out and pointed the wet tip against the loosened by still quite tight entrance to her rectum.  Josh had sank about two inches into her when she finally took her next breath.  He saw her sides expand and her bottom begin to shake uncontrollably.  Then she let out a scream.

“Oh. Fuck. Yeah!” Wendy shrieked.  “My ass… so full… so full of Josh-cock.”

He felt his nuts tighten and knew his load was about to be delivered.  Josh began to think this was right.  Wendy and him together, fucking like bunnies and loving every minute of it was just perfect.  The ring of her anus squeezed him—milked him until he could take no more.

He came.

“Oh yes… you did it in my a-ass!” she said happy and aroused.

Josh felt wave after wave of ropey semen spurt out of his cock and shoot into Wendy’s gyrating ass.  He fell forward and wrapped his arms around her.  He took a heaping double helping of tit in his hands.  He douched her bowels until the lay against one another taking in ragged, uneven breaths.

The television cackled to life and Stacy-Not-Stacy began to ooze out of the screen.

Oh shit!  I f-forgot all about this! Josh thought in terror.

Wendy screamed, her ass tightened down so hard she nearly snipped off Josh’s cock.  She tried to back away but only succeeded in burying the rest of his bone in her backyard.

“W-what the fuck is that?” she wailed.  “J-Josh something is coming out of the TV… oh my God it’s a woman… a fucking porn actress!”

“Good work, Josh,”  Electronic Stacy said with a grin.  “Now move away and let me consume her flesh and drink her blood.”      

Josh pulled out of Wendy’s butt.  His cock still leaking semen on the worn carpet of his apartment.  The static-crackling woman advanced through the coffee table.  Wendy was still leaning over the couch, her massive ass still sticking up in the air.

“N-no…,” his co-worker said, her voice a wet sob.

“I need it,” the thing from the DVD said.  “I want to be real.”

“No!” Josh shouted.  “Leave her alone!’

“But you promised.”

“I made a mistake—I don’t want this anymore.  I want  real woman not some electronic duplicate!”

Stacy-Not-Stacy still walked forward but as she reached out for her intended victim Josh yanked Wendy out of arm’ reach.  He thrust out his arms, a living cross displayed to repel the vampire from the TV.

“You’re going back on your promise!” the she-thing said in a horrible snarling voice.

“W-what is she talking about,” Wendy tittered.

“It seduced me… it wanted a victim and I made a mistake,” he answered.  “I thought I loved this… this thing but now I realized how wrong I was!”

“You were going to feed me to that?”

“I made a mistake… please forgive me, Wendy.”

“No more talk!  It’s time for me to eat!” Electronic Stacy said.

She lunged through the couch.  Josh twisted and threw Wendy out of the way.  A sizzling pain shot through his left thigh where Stacy clawed at him trying to disembowel his date.  Four claw-like burn marks were seared into his flesh.  It hurt.  It hurt a lot.  Staggering he managed to get around the couch before falling to the floor.  He watched in horror as Stacy, as naked as Wendy began to stalk the sobbing woman.  His co-worker tried to put the table between herself and her attacker.  But Stacy Vampire walked through it.  She reached for the bigger woman’s torso.

“Now you die and I live!” she screamed in a triumphant voice.

Josh lunged towards the television.  Stretching his entire body length he managed to brush the eject button for the DVD player.  The device’s tongue slid out slowly exposing the limited edition disc.  He reached for it as Wendy screamed.

The disc snapped like a gunshot.  Fragments of it peppered his face and soon his left eye was blinded by blood.  He could smell the iron scent of it.  Josh looked under the coffee table and past the corner of the couch to see if he’d made it in time.

Electronic Stacy screamed.

Wendy fell to the floor, obscured by the kitchen table.

He rose up from the carpet and saw the creature shatter into a million digital shards.  Stumbling to his feet, wiping away the blood in his eye Josh tried to see if Wendy was okay.  He could hear her sobbing and began to pray it wasn’t because she was in pain—or worse yet dying.  Josh padded in a drunken manner around the couch to see if he’d been on time with his last minute save.  Wendy’s naked form was curled up in a ball.  He didn’t see blood but that didn’t mean anything.

“A-are you okay, Wendy?” he asked.

“I-I think so,” she said in a small voice.

“Can you forgive me?  I was so blind—so stupid.  I became so obsessed with a brainless porn star I didn’t realize my feelings for you until it was almost too late.”

She stood up, her breast bobbling as she did so.  Tears were running down her face but he could still see the love in her eyes.  But now it was tempered with suspicion.  He suddenly knew he’d have a tough road ahead to win back her full trust.

“We should get dressed and talk,” he offered up.

“That’s a good idea,” she whispered.

He walked over and encompassed her in a hug warm hug.  She reached out slow and tentative and returned it. 

“I l-love you,” he said.

Josh realized he had tears in his eyes. He made himself a silent promise to do what it took to show Wendy how much he loved her.

****

            Brian Morrison got home to his dingy house.  He lived alone.  He was barely making ends meet and he had just a few dollars left in his checking account.  Today was payday—but it didn’t alter the fact he was already broke.  His boss had berated him for a minor mistake and his mother had called his cell to tell him his sister was getting married and asked when he was.  He hadn’t had a date in two years.  But he wasn’t depressed.

            Stacy Starr’s DVD, a collector’s edition had come in the mail…

A Baker’s Dozen of Revenge

AUTHOR’S NOTE; The following is a work of horor.  Have you ever seen or heard about someone losing a ton of weight and then getting divorced?  Here’s what could happen via my disturbed mind.  Enjoy!

           Mark and Barbara Parker were fat.  Not the kind of twenty extra pounds sort of American semi-obese but the mountains of flesh, rolling like a herd of cattle sort of fat. Their wedding picture, proudly displayed on a bob on Barbara’s purse showed a shadow of their current size.  But even back then, during their heyday they were large people.  It wasn’t a sin.  Genetically they couldn’t help it and no fad diet, exercise machine or any combination thereof would alter this fact.  Like a man with a limp or a lady with a lazy eye they just got used to it.  It was as much a part of them as breathing.  No big deal.

            Doctor Gillespie on the other hand wasn’t as understanding about it.  The pinched face the physician knew he was wearing during every visit to his office by the Parkers deepened into the ultimate frown.  He had been their doctor for the same amount of time they had been married.  No longer was he using any form of bedside manner during their visits.  He had moved past the point where he felt veiled suggestions and dire warnings of impending demise would cause a drastic change in their dining habits.  Mark and Barbie (she no longer used her full name) guffawed and tittered (he the later, she the former) at his heartfelt pleas.  But today was greatly different.

            This visit found Mark red faced and sweating.  His breathing was labored like the sound of a dying engine which had not received preventive maintenance.  Pudgy hands kneaded the flesh of his right man-tit while his spouse looked on ashen faced with worry.  The Parkers couldn’t have been in a more terrible pickle.  One of them was close to the grave and to put it bluntly the gravy was the problem.

            “I warned you about this for years,” He grumbled.  “How long have I been saying you need to cut down your intake of food?”

            Neither Jennings responded.  Between the guilt and the nearly visible shadow of the Grim Reaper standing behind Mark permitted them to speak.

            “What am I to do with you, Mark?” he asked.  “I could send you to the ER for a battery of tests but even if we manage to get this under control you’re going to have to change.”

            The massive man tried to speak but what came out was more of a mouse’s squeak than an elephant’s trumpeting. 

            “Okay here is what is going to happen,” he firmly stated.  “You’re going to the hospital.  After they get you heart rate, blood pressure and other problems under control I want you back in this office pronto.  I have some options you are going to not just listen to but chose from.  This can’t go on.  People aren’t supposed to weigh over three hundred pounds it just isn’t healthy!  And I swear, if either of you give me that line about being big boned I’m going to scream.  You couldn’t conceive children due to your weight, not because you couldn’t get pregnant but it would almost certainly been fatal.  I can’t believe you let it come to this.”

            Both of them looked chastised like children caught sneaking into the kitchen for a double handful of cookies.  Nodding in unison they surrendered their fate to him.

            “Look this is fixable,” he reassured them.  “I don’t expect you to end up looking like movie stars eating only twigs and berries but I would like to get you down to something manageable.”

            “Okay Doc,” Mark wheezed.

            “Good,” he sighed.

            “What hospital?” Barbie questioned in a whisper.

            Doctor Gillespie smiled because he already knew the best choice for the affliction which ailed them both.  In fact he had his secretary all ready calling it.  He knew Barbie would try to make some sort of fuss about the place her husband would be heading.  She’d pulled this stunt on him before.  Her irrational rationalizations of the various hospitals in the region could be quoted by both the physician and his staff.  It was a litany well known to all by heart.

            “Don’t worry which one it is,” he admonished her, “just be ready to go when the ambulance arrives.”

****

            A month, two hospital visits and a hundred treatments later they rolled into the doctor’s office like two humpback whales migrating to better fishing spots.  For the first time since he came to accept his size Mark winced when the plastic chair squealed in pain-like agony when he sat on it.  Years of denial and shrugging his weight off evaporated.  Shame darkened his all ready ruddy cheeks to a pallor only seen on dye-infested meat at the butcher’s.  Whispered comments, disgusted looks and tittering laughter at jokes he couldn’t hear erupted around him in the waiting room.  He put his hands on his knees.  Trying to find a place his eyes could rest without adding more misery he caught himself staring at his hands.  Like two bloated spiders with sausage-like appendages they lay upon the straining fabric of his sweat pants.  In shock he noted for the first time in years the ring put on his finger by his then blushing (and skinnier) bride was nearly hidden in folds of fat.  He shifted in his seat and it let out a groan of epic proportions protesting the very reality of his heftiness. 

            There is no word in the English language which can describe the shame and humiliation I now feel, he thought.

            Had he been a weaker man (his only weakness being food) Mark would’ve wept like a lost child in some supermarket.  But he was made of sterner stuff, fluffy but sterner.  A ham-sized palm clomped onto his shoulder causing him to look to his left.  The hand belonged to his wife Barbie. 

            I remember the day we met.  How it seemed we were meant for one another and how easily she accepted me.  Now she wears an expression of impending doom like some oracle who sees the tragedy to come and cannot bear the truth of it.

            Mark was buoyed by the fact the hospital’s prognosis was favorable.  There would be some tough days ahead, miles and miles before the light would even be visible at the end of the tunnel.  However it wasn’t as if he’d been given a death sentence.  But radical was the treatment.  There didn’t seem to be time to take the slow and easy approach to weight loss.  The specialist he had been sent to told Mark he needed to drop one hundred pounds or die in a month. 

            Your choice, the female physician stated.

            The decision wasn’t even close to being in question.

            Hell it wasn’t even in the same zip code, Mark thought.

            The nurse, a lovely young woman half his age named Debbie called his name.  Rising like leviathans from the depths of the sea he and his wife stood up and waddled towards the open door.  Fear rose up in him.  He knew what she would ask next.

            “Step on the scale for me please,” she uttered by rote.

            Mark did as he was told.  The number appearing on the LED screen made him feel even more horrible.  He hadn’t lost weight, he had gained two pounds.

            “Follow me,” Debbie implored.

            Lurching in a shifting manner, his thighs rubbing against one another Mark trailed and eventually lost ground to the slender nurse.  He felt his thighs chafe against one another, the heat and sweat building.  Behind him, equally fading in the distance was Barbie.  Every single piece of evidence regarding his size loomed larger in his brain.  It was as if life had decided to admonish him at every turn about his weight.  Thankfully the trip was short.  The small examination room seemed too tiny for their combined numbers like a fish take straining to hold bread-fattened carp instead of minnows.

            “The doctor will be in shortly,” she said.

            Mark heard the distain in Debbie’s voice.  It was a terrible tone not just suggestion she couldn’t wait to be out of his presence, but confirming his worst fears.  He was fat, disgustingly heavy and the woman couldn’t bear being around him.  He fought back tears while his wife plodded over and fell into a chair.  He did the same to the examination couch.

            How long has it been since I sat down? He asked himself.  For years I’ve let gravity do the work for me.  I don’t take a set I collapse into it like a side of beef dropping off a meat hook.

            “You okay babe?” his wife queried.

            “No,” he answered.

            “I’m worried too.”

            He didn’t have a response.  Humiliation coursed over his body and Mark felt the prickling heat on his skin which quickly reminded him of how big he was.  Before he could succumb to weeping over this latest development Doctor Gillespie strolled in.

            “How are we doing today?” he asked.

            “His blood pressure’s down and he’s feeling better,” Barbie answered for him.

            “I see you’ve gained two pounds.”

            “He’s been bedridden!  It’s not like he can even walk due to the strain on his heart.”

            Despite this being true Mark still heard the rationalization in his spouse’s words.  He leaned forward with a groan.

            “I’ve made up my mind,” he gustily groaned.

            “Oh?” the physician commented.

            “I’m having that stomach belt procedure done.  The specialist suggested it and told me it would be the best and safest way for me to lose the weight.”

            “That’s good Mark.”

            “I’m going to schedule the first set of exams.  With luck I should be undergoing the treatment in a month.”

            “I won’t lie to you Mark it’s going to be very tough.”

            “I want to do this.  Not just for my own sake but for Barbie’s as well.  I’ve put this off for too long and like you’ve been saying it well past high time to do something about it.”

            “I applaud your dedication.  What about you Barbie?  Are you going to have the same surgery?”

            “No she can’t.  The specialist told us she could lose the weight naturally and it’d be better for her.  Both of us are going to enter a twelve step program for obese people as well.”

            Barbie grunted in agreement.

            “Well I expect to be kept in the loop,” Doc Gillespie reminded him.  “I’m available anytime you need me.”

****

            The seasons turn and time stands still for no one.  Mark looked at his iPhone’s calendar and came to the sudden, happy conclusion it was a year to the date of his near death experience.  The chair he sat it was silent.  No creaks, groans or complaints issued out of the stressed materials he sat on.  The people didn’t gawk at him.  He felt wonderful, energized and in control for the first time in his life.  His six-feet, two inch frame still wore a bit more weight than he cared for but all in all he was a slimmer, happier man.  Each memory of improvement flapped in his mind like banners snapping in a strong breeze.  And like those flags he pictured them atop towers of a sturdy, secure and staunch castle. 

            He heard a creak beside him.

            Turning to his left he spied his wife squatting on a chair and looking like some mythical troll laboring to gain entrance into the keep he now envisioned his body to be.  Despite the fact she’d labored as hard as he had, Barbie still wore enough excess fat to boil down and create enough soap to bathe everyone in Argentina.  She was thinner, losing a massive one hundred pounds.  Laughing she had come down one day to show Mark she now fit back into her wedding dress with ease.  Even though he found himself cheering her accomplishments, taking great pride in her progress something was simmering just under the surface of his mind. 

            It was an irrational, stupid and prickling concept which had become more and more irritating over the course of the past twelve months.   At first it was just a whisper, a ghost of a comment.  Usually it reared it’s minute head up during bouts of their lovemaking.  Naked it was almost impossible to ignore the differences in their sizes.  Her breasts, ponderous and heavy still resided upon an out thrust stomach in direct disagreement with her diminished weight.   Barbie’s hips, padded like the cushions of some overly stuffed couch gave him pause.  He admired the fact the meat curtain, that hanging pouch of flab once dipping past her loins had vanished.  But a remnant remained, threatening to once more return to its flabby glory.  HeHer

Her  Sex was becoming difficult to think about let alone engage in.  The problem was obvious, hugely so.  He thought of Karen, his mentor in Overeaters Anonymous who continually preached against this particular sin.

            There’s a tendency for those who lose a lot of weight in a rapid manner to begin to look upon their spouse with disgust.  You have to stay on guard against this since she’s doing the best she can to drop the pounds, the once hefty woman preached.

            But try as he might Mark found he couldn’t silence this voice inside of him. 

            Things have changed, he muttered to himself.

            It was true.  People at work (women mostly) had begun to show interest in him despite years of casual, but forced conversations.  Instead of them shunning him they now sought Mark out for talks.  Several of the girls at work had never bothered to speak to him.  The weight loss had changed him drastically.  He now worked out with weights instead of falling into his old habit of eating comfort foods.  A spot on the bowling league had opened up and he’d been invited to join.  Now every Thursday he found himself at the alleys laughing, joking and bowling with his once-distant co-workers.  Barbie had come a few times but soon began begging off for one reason or another.  He tried to keep her involved in his life like before the surgery but she was shrinking away from him. 

            Every pound I lose seems to be equaled to Barbie taking another step away from me, Mark thought darkly.  I try to encourage her but she won’t go along with it.

            They had begun to have fights.  The first one was over an extra slice of Key Lime pie and the latest over her ceasing to go to Overeaters Anonymous.  Her mentor, Barry had called and let the cat out of the bag.  It wasn’t t that she quit it was more of the fact she hadn’t bothered to tell him.  Mark felt betrayed by Barbie’s lying about going to OA.  Then he found the sales receipt to a donut shop hidden almost insultingly in between their wedding photo album.  The heated row had lasted several hours and caused nearly a week of painful silence to crop up between them.  Too often she’d be found engrossed in photographs of them before the surgery.  Vacations, family outings and holiday pictures would be spread out on the table to be fondly stared at.  Lately a box of tissue (along with wads of snot-filled remains) would frame these photos.  Barbie was quiet, morose and becoming increasingly hard to talk to.  No matter how hard he tried she kept backing away.

            I know where this is headed.  I wish I could change the course we’re on but I don’t know how to do it, he mumbled inwardly.

            D-I-V-O-R-C-E, just like Country & Western song went would be the final outcome of their eleven year marriage.  It was something he dreaded, hated but had come to accept.  Barbie wasn’t committed to change.  She wanted their old life back and had said as much during the last argument.

            He waited for Doctor Gillespie to walk in the examination room.  He felt dread.  An all-encompassing, heart-chilling fear which iced over his soul like the pavement on a wind swept bridge in winter.  It wasn’t for himself he worried.  The pit-stop at the scale showed he’d lost another two pounds.  Mark thought how funny it was that he could no longer despise the LED readout but actually looked forward to it.  No he wasn’t concerned with his progress. 

            Barbie was another matter.

            She jerked when Debbie the nurse asked her to step on the electronic scale.  A quick expression of fear crossed her face like a rabbit darting into a busy street.  Mark didn’t really hear her gulp but it wasn’t too difficult for his imagination to make the sound in his head when she stepped up.  He remembered praying silently.

            She’s lost weight, she’s lost weight, he chanted, like the Little Engine that Could.

            But it was all in vain.  No amount of praying, braying or wishing could alter the numbers displayed upon the small screen.  Barbie had gained ten pounds.  He wanted to cuss.  Not at his wife but at the world in general.  Even though he’d caught her red handed lying and eating things she shouldn’t have Mark didn’t have it in him to scold his wife.  He still loved her. 

            I’d do anything for her but she has to want to do this for herself! He cried in the emptiness of his mind.

            Now he sat on the examine couch and she had taken up her defensive position on the chair in the corner of the room.  Barbie clutched her purse in front of her.  It sat precariously on the limited space of her lap like some battered shield.  She wouldn’t meet his gaze.  Shame dotted her cheeks in ruddy spots like some drunken clown’s makeup.  He sighed.

            “It’s all right babe,” he semi-lied.  “You had a setback that’s all.”

            She didn’t dignify his attempt at mollifying her with comment.  She sniffed in an indignant air, like some blue-blooded royal being addressed by a peasant.  He fought the urge to get angry.

            “Look you really need to talk to me,” he implored, “why have you decided to quit?  What is possessing you to give up when you’ve made such great progress?”

            “You wouldn’t understand,” she grumbled.

            “Yes I would.  Try me.”

            “Not here, not now.”

            “Okay how about when we get home?”

            “Will that be before or after you use the treadmill and drink a protein shake?”

            The sarcasm of her words transfixed him like a hurled javelin.  There was an edgy, irate and pointy sharpness to each and ever syllable exiting her lips and lancing into his ears. 

            “We can do it right away,” he said in his best understanding husband’s tone.

            “We’ll see,” she grunted.

            We’ll see was Barbie-talk for “I’ll fucking tell you when I’m damned good and ready and not one second sooner”.  It was ten years of marriage to her giving him the insight to the real meaning of this short, deadly phrase.  He started to open his mouth, to beg her to cool her jets but Doc Gillespie came in.  He physically flinched when the door opened.

            “Well how are you two doing?” the man asked.

            “Not bad,” Mark lied.

            “I see you’re down two pounds…”

              No, no don’t say it please God in Heaven above make him shut up about Barbie’s weight gain! He begged.

            “… and Barbie, well let’s just say we need to talk,” the physician finished.

            “I’d like that,” she replied.

            Mark was stunned.  The only thing right now which could’ve topped this three word response was if the doctor suggested he go out and eat a box of donuts in celebration of his victory.  Wordlessly he allowed the man to take his vital signs and ask a few more questions.  But the feeling of the doctor just giving him the once-over didn’t fade.  Their family physician was more interested in getting to Barbie’s apparent lack of motivation than Mark’s body.

            “Mark if you’ll excuse us,” Gillespie asked politely.

            “Sure Doc,” he surrendered.

            Stepping out of the room he meandered down the hall.  Listless and lost he really didn’t know where he was headed.  His feet just seemed to carry him along like a paper boat succumbing to the unfathomable twists and turns of a fast running stream.  Down the corridor he went, past the door to the waiting room with its TV noise and the sounds of sick kids coughing.  He stopped.  There was nowhere else to go and Mark found himself at the entrance to the office.  He stood there confused and unsure of what to do.  How long did the doctor need?  Should he go into the waiting room?  Perhaps he ought to go back in and offer comfort and aid since he knew Barbie would be in tears soon?  All these thoughts rampaged through his head like Godzilla through Tokyo.  He looked back down the hall to the room he had just exited.

            “Can I help you?” a female voice interrupted.

            He turned to face the speaker.

            It was Marlene one of the older nurses who had been with Gillespie for many years.  She was Mark’s age as approximate as he could guess.  Her dark raven hair was caught up behind her in a loose arrangement held by a very expensive looking device.  The freckles under her eyes, topping her elegant cheeks moved of their own accord.  She was smiling at him.  It wasn’t just a “how can I help you” sort of grin but more of a “how can I help myself to you” type of expression.  If the shock of the doctor’s insistence to speak with Barbie wasn’t enough to sunder his reason, Marlene’s open and obvious interest was.

            “Oh,” he coughed out, “I’m just waiting for my wife.”

            That’s it.  Remind her you’re married and happy before she gets any ideas, he congratulated himself.

            “I see you dropped another two pounds, good for you Mark,” she countered his attack.

            Shit!

            “Yeah I’m rather pleased with it myself,” he replied.

            That’s it keep it short and sweet…

            “I have to tell you I’m impressed with all the work you’ve put in,” Marlene warbled, side stepping his brush-off.  “Me and the girls in the office where just talking about it.”

            “Thank you, it’s been very difficult,” he remarked.

            “It’s a shame though…”

            Oh crap here it comes.  This will be the part in the conversation where she says it’s a shame Barbie isn’t doing as well.

            “… we’d hoped your wife would take your success and use it to motivate herself,” the brunette finished.

            “There’s still time for her.  It’s just a setback really,” he answered.  The tone was the same as good husband one he’d used in the examination room.  Mark prayed, silent and honest she’d get the message and back the hell off.  Instead she did the unthinkable.  Taking a step towards him she closed to a conspirator’s distance before speaking again.

            “Look it’s not that I dislike Barbie,” she whispered, “but I’ve seen this time after time.  A couple starts to diet and one doesn’t make as good a showing as the other.  Usually they come around after a few months and all is well.  But not in her case.  I’ve witnessed married folk begin to drift apart because one of them doesn’t buy into the program.”

            “What are you saying?” he demanded.

            “I’m trying to be as delicate as I can but in reality she’s not going along with it.  In fact she’s gained back half the weight she’s lost the past three months.”

            “She’s my wife and I’m going to help see her through this.  I don’t think I like where this conversation is headed.”

            “I wasn’t trying to make you angry.  But I know this is the same speech she’s getting from the doctor.  He’s warning her she better shape up or your marriage could suffer a premature and fatal illness.”

            “You think you’re so sure of yourself.  Well let me tell you I know my wife and she’ll come out of this with flying colors, you just watch her!”

            “If you say so.  But when I’m proved right I hope you don’t hold it against me.”

            She raised her hand, her left hand up to brush away something out of her hair, a figment of her imagination in fact.  However her true message came rushing into his brain when he noticed she didn’t wear a wedding ring.  The gesture was so painfully obvious it belonged in some bad porn movie.  Marlene was informing Mark of her interest in him.  She wasn’t just hinting at it but doing everything short of shouting it at the top of her lungs.   A momentary interest flashed through him like the snap-crack of a bottle rocket’s explosion just over his head.  The imagined stinging pain was a reminder of the brief betrayal of his wedding vows.  Snapping his mouth shut so hard his teeth clicked audibly he twisted angrily away from the nurse.  But the damage was done.  In the hall, by the door was Barbie with a stricken look on her face.  Hurt, shock and jealousy all mixed together to from a mask of disbelief to be worn by his wife.  Her shoulders slumped.  He instantly regretted not going back into the waiting room, examination room or pretending he was hurtling towards some other planet.  His wife’s face grew cold like the frost on the inside of a car’s windshield.  And like the difficulty in scraping away that clinging ice on the outwardly curved surface Mark knew she’d resist anything he said to the contrary.  In her mind she’d caught him trying to cut another filly from the herd.  Nothing he could say would alter this and like all true misunderstandings the only way to prove his point would be to yank out the encounter from his memory and shove it into a DVD player.  But until such technology was developed his only recourse were words honestly chosen and the hopes she’d not cast them back into his teeth.

            Barbie began stomping towards him.  Her body language and the set of her shoulders in particular shouted volumes about how she was feeling.  Maybe she be willing to talk about this?  Perhaps she wasn’t as angry as he thought and this would blow over.  But as she stalked towards him with all the grace of a charging rhino he felt the truth like her approaching footsteps. 

            No she’s not going to listen, Mark thought glumly.

****

            Mark sat in his three room apartment still wearing the suit and tie he had wore at the divorce hearing.  Depression had bitten into his bones like the fangs of some uncanny and terrible beast.  No radio or television was playing distracting sounds to interrupt his thoughts.  Moody and sullen he merely sat there as unmoving as a stone. 

            “Ten years wasted,” he mumbled thickly.

            Since the loud and terrible argument of six months ago over what he had dubbed the Marlene Incident the distance between him and Barbie had grown into a bottomless chasm.  There was no way to circumvent, leap or bridge it.  Despite hours of fruitless counseling, a brief separation and long talks into the wee hours of the morning all had come to naught.  Barbie filed for divorce just like he knew she would.  All the memories of their good times seemed to mockingly haunt Mark crowding around the small apartment like unwanted guests.  They showed no signs of departing in the near future.  He wanted to talk to his wife (ex-wife his brain reminded him).  For the past sixty days they hadn’t spoken a word to one another.  All demands, queries and answers had passed between them and their lawyers.  He knew if he could just sit down with her one last time he could make her see reason.  But the opportunity, like Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy was just a happy mythical creature unfit for reality.  There would be no governor’s reprieve for their marriage.  The switch was thrown and it died with a whispered agreement in a cold courtroom.  It was over and done, that was that.  Only the picking up of the pieces and moving on was left to do.

            He had given her the house, the car and all the rest.  Not because he wanted to start over but because he felt perhaps she’d see how much he cared.  But no gesture, no matter how great and sacrificial was enough to soothe the unbridled hatred seething in Barbie’s soul.  In the end she just wanted more.  His pension, his part of their savings and every drop of blood out of the ounce of flesh she was owed.  Never had he seen her so vindictive, irate and stubborn.  Friends and family remarked how completely un-Barbie-like her behavior had sunk to.  His in-laws, now a legally removed part of his life had taken Mark’s side in the matter.  But despite this Greek chorus shouting, chanting and imploring in her ears his ex-wife refused to see how destructive she had become.  In the end she got everything she wanted.  Everything she could have and hold but one thing… him. 

            “What a mess,” he groaned.  “Who would’ve thought losing two hundred pounds and starting an exercise regiment would cause this much grief?”

            He had been shocked to see her at court.  She had ballooned back up to her former size in the time away from him.  Six months after he moved out she’d taken solace in cakes, donuts and pies.  Tears had blurred his eyes when she waddled into the courtroom like some vexed circus elephant irate at being lead around her paces.  But she refused to meet his eyes.  In the end it was with a broken voice he answered the judge when he asked if Mark wanted the marriage dissolved.  Henry, his lawyer patted him on the shoulder while Barbie’s mother wailed like some grief stricken mourner in the back of the chamber.  It wasn’t just that he’d failed but the unfair circumstances which led to such a monumental catastrophe.  The numbers added up this way; one innocent conversation, two hundred pounds lost and one woman who wouldn’t see reason.  It was a formula for disaster.  No matter how he added, subtracted, multiplied or divided them they still came to the same result.  Divorce.

            “What a goddamn mess,” he groused louder this time.

            He didn’t know what was worse.  The way he felt at this moment or the fact there were at least five women waiting with baited breath for him to come within arm’s reach of them.  Four at the office who had been jockeying for position for a half-year or the smug-faced nurse at Doctor Gillespie’s who had gone as far as hand him her unlisted phone number.  If he heard the veiled question about how if he needed anything to just ask Mark was afraid he’d explode into jagged shrapnel killing people as far away as two counties.  Their soft pleading eyes, sensually posed bodies and constantly wetted lips put him off all females.  Faced with going back into the dating scene was the last thing on Mark’s mind.  In fact he was so disinterested in it and women in general he wanted to run off to a religious retreat and become a monk. 

            “What a rotten, goddamn mess!” he bellowed.

            With a jerk he leaped off the chair and began to pace around the apartment like some rabid dog ready to bite and chew his way out of being put to sleep.  Each step was accompanied with another repetition of the same sentence.  His loss for words permitted him with saying the same thing over and over.  No matter how he said it, the sentence fit his mood.  But like a sudden break in stormy skies he began to vent the frustration he felt for many months now.

            “I tried and tried and what did I get?” he snarled, “I’ll tell you what I got, nothing!  I begged, pleaded and crawled on my knees in the hopes we could put this all behind us and move on.  But would she listen?  Did she give any thought to my words?  Oh hell no!  She martyred herself and cast me in the role of a cheating husband despite any evidence to the contrary.  It was my fault, all my fault.  Her weight gain, her sneaking out to eat sweets and the fact she quit Overeaters Anon was all laid at my feet whether it belonged there or not!  Damn her!  Damn her to Hell and back!”

            The fury welled up in him from this underwater detonation and the tsunami it caused rose up to epic proportions.  It slammed into the shores of his consciousness with all the subtly of an atomic bomb.  The resulting flood of anger began destroying the years of happiness and once receded showed how it creating a muck-filled landscape of nightmarish images.  The next wave, no less monumental struck and washed away the wreckage as he spewed out more venomous words.

            “Well I’m not going to take the blame,” Mark roared like the tidal wave in his mind, “nor am I going to sit here and wallow in misery.  I’m going to live my life and damned be the consequences!  But I’ll make myself this solemn vow—no more marriage!  I don’t give a good goddamn who comes into my life I’m never going to trust another woman as long as I live.  Petty, vain and greedy the whole lot of them!  Emotional creatures who don’t care for truth, dedication or love but only to see what they can lay their hands on!  Never, fucking never again will I stroll down a church’s aisle and put myself at risk again!”

            As an act of making a point he spotted the slip of paper on the table with the ten digits printed in a feminine handwriting.  With a battle cry, wordless yet profound he pounced on it like a hunting cat.  Furiously he tore up Marlene’s number into the tiniest fragments his fingers could manage.  Then in a bizarre and primitive ritual he danced some nameless jig on the scraps.  This crazy inspired dance lasted until he rose to the tops of his toes in a flourish, his arms reaching towards the heavens.  He paused there momentarily, his heart thundering against his rib cage.  Then it all came to an abrupt end.

            Mark sank back down to the flats of his feet and treaded in defeat towards the tiny bedroom to get undressed.  Yanking clothes off and tossing them randomly away from him he cared not where they fell.  He tugged on a pair of comfortable jeans, a tee shirt and a pair of white tube socks.  Re-entering the living/dining room of his flat he plopped into the chair once more and reached for the remote control.  The TV burst to life and he began to skip through the channels without real interest.  A vague concept kept him going.  Somewhere in the three hundred channels there was something on which would take his mind off his troubles if only for awhile.  Amid all the talk shows there was some sit-com salve to ease the pain of his failed marriage or perhaps some R-rated film in which he could lose himself for a few hours.  Like a bear ready for hibernation he settled in for a long winter’s nap since today was Friday, he didn’t have to work and the weekend was coming.  Mark sighed in resignation.

****

            Two months, five pounds and ten sexual encounters later Mark felt like a new man.  Life was starting to show signs of emerging from a cold winter and like blossoming spring flowers it had become semi-sweet.  It was a Saturday, another weekend which held the promise of another night out on the town with a woman on his arm.  This time, however with the dreaded Marlene (who begged him for a date) with the usual antics to follow.  He was looking forward not to the date itself but to extract some measure of revenge on the woman who’d caused his divorce.  They had all become this.  Just puppets to play with and discarded as quickly as he became bored with them.  Not people, just a set of willing orifices with a life-support system to be employed temporarily.  His new opinion of women being as callous and cruel as fate had been to him.  Mark was comforted in the notion they were getting what they wanted, even deserved.  Patty, Tina, Wendi and Lisa from work had all had their day in the saddle.  One by one they found him unwilling to maintain any figment or fantasy of a steady relationship.  By the wayside they hopped off to stand there confused and angry by his reaction to their questions about “taking it to the next level” and “date only” or whatever it was called in the current vernacular.  He couldn’t be bothered.  His heart, like his wedding vows were as dead as fall leaves.  As soon as one began to get too possessive or express the idea they were a match made in heaven he reacted instinctively.  Out the door they went with a reminder ringing in their ears he didn’t want anything serious.  This was just for pleasurable company; he wasn’t looking for the next Mrs. Parker.  Sobbing voicemail messages, tear stained notes and all other forms of emotional communications would be deleted, torn up or ignored.  Lisa in particular had been almost impossible to shake.  She refused to give up on the idea he had dumped her.  It took several months and a retraining order to persuade her to stop stalking him.  But Mark was a rock, a stone statue of a man who wanted brief female companionship without strings, rings or permanent things attached.  He made these intentions well know from the get-go.  It wasn’t his fault they entertained other fantasies.

            “Women always say how this didn’t come with any consequence,” he mused out loud, “but they really don’t mean it.  They say these things just so they can squirm into your life and then once embedded there pick at the chink in your armor to get inside.   Well I’m not playing that game.”

            The men at the office crowded around him like awestruck boys meeting their favorite sports hero.  They sat at the water cooler and listened in rapt attention to his modest and agonizingly thin details of the weekend past.  Most wanted to be like him and cursed their own lives to be too mundane and unexciting.  He often wondered how many would end up divorced.  Not setting out to start a trend Mark continuously reminded them of how he’d give it all up to be back married to Barbie. 

            “Barbie,” he muttered, “I wonder what she’s doing?”

            His former in-laws had come over last week.  Brian and Marge looked like survivors of some hideous war crime who limped around dead-faced and confused.  The visit wasn’t a good one.  Tales of Barbie’s continued regression and retreating from life cast a gloomy atmosphere in his apartment which had taken days to fumigate.  Tears were shed, good times revisited until they departed in a mental state which was worse than when they arrived.  Mark wished he could help but all lines of communication with his ex-wife had dried up like some mummy’s flesh.  He could no more raise that dead, arid corpse than talk to Barbie.

            “I don’t have time for this I have to grocery shop,” he reminded himself.

            Shaking himself free of these things he snagged the keys to his new car (a present to himself) and went out the door.  Spinning them in around his finger he let the jingle of the keys fill up his mind pushing out the depressing thoughts.  He paused to check his mailbox, it was empty.  Going through the outer door to the apartment complex he spotted his 2010 Chevy Cruze sitting in the morning sunshine of the early summer day.  The gleam of the ice-blue vehicle seemed to call him to the open road.  With lightness to his steps he unlocked the door, climbed inside and started it up.  Pulling out of the parking lot he felt good.

****

            The supermarket section of the chain store was packed with Saturday morning customers doing the same ritual he was.  Mark cruised nonchalantly down the aisles plucking things he needed, had to have or just wanted to try off the shelves.  But since entering the big store he found himself glancing to the rear without a reason to do so.  A prickling sensation had grown on the back of his neck forcing him to occasionally stop and turn around.  But each time he did so there seemed to be nothing behind him worth noticing.  But in that primordial part of his mind, the section honed since Man walked upright, he felt something dangerous was tracking him.  Mark felt exposed and vulnerable to some nameless horror.  Like a man walking down a dark alley in the middle of the night he could almost taste the danger in the air. 

A half-hour into his shopping it became so intense he fled to the checkout just to return home and feel safe.  Bags were hastily tossed into his trunk while he looked over his shoulder.  He felt the need to check his car for sabotage even going so far as to spy into the back seat for hidden assassins.  On the road back he kept checking his mirrors for people following him home.  The forgotten habits he developed during Lisa’s time stalking him came back sharply.  He thought about how the police told him these kinds of women would halt their activities for a while only to take them up again.  Was she back?  Had the blonde from the office decided in some fit of deranged passion she couldn’t live without him?  Was he just being paranoid or was the threat real?  Mark found himself driving faster than the speed limit and forced himself to slow down.  Home and safety was nearby.  More importantly was the Glock pistol he’d bought during the height of Lisa’s terror.   

            “It’s probably my imagination but I really think the better part of valor is the smart move,” he thought, pulling into a parking space.

            He got out of the car, popped the trunk open and began gathering up his purchases.  Even now, in well known environs he kept up his vigil.  Darting glances, identifying cars and deliberating the most secure path to the door Mark noticed everything possible.  Was that car he when he left?  Who was standing there by the bushes with the dog on the leash?  An army of questions stood at attention in his brain.  With an armful he dodged a vehicle moving down the narrow drive and made his way to the front door.  He had to juggle the plastic sacks in order to jab the key into the lock.  Moving down the hall he unlocked his apartment, set down his burdens and went back outside.  He loaded up once more and made the trip again.  The final lap was about to begin and Mark paused at the threshold of his place.  The sudden urge to go into the bedroom and fetch his pistol made him hesitate. 

            “This is silly,” he thought, “there’s nothing to fear but fear itself.”

            He moved out the door, his attention sharp and his senses keenly alert.  The last group of plastic sacks were hefted out of the trunk, the lid was closed and he darted back towards the door.  He felt both silly and embarrassed.  There was no sign of Lisa, her car or anything other possible danger.  Going down the steps he began to smile, the feeling of dread peeling off of him like sunburned skin.  The pain was emotional but no less stinging.  Chagrined he started to shut the door when someone stepped in the way.   

            It was Lisa.

            Her blonde hair hung in tatters around the ruin of her face.  The smeared remains of her ruined mascara gave her a ghostly appearance, deepening her eye sockets.  From amid those blackened smudges her blue eyes peered out.  Agony and angry chased each other in those watery orbs neither one of them holding dominance.  Her slumped shoulders seemed to admit defeat.  Lisa, the ghost of lovers past stared at him.

            “Lisa,” he grunted nervously, “you’re in violation of a restraining order.”

            “I have to ask one last time,” she choked out.  “Will you reconsider your decision to stop seeing me?”

            “We’ve been over this and it’s now a matter for the police.  I’m giving you three minutes to clear out of here before I call the cops.  It’s your choice—take it or leave it.”

            “You won’t change your mind?”

            “No.”

            “I’m sorry—I truly am.”

            She turned around like some shipwreck being drawn away from him by an unforgiving tide.  Listlessly she ascended the stairs and went out the door.  Somehow he knew she’d do something dramatic and final to herself.  It wasn’t his concern.  Relief flooded through Mark making him feel as giddy as Ebenezer Scrooge after the visits from the three spirits.  He shut the door and sucked in a deep sigh. 

            “I should trust my instincts more often,” he told himself.

            “I agree,” a voice behind him stated.

            Something hard slammed into the back of his head.  The apartment’s door spun wildly to the right and then he hit the carpeted floor.  A sickening dizziness came over Mark and he felt his stomach revolt from the atrocity perpetrated on the back of his skull.   He heard footsteps approaching before he passed out.  Heavy ponderous footsteps.

****

            Mark slowly awoke.  He tried to groan but it came out a mere whisper of pain.  He could feel something extremely sore and matted on the back of his head.  But beyond that was something soft, pillow-like.  His stomach protested his first attempt to move his head and before he could stop it he vomited.  The hot greasy trail of intestinal slime ran down the middle of his tongue and dribbled over his trembling lips.  It landed unceremoniously into his lap.  He opened his eyes.  Light stabbed into them forcing his guts to rebel once more and emit another hideous trickle of puke up, out of his mouth and onto his legs. 

            “Oh God what happened?” he groaned.

            Looking around his apartment he saw he was sitting in as much darkness as could be had on a summer’s day.  The blinds were drawn, the lights left off and the shadow of false night encompassing him.  It was enough illumination to confirm his fears of being unable to move.  He was handcuffed ankles and wrists to one of the chairs to his new dining set.  He struggled but the combination of a sick gut and the metallic tightness halted him.  Someone or something moved off to his right.

            “W-who’s there?” he queried.

            “So you’re awake,” a woman answered. “That’s good I was afraid I hit you too hard.”

            The voice was familiar, ten years worth of familiar.  Icy terror crystallized his spine and froze his brain.  He tried to move his head and suddenly realized it was secured in place.

            “Barbie?” he said hesitantly.

            “Well I guess I didn’t rattle your brains with that blow like I thought,” his ex-wife commented.  “If you can recognize my voice then I guess it’s time to start.”

            “What are you talking about?”

            Out of his line of vision she laughed. It was a high-pitched titter of someone less than sane.  The sleet on his backbone thickened.

            “W-what are you doing?” he demanded.

            He felt her walking around to face him.  It was the slow and steady tread of a great weight of doom which shook the floor like a stampede.  The figure of his ex came into view and he sucked in a harsh, quick breath.

            She was huge!

            Not in the “this is what she looked like when I had my surgery” size but an incredible and unbelievable parody of herself.  Her eyes barely peeked out between her fat cheeks and heavy lids.  Like the stare of an overly plumped up pig they speared him in their porcine gaze.  Her jowls had multiplied and then had more offspring.  Her neck was a series of folds upon folds until they reached her collarbone.  Her breasts, even more massive than before stretched and pulled at the upper portions of the Muumuu dress she wore.  The disastrous rioting colors of the exotic flowers painted on the fabric were distorted as grotesquely as her body.  Beyond the too short hem her dimped thighs protruded like the World’s Biggest Sausages.  Her knees looked weak and ineffectual and her ankles were the epitome of the slang term kankles.  Her ratty footwear was a pair of comical and stereotypical Old Lady Slippers usually worn by an extreme cat-fancier with no husband or life to speak of.  She also smelled of cheese, old cheese at that.

            “W-what happened to you?” he sobbed out.

            “What happened?  Exactly what you wanted to occur,” she snickered.  “After all those dirty looks at my body and your obvious disgust with me I became exactly what you envisioned.  I’m a fat, ugly pig—just as you wanted.”

            “I never said that!  Nor did I ever want you to become like… like… this!”

            “Oh you didn’t have to say it—it was written all over your face!  First was all that talk about your OA mentor.  The marvelous and skinny Karen, remember her?  Oh then it was the girls at the office who slid up to you like they were ready to test drive a new car.  Oh and the capper, the absolute and utter capper was that slut Marlene.  No you didn’t say it.  Not in so many words but your actions, your actions Mark spoke volumes.  Eloquent, hurtful and terrible volumes telling me how much I didn’t deserve you!”

            “No you’re wrong!”

            “It was Lisa this and Mary that and blah, blah, blah,” she mocked him.  “Every woman’s name cut like a razor into my flesh.  You never considered how it made me feel, did you?”

            “I told you how disgusted I was with them,” he tried to remind her.

            “Did you?  Did you or where you just trying to point out in some unconscious way how I wasn’t measuring up to them?”

            “You’re twisting the facts!”

            “No I’m not.  It doesn’t matter anyway for after today it won’t make a hill of difference to anybody.”

            “What are you going to do?”

            She smiled.  It was an evil sneer that snaked across her lips like the one he imagined Eve saw on the serpent in the Garden of Eden after she took that first fateful bite of apple.  Moving out of his sight she kept tittering with unholy mirth.  His strength came back slightly enough for him to rattle the bindings on his wrists and ankles.  He knew the white paint was being stripped away with every violent jerk and tug.  The sharp pain jabbing into his flesh let him know his secured joints were bleeding.

            “Stop this right now!” he demanded fearfully.  “This doesn’t have to be this way.”

            “Oh but it does,” she dissented.  “The problems started when you lost all that weight so I think we can solve it.  Don’t worry you’ll enjoy it—I promise.”

            Her words layered the thick coating of icy terror with even more depth.  She was breathing in great heaves as she toiled with something behind him.  The thump and groaning noises she was making was enough for him to hope she’d have a massive coronary.  Self-perseveration thoughts, even one so sinful as this were born in his brain.  Suddenly she lurched into view.

            She was yanking a wet/dry vacuum behind her.

            There was a lull in the horror he was experiencing.  The object she was pulling seemed to make little sense to him no matter how he tried to understand its role in this.  In fact he had to stifle a laugh since it was one he refused to take with him when they got divorced. 

            “I had a helluva time getting this into the apartment before you came back with your second load of groceries,” Barbie admitted.  “I thought for sure you’d see me trying to hide behind your bedroom door.”

            He looked at her in confusion

            “Anyway,” she continued, “I have that woman to thank for having the time to get ready before you noticed.  Who was she?”

            “Someone I used to date,” he said softly.

            “I take it she wanted something you didn’t want to give?”

            “Yes.”

            “Well we all want things.  Right now I want my husband back.”

            She ripped the top off the wet/dry vac and began to grin at him.

            “I’m right here Barbie,” he told her.

            “No I want my real husband.  My roly-poly, chubby happy husband who loved me no matter what I looked like,” she informed him.

            “I still love you.”

            She rumbled into the back room and came back with four large boxes each one labeled on the side from a popular donut shop. 

            “You’d say anything at this point.  But after we’re done today you’ll have no choice but to come back to me.  All those skinny bitches won’t want anything to do with you after I’m done.”

“W-what are you… Oh my God!”
It dawned on him what she was going to do.

“We can do this one of two ways,” Barbie stated.  “You can eat of your own accord or…”

She pointed to the wet/dry vacuum.

“You can’t be serious!” he shouted.

“I am,” she tittered. 

Reaching into the vac she pulled out a silver roll of duct tape, a hose and a nozzle.  Brandishing the items at him his ex-wife let out another eerie giggle.

“Don’t do this,” he pleaded, tears beginning to run down his face.  “I’ve worked so hard…”

“Too hard and look at the cost,” she informed him.

She moved towards him.  He clamped his mouth shut tight and refused to let her insert the nozzle into his lips.  Cruelly she pinched his nose.  He fought for air but eventually he had little choice but to open his mouth to breathe.  In went the air and then the plastic-tasting attachment.  It was quickly secured to his face with several long strips of duct tape.

“Now we’re set,” she said with a heaving sigh.  “Oh I managed to buy all your old favorites.  Unfortunately you’ll be eating them in one big mashed up mess since you won’t play nice.”

She went into his kitchen, found his blender and brought it out.  Plugging it into the wall she began the laborious process of liquefying four dozen pastries into a thick sludge of mixed color but similar thickness.  Each batch was dumped into the wet/dry vacuum without fanfare.

“Just about ready,” Barbie announced.  “Now remember to swallow as fast as you can.  I don’t want you to choke to death, honey.  Oh and we’ll be taking several breaks because even I couldn’t down this many donuts in one sitting.  But I know we have time.  In fact we have all weekend.”

He thought about his date with Marlene.  Surely she’d call the apartment or even come over when he broke their date. 

“Oh I texted your date for tonight and told her you had the flu,” his ex stated with a smirk.  “I found the note of who and when on your calendar in the kitchen and just used your cell while you were napping.  I knew you’d been ogling Marlene and I’m not too happy to see I was right.  Anyway it won’t matter after we get done.”

She put the large lid back on the shop vacuum and pulled it in.  Mark frantically tried to yell and holler past the nozzle but only a terrified squeak made its way painfully out his nose. 

“Okay honey,” Barbie smiled, “here’s the first course.  They’re Boston Crèmes and I know how you love them.  I’ll save your bestest most favorite—those Bismarcks you loved so much—for last, okay?”

She threw the switch, the hose began to undulate snake-like and Mark began to swallow as fast as he could.  The sugary sludge poured into his mouth, down his gullet and threatened to explode out of his nose.