1970 Janice watched as the huge joint was being passed
around, it's glowing cherry leaving trails behind as it went. She was beginning to get off good. Real
good. But not on the jumbo
paper cigar with harsh Mexican marijuana that was going around, though that had
helped. Or the partial case of Schlitz
beer that was being ignored at their feet.
It was too late for that. The
LSD was kicking in now and she shivered again as another body rush passed
through her. Her scalp felt as if a
thousand magic fingers were giving her a head message, and her jaws already
ached from the clenching anticipation of launching on another trip. It always started out this way, but usually
slower.
Randy had said that this was
the best blotter acid to come through in a long time, and he was definitely
right. One of the things that she
really liked about Randy, he knew his drugs, and where to get them.
She had taken it less than
an hour ago, albeit on an empty stomach.
She always got off quicker that way, and more intensely. This was better than she had ever
experienced. It always amazed her that
one little piece of paper about a quarter of an inch square could send one so
far, for so long. She had placed it
under her tongue and left it there as long as she could stand the feeling of
not being able to talk. Then she had
been careful to swallow it with some beer, so the rest would digest in her
stomach. Randy said by putting it under
your tongue, like people with heart problems did with nitro-glycerin tablets,
was the quickest way to get off. Based
on how she was feeling at the moment, he seemed to be right.
Her mind began to race at an
increasing pace, yet she was still coherent.
She flashed back on the conversation that she had with Randy earlier
that day just after school. He had been
initially perturbed that she wanted to get four hits from him to go do
somewhere without him. But she had
explained that it was for her and her friends, 'girlfriends' she had
stressed. That seemed to appease him
somewhat. Promising to 'make it up to
him in his favorite way' had clinched the deal. Randy was always a sucker for good blow job, her 'secret weapon'
as she liked to refer to it.
A nudge on her shoulder got
her attention, as one of her friends was trying to pass her the joint.
"Ground to
Janice," a voice said, handing her the joint.
"Come in Janice!"
the other two girls giggled in unison.
Janice took the joint in her
two fingers, trying not to get burned in the process. She placed the end of the doobie up to her nose, and inhaled
deeply through her nostrils as if there was no air left in the world.
"Nothing like a good
nose hit when you're just getting off, you know what I mean?" she said.
"Amen, sister,"
said Denise Stahl, as she whipped her long straight black hair to one side of
her face. Denise was a tall slender
girl, who spent most of her time praying to God that someday her breasts would
develop. She was always being teased
mercilessly by her peers because she was flat as a board. That's what had brought her into the
'Pack'. The first principle of being a
'Pack Rat' was to not be one
of the 'in crowd'. It also helped that
she was a close friend of Janice's and lived within a block of her house.
"Are you getting off
already?" asked Linda Horton, who lived next door to Denise. Her entrance fee into the 'Pack' was the
fact that she was about fifty pounds overweight, had the foul mouth of a
trucker, and refused to do anything that would make her attractive to the
opposite sex.
"Yeah," was all Janice
said, it was hard enough to maintain a conversation with her friends, let alone
elaborate on the matter. She was really
taking off.
"Just what do you feel
when you know it's taking effect?" asked Patricia Warner, to no one in
particular. This was her first time
dropping acid, and she was very apprehensive.
She hadn't been with the 'Pack' for very long, but had fit in
immediately. Like Janice, she was
considered a brain, as kids
called anyone with better that a 'C' average.
She would have been considered attractive by her peers, if it weren’t
for her scholastic attitude and thick wire rim glasses.
"You'll
know, Patti. Trust me, you'll
know," said Denise, suppressing a giggle.
"That doesn't tell me shit!" said Patti, and
instantly the rest of the girls burst out laughing, including Janice. It always broke them up when Patti used foul
language, something she had just started doing since joining the 'Pack'.
Janice could sense the
stress in Patti's voice and mentally forced her self back down to their level
long enough to address the situation.
"What they mean Pat, is
that it will feel like nothing you have ever felt before. It's better than pot. It's better than getting your driver's
license. Hell, it's even better than
sex! The first thing you'll feel is
kind of an awakening. Things will seem
to be a little brighter, a little bit more defined. Your mouth will start to water even though you have cotton mouth
from the pot. Your scalp will begin to
tingle and you'll be able to feel the wind blow through the hairs on your
arms."
"What wind?" asked
Patti. It was as still as a tomb,
ninety-nine percent humidity and over ninety degrees out, even though it was
eight o' clock.
"The cosmic wind," said Denise. Next to Janice, she appreciated the effects
of LSD more than anyone else in Platte County.
"Yeah, the fucking cosmic wind," added
Linda as she reached for another beer, ignoring the half full one leaning next
to her ample thigh.
"It's what let's you
know that you're really alive. It's all
around you," said Denise seriously.
"Yeah," said
Linda, "it's what you feel go up your shorts and tingle your pubic hairs
as if the paper boy was sniffing at them."
"Jesus, Linda, I'm
trying to be serious!" shouted Denise, also beginning to feel the onset of
the psychedelic drug in her system.
"Denise is right,"
said Janice as she breathed deeply, feeling every cell in her body becoming
aware to the fact that life, as they knew it, was about to change.
"Fuck Denise, I'm
right!" shouted Linda.
Patti looked around the
circle just wondering who to believe.
"Yes, Linda's right
too," said Janice matter of factly, finally remembering she still had the
joint in her hand and passing it on.
"You may even feel it your cunt."
"That's the first place I feel it,
honey," said Linda.
"That's because you are a cunt!" shouted Denise, and they all broke up laughing uncontrollably, rolling from side to side in the grass.
2
Eddie watched the girls
quietly from his hiding spot in the tall grass and saplings that lined the
riverbank. Spying on his sister and her
'Pack of Rats' as he chose to call them, had become his favorite pastime. He had known something was up when his
sister began calling up her friends as soon as she had gotten home. All he had to hear was the words 'Loup
River' and he knew exactly where they would show up.
He had beaten them to their
favorite hangout by almost fifteen minutes, and was beginning to think they had
changed their plans when the four girls nearly ran over him on the way to the
grassy mound where they usually sat. He
reveled in the fact that they could pass within a few feet of him, not detecting
his presence, and mentally patted him self on the back for having perfected his
camouflage skills. They sat below him
now, and he had been able to get up off his stomach and assume a more
comfortable sitting position. The girls
weren't more than fifty feet away, and he could hear most of what they were
saying.
He loved it when their
choice of topics turned to sex, and he learned more about the subject from
listening to them than any conversation he had ever had with his male
peers. Someday all of this insight
would prove invaluable, he told himself.
Someday soon, he
added. While Eddie's interest in sex
was no more intense than any other fourteen-year-old boy with raging hormones,
his desire to accomplish the act was bordering on the insane. He had no desire to follow the normal path
of getting to know someone, going out on dates, working his way through some
heavy petting and hopefully to eventually getting laid. He just wanted to fuck.
As he heard the girls
calling each other cunts, he was instantly aroused. That word never failed to excite him. Sometimes he would just say it to himself over and over and
over. Eddie was no amateur to the
concept of power and he found himself amazed at the incredible power that one
little four-letter word could yield.
Cunt. C-U-N-T. He imagined how Webster would put it in the
dictionary.
cunt (kunt) n. 1. Vulgar. A woman's sexual organ. 2. Vulgar. The orifice which man spends nine months to
get out of and the rest of his life to get back into. 3. Vulgar
Slang. Optimum word used by all
women and some men to piss off other women.
4. Vulgar Truth. Triple E's reason for living. See pussy
and gold mine.
Eddie laughed quietly to
himself. Yeah, he would have to get him
some cunt. Soon. Real soon. He watched as the girls frolicked in the
grass below him, their breasts firmly jiggling up and down and side to
side. Except for Denise. She really was flat as a board, Eddie
noted. Probably still had a cunt
though. He shifted his view to Linda,
who definitely had some tits. And some
ass, a whole lotta ass. He was sure she
had a pussy too, and was definitely nasty enough to know how to use it. She'd probably enjoy what he had in mind,
which totally ruined his ideal fantasy.
Eddie didn't have any
problem looking at his own sister in a sexual way, and he had to admit she had
the best body of all four girls. But
his sister was reserved for other sports that he found interesting; like
spying, pestering, and your basic torturing.
He relished the fact that he could always torture her by fucking her to
death, but that too seemed to ruin his ideal fantasy. We're talking about fucking here, he reminded himself. Plain and simple. Torturing takes everything to a higher level, and messes up the
simple pleasures of raw lust. Still, he
would have to file that thought away for future reference. There could possibly be a new sport in the
making there.
He focused on Patti
Warner. Now that would work. The glasses would have to go, of course, but
otherwise she looked pretty hot in her faded cutoffs and bright red tube
top. She had an innocent quality about
her that seemed to make her all that more desirable. Like I'd be the first she'd ever have, added Eddie to himself,
and they say you never forget your first.
Eddie definitely didn't want to be forgotten.
3
An hour later Eddie was
still watching the girls. He wished he
had a dollar for every time they had said the words cool, wow, and far out! They had been laughing a lot, more than usual, and over things
that didn't seem funny at all to Eddie.
Some of the things they said didn't even seem to make any sense, yet
they rambled on as if they were in another universe, another time, and had left
Eddie behind.
He knew they were high, and
maybe drunk, although he was amused at the fact that no one was really
scrambling for the last of the beer.
Eddie couldn't figure out their desire for getting high, or any one
else's for that matter. His mind was
his most precious gift. Even more
precious than his penis, which was still erect from their earlier conversation. Why would anyone want to diminish their
mental capabilities with drugs of any kind, he wondered?
He had tried alcohol once,
managed to get drunk before he threw up, and found it totally
unacceptable. He had tried a mental
exercise using his powers, one of lifting his fish tank off of its stand and
setting it back down again. He had done
it scores of times before, just for something to do while lying in his
bed. It always amused him to watch the
pair of red Swordfish go nuts as their world was moved around. He had gotten so good that the water hardly
splashed around at all, but the fish still knew that something was up. When he tried to do it under the influence
of alcohol, all he managed to do was awkwardly get the tank a few inches above
the stand, and then it began tipping forward.
Once the weight of the water shifted, there was nothing he could do but
watch as the whole fish tank fell towards him and crashed on the floor, sending
both water and fish rushing under his bed.
Eddie wasn't one to be
concerned about loss of life, but it did mildly upset him that the fish tank
had been destroyed. Not only was he was
out about forty bucks, but had to make up some lame excuse to his father because
the water leaked through the floor and stained the ceiling in the room
below. He got over that soon enough but
the fact that he had lost control over a given situation was more than he could
tolerate. Two days later, after
recuperating from his hangover and replacing the fish tank, he managed to
mentally lift the new aquarium off of its stand, fly it out the window, and set
it on top off the neighbor's front porch.
Then he flew it back in, set it down, and checked the water level after
everything settled down to see how much he had spilled. It was only down a half an inch. It would be along time before he ever drank
again.
Eddie was still trying to
figure out exactly what was up when, as if on cue, Linda made it all perfectly
clear to him.
"You were right,
Janice. This is the most ass kicking
acid I have ever dropped. What a kick
in the pants!"
"You better appreciate
it. It's gonna cost me a blow
job."
"Chump change,"
said Linda matter-of-factly.
"Then maybe you should
do it!" exclaimed Janice.
"I'm talking a whole
blow job here."
"You mean swallow and everything?" asked Denise, curling up her lip in disgust.
"Nothin's free in this
world girls!" replied Janice.
"Look honey," said
Linda. "Any time Randy turns out
to be too much of a man for you, just send him my way. I'll suck him dry everyday as long as he
keeps scorin' me drugs like this!"
'You need to be on a liquid protein diet, bitch,' thought Eddie as
he eavesdropped.
"I just may take you up on that, Linda Lou," said Janice, as she turned towards Patti.
"What ya think,
Pat? This ride worth a whole blow job?"
"How can you even think? I mean I feel like my mind's racing at a thousand miles per hour. It's so confusing, but it's so wonderful. Fucking wow, man!"
The girls burst out laughing
again.
"How wow is it,
girls?" shouted Denise.
"It's fucking wow, ma-a-a-ann!" shouted Janice and Linda in unison.
All four girls broke out in uncontrollable laughter again. Eddie just shook his head in disbelief.
"They're
more messed up than I thought," he whispered, as he looked down at the
bulge in his crotch.
"Stay alert, one
eye. This may just turn out to be your
lucky day."
4
Eddie had patiently waited
for another hour. He made a mental
guess as to what time it must be, coming up with a quarter 'til four. He glanced at his wristwatch for the first
time since leaving his house, and found he was off by only three minutes.
"Not bad, Triple
E," he whispered quietly to himself.
He always found pride in the fact that he had such a good handle on the
concept of time, and how important it could be.
"I'll bet there isn't
one of those cunts down there that could guess the time within an hour,"
he added softly, knowing that in the condition they were in, he hardly had to
worry about being discovered.
The girls had split into two
separate pairs, and things seemed to be looking up for Eddie. Linda had decided that she needed to get up
and walk, and Denise had reluctantly gone with her, after much prodding. She knew that Patti was having a hard, but
wonderful time with her first trip, and probably would be best left alone with
Janice for awhile.
'Too many cooks spoil the broth,' Janice told her when Denise
had first tripped, and had taken her off from the rest of the crowd. It had been at a party, and there had been
just too much stimuli to absorb at the time.
Between the loud rock music, and the multitude of conversations that
seemed to blend into one big rush of a giant verbal waterfall, Denise had
accepted the fact that she was going crazy.
Until Janice had taken her aside, reassured her, and helped guide her to
the real beauty that dropping acid could bring.
Now it was Patti's turn, and
she instinctively knew that her job was to go with Linda. There would be other times for them to
mutually share the wonder. Yet deep
inside her, she wished that she could stay behind. She loved to hear Janice talk when she was at the peak of her
high. Everything seemed to make so much sense. But the evening was young, and the acid was
good, so there would be more time to get to where she really wanted to be. For now she would just relax and enjoy the
chemical high of almost eternal laughter with Linda. She could always get cosmic later.
Eddie watched as Linda and
Denise passed below him, heading upstream along the fisherman's trail that
lined the banks. He slowly managed to
sneak a little closer and into earshot of the two remaining girls who no longer
found it necessary to talk loudly. He
caught them in the middle of their conversation.
"How's that,
Patti?" his sister was asking.
"It's just so
different, you know? A minute ago, I
thought I was going to lose it, and now I find myself feeling so peaceful. I've never felt this way before."
"Yeah, I know what you
mean," answered Janice. "I
love Linda, but she's too much for me sometimes when I'm in a full blown trip. I figured you might need some peace and
quiet. I know I sure did."
"God, I can hear
everything now. And feel everything. This is fantastic."
"It's pretty cool, I have to admit. I never get tired of trippin'. The hardest part is coming down, cause you just don't want it to end. But that's along way off. Wait until the fireflies come out. You'll think you're in heaven."
"You ever have sex when
you where tripping?" asked Patti.
"Yeah, once. But I avoid it like the plague. Pretty hard to try and get intimate with one
person when the whole fucking universe is trying to get you on the phone, if
you know what I mean. It would be like
riding the biggest fucking roller coaster you've ever been on and trying to do
that crochet shit your Aunt Mabel does at the same time. I'd hate to admit it, but if Randy ever
accused me of just laying there, he'd be right."
"I just thought that
having sex must be so wonderful, especially the first time I mean, and to be
tripping too, wow."
'To hell with wondering, babe, let's make it happen. You can fill Janice in later. With any luck, I can hear you brag about me the next time you all get together.'
"Sex is overrated,
especially when compared to tripping.
There isn't a cock in this world that I would trade for a good hit of
LSD."
"You've got to be
kidding?" asked Patti, having her virginal dreams smashed in one
conversation.
'Yeah Janice, you've got to be kidding,' echoed Eddie to himself.
"I don't want to fuck
up your shit when it comes time to having sex, Pat. Some guy will probably do that for you. Or maybe not, who knows?
You may wait and find Mister Wonderful, and then you can set me straight over a hit of acid. If that happens though, you're doin' the
supplin' and the buyin'."
"You got it. But what's so bad about sex?"
"It's not bad, just
don't compare it to trippin'. After
you've done both, we'll have this conversation again. You're here to have your first trip, not your first fuck! Remember?"
'Who says?' thought Eddie, starting to get upset with his sister's train of thought.
"You're right, of
course," replied Patti, much to Eddie's dismay.
"You bet I'm
right. Now what say I light up another
doobie, to take the frizzies off a little?"
"You're the boss,"
answered Patti.
'No, I'm the boss, dammit! And before this little trip of yours is over, you'll know it. Janice knows it too, but she ain't talking. You two can share that later and put it a pipe and smoke it for all I care. Long as you both agree on the truth, and I will be your truth baby.'
5
Eddie watched as his sister
and Patti passed the joint back and forth between them selves, coughing harshly
between each pass. His patience was
beginning to wear thin, especially since neither seemed to be in a talking mood
anymore. They might be having the time
of their lives smoking dope and 'tripping' as they called it, but he was bored,
and tired of sitting in one place. He
was hot, and becoming very thirsty, to the point that beer was even beginning
to sound good. He toyed with the
thought of leaving, but the predatory part of his mind reminded him that all
good things come to those who wait. He
resigned himself to staying to the end, and quietly shifted positions again to
help relieve the cramping in his legs.
He had barely gotten comfortable again when Patti suddenly stood up.
"What's up,
Patti?" asked a surprised Janice, who had just been brought back to earth
by her friend's sudden movement. She
had been way out there, almost to the point of no return. Part of her felt upset for being brought
back, but somehow she remembered that she was in charge of Patti's first
trip. A responsibility she did not take
lightly.
"I gotta pee,"
said Patti, as if the whole world would come to a stop just so she could
perform the function.
"Happens to the best of
us," replied Janice.
"I'll be right
back."
"I'll go with
you," said Janice.
"Look Janice, I love
you and everything, and I know I'm trippin' my brains out, but I think I can
handle this myself."
"Cool. Just don't get too close to the river bank,
okay?"
"Yes mommy,"
giggled Patti, as she headed down the trail along the river in the opposite
direction from the other girls.
Janice watched as Patti
slowly walked down the well-worn path, stopping occasionally to observe
something new that she had never seen under the influence of LSD. She smiled to herself, decided that Patti
was having the trip of her life, and opted to just let her explore a little on
her own. She knew that in the end,
tripping was about being alone, and getting a chance to find your self.
The true wonderment of
psychedelic drugs was the fact that it removed all of the blinders that
civilization had put on you over the course of your adolescence. For once you were not only old enough and
mobile enough to check out your own world as it were, but you were free to do
it without the inbred prejudices of your parents, religion and culture. She reminded herself not to let Patti be
alone for too long, in case she found herself in uncharted waters that might
scare the living hell out of her. She
had seen that happen too, and sometimes the person never came all the way
back. She chuckled to herself. Maybe she had never came all of the way back
her self? She laid her head down and tried
to resume her previous mindset. Just
for a little while….
6
Eddie watched patiently as
Patti headed down the trail, alone. He
wasn't afraid of losing her, she obviously wasn't in any hurry, and he knew
these trails better than anyone. His
main focus was on his sister. He wanted
to make sure that she wasn't going to opt to follow Patti, and he needed a
window of opportunity to cover the open ground between himself and the next row
of trees that ran along his side of the trail Patti was following.
After what seemed an
eternity, but was only a scant minute, he decided Janice was comfortably
distracted and deep into her own high.
She hadn't moved since laying her head down in the grass.
'Thank God for dope', he whispered to himself, as he crept on all fours
and began moving to the edge of his cover.
Sweat was running down his brow and into his eyes, stinging, and making
it hard to focus. He wiped his forearm on
his pants, and then wiped the sweat from the corner of his eyes. Janice was still lying on her back, and from
his new vantage point he could tell that her eyes where closed. Perfect.
He sprinted towards the next
clump of small trees and brush, coming to a stop on one knee once he reached
the shadows. He could make out Patti
through the saplings ahead on the trail, and a quick glance at his sister
showed she hadn't heard a thing. He let
out a breath of relief, followed by two quick breaths of anticipation. He felt the surge of blood traveling to his
penis again, and within seconds he had begun to obtain another erection. The hunt was on.
Patti found herself totally
engrossed in the wonderment of virtually everything. One thing that any tripper will agree on is if things seem to get
boring, just change your surroundings, new stimuli is the key to a good
trip. Just moving fifty yards had brought
Patti into anther world. No longer in
the windblown open grass, her new world was one of shadows, and new smells
created by the hot, humid atmosphere of young trees and bushes. The difference in the smell of the air was
incredible, and she imagined she was in the deepest jungles of the Amazon. She paused for a moment to take everything
in. The setting sun still pierced the
leafy canopy, but was instantly broken into a multitude of laser-like
sunbeams. There was just enough dust in
the air to be illuminated by the sun, creating effects that she had never really seen before. Better than
any rock concert, better than… better than anything she had ever
experienced. Period. She too had been down to the river hundreds
of times before, but now everything seemed so foreign. She might as well be in another country,
lost, a stranger in a strange world, without the apprehension of the unknowing.
She bent down to more
closely observe an ant slowly making it's way across her path. She marveled at its ability to carry some
crumb of something unrecognizable twice it's size and still maintain a steady
beeline towards its destination. She
chuckled at the thought. An ant making a beeline. Her mind ran
off on a tangent, wondering whether an ant actually called it a beeline, or
whether it should be called an antline, or it actually had a concept of the
word line. Did it even give a rat's ass? Did it even know what a rat's ass was? Did it even care? Her mind raced on at a thousand thoughts per minute until the
pain of her bending over and putting pressure on her bladder brought her back
to reality.
"God, I have to
pee," she said out loud. Her own
words seemed to startle her, breaking the peace of mind she had slipped into so
deeply. At first all sound seemed to
disappear as her voice bounced from leaf to leaf, and branch to branch. Then, one by one, the sounds around her
re-established themselves. First came
the wind rustling through the trees. Then
the sounds of the birds she realized were all around her, providing the
background music for her trip, and she felt some remorse for not noticing them
sooner. There was another sound, like
the raking of leaves, and a quick snap of a small twig. She turned her head slightly in that
direction while acknowledging the fact that the sound was somehow out of the
normal symphony of the moment. She
decided it was merely one of the many critters around. Perhaps it was a squirrel, or one of the
other oversized rodents that roamed area.
Part of her, perhaps an old instinctive reflex developed back in the
days of the caveman, told her to pursue that particular sound. But then the overwhelming rush of the waters
of the Loup River came into her ears, desperately reminding her of why she had
set out on this journey in the first place.
"God, I still have to
pee!" she exclaimed, breaking into uncontrollable laughter that she found
as fascinating as the ant that had now managed to make his way across the trail
and into the smaller plants.
Eddie heaved a sigh of
relief, fearing that he had given himself away. He thought he had been more than careful in his stalking of the
drug crazed female, but he had been mistaken.
He made a mental note to be filed away for future reference.
Never underestimate the hearing
sensitivity of someone on LSD.
Patti turned around, doing a
complete three hundred and sixty degree turn, looking for anyone who might be
around before she went about the chore of going to the bathroom. She could wait no longer, as she stepped off
of the trail a couple of steps into the darker shade and began to drop her
faded cutoffs and panties in one swift movement.
Eddie couldn't believe that
things were going his way so well after sitting so long listening to your basic
girlie-girl drug induced high school babble.
His erection came to a peak as he watched his sister's friend lower her
pants down to her knees, legs spread apart as far as her shorts would allow,
and crouch down into position. Although
there was plenty of foliage between where he lay and the other side of the
trail where Patti was relieving herself, he could still see traces of her light
brown pubic hair.
It drove Eddie nuts to be
watching the scene, and he almost felt as if he was going to ejaculate as he
heard the hissing sound of her urine begin to strike the ground.
Was it really a hissing
sound, he asked himself? No. It was a pissing sound he
decided, hence the word. Guys take a leak. Theirs was the not so
powerful sound of a small water hose attacking anything laid in its path, or found
it self being the focus of their hapless aim.
Girls pissed. It was a kind of indiscriminate spraying to
merely relieve them selves, definitely nothing of more importance. How could there be, he reminded himself? There was nothing to grab hold of. Nothing to really be proud of, or
admire. They didn't have a tool, so to speak. Merely a petcock of an orifice allowing them
selves to drain their reservoir, similar to the valve in the bottom of any
common car radiator.
For a moment he almost felt
a small twinge of remorse for womankind, but quickly reassessed the matter and
reminded himself that although they would never know the pleasure of urinating the
way a man did, they were still sitting on a gold mine. An untapped gold mine, he reminded himself,
as he felt his penis reach what he knew must be a new record length. He grabbed the bulge in his pants and
squeezed it as hard as could.
'You ready big guy?' he whispered.
Patti found herself totally
enthralled at the feeling that taking a pee could bring. It wasn't anything sexual, but the immense
feeling of release was almost unbearable.
She looked down between her legs and watched as the stream of almost
clear urine made it's way towards the trail, leaving a trace of white foam as
it went in it's gravitational search for the low ground. The occasional sunbeam lit the bubbles in
the foam, as she watched some of them pop like the soap bubbles she had blown
into the wind from the cheap plastic bubble pipes as a child. She couldn't believe that taking a piss
could be such a cosmic experience.
Eddie continued to watch
her, spellbound at the thought of her squatting there with her pants wrapped
around her knees, seemingly just for his own personal enjoyment. He had been amazed at how long she had
continued, but suddenly became aware that she was almost through as the urine
stream began to ebb.
Without hesitation he leapt
to his feet, and began to traverse the short distance between himself and his
prey, leaping over the brush without any concerns for the noise he was
making. He moved liked a lion springing
for the kill, and Patti barely had time to look up and see him descending upon
her before it was too late.
7
Eddie could not believe the quantity
of adrenaline flowing through his body as he bounded through the brush, with
the exposed and vulnerable teenage girl directly in his sights. At this particular moment in time he felt
that if he had the benefit of the smallest springboard, he could probably
launch himself all the way to the moon.
With that thought in mind, he leaped with all the strength his legs
could deliver, even before he had crossed the path between himself and Patti.
He fell a little short of
his goal, and landed across the bottom of her left shin. Luckily, between the element of surprise,
and his left hand quickly finding her mouth as he fell, she wasn't able to
scream a warning audible over the rush of the river. He could sense from the movement of her lips that she was trying
to bite his hand, so he cupped it in a manner that put his tender palm just out
of the reach of her teeth. He applied
more pressure to her face, and that seemed to make it even harder for her to
bite him.
Eddie found himself in
heaven. Which, in Eddie's terminology,
meant total control. Patti couldn't
speak, couldn't run, and couldn't….
Attack, was what he was about to say to himself, as she kneed him in the
ribs, causing the air to rush involuntarily out of his lungs.
He clamped down harder on
her face, knowing that Janice wasn't that away, and used her head to pull him self
farther on top of her. This was where
he had wanted to land in the first place, although for different reasons. Now he just wanted to get his vital organs
out of the reach of her potentially deadly knee. She struggled more, jerking her head back and forth, still trying
to kick at him. His new position made
everything impossible for her, but the energy she had obtained from the
combination of fear and LSD made her try all the harder.
"Calm down,
Patti," Eddie whispered harshly.
"This doesn't have to be difficult. I just wanted to scare you, that's all."
'Eddie! It was Janice's little
brother Eddie doing this to her, but why?
Why now?' she asked herself, in a mass of psychedelic confusion.
"Just calm down,
okay?" asked Eddie, trying to get her to relax for a while. At first, he realized that his plan has
failed, and then he acknowledged the fact that he never really had a plan to
begin with. Not in the end anyway. All he really had was a hard-on and one of
sister's friends spread eagled beneath him.
'Not that it couldn't work', he reminded himself.
"Just promise me that
won't scream, and I'll let you up," he lied, unconvincingly.
Patti struggled even
harder. Her mind was awash with a
thousand inputs, all of them bad. Her
first, second, and third reactions were to just freak out. She bucked up and down, and twisted from
side to side, all the while trying to get a piece of Eddie's flesh between her
teeth. The transition from the galactic
peacefulness of taking her first leak on acid to the harsh reality of being pinned
down in the bushes was too much for her.
When she closed her eyes, lightning bolts of every color imaginable
flashed across the bright red backdrop of her eyelids, exploding into fireballs
of what she perceived to be raw energy.
Whether it was mind over matter, or merely the pure adrenaline provided
by the 'fight-or-flight' mechanisms within her body, she managed to shake her
head out of Eddie's grasp.
"Help!" she tried
to scream at the top of her lungs, before Eddie had a chance to cover her face
again. This time he wasn't so lucky,
for the meaty part of his lower palm slid right into her open mouth. Even though her eyes were still clenched
shut, she tasted the dirty, salty flavor of his hand and bit down with a fury
that would have shamed any Great White shark in a feeding frenzy.
Eddie howled in pain,
reeling back enough to make her open her eyes, as he grabbed his bleeding hand.
"You fucking
bitch! You'll pay for this!" he
snarled, totally forgetting where he was, or what kind of predicament he was
in, or even how anyone else might perceive the situation to be. His temper flared past the red zone and into
uncharted waters. His eyes began to
glow red and cast a slight orange glow on the nearest plant leaves and Patti's
shaded, tear streaked face.
Seeing the rage in Eddie's
eyes, Patti realized this might be her only chance to get away from the monster
upon her. She reached out with her
hands to try and get enough leverage to bounce Eddie the rest of the way off of
her and he ruthlessly slapped her across the face.
She had never been hit so
hard in her life, and what had once been colorful lightning bolts of power were
now transformed into shooting stars of pain.
She was sobbing so hard she couldn't get out another scream. He slapped her again, harder this time. She tried to clench her hands into fists to
ward off the pain, pulling up a tuft of crab grass in one, but finding
something firm and cool in the other.
He slapped her again, knocking her head to the side where she could see
the hard object in her hand. She blinked
three times before she could focus through her tears. It was a stone, a big, beautiful, two-pound stone.
Suddenly she felt her legs
being spread apart. At first she didn't
comprehend what was about to happen, until she saw the blurry image of Eddie kneeling
between her legs, then the unmistakable sound of a zipper being ripped open.
'My God, he's going to rape me', she realized in slow motion horror.
Eddie fell on her, knocking
the wind out again, simultaneously reaching his hand under her tube top and
squeezing one of her breasts. She
winced in pain while he pinched her nipple as if snapping off the tips of newly
picked pea pods. She could feel his
erection pressing against the inside of her right thigh.
"They say you never
forget your first, bitch, and Triple E's here to make sure you never do!"
he said to her, his face just inches from her own. With that said, he thrust his penis at her as if he was a matador
trying to spear a bull, but he glanced off of her pubic mound and ground his
testicles into her pelvic bone. Again
he howled in pain.
He took his eyes off of
Patti long enough to reach down between his legs and grab his manhood, wanting
to be sure he penetrated her this time.
When he looked up again to enjoy the expression on her face as he
prepared to rape her, all he saw was a blur in the corner of his left eye.
Patti nailed him right along
the side of his cheek with the rock, sending him flying off his knees and to
one side of her. She wasted no time in
admiring her handiwork; instead she flipped to her hands and knees and began
scrambling away form Eddie. Once out of
reach, she stumbled to her feet, struggling to get her shorts back on, and trying
to run at the same time. Eddie was
blocking her access to the trail, so she ran in the opposite direction, clawing
her way through the brush and small trees that lined the river. It didn't occur to her to scream again until
she broke through the bushes, only to find herself a few yards from the steep
riverbank. Her forward momentum was too
much to stop, and the next thing she knew she was flying the last few feet into
the fast running water. Then that she
screamed, with all her might, a long echoing shriek that even the fear of being
beaten and raped could not hold back.
Patti could not swim!
8
Eddie managed to get to his
feet by the time he heard the scream, followed by a loud splash. His head was throbbing and the side of his
face burned as if he had fallen asleep on a waffle griddle. He cursed himself as he refocused on his
current situation. He began to panic,
not knowing what to do. Should he run
away? Seemed like a good idea. And leave a crazy teenage girl to run around
screaming she had been raped by the Triple E?
Okay, scratch that idea. Maybe
he could catch up with her, and scare her into silence. He had pulled that one off before. Why not again?
"Patti? Where are you? Patti. Answer me damn
it!"
It
was Janice. She must have heard Patti's
last scream. Hell, everyone in Platte
County must have heard that scream, he reminded himself. Eddie's panic level increased twofold.
"Patti?" came his
sister's call again, obviously closer this time.
Eddie took off towards the
river, with no real plan. He just had
to put some space between him self and his sister so he could think his way out
of this. He also needed to get to Patti
before Janice did. This was going to be
close. He began following the bent and
broken branches that clearly marked the direction Patti had traveled. He heard his sister in the background again,
perhaps even closer than before.
"Patti! Don't be playing games with me now. Answer me damn it!"
Eddie began to run too, just
as Patti had. And he found himself in
exactly the same predicament as she had when he burst into the open at the edge
of the river. His only advantage was
the fact that he could swim like an Olympian, and he quickly converted his fall
into a nearly perfect dive, breaking the surface of the water head first with a
minimum splash. The cold water startled
him, but it was far from paralyzing. He
arched his back and kicked his feet until he quickly popped up to the surface.
Eddie had always found
swimming to be enjoyable, for it was one of the few normal things he really excelled in. But even he normally stayed away from the swift currents of the
Loup River in this area, mainly because there weren't any decent places to get
back out of the water. Rightfully so,
Eddie kept himself pretty much centered in the current, watching for signs of
Patti, realizing that he could no longer hear his sister in the
background. A person could carefully
guide them self towards one bank or the other, if they knew what they were
doing. But that might lead to being
speared by a low hanging branch or worse yet, getting trapped in some old brush
from the summer before, hidden just beneath the water. He decided to 'go with the flow', so to
speak, and wait it out for calmer water.
It proved to be the wisest choice.
The next morning, he came up
with an excuse for the bruise on his face, not that anyone was really pressing
the issue. The whole town was in an
uproar over the 'unexplainable loss' of Patricia Warner. Search parties went out through the day and
night. The 'Pack' explained that they
didn't know where she had run to, although yes, they had been 'drinking'.
Two days later, a fisherman
found Patricia Warner, her cutoffs snagged on one of the enormous hooks on the
catfish trotline he had set out the same evening that Patti had
disappeared. All but one person in
Platte County decided there had been no foul play and the matter was quickly
explained away as an accident. That one
person was Janice, of course. She had
headed down a different side trail after not getting a response from Patti,
towards the riverbank, just a few yards upstream from where Eddie had attacked
her. She had gotten to the bank just in
time to see her brother catapulting into the Loup River. From his reactions over the next few days,
she could tell that it hadn't been a coincidence. Anymore than Patti's death had been an accident.
It seemed to her that one by
one, Eddie had been taking the lives of the people that meant the most to
her. He was a monster, and the tragic
thing with monsters was, you couldn't get anyone to stop them until you got
them first to believe in their existence.
She had been there, and tried that.
It was very clear to her that there was really only two ways for her to
escape the hellish predicament she found herself in. One was to kill Eddie her self.
The other was to run away, as far as she could go, as soon as she could
find someone to take her. Realizing
that she didn't stand a chance against Eddie on a one to one basis, she opted
for the latter.