Sex and Murder Magazine

By Aaron J. French

Rumors of a man stalking women along the Rialto Riverside Fitness Path.

This is what was said: The man crouched in the bushes beside the path, masturbating, but withholding his orgasm until a woman came along. Then he’d spring out from behind the bush, open his coat (under which he was naked), and ejaculate all over her.

Because of this, Alice had tried to schedule her runs for before sundown. But that wasn’t always possible. Her teaching schedule was too hectic. Plus she hosted an after-school poetry club. Then she had to pick up Tommy from his father’s house.

Tonight, as she stretched her legs by the outset of the path, the sun was setting in the west and night was falling fast.

She adjusted her iPod headphones, as Meredith emerged from the trees, breasts bouncing beneath her sweatshirt. “Hey, Alice,” she said.

“Hey. Finishing up?”

“Uh-huh. Headin’ out?”

“Yep. Wish I’d gotten an earlier start, but my poetry club ran late again. Blake and Wordsworth.”

Meredith smiled, nodded, eyes blank. None of Alice’s friends knew who Wordsworth was.

“How’s Tommy?”

“Good,” Alice said. “Probably reading comic books in his room right now.”

The redhead smiled, then turned toward her minivan, which was parked next to Alice’s Ford Taurus. “Have a good run,” she said. “It’ll be dark soon, so be careful. I’m sure you heard about that jizz creep.”

“I heard.”

Meredith got into her minivan, reversed, waved, sped away. Alice took a deep breath and secured her headphones. The tarmac path unfurled before her, mesquite trees twisting out of the ground on either side. A bone-dry riverbed lay on her left.

She selected the Talking Heads’ album ’77 on her iPod. The opening chords of “Uh-oh, Love Comes to Town” filled her ears, then the familiar groove kicked in. She clipped the iPod to her belt, ran the headphone wire beneath her shirt, and started jogging.

After half a mile, the sky was black and cloudless, stars coming out of it, the moon sliced up like a cantaloupe. After a whole mile, there was darkness in the trees.

Bored with the Talking Heads, she stopped and switched over to Patti Smith’s “Horses.” She glanced back, resuming her jog—thought she saw movement in the bushes and cacti.

Probably a coyote, she told herself. Or a javelina.

She continued on, the empty river following beside her, looking like a giant hairy snake. Patti Smith’s tantalizing vocals commanded her attention, helped her get into the zone. Her feet landed rhythmically on the path.

Reaching the two mile point, where a stone bench stood beside a drinking fountain—she noticed a shadowy bulk sitting on the bench.

Her heart fluttered. Someone was there, shrouded in darkness, black form with slouching posture.

He’ll be gone when I get there, she thought.

But no, someone was definitely…

She slowed her gait, switched off the iPod, pulled back the headphones. The wind circled about her. She could see the black outline, unmoving, yet seeming to…droop.

“Hello?”

A choir of bugs erupted in the riverbed. She nearly screamed, turning with a hand to her mouth. When she looked back, the figure was gone.

The bench was vacant.

I imagined it, she thought.

How long you been doing this now? Seven years? And how often do shadows trick you? That’s right, all the time.

She walked to the drinking fountain, took a drink. It was true that nighttime in the desert warped your perceptions.

It’s the stalker. He was sitting there stroking his phallus waiting for you, bringing himself to climax but saving it.

Stop, she told the voice. Don’t say another word.

She scrolled through the albums on her iPod, seeking something light to bring her home. She cursed her yesterday-self for downloading all these nostalgic mp3s. All this late-seventies proto-punk new-wave, a time when she was young, wild, free.

Elvis Costello and the Attractions. Armed Forces. Best she could do.

“Accidents Will Happen” jumped into her ears. The world grew darker, the scraggly tree limbs, the stars, the weeds, the sticker plants—everything closed in to form a circular tunnel.

As she jogged, she found herself thinking about Tommy; he’d seemed preoccupied when she picked him up. Ted’s new wife, Emily, the bitch, claimed Ted was running an errand. Alice hated when Tommy was left alone with Emily. He wasn’t her son, for Christ’s sake.

She’d better not lay a finger on him, or I’ll knock her ass into the middle of next week.

She suddenly hoped he was doing all right, hoped he wasn’t getting lonely without her. She felt like taking him in her arms, curling up on the couch, and watching a movie with him.

You do this every time you go jogging and every time he’s fine when you get back. The boy loves to read. He doesn’t mind being by himself.

A coyote loped across the path. It paid her no attention, but still, the sight of it made her jump. She waited for it to pass. When it seemed safe, she sprinted by without looking.

Someone cut off Elvis’s vocals mid-sneer.

She stopped, unhooked her iPod, and realized the battery was dead. She’d been so busy yesterday that she forgot to recharge it. She slipped off the headphones and stuck the iPod into her pocket. She’d have to finish her run in silence.

He came out of the settled shadows like lightning, knocking her across the chin. Her momentum was broken and, flashbulbs in her eyes, she fell onto her butt. Sat on the ground looking up, face sore, head dazed, while the man flung back his coat flaps and kneeled down.

Starlight illuminated his naked body; his phallus leaped into view, snakehead probing the dark. He put his weight on her, pinning her to the ground, knees clutching her sides. Lifting her shirt, batting her hands when she resisted.

He leaned forward, crushing her neck with his forearm, choking her. She felt the warm wrinkles of his scrotum against her bellybutton. He wrenched up her sports bra, exposing bare breasts.

Came immediately, pumping seed onto her chest. The stream of liquid sizzled like pan-fried butter, as he pressed harder, smashing fists and phallus against her skin.

He jerked up and down, grunting, and she felt the head of his penis touch her nipple. The next moment he was leaving, hugging his coat around him, dancing away, laughing in the night.

Done in less than a minute.

Reality rushed back. She’d been violated, and now she lay sprawled on the ground in the weeds, rocks, and sticker plants. The seed of some lunatic drying on her stomach.

Whatcha gonna do bout this one? said the voice in her head. Gonna run home to your kid and cry yourself to sleep? Maybe write a stupid poem, call it “Night of the Living Jerk-off?” Phone the police, be humiliated?

Something inside her snapped. She opened her mouth in a silent scream and beat her fists against the dirt till they bled.

Shut up shut up shut up shut up!

Wrenching down her shirt, she groped for a rock and found one, jumped to her feet, spun around. There he was, doing a celebratory dance along the path, his childish laughter echoing through the branches.

Motherfucker!

Driven by blind rage, she aimed the rock and let it soar through the darkness. Frame by frame, she watched as it found its mark. Oh now you’re in trouble, girl! You’d better run as fast as you can!

She whirled, arms flailing, feet sailing over the ground, as the man released a cry of pain, and started after her.

Twice she stumbled and fell but she kept going, her legs feeling like jelly. All she could think of was Tommy, how he was home alone, how she had to get back to him.

But the man was catching up to her. His breath came ragged, and occasionally he uttered a harsh, tittering laugh. Fingers dug into her hair, yanking her back. She yelped and fell to the ground, skinning her knees. His coat whirled open, offering glimpses of naked flesh. Somehow, unspeakably, he was erect again.

Blood poured down his face. “You think that was funny?” he snarled. “Hittin’ me with a rock?”

He ripped her forward by the hair, smashing her nose into his crotch. She gagged on the scent of semen and sweat. Pubic hairs entered her mouth, detached, clung to her lips and tongue.

“Maybe you wanna play more, is that it? Did our brief encounter get your juices going?”

Her teeth found the inside of his thigh and bit down. He screamed, striking her across the cheek. Pain exploded in her jaw. She toppled sideways, shoulder striking a rock. She saw stars.

“Bitch!” he growled.

She got to her feet and for an eerie moment they stood facing each other.

He grinned, flashing a crooked smile. “So, what do you wanna do now? More chase? I can dig that; I live for that. I suspect you wanna run, hide, and play hard to get. But deep down you want five guys penetrating you at once. You want them all cumming on you like you’re a giant jizz rag—”

“Yum yum, the stars out,” she said. “I’ll never forget how you smelled that night, like cheddar cheese under fluorescent light. Like day-old rainbow fish, what a dish.”

He took a step back. “What the hell is that?”

Alice advanced, alive with nature’s fury, the poem springing from her lips unbidden, un-recalled, but there: “I’m gonna peep in Bo’s bodice. Lay down darling don’t be modest. Let me slip my hand in. Ohhh that’s soft, that’s nice, that’s not used up. Ohhh don’t cry. Wet, what’s wet? Oh that. That’s just rain lambie pie. No don’t squirm, let me put my rubber on. I’m a wolf in a lambskin Trojan. Let’s deodorize the night.”

He retreated further. “Stop that, what are you saying?”

She took a giant leap forward, winding her leg like a soccer player. “That’s Patti Smith, motherfucker!”she said, sending her shinbone into his groin. Watching as his eyes widened and a tiny squeal escaped his lungs. He went to his knees, clutching himself, and started coughing.

She’d never punched a man before. Had never been hit by one either. But reciting Patti Smith’s poem had liberated her. It’d released the fiery, feminine spirit lying dormant in her since youth, since she’d begun acting like a proper, well-to-do lady.

But she remembered Judith Drake, Mary Robinson, Kate Chopin, Edith Wharton, The Feminine Mystique, Our Bodies Our Selves—all the female literature she’d read in college.

She had no memory of doing it, of beginning to do it, of refusing to cease until the man’s face resembled a tomato. It just happened. One at a time—left right, left right, like a boxer—she let the blows fly. His head jerked from side to side; her fingers jabbed into his eyes; her knuckles slammed into his lips; his cheeks tore open.

When his nose crunched, she thought she would be sick. She heard a loud noise, only to realize it was her own screams.

The man fell to the ground in a heap, mouth gasping, limbs twitching as he tried to stand. He glared at her. “Bitch, bitch, bitch,” he rambled, “bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch—”

Someone picked up a large rock and dropped it on his head. His brains exploded outward like a hurled egg. Eyeballs popped, rolled in the dirt. Someone did it. Wasn’t her, but someone…

Someone also rolled his breathless body into a bush, then stood by as two coyotes nosed around and discovered him…

Sobbing, Alice limped away. She looked down, saw she was covered in blood, and took off her shirt. She still felt his sticky semen on her chest.

I’ve got to get home, she thought, climbing into her Ford Taurus. My baby boy is waiting for me…