Some Creature
Posted by Steve Bagley
She hopped down the steps, ducked the lowest branches of the pine tree and slid up next to her truck bed, where she—in one fluid motion—swung the weight of her backpack up with one arm, and threw it into the back. She paused—pivoted on her toes—and satisfactorily swung her head around towards him, her dark hair was so long that even as she was glaring at him, it was still following and landing all around her. She was barefoot in low-cut, brown and patched corduroys and she wore no top—perky little breasts pointing up, set well on a slender body—which, as it seemed to the boy—was built for mountain climbing and aggressive lovemaking.
“Get in,” she said to him, before whistling a sharp perfect whistle to call her German Shepard, who sprinted from under the porch and headed out onto the dirt road and out of sight. “She knows the location.”
He shrugged and pulled himself into the girl’s boyfriend’s truck and opened a bottle of beer. He too, wore only a pair of jeans, and he, was not her boyfriend. She started the engine, clicked on the headlights and tore out onto the dirt road shifting gears deliberately. The night was muggy and warm, and the sky was bruised purple overhead—but clear on the horizons. The dirt road turned into a dirt path and she sped the truck up, lumping and careening over rocks and dirt, skidding around narrow turns—tree branches snapping by on the windshield.
The path was so treacherous that the boy was spilling beer all over himself and whacking his head on the ceiling while she watched in secret delight—seemingly paying no attention to her task at hand. She kept looking over at him, never quite smirking and never taking her eyes off of him as she drove through this impossible path in the dark—she was—undoubtedly—trying to scare him. And it became clear to him, that she had been successful in doing so with many other men. But he wasn’t other men—he knew this—and he often thought himself the wolf.
Several times the path would abruptly end and she would throw all her weight with two hands on the wheel and whip the vehicle around, sliding the tail out in the mud just in time, giggling to herself as she watched him gripping onto the door handle. Each sliding turn would send the backpack, ropes, karabiners, hammers, and engine parts sliding into the walls of the truck bed—tires gripping and tearing mud in the smudged night.
All the boy saw was this slender, puppy-eyed, half-naked girl in terrifying control here, in these unfamiliar rattlesnake mountains in the middle of an unknown night that did not belong to him. He would have been terrified, just as she would have liked, but her lips hypnotized him the same way a campfire makes a man forget where he is if he stares at it long enough. She had those lips, and you know the kind, lips so round, pursed and rosaceous that, without trying, were always in the shape of a kiss, and, if in some other place and time you drove by a gas station and saw her waiting coolly in the passenger seat of her poor boyfriend’s truck while he was inside paying for gas—and saw her brown smooth neck coming off her wiry smooth shoulders, hair up in a dark bouncy ponytail, perspiring in a white tank top, with huge round sunglasses sitting on a little nose like she just don’t care, round tomato slice lips like a porcelain doll, so patient and badass—wondering quietly to herself what it would be like to kill a bank teller with a hunting knife as she sits in this passenger seat and pushes wisps of hair behind her ear—and damn those lips—you would drive happily into a culvert as you futilely imagined your own lips pressed up against hers.
The girl drove to a clearing just above some docks. The two hopped out and made their way carefully down a steep path leading to the lake. They stepped out onto the dock—and across the lake she could see her favorite mountains silhouetted with inky purple darkness and a mist creeping over the glassy surface. Her dog was waiting for her. She squatted down and cupped water onto her face and bare chest—just soaking in the dream-effect that late night misty mountain lakes have on unadjusted eyes.
She pulled her pants off and dove in. The boy followed suit. They swam and splashed around for a while, then pulled themselves out of the water.
“I meant to ask earlier, what happened to your knee?” said the boy, pointing at a long gash as she stood there in her own starkness.
“I slipped on the cliff today and whacked it good, before regaining composure and finishing the climb.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Yes.”
“That’s almost as good as tears,” said the boy, knowing full well who he was talking to.
She walked up to him in the dark and pressed her goose pimpled body up against his, and kissed him once. And whispered into his ear.
“You will never see tears come from me.”
She kissed him again, this time with her tongue, and dove back into the water. The boy stood on the dock—just dripping wet in his own starkness.
“How come I’ll never see tears come from you?” He yelled to her, musingly.
“Because little boy.” She was floating alone in the water. “I’m a wolf.”
She hopped down the steps, ducked the lowest branches of the pine tree and slid up next to her truck bed, where she—in one fluid motion—swung the weight of her backpack up with one arm, and threw it into the back. She paused—pivoted on her toes—and satisfactorily swung her head around towards him, her dark hair was so long that even as she was glaring at him, it was still following and landing all around her. She was barefoot in low-cut, brown and patched corduroys and she wore no top—perky little breasts pointing up, set well on a slender body—which, as it seemed to the boy—was built for mountain climbing and aggressive lovemaking.
“Get in,” she said to him, before whistling a sharp perfect whistle to call her German Shepard, who sprinted from under the porch and headed out onto the dirt road and out of sight. “She knows the location.”
He shrugged and pulled himself into the girl’s boyfriend’s truck and opened a bottle of beer. He too, wore only a pair of jeans, and he, was not her boyfriend. She started the engine, clicked on the headlights and tore out onto the dirt road shifting gears deliberately. The night was muggy and warm, and the sky was bruised purple overhead—but clear on the horizons. The dirt road turned into a dirt path and she sped the truck up, lumping and careening over rocks and dirt, skidding around narrow turns—tree branches snapping by on the windshield.
The path was so treacherous that the boy was spilling beer all over himself and whacking his head on the ceiling while she watched in secret delight—seemingly paying no attention to her task at hand. She kept looking over at him, never quite smirking and never taking her eyes off of him as she drove through this impossible path in the dark—she was—undoubtedly—trying to scare him. And it became clear to him, that she had been successful in doing so with many other men. But he wasn’t other men—he knew this—and he often thought himself the wolf.
Several times the path would abruptly end and she would throw all her weight with two hands on the wheel and whip the vehicle around, sliding the tail out in the mud just in time, giggling to herself as she watched him gripping onto the door handle. Each sliding turn would send the backpack, ropes, karabiners, hammers, and engine parts sliding into the walls of the truck bed—tires gripping and tearing mud in the smudged night.
All the boy saw was this slender, puppy-eyed, half-naked girl in terrifying control here, in these unfamiliar rattlesnake mountains in the middle of an unknown night that did not belong to him. He would have been terrified, just as she would have liked, but her lips hypnotized him the same way a campfire makes a man forget where he is if he stares at it long enough. She had those lips, and you know the kind, lips so round, pursed and rosaceous that, without trying, were always in the shape of a kiss, and, if in some other place and time you drove by a gas station and saw her waiting coolly in the passenger seat of her poor boyfriend’s truck while he was inside paying for gas—and saw her brown smooth neck coming off her wiry smooth shoulders, hair up in a dark bouncy ponytail, perspiring in a white tank top, with huge round sunglasses sitting on a little nose like she just don’t care, round tomato slice lips like a porcelain doll, so patient and badass—wondering quietly to herself what it would be like to kill a bank teller with a hunting knife as she sits in this passenger seat and pushes wisps of hair behind her ear—and damn those lips—you would drive happily into a culvert as you futilely imagined your own lips pressed up against hers.
The girl drove to a clearing just above some docks. The two hopped out and made their way carefully down a steep path leading to the lake. They stepped out onto the dock—and across the lake she could see her favorite mountains silhouetted with inky purple darkness and a mist creeping over the glassy surface. Her dog was waiting for her. She squatted down and cupped water onto her face and bare chest—just soaking in the dream-effect that late night misty mountain lakes have on unadjusted eyes.
She pulled her pants off and dove in. The boy followed suit. They swam and splashed around for a while, then pulled themselves out of the water.
“I meant to ask earlier, what happened to your knee?” said the boy, pointing at a long gash as she stood there in her own starkness.
“I slipped on the cliff today and whacked it good, before regaining composure and finishing the climb.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Yes.”
“That’s almost as good as tears,” said the boy, knowing full well who he was talking to.
She walked up to him in the dark and pressed her goose pimpled body up against his, and kissed him once. And whispered into his ear.
“You will never see tears come from me.”
She kissed him again, this time with her tongue, and dove back into the water. The boy stood on the dock—just dripping wet in his own starkness.
“How come I’ll never see tears come from you?” He yelled to her, musingly.
“Because little boy.” She was floating alone in the water. “I’m a wolf.”
This entry was posted by Ben Myers, on
Friday, June 02, 2006.
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