If You Liked School, You'll Love Work

Rattlesnakes

THE AIR CONDITIONER on the silver Dodge Durango had fucked up earlier: the filter and cooler malfunctioning. Instead of sweet, chilled air, it had inexplicably started blowing hot desert dust into the vehicle. It streaked their sweaty faces and hands, merging with the previous layers they’d kicked up during their weekend of intoxicated dancing madness. Throats, dehydrated by drug and desert, dried out even more, as tearless eyeballs burned. They had been forced to switch it off.

It had been a long trek out from the Burning Man festival, and a treacherous drive across these back desert roads. Now they were lost in this dust storm. Eugene’s spine was starting to hurt; his large linebackers frame uncomfortable in the seat. The dirt on his wet and slimy hands was turning to mud on the wheel and it was getting hotter all the time. His big chest rose and fell as his lungs struggled to fill up with the warm, dead air.

This damn Dodge of Scott’s! 40,567 miles on the clock and the fucking air con doesn’t even work!

As the storm continued to kick up, the sky growing murkier by the second, Eugene was feeling the sense of his own stupidity snapping at him like a rabid dog. The short cut hadn’t materialized and as far as he could make out there were no fellow travelers around of any description. Eugene studied his pasty, wan reflection in the mirror, his filthy hair scraped back in a ponytail, the sweat from it now running down his big forehead in rivulets of mud. Picking up an old white towel by his side, he wiped it, glad he couldn’t see his eyes under his shades. Fatigued beyond tiredness, Eugene pressed on as demons danced slowly in his peripheral vision. A bolt of lightning crackled in the phosphorous sky in front of him. He was unfit to drive; he was unfit for anything, he considered ruefully. The drugs and the sleep deprivation had taken him into a mildly psychotic status quo, which was now even starting to bore him. He was praying for clarity soon, both in the wild environment outside and in his troubled mind.

One thought was burning him: Scott and Madeline should be awake to take their turns at the wheel. But he knew they were on a different trajectory to him, and so he’d been stuck with the driving. Rancorous bile rose in Eugene’s gut as he pushed on. Thunder quaked and rumbled in his ears on top of a tinnitus bass line that he feared would stay with him forever.

This goddamn mess.

And Madeline. Asleep on the passenger seat next to him, his eyes straying onto her long, bare legs; tan augmented by surprisingly arousing streaks of muck, making her look dirty, real dirty, suggesting a mud-wrestling slut dried out and he could see those legs right up to the cutoff denim shorts… running towards him on some plowed-up field… her long, curling blond-brown hair cascading onto her shoulders, heavy with desert dust… dirty… filthy… running towards him…

It was hot.

It was goddamned hot.

Eugene glanced down at his groin, and swelling was already very much in evidence through his camouflage shorts. The storm had made visibility poor and he could really do without the further distraction. However, the rational side of his brain was shutting down and his eyes kept turning to the easy swell of Madeline’s breasts through her brown cotton tank top.

This goddamn cock-teasing bitch has been stringing me, and for all I know, Scott, along for days. Those lingering, enticing gazes. Then, when you get too close, she just freezes over.

After the festival they had elected to drive out to the desert for a yagé experience, looking to try out the contraband a Peruvian shaman had sold them. It had been Madeline who had spotted the tent of the Temple of the Mystic Light and insisted they attended the shamanic healing ceremony presented by one Luis Caesar Dominquez, self-styled Peruvian mystic. Madeline and Scott were more impressed by the slide show and lecture than Eugene, who had some good hits of X burning a hole in his pocket, and resented missing this German techno act he’d wanted to catch.

When it was over, Madeline thrust a pamphlet into his hand. — It says that Mr Dominquez trained for years with the Kallahuayas shamans of the northeast Lake Titicaca region, the Amautas of the islands of the Andes, and the Q’ero Elders of the Cusco region, who they reckon are last remaining descendants of the Incas!

Eugene shook his head as they stood outside the tent, watching the people file by. — I’m clueless about that kinda shit, he confessed. — Kallahuayas? Q’ero Elders? Means jack to me, he shrugged.

Madeline was unmoved. Eugene once had a sense that she found his open, straight-down-the-line, proud-to-be-a-dumbass act somewhat endearing. He resolved in future to be more circumspect in his ignorance. He recalled that old adage: it is better to remain silent and let people think you are an idiot, than to open your mouth and confirm this impression.

Scott was happy to pitch in. Eugene had almost forgotten how he read and preached all this New Age bullshit. He’d known him long enough to just tune him out when he started with that stuff. — It means he’s the Bill Gates of fucked-up shit, Scott grew animated. — It means he’s one of the top teachers who share ancient and hidden knowledge to awaken the latent healing abilities in everyone who’s ready. His eyes widened, big and spooky. This time Eugene listened with intent because he saw how much this crap was impressing Madeline. — It’s all based on an ancient Andean prophecy that is part of the Inca legend of the Pachacuti — a time when the world is turned upside down and a new consciousness emerges.

— I’ll bet the dude can get a hold of some good shit, Eugene conceded.

And that was when they’d approached Luis Caesar Dominquez, and the shaman had taken them back into his tent and discreetly sold them the yagé. Madeline and Scott were instantly smitten. To Eugene, under the ethnic garments, Dominquez looked as mystical as a vote-seeking politician, or a real-estate salesman.

But they had the yagé.

The setting was perfect; it had been a clear, cool night and they’d constructed a fire in the red soil and pitched up the big, easily erectable, family-sized tent they’d shared at the festival. Scott and Madeline had gotten very excited, and as they looked expectantly at the cups, they seemed high already. Almost in spite of himself, Eugene couldn’t help pissing on their parade. — That Dominquez guy is just a glorified drug dealer. He’s got access to that shit and knows how to harvest and prepare it into the elixir. And he goes around with that lame slide show calling it enlightenment. Fuck, man! I should’ve done that the time I got busted for dealing coke in that shithouse on Haight; just given the judge a power-point presentation and talked about energy and go-getting, he laughed, exposing his big, capped teeth, replaced at cost after a college football training accident a few years ago. — That’s if this shit is yagé, he added, then forced another smile as he saw Madeline looking grimly at him.

Inside each capful was a reddish-brown concoction. Scott took some first, with the others following suit. It tasted bitter and salty. They all drank a second cupful, as recommended by the shaman Dominquez, who had told them that it should produce an experience lasting three or four hours. Then, if so desired, they could drink some more.

The nausea seemed to hit Scott first. He staggered to his feet and moved over to a line of big rocks where he started barfing up. Eugene was just about to shout ‘pussy’ at him, when he was overcome by a sickening, queasy sensation, which seemed to start in the balls of his feet. Soon he, and then Madeline, were staggering toward the pile of rocks as they threw up small quantities of intensely caustic liquid, in short, wrenching spasms.

The shaman had warned them about this vomiting effect, but it certainly wasn’t pleasant. The liquid had tasted far fouler coming back up than it had on the way down, and was so bad that they were all feverishly shuddering for a few seconds.

Then the effects started to take a hold of them. Scott and Madeline began to space out, giggling and euphoric. But Eugene was disappointed. He’d been expecting a really heavy trip and in the event it was all pretty mild. He took another cup. Then another. He didn’t feel bad, but it was obvious that for Scott and Madeline it was the mind-blowing high of a lifetime. Eugene looked around the barren desert, and tried to see what they were seeing. He felt like a ragged urchin pressed against the window of a great, opulent house where a raging, decadent party was taking place. He upped his consumption to six cups of the elixir and felt his heartbeat race, but the big doors of the mansion house stayed fastened shut. Why was he excluded? Eugene had done big hallucinogenic acid trips with Scott and even, recently, Madeline. He knew that both were seasoned acid-heads. But they had their set of keys. Where were his?

As he sat wondering what to do next, Eugene heard Scott reciting something to an open-mouthed Madeline as the pair of them sat side by side, looking into the sky, — ‘When the Eagle once again flies with the Condor, a lasting peace will reign in the Americas and will spread throughout the world to unite humanity.’ These words are from the Andean shamans who believe we’re living in the Pachacuti; a time when we must go within and know ourselves more deeply, to heal our emotional wounds of the past, and use the power of that healing to help others in their healing.

— That is sooo awesome, Madeline gasped. She pointed upward. — Lookit that sky…

While they were taking off onto another astral plane, all Eugene had done was to shit: loads and loads of it, deposited with the puke behind the closest big boulders in the rock-strewn terrain. He’d listened for a while to Scott going on about the internal purging actions of the drug, and then simply lain down in the tent for the best sleep of his life. Meanwhile, Scott and Madeline hallucinated, partied and talked till dawn. Something in Eugene had resisted the trip, and that concerned him. He recalled Dominquez saying in his lecture, though, that the drug often got you where you needed it. Eugene conceded that his body, with all the charlie and booze he’d indulged in recently, was crying out for a cleansing. Since splitting up with Lana, he’d taken up residence in several North Beach neighborhood bars, his psychosis drawing in on him, the walls of those temples of liberation shrinking to become prison cells. His jailers were the other drinkers and their obsessions. They would crowd his head with their stupid advice. He needed to get out of town for a bit, and Burning Man seemed to fit the bill.

It had been Scott’s idea. Madeline had come along, in her usual pushy way, Eugene thought, although he had very much welcomed it. He had tentatively lined her up as a possible replacement for Lana.

Eugene and Scott, old college buddies, had met Madeline last Halloween. They were drinking in Vesuvio’s Bar when she came in with three girlfriends. All of them were dressed as Storm from the X-Men; skintight black catsuits, big boots and platinum-blond wigs. At first all the girls looked identical. It was a while before Eugene recognized one as Candy, a student and an ex-co-worker in a North Beach tavern he once bartended in.

They all chatted sociably, drinking some more before heading off to join the packed throngs of revelers on Castro. Eugene had found himself talking a lot to Madeline, but in the crowd they had all gotten separated from each other. As the night wore on, the carnival mood on the streets had then turned sour. One man was fatally stabbed as a small mob of Mexican youths rampaged through the crowd. They had taken exception to what they perceived as the hijacking of the ancient Day of the Dead ceremony by the city’s gay community. Paranoia hung heavily in the air. There was a lot of jostling and screaming and Eugene, who was on a nasty coke comedown anyway, had been happy to call it a night and head home. That night he thought of that hot chick — they were all hot in that Storm get-up but the one he’d talked to — and wondered if he’d see her again and hoped that she’d gotten home okay with all the trouble of that night.

Eugene needn’t have concerned himself. After this, he seemed to keep running into Madeline. The next day he saw her in Washington Square Park, practicing t’ai chi on her own. He’d been sitting reading a newspaper. She waved at him and it took a while for Eugene to connect that she was one of the Storm girls at the bar the previous evening. After a bit she came over and they went for a coffee, discussing the previous night’s events with concern. Then he saw her again a couple of days after, in the City Lights bookstore. They went for a drink, which quickly became several; trawling some neighborhood bars they both knew, ending up in a place on Grant. Despite Madeline being quite new to town (she’d told him she’d come in from Cleveland at the end of last summer), they had a few mutual haunts and wondered how it was that they hadn’t run into each other before. They planned to go for some sushi, but somehow ended up at a dive bar on Broadway, sandwiched between strip clubs and sex shops that buzzed with neon. Eugene was impressed that Madeline was totally at ease there, even though she was the only woman present who wasn’t obviously touting for business. They’d talked about sex then, but in an abstract way, as he was at the time too depressed about the Lana situation to make a move.

They started hanging out a lot together: Madeline, Eugene, and Scott. Even at the time, he thought it was weird the way she fussed over them like they were fags, bought them little presents and cards on their birthdays and the like. When Scott had mentioned the Burning Man trip to Eugene, she’d interjected, — Count me in! with such bushy-tailed zeal that it would have been an injurious snub not to do just that.

And while Eugene was rapt in his anticipation, Scott appeared downcast. He liked to engineer what he called ‘buddy time’. A frat-boy thing, Eugene supposed.

The developing relationship with Madeline was mystifying to him, though. Eugene was twenty-six and had never been friends with a chick he hadn’t banged. He wondered whether she was a dyke, but then she would casually go and bring up some guy she’d once fucked. He knew everything about her and nothing at the same time. In those North Beach bars Madeline would sometimes look at him so tenderly; it unequivocably told Eugene that she harbored fervid passions for him. She was still shy of twenty, and he wondered how much experience she’d really had with guys. One time they’d kissed drunkenly, but not particularly passionately, with Eugene holding back, still wondering about Lana. But when his former girlfriend’s ghost receded, Eugene’s feelings for Madeline grew exponentially. Sometimes he could sense that she wanted him, perhaps so desperately that if she let herself go, she’d fall totally, unreservedly in love and give herself completely to him. Be his. In his power. To be neglected. Hurt. And he wanted to tell her: I’m not that kind of guy. I don’t know what sort of shit you heard about me and Lana, but I’m not that kind of guy!

But it was only sometimes that she looked at him like that. On other occasions the look of loathing she vented at him could glaciate his blood.

So Madeline confused Eugene. He’d never met a girl like her before. That was because, despite his wastrel behavior and occasional bohemian affectations, his big, strong, athletic build and his overt sporting sensibilities did not encourage vacillation in girls, who tended to be obviously attracted or completely repelled from the off. But Madeline was different; a constant enigma to him.

Eugene only tried to get beyond first base once after that. A drunken pass. He’d attempted to kiss her again, this time more urgently, at a party. In a dirty kitchen that shrunk with the beer and cocaine until they were in each other’s faces, a field of intensity insulating them from the rest of the festivities. It had seemed the right time. But Madeline pushed an implacable, upturned hand onto his big chest and said: — One thing, Eugene: you and I will never, ever fuck.

He’d woken up the next morning, despondent in his crushing hangover. The phone went. It was Madeline. Before he could apologise, she beat him to the punch. — I’m so sorry about last night, Gene. I was kind of loaded. I guess I said a lot of things I didn’t mean.

— Fine, but I—

— Look, I gotta go and sleep it off. Call you later, babe, and she hung up.

And this short message was enough to erase Eugene’s despair and to offer him fresh hope.

Mostly, though, when they were alone together, which meant without Scott, they’d talked about Lana. Invariably Madeline brought this up. It was as if she knew that it crushed Eugene’s libido around her. She would listen intently, eager eyes widening, studying his every reaction. And Eugene had to concede: Madeline sure was a good listener. Even if he began to suspect it was all purely to educate herself, then that quality had been welcome. Because the others, even Scott, just seemed to talk about them. They expected him to forget that he’d given up a promising football career to party with Lana, and then she’d fucking ditched him. And their bullshit advice: they could stick it up their asses.

It was good that somebody could listen.

But now he wanted more. Driving down that dusty desert road, in the storm, the body of the silver Dodge Durango slapped insistently by the winds outside, him choking slowly on the hot, dead, air inside, no turnoffs in sight that would signal civilization, even in the form of a weather-beaten outpost of a gas station. All Eugene could think of was: he wanted more from Madeline.

And as he fought his own soporific comedown she was slumbering deeply, as if oblivious to the storm outside. And he could ascertain by the heavy snoring coming from the back that Scott had also tripped over to dormancy.

In his fevered mind’s eye, she was running towards him, streaked in mud. She was trying to swerve past him like a surging quarterback would, but he’d be building up his momentum in his strongside role and like Willie McGinest he’d bring her down as a lion would a weak gazelle, them both crashing into that filthy dirt…

It was as if his hand made the decision for him, rubbing against the tip of his cock and sending pulsating jolts of electricity into his belly and groin. Eugene felt his body stiffen and his eyes bulge under those Ray-Bans as his breathing became more irregular. One arm locked on the wheel while the other did the business; fabulously obscene images of Madeline popped and sizzled in his fried brain, augmenting the peaceful, innocent reality of her dozing by his side.

Ahead, the horizon, brought closer by the hazy heat, flickered intermittently through swirls of red and black dust. The road was only just visible. Madeline was facing him, her knees brought up to her chest. If only she had turned the other way, Eugene thought, he could watch her ass and jerk off without the possibility of her opening her eyes and instantly seeing him. But there was little chance of detection, he calculated in insect coldness, as she would be too disorientated, sleeping through her yagé comedown, to grasp what he was up to straight off, and in any case, he was doing it through his shorts…

but the bulge…

damn that fuckin bitch…

a cock-teaser even in her sleep… but now we’re getting down and dirty in this mud, baby, oh yeah, real down and dir—

Suddenly Eugene heard a snap followed by a long screech and his free hand shot from his groin to the wheel, which felt like it was being wrenched from his grip as the vehicle jerked to the left, then, as he tried to compensate, violently to the right. Madeline sprang into consciousness as she flew across his lap. She might have felt Eugene’s erection had it not instantly subsided. It was Eugene who was like a man falling on his own shotgun, ejaculating a shattering bolt of fear into his chest.

Time stretched out in slow motion. Eugene experienced first an irritation, then a frustration, that everything was spinning away from him, beyond his control. Then they tumbled over and back, in a twisting, fairground ride, which preceded an almighty, bone-shuddering crash, followed by them coming to rest in the most beautiful peace Eugene had ever known.

It didn’t last long. He heard a desperate screeching coming from Madeline, but the noises in his own head made it too discordant for him to focus on her anguish. His eyes remained closed as Madeline fell silent, save for a heavy, gulping rhythmic breathing. Then Scott’s voice, coming from the back; weary, almost bored in its concern: — Dude, what the fuck… you trashed my fucking vehicle, man… He hesitated. — Like, are you guys okay…?

— I’m bleeding… I’m bleeding! Madeline screamed.

Eugene opened his eyes. Madeline was still crushed into the front seat next to him. He looked her over, then cast his gaze down his own body. There was a gash on his arm, just below the bicep, with red-black blood ebbing from it. — It’s okay, man, he turned to her, — that’s my blood on you. I’ve cut my fucking arm. Look. He held it up to her.

Madeline was relieved, then guilt and concern surged in her as she looked at his wound and grimaced. — My Gad! What happened?

— That fucking dust storm, Eugene shook his head, — I couldn’t see a goddamn thing. You okay, Scott?

— Yeah… I guess so, he heard Scott behind him, — but my fucking car, man, he moaned.

Eugene looked over at Scott. He seemed fine, just a bit bemused. It appeared that the Dodge had come to rest at an angle. It didn’t look too bad. The windshield and the windows hadn’t even shattered. But suddenly, a dull clunk of fear thumped in Eugene’s chest, and he fretted about the dramatic but real possibility of an explosion from a leak in the gas tank: about being incinerated alive. He tried to open the door beside him. It gave an inch, then stuck in the earth. In panic, he turned to Madeline. — We’d better get out of here. Try your door!

Noting his urgent tension, Madeline didn’t hesitate, grabbing for the handle and pushing the door open. Eugene watched her scrambling out the car, looking like a strange bird emerging from a cracked egg, awkward and gawky. Like all the sex appeal had been shorn from her. Or perhaps it was just his own libido vanishing, he considered, as he hastily climbed out after her. Scott followed, falling out of the rear of the vehicle onto the sand and shale, looking back nervously as he scrambled to his feet.

The warm wind was driving hard, whipping dust and grit into their eyes. Eugene wrapped the towel around his arm. They checked the car as best they could. Eventually satisfied then that there was no gas-tank leakage and the vehicle, though at an angle, was stable, Scott shimmied under the car. — The axle’s gone. Snapped clean in two, he sulkily informed them.

They got back into the Dodge, slamming the door shut and locking the blowing sand out.

There was a silence for a while, as they sat at the uncomfortable angle, stealing despondent glances at each other. Madeline’s eyes suddenly lit in inspiration and she suggested that they checked their cellphones. Scott admitted in embarrassment that he’d lost his. Eugene’s had run down and he couldn’t charge it up. Madeline tried hers, but was unable to get a signal. — What kind of network are you with? Scott accused.

— T-Mobile. She looked defensively at him. — And what about the one you lost? What network is that?

There was more silence. Then Scott passed the small first-aid kit over from the back, and Madeline helped Eugene clean and dress his wound. Fortunately the cut was less deep than it had seemed.

Eugene attempted to work out their location. He had earlier given up on the map — the reverb from the drugs aftermath and his fatigue had made the lines and symbols and colors one big head-fucking mess. He had an autistic younger brother, Danny, who did these incomprehensible drawings. Now Danny’s art made more sense than the gazetteer he was compelled to revisit. Instead of taking the Interstate 80 across the Sierra Nevada, they’d gone north out of Black Rock City onto the 395 and then started to hit some of the back roads to get into the Nevada desert in order to do the yagé. He estimated that they were now probably about two hundred miles northeast of Vegas. — If the axle’s gone, I guess we’re gonna have to stay here until help comes or the storm blows over and we can phone or look for somebody, he ventured.

Scott shook his head in the negative. — I wanted to go to fucking Vegas, man…

Eugene looked at Madeline, who remained impassive, then turned back to Scott. — Don’t think it’s gonna happen, bro.

— And I had somebody coming to paint my apartment, Madeline said, sweeping her road-heavy locks back from her face. — I needed to get things sorted out.

Scott’s big dark eyes fell searchingly over Eugene. Shaking his head, he asked petulantly, — How the hell did you manage to crash?

Sucking in a deep breath, Eugene struggled to force the words through his tightening jaw. — It’s kind of called fatigue, man, he sneered. — If you recall the idea was that we’d fucking share the driving duties, remember that one? His sarcastic voice rose. — But I guess that poor old Eugene here had to do the lot cause you guys were still out of it. I do nat believe that you have got the fucking audacity to complain! Asshole! Eugene snapped, and then was out of the car, slamming the door behind him. Scott glanced at Madeline, who smiled tensely. Her grin vanished as a sound came from behind them. It was Eugene. He opened up the back of the Dodge and pulled out the tent.

As he struggled with the steel and fibreglass poles in the strong winds, Eugene hoped that it would stay up, and he was secretly relieved when Scott and Madeline appeared by his side, even if their coming to his aid meant that his quiet martyrdom would be harder to sustain. They worked in silence, assembling the frame and laying down the flysheet, then pulling over and securing the tent. They took the sleeping bags and some clothes in from the Dodge. As they finished constructing their camp, the storm began to subside.

— I wonder how long we’re gonna be out here? Scott asked. Then he quickly added, although he was aware that Eugene’s behavior had shown this not to be judicious, — I’m sorry, but I gotta say it, buddy: I’m really pissed about the fucking vehicle. I got it for the band. I told my old man that it was my goddamn livelihood and he fronted me the twenty grand. It’s eating at me. I have to say it. I have to speak about it.

Eugene gave his old college buddy a measuring look. He saw a thin, wiry guy with a crew cut and girl’s hands. Scott had never done any kind of work in his life. Worse, thought Eugene in some bitterness, he probably never would. He was just sitting around, ass plonked on the stools of various North Beach bars, telling the diminishing number of bodies who cared to listen about the various bands he was planning to get together, while he waited on that trust fund kicking in. Swallowing down his anger, Eugene realized there was nothing to be gained by blowing up at Scott now. Besides, he was tired. — Sorry, dude. I’ll sort things out. Tommy at the garage in Potrero Hill will be able to fix this.

— So now we just, like, wait here?

Eugene sat cross-legged, looked around the parameters of the orange tent. — Look, man, I thought this was for the best, he yawned, feeling his body start to relax again, the way it had after the yagé. — I’m pretty pooped. I gotta get some sleep. Somebody will come by. This is America, he smiled, — you’re never more than a mile from somebody trying to sell you something.

Scott and Madeline quickly looked at each other, a flashbulb consensus that this was the best course of action. They began to bed down in their respective sleeping bags. Yep, somebody would come by, Eugene thought. Kick back. Rest. Relax. Repair. Get strong. It sounded so good.

The old 1982 blue Chevy pickup truck had been the first thing that Alejandro had bought when he came to America. It had cost him two hundred dollars, most of it borrowed from his sister Carmelita. It was a rusted wreck, but he had talent as a mechanic, and had lovingly resurrected the vehicle. He knew that a truck could always earn you extra money.

Now it was holding up well, the engine ticking over nicely as they cruised down a back road through the desert, Alejandro and his younger brother Noe, who sat in the passenger seat, silently completing a crossword-puzzle book.

When he contemplated their flight from home, Alejandro couldn’t think of Phoenix, although they had now lived there for almost three years. That city was only Carmelita’s home; the place she’d dragged them to.

Not that he held his native town in any higher regard. It was an old fishing village, south of Guaymas on the Pacific Coast. It had survived, and indeed, for such a poor part of Sonora, could even have been said to have thrived, as a transport hub. It was close to Highway 15 and was also a stop on the coastal train route. The main town centre, an ugly 1970s series of poorly maintained low-rise buildings, sat uncomfortably next to an old village that had grown up around a small harbor, which held fewer brown-rusted boats every year.

They were simple people, Alejandro thought in a cold rancor; fools who had fished for years when there was nothing left to fish. Some of them in the village seemed to have barely noted their slide from poverty into destitution. They believed the fish would come back. Then, when they started starving, they moved north, then across to America.

The place Carmelita had taken them to.

The town had nothing going for it. On the highway you would see luxury air-conditioned coaches full of wealthy norteamericanos bypassing it, heading for the foothills of the Sierra Madre occidentals and historic Alamos with its beautiful Spanish colonial architecture. Those tourists would never come near his home town.

On leaving school, Alejandro sweated at menial work in a garage and its attached shop. It was owned by a wealthy, aggressive, fast-talking chilango, named Ordaz, who had promised that he would train him as a mechanic. Eighteen months later, Alejandro was still stacking shelves in the shop, and cleaning the garage and washing cars. He had yet to hold a spanner in his hand.

Alejandro had confronted Ordaz about this. His slick city-boy boss had simply laughed in his face. When Alejandro grew vexed, his employer’s expression took on a sinister hue and he told the youth to gather up his stuff and leave.

So there was nothing to keep them where they were, save their mother’s grave in the old cemetery at the base of the hills above the town, and the local prison, some 150 kilometres away, which held their disgraced father.

It had been Carmelita who had sent for them after she herself had obtained a job through a friend who was working in Phoenix. She was offered employment by a wealthy family following the professionally prepared CV she had sent them, and the smiling photograph, Alejandro recalled with distaste.

She had found them a place to live and got Alejandro some gardening and landscaping work and also enrolled Noe at a local school. Now they all cleaned up after the guero. Did his gardens. Watered his lawns. Looked after his spoiled children. Served his food.

And she did more than that, the filthy whore…

Alejandro seemed invisible to his employers. That was unless something went wrong; then he would instantly feel the eyes of accusation upon him. One woman went as far as to blame him for the theft of an artifact that she was subsequently found to have mislaid. No apology was issued to him, despite the police being called and aggressively questioning him. But mostly they ignored him as he watered and tended their gardens in order to stop the desert reclaiming them, under a hot and merciless sun.

What did these people respect? Those gringos? When you saw them on the television, they always said it was hard work, but they let their women lie around by the pool all day. Sent their children to school and more school and trips and vacations. They themselves spent all their time on planes and in hotels and in cars. Where was the work?

They respected nothing but money, Alejandro had considered. Money and the gun. After the Chevy, his second major purchase had been a Smith & Wesson .38 revolver. When he had it in his pocket, he felt stronger. More worthy of respect. It changed him; his face, his walk, but in such a subtle way.

Because now they seemed to see him. Even if he was feared rather than respected, he sensed that he was no longer invisible to them.

Alejandro drove through the storm in his old Chevy pickup truck, irked at his teenage brother trying to work out those pointless puzzles by his side.

Noe was weak, Alejandro considered. He was becoming a norteamericano. Would he end up a cowardly murderer like their father? Perhaps not. There was a certain niceness about the kid. But Alejandro recalled that it was his mother who had said that about their father, when he’d once asked her what she had seen in his papa. He was the sweetest man, his mother told him. But Alejandro had seen how alcohol could debase and corrupt that decency and charm. Felt it in himself. When he’d gotten drunk, punched, then hit with the pool cue, and then attempted to strangle, the hombre in the bar who had insulted him. He looked at Noe again. Was it not his father who had taught Alejandro the old saying: La puerca más flaca es la primera que rompe el chiquero.

The weakest ones are the first to rebel.

He could see his idiot father now, his pained face and sad, shifty eyes, the glint of his bald pate behind the glass screens of the prison. Despite Carmelita’s promptings, Alejandro had only gone to see him once; to abuse and curse this pathetic, wretched creature, to witness him cowering in his gray prison issue tunic, his shiny rat’s eyes filling with tears.

And then there was Carmelita. Let her have children of her own to boss and baby. He, Alejandro Rodriquez, had had enough.

Alejandro again regarded his puny little brother, who looked at him in such a strange way since they’d taken the bitch’s money, the money she had gotten from whoring herself to the wealthy gringo.

Her nonsense. Her delusion that she and this rich, married norteamericano were in love. When, then, would he move his wife and children out of the house she stayed in? When would they walk hand in hand down a street? When would their sad, furtive, animal trysts be replaced by something less deceitful? When would she share his bed at night?

The job she had gotten Alejandro doing the rich man’s garden. The gratitude he was meant to feel for having his brains fry in the heat every day. Then, that day last week when the norteamericano was supposed to be at work and Alejandro had walked in on them in his sister’s room. The blood from her bad time that he’d seen in her discarded panties, which lay on the floor by the bed; it hadn’t stopped their depraved lust.

We have done her a favor in taking her stinking whore’s bounty. Now we shall see how much the cynical norteamericano really loves her!

Eugene was thinking about Madeline. A sequence of images, between thought and dream, started to play through his head. They seemed to gain a three-dimensional clarity he would never have thought possible. Then he heard a rustling sound, and he could see it through his closed eyes. Madeline was unselfconsciously naked in the tent, ready to climb back into her sleeping bag after getting up to pee outside. Yes, he could see her, even through the membrane of his eyelids. But Eugene needed to get closer still to her opaque figure, as her nakedness would contain surprises, secrets, like every girl’s did. You always thought you’d be able to envision them perfectly with their clothes off — curves, flesh tones, proportions — but they always held mystery. The nipples, the color, the moles, the texture and extent of the pubic hair: they were always different to what you imagined. Like Lana, whom he’d masturbated about so many times at Long Beach Poly before he got her naked in their high-school grad year; his mind becoming a data bank of intricately constructed pornographic narratives in which she starred, or co-starred, with him. The first time that he saw her nude in his bedroom at his parents’ house he almost felt like asking her in his shock: What have you done to your tits? But Madeline; he had always seen her in a certain way. Perhaps if he just opened his eyes now… they would meet with hers, and then… no. She wouldn’t be there, surely: not like that. She was in her sleeping bag. Far better to sustain the delicious virtual reality of it in his substance-enhanced headspace.

But.

But now she was crouching over him, almost touching him. Eugene felt his breath draw into his lungs and his heart pound. Then it happened. Her hand slipped down into his bag and touched his leg. Then it was caressing his thigh in slow, twisting movements. Her fingers seemed so cool and his cock stiffened. He should open his eyes. It was her. She was really doing this to him. Open them.

No.

Keep this going a little bit longer because his cock was so hard and…

…and her cool finger was tweaking its head…

…and…

AAAAGGGHHHHH!

A terrible jab.

She’d stabbed him.

Eugene was up and he was screaming, — WHAT THE FUCK, MAN!

It wasn’t Madeline. It was a rattlesnake: a long, green, twisting rattlesnake. It was sliding across his stomach, out of his sleeping bag, onto the plastic floor of the tent.

Scott and Madeline were immediately woken up by his cry. — Damn! What is it! Madeline hissed as Scott blinked into a furtive consciousness.

Eugene pointed at the slithering creature as it headed across the groundsheet. — A rattlesnake… a rattlesnake bit my cack!

Scott groped around, laying his hand on the torch by his back. As he clicked it on and directed the beam, they watched the snake moving away from them. — Looks like a Mojave rattler, Scott ventured, — those dark stripes on his head…

Grasping his heavy-heeled brown shoe, his features cut in a vengeful tenacity, Eugene started to climb out of his sleeping bag. — Sonofabitch…

— Don’t kill it! Scott shouted.

— What!

— You never heard of conservation, man?

— Conservation? What the fuck! You expect me to conserve some fucker that just bit my fucking dick!?

— Listen, man, you’d better sit down… these guys are pretty damn toxic.

At those words, Eugene felt shaky for the first time, sinking back onto the floor, pulling the bag to him. The rattlesnake slithered underneath the tent flap, into the freedom of the desert. Eugene touched his crotch. Although his genitals were as flaccid as they had ever been, he could feel his pulse in them, pounding on his fingertips. — Oh my God… it bit me… my goddamn pecker…

— Don’t lie down, Scott shouted, — keep your heart above the wound!

Eugene quickly pulled himself up, resting on his elbows. He took heavy, ragged breaths.

— Where did it bite? Scott asked again, as Madeline stared at Eugene.

— My privates… Eugene said more modestly, — a rattlesnake! Damn!

— For God’s sake, Eugene, Scott gasped, — those things are fucking dangerous!

— I fucking know that, Scatt, it bit my damn pecker. Eugene went onto his knees, letting the bag fall around him, and pulled down his shorts. There were two red puncture marks an inch from the tip of his penis. — What am I gonna do! he squealed, in a sudden panic.

— If only that shaman were here… Scott mused, looking around the tent for inspiration.

— Fuck the shaman! Eugene cursed.

Madeline shook her head. — He’s only saying because these people have healing knowledge, Gene.

Eugene grimaced. — Well, he ain’t here, he said mournfully.

— I couldn’t tell for sure what type of snake it was, Scott pursed his lips, getting out of his bag, rising in his green boxer shorts as he stepped toward Eugene, — but I’m sure it was a Mojave green; these sons of bitches are one of the most venomous snakes around. Their toxin attacks the nervous system, not just the tissue… that poison’s gotta come out!

— How the fuck can we…? Eugene gasped in horror.

Scott edged closer, eyes trained on Eugene’s cock. — We gotta open up the area around the wound. You make two crisscross incisions over each hole with a knife, to draw out the bad blood, he explained, and he reached across for the large, multipurpose Swiss Army knife in his bag.

Madeline was trying to get a signal on her cellphone. In the storm the device seemed a useless and dead artifact, technology rendered impotent and void by nature’s whims: complacent men against indifferent gods.—This is supposed to be fucking America, she hissed in frustration.

Eugene looked agog at the glinting blade in Scott’s hand. — This is Boy Scout bullshit! His voice went high and fey. — That sorta crap’s probably been discredited for years! Nobody’s slicing up my fucking dick!

— It’s just four goddamn little nicks, Gene! We ain’t got time to pussy about here! Scott wailed.

For the first time, Eugene realized that he could actually die; that his life could end out here in the stony, unforgiving desert, in such sad, unlucky circumstances. He thought of the footballing career he chucked away to party with Lana, following her around clubs as she ‘networked’ for the purposes of her own advancement. The bitch would hear of his demise as she accepted an Academy Award with a fake tear and a halting choke in her throat. Trembling under the terror and exasperation of it, Eugene gasped, — Okay… okay… I’ll do it, he said, steeling himself as Scott handed him the knife. Then he looked at his cock in his hand, the two angry red holes, and the blade of the knife. Something ugly rose in his gut and he thought he was going to pass out. — You… you do it, his tones hushed as he handed the knife back to Scott and lay down balancing on his elbows to keep his torso raised, looking upwards at the orange roof of the tent.

Eugene gritted his teeth as Scott took his penis in his hand. Winced as his friend made the first cut. Though he had to hold him firmly to get purchase, the sensitive skin of Eugene’s penis yielded easily to the blade. Droplets of blood spotted up in a line along the incision. It only started to flow when Scott made the second, crisscrossing cut. — Maddy, throw me over that towel!

Madeline quickly complied and Eugene screamed as he looked down and saw the dark red blood quickly absorbing into the white towel. — WHAA… YOU’RE FUCKING CASTRATING ME, MAN!

— If you don’t stay still, I goddamn will!

Scott quickly crisscrossed the second wound, urging Eugene to hold the towel against himself as the blood flowed out. — It’s done, he said, then looked at his friend, — but we ain’t finished yet. Somebody’s gonna have to suck the poison out.

Eugene instinctively glanced toward Madeline. His expression was hopeful and pleading.

She gaped at his bleeding cock in the towel. It was large and fat. She’d always thought of him as smaller in that way for some reason, even though he was a big guy. Maybe it was swollen with the snakebite. — Don’t even think about it, she snapped. — That bloody mess… that is so gross!

Eugene felt utterly wretched. He now fancied he could feel the deadly venom of the snake, winding its way through his veins and arteries, meandering with slow menace toward his heart. He looked at her in apoplexy. — You goddamn selfish bitch, he half begged, half threatened.

Madeline lurched forward a little in the bag she kept wrapped round her, even though she was still wearing her brown tank top. With her free hand she swept her tumbling hair back from her face. — I ain’t gonna suck your cack. It’s dripping with blood! You could have herpes or Aids or any shit. No way, she said, her frosty finality taking Eugene back to that party.

— I’m probably fucking dying, man… it’s fucking medicinal, it’s first fucking aid, Eugene pleaded.

— I’ll do it. Fuck it, Scott said.

Eugene regarded his friend with sudden trepidation. There was something about Scott, crouching there in those green boxer shorts. There had always been something about him: from way back in college. His girl’s eyes. His lady hands. Scott had had few close friends at UCLA and after they’d graduated he’d followed Eugene up to San Francisco on the basis that it was a ‘cool spot’. Moved close to him in North Beach. And he’d never really seemed that interested in pussy. The kid was just plain weird. — Keep away from me, man… Eugene said, raising his hands, — I want her to do it, he pointed at Madeline who again shook her head.

— For God’s sake, Eugene, you might get seriously ill. Scott took another step forward.

Eugene upturned his palms. — Back off! Just keep away from me you goddamn faggot!

— Whaaat! Scott protested in disbelief. — You let me cut holes in it with a knife, but you won’t let me get the fucking poison out! He pointed to Madeline. — She ain’t gonna suck your cock, Eugene! he roared.

— You’re darned right I ain’t… Madeline said, looking at Eugene’s bloody penis with horror. He expected her to suck on that, and have every sniggering dude and frat boy back in the neighborhood make a face as she walked into a bar? No way.

— You selfish freakin — I’m fuckin dying! Eugene cried. — You’re murdering me!

Madeline looked at Scott, then at Eugene. — Listen, you asshole, Scotty’s offered to suck it out. You’re murdering yourself with your own fuckin homophobic bullshit. You think when we get back to San Francisco that he’ll be in every bar on Castro boasting about sucking a bit of poison out of your miserable limp dick?

Eugene let this sink in, and looked at Scott, who shrugged. And so he gave a sad, tired nod as his friend knelt down and once again took his cock tentatively in his hand. He looked down at his old college buddy. Eugene had never seen eyes so faggish as the ones in the head that gazed sadly up at him. My God, he thought. It all makes sense now. He nodded and looked back up at the roof of the tent. Madeline watched in fascination, as Scott’s mouth sucked below the bloodied, swollen tip of Eugene’s cock.

The storm had taken them by surprise. It had seemed appropriate, the anger of gods scorning them in this terrible flight from Carmelita’s vengeance. They had just wanted to get away, though they had no real notion of where they were going. The younger brother, Noe, the more circumspect of the two, regarded Alejandro, five years his senior, stern as he drove ahead through the dust.

Taking from your own was so bad, Noe fretfully considered. Carmelita would never forgive them. God would never forgive them. They had ended it; all those years of their big sister’s protection and love. It had been America. They had been promised a better life here, but it had changed Alejandro. Hardened his heart. Noe thought of how Carmelita had taken them to church in Ciudad Obregón every Sunday, always making sure that they were neat and tidy. Insisted that they attended school and even visited their father in prison as they prayed for his soul, and put flowers on their mother’s grave.

He looked at Alejandro’s square jaw, his heavy features in which those sunken eyes were set. Killer’s eyes, Carmelita had once said, after Alejandro had beaten a young man to a pulp in a bar, over some petty argument. The eyes of their father.

Yet it was Carmelita who always made excuses for Alejandro. It had been he who had found their mother, back in their home town in southern Sonora, bending at the kitchen, breathing heavily, pain etched on her face as she smoked a cigarette. A pot of rice and one of fava beans had cooked down on the stove and the house stank of burning food. And then Alejandro had seen the blood in her lap, and on the big knife that lay on the table. He’d started to cry and asked her what had happened, even though he knew, and in demented rage, he quickly searched the house for his father. He was certain the knife had been wielded by the old man’s drunken hand, his breath stinking of tequila and the cheap perfume of whores.

But the old man had fled.

Their mother had begged Alejandro not to call a doctor or the police, said that it looked worse than it was, protecting her treacherous husband even as her own life blood oozed out across her lap. Then she keeled over and fell heavily onto the tiled floor. Alejandro screamed and ran for help. It was too late; their mother was dead before they could get her to the hospital.

Sure enough, the police found their father a few hours later, and he instantly cried out his confession. They had argued and she had pushed him to his limit and he had blindly struck at her with the knife, his mind muddled with drink. When he saw the blood, he’d crossed himself and wandered for a while, eventually ending up back on the seedy Boulevard Morelia at the dingy Casa de Huéspedes he frequented, and in the arms of his favorite whore. She was a big, meaty woman named Gina, and the police officers found him sobbing and singing an alabados, a poignant hymn of praise on the suffering of the Virgin Mary, as she cradled him like a baby.

Then their big sister Carmelita had tried to become their mother. She took the boys to America and worked so hard to give them a better life. Noe remembered passing the old harbor for the last time, the mottled cloudy sky, the squawking of the birds and then driving across the desert roads over the yellow rock and tumbleweed-strewn terrain toward the highway. All the time Carmelita singing, and telling her excited little brothers about how good their new life in America would be.

And this was how they had repaid her!

A sister who had so recently seemed a browbeating harridan was slowly being recast as a madonna figure in Noe’s penitent soul. He looked over at Alejandro’s tight mouth again, his big gold-ringed fingers on the wheel of the Chevy.

It is him, the bullying oaf! He has done this to me. Taken me from my school, from my friends. Poisoned my soul. He’s just like our shitbag of a father!

Alejandro turned at that point, catching his scrawny younger sibling’s angry gaze. — What is wrong? he snapped.

— Nothing, Noe said meekly, kittenlike under the harsh stare of his older brother.

— Do not look at me like that, he spat and contemplated Noe again, his cold black eyes murderous.

A bolt of fear struck Noe square in the chest and he turned away to the side window. It felt cooler on his cheek, reminding him of the times when their father would borrow his brother’s old car and drive the family down to the beach at Miramar, by Guaymas, along the Pacific Coast of Mexico. He recalled the distinctive shapes of the towering denuded mountains, which surrounded the bay. The time he cut his feet paddling in the water on the shells from the delicious oysters native to the area. How he and Alejandro would beg for change when the anglers from all over the world would converge on Guaymas to participate in the tournaments and pursue the fish catch in the Sea of Cortes.

Now, looking gloomily out through the settling dust at the slowly visible horizon, broken only by big rocks, he contemplated his now saintly sister again. What had they done to her? The money. Her savings. All her hard work. Her chance of a better life: they had ruined it.

There was something ahead. The dust was clearing and a peculiar-looking object, giving off a luminous orange glow, was visible by the side of the road. Alejandro stopped the car and the brothers got out, each disappointed that on closer inspection the entity that had excited them was something as banal as a tent. Beside it was a 4x4 vehicle, which had almost turned over on its side, having run into a steep sudden rise of dirt, sand and shale, trapped by some rocks and banked up from the road. Alejandro pulled his .38 revolver from his inside pocket, and transferred it to the external pouch of his leather jacket. Noe went to speak in protest then thought against it. To his knowledge, Alejandro had never shot anybody before, but with a lunatic rage and desperation propelling him through this strange land, both sensed that he was destined to do so, and probably quite soon. Noe just hoped and prayed that it would not be him.

The settling sky brought out a red sun, which shimmered in front of them. In the growing light they could vaguely ascertain smudged figures in silhouette from inside the tent. Noe touched Alejandro’s arm, in a spirit of affirmation rather than any attempt at restraint, but in the event, it was brushed aside. Alejandro confidently opened the tent flap.

Instantly greeted by that smell he knew so well, the meaty, sour scent of spilt blood in the heat, Alejandro could scarcely believe his eyes as he surveyed the scene before him. One gringo was on his knees, performing fellatio on another, as a pretty girl looked on. They were a truly disgusting people, Alejandro thought with rancor. The penis of the man was covered in blood. The girl, she had a bloody towel in her lap. The animal had obviously fucked her in her stinking pussy when she was at her dirty time of month and the other gringo pig was sucking him clean! He wondered, in a bitter rage, if those were the sordid games his sister was participating in right now, the sissy boyfriend of her wealthy lover licking her foul menstrual blood from his dick as she watched on eagerly like the whore she had become. Now the cock-sucking norteamericano pig turned and spat a mouthful of bloody saliva onto the ground.

Inside their own tent!

The Americans turned in shock to see the Mexican brothers.

— Two faggots and a dirty leetal lady, Alejandro said evenly, his features creasing up in malice.

— This is… a rattlesnake bit me… Eugene stuttered, then shouted in outrage, — Get the fuck out of here!

Alejandro’s face tightened further and he took a step into the tent. — Hey, seesay boy, you no talk to us like that, see, and he pulled out the gun and aimed it at Eugene’s cock and Scott’s mouth. — I blow your leemp deek off and thee teeth from thee head of your faggot friend too, he scowled.

Scott and Eugene froze, looking in open-mouthed vacancy at the barrel of the pistol.

Madeline swallowed hard, then crouched backwards, feeling the wall of the tent behind her. — What… what do you want?

Alejandro looked her up and down. A faint, mordant grin of contempt crossed his mouth. Then he turned to the others. — Feenish, he spat.

Scott looked up, Eugene’s cock, dripping with blood, still in his hand. — What… we weren’t—

— Leesen to thees, Alejandro commanded, gun trained on them, — you feenish sucking hees deek, and you suck it right. Suck it like a leel gorl would suck your deek, he smiled coldly.

— But — Scott protested.

— FEENEESH! Alejandro roared, as Noe nodded frantically, imploring them to acquiesce with his brother’s demand.

— Do as he says, for Gad’s sake! Madeline begged.

As a terrified Scott started to obey, Alejandro regarded Eugene. — And you; you weel enjoy eet. I wahn see you come in hees face like he ees your beetch.

Suddenly Scott started to gag on Eugene’s cock. It looked horrible and it tasted foul, the metallic blood so strong; he began to wonder if it was the snake’s poison in his mouth, going down his gullet and into his stomach. He thought he’d spat out most of the venom but he couldn’t be sure.

And then there was Eugene’s dirty blood. He thought of his old college friend’s behavior at UCLA and then in San Francisco. By taking that shit into his system he was sleeping with every campus slut, every drunken waitress or bartender, every poxy whore on Sunset or the Tenderloin that his buddy’s filthy dick had ever been inside. And this meant, by extension, he’d taken in every diseased cock that had breached all those germ-incubating pussies. The odds against him not contracting something seemed so overwhelmingly vast. He could now hear Eugene’s boasts of those whores he’d enjoyed on their trip to Vegas last month, and he could, in his mind’s eye, envision their harsh, painted faces as well as the complacent, arrogant smirk of every John who had brothel-crawled across the globe from Tijuana to Thailand on expense accounts. Scott’s ears rang with the phantom clinks of Vegas slot machines and stoical chants of stern-faced croupiers as they flagged up impossible odds against the avoidance of fatal infection, as his mouth struggled around that sweaty, bloody cock.

But he had to go on. Because a bullet from this range in your face offered worse odds still. Worse odds than just about anything.

That gun; they had a gun pointing at them! These men were psychopaths. The crazy eyes on that sonofabitch with the revolver, it was like looking into hell. In a bitter fear, Scott decided that he was destined to die hopelessly, his skull blown apart by some wetback assassin’s bullet before he could liberate his trust fund. His money. The legacy bequeathed to him. Everything Pops had worked for. The old man: all he had ever expected Scott to do in life was to simply stay alive long enough to collect. And he couldn’t even do that one damned thing. There would be no band, no success, nothing to impress his father. He would perish out here in the desert and his last memory in his short life would be of Eugene’s goddamn bloodied cock in his mouth. The horrible injustice of it all hit home, and Scott started to sob. Then he heard Eugene protesting, — I can’t do this. I can’t come. I can’t even get hard! I don’t like him. I don’t like boys…

Alejandro laughed loudly and thumped his chest in disbelief. — He no like boys! You hear that, my leel brother? He turned to Noe. — He has a faggot sucking his deek and he no like boys! He shook his head in disgust. — You steek it in thee leel gorl on her bad time. You are animals!

Eugene protested, — Look, man, I told you I got a snakebite and—

— Shut up weeth your fucking mouth! Alejandro roared, eyes blazing. — Estás como los frijoles, al primer hervor se arrugan!

They hastily complied as Alejandro turned to Madeline, and grabbed her roughly by the arm.

— Alejandro, please… Noe pleaded.

— Be silent, leetal brother, he commanded in a low hiss, pulling Madeline over to Scott and Eugene. — Take off your top and your brassiere, he whispered at her in soft threat.

— You really think I’d — Madeline started in defiance then faltered, as she looked at Alejandro for a second, then again at the .38 in his hand. In one quick motion, she pulled off her tank top. Noe, now half in the tent, saw the St Christopher’s around her neck, hanging on her chest bone above her breasts and was moved to cross himself and say a silent prayer. He then drew a breath as Madeline removed her bra.

Alejandro thought of them all; the lazy wives and daughters of the rich men. How, as they lay by their pools, in their bikinis, sipping their drinks, they never, ever saw him as he sweated in their gardens. And he wanted them to see him. Wanted them to take off their tops. Free those big breasts they had pumped with silicone. Now he could make them.

— You see her teets, seesay boy? Alejandro turned to Eugene who had his head to the side. He’d bowed it at first, but that had only forced him to regard Scott. — Look at her, seesay boy, Alejandro urged, waving the pistol, — look at those fine teets, so feerm. She want you, seesay boy, she want you so much… so much…

Alejandro gasped, and a horrified Noe realized that his brother had dropped his trousers and was masturbating himself with his free hand.

Noe took a step back out of the tent, trembling as he held the flap open. Madeline closed her eyes and Scott sucked, fearfully swallowing that dark blood. Alejandro continued jerking himself off, filling the tent with his commentary. — She want you just like the leel faggot want you, seesay boy, so wheetch one you choose? Wheetch one, seesay boy? You, beetch, he spat at Madeline, — you touch those teets! Make your neepels hard!

Madeline began caressing herself, first in stiff fear, then attempting to divert her thoughts to Scott, in an effort to black out everything else. She was trying to think about whether or not she was in love with him. Those soft, dark eyes, so full of sadness, yet hope. He was a beautiful boy and they’d had a great experience together on the yagé, and she’d seen something inside him, his soul, and knew there was more to him than the fearful trust-fund kid trying to avoid and appease a distant father and an alcoholic mother.

She thought of how she should have phoned her own folks. They liked to talk to her at least once a week. She knew they worried about her. What would they think if they knew she was here, now? Madeline considered the path, so apparently mundane, that had taken her to this terrible place. Just over six months ago she was working in Walgreen’s and living at home with her parents in the Cleveland suburb she grew up in. She hated it, and had particularly detested her high school. Most of all, she despised her surname: Madeline Frostdyke.

Or Frigid Lesbian, as the nastier kids had called her at school.

In San Francisco she could be Madeline Frost. Sometimes, when her feminist spirit was ascendant, she would take on her mother’s maiden name, Kennaway.

When the insults started, Madeline reacted by trying not to draw attention to herself, but that was exactly what she ended up doing. By letting her conservative mother dress her, Madeline Frostdyke, in her fifties-style outfits and her big glasses, became one of the most obvious geeks in her school. And she’d have stayed that way, trying too hard to be anonymous, but then puberty hit her hard, and left her with curves that her shapeless, dowdy clothes couldn’t quite conceal and drives that a decent, God-fearing suburban American household couldn’t contain. However, save for a couple of encounters hastily engineered largely in order to gain rudimentary carnal experience, she was determined that Cleveland, so cruel to Madeline Frostdyke, was not going to get the best of Madeline Frost.

Jackie Kennaway, a diligent law student at the Jesuit University of San Francisco, was surprised when a vivacious, stunning-looking young girl turned up on her doorstep. She was even more taken aback as she realized it was her formerly awkward young cousin, Madeline.

And so the girl from Cleveland moved into the spare room that Madeline’s aunt had absent-mindedly mentioned was available in Jackie’s apartment in San Francisco. Madeline initially expressed a desire to follow her cousin into the university, in her case to do business studies, but it soon became apparent she wouldn’t be joining Jackie on campus. Instead, Madeline took to San Francisco’s social life like a bear to bacon, making friends with some of her studious relative’s more outgoing acquaintances.

Through one of them, Candy, she had met Eugene. Unbeknown to him, he’d instantly reminded her of Kevin Dailey, the boyfriend of her horrible nemesis Sara Nichols, who gleefully orchestrated many school-bullying campaigns against her. Sara had been quick to enlist Kevin in the offhand dismissal of Madeline. Now she realized that Sara had noted first what the rest of the high-school divas would eventually recognize: Madeline Frostdyke was a looker, and a possible rival, whose confidence needed to be kept low.

Sara had made sure that cool, sporty, conventionally handsome Kevin never took an interest in Madeline. But this version of Kevin Dailey wanted her so badly. That was the thrill of it all. But it was just a game, because it was really Scott, moody, doe-eyed Scott, that she wanted to be with.

And that had brought her out to the desert and this nightmare.

So now there was just this tent and the podgy Mexican youth’s rasping voice: — Suck hard, leetal faggot. Look at the leel gorl, seesay boy, look at the show she put on for us with those beeg fine teetays… maybe you should suck on them, huh, seesay boy? Huh? Like you fuck that dirty pussy, huh?

Dirty pussy? What the fuck was that fat, twisted, spic asshole talking about? Eugene wondered, as he stared at Madeline’s breasts. They were good tits, no getting away from it. Full, firm, but real, with one observably bigger than the other. The way she looked with her eyes closed. Trying to concentrate: to not be powerless and humiliated. And he understood it. He thought of his own sad, solitary experience in the pornography industry. He had been trying to make some extra money as a student at UCLA, and he and Lana were in a decidedly ‘off’ phase of their ongoing on-off relationship. His buddy Jerry did it, so why not him? He was cut, as he worked out, and he was hung. It seemed a good way to make money: fucking hot chicks. He remembered as a kid having a bit part in a couple of scenes from The Other Sister, filmed, like so many Hollywood movies, at his high school. Eugene had even entertained the dumb-ass notion that somebody might just take notice of him and he’d make mainstream Hollywood before Lana.

When he went up to that house in the Valley for the audition, there were three other guys in the frame, or trying to get in the frame. He didn’t know any of them. A fat man in a dark blue suit, no tie, had greeted them. The only thing he could remember about the other dudes was that one of them wore a White Stripes T-shirt. They all waited in a room with soft drinks and magazines. Eugene was told he’d be last. During the wait he grew increasingly edgy. The first two guys had both shuffled through the door with an arrogant gait only to exit in silent, hunched-shouldered humiliation. After the second one departed, Eugene and the White Stripes guy looked at each other in some trepidation. Then White Stripes went next, leaving Eugene alone. And he was in there for ages. When he came out White Stripes was wearing a shit-eating grin, with the fat guy slapping him on the back. The pornographer’s parting words were: — Remember, work on those abs! Then he summoned in Eugene, to whom White Stripes gave a euphoric wink on the way out.

In the other room, a naked girl, long straight black hair, plenty of makeup, pendulous fake breasts, orange suntan, reclined on a sofa. Behind the camera was a train-wreck of a guy with a Texan accent who smelt strongly of alcohol. The guy shook his hand, introducing himself as Ray. The girl didn’t speak, but cracked an ugly, predatory smile at him when the fat man said: — And this beautiful young lady is Monique.

Eugene went across to her and kissed her chastely; in the confident manner he’d seen porn performers execute upon meeting new partners.

— Right, son, let’s see what you got, the fat man said urgently.

With an engine full of lust, Eugene eagerly stripped. This Monique chick was hot. But the trouble was that his dick somehow wasn’t receiving the message his brain was sending it. He knew he had to forget the camera, the others around him, and just focus on Monique. Her tight ass. Her shaved pussy. Her big red lips. Her heavy, silicone tits.

But there was nothing happening. Nothing at all. Monique’s whorish ministrations and exaltations were wasted as her features slowly froze in a mask of boredom. Soon Eugene was forced to quit, leaving as humiliated as the first two guys. The fat guy had said, — Don’t worry, son, there’s very few bucks that can just party in front of the camera on demand. I get some real studs come waltzing in here all best-in-show; 90 per cent of them skulk out like beaten mutts.

And now, when the chips were down, once more his hard-on would fail him. But this time it might cost him his life. The camera, the goddamn camera. Now the camera was the barrel of a gun and the pitch-black eyes of the killer holding it. Eugene looked at Madeline again. She was so beautiful, and he would die without knowing her. With her eyes closed, she attained this tragic but heroic nobility. Her tits were so gorgeous. If only she was sucking his cock… those lips of hers, working skillfully on him, now taking him right to the back of her throat, but her somehow just standing there, virtuous and serene…

Madeline… Madeline…

Yes. It was her. It WAS her. His cock stiffened up.

Oh fuck, Madeline…

Suddenly, Eugene felt an explosion rising from within him as spasms shook his shivering body. He was climaxing like never before. Then, through his euphoria, he suddenly remembered the golden rule of porn: the audience needs to see the ‘facial’, and this deadly audience probably more than any other. Eugene quickly pulled out, splattering Scott’s face and bloodied lips with cum, horrified as he spangled in ecstasy. — Oh my Gad… he moaned, then whispered at Scott, — I’m sorry, buddy… I…

Alejandro ejaculated almost simultaneously, his jism shooting across Madeline’s leg. Then he put his dick away, pulling up his briefs and trousers, fastening and zipping himself in a few casual, perfunctory movements. He handed the gun to Noe who physically shrank from it. Eugene and Scott glanced at each other. — Take it, Alejandro commanded, and the boy slowly moved toward the gun and took it in his trembling hands. — Point it at them, he urged. The boy obeyed, the gun shaking almost uncontrollably in his grip. Scott looked away, his bottom lip seeming to mimic the rhythm of the pistol. — Keep them covered, Alejandro said cheerfully, slapping his terrified brother across the back. — Feel its power, he urged, — be a man. If one of them even speaks, shoot them. Then his eyes fell upon Madeline’s cellphone, which lay by her bag on the groundsheet. — I theenk I take thees, he smiled, picking it up.

Madeline had opened her eyes and crossed her arms over her breasts. — Please leave it. We need it to phone for help, she begged. — We’re stuck out here. We won’t say anything about this!

Noe, the gun still shaking in his hand, looked in a hopeful pleading endorsement at Alejandro, who steadfastly ignored him, instead glaring at Madeline, who fell silent. Then his hard gaze fell on Scott and Eugene. — You should tell this beetch to shut her fucking mouth or she will get you all keeled, he smiled. — Now I need your other phones. You, he pointed at Scott, — where are they?

— I-I didn’t br-ing mine, Gene’s is back here. He pointed behind them.

Dumb-ass pussy, Eugene thought.

Alejandro regarded him with an almost piteous expression. — You did not breeng your phone?

— No, Scott stammered again, — I l-lost it. Check the bag if you like…

— I believe you. I theenk you are too scared to try to deceive us. Throw the other phone to me.

Scott lobbed Eugene’s cell over to Alejandro, who crouched down and picked it up. He played around with both phones for a while. — You know, if I were you, as soon as we are gone, I would contact the po-leece, he mused.

— Please… Noe, still trembling as he pointed the gun, pleaded to his brother, — we should go now!

Alejandro raised a hand to silence him.

As a sniveling, hyperventilating Scott wiped some sperm from his face and started to retch blood up, Eugene lay back against the wall of the tent, his heart pounding. Looking up, he could see only Alejandro’s ice-cold stare closing in on them. — But now there will be no contact with the poleece, the Mexican sang breezily, — because now, we shoot you.

Madeline turned to Eugene in appeal, her face long and white with abject terror. And he knew then that he really loved her; would do almost anything for her. But he wouldn’t take a bullet for her. Eugene wanted her to get it first, then Scott. Because he saw the way that crazy guy was with her and he didn’t want to leave her out here alone with him. His hand went into his pocket, as he fingered the handle of the knife. He would probably only get this one slim chance, and that was if he was very, very lucky. Otherwise they were stone dead by the side of a desert road with buzzards picking at them.

— Please… Madeline begged Alejandro, suddenly falling to her knees. — I did nothing wrong, she begged.

Alejandro looked at this woman, and saw the dangling cross hanging round her neck. Like the one his mother wore. He thought of his father once again, that animal who had shown no mercy. — Hey… relax. He held up her phone and started snapping them with the camera. — If you are good, the only shooting is with the camera on thees phone, he almost whispered, and his hand reached out and gently touched the side of her face. Eugene glanced at the petrified Noe, and was about to lunge when Alejandro suddenly turned toward him, his eyes murderous again. — Go and assume thee position again, faggots, or you get thee bullet!

Madeline gave them a perilous, yearning stare and Eugene, in bitter despondency, nodded at Scott and they had to go through the indignity of the ritual once again. Every snap taken by Alejandro seemed to last minutes, his leering, mocking commentary now a warped parody of a fashion photographer. Eugene shut his eyes, and he could hear the bigger Mexican saying, — Now if you tell anyone about thees, all your friends and family will have those nice peectures sent to them! These will look good in thee family album, two seesay boys and the gorl with the teetays!

And he only knew it was over when he felt the cool, still air on his cock replace the wet heat from Scott’s mouth. Only then could Eugene hear the footsteps of the departing brothers receding and he opened his eyes. In the gray twilight he was aware of an echoing retching sound, like nothing his ears had been privy to before. It seemed as if a malign spirit was smirking in celebration of a particularly vile debasement it had engineered. He thought that it was Scott or even Madeline vomiting, but their vacant gazes and an insidious scorch he was suddenly aware of, told him the source came from somewhere inside of himself. Eugene turned to the canvas, those big arms holding him up as the bile poured from his guts, a nervous laughter punctuating every strength-sapping heave. Outside, he could hear the engine of the Chevy starting up and chugging away into the fading desert light.