When he came into The Sour Notes Bar tonight, the thought of taking someone home was the farthest thing from his mind.

   But as the drinks grew, so did his desire until the only thing he could think of was going over and talking to her.

   But the distance seemed so far.

   Her uptown dress spoke deafeningly to his backwoods dungarees. And like a love-sick fool, he listened to the drumming in his veins and misquoted its governings.

   He thought the language was so simple and so outright: order another beer.

   And being of unsound mind, that’s exactly what he did.

***

   It was somewhere between his changing drinks from beer to tequila -- watching through the haze two or three guys stalk up to the uptown girl with more than obvious intentions in their gaits and being rebuked -- when their eyes met.

   The meeting only lasted a second, her green eyes flecked with yellow boring into his cliched brown, but the glance told him far more than the infernal drumming in his veins.

   The only thing holding him back now was which strategy to use.

***

   After a couple of tequila’s, his strategy simplified; just move on over next to her and let her know what the deal was.

   But before he was able to make a move towards her, she got up -- and surprising the hell out of him -- walked the five stool distance separating them and sat down next to him. Barry raised his empty glass to his mouth and flaunted his nervousness.

   She giggled.

   He smiled and called to the bartender for a refill.

   "And you?"

   "Nothing."

   "Sure?"

   She nodded as the bartender filled Barry’s glass.

   "Name’s Barry." He extended his hand to her. She took it. "Barry Summers."

   "Nice to meet you."

   "And you’re--"

   "Oh!" A giggle. A flush. "Natalie." A drop of the hand.

   "Pretty name."

   "Thank you."

   With a sigh, he nodded and looked over into the mirror behind the bar at his straight-banged, hollow-eyed self and thought; It’s not working. Sure, she’s the one who made the first move. But from the shadows, you were someone she knew. Someone she’d met before. Someone she wanted to be with again. But now, close up, she sees you’re nothing but a drunken sod. Next move? Good-bye, stranger. It’s been swell but I better be moving along now. Maybe some other time, huh? Like, in another life. But instead, she moved closer, her thigh actually touching his. "Barry?"

   "Huh?"

   "Want to dance?"

   "Dance?" he asked clumsily.

   "You know. Two people stumbling over each others feet."

***

   Just like the conversation, she led out on the floor. She was an exquisite dancer, while he mumbled the steps inarticulately.

   During their dancing, they talked. What line of job was he in? Worked as a janitor at the high school and sold furs ("An occasional red fox," he added rather proudly) during the winter months. And what did she do? She didn’t do anything, but find different ways in which to spend her money.

   "Just how much money do you have?"

   "Enough," was her casual answer.

   "Enough to spend it all on free time?"

   "Uh-huh."

   "May I ask where you’re from?"

   "Mountainview.

   "If you’re from Mountainview and you’re rich, then why’re you here?"

   She stopped dancing and pulled away from him. "Is it really important for you to know why?"

   "Just trying to make conversation. If I’m stepping on your feet, I’ll stop--"

   "Let’s just dance right now, Barry. Please. We’ll talk later about it if we must."

***

   By the time later came, her closeness helped him to forget what they were initially talking about. Until she brought it up, framed by a question which startled him for the second time since he met her.

   After rubbing up against her for most of the night, it was an offer he could scarcely refuse.

***

   It was a short two hour drive to Mountainview and an even shorter seven minutes to her house.

   Her house was astonishing. It was a grand Victorian home, echoing Natalie’s bulk in its framework; pale white, big boned, but nicely constructed.

   The first thing he did when he first went in was stop and gape at its splendor.

   "It’s not much, I know--"

   "It’s magnificent."

   "Come on, then. I’ll give you a quick tour," she said, walking over to him and grabbing his hand and leading him from the sutured hallway to the amossed living room. From there to the kitchen, the dining room, the pantry, and of course, the bathroom.

   "Which leaves us with this," she said, standing near the bottom of the stairs, her hand on the rail.

***

   Upstairs, they went through the first nine bedrooms, Barry in abject wonder over the peculiar workmanship imbued into the furniture. "All original?" he asked.

   "All original," she assured him with a nod of her head.

   "I wish I had a place like this in which to live."

   "You could."

   Barry half-laughed, shaking his head, totally missing out on the implications of her words. "In my dreams, maybe."

   "Dreams of our longings is what keeps us going, isn’t it, Barry? Dreaming of something we don’t have but wish we had is what keeps us forging ahead. Know what I mean?"

   "I think so," Barry answered unconvincingly.

   She moved next to him. "Why don’t you do more than think?"

   "I’m not following--"

   "Then allow me to lead." She grabbed his hand, shoved it between her heaving breasts, then drew his hand lower, past her padded stomach. His fingernails scraped against her zipper. She stopped the descent. "Or is this what you want?"

   Flush in the face, Barry withdrew his hand from hers, gabbed her by the shoulders, shoved her giggling form towards the bed, and shut the door.

***

   As always, the man becomes a child when the candy is in full view of his appetites: Barry fumbled with his zipper, then had trouble getting his pants past his boots (it finally dawned on him to first take the damned things off), and then he had to contend with Natalie’s coyness.

   "Natalie?" he asked when he reached for her beside him.

   The bed was empty.

   Then he heard laughter.

   Out in the hall.

   He rose from the bed and headed for the hall.

   There was more laughter.

   How in the hell did she get out into the hall without him noticing?

   "Natalie?"

   "In here," came the response from the room at the end of the hallway. The door was partially ajar. He entered the darkened room.

   "Natalie."

   "Barry." The sound of a bed squeaking. "Come here."

   He did.

   Her hands ran over his stomach, her hands cold yet soothing, causing him to giggle like a child. She giggled with him. Her giggling turned into an oohing when her hand alighted upon his stiffened cock.

   "What a man," she gurgled into his ear. "What a magnificent man."

   He bit her erect nipple in answer.

   She gripped him harder.

   He bit her other raisined nipple.

   Her grip strengthened as she began to pull.

   Barry protested.

   She pulled harder, laughing at his pained whimpers.

   "What are you doing?"

   "Isn’t it obvious Barry?"

   She pulled.

   He grunted.

   "Isn’t it obvious what I’m doing? I’m pulling your string. And then you know what I’m going to do, Barry? Do you? When I pull hard enough?"

   A whimper.

   "I’ll have your cock, Barry, and you won’t have anything." He made to slap her, but she apparently knew the score and gave such a pull there was an audible ripping sound.

   Barry screamed.

   "Don’t do that, Barry. Don’t fight me on this."

   "Please, Natalie. Oh. God. Please. Natalie. Don’t."

   "What’ll you do for me?"

   He sobbed in a great gout of air.

   "What’ll you do for me if I don’t pull this off?"

   "Anything, Natalie."

   "Anything, you magnificent man you?"

   "Yes. Yes. Anything. Just quit pulling." He reached down to try and pry her hand off him, but she slapped him away, then strengthened her grip on him. He laid back on the bed, panting from pain.

   "Did I hear you say that you’d do anything for me, Barry?"

   "Yes. Yes. Just name it and it’s yours. Just name it."

   That’s all she needed to hear. She gave one terse tug and the pain in Barry’s head became excruciating.

   And then there was no extension of his pain.

***

   Barry never went back to Tomely Ridge nor did he ever go back to the Sour Notes Bar.

   There were times when he actually missed the old place. Times when his heart would ache, when some sight, some smell would trigger memories. Natalie told Barry there would be days like that. When the pain in his heart equaled the one felt in his groin that one night. But she told him all that would change. Trust yourself to Mountainview, she said. Give yourself to Mountainview completely and we’ll be closer.

   Someone could become quite attached to Mountainview if they were to allow themselves. It’s large, yes. Impersonal, yes. But it also had variety. Change. A breath all its own. Not at all the loamy smell which Tomely Ridge did on days of plowing, not at all the smell of shit it did on days of fertilizing, but a smell of eviscerations and decay all its own.

   And so, without wanting to, but not being able to help himself from, he gave into the free spirits the large city offered.

***

   It was Natalie who acquainted Barry with Mountainview’s more exotic bar, Grinding Hips, a bar he wouldn’t have frequented at all if it hadn’t been for Natalie’s need.

   "And that is?"

   "You know perfectly well what that is."

   "But--"

   "No butt’s Barry. You know that. It’s what the other side gives is what I need. And besides.... You’re in no position to argue."

   Which was true.

   He wasn’t.

   So he went.

***

   Bountying up to three or four a night and drinking what Natalie taught him to get from them was child’s play. It was the part which came next that sickened him: going home to mama.

   Her legs, so ripe under the full moon of his desire that first night, weren’t slim pickings anymore. Fat was an overused word, so obese was the word he dared use when he was lucky enough to find himself under the cover of some shadowed corner. Natalie still saw herself as she once was, beautiful beyond words’ pitiful attempt at description: a bouquet of flowers which was given unto spring: a rolling stream sculpting a mountainside. But anyone with sight knew differently. Her body was actually a barren tundra, all life dead on the surface. But underneath...

   Underneath was where the seeds had taken hold and had grown.

   Going into her room and seeing her lie there, pale smile of indifference masquerading as wanton desire, he would sometimes prefer death to this. Her legs would spread, her hands gesturing him to come closer (her impassionate lips whispering she was ready, had been ready all evening) and he would do what was expected of him: vomit his night’s earnings into her yawning depths and endure her urgings for more and endure -- as best he could -- the sickening part: the tiny mewling sounds, the sound of leather romping, and the slurping of the evening’s meal. Sometimes he would be able to catch sight of small, taloned fingers escaping from its nest, tearing bloody clumps of Natalie’s vulva in protest for more food as she cooed herself to orgasm.

   When through, Natalie would sit up then, reach down between her legs and stroke them while she sung lullabies until their griping would end.

   That was when he would back away, one hand covering his face to shut out the sight which cavorted behind her vulva and back out of the room, bumping into dusty walls and cobwebbed furniture.

   Despite what she told him, he didn’t think he would ever get used to this change.

***

   Then one day, Natalie’s desires changed.

   "I’m not going to do it anymore."

   "Oh, but you will, Barry. And you know it." She giggled a reckless giggle then. "Because you know what’ll happen if you don’t do it."

   There it was again.

   The threats.

   "Don’t you, Barry?"

   He nodded so she wouldn’t show him the reason for his downfall, so she wouldn’t show him her contempt for him.

   "It’s really not so much different from what I’ve taught you so far. Now you just tickle them a little more. And then—--"

   He closed his eyes to the rest of the narration.

***

   As usual, the homosexuals adored him. They commented on his clothes, his stance, his looks, how nice it would be to be with him. He’d smile demurely, charading coyness. It was all part of the dating game. In the end, there wasn’t any doubt he would be going home with them and they knew it.

   Once there, it was so easy tying them up under the pretense of a little rough play, gagging them, pulling down their pants, and rooting out their twig.

   He still began the ritual the same as he always did: going down on them, taking their last supper into his mouth, and gorging himself on that point. If nothing else, their pleasure helped cover his next act which began with the seven inch blade Natalie gave him and ended with one great slice, their muffled exclamations and squirmings more than he was able to watch.

   But watch he did. Just as Natalie told him to. Until the bucking stopped.

   "We don’t want any witnesses, do we, Barry?" was her becalmed reasoning.

   For once, she said something he could agree with.

***

   Once home, the trophy wrapped securely in the guy’s sock, he slid the man’s cock into Natalie’s cunt, closing his eyes to the sights which struggled there for his attention.

   "Not much longer now, Barry," was Natalie’s cooing. From her vaginal area he heard the sound of the cock being torn and chewed.

   "How much longer?"

   "Time really doesn’t matter, does it, Barry? Time is a commodity we have plenty of. When they get old enough, they’ll hunt on their own. Until then, someone’s got to do it for them."

   But the chirping’s driving me nuts and these nightly excursions to gain food for your children is going to be the death of me, he wanted to say. But he didn’t say it. All he did was bow his head in submission, like a dog begging for a bone.

   "Yes, Barry. I know. You’ve been a good boy tonight. And for being a good boy, I’ve got a little something for you."

   Barry straightened, a gleam in his eye.

   "Don’t get bright on me, Barry. You know the rules. Only for a short time, no longer." Natalie reached over to the table by the bed, picked up the jar which contained Barry’s cock, and handed it to him.