Still Life With Teeth

I am so hungry. Dieting isn't fun, is it? All one can think of is food, feeding, dining, supping, lunching, breakfasting, breaking the fast -- all right. Stuffing one's face. But I am so very very very hungry.

It is a very hot and sunny day, and I've found a nice shady spot in front of the Art Building. I'm pale, of course. The sun is brutal to my white skin, and a tan would look silly with my red hair anyway. I prefer the shadows, the indoors, rainy days. Spring is glorious, though. I'll enjoy the sun vicariously, from my shadowy bench.

I have almost reached my goal. Almost. I'm not goal oriented, usually, but I wanted to lose those few pounds that stick about the thighs. My friendly thighs, as Charlie called them. Poor Charlie. He certainly seemed to enjoy them, being between them. I enjoyed him, too; until we broke up. Until he dumped me.

Shall I pace? Will it bring anyone closer to me? Nah . . . I flop to my side on the cement block bench, my backpack as a pillow, watching the students walk back and forth before me. I should be in the studio, finishing my painting. I should be talking to my advisor about my independent study project.

I should be finding Charlie and taking him home with me; separating him from that blonde bimbo he's taken up with. I should be down on my knees in front of him, sucking him dry, sucking him until he begs for mercy, that son of a bitch . . . I am pacing. Striding back and forth, my hands in my hair, practically pulling it out. Damn him, anyway. If I had a tail, it would be whipping back and forth. If I had a tail, I'd have sharp, long teeth and claws, too. I'd use them -- on her, the blonde, the pudding-faced brainless bimbo . . .

On him. Raking them down his back, as he pumps into me, screaming. Oh, yes, I'd use them on him.

People are looking at me oddly, and I stop pacing. I grab the backpack, stalking back to the building. I don't care; to hell with the goal. I'm too hungry to care. I stop at a vending machine and get a very sugary, caffeine laden soda, and stalk to the studio.

My painting is on the easel, swirling masses of every shade of red. My favorite, of course, is the purplish red, the color of venous blood, that is a prominent feature. However, there is much to be said for the scarlet splash in the center, very arterial. Dr. Lindt stands next to me, his face screwed up with distaste.

"You don't like it?" I ask, lavishly spreading more crimson to the borders.

"It looks like the inside of a slaughterhouse," he says, glaring at me. "For Christ's sake, Melanie, you can do better than this dreck. Scrape it down and start over." He turns and walks away, going to the next easel. I step back and look at my painting objectively. He's right, of course. It does look like the inside of a slaughterhouse. Good. I'm tempted -- for just a moment -- to paint in a blonde head.

I do, however, pick up my knife and commence scraping. I have painted my need, and controlled destruction is therapeutic.

I clean everything up, regesso the canvas, and decide to call it a day. I am feeling marginally better. I'm still ravenous, though. I pinch my abdomen -- wait. I can't anymore; there's nothing extra to pinch. Yes! I can eat!

Control, I tell myself. Small portions, neatly spaced. Chew everything. Enjoy your food. I stride to my car, my keys ready. Everything at this campus is uphill or downhill; my car is down two hills and a thousand steps. I don't care. I am striding, soaring -- feeling light and free. Now that I can eat, I'm not so hungry. I'll have salad again, with a tomato-basil dressing, and perhaps a slice of that good bread . . . and I see them, near my car.

Charlie and his dough-faced blonde. She's wrapped around him like white on rice, and I'm furious. I'm so furious that my painting flashes in back of my eyes -- crimson, scarlet, crimson, scarlet -- and I wish I had a knife. He's murmuring to her, I can hear him; my ears are very sharp -- like a bat, he said -- he's telling her how great she is, how hot.

Hot, my ass, I think. I push by them, almost knocking them over. "Excuse me!" I snarl, unlocking my car and throwing my pack in the backseat. They are staring at me, Charlie with a pained expression and the blonde looking stupid, as usual.

"God, Melanie, you don't have to break bones," he said, rubbing his elbow where my pack hit it.

"Yes, I do," I said, sweetly, "to make my bread. Stay away from my car, asshole," I say, running hungry hungry hungry eyes over him. I want him, I want to eat him -- I want everything about him. I want his life, running out of him, at my feet.

I want a Twinkie.

Control, I tell myself, sliding behind the wheel, adjusting my sunglasses, peeling out of the parking place and trying very hard to hit them. I miss, of course; my better instincts, and drive home.

I have my salad, my crusty bread, a glass of wine. I'm working on another piece at home, another painting. A landscape this time, painted in a cemetery. I love old stone, and the best is found at cemeteries. This is a moonlit painting, and the light is different. It's an interesting problem, and I'm very happy with it. I have Smashing Pumpkins on the stereo, my painting is going well, and my stomach is full.

And Charlie comes over.

I heard the knock, of course, but the music is loud and I thought it was for my neighbor, a girl with a wild social life. Then the knocking got louder. "Open the door, Melanie!" I heard him. "Open the goddamned door!"

I did, of course, feasting my eyes on his lean frame. He's dark haired, dark eyed, intense. We were so good together . . . I turned my back and went back to my picture. He followed, and looked at it.

"Christ, you're morbid," he commented, looking at it critically. "Don't you every lighten up?" He went to my refrigerator and got a beer.

I was offended. "This is light," I protested. "Look -- it's a full moon, and there are different colors of stone -- look at the pinwheels. It's really rather cheerful."

It was; I'd done my sketches Easter Sunday, and there were toys, flowers and balloons decorating the graves. I enjoyed that part.

"It's a fucking graveyard, Melanie," he said, with exaggerated patience. "It sure as hell isn't a rose garden."

"Rose gardens don't have interesting stones," I said.

"Rose gardens don't have graves, you mean, with bodies rotting in them."

"That's a horrible thing to say!" I was very annoyed, and he was standing in my kitchen door, drinking a beer.

"In all the time I've known you, you've never painted a seascape, or a garden, or even a wicker lawn swing. All you paint are graveyards, and moonscapes, and bloody messes." I thought of my painting; crimson, scarlet, crimson, scarlet . . .

"And look at you. You're a wraith right now. You used to have breasts, Melanie."

I looked down. I still did, but they were smaller. I'd been dieting, after all. Trying to lose weight, trying to get the memory of him out of my skin.

"Your point being . . ." I said, putting down my brush and heading for the kitchen. I wanted an apple, a carrot, a nut . . . something I could bite and crunch. Like bones.

"My point being that you're taking our breakup way too hard," he said. "We aren't compatible; you said that, right before you threw my shoes at my head."

"Oh, no," I said, my mind going to our last fight. "You said we weren't compatible; I said you were too goddamned critical -- of me, my art, my life --"

"And I was right, too," he shot back. "You don't eat. You don't sleep. You paint death -- Death, Melanie, the Big D -- all the time. All you came alive for was sex, and there's more to life than sex!"

"Have you told your blonde that?" I sniped. I couldn't help it. She was having Charlie's body; I got Charlie's opinions. It wasn't a fair trade, and I bit into the apple as hard as I could.

"Leave Laurie out of this," he said.

"Leave her in!" I bellowed. "You left me, dammit. You walked out on me, on us -- because I'm morbid, and deathloving, and trying to die . . . that's what you said., that I was trying to die. Well, I'm not trying, bucko. I'm already dead!"

"How is that my fault?" he answered. "How is your giving up life in any way my fault? We burned up the sheets, Melanie, but that's all we had -- ever. No life, no fun, nothing but hot sex and, frankly, I need more than that. Laurie isn't a rocket scientist, but she can go out in the sun!"

"I explained that," I said, "I can't do the sun."

"You don't even try, and it isn't medical," he said. He finished his beer, and sat on my only chair, at my computer. "You don't even try."

He looked sad, and I was still angry. Angry, and hungry again, and oh, so horny . . . I could smell him, his scent was everywhere, and I couldn't stand it anymore.

I walked to him, and sank to my knees in front of him, and reached for the snap on his jeans.

"Oh, God, no, Melanie, that's not why I came here," he said, protesting. His hand closed on my wrist, but I have nimble fingers, and managed the snap.

"Why did you come, then?" I asked, working the zipper in spite of him. His protests were milder now, but he was still making them. "To beat a dead horse? Or a dead girlfriend?"

"Melanie, stop this." He was firm, trying to get up, but I am stronger than I look and kept him in place. I did the next part hands free; his hands and mine were intertwined -- I kept him occupied while my teeth took care of his zipper, and I ever so gently pulled his penis from his boxers.

"Oh, God," he whimpered, as I took him in my mouth and began to work my magic, my life. I could feel the blood in his veins, hear his heart beating, hear his harsh breathing as he struggled, hear his cries as he grew hard, harder -- the very hardest, I sucked him and licked him and kissed him, all on my knees, all for him -- his life was mine; I scraped my teeth lightly along his shaft and he howled, moaning and crying out and then he came, in my mouth, I swallowed him. His life. My life.

I felt full, complete, replete . . . I stood, and took off my black crop top and my jeans. I really was thin, I thought, but that's what happens when one is dieting. I sat astride his legs, pulled his mouth to me and kissed him, hard, long, hungrily; it had been months, and I could feel him stirring again. He cried out again, "No, please -- Melanie, for the love of God, not again!"

I didn't listen. I closed my ears to that and took him inside, impaling myself, holding him inside, by my will, my muscles, my body --- I'm not hungry, I'm beyond hungry, I need this, this is my food, my life -- and I rode him and rode him until he cried out again, and I screamed with pleasure, and then -- I picked up his unconscious body and took it to my bed. I am really stronger than I look.

It was nothing, after all, to finish undressing him. He lay on my bed, tanned, lean, fit, his sex still half aroused. I knew he'd get up in the morning and go back home, back to the blonde, or someone like her. Someone who lives in the light.

I don't think so.

I opened all the curtains, and the windows, so the sun would come in the next morning. There's no point delaying the inevitable, as my great grandfather used to say. I lay next to Charlie, cradling his head against my now warm breast, my fuller form cushioning him. I'd wake him during the night, one more time, and love him, one more time. Feed, really.

When he is unconscious again, and he will be, I will take my knife, my palette knife, and make sure he remembers me. Carved, on his lean stomach, maybe starting at his heart: Melanie luvs Charlie 4ever. Deep enough to scar; shallow enough that he won't bleed to death.

The sun will rise, and he will wake up, and I won't be there. Well, the dust will. I'll be gone. I'm tired of this, truly I am. I am so hungry all the time, and as much as I can, I love Charlie, and I don't like to toy with anything I love. I don't like to play with my food.