Editor's note: this story contains scenes of incest or incest content.
*
She knew he was coming. She didn't know how she knew with such certainty; his visits were always sporadic with no discernable pattern to them, yet, she knew it was today. Sometimes he would come a couple of times a month. Then there would be months when she wouldn't see him. There was even a period, several years back, when he did not show himself for nine months and she thought she had seen the last of him. She felt sure she could expect him this month, given the upcoming holiday, but that was next weekend. That said, it wasn't unusual for him to show up early for special days.
However, one thing remained fairly constant; he usually showed up on a Friday afternoon... and that was today.
Of course, there was more than the calendar feeding her suspicions. Today there had been a feeling in the air all day -- in her very bones; today he would come. She knew it was irrational -- after all, he'd often defied expectations before.
All morning, she had been apprehensive -- on edge, unable to concentrate. She was aware that her students and her colleagues noticed her distraction, yet her efforts to focus were only partially successful. By the time the last bell rang, it was all she could do to control her trembling.
All the children had gone home and the other teachers as well; she alone remained. There in her classroom, she attempted to grade the papers of students whose minds were focused on the impending Summer Holiday... yet she could focus on nothing. She would frequently pause, occasionally pace; torn between anticipation and dread.
It was nearing 5 o'clock before she had conquered her inertia, loaded her briefcase, stood, put on her coat, and slowly exited the middle school where she had taught English for the almost 20 years. As she walked down the street toward home, propelled by the brisk spring wind, she again wondered, as she did almost daily, what they would think of her -- the principal, her coworkers, the children, the school board, the parents -- if they ever learned what she really was, what she had done, what she had become in the last 10 years.
In many ways, her visitor was still a child -- he even still looked like the same 25-year-old stranger who charmed his way into her home a decade ago... the day her life changed. He still delighted in showing up "out of nowhere" to frighten her. It usually worked. Even though today she expected him, she didn't know exactly where or when, so he might still get a scare out of her yet. Still, there were only so many places along her walk home where he could surprise her, and by now, she knew them all. She looked for him in every alley, every doorway, behind every dumpster, trying not to cringe as she passed these haunted spots.
Of course, he was in the last possible location along her route; behind the large oak tree in her own front yard.
She tried to look as if she wasn't startled when he stepped out in front of her.
"You made me wait," he said, "you'll have to pay for that, you know."
"Yes, sir, I know," She said, eyes cast down submissively, "I'm sorry."
"Let's go inside," he said, leading the way up the steps to her front door.
He opened the door with his keys and marched right in, never looking back to check on her. Head down, she followed obediently.
He threw his coat on the sofa, and then plopped down in her old, overstuffed wing chair in the living room. He looked tired, she thought, his face bathed the last rays of the day. No, she thought again, not tired... older. She realized with a start that the lines on his face had grown deeper, and... was that a touch of gray mixed in with the dark blonde hair at his temples? He had always seemed like an ageless Adonis; the face and body of a Greek god, the mind of a demon.
"Prepare yourself for inspection," he said and lit a cigarette. Neither she nor her late husband, nor any of her friends smoked... and never in her house. This was yet another way his presence lingered long after he had gone. She had always suspected, and recently he confirmed, he didn't normally smoke; only when he drank -- which was rare -- or when he was with her. He always bought a fresh pack for their weekends, which he never finished and which he disposed of before he left again... to go back to his other life, where he was another person, a person who didn't smoke, drink or do the things he did with her.
About what business he did when not with her, she had gleaned only three things. First, it was dangerous. Second, it was very clandestine. And third, it was very, very lucrative. She did not need -- nor want -- to know anything more. She liked to think of it "active apathy", or "a healthy lack of curiosity".
She took off and hung up her coat on a rack by the door, then stood three paces from his chair facing him, and calmly began to unbutton her blouse. There was some strange comfort in knowing that the rituals had at last begun. Even horror could be soothing, she thought, if it was familiar enough. And at a certain level of familiarity, was it still horror?
How many times over the last decade had she walked through this exact same nightmare (dream?) -- so often that from old habit, her body could disrobe itself while her mind clinically examined and reflected on her situation, as if reviewing a case study in a journal.
