Now that security guard was really starting to freak me out, man. He tried to play it off like he was just walkin’ the beat, ya know? Only he just kept circlin’ this particular cluster of stores like I was the nucleus at the center of his existence. It seemed like every time I stole a look at him, the dude was starin’ me down. Got to the point that there were some pretty crazy ideas runnin’ through my head. Like maybe how he can see right into me, how he knows exactly what I’ve been thinkin’ about over here and can see all the dark designs swirlin’ around in my mind.
I start getting all fidgety… chasin’ this itch that starts at my neck and then runs to my arm before tryin’ to hide on the side of my belly. And I know this probably just makes me look even more suspicious, right? But what can I say? I was scared, man. I was fuckin’ terrified. Shit, I didn’t even know if I had it in me to do these things I’d been thinkin’ about. I mean, I’m a pretty easy goin’ guy, ya know? Never bought into that whole violence scene. So yeah… maybe I was a little bit on edge. But who can blame me, right?
Anyways, I stroll down into that little sunken area on the other side of the falls… the one with all the benches and that coffee shop set up in the center? I plop my ass down so I can just see past the cascade of water, pick up a newspaper someone had left layin’ around, and try to play it cool. Just an average dude readin’ the sports section. Nothin’ to see here, cats. Move right along.
But the entire time I’m actually watchin’ the shop girl from the corner or my eye like I was Dian Fossey or some shit. I musta sat there about an hour, hour and a half. After a while, the rent-a-pig kinda wandered off so I was able to focus my full attention on Clarice fuckin’ Hudson, ya know?
So I’m listening to the roar of the falls and breathin’ in that scent of fresh ground coffee… man, is that a beautiful aroma or what? That place makes a kick ass cuppa joe, believe you me. Anyways, I’m sittin’ there watchin’ her and I notice how every time she has more than a few seconds between customers, she reaches down beneath the counter and comes back up with a handful of food. Ah hell, man… I don’t know what kind of food. I was a ways off, dig? Cheez Its, potato chips, could been manna for all I fuckin’ know. I swear, the things you guys choose to focus on… blows my mind, man. It really does.
See, the whole point of this little narrative isn’t what she was eating, man. It’s that she’s stuffin’ this shit in her cheeks like a chipmunk stockin’ up for winter. I mean, that musta been a bottomless fuckin’ bag of whatever ‘cause that girl just kept shovelin’ it in. She wasn’t no porker, either. Hell, you know. You’ve seen her… well yeah, most of her, I guess. But you get my drift, right?
So, like I said, she’s wolfin’ down her little snacks for close to two hours when this shirt and tie guy comes along and starts chatting her up. She’s nodding, shaking her head, wiping the sweat off her face with her hand. Then she takes a look at her watch and stuffs her red apron under the counter while Shirt And Tie takes her place at the register.
She walks outta the Dollar Bonanza and I give her about a minute or so and then just kinda stand up casually and start followin’ this broad, right? I tail her to the escalators on the other side of the mall and we ride all the way up to the third floor and I keep thinkin’ about all these people around her. People who have no fuckin’ clue. I mean, this chick could potentially be infested with thirty-one different flavors of crinkum. And you’ve got dudes giving her the once over, dykes undressing her with their eyes. Hell, they probably thought that sweat made her sex….
Crinkum? You know, man… disease. Like an STD and shit. Picked that up back around the turn of the century. No, not the fuckin’ disease, man… the term. I swear, sometimes I think you two get a kick outta pokin’ me with your little verbal sticks. Do you wanna hear this shit or not? ‘Cause I can just shut the fuck up right now and not say another word.
That’s what I thought.
So anyways, here I am following Ms. Clarice fuckin’ Hudson across the food court and, since it was lunch time, they’ve got this guy in a tux sittin’ over at the baby grand. He’s ticklin’ those ivories and the music kinda drifts through the lull of the crowd, weaves in and out of the static sound the falls makes as it flows over the edge of its trough. Real mellow, classical shit. Gives the whole scene this art film quality, ya know? Like I can’t believe I’m actually doin’ this and there’s probably a director hiding with his camera crew in the back of Steak on a Stick, just waitin’ to yell cut.
So the chick walks up to the counter at Burger World and I’m acting like I’m checkin’ out some of the menus from those other paragons of fine dining, but I’m actually still watchin’, ya know? Still trying to figure this shit out.
So this sweaty little shop girl orders two super-size value meals, man. And I’m not talkin’ about those flat, meat pancakes they try to pass off as burgers either. Fuck no. Triple stack with cheese, lettuce, tomato, the optional bacon. Bitch gets it all. Now keep in mind that she’s been eating for nearly half her shift already. Me, I’d be about ready to split wide open by then. But not this lady, no. She eats every last bite and even fuckin’ licks that gooey cheese off the wrappers, if you can believe that. Hell, I half expected her to shove those down her gullet too.
When she goes back to work, she rings herself up a purchase and guess what? More fuckin’ food, man. Ha! This time I know what it was—she got one of those little bags of cotton candy and three boxes of banana moon pies. And by the time she left for the day, there wasn’t anything left but wrappers, cardboard, and this little dab of marshmallow cream on the corner of her mouth.
But did that keep her from stoppin’ by the theater on her way out and gettin’ one of those huge tubs of popcorn? Damn right, it didn’t. I could see the butter glistening on that shit from twenty feet away.
Haven’t you been listening to a fuckin’ word I’ve been sayin’, man? Do I hafta spell it all out for you in big block letters and bright yellow crayon? Good Lord…
Okay, then. Let’s just recap a little here so you retards will be brought back up to speed, okay?
First sign: profuse sweating. And why is that? Anyone? Anyone?
That’s right, man. Give yourself a fuckin’ gold star. They sweat because they’re going through these changes, and the sweat is produced by the heat from the energy required to rewrite someone’s genetic code. But energy can’t be created or destroyed, man. It can only change form, right? So she’s burnin’ up all this energy realigning chromosomes and shit… and it’s gotta be replaced, ya know? Otherwise her entire system will just break down. What good is a pathogen without a host, man?
See, that’s the second sign right there. This ravenous fuckin’ appetite without so much as adding on a pound. Hell, if it didn’t mean the end of everything we know, you could make a killing off that shit in the diet market.
So, Clarice fuckin’ Hudson has now ticked off two of the seven on this little checklist, and in my heart, I know. I fuckin’ know, man. Bitch is infective. But just havin’ that gut feeling isn’t justification enough. You gotta have empirical evidence. You gotta have facts.
I figure I gotta keep doggin’ her, right? Which isn’t hard. She drove this titty pink Volkswagen Bug with a sticker on the back that said It’s Not A Choice… It’s A Child. Which is kinda ironic, don’t ya think?
What d’ya mean, how so? Fuckin’ Ocean, man. It’s like the universe was sending me a message through that bit of bumper sticker philosophy. ‘Cause just thinkin’ about what I had in mind still made me nervous, dig? I wasn’t used to all this cloak and dagger shit. Hell, I encode envelopes for a living. I sit at this little desk for hours on end, looking at these pictures on my monitor where people have scrawled the address so bad the computer can’t read it. I type shit like PE and three states away this piece of mail gets sprayed with a barcode and goes on its merry fuckin’ way. Might just be a day in the life for guys like you… but for me it was foreign territory, right?
So it was like that sticker was reminding me that Ocean wasn’t an option, dig? That she was going to be born and the quality of her life could very well depend on how I handled this Clarice Hudson situation. And it was already too late for that chick, anyhow, there’s no cure for what she had, ya know?
See, this was what went through my head while I was sittin’ outside her apartment. I was half-listening to some right wing windbag on the radio, watchin’ her windows, checking the time every five fuckin’ minutes, tryin’ to figure out exactly how to do it.
Now see, man… when you call it pre-meditated it tells me that you’re still not understanding. You’re still confusing habeas corpus with doing the right thing, and a lot of time—as I believe I’ve mentioned before—those two concepts can run afoul of each other. I mean, give me credit, man. I didn’t go marchin’ up there to do the dirty deed just because she had two fuckin’ signs. Now that woulda been criminal, ya know?
So anways, it’s gotten dark and I’m thinkin’ maybe it’s time to piss on the fire and call in the dogs. Pack it up for the night and head on home, right? And just as I’m about to turn the key, what happens? Her front door opens, man.
She comes traipsin’ down the sidewalk in this low cut, white blouse that’s clingin’ to those tits of hers like a needy lover. Got this tiny skirt that barely covers the cheeks of her ass, black heels and matching bag, hair teased like a geek in a locker room. I mean, this bitch looks hot. Both figuratively and literally, ‘cause even from my car, I can see that sheen of sweat, man. That byproduct of contagion.
I follow her downtown and find myself in this little hole in the wall called Blue Moon. Not the Blue Moon, mind you… just Blue Moon. This is the type of joint that’s got Bob Seeger on heavy jukebox rotation, little Christmas lights all strung along the ceiling, and cans of Vienna Sausages for sale right alongside the overpriced Bics and antacids. Couple of pool tables in the back…
She’s down at the end of the bar by the video poker machines, kinda leanin’ over it like her bosom’s tryin’ to get a good look at all the bottles lined along the back mirror. The bartender’s this short, blonde chick with frizzy hair and she lines five shot glasses in front of Clarice fuckin’ Hudson and starts fillin’ ‘em up with something or other. Don’t ask me what, ‘cause I’m a beer man, myself.
Well, the leading lady in this here little drama throws those shots back like a sailor on leave. Bam, bam, bam. Hardly takes time to breathe between each one. She holds up three fingers and, after the bartender brought me a piss warm Bud, knocks back another trio.
You can bet your ass that by this time she’s caught the eye of every dude in this joint. The pool balls have stopped clackin’ around, there’s this chick throwin’ daggers at her boyfriend with her eyes, an old man who’s not too shy to sit there massagin’ his nutsack while he drinks her in.
This guy who looks like he’s probably in the place on a forged ID plops a few quarters into the juke but his eyes are all over Ms. Hudson when he’s selectin’ the songs. I figure he was probably goin’ for Lynrd Skynrd or some shit but got so distracted by this hard drinkin’ hottie that he somehow queued up Lady Gaga. Bad Romance, it was.
So the music really kicks in after that little Vedic sounding chant at the beginning and the bass is thumpin’ so loud that you can’t even hear the chirps and bleeps from the poker machines. Now our dear Clarice must’ve been a little monster, because she’s out there just gettin’ down. She’s movin’ her body to the rhythm like she was born to work the pole—tossin’ her head back, gyrating those hips as her hands trail along the curves of her body. She’s got her eyes half-closed and in the dim light it almost seemed like I was watchin’ a woman fuck the shit out of an invisible lover.
Now, you know these little dives. Their idea of air conditioning is a ceiling fan hidden up in the rafters that moves slower than a herd of turtles in tar. These places are stagnant, man, which is why they always got that ghost of old beer and stale cigarette smoke hauntin’ the air. No circulation at all.
You better believe by the time the songs fades into the next, this chick is drenched. I mean, her hair’s literally drippin’ with sweat, right, and her blouse looks like wet tissue paper that’s been plastered to her body. You can see right through that shit, too. Those pink nubs sittin’ in the center of these dark aerolas… you could see it all. If I didn’t suspect she was a weapon of mass destruction, I probably woulda shot my load right then and there.
So she starts walking toward my end of the bar, right? And she’s not so much as even a little off kilter, I mean, this chick coulda passed every sobriety test you guys threw her way.
I look down into my suds, tryin’ to play it off like maybe I can find the answers to all my problems somewhere in the bottom of that mug, but my heart’s just poundin’ away like a rabbit on crack. I’m startin’ to sweat a little myself and I want to take a sip of that beer so bad… to calm my nerves, ya know? But I’m afraid if I so much as lift it from that scarred counter, my hands will tremble so bad that it’ll slosh all over the place.
Just be cool, I tell myself. She’ll go to the juke, pick of a few songs, and then wander back down to the other end. Just stay cool, dude.
I could smell her before she even got close to where I was sittin’. It was this heady combination of perfume and deodorant mixed with the slightly sour smack of body odor, but, for some reason, that smell is kinda sexy on a woman, ya know? Why the hell is that? One whiff of a chick’s sweat and most guys pop a boner—or at least a semi—on the spot. I had to keep picturin’ these fuzzy little virons swimming around in all that perspiration, like minnows in a stream, to keep that shit in check.
Then I get this creepy feeling. You know how you can just sense when someone is lookin’ over your shoulder, man? It’s not like they’re touching you or anything, but you know they’re there. Almost like you can feel them rubbin’ up against your aura or something. Most times, it’s nothing but an annoyance, but when it happened at that little bar? I felt the hairs on the back of neck bristle and I just sat there for a moment, watching the bubbles pop on the head of my beer as this hard little lump formed in the back of my throat.
She musta still been a little winded from dancing, cause I could hear her breathing, too… and all I could think was what if this shit is airborne, man?
I realized, for some reason, that she just wasn’t gonna go away. So I looked up at her. Kept thinkin’ about all those nasty little buggers running amuck in her body to keep my eyes from simply stopping at chest level. By this point, I feel like I just wanna bolt out through the door and keep on runnin’ ‘til the sun came up. At the same time, though, it’s like every muscle in my body was suddenly petrified. Even felt like stone, now that I think about it. Cold and hard, immovable as a fuckin’ boulder.
So there I am, face to face with the enemy. With this woman whom I have no doubt will help bring about the destruction of my species. I’m lookin’ into those blue eyes, just waitin’ for her to make the first move. Believe you me, I just about jumped outta my soul when she parted those pouty lips of those and said in this calm, even tone: “You’ve been watching me.”