In Laymon's Terms

Beth stood up. “You will if you want to see these again,” she said furiously. She tore open her blouse, exposing herself. She grabbed his hands and pressed them hard against her naked breasts. He could feel the nipples harden against his palms.

“Beth, stop it. This is crazy. He’s crazy. You’re crazy.” He struggled to pull his hands away. Then he screamed. Beth abruptly released his hands. He looked at his palms and saw deep bite wounds in them, blood running down over his wrists.

He stared in horror at Beth’s chest. Where Beth’s nipples had been there were two vicious little mouths with needlelike teeth, biting at the air. His blood smeared her white flesh. He moved his eyes up to her face. It wasn’t Beth anymore. It was a demon with red and yellow eyes and a full, toothy mouth that was a larger version of the two on her chest. She stepped away from him, yanked up her skirt, and stood with her legs spread apart. She wore no underpants. From between her legs, a long, scaly green tongue thrust out, flicking around his waist like a serpent’s. It traveled down his body and tangled around his ankles, pulling him off balance.

Ernie screamed again and scrambled backward in panic.

“Come down, Ernie Davis, and bear witness!” Swann’s voice filled the arena. The Beth-demon laughed as he stumbled away.

“Bear witness!” echoed the crowd. Hands reached out, grabbing at Ernie as he backed down the aisle, his eyes shifting wildly from Swann to Beth and back. Swann’s eyes glowed with unholy yellow flame, the pupils narrow and reptilian.

“Has your new life been so disappointing that you would turn your back on me?” Swann’s voice was suddenly low and intimate, speaking only to Ernie. “I gave you everything you wanted and more, for the paltry sum of a thousand dollars. Now when I call you, you run from me?” The sorrow in the voice was heart-rending. But still Ernie moved toward the exit, pulling back from the grasping hands. His breath came in ragged sobs.

A big, hairy arm shot out and jerked Ernie backward and lifted him off the floor by the neck.

“Let me go!” Ernie shrieked.

“The hell I will, you miserable little dick!” It was Witkowski. “YOU did this to me, didn’t you, asshole? I came here tonight to get a few of my own prayers answered, and damn if one of them isn’t answered already!”

Witkowski smelled as if he’d been living in a brewery and sleeping in a sewer. His breath was hot and foul. “I’m going to tear your pointy head off, you fucking weasel,” he hissed.

Ernie looked at the Reverend Swann, who was watching him intently. He looked at Beth, who was demurely buttoning her blouse. Her face was normal and lovely again, but she shot him a hate-filled glance.

I’ve been sleeping with a demon from hell, he thought, and shuddered.

Witkowski’s fingers tightened on his throat, and he gagged. The crowd was hushed in anticipation.

“Well, Ernie...? Shall I let you go back to being a nobody? Shall I let my friend here be avenged on you? Or will you come to me?”

Ernie flexed his hands and felt the bites bleed afresh. He flung his arms behind him and crashed his fists against Witkowski’s eyes. The pain and blood blinded Witkowski and with a piercing howl he loosened his grip on Ernie, who spun away from him.

“Fuck you all!” he screamed.

At once the crowd rose and turned, ripping the arms off the seats and brandishing them as they closed in. Ernie raised his arms in weak defense as they prepared to beat him to death.

“God, I’m so sorry. Please God, no,” he screamed.

The crowd drew back and roared as one, a surge of rage reaching a crescendo that rolled over Ernie like a wave. He fell to his knees. “Forgive me,” he cried. Then he knew no more.

When Ernie came to, he was in the parking lot of the Civic Arena. He raised his head and looked around. Dawn was just breaking. The lot was empty except for an old Honda Civic. With a start, he recognized it as his own.

“I’d have thought you’d be scrap metal by now,” he said. He felt dazed, as if he’d just awakened from a deep sleep.

Beth, Swann, Witkowski—where were they? Where was his Acura?

He got slowly to his feet and walked to his battered old car. He still had a key to it on his keyring. He got in and started it.

The palms of Ernie’s hands burned painfully. He turned them up and looked at them. The bite wounds were still there, shaped like the mouths that had been Beth’s nipples.

“Oh, my God,” he groaned.

And he watched as the little mouths slowly curled into smiles.

Mark Justice

NEVER MET DICK LAYMON.

I did interview him twice for my radio show. The first coincided with the Leisure release of Bite.

The first Laymon I read had been The Stake, which I found in the Greenup (KY) County Public Library, in hardcover. I read the book in a few hours, certain that I’d found a new favorite author.