We met at a club in Chicago. I just turned 16; he was at least twice my age. I can’t remember why he was in the States but it would had to have been some monster dope deal. French Connection—sized. It was a terrible, self-destructive time for me. I wanted to leave the iron grip of my family’s wealth and dysfunction but didn’t stand a chance. I was in a vise.
I haven’t showed you this, have I? It’s probably time… [Her right hand slowly emerged from its brocaded silk sleeve, a night- blooming flower in search of lunar light. She held it out for inspection. I looked closely, with curiosity, as if it were an exotic pet — and got the feeling the hand was looking back. The index and middle finger were stumps; those that remained, bejeweled in priceless stones. The skin was covered by graceful, black henna tattoos, extending to the crook in her arm] I’m a southpaw, so it really hasn’t been too much of an impediment. I don’t parade it around, though I’m not particularly hyper-vigilant about concealing it either. I guess I favor it just a little. I’m as vain as the next girl but not so much about my hand, funnily enough. Anyway, my stock explanation is — or was, back in the day — that I was night-snorkeling along the Costa Smeralda and the propeller of our motorboat chopped them off. I’m going to tell you what really happened. [The hand retracted] So, back to Chicago, when Kura and I first met… I was in my wild-child phase. I walked around in a not-so-famous blue raincoat, a kid in a woman’s body. It was a rough club, oh boy, I don’t think it even had a name. No number on the building — a crazy hellish place. But exciting. I was a sick puppy! The only men I was attracted to were gangsters. (If you think that may have had a little something to do with my father, you better believe it did.) And I don’t mean gang-bangers, I mean gangsters. My Puerto Rican boyfriend was quick with a knife and I had a death wish—not a good combo. But aside from all that, I really wanted to bond with a killer. I had these warpy Caril Ann Fugate fantasies — remember Badlands? — they based that movie on her and her boyfriend — I wanted to meet someone who’d murder my parents without having to be asked! I wanted to ride off into the sunset with a soul mate sociopath.
We were in the parking lot of the club and my man was drunk. When he got drunk, he got very, very quiet. Never a good thing when that happened, nuh uh. Supposedly, I was the first girlfriend he’d had in years that he didn’t beat the living shit out of. The other gals who hung around the club — all older, 19 and up — they couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe I wanted to be with him or that it’d lasted so long. They just shook their heads. “He must really love you, Cassie.” (That was them being kind.) Mostly, they looked at me like I was psycho, which I was. I didn’t care what he did to me. I actually started to goad him. There wasn’t anything cute or courageous about it… it was ugly and degrading. He’d been in the penitentiary for murder, for like 10 years. He told me about two killings, contract killings he did while in the joint. That’s what they call the penitentiary — the joint. If you were a junkie you were a hype, and your needle was a harpoon. I picked up a whole new vocabulary. I learned about rigs and works and wolf tickets, oh I learned a lot. Quite the sentimental education. I thought he was afraid of me! Which probably he was, a little bit anyway… We were in the parking lot, standing next to his car. I said some stuff I knew I shouldn’t have. I was horrible, Bruce! I needed a shot — had a bad habit, an expensive one, and he wouldn’t give it to me. All part of our little S and M game. I was out of my skin. I think I probably called him — no, I did, I remember, I called him a fag. Nice, huh? Because he couldn’t get it up a hundred percent of the time and I thought I was the Fuck Queen of the Western World. He actually liked when I got aggressive in bed, he was one of those guys who liked to be dominated but didn’t want anyone to know it. So I called him all kinds of queer, loud enough for people to hear and then I said, “Why don’t you just fucking kill me, faggot?” I was wired like that, I had kamikaze swagger. (I must have been blasted out of my skull too.) You know, you can get away with stuff for a long time. Luck’s a big part of it.
That night, my luck ran out.
He grabbed me by the neck and I felt a sting. I remember it was freezing, a freezing wind like a knife itself. I wasn’t wearing my coat… I was cold, then suddenly warm. I smiled at him. I don’t know how or why but I knew it was the end. I was very calm… he smiled back. It was impossible to know what he was thinking, why he was smiling. In the slow-motion madness of it all I looked up and saw my namesake constellation. Really seemed to have the time to look — and it was upside-down. Did you know Cassiopeia is topsy-turvy half the year? She is, that was her punishment for sacrificing her daughter. It must have been like only 10° but I felt so warm, so sort of strangely… groovy. I thought he must have given me a hot-shot, spiked me somehow. And I kept having all of this time to stare at the sky… I was looking at one queen, he was watching another (me). Then I got so cold—talking about it now, it’s so vivid! I can feel and remember so much. Everything but his name. And I hope to fuck I never do. I’ve tried to before but it’s just gone, erased from the memory bank. One of those amazing tricks the mind’s so good at. I don’t ever want to remember it. Not ever—
My theory was that he had trouble in bed because he didn’t fuck with his cock, he fucked with his knife. The thing that excited him most was holding a blade to my neck during the act. That was the only way he could orgasm. Like a bad B-movie, isn’t it? Some deep Richard Widmark weirdness from the ’40s. What was that flick where he pushes an old woman in a wheelchair down the stairs? He’d make cuts on my neck while we made love, little crosshatches. Boy, I’m glad I don’t know you better or this would be too embarrassing! If I knew you any better, I don’t think I’d ever even have opened my mouth! Obviously, that excited me too — the knife — Jesus, what a sick puppy. O! Check this! You’ll like this detaiclass="underline" I wasn’t completely crazy because I always held his wrist when he came. Because there was always that possibility in the back of my head that he’d get overexcited and give me a slice, not really meaning to, you know, one nip to the carotid would be all she wrote. Finito. Over and out. Though he probably wouldn’t have stopped there… Hey, if you’ve gone that far, why not take the whole head! I could just picture his cronies (who weren’t very fond of me anyway) hustling him to a safe house before shipping the sonofabitch off to Central America or wherever.
Okay, the parking lot: later, I heard a whole mob was out there, but right when it happened it felt like we were totally, spookily alone. Like the scene in West Side Story when Tony and Maria are at a dance and suddenly everything spins and goes dark? And everyone disappears except for them? He got down on the ground, on top of me. I’d fallen into shock, staring over his shoulder at the upside-down Queen. His hard-on felt like the handle of a whip. He was rubbing it against me. Nice, huh. I mean, kinda thoughtful — who wouldn’t want a little frottage before dying? The familiar rhythm of his breath told me he was about a minute away from busting a nut. Sorry. That was crude. I’m getting drunk. Anyway, he was real quiet. Which, as I said, was not good. Didn’t ask me to look in his eyes like he usually did when he was gonna come, he was too far into the kill. I was pretty much gone anyway. You know, starting to merge with the jet-black majesty of woozy sky. He was good at what he did. (With a knife.) The weight of him on me was a comfort… then I felt this tug, but its meaning failed to register… then another — pinpricky tugs that sent me farther into the upside-down Queen’s palace.