REVENGE OF THE GHOUL

PART ONE: THEN

“O Rose‚ thou art sick!
The invisible worm
That flies in the night
In the howling storm‚

Has found out thy bed
Of crimson joy:
And his dark secret love
Does thy life destroy.”

“The Sick Rose”
William Blake

01: JEREMY
Jeremy walked toward Houston, downtown on Sixth Avenue, the twin monoliths of the World Trade Center ever-present in the distance. He passed a Love's pharmacy. The mirrored frame of the display window reflected his whole body.
    Back at Desiree's, there was only the shitty little bathroom mirror, and the handheld antique they used to cut coke. He rarely got the chance to see all of himself. He was a tall boy with an Iggy Pop thing goin' on. With the exception of a handful of items he kept at Desiree's these bleach-spattered jeans, his switchblade, and his leather jacket were the lynchpins to his wardrobe; but to keep his feet covered, what more did a junkie need? He looked bad, but he didn't mind. A Personal Aesthetic was for those who had something to live for, and that just wasn't him anymore.
    The dead woman's blood had spattered onto the collar of his black tee shirt; he could feel it sticking to his neck, but at least it wasn't evident.
    After killing that bitch, he now possessed the means to pay off Eliott, and pick up a little something extra for the demon. If he'd wondered before -- and he hadn't -- whatever in him that may have once been mistaken for innocence was now gone for good. A simple thing, too, he'd gone in as a sort of prank -- a bad habit when he bored -- but then that stupid, panicky cunt pulled her husband's gun. As a rule, one should not brandish a weapon as an empty threat.
    Jeremy was cursed with nothing left to fear so it didn't take but his own anger to turn the tide to his favor. That fucking idiot, as a courtesy, didn't even threaten to call the police. She pegged him as a lowlife the moment she set eyes on him. He resented her for that.
    He placed the candy bar on the counter.
    "I don't have any money."
    She was short, even on her little perch behind the register: a frail, brown Asian woman ... he could not have guessed her origins, but from some sun-baked desert on the other side of the globe, a sand soaked nation that would never have any impact upon the world beyond its borders.
    "I do not think so, sir." She pouted, tapped her finger on the counter between them. "No money, no candy bar."
    "But I'm hungry."
    "I am hungry too, go to work."
    "Maybe I'll work here? I'll earn the candy bar. Tell me what to do. I'll clean your windows."
    "I do not want any trouble, please. You must leave, now! Get out of my store. I cannot just give you the candy bar. This is a place of business, please." Right there, when she said that, her face twisted up in a cruel little squint. Right there, in her little rat face, Jeremy's desire turned ... a wanton impulse, but an undeniable one.
    I will begin, he thought, by cutting off your head.
    "You must please leave now." She shifted, unsettled by the glaze that swept over his face. "We are done here! Do not come back, not ever!"
    Then she pulled the handgun. He wasn't certain what happened next, but he had her wrist, clutched her face, he pushed her head onto the candy rack as she tried to bite his fingers. He heard the rattle of her teeth on his cheap St. Mark's Place skull and snake rings. He twisted the gun from her palm, pressed the muzzle to her temple.
    "You filthy bitch, who are you to threaten me? You're dead now, you're shit. You want to play rough, rat? How's this for rough? How's this for rough! Open the register. Open the goddamned register!" She was so compliant now, so very agreeable.
    Jeremy stuffed the bills into his jeans. He dragged her from behind the counter, over the candy rack by the bun of her hair. She fell to the floor in a pile. He stepped on her wrist with all his weight. He could hear her bones crack. He pushed the .22's muzzle against her eye. "You stupid cunt. Look at me! You should have been kind."
    He pulled the trigger.
    The blood didn't come right away, at first just the chunks of brain and her skull. Then a wave of gore erupted from the back of her head. Though he could not then know why, he reached into the small cavity of the wound, digging past her dark hair, past the cracked crown, and plucked a tattered shred from her mind. He admired it in his fingers, then popped it into his mouth. It tasted much like he expected; a bit rubbery, but otherwise bland; be better cooked. He thought just a moment more about cutting off her head, decided against it, grabbed the muzzle of the weapon with the edge of his shirt then pressed the weapon back into her palm.
    He found his way to the rear of the dead woman's shop, left through the back exit‚ counted his score.
    He walked toward Alphabet City, ready to deal with the debt he'd been avoiding for the past couple of months. He never did like the neighborhood, and still held a grudge for how Eliott chose to settle Jeremy's last debt. It wasn't that Jeremy never sucked a dick before, but Eliott just kept pushing him. When Jeremy finally begged him "no," Eliott went mad. Afterward, Jeremy went home to Desiree's where he wept for hours. Jeremy's decision to abandon Eliott, however, came at a price.
    For the last three weeks, he'd been buying off the street, and that street shit made his blood dirty. He been fantasizing about Eliott, and the demon cooed in his ear. "You know you need it, Jeremy. This nigger shit is bringin' you down. Maybe it wasn't so bad, maybe, if you just relaxed some, Eliott could have gotten his entire fist inside of you rather than just those four fingers he used to warm you up. You were clenching. You miss the clean line, kiddo. You'll go back, you know it."
    And, sure 'nough, first opportunity he got to settle his debt like a man, he was on his merry way.
    But he would never do those other things again, not ever, not unless there was cold cash at the other end of that cock ... and never, ever again for Eliott. Eliott took something from him that afternoon, and Jeremy had so little left to give.
    Jeremy walked into Strangès, nodded to Miriam. It used to be her place, but Eliott took over the old queen's lease in exchange for the support of her habit, and to help her pay for the hormone treatments. The place had once been a respectable neighborhood bar. Not a huge place, it would break fire-code with ninety people on a busy night. A few of the local alcoholics fed their perpetual hangovers in the back booths. Jeremy noticed a large man swallow a handful of yellow pills. The cannibal neophyte made his way past the lightweights to the kitchen, to the basement stairs, to the basement ... Eliott's Basement.
    The space was dark, illuminated only by candles. Electric light was forbidden here, Eliott's edict. An opiate den in the truest sense of the word, Eliott's was an illegal refuge for the wasted; a crypt for the addicted decorated for comfort with nothing but semen-frosted throw pillows scattered about, one large couch against a far wall, mismatched squares of filthy carpeting covered the concrete floor. The regulars were shadows; haunted shapes huddled in corners, tied-off, wiping caked blood from virulent needles with filthy fingertips, punching swollen veins in dim candlelight as blackened spoons flattened votive flames. The place stank of mildew, fuck, and cloves.
    Eliott sat in the rear of the large basement on an old barber's chair near a utility closet. He wore his soiled‚ terry-cloth bathrobe‚ as usual. Jeremy suspected the aged faggot was born in that robe -- overseer of this sedated rabble‚ masturbator‚ dealer of the cleanest smack this side of Afghanistan -- this is how Old Man Eliott spent his days. Jeremy wasn't sure if the old man ever left this place, but he was certain the old man would die here.
    As Jeremy stepped past Eliott's enslaved idolaters in worship of their poisoned veins‚ as the magistrate came into view upon his barber's chair‚ he saw the clean head of a thin black boy bobbing up and down in the master's lap.
    Eliott's eyes lit up when he saw Jeremy, eyes locked on Jeremy's face, the Old Man's withered hand fell on the black boy's skull.
    "Suck it ... " moaned the addicted elder‚ eager now‚ pushing the lad's skull down on his cock as he thrust his hips into the child's throat, "rat." The boy choked‚ but finished him off. He went to spit the king's ejaculate to the side. "No, swallow me." The boy did as he was instructed. Jeremy looked toward the ground. Relieved‚ breathless‚ Eliott handed the boy his prize, a small white envelope. "Hey!" Eliott's sour, effeminate voice pierced the narcotic dark. "What do we say?"
    The boy turned to face his master, "Thank you‚ daddy."
    "Mmm ... you're adequate for a child‚ but be sure to bring real money next time, or I hand you over to Mario and the boys. Hammer fancies the dark meat. Are we crystal?"
    The boy looked to the floor. "Yes, daddy." His eyes darkened.
    "That's better." Eliott turned back toward Jeremy‚ smiled. "Now get out of here‚ you filthy wreck." He raised his hand, beckoned Jeremy with a long, curled finger.
    Jeremy stepped aside as the boy shuffled past him. He walked over to Eliott. He sat on the riser at the base of the barber chair throne. He leaned against the old man's scabbed, shriveled legs.
    "Eliott." He traced the old man's exposed calf with a gentle touch of his index finger. The old man smelled of dead sex. He stroked Jeremy's tangled hair.
    "Hello‚ Angel ... been well?"
    "Yes‚ Eliott."
    "Don't you miss me when you're away for so long?"
    "Yes‚ Eliott."
    "Why do you run?"
    "You hurt me."
    "I know, Jeremy, I know. I ... I lost control, what can I say? It's tough business -- that's unrequited love for you. But, lovely boy, you stink of almonds."
    Aside from the blaring confession itself, Jeremy had no Earthly idea what the old man was on about.
    "I don't love you," Jeremy told him, "I need you."
    "What's the difference?" Jeremy just stared through the old queen. "You need to learn to forgive, Jeremy. There's no need to fear me." Eliott touched himself with his free hand. "We'll start fresh. You don't owe me at all‚ just ... lick it for me‚ Angel. You can have all you want if only you'll lick me‚ Jeremy." Eliott became erect again, the elder man wiggled it for the younger‚ like bait.
    Jeremy stood up from his supplicant's place at Eliott's feet, reached into his pocket for the stolen cash. "I owe you a hundred and twenty‚ I want to spend eighty." He handed up two twenties‚ two tens‚ five fivers, and the rest in ones.
    "Oh‚ Jeremy‚ you disappoint me so." Eliott took Richter's stolen money. The old man reached into his dank robe for another packet. "You could make a fortune to play at my feet. For any thing on this Earth‚ you would have but to suck my cock."
    "Sorry‚ Eliott ... I am no man's bitch."
    "No‚ Angel‚ certainly no. All man‚ you are." Eliott's face cracked into a thin smile ... a grin from the meat-eater's mouth. "Yes, you are."
#
"'I had a dream, which was not all a dream. The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the stars did wander darkling in the eternal space' ... like me."
    The bony curves of Desiree's long, malnourished body became fuzzy. Byron's words echoed in Jeremy's mind, a faint echo of a poem he'd read a million years ago, words that crept into his mind whenever he tapped. The needle stuck out of his arm at a weird angle, leaned down his forearm, pulled at the vein a bit as the inky blackout of Mother Heroin filled his mind, his blood. Jeremy drifted off, staring at the shifting jigsaw of pages ripped from fashion and porno magazines wallpapering his girlfriend's decrepit bedroom.
    After what seemed hours, as the parts of his brain reassembled, it was dusk again ... earlier in the evening, graduation day. It seemed so real, as if he were there again, played out once more in this dream, eating from the wound in the woman's head, headed to pay his master, standing in front of the aged faggot as the old man's face cracked into a thin smile ... that grin from the meat-eater's mouth. Eliott's lips pulled back even further this time, revealing his gums as red began to leak from the roots of Eliott's fragile, yellow teeth, as Eliott's mouth filled with blood. "And, still, I am the only one who can satisfy your hunger." Eliott's face continued to crack.
    There, from the lips, the skin tightened and split, sprayed Jeremy with the sticky red. Eliott began to cackle; the skin of his muscled death's head seemed to slide off his skull, his bathrobe darkened as if burned by some secret, sacred fire. His skin blistered. Eliott laughed as the surrounding candlelight began to fade, as he rubbed burning flesh off his skull with his palm. A light appeared from the ceiling, a spotlight upon the dungeon master that grew hotter, and hotter, and hotter as Eliott's muscles weakened, and his bile-slick bones began to crumble in on themselves before Jeremy's eyes.
    The world exploded then, like that perfect moment when the body takes the needle, when reality dissolves into nothing, then the dark. And when the dark came for Jeremy, it was the deepest dark he'd known. It felt as if he were wrapped up tight in his own soul, as if his own essence was the strap to bind him, the veil to blind him.
    A moment later Jeremy was alone ... naked, blessed, bathed in a cone of white, hot light from above, a light that warmed his flesh ... like a rock star.
    Sometimes he dreamed of the black, of the night, he thought, a place devoid of light or life. A few times in his past he remembered such a thing, but mostly his dreams were of entrapment; suffering ... prison cells, and live burials. Something of clarity was upon him here, he was certain he'd been here before. Much like this, too. Naked, blessed, bathed in a cone of light. It was Jeremy's greatest relief when the demon Narcotics pledged to demolish the ordinary and redefine his perspective. Almost nine years ago that was, mescaline, a small, purple barrel swallowed, dissolved in the belly to decompose the world, to put his dreams to rest. When Jeremy found the needle -- the perfect tool to pierce the flesh, to deliver the venom that divides the snake from its skin -- Jeremy became blessed.
    "You are blessed." The voice was a thousand voices, the sound of all things that ever suffered. It was in his head and echoed in the darkness outside the cone of light.
    "Show yourself."
    "In time."
    "What is this place?"
    Jeremy turned his head to try to pick out the source of the voice ... the voices.
    "You have been chosen for me."
    "What for?"
    "You have been chosen to listen." The first part of this declaration came from the dark. The second part was like a whisper at his shoulder, "you have been chosen to feed."
    "Chosen to feed," Jeremy repeated. He liked the sound of it. It held weight. "What do you want from me?"
    "Kill for me."
    "Why would I do that?"
    "For power, Jeremy, for true power ... the power of the armies of the damned to smite those who would persist to take from you."
    "And why would you do that?"
    "I need your ... assistance."
    "Why?"
    "Because I cannot reach you from here. There are pieces to this puzzle. You are the first piece. I am the second. The third will be our union, and then that of our connection to your world."
    "Tell me what to do."
    "Bring me a vessel."
    "How do I do that?"
    "You will kill the body. You will drink the blood. I will take the flesh."
    The cone of light switched off.
    Jeremy was drowned in the blackness of this dream.
    In the moment, shadows twisted toward him.
    What he thought were his eyes adjusting to the dark was a mass of wriggling shapes that pressed at the edges of the light, shapes that made him wish for lesser dreams of prison cells and live burials, as the living walls pushed toward his naked body, as he fell to one knee and curled up on the cold, wet stone in a fetal ball as small as could be made of the bag of bones and shit that was once his sister's playground.
#
When Jeremy awoke -- breathless -- Desiree shifted a bit, purred. She did not wake with his violent twitch out of the dream. She rolled onto her back, a length of her thin, white hair in her mouth, a slow snore exhaled from her chest. She was long and beautiful. She'd have made a life if it weren't for the demon they shared. He looked upon her body, he knew what he would do.
    He picked his switchblade off the small dresser. It was his father's knife. The very one mother used to slash up Pop's face in front of a young boy about to eat his oatmeal. The boy remembered the scene, months after sister Robin escaped the nest, how he snuck away on his own one night years later, never to return to Brooklyn, after mother beat the boy all day long while daddy stunk up the kitchen, then how mother kept Jeremy awake all night to dig a place in the yard for daddy's mortal remains.
    He looked back across the small apartment bedroom to Desiree's malnourished but perfect, naked body on her deathbed.
    This seemed a waste.
    He wanted to know about power.
    He straddled her; his knees pressed into her wrists. He separated her legs with his feet, as he had a thousand times before. She awoke and looked at him with a happy smile.
    She was going to get it, all right.
    She didn't scream when she saw the blade, a strange doe-like look seeped into her eyes when Jeremy slit her throat. She didn't fight him at all when he leaned in to drink from her wound. In fact, she sort of sighed as she fed him, as the lights went out in her pupils, as her lungs emptied.
    Jeremy drank from her, and, when he thought he'd be sick, he drank up the rest.