Skin on My Skin by John Burks Page B

space. Maybe I’d been exposed enough both from my mother and my father’s contact, in those early days, that I had a certain level of immunity. I heard that too, over the years. It could take longer now than it did in the beginning. Maybe that’s the only way any of us survived as long as we have. We just handled it a little better than the rest.  
    I didn’t want to risk it, though, and hoped the man might move even further away. Maybe I could make a run for his elevator.  
    He never turned and looked in my direction, as I feared, and instead continued to stare at the woman strapped to the bed.  
    “Not again, not now,” the woman begged and I was still surprised she hadn’t given me up. Maybe she’d trade my presence for her freedom. “I’m all torn up inside. Look at me. I… I can’t keep this up.”
    The man said nothing, but began stroking his disfigured member. I could imagine a devious grin on a face I couldn’t see and knew what was coming next. I was torn by the urge to run versus the urge to continue watching.  
    He strode into the bedroom and stared at the woman again. I wasn’t sure what he was doing then, but the woman whimpered at the sight of the disfigured monster and   he lashed out, slapping her hard across the face. She screamed out loud.  
    “Please, I just can’t do it again. You’re killing me,” she said between sobs. “Please don’t do this.”
    He hit her across the face again and I shuddered when I heard him laugh at the woman’s discomfort.  
    “You’re killing me,” she insisted, but it was the sob of the defeated.
    The man ignored her and the crawled onto the bed, between her legs. She only screamed out once more, as he entered her with his large, twisted penis, but then began to sob quietly. The man thrust hard and quick, violently, grunting with each stroke. Each time he pushed into her she whimpered a little more. I knew that, as he was distracted, it was my time to go. I quietly stood and started for the door. Not content to leave with nothing, I scooped up a closed box of liquor. I tiptoed to the door, only pausing for a moment to make eye contact with the woman. Her eyes pleaded to me, begging me to help her. I could, right then. I could shoot the man in the back. I could end her torment right then and there and she knew it. I could tell by the way she looked at me as he ground on her. I set down the liquor and aimed the rifle at the back of the man’s head. I was close enough that I felt the skin of my fingers tingle and burn and looked down in horror as the skin blistered. I’d gotten too close to the man. Our bodies were reacting to each other.  
    The only person I’d ever shot was my father. I’m pretty sure he was dead. He had deserved to die, though. This guy… I just couldn’t shoot him. This wasn’t my business and, as much as the woman’s flesh called to me, I couldn’t just kill him.  
    I mouthed my apologies silently to the woman, scooped up my case of liquor, and slid into the hallway, hoping he was scared enough not to have noticed the start of a few new blisters.  
    She cried out, again, and I thought she was going to finally give me away. She didn’t, though, and I slipped into the dark stairwell.  

    I ran down the stairs as quickly and silently as I could. I was convinced that, at any minute, the Preacher’s Plague was going to kick in and boil me inside out. That I’d survived the nearness of the other man, outside a suit, didn’t stop me from fearing every step I took was about to be my last. I took the steps two or three at a time, holding the box of liquor out in front of me like a totem. I regretted coming to the building in the first place and the box of booze, as valuable as it was, was going to do little to make up for the encounter.  
    I’d be dreaming of the woman later, but it wouldn’t be a good dream. It wouldn’t be like the dreams I had after doing a porn marathon. I’d see the fear splashed across her face.