Grimoire Diabolique

and I told you the police were here, and the EPA men—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Smith said. “I remember. Sorry, this headache’s killing me. I’m just out of it today.”

Out of it was putting it lightly. And Marie’s affection, her sheer care for him, made Smith feel even worse now. Fifteen minutes ago I was letting a blond coed suck my dick, and she didn’t even do it long enough for me to come…What was wrong with him? The gifts of his life couldn’t be more plain. His loving wife, his lovely little girl, his home. All right, so Marie would never make the cover of Swimwear Illustrated. Her breasts, not nearly as large as Donna’s, had a bit of droop to them now, and she was getting a trifle wide in the caboose department. But— She’d stuck with him through thick and thin. She’d given him a beautiful daughter and a beautiful life. She was real, and her love was real. How could anything else matter? The girl next door was just something pretty, a bird in a sense, a black-throated blue warbler no more real to Smith than the August centerfold of Penthouse.

At once his guilt fell down on him, like a mineshaft cave-in.

 “Marie?” he peeped.

“Yes, dear?” Rubbing. Rubbing. “What is it?”

Smith was suddenly close to tears. “I-I-I…”

 “Honey? What is it?”

 My God, Smith realized. “I love you.”

 “I love you too,” Marie said.

 “No, no, I mean…” But what did he mean? “I mean, like, I really love you.”

 Marie’s voice seemed to grow hot. Her fingers meandered at his temples. “Why don’t you show me?” she whispered.

 Fuck dinner, Smith concluded. He led Marie by the hand up the stairs, to the bedroom. He slowly stripped her, reveling at the vision of her body, pale skin and cellulite and crooked teeth and all. “Make love to me, darling,” she hotly breathed. She lay back on the bed, parting her thighs. And what she said next absolutely shocked him, for Marie had never been one to talk dirty.

“I want your cock in my pussy, darling. I want you to stick your cock all the way up my pussy and come in me.”

 The words alone nearly made Smith come, the words in addition to Donna’s previous attentions. Yeah, she primed my pump, all right. But to hell with her. I have a loving wife. I have a real woman…

“Stick your cock in me right up to the balls and come, you big beautiful fucking love-machine. Squirt all that wonderful jizz right up into my little honey hole.”

 Smith was dizzied. He lay atop her and obliged. At once her hand slithered around and massaged his buttocks. “Come, baby, come,” she breathed. “Come in my pussy, darling…”

Aw, shit! Smith was going to come, all right. Quite expeditiously. He tried to stave it off, think about baseball, Mantle’s 500th homer, which Smith had seen with his dad, Marris breaking Ruth’s record, and Catfish Hunter’s first 20-win season. Boy, could the Catfish throw a spitter!

 But it didn’t work. How could it? This was love, not childhood baseball memories.

After a strenuous, sweat-popping five seconds, Smith ejaculated, exhaling like a busted raft. Marie moaned with each pulse, wrapping her legs about his back.

“Oh, honey,” Smith nearly wept into the crook of her neck. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…”

 And what a cruel ripoff this was. Smith generally lasted at least half a minute. Punishment, he thought; his guilt continued to assail him. Yes, the universe was punishing him for being with Donna, decimating his already less-than-impressive endurance.

“I’m so sorry, Marie…”

 Her warm hand played over his scalp. “That’s all right, dear. I…I know.”

 Smith’s heart skipped a beat. She knows? he thought in sheer terror. She knows about Donna?

But then he simmered down. No, no, she didn’t know about that. How could she? She merely meant that she understood Smith’s problem with premature ejaculation. She was so understanding, so considerate. What a woman, Smith realized, as drenched in shame as he was sweat. But—

 Yes!

There was something he could do for her, wasn’t there?

Smith slithered down…

 “Oooo, sweetheart,” Marie cooed lewdly. “You know exactly what I want, you dirty little sex-muffin.”

Yeah, Smith thought. Here was this wonderful, warm, passionate woman who’d offered herself solely for Smith’s pleasure. Now he would return the gesture.

 Yeah.

Her white thighs opened before his face like a newspaper. Her fingers raked his hair, while her own hair—her private hair—tickled around Smith’s mouth. Suddenly he felt bent on something, frantic in the taste of her. Compelled. Driven.

“That’s it, sweetheart, that so good,” she breathed. “You do it so good, you big love-tongue, you…”

 The synchronicity of Smith’s tongue against her pleasure quickened in increments; he chased her squirming hips across the bed. Smith kissed, licked, lapped—

“So good, sweetheart—”

 Kissed, licked, lapped.

“So good, so good, such a—”

 Kissed, licked, lapped.

 “—good good boy.”

 Smith’s eyes bulged. A good boy?

Hadn’t Donna said the exact same thing…

 But before he could even reckon such a coincidence, Marie seemed to gasp, and her body seemed to… tremor.

Smith’s mouth remained locked at her sex when the septic stench rose. Marie gasped again, then her hips twitched, then—

 Holy motherfucking SHIT!

Several hard, steady dolphin spurts of the stinking black sludge shot into his mouth. He wedged away in shock, paused to bend over and vomit, and when he raised his head again, a final pulse of sludge jettisoned right in his face.

 Over the rise of her breasts, Marie’s eyes fixed on him.

 “You didn’t, did you?” she gargled.

 Smith stared, frozen in disgust.

 Marie craned her neck further, her face wavering. “You weren’t ready, were you?” she gushed. It sounded like an accusation. “Goddamn you, you were supposed to be ready…”

 Then her eyes rolled up white, and her head fell back.

 Ready, Smith thought. His face dripped. Madness. The silence gaped at him as he tried to bring her back. No pulse. No breath. He straddled her. One, two, three, four, five, his thoughts counted off in CPR. With each downward thrust, more black slime eddied from each orifice. Popping black bubbles frothed at her lips, ears, and nostrils. Then the truth slapped him in the face as hard as the insanity of this entire situation:

 “She’s dead,” he whispered.

 It was too much, too fast. All rationale escaped him; his psyche felt stuffed, like a Szechuan squid stuffed to bursting. Marie seemed to be on the verge of bursting too. Movement churned beneath her pale, dead belly. Revulsion, shock, etc. cut Smith’s spiritual tether, leaving only his objective remains: Smith the Coroner, Smith the Man Who Autopsies Dead People For a Living. It was impulse now, in this moment of intractable impossibility. He went for his old med school bag in the closet, and his old CMS knife set.

 Thoughts swarmed but he didn’t really hear them. The sharp bivalving blade flashed. “Aw, God,” he muttered, cutting. “Aw, no.” The incision stretched as he drew the gleaming blade from hip to hip, exuding a