Breeding Time

The bar where I meet him is called Chances.

Whoever designed it probably self-identifies as an artist whose work is informed by explorations into nuveaux-modernism. The color scheme is dominated by blues, greys, cheap brushed metal made to look expensive, frosted glass, the dark green of several sansevieria and horsetail plants surrounded by small obsidian decorative stones. The floor is cold, hard concrete. Thin matte-black light fixtures hang from the ceiling like spiders from their webs. And although there are lights everywhere, there isn’t nearly enough lighting. Sports is the only thing on every flatscreen. Drinks are laughably overpriced. It’s the kind of place a man in a designer suit brings a date when he has one goal in mind. A wave of relief washes over me because I have the exact same goal in mind.

One n’ done. Makes my life easier.

I’m early it would seem, a testament to the fact I’m desperate to get this over with. I walk up to the bar, alighting atop a brushed metal bar stool, and do girly things (check lipstick, mascara, blah-blah-blah) while I wait. Lucky for me, he doesn’t make me wait long. He kiks me that he’s on his way in. I kik back my location at the bar. He walks in.

I am absolutely jumping for joy like I won on a game show. He’s a body builder, the kind you see on magazines kneeling and gripping a dumbbell. Thank heavens for those superhero movies; every man wants a body like Thor or Captain America. He sees me. Heaven only knows who he’s comparing me with.

Of course this is no big surprise. We’ve been to each other’s Instagram, Snapchat, TicTok, Kik after swiping right on Tinder. So I already knew this. But he’s not just muscles all over; he's tall and he’s massive. He is a lot of meat.

He lumbers over, places his tight, delicious ass in the brushed steel stool next to mine, picks up the wine list and assures me that “the selection of Merlot, in this particular spot, is remarkably varied.” He then proceeds to ask: “may I order for you?”

“I never drink wine,” I say.

He smiles. It strikes me that most women would find his smile charming. “Oh? Is that because you’re a vampire?”

My turn to smile. “Yeah!” I very playfully agree. “Because in order to live I need to suck...” pause for effect “...blood!” I grab his leg and gently shake as I say this. It’s an excuse to touch his inner thigh. He makes no effort to remove my hands. I leave my hands there a moment longer, sending a message I hope he has brains enough to read. I smell his body as it begins spritzing male pheromone all round him.

“Ohhhh,” he says, flirting with me, “so you want to suck me?” Timed pause. “My neck is very sensitive,” he continues, lightly tickling his jugular. Cue simultaneous laughter. I hear his heart rate increase.

“Well, I don’t know if a body builder like you has what it takes to satisfy my thirst. Do you think you have enough to make me happy?” His heart thumps harder inside his chest.

“Plenty,” he answers before I finish. I hear his blood slushing through his veins.

“Well, in that case I’d love some sex on the beach,” he stares at me in disbelief. It’s bullshit of course. He’s a player pretending not to know there’s a drink called ‘Sex on the Beach.’ But he’s unconsciously pouring vats pheromones through his pores. “I know it’s such a girly drink.”

“There’s nothing wrong sex on the beach,” he says. I can damn near see his jugular pulsing under his skin.

“It’s just a starter,” I say. “After some sex on the beach,” I place my hand on his inner thigh again, “I usually want something harder.” I can feel his body temperature increase rapidly. His body begins dumping other odors from his scalp, arm pits, his mouth, his crotch.

“Sounds like a plan,” he says. Indeed, it is.

As the evening drags on, I have to endure a discussion about Merlot with a self absorbed weight lifter who thinks he’s a sommelier. But I pretend as best I can. It’s a bit like sitting through an insurance seminar when you’ve already made up your mind to buy. I placate him, putting on my best practiced smile, and interact the way any man would expect me to.

“This first selection,” he prattles, “is a 2016 Dark Horse. It’s rated a 90 point wine. The flavor is dominated by notes of cocoa, molasses, and cherries.” At least he can read the notes in the menu.

I sip.

“The next selection on our Merlot flight is a 2017 vintage from Cannonball Winery. Another 90 point entry that carries a bouquet of blueberry, cherry, and black tea infused with sweet vanilla from being aged in French oak.”

I sip.

We move along the wine list to a 93 point selection from Stags Leap Winery. “It’s a 2016 vintage that was awarded a 93-point rating, and has been lauded for it’s melange of boysenberry and floral notes.”

“Delicious.”

We springboard into a Long Shadows Pedestal selection, “whose 2018 vintage is rated somewhere in the mid-nineties and excites the palette with flavors of flowers, spice, and blackberries,” before landing back on planet earth with “a 2016 Pahlmeyer, 96 points, at $100 a bottle.” He really enjoys watching himself perform.

The evening finally picks up its pace in much the previous fashion: sexual inuendo, simultaneous laughing, light touching, timed pauses, eye contact, and all those other non-verbal road signs that communicate that one goal we both want to achieve. Eventually, I lean in, pretending I’m drunker than I am, to smell the cologne on his neck. He turns his head. Our cheeks brush, our noses touch. It’s now or never. My eyes close. I kiss. He melts. I wrap my spidery arms around his shoulders. He wraps his thick hands around my waist. I slip my tongue between his lips. He replies with his. We come up for air after a third round, and I really don’t want to waste anymore time with this kissing garbáge. I need to close this deal. Now. So I growl and lightly nibble his neck. I’m a vampire. One more simultaneous laugh. And then, I cup my eight long fingers around his ears, and whisper:

“I love the way your tongue feels inside me. Stay with me tonight, and fuck me like you own me.”

He sits up immediately and says to the bartender, “check please. Now.”

Finally we’re back at my place. We’re in bed. He’s working like he’s drilling for oil. And I begin to experience the metamorphosis. It’s subtle at first: my eyes become all black, my internal chemistry begins rebalancing, my bones become more flexible. He starts giving the signs that he’s almost climaxing and my body really begins to change: I grow teeth “down there.”

My vaginal teeth are not at all sharp and couldn’t possibly break the skin. But they are necessary to make sure that his seed is securely delivered. Or this is all for nothing. I begin squeezing my PC muscle. He likes it. He announces the big moment. I wrap my elongated legs around him, hug him tightly, and bite down. He groans and spasms and delivers what I need delivered.

We lay sweating and panting for a while. I’ve already released my “grip” down there. I hold his head into my neck. I can feel my body change more rapidly now that it is entering its fertility stage. I have very little time.

“You know what?”

“What, baby?”

“I’m very thirsty. I’d love a glass of that Merlot I bought. Want some?”

“Hell, yeah.”

“Great. You stay here and relax. I’ll pour us each a glass.” I uncork the bottle, get two glasses, pour, and in his I add a little something that will knock him out for a day or so. I pull my hair around my face, having grown two additional smaller eyes. I return, my hair looking disheveled. His eyes are closed. I give him the glass. It’s dark; he can’t see. He drinks the entire glass in several gulps. It doesn’t take long for him to lose consciousness.

I pull a flat cart out from under my bed and dump his body onto it. I get him down the stairs, into the garage, and into his car. My body begins external changes that are going to be difficult to hide. My abdomen elongates and begins to balloon outward. Four more appendages begin to emerge, two on each side of my body. I’ll have eight when it’s time to lay eggs. I drive for hours to some nearby mountains, along dirt roads, to a long forgotten cave. The sun has already risen, but he is still out cold. I tie him up and drag him through the brush to my secret place.

He wakes up naked, dizzy, confused, disoriented. “You psycho bitch!” he shouts when he realizes he’s been chained and cuffed to the cave wall. “Where the fuck are you, you psycho cunt?!”

My transformation was completed days ago. I no longer have a human voice. But I can hiss. So I hiss. I smell the terror in his sweat. I feel his heart rate increasing. I see his body heat rising. I hear that delicious blood slushing through his veins. And it takes all my willpower to restrain myself, though I know restraint means life or death for me. And, I remind myself, there may be something left over, after they’re finished with him. If not, I can always find campers or a hiker.

Over the next eight hours he struggles, he curses, he cries, he begs. But I don’t dare lower myself from my ceiling perch, even to terrorize him. They could hatch at any moment. And eventually, they do. They emerge from their individual eggs and push themselves through their silk egg sac, glistening with green amniotic mucus. They crawl across the floor of the cave, hungry, in search of meat. It isn’t long before their four eyes discover their father. Their eight hairy legs carry them swiftly across the cave floor. He hollers for help as they crawl up his legs, around his sides, across his abs, over his pecs, along his arms, tickling his sensitive neck. Their chelicerae twitch in anticipation. He screams in pain as they push their fangs into him. Bless them, but their venom is not developed yet. Then they begin to eat.

It is a common misconception that spiders drink blood. I guess that’s what he was expecting. The truth is far worse. They vomit digestive fluid over his skin. Their chelicerae chew up the softened tissue as the acid breaks down his flesh into a fluid-like glob. Then they slurp up his liquified flesh. He’s still alive as this process is repeated over and over. Vomit, chew, slurp. Vomit, chew, slurp.

I can see that he’s losing consciousness and his body will give out soon. I hiss. He looks at the ceiling. I lower myself on secreted thread. He sees me. His expression is as easy to read as the wine menu. I have no human voice to answer him with. I can see his mind working. He finally dredges up that old science lesson. “But, aren’t the babies supposed to eat their…,” he coughs up blood. They’ve begun working on his internal organs. It won’t be long now.

“Yes,” I want to confirm, “they are supposed to devour their mother, while their father lives. But this mother has some reservations about that arrangement. Better their father than she. Better you than me.”

I raise myself back into darkness and wait as my babies finish their meal and crawl out into the world.