The Second Substance by Anne Lardeux

Author:Anne Lardeux
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Coach House Books

September 11

He brought someone else to our tryst at the junked car. It shattered something inside me. I was a surfer riding a wave through the ruins of Pacific Ocean Park, and it was all good, and then a concrete column appeared. When I slammed into it, my confidence unhitched.

He’s there, sitting on the dented roof. He’s there but not alone: I see another back beside his. I clench up, my hands grow clammy, my stomach knots up, and not out of desire. My mind races. I try to understand the reason for this kink in our plan, pretend I’m not gutted. They can’t see me yet. I’m behind them, hidden from view by the shrubs that line the path. My fear is telling me something my mind and body already know. I’m neutralized by fear. He slides off the roof and walks over to make his way around the car, but stops, blocking me out with his back, that back that makes my terror swell. Son of a trapper, he’s picked up my scent. He can identify the smell of my secretions and saliva. All he wants is to lick. He recognizes the toxins of fear too. The sight of the unseeing back of his neck covered by the hair I’ve so often grabbed and pulled does something to me … I try to find words that will oppose this affront. Because that’s what he does, by showing tails not heads, not eyes. I am unfaced.

Time stretches out, then I step forward. My old skin has sloughed, I’ve decided no fate can be as bad as our fears. I step forward and that’s my one hope. I step forward toward his ass and muscular back. I move toward his warm hands, toward his dick, I advance despite this other man beside him, who turns around and who I don’t know and who lowers his eyes and now jumps off the roof as well.

I go around the car, I want his face, I try to find his eyes. He turns his head and I’m amazed at what I see: not the face of a monster, no drugged-out eyes. His face tells me no more than the back of his neck. It tells me nothing. He reaches out a hand. I dry mine, which are moist, on the edge of my skirt, and I mark in my mind this brief moment when I had the time to wipe hands that were clammy from fear and put them in the hands of the one who will rape me. He pulls me toward him and whispers his plan in my ear. My friend wants to meet you. Ever since he’s been watching us. He knows what to do. How to get you wet, just like me. The other guy moves forward, to present evidence. I try to look at him, record his features, but nothing comes, his code has been wiped clean, I can’t rewrite it. He is devoid of colour and texture. He has no age.

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