The Wicked: A Love Story

“But I have not been honest,” Loreal said when they were together and Dan was gone.

“You’re always honest,” Laurie said.

She stood before him and held his face in her hands.

“I said I was never one to stop things from happening. But I did. I have.”

“Whaddo you—?” Laurie began.

She pulled his face to her and kissed him. She held his shocked face until he hungrily kissed her. Her hand did not rise to his face. It slipped down to his thin trousers and cupped him. He moaned low and she stroked him, feeling him grow thick and large in her hands, feeling him rise.

Please see for me if her hair hangs long
If it rolls and flows all down her breast
Please see for me if her hair hangs long
For that's the way I remember her best

“Are you…?” he began

Light, and free, young and proud of all she had to offer, she lifted up her dress and let it fall to the floor. He looked on her, transfixed, and then she reached for his pants and unbuttoned them. She pulled them down, while he unbuttoned his shirt.

Remember me to one who lives there
She once was a true love of mine

As his heart thumped against his chest, and she pulled his black briefs from him, letting his thick cock spring out like a diving board, she said, “I have never been more sure.”

A true love of mine…

The first time Dan Rawlinson saw the house he was feeling lonely. It was Halloween. He was fifteen and he and his friends had driven down to Glencastle in Will Bonney’s dad’s car. They left from the south end of Lassador, traveling about forty five minutes southwest, a tang in the blue air when they rolled down the windows, and now they were on a street lined in flame colored October trees.

The house with its turrets and large diamond shaped windows, its wrap around porch and the great cupola looking down on him was deep purple and green, shuttered, and no one else seemed to notice it. He and all his friends leapt out of the car with their bags and their half ass costumes, and Jack said, “This rich old neighborhood is the best candy in town.”

“And we’re not really even in town,” Will Bonney said.

“Divide and conquer and beat up kids if you have to,” Jack said. “See you guys in… synchronize watches… two hours.”

As they split up, Jack suddenly turned around and said, “I was joking about the whole beating up kids thing. You know that… right?”

They just looked at him, plastic bags hanging from their hands, and then they all split up to see how much of the candy of Glencastle, Ohio they could make their own. The looks on peoples’ faces often said, “Aren’t you kind of old to be trick or treating?” and one Black woman simply said it, even though she gave Dan candy anyway. They were right of course. It would have actually been ten times easier to go to the store, buy candy and just eat it. So it must not have been about the candy. It must have been about something else. The sky was going that strange bruised color that only happened in October, and Dan was standing at the top of a hill. seeing the river, wide and silver blue threading through the trees that were losing their leaves, and from this point he looked down on the block they had come to and saw that house.

` “That’s what I’m looking for. That’s the different thing I’m looking for.”

He made his way to the street where the car was. Dan noticed that, among the old Victorians there were a few houses where kids did not go. And why didn’t they go? But he would go. He would go to that very house he had first seen. There was no gate, and he just went up the brick path and to the great wrap around porch, and he came to the large wooden door with lights shining through the cut glass window and the lace curtains, and he knocked.

It was opened by a Black woman, and Dan hoped she wouldn’t say something withering like the woman he’d seen before. But any sort of hope didn’t matter because she was so beautiful, and so strange. Her eyes were blue as her skin was dark, and black hair fell down her back like, he felt stupid for thinking it, an Indian princess. She was exactly as tall as he was, and would always be that way, and he wondered if she wasn’t in a costume, for she stood in a red dress with a great dark blue shawl around her shoulders.

And she was still looking at him.

“Trick or treat!” he said.

“Who is it?” a voice came from down the hall.

The woman opened the door, turned around and called, “Trick or treaters! One,” she modified, “Trick or treater.”

There was silence, and then laughter, and then the voice said, “Well, then you have to bring him in.”

The woman nodded and did so, closing the door behind Dan.

The foyer was of paneled and polished wood, and he could see a large old timey living room off to his right, and Dan sniffed the air. “Is that coffee?”

“We’re just getting up,” the woman said. “Would you like a cup?”

“I…” Dan looked at his watch.

“You will not be late to meet your friends again,” she said, gently. “Come. I am Tanitha.”

“I’m Dan.”

“We’ve been waiting for you,”

“Really?”

Tanitha had sounded so mysterious.

She threw back her head, laughing, and Dan was convinced that she was not only the most beautiful woman in the world, but the lightest and happiest woman he’d ever seen.

“Of course not! Sit, I’ll cut the coffee cake.”

In a moment, a man came down the stairs, and he was dressed well and looked like he could have been Tanitha’s brother except that he did not have the blue eyes. They were dark, but Dan could not tell if they were brown or black because that would have entailed staring at someone who was generally well dressed, and that’s how Dan always thought of him, because at first he could not look at this man for long, and he only gave off a series of strong impressions.

“We have a guest,” the man said, and his voice was elegant, but again, Dan could not say how, could not place the accent. It wasn’t foreign, but it wasn’t exactly American. As the man smiled broadly at him, Dan gave up trying to figure these things out. He knew it would be rude to ask.

“Happy Halloween,” the man said. “I guess that’s why you came by?”

“Yes,” Dan said. As he spoke he was surprised by the disappearance of teenage haltings, the “ums” and the “likes”. In the presence of these strangers, he was possessed of a maturity, and evenness of voice, a certainty about himself that he never possessed even as Tanitha cut the warm coffee cake and handed him a slice.

“Thank you,” Dan said, and the man poured him coffee and said, “It’s never been a big night for us. Creamer is over there. I suppose it’s a big night for witches, though, but not for us.”

Dan gave a half laugh because he was only half sure this man was joking, and he spooned a great deal of sugar into his coffee.

“I am Kruinh by the way,” the man said, extending his hand. It was a long hand, but Kruinh was not a large man, as tall as Tanitha, and as tall as Dan. Dan looked around this kitchen with its hanging herbs and copper pans looking so peaceful and old timey and not old timey, but…

Out of time.

He said, “Are you married?”

Kruinh laughed and Tanitha shook his head.

“Kruinh is my father,” Tanitha said.

Dan looked quickly at Kruinh and tried to assess how that could be possible. There were, to be sure, well preserved adults, and everyone had heard the phrase “Black don’t crack.” But this man was visibly young, not youthful or youngish, but young, and his daughter was a full grown woman.

“I think,” Kruinh said, sipping his coffee, “that you have questions.”

“None of them are really polite,” Dan said.

“Daniel Rawlinson, you are a very polite young man,” Kruinh said.

Dan nodded, and then even as something came to his mind, Kruinh continued, “And of course, at this moment you are wondering how I knew your name, and so I will tell you mine. I am Kruinh Kertesz and this is my daughter Tanitha. Sometimes she is Kertesz, but sometimes she is Tzepesh. You are welcome into our home anytime you can find it. I am a great believer in fate, in things being…. Meant. I believe in destiny.”

And Dan found himself asking, found himself because it seemed like he had been meant to ask it, and he wanted to resist this, “Why is that?”

Kruinh said, cheerily, “You would never have found this house otherwise.”

Dan blinked at him.

“No one else did,” Kruinh said. “Did you see anyone running to this door asking for candy? Did any of your friends even see it? No. You were meant to find us.”

“Are you witches?”

“Well, you already know we aren’t,” Tanitha said.

“Then,…” Dan felt at a loss, “what are you?”

“You are the one who came here and knocked on our door with that lame line,” Tanitha said, “knowing full well there’d be no candy here tonight. And yet you came, so the better question is who are you? And what did you come here for?”

“I…” Dan started. “I… Came to find… I dunno.”

“You do know,” Kruinh said, softly.

“Something more,” Dan said. “I came to find something more.”

Kruinh nodded.

“That is what we are,” he said. “We are that something more. Or part of it..”