Worship You

Chapter One. The End

My name is Lloyd David Harper. That's what they call me in the newspapers and television, all three names. Like Lee Harvey Oswald, John Wayne Gacey, John Wilkes Booth, or John Walker Lindh, the American Taliban. It seems like if you ever get famous for doing something horrible, you are a three-name person for the rest of your life. Which is a shame, because I hate the name Lloyd. Lloyd is a mailman's name.

The cops have it all wrong. So do the newspapers. They think it was about "sex." They're all obsessed with who had his hand where and who was doing what with whom and how much. They even said "sex cult" if you can believe it. Idiots. And they wonder why we don't respect their rules.

Although. You can understand why, if you've seen pictures of Cassie. If you haven't, all I can say is, in this case a picture may speak a thousand words or whatever, but it doesn't come close to the real thing. Yes, with the picture you get that initial helpless, breathless feeling, that feeling that you can't look away. That empty useless feeling. That personal private close connection with what is after all, just a picture, just dots of ink on a page. And yet the arrangement of those dots is magic. The pattern of the dots is Cassie. So I know why they think the way they do. It's the "spell" she makes with her face and the way she moves. That's for TV now. I've seen her on the news being interviewed (protected by her lawyer, of course) and she's showing a new side of herself, a more glamorous, more 'professional' Cassie, I guess. Yeah. Because when I saw her talking to that woman, what's her name, from national television. Shit. I can't remember things anymore. Anyway, she's huge, a star, I guess. And Cassie looks right at home with her. And I see her, I do, doing that thing she can do, living on two levels. On one level she's doing whatever, let's say being interviewed, answering questions. But if you've watched her, (and man, I've made a career out of watching Cassie. Believe.) if you've watched her, you can see her operate on another level, watching herself, grading her performance and making adjustments, improving. By the end of the interview I saw Cassie had the TV Lady down, exact replica of a professional talking head, like she's ready for her own show, you get it? And TV Lady? She's lapping it up like a kitten with milk. She's loving it! You can tell she wants to take Cassie home with her, she's loving it so much. Like the words are practically scrolling across her forehead: YOU DON'T BELONG HERE! THERE'S NO WAY YOU HAD ANYTHING TO DO WITH THIS! Scrolling across, like the news zipper in Times Square Cassie and I watched that one night, the electric letters marching along like little tin soldiers shooting out one by one the news of Stan Cioukowsky's murder.

(How cold it was that night and how I can still feel Cassie's arm in mine, cold together, hugging me to her for warmth I didn't have, pressing her breast into my arm, her whole body thrumming like a guitar string plucked by a giant or something)

Anyway, Cassie's great in print and on the tube.

But, People, that's nothing. You should see her in the flesh. The real Cassie Cioukowsy. Feel the force of her indomitable will. She can make a grown man cry. Literally. I've seen it.

And for us, those who were close to her... well, we would have done anything for her. Anything. And some of us did. I am not exaggerating. I was there. I felt it myself. I saw it happen.

Every time I saw her coming, walking that way she had, as the sun went down behind her, I felt like getting down on my knees. In church, I never felt the things you're supposed to feel. Not once.

But I felt them for her. I still do.

And they think the way she accomplished this was to give out sex like a bribe. I'm laughing at you, idiots. These are people that think life can be printed on a cereal box. Sex was just where it started. It was way beyond that. The truth is, there wasn't that much actual sex at all. Not physical, not much beyond a kiss at the right moment. And then that was everything and more. But it was in our minds that everything really happened. And don't think that by that I mean it was less or less powerful or passionate. No, not unless bliss is less and if it is, give me more of it. Because now that it's gone for good, I would do anything to make it return. Show me your typical upstate small town, say a thousand people, give or take. Then show me the button to push, that would blow them all away. And tell me Cassie's waiting for you just outside that door. All she wants is a little favor. I'd push that button in a second. Why not? I don't know a thousand people in a town, I don't know a million people in the state. I just know one person. I know Cassie and she knows me.