The kiss was powerful. It ended the conversation and started the night.
Most people would feel at least a little bit self conscious about having sex in the middle of a grassy knoll just a few paces away from a touristy waterfall in a public park. However, when one of you happens to run the town and the other is your sizzling hot babe, and both of you are packin' heat, or at least have it close enough to your writhing, naked bodies, you pretty much throw modesty over the precipice like water on the rocks.
Afterward, Victor and Max laid back on the grass and looked at the stars. They lay there in silence for a long time until Max broke the silence, "Do you think we'll ever live like other people do?"
Now this is a very difficult question to answer when you ARE an other people. So Leer answered in the only way he could, "What other people do you mean?"
Max sighed,"Victor, haven't you ever tried to imagine what you would be doing if you didn't run Rat Town for my father - What it would be like if there was no such thing as JumpJuice?"
The urge to laugh out loud swelled within Leer, an urge he knew he needed to contain. Leer had learned a lot of things from travelling, how to survive, how to build, how to fight and to hide, but of all the lessons Leer had learned, the one that proved time and time again to serve him best was that of cultivating the ability to recognize when it was time to just shut up and listen, and generally that lesson served him best when in the company of a woman.
Max was ready to talk.
She had been holding on to a treasure trove of feelings for a very long time. Most of them concerned him, well rather, Victor, what he did to her, how he did it, what he said to her and how he said it, when, where, in front of whom and more. Leer had effectively not only unlocked the the door to Max's heart, he had opened a gateway to Victor's past. He was granted admission and given the guided tour. He discovered that he was, for lack of a better description, a macho, arrogant, reckless, self-centered control freak, addicted to JumpJuice, film scores and board games and played well with the other boys when it came to sports and games of chance. He was a man's man, a short, stocky, balding man's man; cocky, forceful, omnipotent and fearless before all, except Max. The two times that he confided anything to Max were enough to keep her by his side.
A mother's death can be a devastating experience for anyone and it was for Victor. But what disturbed him most is that nobody killed her. He didn't have anyone to blame; no one against whom to seek and have his revenge. She simply died.
When his brother died, he killed Jason "the Shark" by holding onto his long, beautiful, curly hair with both hands and suffocating him in a vat of freshly made hummus. When he was finished, he toasted his brother with "the Shark's" own wine while dipping pita wedges into the hummus. One of his "boys" thought he saw a tear in Victor's eye and said,"Hey boss, what's the matter, you look upset." Without hesitation, Victor smiled and, winking in Max's direction said," Of course I'm upset, I hate when there's hair in my food!"
Everyone laughed. Victor, to ease his sorrow over the loss of his brother and to overcome the feeling that killing "the Shark" did nothing to alleviate that sadness, the boys because they thought that shit was funny and Max, to get over the fact that she had to go home and sleep with Victor.
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