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  ...presents...                Bear Trap of Love
                                                         by Krass Katt

                      >>> a cDc publication.......1989 <<<
                        -cDc- CULT OF THE DEAD COW -cDc-
_______________________________________________________________________________


        Steven came from a very unloving family.  Although he was an only
child, his parents were usually too busy despising each other to pay him much
mind. His most vivid childhood memories were of sullen faces, threatening
fists, and constant bickering.  It is no wonder then, that at a very early age,
Steve decided marriage was a trap to be avoided at all costs.

        In accordance with this resolution, Steve spent his early teenage
years, for the most part, avoiding the opposite sex.  Sure, there were moments
when a hint of perfume or the curve of girlish hips would arouse in him that
vague animal lust so peculiar to the pubescent male.  But those lapses were
always short-lived, for his built-in defense mechanism would soon conjure up
pinched images of his mother's owlish face so grotesque he would turn away from
the object of his longing with disgust.

        Strangely enough, it was this very reticence that made Steve most
appealing to those he sought to evade.  Also, by the time he was seventeen, he
had become so darkly handsome, with his flashing black eyes and chiseled
features, that every girl in his class longed to be the one to unlock the
mysterious brooding that possessed him.

        At first, Steve was puzzled by the alluring glances of the girls who
sized him up as he took his seat in History or English class.  When the awful
truth finally dawned on him, he reacted like all true masters of any game - he
used his knowledge to conquer and destroy his opponent.  Naturally, being so
young, Steve saw these objectives in purely sexual terms.

        So began a long string of girlfriends that the found, unwrapped, an
unwound.  If this description sounds a bit cold and formulistic, it was meant
to be, for Steve soon developed a foolproof strategy that could be described in
no other manner.

        Invariably, each of Steve's encounters began when he permitted the
female to make the first move.  This gave his "prey" a false sense of security
while, at the same time, making him appear vulnerable until he had gained a
girl's complete trust.  That usually didn't take long, considering his natural
cunning and facility with the tender phrase.  As some of the beraved ladies
were to remark after his disappearance, "Steve could charm a vampire out of a
blood bank!"

        Another useful tactic Steve learned after two or three "romances" was
to keep his woman off guard through a mixture of sweetness and cruelty.  As a
matter of fact, it seemed that a girl became hooked on him even sooner if he
was lackadaisical about returning her phone calls or avoided her in the halls
at school.  It was also this same enigma that made it doubly hard for him to
dispose of a lover once he had his way with her.  Each abuse he heaped upon a
girl always made her want him twice as bad.  Little did she understand this his
strained conversation and paleness were merely manifestations of the human
animal balking from a trap.

        Despite all the turmoil caused by his love life, Steve's senior year in
high school went very well until a couple of weeks before the prom.  At the
time he was between girls and had to decide which lady should be given the
privilege of taking him to the dance.  He had pretty much narrowed it down to a
pair of luscious juniors (who had been in hot pursuit for months) when the most
peculiar thing occurred one morning before homeroom period.

        As was his custom, Steve was strolling down the hall "taking
inventory."  He was so intent on rating each girl he passed - noting her
figure, face, and future possibilities - that it took him a while to realize
that he, too, was under surveillance.

        Fearing that a teacher or a principal had guessed his game, he wheeled
stiffly around, half expecting to discover a ferret-faced adult behind him. 
Instead, he found himself examining the shapeliest girl he had ever
encountered.  Such a judgment was easy to make, considering she stood framed in
a sunlit doorway which revealed every shadowy curve of her body through her
dress.  Ironically, the same dazzling glare that highlighted her figure, also
masked her cocked face in a blinding aura of amber light.

        As Steve took note of every delicious inch of the girl's body, he
became instantly aroused.  He started to compliment her several times with his
old line but found his throat so unnaturally constricted that he was unable to
speak. Disarmed in this manner, he felt almost naked himself.  In fact, he was
so uncomfortable, he never questioned why such a dainty girl should wear a
spiked chain bracelet more befitting the Hell's Angels than a High School
girlie.

        At last, the girl shot Steve a dazzling smile, and he began babbling
disjointed phrases that could have made no possible sense to anyone but her. 
When he walked dazedly away a few minutes later, even he could recall only that
the girl's name was Hester, and that HE had asked HER to the prom.  He still
had not distinctly seen her face.  It's doubtful he could have resisted,
anyway....

        On the night of the big prom, Steve was uncharacteristically
apprehensive.  He stayed locked in his bedroom all evening, adjusting his tux
and fussing over his appearance.  Finally, with the eighth chime of the hall
clock ringing in his head, he stomped downstairs to hiss goodbye to his
parents.  He was especially uncivil to his mother when she dropped his date's
corsage while snatching it from the refrigerator.  His father's joke about him
looking like a "stiff in a monkey suit" went over about as well.

        Even behind the wheel of the old man's car, Steve couldn't relax. 
Nothing playing on the radio satisfied him, and he skipped from station to
station as he wondered why he had not seen his date since that morning in the
doorway.  It seemed just plain and unnatural that she hadn't called him on the
phone or, at least, waited around for him after school.  Was it possible that
she actually planned to stand him up?  How foolish he would look if he went to
the biggest social event of the year with no lady hanging on his arm!

        Only visions of Hester's sweet, shadowy body kept Steve from totally
panicking as he turned on to Denizen Street and headed toward the address the
girl had given him during their only encounter.  Could it be that such a
glamorous creature actually lived in such a dingy neighborhood?  He spotted her
soot-blackened apartment house sitting dwarfed beneath the smokestacks of a
meat processing plant.  As it was, he barely noticed the reek of old blood from
the slaughter- house next door when he leapt from his vehicle and charged up
the front steps.

        With his pulse thundering in his temples, Steve tapped lightly on the
front door.  Although it was a muggy May night, his teeth chattered, and his
eyes had a vague, glazed look about them.  He was forced to rap more vigorously
before he discerned the clatter of high heels approaching from inside.

        Finally, the door creaked open and Steve was blinded by a blast
furnace-like flash of light.  Only Hester's enticing voice told him he was
indeed at the right address.  He did not step inside, however, until her hot
fingers closed about his own.

        When the boy's eyes had adjusted to the glare, he found himself
standing in a cavernous living room, the entire back wall of which was
dominated by a fireplace.  A mantel lined with hideous ebony curious ran the
full length of this wall.  Elsewhere about the chamber were scattered various
pieces of furniture made of polished black oak.  These glistened with such
brilliance, they appeared to generate their own light.

        Steve's eyes eventually came to rest again on Hester where she stood
with the firelight dancing seductively on her face.  Her own eyelids were coyly
downcast, and she was attired in a black formal gown that sparkled with her
every movement.  Her plunging neckline attracted Steve like a buzzard to a
corpse.  The sinister rattling of her spiked chain bracelet went totally
undetected beneath the lustful thudding of his heart.

        Sensing her advantage, Hester  ensnared Steve in her arms and led him
in a crude waltz around the room.  At that moment, as if on cue, soft music
began to play.  Steve was so bewitched by the sensual nature of this melody, he
lost track of the course their dance followed across the living room and
through an adjacent hallway.  The next thing he knew, Hester had released her
embrace, retreated a step, and slipped her dress off her shoulders and onto the
floor.  By now all thoughts of the prom had slipped from Steve's mind, as well.

        Steve blinked in amazement as he drank in every slinky curve of the
girl's naked form.  At last, he realized that he was in a dimly lit bedroom,
and that she was motioning for him to lie back on the waterbed behind him. 
When she saw that he was too numb to respond, she took his hand and ran it
across the satin coverlet over the bed.  This simple act brought him
unspeakable pleasure and seemed to promise even more.

        With the recklessness only carnal lust can produce, Steve tumbled
backward and reached out his hand for his lover.  He hit the coverlet with a
sploosh that made the gooseflesh thick on his buttocks.  The next instant he
felt himself sinking out of sight in a benumbing tank of dank liquid.  He was
completely out of breath by the time he touched bottom, shoved off with one
foot, and propelled himself to the surface.  When he broke water, he was
greeted by the first real glimpse of Hester's eyes.

        A scream rattled from Steve's throat, and he sank from sight a second
time.  With the freezing water deadening his limbs, it felt like an eternity
before he again hit bottom.  When his foot finally did touch, a pair of jaws
clamped shut around his ankle.  Sharp teeth tore into his flesh, and clouds of
blood  bubbled upward past his face.  In an animal frenzy, Steve kicked and
thrashed until the lack of oxygen choked the fight out of him.  Only as his
tuxedo-clad form sagged to the bottom of the tank, did he see the bear trap
that secured him, as well as several other unsprung traps on the bottom of the
tank.

        Meanwhile, two crimson pupils peered expectantly downward into the dank
pool.  Just as the water quit bubbling, the faint buzz of a doorbell echoed
from the hall.  Hester glanced once more into the water, then pulled the satin
coverlet in place over the bedframe.  As she left the room to answer the door,
her hellish eyes were cast coyly downward.  Her formal black gown sparkled with
every delicious movement of her hips.

  _   _   _____________________________________________________________________
/((___))\|The Convent..........619/475-6187  The Dead Zone.........214/522-5321
 [ x x ] |Demon Roach Undrgrnd.806/794-4362  Greenpeace's IGB......916/673-8412
  \   /  |PURE NIHILISM..........new # soon  Ripco.................312/528-5020
  (' ')  |Tequila Willy's GSC..209/526-3194  The Works.............617/861-8976
   (U)   |=====================================================================
  .ooM   |1989 cDc communications by Krass Katt.                  09/30/89-#115
\_______/|All Rights Pissed Away.

