Fire Poker

They were far to the rear of the field, away from the paved parking area where darkness would give them privacy, though it was a slow night anyway. Everyone had already seen Saturday Night Fever last summer. They didn't even have a speaker hanging in the back-seat window, with a fat black Bakelite knob to adjust the volume. Those all marched in neat parking-meter rows closer to the screen where the spaces marked off by faded white lines weren't even half full. They had the radio on real low instead. He reshuffled the deck of Aviators expertly and dealt them each another hand. She dragged on the roach, eyeing him with coy knowledge. The night was humid, but he was sweating a little too much just the same. He set the rest of the deck down, and picked up his cards.

"Ahhh, I'll take three," he said, now pleasantly stoned. He discarded, and selected three fresh cards from the pile.

"Shhhit," she said, blowing out smoke and smirking, once she looked at her own five cards. "I'll take four."

He shook his head, grinning. "You'll take three. None of this four card crap."

She again eyed him vicariously, lips pursed, discarded three, and took three more. She flicked the roach out the window.

"Call it," he said.

With some reluctance: "King high."

He whistled low, smiling, shaking his head with eager pride. "Pair of fives. I win again." His grin blossomed, cutting the half-dark. On the big screen, John Travolta and his buddies were silently crashing a car through the front windows of a discotheque. On the radio, Todd Rundgren was singing "Hello, It's Me." But these things seemed faraway, unimportant.

"What's it gonna be now? Hmmm?" he asked, and leaned against the door on his side of the backseat. He still had everything on except his tee-shirt, and he hadn't minded losing that. It was too damned hot. She was down to only undergarments.

She didn't reply: Just reached back, unhooked her bra, and dropped it to the floormat. Her sizeable breasts, now loosed, shook lusciously with the motion. His grin widened.

"One more hand," he said, and scooped up the pile of cards with alacrity.

"What if I don't wanna play anymore?" she asked, smiling smugly.

"My dear, we are gonna play the blues," he remarked, and started to reshuffle.

He dealt them another hand, and noticed that the radio had gone staticky all of a sudden. He considered reaching over the front seat and replacing it with Led Zep on the eight-track, then dismissed the idea. It was just too hot. And soon, things would get hotter still. The anticipation was maddening; butterflies at the base of his skull.

"Ho!" he said, obviously pleased. "One for me." He discarded, and selected another. He glanced up at her in pure mischief.

Her eyes gleamed sensuously in the shadows. "Two." She tossed two away on the seat, and took new ones.

"Well?" he asked.

"You call," she said, mildly defiant.

He looked at her a moment longer, then layed down his hand. "Three jacks." With some amusement, he noted the one on top was the Jack of Hearts.

She sighed. "Pair of queens." She layed them down slow. One of them was the Queen of Spades.

"Endgame," he said with a victorious smile. "Okay. You, or me?"

Eyeing him with both amusement and annoyance, she hooked her thumbs under her waistband, and slid the panties off with a whisper.

At this, he leaned across without the slightest hesitation and French kissed her, long and full. She unzipped his jeans, and he pulled her towards him. She was now flat on her back along the seat, and deliciously buck naked. He clamped his hand on one beautifully smooth cream-colored thigh, and caressed it with something like greed. Presently, he came full-erect.

"Now," she whispered, and with a thrust, he was inside her warmth. The air seemed to burn in his lungs. He worked in a steadily increasing rhythm.

The radio volume jumped. Pure static now. And something just beneath he couldn't quite make out. It didn't matter. He continued to plunder her. But it was hot, God, it was so damned hot. Sweat rolled off him like rain.

He was just feeling himself gather in climax when she sat up abruptly, throwing him back against the seat, straddling him, her working him now, and the action had caused his groin a bolt of intense pain.

"Damned," he breathed, now feeling lightheaded. Dizzy, even.

"Yes," she agreed, and tossed her long raven hair. A flapping sound behind her, and batwings spanned the inside of the car; a horrifying surreal silhouette in the dim light from the movie screen. Her pupils had vanished, he saw to his mute terror, and her retinas had now gone a deep burgundy. The color of coagulated blood. She grinned, revealing rows of fangs thick as marlin spikes. He heard the radio very clear now, and it was the sound of untold numbers of people, throngs of them, screaming, and screaming, and screaming forever. Maybe beyond the end of forever.

He was sweating like a man with malaria, oiled with it, shivering in throes of heat exhaustion. His mouth was dry as dust. "My God," he managed in a whisper. "Wh-...what are you?"

Its voice came in a hiss, like a snake which has learned to mimic human speech. "Eternity," it said.

He cried out, hysterical, pleading, feeling the first playful licks of flame, but the world too soon became an inescapable inferno.