The Girl From South Central

[Eddie08]

The Girl From South Central (c) by Eddie08

Prologue:
February 14, 1994

I heard her name today for the first time in two years.

It came as a shock, for I hadn't heard her name spoken since she'd left me broken in every way. Not the way a lover leaves one broken--we'd never been lovers, it hadn't been like that all. It'd been more of a battle, a battle from which I'd never fully recovered. But even the worst of wounds scar then heal to numbness after a while, and I was starting to no longer think about the horrible circumstances in which we'd met, and how she'd ruined my life during that one awful month. After nearly two years of boozing and self-abuse, I was in rehab now, slowly getting better ...

"Ladies and dogs, get it up for Daniella Maples," Arsenio Hall announced with a purr.

I glanced up at the television over my head as a tall, slender woman strode across the stage and shook Arsenio's hand.

Was it just coincidence? ... No it was her. What in the hell was she doing on TV? On a popular late-night talk show, no less? She'd been a news media darling for a while, thanks to my misfortune. But what now? Had Hollywood invited this common, street thug in? Was there no mercy for me?

I sat up in my hospital bed, punched up the volume, and watched.

Arsenio and Daniella exchaged stupid pleasantries. Arsenio ass-kissing his guest as usual. But why her?

"So, you're the star of the Fox hit comedy, Tia's Place, and you've got a new movie about--tell us about that."

TV show? I thought. Tia's Place? How had I not heard about that?

I watched Daniella flip one slender, well-toned leg over the other and twitch her foot nervously, a little shoe dangling action. My stomach groaned. "Well, it's my first action film ... oh, it's called Gladiatrices ... and I play Shona, a lieutenant in an escaped band of Amazon-like women who escape from this Roman arena in North Africa."

Arsenio stared into the camera and raised an eyebrow, flashed a toothy grin. The audience roared with delight.

I tuned the show out. It was too hard to take. All through the commercials, I started remembering again ... those horrible things she'd done to me.

"... we've got a clip from your new film, Gladiatrices. Want to tell me about this scene?"

Daniella shook her head, shot the show's host a stubborn glare. Arsenio laughed and pointed to the screen. "Let's take a look!"

On screen, a huge Roman guard was shouting at a trio of leather-clad women inside a prison cell. One of the women wore armor: Daniela's character.

Daniela spat into the guard's face, then slapped him hard across the cheek. The guard grew red and came after her. She dropped to the ground and spun, kicking his legs out from under him. Using the heel of her boot, she dropped an axe kick down upon his chest, bringing a grunt.

Daniela's character sprang to her feet, then reached down to remove the keys from the guard's belt.

"Let's go girls," she said.

The audience whistled and hooted, and the camera returned to Arsenio and his guest live.

"Dan-YELL-Ahhhhhh Mayyyyy-pullllllls!" Arsenio belted and the audience roared some more.


***

Before I turned to a life of alcohol, stewing and suffering, losing jobs faster than I could find them, my mind and body deteriorating, I was a successful LA news cameraman. You remember the riots of 1992? I was out on the streets for those, and you couldn't be a loser like I was now to do that kind of stuff; you had to be tough, strong, fast.

And I was.

We'd been there for the Denny aftermath, and I have to admit I'd feared for my life during that first day of the riots. After all, I was a white guy with blonde hair and an intrusive camera. Nobody down in South Central wanted that in their neighborhood then. They wanted justice, they wanted to kick some ass. They were picking targets almost at random. Anyone not black. I was surprised that none of the angry residents I'd seen and filmed had turned on me. Perhaps these residents felt the same safe distance between the camera and them, as I did between it and them. They largely ignored me, these strong young or sometimes middle-age men, smashing windows and throwing rocks. Jumping a Korean here, a white businessman there. I was something off-limits to them, at least that first day I was.

How ironic it was, then, that on my second day of filming the ongoing drama, that the very moment when I felt the least threatened was when I should have been more on guard.

Chapter 1

April 1994: Day 2

It was about noon under a scorching sky, a day in which the sun seemed to be too powerful for even the Los Angeles haze. We'd parked the news van by a curb, jumped out and sent the driver into the African-American-run deli for three sandwiches. A rival news van was parked just outside the same deli, and I saw Tommy Hendricks, another photograper, standing there in the street with his camera following the antics of two teenage girls frolicking in the spray of a busted hydrant. The smoke of buildings burning nearby added an otherworldly aspect to the scene. Maybe Tommy was going for a National Geographic award or something.

I waived to Tommy and he acknowledged me and then resumed his shooting.

The girls were pretty, both about eighteen, two light-skinned black girls, in bright T-shirts and cut-off jeans skipping barefoot through the blast of water. I considered this for a moment and then went to get my own camera from the van.

By the time I was set up and had the girls in focus, they had stopped their playing and were walking directly toward me, the taller of the two more quickly, the shorter, squatter one following a bit tentatively.

Even through the camera's eye, I could tell right away that the tall pretty girl was "on" something. Forget about the strangeness of a girl that age playing in the spray of a hydrant like some younger mischievous boy ... there was a look in her eyes that just wasn't right, sort of an askew, sideways glance, and as she moved closer I noticed the redness in them. Her shoulder-length hair was back in a ponytail but starting to fall out, her mocha face seemed a bit gaunt and pale, as if drained of blood.

"Hi," I said through the protective camera's lens. "What are you doing on this wild day in South Central?"

"Don't Daniella," said the trailing friend. "He didn't do nothing to you."

"Shut up, girl! I'll handle this."

I waited, and Daniella strode forward and slapped the camera hard with her left hand, nearly jarring it from my grip. She hit it in a way that caused it to jerk to my right, taking my arms, head and shoulders with it, leaving the left side of my face open to her.

"Get out of my neighborhood, boy!" Daniella cried and swung at me again. I jumped back, but not fast enough and her sharp, slender fingernails sliced at my face.

I straightened, juggling the expensive videocamera in my right hand, my left hand going to my eye, then cheek. She'd missed my cornea, thank god, but taken a quarter inch of flesh from my cheek.

"Hey, now, miss. I'm here doing my job. Keep your hands to yourself." I reached into my photograper's vest for the pepper spray I carried for protection. As I did this, I glanced at Tommy ...

Son of a bitch, he was filming this. Filming the teenage girl taking a couple swipes at me. "Hey, Tommy--tell her." I appealed to him. He was black. She might listen to him.

"Tell me what?" Daniella demanded and then unexpectedly she lunged forward and grabbed my wrist, came forward with her knee. The blow caught me completely off-guard and produced a sharp, paralyzing stab of pain in my groin. I sank to my knees, put the camera down. I needed to protect myself now. My hands shot up, and I looked up at her, trying to gauge her next move, and that's when I noticed her holding my pepper spray. She'd somehow swiped it from my grasp.

I opened my mouth to object, and the skinny little bitch fired. A burning, acrid sizzling in my throat, my eyes stinging like a thousand jelly fish swimming in them. I coughed from the fumes, helpless. Tumbled forward onto my belly.

"Daniella, don't be like the others. That shit you took is making you crazy," Daniella's friend tried.

"Shut up," was all Daniella said before I felt her tugging on my shirt, flipping me over onto my back and then kicking my ribs.

"Help!" I cried pawing for her invisible kicks, trying to find a slender ankle to grab onto, to stop this surreal, yet excrutiatingly real beating. "Tommy, do something!"

I heard the pepper spray blast again and felt its burn in my mouth as I'd called out for help. I choked and gagged, and Daniella resume kicking me as hard as she could in my unprotected ribs.

Then she pressed down on my shoulders with her palms, gave a final hard shove, and my head hit the pavement.

"I can't see," I managed. "Tommy, get me some water. Help!"

A thud on my chest. The girl had incorporated some of the Day 1 riots' methods she'd witnessed as a bystander or on TV. She was stomping me barefoot in the street. I felt her leaping up, and then coming down, hard on my sternum. My vision clearing only slightly I could see her pretty yet contorted face through my hazy vision and all the besieged city's infernal smoke, just below the blinding sky. I closed my eyes and I heard her swear.

"You. Fucking. Fuck. Motherfucking. Piec-a. White. Trash." Each word came with a fresh stomp. I felt my ribs cracking down by my belly, now she was working my upper chest, shoulders, throat. Stomping me with all the anger of the city. All the fury, the injustice.

All seemed quiet, as suddenly she stepped off of me, and I tried to breathe. My breath was ragged, as if something was obstructing my lungs, my windpipe.

I felt her seize my hair and pull, slapping my face with kicks to prod me. I rolled over and banged into something. I put my hand up to feel what it was--the van.

I heard her open the door and step up into the van. "Fucking blonde asshole!" She shouted down at me and then I felt the impact of her soles on my face, contorting my facial muscles, breaking my nose with a crunch, pressing it into my brain.

I tasted blood and something bitter welling in my throat, and I thought I was dying or at least about to pass out. Unfortunately, there was more. Through my blurry vision, I could only watch as she stepped up into the front of the van again, clapped her hands, and dropped down once more upon my face with all her weight. Her feet were filthy and stunk. She'd been walking through the streets of LA all morning barefoot. But that was the least of my problems.

I tried to call out for help one last time, when she dropped the boom on me for good, her kneecaps hammering my chest and throat. I wheezed and tried to breathe, no good, and to seal the deal her palm came down over my mouth, and she lowered her pretty mocha face and spat a copious glob of saliva into my eye.

[eponymousrex]

Oh fuck yes. Don't stop there :-)

[grizley]

Don't leave us hanging like that, hurry with the next part.

[Eddie08]

Chapter 2

When the Arsenio Hall Show returned from commercial, Daniella was still seated in the VIP guest chair, her high-heel sandal dangling from her slender foot. I noticed the red toenail polish, the gold ankle bracelet, and, as much as my sick curiosity demanded I continue to watch, I regressed inward again ...

For most of the pounding, I was unconscious, and only through the power of TV news and its numerous, subsequent airings of the assault had I seen what had happened to me after it'd all gone dark. She'd been wearing that same fucking ankle bracelet then, the same shade of lacquer, too, the force of her stomps breaking my face, the pavement below my head ungiving, the blood streaming down the sides of my mushed, broken face. I saw her dancing drunkenly on me, trying to keep her balance, some rhythmic dance song playing in her mind, driving her movements.

No help came, and Tommy kept his camera on the action the whole time. Daniella had even found time to step off of me for a moment and drag a nearby garbage can over to my motionless body. She tipped it, slowly at first, and then in a burst of drug-induced strength, she lifted the container and dumped its contents on my chest, my face. She spat on me one last time, and walked away--I remember the TV news had even shown her tiptoeing away over the hot pavement, the soles of her feet caked with tar and dirt, and some crumbs from the spilled trash. As she moved away, she picked up the pace--this must have been when the driver of our news van had come out of the deli and shouted at her, causing her and her bystander friend to flee around the next corner.

"Now, your feet," Arsenio said, pausing, looking down at her hyperactive legs.

"My feet?" Daniella prompted, flexing her ankle so her half-covered sole faced the camera. She wiggled her toes.

Arsenio wiped a hand over his face, chuckled. "Your feet were probably the most famous feet in America for a while, and it all had to do with some accusation against you for wilding and beating up some poor white dude during the LA riots. What really happened?"

Daniella glanced off-stage for a moment, perhaps taking instructions from her agent. Then: "Sure, I don't mind talking about it," she said. "Some guy, and I won't say his name, because he's been through enough already ... and I think you know who he is ... was in the wrong place at the wrong time during the riots, and some other, pretty girl who was my age at the time viciously attacked him and stomped on his face." She leaned forward to slip her shoe back on, then turned to Arsenio. "It turns out it was a case of mistaken identity. I was cleared in a court of law." Her top leg began to bounce again--a nervous tic--and her shoe once more started sliding off, a centimeter at a time.

"Hmm," Arsenio wondered aloud. "Now how did they acquit you again? The marks on the victim's face didn't match those of your footprints?" The audience gave an uncertain chuckle.

The flesh over Daniella's nose creased slightly, and she turned to Arsenio all tongue-in-cheek, and said, "Something like that."

I ground my teeth at this. Lying bitch. I pawed at the remote, my thumb poised over the Off button.

"Speaking of feet, Arsenio,"--Daniella said, removing a sandal, then the other, dropping each to the stage floor with a light clack--"Patty D'Arbanville told me you gave her a mean foot massage on the show last year. I didn't see that. Is that true?"

Arsenio blushed, bowed his head. "Yeah, well, I try to roll out the red carpet for my guests, you know. Pamper them."

Daniella turned to the audience with a conspiratorial look. "My feet kind of hurt from wearing these blasted designer shoes. What do you think, audience, you think Arsenio should give me one of his famous, therapeutic foot massages?"

At this, the crowd whistled and clamored, and Daniella shook and flexed her bare foot expectantly.

Arsenio squinted at his audience, a comedic scowl of betrayal. "Hey, you dogs!" he growled. "Who's calling the shots here?"

Some laughter, and then one booming voice from the live audience roared: "She is!"

Daniella snorted with laughter and steered her long slender leg, far better toned than when I'd first seen it, over Arsenio's desk. She placed her heel on his lap.

"I'm waiting," she said.

***

The show returned from commercial again, and to my horror, the star of the show was ... was ... kneading Daniella's soles with his thumbs, talking softly and sensuously with her, her heels resting comfortably on his lap. Boiling anger surged up from my chest, flushing my face with the sting of anger and contempt, and I could watch only a few seconds more ... Arsenio massaging this phony starlet's feet ... before I switched off the TV and collapsed back down upon my pillow. There in the solitude of my rehab hospital bed, I cried ... for hours it seemed ... until finally, mercifully, I fell asleep.

[Eddie08]

Chapter 3

I felt ill the next morning, like I might throw up. I splashed my face with water, getting some in my mouth, spitting it out, then I toweled off. I stared at my reflection in the mirror.

I'm not a handsome man--I used to be, but not anymore.

Ever seen the movie "Mask"?

My face resembles an unevenly flattened melon, my nose all pushed in, my eye cavities tall and oval, my lips stretched, scarred and grotesque. The driver of our news man called 9-1-1, but no ambulance would come, so I roasted in the hot sun, unconscious, barely breathing, for a half hour until our reporter, Jennifer, returned and she and the driver loaded me into the van. They took me to the nearest hospital--all a blur to me now. I was told that a surgeon drained my brain of the hemorrhaging and kept me breathing. Saved my life.

I awoke a day later with reporters in my face. The nurse quickly cleared them out. My memory started to return.

I'm not sure that's a good thing.

***

I remember the trial perhaps better than anything. How could I forget? You want to talk about injustice? If you had an open mind you might even say a larger injustice was slapped upon me than was upon either Rodney King or the Goldmans.

The courtroom was crowded daily, but I could still see Daniella sneak in each day, led by her lawyer, just in the nick of time, just before Judge Marsha Haynes called each day's first session to order.

The day I'll tell you about--the first day of testimony--Daniella wore a white blouse, light-blue skirt, white stockings, matching blue shoes. Neither her attorney's name, nor the prosecutor's name, is important; the case wasn't really between them. It was between Daniella and me.

And that's the thing that burns me up the most. That she'd trampled me again. This time legally, in smarter, prettier fashion.

A lot of it was luck, too--Daniella's fucking good fortune, coupled with my bad luck. Once a couple things went against the prosecution and me, the whole case snowballed out of control, and came full force back against me. Smack! And then I lost my nerve. Caved. And she was stomping on me again, only in court this time.

Then, the sobering verdict.

But back to that first day of evidence.

First there came the presentation of Tommy's footage.

As the judge and jury quickly saw, the camera had never actually captured Daniella's face. The back of her head, a good many shots of her striking arms and feet, but never her face. Defense attorney, Lisa Dengal, made sure in didactic fashion that the jury was aware of these facts.

Then, there was the issue of Tommy's written testimony that he couldn't tell whether or not Daniella was the assailant--the girl who'd beaten me had seemed uglier, meaner, fatter, he'd stated. The prosecution planned to force Tommy to take the stand, to cross-examine him hard, but by then it would be too late. ...

Finally, I heard my name being called--the moment when I took the stand.

***

[Eddie08]

***

The goddamn fucking bitch!

She was playing with her foot while I was testifying against her, while I was trying to explain to the jury how she'd scratched my face, then kicked me in the groin, then stomped on me multiple times ... for no reason ... while I was trying to do my job.

"And look what she did to my face, my teeth," I said, then opened my mouth to reveal my missing front teeth. Plans were already privately underway for a civilian case, in the slim chance that the public case failed. She would pay for what she'd done to me.

I couldn't help but glance at her, her stockinged feet; both of her shoes laying neatly on the floor under the defendent's table, and she was scratching the spidery silk over one foot, an itch. Of all the arrogance!

I lost my place. Had to start over. She saw this and grinned ever so slightly, smugly.

***

At one point, I told the prosecutor, the jury, that she'd reached into my pocket for the pepper spray, but then later I had to correct myself--she'd snatched it from my hand. The prosecutor made allowances for this, explaining I'd suffered brain damage from the vicious and brutal attack by Miss Maples, that I couldn't be expected to easily remember every detail.

The defense had a field day with that last part.

Fuck.

She'd beaten me, and then beaten me again, this last time in a light-blue skirt and stockings. While attending to an itch on the bottom of her foot.

The jury ruled her innocent.

My medical bills were suddenly my own to pay.

I would not sue the city. I needed time to think.

And with my name and a graphic video of me being trample by a pretty, black teenage girl being broadcast across the planet, I vanished. Into a bottle. Into hiding.

***

[Eddie08]

Chapter 4

So she's a Hollywood starlet now, is she?

And she wants to come back into my life, does she?

Wearing that gold anklet and blood-red nail polish on Arsenio was obviously her way of taunting me--of trying to bring me out of the shadows for Round Three.

Well, this time I'm coming out swinging.

Chapter 5

I called my friend, Jorge, a member of that special breed of photographers known as the paparazzi. I asked him to meet me at a certain Starbucks in Bevery Hills. We each got a Grande and caught up. He knew better than to ask me questions about that day, but he did ask if I was feeling OK. If he could do anything to help ...

"Jorge," I whispered over the drone of the other coffee-shop patrons. "I need you to find her for me."

He shrugged innocently. "Who?"

"Daniella Maples," I whispered softly, but clearly.

"You sure you want to know?" he said.

"I need to confront my fears, Jorge. You know how it is."

He dropped his eyes and nodded. "OK, come outside."

***

"There," he pointed.

I looked up past the parking lot, over the palm trees, and the historic, red train depot at the foot of the mountainous hills. Halfway up the bush-covered Beverly bump was a two-story modern mini-palace, its rear deck hovering over the edge.

"That's her house," Jorge said. "The one with the view."

I stared in disbelief. I could storm up there right now, but ... wait .. I had a better idea. A more devious way of paying back Daniella Maples, the rising star. The bitch who'd stomped me in front of millions, time and time again, with her dirty, stinking feet.

"Does she still have that dog?" I asked Jorge--certain that if he didn't know he could easily find out for me.

"The chihuahua?"

"Yes--does she have others?" I asked.

"Not that I know of. Yes, she still have the chihuahua. He's called Little Terror. Daniella's known for her sense of humor. That's why they give her the comedy sh--"

"Shut up," I said gently. "But thanks for the information."

"Thanks for the coffee. Glad to hear you're doing all right. Don't do anything, senhor. It won't turn out anything like you plan."

I nodded, and we touched fists and Jorge started toward his car.

"Hey, Jorge?"

"Yes?"

"You know a good vet around here? One that might handle exotic pets ... like a turtle?"

"Yes, it's called Beverly Hills Pet Clinic, just like it ought to--."

"And would this be the same vet that all the haughtie-taughties around here use?"

Jorge appeared puzzled.

"Is it a celebrity vet?--Where all the important people around here take their pets?"

"Yes."

My eyes climbed the brush-covered hill once more, pausing at the chic home dangling halfway up. That was Daniella Maples' fortress; that was where she slept.

I'm sure she would have a security system.

Some surveillance was in order.

"I'll see you later," Jorge said, interrupting my thoughts one last time.

"Thanks again," I said, and headed for my own car.

I opened the trunk and lifted out my camera case.

***

Daniella needed a stalker, and I repeated to myself over and over as my Honda Accord climbed the winding hillside, "I'm your huckleberry, Danny."

I parked above her driveway--in a small turnoff hidden by the brush, and set off on foot, into the woods, my eyes searching for the perfect vantage point.

[Eddie08]

Chapter 5

A week later, under the cover of darkness, I crept down the hillside toward Daniella's house. Adorned fully in black, I moved like a ninja, and when finally I was in throwing distance of the likely electrified fence, I pinched the sides of my watch.

10:41 p.m. Four minutes before she routinely let Little Terror out.

This was gonna be great. The vet was open until midnight. The little bugger would eat the large, morsel of hamburger I'd brought along, and then suddenly, unexplainably get sick. I'd be waiting for her in the lobby of the Beverly Hills Pet Clinic, but she'd never recognize me.

I was going to outsmart the bitch, and then get close to her.

And then I was going to punish her real good.

A second after Daniella closed the door, I threw the meat over the fence and the stupid little dog glanced up into the woods, in my general direction, then began sniffing the ground. It wandered from the sanctuary of the hillside porchlight, closer and closer to the bait.

***

Daniella arrived at the animal hospital fifteen minutes after me, and I glanced quickly at her from behind my false mustache and baseball cap, pulled low down over my face. At one point while I'd been waiting, the receptionist had asked to see Cecil, the painted turtle I'd purchased earlier that day, but I politely told her I could wait, the lady with the cat could go in first. This allowed me to still be in reception when Daniella came in.

There was no one else around when she did. The night receptionist had gone into the back with the cat lady and it was just the two of us. I could smell Daniella's spicy perfume, see the way her maroon bathrobe receded from her thigh as she cradled her tiny dog on her lap and shook her foot impatiently. Her matching, maroon bedroom slipper flapped, providing me with quick glimpses of her pink-tinged, mocha heel.

From the corner of my eye, I could also see that her hair was matted. She'd probably been lying on a couch watching TV when Little Terror had started hacking from the poison.

I reached into my jacket for the pistol, then stood and stretched innocently as my fingers traced the grip, the trigger.

Then I sprang, and before Daniella could scream I had her wrist, causing her to drop her prescious Little Terror to the floor. I yanked Daniella close, pressing the muzzle firmly against her mouth.

"Don't even squeak," I hissed in her ear. "Quick, outside and I won't shoot."

I pushed her toward the door, my arm locked around hers, and I snuck her outside and across the parking lot, to her car, a bright-colored Ford Mustang.

The pistol pressed firmly against her temple, I shouted at her. "Drive!"

She rocked in the driver's seat, her mouth open in panic, her eyes staring helplessly up through the windshield. What was she looking for? Security cameras? I didn't care. I saw the tears starting to flow down her cheeks and it brought me great satisfaction.

"Drive," I repeated, "your house--or I'll whack you across the head with this thing. Just drive, you fucking bitch!"

Keep her afraid.

Now I'm calling the shots.

[Eddie08]

Chapter 6

The whole ride up to her house on the hill, Daniella cried for her little stinking dog that we'd left back on the floor of the vet's office. Maybe the receptionist would come out in time and see it lying limp and barely breathing on the tile floor and carry it back to the vet and somehow save it ... and maybe she wouldn't--it wasn't my problem. I shoved the nose of the gun into Daniella's neck and told her to speed it up. We WEREN'T going back for the pooch.

A few minutes later we pulled up outside the gate to her hillside property.

"Open it," I hissed.

"Who are you, what do you want?" she said looking at my face, trying to see past the disguise which included a pair of sunglasses.

"We'll discuss that inside--now open the fucking gate!"

She pressed a button on the overhead visor, then drove through and down the short drive, toward her house.

"Park it here, right in front," I said.

Once more she obeyed and then shut off the engine.

"All right now, give me the keys," I told her, "and don't try anything!"

[Eddie08]

***

The door opened to a dim, ballroom-sized first floor. "Keep the lights off," I said. "Over here." And I shoved her again.

The furniture was large, soft, a half-circle arrangement around a glass coffee table. I pushed her onto the expensive suede sofa. "Sit down. Time for the unmasking. Me first." I sat down next to her, keeping her on my left, my left arm still hooked around her slender bicep, my right hand menacing the pistol.

I let go of her for a minute and flipped off my sunglasses, then my cap, finally the mustache. "Oww--recognize me yet, Daniella?"

She gasped and tried to bring her hands to her face, but I steadied her with the gun.

"No quick movements, Danny."

"Eddie? Eddie from the riots? Sorry, I can't remember your last name."

"That's right, I'm Eddie, and don't play dumb, bitch. You know who I am and you've seen me up close before. When you were stomping on my face, bitch!" I pressed the gun into her cheek.

Daniella shuddered, instinctively put her hands up. "What do you want?"

"What were you 'on' that day?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Save it, bitch!"

Frustrated, I jumped to my feet. "Look at this face," I said leaning toward her on the couch. I pressed my face close to hers. "Get a good look at this face! Think it's easy to find a girlfriend with a face like this, think it's easy to find a job? You ruined my life and then got off scott-free."

She was waving her hands in front of her chest. "It wasn't me--I--I swear."

"Bullshit! Get up!" I seized her arm and yanked, and one of her slippers flew off. I got a quick glimpse of the gold anklet.

I shoved her toward the stairs. There was a loft directly above us, a short hall and a few doors.

"You sleep upstairs?"

"Yes. What do you want?"

"I want you to tell me the truth. That it was you who attacked me."

"It wasn't me--and what happened between us in court was a long time ago."

"Not for me it wasn't. I relive it in my nightmares every fucking night. Now get your ass upstairs!" I slapped her butt as she strode slowly up the carpeted steps, a dead-woman-walking kind of walk. She looked ridiculous with that sleep-mussed hair, the silk bathrobe she'd worn to the vet's office, the one slipper on, the other off.

Inside her bedroom, I tossed her onto the mattress. "Lie back!" I shouted.

"No!"

I pulled back my fist, prepared to strike her. She tensed, her hands coming up.

I snuck in close, and pushed the gun against her forehead.

"Lean back, nice and slowly," I whispered.

"You won't kill me?" she said.

"I don't know yet."

I was being honest. I didn't know where this was going. At the very least, I knew that I wanted to hurt her bad, psychologically and physically, maim her in some way ... as she'd done to me.

"You won't rape me?" She sank back onto the mattress, kicked her remaining maroon slipper off the side of the bed.

I took her in, from head to toe.

"I definitely can't promise that."

She lifted her head, stared into my eyes. A challenge, and something else. I could tell that my face disgusted her. "If you touch me, I'll scatch your eyes out--I swear to fucking god."

I removed my lightweight backpack, pulled out the slender rope. "I know--oh, don't I know--and that's why I'm going to tie you up."

[Eddie08]

Chapter 7

After I had bound her wrists and ankles to the bedposts, I removed the last two items from my knapsack. The first hadn't been hard to find, certainly not in a place like LA. Cat-o-nine-tails. The second, a slender disc, had taken a little doing.

"What are you going to do?" Daniella croaked, and yanked her arms, then legs, trying to get loose.

"First, we're going to watch a little movie, then I'm going to whip your feet."

She struggled some more.

I grabbed the television remote from her bedside table, switched on the television. Walked over and punched on the DVD player. I put my home-grown movie in the slot.

The footage was blurry at first, then ... two teenage girls frolicking in the gush of a busted fire hydrant.

***

She didn't watch most of it, but I did. It reminded me of why I was so bitter all the time, why two years ago things had taken a turn for the worst. She glanced up at the ceiling, tried her bonds some more.

"It's no use, dar-ling," I spat contemptuously. "The only way you're getting out of this is if I let you."

She relaxed a bit, cleared her throat. "Where'd you get the tape?"

"Don't you remember, bitch? I used to be a cameraman, I have friends in the industry. I planned for this night and you're going to say it! You're going to admit what you did to me!"

She nodded, relaxed still more. Perhaps even starting to collect her wits. "OK, OK, it was me, but seriously, Eddie--if you're going to kill me, do you really think this is the best place. I mean, they have forensics teams nowadays who can pluck a hair fiber off a dustmite."

Angrilly, I stared at her face for several seconds, wanting to say something to dispute her statement. But I couldn't. She was right. I'd need to be clean about this. Efficient. And my fingerprints--Shit! I hadn't planned well after all.

I glanced one last time at the exposed soles of her feet. So slender, so pink and sweaty and ready for my whip.

But not here.

If I raped or killed her here, it would be too easy for the police to pin it on me and put me away. I'd already touched some of her furniture. Earlier I hadn't considered or cared about such circumstances, but now, momentarily distracted from the blinding vengeance, reality sank in and I saw that if I wasn't careful it was prison for me, and in prison there would be things rivaling what she'd done to me two years ago. Terrible obscene things ... from Men.

"Daniella, I'm going to unbind you," I said and moved to free her arms. "If you try anything, I will put a bullet in that pretty head of yours."

[Eddie08]

Chapter 8

Look, I know what you're thinking--I'm an idiot for unbinding her. But look on the bright side. I forced her into the bathroom, made her strip, even slapped her ass so hard she gave a little yelp.

And the sight of her now, in that empty jacuzzi. Mwhh.

She had one leg over the side of the tub, the other inside and bent at the knee. Her hands were in her lap, covering her well-groomed private area. She wouldn't look at me directly, but I sensed her watching me.

Twenty-year-old, mocha-skinned babe. The same babe who nearly two years ago had mashed my chest and face in.

I brought the cat-o-nine-tail sharply across her sole.

She shook, pulled her wounded foot back into the tub.

"Hey--get that back out here, bitch!"

I lunged for her, and that's when I saw her lift something, felt the strong blast of water in my eyes, lifted my hands instinctively to my eyes, thinking I had time to rub the water out. I saw a blur coming toward me, and thought for one second to fire, didn't, and by then it was too late and her bony shoulder caught me right in the chops.

I bit down on my tongue, tasted blood, finally got a good look at her. Too late again--

Her pink, sticky heel caught the bridge of my nose and sent me back, and in that instant her dexterous toes pressed into my misshapen face, probing, guiding, and then sending me stumbling away with a final shove, my sneakers slipping on the now-wet bathroom floor--

I crashed, the back of my skull thudding hard on the tiles.

I was still conscious for a moment, but then her shadow fell over me, and I saw her pink heel come down again, moist pinkness, a sweet, almost leathery odor. Strange. No pain. Nothing. The pink before my eyes fading to black.

[Eddie08]

OK, maybe two or three scenes left, and then I'll call it done.

But hey--if there's anyone following this, I'll keep working for you : )

[hhhmmm]

Eddie:

I'm more of a boot lover, but hey, it's your story!:) Thanks for the effort into writing this though. I know how hard it is.

hhhmmm:)

[insectoid]

looking forward to more!

[txordi]

looking forward to more!

very good story, congratulations .... I hope he has more below

[Eddie08]

Chapter 9

Darkness. The sense of things nibbling at me, a breeze chasing them away, then the snout of some animal sniffing my face, I try to lift my hand to shoo it, and it's gone. Then, the breeze is gone, and the flies are landing on me, the sun cooking me.

My eyes shot open. I was outside, pinned down, Daniella's house looking down on me from a 45-degree angle, my head reclined, my feet uphill. She tied me down on my back, headfirst down the slope. I tried to move. Couldn't. I glanced at my bound limbs--she'd used my own rope against me. And now the sun--what the hell time was it?--was roasting my chest, my ghastly face.

Each segment of rope was tied to an iron stake she'd planted in the rocky hillside. Perhaps I could pull upward, pull the stakes right out of the ground. But the blistering, blinding sun was in my eyes, my arms and legs were sore, my ribs freshly cracked.

"Daniella!" I screamed in pain, then: "Somebody! Help!"

***

She sauntered down the balcony steps about two hours later, in a purple belly shirt and gray shorts, barefoot as usual. I should have killed her when I had the chance, even if the jacuzzi was logically the best place to wash away evidence, I shouldn't have moved her, shouldn't have risked it--I'd had her dead to rights ... and I'd let her go.

"Hey, ugly," she said. She had a drink in her hand, some light-amber liquid on the rocks, chinking in a short glass as she walked.

She stood above my feet, gazing downslope at me. "Well, you're in quite a predicament--how quickly I turned it around on you."

"You. Filthy. Whore!" I cursed.

"Careful--I'm not in the mood for your shit, Blondie," she said.

I thrust my chest at her, my hips, struggling to get those stakes out of the rocks and soil. If given time, I could have.

Daniella turned and climbed the hill but instead of taking the steps, she went underneath the balcony and reappeared with a duffel-bag. From it, she removed my cat-o-nine-tails, held the instrument up high so I could see it over my feet.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" I roared. "The news copters will be darting over any minute--you can't get away with this. Just let me go."

She tested the handle of the whip on her palm, then stepped down the hill toward me, walking past my feet, stopping with her toes planted in the rubble, almost touching the left side of my face.

"I hope they do televise this," she whispered, then bent down and spat in my face--a copious amount that splayed across my left eye and sunken nose, all the way to the right corner of my lips.

"I got away with it before," she said, then added with a snort, "Despite the videotape."

My head sank back against the rocks in defeat.

... and now I'm going to get away with it again."

[Eddie08]

***

Her first step onto my chest was a tentative one, Daniella testing the inverted surfboard that was my chest, testing the firmness with which she'd bound me across the sharp rocks. The stones were cutting into my back, now even more under her weight. She lifted her second foot and steadily planted it over my breast.

She stood on my bare chest, her feet pointing downhill, her toes just below my chin. She wiggled them, let out a loud sigh of relief. "Such a beautiful view of the valley--too bad you can't enjoy it ... oh, look, here comes one of those news copters. Let me get into my victory pose."

Daniella stepped onto my face, then brought her other foot down on top of the one she'd planted. Between her toes, I could see her shading her eyes, then waiving to the camera above. "Hi!" she shouted up to the buzzing helicopter. "Down here!" She pointed down at me beneath her feet.

"Smile for the cameras, Eddie."

[Eddie08]

Chapter 10

Her feet smelled like a mixture of body odor and spit, her soles rubbing her gooey, drying sputum into my sunken nose, eyeballs, over my lips ... for a full minute after the helicopter was gone.

It was hard to breathe, and my chest, god, it hurt. Not just from her footsteps, but the sun. It had cooked my skin good, my nipples were screaming.

Daniella stepped off of my face.

I blinked, then tried to lift my head and follow her ascent back toward the house. "Uhhh!" I said, my chest heaving, the pain in my neck crippling. I tried again ... a stiff, broken pain, not letting me move. Finally, I turned slightly, trying a different angle, and I raised my tortured skull from the rocks. I saw her disappear into the shadowy space beneath the balcony.

When she returned, she was carrying a can of lighter fluid in one hand, the multi-pronged whip in the other.

Crushing the pebbles and shale underfoot, she descended, stopping when she'd gone as far as my torso. She spun and brought the crop down.

The nine tails laced my sunburned chest. I sucked in air. I would not cry, would not scream. Wouldn't give her the satisfaction.

Again she cracked the whip. Shit. She'd striped my left nipple with that blow. I could see the blood following the pull of gravity, sliding down my neck, pooling beneath my chin.

"You fucking bitch," I panted.

She strode forward angrilly. "Don't you call me that!" The tails lashed across my face.

I gasped, winced, stinging pain, left eye shot, lips bleeding--I peered up through my right. "Daniella--let's talk about this."

She spiked the whip down on my chest, then left it resting there across my wounds. I rolled my head slightly, and my one working eye caught her pulling down her shorts, gyrating her slender hips, sliding, then stepping out of the tight bottoms.

No underpants--her pubic area was trimly cropped; she placed one foot on each side of my head, then lowered her genitalia until it was inches from my face.

A strong fishy odor, then--

Warm liquid cascaded upon my face.

She was pissing on me. And the helicopter was approaching again, returning from the southside, but I couldn't see it for she was squatting over my face, and my one, good eye was overflowing with the bitter pill of Daniella's urine.

"Stop it! No!"

"Yes," she said. "And this is JUST the beginning. Hi, up there," she called to the hovering news copter.

"Just the beginning."

[Eddie08]

Chapter 11

Daniella seized my scalp and lifted my hapless head from the rocks, maneuvering me from side to side, wiping her pussy in my hair.

"I'll get you for this," I spat.

"Shut up," she said, finishing up, and slapping my face. The back of my head slammed back down on the rocks.

She turned for the lighter fluid, her naked ass hovering over me. I ground my teeth, tried to pull my hands loose, lifted my arms and legs in 1-2-3-4 fashion, and with that final jerk, my right leg came free. I tried again, and a second spike went flying, my left hand free.

I reached for her ankle, just as she spun and raised her foot out of reach then brought it down on my wrist.

"Ha!" she spat with excitement. She tipped the can of lighter fluid toward my head.

***

I closed my eyes, unable to get my hand free from her pinning stomp, dreading the poisonous splash of the combustible fluid on my face.

Nothing happened.

I opened my eyes, tilted back my head, and saw her squatting just behind me, a foot farther down the hill. There, a little patch of brush grew. She'd doused the plants good--I could smell the fumes--and now she was lighting a match, tossing it. The bushes caught, then exploded.

The fire raged in the hot afternoon sun, cooking the weeds, sparks flying, some of them landing in my hair, on my chest.

Daniella tossed her head back and laughed.

"Let me go, you bitch," I hissed.

She picked up the lighter fluid again, then crouched down next to the cat-o-nine-tails, carefully dousing the tassels of each prong. She threw another match down and picked up the whip, its tails flaming.

"Fuck. You!" Daniella roared.

The tails cracked across my already tenderized chest--the tassels of the whip flickered but remained aflame, and she stepped forward and hit me again. My chest hairs caught on fire, and Daniella stared down at me with smug satisfaction just as the TV news helicopter returned for a third look.

***

"Ladies and gentlemen, Beverly Hills Police are racing to the scene as below us Daniella Maples is roasting her stalker, Eddie Pritchett, who police say kidnapped her from a local veterinarian's office late last night after poisoning the actress' dog. Pritchett's car was left behind at the scene, and police believe the man you see below is indeed Pritchett, who in 1992--"

[Eddie08]

Almost fully cooked ... : )

[nathan]

Holy shit...great story,man. :clap:

[Eddie08]

Thanks everyone for reading and the kind comments. Been busy at work, so I'll have to let our hero baste for a while until we can come back to him. Maybe a really f'd-up boot scene coming up for our friend Hmmmmmmm.

[Eddie08]

Chapter 12

Daniella ground my loose hand into the rocks, really putting her hips into it, her ankle twisting, grinding, grinding. Then, she stepped off.

I tried to lift my throbbing hand. It was useless. Dead.

"Ha!" she bellowed, then pulled up her shorts. She studied me for a moment then bent down and spat in my face--a shower of soft, individual pellets that clung to my flattened nose and cheeks. She hacked, digging for something deep in her chest, then leaned in close, spat. A big looghie stuck to my upper lip.

I quivered and almost retched.

"Eee-eww," she said with a disgusted face, then she lowered her foot and spread the globule all over my nose and lips. Her sole slid down my inverted skull to my eyes, which I closed just in time, and she spread the remaining mucous over my eyelids, my forehead.

"Daniella," I pleaded, choking. "I've had enough. I--I'm sorry."

I didn't mean it, but I needed to try something. I couldn't move my neck or any of my limbs and I was getting sick to my stomach.

"Open your mouth," she said.

"N--No."

Her heel came down hard on my sternum, just below my chest, then again, and again. "Open. Your fucking. Mouth!"

I obeyed.

She flexed her foot just inches above my face--and although my left eye was blind and swollen, my right was forced to regard her grimey, spit-lathered sole circling, circling, above my mouth, teasing, her toes curling and extending, curling and extending.

"Daniella, don't ... please, I--"

She stuck her foot inside my mouth.

"Don't you dare bite me," she warned, and inserted her toes deeper inside my mouth. "You'll only make it harder on yourself."

I gagged. The smell ... the taste ... was something like week-old garbage, a ripe, putrid bouquet of aged cheese, soil and female sweat. She wiggled her toes deep inside my throat, causing my stomach to lurch, a dry heave.

"Don't you puke on my toes!" she hollered and dragged her foot out from between my lips, then slapped my face with it. It was a quick, hard shot, and stars flickered in my vision.

"Now, the other one," she said, and inserted the toes of her other foot into my mouth. "Suck my feetsies clean," she said in a little girl voice.

***

I heard the helicopter again, tried to lift my free hand to swat her ankle out of the way, but still couldn't manage. I roared with rage, despite her toes deep inside my throat and yanked at the ropes, my torso and hips twisting, thrusting.

"Stop that!" she cried, and removed her foot from my mouth, then wiped my saliva all over my face. "You know what?--I've had it. That. Is. Fucking. It!"

"What are you going to do?" I croaked.

She didn't answer. She took a step up the hill, then crouched down and began to paw at the heavy stones and shale; digging; thrusting the rubble between her legs and behind her ... down on top of me.

"Daniella!" I yelled, then paused as I heard the approaching sirens. The police! The police would save me from this crazy bitch.

With sudden hope, I lifted my head, tore my right arm free, then reached for her ... her leg, her flexing buttocks inside the gray cotton shorts just inches from my grasp. I stretched--

She hiked a small boulder and it clocked me on the temple. I teetered in an upright position, dazed, dizzy.

Daniella peered down at me over her shoulder and saw the gash and the blood, and she smirked with satisfaction, then resumed her digging.

I collapsed, the back of my head producing a hollow, clacking sound as it once more dropped to the rubble.

More shale and stones covered my legs, waist and scorched chest. Another small boulder bounced off my skull. I closed my eyes, and waited for the police, as she buried me in her backyard rubble.

[Eddie08]

Epilogue

My new residence is at the end of a dark corridor. There are eight rooms, four on each side, each housing one of my fellow residents. The walls are thick and imposing. We are rarely allowed out of our rooms, and have few liberties. Sometimes we can watch TV.

I no longer think about revenge, even when I see a show or movie featuring Daniella.

None of us get visitors. We're the forgotten members of society. The buried.

The guy in the first cell is by far the biggest lunatic. He jerks off at anything that walks past. The guards just laugh at him, try to sprint by before he can work up the steam.

"Hey Pritchett!"

I awoke from my reverie. It was Higgins the guard. Higgins treated me OK, but for some reason he now looked at me with a twinkle of sadism in his eyes. I said nothing.

"You got a visitor," he told me.

I stared dazedly at him, and he winked and blew me a kiss.

I heard the buzzer of the block entrance, some whispers then the clack of boots down the corridor.

"Behave yourself, Rommer," I heard Higgins warn the ejaculator in the first cell.

The other residents started all shouting, whistling, catcalls.

No.

The sound of a woman's heels, coming closer.

"Nice boots! Oh, honey, oh!--please stand outside my cell," Rommer cooed.

It couldn't be.

"Hey, I know you," fellow resident Tyrone's deep voice thundered, bouncing off the rafters. "You that fine piece of ass from Tia's Place."

Couldn't be.

"And don't forget Gladiatrices," I heard Daniella say as she stopped in front of my cell and turned to face me.

I stared in disbelief. Not just because of the improbability of her being here, and the question of how the hell she'd gotten the guards to let her in, but because of what she was wearing.

Jagged thigh-high boots, sharp at the top and at the seam, at the toe and the heel. Polished and black, the stilettos six inches long and the sharpest of all.

My eyes climbed her thighs--she wore no pantyhose--and rested on her gray flannel skirt, before moving to her perky breasts pointing at me from beneath her black, turtleneck sweater.

Her face.

She smiled at me.

"Stay out!" I shouted. "Help! Guard!"

Higgins reappeared, and instead of listening to me as I plead with him that I wanted no visitors, he opened my cell and let her in. He locked the door behind her.

"Higgins!" I roared. "I have a right to refuse visitors!"

Higgins smiled and crossed his arms.

"What did you give him, bitch?" I said from my wheelchair.

Daniella glanced back at Higgins, then her eyes returned on me.

"Well, I promised him I wasn't going to tell anyone, but I lied--I gave him a foot job. We went into the maintenance closet, and I let him take off my boots and I beat him off. My feet were sweaty, weren't they, Higgins?"

"Ohhhhhhh!" Rommer moaned from the end of the corridor. "Oh, oh!"

"Rommer, shut up!" hollered Tyrone. "You sound like a fucking chimapanzee!"

Daniella continued: "And of course he also bargained for the chance to watch."

"Watch what?" I asked, and gazed down at the floor beneath my useless legs as I pondered this.

"Round Four," she said--and then in a whisper: "The final knockout."

I glanced up at her.

She moved quickly, bending at the knees, one leg cocking back, then coming forward. The heel of her boot punctured the flattened bridge of my already obliterated nose, stuck there, forcing her to dance on one leg. Then, she ripped her leg back, and ripped the stiletto out of my skull.

I quivered inside the wheelchair, the blood rushing down my flat face, falling to my lap, laughing to myself at how comical this all was.

I collapsed forward onto the floor at Daniella's feet.

[Eddie08]

***

I'm stuck, on my back, like an upended turtle ... only worse, because I can't move my arms or legs.

My legs won't move because of that hot afternoon on the hillside, Round Three, when she'd rendered my legs useless by lighting me on fire--my flesh is burned and scarred from the neck down--the pain so excrutiating it prevents movement; and finally, only seconds ago, she'd tipped my wheelchair on top of my arms, mashing them, crippling them from even the slowest, most methodical motion. The clanging of the steel on pavement is still ringing in my ears.

This was it, then. The End. In Round One, she'd taken care of cracking and mushing my head and face in the dirty streets of South Central, but I could still breathe, talk, walk, eat. Round Two, she'd whipped me in court--whipped my mind, my last shred of confidence, pride. Round Three, my legs ... but my head and neck still worked, my internal organs still beat. This was why she'd come back. She was going to take these final capabilities away from me.

Her sharp, booted heel pressed down on my throat, and the guard ... the guard just watched. He'd pulled up a chair and was calling out the one-sided play-by-play for the other residents.

The slightly curled toe of her boot rocked up toward the ceiling, then in a see-sawing motion, she brought it down and her heel came up. I gasped.

"You going to kill him?" Higgins asked.

She didn't answer.

"Because if you do, I've got a lot of explaining to do--it wasn't part of our deal."

I was starting to blink out.

Daniella removed her booted foot from my throat.

"No," she said, and walked over to my bed and sat.

From the corner of my one working eye, I saw her unzipping the tall boots.

"She's taking off her boots, Rommer!" Higgins announced.

"Uhh," Rommer grunted. Then, in a squeaky voice: "I'm spent already ... what do her feet look like?"

Higgins cocked his head and looked down at the cell floor. "She's got some pretty feet. They're soft but strong, very nimble, and warm and moist--I like the smell."

"Uhh, I try again!" Rommer squeaked, and a flapping noise echoed down the corridor.

"You ought to see it, Rommer--she's got blood-red toe nail polish and this gold-trinket bracelet on her ankle."

"Uhh--almost there. What's she doing to him?"

Higgins took a moment to find the right words. "Uh, well, he's flat on his back and helpless, kind of like a frog squashed on a highway, and she's wiping her foot sweat on him."

That's me they're talking about.

And I can't do a thing about it.

She's using me like a shower rug, wiping her pungent, sweaty feet on my chest and face.

I can't raise a hand to stop her, can't strike her, can't get up and run away. I'm that frog in the highway that Higgins talked about.

And now she's stepping on my throat again, and her other foot's on top for extra pressure.

Something just popped--my larynx? pharanx? Getting harder to think now. I'm getting sleepy.

A final thought.

She loves me. Killing me is the kindest thing she can do to me at this point.

She steps off, and her fists go to her hips. She stares down at me.

"You're so pitiful."

I try to answer; can't.

She spits on me and lowers her foot. Spreads her discharge all over my chest, then my face.

Just kill me, bitch.

Instead, she turns on her heels, and motions to the guard.

"He's had enough for today, Higgins. Let me out."

"N--," I choke in protest, but can't speak. She's crushed my voice.

"See you in two," Daniella says seconds later from behind the window, and she waives to me.

Her boots are still inside with me--a gift, wafting, waiting, demanding attention from beside my bed.

THE END

[Eddie08]

If you liked this story, try my earlier work, Exit Sandman. Thanks for putting up with my shit.

http://www.mistressdestiny.com/forums/showthread.php?t=97379&highlight=Exit+Sandman

[hhhmmm]

Thanks everyone for reading and the kind comments. Been busy at work, so I'll have to let our hero baste for a while until we can come back to him. Maybe a really f'd-up boot scene coming up for our friend Hmmmmmmm.

Thanks Eddie:) I appreciate that!:)

hhhmmm:)

[iceblock]

Gee, great story Eddie08. And I took your advice and read Sandman as well - I liked it even better!

[Eddie08]

Thanks. I think I'm retiring from storytelling until right before Christmas when I try my hand at "A Cucciolo Carol, Part 2." I'm going to bring Fanny and Margo back as the ghosts of Christmas Past.

I have no stock in the site--it's purely the brilliance of a legendary fellow member named Carlo--but check out www.cucciolopage.com.

To all a good night!

[hhhmmm]

Eddie:

I have some bought some vids from Carlo. I hope that the story that you have in mind have some boots involved, with some boot sole licking:)

hhhmmm:)

[Eddie08]

I'll give it a try, hhhmmm, but this won't be until next winter. I especially like the boots Margo wears in the movie linked below: the ones in the second part where you can see through the black mesh. Margo never starred in a movie with Fanny, but we can always hope, can't we?

http://www.cucciolopage.com/shop/video287/video287.php