Page 103 of Devil Inside

“Good and bad?”

“I tip the scales.”

“Why?”

“Balance is boring, don’t you think? There’s so much wasted potential in people. They never listen to their desires... Sometimes all it takes is a little encouragement.”

“And that’s where you come in,” Jordan says.

Let me in...

“We saw this film when it was initially released,” we say,changing the subject. “People despised it then. Called it crass. But we thought it was lush. The French loved it. Americans were repulsed by it. We always felt it was lost on most audiences, but we watched it again and again.”

“Check you out,” he says.

“What?”

“I’ve never heard you go off about something you’re really into, you know? It’s nice. Hearing about your passions. I didn’t know you had any, I guess...”

He’s right. Our mask has slipped just a bit, this façade of flesh falling away. Exposing ourselves. Is this too much? It’s so much easier to be an archaic demon who wants nothing more than to sow despair throughout humanity. Nobody’s noticed our personal interests.

“Remember much about the story?” he asks.

“Refresh our memory,” we say as we kiss the back of his neck. There. Just there. That tender divot of exposed flesh behind his ear, along the upper hemisphere of his throat, that soft flesh, just where the jawbone begins. We could live here. Inhabit that skin.

“See her?” Jordan points to the screen, his hand reaching over the balcony, into the open air, the very mouth of the abyss. “Her husband is convinced she’s possessed.”

“How awful,” we tease.

“Turns out it’s not true.”

“Even worse,” we whisper as we lose ourself along his skin, kissing down his neck, until our lips reach his shoulder.

“It’s more about one man’s obsession, really...”

“Do you consider this film to be a love story?”

“Guess that depends on how you look at it.”

“How do you look at it, Jordan?”

“It changes,” he says. “Some days I think it’s about obsession. Other times... it feels pretty dated. And other times, it’s a tragic love story.”

“How about tonight we interpret it that way?”

“Which?”

“A love story.” Our hands reach over his seat and wrap themselves around his chest. We are pressing ourselves against him, burrowing our face into his neck. His flesh burns.

“Better than obsession,” he says, finally turning toward us.

Our lips meet.

“Maybe it’s both,” we say in between kisses. “Possession becomes possessive.”

His chest is the projector. His heart is the bulb. The beam of black light that bursts free from inside himself is enough to illuminate the entire screen. We can’t look directly into his light. It blinds us. Burns us. But we can’t look away. What movies he makes. What cinema of the soul.

“I want to see you,” he says.