“Are we there yet?” you ask.

All around the forest stands either grey and silent beneath the moonlight or bright yellow beneath Julie’s flashlight.

“I'm doing this for you, you know,” she answers without a hint of irritation.

“But you're the one who said you’d bring me to Daffy’s tree. I never asked for anything.” You adjust your backpack straps while closing in on her.

Her legs, covered in tattoos, make her body seem almost incomplete. From up close, there isn't a trace of deception as she answers.

“I brought you here because he's YOUR favorite serial killer. You know I'm not keen on this.” Confronted to your silence, she adds: “You know I found this tree just for you…”

You never doubted that. This was not something Ross would have done.

* * *

Ross was the one who introduced you to serial killers. It was one of his phases. Ross had phases.

Waves, really.

You both lived together at the time. Ross and you. Every two weeks, you would come home after work and find him rowing in some new hobby.

Taxidermy. Scrapbooking. Lolcows. Serial killers. Moon phases that would appear, rock your life for a week then disappear on the horizon.

You don't know why serial killers stayed with you. Maybe it was that Dahmer TV show, how it led to your love for Dahmer then for Daffy.

Their innocence caught you. Because while other murderers always seemed very conscious of what they had done, you found a childish naivety in both men.

Dhamer praying on minorities certainly didn't help him win the race for your heart. Definitely clashed with your ideology. Your being woke.

But Daffy was another thing entirely. First, he preyed on women. Not at-risk population, regular housewives he’d tear from their home. Bound them, raped them and hung them in the woods. Promised them a lot of things. Told even crazier stories to the few who survived.

You pictured Daffy, all buoyant belly and mustache and all schizophrenic. So, so lonely.

You always envisioned how this could have gone differently.

* * *

The tree isn't anything special. Despite what you thought, there isn't even a clearing at its foot. Thorns and branches everywhere.

“How would you know this the good tree?” You ask while Julie set down her package.

“Did my research.”

Back when you dated, Ross used to tell you he'd go out in the woods with his friends to drink wine and eat sausages. Never took you along with him.

You scan the horizon which is dark and full of monsters. Crossing your arms, you turn your attention back towards Julie. Firefly within the tar.

“Research? There are probably eighteen suckers across as many websites pretending to know on which tree Daffy hung his victims.”

You decide to indulge in Julie's fantasy. Pleasuring you is her way of pleasuring herself, you think while grabbing a beer can.

“Sandwich?” You ask to the darkness all around.

By the tree, Julie has extracted a rope from her backpack. Thick one. You wonder how rough it would feel upon your skin.

“I'm not hungry,” she answers.

“I meant, this is probably stuff only law enforcement knows about.”

Julie comes to you. Her bare legs turning black trunks as she gets away from the torch she’s left by her bag.

“You think I'd take you to the woods just for the fun of it?” There is a seriousness and a hint of reproach on her tongue. “You don't think I'd suck a cop just for you?”

Her breath smells of parsley and garlic. Her silky fingertips on the inside of your wrists. The rope feels harsh against your bare wrists.

* * *

Ross would never have tied you up. New sex tricks were reserved to your first year together and your moving together. The more weight he put on, the less he touched you. In retrospect, you pin this on his porn addiction. The way he'd wait for you to go to bed first to jerk off alone.

You tried to break the cycle. Enter the living room to suck him off. Help him out is what you thought.

His left hand pressing on your hair as you try to fit his whole dick in your mouth.

Deepthroating his cock while, on the TV screen, some bald fucker said Daffy once stated God granted him his victims. At least, the fifth one who remains an enigma.

Daffy claiming he once told Rosemary Curl he wouldn't kill her if she could keep his cock in her mouth while he led her from his truck to the tree.

Might be what fucked you up.

The danger. The death. The cock. The fear. The desire. Sucking on Ross's member, you imagined the wet leaves beneath your knees instead of the linoleum. Gravel stabbing onto your skin.

The trick is not to bite. The trick is to breathe through your nose. No hands, like Ross’ porn flicks.

In due times, there was no contact except your lips, your glottis and his throbbing cock.

* * *

The rope feels harsh between your tits, onto the most tender flesh. You feel cold and scared and all wet and hot between your knees.

Because letting your newfound girlfriend bind you up in the middle of the woods, in front of a tree allegedly used by a serial killer, is a fucked-up idea.

As fucked up as no touch sex with your ex-boyfriend.

While it excites you, you resent Julie for her hesitation, for the kindness she expresses when she messes up. You'd like her to just breathe and smell of tobacco as she puts you into bondage. You deserve it.

You're kneeling, meaning wet leaves caress your labia.

Your breath gets more fractured the more she goes on. Binds pressure makes your flesh bulge. Your skin turning smoother beneath her caress.

You realize you're bound naked in some forest god knows where. That Julie could do anything to you. You hope she uses her mouth.

“This is a form of magic,” she whispers.

Her palms tread your goosebumps.

You watch her as she lights a bonfire. Iridescent shards flutter in the air towards the foliage. Photons like amber rain upon Julie's naked knees, on every fold of her clothes. She asks:

“Do you trust me?”

You do not answer for the rising smoke strangles you. Throat aches. Eyes sore. With both your hands neatly tied behind your back, you can only watch the shadow Julie cast upon the grey world that's the soil.

She brings out another rope. You cannot be sure. Her silhouette mere hieroglyphics on a clay tablet. Smoke smells of pine, thyme and a bit of wild garlic.

Julie, she turns Daffy’s tree into gallows.

Your sweat grows cold. Your body odors sour despite the fumes. Julie comes back to you, traces upon your back, with her tongue, one slow descent.

Her breath upon your lower back. She kisses the insides of your thighs. Her teeth upon your ass cheeks. Your face on the dry leaves. The taste of dirt. Clean air.

“Han,” you moan as Julie buries herself behind you.

First your perineum. Lower. She stays. Even after both your breathing synchronize. Even after your first orgasm and your hands turn claws within their cuffs.

Your heartrate’s too quick. You'd like to stand up, to stretch, but the gentle push of her hand upon your hair prevents you from doing so.

When you start to shake, labored breathing, is when she climbs your back with kisses. Her hand smells like you as she grips your neck from behind.

“I'm doing this just for you,” she whispers in your ear. “We're so close…”

The weight of her body upon yours makes the world feel hollow. All around, trees are on a downward spiral.

Julie then kneels before the gallows. Her back to you. You'd like nothing more than to reach inside her shorts. You'd like to run.

Julie's shadow gets up and you can't hear what she says over the blazing bonfire, you pant at the laughing stars above. You think she says “once” while showing you, her index.

Bent-in-half-Julie bringing back a fallen stump. Standing-on-it-Julie putting her head inside the hangman's knot.

You don't doubt Julie's determination, yet, as she dies, she tries and claws at the rope. She fights. Her will to live. Useless. Soon her movements become spasms. Legs stretching and bending and kicking. Julie’s head goes red. Julie goes limp and it's daylight.

Forest sounds seem more muffled now that light smothers them. Fire is gone. Julie's body is gone, too. Only the rope swings in the wind.

You think this can't be happening. Did you space out? Only it's not autumn anymore. Insects chirp all around and the earth is dry beneath your knee. You try to look up. Flowers are spurting from blueberry trees.

The sun that pierced through the branches overhead is warm. Blinding shards pass through green leaves and the hangman's knot seems weathered and used.

It creaks as it balances in a non-existing wind.

The forest goes suddenly silent.

Footsteps are coming your way. Heavy stomps. In between every step, you decipher the muffled cries of some woman being dragged towards you.

While he's French and lives south of Paris, Basile Lebret writes in English. Since it first sprouted in 2022, his work has now spread to over twenty publications in the US, the UK, France or Canada. The most recent include ROF Publishing's Season's Grievings, The Horror Zine, Carnage House and Lowell & Benson's Dichotomy of Love. Soon in Squirm Books' Skin Deep. His first collection Welcome to Valenton is set to release this year.
Find him on any network: @evoripclaw