Copyright (c) 1988 Ashtoreth (William Haas) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The kinda-fat cheerleader ran off behind some trees at the far end of the Lawn. She found a tree she liked and was about to sit down, but there was a man sitting there already. Another man wearing a black trenchcoat, sort of dejectedly hunched up under the tree, looking down. "What is this, a club?" she said. The man looked up at her, giving her a look which was undefinable but not pleasant. The girl had compassion, and asked, "Why are you sitting here alone under this tree?" "Why were you about to sit alone under it?" replied the man. But then, after a pause, he saw that she had taken his last statement wrong, and he said, "But won't you sit here beside me, since you were about to?" Cautiously, but without hesitation, she did. "I sit here alone," said the man, "because I am alone wherever I go, and it saddens me to be in the presence of others and yet feel as though there were no one there at all." The girl was caught by his story. "But they're there, right in front of you, living, breathing. How can you say they're not there?" "On my journey through life," replied the man, "I met someone who, for some reason, meant so much to me that she outshone everything else. My friends, my family, they were nothing compared to her and the love I felt for her. But she cast me away, slowly, so that I didn't know it had hap- pened until it was far too late to do anything about it; and after having known her love, anything that these people have to offer is pitiful in comparison. She empathized with him deeply, and felt badly for him, since she had known such pain, though not as extreme as this man let himself feel it. She offered him her hand. He looked at it, surprized, and took it. "Should I find someone who meant as much to me as she did, the presence of these others would be bearable; but I see no one who begins to compare with her, and I tire of searching," said the man. "But you can't give up," said the girl, clasping his hand in hers. "You don't know what's going to happen the next day..." "I have a fairly good idea..." "But you don't know. She could be right around the corner. You're attractive...you shouldn't have any trouble--" "What does that matter when *I'm* the one who's selective?" shouted the man, and then turned away. There was a long, undefinable pause, at the end of which the girl said, "Please...show me your eyes." The man resolved not to do this, but she took off his sunglasses and turned his head so that he was looking into her eyes. When she looked into his she nearly gasped; she was transfixed by them. "See?" said the man. "I live with that within me. I'm sorry you had to see it." He clasped her hands. "There's nothing to be sorry about," said the girl, and smiled. "You, on the other hand, have very beautiful eyes," said the man; and he raised his hand, and one-inch steel fingernails like the tips of screw- drivers rose out of his fingertips. He pinned her to the ground and covered her mouth with his other hand. "In fact," said the man, "I'd like to have them for my very own..."