"A noir archetype as bare as unfinished furniture. The plot...has been sanded down into a taut monofilament... The prose in Shella is boiled to the bone."--Village Voice

The first time I killed someone, I was scared. Not scared to be doing it -- I did it because I was scared.

Shella told me it was like that for her the first time she had sex.

I was fifteen that first time. Shella was nine.

We bumped paths in Seattle. I was in a strip bar, looking for a guy. She was dancing there, taking off her clothes to the musie, humping something that looked like a fireman's pole in the middle of the runway.

After her number, she came over to my table in the back, just a gauzy wrapper on over her G-string. I thought she was working as a B-girl between sets, but it wasn't that. Like blind dogs, we heard the same silent whistle. Recognized each other in the dark.

After that, we worked Badger together, riding the circuit. I'm not real big -- Shella's as big as I am, taller in her heels. She works out regular, a real strong girl. I don't do muscle -- I just talk to the marks, tell them the truth. Most of them get it then -- they pay the money and go away. In L.A., a guy didn't listen. Big guy, bodybuilder. Flexed his biceps, came right at me. I stopped his heart, left him there.

We kept moving. Denver, Houston, New Orleans. Shella took a mark home after work one night in Tampa. Back to the motel room just off the strip. I sat near the connecting door, waited for her signal. Nothing. Couldn't even hear her voice. When I let myself in, moving soft, the room was dark. Shella was face down on the ratty bed, lashed spread-eagle with wire coat hangers, a gag in her mouth. Her back was all bloody.

He never saw me coming. In his coat I found his works -- a pair of black gloves, a wad of white cheesecloth, and a little bottle with a glass stopper. He had a plastic jar of Vaseline too. I smeared it all over Shella's back so her blouse wouldn't stick to her. Told her to get going, take the car, I'd meet her later, when I got done wiping down the rooms.

When the cops kicked in the door a few minutes later, I was still there.

They threw down on me, pistols and shotguns. Three in the room, probably had backup outside. I went easy. They'd been tracking the freak -- he'd done three women in the last month. Same pattern. I told them my story. A drifter, passing through. I heard the noise, went inside -- he was working on a girl. We fought, she ran away. He died.

The cops did their tests. Blood tests, DNA. I wasn't the guy who did those other girls -- the dead guy was. One of the detectives said they should give me a medal. He wasn't stupid -- kept asking me if I might know the girl who'd taken off The one whose blood was all over the bed. Asked me about who might have been staying in the connecting room next door.

Shella had the car, all the money, everything. I was indigent, they said, so they got me a lawyer. He wasn't much -- said the only way I could help myself was if they could find the girl who'd been in the room. I told him what I told the cops.

I asked him how much time I'd have to do -- I didn't care what they called it.

After a while, I said what the lawyer told me to say and they took me down.

He was there, waiting. I turned my back to him, dropped my towel, bent over. I felt his hands on my waist, and it happened like it always does. I whipped an elbow into his throat -- crushed his Adam's apple. He went down, holding his throat, trying to scream. I got hold of his face in my hands. I could feel all the bones in his skull -- I could feel them start to crack. The shower room Hoor was hard tile. The water was coming down on us. Blood ran out of the back of his head.

I could feel the other cons come in behind me, watching. Nobody did anything. It was a crazy, wild place, that prison -- they wanted to watch me kill him. I got my thumb in his eye. Pushed it through until I felt it go all wet and sticky.

The guards pulled me off. I put my thumb in my mouth, sucked on it while I stood against the wall. I knew what they would think. That I liked the taste.

The wolf didn't die -- they transferred him someplace.

I got thirty days in solitary. When they opened the cage, I watched for a while. To see if the wolf had friends. Nobody came.

I was a good inmate. After what I'd done to the wolf, I couldn't fool anyone in there, but they stayed away. That's all I ever want.

The work wasn't hard. I didn't talk to anyone. Didn't have any money on the books, so I quit smoking. They came around to my cell, told me how I could get cigarettes, get anything I wanted. I looked at them until they went away.

I never got a visit, never got a letter.

In my cell, I did my exercises. Not like the weightlifters, just stretching and breathing. Slowing down inside so I could count my heartbeats.

They let me out on a Monday.

You can go a long distance in three years. I'm no good on the phone, talking to people. I reported to the Parole Officer, got a job working produce.

Soon as I drew a paycheck, I went back to the bar where Shella was dancing when it happened. Sat through all the shifts, came back a few times. She wasn't there.

I walked the strip, checked every runway in Tampa. Shella wasn't dancing there anymore. One night, in one of the bars, a man overed me a job. I don't know how he knew.

When he paid me, I bought a car. Kept looking. Couldn't find her.

I did a couple more jobs for the man, saved my money. When I had a stake, I headed north to Atlanta.

I don't have a picture of Shella. Just in my mind. Big girl, white-blonde hair, gray eyes. Some things she couldn't change. The beauty mark on her left cheek, just past her lips. I put it there. She wanted one, asked me to do it. I rubbed some Xylocaine into the spot, froze it with ice cubes. Burned a hypo needle in a match flame held two angers inside her cheek to steady it, tipped the needle in black India ink, jabbed it in a perfect little dot -- my hands are real steady. Shella said she never felt it, but I could see little things move in her eyes while I was doing it.

Her name too. She gave it to herself. She was a runaway, she told me. When she was a kid. Some social worker in one of the shelters told her she had to come out of her shell. So they could help. A shell, that's what she needed. So she turned it around, made it her name. She told me it was all she had that was really hers.

But she didn't use it with people -- it was a secret she told me. When I met her, her name was Candy. A runway dancer's name.

I always thought about Shella in prison, but I thought about her strong now. Stuff she told me, signs on the track.

Atlanta has a strip, they all do. Shella would be dancing someplace. She wouldn't turn tricks, wouldn't have a pimp. I asked her about that once, if she ever had one. She told me her father.

I was in Atlanta a week. Bought some stuff I needed while I was looking around. I'd never find her, the way I was working. I thought about a guy in New York. I'd done some work for him, years ago. He would maybe have something for me, for how I do it -- up close. I don't use guns or bombs or anything. I could see him again, maybe make a trade.

Before I left, I got a set of ID from a guy who sent me to another guy. Driver's license, Social Security card, like that. The guy asked me if I wanted a passport, cost an extra grand. I told him no.

I bought a better car, a nice Chevy, couple of years old. I paid cash, drove it right off the lot. I mostly live in it now, keep my clothes and stuff in the trunk.

In Baltimore, one of the dancers came and sat at my table after her shift, hustling drinks. Told me she wasn't allowed to date the customers, she'd get fired if the boss found out. But she'd take a chance, she said, flicking her red fingernail against one nipple, licking at her lips. Because she liked me so much.

We went to her apartment. It was Badger, like I thought. She was on her knees when the hammer came in. Big guy, said she was his wife. Going to hurt me for messing around in his patch. I told him how scared I was, took my pants off the bed, handed them over so he could have my wallet. He watched my eyes, never saw my hands. The girl didn't move to help him, didn't make a sound.

Shella wasn't like that. I had trouble with a mark once. It was in Phoenix. He took my first shot to the side of the neck -- I heard a crack but he didn't go down. Pulled a straight razor out of his shirt pocket. I backed off to get room to go again when Shella hit him from behind, an icepick in her hand. She stabbed him so many times I had to pull her off.

The hammer had almost three grand in his pockets, half a dozen different credit cards, a little gun with a pearl handle. The girl talked fast, said he made her do it, she was afraid of him. Showed me a little round scar on the inside of her thigh. Cigarette, she said, a present from the hammer. So she'd remember.

He wasn't dead. I could feel the pulse in his neck. I told the girl I'd have to tie her up, give me time to get away. She said she wanted to come with me. I figured she was just scared, scared stupid -- if I wanted to do her, taking her out of there would just make it easier. She lived with the hammer -- let the cops think she'd done him, taken off. I told her she could take one suitcase.

On the highway, she wanted to stop a couple of times, use the bathroom. I pulled off to the side of the road, walked her into the bushes. She didn't try to run.

I spotted a motel just off the Pennsylvania Turnpike, circled around, stopped at a 7-Eleven, bought enough food for a couple of days, went back and checked us in.

She told me her name was Misty. A short, chunky girl, heavy thighs, breasts too big for her body. Implants, she told me -- the hammer made her do it.

I told her I'd have to tie her up. So I could get some sleep, not worry about her doing anything. She wiggled on the bed, smiled at me, said a little girl like her couldn't hurt me. That was what the hammer thought about me, I told her, and she held out her hands for the rope.

She woke me early in the morning. Soft, just rubbing against me. Asked me, didn't I want to knish what we started just before her man came into the room? I thought about what Shella told me once, how it's evil to hurt someone's feelings, just to be doing it. How it's worse than a beating, makes you feel like nothing. So I didn't say anything to Misty. Never even untied her. She acted like it made her feel good, made little noises in her throat, went to sleep right after.

I didn't know what to do.

I had to find Shella.

In daylight, she looked older. I untied her so she could use the bathroom -- there was no window in there, nothing she could do.

She came out wrapped in a couple of towels, hair all wet. Sat down on the bed next to me.

"What are you going to do with me?" she asked.

"I don't know."

"You let me go, you're afraid I'll go back to the block?"

"Your man's not dead. He's not gonna go to the cops. You go back there, he's gonna thank you for saving his life, you tell him the right story."

"You don't know him. He likes to hurt me. He doesn't need an excuse."

"So?"

"So I can't go back."

"All right. You stay with me a few days. You got friends in Baltimore? Make some calls, find out if anything's going on?"

"Just a couple of girls at work. They'd know, maybe. But they'd rat me out in a minute, there was money in it. They're mostly junkies anyway, always getting busted. I couldn't trust them."

"You got money?"

"Yes. In my suitcase. You want me to get it for you?"

"No. It's enough, get you someplace, start over?"

"Yes.

"Okay. We'll do that, couple of days."

Misty couldn't drive, said she'd never learned. Shella was a good driver, but kind of wild -- I always had to watch her, especially on the highway. I took the wheel all the way past Philadelphia, found another motel near Trenton.

I didn't tie her up that night. Prison teaches you to sleep light, even with the door locked. One guy, he dropped a dime on this shakedown gang, took a PC lockup, thought he was safe. They filled a plastic bottle with gasoline, squirted it in between the bars, dropped in a match. The guards couldn't get close enough to open his cell. By the time they got a hose down the corridor, he was gone. They never got the smell out.

Misty was still asleep when I woke up in the morning.

I asked her again if she had enough money. Made her show it to me. She had a few thousand. Holdout money. Shella never did that with me. I told Misty I'd drop her at the bus station, or she could come along as far as Newark, catch a plane.

She told me she had no place to go, asked me where I was going. I told her Chicago.

She said she always wanted to try it there, said she heard it was good pickings.

I told her I was going alone. She asked me, did I have a girlfriend.

I made her stay in the bathroom while I took a shower.

I could see her through the cheesy plastic curtain. She took off her clothes and we had sex when I got out.

On the road to Newark, Misty was quiet. I thought about it. I don't look like much -- even if she described me, it wouldn't help the cops. But the car, the license plate...

I'm not a good thief, don't even know how to hotwire a car. We had to get a car once, in a hurry, me and Shella. She broke in, got it started. She thought it was funny, I didn't know how to do it.

Misty looked at me like she knew what I was thinking. "You don't like to hurt girls, do you?"

"I don't like to hurt anyone."

"I don't mean that. I mean... like to hurt them. For fun."

"It's not fun."

"Maurice liked to hurt me."

"Don't go back."

"I'm not. I'm good, you know. Real good. Everybody says so. I'm good. I look better when I'm dressed up. I could go with you."

"Why?*'

"To be with you, okay' I can make money. Dancing, whatever you want."

"I don't want anything."

She started to cry then. Soft, to herself, not putting on a show. It reminded me of something, couldn't remember what.

I drove through this long tunnel from New Jersey. It let us out in Times Square, long blocks lined with hookers. They looked used.

There's a hotel there, right near the highway. I put the car in the lot, checked us in for a week.

It didn't take long to unpack. Misty bounced around -- she really liked the room. Took a real long shower. When she came out, I was lying on the bed, feeling the room.

"How come you keep it so dark in here, honey?"

"I was resting," I told her. I always rest inside myself when I'm not working, but I couldn't explain that to her.

She crawled on the bed, nuzzling between my legs. "Can I buy some clothes tomorrow, Daddy? I left most of my stuff back in Baltimore."

"I'm not your daddy."

"Yes, you are. My sweet daddy. You're gonna take care of Misty, aren't you?"

I shifted the muscles in my back, sat up. "I'm nobody's daddy," I told her. Quiet and nice. "You want to buy clothes, you got money. I'm not taking care of you."

"I know I have money, baby. I showed it to you, remember? I was just... like, asking permission."

"It's yours, you use it the way you want, understand?"

"I'm sorry."

"You got nothing to be sorry about," I told her, and let her do what she thought would make me happy.

She stayed up with me all that night, doing things. I listened when she talked, working my body around to a new clock. Where I had to look, I could only do it at night.

We anally fell asleep. When I opened my eyes, it was after one o'clock. Misty was sleeping on her belly next to me, my belt wrapped around her wrists, looped over the bedpost. I touched a spot in her neck and she came around.

"What's all this?" I asked her, pulling on the belt.

"I didn't want to wake you up, baby. So I tied myself up. I know it's stupid... I mean, I could get out of it and all... but I thought you'd feel better if you got up and saw me like this."

"It's okay," I told her. "You don't need to do that anymore.

She smiled. A big smile, like I just gave her something.

She took another long shower. Put on black stockings with seams down the back, spike heels. Did a couple of turns in front of the mirror.

"You think my legs look longer in these?"

I told her they did. She shoved herself into a push-up bra, put on a little black jersey dress. I watched her from the bed.

She took the hotel key, went out. Came back in a half-hour or so, had a little paper bag with cigarettes and some cosmetic stuff couple of newspapers. I read one of the newspapers while she made some calls.

I closed my eyes, listening to the purr of her voice on the phone. When she hung up, she put some stuff into a little purse, dabbed some heavy perfume between her breasts.

"I got an audition at four -- I'm not sure when Ill be back, maybe Ill be working tonight... okay?"

"Okay. Leave the key with me. Tell the desk clerk you need another one for yourself, slip him ten bucks. Itll be all right."

She kind of posed in front of me. "Do I look sexy?"

I told her she did.

I started looking that night. Not for Shella, for the man who could help me find her. He wouldn't do something for nothing, this man. I never expect that -- something for nothing, that's a whore's promise.

There isn't a lot of street sex in Times Square. Come-ons, to get you inside. Movies, books, magazines, videotapes. The places where there's real flesh they always let you know. Live Girls, a lot of the signs say. Like there's dead girls in the other places.

In the live places, the girls are on stage, or behind glass. You put a token in a slot, the window opens up, the girl moves around, shows herself, says things. Your time runs out, the window closes, you have to put another token in to open it up again. When one of the watchers is done, they send a man into his booth, hose the place down, spray some green-smelling stuff around.

Some of the places, the girls come into your booth. Massage parlors, modeling studios, lingerie shows... they have all these names for the same things. They show it to you, you want to touch it, it costs you more money. The more you want the girls to do, the more it costs.

Come and Go, Shella used to call those places.

I passed them all by, not looking for her there. Shella wouldn't be in any of those places.

Little knots of hunters on the street too, looking for someone weaker than them to take down. Smash and grab. Police cars cruised around the blocks, blue and white. Right past guys selling drugs, saying "Smoke?" when you went past.

In the windows, big radios, the kind kids carry on their shoulders. Little TV sets you could carry in your pocket. Watches, electronic stuE All kinds of knives, camera stuff Sex stuff too: vibrators, fake cunts made out of fur, handcuffs, leather masks with zippers for mouths, dildos.

I walked criss-cross through the blocks until I found the place where I used to meet the man. The club had a different name, but I figured, they do that all the time, he might still be there.

The beefy guy at the door took ten dollars from me. I sat down at the end of the bar. On the stage, a woman dressed like a little girl, short little dress with straps over a blouse... like a sailor suit. She had on little white socks, shoes with straps over the front. Dark hair in pigtails. Licking a lollipop, lifting up her skirt with one hand, pulling it down, teasing.

When the bartender came over, I asked him for the man, gave him the name I had. Monroe. I didn't offer him any money to tell me, that's what a hunter would do. I asked him like I was an old friend, been out of town for a while. Shella always said I didn't know how to be slick, but I could do pretty good if I had to.

The bartender went away, like he hadn't heard me. I stayed where I was. He came back, looked me over careful, like he'd have to describe me. I knew that wouldn't do any good -- I don't look like anything.

I sat there, watching the woman on the stage bend over, Hip up her skirt, pull down her underpants, crawl around so everyone could see. She had a roll of fat on her hips, lumps on her thighs.

The bartender came back again, leaned over.

"If I knew a guy named Monroe -- if I knew him, understand? -- who would I tell him wants to see him?"

I'm no good at that kind of stuff -- I never know what to say. I told him to bring me a glass. He gave me a look, but he went and got one. I held it up to the bluish light in the bar. It was medium weight, had spots on it from the dishwasher. I took the glass in my hand, squeezed it until it popped, crushed the glass in my hand, put it back down on the bar -- only the bottom of the glass was in one piece. I opened my hand so he could see there was nothing in it. No blood either.

"Tell him it's me," I said.

The bartender looked, said I could find Monroe in this poolroom on the East Side of town. Gave me the address, said Monroe would be there tomorrow night.

I don't dream much. I did when I was a kid. In the institution. I'd wake up, wires in my face like I was screaming, but no sound came out, the blanket all wet from my body. I was always scared then.

Every place they put me, I was scared. All the time, scared. I ran away, a lot. Every place they put me. The foster home, the farm

I could always run away. The last time I ran, I wanted to get far away, so I stole some money from a store. Just grabbed it out of the open cash register and ran. They caught me so easy.

Where they put me, there was no place to run.

Every other place they put me, the grownups ran it. But in the institution, the kids ran the place. Not all of them, just a few.

Duke, he was the one in charge. A real big kid. I think he was seventeen. He was in other places before too. The way you could tell, he had two little blue blobs tattooed on his face. They were supposed to be tears. One for each time he was locked up before.

The first time I saw the tears, I thought, I guess I could get one myself now.

Duke had flunkies with him always. They carried his stuff He never carried anything himself, not even his cigarettes. They always handed him whatever he wanted, even a knife, sometimes.

The first day I was there, I went in the bathroom. Duke was there, with his flunkies. He had one of the littler kids and he was slapping him. Hard. Over and over. The flunkies laughed. The little kid's face was all red and wet. Duke took the little kid back into the showers. I kept my face down, but I heard them. He made the little kid suck him.

I didn't say anything to anybody. I knew that much from the other places.

When the little kid came out of the bathroom, he laid down on his bunk with his face in the pillow. He was crying when The Man came by. When The Man asked him why he was crying, the little kid said he was homesick.

The Man laughed at him.

Every day was like that. Duke and his flunkies would take everything for themselves. If you were playing basketball when they came up, you had to get off the court. They watched whatever they wanted on the TV. If you got packages from home, they took some of it.

I never got any packages.

The nights were the worst part. The Man never checked on us at night. He stayed outside the dorm, watching his own TV. As long as it was quiet, he never came back where we were.

Fridays, we got our commissary draw. That's when we could spend our money. They held our money for us until then. Every week. On Fridays, you could buy cigarettes, candy, soda pop. It was supposed to last you all week. Duke took some from everyone.

Even the State kids, the ones with no families like me, they got something. For chores, like cleaning up the grounds outside.

One Thursday night, Duke and his flunkies came over to another kid. They woke him up. I kept my eyes closed, breathed deep like I was asleep. But I listened.

"Tomorrow, when you draw commissary, you buy me a chocolate bar," Duke told the kid.

"Please, please, Duke... I don't wanna..."

I heard a slap. "Shut up, punk," one of the flunkies said.

"Tomorrow," Duke told the kid. "Or I'll cut your fucking heart out."

Friday, the kid drew his commissary. Handed Duke a chocolate bar. Duke unwrapped it, put it on the radiator. I watched the bar get soft until it flowed down the side of the radiator.

That night, one of the flunkies picked up the gooey bar in the paper in two hands. He carried it, walking next to Duke. Duke went to the kid's bed.

"Give it up," is all he said.

The kid turned over. Duke dropped his pants. Smeared the soft chocolate all over his stiff prick and got on top of the boy.

The boy screamed, once. I heard a squishy sound and then he was quiet.

I was so scared I couldn't cry, like no air was in me.

The Man never came in.

The boy went to the Infirmary the next morning.

It was two weeks later, summer just starting, when Duke told another boy to bring him a chocolate bar the next day. We were chopping weeds on that Friday when the boy who had to bring the chocolate bar, he brought the scythe down over his foot. It went right through. I could see a piece of his toe in the tip of the sneaker.

The Man took him to the Infirmary. They know all about stab wounds there, but they don't keep you long. They took the boy to the hospital, outside the institution.

I thought the boy won then. But they brought him back a few days later, walking on crutches.

The next Friday, Duke walked by the boy's bed. One of his flunkies held up a chocolate bar. Duke smiled at the boy.

"This time, I got my own," he said.

They gang-banged the boy that night. All of them.

The next morning, The Man took him out of the dorm. He never came back.

I thought about it. Every day. Some days, it was all I thought about.

It was just after the 4th of July when Duke and his flunkies came over to me.

"This Friday," he said, "when you draw, buy me a chocolate bar, okay?"

My heart slowed down when he said that. There was a smooth, cold chill inside me. An icy feeling, but it made me warm inside.

I nodded like it was okay. My voice wouldn't work.

Thursday night. I could feel the moon, even if I couldn't see it from my bed. I walked over to it, shining through the window. Duke's bed is just below the window, the best bed in the dorm.

Everybody was asleep. The cottage was full of night sounds, night smells. The Man only looked in when there was noise.

Duke had a big portable radio, the kind with speakers on the side and a tape player and everything. One of his flunkies carried it around for him. I lifted the radio down from the shelf, Big fat batteries inside. I took them out, quiet, quiet.

Duke's sneakers were at the foot of his bed. Brand-new white leather sneakers. His socks were inside, dirty socks from yesterday. One of the boys did his laundry every week for him.

I took out one of the socks. Put the batteries inside the toe. One by one. Soft, so they wouldn't click together.

I held the ankle-part of the sock in my right hand and walked around to the head of the bed in my bare feet. Where Duke was sleeping on his back. I spread my legs apart. I could feel wetness on my face but I didn't make a sound. I swung the sock between his eyes as hard as I could. His nose splattered, red and white. He made some moaning sound and rolled over, moving his hands, but I smashed the sock into the back of his head again and again. White stuff came out of his head onto the pillow.

When I stopped, it was all pulp. The sock was sticky with hair.

I put the sock on the floor, went back to my bed.

They found Duke in the morning. Some men in white coats came later, with a stretcher. They covered his face with a sheet.

That night, Friday night, Duke's flunkies walked over to my bed. One of them was carrying his big radio. They put it on my bed and walked away.