Intensity

friend, I'm always on vacation."
        "Too young to be retired."
        "I mean," says Vess, "life itself is a vacation if you look at it the right way. Been doing some hunting."
        "Around these parts? What game's in season?" the redhead asks.
        The Asian remains silent but attentive. He takes a Slim Jim sausage off a display rack and skins open the plastic wrapper without letting his gaze flicker from Vess.
        They don't suspect for a second that they're both going to be dead in a minute, and their cow-stupid lack of awareness delights Vess. It is quite funny, really. How dramatically their eyes will widen in the instant that the shotgun roars.
        Instead of answering the cashier's question, Vess says, "Are you a hunter?"
        "Fishing's my sport," the redhead says.
        "Never cared for it," says Vess.
        "Great way to get in touch with nature-little boat on the lake, peaceful water."
        Vess shakes his head. "You can't see anything in their eyes."
        The redhead blinks, confused. "In whose eyes?"
        "I mean, they're just fish . They just have these flat, glassy eyes. Jesus."
        "Well, I never said they're pretty. But nothing tastes better than your own-caught salmon or a mess of trout."
        Edgler Vess listens to the music for a moment, letting the two men watch him. The song genuinely affects him. He feels the piercing loneliness of the road, the longing of a lover far from home. He is a sensitive man.
        The Asian bites off a piece of the Slim Jim. He chews daintily, his jaw muscles hardly moving.
        Vess decides that he will take the unfinished sausage back to Ariel. She can put her mouth where the Asian had his. This intimacy with the beautiful young man will be Vess's gift to the girl.
        He says, "Sure will be glad to get home to my Ariel. Isn't that a pretty name?"
        "Sure is," says the redhead.
        "Fits her too."
        "She the missus?" asks the redhead. His friendliness is not as natural as when Vess spoke with him about turning on pump number seven. He is definitely uncomfortable and trying not to show it.
        Time to startle them, see how they react. Will either of them begin to realize just how much trouble is coming?
        "Nope," Vess says. "No ball and chain for me. Maybe one day. Anyway, Ariel's only sixteen, not ready yet."
        They are not sure what to say. Sixteen is half his age. Sixteen is still a child. Jailbait.
        The risk he's taking is enormous and titillating. Another customer might pull off the highway at any moment, raising the stakes.
        "Prettiest thing you'll ever see this side of paradise," says Vess, and he licks his lips. "Ariel, I mean."
        He takes the Polaroid snapshot from his coat pocket and drops it onto the counter. The clerks stare at it.
        "She's pure angel," says Vess. "Porcelain skin. Breathtaking. Makes your scrotum twang like a bass fiddle."
        With barely disguised distaste, the cashier looks at the pump-monitor board to the left of the cash register and says, "Your sixty bucks just finished going in the tank."
        Vess says, "Don't get me wrong. I never touched her-that way. She's been locked in the basement the past year, where I can look at her anytime I want to. Waiting for my little doll to ripen, get just a little sweeter."
        As glassy-eyed as fish, they gaze at him. He relishes their expressions.
        Then he smiles, laughs, and says, "Hey, had you going there, didn't I?"
        Neither man smiles back at him, and the redhead says tightly, "You still going to make some other purchases, or do you just want your change?"
        Vess puts on his most sincere face. He can almost manage a blush. "Listen, sorry if I offended. I'm a joker. Can't help puttin' people on."
        "Well," says the redhead, "I have a sixteen-year-old daughter, so I don't see what's funny."
        Speaking to the Asian, Vess says, "When I go hunting, I take trophies. You know-like a matador gets the bull's tail and ears? Sometimes it's just a picture. Gifts for Ariel. She'll really like you."
        As he speaks, he raises the Mossberg, draped with the raincoat as if with black funeral bunting, seizes it in both hands, blows the redheaded cashier off his stool, and pumps another shell into the breech.
        The Asian. Oh, how his eyes widen. The expression in them is like nothing ever to be seen in the eyes of