19. [Bonus Chapter 4: Sweet but Psycho]
That's how lovers are.
Although Lawrence and I are always in the honeymoon phase, we do have our little disagreements from time to time. That's just how lovers are; you're together all the time, it's unavoidable.
The first point of contention is that we occasionally run out of money. As I mentioned before, when we're short on cash, we resort to robbery, like loitering around Las Vegas. But if it happens to be peak tourist season there, and the local police deploy extra officers, we have to find other targets. Robbing banks is out of the question; there's no need to take such a big risk, and we don't need that many gold bars, so we usually rob supermarkets. It's simple: masked, armed, we just walk in, the cashiers and customers all obediently hand over their money—very peaceful, and no one dies. So Lawrence thinks this is boring, but we can't always send me; too many times and we'll be recognized. Therefore, we usually decide who goes by lottery.
The rules are simple, like playing a card game. You take two cigarettes, mark the tip of one, one person holds it in their hand, and the other person smokes it. If you draw the "ghost cigarette," you have to go to the other side. "Smoking the ghost cigarette" tests whether the person holding the cigarette can maintain a "poker face," which isn't really fair. If Lawrence is in charge of smoking, he'll try to seduce me, either with his eyes or through sexual harassment. Eventually, I'll become infatuated and give myself away, and he'll successfully steal the unmarked cigarette, leaving me resentful. If I'm in charge, Lawrence will start his performance, using unpredictable expressions to make me make the wrong judgment, always managing to fool me completely, and then I'll still resentfully go to the other side. He's always bullying me.
"My luck is terrible, it's my turn again today." Lawrence smiled mockingly at me, leaned over and kissed my eyelid. I immediately lost my temper and obediently got out of the car with my hood and pistol. The supermarket wasn't crowded at this time; I felt like the clerks almost recognized me. They'd pull out their money as soon as they saw me, and then try to persuade other customers to do the same, using the excuse: "Dude, money or life? You're lucky you didn't run into another guy, that guy really wanted you dead." He recounted Lawrence's horrific acts of vandalism and robbery, claiming he had once beaten a customer to death in public—pure exaggeration, I heard the person survived—and then again urged everyone to pay. This clerk should really be a pyramid scheme operator; he described it vividly, gesturing with every word, and everyone was convinced. He was also very customer-oriented, proactively carrying bags and collecting money for me everywhere, using the supermarket's own paper bags. He was probably genuinely afraid of Lawrence; I was just using him as a shield. Mission accomplished, I politely thanked them and returned home with a full load.
The second point of contention was that Lawrence loved having sex with me in the truck. He hated using condoms, feeling it wasn't intimate enough and that he couldn't leave his scent on me, which went against his animalistic instinct to mark his mate and territory. This really bothered me. Lawrence was incredibly energetic and never had a problem with driving while fatigued. The truck would often be on the road for four or five hours at a time, during which I had to sit in the passenger seat with his semen inside me. The slightest movement would cause it to leak out, wetting my pants and making my crotch sticky. I always begged him not to ejaculate inside me; I'd rather he ejaculate in my mouth. But Lawrence was absolutely obsessed with my mouth and wouldn't listen to my pleas. What could I do? Could I get angry at Lawrence? My only form of resistance was to cry. But how I cried was crucial. Crying too loudly would excite Lawrence more, crying too softly would be too much for him to hear while he was busy having sex with me. It had to be a loud, gentle cry, so that when he touched my face and his hands were covered in tears, he at least showed some tenderness. If I then adopt a submissive expression, he'll definitely be in a good mood and might just let my butt off the hook.
Besides, there's another problem with having sex in the car: people sometimes see us. For example, when I'm kneeling under the car seat giving him oral sex, Lawrence looks incredibly sexy, and some roadside prostitutes get attracted to him and stand outside the car chatting with him. At these times, Lawrence will thrust even harder into my mouth, only arching his back, keeping his upper body still, so from the window it looks like nothing's wrong. But behind the car door, his hand is gripping my hair tightly, his strong legs clamping my head shut, preventing me from moving back at all. I can only curl up in the cramped space, and I have to give him oral sex for as long as Lawrence chats with those prostitutes. His stamina is incredible; sometimes I feel like I'm suffocating and going into shock by the end. Even worse, sometimes those prostitutes will ask nerve-wracking questions like "What's that sound?" or "Do you have a girlfriend?" I get a thrill of being watched, and my lower body gets painfully hard. Once Lawrence noticed, he would find an opportunity to interrupt the oral sex, forcing me to kneel on the ground with my legs wide open, and then stomp on me with the tip of his shoe until I ejaculated. It was painful and humiliating; I couldn't help but make noises, and Lawrence would then thrust into my mouth again. It felt like being violated by two Lawrences simultaneously. It was so shameful, and so suggestive.
The third point of contention concerns wildlife on the highway. While Lawrence was brutal to humans, he inexplicably managed to coexist peacefully with animals. Last time we drove through the grasslands, a passing lion bowed to him, and he returned the gesture; after that, they never saw each other again. He would discard human corpses to feed vultures, toss severed limbs high into the air to feed eagles, and some even recognized him, always following our car—driving was like walking eagles. Occasionally, deer would dart out on the highway, but Lawrence wouldn't run them over; instead, he would use astonishing driving skills to swerve around them. We'd never encountered the kind of fatal accidents involving speeding deer seen in road movies. However, he didn't completely condone all animal behavior. Once in the desert, a king cobra tried to bite me, and Lawrence, taking advantage of its open mouth, shot it with a bullet, skinned it, and made a whip from its hide. During that period, this was his favorite instrument of torture; I tried it—it was quite effective, very painful. We often used that whip for role-playing. He was the circus animal trainer, and I played... well, that goes without saying.
I never objected to his love of animals; after all, I've volunteered at an animal protection society, and with global warming, the plight of wild animals is becoming increasingly difficult, so they definitely need protection. However, one thing we must be clear about is that he can't touch other dogs, not even hyenas. Lawrence is a man who's slept with lions; his sexual fetishes are quite diverse. Once, Lawrence even wanted to name a hyena we'd encountered many times, which made me so angry I didn't speak to him for an entire day, even biting the sheets silently during sex. After similar incidents happened many times, Lawrence finally developed a sense of responsibility for having dogs, but I've always suspected he might be deliberately trying to see me jealous, because I equally hate all humans who approach him, and he wants to see if I can equally hate all animals that approach him. I guess his next plan is to see if I'll get upset about a cactus he's praised, thus expanding the scope from "animals" to "living things."
I think I'm going a bit too far. Will I become increasingly jealous of Lawrence's cells? Human skin cells renew about once a month, red blood cells in the blood renew every six months or so, but some nerve cells in the cerebral cortex may never renew in a lifetime. So, in my next life, I want to be a nerve cell in Lawrence's cerebral cortex, so I can not only know what he's thinking, but also be a part of his body forever.
The fourth point of contention was Lawrence's destructive tendencies. On a small scale, like when we stayed at a motel, he was sexually aroused and, too lazy to get out of bed to turn off the light, shot the light bulb. I had to buy a new one the next day to avoid the motel owner discovering our illegal possession of a firearm. On a more serious level, Lawrence occasionally suffered from road rage. Once, a car tried to overtake us, and Lawrence, in a particularly bad mood, shot the gas tank. The car exploded, killing everyone on the spot, and the incident made the local news. Even more serious, once when we were being chased by the police on the highway, Lawrence took down five police cars and a helicopter. He was in the driver's seat and firing the gun the entire time, while I was on the steering wheel. It was extremely thrilling and dangerous, so much so that I still feel a lingering fear whenever I think about it, yet I also really miss that adrenaline rush. We became quite famous on American highways; the Florida state government even named two adjacent hurricanes after us, forcing us to plan a temporary escape to Mexico. That's a truly wild place, and I'm really looking forward to it.
After all this talk, it seems like we didn't really have a fight? Oh well, that's how it is with couples.
A note from the author:
There's a deranged highway serial killer who can't afford to get married. Please leave your toll! Okay, I'm laying it all out: please tip! The author needs to buy a name change card! I need to change my pen name! (If possible, please tip the work directly so I can see your names on the homepage.)
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