Hunger.

I am the hunter.

I am the hunter.

Hungry, ravenous. I am out for blood.

I have been docile too long, lying in wait. Watching the sky hang over me. My new apartment’s walls that line the balcony leave little view other than above, I can only look up. I lie in wait for something to happen, for prey to reveal itself. But in waiting I have grown hungry, thus I have also grown unease.

I yearn for blood, carnality. Physically, mentally. Up until recently I have been floating; detached, disillusioned. But something has awakened, and as it brews my stomach begins to growl.

A customer hasn’t touched the last of her beef for twenty minutes. My eyes, sharp and circling, give her ten more before I take her plate. A proud vegan for half of my adult life, and regrettably vegetarian for the rest— this is the first time I’ve craved meat to such a carnality, such visceral want.
I couldn’t buy it, I wouldn’t dare put my dollar to slaughtered flesh. But the smell, its blood and oil and juice lining the plate underneath, how it tastes— my thoughts are subsumed.

I had begun to play with leftover meat in my hands whenever I tipped it into the bin. I slide it off the plate with my fingers, feeling the fibres between the tips. The hunger stirs. I let it fall to the other waste.
On this particular night I was daring and couldn’t hold back any longer. I scooped up her plate and ducked into the kitchen, tearing into this cold piece of flesh with my eager teeth. It was mildly tough, cold and disappointing.

It was not enough. I’m hungry for more.

A client of mine, one that has spanned the breadth of my phone sex career, has gone rogue. He will come to me once a week; tail between his legs, grovelling and desperate, telling me he has cheated on me with another Mistress. I, for one; don’t care what he does when I’m off the clock, but for the sake of dynamic, I pretend to.
I truly believe he feels this guilt, likely projection for destroying his family with his all consuming porn addiction. Perhaps I’ve gone too soft on him— he’s one of the few clients I like, mostly because we share a love for leftist politics and old school punk.

He is hungry, too. Hungry enough to self-destruct before my eyes, hungry for something he can never have and perpetually chase. He is more active than usual, and I begin to wonder if this has happened every holiday season. One night he tells me he spent too much money on a Mistress who took advantage of him. He apologised for straying, and promised his loyalty, but I knew he would do it again. I knew the hunger would consume him.

A coworker of mine has become attractive to me overnight. It turns out I am hungrier than I initially assumed, and have now become the hunter. It was a brief, inconsequential interaction— I had broken a glass while polishing, my fingers gripping too hard (my hunger has sharpened every movement) and it cracked in my hands. He, usually sardonic in tone, softens his edge when he asked if I was alright. The mask had slipped, and that’s usually how one gets to me.

Now each time I walk through the doors my jaw is clenched and I try not to meet his eyes. Hiding behind my curls, my dowdy blouses, a predator disguised. I am hunting.

I must not shit where I eat, my mouth is still stained from last year. It was around this time last year when we were at the height of our interactions, where he and I would sneak words and glances when coworkers were turned away. I think of how he felt behind me, his breath against my neck. I think of when we were alone in the prep kitchen, and I asked how often he thinks of bending me over the counter he’s using. He paused, his eyes unwavering from his work.
“Often.” He tells me. I smile with satisfaction. He asks me about the book I’m reading, I ask what the Hebrew on his knife means (something about family, if I recall), and we continue with our day.

I will not let the hunger consume me again. I cannot. Not for a job that I like, not for staff that like me. But the hunger begs, the appetite builds, and I am finding it hard to stifle. He is hairy and that only makes me more hungry for his flesh, to tear at him.
I believe my mind has manifested this fruitless crush out of banal stress and a lack of direction. A part of me calls for disruption, for rebellion. Another part feels I’ve manifested this because I am so hungry I must pick prey within my immediate vicinity, and so a target has been placed.

A target I must ignore, an appetite I can only so partially fill with relentless masturbation. I’ve been touching myself almost every day for months, almost in direct correlation with my celibacy.
Why be celibate? One might ask, and the answer is that I have sinned too deeply. For lack of a better term, I hit the curb on my self-destructive sexual proclivities and am driving my way home in silence. Until that drive is done, (and I will know when that occurs) I have sworn myself to celibacy.
A feat that was remarkably easy until I could no longer muzzle the wanton desire that is desperate for flesh, for blood. To feel a metallic richness meet my tongue, to swallow it.

My client, after telling me he’d missed a car payment and will need to sell some items to afford Christmas this year, came back to inform me he’s now found a new Goddess to worship. She’s taken him in, and he is now changed for good. I told him I hope he thinks of his family. He has since blocked me.
When you fly too close to the sun, when you give into hedonism, when hunger fully consumes you and you must feast, this is its consequence. I already indulge too much, am too permissive with things that are bad for me. I so love to be bad, to be messy, to unleash the predator within. Claws bared, teeth ripe for tearing, an ever-growing roar that bellows from my gut.

If I don’t quell my desire for flesh I fear I will unravel. I must accept the animal that lives within, the one that wrestles against the edge of her enclosure. She cannot be contained, she will burst through eventually. She is the only thing stopping me from feeling human, the id in a parlay with ego. But as we meet eyes and I see that I am starving her, it becomes apparent I must give in.

I am a hunter. By nature, by design. Working against such primal instincts has begun to eat away at me. Every moment the thought of devouring is on my mind. Every day I stalk prey as I sit on the tram, as I walk through the city. Noting arms; waists, the way hair falls, the way eyes glare and cower. I watch flesh as it moves, as it creases and folds in motion. Every day I am hunting, predating my next victim.

I am too hungry, too ravenous.

I must hunt.