They say survival is the strongest of the urges. The will to live is what enables you to shoot, to cut, to run on broken glass and gnaw off your own fingers. When someone holds you immobile, with a knife threatening to slash at the skin on your face, your fears and your instinct are supposed to tie together into a mesh of adrenaline that will clear your mind of everything but the way to survive.

Sometimes, the fear is too paralyzing, and you lose.

Sometimes, for bizarre and unjust reasons, the fear is intoxicating. Your senses are heightened, your insides are palpitating, and your hands are as sweaty as they ought to be. It seems like time has slowed down to allow you a way out, but all that you are picking up is your captor's musk, the strength of his arms, the difference between the heat of his pulse, and the cold of his steel against your cheek.

I have heard the broadcasts and seen the papers. He killed and maimed for pleasure and without remorse. And yet, I did not think of death. I saw his tongue dart out and all I could feel was desire. I felt his hand twist my hair, and thought he was pulling me into a kiss. Our faces aligned, and a blade met my mouth, but I looked past the knife, at his lips. Meaty and sensuous, the red of lust. I wanted to smear the paint, from his lips onto mine.

"Mmh. I see we're of the same mind," he said. He'd seen the flush of my cheeks. He'd felt me relax in his grip. "But really, it's not here that I want your mouth."

His eyebrows came up and down in a parody of suggestiveness. The hand gripping my hand started descending, dragging me down. I tried to keep my knees from buckling.

"Oh, come on, now," he chastised in his impatient, childish voice. "You don't need to play coy. A whore pretending to be chaste, why, that's like a starving man refusing a meal! No sense in it. No sense at all."

"I'm not a whore," I told him weakly, careful to avoid being cut. He succeeded in getting me to kneel.

"Do you need some sort of moral encouragement? Huh? Do you need a way not to feel guilty for surrendering your body at knifepoint? Here, I'll help you."

He began unbuttoning his shirt. Slowly, inch by inch, his skin was uncovered to me. Pale and smooth. No scars. Fine hair.

"Yes," he feigned ecstasy. "Yes. Let the lust consume you!" A short, manic laugh escaped through his teeth as he threw his shirt on the ground. "Isn't... that... ironic. Isn't it? You were expecting something ugly and disfigured, I know. I know. Do you know how I got these scars?"

"You sucked a really large cock?"

"No. But that's a really good guess. I really value creativity. Ha-ha."

When he stopped giggling, his blade found its way to my mouth again. "Do you want to know?"

I lowered my eyes.

"I was such a good looking kid. Women looked at me like I was Adonis. I got so sick and tired of it, so sick of not being taken seriously, wanted and appreciated only for my good looks. One day, I was so sick of it, I put a razor in my mouth and... Whoosh! Hee hee!"

"You're sick."

"I'm sick?" he asked melodramatically. "Look at my body. Tell me you don't want me. Tell me you don't want me, and I'll go right now."

I looked at his chest. It was flawless. It was the prototype of male beauty. It was Apollo wearing a clown mask. I half believed his story, half thought that here was a perfect human being trying to slash through his own perfection. Trying to blot out his beauty. I knew he was mocking me. I knew that he would stay no matter what my answer was.

"Oh, what the hell." I said. "Feed the starving man."