The Tumours Made Me Interesting

by Matthew Revert

  The cigarette fell from my mouth and rolled down my chest before landing with a fizz in the water.

  “It’s quite simple,” said a calm, familiar female voice.

  Fiona was standing over me with that slight grin I’d come to know and dread. The others left my side and stood behind her like she was the leader of something I didn’t understand.

  “The tumours have reached an evolutionary stage I didn’t dare hope for, Bruce,” she said. “By leaving your body they have shown a propensity for autonomy. The tumours aren’t yours, Bruce. You merely incubated them. You’re little more than an environment.”

  “What does this have to do with my mother?”

  She remained silent for some time. The sound of splashing water infused the silence with anxiety and foreboding.

  “Your mother loves you too much, Bruce and you love her. Her positive influence over you wasn’t good for the tumours. She wants you to be well. Every thought is of your wellbeing. She can’t understand how important your ability to grow the illness is because she’s blinded by love. You’re a weak man. You’d fall victim to this, just as you fell victim to me.”

  The part of me that wanted to escape was being beaten into submission by the part of me that wanted to hide. My vision had devolved into blinking pastel blurs. I tried closing my eyes, but they were like broken blinds and just kept springing back open. The tumours were barking and screaming, trying to get my attention.

  “Your friends here are good people, Bruce. They care for you in a way that allows your gift to flourish. Your body is an amazing vessel. They seem to understand that better than you.”

  “I don’t want to die,” I said meekly.

  Fiona took several quick steps toward me and slapped me hard across the face. I felt teeth dislodge and tumble down my throat.

  “You’re ego is incredible!” she screamed. “This is so far beyond you now! Disease will exist irrespective of your desire to thwart it. Nobody ever thinks of the illness. Nobody ever considers its hunger to survive. Up until now, our illnesses have had to live in symbiosis with a host – hopelessly reliant. You have helped break that necessity. The illness you have grown longs to live independently. Think of how many lives could be saved if the illness no longer needed a host.”

  I tongued the blood on my gums as Fiona’s words stabbed at me. Her true colours were infinite shades of black. The tumours made me interesting, I didn’t make them interesting. But without me, the tumours would be nothing. I was their owner, not Fiona.

  “You can’t have them,” I said.

  Fiona’s laughter flew from her mouth like bats, squeaking and smothering me in condescension.

  “That’s where you’re quite wrong, Bruce. The tumours have started to leave your body. It won’t be long until they’ve all externalised. You’re not going anywhere until I have them. You’re not strong enough to leave, and even if you were, you’re too much of a coward.”

  I wanted to refute her words, but they were true. I was a coward. I’d never been anything else. It would be easier for me to stay here until the tumours had left me, which is why it was probably going to be the outcome.

  The water had passed my waist now and my legs had shriveled into prunes. I tried to kick against my bonds, but the pain this caused was too much. I studied my arms. All the fat had deteriorated and all that remained was skin-wrapped bone.

  “What if I die before the tumours leave?” I asked with vague defiance.

  “I’m certainly not above slicing you open,” came her swift reply.

  “No, no no!” cried Rhonda. “We never discussed cutting him open. We musn’t do that.”

  “We’ll do what we have to do, honey,” replied Vince, comforting his wife with a hug. “This is more important than all of us.”

  Rhonda’s height was such that the water was already licking at her chin. Her discomfort was palpable, but she remained silent about the inconvenience.

  “Come on,” said Arthur. “Let’s all go to another room and have a nice cup of Earl. Let’s give poor Bruce some time to himself.”

  Everyone, including Fiona, followed Arthur’s suggestion and I was left alone. I could hear them squabbling amongst themselves, but I couldn’t make out what they were saying. The residual echo of Fiona’s words bounced around my head, obscuring my ability to think. I toyed with the idea of an escape plan, but my innate powers of self-deprecation made this an impossible prospect. I thought about my mother and the hopelessness she must be feeling. It didn’t matter how amazing the care Fiona was providing for her was… it wasn’t the same as the loving care only a son can provide. I’d abandoned her.

  Nausea wrenched me awake some hours later. I sat in darkness, the ropes chewing into me without mercy. Diluted artificial light spilled into my apartment through the curtains, illuminating the water just enough for it to look like tar. It was sloshing against my nipples and rising steadily. I tried bucking against the ropes once more, but the pain was even more intense than before. I slumped my head forward in defeat. A vomitous string of drool oozed from my mouth, refusing to break free despite trying to sever it with my teeth. I had become so intimately familiar with my bodily excretions. It was like a barometer, letting me know how I was. I had stopped being disgusted by it a long time ago. The first time I saw blood in the toilet bowl, the fear of human waste that society instills in us disappeared. So much of life is shit, piss and vomit. The waste itself is no way near as disgusting as our urge to run away from it.

  I felt something with substantial mass bump into me. The darkness made it hard to decipher and I had to train my gaze for some time before any detail came into focus. It was a body, floating facedown in the water. The tumours kicked and my throat tightened. Who was it? The body was small. Logically it had to be Belinda or Rhonda. The thought was repulsive. Even with their allegiance to Fiona, I couldn’t stand the thought of harm coming to either of them. My stomach churned like a washing machine, displacing my interior fortitude. Something big in my throat was rising, cutting off my oxygen supply. I hacked, trying to bring it up, but it was too large. It was moving on its own. I’d have to wait and hopefully not pass out in the process. The body kept knocking against me with morbid rhythm. The object rising in my throat had caused my neck to expand. Despite the darkness, all I could see was white light. The veins in my forehead were jutting out so far I could see them in my periphery. When I was sure consciousness was about to leave me, I painfully coughed up the object. I heard it splash and flail in the water somewhere in front of me. Oxygen spilled into my lungs, causing more pain than relief.

  The object I’d coughed swam toward me. I knew it was a tumour and kept expecting Fiona to lie in wait. The tumour mounted me and slowly climbed my torso. I could feel it on my shoulder like a pirate’s parrot. It pressed itself against my ear.

  “Thank you,” it whispered. “You’ve been so good to us.”

  “Help me,” I found myself saying.

  “Of course,” it said.

  It rolled into the water above my lap and swam for the rope. It splashed around like a piranha, chewing and tearing. I remained still, hoping that I wasn’t experiencing a dream. The rope around my wrists broke free. I clenched my fist to stimulate the flow of blood and watched the helpful tumour swim down toward my feet until it was lost in darkness. As the last of the rope fell away, I wanted to cry in relief, but I knew I was in danger of waking Fiona. The tumour swam back to the surface and I scooped it up. I held it before my face and studied it.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “You’d better go,” it replied. “Just set me down if you could and I’ll be on my way.”

  I obeyed and made my way for the door. I love my tumours, I thought.

  4.

  In the state I was in, making the trip to my mother’s on foot wasn’t possible. My legs were waterlogged and my feet had the flexibility of brick. My car had been removed by Fiona, purportedly out of concern for my safety. It was now apparent that this had more to
do with limiting my ability to leave the apartment than anything else. I needed to join my sick and destitute brethren on the bus if I was going to make it. It wouldn’t be long until Fiona learned of my escape. I had no idea what she’d do, but I couldn’t imagine her leaving me be. Catching public transport at night had always filled me with terror. Humanity contorts in the darkness. Civility melts away. Nobody can be trusted… especially now.

  The streetlights that lined the road bent at invisible joints and spilled a dull pink hue into the environment. Moths that approached the light flew away as something else. The occasional cars that drove by coughed from their exhaust pipes and spilled carnival music through blown speakers. Nothing was safe and the bus stop felt so far away. The only thing it seemed I could trust was the illness inside me. If I made a wrong move, the tumours would let me know. They were on my side.

  Two teenagers walked by holding hands that weren’t their own or each others. They were rapping about mustard and filling the gutters with spit. I wanted to cross the road, but I knew any overt effort to avoid them would probably only attract their attention. I trained my eyes directly ahead, looking through the menacing teens. My tumours moaned just enough to convince me that caution was warranted.

  “Hey, buddy,” said one of the teens.

  He blocked my path, forcing me to acknowledge him. His face was an accumulation of weeping scars. I gulped at my nerves, but couldn’t force them down.

  “Yes,” I replied.

  “Check out this hand that I found.”

  He gently slapped my face with the severed hand. It felt and smelled like cold ham. Most of the fingernails were missing.

  “I’ll sell it to you,” he said in a way that didn’t make it seem like I had a choice.

  I shook my head slowly. Both the teens started laughing in a forced way designed only to intimidate.

  “I’m sorry. I have a bus to catch,” I said.

  “You don’t seem to understand,” said the other teen. “He’ll sell it to you.”

  “I have no money.”

  They glanced at each other, the laughter gone and intent filling them to the brim. A man in a wheelbarrow drove by screaming, distracting them for a moment, but not long enough for me to run away.

  “We don’t want your money,” said the scar faced one. “We want to sell it to you.”

  These people are nothing, said the tumours. Let us destroy them.

  I started to pat my stomach in small rotations. The tumours kicked against my palm, hungry and ready. Their assistance introduced confidence into my system.

  “Get out of my way,” I said.

  Their mouths dropped open. I could see fluorescent brain liquid leaking down their throats. They spat in my face. I could feel their cooling saliva oozing through my beard.

  We’re ready, daddy… We’ll destroy them for you.

  “GET OUT OF MY FUCKING WAY!”

  They took a step backward, letting their guard slip before regrouping and pulling knives from their hair. They waved them about, slashing the air around them until it bled.

  “You are a fucking moron,” said scar face.

  They dropped their severed hands and we watched for a moment as they scurried away. The tumours beat at my body with tribal momentum. I was going to be alright… somehow.

  “Get out of my way or I’ll fucking destroy you,” I said.

  They raised the knives above their heads, catching the pink of the streetlights on the blade. They offered each other one final glance before bringing the knives down and sliding the blade across their throats. Their eyes remained locked as the blood began to trickle. The trickle evolved into thick spurts until they were both coated in the blood of the other. When adequately doused, they collapsed to the ground and held hands as the last of their life ebbed away. It looked to me like they were smiling.

  The tumours started to calm and purr, filling me with warmth. I stepped around their bodies and hobbled toward the bus stop. The bus in question screeched around the corner and began lurching up the road toward my goal. I increased my speed, suppressing the urge to vomit as best I could. I thought about my mother lying in that bed. I imagined Fiona hot on my heels. I felt my pockets for cigarettes, but there were none. Fuck! Catching this bus had become extremely important and nothing, not even desire for cigarettes, was going to stop me.

  It callously passed me and pulled over at the bus stop. Its doors hissed open and decrepit, blackened souls clambered on and off. I fell against the rear door as it started to close and I pushed my way through. The door took gummy bites at my body, trying to keep me out, but I kept pushing until I was inside. I was on my way.

  The bus was illuminated like a hospital corridor. The dead and dying sat slumped in their seats staring vacantly out of the window, seeing only their miserable reflections. I sat down beside a man whose face had been turned 90 degrees anti-clockwise like a curious bird. He was muttering something to himself about the end times. I wondered if they were coming or if they’d already been. A child in the adjacent aisle played an oboe mournfully through a nostril while the woman sitting beside him pulled his hair out in fistfuls. She stuffed the hair into her mouth and struggled it down. Behind me there were people having sex. I couldn’t bring myself to look, but the sound, according to internet pornography, was unmistakable. The bus driver barked into her microphone, flooding us with rusty static. The sex sounds stopped for a moment before starting up again, louder and wetter than ever.

  The tumours clearly appreciated the swirling negativity of the wretched souls surrounding them. They purred so loud that people around me had to plug their ears. It felt like an internal massage and had my situation not been so desperate, I could have easily drifted off to sleep. The unwavering darkness pressing against the windows from outside longed to smother the light inside.

  I had no idea how close I was to my mother’s house. I had nothing in which to gauge my bearings. The sallow faces of my fellow travellers radiated hatred, which fed my tumours and hastened my decline. This bus was begging my life to fade away. My corpse would complement the others so well. Had I not loved my mother as much as I did, it would have been so easy to slip away. I could feel her inside me, manually pumping my heart and keeping me on track. I didn’t even know conviction of this strength was possible. Without Fiona’s narcotic-ridden cigarettes, I was approaching the situation with the sort of clarity I’d never had the courage to experience before. The month I’d just endured began to reveal itself in a new, macabre light.

  Flashes of green lightning began painting the darkness outside, gifting me flashes of environment in which to find my way. I crawled over the mumbling man and pressed my face to the glass. He wrapped his arms around me and started to sob. I let his sadness soak into me. I let him find comfort in the embrace. I was getting close now.

  Fists of rain started punching at the bus, knocking out windows and flooding the aisle. Commuters fell from their seats and writhed together, unable or unwilling to find their footing. I let the mumbling man hold me until the water washed him into the aisle where he became lost in the tangle of limbs. The bus came to a slippery halt and fell on its side. Everyone not already in the aisle fell.

  I climbed the bodies of others, making my way toward the shattered window above me. What little remained of my muscles burned with pain as I moved. Nothing had ever been this hard. I’d orchestrated my life to avoid exertion and pain. I was the consummate nobody. Being nobody was so easy. I used to dream of a better life. I refused to move beyond the dream. I turned down opportunities because it was more rewarding to dwell on misfortune. I embraced failure and surrendered.

  I emerged from the overturned bus and breathed in the fresh air with relief. As soon as it had begun, the rain ceased, but the green lightning remained. I tried easing my way to the ground, but lost my footing and landed hard on my back. I spat a ball of black flotsam and forced myself to stand. I wasn’t far from my mother’s house. I was going to make it.

  My mother�
��s house didn’t look right. Its once-quaint exterior was now mapped in poorly spelled graffiti as if it had been set upon by 80s teens. It was an ominous sign. The garden gate had been torn from its hinges and now lived in the oak tree above. It’s only been a month… I don’t understand… I stumbled forward. The garden had been systematically destroyed. The lime green lawn of old now looked like a bog and hissed foul smelling vapour into the air. Kitten-sized bison gorged themselves on the filth that bubbled to the surface. The garden beds were strewn with medical waste and severed hooves. The front windows had been shattered and the roof was concaving in imminent collapse. It was difficult to imagine my mother would somehow be alive and well inside.

  The front door, as expected, had been torn away. The smell that wafted from within the house was chilling. It contained the unmistakable whimsy of childhood, but was joined by the pungent stench of fresh death. I fumbled for the light switch, half hoping it wouldn’t work. I was too scared for the clarity light provides. With the switch flicked, dirty yellow light filled the room. Everything was broken. The nostalgic stasis that had once hugged my childhood home was gone.

  “Mum?” I wheezed. “Are you there?”

  I received no reply. My blood became panicked and flowed through my veins at double speed. I wanted to turn around and run away.

  As you’re already here, you might as well keep going, said the tumours. We’re not going to let anything happen to you. While we’re living in here, we need you to stay alive. Remember that.

  I moved toward the darkness of her bedroom. I felt my pocket for cigarettes again, hoping somehow they’d magically appear. When this failed to occur, I sucked hard at nothing, hoping there were enough toxins in the air to tide me over.

  “It’s Bruce, mum… are you there?”

  “Is that you, hon?” came my mother’s voice, weak and childlike, from the darkness.