by Mark Tufo
“Shit, you’d think with a nice rack like this, you’d want to show everyone. I would have walked around the bar flashing these things constantly. Would have drank for free for life!”
“Yes, because that was my ambition in life. To consume alcoholic beverages for breast display,” she scoffed.
“Why not? What else are women good for?”
“I feel sorry for the poor women that went home with you. How many things had to have gone wrong in their lives? Such poor self-esteem.”
“You’re really going to wish you’d learned to shut your mouth. But that’s just not in your nature though, is it? I don’t mean you specifically, women in general, all women. They just fucking talk and talk. Won’t shut the fuck up as a matter of fact.”
“You’re the one rambling, Tim. But maybe that’s because your big strong self is stuck in a small, weak, woman’s body. Who knows? I did read some of your secret files; maybe this is exactly what you want.”
“I’m going to cut your tits off!” I reached down and grabbed a large shard of glass. I saw the gaze of a crazed person reflected back as I lifted it up. “Yeah, you look alarmed now! I can only take so much shit. A lesson must be taught. I’m going to slice this thing off, like a side of bacon, then I’m going to eat it.” There may have been maniacal laughter on my part, I’m not entirely sure. I’d been divided so many times it was getting difficult to tell what was me and what wasn’t. I placed the jagged point of the makeshift blade under my left breast and pushed up. Or, more accurately, attempted to push up. There was a bubbling welt of blood where I’d punctured the skin, but certainly not the torrent I’d been expecting when I cut through the fatty flesh. “What the fuck are you doing!?” I railed at Scarlett. She looked just as shocked as I did.
“No injuries.” It was Manny, the ever-present Manny. Almost like a fucking cop, he showed when I wanted him there the least.
“Where the fuck were you when I was making my hands bleed, you fucking stiff! I’ll rip my tit, I mean Scarlett’s tit, off whenever I want!” I attempted to push again, but if anything, my hand was pulled downward from its upward thrust.
“Injuries require healing, healing requires food. I see no food.”
And that was it. Manny had laid it all out in a neat little package for me. I would have argued with him if not for the fact that Scarlett was whooping it up like her team had just won the Super Bowl. I would have turned and focused my rage on her, but I’d gone from omnipotent to impotent in a matter of a day. Only two little letters of difference had toppled me from my king of the mountain perch to puissant pauper.
I swept the dusty coverlet, blankets, and sheets off the bed before plopping down atop it. I was lost in my miserable mood as I violently rocked back and forth. As it gradually slowed to a more rhythmic lolling, I found myself somewhat comforted, like I was a small child in the loving arms of my mother. I began to doze off, rest … blissful rest.
“Get up.” Manny issued the order.
“Danger?” I bolted upright, disorientated as the bed swung back and forth. Felt like I’d been on a three-day bender and the buzz had not worn off yet. Had a moment where vomiting would have been welcome. Although it didn’t happen often, vomit was undigested food and Manny was not a fan of wasting it.
“Hungry.”
I could argue with the glutton, call him all sorts of unflattering names, but it would do me no good. In the end, I would have to do exactly what he told me. I was the fucking puppet on parade, here for the service and entertainment of others. Pissed off didn’t begin to impinge on what I was feeling. I dutifully sifted through the closet and found exactly what I’d been expecting, granny knit pants and sweaters that smelled musty and were infused with muscle ointment, like it had been rubbed into the fabric, so when it was adorned, it would just start working. Why the fuck do all old people smell the same? Can’t they make the salve smell more like sugar cookies or some shit? At least that way, their ungrateful little bastard grandchildren would come and visit them more often. Either that or maybe give them more than a two-dollar Social Security check; it isn’t 1902 anymore. They should be able to get something that doesn’t smell like embalming fluid.
The more I thought about things, the more frustrated I was becoming. Maybe I couldn’t take it out on those with me, but I could certainly release my frustration on those out there, and that was exactly what I was going to do. I hopped off that bed like I’d been atop a geyser and it had just blown. By the time I stomped out that front door, I felt more like the 6’5” behemoth I’d left behind than the 5’2” waif I was.
“Maybe I can’t touch you directly, Scarlett, but my guess is you can’t do much to me either or you would have. But you know what I can touch, my dear, because frankly I do give a damn. I can touch your mind repeatedly. I can stomp all over it like a fucking hippo spreading shit with his tail. I am going to produce imagery for your memory that a fucking lobotomy wouldn’t dispose of. You are going to feel so fucking dirty that even wire bristling your lily white skin under scalding water would do little to strip away the diseased infestation of thoughts I am going to indelibly inscribe on your mind!” Oh, maybe she had thwarted me one way, but I was not going to be turned away!
I started showing her images of babies being eaten, puppies, kittens. Families forced into copulation as I devoured them. I worked on every fevered fetish, and they all ended with me ripping into them. We’d walked for an hour, and every ecstatic second of it was filled with eclectic, disturbed imagery, guaranteed to fry even the sanest of minds! I hadn’t really been focused on my outer surroundings; I’d been too intent on crushing Scarlett’s spirit. And if the way she’d retreated was any indication, I was succeeding. Who knows? Maybe at some point the bitch would come out on top, but the tattered remnants she was going to be left with would make the victory wholly unsatisfying. It was the smell that pulled me from the inner to the outer.
“Eau de shite.” I did my best French accent. It was not as good as my French, and I didn’t know any of the language. I laughed at my quip. But the smell, that was intriguing. Shit in and of itself is only shit, but it signifies something. Something had to take that dump, something living. Well, that’s not necessarily true; zombies shit and are not technically alive, not in the traditional way anyway. But when they shit, well, that’s a whole different odor. Zombies process their proteins differently, and even if they didn’t, crapped-out people just reek, and reek badly. Humans as a species will eat just about anything, sugar in massive quantities, over processed foods, preservatives, steroid infused meats, mercury laced fish, E. coli coated vegetables, we don’t care. But I’m here to tell you, when that tainted meat is eaten, it produces one horrific fucking fragrance. What I was smelling now was more on par with that sweet sickening smell of offal after an all-you-can-eat night at the local Mexican bean and burrito stand. Low quality ingredients at an even lower price. Nothing is tastier than old, ground up cow and bean paste covered in asshole shredding hot sauce.
Whatever was making that grand abundance of putrid perfume needed to be found. My belly was grumbling, and I had a need … I had a need to feed! Yeah it’s a rip-off. I somehow doubt Tom Cruise cares right now, probably got the fuck off the planet and is in his rocket ship heading to wherever the planet Hubbard promised his followers is. My prospective dinner guest or guests’ stench was so over-powering I was wondering why this place wasn’t zombie-shuffling-room only with everyone struggling to get into the restaurant. That was fine with me. They’d take the heat off of me if the humans were in defense mode. Still, though, I was a yummy mommy; I could get in just about anywhere. Too bad I was dressed for bingo. I sniffed around, using Manny’s improved scent detector. When I honed in on where I was certain the smell was coming from, I was looking at a ranch style home that came across as if it had been kept up—at least until the zombies had come—but other than that, it was wholly unremarkable with its off-white color and blue trim.
“House looks like a lunch box.
Let’s just hope when I open the door, there’s something good to eat and not some damn nasty old banana like mom used to put in mine. Jimmy Fletcher always had Ring Dings and Ho-Ho’s, and I had brown bananas. Thanks, Ma! You damn bat. Maybe if you’d spent a little less money on the cigarettes, I could have had a dessert that didn’t smell rotten and come with its own battalion of fruit flies. Do you know how mercilessly they teased me when those things would come out of the box? Got to the damn point where I’d toss everything out as soon as I left the house. Ma, I didn’t eat lunch for most of the fourth grade! My stomach used to be twisted up in knots by the time I got home!”
“Who are you talking to, Tim?” It was Scarlett. I was now standing on the porch of the lunchbox. Right there, with my hands by my side, a glazed look over my face (I could see my reflection in the storm glass in the screen door), drool pouring from my mouth, I looked more the zombie than the person I was masquerading as.
“This is how zombies get shot, Tim. Pull yourself together.”
“It’s encouraging the way you talk to yourself to get ready for things,” Scarlett said sarcastically and maybe a little caustically.
I didn’t acknowledge her. I couldn’t. What would be the point? She was right. Something was fundamentally wrong with me and appeared to be getting worse. I thought about knocking, but instead I opened the storm door and twisted the knob to the front door. You’d think I would have been a little more surprised that it was unlocked.
“This is too easy.”
“I hope they blow your head off,” Scarlett said evenly and calmly, considering it was her pretty little head that was going to send little itty bits of all over the place.
“Typical chick, you just told me to get my shit together so I didn’t get shot. Make up your damn mind. If I did get shot, at least I won’t be bothered by the voices in my head,” I said darkly, though I’d been shooting for humor. There was no cocking of a gun, no clicking off of a safety, no hitting of a firing pin on a primer, and more importantly, no explosion as a projectile lodged into my head. There was that smell though, that sweet, sweet smell. The inside of the lunchbox was as kept up as the outside had been. Furniture that looked as if it had never been sat in decorated the living room I was standing in. Light fake wood flooring stretched off to, at least, the hallway; my guess is it went throughout the bedrooms as well. But that was not what had the fist hold on my attention. No, that was reserved for the large, brown swath of what had to be shit that had come out of that same hallway and headed into what I guessed was the kitchen.
Kind of looked like the world’s largest dog had a bad case of worms and had been dragging his ass over the floor in a desperate bid to scratch that itch after a wet syrupy diarrhea-taking experience. There were sounds coming from the kitchen, it was tough trying to find some precursor that gave me an idea of just exactly what was going on. Sounded something like an elephant on a respirator. I wanted to call out, though I wasn’t sure of the wisdom in that. Was it possible a wild boar had got in here? They could do some serious damage to a zombie. I was just about to turn around and go try my luck somewhere else when I heard the tell-tale sound of a most human mmmm. Someone was eating, and whatever it was, they were enjoying it thoroughly. I moved slowly over, toward the sounds, not making any myself, not so much as the squeak of a loose floorboard. Didn’t much matter, as I could have been playing a trumpet and the thing that was laying there on the floor wouldn’t have heard it over the shoveling of food into his mouth, and if he had, my guess is he would not have cared.
I’m not sure I’m going to be able to accurately describe what was in the kitchen taking up most of the floor in the ten-by-eight room. Let’s start with an overall visual—you’re going to need to be a Star Wars fan for this one. Picture Jabba the Hut, with many more skin folds and flaps and much, much paler like … umm, like Interview with a Vampire Tom Cruise, pale. You getting close to what I was witnessing? Here was a humanoid thing, human only in the fact that it had two arms and two legs, though none of those extremities had been much good for most of this thing’s life. What laid before me had to be at least eight hundred pounds of monstrosity, and it had lost at least half more of that weight if the bed-sore laden skin pooled around it was any indication. He sort of looked like the world’s largest candle and he was in the midst of melting. Oh, and did I forget to mention that it was naked? I guess that goes without saying; not a big and tall store on the planet could cater to something along these lines. Not like that thing was going out anyway. Whoever had stayed with it previously most likely went to Bed Bath and Beyond’s sheet department, I think, to find something to cover this thing up with.
The beast had dragged itself here to feed. Either it had eaten its caregiver or that poor bastard had left when things had gone bad. This thing must have been lying in bed for weeks begging to be fed. Its sty was something even I did not want to venture down the hallway to see, must have been stewing in his own juices that entire time. Pigs rutting through swill had more manners than this man. His enormous head was inside one of the floor cabinets, had nearly taken up the entire width of it, and he was mowing through a box of what looked like mashed potato flakes. Frothy white particles would occasionally fall to the side and onto the vinyl flooring. I was fascinated as I watched this alien creature in his natural habitat. And by that, I mean stuffing things into its face.
Who was the asshole that had enabled this thing? At some point he’d become bed-ridden, and still trays of food had been brought. Maybe they were fattening him up for the slaughter. Well, I guess I could thank them for all their hard work.
Used a modified Chance colloquialism to introduce myself. “Well hello there, my hefty eater.” Maybe I’d lean up against the entry way in a seductive manner, but unless I coated myself in bacon grease, I don’t think he would have given a shit. Nothing, not so much as a “How do you do.” Then I realized he was making so much noise eating, in such a confined area, he had not heard me. I can only be civil for so long. I stomped on some of the rolls that were by my feet. There was a loud grunt, then a squeal, as he slammed his head off the top of the cabinet. Then something happened that I had not been prepared for. It spoke, and its voice was suited to a woman; a falsetto sound from this thing was like a Yeti roaring and having it sound more like the squeak of a mouse or a dog toy.
“What … what do you want?” It was trying to push back and away from the cabinet, ripples of fat formed as it did so, much like a bull walrus. A thick coating of sweat broke out over its entire body, enough it could have drowned a normal person. Just the foot it was trying to move now was stretching the limits of its capacity. The crawl from the bedroom to the kitchen must have been monumental, like a quest for the Holy Grail or to the gates of Mordor.
I waited and waited, but this was akin to the proverbial pot watching. It was sighing, sweating, jiggling, resting, and snorting.
“How are you not dead yet?” I asked, truly wondering.
He repeated his first question.
“Did you hate your parents so much you ate them? You fat fuck. Fat … that’s funny, that gives plus-sizers a bad rap.”
He had anger in his eyes. He weighed as much as a cow and he sounded like Pee-wee Herman on helium, and still there was a spark of anger in him. I guess he sort of had a right to be angry at the world. But he’s the one that kept shoving sheet cakes into his mouth.
“I’m curious, I don’t know why I need to know, but do you have a cock somewhere buried in all that?” I swirled my finger around in the general area of his crotch. The pink mottled flesh was thick with dried crusts of excrement and piss. Could probably do an archaeological dig on him. “I guess I was assuming you were male, but now I’m not sure. Your tits are nearly as big as I am.”
“I’m a man!” it said defiantly.
“No way.”
“I was married.”
Now I snorted. “Come on, you are not seriously going to tell me that something crawled on top of Mount Vesuvius for a little b
ronco bucking are you? You said you were married. What happened? Did you want to be on top once? Is the poor bitch even now imbedded in your top sheets?”
“I’ll kill you!”
“Please. I’m in more danger of prostate cancer. Get it? Because I’m female and that’s not a problem. No? That not funny for you?”
“Get whatever you want and get out.”
“Well see, that’s the problem, Whale.”
“Barry… my name is Barry.”
“Barry, that’s funny. I didn’t know marine creatures started naming themselves now. Listen, Whale, I am going to take whatever I want and leave, but I guess it’s nice to have you be all right with that. The problem is, though, there’s no way ten of me could lift you out of here.”
“Me? What do you possibly want with me?”
“Well you see, Whale, I think you and I share more in common than you might realize.”
Whale didn’t answer. He wasn’t rising to the bait, although how could he possibly know what I was talking about?
“Fine, I thought you fat men were supposed to be more jolly? Although I’m guessing the last time you had the ability to jack off, there was an actor in the White House. That would make anyone fuming mad, all that testosterone flowing through your blood without the ability to release, although it looks like you may have replaced that with grease. Now that we’re on the subject of that general area, what’s it like to have someone wipe your ass? Was it your wife? Did you kind of roll onto your side and she had a high pressure hose? Otherwise she would have been in danger of being crushed between your ass cheeks, wouldn’t she? Wait, is that where it happened? Her death, I mean. Was she choked off by an anaconda sized hemorrhoid? Poor thing … her last gasps for air were in your asshole.”
“My wife did not come home from the store the day the zombies came.” It was tough to see facial features due to the fat that surrounded and encompassed his eyes. His eyebrows, which floated on a curtain of blubber, could not convey any true meaning. But his voice had an angry warble to it.