"Brick and Mortar; Meat and Bone" by R. M. Bundridge

Brick and Mortar; Meat and Bone

by R. M. Bundridge

In the coming sun’s light, both eyes slipped from their sockets. Reminiscent of tetherballs I used to smack with all my strength, they dangled down to my chin, peeking over the edge at my gut. It was growing, slowly, the skin stretching. There had been nothing of substance in it: some want, some confusion at the cold barrel I had pressed to the roof of my mouth. In a fit of hunger, my gut had gurgled: expectant.

From where my eyes rested on my chin, I could see the buttons of Virgil’s shirt beginning to strain; the purpling of my fingers as if I’d just finished plucking away at some berries, and the ever-growing dark spot between my legs. I knew the blood from my exploded skull had dried in my hair, caked up against the antique, high-back chair I resided in, so this spot could only be one thing: piss. This meant I’d probably shit myself, too, if there was anything to let go of. Who knew I’d be grateful to lose my sense of smell? Though I’d never smell this shirt again, take in his scent of ripe fruit and aftershave.

My attention fell back to my fingers, pockets of coagulated blood that would burst if poked with a needle. If they fell off and popped on the wood, disturbing dust bunnies and discarded memories of insects—if my blood leaked out and bathed in the dust—besides having seen it, would I ever know? My eyes had started in my head, after all. Both had fallen out of me without sensation. My fingers would do the same. As would the rest of me. It was only a matter of time, and I didn’t know how long It was going to keep me here.

I’d been alone when I arrived; however, when I stepped off the welcome mat—a smoggy, pinkish red cloth—and shut the door on splinters which stuck stiffly down from the doorframe, there was a weight which followed me from room to room. It wasn’t on my shoulders, or even heavy on my mind. It was behind me. The air thickened, and I could taste something chemical, but whenever I’d turn around, no matter how quick, I’d be alone. Virgil would have claimed me a madman had he seen the whipping motions of my body after entering and exiting each room. His smile would have been broad, though. The dimples in his cheeks would have deepened, and my, how I would’ve kissed him.

But he wasn’t here. With me. A malignancy made sure of that, but I was here. Still. Bullet through my brain and seemingly cursed by a god I hadn’t believed in with my full beating heart. Whatever It was, wasn’t a god I had learned about.

As if it heard me, a creak came from the guts of the house; though my ears would never feel heat from embarrassment, or beat with blood from over-exerting myself, they picked up on a noise which shouldn’t have been. A noise intended for me. Gooseflesh was beyond me, raised hair a memory, chittering teeth could almost be a dream—the sound came again. Closer than before.

A grip creaked against the wood of the chair, and unable to stop the course of it all, my decomposition sped up. My left eye loosened from its optic nerve, untwining, and bounced from my gut—which was now rapidly expanding—to the floor. My fingers didn’t fall off, just leaked and deflated; still, I didn’t feel my flesh unspool from itself.

The weight which had followed me around was closer than it had been on my tour of the abandoned two-bedroom home: now latched onto what remained of my skull, pulling me back into my own fragments and clumps of brain. It held me there. When the buttons of Virgil’s shirt popped free and cracked against the wall, it continued to hold me until my stomach creased open and popped; only then it pushed me deeper into my self-inflicted gore.

From behind, my eye was placed back into my socket.

I could watch myself unfold.

A stomach void of digestion, lungs whose last breath was quick and attempting to be brave, shattered ribs, kidneys, a never-to-beat-again heart; I splashed against the wall in a viscera of reds, purples, blues, and black. So much black, so much sludge. Slowly, over cracked stone and dust, what slithered down the wall was greeted by flies. A maggot protruded through my heart.

From behind me there came a rustling sound, like leaves being brushed through, and the pressure relieved itself from my skull. The sound came around me until a figure stood between my knees, blocking the view of my organs on display. What had ahold of me, its hands, contained smiling families of all kinds. Some had pets while others were simply two adults looking cheerily into whatever had captured them in these photos forever.

The hand came up and grasped the tip of my broken ribcage. Unbothered by my dead weight, I was lifted away from the high-back chair and brought up, closer to where a mouth would be.

“You live for me.” Its words were folds in thick paper. They couldn’t have been words at all, but I heard them. “Now, I become.”

What was left at the bottom of my torso was scooped out—excess bones and meat. That was when it crawled inside me. Blood seeped into my pants and the chair. I squelched and separated. Polaroids slid between veins and unused muscles: becoming. Once inside, adjusted, it sealed me up. We cradled Virgil’s shirt close. With ease, it learned what it meant to live, its longing no longer necessary. It had been waiting, expectant, for a soul so willing.