"What Was Mine" 2

I slept, floating in and out, hearing snippets of conversation, all of it about me: “When’s he going to be ready?” in a terse Eastern accent, “Haven’t had one of these in awhile,” in a more local and alcoholised tone, “He’ll be worth looking at once he cleans up,” in a giggly, conspiratorial young woman’s voice.  I paid it all no heed, knowing that as soon as I was fully conscious and capable of communication, I’d get the full story.

At one point, I felt hands fumbling at my shorts, and them embarrassed, girlish laughter.  Another time, two voices, military in vibe, prodded and manipulated my body here and there, checking out my collection of knife-scars, bullet wounds and snake-bites.  One voice approved of my toughness; the other disapproved of my lifestyle.  I instinctively liked the first voice more.

However long this period lasted, I was pretty sure that by the end of it, there wasn’t a single person in this place, wherever it was, who hadn’t seen and commented upon every inch of me.

When I came to for what felt like the final, permanent time, I lifted my head a bit, just to test it out.  I didn’t immediately feel like puking, so I eased myself up, a bit at a time, muscles burning and bitching with the effort, until I was sitting up against the wall and feeling, at long last, like an exhausted and pissed-off but still essentially functional human being.

I was alone in the room.  I blinked my eyes, rubbed them.  Vision was still a little blurry.  I looked around.  Walls were dried mud and stone; floors were wood planks and dirt.  The door was metal.  There were bars on the windows, and the light coming through them could have been either morning or evening: I had no bearings to tell me which.

Again, I tested the vocal chords.  Again, I produced nothing.

I looked for something near me, something I could lift in my weakened hand.  I found a cup next to a pitcher, both of them carved of wood.  Slowly, I hefted it.  My arm felt like I was lifting a cup ten times the size of this one.  I threw it towards the door.  It landed two feet shy, and didn’t make much noise at that.  Sonofabitch.

Pathetic.

I chuckled harshly and noiselessly at my predicament.

I didn’t know who had put me in this condition, whatever it was, but one thing was for certain.  As soon as my finger could pull a trigger, some people were going to die.

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"What Was Mine" 1

Maybe I have a dim memory of hitting the ground hard like a shit-smeared cannonball.  Maybe I remember dozing like the blind, slimy pile of excrement I was, the beast that birthed me nuzzling me curiously, my brain barely awake enough to notice the all-over skin burn that tingled and needled.  Maybe I’ve just convinced myself that I remember.  Regardless, the first proper memory that I can lay unquestioned claim to is waking up on a canvas cot in a brown room, a dirty-faced boy rubbing a rag on me that had been soaked in something foul-smelling and yellow.

His eyes widened as he saw mine open.  I tried to speak.  My mouth was clammy and tasted like grass and vomit.  I blew a speechless spit-bubble.  The burn in my throat was fiery and deep.  I felt the pain in all my holes, even the ones in the coarse wool short pants I was wearing.

The boy dipped the rag in a bucket, wrung it out, and slapped it on my thighs.  Whatever nasty shit he was spreading on me, it soothed my raw skin, but he wasn’t working it into my nose or my asshole; hence the sting.

I cleared my throat and worked my mouth silently again, trying to force out at least a whisper.  The boy leaned over me.  He was around 11, and the top of his head was a lot larger than the bottom.  Also, one of his eyes wasn’t right.  “Your throat isn’t gonna be able to make words for a while,” he said, in an accent that spoke of isolation, hard living and illiteracy.  “I’ll bring in some special soup to help with that,” he said with a mild smile.  I looked pointedly at the disgusting rag as he moved it up to my chest.  “That’s crone’s balm,” he said.  “Smells like death, but it numbs the pain…you’d be screaming from the burning otherwise.”  How long would this all last, I thought.  “About a week,” he said, anticipating my question.  “After that, everything will still hurt, but you should be able to handle it.”  He ducked his head closer to my ear.  “My name’s Osef,” he said shyly.  I nodded at him, then, exhausted from the effort of even that level of communication, sunk my head back into the pillow and let oblivion come.

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I Am Going to Be Posting Fiction Here

To get myself back in the writing habit, I’m going to be posting a piece of serial fiction here in bite-size nuggets.  It is a fantasy/Western/revenge tale entitled What Was Mine, and it can’t be helped that that is also the title of a short-story collection and a pop song, because I found these two facts out after the titling.

I know text doesn’t elicit as much interest on Tumblr as images, but, please, no post will be longer than about a page and a half.  Please find time in your day for reading and responding.

That is all.  The first bit is coming up here directly.

Fumbly-Speak

I ate breakfast at Burger King with a friend this morning.  They have a Twilight game going there now, where if you get a certain size of drink there is a gamepiece on the cup.  The gamepiece has two scratch-off areas, and you have to choose which area to scratch.

I said, “Huh…I guess what you have to do is choose Team Edward or Team Jacob, and then rub one off.”

I paused, realized what I had just said, and then broke into hysterical laughter.

I Own This, Too

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I had seen HOSTEL and enjoyed it (and still do), and so I decided to finally check out Eli Roth’s debut movie, which had gotten a lot of positive buzz, from even such luminaries as Peter Jackson.

I should have known something was up when the movie only cost me ten bucks.  There are aspects of Roth’s later skill to be be found here in their infant state, but the movie is altogether terrible.  Poorly plotted, filled with amateurish acting, and hampered by stupid character decisions that make absolutely no sense, it’s a hard movie to convince yourself to sit through.

I’ve watched it once, and then a second time to make sure I hated it.

I don’t know why it’s still in my collection.