The Wish
Frank Merck strolled the carnival midway with his wife, Millie. She clutched his muscled arm possessively with one hand, holding a paper container of greasy, ketchup-smeared french fries in the other. Frank was unaware of Millie's hand as he took in the sights and sounds of the game tents. Then a girl of about nineteen, working the ring-toss booth caught his eye. She smiled seductively. Frank stopped and swallowed hard as he admired her breasts moving beneath her white tee-shirt.
"Frank?" said Millie, as she tugged on his arm, "Frank!"
"Huh?" he said, the spell broken.
"I want to get a cotton candy," said Millie. "The booth is back the way we came in. Do you mind?"
"Get what?" said Frank, his mind still on the girl.
Millie released his arm and turned to him angrily. "Frank! I'm talking to you!"
Frank looked into Millie's puffy face and wondered what he had ever seen in her. His trim, muscled appearance, the result of years of daily effort - weight-lifting, jogging, eating right - contrasted sharply with her fat form. Millie was at least fifty pounds overweight and her hair was an unkempt mop of greasy brown clumps.
Millie looked into his eyes angrily, her lower lip quivering. A red drop of ketchup glistened on the fuzzy sleeve of her white mohair sweater.
"What is it?" he said angrily.
"Well, you don't have to yell." Millie's eyes misted over. In a whining voice she said, "I wanted a cotton candy."
"All right, where are they?"
Millie pointed and they walked back. Frank remembered the early days of their relationship. He had been in such a hurry... a walking talking, twenty two-year-old erection. But even if he had been older and wiser, he never could have known that it would turn so bad so quick. Now, a divorce would ruin him. Millie's father had taken him into the family's plumbing supply business and Frank had worked hard and done well. A divorce would land him back on square one at the ripe age of thirty five.
Millie tugged at his arm.
"What?" he snapped.
"It's over there."
They turned and Frank took one last, quick look at the girl. She was bending over the table in the middle of the tent, retrieving the wooden rings scattered among the cases of Coca Colas. Her buttocks were firm and pert beneath her tight jeans. He could almost feel them cupped in his hands. She turned round and saw him looking. She smiled.
Frank glanced at his watch. He could tell Millie he was going down to the high school track to jog. Then he could come back here before they closed at midnight. He felt the flush of desire and pulled Millie along a little faster. "All right, babe," he said. “Let's get your cotton candy and then we're getting the hell out of here. I want to do some running tonight before it gets too late."
Millie purchased a blue sphere of cotton candy and they headed for the parking lot. They passed a booth with an old Gypsy woman sitting outside in a lawn chair. 'Madam Rosa,' the sign over the tent proclaimed, 'Knows all! Tells all! - One dollar!'
Millie slowed.
The old woman smiled at them, getting slowly from her chair. "God bless you, children," she said, flashing a toothless smile. "Come inside. I read your palms."
"Let's go in, Frank," said Millie.
"Millie, for crying out loud! I told you I wanted to get back and get some jogging in."
Millie gave him a hurt look. "It'll only take a minute."
The woman smiled kindly at Frank, then took Millie by the arm. She led her into the tent as Frank followed reluctantly, sitting down in an old wooden chair. Overhead, moths flitted noisily around two neon tubes suspended from the tent roof.
Millie sat and the Gypsy sat opposite her. The old woman looked over Frank. "It won't take long, Dearie. How about if I read the two of you for a dollar fifty."
Frank threw his eyes skyward, "for chrisake.”
The woman got to her feet and came over to him, taking his hand. "Please, you're in a hurry. I will do your palm first and then you can go outside and smoke."
"I don't smoke."
Ignoring the comment, she pulled his hand under the light and leaned closer to it. She studied it for a moment and then gasped and moved away.
"That was fast," Frank said to her acidly, "that must've been speed palmreading. What did you see?"
"I see nothing," said the Gypsy, avoiding his eyes.
Frank looked down at his hand. "So do I. Exactly nothing. Except for a few wrinkles. C'mon Millie."
Millie remained seated, a pout on her face, as the Gypsy woman backed away from Frank.
Sitting down before Millie, the Gypsy looked over quickly at Frank and said, "I don't read you. You wait outside."
Frank stayed in his chair while the Gypsy took Millie's hand in hers. She looked closely at the palm. Rocking back and forth, the woman's eyes became slits as she began speaking excitedly in a strange language. Suddenly she stood up and made the sign of the cross. "You must both go now."
"Go?" Millie whined, "but you didn't even tell us our fortunes..."
"I'm sorry, I cannot read you. Please go."
"And I can't pay you, either," said Frank angrily as he got to his feet. "C'mon, Millie."
Neither Frank nor Millie spoke as they drove the dark country roads. The car's V-8 hummed quietly as an occasional bug crashed into the windshield with a click. Millie broke the silence.
"What do you suppose she saw in our palms, honey?"
Frank sighed angrily in the darkness of the car. "She didn't see nothin'. Those people are fulla crap."
"I don't know, honey. They're very sensitive people and she looked genuinely scared. Frank, she saw something in our palms and it scared her."
Frank threw her an angry look. "Aw, cut it out, will ya? She probably thought I was a detective or something and it made her nervous. Those people are involved in a lot of scams, you know."
Millie said nothing.
Frank clicked the radio on, turning the volume up loud to dispel the cold, creeping apprehension that seemed to ooze through the car windows from the blackness outside. They drove for another five minutes and the music began to fade. Saying nothing, Frank turned the dial. All the other stations had faded too. That was odd, he thought. He turned the volume up all the way and harsh static filled the car, but no music. "That's weird," he said absently as he clicked it off. "I just had the damn thing fixed last month."
The road turned and they approached the wooden bridge spanning Crooked Creek. As the car rumbled over the wooden planks, the engine suddenly went dead.
"What the hell?" said Frank. He coasted to the side guardrail and pulled the emergency brake on. The headlights died suddenly. Frank turned the light switch on and off repeatedly, but the lights stayed off. He opened the door and got out. The rhythmic chirp of crickets filled the hot air. Frank lifted the hood and felt around with his hands.
"Maybe the battery cable came loose," he called in to Millie's darkened form, "that would account for everything going dead at once."
Millie got out of the car and stood beside him. "It's such a beautiful night, Frank. "There are so many stars in the sky. Jees! Look at that one over there. It's so bright!"
Frank slammed the hood down noisily. "Crap," he said, "I can't figure it out. Those cables are tight. I can't budge them! It must be the battery. But I never had a battery go out all of a sudden like that." He pounded his fist on the hood and walked over to lean against the wooden rail of the bridge. Millie followed him.
"Don't worry, honey," she said, "someone will come along soon. Let's just enjoy the moment."
Frank thought again of the pretty young woman who had given him the come-on look. She would be available tonight, whether he was or not.
"Damn," he said through clenched teeth. He felt mad enough to turn the car over.
"What?" said Millie absently.
"I wanted to go running," he said angrily.
"That's my Mister America," she said jovially, "that's all he ever thinks about." She ran her fingers lightly along his muscled arm. "When we get home we'll think of some other way for you to get your exercise."
Frank pulled his arm away. "Yeah,” he said, thinking, that's a good description of it too.
"Huh, honey?"
"Never mind."
Millie tapped him on the arm. "Let's wish on a star, honey. See that big blue one over there? I'm making my wish on that one."
Frank said nothing, thinking instead, 'yeah, I wish you would die, that's what I wish... Within the week!'
"Frank," said Millie nervously, "it's started moving. It's coming this way."
"Huh?"
"The star. It's coming this way. Honey, I'm scared!"
"What star? Where?" Frank scanned the sky.
"Over there! It's getting bigger. See! Oh, Frank..."
Frank saw it racing toward them, growing larger, brighter. Millie started running. Frank ran after her. The wind began blowing forcefully and suddenly it was bright as day. Frank looked up and all he saw was light. He tripped over something and fell hard onto the road. Millie grabbed him tightly around the neck. Light burned through Frank's eyelids, searing his eyes. The sound of a thousand chain saws exploded in his ears and heat washed over him as the furious sound and light permeated his entire body. He passed out.
The two doctors walked quickly down the brightly-lit corridor. "Sorry to bother you, Doctor Bernstein," said the younger of the two, "but I knew you'd want to talk to him."
"It's all right, John. Maybe he can shed some light on this. How long has he been conscious?"
The young doctor glanced quickly at his watch. "Five minutes. The nurse just told me."
"What about his wife?"
"Dead. Last night."
Doctor Bernstein shook his head as they turned a corner and approached the elevator. The doors whoosed open and the young doctor pushed '4'. He turned to Doctor Bernstein. "I'm surprised she lasted as long as she did. The cancer was in such an advanced stage. Well, you saw."
Bernstein nodded slowly. "Yes. How does he look?"
"Hideous. His neck and face have swollen incredibly. The burning and swelling seems to have fused his legs together, and his arms to his sides. But the lab reports indicate something entirely different."
The door opened and the two men exited the elevator. "What's that, Doctor?" said Bernstein, as they turned down a tiled corridor, "what do they indicate?"
The younger doctor’s breath came quickly as he struggled to keep pace. "A complete breakdown of muscle and bone tissue, almost - I know this sounds incredible - but, almost a metamorphosis."
They came to a set of double doors. The younger doctor pushed them open. "He's in here."
Frank Merck floated in a world of pain. Like water, it supported his body, pressing in at every point. He couldn't move a muscle. He heard someone come into the room, but he could not turn his head to look at them. A face looked down into his.
"Can you talk?"
"I think so," said Frank Merck, but only a strangled groan came from his lips.
"Your wife is dead," said the doctor. "Can you tell us what happened out there?"
Frank Merck closed his eyes. The effort to keep them open was too much. She's dead, he thought. I wished and she's dead. He felt a slight twinge of pity for her and then he was seized with a euphoric giddiness. He thought comically of the cricket from the Disney movie singing, when you wish upon star... And what a star they had wished upon! A blue giant! I wonder what she wished for, he thought. Probably a plate of spaghetti and meatballs.
A voice kept repeating his name, drawing him up from the well of pain. He opened his eyes.
"Mister Merck," said the doctor, "are you in great pain? If you are, blink your eyes twice."
Frank did as he was told.
Doctor Bernstein turned. "Get a nurse down here with four milligrams of Dilaudid."
Three hours later, his round completed, Doctor Bernstein returned to Frank Merck's room and stared down at the bloated form. The face was not a face anymore. The eyes, ears, nose and mouth were now almost completely covered by oily, blistered skin. He flipped the sheet down. The body was a long mass of slick whitish scar tissue. He stepped back. It reminded him of something. Bernstein suddenly felt sick. It was the sight and smell, coupled with the thought in his head. He had noticed the smell before, but had not connected it with the patient. The smell was much stronger now.
Oh, my God, he thought, that's what he smells like... that's what he looks like! A larva... or a huge french fried potato!