Spork
My name is Rose. Well its Rosemary, but do NOT call me that. It means dew of the sea. That isn’t the type of fun fact I usually keep nestled in the confines of my brain. It was embroidered into every Sunday dress, blanket, cotton sheet, top cover and yes, even the bed skirt of every bed Ive slept in till the day I graduated high school. I moved out in my graduation gown. White square cap and all. Something Catholic about it, I mean Cathartic. Or both? I don’t really know a lot about that either. Growing up in the south of Boston, raised on the blood and body of some effigy, it didn’t jive with me. I stopped paying attention right after my first visit from “flow” right there in the pews. My mom grabbed my hand and squeezed it so hard, I thought I was going to clock out right then from the mix of it all. She slapped and cursed me with the twitches that crept from the sides of her mouth. I knew the way her face got when she was throwing me through the cleaners in her mind. I was wearing my jacket in July after all. I sat through the two hour service before I could attend to the devils mark on womanhood. I pray, ha! Ya, me, I PRAY, that my “mark” still stains that pew.
That same church buried my mother fourteen years later. Lung cancer. It was 1974, I was a sophomore in community college. I was trying to be a nurse. I got pretty far, until the blood. I didn’t think that I could handle the blood. I thought that when I saw a doctor carve into the flesh of another person, my face would turn and I would cover my mouth and trip over the bedsheets trying to find a trash can. I wasn’t far off. I didn’t trip over the bedsheet, I didn’t loose my breakfast either, but in a way, I suppose, I couldn’t handle the blood.
After her funeral, I thought I could balance the empty feeling of not knowing what to feel about her death, and the curriculum of microbiology and western civilizations. I attended classes and maintained an average GPA. The school counselor advised that I take an excused absence, reassured me I wouldn’t loose my seat in the program and for all intents and purposes, escorted me off the campus.
The state started sending letters, demands really. Her apartment was still furnished and covered in plastic. It hadn’t occurred to me that I was the only one around to clean up after her. I’d just drop them in the neighbors mailboxes knowing they would get sent back and their cycle would start a new. I kept the beast at bay for two months before the warden arrived. He found my apartment, just as my mothers. Full of life and memories, and yet wholly abandoned.
Playing pin the tail on the Amtrak sign, I hopped a train that took me to a bus. I rode that till the trees outnumbered the buildings. It was a small town. Four hours west. Killingly. There was a trolley that ran down Main Street then curved right into Canal. I felt like I was in San Francisco, on my way to eat lunch over looking the Golden gate. It was no bridge of grandeur but a bridge none the less that decorated the view outside the quaint broken yolk cafe. I sat at the bar and watched the torrent calmly slink, away a ribbon carving through the earth. That was until the grating sound of metal prongs on ceramic clawed at my ear drums. A toddler pouting over a plate of peas. Who orders peas for lunch? The same people that force their kids to sit at the table, obstinate, until their vegetables are eaten. The parents that make you bring that plate of cold cream corn to your bedroom. The parents that force you to scratch a metal fork against the plate until two in the morning. The parents that see your tears, but refuse to give in and realize its slop fed to prisoners of war. The parents that remove the metal pronged utensil, only to replace it with a spork. A piece of plastic that if found in any condition other than it was presented, would herald a rage the fallen angels would fear.
I watched as the waitress, who after reading the dining room, promptly brought the family of three a spork wrapped in cellophane. Dad thanked her, removed the heavy stainless steel fork form his daughters frail determined grip and supplicated her with the object that pulls from my viscera feelings of twitching carnage.
Waking up in a hospital after drinking too much, with an IV in your arm is one thing. That sounds like a Tuesday. Having a panic attack and waking up to a diagnosis is another matter completely. I went face first into my biscuits and gravy.
The Docs threw the phrase “anxiety disorder” around more times than I can count. These white coats talked to each other more than they did me. I sat up in bed and watched as the top doc went through his ranks and humiliated them one by one. Right there in the room, so close I could count the rings on his spiral notebook. Thirty-five. I can tell his dry cleaner couldn’t fully remove the ink stain from his pocket. Doc approved of my change of address. Out from the stressors of the city and into the small town life. He gave me a slip of paper with some chicken scratch on it for some pills and told me to find a therapist to follow up with. Once they where done with me, I found my clothes in a clear bag, marked “patient”. Next to it was a brown to-go bag, stamped “Broken yolk”. They must have really felt bad for me. I took a long piss then got dressed and left. Well, not before I took the elevator down into the basement. To the morgue.
It was colder than I expected it to be. I dropped out of school before we got to clinicals. Before I got to see a body. To see where they are stored. Far from the sensitive gaze of the living. I pried the bracelet from my wrist and shoved it deep in my jean pockets. If I get caught, It’s easier if I’m just a lost visitor looking for the bathroom. As the metal doors of the elevator closed, a gust of warm air mixed with the frigid stench of formaldehyde. Sending a chill down the backs of my legs and arms. The thrill of being where I am not supposed to be, the pull of what’s left after life, an amalgamation of power and positioning took control and without blinking I was there. Staring down at a husky, stark naked man from the medical examiners stool. Just dead weight on a table. The tag on his toe read. Derrick Stowd. Without blood coursing through the immense highway of veins and arteries, his skin was fair as snow. I knew he wouldn’t move when I pried his fingers back, farther, farther. Rigor Mortis gave me resistance, but I channeled that stored energy and found myself exploring the parts of my body only the devil would compel me to touch. His chest was marked with blue ink, dashes in the shape of a Y. His heart was still in his chest. Dormant, sleeping, waiting for a shock to run through its nodes, a twitch it will perform even in death. We are simply and extensively, voltage boxes covered in skin and disorders. Destined to lose the spark and decay.
The ME’s coffee was still steaming on his desk. He’s due back any moment and I’m in too deep for the bathroom excuse. Back up the elevator, down the passageway and out the front door. I spent the bus ride home imbibing on the lingering scents on my fingers. The smell of death on one, the scent of pleasure on the other. I passed the tips of my death fingers around my lips the way my mother used to put on lipstick. The pulse of life quickened my heart as I bit my lip. Copper and stainless steel, life and death join into a potion. An enchantment. A compulsion.
Life is such a simple thing. A flicker in the eye that passes through the heart and tells the body to keep it up. It is the spirit that separates mind and body. It is the suture woven between them. I find myself desiring to pull that thread, to see the spark travel from the heart back to the eyes.
I passed my stop four stops ago. I couldn’t move my legs. Paralyzed with desire, I craved nothing more than the dark red blood of someone’s veins painted on my skin. To gaze straight through their blown pupils and count away the moments till the stardust in their minds vanish.
It wasn’t until the passenger next to me pulled the cord, telling the driver to stop, that I noticed my hand was holding the spork from inside the to-go bag. To see it was unwrapped, and the second to last tine had been snapped off. The guy barreled past me before I could move my knees. Sending my second attempt at breakfast to the floor. Something about the color of the white gravy on the aluminum floor sent my mind into slow motion. I could feel my chest getting tighter. My free hand pulled on the coat tails of the guy and in the flash of a reflex, he was back in the seat beside me. Muffled voices grew louder and less distinct. Lost echos from an ancient civilization. I saw mother coming into my room, her eyes searching for the bowl of creamed corn. For the Spork. By now the potion had taken full effect, I sat upon the precise moment on which to act. There is nothing after. Only this, here, now, this dirty old man, this plastic piece of memorabilia.
He fought at first. He yelled when he felt the plastic shards break off in his neck. I snapped the spork and sliced into his thyroid membrane. Only the passengers could be heard now. All of them yelling and hollering, not one of them doing anything about it. His arms flailed as a bird with broken wings. I placed my hand over his throat, I wanted to feel his pulse slow. I wanted to be able to count the moments. To live in each one. There it is. Three. Two.......One.
#thriller #horror #murder #fiction #feminine #female #pain #explode