Steak & Orange Juice

Steak. So bland.

It had been five years since I had last tasted a person. Five years since that satisfying dinner in my apartment. I had only been able to get through half of the child’s meat when the police had burst in with their dogs.

The dogs...they had a hard time controlling the dogs that night.

Well, that had been the end of living vicariously for me.

And now, for my final meal, I had to eat this insipid dry mass. Didn’t I deserve at least one leg piece today?

Just a tender, freshly cut chunk off a youngling...

Kids tasted the best- unadulterated and juicy. I had even given the guard a set of instructions on how to cook it when I noticed the disgusted look on his face. I guess not even years of being a model prisoner could make them look at me any differently.

Differently? Rather the same way they looked at all the other nondescript killers.

I often wondered if they’d ever understand. If they’d see that I wasn’t a monster. I didn’t kill for money. I didn’t kill out of jealousy. I didn’t kill because I enjoyed it. I killed simply to feed myself. And wasn’t that something they all did? How was it any different from them butchering pigs and lambs, and fishing every weekend at the lake? Didn’t I, in fact, deserve better treatment than the rest of the hooligans? Didn’t I deserve a lesser Hell?

Yet, here I was, in isolation, while the others got to share bunks.

I finished up the last few pieces of my steak, and washed it down with orange juice. Steak and OJ- the standard meal given to anyone about to be offed, if their actual wishes cannot be fulfilled.

Standard? Ah! The irony.

Perhaps my wish did get fulfilled. The wish to be treated like any other, normal, standard, fellow. I couldn’t help but smile. The steak didn’t feel so horrid anymore.