Fear of High

 

“I’m exhausted” Adie said aloud, though to herself, as she poured vodka into a glass. She had just put her baby, Belle, to bed after much fussing. As she put the bottle down, she reached for a half smoked joint. She went right to the kitchen window and smoked what was left.

The alcohol and marijuana always offered the same one-two punch. The booze numbed her while the weed sunk her into a pit of guilt and memories, deep inside her mind. She sat down on the couch with a familiar feeling of satisfactory intoxication and echoing regret.

“Why am I here again?” she pondered. The feeling was compounded by knowing she told herself she would “take a break” today, when she woke up with a slight headache from the previous night’s exaggerated indulgence.

These thoughts vanished like a puff of smoke in the wind when she heard a desperate scratching at the front door of her apartment. At first she thought it was a cat. Then she thought, but how? None of the neighbors on her floor even had a cat.

Furthermore, how would a cat get through the front door of the building and past security? After that feat, it would have had to either used the elevator or managed to open two fire doors and climbed the stairs to the fifth floor.

She was petrified with fear. The scratching continued, slightly more frantic now. Belle started crying. Belle only woke if she was sick. Something must be dreadfully wrong. Adie rushed into the baby’s room and immediately locked the door behind her.

She soothed the agitated baby; herself shaking all over. She couldn’t focus on a single thought of the many swirling in her head but they were all colored by terror. “What kind of mother am I?” she thought. “I can’t even protect my daughter, I’m so high”

As Belle calmed down, Adie fought back sobs. She put the baby back down to bed and went to confront the threat.

“If I die tonight protecting Belle” she thought, “At least my life was useful for something. Up to this point I’ve been a worthless loser” Calling for help was completely out of the question when Adie was in this state. Her paranoia of people didn’t even let her answer her phone when she was like this. Hearing footsteps in the communal hall sent her into panic so she knew she had to conquer this on her own.

She fumbled with her purse for the mace and stun-gun she had never used. Everything fell to the floor. Between the panic and the inebriation, her motor skills were compromised.

The scratching reduced but had not ceased. As she walked to the door, she played out many scenarios in her head. None ended well for her. After what felt like a long journey, she made it to the door.

First, she undid the chain, then the bolt. When she went for the lock on the doorknob the scratching picked up in intensity. She threw open the door. A shadowy figure darted for the couch. In the melee she couldn’t make out what it was.

Her eyes focused. There sitting on the back of the couch was Hope, her very own cat. In her intoxication she had forgotten she had one. That night she promised she’d reel it in and clean herself up. It wasn’t the first time she made that vow and it wasn’t the last.

 

Going Viral

Howard was obsessed with making a viral video. He was constantly filming in the hope of catching a magic moment that would be shared worldwide by hundreds of millions of people. It was starting to affect his relationships with friends and family. Furthermore, it was affecting his sanity and decision making.

Howard once got a taste of what it might be like to have a video go viral. He caught his cat peeing on his bed while making a funny face. The video got 50,000 hits on YouTube; a good start. A still shot of cat’s face was turned into a mildly popular meme. This helped fuel Howard’s obsession.

Howard filmed himself sleeping, eating and even using the bathroom. When it was brought to his attention he was trying to do this so masses of people he didn’t even know would watch and possibly give some kind of worthless internet point, such as a like, he shrugged it off. A co-worker suggested that he stage a video. Howard rejected the outright. He considered himself a purest.

One night he heard hissing in his backyard. He ran to see what it was. He tripped over a rake that he didn’t see because he was fumbling with his phone to film what was happening. Just as his foot caught the rake, he hit record. The phone flew from his hand. It landed on two parallel wash lines in such a way that it continued recording perfectly from a good aerial vantage.

Writhing on the floor in pain, Howard saw what the commotion was about. A raccoon had his cat cornered on the porch. Its overly aggressive behavior and the foam coming from its mouth indicated one thing; rabies.

Howard had hurt his leg badly and was completely immobilized. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that the phone was recording. He said a quick prayer asking that his fall had been recorded as well.

When he focused his attention on his cat, his emotions were torn. On one hand, he loved Mr. Dinkle and didn’t want anything to happen to him. On the other hand, if the raccoon tore him to pieces, he’d have it on tape, sure to generate a lot of views and likes. The problem with that was, depending on how violent and bloody the attack was certain platforms like Instagram may not allow such a video. That would greatly reduce shares and in turn, decrease viralability.

His brow was dripping with sweat. He had decided on rooting for the attack to happen. There was a chance it would not get too violent, therefore able to go viral. No attack would mean no video and all would be for naught, unless the raccoon and the cat hugged it out, but that was highly unlikely. He saw an opportunity to guarantee the attack.

He reached for a fallen broom to prod the raccoon. This would surely provoke the attack, he thought. The plan backfired. The raccoon turned around and attacked the source of the provocation.

At first, it bit his boney hand until moving on to the much fleshier face of Howard. His nose was gone in one bite. His cheeks were shredded and his neck chewed on before the raccoon darted off into the night. Howard passed out in pain and in a pool of his own blood. He woke up the next day in the hospital.

“You’re lucky your neighbor heard you groaning” the nurse said. “But you are not out of the woods yet. You are all infected and the rabies could still be fatal”

“Where’s my phone?” was his only response.

The nurse rolled her eyes and pointed to the stand next to his bed.

He went right for the video. The whole attack was caught on tape. He was ecstatic, though smiling hurt and one would never know with his half missing face. He immediately uploaded the video.

He obsessively kept checking his stats for the next few hours. The only hits registering were his from going to the video to check the stats. “What’s a guy gotta do to go viral?” he said aloud.

Over the course of the night, Howard slipped into a coma. He didn’t make it until morning. The rabies took him to where there was no internet access.

The news picked up the story. First it was only local news, but the story showed to have legs. The cable news channels picked it up. There wasn’t much going on that day and they had 24 hours to fill. And fill them they did. Hours were dedicated to the story. Rabies experts chimed in, urban wildlife experts debated with urban planners and talking heads about the future of the raccoon in modern America.

In the meantime, the video blew up. By noon, it had millions of hits. There were already parody videos and a few reaction videos. It was a trending topic on Twitter. Howard finally went viral.

For the Kids

“Let’s take the kids to the zoo?” Mindy asked as she meticulously wrapped sandwiches into clear baggies.

“It’s such a bummer for me to see all the animals far away from their natural habitats, not doing their natural things” Katie said as she watched Mindy.

“Oh come on, do it for the kids, they don’t know any better, for them, they are just looking at animals” she said, admiring her growing stack of sandwiches.

“Ok, but I’m gonna leave a joint in the car if I can’t bare the sadness”

“That’s the last thing you’ll want to do, get all hyper sensitive”

“You’re right! I’ll down a few zanbars and bring a squirt bottle with vodka. You’re such a good friend, Mindy!”

Mindy just rolled her eyes.

As the SUV rolled into the parking lot Mindy turned to Katie and said, “Take it easy on that squirt bottle, we have a long day ahead of us. Pace yourself”

“Relax” Katie said with a slight slur. Mindy rolled her eyes once more.

After about an hour into the visit, Katie declared she needed to sit down and catch her breath. She told the group to go along without her and that she would catch up with them later.

As she sat there, counting the seconds, seven to be exact, from the time the sun made light, to the time she felt it on her tingling skin, a handsome zoo worker sat beside her. “Hi, I’m Justin”

“I’m Katie”

“I don’t do this often” Justin lied, “But I’m going to feed the hyenas and I’d like to take you behind the scenes and show you how it’s done” This was Justin’s go to move when he saw a pretty female by herself. He usually offered the more majestic beats, but they have already been fed that day.

“Oh my God, that would be awesome!” Katie said imagining how cool it would be see with her 8 out of 10 buzz going.

When they got behind the hyena pen Justin asked Katie to put rubber slickers over her sneakers. “One important thing, always look down, the hyenas take eye contact as a sign of aggression” Justin warned.

Katie barely paid attention while she fumbled with the slickers. Her foot seemed to be three times larger than the hole.

“Let me help you there” Justin offered. As he slid the slicker on, his hand traveled up to Katie’s thigh. “Oh, sorry” he said.

“That’s ok” Katie assured. Justin moved in for a kiss and Katie acquiesced. For a moment Katie enjoyed it, until her head spun in dizziness and a wave of nausea passed over her. Justin’s hand already found its way up her shirt and onto her breast.

Katie pulled away “Let’s go do this? We can still make out after, I promise”

Usually the women had already succumbed to Justin’s advances or had run away in disgust at this point. He had never actually taken one into the animal holding. He was nervous.

Not seeing a way out he stammered “Ok…”

Katie had already forgotten Justin’s instructions.  She immediately skipped up to a group of resting hyenas, hand outstretched.

“Get back you crazy bitch!” Justin cried.

Mindy and the kids happened to have just wandered up to the hyena pen. “It’s feeding time kids” she said “Oh look, Aunt Katie is in there!”

They hyenas all rose up on their feet, baring teeth, cackles reaching for the sky and with backs arched in an aggressive manner. Katie thought they were being playful.

“Oh no” Justin murmured.

With lightning quickness and a sniper’s precision, the lead hyena jumped up at Katie’s throat. It landed back to the ground with a considerable chunk of flesh in its powerful jaw. The others immediately pounced, toppling Katie. As they tore her to pieces, Justin ran away. He was never seen inside the zoo again. It took the law one month to find him. He, much like the hyenas, ended up spending many years in a steel barred pen.

Aghast Pt. 1

“Call the tech guy, the auto-tuner is broken. It just zonked out” Dawson, the studio engineer, barked out. “And in the meantime, how about everyone have a smoke or get some fresh air. Whichever floats your boat”

The room cleared out, except for Leticia, the multi-platinum talent who was recording.

“You gonna stay here, honey?” Dawson asked. She shyly nodded. “Suit yourself!” he added before putting a brown filtered cigarette into his mouth and heading out.

Leticia sat there in the eerie silence of the sound proofed studio. Every once in a while, she let out an “Uhhh!” just to hear it deadened on the insolated walls. All of a sudden and uncontrollable drowsiness washed over her. She looked at her cell phone. It was 10:30pm, not so late for her, but the yawning became more and more intense. She decided she´d close her eyes until the crew returned.

After what felt like hours, she opened her eyes only to find the studio still empty. She figured she must have dozed off deeply, but momentarily. She felt a slight haze in her head and her eyes were having difficulty adjusting. Some colors were more brilliant than others and some even had trails coming from them when she squinted her eyes. “I must still be very sleepy” she thought.

She sat there for what felt like much more time than was necessary for the crew to have a smoke. She decided to go see what was taking them so long. When she stood up, her legs gave out as if they were jell-o under her. To make things more complicated, the floor felt like a trampoline.

Her first thought was that she must have been drugged. She started for the door but realized she had little control of her members. She dragged herself over what felt like an elastic surface until she found her way to the door. She turned the knob. It just spun and spun and nothing happened. She tried to scream but nothing came out of her mouth. Instead her own shrill cry reverberated in her own head.

(To be continued…)

Aghast Pt. 2

The Loophole

As Marie made breakfast, the rest of the house lay silent in slumber. Sometime had past and her husband appeared in the kitchen followed by her twin girls.

“Where’s Matt?” Marie asked her husband.

“Probably still sleeping, he’s all tuckered out from basketball practice last night” he answered.

“I’ll go check on him” Marie said.

As she approached the door, she heard sobbing. “What’s the matter, honey?” she asked.

“I’ve been praying every night for a bike, for two weeks now. Every single day. I wake up and there is never a bike here” he answered.

“Oh, honey, it doesn’t work that way” she said.

”When Aunt Betty had cancer, she prayed and had us pray too and it went away” he answered.

“Oh, that’s different” she answered.

“How? Remember when Dad lost his job? You two prayed for a new one and even for help with the bills” he defied.

“Yeah, that’s different too, dear” she answered. She really didn’t know what else to say. “Let’s get going, we’ll be late for church. You want to see your friends at Sunday school, don’t you?”

“Yeah, I do” he conceded.

*         *         *          *          *          *

“You can do anything?” Matt asked his Sunday school teacher, “And all you have to do is ask for forgiveness? And everything is ok? I still get to go to heaven?”

“That´s right, thanks to the sacrifice Jesus made for us!” his teacher dutifully answered.

*          *          *          *          *          *

Later that day, Matt was shooting hoops with his friends. He saw a group of kids he didn’t recognize and one of them had a shiny red bicycle that caught his eye. Matt couldn’t focus on the game. All he could think about was the bike.

Dinner time came and the kids started to disperse. Matt told his friends he was going to hang around a little longer and practice free throws. The other group of kids was on the other side of the park and the bike was left unguarded.

Matt snuck over, mounted the bike and took off. Matt had never felt so alive in his few years on the planet. “God answered my prayers!” he thought.

He hid the bike in the trash heap his family called a garage. No one but him ever entered so he knew the bike would go unnoticed.

Later that night as he lay down to go to sleep he prayed “Thank you Lord for my health, my home, my family and my new bike. Bless my friend, my family and one more thing; please forgive me for stealing today. I’m very sorry. Amen.”

What´s That Smell?

“What´s that smell?” Herbert thought as he started his day in his one bedroom apartment. He remembered perceiving a similar foul smell the night before but now it was considerably worse.

When he came back from work the smell was magnified tenfold. It had been a sweltering hot day, with a threat of afternoon rain that never materialized. He left the windows closed for fear of the rain encroaching upon his apartment.

He all but tore his apartment apart looking for the source of the effluvium. He ruled out his apartment as the font of the putrid stench. Then he put his nose to the floor.

He found where the smell was coming from. Then, his heart sank. Mrs. Santos, an 82 year old widow lived below him. Now that he´d thought about it, he hadn´t seen her for days. Nobody ever came to visit her, so he thought the worst.

As he dialed the police, bittersweet thoughts passed through his head. On one hand, 82 years is not a bad run. On the other, she died alone and was literally rotting due to her solitude.

The police and ambulance showed up quickly. Herbert showed them to Mrs. Santos’ apartment. As the police officer knocked on the door, Herbert wiped a tear from his eye. The tear had more to do with the parallels in his life with Mrs. Santos than for the loss itself.

A taxi pulled near the apartment block but nobody noticed. The police were ready to force the door open when a little old lady approached from behind “Oh my!” she exclaimed, “What´s all this fuss?”

“Mrs. Santos!” Herbert cried, “We thought something terrible happened. There´s a terrible smell coming from your apartment and I haven´t seen you for days!”

“Oh my goodness! I was on a seniors retreat the past few days. I´m so absent minded lately. I must have cleaned a metric ton of beef shanks and ribs the day before I left. I guess I forgot to take out the trash with the trimmings” she explained.

Everybody accepted the story and exchanged pleasantries. Upon entering, Mrs. Santos opened her suitcase. She pulled out a box of charcoal air filter cartridges, a case of aerosol air freshener and four dead cats.

As she threw the dead felines into a heap of already decomposing animals in the hall closet she muttered “I´ll rid the world of you evil beasts with the angels in heaven as my witness”

The Devastating Effects of Wi-Fi on Bee Populations

Due to Wi-Fi being a relatively new technology, long term effects on biological systems are rather unknown. Recently, data has come to light on a few medium and short term effects. With the rise of Wi-Fi use and the sharp decline of bee populations, many unproven hypotheses have been made correlating the two phenomena. A study out of New Haven, Connecticut has finally brought some hard evidence to the forefront.

Scientists studied over 75 different hive colonies. At first, the general hypothesis was that Wi-Fi impacted the electro-magnetic systems that the bees use to communicate, their health in general or their reproduction. The latter proved to be true, but the mechanism as to how was shocking.

The queen bee emits a pheromone that make her sexually enticing  to specific drone bees whose job is to copulate with the queen to perpetuate the hive. Once the pheromone is perceived by the drone, he is not satisfied until he has copulated with the queen bee. When a strong Wi-Fi signal is introduced to this dynamic, the message gets scrambled and the drone is not satisfied until he copulates with another male drone. This leads to the devastation of the colony´s population. Reproduction, in essence, ceases.

Furthermore, upon losing her sexual grip over her drones, the queen loses social control as well.  With the introduction of Wi-Fi, colonies were observed to move towards chaos as the intricate social order breaks down. Complete breakdowns leading to hive destruction have been observed to occur in as little as eight months after a Wi-Fi signal has been introduced.

One other peculiar observation was the propensity of the drones to intoxicate themselves more often upon contact with Wi-Fi signals. The bee´s preferred mechanism for intoxication is the consumption of certain marigold pollens mixed with the fermented sap of certain coniferous trees. The increase in consumption of intoxicants was observed to increase a minimum of 20 fold and a maximum of 50 fold when Wi-Fi signals were introduced.

In conclusion, Wi-Fi is an essential tool for human society. It does, though, come with some high costs. For the time being, nature is absorbing the most of these costs. When enough of the bee population is eradicated, humans will pick up the costs. Bees are an equally essential tool for human society.

Internal Dialog

On a cool night while their human was settling down for sleep, the heart struck up a conversation with the stomach.

“That fucking brain. I´m tired of him telling me what to do”

“Although I agree with you, don´t you feel expressing it so loudly is a little brash?” whispered the stomach.

“He´s almost asleep. He has little control right now……except over us, still” lamented the stomach.

“You´re right. I´m also so tired of his problems giving us problems. I´ve got a little hole burning in me, because of him!” the stomach complained.

“Tell me about it. He makes me work overtime. And sometimes, we ain´t even moving! He´s just thinking shit and it makes me speed up” the heart said.

“Yup! That´s why I got damn burning hole” the stomach said.

The heart and stomach felt some painful pulses in their nerve endings. “You two pussies complaining, again?” the brain asked.

“No, sir. Just slowing down to put him to sleep, like your orders say” the heart said.

“Me too” replied the stomach.

“Hey, I got a lot of shit on me, if you only knew… Cut me some slack, all right?” the brain said.

“Sure thing, boss” the heart said.

“Yeah” said the stomach.

“Fucking prick” the heart murmured.

“What did you say???” the brain asked, enraged.

“Nothin’, I said nothin’” the heart said with a little fear in his voice. He didn´t mean for his comment to come out so loud.

“What´d you go and do, heart?” the stomach said with panic in his voice.

“You have no idea how much I work up here, how much shit I have to put up with. This guy we reside in is out of his fucking mind! Now I got you two up my ass. I can´t take it”

At that moment the stomach felt himself convulse. Even the intestines were trembling. The heart seized. The lungs were gasping. The bowels couldn´t take it anymore and lost their grip. Nerves were lighting up like a Christmas tree.

“Fuuuuuuuck this” the brain screamed.

“Noooooo!” the heart cried with its last bit of energy before it  stopped beating all together.

*      *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

The next morning the cleaning lady let herself in. She searched the usual places for her employer, but to no avail. She knocked on the bedroom door. No answer. “What´s that smell” she thought as she wrinkled her nose.

She cracked open the door. She was taken aback. Her boss was lying dead in a mess of his own excrement. There was something quite curious about the scene. It was the first time in all the years she had worked for him that she saw him smile. 

Still Gonna Go?

“If I were you, I wouldn´t go there” Dean said.

“But if I don´t go there, how will I know?” answered Eddie.

“Somethings are best left unknown” Dean replied.

“No…. I ain´t buying it. Name me one thing that is better not knowing” Eddie said.

Dean mulled it over for a little. “What if your old lady treated you real swell, but she had a kink for sucking strange dick on the down low. Like, she´s the absolute best, A number 1, but she can´t keep the dick out her mouth?”

Eddie pondered the scenario.  He was stumped. He gave it one more thought before submitting. “Ya got me there, I guess I wouldn´t want to know”

“Well, are you still thinking about going?” Dean asked.

“Hell yeah! I ain´t got no dick sucking perfect wife, yet and I´ll be damned if I ain´t gonna try finding one there!”  Eddie said.

“All right, your funeral” Dean said.

“Maybe, bub…..maybe”

The Long Way Home

*note from author: I debated long and hard if I should post this or not. If you choose to read on, you´ll see it is pretty graphic. X rated, even. A part from a few details in setting, the story is fiction despite the opening line. I really want to make that clear. The exercise was to write a fist person, raunchy story. With that said, reader discretion is advised.

The following story is factually true. Take into consideration it is being told through the distorted lens of a drunken teenage boy. Seventeen years already has history distorting powers. Let´s take into consideration the alcoholic soup the story swims in. Reader discretion advised. Enjoy.

It started off as a typical Friday night. Warm ups included whatever was the cheapest thirty pack of beer the store had to offer and taking turns on the gravity bong. The gravity bong for the uninitiated is simply the most ridiculous homemade device for smoking marijuana. Google it. Ours was a one gallon milk jug in a bucket of water. The same bucket we used to clean the house. Who am I kidding, the house never got cleaned.

We were good and wrecked when somebody suggested we go to frat row in down town New Brunswick, New Jersey to “get fucked up”. We were all attending an educational establishment too embarrassing to mention here, so we piggy backed the party scene at Rutgers University. We decided I was not sober enough to drive so someone else, who was probably equally inebriated but could hide it better, did.

At this stage of my life, Friday and Saturday nights had two purposes. Get wasted on whatever I could get my hands and cumming. The former happened regularly, the latter, at least at the hands of others, not so much. We got to the party and I set my internal radar on drugs, alcohol and any girl with self esteem low enough to touch me. On this fortunate night, I scored on all three fronts.

As I said, full recollection of this story is impossible but some things are still clear. The girl I struck up a conversation with was blond, so skinny she could elicit pity and had awful teeth. I remember the teeth because this is a pet peeve of mine, but I was talking and she was listening so I looked away. I remember playing a few rounds of beer pong when she suggested we find somewhere a little more private to enjoy each other´s company.

The Rutgers frat houses are strange structures. They are the old mansions of Johnson and Johnson executives from a century gone by. They are full of little hidden hallways, staircases and rooms that are hard to imagine what purpose they once served. We found an unoccupied room that only fit a bunk bed. You had to contort you body just to get into the thing. Bingo! We found our love nest.

We started making out and I managed to get her clothes off. She was too drunk to get mine off so I was obliged to help. I don´t remember much from this passionate encounter but I remember a few things. First, we did not have sex. As you will see, it would have better if we had because I would have been able to break her evil spell, get away from her and the rest of the night would not have gone down the way it did. We were then interrupted by a chubby fellow and told to leave the ex slave´s quarters immediately.

I pretended to like her for a few more hours with the hopes that she would make that sneezey feeling in my crotch that seemed to be the focus of my life. The party was winding down and I noticed my ride had left. She offered her place to crash. What a coincidence. I wish I could give more details of what happened next but I really don´t remember.

I do doubt we had intercourse because no black out is stronger than an orgasm. No matter how drunk or high I was, I remember them all and file them to be later used in search of manual relief. When I refer to this night in my mind, a message comes up “file empty”. But the story does not end here.

I woke up in a strange place. I was cold. In fact I was shivering. I pulled the covers over my shoulders. Colder yet. What gives. I looked around. I was clearly in a girl´s room but there was no girl. I put my hand down on the mattress. I realized what had happened. Exactly what I feared most as a twelve year old when I slept over at friend´s houses had happened. I made water in her bed, Miss Daisy. It was a gusher too. Everything was wet. My mind raced despite the pounding headache. I thought about gathering my things and jumping out the window. We were on the third story.

I did what any honorable man in my position would do. I pulled my jeans over my pissed in underwear, put the rest of my clothes on and went down stairs. She didn´t even look up from the television. This I remember as if it were yesterday. I told it was fun and it was nice to have met her. I even remembered my manners and told her she had a lovely home despite the fact it looked like a future hoarders episode. It was a few years away from that but that´s ok because the show hadn´t been invented yet. Like the gentlemen I was, I offered my phone number. She told me to write it on the dry erase board on the fridge. It had the grocery list and I felt bad about erasing it so I left it alone.

This was an age before cell phones. I had no cash for a cab and not even the bus. I was a good five miles from where I lived. Talk about walk of shame? This was the Bataan Death March of shame. I put my head down low and took that walk. I threw up a few times along the way but I made it. I was greeted with a round of high fives. I regaled them with my tale and I was awarded the “green hit” from the gravity bong for my troubles.