Some Assembly Required pt. 2

Some Assembly Required pt. 1

Artie realized the gravity of the situation. He was trapped. His leg was in agony and he thought it was surely broken. Above all, his chief concern was that his beer buzz would pass without him watching his Netflix shows.

His cell phone vibrated on the kitchen counter. “Help!” he meekly shouted. He tried banging on the floor, trying to get the attention of the tenant below. His efforts were met with a few thumps back from the handle end of a broom.

He felt himself losing consciousness. He decided it was better that he let the feeling take him away. Either he would wake up to a possibly more favorable scenario or the sweet relief of death would alleviate the situation.

An amount of time unbeknownst to Artie had passed before he came to. He people talking. He tried to cry out but he had no voice. His vocal chords were not damaged; just nothing came out despite his better efforts. He also had no response in his limbs. “Oh my god” he thought, “I´m paralyzed.”

The voices were clearly talking about him. There was no urgency to help. They seemed to be gossiping about Artie. Nothing they said was flattering. In fact, it was hurtful. Artie even tried to cry, but no tears fell. He slipped back into unconsciousness.

Artie was startled when he felt a hand on his shoulder. He was still encased in the darkness of the armoire, yet the arm seemed to just pass through the wood.

“Artie, are you all right?” the voice asked.

Artie came to and saw his neighbor. The armoire was still in the upright position it had been before the fall. The ladder was capsized on the floor. Artie had smashed his head on a pile of lumber.

“Artie, I heard a crash and I ran up as fast as I could. I found you here unconscious! Good thing you keep your door unlocked.”

“How long ago did you hear the crash?” Artie asked.

“A few moments ago. The time it took for me to get up here”

“Wow, great!” Artie was relieved that it was only head trauma that made the episode feel like a long time had passed. He was happy to know the window of buzz was still open for optimum Netflix viewing.

The end

Some Assembly Required pt. 1

Artie carefully slid the box cutter down the taped seam as to not damage the contents of the intricate packaging. He was excited, yet nervous. He was still unsure if he would be able to assemble the armoire by himself.

In his anticipation he had watched hours of YouTube videos about putting this monstrosity together. He made a list of do’s and don’ts cultivated from perky, over caffeinated, wannabe internet celebrities. He had his unused and fully stocked tool bag and he was ready to go.

The first thing he noticed was the quality of the wood. It was extremely thick and heavy, considering how little he paid. After all, he had spent hours reading reviews and they all spoke highly of the quality materials so he shouldn’t have been surprised.

After a few hours of fervent assembly and dutiful beer drinking, the armoire started taking form, as well as his buzz. He marveled that the once pile of wood was transforming into an actual piece of furniture. The alcohol increased his amazement even further.

All was going smoothly until he got to a piece of trim that he couldn’t for the life of him figure out where to put. His determination and attention to detail were starting to float away with each gulp of cold beer. He was starting to get antsy and wanted to be done so he could watch another episode if the Netflix series he was currently on, while still buzzed.

He thought he figured out where the piece fit, on the inside of the opening for the sliding door. He had to climb in to screw this piece on. He saw it was a little high up so he propped the ladder on inside of the armoire. The screw hole was just out of reach but Artie was too much in a rush now to reposition the ladder.

As he reached over to insert the screw, the ladder slipped from under him and as he fell to the floor and the heavy armoire fell with him. It laid over him like a tomb. To make matters worse his leg was smashed and pinned under the internal drawers.

The first thing he thought was to reach for his cell phone. He was in a lot of pain, entombed in the armoire and completely stuck. A wave of panic washed over him when he realized his cell phone was on the kitchen counter. Charging.

 

To be continued…

Some Assembly Required pt. 2

A Speedy Recovery Part 5 (Final)

Part 1    Part 2     Part 3    Part 4

Months went by and although business was gangbusters, Carl had a lot of questions. First, where was Dustin? Second, how did his business go from almost going under to breaking all previous sales records if basically nothing had changed? He sold his entire stock every single day since the promotional party that Dustin threw together.

One Saturday night, as Carl was sweeping up, Dustin appeared, from what seemed like out of thin air, walking from the kitchen into the dining room.

“Hey” he said, startling Carl half to death.

Carl was at a loss for words. On one hand Dustin had, for lack of a better term, pulled a Dustin. On the other hand, things were going great and quite possibly the promotional party that Dustin had produced may have played a role.

Carl sighed “Hey. Where have you been?” he asked.

“You’re never gonna believe this” Dustin answered.

“Try me”

“Well, let me show you” Dustin said, before vanishing.

Carl demonstrated his shock with a loud “Huh?”

Dustin appeared again. “Crazy isn’t it?”

“What’s going on?”

“I’m dead Carl!”

Carl just fixated on Dustin without blinking or saying a word.

“Well, I owed someone, like, a lot of money. So I decided to sell our stash to pay it off because they were going to kill me! But, the deal went bad and I got “got””

“Oh my…” Carl said, putting his hand to his mouth, “That’s why you disappeared”

“Yeah, but check this out. Apparently, on the other side, where you go when you die, you get to call up a favor. Even a scum bag like me! So, I felt bad, for like, fucking you over, so I asked to help out the shop with my favor”

“I’ll be…” Carl just stared at Dustin, even passing his hand through him.

“I know you said ‘no fuck ups’, but I made it right, didn’t I?”

They talked through the night until Dustin had to go. Carl told of the success of the shop and Dustin told what he was allowed to of the other side. Dustin also told Carl that the shop would only continue to have success if Carl personally ran it. As soon as he stopped or tried passing the shop along, the favor would not work anymore. It was part of the “Rules”. Dustin promised to visit Carl as often as he could and that made Carl very happy.

The End.

A Speedy Recovery Part 4

A Speedy Recovery Part 1

A Speedy Recovery Part 2

A Speedy Recovery Part 3

Weeks past and business boomed. The store was crowded from the time it opened until the last call. No one had seemed to be the wiser about the special ingredient.

Carl was very conscience about trying the sandwich himself. After all, he had watched the movie Scar-face and rule number one was “don’t get high on your own supply”.

Dustin was good about keeping the supply of product flowing but was a little flakey about actually coming in and working as per the agreement. Carl was okay with that as long as he had his special ingredient.

Carl didn’t worry much when three days passed and Dustin hadn’t shown up. On the fourth day, delivery day, he became rather upset when neither Dustin nor product showed up. In fact he panicked.

With the prior stress of being in the financial doldrums, mixed with the new stress of his illicit activities, he was already having small panic attacks. Now that his special ingredient, the chi of his success, dried up, he was experiencing full blown anxiety.

He needed an escape. He wanted to feel better. He wanted to at least feel different from what he felt currently. He decided to eat a sandwich to see if it would make him feel good. Thousands of local customers couldn’t be wrong, could they?

He sat down at a table with a root beer and thought to himself, here goes nothing. And that was exactly what he felt after downing half of the sub. Nothing. He thought he should eat more but he could only put down another half because he was so full.

He felt no different, except that he was stuffed. He was perplexed. The bread was made this morning. He went to the vat that held the remainder of the secret ingredient. He scraped enough to make a pretty decent sized line and laid it out on the stainless steel prep table.

He cut a third of a straw off and snorted the substance. “What the fuck?!” he yelled aloud, eyes watering. He knew nothing about drugs but was an expert in baked goods. It was nothing more than manioc flour.

“I’m gonna kill Dustin!”

 

To be continued…

 

 

 

A Speedy Recovery Part 3

A Speedy Recovery Part 1

A Speedy Recovery Part 2

A few weeks later on a Saturday afternoon, the place was packed.

“It worked! You really pulled it off. How did you get D.J. Cyanide, one of the biggest DJs around to agree to do this?” Carl asked Dustin.

“Well, I’m a fan of his and he’s a fan of a certain product. I just called in a favor” Dustin answered.

“I’ve never seen so many people here before. This is bigger than when 94.1 ZROK did a remote from here 15 years ago!”

“And everyone’s eating sandwiches!” Dustin added, rubbing his hands together in a sinister fashion.

The place remained at capacity until closing time. Dustin and Carl had to practically beg a few stragglers to leave so they could clean up and count the day’s money.

“We did well, Dustin. This is by far the most successful promotion the store has ever done” Carl said as he sorted debit receipts from credit receipts.

“This is nothing, bro. This just gave the public a taste. The real “W” will come when the people are trying to smash down the door to get more”

“Your mouth to God’s ears”

“Ha! God…I’m not sure He’s gonna be a big fan of this endeavor”

The next day Carl saw a crowd in front of the store as he pulled up. It was only 7:00am and the store wouldn’t open for another three and a half hours. He was there to make the day’s bread.

The crowd cheered as Carl stepped out of his car.

“Sandwich man!” a man in the crowd shouted.

“We’re hungry!” another voice shouted.

“Folks, we don’t open until 10:30!” Carl said “I still have to make the bread”

“I’ll take some dough raw!” a voice cried. It was followed with a salvo of “Me too!”

Carl had a sinking suspicion that he may have gotten himself in over his head.

 

A Speedy Recovery Part 2

A Speedy Recovery Part 1

“Let me get this straight, it’s like speed, but you can eat it?” Carl asked out of morbid curiosity.

“Yes! Not only that, it doesn’t lose its potency at high temperatures. That means it can be baked into foods…like bread!” Dustin answered.

“But it’s gotta taste like shit, right?” Carl probed.

“That’s the beauty, no! Doesn’t change taste or texture. You’d never know it’s in there. Also, the buzz is subtle. You gotta snort it to get really high. But when you eat it, it gets metabolized by the liver and smooths out the buzz” Dustin stated with pride for having knowledge of something.

“Is it addictive?”

“Well, I don’t need it and I’ve been using it for months, but some people catch the hooks”

Carl knew “the hooks” meant chemical dependency; he also knew Dustin was not being completely honest when he said he hadn’t caught them himself. They went on to discuss price, availability of product and Dustin’s possible cut if they were to go through with this. One thing that held Carl back, not morality or ethics, was knowing Dustin was a world class fuck up.

“If we’re gonna to do this we’re gonna start very small and Dustin, look at me, no fuck ups. Especially that mouth of yours. You’re gonna have to keep real quiet about this”

“Scouts honor” Dustin replied, raising his right hand with his index and middle fingers extended.

“No one is even coming in to the shop, how are we going to get people hooked in the first place?” Carl asked.

“Leave that to me. I have some ideas”

“That’s kind of scary but I’ll have to trust you. I don’t know much about this world”

“Well, that’s about the only thing I know about”

“Make the calls, let’s do this” Carl said with a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.

 

To be continued….

A Speedy Recovery Part 3

 

A Speedy Recovery Part 1

As the fiscal year was winding down, Carl realized that his sandwich shop might not break even for the first time since opening. He had even made a nominal profit his first year in business. A more health conscience public and a rough overall economy were his proverbial rock and a hard place.

He tried a marketing campaign on social media, but the coupons had an error and he ended up losing money every time someone redeemed one. He tried having an in-store even but his brother got so drunk he embarrassed himself and Carl. That event was deemed a disaster. He even tried taking the healthy approach to sandwich making but that, too, fell flat.

One slow afternoon, Carl was googling small business consultants when his ne’er-do-well friend form high school, Dustin, barged in.

“Hey man! How you doing? It’s been a while. Shop’s looking good. Got any water?” Dustin said in what seemed like one breath and with incredible speed.

“Hi, Dustin” Carl replied, “You can grab a water from the fridge”

Dustin paced around the empty tables in a curious manner to get to the beverages. “Thanks man. Hey, it’s lunchtime, why so empty?” he then drained the bottle of water and let out a loud “Ahhhhh”

Carl sighed, “Everyone’s on the low carb kick and if you take the bread away, what is a sandwich?” he asked rhetorically.

“Uhhh, a shitty salad?” Dustin earnestly answered, getting a chuckle from Carl.

“You’re a little extra fidgety today, what the hell you on this time?” Carl asked.

“A little bit of this, a little bit of that” Dustin smirked.

“You haven’t changed a bit” Carl laughed.

Dustin startled Carl when he exclaimed with all the animation he could muster “I can save your store and make some cash too!!!”

“Dustin, if it’s illegal I don’t…”

“Just hear me out!”

 

To be continued…..

A Speedy Recovery Part 2

Tonight’s the Night!

 

 

[NSFW] *Note from the author: This story is a little raunchy. If you have delicate sensibilities, it may be wise to move on, otherwise, please enjoy.

 

Tonight was the night Stan had been waiting for since he signed himself up as a participant months ago on Facebook. The event billed itself as the largest orgy North Dakota has ever seen. Stan’s interest in orgies peaked when he saw some graphic videos at the tender age of thirteen.

Stan had no plans for the day, until 8:00pm, the start time. He figured he’d need his stamina so he decided to take an early run before breakfast. On his run, Stan saw a pair of the most beautiful women in spandex leggings. He ran behind them for an extra mile as to not lose his privileged view, even though it meant him going out of his way to do so.

This stimulation was too much for Stan. Upon arrival in his home, he immediately ran to the upstairs bathroom and released his sticky tension into the sink while thinking about those two bodacious bouncing butts that he dutifully trailed. He figured he’d be ok, the event wasn’t for hours and besides, “taking a bullet out of the chamber” would help him last longer, later.

Stan finished his breakfast and thought about how he could kill more than ten hours. He knew he’d have to be careful about getting excited. He needed to save his virility for the orgy.

He went to his room to play video games. He scored a touchdown in a college football game. Cartoon cheerleaders flashed on the screen with exaggerated sensuality and even more exaggerated proportions. This got Stan thinking about the orgy. Before he knew what he was doing, his shorts were down and he was depositing more DNA into a tissue, though considerably less than the first time. That’s ok, he thought, he had hours to recuperate.

After lunch, he got a text from a girl he was flirting with in his Economics class. She said her parents were out of the house and asked if he would like to come over. After a hard fought mental debate with himself, he agreed.

Almost as soon as he arrived he realized he wasn’t there to talk about the finer points of Adam Smith’s invisible hand. She led him to the hot tub, already running, on the back porch, clad in a bikini. They made out for a while and then she slid her hand under the bubbles. She was surprised to find him softer than a cone of ice cream in the hot July sun. He told her he was nervous because he found her so attractive and he had been dreaming of this moment and he couldn’t believe it was coming true. After some serious coaxing, she was able to get him just stiff enough for entrance, where in turn he immediately orgasmed.

He apologized to his disappointed lover and went home. He was a little worried at this point. There were only a few hours until the orgy and he had already had three orgasms that day; the last one being embarrassingly unimpressive.

He took a nap and upon awakening, reached for his cell phone. He flipped through Facebook and Instagram. He came across one of his favorite fitness models and lurked her page for a while. Without consciously realizing it, he was rubbing himself.

As if on some kind of pervert autopilot, he had already clicked over to a porn site and was going to town on his barely erect self. He caught himself in mid-stroke when he thought, “What am I doing? The orgy is tonight!” He couldn’t help himself, though. Stopping at this point would be like taking a steak from the jaws of a famished pit-bull. He finished with a dribble and lamented over it for a while.

As 8:00pm neared, Stan agonized over how he was going to perform after what he had done over the course of the day. Furthermore, he was quite drained and didn’t even feel like going. 8:00 struck and Stan made up his mind. He wasn’t going if it was just to make a fool of himself.

He watched a movie and decided to go to bed. He brushed his teeth and lay down. He looked at Facebook for some time and realized he wasn’t all that sleepy. There was one thing he could do in this situation. He went to his “go to” porn site and typed “orgy”. As the video loaded all he could think was “What is wrong with me?”

 

 

 

The Injection

“What if I told you that what’s in here will make you strong as an ox, lean you out and make you bigger?” Mark paused, holding a little vial of golden liquid to the light for dramatic effect, “And there are no side effects, well, bad ones anyway”

“I´d say you’re full of shit for starters and then I’d ask what do you mean by ‘not any bad ones’?” Jeremy answered as he racked the barbell and sat up from the bench.

“I’m not going to acknowledge the first part, but the side effect is that it does something to your pheromones that make some people susceptible to your smell and they go crazy over you. It’s not everyone, but the ones who do, when they get a whiff of who’s using this stuff, watch out” Mark said.

“I’m sorry but that all sounds bogus to me” Jeremy insisted.

“Then try it. For free. One month, actually, this here vial is a one month dose. Just one stick and you are good to go. I guarantee results. You’ll be begging for another in four weeks”

Jeremy’s ears perked up at “free”. He has tried almost every steroid combination known to man. He was not a stranger to putting unknown substances in his body. Even though he was incredulous of the claims, he was certainly willing to pay nothing to find out if they were true or not. “Ok” Jeremy agreed, “Stick me”

*          *          *          *           *          *

The next morning Jeremy felt slightly different. He couldn’t put his finger on what it was but he believed the substance was having an effect. He reached for the chin-up bar in his door jam. He banged out 21 pull-ups, a significant increase from the already impressive 15 in a row he was used to doing.

He got dressed for work and headed out. On the bus, he noticed more people were looking at him than usual. He caught a woman close to him nervously averting her glance. She was staring until he looked over, then she would pretend she was not looking at all.

He arrived at the office, sat down at his cubicle and turned on his computer. His boss, the director of finance, passed by to say his usual good mornings.

“Hey Jeremy how are you…” he said, trailing off as if he had lost his train of thought.

“Great Richard. I’m ahead of schedule on that project you put me on” Jeremy said.

Richard just stared, making Jeremy momentarily uncomfortable. He finally broke his silence with “Did you get a haircut or something, there seems to be something different about you”

“No sir” Jeremy chuckled.

“Well, you’re looking good and hey, about that project, that’s great and all, but really, there is no rush. Get it to me when you can”

“Sure thing, sir” Jeremy smiled. Richard backed away slowly as to not break his privileged view of Jeremy.

Tiffany, Jeremy’s cubicle neighbor arrived in time to witness the awkward scene. “What was that all about?” she asked.

“I have no idea” he answered.

“You do look different” she said, “It’s kind of hot” she offered, half-jokingly.

Jeremy laughed it off, “Thanks Tiff”

*          *          *          *           *          *

A week had passed since the injection. Jeremy was clearly stronger than before. He was breaking all of his all-time best lifts by considerable amounts. His clothes were getting tighter. He felt more energy and he was getting more attention from people, everywhere he went. When he related this to Mark in a text message, the replay was four words: “I told you so”

Late Friday afternoon, Richard called Jeremy into his office.

“Yes, sir?” Jeremy said as he approached Richard’s desk.

“Please, close the door behind you” Richard said. “Let’s get right to this. Your work is impeccable but that’s not why I’ve called you here. This is personal” Richard confessed. Jeremy was very confused.

Richard continued, “I can’t stop thinking about you” he folded his hands together and waited for a response.

“Uh, I don’t know what to say” Jeremy said his face burning with embarrassment.

“Say you’ll go with me to St. Bart’s. Next week. Everything first class and everything paid. There is a big financial conference so we have cover” he said as he rose and approached Jeremy.

“Sir, you’re m-m-married and I’m not, w-w-well, that w-w-ay” Jeremy stuttered. He hadn’t stuttered since junior high school.

“What do you mean ‘that way’?” Richard asked, “Me neither but you have become an obsession of mine, I’ve never seen a man this way. I need you” he moved in for a kiss.

Jeremy bobbed and weaved and took a step back and left Richard’s pursed lips alone in the space between them, kissing air. “Sir!” Jeremy exclaimed.

“I’ll give you a thousand dollars right now. Cash. Just kiss me” Richard said as a crazed look grew in his eyes. Richard’s silky dress pants betrayed his tumescence.

“I have to go sir” Jeremy said as he tripped for the door. He could hear Richard’s pleas for him to return as he closed the door.

The next Monday, Jeremy showed up for work very tired. He didn’t sleep well the whole weekend. The scene in Richard’s office played in his head over and over like a .GIF file on a loop. He contemplated resigning.

Tiffany arrived with a strange look on her face. “Did you hear about Richard?”

Jeremy’s heart sank into the black hole that his stomach had become. The word “No” almost didn´t make its way out of the gravity and was almost sucked back into him.

“A hiker found him in his car by the fire tower. He attached a hose to the exhaust and fed it into the inside of the car through a crack in the window. He was already dead when the guy found him but it does look like booze was involved as well”

Jeremy just stared at Tiffany without even blinking.

“I guess the pressure of this place finally got to him. He was such a good man. He’ll be missed” Tiffany said to a hollow shell of a person. Jeremy decided that very moment he would stop treating his body like a science experiment.

Unwanted Wants Pt. I

“All I want for Christmas is a nice present” complained Suzy. “I don´t even want the ´thing´” she said, making quotation marks in the air with her fingers. “I really just want someone in my life that cares about me enough to give me one”

“Be careful what you wish for” Amanda said, “Bill will give me anything I want but I hate every second of my life I spend with him”

“Of course! In fifteen years of marriage he´s given you herpes and gonorrhea” Suzy said.

Amanda sighed “If it weren´t for the kids…” she lost her train of thought but snapped back quickly, “Hey, how´s that roommate search coming?”

“I have two interviews tomorrow” Suzy answered.

“Great! Both are girls, I presume?” Amanda prodded.

Suzy hesitated.

“No!” Amanda said, “Don´t do this to yourself, again. You know if the guy is halfway good looking, you´ll pick him. Then, you´ll be fucking him in a few weeks after moving in and your life will be a certain disaster in a few months”

“Therapy is helping! And besides, very few people answered the ad. I´ve filtered it down to these two; a guy and a girl. I want to see which I click with more” Suzy defended herself.

“We both know how this plays out” Amanda said, “I just don´t wanna say ‘I told you so’ again”

“Look, I´ll give more consideration to the girl if it makes you feel any better” Suzy said.

“Because I know you, it doesn´t make me feel any better” Amanda said.

Suzy laughed nervously.

* * * * * *

The next day, Suzy was escorting a very handsome man to the lobby of her apartment building. “I had one other interview today, but she couldn´t come” she lied.

“Oh yeah?” Justin said.

“I don´t think I´ll need to reschedule, you are perfect. I think you´ll fit right in” she said.

“That´s great! But maybe out of curiosity you should see them, though” he answered.

“That won´t be necessary” Suzy said, looking into Justin´s eyes, imagining going to the beach with him.

“That´s great then! When can I move my stuff in?”

“Whenever you want, I´ll just need the security deposited we discussed…” Suzy said before Justin cut her off.

“Can I just bring a few things over tonight and get you that deposit next week?” Justin asked.

“That sounds great!” Suzy answered, but in her gut she felt a familiar twang that meant the opposite was true. “I´ll be home all day. Come when you want”

“Ok”, Justin said as he leaned in for a hug.

Suzy inhaled the sweat yet masculine aroma from the chest area of Justin´s cotton t-shirt. “Hmmmmmm” she thought to herself.

(To be continued…)

Continue to Unwanted Wants Pt. II