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”

Left Behind

 “Sometimes the fear of getting left behind is greater than the fear of getting wet.”  -Otto Kilcher

 

As Jim looked over the cliff he kicked a stone over. He counted almost three seconds before he heard the splash below. His stomach was turning over with fear. No matter how hard he tried, he could not hide the fact that he was extremely nervous about the jump.

“You´re not thinking of chickening out, are you?” Mike said.

“No” Jim answered looking not at Mike but out into the horizon and beyond to infinity.

When Jim looked down to the water below he felt a sickening dizziness. He was not sure how he was going to make this jump. He was terrified of heights, not a good swimmer and not very adventurous. In fact, he thought the notion of testing one’s self a bunch of nonsense. His philosophy in life was to be as comfortable as possible until you die.

His mother would not let him play sports as a youth for fear he would hurt himself. In junior high school he never asked a girl out for fear she would say no. In college he took accounting because he knew it was an exact science and he would easily land a job upon graduation. His life was, work, television and sleep. This vigorous schedule was interrupted when a coworker asked him if he was like to go on a picnic with some others from the office. Little did he know, to get to the picnic spot, there would be a fifty foot cliff dive followed by a quarter mile swim to a deserted island.

When the first picnic goer made the plunge, a petite secretary not much more than 20 years old, Jim almost fainted. It´s on. No turning back now.

The second person to make the jump was an ex special forces officer now turned middle manager. This comforted Jim a little more. He´s a real man, he thought. Of course he should be able to do this.

When the third, fourth and fifth jumpers were all woman, Jim knew he had jump. A few more people later, the last person jumped and Jim was the only one left on the cliff. He could see the petite secretary, the first to jump, was almost at the shore of the destination island.

All of a sudden a new dread washed over Jim. He was alone. For the first time in his life he felt the solitude that his fearful life has brought. A tear rolled down his eye. He felt grateful that Mike invited him. For the first time, he felt he wanted to belong. The water all of a sudden appeared closer, the swim, not so daunting. What waited for him on the white, soft sandy shore was a chance at friendship. A chance at belonging.

Jim closed his eyes. He cleared his mind of all thoughts. Then, with a force behind him that was not quite his own, he stepped over. He wanted to scream but nothing came out. Then his feet smacked the water, stinging them something awful, but the pain was not unbearable. In fact, it was liberating. Jim left out a “Whoo-hoo” and a fist pump over his head under the water. As he bobbed up he got his bearings and set off, doggy paddle style, to the island.