fiction by wes demars

Meltdown

In the washed-out light of your bathroom, your skin appears waxen and the color of tallow. The discoloration underneath your eyes look more like you lost a fight than they do dark circles; the whites of those eyes themselves are bloodshot. Your hands shake as they cup underneath the searing cold of the faucet. A shiver cuts through your body as the water hits your face, seemingly shocking every nerve at once. Goosebumps rise up on your bare arms.

 “Having trouble, are we?”

“Shut up.”

Your voice crackles with disuse, lips feeling more wooden than flesh. It feels as though the floor is about to give way underneath your feet, the rot finally having spread out from your core to the very spot you stand. That, or the way the world is pitching is from the nausea as your stomach clenches, hollow aside from the bile that resides within. You’ve long given up on trying to figure out which is the case. Clutching the sides of the sink in a death grip, you force yourself to meet the gaze of what faces you in the mirror.

With dawning horror, you realize that you don’t recognize the person staring back at you.

Behind you stands The Man, features blurry and distorted as they always are, shifting and changing by the second. Even in the brightness of the bathroom fluorescents, he seems to bring his own darkness, all-consuming and producing more shadows than what should be possible. He leans down, looking over your shoulder into the mirror. A single claw reaches around to prod at the skin covering your cheekbone. You watch in the mirror as he slides the razor-sharp instrument down the meat of The Thing’s cheek, the skin opening up like cutting through softened butter. It doesn’t bleed. Why doesn’t it bleed?

“My, My. You’ve let yourself go. Again.”

“I’m fine.”

You feel something run down the side of your face. The Man has retreated, leaning back against the wall. The Thing’s expression in the mirror twists from one of apathy to fear, eyes widening just a fraction, pupils contracting. Its hand moves as your hand moves, and it prods at its cheek when you prod at your own. Something warm and slimy quickly coats your fingers. It feels less like a tug when you pull at your cheek and more like pulling apart wet clay.

When you look, you find that some of your skin has sloughed off into your grasp.

You can’t find it in yourself to scream.

“Let’s face it: you can’t keep going like this.”

“I don’t think I can stop.”

“Why?”

Why indeed.

Any normal person would answer with something like I don’t get sick nearly as often, or I get more done this way. What would your answer sound like? I always feel like I’m being watched unless I’m at home; I’m alone so I don’t have to worry. That’s a lie, what with The Man always being around and now the sudden appearance of The Thing, you haven’t been alone in a very long time. It would probably sound something closer to this: I’ve always been a socially anxious person but now I’ve let myself become so agoraphobic that I don’t know how to be a person anymore. I would rather rot in my home than try to make any meaningful contact. At least I can get paid while I’m at it.

I’m less of a hazard for other people this way.

You prod at your face again. The Thing smiles in the mirror. Your lips are quirking up in a similar fashion, the action unbidden. Your face melts more under your probing. Oh, God. Your nerves oscillate the blaze of a forest fire and the quiet numbness of Novocain. You feel something crawl under your skin, distorting your arms, hands, shoulders, legs—anywhere, really. You wish The Man would take his claws to it, tear where it would be useful, but instead he watches with acute boredom. You almost think you see him yawn. Amidst the fear and fatigue, anger boils up through your chest. You open your mouth to scream, Do something, anything-! And—

Something is lodged in your throat.

It is only when you try to speak that you finally notice it, finally begin to choke on it. You gag, leaning over the sink as you expel the blockage—

Roaches. . .

Maggots. . . .

As they make their quick escape, you feel them tear your lips apart. Chunks of waxy flesh mix with the squirming mass. They stand out, stark against the black sludge they’re coated and writhing in. Blood mixes with the rot, dribbling down what remains of your mouth and chin in sluggish streams. The maggots writhe in the porcelain. Another gag sends more insects flying. A roach crawls over your hand that has the sink in a vice grip; it’s all you have keeping you standing. An inhuman shriek bounces off of the tile. You whirl around, dizzily searching for the source of that animalistic sound for a moment until you realize it came from you. It’s in that moment you find your voice again.

“Help me–”

“Why should I?”

In the mirror, The Man crosses his arms and tilts his head. If he had any discernible features, you’re sure his expression would be a stern one. As it is, his many faces oscillate between varying shades of irritation and pity. Your breath stutters in your chest as you turn to face him, the hair on the back of your neck prickling as you take your gaze completely away from The Thing for the first time. Softly, you say:

“…Please.”

        The Man scoffs. The Thing titters.

“Pathetic.”

Despite the admonishment, The Man steps forward, one clawed hand gripping your wrist harshly while the other cleanly snatches the skin that’s oozing through your fingers. He presses his palm to the ruined landscape that is your face, smoothing the skin back over your cheekbone with the swipe of his thumb. It’s gentle, almost lover-like, and you find yourself leaning into the contact. The hand at your wrist releases its grasp as it reaches around your form into the sink behind you. You’re sure he’s picking up what is left of your lips out of the sludge and despite the disgust that churns in your stomach, you’re focusing on the way he towers over you. His hands are warm, almost too warm for comfort. Your eyes close despite, a relieved sigh slipping out of your nose. His hand presses over what was your mouth. He works your lips back into place with the precision of a ceramist sculpting his most recent piece.

Despite the care The Man takes, they don’t feel quite right on your face. The Thing continues to titter behind you—or is it beside you? Your eyes fly open, the contentment that was warming your chest turning to ice as panic overcomes it. You can’t see The Thing, although you can’t be sure if it’s because it’s somewhere else in your house or if it’s hiding behind The Man. It cannot be behind you, you’re sure, because your spine isn’t crawling anymore. The Man cradles the back of your head with the hand that so carefully set your lips right.

“Settle.”

Despite your fear over The Thing, the torturous jack-rabbiting your heart had started doing begins to calm back to its normal pace. Tremors wrack your body, and you feel the way your joints creak and threaten to come apart at the seams.

“I cannot always do this.”

“I know.”

“Next time I won’t put you back together.”

A series of particularly rough tremors course through your body. With the first, your arm falls to the grimy tile with a thump. With the second, your jaw cracks and the skin splits on the side that isn’t being cradled by The Man, hanging limp and useless. A sad, low keen comes from your throat, more out of surprise than actual pain. It should hurt more, but it doesn’t; your nerves are so overworked and fried they can’t find it in themselves to do the one job they’ve been tasked with.

The Man’s hand comes away from your head and pushes your jaw back into place, smoothing over your clammy skin. Despite the harsh words and how clinically he puts you back together, his hands cradle your face so gently. You should hate this; you’ve always hated being touched, flinching away from contact, anticipating pain or pleasure when you weren’t successful and never able to tell which one it would be. Right now, you’re too tired to care.

Your body sags like a marionette with its strings cut. The Man’s hands leave your cheeks—the absence of the tenderness causing something lonely and ugly to writhe in pain in your chest—and he puts his clawed hands on your waist, steadying you. For all his coarseness, he’s never let you fall, and you’ve never not trusted him to keep you upright. As many times as you and The Man have done this song and dance, you think he should let you fall this time. You wish he would break that trust, show you how misplaced it is. Instead, his hands are firmly placed underneath where your ribcage gives way to the soft flesh of your sides, tight enough to keep you standing but not hard enough to hurt. He presses the pads of his fingers into your back, careful to keep his claws from tearing you up further. Under his touch, you feel a little more put together.

Exhaustion catching up to you, you lean against The Man, nosing into the junction where his shoulder and his neck meet. This is the most you’ve ever touched him; the last several times the only touches shared between you and him were fleeting and dispassionate. He’s warm where you would expect him to be freezing, his darkness blanketing you like a comforter on a particularly bitter winter’s day. You wrap your remaining arm around his shoulders, not caring to think of how he may reproach you for this. Maybe he’ll let you fall for this; you could forgive him for that in this moment.  

He doesn’t.

The Man shifts you in his grip, one hand sliding up to rest firmly between your shoulder blades, the other sliding down to your hip. He pulls you closer, pressing his cheek to your head. A lump forms in your throat, fear stabbing your belly at the thought of a repeat of the bugs. You know you need to get the rot out somehow, but the thought of vomiting it up again makes you want to scream and curl into a ball so, so small, smaller than anything in this house, so small that nothing could ever hurt you again, yourself included. You open your mouth and—

Unbidden, a sob is what shakes out of your throat, tears forming so quickly that you find yourself dizzy as the world swims in an entirely new way than what you’re used to.

You haven’t cried in so long.

You thought you might have forgotten how to.

You haven’t.

You and The Man stay like that for a long while—could be hours, could be seconds, the difference doesn’t mean much to you—swaying to an unknown rhythm. Eventually your crying dies down and you begin to doze with eyes burning behind half-closed lids, swaddled like a babe within his warmth. At some point The Man re-attaches your arm with the same care and precision he’s been affording you tonight. You burrow your face further into his neck, pulling him impossibly closer to you. If you were able to, you would crawl into his ribcage and stay there for the rest of eternity. Tonight, you trick yourself into thinking he would try to find a way to make that a reality.

In a blink, you find yourself bundled in his arms and out of the sterile bathroom lighting, back in the dimness of your bedroom. The room is bathed in the warm glow of the lamp next to your bed rather than your laptop’s harsh glare. The desk has been cleaned up, papers neatly tucked away in folders, the myriad of cups and dishes cleared away. Another blink and you feel yourself being lowered into your bed, The Man continuing to be aware of his claws. Despite the care, you feel a claw drag against your side in a way that will certainly show up in the morning. It isn’t enough to draw blood, maybe enough to bruise. You feel him draw away, and that ugly little creature in your chest—you think it nestles itself somewhere between your diaphragm and your heart—starts to keen like a wounded animal at the loss of contact.

“Don’t go.”

You don’t know why you say that. You don’t know why you sound so broken when you say it. You’ve had years to be used to being alone, years telling yourself that you don’t need other people. Why is it tonight that you find yourself wanting—starving—for the tenderness of another?

“I cannot promise to stay.”

Your hands fist in The Man’s clothes. You wish his features were clearer, wish they were easier to read. Maybe then you would be able to figure out if he was doing this only out of obligation or if it was genuine care. The former seems more likely, but you find yourself terrifyingly hopeful it’s the latter.

He cradles your face in his hands, hunched yet still towering over you. Something in your hindbrain tells you that you should be afraid, but how could you be afraid of this? The warmth of his hands lull you back into a comfortable tiredness, your grip on his clothing slackening as you teeter on the edge of sleep. Your vision is fuzzy, and through your eyelashes The Man is starting to look more like a puddle of black; a splotch of ink on a white shirt.

“The Thing—”

“Gone.”

“Are you sure? I don’t know where it went…”

“I am certain. It has left.”

You can’t think of anything else to say to make him stay. Suddenly you wish you were better with your words, better at holding attention rather than fading into the background. Under the warmth of The Man, you’re suddenly aware of how strung out you feel underneath the fatigue. What will happen when he leaves? You may just end up falling apart again; you’re not sure if you’ll be able to put yourself back together, nor if you would care to try.

You don’t know why you need him to stay so badly. You’ve never wanted him to stay before—and he never did. He was always gone before you could realize you wanted to miss him.

“Stay until I fall asleep?”

“. . . I can do that.”