Unmade: A Neo-Nihilist Vampire Tale (8 page)

            He
looked at his pile of meat, cheese, and grease and all of the sudden, he wasn’t
hungry. He hadn’t eaten for a while so he decided to force it down anyway. He
picked the hamburger up feeling his fingers sink into the spongy bottom of the
grease-soaked bun. He deliberately opened his mouth and forced his mind
elsewhere. The meat squished and sloshed in his mouth as grease exploded from
every bit of tooth-crunched beef. He eyed the empty street as he chewed and
chewed, untasting and automatic. The burger disappeared from beneath his
fingertips with one last forced bite.

            He
sat there, feeling the fullness in his stomach and realizing it wasn’t the
pleasant fullness that usually comes with stuffing yourself to the gills. It
was that horrible, dizzy type of fullness that one gets after a long night of
drinking. The type of fullness you feel right before you find yourself emptying
out your insides on all fours. He felt it rise into the back of his throat, and
he knew there wouldn’t be any making it to the bathroom.

            The
sudden gush of greasy vomit covered the counter in front of the window. The
smell was all the more revolting because it didn’t so much smell like vomit as
it smelled like McDonald’s. He dry-heaved several times, grabbing onto the counter
to keep from doubling over as he did so. The splash of his insides must have
alerted the lady behind the counter because a few seconds later she was
standing by his side swearing at him.

            Drops
of vomit stained the front of his shirt and he attempted to stumble out the
front door with the lady from behind the counter smacking him in the head. As
soon as he stepped outside, she left him alone. He stood in the cool night air
and felt even hungrier than when he had come to the McDonald’s. He watched as
the lady from behind the counter pulled a mop bucket up to his mess and began
ascertaining how to best clean up the spew. All of the sudden he felt ten times
better, still hungry as hell, but ten times better. He sauntered past the
window smiling at the lady from behind the counter. He pressed his middle
finger up against the window and smiled at her. She only glared at him as she
struggled to clean off the countertop using the mop. Eventually, she realized
that using the mop just wasn’t going to work and that she was going to have to
use a rag. He stood there as she scooped his filth into a plastic bag and dry
heaved.

            He
left just before she finished, just in case she wanted to hit him some more. He
shuffled his way back towards his shabby apartment. The blocks swam past him as
his mind was occupied with the expression of the lady from behind the counter.
He would have smiled if it wasn’t for the constant burning in his ribs.
Vomiting was not the cure for busted up ribs apparently.

            He
found himself standing on the freeway overpass watching the cars go by with a
wistful expression.

            “It
looks like there’s not going to be any sleep tonight,” he mused.

            The
rush of the traffic was siren-like in its call, but he just didn’t have it in
him. Besides, his insides would look ever so much more interesting with a meal
inside of him. Unfortunately, he was too tired to attempt another foray into
the fast food department, and he still felt a little greasy on the inside from
his previous attempt.

            He
watched the cars as they ventured off into the night… he would be back.

            That
night he slept the sleep of the dead, haunted by nightmares and the pale
visages of demons with penetrating canine teeth. The morning was the same way,
as was the afternoon. He didn’t wake up until the sun had gone down and the
apartment became musty and cool with the reek of un-showered man.

            His
eyelids peeled open, almost sticking to his eyeballs. The pain was still there,
waiting to greet him. If only it could make some eggs and bacon, he would have
welcomed it with open arms. He laid there, wondering, ‘What now?’

            The
darkness of his apartment wasn’t conducive to simply laying about. The hunger
pains in his stomach had dwindled to almost nothing. Nature was wonderful like
that. Don’t eat for a couple of hours and you felt like you were starving.
Don’t eat for a couple of days and you felt just fine. He supposed he would
have to eat sometime but tonight was not the time. He fell back asleep, vowing
to get some food the moment he woke up.

            He
awoke with a start from the depths of some already fading nightmare. His breath
came in ragged gasps as he struggled to realize that he was no longer
suffocating. He didn’t know what he had been doing but he did know that
wherever he was in Dreamland, there hadn’t been any air. He remembered an old
myth that he had heard somewhere in his life.

            The
myth said that if you died in your dreams, then you would die in the real world.
He always laughed at that one. It wasn’t that it wouldn’t be a relief to fade
away silently in the night. It was that he had been dying in his dreams ever
since he was a little boy. Except when he died in his dreams, he was still
alive. He always became the walking dead. He supposed it didn’t matter; he was
still there, still alive and lying on his bed.

            He
performed a routine self-check and realized that despite the fact that he was
starving, he was actually coming along rather nicely. The soreness in his face
was actually fading away. His ribs ached, but only when he twisted his torso or
attempted to bend over. If he stood straight and didn’t move too quickly, he
almost felt like he was ok.

He wandered
over to the cupboards and pulled out a dusty phone book. He scanned the is of
restaurants and quickly located one within walking distance, as he had no
desire to return to the McDonald's. The mere thought of a greasy burger made
him want to dry-heave some more.

            Food…
that’s what he needed. He put his clothes on, which was a little easier this
time, and headed for the nearest fast food restaurant that he could find in the
phone book, a Taco Bell off of 21
^st
and Burnside. He had seen it
during his aimless wanderings.

            He
stumbled down the apartment stairs and set his feet upon the street. He could
walk a little easier and the streets were beautiful again. Pain was like that.
Fill your nerves up with pain and everything was ugly. Get hit in the nose and
even your mom’s face would be hideous.

            The
gutters were still filled with trash. The city still reeked of hard concrete.
But,  for a second, just a single second, it was like walking through the Lego
set of some gigantic sentient being. Sure, everything was uniform and looked
the same, but it didn’t really matter. The only thing that gave the city
personality was the trash, the bums.

            He
enjoyed his walk through the city's evening, and eventually, found himself in
front the fabled 21
^st
and Burnside Taco Bell. His mouth watered with
the thought of refried beans and seasoned semi-meat. He walked inside,
mistaking “pull” for “push” on the way in. He was too hungry to be embarrassed.
The dining room was still full even though it was 10:30 at night. He wouldn’t necessarily call the denizens of the dining room people, more like a
collection of down on their luck husks oozing weariness. They eyed him with the
suspiciousness of a people that had been crushed daily for the better part of
their recent existence. Their eyes seemed to almost bug out of their heads, accusing
him of … something. He didn’t quite know what problem they could have with him,
and he put it out of his mind for the time being.

            He
walked through the empty poles and straps that would contain a line if there
had been enough customers. He always felt stupid walking through them when no
one was there, but that’s the way it’s done. He stood back a little bit
admiring the pretty pictures of food on the lit-up menu that hangs in every
fast food joint. He made up his mind and stepped forward to order his food.

            The
boy behind the counter was obviously tired after a long day of standing and
helping people like him. He wore a headset and a shirt that had more food on it
than was probably sanitary.

            “Good
afternoon. How may I help you?” droned out of his mouth in robotic habit.

            “Yeah…
lemme get a Mexican pizza and a grilled stuffed chicken burrito… oh, and a
large drink.”

            The
tired robot read his order back to him in a monotonous fashion and declared the
price. Money was given. Change was handed back along with the number of his
order, even though he was the only one here and it wasn’t likely that anyone
would roll up and claim his food as their own. He walked to the soda fountain
and filled his cup with a bubbly brown liquid. Then he stood off to the side
awaiting his food and admiring the rainbow quality of the lit-up menu.

            “234.”

            The
robotic teen put his food on the counter and turned away to get started on the
mundane tasks of a fast food worker.

            He
snatched his food in one hand and walked outside to eat. He couldn’t stand the
thought of trying to power down his food with all of those bug-eyed Taco Bell
patrons watching his every move. He hustled out the glass door, getting the
push/pull directions right this time, and surveyed the Taco Bell parking lot.
There was no place to sit and he didn’t feel like walking all the way home
before eating.

            He
strutted down the street, feeling alive for the first time in quite a while. He
found an alley between a car wash and some apartments and sat down on what looked
to be a brick planter. Although you couldn’t really call it a planter, unless
the owners of the apartment complex were trying to grow old bark dust.

            He
sat in the alley, unwrapping his food in the dark. He went for the burrito
first. The flavors exploded in his mouth. He had a feeling that this wasn’t the
best burrito in the world, but at that moment that’s exactly what it was to
him, the best damn burrito in the world. God himself couldn’t make a better
burrito than this bad boy.

            He
chewed rhythmically, almost mechanically, mashing the chicken into the rice,
the rice into the cheese, and the cheese into the tortilla. The flavors mingled
together like the people at a particularly interesting party moving from one
group to the next until it all blended together into an almost religious
experience. When all of the elements had been mixed into one he swallowed. He
could feel the ball of mashed-up goodness travel from his mouth, down the back
of his throat, and into the hollow pit that his stomach had become.

            He
sat there eating in the dark of the city between a run down car wash and an old
apartment complex. The burrito disappeared, bite by bite, until he was balling
up the wrapper that had kept burrito juice from dripping onto his hands and his
clothes. He tossed the wrapper into the planter of bark dust and wondered
wistfully if a burrito tree would grow. No... that’s impossible. Everyone knows
burritos grow on bushes. He actually smiled as he reached for the Mexican pizza
that had been sitting there, quietly awaiting its execution at the hands of
thirty enamel covered executioners.

            The
feeling began as a sound, a low grumble in that area that had previously been
empty. The feeling quickly became an action as his long-abused ribs contracted,
propelling a mishmash of cheese, chicken, tortilla, and rice into the back of
his throat.

 There was
almost no liquid in his vomit, so the contents of his stomach came out as more
of a brick than anything else. It was like taking an exceptionally long deuce,
he pushed and pushed, involuntarily of course, and when he couldn’t push
anymore, there it was hanging from his mouth, a wiggly burrito slug. He
couldn’t breathe as his body readied itself for another bout of involuntary
Olympics. To anyone that was walking by he must have looked like some sort of
retarded Play-Doh spaghetti factory.

His wiggly
slug finally escaped his throat and landed on top of the box that contained his
Mexican pizza. He gasped for air, because, as anyone that has ever had a thick
puke knows, he hadn’t been able to breathe for the last few agonizing seconds.
He longingly regarded his new creation. It still looked good enough to eat.
Much of the rice was still recognizable as rice and he could even see a shred
or two of melted cheese. Tears sprang to his eyes as he contemplated eating his
food a second time.

He curled his
fingers into a shaky claw and took a scoop of once eaten burrito with his middle
and index fingers and placed it into his mouth. It still tasted like burrito
but it had some sort of sour coating on it, the faintest traces of long dormant
stomach acid. He chewed twice before he started retching. Eventually, a tiny
squirt of stomach acid made its way up from the back of his throat and into his
nasal passage. He gagged at the burn, as his eyes watered and snot dripped from
his mouth and nose.

When he was
done gagging he rolled over onto his side, covering himself in bark dust. He
clutched at his ribs, and tears, vomit-induced or maybe not, rolled from the
corners of his eyes. He looked like nothing more than a poor wino lamenting a
lost bottle. The hunger was even more intense now than it had been before.
Somehow he knew that the Mexican pizza hiding under his newly invented burrito
log wouldn’t do him any good.

He laid there
listening to the sounds of the city. Cars rushed by on Burnside, which was just
around the corner. It was probably eleven o’clock by now, but it didn’t really
matter. The city would never be completely quiet. The howls of street people
could be heard in the distance, unintelligible but plaintive nonetheless. The
hum of the street light burned in his ears, threatening to lull him back to
sleep.