Day 169

It was on the table in the other room.

Packaged in one of those styrofoam boxes, probably getting soggy like takeout Mexican.
It wasn’t a whole one.  The Doc had cut a quarter of into a neat little chunk. Like a slice of dead pie.

Movies make it out like zombies can smell the brains of their victims.  It’s not like that.

I knew it was there, but it wasn’t so much a smell as a feeling.

Like how you might feel gravity.

I didn’t want to go in there, to that dim lit kitchen and open that box and eat those leftovers, because, honestly that’s what they were.  Somebody’s leftovers.

I didn’t want to, but in the same way you can’t jump off a ten story building and go anywhere but down, I found myself sitting at that table.

You know when you’re about to vomit and you try to not vomit? Does that work?

Maybe you’ve had too much to drink or have the flu or you’ve seen something terrible or gross and there you are, fighting the urge to let your body do what it wants.

You can  try to take control, you can focus on something happy, you can open a window, stand in front of the fan, whatever trick you want, but they don’t work.  You can’t stop the room from spinning even if you do hang one leg off the bed.

Your body is going to win and you know it

You will only feel better when your mind gives up and stops focusing on the regrettable but necessary thing you have to do.

When you accept it, you say ok, fine, I’m going to puke, and you run to the bathroom and fling up the white lid and let go of everything.

It’s one of  the most raw, violent, sickening things you can do.  You know what I’m talking about?

Good, because it’s kinda like that.

Except, instead of the bathroom, you run to the table and you lift up that white lid and instead of expunging the worst of what you did a few hours ago, you ingest the worst you think you could ever do.  You hate yourself for a few minutes, just like you did when you were puking.  You say you’ll never do it again.  But you know you will.

After it’s over, you feel a little bit better.   Well, in my case, I feel a whole lot better. Because that fat, meaty, slightly congealed part of someone I just gorged on is the most perfect food I’ve ever eaten. It fixes the hangover.  I no longer have the flu.  I feel my body repairing itself.  The shakes ease up.

I will not sleep fitfully on the cold tile floor, an arms reach away from the smell and the stained nasty butt seat.

I will instead amble over to the recliner and kick back, maybe watch some tv or read a little,  my stomach full and warm just like yours was last Thanksgiving when you fell asleep after that grand feast, not even noticing the little bit of macaroni and cheese on your shirt.

Tomorrow it begins again, the hunger, the headache and the guilt, but right now I don’t care about tomorrow and for my sake (and probably yours) not caring is the best I can do.