A Delicacy

The night had been busy, bustling with customers eating to their heart’s content, their stomachs fattening with every loaded bite of cherry cheesecake they shoveled into their mouths. I was sickened by the sight, but I swallowed my bile and reluctantly shuffled over to a customer’s table, slapping another plate of cheesecake in front of the obese man. 

“Thank ya, darling,” he drawled, his fork already buried in the moist white flesh of his third serving. I gulped as his cavernous mouth widened to accommodate the incoming bite, his jolly cheeks rounded with visceral fat, glistening in the artificial light of the diner. 

I vomited, “Not a problem, sir,” and placed a protective hand on my own rounded belly, fattened by pregnancy. 

The beast, with a belaboured breath between bites, panted, “Babe’s giving you trouble, darling? My wife,” I shuddered imperceptibly in disgust and pity for the woman who was married to the beast, “had morning sickness, vomit just spewing everywhere. Lemme tell ya, I didn’t spend one day in the house during that time. It was just too much for me!” He guffawed and stuffed his fat face full once more. “You haven’t been having any of that, have ya? If ya have, I don’t want ya serving me.” He had the audacity to look suspicious of me, shiftily glancing from my bloated belly to my flushed face, and I felt the bile rising in my throat.

“I assure you, sir, I’ve been lucky. No morning sickness from me,” I smiled assuredly, and with a nod to the man, I took the two empty plates from the sticky table. The burning in my throat was the first signal I didn’t have long. 

The edge of one of the plates chipped as I dropped them into the kitchen sink; Mark the cook shouted at me for the damage and David the manager added, “That’s coming out of your paycheque!” I couldn’t take it anymore. My throat burned and my eyes teared up as I rushed to the back. I slammed the door of the women’s bathroom open, only a hand stopping the inevitable vomit, and I ran to a stall. I released a spew of the day’s trimmings - chicken bones and frog’s feet - into the toilet bowl. I was hunched over, every muscle trembling, my stomach cramping. 

Only a few more minutes.

There was spittle dripping from my bottom lip; I absent-mindedly wiped it, smearing it up my cheek, as I pondered what this meant. Was my body rejecting the pregnancy? No, I thought firmly, this was to be expected. A human body wasn’t meant to carry this abomination, but with the help of some internet pagans, I had successfully impregnated myself. I remembered the act itself, prompting another spewing of my lunch into the porcelain bowl. My hands shook with this last expulsion of my gastrointestinal fluids, promptly emptying my body of any remaining sustenance. I felt weak and my belly ached, and an unholy pulsing protested its uterine prison.

I knew this spell was going to be rough, but I didn’t realize everything that I ate was going to come right back up! I had splurged on the frog’s feet as a last hurrah before the birth, but I now regretted that decision. I couldn’t keep anything down. The frog’s feet were to help increase the potency of a selected spell and, well, I guess birthing the antiChrist and eating frog’s feet don’t go together. 

I gathered myself, my eyes and throat burning. I vaguely noticed that my uniform was wrinkled and barely covered my translucent, distended belly. Deciding to take a gander at the unsightly paleness, I lifted up my shirt. I couldn’t stop staring.

An intrauterine hand was visible, an increasing pressure that sent another wave of nausea. I dry-heaved, my hands going to my throat in a futile attempt to stop the constant burn in my esophagus. The pressure subsided for a moment, the creature seemingly granting me a reprieve from its onslaught. I caught my breath and decided that I should return to work. 

Luckily, no customers had come upon my episode in the bathroom, so I exited the stall and stumbled to the sink to splash some water on my face, a further mercy I was allowed. I let out a heavy sigh as the cool water hit my cheeks and forehead, closing my eyes as it streamed down my face. I was still, enjoying this respite until I made the mistake of glancing at myself in the mirror.

My eyes were sunken in my skull, my skin was ghastly pale, and my collar bones protruded from the collar of my uniform. It looked as though my muscles had atrophied and the blood had drained from my body, save for my swollen, pulsing abdomen. It was at my reflection that I became utterly terrified. The internet pagans hadn’t told me this would happen. What I had done was truly unholy. 

Without sparing a second glance, I weakly raced out of the bathroom only to be stopped cold. Mark the cook and David the manager were both standing eerily still, staring at me as I emerged from the back. Their eyes didn’t shift from me as I treaded closer, very aware of the oddity of the situation. I attempted to bridge the gap.

“Mark, David? I’m real sorry about the plate,” I turned to David specifically, “ and I understand why you have to take it out of my paycheque, but I’m begging you, please, just this once, if you could give me a small blessing? I really need the money,” I cautiously patted my belly, not wanting to wake the creature that had seemed to disappear, “especially with a baby on the way.” My eyes kept shifting between my two co-workers, waiting for a word from either of them, but neither said anything. I grew warier and warier of the way their eyes stayed glued to my emaciated person. I was now close enough to see their pupils; they were fixed, even as I frantically waved a hand in front of their faces trying to garner any response. Okay, then. I didn’t loiter any longer. I inched by them, and I was greeted by more blank stares and barren faces.

The customers in the diner had their eyes glued on me, awaiting my next move. Customers that had been seated now stood, their bodies directly turned toward my person. I stepped back in terror, turning to return to the sanctity of the bathroom, but Mark and David had followed me out, their faces still slack and their pupils fixed on me. But the closer I looked, I saw their eyes weren’t looking at me but at my now-pulsing belly. The pressure I felt before was building, and I saw the hand from within pushing against its bounds. A wave of nausea consumed me and I collapsed, the edges of my vision beginning to blur and blacken. As I came in and out of consciousness, I was vaguely aware of hands touching me, holding me, carrying me. 

Sometime later, or maybe sooner, a light breeze brushed my face, bringing me back to consciousness, but the pulling sensation of the skin on my abdomen brought me to painful awareness. I screamed, my throat protesting the rasp I brought forth as my skin burned like fire. Amidst the pain, I became frighteningly aware of my restrained arms and legs against the crabgrass. With eyes wide, my breathing quickened, and I saw the customers from the diner holding my limbs down. The fat man held my ankles while Mark’s greasy hands pressed painfully down on my shoulders and David’s stale breath hit my face as he pressed on my forehead, stopping me from raising my head. 

I struggled against their restraints, screaming, “Let - go!” But I was no match for the men who held me down, their blank stares still eerily fixated upon my belly that had resumed its pulsing. The futility of my efforts and the burning across my abdomen forced me to give up; I panted as I melted into the ground, my muscles spent. 

What is happening? 

I heard Mark mutter something under his breath. “Ant -” 

What?

“Anti -” My eyes swiveled to David as he breathlessly uttered something. My breathing increased, as I soon knew what they were talking about.

The fat man at my feet mumbled, “AntiChrist,” his forehead glistening in the moonlight. Now I understood. As all the people holding me down repeated this word, revelation grasped me. Calmness breathed over me and I remembered. This is what my purpose was. I was to birth the antiChrist to usher in a new era. This is what my pagan brothers and sisters had raised me to believe. They prophesied that I was going to become heavy with child before my quarter-life had finished. The internet pagans had helped with the insemination, and the process had been gruesome. The details I couldn’t recall, surely for sanity’s sake. 

The burning in my belly subsided. I glanced down at the protruding roundness and I saw the hand reaching up to the sky, desperate for the fresh air of the night. The fat man saw the hand’s struggle and disappeared for a moment, only to return with a blunt diner knife. He tapped on my belly, and the hand disappeared. The man was smart; he didn’t want to injure the creature. Once he was satisfied that the creature was out of harm’s way, the man plunged the knife into me. I looked upon him calmly, a cool rush of night air tempering the repeated jabs to my abdomen as the fat man attempted to free the creature. I expected burning, but there was none.

He made quick work, only stopping once he had made a jagged wound from my sternum to my pelvis, making an appropriate entryway for the creature to enter his pre-ordained kingdom. The fat man, clearly exhausted from his work but moved by an unholy endurance, discarded the knife haphazardly and dropped to his knees between my legs. He placed both of his hands in the wound and spread my belly wide. Bursting forth into the glorious night - my son, my Lord, the antiChrist - leaped from my womb. I was ecstatic; I wanted to celebrate, but my body, weakened from the birth, and still restrained by the people - out of safety for our Lord, of course - would not cooperate. I weakly grinned at my son, his little black body with little wingtips protruding from his scapulae.

So cute. 

My son, still unsteady from his birth, saw my grin and rushed toward me, “Mother…” I was filled with joy at his calling me this and I weakly reached for his little body. He stumbled to me, and with the fat man’s assistance, sat on my chest, with his black eyes staring into mine. At this moment, I only felt sublime love for this eminent being I had birthed. 

I murmured, “Son…” and grasped his tiny hands. I couldn’t believe he was here; he was real. 

Despite his age, he cheekily grinned and glanced at my belly. He looked back to me with pleading eyes and a cute little pout, and I nodded cheerfully. And then he was at my stomach, his mouth buried in the moist white flesh, the cherry red blood being sucked from me as though I was a bountiful source of the succulent juice. 

Oddly, I felt myself fading and I was unsure why. Feeling drawn to the night sky, it felt like days were passing too quickly. I saw the sun rise in the west and set in the east, which I thought was odd, but then I remembered; with the birth of my son and our Lord, the world was beginning anew.