A Bone

Darkness. It descended like a black veil on a widow, concealing from the eyes all things good and beautiful all while creating a sort of mystery. It was in this sudden gloom that a young woman got off the train at her stop and looked up to ponder the weather before she continued on. She wore no jacket, carried no umbrella, and wore no rain shoes; yet she did not move briskly to avoid the impending storm. She took her time, descending the station steps and exited out onto the desolate streets. On the street corner that she waited, the light flickered. The young woman’s pulse quickened, and she did not wait for the light to change in her favor, crossing the street to the sidewalk that was cast in the building’s shadow. With each step, she quickened her pace, looking over her shoulder periodically. She could feel her skin crawl as goosebumps developed. 

“Gotcha!” hollered a voice that came, not from behind, but in front of the woman. 

She jumped but fell mute, unable to scream. The man tugged her into the nearby alley and threw her down on a pile of trash bags, which emitted a rather putrid odor as her body displaced the air that was inside the bags. 

The man fumbled with his trousers as he approached the cornered woman. Her eyes grew wide, but still she did not scream. Then suddenly, her mouth opened and a voice said, “I will kill you.”

The man hesitated. Not out of fear of the threat that was uttered, but by the deep booming voice that had said it. He shook his head and continued his approach. That was when the voice spoke again:

“Surely, you will die. In his name let it be done.”

The man chuckled. ‘So this was one of those religious women,’ he thought. He spat. 

“There is no god,” he said, moving even closer. 

When he was almost within reach, a blinding light struck the alley. The man rubbed his eyes, adjusting back to the darkness. He began to wonder wonder if they really were almost hit by lighting. Did the woman really call lightning down on him?”

“Ha!” he exclaimed. “You missed!”

The sky grumbled in response with thunder. It was as if someone were up there and was unamused by his taunts. 

The man returned his attention to in front of him. Looking down, he was not surprised to find only the garbage bags there. He kicked at the trash and swore before exiting the alley. 

The man turned left and walked slowly in the warm rain that began to pour. He walked a few blocks until he reached the hovel that he called home. Once inside, he opened a can of soup and began eating straight from the can, dripping some of the contents in the chasm between the can and his mouth. The red-orange liquid splattered on his already dirty shirt and fleshy belly. When he was finished, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and tossed the can into a corner of the room. He licked the spoon and sat it on the counter.

In an adjacent room, the man flopped onto a dirty mattress that lay beneath a window. He pulled out a magazine and used the light from the street so he could finish the job on himself that he felt should have been settled earlier in the alley. Once fully exhausted, he flopped back and fell asleep. 

“You will die!” a voice said, waking the man in the middle of the night. He relaxed his widened eyes, rolled onto his side and returned to his lewd dreams. 

In the morning, the man woke feeling well rested. He yawned and stretched and said, “ha! I’m still alive and kicking.”

He got up form the mattress and went into the other room and opened another can of food. He sat down on his porch to enjoy himself. 

Moaning as he ate, he knowingly disturbed passersby. He whistled and rubbed himself at women who had long since learned to cross the street before his house and avoid his taunts.

“Pervert!” one woman shouted. 

The man laughed and gesticulated to her in a way that made her frown. Still laughing, he slurped down the remnants of his can of food. He continued to laugh so hard that he began to cough. He coughed and coughed, harder and harder, but found no relief. It grew more difficult to find the breath to cough. He began to flail around, but was unsuccessful in his efforts. After months and months of his antics, pedestrians learned to simply ignore him. 

Feeling faint, the main finally collapsed to the floor. Bleary eyed, the man looked skyward and saw what he thought was the woman from last night. 

“You’re dying,” he heard her say. “I told you this would happen.”

The man scowled. He did not have the breath to say it, but his final thought was the same, ‘silly woman, this is not your doing.”

And just like that, the man died a bitter mess. His dead body remained on the stoop for a few days. No one had the nerve to go near it. Most feared he was just sleeping and would immediately wake and harass anyone who was curious enough to get close. It was on the third day that officers showed up, responding to a call about a strong odor. It was the man for sure. He was pronounced dead and hauled away in a body bag. 

The following day, a young woman suited up and entered the sterile medical facility. The subject on whom she was to perform the autopsy laid bare on the metal table. The woman spoke her observations to her assistant as she circled the body. She paused when she reached the face, recognizing the man. Her body made an uncontrollable twitch. 

“Is everything okay?” asked the assistant. 

“Yes,” continued the woman, shaking herself from her trance. She wanted to state the cause of death as an act of god, but knew that would raise eyebrows. Instead she said, “probable cause of death is suffocation.”

Malicious thoughts swarmed in her mind. Had he suffered when he died? Was it equal to the suffering he had hoped to inflict on her?

Quieting her thoughts, the young woman made the necessary incision into the man’s throat and found the blockage. With tweezers, she carefully dislodged the object and held it up to the light. It was a bone. The man had chocked to death on a bone.