The Esky

Caleb and Jarrad tilted the esky onto the grass, careful not to splash the contents onto themselves. The liquid glided smoothly from the tub, striking the grass below before taking its time to settle into patches of dirt. Once the pair had pushed the now empty esky to the back of Jarrad’s ute, Caleb lit up a cigarette and walked away in quiet contemplation, leaving Jarrad to gather the remaining components alone. His gaze zoned in on the missing cat poster clinging to his neighbour’s bins.

In retrospect, his household had been careless with theirs, lifting each lid and unloading rubbish into the emptiest. After numerous warning letters from the local council and subsequently throwing each letter into the wrong bin, they were confiscated, indefinitely.

So when Tom brought the esky home, it seemed like an odd short term solution.

The esky, larger than average, as plain as the average, sat imposingly in their small laundry. A ribbed pipe disappeared into the walls, flowing water from their house into the tub, and once the fluoride, amongst other various chemicals, broke down any object placed inside, the murky solution retreated back the way it came. Jarrad didn’t listen to the mechanics, distracted by the ringing of his phone as Tom explained the process. Even so, what justification could Tom have given to the disposing of dirty, acidic water back into their pipes? Yet, Jarrad knew it didn’t matter what he thought. He had a docile disposition, and, although somewhat self-aware, he was too used to swallowing whatever nonsense Tom spewed.

“It’s a one-way system”, Tom replied before taking a swig of his beer, “Besides, it’s only temporary.”

Temporary seemed to stretch out until after all the garbage bins had been replaced by bottled water. Until brushing teeth was done alongside bottled water. Until hand sanitiser was used to wash themselves, leaving red, raw, dried and itchy, but, most importantly, clean skin in its wake.

On the fifth day, a persistent dribbling began from the unused shower head, like an offbeat pulse. An itchiness beneath Jarrad’s skin grew as each droplet hitting the bath reverberated through his walls and into his room. In the corner of Jarrad’s ceiling, where pipes had leaked, a discoloured stain had grown, as if a body were up there, slowly leaking out onto the world below. His tiny corner that was once his, and his alone, had been blemished.

“Shit in the walls is better than shit on the floor”, Tom asserted, as Jarrad voiced his concern.

Was it? Jarrad wanted to ask. But he didn’t. He nodded and agreed and opened up another beer. Tom had an answer for everything, and every answer would maintain his personal narrative that he was always right, so it seemed no use to question anything he said anymore. It was easier to just carry on.

Whilst the dripping from the faucets and ceiling was unnerving, it was the cat that haunted him most. When Tom had run over their neighbour’s cat, although the animal did not look like it had met such a fate, Caleb’s squeamish reaction before reverting to nonchalance bored him. Jarrad, however, couldn’t hide his horror. Tom dangled the creature in front of Jarrad’s face, swinging it by the grip of his palm like some ultimate prize. He regretted being unable to mask his disgust almost as much as he regretted asking what Tom was planning to do with it.

“Chuck it in the esky”, came his reply as if it were obvious. Except it wasn’t obvious to Jarrad.

They had thrown rotten food in there before; however, nothing had permeated through the house like that of the cat’s cadaver. It was an unforgiving, unforgettable stench. One that Jarrad felt so severely, when he walked, the cat would walk with him, weaning in between his legs.

The animal greeted him in the hallway when he came home earlier today. It walked alongside him till they reached the laundry where Caleb crouched, tightly bound in his own limbs. But Jarrad paid him no mind. He was preoccupied with the lifeless arm that dangled from inside the esky—Tom’s. The adjoining pipes shook vigorously, taking time to digest its recent meal. The esky smirked from its corner, salivating for more. As Caleb continued to grab his legs impossibly closer together, he muttered words that only Jarrad could acutely make out. Grabbed, planned, pushed, protected, believe, please, believe.

And so he did, or at least that seemed like the thing to do. Now, with only the pipes coiled around his arm, Jarrad strolled through the kitchen, following Calebs plan to dispose of all evidence. His phone pinged twice before he muted it, his attention drawn to the shadows casting over this room. It was on a shelf, where glasses stood wearing coats of dust that he could see it how it once was—a warm light hanging over his head. Dishes in the sink, crumbs lingering on the countertop, Caleb cooking two-minute noodles.

Tom telling Jarrad, “It’s not my turn to clean.”

And with those words, the light flickered off, leaving a cold void hidden behind a pristine showroom.

As he exited this strange place and wayward house, he realised, as he reached his front yard, he was now also alone. Caleb had gone.

Jarrad leant into the heat from the bonnet. The esky stared at him, perched among couches on a verge side collection. At any moment, he was waiting, wanting, for it to burp up a bottle grasped around Toms’s fingers, and as he clambered out from the beast’s stomach, he would point his drink at Jarrad, smirking all the while, then swing it back, finishing its contents. The neighbour’s cat promptly jumping out behind him.

But all remained unchanged, or so it seemed. Streetlights gave way to the surrounding emptiness. The esky sat smug. A buzzing began in Jarrad’s pocket, and with pious resignation, he pulled out his phone and answered.