Dissociate

I was alone when it happened. The air was chilly, and I tripped over a crack in the sidewalk on King Street.

“Ouch.” I said it out loud and caught my balance. I pulled a black hood over my head and buried my hands in my front pockets. I remember my toes beginning to feel numb and a cold chill ran through my body with a shudder.

[coughing]

I peeked behind me but there was nothing to see.

“Hello.” I cleared my throat and continued, “hello, is someone there?” I didn’t hear an answer, so I shrugged my shoulders and kept walking until I got to number 115. There was a white picket fence around a small yard, the kind you used to see in those bullshit “American Dream” commercials. I remember the gate had a simple lift-latch, but it squeaked and had a hard tug.

The house was white too, and I could see cracks in the siding, and the gray shutters reminded me of a hospital room. I twitched then knocked on the door. I didn’t hear any footsteps or cluttering behind the door and thought that perhaps I should turn back, go home, and look for a different job. I needed the money though, and I didn’t think about how difficult being a P.C.A. could be. Hell, I didn’t even know what being a P.C.A meant at the time, but the hiring ad said, “no experience necessary” and “hiring immediately.”

[coughing]

I spun around and gazed into the morning fog, looking from one direction to the next but found no one again. [Maybe this is the universe’s way of telling you to peace the fuck out and go home] I didn’t want my paranoia to get the best of me, so I rang the doorbell this time. I felt the earth disappear from beneath my feet, and my stomach travel to my throat. I landed with a thud on my ass.

“Well, aren’t you pretty?” I heard a raspy, fake southern drawl and looked up to see a 6-foot-tall redneck with a beer gut, white t-shirt, and red button up flannel. I smirked a little when I saw his belly poking out of his t-shirt.

“I think I have the wrong address," I stumbled to my feet. My legs felt weak and tired, “I’m looking for a Tim Lambert? My name is Daria Filmore, I’m supposed to be interviewing to take over as his P.C.A."

“Gotcha!” I felt my eyes widen at the playful carny-like inflection in his voice.

"Hehe, what do you mean?" The awkward smile on my face melted. "Are you Tim?"

I watched the grin on his face grow as I collapsed, my body hunched up on the floor.

"Tim doesn't exist." My eyes grew wider. I felt a violent sting radiating through my body, like I had been stung by several wasps at once, and I watched as his shadow crept closer. I watched for as long as I could, and the last thing I remember before I knocked out was his muddy, brown work boots stopping right in front of my face.

I woke up strapped to a standing table bound at my wrists and ankles with leather straps. I could hear my heart pounding in my chest. I noticed my head was free and so I turned my neck to and fro until I located my captor with my eyes. I wanted to take advantage of his back being turned but I couldn’t find a way to free myself.

“Ah, good,” I felt my toes twitch when he turned to me and approached me with a pair of dull, stained eyes and diagonal pliers in his right hand. I pushed my body forward and pressed my muscles as hard as I could. "You're awake." I screamed and closed my eyes, but I could hear his footsteps approaching me and then I heard the steps come to a stop.

I could feel his hot, raunchy breath against my neck and pushed as hard as I could, screaming at the top of my lungs until I felt myself freed from the bonds and I rushed up the stairs. I jiggled with the handle, struggling to unlock the door and bolted from the house. I left her behind and saved myself. I swam in the ocean as he clipped off her fingers one by one. I tested my surfing abilities in Hawaii, while he grabbed a rusted old ratchet and lopped off her right hand.

Then I lost my arm in a shark attack, and he chipped away at hers with a dull axe. It took five swings for the greasy, fat hobbit of a man to separate it from her body completely. I saw her wide eyes glistening in the distance.

“You’re so quiet now.” I watched as he hissed in her ear. “I like it.” I scowled as he licked her cheek and then spat in her face. But I went on to pursue other activities instead of helping her. I could still get on a bike with one arm, so I took a ride through downtown Dunkirk. I felt my stomach fly into my chest when the bike tire struck a busted railroad track and threw me off the bike.

I stumbled to my feet and felt an aching behind my eyes. And then I saw him. I watched him slice off her toes one at a time and chop her feet off one right after the other. As her body convulsed, I felt the train tracks rumble beneath my feet but when I tried to step off the tracks, I found my shoe had melted to the steel bar. The train's horn blared, and the whistle stung my ear drums. I couldn’t get myself completely free, so I laid on the tracks and left the train to pulverize my legs. I didn’t feel it, but the site of my shredded legs made me vomit.

I woke up to being wheeled around a hospital wing. I still had my right arm; I used it to sign the discharge papers at the service desk. I had one arm and two stubs for my legs, but I was still alive and determined to make the best of it. I took my motorized wheelchair on a stroll through Washington Park.

“Don’t swing to high sweetheart!” I smiled when I saw the little boy on the swing.

“Okay, mommy.” I wiped a tear from my cheek. I have always been a sucker for life’s uniquely beautiful moments.

I listened while the windchimes danced in the wind and smiled when I felt the rain kiss my cheeks. I looked up and was struck by a red Honda. My body fumbled through the air like a lumpy potato. I could see the lumpy hobbit again. I watched him raise the axe above his head once more and hack off her right arm, and it was at that point I realized I couldn’t feel mine anymore either.

I closed my eyes for a second and opened them to a new setting. The walls and ceilings were white, and the fluorescent lights made me wince. I could hear the beeping of medical equipment and the frustrated clattering of doctors losing their fight to save a patient. I could feel tugging inside my abodomen and the fluttering of my eyelashes against the tops of my cheeks. I watched as the medical staff struggled to save me, and I watched as my captor played gleefully with the intestines of his victim like silly putty. I heard the heart monitor flatline as I watched him chop away at her throat until her head fell from her shoulders. I knew I was dead, and I knew that she was too. The same way I knew that three weeks later there would be an ad in the miscellaneous collumn of the Observer: Slightly disabled, 78-year-old man seeks full time P.C.A contact at (XXX-XXX-XXX).