Klempner

What's the obsession with potatoes?

I called her Potato Face when she was a kid.

What does she look like now?

Jenny was no looker at that age…

… But she matured. Bloomed.

Juliana... Never the same twice.

I scratch at my beard. I’ve never liked facial hair in hot climates, but I don’t have a choice right now. Even so, the flourishing colony of lice that has stowed aboard adds an extra edge of irritation.

Lice…

Where the fuck did they come from?

Can rat lice live on humans?

Having a fucking good go at it…

I catch one, squeezing the revolting thing between my fingernails. It bursts with a Pop!

Only another 999 to go…

*****

The boredom’s the worst. Endless hours. Endless days and nights. I’ve no idea how long.

The only breaks in the monotony are Juliana’s visits: just long enough to sit, eat something at me, toss a potato at me.

No, not Juliana: Solana.

Why's she so obsessed with the name?

How many names have I used over the years? Worn like a suit of clothes to be discarded when the weather changes and something different is needed.

I’ve never been defined by my name.

But she sees it differently…

Something skritches and I jerk a look sidelong

It’s a rat…

Just a rat…

down

It’s just a rat…

the dark openings, more scratching. And a nose

you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

my case, the abyss comes equipped with teeth and whiskers. I come

*****

know what Stockholm syndrome

lunchbox, unwrapping one of her usual

psychological condition where, in a kidnap or

“You saying you're getting

but I have her attention. “… But there's a reverse condition. It's called Lima syndrome, where the captor comes to empathise

“So?”

I your only friend,

“Friend? You think you’re my friend?” The napkin produces a brigadeiro. A flake of chocolate cracks off the small round cake, dropping back into

why do you

pauses in her chewing, mouth hanging a little open.

to watch me rot, you have your camera there.” I jerk my chin up to the blinking

you. I assume you do want me to feed you?

leave me a bag of potatoes and come once a week. Or even, once a month. But, so far as I can reckon, you're

swallows, not speaking, simply regarding me. I continue. “Am I your only friend, Sola? Is that it?

swings her head, giggling. “So,

You've not changed, Larry. I can see right through you. The same heartless bastard that shipped me out

back in her seat, arches her

I keep my voice mild. “Did I say otherwise? I'm not claiming to have changed. Who ever really changes?” I raise my

“Solana…” she hisses.

the rancid concrete, some of it dropping just this side of that painted line, now less than white. Even under the heavy make-up, her colour

on her heel,

ignoring the jab of pain in my ankle as the chain snaps taut, I snatch up the discarded meal from the filthy concrete, scrabbling

blind, my eyes adjust to the green blink of the camera. It hardly matters. My attention is on the wealth in

is almost untouched, only a single bite taken from the

anything like this for…

For how long?

Weeks? Months? My sense of time is out

I had a

another, I ram the food into

Too soon. Half-chewed pulp goes down the wrong way and suddenly

to swallow, gagging on my scavenged meal, I barf it up, where it

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