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…

faced down

It’s just a rat…

scratching. And

if you gaze long enough into an abyss,

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

the abyss comes equipped with teeth and whiskers. I come equipped

*****

do you know what

She takes something from her lunchbox, unwrapping one

the label for a psychological condition where, in a kidnap or hostage situation,

“You saying you're getting

her attention. “… But there's a reverse condition. It's called Lima syndrome, where the captor

“So?”

I your

flake of chocolate cracks off the small round cake, dropping back into the napkin and she dabs it up with a fingertip then into

do you

her chewing, mouth hanging a little

me rot,

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

once a week. Or even, once a month. But, so far as I can reckon,

I your only friend, Sola? Is that it? You've murdered everyone else that might get close to

“So,

believe you're worth saving? That there's anyone out there who thinks you're worth it? The daughter you had slated as a sex-slave when she was a kid? That middle-aged hooker? You've not changed, Larry. I can see right through you. The same heartless bastard that shipped me out to dig up potatoes for

her arms, sits back in her seat, arches

otherwise? I'm not claiming to have changed. Who

“Solana…” she hisses.

tumbling from her lap. The contents spill and scatter over the rancid concrete, some of it dropping just this

heel,

my ankle as the chain snaps taut, I snatch up the discarded meal from the filthy concrete, scrabbling to grab broken fragments

adjust to the green blink of the camera. It hardly matters. My

delicacy is almost untouched, only a single bite taken from the corner. And I have half

not eaten anything like this

For how long?

no idea. Weeks? Months? My sense of time is out

I had a

then another, I ram the food

and suddenly I’m no longer

I barf it up, where

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