…And that’s when I knew 911 was an inside job.

Why did you take the freeway. I’ve already got a set price anyway. Tip? Or no?

I’ve been down, in my life. People don’t know that I had a life before. College, football. I dropped out, again and again. I want to go to Switzerland. For some reason it’s always called to me.

Belching and twisting dreadlocks, head shaved in an undercut. Vegetarian.

Do you like country music.

I don’t know what it is.

That’s what people don’t realise about our guns, we always had them and no one got shot.

Background check? Yes.

No proper background checks at the border though.

I see.

Here we are.

Safe travels.

There are no people living here anymore. No one to talk to, no one to look at, I don’t think there will be anyone for a long time. Maybe I should take some time off, Maybe I should stop living here myself? Eh Harold?

The Mattress is getting lumpy. A spring came through yesterday and nearly pierced me, straight through the eye and into my brain. It made a boing sound before it ripped through though, so I was able to get my head out of the way in time. Maybe I shouldn’t have.

When there were people living here, they used to say that I was a pitiful sight. A thankless job they said I had, a thankless job. I’m wondering whether I still am a pitiful sight, probably more so now, since my fingers started to fall off.

I still remember that very day. The turning point, if you will allow the phrase? My car was in wonderful shape, I had a family then, and we all went for a drive. It was a short trip to be sure, but hardly un-eventful one. They had screeched screamed in terror as we sped towards the wall. They were new you see, but I was a veteran, an old timer in the field of consumer safety.

A perfect day it was. Not a scratch on me afterwards. 80 miles an hour and not a broken arm or leg. The young ones in the back however, they didn’t get off so lightly. Straight through the front window they went. A man in a grey suit had shouted and screamed so loudly after the crash. Poor Harold, it wasn’t his fault. But he took the screaming all the same, a whole hour it went on. I waited outside for him. A design flaw in the car was all it was, nothing to do with Harold.

That was around the same time everyone started leaving. Harold packed everything up, even my family. He had intended to bring me with him too, until I asked if I could stay. That had come as a bit of a shock to Harold. I don’t know why.

He always talked to me!

Just because I had decided to talk to him, just once, I really wanted to stay! He backed away then, a look of disbelief in his eyes. Horrified, how dare he be horrified! 13 years working with him and he was horrified when I decided to speak to him. I tried to stop him running away, asked him what was wrong. He just ran as fast as he could. But I was taller than he, and faster. When I caught him I tried to prove to him that I meant no harm, but even when I took his head off, he didn’t understand. Even now, sitting beside me he refuses to talk. Or move, or do anything. His face has gone a funny colour, even though I put his head back on the way he always did mine. I think he might need some varnish, but I can’t find any and if I did, I don’t think it would matter. He’s a lot more mushy and runny than I am, not an ideal dummy at all.

I think he’s made from a different type of wood.

© 2023

Published in Penduline Press

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Published in Penduline Press

Beyond the hill there was a convoy waiting. There were other women there, like me, frightened, and resigned. The men were killed. Pain does, ha, it does something to you, after a while. It doesn’t dull, or wane, but always feels the same, as sharp and deep and discouraging as the first time. The same shivers shudder and the neurons fire and deliver the same damn message. Listen to me, they cry. Listen to your body. But the operatives on the inside of the body aren’t aware of my outside reality, not in the same way, when pain is delivered. The messages clearly expect my body to react and cease its pain inducing exploits. They think that my body has control. I have no control. I can’t remember if I ever did. I would eat sheep, if I could. Taste the meat, my favourite, but so far away from the food they force into us here. Aha! I do have control over one thing, my mouth. I can use it to shout out, for all the ones that want to listen. The bears don’t care and don’t need to plug my gob with anything but the grey￾blue dribble of their miscellaneous gruel. I can bite my nails, and if that fails, the skin from my knuckles, or my cheeks. I chew on it like gum and it even tastes like that sometimes. It’s better really, because nothing ends up in my stomach, you see?

Down there, the tube goes in, not into my stomach, but close, and it is better I don’t eat too much. The cavity stings and burns at the same time. Mortality cuts into me every second that I’m alive and I don’t know what sort of person I could ever be again. I used to panic and cry against the bars of my crush-cage, indents along my back. Now it holds me together, like a film I could burst from, if it was taken away. My legs, I’m sure, will not work. Out there, amongst the other cages, set free, I would flollup around like a

drunken clown, ha, what a joke, I’d be. I’d have enough time though, yes I would. I’d have enough time, to be a human being for a few more seconds. I could do what needed to be done, and take as many of these others with me. Sweet suicidal peace, without the never-ending pain and ache and the boredom with that pain, though it continues to sting and throb.

What is this thing the bears do? What can they need my fluids for? Nothing restorative can come from a pain like this. I cannot believe that healing is derived from suffering like mine, with no End.

*The World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) state that over 12,000 bears are currently suffering in Asia’s bear farms. Their bile is extracted for use in some traditional Asian Medicines. Calls for a change to the inhumane conditions of its extraction, resulting in terrible pain and gross confinement, have produced some legislation but no enforcement or change, even when the chemical properties of bear bile are now easily synthesised.

© 2023

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