Underwater Minefield

The Last Year on Earth: Day #202: A Brief History of the State of Florida…

Spanish explorer Ponce de Leon “discovered” the area in 1513 and named it La Florida, which means “the flowery land” in Spanish. Oh, and by discovered, we mean that the only human beings who knew about it were Native Americans and they were pretty easy to slaughter with no consequence, so sure, Ponce de Leon discovered Florida.

In 1845, Florida was granted statehood. 

In 1971, Disney World opened. In 1990, Universal Orlando followed suit.

In 2000, Florida supremely fucked up the federal election process and awarded the presidency to legendary dunce, George W. Bush, who hastened the world’s decline more than any other president before him and certainly more so than his opponent, tree-hugging nature lover Al Gore.

In 2010, the Whore of Akron, LeBron James, infamously screwed over the good people of Cleveland, Ohio to “take his talents to South Beach” and play for the Miami Heat. That was the beginning of the end.

In the last few weeks, very peculiar things have been happening in Florida. Let’s recap.

First, a dozen high school students and two teachers broke out in mysterious rashes that a HAZMAT team was unable to identify. Then, Fort Lauderdale international Airport was closed down due to an unknown chemical sending five people to the hospital with respiratory problems. A week later, students at a different high school broke out in similar rashes to those experienced by the first victims. The next day, the HAZMAT team was called in again as dozens of students and adults became ill on a school bus. They were hosed down with water after a household pesticide used to clean the bus had been determined to be the cause of their illness. 

The day after that, a man described only as disoriented was arrested on a flight to Miami for trying to rush the cockpit. Later that night, a doctor was arrested by police on a DUI charge, at which point he became enraged and spat a mouthful of human blood at the officers. On Monday, Tropical Storm Beryl touched down in the state, threatening it with floods and 70 mph winds. Perhaps the most disturbing story, however, came the next morning with the news that a naked, homeless man was shot and killed by police because he was eating somebody’s face off. The man whom he attacked is in critical condition recovering at an area hospital. 

The last few days have seen this story go completely viral (It’s a pun!). Police in the area believe that the man was high on a drug called bath salts that apparently makes its users go insane and become violent, much like cocaine psychosis but with more of a crystal meth-like euphoria. People on the internets took to calling this man the “Miami Zombie,” which is totally fair and perhaps even an accurate description. But the people at the Atlantic Wire do not like it and want everybody to just cut it out already. The Daily Beast found that last article pretty hilarious and ridiculous.

I agree with them. Y’all gonna look stupid when the apocalypse goes down in Florida.

(Shout out to ihopericksantorum’s tumblr for providing some of the links used above.)

Blips on our radar:

• More evidence for the apocalypse being of the zombie variety as a man in San Diego bit his cousin’s nose off.

• A man in Illinois was arrested after biting a woman in the face.

• A Swedish man cut off his wife’s lips and ate them.

• A college student in Maryland killed his roommate and then ate his heart and brains.

• A Canadian dude who worked in gay porn apparently killed a man, dismembered his body, and began sending body parts to government officials. Don’t show Brad Pitt what’s in the box.

• A Japanese man had his genitals removed, then cooked them and served them to paying dinner guests.

• Earthquakes hit near Los Angeles, Italy, and Japan, presumably in the fallout from being passed over for epicenter of the apocalypse in favor of Florida. Tough luck, guys. Hang in there.

• A New Mexico wildfire has continued to spread and is close to becoming the state’s largest ever as the state attempts to self-immolate in protest of China’s refusal to recognize Tibet.

• Radioactive blue fin tuna have been discovered off the coast of California as Los Angeles recruits a team of mutated sea creatures to attack Florida in retaliation for getting beaten to the punch in the zombie apocalypse sweepstakes.

• Snigdha Nandipati won the National Spelling Bee because how could somebody with a name like that ever lose a contest about spelling?

• Apparently, Iran has enough plutonium to build five nuclear bombs, but don’t worry because President Obama just ordered a cyber attack on their Iranian asses. And you know he doesn’t fuck around. Suck it, Iran.

• A Boston University archaeologist has uncovered Maya ruins containing a mural with calculations that scribes used to predict events throughout time. These calculations suggest that the world will not truly come to an end for thousands of years. Um, all other evidence points to the contrary. Don’t you read my blog, Professor William Saturno? [Ed. Note: I totally had a class with Professor Saturno, and he’s a super cool dude and also a total badass. That said, the facts are the facts. And I don’t think zombies paint murals.]

Reporting from the brink of Armageddon,

Michael J. Carlos 

“For the apocalypse is most likely already upon us. I shall not repent.”

Salting Machine Number 1

“It looks like somebody sneezed on a turd,” Susan thought.

Do you know what Susan did? She worked as a Quality Control Specialist at Rold Gold Pretzel Rod Factory. She updated her Facebook profile to reflect her views on the matter. This job was terrible in the same way that teaching kindergarten was terrible: it was entirely useless and unnecessary. She added that comment to the bottom of her status update. Susan wore low cut shirts to work everyday, though at this point it was more a product of habit. Early in her career, the loathing she had for her boss, Harris Cayburn, prompted her to concoct a scheme in which she would wear low cut shirts to coax Harris into something she could qualify as sexual harassment and get his ass fired. And if she was crafty, move into his cushier and better paying job. As her luck would have it, though, Harris was entirely oblivious to anything sexual. Not, to be clear, from any sort of religiousness, but from a pure absence of libido. He had as much libido as a fly has an aptitude for high-level mathematics. Harris needed to learn to be more in tune with his fly-ness and ram into a closed window every so often. Currently, Harris was in his cushy office while Susan was leading some bozo electrician around the plant. He was changing a light bulb or some stupid thing, who knows. It shouldn’t have been Susan’s job to lead this guy around. At one of the machines, Bozo stopped and made a face like a shrill violin electrocuting a horse, frozen on his head just long enough for me to register the metaphor, and then he sneezed all over Salting Machine Number 1.

Can robots catch human diseases? Well in this story they can. I don’t think I want to anthropomorphize it or anything, but when Bozo sneezed it infected Salting Machine Number 1 with the equivalent of a perpetual hiccup. This hiccup was regular, you could set your watch to it it was so specific, as is usually the case with robots. The effect on the product, Rold Gold Pretzel Rods, was to produce a gap two inches in length where the rod would not be salted. Just pure turd. All across the country, these defective rods, which only numbered in the thousands out of millions of potential rods, were distributed to individuals who, if they were even awakened to the deficiency from their normal unconscious lifestyle, rarely gave a fucking shit about it. They had more important things. So many important things. But, thanks to the power of statistics, there was one individual who did give a shit.

Donald Fleck had severe obsessive-compulsive disorder. He was also a huge fan of Rold Gold Pretzel Rods. On Tuesday’s at 12:13pm just after watching The Price is Right and nailing every answer, Donald would walk to the bodega down his block and purchase a bag of Rold Gold Pretzel Rods. When he got home, he would dump the bag out and on his giant, spotlessly clean dining room table, he would create a pretzel rod mandala. Triangles. All triangles, and triangles inside of triangles. Geometry was very soothing and made him forget that he had severe obsessive compulsive disorder that kept him from getting a job that paid him enough to save up and move out of the city, which was filthy and exacerbated his problem exponentially. His mandala, aside from the aesthetic, also helped him choose which rod to eat first, because inevitably there would be one or two rods left over that could not complete a triangle. If it was two left over, he placed one by each hand and played himself in rock paper scissors, as he also had mastered the ability to play the game subconsciously, picking a throw for each hand without in his mind coordinating which one would inevitably win. Donald Fleck was just all around fucked up, and evolution should have killed him. Anyways, he would start with the odd out rod then work his way through the mandala systematically. The point of all of this, of course, is to provide context for the man who would be writing daily letters informing the Rold Gold Pretzel Company of their deficient pretzel rods. They were not fully salted, again, he would write, and he provided the Polaroid pictures to prove it.

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Sincerely, Yours Truly: An Open Letter to Kim Kardashian

Dear Kim,

Heeeeeeeeyyyyyyy, girl! You look greeeat- the cutouts on that dress are… something! Yes, hi Kris, you look fine too whatever. Let’s focus on Kim here for a second?

Kimmy it is IMPOSSIBLE to get a hold of you! You’re so busy globetrotting with Kanye, going to the Met Costu… oh, you weren’t invited? Er, stopping by crazy parties with Beyon… oh, she didn’t… she didn’t want you there? Well, you rocked that Quick Trim launch, K-Squared. It was like a really glam, British… infomercial, but LIVE!

Yeah, Kris, you were there too, that’s super, but again, this letter is addressed to Kim, right? Thanks… anyway, KK, I wanted to talk to you about the Big Bad Ms. B.  I know you thought hopping on the Ye Train was gonna be your ticket into the Illuminati Inner Circle, but I feel like it’s my place (shut up, all of you) to tell you it just… isn’t going to happen.

Nooo, no, don’t cry! God, please, seriously, you’re gonna pull a Botox’d-out muscle, jeez. It’s not you, K, obviously. I mean, you’re a successful entrepreneur (hey, you’ve been sued so you KNOW it’s real,) you’ve got Paris Hilton on speed dial (hello, yes, this is 2004? Amiright Khloe? UP TOP.) No, no, sorry, we’re just kidding, Kim! 

But really, this fascination with the Queen has to stop. I don’t wanna see you get hurt trying to scooch that infamous backside of yours in where it won’t be appreciated, Kim. You don’t wanna hang out where you’re not wanted, even if that means having to get Cosmos with Seacrest while your boo is sashaying down red carpets with models around every corner, or playing Connect Four with Blue Ivy. (Please, you know that infant can already speak 3 languages and has a wardrobe worth more than the car I had to sell to help pay for my move to New York.)

So no more trying to play on the level of a woman whose waste sparkles and smells like fresh lilac (I mean, if I had to guess…). Wipe away those tears, hike up those breasts and let Mama Kris give you an extra coat of bronzer and a shot of collagen to those lips.

You’re Kim Kardashian, dammit - and if Beyonce doesn’t wanna hang out with you, you’ll find someone who will. I hear Amber Rose makes a fine companion.

Sincerely, Yours Truly

A Woman Who Will Also Never Get to Be Around Bey

PS. Tell your mother to stop calling me.

Blind Sheep

Professor Garibaldi stood outside the back door to the lecture hall, miserably sucking at his cigarette. Through the emergency exit door he had propped open with a fire extinguisher — the paragon of fire safety that he was — he could hear the students shuffling to their seats, restlessly fidgeting with knapsacks and notepads, laptops and cell phones, as they waited for the final lecture of the semester.

Garibaldi had become something of a legend around campus due to the rants he delivered on the last day of class each semester. It was an ingenious marketing ploy, really. Students lined up outside Metzger Union during the registration period hoping to be lucky enough to lock down a spot in his class just so they could be present for one of his rants. He harangued the federal government’s handling of healthcare, mostly because he empathized with the seniors who would be graduating into a society and job market that held no place for them. He railed against the student loan policies of the Bush administration, getting so worked up that he’d become red in the face, foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog. He attacked the very university that employed him for mercilessly squeezing each and every last penny from its student body. Ostensibly, he taught Social Theory in Economics, but his final lecture acted as a crash course in leftist outrage. The lone outlet for his considerable rage.

The students loved it. The faculty of the Sociology Department flaccidly admonished him for his outspokenness but never took any measures to stop him because enrollment in department courses had nearly tripled in the years since that first lecture. The President of the university privately wanted to remove Garibaldi from his position but tolerated his tirades against authority only because he knew that the lectures gave voice to the students’ own private anger over their disenfranchisement and exploitation.

Garibaldi stabbed the end of his cigarette at the wall and marched back through the fire exit towards his classroom, his soapbox, the pulpit from which he preached active participation in one’s society. He believed in the power of his words to strike a chord within his students just as strongly as the school’s administration rejected any meaningful consideration of them.

Garibaldi stormed through the double doors and swung his messenger bag onto the empty desk at the front of the room. The students went silent with anticipation. He wasted no time.

Garibaldi stomped up the steps and gauged each face in his audience. There were always a few students who tried to sneak in though they weren’t in his class. About halfway up the left aisle, he spotted a young man wearing a backwards baseball cap whose freckle-spotted face Garibaldi did not recognize. 

“You! Name!” he bellowed. 

The kid shrunk in his seat, his face red as a tomato. “Nate Smith,” he offered weakly.

The professor seized the boy by the back of his hooded sweatshirt and lifted him from the seat. He took long, swift strides, two steps at a time back down the aisle, taking the boy with him. He swung open the door to the hallway and gently but forcefully shoved Nate out of his classroom like a bouncer expelling an underage kid from a bar.

“But my stuff is still in there—“

He turned to his class, “Anyone else who doesn’t belong here?”

Two bodies awkwardly rose from their seats and quickly gathered together their things.

“Will one of you please take Mr. Smith his belongings?”

The girl closest to where Nate had been sitting nodded. 

When the students had left, Garibaldi faced his audience.

“Now then,” he began, “let’s get down to business. My freshpersons! God bless you all! Thank you for taking my course and good luck on the final. I’m sure you’ll all do great and then have wonderful summers. Enjoy your lack of burden for the next few years and I hope to see you in another class of mine in the future. You are dismissed!”

A handful of students reluctantly got up and left the hall.

“Sophomores! You don’t get off so easily. Take out your phones. All of you. Now turn them off!” After a short pause, “I’m waiting!” The sophomores half-heartedly turned off or silenced their phones. “Now come up to my desk and everybody place your phone in the top drawer.” They did.

“This technology is fucking amazing and all of you take it for granted. You roll your eyes when it takes five seconds to send a text message. Go. Go outside and converse with one another. When my lecture is over, you can come back and get your phones. And hopefully, you’ll have had a meaningful discussion and connected with another human being. Be present with each other. Listen. You are dismissed!”

Garibaldi addressed the juniors.

“Oh, you poor bastards. You’re almost worse off than the seniors in here. You only have one year left and you have no idea how quickly the time will come when you’re out on your ass, fending for yourself. Of course, it’s not your fault that the system is fucked up. But look no further than your fat, rich parents, bankrolling your little odyssey into the arena of higher learning. Quick, somebody tell me one thing that they have learned while in college.” 

Silence.

“You spoiled, condescending, rotten, pretentious little pieces of pop-culture spewing, inane, vapid, plastic, conformist shit. You know you’re worthless so you pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to an institution to give you a tiny slip of paper that tells other worthless zombies you’re one of them so they might give you a job. But it doesn’t matter, because the zombies don’t even have the jobs anymore. They don’t even know where they went.”

Garibaldi looked around the room.

“Is this too much for you to hear? Do you hate me right now? Good. Let it fuel you. You might spend the rest of your pathetic, godforsaken lives trying to prove me wrong. Or you might just shrug me off. Go ahead. Tell all your friends on Facebook how big of a dick I am. Tweet to your followers—-ha! Yeah, right?! Like any of you are leaders. Not to mix metaphors, but a blind sheep can’t lead a horse to water. So go ahead and tweet this, you twats. You are dismissed!”

All of the juniors left, some of them shaken, some amused, none as disappointed as the freshmen and sophomores.

“Ah, seniors. I hope all is well with each of you and the best of luck in the future. I really mean that. You are dismissed.”

The seniors filed out, somewhat puzzled.

Garibaldi slunk down to the carpet and leaned back against the chalkboard. He was sweating and tired and needed another cigarette for sure. A hopelessness welled up in him. He took out his phone and read the message again.

“I’m sorry. - Nicole.”

Michael Carlos | Dismiss

DISMISS

dis·miss

\dis-ˈmis\

transitive verb

Definition of DISMISS

1: to permit or cause to leave <dismissed the visitors>

2: to remove from position or service : discharge <dismissed the thievish servant>

3a: to reject serious consideration of <dismissed the thought>

b: to put out of judicial consideration <dismissed all charges>

Happiest in the Summer

Before walking in the door to his apartment building, the man had rehearsed the story in his head so many times that he was starting to believe it was true.  He entered the foyer – his breath smelling of mints, his jacket reeking of freshly sprayed cologne – then made his way down the hall, checking himself one last time in the grimy window.  With a small bouquet of flowers in his hand, and a look of innocence on his face, he carefully entered his apartment.

His wife was seated at the table with the newspaper in front of her.  She didn’t look up when he came in, or when he presented her with the wilting flowers, which he hesitantly placed before her.

“Happy Anniversary,” he said, leaning down to kiss her forehead.  The newspaper was still folded and looked like it had not yet been read.  She leaned on her arm and stared at the front page with blank eyes.

“You’re late,” she said.

He had anticipated this response and he started in with his story. “I know, I’m sorry, but he wouldn’t let me leave the office until I finished the presentation.”  He took off his jacket and tie and untucked his shirt.  “The meeting with the investors is next week and he wanted everything to be done by today.”

She looked at the flowers that he had set on the table and recognized the plastic in which they were wrapped.  He had bought them from the dirty little flower stand at the train station.

“So you were working late?” she asked.

“I’m so sorry, honey.  I know it’s our anniversary, but you know how important this meeting is to our company.  If I screw this up, I could lose my job.”  Then, looking at the empty table, he asked, “Did you eat already?”

“It was getting cold,” she said.  “I wrapped up a plate for you.  It’s in the microwave if you want it.  Unless you’ve already eaten.”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“I don’t know.  Maybe you met up with someone after work.”

“Who would I meet up with?”

“You know who.  Don’t you dare make me say her name,” she said, storming off into the kitchen.

“Oh, Jesus Christ,” the man exclaimed, waiting a few seconds before following her.  “I thought we were past this.”

“So you always wear this much cologne?” she said, starting to wash the dishes.  “You’re not trying to cover something up?”

“You always do this,” he said, ignoring her question.  “If I’m not home at exactly 5:30, you assume the worst.  You’re paranoid.”

“I have good reason to be paranoid!” she screamed.  They both froze, shocked by her sudden outburst.  Then, just as quickly, they thawed, and she continued scrubbing a pan while he slumped into a chair in the corner, looking defeated.

A few minutes passed, with the only sound coming from the running water and the scrape of the sponge on the metal pans.  Then the man stood, walked over to the sink, and shut off the faucet.  “You have to trust me,” he said.  “I know what I’ve done.  I know I’ve hurt you, and I will spend the rest of my life regretting it.” 

He put his hands on her hips and pulled her close.  She didn’t look him in the eye, but her body didn’t resist.  “But if you don’t trust me,” he continued, “we’ll spend the rest of our lives being miserable.”

They stood in silence, and he could hear her tears splattering on the tile floor.

“Whenever I look at you,” she said, “I see her reflection in your eyes.”

The man tried to speak, but no words came to him, so he just wrapped his arms around her and held her while she cried under the dim kitchen light.  After a short while, with her voice muffled as she pressed her face into his chest, she muttered, “I love you.”

He hated the way she said it, like it was a cure-all, and he wondered if she really meant it.

“I love you, too,” he replied.

“Please don’t ever love anyone but me,” she said.

He hesitated.  “Why don’t we take a trip?” he asked.  “You always wanted to go to Paris.”

She lifted her head and looked at him with tear-stained eyes.  “Really?  You mean it?”

“Of course,” he said.  “We’ll go this summer.”

She smiled and hugged him.  “Oh, we’ll have such a good time together.  It will be like a fresh new start, don’t you think?”

“I just want you to be happy,” he said.

They separated and she wiped off the counter with a dirty rag.  “I’m going to bed,” she said.

“Okay, I’ll be right in,” the man replied.  “I’m just going to grab something to eat.”

When he heard the bedroom door close at the end of the hall, he quickly dialed a number on his phone and, after a couple of rings, got an answering machine.

“Hey, it’s me,” he said in hushed tones.  “I think it would be a good idea if you didn’t call my cell phone anymore.  I’ll explain tomorrow.  I’ll meet you at four when I get out.  I love you.”

He hung up the phone and made his way down the hall and into the bedroom, where his wife was changing into her pajamas.

“I was thinking,” she said happily, “what if we renew our vows?  And then the trip will be like our second honeymoon.”

“Yeah, maybe,” he said, changing out of his clothes.

“I’m so sorry I didn’t trust you.  I don’t want to be miserable the rest of my life.”

The man checked himself in the mirror and put on a look of innocence.  “I hear Paris is happiest in the summer.”

Zach Ranger | Anniversary

The Last Year On Earth, Day #217: Attack of the Flesh-Eating Bacteria

A few weeks ago, a graduate student from Georgia began to suffer from a rare bout of necrotizing fasciitis, commonly known as flesh-eating bacteria, after being involved in a zip lining accident over the Little Tappaloosa River. For a week or two, it seemed as though this young woman’s case was an isolated incident, tragic though it may be. Then, a South Carolina woman who had recently given birth to twins was diagnosed with the condition, igniting speculation that we may have a Contagion-like outbreak on our hands. The only thing necessary to whip society into full-blown pandemonium was a case affecting a man.

Cue Enrique Milla, stage right.

Enrique is a man currently living in Peru who had penile implant surgery performed in Florida in 2007 so that he could better please his wife. Unfortunately, the surgery did not go as planned and now Enrique is suing the anesthesiologist involved in his surgery because he contracted gangrene in his penis following the surgery and it turned into flesh-eating bacteria that ate his penis. FLESH-EATING BACTERIA ATE THIS MAN’S PENIS. 

Men, you know what this means.

TIME. 

TO.

PANIC!!!!!

Blips on our radar:

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Quite Good Aim

She breezed into the apartment, noticed the single rose in a vase on the kitchen table, and quickly turned to the coat rack. Dispensing with her trench and shaking the rain from her umbrella, she moved swiftly through the room, not glancing into the kitchen where he was busying himself over the stove. Salsa music wafted saucily through the apartment, but she barely registered it.

Once in the bedroom she sat down on the bed, removing her boots and throwing them down to the floor. It was late; she was annoyed, and the rain hadn’t helped her mood any. Woozily, she stood again, and looked at herself in the mirror, pulling her shirt down slightly in the front and adjusting her hair so she looked slightly less rumpled. Without a word, she walked out into the kitchen and began uncorking a bottle of wine.

“How was your day?” he asked with a faux innocence, not looking up from the pot he was stirring, and she shot him a withering look. A half-empty bottle of whiskey sat on the counter to his right; there was no glass in sight.

“Drunk again, I see,” she retorted.

“I just wanted to keep up with you.”

She scoffed, but said nothing. Work had been long, but so, too, had been the hour she had spent splitting a bottle of wine (or was it two? she couldn’t quite recall) with Shirley in her office afterward. She uncorked the bottle in her hand, and drank straight from it, matching his disdain for glasses.

“And how did you get home?” he asked her, still not looking up.

“I drove,” she said nonchalantly, and saw his eyebrows rise. The seconds passed with no sound but the boiling water of the pot, the music faint in the background.

She picked up the cork from the wine bottle and hurled it at his head.

The bottle of whiskey was halfway to his mouth when the cork connected right behind his ear, and she turned quickly away to stifle a smile. She always had quite good aim, she thought, and she was proud of it now. Turning back around, she saw he had finally looked up.

“What the fuck is your problem?” he said calmly, rubbing his head where the cork had hit. “I didn’t do a goddamn thing wrong.”

She rolled her eyes and looked around the living room, connected through an open doorway to the kitchen. “Please,” she said dismissively, and walked to the door. “So this was your plan, huh?”

“What was?” he said, still rubbing his head and turning from the stove to look at her.

“You were, what?” she scoffed. “Going to make me dinner? Seduce me with liquor? Prance around to this music, rub against me with some lame dance moves, and then fuck me?” She twirled, pulling her shirt slightly down again, before leering back at him. “That’s how you wanted this night to go?”

He bristled, was immediately offended. “Well, baby,” he said, barely suppressing his anger. “It is our fucking anniversary after all. I thought we could do something nice for once. I should have known.”

“Should have known what?” she countered, taking a step forward and placing the bottle down on the table between them, but not before taking another swig. “Should have known what?”

“That you’d find a way to wreck it somehow,” he retorted, and stared at her briefly in the eye before turning back to the stove. “That you’d be pissed already by the time you got home.”

“You don’t think I have a reason to be pissed?”

“What the fuck did I do?”

She ignored his last comment and grabbed the bottle, turned away, sashayed into the living room, moving to the music. Twirling, spinning, dancing by herself, she sucked down the bottle of wine as he took the pot off the stove. She moved to the stereo, turned the music up, and continued her personal spin-step, approximating the steps. Not even the massive crashing noise from the kitchen interrupted her movements.

“Jesus Christ!” he yelled as the pot smashed into the wall, spraying boiling water and pasta all over the kitchen. “I was only trying to help! I didn’t do a damn thing wrong!”

She danced her way back into the kitchen, putting her empty bottle of wine on the table next to his empty bottle of whiskey. She stared at him as he fumed, tapping her fingers to the beat. A minute passed with silence between them, and he turned to pick up the pot from the floor. “Fucking Christ,” he said loudly to the wall. “Fucking hell.”

Calmly, she watched him as he began to clean the kitchen, sweeping everything into a pile. Calmly, she picked the bottle of wine up off the table. She’d always had quite good aim, she thought to herself as the bottle flew through the air. She turned quickly and tried to suppress a smile as it collided with the back of his head, let out a small spurt of laughter as he hit the ground, tried not to giggle as she picked up the phone.

Dan Rys | Anniversary