Jerry Jr. has six years. He is Death’s only son, and he is Death’s love and pride, his will to live. Everything that Death has accomplished means nothing in comparison. The universe means nothing, life means nothing, everything means nothing except for his son… and the rest of his family.
But Death has never been able to touch them, because of his Death touch. He could never caress his wife in passion, could never hold her, never sleep with her. Just a little brush of his fingertip would put her down…
They still created three children, but it was done in the least passionate way possible, without even touching, without even having sex. He didn’t want to risk killing his wife, even after she suggested handcuffing his hands behind the bedpost, where they would be safe and clear from touching her.
Worst of all, Death will never be able to pat his son on the back when he gets an A in geometry, or when his football team goes to the state championship.
Because his touch brings death.
Back at the corpse:
The infested spider-sounds refuse to stop.
The blue woman still in her position on my bladder, pains do not desist.
I move, quick without hesitation without worrying about her, or the pain in my bladder.
A sharp blunt pain, but not as bad as I anticipated. It’s just like me to exaggerate something so inconsequential.
The blue woman doesn’t even wake up. A slight vibration-fizzle whimpers from her throat, which is supposed to be snoring, and she plops down where I was groaning. Her ocean breasts squishing into the mattress brings me a smile.
Then I rush out of my bedroom-closet to the toilet, which is still situated in the middle of the room instead of in a bathroom. And I leak away a pain-filled balloon.
I am surrounded by people that I have never seen before. All walm comers, all new. None of them stare at my penis, but it’s still disturbing to have it flashed out to them. My pissing is more important to me now than my embarrassment. I let the urine leak completely away, but there is still a slight pain in my bladder from the stretching.
For one reason or another, the new homeless people in my home aren’t much of a bother. There’s about three or four medium-sized families that all look human and decent enough. The overpopulation in the streets was too much for them, I’m guessing, and forced them to take refuge inside of the warehouse. It was going to happen sooner or later.
On the way back to my azure woman/thing, my mouth speaks to the new people — and let me mention that my mouth says this and not me — as if my mouth is their governor:
“I will allow you all to live here for free on two conditions. One, you can’t ever go in any of the bedrooms. Two, you have to stop any other outsiders from moving in here and crowding us. Be the protectors of this place and it can be your place.”
Then I say, “Smile, it’s Listen Day.”
And go back into my cozy closet-room, where the most beautiful creature ever created is sleeping.
I curl up next to her and go into my God’s Eyes:
Nan and Christian are just arriving at Death’s door. They are saying their hello-greetings to Mrs. Death and placing themselves next to Gin and Mort — Vodka is there too, but he hasn’t said anything for two days. Mrs. Death seems quite scared of Nan; she’s never had a skinhead girl inside of her home before.
“So what are you doing for Listen Day?” Mrs. Death says to Mort and Gin, ignoring her new guests — Skinhead Girl and Skinhead Girl’s friend — smiling in her very energetic style.
“We’re going to have a concert at our warehouse,” Mort says in his very fake British accent, a slight modification of his pirate accent. Of course, he was going to have the concert anyway. Listen Day just seems like a good excuse to have a concert, even though Mort has never heard of Listen Day before and is trying to impress Mrs. Death with a lie.
Now that I think about it, Mortician seems to be attracted to Mrs. Death. She isn’t a bad looking woman for her age. She has cute white skin, chubby lips, farmer-blonde hair, and an old-fashioned style of clothes. Her body is the same as any healthy thirty-eight-year-old, but I can see why Mort would be attracted to her. Especially since Mort is obsessed with pirates, and Mrs. Death is the type of woman that pirates would love to conquer and rape.
Mrs. Death starts lunch.
Mr. Death still hasn’t arrived, and Mrs. Death is worried. He’s way past due, four hours past due actually, and it’s unsociable to not serve lunch at lunchtime. She’s left with no choice.
Since it is a Listen Day meal, the lunch consists of foods that make sounds. For an appetizer, she serves them the squishy sounds of stuffed mushrooms, which is Charley’s favorite food. She likes fungusy-tasting things, I guess. She also serves an orchestrated salad, with crisp vegetables, crunchy croutons, and gooey dressing. They listen to their food carefully as they eat. It’s a tradition, on Listen Day.
I go back to my body, shivering excitedly because of the thought of the girl I’m sleeping next to. My palm squeezes a blue cheek, then rubs its smoothness. She doesn’t wake up. Blue women are deep sleepers. All they need for survival is sex, and all they need for enjoyment is sleep. Their lives are complete perfection because of this. I wish humanity’s culture was more like theirs. Then again, blue women are machines, and humans are the opposite of machines (whatever that is). They have too many emotions and imperfections.
The scratching-crawling sounds continue. They’re concentrated in a single spot, in the corner of the bed’s wall. The blue woman doesn’t wake to the sound even though it’s right next to her ear. Deep-deep sleeping…
The scratching/crawling turns into scraping into tearing into pounding/ripping. It’s trying to get through the wall into my closet-room, to my bed, to my blue woman. Then there’s a crack. In the corner, the wall’s cracking right through, it’s going to come into my room. Blackness takes over. I can see it coming out. A rat maybe, or a thousand-bug army. Coming from their world into mine.
The crack splatters and the blackness gets BIGGER. But nothing moves inside of it…
Mr. Death enters as a zombie, the same way I was always said the grim reaper would walk. But this isn’t a robed skeleton; it’s a man in a normal suit, an average American man. Cold from the cloudy day, but sweating, nervous. A horrifying expression on his face.
Mrs. Death smiles and says, “Hello, precious.” But the rest of us, all of my friends and the two daughters, frown and say nothing.
The bringer-of-death is actually a normal person, well-dressed, well-groomed, well-classed, average. I didn’t expect this. He’s just like any other father — well, besides Nan’s father, the alcoholic.
They watch the man discreetly as he begins crying into the table, wetting the table’s cloth, making small whimper sounds.
Mrs. Death smiles without concern — a natural reaction to everything. Or maybe she has lost soul too.
The man doesn’t speak. He just cries.
Cries.
My body:
Something appears from the hole near my bed. It’s a small man, the size of a human child’s action figure, who looks like a cockroach. Cockroach man. Staring at me with its pickax, which it used to break my wall apart. Tiny, spider-like eyes.
The cockroach people look just like humans, but have many cockroach characteristics. They’re the size of cockroaches, they eat shit like cockroaches, and they live in the walls like cockroaches. Millions upon millions of them live on top of each other because their tribes are so BIG. A single mother produces at least one hundred offspring with each pregnancy, and reproduction is their main activity. Each cockroach person lives from one to two hundred years and usually produces two thousand children