“Your friends here are good people, Bruce. They care for you in a way that allows your gift to flourish. Your body is an amazing vessel. They seem to understand that better than you.”
“I don’t want to die,” I said meekly.
Fiona took several quick steps toward me and slapped me hard across the face. I felt teeth dislodge and tumble down my throat.
“You’re ego is incredible!” she screamed. “This is so far beyond you now! Disease will exist irrespective of your desire to thwart it. Nobody ever thinks of the illness. Nobody ever considers its hunger to survive. Up until now, our illnesses have had to live in symbiosis with a host — hopelessly reliant. You have helped break that necessity. The illness you have grown longs to live independently. Think of how many lives could be saved if the illness no longer needed a host.”
I tongued the blood on my gums as Fiona’s words stabbed at me. Her true colours were infinite shades of black. The tumours made me interesting, I didn’t make them interesting. But without me, the tumours would be nothing. I was their owner, not Fiona.
“You can’t have them,” I said.
Fiona’s laughter flew from her mouth like bats, squeaking and smothering me in condescension.
“That’s where you’re quite wrong, Bruce. The tumours have started to leave your body. It won’t be long until they’ve all externalised. You’re not going anywhere until I have them. You’re not strong enough to leave, and even if you were, you’re too much of a coward.”
I wanted to refute her words, but they were true. I was a coward. I’d never been anything else. It would be easier for me to stay here until the tumours had left me, which is why it was probably going to be the outcome.
The water had passed my waist now and my legs had shriveled into prunes. I tried to kick against my bonds, but the pain this caused was too much. I studied my arms. All the fat had deteriorated and all that remained was skin-wrapped bone.
“What if I die before the tumours leave?” I asked with vague defiance.
“I’m certainly not above slicing you open,” came her swift reply.
“No, no no!” cried Rhonda. “We never discussed cutting him open. We musn’t do that.”
“We’ll do what we have to do, honey,” replied Vince, comforting his wife with a hug. “This is more important than all of us.”
Rhonda’s height was such that the water was already licking at her chin. Her discomfort was palpable, but she remained silent about the inconvenience.
“Come on,” said Arthur. “Let’s all go to another room and have a nice cup of Earl. Let’s give poor Bruce some time to himself.”
Everyone, including Fiona, followed Arthur’s suggestion and I was left alone. I could hear them squabbling amongst themselves, but I couldn’t make out what they were saying. The residual echo of Fiona’s words bounced around my head, obscuring my ability to think. I toyed with the idea of an escape plan, but my innate powers of self-deprecation made this an impossible prospect. I thought about my mother and the hopelessness she must be feeling. It didn’t matter how amazing the care Fiona was providing for her was… it wasn’t the same as the loving care only a son can provide. I’d abandoned her.
Nausea wrenched me awake some hours later. I sat in darkness, the ropes chewing into me without mercy. Diluted artificial light spilled into my apartment through the curtains, illuminating the water just enough for it to look like tar. It was sloshing against my nipples and rising steadily. I tried bucking against the ropes once more, but the pain was even more intense than before. I slumped my head forward in defeat. A vomitous string of drool oozed from my mouth, refusing to break free despite trying to sever it with my teeth. I had become so intimately familiar with my bodily excretions. It was like a barometer, letting me know how I was. I had stopped being disgusted by it a long time ago. The first time I saw blood in the toilet bowl, the fear of human waste that society instills in us disappeared. So much of life is shit, piss and vomit. The waste itself is no way near as disgusting as our urge to run away from it.
I felt something with substantial mass bump into me. The darkness made it hard to decipher and I had to train my gaze for some time before any detail came into focus. It was a body, floating facedown in the water. The tumours kicked and my throat tightened. Who was it? The body was small. Logically it had to be Belinda or Rhonda. The thought was repulsive. Even with their allegiance to Fiona, I couldn’t stand the thought of harm coming to either of them. My stomach churned like a washing machine, displacing my interior fortitude. Something big in my throat was rising, cutting off my oxygen supply. I hacked, trying to bring it up, but it was too large. It was moving on its own. I’d have to wait and hopefully not pass out in the process. The body kept knocking against me with morbid rhythm. The object rising in my throat had caused my neck to expand. Despite the darkness, all I could see was white light. The veins in my forehead were jutting out so far I could see them in my periphery. When I was sure consciousness was about to leave me, I painfully coughed up the object. I heard it splash and flail in the water somewhere in front of me. Oxygen spilled into my lungs, causing more pain than relief.
The object I’d coughed swam toward me. I knew it was a tumour and kept expecting Fiona to lie in wait. The tumour mounted me and slowly climbed my torso. I could feel it on my shoulder like a pirate’s parrot. It pressed itself against my ear.
“Thank you,” it whispered. “You’ve been so good to us.”
“Help me,” I found myself saying.
“Of course,” it said.
It rolled into the water above my lap and swam for the rope. It splashed around like a piranha, chewing and tearing. I remained still, hoping that I wasn’t experiencing a dream. The rope around my wrists broke free. I clenched my fist to stimulate the flow of blood and watched the helpful tumour swim down toward my feet until it was lost in darkness. As the last of the rope fell away, I wanted to cry in relief, but I knew I was in danger of waking Fiona. The tumour swam back to the surface and I scooped it up. I held it before my face and studied it.
“Thank you,” I said.
“You’d better go,” it replied. “Just set me down if you could and I’ll be on my way.”
I obeyed and made my way for the door. I love my tumours, I thought.
4.
In the state I was in, making the trip to my mother’s on foot wasn’t possible. My legs were waterlogged and my feet had the flexibility of brick. My car had been removed by Fiona, purportedly out of concern for my safety. It was now apparent that this had more to do with limiting my ability to leave the apartment than anything else. I needed to join my sick and destitute brethren on the bus if I was going to make it. It wouldn’t be long until Fiona learned of my escape. I had no idea what she’d do, but I couldn’t imagine her leaving me be. Catching public transport at night had always filled me with terror. Humanity contorts in the darkness. Civility melts away. Nobody can be trusted… especially now.
The streetlights that lined the road bent at invisible joints and spilled a dull pink hue into the environment. Moths that approached the light flew away as something else. The occasional cars that drove by coughed from their exhaust pipes and spilled carnival music through blown speakers. Nothing was safe and the bus stop felt so far away. The only thing it seemed I could trust was the illness inside me. If I made a wrong move, the tumours would let me know. They were on my side.