A Little Piece of Another Life

Charles F. Dunham

"Henry, take the garbage out."

He chugged down half a bottle of Ball Game Beer, then set it on the end table next to his recliner. It joined the bottle he'd already killed. He belched.

A primeval moaning rose from the alley behind the house. "It's hungry," Mona said. "The neighbors are going to complain."

He pointed at the wall-sized television. "Ballgame."

"You said you'd take it out during the commercial." Mona moved in front of him, blocking his view. Even covered by a baggy gray Diamondbacks sweatshirt, her breasts caught his attention. Especially the middle one.

Another moan came from the alley. Sounds of the crowd cheering pulled Henry's attention back to the baseball game. On the television, Mickey Prodigious strode to the plate. Henry waved an arm at Mona. "Prodigious."

"It's only the second inning, Henry. He'll bat again."

Henry chugged down the last of the beer, then pointed the empty bottle at the recliner next to him. "Sit."

Mona raised her hands to the heavens, then dropped them to her sides, causing her breasts to wobble. Henry's eyes swung toward them, focusing on the middle one. In ten years of marriage Mona hadn't let him touch that one. She was a respectable woman. She settled into the empty recliner. "Take it out after Prodigious bats. Promise."

Henry grunted. Prodigious fouled off a couple of pitches, quickly falling two strikes behind. Henry groaned. Mona moaned. A tremendous cry rose again from the alley. It sounded like a cave waking up with a massive toothache.

"Homer," Henry pleaded.

"Hit one out," Mona shouted, ignoring the moans from the alley. Prodigious was a stud. If she'd let anyone touch her middle breast, he'd be the one.

Prodigious struck out. "Damn," said Mona.

"Beer."

The moan from the alley became a shriek. Mona sprang out of the recliner. She walked behind Henry, pausing to slap the back of his head.

"Hurt," he said.

She picked up the two bottles from the end table. "You come home from the warehouse every night, plant your ass in the recliner and don't get up the rest of the night except to go to the bathroom or if you want sex."

"Sorry."

Another shriek.

"You don't have to listen to Edna whine about the noise. I do." She'd just take the garbage out herself if she could, but what a scandal that would cause.

"Neighbors." His tone carried the disgust of the ages.

"Edna's a good neighbor. She shouldn't have to listen to it screaming."

"Beer."

Mona headed toward the kitchen carrying the bottles. "After you take the garbage out."

"Myself."

"You will not get another beer yourself. Do hear me?" She stomped a foot. Her breasts jiggled.

"Middle."

"Jesus Christ. What's with men? We have three breasts and you obsess on the middle one. What's so special about that one?"

On the television, retired Diamondbacks outfielder Barry Steroid held up a bottle of Ball Game Beer. "It's what the major leaguers drink. Come on, get in the game."

"You're not touching my middle breast." Mona said. "We're not that kind of people."

A shriek that rattled the windows. Mona hurried into the kitchen and threw the bottles into the plastic garbage container under the sink. She'd heard rumors of glass being shattered by a creature's shriek.

The phone rang. "Get that," she called. No answer. "Why do I have to do everything?" She hurried out to the living room and snatched up the receiver.

"Oh, hi Edna . . . Henry will feed it right away . . . I promise."

She slammed down the receiver. "Henry take the damned garbage out!" His eyes were on her breasts as she shouted.

"Middle."

"You better take that garbage out. Right. Now."

The doorbell rang. A burly policeman stood on the porch. He held a citation book. "Mona, this is getting old."

"I'm sorry, Jim. Henry will take the garbage out right away. Won't you, Henry?"

Henry grunted.

Jim nodded. "He better. A third citation will cost you $2,000."

"I know. I appreciate your patience."

Three shrieks, each one a step up in volume and rolling into the next. Jim's eyes widened. He flipped open the citation book.

Mona covered the book with her hand. "I'll make sure Henry takes care of it right away."

"Look, Mona, I have another call to make. Then I'll be back. That garbage had better be taken out and everything quiet or I will write you a third citation."

"It'll be done. I promise."

He tucked the citation book under his belt as if to signal the end of official business. He took a good look at her middle breast, then walked back to his patrol car.

Mona slammed the door. Did he really think she hadn't seem him look at her that way? But she couldn't dwell on it; the garbage had to go out. She ought to call for a volunteer from the local church. That would show Henry. But, slug though he was, he didn't deserve that kind of humiliation.

The commercials ended and the game returned. Henry belched. Mona decided to try another way. She crossed her arms, gripped the bottom of her sweatshirt and pulled it over her head, then stepped in front of Henry.

"Sex." He grinned.

She dropped her outer bra to the floor, exposing her left and right breasts. She kept her inner bra on.

"Middle."

"No." Only her doctor, and of course Annie when she was nursing, had ever seen or touched her middle breast.

"Annie," Henry said, as if reading her mind. He sagged back into the recliner. His eyes teared up.

Mona moved next to him and stroked his hair. "I miss her too."

"Home."

"No, she stays at the institute."

"Childhood."

Mona stopped stroking his hair. "Annie will have a childhood, just a different one. We agreed that this is a wonderful opportunity."

Howls from the alley. The rattle of steel bars. She had to do something. "Okay, Henry. Just this once."

Henry didn‘t respond.

Mona cupped her middle breast, still covered by her inner bra. "I'm talking the middle one here." God, what would her mother say if she knew?

Henry looked up. "Middle?"

"Yes. Middle."

He stood and reached for her.

"Garbage first."

Inhuman howls. Bars rattling. The phone ringing.

"Henry, it's alive, it feels pain, even if it is genetically engineered." She touched her middle breast again. "Last chance."

Henry hurried into the kitchen and bagged up the garbage under the sink. He opened the back door and stepped into the Arizona room. The day's high had been 120 degrees and it hadn't cooled much with nightfall. A token breeze limped through the screening. He tossed the bags into the grocery cart already filled with nearly a week's garbage and pushed it into the yard.

The howls stopped. The rattling of the bars died away. Henry could see it hopping up and down in the cage beyond the chain link fence. A glance back showed a single light on in the kitchen. The bedroom window was dark.

The creature gave a joyful whoop. Whoops, tinged with jealousy, rose up from every cage flanking each house bordering the alley. Overhead, the triplets were out, hanging low in the western sky. Each moon seemed like a computer generated reflection of the other two, the outer ones equidistant from the middle.

Henry trundled the cart across the yard. "Beer." He grinned. At the back gate he said, "Game." He punched in the code on the gate's key pad. "Middle." He laughed and clapped his hands three times before rolling the cart up to the cage.

Red, child-like eyes peered through the steel bars. "Food," it said and sprang up, horns clanging against the pitched steel ceiling, before hoofs slipped as they landed on the steel floor. Tiny, raisin-wrinkled hands reached through the bars.

Henry took the bags out of the cart and set them down on the gravel. "Food."

It shot across the cage and rammed a push-bar, allowing water to flow into a steel trough. It drank deeply to replace the sweat pouring off its leathery skin, its only means of eliminating bodily waste.

"Sorry I haven't fed you for a few days."

"Starving."

"I know. I really am sorry." He opened the cage door and tossed the bags inside, then locked the door.

It bounded away from the water trough and rushed the bags. It ripped one open and stuffed its head inside. Henry could hear smacks and crunches as it ate. After several minutes, it pulled its head out of the bag and looked at Henry. "Thanks."

"I've been kind of depressed. My job sucks. And we only see Annie a couple of times a year."

Guileless eyes focused on Henry. "Sorry."

"And Mona's so repressed about the middle breast thing." He turned and started to push the cart away.

"Luck."

"Thanks." He pushed the cart down the alley and into the back yard, locking the gate behind him. Ahead, the light had been turned on in the bedroom. "Yeah!" he yelled, echoed by the creatures of the alley.

Henry abandoned the cart, eager to get inside, his pace quickening, a joy in his legs. "Middle!"

Charles F. Dunham

Return