Shopping day

Shivering as he walked through the rain, George Wilson pulled his hood farther down over his eyes and tried to breath through his mouth. George, not a mouth breather by nature had trained himself to do it ever since the smells had started. The rain helped keep the smell down which is why he only ventured out of his apartment on rainy days. He was walking to the corner grocery store, his cupboards woefully bare and he was down to his last two cans of tuna. He thanked God for the rain as he hurried alone down the street.

He stepped to the door of the store and took a deep breath knowing the smell inside was likely to be staggering. With a set shopping list and his route through the store firmly in his mind he opened the door and rushed in. It was a small grocery store with five narrow rows of dusty cans and expired cereals and a produce section that featured a fine selection of fruit flies and wilted lettuce.

The smell was, as he had imagined, enough to make him gag and he quickly covered his mouth with a hanky to help to mask it. He could taste the stink through the hanky so he rushed through the store holding his breath as long as he could until he couldn’t help but take another stinking lungful.

The rain had come, thank God, when the store was likely to be deserted, save the clerk at the counter. George rushed through the aisles grabbing things quickly wanting to be back in the rain as soon as possible.

His basket full he walked to the counter. The clerk was a slight man standing a modest five foot five. He was neatly dressed in blue jeans and a clean white shirt. A straight nose beneath close set eyes reminded George of a weasel. His hair and small goatee were meticulously trimmed. He smiled at George. A nametag pinned to his shirt read Jim.

“Find everything ok? Jim asked.

“Yes” George said face down and turned from the thick stink coming from Jim. The smell was thick and it coated his nose and throat like tar. He could feel the stink…taste it in the back of his throat. It was the smell of rot and ruin. It was the smell of the animate dead.

“Are you okay?” Jim asked.

George coughed into his hanky fighting back the urge to vomit at the fresh wave of stink that came from Jim’s mouth. Oh God what has this man done, George thought. He coughed again nodding that he was alright and he made a circle motion with his free hand to indicate to Jim that he wanted him to get on with it and ring up his order.

“Okay…if you say so.” Jim said, now thinking that he better hurry before George vomited on the floor.

George pulled his wallet out and started to pull out bills as he waited and he prayed as he had a hundred times before. Make it go away...I get it…I do.

Tim watched George out of the corner of his eye while he bagged the order. Drunk he thought. Just get him out of here. Then I can close up and go to the basement. There is discipline and relief in the basement. He’s had her for two weeks now and the police were ready to call it a runaway and give up the search.

George grabbed his bags and rushed for the door and the relief of the rain when from a door hidden behind a rack of bread he smelled something different…something wonderful. It brought him to a dead stop. He stood swaying on his feet like a heavyweight who just caught a hard right. Warm honey he thought. It reminded him of fresh warm honey bought at a country market on a hot summer morning. He took a deep breath through his nose and it washed away the thick stench that was caked inside his nose and throat. It calmed him and he breathed deep again. He smelled sweet hope and sad longing. He was drawn to it…would die to find it.

Jim watched George stop and saw him wavier on his feet. Worried that he would pass out and force him to call an ambulance he called out. “Have a good one buddy.”

Instantly, a new wave of stink rolled over George and stuck to him like an oil slick. It poured unchecked into his nose and mouth in thick putrid chucks. It reached deep inside his mind searching for his soul. He tasted, on lowest part of his tongue, cries of shame and remorseless action. He felt, as an itch behind his eyes, a nurtured lust for innocence corrupted and a brutal hatred for self. He ran out of the store and into the pouring rain to escape. Fourteen fast steps to the alley and he vomited the smell and the corruption until there was nothing left but bitter bile. He started to cry as he prayed again for mercy or death and started to walk home, head hanging, thankful for the rain that kept the smell down.



The End