Orgy of Souls

6

There was something about the hospice that made Samuel immediately rush to the shower when he returned home. A film of death, an inevitability, that he had to scrub off. He looked at his mild paunch in the mirror, cupping his belly and jiggling it up and down as if he could shake it away. He knew it was only a matter of time until his “AIDS diet” stripped him of it. He had already lost a lot of weight. The outlines of his bones began to reveal themselves along his arms and legs. His belly, as had been his curse all his life, was the last place he lost weight.

The water hit him with a hot sting as soon as the glass door closed behind him. He moved to turn the temperature down then decided that he wanted to feel the scald, enjoy the ability to feel anything. The poor water pressure spit out drops in fits and spurts within the glass tomb of the shower stall, splattering his shaved head. The other family legacy was his premature baldness. His illness nibbled at his vanity, but not so much that he wouldn’t shave his head rather than nurse a balding pate. He turned his back to the stream, leaning against the rear of the shower enclosure to allow the hot water to scourge him. If he had any courage whatsoever, he’d open his veins now and be done with it. The thought of being discovered naked in the shower—a conflict with his personal vanity—was only made worse by the knowledge that suicide was one of the greatest sins. Ultimately, however, he wanted a better ending to his story.

The sputter of the showerhead caused him to turn around. His routine was to hold his mouth ajar to rinse it out, but he was met with the taste of rusty nails. Opening his eyes, pink splotches spotted the floor. His skin blistered under the pelting water. Sores scored his flesh; his budding melanomas swelled like overripe fruit. The cratered flesh of his arm, riddled with spent pustules, issued thin trickles of blood like poxed stigmata. The wounds cracked, drowsy eyes filling with tears of mucous-like pus, before bursting in splays of blood.

A startled scream escaped his throat as he tumbled out of the stall. Samuel patted at his skin as if he were on fire. Only his now all-too-usual discolorations marbled him. Scarlet streams, a blood frieze, streaked the shower. He grabbed a towel to sop up the mess, but after a few unsuccessful swipes he unfolded it to make out the words “Blood Must Be Paid.” He dropped the towel into the remaining pool of blood. When he found the courage to pick it back up, it was no more than a crime scene inspired Rorschach.