Stratum granulosum

The condition of the boy infuriated him. It was a far from perfect specimen. No matter, this one would enrich the stockpot ahead of the main ingredient. He took the lad’s body from the hook where it hung limp and heavy beneath the cold, unkind beams of the work lights, lifted it onto his shoulder and laid it down on the gurney.

Taking a fresh scalpel from the bench, he made the primary incision from the tip of the acromion down, being careful to use the belly of the knife not the tip. His wrist remembered the act from countless times before and gave its signature twist around the umbilicus as he sliced. He wiped the scalpel on his apron and put it aside, picking up the heaviest of his cartilage knives. Time to begin reflecting the tissues. A world of interest on the inside, so much more than the drab outer layers, slave to the tyranny of facial expression and superficial physique. He sawed with the knife, using its weight to help him pull the flesh back from the bone all the way up to and over the boy’s chest. He wiped the knife and reverted to the scalpel. Now it was time to work on the abdomen, taking great care to slice layer by layer so as not to perforate the bowel. The silver kiss of the blade caused new lips to open expectantly in the boy’s belly, which puckered open wetly like a flower. The peritoneum incised, he fingered the orifice, making a V-shape to raise the abdominal wall. Just as thousands of others had before, the organs fell away from the outer surface, crouching back as though they knew they mustn’t be cut. He paused, taking in the saltwater bile stench of the lad’s innards, then opened the abdomen fully. He grabbed the heaviest cartilage knife once more and got to work on the chest, cutting through the sternoclavicular joints then sawing at the costal cartilages. The boy was in good shape, supple and young, easy work. Older cadavers could result in calcified costal cartilages, rigid structures like tombstones an epitaph to the specimen’s age. Cutting and prizing against the posterior surface of the sternum, he lifted away the large elongated pyramid of flesh and bone and placed it in a dish on the workbench. Adjusting the lamp, he peered into the deeper mystery of the chest cavity. He used the huge knife again, cutting close to the spine and then used his free hand as a scoop, dipping it into the thoracic cavity. Stringy adhesions stretched and snapped as he lifted the thoracic organs from out of their gory hole. He piled them up on the boy’s neck then stepped back and admired his handiwork. He had usurped the superficial. He was looking at the boy’s true face.

Загрузка...