Saturday, January 8, 2011

Task at Hand


He noticed how she quietly went about doing it her way. She did it slowly and real careful like. Her cuts were clean, and precisely where they should have been.

He let out his breath slowly, so as not to disturb her. He knew his head would be on the line if he did and that was the last place he wanted to be. She turned and looked at him with no expression in her eyes. It was as if she was dead and stuffed, with glass eyes that held no feeling and no depth. He shivered despite himself and slowly handed her a clean cloth and some gut to finish up.

She bent back down and continued with the task at hand. As she placed the last piece in place, she let out a slow sigh like a gently deflating balloon that you could only see deflate and not hear. Finally, she turned to him and said, "Well, that's all I'm doing for today - you did a good job."

He smiled and picked up the heavy tubs. As he heaved them onto the dolly, he thought of when things were better. He wheeled them over to the freezer and carefully emptied the contents onto the shelves at the back, hanging the sausages from the hooks in the ceiling. Returning back to the operating room, he removed the bones and skulls, glad it wasn't him that was going to be dinner tomorrow.

4 comments:

  1. That's a very good reason to be glad. Nobody wants to be dinner. :)

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  2. Laurita, I agree. I had the ending of Silence of the Lambs (the part when Hannibal is talking on the phone about having someone for dinner the next night)in mind when I wrote this.

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  3. I hope they didn't just throw out the bones and skulls. They make great soup.

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  4. Cathy I laughed so hard at your comment I almost swallowed my tongue!

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