RE Bunch

Polyphagia: An abnormally strong sensation of hunger or desire to eat often leading to or accompanied by overeating

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Klara said nothing, only looking at the dust covered card pinned to the refrigerator. The card read: We’re Engaged! 3.14.20** x Klara & Tarrance. Details to Follow.

She looked at the sun-faded card and tried to remember the joy it once held. A new thin gold band elegantly wrapped around her finger. The diamond dancing light around the card. She wondered if her engagement card still held a prominent place in the homes of the people she mailed it to. Klara often wondered if her family and friends moved her engagement to the side to make space for newer, more current pieces of mail. If their announcement were replaced with a really good pizza coupon, Klara would understand. It had been four years since the card was mailed, and they had yet to followed up with a Save the Date card.

Klara said nothing, as she turned back to the kitchen island. Her brown eyes skipping over Tarrance. He was lazily chewing toast, brushing the crumbs to the floor. Tarrance’s tongue made room to speak through the dry crumbs stuck in his mouth, “I’ll be late tonight. Dillon and I have to get this project finished. I told Harry we had plans tonight, but you know how he gets about deadlines. I promise I will make it up this weekend.”

Her stomach growled as she rested her hand on top of it. It did not feel like hunger, it was something sharper than that. More nagging and pronounced. It interrupted her early morning sleep, like Tarrance’s soft snoring. She grabbed her slightly cooled mug of tea and leaned against the island. She was lost in thought trying to describe the sharp emptiness boring out her gut. “Okay. I love you.”

“Love you too.” Tarrance left the burnt ends on the counter and wiped his mouth. He kissed her forehead, leaving a few loose crumbs behind on her before walking out the front door. Klara’s eyes moving to the dog-eared wedding planning magazine stacked on top of a newer one that she left out from the evening before. Visions of marvelous mauve dresses felt stale on the page now, replaced by blushing pink bridesmaids.

This morning marked four years since they had gotten engaged, and scarcely any real planning had happened.

She brushed off her forehead as she drank her tea. Her stomach gurgled as the fluid dripped down her throat. It felt gritty and curdled as it dropped down her throat. She coughed, stiffening her back to clear her throat. Klara wiped the tears that formed at the corners of her eyes and examined her mug. Still, just tea and few leaves sliding along the bottom. Nothing, same as before. Klara shook her head and brushed her messy blonde hair behind her ear.

She was certain it was just a few leaves, a slippery over-steeped leaf that wiggled its way down her throat. Startling but not harmful. It was nothing. It was always nothing, a disappointing comfort of normalcy. But she could not place her lightheadedness now. Her mouth felt wetter, heavy with her saliva. Klara suppressed a gag as the need to spit rose in her throat. She braced herself as she moved to the side of the island with stools along it. She sat in the same spot Tarrance had abandoned his breakfast at, and as her face flushes. Klara closed her eyes and tried to shake the awful feeling growing inside her.

The thing that was sinking down her throat sublimely disappeared. It pitted her, turning the tight confined space in her abdomen to an empty drum. Larger and more vacuous, thrumming an aching craving up her spine. Klara felt hungry. Hunger like she would never eat again, and as if she would never stop eating again.

Klara grabbed the hand full of burnt crust and corners of toast and shoved them into her mouth. The acrid charcoal of crust crumbled instantly in her mouth and scraped against her tongue. It was brittle and bitter as it caught in the back of her throat. It was like an unnoticed itch finally being scratched as her eyes shot open. Klara choked on the bits of burnt ends down her throat, slugging the last bits of her tea down to drowned out the harshly charred toast.

“What the hell is wrong with me?” She shivered to herself. Klara was stunned. She had never done anything remotely like that before or felt like this. It was shockingly primal and entirely foreign to her. It almost made her earlier disquieted feelings seem cozy. Safer in a way she knew what to expect from the earlier nausea, but this feeling was new. She needed to fill the newly formed hole in her mind that the impulse had punched out.

Klara grabbed at the magazines, discarding the older copy. Something new, to bring her back to the present. The cover was still glossy and crisp to her fingertips. The pages snapped as they turned over. It was fresh off the newsstand. The bride on the cover’s face did not show the signs of age, with torn corners and water-stained pages. Klara needed new ideas, something more current, and on-trend. Just because she got engaged four years ago, did not mean that she had to use ideas from then. Cupcake bars were so old now, even back then it felt something she would shrug at. The new idea she was mounting to shrug at was an interactive cocktail bar.

As she turned over the lustrous pages of smiling faces, she felt her mind slipping into the world of the magazine. Sweet scents of unusual proteas and dainty peonies wove themselves into elegant bouquets and fascinating center arrangements. Happy whispers jumping between the pews of the church she went to as a child. If they were getting married today, their baby would have been about three years old. A laughing little boy or girl in a pressed matching outfit. Tiny lace on the hem of a flower girl skirt or matching bow tie to complement his father’s. Tiny fingers throwing delicate petals onto the ground or bravely holding onto the rings at the end of the aisle.

Her baby’s face would have been beautiful to see on a day like today. To have her first mommy and son dance as their son clung tightly to her hands. A small tear in her eye as she watched Tarrance gently rock their daughter on top of his polished dress shoes. Helping her baby at their little family table to eat a piece of decadent cake was all her heart wanted in that moment.

Tiers of fragrant crystallized flowers and pastel-colored candied lemon wheels pressed into the smooth swiss buttercream. The vibrant pinks and purples of the pansies and peonies crumbled on their forks. The little black specks of vanilla bean stood out in the strongly white cake, layered with vibrant lemon curd. Her baby’s blue, no brown like her eyes, were as large as saucers as they picked off and played with the flowers from the edges.

The first bite was startling cold and rough. The silky edges crinkled and cut the inside of her mouth. Its glossy edges melted into a pulp as her teeth bite down harder into the gumminess of it. The cake tasted bland and stuck to the roof of her mouth.

Klara’s reception was gone. She was alone in their apartment, as she always had been. She half-swallowed the weird texture forming in her mouth and spat out the rest into her hand. The glossy wedding cake from the magazine was gone. Jagged edges and the torn spine of the magazine was left before her. The masticated pulp of the paper was warm and slippery in her palm. The synthetic ink sticking between the groves of her tongue.

“I will always wonder what you could have been,” Klara whispered to her paper pulp in her hands. Her stomach felt like a vacuum expanding inside of her. It gurgled as it sucked in the paper that had slid down her throat. It was ravenous with a craving she could not name. It unfurled itself as the tendrils of a hollow pain climbed up her spine. She was nauseated as she threw the mash onto the cold tile by her feet.

She was dazed as she pulled herself to her feet. She would not be able to go on with her day until this feeling was gone. Her mouth salivated uncontrollably as acrid bile rose like floodwater inside of her. Her heart fluttered in her chest, trapped behind the iron cage of her ribs. She was starving. She was starving for something she had never had. Starving for something she could not place a name to.

She leapt over the kitchen island in one effortless bound. Her nose felt raw on the inside. Heightened and going numb from the odors rushing up. Each new scent like a lightning bolt to her brain, striking quickly but not hitting the lightning rod. She flung open the fridge, and scanned the shelves. The milk smelled curdled through the plastic container, and butter slipping out a foul rancid odor. The food of the anniversary dinner sat neatly out on the shelves.

Raw veggies looked limp in the crisper drawer. Tomatoes looked dull through the clear plastic bin, and the lettuce wilted dark green with liquid pooling at the bottom of the container. There was a smell like ambrosia that she was looking for on the shelves. It was sweet and tender, but with a slight sourness. It radiated through the heavy doors of the fridge that pulled her in. As she frantically looked around, she arrived at it on the middle shelf. Hidden under butcher paper with scrawled words: Chicken Breast.

She tore through the paper to reveal the peachy pink breasts. Thin white lines traveled along the plumb raw chicken, punctuating to pale yellow fat hastily left hanging on to the edges. The raw chicken was chilled and slick to the touch. Soft and firm in her hand, sending an excited chill down Klara’s spine. Apprehension faded quickly as her stomach unknotted itself.

Her teeth gnashed clumsily into the raw chicken. A faint taste of chicken accompanied the wetness rolling around her mouth. Raw tendons sticking between her teeth as she ripped a large chunk out of the breast. The fat melted under the heat of her mouth and coated her throat. The chicken mashed between her flat molars as she threw her head back. She felt the meat stick to the back of her throat as she forced it down. It was so close but fell just short of the feeling. The craving only grew more ferocious with the small offering of raw muscle. It was lacking something vital to fulling scratching the itch. A cruel incompleteness entered her. She tore another large bite from the breast before tossing it to the floor.  

As the breast smacked against the tile, it was like earmuffs being lifted off her head. It was hearing for the first time. Sound had just been invented for her as she spun around her boisterous housing. Her empty apartment was livelier than she ever imagined. Like it had always been living around her. It had a pulse that was not her own. She heard the upstairs neighbor pacing above her like they were walking on top of her head. She heard the muffled chattering of her neighbor’s voice responding to a speaker not in the room with them. She heard something begin to move inside the walls.

She heard the chattering of small teeth echo inside of the empty walls. She pressed her head against the grey walls to listen. She heard the tiny claws digging into wood and plaster. Small paws climbing on brick, moving blindly through the darkness in the walls. She stifled her breathing to listen to the direction more clearly. As her ear travel along the kitchen wall, she was interrupted by a winding sound. It was buzzing coming from inside the apartment. It was mechanical and louder than the creatures in the wall. The sound overriding even her heartbeat and oscillating blood.

Klara was starving and irritated. Angry at the interruption to her feeding by the strange noise. She had to find it before she could fully hear the creature in the wall. Her feet flew to the wavering sound of the mechanical buzzing. Her ears pinpointed the sound exactly, coming from her bedroom. The sound etched an exact location in her mind’s eye. Like echolocation to a bat. She dove right into Tarrance’s nightstand drawer.

Klara rifled through the drawer, throwing books and worn paper receipts to the ground. Inside a small worn box was the reason for the interruption. A small black phone that had just missed a call. Klara felt herself sink onto the cold floor with the new device. She could more accurately hear the creature’s movement from inside the walls now, but the phone held her attention. It was new to her but was seemingly well used. Like a diary, no other eyes were meant to see it other than the writer’s. The mystery taunted her for a moment but revealed itself quickly.

The smooth screen lit up as she pressed the home button on the front screen. Two missed calls, a voicemail, and five unread texts from Dillon. Her fingers moved on their own to expand the text notifications.

Good Morning. Sleep well?

I missed you last night.

I always miss you when you’re not here at night.

See you soon. I love you.

Don’t worry. I’ll get the reports done tonight, you focus on feeling better. Get home safe. I love you.

This somehow did not feel like new information to Klara, only a confirmation. Klara had always imagined finding infidelity in her relationship would be heartbreaking. Like being stabbed suddenly in a grocery store parking lot—inconceivable terror, devastation, and untethered anger. Feeling gutted. But this felt numb, unsurprising, and infuriatingly banal. She wanted to pin this affair on the miscarriage, but she did not want to give Tarrance more credit than he deserved. He often avoid conflict and choose the path of least resistance when things were hard between them. Tarrance always had a wondering, unimaginative eye. Klara turned off the phone so she could better hear the creature traveling along her bedroom walls. No more distractions. She needed to focus.

Her eyes traveled with the restless scratching from inside the white painted walls. Klara could smell the small rodent moving around. The smell of damp fur whetted her appetite further. In a feat of strength that startled her, she punched a hole into the wall of her bedroom. The pain shot like a joyful star up her arm as she pulled it from the dark hole. Her senses went wild as she looked at the blood trickling from her hand. Her eyes sharpening in the darkness as she peered into the hole.

She sucked on her bleeding knuckle as her eyes darted around the newly found space in the wall. The rich coppery blood was electric on her tongue. Klara could visibly hear the beating of the rat’s heart, racing quicker as it tried to jump up the support beams in the wall. Her fingers pulling away the drywall leaving large chunks on the floor surrounding her.

She dove her hand back into the wall where the rat was trapped at the bottom. The rat’s teeth clamped down on the webbing between thumb and index finger. She hissed with pain and thrilling happiness as she gripped around the rat’s stomach and neck. The creature wriggled and fought in her hand. She had finally caught it as she squeezed it tightly in her hand. Light-headedness enveloped her, as the craving barked louder from inside her.

The rats gnashed its flat teeth into her knuckle as it squealed frantically. Klara’s vision felt singular, pinpointed as she watched the rat flail around her hand. Its long pink tail whipping around, crashing against the wall and her arms. Its small hind legs spread out, groping around the air to something to hold onto. Its shiny beads of black bulged out while making direct contact with her own dark eyes. The snapping of tiny bones deafened Klara for a moment, as the rat went limp in her hand.

Her teeth ripped into the wet fur of the rat’s neck as she spat it out onto the debris-covered floor. The cooling blood gushed over the edges as she lapped it up. The blood was divine in the face of the hollowness crumbling away from inside of her. She sucked hard on the rat’s neck and felt the rat’s body resist for a moment. Bleeding it dry in a matter of seconds, the drool ran down her neck. It was like being fed for the first time. True satisfaction slipping down her gullet, only momentarily silencing her craving.

She discarded the twisted remains on top of the chipped plaster on the floor of her bedroom. Klara left her bedroom and went back towards the kitchen. She could hear footsteps coming. The heavy footfalls being damped on the worn carpet. She smelled tobacco, and synthetic lilac wafting closer to her entryway. She heard annoying clicking of Tarrance’s deviated septum and puffing breaths from the walk-up.

Klara wiped the blood from her mouth and sat down on the stool of the island in the kitchen. Her eyes watching the doorknob for the slightest turn. Her skin turning to gooseflesh as another wave of nauseated hunger overtook her. The muscles in her arms tensed up, as she inhaled deeply. Tarrance’s cologne lingered on the back of her tongue, but a new smell came to the front. The rich iron coursing through his veins, and the left-over smell of a lover’s good-bye. A nervous excitement tingled down her scalp down to her icy toes. Her stomach growled deeply as she leaned forward in her seat. She exhaled slowly to quiet her nerves as she heard keys begin to jingle in his pocket. She heard the church bell across town chime once. It was One-o-clock in the afternoon as she heard the clanking of tumblers in lock shift.

Klara was famished. She was going to feast with her whole heart for the rest of Tarrance’s life.