SEVER

There was nothing going on in the neighbourhood. Day after day I would sit on the doorstep and smoke. The street was cold. Nobody was walking around. Sometimes I’d walk to the corner store and buy a candy bar. Maybe a cold can of soda. Package noodles. Cotton balls. Whatever. I was living alone. Everybody was living alone. I didn’t know how to talk to anybody anymore. I was sitting out front of the house in the afternoon. My neighbour’s kids were out in their front yard but we didn’t speak. I was smoking a cigarette when I saw Stephen on the street walking. Stephen was a really nice guy. I’d known him for a while. He was living with his girlfriend. They’d been together forever. Her name was Sarah. She was a total bitch. I didn’t like her but I liked Stephen. I raised a hand to him and I called out his name. He smiled. He looked really happy to see me. He crossed the street and came over to me. I gave him a hug. I wanted to hug somebody. Stephen was a handsome man. He had blonde hair. I don’t know what it was. I don’t know why I did it. We were hugging each other for a long time. He picked me up off of the ground a little and he was holding me to his chest. I don’t know why I did it but I kissed him, I kissed his shoulder and collarbone, then I was kissing his jaw, and his face, and then I was kissing his mouth and he was kissing my mouth. We were kissing each other on the doorstep for a pretty long time. The neighbour’s kids were watching us kiss each other. I told him we should probably take this inside and he said okay, sure. He was bored of Sarah. He didn’t have to say it. I didn’t blame him. I just wanted to touch somebody. We were fooling around on the couch and then we went upstairs to the bedroom. We took all our clothes off and we had sex. I didn’t think anything about it at the time. It wasn’t a serious problem. I didn’t care so much about having sex with him. It was good to have a body to make contact with. It was good to be touching somebody. I was pretty impressed that he was fooling around on Sarah. Fuck Sarah. When it was over he seemed totally deflated but they always do. I went to the bathroom and I put on a shirt and sweatpants. I went downstairs and I got a glass of water. I made a cup of coffee. I called up to Stephen to ask if he wanted anything but he didn’t answer. I sat on the couch. I watched The Simpsons on the television. I figured he probably regretted cheating on Sarah with me. I wanted to give him some space. I heard him moving around on the landing. I didn’t mind. I passed out for a while. I took a nap on the couch. My body didn’t feel right but it never did. I got up off of the couch. My mouth was dry. I felt bad. The sun had gone down and the house was totally dark. I called out for Stephen but he didn’t say anything. I checked the downstairs rooms. I figured maybe he’d gone home. I went up the stairs in the dark. I checked the bedrooms and he wasn’t there. I checked the bedroom and he wasn’t in the bed. I passed the bathroom and I heard him speaking low and odd. The bathroom door was cracked. I pushed the door open and I saw him laying in the bath. His body was white in the dark. He was muttering. He was trembling. His hair was wet. He was holding something in his hand. He told me to bring him some ice. He told me he needed a box of ice. I asked him what was going on and he told me not to look. I turned the light on and he screamed. He was holding his penis in his hand but the head had come off. There wasn’t any blood. There was just the fleshy head of his penis in his hand. It was totally detached from his body. I didn’t know what to do. I told him that I’d call an ambulance. He told me to bring him some ice. He was screaming and crying. He kept saying the same thing over and over. You broke it. You broke it. You broke it. I went into the kitchen and I tried to call for an ambulance. I could hear him screaming in the bathroom. I didn’t want to touch him. The thought of touching his body was totally awful. I couldn’t comprehend what was happening. I didn’t know what else to do so I brought him a Tupperware full of ice cubes but he didn’t want to let go of it. He was pressing it against the pink stump. It was like he was trying to reattach it. I sat on the floor by the bathtub. He looked totally insane. I didn’t want to look at him. I really regretted the whole afternoon that we’d spent together. It was a big mistake. I called the emergency services and I told the dispatcher what had happened. The dispatcher was really composed and reassuring. It really calmed me down a lot. I figured I’d call Sarah and tell her to meet him at the hospital. I took the paramedics into the bathroom when they arrived. They pulled him out of the bathtub and wrapped him in a heating blanket. He wouldn’t let them take it out of his hand. They wrapped him up really tight so nobody would see what had happened. I stood on the doorstop and waved goodbye to him. I said that I hoped he’d feel better. All of the neighbours were out on the street watching. There wasn’t much else to do. I felt really bad about what happened to Stephen. I probably shouldn’t ever have said hello to him. We really didn’t know each other that well.

A brutal tale based on true events by Chip Driver.