Ink

There are three spots of black ink on my left index finger above the third knuckle. For some reason I cannot fathom, this concerns me far more than the fact that I have not observed any personal hygiene regimen for over a month. Each time I wake, I feel as though some large animal has shit in my mouth and I chew salted meat in the hope it will take away the taste. I dare not look in a mirror.

The three spots of black ink on my left index finger above the third knuckle keep me awake. The grime of a month’s worth of not cleaning my self is a film over the caucasional whiteness of my skin. It is even and steady. The ink spots blare at me in dark stars. I cannot clean them off.

I awake to the sound of thunder, a thousand fists on a thousand doors and the lightning illuminates my hiding place in staccato flashes through high dusty windows that seem cleaner than I am. In the flinty white light of the storm, the first light in the darkness that I have seen in two weeks, since the batteries died, there are three spots of black ink on my left index finger above the third knuckle.

There are sausages in the snack machine. They were crammed in the back, behind the coiled metal racks that would rotate and push them forward for anyone with an electrical outlet and a dollar. I reach through the void where the glass used to be and grab them. No telling how long they have been there. No telling how hungry I am…almost hungry enough to eat three spots of black ink on my left index finger above the third knuckle.

I watch dust motes as they sail through the air in the great open space that has become my hiding place and my final resting place and my prison. The dust lands on me, I haven’t moved for days it seems. Too weak to move, except to raise my hand and look at three spots of black ink on my left index finger above the third knuckle.

There are three spots of black ink on my left index finger above the third knuckle. I stare at them and I wonder how they became so large…they are large enough to devour me. They are three hungry, open mouths that look like three spots of black ink on my left index finger above the third knuckle.

I cannot remember her name. Her hair was dark, her eyes blue. I saw her devoured by three mouths, dark, open, empty holes that looked like three spots of black ink on my left index finger above the third knuckle. When the holes open up to devour me, I shudder in relief on the cement floor.