by Brian Auspice
Hamstring lies in a hospital bed. Tubes feed out of his right arm into a large 1970’s mainframe computer. He watches his blood slowly get sucked through the plastic. The computer beeps. A nurse walks in. She places a stereo on a nearby table.
“The doctor will see you now,” she says. She opens a utility cabinet, squeezes herself in, and closes the door behind her.
The doctor enters the room. He grabs a clipboard hanging from the edge of the bed. He reads it over. His expression becomes grave.
“This isn’t good,” he shakes his head. “No, no. This. Is. Not. Good. Simply not good.”
“What is it, doctor?” Hamstring asks.
“Hamstring is such a shitty name,” the doctor replies. He throws the clipboard out the window. It bursts into flames on the way down to the parking lot. It lands on a bus full of nuns and causes an explosion.
“Injuries!” the doctor cheers. The stereo blares techno. The nurse jumps out of the utility cabinet and runs over to the doctor. They hug, make out, fist-pump, and dance. The song ends. They put their hands to their sides. The nurse adjusts her hair.
“I’ll check on that for you,” she says. She leaves the room.
The doctor turns to Hamstring, “Now, Hamstring.”
“Yes, doctor?”
“I’m not going to call you Hamstring,” the doctor continues. “It’s such a shitty name. Your parents should be beaten. Or you should’ve been aborted. One or both. I don’t know. I don’t care. From now on, you are Kazoo.”
“My name’s not Kazoo,” Hamstring replies. “It’s Hamstring.”
The doctor laughs.
“Kazoo…Kazoo, Kazoo, Kazoo,” the doctor begins. “Listen, I’m the most qualified doctor on the planet – the Universe, actually – I’ve taken several online courses over a six-week period. And! And. I have a Masters in Communication. I even got it through the mail. Trust me. I know what’s best. You. Are. Kazoo.”
The computer beeps. It spits out seven-thousand sheets of paper. The doctor picks up the top page and pulls out a magnifying glass.
“It says here,” the doctor peers through the lens. “It says here you have a sore throat.”
The doctor drops the magnifying glass and smashes it with his foot.
“You know what that means, Kazoo?” the doctor asks.
Hamstring glances around the room, “N-no…?”
“Sickness!” the doctor cheers. He shreds the paper into a million pieces and tosses it into the air like confetti. The stereo blares techno. The nurse runs in and has sex with the doctor. They bump and grind and writhe on the floor. Squares of paper stick to their sweaty bodies. The doctor climaxes. The music stops. They stand up, hands at their sides.
The nurse turns to Hamstring, “You have a visitor.”
She fixes her hair.
“Doctor,” she says, performing a pirouette.
The doctor smacks her bottom.
“I’m going to get a cup of coffee,” he says. They walk out of the room together, their clothes in their arms.
Ten-million years go by. A visitor enters the room. Hamstring doesn’t recognize him.
“Sorry I’m late,” the visitor says. He is out of breath. “I got lost near the break room. I took a left when I should’ve taken a right and wound up in the catacombs beneath the hospital. You know they keep children down there? I even asked one of the nurses about it and she told me anyone who falls deathly ill before the age of ninety isn’t worth trying to save. So, I guess they just keep them where they’ll end up. Anyways. These are for you.”
The visitor pulls a bouquet of flowers from behind his back and holds them out. They immediately wilt. The visitor frowns and insta-rots. His carcass falls to the tile floor and explodes in a cloud of dust.
Hamstring rips the surgical tubing from his arm. He stands and wobbles slightly as he gains his balance. He awkwardly walks to the window. A vast desert stretches into the distance. A solitary sun sets fire to the world. Below, in the parking lot, tucked in the shallow spaces between the dunes, are rusted car frames. The remnant of an exploded bus is littered with a dozen skeletons. Hamstring turns and walks over to the stereo. He turns it on. Techno music begins to play. And Hamstring dances.
Brian Auspice exists in an impermeable void between time and space. A gazebo entitled “Deep Blue” is being published by Eraserhead Press as part of their 2014 New Bizarro Author Series. 01001010 01101111 01101000 01101110 00100000 01110011 01110101 01100011 01100011 01110101 01101101 01100010 01110011 00101110 http://bauspice.wordpress.com
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