By Nicholas Alan Tillemans


Every year that goes by paints me as an older man...wiser but also more estranged and less influential. Fashions come and go. Children pull away from their roots. They rebel. They conform to the ignorance of their peers. I'm not the best role model. Confined to my wheelchair, I communicate to Lisa, my step-granddaughter, only with the assistance of my electric larynx. She'll never take up smoking. I'm proud of her for that. She didn't learn that self-restraint from me. I'm incorrigible. Despite undergoing a total laryngectomy, I smoke half a pack of cigarettes a day. I'm a fiend. I smoke through my stoma. Lisa pretends to gag and cough whenever I smoke around her. I used to see her disapproval as a sign that she was coming into her own. But she's just as much a cow for the slaughter as I ever was. She's deadly impressionable. I tell her not to worry so much about what her friends think of her. I tell her it isn't healthy. But it doesn't matter what I think. She'll do just about anything to win the respect of her friends.

I tell Lisa that some of the things she wears are too revealing for a girl her age. She's only sixteen. She won't listen. She sneaks around behind my back...as if fashion is her salvation. She's a vulnerable girl.

She lost her parents when she was just eight years old. She's been living with me ever since. At first, Maria, my wife, took care of her. But Maria passed away last year. So, I'm alone with Lisa. I do my best to care for her. It isn't easy. Raising her has been more trouble than raising her mother ever was. The age difference is too much. And I'm not her "real" grandfather, just like I wasn't her mother's "real"; father. She reminds me whenever she gets upset. She's basically a good girl. But she gets impatient. I can't keep up with her. I can't compete with her friends. Ordinarily, that wouldn't be a problem; but her friends are insane. They're getting toes and fingers amputated. I could try to get Lisa out of that crowd; but it isn't just them. Girls all over the country are mutilating their bodies to keep up with the latest fashion trends. As much as I'd like, I can't raise Lisa in a bubble. I'm at my wit's end. When Lisa's mother was growing up, this sort of thing was unheard of. I don't understand it. Girls go under the knife all the time these days.

Lisa keeps pressuring me to help her pay for a surgery to remove her ring and pinky fingers. She keeps saying all the other girls are teasing her. She thinks her hands are awkward and clumsy. I tell her that it would be harder for her to use the computer. She doesn't care. She has her education to fall back on. It's better to be beautiful, smart and fashionable. She'll find a husband when she finishes college. It's sad. It's just the opposite of the way her parents and I thought. We never expected jobs that would cater to our disabilities. Kids these days are worthless.

I'd condemn them all, if it were just their faults. But I sympathize with them. The matter's been coming to a head ever since Anja, the first model in a wave of deformed supermodels, started showing up on the front covers of fashion magazines everywhere. She's missing her ring and index finger from either hand. She has a perfect, tight circle for a mouth. She walks around in little girl's shoes. She's bound her feet or disfigured them to fit the shoes. Ever since she made her debut, girls everywhere have been trying to look like her. I think it's plastic and perverse. I saw an interview with the model once. Her lips were so tight she could hardly talk.

I keep expressing my disapproval to Lisa. But she threatens to get work done in some van that stops by her school every other week. For a while, I knew she was bluffing. She didn't want ugly scars. Now, I'm not sure. She gets more insistent every day. She threatens to run away and leave me to die miserable and alone. It's cruel. It hurts. But I can't buckle. It would keep getting worse. She's already gone too far with her new diet.

Her friends are all "on the worm", as they say. Some of the thicker girls have lost thirty or forty pounds in less than a week. Lisa doesn't have to tell me. I know she's "on the worm"; too. She's lost maybe twenty pounds herself without even batting an eye.

I don't care what she thinks. She's not going to keep it. It's not a matter up for debate. For the last five days, I've been crushing up sedatives in her water at dinner. She gets woozy. She turns in early. I pull down her pajama pants and panties and insert a small meatball into her anus like a suppository. I read somewhere that I could coax the worm out that way.

At first, I was concerned that I'd sedate the worm as well. But, every time I checked, even as little as ten minutes later, the meatball was gone without a trace. The worm snapped it right up. I could probably go a step further and lead it out with a trail of meatballs...even set a trap for it. I know it's a silly idea. But it would work with that thing.

Anyways, tonight I'm gonna get it. I made a wire noose. I'll sit there with a meatball and snare that damn thing when it comes out. I'll humor Lisa for now. We'll watch that fashion show. She'll see how sick it all is. They're fucking zombie girls...lobotomized pussies with mouths that ache for anything they can get in them. They're just those parasites. That's all that's left of them.

I heard that Anja's going to be in the show tonight, wearing her three-fingered gloves and baby doll shoes. She'll be unveiling an even bolder look. Fashion can compel anything. If gloves have three fingers, girls these days will cut two off to fit in them. It's the price they pay for fashion. They'd cut their faces off to compliment a new dress.

It's the winter fashions we have to worry about now. It's getting cold out. Last night dipped down into the thirties. I had Lisa pull the glass down over all the screens in the windows when she came home from school today. It's very quiet in the house now. I can just barely hear the traffic outside. The house seems stuffy. "Lisa...help me onto the couch." Most people would ask nicely for help. But it comes out all wrong. So, I form imperative or declarative sentences instead of interrogative ones. It may seem rude. But I can't make any vocal inflections.

"Hang on grandpa." Lisa's popping our TV dinners into the oven. The oven door swings shut on its squeaky hinges. Lisa comes into the living room and helps me out of my wheelchair.

"You hurt your head." I notice a band-aid in the middle of Lisa's forehead. I reach for it.

Lisa jerks her head away. She giggles.

"Tell me what happened."

She ignores me and walks back into the kitchen.

"Lisa, come back here."

She walks down the hall and closes her bedroom door. I reach for the remote control and flip on the television. I nod off. I wake up to Lisa tapping me on the shoulder. Dinner's ready. Lisa's wearing make up. She just put it on. She's painted bright red lipstick on her lips. She's wearing mascara. Her eyebrows are perfect too.

I take the dinner tray from Lisa. I shake salt and pepper on it. I offer the salt to Lisa.

She covers her mouth. "I don't want any. Just set it on the table."

I shrug and fork up a piece of turkey. I take a good look at her. "You're wearing make up."

"I'm wearing it for you grandpa. Do I look pretty?"

I nod to Lisa. But I feel awkward about it. I take a drink of water and wipe sweat from my forehead. I look away. "You didn't tell me what happened to your head." I'm starting to break up. My battery is dying.

"You'll see grandpa. I'll show you later." She giggles again. She spreads her legs and scratches her butt through her pink velour sweatpants.

I gulp down more water. I'm trying to ignore the television. The contestants on the reality TV show we're watching are chewing up worms by the mouthful. They're spitting the worms out into a blender and blending the worms. They pass their shake to the contestant on their right and drink the earthworm shake that was passed to them. I don't have much of an appetite as it is...let alone after watching something like this. You think there'd be a law against it. It's gotta be a major health violation. But there it is.

Lisa stopped eating. She's gaping at the television set in disbelief. She's lost her appetite. She sets her dinner tray down on the coffee table.

Hell, I'm done now too. Just the thought of what we're watching makes me want to puke. I gag. But I gulp down more water and I'm fine. I finish my water. I pull out a cigarette and light it with my Aim n Flame...my other lighter died. I drag the smoke in through my stoma. It hurts and makes me want to cough. But I don't care. I need to smoke after I eat.

At 8PM, Lisa joins me on the couch. She grabs the remote control and turns the channel to her fashion show. "Do you think I'm pretty grandpa?"

I nod. I don't feel well. My heart is beating fast. The color on the television looks fucked up. There's too much blue in the picture. I take the remote control from Lisa. I try to adjust the set. It starts to look better...not much better though. Actually, when I look away from the set, the whole room looks blue. I'm getting a hard-on. I can't remember the last time I got stiff. It's been years. I think she crushed something up in my water.

Lisa puts an arm around me as the disfigured models come sauntering up the catwalk in the latest fashions. She presses her chest into my shoulder. She sucks on her thumb.

I reach for my glass of water but knock it off the end table. It's empty anyways. I forgot.

Lisa reaches down the back of her sweatpants and scratches herself again. She pulls her hand back out and rubs her forehead.

I know I shouldn't be thinking what I'm thinking right now. But I think she's coming onto me.

Lisa puts her hand on my leg, just under my groin. She squeezes it. She can see I'm aroused. She feels it too.

I pull away. But she won't let go.

"See Grandpa...they're pretty."

The battery for my electric larynx died. I can't say anything anymore.

"What's wrong grandpa?" Lisa looks at me for a while. "You can't say anything, can you?"

I point to my electric larynx.

Lisa removes the electric larynx from under my chin. She kisses my stoma and straddles me.

It's okay. She still has her sweatpants on. Maybe I'll just give her a little horsey ride. She always liked that when she was a little girl.

Lisa's moaning now. I can smell her. She's soaking into my pants. She unzips me. She pulls down her sweatpants and panties.

I try to push her away; but she's too insistent. I'm in her asshole. She's got her arms wrapped around me tight. She's bouncing up and down. I'm breathing heavy. I cough some phlegm out of my stoma. I wipe it away with my hand. It's still hard to breathe. I think I'm going to come; but I don't. She's bleeding and shitting all over me. Her breath smells like sewage. She peels off her band-aid. There's a hole drilled into her forehead. The models on television have holes in their heads too. They had jewels glued onto their foreheads before.

Lisa scratches around her ass again. This time I see little worms in her fingernails that scramble into the hole in her head when she rubs her forehead.

Instinctively, I try to scream. But I can't make a sound. I try to push her off; but something has snared my cock and pulls me in deeper. It's okay. I feel it. There's no turning back. Lisa's gonna feel it inside her.

As I come, Lisa opens her mouth wide and vomits muddy black bile and worms. She keeps riding me. I see something moving in the back of her throat. I reach for my medical alert pendant and push the button.

The music on the television stops. Anja has stopped at the end of the catwalk. A mucous-coated, black-skinned head just slightly smaller than Anja's is pushing its way out of her mouth. It has Anja's face and the mouth of a lamprey eel. The black face stretches and distorts as the mouth opens to reveal its teeth. Black bile is bleeding from Anja's every orifice. Her head is losing its shape and caving in. The audience has turned into a frantic mob. The show cuts to a Tracker commercial. The Beach Boy's "Dance, Dance, Dance"; is playing under the voice over.

Lisa's getting worse. Her face is stretching and losing its shape.

The telephone starts ringing. I can't answer it.

I sum up my strength. I reach for my Aim n Flame from the end table and jab it into the hole in Lisa's head. I shove her back. She takes me down with her to the floor.

She starts whining and pleading with me. "No, Grandpa!"

I'm putting all the weight I can on the Aim n Flame and forcing the metal tip deeper into her skull.

The door opens; and Gary, my neighbor, comes rushing in to check on me.

Lisa's face reforms; and she whimpers. "No, Grandpa. It hurts." She smiles at me quickly and then starts crying again. She pulls me deeper inside her.

Gary comes around the couch. He takes one look at what's going on and starts pulling me off Lisa.

The long metal tip of the Aim n Flame breaks off in Lisa's head as I fight Gary.

Lisa releases me.

Gary leans me up into the wall.

My knees lock.

He punches me in the gut. "I always knew you were a fuckin' pervert."

I lean forward and collapse to the floor.

He starts kicking me.

Lisa's coming up behind him. A mimetic black head is emerging from her mouth. It's like what was happening to Anja moments earlier on TV.

I can't say anything. I try pointing once. But Gary kicks me again. I pull my legs in defensively.

Gary pisses himself as Lisa takes his face off.

I'm still reeling from the blows Gary dealt me. I sum up the strength to start pulling myself toward the kitchen as the thing inside of Lisa leaves her body like a spent cocoon and sucks Gary's body dry. I can hear it slurping as I dig my fingers into the shag carpet and pull myself away. My heart's pounding. I'm not breathing right. But I reach the kitchen and drag myself across the linoleum floor to the back door. I lean against the door for a minute to catch my breath. I cough. It’s useless to go outside. I won't get far. There's a garden shovel propped up against the wall and a bag of rock salt on the shelf to my left. I remember using salt to burn leeches off my skin when I was a kid. Maybe it's a stretch. Maybe it's just a wishful thought to calm my nerves. I don't know. But I pull myself up the shelf, lock my knees and lean against the back door. I grab the shovel.

The slurping in the living room stops and the creature emerges, dragging itself across the floor with two frail, black arms. It has just a thumb and two fingers on either hand. I can only imagine the damn thing in an evening gown, dust mopping the floor with its fashion. It shrieks once as it approaches.

I raise the shovel. As the creature nears my feet, I strike the bag of rock salt with the shovel. About a cup of rock salt spills out of the bag as the creature coils its serpentine body and springs up at my face. I raise my right arm defensively. The creature sinks its teeth into my flesh and wraps itself around my neck, mostly obstructing my stoma. I can't get a full breath in. Desperately, I lean to the side and fall into the shelf. I grab on with my left arm. I smash the back of the creature's head against the shelf with my right arm. The bag of rock salt slides farther over the edge of the top shelf. Half the bag is spilling out on the creature.

The creature releases my arm and throat and drops to the floor. It stares up at me with Lisa's eyes. "It burns, Grandpa. Don't hurt me anymore." There's a chemical reaction. Its slimy flesh beads up with perspiration. It starts smoking. It's shriveling up. I lose my grip on the shelf and fall on top of the creature. It burns me. I push myself off it, drag myself back to the living room and up into my wheelchair. I close and lock the front door.

The news is on. It reaches a frantic pitch. Reports are coming in from everywhere. The station cuts to an anchorwoman. She doesn't say anything. She stares at the camera madly...scratching at a hole in her forehead. She wipes black bile from the corner of her lip. The signal drops out. All I get is static. I try every other channel. They've all cut out.

I pull the batteries out of my electric larynx and put them on the charger. I fill a glass with water and add denture cleaner. I pull out my teeth and drop them in the glass. It fizzes...must be doing something. I relieve myself and clean up with soap and water.

I try calling the news stations; but the lines are busy. I give up. I climb into bed. I know I'm not safe anywhere. But I'm exhausted.

I drift off to sleep...

And dream that I'm packed in salt.

::.. ::.. ::.. ::.. ::.. ::.. ::..

Fashion-Fatale Copyright 2004 Nicholas Alan Tillemans. All rights reserved.