Josh groggily woke up with his chest feeling afire. He looked to the side where Kris had been sleeping to see that she was gone. He felt a pang of regret not having been able to see her, hopefully this wouldn’t be the last of her that he saw. As he kicked his legs over to get out of bed he let out a moan of pain as every inch of his body hurt, he must be getting sick.
Going into the bathroom Josh found a small piece of paper folded and left on the sink. Josh opened it and read. It was written in a girly, flowing hand.
Dear Josh,
Thank you for the beer and other stuff last night. I had to get going early this morning for some errands I had to run. I hope to see you again soon, but it probably won’t be for a couple weeks. You sounded like you were getting sick, we will have to talk about this when I see you again.
Sincerely,
Ma (Josh noticed that part of the signature was crossed out) Kris
This letter was a great thing for Josh. Finally, he would have regular interaction with the opposite sex and Kris seemed like a good person. It was nice that Kris was concerned about him getting sick, although it was odd that she would want to speak to him about it.
Josh went about the rest of his day feeling almost unsubstantial, like he was only half there. He spent most of the day just doing normal things he enjoyed, watching tv, and playing games. Everything seems lighter like the world wasn’t as bad as it was yesterday. He enjoyed doing things again, rather than doing them just to escape from his life.
Josh went out later in the night to get some food. He decided he would treat himself and go pickup food from one of his favorite places. He went to an Indian restaurant just down the street. After making his way there and placing his order Josh sat in one of the chairs for those that were ordering take out. Fiddling around on his phone Josh looked up and he gasped as he saw Kris sitting enjoying dinner, with another man. Jealousy flared up immediately but he pushed it down, reasoning out that it could be a family member or someone else.
Josh stood up and walked over to her table and stood there patiently waiting for her male companion to finish speaking. She looked up and narrowed her eyes, “What do you want? Can I help you with something?” Josh was taken aback by how thick her accent was, it was nothing like the woman last night. This was more like a ghetto woman than the Kris he knew last night.
Josh stammered and said, “Oh h-h-hi Kris. It’s Josh from last night?”
As Josh spoke he knew that there was something direly wrong here, the woman looked up to him with confusion and small sparks of anger. “I’ve never met you in my life. I don’t know how you fucking know my name, but you better leave me alone.”
While Kris was going on a tirade her companion stood up, displaying a much better build than Josh himself possessed. Josh felt numb, rather than worrying about this he muttered his apologies and walked away. He walked past the cashier and out the door, his attention snapped back and the cashier chased him and handed him the food he had ordered. He gave a weak nod of thanks, and headed home.
Thoughts thundered through his head, as he tried to sort it all out. She had said she had a good time in her letter. She had also sounded far different. Maybe this woman was crazy? Could she have multiple personalities and just have been on one that liked loser men?
Josh decided to go back to his default state of existing of not enjoying much. He mechanically eat his dinner, barely tasting anything. He went through each routine until it was time for bed. He lay in bed for several hours, thoughts racing about the events of the past two days.
Waking up the next morning Josh’s numbness had subsided into a dull ache. He found that his sickness was mostly gone and he now just felt a bit sore like he had worked out the previous day. Josh readied himself for work, and was interrupted by a knock at the door.
Josh opened the door without bothering to look, maybe some tough would come in and bash his brains in for him. Greeting him at the door was Kris with an abashed looked on her face.
She made as if she was going to walk into his place, Josh stepped in front of her and blocked the way. She looked up at him, and saw the seething in his eyes the barely contained rage just beneath.
Backing up a step she took a deep breath and started to speak, but Josh cut her off like a knife cutting the air, “Listen, I don’t care what you do, but I don’t know why you involved me. Also I don’t have time for this, because I need to be to work in an hour.”
She gave him a stern look at said, “Listen god dammit, you-“
“No you listen, I don’t know what your game is but I’m not playing. Forget you know where I live and leave me alone.”
Kris seemed to be getting quite angry, her face turning red. She looked over Josh and said, “Fine, fuck you then. I’ll be back when I’ve cooled down a bit. But you really need to stop fucking interrupting people. Especially when they have your best interests at heart.”
Josh just stood there dumbstruck, her voice had lowered in pitch until the point that it was deeper than his own. It must have been a product of his imagination, because she said some other choice things and her voice sounded more like when she had dressed him down at the restaurant yesterday.
Josh went back inside his house closing the door behind him. He continued to get ready for work and thought over the past few run-ins he had with Kris. None of it would turn into a cohesive reason.
Snapping back to reality Josh continued to ready himself for work. The rest of the morning was uneventful as he dressed himself and then made his way to work. He dreaded going to work. Work gave him no satisfaction, but it was necessary to continue this existence as it was. Working as a cashier at a store was not something most people would consider fulfilling.
Josh’s day of work was filled with the same mindless work, and the same mindless people. His mind kept trailing off to the odd occurrences that he had with Kris. All the strange things that happened churned over and over again. How her personality seemed to flip on a dime.
A loud thump pulled Josh back to his work, he looked up and saw a burly man standing before him with an odd assortment of items. Josh had to suppress a laugh as he saw the items that the man was buying. A personal massager, some sex lubricant, a cucumber, and a box of condoms, Josh picked up the items one by one and scanned them.
“Hello Josh, how are you doing today?” the man asked in a familiar way.
Josh looked up quizzically at the man and said “I’m doing fine today sir, how are you?” Josh hesitated for a moment and asked, “Do I know you by chance?”
The man across from Josh smiled, and said, “No I don’t believe you do. I was looking at your nametag.” The man said nodding with his head to indicate.
Josh looked down his shirt to see the nametag pinned through his shirt, and inwardly chastised himself for his foolishness. Josh proceeded by telling the customer his total. The man used a credit card, and Josh had to validate the card versus his ID. Josh took the credit card and photo id in hand, and gave them back to the customer. Josh gave him a winning smile and said, “Thanks for your business Malcolm.”
Malcolm took his groceries in hand, nodding farewell to Josh as he exited. Josh’s day continued per normal for the rest of the day, flipping between working and trying to figure out what happened between him and Kris until his day was done and it was time to head home.
Josh went home, lounging around his house for a couple hours until he was interrupted by a knock at the door. Josh ran off to the kitchen to grab a knife and hid it behind his back. Looking through the peep hole he saw Kris standing there yet again, dressed whorish as per usual. Exhaling deeply, Josh tucked the knife in by the small of his back.
Unlocking and opening the door Josh was knocked back as the door violently flipped opened and struck him. Lying sprawled on the floor he lifted his head to see Kris, and a large older, burly man gripping the handle to his door. Josh blinked away tears from the impact hitting his head.
He rushed to scramble to his feet, but dazed as he was he wasn’t in time before a large shoe pressed firmly against his chest. He tried to yell but the pressure against his chest didn’t allow for enough air to enter his lungs.
The rough-looking man lean down and said, “Stop squirming and don’t yell and I’ll let you up.”
Looking over to Kris, Josh whispered, “What the hell are you doing here, are you going to rob me or something?”
Kris responded while Josh’s hand made it to the small of his back to grab the knife that was there. He didn’t listen to what Kris was saying; he was just trying to delay them. Josh whipped the knife out in a quick single thrust, faster and harder than he thought was possible. The knife struck out against the man’s ankle, scoring a solid hit.
The foot was off his chest immediately as the man cursed and jumped back from Josh. Kris’s expression seemed to darken, not betraying any sort of fear.
With an icy expression Kris said, “God dammit kid stop it now.” The voice boomed with authority and rang out in a tenor voice. Josh was startled by this, but kept the knife at hand ready to score another strike.
Kris turned to the man as he gritted his teeth in pain, and said, “Hey Dan, what size do you wear?”
The man turned back to her and said, “XL shirt, 36 inch pants, and 12 ½ shoes.”
Kris nodded and said, “Close enough, go ahead and close the door. We need to get this over with before someone gets hurt.” Kris said that last part glaring at Josh, as if it was him that would be the one inflicted with that hurt.
Josh looked down and saw a large pool of blood gather at Dan’s feet. Josh had done more damage than he had meant to, but with the way they entered they should have expected it. Josh looked to Dan’s face and saw it was going pale, probably due to the blood lose.
Josh made to move towards the phone, when Kris’s phone cracked again and said, “Sit down and watch, you fool. I’m sorry that we intruded the way we did, it probably wasn’t the best way to do this. But you WILL listen! Watch me.”
Turning Josh said, “Are we just going to let him die? I mean look at him he’s lost a lot of blood and is turning pale. We need to get some help in here.”
Kris’s mouth quirked into a mischievous grin, as she said, “He has the best help right here that he could hope for.” As she said that she sat on the couch, and began to experience seizures. She appeared to be perspiring a lot until Josh noticed that the droplets that exited her skin quickly gathered in a pool at her feet. Within about thirty seconds, Josh looked wide-eyed as Malcolm got up from a prone position on his floor, naked as any person could be.
Dan made it for Kris’s slumped form and began to liquefy, slowly at first but gaining more speed as her body absorbed all of him. Kris’s eyes snapped opened and she looked at Malcolm and then narrowed her gaze on Josh.
Malcolm busied himself with getting dressed while Kris said, “Get rid of that damned knife please! You’ve done enough damage for one night. I promise we won’t hurt you. You just happened to flare up Malcolm’s temper, and he tends to do stupid things when angry. Somehow I always seem to get pulled into those stupid things.” Kris said the last with a look of exasperation.
Numbly Josh made his way to the kitchen to dispose of the bloodied knife into the sink, and promptly passed out onto the floor.