The Feast Begins

Kroll was a head distorted in the glass of a cylindrical vase. Her eyes pierced through the interweaving stems. Felicity’s eyes bubbled open slowly and carefully over a stretch of perhaps 6 minutes. Clair de Lune was nibbling at her sleeping ears for longer than she remembered being awake. She sat at a table, long, proud and warm mahogany. A fireplace blazed from a metre or so to her right, chopping sparks across the marble floor.

                Felicity released a wobbly ‘whu�"’ and faded back to a complicit sleep.

                Rain pattered on the huge windows along the eastern wall of this grand room, alcoves dented along bearing shelves of trophies and framing tall oil portraits. Chandeliers dotted orbs of gold across the table.

                ‘You’re okay, you can wake now. You’re all A-Okay my little hummingbird’

                Kroll’s slender face hung over a dinner plate which tossed steam up her dark complexion. She hadn’t touched it. rows of cutlery were fashioned and professionally positioned. ‘I’ve been waiting for you, so long.’ Her voice was insipid and faded in felicity’s mind to a hum. ‘So,’ she continued, ‘may we begin?’

                Movement hadn’t crossed Felicity’s mind; her pain was overwhelming and flooded every inch of her being. So, she muttered- ‘whu�"’

                ‘Excellent,’ she replied. ‘Come on then,’ she dived in. Her cutlery clattered along the shallow breaths leaving Felicity at a sonic rate.

                ‘I nuh- need some… time,’ Felicity moaned.

                ‘Oh, that’s okay my darling. Hope I didn’t wake you. You don’t mind if I begin? I’m oh so hungry,’ a thunderbolt clapped and shook the ground.

                ‘No that’s okay,’ Felicity replied.

                ‘You know,’ Kroll was talking through the slipping and slopping of the meat she was chewing, ‘You did exceptionally well. Perhaps better than I anticipated. You’ve really displayed yourself recently and I must say that I’m impressed.’ A bead of red fluid fell from Kroll’s wet lips and she licked it up with a blood-red tongue.

                Felicity snuck a loose smile and nodded slightly, ‘thank you.’

                Felicity’s meal was foreboding before her. A large leg of meat on the bone (rare) glazed with a slimy concoction of oils and seasonings. Dotted along the brim of the plate was a greasy red sauce guiding into a small helping of fresh greens. Bloody oil squeezed from the pit of the meat across the greens, slowly turning them red.

                ‘Cooked just how you like. To perfection, actually. The chefs I’ve hired for this are second to none, you’ll be pleased to know. Nothing goes to waste.’

                Nothing goes to waste.

                That rang in Felicity’s mind over all else. It wasn’t comforting as Kroll might have intended.

                ‘I’m sure you’ll be hungry too. You’re just a little out of sorts. I know we’re rushing, perhaps but it’s important to feast while the meat is as fresh as possible. Perfection, I’m telling you. And might I say,’ she smeared red along her cheek with the rough of her right sleeve, ‘it’s completely delicious.’

                ‘I’m happy,’ Felicity wheezed, before correcting herself- ‘No, glad’.

                ‘Splendid.’

                Kroll munched on a scrag of meat. The table felt longer than it was, as if Felicity’s vision, in her daze, blew her backwards and forced her into a position of disconnect. Her arms remained. One was hooked on the edge of the table. The other featured a hand without fingers. A hexagonal lump. One leg remained, clasped firmly into the metal of her wheelchair, along the forearm was a tube inserted into the bloodstream, to her side was a limp bag of fluid contracting pipes down along her chair. Her hair was matted into the Velcro of the chair, soft movements had her tear chunks of dead, unwashed hair. Her face was unwashed and slimy with sweat and day-old tears. A toothache clamoured for attention, her back teeth winced a moment like they had been shifted out of place.

                ‘You know, my darling I do hope you find it within you to feast quite soon, its uncomfortable eating alone, don’t you think?’

                Felicity nodded. ‘Yes, madam. I’ll try.’ She guided her full hand up and hovered it across the stream of cutlery.

                ‘Don’t worry about all those, just pick any one you’re comfortable with,’

                Felicity’s grip was trembling. Her shake was aggressive. The painkillers had done a number on her head, she had little in the way of appetite. Clair de Lune still played and was almost as infuriating as the sting in her thigh. The notes being plucked were like individual pin pricks in her ringing ears.

                She dug the longest fork into the meat at its outer brim and tugged. Flesh chords split and stretched like a meaty accordion. Blood oozed as if it hadn’t been cooked at all.

                ‘Nice and tough, just how you like it, uh?’ Kroll’s face was warping in the vase.

                ‘Yes, thank you.’

                The first chew was like gnawing on hot plastic. The taste was explosive and coppery. It could have been delicious without the rubbery dryness of her mouth having survived on painkillers and force-feeding.

                ‘Now tell me, Felicity. How have you enjoyed your stay so far?’

                The question was so large and potent that before she spoke she knew that whatever she said would be a lie, or a crafty exaggeration. ‘It’s not exactly what I expected,’

                ‘In a good… or bad sense, may I ask?’

                ‘Well, good,’ there was the exaggeration.

                ‘I put a lot of work into this, Felicity. I do hope I’m not underwhelming you.’

                ‘Of course not.’ Kroll’s voice was snarly, and her smile was crooked. She was looking to bite, and Felicity had her guard up.

                ‘The pain will pass, its just a matter of getting used to. Remember, you’re not alone in this. We’re in this for good, you and me. I admire you, and myself to an extent, for putting the upmost trust in the commitment of a stranger.’

                ‘Yes, I agree.’ Do I? She knew that missing limbs took a toll on her, her phantom leg preyed to be shifted. She wanted to walk to the bathroom or jump from her chair. Her mind placed a leg that wasn’t there. Kroll had strapped her other leg down, loss of movement in both legs would surely dim the perpetual knowledge that one was missing. Maybe she didn’t need this, maybe she should scrape herself long the floor and feel the carpet rub along the mound of her thigh to feel the absence, and only then could she get used to it.

                Thunder clapped once more,

                ‘How did you get here,’ asked a voice. It came from above her. she thought, for a moment, that it was God, but she didn’t believe herself. She knew it was the fabrication of her mind. She knew the voice, and she knew that who the voice belonged to was long gone.

                You know how I got here

                ‘I want to hear it from you.’

                ‘So,’ Kroll began, ‘tell me a bit about yourself, my darling. Where do you come from?’

                She stammered a moment and collected coherent thought from the jumble of her screaming mind. ‘I come from Alex on the border. I didn’t get much education, I assume you know why.’

                ‘Of course, Talk the Talk.’

                ‘Right. My mother slotted me right in as the pretty face of the business,’

                ‘Very wise of her, my darling. Very wise.’

                ‘Sure. I do mostly commission work now, I’m enjoying irrelevan--,’ she spat a slimy cleft of tough meat after choking, Kroll cackled softly in response.

                ‘You’re okay, darling, just watch the fat.’

                Shut up you f*****g bitc�"

                ‘Mhm,’ Felicity replied with a smile drenched in rust -oloured glut.

                The rest of the meal was rather quiet, and Felicity remained silent on the man in the corner, a tall man with a clean but old face draining its wrinkled neck into a black tux, complemented by a tasteful waist coat. He was dimmed in the shadow of an alcove and was probably a caretaker, or a waiter.

                Felicity cleared her throat, quickly brought a hand to catch the phlegm and dropped her fork. ‘Oh, damn,’

                ‘It’s okay, Harold?’ Kroll snapped her fingers and the man approached. Washing over him, light detailed his wrinkle spattered face. Blotches of purple around his eyes denoted elderly illness, she figured. ‘His name isn’t Harold, I chose it for him,’

                He folded to grab the fork and Felicity leaned in, brought her wet mouth as close to his ear as she could manage, ‘please get help,’ she whispered. He leaned back up with a mournful sigh, his eyes had hidden behind the bags of his eye lids.

                ‘What’s his name?’ Felicity asked.

                Kroll grinned unpleasantly. ‘Doesn’t matter, does it Harold?’

                ‘No, ma’am.’ Slowly and gravely, he returned to his place by the door. Felicity shot him winces of grave sincerity, and he remained.

                ‘This is nice,’ Felicity said. ‘The meat, I mean.’

                ‘Absolutely. You have my chef, Graham to thank for the pleasure. My best ever, don’t you think?’

                ‘Yes, I agree.’

                ‘What, haven’t my previous receptions lived up to your expectations?’

                F*****g b***h, I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you just you wait, ‘No, they have. I agree that this it perhaps the greatest so far, although it’s so hard to choose.’ She clenched and for a moment the wobble in her hand ceased.

                ‘You know, Felicity- ‘, There it is. The moment ‘Felicity’ is uttered none is to end well. ‘I’m trying my best, I’ve prepared all the meat you could wish for and tonight you have the nerve to tell me that it’s all been underwhelming until tonight’s grand feast, which I know I can never live up to again unless you�" ‘,

                ‘No, it’s not that at all. I’ve loved everything you’ve prepared, each and every little thing. I’m sorry, tonight’s feast has been just as phenomenal as all the rest,’

                ‘Don’t belittle me with dishonesty, darling,’

                ‘No, it’s true. I just wanted to please you, Madam.’

                Kroll winced and fell deeper into the warping glass of the vase. ‘The things I’ve done for you, my little hummingbird.’ She was quieter, speaking in that whimsical father-where’s-my-pony tone. ‘The things I’ve sacrificed have been astronomical, you could never understand.’

                Felicity’s phantom leg twitched, and she felt a heaving in her face, like a sudden burst of tears were trying to escape. She held it with all the little might and dignity she held. Her phantom fingers tried to grip the tendril of blood-soaked pipe training along the arm of the wheelchair, as if it was her own beating vein.

                ‘I appreciate all of it, Madam.’

                ‘Is any of this working? F*****g any of it? how do I know, everything you say is an act. Belittling f*****g dishonesty. You think I don’t understand? Oh, Madam I love this blah- blah it’s all a f*****g game to you. You just don’t want me to get angry, isn’t that the truth, Felicity?’

                ‘This isn’t a game,’ she replied solemnly, her eyes ducked into the solitude of her eyelids. You’re dead, you’re f*****g dead.

                ‘I just wish you took all of this as seriously as I do. Maybe I’ve gotten overly-exited. Maybe I’m not the hostess that I cracked myself up to be,’

                ‘Of course, you are,’

                Maybe if I disagreed she’d get angry, and maybe then she would kill me. F*****g finally, she would kill me.

                ‘Fat chance,’ the voice above her said.

                ‘I’m glad you think so, darling. Now, eat up.’

                ‘You’re wasting time,’ said the voice from above her. She knew now that it wasn’t God.

                ‘Everything okay?’ Kroll snarled. Felicity’s hexagonal lump of a hand was bleeding from 4 points like the bite of a bat. She released the fork from her grip and tried a smile, like she hadn’t smiled before and was experimenting to see how it looked on her.

                ‘Yes, excellent.’