No Bounds

Everything changed after getting a chemistry set for his 13th birthday.

It was my 13th birthday.  I can remember waking up while it was still dark outside. It was early and it seemed to take forever for my party to finally start, I was anxious for all my friends to arrive.  Over the course of the party we played stuff like pin the tail on the donkey and chutes and ladders, we ran around outside like maniacs after demolishing my birthday cake. Everyone sat around watching me open all my presents, I remember getting some He-men and transformers, a couple of board games, some cool binoculars, a chemistry set, a boring puzzle,  and some clothes; not a bad haul if I do say so myself.  After a couple hours of sugar induced craziness my 13th birthday party sizzled to its end.  When I was finally alone and able to really check out all my new stuff I can remember thinking the Chemistry set was nearly as boring as the puzzle.  Life is ironic sometimes.  

After about a week of being 13, I finally decided to crack open the chemistry set.  I liked it almost immediately.  I liked the beakers and their little stands.  I liked all the vials neat tools that were included, all the harmless chemicals that I got to mix together and hope I had just stumbled upon the discovery of the ages.  I played with it every night for a month before I started getting creative with ways of procuring new ingredients to fuel my new career as an apothecary.  First I delved into the kitchen, finding mostly spices and herbs, luckily heeding my moms warning to never touch the bleach; I quickly had to move on to new sources.  The garage gave me a couple things that I will talk more about later, but it turned out that the forest behind my neighborhood was the best source for interesting ingredients, or at least the most interesting ingredient.  

One day, a few months into my new hobby, I was foraging for something new when I came across a dying tree with a weird sticky blue wetness on its bark.  And just as I was reaching out my hand to touch the goo covered bark I took one too many steps towards the tree.  When I put my right foot down it immediately sank into the soft soil, I fell through a small hole in the ground at the roots of the dying tree.  I fell down maybe ten feet into the earth.  In my newly discovered nightmare it was damp and smelled moldy and I could hear things moving. I remember thinking I was going to have a panic attack, but luckily I got it together before that happened.  It took me almost 10 minutes to scramble out of that hole, and another 10 to sprint home, absolutely positive I was being followed the whole time.  After I got through the front door I collapsed in the corner and waited for my breathing to level out, no one was home yet.  I climbed the stairs to my room and flopped on my bed, clothes and all, and passed out from the exhaustion.  I somehow woke up under the covers and in my pajamas, my mom said she didn't touch me all night; I still wonder about that sometimes.

  It wasn’t until a couple days later that I noticed the goo on my coat.  It was right after I got home from school and took my coat off, I saw it just under the right arm of the coat.  There wasn't much of it, probably why I hadn't noticed it right away, and it kinda looked like light blue pudding.  I’ll be honest, most kids probably would have been grossed out, I got pretty excited.  Something new to mix into the creation station.   

I quickly ran downstairs to the basement, where I was currently keeping my lab.  I grabbed a test tube and spoon and as carefully as possible removed the pudding substance from my coat putting it into the test tube.  I mixed it with some salt first, nothing. Next I tried mercury, they wouldn't even mix together.  I didn't have a lot of this stuff so I had to be smarter about my choices.  I remember taking a couple minutes to really think about what the best choice would be, first I decided to mix yeast with some iodine, then I threw in a little orange juice before I mixed in the blue goo,  maybe not my best moment as a scientist.  At first when I added the blue stuff the mixture only fizzled, then after a disappointing few seconds, that in retrospect feel like an eternity, the substance turned a dark bloody red and quickly started to boil.  I don't think I could've reacted fast enough even if I new it was coming.  The boiling bloody goo jumped out of the test tube, mostly landing on my throat. My first reaction was to scream, but I couldn’t, I was trying, I just couldn’t.  The stuff wasn't hot, not even a little, wasn’t cold either.  I didn't hurt in any way.  I could however feel it seeping into my skin.  I ran upstairs into the bathroom to wash it off my neck, but by the time I got there, there was nothing left to wash away.  At first there didn't seem to be any after effects.  It was couple hours later at dinner that night when I first noticed something was wrong.  Mom made spaghetti, one of my absolute favorites, so I was pretty excited.  I wolfed down half my plate before I noticed anything.  At first I thought I just had to go to the bathroom, but when I tried I quickly learned that I in fact needed to throw up.  After cleaning up I told my mom I wasn't feeling well and just went up to my room to go to bed.  The next morning when I woke up I didn't feel normal.  I got up and went to the bathroom to start getting ready for school when I started to feel nauseous.  I threw up 3 more times that morning, my mom let me stay home from school.  I went back to sleep for a few more hours before waking up in a cold sweat and having to throw up again, luckily I had a smart mom who had put a small bucket by the side of my bed just in case.  The rest of the day wasn't much different.

The next morning I woke up and felt completely fine, better than fine actually.  Mom asked how I felt and even she was surprised by my quick recovery.  I got ready for school, but skipped breakfast, still a little hesitant on the eating, and to be honest I wasn't even hungry.  The only thing not normal about that day at school was I didn’t eat lunch either, still wasn't hungry.  I got home from school and went down to my basement lab to see if there was any of that stuff left from the other day.  After cleaning up the broken glass from the test tube I dropped and a pretty thorough search of the area I couldn’t find any of it, I was down there until I heard mom calling for dinner.  I sat down at the table for dinner, meatloaf with corn and green beans tonight, still not hungry.  My mom said she understood, she said it was because I was still getting over my wicked cold and shouldn't worry.  I went back down to the lab after my mom let me leave the table, and fiddled around with some more meaningless concoctions until it was time for bed.  I remember laying it bed for hours that night and thinking about that stuff that soaked into my throat.  

Morning came fast the next day, I think I only got about 2 or 3 hours of sleep.  I woke up and got ready for school as usual, then went downstairs to the kitchen, but instead of finding my mom I found a note saying she had to leave early this morning but there were Eggos in the freezer and that I needed to remember to take the magnifying glass with me today for biology.  So I threw a couple Eggos in the toaster and went to grab the magnifying glass.  I got to school quickly that morning. I was standing at my locker before I realized I was still holding both Eggos in my hand, still untouched.  Amazingly, I still wasn't hungry.  I walked by a trash can on the way to 1st period and tossed them in the bin.  This was starting to get weird.  

While I was sitting in homeroom I started to recall the last 2 plus days to see if I had choked down anything at all.  After going through my memories as detailed as I could, I noticed that not only did I not have anything to eat, I didn't even have 1 sip of any liquid whatsoever.  Honestly, I felt that the strangest part of it all was that I still didn't have any desire or craving for either one of them.  In fact, after thinking for a while there wasn't any kind of food that would make me even slightly hungry. 

Lunch came and went pretty quick that day, dinner too, although mom wasn't quite as understanding this time.  Tonight I decided to skip the basement and just went up to my room to attempt to get some extra sleep and make up for last night.  Unfortunately, I was not so lucky for the 2nd night in a row.  And when I did finally fall asleep I was tormented by Willy Wonka esc dreams featuring talking food taunting me with its deliciousness.  

I woke the next morning and started to worry almost immediately, not only was I still not hungry or thirsty, it had been days since I used the bathroom.  I got up and went and sat on the toilet.  I sat there for 10 minutes hoping something might happen. It was my mom yelling for me that finally made me get up, still having done nothing on the job I was hoping to work out this morning.  I dressed and then made it downstairs just in time for my mom to give me a kiss as she was running out the door.  

Author's Note

The beginning of a longer story