Porn and the Ninth

She sat alone in the airport terminal staring at the front of an empty VHS box of porn. The chair she sat in, connected to nine other chairs, each similar in style but unique in scars and gum color, was poorly made by her standards. Especially in such a shitty place. Airports are shitty. Shitty shit shit. No one ever at anytime wants to be sitting in a chair in the airport so why don’t these FDA wackoffs get their shit together and reduce terrorism by reducing anger by reducing the amount of plastic that is digging into my fucking spine, she thought. The porn was nice though. Not like the airport provided that, she had to come by that herself. It was laying on top of a hill on the 9th green at Stony Ridge Golf Resort. She liked to ride her bike on the cart paths on the course, basking in the slight thrill that at anytime some geezer who was one stroke away from a heart attack’s ball could go careening into her fragile head at any moment. Truth was that the risk was small, she only rode her bike there after school and at that time the Club House was serving their Early Bird Special and lord knows that discount lasagna was too good to pass up when your teeth were removable.
And that’s when he noticed her. Being in the airport for three hours already he became accustomed to the comings and goings of the harried passengers. Most who were there for a substantial wait would hit up the one food establishment in the terminal, a burger joint. He spent the last twenty minutes watching one woman in particular slowly savor every bite of her two double cheeseburgers, then methodically place each fry on her tongue as if it were a much needed drop of acid, except these were doused in ranch dressing. She took a brief respite at that juncture to stand, put on her XXL stone gray zip-up jacket, before once again bending at her doughy knees to sit back down. Then out came the box. It was a ritzy shade of brown and posted in white lettering on it’s side was TeaCake Shop. He wanted to casually walk over to her and state that he was pretty sure he could pinpoint the cause of her weight problem, but thought better of it as she carefully extracted one (of what was bound to be many) cupcake more perfect than he had ever seen. The milky frosting on top must have risen to a two inch cloud, and the paper that hugged it looked like it was ancient Chinese papyrus. He let her walk away, possibly still holding the vague impression that she just feels bigger than she is.
And that’s when she noticed him. He was clearly a creeper. Mid thirties. Not quite balding, but what she might classify as an M&M Head. With a widow’s peak so extreme that the middle stops being a V and becomes a U, making the whole thing take on the feeling of an immature M. He was staring at some fat chick, probably fantasizing about how he would rub his thing between the folds in her upper arms. She was staring right at him, thumbing the empty VHS box between both of her small hands. His head turned slightly to the right, and he too was staring at a small brown haired girl who couldn’t have been more than nine.
Now, generally when two strangers in public make eye contact they do the polite thing, or at least the human nature thing, and that is look away as fast as possible or act like you were just staring off into space and you break the awkwardness by rubbing your eyes and yawning. Neither of them did that. They just looked. And looked. She set down the empty box of would-be porn on the chair to the right of her and motioned for him to come sit on her left.
Still thinking about the cupcake that he was sure by now consisted of mere morsels lingering on the fat woman‘s lips, he wasn’t sure that he was seeing correctly. So he didn’t move. Growing annoyed and impatient she rolled her eyes and picked her porn back up. Man, those titties were huge. She couldn’t imagine having milk sacks that big. Sneaking a glance down at her own shirt which hung with ease from the collar down to her belt, she was glad to be without the burden.
When she finally looked away his head slowly rotated back to the space where the cupcake had been. It was gone. So was the belly in which it now resided. He said a silent prayer that he would not be sharing his seat on the airplane with her ass, before slowly rising and gathering his things.
Hello.
She slowly looked up from the image of a huge cock stuck between some woman’s beach ball inflated breasts.
Yes?
May I sit?
You don’t need my permission.
Ok. Thanks. What have you got there?
My future.
In porn?
Possibly. But isn’t this everyone’s future. The only difference is whether or not there are camera’s present.
Honey, I wish all the women I’ve fucked looked like that and that my dick was indeed that big.
You get my point, though.
Yes. Where are your parents?
I don’t believe that is any of your business.
She sighed her signature monotoned exhale and carefully slid the box into her shoulder bag that sat next to her feet.
Did you want to fuck that fat woman?
No!
Then why were you staring at her.
Out of pity.
For her?
Yes. And No. Mostly for my friends. I’m on my way to their wedding. It’s in Tallahassee. That’s why I’m here. Catching a flight to Tallahassee.
The girl was very uninterested in these inane details. The man had never felt so self conscious around a child. He began to think of Humbert Humbert and tried to remember the definition of a nymphet.
That fat woman was clearly unhappy. And I’m pretty sure that all married people feel the same way that she does. Hopefully most of them learn to manifest it in ways other than frosting ingestion. Where are you going?
I don’t know yet. I’m running away.
From what?
Raw meat. I don’t want to touch it.
You probably don’t have to.
Every grown woman does. I watch my mother make dinner almost every night. Usually it’s chicken. She runs hot water over the frozen meat until the white stuff on the top layer-
The skin?
Yeah I guess. The skin starts looking all fatty and different. And now it’s not hard and frozen like an ambiguous ice block, now it’s limp and lifeless. Which you would think would be a relief, but it’s not because if it’s lifeless that means it once had life. She would pick it up with her bare hands and not even flinch. The excess water would squilch between her fingers and the muscles of this unsuspecting bird would conform to the grooves in the palm of her hand. It would make me wonder if the chicken could tell someone’s fortune by being pressed into that person’s palm after the chicken’s death but then how would the chicken ever be able to tell that person their fortune? It also made me want to die. I finally told her to stop, and that I would never touch such a thing. She just smiled and said that someday I would, how else would I feed my family? She says this with a sly smile on her face, meanwhile not even a few feet away she grips this wad that has had it’s flesh and feathers torn off of it, it’s head chopped, it’s intestines ripped out. And all of this for the people that she loves most in the world to put in their mouths.
You shouldn’t be so hard on your mom. Being a parent is tough. You know my daughter once told me that her biggest fear is coming home to find me hanging from the ceiling by a rope. With my wrists cut for extra measure.
You have a daughter?
No, but if I did, I’m sure she would think that of me.
She grabs his hand and holds it to her uneven nostrils and they flare at the intake of scent.
Your hands. They smell like burnt popcorn. The way the acrid ashy smell fills the whole house and soaks into your hair. That’s how your hands smell.
You are quite articulate for such a little girl.
My soul is a lot older than my body. I can tell. I can feel the arthritis setting into my aura.
It’s cigarettes.
No, it’s arthritis.
My hands. It’s not popcorn, they just smell like nicotine.
Maybe nicotine is made from overcooking, you know, from the mistakes.
Maybe.
May I hold your popcorn hand?
Isn’t your soul a little too old for hand holding. And I think your body might be too young, especially for holding the hand of a grown man who is a stranger with popcorn hands no less.
It doesn’t matter the age of my body or soul, what matters is that we are both humans, and all humans need a connection. I think porn is good for that. You get to connect with another, and share that connection with others.
That sounds very noble of you. Okay, you can hold my hand, but no interlocking fingers. I think that would be inappropriate.
Okay, diagonal palms then. Your hands are very dry.
Yours are very sweaty.
I’m sorry.
It’s okay, maybe your old soul sweat will moisturize my dry skin.
I’m not sure it works that way, but you could be right.
The man leaned his head back, feeling the scalpel-edged chair dig into his upper neck. He imagined it actually turning into some doctoral cutting implement, and with an invisible force pressing him down, his head was slowly allowed to sink deeper and deeper into it, eventually severing the brain stem. The mammalian part of the brain. The least evolved, but by the same token it’s been around the longest so that’s got to be saying something. He wondered if the need for a connection came from that primal spot, or if it was more advanced, coming from the newer, smarter part of the brain. He imagined two primordial lizards laying next to each other on some prehistoric flagstone, feeling their blood boil in the sizzle of the sun, each with a little arm extended towards the other, with nothing but their creepy small claw-tips touching. Suddenly the lizard on the lefts’ eyes snap open and it begins to growl at the peeping man. It morphs in color, from the complacent grey of the rock to firey orange-red with licks of royal blue nipping down it’s legs. It’s needle head teeth begin to extend like a vampire’s who is ready to feast. Almost as in slow motion the lizard raises itself onto it’s hind legs, and even more slowly lifts it’s head, the last thing to come up to complete height, to meet the intruder eye to eye. The lizard was now at least 6 feet tall, the vibrant hues and reflective scales were blinding the man in the confused bouncing prism of sunlight. Real time, now, the lizard points it’s gaping mouth directly over the man’s head, the man can feel the hot breath and stale smell of half digested crickets as the reptile takes a deep breath. The man, expecting a roar, or at least a painful decapitation, instinctively (there’s that primal brain hard at work) brought his hands to either side of his head in some weak attempt at protection. His eyes were squeezed shut so hard that he half expected to weep lemonade, and before he could ask himself ‘why lemonade?’, enough time had passed without pain that he became curious. Quickly, he flitted open one lemon shaped lid to see the lizard wordlessly mouthing something to him. The man furrowed his brow, quite confused as to why and what the lizard was trying to communicate, and why he couldn’t hear. Remembering his protection reflex, he realized that he was covering his ears and as soon he removed his hands he heard the seductive womanly voice of the lizard whisper, in an echo, one single word.
Tallahassee.
Suddenly the man awoke, brain stem intact, and all reptilian beasts replaced by frazzled travelers with cheap luggage. The chair next to him was empty. But the popcorn hand that was still warm from it’s tiny companion was not. It was replaced with silicone inflated tits and fluffer enlarged erections. Cum shots and gaping assholes. Mascara-run eyes sealed shut with a money shot. All displayed on an empty cardboard box. He turned the box over in his hands, smiling to himself in a way that assured him that he did something right. He looked into the vacant hollow of the box, lined with stark white walls, all clean except for on one of the longer sides. Right at the mouth of the inside of the box was scrawled, rather childishly, but with the sensation of something older behind it, were three small words in standard blue ink. The man had to squint to see. To passersby they merely saw a man in his mid-30’s, with an M&M head staring into an empty porn box as if he were searching for the last remaining crumbs in a box of cookies. But what he saw were the words:
TRUST YOUR STRUGGLE.