A Friendship of Most Delectable Poison

A Friendship of Most Tasty Poison

The choice to wake up rather than dream - even if it hurts more than anything. 

“You’re the best friend I could ever ask for.” Said Mint as he peeled a layer of flesh from the surface of his eyeball. In his plaid pyjamas, he perched atop the kitchen bar stool. His lips crinkled like tissue paper from the pain of the breaking skin, quivering as they fought to maintain a smile. 

As a claw protruded from the peeled skin, it etched a smily face pattern into the fragile layer of eyeball. Mint giggled like a child. The only light Mint could see was filtered through the curious cut-out, the smile reminding him of the potato waffles that were shoved down his throat as a child, but instead of ketchup filling its holes, deep navy scales shimmered beneath a ghostly cloak. 

Colours Mint had never seen in a rainbow graced his vision. Little, but equally manic, fruity ghosts danced and drifted around his plane of perception like schizophrenic fireflies. He plopped the shaving of eyeball into the scaled creature’s open jaws. From the darkness, only the gleam of teeth was visible - no tongue, no eyes, no ears. Only the mouth from which Zin received his owner’s glutinous offerings.

Such artistry was his best friend’s preferred way of speaking - through actions and the sensation of shared pain.

Mint’s scaled friend curled his tail around the vibrant fruit bowl that graced the kitchen counter.

Mint lifted his leg, bare feet stepping over a calendar and sinking into a splotch of dried coffee. It faced down, blank, having stripped itself off the wall aeons ago. They knew no longer the day, or counted the minutes left until breakfast or dinner. Chips of beige paint it had stolen from the wall littered the shaggy dining-room carpet, revealing the house’s stale cardboard base. 

But Mint did not mourn the routine of crossing off the calendar’s numbers with a bright red ‘X’. Neither did he mourn the monotonous tick of the now frozen clock carved into the oven door.

As long as he had Zin, Mint was happy. 

As long as Mint continued to peel pieces of himself for Zin, Zin was happy.

For friendships chained by bonds so strong, time was of no relevance.

Was what Zin always told Mint. The chant hissed in his ear.

Every single day.

Curled atop the marble counter.

* * *

When Zin scratched Mint’s ear to awaken him from the land of slumber, his eyelids lifted groggily - more so than usual. The the morning sun's amber uhes no longer penetrated Mint’s eyes like they once had. He found himself forgetting what it felt like to be warmed by something other than an electronic heater. He pressed his palm against Zin’s scales - cold. The beast flinched.

The whir of engines from the soot-riddled streets he remembered were dimmer than yesterday’s. He wondered if the pizza place survived - if the playground he once swung from stood strong - or if it had been bashed and battered, reduced to multicoloured smithereens.

Mint tried to conjure an image in his mind of a land beyond the window, but if a scientist scanned his brain, the result would be an incoherent mush.

Mind sludge.

At the strain of thought, a cavernous hole formed in Mint's stomach. His heart bashed against his ribcage, and he felt a wild fizz bubbled within his mind, like the surface of a volcano.

He took a risk.

His heart compelled him.

Possessing his joints and muscles' lethargic movements, Mint gripped the window handle, and yanked it downwards. He stuck a fingertip outside, exposing it to the elements. He let the air drift over his skin.

This is vastly unpleasant.

This is vastly unpleasant.

This is vastly unpleasant.

Mint snapped the curtains close. Sharp rays burnt his eyes, sending a vast ache to the front of his mind. Light filtered through the fabric covering the room in a crimson-tinged darkness. 

Mint turned, facing his best friend, who was slumped amongst floral bedsheets. Staring into Zin’s dagger-like pearly whites and webbed palms eased the pit ebbing inside his stomach. Like patching a booby trap with leaves.

Zin hinged open his scaled jaw, bearing the full glory of his gnashers, his teeth stark against the backdrop of his dark navy complexion - Mint had never cared to count how many razors lined his friend’s gums, but he assumed it approached the hundreds.

Mint patted Zin’s sturdy, armoured head, ruffling the white cloak. He stood, leaving Zin to rest, and ambled to the kitchen. He opened a slim drawer and picked out a glossy cheese grater. He lifted his leg, propping his calf against a bean bag. He wielded the metal device. His teeth ground and grated as he braced himself for the temporary sting. He slithered a hand over his knee, noting how his bones now protruded at all sorts of pointed angles. You gaunt boy. The barrier separating flesh from the air’s frigid bite was so thin. 

Mint tossed the sliver skin into the air. He watched it fall and disappear into his friend’s jaws. Mint tried averting his attention from the tart sizzle permeating his calf's fresh slit.

Blood trickled from the disaster site, dripping and seeping into the bed’s ancient linen.

Zin’s cheeky grin quelled the jitters plaguing Mint’s limbs. His best friend’s joy was a contagious blanket of comfort - a band-aid for his physical ailments.

Zin nibbled Mint’s ankle- this was the signal of hunger. Where a newborn cried, turning a bright tinge of rouge, the reptile would sink his teeth. Zin knew the reptilian-like creature was still growing and yet to achieve his full stature. Mint knew not what the mysterious creature’s dietary preferences were besides the contents of his own flesh and senses. He couldn’t bear the idea of the creature starving under his own roof.

So he continued to feed him. 

Satiate.

Mint pried open his eyelids. The rainbow fireflies danced again. Their sickly serenade sent a jolt of drowsiness behind his nose and eyes, infecting him with an incurable cold - minus the mucus.

With a groan, Mint leveraged his body up from the bed, his joints thick, sludgy, and heavy like a melting bog. Mint strode himself to the dresser, Zin nibbling his calf as he watered a withering, drooping, faded foliage stuffed in a pot. He cared not for the dead plant. 

As long as Zin was alive, he was okay. The agony leaking from his eyes, ears, mouth, nose like fervent bee-stings could be patched. 

Zin’s friendship was the antidote, after all.

I’m the only comfort you need. Everything you could ever want lies within the walls of this apartment.

* * *

Fuelled by the newfound energy and buzz from the nutrients of his friend’s flesh, Zin flung open a kitchen cabinet. He picked out a loaf of bread, the vague crunch of colourful plastic tapping Mint’s ears. He retrieved two slices, inserting each one inside the cream toaster’s rectangular caverns. He pushed the lever. The toast snapped, ready and eager to be heated. A dim mechanical whir droned as the toaster warmed the food.

Pop!

Mint forced the slice of jam-on-toast down Mint’s gullet. As the starchy, supposedly sweet substance scraped his tongue, it offered him no taste nor texture. The sweetness of the jam placated the discomfort induced by the fresh wound. The ethereal whiff of cooking blessed his nostrils.

“Thank you.” He told the creature.

He swallowed. 

The taste vanished.

Food was no more than fuel, and sprang no joy within him. 

At least he had Zin. He still brought Mint joy.

* * *

Like always, like every night or day or in-between, Mint nibbled on a fresh slice of strawberry-adorned toast, art of his best-friend, nursing the fresh yet fervent wound on his elbow. 

Mint reached forward his hand, ready to receive the tasteful offering.

Instead of handing over the toast, in a flash, Zin thrust forward his vacant hand forward, slicing the stale kitchen air, aiming to plunge it snug within his. Mint’s pupils widened.

But it was too late.

The oily claw dug beneath Mint’s brow bone, gauging Mint’s squishy eye from its socket. Zin ducked as it popped and flew through the kitchen.

Mint prodded the hollow, fleshy cave his vision had been stolen from. Moist walls.

With his remaining eye, Mint watched as its sibling eye rolled like a smooth golf ball against the marble. 

The same voice that spurred him to stick his fingertip out the window and plunge into the smoky street spurred his body to action.

Run.

 * * * 

Mint gripped the sides of the apartment’s doorframes to propel himself, whipping his body through the apartment’s splintered door frames. He sent every photograph in his path - they were all taken from within the apartment walls - of himself and his companion clattering to the floor in a conundrum of decaying memories. 

In all, he wore a smile. In all, the familiar beige walls graced the backdrop, the only indication of time passing being the variation of griminess in each photograph.

Was he really leaving the birthplace of all this joy on a mere whim? A frenzied impulse?

Was this happiness?

Could he ever be happy again outside the warmth of this place?

The fibres of Mint’s being persisted, relentless. His hand latched to the kitchen counter, and he swung his body like a wrecking ball, further fuelling his momentum. He felt a bitter prick on his ankle. A tooth had sunk beneath his frail flesh, leaving a scarlet semi-colon in its wake. His head throbbed, and every surge of movement from his legs felt no different to wading through thick cement. Mint bit through the searing agony and booted his friend’s plush bed by the front door - it was like a dog’s bed, but had a hood, resulting in a grotto-like appearance. Mint tripped over the quilted bed, crashing against hard tile. 

The beast roused from its slumber, stirring. It jostled its head, and the white fabric waved. The ghostly cloak covered his face, but if Zin had eyes beneath it, Mint could feel them opening and pressing into him and his soul, like an intrusion. 

Wide open, its presence bore into him as he attempted to escape and scramble closer to the door, like a beacon of rustic light. Mint felt a surge of blood stream to his head, the thrum of his pulse like hammers in his ears. His hands shook like the motor of a lawnmower, dripping and slipping with sweat as he attempted to scamper back to his feet. Zin growled, bearing his teeth.

Mint’s mind wept at the spur of his body escaping and betraying him - leaving his friend like this sent waves of thick guilt rippling through him. As he ran, an unswallowable ball of remorse jammed his throat. The man could barely force oxygen out his system. The act of breathing had become a searing scrape. Wind caressed the cavern in his face.

It’d scar, for sure - serve as an addition to his pastel pink collection Zin had awarded him over their many years of companionship.

Mint turned, legs still propelling him forwards like wild, and cranked his neck, peering behind.

On all fours, Zin was scampering closer, and closer, flailing his dark scaly arms at Mint in an attempt to gift him with further scratches. Lure him away from the door. Lure his life backwards, further into the gloom of the apartment and the allure of crunchy strawberry toast.

Mint faced the coat rack and thrust his hands into pockets. Red coat, yellow coat, fuzzy coat. Zin’s footsteps grew louder. 

At last, Mint felt the chill as his hands collided with cool metal. Mint scooped the key from a coat pocket, stealing the tool like a starving man plucking the last apple on earth from a tree. He jammed the key into its hole, twisting, and then used every ounce of strength his frail form could muster to yank the brass doorknob. When the knob clicked, he threw his body against the door. Mint’s feet crossed the barrier that separated apartment from pavement. 

Fresh air wrapped his skin, welcoming his sore body in a tranquil blanket. Like receiving a baton in a relay, Mint clung to the doorknob behind him, dragging it firmly closed behind him. It clicked as it fit into the frame. 

A loud thud assaulted Mint’s ears. The door shook violently as the mass of malicious reptile threw itself against the oak, colliding with a flurry of deep thuds. Mint’s hands shook no matter how hard he attempted to quell his body’s panic. Flickers of webbed, jagged scaly limbs flashed through the heart-shaped window. He picked his fingernails. He looked down at his hands, noticing the skin he had torn from his fingers in an attempt to placate his anxiety. 

The door continued to shake, until it no longer did. 

A silence filled the air, accompanied in lonely duet by the distant revving of motorbikes.

Mint’s heart sank.

Mint patted his pockets. His hands felt a rigid outline.

Good.

The keys.

The pink curtains tore open - as in, claws scratched holes through the fabric for Zin’s beady eyes to peer through, like the orifices of Swiss cheese.

Zin screeched and squealed like a feral boar. He thrust his skull against the dusty windows, royal purple saliva staining the windows like graffiti. The force of his bones painted cracks in the glass, like fragile sheets of ice. The cracks multiplied, forging a spiderweb of betrayal.

At last, the glass caved in. Glass shards flew like sharp shards of hail, sprinkling the street. Amongst the glistening fragments, the bulk of Zin’s scaly mass soared. Mid-air, his spiked neck flopped, posture drooping like a ragdoll as he let gravity carry his form.

Mint watched, mouth agape, as his best friend dissipated like ashes. Limb by limb, his scales fractured like dismembered puzzle pieces. The wind carried his hungry remnants. The glistening glass drifted high and low, carrying Mint’s best friend to distant lands. Mint watched, still and powerless, as his best friend withered like the plant on the drawer, left all alone inside the apartment.

A crowd of neighbours - none of whom Mint recognised - had gathered, pooling around the pile of glass and Mint. Sirens. All at once, the dam of pain in his bones released its fury. Mint’s head spun, ramming his thoughts with anguish like an overpowered washing machine. Unable to withstand the pressure, his feeble frame collapsed onto the concrete. His vision flickered, and his skull landed on the concrete, propped sideways. He watched through tainted vision as the final fractures of his friend drifted and diffused, likely landing in the soil of a plant pot miles away.

* * *

When Mint woke up, he could not feel his body. In its place was a numb vacancy. Memories of last evening flickered - the bright neon lights, the sound of crashes, the searing pain that had coursed him both physically and mentally.

But his eyeball could see and perceive

The rainbow fireflies were gone- vanished.

Their cruel dance was no longer.

He could hear the mechanical whir of technology- hear the rhythmic beeps of the rectangular screen to his left. The tap of footsteps echoed from the adjacent corridor.

He looked down, his neck curling. A pastel blue blanket layered his body. 

Not floral.

Where am I?

A calendar clung to the wall, assisted by a thin layer of see-through tape. Mint squinted out of habit, but stopped when he realised his remaining eye could assess the scene clearly as a camera. At the reminder, he lifted a hand, patting where the cavern in his face was. His palm was met with a softness, a cushioning—an eyepatch. 

Next to a bright green plant in a polished vase, Mint spotted a peculiar cardboard box perched beside it. It was in contrast with the sterile aesthetic the room otherwise maintained.

Mint crawled, slithering along the cool tile until he could reach the table. He clawed, limbs refusing to support any more weight than strictly necessary. When he reached the table, he propped himself up like a cobra and lifted the shoebox’s lid. He craned his neck, peering at its contents. 

A collection of navy-blue flakes dusted the cardboard base. A lone tear trickled from Mint’s unhazened gaze. It dropped on the flakes, creating a dark brown splotch on the cardboard base.

A sigh broke his trance.

The nurse stared at him, arms crossed in her uniform, a light blue equal to the sheets he had rested within mere moments ago. She called for a colleague, and the two healthcare professionals picked him up as if he were no more than a sack of potatoes. Trapped within the security of her grasp, Mint stretched his arm and clung to the shoebox, desperate to keep his best-friend’s company. To bring him back to his side.

Mint’s grip faltered, muscles weak from the lack of use.

The shoebox tumbled to the floor. The lid flew off, drifting across the tile.

The contents spilt. 

Navy scales littered the floor like confetti.

The dam of tears which fled his eyes was relentless. The nurse shot an expression which implied she thought him hysterical.

“Back in bed.” They groaned, as if they had encountered patients hectic as Mint thousands of times before.

She tucked Mint in, pulling the pastel sheet over his body, placing him on the bed’s creaky metal frame. He caught a whiff of her lemony perfume. She smelt like a clean public bathroom. Mint hid his face, burying and smothering his features within the pillow’s warm stench. 

Mint shut his eyes. He listened to the whir of a hoover. He listened to the clicks as it inhaled navy scales into its abyss. He listened to the clack of slip-ons, then the click of a door. He listened to the rustle as cardboard fell into the jaws of a bin’s plastic lining.