All Backed Up

“This isn’t what I signed up for”

“That makes two of us, dipshit.”

“Why do I always have to do the gritty work?”

“What— you think my fat arms could fit through the pipes?” Jonathan says, flapping the front of his t-shirt.

“You’re the one who wants this key so badly.”

My arm is elbow-deep in the toilet drain—the bowl already removed, leaving a black hole in the floor where it used to be. Yeah, you heard me correctly. Elbow deep. And right now I want to smack my childhood friend right in the face with my shit-covered hand.

“I hate you so much right now,” I say as I reach further, bending my arm as the pipe curves sideways into the wall.

My cheek is now pressed against the emerald tiles.

Plumbers Galore—Jonathan’s business—is definitely not glamorous. Sure, the money is there. Which Jonathan’s Father, Jack made clear, practically shouting it as he cleaned his ruby red Cadillac at the front of their house. Originally, it was Jack’s business. But then he had a heart attack whilst he was cleaning the gutters of somebody’s roof. The heart attack probably wouldn’t have killed him, but the fall that broke his neck sure sealed the deal.

Don’t feel too sad, though. He was a real asshole and spent way too much time running a rag along his midlife crisis sports car and chatting up any unlucky lady who would pass his driveway. He would even park his van slightly down the road so as to avoid cramping out ‘his style’.

“The ladies love shiny things” he would say.

Nothing shinier than the bald spot at the back of his head.

Now, the van is parked in front of this gigantic mansion of a house, which has been derelict for who knows how long.

“I want it flushed out and done before the end of the day, boys. Toilet needs to be removed and replaced too” That’s what the real estate agent said. I remember his keen stare as he shook my left hand.

“If you see a key floating around too, be sure to give it to me” He squeezed my hand tightly before letting go. “Kind of important” he tacked on with a wink.

So odd.

“Well?” Jonathan says, sliding down the wall to sit. He’s already smoked away half a joint, sucking on it like it’s his life source. Meanwhile I’m the one face-planted on a filthy bathroom floor.

“I don’t know, man,” I say, trying to feel anything. It’s a hot day, and the mosquitoes are having a wild disco party with our blood whilst the crickets act as the DJs.

“What do you mean?!”

“I can’t feel nothing. My arms must not be long enough!”

“We need that key, dude. Who knows what it unlocks?”

Jonathan and his stupid side quests. He shoved the little camera down there—Slender Spy, he calls it—and spotted something shiny. That was all it took. It reminds me of what surgeons use to see the inside of someone’s asshole, or nose, or whatever.

I rip my arm out, my skin prickling with annoyance. My black glove has somehow ripped, which means I will probably die from some virus or parasite I’ll get from touching sewage.

“Whoa, dude—how’d you cut yourself?” Jonathan’s bloodshot eyes wobble and widen, staring at my hand.

“Wha—”

I look down. Where my glove has ripped, blood is there.

“What the fuck.”

I rip my glove off. I must have cut myself. Which means I’m definitely dying from a sickness and will be buried by the end of this year.

“Ew, dude” Jonathan says.

I scramble to my feet and rush to the sink, internally screaming as the tap just gurgles.

“Goddamn stupid thing. Jonathan, turn the water back on!”

As I wait for him to move his slow ass, I can practically feel the germs infecting my blood.

I gag. “I’m done, Jonathan. This is it!”

“Don’t worry, dude. Jesus didn’t die from tetanus. You think those nails were free from rust?”

Oh, for fuck’s sake.

“And Jesus was—”

“Did you turn the water on?”

“Yeah, yeah. And you think… like Jesus walks on water now.”

“WHAT IS YOUR POINT?”

Finally, I hear the water gurgle through the pipes. It sprays and spits before flowing out.

Soap. Soap. Water. I’m scrubbing my hands more than any surgeon before an operation.

“I’m saying, dude—” I hear the door slam shut a few moments before he walks back into the bathroom—“you may get special powers.”

There are moments like this where I really wonder why we became friends—and how on earth we’ve managed to stay best buds all these years.

He’s the very opposite of me. He’s relaxed, perhaps from all the pot. But even from when we were in prep, he was practically a careless Buddha with a few screws loose. He would bang his head against the wall whilst I was stressing about colouring within the lines. And then in high school, whilst he spent the afternoons hot boxing his car, I would be studying on the bonnet, trying to cram in last minute study for another endless exam.

But somehow, for some reason, we always stuck together. He would always talk me down from a panic attack right before I walked up to the pretty girl I was crushing on. And I would spray him with deodorant or cologne before he went to a job interview smelling like weed.

Now, I’m helping him clean some motherfucker’s mansion because apparently this job is a two-man job.

Although it feels like I’m doing all the work.

“There’s no cuts on my hand.” The blood is all washed off. It was thick. Dark. As if it were mixed with something else.

This isn’t my blood.

“What you say, dude?”

“This isn’t from me.”

I run my hands down my pants to dry them and return to the hole in the ground.

“We need the camera again”

As I lower it into the pipe, Jonathan smacks the screen in his hands.

“It’s all a blur” he says, the joint bouncing precariously on his bottom lip.

“You’ve got to be kidding.”

“You think someone killed somebody and then flushed them down a toilet?” Jonathan says, coughing violently as he breathes out smoke. For once, our thoughts are going down the same path.

“I don’t know. Maybe an animal somehow crawled through and died?”

The camera hits the curve of the pipe before scraping along the surface.

“Ohhh yeah. What if it’s a snake?”

I shiver, imagining it’s fangs biting me. I’m never helping my friend out again.

The camera eventually hits something, and I stop.

“Can you see anything?” I say.

“Maybe pull it back a little?”

I do and look over to him. He’s squinting at the small screen, putting it right in front of his face.

“So?”

He looks at me over the screen. “Too blurry.”

“Give it to me!”

We swap places. The little light attached above the camera shows a blur of red and brown. It shifts, making it hard to see any shapes.

“Keep it steady!” I shout.

Right there in the middle is the key—the shiny grey metal making it obvious. But then there… right next to it…is that a finger?

I blink before refocusing “I think I’m seeing something”

“Whoa. No wayyyy.” The end of the word elongates as Jonathan gets lost in his thoughts.

I roll my eyes. It’s so hard to see. Maybe it’s a stick.

It’s thin. Sharp. Barely poking through whatever shit it’s in. But I swear to god I see an

overgrown fingernail.

It must have cut through my glove.

“Okay, pull the camera out.”

He does.

“The key is lost.”

“Nooo, come on.”

“I’m not sticking my hand down there again”

“Yeah, but that key could unlock a secret safe. We could be the finders of, like, thousands of dollars.”

“Maybe you should stop smoking so much pot, you’ll be rich from all the savings”

He laughs “Oh come on, I’m rich in happiness. Now I wanna be rich in material things”

I shake my head, kicking at my discarded gloves on the floor. I’m still thinking about what I just saw. No way could it have been a finger. That’s just batshit crazy.

“One more—come on—”

“No. This is so stupid. You do it.”

He drags on his joint, long and hard. I can hear the smoke rattling in his lungs. He exhales it right into my face. I wave my hand, swearing.

“Yeah, that’s just helping your case.”

“Man, just listen to my words, okay?” He blinks slowly, lowering the joint. “That agent said if we found a key, to give it to him. Who would say that? Unlesssss…… someone hid this key from him.” He holds up a finger. “Which means it’s valuable.”

I hate how convincing he is.

I look down at the pipe that may as well be a wormhole about to send me flying into another dimension.

“Oh my God,” Jonathan gasps.

“What?” I say sharply.

“A key to a better life.”

“What?”

“This. Could be. The key to a better life.”

I look at him. He looks at me.

I swear, drop to my stomach, and shove my arm down the pipe.

In my anger, I didn’t even put on gloves. But it’s too late. Maybe I’ve gotten secondhand smoke. Maybe I’m hallucinating. But as my hand reaches for this stupid key that Jonathan’s convinced unlocks some sort of mystery, a hand grasps mine.

I freeze.

I can feel cold fingers wrap around in a gentle embrace before tightening—crushing my bones.

I scream.

Jonathan screams.

And somewhere behind me, the real estate agent steps into the bathroom.

“Ah,” he says. “Greed got you good.” He walks over, until his leather loafers appear in my line of sight and crouches down. His smile, a wide red stitch sewn across his unblemished face. And where his right hand should be, there’s empty air.