Allergorphosis
Allergorphosis
by David Michael
While watching reruns of Project Runway, Peter discovered that he had become a peanut. Roasted, with salt.
At first he wondered if this was some new form of food allergy. He had been allergic to seafood for years. Maybe he had developed an allergy to peanuts, as well. He thought about checking on the Internet, but couldn’t move off the couch. Then noticed his lack of hands and fingers. Roasted peanuts, it seemed, were neither particularly mobile nor incredibly dexterous.
His family didn’t notice his change. They continued to talk to him and around him. His wife, Connie, took the TV remote from beside him on the couch. His children got bored with wannabe fashion designers and size-zero wannabe models and started a lively game of “glub-glub”, with one pretending to be a zombie and chasing the other throughout the house.
Peter wanted to tell the kids to be quiet, to chill out, to find some other game to play, preferably one that involved more parking their butts in chairs and/or reading or playing video games and less squealing. But roasted peanuts also have issues with vocalization, verbalizing or otherwise making their thoughts known.
Now Peter wanted a drink. Like a beer. Or a stiff shot of vodka. Maybe it was all the salt. Or maybe this new food allergy was taking a lot out of him.
No drink was forthcoming. Not only could he not get up and get one, but he couldn’t ask anyone to get him one, either.
Being a roasted peanut, it seemed, sucked.
His family finished watching TV for the night. They adjourned to the various bathrooms and bedrooms to get ready for bed, leaving Peter on the couch, immobile and mute from shock.
The shock wore off after a while, but he was still a peanut, so the muteness didn’t go away. Nor the immobility.
The next morning, Peter continued to reside on the end of the couch. Connie patted him and said, “Good morning, Honey” as she went into the kitchen to make coffee.
Peter spent the day on the couch, wondering first if anyone would ever comment on his being a peanut. Then worried that he seemed to be shrinking.
The next morning, he knew for a fact he was shrinking.
By Wednesday, he had shrunk enough that the kids took him out back and used him for a football. He enjoyed spending time with the kids. But then they left him out in the backyard overnight.
That night, in the backyard, circled by curious, hungry-looking squirrels, Peter began to reconsider his lack of attention to established religion. He wondered if his becoming a roasted peanut might be proof that one of the religions was correct. And, if so, which one.
Maybe he cried. Maybe the dew mixed with his salt to make something a lot like tears.
Wrought up, emotional in a way he had never been before, he talked to himself, since no one else could hear him, trying to make sense of what was happening. He didn’t notice that he had been brought back into the house, and put on a wire shelf in the kitchen. He no longer knew what day it was.
Two days later, he had shrunk enough that he fell through the wire shelf, and bounced on the floor, rolling under the edge of a cabinet.
The last thing he remembered was thinking that Connie had been right: they did have a mouse.
Copyright © 2006 by David Michael. All rights reserved.
Andrew Wells said,
September 7, 2006 @ 9:55 am
Hi David,
Kafka and junk food. Nice.
I’m doing a short story a day thing too. It’s at http://seattletimesla.blogspot.com/
Cheers,
Andrew
DavidRM said,
September 7, 2006 @ 2:43 pm
Andrew,
Yah, I wasn’t being subtle about the Kafka “influence”/”blatant copying”.
Yesterday I discovered that I was allergic to peanuts. I felt like I was changing, forcibly.
Thanks for stopping by! And thanks for the link. I checked out what you’ve written so far. Looking forward to reading some more.
-David
A Short Story a Day » Best of ASSAD 2006 said,
December 27, 2006 @ 8:02 pm
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