yawn/scream

It seems to Jen that her dad works all the time. He's out when she gets ready in the morning. She walks to school alone. She makes her own way home. At the end of the day, Jen puts herself to bed. But Father is always there to make dinner, though Father is not a good cook. Jen’s meals come from tins, or from frozen plastic bags. Jen’s food is bloated and swimming in sauce, or dry and crusted with breadcrumbs. She eats processed animal parts. She eats reshaped potatoes. She eats limp vegetables.


Tonight’s meal though, is not Father’s usual fare.


“Now come on honey-pie, sit,” Father says, patting the chair-back. “Sit down and eat up.”


Jen looks at the plate and twists her lips together. On the fold-out formica table, in the corner of the kitchen, Father has served a dinner comprised of nothing but three stones. Their surfaces are uneven but they are of a similar size and shape to eggs. Eggs with two rounded ends and no point. As Jen approaches the dull, beige table, the stones speak out in sharp, hollow clicks, moving with every step she takes, rocking back and forth, and drumming at the chipped plate, reverberating through the laminate.


“These are rocks, Father,” Jen points out, taking her seat.


Father breathes out slowly and leans forward. It places one of its hands on the back of her chair while the other grips the edge of the table.


“Now, honey-pie,” Father says, “none of your silly games. You eat up like a good girl.”


Jen narrows her eyes as she picks out a knife and fork from the many stacked in the world’s #1 dad mug that sits at the table’s corner.


“Honey-pie, don't be silly,” Father sing-songs as impatience creases the corners of its eyes. “You eat these with your hands.”


Father mimes, cupping one hand and raising its other hand to its mouth three times.

The cutlery slips from Jen’s hand and clatters against the laminate, adding more scuffs and scratches to lifetimes of wear. Father nods in encouragement as Jen reaches out and takes the nearest stone. She tests it, squeezing. Gritty and cold, it presses into her palm. She looks up at Father, desperate for some sign that this is a joke or a prank, but Father is still nodding, its eyes fixed on hers, its pupils moving up and down in their sockets as it nods and nods and nods.


“That’s it, that’s it,” Father says, opening its mouth wide and drawing out every vowel.


Jen places the stone against her upper front teeth. Her hand is shaking a little, the coarse surface of the stone scraping against enamel. Jen hears the grinding through her jaw more than her ears. She closes her mouth and pins the stone in place. Father is nodding still. Its eyes widen.


“I can't!” Jen mumbles around the stone before pulling it from her mouth.


“Damnit Sarah!” Father shouts, slamming its fist on the table, making everything jump.


Once the rattling of the stones has settled down, Jen hears the chair-back creak behind her. Sarah had been her mother’s name. Father can get confused when it gets upset. To placate it, Jen quickly places the stone back in her mouth.


“Good, good,” Father says, colour slowly returning to its knuckles, “now you just go on and take a bite, honey-pie. Ok?”


Jen suddenly has a thought.


This could be a test, like in the Sunday-school stories. If she trusts Father, she might rewarded. The stones may even be shells filled with sweets. And so, with a new-found brightness, Jen screws her eyes shut and bites down as hard as she can. She feels sweat prickle at her brow. She feels Father's hand on her shoulder. Jen feels a growing pressure in her teeth and in her gums and in her jaw.


There is a crack and a crunch.

The stones are filled only with pain and with blood and with the splinters of teeth.


And Father smiles.


-yotchki