Caramel Apples

         It was almost a year, he had remained inside he luxurious apartment at the top floor of a sky scraper. Daniel was stricken with a fear of the elevator ever since it plummeted down twenty seven stories, taking his wife with it. Daniel and his wife were going to see a film when it happened, if he hadn’t went back because he forgot his car keys.., if his wife didn’t hold the door for him wile he rummaged through the soup can on the counter where all their keys came to die… It wouldn’t change the fact that she is dead, but it he would not have the memory of watching her die. Daniel didn’t remember what was louder, the screech as the elevator grinded down the shaft, or the hollow scream of his wife plummeting with it.
         Daniel didn’t show up for work, or go to the store, or get to his car, or do anything. He never left anymore. The closest he ever came to leaving was his bi-monthly trips to the balcony, climbing onto the picnic table and looking out to the street looming around three hundred and ten feet below, fighting with himself for what seemed forever on whether or not to just take the fall. His new fear of heights always kept him at bay.
         All he ate was tuna now. Vacuum-packed, sealed in oil, imperishable, unflavorful, practically inedible, fresh water tuna. He never liked tuna when his wife was alive, but every week when she shopped for groceries she would always pick up two cans in case Daniel ever changed his mind. He never changed his mind. So the result after three years of marriage was over one thousand cans of never eaten, all but forgotten, vacuum-packed, evil, pink fish.
         Not leaving meant no job; no job meant no money; and no money meant no buying food.  He didn’t have any sort of ration plan. He just ate when he was hungry, for the first weeks it wasn’t much, and a lot went bad, milk turned to cream and then ugly green yogurt in his warm fridge. No money meant no electricity. No money meant no water; he had to collect rain to drink which mostly made him sick. His penthouse was just high enough that pollution clouds made a hazy layer on the balcony windows.  When he was sick he always had to tough it out. No money meant no medicine. No money  meant no phone.
         So there’s Daniel, on his balcony, standing with his toes on the edge of the picnic table looking down at the hazy ants down on the earth below, wondering if the term ‘Road Pizza’ would ever be used to describe him. The pungent smell of acid rain and  the ever present odor of tuna filling his nose.
         ‘My last smell‘, he mused. This brought back his senses. Daniel decided that he would not be jumping today and stepped back onto the table, and into the house before his vertigo set back in.
         His tuna supply was low, he used approximately two to three cans a day, and now he had less then ten.  He opened a can of that vacuum-packed, poor-tasting, nauseating fish. Tuna made him sick, but he had to finish it. Tuna doesn’t last very long outside a can, and less time if you don’t have a cold fridge. He knew he would either use the elevator, starve to death, or kill himself. To him, the elevator seemed the smart choice, but every time he pushed the call button a deep feeling would well up in his gut and he would break down crying over his wife, leaving the other two options: starve or kill himself. He either chose to die, or wait to die. Daniel felt that a quick death while falling through the air would be much better than waiting in pain for weeks as his body ate all of his fat, which wasn’t much to begin with.
         So now there he is, in front of an open smelly can of grayish-pink, vacuum-packed, horrible fish meat, when the elevator bell rang telling him he had a visitor. He never had visitors, no one even came by to say sorry when his wife died. Daniel didn’t answer immediately, he let it ring a few more seconds, horrified that some wrath would come out of that little box held together by a couple of cables and pulleys. He even said his wife’s name wondering if it, indeed, was this ghost coming to help him die. Daniel eventually decided against opening the door to let the intruder in. He went to bed.
         He got no sleep. Throughout the night the bell continued to blare its high pitched call. His mind racing with what might be lying in wait on the other side of those two big, silver, metal doors. He threw up on the floor, but he still ignored the ringing.
         In the morning, weary-eyed and fatigued he just said, “Fuck it,” and pushed the button, feeling a familiar tug on his stomach that signaled another break down. He swallowed this one up. ‘It’s her‘, he thought, ‘Going to help me escape my own house.’
         But when those large doors opened, creaking from eleven months without use, his wife was not what was looking back at him. What Daniel received was something much more different, a blurry profile of some small animal, racing from the small deathtrap elevator and into his kitchen. Daniel followed hoping to find out what he had just let in.  When he walked to the kitchen the bulky doors closed,  sealing in all air and dust.  Daniel arrived in the kitchen to see a dirty, dusty, ugly, yellowish-orange, cat, with a single brown stripe tracing the length of his right side, and a pink collar with a tag hung from its neck. It looked at Daniel and purred. He had not experienced direct interaction with anything living for almost a year. To him, this cat became something important almost instantly. The cat seemed to know this and approached Daniel rubbing up to his shins marking him as it’s territory. Daniel reached down and lifted the cat; it obviously belonged to somebody. It had a tag and was far too friendly to be a stray. He lifted the circular name tag, “Caramel Apples.”
         The cat gave him friendship, but however Daniel knew he must send it back down the shaft. At this point he only possessed four cans of tuna, he tried giving the cat one and he figured he would take what was left over. But, when the cat abandoned the Vacuum-packed, ugly, grey-pinkish, unwholesome, two year old can. Daniel discovered not one trace of fish, the cat even licked the oil from the bottom of the can. if he kept the cat he would use to much tuna. Not enough to last him into tomorrow without running completely out.
         So there he is, holding a dirt covered scrappy cat in front of that big, silver container, struggling to try to gain the will to press the call button. Every time he got his finger to touch the button the same thing ran into his brain, ‘the last time I sent something living in here…’ In the end he just sat the can down next to an evil vacuum-packed can of stinky tuna. And went off to bed.
         The next day he just played with the cat, using the last two cans up for a last meal. Trying as hard as he could to enjoy a food he could not even taste anymore;  to enjoy the company of his new friend; his new family. All other ‘family’ before the cat never cared. They never visited him when his wife died, they never sent letters or Christmas cards or anything else families are supposed to do.  He was always forgotten by his ‘family’.  So, he made this cat family, cousin Caramel Apples. And because he cared for this cat for reasons he didn’t really know,  Daniel decided it would be best to send it back down in the morning. But, of course, the next morning when he stood in front of those giant metal gates, the cat purring in his arms, snoozing lightly, He could send it back down, but he didn’t want to risk this cat’s life like he unknowingly risked his wife’s. It went on like that for the next fourteen days.
         Hunger demanding food, but he had none. No rotted yogurt milk, no slice of moldy wheat bread, and no evil, rotten, horribly disgusting, vacuum-packed, pinkish, grayish, tasteless, inedible, smelly, non-perishable, unbearable tuna.  Just the emptiness of the apartment and the weak purr of the equally starving cat. The cat that was now trapped with him. Daniel eyed the cat, scrawny almost bone now, like him, and he held back horrible thoughts.
         How many times does man make himself more important than animals? How many cows have we sent to a slaughter? How many turkeys do we grow each year just to be lunchmeat? Was this any different? He had unused charcoal and maybe a few matches somewhere, so that he could grill the cat. He was encouraged by his instinct. Kill the cat. Murder his new family to save himself. Was he more important than the cat? Daniel was meaningless. He just stayed in his apartment never meaning anything to anyone. But this cat, Caramel Apples, had found him and chose to be something. The cat made his last few days happy, and in gratefulness Daniel wanted to roast the poor thing and eat it, to lure the ignorant stupid cat into his slaughterhouse like a turkey or cow or a tuna fish. He felt like a monster.
         So there he was, staring at the cat, mouth salivating, hand twitching, the other steadily holding a steak knife behind his back. Daniel gingerly picked up the cat, who trusted Daniel enough to simply curl up and purr in his arm. He set the cat on the counter, Caramel Apples stretched arching its back before laying on its side looking at Daniel with only what he could recognize as trust or love or some other happy feeling. Daniel held the cat down to the table by the head. Quickly the cat’s trust was gone. It struggled to pull away from The Monster’s tight grip. The Monster felt the least painful way was to sever the head as quickly as possible. The Monster did not want the poor thing to suffer anymore for his existence. In a display of flexibility the cat brought one of its back legs to the wrist of The Monster, The tiny claws desperately tearing at The Monster’s skin. The Monster missed his mark. Instead of the neck, The Monster struck Caramel Apple’s left eye. A hideous inhuman scream filled the empty air of the penthouse for the shortest of moments. But that’s all it took to transform The Monster of Daniel back to himself.
         The damage was done, the cat’s eye was pierced bleeding, forever blind never forgotten. Daniel out of guilt moved to the balcony and vomited over the side of the rail. The Cat’s trust forever broken. It ran around panicked hissing through the apartment, hair on end, tail puffed, eyes wide, back arched, teeth glaring. It was not only afraid, it was angry. The cat followed Daniel to the balcony jumping onto the picnic table, which wobbled furiously. The vengeful Caramel Apples leaped onto Daniel‘s shoulders, who, in a panic, hit the table falling backwards over the railing, plummeting three hundred and ten feet, twenty seven stories  below.
         So there Daniel was, falling a great distance to earth, but it he was not consumed by fear, he was consumed by final thoughts of that elevator, and final thoughts of his wife, sealed tight, in that tin can, Vacuum-packed, plummeting downwards. Being compressed into a pinkish-grey, horrible smelling, giant can of human tuna. And maybe someone walked past him, maybe someone called him ‘road tuna.’