The Moistness of Mary

The Moistness of Mary

It was December 25th, Mary's 38th Christmas, and the one time of the year when Mary's life seemed to make sense. Christmas morning, the day that Jesus Christ was supposedly born. This was Mary’s day away from the stresses and horrors of the world, away from the cares and responsibilities of her job, her family, and her ‘friends’. Each Christmas was her special day, her time finally alone and unchained-free. Today would be something special, for indeed today was going to be completely under her control.

She lay there on her twin bed all snug and comatose; violent snores wrestling for dominance over the howling and restless sound of wind which moaned and clawed through tiny weathered crevices in the cracked and peeling window-frame. A thin sliver of drool plodded listlessly down her cheek, a habit she had been punished often and thoroughly for throughout her life with no discovered remedy. “Mark of a savage, a heathen beast!” Her aunt used to declare between the blistering strokes of the paddle’s remedy.

She was dreaming; dreaming about being locked away in the closet by this particular aunt, Aunt Clare whose voice came from between the wooden slats of a darkened closet door. It was an angry but muffled shout which espoused the deadly importance of Jesus Christ's recognition on the holidays, and then terrible consequences of accidental heresy. It was a memory really, from when Mary was a little girl and having knocked over one of Clare’s prayer candles she stood trembling in fear from within an out of the way closet as the woman went positively nuclear. Another in a long list of trauma’s perpetrated by the God-guided hand of this woman.

The drool had reached the side of her ear now, meeting a small amount of resistance at the pinna, but pushing on nonetheless. This was a determined drool, a drool on a mission. A kind of dogged determination which Mary herself displayed every day at the office while trying to coach troubled youths on to better paths in life - a job whose crushing weight pressed unkindly on Mary’s shoulders leaving her with a stooped posture and several distinguished yet unwelcome lines about her face.

She was still huddled in that tiny closet when Mary’s dream took a sudden and sinister turn, that unplaceable feeling in the pit of her stomach punctuated an intense and irrational fear welling up inside. Aunt Clare’s voice now replaced by a horrible and ever growing buzz-pulse more felt than heard. This noise seemed to draw closer, ever closer until it revealed itself as an abominable cacophony of madness - a tidal wave built of a thousand screeching voices soon be on her.

Mary's drool had found its way home and crested her ear-flap, and disappeared eagerly into her ear canal. The voyage was finally complete.

Strangely, as Mary peered out from her closet, she felt a modicum of warmth creep over her body, and for a moment she felt all would be all right. This impending roar would pass, and everything would be all right. There truly was nothing to worry about, because after all, this was Christmas. However, when the door began to buckle and splinter violently she knew beyond all doubt that it was not, in fact, all right.

Heat and pressure washed over her like plunging into a warm pool, a frantic panic gripped her and the door exploded inward revealing the faces of a thousand grinning, screaming, oft-toothless and ever moist demons all clutching and grabbing at her face.



Wake up, Mary, it’s 5:30 in the morning, and you're killing Christmas.



Warmth and panic gave way, horror set in.

As the cold air became a reality on her skin, Mary's eyes snapped open to behold about half a dozen incredibly pungent and pudgy members of her family crowded about her bed. These were children sitting on the bed with her, and an especially overweight youngster on her belly noisily masticating a piece of her quilt – beady insectoid eyes staring vapidly at her. Jarod. Markus? No; Chris. Fuck, no idea.

Ladies and gentlemen, the family has arrived. Uninvited.

There was an older woman standing at the edge of her bed, the unmistakable scent of stale cigarette smoke emanating from her while dry, cracked lips moved in exaggerated manner; Mary realized she could hardly hear a word the old woman was saying. It was as if the woman were trying to hold the conversation with her from the other end of a tunnel - and why was it so cold and miserable in this room all of a sudden?

Aunt Clare seemed to assess the situation quite quickly - noticing the path of the drool along the side of Mary’s face, and its ultimate destination. Clare knew exactly what to do, and quickly reached for the small flask of cheap whiskey she kept stowed away in her purse. She sprung right on top of Mary, pinning her down and absently shoving aside a rotund toddler. Off came the cap to the flask with a noisy pop, sloshing over the quilt and into Mary's ear went a few drops of the thick alcohol. To make matters worse, Clare felt a need to begin blowing into that same ear.

"What the HELL," thought Mary. This couldn't be Christmas. This was ridiculous. She had just woken up to her aunt savagely subduing her in her own bed – smothered in other peoples’ horribly overweight children and receiving a violent dose of whiskey in her ear. “What the hell?”

"MARY, you stupid girl, can you HEAR me? You're gonna make yourself deaf in both ears if you keep doing that, damn it! Cut it out, Mary! Cut it out! Bad Mary! Mary no!" Her Aunt had this wonderful idea that humans were like dogs - best taught with repeatedly shouting a form of "NO!" despite how many times her use of this method ironically debunked that same theory. Repetition was her mantra, however- a point made clear on Mary’s bottom many times in her youth.

"Mommy! Mary's bed feels like my bed!" A round little girl patted down Mary's quilt and body alike, each strike punctuated by a sloshy wet sound that surely could mean no good. It was only then Mary realized her bed was soaked in her own urine. It was about then she noticed the other adults in the room, and that they were realizing it as well. The little girls’ fat-framed face was scrunched up and beaming in demonic glee.

"GET OUT OF MY ROOM! ALL OF YOU! GET OUT, GET OUT, GET OUT!" she screamed and like startled animals they immediately dispersed to regroup downstairs in the kitchen. They would have slammed shut her door as well, had they not bent a hinge during the process.

As Mary sat upwards in her bed, she felt her ear slowly clear as the alcohol gradually dissolved and mulled over her hearing loss - largely induced by a combination of her older brother Markus always sticking pens in her ears and from the horrible infection she had when she was younger. She had an infection once every two or so years of her life and was about due for another, a recurring condition which put her other issues such as her tiny bladder into context.

That thought was no more depressing than the other immediate problems of the day. Waking up in such a manner… romantically alone and deaf with drool in your ear, your rooms’ door broken-in and a wretched, stinking family you weren’t supposed to see this day both present and screaming murder at you. Her mom was still dead from the overdose at Woodstock, and her father still supposedly in the Spanish Navy. There was also the matter of her bed, which she had, of course... wet.

Warm tears began to well up in her eyes as the frustration of everything built to an overbearing crescendo. Why did her family have to visit on Christmas? This was HER day. She didn't need this… she didn’t deserve this… she couldn't TAKE this. Of course she would have to. She would have to get up and go down there, face them all and scrape this day out just like all the other 364 days of the year. This one was scrap, thank you very much.

With a sigh she grasped the old crutch leaning against her nightstand and transferred her weight to it and hauled herself out of bed to go about the business of making herself halfway presentable. She found no relief in the shower, only in that it was something to separate herself from the unwashed likes of them. She found no satisfaction as she usually did in pulling on the clean pair of pajamas she had lain out to relax in today - the comforts of her morning would instead have to come from a quick swig from the half-empty bottle of gin on her nightstand. She knew her family was downstairs in her little kitchenette going about their business as if nothing had happened - eating her food, drinking her drink, talking loudly and using the bathroom with the door open. God she hated that particular family vice, as Mary was pretty sure she was the only member of the family with a measure of self-dignity. It frankly didn’t even make sense with a matriarch as overbearingly God-faring as her Aunt.

Mary heard the sharp smash of one of her dishes biting the dust, and knew the rest of the gin wouldn’t save her dinner-ware from the inevitable apocalypse of all that is fragile. She had to face them, and to that effect she snatched up her other crutch and lurched through the wounded frame of her bedroom door, slumping down the stairwell to the expectant band of mongoloids waiting below.

"Mary peepee!" Cried the piggish little girl standing at the bottom of the stairs, pointing one grotesque sausage-finger rudely at the groin of Mary's pajamas. Naturally everyone in the room went quiet, and all attention jumped to this wretched youth, raced along her arm to extended finger, lept mercilessly to her unflattering pajamas.

Mary glowered, whispered "Burn in hell, kid." Then knocked the child aside with a crutch.

“Mary! Mary what the hell is wrong with you? You are ruining everything! Why can't you be more like your brother, Jose? Why can't you..." her Aunt was cut short by a dog most certainly not Mary’s - a miniature poodle which begun urinating happily on a chaotic pile of gifts strewn out on the floor of the entryway.

"SPANKY YOU LITTLE SHIT, GET OUT OF THIS HOUSE GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT!!!!" she screamed at the little dog. The startled dog immediately began to scamper for the porch door while dragging its hind legs and streaming urine messily along the floor as it ran away in terror. The doggy-door was, naturally, non-existent in this house, and so poor Spanky ran headfirst into a glass door with a dull thud, cried out pitifully, then hobbled away to hide in the shower – confused and wet.

And there was Mary, standing on the last step of her stairs above the kitchen, disheveled, dirty, and cold. She was surveying her family, and thinking about her ailing body. What else could go wrong?

Well, there was the pitcher of eggnog sitting on the floor in which Mary could see soap bubbles foaming (her aunt never properly washed dishes). There was the child who ate a portion of her quilt there in the bathroom feeding a stream of toilet paper from the cabinet into her toilet, and there was the rapidly expanding stream of dog urine menacingly inching ever closer and closer to the infant playing alone on the floor nearby.

There was that stench, that awful horrible stench – a sickly sweet yet musty smell that simply pervaded everything. What bothered her most wasn't any of that, however. It was simply that they were here on Christmas. They always came on New Year’s. It meant… oh god… it meant they were staying here for over a week. Hell hath arrived.

"Mary, I think you pissed yourself," announced Maynard, Clare’s latest boyfriend. He was a tall man with brilliant red hair and bushy beard that framed his face – a brilliant shade of red itself save for a mottled purple nose. The man was hideous, but he was kind – and now growing intimately familiar with Mary at her worst on a day in which company was not expected nor welcome.

"What would Jesus say?!" came that horrible, angry, judging voice.

"Mary peepee!" squealed a horrible demon-cherub behind her.

Her brother Jose began to approach from the far corner of the room, stepping carefully over squirming children, food, and puddle to rest his hand on Mary’s shoulder. It should be mentioned that Jose was not in fact of ethnic descent, but so convinced of his father’s Spanish heritage that he had decided to have his name changed from Joe many years ago. This bothered the hell out of Mary, but she never confronted him about it - she never could go on the attack. “Mary, why don’t you get this cleaned up while we get comfortable, and you can cool off a little.” He said.

A reflexive burst of anger at being treated like this shot through her “You clean it, damnit! YOU clean it!” her hands were balled fists held awkwardly out to each side.

There are those who argue that there is no such thing as luck, who would then launch into an educated tirade about control-theory. These people have never had a morning like this, followed by the rotted cord of their dining-room light-fixture finally giving out after 15 long years – sending it crashing downwards onto Mary's shoulder and superficially slicing her skin open in several places with shards of glass and bruising metal. It was altogether unexpected and yet Mary simply did not react. She merely stood there with her eyes squished shut, an anguished bestial howl all in her head.

Jose instinctively and violently reached out to Mary, but his clumsy hand merely knocked out a crutch from under her. As her body was sent reeling backwards, the little boy behind her stood staring vacantly at her encroaching mass with mouth agape and eyes wide in stupefied horror.

As their bodies collided the child gave way and slammed into the ground beneath her, his little arm smacking with a rude ‘thonk!’ on the metal bannister at the side of the stair. Mary rolled off onto her good shoulder and scrambled upright while snatching up her crutch for support. The little boy underneath naturally gave way to a terrific banshee's wail, littered with dramatic pauses where he gasped for air, expulsed snot out his nose, and blubbered incoherently from the mouth.

"MARY, MARY OH GOD WHAT HAVE YOU DONE! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE YOU'VE MAULED HIM! YOU'VE MAULED MY BOY!"

Mary wondered if they even knew the little gremlins’ name.

“What would Jesus do..?" Her Aunt’s screaming lamentations were now a meek little whisper.

Then the floor dropped out, Mary cracked. All the trouble they had caused, all the filth, all the problems. It was too much. "Just too GOD damned much!" Her eyes were slits, and her voice acid.

"Aunt Clare, you can take your bullshit and cram it! I'm sick of you, I'm sick of señor Jose the Spanish wannabe, and I'm sick of these horrible clones one of you sick bastards keeps on propagating!" Mary emphasized this with a light kick at one of the children underfoot "I'm sick of this whole damn family, and, most of all, I'm sick of you ruining my life!"

Aunt Clare stood bewildered, only able to gasp out Mary’s name in a stunned, admonishing tone.

"Everything but everything in my life goes HORRIBLY awry. I am a beaten old woman with no joys left, because you just took my last one - Christmas. This is the day, this was MY day of the year that is supposed to actually work out RIGHT, but YOU showed up and ruined it! You rip me out of bed to find I’ve pissed myself, dump booze in my ear, assault me with children, ruin my life!" She then flailed wildly "AND A DAMN CHANDELIER FELL ON ME!"

"Mary!" Clare croaked.

"Why did you have to show up? Why are you here? You didn’t call, you shouldn’t be here! I just don’t think I can handle this, Clare - I need a break.” she whimpered.

Tossing aside her crutches in disgust she limped through the front door, trailing behind a thin, spotty line of blood. Angrily she shoved the screen-door aside with her shoulder, leaving her stunned family standing inside in silence, mouths agape. Instantly the bite of coldness gripped her bare feet as she stepped through the deep snow piled up on her driveway – the frigid wash of crisp winter air danced across her skin intimately. Mary exhaled a frosted plume of breath and felt some stress ease out of her, allowed her body to go limp and drop lazily downwards into the snow. Softness enveloping, eyes shut and pretending she was somewhere else so very far from here.

Mercifully her family decided to leave her alone for a full ten minutes, until eventually and inevitably she heard the slam of her front door announce someone’s rather unwelcome presence. The soft crunch of snow betrayed the presence of a child, and out of the corner of her eye Mary watched his small body plop down next to her – and yet a few moments of kind silence persevered in which she drew closed her eyes and took in a deep, fresh breath.

“I’m sorry we made you mad.” Announced the young boy whose consuming habits had already cost her at least one roll of toilet paper and a portion of her quilt - his name buried somewhere deep within a sea of apathy.

Mary popped open an eye and took him in, considering her failure to place a name. Come to think of it, she really wasn’t sure if she ever had met this kid. Fortunately you don’t have to apologize for those sorts of things with children, she decided, so with a small smile she simply and bluntly inquired: “What’s your name?”

“Billy. No, Ben – I’m Ben!”

For a second Mary was going to jump on this kid’s name confusion, but she was feeling good after her little break, and stayed that line of discourse. “Ben, do you know how to make a snow angel?”

“Nuh uh.”

“Would you like me to show you?” She asked with a wince as she propped herself up on a shoulder and looked him in the eye. She was starting to feel a tiny bit nauseous, nothing a heavy gulp of cool, fresh air couldn’t fix.

“No.”

With a discouraged sigh she slowly got to her feet and stumbled back to the house, her left leg a little bit numb and throbbing in the knee. Perhaps she might turn to the sweet and loving embrace of medicinal whiskey. She needed to take care of the lacerations on her shoulder anyway, a perfect excuse for a couple shots of Maker’s Mark.

No sooner than she entered the house was Aunt Clare upon her, tears welled up in her eyes and anguish on her face as clear and overbearing as if she had written the word on her forehead with permanent marker. “We’re leaving, Mary. You’ve ruined it and we’re leaving now, I hope you’re happy!”

“Clare, I need you to back off. We both know you’re not going anywhere and I’m not going to give you the satisfaction of making me feel any worse. Now PLEASE back off and let me get to my cabinet.”

Mary heard very little of what Clare was saying after that – only a faint and far-off buzzing noise that meant she was surely still there, as predicted. She had just seen her clothing in the mirror, however and realized her wounds were much more severe than originally thought. Mary was, in fact, soaked in blood now – the sight of which causing a warm panic to well up deep inside of her. There was a black tinge at the edges of her vision like eyelids that were not quite her own closing for a nap, the blackness drawing steadily inwards and a certain fuzzy grain spreading through her vision. The floor seemed to give out from underneath her, and she was falling away.

Some hours later Mary awoke in a plain white room on a hard plastic bed with unfriendly sheets. She recognized the hospital instantly by smell and the cold, sterile glow of the lighting, but it would take her a few moments longer for the peace and solace that it afforded her to actually sink in. With her family held at bay by hospital protocol or familial indifference – it was looking like Mary might just get her day, or at least just a moment thereof.

Ben. She’d remember that rude little bastard’s name now.