The Fixer-Upper

(The Writer's Cramp contest entry for 9/24/09
Prompt: Write a story or poem about a home improvement project that goes amiss.)



Joe stood in the small living room of his latest fixer-upper, hands on his hips, surveying the dingy walls and stained carpet. The odor of mildew made him want to sneeze, but he held it in.

Fresh paint ought to be able to hide the smell, at least until the new owners were settled, he reasoned.

There was a large, brown, water stain on the ceiling and a matching stain on the white carpet directly below it. The ceiling's stain appeared to be bulging and he figured the sheetrock would collapse under the weight of another deluge.

The roof was going to be a priority.

The floor creaked as he walked from the living room to the kitchen and it made him wonder about the condition of the posts and beams under the house.

He’d made calculations before buying the house as to how much it was going to cost to fix the little home. It wasn’t the worst house in the neighborhood but it was close. After patching up the roof, installing new toilets and sinks and slapping fresh paint inside and out, some sucker would pay him way more than the house was worth.

He couldn’t help but smile thinking of money.

He’d convinced an old man to sell the house for tens of thousands below market value, using his ‘death and taxes’ and ‘burden to his family’ angles.

He stood there, proud of his negotiating skills but then was overcome with the sense that he was being watched. . He looked towards the window and then the doorways but didn’t see anything.

There was a sound as if there was a great gust of wind outside. The sky had been clear and sunny so Joe strolled to the window to peek outside.

The trees were still, as were the dead bushes and leaves on the ground surrounding the house.

There it was again, another wave of air. He swore he could hear the sound of leaves passing over the house. His eyes scanned the ceiling and walls and then fixed on noise coming from underneath the sink. It was the sound of a thousand dry, rustling leaves.

He crept towards the cabinet and jumped when a drop of brown water dripped into the metal sink. As he neared the cabinet, the crackling subsided.

But he was still going to look underneath the sink.

He had to.

Fingers on the little knob, he paused and thought about what might be under there.

Termites?

Mice?

Bugs?

Leaves? What the hell would leaves be doing under there?

He threw the doors open—

The smell of rotting wood hit him in the face but there were no creatures.

There was, however, a hole in the back wall where something, whatever it was, could have crawled away through.

A chill crept up his arm, to his neck and then made one side of his face tingle.

He shook it off and sauntered back out to the truck to retrieve his tool belt.

Walking back up the cracked and uneven sidewalk, the front door slammed shut.

“What the…”

Was someone in the house? It couldn’t be a ghost. Ghosts aren’t real, he thought.

Joe peered through the front window, face pressed against the glass, his hands covering the sides of his eyes to block out the light.

The room appeared to be empty.

He grabbed the door handle and pushed but there was something keeping the door from opening. It budged so he knew it wasn’t locked. It was as if the door was wedged on something.

He pushed harder, throwing his shoulder into it and the door gave way. The release was swift and there was a crunching sound under his feet as he stumbled into the house and fell on his hands and knees.

The door slammed behind him and when he saw what caused the door to slam shut, and quite possibly tried to keep him from coming in, he could not believe it.

There was a thick group, a solid rank of a brown, pulsating, shimmery glob a few inches high. He looked closely, slowly edging toward the mass, eyes narrowing.

The wide doorstop shattered into hundreds of pieces, swarming towards him on the floor.

He scooted away on his hands and heels, turned over and scrambled into the kitchen.

A legion of roaches was waiting for him.

The bugs moved so quick and fluidly, a brown tide that surrounded and enveloped him. He shuffled around and stomped as many as he could but the more roaches he squished, the more they were able to crawl up his legs, some over his pants, some under.

He could feel their spiny legs, their crispy bodies crawling up his legs, up his shirt. Bolting for the door, he slipped in the squashed mess and fell hard on his back, smashing a thousand attackers. But it wasn’t enough to make a difference in this battle.

He frantically brushed the roaches off his torso and off his head and face but they were overwhelming him, trying to squeeze their way in between his lips and eyelids. He wanted to cry out but that meant opening his mouth, letting them in.

He screamed a tight-lipped cry for help, over and over, desperately trying to emerge from the teeming infliction. He flailed wildly, looking like a giant, gleaming man-shaped turd until he drowned in the violent sea of roaches.

* * *

An old man leaned against Joe’s truck, fanning his face with a bank draft, waiting for the thrashing inside the house to end. When all was quiet, he drove off in the truck, headed to an appointment with another buyer for his little fixer-upper.


(952 words)