Quiet
Hungry, hungry. Fridge.
Thea’s popped to the shop for milk, so no tea just yet but I could do with a nibble. What’ve we got?
Salami.
Not the choicest cut, something from the corner shop in a clingy pack, but still better than pretty much anything on the NHS menu. You’re coming with me.
This salami likes its orderly existence in the pack and is reluctant to leave. Pick-pick-pick, eventually I wriggle a fingernail under it, peel it off its neighbour, look at it for a second and shove it inelegantly into my mouth. Poke-poke-poke, in you go.
Salty and greasy as a trawler’s winch, but tremendously satisfying. I should make a sandwich! Put it on a plate and everything; presentation is key. The plates are in this cupboard down here, below the chopping board…somewhere…the plates, every plate we have, are all stacked conically at the back of the cupboard, right under my little workspace. I bend down until my face is nearly in the salami pack and grope towards the Ikea tower of Hanoi. Here we are…come on. You, there, small plate under the saucers. I can feel its edge but can’t get my greasy finger under it no matter how much I push, lever and growl. Meanwhile the salami’s gently unfurling in my mouth. Wiggle, shove, nothing, the stack of plates denies access. I insert a brief sanity-preservation pause, take a breath and the slick, lithe salami sucks itself into my airway.
-uck.
Stand. Breathe. A little slow-puncture stream of air leaks under the salami gasket and trickles into my lungs. I cough once and all my breath pops out in a single chunk. The salami tightens its grip. I turn to the sink, repeatedly trying to cough with empty lungs; just chest contractions really. It hurts. Gaping over the sink, drool pouring out of my mouth, I reach in and pull on the salami. It tears, part of it comes away but the piece sealing my windpipe only shifts. I feel it flutter, letting me heave in a single creaking breath, which I immediately cough back out. I’m starting to shake.
It’s so quiet. I’d like to sit down. I can’t breathe, at all. I’d like to sit down.
Not far away, there’s a wooden chair, one of four around the table; I’ll go over there. Slow, careful, each step just a few inches. Shaking, more and more. So quiet.
I can’t move any more. The chair’s right there, just over there.
It’s so quiet.
I’d like to sit down.
