A horrible, wet, hacking noise ripped me from my unconsciousness. I jumped off the bed immediately to survey my surroundings, only when I turned back toward the bed did I see what was causing the sound. Marshall was in an odd position with his upper body toward the edge, holding his head as far away as possible and he was coughing uncontrollably. I’d never heard anyone cough like that before, it was wet sounding, like his lungs were filled with fluid. When he breathed in it made a terrible gurgling.
I ran to his side, shocked by what was lying on the floor below his face. Blood, darker than normal, pooled on the linoleum and was speckled in various places but what was more appalling were the half-dozen teeth that lay in the middle of the burgundy pool. The teeth were whole, like they’d been extracted perfectly. I was trying to stay calm and think but my thoughts just screamed ‘What the hell is going on’ at me. Before I had a chance to think what to do another tooth flew from his mouth and hit the floor, and then he was trying to catch his breath. He’d been choking on a tooth, on his tooth.
“Water,” he rasped.
I rushed out the door, filled a pitcher with water and grabbed a large bowl in the kitchen then hurried back to him. When I reached the nightstand, I filled the glass there and handed it to him. I brought the bowl suspecting he’d want to rinse his mouth out before actually drinking but he just drank down the water, ignoring the fact his mouth was full of blood.
I looked him over while he drank. He was extremely pale, almost all the color gone from his skin, making the darkened veins more pronounced. That’s when I realized that they now covered his entire body and they looked gruesomely black against his pallor. When my gaze made its way back to his face he was staring at me, his eyes full of sadness.
“Open your mouth I want to look at what’s going on in there.” I said, sitting down on the edge of the bed.
He said nothing but did what I asked. Nearly all his top teeth were missing. More than what lay on the floor. I could only assume he’d swallowed some. I couldn’t see much, just the dark red holes left behind where the teeth use to be, there was no indication of why they had fallen out. Again, what was going on stumped me.
“I don’t know but I think this just looks worse than it really is.” I lied.
By the look on his face, he knew I was lying but he stayed silent. I left him alone most of the day, after cleaning up the blood off the floor and placing the lost teeth in the bowl. I only checked on him occasionally. I knew he wanted to be alone. I spent most of my time on the couch in the TV room feeling his emotions flicker and waiting for what I was sure was inevitable. I let myself follow the emotions that were not my own. There was a time that he denied what was happening, shortly proceeded with a fierce anger. Sometime close to dusk, I felt him give up, as if he embraced what was happening. He was accepting his fate and that’s when I returned to him.
“You know, we’re not a hundred percent sure that’s what’s happening.” I said as I entered the room.
I startled him, making him jump and then shake his head.
“You should get some sleep. You’re looking a little pale and you could use the rest.”
“No,” was all he said but I could feel that the thought of sleep frightened him.
I stayed in the room with him, not that he wanted me there but because I was afraid. I offered him food several times just for him to refuse, only allowing me to bring him water when the pitcher was empty. It was strange, when I finally noticed it, all the water he consumed and never having the necessity to use the toilet. I asked to make sure he didn’t need the use of it. He responded to my question with an odd expression and shook his head indicating that he didn’t. I didn’t know how much more of these unexplainable occurrences I could handle. I’d never heard of anything like this happening to anyone.
Once, while retrieving the pitcher to refill it, I noticed the bowl on the nightstand had several more of his teeth in it. By the amount there, he couldn’t have had many left in his mouth. It made me think if he did decide to eat something it would have to be soup. He stayed awake the whole night, just staring into space, occasionally adding another lost tooth to the growing pile.
Another night had passed and Marshall was still alive, though he seemed to be falling apart and his body running out of time. Somewhere between dawn and noon, the normal gurgles of his stomach stopped and the rhythm of his heartbeats slowed drastically. He didn’t speak at all throughout the day and just continued to do what he had done during the night. The last of his teeth had left the confines of his mouth in the early evening and soon after, he lost the struggle with his eyelids and slipped into unconsciousness.
I observed him while he slept, taking in the raspy, jaggedness of his breaths. Then it seemed that his darkened veins were fading, they were disappearing much faster than it took them to get there. Paying closer attention, I realized, it wasn't the veins fading but the skin of his body becoming opaque. His skin was still pale but it was getting less translucent, like it was becoming more durable. After a few hours there was no evidence the darkness, in the veins running through him, ever existed. As I stared unbelieving at him, the only thing I saw was a rather unnoticeable light blue tint to his skin, which I probably would have missed had I not been looking so intently.
I wasn’t sure how to take this occurrence. It seemed like a good thing, it was as if his body might have been trying to fix the damage but he’d been out for nearly twenty hours without even a wiggle of a finger, so his unresponsive condition challenged my hope.
I couldn’t stand sitting around any longer but there wasn’t much I could think to do. I decided on cleaning off the little blood that had dried around his mouth and on his chest. I got up and went to fetch a washrag from the bathroom and wet it, wringing out the excess water, when I returned I started with the blood that spotted his chest. I rubbed gently at the first spot but something didn’t feel right. The flesh didn’t give, as it should have. It was sturdier than I remembered it being when I’d touched him before. I moved on to clean the remaining blood from his chest, ignoring my observation. When all the blood was gone there, I moved to wiping his chin and around his mouth. I was running the cloth over his lips when they parted slightly and I seen a hint of ivory. I thought to myself, that he must not have lost all of his teeth but I set down the washcloth and brought my hands back to his face.
“Oh shit,” I squeaked as I saw the mouth full of perfect teeth in front of me.
It was as if he hadn’t lost any teeth at all. They were perfectly white, had an indescribable shine and they looked deadly. I took my thumb, ran it along the bottom of the two front ones and gasped when they sliced my thumb open. A few drops of blood fell on his tongue. That’s when I heard his heart stutter to a halt.
‘OH MY GOD! HE'S DEAD!’ I thought to myself.
I barely knew him but I felt the unbearable sadness lash through me, just as it had when I found out Peter had died. Tears slipped down my face just as they did when I lost my love. The pain that had been with me the past six days was gone... However, the bond between us didn’t feel broken.
(I put it on rewind a little, this post is from an earlier chapter than the last post from my novel Halfborn. Also, if you would like to read more about Coral and Marshall check out their diaries/journals at http://corallyn.blogspot.com/ and http://marshallsdiary.blogspot.com/ )
Thanks for reading and as always comments are welcome and very much appreciated :)
