The Gift That Kept Giving (A 24 Hour Short Story Entry)

He started transfixed at the bare muscles. The bones of each finger, candy-flossed in a thin layer of tissue, wove between the veins as they twisted across the back of the hand. Each fleshy muscular vesicle stretching, the exposed tendons taunt and stringy, as the skinless hand reached out towards him.

He forced himself to look up, to meet the man in the lidless eyes as he grasped the stomach-churning hand. He knew the skin was there, he knew he just couldn’t see it, but it didn’t make gripping the meat and bones any easier.

It had been fine when it was just the walls of buildings. His gift had helped ease his loneliness, back then. He found it so hard to spend time with other people now, but his own company was becoming infinitely worse. He couldn't stop his eyes roaming to his own skinless form.

Jim grimaced under a gritted smile, shaking the grotesque hand with his own.

The man before him was speaking, his teeth were moving, the lipless mouth making shapes before him. He forced himself to concentrate, to hear the words.

He had spent too long alone, in his shitty apartment, one of the last tenants in a waiting-to-be condemned building. He needed this.

“If you want to come with me, my office is just through here”

Jim compelled himself to follow the skinless man. Fibrous flaps of flesh contorted with each step, the shiny calf muscles twitching as he walked. Yellow fatty deposits clung to the pink tissue of his thighs, ribboned and beaded in red, wobbling in time with his pace.

The putrid bloodied yellow fat encased the mans torso, swallowing the definition of muscle in its engulfing smother.

The narrow corridor they walked down ran between two large open plan call centres. Jim, in an attempt to fight the repulsion, ran his eyes over the walls, letting them slip from his sight. Rows of chattering young people, chained to the desk by their headsets, stared blankly at their screens. A dusty mini basketball hoop protruded on the other side of the wall, a testament to long forgotten good intentions.

“So I’m just in here”

The man had turned around to face him. The thin flesh of his skull once more in plain view.

Jim quickly flashed a smile, stepping obligingly into the dingy office. An old stained desk half filled the small room, the light of the well lit warehouse beyond stopped dead at the line of the wall he saw through. Pictures and certificates appeared suspended, creating a lattice Jim was grateful for.

A compact chair waited for him before the desk, a dusty shadow marking it’s usual spot in the corner. Jim took a moment to sit down, looking for a position where he didn’t have to squint at a light his interviewer couldn’t see.

“... then if you have any questions about the role, we will go into those.”

He nodded in response, his face painted with what he hoped was the picture of enthusiasm.

In the gaps between the frames, he could see glimpses of the bustling conveyor belts, the sorting machinery. The huge scanners. A small smile crept over his lips as the man asked,

“So what was it that drew you to baggage handling?”

I was drawn to 'lonely' aspect of this prompt to begin with, but seeing the sheer mastery of others on the more emotive road, I wanted to go with something more visual. I tried to think about how this would affect life, so here we have a gifted (or cursed) man, trying to find a life he can live.

This is my entry to @mctiller 's Twenty Four Hour Short Story Contest the challenge this week, the story of a lonely man who develops the ability to see through walls.

For the brave-hearted, this is the image I used for reference, I thought it was a tad much to use with the story, but interesting to see what's under the skin.

Photo Credit by Pixabay user PRAIRAT_FHUNTA who has a great selection of these marble like textures that can suit many a different tale.