Frankie & Formaldehyde

Chapter Seven: Friendly Neighbour

His gut was so hungry, its unsatisfied hollowness screaming in agony. He walked up behind Jack, who turned the steak on the BBQ with a flip of his spatula, the fat sizzling into delicate black edging as the blood dripped onto the hot coals.

George grabbed Jack by the shoulders, hoping to shake some sense into the little creep. He knew better than many how to reason with a cocky, know-all fool. But George wasn't aware of his new strength, and where a shake of the shoulders should have resulted in a bit of cursing and a sense of self-satisfaction for George, the result was horrifyingly different.

Damn. It was just a couple of tugs.

It wasn't like he was expecting to shake the fool's head clean off.

George stood dumbfounded on the front lawn of Jack's house, the man's severed head in his hands dripping blood and BBQ sauce. The remainder of the body lay twitching on the ground a few feet away, the arms and legs running like the last neurological impulses of a headless chicken before finally collapsing into an eerie stillness.

A low humming began behind him and George slowly turned to see Dolores, who had a fresh martini in her hand. She had staggered over to the stereo and was adjusting the controls. Pink Floyd disappeared and Henry Mancini took their place.

George absently took a bite out of the side of Frank's face, eyeing Dolores all the while. Beneath the hair and crunchy bits of skull, the grey matter within was especially sweet. The aching in his gut was finally appeased, and he hungrily chewed and bit into the rich sustenance with a vigour he once used to attack pistachio ice cream.

"It's just so nice that everything has stayed the same in the neighbourhood, just like they promised," Dolores crooned. She downed her martini and toddled over to the BBQ the spatula in Frank's dead grip torn from it with effort, and bringing a couple of fingers with it. She flicked them off with a quick pinch of her thumb and forefinger. "I wonder if he has any hamburgers in his freezer? You remember the hamburgers we used to have back then, don't you, George? Thick and juicy, with lettuce and pickles and mustard and those nice, fluffy sesame seed buns you could get at Earl's Bakery. Those were lovely times."

She regarded the carnage at her feet with a wistful understanding.

"Do you think he's still going to eat that steak?"

***

Dolores was an organized soul, he had to admit. With her martini freshly renewed, she had come back out to Jack's backyard with her hands encased in yellow kitchen gloves and a shop grade rubber apron. Before she had become an Osmosis investor, and long before she had been married, Dolores had worked in her father's butcher shop. Her dispatching of Jack was remarkably efficient. Arms and legs cut off, at the joints and then neatly packaged in brown paper. The torso was cut into steaks. The guts were properly emptied and dumped into a large metal garbage can for easy disposal. When she was finished, she clapped her hands, splattering blood across her pink forehead.

"That takes care of that," she said, and began hauling the little packages into her house. "Really, you can't expect a meat and potatoes generation like ours to live without the meat part. Such nonsense." She heartily wiped a piece of human tissue from her cheek with the back of her hand, leaving a nasty read smear behind. "Say hello to Frankie for me when she gets home. My, but that poor woman works so hard. She should settle down and retire, that's what she needs to do. It's time to enjoy life." She patted George sweetly on the shoulder and gave him a warm smile before going back into her house.

Henry Mancini was still playing in the background. The theme from the Pink Panther crept across the silent, green, overly manicured lawns like a pop jazz dirge. Frowning, George tossed the remains of Jack Morgan's head in front of his BBQ, bits of the man's teeth still stuck to George's palm. He wasn't hungry anymore, which was strange enough, but he had a sudden, new ability he hadn't counted on. With that physical need satisfied, the cloudy remnants of his mind were suddenly in clear focus. He couldn't understand why he had been so confused by the air conditioner, or how even the simple act of opening a door had taken such effort. It was all very strange.

While intellectually he could concede that it was indeed terrible that he'd made a meal of someone else's mind, there was an unmistakable rightness to the fact that he had regained his own.

He'd have to talk to Frankie about it when she got home.

Frankie.

Home.

The one-sided conversation Jack Morgan, Esq. had subjected George to now took on a new significance. He looked down at himself in disgust and knew he wasn't going to get any answers looking this gory. He'd go back in and take a cool shower and get changed into something worthy for battle. A suit and tie and rock solid argument were difficult to overcome. George had some questions, and the manager of that damn bank was going to let him pick his brains for an answer.