Fear the Abyss: 22 Terrifying Tales of Cosmic Horror Read Free Page B

and inexplicable lust. I think I used to be a good man. I think I used to have a purpose. Trying to remember hurts my brain, though not as badly as the pain currently boiling my stomach. The distended lump there cries out for attention, but the only attention I care to give my belly lives in the bottle hidden under the desk in my office.
    "Desk" is actually a misnomer. "Office," too. The truth is I sit in a lab, separated from all of the other employees. I don't mind since it gives me plenty of freedom to drink, but I'm not exactly in Siberia. Dana can find me quite easily, and my boss Regina Bauer always calls to check in and issue my assignments for the day. My assignments are usually the easiest production a manufacturing technician can get, I assume because Regina can tell how hard it is for me to function these days. She's never brought up my drinking, but I can't believe she's oblivious. She's a smart lady, and except for her wrinkles and unfortunate chicken pox scars, quite beautiful. So how come my dick doesn't give the zipper a hard hello when Regina is around? Why Dana? Why does disgust turn to lust at the mere whiff of her perfume?
    So maybe I don't take my work seriously. So maybe I'm a full-fledged alcoholic. So maybe this blinding pain in my gut is just the first symptom of a body that's grave-ready. But in exchange for health and harmony, I was allowed to recognize the greatest gift God bestows: that even when liquor is out of reach, this world is constructed from elements that fuck you up. Growing, cooking, crushing, smoking…I want to put Earth up my nose.
    That hunger began after my first week of work at BioTech, with one drink—bought by none other than Dana Cully. Until she hippoed up with a glass of liquor, I was content to spend a few hours by myself. It always comforted me before, watching people. I guess I was just one of those weirdoes. Now, I'm a different kind of weirdo. The kind who keeps his ears perked during nightly strolls, listening for kids with severe coughing fits so he'll know which house has good medicine. Nothing makes my heart skip a beat quite like seeing a bottle of Delsym perched on a child's bedside table. Breaking into houses isn't always easy, but I'm fairly quiet for a drunk. I slip in like a snake, coil myself around the bottle and ooze away like some otherworldly creature. In a life with so little to revere, I pride myself on any accomplishment.
    I initially refused Dana's drink without a hint of temptation. But then she sat down, flashed me Brown Lightning, and pushed the glass into my hands. Her perfume smelled like childhood. What from childhood? Your guess is as good as mine. All I know is that I wanted her to sit closer. I wanted her on my lap. I wanted her to wriggle and bounce and give me a revolting reason to call out of work the next day.
    She repulsed me, but I craved her immeasurably, and the alcohol made it worse. Then, "worse" became the alcohol. After one sip of bourbon, I had to have a full glass. Then a beer. Then some wine. Then a dusty pill I found under the urinal. I asked Dana how quickly other people got hooked on the stuff, but she just brayed and squeezed my thigh. With a cough, I came in my pants. Whether she noticed, I don't know, but she did leave soon after. My pants were so wet I was afraid to stand, so I kept ordering more drinks. Two hundred dollars later, the bartender had to peel me out of the booth and call a cab to drive me home. But I couldn't go home yet. There was no liquor there.
    After that night, that was never the case again. At this point, I've only been at BioTech for a month, but things have changed drastically for me in that short time. I started out with a desk surrounded by coworkers. I resuspended DNA primers, even worked with magnetic Dynabeads for an eColi testing kit. I didn't have much experience, but I was a fast learner and Regina liked that kind of gumption. But I was gradually moved away from manufacturing certain